a middy of the slave squadron a west african story by harry collingwood ________________________________________________________________________ this was one of the last books written by "harry collingwood". the copy we worked from was very clearly printed, but with one very major problem - the text was printed far too close to the centre of the book. therefore the book could not be scanned using the regular book-scanner, but rather it was done using the scanner in flat-bed mode. however, the results were quite good, with the text coming through very clearly, and only the hyphens needing a good amount of checking. the hyphens get affected by the cleaning-up process which takes out the unwanted dark patches on the scans. the book is exactly according to the title. remembering that "harry collingwood" was in real life a naval architect, you can take good note of the way he handles nautical terminology. other contemporary authors were good, but in this respect collingwood is a real master. it makes a good audiobook, so you ought to enjoy it very greatly. nh. ________________________________________________________________________ a middy of the slave squadron a west african story by harry collingwood chapter one. a sound through the darkness. "phew!" ejaculated mr perry, first lieutenant of his britannic majesty's corvette _psyche_, as he removed his hat and mopped the perspiration from his streaming forehead with an enormous spotted pocket-handkerchief. "i believe it's getting hotter instead of cooler; although, by all the laws that are supposed to govern this pestiferous climate, we ought to be close upon the coolest hour of the twenty-four! just step aft to the skylight, mr fortescue, and see what the time is, will ye? it must surely be nearing two bells." "ay, ay, sir!" i dutifully answered; and, moving aft to the skylight, raised the canvas cover which had been placed over it to mask the light of the low-turned lamp which was kept burning all night in the fore cabin, and glanced at the clock which, screwed to the coaming on one side of the tell-tale compass, balanced the barometer which, hung in gimbals, was suspended on the other side. the clock marked the time as two minutes to five a.m., or within two minutes of two bells in the morning watch. dropping the canvas screen back into place, i was about to announce the time to my superior officer, when i thought i caught, through the faint creak of the ship's timbers and the light rustling of the canvas aloft, a slight, far off sound, like the squeak of a sheave on a rusty pin. therefore, instead of proclaiming the time aloud, i stepped quietly to the side of the first luff, and asked, almost in a whisper-- "did you hear anything just then, sir?" "hear anything?" reiterated mr perry, unconsciously lowering his usually stentorian voice in response to the suggestion of secrecy conveyed by my whisper; "no, i can't say that i did. what d'ye mean, mr fortescue?" "i mean, sir," i replied, "that i thought i caught, a moment ago, a sound like that of--ah! did you hear _that_, then, sir?" as a voice, uttering some words of command, apparently in the spanish language, came floating to us, faint but clear, across the invisible water upon which the _psyche_ lay rolling almost imperceptibly. "ay, i did," answered mr perry, modulating his voice still further. "no mistake about that, eh? there's a craft of some sort out there, less than a mile distant, i should say. did you catch the words? they sounded to me like some foreign lingo." "no, sir," i replied, "i did not quite catch them, but, as you say, they appeared to be foreign, and i believe they were spanish. what about striking two bells, sir? it only wanted two minutes--" "on no account whatever, mr fortescue," hastily interrupted my companion. "on the contrary, have the kindness to slip for'ard and caution the watch not to sing out, or make the slightest noise, on any account, but to come quietly aft if they happen to have anything to report. and when you have done that, kindly go down and call captain harrison." "ay, ay, sir!" i answered; and, kicking off my shoes, lest the sound of them upon the deck should reach the stranger through that still and breathless atmosphere, i proceeded upon my twofold errand. but it is time to tell the reader where the _psyche_ was upon this dark and stifling night; what she was doing there; and why the precautions above referred to were deemed necessary. as has already been mentioned, the _psyche_ was a british man-o'-war. she was a sloop, armed with fourteen long -pounders; and carried a crew which had originally consisted of one hundred and thirty men, but which had now been reduced by sickness and casualties to one hundred and four, all told. she was a unit in the somewhat scanty slave squadron which great britain had stationed on the west african coast for the suppression of the infamous slave-trade; and when this story opens-- namely, about the middle of the year --had been upon the station nearly two years, during the whole of which period i, richard fortescue, hailing from the neighbourhood of the good town of plymouth, had been on board her, and now held the responsible position of senior midshipman; being, at the above date, just turned seventeen years of age. the _psyche_ was a fine, stout, roomy, and comfortable craft of her class; but about as unsuitable for the work upon which she was now engaged as could well be, for she was a converted merchant ship, built for the purpose of carrying the biggest possible cargo that could be packed into certain prescribed limits, and consequently, as might be expected, phenomenally slow. to commission such a vessel to chase and capture the nimble craft that were usually employed to transport the unhappy blacks across the atlantic was simply a ghastly farce, and caused us, her unfortunate crew, to be the laughing-stock of the entire coast. yet, considering all things, we had not done so very badly; for realising, early in the commission, that we need never hope for success from the speed of our ship, we had invoked the aid of strategy, and by dint of long practice had brought the trapping of slavers almost up to the level of high art. consequently the _psyche_, despite the disabilities arising from her astonishing lack of speed, had acquired a certain reputation among the slave-dealing fraternity, and was as intensely detested by them as any ship on the station. at the moment when the reader first finds himself a member of her crew the _psyche_ was lying near the mouth of the benin river, some two miles off the shore and about twice that distance from the river's mouth, at which point we had arrived at midnight; having made our way thither in consequence of "information received," which led us to believe that a large ship was at that moment in the river taking on board a full cargo of blacks. we had drifted down to the position which we then occupied under the impulse of the last of the land-breeze, which had died out and left us becalmed some two miles short of the precise spot for which we were aiming. still, we were near enough for all practical purposes, or believed that we were; for we thought that if a thoroughly smart look- out were maintained--and we had grown to be adepts at that sort of thing--it would be impossible for a slaver to attempt to slip out of the river without our becoming cognisant of the fact. and now, to return to my story. having first stolen forward and warned the watch that a craft of some sort was within hearing distance of us, and that they were therefore carefully to avoid crying out, or making any other sound that might betray our presence, i returned aft, in the same cautious manner, and was on the point of descending the companion ladder to call the captain, when _ting-ting_ came the soft chiming of a ship's bell, mellowed by distance, from somewhere in the offing, evidencing--or so it seemed to me--the fact that the stranger had not as yet discovered our proximity. the skipper, accustomed to being disturbed at all hours of the night, awoke at the first touch of my knuckles upon his cabin door. "yes!" he called; "what is it?" "there is a strange craft not far from us, sir," i answered; "and mr perry considered that you should be apprised of the fact. we know nothing whatever about her, except that she is there; for the night is so intensely dark that we have been unable to catch the faintest glimpse of her, but we have just heard them strike two bells aboard her. we have not struck our own bell, sir, thinking--" "yes, of course, quite right," interrupted the skipper, as he landed with a soft thud on the floor of his state-room. "tell mr perry that i'll be on deck in a brace of shakes." he followed close at my heels up the companion ladder, having paused only long enough to slip into his nether garments, and came groping blindly out on deck. "phew!" he muttered, as he emerged from the companion; "it's as dark as the inside of a cow. where are you, mr perry?" "here i am, sir; close alongside you," answered the first luff, stretching out his hand and lightly touching the skipper's arm. "yes," he continued, "it certainly _is_ dark, unusually so; so dark that i am in hopes of keeping our presence a secret from the fellow out yonder until you shall have decided what is to be done." "mr fortescue tells me that you have not seen anything of him thus far," remarked the captain. "whereabout is he, and how far off, do you reckon?" "somewhere away in that direction," indicated the lieutenant, with a flourish of his arm. "as to the distance--well, that is rather difficult to judge. sound travels far on such a night as this; but i should say that the craft is not more than half a mile distant, or three-quarters, at the utmost." "um!" commented the captain meditatively. "i suppose it is not, by any chance, the craft which we are after, which has slipped out of the river in the darkness, eh?" "i should scarcely think so, sir," answered perry. "a man would literally have to be able to find his way about blindfolded to attempt to run out of the river on such a night as this. no, i am inclined to think that it is some inward-bound craft, becalmed like ourselves. we caught the sound of some order spoken on board her when we first became aware of her presence, and mr fortescue here was of opinion that the words used were spanish, although the distance was too great to enable us to distinguish just what was said." "ay," responded the skipper; "two out of every three slavers doing business on this coast are either spaniards or portuguese. now, the question is, what are we to do with regard to our unknown friend out yonder? either she is, or is not, the craft that we are on the look-out for. if she _is_, we must take her, by hook or by crook, before the sea-breeze sets in and gives her the chance to run away from us; and that means a jaunt in the boats. on the other hand, if she is not the craft that we are after, she is still in all probability a slaver, and in any case will doubtless pay for an overhaul, which again means a boat trip. therefore, mr perry, be good enough to have the hands called, and the boats got into the water as silently as possible. if the men are quick we may be able to get away, and perhaps alongside her, before the dawn breaks. i will take charge of this little pleasure-party myself, and you can stay here and keep house during my absence." "ay, ay, sir," answered perry, in tones which clearly betrayed his disappointment at the arrangement come to by the skipper. "i will put matters in hand." "yes, do," returned the skipper; "and meanwhile i will go and dress. it shall be your turn next time, perry," he chuckled, as he turned away to go below again. "ay," grumbled the lieutenant to himself, but audibly enough for me to hear. "same old yarn--`your turn next time, perry.' this will make the third time running that i have been left behind to `keep house,' but there's not going to be a fourth, i'll see to that; it is time that this child stood up for his rights. now, mr fortescue, have the goodness, if you please, to pass the word for all hands to arm and man boats; and to be quiet about it, too, and show no lights." "ay, ay, sir," i briskly responded, as i turned to hurry away; "i'll see that our lambs don't bleat too loudly. and--i suppose--that i may take it for granted that--" "that you will make one of the `pleasure-party'?" interrupted the lieutenant, with a laugh, as he put his disappointment and ill-humour away from him. "oh, yes, i suppose so. at all events there will be no harm in making your preparations; the captain is pretty certain to take you." still on my bare feet, i hurried forward and found the boatswain. "that you, mr futtock?" i inquired, as i made out his burly form. "ay, ay, mr fortescue, it's me, right enough," was the answer. "i presoom, sir, it's another boat job, eh? you heard that bell?" "we did, mr futtock; yes, we heard it distinctly, seeing that we don't `caulk' in our watch on deck," i retorted. "yes, it's another boat affair; so be good enough to have all hands called at once, if you please. and kindly make it your personal business to see that nobody raises his voice, lets anything fall, or otherwise creates row enough to wake the dead. this is going to be a little surprise visit, you understand." "ay, ay, mr fortescue, i understands," answered futtock, as he moved toward the open hatchway; "i'll see that the swabs don't make no noise. the man that raises his voice above a whisper won't go. that's all." "just one word more, mr futtock," i hastily interposed, as the boatswain stepped over the coaming to descend the hatchway. "you may do me a favour, if you will. kindly ask the armourer to pick me out a nice sharp cutlass, if you please. you can bring it on deck with you when you come up." to this request the boatswain readily enough assented; and matters being thus far satisfactorily arranged i descended to the cockroach-haunted den wherein we mids. ate and slept, to find that little tom copplestone--who shared my watch, and who was a special favourite of mine because of his gentle, genial disposition, and also perhaps because he hailed from the same county as myself--having overheard the conversation between mr perry and myself, had already come below and roused the occupants of the place, who, by the smoky rays of a flaring oil lamp that did its best to make the atmosphere quite unendurable, were hastily arraying themselves. "murder!" i ejaculated, as i entered the pokey little place and got my first whiff of its close, reeking, smoke-laden atmosphere; "put out that abominable lamp and light a candle or two, somebody, for pity's sake. how the dickens you fellows can manage to breathe down here i can't understand. and, boy," to the messenger outside, "pass the word for cupid to bring us along some cocoa from the galley." "there's no need," remarked nugent, the master's mate, as he struggled ineffectively to find the left sleeve of his jacket. "the word has already been passed; i passed it myself when master cock-robin there," pointing to copplestone, "came and roused us out. and, as to candles, i'm afraid we haven't any; the rats appear to have eaten the last two we had in the locker. however--ah, here comes the cocoa. put the pot down there, cupid--never mind if it _does_ soil our beautiful damask table- cloth, we're going to have it washed next time we go into sierra leone. and just see if you can find us a biscuit or two and some butter, will ye, you black angel? here, avast there,"--as the black was about to retire--"produce our best china breakfast-set before you go, you swab, and pour out the cocoa." the black, a herculean krooboy, picked up when we first arrived on the coast, and promptly christened "cupid" by the master's mate, who, possibly because of sundry disappointments, had developed a somewhat sardonic turn of humour, grinned appreciatively at nugent's sorry jest respecting "our best china breakfast-set," and proceeded to rout out the heterogeneous assortment of delf and tin cups, basins, and plates that constituted the table-equipage of the midshipmen's berth, poured out a generous allowance of cocoa for each of us, and then departed, with the empty bread-barge, in quest of a supply of ship's biscuit. by the time that cupid returned with this, we had gulped down our cocoa and were ready to go on deck. i therefore helped myself to a couple of biscuits which, breaking into pieces of convenient size by the simple process of dashing them against my elbow, i crammed into my jacket pocket, and then rushed up the ladder to the deck, leaving my companions to follow after they had snatched a hasty bite or two of food; for there was now no knowing when we might get breakfast. upon my arrival on deck i found the hands already mustering under the supervision of the first lieutenant, and a moment later i encountered the boatswain, who handed over to me a good serviceable ship's cutlass-- worth a dozen of the ridiculous little dirks which were considered suitable weapons for midshipmen--which i promptly girded about my waist. at this moment all was bustle and animation throughout the ship, yet so sedulously had we been trained to act in perfect silence that i am certain the stealthy footfalls of the men hurrying to their stations, and the whispered words of command, were quite inaudible at a distance of twenty yards from the ship. within a minute or two, however, even these faint sounds had subsided, the crew were all mustered, and the first lieutenant, assisted by a quartermaster who carried a carefully masked lantern, was carefully, yet rapidly, inspecting each man's weapons and equipment, scrutinising the flints in the locks of the pistols, and otherwise satisfying himself of the efficiency of our hurried preparations. while the inspection was still in progress the captain came on deck, with his sword girded to his side and a brace of pistols thrust into his belt, and stood quietly looking on until the inspection was completed and mr perry had reported that everything was in order. then the skipper announced that he would personally lead the attack in his own gig, manned by eight oarsmen, a coxswain, and a midshipman-- myself; while the first cutter, manned by sixteen oarsmen, a coxswain, and a midshipman--jack keene--was to be commanded by mr purchase, the second lieutenant; and the second cutter, with twelve oarsmen, a coxswain, and nugent, the master's mate, was to be under the command of the boatswain. thus the attacking party was to consist of forty-five persons, all told, which was as many, i suppose, as the skipper felt justified in taking out of the ship under the circumstances. then ensued a busy five minutes, during which the boats were being noiselessly lowered and manned, the oars muffled, and every possible precaution observed to enable us to take our unseen but doubtless vigilant enemy unawares. this was just then regarded as of especial importance, for at the time of which i am now writing the traffic in slaves was regarded as piracy, and rendered its perpetrators liable to capital punishment, in consequence of which almost every slaver went heavily armed, and her crew, knowing that the halter was already about their necks, resisted capture by every means which their ingenuity could devise, whenever they had the chance, and often fought with desperate valour. as i hurried aft to attend to the lowering of the gig, which hung from davits over the stern, a hand was suddenly laid upon my arm, and, turning, i found myself confronted by cupid, the krooboy servant who "did for us" in the midshipmen's berth. his eyes were aglow with excitement, he carried a short-handled hatchet, with a head somewhat bigger and heavier than that of a ship's tomahawk, in his hand, and he was naked, save for a pair of dungaree trousers, the legs of which were rolled up above his knees. "mr fortescue, sar, i fit for go in dem boat wid you, sar," he whispered eagerly. "yes, i quite believe it, cupid," i replied. "but you know perfectly well that i cannot give you permission to join the gig's crew. if the captain had been anxious to have the pleasure of your company i feel sure that he would have mentioned the fact. besides, if you should happen to be killed, what would become of us poor midshipmen?" a suppressed chuckle, and a gleam of white teeth through the darkness, betrayed cupid's appreciation of the compliment subtly conveyed in the suggestion that the budding admirals inhabiting the midshipmen's berth aboard h.m.s. _psyche_ would suffer, should he unhappily be slain in the impending conflict, but he hastened to reassure me. "no fear, sar," he whispered. "dem slaber no lib for kill me. i, cupid, too much plenty black for see in de dark; an' if dey no see me, dey no kill. savvey? _please_, mr fortescue, sar. i no lib for fight too much plenty long time." "look here, cupid," i replied. "it is no use for you to ask me for permission to go in the gig, for i cannot give it you. but,"-- meaningly--"if you were to stow yourself away in the eyes of the gig it is just possible that the captain might not notice you until we had got too far from the ship to turn back. only don't let me see you doing it, that's all." "dat all right, sar," answered the black, with a sigh of extreme content. "if you no look for dem cupid you no see um." and he turned and ostentatiously walked away forward. the boats having been gently and carefully lowered into the water without a splash, or so much as a single tell-tale squeak from the tackle-blocks--the pins and bushes of which were habitually overhauled at frequent intervals and kept well lubricated with a mixture of melted tallow and plumbago--the crews took their places, each man carefully depositing his drawn cutlass on the bottom-boards between his feet, and we shoved off with muffled oars, the three boats pulling abreast, with about a ship's length between each; so that if perchance we should happen to be seen, we should present as small a target as possible to aim at. we pulled slowly and with the utmost caution, for the twofold reason that we had not yet caught sight of our quarry and only knew in a general sort of way that she was somewhere to seaward of us, and because we were anxious to avoid premature discovery from the splash of our oars. it was of course perfectly right and proper that we should observe all the precautions that i have indicated; for if we could but contrive to creep up alongside the stranger without being detected, it would undoubtedly mean the prevention of much loss of life. but, personally, i had very little hope of our being able to do so; for the night was so breathlessly still that, if any sort of look-out at all were being kept aboard the stranger--and slavers usually slept with one eye open--they must surely have caught some hint of our proximity, careful as we had been to maintain as complete silence as possible while making our preparations. besides, as ill-luck would have it, the water was in an unusually brilliant phosphorescent condition just then, the slightest disturbance of it caused a silvery glow that could be seen a mile away; and, be as silent as we might, the dip of our oars and the passage of the boats through the water set up such a blaze as could not fail to betray us, should a man happen to glance in our direction. at length, when we had pulled about half a mile, as nearly as i could judge, i detected a slight suspicion of a softening in the velvety blackness of the sky in the eastern quarter. it brightened, even as i looked, and a solitary star, low down in the sky, seemed to flicker, faintly and more faintly, for half a dozen seconds, and then disappear. "the dawn is coming, sir," i whispered to the skipper, by whose side i was sitting, "and in another minute or two we ought to--ah! there she is. do you see her, sir?" and i pointed in the direction of a faint, ghostlike blotch that had suddenly appeared at a spot some three points on our port bow. "where away?" demanded the skipper, instinctively raising his hand to shade his eyes; but he had scarcely lifted it to the height of his shoulder when he too caught sight of the object. "ay," he exclaimed, "i see her. and a big craft she is, too; a barque, apparently. surely that cannot be the craft that we are after? yet it looks very like her. if so, she must have slipped out of the river with the last of the land-breeze last night, and lain becalmed all night where she is. now what are the other boats about that they have not seen her? parkinson," to the coxswain, "show that lantern for a moment to the other boats, but take care to shield it with--ah! never mind, there are both their lights. give way, men. put me alongside under her mizen chains, my lad. either side; i don't care which." while the captain had been speaking the faint, ghostly glimmer that i had detected had resolved itself into the spectral semblance of a large ship clothed from her trucks down with canvas upon which the rapidly growing light of the advancing dawn was falling and thus rendering it just barely visible against its dark background of sky. in the tropics day comes and goes with a rush, and, even while the skipper had been speaking, the object which had first revealed itself to me, a minute earlier, as a mere wan, ghostly suggestion had assumed solidity and definiteness of form, and now stood out against the sky behind her as a full-rigged ship of some seven hundred and fifty tons burthen, her hull painted bright green, and coppered to the water-line. she was lying stern-on to us, and sat deep in the water, from which latter fact one inferred that she had her cargo of slaves on board and had doubtless, as the skipper conjectured, come out of the river with the last of the land-breeze during the previous night, and had remained becalmed near us, and, we hoped, quite unaware of our proximity all night. she was now within a cable's length of the boats, but, lying as she was, dead stern-on to us, we in the gig were unable to see how many guns she carried, which was, however, an advantage to us, since, however many guns she might mount on her broadsides, she could bring none of them to bear upon us. we saw, however, that she carried two stern- chasers--long nine's, apparently--and now, in the hope of dashing alongside before those two guns could be cast loose and brought to bear upon us, the captain stood up in the stern-sheets of the gig and waved his arm to the other boats as a signal to them to give way--for, with the coming of the daylight we could not possibly hope to remain undiscovered above a second or two longer. indeed the boats' crews had scarcely bent their backs in response to the signal when there arose a sudden startled outcry on board the ship, followed by a volley of hurried commands and the hasty trampling of feet upon her decks. but we were so close to her, when discovered, and the surprise was so complete, that her crew had no time to do anything effective in the way of defence; and in little over a couple of minutes we had swept up alongside, clambered in over her lofty bulwarks, driven her crew below, and were in full possession of the _dona isabella_ of havana, mounting twelve guns, with a crew of forty-six spaniards, portuguese, and half-castes, constituting as ruffianly a lot as i had ever met with. she had a cargo of seven hundred and forty negroes on board, and was far and away the finest prize that had thus far fallen to the lot of the _psyche_. so valuable, indeed, was she that captain harrison decided not to trust her entirely to a prize crew, but to escort her to sierra leone in the corvette; and some two hours later, having meanwhile made all the necessary dispositions, the two craft trimmed sail with the first of the sea-breeze and hauled up for sierra leone, where we arrived a week later after an uneventful passage. chapter two. in the fernan vaz river. while we were awaiting the formal condemnation of the _dona isabella_ by the mixed commission, and the trial of her crew upon the charge of piracy, captain harrison, our skipper, busily employed himself, as was his wont, in hunting up information relative to the movements, present and prospective, of the slavers upon the coast. and this was not quite so difficult to do as might at first be imagined; for, sierra leone being the headquarters, so to speak, of the british slave squadron, the persons actually engaged in the slave-trade found that it paid them well to maintain agents there for the sole purpose of picking up every possible item of information relative to the movements and doings of that squadron. for it not unfrequently happened that, to those behind the scenes, an apparently trivial and seemingly quite worthless bit of information, an imprudent word dropped by an unwary officer respecting one of our vessels, enabled the acute ones to calculate so closely that they often succeeded in making a dash into some river, shipping a cargo of slaves, and getting clear away to sea again only a few hours before our cruisers put in an appearance on the spot. and in the same way our own officers, by frequenting, in disguise, the haunts of the slavers and their agents, very often succeeded in catching a hint that, carefully followed up, led to most important captures being made. it was, indeed, through a hint so acquired that we had been put upon the track of the _dona isabella_. now, our own skipper, captain harrison, was particularly keen upon this sort of work, and was exceptionally well qualified to achieve success in it. for, in the first place, he was a west indian by birth, being the son of a trinidad sugar-planter, and he consequently spoke creole spanish as fluently as he did his mother tongue. also his physical characteristics were such as to be of the greatest assistance to him in such enterprises; for he was tall, lean, and muscular, of swarthy complexion, with thick, black, curly hair, and large, black, flashing eyes, suggesting that he carried a touch of the tar-brush, although, as a matter of fact, he had not a drop of negro blood in him. he was a man of dauntless courage, knowing not the meaning of fear, and absolutely revelling in situations of the most extreme peril, yet gifted with quite as much discretion as was needful for a man entrusted with heavy responsibilities involving the lives of many of his fellow-men. he never sought danger for danger's sake alone, and never embarked in an enterprise which his reason assured him was hopelessly impracticable, but, on the other hand, he never hesitated to undertake the most perilous task if he believed he could see a way to its successful accomplishment. it was his habit to assume a variety of disguises in which he would haunt the third and fourth rate taverns of freetown, especially patronised by the slave-dealing fraternity, and mingling freely with these gentry, would boldly express his own views, adopted, of course, for the occasion, upon the various matters affecting the trade, or discuss with them the most promising schemes for baffling the efforts of the british cruisers. he had noticed, very early in his career as an officer of the slave squadron, that it was always the _british_ who constituted the _bete noire_ of the slavers; the french they feared very little; the americans not at all. these little incursions into the enemy's territory captain harrison conducted with consummate boldness and skill, and with a considerable measure of success, for it was quite a favourite amusement of his to devise and suggest schemes of a particularly alluring character which, when adopted by the enemy, he of course triumphantly circumvented without difficulty. there was only one fault to find with this propensity on the part of our skipper, but in my humble judgment it constituted a serious one. it was this. captain harrison's personality was a distinctly striking one; he was the kind of man who, once seen, is not easily forgotten; and i greatly dreaded that some day, sooner or later, the reckless frequenter of the low-class freetown taverns would be identified as one and the same with the captain of h.m.s. _psyche_, who was of course frequently to be seen about the streets in the uniform of a british naval captain. indeed i once took the liberty of delicately hinting at this possibility; but the skipper laughed at the idea; he had, it appeared, the most implicit faith in his disguises, which included, amongst other things, a huge false moustache of most ferocious appearance, and an enormous pair of gold earrings. we had been at sierra leone a little over a fortnight, and our business there was just completed, when the skipper came aboard on a certain afternoon in a state of the highest good-humour, occasioned, as soon transpired, by the fact that he had succeeded in obtaining full particulars of an exceptionally grand _coup_ that had been planned by a number of slavers in conjunction, which they were perfectly confident of pulling off triumphantly. it appeared, from his story, that intelligence had just been received of the successful conclusion of a great slave-hunting raid into the interior by a certain king olomba, who had recently returned in triumph to his town of olomba, on the left bank of the fernan vaz river, bringing with him nearly three thousand negroes, of whom over two thousand were males, all in prime condition. this information having reached the slavers' agents at sierra leone through the mysterious channels by which news often travels in africa, an effort of quite exceptional magnitude was to be made to get at least the two thousand males out of the country at one fell swoop; the present being regarded as an almost uniquely favourable opportunity for the accomplishment of this object, for the reason that the _psyche_ was just then the only ship which could by any possibility interfere with the scheme. and in the event of her happening to put in an inopportune appearance on that part of the coast at the critical moment--as she had a knack of doing, in the most unaccountable manner--she was to be decoyed away from the spot by the simple process of dispatching to sea a certain notorious schooner well-known to be in the trade, but which, for this occasion only, was to have no slaves or slave fittings or adjuncts on board, and after a chase of some two or three hundred miles to the southward, was to permit herself to be caught, only to be released again, of course, after an exhaustive overhaul. it was an admirable scheme, beautifully simple, and could scarcely fail to achieve complete success, but for the fact that captain harrison had contrived to obtain full particulars of it, and therefore knew exactly how to frustrate the plan. his plot was as simple as that of the slavers: he would proceed in the _psyche_ to the scene of operations, and when the decoy schooner made her appearance she would be permitted to go on her way unmolested, while a boat expedition would be dispatched up the river to the town of olomba, where the vessels actually engaged in shipping the two thousand blacks would be captured _flagrante delicto_. naturally we were all thrown into a high state of jubilation at the receipt of this intelligence; for it promised us a slice of good luck of such magnitude as very seldom fell to the lot of a single cruiser. to convey two thousand negroes across the atlantic at once would necessitate the employment of at least three large ships, the value of which might be roughly calculated at, upon the very lowest estimate, ten thousand pounds each, or thirty thousand pounds in all, besides which there would be the head-money upon two thousand negroes, amounting altogether to quite a nice little sum in prize-money for a cruise of probably less than a month's duration. oh, how we chuckled as we pictured to ourselves the effect which the news of so magnificent a _coup_ would create upon the minds of the rest of the slave squadron. the _psyche_, from her phenomenal lack of speed, and general unsuitability for the service upon which she was employed, had, with her crew, become the butt and laughing-stock of every stupid and scurrilous jester on the coast, and many a time had we been made to writhe under the lash of some more than ordinarily envenomed gibe; but now the laugh was to be on our side; we were going to demonstrate to those shallow, jeering wits the superiority of brains over a clean pair of heels. of course we were all in a perfect fever of impatience to get to sea and make the best of our way to the scene of action, lest haply we should arrive too late and find the birds flown; but the skipper retained his coolness and would permit nothing to be done that could by any possibility suggest to the slavers the idea that the faintest hint of their audacious scheme had been allowed to get abroad. he insisted that we had plenty of time and to spare, and actually remained in harbour three whole days after the information had reached him. then, on the morning of the fourth day, we weighed and stood out to sea, beating off the land against the sea-breeze until we ran into the calm belt between the sea-breeze and the trade-wind. here we remained motionless for more than an hour until the trade-wind gradually ate its way inshore and reached us, when we ran right out to sea until we had sunk the land astern of us. then we hauled up to the southward on a taut bowline, and, under easy canvas, made our leisurely way toward the mouth of the fernan vaz river, off which we arrived five days later, making the land from the masthead about an hour before sunset. all that night, the whole of the next day, and all the night following we remained hove-to under topsails, jib, and spanker, dodging to and fro athwart the mouth of the river, with a man on the main-royal yard, during the hours of daylight, to give us timely notice of the appearance of the craft which was to play the part of decoy; while with the approach of nightfall we made sail and beat in to within a distance of some three miles of the coast, running off into the offing again an hour before daylight. at length, when we had hung upon the tenterhooks of suspense for close upon forty hours, and were beginning to fear that the captain, in his resolve to cut matters as fine as possible, had overdone the thing and allowed the quarry to escape, we were gladdened by the hail from aloft of-- "sail he! a large schooner just comin' out o' the river, sir." "ay, ay," answered the first lieutenant, whose watch it happened to be. "just keep your eye on her, my lad, and let me know how she steers when she is clear of the bar." we were heading to the southward at the time, and were about three miles south of the river entrance, and some sixteen miles off the land; by pretending therefore not to see her for the next quarter of an hour or so, and keeping the _psyche_ still heading to the southward, we should afford the stranger an excellent opportunity to secure a sufficient offing to make good her escape. then we would heave about, make sail in chase, drive her off the coast, and work in as close to the river's mouth as we dared venture, when the ship was to be brought to an anchor, and the boats manned, armed, and dispatched into the river. meanwhile, as previously arranged, captain harrison was aroused, and informed of the fact that the decoy schooner, or what was assumed to be such, had made her appearance and was now fairly at sea, steering a little to the northward of west under a heavy press of sail; and close upon the heels of the returning messenger the worthy skipper himself appeared. he sprang upon a gun-carriage and peered intently shoreward under the shade of his hand; but only the upper canvas of the stranger was visible from our deck; and he impatiently hailed the look-out aloft to give him a detailed description of the vessel. the fellow in the cross-trees happened, however, to be a poor sort of unintelligent fellow, and could say very little about the craft beyond stating the fact that she was a schooner, painted black; that she sat deep in the water, showed an immense spread of canvas, and appeared to be very fast. "i have no sort of doubt that yonder schooner is the craft whose duty it is to draw us off the coast and leave the way clear for the other fellows to get out to sea," he said. "but i should like to have a somewhat better description of her than that `sodger' up aloft there seems able to give." he glanced round the deck and his eye fell upon me. "ah, mr fortescue," he exclaimed, "you will doubtless be able to do what i want. just slip down into my cabin; you will find my glass hanging above the head of my bunk. throw the strap of it over your shoulder, and shin up alongside that fellow in the cross-trees; take a good look at the stranger; and report to me any peculiarities that you may detect in her, will ye." "ay, ay, sir," i replied, touching my hat; and five minutes later i was sitting in the main-topmast cross-trees, with the long barrel of the telescope steadied against the topmast-head, and my eye glued to the eye-piece. from this elevation i commanded a complete, if distant, view of the low land about the river entrance, with its fringe of mangrove trees running away inland, the sand hummocks, sparsely clothed with coarse, reedy grass and trailing plants, and the endless line of the surf-beaten african beach. also through the skipper's powerful lenses i obtained a most excellent view of the strange schooner, from her trucks to her water-line, including such details as i could have discerned with the naked eye at a distance of about half a mile. i saw, for example, that, as the look-out had already reported, she was a large schooner--i estimated her to be one hundred and eighty tons burthen at the least; i verified the statement that her hull was painted all black from the rail to the top of her copper; that she showed an enormous spread of canvas; and that she sat very low in the water. but i noticed a few other peculiarities as well; i saw that her bowsprit was painted black, while her jib-booms were scraped and varnished; that her foremast, fore- topmast, and fore-topgallant and royal-mast were varnished, while the mast heads were painted black, and that the whole of the mainmast, from the cap down, was painted _white_, which was a peculiarity that ought to have been sufficient to identify her as far as one could see her. and so it was; for the moment that i reported it the skipper hailed-- "thank you, mr fortescue; that will do; you may come down. or--hold on a minute. is the stranger far enough out of the river to enable her to get clear away, think ye?" "she is fully a mile from the mouth of the river, sir," i answered. "ah, that will do, then, thank you; you may both come down," answered the skipper. and as i swung myself down through the cross-trees to the topmast rigging, i heard him give the order to "wear ship and make sail." five minutes later the _psyche_ was heading to the northward, close- hauled on the port tack, under all plain sail to her royals, doing nearly seven knots, and laying a course that, with nice steering, would just enable us to fetch the river's mouth handsomely without breaking tacks. the schooner, meanwhile, was romping along at a pace of at least twelve knots per hour, on the starboard tack, throwing the spray over her weather bow to half the height of her lower yard, and shaping a course which would enable her to pass us at a distance of fully eight miles dead to windward. we allowed her to go on her way unmolested. it was just noon when, having arrived off the mouth of the river, we made a flying moor of it, letting go the first and then the second bower anchor in ten fathoms, at a distance of about one and a half miles from the shore, and at a spot from which the river mouth and perhaps half a mile of the river itself were in plain view. the town of king olomba, it was understood, was situated at a distance of about thirty-two miles from our anchorage; and as the captain was anxious that the journey should be made at an easy pace, so that the men might arrive comparatively fresh, and in fit condition for the rather stiff bit of work that lay at the end of it, eight hours were to be allowed for the passage of the boats to their destination. and as it was highly undesirable that the expedition should be unduly exposed in the boats to the pestiferous effects of the miasmatic night-fogs which gather upon most of the west african rivers after sunset, it had already been arranged that the attacking party should not start until the following morning, at an hour which would enable us to reach the scene of operations in time to make a reconnaissance and arrange the plan of attack by nightfall. the remainder of that day was therefore employed in getting the boats ready, stocking them with three days' rations of provisions and water, overhauling the boat guns and slinging them ready for lowering, filling the ammunition boxes, sharpening cutlasses, fixing new flints to the pistols, where necessary, and generally completing our preparations. we also sent down royal and topgallant yards and housed the topgallant-masts, in order that, should it by any chance come on to blow heavily from the westward during our absence the ship might ride the more easily at her anchors. we also made preparation, in view of the foregoing contingency, for backing the bowers with the two stream anchors, and otherwise made every possible preparation for the safety of the ship during our absence; for the expedition in which we were about to engage was one of very considerable importance, and the task which we had set ourselves to perform was so formidable that, in order to insure success, it would be necessary to employ practically the entire ship's company, leaving the vessel in charge of the second lieutenant and only enough hands to keep a look-out and perform such tasks as, for example, the letting go of the stream anchors in case of necessity, the paying out of the additional amount of cable, the keeping of the ship reasonably clean, and so on. on the following morning, having washed decks and partaken of breakfast, the hands were mustered and inspected, the boats lowered, guns secured in the bows of the launch, pinnace, and first and second cutters, ammunition boxes passed down, masts stepped, sails cast loose, yards hooked on, and, in short, everything made ready for a start. then we went down over the side and took our places in the boats to which we were severally appointed, the captain going as usual in his own gig, while mr perry, the first luff, was in command of the launch; mr hoskins, the third lieutenant, commanding the pinnace; mr marline, the master, having charge of the first cutter, while mr tompson, the gunner, commanded the second cutter. the skipper took me, as he generally did, in his own boat, but the other three mids. were left on board the _psyche_ to keep mr purchase company. for the rest, nugent, the master's mate, went with the first lieutenant, while peter futtock, the boatswain, accompanied the third lieutenant in the pinnace. we mustered ninety all told, and were none too many for the work that we had undertaken to do, which was--to capture three, if not four, large ships; capture and demolish the shore batteries which the slavers very frequently erected for the defence of their strongholds; and also, most likely, fight king olomba and a whole flotilla of war canoes. the task was indeed a formidable one; the more so that we, the attacking party, would be, at least at the beginning of the fight, huddled closely together in boats, while our antagonists would have all the advantage of roomy decks to move about on, and steady gun platforms from which to pour in their fire, to say nothing of a tremendous superiority in point of numbers. we thought nothing of all this, however; we were going to have a change from the monotony of shipboard life; we should be certain to see new sights of a more or less interesting character; there was the excitement and exhilaration of a stiff fight awaiting us at the end of our journey; and, finally, there was the prospect of a pocketful of prize-money as a wind-up to the whole affair. what more could any reasonable individual desire? like most african rivers, the fernan vaz has a bar, but the sea breaks upon it only when the wind blows fresh from the north-west, owing to the fact that as far up as the town of olomba the river flows parallel to the line of coast, being separated from the open atlantic by a low, sandy peninsula, varying from one to three miles in breadth, terminating in a spit which ordinarily shelters the bar from the rollers, leaving a narrow channel of unbroken water, wide enough to enable a couple of craft of moderate tonnage to pass each other comfortably. and well was it for us that this was the case; for as we approached the river's mouth we saw that the ground-swell was rapidly increasing in weight, and that the surf was breaking upon the beach with such violence that if it happened to be also breaking upon the bar it would be quite useless for us to attempt to enter the river. indeed, so formidable did the appearance of the surf at length become that the captain ordered the rest of the boats to heave-to, while we in the gig went ahead to reconnoitre and inspect the condition of the bar. this was a bit of work for which the gig was peculiarly well adapted, for she was a beautifully modelled boat, double-ended, with a long flat floor--a splendid sailer, and a boat which would claw off a lee shore in almost any weather, the skipper having had her fitted with a good, deep, false keel. the wind was blowing a moderately fresh breeze from the westward at the time, thus, the rest of the boats having hove-to, it did not take us very long to run in far enough to get a sight of the bar. this was a rather trying experience for the nerves of us all; for the surf was pounding on the beach ahead of us in a constant succession of towering walls of water, that reared themselves to a height of fully thirty feet ere they curled over and broke in thunder so deafening that we presently found it impossible to make our voices heard above its continuous roar. but the skipper, standing up in the stern-sheets, soon detected the smooth, narrow strip of unbroken water, and directed the coxswain to shift his helm for it. i sprang up on a thwart and waved a small white flag as a signal to the other boats to fill away and follow us; and as soon as we had reached the very middle of the channel we rounded-to and lowered our sail, remaining where we were to act as a guide to the other boats. keeping our position with the aid of a couple of oars thrown over to enable us to stem the out-flowing current, which we now began to feel, we allowed the other boats to pass in over the bar and reach the smooth water before us; then, hoisting our sail again, we followed them in and presently resumed our position at the head of the line. the change from the scene of wind-flecked blue sea, stately march of the swell, and thunderous roar and creaming froth of the breakers outside to the oil-smooth, mud-laden, strong-smelling river, with its tiny, swirling eddies here and there, its mangrove-lined banks, and its silence, through which the roar of the surf came to us over the intervening sand spit, mellowed and subdued by distance, was so marked that, although this was by no means my first experience of that kind of thing, i found myself rubbing my eyes as though i were by no means certain that i was awake; and i noticed others doing the same. a sharp word from the skipper, however, cautioning all hands to maintain a smart look-out, soon brought to us the realisation of our surroundings; for the river here was narrow, being not more than half a mile wide, with a number of small islets dotted about it, any one of which might prove to be the hiding-place of a formidable foe. when at length we had passed these without interference, and had reached the point where the river began to widen out somewhat, we were no better off, but rather the worse; for here the stream was encumbered with extensive sandbanks, to avoid which we were compelled to approach the margin of the river so closely that a well-arranged ambush might have practically annihilated us before we could have effected a landing through the thick, viscid mud and the almost impenetrable growth of mangroves that divided the waters of the river from the solid ground of the shore. fortunately for us, the slavers appeared unaccountably to have overlooked the admirable opportunities thus afforded for frustrating an attack; or possibly, as we thought, it was that they had fully relied upon the power of the decoy schooner to draw us away from the coast, and thus leave the way free for them to escape. the passage of this part of the river occupied us until noon, and was rather trying to the nerves of all hands, for not only were we constantly exposed to attack by the slavers, but there were the natives also to be reckoned with; and these, as we all knew, had a most objectionable habit of using poisoned arrows, the slightest wound from which was invariably followed by death after some eight to twelve hours of dreadful suffering. shortly after noon we emerged from these natural entanglements into a long reach of the river where the stream expanded to a width of some three and a half miles, with a narrow deep-water channel running about midway between the banks. here we were quite free from any possibility of ambush of any kind; and with a sigh of intense relief the captain gave the word to pipe to dinner. about four o'clock in the afternoon we arrived at a point where the river again narrowed to a width of about a mile; but some two miles farther on it again widened out, and changed its direction, trending away almost due east, or about at right angles to its former course; and this, according to the information in the skipper's possession, indicated that we were nearing our destination. drawing from his pocket a sketch chart which he had already consulted several times during our passage up the river, he again studied it intently for several minutes, carefully comparing the configurations delineated upon it with our actual surroundings; then, apparently satisfied with the result, he refolded the paper, returned it to his pocket, and directed the coxswain to bear away a couple of points toward a projecting point--which we afterwards discovered to be the western extremity of an islet--on the far side of the river. as we approached the spot for which we were heading it became apparent that there were two islets instead of one between us and the river bank; and a quarter of an hour later the gig, with the rest of the flotilla following her, glided in between these two islets, and, lowering her sails, made the signal for the other boats to anchor. the boats were now completely concealed from all possible observation, for we soon saw that the islets between which we were anchored consisted merely of mud-banks thickly overgrown with mangroves, and absolutely uninhabitable even by natives; for there did not appear to be an inch of ground upon either of the islets sufficiently solid to support even a reed hut, while the mangroves were tall enough and grew densely enough to hide the boats from all possible observation from the mainland. the only question which now troubled us was whether the presence of the boats in the river had already been observed. if the slavers had placed absolute confidence in the success of their plan to draw us away from the coast by means of the decoy schooner, they might not have troubled to keep a look-out; but if they were as cautious as such gentry usually are, and had left nothing to chance, it would be scarcely possible for the approach of the boats to have passed undetected. this was the question to which the captain was now going to seek an answer. chapter three. at the camma lagoon. distant about a mile from our hiding-place, there was, according to the captain's rough sketch map, a small peninsula enclosing a little bay, or creek, at the inner extremity of which was situated king olomba's town; and it was here that we were led to believe we should find the slavers busily engaged in shipping their human cargoes. and truly, as seen from the boats, the ingenuity of man could scarcely have devised a more perfect spot whereat to conduct the infamous traffic; for the configuration of the land was such that boats, entering the river merely on an exploring expedition, without having first obtained, like ourselves, special information, would never have suspected the existence of the creek, or of the town which lay concealed within it. nor would it have been possible to detect the presence of slave craft in the creek; for the peninsula which masked it was thickly overgrown with lofty trees which would effectually conceal all but the upper spars of a ship, and these would doubtless be struck or housed while she was lying in the creek. the skipper having explained to the officers in command of the other boats what he intended to do, and given them instructions how to act in the event of certain contingencies arising, the gig's crew manned their oars, and we pulled away in the direction of the peninsula, which we reached in the course of a few minutes. now our real troubles began, for our object was not only to reach the peninsula but also to land upon and walk across it until a spot could be found from which, unseen ourselves, we could obtain a clear view of the creek and everything in it, and upon approaching the shore of the peninsula we discovered that, in common with as much of the river bank as we had yet seen, it consisted, first of all, of a wide belt of soft, fathomless mud overgrown with mangrove trees; the mud being of such a consistency that to attempt to walk upon it would mean being swallowed up and suffocated in it, for a sixteen-foot oar could be thrust perpendicularly into it with scarcely any effort, although when one of the men incautiously tried the experiment, it was only with the utmost difficulty that he was able to withdraw the oar, so tenaciously did the mud cling to it. yet it was not sufficiently liquid to allow of the gig being forced through it, even if the thickly clustering mangrove roots would have permitted of such a proceeding. the only alternative left to us, therefore, was to endeavour to reach solid ground by clambering over the slippery mangrove roots, with the possibility that at any moment one or another of us might lose our footing, fall into the mud, and be swallowed up by it. however, "needs must" under certain circumstances, the skipper and i therefore scrambled out of the boat--taking cupid with us to search out the way and carry a small coil of light line in case it should be wanted--and proceeded cautiously to claw our way like so many parrots, over and among the gnarled and twisted roots of the mangrove trees, the krooboy leading the way, leaping and swinging himself with marvellous agility from tree to tree, while we followed slowly in his wake, as often as not being obliged to make a slip-rope of the line to enable us to cross some exceptionally wide or awkward gap. in this manner, after about half an hour's arduous toil, with the perspiration pouring out of us until our clothes were saturated with it, while we were driven nearly frantic by the attacks of the mosquitoes and stinging flies that beset us by thousands, and could by no means be driven away, we contrived at length to reach soil firm enough to support our weight, and, some five minutes later, the solid ground itself. but, even now, our troubles were only half over; for after we had crossed the peninsula we still found it impossible to discover a spot from which the interior of the creek could be seen without laying out upon the roots of the mangrove trees that bordered the inner as well as the outer shore of the peninsula, the wearisome business of crawling and climbing had therefore all to be gone over again, with the result that the sun was close upon setting before we had reached a spot from which a clear view of the entire creek could be obtained. and then we had the unspeakable mortification of discovering that the expedition must result in failure; for, save a few canoes, the creek was innocent of craft of every description--_there were no slavers in it_! moreover, the so- called town of king olomba consisted only of about fifty miserable native huts in the very last stage of sordidness and dilapidation; and there was no sign that a slave barracoon had ever existed near the place. the captain stared across the water as though he found it quite impossible to believe his eyes. then he drew the sketch map from his pocket and once more studied it attentively, muttering to himself the while. finally he sat himself down upon a knot of twisted roots, with his back against the trunk of the tree, and, spreading the sketch wide open on his knee, beckoned me to place myself beside him. "just come here and look at this map, mr fortescue," he said, and he spoke with the air and in the tones of a man who is so utterly dazed with disappointment that he begins to doubt the evidence of his own senses. "just give me your opinion, will ye. i cannot understand this business at all. this map, although only a free-hand sketch, seems to me to be perfectly accurate. there, you see, is the mouth of the river, just as we found it; there are the little islets that we passed immediately after getting inside; there are the dry mud-banks; and there, you see, the river widens out, in precise accordance with our experience; here it narrows again at the bend; there is where the boats are lying concealed; and this," laying his finger upon a particular part of the sketch, "is the creek that we are now looking at; and there is the town of olomba. it all seems to me to be absolutely correct. does it not appear so to you?" "certainly, sir," i answered. "the sketch answers in every particular to what we have seen since entering the river--answers to it so perfectly, indeed, that it might have been copied from a carefully plotted survey." "exactly," assented the skipper. "yet it is nothing of the kind; for with my own eyes i saw it drawn from memory by a man whom i happened to meet in one of the third-rate hotels in freetown, which are frequented by the masters and mates of palm-oil traders and the like. i happened to hear him mention that he had been in and out of the fernan vaz at least a dozen times, in his search for cargo along the coast, so i waited until the people with whom he was talking had left him, and then i entered into conversation with him, finally inducing him to furnish me with this sketch." "and was it from him, sir, that you also obtained the information upon the strength of which you determined upon this expedition?" i asked. "oh, no," answered the skipper. "i had that from quite a different source, in a very different kind of house. the people who told me about king olomba's raid, and the plans laid by the slavers for carrying off the prisoners, were slavers themselves; and they told me of the scheme because they believed me to be the master of a slaver waiting for information from the senegal river. the cream of the joke was that these fellows should have told me--_me_, the captain of the _psyche_-- that the scheme had been carefully planned with the express object of putting the _psyche_ upon a false scent and so getting her out of the way while the negroes were being shipped." "yet there seems to have been something wrong somewhere, sir," i ventured to suggest. "but it is not with your map; that appears to be marvellously accurate for a mere free-hand sketch; there is no attempt at deception apparent there. this creek that we are looking at is undoubtedly the one shown on your map, and there is king olomba's town, precisely in the position indicated on the sketch; the assumption therefore is that the man who drew the map for you was dealing quite honestly with you. the misleading information, consequently must, it appears to me, have come from the others; as indeed is the case, seeing that they led you to believe that you would find at least three or four large ships in the creek, whereas there are none." "that is perfectly true," concurred the skipper. "yet i quite understood my informants to say that they were the persons who had formulated the scheme." "i suppose, sir," said i, giving voice to an idea that had been gradually shaping itself in my brain, "it is not possible that the people who were so singularly frank with you happened to recognise you as captain harrison of h.m.s. _psyche_, and gave you that bit of information with the deliberate purpose of misleading you and putting you upon a false scent, in order that while you are searching for them here they may have the opportunity to carry out their scheme elsewhere? their story may in the main be perfectly true, but if by any chance they should have happened to recognise you it would not be very difficult for them to substitute the name of the fernan vaz for that of some other river, and to mention king olomba instead of some other king." "n-o-o," said the skipper dubiously; "it would not. yet i cannot see why, if they had recognised me, they should have gone to the trouble of spinning an elaborate yarn merely to deceive me. it would have been just as easy for them to have knifed me, for there were seven of them, while i was quite alone. no, i don't quite see--" "do you not, sir?" i interrupted with a smile. "i do. i see quite clearly two very excellent reasons why they did not resort to the rough and ready method of the knife. in the first place, these fellows attach a ridiculously high value to their own skins, and never seem to imperil them when an alternative will serve their purpose equally well; and although they were seven to one, if they really recognised you they would know perfectly well that, while the ultimate result of a fight would probably be in their favour, you would certainly not perish alone; and i suppose none of them were particularly anxious to accompany you into the great beyond. and, apart from that, they would know quite well that were the captain of a british man-o'-war to go a-missing there would be such a stir among their rookeries that soon there would be no rookeries left. oh, no, sir! glad as they might be to put you quietly out of the way if they had the chance, depend upon it the last thing that they would dream of would be to attempt anything of the sort in sierra leone." "well, well, well, perhaps you are right, young gentleman, perhaps you are right. you seem to have quite a gift for reasoning things out," replied the skipper, as he pocketed his map and hove himself up into a standing position. "but it is high time that we should get under way, for the sun is setting, and we shall have all our work cut out to find our road back to the boat. do you think you will be able to find the gig, cupid?" "yes, i fit, sar," answered the krooboy. "but we mus' make plenty haste; for dem darkness he come too much plenty soon, an' if we slip and fall into dem mud we lib for die one time." "ay, ay," answered the skipper, with an involuntary shudder at the hideous fate thus tersely sketched by cupid; "i know that, my lad, without any telling; so heave ahead as smartly as you like." and therewith we started upon our return journey with all speed; striding, leaping, slipping, and scrambling from root to root, cupid leading the way, i following, and the skipper bringing up the rear, until at length we stood upon solid ground once more. but by this time not only had the sun set but the dusk was gathering about us like a curtain, while star after star came twinkling out from the rapidly darkening blue overhead, and the foliage of the trees that hemmed us in on every side was changing, even as we stood and watched while recovering our breath, from olive to deepest black. now, too, we were beset, even more pertinaciously than before, by the myriads of mosquitoes, sand flies, gnats, and other winged biting creatures with which the islet swarmed; to say nothing of ants; indeed it almost seemed as though every individual insect upon that particular patch of soil and vegetation had scented us out and, having found us, was quite determined that we should never escape them alive. when presently we again began to move, it seemed impossible to take a single step without tripping over a land-crab's hole, or treading upon one of the creatures and hearing and feeling it crackle and writhe underfoot. ugh! it was horrible. all these unpleasantnesses were sharply accentuated by the darkness, which fell upon us like a pall; for now the stars began to be obscured by great black clouds that came sweeping in from seaward, while the increasing roar and swish in the boughs overhead seemed to indicate that the wind was freshening. progress was difficult enough, under such conditions, while we were traversing solid ground and had no special need to pick our footsteps; how would it be, i wondered, when it came to our re-crossing the belt of mangroves and mud that lay between us and the gig? then, to add still further to our difficulties, the dank, heavy, pestilential fog that rises from the tropical african rivers at nightfall began to gather about us, and in a few minutes, from being bathed in perspiration from our exertions, we were chilled to the bone, with our teeth chattering to such an extent that we could scarcely articulate an intelligible word. "plenty too much fever here come," remarked cupid, while his teeth clattered together like castanets. "sar, you lib for carry dem quinine powder dat dem doctor sarve out dis morning?" "certainly, cupid," jibbered the skipper. "m-m-many thanks for the hint. m-m-m-mister fortes--ugh! t-t-take a p-p-pow-ow-der at once." i did so, and handed one to the krooboy, who simply put it, paper and all, into his mouth, and swallowed the whole. having done this, cupid announced, as well as his chattering teeth would permit, that in view of the fog and the intense darkness it would be simply suicidal for us to attempt the passage of the mangroves without a light, and that therefore he proposed to make his way alone to the gig, not only to reassure her crew as to our safety, but also to procure a lantern. and he enjoined the skipper and me to remain exactly where we were until he should return. after an absence which seemed to be an age in duration, but which was really not quite three-quarters of an hour, he reappeared, accompanied by the coxswain of the boat and two other seamen, who brought along with them a couple of lighted lanterns. thus reinforced and assisted, we got under way again, and eventually, after a most fatiguing and dangerous journey, reached the boat and shoved off into the stream. the gig was of course provided with a boat compass, and we knew the exact bearing of the spot where the other boats lay hidden; but we already knew also how complicated and confusing was the set of the currents in the river, and how hopeless would consequently be any attempt to find our friends in that thick fog. we therefore did not make the attempt, but, pushing off into the stream until we were clear of the mosquitoes and other winged plagues that had been tormenting all hands for so many hours, let go our anchor in one and a half fathoms of water, and proceeded to take a meal prior to turning-in for the night. never in my life before, i think, had i spent so absolutely uncomfortable a night. what with the rats, cockroaches, fleas, and other vermin with which the ship was overrun, to say nothing of the complication of stenches which poisoned the atmosphere, the midshipmen's berth aboard the _psyche_ was by no means an ideal place to sleep in, but it was luxury compared with the state of affairs in the gig. for aboard the _psyche_ we at least slept dry, while in the boat we were fully exposed to the encroachments of that vile, malodorous, disease- laden fog which hemmed us in and pressed down upon us like a saturated blanket, penetrating everywhere, soaking our clothing until we were wet to the skin, chilling us to the very marrow, despite our greatcoats, so that we were too miserable to sleep; while it so completely enveloped us that, even with the help of half a dozen lanterns, we could not see a boat's length in any direction. as the foul water went swirling away past us great bubbles came rising up from the mud below, from time to time, bursting as they reached the surface, and giving off little puffs of noxious, vile-smelling gas that were heavy with disease-germs. yet, singularly enough, when at length the morning dawned and the fog dispersed, not one of us aboard the gig betrayed the slightest trace of fever, although, among them, the other boats mustered nearly a dozen cases. our first business, after once more joining forces, was to pull into the creek and call upon his majesty, king olomba; but, upon interviewing that potentate, through the medium of cupid, who acted as interpreter, it at once became evident that our worthy skipper had been made the victim of an elaborate hoax--even more elaborate, indeed, than we at the moment expected; for the king not only vigorously disclaimed any propensity toward slave-hunting or slave-dealing, but went the length of strenuously denying that the river was ever used at all by slavers; also he several times endeavoured to divert the conversation into another channel by pointedly hinting at his readiness to accept a cask of rum as a present, to which hint the skipper of course turned a deaf ear. then, having got out of the old boy all the information that we could extract--which, when we came to analyse it, amounted to just nothing--we carefully searched the bush in the neighbourhood of the town, to see if we could discover anything in the nature of a barracoon, but found no trace whatever of any such thing. having drawn the creek blank, the skipper next determined to search a spot known as the camma lagoon, some twelve miles farther up the river; and, the sea-breeze having by this time set in, we stepped the masts and made sail upon the boats, creeping up the river close to its northern bank in order to dodge the current as much as possible. upon reaching the lagoon we found it to be in reality a sort of bay in the north bank of the river, some five and a half miles long by about three and three-quarter miles wide, with an island in the centre of it occupying so large an extent of its area that at one spot the creek behind was barely wide enough to allow the passage of a vessel of moderate tonnage. the eastern extremity of this creek, however, widened out until it presented a sheet of water some two miles long by about a mile and a half in width, with a depth of water ranging from two to three fathoms. furthermore, the island itself and the adjacent banks of the river were thickly wooded, affording perfect concealment, behind which half a dozen slavers might lurk undetected; and altogether it wore, as seen from the river, the aspect of an exceedingly promising spot. we therefore lowered the boats' sails, unshipped their masts, and, keeping a bright look-out all round us, pulled warily into the lagoon at its eastern extremity. for the first mile of our passage we detected nothing whatever of a suspicious character; but upon rounding the eastern extremity of the island and entering the widest part of the lagoon we sighted two large canoes paddling furiously up the creek, about a mile ahead of us. the captain at once brought his telescope to bear upon these craft, and with its aid discovered that each canoe was manned by about forty black paddlers, while the after end of each craft was occupied by some ten or a dozen men in european dress, most of whom appeared to be armed with muskets. these men had the appearance of being either portuguese or spaniards, and their presence in such a spot could mean but one thing, namely, that there was a barracoon somewhere near at hand. the skipper accordingly gave the order to chase the two canoes, to which the boats' crews responded with a cheer, and laid themselves down to their oars with such a will that they almost lifted the boats out of the water. but we had scarcely traversed a distance of half a dozen boats' lengths when, upon opening up a little indentation in the shore of the mainland, we saw before us a substantial wharf, long enough to accommodate two fair-sized craft at once, with a wide open space at the back of it upon which stood some eight or ten buildings, one of which was unmistakably a barracoon of enormous size. with another cheer the course of the boats was at once diverted toward the wharf; and we had arrived within less than a hundred yards of it when the deathlike silence which had hitherto prevailed ashore was pierced by a shrill whistle, in response to which the whole face of the bush bordering the open space at once began to spit flame, while the air around us hummed and whined to the passage of a perfect storm of bullets and slugs, among which could be detected the hum of round shot, apparently nine-pounders, the gig weathered the storm unscathed; but upon glancing back i saw that the other boats had been less fortunate, there being a gap or two here and there where a moment before a man had sat, while certain of the oars were at that moment slipping through the rowlocks to trail in the water by their lanyards a second later. here and there, too, could be seen a man hastily binding up a wounded limb or head, either his own or that of a shipmate. the skipper sprang to his feet in the stern-sheets of the gig, and drew his sword. "hurrah, lads!" he shouted. "give way, and get alongside that wharf as quickly as you can. then let every man run his hardest for the shelter of the buildings, carrying his musket and ammunition with him. one hand remain in each boat as boat-keeper, who must crouch down under the shelter of the wharf face. mr fortescue, stick close alongside me, please; i shall probably want you to carry messages for me." "ay, ay, sir," i answered; and the next moment the voice of the coxswain pealed out: "oars! rowed of all!" followed by the clatter of the long ash staves as they were laid in on the thwarts, and the gig, still leading the other boats, swept up alongside the low wharf and hooked on. with a yell of fierce delight, and eyes blazing with excitement, cupid, the krooboy, bounded up on the wharf, and extended one great black paw to assist the skipper, while in the other he grasped his favourite weapon, an axe, the edge of which he had carefully ground and honed until one could have shaved with it; in addition to which he wore a ship's cutlass girded about his waist. moreover he had "cleared for action," by stripping off the jacket and shirt which he usually wore, and stowing them carefully away in the stern-sheets of the boat; so that his garb consisted simply of a pair of dungaree trousers rolled up above his knees and braced tight to his waist by the broad belt from which hung his cutlass. in a second the gig was empty save for her boat-keeper, and her crew were racing for the shelter afforded by the barracoon, where, as i understood it, the captain intended to announce his arrangements for clearing the enemy out of the bush. but when we had accomplished about half the distance between the edge of the wharf and the barracoon there came a sudden splutter of fire from the windows of the other buildings-- which were so arranged as to enfilade the whole of the open space--and in a moment we once more found ourselves in the midst of a storm of flying bullets. the skipper, who was a pace ahead of me, stumbled, staggered a pace or two, and fell headlong upon his face, where he lay still, while his sword flew from his grasp with a ringing clatter. at the same moment the two cutters dashed up alongside the wharf, and their crews came swarming up out of them, to be met by another murderous discharge from the enemy lurking in the bush. i came to a halt beside the skipper, and looked round me. a couple of yards away stood cupid, who, it seemed, had just caught sight of the captain as he fell, and had pulled himself up short. "you, cupid," i shouted, "come back here, sir, and lend me a hand to get the captain back into the gig." the fellow came, and stooping over the skipper's body raised it tenderly in his arms. "all right, mistah fortescue, sar," he said; "you no trouble. i take dem captain back to de gig by myself, and find mistah hutchinson," (the surgeon). "but it no good, sar; he gone dead. look dere." and he pointed to a ghastly great hole in the side of the skipper's head, just above the left ear, where a piece of langrage of some description had crashed its way through the poor fellow's skull into his brain. it was a horrid sight, and it turned me quite sick for the moment, accustomed though i was by this time to see men suffering from all sorts of injuries. "very well," i said; "take it--the captain, i mean--back to the gig, anyway, and do not leave him until you have turned him over to mr hutchinson; who, by the way, is in the launch, which i see is just coming alongside. i will find mr hutchinson and send him to you." and away i hurried toward the spot where i saw the launch approaching, for the double purpose of reporting to mr perry the news of the captain's fall, and dispatching the surgeon to see if life still remained in the body. the first luff was terribly shocked at the news which i had to tell him; from a distance he had seen the skipper fall, but had hoped that it was a wound, at most. but this was not the moment for unavailing regrets; the fall of the captain at once placed perry in command and made him responsible for the fate of the expedition. he therefore gave orders for the guns which were mounted in the bows of the launch, pinnace, and first and second cutters to be cast loose and landed, the men not engaged in this work being placed under the command of the third lieutenant, with instructions to load their muskets and keep up a constant fire upon the windows of the various buildings. then, as soon as the guns were landed, two of them were loaded with double charges of grape, for the purpose of clearing the bush of the hidden foe, while the remaining two were double shotted and then run close up to the barricaded doors of the buildings, which were thus blown in, one after the other. as each door was blown in the building to which it belonged was stormed; the enemy, however, contriving to effect an exit by the rear as our lads poured in at the front. in ten minutes the whole of the buildings were ours, without further casualties on our side; after which we set them on fire and, waiting until they were well alight, retired in good order to the boats, in which we hauled off far enough to enable us to effectively cover the burning buildings with our musketry fire and thus defeat any attempt to extinguish the flames. an hour later the entire settlement was reduced to a heap of smouldering ashes; whereupon we pulled away round to the main stream once more by way of the back of the island, in search of further possible barracoons, but found none. our loss in this affair, considering its importance, was comparatively slight, amounting as it did to two killed--of whom one was the skipper-- and seven wounded. but we were a sorrowful party as we left the lagoon behind us and found ourselves once more in the main stream and on our way back to the ship; for captain harrison was beloved by everybody, fore and aft, and we all felt that we could better have spared any one else than him. chapter four. the wreck of the psyche. our journey down the river was a very different affair from that of our upward passage; for whereas in the latter we had been compelled to force our way against an adverse current, we now had that current favouring us; thus it came about that although the sun had passed the meridian when the boats emerged from the camma lagoon, after destroying the slave factory therein, it yet wanted an hour to sunset when the gig, still leading the rest of the flotilla, entered the last reach of the river and we once more caught sight and sound of the breakers beyond the bar. mr perry, the late first lieutenant, who now, by the death of captain harrison, had automatically become acting captain of the _psyche_, had turned over the command of the launch to the master's mate, for the return passage, and was in the gig with me; and as we drew nearer to the river's mouth i noticed that he rose in the stern-sheets of the boat and glanced somewhat anxiously to seaward. for a full minute or more he stood gazing under the sharp of his hand out across the sandbank as it seemed to glide rapidly past us, its summit momentarily growing lower as the gig swept along toward the point where the dwindling spit plunged beneath the surface of the water, and, as he gazed, the expression of puzzlement and anxiety on his face rapidly intensified. by this time, too, his action and attitude had attracted the attention of those in the boats astern, and, glancing back at them, i saw that nugent, in the launch, and hoskins, the third lieutenant, in the pinnace, had followed his example. naturally, i did the same, wondering meanwhile what it was at which they were all looking so intently, when mr perry suddenly turned upon me and demanded, almost angrily-- "i say, mr fortescue, what has become of the ship? d'ye see anything of her?" "the ship, sir?" i echoed dazedly--for, with the question, it had come to me in a flash that we ought by this time to be able to see at least the spars of the _psyche_ swaying rhythmically athwart the sky out over the low sandbank, if she still lay at anchor where we had left her;--"the ship? no, sir, i confess that i can't see her anywhere. surely mr purchase cannot have shifted his berth, for any reason? but--no," i continued, as the absurdity of the suggestion came home to me--"of course he hasn't; he hasn't enough hands left with him to make sail upon the ship, even if he were obliged to slip his cables." at that moment a hail of "gig ahoy!" came from nugent aboard the launch; and, glancing back at him, we saw him pointing at some object that had suddenly appeared on the ridge of the spit, away on our port quarter. it was a man, a white man, a seaman, if one might judge from his costume, and he was waving a large coloured handkerchief, or something of the kind, with the evident object of attracting our attention. while we still stood at gaze, wondering what this apparition could possibly mean, another man appeared beside him. "down helm, and run the boat in on the bank," ordered our new skipper. "i must see what this means." "flatten in, fore and aft, and stand by to let run your halyards!" ordered the coxswain, easing his helm down; and as he spoke i stepped upon the stern thwart with the object of getting a somewhat more extended view over the sandbank. but there was nothing to be seen-- stay! why was the spray from the surf flying so much higher in one particular spot than elsewhere? and that spot appeared to be about abreast of that part of the bank where the two men were standing. i stood a moment or two longer, seeking an explanation of the phenomenon, and then fell headlong over the man who was sitting upon the aftermost thwart gathering in the slack of the mainsail as the yard came down; for at that moment the gig grounded on the bank and shot a quarter of her length high and dry with the way that she had on her. as i picked myself up, rubbing my barked elbows ruefully, to the accompaniment of a suppressed snigger from the boat's crew, mr perry, with a brief "make way, there, lads," sprang upon the thwarts and, striding rapidly from thwart to thwart, rushed along the length of the boat, placed one foot lightly on the gunwale, close to the stem head, and leaped out on to the sand, with me close at his heels. together we raced for the crest of the spit; but even before we had reached it the terrible truth lay plain before us. for there, about a quarter of a mile to the southward of us, on the seaward side of the spit, lay the _psyche_, hard and fast aground, dismasted, and on her beam-ends, with the surf pounding at her, and her spars and rigging, worked up into a raft, floating in the swirl alongside the beach; while on the shore, opposite where she lay, the little company that had been left aboard to take care of her laboured to save such flotsam and jetsam as the surf flung up within their reach. for a full minute the new skipper, thus by a cruel stroke of malicious fortune robbed of the command that had been his for such a few brief hours, stood gazing with stern, set features at the melancholy scene. then he turned to me and said--very quietly-- "mr fortescue, be good enough to go down to mr hoskins, and request him, with my compliments, to take the boats back up the river until they are abreast the spot where the wreck lies, and there beach them; after which, leaving a boat-keeper to watch each boat, he will take the men over to the other side of the spit to assist in salving such matters as may come ashore. having delivered this message, you will please join me yonder." and he pointed to where the little group of men were toiling on the beach. "ay, ay, sir!" i answered. and, touching my hat, i turned and hurried down to the river bank, alongside which the other boats were now lying, with lowered sails, evidently awaiting orders. meanwhile mr perry strode off over the ridge in the direction of the wreck. i quickly found mr hoskins and delivered my message, with the result that the entire flotilla pushed off again and headed up-stream, one of the men having landed upon the narrow spit and ascended to its ridge in order that he might notify the boats' crews when they should have arrived at the spot on the seaward side of which lay the wreck; while i, burning with curiosity to learn how the disaster had been brought about, hurried after the skipper. as he walked, while i ran, i managed to overtake him at the precise moment when mr purchase, who had been left by captain harrison in charge of the ship, met him at a little distance from the spot where the party of salvors were at work. "mr purchase," said the skipper, as the two men met and halted, "i deeply regret to inform you that captain harrison is dead--killed this morning, with one other, while gallantly leading us to the attack of a strongly defended slave barracoon. we have both bodies in the boats, yonder, and it was my intention to have buried them at sea to-night; but that, i perceive, is no longer possible. and now, sir, perhaps you will be good enough to explain to me how the _psyche_ comes to be where i see her." "ah, sir!" answered mr purchase, removing his hat and mopping his forehead in great perturbation of spirit, "i wish i could tell you. all i know--all that _any_ of us knows, so far as i have been able to ascertain--is that we were cut adrift--both cables, sir, cut through as clean as a whistle--and allowed to drive ashore!" "cut adrift?" reiterated the captain incredulously. "_cut adrift_? really, my dear purchase, you must excuse me if i say that i utterly fail to understand you. how the mischief could you possibly be cut adrift from where you were anchored; and by whom? you surely do not intend to insinuate that any one of the ship's company--?" "no--no; certainly not," interrupted purchase. "nothing of the kind. let me tell you the whole yarn, perry; then you will be as wise as myself, and can give me your opinion of the affair, which i admit is most extraordinary. "nothing in the least remarkable occurred for some hours after the boats left the ship yesterday morning. i stood aft and watched you through the starboard stern port until you had all safely crossed the bar and disappeared behind the sand spit; and then i set the hands to work upon various small jobs; after which i went round the ship and satisfied myself that everything was perfectly safe and snug on deck and below. then, feeling tolerably certain that you would not return until to-day at the earliest, and that consequently it would be necessary for me to be up and about during the greater part of the coming night, i went below and turned in all standing, to get as much sleep as possible, leaving the boatswain's mate in charge of the deck, together with midshipmen keene and parkinson. "the day passed quite uneventfully; everything went perfectly smoothly; the ship rode easily to her anchors; and there had been nothing to report. but about two bells in the first dog-watch i noticed that the sky was beginning to look a bit windy away down in the western quarter-- nothing to speak of, you understand, or to cause any uneasiness; but it made me take a look at the barometer, and i saw that it had dropped a trifle since eight bells; and at the same time the wind was distinctly freshening and the swell gathering weight. all this, of course, meant more wind within the next few hours; i therefore kept a sharp eye on the barometer; and when at four bells i found it still dropping i decided to let go the two stream anchors, as a precautionary measure, while we had light enough to see what we were doing; and this i did, at the same time paying out an extra fifty fathoms on each cable, after which i felt that we were perfectly safe in the face of anything short of a hurricane." the new skipper nodded his approval, but said nothing; and purchase proceeded with his story. "well, as you probably noticed, shortly after sunset the wind breezed up quite strongly; but i was not in the least uneasy, for the barometer had ceased to drop before eight bells, and, although the sky was overcast and the night very dark, there was nothing threatening in the look of the weather, and it was only occasionally that we really tautened out our cables. still, i made up my mind to remain on deck all night, having had a good spell of sleep during the day. "as the night wore on and the wind held fresh but steady, i felt that after all i really need not have let go the streams, for the bowers alone would have held us quite easily against six times as much wind and sea as we had; you may therefore perhaps be able to picture to yourself my amazement and consternation when, a few minutes before six bells in the middle watch, i became aware that the ship was adrift and fast driving down toward the breakers!" "how did you discover that the ship was adrift? did you feel her cables parting?" demanded the skipper. "no," answered purchase; "we never felt anything of that kind; but i suddenly noticed that she was falling off and canting broadside-on to the wind and sea, so i knew at once that something was wrong--that in fact we had, in some incomprehensible way, struck adrift. i therefore sang out to thompson, the boatswain's mate, to pipe all hands to make sail, intending to run her into the river, if possible. but by the time that we had got the mizzen and fore-topmast staysail upon her, and were loosing the main-topmast staysail, we were in the first line of breakers; and a moment later she struck heavily. then a big comber came roaring in and broke over us, lifted us up, swept us shoreward a good twenty fathoms, and we struck again, with such violence this time that all three masts went over the side together. after that we had a very bad half-hour, for every roller that came in swept clean over us, carrying away everything that was movable, smashing the bulwarks flat, and hammering the poor old barkie so furiously upon the sand that i momentarily expected her to go to pieces under our feet. to add to our difficulties, it was so intensely dark that we could not see where we were; true, the water all round us was ablaze with phosphorescence, which enabled us to discern that land of some sort lay about a couple of cables' lengths to leeward of us, but it was quite indistinguishable, and the water between us and it was leaping and spouting so furiously that i did not feel justified in making any attempt to get the men ashore, especially as we were then being swept so heavily that we had all our work cut out to hold on for our lives. about half an hour later, however, the tide turned and began to ebb, and then matters improved a bit. "but it was not until daybreak that we were able to do anything really useful; and then all hands of us got to work and built a raft of sorts, after which we got up a good supply of provisions and water, sails to serve as tents, light line, and, in short, everything likely to be useful, and managed to get ashore without very much difficulty. but before i left the ship i had the cables hauled in through the hawse- pipes, and examined them most carefully. they were both unmistakably cut through--a clean cut, sir, evidently done with a sharp knife--at about the level of the water's edge." "most extraordinary!" commented perry. "and i presume nobody saw anything, either immediately before you went adrift or afterwards--no boat, or anything of that kind, i mean--to account for the affair?" "no," answered purchase, "nothing. yet i was not only wide-awake and on the alert myself, but i took care that the anchor watch should be so also; for i felt the responsibility of having such a ship as the _psyche_ to take care of, with only twenty hands, all told, to help me." "of course," agreed the skipper. "and did you succeed in getting everybody ashore safely?" "yes, thank god!" answered purchase fervently. "we are all safe and sound, and very little the worse for our adventure, thus far." "ah! that at least is good news," remarked perry. "well," he continued, "there is one very melancholy duty demanding our immediate attention, mr purchase, namely, the interment of captain harrison and the other poor fellow who fell during the attack upon the barracoon to-day. i will see about that matter personally, by choosing a suitable spot and getting the graves dug, for we shall soon have the darkness upon us. meanwhile, you will be good enough to get tents rigged and such other preparations made as may be possible for the comfort of all hands, and especially the wounded, during the coming night; for we have all had a very trying day, and it is imperative that we should secure a good night's rest. mr fortescue, come with me, if you please." now, during the progress of the foregoing conversation the boat party had not been idle; for, as soon as the fact of the wreck had become known to them, mr hoskins, the third lieutenant, seeing how matters stood, had grappled with the situation by causing the guns, ammunition, and stores of all kinds to be landed from the boats, and the craft themselves to be hauled up high and dry upon the beach on the river-side of the sand spit; and then, leading his men over the ridge, to where the others were at work upon the salving of wreckage from the surf, he had detailed a party to pick out from among the pile of heterogeneous articles such things as were most needed to meet our more immediate wants, and carry or drag them up the slope to the spot which henderson, the surgeon, had already selected as the most suitable spot for a camp. it was toward this party that mr perry and i now directed our steps; and when we had joined it the skipper, picking out a dozen of the most handy men, gave them instructions to provide themselves with tools of some sort suitable for the purpose of digging a couple of graves in the loose, yielding sand above the level of high-water mark; and while they were doing this, under my supervision, my companion wandered away by himself in search of a suitable site for the graves. as a matter of fact there was very little in the nature of choice, the entire spit, or at least that portion of it which we occupied, consisting of loose sand, sparsely covered, along the ridge and far a few yards on either side of it, with a kind of creeper with thick, tough, hairy stems and large, broad leaves, the upper surface of which bristled with hairy spicules about a quarter of an inch long. this plant, it was evident, bound the otherwise loose drifts and into a sufficiently firm condition to resist the perpetual scouring action of the wind; it was in this portion of the spit, therefore, that mr perry gave orders for the two graves to be dug; and presently my little gang of twelve were busily engaged in scooping out two holes, some twenty feet apart, to serve as graves. they were obliged to work with such tools as came to hand, and these consisted of splintered pieces of plank, the boats' balers, and some wooden buckets that had come ashore. under such circumstances the task of excavation was distinctly difficult, the more so that the sand ran back into the holes almost as fast as it was scooped up and thrown out; but at length, by dint of strenuous labour, a depth of some three feet was reached just as the sun's rim touched the western horizon and flung a trail of blood athwart the tumble of waters that lay between. then, the exigencies of the occasion admitting of no further delay, the task was suspended; all hands knocked off work; and, the bodies having meanwhile been enclosed in rough coffins very hastily put together by the carpenter and his mate, we all fell in; the gig's crew shouldered the late captain's coffin, while six of his mates acted as bearers to the other dead man; and, with mr perry leading the way and reading the burial service from a prayer-book, which it appeared he always carried about with him, we marched, slowly, solemnly, and bare-headed, up the slope of the sand spit to the spot which had been selected for the last resting-place of the dead. arrived there, the two coffins were at once deposited in their respective graves, when the new captain, standing between the two holes, somewhat hurriedly completed the ritual--for the light was fading fast; whereupon, after bestowing a final parting glance at the rough, uncouth box which concealed our beloved chief's body, we all turned slowly and reluctantly away to retrace our steps back to the apology for a camp which was to shelter us for the night, leaving a fresh party of workers to fill in the graves. in neither arm of the british fighting service do men unduly dwell upon the loss of fallen comrades, for it is quite justly held that the man who yields up his life in the service of his country has done a glorious thing, whether he falls in a pitched battle deciding the fate of an empire, or in some such obscure and scarcely chronicled event as the attack upon a slave factory. he is, where such is possible, laid in his last resting-place with all the honourable observance that circumstances permit, and his memory is cherished in the hearts of his comrades; but whether his fame pass with the echo of the last volley fired over his grave, or outlives the brass of the tablet which records his name and deeds, there is no room for grief. wherefore, when we got back to camp and had made the best possible arrangements for the coming night, there was little reference in our conversation to the tragic events of the past twenty-four hours; mr perry took up the reins of government, and matters proceeded precisely as they would have done had captain harrison been still alive and among us. our "camp" was, naturally, an exceedingly primitive affair; our living and sleeping quarters consisting simply of sails cut from the yards and stretched over such supports as could be contrived by inserting the lower ends of spars or planks in the sand and lashing their upper ends together. these structures we dignified with the name of "tents." the exigencies of the situation did not permit of the observance of such nice distinctions of rank in the matter of accommodation as exist under ordinary conditions, it therefore came about that we of the midshipmen's berth were lodged for the night in the same tent as the ward-room officers, and consequently we heard much of the conversation that passed between them, particularly at dinner. this meal--consisting of boiled salt beef and pork, with a few sweet potatoes, and a "duff" made of flour, damaged by sea water, with a few currants and raisins dotted about here and there in it--was served upon the _psyche's_ mizzen royal stretched upon the bare sand in the centre of our "tent"; and we partook of it squatted round the sail cross-legged on the sand, finding the way to our mouths by the light of four ship's lanterns symmetrically arranged one at each corner of the sail. naturally enough, mr purchase--now ranking as first lieutenant _vice_ mr perry, acting captain--having told the tale of the happenings which had resulted in our becoming castaways, was anxious to hear full particulars of what had befallen the boat expedition; and this mr perry proceeded to relate to him as we sat round the "table." when he had finished there was silence for a moment; then purchase looked up and said-- "don't you think it very strange that your experiences throughout should have accorded so ill with the information that captain harrison acquired at so much trouble and personal risk? hitherto it has always happened that such information as he has been able to pick up has proved to be accurate in every particular." "yes," agreed mr perry, "it has. i've been thinking a good deal about that to-day; and the opinion i have arrived at is that harrison played the game once too often, with this result--" and he waved his right hand comprehensively about him, indicating the tent, the makeshift dinner, and our condition generally. "what i mean is this," he continued, in reply to purchase's glance of inquiry. "the poor old _psyche_, as we all know, was a phenomenally slow ship, yet her successes, since she came on the coast, have been greater and more brilliant than those of any other vessel belonging to the squadron. and why? because she had a trick of always turning up on the right spot at the right moment. now it seems to me that this peculiarity of hers can scarcely have escaped the notice of the slave- trading fraternity, because it was so very marked. i imagine that they must often have wondered by what means we gained our information; and when at length the thing had become so unmistakable as to provoke both conjecture and discussion it would not take them long to arrive at a very shrewd suspicion of the truth. when once the matter had reached this stage discovery could not possibly be very long delayed. captain harrison was undoubtedly a well-known figure in sierra leone; he was of so striking a personality that it could not be otherwise, and i am of opinion that at length his disguise was penetrated. he was recognised in one of those flash places in freetown that are especially patronised by individuals of shady and doubtful character; and a scheme was devised for his and our undoing which has succeeded only too well. in a word, i believe that the whole of the information upon which he acted when arranging this most unfortunate expedition was carefully fabricated for the express purpose of bringing about the destruction of the ship, and was confided to him by some one who had recognised him as her captain. i believe, purchase, that you were cut adrift last night, either by the individual who spun the yarn, or by some emissary or emissaries of his who have a lurking-place somewhere in this neighbourhood; and, if the truth could be got at, i believe it would be found that the schooner which we saw come out of this river on the day before yesterday--and which the captain was led to believe was a decoy intended to draw us off the coast--was actually chock-full of slaves!" "by jove!" ejaculated purchase. "what a very extraordinary idea!" "i don't think so at all," cut in hoskins, before mr perry could reply. "it may seem so to you, purchase, because it has just been presented to you, fresh and unexpectedly, as it were. but when we arrived at king olomba's town yesterday morning, and found neither slaves nor barracoon there, i must confess that i was visited by some such suspicion as that of which captain perry has just been speaking, although in my case it did not take quite such a concrete and connected form. to my mind there is only one thing against your theory, sir," he continued, turning to the skipper, "and that is the existence of the factory on the lagoon." "yes," agreed the captain, "i admit that to be somewhat difficult to account for. and yet, perhaps not so very difficult either; because if the fellows who gave captain harrison the information upon which he acted happened to have a grudge against the owners of that factory they would naturally be more than glad if, while groping about in search of the imaginary slavers and barracoon, we should stumble upon the real thing and destroy it. all this, however, is mere idle conjecture, which may be either well founded or the opposite; but there is one indisputable fact about this business, which is--unless mr purchase is altogether mistaken, which i do not for a moment believe--that the _psyche_ was last night cut adrift from her anchors and wrecked by somebody who must have a lurking-place in this immediate neighbourhood; and i intend to have a hunt for that somebody to-morrow." chapter five. the battle of the sand spit. as the evening progressed it became evident to me that our new captain had developed a very preoccupied mood; he fell into long fits of abstraction; and often answered very much at random such remarks as happened to be addressed to him. he appeared to be turning over some puzzling matter in his mind; and at length that matter came to the surface and found expression in speech. "mr purchase," he said, "i have been trying to put two and two together--or, in other words, i have been endeavouring to find an explanation of the puzzle which this business of the wreck of the _psyche_ presents. i can understand quite clearly that poor captain harrison was deliberately deceived and misled by certain persons in sierra leone in order that the ship might be cast away. but why _here_ particularly? for if my theory be correct that the supposed decoy schooner actually sailed out of this river with a full cargo of black ivory, there must certainly be a barracoon somewhere close at hand from which she drew her supplies; and the people who planned the destruction of the sloop could scarcely have been so short-sighted as to have overlooked the fact that such a happening would leave us here stranded in close proximity to a slave factory which, presumably, they would be most anxious should remain undiscovered by us. that is the point which i cannot understand; and i have come to the conclusion that my theory with regard to the schooner must be altogether wrong, or there must be something else in the wind--that, in short, the wreck of the sloop is only a part instead of the whole of their plan." "but what about the barracoon which you destroyed to-day, sir?" asked purchase. "might not that be the place from which those fellows draw their supplies of slaves?" "it might, of course," admitted the skipper; "but, all the same, i do not believe it was. for the people who supplied captain harrison with false information would surely know enough of him and his methods to be certain that, failing to find anything in the nature of a slave factory at king olomba's town, we should not leave the river again until we had thoroughly explored it; and if they knew the river at all they would also know that the factory on the camma lagoon could scarcely be overlooked by us. no; in my own mind i feel convinced that the factory which we destroyed to-day was not the one in which those fellows are interested; there is another one somewhere in the river; and i will not leave until i have discovered and destroyed it. but that only brings me back to the point from which i started, and once more raises the question, why did they cast us away within a few miles of this other factory which i am persuaded exists? is it that the place is so strongly fortified that they are confident of our inability to take it? or is there something else at the back of it all, of which we have not yet got an inkling?" purchase shook his head hopelessly. "upon my word, sir," he answered, "it is quite impossible for me to say. when you come to put the matter like that it becomes as inexplicable as a chinese puzzle. what is your own opinion?" "i haven't been able to form one at all," answered the skipper. "but the matter is puzzling enough to convince me that it would be folly on our part to assume that the casting away of the ship is the beginning and ending of the adventure; therefore we will neglect no precautions, mr purchase, lest we find ourselves landed in an even worse predicament than our present one. our first and most important precaution must be to maintain a strict watch throughout the night. it need not be a very strong watch, but it must be a vigilant one; therefore each watch will be kept under the supervision of an officer who will be responsible for the vigilance of the men under him. moreover, all hands must see that their muskets and pistols are loaded and ready for instant action; for it would not be a very difficult matter to surprise this camp of ours sometime during the small hours. just come outside with me and let us take a look round." the result of the above conversation and the "look round" was an arrangement that the night was to be divided into five watches of two hours each, beginning at eight o'clock in the evening and ending at six o'clock in the morning; each watch to consist of twelve men, fully armed, who were to act as sentries, half of them being detailed to watch the river in the neighbourhood of the boats, while the other half kept watch and ward over the land approach to our encampment, being stretched across the narrow isthmus in open order from the water's edge on the river-side to that on the sea-side. each watch was commanded by an officer, with a midshipman under him; and the general orders were to fire a single shot at the first sign of anything of an alarming character, and then retire upon the camp, if an attack should threaten to cut off the outpost from the main body. the first watch was taken by the captain, with me for his subordinate; and i was given the command of the party of six guarding the shore approach to the camp, while the skipper took the party mounting guard near the boats, as it was his opinion that if danger threatened it was most likely to come by way of the river. my instructions were to march my men out to a distance of not more than two cables' lengths from the camp, and there take such cover as might be possible. at first sight it did not appear that there was the least bit of cover of any description available, for the spit or peninsula on which we were encamped was just bare sand for a distance of fully a mile from the spot whereon our camp was pitched, and then there began a growth of scrubby bush which gradually became more dense as one proceeded in a southerly direction; but i solved the difficulty by causing each man to scoop a little pit for himself in the loose sand, in which it was easy for him to crouch perfectly concealed particularly as there was no moon, and the light from the stars was not strong enough to reveal objects at a distance much beyond a quarter of a mile. the first, second, and third watches passed uneventfully; but the fourth watch was little more than half through when--about a quarter after three o'clock in the morning--the whole camp was roused from its slumbers by the sound of musket-shots, one from the party guarding the boats and the river approach, quickly followed by three in rapid succession from the contingent that occupied the sand pits stretched across the neck of the peninsula. then three or four more shots from the river party spurted out, and it began to dawn upon us that the matter threatened to be serious. of course none of us had thought of discarding any of our clothing that night, the second shot therefore had scarcely pealed out upon the night air before we in the camp were upon our feet, with our weapons in our hands, and all drawn up in regular array ready for the next move in the game, with the skipper in command. "where are mr fortescue and mr copplestone?" demanded the captain, looking about him, as soon as the first momentary bustle was over. "here i am, sir," answered i, stepping forward and mechanically touching my hat; and "here i am, sir," answered tom copplestone, suddenly appearing from nowhere in particular. "mr fortescue," ordered the captain, "take to your heels and run out to mr nugent as fast as you can; ascertain from him the reason for the firing from his party; ask him whether he requires any assistance; and then return to me with his reply as quickly as possible. mr copplestone, you will run down to the boats with a similar message to mr marline." away we both went, as fast as we could lay legs to the ground, copplestone down-hill toward the river beach, and i along the sand spit, making upward gradually toward the ridge as i ran. running in that fine, heavy sand was, however, horribly exhausting work, especially to one whose only mode of taking exercise was to stump the lee side of the quarter-deck during his watch, and i was soon so completely blown that, with the best will in the world to hurry, i was brought to walking pace. but before i had made twenty fathoms from my starting-point two more shots rang out from the party by the boats, and a moment later one of the boat guns began to speak. i looked out over the river, striving to discover what the disturbance was about, and thought i could dimly make out several dark blurs on the faintly shimmering surface of the water, which i conjectured must be canoes, but i could not be sure; meanwhile my business was not with them, whatever they were, but with nugent and his party, from whom, as i struggled along, two more musket-shots cracked out almost simultaneously. then, down by the river-side, a second shot roared from a boat gun, and this time before the ringing report of the piece died away i distinctly heard a crash followed by loud shrieks and much splashing out somewhere on the surface of the river. a few seconds later, panting and gasping for breath, i staggered up to a figure which i had made out standing upright and motionless on the crest of the spit, and found it to be nugent, with his drawn sword tucked under his right arm while with both hands he held his night glass to his eye. "who goes there?" he demanded sharply, wheeling round and seizing his sword as he heard the noise of my panting behind him. "friend!" i answered. "the sk---captain desires to know why you are firing, out here, and whether you require any assistance." "oh! is that fortescue? all right. just take my night glass, will you, and sweep the face of the spit carefully at about two hundred yards distance from here. then tell me if you can see anything," answered nugent. "and, if it comes to that, why are the others firing, down by the boats?" "can't say for certain," i answered, as i took the proffered night glass and raised it to my eye, "but i believe some suspicious canoes or boats have hove in sight, and they are just giving them a hint to keep their distance." "ah! just so," returned nugent. "now _we_ are firing because, although we can't be absolutely certain in this darkness, we think that there is a body of men out there who would be not altogether disinclined to rush the camp, if we gave them the opportunity; so we are just potting at them--or what we fancy to be them--whenever we get a clear enough sight of them, just as a hint that we are awake. but as to assistance--n-no, i don't think we need any, at least not at present. should we do so, later on, i will blow a blast on this whistle of mine." and he produced from his pocket a whistle possessing a particularly shrill and piercing note, with which he had been wont to summon cupid to the midshipmen's berth aboard the _psyche_, when that individual's presence had been needed with especial urgency. "well, d'ye see anything?" he demanded, after i had been peering through his glass for a full minute or more. "i am really not at all certain whether i do, or not," i answered, still working away with the glass. "i thought, a moment or two ago, that i caught sight of something in motion for an instant, but it is so abominably dark, as you say, that--but stay a moment, what is that dark mass out there stretching across the ridge? i don't remember having noticed anything there before nightfall." "dark mass?" reiterated nugent; "what dark mass d'ye mean? there is nothing out there, so far as i--" "by jingo! but there is, though, sir; i can see it myself now, wi' the naked eye!" exclaimed a seaman who was crouching in a sand pit a yard or so distant from where nugent and i were standing. "there, don't ye see it, mr nugent, stretchin' athwart the back of the spit? why, i can make it out quite distinctly." "give me the glass," demanded nugent, snatching the instrument from me and applying it to his eye. for some eight or ten seconds he peered intently through the tube, then exclaimed excitedly-- "ah, now i have it. yes, by jove, fortescue, you are right, there _is_ something out there; and it looks like--like--ay, and it _is_, too--a body of blacks creeping along toward us on their stomachs! why, there must be hundreds of 'em, by the look of it; they reach right across the spit! yes, we shall certainly want help, and plenty of it, to keep those fellows at arm's length. i thought it was only some twenty or thirty when i first made them out. yes, cut away to the skipper, fortescue, as hard as you can pelt; tell him what you've seen; and say that i shall be obliged if he will kindly send me as many men as he can spare. that disturbance down by the boats seems to have ceased, so he ought to be able to send us a pretty strong reinforcement." "all right," i said; "i'll tell him, and then comeback with the men." and away i went back through the heavy sand at racing pace, and delivered my message. the captain listened patiently to my breathless and somewhat disconnected story, and then turned to mr purchase, who was standing close at hand, and said-- "mr purchase, have the goodness to take the entire port watch, and go out to mr nugent's assistance. but do not allow your men to fire away their ammunition recklessly, for we have very little of it. let no man pull trigger until he is quite certain of hitting his mark." "ay, ay, sir!" answered purchase. "port watch, follow me." and away he and his following trudged into the darkness. i was making to join them, but the skipper happened, unfortunately, to see me, and called me back. "no, no, mr fortescue," he said; "you and mr copplestone will please remain with me. i may want one or both of you to run messages for me presently." so we remained. but i at once ranged up alongside copplestone, for i was anxious to hear the news from marline, down by the boats. "well, tommy," i said, "what was old marline blazing away at? whatever it was, he managed to hit it, for i heard the smash." "yes," answered copplestone. "but it was more a case of luck than of good shooting, for it is as dark as a wolf's mouth. some of his men, however, had eyes keen enough to see that there was a whole flotilla of boats, or canoes, or something of that sort, hovering in the river and manoeuvring in such a fashion as to lead to the suspicion that they had designs upon our boats, so he dosed them with a few charges of grape, which caused them to sheer off `one time,' as cupid is wont to remark. what was the row with nugent?" "lot of niggers creeping along the spit on their stomachs toward him," i answered. "got some idea of rushing the camp for the sake of the plunder in it, i expect. but now that mr purchase and the port watch have gone out to back him up i think we need not--hillo! that sounds like business, though, and no mistake." my ejaculation was caused by a sudden cracking off of some six or eight muskets, one after the other, closely followed by a heavy if slightly irregular volley, and the next instant the air seemed to become positively vibrant with a perfect pandemonium of shrieks, howls, yells, and shouts as of men engaged in close and desperate conflict. the skipper pricked up his ears and clapped his hand to his sword-hilt; then he turned to where tommy and i were standing close beside him. "mr copplestone," he said, "take twenty men--the first you can pick-- and go with them to support mr marline, for i fancy he will need a little help presently. the rest of us are going out to support mr purchase and mr nugent." "ay, ay, sir," answered tommy. he picked out the first twenty men he could lay hands on and taarched them off to join mr marline's "picnic," as he expressed it, and the rest of us went off at the double to take part in the scrimmage that was proceeding in the neighbourhood of the sand pits. and a very pretty scrimmage it was, if one might judge from the tremendous medley of sounds that reached us from that direction. the firing was now very irregular and intermittent, but there was plenty of yelling and shrieking mingled, as we drew nearer to the scene of the fray, with sounds of gasping as of men engaged in a tremendous struggle, quick ejaculations, a running fire of forecastle imprecations, the occasional sharp order of an officer to "rally here, lads!" dull, sickening thuds as of heavy blows crashing through yielding bones, and here and there a groan, or a cry for water. it was evident that the fight had resolved itself into a desperate hand-to-hand struggle; and it seemed to me that our lads were being hard put to it to hold their own. but the worst feature of the whole affair, to my mind, was that the darkness was so intense that it was almost impossible to distinguish friend from foe. we reached the scene of the struggle so much sooner than i had expected that it was impossible to avoid the conclusion that our people were being steadily forced back in the direction of the camp; and this i afterwards found to be correct; but the appearance of the skipper with his reinforcements soon put another face upon the matter. it was evident that the foe--consisting of some hundreds of negro savages had been under the impression that they were fighting the entire strength of the british, but when we came up they at once discovered their mistake, which, with the knowledge that, for aught they could tell, there might be further reinforcements waiting to take a hand in the game, somewhat damped their courage. not by any means at once, however; indeed it was not for perhaps two or three minutes after our appearance upon the scene that the first actual check upon their advance occurred. for they appeared to number seven or eight to every one of us, and moreover they were all picked warriors in the very prime of life, brave, fierce, determined fellows, every one of them, and well armed with spear, shield, war-club, and, in some cases, a most formidable kind of battle- axe. "spread out right and left, and cut in wherever you can find room," ordered the skipper as we plunged, stumbling and gasping, into the midst of the fray. and there was no difficulty in obeying this order; for, narrow as the sand spit was, it was yet too wide for mr purchase and the port watch to draw a close cordon across it; there were gaps of a fathom or more in width between each of our men, and those gaps were rapidly widening as some poor wretch went down, transfixed by a broad- bladed spear, was clove to the shoulder by the terrific blow of an axe, or had his brains dashed out by a war-club. but as our contingent arrived each man chose an enemy--there was no difficulty in doing that-- and pulled trigger upon him, generally bringing him down, for we were too close to miss; after which it became literally a hand-to-hand fight, some using their discharged muskets as clubs while others flung them away and trusted to their cutlasses, and one or two at least--for i saw them close alongside me--depended entirely upon the weapons with which nature had provided them, first dealing an enemy a knock-out blow with the clenched fist and then dispatching him with one of his own weapons. as for me, i still had the brace of pistols and the cutlass with which i had provided myself when setting-out upon our ill-starred boat expedition up the river, and i made play as best i could with these, bowling over a savage with each of my pistols and then whipping out my cutlass. for a time i did pretty well, i and those on either side of me not only holding our ground but actually beginning to force the enemy back; but at length a huge savage loomed up before me with his war-club raised to strike. my only chance seemed to be to get in a cut or a thrust before the blow could fall, and i accordingly lunged out at his great brawny chest. but the fellow was keen-eyed and active as a cat; he sprang to one side, avoiding my thrust, and at the same instant brought down his club upon my blade with a force that shattered the latter like glass and made my arm tingle to such an extent that for the moment at least i was powerless in the right arm. then, quick as thought, he swung up the huge club again, with the evident determination to brain me. disarmed and defenceless, i did the on'y thing that was possible, which was to spring at his great throat and grip it with my left hand, pressing my thumb hard upon his wind-pipe. but i was like a child in his hands; he shook me off with scarcely an effort; and as i went reeling backward i saw his club come sweeping down straight for the top of my head. at that precise instant something seemed to flash dully before my eyes in a momentary gleam of starlight, a sharp _tchick_ came to my ears, a few spots of what felt like hot rain spattered in my face, and the great savage, his knees doubling beneath him, reeled backward with a horrible groan and crashed to the sand, with cupid's axe quivering in his brain, while the club, flying from his relaxed grasp, caught me on the left forearm, which i had instinctively flung up to defend myself, snapping the bone like a carrot, and then whirling over and catching me a blow upon the head that stretched me senseless. but before i fell i had become conscious that through the distracting noises of the fight that raged around me i could hear the sound of renewed firing spluttering out from the direction of the boats. when my senses returned to me the day was apparently some three or four hours old, for the shadows of certain objects upon which my eyes happened to fall as i first opened them were, if anything, a trifle shorter than the objects themselves, which was a sure indication that the sun stood high in the heavens. i was lying, with a number of other people, in the large tent-like structure which the ward-room officers had used on the preceding evening; and hutchinson, the ship's surgeon, was busily engaged in attending to the hurts of a seaman who lay not far from me. this was the first general impression that i gained of my surroundings with the recovery of consciousness; the next was that my left arm, which was throbbing and burning with a dull, aching pain from wrist to shoulder, was firmly bound up and strapped tightly to my body, and that my head, which also ached most abominably, was likewise swathed in bandages. i was parched with thirst, which was increased by the sound of a man drinking eagerly at no great distance from me, and, turning my head painfully in the direction of the sound, i saw jack keene, a fellow-mid., administering drink out of a tin pannikin to a man whom i presently recognised as nugent, the master's mate, who, poor fellow, seemed to be pretty near his last gasp. "jack," i called feebly, "you might bring me a drink presently, when you have finished with nugent, will you? how are you feeling, nugent? not very badly hurt, i hope." i saw nugent's lips move, as though attempting to answer me, but no sound came from them, while keene, glancing towards me, shook his head and laid his finger upon his lips as a sign, i took it, that i should not attempt to engage the poor fellow in conversation. "all right, fortescue," he said, in a low voice, "i'll attend to you in a brace of shakes." he laid nugent's head very gently back upon a jacket which had been folded to serve as a pillow, and then, refilling the pannikin from a bucket which stood close at hand, he came to me. "feeling bad, old chap?" he asked, as he raised my head and placed the pannikin to my lips. i emptied the pannikin before attempting to reply, and then said-- "not so bad but that i might easily be a jolly sight worse. bring me another drink, jack, there's a good boy; that was like nectar." "ah; glad you enjoyed it," was the reply. "but you'll have to wait a spell for your next drink; hutchinson's orders to me are that water is to be administered to you fellows very sparingly, as it is drawn from the river and is probably none too wholesome. what are your hurts?" "broken arm and a cracked skull, so far as i know," i answered. "what's the matter with poor nugent?" i added, in a whisper. "he looks as though he is about to slip his cable." jack nodded. "yes, poor chap," he whispered. "no chance of his weathering it. ripped open by one of those broad-bladed spears. can't possibly recover. well, i must go and look after my other patients; i'm acting surgeon's mate, you know." "surgeon's mate!" i ejaculated. "why, you surely don't mean to say that murdoch has been bowled over, too, do you?" "no; not so bad as that," answered jack. "he's away with the rest in the boats. the skipper's gone to pay a return visit to those fellows who beat up our quarters last night. and now i really must be off, you know. go to sleep, if you can; it will do you all the good in the world." go to sleep! yes, it was excellent advice, but i did not seem able to follow it just then; the throbbing and aching of my arm and the racking pain of my sore head were altogether against it, to say nothing of the continuous groaning and moaning of the injured men round about me, and the occasional sharp ejaculations of agony extorted from the unfortunate individual who happened at the moment to be under the surgeon's hands. so, instead, i looked about me and endeavoured to form some idea of the extent of our casualties during the past night. judging from what i saw, they must have been pretty heavy, for i counted twenty-three wounded, including myself, and i realised that there might be others elsewhere, for the tent in which we lay was full; there did not seem to be room enough for another patient in it without undue crowding. and even supposing that we comprised the sum total of the wounded, there must have been a large proportion of dead in so desperate an affair as that of the past night. i estimated that in so obstinately contested a fight as that in which we had all sustained our injuries, and against such tremendous odds as those which were opposed to us, there must have been at least half as many dead as wounded, which would make our casualties up to thirty-five; a very heavy percentage out of a crew that, owing to various causes, was already, before this fresh misfortune, growing short-handed. when to these came to be added the casualties sustained on the preceding day in the attack upon the barracoon, it seemed to me that our new captain would have little more than a mere handful of men available for service on this fresh expedition upon which he had embarked--for i did not suppose that he had gone off taking with him every sound man and leaving the camp and the wounded entirely unprotected and exposed to a renewed attack by the savages. after about an hour's absence jack came back to me again and gave me another draught of water, which so greatly refreshed me that the excitement and uneasiness under which i had been labouring since his first visit gradually subsided, my aches and pains grew rather more tolerable; my thoughts grew first more placid and then gradually more disconnected, wandering away from the present into the past and to more agreeable themes, my memory of past incidents became confused, and finally i slept. i must have slept some three or four hours; for when i awoke it was undoubtedly afternoon; hutchinson had completed his gruesome labours and was sitting not very far away entering some notes in his notebook, and a few of the less seriously wounded were sitting up partaking of soup or broth of some kind out of basins, pannikins, or anything of the kind that came most handy. the sight of these people refreshing themselves reminded me that i was beginning to feel the need of food, and i called out to the doctor to ask if i might have something to eat and drink. he at once rose up and came to me, felt my pulse, looked at my tongue, and prescribed a small quantity of broth, which jack keene presently brought me, and which i found delicious. i may here mention that several days later i became aware that this same broth--the origin of which puzzled me at the moment, though not enough to prevent me from taking it--had been prepared from a kind of tortoise, the existence of which in large numbers on the spit hutchinson had accidentally discovered that very morning, and in pursuit of which he had sent out two of the most slightly wounded with a sack, and instructions to catch and bring in as many of the creatures as they could readily find. while i was taking my broth the worthy medico stepped to where nugent was lying and bent over the poor fellow, feeling his pulse and watching his white, pain-drawn face. then, rising softly, he went into a dark corner of the tent, where, it appeared, his medicine-chest was stowed away, and quickly prepared a draught, which he brought and held to the lips of the patient, tenderly raising the head of the latter to enable him to drink it. then, having replaced the sufferer's head upon the makeshift pillow, he bent over and murmured a few words in the dying man's ear. what they were i know not, nor did i catch nugent's response, but the effect of the brief colloquy was that hutchinson drew from his pocket a small copy of the new testament and, after glancing here and there at its opened pages, finally began to read, in a clear voice and very impressively, the fifteenth chapter of the first epistle to the corinthians, reading it through to the end. as he proceeded i saw poor nugent slowly and painfully draw up his hands, that had lain clenched upon the sand beside him, until they were folded upon his breast in the attitude of prayer. and when at length hutchinson, with a steady voice, but with the tears trickling down his cheeks, reached the passage, "but thanks be to god, which giveth us the victory," nugent's lips began to move as though he were silently repeating the words. the chapter ended, hutchinson remained silent for a few moments, regarding his patient, who he evidently believed was praying. suddenly nugent's eyes opened wide, and he stared up in surprise at the canvas roof over his head as though he beheld some wonderful sight; the colour flowed back into his cheeks and lips, and gradually his face became illumined with a smile of ecstatic joy. "yes," he murmured, "thanks be to god, which giveth us the victory--_the victory_--victory!" as he spoke his voice rose until the final word was a shout of inexpressible triumph. then the colour ebbed away again from cheeks and lips, a film seemed to gather over the still open eyes, the death-rattle sounded in the patient's throat, he gasped once, as if for breath, and then a look of perfect, ineffable peace settled upon the waxen features. nugent's gallant soul had gone forth to join the ranks of the great captain of his salvation. chapter six. we find new quarters. it was about half an hour after nugent's death that young parkinson, who had been engaged somewhere outside the tent, came in and said to hutchinson-- "the launch, under sail, and with only about half a dozen hands in her, has just hove in sight from somewhere up the river. none of the other boats seem to be in company, but as she is flying her ensign at the peak,"--the launch, it may be mentioned, was rigged as a fore-and-aft schooner--"i suppose it's all right." "it is to be hoped so," fervently responded the medico; "goodness knows we don't want anything further in the nature of a disaster; we've had quite enough of that sort of thing already. could you distinguish the features of any of the people in the boat?" "no, sir," answered the lad. "i hadn't a glass with me. is there such a thing knocking about anywhere here in the tent, i wonder?" "yes," answered hutchinson. "you will find mr nugent's somewhere about. it was picked up and brought in by the fatigue-party this morning. you might take it, if you can find it, and see if you can distinguish an officer in the boat. the glass ought to be somewhere over there." parkinson went to the spot indicated, and proceeded to rummage among the heterogeneous articles that had been recovered from the scene of the previous night's fight, and soon routed out the instrument of which he was in search, with which he went to the opening of the tent, from which the launch was by this time visible. applying the telescope to his eye, he focussed it upon the fast-approaching boat and stared intently through the tube. "yes," he said at length, "i can make out mr purchase in the stern- sheets, with rawlings, the coxswain, alongside of him; and there is cupid's ugly mug acting as figure-head to the boat. the beggar is grinning like a cheshire cat--i can see his double row of ivories distinctly--so i expect there is nothing much the matter." presently, from where i was lying, the launch slid into view, coming down-stream at a great pace under whole canvas, and driven along by a breeze that laid her over gunwale-to. she was edging in toward our side of the river; and as i watched her movements, her crew suddenly sprang to their feet, apparently in obedience to an order; her foresail and mainsail were simultaneously brailed up at the same moment that her staysail was hauled down, then her helm was put up and she swerved inward toward the beach, upon which she grounded a minute later. then mr purchase rose to his feet, sprang up on the thwarts, and, striding from one to the other, finally sprang out upon the beach, up which, followed by cupid, he made his way toward our tent. a couple of minutes later he stood in the entrance, waiting for his eyes to accustom themselves to the comparative darkness of the interior. "well, doc.," he exclaimed cheerily, "how have things been going with you to-day?" "quite as well as i could reasonably have expected, taking all things into consideration," answered hutchinson. "poor nugent has passed away--went about half an hour ago--but the rest of the wounded are doing excellently. how have things gone with you, and where are the others?" "left them behind busily preparing quarters for you and your contingent," answered purchase. "we have had a pretty lively time of it, i can tell you, since we left here this morning. searched both banks of the river for a dozen miles or more, exploring creeks in search of the gentry who attacked us from the river last night, and who undoubtedly put the savages up to the shore attack upon the camp, and eventually found them snugly tucked away in a big lagoon about twelve miles from here, the entrance of which is so artfully concealed that we might have passed it within a hundred fathoms and never suspected its existence. splendid place it is for carrying on the slave traffic; large open lagoon, with an average of about fifteen feet of water everywhere; fine spacious wharf, with water enough for ships to lie alongside; two spanking big barracoons; and a regular village of well- built houses; in fact, the finest and most complete slave factory that i've ever seen. well-arranged defences, too; battery of four nine- pounders; houses loop-holed for musketry; and a garrison of about a hundred of the most villainous-looking portuguese, spaniards, and half- breeds that one need wish to meet. they were evidently on the look-out for us--had been watching us all day, i expect--and opened a brisk fire upon us the moment that we hove in sight. luckily for us their shooting was simply disgraceful, and we managed to effect a landing, with only two or three hurt. but then came the tug-of-war. the beggars barricaded themselves inside their houses, and blazed away at us at short range, and then, of course, our people began to drop. but perry wouldn't take any refusal; landed the boat guns, dragged them forward, and blew in the doors, one after the other, stormed the houses, and carried them in succession at the sword's point. after that it was all plain sailing, but very grim work, doc, i can tell you; our people had got their blood up, and went for the dagoes like so many tigers. it lasted about a quarter of an hour after we had blown the doors down, and i don't believe that more than a dozen of the other side escaped. of course we, too, suffered heavily, and there are a lot of fresh cases waiting for you, but murdoch is working like a trojan. and now i have come to fetch you and your contingent away out of this; there is a fine, big, airy house that murdoch has turned into a hospital, where the wounded will be in clover, comparatively speaking; so, if you don't mind, we'll get to work at once and shift quarters before nightfall." no sooner said than done. as i had surmised, a party of twenty unwounded men, under the boatswain, had been left behind by the skipper to look after the camp when he had gone away early in the morning, and these men were now called in to convey the most seriously wounded down to the launch, while the less seriously hurt helped each other; and in this way the whole of the occupants of the camp were got down to the launch and placed on board her in about twenty minutes. then hutchinson caused his medicine-chest to be taken down to the boat, together with such other matters as he thought might be useful; and, lastly, poor nugent's body was taken down and reverently covered over with the ship's ensign, which had been saved, laid on a rough, impromptu platform on the thwarts amidships--the other poor fellows who had fallen in the fight had been buried before the setting-out of the boat expedition, i now learned. a final look round the camp was then taken by purchase and hutchinson; a few more articles that were thought worth preserving from possible midnight raiders were brought down; and then we got under way and stood up the river, keeping in the slack water as much as possible, in order to cheat the current. it was within an hour of sunset when purchase, who had been standing up in the stern-sheets of the boat, intently studying the shore of the right bank of the river for some ten minutes, gave the order to douse the canvas and stand by to ship the oars; and as he did so he waved his hand to the coxswain, who put down his helm and sheered the boat in toward what looked like an unbroken belt of mangroves stretching for miles along the bank. but as the launch, with plenty of way on her, surged forward, an opening gradually revealed itself; and presently we slid into a creek, or channel, some two hundred feet wide, the margins of which were heavily fringed with mangroves, and at once found ourselves winding along this narrow passage of oil-smooth, turbid water, in a stagnant atmosphere of roasting heat that was redolent of all the odours of foetid mud and decaying vegetation. this channel proved to be about a mile long, and curved round gradually from a north-easterly to a south-easterly direction, ending in a fine spacious lagoon about eight miles long by from three to four miles wide at its widest point, arrived in which we once more felt the breeze and the sails were again set, the boat heading about south-east, close-hauled on the port tack, toward what eventually proved to be an island of very fair size, fringed with the inevitable mangroves, but heavily timbered, as to its interior, with magnificent trees of several descriptions, among which i distinguished several very fine specimens of the _bombax_. handsomely weathering this island, with a few fathoms to spare, and standing on until we could weather a small, low-lying island to windward of us on the next tack, we then hove about and stood for the northern shore of the lagoon, by that time some five miles distant, finally shooting in between the mainland and an island nearly two miles long, upon which stood the slave factory that our lads had captured earlier in the day. the whole surface of this island, except a narrow belt along its southern shore, had been completely cleared of vegetation; and upon the cleared space had been erected two enormous barracoons and, as purchase had said, a regular village of well-constructed, stone-built houses raised on massive piers of masonry, and with broad galleries and verandahs all round them, evidently intended for the occupation of the slave-dealers and their dependants. a fine timber wharf extended along the entire northern side of the island, with massive bollards sunk into the soil at regular intervals for ships to make fast to; half a dozen trunk buoys occupied the middle of the fairway; and the whole settlement was completely screened from prying eyes by the heavy belt of standing timber that had been left undisturbed on the southern shore of the island. i had thought that the factory on the camma lagoon represented the last word in the construction of slave-dealing establishments; but this concern was quite twice as extensive, and more elaborately complete in every respect. by the time that we invalids were landed it was close upon sunset, and under purchase's guidance we were all conducted up to the largest house in the place, where, in one of the rooms, murdoch was still hard at work attending to the batch of patients that were the result of that day's work. we, the new arrivals, however, were shepherded into another room, where fairly comfortable beds were arranged along the two sides, and into these beds the worst cases were at once put and turned over to murdoch's care, while hutchinson promptly pulled off his coat and took up murdoch's work in what might be termed the operating-room. i, however, was not considered a bad case, and was accordingly placed in another smaller room, or ward, along with about half a dozen others in like condition with myself. while these arrangements were proceeding, a fatigue-party had been busy at work in a secluded spot chosen by the skipper, at some distance from the houses; and before we, the wounded, had all been comfortably disposed of for the night, the dead nugent included--were laid to rest with such honourable observance as the exigencies of the moment would permit. the casualties in this last affair were, of course, by no means all on the british side; we had suffered pretty severely in the three affairs in which we had been involved since the departure of the boat expedition from the ship, our total amounting to eleven killed and twenty-six wounded; but the losses on the part of the enemy had been very considerably greater, their dead, in this last fight alone, numbering nineteen killed, while thirty-three wounded had been hurriedly bestowed in one of the houses, to be attended to by the surgeons as soon as our own people had been patched up; thus hutchinson and murdoch were kept busy the whole of that night, while copplestone, keene, and parkinson-- the three uninjured midshipmen--were impressed as ward-attendants to keep watch over our own wounded, and administer medicine, drink, and nourishment from time to time. it was a most fortunate circumstance for all hands that this last factory had been discovered and captured; for we were thus provided with cool, comfortable living quarters, instead of being compelled to camp out on the exposed beach opposite the wreck; and to this circumstance alone may be attributed the saving of several of the more severely wounded, to say nothing of the fact that we now occupied a position which could be effectually defended from such attacks as that to which we had been exposed on the spit during the previous night. moreover, it relieved the captain of a very heavy load of anxiety, since, but for the fortunate circumstance of this capture, he would have had no alternative but to have continued in the occupation of our makeshift camp on the spit, it being impossible for him to undertake a boat voyage to sierra leone with so many wounded on his hands. it is true that he might have sent away the launch, with an officer and half a dozen hands, to sierra leone to summon assistance; but his ambition was not to be so easily satisfied. we had done splendid service in capturing two factories and destroying one of them--the second would also, of course, be destroyed when we abandoned it--but the loss of the _psyche_ was a very serious matter, which must be atoned for in some shape or another; and he soon allowed it to be understood that he was in no particular hurry to quit our present quarters, where the wounded were making admirable progress, and the sound were comfortably housed, while provisions of all kinds were plentiful and the water was good. but this, excellent as it was in itself, was by no means all; with two such perfectly equipped factories as we had found upon the river it was certain that the slave traffic on the fernan vaz must have assumed quite formidable proportions; and it was the skipper's idea that before our wounded should be lit to be moved, one or more slavers would certainly enter the river, when it would be our own fault if we did not capture them. the most careful dispositions were accordingly made, with this object in view; the gig, in charge of an officer, was daily dispatched to the entrance of the lagoon in order that, herself concealed, her crew might maintain a watch upon the river and report the passage of any vessels upward-bound for the camma lagoon, while, so far as our own quarters were concerned, everything was allowed to remain as nearly as possible as it was before it fell into our hands, in order that, should a slaver arrive at the factory, there should be nothing about the place to give the alarm until it should be too late for her to effect her escape. as a final precaution, a sort of crow's-nest arrangement was rigged up in a lofty silk-cotton tree which had been left standing in the screening belt of timber along the southern shore of the island, in order that a look-out might be maintained upon the approach channel during the hours of daylight, and timely notice given to us of the approach of slavers to the factory of which we were in occupation. a full week elapsed from the date of our desperate fight on the sand spit, with no occurrence of any moment save that, thanks to the skill and indefatigable exertions of hutchinson and murdoch, all our wounded were doing remarkably well, two or three of them, indeed, having so far recovered that they were actually able to perform such light duty as that of hospital ward-attendants; while the unwounded had been kept perpetually busy at the scene of the wreck, salving such matters as were washed ashore, and transferring everything of any value to our quarters. meanwhile, the ship had parted amidships, and was fast going to pieces, so that our labours in that direction were coming to an end, and in the course of another week or two there would be nothing more than a rib showing here and there above water, and a few trifles of wreckage scattered along the beach to tell to strangers the story of our disaster. the enemy's wounded also, who were sharing with us the attentions of the surgeon and his mate, were doing well upon the whole, although there had been some half a dozen deaths among them, and there were a few more, whose hurts were of an exceptionally severe character, with whom the issue still remained doubtful. it chanced that among these last there was a negro who seemed gradually to be sinking, despite the utmost efforts of hutchinson to save him; and this individual, named m'pandala, had latterly evinced a disposition to be friendly and communicative to cupid, our krooboy, who had been told off for hospital duty in the house occupied by the enemy's wounded; and at length--it was on the tenth day of our occupation of the island, and i was by this time well enough to be out and about again, although still unable to do much on account of my disabled arm--this negro made a certain communication to cupid which the latter deemed it his duty to pass on to me without loss of time. accordingly, on the evening of that day, after cupid had been relieved--he was on day duty--he sought me out and began-- "mr fortescue, sar, you know dem m'pandala, in dere?" pointing with his chin toward the house in which the wounded man was lodged. "no, cupid," i answered. "i cannot truthfully say that i enjoy the honour of the gentleman's acquaintance. who and what is he?" cupid grinned. "him one eboe man," he answered, "employed by dem portugee to cook for and look after dem captain's house. he lib for die, one time now; and 'cause i been good to him, and gib him plenty drink when he thirsty, he tell me to-day one t'ing dat i t'ink de captain be glad to know. he say dat very soon--perhaps to-morrow or next day, or de day after--one big cauffle of slabe most likely comin' here for be ship away from de coas'; and now dat he am goin' to die he feel sorry for dem slabe and feel glad if dem was set free." "whew!" i whistled. "that is a bit of news well worth knowing--if it can be relied upon. do you believe that the fellow is telling the truth, cupid?" "cartain, mr fortescue, sar," answered the krooboy, with conviction. "he lib for die now; what he want to tell me lie for? he no want debbil to come after him and say, `hi, you m'pandala, why you tell dem white men lie about slabe cauffle comin' down to de coas'? you come along wid me, sar!' no, he not want dat, for cartain." "when did he tell you this, cupid?" i demanded. "'bout two hour ago," answered cupid. "he say to me, `cupid, i lib for die to-night, and when you come on duty to-morrow you find me gone. so i want to tell you somet'ing now, before it too late.' and den he tell me de news, mr fortescue, sar, just as i tell it to you, only in de eboe language, which i understand, bein' well educate." "all right," said i. "in that case you had better come with me at once to the captain, and we will tell him the yarn. the sooner he hears it the better. did he tell you where the cauffle was coming from, and which way?" "he say," answered cupid, "dat dem cauffle am comin' down from de bakota country, where 'most all de slabe sent from dis place come from; and dere is only one way for dem to come here, t'rough de bush ober de oder side ob de water. den dey bring dem across to de island in dem big flat-bottom punt dat lay moored up by de top end ob de wharf." we found the captain in the store with mr futtock, the boatswain, overhauling the various articles salved from the wreck, and as soon as he had seen all that he desired, and was ready to leave the building, i got hold of him and repeated the yarn that cupid had spun to me, the krooboy confirming and elaborating my statement from time to time as i went on, and answering such questions as the skipper put to him. when at length we had brought the yarn to an end the captain stood for some minutes wrapped in deep thought, and then said-- "this is a very valuable piece of information that you have managed to pick up, cupid: and if it should prove to be well founded i will not forget that we owe it to you. it is too late now, mr fortescue, to do anything in the matter to-night, for it will be dark in less than half an hour; but the first thing to-morrow morning you and cupid here had better take the dinghy, pull across to the mainland, and endeavour to find the road by which the cauffle will come--there ought not to be very much difficulty in doing that, i should think. and, having found it, it will be well for the pair of you to proceed along the road on the look- out for some suitable spot at which to ambush the party, after which the rest should be easy. there is, however, another matter that needs consideration. how are we to ascertain the precise moment at which to expect the arrival of the slave-dealers? because it will be hardly desirable to take a party out, day after day, and keep them in the bush all day waiting for the cauffle to come along. we are all doing excellently well here; but two or three days spent in the bush would very possibly mean half the party being down with fever." here cupid, bursting with pride and importance at finding himself, as it were, a member of a council over which the captain was presiding, struck in-- "you jus' leabe dat to me, sar. suppose you gib me leabe to go, i take ration for, say, free day, and go off by myself into de bush to meet dem cauffle. dhen when i hab met dem i soon find out when dem expec' to arribe here, and i come back and tell you." the skipper regarded the black doubtfully. "but," he objected, "if you fall in with them, my man, the traders are as likely as not to shoot you; or, if not that, at least to seize you and chain you on to the cauffle. then how could you let us know when to expect the beggars?" "no fear ob dat, sar," answered cupid with a grin. "i shall take care dat dem do not know i, cupid, am anywhere near dem. dem shall neber suspec' my presence, sar; but i shall be dere, all de same, and shall take partikler care to hear eberyt'ing dat dem say, so dat we may know exactly when to expec' dem. and when i hab learned dat piece of information, i shall hurry back so as to let you know as early as possible. i don' t'ink dat dere is much fault to find wid dat plan, sar." "no," answered the skipper, smiling at the black's eagerness and excitement, "provided, of course, that you are quite confident of your ability to carry it through." "you trust me, sar; i'll carry it through all right, sar," answered cupid, in huge delight at being specially entrusted by the skipper with this mission. "you hab but to gib me leabe to go, and i will undertake to carry out de enterprise to your entire satisfaction." "very well," said the skipper, now struggling manfully to suppress his inclination to laugh outright at the man's high-flown phraseology; "let it be so, then. mr fortescue, i leave it with you to arrange the matter." and he turned away. on the following morning, cupid having called me at daylight, i snatched a hasty breakfast of cocoa and biscuit, and then wended my way to the wharf, where the krooboy, in light marching order, with three days' rations--which he proposed to supplement on the way, if necessary--tied up in a gaudy bandana handkerchief, awaited me in the dinghy. scrambling down into the boat with some circumspection--for my broken arm, although knitting together again nicely, was still rather painful at times, and very liable to break again in the same place if treated roughly--i took my place in the stern-sheets, whereupon cupid, giving the little cockle-shell a powerful thrust off from the wharf wall, threw out the two tiny oars by which the boat was usually propelled, and proceeded with long powerful strokes to row across to the mainland, at this point a bare half-mile distant. as we went the black informed me that, with the view of ascertaining a few additional items of information of which he had thought during the night, he had looked into the ward wherein his friend m'pandala had been lodged, but had discovered, as he indeed more than half feared, that the eboe had quietly slipped his moorings during the night and passed on into his own particular "happy hunting grounds." but he added cheerfully that, after all, it really did not greatly matter; he would probably be able to obtain the required information in some other way. arrived at the other side of the inlet, it became necessary for us to search the shore for the spot at which the bush road debouched, and this we eventually found with some difficulty, for, like everything else connected with the factory, it had been very carefully arranged with the object of screening it from casual observation. but once discovered, our difficulties in that respect were at an end, for we found that it ran down into a tiny indentation in the shore, just sufficiently spacious to accommodate two of the large flats or punts at a time, with firm ground, sloping gently down into the water, affording admirable facilities for the rapid embarkation of large numbers of people. hauling the dinghy's stem up on this piece of firm sloping ground, and making fast her painter to a convenient tree, as a further precaution, cupid and i set out along the firm, well-beaten path, some six feet in width, which had been cleared through the dense and impenetrable bush that hemmed us in on either hand, tormented all the while by the dense clouds of mosquitoes and other stinging and biting insects that hovered about us in clouds and positively declined to be driven away. we walked thus about a mile and a half when we came out upon an open space, some ten acres in extent, through which the path ran. this cleared space had evidently been caused by a bush fire at no very distant date, for a few charred trunks and portions of trunks of trees still reared themselves here and there; but the undergrowth had all been burned away down to the bare earth, and was now springing up again, fresh and green, in little irregular patches, all over the open area. the spot would serve admirably for an ambuscade, for while it was sufficiently open to permit of straight shooting, there was cover enough to conceal a hundred men, or more, at need. but what made the place especially suitable for our purpose was the fact that away over in one corner of the clearing there grew a thick, dense belt of wild cactus, newly sprung up, fresh, tough, and vigorous, every leaf being thickly studded with long, strong, sharp spikes growing so closely together that nothing living would dare to face it, or attempt to force a passage through it--or, at all events, if they should be foolhardy enough to try it once they would not attempt it a second time. it immediately occurred to me--and cupid promptly corroborated my view--that if our party could but find or make a way in behind this belt of cactus, they would be at once in a natural fort from which it would be impossible to dislodge them, and after further careful investigation a passage was found through the bush by which our lads could easily gain access to the interior of the cactus fort, and hold it against all comers. there was therefore no need to search farther; the place was admirably adapted to our requirements; and, once satisfied of this, i bade cupid proceed on his way in quest of the approaching cauffle, while i leisurely wended my way back to the dinghy and, with a single oar thrown out over the stern, sculled myself back to the factory. chapter seven. la belle estelle. my first act upon my return was, of course, to report the result of my reconnaissance to the captain, who, after hearing what i had to say, came to the conclusion that he would personally inspect the spot which i had selected as the scene of the proposed ambuscade; and accordingly, ordering the second cutter to be manned, we pushed off, taking mr hoskins with us, and towing the dinghy, which was to be left on the other side for the convenience of cupid, upon that individual's return. when we at length reached the place the skipper was so pleased with it that he at once determined to set a strong party to work upon it, partly to keep the hands employed--there being by this time very little to do at the factory--and partly that the necessary preparations might be completed at the earliest possible moment. accordingly he gave hoskins, who was to have charge of the working-party, the most elaborate instructions as to how to proceed and what to do. the work was put in hand that same day; and when hoskins and his party returned to quarters that night the former reported that the whole of the work absolutely necessary to insure the success of the ambuscade had been done, and that only about another hour's work, on the following day, was required to complete the whole of what the skipper had ordered. the next day, accordingly, the party crossed to the mainland to complete the preparation of the ambuscade, returning, in good time for dinner, with the report that all was now done, and that the spot was ready for occupation at a moment's notice. as it happened, it was just as well that we had acted with such promptitude and expedition, for the men were still engaged upon their mid-day meal when cupid was seen returning in the dinghy. the fellow had evidently travelled fast and far, for he was smothered in dust, and so done up that he could scarcely drag one leg after another--there is nothing that puts one out of walking condition more quickly than being pent up for long periods on board a ship. but, despite his fatigue, he was puffed up with pride and importance, for he had accomplished the mission upon which he had been despatched, and in a very satisfactory manner, too. his report was to the effect that he had travelled at a good pace all through the preceding day, and that at nightfall, while still plodding forward, keeping his eyes wide open, meanwhile, on the look-out for a suitable camping spot, he had suddenly detected in the air a smell of burning wood and dry leaves, and, proceeding cautiously a little further, had become aware of a low, confused murmuring, as that of the voices of many people, together with a brisk crackling sound which he at once recognised as that of camp fires. a minute or two later, having meanwhile taken cover, he sighted the camp, which proved to be, as he had of course expected, that of the slave-traders and their unhappy victims. the caravan, or "cauffle," had just camped for the night, and its members were busily engaged in preparing the evening meal, cupid was therefore able to approach the camp closely enough to catch a great deal of the conversation of the slave-traders, as well as to make a pretty accurate guess at their number and that of their victims. later on he was able to ascertain the exact number of the former, which totalled eighty-two, while the slaves he estimated to number from a thousand to fifteen hundred. maintaining his concealment, but steadily working his way ever closer to the camp fire, the krooboy ultimately wriggled himself into a position so close to the spot where the chiefs of the band had seated themselves that he was able without difficulty to catch every word spoken by them; and although his knowledge of the spanish and portuguese languages was exceedingly limited, yet by listening patiently to everything that was said during the somewhat dilatory progress of the meal, and afterwards while the leaders smoked and chatted prior to turning-in for the night, he was able to gather that the remaining distance of the journey was to be divided into three marches, the last of which was to bring the party to the shore of the lagoon pretty early in the afternoon of the day following that of cupid's return to us. then, having learned this, the krooboy had waited until the leaders of the expedition had bestowed themselves for the night, and the occupants of the camp generally were settling to rest after the hot and toilsome march of the past day, when he cautiously left his place of concealment and, mingling with the unhappy captives, had contrived to communicate to several of them the joyful news that in due time, and upon their arrival at a certain spot already fixed upon, the cauffle would be ambuscaded and the dealers and escort attacked and captured, after which the slaves would be released and supplied with food and water to enable them to return to their homes. he did this, he said, not only to comfort and encourage them but also to put them on their guard against falling into a panic at the critical moment and getting themselves hurt. the skipper listened very carefully to this story, cross-examined the narrator upon several points, and then dismissed him to get food and rest. that same afternoon the captain, accompanied, as before, by lieutenant hoskins, again visited the place of ambush, and presumably made final arrangements for the capture of the cauffle, but what they were i did not know, for i was left behind, with tompson, the gunner, in charge of the factory, with instructions to overhaul our stock of arms and ammunition, and see that everything of that kind was made perfectly ready for the next day's work. when the next day arrived and all hands were mustered for inspection prior to the choosing of the ambuscading party, i learned to my disgust that i was to be left behind, with the other invalids, to look after the factory, hutchinson having reported that i was not yet fit for duty, although, like a full dozen others who had been hurt in one or another of our recent fights, i was able to be up and about, and to attend to matters not requiring the use of both arms. but the slave-traders were known to be, as a general rule, determined fellows, and it was certain that, in the present case, with such a rich haul in their possession, they would fight desperately in defence of their booty. the skipper therefore determined to take only sound men with him, concluding that "lame ducks" would be more of a hindrance than a help to him. with envious eyes i watched the departure of the skipper and his party-- in three boats, namely, the launch and the first and second cutters--and then walked moodily away from the wharf to perform a duty inspection of the sick wards. the place wore an unnaturally quiet and deserted look, as i crossed the great open space between the wharf and the building which we had converted into a hospital; for there was nobody about excepting a round dozen or so of convalescents, well enough to sit out on the gallery under the shade of the verandah, and the solitary watcher, perched aloft in the crow's-nest which we had rigged among the topmost branches of one of the most lofty trees on the island, in order to maintain a watch upon the lagoon, and give us timely notice of the approach of a slaver. sauntering quietly along, for the heat was already intense, i entered the hospital building and proceeded with the usual daily inspection of the wards, which i found were to-day in murdoch's charge, hutchinson having been detailed to accompany the skipper's party. the invalids were all doing excellently, thanks, no doubt, in a great measure, to the fine, airy room in which they had been bestowed; some, indeed, were so far advanced toward recovery that murdoch had given three or four of them permission to leave their beds and go into the open air for an hour or two, and these were now assisting each other to dress. i completed my rounds, both of this building and also of that in which the wounded prisoners were lodged, and was just leaving the latter when i caught sight of one of the convalescents hurrying toward me at a great rate, in the full glare of the sunshine, in direct defiance of the medico's standing order that none of them were on any account to leave the shadow of the verandah. but this man had a very excellent excuse for his breach of the rules, for the moment that he saw me he first took off his hat and waved it to attract my attention, and then flourished it in the direction of the look-out tree, glancing toward which i caught sight of the fluttering fragment of scarlet bunting which was the prearranged signal that a slaver had entered the lagoon and was approaching the factory! a moment later the look-out himself, having descended the tree, came hurrying along to make his report. "well, edwards," i exclaimed, as the man came bustling up to me, and saluted, "i see you have made the signal that a slaver is approaching. what sort of a craft is she; and how far off?" "she's a very tidy and smart-looking brig, sir, measurin' close upon three hundred ton, by the look of her; and she's headin' straight for the eastern end of this here island, clewin' up and furlin' as she comes. she was under topsails and to'ga'nts'ls when i shinned down out of the crow's-nest, yonder; and i reckon she'll reach the anchorage in about another twenty minutes or so," reported the man. "very good," i answered. "now, go back to your look-out, and put that piece of red bunting out of sight as quickly as possible; for if those slaver fellows should happen to catch sight of it they may suspect something and be on their guard; which won't do; for, with only a few convalescents to help me, our sole chance of capturing them lies in the use of stratagem." then, as the man turned away and hurried back to his post, i crossed the open space between the wharf and the buildings, and, giving the convalescents instructions to arm themselves at once and to stand by to show themselves when called upon, i entered my own quarters and hastily shifted from my uniform into a somewhat soiled suit of "whites" and a pith hat that had doubtless once been the property of one of the former inhabitants of the place--and which i had appropriated in view of some such contingency as the present--and otherwise made such preparations as were possible for the suitable reception of our expected visitors. we had only just barely completed our preparations when the strange brig, under topsails and fore-topmast staysail, came sweeping round the eastern extremity of the island, bracing sharp up as she did so and making a short "leg" athwart the anchorage, toward the mainland. then, tacking very smartly, even under such short canvas as she was showing, she headed well up for the line of buoys which had been laid down as moorings, and, splendidly handled, presently came up head to wind, settling away both topsail-yards to the caps as she did so, and, while her crew clewed up the topsails and hauled down the staysail, glided, with the way which she still had on her, up to the weathermost buoy, to which a hawser was promptly run out and made fast. then, as about a dozen hands climbed into the fore and main rigging and made their leisurely way aloft for the purpose of rolling up the topsails, a light, handsome gig was dropped into the water from the starboard quarter davits and presumably hauled alongside the gangway; but this i could not see, as she was presenting her port broadside to us--which, by the way, i noticed, was garnished with five grinning twelve-pounders. she was a most beautiful vessel, lying long and low upon the water, her hull painted all black, from her rail to her copper, relieved only by a single narrow white stripe running along her sheer-strake from her white figure-head to the rather elaborate white scroll-work that decorated her quarter. she was grandly sparred, with very heavy lower-masts, long mastheads, painted white, very taunt topmasts, topgallant and royal- masts, stayed to a hair, with a slight rake aft, and accurately parallel, and enormously long yards. the french ensign floated lazily from the end of her standing gaff. as i stood under the shade of the verandah, admiring this sea beauty, the gig came foaming round under her stern, propelled by four oarsmen, and with a white-clad figure in the stern-sheets, and headed toward the wharf, alongside a flight of steps in which she presently ranged, and hooked on. then the white-clad figure in the stern-sheets rose and, leisurely climbing the steps to the level of the wharf, revealed itself as that of a man somewhat over middle height, broadly built, with hair, beard, and moustache of raven black, and a skin tanned almost to the colour of that of a mulatto by long exposure to sea-breezes and a tropical sun. his age i roughly estimated as somewhere about forty. with a swaggering sea roll he came striding across the wide arid space between the wharf side and the buildings, puffing at a big black cigar as he walked, and glancing about him curiously, as though he could not quite understand the utter quietude and deserted aspect of the place. apparently, however, this was not sufficiently marked to arouse his suspicion, for he betrayed no hesitation as he made straight for the house under the broad verandah of which i stood in full view, watching his approach. as he came within speaking distance he slightly raised his broad-brimmed pugaree-bound panama hat, for a moment, exclaiming, in execrable spanish: "good-morning, senor! what has happened that i see nobody about? and where is senor morillo? i would have speech with him." raising my hat in reply, i answered, in the same language: "i deeply regret to inform you, senor, that morillo is indisposed--down with a slight attack of fever, in fact; and, as for the rest, they are away in the bush on the other side, whither they have gone to help bring in the cauffle which is due to arrive this afternoon. but will you not step in out of the sun?" "thanks!" answered the stranger, ascending the gallery steps. "i am sorry to hear of my friend morillo's indisposition. a _slight_ attack of fever, i think you said. is he too ill, think you, to talk business? if not, you will perhaps have the extreme kindness to tell him that captain lenoir of _la belle estelle_ has arrived and would like to see him." "assuredly i will, senor," i answered politely. "pray step inside here, out of the heat, and be seated, while i convey your message to senor morillo." so saying, i flung open the door of an inner room, and stood aside for him to enter. quite unsuspectingly he stalked in through the open door, removed his hat and laid it upon the table, flung himself into a basket-chair, and, withdrawing an enormous silk pocket-handkerchief from his pocket, proceeded to mop the streaming perspiration from his forehead. at the same moment i whipped a loaded pistol from my pocket, aimed straight at his left eye, and, as he stared at me in amazement, said-- "you are a dead man, captain lenoir, if you move so much as a muscle. you are my prisoner, senor. no,"--as i saw by the expression of his eye that he had it in his mind to suddenly spring upon and disarm me--"not a movement, i pray you. to attempt what you are thinking of would be fatal, for upon your slightest motion i will pull the trigger and blow your brains out; i will, as surely as that you are sitting there." then, slightly raising my voice, i called-- "collins, bring your party into this room; and do not forget to bring along that length of ratline that i told you to have ready." "ay, ay, sir," answered collins; and the reply was followed by the shuffling sound of several pairs of feet, the owners of which came shambling into the room the next moment, with naked cutlasses in their hands, while one of them carried, in addition, a length of some three or four fathoms of ratline. meanwhile, i had never for the smallest fraction of a second withdrawn my gaze from captain lenoir's eyes, or allowed the barrel of my pistol to waver a hair's-breadth from his larboard optic, for i knew that if i did he would be upon me like lightning. but although he dared not move his limbs he was not afraid to use his tongue, angrily demanding what i meant by perpetrating such an outrage upon one of senor morillo's best customers, and vowing that he would not be satisfied until he had seen me flogged within an inch of my life for my insolence. then, when i explained to him the actual state of affairs--while collins and another man securely lashed his hands together behind his back--his temper completely got the better of him, and he raved, and shrieked curses at us until we were perforce compelled to gag him lest his cries should reach the men in the boat and give them the alarm. however, we very soon secured and silenced him; and then, having marched him out at the back of the house and secured him in a remote hut by himself, i gave collins fresh instructions, after which i sauntered across the open space of blistering sunshine to the edge of the wharf, and looked down into the boat. the four men had already made fast her painter to a ring in the wharf wall, and were now lolling over the gunwale, staring down into the deep, clear water at the fish playing about beneath them, and chatting disjointedly as they sucked at their pipes. "it is thirsty work sitting there and grilling in the sun, is it not, lads?" said i in french. "come up to the house and drink senor morillo's health in a jug of sangaree; and then captain lenoir wants you to carry down some fruit and vegetables that senor morillo has given him for the ship's use." "_bien_! we come, monsieur," they answered with one accord; and the next moment they were all slouching toward the house, a pace or two in my wake. i traversed a good three-quarters of the distance from the wharf to the house, and then halted suddenly and smote my forehead violently, as though i had just remembered something. "dolt that i am," i exclaimed in french, "i had almost forgotten! indeed i have completely forgotten something--your mate's name. i have a message for him." and i looked the man nearest me straight in the eye. "ah!" he ejaculated; "monsieur doubtless means monsieur favart, our chief mate--" "of course," i cut in. "favart is the name. thanks! go you on to the house and walk straight in; you will find your friends awaiting you. as for me--" i flung out my hand with an expression of disgust, and turned back as though to return to the wharf edge. but as soon as the quartette had fairly entered the house and i was assured, by certain subdued sounds, that they had fallen into the trap that had been set for them, i turned on my heel again, and presently found the four prisoners in process of being secured. "i am sorry, lads," i said to them in french, "that i have been compelled to resort to subterfuge to make prisoners of you, but, you see, we are all invalids here, and not strong enough to take your ship by force; and therefore, since it is imperative that we should have her, i have been compelled to use guile. however, i will keep my word with you in the matter of something to quench your parched throats; and if you choose to be sensible, and make no foolish attempts at escape, you shall have no reason to complain of harsh treatment." "ah, monsieur anglais, if we had but known--" answered one of the frenchmen, with a rather rueful smile. "however," he continued, shrugging his shoulders, "although you have contrived to get hold of us--and the captain--you have not yet got the ship; and before you can get her you will be obliged to use a great deal more guile than sufficed for our capture; for monsieur favart is a sharp one, i assure you, and not to be so very easily deceived." "i can well believe it," i answered lightly. "all the same, i am very much obliged to you for the hint, and will do my best to profit by it." whereupon, as i turned on my heel to quit the house, the garrulous frenchman's three shipmates fell upon him, figuratively, tooth and nail, heaping reproaches upon the unhappy man's head for having warned me against the chief mate's astuteness. i did not wait to hear how the matter ended, but, leaving the house briskly, as though i were the bearer of an important message, i hurried across to the wharf and, dropping into the dinghy, cast off her painter and sculled her across to _la belle estelle_, alongside which i coolly went, and, making fast the painter, ascended the gangway ladder and stepped in on deck before anybody condescended to take any notice of me. there were some twenty men, or thereabout, busying themselves about the deck in a very leisurely manner, taking off hatches, hauling taut the running rigging, and so on, under the supervision of a very smart, keen-looking man, dressed, like the skipper of the ship, in white. this man i took to be monsieur favart, the chief mate; so stepping up to him where he stood, at the break of the monkey poop, i raised my hat politely and said: "have i the pleasure to address monsieur favart, the chief mate of this vessel?" "certainly, monsieur," he answered, bringing his piercing black eyes to bear upon me. "and who may you be, my friend, that you find it necessary to ask such a question? i thought i had been here often enough to enable every dweller upon yonder island to at least know jules favart by sight. but i do not seem to remember ever having seen you before." "you have not, monsieur," i answered. "i am quite a new recruit, and only joined just in time to witness the destruction of that pestilent british man-o'-war, the wreck of which you doubtless observed as you entered the river." "we did," he answered; "and we guessed, of course, that it was the wreck of the _psyche_. so that affair came off all right, eh? well, i didn't very well see how it could possibly fail, for we all had a hand in the devising and arranging of it, and we chopped and trimmed away at the plan until i flatter myself that it was as perfect as human ingenuity could make it. but i take it that you did not come aboard here to discuss that matter with me?" "no, indeed," i answered. "my business with you has reference to quite another affair. i bring a message to you from captain lenoir, who is at present discussing with senor morillo the matter of the expected arrival of the cauffle this afternoon. we find ourselves in something of a difficulty over that matter; and your arrival in the nick of time proves most opportune. for you must know that when the _psyche_ was cut adrift and came ashore, her crew were compelled to camp on the beach, yonder; and senor morillo considered that the opportunity to give the english a thorough drubbing was far too good to be let slip; he therefore attacked them in the dead of night, and punished them severely; but i regret to say that our side also suffered very heavily, with the result that a good many of our best men are at this moment on the sick list and unfit for duty. this puts us in a very awkward position; for the cauffle that is arriving is a big one, and rather difficult to handle--so we learn. therefore, in order to avoid all possibility of trouble, senor morillo has arranged with captain lenoir that the latter shall land his crew to lend a hand in keeping the slaves in order when they arrive; and my instructions from the captain are to request that you will at once land, bringing all hands except the idlers with you." "i understand," answered favart. "very well. when is the cauffle expected to arrive?" "it may heave in sight at any moment," i answered. "therefore it is advisable that you should lose no time in obeying captain lenoir's instructions." "trust me, i am not a man to lose time," answered favart with a boisterous laugh. "lenoir knows he may rely upon me. i suppose we ought to go fully armed?" "captain lenoir said nothing about that," i answered. "no, i don't think there will be any need for you to arm yourselves. anyhow, if weapons are needed we have plenty ashore." "very well; so much the better," observed favart; "for it has just occurred to me that the skipper has the keys of the arms chest in his pocket, and we could not get at the weapons, even though we should require them ever so urgently. all right; you may tell the captain to expect me at once. but perhaps you would prefer to remain and go with us--i see that you are one of the lame ducks. did you get that hurt in the fight with the english?" "yes," said i--"a broken arm. it is getting better fast, however; and i dare say i can scull the dinghy back, as i sculled her off, unless you will be charitable enough to give me a tow." "of course i will, with the utmost pleasure," answered favart. and away he bustled forward, shouting an order for all hands to lay aft and get a couple of boats into the water. it was a very great relief to me to be rid of the fellow for a few minutes, for, truth to tell, the interview was beginning to get upon my nerves a bit; i could see that the french seaman's estimate of his chief officer was just, and that favart was indeed "a sharp one." true, i had managed to hoodwink him, thus far, but i was in constant dread of saying or doing something that might awaken his suspicions, in which case all the fat would at once be in the fire; for i had placed myself absolutely in his power, and i judged him to be a man who would take a terrible revenge, should he prematurely discover that something was wrong. moreover, if his suspicions should once be aroused, and verified, not only did we stand to lose the ship-- which i was quite determined to capture--but with twenty stout seamen at his back he was fully capable of recapturing the factory and releasing all the prisoners, when we should find ourselves in a very pretty mess. thus far, however, everything seemed to be going admirably, and i told myself that all i had to do was to keep my nerve and neither say nor do anything to excite suspicion; indeed it was this consideration that caused me to hang about aboard _la belle estelle_ rather than hurry away ashore again as soon as i had delivered my message. there was a great deal of fuss and bustle on board the brig, while the frenchmen were clearing away and lowering the boats; then, with a vast amount of jabber, they went down the side, took their places, and shoved off, with me and my dinghy in tow. now came the critical moment when everything must be won or lost; for, personally, i had done all that was possible, and the rest depended entirely upon the intelligence of the little party of seamen to whom i had entrusted the carrying out of my plan; i had explained that plan to them, and directed them what to do and precisely when to do it, and i was also decoying the enemy into the trap prepared for them; but i foresaw clearly that if my men acted prematurely, and thus gave the alarm, or, on the other hand, allowed the psychological moment to pass before they put in an appearance, the whole affair was likely enough to end in a ghastly tragedy. but while i reflected thus the boats traversed the space of water between the brig and the wharf, and ranged up alongside the landing steps. then, with more excited jabber and shouting, the frenchmen tumbled over the gunwales and up the steps to the top of the wharf, where they stood in a bunch, waiting for further orders. as the last of them ascended the steps, with me bringing up the rear, i glanced across the water toward the spot where i expected the cauffle to appear, and pretended that i caught sight of a cloud of dust rising beyond the trees. as a matter of fact there really was an effect of sunlight that might very easily have been mistaken for a dust cloud, and it was this appearance that gave me the inspiration to act as i now did. "look!" i exclaimed excitedly to favart, pointing at the same moment across the water--"do you see that cloud of dust yonder? that is undoubtedly the cauffle coming along the road; and we must hurry with our arrangements, or we shall be too late. this way, monsieur favart, if you please. come along, lads!" and i led them all at a rapid rate across the open space and into the compound belonging to the smallest barracoon. "straight across, and into the barracoon itself," i panted, making a great show of hurry and excitement; and the frenchmen streamed through the gate like a flock of sheep. as the last man entered, i flung the gate to, dropped the bar into its place, and blew a piercing blast on a whistle which i carried. then, replacing the whistle in my pocket, i drew forth a pistol, and placed my back against the gate. at the first sound of the whistle the frenchmen halted abruptly, instinctively guessing that it was a signal of some sort, while favart turned in his tracks and flung a fierce glance of inquiry at me. something in the expression of my face must have given him the alarm, i think, for after a prolonged stare he suddenly came striding toward me. "halt, monsieur!" i cried sharply, levelling the pistol at him. "another step, and i fire! look behind you." he did so, and beheld eighteen english sailors, armed with muskets, cutlasses, and pistols, file out of the open door of the barracoon and draw up as if on parade. "what does this mean, monsieur?" demanded favart, glaring at me murderously. "simply that you and your men are my prisoners, monsieur," answered i. "nay, do not move, i beg you,"--as the frenchmen seemed to be preparing for a rush. "the man who moves will be shot dead without further warning. it is useless to dream of resistance, for my men are fully armed, while you are not; therefore, to save unnecessary bloodshed, i beg that you will at once surrender. you see the force of my argument, i am sure, monsieur favart?" "i do," he answered grimly; "and of course we surrender, since there is nothing between that and being shot down. but, oh, if i had only suspected this when you were aboard the brig--! well, what do you want us to do?" "have the goodness to march your men into the barracoon, monsieur," said i. "it is but for half an hour or so, until i can make other arrangements for your disposal. i assure you i have not the remotest intention of detaining you there." favart turned and said a word to his men, and the whole party then wheeled and shambled away across the compound and into the open door of the barracoon, which was immediately shut and locked upon them. chapter eight. another stroke of luck. having captured the frenchmen, the next item on the programme was to so arrange matters that they might be at once transferred to other and more comfortable quarters--thus leaving the barracoon free for the reception, if necessary, of the unfortunate slaves now close at hand without running any risk of their getting the better of my little band of invalids. this was not a very difficult matter, for there were plenty of slave irons about the place; and, having procured the necessary number of sets, i had the frenchmen out of the barracoon, four at a time, ironed them, and then marched them out of the compound to a large empty shed which would answer the purpose of a prison most admirably. in less than half an hour i had the entire party secured and in charge of an armed guard of two men; and now all that remained to be done was to obtain possession of the brig. to accomplish this, i chose the soundest eight of the party who had assisted in capturing the frenchmen, and, leading them to the wharf steps, ordered them down into the french captain's gig, which was, of course, still lying alongside the wharf. then, stepping into the stern- sheets myself, we pushed off and headed for the brig, which we boarded a few minutes later without let or hindrance, the small number of hands still remaining on board having apparently gone below and turned in the moment that they saw the chief mate clear of the ship. at all events when we ascended the gangway ladder not a soul was to be seen; our lads therefore quickly clapped on the hatches, beginning with the fore- scuttle, and the brig was ours. then, having made sure that the half- dozen or so of prisoners down in the forecastle could not get loose again, i went up and hauled down the french flag, hoisting it again to the gaff-end beneath an english ensign which i found in the flag-locker. i thought that the sight of the brig, with the two ensigns thus arranged, would be an agreeable sight and afford a pleasant surprise to our people when they returned from capturing the cauffle. it had just gone five bells in the afternoon watch when the skipper's party hove in sight at the spot where the bush path led down to the creek, and where their boats were moored. the brig, of course, at once attracted their attention, and, looking through the ship's telescope at them, i made out captain perry standing alone on a little projecting point, staring hard at her, as though he scarcely knew what to make of her; i therefore ordered four hands into the gig, and, rowing across to where he stood, explained matters. my story took quite a quarter of an hour to tell, for he continually interrupted me to ask questions; but when i had finished he was good enough to express his most unqualified approval of what i had done, winding up by saying-- "i may as well tell you now, mr fortescue--what indeed i had quite made up my mind to before the performance of this exceedingly meritorious piece of work--that it is my intention to give you an acting order as third lieutenant, mr purchase and mr hoskins moving up a step, as well as myself, in consequence of the lamented death of captain harrison." of course i thanked him, as in duty bound; and then he informed me that the ambuscade had been completely successful, the entire cauffle having been captured with the exchange of less than a score of shots; and that although three of the slave-traders had been killed and five wounded, not one of our own men had been hurt. but he added that the unhappy blacks were so completely worn out with their long march down to the coast that it would only be rank cruelty to release them at once, and that he had therefore decided to house them in the barracoons and give them a week's complete rest before starting them back on their long homeward march. "and now, mr fortescue," he concluded, "since that english ensign aboard the prize has done its work, have the goodness to haul it down, and keep the french flag flying, if you please; i quite expect that we shall have two or three more ships here to help in the conveyance of this huge cauffle of slaves across the atlantic; and i do not wish them to be alarmed and put on their guard--should they come upon us unexpectedly--by seeing a vessel riding at anchor with the signal flying that she has been captured by the english." this was, of course, sound common sense, and i lost not a moment in returning to the brig and making the required alteration in the arrangement of the flags. that being done, it occurred to me that it would be a wise thing to clear the remainder of the french crew out of the vessel; and this i also did; afterwards assisting in transporting the miserable slaves across the channel to the island, and helping to arrange for their comfort and well-being during the night. they were, without exception, what the slave-dealers would doubtless have called "a prime lot"--numbering fifteen hundred and eighty-four, of whom less than two hundred were women; but they were all worn to skin and bone with the fatigue and hardship which they had been called upon to endure on the march from their own country down to the coast, and were so dead-beaten with fatigue that they appeared to have sunk into such a state of apathy that even the prospect of immediate rest, plenty of good food, and a speedy restoration to liberty seemed insufficient to lift them out of it. but after they had been made to bathe and thoroughly cleanse themselves from the dust and other impurities of the march, prior to being housed in the barracoons, they seemed to pluck up a little spirit,--a salt-water bath is a wonderful tonic,--and later on in the evening, when a plentiful meal was served out to them, they so far recovered their spirits as to begin to jabber among themselves. it was close upon sunset before the last batch had been ferried across to the island and lodged in the barracoons; and then, in accordance with an order from the skipper, i took a working-party on board the brig, and, casting her off from the buoy to which she had been moored, warped her in alongside the wharf and made her fast there. the next two days were entirely devoid of incident; but we were all kept busy in attending to the unfortunate captive blacks, supervising the bathing of them in batches, inducing them to take a moderate amount of exercise in the barracoon compounds, feeding them up, and nursing the sick--of whom, however, there was luckily a singularly small percentage. but on the morning of the third day, before the gig had started upon her daily cruise of surveillance of the river, the look-out whose turn it was for duty in the crow's-nest had scarcely ascended to his lofty perch in the tree when he hurried down again with the intelligence that three craft--a ship, a barque, and a large brigantine--were in the offing and making for the mouth of the river. whereupon mr purchase volunteered to go aloft, taking me with him as aide-de-camp, to keep an eye upon the strangers, and to transmit intelligence of their movements from time to time. the skipper promptly accepted the offer and, besides, arranged a system by which i was to write mr purchase's messages, carry them from the crow's-nest to the ground, and deliver them over to one of two midshipmen in waiting, who would at once scamper off with it, while i ascended the jacob's ladder again for further information, to be transmitted by the second midshipman--if, meanwhile, the first had not had time to return. this system acted admirably, for it kept the captain fully informed of the course of events, and at the same time left him quite free to attend to such preparations for the reception of the three craft as he might deem necessary. these preparations were beautifully simple, consisting merely in the arming of every man capable of taking part in what would probably prove to be a fairly stubborn fight, manning the boats with the fighting contingent, and then remaining concealed until the approaching craft had come up to the anchorage and made fast to the buoys,--as we fully expected that they would,--when the boats were to make a simultaneous dash at all three craft and carry them by boarding, while we invalids were left to look after the prisoners and see that they did not break out and create a diversion in favour of their friends. meanwhile the land-breeze was fast dying away in the offing, while the sea-breeze had not yet set in, consequently, when the approaching craft arrived within about two miles of the river's mouth they entered a streak of glassy calm, and lay there, rolling heavily, with their sun- bleached canvas napping itself threadbare against their masts and rigging, thus affording us an excellent opportunity to get breakfast at leisure, and fortify ourselves generally against the stress of the coming struggle. we had just comfortably finished our meal, and captain perry had completed his final dispositions, when the look-out who had temporarily taken mr purchase's place in the crow's-nest came down with the intelligence that the sea-breeze was setting in, and might be expected to reach the becalmed craft within the next ten minutes; whereupon the first lieutenant and i returned to our post of observation to watch the progress of the approaching slavers, and report upon it from time to time. upon regaining our perch we saw that the brigantine, which was the outermost craft of the three, had just caught the sea-breeze and, having squared away before it, was coming along almost as fast as the breeze itself; then the barque and the ship caught it within a minute of each other, and presently all three of them were racing straight for the mouth of the river. but they were still a long way off, and, owing to the many twists and turns in the course of the river, would have nearly twenty miles to travel before they could reach the anchorage. and when, some time later, having safely negotiated the bar and entered the river, they arrived at the point where they would have to shift their helms to enter the n'chongo chine lagoon--where we were patiently awaiting them-- we saw that only two of them, the barque and the brigantine, were coming our way, while the ship continued on up the river, presumably bound to the camma lagoon, where poor captain harrison had lost his life in the attack upon the factory. this was a distinct relief to us; for although all our wounded were doing remarkably well, the number of men actually in fighting trim was so small that to tackle the three vessels simultaneously would have been an exceedingly formidable job, whereas we felt that the capture of two of them was well within our powers. moreover it would be comparatively easy to take the ship upon her return down the river, which would doubtless happen immediately upon the discovery of the destruction of the factory to which she was evidently bound. despite the zigzag course that the two approaching craft would have to steer, the sea-breeze afforded them a leading wind all the way to the south-east end of the island, which we occupied; consequently after leaving the river and entering the lagoon they came along at a very rapid rate, the brigantine seeming to be rather the faster craft of the two. meanwhile the skipper, being kept fully informed of the progress of the approaching vessels, had caused our prize, _la belle estelle_, to be warped far enough off from the wharf wall to allow of our boats being placed in ambush between her and the wharf, where they now lay, with their officers and crew already in them, waiting for the moment when the word should be given for them to dash forth from their hiding-place. at length the brigantine, with the barque less than a cable's length astern of her--both of them flying spanish colours at their gaff-ends-- arrived within a mile of the spot where it would be necessary for her to luff up in order to fetch the anchorage, whereupon purchase and i descended from our look-out, and, having made our final report to the skipper, went our several ways--the first to take command of the pinnace in the impending attack, and i to place myself at the head of the convalescents, my duty being to assist as might be required, and to see that the prisoners did not seize the opportunity to become troublesome. the prisoners were all confined in outbuildings at the rear of the settlement, and it was there that my little band of armed convalescents were assembled; consequently i was obliged to station myself where i could keep an eye upon and be in touch with them. yet i was quite determined that, even though i must keep one eye upon my own especial command, and the buildings over which they were mounting guard, i would also witness the attack upon the approaching slavers. ultimately, after two or three unsuccessful attempts, i succeeded in finding a spot from which i could accomplish both objects, and at the same time sit comfortably in the shadow of a building. a few minutes later, from behind the belt of trees and scrub that extended along the whole southern shore of the islet, i beheld the end of the brigantine's flying-jib-boom slide into view, with the flying- jib, recently hauled down, napping loosely in the wind; then followed the rest of the spar, with the standing jib also hauled down, and a couple of men out on the boom, busily engaged in stowing it; then her fore-topmast staysail, beautifully cut and drawing like a whole team of horses, swept into view, followed by the fore part of a very handsome hull bearing the foremast, with the topsail still set, the topgallantsail and royal clewed up and in process of being furled, and the course hanging from the foreyard in graceful festoons. finally came the remaining length of hull with the towering mainmast supporting a mainsail as handsomely cut and setting as flat as that of a yacht. she was a most beautiful vessel, sitting very low in the water, and therefore, perhaps, looking even longer than she actually was. she was broadside-on to me, so i could not see what amount of beam she showed; consequently it was a little difficult to estimate her size, but, judging from her general appearance, i put it down at about two hundred and twenty tons. she was painted a brilliant grass green from her rail to her copper, and showed four ports of a side, out of which peered the muzzles of certain brass cannon that i decided were probably long nines. the vessel reached across the narrow channel and went in stays quite close to the tree-clad northern shore of the lagoon--thus at once exhibiting her own exceedingly shallow-draught of water and her skipper's intimate knowledge of the locality--just as the barque in turn hove in sight. this last vessel had nothing at all remarkable in her appearance, except perhaps that her canvas was exceptionally well cut, but she was by no means a beauty, and to the eye presented all the characteristics of the ordinary merchantman, being painted black, with a broad white band round her upon which were depicted ten painted ports. but these appearances of honesty were deceptive, for despite the general "motherliness" of her aspect she was almost as speedy a ship as the brigantine, although she had by this time shortened down to her two topsails and fore-topmast staysail. also, with the aid of my telescope, i was able to discern, above the blatant pretence of the painted ports, six closed ports of a side, which i had no doubt concealed as many cannon. the brigantine, tacking as smartly and handily as a little boat, came round and headed well up for the weathermost buoy, to which she made fast a few minutes later, with the barque close upon her heels. until the latter had also made fast to a buoy--the one astern of the brigantine--a dead silence reigned over the settlement, broken only by the shouts of the people on board the two new arrivals as they went noisily about their work of clewing up, hauling down, and furling their canvas; but the moment that the barque was fast to her buoy and the men who had bent the cable to the buoy had returned on board, there arose a sudden rattle and splash of oars, and our concealed boats swept out from their hiding-place between the brig and the wharf and made a dash for the two craft, half of them going for the brigantine while the other half struck out for the barque. the surprise, admirably managed by the skipper, was complete; for the greater part of the crews of the two vessels was aloft furling the canvas at the moment when our boats appeared; and although their appearance served as a signal for the men aloft to swing themselves off the yards and descend to the deck by way of the backstays, yet before they had time to arm themselves and prepare for an effective resistance our lads were alongside and swarming in over the low rails of the two craft; and a very brief scuffle sufficed to place them in possession of both. upon inspection, they proved to be undoubted slavers, for they were not only fitted with slave-decks, but had a full supply of water and meal on board; in fact they were ready for the immediate reception of their human cargo, which, but for our interference, they could have shipped and gone to sea again in a very few hours. the barque was named _don miguel_, of three hundred and forty-seven tons measurement, hailing from havana; with a crew of fifty-six, all told; and she mounted twelve twelve-pounders, with an ample supply of ammunition for them in her magazine. the brigantine rejoiced in the name _el caiman_. she was a trifle bigger than i had estimated her to be, her papers showing her tonnage to be two hundred and thirty. she carried a crew of forty; and mounted eight beautiful brass long nines on her broadsides, as well as a long eighteen pivoted on her forecastle. she hailed from santiago de cuba, and was quite a new ship; whereas the _don miguel_ was nearly twenty years old, and leaked like a basket when heavily pressed by her canvas, as some of us soon discovered. none of our people were hurt in the scrimmage which resulted in the capture of these two craft; as soon, therefore, as their crews had been taken out of them and securely confined, captain perry made ready to sally forth and capture the ship which had gone up the river, and which might be expected to return immediately upon discovering the destruction of the factory on the camma lagoon. it was regarded as just possible that, finding the up-river factory destroyed, her captain might make his way to our anchorage, in the hope of securing a cargo from our factory; but, on the other hand, it was also possible that he might get an inkling of our presence somewhere in the river, and go straight to sea again, preferring to try his luck on some other part of the coast. there was just sufficient time for our lads to get a meal in comfort before the moment arrived for them to shove off and make their way to the mouth of the lagoon in order to intercept, and prevent the escape of, the returning ship; the skipper therefore gave orders to pipe all hands to dinner, and while the meal was in progress he made his dispositions for the forthcoming expedition. as before, i was left in charge of the convalescents to take care of the sick and see that the prisoners--now, of course, considerably augmented in numbers by our most recent captures--did not get into mischief. but although i was not permitted to participate in the fun, i was in no mood to lose it altogether; i therefore waited patiently until the little flotilla of boats had started--and my services on their account were no longer required--and then, having first gone the rounds of the place and satisfied myself that everything was perfectly safe, i slung my telescope over my shoulder and made my way aloft to the crow's-nest, wherein i comfortably settled myself, and, levelling my glass over a big branch that served admirably as a rest for it, prepared to watch the progress of the boats and, as i hoped, witness the capture of the ship. the crow's-nest was rigged among the topmost branches of the highest tree on the islet, the view obtainable from it was very extensive, embracing an arc of the horizon of nearly one hundred and eighty degrees, which included, on my far right, the mouth of the river, some twenty miles distant, and a few miles of the offing beyond, while stretching away to the left of that point, toward the southward and eastward, could be traced the entire course of the river as far as the native town of olomba, and thence onward to the camma lagoon, while the near and middle distance was occupied by the waters of the n'chongo chine lagoon, with--in the present instance--the boat flotilla carrying on under a heavy press of canvas to fetch the passage giving access to the river. i watched these for some time, observing with interest the gallant manner in which the captain's gig, under a spread of canvas that was manifestly too much for her in the roaring sea-breeze that was now blowing, struggled along and contrived to still retain the lead of the bigger and more powerful boats; and then i began to search the river for signs of the returning ship, for i calculated that by this time she must have arrived at her destination and discovered the destruction of the factory; so it was a question what the skipper of her would do upon making the discovery. that she was not in the camma lagoon was pretty evident, for almost the whole expanse of that sheet of water was in full view from my look-out, and i could scarcely have failed to see her, had she been there; i therefore carefully inspected the course of the river more toward olomba, and presently i caught a glimpse of her upper canvas sliding along past the belt of mangroves and bush that bordered the river. she was beating down against the sea-breeze, with a strong current under her lee bow hawsing her up to windward, and was making very rapid progress. then i allowed my glances to return to the boats, and wondered whether those in them could see the ship. i came to the conclusion that they could not, being by this time too far over toward the other side of the lagoon, and consequently too close in to the mangroves to be able to see over them. i now most ardently wished that i had thought of arranging to display a signal warning them of the approach of the ship, for it would be a piece of information very useful for them to possess under the existing circumstances; but i had not, so there was no use in worrying about it. and even as i came to this conclusion the gig, still leading, disappeared within the narrow channel giving access to the river, and was quickly followed by the other boats, until the whole had vanished. and now i could but guess what was happening in the channel, and watch the movements of the ship. by the time that the last of the boats had disappeared, and i was free to again direct my attention to the larger craft, she had worked down the river as far as the entrance of the creek giving access to olomba; and when she next hove about i soon saw, by the length of time that she was holding on the same tack, that she was making a long "leg" down the main channel of the river. but she still had some ten miles of river to traverse before she would reach the spot at which it had been arranged that the boats should lie in ambush for her; and, fast as she was travelling, i estimated that it would take her at least an hour to cover that distance. i therefore drew out my watch, noted the time, and then set myself patiently to await the course of events, keenly watching her movements meanwhile. i noticed that, thanks to the exquisite cut of her canvas, she was looking well up into the wind, and i thought it possible that, with this advantage, she might perhaps reach the spot where the boats were awaiting her, without breaking tacks, which would be an advantage for our people, for it would throw her so close to the place of ambush that it would cause the attack almost to take the form of a surprise. and so it did, as i afterward learned; for when at length her skipper was compelled to put his helm down and go about, in order to avoid grounding on the mud of the eastern bank of the river, the ship was in the very mouth of the creek wherein our boats were lurking; and while the ship was in stays, and all hands of her crew were busily engaged in tending the tacks, sheets, and braces, our people dashed alongside and took her almost without striking a blow. chapter nine. we leave the fernan vaz. of course nothing of this was perceptible from my look-out in the crow's-nest; the only thing of a suggestive character that came to my notice was that when, looking through my telescope, i saw the ship hove in stays, i observed that the operation of swinging the after yards seemed to be only partially performed, while the head sails remained aback for an unconscionable length of time, from which i concluded that at that precise moment events were happening on board her. when, some five minutes later, i saw her yards trimmed, and presently observed her come about again and bear away for the lagoon, instead of holding her luff down the river, i was able to make a pretty accurate guess as to what had happened. i remained aloft, however, until she slid through the narrow channel leading from the river into the lagoon, when i saw that she had all our boats towing astern of her in a string; whereupon i descended, for i knew that to betoken the fact that she was now in the possession of our people. she came along very fast, and as she drew nearer i saw that she was an exceedingly handsome vessel, by far the most handsome, indeed, that i had ever seen. she was frigate-built, seven hundred and forty tons measurement, her three masts accurately parallel, raking slightly aft, and stayed to a hair, while her snow-white canvas was more beautifully cut than that of many a yacht. she was painted black all over--hull, masts, and yards; and her royal yards hoisted close up under the trucks, like those of a man-o'-war. if she was anything like as good as she looked we had secured a prize that was indeed worth having. the skipper had instructed me that he might possibly bring the prize directly alongside the wharf, and that i was to make all the necessary preparations to assist in the operation. i accordingly turned out my contingent and mustered them on the wharf, at the next berth ahead of that occupied by _la belle estelle_, with an ample supply of hawsers and heaving-lines at the bollards; and by the time that i was quite ready the ship was in sight, luffing round the point and hauling up for the anchorage. but instead of making a board across to the mainland, as all the others had done, the skipper kept his helm down until she was all a- shiver, when everything was let go at the same instant, the square canvas shrivelled up to the yards, the fore and aft canvas was brailed in, or hauled down, and then, as a strong party of men sprang aloft and laid out upon the yards, the beautiful craft came sliding along, with the way which she still had on her, straight for the wharf. the skipper had calculated his distance to a nicety, for her momentum was sufficient to bring her handsomely up to her berth, but not enough to impose any undue strain upon the hawsers in checking her and bringing her alongside; this part of the work being done by my gang, while the men who had captured her were still aloft busily furling the canvas. as soon as she was securely moored and a gangway plank rigged, i went aboard and had a good look at our latest acquisition. there could be no doubt as to the fact that she was a slaver; for her slave-decks were already fitted, and she carried all the requisites, including meal and water, for the transport of a very large cargo of slaves. she was, in fact, the largest slaver i ever saw, and had accommodation to--i had almost said _comfortably_--carry at least eight hundred slaves. she was spanish; named the _dona josefa_; hailed from havana; was oak-built, coppered, and copper-fastened; was a brand-new ship, worth half a dozen _psyches_; and her cabin accommodation aft was the most spacious and elegantly fitted that i had ever seen. she was armed with eighteen twenty-four pounders, and carried a crew of ninety-eight, all told. she was, in short, a most formidable ship; and, but for the fact of our having taken her by surprise as we did, she might have bade defiance to the slave squadron for years, and paid for herself twenty times over. naturally, the skipper was in high feather at so brilliant a series of successes as we had met with, for he had not been altogether without his anxious moments as to what might be the result of the inevitable court- martial that awaited us all for the loss of the _psyche_; but he flattered himself that the authorities could not possibly be hard upon officers who brought in four such rich prizes as ours. and now there began to be general talk about leaving the river and reporting ourselves at sierra leone; for not only had we ships in plenty to accommodate all hands, but those among us who were most experienced felt that, after having made such a clean sweep as we had, it was exceedingly unlikely that there would be any more chances to capture either slaves or ships in the fernan vaz for some time to come. still, it would not be possible for us to go quite at once; for even now there remained several matters to be attended to, the most important being the disposal of the blacks whom we had captured from the slave-traders. although these had come a long distance down from the interior, there was no doubt that they would be able to find their way back to their homes; whereas, if we carried them to sierra leone, the chances were that they would never see either home or relatives again. therefore although, strictly speaking, it was our duty to take them to sierra leone with us, the skipper decided to strain a point, if necessary, and give the poor wretches the opportunity to decide for themselves which alternative should be adopted. accordingly, the question was put to them, through cupid, with the result that they decided, unanimously, to return by the way that they came rather than trust themselves to the tender mercies of the sea, which none of them had seen, and few had heard of, before. but they begged a few days longer in which to rest and recuperate before they were despatched on their long journey; and this the skipper cheerfully accorded them, although he was now all anxiety to get away. after the negroes had been given a full week in which to recover their health and strength, they were mustered early on a certain morning, given a good breakfast, allowed to load themselves up with as much meal as they chose to take, furnished with a few boarding-pikes and cutlasses from the prizes wherewith to defend themselves on the way, and transported across the harbour and fairly started upon their journey. then, having already completed our own preparations for departure, our prisoners were apportioned out among the four prizes, put down in the holds on top of the ballast and made perfectly secure, and the officers and men then proceeded to take up their quarters on board the vessels to which they had severally been appointed by the skipper. the captain himself naturally took command of the _josefa_, with mr purchase as his first lieutenant; mr hoskins was given the command of the _don miguel_, with copplestone and parkinson from our old midshipman's berth to bear him company and keep him from becoming too completely satisfied with life; mr marline, the master, was placed in charge of _la belle estelle_, with the boatswain's mate to assist him; and, lastly, the skipper was good enough to show his confidence in me by giving me the brigantine to navigate to sierra leone--our common destination--with the gunner's mate and jack keene as my deck officers. as there was not very much room in the anchorage for manoeuvring, we got under way in succession, the _josefa_ taking the lead, followed by _don miguel_, after which went _la belle estelle_, while _el caiman_, with her canvas set, strained at the cable which secured her to the buoy, as though she were afraid of being left behind. but _i_ had a duty to perform before i cast off from the buoy at which the brigantine was straining; therefore, while the other vessels got under way, i and my boat's crew stood on the wharf and quietly watched them go. then, as soon as the brig was fairly clear of the anchorage, i went, with two of my boat's crew, to the leewardmost building of the settlement and set light to a little pile of combustibles that had been carefully arranged in each room, finally thrusting a blazing torch into the thatch upon quitting the building. and in the same way we proceeded to each building in turn, until the entire settlement, barracoons and all, was a roaring furnace of flame. then, bidding my crew get down into the boat and stand by to shove off in a hurry, i proceeded to a certain spot and set fire to an end of slow match that was protruding from a box sunk into the ground near the wharf face, after which i picked up my heels and scampered off, best leg foremost, for the boat, into which i sprang, without much consideration for my dignity, and gave the word to shove off. the boat's crew, who were fully aware of my reasons for haste, lost no time in obeying the order, and the next instant we were foaming away toward the brigantine, from the deck of which the hoarse voice of tasker, the gunner's mate, now reached us, bawling an order for those for'ard to "stand by to slip!" but before we were half-way across the intervening stretch of water a dull "boom" resounded astern of us, and a length of some fifty feet of wharf face suddenly leapt outward and fell with a heavy splash into the water, followed, about half a minute later, by a second "boom" and splash, then a third, fourth, fifth, and so on, until the entire wharf was completely destroyed and the whole place a ghastly, fire-swept ruin. then we, too, turned our backs upon what, a short time before, had been one of the most extensive, important, and conveniently situated slave factories on the whole of the west coast, and made sail to rejoin our companions. we overtook them about half a mile outside the bar; and when i had signalled the commodore that my mission of destruction was fulfilled, he hoisted a general signal setting a course of north-west by west for cape palmas; and, when this had been acknowledged, hoisted another to "try rate of sailing." this, of course, was the same thing as giving the word for a race, and, the weather being moderate at the time, we each at once proceeded to pile upon our respective commands every rag of canvas that we could find a yard, boom, or stay for. the race proved an exceedingly interesting and exciting event, for all the vessels were fast. the wind being off the land, the water was smooth for the first three or four hours of the race; and during that time there was scarcely a pin to choose between the _josefa_ and the brigantine, first one and then the other contriving to get the lead by a length or two, while the brig and the barque also made a neck-and-neck race of it but very gradually dropped astern until, by the time that we had run the land out of sight, the _josefa_ and the brigantine were leading by nearly a mile, which lead we very gradually increased. by this time, however, the breeze had freshened up considerably, and the sea had got up, whereupon the _josefa_ displayed so marked a superiority that she had to take in all three royals and her mizzen topgallantsail to avoid running away from the rest of us. but, contrary to my expectations, _el caiman_, which was an exceedingly beamy, shallow vessel, behaved so well under the new conditions that we also could spare the barque and brig our royal and still keep ahead of them. the weather remained fine, and we made a very quick and pleasant passage to sierra leone, where our arrival under such unusual conditions, and the report of our doings and adventures, created quite a sensation. also we happened to arrive at a most opportune moment; for there were three british men-o'-war in harbour at the time, and we were, therefore, able to undergo at once, and on the spot, our trial by court-martial for the loss of the _psyche_, instead of being obliged to return to england for the ordeal. the trial took place on the fourth day after our arrival; and, as a matter of course, those of us who had been away in the boats at the time of the wreck were acquitted and exonerated from all blame. but poor purchase, who had been left in charge of the ship, was not so fortunate, the court finding that, in the first place, he had been negligent in that he had not maintained a sufficiently careful look-out to preserve the ship from being maliciously cut adrift; and that, in the second place, he had let go the two stream anchors prematurely and before the actual necessity for such a precaution arose, but for which act he would have had the stream anchors available to let go when he discovered that the ship was adrift, and might thus have checked her shoreward drift long enough to permit of other measures being taken for the safety of the ship, even if the streams had not brought her up altogether. for these acts of negligence the prisoner was sentenced to be reprimanded, to lose two years' seniority, and to be dismissed his ship! fortunately for purchase, the sentence was not quite so severe as it sounded, for the _osprey_--one of the men-o'-war in harbour--happened to have a vacancy for a lieutenant, and the commodore, after hearing purchase's story of the disaster from his own lips, unhesitatingly gave him the appointment. the fact of the three ships being in port also suggested to me the possibility of getting through my examination, forthwith; i therefore ventured to speak to captain perry about it, who very kindly explained my desire to the commodore. the commodore, in turn, caused a few inquiries to be made, when it was ascertained that, among the three ships, there were sufficient midshipmen desirous of passing to justify the arrangement of an examination; and within the next fortnight i had the satisfaction of finding myself a full-blown lieutenant. meanwhile, the mixed commission had condemned all four of our prizes--as indeed they could not avoid doing--and the crews were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment with hard labour in chains upon the roads. then there arose the question of replacing the _psyche_ on the station; and at the earnest representation of captain perry the commodore was induced to take upon himself the responsibility of purchasing the _josefa_ into the service, rechristening her the _eros_, and commissioning her under the command of captain perry, who at once arranged for the whole of the officers and crew of the _psyche_ to accompany him. then, arising out of the loss of the _psyche_, another matter was brought to the fore which was destined to exercise a very important influence upon my fortunes. this matter had reference to the dearth of shallow-draught vessels in the slave squadron vessels capable of following the slavers in over the bars of the african rivers and fighting them upon equal terms. at the moment in question we had not a ship in the squadron drawing less than fourteen feet of water; consequently, when a slaver entered a shallow river, or a river with a shallow bar, such a course of procedure as that which had led up to the loss of the _psyche_ was imperative; and it was very strongly felt that the time had arrived for an improvement in the conditions. the result was that _el caiman_ also was purchased into the service, rechristened the _dolphin_, and placed under my command with a crew of sixty, all told; of whom, however, jack keene, midshipman, and tasker, the gunner's mate--who in his new ship held the rank of gunner--were the only individuals with whom i had already been shipmate; the rest were a motley crowd indeed, collected out of the gutters and slums of freetown. the _dolphin_, it was arranged, was to act in the first instance as tender to the _eros_; but, later, might perhaps be detached for certain special work which was just then beginning to attract the attention of the authorities. there was, however, still another matter that was at that moment forcing itself upon the attention of the commodore; and that was the doings of two craft which were pursuing the nefarious business of slavers, with a measure of audacity that was only equalled by the impunity with which they worked. they were said to be sister ships, undoubtedly built from the same model, most probably launched from the same stocks, and made to resemble each other so absolutely in every respect, down to the most insignificant detail, that it was impossible to distinguish one from the other, excepting at close quarters. but one was an american--named the _virginia_, hailing from new orleans, and manned by a yankee crew--while the other--the _preciosa_--sailed under the spanish flag, and was manned by spaniards. they were phenomenally fast vessels, and simply laughed at the efforts of ships of the squadron to overtake them; but they had been caught in calms on three or four occasions, and boarded by means of boats; when, by a curious freak of fortune, if the boarding party happened to be british, it always proved to be the american that they had boarded; while, if the boarders happened to be american, it was the spaniard that they found themselves meddling with. thus, as there was no treaty existing between spain and the united states of america on the one hand, and england and the united states on the other, conferring mutual rights of search and capture, the vessels had thus far escaped. but now, with two such speedy craft as the _eros_ and the _dolphin_, it was confidently hoped that the spaniard at least would soon be brought to book; when, there being no possibility of further confusion, it was believed that the americans--who, in consequence of repeated disappointments, had manifested a disposition to leave both craft severely alone--might be induced to renew their interest and speedily capture the _virginia_. as soon as captain perry learned that his special mission was to put a stop to the operations of these notorious vessels, he made it his business to institute exhaustive inquiries in every direction, with the object of acquiring the fullest possible information relative to their movements. although he had been unable to learn anything very definite he had finally come to the conclusion that at least one of them--which one he could not be certain--was now well on her way to the other side of the atlantic; so he reasoned that if we proceeded with all despatch to the west indies, and maintained a careful watch upon the mouth of the old bahama channel, we should be almost certain to fall in with one or the other of them upon her next eastward trip. accordingly, on a certain day, the _eros_ and the _dolphin_ sailed in company from sierra leone, and, having made a good offing, caught the trade-wind, blowing fresh, to which we in the _dolphin_ showed every rag of canvas we could set, while the _eros_ kept us company by furling her royals and letting run the topgallant halliards from time to time when she manifested a disposition to creep away from us. we did the run across in the quickest time on record, up to that date, making the sombrero in a fortnight, almost to the hour, from the moment of leaving sierra leone, without starting tack, sheet, or halliard--so far as the _dolphin_ was concerned--during the entire passage. but now, with the sombrero in sight and anegada only about one hundred miles ahead, we felt that we were practically on our cruising ground; the _eros_ therefore shortened sail to her three topsails and jib and signalling to the _dolphin_ to do the like in proportion and to close, requested me to proceed on board for fresh orders. i was glad enough to obey these instructions, particularly the one relative to shortening sail, for the past fortnight of "carrying on" had been a distinctly anxious time for me; moreover it was a pleasant change to find myself on the comparatively spacious deck of the _eros_, and once more surrounded by the familiar faces of my former shipmates. there was scant time, however, for the interchange of greetings, for captain perry was in a perfect fever of anxiety to complete his arrangements, and i was no sooner through the gangway than he hustled me off to his handsome and delightfully cool cabin under the poop, where, over a large-scale chart of the west indies, he explained to me in much detail the course of action that he had planned for the two craft. this, in brief, consisted in the adoption of measures which enabled us, while remaining within signalling distance of each other all day, to keep an effective watch upon a stretch of sea some forty miles wide--over which we felt certain the vessel of which we were in search must sooner or later pass--while at sunset we were to close and remain in touch all night. this, of course, was an excellent plan so far as it went, but it was open to the objection that the craft for which we were on the look-out might slip past us unobserved during the night. that, however, was something that could not be helped; moreover, there was a moon coming which would help us, and according to captain perry's calculations one or the other of the two craft was almost certain to turn up ere that waxing moon had materially waned. and turn up she did, shortly after midnight on the fifth night following our arrival upon our cruising ground. the moon was by that time approaching her second quarter, was well above the horizon by sunset, and was affording enough light to enable us to distinguish the rig and chief characteristics of a vessel eight miles away. to my very great gratification it was the look-out aboard the _dolphin_ who first sighted her, she being at that time hull-down in the south-western quarter and reaching athwart our hawse on the starboard tack; thus as the _eros_ and ourselves were hove-to, also on the starboard tack, she rapidly neared us. at first the only thing that we could clearly distinguish was that she was a full-rigged ship--as were the _virginia_ and the _preciosa_-- but, even so, there were certain details connected with her rig which, while not being exactly peculiar, corresponded with similar details referred to in the description of the two notorious slavers, as ascertained by captain perry; i therefore made a lantern signal to the _eros_--under the shelter of our mainsail, so that the stranger to leeward might not see our lights and take the alarm--calling attention to the fact that there was a suspicious sail in sight to the south-west; and this signal was simply acknowledged without comment. but i saw that almost immediately afterwards the _eros_ swung her main-yard, boarded her fore and main tacks, and hauled to the wind with the object, of course, of preventing the strange sail from working out to windward of us; and a few minutes later i got a signal from the commodore instructing me to remain hove-to for the present, and, later, to act as circumstances might require. the stranger was under all plain sail, to topgallantsails, and was slipping through the water like a witch; but i had very little fear of her outsailing the _eros_, for, fast as that ship had been when she first fell into our hands, the skipper had improved her speed on a wind nearly a knot, merely by a careful readjustment of the ballast; and now she fully justified my faith in her by handsomely holding her own, and perhaps rather more, but this i could scarcely judge, for since we remained hove-to, the others rapidly drew away from us. i waited with what patience i could muster until the stranger had worked out to a position some five miles ahead of us, and two points on our lee bow, and then i determined to wait no longer, for i felt that if, perchance, anything were to happen aboard the _eros_--if, for example, she were to carry away or even spring a spar--and the trade-wind was piping up strongly--our unknown friend might very easily give us the slip; i therefore gave orders to swing the foreyard and make sail, piling on the brigantine everything we could show, even to the royal and flying-jib. and it was well that we did so, for half an hour later, strangely enough, my fears with regard to the _eros_ were realised, an extra heavy puff of wind snapping our consort's fore-topgallant-mast short off at the cap, and causing her to luff sharply into the wind with her big flying-jib dragging in the water under her forefoot. that the stranger was not anxious to make our closer acquaintance at once became apparent, for no sooner did her people perceive the accident that had befallen the _eros_--which was within a minute of its occurrence--than they put down their helm, tacked, and endeavoured to slip away out to windward clear of us both. the _dolphin_, however, was doing exceptionally well just then, the combination of wind and sea seemed to exactly suit her, and i felt that, although i had perhaps unduly delayed taking action, we could more than hold our own with the stranger provided that it blew no harder--and i therefore held on grimly, presently receiving a signal from the _eros_ to take up the chase, which she would resume as soon as she had repaired damages. shortly afterward the stranger reached out across the bows of the _eros_, beyond cannon-shot, and although the skipper fired two blank charges and a shotted gun to bring her to she took no notice, a fact which made me more determined than ever, if possible, to get within speaking distance of her. the _eros_, meanwhile, having cleared away her wreckage, had stowed her mizen topgallantsail, brailed up her spanker, and filled away again; and when we passed her, some three-quarters of an hour later, and about a mile to windward, they had already sent down the stump of her topgallant-mast and had prepared the topgallant rigging for the reception of the new spar. the moment that we arrived in the wake of the stranger we tacked and stood directly after her; and we had not been on the new tack more than ten minutes when i found, to my great gratification, that the _dolphin_, despite the exceeding shallowness of her hull, was quite as weatherly a vessel as the chase, which was now nearly four miles ahead of us. but it was not until we had been in direct pursuit of her for a full hour that i was able to assure myself that we were undoubtedly gaining on her. yes, we were gaining on her, but it was _so_ slowly that it was not until sunrise next morning that we were within gun-shot of her; and now, in response to our first shot, she let fly her royal and topgallant halliards, flowed her jib-sheet, and backed her main-yard to allow us to come up with her. as, still carrying on, we rapidly approached the handsome craft, i was busily engaged, with the aid of my glass, in discovering, one after the other, the various points of resemblance between her and the vessels that had been described to us, and i could have kicked myself with vexation when, in answer to the hoisting of our ensign, we saw the stars and stripes of the united states flutter out over her taffrail and go soaring aloft to her gaff-end. and almost at the same instant, she now being out of the dazzle of the sun, i was able to read, legibly inscribed on her stern, the words "virginia. new orleans!" with the usual perverse luck that had attended the efforts of the british, we had dropped upon the wrong ship of the pair; the _virginia_ was american, and we had no power to interfere with her. nevertheless, having gone so far in the matter as to bring her to, i was determined to board her and get a sight of her papers; a spanish vessel might hoist american colours if she happened to find herself in a tight corner and believed that she might thereby escape. while, as for the name--ah! that certainly was a difficulty not to be easily got over; a ship could scarcely change the name painted on her stern as easily as a chameleon changes his colour, without affording some indication that the change had been made. still, the slavers were up to all sorts of extraordinary dodges, and--well, i would at least inspect the _virginia's_ papers, and satisfy myself that they were in order. chapter ten. the virginia of new orleans. having arrived within pistol-shot of the chase, we hove-to to windward of her, lowered a boat, and i proceeded to board her. as we swept round under her stern, in order to reach her lee gangway, i took a good look at the name on her counter. yes; there was nothing of pretence or fraud about it, so far as i could see; the words were not only painted upon the wood, but were actually cut deep into it as well; and, furthermore, the paint had all the appearance of having been applied at the same time as that on the rest of her hull. upon our arrival alongside i was somewhat surprised to observe that the crew had not taken the trouble to throw open the gangway, or put over a side ladder; i had therefore to watch my opportunity and scramble aboard by way of the main chains. the _virginia_ was a very fine craft indeed, measuring quite eight hundred tons, and carrying a fine, lofty, full poop, by the rail of which stood a typical yankee, eyeing me with even greater malevolence than the yankee of that day was wont to exhibit toward the britisher. he was tall, lean, and cadaverous, with long, straight, colourless hair reaching almost to his shoulders, and a scanty goatee beard adorning his otherwise clean-shaven face. his outer garments, consisting of blue swallow-tail coat with brass buttons and white kerseymere waistcoat and trousers--the former also trimmed with brass buttons--seemed to have been made for a man many sizes smaller than himself; for the coat was distinctly short at the waist, while the sleeves terminated some four inches above the wrist; his waistcoat revealed some two inches of soiled shirt between its lower hem and the top of his trousers; and the latter garments did not reach his bony ankles by quite three inches. he wore an enormous stick-up collar reaching almost to the level of his eyes; his head was graced by an old white beaver hat of the pattern worn by the postboys at that period, and the nap looked as though it had never been brushed the right way since it had been worked up into a hat. on his feet he wore white cotton stockings or socks and low-cut slippers; he carried both hands in his trousers pockets, and his left cheek was distended by a huge plug of tobacco, upon which he was chewing vigorously when i scrambled in over the rail and leaped down on the deck. as i did so i raised my hat and courteously bade him good-morning. instead of returning my greeting, he ejected a copious stream of tobacco-juice in my direction so dexterously that i had some difficulty in avoiding it, and then remarked-- "waal, my noble britisher, what the tarnation mischief do yew mean by firin' them brass popguns of yourn at me, eh? what right have yew to shoot at a ship flyin' the galorious stars and stripes? d'ye see them handsome barkers of mine?"--pointing to a fine display of eighteen- pounders, six of a side, mounted in the ship's main-deck battery. "waal, i was in more'n half a mind to give ye a dose from them in answer to your shot; and yew may thank my mate here, mr silas jenkins, for persuadin' me outer the notion! and what d'ye want, anyway, now that yew're here, and be hanged to ye?" "i have taken the liberty to board your ship for the purpose of getting a sight of your papers," i answered. "our information is that there are two sister ships--this vessel, and a spanish craft named the _preciosa_ which are doing a roaring trade in carrying slaves across the atlantic; and it is part of my duty to lay hands on the _preciosa_ if i can. your vessel answers to her description in every particular save that of name and the flag she flies; and therefore, having fallen in with you, i felt that i should not be doing my duty unless i boarded you and inspected your papers." "waal, i'll be jiggered!" exclaimed the skipper, turning to his mate. "hear that, silas? i'll bet yew ten dollars the critter calls hisself a sailor, and yet he can't tell the difference between the _virginia_ and the _preciosa_ without lookin' at their papers! i'll tell ye, stranger, where the difference is between them two vessels. one on 'em has v-i-r- g-i-n-i-a, n-e-w o-r-l-e-a-n-s cut--_cut_, mind you--and painted on her starn, and she flies that galorious flag that's floatin' up thar," pointing to the american ensign fluttering from the gaff-end--"while t'other has the words p-r-e-c-i-o-s-a, h-a-v-a-n-a cut and painted on hern, and she flies a yaller flag with two red bars. i know, because i've seen her--ay, most as often as i've seen the _'ginia_! now, sonny, d'ye think ye'll be able to remember that little lesson in sailormanship that a free-born american citizen has been obliged to give ye?" i laughed. "thank you for nothing," said i. "and now i will trouble you for a sight of those papers that we were speaking of." "i'll be darned if yew will, though, stranger!" he snapped. "no, sirree; not much, i don't think! why, yew're even more ignorant than i thought yew was, and i must teach ye another little bit of yewr business. why, yew goldarned britisher, d'ye know that yew haven't got no right at all to stop me from pursooin' my v'yage, or to demand a sight o' my papers? supposin' i was to report this outrage to my gover'ment, what d'ye suppose would happen? why, our men-o'-war would just up and sink every stinkin' britisher that they comed across!" "ah, indeed!" i retorted sarcastically. "very well; now we'll have a look at those papers; after which you may take whatever steps you deem fit." "and supposin' i refuse?"--began the skipper. but the mate, seeing, i imagine, that i would take no denial, seized his irate superior by the arm and, leading him right aft, conversed with him in low tones for nearly five minutes, at the end of which time they both came forward to the break of the poop, and the skipper, descending the poop ladder, remarked ungraciously: "waal, since nothin' less than seein' my papers 'll satisfy ye, ye'd better come into my cabin, and i'll show 'em to yew." whereupon i followed him in through a passage which gave access to a fine, airy poop cabin, plainly but comfortably fitted up, and seated myself, uninvited, upon a cushioned locker while my companion went alone into his state-room, returning, a minute or two later, with a large tin box, the contents of which he laid upon the table. "thar they are," he exclaimed, pushing them toward me; "look at 'em as long as yew like! i guess yew won't find nothin' wrong with 'em." nor did i. i inspected them with the utmost care, and ultimately came to the conclusion that they were genuine, and that the ship was undoubtedly the _virginia_, and american. "waal," exclaimed the yankee skipper, when i at length refolded and handed the papers back to him, "are ye satisfied, stranger?" i intimated that i was. "then git out o' here, ye darned galoot, as quick as you knows how," he snarled, "and thank your lucky stars that i don't freshen yewr way wi' a rope's end!" then, suddenly changing his tune, as he followed me out on deck and saw me glance round, he remarked: "purty ship, ain't she? and roomy for her size. guess i can stow away all of seven hundred niggers down below, and not lose more'n twenty per cent of 'em on an ordinary average passage. and the _preciosa_ is the very spit of this here craft--built in the same yard, she was, and from the same lines; there ain't a pin to choose atween 'em. now, if yew was only lucky enough to fall in with _her_, stranger, i guess she'd be a prize worth havin', eh?" "she would!" i agreed. "and, what's more, my friend, we mean to have her, sooner or later." "yew don't say!" he jeered. "waal, i guess yew'll have to fight for her afore you git her. and yew'll have to find her afore yew can fight for her, won't yew, sonny? and p'rhaps that won't be so very difficult, a'ter all, for when i next see my friend rodriguez--that's the cap'n of the _preciosa_--i'll tell him that yew're out arter him, and maybe he'll lay for yew; for rodriguez hates the britishers 'most as bad as i do, and i'm sure he'd enjy blowin' _el caiman_ outer the water now that she's fallen into yewr hands. he and morillo was great friends; and i reckon he'll feel bound to avenge morillo's loss. yes; i'll tell him, for sure. and i'll also tell all the others on the coast to keep a bright look-out for the brigantine. waal, so long, stranger. i'm bound for the congo, if yew're anyways anxious to know." the foregoing remarks were made as he followed me to the waist and watched my progress over the rail and from the main chains into my boat; and the last item of information was yelled after me when we had put about twenty fathoms of blue water between the boat and the ship. as i flourished my hand by way of reply to his jeers, he turned away and i heard his harsh, nasal accents uplifted in an order to his crew to "swing the main-yard; haul aft the jib-sheet; and sway away them t'gallan' and r'yal yards." profoundly disappointed at my non-success, and bitterly mortified at the insults to which i had been subjected by boarding the yankee, i moodily returned to the _dolphin_ and, upon mounting to the deck, ordered the gig to be hoisted and the helm to be put up in order that we might return to the _eros_, the royals of which were now just rising above the horizon to the westward. three-quarters of an hour later we were again hove-to, and i was once more in the gig, on my way to report to captain perry the result of my pursuit. to say that the commodore was also deeply disappointed is only stating the bare truth; yet i was not more than half-way through my narrative before i saw that some scheme was taking shape in the back of his mind. he questioned me very closely indeed upon certain points, one of his questions having reference to the point of the possibility of effecting a change in the name of the ship displayed upon her stern, it being evident that a suspicion had arisen in his mind that the two ships might, after all, be one and the same craft, sailing under different flags as circumstances might require. to speak the truth the same suspicion had once or twice crossed my own mind, but had been completely dissipated by my visit to the _virginia_; i was quite convinced there could be no possible tampering with the name on the stern, while the papers were undoubtedly genuine, and the crew were as undoubtedly genuine yankee as were the papers. yet, despite all this, the fact that such a suspicion had arisen in captain perry's mind caused it to recur in my own; i was therefore very glad when he finally said: "thank you, mr fortescue. you appear to have executed your mission very effectively, and to have done everything that i should have done, had i been there. of course i should have preferred to have been there myself; but--well, i have no doubt the result would have been precisely the same. now, having found the _virginia_, i am minded to send you after her, to keep an eye upon her and also to drop a friendly hint to any yankee cruiser that you may happen to fall in with; for, although you cannot touch her, they can; and they ought to be exceedingly grateful for a hint that will ensure them against making any further mistakes. yes; you shall follow her up, every inch of the way; go into the congo with her, and, unless there is some very strong reason against it, come out again with her and follow her right across the atlantic to her destination, wherever it may be. and while you are doing that, i-- confident that you are keeping the _virginia_ under observation--will look out for the _preciosa_, and endeavour to nab her. go and have a yarn with mr hoskins while i prepare your written instructions." the skipper was much longer than i had anticipated over the job of drafting his written instructions to me, and hoskins and i therefore had an opportunity to discuss the situation at some length. i ventured to voice the suspicion that, for some inexplicable reason, so persistently suggested itself to me that the _virginia_ and the _preciosa_ might possibly be one and the same vessel, despite the weighty evidence against such a supposition, but the first lieutenant laughed at the notion, which he pronounced in the highest degree fantastic. "no," said he, "i do not think you need worry about that, fortescue. but, all the same, you will have to keep your weather eye lifting, on this expedition upon which the captain is about to despatch you. for, from your account of him, i judge the skipper of the _virginia_ to be an exceptionally vindictive individual, with a very strong animus against us `britishers,' as he calls us, and such men are apt to be dangerous when provoked, as he will pretty certainly be when he discovers that you are following and watching him. therefore, be on your guard against him, or he may play you one of those ghastly tricks that the slavers are apt to play upon the slave-hunters when the latter chance to fall into their hands. in my opinion you are rather too young and inexperienced to be sent alone upon such a job." "nevertheless," said i, "one must acquire one's experience in some way before one can possess it; and i suppose there is no way in which a young officer can learn so quickly as by being placed in a position of responsibility. after all, there is no danger in this forthcoming expedition, so far as i can see; it is but to follow and keep an eye upon a certain ship, and do what i can to promote her capture. but i will keep your warning in mind, never fear. and now i suppose i must say good-bye; for here comes parkinson, the captain's steward, doubtless to say that my instructions are ready." it was even as i had anticipated; parkinson was the bearer of a message summoning me to the skipper's cabin, where my written instructions, having first been read over to me, in order that i might be afforded an opportunity to seek explanation of any doubtful points, were placed in my hands, and i was dismissed; the skipper's final order to me being to carry on and, if possible, overtake the _virginia_, thereafter keeping her in sight at all costs until the remainder of my instructions had been carried out. ten minutes later i was once more on the deck of the _dolphin_, and giving orders to make sail, the signal to part company having been hoisted aboard the _eros_ the moment that my boat left her side. having braced up on the same course as that steered by the _virginia_ when last seen, and crowded upon the brigantine every square inch of canvas that her spars would bear, i sent a hand aloft to the royal yard to take a look round and see whether he could discover any sign of the chase; but, as i had more than suspected, she had completely vanished; and my first task was now to find her again. to do this, two things were necessary; the first being that we should follow precisely the same course that she had done; and the second, that we should sail fast enough to overtake her. i therefore ordered the boatswain at once to get up preventer backstays, fore and aft, to enable our spars to carry a heavy press of sail; and then went to my cabin, where, with a chart of the atlantic spread open before us upon the cabin table, jack keene and i discussed the knotty question of the course that should be steered to enable us once more to bring the _virginia_ within the range of our own horizon. the point that we had to consider was whether our yankee friend would or would not anticipate pursuit. if he did, he would probably resort to some expedient to dodge us; but if he did not there was little doubt that he would make the best of his way to his port of destination, which, if he spoke the truth, was the congo. now, we were well within the limits of the north-east trade-winds, the wind at the moment blowing, as nearly as might be, due north-east, and piping up strong enough to make us think twice before setting our topgallantsail; it was therefore perfectly ideal weather for so powerful a craft as the _virginia_, which might dare not only to show all three of her topgallantsails but also, perhaps, her main-royal. we therefore ultimately came to the conclusion that, the weather being what it was, our friend the yankee would shape a straight course for cape palmas, with the intention of then availing himself of the alternate sea and land-breezes to slip along the coast as far as the congo--that being the plan very largely followed by slavers on the eastward passage--and that he would only be likely to deviate from that plan in the event of his actually discovering that he was pursued. consequently we determined to do the same; and i issued the necessary orders to that effect. we were not very long in getting our preventers rigged, after which we not only set our royal and flying-jib, but also shifted our gaff-topsail, hauling down number , a jib-headed affair, and setting number in its place, a sail nearly twice as big as the other, with its lofty, tapering head laced to a yard very nearly as long as the topmast. then, with her lee rail awash--and, in fact, dipping deeply sometimes, on a lee roll--and the lee scuppers breast-deep in water, the _dolphin_ began to show us what she really could do in the matter of sailing when called upon; reeling off a steady eleven knots, hour after hour, upon a taut bowline; the smother of froth under her bows boiling up at times to the level of her lee cat-head, and her foresail wet with spray to the height of its reef-band. it was grand sailing, exhilarating as a draught of wine, maddening in the feeling of recklessness that it begot; but, all the same, i did not believe that we were doing more than perhaps just holding our own with the _virginia_; it was not under such conditions as those that we were likely to overhaul her; our chance would come when, as we gradually neared the equator, the wind grew more shy and fitful. nevertheless, i kept a look-out in the fore-topmast cross-trees throughout the hours of daylight, to make sure that we should not overtake her unexpectedly. we carried on all through that night, and the next day, and the next, with the breeze still holding strong, yet there was no sign of the chase; and, meanwhile, the carpenter informed me we were straining the ship all to pieces and opening her seams to such an extent that the pumps had to be tended for half an hour at a time twice in each watch; while the boatswain was kept in a perpetual state of anxiety lest his rigging should give way under the strain. at length, on the afternoon of the fourth day after parting from the _eros_, the wind began to moderate somewhat rapidly, with the result that by sunset our lee scuppers were dry, although we still had all our flying kites aloft; and that night the watch below were able to bring their mattresses on deck and sleep on the forecastle, a luxury which had hitherto been impossible during our headlong race across the atlantic. and now i began to feel sanguine that before many hours were over we should see the mastheads of the _virginia_ creeping above the horizon somewhere ahead of us; for i felt convinced that, in the moderate weather which we were then experiencing, we had the heels of her. but when the next morning dawned, with the trade-wind breathing no more than a gentle zephyr, the look-out, upon going aloft, reported that the horizon was still bare; which, however, was not to say that the chase might not be within a dozen miles of us, for the atmosphere was exceedingly hazy, and heavy with damp heat which was very oppressive and relaxing, to such an extent, indeed, that the mere act of breathing seemed to demand quite an effort. after taking my usual morning bath under the head pump, i made my way below to my state-room to dress, and found keene sitting in the main cabin, on one of the sofa lockers, attired only in shirt and trousers, perspiring freely, and in a general state of limpness that was pitiable to behold. "morning, skipper!" he gasped. "i say, isn't this heat awful? worse, even, than that on the coast, i think! and what has become of all the wind? i say, i suppose we haven't made a mistake in our reckoning, and run down on to the line unbeknownst, have we?" "if we have," said i severely, "the mistake is yours master jack; for, as you are very well aware, i have been entrusting the navigation of this ship to you." which, by the way, was only true in a certain sense; for while i had given the young man to understand that, for his own benefit and advantage, i intended to make him perform the duty of master, and hold him responsible for the navigation, i had taken care to maintain a strict check upon his calculations and assure myself that he was making no mistakes. of which fact he was of course quite aware. wherefore his reply to my retort was simply to change the subject with some celerity. "i say, old chap," he remarked, "you look awfully cool and comfy. been under the head pump, as usual, i suppose. upon my word, if it were not for the possibility--not to say the extreme probability--of being snapped up by a shark, i should like to go overboard in a bowline and be towed for half an hour. and--talking of sharks--have you noticed how often we have seen the beggars following us since we have been in this ship? i suppose her timbers have become saturated, as it were, with the odour of the slaves she has carried, and so--but, hillo! what has happened to the barometer?" i glanced at the instrument, which, together with a tell-tale compass, swung from the skylight transoms, and saw that the mercury had sunk in the tube to the extent of nearly an inch since the last setting of the vernier; and, as it was our custom in the slave squadron at that time to set the instrument at o'clock a.m. and o'clock p.m., it meant that the mercury had fallen to that extent during the night! what was about to happen? i had observed nothing portentous in the aspect of the weather, while on deck, unless, indeed, the softening away of the trade- wind and the hazy condition of the atmosphere might be regarded as portents. yet that could hardly be, for i had observed the same phenomena before, yet nothing particular had come of it. i decided to have a talk with tasker, the gunner's mate, and get his views on the matter; he was a man of very considerable experience, having been a sailor before i was born; i therefore at once entered my cabin, and proceeded to dress; after which i returned to the deck, where tasker was officer of the watch. i found him sitting aft on the stern grating, replacing his socks and shoes, which he had removed from his feet at four bells in order to take a leading part in the matutinal ceremony of washing decks. i had already seen him a little earlier that morning, and exchanged greetings with him; i therefore at once, and without any circumlocution, plunged into the subject by asking: "what do you think of the look of the weather, mr tasker; is there anything unusual about it, in your opinion?" tasker rose to his feet and cast a prolonged glance at the sky before replying. then he said slowly: "i can't say as i sees anything much out of the common about it, so far, mr fortescue. the wind's dropped a bit more than's quite usual, certainly; but i don't know as there's very mich in that. and then there's this here thickness o' the hatmosphere--well, that may or may not mean somethin', but i don't see anything alarmin' about it just yet. why d'ye ask the question, sir? is the glass droppin' at all?" "it has dropped nearly an inch since it was set last night," i answered. "phew! nearly an inch since eight bells last night!" ejaculated the old salt, with an air of concern. "that means, sir, that it have fallen that little lot since midnight; for i looked at it then, when mr keene relieved me, and it hadn't dropped nothin' then." "then what is going to happen?" i demanded. "are we going to have a hurricane?" "i should say yes, mr fortescue, most decidedly," answered tasker. "and yet," he continued, again carefully scanning the sky, "i must confess i don't see nothin' very alarmin' up there at present. i s'pose the mercury bag haven't sprung a leak, by no chance, have it? this here sudden drop reminds me of a yarn a shipmate of mine once told me about a scare he had when he was in the sloop _pyramus_ in the indian ocean, outward bound to the china station. the scare started with a sudden fall of the barometer, just as it might be in this here present case, and it went on droppin' until the skipper began to think he was booked for the biggest blow as ever come away out o' the 'eavens. he started by sendin' down royal and t'gallan' yards and housin' the t'gallan' masts. then, as the mercury still went on droppin', he shortened sail to close-reefed fore and main taups'ls, sent the t'gallan' masts down on deck, and housed the topmasts. while this work was goin' on the mercury kept fallin' until it sank out o' sight altogether; and the skipper had actually given the order to furl the taups'ls and send the yards and masts down when the cabin steward happened to make the discovery that the mercury bag had busted and the mercury from the barometer was rollin' in little balls all over the cabin floor! my mate told me that the time in which they got that there _pyramus_ ataunto again, that day, and the royals upon her, was never a'terwards beaten!" i could not avoid a good hearty laugh at this quaint story of a phenomenal fall of the mercury in a barometer; for it was easy to conjure up a picture of the rapidly growing alarm and dismay of the captain as he watched the steady and speedy shrinkage of the metallic column, and of the feverish anxiety and haste with which he would proceed with his preparations to meet the swoop of the supposedly approaching typhoon, as also of his disgust at the discovery that all his alarm and anxiety had been brought about by the unsuspected leakage of a leather bag! but the story served as a hint to me; what had happened once might happen again; and i forthwith retired to the cabin and carefully examined our own instrument to discover whether, haply, such an accident had occurred in our case. but no, the bag into which the base of the glass tube was plunged was perfectly sound and intact; and, meanwhile, during my brief colloquy with tasker a further fall of a full tenth had occurred. i lost no time in returning to the deck. "the scare is quite genuine this time, mr tasker," i said; "there is no leakage in our mercury bag to account for the heavy drop; moreover, the drop has increased by a full tenth. therefore, although the present aspect of the weather may not be precisely alarming, we will proceed to snug down at once, if you please, in view of the fact that the crew we carry is not precisely what might be called efficient, and will probably take an unconscionably long time over the work." "ay, ay, sir," answered tasker. "i expect the mercury ain't droppin' exactly for nothin', therefore, as you says, we'd better be makin' ready for what's in store for us." then, facing forward, he gave the order: "clew up your royal and t'garns'l, furl 'em, and then get the yards down on deck. hurry, you scallywags; the more work you does now, the more time for play will you have a'ter breakfast." the "snugging down" process occupied us until nearly four bells of the forenoon watch; but when at length it was completed we felt that we were prepared to face anything, our royal and topgallant-mast and all our yards being down on deck, the fore and main-topmasts and the jib-boom housed, the great mainsail snugly stowed and the heavy boom securely supported in a strong crutch, and the ship under fore and main storm staysails only. chapter eleven. the end of the dolphin. by the time that all this had been accomplished, the wind had fallen away to a dead calm, and the only sounds audible were the creaking and groaning of the ship's timbers, the loud rattle of the cabin doors below upon their hooks, the wash of the sea alongside and under the counter, the constant irritating _jerk-jerk_ of the tiller chains, and the violent rustle and slatting of the staysails, as the _dolphin_ rolled her channels under in the long, oily swell that was now running. but, so far as the aspect of the sky was concerned, there was no more sign of the threatened storm than there had been when i first went on deck that morning--except that, maybe, the haze had thickened somewhat, rendering our horizon still more circumscribed, and the heat had increased to such an extent that, as keene had remarked, one would gladly have gone overboard to escape it but for the sharks, several of which were cruising round us, while three monsters persistently hung under our counter in the shadow of the ship's hull, hungrily ogling those of us who chanced to lean over the taffrail to get a glimpse of them. yet, when, for want of something better to do, jack keene and i got a shark hook and, baiting it with a highly flavoured piece of pork out of the harness cask, sought to inveigle one of the monsters into swallowing it, they disdained to even so much as look at it, merely glancing upward at us, when we deftly dropped the bait upon one of their broad, shovel noses, as though to say: "no, no, my hearties! no rancid pork for us, thank you, when, by exercising a little patience, we may, with luck, get a chance to learn what one of you jokers tastes like." the enervating effect of the heat seemed to be as strongly revealed in them as it was in ourselves. the sun still flamed in the heavens when, shortly before noon, jack and i brought our sextants on deck with the object of measuring his meridian altitude above the horizon; but we were only able to obtain a very approximate and wholly useless result, for, when we came to try, we found that the sun appeared in our instruments merely as a shapeless glare of light, while the horizon was wholly indistinguishable. then, by imperceptible degrees, the sun, like the horizon, became obliterated, and the atmosphere stealthily darkened, as though a continuous succession of curtains of grey gauze were being interposed between us and the sky. meanwhile the barometer was still persistently declining, although not quite so rapidly as during the early hours of the morning. it was about six bells in the afternoon watch when, with a sudden darkening of the sky, that came upon us like the gloom of night, it began to rain--a regular tropical deluge, sluicing down upon us in sheets, as though the bottom of a cloud had dropped out; and within less than a minute our decks were more than ankle-deep in warm fresh water, and our scuppers were running full. the downpour lasted for perhaps a minute and a half, and then ceased as abruptly as though a tap had been turned off, and we heard the shower passing away to the northward of us, leaving us with streaming decks and dripping canvas and rigging. but, although the rain had come and gone again in the space of a couple of minutes, the darkness intensified rather than otherwise, and presently we heard a muttering of distant thunder away down in the southern quarter, followed, after a while, by a further dash of rain, lasting for a few seconds only. then, all in a moment, and without any further warning, the blackness overhead was riven by the most appallingly vivid flash of lightning that i had ever seen, accompanied--not followed--by a crash of thunder that temporarily deafened all hands of us and caused the ship to quiver and tremble from stem to stern. then, while we were all standing agape, our ears deafened by the thunder and our eyes blinded by the glare of the lightning, a fierce gust of hot wind swept over us, filling our two staysails with a report like that of a cannon and laying the ship over to her sheer-strake. tasker, who was again officer of the watch, at once sprang to the wheel and assisted the helmsman to put it hard up; but almost before the ship had begun to gather way the first fierceness of the gust had passed, leaving us little more than a fresh breeze. i therefore went aft and shouted to them--for they were as deaf as i was-- to bring the vessel up to her course again, when we began to move through the water at a speed of some five knots. that first terrible flash of lightning and crash of thunder was, however, only the beginning of the most awful electric storm that it has ever been my fate to witness, the sky, now black as night, being rent in half a dozen different directions at once by fierce, baleful flashes, green, blue, crimson, and sun-bright, while the bombarding of the thunder was absolutely terrifying, even to us who were by this time growing quite accustomed to tropical storms. with it there came frequent short, sharp, intermittent bursts of rain that swept across our decks, stinging the exposed skin like shot, and enshrouding everything beyond a couple of fathoms away in impenetrable obscurity. now, too, there came, at irregular but quickly recurring intervals, savage gusts of wind that smote the ship as though she had been but a child's toy, heeling her down until her lee rail was awash, and holding her thus for two or three minutes at a time, then easing up for a short space, the "easing up" intervals, however, steadily growing more abbreviated, while the gusts that invariably followed them rapidly grew in intensity and fury, until after the passage of one that had pinned us down for three or four minutes, with our lee sheer-poles buried in the smother, i thought that the time had arrived to heave-to, and gave the order to do so. nor was i any too soon; for the sea was rapidly rising, and a quarter of an hour later we probably could not have accomplished the feat without having had our decks swept. the gale now rapidly increased in intensity, the gusts of wind ever growing stronger and more furious, and succeeding each other more rapidly, until at length the intervals between them became so brief as to be practically imperceptible, the strength of the wind now being equal to that of a heavy gale, and momentarily growing stronger as gust after gust swooped down upon us. the blinding, drenching showers that occasionally swept us were no longer composed of fresh water only, for there was a strong mingling of salt-water in them that was none other than the tops of the waves, torn off by the terrific blasts of wind and hurled along horizontally in the form of vast sheets of spray. the sea, meanwhile, was rising with astounding rapidity, taking into consideration the fact that, as just stated, the height of the combers was greatly reduced by the enormous volumes of water that were scooped up from the ocean's surface by the fury of the wind; moreover the sea was short, steep, and irregular, much more nearly resembling the breakers on a coast in shallow water, than the long, regular, majestically moving seas of the open ocean. the _dolphin_, therefore, despite her beautiful model and the reduction of her tophamper, was beginning to make exceedingly bad weather of it, frequently burying herself to her foremast, and careening so heavily that during some of her lee rolls it was impossible to maintain one's footing on deck except by holding on to something. at length, about four bells in the first watch, the lightning, which had hitherto almost continuously illuminated the atmosphere, suddenly ceased altogether, and the night grew intensely dark, the only objects remaining visible being the faintly phosphorescent heads of the seas, flashing into view and gleaming ghostly for a moment before they were torn into spray by the violence of the wind and whirled away through the air to leeward. then, with almost equal suddenness, there came a positively startling lull in the strength of the wind, and the ship-- which had for some hours been laying over to it so steeply that movement about her decks was only to be achieved with great circumspection and by patiently awaiting the arrival of one's opportunity--suddenly rose almost to an even keel. i seized the chance thus afforded me to claw my way to the skylight and glance through it at the barometer, illuminated by the wildly swaying lamp which the steward had lighted when darkness fell, but, to my intense disappointment, the mercury, which had steadily been shrinking all day, exhibited a further drop since the index had been set at eight o'clock that evening. "we have not yet seen the worst of it," i shouted to tasker, who, although it was now his watch below, had elected to remain on deck and bear me company. "the glass is still going down." "i'm very sorry to hear it, mr fortescue," he answered. "i don't like the look of things at all. the ship has been most terrible uneasy for several hours now, and i'm afraid we shall find that she's been strainin' badly. it might not be amiss to sound the well; and if, as i fear, we find that she's been takin' water in through her seams, i'd advise--" his further speech was cut short by a terrific blast of wind that swooped down upon us like a howling, screaming fiend, without a moment's warning. so violent was it that tasker and i were both swept off our feet and dashed to the deck, where i brought up against the cabin companion with a crash that all but knocked the senses out of me, while the gunner's mate disappeared in the direction of the lee scuppers. the yelling and screaming of the wind was absolutely appalling, the volume of sound being such that nothing else could be heard above it; and in the midst of the din i became vaguely conscious that the ship was going over until she lay upon her beam ends, with her deck almost perpendicular, and the water up to the level of her hatchways. for a few seconds i lay where i was, on the upturned side of the companion, listening to the water pouring into the cabin with every lee roll of the ship, and endeavouring to pull together my scattered faculties; then, dimly realising that something must be done to relieve the ship if we would not have her founder beneath us, i scrambled to my feet and, seizing a rope's end that came lashing about me, dragged myself up to the weather rail, clinging to which i slowly and painfully worked my way forward, shouting for the carpenter as i did so. at length, arrived at the fore rigging, i came upon a small group of men who had somehow contrived to climb up to windward and out upon the ship's upturned side, where they were now desperately hacking away with their knives at the lanyards of the weather fore rigging. "that's right, lads!" i exclaimed, whipping out my own knife and lending a hand; "we must cut away the masts and get the ship upright again, or she will go down under us. where is the carpenter? let him bring along his axe. he will do more good in one minute than we can in ten." "i'm afraid, sir, as chips has gone overboard with some more when the ship was hove down. but i'll see if i can get into the fo'c's'le and lay my hand upon his axe," answered one of the men. "do so by all means," i returned; "and be quick about it. i would go myself, but you will know better than i where to find the axe; and even moments are precious just now." they were, indeed; for it was easy to tell, by the feel of the ship, that she was becoming waterlogged, and every gallon of water that now poured into her seriously decreased our chances of saving her. but it was bad news to learn that the carpenter, "with some more" men, had been lost overboard when the ship was thrown upon her beam-ends; yet, when i came to recall the suddenness of the event, the surprising thing was that any of us had survived it. this reminded me of tasker, and set me wondering whether he had been as fortunate as myself, or whether that last awful lurch had been as fatal to him as it had been to some others among us. meanwhile we continued to hack away with our knives at the lanyards, and presently, after what appeared to have been a terribly protracted interval, but which was probably not more than a couple of minutes, the last lanyard parted with a twang, and the next instant, with a crash heard even through the terrific hubbub of the gale, the foremast snapped close off by the deck and plunged, with all attached, into the boil to leeward. then we breathlessly waited, hoping that, thus relieved, the ship would recover herself, and for a moment it almost seemed that she would do so; but just at the critical moment the gale swooped down heavier than ever, and at the same instant an extra heavy sea struck her, and down she lay again, as though too tired to struggle further. "it is no good, men," i cried, "she won't rise. lay aft, and cut away the mainmast also. it is our only chance!" and, therewith, we all crawled along the ship's side--escaping being washed off or blown overboard only by a series of miracles, as it seemed to me--until we arrived at the main chains, where we had something to cling to, and where the channel-piece partially sheltered us. here we at once got to work with all our energy upon the weather main lanyards, and, the man with the axe presently joining us, in a few minutes the mainmast also went over the side. "now, inboard with you, men, as smart as you like," i cried. "if she is going to rise at all she may do so quite suddenly, in which case we run the risk of being hove overboard if we remain here." we all scrambled in on deck, steadying ourselves by such of the running rigging as we could lay hold of; and we had scarcely done so when the hull partially recovered its upright position, not quite so suddenly as i had expected, yet with a quick righting movement that left our decks knee-deep in water. i sprang to the companion and strove to close the burst-open doors and so prevent any further influx of water to the cabin; but the heavy washing sounds that came up from below told me that my efforts were already too late to be of any service, for the cabin seemed to be flooded to almost half the height of the companion ladder, and the sluggish motions of the ship told me eloquently enough that she was perilously near to a foundering condition. i therefore rallied the men and bade them get to work at the pumps forthwith; and it was then that i discovered, to my horror, that, of our complement of sixty, we had lost no fewer than fourteen, including my messmate, poor jack keene, and tasker, the gunner's mate, all of whom must have gone overboard when the vessel was thrown down on her beam-ends! it was a most deplorable affair, and i was especially grieved at the loss of my light-hearted chum; but that was not the moment for indulgence in useless lamentation, and i busied myself in doing what might be possible to provide for the safety of the ship. first of all i got a strong gang to work at the pumps in two relays, each taking a spell of ten minutes pumping, followed by an equal length of time for rest. when i had fairly started these, and saw the water gushing in a clear stream from the spouts of both pumps, i set the rest to work cutting away all the rigging which still held the wreckage of the masts attached to the hull, leaving the fore and fore-topmast stays untouched, my intention being that the drift of the hull should bring the wreckage under the bows, where, being held fast by the stays, it should form a sort of floating anchor to which the ship should ride head to wind and sea. thus we might hope that she would no longer ship water in such quantities as to threaten her safety. after nearly an hour's hard labour we succeeded, during which it appeared to me that the men were making little or no impression upon the amount of water in the hold. but, as i had hoped, when once we had brought the hull head to wind she no longer shipped water in any very alarming quantities; and after watching her carefully for some minutes i came to the conclusion that we might safely venture to open the after hatchway and supplement the efforts of those at the pumps by baling with buckets. before starting the pumps i had taken the precaution of having the well sounded, with the result that we had discovered the depth of water in the ship's interior to be three feet ten inches, as nearly as could be ascertained; but the violent motions of the hull had rendered anything like really accurate sounding an impossibility, and the same cause now precluded us from ascertaining with certainty whether the leak was gaining upon the pumps or _vice-versa_. one thing was perfectly certain, and that was that if the pumps were gaining upon the leak at all, it was but slowly. if that should prove to be the case, it would mean that there was something the matter more serious than the mere straining of the ship; possibly a butt or a hood-end had been started. it was by this time close upon midnight, and there were times when i almost succeeded in persuading myself that it was not blowing quite so hard as it had been, although the difference--if difference there were-- was certainly not very strongly marked; the sea, however, still continued to rise, and was now running higher than i had ever before seen it. yet the poor, sorely battered _dolphin_ rode it reasonably well, all things considered; although there were times when the water in her interior, happening to become concentrated in the fore part of her just as she should be rising to a sea, pinned her down by the head to a dangerous extent, causing the sea to come in, green, unbroken, and like a miniature mountain, over her bows. when this threatened to occur it became necessary to watch her narrowly, and if the danger seemed to be imminent we hurriedly replaced the after hatches, otherwise we should very quickly have been swamped. when the pumping gangs had been at work for about an hour they complained of exhaustion, and i accordingly relieved them to the extent of setting them to work with the buckets and putting two fresh gangs at the pumps; yet, although these men worked pretty energetically, it soon became evident that we were not gaining anything upon the leak, and as time passed on it became exceedingly doubtful whether the leak were not rather gaining upon us. moreover, as the sea continued to rise the vessel's movements became more laboured, and she again began to take the water aboard in such dangerous quantities that at length we were reluctantly compelled to abandon our baling operations, and close the hatches to prevent the heavy seas from reaching her interior. in this fashion the seemingly endless night at length wore itself away and the lowering dawn came, disclosing to us the true seriousness of our condition. there we were, aweary, hollow-eyed, haggard-looking little band, sodden to the very bones of us with long hours of exposure to the pitiless buffeting of rain and sea, our flesh salt-encrusted, our eyes bloodshot, our hands raw and bleeding with the severe and protracted work at the pumps, adrift in mid-ocean upon a mastless, sorely battered, and badly leaking hulk, with her ballast shifted and a heavy list, tossed helplessly upon a furiously raging sea that seemed instinct with a relentless determination to overwhelm us, toiling and fighting doggedly against the untiring elements, in the hope that, perchance, if our strength held out, we might keep the now crazy, straining, and complaining fabric beneath us afloat long enough to afford us some chance of saving our lives. yet the hope was, after all, but a slender one; for with the coming of daylight we were able to see that our plight was very considerably worse than we had dreamed it to be during the hours of darkness; for _then_ we had believed that the loss of our masts and the springing of a somewhat serious leak represented the sum total of our misfortunes; while _now_ we saw, to our unspeakable dismay, that, with the solitary exception of the longboat, the whole of our boats were so badly damaged as to be altogether beyond our ability to repair; of two of them, indeed, nothing save the stem and stern remained dangling forlornly from the davit tackles. but that, bad though it was, was not the worst; for it was no longer possible for us to blind ourselves to the fact that the leak was gaining upon us inexorably, and that, even though we should continue to toil with unabated energy, we could not keep the ship afloat longer than a few hours more, at the utmost. and then what were we to do? the longboat, fine boat though she was, when stocked with even a meagre supply of provisions and water, would not accommodate more than twenty-five men, and i gravely doubted whether she would live ten minutes in such a sea as was then running, with half that number in her. still, with the exception of such a raft as we might be able to put together, she was all that we had, and half an hour of daylight sufficed to show me that no time must be lost in making preparations to quit the slowly foundering ship. yet it would not do for us to leave the pumps for a moment; one gang must, at all costs, be kept hard at work pumping out as much as possible of the water that was pouring in through the open seams, otherwise the leak would gain upon us so rapidly that the ship would settle from under us long before we were ready to face such a catastrophe. i therefore at once set about the formulating of my plans and carrying them into effect. first of all, while one gang kept the pump-brakes clanking and the clear water spouting out upon our streaming deck, i got another gang to work at launching the guns overboard as the roll of the ship permitted--and this, i was glad to see, eased the poor labouring craft quite perceptibly. this done, all hands, except those at the pumps, went to breakfast, the meal consisting of hot coffee sweetened with molasses, and ship's biscuit, more or less sodden with salt-water--for with the coming of daylight and the preparation of breakfast the unwelcome discovery had been made that the salt-water had got at the provisions and gone far toward spoiling them. then, as soon as the first gang had finished breakfast, they relieved those at the pumps, who in their turn took breakfast and next proceeded to clear away the longboat and prepare her for launching, by providing her with a proper supply of oars and thole-pins, her rudder and tiller, masts and sails, and then carefully stowing her stock of water and provisions. but when all this was done it was still blowing too hard--although the worst of the gale seemed to be over--and the sea was altogether too rough to allow of our attempting to launch her. we therefore next got to work upon a raft, first of all lashing all our spare spars together as a sort of foundation, and then, upon the top of this, lashing the hen-coops, gratings, a few planks that the carpenter had stowed away down below, and, finally, some lengths of bulwark that we cut away for the purpose. this raft, when completed, was a fairly roomy affair, affording space enough to stow away some thirty people, together with a good supply of provisions and water, which we now proceeded to get up from below and stow; the cook, meanwhile, industriously boiling as much beef and pork as he could crowd into his coppers. then we knocked off and piped to dinner; and while we were getting this--probably the last meal of which we should ever partake aboard the poor old _dolphin_--our hearts were gladdened by a sudden burst of sunshine breaking through the clouds, and half an hour later the sky to windward was clear, the sun was shining brilliantly and pouring his welcome warmth upon our chilled bodies and saturated clothing, while the gale had broken and was fast moderating, having already declined to the strength of a double-reefed topsail breeze. the sea, too, was no longer raging like a boiling cauldron; yet, even so, it was still too heavy to justify us in attempting to launch either the longboat or the raft. and now, at the very moment when it was most necessary that the crew should preserve an orderly and obedient disposition, they suddenly broke into open mutiny, flatly refusing to work any longer at the pumps; declaring that the ship was good for at least another hour, and that before that had passed we should all be safely away from her; that there was no sense in wanting to keep the ship afloat longer than there was any absolute need for; and that the time had now arrived when they must begin to think of saving their own personal belongings. when i attempted to remonstrate with them and point out the folly of their behaviour they became virulently abusive, and declared that if i wanted the pumps kept going i might keep them going myself--and this although i had already done considerably more than my fair share of that back- breaking labour. therewith they abandoned the pumps and betook themselves forward to the forecastle, from which there shortly afterward came floating to my horrified ears loud peals of maudlin laughter, mingled with snatches of ribald songs and coarse jests, whereby i came to know, all too late, that, while getting up the provisions from below, some of them must have broken into the spirit-room and possessed themselves of a very considerable supply of rum, upon which they were now fast drinking themselves into a condition of reckless indifference to the awful danger that threatened them. anything, i thought, was better than this; therefore, having first gone down below and brought up the chronometer, my sextant, and a chart of the atlantic, and stowed the whole carefully in the stern-sheets of the longboat, loaded my pistols, and girded my sword to my side, i went forward to the fore-scuttle and, putting my head into it, shouted in as cheery a tone as i could summon: "now then, lads, tumble up on deck, all hands of you. we have still a great deal to do, and very little time to do it in; therefore let us see about getting the longboat into the water, and the raft over the side. there will be time enough to rest when we are safe away from the wreck." "all ri', schipper, don' you worry," bawled a great hulking dutchman in reply. "dere's blendy of dime yet; and ve're nod going do move undil ve've vinished dhis grog." then another--an american this time--took up the tale, shouting, "go 'way, little man, go 'way! wha' d'you mean, anyway, by comin' here and disturbin' gen'lemen when they're busy? come in and have a drink with us, youngster, just to show that you're not stuck up. i guess we're all equals in this dandy little barkie; yes, sirree! i'm a free-born 'murican, i am, an' just as good as you or any other blamed britisher, and don' you forget it. so, if you won' come in an' have a drink, take your ugly-lookin' mug out o' the daylight, d'ye hear?" to emphasise this polite request the man seized a heavy sea boot from the forecastle deck and hove it at me, with so poor an aim that instead of hitting me he dashed it into the face of an englishman who happened at the moment to be drinking rum out of a pannikin. the blow dashed the pannikin out of the man's hand, and splashed the fiery spirit all over his face and into his eyes; and the next instant, with a low, fierce growl of concentrated ferocity, he sprang to his feet and struck the free-born 'murican a smashing blow under the chin that sent him sprawling. "you have no time to waste in fighting, lads," i cried, for i felt that the ship was fast settling under our feet. but my voice was completely drowned in the babel of angry yells that instantly arose, for it appeared that the men were, after their own fashion, rivals for leadership in the forecastle, and each man had his own partisans, every one of whom instantly took up the quarrel of his own favourite, and in another moment the whole of them were at each others' throats, like so many quarrelsome dogs. "let the drunken, mutinous brutes fight it out among themselves," i muttered disgustedly as i turned and walked away. "they will get a sobering-up before very long that will astonish them, or i am greatly mistaken!" as i walked aft i could tell, by the feel of the ship, that her race was nearly run--although i did not at that moment dream how very near to her end she was--and i paused abreast of the longboat to satisfy myself that she was quite ready for launching out through the wide gap that we had made in the bulwarks when cutting them away to provide material for the construction of the raft. the gripes, i saw, had been cast off, and the boat was supported solely by her chocks, upon which she stood upright on the main hatchway. suddenly, stooping down, a small spot of bright light in the deep shadow under the boat caught my eye, and looking closer i saw that some careless rascal had omitted to put in the plug, and that the bright spot of light was caused by the sun shining down through the unplugged hole in the boat's bottom. with a muttered objurgation of the fellow's carelessness, i climbed into the boat and, stooping down, sought for the plug. i was seeking for perhaps two or three minutes before i found it, but as i was about to abandon the search, and hunt for a suitable cork out of which to cut another, my eye fell upon the missing plug, and i at once inserted it and proceeded to drive it tightly home. i had just completed the job to my satisfaction when i felt the ship lurch heavily. there was a sudden, violent rush and wash of water, and i sprang to my feet barely in time to see the boat caught up on the crest of a sea that came sweeping, green and solid, through the gap in the starboard bulwarks, and carried clear and clean out through the corresponding gap in the port side! the longboat had launched herself; and before i could collect my senses, or lift a hand, i found myself adrift alone, some twenty fathoms to leeward of the doomed ship, and driving farther away from her every moment. chapter twelve. alone in the longboat. to seize one of the long, heavy ash oars that formed part of the boat's equipment, fling the blade over the stern, and jerk the oar into the sculling notch, with the idea of sculling the boat back to the wreck was, with me, the work of but a second or two; but although i contrived, with some labour, to get the boat's head round toward the _dolphin_, and to keep it pointed in that direction, i soon discovered--as i might have had the sense to know--that to scull a big heavy boat like the longboat to windward against such a strong wind and so heavy a sea was a task altogether beyond the power of a single man, however strong he might be; for every sea that swept down upon the boat sent her surging away a good half-dozen fathoms to leeward. finding this attempt useless, i at once hauled the oar inboard again, and proceeded to ship the rudder, which task i at length accomplished, with some difficulty owing to the violent motion of the boat; then i shipped the tiller; and next proceeded to loose the boat's canvas, with the idea of beating back to the ship. but here again i found myself seriously hampered and delayed by the circumstance that, when equipping the boat, the men had only half done their work. the boat was rigged as a fore and aft schooner, setting a main trysail, fore trysail, and a staysail secured to the head of the stem; and while the masts had been stepped and the shrouds set up hand-taut, i found, upon casting loose the sails, that they had omitted to obey my instructions to close-reef them, and since the wind was still blowing altogether too hard for the boat to carry anything more than close-reefed canvas i lost quite ten minutes in reefing and setting the mainsail and staysail--i dared not attempt to set the foresail also, for i did not believe that the boat could carry it. and when at length i had got the canvas set and the boat fairly under way, i found, to my consternation, that i had driven a good half-mile to leeward of the ship, by which time, their quarrel, i suppose, being over, the men had left the forecastle and, finding that i had gone adrift in the longboat, were making frantic signs to me to return. but i soon discovered that, even now, with the boat under canvas, to beat back to the ship was an impossibility; for the boat had not been built for sailing to windward in a strong breeze; she was the ordinary type of ship's longboat, constructed to carry a heavy load in proportion to her dimensions, with a long, flat floor, bluff bows, and with only some three inches of exposed keel; and while she might possibly, with skilful management, have been made to work to windward in very moderate weather, she now, with so strong a wind and so heavy a sea to battle with, drove to leeward almost as rapidly as she forged ahead. nor did i dare to press her with any more canvas, for she was already showing more than was at all prudent, the stronger puffs careening her to her gunwale and taxing my seamanship to the utmost to prevent her from filling. under such circumstances, with the boat demanding my utmost vigilance to keep her afloat, it will be readily understood that i was only able at intervals to cast a momentary glance toward the ship to see how she was faring, and even then it was not always possible for me to catch a glimpse of her because of the mountainous seas that interposed themselves between her and me. at length, however, when i had been adrift about half an hour, i got a chance to take a fairly long look to windward at a moment when the longboat was hove up on the crest of an unusually lofty wave; but the ship was nowhere to be seen; nor did i again catch sight of her, or even of the raft; and the only conclusion at which i could arrive was that she had gone down and taken all hands with her. but, in such a mountainous sea as was then running, the horizon of a person in a boat is naturally very restricted, and i knew that, although i had failed to catch a glimpse of either the wreck or the raft, the latter at least might be afloat, and my plain duty was to remain in the neighbourhood so long as there was any chance of falling in with it; i therefore watched my opportunity and, seizing a favourable moment, wore the boat round on the other tack and, again bringing her to the wind, went back as nearly over the ground i had already traversed as was possible. but although i kept a sharp look-out, and wore round every half-hour, i saw nothing, no, not even so much as a fragment of floating wreckage, to indicate what had actually happened; nor did i ever hear of any of my late crew being picked up. it was about four bells--two o'clock--in the afternoon watch when i last saw the wreck; and i beat about, remaining as near the spot as i could, until sunset. then, having failed to fall in with or sight either the wreck or the raft, i came to the conclusion that i had seen the last of my mutinous crew, and that the time had arrived when i was quite justified in abandoning any further effort to find them, and might look after my own safety. the weather, by this time, had improved very considerably; the wind had been slowly but steadily moderating, and the sea, although still tremendously high, was not now breaking dangerously; the sky also had cleared and was without a cloud; there was therefore every prospect of a fine night, with a further steady improvement of the weather; the boat was no longer dangerously pressed by the amount of canvas that she was carrying, and i felt that i need be under no immediate apprehension regarding the future. moreover my clothes had by this time dried upon my body, and i felt quite warm and comfortable. but i was both hungry and thirsty, for the so-called dinner that i had snatched aboard the _dolphin_ had been a very hasty and meagre meal. i therefore hove the boat to, by lashing the tiller hard down and hauling the staysail sheet to windward, and then, finding that she rode quite comfortably and was taking care of herself, i proceeded to rummage among my stock of provisions, and soon had a hearty meal set out before me on the after thwart. by the time that i had finished my supper night had fallen, the stars were shining with the brilliance that they only display in the tropics, and i was beginning to feel the need of sleep; i therefore took a final look round, satisfied myself that all was right and that nothing was in sight, and then, heartily commending myself to the care of my maker, i stretched myself out on the bottom-boards, and was almost instantly asleep. to say that i slept soundly that night would scarcely be speaking the truth; for, although i had pretty well satisfied myself before i lay down, that the weather was improving and that therefore i had little or no cause for immediate apprehension, a sailor quickly acquires the trick of maintaining a certain alertness, even in the midst of his slumbers, since he knows that the weather is his most formidable and treacherous enemy, against which he has always to be on his guard; and this faculty of alertness is of course especially active when, as in my own case, he has only himself to depend upon. consequently i never completely lost consciousness throughout that night, the rush of the wind, the hiss of the sea, the occasional sprinkling of spray were all mechanically noted, and whenever the heel of the boat appreciably exceeded its normal angle i at once became momentarily awake; yet, notwithstanding this, when on the following morning--the first rays of the newly risen sun smote upon my closed eyelids, informing me of the arrival of a new day, i at once arose, refreshed and vigorous, and ready to face any emergency that the day might bring. my first act was to kneel down and return thanks for my preservation through the night and seek the protection and guidance of god throughout the day; after which i leaned over the boat's gunwale and freely laved my head, face, and hands in the clear salt-water. then i set about preparing for myself the most appetising breakfast that my resources would permit; and while i was doing this and discussing the meal i carefully reviewed the entire situation, with a view to my arrival at an immediate decision as to my future proceedings. the chart which i had with me showed the position of the _dolphin_ at the moment when my last observations were taken; and from this information i was able to deduce the approximate position of the spot where the vessel had foundered. this spot, i found, was, in round figures, one thousand miles from sierra leone, and fourteen hundred miles from the island of barbadoes; but whereas sierra leone was almost dead to windward, barbadoes was as directly dead to leeward; and a little calculation convinced me that while it would take me about thirty-six days to beat to windward the shorter distance, i might cover the longer, running pleasantly before the wind, in about twenty-four days, allowing, in both cases, for the boat being hove-to throughout the night to enable me to obtain necessary rest. fortunately, i had with me not only the chart of the north atlantic, but also a chronometer, sextant, nautical almanac, and boat compass; i was therefore equipped with every requisite for the efficient navigation of the boat, and had no fear of losing my way. i could consequently without hesitation choose what i considered to be the most desirable course, and it did not need any very profound reflection to convince me that this was to make the best of my way back to barbadoes. i accordingly put up my helm, kept away before the wind, shook out all my reefs, and went sliding away to the westward, easily and comfortably, at a speed of some six knots per hour. the weather had by this time reverted to quite its normal condition; the trade-wind was blowing steadily, the sea had gone down, and i had nothing worse than a somewhat heavy swell to contend with; i therefore felt that, unless i should be so unfortunate as to fall in with another gale, there was no reason at all why i should not reach my destination safely, and without very much discomfort. my only trouble was that, running, as the boat now was, with the wind so far over the starboard quarter, i dared not release my hold upon the tiller for an instant, lest she should broach-to and, possibly, capsize. whenever, therefore, it became necessary for me to quit the helm for the purpose of taking an astronomical observation, or otherwise, i had to heave-to, and, occasionally, to shorten sail while doing so, which kept me pretty actively employed, off and on, all day. thus, about nine o'clock in the morning, i had to heave-to and leave the boat to take care of herself while i secured observations of the sun for the determination of the longitude; the same procedure had to be adopted again at noon when i took the sun's altitude for the determination of the latitude; and the preparation of a meal involved a further repetition of the manoeuvre. thus i had no time to feel lonely, at least during the hours of daylight; but after nightfall, surrounded and hemmed in by the gloom and mystery of the darkness, with no companionship save that of the multitudinous stars--which, to my mind, never betray their immeasurable distance so clearly as when one is in mid-ocean--with the sough and moan of the night wind and the soft, seething hiss of the sea whispering in one's ears, the feeling of loneliness becomes almost an obsession, the sense of all-pervading mystery persistently obtrudes itself, and one quickly falls into a condition of readiness to believe the most incredible of the countless weird stories that sailors love to relate to each other, especially when this condition of credulity is helped, as it sometimes is, by the sudden irruption of some strange, unaccountable sound, or succession of sounds, upon the peaceful quietude and serenity of the night. these sounds are occasionally of the weirdest and most hair-raising quality; and while the startled listener may possibly have heard it asserted, time and again, by superior persons, that they emanate from sea birds, or from fish, he is perfectly satisfied that neither sea birds nor fish have ever been known to emit such sounds _in the daytime_, and the strain of superstition within him awakes and whispers all sorts of uncanny suggestions, the sea bird and fish theory being rejected with scorn. moreover, those harrowingly mysterious sounds seem never to make themselves audible save when the accompanying circumstances are such as to conduce to the most startling and thrilling effect; thus, although i had now been knocking about at sea for more than three years, and had met with many queer experiences, i had never, thus far, heard a sound that i could not reasonably account for and attribute to some known source; yet on this particular night--my second night alone in the longboat--i was sitting comfortably enough in the stern-sheets, steering by a star--for i had no lantern wherewith to illuminate my compass--and thinking of nothing in particular, when suddenly a most unearthly cry came pealing out of the darkness on the starboard beam, seemingly not half a dozen yards away, and was twice repeated. i felt the hair of my scalp bristle, and a violent shudder thrilled through me as those dreadful cries smote upon my ear, for they seemed to be the utterance of some human being in the very last extremity of both physical and mental anguish, the protest of a lost soul being wrenched violently out of its sinful human tenement, cries of such utter, unimaginable despair as the finite mind of man is unable to find a cause for. yet, despite the agony of horror that froze my blood, i instinctively thrust my helm hard down and flattened in the sheets fore and aft; for the thought came to me that, perchance, a few fathoms out there, veiled from sight in the soft, velvet blackness of the night, some poor wretch--a victim, like myself, to the fury of the late gale-- clinging desperately to a fragment of wreckage, might have caught a glimpse of the longboat's sails, sliding blackly along against the stars, and have emitted those terrible cries as a last despairing appeal for help and succour. accordingly, as the boat swept round and came to the wind, careening gunwale-to as she felt the full strength of the night breeze in her dew-sodden canvas, i sprang to my feet and, clapping both hands funnel-wise to my mouth, sent forth a hail: "ahoy, there! where are you? keep up your courage, for help is at hand. where are you, i say? let me but know where to look for you and i'll soon be alongside. shout again; for i can see no sign of you. ahoy, there! _ahoy_!! ahoy!!!" the sound of my own voice, coming immediately after that terrible thrice-repeated cry, seemed somehow comforting and reassuring, and i now awaited a reply to my hail with a feeling in which there was more of curiosity than horror. but no reply came; and i once more lifted up my voice in tones of appeal and encouragement. then, since i failed to evoke any response, i put the boat's helm down, and tacked, the conviction being strong within me that i could hit off, to an inch, the exact spot from which those dreadful sounds had come. so firmly convinced, indeed, was i of my ability to do this that when the boat came round i left the staysail sheet fast to windward, eased off the fore sheet, and stood by, leaning over the lee gunwale, in readiness to seize and haul inboard the drowning wretch who, i was fully persuaded, must be now almost under the boat's bilge. but, although the starlight was sufficiently brilliant to have betrayed, at a distance of seven or eight yards, the presence of such an object as a man clinging to a piece of floating wreckage, i could see nothing, no, not even so much as a scrap of floating weed. that i was bitterly disappointed--and also somewhat frightened--i freely admit; for i had somehow succeeded in convincing myself that those terrifying sounds had issued from the throat of a human being so close at hand that i could not possibly fail to find him; yet i had _not_ found him; had failed, indeed, to find the slightest suggestion of his presence; and if those sounds had not a human origin, _whence came they_? it was the mystery of the thing, as well as the weird, unearthly character of the cries, that sent a thrill of horror through the marrow, and made me almost madly anxious to find an explanation. i worked the boat to and fro athwart those few square yards of ocean for a full hour or more, and shouted myself hoarse, until i at length most unwillingly abandoned the search, and squared away to place as many miles as possible between myself and that unhallowed spot ere i attempted to sleep. it must have been past midnight before i had so far thrown off the feeling of horror induced by the uncanny experience that i have related as to admit of my contemplating seriously the idea of securing some rest; and even when at length i did so, and had completed all my preparations, such as shortening sail and heaving-to, it was still some time before oblivion came to me. but when it did, it was complete, for the weather was fine and had a settled appearance, the boat lay-to most admirably and took perfect care of herself, and altogether i felt so absolutely safe that there seemed to be no need at all for that peculiar attitude of alertness during sleep to which i have already alluded; my need of sound, refreshing slumber was great, and i lay down, determined to satisfy that need while the opportunity presented itself, and let myself go completely. yet, although i had surrendered myself to sleep with the settled conviction of my absolute safety, and the feeling that my repose would continue until broken by the first rays of the morrow's sun, i awakened suddenly while it was yet quite dark and when, as it seemed to me, i had only been asleep a very few minutes. and my awakening was not that of a person who gradually passes from sleep to wakefulness because he has enjoyed a sufficiency of rest; it was an abrupt, instant transition from complete oblivion to a state of wide-awake, startled consciousness that caused me to leap to my feet and gaze wildly about me as my eyes snapped open to the star-lit heavens. and as i did so i became aware of a rapidly growing sound of leaping, splashing, gurgling water, and a humming as of wind sweeping through tightly strained cordage, close to leeward. there was no need for me to pause and consider what was the origin of these sounds; i recognised them instantly as those given forth by a sailing ship sweeping at a high speed through the water, and i sprang forward clear of the mainmast to where the stowed foresail permitted me a clear and uninterrupted view to leeward. the next instant three dreadful cries in quick succession--exactly reproducing, tone for tone, those terrifying sounds that had so startled and unnerved me only a few hours earlier--burst from my lips; for there, almost within reach of my hand, was the black, towering mass of the hull and canvas of a large ship bearing straight down upon the longboat, and aiming accurately to strike her fair amidships. so close was she that her long slender jib-boom, with the swelling jibs soaring high among the stars, was already over my head, the phosphorescent boil and smother from the plunge of her keen bows already foamed to the gunwale of the longboat. a startled shout rang out upon the heavy night air from somebody upon her forecastle in response to those weird cries of mine, and above the hissing wash and gurgle of the water under her bows i caught the sound of naked feet padding upon her deck-planking, as the rudely awakened look-out sprang to peer over the topgallant rail. but before the man could reach the spot for which he sprang the ship was upon me, and as her cutwater crashed into the frail hull of the boat, rending it asunder and flinging the two halves violently apart to roll bottom upward on either side of the swelling bows, i leapt desperately upward at the chain bobstay, caught it, shinned nimbly up it to the bowsprit, and made my breathless way inboard, to the terror and astonishment of some twenty forecastle hands who had evidently been startled out of a sound sleep by the sudden outcries and commotion under the bows, and into the midst of whom i unceremoniously tumbled. the excited jabber which instantly arose among my new shipmates at once apprised me that i was aboard a vessel manned by frenchmen. a single quick glance aloft sufficed to inform me that she was barque-rigged, and probably of about three hundred and fifty tons measurement. the excited and astonished watch crowded round me, regarding me curiously--and, methought, with looks not wholly devoid of suspicion. they were, one and all, beginning to deluge me with questions, when an authoritative voice from the poop broke in with a demand to be informed what all the disturbance on the forecastle was about. whereupon an individual among the crowd who surrounded me, and who might have been, and indeed proved to be, the boatswain, took me by the arm, and bluntly suggested that i had better accompany him aft to monsieur leroy, the chief mate, and explain my uninvited presence aboard the barque. it was, of course, the only thing to be done, and i accordingly turned and walked aft, with my arm still firmly grasped by the individual who had made the suggestion, and who seemed to regard me as his prisoner, until we reached the poop ladder, up which i was somewhat unceremoniously hustled, to find myself in the presence of a broad, sturdily built man of about middle height, who stood at the head of the ladder, with his feet wide apart, lightly balancing himself to the roll and plunge of the ship. there was a lighted lamp hanging in the skylight some two or three fathoms away, and as this man stood between me and the light, which somewhat feebly gleamed out through the skylight on to the deck, i was unable to see his features or the details of his dress; but as he stepped back and somewhat to one side to make way for me the light fell full upon me, and, feeble as it was, it sufficed to show him my uniform. "ah!" he exclaimed sharply, "a british naval officer, if i am not very greatly mistaken. pray, monsieur, where did you come from; and are there any more of you?" "i came in over the bows, a minute ago, out of a boat that--thanks to the blind look-out that your people seem to keep--you ran down and cut in two. and there are no more of us; i was the only occupant of the boat," i answered. "the only occupant of the boat!" he exclaimed in astonishment. "you amaze me, monsieur. is it permissible to inquire how you, a british officer, come to be adrift, quite alone, in a boat, in the middle of the atlantic?" whereupon i told him briefly the story of the loss of the _dolphin_, very imprudently adding the information that she was a unit of the slave squadron, and that i was her commander. "ah!" he commented, incisively, when i had finished. "an exceedingly interesting story. captain tourville will be pleased that we have picked you up when he hears the news to-morrow. meanwhile, by lucky chance we happen to have an unoccupied state-room into which i will put you for the remainder of the night. thoreau,"--to the man who had conducted me aft--"take this gentleman below to the cabin; then turn out the steward and tell him to put some bedding into the spare state-room, but to be silent about it lest he disturb the captain. and now, monsieur, permit me to bid you good-night. i trust you will rest well." the man thoreau, who seemed to be an individual of exceedingly glum and taciturn disposition, thereupon signed to me to follow him, and led the way down the poop ladder and through an open door in the front of the poop which gave access to a narrow passage, some eight feet long, at the end of which was another open door giving access to the ship's main cabin. this was a fairly roomy and comfortable apartment, plainly but tastefully fitted up, with a mahogany table running lengthwise down the middle, through the centre of which the mizenmast passed down to the depths below. a row of seats upholstered in red utrecht velvet, and with swinging backs, was secured, on each side of the table, to the deck, between which and the sides of the cabin ran narrow strips of carpet. the sides and ends of the cabin were formed of bulkheads, the fore bulkhead being occupied by a sort of sideboard on each side of the entrance door, while against the after bulkhead stood a very handsome pianoforte, open, with a quantity of music in a stand beside it. there was a door to the right of the piano, which, i conjectured, led to the captain's state-room, right abaft; and the side bulkheads, which like the rest of the woodwork of the cabin were painted in white enamel, were each pierced by two doors, close together, which, i had no doubt, gave access to state-rooms. my surmise as to this arrangement was proved true, a few minutes later, by the steward, an ugly, shock-headed, taciturn individual, who, still more than half asleep, presently came stumbling into the cabin with a bundle of bedding, which, having with silent care opened the aftermost door on the port side, he flung into the dark state-room and then motioned me to enter; it appeared that he intended me to make up my own bed. well, that was no very great hardship; but i should have liked a light to enable me to see what i was about, and i turned to ask my surly friend for one, but he had already turned his back upon me and was in full retreat to the forecastle to finish his interrupted night's rest. i therefore opened out the bundle and found that it consisted of a straw mattress, a flock pillow, and a pair of blankets, all of which i at once proceeded to arrange in the bunk, as best i could, by the dim light which entered the open door from the main cabin. then i most thankfully removed my clothes--for the first time since the springing up of the gale--tumbled into the bunk, and at once fell fast asleep. chapter thirteen. in the power of a madman. the sounds of water being freely sluiced along the deck overhead, and of the vigorous use of holystones and scrubbing-brushes immediately following thereupon, awoke me on the following morning, and i opened my eyes to find the rays of the newly risen sun flashing off the heaving surface of the ocean through the open scuttle of the state-room which i occupied. although i could not have been asleep more than three or four hours at most, i awoke wonderfully refreshed, and the memory of what had happened to me during the night instantly returning, i at once sprang out of the berth, determined to avail myself forthwith of the renewed opportunity of starting the day by taking a salt-water bath under the head pump. it took me but a few seconds to make my way out on deck, where i found the watch, under the supervision of the second mate, as i presumed, busily engaged in the operation of washing decks, while the fresh, invigorating trade-wind, sweeping in over the port cat-head, hummed and drummed with an exhilarating note through the taut weather rigging and into the hollows of the straining canvas overhead. the weather was brilliantly fine, the clear, deep azure of the sky merely flecked here and there with a few solemnly drifting puff-balls of trade- cloud, and the ocean of deepest blue sweeping in long, regular, sparkling, snow-capped surges diagonally athwart our bows, from beneath which the flying-fish continually sprang into the air and went flashing away on either hand, like handfuls of bright silver dollars new from the mint. merely to breathe such an exhilarating atmosphere, and to feel the buoyant, life-like lift and plunge of the straining, hurrying ship, were joys unspeakable, and i felt in positively hilarious spirits as i danced up the poop ladder to greet the officer of the watch, and prefer my modest request for a minute's use of the head pump. the individual whom i assumed to be the officer of the watch was a young fellow apparently not very much older than myself, attired in a somewhat dandified style of semi-uniform, bare-footed, and with his trousers rolled up above his knees. it was he who was sluicing the water about the poop so freely, while half-a-dozen of the crew vigorously plied the holystone and scrubber under his directions, and my first quick glance round the decks sufficed to show that the holystoning process was confined to the poop only, the cleansing of the main-deck seemed to be accomplished sufficiently by the application of the scrubber only. the exuberant buoyancy of my spirits suffered a sudden and distinct check as i glanced at the faces of those about me, which, without exception, seemed to belong to the lowest and most depraved class of seamen-- sullen, brutal, reckless, resembling, more than anything else, in air and expression, an assemblage of wild beasts, whose natural ferocity has not been eradicated but is held in check, subdued, and daunted by the constant exercise of a ferocity even greater than their own. the aspect of the young man whom i conceived to be the officer of the watch was even more repellent than that of his subordinates; and it was in distinctly subdued tones that i bade him good-morning and preferred my request to be allowed to take a bath under the head pump. he did not respond to my salutation, but, carefully placing upon the deck the bucket which he had just emptied, stood intently regarding me, with his feet wide apart and both hands upon his hips. he remained silent for so long a time that the men about him suspended their operations, regarding him with dull curiosity, while i felt my patience rapidly oozing away and my temper rising at the gratuitous insolence of his demeanour, and i was on the point of making some rather pungent remarks when he suddenly seemed to bethink himself, and said, in accents that were apparently intended to convey some suggestion of an attempt at civility: "so you are the british naval officer that monsieur leroy told me about when i relieved him, are you? and you want a bath, do you? very well; go and take one, by all means. and, hark ye, monsieur englishman, a word in your ear. take my advice, and after you have had your bath get back to your cabin, and stay there until the captain has been informed of your presence in the ship; for if he were to come on deck, and unexpectedly see you, the chances are that he would blow your brains out without thinking twice about it. he is not quite an angel in the matter of temper, and i may tell you that he is not too well disposed toward englishmen in general, and english naval officers in particular. now be off, get your bath, and scuttle back to your cabin as quickly as may be." "i am much obliged to you for your warning, monsieur," said i, "and i will act upon it. do you care to increase my obligation to you by stating why your captain has such a--prejudice, shall we call it, against british naval officers?" "well," replied my new acquaintance--whose name i subsequently learned was gaston marcel--"for one thing, this ship, which is his own property, is employed in the slave-trade, and captain tourville has already suffered much loss and damage through the meddlesome interference of your pestilent cruisers. but i believe he has other and more private reasons for his hatred of your nation and comrades." so that was it. after having suffered shipwreck, i had been run down and narrowly escaped with my life, only to fall into the hands of a frenchman--and a slaver at that! now, most slavers were little if anything better than pirates; they were outlaws whose crimes were punishable with death; trusting for their safety, for the most part, to the speed of their ships, but fighting with the desperation of cornered rats when there was no other way of escape; neither giving nor asking quarter; and, in many cases, guilty of the most unspeakable atrocities toward those hapless individuals serving in the slave squadron who were unfortunate enough to fall into their hands. this was especially true in the case of those who carried on their nefarious traffic under the french flag; for they were, almost without exception, west indian creoles, most of whom bore a dash of negro blood in their veins, therefore adding the inherited ferocity of the west african savage to the natural depravity of those to whose unbridled passions they owed their being. if, as was more than likely, i had fallen into the power of one of these fiends, my plight was like to be desperate indeed. i came to the conclusion that i could not do better than act upon the advice of the second mate, and abide the issue of events with as much equanimity as i could muster. accordingly, as soon as i had taken my bath i returned to the state-room which had been assigned to me by the mate, and there remained _perdu_, awaiting the moment when that somewhat formidable individual the captain should be pleased to send for me. the approach to my state-room was, it will be remembered, through the main cabin; and as i passed through the latter the ugly, shock-headed steward, more ugly and more shock-headed now, in the garish light of day, than he had been when he presented himself fresh from his hammock on the night before--was down on his hands and knees busily engaged in scrubbing the cabin floor, while the strips of carpet and the table- cloth were rolled up and placed upon the table, the beautifully polished surface of which was partially protected by a large square of green baize. i bade the fellow good-morning; but he took no more notice of me than if i had never spoken; so i passed on and entered my sleeping apartment, closing the door behind me. i then proceeded to dress leisurely and perform my toilet as well as the means at my disposal would permit, but when it is remembered that i had no change of linen, and owned only the clothes which i happened to be wearing when i was washed off the wreck, it will be readily understood that when i had done all that was possible to render myself presentable the result still left much to be desired. the steward finished the washing and swabbing of the cabin deck, and then retired, returning about half an hour later--by which time the planks were dry--to relay the strips of carpet, replace the table-cloth, and arrange the table for breakfast, producing, somewhat to my surprise, a very elegant table-equipage of what, seen through the slats which formed the upper panel of my cabin door, appeared to be solid silver and quite valuable china. he had barely finished his task when seven bells struck on deck, and prompt upon the last stroke the door in the after bulkhead was thrown open and a man issued from it, and, passing rapidly through the cabin, with just a momentary pause to glance at the tell-tale barometer swinging in the skylight, made his way out on deck. i caught a glimpse of him, through the slats in the top panel of my door, as he passed, and judged him to be about thirty years of age. he was rather tall, standing about five feet ten inches in his morocco slippers; very dark--so much so that i strongly suspected the presence of negro blood in his veins--with a thick crop of jet-black hair, a luxuriantly bushy beard, and a heavy thick moustache, all very carefully trimmed, and so exceedingly glossy that i thought it probable that the gloss was due to artificial means. the man was decidedly good-looking, in a frenchified fashion, and was a sea dandy of the first water, as was evidenced by the massive gold earrings in his ears, the jewelled studs in the immaculate front of his shirt of pleated cambric, his nattily cut suit of white drill, and the diamond on the little finger of his right hand, the flash of which i caught as he raised his hand to shield his eyes from the dazzle of the sun when glancing at the barometer. i heard his voice--a rather rich, full baritone--addressing the second mate, but could not distinguish what was said, at that distance and among the multitudinous noises of the straining ship; and a few minutes later the door opposite my own, on the other side of the cabin, opened, and monsieur leroy, the chief mate of the ship--to whose slackness of discipline i was chiefly indebted for being run down during the previous night--emerged and followed his chief out on deck. i recognised him in part by his figure, and in part by the fact that he was evidently an occupant of one of the state-rooms adjoining the main cabin, which would only be assigned to an officer of rank and consideration. as i now gained a momentary glimpse of him he appeared to be about thirty-seven years of age, broadly built, his features almost hidden by the thickly growing beard, whiskers, and moustache that adorned them, and out of which gleamed and flashed a pair of resolute but good-natured eyes as black as the bushy eyebrows that overshadowed them. he was dressed in a coat and pair of trousers of fine, dark-blue cloth, and, like the captain, wore no waistcoat. his shirt, thus exposed, however, unlike that of his superior, was made of coarse linen woven with a narrow blue stripe in it. also, like his captain, he wore no stockings on his slippered feet. while i was speculating what the captain's behaviour toward me would probably be, the steward unceremoniously flung open my cabin door, and in surly tones curtly informed me that the captain desired to see me at once upon the poop. he stood aside to permit me to pass, waved a directing hand toward the passage leading out on deck, and then busied himself in putting a few finishing touches to the arrangement of the table. when, in obedience to this summons, i stepped out on deck, the washing down had been completed and the planks were already practically dry; the running gear had been carefully coiled down; the brasswork polished; mops, swabs, and scrubbing-brushes stowed away; and the crew were mustered on the forecastle, partaking of breakfast. they glanced curiously at me as i emerged on to the quarter-deck, and one of them said something that excited a burst of sardonic laughter from the rest, disregarding which i sprang lightly up the poop ladder and found myself in the presence of a group consisting of the captain and the two mates. the countenances of the latter expressed much annoyance and some perturbation, particularly that of leroy, the chief mate; but the look of savage ferocity on the captain's face was positively fiendish, and enough to strike terror into the heart of even the boldest who might find himself in the power of such an individual. my hopes of considerate, or even of ordinarily merciful, treatment from one of so vindictively ferocious a character as this man seemed to be at once sunk to zero; yet i was not minded that any frenchman should enjoy the satisfaction of saying that he had frightened me. i therefore assumed a boldness of demeanour that i was very far from feeling, and bowed with all the ease and grace that i could muster. then addressing the captain i said: "good-morning, captain tourville. i am afraid that the hard necessities of misfortune compel me to claim from you that succour and hospitality which the shipwrecked seaman has the right to ask--" "stop!" shouted tourville, as, with clenched fist, he stood seeming about to spring upon me; "i admit no such right, especially of an englishman. the english have ever been my most implacable enemies. because, forsooth, i choose to earn my living by following a vocation of which some of them disapprove, they must needs do their utmost to ruin me, and by heaven they have very nearly succeeded, too! who are they that they should presume to thrust their opinions down the throats of other people? if their own countrymen choose to be led by the nose and are willing to submit to their dictation, well and good, it is nothing to me; it is their own affair, not mine. but what right have they to dictate to other nations, to say you shall do this, and shall not do that? i tell you that it is nothing short of monstrous, and i am ashamed of france that she has submitted to be thus dictated to. but if my country is so weak as to tolerate interference from a foreign power, i am not. i claim to judge for myself what is right or wrong, and to be governed by my own conscience. i am a slaver, and i care not who knows it! and i will continue to be a slaver as long as i please, despite the disapproval of a few english fanatics. but let those beware who dare to interfere with me, and especially those englishmen who have done their utmost to ruin me! you, monsieur, are one of them; by your own confession you belong to an english man-o'-war engaged in the suppression of that trade by which i am striving to make a living; and do you suppose that because you happen to have suffered shipwreck you are entitled to claim from me succour and hospitality, and ultimate restoration to your own people in order that you and others like you may do your utmost to ruin me? i tell you no! i do not admit the claim; you are an enemy--an implacable enemy--and you shall be treated as such. the fact of your shipwreck is merely an accident that has placed you in my power, and you shall die! i will revenge upon you some few of the countless injuries that i have suffered at the hands of your accursed countrymen!" "shame upon you, monsieur!" i cried. "are you coward enough to revenge yourself upon a mere lad like myself? i will not ask you what your crew will think of you, but what will you think of yourself, in your calmer moments, when you come to reflect--" "silence, boy!" he thundered; "silence, you english dog! how dare you speak--" then, suddenly interrupting himself, he turned to the chief mate and exclaimed: "leroy, have that insolent young puppy confined below in irons until i can make up my mind how to dispose of him." the chief mate approached and took me by the arm. "come with me, monsieur john bulldogue," said he, not unkindly, as he led me away; "and do not allow yourself to be more anxious as to your fate than you can help. i tell you candidly that i cannot form the slightest idea what that fate will eventually be; many men, knowing the skipper as well as i do, would no doubt say that you will be thrown to the sharks before you are an hour older--and it may be; yes, it certainly may be; for you are the first who has ever dared to assume a defiant attitude toward him and he is an inordinately vain man, as well as a man of unbridled temper. but, somehow, i am inclined to think that your defiance, which some people would say must seal your fate, will be more likely to tell in your favour than against you. yes; although you have the misfortune to be an englishman, i really think i may venture to encourage you to hope for the best. now, here we are; and here comes moulineux with the irons. i must obey orders and see that they are put on you; but make yourself as comfortable as you can; and i will send you down some breakfast presently. and, monsieur, you may rely upon my goodwill; i admire courage wherever i see it, whether in friend or in enemy, and you have proved that you possess it. if i find it in my power to do anything to help you, i will." the place in which i now found myself confined was a small apartment that was apparently used upon occasion as an auxiliary store-room, for there were a number of barrels and cases of various sizes in it, as well as what had the appearance of being spare sails. as the place was constructed in the depths of the ship, and considerably below the level of the water-line, there was no window to give light to it, the only light which reached it being as much as could find its way down through the partially open hatchway, some ten feet above. i was therefore able to observe my surroundings only very indistinctly even after i had been some time in the place and my eyes had become accustomed to the gloom of it. the mate was as good as his word in the matter of breakfast, a man bringing down to me a most excellent and substantial meal after i had been incarcerated for nearly an hour. i discussed the food with relish, for i was hungry, and then sat impatiently awaiting the moment when my fate should be made known to me. but hour after hour passed without word or sign from the man who held my destiny in the hollow of his hand; and it was not until late in the afternoon that the carpenter appeared and, removing my irons, requested me to follow him. he conducted me up the steep ladder leading to the main-deck and into the main cabin, where captain tourville was sitting alone. there was silence for a full minute after the carpenter had ushered me into the cabin and closed the door behind me. tourville remained seated at the end of the table, with one hand clenched on the cloth before him, while with the other he plucked quickly and impatiently at his thick beard and then combed it through with his fingers, "glowering" moodily at me meanwhile, in an absent-minded fashion, as though he scarcely realised my presence. at length he pulled himself together with an effort, and, pointing to the lockers, said: "be seated, monsieur, and have the kindness to tell me who and what you are; and how you come to be on board my ship. i have only heard my chief mate's story as yet." whereupon i proceeded to give him the required information, as briefly as possible, not omitting to mention the fact of my being an officer of the slave squadron; for i had already stated this to the chief mate, and from what had transpired earlier in the day i knew that he, in turn, had communicated the information to his captain. that what i told him did not appear greatly to increase his state of irritation seemed proof enough that he had already learned all the material facts, and i congratulated myself upon having shown him that i was not to be frightened into the suppression of any portion of my history, no matter how damaging its effect might be expected to be upon my interests. when i had told him everything he remained silent for quite two or three minutes, drumming the table meditatively with his fingers. at length he looked up from the table, at which he had been moodily glowering, and said: "monsieur fortescue, i thank you for the evident frankness with which you have told your story; and, in return, feel that you are entitled to some explanation of what you must doubtless have deemed my very extraordinary conduct of this morning. it is unnecessary for me to enter into details, but i may inform you that i have suffered irreparable loss and injury at the hands of the english. they have chosen to regard the method by which i earn my living as unlawful, and on no less than four occasions have brought me to the verge of ruin at the moment when i was upon the point of realising a handsome competence. they have persecuted me relentlessly, confiscated my property, slain my two brothers in action, and would have hanged me ignominiously, had i not been fortunate enough to effect my escape from them; and it was an englishman who--well, that is a story into which i need not enter with you; let it suffice to say that the injuries which i have suffered at the hands of your countrymen have been such, that the mere name of englishman excites me to a very frenzy of anger and hate, in which i am really not responsible for my actions. now, the question is: what is to be done with you? i tell you candidly that your life is not safe for a moment while you remain on board this ship. even as you sit there the memory of all that i have suffered at the hands of your countrymen so strongly moves me that i find it exceedingly difficult to refrain from blowing your brains out--" "but, monsieur," i interrupted, "pardon me for suggesting such a thing, but are you not surrendering yourself to a very childish weakness? is it possible that you, a man in the very prime of life and apparently in perfect bodily and mental health, can be so utterly devoid of self- control that because you have suffered injury, real or imagined, from--" "_sacre_!" he interrupted, starting savagely to his feet; "there is no question, monsieur, as to the reality of the injuries that i have suffered at the hands of your hateful countrymen--" "very well, monsieur," i cut in, speaking very quietly, "for argument's sake i will admit, if you like, that your injuries are both real and deep. still, does it not seem to you absurdly illogical that because certain persons have injured you, you must yield to this insane craving to wreak your revenge upon somebody else who has had no hand in the infliction of those injuries?" "quite possibly; i cannot tell," answered tourville. "it may be that i _am_ mad on this one particular point. but i do not admit the soundness of your argument, monsieur. you contend that you personally have not injured me. that may be perfectly true. but you admit that you belong to the slave squadron; and it is at the hands of that same squadron that i have suffered much of the injury of which i complain. now it is impossible for me to discriminate between the individuals in that squadron who have injured me, and those who have not; and i therefore contend that i am perfectly justified in wreaking my vengeance upon any of them who chance to fall into my power. and, in any case, if i should blow out your brains i shall at least have rid myself of one potential enemy. therefore--" and to my immeasurable surprise the man calmly drew a pistol from his belt and levelled it across the table straight at my head. i sprang to my feet with the idea of flinging myself upon and disarming him, for i could no longer doubt the fellow was stark, staring mad upon this one particular point; but before i could get at him the weapon exploded, and the ball, passing so close to my head that i felt it stir my hair, buried itself in the panelling of the cabin behind me. with a savage snarl he raised his hand, and would have dashed the heavy pistol-butt in my face; but by that time i was upon him, and, seizing his throat with one hand, while i wrenched the weapon from his grasp with the other, i bore him to the deck, and planted my right knee square in the middle of his chest, pinning him securely down. "you treacherous, murderous scoundrel!" i cried. "how shall i deal with you? you are as dangerous as a wild beast! if i were to beat your brains out with the butt of this pistol i should only be treating you as you deserve! and i will do it too as sure as you are lying there at my mercy, unless you will swear by all you hold sacred that you will never again attempt my life, and that you will set me ashore, free, at the first port at which we touch. will you swear that, or will you die?" "i swear it, monsieur," he gasped. "release my throat and let me rise, and i swear to you by the blessed virgin that i will declare a truce in your favour, and that you shall leave this ship as soon as a suitable opportunity offers." i relaxed my grasp upon his throat, and permitted him to regain his feet, whereupon he looked at me for some moments with an expression of surprise, not altogether unmingled, methought, with fear. then, bowing profoundly, he said: "leave me, monsieur, i beg of you. i will send for you again, a little later." i passed out of the cabin, and made my way up on to the poop, where i found monsieur leroy, the chief mate, in charge of the watch. he nodded to me as i ascended the poop ladder, and when i joined him in his fore- and-aft promenade of the weather side of the deck, jerked his head knowingly toward the skylight and remarked: "in his tantrums _again_? ah! quite as i expected. it is rather unfortunate for you, monsieur, that you happen to be an englishman, for the mere mention of the word to him has the same effect as exhibiting a red rag to a bull: it drives him perfectly frantic with rage." "so it appears," remarked i dryly. "what is the cause of it? have you any idea?" "no," answered the mate. "i doubt whether anybody knows; perhaps he does not even know himself. of course i have heard him speak of the losses which he has sustained through the interference of the ships of the slave squadron; but we who elect to make our living by following a vocation which civilised nations have agreed to declare unlawful must be prepared to be interfered with. for my own part i have no particular fault to find with those who have undertaken to suppress the slave- trade. we go into the business with our eyes open; we know the penalties attaching to it; and if we are foolish or unskilful enough to permit ourselves to be caught we must not grumble if those penalties are exacted from us. i like the life; i enjoy it; it is full of excitement and adventure; and when we succeed in outwitting you gentlemen the profits are handsome enough to amply repay us for all our risk and trouble. it is like playing a game of skill for a heavy wager; and i contend that no man who is not sportsman enough to bear his losses philosophically should engage in the game. but that is not precisely what ails the skipper; he takes his ill-luck grievously to heart it is true, but he insists that he has other grievances against the english as well; and, whatever they may be, they seem to have partially turned his brain." "partially!" i objected. "why, the man is as mad as a march hare. he absolutely loses all control of himself when he allows his temper to master him, and becomes more like a savage beast than a man!" "ay, that is true, he does," agreed leroy. "but, hark ye, monsieur, let me give you a friendly hint--you have escaped unharmed thus far, therefore i believe you may consider yourself reasonably safe; but in case of any further outbreaks on the captain's part, take especial care that you give him no reason to suppose that you are afraid of him; that is the surest road to safety with him." "upon my word i believe you are right," said i. "at all events that is the road which i took with him just now, for i pinned him down to the cabin deck, and threatened to beat his brains out. yet here i am, alive, to speak of it." "good!" ejaculated the mate. "if you did that you are all right; i believe that if there is one thing he admires more than another it is absolute fearlessness. show him that you do not care the snap of a finger for him and he will forgive you anything, even the fact that you are an englishman." i walked the poop with monsieur leroy for a full hour, chatting with him and learning many things very well worth knowing; and while i was chatting with him i kept my eyes about me, carefully noting all the particulars and peculiarities of the barque, with a view to future contingencies. among other things i learned that she was named _la mouette_; that she was of three hundred and sixty-four tons register; that she mounted fourteen twenty-eight pound carronades on her main-deck and four six-pounders on her poop; that she carried a complement of one hundred and seventy men; and that she was then bound into the river kwara for a cargo of slaves to be conveyed to martinique, or cuba, as circumstances might decide. at the end of about an hour i was once more summoned to the cabin, where i found tourville sitting at the table. the man had now completely regained his self-control; he was perfectly calm, and waved me courteously to a seat on the cabin sofa, which i took. "monsieur fortescue," said he, "i shall not mock you or myself by pretending to excuse or apologise for my recent outbreak of violence, for it is due to a weakness which i am wholly unable to conquer, and which may, quite possibly, get the better of me again. if it should, i must ask you to kindly be patient and forbearing with me, and to keep out of my way until the fit has passed. what i particularly wish to say to you now is that you are from this moment perfectly safe so long as it may be necessary for you to honour my ship with your presence. but, since you will naturally desire to rejoin your own ship as speedily as possible, i propose to tranship you into the first vessel bearing the british flag which we may chance to fall in with--provided, of course, that she is not a ship of war. should we happen to fall in with a british man-o'-war, my course of action will be guided by circumstances; i shall not feel myself justified in trusting to her captain's magnanimity to let us go free after delivering you safe on board her; but should the weather be fine enough to allow of such a proceeding without risk to you, i will give you a boat in which you may make your own way on board her. meanwhile, i beg that you will regard yourself as my guest, free to come and go in this cabin as you please, and to take your meals at my table; and i have also made arrangements for your greater comfort in the state-room which leroy assigned to you when you came aboard last night. i trust that these plans of mine will be agreeable to you." i replied that they were not only perfectly agreeable to me, but that i regarded them as exceedingly generous--taking all the circumstances of the case into consideration; that i regretted his violent antipathy to englishmen, as i feared that, in consequence of it, my presence could never be otherwise than exceedingly disagreeable to him, but that during my enforced sojourn aboard _la mouette_ i would strive to render my nationality as little obtrusive as possible, and that i trusted we might very soon be fortunate enough to fall in with a craft of some sort into which he could transfer me. to which he replied that he fervently hoped so too, for both our sakes; then directing my attention to a case of books attached to the after bulkhead, on the opposite side to that occupied by the piano, he rose, bowed, and retired to his own cabin. as for me, i went out on deck and resumed my conversation with leroy, telling him what had passed, and begging him to keep a sharp look-out for vessels; for that since captain tourville made no attempt to disguise his uneasiness at my presence on board his ship i was quite determined to tranship into the first craft that we might happen to fall in with, provided, of course, that she did not happen to be of questionable character--for i had no inclination to jump out of the frying-pan into the fire by going aboard another slaver. the mate fully agreed with me as to the wisdom of leaving the ship as soon as possible; indeed i soon discovered that, even after what had passed between tourville and myself, he was still very far from satisfied that there might not be further trouble ahead. "if such should unfortunately come," said he, "you must maintain a bold front, and show him that you are not to be so easily frightened. when his fits are upon him he very strongly reminds me of a wild beast which hesitates to attack so long as one faces it boldly, but springs the instant that one's back is turned." i considered this very excellent advice, singularly applicable to the circumstances, and determined to act upon it. at eight bells i was summoned below to supper, and found the cabin brilliantly lit, and the table a picture of dainty elegance in the matter of equipage and of choice fare. captain tourville was evidently no ascetic in the matter of eating and drinking, and the meal to which we immediately sat down was quite as good as many that i have partaken of ashore in so-called first-class hotels. tourville seemed at first to be in imminent danger of relapsing into one of his black moods, for he was distrait and inclined to be silent; but i was determined not to permit this if i could help it. i therefore persisted in talking to him, trying him with subject after subject, until i discovered him to be an enthusiast upon the arts of painting and music--in both of which i also dabbled, in an amateurish way. as soon as i spoke of these his brow cleared, he threw off his gloom, and spoke fluently and with evident knowledge of his subject, with the result that the meal which had begun so inauspiciously ended quite pleasantly. nay, more than that, as soon as the cloth was drawn this extraordinary man opened the piano and, sitting down to it, played piece after piece, sang several songs, and finally invited me to sing, the result being that, on the whole, the evening passed with far less constraint than i had anticipated. the next morning, while tourville was engaged in taking his sights for the longitude and working them out, he suddenly complained of feeling ill, sent for leroy, gave him certain instructions, and then took to his bed. by noon it became evident that he was in for a smart attack of malarial fever, to which it appeared he was very subject; and when i turned in that night the mate volunteered the information that he feared the skipper was going to be very ill. tourville's condition on the following morning amply justified leroy's foreboding; he grew steadily worse, became delirious, and at length grew so violent that about mid-day the mate considered it necessary to remain with him constantly, lest in his madness he should rise from his bed and fling himself through the stern windows into the sea. one result of this was that i offered to take leroy's watch, from eight o'clock to midnight, an offer which was gratefully accepted; but as we were running down before a fair wind there was nothing for me to do beyond maintaining a good look-out, and i thus found it unnecessary to give the crew any orders or to interfere with them in any way. for the next three days tourville's condition was such that the constant presence of some one in his cabin, night and day, to watch over him and guard against the possibility of his doing himself an injury, became an absolute necessity, and leroy, the chief mate, and thoreau, the boatswain, shared this duty between them. i volunteered to assume nursing duty in the place of leroy, but my offer was declined, the chief mate rather drily remarking that the presence of an englishman by the captain's bedside was scarcely likely to accelerate the patient's recovery, while some of his ravings were of such a character that it was better for all concerned that i should not hear them. but, he added, if i would be complaisant enough to keep his watch for him, he would esteem it a very great favour. of course i could do no less than accede to this suggestion with a good grace. chapter fourteen. h.b.m.s. gadfly. i had been on duty as leroy's deputy for two whole days when it fell to my turn to keep the middle watch, that is to say, the watch which extends from midnight to four o'clock in the morning. when, upon being called by marcel, the second mate, i went on deck to relieve him, he informed me that the wind had been steadily dropping all through the first watch, and expressed a fear that we were about to lose it altogether. this did not in the least surprise me, for we were now at about our lowest parallel, and on the border at least of, if not actually within, the belt of practically perpetual calms that exists about the line, which are the sources of so much delay, vexation, and hard work to the mariner. that the wind had dropped very considerably since i had turned in was evident to me even before i reached the deck, for, upon turning out of my bunk to dress after being called, i had immediately noticed that the ship was almost upon an even keel, while the inert "sloppy" sound of the water alongside that reached my ears through the open port of my cabin told me that we were sailing but slowly. the night was intensely dark, for the moon was but one day old, and had only barely revealed herself as a thin line of faint pearl in the evening sky for about half an hour before she followed the sun beneath the horizon, there was not a star to be seen in the whole of the visible firmament, and there was a feeling of hot, muggy dampness in the air that made me shrewdly suspect the presence overhead of a pall of rain- charged vapour, which would account for the opacity of the darkness which hemmed us in and pressed down upon us from above. as marcel curtly bade me good-night and went below upon being relieved, after giving me the course to be steered, and expressing his forebodings concerning the weather, i walked aft, glanced into the binnacle, and inquired of the helmsman whether the ship still held steerage-way, to which he replied that she did, and that was about all, the man whom he had relieved at eight bells having informed him that the log, when last hove, had recorded a speed of barely two and a half knots. he also volunteered the opinion that we were booked for a heavy downpour of rain before long, significantly glancing at the same time at the oilskins and sou'wester which he had brought aft with him. as the time dragged slowly along the heat seemed steadily to grow more oppressive, and the difficulty of obtaining a full breath greater; the perspiration was streaming from every pore of my body, and i felt almost too languid to drag one foot after the other as i moved about the deck. that the sick man also was affected unfavourably was evident, for his shouts came up through the after skylight with positively startling distinctness as his delirium grew more acute. at length, just after two bells had struck--and how dreadfully clamourous the strokes sounded in that heavy, stagnant air--the helmsman reported that the ship was no longer under command; and presently she swung broadside-on to the swell, rolling heavily, with loud splashing and gurgling sounds in the scuppers, with a swirling and washing of water under the counter, frequent vicious kicks of the now useless rudder, accompanied by violent clankings of the wheel chains, loud creakings and groanings of the timbers, heavy flappings and rustlings of the invisible canvas aloft, with fierce jerks of the chain sheets, and, in short, a full chorus of those multitudinous sounds that emanate from a rolling ship in a stark calm. the helmsman, no longer needed, lashed the wheel and, gathering up his oilskins, slouched away forward, muttering that he was going to get a light for his pipe; and i let him go, although i knew perfectly well that he had no intention of returning uncalled; for, after all, where was the use of keeping the man standing there doing nothing? i therefore contented myself by calling upon the hands forward, from time to time, to keep a bright look-out, and flung myself into a basket-chair belonging to the skipper. sitting thus, i gradually fell into a somewhat sombre reverie, in the course of which i reviewed the events that had befallen me during the short period that had elapsed since the _dolphin_ and the _eros_ had parted company. i went over again, in memory, all the circumstances connected with the loss of the brigantine, the hours i had spent alone in the longboat, her destruction and my somewhat dramatic appearance among the crew of _la mouette_, my reception by her mad captain, and then fell to conjecturing what the future might have in store for me, when i was suddenly aroused to a consciousness of my immediate surroundings by a sort of impression it was no more than that--that i had heard the sound of a ship's bell struck four times--_ting-ting_, _ting-ting_--far away yonder in the heart of the thick darkness. so faint, such a mere ghost of a sound, did it seem to be that i felt almost convinced it was purely imaginary, an effect resulting from the train of thought in which i had been indulging; yet i rose to my feet and, walking over to the skylight, peered through it at the cabin clock to ascertain what the time might actually be. _it was on the stroke of two o'clock_! therefore if, as i had assured myself, the sounds were imaginary, it was at least a singular coincidence that they should have reached me just at that precise moment. i walked to the fore end of the poop, upon the rail guarding which the ship's bell was mounted, and sharply struck four bells, after which i again called to the crew forward to maintain a sharp look-out. "now," thought i, "if those sounds originated outside my own imagination some of those fellows for'ard will certainly have heard them, and will mention it." but my call elicited nothing more than the stereotyped "ay, ay, sir!" and a faint momentary shuffling of feet--meant, no doubt, to convey to me the impression that the look-outs were on the alert and then deep silence, as before, so far as any report of suspicious sounds was concerned. i stood for quite two minutes listening intently for any further sounds out of the darkness, but none came to me, nor could i detect any light or other evidence of another craft in our neighbourhood. at length, fully confirmed in my conviction that my imagination had been playing a trick with me, i returned to the chair in which i had been sitting, and there finished out the watch, merely leaving my seat to strike six, and finally eight, bells. but i placed my chair in such a position that while still sitting in it i could keep my eye on the clock, and as the hands crept round its face, marking first three and then four o'clock, i strained my listening powers to their utmost in the hope that those elusive bell-strokes might again come stealing across the sea to me, but without result. when four o'clock came round, after striking eight bells with perhaps a little more vigour than usual, i called marcel, resigned the deck to him, and went below. yet, although i had felt drowsy enough on deck, and although tourville's ravings had ceased and he seemed to have fallen asleep, when i flung off my clothes and stretched myself on top of the bedding in my bunk, expecting to instantly drop off to sleep, i found, to my annoyance, that i had never been less inclined to slumber than i was just then. the fact was that in spite of myself those ghostly tinklings were still worrying me. were they, or were they not, imaginary? if they were-- well, there was an end of it. but if they were not imaginary; if, as i now perversely began to think, they were actual sounds, then it followed, of necessity, that there must be a craft of some sort not very far from us. if this were the case, what, i asked myself, was she likely to be? she could but be one of three things--either a trader, a slaver, or a craft belonging to the slave squadron; the chances, therefore, were about even that on the morrow i might be able to effect my escape from _la mouette_--always provided, of course, that those strokes of the bell had been real. for if the craft on board which they had been struck happened to be a trader, the odds were in favour of her being british; and the same might be said presuming her to be a man-o'-war. on the other hand, she might of course be a slaver; in which case i was fully resolved to endure the ills i had, rather than fly to others which might conceivably be worse. thinking thus, and worrying myself as to the best course to be pursued in certain eventualities, i lay there restlessly tossing first to one side, then to the other, until at length, sitting up in my bunk and putting my face to the open port in quest of a breath of fresh air, the fancy took me that the darkness was no longer quite so opaque as it had been, nay, i was sure of it, for by putting my face right up against the circular opening i was enabled to catch an occasional transient gleam of faint, shifting light that i knew was the glancing of the coming dawn upon the back of the oily swell that came creeping up to the ship; while, by directing my glances higher, i found that i was able to make out indistinctly something of the outline of the great black cloud- masses that overhung us. in those latitudes the dawn comes as quickly as the daylight vanishes, day comes and goes with a rush--thus within five minutes of the time when i first glanced out through the port there was enough light abroad to reveal a louring, overcast, thunder-threatening sky, an inky, oil- smooth, sluggishly undulating sea, and a long, low schooner with tremendously taunt masts raking over her stern, and not an inch of canvas set, lying broadside-on to us at a distance of some two miles to the eastward. when i caught my first glimpse of her she was very little more than a black blur standing out against the background of scarcely less black sky; but even as i sat looking at her the light grew, her outline sharpened and became clear and distinct, and my heart gave a great bound of delight as the conviction forced itself upon me that i knew her. yes, that long low hull, with its abnormal length of counter, and its bold sheer forward, the high, dominating bow with its excessive rake of stem, and the peculiar steeve of the bowsprit were all familiar to me. i had seen and noted them before while in sierra leone harbour, and i was convinced that the craft was none other than the british man- o'-war schooner _gadfly_, armed with eight -pound carronades and a long -pound pivot-gun on her forecastle, with a crew of eighty men under the command of lieutenant peters, than whom there was not a more dashing and enterprising officer on the coast. i had just arrived at the above conclusion when i heard one of the barque's crew hailing the poop; i could not distinguish what was said, but i presumed that it had reference to the schooner, for immediately upon the hail i heard the creaking of the basket-chair on the poop, as though marcel was just hoisting himself out of it, and presently his reply came floating down through the skylight, "ay, ay; i see her." then i heard the soft shuffling of his footsteps overhead and guessed that he was getting hold of the telescope wherewith to examine the schooner. ten minutes later, perhaps, i heard the second mate leave the poop and enter the cabin, and i concluded that he had come down to report the schooner to leroy; but, to my surprise, instead of doing that, he came straight to my cabin door and knocked softly. i at once guessed that he wished to question me about the stranger, but it was no part of my policy to let him know that i had already seen and made up my mind about her, i therefore feigned to be sound asleep, and did not reply. then he knocked a second time more sharply, whereupon i started up and responded in a drowsy tone of voice, "hillo! who is it? what's the matter?" "monsieur fortescue," marcel responded, murmuring through the slats in the upper panel of the door, "i want you on deck, quick!" "oh, indeed," i replied, still affecting drowsiness; "what for? is there anything wrong?" "please come up at once, monsieur," he returned, with a note of impatience in his voice. "when you come on deck you will understand why i want you." "very well," i grumbled, "i will be up in a brace of shakes;" whereupon my disturber departed. but his conversation with me, brief as it had been, and quietly as it had been conducted, had evidently aroused leroy, for as i emerged from my cabin he stepped out of his and we proceeded to the poop together, the chief mate expressing his surprise that marcel should have called me instead of him. of course i had a very shrewd idea as to the reason, but it was my cue to feign ignorance, and i did so. by the time that leroy and i reached the poop the sun must have risen-- although there was no sign of him to be seen through the dense canopy of cloud that completely obscured the heavens--for the light had strengthened so much and the atmosphere was so clear that every detail of the distant schooner was plainly distinguishable even to the unassisted eye. marcel was again examining her through the glass; it was therefore only natural that leroy's and my own glances should turn toward her as soon as our heads rose above the level of the rail. neither of us said anything, however, until marcel took the glass from his eye, when, seeing leroy, he said: "what d'ye think of her, monsieur? i have taken it upon myself to turn out monsieur fortescue to see whether he can tell us anything about her?" "_i_?" i ejaculated. "what the dickens should i know about her? that she is a slaver anybody can tell with half an eye,"--as a matter of fact the _gadfly_ had been a slaver in her time, but having been captured, had been purchased into the service--"but her skipper is a sensible fellow, evidently; he doesn't believe in threshing his canvas threadbare in a calm, so he has furled it." "permit me," said leroy, taking the telescope from marcel and placing it to his eye. he looked long and anxiously at the distant schooner, and at length, with an "ah!" that spoke volumes, passed the glass over to me. i understood at once from that expressive "ah!" that leroy knew and had recognised the vessel, and that my pretence of ignorance would no longer serve any good purpose. i therefore determined to abandon it and to make a virtue of necessity by frankly admitting my knowledge. for if leroy recognised the schooner, as i was certain he had, he would be fully aware of the fact that i, as an officer of the slave squadron, must necessarily know her too. after regarding her attentively through the lenses, therefore, for more than a minute, i passed the glass back to the chief mate with the quiet remark: "yes, i believe i recognise her now that i come to see her distinctly. if i am not mistaken she is the british man-o'-war schooner _gadfly_, and her presence yonder affords captain tourville an opportunity to fulfil his promise of transhipping me. he promised me that, should such a case as this occur, he would give me a boat in which to transfer myself; and that small dinghy of yours will be just the thing." "y-es," returned leroy meditatively. "he promised you that, did he? i remember your telling me so. but, unfortunately for you, he never said a word upon the matter to me, and he is far too sick just now to be worried about that or anything else. i am very much afraid, therefore, monsieur fortescue, that you will be obliged to let this opportunity pass; for, you see, i could not possibly take it upon myself to release you and give you even the dinghy without first receiving definite instructions from the captain." "oh, come, i say, leroy, you surely don't mean to insinuate that you doubt my word, do you?" i remonstrated. "i hope you don't pretend--" "i do not pretend or insinuate anything," leroy retorted, somewhat impatiently; "i merely state the fact that i have received from captain tourville no such instructions as those you mention, and without such instructions i dare not comply with your wishes." "ha, ha!" jeered marcel. "you will have to curb your impatience, monsieur englishman. it is evident that we are not yet to lose the pleasure of your society." to this i replied nothing, but turned remonstratingly to the chief mate, urging him to at least do me the favour to go down and see if the captain chanced to be awake, and if so, to put the matter to him. but he would not listen to my suggestion, insisting that, even if captain tourville happened to be awake, he was far too ill to be troubled over any such matter. suddenly it came to me that, despite all his past apparent friendliness, he was, for some unknown reason, anxious that i should not be released. seeing, therefore, the utter uselessness of further argument, i desisted, and turned away, bitterly disappointed. not, of course, that with leroy's refusal all hope of deliverance was to be abandoned. by no means. so long as the _gadfly_ remained in sight there was always a chance; for if i knew anything of lieutenant peters, he was not the man to let us go without giving us an overhaul, and then my chance would certainly come. it was the duty of the ships of the slave squadron to stop and examine the papers of _every_ ship encountered in those waters, and i was certain that peters would not be likely to make an exception in our favour; while, if leroy resisted, as, of course, he would--well, it would simply mean that _la mouette_ would be captured. meanwhile leroy and marcel were eagerly consulting together, and presently the second mate left the poop, went forward, and quietly called all hands. then, as soon as the crew were all on deck, they were ordered to clear for action, the guns were cast loose, the magazine opened, and powder and shot were passed up on deck; the arms' chests were brought up, cutlasses and pistols were served out--a brace of the latter to each man; pistols and muskets were loaded, pikes cast adrift and distributed, and, in short, every preparation was made for a fight, except that the guns were not then loaded. the second mate had been the moving spirit in all these preparations, leroy, meanwhile, remaining on the poop and intently watching the schooner through the telescope. by the time that the preparations for battle were complete it was close upon seven bells, and the order was given for the crew to get breakfast, and for that meal to be also served in the cabin. a few minutes later the steward came along with a pot of cocoa in one hand and a covered dish in the other, and leroy, coming aft to where i stood moodily pondering, thrust his hand under my arm and said, with all apparent good-nature: "now, don't sulk, _mon cher_, but come down and have some breakfast. unless i am greatly mistaken the _gadfly_ is about to send us her boats, and then you may perhaps be able to return in them. but do not build too much upon the chance, for as soon as they come within range i shall open fire upon them with round and grape; and if we cannot sink them before they get alongside, why, we shall deserve to be hanged, that's all." "thank you, monsieur," i answered, "but i have no appetite for breakfast just now, and, with your permission, will remain on deck rather than go into that suffocating cabin, merely to watch you and marcel eat." "_eh, bien_! as you please," he returned, with a shrug of the shoulders. "i will not ask you to keep a look-out for me, because i can do that quite well from the windows of the captain's cabin; and," looking round, "i do not think you can do any mischief up here. you are sure you will not come down? very well, then, _an revoir_!" now, to be left on deck, practically alone, was a bit of luck that i had not dared to hope for; and the fact that i had been, coupled with what leroy had said about the boats, gave me an idea upon which i immediately acted. we were still lying broadside-on to the _gadfly_, and i had not the least doubt that on board her a constant watch was being kept upon the barque; glancing round hurriedly, therefore, and observing that all hands on the forecastle were busy with their breakfast, i slipped over the side into the mizzen chains, where i could stand without being seen from inboard, and, removing my jacket, so that my white shirt-sleeves might show up clearly against the barque's black side, i forthwith began to semaphore with my arms, waving them up and down for about a minute to attract attention. then, without knowing whether or not i had been successful, i proceeded to signal the following message: "_la mouette_, slaver, armed with fourteen -pound carronades and four -pounders. carries one hundred and seventy men. attack with your long thirty-two; boats too risky!" then, donning my jacket again, i returned inboard just in time to see marcel's head appear above the level of the poop. "hillo!" he exclaimed; "i was wondering what had become of you. what have you been doing over the side? considering whether you should attempt to swim across to the _gadfly_?" "yes," answered i boldly, seizing at once upon the suggestion thus given. "but i have thought better of it," i continued. "there are too many sharks about. look there!" and i pointed to a dorsal fin that was sculling lazily along half-a-dozen fathoms away. the man looked at me suspiciously for several seconds, then walked to the side and looked over into the chains, but of course there was nothing to be seen. then, muttering to himself, he returned to the cabin, presumably to finish his breakfast. he had scarcely disappeared, and i was looking round for the telescope, when a flash of flame and a cloud of white smoke suddenly burst from the schooner's forecastle, and presently a -pound shot dashed into the water within half-a-dozen fathoms of our rudder. "good shot, but not quite enough elevation!" muttered i, delighted at this indication that my message had been noted and was being acted upon; and then came the sullen _boom_ of the gun across the water. i went to the skylight and quite unnecessarily reported, "the schooner has opened fire!" "_sacre-e-e_!" i heard leroy exclaim between his teeth. "the one thing that i was afraid of! he has thought better of sending his boats, then!" marcel answered something, but what it was i could not catch, and then the pair of them came racing up on deck. they had scarcely arrived when another shot came from the schooner, crashing through the bulwarks just forward of the fore rigging, dismounting a gun, and playing havoc with the men who crowded that part of the deck. five were killed outright and nine wounded by that one shot and the splinters that it created. leroy at once called the crew to quarters and ordered them to return the schooner's fire; but the latter was too far off for either the carronades or the -pounders to reach her; and my spirits began to rise, for if the schooner could only continue as she had begun she would soon compel _la mouette_ to strike. and there was every prospect of this happening, for the _gadfly_ had now got our range to a nicety, and shot after shot hulled us, playing the very mischief with us, dismounting another gun, strewing our decks with killed and wounded, and cutting up our rigging, but, most unfortunately, never touching our spars. leroy stamped fore and aft the deck, cursing like a madman, shaking his fist at the schooner, glowering savagely at me, and whistling for a wind. "give me a breeze!" he shouted; "give me a breeze, and i will run down and blow that schooner out of the water!" presently his prayer was answered, but not quite as he desired; for, while we watched, the clouds broke away to the eastward, and presently we saw a dark line stealing along the water toward the schooner. ten minutes later all hands aboard her were busily engaged in making sail, and by the time that the wind reached her she was all ready for it. then, as it filled her sails, she put up her helm and squared away for us, running down before the wind and yawing from time to time to give us another shot. but it was a fatal mistake; she should have continued to play the game of long bowls, in which case she could have done as she pleased with us; by keeping away, however, and running down to us, she gave leroy just the chance he wanted; he waited until she was well within range of his carronades, and then, double-shotting them and watching his opportunity, he gave her the whole of his starboard broadside, and down came her foremast and main-topmast. at the same moment another shot came from the schooner, badly wounding our main- topmast above the cap, and the breeze reaching us almost immediately afterward, the spar went over the side, dragging down the mizzen topmast and the fore-topgallant-mast with it. the result of all this was that while the schooner broached to and rode by the wreck of her foremast as to a sea anchor, _la mouette_ fell broad off and refused to come to the wind again; consequently the distance between the two vessels rapidly widened until both were out of range, and the firing ceased. thus ended the fight; and i presume that the two craft soon passed out of sight of each other and did not again meet, during that voyage at least, for there was no more firing from _la mouette_ while i remained aboard her. but what transpired during the rest of the voyage i was destined to know very little about, for scarcely had the firing ceased when captain tourville, thin, weak, and emaciated, crept up on the poop. he had a pistol in his hand, and no sooner did his gaze fall on me than he levelled the weapon at me and fired it point-blank. fortunately for me, the man's hand was so unsteady that the ball flew wide; but the report brought the mates and half-a-dozen men to us with a rush to see what was the matter. "take that young scoundrel," exclaimed tourville, pointing at me with a finger that trembled with rage as much as with weakness, "put his hands and his feet in irons, heave him down on the ballast, and leave him there until i give you further instructions." chapter fifteen. in the hands of savages. the order was promptly obeyed; and in a few minutes i found myself, heavily ironed, in the pitchy darkness of the lower hold, squatted disconsolately upon the bed of shingle which constituted the ballast of the vessel. and what a situation for a young fellow of less than twenty years of age to be in! the ship of which i had been placed in command lost-- foundered in mid-ocean, and, only too probably, all hands lost with her. our fate would never be known; it would be concluded that one of the mysterious disasters that so frequently befall the seaman had overtaken us; we should be given up as lost; and there would be an end of us all, so far as our fellow-men were concerned. for whatever hopes i might once have entertained of escaping from this accursed ship, i had none now. that tourville would not be satisfied with anything short of taking my life, i was convinced; and very soon i began to feel that i did not care how soon he sated his vengeance; for confined below in the heat and darkness of the stifling hold, with no resting-place but the hard shingle for my aching body, breathing an atmosphere poisonous with the odour of bilge-water, with only three flinty ship-biscuits, alive with weevils, and a half-pint of putrid water per day upon which to sustain life, and beset by ferocious rats who disputed with me the possession of my scanty fare, i soon became so miserably ill that death quickly lost all its terrors, and i felt that i could welcome it as a release from my sufferings. how long i remained in this state of wretchedness i cannot tell, for i soon lost count of time and indeed at last sank into a state of semi- delirium; but i think from subsequent calculations it must have been about ten or twelve days after the date of my incarceration that i was aroused once more to a complete consciousness of my surroundings by observing that a change had occurred in the motion of the ship. she no longer pitched and rolled as does a vessel in the open sea, but slid along--as i could tell by the gurgling sound of the water along her bends--upon a perfectly even keel except for the slight list or inclination due to the pressure of the wind upon her sails. i conjectured that she must have arrived at the end of her voyage and entered the kwara river, a conjecture that was shortly afterward confirmed by the sounds on deck of shouted orders and the bustle and confusion attendant upon the operation of shortening sail, soon followed by the splash of an anchor from the bows and the rumble of the stout hempen cable through the hawse-pipe. then ensued a period of quiet of several hours' duration, broken at length by the appearance of the carpenter and another seaman who, having removed my irons, gruffly ordered me to follow them up on deck. i felt altogether too wretchedly ill, and too utterly indifferent respecting my fate, to ask these men any questions, but contrived, by almost superhuman exertion, to climb up the perpendicular ladder which led to the deck; and when i presently emerged from the foetid atmosphere of the hold into the free air and dazzling sunshine of what proved to be early morning, i was so overcome by the sudden transition that i swooned away. i must have remained in a state of complete unconsciousness for several hours, for when at length i again opened my eyes and looked about me the sun was nearly overhead, and i was lying unbound in the bottom of a long craft that my slowly returning senses at length enabled me to recognise as a native dug-out canoe. she was about forty feet long by four feet beam and about two feet deep; and was manned by thirty as ferocious- looking savages as one need ever wish to see. they were stark naked, save for a kind of breech-clout round the loins, and squatted in pairs along the bottom of the canoe, plying short broad-bladed paddles with which they seemed to be urging their craft at a pretty good pace through the water. a big, brawny, and most repulsive-looking savage, who was probably the captain of the craft, sat perched up in the stern, steering with a somewhat longer and broader-bladed paddle, and urging his crew to maintain their exertions by continually giving utterance to the most hair-raising shrieks and yells. it was the fresh air, i suppose, that revived me, even as, after my long sojourn in the noisome hold of the slaver, it had prostrated me by my sudden emergence into it, and i presently became conscious that i was feeling distinctly better than i had done for some time past. for a minute or two i lay passively where i was, in the bottom of the canoe, blinking up at the pallid zenith, near which the sun blazed with blinding brilliancy; and then, no one saying me nay, i slowly and painfully raised myself into a sitting posture and looked about me. we were in a typical african river, about three-quarters of a mile wide, with low bush-clad banks bordered by the inevitable mangrove, while beyond towered the virgin tropical forest, dense, impenetrable, and full of mystery. the turbid current was against us, as could be seen at a glance; i therefore knew at once that we were paddling up-stream. but whither were we bound; of what tribe or nation were the negroes who manned the canoe; and how had i come to be among them? had tourville, with a greater refinement of cruelty than even i gave him credit for, handed me over to the tender mercies of these savages, to work their bloodthirsty will upon me, instead of himself murdering me out of hand? if so, what was to be my ultimate fate? i shuddered as i put this question to myself, for i had been on the coast quite long enough to have heard many a gruesome, blood-curdling story of the horrors perpetrated by the african savages upon those unhappy white men who had been unfortunate enough to fall into their hands. but i was not going to allow myself to be frightened or discouraged by dwelling upon stories of that kind; i was feeling so far better that the desire to live had returned to me. i even experienced some slight sensation of hunger, and there was no doubt at all as to the fact that i was parched with thirst. i therefore turned to the savage who was flourishing the steering paddle and, first pointing to my open mouth, went through the motions of raising a vessel to it and drinking. the man evidently understood me, for he shouted a few--to me quite unintelligible--words, whereupon one of the paddlers about the centre of the canoe laid in his paddle for a few moments, did something dexterous with a spear and a brownish-grey object the size of a man's head, and a minute later my lips were glued to a luscious cocoa-nut, the extremity of which had been deftly struck off with the blade of the spear, disclosing the white-lined hollow of the cup within brimming with a full pint or more of the delicious "milk," which i swallowed to the last drop. then, breaking off a strip of the husk and using it as a spoon, i proceeded to scrape out and hungrily devour the soft creamy fruit that lined the shell, and thus made the most satisfying and enjoyable meal that had passed my lips for many a day. shortly afterward, the strength of the ebb current increasing so greatly that we were able to make scarcely any headway against it, our steersman headed the canoe in toward the western bank of the river, and we presently entered a narrow creek up which we passed for a distance of about a quarter of a mile until we reached a practicable landing-place, when the canoe was secured to a stout mangrove root, and all hands stepped out of her, the steersman taking the precaution to draw my attention to the spears and bows and arrows with which his party were armed, as a hint, i suppose, of what i might expect should i be foolish enough to attempt to escape. we pushed our way through the thick bush for a distance of about a hundred yards, and then reached a small open space, where we bivouacked; a party of ten disappearing into the bush, while the rest remained to kindle a fire and, evidently, to look after me and make sure that i did not give them the slip. at length, after the lapse of about half an hour, the party who had vanished into the bush returned, singly or by two's and three's, some bringing in a monkey or two, others a few brace of parrots, one man a big lizard like an iguana, another a fine deer, until each of the ten had contributed something to the common larder, when the fire was made up, a plentiful supply of food cooked, and all hands set to with a will, each apparently animated by a determination to show all the others how much solid food he was capable of putting out of sight at a sitting. they very civilly offered me a choice of their dainties, and i accepted a tolerably substantial venison steak, broiled over the fire by being suspended close over the glowing embers upon the end of a stick. off this i contrived to make a fairly hearty meal, after which, following the example of the others, i stretched myself out in the long grass under the shadow of a big bush, and quickly fell into a deep sleep. i was aroused from my slumbers, some hours later, by my savage companions, who intimated to me, by signs, that the moment had arrived for us to take our departure, and we accordingly wended our way back to the canoe, taking our surplus stock of food with us, and, embarking, soon found ourselves once more afloat on the placid bosom of the broad river, the downward and opposing current of which had by this time greatly slackened under the influence of the flood tide which was evidently making fast. keeping well out toward the centre of the stream, and paddling steadily, we now made rapid progress in a northerly direction, the river gradually widening and shoaling as we went, until, by the time of sunset, we found ourselves progressing up a comparatively narrow deep-water channel with wide expanses of shallow water on either side of us, dotted here and there with dry patches of mud or sand upon which crocodiles lay basking, in some cases in groups of as many as six or eight together, while occasionally the great head of a hippopotamus appeared for a moment, only to vanish again with a little eddying swirl of the mud-charged water as the creature dived. while the sun still hovered a degree or two above the tree-tops on the western bank of the stream, the moon, now nearly full, sailed gloriously into view above the clumps of vegetation that shrouded the eastern bank; and the gradual transition from the ruddy, golden light of the dying sun to the flooding silver of the brilliant moon, with the ever-changing effects that accompanied the transition, presented a spectacle of enchanting beauty such as i had never up to that time beheld, even at sea. but, beyond a low muttered word or two and a grunt, apparently expressive of deep satisfaction at the appearance of the unclouded moon, the savages took no notice of the magical loveliness of the scene; and while i sat entranced and practically oblivious of everything else, they merely paddled the harder, conversing in low tones among themselves. of course i did not understand a single word of what was said, yet, so much did i gather from the glances that they flung about them, and the emphasis and accent of their speech, that i shrewdly suspected them of anticipating the possibility of attack from the shore. this suspicion was strengthened, a little later on, by the fact that as we approached a certain bend in the river our timoneer edged the canoe in toward the eastern bank, until we were completely plunged in the deep shadow of the vegetation that grew right down to the water's edge, as though he were desirous of escaping observation; at least there was no other reason that i could think of for such a manoeuvre, for by this time the current was running up quite strongly, and under ordinary circumstances it would have been to our advantage to have remained in mid-channel, where the full strength of it would be felt. but if this was his object he was only partially successful; for we presently arrived abreast of a bay, or it may have been the wide entrance of a creek, many of which branched off the main stream on either hand, where the forest receded so far that, for the distance of fully half a mile, we were compelled to traverse a space of water completely flooded by the brilliant rays of the moon, and before we had accomplished half the passage a quick ejaculation of mingled annoyance and dismay from the steersman caused me to glance toward the western bank, from an opening in which half-a-dozen canoes were darting out with the evident determination to intercept us if possible. fortunately for us, however, we had already passed the spot from which the pursuing canoes were emerging, this spot now bearing well upon our port quarter; but, on the other hand, our pursuers would presently obtain an important advantage over us, since they would soon reach the deep channel, where the upward current was now running strongly. i feared that when they arrived in that channel they would turn the bows of their craft up-stream and avail themselves of the advantage afforded by the strong current to endeavour to pass ahead of us and cut off our retreat; but in the eagerness of their pursuit they seemed to lose sight of this advantage, for they continued to head straight for us, while we, impelled by the full strength of our thirty paddles, now plied with desperate energy by our freely perspiring crew, gradually drew out and threw our pursuers still further on our quarter. yet they were steadily nearing us, and i did not see how we could scrape clear without something in the nature of a fight. all this time we were heading straight for a low, heavily timbered point which marked another turn in the course of the stream, and i could see that our people were straining every nerve to get round this point before being overtaken. at length, with a mighty stirring up of the mud by our deep-plunging paddles in the shallow water, we shaved close round this point and almost immediately afterwards darted into a narrow creek so completely overgrown with vegetation that the boughs of the mangroves and other trees united over our heads, forming a sort of tunnel, the interior of which was so opaquely dark that it was scarcely possible to see one's hand before one's face. yet our helmsman seemed to know the place perfectly, for he stood boldly on, urging the crew to continue their exertions. at length, after we had traversed a full hundred yards or more of the creek, we sighted a spot ahead where, doubtless in consequence of a wind-fall, or some similar phenomenon, the dense bush had been levelled, leaving room for a patch of clear moonlight, some ten yards in circumference, to fall full upon the channel of the creek, revealing every object, even the smallest, within its boundary with a clearness and distinctness that was positively startling. arrived here, the canoe was sheered in alongside a spot where the mangroves grew thickly, and some twenty of our crew, laying in their paddles, hastily seized their bows and arrows and, springing ashore, swiftly vanished into the adjacent deep shadow, while the canoe, with the remainder of us on board, pushed across the patch of moonlight into the darkness beyond, where she was forced beneath an overhanging mass of foliage, in such a manner as to lie perfectly concealed. hardly had this been accomplished when we heard from the river the exclamations of our pursuers, startled at our sudden and, at first, inexplicable disappearance. but it did not long remain inexplicable; some sharp eye soon detected the entrance of the creek and suspected that we were concealed therein, for, after a few minutes spent in animated discussion by the occupants, the pursuing canoes were heard cautiously approaching. it was evident that their knowledge of the creek was not nearly so complete as that of our own steersman, for whereas we had contrived, despite the pitchy darkness, to navigate the crooked channel without running foul of anything, we could hear the continual swishing of foliage and the bumping of the canoes as they encountered the overhanging branches or collided with the mangrove roots on one side or the other. we were thus able to follow the progress of their approach with the utmost precision, and the moment that the leading canoe--a craft manned by some twenty most villainous-looking savages--emerged from the darkness into the patch of brilliant moonlight, she was greeted with a murderous discharge of arrows at short range which put the greater part of her crew _hors de combat_. she was closely followed by another canoe of about the same size, the occupants of which were treated to a similarly warm reception. a warning shout from one of the survivors of this second discharge was raised in time to save those behind from pushing forward to meet a similar fate, and now the quick twanging of bowstrings and loud shouts from those ashore and afloat told that a fierce battle was raging. but our people, from the advantage of their position, had very much the best of it, and at length the pursuers were beaten off and compelled to retreat precipitately, with the loss of nearly two-thirds of their number and two canoes, which, with their wounded occupants, were left in our hands, while our party escaped absolutely unscathed. the wounded of the enemy, numbering eleven, would have met with but short shrift at the hands of their captors, but for the interposition of the man whom i have termed our timoneer, who seemed to be a petty chief. this individual carefully examined his prisoners and found that three of them were so severely wounded as to afford little hope of their recovery; these three he therefore despatched with the most callous sang-froid by driving his broad-bladed spear into their throats, after which they were flung over the side; the remaining eight, who appeared to be only temporarily disabled, were trussed up, hand and foot, with thin, tough, pliant creeper, cut from the adjacent jungle, and bestowed, without much consideration for their comfort, in the bottom of our canoe. the captured canoes were then sunk by means of a few large stones placed in them to take them down, and then heeled until the water flowed in over their gunwales, when they quickly vanished beneath the turbid, foetid waters of the creek. this done, our people made preparations for the continuation of their journey. but our leader, whose knowledge of the river seemed intimate enough to entitle him to a certificate as branch pilot, had no inclination to incur the risk of leaving the creek again at the point where we had entered it, and thus very possibly falling into a cleverly arranged ambuscade. on the contrary, he proceeded to push boldly on up the creek for a distance of several miles, much to my astonishment, for the waterway generally was so narrow as scarcely to afford room for two canoes to pass abreast, and i was momentarily expecting that this creek, like so many others of the african rivers, would abruptly end in a mud- bank overgrown with mangroves. contrary to my anticipations, however, when a dozen times or more the banks closed in upon us in such a manner as to suggest that our further progress was about to be stayed, we would suddenly emerge into a comparatively wide channel, and push merrily on for a mile or more ere we encountered our next difficulty. in this manner we must have traversed a distance of nearly twenty miles when, to my amazement, and also that of most of the canoe's crew, i think, we suddenly emerged from the tunnel-like channel that we had been navigating for something like five hours, and found ourselves once more in what was undoubtedly the main stream of the river, and so far away from the spot at which we had diverged from it that it was nowhere to be seen. the moon had by this time risen so high in the sky as to be almost directly overhead; there was therefore little or no shadow on either bank of the river to shroud us from observation, nevertheless we continued to cling closely to the eastern bank for several miles further--the tide having now turned and being against us--until at length, the current becoming too strong for us, our leader found a practicable landing-place, and all hands, except the unfortunate prisoners of war, scrambled ashore and, hastily lighting a fire, disposed ourselves to sleep around it. now, it will probably be thought by many that i was submitting to my uncertain fate with far greater philosophy than wisdom; but this was by no means the case. the fact was that i had no sooner awakened to the consciousness that i was a prisoner in the hands of african savages than i made up my mind that i could not too soon effect my escape from them; for although i have just spoken of my fate as uncertain i felt that, in reality, there was very little uncertainty about it. it was so rarely that a white man fell into the hands of the negro savages that when one had the misfortune to do so they generally made the utmost of him. and that "utmost" was usually something in which prolonged and agonising torture figured largely. but it would obviously be worse than useless to attempt to escape until an opportunity occurred of at least a fair prospect of success; for to attempt and _fail_ meant the extinguishment at once of all further hope. and, up to the present, i had not had a ghost of an opportunity. my captors had taken good care of that, although they had been kind enough to leave me unbound. but now, when all hands must be feeling the effect of fatigue after several hours of strenuous labour at the paddles, and were likely to sleep soundly, it was possible that, by biding my time, i might be able to steal off to the canoe and cut the bonds of the captives who had been so callously left in it, when it would be strange indeed if, out of gratitude for my release of them, they were not willing to help me to make my way back to the mouth of the river, where i should of course have to take my chance of finding a ship the master of which would be willing to receive me on board. it was not, perhaps, a very brilliant prospect, but i felt that it was at least preferable to that to which i might look forward if i remained in the company of my present owners; and accordingly when my sable companions disposed themselves to sleep, i apparently did the same, but summoned all my energies to aid me in the task of resisting the tendency toward somnolence that i felt stealing over me. but this was not nearly so easy as i had believed it would be. if i closed my eyes for a few seconds a delicious languor seized me, my thoughts began to wander, and it was only by an almost painful effort that i succeeded in, as it were, jerking myself back to full consciousness. my intention was to remain awake until all my companions had become wrapped in slumber, and then effect my escape from them; but to my chagrin i found that while it was almost impossible for me to remain awake, my captors or owners--i scarcely knew which to consider them seemed restless, watchful, and all more or less upon the alert. finally, while waiting and watching for signs that they were succumbing to the influence of the drowsy god, i lost all control of myself and sank into a profound and delicious slumber. chapter sixteen. king banda. how long i remained steeped in that delightful and refreshing sleep i did not then know; but when at length i awoke with a violent start the embers of the fire were merely smouldering, while the snorts and snores that were emitted by the recumbent figures grouped around it seemed to indicate that the fateful moment had arrived when i might make a bid for liberty with some prospect of success. it was now very much darker than it had been when i sank into involuntary slumber, for the moon had swung so far over toward the west that at least two-thirds of the small clearing which we occupied were enveloped in deep shadow, but i observed with some dismay that my path to the canoe lay directly across the patch that was still bathed in the moon's rays. that, however, could not be helped; i could not afford to delay until the moon had sunk low enough to throw the entire clearing into shadow, for with the setting of the moon would come dawn and sunrise. i therefore determined to start upon my attempt forthwith, and, as a first step, rolled myself over, away from the fire, as though stirring in my sleep. i was now lying with my back to the fire, and could therefore not see my companions or observe what effect, if any, my movement had had upon them; but i resolved not to fail for want of caution, so i made no further attempt to withdraw myself for the next ten minutes, but confined myself simply to a few restless movements, as though--which was actually the case--i was being worried by the swarms of minute creeping and biting things with which the spot abounded. then, at the end of about ten minutes from my first movement, i ventured again to roll over in the same direction as before, which once more brought me with my face toward the fire. i now opened my eyes cautiously and carefully surveyed my surroundings. not one of the black figures about the fire appeared to have altered his position in the slightest degree, so far as i could perceive, while the snoring and snorting still proceeded as vigorously as ever. i lay quite still for two or three minutes, and then, as everything seemed perfectly safe, and i had not too much time to spare, i decided that i might venture upon a somewhat more rapid mode of progression. i accordingly raised myself upon my hands and knees, and proceeded to crawl very cautiously toward the canoe, looking back from time to time to see if i were observed. it was while i was thus engaged in looking back, while still creeping forward, that, as i put forth my right hand, it fell upon something cold and clammy that stirred beneath my touch, and the next instant i felt a sharp pricking sensation in the fleshy base of my right thumb. like lightning i snatched my hand away, threw myself backward and sprang to my feet with an involuntary cry; and as i did so i indistinctly caught sight of a small wriggling object in the long grass that seemed to vanish in a flash. it was a snake, and it had bitten me! yes, there was no mistake about that, for as i lifted my hand to my eyes there was light enough for me to see two drops of blood, about a quarter of an inch apart upon my right hand. upon the spur of the moment i clapped the wounded part to my mouth and sucked vigorously, spitting out such blood as i was able to draw from the wound, and this i continued to do industriously for the next hour or more. but my chance of escape was gone for that night at least; for my cry brought the whole of the savages to their feet as one man, with their weapons grasped and ready for instant use. some half-a-dozen of them, seeing me upon my feet, sprang toward me and surrounded me with angry cries, but i did not of course make the slightest attempt to run; on the contrary, i showed them my wounded hand, and, with two fingers of my left hand extended, made a motion as of a snake striking his fangs into my flesh. the individual whom i took to be the chief of the little party thereupon led me back to the fire, and thrusting two or three dry twigs into the smouldering ashes, fanned the latter into a blaze with his breath, thus causing the twigs to ignite. then, using these twigs as a torch, he carefully examined my wounded hand, shook his head as though to indicate that i had no chance, cast the blazing twigs to the ground, and saying a few words to his companions, lay down and again composed himself to sleep, an example at once followed by his companions. i, however, remained awake, diligently sucking my wounded hand, which soon began to swell and grow acutely painful, the throbbing pain extending all the way up my arm, right to the shoulder. the pain at length became so acute that i could sit still no longer, i therefore sprang to my feet and began to pace to and fro; but i had no sooner done so than half-a-dozen of the savages were beside me, not exactly interfering with me--for i think they understood pretty clearly what was the matter with me--but making it perfectly plain that they were watching me, and that only a certain amount of freedom would be permitted me. whether they really understood that i was actually attempting to effect my escape when the snake bit me, i was never able to determine. at length the dawn arrived, day broke, the sun rose, and a few of the savages, taking their bows and arrows, went off into the bush to forage, as i surmised; and a little later they returned, one after the other, each bringing some contribution to the common larder, while others busied themselves in collecting fresh wood and rebuilding the fire. while they were thus engaged, one of the party, who happened to pass near the spot where i had been bitten, suddenly uttered a most dreadful yell, grasped his left foot, looked at it a moment, and then began with furious haste to search about in the long grass, which he pushed apart with the blade of his spear. a few seconds later he fell to stabbing the ground, as it seemed, savagely, finally stooping down and picking up the still writhing halves of a snake that had been cut clean in two by a blow of his spear. it was not at all a formidable-looking creature, being not more than eighteen inches long and perhaps three inches girth about the thickest part of its body. but it was an ugly, repulsive- looking brute, its head being heart-shaped, and its body almost the same thickness for the greater part of its length, terminating in a short, blunt tail. its ground colour was a dirty grey, upon which occurred large, irregular blotches or markings of dull black with a few splashes of brilliant red here and there. the fellow who had fallen upon it with such ferocity, and who had evidently been bitten by it, brought the two writhing fragments and flung them into the fire, in the midst of which they writhed still more horribly. then seizing a good, stout, brightly- glowing brand from the fire, he coolly sat down and applied the almost white-hot end to the wound, which was in his left instep. i do not think i ever saw anything more heroic than this act of the savage, for though the flesh hissed and smoked and gave forth a most horrible odour of burnt flesh, the man never winced, but calmly and deliberately cauterised the bite with as much care and thoroughness as though he had been operating upon somebody else. but that he was not insensible to his self-inflicted torture was very evident from the fact that in a few seconds he was literally drenched with the perspiration that started from every pore of his body. while this was happening, the leader of the party had hurriedly raked from the fire the scorched and blistered half of the snake to which the head was attached, and, seizing it by the neck, squeezed it until the jaws were forced open, revealing two long, slender, needle-like fangs projecting from the upper jaw. holding this horrible object between the finger and thumb of his right hand, he approached me, and, before i had the least idea of what he intended to do, seized my wounded hand and approached the head of the still living reptile so closely to it that it was easily to be seen that the two tiny punctures in my flesh were exactly the same distance apart as the snake's fangs, the inference being that this was the identical reptile that had bitten me. having satisfied himself of this, the man flung the loathsome object back into the heart of the fire, where it was soon consumed. i was by this time suffering the most dreadful agony, my hand and arm were so terribly swollen that they had almost lost all semblance to any portion of the human anatomy, while the two punctures made by the poison fangs were puffed up, almost to bursting, and encircled by two rings of livid grey colour. the throbbing of the limb, as the blood forced itself through the congested passages, can only be compared to the pulsing of a stream of fire, and i am certain that, had i been within reach of qualified surgical assistance at the moment, i should have insisted upon having the limb removed, as i was convinced that the pain of amputation would have been less acute than that from which i was suffering. needless to say, i had no appetite for food when it was offered me a little while afterward; but i felt thirsty enough to drink the river dry, and quaffed several cocoa-nuts with an ecstasy of delight that almost caused me to forget my pain--for the moment. breakfast over, the word was given to re-embark, and we all wended our way back to the canoe. i do not know whether it was deliberate intention, or merely the result of accident, but i could not help noticing that during the short journey from our camping-place to the spot where the canoe had been left, there were always three or four savages quite close to me, who appeared to be keeping a very careful watch upon my movements, as though they more than half suspected me of a desire to give them the slip; but i was by this time suffering such excruciating agony that, for the time being at least, all thoughts of escape were completely banished from my mind. i had become quite convinced that the bite was going to prove fatal, and my only subject of speculation was how many more hours of torture i was doomed to endure before merciful death would come to my relief. but after we had been afloat for about half an hour, and were once more speeding up the river as fast as the sturdy arms of the paddlers could urge us, i suddenly became violently sick, the paroxysm lasting for nearly ten minutes; and when i had in some degree recovered from the exhaustion attendant upon this attack, i was equally surprised and delighted to find that the pain and throbbing in my arm were distinctly less acute; and from that moment, as much to the astonishment of the savages as of myself, my symptoms rapidly improved, until by evening i was so far free from pain as to be able to sleep for several hours, although the swelling did not entirely subside until nearly forty-eight hours later. but meanwhile my fellow-sufferer, the savage who had also been bitten, and who had resorted to the heroic method of cauterising his wound, had been all day steadily developing symptoms similar to my own before the curative attack of sickness, his foot and leg, right up to the hip, had swollen to an enormous size and become so stiff that when the moment arrived for us to disembark for the night he was unable to move, and begged most piteously--as i interpreted the tones of his voice and his actions--to be left in the canoe all night, to fight out the battle between life and death alone and undisturbed. the next morning, when we went down to the canoe, the poor fellow was not only dead, but his whole body was swollen almost out of human semblance, presenting in that and other respects a most shocking and revolting spectacle. we took the corpse with us until we had reached the main channel of the river, and there flung it overboard. we had scarcely left it fifty fathoms astern when there arose a sudden violent commotion in the water about it, and a second or two later it disappeared from view, dragged down by the voracious crocodiles with which the river swarmed. i was by this time quite free from pain, and apart from a feeling of extreme debility, which i had endured for some hours on the previous day, i was not much the worse for the alarming experience that i had undergone. the death of the savage who had been bitten after me, and undoubtedly by the same reptile, conclusively proved how very narrow had been my escape from a similar fate; and i naturally fell to wondering how it was that he had succumbed to his injury while i had recovered from mine. for it seemed to me at the moment that the remedial measure which he had adopted ought, from its very severe and drastic character, to have proved much more efficacious than my own; whereas the opposite was the case. but upon further reflection i came to the conclusion that while i had proceeded to suck the poison from the wound _at once_, or within a second or two of its infliction, the savage had wasted at least a minute in pursuing and slaying his enemy before cauterising his wound, and that this minute of delay, accompanied as it was by somewhat violent action on the part of the injured man, had sufficed for the poison to obtain a strong enough hold upon his system to produce fatal results. whether or not this is the correct explanation i must leave to those who are better qualified than myself to judge. day after day we steadily pursued our course up the river, which, for the most part, retained the same dreary, monotonous aspect of low, bush- clad, mangrove-lined banks, and practically the same width, save where, at occasional intervals, it widened out and became dotted with islands, some of considerable size. at length we arrived at a point where the land on the western bank rose into a range of hills some eight or nine hundred feet high, densely clothed with vegetation to their summits. this range of hills extended northward for a distance of about thirty miles before it once more sank into the plain; but before it sank completely out of sight astern more high land was sighted ahead, and two days later we found ourselves navigating among some very picturesque scenery, with high land on both sides of us, some of the peaks being twelve to fourteen hundred feet high. late in the evening of the second day after entering upon this picturesque stretch of the river we arrived at a point where the stream forked into two of apparently equal width and depth, one branch striking away to the eastward, while the other continued its northerly course. here my savage companions proceeded with the utmost caution, frequently landing and sending one or two of the party away to reconnoitre, and otherwise behaving as though they feared attack; but after a slow and anxious progress of some twenty hours' duration they seemed to consider the danger as past, and once more pressed boldly forward. by this time i had completely recovered, not only from the effects of the snake-bite--at which my companions seemed greatly astonished--but also from the hardship and privation which i had experienced during the latter part of my voyage aboard _la mouette_, and had begun to think very seriously of how i was to effect my escape from those who held me captive. not that i was ill-treated by them, far from it; i enjoyed the same fare as themselves, and was never asked to share their labours, and that, i take it, was as much good treatment as i could reasonably expect under the circumstances. but i knew that they were not hampering themselves by taking me and their other prisoners this long journey up the river--much of the paddling being done against the stream--merely for the pleasure of enjoying our society. my intuition assured me that their action had a more sinister motive than this, and in any case i had no desire to penetrate the interior of equatorial africa; therefore so soon as i felt that my health and strength were sufficiently restored to allow of my attempting the long and perilous journey back to the sea alone, i began to consider the question of escape. but the longer i thought of it the less became my hope of success; for i very soon discovered that under no circumstances whatever were my custodians disposed to allow me to stray a yard out of their sight. without imposing any actual restraint upon me, they invariably so contrived that, if i made the slightest attempt to withdraw myself from them, three or four of the most active of the party, always well armed, had occasion to go in precisely the same direction as myself. that, however, was not my only difficulty; for, assuming for a moment the possibility of my being able to give the savages the slip, how was i, a white man, alone, unarmed, and with no means of obtaining food, to make my way down more than two hundred miles of river, flowing through a country every inhabitant of which would undoubtedly be an enemy, whose delight it would be to hunt me to death? i told myself that if i could obtain a small, light, handy canoe and weapons, even though they should but consist of a bow and arrows, the situation would not be altogether hopeless--for i possessed a very fair share of pluck and resource; but i felt that before i could effect my escape from my watchful custodians, and obtain these necessities, i might find myself in so dire a strait as to render them and all else valueless to me. yet i would not suffer myself to feel discouraged, for i recognised that to abandon hope was to virtually surrender myself tamely to the worst that fate might have in store for me, and this was by no means my disposition; i therefore continued to keep my eyes wide open for an opportunity. but, watch as i might, the opportunity never presented itself, nor, thanks to the watchfulness of my companions, could i make one; so the time dragged on until, after a river voyage of more than three weeks, we one evening, about two hours before sunset, entered a creek important enough to suggest the idea that it might possibly be a small tributary of the main river. after paddling up it for a distance of about two miles we suddenly hove in sight of a native town of considerable size built upon the north bank of the creek, upon an area of ground that had been completely cleared of all undergrowth, but was well shaded by the larger trees which had been allowed to stand. that the town was of some importance, as well as of considerable size, i surmised from the fact that, with a few exceptions, the habitations, instead of being of the usual circular, bee-hive shape common to most native african towns, were of comparatively spacious dimensions and substantial construction, being for the most part quadrangular in plan, with thick walls built of substantial wattles, interwoven about stout poles sunk well into the ground and solidly plastered with clay which, having dried and hardened in the sun, had become quite weather-tight, protected as they were from the tropical rains by a thick thatch of palm leaves, with which also their steep sloping roofs were covered. the average size of these huts was about twenty feet long by twelve feet wide and eight feet high to the eaves; but there were others--about fifty of them altogether-- surrounded by and cut off from the rest by a high and stout palisade-- the points of the palisades being sharpened, in order, as i took it, to render the fence unclimbable--which were not only considerably larger and more substantial in point of construction, but which, as i afterward had opportunity to observe, evidenced some rude attempt at decoration in the form of grotesquely carved finials affixed to the roofs. this part of the town, situated in its centre, and covering, perhaps, a space of forty acres, was, i afterwards learned, the habitation of king banda, his court, the principal officers of his army and household, and the priests, whose temple, or fetish-house, stood on the opposite side of the square to that occupied by the "palace" of the king. our appearance did not at first attract very much attention, or create any very great amount of excitement; but when we arrived within hail of the beach in front of the town--upon which were hauled up some three to four hundred canoes of various sizes--our skipper suddenly sprang to his feet and, placing his hands trumpet-wise to his mouth, began, in a curious, high-pitched voice, to shout a somewhat lengthy communication. before it was half finished there was a very distinct commotion upon the beach; half the naked children, who had been playing in the water, were racing up to the town as fast as their legs would carry them, shouting as they went, while from every hut the inhabitants came pouring out, like ants from a disturbed nest, and began to hurry down to the beach. by the time that we arrived there must have been at least two thousand people assembled to meet us, and others were hurrying down in crowds. i soon found that i was the cause of all the commotion, for no sooner did i step out of the canoe than, although my travelling companions formed themselves into a cordon round me, and the headman or chief who had me in charge strove by virtue of his authority to prevent such a happening, there occurred a wild rush on the part of the crowd to get at least a sight of me, while those who could get near enough to me insisted upon touching my skin, apparently with the object of satisfying themselves as to the genuineness of its colour; and from their eagerness and their exclamations of astonishment i came to the conclusion that although they might have heard of, they had never actually seen a white man before, a conclusion which i afterwards found to be correct. using the butts, and occasionally the points, of their spears freely in order to force a passage through the steadily growing crowd, my escort slowly made their way toward that part of the town which was enclosed by the palisade; and, as they did so, i studied the faces of those who thronged about me, with the object of forming some idea, if i could, of the fate that i might expect at their hands. i must confess that the results of my inspection were by no means reassuring. the first fact to impress itself upon me was that these people among whom i now found myself were of an entirely different race from the negro, properly so-called--the woolly-pated, high cheek-boned, ebony-skinned individual with snub nose and thick lips usually met with aboard a slaver. to start with, their colour was much lighter, being a clear brown of varying degrees of depth, from that of the mulatto to a tint not many shades deeper than that of the average spaniard. but this difference, marked though it was, was not so great as that between their cast of features and that of the negro; the features of these people were, for the most part, clean cut, shapely, and in many cases actually handsome, their noses especially being exceedingly well formed. then their head covering was hair, not wool, that of the men being worn close-cropped, while the women allowed theirs to grow at will and wore it flowing freely over the back and shoulders, the locks in many cases reaching considerably below the waist. it was invariably curly, that of the men growing in close, tiny ringlets clustering thickly all over the head, while that of the women, because it was worn longer, i suppose, took the form of long graceful curls. in colour it was a rich glossy black. they were certainly an exceptionally fine race of people, the men being lithe, clean-limbed, muscular fellows, every one of them apparently in the pink of condition, while the faces and figures of the women, especially the younger ones, would have excited the envy of many an english belle. but there was a something, very difficult to define, in the expression of these people that i did not at all like, a hardness about the mouth, and a cruel glint in the eyes--especially of the men-- which looked at me in a manner that suggested all sorts of unpleasant possibilities, and excited within me a distinct longing to be almost anywhere rather than where i was. the party who had brought me to this remote spot were of an entirely different race from those among whom i now found myself, and the fact that we were making our way toward what was obviously the aristocratic part of the town, coupled with the expressive conversation carried on by the leader of my custodians with three or four individuals who had joined us, led me to surmise--although of course i did not understand a word of what was said--that i had been brought up the river as a peace- offering or something of that sort, which conclusion was again the reverse of reassuring. as we drew near to the exceedingly narrow gate in the palisade, which had been thrown open to admit us--and which, i presently saw, was strongly guarded by a number of warriors armed with heavy, broad-bladed spears, murderous-looking swords, and small round shields, or targets, of wood covered with what looked like crocodile hide--i became sensible of a horrible charnel-house smell; but it was not until we had passed through the gate, and were inside the palisaded enclosure, that i discovered from whence it emanated. then, observing the direction of the wind which wafted this dreadful odour to my nostrils, i looked that way and presently noticed a large dead tree standing in the middle of the square that formed the centre of this part of the town. it was the immense number of birds that wheeled and screamed about this tree that first caused me to regard it with particular attention, but even then i could not, for the moment, see anything to account for either the birds or the odour. but a minute or two later, as we drew nearer the tree, the stench meanwhile becoming almost overpoweringly strong, i detected fastened to the trunk of the tree, in a manner that was not at first apparent, nine human corpses, some of them so far advanced in decomposition that even the birds would not approach them! then i understood that i saw before me that detestable thing of which i had often heard as the most prominent object in the typical african native town or village, the "crucifixion tree," upon which the petty despot who rules over that particular community is wont summarily to put to a cruel and lingering death such of his subjects as may be unfortunate enough to offend him! in some cases, i believe, the monarch is content to cause his victims to be securely lashed to the crucifixion tree by stout lianas, there to perish slowly of hunger and thirst; but king banda, the potentate whose will was law in this particular town, had carried his cruelty to its utmost limit by adopting the time-honoured method of nailing his victims to the tree with spike nails driven through the hands and feet into the tough timber. the enormous crowd who had followed us up from the beach were not permitted to enter the palisaded enclosure, which was strictly taboo to the common herd; our party therefore now consisted solely of those who had brought me up the river, four individuals who had joined us outside the gate--and whom i took to be officials of some sort--and my unworthy self; and, for my own part, i would very willingly have waived the distinction of forming one of the party. marching up to what i conjectured to be the king's house--from the fact that it was not only by far the largest dwelling in the enclosure, but was also distinguished by an exclusive embellishment in the form of a row of a dozen poles, each surmounted by a human skull, planted upright in the ground before it--we halted at a distance of some twenty paces from the entrance, with our backs turned toward the crucifixion tree, the leafless branches of which overshadowed us, and waited. ten minutes, twenty minutes, passed, and the sun was within a hand's- breadth of the horizon when a man emerged from the "palace," bearing a massive chair of ebony, quaintly-carved, and draped with a magnificent leopard's skin, which he placed immediately before the open door, midway between the house and ourselves, and departed. a moment later another man appeared--this time from the fetish-house on the opposite side of the square--also with a chair, decorated with most gruesome--looking carvings, which he placed beside the first. then a tall and enormously stout man, clad in a leopard-skin _moucha_, and with a handsome leopard- skin cloak on his shoulders, came forth from the palace, leaning upon the shoulders of two other men, and advanced toward the chair which had first been placed in position, into which he subsided heavily, casting a strongly disapproving glance at the second chair as he did so. then there arose a sudden tramping of bare feet upon the dry earth, and from somewhere in the rear of the palace there swung into view a hundred picked warriors, armed like those who had mounted guard at the palisade gate, who formed up behind and on each side of the chairs with very commendable military precision. simultaneously with the appearance of the guards--for such they were--there emerged from the fetish-house a man who appeared to be incredibly old, for his hair and beard were as white as snow, and his once stalwart form was now bowed and wizened with the passage of, as it seemed to me, hundreds of years. yet, although in appearance a very methuselah in age, this individual had a pair of piercing black eyes that glowed and sparkled with all the fire and passion of early manhood, and, bowed as he was, and decrepit as he appeared to be, he tottered across the intervening space with extraordinary agility, and seated himself in the second chair. thus i found myself in the presence of the two most powerful men in the district, namely, king banda and mafuta, the chief witch-doctor. the contrast between these two men was most remarkable, for whereas mafuta appeared to be the living embodiment of extreme age, king banda could scarcely have been forty; and while mafuta was an image of decrepitude, banda, despite his excessive corpulence, appeared to be-- what in fact he was--a man of immense physical strength. yet, notwithstanding this marked dissimilarity in their appearance, there was one point of strong resemblance between them: the expression of their faces, and particularly of their eyes, was ineffably cruel. chapter seventeen. king banda's daughter. for the space of nearly a minute there now prevailed an intense silence while king banda sat glowering at our party, and especially at me, in a manner that caused cold chills to run down my back, as i reflected that this was the man who was responsible for the gruesome fruit borne by the tree, the branches of which overshadowed us, and that if he should by any chance take the fancy into his head to further decorate that tree by nailing a white man to it, there was nobody but myself within some hundreds of miles who would dream of saying him nay; and i somehow had a conviction that my disapproval of such a course would not very strongly influence him. at length, when the prolonged silence was beginning distinctly to get upon our nerves, the king spoke to the headman of our party, addressing to him a few curt words in a decidedly ungracious tone of voice; whereupon the headman, taking the precaution first to conciliate his majesty by prostrating himself and rubbing his nose in the dust in token of abject submission, rose to his feet and proceeded to spin a long yarn, of which i was evidently the subject, since he repeatedly pointed to me. he must have included in his narrative the incident of the snake-bite, for at one point he seized my right hand and, turning the palm upward, pointed out the spot where the two tiny punctures of the poison fangs were still faintly visible. it appeared as if this part of his story was received with grave suspicion by both banda and mafuta, for i was led forward in order that each in turn might examine the marks; and after this had been done, several of the savages who had been present at the time were invited to give what i took to be corroborative testimony. when at length the headman had told his story, banda issued a brief order to his guards, two of whom at once advanced toward me and laid their hands upon my shoulders as though to lead me away. but, whatever the order may have been, mafuta evidently objected to it, for no sooner had it been spoken than he sprang to his feet, and with quite marvellous agility, hurried to me and seized me by the left arm, saying in an angry voice something to the guards that i interpreted as an order to release their hold upon me. but banda promptly intervened, reiterating his order to his guards; whereupon there ensued between the two great men a most unseemly altercation, the hubbub of which had the effect of bringing the entire royal household to the door of the palace, when, catching sight of me, they unceremoniously swarmed out and crowded round me with every expression of the most unbounded astonishment, particularly on the part of the women, who apparently could not persuade themselves that the colour of my skin and hair were real, for they not only took my skin between their fingers, but gently pinched it. when they found that my shoulders and other parts of my body which had been protected from the sun were quite white, whereas the exposed parts were by this time quite as dark as their own skins, there was no limit to their amazement and delight. i thought that the women-folk seemed rather well disposed toward me, i therefore did the best i could to strengthen this feeling by smiling at them and speaking to them in a gentle tone of voice, with the result that before another five minutes had passed we were all gabbling and laughing together like so many children, although neither side understood a word of what was said by the other. in the midst of it all mafuta sprang from his chair in a towering rage, and, addressing a few remarks to the king which seemed to make the latter feel rather uncomfortable, took himself off to his fetish-house, within which he vanished. then the king shouted something to his women-folk which caused them to scuttle back into the palace like so many rabbits; and the next moment the two guards who had me in charge marched me off to an empty hut behind the palace--which was, luckily, to windward of the crucifixion tree, the odour from which therefore did not reach as far as my lodging--and, having signed to me to enter, mounted guard, one on each side of the door. my prison--if such it was--was a tolerably spacious affair, measuring about twenty feet long by fifteen feet wide, and it was absolutely empty; also, there being no windows to the building, and the light entering only by the open door, the obscurity, on entering, seemed profound, although a few minutes sufficed to enable one's eyes to grow accustomed to it, when, at least during daylight, it was possible to see clearly enough for all practical purposes. i had not been in my new quarters above five minutes when two elderly women entered, each bearing upon her head a large bundle of dry fern, which they cast down in one of the two corners of the hut most distant from the door and proceeded to spread there in such a fashion as to form a most comfortable bed, upon which i at once flung myself, for i was very weary. but before i could compose myself to rest two other women entered, one of whom bore, upon a thick biscuit-like cake the size of an ordinary dinner-plate, two roast ribs of goat and a generous portion of boiled yam, while the other carried a calabash full of what i took to be some kind of native beer. evidently, whatever was to be my fate, they did not intend to starve me; and, gratefully accepting the viands, which gave forth a most appetising odour, i sat down and made a hearty meal, after doing full justice to which i composed myself to sleep upon my bed of ferns, and enjoyed a long and most comfortable night's rest. i may here mention that i never again saw the party of savages who brought me up the river, and i was therefore strengthened in the conclusion at which i had arrived that they had gone to all the trouble of conveying me that long distance in order that they might make a present of me, possibly as a peace-offering from their tribe, to king banda, who, i soon had reason to believe, was a decidedly formidable potentate, as african kings went. for nearly a week i was kept closely confined to the hut which had been assigned to me, never being permitted to go beyond the door of the building, where, when the sun had worked round far enough to cause the building to cast a shadow, i soon got into the way of sitting for an hour or two, doing my best to ingratiate myself with the inhabitants of the place, many of whom used to come and stare at me with never-ceasing curiosity and wonder, and with whom i used to laugh and chat, although of course neither party understood a word of what was said by the other. that is to say, neither understood the other _at first_; but in the course of a few days i found that, with the more intelligent of the natives, it was possible for me to convey by signs, and by speaking with much emphasis, some sort of general idea of my meaning. it was undoubtedly by diligent practice in this direction that, after strict confinement to the interior of my hut for some five or six days, i was permitted, first of all, to wander at will about that portion of the town which was enclosed by the palisade, and ultimately to pass outside and go practically whither i would, always accompanied, however, by two armed guards. one of the greatest discomforts from which i suffered at this time was the outcome of the peculiar musical taste of king banda's subjects. though i was then happily unaware of the fact, the period of the great annual festival, or customs, was approaching, and the joy of the populace began to find vent in nocturnal concerts inordinately prolonged, the musical instruments consisting of tom-toms, each beaten by two, three, or four performers--according to the size of the tom- tom--with a monotony of cadence that soon became positively maddening, further aggravated by the discordant squealing of a number of flageolet- like instruments made of stout reeds. now, although i have not hitherto had occasion to mention the fact, i was passionately fond of music, and rather fancied myself as a performer upon the flute; one night, therefore, when one of these hideous concerts was in full blast, and when, consequently, it was useless to attempt to sleep, i sallied forth, accompanied as usual by my guards, and made my way round to the great square in front of the king's house, where, squatted round a huge fire, some twenty of these enthusiasts were tootling and thumping with a vigour that i could not help regarding as utterly misplaced. i stood watching them for a few minutes, and then approaching one of the flageolet players i held out my hand and pointed to his instrument, signifying that i desired to examine it. with some show of hesitation the man surrendered the thing, and upon inspection i found it to be a reed of about a foot in length, with a mouthpiece shaped something like that of a whistle, and with four small holes drilled in the length of the tube, whereby an expert performer might produce seven distinct tones; but the tones were not consecutive, and the instrument was altogether a very poor and inefficient affair. it furnished me with an idea, however, and on the following day, by dint of much suggestive gesticulation, i contrived to intimate to my guard my desire to obtain a reed similar to those from which the native instruments were made. they offered no objection, but conducted me some distance beyond the town, through the bush, to a spot on the bank of the river where the reed was growing in abundance. i had resolved to make myself either a flute or a flageolet, whichever might prove easiest, and i accordingly selected with great care half-a-dozen of the most suitable reeds that i could find, and, borrowing his spear from one of my guards, cut them, taking care that they should be of ample length for my purpose. then i hunted about for some soft wood wherefrom to make mouthpieces and the stopped end of the flute; and it was while i was thus engaged that i made a most important discovery, which was nothing less than that there were several very fine specimens of the cinchona tree growing in the jungle quite close to the town. this was a singularly fortunate and opportune discovery, for i had already observed that fever and ague were very prevalent among the inhabitants, and i hoped that if by means of a decoction of cinchona bark i could effect a cure, i might be able very materially to improve and strengthen my position in the town. i therefore collected as much of the bark as i could conveniently carry, and took it back with me to my hut, where i lost no time in preparing a generous supply of tolerably strong solution of quinine. this done, i sallied forth on the look-out for patients, and soon found as many as i wanted. but it was one thing to find them, and quite another to persuade them to swallow my medicine, and it was not until at length i administered a pretty stiff dose to myself that i prevailed upon a man to allow me to experiment upon him. that, however, was quite sufficient; for it did him so much good that not only did he come to my hut clamouring for more, but brought several fellow-sufferers with him, with the result that before the week was out i had firmly established my reputation as a powerful witch-doctor. i very soon found, however, that this reputation was by no means an unmixed blessing; for the people jumped to the conclusion that if i could cure one disease i could of course cure all; and i speedily found myself consulted by patients suffering from ailments of which i did not even know the names, and expecting to be cured of them. yet, astonishing to say, i was marvellously successful, all things considered, for when at a loss i administered pills compounded of meal dough and strongly flavoured with the first harmless substance that came to hand, and so profound was the belief of these people in my ability that at least half of them were cured by the wonderful power of faith alone. all this, however, was exceedingly detrimental to the reputation of mafuta, the chief witch-doctor of the community, who found his power and influence rapidly waning, and he soon discovered means to make me understand that i must cease to trespass upon what he deemed his own exclusive sphere of operations, on pain of making him my mortal enemy. this of course was bad, for i was in no position to make any man my enemy, much less an individual of such power and influence as mafuta; nevertheless i continued to prescribe for all who came to me, trusting that if ever it should come to a struggle between mafuta and myself, the gratitude of my patients would suffice to turn the scale in my favour. meanwhile i devoted my spare moments to the construction of a flute, and, after two or three partial failures, succeeded in producing an instrument of very sweet tone and a sufficient range of notes to enable me to tootle the air of several of the most popular songs of the day, as well as a fairly full repertoire of jigs, hornpipes, and other dance music. and it was particularly interesting to observe how powerfully anything in the nature of real music, like some of the airs of braham, purcell, dr arne, and sir h. bishop, appealed to these simple savages; a sentimental ditty, such as "the anchor's weighed" or "tom bowling," would hold them breathless and entranced; "rule, britannia!" or "should he upbraid" set them quivering with excitement; and they seemed to know by intuition that "the sailor's hornpipe" was written to be danced to, and they danced to it accordingly a wild, furious, mad fandango in which the extraordinary nature of the gambols of the performers was only equalled by the ecstasy of their enjoyment. such proceedings as these could not of course long exist without the fame of them reaching the ears of the king, and i had only given some three or four performances when i was summoned to entertain his majesty and his household, which i did in the great square before the palace, my audience numbering quite two thousand; banda and his numerous family being seated in a huge semicircle--of which i was the centre--in front of the palace, while the rest of the audience filled the remaining portion of the square. it was now that i first began to grow aware of the fact that there was a certain member of the king's household who seemed to be taking rather more interest in me than any one else had thus far manifested. she was a girl of probably not more than sixteen years of age, but for all that a woman, and, as compared with the rest, a very pretty woman too; quite light in colour, exquisitely shaped, and with a most pleasing expression of countenance, especially when she smiled, as she generally did when my eyes happened to meet hers. i had seen her many times before, but had never taken very particular notice of her until now that she appeared determined to make me understand that she was friendly disposed toward me. i endeavoured to ascertain who she was; but although i had contrived to pick up a few words of the language, my ignorance of it was still so great that i had experienced the utmost difficulty in making myself understood, and all i could then learn about her was that her name was ama. it was not until later that i discovered her to be king banda's favourite daughter. and the discovery was made in a sufficiently dramatic manner, as shall now be related. it happened that one night, when, as now was frequently the case, i had been summoned to entertain the king and his household by "obliging them with a little music," i was playing some soft, plaintive air--i forget what--when, chancing to glance toward ama, who, seated on the ground on the extreme left of the semicircle, was well within my range of vision, i fancied i saw some moving object close to her left hand, which was resting lightly on the ground. at the moment i took but scant notice of the circumstance, for the flickering flames of the fire which was always kindled upon such occasions played strange pranks with the lights and shadows, and often imparted a weird effect of movement to stationery and even inanimate objects; but presently, happening to again glance in that direction, my eye was once more caught by the same queer wavering movement. there was something so strange and uncanny about it--for i by this time knew the ground well enough to be fully aware that there _ought not_ to be any moving thing there--that i stopped playing and sprang to my feet so suddenly that my movement appeared to startle ama, who uttered a little cry of alarm, or surprise, and made as though she too would spring to her feet. at that instant the thing upon which my gaze was fixed, and which looked like half a fathom of stiff tarred lanyard, darted with lightning swiftness at the girl and coiled itself about her shapely bare arm, while a piercing scream rang out from her pallid lips. i of course knew in an instant what it was--a snake, that very possibly had been attracted to the spot by the notes of my flute, and, startled by the sudden cessation of the music and ama's quick, involuntary movement, had instantly coiled itself round her arm and struck at it in its blind and panic-stricken rage. acting upon the impulse of the moment, and scarcely knowing what i was about, with a single bound i flung myself upon the terrified girl and, guided more by instinct than reason, seized the reptile immediately behind the head in so vice-like a grip that its jaws at once opened wide, when i tore its hideous coils from the girl's arm and flung it far from me into the very heart of the blazing fire. then, gripping the wounded limb, i turned it toward the light of the fire, and saw two marks close together upon the inner part of the arm, just below the elbow, from which, as i gazed, two drops of blood began to ooze slowly. without wasting a moment, i applied my lips to the double wound, intending to suck the poison from it, even as i had done in my own case; but another startling scream from the girl caused me to look up, and, following the direction of her terrified glance, i looked behind me and beheld the king himself, his eyes ablaze with demoniac fury, in the very act of raising a spear that he had snatched from the hand of one of his guards, to drive it through my body. whether it was that he had not seen just what had happened--as might very well have been the case, since the whole thing seemed to have occurred in the space of a single instant--and was under the impression that i had suddenly gone mad and was attacking his daughter, i know not, but it is certain that ama's scream, and certain hasty words uttered by her, only barely saved me from his fury. but no sooner did he lower the threatening spear than i once more glued my lips to the wound, sucking hard at it with the object of extracting the poison before it had contaminated the blood; and in this effort i was happily successful, for although there was a slight swelling of the limb, and some pain for an hour or two, that was all that happened; and before morning my patient had quite recovered from all the effects of her alarming adventure. the result of this was that i immediately became a prime favourite of the king. there was no further pretence of treating me as a prisoner, but, on the contrary, i was loaded with honours. a large house was assigned to my use, with a complete staff of servants to attend to my wants; an abundant supply of food was daily sent to me from the royal table; and, as i understood it, i was appointed physician in ordinary to the royal household. another result--to which i did not attach nearly sufficient importance at the moment--was that i made an implacable and deadly enemy of mafuta, the chief witch-doctor. i have said that there was no further pretence of treating me as a prisoner, and this was true, but only within certain limits, as i discovered the moment that i set about taking measures to effect my escape. i was allowed to go freely where i pleased, it is true, even to the extent of making long hunting or exploring excursions into the adjacent country, but--whether or not by the king's orders i could never satisfactorily ascertain--i soon found that i could never manage to steal off anywhere alone. if ever i attempted such a thing--and i did, very frequently--a party of the king's guards was certain to turn up, in the most exasperatingly casual and unexpected manner, and join me, under the pretence, as they made me understand, that it was extremely dangerous to venture alone beyond the confines of the town, if i pretended that i was engaged in hunting for animals, or plants to be used in my medical practice. or, if i attempted to go anywhere by water, i could take any canoe i chose, but two or more men always insisted upon accompanying me, that i might be spared the labour of paddling. it was always the same, no matter what the hour of day or night that i might choose to start upon my expeditions; no surprise was ever displayed at my eccentricity in the choice of times, but i simply could not contrive to elude notice; and at length it was borne in upon me that if i wished to effect my escape i must adopt tactics of a totally different kind. i therefore very gradually curtailed my excursions, and when i undertook them was careful that there should be nothing in the nature of secrecy connected with my movements. meanwhile, without any effort on my part, i now seemed to see a good deal of ama, the king's daughter, who appeared to have assumed the responsibility of seeing that my house was kept in order, and that the servants were faithfully performing their duty. she was frequently in and out, as often as three or four times a day, and very seldom indeed less than twice; moreover, she seemed exceedingly anxious to become my instructress in her own language, and as i had already felt heavily handicapped on several occasions by my inability to converse freely with those around me i made no demur, although i must confess that i at length began to view with vague disquietude the extreme freedom of intercourse thus instituted by the young woman. yet i scarcely knew precisely what it was that i feared, but i certainly had a feeling that the situation was not altogether devoid of peril, one of the most obvious of which was foreshadowed in the question which i frequently asked myself, what would the king think of the intimacy of his daughter with one of totally different race and views of life, should the matter chance to come to his knowledge? therefore i kept a very close watch upon myself, and was careful never to allow my manner to relax in the slightest degree from the strictest formality, although to preserve consistently this attitude of extreme reserve was sometimes exceedingly difficult with a companion of so amiable and altogether winsome a manner and disposition as that of ama. under the zealous and indefatigable tuition of this young damsel i made astonishingly rapid progress as a student of the language spoken by those around me, and was soon able to converse in it with a very fair amount of freedom. meanwhile i had practically abandoned my attempts to effect my escape, for the time being at least; for the conviction had at length been forced upon me that neither banda nor his people would ever willingly let me go, and that, therefore, before engaging in any further attempts, i must contrive to disarm suspicion completely, and create the impression that i had at length resigned myself to live out my life in this remote african town, and with savages only for my companions. it was while matters were in this very unsatisfactory state that i became aware that some event of extreme importance was imminent in the town; for upon sallying forth from my residence on a certain morning and crossing the great square, in the centre of which stood banda's crucifixion tree, i saw that a number of men were engaged in setting up some forty stout, quaintly-carved posts in a circle round about the tree. the arrangement somehow had a sinister, suggestive appearance that made me feel vaguely uncomfortable; and abandoning the intention, whatever it may have been, that took me to the spot, i returned to my house, and, as soon as ama made her appearance, asked her what it meant. "it means, my dear dick," said she, laying her hand upon my arm, and looking very serious--she had insisted upon knowing my name, and calling me by it, early in our acquaintance--"that the customs begin six days hence; and those men whom you saw setting up the posts round the crucifixion tree are making preparations for them." "the customs!" i exclaimed, in horrified accents, for i had heard of these grim and ghastly festivities before. "and pray, ama, what is the nature of these customs under your father's beneficent rule?" "oh, they are horrible; i hate them!" answered the girl. "they last six days--six whole days, in which the people abandon themselves to every kind of licence and cruelty, in which human blood is shed like water. i do not think _you_ will like them, dick--at least i hope not!" "like them?" i ejaculated indignantly. "i should think not, indeed. but i suppose a fellow is not obliged to watch them, is he? i shall go off into the forest, or up the river, during those six days--" "nay, dick, you will not be able to do either of those things," answered ama. "in the first place i am not at all certain that the king would give you leave; and, even if he did, you would not be permitted to go alone; and where would you find men willing to absent themselves from the customs for the sake of accompanying you? there is not a man in the town who would consent to do so. no, i am afraid that we shall both be obliged to witness them." "no," i said. "we must devise some scheme whereby we may both be exempted. you say that they take place six days hence; it will be strange indeed if our united ingenuity is not equal to the task of devising some simple yet efficacious plan. but, tell me, ama, where do the victims come from, and how many of them are usually sacrificed?" "the number sacrificed depends, of course, upon how many can be found," answered ama; "but generally there are at least three hundred; this time it is hoped that there may be many more. as to where they come from, a good many are `smelled out' by mafuta and his assistants, and the rest are made up of such prisoners as may happen to be in our possession at the time. there are five hundred hunters out now securing prisoners; we expect them back to-morrow or the next day. and that reminds me, dick," she added, with a sudden access of gravity, "if you had not been clever enough to save my life when the snake bit me, you would most certainly have been one of the victims; indeed it was with a view to sacrificing you at the customs that my father accepted you from the igbo." "the dickens it was!" ejaculated i, in some dismay. "then who is to say that i shall not be still included in the batch?" "nay," answered ama; "you saved my life, and for that my father will spare you. it is not he whom you have to fear, but mafuta. mafuta hates you, i know, and would willingly `smell you out' if he dared; but the people will not let him; for where would they get any one else to play beautiful music to them if you were to die? besides, do you think _i_ would allow any one to hurt you? my father is the king; no one, not even mafuta, dare dispute his will; and i have more influence than any one else with the king. nay, fear not, dick, none shall hurt you while i live." "i would that i could feel as fully assured of that as you appear to be, ama," answered i. "with all due respect to your father, i may perhaps be permitted to remark that he has impressed me as a man of singularly short and uncertain temper; and if i should ever chance to be so unfortunate as to offend him--" at this moment two guards presented themselves at the door of my hut and, saluting, one of them curtly remarked: "the king is ill, and commands the presence of the white man at the palace _at once_!" "the king--my father--ill!" ejaculated ama, in a tone of greater consternation than seemed quite called for. "let us go at once, dick. and--oh, you must cure him--you must, _for your own sake_, dick!" chapter eighteen. doomed to the torture. "you must cure him--you _must, for your own sake, dick_!" exactly. in uttering those words ama unconsciously disclosed how slight was her confidence in the influence over her father, of which she had been boasting only a moment or two before the arrival of the summons for me to attend that father on his bed of sickness. it was all very well for her to tell me that i _must_ cure him; but suppose that i could not, suppose that the sickness--whatever it might be--should run its course and fail to yield to my treatment, what then? the reason, so urgently expressed by her, why i must effect a cure--"for your own sake, dick,"-- was significant enough of the direction in which her apprehensions pointed; there was no necessity for me to inquire what she meant. i _must_ cure the king, or it would be so much the worse for me! and how was i to cure him? my knowledge of disease was of the slightest and most amateurish kind, and, for aught that i could tell to the contrary, might not even be sufficient to enable me to diagnose the case correctly, much less to treat it successfully! however, there was no use in meeting trouble half-way; the only possible course was to obey the summons forthwith, and do my best, leaving the result in the hands of providence. i accordingly rose to my feet and, motioning the guards to lead the way, followed them to the palace, with ama walking by my side and holding my hand in a protective sort of way. the distance from my hut to the palace was but a few yards; and we quickly arrived at our destination, being at once conducted into the presence of the king, who, stretched upon a couch, and evidently suffering severe pain in his internal organs, was surrounded by the somewhat numerous members of his family. as i approached the side of his couch he gazed at me with lack-lustre eyes and groaningly said: "i am very sick, o dick; my entrails are being burnt up within me! cure me at once and i will give thee my daughter ama as thy wife and make thee a powerful chief!" "i thank thee, banda, for thy magnificently generous promises," answered i, "but i will gladly do my utmost for thee without reward. tell me, now, how long hast thou been like this?" "not very long," answered the king; "perhaps while the sun has been climbing thus far,"--describing with his hand the arc of a circle measuring about seven degrees, or, say, half an hour--"i had just finished my breakfast when the pains seized me." "ah!" remarked i, trying to look as though i knew all about it; "and of what did thy breakfast consist?" "of very little, for i am but a moderate eater," answered the king. let me consider. there was, first, a broiled fish, fresh from the river, with boiled yams; then a few roast plantains--not more than a dozen, i think; then the roast rib of a cow; a few handfuls of boiled rice; and-- yes, i think that was all, except a bowl of jaro'--the latter being a kind of native beer. it occurred to me that, probably, after this very "moderate" meal, his majesty might be suffering from indigestion, although the "burning" pains in the stomach puzzled me a bit. i therefore came to the conclusion that if vomiting could be freely induced almost immediate relief ought to follow; and i accordingly prescribed the only emetic which i could think of at the moment, namely, copious draughts of warm water, followed by tickling the back of the throat with a feather. these means were so far successful that the patient acknowledged a certain measure of relief; but after a time the burning pains recurred and seemed to become more acute than ever, to my profound dismay; for, goaded almost to madness by the intensity of his suffering, the king was rapidly growing as dangerous as a wounded buffalo, and, between the paroxysms of his anguish, began to threaten all and sundry with certain pains and penalties, the mere enumeration of which made my flesh creep and plunged me into a cold perspiration. at length, after a more than usually intense paroxysm of pain had passed, gouroo, banda's favourite wife, who was present, and whose virulent animosity i had been unfortunate enough to arouse, bent over the patient and whispered something in his ear, the purport of which i could not catch. but it was a suggestion, the nature of which i was able to divine without difficulty, for, by way of reply, banda ejaculated between his groans: "yes, yes; let mafuta be instantly summoned. and as for the white man, let the presumptuous pretender be closely confined in his own hut until i can decide upon the nature of his punishment. away with him at once; and if he is allowed to escape, the guards who have him in charge shall be nailed, head downward, to the crucifixion tree!" gouroo smiled a smile of triumphant malice as, in reply to her summons, two guards entered, and, seizing me roughly, hurried me away; while ama, bathed in tears, flung herself upon her knees beside her father's couch and vainly besought him to have mercy upon me. as i passed out of the room i saw the king, writhing in agony, rise upon his couch and strike the poor girl a violent blow, while he bellowed a fierce command to her to withdraw from his sight. it was nearly noon when i was conducted back to my hut after my futile attempt to cure the king; and it was not until close upon sunset that i got any further news, when one of the guards who had me in charge informed me, as he brought in my supper, that mafuta had completely cured the king within an hour of the moment when he was first summoned to his majesty's bedside; that banda had already risen from his couch; and that, in requital for his service, mafuta had claimed--and been granted--the right to dispose of me as he pleased upon the occasion of the forthcoming festival of the customs! which meant, of course, that i was to die by some exquisite refinement of torture, the nature of which would probably be too dreadful for description. for i very shrewdly suspected that gouroo and mafuta were equally interested in my downfall--might, indeed, have conspired in some mysterious manner to bring it about--and would probably take care that it should be as complete and disastrous as savage vindictiveness could make it. the days now dragged themselves away upon leaden feet, yet--apparent paradox--with frightful rapidity; for i now no longer had a household to attend to my wants; my meals were brought to me with unfailing regularity by my guards, but they had apparently been forbidden to communicate with me, for not a word could i get out of them, good, bad, or indifferent. i was not permitted to show myself in the doorway of my dwelling, or even to approach it nearly enough to see what was going on; and in this dreadful solitude, waiting and hoping for i knew not what impossible happening to occur and effect my deliverance, each day seemed to drag itself out to the length of a month--until the darkness came; and then, with the realisation of the fact that i was so much nearer to a hideous fate, the hours seemed suddenly to have sped with lightning swiftness. the excited buzz and bustle of preparation pervaded the town all day, and every day, while night again became a pandemonium of barbarous sounds--for the tom-tom and flageolet concerts had been resumed with tenfold virulence since my incarceration--and on one occasion a terrific uproar announced the arrival of the unhappy prisoners who had been captured, in order that the festival might lose nothing of its importance or impressiveness through lack of a sufficient tale of victims; but i could not detect any indications of an attempt on the part of any one to communicate with me; and at length the latent hope that ama's boast of her influence with her father might be verified, and that she might succeed in inducing the king to spare me, died out, and i began to prepare myself, as best i could, to meet whatever fate might have in store for me with the fortitude befitting a christian and an englishman. but do not suppose that all this while i was supinely and tamely acquiescing in the fate that awaited me. far from it. for the first few days of my captivity my brain was literally seething with schemes for effecting my escape, most of them wildly impossible, i admit; but some there were that seemed to promise just a ghost of a chance of success--until i attempted to put them into effect, when the vigilance of my guards--with the fear of crucifixion, head downward, before their eyes--invariably baffled me. thus the time passed on until the first day of the customs dawned, when, having received a more than usually substantial meal, i was stripped of the few rags that still covered my nakedness, and, with my hands tightly bound behind me by a thin but strong raw-hide rope, was led forth to the great square wherein the customs were celebrated, and firmly bound to one of the posts, the erection of which i had witnessed a week earlier. of course i was but one of many who were to gasp out their lives in this dreadful aceldama; and in a very short time each post, or stake, was decorated with its own separate victim, some of whom, it seemed, were to perish by the torture of fire, for after the victims had been secured to the stakes, huge bundles of faggots, composed of dry twigs and branches, were piled around some of them. what the fate of the rest of us was to be there was nothing to indicate, but i had no doubt that it would be something quite as dreadful as fire; and i had fully made up my mind that when my turn came i would endeavour, by insult and invective, to goad my tormentors to such a state of fury and exasperation as should provoke them to finish me off quickly. all being now ready, the gate in the palisade was thrown open, a conch- shell was blown, and the waiting inhabitants began to pour into the enclosure with all the eagerness and excitement of an audience crowding into the unreserved portions of a theatre, and in a very short time the great square was full, the front ranks pressing close up to a cordon of armed guards that had been drawn round the circle of posts. then, while the air vibrated with the hum and murmur of many excited tongues, shouts and a disturbance in the direction of the palace proclaimed the approach of the king and his household, and presently the entire party, numbering some three hundred, passed in and made their way to a kind of grand- stand, from which an admirable view of all the proceedings was to be obtained. i looked for ama, but could not see her; gouroo, however, was present and favoured me with a smile of malicious triumph. banda himself took not the slightest notice of my presence. no sooner were the royal party seated than a commotion on the opposite side of the square portended another arrival; and in a few minutes, through a narrow lane that had been formed in the dense mass of people, mafuta and his myrmidons, to the number of nearly a hundred, came leaping and bounding into the open space beneath the crucifixion tree. daubed all over their naked bodies with black, white, and red paint, with their hair gathered into a knot on the crown of the head, and decorated with long feathers, strings of big beads, and long strips of scarlet cloth--obtained from goodness knows where--with necklaces of birds' and animals' claws about their necks, and girdles of animals' entrails round their waists, they presented as hideous and revolting a picture as can possibly be imagined as they went careering madly round the circle, each man waving a long spear over his head. now i noticed a curiously subdued but distinct commotion among the spectators of the front rank, each of whom seemed anxious to surrender his apparently advantageous position to whomsoever might be willing to accept it. but, singularly enough, no one seemed desirous to avail himself of his neighbour's generosity; and the reason soon became apparent; for presently, in the midst of their wild bounding round the inner edge of the tightly packed mass of spectators, they came to a sudden halt, and mafuta, advancing alone, proceeded to "smell out" those who were supposed to be inimical to the king's or his own authority, or against whom either of them had a secret grudge. with his body bent, his head thrust forward, and his nostrils working, he slowly passed along the inner face of the crowd, his shifty eyes darting hither and thither, until his gaze happened to fall upon one of the individuals for whom he was looking, when he would come to a halt, appear to be following a scent, and finally stretch forth his spear and lightly smite some man or woman on the head with it. the unhappy victim, thus "smelled out," would thereupon be instantly taken in charge by mafuta's followers, and the process would be repeated until all those whose removal was desired had been gathered in. in the present case the victims numbered nearly a hundred, and the finding of them consumed the best part of two hours. the process of "smelling out" being at an end, and those who had passed the ordeal unscathed being relieved of all further apprehension, the enormous crowd which had gathered to witness the "sports" settled down to thoroughly enjoy itself. and certainly there was a very commendable celerity manifested by those who had the direction of affairs; there was no disposition to keep the holiday-makers waiting; the unhappy victims were led up, one after the other, before king banda, and their supposed crimes very briefly recited to him, whereupon his majesty, with equal brevity, pronounced their sentence--in all cases that of death--which was at once carried out, the only difference consisting in the mode of execution; some of the unfortunate wretches being secured to the crucifixion tree in one way, some in another; but it was very difficult for a mere onlooker to decide which of the plans adopted inflicted the most suffering. these victims, it should be explained, were doomed to remain fastened to the tree until death should ensue from hunger, thirst, exposure, and the agony of their wounds. then, in batches of ten at a time, forty more victims were triced up to the boughs of this accursed tree by raw-hide ropes fastened to one wrist or one ankle, in such positions that their bodies showed clearly against the bright background of sky; and, while thus suspended, whosoever would was at liberty to shoot at them with bows and arrows, the great object being, apparently, to pierce the body with as many arrows as possible without inflicting a mortal injury. king banda evidently prided himself upon his skill in this direction. but there were a few bunglers among the crowd, for some of the shots went so far astray that instead of hitting the mark at which they were supposed to be aimed, they hit and _slew_ some half-a-dozen of the crucified ones. i wondered whether by any chance the fatal wounds were actually inflicted by interested persons who desired to put as speedy an end as possible to the sufferings of their unfortunate friends; and if so, whether the idea would occur to ama to enlist the services of a few good marksmen in my behalf when my turn should come. when all those who had been condemned to die in the above manner had perished, a further variety was imparted to the proceedings by compelling some fifty victims to "run the gauntlet." this is a very favourite form of pastime among savages, and is carried out in a variety of ways. in the present instance a narrow circular course was arranged round the great square, a lane of about a yard in width being formed through the mass of spectators, and into this lane the victims, stripped naked, were introduced, one at a time, to run round and round until beaten to death by the bare fists of as many as could get in a blow at them. and, since the lane was so exceedingly narrow, it happened that practically every individual on either side of the lane was able to get in at least one blow. to the uninitiated this may seem a not particularly inhumane form of inflicting the death punishment; but i, who saw the whole remaining part of the day spent in doing some fifty poor wretches to death in that fashion, can tell a very different story; there is no need to enter into details, but i may say that those who were weakest, and who succumbed most quickly, were to be most envied. the day had opened with a cloudless sky and brilliant sunshine; but, as the hours dragged themselves slowly away, clouds, light and filmy at first but gradually growing more dense and threatening, began to gather, until toward evening the sun became blotted out and the whole vault of heaven grew overcast and louring, as though nature, horrified and disgusted at the orgy of human cruelty being enacted here on this little spot of earth, were veiling her face to shut out the shameful sight. by the time that the proceedings of the day were over and the enormous crowd began to disperse, it became evident that a more than usually violent tropical thunderstorm was brewing, although it might be some hours yet before it would burst over the blood-stained town. naturally, i was very thankful that the awful day had passed over, and that its end found me still in the land of the living; for "while there is life there is hope," and in the course of my somewhat adventurous career i have seen so many extraordinary escapes from apparently inevitable disaster that the one piece of advice above all others which i would give to everybody is "never despair!" i can recall more than one occasion when, if i had abandoned hope and the effort which goes with it, i should not now have been alive to pen these words. no man can ever know what totally unexpected happening may occur to effect his deliverance at the very moment when fate looks blackest and most threatening. but although i had passed through the day unscathed, so far as actual bodily injury was concerned, it had nevertheless been a day of suffering for me, growing ever more acute as the hours dragged wearily away, for, apart from the feelings of horror with which i had witnessed the display of so much unimaginable cruelty and torture, the bonds which confined me to my post had been drawn so tightly as greatly to impede the circulation of blood through my extremities, until by the time that the great square was empty of its crowd of bloodthirsty revellers, the anguish had become so great that i was almost in a fainting condition and could give but scant attention to anything beyond the pangs that racked every nerve of my tortured body; in fact i observed, with feelings of envy, that many of my fellow-sufferers had already succumbed and become unconscious, if indeed they were not dead. however, since we had been spared thus far, i concluded that we might reasonably hope to be reprieved at least until the next day, and i looked with impatience to be released and conveyed back to my place of confinement until dawn should again summon me forth to witness and, peradventure, be the victim of accumulative horrors. but i soon discovered that even this small measure of mercy was to be denied me; food and drink were indeed to be served out to us--in order, as i surmised, that we might meet the ordeal in store for us with unabated strength--but the night was to be passed, as the day had been, secured to the sacrificial post, exposed, naked and helpless, to the elements and to the myriad insect plagues that attacked us unceasingly. i noted that while those who had not succumbed to their sufferings were fed as they stood still bound to their posts, those who had become unconscious were temporarily released, and revived by being copiously soused with water, and, further, were allowed to eat and drink while seated on the ground, before they were lashed up afresh; and i took the hint, feigning insensibility for the sake of the few minutes of temporary relief that i hoped thus to win. by the time that the attendants reached me i was so near to swooning that very little pretence was necessary, and when at length they released me i sank to the ground in a heap with a low groan. i gathered from their remarks that they were seriously concerned at my condition, for it seemed that i was reserved for some very especial refinement of torture, the satisfactory application of which demanded that i must come to it in the possession of my full strength, which they feared had been seriously sapped by the suffering which i had already endured, and they freely expressed their concern lest, under existing circumstances, i should not furnish quite so much sport as was being expected of me. they therefore displayed real solicitude in their efforts to revive me, which i took especial care they should not accomplish too quickly. but, oh, what exquisite torment was mine when, my bonds being released, the blood once more began to circulate through my benumbed members! i could have screamed aloud with the excruciating agony, had not my pride prevented me; and it was a full hour before i had sufficiently recovered the use of my hands to enable me to convey food and drink to my lips. the food and drink provided for me were of an especially nourishing character, and when at length i had partaken of as much as i could force down my throat i was again lashed to my stake, but this time so carefully that, while for me to loose my bonds was an impossibility, the circulation of blood was in nowise impeded; and for even this small mercy i was inexpressibly grateful. meanwhile the night had fallen so intensely dark that the completion of the task of feeding us unfortunates had to be accomplished by torchlight; and we had not been very long left to ourselves before the faint flickering of distant lightning and the low muttering and grumbling of thunder warned us to expect a storm of more than ordinary violence. everything portended it; the atmosphere was absolutely still, not a twig or even a leaf stirred, all nature seemed to be waiting in breathless suspense for the coming outbreak; even the insects had ceased to attack us, and had retired to their leafy retreat, and the air was so heavy and close that, naked as i was, i perspired at every pore. not a sound broke the unnatural stillness save when, at irregular intervals, a low groan broke from some poor wretch upon the crucifixion tree in whom the life still lingered. but even to them relief was promised, for with the impending downpour of rain their wounds would quickly mortify, and then their sufferings would soon be at an end. very slowly and gradually the storm worked its way toward the zenith, gathering intensity as it rose, and at length--probably about ten o'clock--the first drops of rain, hot and heavy, like gouts of blood, began to fall, quickly increasing to a drenching downpour, accompanied by lightning, green, rose-tinted, violet, sun-bright, that lighted up the town until every object, however minute, was as clearly visible as in broad daylight, while the ceaseless crashing of the thunder was unspeakably appalling. in the very height of the storm, when thunder, lightning, and rain together were raging in a perfect pandemonium, a stream of steel-blue lightning darted straight from the zenith, struck the crucifixion tree, and shattered it into a thousand fragments, leaving a great hole in the ground where it had stood! the storm continued to rage in full fury for about an hour, and then the flashes of lightning, with their accompanying peals of thunder, gradually became less frequent, although the rain continued to beat down upon the parched earth in a perfect deluge which formed rivulets, ay, and even brooks of quite respectable size, flowing in every direction. my weary and aching frame soothed and refreshed by the pelting rain, i must have fallen into a kind of doze, for i was suddenly startled into full consciousness by the feeling that some one was meddling with my bonds, which, the next moment, severed by a sharp knife, fell from my limbs. then a small soft hand seized mine and dragged me swiftly away from the stake to which i had been bound. it was so intensely dark just then, however, that i was quite unable to see where i was going, and was obliged to trust implicitly to my unknown guide. for two or three minutes we twisted hither and thither, blindly, so far as i was concerned, and then another flash came which enabled me to see that my companion was, as i had already suspected, my faithful little friend ama, and that she was conducting me, by a somewhat circuitous route, toward the gate in the palisade. "a thousand thanks to you, ama, for coming to my help," i murmured in her ear as i squeezed her hand. "but whither are you taking me? to the gate? we can never pass it! the guards--" "they are not there; they are sheltering in the houses close at hand, i expect; i took care to find out before coming to release you. and now, dick, we must be silent," answered ama, as we cautiously approached the spot where i knew the gate must be. suddenly my guide halted, and pressed herself and me close up against the wall of a building of some kind, at the same time feeling for my face in the darkness, and laying her finger on my lips to enjoin perfect silence. here we waited for nearly five minutes until another flash of lightning came, when my companion, having caught a glimpse of her surroundings, again hurried me forward, and a few seconds later we had passed through the unguarded gate, closed it behind us, and were rapidly making our way through the streets of the outer part of the town, in the direction of the beach. about half-way down, however, we turned sharply aside and plunged down a narrow lane, which, after some twisting and turning, at length brought us out clear of the town into a plantain grove. and all this time we had not seen a single living creature, no, not so much as a dog; every living thing, save ourselves, had taken shelter from the fury of the elements, and was not likely to venture abroad again until it was over. still hurrying me forward, ama led the way through the grove and along its edge, until we eventually reached a narrow bush path, through which it was necessary to wend our way circumspectly, for it was now as black as a wolf's mouth, save when an occasional flicker of lightning from the now fast-receding storm momentarily lit up our surroundings. we traversed this path for about half a mile, still maintaining perfect silence, and at length emerged, quite suddenly, upon a tiny strip of beach, beyond which hissed and gurgled the stream, already swollen by the rain. a flash of lightning, that came most opportunely at this moment, revealed a small light canoe hauled up on the beach, with a couple of paddles, a sheaf of spears, bows and arrows, and a few other oddments in it. "get in quickly, dick, and let us be going," murmured ama hastily. "the storm is passing away, and it cannot now be long before some one will visit the prisoners to see how they have fared; indeed, that may have happened already. and, whenever it occurs, your absence will certainly be discovered, and a search for you will be at once begun. it will take a little while for them to ascertain that you are nowhere concealed in the town, but when that has been determined they will at once think of the river, and a party will be despatched in pursuit; therefore it is imperative that we should secure as long a start as possible." "of course," answered i, as i laid hold of the light craft and ran her afloat; "i quite understand that. but, ama, you speak of `we,' as though you intended to accompany me. that must not be, my dear girl; you have already done nobly in freeing me, and in providing me with the means of flight, and i must now do the best i can for myself; i cannot consent to implicate you by permitting you to accompany me. therefore let me now bid you adieu, with my warmest and most grateful thanks, not only for what you have done for me to-night, but also for the friendship which you have shown me from the moment when i first came to know you. now, hasten back to your own quarters as quickly as possible, i pray you; i think you can be trusted to find your way back to them without permitting your share in this night's doings to be discovered. farewell, dear ama, and may god bless and keep you! i shall never forget you, or your goodness to me. good-bye!" and, in the fulness of my gratitude, i took her in my arms and kissed her. for a moment the gentle girl resigned herself to my embrace; then, freeing herself, she said, "thank you, dick, for thinking of my safety at such a moment, dear, but i cannot return; i _must_ go with you, not only for your own sake but for mine also. you do not understand the ways of my people, as i do, and therefore without my help you could never make good your escape. as for me, my father knows that there is only one person--myself--who would dare to do what i have done for you to-night; and even were i to succeed in returning to my own quarters undetected--which is exceedingly doubtful--his anger at your loss will be so great that he would assuredly condemn me to take your place at the stake. therefore, dick," she concluded pleadingly, "i must either go with you, or undergo the tortures that were destined for you." "but surely,"--i protested, and was about to argue that, she being her father's favourite daughter, he would never be so inhuman as to sacrifice her to his anger, when a sound of distant shouting came faintly to our ears. "hark!" exclaimed ama, "do you hear that, dick? it means that your absence has been discovered, and that the hunt for you has already begun. we must not waste another moment. will you take me with you; or must i go back to face a cruel and lingering death?" "not the last, certainly," answered i. "jump in, little one, and let us be off without further parley." giving her my hand to steady her in entering the crank little craft, i waited until she had seated herself aft and taken the steering paddle in her hand, then, with a powerful push that sent the canoe, stern-first, far out into the rapidly flowing stream, i sprang in over the bows, seized a paddle, and proceeded to force the craft off-shore into the strength of the current. chapter nineteen. the tragic death of ama. we now had leisure to observe that the storm had so far passed away that there were big breaks in the canopy of cloud overhead and away to the eastward, through which the stars were beginning to show themselves, affording enough light just to enable us to discern the two banks of the stream, but not sufficient to betray our presence to an observer at a greater distance than, say, a quarter of a mile. there was therefore not much fear of our immediate discovery, since i now learned from ama that our starting-point was at least three-quarters of a mile below the town, while, apart from our own exertions, the swollen current was sweeping us along at a speed of about six knots. in little more than ten minutes from the moment of starting we swept out of the tributary stream into the main river, the current of which was also flowing pretty rapidly, though not, of course, so swiftly as that of the lesser stream; and now, as we pushed off into mid-channel, we found time to exchange a few remarks. for my own part i was anxious to know what had first suggested to my companion the idea of effecting my rescue, and by what means, after she had conceived the idea, she had contrived to carry her plans to a successful issue. i put the question to her; and by way of reply she related to me the following story: "from the moment when i first became aware of my father's illness i was not entirely free from suspicion; and when at length i saw that your efforts to cure him were only partially successful, and that his symptoms persistently recurred, i was convinced that there was foul play somewhere, though why, i could not at first imagine. but when gouroo whispered to my father, hinting at your incapacity, and suggesting that mafuta should be sent for, my suspicions began to take definite shape, and, although i was not able to verify those suspicions, i finally made up my mind that the whole occurrence was the outcome of a plot between gouroo and mafuta--your only enemies--to ruin you. and these suspicions were confirmed when, after you had been carried away and imprisoned, my father began to mend, even before the arrival of mafuta upon the scene, while it seemed extraordinary to me that the witch-doctor should know so well the character of my father's ailment, that he was able to bring with him precisely the right remedies for administration. "now, as i told you just now, dick, i was quite unable to verify my suspicions, but in my own mind i have not the slightest doubt that mafuta gave gouroo poison of some kind to administer to my father and make him ill, knowing that you would be summoned to cure him, and knowing, too, that your failure to cure would result in your condemnation to a death by torture. i tried to intercede for you, not once but many times; but my father had suffered horribly, and had been terribly frightened. he believed that, but for gouroo's suggestion, you would have allowed him to die; and he refused to show you any mercy. your fate seemed sealed--unless i could contrive a scheme to save you; but i could think of nothing; and the anticipation of your death made me feel so utterly wretched, that at last i entreated my father that, if he would not spare you, he would at least not compel me to witness your sufferings. he was still dreadfully angry with me for interceding in your behalf, but i persisted; and at length he told me that if i did not wish to witness the customs i might remain at home, and of course i did so, although i knew that you were not to suffer until to-morrow. i spent all my time trying to devise some plan for effecting your deliverance, but could think of none; nevertheless, as soon as everybody was in the square and the customs had begun, i went down to the river, got my canoe ready, and paddled it down to the place where we found it to-night. and it was while i was returning, and searching for a way to pass inside the palisade without entering by the gate, that i first saw the storm working up, and i knew that if it delayed its coming long enough i might be able to save you. as it happened, circumstances could scarcely have arranged themselves more favourably; and the result is that i have now the happiness to have you here with me in safety. now, dick, we must push on as fast as we can, travelling all through the night, and concealing ourselves and resting during the day; for if we are to escape it must be by stratagem, and not by strength, or speed." "yes," said i; "i can quite understand that if they should take it into their heads to pursue us--as you seem to think they will--we should have small chance of running away from one of your big canoes, manned by forty or fifty paddlers. but where do you propose to take me, ama?" "where do you wish to go, dick?" demanded my companion, answering one question with another. "why," replied i, "of course i am anxious to get down to the coast again, and aboard a ship. but i am puzzled to know what is to become of you when we part." "_must_ we part, dick?" murmured ama softly. "cannot i always remain with you?" "quite impossible, my dear girl," answered i hastily, beginning at last to have some faint suspicion of what was in this savage beauty's unsophisticated mind. "i owe a duty to my king; and that duty imperatively demands that i shall return at once to the ship in which i am serving him--and where, ama, i may mention, no place could possibly be found for you. but i do not forget that you have saved my life, ama; and therefore, come what will, i will not leave you until you have formed some definite plan for your own safety and happiness. what did you think of doing when the time comes for us to part?" the girl was silent so long that i was obliged to repeat my question before i could get an answer, and when at length she replied, i feared i could detect tears in her voice, and could have execrated myself for a stony-hearted wretch. "i have never looked so far forward as that," she answered in quavering tones; "but we need not think of that yet, dick. when the time comes i have no doubt that i shall know what to do. and now, we really _must_ cease talking, and push on as fast as we can, or we shall not reach our place of concealment before the dawn comes to reveal our whereabouts to our pursuers." i was not sorry to have the conversation closed, for i wanted a little time for reflection. it was clear to me that this unsophisticated young savage had been dominated in her actions by one idea alone, that of saving me from a death of unspeakable horror; she knew that, in so doing, she was cutting herself off for ever from her own people, to whom it would be impossible for her to return; and, in her absolute simplicity, she had evidently thought that it would be the easiest thing in the world for her to throw in her lot with mine. how was i to undeceive her; how make her understand the absolute impossibility of such a thing? i greatly feared that to convince her of this would be wholly beyond my power. yet what was to become of her? i could not abandon her, alone and unprotected, to her fate; nor could i take her with me. the problem seemed absolutely insoluble; and at length i came to the conclusion that the only thing to be done was to leave the issue to destiny. hour after hour we paddled on in absolute silence, making excellent progress, for the current was running strong in our favour; and at length, just as the eastern horizon was beginning to pale with the first hint of dawn, ama gave the canoe a sheer in toward the eastern bank, looking anxiously about her as she did so. she was not long in discovering the landmarks of which she was in search, and a few minutes later the canoe was threading its tortuous way among a tangled mass of mangrove roots toward the solid bank of the river, landing upon which, we drew our light craft bodily up out of the water, concealing her beneath a broad overhanging mass of foliage which hid her so effectually that i would defy anybody but ourselves to find her. then, taking a bow and quiver of arrows, together with a brace of spears, out of the canoe, and signing to me to do the same, ama led the way through the dense growth bordering the river bank, until we reached an open grassy space of about twenty acres, sparsely dotted here and there with magnificent trees; and here ama signified that we were to camp for the day. she further mentioned that, as she felt sure her father would have despatched a party in pursuit of us, which, she expected, would by this time be, not far behind us, it would be very desirable to keep a watch for them, since it was important that we should know as much as possible of their movements; and she accordingly suggested that i should climb a particularly lofty tree which she indicated, and keep a look-out for them, while she went off into the forest to seek the wherewithal to furnish a breakfast. she was very quiet and subdued in her manner, and i greatly feared that she was feeling deeply mortified and hurt because i had pointed out the impossibility of her remaining with me after our arrival at the coast--should we be so fortunate as to get there. as ama, taking her bow and arrows, tripped lightly away toward the forest, i proceeded to shin up the tree, and presently, after some labour, found myself among its topmost branches, which towered high above those of all the other trees in the neighbourhood, and--it being by this time broad daylight--obtained a magnificent view of the surrounding country, extending for, as i estimated, some forty miles toward the south and east, while toward the north and west the view was shut off by high hills, through which the river wound its way. to my surprise i found that our camping-place was much nearer the river than i had supposed, and i was thus able to obtain a clear and unobstructed view of its surface for many miles north and south, except a width of a few yards on its eastern side, which was shut off by the mangroves and low scrub which grew along its margin. i most carefully searched the shining bosom of the stream for signs of our expected pursuers, but saw none; nor had they hove in sight when, about half an hour later, ama returned with some seven or eight wood-pigeons which she had brought down with her arrows. she did not call to me, or announce her return in any way, but set to work to mow a circle of about ten feet in diameter in the long grass; and then, having produced fire by rubbing two pieces of wood together, she proceeded very carefully to burn off the short grass left inside the circle, setting fire to it, allowing it to burn for a few seconds, and then beating it out again with a branch, in order that the fire might not spread and burn us out, to say nothing of betraying our presence by the smoke that it would raise. then, when she had at length cleared a sufficient space she lighted her cooking fire, taking care to use only dry wood, and thus make but little smoke, after which she proceeded to the margin of the river and brought back a large lump of damp clay, pieces of which she broke off and completely encased the birds in, and this she did with considerable care, i noticed. when she had completed her task, she consigned the whole to the fire, placing the shapeless lumps in the centre of the glowing embers, and piling more dry wood on the top, so as to maintain a brisk blaze. in about half an hour the lumps of clay, baked hard by the heat, began to crack and break open, when ama carefully raked them out of the embers and set them aside. then, and not until then, did she hail me, asking whether the expected pursuers were in sight; and upon my replying in the negative, she informed me that breakfast was ready, and invited me to come down and partake of it. i felt somewhat curious to see how ama's primitive style of cooking would turn out; but it was all right. we simply broke open the lumps of baked clay with our spears and took out the birds--minus the skin and feathers, which adhered to the clay--and, splitting them open, removed the interior organs and devoured the flesh, which i found done to a turn, and particularly rich and juicy in flavour. then, after we had finished eating, ama again disappeared, to return shortly afterward with four fine cocoa-nuts, which we opened with our spear-heads and drank. "now, dick," said ama, when we had finished our meal, "you need rest badly, and must have it; therefore compose yourself to sleep near the fire, where i can watch over you; and i will take your place in the tree and look out for our pursuers. they will be sure to be along very soon now; and it is important that i should see upon what plan they are conducting their search for us. i want them to get well ahead of us before we resume our journey to-night." "yes," said i, "that is all very well, ama. but what about yourself? you need rest fully as much as i do--" "no, i do not," she retorted. "i took plenty of rest yesterday, in anticipation; while you were exposed all day to the scorching sun and the flies, and have been awake all night. so please lie down and sleep; for in any case i must watch the river until our pursuers appear. i promise you that when they have passed, and i have seen all that i can of them, i will come down and sleep too." i attempted to dissuade her from this resolution; but she was in an obstinate mood, and would not be dissuaded; recognising which, at length, i gave in; for it was true that i needed rest. accordingly, flinging myself down in the long grass, i fell, almost instantly, into a deep sleep. it must have been about four o'clock in the afternoon, judging from the position of the sun, when i awoke to find ama crouching over the fire, busily preparing another meal which--even as i rose and stretched myself luxuriously, feeling immeasurably refreshed and invigorated by my long sleep--she pronounced ready. as we sat down to partake, of it together, ama informed me that one of her father's largest canoes, manned by forty paddlers, and commanded by a chief whom she had recognised, had passed slowly down the river about an hour after i had composed myself to rest, the chief in charge intently scrutinising both banks, as they went, evidently in search of some indication of our presence, and had finally passed out of sight to the southward; after which ama had descended and taken a few hours' rest. she further stated that, upon awaking, she had again gone aloft to take another long and careful look round, but had seen nothing more of our pursuers, and was therefore inclined to believe that we were now reasonably safe, provided, of course, that we did all our travelling at night, kept a sharp look-out, and were careful not to allow ourselves to be fallen in with by other users of the river. the supply of food which ama had provided for our afternoon meal was so bountiful that, when we had finished, enough remained to furnish us with a good substantial meal about the middle of the night. our wants for the next few hours were consequently supplied, we had therefore no need to do anything further than just to wait for nightfall and then resume our voyage; which we did, passing the intervening time in chatting together and discussing the various precautions which we must take in order to elude our pursuers, who, by the way, were now several miles ahead of us. we remained where we were until close upon sunset, when i again climbed our look-out tree and carefully scanned the whole surface of the river, as far as the eye could reach. there was nothing of an alarming character in sight, and therefore, as soon as i had descended to the ground, we both set out for the spot where we had hidden our canoe, launched her, and made our way out through the labyrinth of mangrove roots to the margin of the river, where we lay _perdu_ until the darkness had completely fallen, when we boldly pushed off into the strength of the current, and steadily pursued our way. i soon found that travelling down-stream, with the current in our favour, was a very different matter from travelling up-stream against it; and within the next twenty-four hours i was able to estimate that we were now proceeding about three times as rapidly as was the case when i was making the upward journey. i calculated, therefore, that a full week ought to suffice us to reach the sea. and then what was to become of poor ama, my gentle and loving companion? alas, destiny was soon to answer that question, and most tragically, too, had we but known it. thanks to ama's foresight and admirable judgment, our progress down the river was uneventful. we travelled during the night, resting and refreshing ourselves during the day, and never again saw a sign of our pursuers, nor indeed of anybody else, for our journey was begun when the moon was past her third quarter, and rose late; and ama explained that the natives of that region never travelled through the darkness, if they could possibly avoid it. it was on the sixth day of our journey that, having landed as usual at the first sign of dawn, we were resting in a secluded and shady spot after having partaken of an excellent and substantial breakfast. i had been sound asleep for some hours, for the sun was well past the meridian, when i was startled into sudden and complete wakefulness, and sprang up with the sensation that i had heard ama screaming and calling upon me for help. i glanced at the spot where she had lain, a short distance from me. she was not there; and i at once concluded that, having awakened before me, she had gone off into the forest to obtain the wherewithal for our mid- day meal. i listened intently, but the silence of noontide had fallen, and everything was deathly still; there was not the faintest zephyr to stir the foliage; and even the very insects that so persistently attack one in the african jungle seemed to be indulging in a mid-day siesta. yet i could not divest my mind of the conviction that my abrupt awakening had been caused by a cry for help from ama having reached my ears; and, seizing my weapons, i set out in search of her. the "form" in the grass where she had lain was plain enough to the sight, as also were her tracks in the direction of the forest, and these i followed for some distance without much difficulty, coming out at length into an open glade, through which a tiny streamlet made its way. and here, among an outcrop of immense granite rocks, i came upon the signs of a tragedy. the long grass was disturbed and beaten down, as though a desperate struggle had taken place; the ground was smeared and splashed with blood; and in the midst of it lay one of ama's spears, and the broken shaft of the other. and, leading away from this, there was a broad, blood-stained trail, as though a body had been dragged along through the grass and over some rocky ground, further on, toward another and much bigger outcrop of rock. it was not difficult to read the signs: ama, intent upon her hunting, had been surprised and overpowered by some ferocious beast; and now all that remained was for me to follow and rescue the unfortunate girl, or avenge her death. i accordingly fitted to my bow the stoutest arrow in my quiver, and dashed forward in a fury of rage and grief, absolutely reckless of consequences to myself, and animated by but one impulse--the determination to slay the beast, whatever it might be, that had wrought this evil to my faithful and gentle companion. for a hundred yards or more the trail led over uneven rocky ground toward an immense rock, upon rounding which i found myself face to face with, and within half-a-dozen yards of, a splendid full-grown male leopard who was crouching over poor ama's motionless body, snarling savagely as he strove with his claws to remove a broken spear, the head of which was buried deep in his neck. as i rounded the rock and came in sight of him he rose to his feet, with his two front paws on ama's body, and bared his great fangs at me in a hideous grin, as he gave utterance to a snarling growl that might well have struck terror to the boldest. but my heart was so full of rage and grief at the dreadful sight before me that there was no room in it for any other emotion, and, halting short in my tracks, i gazed the brute steadfastly in the eye, as i slowly raised my bow and drew the arrow to its head. never in my life had i felt more deadly cool and self-possessed than i did then as i aimed steadily at the animal's right eye; i felt that i _could not_ miss; nor did i; for while we thus stood motionlessly staring at each other, i released the string, and the next instant the great lithe beast sprang convulsively into the air, with the butt of my arrow protruding from his eye and the point buried deep in his brain. as he fell back, and struggled writhing upon the ground, moaning horribly for a few seconds ere his great limbs straightened out in death, i dashed forward, and, seizing poor ama's body, drew it out of reach of the beast's claws. but a single glance sufficed to show me that the unfortunate girl was beyond the reach of further hurt. yes, she was quite dead, this gentle, faithful, savage girl who, in return for a comparatively slight service, had unhesitatingly abandoned home, kindred, everything, to save me from a cruel and lingering death; and now the only thing that i could do to show my gratitude was to make sure that no further violence should be offered to her remains. my first impulse was to carry the body down to where the soil was softer, and there dig a grave for it; but while i was considering this plan, it occurred to me that, with no more efficient tool than a spear to serve as a shovel, it would be practically impossible for me to bury the body deep enough to protect it from the jackals and hyaenas; and i therefore determined that, instead of burying it, i would burn it. there was an abundance of fallen boughs and twigs in the adjacent jungle to enable me to build a funeral pyre; and i should have the melancholy satisfaction of actually watching the reduction of the body to impalpable ashes. i therefore took all that remained of poor ama in my arms and carried it to the top of a bare rocky plateau close at hand, upon which i intended to build my pyre, and then diligently set to work to collect the necessary wood. it took me the remainder of the day to collect as much dry and combustible material as i considered would be needful to accomplish the complete incineration of the body, and to build the pyre; but it was done at last; and then, once more raising the corpse in my arms, i gently placed it on the top. then, making fire, as i had seen ama do, by rubbing two pieces of wood together, i ignited a torch and thrust it deep into the heart of the pyre, through an opening which i had left for the purpose. the dry leaves and grass which i had arranged as kindling material instantly caught fire, and in a few minutes the flames were darting fiercely upward through the interstices, and wreathing themselves about the corpse. then, placing myself to windward, clear of the smoke, i knelt down on the hard rock and--i am not ashamed to admit it--prayed earnestly that god would have mercy upon the soul of the simple, unsophisticated, savage maiden who had lost her life while helping me to save my own. i was doing a most imprudent thing to linger by the side of the pyre, for the smoke, in the first place, and the light of the flames when it fell dark, could scarcely have failed to attract to the spot any savages who might have been in the neighbourhood, when my plight would probably have been as bad as ever; but at that moment my sorrow at the loss of my companion overcame every other feeling, and, for the moment at least, i was quite indifferent as to what befell me. as it happened, no one came near me, and i remained, unmolested, watching the fire until it had burnt itself out, leaving no trace of the body that had been consumed. meanwhile, since i was almost naked, and was hoping soon to find myself once more among civilised people, it occurred to me that the skin of the leopard which had wrought this dire tragedy might be of use to me as material out of which to fashion some sort of a garment; and, therefore, while the flames of the pyre were still blazing brilliantly i utilised their light to enable me to strip the pelt off the great carcase. when the fire had entirely died down, and i had satisfied myself that there was nothing left of poor ama to be desecrated by fang of beast or beak of bird, i sorrowfully retired from the fatal spot, carrying the leopard's skin with me, and making my way with some difficulty to the place where the canoe lay concealed, sprang in and shoved off. four days later i arrived at the mouth of the river, without further adventure, and was fortunate enough to find a fine slashing brigantine flying french colours riding at anchor there. it did not need a second look at her to tell me that she was a slaver; but beggars must not be choosers. i could not afford to wait about for the arrival of a more honest craft, at the risk of being again seized and carried off by the natives, and therefore, putting a bold face upon it, i paddled alongside and, with my leopard-skin wrapped round me petticoat-fashion, climbed up the side and inquired for the skipper. it appeared that he was ashore at the moment making arrangements for the shipment of a cargo of slaves on the next day; but the chief mate was aboard, and upon representing myself to him as a shipwrecked englishman who had been carried away captive into the interior, and had just effected my escape, he gave me permission to remain, saying that he had no doubt captain duquesne would receive me if i were willing to work my passage to martinique. this was not at all what i wanted; but even martinique was better than king banda's town, and i therefore consented. some hours later the captain returned, and upon my repeating to him the yarn which i had spun to the mate he not only very readily consented to my working my passage, but also offered me two excellent suits of clothes, two shirts, two pairs of stockings, a pair of shoes, and a worsted cap in exchange for my leopard-skin, which offer i gladly accepted; and that night found me domiciled in the forecastle of _l'esperance_ as one of her crew. my companions, although a sufficiently lawless lot, were nevertheless genial enough among themselves, and--let me do them justice--made me heartily welcome among them. naturally enough, having heard that i had been a captive among the savages, they insisted upon my relating to them my adventures; and this inaugurated an evening of yarn-spinning in the forecastle, the incidents related having reference for the most part to the slave-trade. there was one grizzled old scoundrel, in particular, nicknamed--appropriately enough, no doubt--"red hand," who was full of reminiscence and anecdote; and by-and-by, when the grog had been circulating for some time, he made mention of the names _virginia_ and _preciosa_, at which i pricked up my ears; for i remembered at once that those were the names of the two slavers that our own and the american government were so anxious to lay by the heels, and which had hitherto baffled all our efforts and laughed at our most carefully laid plans. not altogether to my surprise, i now learned that the _virginia_ and the _preciosa_ were one and the same craft, manned by two complete crews-- one american and one spanish--and furnished with duplicate sets of papers. thus, if by any chance she happened to be overhauled by a british ship, she hoisted american colours, her american skipper, officers, and crew showed themselves, and her american set of papers was produced, the result being that she went free, although she might have a full cargo of slaves on board--for the british were not authorised to interfere with american slavers. and, in like manner, if an american cruiser happened to fall in with her, she showed spanish colours, mustered her spanish crew on deck, and produced her spanish papers for inspection if she were boarded, there being no treaty between america and spain for the suppression of slavery. what she did if she happened to encounter a french cruiser i did not learn; apparently such an accident had not yet happened, she being a remarkably fast sailer while the french cruisers were notoriously slow-coaches. this was a most valuable piece of information for me to get hold of, and i carefully laid it away in the storehouse of my memory for use when occasion should serve. on the following morning we began to ship our cargo of slaves--three hundred and forty of them; and that same night, about an hour before sunset, we weighed and stood out to sea, securing a good offing by means of the land-breeze which sprang up later on, and finally bore away for cape palmas. as it happened, the weather was light and fine, and our progress was consequently slow, cape palmas not being sighted until our sixth day out. here captain duquesne secured an excellent departure by means of three carefully taken bearings of the cape, observed at intervals of two hours, by means of which he was able to establish our position on the chart with the utmost accuracy; and, this done, we held on a westerly course, the skipper's intention being not to haul up to the northward until he had arrived at the meridian of ° west longitude, lest he should fall in with any of the cruisers of the slave squadron. but, as luck would have it, the weather fell still lighter at sunset on our ninth day out; and on the following morning at daybreak we found ourselves becalmed within three miles of a british cruiser, which promptly lowered her boats and despatched them to overhaul us; and by breakfast-time i had the pleasure of finding myself once more under the british flag, our captor proving to be the corvette _cleopatra_, by the captain and officers of which i was most kindly received when i had related to them my strange story. the prize was promptly provided with a prize crew and sent into sierra leone in command of the third lieutenant, and i was given a passage in her. four days later we arrived at our destination; and, to my great joy, among the vessels at anchor in the harbour i recognised the _eros_. i pointed her out to the prize master; and he, good-hearted fellow that he was, kindly let me have a boat to go on board her as soon as our own anchor was down. chapter twenty. our crowning exploit. "come on board, sir," remarked i, touching my cap as i passed in through the gangway of the _eros_ and found myself face to face with captain perry and the master, who were walking the quarter-deck side by side and conversing earnestly, while the first lieutenant, from the break of the poop, was carrying on the work of the ship. "good heavens!" exclaimed the skipper, stopping short and staring at me as though he had seen a ghost--"is it possible? it can't be--and yet, by jove, it _is_--mr fortescue! welcome back to the _eros_, mr fortescue; i am delighted to see you again. but where on earth have you sprung from? from that fine brigantine that has just come in, i imagine, since i see that the boat which brought you is returning to her; but i mean before that. you look as though you have been having a pretty rough time of it lately. and what of the _dolphin_ and her crew? we gave you all up for lost, long ago." "and with good reason, sir," i answered. "she foundered in a hurricane in mid-atlantic; and i have only too much reason to fear that i alone have survived to tell the tale." "ah," said the skipper, "that is bad news indeed; but the fact that you never turned up at our rendez-vous, and that no intelligence could be gained of you, has prepared us for it. well, mr fortescue, i am afraid i am too busy to listen to your story just now; you must therefore dine with me and the officers of the ship to-day, and then spin us your yarn. meanwhile, since you seem to have returned to us flying light, without any `dunnage,' i would recommend you to get hold of the ship's tailor and see what he can do for you in the matter of knocking you up a uniform. for the rest, you may take a boat and go ashore to replenish your wardrobe, which you had better do at once, for we go to sea again to-morrow. i have no doubt the purser will be able to let you have such funds as you need. now, run along and renew your acquaintance with your shipmates; i see mr copplestone and one or two more glancing rather impatiently this way, as though they were anxious to have a word or two with you." touching my cap, i slipped up on to the poop, as in duty bound, to report myself to the first lieutenant, who gave me as hearty a welcome as the skipper had done, and then joined copplestone, the surgeon, and one or two others who were obviously waiting to have a word with me, and retired with them to the gunroom, where my return was celebrated in due form. of course they were all exceedingly anxious to hear the story of what had befallen me since the _dolphin_ and the _eros_ had parted company; but i steadfastly refused to tell them anything beyond the bare fact that the _dolphin_ had gone down with all hands, explaining that the skipper had invited me to dine with him that day, and that they would learn all particulars then, as i gathered that it was his intention to invite them all to meet me. then, having had a satisfactory interview with the tailor and the purser, i went ashore and laid in a stock of linen, etcetera, together with a chest, all of which i brought off with me. as i had quite anticipated, the captain invited everybody to meet me at dinner that day, even to copplestone and parkinson, who were now the sole occupants of the midshipmen's berth. and very attentively everybody listened to the story, as i told it in detail, of how, after parting from the _eros_, we had carried on in the hope of overtaking the _virginia_; of how we had been caught in and overwhelmed by the hurricane; of how i came to go adrift, alone, in the longboat; of how i had been run down by _la mouette_, and of my treatment on board her; of my adventures in king banda's town, and my escape therefrom with the aid of poor ama; of the death of the latter--at which all hands expressed their sincere regret; and, finally, of how i had reached _l'esperance_, and the extraordinary story i had heard while aboard her. it is not to be supposed that i was allowed to spin my yarn without interruption; on the contrary, i was bombarded with a continuous fire of questions for the elucidation of points that i had failed to make quite clear; and when i had finished the captain was pleased to express himself as perfectly satisfied with all that i had done, and that the loss of the _dolphin_ was due to causes entirely beyond my control. regret was expressed for the loss of tasker and keene, both of whom were highly esteemed by all their shipmates; and then the conversation diverged to the topic of the audacious _virginia-preciosa_, which, protected by the very ingenious fraud of the double sets of papers and the double crews, was still merrily pursuing her way and bidding defiance to everybody. "ah!" ejaculated the skipper, with a deep sigh of satisfaction; "thanks to your friend red hand's garrulity in his cups, mr fortescue, we shall now know how to deal with that precious craft. we go to sea to-morrow, and it shall be our business, gentlemen, to bring her to book; and a fine feather in our caps it will be if we should be successful." the first thing after breakfast, on the following morning, captain perry went ashore, remaining there until close upon eight bells in the afternoon watch; and when at length he came off, he looked uncommonly pleased with himself. i saw him talking animatedly with the first lieutenant for some time, and then he beckoned to me. "i suppose, mr fortescue," he said, when i joined him, "you will not have very much difficulty in identifying the _virginia_ should we be lucky enough to fall in with her?" "none at all, sir," answered i. "i believe i should be able to identify her as far as i could see her. i boarded her, you will remember, and i took full advantage of the opportunity to use my eyes. oh, yes, i shall know her if ever i clap eyes on her again." "which will be before very long, i hope," answered the skipper. "for by a most lucky chance i have to-day obtained what i believe to be trustworthy information to the effect that she was sighted four days ago, bound for the gaboon river--or perhaps it would be more correct to say that she was sighted steering east, and identified by the master of a brig who knows her perfectly well, and who has since arrived here, and that there is authentic information to the effect that she is this time bound for the gaboon." "in that case, sir," said i, "there ought not to be very much difficulty in falling in with her when she comes out." "that is what i think," returned the skipper. "are we quite ready to go to sea, mr hoskins?" "absolutely, sir, at a moment's notice," answered hoskins. "very well, then, we will weigh as soon as the land-breeze springs up," said the skipper. and weigh we did, a little after seven o'clock that evening, securing a good offing, and clearing the shoals of saint ann by daybreak the next morning. we knew that it was customary for the slavers coming out of the gulf of guinea to endeavour to sight cape palmas, in order that they might obtain a good "departure" for the run across the atlantic, also because they might usually reckon upon picking up the trades somewhere in that neighbourhood. the skipper therefore carefully laid down upon his chart the supposititious course of the _virginia_ from the gaboon to cape palmas, and thence onward to the caribbean sea; and then shaped a course to enable us to fall in with her on the latter, at a spot about one hundred miles to the westward of palmas. having reached this spot, we shortened sail to our three topsails, spanker, and jib, and slowly worked to windward along that course, tacking every two hours until we had worked up to within sight of the cape, and then bearing up and running off to leeward for a distance of one hundred miles again, keeping a hand aloft on the main-royal yard as look-out from dawn to dark. it was weary, anxious work; for of course our movements were being regulated by a theory that, for aught we knew to the contrary, might be all wrong; and as day succeeded day without bringing the expected sail within our ken there were not wanting among us those who denounced the skipper's plan as foolish, and argued that the proper thing would have been to go direct to the gaboon, and look there for the _virginia_. but captain perry, having carefully thought the whole thing out, stuck to his guns, refusing to budge an inch from his original arrangement, in response to the hints and insinuations of those who disagreed with him. and the result proved the soundness of his theory, for on the sixteenth day of our quest, about seven bells in the afternoon watch, the look-out hailed the deck with: "large sail two points abaft the weather beam, steerin' to the west'ard under stunsails!" "how far away is she?" hailed the skipper. "her r'yals is just showin' above the horizon, sir," answered the man. "ah! that means that she is about twenty miles distant," remarked the skipper to me--i being officer of the watch. "too far off for identification purposes, eh, mr fortescue?" "well, sir," answered i, "it is a longish stretch, i admit. yet, with your permission, i will get my glass, go aloft, and have a look at her." "thank you, mr fortescue. pray do so, by all means," returned the skipper. hurrying below for my own private telescope, which was an exceptionally fine instrument, i slung it over my shoulder and wended my way aloft to the main-royal yard. "whereabout is she, dixon?" i asked, as i swung myself up on the yard beside him. "ah, there she is; i see her. mind yourself a bit and let me have a peep at her." the man swung off the yard and slid down as far as the cross-trees, while i unslung my glass and brought it to bear upon the stranger. the rarefaction of the air bothered me a good deal, producing something of the effect of a mirage, and causing the royals of the distant vessel to stand up clear of the horizon as though there were nothing beneath them; yet, as she rose and fell with the 'scend of the sea, shapeless snow- white blotches appeared and vanished again beneath them occasionally. she was coming along very fast, however; and presently, when she took a rather broad sheer, i caught a momentary glimpse of _two_ royals and just the head of a third--the mizzen--proving conclusively that she was full-rigged--as was the _virginia_. but, as the skipper had surmised, she was still much too far off for identification. i thought rapidly, and an idea occurred to me which caused me to close my glass, re-sling it, and slide down to the cross-trees. "up you go again, dixon, and keep your eye on that vessel, reporting any noticeable thing about her that may happen to catch your eye," said i. and swinging myself on to the topgallant backstay, i slid rapidly down to the deck. "well, mr fortescue, what do you make of her?" demanded the skipper, as i rejoined him. "she is a full-rigged ship, sir," said i; "but, as you anticipated, she is still too far off for identification. but she is steering the course that we have decided the _virginia_ ought to be steering; and it has just occurred to me that, should she indeed be that craft, she may give us a great deal of trouble if she discovers us prematurely, seeing that she is to windward. i would therefore suggest, sir, that we bear up and make sail, so as to keep ahead of her until dark, and then--" "yes, i see what you mean, mr fortescue," interrupted the skipper; "and doubtless there are many cases where the plan would be very commendable; but in this case i think it would be better to close with her while it is still daylight and we can see exactly what we--and they--are doing. therefore be good enough to make sail at once, if you please." "ay, ay, sir," answered i. "hands make sail. away aloft and loose the royals and topgallantsails. lay out and loose the flying-jib. board your fore and main tacks!" in a moment all was bustle; the watch below tumbled up to lend a hand without waiting to be called; and in five minutes the noble ship was clothed with canvas from her trucks down, and shearing through the deep blue water with her lee channels buried. "now, mr fortescue," said the skipper, "we will 'bout ship, if you please." we tacked, accordingly; and as soon as we were fairly round and full again the skipper hailed the royal yard to know how the chase bore. the answer was, "a point and a half on the weather bow!" "just so!" commented the skipper. "we will keep on as we are going until she bears dead ahead, and then we will edge away after her." presently eight bells struck, and hoskins came up to relieve me, whereupon i made another journey aloft, to the fore-topmast cross-trees this time. we were raising her very fast now that both ships were steering upon converging lines; i could already see nearly to the foot of her topsails; and i settled myself comfortably, determined to remain where i was until i could absolutely identify her, although even at this time i had scarcely a shadow of a doubt that it was the long-sought _virginia_, or rather the _preciosa_, that i held in the field of my telescope. another twenty minutes and she was hull-up from my point of observation, by which time there was no further room for doubt, and i descended to the deck to acquaint the captain with the success of his strategy. she was by this time dead ahead of us; and the skipper thereupon gave orders to bear away four points and set the larboard studdingsails; at the same time instructing the look-out to give us instant warning of any change in the stranger's course or amount of sail set. both ships were now travelling very fast; and by the time that we had got our studdingsails set, the stranger was visible from our poop for about half-way down her topsails, and rising higher even as we watched. in a few minutes more we had lifted the heads of her courses above the horizon, still edging away and keeping her about four points on our port bow; and presently, as we watched her, we saw the stars and stripes go soaring up to her gaff-end. not to be outdone in politeness, we hoisted our colours also; and for the next quarter of an hour the two craft continued to close, the chase stolidly maintaining her course, while we, under the skipper's skilful conning, continued to edge very gradually away, as the other vessel sped to leeward, checking our weather braces by a few inches at a time until our yards were all but square. at length, when we had brought the chase fairly hull-up it became apparent that, thanks to the pains taken by the skipper to improve our rate of sailing, the _eros_ was now a trifle the faster vessel of the two; and that, consequently, nothing short of an accident could prevent us from getting alongside the chase. still, at sea there is always the possibility of an accident, therefore as soon as we were near enough the captain gave orders to clear away the bow gun and pitch a shot across the fellow's forefoot, as a hint that we wanted to have a talk to him. this was done; but no notice was taken aboard the chase; the next shot therefore was let drive slap at her, care being taken to fire high, with the result that the shot passed through the head of her fore-topsail and only very narrowly missed the topmast-head. this seemed to rather shake the nerve of her skipper, for the next moment her studdingsails collapsed and came down altogether, regular man-o'-war fashion--showing her to be strongly manned; but instead of rounding-to and backing her main-yard, as we thought she intended, she braced sharp up on the port tack and endeavoured to escape to windward. but we were every whit as smart with our studdingsails as she was, and instantly hauled our wind after her, she being now about one point on our lee bow. for the next hour we held grimly on, firing no more meanwhile, but by the end of that time we had neared her sufficiently to risk another shot, which, aimed with the utmost care by the gunner himself, struck the main-topmast of the chase, sending everything above the main-yard over the side to leeward. this settled the matter, and the next moment the beautiful craft hove-to. "mr fortescue," said the skipper, "you know more about yonder vessel than any of the rest of us, therefore you shall take the second cutter, with her crew fully armed, and proceed on board to take possession." "ay, ay, sir," answered i; and running down the poop ladder i gave the order for the boatswain to pipe the second cutter away while i went below to buckle on my sword and thrust a pair of pistols into my belt. by the time that the boat's crew were mustered, and the boat made ready for lowering, we were hove-to within biscuit-toss of the other vessel's weather quarter, and were able to read with the naked eye the words "virginia, new orleans," legibly painted across the turn of her counter. "d'ye see that, mr fortescue?" questioned the skipper, pointing to the inscription. "i hope there is no mistake as to the accuracy of your information; because, if there is, you know, we shall have got ourselves into a rather awkward mess by firing upon and winging that craft!" "never fear, sir," answered i confidently; "i know the secret of that trick, as you shall see very shortly." "very well," said he, "off you go. and as soon as you have secured possession let me know, and i will send the carpenter and a strong gang aboard to help you to clear away the wreck and get another topmast on end before it falls dark." five minutes later i was alongside the prize, which, as on the occasion of my previous visit, i was compelled to board by way of the lee main chains, no side ladder having been put over for my accommodation. my yankee friend and his mate were on the poop watching us, and i thought the former turned a trifle pale as he noted the strength of the crew that i had brought with me. "all hands out of the boat, and veer her away astern!" ordered i as we swept alongside; and the next moment i and my party were over the rail and on deck. i had already made my plans during the short passage of the boat between the two vessels; consequently the moment that we were all aboard young copplestone, who had come with me, led a party of men forward to drive the slaver's crew below, while i, with a couple of sturdy seamen to back me up, ascended to the poop. "look 'e hyar, young feller," began the yankee skipper, as i set foot on the poop, "i wanter know what's the meanin' of this outrage. d'ye see that there flag up there? that's the galorious--" "stars and stripes," i cut in. "yes; i recognise it. but i may as well tell you at once that i know this ship has no right to hoist those colours. she is the _preciosa_, a slaver hailing from havana, and sailing under spanish colours; consequently she is the lawful prize of his britannic majesty's ship _eros_; and i am here to take possession of her." i saw the man turn pale under his tan, and for a moment he was speechless, while his mate silas whispered something in his ear. but he would not listen. instead, he pushed the man roughly away, angrily exclaiming, "hold yer silly tongue, ye blame fool!" then, turning to me, he demanded: "who's been makin' a fool of ye this time, stranger?" "nobody," answered i curtly. "i acknowledge that you did the trick very handsomely when i boarded you on a former occasion; but there is going to be no fooling this time i assure you." "well, i'll be goldarned!" exclaimed the man, suddenly recognising me. "if it ain't the young britisher that--jigger my buttons if i didn't think i'd seen yer before, stranger. well, you know, you've got to prove what you say afore you can do anything, haven't ye?" "yes," i answered; "and if you will be good enough to hand me over your keys i will soon do so, to my own satisfaction if not to yours." "very well," he said, producing the keys; "the game's up, i can see, so i s'pose it's no use kickin'. there's the keys, stranger. but i'd give a good deal to know who let ye into the secret." "no doubt," returned i, with a laugh. "adams and markham, just mount guard over these two men, and do not let them stir off the poop until i return." so saying, i descended the poop ladder and, entering the cabin, made my way to the skipper's state-room, and, opening a desk which i found there, soon discovered the genuine set of papers declaring the ship's name to be the _preciosa_, her port of registry havana, and her ownership spanish. her spanish crew we soon found snugly hidden away in spacious quarters beneath the lazaret; and, as to the name on her stern, we found that the piece of wood on which it was carved and painted was reversible, having virginia, new orleans, carved on one side of it and preciosa, havana, on the other, and that it could be unbolted and reversed in a few minutes by lifting a couple of movable planks in the after cabin. i called a couple of hands into the cabin and had this done forthwith, much to the relief of captain perry, as i afterward learned. she had a full cargo, consisting of seven hundred and thirty negroes, all young males, on board; and as she was a remarkably fast and well-built ship she was a prize worth having, to say nothing of the credit that we should win by putting a stop to her vagaries. we transferred her double crew to the _eros_, where they were carefully secured in the hold on top of the ballast, and, a strong prize crew being put on board by captain perry, we were not long in clearing away the wreck and putting everything back into place again, being ready to make sail by one bell in the first watch. being a prize of such exceptional value, captain perry decided to accompany her in the _eros_ to sierra leone, where we arrived without adventure five days later. in due course she was adjudicated upon and condemned by the mixed commission; but i did not remain at sierra leone for that to take place; for upon our arrival we found that a packet had come in from england a few days previously bringing letters for me, acquainting me with the sad news of my father's death and urging me to proceed home immediately to supervise the winding up of his affairs, and to assume the management of the very important property that he had left behind him. i therefore at once applied for leave, and, having obtained it, secured a passage in a merchant vessel that was on the point of sailing for liverpool, where i duly arrived after an uneventful passage of twenty-seven days. i discovered, upon reaching home, that it would be quite impossible for me to manage my property and at the same time follow the sea; at my mother's earnest entreaty, therefore, i gave up the latter; and am now a portly grey-headed county squire, a j.p., m.f.h., and i know not what beside, to whom my experiences as a middy of the slave squadron seem little more than a fevered dream. the keepers of the king's peace by edgar wallace ward, lock & co., limited london and melbourne printed in great britain by the whitefriars press ltd., london and tonbridge contents chap. page i bones, sanders and another ii bones changes his religion iii the maker of storms iv bones and the wireless v the remedy vi the medicine man vii bones, king-maker viii the tamer of beasts ix the mercenaries x the waters of madness xi eye to eye xii the hooded king to pat (p. m. c. w.) the keepers of the king's peace chapter i bones, sanders and another to isongo, which stands upon the tributary of that name, came a woman of the isisi who had lost her husband through a providential tree falling upon him. i say "providential," for it was notorious that he was an evil man, a drinker of beer and a favourite of many bad persons. also he made magic in the forest, and was reputedly the familiar of bashunbi the devil brother of m'shimba-m'shamba. he beat his wives, and once had set fire to his house from sheer wickedness. so that when he was borne back to the village on a grass bier and the women of his house decked themselves with green leaves and arm in arm staggered and stamped through the village street in their death dance, there was a suspicion of hilarity in their song, and a more cheery step in their dance than the occasion called for. an old man named d'wiri, who knew every step of every dance, saw this and said in his stern way that it was shameless. but he was old and was, moreover, in fear for the decorum of his own obsequies if these outrageous departures from custom were approved or allowed to pass without reprimand. when m'lama, the wife of g'mami, had seen her lord depart in the canoe for burial in the middle island and had wailed her conventional grief, she washed the dust from her body at the river's edge and went back to her hut. and all that was grief for the dead man was washed away with the dust of mourning. many moons came out of the sky, were wasted and died before the woman m'lama showed signs of her gifts. it is said that they appeared one night after a great storm wherein lightning played such strange tricks upon the river that even the old man d'wiri could not remember parallel instances. in the night the wife of a hunter named e'sani-osoni brought a dying child into the hut of the widow. he had been choked by a fish-bone and was _in extremis_ when m'lama put her hand upon his head and straightway the bone flew from his mouth, "and there was a cry terrible to hear--such a cry as a leopard makes when he is pursued by ghosts." a week later a baby girl fell into a terrible fit and m'lama had laid her hand upon it and behold! it slept from that moment. ahmet, chief of the government spies, heard of these happenings and came a three days' journey by river to isongo. "what are these stories of miracles?" he asked. "_capita_," said the chief, using the term of regard which is employed in the belgian congo, "this woman m'lama is a true witch and has great gifts, for she raises the dead by the touch of her hand. this i have seen. also it is said that when u'gomi, the woodcutter, made a fault, cutting his foot in two, this woman healed him marvellously." "i will see this m'lama," said ahmet importantly. he found her in her hut tossing four bones idly. these were the shanks of goats, and each time they fell differently. "o ahmet," she said, when he entered, "you have a wife who is sick, also a first-born boy who does not speak though he is more than six seasons old." ahmet squatted down by her side. "woman," said he, "tell me something that is not the talk of river and i will believe your magic." "to-morrow your master, the lord sandi, will send you a book which will give you happiness," she said. "every day my lord sends me a book," retorted the sceptical ahmet, "and each brings me happiness. also it is common talk that at this time there come messengers carrying bags of silver and salt to pay men according to their services." undismayed she tried her last shot. "you have a crooked finger which none can straighten--behold!" she took his hand in hers and pressed the injured phlange. a sharp pain shot up his arm and he winced, pulling back his hand--but the year-old dislocation which had defied the effort of the coast doctor was straightened out, and though the movement was exquisitely painful he could bend it. "i see you are a true witch," he said, greatly impressed, for a native has a horror of deformity of any kind, and he sent back word of the phenomenon to sanders. sanders at the same time was in receipt of other news which alternately pleased him and filled him with panic. the mail had come in by fast launch and had brought captain hamilton of the houssas a very bulky letter written in a feminine hand. he had broken the glad news to commissioner sanders, but that gentleman was not certain in his mind whether the startling intelligence conveyed by the letter was good or bad. "i'm sure the country will suit her," he said, "this part of the country at any rate--but what will bones say?" "bones!" repeated captain hamilton scornfully. "what the dickens does it matter what bones says?" nevertheless, he went to the sea-end of the verandah, and his roar rivalled the thunder of the surf. "bones!" there was no answer and for an excellent reason. sanders came out of the bungalow, his helmet on the back of his head, a cheroot tilted dizzily. "where is he?" he asked. hamilton turned. "i asked him to--at least i didn't ask him, he volunteered--to peg out a trench line." "expect an invasion?" asked sanders. hamilton grinned. "bones does," he said. "he's full of the idea, and offered to give me tips on the way a trench should be dug--he's feeling rotten about things ... you know what i mean. his regiment was at mons." sanders nodded. "i understand," he said quietly. "and you ... you're a jolly good soldier, hamilton--how do you feel about it all?" hamilton shrugged his shoulders. "they would have taken me for the cameroons, but somebody had to stay," he said quietly. "after all, it is one's business to ... to do one's job in the station of life to which it has pleased god to call him. this is my work ... here." sanders laid his hand on the other's shoulder. "that's the game as it should be played," he said, and his blue eyes were as soft and as tender as a woman's. "there is no war here--we are the keepers of the king's peace, hamilton." "it's rotten...." "i know--i feel that way myself. we're out of it--the glory of it--the chance of it--the tragedy of it. and there are others. think of the men in india eating their hearts out ... praying for the order that will carry them from the comfort of their lives to the misery and the death--and the splendour, i grant you--of war." he sighed and looked wistfully to the blue sea. hamilton beckoned a houssa corporal who was crossing the garden of the residency. "ho, mustaf," he said, in his queer coast arabic, "where shall i look for my lord tibbetti?" the corporal turned and pointed to the woods which begin at the back of the residency and carry without a break for three hundred miles. "lord, he went there carrying many strange things--also there went with him ali abid, his servant." hamilton reached through an open window of the bungalow and fished out his helmet with his walking-stick. "we'll find bones," he said grimly; "he's been gone three hours and he's had time to re-plan verdun." it took some time to discover the working party, but when it was found the trouble was well repaid. bones was stretched on a canvas chair under the shade of a big isisi palm. his helmet was tipped forward so that the brim rested on the bridge of his nose, his thin red arms were folded on his breast, and their gentle rise and fall testified to his shame. two pegs had been driven in, and between them a string sagged half-heartedly. curled up under a near-by bush was, presumably, ali abid--presumably, because all that was visible was a very broad stretch of brown satin skin which showed between the waistline of a pair of white cotton trousers and a duck jacket. they looked down at the unconscious bones for a long time in silence. "what will he say when i kick him?" asked hamilton. "you can have the first guess." sanders frowned thoughtfully. "he'll say that he was thinking out a new system of communicating trenches," he said. "he's been boring me to tears over saps and things." hamilton shook his head. "wrong, sir," he said; "that isn't the lie he'll tell. he will say that i kept him up so late last night working at the men's pay-sheets that he couldn't keep awake." bones slept on. "he may say that it was coffee after tiffin," suggested sanders after a while; "he said the other day that coffee always made him sleep." "'swoon' was the word he used, sir," corrected hamilton. "i don't think he'll offer that suggestion now--the only other excuse i can think of is that he was repeating the bomongo irregular verbs. bones!" he stooped and broke off a long grass and inserted it in the right ear of lieutenant tibbetts, twiddling the end delicately. bones made a feeble clutch at his ear, but did not open his eyes. "bones!" said hamilton, and kicked him less gently. "get up, you lazy devil--there's an invasion." bones leapt to his feet and staggered a little; blinked fiercely at his superior and saluted. "enemy on the left flank, sir," he reported stiffly. "shall we have dinner or take a taxi?" "wake up, napoleon," begged hamilton, "you're at waterloo." bones blinked more slowly. "i'm afraid i've been unconscious, dear old officer," he confessed. "the fact is----" "listen to this, everybody," said hamilton admiringly. "the fact is, sir," said bones, with dignity, "i fell asleep--that beastly coffee i had after lunch, added to the fatigue of sittin' up half the night with those jolly old accounts of yours, got the better of me. i was sittin' down workin' out one of the dinkiest little ideas in trenches--a sort of communicatin' trench where you needn't get wet in the rainiest weather--when i--well, i just swooned off." hamilton looked disappointed. "weren't you doing anything with the bomongo verbs?" he demanded. a light came to bones's eyes. "by jove, sir!" he said heartily, "that was it, of course.... the last thing i remember was...." "kick that man of yours and come back to the bungalow," hamilton interrupted, "there's a job for you, my boy." he walked across and stirred the second sleeper with the toe of his boot. ali abid wriggled round and sat up. he was square of face, with a large mouth and two very big brown eyes. he was enormously fat, but it was not fat of the flabby type. though he called himself ali, it was, as bones admitted, "sheer swank" to do so, for this man had "coast" written all over him. he got up slowly and saluted first his master, then sanders, and lastly hamilton. bones had found him at cape coast castle on the occasion of a joy-ride which the young officer had taken on a british man-of-war. ali abid had been the heaven-sent servant, and though sanders had a horror of natives who spoke english, the english of ali abid was his very own. he had been for five years the servant of professor garrileigh, the eminent bacteriologist, the account of whose researches in the field of tropical medicines fill eight volumes of closely-printed matter, every page of which contains words which are not to be found in most lexicons. they walked back to the residency, ali abid in the rear. "i want you to go up to the isongo, bones," said sanders; "there may be some trouble there--a woman is working miracles." "he might get a new head," murmured hamilton, but bones pretended not to hear. "use your tact and get back before the th for the party." "the----?" asked bones. he had an irritating trick of employing extravagant gestures of a fairly commonplace kind. thus, if he desired to hear a statement repeated--though he had heard it well enough the first time--he would bend his head with a puzzled wrinkle of forehead, put his hand to his ear and wait anxiously, even painfully, for the repetition. "you heard what the commissioner said," growled hamilton. "party--p-a-r-t-y." "my birthday is not until april, your excellency," said bones. "i'd guess the date--but what's the use?" interposed hamilton. "it isn't a birthday party, bones," said sanders. "we are giving a house-warming for miss hamilton." bones gasped, and turned an incredulous eye upon his chief. "you haven't a sister, surely, dear old officer?" he asked. "why the dickens shouldn't i have a sister?" demanded his chief. bones shrugged his shoulders. "a matter of deduction, sir," he said quietly. "absence of all evidence of a soothin' and lovin' influence in your lonely an' unsympathetic upbringin'; hardness of heart an' a disposition to nag, combined with a rough and unpromisin' exterior--a sister, good lord!" "anyway, she's coming, bones," said hamilton; "and she's looking forward to seeing you--i've written an awful lot about you." bones smirked. "of course," he said, "you've overdone it a bit--women hate to be disillusioned. what you ought to have done, sir, is to describe me as a sort of ass--genial and all that sort of thing, but a commonplace sort of ass." hamilton nodded. "that's exactly what i've done, bones," he said. "i told her how bosambo did you in the eye for twenty pounds, and how you fell into the water looking for buried treasure, and how the isisi tried to sell you a flying crocodile and would have sold it too, if it hadn't been for my timely arrival. i told her----" "i think you've said enough, sir." bones was very red and very haughty. "far be it from me to resent your attitude or contradict your calumnies. miss hamilton will see very little of me. an inflexible sense of duty will keep me away from the frivolous circle of society, sir. alert an' sleepless----" "trenches," said hamilton brutally. bones winced, regarded his superior for a moment with pain, saluted, and turning on his heel, stalked away, followed by ali abid no less pained. he left at dawn the next morning, and both sanders and hamilton came down to the concrete quay to see the _zaire_ start on her journey. sanders gave his final instructions-- "if the woman is upsetting the people, arrest her; if she has too big a hold on them, arrest her; but if she is just amusing them, come back." "and don't forget the th," said hamilton. "i may arrive a little late for that," said bones gravely. "i don't wish to be a skeleton at your jolly old festive board, dear old sportsman--you will excuse my absence to miss hamilton. i shall probably have a headache and all that sort of thing." he waved a sad farewell as the _zaire_ passed round the bend of the river, and looked, as he desired to look, a melancholy figure with his huge pipe in his mouth and his hands thrust dejectedly into his trousers pockets. once out of sight he became his own jovial self. "lieutenant ali," he said, "get out my log and put it in old sanders' cabin, make me a cup of tea and keep her jolly old head east, east by north." "ay, ay, sir," said ali in excellent english. the "log" which bones kept was one of the secret documents which never come under the eye of the superior authorities. there were such entries as-- "wind n.n.w. sea calm. hostile craft sighted on port bow, at . a.m. general quarters sounded . . interrogated captain of the hostile craft and warned him not to fish in fair-way. sighted cape m'gooboori . , stopped for lunch and wood." what though cape m'gooboori was the village of that name and the "calm sea" was no more than the placid bosom of the great river? what though bones's "hostile craft" was a dilapidated canoe, manned by one aged and bewildered man of the isisi engaged in spearing fish? bones saw all things through the rosy spectacles of adventurous youth denied its proper share of experience. at sunset the _zaire_ came gingerly through the shoals that run out from the isongo beach, and bones went ashore to conduct his investigations. it chanced that the evening had been chosen by m'lama, the witch, for certain wonderful manifestations, and the village was almost deserted. in a wood and in a place of green trees m'lama sat tossing her sheep shanks, and a dense throng of solemn men and women squatted or sat or tiptoed about her--leaving her a respectable space for her operations. a bright fire crackled and glowed at her side, and into this, from time to time, she thrust little sticks of plaited straw and drew them forth blazing and spluttering until with a quick breath she extinguished the flame and examined the grey ash. "listen, all people," she said, "and be silent, lest my great ju-ju strike you dead. what man gave me this?" "it was i, m'lama," said an eager woman, her face wrinkled with apprehension as she held up her brown palm. the witch peered forward at the speaker. "o f'sela!" she chanted, "there is a man-child for thee who shall be greater than chiefs; also you will suffer from a sickness which shall make you mad." "o ko!" half dismayed by the promise of her own fate; half exalted by the career the witch had sketched for her unborn son, the woman stared incredulously, fearfully at the swaying figure by the fire. again a plaited stick went into the fire, was withdrawn and blown out, and the woman again prophesied. and sometimes it was of honours and riches she spoke, and sometimes--and more often--of death and disaster. into this shuddering group strode bones, very finely clad in white raiment yet limp withal, for the night was close and the way had been long and rough. the sitters scrambled to their feet, their knuckles at their teeth, for this was a moment of great embarrassment. "oh, m'lama," said bones agreeably, and spoke in the soft dialect of the isisi by-the-river, "prophesy for me!" she looked up sullenly, divining trouble for herself. "lord," she said, with a certain smooth venom, "there is a great sickness for you--and behold you will go far away and die, and none shall miss you." bones went very red, and shook an indignant forefinger at the offending prophetess. "you're a wicked old storyteller!" he stammered. "you're depressin' the people--you naughty girl! i hate you--i simply loathe you!" as he spoke in english she was not impressed. "goin' about the country puttin' people off their grub, by jove!" he stormed; "tellin' stories ... oh, dash it, i shall have to be awfully severe with you!" severe he was, for he arrested her, to the relief of her audience, who waited long enough to discover whether or not her ju-ju would strike him dead, and being obviously disappointed by her failure to provide this spectacle, melted away. close to the gangway of the _zaire_ she persuaded one of her houssa guard to release his hold. she persuaded him by the simple expedient of burying her sharp white teeth in the fleshy part of his arm--and bolted. they captured her half mad with panic and fear of her unknown fate, and brought her to the boat. bones, fussing about the struggling group, dancing with excitement, was honourably wounded by the chance contact of his nose with a wild and whirling fist. "put her in the store cabin!" he commanded breathlessly. "oh, what a wicked woman!" in the morning as the boat got under way ali came to him with a distressing story. "your excellency will be pained to hear," he said, "that the female prisoner has eradicated her costume." "eradicated...?" repeated the puzzled bones, gently touching the patch of sticking-plaster on his nose. "in the night," explained this former slave of science, "the subject has developed symptoms of mania, and has entirely dispensed with her clothes--to wit, by destruction." "she's torn up her clothes?" gasped bones, his hair rising and ali nodded. now, the dress of a native woman varies according to the degree in which she falls under missionary influence. isongo was well within the sphere of the river mission, and so m'lama's costume consisted of a tight-fitting piece of print which wound round and round the body in the manner of a kilt, covering the figure from armpit to feet. bones went to the open window of the prison cabin, and steadfastly averting his gaze, called-- "m'lama!" no reply came, and he called again. "m'lama," he said gently, in the river dialect, "what shall sandi say to this evil that you do?" there was no reply, only a snuffling sound of woe. "oh, ai!" sobbed the voice. "m'lama, presently we shall come to the mission house where the god-men are, and i will bring you clothing--these you will put on you," said bones, still staring blankly over the side of the ship at the waters which foamed past her low hull; "for if my lord sandi see you as i see you--i mean as i wouldn't for the world see you, you improper person," he corrected himself hastily in english--"if my lord sandi saw you, he would feel great shame. also," he added, as a horrible thought made him go cold all over, "also the lady who comes to my lord militini--oh, lor!" these last two words were in english. fortunately there was a jesuit settlement near by, and here bones stopped and interviewed the stout and genial priest in charge. "it's curious how they all do it," reflected the priest, as he led the way to his storehouse. "i've known 'em to tear up their clothes in an east end police cell--white folk, the same as you and i." he rummaged in a big box and produced certain garments. "my last consignment from a well-meaning london congregation," he smiled, and flung out a heap of dresses, hats, stockings and shoes. "if they'd sent a roll or two of print i might have used them--but strong religious convictions do not entirely harmonize with a last year's paris model." bones, flushed and unhappy, grabbed an armful of clothing, and showering the chuckling priest with an incoherent medley of apology and thanks, hurried back to the _zaire_. "behold, m'lama," he said, as he thrust his loot through the window of the little deck-house, "there are many grand things such as great ladies wear--now you shall appear before sandi beautiful to see." he logged the happening in characteristic language, and was in the midst of this literary exercise when the tiny steamer charged a sandbank, and before her engines could slow or reverse she had slid to the top and rested in two feet of water. a rueful bones surveyed the situation and returned to his cabin to conclude his diary with-- " . struck a reef off b'lidi bay. fear vessel total wreck. boats all ready for lowering." as a matter of fact there were neither boats to lower nor need to lower them, because the crew were already standing in the river (up to their hips) and were endeavouring to push the _zaire_ to deep water. in this they were unsuccessful, and it was not for thirty-six hours until the river, swollen by heavy rains in the ochori region, lifted the _zaire_ clear of the obstruction, that bones might record the story of his salvage. he had released a reformed m'lama to the greater freedom of the deck, and save for a shrill passage at arms between that lady and the corporal she had bitten, there was no sign of a return to her evil ways. she wore a white pique skirt and a white blouse, and on her head she balanced deftly, without the aid of pins, a yellow straw hat with long trailing ribbons of heliotrope. alternately they trailed behind and before. "a horrible sight," said bones, shuddering at his first glimpse of her. the rest of the journey was uneventful until the _zaire_ had reached the northernmost limits of the residency reserve. sanders had partly cleared and wholly drained four square miles of the little peninsula on which the residency stood, and by barbed wire and deep cutting had isolated the government estate from the wild forest land to the north. here, the river shoals in the centre, cutting a passage to the sea through two almost unfathomable channels close to the eastern and western banks. bones had locked away his journal and was standing on the bridge rehearsing the narrative which was to impress his superiors with a sense of his resourcefulness--and incidentally present himself in the most favourable light to the new factor which was coming into his daily life. he had thought of hamilton's sister at odd intervals and now.... the _zaire_ was hugging the western bank so closely that a bold and agile person might have stepped ashore. m'lama, the witch, was both bold and agile. he turned with open mouth to see something white and feminine leap the space between deck and shore, two heliotrope ribbons streaming wildly in such breeze as there was. "hi! don't do that ... naughty, naughty!" yelled the agonized bones, but she had disappeared into the undergrowth before the big paddle-wheel of the _zaire_ began to thresh madly astern. never was the resourcefulness of bones more strikingly exemplified. an ordinary man would have leapt overboard in pursuit, but bones was no ordinary man. he remembered in that moment of crisis, the distressing propensity of his prisoner to the "eradication of garments." with one stride he was in his cabin and had snatched a counterpane from his bed, in two bounds he was over the rail on the bank and running swiftly in the direction the fugitive had taken. for a little time he did not see her, then he glimpsed the white of a pique dress, and with a yell of admonition started in pursuit. she stood hesitating a moment, then fled, but he was on her before she had gone a dozen yards; the counterpane was flung over her head, and though she kicked and struggled and indulged in muffled squeaks, he lifted her up in his arms and staggered back to the boat. they ran out a gangway plank and across this he passed with his burden, declining all offers of assistance. "close the window," he gasped; "open the door--now, you naughty old lady!" he bundled her in, counterpane enmeshed and reduced to helpless silence, slammed the door and leant panting against the cabin, mopping his brow. "phew!" said bones, and repeated the inelegant remark many times. all this happened almost within sight of the quay on which sanders and hamilton were waiting. it was a very important young man who saluted them. "all correct, sir," said bones, stiff as a ramrod; "no casualties--except as per my nose which will be noted in the margin of my report--one female prisoner secured after heroic chase, which, i trust, sir, you will duly report to my jolly old superiors----" "don't gas so much, bones," said hamilton. "come along and meet my sister--hullo, what the devil's that?" they turned with one accord to the forest path. two native policemen were coming towards them, and between them a bedraggled m'lama, her skirt all awry, her fine hat at a rakish angle, stepped defiantly. "heavens!" said bones, "she's got away again.... that's my prisoner, dear old officer!" hamilton frowned. "i hope she hasn't frightened pat ... she was walking in the reservation." bones did not faint, his knees went from under him, but he recovered by clutching the arm of his faithful ali. "dear old friend," he murmured brokenly, "accidents ... error of judgment ... the greatest tragedy of my life...." "what's the matter with you?" demanded sanders in alarm, for the face of bones was ghastly. lieutenant tibbetts made no reply, but walked with unsteady steps to the lock-up, fumbled with the key and opened the door. there stepped forth a dishevelled and wrathful girl (she was a little scared, too, i suspect), the most radiant and lovely figure that had ever dawned upon the horizon of bones. she looked from her staggered brother to sanders, from sanders to her miserable custodian. "what on earth----" began hamilton. then her lips twitched and she fell into a fit of uncontrollable laughter. "if," said bones huskily, "if in an excess of zeal i mistook... in the gloamin', madame ... white dress...." he spread out his arms in a gesture of extravagant despair. "i can do no more than a gentleman.... i have a loaded revolver in my cabin ... farewell!" he bowed deeply to the girl, saluted his dumbfounded chief, tripped up over a bucket and would have fallen but for hamilton's hand. "you're an ass," said hamilton, struggling to preserve his sense of annoyance. "pat--this is lieutenant tibbetts, of whom i have often written." the girl looked at bones, her eyes moist with laughter. "i guessed it from the first," she said, and bones writhed. chapter ii bones changes his religion captain hamilton of the king's houssas had two responsibilities in life, a sister and a subaltern. the sister's name was patricia agatha, the subaltern had been born tibbetts, christened augustus, and named by hamilton in his arbitrary way, "bones." whilst sister and subaltern were separated from one another by some three thousand miles of ocean--as far, in fact, as the coast is from bradlesham thorpe in the county of hampshire--captain hamilton bore his responsibilities without displaying a sense of the burden. when patricia hamilton decided on paying a visit to her brother she did so with his heartiest approval, for he did not realize that in bringing his two responsibilities face to face he was not only laying the foundation of serious trouble, but was actually engaged in erecting the fabric. pat hamilton had come and had been boisterously welcomed by her brother one white-hot morning, houssas in undress uniform lining the beach and gazing solemnly upon militini's riotous joy. mr. commissioner sanders, c.m.g., had given her a more formal welcome, for he was a little scared of women. bones, as we know, had not been present--which was unfortunate in more ways than one. it made matters no easier for the wretched bones that miss hamilton was an exceedingly lovely lady. men who live for a long time in native lands and see little save beautiful figures displayed without art and with very little adornment, are apt to regard any white woman with regular features as pretty, when the vision comes to them after a long interval spent amidst native people. but it needed neither contrast nor comparison to induce an admiration for captain hamilton's sister. she was of a certain celtic type, above the medium height, with the freedom of carriage and gait which is the peculiar possession of her country-women. her face was a true oval, and her complexion of that kind which tans readily but does not freckle. eyes and mouth were firm and steadfast; she was made for ready laughter, yet she was deep enough, and in eyes and mouth alike you read a tenderness beyond disguise. she had a trinity of admirers: her brother's admiration was natural and critical; sanders admired and feared; lieutenant tibbetts admired and resented. from the moment when bones strode off after the painful discovery, had slammed the door of his hut and had steadfastly declined all manner of food and sustenance, he had voluntarily cut himself off from his kind. he met hamilton on parade the following morning, hollow-eyed (as he hoped) after a sleepless night, and there was nothing in his attitude suggestive of the deepest respect and the profoundest regard for that paragraph of king's regulations which imposes upon the junior officer a becoming attitude of humility in the presence of his superior officer. "how is your head, bones?" asked hamilton, after the parade had been dismissed. "thank you, sir," said bones bitterly--though why he should be bitter at the kindly inquiry only he knew--"thank you, sir, it is about the same. my temperature is--or was--up to one hundred and four, and i have been delirious. i wouldn't like to say, dear old--sir, that i'm not nearly delirious now." "come up to tiffin," invited hamilton. bones saluted--a sure preliminary to a dramatic oration. "sir," he said firmly, "you've always been a jolly old officer to me before this contretemps wrecked my young life--but i shall never be quite the same man again, sir." "don't be an ass," begged hamilton. "revile me, sir," said bones dismally; "give me a dangerous mission, one of those jolly old adventures where a feller takes his life in one hand, his revolver in the other, but don't ask me----" "my sister wants to see you," said hamilton, cutting short the flow of eloquence. "ha, ha!" laughed bones hollowly, and strode into his hut. "and what i'm going to do with him, heaven knows," groaned hamilton at tiffin. "the fact is, pat, your arrival on the scene has thoroughly demoralized him." the girl folded her serviette and walked to the window, and stood looking out over the yellow stretch of the deserted parade-ground. "i'm going to call on bones," she said suddenly. "poor bones!" murmured sanders. "that's very rude!" she took down her solar helmet from the peg behind the door and adjusted it carefully. then she stepped through the open door, whistling cheerfully. "i hope you don't mind, sir," apologized hamilton, "but we've never succeeded in stopping her habit of whistling." sanders laughed. "it would be strange if she didn't whistle," he said cryptically. bones was lying on his back, his hands behind his head. a half-emptied tin of biscuits, no less than the remnants of a box of chocolates, indicated that anchorite as he was determined to be, his austerity did not run in the direction of starvation. his mind was greatly occupied by a cinematograph procession of melancholy pictures. perhaps he would go away, far, far, into the interior. even into the territory of the great king where a man's life is worth about five cents net. and as day by day passed and no news came of him--as how could it when his habitation was marked by a cairn of stones?--she would grow anxious and unhappy. and presently messengers would come bringing her a few poor trinkets he had bequeathed to her--a wrist-watch, a broken sword, a silver cigarette-case dented with the arrow that slew him--and she would weep silently in the loneliness of her room. and perhaps he would find strength to send a few scrawled words asking for her pardon, and the tears would well up in her beautiful grey eyes--as they were already welling in bones's eyes at the picture he drew--and she would know--all. "phweet!" or else, maybe he would be stricken down with fever, and she would want to come and nurse him, but he would refuse. "tell her," he would say weakly, but oh, so bravely, "tell her ... i ask only ... her pardon." "phweet!" bones heard the second whistle. it came from the open window immediately above his head. a song bird was a rare visitor to these parts, but he was too lazy and too absorbed to look up. perhaps (he resumed) she would never see him again, never know the deep sense of injustice.... "phwee--et!" it was clearer and more emphatic, and he half turned his head to look---- he was on his feet in a second, his hand raised to his damp forehead, for leaning on the window sill, her lips pursed for yet another whistle, was the lady of his thoughts. she met his eyes sternly. "come outside--misery!" she said, and bones gasped and obeyed. "what do you mean," she demanded, "by sulking in your wretched little hut when you ought to be crawling about on your hands and knees begging my pardon?" bones said nothing. "bones," said this outrageous girl, shaking her head reprovingly, "you want a jolly good slapping!" bones extended his bony wrist. "slap!" he said defiantly. he had hardly issued the challenge when a very firm young palm, driven by an arm toughened by a long acquaintance with the royal and ancient game, came "smack!" and bones winced. "play the game, dear old miss hamilton," he said, rubbing his wrist. "play the game yourself, dear old bones," she mimicked him. "you ought to be ashamed of yourself----" "let bygones be bygones, jolly old miss hamilton," begged bones magnanimously. "and now that i see you're a sport, put it there, if it weighs a ton." and he held out his nobbly hand and caught the girl's in a grip that made her grimace. five minutes later he was walking her round the married quarters of his houssas, telling her the story of his earliest love affair. she was an excellent listener, and seldom interrupted him save to ask if there was any insanity in his family, or whether the girl was short-sighted; in fact, as bones afterwards said, it might have been hamilton himself. "what on earth are they finding to talk about?" wondered sanders, watching the confidences from the depths of a big cane chair on the verandah. "bones," replied hamilton lazily, "is telling her the story of his life and how he saved the territories from rebellion. he's also begging her not to breathe a word of this to me for fear of hurting my feelings." at that precise moment bones was winding up a most immodest recital of his accomplishments with a less immodest footnote. "of course, dear old miss hamilton," he was saying, lowering his voice, "i shouldn't like a word of this to come to your jolly old brother's ears. he's an awfully good sort, but naturally in competition with an agile mind like mine, understanding the native as i do, he hasn't an earthly----" "why don't you write the story of your adventures?" she asked innocently. "it would sell like hot cakes." bones choked with gratification. "precisely my idea--oh, what a mind you've got! what a pity it doesn't run in the family! i'll tell you a precious secret--not a word to anybody--honest?" "honest," she affirmed. bones looked round. "it's practically ready for the publisher," he whispered, and stepped back to observe the effect of his words. she shook her head in admiration, her eyes were dancing with delight, and bones realized that here at last he had met a kindred soul. "it must be awfully interesting to write books," she sighed. "i've tried--but i can never invent anything." "of course, in my case----" corrected bones. "i suppose you just sit down with a pen in your hand and imagine all sorts of things," she mused, directing her feet to the residency. "this is the story of my life," explained bones earnestly. "not fiction ... but all sorts of adventures that actually happened." "to whom?" she asked. "to me," claimed bones, louder than was necessary. "oh!" she said. "don't start 'oh-ing,'" said bones in a huff. "if you and i are going to be good friends, dear old miss hamilton, don't say 'oh!'" "don't be a bully, bones." she turned on him so fiercely that he shrank back. "play the game," he said feebly; "play the game, dear old sister!" she led him captive to the stoep and deposited him in the easiest chair she could find. from that day he ceased to be anything but a slave, except on one point. the question of missions came up at tiffin, and miss hamilton revealed the fact that she favoured the high church and held definite views on the clergy. bones confessed that he was a wesleyan. "do you mean to tell me that you're a nonconformist?" she asked incredulously. "that's my dinky little religion, dear old miss hamilton," said bones. "i'd have gone into the church only i hadn't enough--enough----" "brains?" suggested hamilton. "call is the word," said bones. "i wasn't called--or if i was i was out--haw-haw! that's a rippin' little bit of persiflage, miss hamilton?" "be serious, bones," said the girl; "you mustn't joke about things." she put him through a cross-examination to discover the extent of his convictions. in self-defence bones, with only the haziest idea of the doctrine he defended, summarily dismissed certain of miss hamilton's most precious beliefs. "but, bones," she persisted, "if i asked you to change----" bones shook his head. "dear old friend," he said solemnly, "there are two things i'll never do--alter the faith of my distant but happy youth, or listen to one disparagin' word about the jolliest old sister that ever----" "that will do, bones," she said, with dignity. "i can see that you don't like me as i thought you did--what do you think, mr. sanders?" sanders smiled. "i can hardly judge--you see," he added apologetically, "i'm a wesleyan too." "oh!" said patricia, and fled in confusion. bones rose in silence, crossed to his chief and held out his hand. "brother," he said brokenly. "what the devil are you doing?" snarled sanders. "spoken like a true christian, dear old excellency and sir," murmured bones. "we'll bring her back to the fold." he stepped nimbly to the door, and the serviette ring that sanders threw with unerring aim caught his angular shoulder as he vanished. that same night sanders had joyful news to impart. he came into the residency to find bones engaged in mastering the art of embroidery under the girl's tuition. sanders interrupted what promised to be a most artistic execution. "who says a joy-ride to the upper waters of the isisi?" hamilton jumped up. "joy-ride?" he said, puzzled. sanders nodded. "we leave to-morrow for the lesser isisi to settle a religious palaver--bucongo of the lesser isisi is getting a little too enthusiastic a christian, and ahmet has been sending some queer reports. i've been putting off the palaver for weeks, but administration says it has no objection to my making a picnic of duty--so we'll all go." "tri-umph!" said hamilton. "bones, leave your needlework and go overhaul the stores." bones, kneeling on a chair, his elbows on the table, looked up. "as jolly old francis drake said when the spanish armada----" "to the stores, you insubordinate beggar!" commanded hamilton, and bones made a hurried exit. the accommodation of the _zaire_ was limited, but there was the launch, a light-draught boat which was seldom used except for tributary work. "i could put bones in charge of the _wiggle_," he said, "but he'd be pretty sure to smash her up. miss hamilton will have my cabin, and you and i could take the two smaller cabins." bones, to whom it was put, leapt at the suggestion, brushing aside all objections. they were answered before they were framed. as for the girl, she was beside herself with joy. "will there be any fighting?" she asked breathlessly. "shall we be attacked?" sanders shook his head smilingly. "all you have to do," said bones confidently, "is to stick to me. put your faith in old bones. when you see the battle swayin' an' it isn't certain which way it's goin', look for my jolly old banner wavin' above the stricken field." "and be sure it _is_ his banner," interrupted hamilton, "and not his large feet. now the last time we had a fight...." and he proceeded to publish and utter a scandalous libel, bones protesting incoherently the while. the expedition was on the point of starting when hamilton took his junior aside. "bones," he said, not unkindly, "i know you're a whale of a navigator, and all that sort of thing, and my sister, who has an awfully keen sense of humour, would dearly love to see you at the helm of the _wiggle_, but as the commissioner wants to make a holiday, i think it would be best if you left the steering to one of the boys." bones drew himself up stiffly. "dear old officer," he said aggrieved, "i cannot think that you wish to speak disparagingly of my intelligence----" "get that silly idea out of your head," said hamilton. "that is just what i'm trying to do." "i'm under your jolly old orders, sir," bones said with the air of an early christian martyr, "and according to paragraph of king's regulations----" "don't let us go into that," said hamilton. "i'm not giving you any commands, i'm merely making a sensible suggestion. of course, if you want to make an ass of yourself----" "i have never had the slightest inclination that way, cheery old sir," said bones, "and i'm not likely at my time of life to be influenced by my surroundings." he saluted again and made his way to the barracks. bones had a difficulty in packing his stores. in truth they had all been packed before he reached the _wiggle_, and to an unprofessional eye they were packed very well indeed, but bones had them turned out and packed _his_ way. when that was done, and it was obvious to the meanest intelligence that the _wiggle_ was in terrible danger of capsizing before she started, the stores were unshipped and rearranged under the directions of the fuming hamilton. when the third packing was completed, the general effect bore a striking resemblance to the position of the stores as bones had found them when he came to the boat. when everybody was ready to start, bones remembered that he had forgotten his log-book, and there was another wait. "have you got everything now?" asked sanders wearily, leaning over the rail. "everything, sir," said bones, with a salute to his superior, and a smile to the girl. "have you got your hot-water bottle and your hair-curlers?" demanded hamilton offensively. bones favoured him with a dignified stare, made a signal to the engineer, and the _wiggle_ started forward, as was her wont, with a jerk which put upon bones the alternative of making a most undignified sprawl or clutching a very hot smoke-stack. he chose the latter, recovered his balance with an easy grace, punctiliously saluted the tiny flag of the _zaire_ as he whizzed past her, and under the very eyes of hamilton, with all the calmness in the world, took the wheel from the steersman's hand and ran the _wiggle_ ashore. all this he did in the brief space of three minutes. "and," said hamilton, exasperated to a degree, "if you'd only broken your infernal head, the accident would have been worth it." it took half an hour for the _wiggle_ to get afloat again. she had run up the beach, and it was necessary to unload the stores, carry them back to the quay and reload her again. "_now_ are you ready?" said sanders. "ay, ay, sir," said bones, abased but nautical. * * * * * bucongo, the chief of the lesser isisi folk, had a dispute with his brother-in-law touching a certain matter which affected his honour. it affected his life eventually, since his relative was found one morning dead of a spear-thrust. this sanders discovered after the big trial which followed certain events described hereafter. the brother-in-law in his malice had sworn that bucongo held communion with devils. it is a fact that bucongo had, at an early age, been captured by catholic missionaries, and had spent an uncomfortable youth mastering certain mysterious rites and ceremonies. his brother-in-law had been in the blessed service of another missionary who taught that god lived in the river, and that to fully benefit by his ju-ju it was necessary to be immersed in the flowing stream. between the water-god men and the cross-god men there was ever a feud, each speaking disparagingly of the other, though converts to each creed had this in common, that neither understood completely the faith into which they were newly admitted. the advantage lay with the catholic converts because they were given a pewter medal with hearts and sunlike radiations engraved thereon (this medal was admittedly a cure for toothache and pains in the stomach), whilst the protestants had little beyond a mysterious something that they referred to as a'lamo--which means grace. but when taunted by their medal-flaunting rivals and challenged to produce this "grace," they were crestfallen and ashamed, being obliged to admit that a'lamo was an invisible magic which (they stoutly affirmed) was nevertheless an excellent magic, since it preserved one from drowning and cured warts and boils. bucongo, the most vigorous partisan of the cross-god men, and an innovator of ritual, found amusement in watching the baptist missionaries standing knee-deep in the river washing the souls of the converts. he had even been insolent to young ferguson, the earnest leader of the american baptist mission, and to his intense amazement had been suddenly floored with a left-hander delivered by the sometime harvard middle weight. he carried his grievance and a lump on his jaw to mr. commissioner sanders, who had arrived at the junction of the isisi and the n'gomi rivers and was holding his palaver, and sanders had been unsympathetic. "go worship your god in peace," said sanders, "and let all other men worship theirs; and say no evil word to white men for these are very quick to anger. also it is unbecoming that a black man should speak scornfully to his masters." "lord," said bucongo, "in heaven all men are as one, black or white." "in heaven," said sanders, "we will settle that palaver, but here on the river we hold our places by our merits. to-morrow i come to your village to inquire into certain practices of which the god-men know nothing--this palaver is finished." now bucongo was something more than a convert. he was a man of singular intelligence and of surprising originality. he had been a lay missioner of the church, and had made many converts to a curious religion, the ritual of which was only half revealed to the good jesuit fathers when at a great palaver which bucongo summoned to exhibit his converts, the church service was interspersed with the sacrifice of a goat and a weird procession and dance which left the representative of the order speechless. bucongo was called before a conference of the mission and reprimanded. he offered excuses, but there was sufficient evidence to prove that this enthusiastic christian had gone systematically to work, to found what amounted to a religion of his own. the position was a little delicate, and any other order than the jesuits might have hesitated to tackle a reform which meant losing a very large membership. the fate of bucongo's congregation had been decided when, in his anger, he took canoe, and travelling for half a day, came to the principal mission. father carpentier, full-bearded, red of face and brawny of arm, listened in the shade of his hut, pulling thoughtfully at a long pipe. "and so, pentini," concluded bucongo, "even sandi puts shame upon me because i am a cross-god man, and he by all accounts is of the water-god ju-ju." the father eyed this perturbed sheep of his flock thoughtfully. "o bucongo," he said gently, "in the river lands are many beasts. those which fly and which swim; those that run swiftly and that hide in the earth. now who of these is right?" "lord, they are all right but are of different ways," said bucongo. father carpentier nodded. "also in the forest are two ants--one who lives in tree nests, and one who has a home deep in the ground. they are of a kind, and have the same business. yet god put it into the little heads of one to climb trees, and of the other to burrow deeply. both are right and neither are wrong, save when the tree ant meets the ground ant and fights him. then both are wrong." the squatting bucongo rose sullenly. "master," he said, "these mysteries are too much for a poor man. i think i know a better ju-ju, and to him i go." "you have no long journey, chief," said the father sternly, "for they tell me stories of ghost dances in the forest and a certain bucongo who is the leader of these--and of a human sacrifice. also of converts who are branded with a cross of hot iron." the chief looked at his sometime tutor with face twisted and puckered with rage, and turning without a word, walked back to his canoe. the next morning father carpentier sent a messenger to sanders bearing an urgent letter, and sanders read the closely written lines with a troubled frown. he put down the letter and came out on to the deck, to find hamilton fishing over the side of the steamer. hamilton looked round. "anything wrong?" he asked quickly. "bucongo of the lesser isisi is wrong," said sanders. "i have heard of his religious meetings and have been a little worried--there will be a big ju-ju palaver or i'm very much mistaken. where is bones?" "he has taken my sister up the creek--bones says there are any number of egrets' nests there, and i believe he is right." sanders frowned again. "send a canoe to fetch him back," he said. "that is bucongo's territory, and i don't trust the devil." "which one--bones or bucongo?" asked hamilton innocently. but sanders was not feeling humorous. * * * * * at that precise moment bones was sitting before the most fantastic religious assembly that ecclesiastic or layman had ever attended. fate and bones had led the girl through a very pleasant forest glade--they left the light-draught _wiggle_ half a mile down stream owing to the shoals which barred their progress, and had come upon bucongo in an exalted moment. with the assurance that he was doing no more than intrude upon one of those meetings which the missionizing chief of the lesser isisi so frequently held, bones stood on the outer fringe of the circle which sat in silence to watch an unwilling novitiate getting acquainted with bucongo's god. the novice was a girl, and she lay before an altar of stones surmounted by a misshapen _beti_ who glared with his one eye upon the devout gathering. the novice lay rigid, for the excellent reason that she was roped foot and hands to two pegs in the ground. before the altar itself was a fire of wood in which two irons were heating. bones did not take this in for a moment, for he was gazing open-mouthed at bucongo. on his head was an indubitable mitre, but around the mitre was bound a strip of skin from which was suspended a circle of dangling monkey tails. for cope he wore a leopard's robe. his face was streaked red with camwood, and around his eyes he had painted two white circles. he was in the midst of a frenzied address when the two white visitors came upon the scene, and his hand was outstretched to take the red branding-iron when the girl at bones's side, with a little gasp of horror, broke into the circle, and wrenching the rough iron from the attendant's hand, flung it towards the circle of spectators, which widened in consequence. "how dare you--how dare you!" she demanded breathlessly, "you horrible-looking man!" bucongo glared at her but said nothing; then he turned to meet bones. in that second of time bucongo had to make a great decision, and to overcome the habits of a lifetime. training and education to the dominion of the white man half raised his hand to the salute; something that boiled and bubbled madly and set his shallow brain afire, something that was of his ancestry, wild, unreasoning, brutish, urged other action. bones had his revolver half drawn when the knobbly end of the chief's killing-spear struck him between the eyes, and he went down on his knees. thus it came about, that he found himself sitting before bucongo, his feet and hands tied with native grass, with the girl at his side in no better case. she was very frightened, but this she did not show. she had the disadvantage of being unable to understand the light flow of offensive badinage which passed between her captor and bones. "o tibbetti," said bucongo, "you see me as a god--i have finished with all white men." "soon we shall finish with you, bucongo," said bones. "i cannot die, tibbetti," said the other with easy confidence, "that is the wonderful thing." "other men have said that," said bones in the vernacular, "and their widows are wives again and have forgotten their widowhood." "this is a new ju-ju, tibbetti," said bucongo, a strange light in his eyes. "i am the greatest of all cross-god men, and it is revealed to me that many shall follow me. now you and the woman shall be the first of all white people to bear the mark of bucongo the blessed. and in the days to be you shall bare your breasts and say, 'bucongo the wonderful did this with his beautiful hands.'" bones was in a cold sweat and his mouth was dry. he scarcely dare look at the girl by his side. "what does he say?" she asked in a low voice. bones hesitated, and then haltingly he stammered the translation of the threat. she nodded. "o bucongo," said bones, with a sudden inspiration, "though you do evil, i will endure. but this you shall do and serve me. brand me alone upon the chest, and upon the back. for if we be branded separately we are bound to one another, and you see how ugly this woman is with her thin nose and her pale eyes; also she has long hair like the grass which the weaver birds use for their nests." he spoke loudly, eagerly, and it seemed convincingly, for bucongo was in doubt. truly the woman by all standards was very ugly. her face was white and her lips thin. she was a narrow woman too, he thought, like one underfed. "this you shall do for me, bucongo," urged bones; "for gods do not do evil things, and it would be bad to marry me to this ugly woman who has no hips and has an evil tongue." bucongo was undecided. "a god may do no evil," he said; "but i do not know the ways of white men. if it be true, then i will mark you twice, tibbetti, and you shall be my man for ever; and the woman i will not touch." "cheer oh!" said bones. "what are you saying--will he let us go?" asked the girl. "i was sayin' what a jolly row there'll be," lied bones; "and he was sayin' that he couldn't think of hurtin' a charmin' lady like you. shut your eyes, dear old miss hamilton." she shut them quickly, half fainting with terror, for bucongo was coming towards them, a blazing iron in his hand, a smile of simple benevolence upon his not unintelligent face. "this shall come as a blessing to you, tibbetti," he said almost jovially. bones shut his teeth and waited. the hot iron was scorching his silk shirt when a voice hailed the high-priest of the newest of cults. "o bucongo," it said. bucongo turned with a grimace of fear and cringed backward before the levelled colt of mr. commissioner sanders. "tell me now," said sanders in his even tone, "can such a man as you die? think, bucongo." "lord," said bucongo huskily, "i think i can die." "we shall see," said sanders. * * * * * it was not until after dinner that night that the girl had recovered sufficiently to discuss her exciting morning. "i think you were an awful brute," she addressed her unabashed brother. "you were standing in the wood listening to and seeing everything, and never came till the last minute." "it was my fault," interrupted sanders. "i wanted to see how far the gentle bucongo would go." "dooced thoughtless," murmured bones under his breath, but audible. she looked at him long and earnestly then turned again to her brother. "there is one thing i want to know," she said. "what was bones saying when he talked to that horrible man? do you know that bones was scowling at me as though i was ... i hardly know how to express it. was he saying nice things?" hamilton looked up at the awning, and cleared his throat. "play the game, dear old sir and brother-officer," croaked bones. "he said----" began hamilton. "live an' let live," pleaded bones, all of a twitter. "_esprit de corps_ an' discretion, jolly old captain." hamilton looked at his subordinate steadily. "he asked to be branded twice in order that you might not be branded once," he said quietly. the girl stared at bones, and her eyes were full of tears. "oh, bones!" she said, with a little catch in her voice, "you ... you are a sportsman." "carry on," said bones incoherently, and wept a little at the realization of that magnificent moment. chapter iii the maker of storms everybody knows that water drawn from rivers is very bad water, for the rivers are the roads of the dead, and in the middle of those nights when the merest rind of a moon shows, and this slither of light and two watchful stars form a triangle pointing to the earth, the spirits rise from their graves and walk, "singing deadly songs," towards the lower star which is the source of all rivers. if you should be--which god forbid--on one of those lonely island graveyards on such nights you will see strange sights. the broken cooking-pots which rest on the mounds and the rent linen which flutters from little sticks stuck about the graves, grow whole and new again. the pots are red and hot as they come from the fire, and the pitiful cloths take on the sheen of youth and fold themselves about invisible forms. none may see the dead, though it is said that you may see the babies. these the wise men have watched playing at the water's edge, crowing and chuckling in the universal language of their kind, staggering groggily along the shelving beach with outspread arms balancing their uncertain steps. on such nights when m'sa beckons the dead world to the source of all rivers, the middle islands are crowded with babies--the dead babies of a thousand years. their spirits come up from the unfathomed deeps of the great river and call their mortality from graves. "how may the waters of the river be acceptable?" asks the shuddering n'gombi mother. therefore the n'gombi gather their water from the skies in strange cisterns of wicker, lined with the leaf of a certain plant which is impervious, and even carry their drinking supplies with them when they visit the river itself. there was a certain month in the year, which will be remembered by all who attempted the crossing of the kasai forest to the south of the n'gombi country, when pools and rivulets suddenly dried--so suddenly, indeed, that even the crocodiles, who have an instinct for coming drought, were left high and dry, in some cases miles from the nearest water, and when the sun rose in a sky unflecked by cloud and gave place at nights to a sky so brilliant and so menacing in their fierce and fiery nearness that men went mad. toward the end of this month, when an exasperating full moon advertised a continuance of the dry spell by its very whiteness, the chief koosoogolaba-muchini, or, as he was called, muchini, summoned a council of his elder men, and they came with parched throats and fear of death. "all men know," said muchini, "what sorrow has come to us, for there is a more powerful ju-ju in the land than i remember. he has made m'shimba m'shamba afraid so that he has gone away and walks no more in the forest with his terrible lightning. also k'li, the father of pools, has gone into the earth and all his little children, and i think we shall die, every one of us." there was a skinny old man, with a frame like a dried goatskin, who made a snuffling noise when he spoke. "o muchini," he said, "when i was a young man there was a way to bring m'shimba m'shamba which was most wonderful. in those days we took a young maiden and hung her upon a tree----" "those old ways were good," interrupted muchini; "but i tell you, m'bonia, that we can follow no more the old ways since sandi came to the land, for he is a cruel man and hanged my own mother's brother for that fine way of yours. yet we cannot sit and die because of certain magic which the stone breaker is practising." now bula matadi ("the stone breaker") was in those days the mortal enemy of the n'gombi people, who were wont to ascribe all their misfortunes to his machinations. to bula matadi (which was the generic name by which the government of the congo free state was known) was traceable the malign perversity of game, the blight of crops, the depredations of weaver birds. bula matadi encouraged leopards to attack isolated travellers, and would on great occasions change the seasons of the year that the n'gombi's gardens might come to ruin. "it is known from one end of the earth to the other that i am a most cunning man," muchini went on, stroking his muscular arm, a trick of self-satisfied men in their moments of complacence; "and whilst even the old men slept, i, koosoogolaba-muchini, the son of the terrible and crafty g'sombo, the brother of eleni-n'gombi, i went abroad with my wise men and my spies and sought out devils and ghosts in places where even the bravest have never been," he lowered his voice to a hoarse whisper, "to the ewa-ewa mongo, the very place of death." the gasp of horror from his audience was very satisfying to this little chief of the inner n'gombi, and here was a moment suitable for his climax. "and behold!" he cried. by his side was something covered with a piece of native cloth. this covering he removed with a flourish and revealed a small yellow box. it was most certainly no native manufacture, for its angles were clamped with neat brass corner-pieces set flush in the polished wood. the squatting councillors watched their lord as with easy familiarity he opened the lid. there were twenty tiny compartments, and in each was a slender glass tube, corked and heavily sealed, whilst about the neck of each tube was a small white label covered with certain devil marks. muchini waited until the sensation he had prepared had had its full effect. "by the great river which runs to the allamdani,"[ ] he said slowly and impressively, "were white men who had been sent by bula matadi to catch ghosts. for i saw them, i and my wise men, when the moon was calling all spirits. they were gathered by the river with little nets and little gourds and they caught the waters. also they caught little flies and other foolish things and took them to their tent. then my young men and i waited, and when all were gone away we went to their tents and found his magic box--which is full of devils of great power--ro!" [footnote : this was evidently the sanga river.] he leapt to his feet, his eye gleaming. across the starry dome of the sky there had flicked a quick flare of light. there came a sudden uneasy stirring of leaves, a hushed whisper of things as though the forest had been suddenly awakened from sleep. then an icy cold breeze smote his cheek, and staring upward, he saw the western stars disappearing in swathes behind the tumbling clouds. "m'shimba m'shamba--he lives!" he roared, and the crash of thunder in the forest answered him. bosambo, chief of the ochori, was on the furthermost edge of the forest, for he was following the impulse of his simple nature and was hunting in a country where he had no right to be. the storm (which he cursed, having no scruples about river and water, and being wholly sceptical as to ghosts) broke with all its fury over his camp and passed. two nights later, he sat before the rough hut his men had built, discussing the strange ways of the antelope, when he suddenly stopped and listened, lowering his head till it almost touched the ground. clear to his keen ears came the rattle of the distant lokali--the drum that sends messages from village to village and from nation to nation. "o secundi," said bosambo, with a note of seriousness in his voice, "i have not heard that call for many moons--for it is the war call of the n'gombi." "lord, it is no war call," said the old man, shifting his feet for greater comfort, "yet it is a call which may mean war, for it calls spears to a dance, and it is strange, for the n'gombi have no enemies." "all men are the enemies of the n'gombi," bosambo quoted a river saying as old as the sun. he listened again, then rose. "you shall go back and gather me a village of spears, and bring them to the borderland near the road that crosses the river," he said. "on my life," said the other. muchini, chief of the inner n'gombi, a most inflated man and a familiar of magical spirits, gathered his spears to some purpose, for two days later bosambo met him by his border and the chiefs greeted one another between two small armies. "which way do you go, muchini?" asked bosambo. now, between muchini and the chief of the ochori was a grievance dating back to the big war, when bosambo had slain the n'gombi chief of the time with his own hands. "i go to the river to call a palaver of all free men," said muchini; "for i tell you this, bosambo, that i have found a great magic which will make us greater than sandi, and it has been prophesied that i shall be a king over a thousand times a thousand spears. for i have a small box which brings even m'shimba to my call." bosambo, a head and shoulders taller than the other, waved his hand towards the forest path which leads eventually to the ochori city. "here is a fine moment for you, muchini," he said, "and you shall try your great magic on me and upon my young men. for i say that you do not go by this way, neither you nor your warriors, since i am the servant of sandi and of his king, and he has sent me here to keep his peace; go back to your village, for this is the way to death." muchini glared at his enemy. "yet this way i go, bosambo," he said huskily, and looked over his shoulder towards his followers. bosambo swung round on one heel, an arm and a leg outstretched in the attitude of an athlete who is putting the shot. muchini threw up his wicker shield and pulled back his stabbing-spear, but he was a dead man before the weapon was poised. thus ended the war, and the n'gombi folk went home, never so much as striking a blow for the yellow box which bosambo claimed for himself as his own personal loot. at the time, mr. commissioner sanders, c.m.g., was blissfully ignorant of the miraculous happenings which have been recorded. he was wholly preoccupied by the novelty which the presence of patricia hamilton offered. never before had a white woman made her home at the residency, and it changed things a little. she was at times an embarrassment. when fubini, the witch-doctor of the akasava, despatched five maidens to change sandi's wicked heart--sanders had sent fubini to the village of irons for six months for preaching unauthorized magic--they came, in the language of bones, "doocedly undressed," and patricia had beaten a hurried retreat. she was sometimes an anxiety, as i have already shown, but was never a nuisance. she brought to headquarters an aroma of english spring, a clean fragrance that refreshed the heat-jaded commissioner and her brother, but which had no perceptible influence upon bones. that young officer called for her one hot morning, and hamilton, sprawling on a big cane chair drawn to the shadiest and breeziest end of the verandah, observed that bones carried a wooden box, a drawing-board, a pad of paper, two pencils imperfectly concealed behind his large ear, and a water-bottle. "shop!" said hamilton lazily. "forward, mr. bones--what can we do for you this morning?" bones shaded his eyes and peered into the cool corner. "talkin' in your sleep, dear old commander," he said pleasantly, "dreamin' of the dear old days beyond recall." he struck an attitude and lifted his unmusical voice-- "when life was gay, heigho! tum tum te tay, heigho! oh, tiddly umpty humpty umty do, when life was gay--dear old officer--heigho!" patricia hamilton stepped out to the verandah in alarm. "oh, please, don't make that hooting noise," she appealed to her brother. "i'm writing----" "don't be afraid," said hamilton, "it was only bones singing. do it again, bones, pat didn't hear you." bones stood erect, his hand to his white helmet. "come aboard, my lady," he said. "i won't keep you a minute, bones," said the girl, and disappeared into the house. "what are you doing this morning?" asked hamilton, gazing with pardonable curiosity at the box and drawing-board. "polishin' up my military studies with miss hamilton's kind assistance--botany and applied science, sir," said bones briskly. "field fortifications, judgin' distance, strategy, bomongo grammar, field cookery an' tropical medicines." "what has poor little making-up-company-accounts done?" asked hamilton, and bones blushed. "dear old officer," he begged, "i'll tackle that little job as soon as i get back. i tried to do 'em this mornin' an was four dollars out--it's the regimental cash account that's wrong. people come in and out helpin' themselves, and i positively can't keep track of the money." "as i'm the only person with the key of the regimental cash-box, i suppose you mean----?" bones raised his hand. "i make no accusations, dear old feller--it's a painful subject. we all have those jolly old moments of temptation. i tackle the accounts to-night, sir. you mustn't forget that i've a temperament. i'm not like you dear old wooden-heads----" "oh, shut up," said the weary hamilton. "so long as you're going to do a bit of study, it's all right." "now, bones," said patricia, appearing on the scene, "have you got the sandwiches?" bones made terrifying and warning grimaces. "have you got the board to lay the cloth and the paper to cover it, and the chocolates and the cold tea?" bones frowned, and jerked his head in an agony of warning. "come on, then," said the unconscious betrayer of lieutenant tibbetts. "good-bye, dear." "why 'good-bye,' dear old hamilton's sister?" asked bones. she looked at him scornfully and led the way. "don't forget the field fortifications," called hamilton after them; "they eat nicely between slices of strategy." the sun was casting long shadows eastward when they returned. they had not far to come, for the place they had chosen for their picnic was well within the residency reservation, but bones had been describing on his way back one of the remarkable powers he possessed, namely, his ability to drag the truth from reluctant and culpable natives. and every time he desired to emphasize the point he would stop, lower all his impedimenta to the ground, cluttering up the landscape with picnic-box, drawing-board, sketching-blocks and the numerous bunches of wild flowers he had culled at her request, and press his argument with much palm-punching. he stopped for the last time on the very edge of the barrack square, put down his cargo and proceeded to demolish the doubt she had unwarily expressed. "that's where you've got an altogether erroneous view of me, dear old sister," he said triumphantly. "i'm known up an' down the river as the one man that you can't deceive. go up and ask the bomongo, drop in on the isisi, speak to the akasava, an' what will they say? they'll say, 'no, ma'am, there's no flies on jolly old bones--not on your life, harriet!'" "then they would be very impertinent," smiled pat. "ask sanders (god bless him!). ask ham. ask----" he was going on enthusiastically. "are you going to camp here, or are you coming in?" she challenged. bones gathered up his belongings, never ceasing to talk. "fellers like me, dear young friend, make the empire--paint the whole bally thing red, white an' blue--'unhonoured an' unsung, until the curtain's rung, the boys that made the empire and the navy.'" "bones, you promised you wouldn't sing," she said reproachfully; "and, besides, you're not in the navy." "that doesn't affect the argument," protested bones, and was rapidly shedding his equipment in preparation for another discourse, when she walked on towards sanders who had come across the square to meet them. bones made a dive at the articles he had dropped, and came prancing (no other word describes his erratic run) up to sanders. "i've just been telling miss hamilton, sir and excellency, that nobody can find things that old bones--you'll remember, sir, the episode of your lost pyjama legs. who found 'em?" "you did," said sanders; "they were sent home in your washing. talking about finding things, read this." he handed a telegraph form to the young man, and bones, peering into the message until his nose almost touched the paper, read-- "very urgent. clear the line. administration. "to sanders, commission river territories. message begins. belgian congo government reports from leopoldville, bacteriological expedition carriers raided on edge of your territory by inner n'gombi people, all stores looted including case of culture tubes. stop. as all these cultures are of virulent diseases, inoculate inner n'gombi until intact tubes recovered. message ends." bones read it twice, and his face took on an appearance which indicated something between great pain and intense vacancy. it was intended to convey to the observer the fact that bones was thinking deeply and rapidly, and that he had banished from his mind all the frivolities of life. "i understand, sir--you wish me to go to the dear old congo government and apologize--i shall be ready in ten minutes." "what i really want you to do," said sanders patiently, "is to take the _wiggle_ up stream and get that box." "i quite understand, sir," said bones, nodding his head. "to-day is the th, to-morrow is the th--the box shall be in your hands on the th by half-past seven in the evening, dear old sir." he saluted and turned a baleful glare upon the girl, the import of which she was to learn at first hand. "duty, miss patricia hamilton! forgive poor old bones if he suddenly drops the mask of _dolce far niente_--i go!" he saluted again and went marching stiffly to his quarters, with all the dignity which an empty lunch-box and a dangling water-bottle would allow him. the next morning bones went forth importantly for the ochori city, being entrusted with the task of holding, so to speak, the right flank of the n'gombi country. "you will use your discretion," sanders said at parting, "and, of course, you must keep your eyes open; if you hear the merest hint that the box is in your neighbourhood, get it." "i think, your excellency," said bones, with heavy carelessness, "that i have fulfilled missions quite as delicate as this, and as for observation, why, the gift runs in my family." "and runs so fast that you've never caught up with it," growled hamilton. bones turned haughtily and saluted. it was a salute full of subdued offence. he went joyously to the northward, evolving cunning plans. he stopped at every village to make inquiries and to put the unoffending villagers to considerable trouble--for he insisted upon a house-to-house search--before, somewhat wearied by his own zeal, he came to the ochori. chief bosambo heard of his coming and summoned his councillors. "truly has sandi a hundred ears," he said in dismay, "for it seems that he has heard of the slaying of muchini. now, all men who are true to me will swear to the lord tibbetti that we know nothing of a killing palaver, and that we have not been beyond the trees to the land side of the city. this you will all say because you love me; and if any man says another thing i will beat him until he is sick." bones came and was greeted by the chief--and bosambo was carried to the beach on a litter. "lord," said bosambo weakly, "now the sight of your simple face will make me a well man again. for, lord, i have not left my bed since the coming of the rains, and there is strength neither in my hands and feet." "poor old bird," said bones sympathetically, "you've been sittin' in a draught." "this i tell you, tibbetti," bosambo went on, as yet uncertain of his ruler's attitude, since bones must need, at this critical moment, employ english and idiomatic english, "that since the last moon was young i have lain in my hut never moving, seeing nothing and hearing nothing, being like a dead man--all this my headman will testify." bones's face dropped, for he had hoped to secure information here. bosambo, watching his face through half-closed lids, saw the dismal droop of the other's mouth, and came to the conclusion that whatever might be the cause of the visit, it was not to hold the ochori or their chief to account for known misdeeds. "o bosambo," said bones, in the river dialect, "this is sad news, for i desire that you shall tell me certain things for which sandi would have given you salt and rods." the chief of the ochori sat up in his litter and went so far as to put one foot to the ground. "lord," said he heartily, "the sound of your lovely voice brings me from the grave and gives me strength. ask, o bonesi, for you are my father and my mother; and though i saw and heard nothing, yet in my sickness i had wonderful visions and all things were made visible--that i declare to you, bonesi, before all men." "don't call me 'bonesi,'" said bones fiercely. "you're a jolly cheeky feller, bosambo--you're very, very naughty, indeed!" "master," said bosambo humbly, "though i rule these ochori i am a foreigner in this land; in the tongue of my own people, bonesi means 'he-who-is-noble-in-face-and-a-giver-of-justice.'" "that's better," nodded the gratified bones, and went on speaking in the dialect. "you shall help me in this--it touches the people of the inner n'gombi----" bosambo fell back wearily on to the litter, and rolled his eyes as one in pain. "this is a sorrow for me, bo--tibbetti," he said faintly, "but i am a sick man." "also," continued bones, "of a certain box of wood, full of poisons----" as well as he could bones explained the peculiar properties of germ culture. "oh, ko!" said bosambo, closing his eyes, and was to all appearances beyond human aid. * * * * * "lord," said bosambo, at parting, "you have brought me to life, and every man of every tribe shall know that you are a great healer. to all the far and quiet places of the forest i will send my young men who will cry you aloud as a most wonderful doctor." "not at all," murmured bones modestly, "not at all." "master," said bosambo, this time in english, for he was not to be outdone in the matter of languages, for had he not attended a great mission school in monrovia? "master, you dam' fine feller, you look 'um better feller, you no find um. you be same like moses and judi escariot, big fine feller, by golly--yas." all night long, between the visits which bones had been making from the moored _wiggle_ to the village (feeling the patient's pulse with a profound and professional air and prescribing brandy and milk), bosambo had been busy. "stand you at the door, secundi," he said to his headman, "and let one of your men go to the shore to warn me of my lord tibbetti's coming, for i have work to do. it seems this maker of storms were better with sandi than with me." "tibbetti is a fool, i think," suggested secundi. bosambo, kneeling on a rush mat, busy with a native chisel and a pot of clay paint, looked up. "i have beaten older men than you with a stick until they have wept," he said, "and all for less than you say. for this is the truth, secundi, that a child cannot be a fool, though an old man may be a shame. this is the word of the blessed prophet. as for tibbetti, he has a clean and loving heart." there was a rustle at the door and a whispered voice. the box and the tools were thrust under a skin rug and bosambo again became the interesting invalid. in the morning bosambo had said farewell, and a blushing bones listened with unconcealed pleasure to the extravagant praise of his patient. "and this i tell you, tibbetti," said bosambo, standing thigh-deep in the river by the launch's side, "that knowing you are wise man who gathers wisdom, i have sent to the end of my country for some rare and beautiful thing that you may carry it with you." he signalled to a man on the bank, and his servant brought him a curious object. it was, bones noted, a square box apparently of native make, for it was fantastically carved and painted. there were crude heads and hideous forms which never were on land or sea. the paint was brilliant; red, yellow and green indiscriminately splashed. "this is very ancient and was brought to my country by certain forest people. it is a maker of storms, and is a powerful ju-ju for good and evil." bones, already a collector of native work, was delighted. his delight soothed him for his failure in other respects. he returned to headquarters empty-handed and sat the centre of a chilling group--if we except patricia hamilton--and endeavoured, as so many successful advocates have done, to hide his short-comings behind a screen of rhetoric. he came to the part of his narrative where bosambo was taken ill without creating any notable sensation, save that sanders's grey eyes narrowed a little and he paid greater heed to the rest of the story. "there was poor old bosambo knocked out, sir--ab-so-lutely done for--fortunately i did not lose my nerve. you know what i am, dear old officer, in moments of crisis?" "i know," said hamilton grimly, "something between a welsh revivalist and a dancing dervish." "please go on, bones," begged the girl, not the least interested of the audience. "i dashed straight back to the _wiggle_," said bones breathlessly, "searched for my medicine chest--it wasn't there! not so much as a mustard plaster--what was i to do, dear old miss hamilton?" he appealed dramatically. "don't tell him, pat," begged hamilton, "he's sure to guess it." "what was i to do? i seized a bottle of brandy," said bones with relish, "i dashed back to where bosambo was lyin'. i dashed into the village, into his hut and got a glass----" "well, well!" said sanders impatiently, "what happened after all this dashing?" bones spread out his hands. "bosambo is alive to-day," he said simply, "praisin'--if i may be allowed to boast--the name of bones the medicine man. look here, sir." he dragged towards him along the floor of the hut a package covered with a piece of native sacking. this he whisked away and revealed the hideous handiwork of an artist who had carved and painted as true to nature as a man may who is not quite certain whether the human eye is half-way down the nose or merely an appendage to his ear. "that, sir," said bones impressively, "is one of the most interestin' specimens of native work i have ever seen: a gift! from bosambo to the jolly old doctor man who dragged him, if i might so express it, from the very maws of death." he made his dramatic pause. sanders bent down, took a penknife from his pocket and scraped the paint from a flat oblong space on the top. there for all men to see--save bones who was now engaged in a relation of his further adventure to his one sympathizer--was a brass plate, and when the paint had been scraped away, an inscription-- department du médicins, etat congo belge. sanders and hamilton gazed, fascinated and paralysed to silence. "i've always had a feelin' i'd like to be a medicine man." bones prattled on. "you see----" "one moment, bones," interrupted sanders quietly. "did you open this box by any chance?" "no, sir," said bones. "and did you see any of its contents?" "no, sir," said bones confidentially, "that's the most interestin' thing about the box. it contains magic--which, of course, honoured sir and excellency, is all rubbish." sanders took a bunch of keys from his pocket, and after a few trials opened the case and scrutinized the contents, noting the comforting fact that all the tubes were sealed. he heaved a deep sigh of thankfulness. "you didn't by chance discover anything about the missing cultures, bones?" he asked mildly. bones shook his head, shrugged his shoulders, and looked disconsolately at his chief. "you think i've been feeble, but i haven't lost hope, sir," he said, with fine resolution. "i've got a feelin' that if i were allowed to go into the forest, disguised, sir, as a sort of half-witted native chap, sir----" "disguised!" said hamilton. "good lord, what do you want a disguise for?" chapter iv bones and the wireless ko-boru, the headman of bingini, called his relations together for a solemn family conference. the lower river folk play an inconsiderable rôle in the politics of the territories, partly because they are so near to headquarters that there is no opportunity for any of those secret preparations which precede all native intrigues, great or small, and partly because the lower river people are so far removed from the turbulent elements of the upper river that they are not swayed by the cyclonic emotions of the isisi, the cold and deliberate desire for slaughter which is characteristically akasavian, or the electrical decisions of the outer n'gombi. but they had their crises. to bingini came all the notables of the district who claimed kinship with ko-boru, and they sat in a great circle about the headman's hut, alternately eyeing the old headman and their stout relative, his daughter. "all my relations shall know this," began ko-boru, after okmimi, the witch-doctor, had formally burnt away the devils and ghosts that fringe all large assemblies, "that a great shame has come to us, every one, because of yoka-m'furi. for this yoka is to sandi as a brother, and guides his little ship up and down the river, and because of this splendid position i gave him my own daughter by the first of my wives." "s'm-m!" murmured the council in agreement. "also i built him a hut and gave him a garden, where his wife might work, and he has sat at family palavers. now, i tell you that yoka-m'furi is an evil man, for he has left my daughter, and has found another wife in the upper river, and he comes no more to this village, and my daughter weeps all day. "for three seasons he has not been to this village; when the moon comes again, it will be four." he said this with proper significance, and the flat face of the melancholy girl by his side puckered and creased miserably before she opened her large mouth to wail her woe. for the man who deliberately separates himself from his wife for four seasons and does not spend twenty-four hours--"from sunrise to moonset" in her village is automatically divorced and freed from all responsibility. this is the custom of all people from the lands of the great king to the sea. "now, i have had a dream," ko-boru went on, "and in this dream it was told me that i should call you all together, and that i and the chief of my councillors and friends should go to sandi and tell him what is true." "brother and uncle," said bechimi of g'lara, "i will go with you, for once i spoke to sandi and he spoke to me, and because of his cunning memory he will recall bechimi, who picked up his little black stick, when it fell, and gave it to him." five were chosen to accompany ko-boru, and they took canoe and travelled for less than five miles to the residency. sanders was entertaining patricia hamilton with stories of native feuds, when the unexpected deputation squatted in the sun before the verandah. "o ko-boru," hailed sanders, "why do you come?" ko-boru was all for a long and impressive palaver, but recognized a certain absence of encouragement in the commissioner's tone. therefore he came straight to the point. "now, you are our father and our mother, sandi," he said, in conclusion, "and when you speak, all wonders happen. also you have very beautiful friends, militini, who speak a word and set his terrible soldiers moving like leopards towards a kill, and tibbetti, the young one who is innocent and simple. so i say to you, sandi, that if you speak one word to yoka, he will come back to my daughter, his wife." sanders stood by the rail of the stoep and looked down upon the spokesman. "i hear strange things, ko-boru," he said quietly. "they tell me stories of a woman with many lovers and an evil tongue; and once there came to me yoka with a wounded head, for this daughter of yours is very quick in her anger." "lord," said the flustered ko-boru, "such things happen even in love." "all things happen in love," said sanders, with a little smile, "and, if it is to be, yoka will return. also, if it is to be, he will not go back to the woman, and she will be free. this palaver is finished." "lord," pleaded ko-boru, "the woman will do no more angry things. let him come back from sunrise to moonset----" "this palaver is finished," repeated sanders. on their way back to bingini the relatives of ko-boru made a plot. it was the first plot that had been hatched in the shadow of headquarters for twenty years. "would it be indiscreet to ask what your visitors wanted?" asked the girl, as the crestfallen deputation was crossing the square to their canoe. "it was a marriage palaver," replied sanders, with a little grimace, "and i was being requested to restore a husband to a temperamental lady who has a passion for shying cook-pots at her husband when she is annoyed." the girl's laughing eyes were fixed upon his. "poor mr. sanders!" she said, with mock seriousness. "don't be sorry for me," smiled sanders. "i'm rather domestic, really, and i'm interested in this case because the man concerned is my steersman--the best on the river, and a capital all-round man. besides that," he went on seriously, "i regard them all as children of mine. it is right that a man who shirks his individual responsibilities to the race should find a family to 'father.'" "why do you?" she asked, after a little pause. "why do i what?" "shirk your responsibilities," she said. "this is a healthy and a delightful spot: a woman might be very happy here." there was an awkward silence. "i'm afraid i've been awfully impertinent," said patricia, hurriedly rising, "but to a woman there is a note of interrogation behind every bachelor--especially nice bachelors--and the more 'confirmed' he is, the bigger the question mark." sanders rose to her. "one of these days i shall do something rash," he threatened, with that shy laugh of his. "here is your little family coming." bones and hamilton were discussing something heatedly, and justice was on the side of lieutenant tibbetts, if one could judge by the frequency with which he stopped and gesticulated. "it really is too bad," said the annoyed hamilton, as he mounted the steps to the stoep, followed by bones, who, to do him justice, did not adopt the attitude of a delinquent, but was, on the contrary, injured virtue personified. "what is too bad, dear?" asked the girl sympathetically. "a fortnight ago," said hamilton, "i told this silly ass----" "your jolly old brother is referrin' to me, dear lady," explained bones. "who else could i be referring to?" demanded the other truculently. "i told him to have all the company accounts ready by to-morrow. you know, sir, that the paymaster is coming down from administration to check 'em, and will you believe me, sir"--he glared at bones, who immediately closed his eyes resignedly--"would you believe me that, when i went to examine those infernal accounts, they were all at sixes and sevens?" "threes an' nines, dear old officer," murmured bones, waking up, "the matter in dispute being a trifle of thirty-nine dollars, which i've generously offered to make up out of my own pocket." he beamed round as one who expected applause. "and on the top of this," fumed hamilton, "he talks of taking pat for an early morning picnic to the village island!" "accompanied by the jolly old accounts," corrected bones. "do me justice, sir and brother-officer. i offered to take the books with me, an' render a lucid and convincin' account of my stewardship." "don't make me laugh," snarled hamilton, stamping into the bungalow. "isn't he naughty?" said bones admiringly. "now, bones," warned the girl, "i shan't go unless you keep your word with alec." bones drew himself up and saluted. "dear old friend," he said proudly, "put your faith in bones." * * * * * "h.m. launch no. (territories)," as it was officially described on the stores record, had another name, which she earned in her early days through certain eccentricities of construction. though she might not in justice be called the _wiggle_ any longer, yet the _wiggle_ she was from one end of the river to the other, and even native men called her "komfuru," which means "that which does not run straight." it had come to be recognized that the _wiggle_ was the especial charge of lieutenant tibbetts. bones himself was the first to recognize this right. there were moments when he inferred that the _wiggle's_ arrival on the station at the time he was making his own first appearance was something more than a coincidence. she was not, in the strictest sense of the word, a launch, for she possessed a square, open dining saloon and two tiny cabins amidships. her internal works were open to the light of day, and her engineer lived in the engine-room up to his waist and on deck from his waist up, thus demonstrating the possibility of being in two places at once. the _wiggle_, moreover, possessed many attributes which are denied to other small steamers. she had, for example, a maxim gun on her tiny forecastle. she had a siren of unusual power and diabolical tone, she was also fitted with a big motor-horn, both of which appendages were bones's gift to his flagship. the motor-horn may seem superfluous, but when the matter is properly explained, you will understand the necessity for some less drastic method of self-advertisement than the siren. the first time the siren had been fitted bones had taken the _wiggle_ through "the channel." here the river narrows and deepens, and the current runs at anything from five to seven knots an hour. bones was going up stream, and met the bolalo mission steamer coming down. she had dipped her flag to the _wiggle's_ blue ensign, and bones had replied with two terrific blasts on his siren. after that the _wiggle_ went backwards, floating with the current all ways, from broadside on to stern first, for in those two blasts bones had exhausted the whole of his steam reserve. she was also equipped with wireless. there was an "aerial" and an apparatus which bones had imported from england at a cost of twelve pounds, and which was warranted to receive messages from two hundred miles distant. there was also a book of instructions. bones went to his hut with the book and read it. his servant found him in bed the next morning, sleeping like a child, with his hand resting lightly upon the second page. sanders and hamilton both took a hand at fixing the _wiggle's_ wireless. the only thing they were all quite certain about was that there ought to be a wire somewhere. so they stretched the aerial from the funnel to the flagstaff at the stern of the boat, and then addressed themselves to the less simple solution of "making it work." they tried it for a week, and gave it up in despair. "they've had you, bones," said hamilton. "it doesn't 'went.' poor old bones!" "your pity, dear old officer, is offensive," said bones stiffly, "an' i don't mind tellin' you that i've a queer feelin'--i can't explain what it is, except that i'm a dooce of a psychic--that that machine is goin' to be jolly useful." but though bones worked day and night, read the book of instructions from cover to cover, and took the whole apparatus to pieces, examining each part under a strong magnifying glass, he never succeeded either in transmitting or receiving a message, and the machine was repacked and stored in the spare cabin, and was never by any chance referred to, except by hamilton in his most unpleasant moments. bones took an especial delight in the _wiggle_; it was his very own ship, and he gave her his best personal attention. it was bones who ordered from london especially engraved notepaper headed "h. m. s. _komfuru_"--the native name sounded more dignified than _wiggle_, and more important than "launch ." it was bones who installed the little dynamo which--when it worked--lit the cabins and even supplied power for a miniature searchlight. it was bones who had her painted service grey, and would have added another funnel if hamilton had not detected the attempted aggrandizement. bones claimed that she was dustproof, waterproof, and torpedo-proof, and hamilton had voiced his regret that she was not also fool-proof. at five o'clock the next morning, when the world was all big hot stars and shadows, and there was no sound but the whisper of the running river and the "ha-a-a-a--ha-a-a-a" of breakers, bones came from his hut, crossed the parade-ground, and, making his way by the light of a lantern along the concrete quay--it was the width of an average table--dropped on to the deck and kicked the custodian of the _wiggle_ to wakefulness. bones's satellite was one ali abid, who was variously described as moor, egyptian, tripolitan, and bedouin, but was by all ethnological indications a half-breed kano, who had spent the greater part of his life in the service of a professor of bacteriology. this professor was something of a purist, and the association with ali abid, plus a grounding in the elementary subjects which are taught at st. joseph's mission school, cape coast castle, had given ali a gravity of demeanour and a splendour of vocabulary which many better favoured than he might have envied. "arise," quoth bones, in the cracked bass which he employed whenever he felt called upon to deliver his inaccurate versions of oriental poets-- "arise, for morning in the bowl of night has chucked a stone to put the stars to flight. and lo! and lo!... get up, ali; the caravan is moving. oh, make haste!" ("omar will never be dead so long as bones quotes him," hamilton once said; "he simply couldn't afford to be dead and leave it to bones!") ali rose, blinking and shivering, for the early morning was very cold, and he had been sleeping under an old padded dressing-gown which bones had donated. "muster all the hands," said bones, setting his lantern on the deck. "sir," said ali slowly, "the subjects are not at our disposition. your preliminary instructions presupposed that you had made necessary arrangements _re personnel_." bones scratched his head. "dash my whiskers," he said, in his annoyance, "didn't i tell you that i was taking the honourable lady for a trip? didn't i tell you, you jolly old slacker, to have everything ready by daybreak? didn't i issue explicit an' particular instructions about grub?" "sir," said ali, "you didn't." "then," said bones wrathfully, "why the dickens do i think i have?" "sir," said ali, "some subjects, when enjoying refreshing coma, possess delirium, hallucinations, highly imaginative, which dissipate when the subject recovers consciousness, but retain in brain cavity illusory reminiscences." bones thrust his face into the other's. "do you mean to tell me i dreamt it?" he hissed. "sir," said ali, "self-preservation compels complete acquiescence in your diagnosis." "you're childish," said bones. he gave a few vague instructions in the best bones manner, and stole up to the dark residency. he had solemnly promised sanders that he would rouse the girl without waking up the rest of the house. they were to go up stream to the village island, where the ironworkers of the akasava had many curious implements to show her. breakfast was to be taken on the boat, and they were to return for tiffin. overnight she had shown bones the window of her room, and hamilton had offered to make a chalk mark on the sash, so there could be no mistaking the situation of the room. "if you wake me before sunrise, i shall do something i shall be sorry for," he warned bones. "if you return without straightening the accounts, i shall do something which _you_ will be sorry for." bones remembered this as he crept stealthily along the wooden verandah. to make doubly sure, he took off his boots and dropped them with a crash. "sh!" said bones loudly. "sh, bones! not so much noise, you silly old ass!" he crept softly along the wooden wall and reconnoitred. the middle window was hamilton's room, the left was sanders's, the right was patricia's. he went carefully to the right window and knocked. there was no answer. he knocked again. still no reply. he knocked loudly. "is that you, bones?" growled sanders's voice. bones gasped. "awfully sorry, sir," he whispered agitatedly--"my mistake entirely." he tiptoed to the left window and rapped smartly. then he whistled, then he rapped again. he heard a bed creak, and turned his head modestly away. "it's bones, dear old sister," he said, in his loudest whisper. "arise, for mornin' in the bowl of light has----" hamilton's voice raged at him. "i knew it was you, you blithering----" "dear old officer," began bones, "awfully sorry! go to sleep again. night-night!" "go to the devil!" said a muffled voice. bones, however, went to the middle window; here he could make no mistake. he knocked authoritatively. "hurry up, ma'am," he said; "time is on the wing----" the sash was flung up, and again bones confronted the furious hamilton. "sir," said the exasperated bones, "how the dooce did you get here?" "don't you know this room has two windows? i told you last night, you goop! pat sleeps at the other end of the building. i told you that, too, but you've got a brain like wool!" "i am obliged to you, sir," said bones, on his dignity, "for the information. i will not detain you." hamilton groped on his dressing-table for a hair-brush. "go back to bed, sir," said bones, "an' don't forget to say your prayers." he was searching for the window in the other wing of the residency, when the girl, who had been up and dressed for a quarter of an hour, came softly behind him and tapped him on the shoulder. "wow!" screeched bones. "oh, lord, dear old sister, you gave me the dickens of a fright! well, let's get along. thank heavens, we haven't disturbed anybody." he was followed to the boat with the imprecations of two pyjamaed figures that stood on the stoep and watched his lank body melt in the darkness. "send us a wireless when you're coming back!" roared hamilton. "cad!" said bones, between his teeth. ali abid had not been idle. he had aroused yoka, the steersman, and boosoobi, the engineer, and these two men had accepted the unexpected call with the curious readiness which natives show on such occasions, and which suggests that they have pre-knowledge of the summons, and are only waiting the word. in one of the small cabins ali had arranged the much-discussed company accounts ready for his lord's attention, and there was every promise of a happy and a profitable day when yoka rang the engines "ahead," and the _wiggle_ jerked her way to midstream. the east had grown pale, there was a murmur from the dark forests on either bank, the timorous chirping or bad-tempered squawk of a bird, a faint fragrance of burning gumwood from the fishing villages established on the river bank, where, in dancing spots of light, the women were tending their fires. there is no intermediate stage on the big river between darkness and broad daylight. the stars go out all at once, and the inky sky which serves then becomes a delicate blue. the shadows melt deeper and deeper into the forest, clearly revealing the outlines of the straight-stemmed trees. there is just this interregnum of pearl greyness, a sort of hush-light, which lasts whilst a man counts twenty, before the silver lances of the sun are flashing through the leaves, and the grey veil which blurs the islands to shapeless blotches in a river of dull silver is burnt to nothingness, and the islands are living things of vivid green set in waters of gold. "the sunrise!" said bones, and waved his hand to the east with the air of one who was responsible for the miracle. the girl sat in a deep wicker chair and breathed in the glory and the freshness of the scene. across the broad river, right ahead of the boat, a flock of parroquets was flying, screeching their raucous chorus. the sun caught their brilliant plumage, and she saw, as it seemed, a rainbow in flight. "isn't that wonderful?" she whispered. bones peered up at the birds, shading his eyes. "just like a jolly old patchwork quilt," he said. "what a pity they can't talk till you teach 'em! they're awful bad eatin', too, though some fellers say they make a good curry----" "oh, look, look!" the _wiggle_ was swerving to the southern bank of the river, and two majestic flamingos standing at the water's edge had arrested the girl's attention. "_they're_ bad eatin', too," said the informative bones. "the flesh is fishy an' too fat; heron are just the same." "haven't you a soul, bones?" she asked severely. "a soul, dear ma'am?" bones asked, in astonishment. "why, that's my specialty!" it was a delightful morning for the girl, for bones had retired to his cabin at her earnest request, and was struggling with the company accounts, and she was left to enjoy the splendour of the day, to watch the iron-red waters piling up against the _wiggle's_ bows, to feel the cool breezes that swept down from the far-away mountains, and all this without being under the necessity of making conversation with bones. that gentleman had a no less profitable morning, for ali abid was a methodical and clerkly man, and unearthed the missing thirty-nine dollars in the compensation record. "thank goodness!" said bones, relieved. "you're a jolly old accountant, ali. i'd never have found it." "sir," said ali, "some subjects, by impetuous application, omit vision of intricate detail. this is due to subjects' lack of concentration." "have it your way," said bones, "but get the statement out for me to copy." he awoke the girl from a profound reverie--which centred about shy and solemn bachelors who adopted whole nations of murderous children as their own--and proceeded to "take charge." this implied the noisy issuing of orders which nobody carried out, the manipulation of a telescope, anxious glances at the heavens, deep and penetrating scrutinies of the water, and a promenade back and forward from one side of the launch to the other. bones called this "pacing the bridge," and invariably carried his telescope tucked under his arm in the process, and, as he had to step over pat's feet every time, and sometimes didn't, she arrested his nautical wanderings. "you make me dizzy," she said. "and isn't that the island?" * * * * * in the early hours of the afternoon they re-embarked, the _capita_ of the village coming to the beach to see them off. they brought back with them a collection of spear-heads, gruesome execution knives, elephant swords, and wonder-working steel figures. "and the lunch was simply lovely, bones," agreed the girl, as the _wiggle_ turned her nose homeward. "really, you can be quite clever sometimes." "dear old miss hamilton," said bones, "you saw me to-day as i really am. the mask was off, and the real bones, kindly, thoughtful, considerate, an'--if i may use the word without your foundin' any great hope upon it--tender. you saw me free from carkin' care, alert----" "go along and finish your accounts, like a good boy," she said. "i'm going to doze." doze she did, for it was a warm, dozy afternoon, and the boat was running swiftly and smoothly with the tide. bones yawned and wrote, copying ali's elaborate and accurate statement, whilst ali himself slept contentedly on the top of the cabin. even the engineer dozed at his post, and only one man was wide awake and watchful--yoka, whose hands turned the wheel mechanically, whose dark eyes never left the river ahead, with its shoals, its sandbanks, and its snags, known and unknown. two miles from headquarters, where the river broadens before it makes its sweep to the sea, there are three islands with narrow passages between. at this season only one such passage--the centre of all--is safe. this is known as "the passage of the tree," because all boats, even the _zaire_, must pass so close beneath the overhanging boughs of a great lime that the boughs brush their very funnels. fortunately, the current is never strong here, for the passage is a shallow one. yoka felt the boat slowing as he reached shoal water, and brought her nearer to the bank of the island. he had reached the great tree, when a noose dropped over him, tightened about his arms, and, before he could do more than lock the wheel, he was jerked from the boat and left swinging between bough and water. "o yoka," chuckled a voice from the bough, "between sunrise and moonset is no long time for a man to be with his wife!" * * * * * bones had finished his account, and was thinking. he thought with his head on his hands, with his eyes shut, and his mouth open, and his thought was accompanied by strange guttural noises. patricia hamilton was also thinking, but much more gracefully. boosoobi sat by his furnace door, nodding. sometimes he looked at the steam gauge, sometimes he kicked open the furnace door and chucked in a few billets of wood, but, in the main, he was listening to the soothing "chook-a-chook, chook-a-chook" of his well-oiled engines. "woo-yow!" yawned bones, stretched himself, and came blinking into the sunlight. the sun was nearly setting. "what the dooce----" said bones. he stared round. the _wiggle_ had run out from the mouth of the river and was at sea. there was no sign of land of any description. the low-lying shores of the territory had long since gone under the horizon. bones laid his hand on the shoulder of the sleeping girl, and she woke with a start. "dear old shipmate," he said, and his voice trembled, "we're alone on this jolly old ocean! lost the steersman!" she realized the seriousness of the situation in a moment. the dozing engineer, now wide awake, came aft at bones's call, and accepted the disappearance of the steersman without astonishment. "we'll have to go back," said bones, as he swung the wheel round. "i don't think i'm wrong in sayin' that the east is opposite to the west, an', if that's true, we ought to be home in time for dinner." "sar," said boosoobi, who, being a coast boy, elected to speak english, "dem wood she no lib." "hey?" gasped bones, turning pale. "dem wood she be done. i look um. i see um. i no find um." bones sat down heavily on the rail. "what does he say?" pat asked anxiously. "he says there's no more wood," said bones. "the horrid old bunkers are empty, an' we're at the mercy of the tempest." "oh, bones!" she cried, in consternation. but bones had recovered. "what about swimmin' to shore with a line?" he said. "it can't be more than ten miles!" it was ali abid who prevented the drastic step. "sir," he said, "the subject on such occasions should act with deliberate reserve. proximity of land presupposes research. the subject should assist rather than retard research by passivity of action, easy respiration, and general normality of temperature." "which means, dear old miss hamilton, that you've got to keep your wool on," explained bones. what might have happened is not to be recorded, for at that precise moment the s.s. _paretta_ came barging up over the horizon. there was still steam in the _wiggle's_ little boiler, and one log of wood to keep it at pressure. bones was incoherent, but again ali came to the rescue. "sir," he said, "for intimating sos-ness there is upon steamer or launch certain scientific apparatus, unadjusted, but susceptible to treatment." "the wireless!" spluttered bones. "good lor', the wireless!" twenty minutes later the _wiggle_ ran alongside the gangway of the s.s. _paretta_, anticipating the arrival of the _zaire_ by half an hour. the s.s. _paretta_ was at anchor when sanders brought the _zaire_ to the scene. he saw the _wiggle_ riding serenely by the side of the great ship, looking for all the world like a humming bird under the wings of an ostrich, and uttered a little prayer of thankfulness. "they're safe," he said to hamilton. "o yoka, take the _zaire_ to the other side of the big boat." "master, do we go back to-night to seek ko-boru?" asked yoka, who was bearing marks which indicated his strenuous experience, for he had fought his way clear of his captors, and had swum with the stream to headquarters. "to-morrow is also a day," quoth sanders. hamilton was first on the deck of the s.s. _paretta_, and found his sister and a debonair and complacent bones waiting for him. with them was an officer whom hamilton recognized. "company accounts all correct, sir," said bones, "audited by the jolly old paymaster"--he saluted the other officer--"an' found correct, sir, thus anticipatin' all your morose an' savage criticisms." hamilton gripped his hand and grinned. "bones was really wonderful," said the girl, "they wouldn't have seen us if it hadn't been for his idea." "saved by wireless, sir," said bones nonchalantly. "it was a mere nothin'--just a flash of inspiration." "you got the wireless to work?" asked hamilton incredulously. "no, sir," said bones. "but i wanted a little extra steam to get up to the ship, so i burnt the dashed thing. i knew it would come in handy sooner or later." chapter v the remedy beyond the far hills, which no man of the ochori passed, was a range of blue mountains, and behind this again was the l'mandi country. this adventurous hunting men of the ochori had seen, standing in a safe place on the edge of the great king's country. also n'gombi people, who are notoriously disrespectful of all ghosts save their own, had, upon a time, penetrated the northern forest to a high knoll which nature had shaped to the resemblance of a hayrick. a huntsman climbing this after his lawful quarry might gain a nearer view of the blue mountains, all streaked with silver at certain periods of the year, when a hundred streams came leaping with feathery feet from crag to crag to strengthen the forces of the upper river, or, as some said, to create through underground channels the big lakes m'soobo and t'sambi at the back of the n'gombi country. and on summer nights, when the big yellow moon came up and showed all things in her own chaste way, you might see from the knoll of the hayrick these silver ribbons all a-glitter, though the bulk of the mountain was lost to sight. the river folk saw little of the l'mandi, because l'mandi territory lies behind the country of the great king, who looked with a jealous eye upon comings and goings in his land, and severely restricted the movement and the communications of his own people. the great king followed his uncle in the government of the pleasant o'mongo lands, and he had certain advantages and privileges, the significance of which he very imperfectly interpreted. his uncle had died suddenly at the hands of mr. commissioner sanders, c.m.g., and the land itself might have passed to the protection of the crown, for there was gold in the country in large and payable quantities. that such a movement was arrested was due largely to the l'mandi and the influence they were able to exercise upon the european powers by virtue of their military qualities. downing street was all for a permanent occupation of the chief city and the institution of a conventional _régime_; but the l'mandi snarled, clicked their heels, and made jingling noises with their great swords, and there was at that moment a government in office in england which was rather impressed by heel-clicking and sword-jingling, and so the territory of the great king was left intact, and was marked on all maps as omongoland, and coloured red, as being within the sphere of british influence. on the other hand, the l'mandi people had it tinted yellow, and described it as an integral portion of the german colonial empire. there was little communication between l'mandi and sanders's territory, but that little was more than enough for the commissioner, since it took the shape of evangelical incursions carried out by missionaries who were in the happy position of not being obliged to say as much as "by your leave," since they had secured from a government which was, as i say, impressed by heel-clicking and sword-jingling, an impressive document, charging "all commissioners, sub-commissioners, magistrates, and officers commanding our native forces," to give facilities to these good christian gentlemen. there were missionaries in the territories who looked askance at their brethren, and ferguson, of the river mission, made a journey to headquarters to lay his views upon the subject before the commissioner. "these fellows aren't missionaries at all, mr. sanders; they are just political agents utilizing sacred symbols to further a political propaganda." "that is a government palaver," smiled sanders, and that was all the satisfaction ferguson received. nevertheless, sanders was watchful, for there were times when the l'mandi missioners and their friends strayed outside their sphere. once the l'mandi folk had landed in a village in the middle ochori, had flogged the headman, and made themselves free of the commodities which the people of the village had put aside for the payment of their taxation. in his wrath, bosambo, the chief, had taken ten war canoes; but sanders, who had been in the akasava on a shooting trip, was there before him, and had meted out swift justice to the evil-doers. "and let me tell you, bosambo," said sanders severely, "that you shall not bring spears except at my word." "lord," said bosambo, frankness itself, "if i disobeyed you, it was because i was too hot to think." sanders nodded. "that i know," he said. "now i tell you this, bosambo, and this is the way of very wise men--that when they go to do evil things with a hot heart, they first sleep, and in their sleep their spirits go free and talk with the wise and the dead, and when they wake, their hearts are cool, and they see all the folly of the night, and their eyes are bright for their own faults." "master," said bosambo, "you are my father and my mother, and all the people of the river you carry in your arms. now i say to you that when i go to do an evil thing i will first sleep, and i will make all my people sleep also." there are strange stories in circulation as to the manner in which bosambo carried out this novel reform. there is the story of an ochori wife-beater who, adjured by his chief, retired to slumber on his grievance, and came to his master the following morning with the information that he had not closed his eyes. whereupon bosambo clubbed him insensible, in order that sanders's plan might have a fair chance. at least, this is the story which hamilton retailed at breakfast one morning. sanders, appealed to for confirmation, admitted cautiously that he had heard the legend, but did not trouble to make an investigation. "the art of governing a native country," he said, "is the art of not asking questions." "but suppose you want to know something?" demanded patricia. "then," said sanders, with a twinkle in his eyes, "you must pretend that you know." "what is there to do to-day?" asked hamilton, rolling his serviette. he addressed himself to lieutenant tibbetts, who, to sanders's intense annoyance, invariably made elaborate notes of all the commissioner said. "nothin' until this afternoon, sir," said bones, closing his notebook briskly, "then we're doin' a little deep-sea fishin'." the girl made a grimace. "we didn't catch anything yesterday, bones," she objected. "we used the wrong kind of worm," said bones confidently. "i've found a new worm nest in the plantation. jolly little fellers they are, too." "what are we doing to-day, bones?" repeated hamilton ominously. bones puckered his brows. "deep-sea fishin', dear old officer and comrade," he repeated, "an' after dinner a little game of tiddly-winks--bones _v._ jolly old hamilton's sister, for the championship of the river an' the sanders cup." hamilton breathed deeply, but was patient. "your king and your country," he said, "pay you seven and eightpence per diem----" "oh," said bones, a light dawning, "you mean _work_?" "strange, is it not," mused hamilton, "that we should consider----hullo!" they followed the direction of his eyes. a white bird was circling groggily above the plantation, as though uncertain where to alight. there was weariness in the beat of its wings, in the irregularity of its flight. bones leapt over the rail of the verandah and ran towards the square. he slowed down as he came to a place beneath the bird, and whistled softly. bones's whistle was a thing of remarkable sweetness--it was his one accomplishment, according to hamilton, and had neither tune nor rhyme. it was a succession of trills, rising and falling, and presently, after two hesitating swoops, the bird rested on his outstretched hand. he came back to the verandah and handed the pigeon to sanders. the commissioner lifted the bird and with gentle fingers removed the slip of thin paper fastened to its leg by a rubber band. before he opened the paper he handed the weary little servant of the government to an orderly. "lord, this is sombubo," said abiboo, and he lifted the pigeon to his cheek, "and he comes from the ochori." sanders had recognized the bird, for sombubo was the swiftest, the wisest, and the strongest of all his messengers, and was never dispatched except on the most critical occasions. he smoothed the paper and read the letter, which was in arabic. "from the servant of god bosambo, in the ochori city, to sandi, where-the-sea-runs. "there have come three white men from the l'mandi country, and they have crossed the mountains. they sit with the akasava in full palaver. they say there shall be no more taxes for the people of the river, but there shall come a new king greater than any. and every man shall have goats and salt and free hunting. they say the akasava shall be given all the ochori country, also guns like the white man. many guns and a thousand carriers are in the mountains waiting to come. i hold the ochori with all my spears. also the isisi chief calls his young men for your king. "peace be on your house in the name of allah compassionate and merciful." "m-m!" said sanders, as he folded the paper. "i'm afraid there will be no fishing this afternoon. bones, take the _wiggle_ and get up to the akasava as fast as you can; i will follow on the _zaire_. abiboo!" "lord?" "you will find me a swift ochori pigeon. hamilton, scribble a line to bosambo, and say that he shall meet bones by sokala's village." half an hour later bones was sending incomprehensible semaphore signals of farewell as the _wiggle_ slipped round the bend of the river. sokala, a little chief of the isisi, was a rich man. he had ten wives, each of whom lived in her own hut. also each wife wore about her neck a great ring of brass weighing twenty pounds, to testify to the greatness and wealth of her lord. sokala was wizened and lined of face, and across his forehead were many deep furrows, and it seemed that he lived in a state of perplexity as to what should become of all his riches when he died, for he was cursed with ten daughters--o'femi, jubasami, k'sola, m'kema, wasonga, mombari, et cetera. when wasonga was fourteen, there was revealed to sokala, her father, a great wonder. the vision came at the tail end of a year of illness, when his head had ached for weeks together, and not even the brass wire twisted lightly about his skull brought him relief. sokala was lying on his fine bed of skins, wondering why strange animals sat by the fire in the centre of his hut, and why they showed their teeth and talked in human language. sometimes they were leopards, sometimes they were little white-whiskered monkeys that scratched and told one another stories, and these monkeys were the wisest of all, for they discussed matters which were of urgency to the sick man rolling restlessly from side to side. on this great night two such animals had appeared suddenly, a big grey fellow with a solemn face, and a very little one, and they sat staring into the fire, mechanically seeking their fleas until the little one spoke. "sokala is very rich and has ten daughters." "that is true," said the other; "also he will die because he has no son." sokala's heart beat furiously with fear, but he listened when the little black monkey spoke. "if sokala took wasonga, his daughter, into the forest near to the tree and slew her, his daughters would become sons and he would grow well." and the other monkey nodded. as they talked, sokala recognized the truth of all that they had said. he wondered that he had never thought of the matter before in this way. all night long he lay thinking--thinking--long after the fires had died down to a full red glow amidst white ashes, and the monkeys had vanished. in the cold dawn his people found him sitting on the side of the bed, and marvelled that he should have lived the night through. "send me wasonga, my daughter," he said, and they brought a sleepy girl of fourteen, tall, straight, and wholly reluctant. "we go a journey," said sokala, and took from beneath his bed his wicker shield and his sharp-edged throwing-spear. "sokala hunts," said the people of the village significantly, and they knew that the end was very near, for he had been a great hunter, and men turn in death to the familiar pursuits of life. three miles on the forest road to the isisi city, sokala bade his daughter sit on the ground. bones had met and was in earnest conversation with the chief of the ochori, the _wiggle_ being tied up at a wooding, when he heard a scream, and saw a girl racing through the wood towards him. behind her, with the foolish stare on his face which comes to men in the last stages of sleeping sickness, his spear balanced, came sokala. the girl tumbled in a wailing, choking heap at bones's feet, and her pursuer checked at the sight of the white man. "i see you, sokala,"[ ] said bones gently. [footnote : the native equivalent for "good morning."] "lord," said the old man, blinking at the officer of the houssas, "you shall see a wonderful magic when i slay this woman, for my daughters shall be sons, and i shall be a well man." bones took the spear from his unresisting hand. "i will show you a greater magic, sokala, for i will give you a little white stone which will melt like salt in your mouth, and you shall sleep." the old man peered from lieutenant tibbetts to the king of the ochori. he watched bones as he opened his medicine chest and shook out two little white pellets from a bottle marked "veronal," and accepted them gratefully. "god bless my life," cried bones, "don't chew 'em, you dear old silly--swallow 'em!" "lord," said sokala soberly, "they have a beautiful and a magic taste." bones sent the frightened girl back to the village, and made the old man sit by a tree. "o tibbetti," said bosambo, in admiration, "that was a good palaver. for it is better than the letting of blood, and no one will know that sokala did not die in his time." bones looked at him in horror. "goodness gracious heavens, bosambo," he gasped, "you don't think i've poisoned him?" "master," said bosambo, nodding his head, "he die one time--he not fit for lib--you give um plenty no-good stuff. you be fine christian feller same like me." bones wiped the perspiration from his brow and explained the action of veronal. bosambo was sceptical. even when sokala fell into a profound slumber, bosambo waited expectantly for his death. and when he realized that bones had spoken the truth, he was a most amazed man. "master," he said, in that fluid ochori dialect which seems to be made up of vowels, "this is a great magic. now i see very surely that you hold wonderful ju-jus, and i have wronged you, for i thought you were without wisdom." "cheer-oh!" said the gratified bones. * * * * * near by the city of the akasava is a small hill on which no vegetation grows, though it rises from a veritable jungle of undergrowth. the akasava call this place the hill of the women, because it was here that m'lama, the king of the akasava, slew a hundred akasava maidens to propitiate m'shimba m'shamba, the god of storms. it was on the topmost point of the hill that sanders erected a fine gallows and hung m'lama for his country's good. it had always been associated with the spiritual history of the akasava, for ghosts and devils and strange ju-jus had their home hereabouts, and every great decision at which the people arrived was made upon its slopes. at the crest there was a palaver house--no more than a straw-thatched canopy affording shelter for four men at the most. on a certain afternoon all the chiefs, great and minor, the headmen, the warriors, and the leaders of fishing villages of the akasava, squatted in a semicircle and listened to the oration of a bearded man, who spoke easily in the river dialect of the happy days which were coming to the people. by his side were two other white men--a tall, clean-shaven man with spectacles, and a stouter man with a bristling white moustache. had the bearded man's address been in plain english, or even plain german, and had it been delivered to european hearers accustomed to taking its religion in allegories and symbols, it would have been harmless. as it was, the illustrations and the imagery which the speaker employed had no other interpretation to the simple-minded akasava than a purely material one. "i speak for the great king," said the orator, throwing out his arms, "a king who is more splendid than any. he has fierce and mighty armies that cover the land like ants. he holds thunder and lightning in his hand, and is greater than m'shimba m'shamba. he is the friend of the black man and the white, and will deliver you from all oppression. he will give you peace and full crops, and make you _capita_ over your enemies. when he speaks, all other kings tremble. he is a great buffalo, and the pawing of his hoofs shakes the earth. "this he says to you, the warrior people of the akasava----" the message was destined to be undelivered. heads began to turn, and there was a whisper of words. some of the audience half rose, some on the outskirts of the gathering stole quietly away--the lesser chiefs were amongst these--and others, sitting stolidly on, assumed a blandness and a scepticism of demeanour calculated to meet the needs of the occasion. for sanders was at the foot of the hill, a trim figure in white, his solar helmet pushed back to cover the nape of his neck from the slanting rays of the sun, and behind sanders were two white officers and a company of houssas with fixed bayonets. not a word said sanders, but slowly mounted the hill of the dead. he reached the palaver house and turned. "let no man go," he said, observing the disposition of the gathering to melt away, "for this is a great palaver, and i come to speak for these god-men." the bearded orator glared at the commissioner and half turned to his companions. the stout man with the moustache said something quickly, but sanders silenced him with a gesture. "o people," said sanders, "you all know that under my king men may live in peace, and death comes quickly to those who make war. also you may worship in what manner you desire, though it be my god or the famous gods of your fathers. and such as preach of god or gods have full liberty. who denies this?" "lord, you speak the truth," said an eager headman. "therefore," said sanders, "my king has given these god-men a book[ ] that they may speak to you, and they have spoken. of a great king they tell. also of wonders which will come to you if you obey him. but this king is the same king of whom the god-cross men and the water-god men tell. for he lives beyond the stars, and his name is god. tell me, preacher, if this is the truth?" [footnote : a book = written permission, any kind of document or writing.] the bearded man swallowed something and muttered, "this is true." "also, there is no king in this world greater than my king, whom you serve," sanders continued, "and it is your duty to be obedient to him, and his name is d'jorja." sanders raised his hand to his helmet in salute. "this also the god-men will tell you." he turned to the three evangelists. herr professor wiessmann hesitated for the fraction of a second. the pause was pardonable, for he saw the undoing of three months' good work, and his thoughts at that moment were with a certain party of carriers who waited in the mountains. "the question of earthly and heavenly dominion is always debatable," he began in english, but sanders stopped him. "we will speak in the akasava tongue," he said, "and let all men hear. tell me, shall my people serve my king, or shall they serve another?" "they shall serve your king," growled the man, "for it is the law." "thank you," said sanders in english. the gathering slowly dispersed, leaving only the white men on the hill and a few lingering folk at the foot, watching the stolid native soldiery with an apprehension born of experience. "we should like you to dine with us," said sanders pleasantly. the leader of the l'mandi mission hesitated, but the thin man with the spectacles, who had been silent, answered for him. "we shall be pleased, mr. commissioner," he said. "after eating with these swine for a month, a good dinner would be very acceptable." sanders said nothing, though he winced at the inelegant description of his people, and the three evangelists went back to their huts, which had been built for their use by the akasava chief. an hour later that worthy sent for a certain witch-doctor. "go secretly," he said, "and call all headmen and chiefs to the breaking tree in the forest. there they shall be until the moon comes up, and the l'mandi lords will come and speak freely. and you shall tell them that the word he spoke before sandi was no true word, but to-night he shall speak the truth, and when sandi is gone we shall have wonderful guns and destroy all who oppose us." this the witch-doctor did, and came back by the river path. here, by all accounts, he met bosambo, and would have passed on; but the chief of the ochori, being in a curious mind and being, moreover, suspicious, was impressed by the importance of the messenger, and made inquiries.... an old man is a great lover of life, and after the witch-doctor's head had been twice held under water--for the river was providentially near--he gasped the truth. * * * * * the three missioners were very grateful guests indeed. they were the more grateful because patricia hamilton was an unexpected hostess. they clicked their heels and kissed her hand and drank her health many times in good hock. the dinner was a feast worthy of lucullus, they swore, the wine was perfect, and the coffee--which abiboo handed round with a solemn face--was wonderful. they sat chatting for a time, and then the bearded man looked at his watch. "to bed, gentlemen," he said gaily. "we leave you, herr commissioner, in good friendship, we trust?" "oh, most excellent," said sanders awkwardly, for he was a poor liar, and knew that his spies were waiting on the bank to "pick up" these potential enemies of his. he watched them go ashore and disappear into the darkness of the forest path that leads to the village. the moon was rising over the tall trees, and an expectant gathering of akasava notables were waiting for a white spokesman who came not, when bosambo and his bodyguard were engaged in lifting three unconscious men and laying them in a large canoe. he himself paddled the long boat to midstream, where two currents run swiftly, one to the sea and one to the isisi river, which winds for a hundred miles until it joins the congo. "go with god," said bosambo piously, as he stepped into his own canoe, and released his hold of the other with its slumbering freight, "for if your king is so great, he will bring you to your own lands; and if he is not great, then you are liars. o abiboo"--he spoke over his shoulder to the sergeant of houssas--"tell me, how many of the magic white stones of bonesi did you put in their drink?" "bosambo, i put four in each, as you told me, and if my lord tibbetti misses them, what shall i say?" "you shall say," said bosambo, "that this is sandi's own word--that when men plan evils they must first sleep. and i think these men will sleep for a long time. perhaps they will sleep for ever--all things are with god." chapter vi the medicine man at the flood season, before the turbulent tributaries of the isisi river had been induced to return to their accustomed channels, sanders came back to headquarters a very weary man, for he had spent a horrid week in an endeavour--successful, but none the less nerve-racking--to impress an indolent people that the swamping of their villages was less a matter of providence and ghosts than the neglect of elementary precaution. "for i told you, ranabini," said an exasperated sanders, "that you should keep the upper channel free from trees and branches, and i have paid you many bags of salt for your services." "lord, it is so," said ranabini, scratching his brown leg thoughtfully. "at the full of the moon, before the rains, did i not ask you if the channel was clear, and did you not say it was like the street of your village?" demanded sanders, in wrath. "lord," said ranabini frankly, "i lied to you, thinking your lordship was mad. for what other man would foresee with his wonderful eye that rains would come? therefore, lord, i did not think of the upper channel, and many trees floated down and made a little dam. lord, i am an ignorant man, and my mind is full of my own brother, who has come from a long distance to see me, for he is a very sick man." sanders's mind was occupied by no thought of ranabini's sick brother, as the dazzling white _zaire_ went thrashing her way down stream. for he himself was a tired man, and needed rest, and there was a dose of malaria looming in the offing, as his aching head told him. it was as though his brains were arranged in slats, like a venetian blind, and these slats were opening and closing swiftly, bringing with each lightning flicker a momentary unconsciousness. captain hamilton met him on the quay, and when sanders landed--walking a thought unsteadily, and instantly began a long and disjointed account of his adventures on a norwegian salmon river--hamilton took him by the arm and led the way to the bungalow. in ten minutes he was assisting sanders into his pyjamas, sanders protesting, albeit feebly, and when, after forcing an astonishing amount of quinine and arsenic down his chief's throat, hamilton came from the semi-darkness of the bungalow to the white glare of the barrack square, hamilton was thoughtful. "let one of your women watch by the bed of the lord sandi," said he to sergeant abiboo, of the houssas, "and she shall call me if he grows worse." "on my life," said abiboo, and was going off. "where is tibbetti?" asked hamilton. the sergeant turned back and seemed embarrassed. "lord," he said, "tibbetti has gone with the lady, your sister, to make a palaver with jimbujini, the witch-doctor of the akasava. they sit in the forest in a magic circle, and lo! tibbetti grows very wise." hamilton swore under his breath. he had ordered lieutenant tibbetts, his second-in-command, prop, stay, and aide-de-camp, to superintend the drill of some raw kano recruits who had been sent from the coast. "go tell the lord tibbetti to come to me," he said, "but first send your woman to sandi." lieutenant tibbetts, with his plain, boyish face all red with his exertions, yet dignified withal, came hurriedly from his studies. "come aboard, sir," he said, and saluted extravagantly, blinking at his superior with a curious solemnity of mien which was his own peculiar expression. "bones," said hamilton, "where the dickens have you been?" bones drew a long breath. he hesitated, then-- "knowledge," he said shortly. hamilton looked at his subordinate in alarm. "dash it, you aren't off your head, too, are you?" bones shook his head with vigour. "knowledge of the occult, sir and brother-officer," he said. "one is never too old to learn, sir, in this jolly old world." "quite right," said hamilton; "in fact, i'm pretty certain that you'll never live long enough to learn everything." "thank you, sir," said bones. the girl, who had had less qualms than bones when the summons arrived, and had, in consequence, returned more leisurely, came into the room. "pat," said her brother, "sanders is down with fever." "fever!" she said a little breathlessly. "it isn't--dangerous?" bones, smiling indulgently, soothed her. "nothin' catchin', dear miss patricia hamilton," he began. "please don't be stupid," she said so fiercely that bones recoiled. "do you think i'm afraid of catching anything? is it dangerous for mr. sanders?" she asked her brother. "no more dangerous than a cold in the head," he answered flippantly. "my dear child, we all have fever. you'll have it, too, if you go out at sunset without your mosquito boots." he explained, with the easy indifference of a man inured to malaria, the habits of the mosquito--his predilection for ankles and wrists, where the big veins and arteries are nearer to the surface--but the girl was not reassured. she would have sat up with sanders, but the idea so alarmed hamilton that she abandoned it. "he'd never forgive me," he said. "my dear girl, he'll be as right as a trivet in the morning." she was sceptical, but, to her amazement, sanders turned up at breakfast his usual self, save that he was a little weary-eyed, and that his hand shook when he raised his coffee-cup to his lips. a miracle, thought patricia hamilton, and said so. "not at all, dear miss," said bones, now, as ever, accepting full credit for all phenomena she praised, whether natural or supernatural. "this is simply nothin' to what happened to me. ham, dear old feller, do you remember when i was brought down from the machengombi river? simply delirious--ravin'--off my head." "so much so," said hamilton, slicing the top off his egg, "that we didn't think you were ill." "if you'd seen me," bones went on, solemnly shaking one skinny forefinger at the girl, "you'd have said: 'bones is for the high jump.'" "i should have said nothing so vulgar, bones," she retorted. "and was it malaria?" "ah," said hamilton triumphantly, "i was too much of a gentleman to hint that it wasn't. press the question, pat." bones shrugged his shoulders and cast a look of withering contempt upon his superior. "in the execution of one's duty, dear miss patricia h," he said, "the calibre of the gun that lays a fellow low, an' plunges his relations an' creditors into mournin', is beside the point. the only consideration, as dear old omar says, is-- "'the movin' finger hits, an', havin' hit, moves on, tum tumty tumty tay, and all a feller does won't make the slightest difference.'" "is that omar or shakespeare?" asked the dazed hamilton. "be quiet, dear. what was the illness, bones?" "measles," said hamilton brutally, "and german measles at that." "viciously put, dear old officer, but, nevertheless, true," said bones buoyantly. "but when the hut's finished, i'll return good for evil. there's goin' to be a revolution, miss patricia hamilton. no more fever, no more measles--health, wealth, an' wisdom, by gad!" "sunstroke," diagnosed hamilton. "pull yourself together, bones--you're amongst friends." but bones was superior to sarcasm. there was a creature of lieutenant tibbetts a solemn, brown man, who possessed, in addition to a vocabulary borrowed from a departed professor of bacteriology, a rough working knowledge of the classics. this man's name was, as i have already explained, abid ali or ali abid, and in him bones discovered a treasure beyond price. bones had recently built himself a large square hut near the seashore--that is to say, he had, with the expenditure of a great amount of midnight oil, a pair of compasses, a box of paints, and a t-square, evolved a somewhat complicated plan whereon certain blue oblongs stood for windows, and certain red cones indicated doors. to this he had added an elevation in the severe georgian style. with his plan beautifully drawn to scale, with sectional diagrams and side elevations embellishing its margin, he had summoned mojeri of the lower isisi, famous throughout the land as a builder of great houses, and to him he had entrusted the execution of his design. "this you shall build for me, mojeri," said bones, sucking the end of his pencil and gazing lovingly at the plan outspread before him, "and you shall be famous all through the world. this room shall be twice as large as that, and you shall cunningly contrive a passage so that i may move from one to the other, and none see me come or go. also, this shall be my sleeping-place, and this a great room where i will practise powerful magics." mojeri took the plan in his hand and looked at it. he turned it upside down and looked at it that way. then he looked at it sideways. "lord," said he, putting down the plan with a reverent hand, "all these wonders i shall remember." "and did he?" asked hamilton, when bones described the interview. bones blinked and swallowed. "he went away and built me a square hut--just a plain square hut. mojeri is an ass, sir--a jolly old fraud an' humbug, sir. he----" "let me see the plan," said hamilton, and his subordinate produced the cartridge paper. "h'm!" said hamilton, after a careful scrutiny. "very pretty. but how did you get into your room?" "through the door, dear old officer," said the sarcastic bones. "i thought it might be through the roof," said hamilton, "or possibly you made one of your famous dramatic entries through a star-trap in the floor-- "'who is it speaks in those sepulchral tones? it is the demon king--the grisly bones! bing!' "and up you pop amidst red fire and smoke." a light dawned on bones. "do you mean to tell me, jolly old ham, that i forgot to put a door into my room?" he asked incredulously, and peered over his chief's shoulder. "that is what i mean, bones. and where does the passage lead to?" "that goes straight from my sleepin' room to the room marked l," said bones, in triumph. "then you _were_ going to be a demon king," said the admiring hamilton. "but fortunately for you, bones, the descent to l is not so easy--you've drawn a party wall across----" "l stands for laboratory," explained the architect hurriedly. "an' where's the wall? god bless my jolly old soul, so i have! anyway, that could have been rectified in a jiffy." "speaking largely," said hamilton, after a careful scrutiny of the plan, "i think mojeri has acted wisely. you will have to be content with the one room. what was the general idea of the house, anyway?" "science an' general illumination of the human mind," said bones comprehensively. "i see," said hamilton. "you were going to make fireworks. a splendid idea, bones." "painful as it is to undeceive you, dear old sir," said bones, with admirable patience, "i must tell you that i'm takin' up my medical studies where i left off. recently i've been wastin' my time, sir: precious hours an' minutes have been passed in frivolous amusement--_tempus fugit_, sir an' captain, _festina lente_, an' i might add----" "don't," begged hamilton; "you give me a headache." there was a look of interest in bones's eyes. "if i may be allowed to prescribe, sir----" he began. "thanks, i'd rather have the headache," replied hamilton hastily. it was nearly a week before the laboratory was fitted that bones gave a house-warming, which took the shape of an afternoon tea. bones, arrayed in a long white coat, wearing a ferocious lint mask attached to huge mica goggles, through which he glared on the world, met the party at the door and bade them a muffled welcome. they found the interior of the hut a somewhat uncomfortable place. the glass retorts, test tubes, bottles, and the paraphernalia of science which bones had imported crowded the big table, the shelves, and even overflowed on to the three available chairs. "welcome to my little workroom," said the hollow voice of bones from behind the mask. "wel----don't put your foot in the crucible, dear old officer! you're sittin' on the methylated spirits, ma'am! phew!" bones removed his mask and showed a hot, red face. "don't take it off, bones," begged hamilton; "it improves you." sanders was examining the microscope, which stood under a big glass shade. "you're very complete, bones," he said approvingly. "in what branch of science are you dabbling?" "tropical diseases, sir," said bones promptly, and lifted the shade. "i'm hopin' you'll allow me to have a look at your blood after tea." "thank you," said sanders. "you had better practise on hamilton." "don't come near me!" threatened hamilton. it was patricia who, when the tea-things had been removed, played the heroine. "take mine," she said, and extended her hand. bones found a needle, and sterilized it in the flame of a spirit lamp. "this won't hurt you," he quavered, and brought the point near the white, firm flesh. then he drew it back again. "this won't hurt you, dear old miss," he croaked, and repeated the performance. he stood up and wiped his streaming brow. "i haven't the heart to do it," he said dismally. "a pretty fine doctor you are, bones!" she scoffed, and took the needle from his hand. "there!" bones put the tiny crimson speck between his slides, blobbed a drop of oil on top, and focussed the microscope. he looked for a long time, then turned a scared face to the girl. "sleepin' sickness, poor dear old miss hamilton!" he gasped. "you're simply full of tryps! good lord! what a blessin' for you i discovered it!" sanders pushed the young scientist aside and looked. when he turned his head, the girl saw his face was white and drawn, and for a moment a sense of panic overcame her. "you silly ass," growled the commissioner, "they aren't trypnosomes! you haven't cleaned the infernal eyepiece!" "not trypnosomes?" said bones. "you seem disappointed, bones," said hamilton. "as a man, i'm overjoyed," replied bones gloomily; "as a scientist, it's a set-back, dear old officer--a distinct set-back." the house-warming lasted a much shorter time than the host had intended. this was largely due to the failure of a very beautiful experiment which he had projected. in order that the rare and wonderful result at which he aimed should be achieved, bones had the hut artificially darkened, and they sat in a hot and sticky blackness, whilst he knocked over bottles and swore softly at the instruments his groping hand could not discover. and the end of the experiment was a large, bad smell. "the women and children first," said hamilton, and dived for the door. they took farewell of bones at a respectful distance. hamilton went across to the houssa lines, and sanders walked back to the residency with the girl. for a little while they spoke of bones and his newest craze, and then suddenly the girl asked-- "you didn't really think there were any of those funny things in my blood, did you?" sanders looked straight ahead. "i thought--you see, we know--the tryp is a distinct little body, and anybody who had lived in this part of the world for a time can pick him out. bones, of course, knows nothing thoroughly--i should have remembered that." she said nothing until they reached the verandah, and she turned to go to her room. "it wasn't nice, was it?" she said. sanders shook his head. "it was a taste of hell," he said simply. and she fetched a quick, long sigh and patted his arm before she realized what she was doing. bones, returning from his hut, met sanders hurrying across the square. "bones, i want you to go up to the isisi," said the commissioner. "there's an outbreak of some weird disease, probably due to the damming of the little river by ranabini, and the flooding of the low forests." bones brightened up. "sir an' excellency," he said gratefully, "comin' from you, this tribute to my scientific----" "don't be an ass, bones!" said sanders irritably. "your job is to make these beggars work. they'll simply sit and die unless you start them on drainage work. cut a few ditches with a fall to the river; kick ranabini for me; take up a few kilos of quinine and dose them." nevertheless, bones managed to smuggle on board quite a respectable amount of scientific apparatus, and came in good heart to the despondent folk of the lower isisi. three weeks after bones had taken his departure, sanders was sitting at dinner in a very thoughtful mood. patricia had made several ineffectual attempts to draw him into a conversation, and had been answered in monosyllables. at first she had been piqued and a little angry, but, as the meal progressed, she realized that matters of more than ordinary seriousness were occupying his thoughts, and wisely changed her attitude of mind. a chance reference to bones, however, succeeded where more pointed attempts had failed. "yes," said sanders, in answer to the question she had put, "bones has some rough idea of medical practice. he was a cub student at bart.'s for two years before he realized that surgery and medicines weren't his forte." "don't you sometimes feel the need of a doctor here?" she asked, and sanders smiled. "there is very little necessity. the military doctor comes down occasionally from headquarters, and we have a native apothecary. we have few epidemics amongst the natives, and those the medical missions deal with--sleep-sickness, beri-beri and the like. sometimes, of course, we have a pretty bad outbreak which spreads----don't go, hamilton--i want to see you for a minute." hamilton had risen, and was making for his room, with a little nod to his sister. at sanders's word he turned. "walk with me for a few minutes," said sanders, and, with an apology to the girl, he followed the other from the room. "what is it?" asked hamilton. sanders was perturbed--this he knew, and his own move towards his room was in the nature of a challenge for information. "bones," said the commissioner shortly. "do you realize that we have had no news from him since he left?" hamilton smiled. "he's an erratic beggar, but nothing could have happened to him, or we should have heard about it." sanders did not reply at once. he paced up and down the gravelled path before the residency, his hands behind him. "no news has come from ranabini's village for the simple reason that nobody has entered or left it since bones arrived," he said. "it is situated, as you know, on a tongue of land at the confluence of two rivers. no boat has left the beaches, and an attempt to reach it by land has been prevented by force." "by force?" repeated the startled hamilton. sanders nodded. "i had the report in this morning. two men of the isisi from another village went to call on some relations. they were greeted with arrows, and returned hurriedly. the headman of m'gomo village met with the same reception. this came to the ears of my chief spy ahmet, who attempted to paddle to the island in his canoe. at a distance of two hundred yards he was fired upon." "then they've got bones?" gasped hamilton. "on the contrary, bones nearly got ahmet, for bones was the marksman." the two men paced the path in silence. "either bones has gone mad," said hamilton, "or----" "or----?" hamilton laughed helplessly. "i can't fathom the mystery," he said. "mcmasters will be down to-morrow, to look at some sick men. we'll take him up, and examine the boy." it was a subdued little party that boarded the _zaire_ the following morning, and patricia hamilton, who came to see them off, watched their departure with a sense of impending trouble. dr. mcmasters alone was cheerful, for this excursion represented a break in a somewhat monotonous routine. "it may be the sun," he suggested. "i have known several fellows who have gone a little nutty from that cause. i remember a man at grand bassam who shot----" "oh, shut up, mac, you grisly devil!" snapped hamilton. "talk about butterflies." the _zaire_ swung round the bend of the river that hid ranabini's village from view, but had scarcely come into sight when-- "ping!" sanders saw the bullet strike the river ahead of the boat, and send a spiral column of water shooting into the air. he put up his glasses and focussed them on the village beach. "bones!" he said grimly. "take her in, abiboo." as the steersman spun the wheel-- "ping!" this time the shot fell to the right. the three white men looked at one another. "let every man take cover," said sanders quietly. "we're going to that beach even if bones has a battery of 's!" an exclamation from hamilton arrested him. "he's signalling," said the houssa captain, and sanders put up his glasses again. bones's long arms were waving at ungainly angles as he semaphored his warning. hamilton opened his notebook and jotted down the message-- "awfully sorry, dear old officer," he spelt, and grinned at the unnecessary exertion of this fine preliminary flourish, "but must keep you away. bad outbreak of virulent smallpox----" sanders whistled, and pulled back the handle of the engine-room telegraph to "stop." "my god!" said hamilton through his teeth, for he had seen such an outbreak once, and knew something of its horrors. whole districts had been devastated in a night. one tribe had been wiped out, and the rotting frames of their houses still showed amidst the tangle of elephant grass which had grown up through the ruins. he wiped his forehead and read the message a little unsteadily, for his mind was on his sister-- "had devil of fight, and lost twenty men, but got it under. come and get me in three weeks. had to stay here for fear careless devils spreading disease." sanders looked at hamilton, and mcmasters chuckled. "this is where i get a swift vacation," he said, and called his servant. hamilton leapt on to the rail, and steadying himself against a stanchion, waved a reply-- "we are sending you a doctor." back came the reply in agitated sweeps of arm-- "doctor be blowed! what am i?" "what shall i say, sir?" asked hamilton after he had delivered the message. "just say 'a hero,'" said sanders huskily. chapter vii bones, king-maker patricia hamilton, an observant young lady, had not failed to notice that every day, at a certain hour, bones disappeared from view. it was not for a long time that she sought an explanation. "where is bones?" she asked one morning, when the absence of her cavalier was unusually protracted. "with his baby," said her brother. "please don't be comic, dear. where is bones? i thought i saw him with the ship's doctor." the mail had come in that morning, and the captain and surgeon of the s.s. _boma queen_ had been their guests at breakfast. hamilton looked up from his book and removed his pipe. "do you mean to tell me that bones has kept his guilty secret all this time?" he asked anxiously. she sat down by his side. "please tell me the joke. this isn't the first time you have ragged bones about 'the baby'; even mr. sanders has done it." she looked across at the commissioner with a reproving shake of her pretty head. "have _i_ ragged bones?" asked sanders, in surprise. "i never thought i was capable of ragging anybody." "the truth is, pat," said her brother, "there isn't any rag about the matter. bones adopted a piccanin." "a child?" "a baby about a month old. its mother died, and some old bird of a witch-doctor was 'chopping' it when bones appeared on the scene." patricia gave a little gurgle of delight and clapped her hands. "oh, please tell me everything about it." "it was sanders who told her of henry hamilton bones, his dire peril and his rescue; it was hamilton who embellished the story of how bones had given his adopted son his first bath. "just dropped him into a tub and stirred him round with a mop." soon after this bones came blithely up from the beach and across the parade-ground, his large pipe in his mouth, his cane awhirl. hamilton watched him from the verandah of the residency, and called over his shoulder to patricia. it had been an anxious morning for bones, and even hamilton was compelled to confess to himself that he had felt the strain, though he had not mentioned the fact to his sister. outside in the roadstead the intermediate elder dempster boat was waiting the return of the doctor. bones had been to see him off. an important day, indeed, for henry hamilton bones had been vaccinated. "i think it 'took,'" said bones gravely, answering the other's question. "i must say henry behaved like a gentleman." "what did fitz say?" (fitzgerald, the doctor, had come in accordance with his promise to perform the operation.) "fitz?" said bones, and his voice trembled. "fitz is a cad!" hamilton grinned. "he said that babies didn't feel pain, and there was henry howling his young head off. it was horrible!" bones wiped his streaming brow with a large and violent bandana, and looked round cautiously. "not a word, ham, to her!" he said, in a loud whisper. "sorry!" said hamilton, picking up his pipe. "her knows." "good gad!" said bones, in despair, and turned to meet the girl. "oh, bones!" she said reproachfully, "you never told me!" bones shrugged his shoulders, opened his mouth, dropped his pipe, blinked, spread out his hands in deprecation, and picked up his pipe. from which it may be gathered that he was agitated. "dear old miss hamilton," he said tremulously, "i should be a horrid bounder if i denied henry hamilton bones--poor little chap. if i never mentioned him, dear old sister, it is because----ah, well, you will never understand." he hunched his shoulders dejectedly. "don't be an ass, bones. why the dickens are you making a mystery of the thing?" asked hamilton. "i'll certify you're a jolly good father to the brat." "not 'brat,' dear old sir," begged bones. "henry is a human being with a human heart. that boy"--he wagged his finger solemnly--"knows me the moment i go into the hut. to see him sit up an' say 'da!' dear old sister hamilton," he went on incoherently, "to see him open his mouth with a smile, one tooth through, an' one you can feel with your little finger--why, it's--it's wonderful, jolly old miss hamilton! damn it, it's wonderful!" "bones!" cried the shocked girl. "i can't help it, madame," said bones miserably. "fitz cut his poor little, fat little arm. oh, fitz is a low cad! cut it, my dear old patricia, mercilessly--yes, mercilessly, brutally, an' the precious little blighter didn't so much as call for the police. good gad, it was terrible!" his eyes were moist, and he blew his nose with great vigour. "i'm sure it was awful," she soothed him. "may i come and see him?" bones raised a warning hand, and, though the habitat of the wonderful child could not have been less than half a mile away, lowered his voice. "he's asleep--fitfully, but asleep. i've told them to call me if he has a turn for the worse, an' i'm goin' down with a gramophone after dinner, in case the old fellow wants buckin' up. but now he's asleep, thankin' you for your great kindness an' sympathy, dear old miss, in the moment of singular trial." he took her hand and shook it heartily, tried to say something, and swallowed hard, then, turning, walked from the verandah in the direction of his hut. the girl was smiling, but there were tears in her eyes. "what a boy!" she said, half to herself. sanders nodded. "bones is very nice," he said, and she looked at him curiously. "that is almost eloquent," she said quietly. "i thought it was rather bald," he replied. "you see, few people really understand bones. i thought, the first time i saw him, that he was a fool. i was wrong. then i thought he was effeminate. i was wrong again, for he has played the man whenever he was called upon to do so. bones is one of those rare creatures--a man with all the moral equipment of a good woman." her eyes were fixed on his, and for a moment they held. then hers dropped quickly, and she flushed ever so slightly. "i think you have defined the perfect man," she said, turning the leaves of her book. the next morning she was admitted to an audience with that paragon of paragons, henry hamilton bones. he lived in the largest of the houssa huts at the far end of the lines, and had for attendants two native women, for whom bones had framed the most stringent and regimental of orders. the girl paused in the porch of the hut to read the typewritten regulations which were fastened by drawing-pins to a green baize board. they were bi-lingual, being in english and in coast arabic, in which dialect bones was something of a master. the girl wondered why they should be in english. "absolutely necessary, dear old lady friend," explained bones firmly. "you've no idea what a lot of anxiety i have had. your dear old brother--god bless him!--is a topping old sport, but with children you can't be too careful, and ham is awfully thoughtless. there, i've said it!" the english part of the regulations was brief, and she read it through. henry hamilton bones (care of). . visitors are requested to make as little noise as possible. how would you like to be awakened from refreshing sleep! be unselfish, and put yourself in his place. . it is absolutely forbidden to feed the child except with articles a list of which may be obtained on application. nuts and chocolates are strictly forbidden. . the undersigned will not be responsible for articles broken by the child, such as watches. if watches are used to amuse child, they should be held by child's ear, when an interested expression will be observed on child's face. on no account should child be allowed--knowing no better--to bite watch, owing to danger from glass, minute hand, etc. . in lifting child, grasp above waist under arms and raise slowly, taking care that head does not fall back. bring child close to holder's body, passing left arm under child and right arm over. child should not be encouraged to sit up--though quite able to, being very forward for eight months--owing to strain on back. on no account should child be thrown up in the air and caught. . any further information can be obtained at hut . (signed) augustus tibbetts, lieutenant. "all based upon my personal observation and experience," said bones triumphantly--"not a single tip from anybody." "i think you are really marvellous, bones," said the girl, and meant it. henry hamilton bones sat upright in a wooden cot. a fat-faced atom of brown humanity, bald-headed and big-eyed, he sucked his thumb and stared at the visitor, and from the visitor to bones. bones he regarded with an intelligent interest which dissolved into a fat chuckle of sheer delight. "isn't it--isn't it simply extraordinary?" demanded bones ecstatically. "in all your long an' painful experience, dear old friend an' co-worker, have you ever seen anything like it? when you remember that babies don't open their eyes until three weeks after they're born----" "da!" said henry hamilton bones. "da yourself, henry!" squawked his foster-father. "do da!" said henry. the smile vanished from bones's face, and he bit his lip thoughtfully. "do da!" he repeated. "let me see, what is 'do da'?" "do da!" roared henry. "dear old miss hamilton," he said gently, "i don't know whether henry wants a drink or whether he has a pain in his stomach, but i think that we had better leave him in more experienced hands." he nodded fiercely to the native woman nurse and made his exit. outside they heard henry's lusty yell, and bones put his hand to his ear and listened with a strained expression on his face. presently the tension passed. "it _was_ a drink," said bones. "excuse me whilst i make a note." he pulled out his pocket-book and wrote: "'do da' means 'child wants drink.'" he walked back to the residency with her, giving her a remarkable insight into henry's vocabulary. it appeared that babies have a language of their own, which bones boasted that he had almost mastered. she lay awake for a very long time that night, thinking of bones, his simplicity and his lovableness. she thought, too, of sanders, grave, aloof, and a little shy, and wondered.... she woke with a start, to hear the voice of bones outside the window. she felt sure that something had happened to henry. then she heard sanders and her brother speaking, and realized that it was not henry they were discussing. she looked at her watch--it was three o'clock. "i was foolish to trust that fellow," sanders was saying, "and i know that bosambo is not to blame, because he has always given a very wide berth to the kulumbini people, though they live on his border." she heard him speak in a strange tongue to some unknown fourth, and guessed that a spy of the government had come in during the night. "we'll get away as quickly as we can, bones," sanders said. "we can take our chance with the lower river in the dark; it will be daylight before we reach the bad shoals. you need not come, hamilton." "do you think bones will be able to do all you want?" hamilton's tone was dubious. "pull yourself together, dear old officer," said bones, raising his voice to an insubordinate pitch. she heard the men move from the verandah, and fell asleep again, wondering who was the man they spoke of and what mischief he had been brewing. * * * * * on a little tributary stream, which is hidden by the island of bats, was the village of kulumbini. high elephant grass hid the poor huts even from they who navigate a cautious way along the centre of the narrow stream. on the shelving beach one battered old canoe of ironwood, with its sides broken and rusted, the indolence of its proprietor made plain by the badly spliced panels, was all that told the stranger that the habitations of man were nigh. kulumbini was a term of reproach along the great river and amongst the people of the akasava, the isisi, and the n'gombi, no less than among that most tolerant of tribes the ochori. they were savage people, immensely brave, terrible in battle, but more terrible after. kulumbini, the village and city of the tribe, was no more than an outlier of a fairly important tribe which occupied forest land stretching back to the ochori boundary. their territory knew no frontier save the frontiers of caprice and desire. they had neither nationality nor national ambition, and would sell their spears for a bunch of fish, as the saying goes. their one consuming passion and one great wish was that they should not be overlooked, and, so long as the tribes respected this eccentricity, the kulumbini distressed no man. how this desire for isolation arose, none know. it is certain that once upon a time they possessed a king who so shared their views that he never came amongst them, but lived in a forest place which is called to this day s'furi-s'foosi, "the trees (or glade) of the distant king." they had demurred at government inspection, and sanders, coming up the little river on the first of his visits, was greeted by a shower of arrows, and his landing opposed by locked shields. there are many ways of disposing of opposition, not the least important of which is to be found in two big brass-barrelled guns which have their abiding place at each end of the _zaire's_ bridge. there is also a method known as peaceful suasion. sanders had compromised by going ashore for a peace palaver with a revolver in each hand. he had a whole fund of bomongo stories, most of which are unfit for printing, but which, nevertheless, find favour amongst the primitive humorists of the great river. by parable and story, by nonsense tale and romance, by drawing upon his imagination to supply himself with facts, by invoking ju-jus, ghosts, devils, and all the armoury of native superstition, he had, in those far-off times, prevailed upon the people of kulumbini not only to allow him a peaceful entrance to their country, but--wonder of wonders!--to contribute, when the moon and tide were in certain relative positions, which in english means once every six months, a certain tithe or tax, which might consist of rubber, ivory, fish, or manioc, according to the circumstances of the people. more than this, he stamped a solemn treaty--he wrote it in a tattered laundry-book which had come into the chief's possession by some mysterious means--and he hung about the neck of gulabala, the titular lord of these strange people, the medal and chain of chieftainship. not to be outdone in courtesy, the chief offered him the choice of all the maidens of kulumbini, and sanders, to whom such offers were by no means novel, had got out of a delicate situation in his usual manner, having resort to witchcraft for the purpose. for he said, with due solemnity and hushed breath, that it had been predicted by a celebrated witch-doctor of the lower river that the next wife he should take to himself would die of the sickness-mongo, and said sanders-- "my heart is too tender for your people, o chief, to lead one of your beautiful daughters to death." "o sandi," replied gulabala hopefully, "i have many daughters, and i should not miss one. and would it not be good service for a woman of my house to die in your hut?" "we see things differently, you and i," said sanders, "for, according to my religion, if any woman dies from witchcraft, her ghost sits for ever at the foot of my bed, making terrifying faces." thus sanders had made his escape, and had received at odd intervals the tribute of these remote people. for years they had dwelt without interference, for they were an unlucky people to quarrel with, and, save for one or two trespasses on the part of gulabala, there was no complaint made concerning them. it is not natural, however, for native people to prosper, as these folks did, without there growing up a desire to kill somebody. for does not the river saying run: "the last measure of a full granary is a measure of blood"? in the dead of a night gulabala took three hundred spears across the frontier to the ochori village of netcka, and returned at dawned with the spears all streaky. and he brought back with him some twenty women, who would have sung the death-song of their men but for the fact that gulabala and his warriors beat them. gulabala slept all the day, he and his spears, and woke to a grisly vision of consequence. he called his people together and spoke in this wise-- "soon sandi and his headmen will come, and, if we are here, there will be many folk hanged, for sandi is a cruel man. therefore let us go to a far place in the forest, carrying our treasure, and when sandi has forgiven us, we will come back." a good plan but for the sad fact that bosambo of the ochori was less than fifty miles away at the dawn of that fatal day, and was marching swiftly to avenge his losses, for not only had gulabala taken women, but he had taken sixty goats, and that was unpardonable. the scouts which gulabala had sent out came back with the news that the way to sanctuary was barred by bosambo. now, of all the men that the kulumbini hated, they hated none more than the chief of the ochori. for he alone never scrupled to overlook them, and to dare their anger by flogging such of them as raided his territory in search of game. "ko," said gulabala, deeply concerned, "this bosambo is sandi's dog. let us go back to our village and say we have been hunting, for bosambo will not cross into our lands for fear of sandi's anger." they reached the village, and were preparing to remove the last evidence of their crime--one goat looks very much like another, but women can speak--when sanders came striding down the village street, and gulabala, with his curved execution knife in his hand, stood up by the side of the woman he had slain. "o gulabala," said sanders softly, "this is an evil thing." the chief looked left and right helplessly. "lord," he said huskily, "bosambo and his people put me to shame, for they spied on me and overlooked me. and we are proud people, who must not be overlooked--thus it has been for all time." sanders pursed his lips and stared at the man. "i see here a fine high tree," he said, "so high that he who hangs from its top branch may say that no man overlooks him. there you shall hang, gulabala, for your proud men to see, before they also go to work for my king, with chains upon their legs as long as they live." "lord," said gulabala philosophically, "i have lived." ten minutes later he went the swift way which bad chiefs go, and his people were unresentful spectators. "this is the tenth time i have had to find a new chief in this belt," said sanders, pacing the deck of the _zaire_, "and who on earth i am to put in his place i do not know." the _lokalis_ of the kulumbini were already calling headmen to grand palaver. in the shade of the reed-thatched _lokali_ house, before the hollow length of tree-trunk, the player worked his flat drumsticks of ironwood with amazing rapidity. the call trilled and rumbled, rising and falling, now a patter of light musical sound, now a low grumble. bosambo came--by the river route--as sanders was leaving the _zaire_ to attend the momentous council. "how say you, bosambo--what man of the kulumbini folk will hold these people in check?" bosambo squatted at his lord's feet and set his spear a-spinning. "lord," he confessed, "i know of none, for they are a strange and hateful people. whatever king you set above them they will despise. also they worship no gods or ghosts, nor have they ju-ju or fetish. and, if a man does not believe, how may you believe him? lord, this i say to you--set me above the kulumbini, and i will change their hearts." but sanders shook his head. "that may not be, bosambo," he said. the palaver was a long and weary one. there were twelve good claimants for the vacant stool of office, and behind the twelve there were kinsmen and spears. from sunset to nigh on sunrise they debated the matter, and sanders sat patiently through it all, awake and alert. whether this might be said of bones is questionable. bones swears that he did not sleep, and spent the night, chin in hand, turning over the problem in his mind. it is certain he was awake when sanders gave his summing up. "people of this land," said sanders, "four fires have been burnt since we met, and i have listened to all your words. now, you know how good it is that there should be one you call chief. yet, if i take you, m'loomo"--he turned to one sullen claimant--"there will be war. and if i take b'songi, there will be killing. and i have come to this mind--that i will appoint a king over you who shall not dwell with you nor overlook you." two hundred pairs of eyes watched the commissioner's face. he saw the gleam of satisfaction which came at this concession to the traditional characteristic of the tribe, and went on, almost completely sure of his ground. "he shall dwell far away, and you, the twelve kinsmen of gulabala, shall reign in his place--one at every noon shall sit in the chief's chair and keep the land for your king, who shall dwell with me." one of the prospective regents rose. "lord, that is good talk, for so did sakalaba, the great king of our race, live apart from us at s'furi-s'foosi, and were we not prosperous in those days? now tell us what man you will set over us." for one moment sanders was nonplussed. he was rapidly reviewing the qualifications of all the little chiefs, the headmen, and the fisher leaders who sat under him, and none fulfilled his requirements. in that moment of silence an agitated voice whispered in his ear, and bones's lean hand clutched his sleeve. "sir an' excellency," breathed bones, all of a twitter, "don't think i'm takin' advantage of my position, but it's the chance i've been lookin' for, sir. you'd do me an awful favour--you see, sir, i've got his career to consider----" "what on earth----" began sanders. "henry hamilton bones, sir," said bones tremulously. "you'd set him up for life, sir. i must think of the child, hang it all! i know i'm a jolly old rotter to put my spoke in----" sanders gently released the frenzied grip of his lieutenant, and faced the wondering palaver. "know all people that this day i give to you as king one whom you shall call m'songuri, which means in your tongue 'the young and the wise,' and who is called in my tongue n'risu m'ilitani tibbetti, and this one is a child and well beloved by my lord tibbetti, being to him as a son, and by m'ilitani and by me, sandi." he raised his hand in challenge. "wa! whose men are you?" he cried. "m'songuri!" the answer came in a deep-throated growl, and the assembly leapt to its feet. "wa! who rules this land?" "m'songuri!" they locked arms and stamped first with the right foot and then with the left, in token of their acceptance. "take your king," said sanders, "and build him a beautiful hut, and his spirit shall dwell with you. this palaver is finished." bones was speechless all the way down river. at irregular intervals he would grip sanders's hand, but he was too full for speech. hamilton and his sister met the law-givers on the quay. "you're back sooner than i expected you, sir," said hamilton. "did bones behave?" "like a little gentleman," said sanders. "oh, bones," patricia broke in eagerly, "henry has cut another tooth." bones's nod was grave and even distant. "i will go and see his majesty," he said. "i presume he is in the palace?" hamilton stared after him. "surely," he asked irritably, "bones isn't sickening for measles again?" chapter viii the tamer of beasts native folk, at any rate, are but children of a larger growth. in the main, their delinquencies may be classified under the heading of "naughtiness." they are mischievous and passionate, and they have a weakness for destroying things to discover the secrets of volition. a too prosperous nation mystifies less fortunate people, who demand of their elders and rulers some solution of the mystery of their rivals' progress. such a ruler, unable to offer the necessary explanation, takes his spears to the discovery, and sometimes discovers too much for his happiness. the village of jumburu stands on the edge of the bush country, where the lawless men of all nations dwell. this territory is filled with fierce communities, banded together against a common enemy--the law. they call this land the b'wigini, which means "the nationless," and jumburu's importance lies in the fact that it is the outpost of order and discipline. in jumburu were two brothers, o'ka and b'suru, who had usurped the chieftainship of their uncle, the very famous k'sungasa, "very famous," since he had been in his time a man of remarkable gifts, which he still retained to some extent, and in consequence enjoyed what was left of life. he was, by all accounts, as mad as a man could be, and in circumstances less favourable to himself his concerned relatives would have taken him a long journey into the forest he loved so well, and they would have put out his eyes and left him to the mercy of the beasts, such being the method of dealing with lunacy amongst people who, all unknown to themselves, were eugenists of a most inflexible kind. but to leave k'sungasa to the beasts would have been equivalent to delivering him to the care of his dearest friends, for he had an affinity for the wild dwellers of the bush, and all his life he had lived amongst them and loved them. it is said that he could arrest the parrot in the air by a "cl'k!" and could bring the bird screeching and fluttering to his hand. he could call the shy little monkeys from the high branches where they hid, and even the fiercest of buffaloes would at his word come snuffling and nosing his brown arm. so that, when he grew weak-minded, his relatives, after a long palaver, decided that for once the time-honoured customs of the land should be overridden, and since there was no other method of treating the blind but that prescribed by precedent, he should be allowed to live in a great hut at the edge of the village with his birds and snakes and wild cats, and that the direction of village affairs should pass to his nephews. mr. commissioner sanders knew all this, but did nothing. his task was to govern the territory, which meant to so direct affairs that the territory governed itself. when the fate of k'sungasa was in the balance, he sent word to the chief's nephews that he was somewhere in the neighbourhood, and that the revival of the bad old custom of blinding would be followed by the introduction of the bad new custom of hanging; but this had less effect upon the council of relatives--to whom sanders's message was not transmitted--than the strange friendship which k'sungasa had for the forest folk. the nephews might have governed the village, exacted tribute, apportioned fishing rights, and administered justice for all time, but for the fact that there came a period of famine, when crops were bad and fish was scarce, and when, remarkably enough, the village of l'bini, distant no more than a few hours' paddling, had by a curious coincident raised record crops, and had, moreover, a glut of fish in their waters. there was the inevitable palaver and the inevitable solution. o'ka and b'suru led ten canoes to the offending village, slaughtered a few men and burnt a few huts. for two hours the combatants pranced and yelled and thrust at one another amidst a pandemonium of screaming women, and then lieutenant tibbetts dropped from the clouds with a most substantial platoon of houssas, and there was a general sorting out. sanders held a court on one of the middle islands near the residency, and b'suru was sent to the village of irons for the term of his natural life. o'ka, who had fled to the bush, escaped, however, and with him a headman and a few followers. lieutenant tibbetts, who had spent two profitable days in the village of jumburu, came back to the residency a very thoughtful young man. "what is the matter with bones?" asked captain hamilton. his sister smiled over her book, but offered no other comment. "do you know, pat?" demanded hamilton sternly. sanders looked at the girl with a twinkle in his grey eyes, and lit a cheroot. the relationships between patricia hamilton and bones were a source of constant joy to him. taciturn and a thought dour as he was, pat would never have suspected the bubbling laughter which arose behind that lean brown face, unmovable and, in his moments of most intense enjoyment, expressionless. "bones and i have a feud," said the girl. sanders smiled. "not as violent a feud as o'ka and i have, i hope?" he said. she frowned a little and looked at him anxiously. "but you don't worry about the threats of the people you have punished?" she asked. "i haven't punished o'ka," said sanders, "and an expedition into the bush would be too expensive an affair. he has apparently settled with the b'wigini people. if they take up his feud, they might give trouble. but what is your trouble with bones?" "you must ask him," she said. hamilton's opportunity came next day, when bones applied for leave. "leave?" said captain hamilton incredulously. "leave, bones? what the dickens do you want leave for?" bones, standing as stiff as a ramrod before the office table at which his superior sat, saluted. "urgent private affairs, sir," he said gruffly. "but you haven't any private affairs," protested hamilton. "your life is an open book--you were bragging about that fact yesterday." "sir and brother-officer," said bones firmly, "a crisis has arisen in my young life. my word, sir, has been called into doubt by your jolly old sister. i desire to vindicate my honour, my reputation, an' my veracity." "pat has been pulling your leg!" suggested hamilton, but bones shook his head. "nothin' so indelicate, sir. your revered an' lovely relative--god bless her jolly old heart!--expressed her doubt in _re_ leopards an' buffaloes. i'm goin' out, sir, into the wilds--amidst dangers, ham, old feller, that only seasoned veterans like you an' me can imagine--to bring proof that i am not only a sportsman, but a gentleman." the timely arrival of miss patricia hamilton, very beautiful in dazzling white, with her solar helmet perched at an angle, smote bones to silence. "what have you been saying to bones?" asked hamilton severely. "she said----" "i said----" they began and finished together. "bones, you're a tell-tale," accused the girl. "go on," said bones recklessly. "don't spare me. i'm a liar an' a thief an' a murderer--don't mind me!" "i simply said that i didn't believe he shot the leopard--the one whose skin is in his hut." "oh, no," said bones, with heavy sarcasm, "i didn't shoot it--oh, no! i froze it to death--i poisoned it!" "but did you shoot it?" she asked. "did i shoot it, dear old ham?" asked bones, with great calmness. "did you?" asked hamilton innocently. "did i shoot at that leopard," bones went on deliberately, "an' was he found next mornin' cold an' dead, with a smile on his naughty old face?" hamilton nodded, and bones faced the girl expectantly. "apologize, child," he said. "i shall do nothing of the kind," she replied, with some heat. "did bones shoot the leopard?" she appealed to her brother. hamilton looked from one to the other. "when the leopard was found----" he began. "listen to this, dear old sister," murmured bones. "when the leopard was found, with a spear in its side----" "evidently done after death by a wanderin' cad of a native," interposed bones hastily. "be quiet, bones," commanded the girl, and bones shrugged his shoulders and obeyed. "when the leopard was found," continued hamilton, "he was certainly beyond human aid, and though no bullet mark was discovered, bones conclusively proved----" "one moment, dear old officer," interrupted bones. he had seen out of the tail of his eye a majestic figure crossing the square. "will you allow me to produce scientific an' expert evidence?" hamilton assented gravely, and bones went to the door of the orderly room and roared a name. "i shall produce," he said quietly, but firmly, "the evidence of one who enjoyed the confidence of dear old professor what's-his-name, the eminent thigumy-ologist. oh, ali!" ali abid, a solemn figure, salaamed in the doorway. not for nothing had he been factotum to a great bacteriologist before the demise of his master had driven him to service with a lieutenant of houssas. his vocabulary smelt of the laboratory, his english was pure, undefiled, and unusual. "ali, you remember my leopard?" "sir," said ali, shaking his head, "who can forget?" "did i kill him, ali?" asked bones. "tell the lady everything." ali bowed to the girl. "miss or madame," he said, "the leopard (_felis pardus_), a wild beast of the felidæ family, is indigenous to forest territory. the subject in question--to wit, the skin thereof exhibited by sir bones--was particularly ferocious, and departed this life as a result of hunting conducted by aforesaid. examination of subject after demise under most scientific scrutiny revealed that said leopard (_felis pardus_) suffered from weak heart, and primary cause of death was diagnosed as shock occasioned by large 'bang' from sir bones's rifle." "what did i say?" asked bones complacently. "do you mean to tell me," gasped the girl, "that you _frightened_ the leopard to death?" bones spread out his hands disparagingly. "you have heard the evidence, dear old sister," he said; "there is nothing to add." she threw back her head and laughed until her grey eyes were swimming in tears. "oh, bones, you humbug!" she laughed. bones drew himself up more stiffly than ever, stuck his monocle in his eye, and turned to his chief. "do i understand, sir," he said, "that my leave is granted?" "seven days," said hamilton, and bones swung round on his heel, knocked over hamilton's stationery rack, stumbled over a chair, and strode gloomily from the hut. when patricia hamilton woke the next morning, she found a note pinned to her pillow. we may gloss over the impropriety of the proceedings which led to this phenomenon. bones was an artist, and so small a matter as the proprieties did not come into his calculations. patricia sat up in bed and read the letter. "dear old friend and doutting thos." (bones's spelling was always perfectly disgraceful),-- "when this reaches you, when this reaches you, i shall be far, far away on my long and dangerus journey. i may not come back, i may not come back, for i and a faithful servant are about to penetrate to the lares of the wild beasts of the forest, of the forest. i am determined to wipe out the reproach which you have made. i will bring back, not a dead leppard, not a dead leppard, but a live one, which i shall seeze with my own hands. i may lose my life in this rash and hazardus enterprise, but at least i shall vindycate my honour.--farewell, dear old patrisia. "your friend, "b." "which proves," said hamilton, when he was shown the letter, "that bones is learning to spell. it only seems yesterday when he was spelling 'hamilton' with three m's. by the way, how did you get this letter?" "i found it pinned to the door," said patricia tactfully. bones went by the shortest route to jumburu, and was received without enthusiasm, for he had left a new chief to rule over a people who were near enough to the b'wigini to resent overmuch discipline. but his business was with k'sungasa, for the two days' stay which bones had made in the village, and all that he had learnt of the old tamer, had been responsible for his reckless promise to patricia hamilton. he came at a critical moment, for k'sungasa, a thin and knobbly old man, with dim eyes and an incessant chuckle, was very near his end. he lay on a fine raised bed, a big yellow-eyed wild cat at his feet, a monkey or two shivering by the bedside, and a sprawling litter of kittens--to which the wild cat leapt in a tremble of rage when bones entered the hut--crawling in the sunlight which flooded the hut. "lord tibbetti," croaked the old man, "i see you! this is a good time, for to-morrow i should be dead." "k'sungasa," said bones, seating himself gingerly, and looking about for the snake which was usually coiled round the old man's stool, "that is foolish talk, for you will see many floods." "that is fine talk for the river folk," grinned the old man, "but not for we people of the forest, who never see flood and only little-little rivers. now, i tell you, lord, that i am glad to die, because i have been full of mad thoughts for a long time, but now my mind is clear. tell me, master, why you come." bones explained his errand, and the old man's eyes brightened. "lord, if i could go with you to the forest, i would bring to you many beautiful leopards by my magic. now, because i love sandi, i will do this for you, so that you shall know how wise and cunning i am." in the woods about the village was a wild plant, the seeds of which, when pounded and boiled in an earthen vessel, produced, by a rough method of distillation, a most pungent liquid. abid spoke learnedly of _pimpinella anisum_, and probably he was right.[ ] [footnote : both anise and star anise (_illicium anisatum_) are to be found in the territories, as also is a small plant which has all the properties (and more) of _pimpinella anisum_. this was probably the plant.--author.] bones and his assistant made many excursions into the woods before they found and brought back the right plant. fortunately it was seed-time, and once he was on the right track bones had no difficulty in securing more than a sufficient quantity for his purpose. he made his distillation under the old man's directions, the fire burning in the middle of the hut. as the drops began to fall from the narrow neck of his retort, a fault sweet aroma filled the hut. first the cat, then the monkeys began to show signs of extraordinary agitation. cat and kittens crouched as near the fire as they could, their heads craned towards the brown vessel, mewing and whimpering. then the monkeys came, bright-eyed and eager. the scent brought the most unexpected beasts from every hole and crevice in the hut--brown rats, squirrels, a long black snake with spade-shaped head and diamond markings, little bush hares, a young buck, which came crashing through the forest and prinked timidly to the door of the hut. the old man on the bed called them all by name, and snapped his feeble fingers to them; but their eyes were on the retort and the crystal drops that trembled and fell from the lip of the narrow spout. * * * * * a week later a speechless group stood before the residency and focussed their astonished gaze upon the miracle. "the miracle" was a half-grown leopard cub, vividly marked. he was muzzled and held in leash by a chain affixed to a stout collar, and bones, a picture of smug gratification, held the end of the chain. "but how--how did you catch him?" gasped the girl. bones shrugged his shoulders. "it is not for me, dear old friend, to tell of nights spent in the howlin' forest," he quavered, in the squeaky tone which invariably came to him when he was excited. "i'm not goin' to speak of myself. if you expect me to tell you how i trailed the jolly old leopard to his grisly lair an' fought with him single-handed, you'll be disappointed." "but did you track him to his lair?" demanded hamilton, recovering his speech. "i beg of you, dear old officer, to discuss other matters," evaded bones tactfully. "here are the goods delivered, as per mine of the twenty-fourth instant." he put his hand to his pocket mechanically, and the cub looked up with a quick eager stare. "bones, you're a wonderful fellow," said sanders quietly. bones bowed. "and now," he said, "if you'll excuse me, i'll take my little friend to his new home." before they realized what he was doing, he had slipped off the chain. even sanders stepped back and dropped his hand to the automatic pistol he carried in his hip pocket. but bones, unconcerned, whistled and marched off to his hut, and the great cat followed humbly at his heels. that same night bones strode across from his hut to the residency, resolved upon a greater adventure yet. he would go out under the admiring eyes of patricia hamilton, and would return from the residency woods a veritable pied piper, followed by a trail of forest denizens. in his pocket was a quart bottle, and his clothes reeked with the scent of wild aniseed. as a matter of fact, his secret would have been out the moment he entered sanders's dining-room, but it so happened that his programme was doomed to interruption. he was half-way across the square when a dark figure rose from the ground and a harsh voice grunted "kill!" he saw the flash of the spear in the starlight and leapt aside. a hand clutched at his jacket, but he wrenched himself free, leaving the garment in his assailant's hands. he was unarmed, and there was nothing left but flight. sanders heard his yell, and sprang out to the darkness of the verandah as bones flew up the steps. he saw the two men racing in pursuit, and fired twice. one man fell, the other swerved and was lost in the shadows. an answering shot came from the houssa sentry at the far end of the square. sanders saw a man running, and fired again, and again missed. then out of the darkness blundered ali abid, his face grey with fear. "sir," he gasped, "wild animal (_felis pardus_) has divested muzzlement and proper restraint, and is chasing various subjects outrageously." even as he spoke a fourth figure sped across the ground before the residency, so close that they could see the bundle he carried under his arm. "my jacket!" roared bones. "hi, stop him! good lord!" swift on the heels of the flying man came a streak of yellow fur.... whether o'ka of the jumburu outpaced the leopard, or the leopard overtook o'ka, is not known, but until the rains came and washed away the scent of crude aniseed, bones dared not leave his hut by night for fear of the strange beasts that came snuffling at his hut, or sat in expectant and watchful circles about his dwelling, howling dismally. chapter ix the mercenaries there was a large brown desk in sanders's study, a desk the edges of which had been worn yellow with constant rubbing. it was a very tidy desk, with two rows of books neatly grouped on the left and on the right, and held in place by brass rails. there were three tiers of wire baskets, a great white blotting-pad, a silver inkstand and four clean-looking pens. lately, there had appeared a glass vase filled with flowers which were daily renewed. except on certain solemn occasions, none intruded into this holy of holies. it is true that a change had been brought about by the arrival of patricia hamilton, for she had been accorded permission to use the study as she wished, and she it was who had introduced the floral decorations. yet, such was the tradition of sanctuary which enveloped the study, that neither captain hamilton, her brother, nor bones, her slave, had ever ventured to intrude thither in search of her, and if by chance they came to the door to speak to her, they unaccountably lowered their voices. on a certain summer morning, hamilton sat at the desk, a stern and sober figure, and bones, perspiring and rattled, sat on the edge of a chair facing him. the occasion was a solemn one, for bones was undergoing his examination in subjects "x" and "y" for promotion to the rank of captain. the particular subject under discussion was "map reading and field sketching," and the inquisition was an oral one. "lieutenant tibbetts," said hamilton gravely, "you will please define a base line." bones pushed back the hair straggling over his forehead, and blinked rapidly in an effort of memory. "a base line, dear old officer?" he repeated. "a base line, dear old ham----" "restrain your endearing terms," said hamilton, "you won't get any extra marks for 'em." "a base line?" mused bones; then, "whoop! i've got it! god bless your jolly old soul! i thought i'd foozled it. a base line," he said loudly, "is the difference of level between two adjacent contours. how's that, umpire?" "wrong," said hamilton; "you're describing a vertical interval." bones glared at him. "are you sure, dear old chap?" he demanded truculently. "have a look at the book, jolly old friend, your poor old eyes ain't what they used to be----" "lieutenant tibbetts," said hamilton in ponderous reproof, "you are behaving very strangely." "look here, dear old ham," wheedled bones "can't you pretend you asked me what a vertical interval was?" hamilton reached round to find something to throw, but this was sanders's study. "you have a criminal mind, bones," he said helplessly. "now get on with it. what are 'hachures'?" "hachures?" said bones, shutting his eye. "hachures? now i know what hachures are. a lot of people would think they were chickens, but i know ... they're a sort of line ... when you're drawing a hill ... wiggly-waggly lines ... you know the funny things ... a sort of...." bones made mysterious and erratic gestures in the air, "shading ... water, dear old friend." "are you feeling faint?" asked hamilton, jumping up in alarm. "no, silly ass ... shadings ... direction of water--am i right, sir?" "not being a thought-reader i can't visualize your disordered mind," said hamilton, "but hachures are the conventional method of representing hill features by shading in short vertical lines to indicate the slope and the water flow. i gather that you have a hazy idea of what the answer should be." "i thank you, dear old sir, for that generous tribute to my grasp of military science," said bones. "an' now proceed to the next torture--which will you have, sir, rack or thumbscrew?--oh, thank you, horace, i'll have a glass of boiling oil." "shut up talking to yourself," growled hamilton, "and tell me what is meant by 'orienting a map'?" "turning it to the east," said bones promptly. "next, sir." "what is meant by 'orienting a map'?" asked hamilton patiently. "i've told you once," said bones defiantly. "orienting a map," said hamilton, "as i have explained to you a thousand times, means setting your map or plane-table so that the north line lies north." "in that case, sir," said bones firmly, "the east line would be east, and i claim to have answered the question to your entire satisfaction." "continue to claim," snarled hamilton. "i shall mark you zero for that answer." "make it one," pleaded bones. "be a sport, dear old ham--i've found a new fishin' pool." hamilton hesitated. "there never are any fish in the pools you find," he said dubiously. "anyway, i'll reserve my decision until i've made a cast or two." they adjourned for tiffin soon after. "how did you do, bones?" asked patricia hamilton. "fine," said bones enthusiastically; "i simply bowled over every question that your dear old brother asked. in fact, ham admitted that i knew much more about some things than he did." "what i said," corrected hamilton, "was that your information on certain subjects was so novel that i doubted whether even the staff college shared it." "it's the same thing," said bones. "you should try him on military history," suggested sanders dryly. "i've just been hearing from bosambo----" bones coughed and blushed. "the fact is, sir an' excellency," he confessed, "i was practisin' on bosambo. you mightn't be aware of the fact, but i like to hear myself speak----" "no!" gasped hamilton in amazement, "you're wronging yourself, bones!" "what i mean, sir," bones went on with dignity, "is that if i lecture somebody on a subject i remember what i've said." "always providing that you understand what you're saying," suggested hamilton. "anyway," said sanders, with his quiet smile, "bones has filled bosambo with a passionate desire to emulate napoleon, and bosambo has been making tentative inquiries as to whether he can raise an old guard or enlist a mercenary army." "i flatter myself----" began bones. "why not?" said hamilton, rising. "it's the only chance you'll have of hearing something complimentary about yourself." "_i_ believe in you, bones," said a smiling patricia. "i think you're really wonderful, and that ham is a brute." "i'll never, never contradict you, dear miss patricia," said bones; "an' after the jolly old commissioner has gone----" "you're not going away again, are you?" she asked, turning to sanders. "why, you have only just come back from the interior." there was genuine disappointment in her eyes, and sanders experienced a strange thrill the like of which he had never known before. "yes," he said with a nod. "there is a palaver of sorts in the morjaba country--the most curious palaver i have ever been called upon to hold." and indeed he spoke the truth. beyond the frontiers of the akasava, and separated from all the other territories by a curious bush belt which ran almost in a straight line for seventy miles, were the people of morjaba. they were a folk isolated from territorial life, and sanders saw them once every year and no more frequently, for they were difficult to come by, regular payers of taxes and law-abiding, having quarrels with none. the bush (reputedly the abode of ghosts) was, save at one point, impenetrable. nature had plaited a natural wall on one side, and had given the tribe the protection of high mountains to the north and a broad swamp to the west. the fierce storms of passion and hate which burst upon the river at intervals and sent thousands of spears to a blooding, were scarcely echoed in this sanctuary-land. the marauders of the great king's country to the north never fetched across the smooth moraine of the mountains, and the evil people of the-land-beyond-the-swamp were held back by the treacherous bogland wherein, _cala-cala_, a whole army had been swallowed up. thus protected, the morjabian folk grew fat and rich. the land was a veritable treasure of nature, and it is a fact that in the dialect they speak, there is no word which means "hunger."[ ] [footnote : it is as curious a fact that amongst the majority of cannibal people there is no equivalent for "thank you."--e. w.] yet the people of the morjaba were not without their crises. s'kobi, the stout chief, held a great court which was attended by ten thousand people, for at that court was to be concluded for ever the feud between the m'gimi and the m'joro--a feud which went back for the greater part of fifty years. the m'gimi were the traditional warrior tribe, the bearers of arms, and, as their name ("the high lookers") implied, the proudest and most exclusive of the people. for every man was the descendant of a chief, and it was "easier for fish to walk," as the saying goes, than for a man of the m'joro ("the diggers") to secure admission to the caste. three lateral cuts on either cheek was the mark of the m'gimi--wounds made, upon the warrior's initiation to the order, with the razor-edged blade of a killing-spear. they lived apart in three camps to the number of six thousand men, and for five years from the hour of their initiation they neither married nor courted. the m'gimi turned their backs to women, and did not suffer their presence in their camps. and if any man departed from this austere rule he was taken to the breaking tree, his four limbs were fractured, and he was hoisted to the lower branches, between which a litter was swung, and his regiment sat beneath the tree neither eating, drinking nor sleeping until he died. sometimes this was a matter of days. as for the woman who had tempted his eye and his tongue, she was a witness. thus the m'gimi preserved their traditions of austerity. they were famous walkers and jumpers. they threw heavy spears and fought great sham-fights, and they did every violent exercise save till the ground. this was the sum and substance of the complaint which had at last come to a head. s'gono, the spokesman of the diggers, was a headman of the inner lands, and spoke with bitter prejudice, since his own son had been rejected by the m'gimi captains as being unworthy. "shall we men dig and sow for such as these?" he asked. "now give a judgment, king! every moon we must take the best of our fruit and the finest of our fish. also so many goats and so much salt, and it is swallowed up." "yet if i send them away," said the king, "how shall i protect this land against the warriors of the akasava and the evil men of the swamp? also of the ochori, who are four days' march across good ground?" "lord king," said s'gono, "are there no m'gimi amongst us who have passed from the camp and have their women and their children? may not these take the spear again? and are not we m'joro folk men? by my life! i will raise as many spears from the diggers and captain them with m'joro men--this i could do between the moons and none would say that you were not protected. for we are men as bold as they." the king saw that the m'gimi party was in the minority. moreover, he had little sympathy with the warrior caste, for his beginnings were basely rooted in the soil, and two of his sons had no more than scraped into the m'gimi. "this thing shall be done," said the king, and the roar of approval which swept up the little hillock on which he sat was his reward. sanders, learning something of these doings, had come in haste, moving across the lower akasava by a short cut, risking the chagrin of certain chiefs and friends who would be shocked and mortified by his apparent lack of courtesy in missing the ceremonious call which was their due. but his business was very urgent, otherwise he would not have travelled by nobolama--the-river-that-comes-and-goes. he was fortunate in that he found deep water for the _wiggle_ as far as the edge of this pleasant land. a two days' trek through the forest brought him to the great city of morjaba. in all the territories there was no such city as this, for it stretched for miles on either hand, and indeed was one of the most densely populated towns within a radius of five hundred miles. s'kobi came waddling to meet his governor with maize, plucked in haste from the gardens he passed, and salt, grabbed at the first news of sanders's arrival, in his big hands. these he extended as he puffed to where sanders sat at the edge of the city. "lord," he wheezed, "none came with news of this great honour, or my young men would have met you, and my maidens would have danced the road flat with their feet. take!" sanders extended both palms and received the tribute of salt and corn, and solemnly handed the crushed mess to his orderly. "o s'kobi," he said, "i came swiftly to make a secret palaver with you, and my time is short." "lord, i am your man," said s'kobi, and signalled his councillors and elder men to a distance. sanders was in some difficulty to find a beginning. "you know, s'kobi, that i love your people as my children," he said, "for they are good folk who are faithful to government and do ill to none." "wa!" said s'kobi. "also you know that spearmen and warriors i do not love, for spears are war and warriors are great lovers of fighting." "lord, you speak the truth," said the other, nodding, "therefore in this land i will have made a law that there shall be no spears, save those which sleep in the shadow of my hut. now well i know why you have come to make this palaver, for you have heard with your beautiful long ears that i have sent away my fighting regiments." sanders nodded. "you speak truly, my friend," he said, and s'kobi beamed. "six times a thousand spears i had--and, lord, spears grow no corn. rather are they terrible eaters. and now i have sent them to their villages, and at the next moon they should have burnt their fine war-knives, but for a certain happening. we folk of morjaba have no enemies, and we do good to all. moreover, lord, as you know, we have amongst us many folk of the isisi, of the akasava and the n'gombi, also men from the great king's land beyond the high rocks, and the little folk from the-land-beyond-the-swamp. therefore, who shall attack us since we have kinsmen of all amongst us?" sanders regarded the jovial king with a sad little smile. "have i done well by all men?" he asked quietly. "have i not governed the land so that punishment comes swiftly to those who break the law? yet, s'kobi, do not the akasava and the isisi, the n'gombi and the lower river folk take their spears against me? now i tell you this which i have discovered. in all beasts great and little there are mothers who have young ones and fathers who fight that none shall harass the mother." "lord, this is the way of life," said s'kobi. "it is the way of the bigger life," said sanders, "and greatly the way of man-life. for the women bring children to the land and the men sit with their spears ready to fight all who would injure their women. and so long as life lasts, s'kobi, the women will bear and the men will guard; it is the way of nature, and you shall not take from men the desire for slaughter until you have dried from the hearts of women the yearning for children." "lord," said s'kobi, a fat man and easily puzzled, "what shall be the answer to this strange riddle you set me?" "only this," said sanders rising, "i wish peace in this land, but there can be no peace between the leopard who has teeth and claws and the rabbit who has neither tooth nor claw. does the leopard fight the lion or the lion the leopard? they live in peace, for each is terrible in his way, and each fears the other. i tell you this, that you live in love with your neighbours not because of your kindness, but because of your spears. call them back to your city, s'kobi." the chief's large face wrinkled in a frown. "lord," he said, "that cannot be, for these men have marched away from my country to find a people who will feed them, for they are too proud to dig the ground." "oh, damn!" said sanders in despair, and went back the way he came, feeling singularly helpless. the odyssey of the discarded army of the morjaba has yet to be written. paradoxically enough, its primary mission was a peaceful one, and when it found first the frontiers of the akasava and then the river borders of the isisi closed against it, it turned to the north in an endeavour to find service under the great king, beyond the mountains. here it was repulsed and its pacific intentions doubted. the m'gimi formed a camp a day's march from the ochori border, and were on the thin line which separates unemployment from anarchy when bosambo, chief of the ochori, who had learnt of their presence, came upon the scene. bosambo was a born politician. he had the sense of opportunity and that strange haze of hopeful but indefinite purpose which is the foundation of the successful poet and statesman, but which, when unsuccessfully developed, is described as "temperament." bones, paying a business call upon the ochori, found a new township grown up on the forest side of the city. he also discovered evidence of discontent in bosambo's harassed people, who had been called upon to provide fish and meal for the greater part of six thousand men who were too proud to work. "master," said bosambo, "i have often desired such an army as this, for my ochori fighters are few. now, lord, with these men i can hold the upper river for your king, and sandi and none dare speak against him. thus would n'poloyani, who is your good friend, have done." "but who shall feed these men, bosambo?" demanded bones hastily. "all things are with god," replied bosambo piously. bones collected all the available information upon the matter and took it back to headquarters. "h'm," said sanders when he had concluded his recital, "if it were any other man but bosambo ... you would require another battalion, hamilton." "but what has bosambo done?" asked patricia hamilton, admitted to the council. "he is being napoleonic," said sanders, with a glance at the youthful authority on military history, and bones squirmed and made strange noises. "we will see how it works out. how on earth is he going to feed them, bones?" "exactly the question i asked, sir an' excellency," said bones in triumph. "'why, you silly old ass----'" "i beg your pardon!" exclaimed the startled sanders. "that is what i said to bosambo, sir," explained bones hastily. "'why, you silly old ass,' i said, 'how are you going to grub 'em?' 'lord bones,' said bosambo, 'that's the jolly old problem that i'm workin' out.'" how bosambo worked out his problem may be gathered. "there is some talk of an akasava rising," said sanders at breakfast one morning. "i don't know why this should be, for my information is that the akasava folk are fairly placid." "where does the news come from, sir?" asked hamilton. "from the isisi king--he's in a devil of a funk, and has begged bosambo to send him help." that help was forthcoming in the shape of bosambo's new army, which arrived on the outskirts of the isisi city and sat in idleness for a month, at the end of which time the people of the isisi represented to their king that they would, on the whole, prefer war to a peace which put them on half rations in order that six thousand proud warriors might live on the fat of the land. the m'gimi warriors marched back to the ochori, each man carrying a month's supply of maize and salt, wrung from the resentful peasants of the isisi. three weeks after, bosambo sent an envoy to the king of the akasava. "let no man know this, gubara, lest it come to the ears of sandi, and you, who are very innocent, be wrongly blamed," said the envoy solemnly. "thus says bosambo: it has come to my ears that the n'gombi are secretly arming and will very soon send a forest of spears against the akasava. say this to gubara, that because my stomach is filled with sorrow i will help him. because i am very powerful, because of my friendship with bonesi and his cousin, n'poloyani, who is also married to bonesi's aunt, i have a great army which i will send to the akasava, and when the n'gombi hear of this they will send away their spears and there will be peace." the akasava chief, a nervous man with the memory of all the discomforts which follow tribal wars, eagerly assented. for two months bosambo's army sat down like a cloud of locusts and ate the akasava to a condition bordering upon famine. at the end of that time they marched to the n'gombi country, news having been brought by bosambo's messengers that the great king was crossing the western mountains with a terrible army to seize the n'gombi forests. how long this novel method of provisioning his army might have continued may only be guessed, for in the midst of bosambo's plans for maintaining an army at the expense of his neighbours there was a great happening in the morjaba country. s'kobi, the fat chief, had watched the departure of his warriors with something like relief. he was gratified, moreover (native-like), by the fact that he had confounded sanders. but when the commissioner had gone and s'kobi remembered all that he had said, a great doubt settled like a pall upon his mind. for three days he sat, a dejected figure, on the high carved stool of state before his house, and at the end of that time he summoned s'gono, the m'joro. "s'gono," said he, "i am troubled in my stomach because of certain things which our lord sandi has said." thereupon he told the plebeian councillor much of what sanders had said. "and now my m'gimi are with bosambo of the ochori, and he sells them to this people and that for so much treasure and food." "lord," said s'gono, "is my word nothing? did i not say that i would raise spears more wonderful than the m'gimi? give me leave, king, and you shall find an army that shall grow in a night. i, s'gono, son of mocharlabili yoka, say this!" so messengers went forth to all the villages of the morjaba calling the young men to the king's hut, and on the third week there stood on a plateau beneath the king's palaver house a most wonderful host. "let them march across the plain and make the dance of killing," said the satisfied king, and s'gono hesitated. "lord king," he pleaded, "these are new soldiers, and they are not yet wise in the ways of warriors. also they will not take the chiefs i gave them, but have chosen their own, so that each company have two leaders who say evil things of one another." s'kobi opened his round eyes. "the m'gimi did not do this," he said dubiously, "for when their captains spoke they leapt first with one leg and then with the other, which was beautiful to see and very terrifying to our enemies." "lord," begged the agitated s'gono, "give me the space of a moon and they shall leap with both legs and dance in a most curious manner." a spy retailed this promise to a certain giant chief of the great king who was sitting on the morjaba slopes of the mountains with four thousand spears, awaiting a favourable moment to ford the river which separated him from the rich lands of the northern morjaba. this giant heard the tidings with interest. "soon they shall leap without heads," he said, "for without the m'gimi they are little children. for twenty seasons we have waited, and now comes our fine night. go you, b'furo, to the chief of the-folk-beyond-the-swamp and tell him that when he sees three fires on this mountain he shall attack across the swamp by the road which he knows." it was a well-planned campaign which the great king's generals and the chief of the-people-beyond-the-marsh had organized. with the passing of the warrior caste the enemies of the morjaba had moved swiftly. the path across the swamp had been known for years, but the m'gimi had had one of their camps so situated that no enemy could debouch across, and had so ordered their dispositions that the northern river boundary was automatically safeguarded. now s'gono was a man of the fields, a grower and seller of maize and a breeder of goats. and he had planned his new army as he would plan a new garden, on the basis that the nearer the army was to the capital, the easier it was to maintain. in consequence the river-ford was unguarded, and there were two thousand spears across the marshes before a scared minister of war apprehended any danger. he flung his new troops against the great king's chief captain in a desperate attempt to hold back the principal invader. at the same time, more by luck than good generalship, he pushed the evil people of the marsh back to their native element. for two days the morjaba fought desperately if unskilfully against the seasoned troops of the great king, while messengers hurried east and south, seeking help. bosambo's intelligence department may have shown remarkable prescience in unearthing the plot against the peace and security of the morjaba, or it may have been (and this is sanders's theory) that bosambo was on his way to the morjaba with a cock and bull story of imminent danger. he was on the frontier when the king's messenger came, and bosambo returned with the courier to treat in person. "five thousand loads of corn i will give you, bosambo," said the king, "also a hundred bags of salt. also two hundred women who shall be slaves in your house." there was some bargaining, for bosambo had no need of slaves, but urgently wanted goats. in the end he brought up his hirelings, and the people of the morjaba city literally fell on the necks of the returned m'gimi. the enemy had forced the northern defences and were half-way to the city when the m'gimi fell upon their flank. the giant chief of the great king's army saw the ordered ranks of the old army driving in his flank, and sent for his own captain. "go swiftly to our lord, the king, and say that i am a dead man." he spoke no more than the truth, for he fell at the hand of bosambo, who made a mental resolve to increase his demand on the herds of s'kobi in consequence. for the greater part of a month bosambo was a welcome visitor, and at the end of that time he made his preparations to depart. carriers and herdsmen drove or portered his reward back to the ochori country, marching one day ahead of the main body. the m'gimi were summoned for the march at dawn, but at dawn bosambo found himself alone on the plateau, save for the few ochori headmen who had accompanied him on his journey. "lord," said s'kobi, "my fine soldiers do not go with you, for i have seen how wise is sandi who is my father and my mother." bosambo choked, and as was usual in moments of intense emotion, found refuge in english. "dam' nigger!" he said wrathfully, "i bring um army, i feed um, i keep um proper--you pinch um! black t'ief! pig! you bad feller! i speak you bad for n'poloyani--him fine feller." "lord," said the uncomprehending king, "i see that you are like sandi for you speak his tongue. he also said 'dam' very loudly. i think it is the word white folk say when they are happy." bosambo met bones hurrying to the scene of the fighting, and told his tale. "lord," said he in conclusion, "what was i to do, for you told nothing of the ways of n'poloyani when his army was stolen from him. tell me now, tibbetti, what this man would have done." but bones shook his head severely. "this i cannot tell you, bosambo," he said, "for if i do you will tell others, and my lord n'poloyani will never forgive me." chapter x the waters of madness unexpected things happen in the territories which mr. commissioner sanders rules. as for example: bones had gone down to the beach to "take the mail." this usually meant no more than receiving a mail-bag wildly flung from a dancing surf-boat. on this occasion bones was surprised to discover that the boat had beached and had landed, not only the mail, but a stranger with his baggage. he was a clean-shaven, plump man, in spotless white, and he greeted bones with a friendly nod. "morning!" he said. "i've got your mail." bones extended his hand and took the bag without evidence of any particular enthusiasm. "sanders about?" asked the stranger. "mr. sanders is in residence, sir," said bones, ponderously polite. the other laughed. "show the way," he said briskly. bones looked at the new-comer from the ventilator of his pith helmet to the soles of his pipe-clayed shoes. "excuse me, dear old sir," he said, "have i the honour of addressin' the secretary of state for war?" "no," answered the other in surprise. "what made you think that?" "because," said bones, with rising wrath, "he's the only fellow that needn't say 'please' to me." the man roared with laughter. "sorry," he said. "_please_ show me the way." "follow me, sir," said bones. sanders was not "in residence," being, in fact, inspecting some recent--and native--repairs to the boilers of the _zaire_. the stranger drew up a chair on the stoep without invitation and seated himself. he looked around. patricia hamilton was at the far end of the stoep, reading a book. she had glanced up just long enough to note and wonder at the new arrival. "deuced pretty girl that," said the stranger, lighting a cigar. "i beg your pardon?" said bones. "i say that is a deuced pretty girl," said the stranger. "and you're a deuced brute, dear sir," said bones, "but hitherto i have not commented on the fact." the man looked up quickly. "what are you here," he asked--"a clerk or something?" bones did not so much as flush. "oh, no," he said sweetly. "i am an officer of houssas--rank, lieutenant. my task is to tame the uncivilized beast an' entertain the civilized pig with a selection of music. would you like to hear our gramophone?" the new-comer frowned. what brilliant effort of persiflage was to follow will never be known, for at that moment came sanders. the stranger rose and produced a pocket-book, from which he extracted a card and a letter. "good morning, commissioner!" he said. "my name's corklan--p. t. corklan, of corklan, besset and lyons." "indeed," said sanders. "i've got a letter for you," said the man. sanders took the note, opened it, and read. it bore the neat signature of an under-secretary of state and the embossed heading of the extra-territorial office, and it commended mr. p. t. corklan to mr. commissioner sanders, and requested him to let mr. corklan pass without let or hindrance through the territories, and to render him every assistance "compatible with exigencies of the service" in his "inquiries into sugar production from the sweet potato." "you should have taken this to the administrator," said sanders, "and it should bear his signature." "there's the letter," said the man shortly. "if that's not enough, and the signature of the secretary of state isn't sufficient, i'm going straight back to england and tell him so." "you may go to the devil and tell him so," said sanders calmly; "but you do not pass into these territories until i have received telegraphic authority from my chief. bones, take this man to your hut, and let your people do what they can for him." and he turned and walked into the house. "you shall hear about this," said mr. corklan, picking up his baggage. "this way, dear old pilgrim," said bones. "who's going to carry my bag?" "your name escapes me," said bones, "but, if you'll glance at your visitin' card, you will find the name of the porter legibly inscribed." sanders compressed the circumstances into a hundred-word telegram worded in his own economical style. it happened that the administrator was away on a shooting trip, and it was his cautious secretary who replied-- "administration to sanders.--duplicate authority here. let corklan proceed at own risk. warn him dangers." "you had better go along and tell him," said sanders. "he can leave at once, and the sooner the better." bones delivered the message. the man was sitting on his host's bed, and the floor was covered with cigar ash. worst abomination of all, was a large bottle of whisky, which he had produced from one of his bags, and a reeking glass, which he had produced from bones's sideboard. "so i can go to-night, can i?" said mr. corklan. "that's all right. now, what about conveyance, hey?" bones had now reached the stage where he had ceased to be annoyed, and when he found some interest in the situation. "what sort of conveyance would you like, sir?" he asked curiously. (if you can imagine him pausing half a bar before every "sir," you may value its emphasis.) "isn't there a steamer i can have?" demanded the man. "hasn't sanders got a government steamer?" "pardon my swooning," said bones, sinking into a chair. "well, how am i going to get up?" asked the man. "are you a good swimmer?" demanded bones innocently. "look here," said mr. corklan, "you aren't a bad fellow. i rather like you." "i'm sorry," said bones simply. "i rather like you," repeated mr. corklan. "you might give me a little help." "it is very unlikely that i shall," said bones. "but produce your proposition, dear old adventurer." "that is just what i am," said the other. he bit off the end of another cigar and lit it with the glowing butt of the old one. "i have knocked about all over the world, and i have done everything. i've now a chance of making a fortune. there is a tribe here called the n'gombi. they live in a wonderful rubber country, and i am told that they have got all the ivory in the world, and stacks of rubber hidden away." now, it is a fact--and bones was surprised to hear it related by the stranger--that the n'gombi are great misers and hoarders of elephant tusks. for hundreds of years they have traded ivory and rubber, and every village has its secret storehouse. the government had tried for years to wheedle the n'gombi into depositing their wealth in some state store, for riches mean war sooner or later. they lived in great forests--the word n'gombi means "interior"--in lands full of elephants and rich in rubber trees. "you are a regular information bureau," said bones admiringly. "but what has this to do with your inquiry into the origin of the candy tree?" the man smoked in silence for awhile, then he pulled from his pocket a big map. again bones was surprised, because the map he produced was the official map of the territories. he traced the river with his fat forefinger. "here is the n'gombi country from the east bank of the isisi, and this is all forest, and a rubber tree to every ten square yards." "i haven't counted them," said bones, "but i'll take your word." "now, what does this mean?" mr. corklan indicated a twisting line of dots and dashes which began at the junction of the isisi river and the great river, and wound tortuously over five hundred miles of country until it struck the sigi river, which runs through spanish territory. "what is that?" he asked. "that, or those," said bones, "are the footprints of the mighty swoozlum bird that barks with its eyes an' lives on buttered toast an' hardware." "i will tell you what i know it is," said the man, looking up and looking bones straight in the eye--"it is one of those secret rivers you are always finding in these 'wet' countries. the natives tell you about 'em, but you never find 'em. they are rivers that only exist about once in a blue moon, when the river is very high and the rains are very heavy. now, down in the spanish territory"--he touched bones's knee with great emphasis--"they tell me that their end of the secret river is in flood." "they will tell you anything in the spanish territory," said bones pleasantly. "they'd tell you your jolly old fortune if you'd cross their palms with silver." "what about your end?" asked the man, ignoring the scepticism of his host. "our end?" said bones. "well, you will find out for yourself. i'd hate to disappoint you." "now, how am i going up?" asked the man after a pause. "you can hire a canoe, and live on the land, unless you have brought stores." the man chuckled. "i've brought no stores. here, i will show you something," he said. "you are a very good fellow." he opened his bag and took out a tight packet which looked like thin skins. there must have been two or three hundred of them. "that's my speciality," he said. he nipped the string that tied them together, stripped one off, and, putting his lips to one end, blew. the skin swelled up like a toy balloon. "do you know what that is?" "no, i cannot say i do," said bones. "you have heard of soemmering's process?" bones shook his head. "do you know what decimal signifies?" "you've got me guessing, my lad," said bones admiringly. the other chuckled, threw the skins into his bag, and closed it with a snap. "that's my little joke," he said. "all my friends tell me it will be the death of me one of these days. i like to puzzle people"--he smiled amiably and triumphantly in bones's face--"i like to tell them the truth in such a way they don't understand it. if they understood it--heavens, there'd be the devil to pay!" "you are an ingenious fellow," said bones, "but i don't like your face. you will forgive my frankness, dear old friend." "faces aren't fortunes," said the other complacently, "and i am going out of this country with money sticking to me." "i'm sorry for you," said bones, shaking his head; "i hate to see fellows with illusions." he reported all that occurred to the commissioner, and sanders was a little worried. "i wish i knew what his game is," he said; "i'd stop him like a shot, but i can't very well in the face of the administrator's wire. anyway, he will get nothing out of the n'gombi. i've tried every method to make the beggars bank their surpluses, and i have failed." "he has got to come back this way, at any rate," said hamilton, "and i cannot see that he will do much harm." "what is the rest of his baggage like?" "he has a case of things that look like concave copper plates, sir," said bones, "very thin copper, but copper. then he has two or three copper pipes, and that is about his outfit." mr. corklan was evidently no stranger to the coast, and bones, who watched the man's canoe being loaded that afternoon, and heard his fluent observations on the slackness of his paddlers, realized that his acquaintance with central africa was an extensive one. he cursed in swahili and portuguese, and his language was forcible and impolite. "well," he said at last, "i'll be getting along. i'll make a fishing village for the night, and i ought to reach my destination in a week. i shan't be seeing you again, so i'll say good-bye." "how do you suppose you're going to get out of the country?" asked bones curiously. mr. corklan laughed. "so long!" he said. "one moment, my dashin' old explorer," said bones. "a little formality--i want to see your trunks opened." a look of suspicion dawned on the man's face. "what for?" "a little formality, my jolly old hero," said bones. "why didn't you say so before?" growled the man, and had his two trunks landed. "i suppose you know you're exceeding your duty?" "i didn't know--thanks for tellin' me," said bones. "the fact is, sir an' fellow-man, i'm the custom house officer." the man opened his bags, and bones explored. he found three bottles of whisky, and these he extracted. "what's the idea?" asked mr. corklan. bones answered him by breaking the bottles on a near-by stone. "here, what the dickens----" "wine is a mocker," said bones, "strong drink is ragin'. this is what is termed in the land of hope an' glory a prohibition state, an' i'm entitled to fine you five hundred of the brightest an' best for attemptin' to smuggle intoxicants into our innocent country." bones expected an outburst; instead, his speech evoked no more than a snigger. "you're funny," said the man. "my friends tell me so," admitted bones. "but there's nothin' funny about drink. acquainted as you are with the peculiar workin's of the native psychology, dear sir, you will understand the primitive cravin' of the untutored mind for the enemy that we put in our mouths to steal away our silly old brains. i wish you 'bon voyage.'" "so long," said mr. corklan. bones went back to the residency and made his report, and there, for the time being, the matter ended. it was not unusual for wandering scientists, manufacturers, and representatives of shipping companies to arrive armed with letters of introduction or command, and to be dispatched into the interior. the visits, happily, were few and far between. on this occasion sanders, being uneasy, sent one of his spies to follow the adventurer, with orders to report any extraordinary happening--a necessary step to take, for the n'gombi, and especially the inner n'gombi, are a secretive people, and news from local sources is hard to come by. "i shall never be surprised to learn that a war has been going on in the n'gombi for two months without our hearing a word about it." "if they fight amongst themselves--yes," said captain hamilton; "if they fight outsiders, there will be plenty of bleats. why not send bones to overlook his sugar experiments," he added. "let's talk about something pleasant," said bones hastily. it was exactly three months later when he actually made the trip. "take the _zaire_ up to the bend of the isisi," said sanders one morning, at breakfast, "and find out what ali kano is doing--the lazy beggar should have reported." "any news from the n'gombi?" asked hamilton. "only roundabout stories of their industry. apparently the sugar merchant is making big experiments. he has set half the people digging roots for him. be ready to sail at dawn." "will it be a dangerous trip?" asked the girl. "no. why?" smiled sanders. "because i'd like to go. oh, please, don't look so glum! bones is awfully good to me." "better than a jolly old brother," murmured bones. "h'm!" sanders shook his head, and she appealed to her brother. "please!" "i wouldn't mind your going," said hamilton, "if only to look after bones." "s-sh!" said bones reproachfully. "if you're keen on it, i don't see why you shouldn't--if you had a chaperon." "a chaperon!" sneered bones. "great heavens! do, old skipper, pull yourself together. open the jolly old window and give him air. feelin' better, sir?" "a chaperon! how absurd!" cried the girl indignantly. "i'm old enough to be bones's mother! i'm nearly twenty--well, i'm older than bones, and i'm ever so much more capable of looking after myself." the end of it was that she went, with her kano maid and with the wife of abiboo to cook for her. and in two days they came to the bend of the river, and bones pursued his inquiries for the missing spy, but without success. "but this i tell you, lord," said the little chief who acted as sanders's agent, "that there are strange things happening in the n'gombi country, for all the people have gone mad, and are digging up their teeth (tusks) and bringing them to a white man." "this shall go to sandi," said bones, realizing the importance of the news; and that same evening he turned the bow of the _zaire_ down stream. * * * * * thus said wafa, the half-breed, for he was neither foreign arab nor native n'gombi, yet combined the cunning of both-- "soon we shall see the puc-a-puc of government turn from the crookedness of the river, and i will go out and speak to our lord tibbetti, who is a very simple man, and like a child." "o wafa," said one of the group of armed men which stood shivering on the beach in the cold hours of dawn, "may this be a good palaver! as for me, my stomach is filled with fearfulness. let us all drink this magic water, for it gives us men courage." "that you shall do when you have carried out all our master's works," said wafa, and added with confidence: "have no fear, for soon you shall see great wonders." they heard the deep boom of the _zaire's_ siren signalling a solitary and venturesome fisherman to quit the narrow fair-way, and presently she came round the bend of the river, a dazzling white craft, showering sparks from her two slender smoke-stacks and leaving behind her twin cornucopias of grey smoke. wafa stepped into a canoe, and, seeing that the others were preparing to follow him, he struck out swiftly, man[oe]uvring his ironwood boat to the very waters from whence a scared fisherman was frantically paddling. "go not there, foreigner," wailed the isisi stabber-of-waters, "for it is our lord sandi, and his puc-a-puc has bellowed terribly." "die you!" roared wafa. "on the river bottom your body, son of a fish and father of snakes!" "o foreign frog!" came the shrill retort. "o poor man with two men's wives! o goatless----" wafa was too intent upon his business to heed the rest. he struck the water strongly with his broad paddles, and reached the centre of the channel. bones of the houssas put up his hand and jerked the rope of the siren. _whoo-o-o--woo-o-op!_ "bless his silly old head," said bones fretfully, "the dashed fellow will be run down!" the girl was dusting bones's cabin, and looked round. "what is it?" she asked. bones made no reply. he gripped the telegraph handle and rung the engines astern as yoka, the steersman, spun the wheel. bump! bump! bumpity bump! the steamer slowed and stopped, and the girl came out to the bridge in alarm. the _zaire_ had struck a sandbank, and was stranded high, if not dry. "bring that man on board," said the wrathful bones. and they hauled to his presence wafa, who was neither arab nor n'gombi, but combined the vices of both. "o man," said bones, glaring at the offender through his eyeglass, "what evil ju-ju sent you to stop my fine ship?" he spoke in the isisi dialect, and was surprised to be answered in coast arabic. "lord," said the man, unmoved by the wrath of his overlord, "i come to make a great palaver concerning spirits and devils. lord, i have found a great magic." bones grinned, for he had that sense of humour which rises superior to all other emotions. "then you shall try your magic, my man, and lift this ship to deep water." wafa was not at all embarrassed. "lord, this is a greater magic, for it concerns men, and brings to life the dead. for, lord, in this forest is a wonderful tree. behold!" he took from his loose-rolled waistband a piece of wood. bones took it in his hand. it was the size of a corn cob, and had been newly cut, so that the wood was moist with sap. bones smelt it. there was a faint odour of resin and camphor. patricia hamilton smiled. it was so like bones to be led astray by side issues. "where is the wonder, man, that you should drive my ship upon a sandbank! and who are these?" bones pointed to six canoes, filled with men, approaching the _zaire_. the man did not answer, but, taking the wood from bones's hand, pulled a knife from his belt and whittled a shaving. "here, lord," he said, "is my fine magic. with this wood i can do many miracles, such as making sick men strong and the strong weak." bones heard the canoes bump against the side of the boat, but his mind was occupied with curiosity. "thus do i make my magic, tibbetti," droned wafa. he held the knife by the haft in the right hand, and the chip of wood in his left. the point of the knife was towards the white man's heart. "bones!" screamed the girl. bones jumped aside and struck out as the man lunged. his nobbly fist caught wafa under the jaw, and the man stumbled and fell. at the same instant there was a yell from the lower deck, the sound of scuffling, and a shot. bones jumped for the girl, thrust her into the cabin, sliding the steel door behind him. his two revolvers hung at the head of his bunk, and he slipped them out, gave a glance to see whether they were loaded, and pushed the door. "shut the door after me," he breathed. the bridge deck was deserted, and bones raced down the ladder to the iron deck. two houssas and half a dozen natives lay dead or dying. the remainder of the soldiers were fighting desperately with whatever weapons they found to their hands--for, with characteristic carefulness, they had laid their rifles away in oil, lest the river air rust them--and, save for the sentry, who used a rifle common to all, they were unarmed. "o dogs!" roared bones. the invaders turned and faced the long-barrelled webleys, and the fight was finished. later, wafa came to the bridge with bright steel manacles on his wrist. his companions in the mad adventure sat on the iron deck below, roped leg to leg, and listened with philosophic calm as the houssa sentry drew lurid pictures of the fate which awaited them. bones sat in his deep chair, and the prisoner squatted before him. "you shall tell my lord sandi why you did this wickedness," he said, "also, wafa, what evil thought was in your mind." "lord," said wafa cheerfully, "what good comes to me if i speak?" something about the man's demeanour struck bones as strange, and he rose and went close to him. "i see," he said, with a tightened lip. "the palaver is finished." they led the man away, and the girl, who had been a spectator, asked anxiously: "what is wrong, bones?" but the young man shook his head. "the breaking of all that sanders has worked for," he said bitterly, and the very absence of levity in one whose heart was so young and gay struck a colder chill to the girl's heart than the yells of the warring n'gombi. for sanders had a big place in patricia hamilton's life. in an hour the _zaire_ was refloated, and was going at full speed down stream. * * * * * sanders held his court in the thatched palaver house between the houssa guard-room and the little stockade prison at the river's edge--a prison hidden amidst the flowering shrubs and acacia trees. wafa was the first to be examined. "lord," he said, without embarrassment, "i tell you this--that i will not speak of the great wonders which lay in my heart unless you give me a book[ ] that i shall go free." [footnote : a written promise.] sanders smiled unpleasantly. "by the prophet, i say what is true," he began confidentially; and wafa winced at the oath, for he knew that truth was coming, and truth of a disturbing character. "in this land i govern millions of men," said sanders, speaking deliberately, "i and two white lords. i govern by fear, wafa, because there is no love in simple native men, save a love for their own and their bellies." "lord, you speak truth," said wafa, the superior arab of him responding to the confidence. "now, if you make to kill the lord tibbetti," sanders went on, "and do your wickedness for secret reasons, must i not discover what is that secret, lest it mean that i lose my hold upon the lands i govern?" "lord, that is also true," said wafa. "for what is one life more or less," asked sanders, "a suffering smaller or greater by the side of my millions and their good?" "lord, you are suliman," said wafa eagerly. "therefore, if you let me go, who shall be the worse for it?" again sanders smiled, that grim parting of lip to show his white teeth. "yet you may lie, and, if i let you go, i have neither the truth nor your body. no, wafa, you shall speak." he rose up from his chair. "to-day you shall go to the village of irons," he said; "to-morrow i will come to you, and you shall answer my questions. and, if you will not speak, i shall light a little fire on your chest, and that fire shall not go out except when the breath goes from your body. this palaver is finished." so they took wafa away to the village of irons, where the evil men of the territories worked with chains about their ankles for their many sins, and in the morning came sanders. "speak, man," he said. wafa stared with an effort of defiance, but his face was twitching, for he saw the soldiers driving pegs into the ground, preparatory to staking him out. "i will speak the truth," he said. so they took him into a hut, and there sanders sat with him alone for half an hour; and when the commissioner came out, his face was drawn and grey. he beckoned to hamilton, who came forward and saluted. "we will get back to headquarters," he said shortly, and they arrived two hours later. sanders sat in the little telegraph office, and the morse sounder rattled and clacked for half an hour. other sounders were at work elsewhere, delicate needles vacillated in cable offices, and an under-secretary was brought from the house of commons to the bureau of the prime minister to answer a question. at four o'clock in the afternoon came the message sanders expected: "london says permit for corklan forged. arrest. take extremest steps. deal drastically, ruthlessly. holding in residence three companies african rifles and mountain battery support you. good luck. administration." sanders came out of the office, and bones met him. "men all aboard, sir," he reported. "we'll go," said sanders. he met the girl half-way to the quay. "i know it is something very serious," she said quietly; "you have all my thoughts." she put both her hands in his, and he took them. then, without a word, he left her. * * * * * mr. p. t. corklan sat before his new hut in the village of fimini. in that hut--the greatest the n'gombi had ever seen--were stored hundreds of packages all well wrapped and sewn in native cloth. he was not smoking a cigar, because his stock of cigars was running short, but he was chewing a toothpick, for these, at a pinch, could be improvised. he called to his headman. "wafa?" he asked. "lord, he will come, for he is very cunning," said the headman. mr. corklan grunted. he walked to the edge of the village, where the ground sloped down to a strip of vivid green rushes. "tell me, how long will this river be full?" he asked. "lord, for a moon." corklan nodded. whilst the secret river ran, there was escape for him, for its meandering course would bring him and his rich cargo to spanish territory and deep water. his headman waited as though he had something to say. "lord," he said at last, "the chief of the n'coro village sends this night ten great teeth and a pot." corklan nodded. "if we're here, we'll get 'em. i hope we shall be gone." and then the tragically unexpected happened. a man in white came through the trees towards him, and behind was another white man and a platoon of native soldiers. "trouble," said corklan to himself, and thought the moment was one which called for a cigar. "good-morning, mr. sanders!" he said cheerfully. sanders eyed him in silence. "this is an unexpected pleasure," said corklan. "corklan, where is your still?" asked sanders. the plump man laughed. "you'll find it way back in the forest," he said, "and enough sweet potatoes to distil fifty gallons of spirit--all proof, sir, decimal specific gravity water extracted by soemmering's method--in fact, as good as you could get it in england." sanders nodded. "i remember now--you're the man that ran the still in the ashanti country, and got away with the concession." "that's me," said the other complacently. "p. t. corklan--i never assume an alias." sanders nodded again. "i came past villages," he said, "where every man and almost every woman was drunk. i have seen villages wiped out in drunken fights. i have seen a year's hard work ahead of me. you have corrupted a province in a very short space of time, and, as far as i can judge, you hoped to steal a government ship and get into neutral territory with the prize you have won by your----" "enterprise," said mr. corklan obligingly. "you'll have to prove that--about the ship. i am willing to stand any trial you like. there's no law about prohibition--it's one you've made yourself. i brought up the still--that's true--brought it up in sections and fitted it. i've been distilling spirits--that's true----" "i also saw a faithful servant of government, one ali kano," said sanders, in a low voice. "he was lying on the bank of this secret river of yours with two revolver bullets in him." "the nigger was spying on me, and i shot him," explained corklan. "i understand," said sanders. and then, after a little pause: "will you be hung or shot?" the cigar dropped from the man's mouth. "hey?" he said hoarsely. "you--you can't--do that--for making a drop of liquor--for niggers!" "for murdering a servant of the state," corrected sanders. "but, if it is any consolation to you, i will tell you that i would have killed you, anyway." it took mr. corklan an hour to make up his mind, and then he chose rifles. to-day the n'gombi point to a mound near the village of fimini, which they call by a name which means, "the waters of madness," and it is believed to be haunted by devils. chapter xi eye to eye "bones," said captain hamilton, in despair, "you will never be a napoleon." "dear old sir and brother-officer," said lieutenant tibbetts, "you are a jolly old pessimist." bones was by way of being examined in subjects c and d, for promotion to captaincy, and hamilton was the examining officer. by all the rules and laws and strict regulations which govern military examinations, bones had not only failed, but he had seriously jeopardized his right to his lieutenancy, if every man had his due. "now, let me put this," said hamilton. "suppose you were in charge of a company of men, and you were attacked on three sides, and you had a river behind you on the fourth side, and you found things were going very hard against you. what would you do?" "dear old sir," said bones thoughtfully, and screwing his face into all manner of contortions in his effort to secure the right answer, "i should go and wet my heated brow in the purling brook, then i'd take counsel with myself." "you'd lose," said hamilton, with a groan. "that's the last person in the world you should go to for advice, bones. suppose," he said, in a last desperate effort to awaken a gleam of military intelligence in his subordinate's mind, "suppose you were trekking through the forest with a hundred rifles, and you found your way barred by a thousand armed men. what would you do?" "go back," said bones, "and jolly quick, dear old fellow." "go back? what would you go back for?" asked the other, in astonishment. "to make my will," said bones firmly, "and to write a few letters to dear old friends in the far homeland. i have friends, ham," he said, with dignity, "jolly old people who listen for my footsteps, and to whom my voice is music, dear old fellow." "what other illusions do they suffer from?" asked hamilton offensively, closing his book with a bang. "well, you will be sorry to learn that i shall not recommend you for promotion." "you don't mean that," said bones hoarsely. "i mean that," said hamilton. "well, i thought if i had a pal to examine me, i would go through with flying colours." "then i am not a pal. you don't suggest," said hamilton, with ominous dignity, "that i would defraud the public by lying as to the qualities of a deficient character?" "yes, i do," said bones, nodding vigorously, "for my sake and for the sake of the child." the child was that small native whom bones had rescued and adopted. "not even for the sake of the child," said hamilton, with an air of finality. "bones, you're ploughed." bones did not speak, and hamilton gathered together the papers, forms, and paraphernalia of examination. he lifted his head suddenly, to discover that bones was staring at him. it was no ordinary stare, but something that was a little uncanny. "what the dickens are you looking at?" bones did not speak. his round eyes were fixed on his superior in an unwinking glare. "when i said you had failed," said hamilton kindly, "i meant, of course----" "that i'd passed," muttered bones excitedly. "say it, ham--say it! 'bones, congratulations, dear old lad'----" "i meant," said hamilton coldly, "that you have another chance next month." the face of lieutenant tibbetts twisted into a painful contortion. "it didn't work!" he said bitterly, and stalked from the room. "rum beggar!" thought hamilton, and smiled to himself. "have you noticed anything strange about bones?" asked patricia hamilton the next day. her brother looked at her over his newspaper. "the strangest thing about bones is bones," he said, "and that i am compelled to notice every day of my life." she looked up at sanders, who was idly pacing the stoep of the residency. "have you, mr. sanders?" sanders paused. "beyond the fact that he is rather preoccupied and stares at one----" "that is it," said the girl. "i knew i was right--he stares horribly. he has been doing it for a week--just staring. do you think he is ill?" "he has been moping in his hut for the past week," said hamilton thoughtfully, "but i was hoping that it meant that he was swotting for his exam. but staring--i seem to remember----" the subject of the discussion made his appearance at the far end of the square at that moment, and they watched him. first he walked slowly towards the houssa sentry, who shouldered his arms in salute. bones halted before the soldier and stared at him. somehow, the watchers on the stoep knew that he was staring--there was something so fixed, so tense in his attitude. then, without warning, the sentry's hand passed across his body, and the rifle came down to the "present." "what on earth is he doing?" demanded the outraged hamilton, for sentries do not present arms to subaltern officers. bones passed on. he stopped before one of the huts in the married lines, and stared at the wife of sergeant abiboo. he stared long and earnestly, and the woman, giggling uncomfortably, stared back. then she began to dance. "for heaven's sake----" gasped sanders, as bones passed on. "bones!" roared hamilton. bones turned first his head, then his body towards the residency, and made his slow way towards the group. "what is happening?" asked hamilton. the face of bones was flushed; there was triumph in his eye--triumph which his pose of nonchalance could not wholly conceal. "what is happening, dear old officer?" he asked innocently, and stared. "what the dickens are you goggling at?" demanded hamilton irritably. "and please explain why you told the sentry to present arms to you." "i didn't tell him, dear old sir and superior captain," said bones. his eyes never left hamilton's; he stared with a fierceness and with an intensity that was little short of ferocious. "confound you, what are you staring at? aren't you well?" demanded hamilton wrathfully. bones blinked. "quite well, sir and comrade," he said gravely. "pardon the question--did you feel a curious and unaccountable inclination to raise your right hand and salute me?" "did i--what?" demanded his dumbfounded superior. "a sort of itching of the right arm--an almost overpowerin' inclination to touch your hat to poor old bones?" hamilton drew a long breath. "i felt an almost overpowering desire to lift my foot," he said significantly. "look at me again," said bones calmly. "fix your eyes on mine an' think of nothin'. now shut your eyes. now you can't open 'em." "of course i can open them," said hamilton. "have you been drinking, bones?" a burst of delighted laughter from the girl checked bones's indignant denial. "i know!" she cried, clapping her hands. "bones is trying to mesmerize you!" "what?" the scarlet face of bones betrayed him. "power of the human eye, dear old sir," he said hurriedly. "some people have it--it's a gift. i discovered it the other day after readin' an article in _the scientific healer_." "phew!" hamilton whistled. "so," he said, with dangerous calm, "all this staring and gaping of yours means that, does it? i remember now. when i was examining you for promotion the other day, you stared. trying to mesmerize me?" "let bygones be bygones, dear old friend," begged bones. "and when i asked you to produce the company pay-sheets, which you forgot to bring up to date, you stared at me!" "it's a gift," said bones feebly. "oh, bones," said the girl slowly, "you stared at me, too, after i refused to go picnicking with you on the beach." "all's fair in love an' war," said bones vaguely. "it's a wonderful gift." "have you ever mesmerized anybody?" asked hamilton curiously, and bones brightened up. "rather, dear old sir," he said. "jolly old ali, my secretary--goes off in a regular trance on the slightest provocation. fact, dear old ham." hamilton clapped his hands, and his orderly, dozing in the shade of the verandah, rose up. "go, bring ali abid," said hamilton. and when the man had gone: "are you under the illusion that you made the sentry present arms to you, and abiboo's woman dance for you, by the magic of your eye?" "you saw," said the complacent bones. "it's a wonderful gift, dear old ham. as soon as i read the article, i tried it on ali. got him, first pop!" the girl was bubbling with suppressed laughter, and there was a twinkle in sanders's eye. "i recall that you saw me in connection with shooting leave in the n'gombi." "yes, sir and excellency," said the miserable bones. "and i said that i thought it inadvisable, because of the trouble in the bend of the isisi river." "yes, excellency and sir," agreed bones dolefully. "and then you stared." "did i, dear old--did i, sir?" his embarrassment was relieved by the arrival of ali. so buoyant a soul had bones, that from the deeps of despair into which he was beginning to sink he rose to heights of confidence, not to say self-assurance, that were positively staggering. "miss patricia, ladies and gentlemen," said bones briskly, "we have here ali abid, confidential servant and faithful retainer. i will now endeavour to demonstrate the power of the human eye." he met the stolid gaze of ali and stared. he stared terribly and alarmingly, and ali, to do him justice, stared back. "close your eyes," commanded bones. "you can't open them, can you?" "sir," said ali, "optics of subject are hermetically sealed." "i will now put him in a trance," said bones, and waved his hand mysteriously. ali rocked backward and forward, and would have fallen but for the supporting arm of the demonstrator. "he is now insensible to pain," said bones proudly. "lend me your hatpin, pat," said hamilton. "i will now awaken him," said bones hastily, and snapped his fingers. ali rose to his feet with great dignity. "thank you, ali; you may go," said his master, and turned, ready to receive the congratulations of the party. "do you seriously believe that you mesmerized that humbug?" bones drew himself erect. "sir and captain," he said stiffly, "do you suggest i am a jolly old impostor? you saw the sentry, sir, you saw the woman, sir." "and i saw ali," said hamilton, nodding, "and i'll bet he gave the sentry something and the woman something to play the goat for you." bones bowed slightly and distantly. "i cannot discuss my powers, dear old sir; you realize that there are some subjects too delicate to broach except with kindred spirits. i shall continue my studies of psychic mysteries undeterred by the cold breath of scepticism." he saluted everybody, and departed with chin up and shoulders squared, a picture of offended dignity. that night sanders lay in bed, snuggled up on his right side, which meant that he had arrived at the third stage of comfort which precedes that fading away of material life which men call sleep. half consciously he listened to the drip, drip, drip of rain on the stoep, and promised himself that he would call upon abiboo in the morning, to explain the matter of a choked gutter, for abiboo had sworn, by the prophet and certain minor relatives of the great one, that he had cleared every bird's nest from the ducts about the residency. drip, drip, drip, drip, drip! sanders sank with luxurious leisure into the nothingness of the night. drip-tap, drip-tap, drip-tap! he opened his eyes slowly, slid one leg out of bed, and groped for his slippers. he slipped into the silken dressing-gown which had been flung over the end of the bed, corded it about him, and switched on the electric light. then he passed out into the big common room, with its chairs drawn together in overnight comradeship, and the solemn tick of the big clock to emphasize the desolation. he paused a second to switch on the lights, then went to the door and flung it open. "enter!" he said in arabic. the man who came in was naked, save for a tarboosh on his head and a loin-cloth about his middle. his slim body shone with moisture, and where he stood on the white matting were two little pools. kano from his brown feet to the soaked fez, he stood erect with that curious assumption of pride and equality which the mussulman bears with less offence to his superiors than any other race. "peace on this house," he said, raising his hand. "speak, ahmet," said sanders, dropping into a big chair and stretching back, with his clasped hands behind his head. he eyed the man gravely and without resentment, for no spy would tap upon his window at night save that the business was a bad one. "lord," said the man, "it is shameful that i should wake your lordship from your beautiful dream, but i came with the river."[ ] he looked down at his master, and in the way of certain kano people, who are dialecticians to a man, he asked: "lord, it is written in the sura of ya-sin, 'to the sun it is not given to overtake the moon----'" [footnote : i came when i could.] "'nor doth the night outstrip the day; but each in his own sphere doth journey on,'" finished sanders patiently. "thus also begins the sura of the cave: 'praise be to god, who hath sent down the book to his servant, and hath put no crookedness into it.' therefore, ahmet, be plain to me, and leave your good speeches till you meet the abominable sufi." the man sank to his haunches. "lord," he said, "from the bend of the river, where the isisi divides the land of the n'gombi from the lands of the good chief, i came, travelling by day and night with the river, for many strange things have happened which are too wonderful for me. this chief busesi, whom all men call good, has a daughter by his second wife. in the year of the high crops she was given to a stranger from the forest, him they call gufuri-bululu, and he took her away to live in his hut." sanders sat up. "go on, man," he said. "lord, she has returned and performs wonderful magic," said the man, "for by the wonder of her eyes she can make dead men live and live men die, and all people are afraid. also, lord, there was a wise man in the forest, who was blind, and he had a daughter who was the prop and staff of him, and because of his wisdom, and because she hated all who rivalled her, the woman d'rona gufuri told certain men to seize the girl and hold her in a deep pool of water until she was dead." "this is a bad palaver," said sanders; "but you shall tell me what you mean by the wonder of her eyes." "lord," said the man, "she looks upon men, and they do her will. now, it is her will that there shall be a great dance on the rind of the moon, and after she shall send the spears of the people of busesi--who is old and silly, and for this reason is called good--against the n'gombi folk." "oh," said sanders, biting his lip in thought, "by the wonder of her eyes!" "lord," said the man, "even i have seen this, for she has stricken men to the ground by looking at them, and some she has made mad, and others foolish." sanders turned his head at a noise from the doorway. the tall figure of hamilton stood peering sleepily at the light. "i heard your voice," he said apologetically. "what is the trouble?" briefly sanders related the story the man had told. "wow!" said hamilton, in a paroxysm of delight. "what's wrong?" "bones!" shouted hamilton. "bones is the fellow. let him go up and subdue her with his eye. he's the very fellow. i'll go over and call him, sir." he hustled into his clothing, slipped on a mackintosh, and, making his way across the dark square, admitted himself to the sleeping-hut of lieutenant tibbetts. by the light of his electric torch he discovered the slumberer. bones lay on his back, his large mouth wide open, one thin leg thrust out from the covers, and he was making strange noises. hamilton found the lamp and lit it, then he proceeded to the heart-breaking task of waking his subordinate. "up, you lazy devil!" he shouted, shaking bones by the shoulder. bones opened his eyes and blinked rapidly. "on the word 'one!'" he said hoarsely, "carry the left foot ten inches to the left front, at the same time bringing the rifle to a horizontal position at the right side. one!" "wake up, wake up, bones!" bones made a wailing noise. it was the noise of a mother panther who has returned to her lair to discover that her offspring have been eaten by wild pigs. "whar-r-ow-ow!" he said, and turned over on his right side. hamilton pocketed his torch, and, lifting bones bodily from the bed, let him fall with a thud. bones scrambled up, staring. "gentlemen of the jury," he said, "i stand before you a ruined man. drink has been my downfall, as the dear old judge remarked. i _did_ kill wilfred morgan, and i plead the unwritten law." he saluted stiffly, collapsed on to his pillow, and fell instantly into a deep child-like sleep. hamilton groaned. he had had occasion to wake bones from his beauty sleep before, but he had never been as bad as this. he took a soda siphon from the little sideboard and depressed the lever, holding the outlet above his victim's head. bones leapt up with a roar. "hello, ham!" he said quite sanely. "well dear old officer, this is the finish! you stand by the lifeboat an' shoot down anybody who attempts to leave the ship before the torpedoes are saved. i'm goin' down into the hold to have a look at the women an' children." he saluted, and was stepping out into the wet night, when hamilton caught his arm. "steady, the buffs, my sleeping beauty! dress yourself. sanders wants you." bones nodded. "i'll just drive over and see him," he said, climbed back into bed, and was asleep in a second. hamilton put out the light and went back to the residency. "i hadn't the heart to cut his ear off," he said regretfully. "i'm afraid we shan't be able to consult bones till the morning." sanders nodded. "anyway, i will wait for the morning. i have told abiboo to get stores and wood aboard, and to have steam in the _zaire_. let us emulate bones." "heaven forbid!" said hamilton piously. bones came blithely to breakfast, a dapper and a perfectly groomed figure. he received the news of the ominous happenings in the n'gombi country with that air of profound solemnity which so annoyed hamilton. "i wish you had called me in the night," he said gravely. "dear old officer, i think it was due to me." "called you! called you! why--why----" spluttered hamilton. "in fact, we did call you bones, but we could not wake you," smoothed sanders. a look of amazement spread over the youthful face of lieutenant tibbetts. "you called me?" he asked incredulously. "called _me_?" "_you!_" hissed hamilton. "i not only called you, but i kicked you. i poured water on you, and i chucked you up to the roof of the hut and dropped you." a faint but unbelieving smile from bones. "are you sure it was me, dear old officer?" he asked, and hamilton choked. "i only ask," said bones, turning blandly to the girl, "because i'm a notoriously light sleeper, dear old miss patricia. the slightest stir wakes me, and instantly i'm in possession of all my faculties. bosambo calls me 'eye-that-never-shuts----'" "bosambo is a notorious leg-puller," interrupted hamilton irritably. "really, bones----" "often, dear old sister," bones went on impressively, "campin' out in the forest, an' sunk in the profound sleep which youth an' a good conscience brings, something has wakened me, an' i've jumped to my feet, a revolver in my hand, an' what do you think it was?" "a herd of wild elephants walking on your chest?" suggested hamilton. "what do you think it was, dear old patricia miss?" persisted bones, and interrupted her ingenious speculation in his usual aggravating manner: "the sound of a footstep breakin' a twig a hundred yards away!" "wonderful!" sneered hamilton, stirring his coffee. "bones, if you could only spell, what a novelist you'd be!" "the point is," said sanders, with good-humoured patience, which brought, for some curious reason, a warm sense of intimacy to the girl, "you've got to go up and try your eye on the woman d'rona gufuri." bones leant back in his chair and spoke with deliberation and importance, for he realized that he, and only he, could supply a solution to the difficulties of his superiors. "the power of the human eye, when applied by a jolly old scientist to a heathen, is irresistible. you may expect me down with the prisoner in four days." "she may be more trouble than you expect," said sanders seriously. "the longer one lives in native lands, the less confident can one be. there have been remarkable cases of men possessing the power which this woman has----" "and which i have, sir an' excellency, to an extraordinary extent," interrupted bones firmly. "have no fear." * * * * * thirty-six hours later bones stood before the woman d'rona gufuri. "lord," said the woman, "men speak evilly of me to sandi, and now you have come to take me to the village of irons." "that is true, d'rona," said bones, and looked into her eyes. "lord," said the woman, speaking slowly, "you shall go back to sandi and say, 'i have not seen the woman d'rona'--for, lord, is this not truth?" "i'wa! i'wa!" muttered bones thickly. "you cannot see me tibbetti, and i am not here," said the woman, and she spoke before the assembled villagers, who stood, knuckles to teeth, gazing awe-stricken upon the scene. "i cannot see you," said bones sleepily. "and now you cannot hear me, lord?" bones did not reply. the woman took him by the arm and led him through the patch of wood which fringes the river and separates beach from village. none followed them; even the two houssas who formed the escort of lieutenant tibbetts stayed rooted to the spot. bones passed into the shadow of the trees, the woman's hand on his arm. then suddenly from the undergrowth rose a lank figure, and d'rona of the magic eye felt a bony hand at her throat. she laughed. "o man, whoever you be, look upon me in this light, and your strength shall melt." she twisted round to meet her assailant's face, and shrieked aloud, for he was blind. and bones stood by without moving, without seeing or hearing, whilst the strong hands of the blind witch-doctor, whose daughter she had slain, crushed the life from her body. * * * * * "of course, sir," explained bones, "you may think she mesmerized me. on the other hand, it is quite possible that she acted under my influence. it's a moot point, sir an' excellency--jolly moot!" chapter xii the hooded king there was a certain portuguese governor--this was in the days when colhemos was colonial minister--who had a small legitimate income and an extravagant wife. this good lady had a villa at cintra, a box at the real theatre de são carlos, and a motor-car, and gave five o'clocks at the hotel nunes to the aristocracy and gentry who inhabited that spot, of whom the ecstatic spaniard said, "dejar a cintra, y ver al mundo entero, es, con verdad caminar en capuchera." since her husband's salary was exactly $ . weekly and the upkeep of the villa alone was twice that amount, it is not difficult to understand that senhor bonaventura was a remarkable man. colhemos came over to the foreign office in the praco de commercio one day and saw dr. sarabesta, and sarabesta, who was both a republican and a sinner, was also ambitious, or he had a plan and an ideal--two very dangerous possessions for a politician, since they lead inevitably to change, than which nothing is more fatal to political systems. "colhemos," said the doctor dramatically, "you are ruining me! you are bringing me to the dust and covering me with the hatred and mistrust of the powers!" he folded his arms and rose starkly from the chair, his beard all a-bristle, his deep little eyes glaring. "what is wrong, baptisa?" asked colhemos. the other flung out his arms in an extravagant gesture. "ruin!" he cried somewhat inadequately. he opened the leather portfolio which lay on the table and extracted six sheets of foolscap paper. "read!" he said, and subsided into his padded armchair a picture of gloom. the sheets of foolscap were surmounted by crests showing an emaciated lion and a small horse with a spiral horn in his forehead endeavouring to climb a chafing-dish which had been placed on edge for the purpose, and was suitably inscribed with another lion, two groups of leopards and a harp. colhemos did not stop to admire the menagerie, but proceeded at once to the literature. it was in french, and had to do with a certain condition of affairs in portuguese central africa which "constituted a grave and increasing menace to the native subjects" of "grande bretagne." there were hints, "which his majesty's government would be sorry to believe, of raids and requisitions upon the native manhood" of this country which differed little from slave raids. further, "mr. commissioner sanders of the territories regretted to learn" that these labour requisitions resulted in a condition of affairs not far removed from slavery. colhemos read through the dispatch from start to finish, and put it down thoughtfully. "pinto has been overdoing it," he admitted. "i shall have to write to him." "what you write to pinto may be interesting enough to print," said dr. sarabesta violently, "but what shall i write to london? this commissioner sanders is a fairly reliable man, and his government will act upon what he says." colhemos, who was really a great man (it was a distinct loss when he faced a firing platoon in the revolutionary days of ' ), tapped his nose with a penholder. "you can say that we shall send a special commissioner to the m'fusi country to report, and that he will remain permanently established in the m'fusi to suppress lawless acts." the doctor looked up wonderingly. "pinto won't like that," said he, "besides which, the m'fusi are quite unmanageable. the last time we tried to bring them to reason it cost--santa maria!... and the lives!... phew!" colhemos nodded. "the duc de sagosta," he said slowly, "is an enthusiastic young man. he is also a royalist and allied by family ties to dr. ceillo of the left. he is, moreover, an anglomaniac--though why he should be so when his mother was an american woman i do not know. he shall be our commissioner, my dear baptisa." his dear baptisa sat bolt upright, every hair in his bristling head erect. "a royalist!" he gasped, "do you want to set portugal ablaze?" "there are moments when i could answer 'yes' to that question," said the truthful colhemos "but for the moment i am satisfied that there will be no fireworks. it will do no harm to send the boy. it will placate the left and please the clerics--it will also consolidate our reputation for liberality and largeness of mind. also the young man will either be killed or fall a victim to the sinister influences of that corruption which, alas, has so entered into the vitals of our colonial service." so manuel duc de sagosta was summoned, and prepared for the subject of his visit by telephone, came racing up from cintra in his big american juggernaut, leapt up the stairs of the colonial office two at a time, and came to colhemos' presence in a state of mind which may be described as a big mental whoop. "you will understand, senhor," said colhemos, "that i am doing that which may make me unpopular. for that i care nothing! my country is my first thought, and the glory and honour of our flag! some day you may hold my portfolio in the cabinet, and it will be well if you bring to your high and noble office the experience...." then they all talked together, and the dark room flickered with gesticulating palms. colhemos came to see the boy off by the m.n.p. boat which carried him to the african coast. "i suppose, senhor," said the duc, "there would be no objection on the part of the government to my calling on my way at a certain british port. i have a friend in the english army--we were at clifton together----" "my friend," said colhemos, pressing the young man's hand warmly, "you must look upon england as a potential ally, and lose no opportunity which offers to impress upon our dear colleagues this fact, that behind england, unmoved, unshaken, faithful, stands the armed might of portugal. may the saints have you in their keeping!" he embraced him, kissing him on both cheeks. * * * * * bones was drilling recruits at headquarters when hamilton hailed him from the edge of the square. "there's a pal of yours come to see you, bones," he roared. bones marched sedately to his superior and touched his helmet. "sir!" "a friend of yours--just landed from the portuguese packet." bones was mystified, and went up to the residency to find a young man in spotless white being entertained by patricia hamilton and a very thoughtful sanders. the duc de sagosta leapt to his feet as bones came up the verandah. "hullo, conk!" he yelled hilariously. bones stared. "god bless my life," he stammered, "it's mug!" there was a terrific hand-shaking accompanied by squawking inquiries which were never answered, uproarious laughter, back patting, brazen and baseless charges that each was growing fat, and sanders watched it with great kindness. "here's old ham," said bones, "you ought to know ham--captain hamilton, sir, my friend, the duke of something or other--but you can call him mug--miss hamilton--this is mug." "we've already been introduced," she laughed. "but why do you let him call you mug?" the duc grinned. "i like mug," he said simply. he was to stay to lunch, for the ship was not leaving until the afternoon, and bones carried him off to his hut. "a joyous pair," said hamilton enviously. "lord, if i was only a boy again!" sanders shook his head. "you don't echo that wish?" said pat. "i wasn't thinking about that--i was thinking of the boy. i dislike this m'fusi business, and i can't think why the government sent him. they are a pretty bad lot--their territory is at the back of the akasava, and the chief of the m'fusi is a rascal." "but he says that he has been sent to reform them," said the girl. sanders smiled. "it is not a job i should care to undertake--and yet----" he knitted his forehead. "and yet----?" "i could reform them--bones could reform them. but if they were reformed it would break bonaventura, for he holds his job subject to their infamy." at lunch sanders was unusually silent, a silence which was unnoticed, save by the girl. bones and his friend, however, needed no stimulation. lunch was an almost deafening meal, and when the time came for the duc to leave, the whole party went down to the beach to see him embark. "good-bye, old mug!" roared bones, as the boat pulled away. "whoop! hi! how!" "you're a noisy devil," said hamilton, admiringly. "vox populi, vox dei," said bones. he had an unexpected visitor that evening, for whilst he was dressing for dinner, sanders came into his hut--an unusual happening. what sanders had to say may not be related since it was quite unofficial, but bones came to dinner that night and behaved with such decorum and preserved a mien so grave, that hamilton thought he was ill. the duc continued his journey down the african coast and presently came to a port which was little more than a beach, a jetty, a big white house, and by far the most imposing end of the moanda road. in due time, he arrived by the worst track in the world (he was six days on the journey) at moanda itself, and came into the presence of the governor. did the duc but know it, his excellency had also been prepared for the young man's mission. the mail had arrived by carrier the day before the duc put in his appearance, and pinto bonaventura had his little piece all ready to say. "i will give you all the assistance i possibly can," he said, as they sat at _déjeuner_, "but, naturally, i cannot guarantee you immunity." "immunity?" said the puzzled duc. senhor bonaventura nodded gravely. "nothing is more repugnant to me than slavery," he said, "unless it be the terrible habit of drinking. if i could sweep these evils out of existence with a wave of my hand, believe me i would do so; but i cannot perform miracles, and the government will not give me sufficient troops to suppress these practices which every one of us hold in abhorrence." "but," protested the duc, a little alarmed, "since i am going to reform the m'fusi...." the governor choked over his coffee and apologized. he did not laugh, because long residence in central africa had got him out of the habit, and had taught him a certain amount of self-control in all things except the consumption of marsala. "pray go on," he said, wearing an impassive face. "it will be to the interests of portugal, no less than to your excellency's interest," said the young man, leaning across the table and speaking with great earnestness, "if i can secure a condition of peace, prosperity, sobriety, and if i can establish the portuguese law in this disturbed area." "undoubtedly," acknowledged the older man with profound seriousness. so far from the duc's statement representing anything near the truth, it may be said that a restoration of order would serve his excellency very badly indeed. in point of fact he received something like eight shillings for every "head" of "recruited labour." he also received a commission from the same interested syndicates which exported able-bodied labourers, a commission amounting to six shillings upon every case of square-face, and a larger sum upon every keg of rum that came into the country. sobriety and law would, in fact, spell much discomfort to the elegant lady who lived in the villa at cintra, and would considerably diminish not only senhor bonaventura's handsome balance at the bank of brazil, but would impoverish certain ministers, permanent and temporary, who looked to their dear pinto for periodical contributions to what was humorously described as "the party fund." yet the duc de sagosta went into the wilds with a high heart and a complete faith, in his youthful and credulous soul, that he had behind him the full moral and physical support of a high-minded and patriotic governor. the high-minded and patriotic governor, watching the caravan of his new assistant disappearing through the woods which fringe moanda, expressed in picturesque language his fervent hope that the mud, the swamp, the forest and the wilderness of the m'fusi country would swallow up this young man for evermore, amen. the unpopularity of the new commissioner was sealed when the governor learnt of his visit to sanders, for "sanders" was a name at which his excellency made disapproving noises. the predecessor of the duc de sagosta was dead. his grave was in the duc's front garden, and was covered with rank grass. the new-comer found the office correspondence in order (as a glib native clerk demonstrated); he also found empty bottles behind the house, and understood the meaning of that coarse grave in the garden. he found that the last index number in the letter-book was . it is remarkable that the man he succeeded should have found, in one year, subjects for correspondence, but it is the fact. possibly nine hundred of the letters had to do with the terrible state of the residency at uango-bozeri. the roof leaked, the foundations had settled, and not a door closed as it should close. on the day of his arrival the duc found a _mamba_ resting luxuriously in his one armchair, a discovery which suggested the existence of a whole colony of these deadly brutes--the _mamba_ bite is fatal in exactly ninety seconds--under or near the house. the other fifty dispatches probably had to do with the late commissioner's arrears of pay, for portugal at that time was in the throes of her annual crisis, and ministries were passing through the government offices at lisbon with such rapidity that before a cheque could be carried from the foreign office to the bank, it was out of date. uango bozeri is miles by road from the coast, and is the centre of the child-like people of the m'fusi. here the duc dwelt and had his being, as governor of , square miles, and overlord of some million people who were cannibals with a passion for a fiery liquid which was described by traders as "rum." it was as near rum as the white city is to heaven; that is to say, to the uncultivated taste it might have been rum, and anyway was as near to rum as the taster could expect to get. this is all there is to be said about the duc de sagosta, save that his headman swindled him, his soldiers were conscienceless natives committing acts of brigandage in his innocent name, whilst his chief at moanda was a peculating and incompetent scoundrel. at the time when the duc was finding life a bitter and humiliating experience, and had reached the stage when he sat on his predecessor's grave for company, a small and unauthorized party crossed the frontier from the british territories in search of adventure. now it happened that the particular region through which the border-line passed was governed by the chief of the greater m'fusi, who was a cannibal, a drunkard, and a master of two regiments. the duc had been advised not to interfere with the chief of his people, and he had (after one abortive and painful experience) obeyed his superiors, accepting the hut tax which was sent to him (and which was obviously and insolently inadequate) without demur. no white man journeyed to the city of the m'fusi without invitation from the chief, and as chief karata never issued such invitation, the greater m'fusi was a _terra incognita_ even to his excellency the governor-general of the central and western provinces. karata was a drunkard approaching lunacy. it was his whim for weeks on end to wear on his head the mask of a goat. at other times, "as a mark of his confidence in devils," he would appear hidden beneath a plaited straw extinguisher which fitted him from head to foot. he was eccentric in other ways which need not be particularized, but he was never so eccentric that he welcomed strangers. unfortunately for those concerned, the high road from the territories passed through the m'fusi drift. and one day there came a panting messenger from the keeper of the drift who flung himself down at the king's feet. "lord," said he, "there is a white man at the drift, and with him a certain chief and his men." "you will take the men, bringing them to me tied with ropes," said the king, who looked at the messenger with glassy eyes and found some difficulty in speaking, for he was at the truculent stage of his second bottle. the messenger returned and met the party on the road. what was his attitude towards the intruders it is impossible to say. he may have been insolent, secure in the feeling that he was representing his master's attitude towards white men; he may have offered fight in the illusion that the six warriors he took with him were sufficient to enforce the king's law. it is certain that he never returned. instead there came to the king's kraal a small but formidable party under a white man, and they arrived at a propitious moment, for the ground before the king's great hut was covered with square bottles, and the space in front of the palace was crowded with wretched men chained neck to neck and waiting to march to the coast and slavery. the white man pushed back his helmet. "goodness gracious heavens!" he exclaimed, "how perfectly horrid! bosambo, this is immensely illegal an' terrificly disgustin'." the chief of the ochori looked round. "dis feller be dam' bad," was his effort. bones walked leisurely to the shady canopy under which the king sat, and king karata stared stupidly at the unexpected vision. "o king," said bones in the akasavian vernacular which runs from dacca to the congo, "this is an evil thing that you do--against all law." open-mouthed karata continued to stare. to the crowded kraal, on prisoner and warrior, councillor and dancing woman alike, came a silence deep and unbroken. they heard the words spoken in a familiar tongue, and marvelled that a white man should speak it. bones was carrying a stick and taking deliberate aim, and after two trial strokes he brought the nobbly end round with a "swish!" a bottle of square-face smashed into a thousand pieces, and there arose on the hot air the sickly scent of crude spirits. fascinated, silent, motionless, king karata, named not without reason "the terrible," watched the destruction as bottle followed bottle. then as a dim realization of the infamy filtered through his thick brain, he rose with a growl like a savage animal, and bones turned quickly. but bosambo was quicker. one stride brought him to the king's side. "down, dog!" he said. "o karata, you are very near the painted hut where dead kings lie." the king sank back and glared to and fro. all that was animal in him told of his danger; he smelt death in the mirthless grin of the white man; he smelt it as strongly under the hand of the tall native wearing the monkey-tails of chieftainship. if they would only stand away from him they would die quickly enough. let them get out of reach, and a shout, an order, would send them bloodily to the ground with little kicks and twitches as the life ran out of them. but they stood too close, and that order of his meant his death. "o white man," he began. "listen, black man," said bosambo, and lapsed into his english; "hark um, you dam' black nigger--what for you speak um so?" "you shall say 'master' to me, karata," said bones easily, "for in my land 'white man' is evil talk."[ ] [footnote : in most native countries "white man" is seldom employed save as a piece of insolence. it is equivalent to the practice of referring to the natives as niggers.] "master," said the king sullenly, "this is a strange thing--for i see that you are english and we be servants of another king. also it is forbidden that any white--that any master should stand in my kraal without my word, and i have driven even igselensi from my face." "that is all foolish talk, karata," said bones. "this is good talk: shall karata live or shall he die? this you shall say. if you send away this palaver and say to your people that we are folk whom you desire shall live in the shadow of the king's hut, then you live. let him say less than this, bosambo, and you strike quickly." the king looked from face to face. bones had his hand in the uniform jacket pocket. bosambo balanced his killing-spear on the palm of his hand, the chief saw with the eye of an expert that the edge was razor sharp. then he turned to the group whom bones had motioned away when he started to speak to the king. "this palaver is finished," he said, "and the white lord stays in my hut for a night." "good egg," said bones as the crowd streamed from the kraal. senhor bonaventura heard of the arrival of a white man at the chief's great kraal and was not perturbed, because there were certain favourite traders who came to the king from time to time. he was more concerned by the fact that a labour draft of eight hundred men who had been promised by karata had not yet reached moanda, but frantic panic came from the remarkable information of karata's eccentricities which had reached him from his lieutenant. the duc's letter may be reproduced. "illustrious and excellent senhor, "it is with joy that i announce to you the most remarkable reformation of king karata. the news was brought to me that the king had received a number of visitors of an unauthorized character, and though i had, as i have reported to you, illustrious and excellent senhor, the most unpleasant experience at the hands of the king, i deemed it advisable to go to the city of the greater m'fusi and conduct an inquiry. "i learnt that the king had indeed received the visitors, and that they had departed on the morning of my arrival carrying with them one of their number who was sick. with this party was a white man. but the most remarkable circumstance, illustrious and excellent senhor, was that the king had called a midnight palaver of his councillors and high people of state and had told them that the strangers had brought news of such sorrowful character that for four moons it would be forbidden to look upon his face. at the end of that period he would disappear from the earth and become a god amongst the stars. "at these words, illustrious and excellent senhor, the king with some reluctance took from one of the strangers a bag in which two eyes had been cut, and pulled it over his head and went back into his hut. "since then he has done many remarkable things. he has forbidden the importation of drink, and has freed all labour men to their homes. he has nominated zifingini, the elder chief of the m'fusi, to be king after his departure, and has added another fighting regiment to his army. "he is quite changed, and though they cannot see his face and he has banished all his wives, relatives and councillors to a distant village, he is more popular than ever. "illustrious and excellent senhor, i feel that at last i am seeing the end of the old régime and that we may look forward to a period of sobriety and prosperity in the m'fusi. "receive the assurance, illustrious and excellent senhor, of my distinguished consideration." his excellency went purple and white. "holy mother!" he spluttered apoplectically, "this is ruin!" with trembling hands he wrote a telegram. translated in its sense it was to this effect-- "recall de sagosta without fail or there will be nothing doing on pay day." he saw this dispatched on its way, and returned to his bureau. he picked up the duc's letter and read it again: then he saw there was a postscript. "p.s.--in regard to the strangers who visited the king, the man they carried away on a closed litter was very sick indeed, according to the accounts of woodmen who met the party. he was raving at the top of his voice, but the white man was singing very loudly. "p.ss.--i have just heard, illustrious and excellent senhor, that the hooded king (as his people call him) has sent off all his richest treasures and many others which he has taken from the huts of his deported relatives to one bosambo, who is a chief of the ochori in british territory, and is distantly related to senhor sanders, the commissioner of that territory." the end transcriber's note: minor changes have been made to correct typesetter's errors; in all other respects, every effort has been made to be true to the author's words and intent. the pirate slaver, a story of the west african coast, by harry collingwood. ________________________________________________________________________ this is a very well-written book, especially from the nautical point of view. it is written as by a midshipman in a british warship patrolling the west coast of africa, especially the congo area, to try to prevent the slave traders, especially the portuguese, from succeeding in their efforts to get the poor captured africans over the atlantic to cuba in the most miserable conditions. but it doesn't work out as simply as that! for the hero, harry dugdale, is captured in an action, and would have been killed but for the interest taken in him by the slaver-captain's son. from this there sprang a deal with the slaver that harry would assist with navigation and watch-keeping, but must go below decks when there is an action in progress. we won't tell you much more than that but cannot refrain from commenting that the book is at least as good as the best by kingston, though in this book the action is almost entirely at sea, or at least on board a sea-going vessel. ________________________________________________________________________ the pirate slaver, a story of the west african coast, by harry collingwood. chapter one. the congo river. "land ho! broad on the port bow!" the cry arose from the look-out on the forecastle of her britannic majesty's -gun brig _barracouta_, on a certain morning near the middle of the month of november, ; the vessel then being situated in about latitude degrees minutes south and about east longitude. she was heading to the eastward, close-hauled on the port tack, under every rag that her crew could spread to the light and almost imperceptible draught of warm, damp air that came creeping out from the northward. so light was the breeze that it scarcely wrinkled the glassy smoothness of the long undulations upon which the brig rocked and swayed heavily while her lofty trucks described wide arcs across the paling sky overhead, from which the stars were vanishing one after another before the advance of the pallid dawn. and at every lee roll her canvas flapped with a rattle as of a volley of musketry to the masts, sending down a smart shower from the dew-saturated cloths upon the deck, to fill again with the report of a nine-pounder and a great slatting of sheets and blocks as the ship recovered herself and rolled to windward. the brig was just two months out from england, from whence she had been dispatched to the west african coast to form a portion of the slave-squadron and to relieve the old _garnet_, which, from her phenomenal lack of speed, had proved utterly unsuitable for the service of chasing and capturing the nimble slavers who, despite all our precautions, were still pursuing their cruel and nefarious vocation with unparalleled audacity and success. we had relieved the _garnet_, and had looked in at sierra leone for the latest news; the result of this visit being that we were now heading in for the mouth of the congo, which river had been strongly commended to our especial attention by the governor of the little british colony. our captain, commander henry stopford, was by no means a communicative man, it being a theory of his that it is a mistake on the part of a chief to confide more to his officers than is absolutely necessary for the efficient and intelligent performance of their duty; hence he had not seen fit to make public the exact particulars of the information thus received. but he had of course made an exception in favour of mr young, our popular first luff; and as i--henry dugdale, senior mid of the _barracouta_--happened to be something of a favourite with the latter, i learned from him, in the course of conversation, some of the circumstances that were actuating our movements. the intelligence, however, was of a very meagre character, and simply amounted to this: that large numbers of african slaves were being continually landed on the spanish west indian islands; that two boats with their crews had mysteriously disappeared in the congo while engaged upon a search of that river for slavers; and that a small felucca named the _wasp_--a tender to the british ship-sloop _lapwing_--had also disappeared with all hands, some three months previously, after having been seen in pursuit of a large brig that had come out of the river; these circumstances leading to the inference that the congo was the haunt of a strong gang of daring slavers whose capture must be effected at any cost. it was for this service that the _barracouta_ had been selected, she being a brand-new ship especially built for work on the west african coast, and modelled to sail at a high speed upon a light draught of water. she was immensely beamy for her length, and very shallow, drawing only ten feet of water with all her stores and ammunition on board, very heavily sparred--_too_ heavily, some of us thought--and, as for canvas, her topsails had the hoist of those of a frigate of twice her tonnage. she was certainly a beautiful model of a ship--far and away the prettiest that i had ever seen when i first stepped on board her--while her speed, especially in light winds and tolerably smooth water, was such as to fill us all, fore and aft, with the most extravagant hopes of success against the light-heeled slave clippers whose business it was ours to suppress. she was a flush-decked vessel, with high, substantial bulwarks pierced for nine guns of a side, and she mounted fourteen -pounder carronades and four long nine-pounders, two forward and two aft, which could be used as bow and stern-chasers respectively, if need were, although we certainly did not anticipate the necessity to employ any of our guns in the latter capacity. our crew, all told, numbered one hundred and sixty-five. i was in the first lieutenant's watch, and happened to be on deck when the look-out reported land upon the morning upon which this story opens. i remember the circumstance as well as though it had occurred but yesterday, and i have only to close my eyes to bring the whole scene up before my mental vision as distinctly as a picture. the brig was, as i have already said, heading to the eastward, close-hauled, on the port tack, under everything that we could set, to her royals; but the wind was so scant that even the light upper sails flapped and rustled monotonously to the sleepy heave and roll of the ship, and it was only by glancing through a port at the small, iridescent air-bubbles that drifted astern at the rate of about a knot and a half in the hour that we were able to detect the fact of our own forward movement at all. we had been on deck just an hour--for two bells had barely been struck-- when the first faint suggestion of dawn appeared ahead in the shape of a scarcely-perceptible lightening of the sky along a narrow strip of the eastern horizon, in the midst of which the morning star beamed resplendently, while the air, although still warm, assumed a freshness that, compared with the close, muggy heat of the past night, seemed almost cold, so that involuntarily i drew the lapels of my thin jacket together and buttoned the garment from throat to waist. quickly, yet by imperceptible gradations, the lightening of the eastern sky spread and strengthened, the soft, velvety, star-lit, blue-black hue paling to an arch of cold, colourless pallor as the dawn asserted itself more emphatically, while the stars dwindled and vanished one by one in the rapidly-growing light. as the pallor of the sky extended itself insidiously north and south along the horizon, a low-lying bank of what at first presented the appearance of dense vapour became visible on the _barracouta's_ larboard bow; but presently, when the cold whiteness of the coming day became flushed with a delicate tint of purest, palest primrose, the supposed fog-bank assumed a depth of rich purple hue and a clear-cut sharpness of outline that proclaimed it what it was--_land_, most unmistakably. the look-out was a smart young fellow, who had already established a reputation for trustworthiness, and he more than half suspected the character of the cloud-like appearance when it first caught his attention; he therefore kept his eye upon it, and was no sooner assured of its nature than he raised the cry of-- "land ho! broad on the port bow!" the first luff, who had been for some time meditatively pacing the weather side of the deck from the binnacle to the gangway, with his hands clasped behind his back and his glance directed alternately to the deck at his feet and to the swaying main-royal-mast-head, quickly awoke from his abstraction at the cry from the forecastle, and, springing lightly upon a carronade slide, with one hand grasping the inner edge of the hammock-rail, looked long and steadily in the direction indicated. "ay, ay, i see it," he answered, when after a long, steady look he had satisfied himself of the character of what he gazed upon. "wheel, there, how's her head?" "east-south-east, sir!" answered the helmsman promptly. the lieutenant shut one eye and, raising his right arm, with the hand held flat and vertically, pointed toward the southern extremity of the distant land, held it there for a moment, and murmured-- "a point and a half--east-half-south, distant--what shall we say--twenty miles? ay, about that, as nearly as may be. mr dugdale, just slip below and let the master know that the land is in sight on the port bow, bearing east-half-south, distant twenty miles." i touched my cap and trundled down to the master's cabin, the door of which was hooked back wide open, permitting the cool, refreshing morning air that came in through the open scuttle free play throughout the full length of the rather circumscribed apartment in which mr robert bates lay snoring anything but melodiously. entering the cabin, i grasped the worthy man by the shoulder and shook him gently, calling him by name at the same time in subdued tones in order that i might not awake the occupants of the contiguous berths. "ay, ay," was the answer, as the snoring abruptly terminated in a convulsive snort: "ay, ay. what's the matter now, youngster? has the ship tumbled overboard during the night, or has the skipper's cow gone aloft to roost in the main-top, that you come here disturbing me with your `mr bates--mr bates'?" "neither, sir," answered i, with a low laugh at this specimen of our worthy master's quaint nautical humour; "but the first lieutenant directed me to let you know that the land is in sight on the port bow, bearing east-half-south, distant twenty miles." "what, already?" exclaimed my companion, scrambling out of his cot, still more than half asleep, and landing against me with a force that sent me spinning out through the open doorway to bring up prostrate with a crash in the cabin of the doctor opposite, half stunned by the concussion of my skull against the bulkhead and by the avalanche of ponderous tomes that came crashing down upon me as the worthy medico's tier of hanging bookshelves yielded and came down by the run at my wild clutch as i stumbled over the ledge of the cabin-door. "murther! foire! thieves! it's sunk, burnt, desthroyed, and kilt intoirely that i am!" roared poor blake, rudely awakened out of a sound sleep by the crashing fall of his pet volumes upon the deck and by a terrific thwack across the face that i had inadvertently dealt him as i fell. "fwhat is it that's happenin' at all, thin? is it a collision? or is it a case of sthrandin'? or"--he looked over the edge of his cot and saw me sitting upon the deck, ruefully rubbing the back of my head while i vainly struggled to suppress my laughter at the ridiculous _contretemps_--"oh! so it's _you_, thin, is it, misther dugdale? bedad, but you ought to be ashamed of yoursilf to be playin' these pranks--a lad of your age, that's hitherto been the patthern of good behaviour! but wait a little, my man--sthop till i tell the first liftinint of your outhrageous conduct--" by this time i thought that the matter had gone far enough; more over, i had in a measure recovered my scattered senses, so i scrambled to my feet and, as i re-hung the book shelf and replaced the books, hurriedly explained to the good man the nature of the mishap, winding up with a humble apology for having so rudely broken in upon what he was pleased to call his "beauty shlape." understanding at once that my involuntary incursion into the privacy of his cabin had been the result of pure accident, "paddy," as we irreverently called him--his baptismal name was william--very good-naturedly accepted my explanation and apology, and composed himself to sleep again, whereupon i retreated in good order and re-entered the master's cabin. the old boy had by this time slipped on his breeches and coat, and was bending over the table with the chart of "africa--west coast" spread out thereon, and a pencil and parallel ruler in his hands. he indulged in one or two of the grimly humorous remarks that were characteristic of him in reference to my disturbance of the doctor's slumbers; and then, pointing to a dot that he had just made upon the chart, observed-- "if the first lieutenant's bearing and distance are right, that's where we are, about twelve miles off shark point, and therefore in soundings. did _you_ see the land, mr dugdale? what was it like?" "it made as a long stretch of undulating hills sloping gently down to the horizon at its southernmost extremity, and extending beyond the horizon to the northward," i replied. "ay, ay, that's right; that's quite right," agreed the master. "it is that range of hills stretching along parallel with the coast on the north side of the river, and reaching as far as kabenda point," indicating the markings on the chart as he spoke. "well, let us go on deck and get a cast of the lead; it is time that we ascertained the exact position of the ship, for the deep-water channel is none too wide, and although there seems to be plenty of water for us over the banks on either side, i have no fancy for trusting to the soundings laid down here on the chart. these african rivers are never to be depended upon, the shoals are constantly shifting, and where you may find water enough to float a line-of-battle ship to-day, you may ground in that same ship's launch a month hence." he rolled up the chart, tucked it under his arm, gathered up his parallel ruler, pencil, and dividers, and together we left the cabin and made our way up the hatchway to the deck, where we found the first luff still perched upon the carronade slide, anxiously scanning the horizon on either bow under the sharp of his hand. as we reached the deck a spark of golden fire flashed out upon the horizon on our lee bow, and the sun's disc soared slowly into view, warming the tints of a long, low-lying broken bank of grey cloud that stretched athwart his course into crimson, and fringing its skirts with gold as his first beams shot athwart the heaving water to the ship in a tremulous path of shimmering, dazzling radiance. the lieutenant caught a glimpse of us out of the corner of his eye as we emerged from the hatchway, and at once stepped down off the slide on to the deck. "good-morning, bates," said he. "well, here we are, with the land plainly in view, you see; and i am glad that you have come on deck to tell us just _where_ we are, for all this part of the world is quite new ground to me. we are closer in than i thought we were, for just before the sun rose the horizon ahead cleared, and i caught sight of what looked like the tops of trees, both on the port and on the starboard bow--you can't see them now for the dazzle, but you will presently, when the sun is a bit higher--and there seemed to be an opening or indentation of some sort between them, which i take to be the mouth of the river." "ay, ay," answered bates, "that will be it, no doubt." he sprang on to the slide that young had just vacated, took a long look at the land, and then, turning to the helmsman, demanded, "how's her head?" "east-south-east, sir," answered the man for the second time. with this information the master in his turn took an approximate bearing of the southernmost extremity of the range of hills, after which he stepped down on to the deck again and, going to the capstan, spread out his chart upon the head of it, calling me to help him keep the roll open. the lieutenant followed him, and stood watching as the master again manipulated his parallel ruler and dividers. "yes," remarked bates, after a few moments' diligent study, "that's just about where we are," pointing to the mark that he had made upon the chart while in his own cabin. "and see," he continued, glancing out through the nearest lee port, "we have reached the river water; look how brown and thick it is, more like a cup of the captain's chocolate than good, wholesome salt water. we will try a cast of the lead, mr young, if you please, just to make sure; though if we are fair in the channel, as i think we are, we shall get no bottom as yet. nor shall we make any headway until the wind freshens or the sea-breeze springs up, for we are already within the influence of the outflowing current, and at this season of the year--which is the rainy season--it runs very strongly a little further in." the lead was hove, but, as bates had anticipated, no bottom was found; whereupon the master rolled up his chart again, gave orders that the ship was to be kept going as she was, and returned to his cabin, while the watch mustered their buckets and scrubbing-brushes and proceeded to wash decks and generally make the brig's toilet for the day. our worthy master was right; we did not make a particle of headway until about nine o'clock, when the wind gradually hauled round aft and freshened to a piping breeze before which we boomed along in fine style until we came abreast of a low, narrow point on our port hand, protected from the destructive action of the atlantic breakers by a shoal extending some three-quarters of a mile to seaward. abreast of this point we hauled up to the northward and entered a sort of bay about half-a-mile wide, with the low point before-mentioned on our port hand, and a wide mud-bank to starboard, beyond which was an island of considerable extent, fringed with mangroves and covered with thick bush and lofty trees. on the low point on our port hand were two "factories," or trading establishments, abreast of which were lying two brigs and a barque, one of the brigs flying british and the other spanish colours, while the barque sported the dutch ensign at her mizen-peak. we rounded-to just far enough outside these craft to give them a clear berth, and let go our anchor in four fathoms of water. it was a queer spot that we now found ourselves in; queer to me at least, who was now entering upon my first experience of west african service. we were riding with our head to the north-west under the combined influence of wind and tide together, with the low point--named banana peninsula, so the master informed me, though _why_ it should be so named i never could understand, for there was not a single banana-tree upon the whole peninsula, as i subsequently ascertained. let me see, where was i? i have gone adrift among those non-existent banana-trees. oh yes, i was going to attempt to make a word-sketch of the scene which surrounded us after we had let go our anchor and furled our canvas. the sea-breeze was piping strong from the westward, while the tide was ebbing down the creek from the northward, and under these combined influences the _barracouta_ was riding with her head about north-west. banana peninsula lay ahead of us, trending away along our larboard beam and slightly away from us to the southward for about half-a-mile, where it terminated in a sandy beach bordered by a broad patch of smooth water, athwart which marched an endless line of mimic breakers from the wall of flashing white surf that thundered upon the outer edge of the protecting shoal three-quarters of a mile to seaward. the point was pretty thickly covered with bush and trees, chiefly cocoa-nut and other palms--except in the immediate vicinity and in front of the two factories, where the soil had been cleared and a sort of rough wharf constructed by driving piles formed of the trunks of trees into the ground and wedging a few slabs of sawn timber in behind them. the point, for a distance of perhaps a mile from its southern extremity, was very narrow--not more than from one hundred and fifty to two hundred yards wide--but beyond that it widened out considerably until it merged in the mainland. on the opposite side of the creek, on our starboard quarter and astern of us, was what i at first took to be a single island, but which i subsequently found to be a group of about a dozen islands, of which the smallest may have been half-a-mile long by about a third of a mile broad, while the largest was some nine or ten miles long by about three miles broad. these islands really constituted the northern bank of the river for a distance some twenty-four miles up the stream, being cut off from the mainland and from each other by narrow canal-like creeks running generally in a direction more or less east and west. the land all about here was low, and to a great extent swampy, the margin of the creeks being lined with mangroves that presented a very curious appearance as they stood up out of the dark, slimy-looking water, their trunks supported upon a network of naked, twisted roots that strongly suggested to me the idea of spiders' legs swollen and knotted with some hideous, deforming disease. the trees themselves, however, apart from their twisted, gnarled, and knotted roots, presented a very pleasing appearance, for they had just come into full leaf, and their fresh green foliage was deeply grateful to the eye satiated with a long and wearisome repetition of the panorama of unbroken sea and sky. beyond the belt of mangroves the islands were overgrown with dense bush, interspersed with tall trees, some of which were rich with violet blossoms growing in great drooping clusters, like the flowers of the laburnum; while others were heavily draped with long, trailing sprays of magnificent jasmine, of which there were two kinds, one bearing a pinky flower, and the other a much larger star-like bloom of pure white. the euphorbia, acacia, and baobab or calabash-tree were all in bloom; and here and there, through openings between the trunks of the mangroves, glimpses were caught of rich splashes of deep orange-colour, standing out like flame against the dark background of shadowed foliage, that subsequent investigation proved to be clumps of elegant orchids. it appeared that we had entered the river at precisely the right time of the year to behold it at its brightest and best, for the spring rains had only recently set in, and all nature was rioting in the refreshment of the welcome moisture and bursting forth into a joyous prodigality of leaf and blossom, of colour and perfume, of life and glad activity. the forest rang with the calls and cries of pairing birds; flocks of parrots, parrakeets, and love-birds were constantly wheeling and darting hither and thither; kingfishers flitted low across the placid water, or watched motionless from some overhanging branch for the passage of their unsuspecting prey; the wydah bird flaunted his gay plumage in the brilliant sunshine, where it could be seen to the fullest advantage; and butterflies, like living gems, flitted happily from flower to flower. astern of us, some three miles away, lay boolambemba point, the southernmost extremity of the group of islands to which i have already alluded, where the embouchure of the river may be said to begin, the stream here being about three and a half miles across, while immediately below it abruptly widens to a breadth of about five and a half miles at the indentation leading to banana creek, in the narrow approach to which we were lying at anchor. of course it was not possible for us to distinguish, from where we were lying, much of the character of the country on the southern or left bank of the river, but it appeared to be pretty much the same as what we saw around us; that is to say, low land densely covered with bush and trees along the river margin, with higher land beyond. about half-a-mile beyond us, broad on our starboard bow as we were then lying, the anchorage narrowed down to a width of less than half-a-mile, the western extremity of the group of islands already referred to there converging toward banana peninsula in a low, mangrove-wooded point. beyond this, however, could be seen a stretch of water about a mile and a half wide, which i subsequently learned ran for several miles up at the back of the islands, between them and the mainland, in the form of a narrow, shallow, canal-like creek that bates, the master, seemed to think might well repay the trouble of careful inspection, since the narrow maze of channels to which it gave access offered exceptional facilities for the embarkation of slaves, and a choice of routes for the light-draught slavers from their places of concealment into the main channel of the river. chapter two. we receive some important intelligence. we had barely got our canvas furled and the decks cleared when we saw a fine, handsome whale-boat, painted white, with a canvas awning spread over her stern-sheets, and the portuguese flag fluttering from a little staff at her stern, shove off from the wharf and pull toward us. she was manned by four krumen, and in the stern-sheets sat a tall, swarthy man, whose white drill suit and white, broad-brimmed panama hat, swathed with a white puggaree, caused his suntanned face and hands to appear almost as black as the skins of his negro crew. the boat swept up to our gangway in very dashing style, and her owner, ascending the accommodation ladder, stepped in on deck with a genial smile that disclosed a splendid set of brilliantly white teeth beneath his heavy, glossy black moustache. "good-morning, sar," said he to the first lieutenant, who met him at the gangway. "velcome to banana," with a flourish of his hat. "vat chip dis is, eh?" "her britannic majesty's brig _barracouta_," answered young. "you are the portuguese consul here, i suppose?" "no--no; i not de consul," was the answer. "dere is no consul at banana. i am senor joaquin miguel lobo, portuguese trader, at your savice, sar; and i have come off to say dat i shall be happie to supply your chip wid anyting dat you may require--vattare, fresh meat, vegetabl', feesh, no fruit--de fruit not ripe yet; plenty fruit by an' by, but not ripe yet--parrots, monkeys--all kind of bird and animal, yes; and curiositie--plenty curiositie, sar." here the skipper, who had been below for a few minutes, re-appeared on deck, and, seeing the stranger, advanced toward him, whereupon the first lieutenant introduced senor joaquin miguel lobo in proper form. "glad to see you, senor," remarked the skipper genially. "will you step below and take a glass of wine with lieutenant young and myself?" "ver' happie, captain, i am sure," answered the senor with another sweeping bow and flourish of his panama; and forthwith the trio disappeared down the hatchway, to my unbounded astonishment, for it was not quite like our extremely dignified skipper to be so wonderfully cordial as this to a mere trader. "ah, i'm afraid that won't wash," remarked bates, catching the look of astonishment and perplexity on my face as i turned my regards away from the hatchway. "the captain means to pump the portuguese, if he can, but from the cut of the senor's jib i fancy there is not much to be got out of him; he looks to be far too wide-awake to let us become as wise as himself. i'll be bound that he could put us up to many a good wrinkle if he would; but, bless you, youngster, he's not going to spoil his own trade. he professes to be an honest trader, of course--deals in palm-oil and ivory and what not, of course, and i've no doubt he does; but i wouldn't mind betting a farthing cake that he ships a precious sight more _black_ ivory than white out of this same river. look at that brig, for instance--the one flying spanish colours, i mean. just look at her! did you ever set your eyes upon a more beautiful hull than that? look at the sweep of her run; see how it comes curving round to her stern-post in a delivery so clean that it won't leave a single eddy behind it. no drag _there_, my boy! and look at her sides: round as an apple--not an inch of straight in them! and do you suppose that a brig with lines like that was built for the purpose of carrying palm-oil? not she. i should like to have a look at her bows; i'll be bound they are as keen as a knife--we shall see them by and by, when she swings at the turn of the tide. yet if that brig were overhauled--as she probably will be--nothing whatever of a suspicious character would be found aboard her, except maybe a whole lot of casks, which they would say was for stowing the palm-oil in. well, here we are; but we shall have to keep our eyes open night and day to weather upon the rascally slavers; they are as sly as foxes, and always up to some new circumventing trick." with which reflection, followed by a deep sigh at the wily genius of the slaving fraternity in general, the worthy master turned upon his heel and retired below. the portuguese remained in the cabin for over an hour; and when he came on deck again, accompanied by the captain and the first lieutenant, i thought that the two latter looked decidedly elated, as though, despite the master's foreboding, they had succeeded in obtaining some important information. the captain was particularly gracious to his visitor, going even to the length of shaking hands with him ere he passed out through the gangway, the first luff of course following suit, as in duty bound. "then we may rely upon you to send us off the fresh meat and vegetables early this afternoon?" remarked young, as he stood at the gangway. "yais, yais; dey shall be alongside by t'ree o'clock at de lates'!" answered the portuguese. "and as soon as you have receive dem you had better veigh and leave de creek. give dat point"--indicating boolambemba point--"a bert' of a mile and you veel be all right." "yes, thanks, i will remember," returned the first lieutenant. "and where are we to pick you up?" "hus-s-sh! my dear sair; not so loud, if you please," answered lobo, hastily leaving his boat and coming half-way up the gangway ladder again. "dere is a leetl' creek about two mile pas' de point, on de nort' bank of de river. i vill be on de look-out for you dere in a small canoe vid two men dat i can trus'. and you mus' pick me up _queevk_, because if eet vas known dat i had consent to pilot you my t'roat would be cut before i vas a mont' oldaire." "never fear," answered young. "we will keep a sharp look-out for you and get you on board without anybody being a penny the wiser. good-bye." the portuguese bowed with another flourish of his hat, seated himself in the stern-sheets of his boat, gave the word to his krumen, and a few minutes later was on the wharf, walking toward his factory, into the open door of which he disappeared. "come," thought i, "there is something afoot already. the captain and the first luff have, between them, evidently contrived to worm some intelligence out of the portuguese. i must go and tell bates the news." before i could do so, however, the captain, who had been standing near the gangway, listening to what was passing between young and lobo, caught sight of me and said-- "mr dugdale, be good enough to find mr bates, and tell him that i shall feel obliged if he will come to me for a few minutes in my cabin." i touched my hat, dived down the hatchway, and gave the message, whereupon the master stepped out of his cabin and made his way aft. he was with the captain nearly half-an-hour; and when he re-appeared he looked as pleased as punch. "i'll never attempt to judge a man's character by his face again," he exclaimed, as he caught me by the arm, and walked me along the deck beside him. "who would have thought that a piratical-looking rascal like that portuguese would have been friendly disposed towards the representatives of law and order? yet he has not only given the captain valuable information, but has actually consented to pilot the ship to the spot which is to serve as our base of operations, although, as he says, should the slavers get to know of his having done such a thing, they would cut his throat without hesitation." "yes," said i, "i heard him make that remark to mr young just before shoving off. and pray, mr bates--if the question be not indiscreet-- what is the nature of the expedition upon which we are to engage this afternoon?" "well, i don't know why i shouldn't tell you," answered bates, a little doubtfully. "our movements are of course to be conducted with all possible secrecy, but if i tell you i don't suppose you'll go ashore and hire the town-crier to make public our intentions; and all hands will have to know--more or less--what we're after, very soon, so i suppose i shall not be infringing any of the articles of war if i tell you now; but you needn't go and publish the news throughout the ship, d'ye see? let the skipper do that when he thinks fit." "certainly," i assented. "you may rely implicitly upon my discretion." "oh yes, of course," retorted the master ironically. "a midshipman is a perfect marvel in the way of prudence and discretion; everybody knows _that_! however," he continued, in a much more genial tone, "i will do you the justice to say that you seem to have your ballast pretty well stowed, and that you stand up to your canvas as steadily as any youngster that i've ever fallen in with; so i don't suppose there'll be very much harm in trusting you. you must know, then, that there's a bit of a creek, called chango creek, some fourteen or fifteen miles up the river from here; and in that creek there is at this moment lying snugly at anchor, quite unconscious of our proximity, and leisurely filling up her complement of blacks, a large spanish brig called the _mercedes_ hailing from havana. she is a notorious slaver, and is strongly suspected of having played the part of pirate more than once, when circumstances were favourable. moreover, from what our portuguese friend lobo says, she was in the river when the _sapphire's_ two boats with their crews disappeared; and according to the dates he gives, she must also have been the craft that the plucky little _wasp_ was in chase of when last seen. there is very little doubt, therefore, that the _mercedes_ is the craft--or, at all events, one of them--which it is our especial mission to capture at any cost; and we are therefore going to weigh this afternoon for the purpose of beating up her quarters. lobo has undertaken to pilot us as far as the mouth of the creek; and as he tells us that the brig is fully a hundred tons bigger than ourselves, is armed to the teeth, and is manned by a big crowd of desperadoes, every man of whom has bound himself by a fearful oath never to lay down his arms while the breath remains in his body, i shouldn't wonder if we find out before all is done that we have undertaken a pretty tough job." "it would seem like it, if senor lobo's information is to be relied upon," said i, an involuntary shudder and qualm thrilling me as my vivid imagination instantly conjured up a vision of the impending conflict. "but i suppose every precaution will be taken to catch the rascals unawares?" "you may be sure of that," answered the master, peering curiously into my face as he spoke. "captain stopford is not the man to court a reverse, or a heavy loss of life, by unduly advertising his intentions. but you look pale, boy! you are surely not beginning to funk, are you?" "no," said i, a little dubiously, "i think not. but this will be my first experience of fighting, you know--i have never been face to face with an enemy thus far--and i must confess that the idea of a hand-to-hand fight--for i suppose it will come to that--a life-and-death struggle, wherein one has not only to incur the awful responsibility of hurling one's fellow-creatures into eternity, but also to take the fearful risk of being hurled thither one's self, perhaps without a moment of time in which to breathe a prayer for mercy, is something that i, for one, can hardly contemplate with absolute equanimity." "certainly not," assented bates kindly, linking his arm in mine as he spoke; "certainly not; you would be something more or less--_less_, i should be inclined to say--than human if you could. but, as to the responsibility of hurling those villains into eternity, do not let that trouble you for a single moment, my lad; in endeavouring to put down this inhuman slave-trade we are engaged upon a righteous and lawful task--lawful and righteous in the eyes of god as well as of man, i humbly believe--and if the traffickers in human flesh and human freedom and human happiness choose to risk and lose their lives in the pursuit of their hellish trade, the responsibility must rest with themselves, and in my humble opinion the earth is well rid of such inhuman monsters. and as to the other matter--that of being yourself hurried into eternity unprepared--it need not occur, my boy; _no one_ need die unprepared. what i mean is, of course, that _all_ should take especial care to be prepared for death whenever it may meet us, for we know not what a day, or an hour, or even a moment may bring forth; the man who walks the streets of his native town in fancied security is actually just as liable to be cut off unawares as are we who follow the terrible but necessary profession of arms; the menaces to life ashore are as numerous as they are afloat, or more so; the forms of accident are innumerable. and therefore i say that _all_ should be careful to so conduct themselves that they may be prepared to face death at any moment. and if they are not, they may easily become so; for god's ear is always open to the cry of his children, and i will take it upon myself to say that no earnest, heartfelt prayer is ever allowed to go unanswered. so, if you have any misgivings about to-night's work, go to god and ask for his mercy and protection and help; and then, _whatever_ happens, you will be all right." so saying, the good old fellow halted just abreast the hatchway, which we had reached at this point in our perambulation fore and aft the deck, and, gently urging me toward it suggestively, released my arm and turned away. i took the hint thus given me and, without a word--for indeed at that moment i was too deeply moved for speech--made my way below to the midshipmen's berth, which i found opportunely empty, and there cast myself upon my knees and prayed earnestly for some minutes. when i arose from this act of devotion i was once more calm and unperturbed; and from that moment i date a habit of prayer that has been an inexpressible comfort and support to me ever since. upon returning to the deck the first object that caught my eyes was our gig, with the first luff and little pierrepoint--our junior mid but one--in the stern-sheets, pulling toward the very handsome spanish brig--already spoken of as lying at anchor a short distance inside of us--upon a visit of inspection. that the inspection to which she was subjected was pretty thorough was sufficiently attested by the fact that the gig remained alongside her a full hour, the british brig and the dutch barque being in their turn afterwards subjected to a similarly severe examination; but, as bates had predicted, nothing came of it, all their papers being perfectly in order, while a rigorous search failed to discover anything of an incriminating character on board either of them. "of course not," commented the master, when he learned the substance of the first luff's report to the skipper; "of course not. bless ye, the people that trade to this river aren't born fools, not they! just consider the matter for a moment. let's suppose, for argument's sake, that the spaniard yonder is a slaver. would she ship her cargo here in the very spot that would be first visited by every man-o'-war that enters the river? of course she wouldn't; she'd go away up the river into one of the many creeks that branch into it on either side for the first twenty miles or so, and ship her blacks there, watching for the chance of a dark night to slip out and get well off the land before daylight. if she came in here at all, it would be to fill up her water and lay in a stock of meal upon which to feed her niggers when she'd got 'em; and you may depend on it that when a slaver comes in here upon any such errand as that, a very bright look-out is kept for cruisers, and that, upon the first sight of a suspicious-looking sail in the offing, her irons, her meal, and everything else that would incriminate her are bundled ashore and hidden away safely among the bushes, while her water would be started and pumped out of her long enough before a man-o'-war could get alongside of her. what is that spanish brig taking in?" he continued, turning to little pierrepoint, who, with the first lieutenant, had visited her. "nothing," answered the lad. "she only arrived yesterday; and her hold is half full of casks in which she is going to stow her palm-oil." "of course," remarked the master sarcastically, turning to me. "what did i say to you this morning? whenever a ship is found in an african river with a lot of casks aboard, that ship is after palm-oil--at least, so her skipper will tell ye. and that's where they get to wind'ard of us; for unless they've something more incriminating--something pointing more directly to an intention to traffic in slaves--than mere casks, we daren't touch 'em. but, you mark me, that brig's here to take off a cargo of blacks; and unless i'm greatly mistaken she'll have vanished when we turn up here again to-morrow." it was just six bells in the afternoon watch when two boats--one containing fresh water in casks, and the other loaded to her gunwale with fresh meat--mostly goat-mutton strongly impregnated with the powerful musky odour of the animal--appeared paddling leisurely off to the _barracouta_ under the guidance of four powerful but phenomenally lazy krumen, who would probably have consumed the best part of half-an-hour in the short passage from the wharf to the brig had not our impatient first luff dispatched a boat to tow them alongside. the water was pumped into the tanks, the provisions were passed up the side and stowed away below in the coolest part of the ship; and no sooner were the boats clear of the ship's side than the boatswain's whistle shrilled along the deck, followed by the gruff bellow of "all hands unmoor ship!" the messenger was passed, the anchor roused up to the bows, and in a few minutes the _barracouta_, under her two topsails, and wafted by a light westerly zephyr, was moving slowly down the narrow channel toward the estuary of the river. so light was the draught of air that now impelled us, that, although every cloth was quickly spread to woo it, the ship was a full hour and a half reaching as far as boolambemba point, where we met the full strength of the river current; and when we bore away on our course up the river, our patience was severely taxed by the discovery that, even with studding-sails set on both sides from the royals down, we could scarcely do more than hold our own against the strong rush of the tide and current together. slowly, however, and by imperceptible degrees, by hugging the northern shore as closely as we dared, with the lead constantly going, we managed to creep insidiously past the mangrove and densely bush-clad river bank until, just as the sun was dipping into the horizon astern in a brief but indescribably magnificent blaze of purple and scarlet and gold, we reached the place of our rendezvous with senor lobo. and soon afterwards we had the satisfaction of discovering that gentleman making his way toward us out of the narrow creek, his conveyance being a small native canoe about fifteen feet long, roughly hewn and hollowed out of a single log, and propelled by two natives, who apparently regarded clothes as an entirely unnecessary superfluity, for they were absolutely naked. they were fine, powerful specimens of negro manhood, however, and smart fellows withal, for they propelled their ungainly little craft along at a truly wonderful pace with scarcely any apparent effort, sheering her alongside the brig in quite respectable style without obliging us to start tack or sheet in order to pick them up, and shinning up the side with the agility of a couple of monkeys as soon as they had securely made fast the rope's-end that was hove to them. our impatience at the slow progress that we had thus far made was somewhat relieved by lobo's assurance that we might confidently rely upon a brisk breeze speedily springing up that would carry us to our destination as soon as was at all desirable; his opinion being that our best chance of success lay in the postponement of our attack until about two o'clock in the morning, by which time the moon would have set, and the slaver's crew would probably be wrapped in their deepest slumber. so far as his prognostication relative to the wind was concerned, it was soon confirmed, a strong breeze from the southward springing up, under the impulsion of which, and with considerably reduced canvas, we reached our destination, so far as the brig was concerned, about five bells in the first watch. this spot was situated on the northern bank of the river, at a distance, up-stream, of about thirteen miles from boolambemba point. it was at the mouth of a creek, named chango creek, and in a small bay or roadstead about a mile long by perhaps half that width formed by six islands, the largest of which was nearly two miles long by half-a-mile wide, while the smallest and most easterly of all was a very diminutive affair, of perhaps not more than an acre in area, densely overgrown, like the rest of them, with thick, impenetrable bush. in the very centre of this small roadstead, to which we had been piloted by the portuguese trader, we anchored the brig in two and a half fathoms of water; when, the canvas having been furled, and all our preparations for the attack having been fully made before dark, a strong anchor-watch was set, and everybody else turned in to get an hour or two's sleep, strict injunctions being laid upon the master, who had charge of the watch, to keep a bright look-out, and to have all hands called at two bells precisely in the middle watch. as for lobo, he took leave of us directly that our anchor was down, and, rousing out his sable crew, who were fast asleep and snoring melodiously underneath the long-boat, took to his canoe, once more and almost immediately vanished among the deep black shadows of the islets that hemmed us in. i know not what were the feelings of others on board the brig on that eventful night, or how those two short hours of inaction were spent in other parts of the ship, but i am convinced that when we all went below to turn in, a very general conviction had spread among us that the enterprise upon which we were shortly to engage was one that would prove to be more than ordinarily difficult and dangerous, and while not one of us probably had a moment's doubt as to its ultimate result, i believe the feeling was pretty general that the struggle would be fierce and obstinate, and that our loss would probably be unusually heavy. i gathered this from the demeanour of the ship's crew generally, officers as well as men; the former revealing the feeling by the extreme care with which they scrutinised and personally superintended the several preparations for the expedition, and the latter by the grim and silent earnestness with which they performed their share of the work. true, there was some faint attempt at jocularity among a few of the occupants of the midshipmen's berth as we sought our hammocks, but it was manifestly braggadocio, utterly lacking the true ring of heartiness that usually characterised such attempts, and it was speedily nipped in the bud by gowland, the master's mate, who gruffly recommended the offenders to "say their prayers and then go to sleep, instead of talking nonsense." though i was not one of the offenders i took his advice, earnestly commending myself to the mercy and protection of the almighty, both in the coming conflict and throughout the rest of my life, should it please him to spare it, after which i sank quickly into a deep, untroubled sleep. chapter three. the night attack. from this sleep i was aroused--in a few minutes, it seemed to me, although really it was nearly two hours later--by a boisterous banging upon the mess-table, followed by the voice of the marine who executed the functions of steward to the mess, exclaiming-- "`all hands,' gentlemen, please! the captain and the first liftenant is already on deck." this was followed by the rasping scrape of a lucifer match, by the feeble light of which the man's face was seen bending over the lantern which he was endeavouring to light. "ay, ay, jerry, look alive with the lantern, man!" responded the master's mate. "what is the night like?" he continued, as he swung himself out of his hammock and hastily proceeded to thrust his long legs into his breeches. "dark as pitch, sir; blowing more than half a gale of wind, and threatening rain," was the cheering answer. "a pleasant prospect, truly," muttered good, my especial chum, as we jostled each other in the confined space wherein we were struggling into our clothing. "it might be worse, however," responded gowland, as he knotted a black silk handkerchief tightly about his loins. "the darkness and the roar of the wind among the trees will help capitally to mask our approach, while i dare say that the craft which we are going to attack will be in such a snug berth that nobody will think it worth while to keep a look-out, blow high or blow low. i say, pierrepoint, are you told off for the boats?" pierrepoint intimated that he was. "then put that rubbishy toasting-fork away and get a cutlass, boy, as dugdale has. of what use do you suppose a dirk would be in a hand-to-hand fight with a great burly spaniard? why, none at all. i can't understand, for my part, why such useless tools are supplied for active service! get a good honest cutlass, boy; something that you can trust your life to. and look sharp about it! hurry up there, you loafers! come, burdett, my boy, stir your stumps if you don't want a wigging from the first luff! hillo, jerry! what's that, hot coffee? well done, my man, i'll owe you a glass of grog for that! pour it out quickly, and rouse out the bread barge." jerry was a smart fellow and looked after us well, i will say that for him. in less than a minute a cup or pannikin of steaming coffee stood ready for each of us, with the bread barge, well supplied, in the centre of the table. "there's no time for eating now, but take my advice and slip a biscuit into your pocket, each of you, to eat as soon as the boats shove off," advised gowland. "there is nothing worse for a man, in this climate--or _any_ climate, for the matter of that--than to turn out and go into the open air in the middle of the night upon an empty stomach." and, suiting the action to the word, he thrust a biscuit into each of his side-pockets, placed a morsel in his mouth, and, with the exclamation, "well, i'm off!" darted up the ladder and disappeared. i followed, and, upon reaching the deck, found that all hands were mustered and waiting for inspection previous to being told off to the boats. the skipper was in his cabin, but a few minutes later--by which time all the laggards had put in an appearance--he emerged from the companion-way and the inspection at once began, great attention being given, i noticed, to those who were to go in the boats, to insure that their weapons were in serviceable order, their pistols loaded, and that each man had his due supply of cartridges. the inspection was conducted by the first lieutenant, accompanied by the captain and a sergeant of marines, the latter carrying a lantern, by the rather dim and uncertain light of which the inspection was made. the moment that this was over the men who were to participate in the expedition were told off, each to his proper boat, the boats were lowered and brought to the gangway, and in less than a quarter of an hour from the moment of our being called we were off. the expedition consisted of four boats; namely, the gig, the pinnace, and the first and second cutters. the gig was a very fine, handsome boat, beautifully modelled, and exceedingly fast; she was commanded by the captain himself, who led the expedition--a sure indication of the important character, in his opinion, of the impending encounter. she pulled six oars, and in addition to the skipper, my chum, good, and her crew of seamen, carried half-a-dozen marines, four in the stern-sheets, and two forward. the pinnace was a big, roomy, and rather heavy boat, pulling ten oars, double banked, and mounting a nine-pounder gun in her bows. she was commanded by mr michael ryan, the second lieutenant, a rollicking, high-spirited irishman, whose only fault was that he lacked discretion and was utterly reckless; albeit this fault was to a great extent condoned by the effect of his influence upon the men, who would follow him anywhere. his crew, in addition to the ten oarsmen and a coxswain, consisted of little pierrepoint and ten marines, six aft and four forward. the first and second cutters were sister boats, precisely alike in every respect, each pulling eight oars, double banked. they were rather smarter boats than the pinnace, being nearly as long but with less beam and freeboard, and finer lines. the first cutter was commanded by gowland, the master's mate, and carried, in addition to her crew of ten men and a coxswain, eight marines. the second cutter was entrusted to me, and carried the same complement as her consort, the first cutter. it will thus be seen that the expedition numbered seventy-seven souls in all--nearly the half of our ship's company, in fact--the brig being left in charge of the first luff, with the master, the purser, the surgeon, young burdett of the midshipmen's mess, the cook and his mate, captain's, gun-room, and wardroom stewards, and seventy-eight seamen. the weather, although favourable enough for such an expedition as that upon which we were engaged--and which, if our anticipations should prove correct, would depend largely for its success upon our ability to take the enemy completely by surprise--was decidedly disagreeable; for, as jerry had reported, it was dark as pitch, the wind was sweeping athwart the river in savage gusts that roared among the trees with a volume of sound that rendered it necessary to raise the voice to a loud shout in order to make an order heard from one end of the boat to the other, and we had scarcely left the ship when it came on to rain with a fury that rendered the preservation of our ammunition from damage a serious difficulty and a source of keen anxiety. fortunately for us, we reached the mouth of the creek a few minutes before the rain began to fall, but for which circumstance we should have met with the utmost difficulty in discovering the entrance, and might possibly have lost a considerable amount of valuable time in the search for it. even as it was, so intense was the darkness that, although the creek was only some two hundred yards wide, we found it impossible to keep the boats in the centre of the channel, and for a little while were constantly running foul of each other or the banks. luckily for us, we were no sooner in the creek than its eastern bank afforded us a shelter from the direct violence of the wind, the bush and trees growing so thickly right down to the water's edge that close inshore we were completely becalmed; and, thus sheltered, our sense of hearing helped us somewhat despite the deep roar of the gale overhead, while we quickly caught the knack of steering along the outer edge of the narrow belt of calm, in this way avoiding to a great extent the difficulties and petty mishaps that had at first so seriously hampered our movements. in this way, and exposed all the while to the pelting of the heavy tropical downpour, which quickly drenched us to the skin in spite of the protection of our oil-skins, we slowly groped our way along the creek with muffled oars for rather more than an hour, when we unexpectedly found ourselves at the entrance of a fairly spacious lagoon, in the centre of which we speedily made out not one, but _four_ craft moored right athwart the channel, completely barring our further passage. from their disposition it looked very much as though they had been moored with springs upon their cables--for their broadsides were presented fair at us--and, if so, it argued at least a suspicion on their part of a possible visit from an enemy, with doubtless a corresponding amount of precaution against the chance of being surprised. scarcely had we made this discovery when the gig, which was leading, found her further progress unexpectedly interrupted by a boom composed of tree-trunks, secured together with chains, stretching right across the water-way. as she struck it a loud cry was heard proceeding from the river bank on our starboard hand, immediately followed by a musket-shot. the next moment a spark of light appeared in the same quarter, quickly increasing in size and intensity until in less than a minute a large fire, evidently caused by the ignition of a very considerable quantity of highly combustible material, was blazing fiercely in the shelter of a thick clump of overhanging bush, that seemed to almost completely shield it from the rain, which, however, had considerably moderated by this time. the dense mass of bush behind and on either side of the blazing mass acted in some sort as a reflector, concentrating the light of the fire upon the boom and our four boats clustered closely together about it, and defining them with very unpleasant distinctness against the background of impenetrable darkness. that this was so, and that our projected surprise had proved a lamentable failure, was made clear by the sounds of commotion and the sharp cries of command that at once arose on board the slavers, almost instantly followed by a smart and well-directed musketry fire, the bullets from which came dropping about us in very unpleasant proximity, although, fortunately, nobody was actually hit. "separate at once!" cried the skipper, rising in the stern-sheets of the gig as he realised that the time for silence and secrecy was past; "separate at once; spread yourselves along the boom, and let each boat's crew do its best to make a passage through it. try the effect of a shot from your gun upon it, mr ryan. marines, return the fire of those craft, aiming at the flashes from their pieces. the first boat to force the boom will report the fact to me before passing through." we spread well along the boom, maintaining open order, so that we might afford as small a target as possible, and devoted our energies to breaking through the obstruction at points where the trunks were united by chains; but we found this by no means an easy matter, staples being driven home through the links into the tenacious wood so closely together that it was impossible to find a space wide enough to take the loom of an oar--the only lever at hand, as we had not anticipated or provided for such a contingency. meanwhile, our adversaries proved themselves fully alive to the advantage which our situation afforded them, and fully prepared to make the most of it, for they kept up a brisk though irregular fire of musketry upon us from which we soon began to suffer rather severely, two of my men being hit within the space of as many minutes, while sharp cries of pain to our right and left told us that the occupants of the other boats were receiving their full share of the slavers' attentions. this was only the beginning of the conflict, however, for before our marines had had time to fire more than thrice in reply to the slavers' musketry fire, five fierce flashes of flame burst simultaneously from the side of the largest of the four craft, accompanied by the sharp, ringing roar of brass nine-pounder guns, and instantly a perfect storm of grape tore and whistled about our ears, splintering the planking of the boats and bowling over our people right and left. three more of my men went down before that discharge, and the cries of anguish from the other boats told that they too had suffered nearly or quite as severely. the gig fared worst of all, however, for an entire charge, apparently, plumped right into her bows, where the men were clustered pretty thickly, helping two of their comrades who were kneeling upon the boom endeavouring to tear asunder its fastenings, and no less than six of her crew fell before that withering discharge, including the two men upon the boom, who both fell into the water, and were never seen again. "by jove! this will never do," cried the captain. "out oars, men, and pull alongside the pinnace!" this was done; and as the two boats touched, our gallant leader sprang on board the larger of the two, crying to the second lieutenant-- "here, mr ryan, i will change places with you. take the gig, if you please, and see if you can cast the boom adrift at its shore end; i will look after matters here meanwhile. mr gowland, go you to the other end of the boom, and see what you can do there. now then, lads, what is the best news there with that gun?" "just ready, sir," came the answer. "poor jim baker was struck, and fell athwart the breech, wettin' the primin' with his blood just as we was about to fire, so we've had to renew it; but we're ready now, sir." "very well," cried the skipper. "bear the boat off from the boom, and fire at the chain-coupling; that ought to do the business for us." the order was promptly obeyed, and a few seconds later the gun spoke out, the shot hitting fair and square, and dividing the two parts of the chain that formed the coupling between two contiguous tree-trunks. a loud hurrah proclaimed this result, yet when the pinnace pulled up to the boom again, and tried to force her way through, it was found that the logs could not be forced apart; evidently they were still united under water. "load the gun again, lads, as smartly as you can," exclaimed the skipper; "and then we must try to roll the logs over, and get the chains above water. well, what news, mr gowland?" as the first cutter was seen approaching us. "it's no good, sir," answered gowland. "we can't get within twenty yards of dry ground for the mud, which is too stiff to permit of our forcing the boat through it, but not stiff enough to support a man. i made the attempt, and went in up to my arm-pits before they could get hold of me to pull me out." meanwhile, a hot fire of grape and musketry--the latter from all four of the craft--was being maintained upon us; our men were falling fast; and the matter to my mind began to look very serious. still, those who were not hurt, or whose hurts were not very severe, worked away manfully in an endeavour to break the boom; but it was clear--to me at least--that our only hope lay in the pinnace's gun. if that failed, it seemed probable that every man of us would be placed _hors de combat_ before we could force a passage through. our nine-pounder was soon ready again; and then--gowland and i having meanwhile stationed our respective boats one on each side of the pinnace, and by the united efforts of our crews succeeded in rolling the logs so far over as to bring the remaining pair of coupling chains out of the water--a second effort was made to divide the boom. the shot was a successful one, both chains being completely cut through. another ringing cheer proclaimed the good news just as the gig rejoined us with a similar piece of intelligence to that already brought by gowland, as to the impossibility of landing and getting at the shore-fasts of the boom. that obstacle was now, however, happily severed, and drawing his sword, the skipper waved it over his head as he shouted-- "out oars, men, and give way for your lives! follow me, the rest of the boats. we will tackle the big fellow first, and bring the other three to their senses afterwards with the aid of her guns." the words were scarcely out of his mouth when another broadside of grape hurtled in among us, now once more huddled closely together about the breach in that deadly boom, and from the dreadful outcry that immediately arose, the tossing of arms aloft, and the dropping of oars, it was evident that fearful havoc had been wrought by it among our already seriously diminished company. and, to make matters worse, it was instantly followed by a louder, deeper report, and a crash on board the pinnace as an eighteen-pound shot struck her gun fair upon its starboard trunnion, dismounting the piece and sending it overboard, while a shower of splinters of wood and metal flew from the slide, wounding and maiming at least four more men. and then, as though that were not enough, the shot glanced and swept the boat fore and aft, crushing in the side of one poor fellow's head like an egg-shell, smashing in the ribs of another, and whipping the captain's sword out of his hand, with all four of his fingers, as it flew over his head into the darkness beyond. in the teeth of this new disaster the pinnace forced her way through the now divided boom, closely followed by ryan in the gig, then myself, with gowland bringing up the rear. "give way for your lives!" was now the word; and at racing pace--or as near it as we could get with our sadly diminished crews--we headed for the biggest craft of the four, which we now made out to be a large brig, very heavily rigged and with immensely square yards. we opened out a little to port and starboard as we went, in order that we might show as small a mark as possible for our antagonists to fire at, and, having already passed the heavy pinnace, i was fast creeping up into the leading position, when ryan, who saw what i was after, sheered alongside and in sharp, terse language ordered me to change places with him. of course i could but obey, and the fiery irishman, finding himself in the best-manned boat of the lot, speedily passed ahead, despite the utmost efforts of the rest of us to keep pace with him. one more broadside of grape greeted us as we pushed somewhat heavily across the lagoon, and that put the poor unfortunate gig practically out of the combat, for it reduced her oarsmen to two, while she had already been so badly knocked about that it needed the utmost efforts of the least severely wounded of her crew to keep her afloat by baling. we kept on, however, in the wake of the other boats, and had at least a good view of the short, sharp fight that followed. the brig was lying with her starboard broadside presented to us, and as the boats advanced toward her they gradually passed out of the broad line of light cast by the still fiercely blazing fire that had been kindled on the shore. no sooner did this happen, however, than half-a-dozen men provided with port-fires sprang, three into her main and three into her fore port rigging, illumining the brig herself brilliantly, it is true, but at the same time revealing the whereabouts of our boats distinctly enough to enable her people to keep up a most galling pistol and musketry fire upon us, besides giving them the advantage that the light was at their backs, while it shone in the faces of our marines with such dazzling effect that they were able to reply but ineffectively to the fire with their own muskets. the second lieutenant was first alongside, closely followed by gowland, the pinnace making a bad third and ranging up under the bows of the brig, while the other boats attempted to board her in the waist. but the brig--and the three schooners as well for that matter--was well protected by boarding nettings triced up fore and aft, and as our men made a dash at her they were met by pikes thrust at them out through the ports, by the snapping of pistols in their faces, and the fierce lunge of cutlasses through the meshes of the netting. nevertheless they persevered gallantly, hacking away at the netting with their cutlasses, and occasionally delivering a thrust through it at any one who happened to come within arm's-length of them. but it was clearly a losing game; our losses had been so heavy during our attack upon the boom that we were already far out-numbered by the crew of the brig alone, and they possessed a further important advantage over us in that they fought upon a spacious level deck, while our lads were obliged to cling to the bulwarks as best they could with one hand while they wielded their weapons with the other; moreover, the slavers were able to make a tolerably effective use of their pikes and still keep beyond the reach of our cutlasses. "if it were not for that diabolical netting," thought i, "there would be some chance for us still." and as we ranged laboriously up alongside, my eye travelled up the face of the obstruction to its upper edge, and i saw that it was suspended at four points only, two on the port and two on the starboard side, in the wake of the main and foremasts. "a sharp knife," thought i, "ought to divide each of those tricing-lines at a single stroke, when down would go the net upon the defenders' heads and hamper their movements long enough to give our people a chance." and then i remembered that only a day or two before i had sharpened my own stout clasp-knife--at that moment hung about my neck on a lanyard-- to almost a razor edge, and that consequently i had in my possession just the weapon for the purpose. as my meditations reached this point the gig touched the brig's side, and whipping out my knife and opening it, i made one spring from the boat's gunwale into the netting, up which i at once swarmed with all the agility i could muster--and i was fairly active in those days, let me tell you--a musket-shot knocking my cap off as my head rose above the level of the bulwarks, while a moment later a fellow made a lunge at me with his pike as i skipped up the meshes, and drove its head half through the calf of my left leg. i felt the wound, of course, but was at the moment much too excited and intent upon the task which i had set myself to give it a second thought, and in another instant, so it seemed to me, i had reached the tricing line, which i grasped tightly with one hand while i hacked away vigorously with the other. the rope parted at the third stroke of the knife, and down dropped the net, sagging so much in the wake of the main-rigging that our lads were easily able to surmount the obstacle, and i saw ryan, with a wild, exultant "hurroo!" half fall, half leap down to the brig's deck, where he laid about him so ferociously with fist and cutlass that he at once cleared a space around himself for his followers. as for me, i was left dangling by one hand at the bare end of the severed tricing line, but within easy reach of the starboard main-topsail sheet, which i promptly grasped and began to lower myself hand over hand down to the deck. even as i glided down the sheet, i saw that one of our lads had followed my example, and, cutting the fore tricing line, had let the whole of the starboard netting down on deck, while his comrades were pouring in over the bulwarks like an avalanche. the brig's crew still offered a gallant resistance, but the british blood was by this time fairly at boiling point, and, grimly silent, the blue-jackets laid about them in such terrible earnest with fist and cutlass, belaying-pin, clubbed musket, sponge, rammer, or any other effective weapon that they could lay hands upon, that their rush became irresistible, and their antagonists gave way before them in terror. at this juncture, and while i was still some twelve or fourteen feet above the deck, i noticed a man, whose dress and appearance suggested to me the idea that he might possibly be the leader of this band of outlaws, quietly separate himself from the combatants, and with a certain sly, secretive manner, as though he were desirous of avoiding observation, slink along the deck to the companion, down which he suddenly vanished. there was an indescribable something about the air and movements of this fellow that powerfully aroused my curiosity and excited an irresistible impulse within me to follow him; and accordingly, swinging myself to the deck abaft the main-mast, which was deserted, the fight still being confined to the waist and forecastle of the brig, i made a dart for the companion, kicked off my shoes before entering, animated by some instinct or idea which i did not stop to analyse at the moment, and drawing my cutlass from its sheath, crept cautiously and noiselessly down the companion-ladder. the moment that i entered the companion-way i was saluted by a whiff of moist, hot air loaded with a powerful, foetid, musky odour, of which i had already become vaguely conscious, accompanied by a deep, murmuring sound that seemed to proceed from the vessel's hold; and although this was my first experience with slavers, i knew in an instant that the brig had her human cargo on board, and that the sound and the odour proceeded from it. the companion-way was in complete darkness, but at the foot of the ladder, and to starboard of it, there was a thin, horizontal line of dim light marking the presence of a door that i had heard slam-to as i kicked off my shoes previous to descending. making for this, i groped for the door-handle, found it, and, grasping it firmly, suddenly turned it and flung the door open. as i did so i found myself standing at the entrance to a fine, roomy cabin, which seemed to be handsomely, nay, luxuriously furnished. it was but dimly illuminated, however, the only light proceeding from an ordinary horn lantern, which, kneeling upon the deck, the man i had followed was holding open with one hand, while with the other he was applying the end of a slender black cord to the flame of the enclosed candle. the other end of the cord referred to led down an open hatchway close to the fore-bulkhead of the cabin; and as i took in the whole scene in a single comprehensive glance--the open hatchway, the black cord, and the dimly-burning lantern--i realised with lightning intuitiveness that every soul on board the brig was tottering upon the very brink of eternity; the reckless villain before me was in the very act of exploding the powder magazine, and blowing the ship and all she contained into the air. this surmise was confirmed as, turning his head at the sound of the opening door, the fellow withdrew from the lantern the end of the black cord--which was of course a length of fuse composed of spun-yarn well coated with damp powder, now fizzing and spluttering and smoking as the fire swiftly travelled along it. so rapidly did the fire travel indeed, that during the second or so that the desperado paused in surprise at my unexpected appearance, it reached his fingers, causing him to drop it to the deck with a muttered curse. i knew that in twenty or thirty seconds at most that hissing train of fire would run along the guiding line of the fuse down the hatchway to the powder in which the other end of it was certain to be buried; and bounding forward i placed one foot upon the blazing fuse as i dealt a heavy downward stroke with the hilt of my cutlass upon the upturned temple of the man who, crouching before me, was clearly on the point of springing to his feet. then, dashing down my cutlass as the fellow sank back with a groan upon the deck, i wrenched my still open knife from my neck, and, while the struggling flame scorched and seared the sole of my naked foot, slashed the blade quickly through the fuse, and with the same movement whirled the severed and unlighted part as far away from me as possible. this done, i knew that the danger was past; and, drawing the short burning fragment of fuse from beneath my foot, i carefully deposited it in the lantern, where it instantly flamed itself harmlessly away. my next act was to secure the remainder of the fuse and cautiously withdraw it from the dark hatchway down which it led; and, this safely accomplished, i closed the aperture by drawing over the hatch, and then sat down to nurse my seared and blistered foot and to await the progress of events; my companion or adversary, or whatever he should be rightly called, still lying motionless where he had fallen, with a large blue lump on his white temple from which a thin stream of blood slowly oozed. during the few brief seconds that had elapsed between my entrance into the cabin and the flinging of myself upon one of its sofas, i had lost all cognisance of what was happening elsewhere; but as i took my scorched foot upon my knee and ruefully contemplated its injuries, i once more became aware of the sounds of conflict on deck; the fierce, confused stamping of many feet; the cries and ejaculations of encouragement or dismay; the quick jar and clash of blade upon blade; the occasional explosion of a pistol; the dull, crushing sound of unwarded blows; the sharp scream of agony as some poor wretch felt the stroke of the merciless steel; the cries and groans of those who had been smitten down, and, still conscious, were being trampled underfoot by the combatants; the deep muttered curse; the sharp word of command; and the occasional cheer that broke from the lips of our own gallant lads. suddenly there was a louder hurrah, a quick scurrying rush, a loud shout of command in spanish for every man to save himself, an outcry of terrified ejaculations in the same tongue, a quick succession of splashes in the water alongside, and a sudden silence, broken the next instant by a gasping but triumphant shout from ryan of-- "hurroo, bhoys! by the blessed--saint--pathrick--but--that's nately done! ugh!--pouff!--we've--drove them--clane overboard! murther! but it's meltin' i am--and as dhry--as a limekiln!" chapter four. chango creek. then i heard the skipper hailing, apparently from the forecastle-- "is that mr ryan's voice that i hear, aft there?" "ay, ay, sorr," answered the second luff; "it's myself, bedad, all that's left ov me!" a sound of footsteps followed, suggesting that he had walked away forward to join his superior; but as the man at my feet just then stirred uneasily, as though his senses were returning to him, i made a quick grab at my cutlass, and drawing from my belt a loaded pistol, the existence of which i had until then forgotten, i pulled myself together and made ready for the next emergency. presently, my prisoner, for such he now was, stirred again, sighed deeply, and opened his eyes, his glance immediately falling upon me. for a few seconds he seemed not to know where he was, or what had happened; then, as we gazed into each other's eyes, i saw that his memory had returned to him, and as he made a motion to rise to his feet, i sprang to mine, and pointing my pistol straight at his head, said in the best spanish that i could muster-- "stay where you are! if you make the slightest attempt to move i will blow your brains out, you villain!" he continued to gaze steadfastly at me for some moments; and then seeing, i suppose, that i fully meant what i said, he smiled bitterly and muttered-- "so it has come to this, has it, that i must lie here in my own cabin, helpless, at the mercy of a mere boy? _car-r-am-ba_!" he still kept his regards steadfastly fixed upon me; and as i seemed to read in the expression of his eyes a dawning determination to make at least one more effort for freedom, i was not sorry to hear footsteps coming along the deck, and the voices of the skipper and ryan in earnest conversation. "we must get a light from somewhere at once, and look to the wounded without a moment's delay," said the former. "i fear that our loss has been very serious in this affair. ah! there is a faint glimmer of light from the skylight yonder; i will go below and see what it is. meanwhile, mr ryan, muster your men, and load the guns, if you can lay your hand upon any ammunition. those schooners will try to slip away if they can, now that we have got the brig; but i shall not be satisfied unless i can secure the whole of them; we _must_ have something more than we have got already to account satisfactorily for our loss!" "niver fear, sorr," answered the second luff; "they'll not get away from--by all the powers though, there goes one of thim now!" and away he dashed forward again, shouting out certain orders to the men, while the skipper, after hesitating for a few seconds, entered the companion and began to descend. my attention had been somewhat distracted from my prisoner by this brief conversation, a fact which had evidently not passed unnoticed by him, for before i fully realised what was happening, he had in some inexplicable manner sprung to his feet with a single, lightning-like movement, and his hand was already upon my left wrist, when with a quick twist of the arm i managed to get my pistol-barrel pointed at him as i pressed the trigger. there was a bright flash, lighting up the whole cabin as though by a gleam of lightning, and glancing vividly from the rolling eyeballs of my antagonist, a sharp explosion, and the spaniard went reeling backward with a crash upon one of the sofas as the captain entered the cabin at a bound. "hillo!" he exclaimed, as he peered at me in the faint light of the lantern, "who are you, and what is the matter here? why--bless me!--it is mr dugdale, isn't it? and pray who is that man on the sofa?" in a few brief words i narrated my adventure, to which he listened quietly, holding his wounded hand, bound up in a handkerchief, in the other meanwhile; and when i had finished, he glanced at the prostrate figure on the sofa and said, noticing the ghastly paleness of the upturned face, and the lifelessness of the outstretched limbs-- "well, he looks as though there was not much mischief left in him now, at all events. but it will not do to take any risks; he is evidently a desperate character, or was before you pinked him, so slip up on deck and get a length of line--a bit off one of the topgallant-braces will do if you can't find anything better--to make him fast with. and call a couple of hands to come below and carry him on deck; it is scarcely safe to leave such a fellow alone in the cabin, even when securely bound." i hobbled on deck as well as my burnt foot--which by this time was excruciatingly painful--would permit, and finding a suitable bit of line, and securing the assistance of two of our lads, the slave-captain, as he eventually proved to be, was speedily bound hand and foot, conveyed on deck, and propped up in a reclining position against the bulwarks, well aft out of the way, in such a position as seemed least likely to encourage the bleeding of his wound. meanwhile, ryan, upon leaving the skipper, had rushed forward and hailed the fugitive schooner, in his richest dublin accent, to heave-to, or he would sink her. to this command, however, whether understood or not, no attention was paid; and before our people, groping about in the thick darkness among the dead and wounded, could lay their hands upon a single cartridge, they had the mortification of seeing her vanish round a bend of the creek on her way seaward, the lieutenant consoling himself with the assurance that she would infallibly be snapped up by the _barracouta_, whose slender crew would be certain to be on the alert all through the night. when the skipper and i arrived on deck, after securing our prisoner, ryan and a few of our lads were busily employed ramming home a charge in the long eighteen mounted upon the brig's forecastle, a cartridge and shot for which they had stumbled across in their search. the second luff at once began to relate, with many comical expressions of righteous indignation, the particulars of the schooner's escape; but he had scarcely got well into his narrative when the faint _screep_ of a block-sheave from to windward warned us that another of our slippery neighbours was about to hazard a like experiment. without waiting for orders, or thinking of what i was doing, forgetting even my injured foot in the excitement of the moment, i sprang upon the rail and hailed in spanish-- "hola there, keep all fast on board those schooners, or we will riddle you with grape! and light a lantern each of you and hoist it to your main-mast-head. i warn you that we will stand no nonsense, so if you value your lives you will attempt to play no tricks!" to this no reply whatever was vouchsafed; and i was about to hail again, when the captain remarked, very quietly-- "may i inquire, mr dugdale, what is the nature of the communication-- the _unauthorised_ communication--that you have just made to those schooners?" "i beg your pardon, sir," answered i, considerably abashed; "i thought i heard a sound just now as though another of the schooners were on the point of attempting to slip away; so i hailed them that if they attempted any such trick we would treat them to a dose of grape. i also ordered them to each hoist a lantern to the mast-head, so that we may see where they are." "very good," remarked the skipper suavely; "it was quite the proper thing to do. but i do not altogether approve of my young gentlemen taking the initiative in any matter unless they happen to be for the time being in supreme command. when that is not the case i expect them to wait for instructions. and now, be so good as to hail them again, and say that unless those lanterns are displayed within three minutes i will fire into them." my second hail proved effective, the two lanterns being in position well within the time specified. our skipper was, however, very uneasy; and after retiring aft and consulting with ryan for a few minutes, the second luff and gowland went away in the first and second cutters with two good strong crews, and boarded the schooners, the slavers--who were evidently on the look-out--shoving off in their own boats and escaping to the shore the moment that they detected what we were after. both schooners had a cargo of slaves on board, and were of course at once taken possession of, an instant search--prompted by our experience on board the brig--revealing the fact that one of them had been set fire to so effectually that it took the prize-crew fully an hour to extinguish it. meanwhile, lamps and lanterns were found on board the brig and lighted, when those of us whose hurts were the least serious set to work to attend to our more unfortunate comrades. closer investigation now revealed the welcome fact that we had suffered less severely than had been at first anticipated, our killed amounting to five only--although two more died before they could receive proper surgical attention-- while, of the wounded, seven had received injuries serious enough to completely disable them, the rest, amounting to no less than twenty-three, suffering from hurts ranging from such an insignificant prod as i had received in the leg, up to a cutlass-stroke that had all but scalped one poor fellow. at length, just as we had completed the task of getting our worst cases below out of the persistent rain, and making them in a measure comfortable, the wind shifted and subsided to a gentle breeze from the north-eastward, the weather cleared, the rain ceased, and about half-an-hour later the day broke gloriously, and we were able to get a view of our surroundings. we found ourselves in a nearly circular lagoon or basin, about half-a-mile in diameter, across the centre of which lay moored the brig and the two schooners, with a gap in the line to mark the berth that had been occupied by the third schooner--the craft that had succeeded in effecting her escape. we were completely land-locked, the shores of the creek being low, and for the most part closely fringed with mangroves, behind which rose dense and apparently impenetrable masses of bush, now in full leaf, and thickly overgrown with flowering parasites, the bush being interspersed with trees of several kinds, some of which were very lofty and handsome. at a short distance above where we were lying, there appeared to be another creek--a small affair, not more than a hundred feet wide--branching off from the main channel; and, upon its being pointed out to him, the captain at once hailed the schooner of which the second lieutenant was in possession, directing that the latter should take his boat, with the crew well armed, and make an exploration of the subsidiary and main creeks for a short distance, for the purpose of ascertaining whether, as was exceedingly probable, there was a slave depot in the neighbourhood. i should greatly have liked to have made one of the party, and indeed asked permission to join it, but my burnt foot was by this time so inflamed and painful that i could not put it to the deck, and captain stopford, while expressing his gratification at the zeal manifested by the request, refused, pointing out that, lame as i was, i should not only be useless but an actual encumbrance and embarrassment to the party in the event of resistance being offered to any attempt on their part to land. in a few minutes ryan was ready, and the boat shoved off from the schooner, leaving just enough hands to take care of her during the absence of the others. she made straight for the small subsidiary creek, in the first instance, but re-appeared in about a quarter of an hour, when the second luff hailed to say that it was a mere _cul de sac_, only some half-a-mile long, and with very little water in it, the banks being of soft, black, foetid mud, of a consistency which rendered landing an impossibility. having communicated this intelligence, the cutter next proceeded up stream and quickly vanished round a bend. she had been out of sight fully half-an-hour, and the captain was just beginning to manifest some anxiety, neither sight nor sound having reached us to indicate her whereabouts, when thin wreaths of light brown smoke appeared rising above the bush and trees about a mile away, the smoke rapidly increasing in density and volume, and darkening in colour, until it became quite apparent that a serious conflagration was raging at no great distance. when the smoke at first appeared, there was some question in the mind of the captain whether it might not be the work of the people who had effected their escape from the craft during the darkness, they having perhaps set fire to the bush in the hope of involving the prizes and ourselves in the ensuing destruction; but a little reflection revealed the unlikelihood of this, the vegetation not only being saturated with the rain that had fallen during the night, but also being so green and full of sap that it would probably prove impossible to fire it. we had just reached this conclusion when ryan and his party appeared returning, and in a few minutes the cutter ranged up alongside us to enable the second luff to make his report. he stated that he had proceeded about a mile and a half up the creek, the course of which he had found to be very sinuous, when he reached a spot at which the bank on his port hand was clear of bush and trees, with the soil firm enough to admit of a landing being conveniently effected, and as there were signs indicating that the place had been very freely used quite recently, he shoved alongside the bank and stepped ashore. a single glance about him now sufficed to convince him that he had made an important discovery; the grass was much worn, as with the trampling of many feet, and from this well-trodden spot a broad path led into the bush. leaving two men in the boat; to take care of her, with orders how to proceed in the event of an enemy heaving in sight, ryan at once led his party along this path, and after traversing it for less than a hundred yards, came upon a large barracoon, very solidly and substantially built, and of dimensions sufficient to accommodate fully a thousand slaves; there were also kitchens for the preparation of the slaves' food, tanks for the collection of fresh water, several large thatched huts that looked as if they were for the accommodation of the traders, a large store building, and, in short, everything necessary to complete an important slave-trading establishment. it was evident that it had been very hurriedly abandoned only a few hours previously; but a strict and prolonged search failed to reveal the whereabouts of any of its late occupants; ryan had therefore first emptied the water-tanks, and had then set fire to the whole establishment, remaining until the flames had taken a strong hold upon the several buildings, when he had retired without molestation. meanwhile, by the captain's orders, the hatches had been removed on board the three prizes, and the condition of the unfortunate prisoners looked to. i shall never forget the moment when the first hatch was taken off on board the brig; a thick cloud of steam slowly rose up through the opening, and the foetid, musky odour, of which i have already spoken, at once became so pungent and overpowering that the men who were engaged upon the operation of opening the hatchways were fairly driven away from their work for the moment, and until the strength of the stench had been to some extent ameliorated by the fresh air that immediately poured down into the densely-packed hold. what the relief of that whiff of fresh air must have been to the unhappy blacks can only be faintly imagined; but that it was ineffably grateful to them was evidenced by the deep murmur of delight, and the loud, long-drawn inspiration of the breath that swept from end to end of the hold the moment that the hatch was withdrawn, as well as by the upward glance of gratitude that instantly greeted us from the upturned eyes of those who were placed nearest the hatchway! but what a sight that hold presented when in the course of a few minutes the hatches were all removed, and the blessed light of heaven and the sweet, pure air of the early morning had gained free access to its sweltering occupants, dispersing the poisonous fumes which they had been condemned to breathe from the moment when the approach of our boats had been first notified! i had more than once had the hold of a slaver and the mode of stowing her human cargo described to me, but it was necessary to actually _see_ it before the full horror and misery of the thing could be completely realised. the space between the planking of the slave-deck and the underside of the beams was just three feet, or barely sufficient to allow the unfortunate wretches to sit upright; and in this confined space they were stowed as tightly as herrings in a barrel, seated on their hams, with the feet drawn close up to the body, and the knees clasped by the arms close to the chest. let anyone try the fatiguing effect of sitting in this constrained attitude for only a single half-hour, and some idea may then be formed of the horrible suffering and misery that the unhappy slaves had to endure cooped up in this fashion for _weeks at a stretch_, not on a steady, motionless platform, but on the heaving, plunging deck of a ship driven at her utmost speed over a sea that was seldom smooth enough to render the motion imperceptible, and often rough enough to sweep her from stem to stern, and to render the closing of the hatches imperatively necessary to save her from foundering. add to this the fact that the slaves were packed so tightly together that it was impossible to move, and thus obtain the relief of even a slight change of position; bear in mind that it was equally impossible to cleanse the slave-deck during the entire period of the passage of the ship from port to port; think of the indescribable foulness of the place, the dreadful atmosphere generated by the ever-accumulating filth, and the exhalations from the bodies of four or five hundred human beings wedged together in this confined space; and add to all this the horrors of sea-sickness, and it at once becomes a perfect marvel that a sufficient number remained alive at the end of the passage to render the slave-traffic a remunerative business. it is true that, solely in their own interests, and not in the least from motives of humanity, the slavers exercised a certain amount of care and watchfulness over the health of their captives; that is to say, they allowed one-half to go on deck during meal-times (twice a day), for the double purpose of affording an opportunity for the inspiration of a little fresh air, and at the same time of providing space for the poor wretches below to feed themselves. this, however, was only when the weather and other circumstances were favourable; if the weather was bad, the hatches were put on and kept on until a favourable change occurred; and in the case of a gale, of wind the unhappy slaves have been known to have been kept without food or water for forty-eight hours, or even longer, simply because it was impossible to give them either. of course in such a case the mortality was simply frightful, it being no uncommon occurrence for a slaver to lose more than half her cargo in a single gale; this loss, be it understood, arising not so much from the want of food as from simple suffocation through long confinement in the dreadful atmosphere of the unventilated hold. and when a slaver happened to be pursued by a man-o'-war, the sufferings of the slaves were almost as bad, for in such a case the crew seldom troubled themselves to attend to the wants of their helpless prisoners, devoting all their thoughts and energies to the task of effecting their own escape. but as i shall have more to say upon this subject further on, i will not enlarge upon it here. ryan having rejoined his prize, and there being a nice little easterly breeze blowing, the order was given for all three craft to weigh and proceed down the creek; the captain being rather anxious lest the slavers should return and take us at a disadvantage now that our force was divided. nothing untoward occurred, however, and in a short time we were all proceeding down the creek, with the second lieutenant in his schooner as pilot. and here it may be as well to enumerate the few particulars relative to our prizes that the exigencies of the narrative have hitherto not enabled me to give. to begin with the brig: she was, as lobo had stated, the _mercedes_ of havana; a truly beautiful craft, measuring fully five hundred tons, very flat in the floor, and so exceedingly shallow that even in her sea-going trim, with everything on board as when we took her, she only drew a trifle over eight feet of water aft. but what she lacked in depth she more than made up for in beam, her deck being half as spacious again as that of the _barracouta_. she was a perfectly lovely model, and sailed like a witch, as we soon discovered. this was not to be wondered at, however, for in addition to the beautiful, easy grace of her flowing lines, her scantling was extraordinarily light--less than half that of the _barracouta_--and all her chief fastenings were _screws_! with so light a scantling she of course worked like a wicker basket in anything of a breeze and seaway, and leaked like a sieve, the latter being of little or no consequence with plenty of negroes to send to the pumps in relays, while the working of her gave her life, and contributed in no small degree toward the extraordinary speed for which she was distinguished. she was armed with eight nine-pounder broadside guns, and a long eighteen mounted upon a pivot on her forecastle; and in the course of our investigations we discovered that her crew had numbered no less than seventy men, of whom fourteen were killed in her defence, and twenty-six too severely wounded to effect their escape. at the moment of her capture five hundred and sixty-four slaves, all males, were confined in her hold. she was thus, in herself, a very valuable prize, and quite worth all the trouble that we had taken to secure her. but in addition to her there were the two schooners, the larger of which, named the _dona hermosa_, was a vessel of close upon one hundred and twenty tons measurement, with nothing very remarkable about her appearance to distinguish her from a perfectly honest trader. her cargo consisted of exactly three hundred slaves, rather more than half of whom were women and children. she was unarmed save for the few muskets that were found scattered about her decks when our lads boarded and took possession of her. the second schooner, of which gowland, the master's mate, had temporary command, was a little beauty. she was named the _felicidad_, and hailed from santiago de cuba. she was of one hundred and eighteen tons measurement, and in model generally very much resembled the _mercedes_ though neither quite so shallow nor so beamy in proportion, while her proportionate length was considerably greater; her lines were therefore even more easy and beautiful than those of the larger vessel. she sat very low in the water, and might have been sworn to as a slaver as far away as she could be seen, her raking masts being short and stout, and her yards of enormous proportionate length--her foreyard measuring no less than seventy-eight feet--with a truly astonishing spread of beautifully cut canvas. in light winds and smooth water she developed a speed that was absolutely phenomenal, easily running away from her two consorts on the passage down the creek under her flying jib and main sail only. she was pierced for three guns of a side, and was further fitted with a very ingenious arrangement for mounting a gun on a pivot amidships, and at the same time shifting it a few feet to port or starboard so as to permit of its being fired directly ahead or astern clear of the masts. none of her guns, however, were mounted at the time of her capture, they afterwards being found stowed below at the very bottom of her hold in a space left for them among her water-leaguers, from which they could easily be raised on deck when required. like her consorts, she had on board a full cargo of slaves--numbering two hundred and forty, of whom about one-fourth were women and children--when captured. our passage up the creek having been effected in the intense darkness of an overcast and rainy night, it had of course been quite impossible for us to form any conception of the appearance of our surroundings; but now, in the broad daylight and clear atmosphere of a fresh and brilliant morning, every detail of the scene in the midst of which we found ourselves stood out with the most vivid distinctness, and i was not only astonished but delighted with the singularity and beauty of nature's handiwork that everywhere met my eye in this region of tropical luxuriance. the three craft were the only evidences of man's intrusion upon the scene with which we were confronted; everything else was the work of nature herself, untrammelled and uninterfered with; and it appeared as though in the riotous delight of her creative powers she had put forth all her energies in the production of strange and curious shapes and bewildering combinations of the richest and most dazzling colours. true, the water of the creek, which in consequence of the sheltering height of the bordering vegetation was glassy smooth, was so fully charged with mud and soil held in suspension that it resembled chocolate rather than water; but its rich brown colour added to rather than detracted from the beauty of the picture, harmonising subtly with the brilliant greens, deep olives, and splendid purples of the foliage, and the dazzling white, yellow, scarlet, crimson, and blue of the trailing blossoms that were reflected from its polished surface, as well as the delicate blue of the sky into which it merged at a short distance from the vessels. mangroves with their multitudinous and curiously twisted and gnarled roots and delicate grey-green foliage lined the margin of the creek on either hand, and behind them rose tall, feathery clumps of bamboo alternating with impenetrable thickets of bush, the foliage of which was of the most variegated colours and curious forms, beyond which again rose the umbrageous masses of lofty trees, several of which were clothed with blossoms of pure scarlet instead of leaves, while over all trailed the serpentine convolutions of gorgeous flowering creepers. euphorbias, acacias, baobabs, all were in blossom, and the fresh morning air was laden with delicious and almost overpoweringly fragrant perfume. wherever a slight break in the continuity of the mangrove belt permitted the river bank itself to be seen, the margin of the water was ablaze with tall orchids, whose eccentricities of form were matched only by their unsurpassable beauty of colouring; and even the tall, luxuriant grasses contributed their quota to the all-pervading loveliness of the scene by the delicate purple tints of their stamens; while the curious, pendent nests of the weaver-bird, hanging here and there from the longer and coarser grass-stalks curving over the water, added a further element of strangeness and singularity to the picture. brilliant-plumaged birds flashed hither and thither; kingfishers of all sizes perched solemnly upon the roots and overhanging branches of the mangroves, intently watching the surface of the muddy water for the tiny ripple that should betray the presence of their prey, or flitted low athwart the placid, shining surface of the creek; bright-coloured parrots were seen clawing their way about the trunks of the more lofty trees, or winging their flight fussily with loud screams from branch to branch; the cooing of pigeons was heard in every direction; and high overhead, a small black spot against the deep, brilliant blue of the sky, marked the presence of a fishing eagle on the look-out for his breakfast. in less than half-an-hour we had traversed the distance to the mouth of the creek, just before reaching which we were astonished to discover the _barracouta_ hard and fast upon a sand-bank that lay just off the entrance, with her topgallant-masts struck, and her remaining boats in the water, apparently engaged in the task of lightening her. the captain looked terribly annoyed, but said nothing until we had rounded the last point and come to an anchor near the spot at which we had left the _barracouta_ on the previous night, when he ordered the gig to be hauled alongside, and, directing me to accompany him, gave the word for us to pull to the stranded craft. chapter five. the `felicidad'. the first lieutenant, looking exceedingly worried and distressed, was at the gangway to meet us. "well, mr young," exclaimed the captain as he stepped in on deck, "what is the meaning of this?" "i wish i could tell you, sir," answered young. "there has been foul play of some sort; but who is the guilty party i know no more than you do. as you will remember, it blew very hard last night when you left us; and for some time after you had gone i remained on the forecastle, watching the ship as she rode to her anchor. she strained a little at her cable when the heavier puffs struck her, but by no means to such an extent as to arouse the slightest anxiety; and after i had been watching for fully an hour, finding that the holding ground was good, and that even during the heaviest of the puffs the strain upon the cable was only very moderate, i felt perfectly satisfied as to the safety of the ship, and retired to the quarter-deck, leaving two men on the look-out on the forecastle, two in the waist, and one on either quarter; for although i anticipated no danger, i was fully alive to the responsibility that you had laid upon me in entrusting me with the care of the ship, as well as to the fact that in the event of a chance encounter just hereabout, we were far more likely to meet with an enemy than a friend. the same feeling animated the men too, i am sure, for the look-outs never responded to my hail with more alacrity, or showed themselves more keenly watchful than they did last night; yet i had barely been off the forecastle half-an-hour when we discovered that we were adrift; and before i could let go the second anchor we were hard and fast upon this bank, fore and aft, and that, too, just upon the top of high-water. i of course at once hoisted out our remaining boats, and ran away the stream-anchor to windward; but, working as we were in the dark, it took us a long time to do it; and i then sent down the royal and topgallant-- yards and masts. when daylight came i examined the cable, thinking that possibly it might have chafed through on a rock; but to my surprise i found that it had been clean cut at the water's edge. how it was done, or who did it, is impossible to guess, for although i have very strictly questioned both the forecastle look-outs, they persist in the statement that they saw nothing, and were aware of nothing until the ship was found to be adrift." "well, it is a most extraordinary circumstance," commented the captain. "are you quite satisfied that the men remained fully on the alert all the time?" "perfectly, sir," answered the lieutenant. "i hailed them every ten minutes or so, not knowing at what moment some disagreeable surprise might be sprung upon us. besides, we did not know how you might be faring, and thought it quite possible that the craft you were after might attempt to give you the slip in the darkness. the men on the forecastle were two of the best we have in the ship--william robinson and henry perkins." "yes," assented the captain; "they have always hitherto seemed thoroughly trustworthy and reliable men. where are they? i should like to ask them a question or two." the two men were summoned, and at once subjected to a very sharp cross-examination, which led to nothing, however, as they both persistently declared that they had neither seen nor heard anything to arouse the slightest suspicion until the discovery was made that the ship was adrift. the captain then went forward and inspected the severed cable; but that revealed nothing beyond the fact that the strands had been cut almost completely through with some very sharp instrument before the stubborn hemp had given way. in short, the whole affair was enshrouded in the deepest mystery. when, however, the captain had heard the whole story, and thoroughly investigated the matter, he freely absolved the first luff from all blame, frankly acknowledging that he did not see what more could have been done to provide for the safety of the ship, and that the thing would undoubtedly have happened just the same had he himself remained on board instead of going away with the boats. meanwhile, the dead and wounded had been conveyed from the prizes to the _barracouta_, where the doctor immediately took the sufferers in hand, while the slain were stitched up in their hammocks ready for burial. at length it came to my turn to be attended to, and when the doctor saw my foot--now so dreadfully swollen and inflamed that my whole leg was affected, right up to the knee--i was promptly consigned to the sick-bay, with the intimation that i might think myself exceedingly fortunate if in that hot climate mortification did not set in and necessitate the amputation of my leg. i am thankful to say, however, that it did not; and in three weeks i was discharged from the doctor's care, and once more able to hobble about with the aid of a soft felt slipper. the dead were buried that same forenoon on the point projecting into the river at the junction of the creek with the main stream, the graves being dug in a small space of smooth, grassy lawn beneath the shadow of a magnificent group of fine tall palms. a hasty breakfast was snatched, as soon as it could be got ready; and then every man available was set to work upon the task of lightening the stranded brig, her guns and such other heavy weights as were most easily accessible being transferred to the prizes, after which the second bower was weighed and run away to windward in the long-boat by means of a kedge; and such was the activity displayed, that at high-water that same afternoon--the tides were fortunately making at the time--the _barracouta_ floated and was hove off to her anchor. meanwhile, the missing anchor had been swept for and found, and the severed end of the cable buoyed; before nightfall, therefore, the cable was spliced, and the bonny brig once more riding to her best bower. the men were kept at work until it was too dark to see further; and by six bells in the forenoon watch next day she was again all ataunto, her guns and everything else once more on board her, and the ship herself all ready for sea, it having been ascertained that she had sustained no damage whatever. it may be mentioned that the schooner which had effected her escape from us in the lagoon managed to slip out of the creek and get clear away without being observed by anybody on board the _barracouta_; but that of course is easily accounted for by the pitchy darkness of the night, and the fact that she must have passed out of the creek a very short while after the brig had grounded upon the sand-bank, and when of course our lads would be fully occupied in looking after their own craft. proper prize-crews were now told off to the three prizes--ryan being placed in charge of the _mercedes_; gowland, the master's mate, in charge of the _dona hermosa_; and good, one of the midshipmen, in charge of the _felicidad_--and the order to weigh and proceed in company was given. there was a slashing breeze from the eastward blowing; and this, combined with a strong downward current, carried us along over the ground so smartly that in less than two hours we were abreast of shark point, although the _dona hermosa_ proved to be such an indifferent sailer that the rest of us had to materially reduce our spread of canvas to avoid running away from her altogether. the _felicidad_, on the other hand, sailed like a witch, and kept her station without difficulty, under a single-reefed mainsail, foresail, and inner jib, with all her square canvas stowed. the master informed me that as we passed banana point he had remembered to subject the anchorage to a very careful scrutiny through his telescope, and, as he had foretold, the handsome spanish brig had disappeared, the englishman and the dutchman being the only craft still lying off the wharf. having made an offing of about twenty miles, we hauled up some three points to the northward for cape palmas, our destination being of course sierra leone. on the third day out, the captain of the _mercedes_--whom i had shot in self-defence in his own cabin, it will be remembered--died of his wound, solemnly declaring with his last breath that he was absolutely innocent of any complicity in the destruction of the _sapphire's_ two boats with their crews, or in the disappearance of the _wasp_. he admitted that he had heard of both occurrences, and had been told the name of the individual who was said to be responsible for them, but he stubbornly persisted in his refusal to give any information whatever, and carried the secret to his ocean grave with him. in due time we reached sierra leone without mishap and without adventure, after a moderately quick passage; and, our prizes having been taken _in flagrante delicto_, they were forthwith condemned. at captain stopford's suggestion, however, the _felicidad_ was purchased into the service, and with all speed fitted to serve as a tender to the _barracouta_, her extraordinary speed peculiarly fitting her for such employment, while her exceedingly light draught promised to render her especially useful in the exploration of the various rivers along the coast, many of which are very shallow. we remained in harbour a trifle over three weeks while the necessary alterations were being effected-- during which time, owing to the unremitting vigilance and skill of "paddy" blake, our doctor, we lost only one man through fever--and then, all being ready, the _felicidad_ was commissioned, ryan, our second lieutenant, being given the command of her, with--to my great delight-- myself as his chief officer, pierrepoint and gowland being our shipmates. we also shipped as surgeon a young fellow named armstrong, a scotchman, whom the captain of the _ariadne_ kindly spared to us with a first-rate recommendation; and in addition we had warren, the gunner's mate of the _barracouta_, as gunner; coombs, the carpenter's mate, as carpenter; and bartlett, the boatswain's mate, as boatswain. and by way of a crew, the captain gave us forty of his best men, as he very well could without weakening his own ship's company, a ship with supernumeraries having most opportunely arrived from home only a few days previously. it will thus be seen that, so far as strength was concerned, we were fairly well able to take care of ourselves. we were expected to do far more than that, however; the captain, when giving us our instructions, hinting that he looked to us to fully justify him by our services for all the trouble that he had taken in causing the schooner to be fitted out. i think, however, that having put such a dashing fellow as ryan in command, he had very few misgivings upon this point. the _barracouta_ and the _felicidad_ sailed together on the evening of the eighteenth of december, and, the captain having given ryan a pretty free hand, parted company off the shoals of saint ann; the schooner keeping her luff and heading about south-south-west, while the brig bore away on a south-east-by-south course for cape palmas; the idea being that we should do better apart than together. we were to cruise for six weeks, and at the end of that time, if unsuccessful, to rendezvous on the parallel of six degrees south latitude and the meridian of twelve degrees east longitude; or, in other words, some eighteen miles off the mouth of the congo. we were to remain on this spot twenty-four hours; and if at the end of that time the brig had not appeared, we were to proceed on a further cruise of six weeks, and then return to sierra leone to replenish our stores and await further orders. it was a glorious evening when we sailed; a moderate breeze was blowing from the westward, pure, refreshing, and cool compared with the furnace-like atmosphere in which we had been stewing for the previous three weeks. the sky was without a cloud; the sea a delicate blue, necked here and there with miniature foam-caps of purest white; while, broad on our lee quarter, the high land about the settlement of sierra leone, just dipping beneath the horizon, glowed rosy red in the light of the sinking sun. it was an evening to make one's heart rejoice; such an evening as can only be met with in the tropics; and, just starting as we were upon what all hands regarded as a holiday cruise, it is but small wonder that we experienced and enjoyed its exhilarating influence to an almost intoxicating extent. jocularity and laughter pervaded the little craft from end to end; and throughout the second dog-watch dancing, singing, and skylarking--all, of course, within the limits of proper discipline--were the order of the evening. as the sun disappeared in the west, the full, round orb of the moon floated majestically up over the purple rim of the horizon to leeward; and the swift yet imperceptible change from the golden glory of sunset to the silvery radiance of a clear, moonlit night was a sight of beauty that must be left to the imagination, for no mortal pen could possibly do justice to it. "now, harry, me bhoy," exclaimed ryan, speaking in the broad brogue that always sprang to his lips when he was excited or exhilarated, and slapping me upon the back as we emerged from the companion after dinner that evening, and stood for a moment contemplating the glory of the night, "from this moment we're slavers, we're pirates, we're cut-throats of the first wather, to be hail-fellow-well-met with every dirty blagguard that sails the says--until we can get them within rache of these pretty little barkers," affectionately tapping the breech of one of our long nines as he spoke; "and thin see if we won't give thim such a surprise as they haven't met with for manny a day!" and he quite looked the character, too--for he was of very powerful, athletic build, though not very tall, swarthy in complexion, and burnt as dark as a mulatto by the sun; with a thick, bushy black beard, and a most ferocious-looking moustache that he had been assiduously cultivating ever since he had known that he was to have the command of the schooner--as he stepped out on deck at eight bells on the following morning, attired in white drill jacket and long flowing trousers of the same, girt about the waist with a gaudy silken sash glowing in all the colours of the rainbow, the costume being topped off with a broad-brimmed panama hat swathed round with a white puggaree. he was indeed the beau-ideal of a dandy pirate skipper, and i was not a very bad imitation of him--barring the whiskers. the only things perhaps that a too captious critic might have objected to were the spotless purity of our clothing, and an utter absence of that ruffianly manner which distinguishes the genuine pirate; but, as ryan observed, the first of these objections would grow less noticeable with every day that we wore the clothes, while the other was not necessary, or, if it should become so, must be assumed as successfully as our talents in that direction would permit. as for the crew, they had by ryan's orders discarded their usual clothing for jumpers and trousers of blue dungaree, with soft felt hats, cloth caps, or knitted worsted nightcaps by way of head-covering, so that, viewed through a telescope, we might present as slovenly and un-man-o'-war-like an appearance as possible. this effect was further heightened by ryan having very wisely insisted that not a spar or rope of the schooner should be altered or interfered with in any way, saving of course where it needed refitting; those therefore who happened to know the _felicidad_ would recognise her at once; and it was our business so to conduct ourselves that they should not suspect her change of ownership until too late to effect an escape. her capture was of course by this time known to many of the craft frequenting the congo; but that we could not help; our plans were based mostly upon the hope that there were still many who did not know it, and also, to some extent, upon a belief that, even to those who were aware of it, we might by judicious behaviour convey an impression that her people had cleverly effected their own and her escape, and were once more boldly pursuing their lawless trade. we did not much expect to fall in with anything worthy of our attention until we were pretty close up with the line; we therefore carried on all through the first night and the whole of the next day, arriving by sunset upon the northern boundary of what we considered our cruising ground proper. and then, as ill-luck would have it, the wind died away, and left us rolling helplessly upon a long, glassy swell, without steerage-way, the schooner's head boxing the compass. this period of calm lasted all through the night and the whole of the next day, varied only by an occasional cat's-paw of scarcely sufficient strength or duration to enable us to get the schooner's jib-boom pointed in the right direction. but this did not trouble ryan in the least, for, as he reminded me for my consolation, we were now just where we wanted to be, and the first breeze that sprang up might bring with it one of the gentry that we were so anxiously on the look-out for. meanwhile, he availed himself of the opportunity to prepare a certain piece of apparatus that he had employed his leisure in devising, and which he thought might possibly prove useful on occasion. "i've been thinking," said he to me on the morning after the calm had set in, "that it mayn't always be convanient for the schooner to go through the wather at her best speed, so i've devised a thriflin' arrangement that'll modherate her paces widhout annyone out of the craft bein' anny the wiser." and therewith he ordered a good stout hawser to be roused up on deck; and from this he had a length of some fifteen fathoms cut off, all along the middle part of which he caused a dozen pigs of ballast to be securely lashed. this done, he ordered the bight, with the pigs attached, to be passed under the ship's bottom, and the two ends of the hawser to be passed inboard through the port and starboard midship ports and well secured, when we had a drag underneath the schooner that would certainly exercise a very marked effect upon her sailing, without making a sufficient disturbance in the water to reveal the fact that trickery was being resorted to. towards the close of the afternoon the aspect of the sky seemed to promise that ere long we might hope for a welcome change of weather; the deep, brilliant blue of the unclouded dome became blurred as though it were gradually being overspread by a thin and semi-transparent curtain of mist, which gradually resolved itself into that streaky, feathery appearance called by seamen "mare's-tails"; and a bank of horizontal grey cloud gathered in the western quarter, into which the sun at length plunged in a glare of fiery crimson and smoky purple that had all the appearance of a great atmospheric conflagration. a short, steep swell, too, gathered from the westward, causing the inert schooner to roll and wallow until she was shipping water over both gunwales, and her masts were working and grinding so furiously in the partners that we had to lift the coats and drive the wedges home afresh, as well as to get up preventer-backstays and rolling tackles. "there is a breeze, and a strong one too, behind all this," remarked ryan to me, "and it will give us an opportunity to test the little hooker's mettle. i wish it would come and be done with it, for by the powers i'm gettin' mighty toired of this stoyle of thing," as the schooner's counter squattered down with a thud and a splash into a deep hollow, and then rolled so heavily and so suddenly to starboard that we both gathered way and went with a run into the scuppers just in time to be drenched to the waist by the heavy fall of water that she dished in over her rail. this sort of thing soon gave us a taste of the _felicidad's_ quality, for so lightly was she framed that the heavy rolling strained her tremendously, and she began to make so much water that we were obliged to set the pumps going every two hours, while the creaking and complaining of her timbers and bulkheads raised a din that might have been heard half-a-mile away. "as soon as the breeze comes," said ryan, as we descended the companion-ladder to shift into dry clothes, "we will bear up and jog quietly in for cape lopez, which will give us a chance of being overhauled by something running in for either the gaboon or the ogowe, or of blundherin' up against something coming out from one or the other of those same rivers. if we don't fall in with annything by the time that we make the land, we will just stand on and take a look in here and there, beginning with the ogowe and working our way northward gradually until we've thoroughly overhauled the whole of the bight." by the time that we were summoned below to dinner, the sky had become entirely overcast with heavy, black, thunderous-looking clouds that entirely-obscured the stars, and only allowed the light of the moon to sift feebly through; yet there was light enough to enable us to see our way about the deck, or to reveal to a sharp eye a sail as far away as seven or eight miles, had anything been within that distance. as we left the deck a quivering gleam of sheet-lightning flashed up along the western horizon, and ryan gave pierrepoint--who was taking the deck for me while i got my dinner--instructions to keep a sharp eye upon the weather, as there was no knowing how it might turn out. while we sat at table the lightning became more vivid and frequent; and after a while the dull, deep rumble of distant thunder was heard. presently we heard pierrepoint singing out to one of the boys to jump below and fetch up his oil-skins for him; and a minute or two later the sound of a heavy shower advancing over the water became audible, rapidly increasing in volume until it reached us, when in a moment we were almost deafened by the loud pelting of the rain upon the deck overhead as the overladen clouds discharged their burden with all the fierce vehemence of a truly tropical downpour. at the first crash of the rain upon the deck ryan and i both with one accord glanced hastily at the barometer that was hanging suspended in gimbals in the skylight; the mercury had dropped slightly, but not sufficient to arouse any uneasiness, and we therefore went quietly on with our dinner, although ryan shouted across the table to me-- "when the rain comes before the wind, halliards, sheets, and braces mind." there was little danger, however, of our being caught unawares, for we had long ago clewed up and hauled down everything, except the boom-foresail and jib, to save the sails from thrashing themselves threadbare with the rolling of the ship; we consequently awaited the development of events with perfect equanimity. the downpour lasted perhaps three minutes, and then ceased with startling abruptness, leaving us in absolute silence save for the rush and splash of the water athwart the flooded decks with the now greatly diminished rolling of the schooner, the gurgle of the spouting scuppers, the kicking of the rudder upon its gudgeons, the groaning and complaining of the timbers, or the voices of the people on deck, and the soft patter of their bare feet upon the wet planks as they moved here and there. the shower had knocked the swell down very considerably, rendering the movements of the schooner much more easy than they had been, and we were able to finish our meal in peace and comfort without the continued necessity to steady the plate with one hand and the tumbler with the other, keeping a wary eye upon the viands meanwhile, in readiness to dodge any of them that might happen to fetch away in our direction, and snatching a mouthful or a sip in the brief intervals when the ship became comparatively steady. when we again went on deck the sky presented a really magnificent spectacle, the vast masses of heavy, electrically-charged cloud being piled one above the other in a fashion that resembled, to me, nothing so much as a chaos of titanic rocks of every conceivable shape and colour, the forms and hues of the clouds being rendered distinctly visible by the incessant play of the sheet-lightning among their masses. not only the whole sky, but the entire atmosphere seemed to be a-quiver with the silent electric discharges, and the effect was indescribably beautiful as the quick, tremulous flashes blazed out, now here, now there, strongly illumining one portion of the piled-up masses and the reflection in the glassy water with its transient radiance, while the rest of the scene was by contrast thrown into the deepest, blackest, most opaque shadow. meanwhile the mutterings of the distant thunder had gradually grown louder and drawn nearer, while sudden, vivid flashes of forked or chain-lightning, golden, violet, or delicate rose-tinted, darted at ever-lessening intervals from the lowering masses of intensely black cloud heaped up along the western horizon. we had been on deck perhaps half-an-hour, when a delicious coolness and freshness began by almost insensible degrees to pervade the hitherto intolerable closeness of the hot and enervating atmosphere, and, looking away to the westward, we saw, by the quick, flickering illumination of the lightning, a few transient cat's-paws playing here and there upon the surface of the water. gradually and erratically these evanescent movements in the inert air stole down to the schooner, lightly rippling the water round her for an instant, just stirring the canvas with a faint rustle for a moment, and then dying away again. they were succeeded by others, however, with rapidly increasing frequency, and presently a faint blurr upon the glassy surface of the water to the westward marked the approach of the true breeze. "sheet home your topsail, and hoist away!" shouted ryan. "up with your helm, my man"--to the man at the tiller--"and let her go off east-south-east. sheet home your topgallant-sail, and man the halliards. lay aft here, some of you, to the braces, and lay the yards square. well there, belay! main throat and peak-halliards hoist away. ease off the mainsheet. rouse up the squaresail, mr dugdale, and set it, if you please. well there with the throat-halliards; well with the peak; belay! away aloft, one hand, and loose the gaff-topsail! give her everything but the studding-sails while you are about it, mr dugdale; it will save the canvas from mildew if it does little else." the breeze--a light air from about west--had by this time crept up to us, and under its vivifying influence the schooner had gathered way, and was soon creeping along at a speed of barely two and a half knots, which, however, rose to three and finally to five as the wind freshened, the sky meanwhile clearing as the heavy thunder-clouds drove away to leeward before the welcome breeze, until the sky was once more cloudless save for the mare's-tails that thickly overspread the blue, through which the stars blinked dimly, and the moon, with a big halo round her, poured her chastened radiance. "by the powers," exclaimed ryan, as we paced the deck together after the operation of making sail had been completed--"by the powers, but that dhrag of mine is a wondherful invention entirely! do ye notice, harry, me bhoy, how it's modherated the little huzzy's paces? bedad, she's goin' along as sober as a quaker girl to meetin' instead of waltzin' away like a ballet-dancer! but wait until one of those light-heeled picaroons comes along, and then won't we surprise thim above a bit! if it's not blowing too hard when ye come on deck in the middle watch ye may give her the stunsails; it'll look more ship-shape, and as if we were in a hurry to make the coast and get our cargo aboard, if we happen to be overhauled by anybody in the same line of business, and the deuce of a fear have i now of outsailing any of them that may happen to be in the neighbourhood. keep a sharp look-out, mr pierrepoint, and if anything heaves in sight, either ahead or astern, during your watch, give me a call. i'm going below to turn in now." i followed suit a minute or two later and, with my cabin-door wide open to freely admit the cool, welcome breeze that poured down through the open skylight, soon fell into a deep, refreshing sleep. chapter six. a capture and a chase. when i went on deck at midnight i found that there was no occasion to set the studding-sails, for the breeze had freshened to more than half a gale, and the little hooker was staggering along before it and a fast-rising sea at a tremendous pace--considering the drag--with her royal clewed up and furled, and the gaff-topsail hauled down. even thus she was being greatly over-driven; so, as there was no need for _too much_ hurry, and as the sky astern had a hard, windy look, i took in the topgallant-sail, and hauled down and stowed the mainsail, letting her go along easily and comfortably for the remainder of the night. i had half a mind to further relieve her by getting the drag inboard, but did not like to do so without first consulting ryan--since the thing was of his contrivance--so, as the matter was by no means sufficiently urgent to justify me in disturbing him, i let it remain, and very glad was i afterwards that i had done so; for when i went on deck again at seven bells, there, away about a point on our weather quarter, gleamed in the bright morning sunshine the white upper sails of a large craft that had been sighted at daybreak and that was now coming up to us fast. ryan was already on deck, having been called immediately that the stranger was made out, and was in a state of high glee at the success of his stratagem, for he informed me that he had been up on the topsail-yard, and had pretty well satisfied himself, both by the look of the craft and the course she was steering, that she was a slaver running in upon the coast to pick up a cargo. it now became a nice question with us whether we should reveal our true character as soon as the stranger should have approached within reach of our guns, or whether we should try to follow her in, and, lying in wait for her, seize her as she came out with her cargo on board. we were still at a considerable distance from the coast--some twelve hundred miles--and that fact inclined us strongly to make short work of her by showing our colours and bringing her to as soon as she should come abreast of us; while, on the other hand, there was the chance that by following her in we might fall in with something more valuable than herself. we were still weighing the pros and the cons of this important question, when the look-out aloft--for ryan had only half-an-hour previously determined to have a look-out maintained from the topgallant-yard between the hours of sunrise and sunset--the look-out, i say, reported a sail broad on our starboard bow, standing to the northward on a taut bowline, and under a heavy press of sail. she was as yet invisible from the deck; my superior officer and i therefore with one accord made a dash for our telescopes, and, having secured them, hastened forward and made our way up the fore-rigging to the topsail-yard, on to which we swung ourselves at the same moment. from this elevated view-point the upper half of the stranger's topmasts and all above were just visible clear of the horizon; and, bringing our glasses to bear upon her, we made her out to be a barque-rigged vessel under single-reefed topsails, courses, jib, fore and main-topmast-staysails, and spanker; her yards, which were pretty nearly square on to us, showed a quite unusual amount of spread for a merchant vessel, and the rapidity with which she altered her bearings and forged athwart our forefoot was conclusive evidence that she was a remarkably speedy craft. for a moment it occurred to us that she might possibly be a cruiser belonging to one or another of the nations who had undertaken to share with great britain the noble task of suppressing the inhuman slave-traffic; but a very little reflection sufficed to disabuse our minds of this idea, for no cruiser would have been carrying so heavy a press of canvas as she was showing, in the teeth of what had by this time become almost a gale, unless she were in chase of something, and, had she been, we must have seen it. besides, although everything looked trim and ship-shape enough so far as her spars, sails, and rigging were concerned, there were evidences even there of a certain lack of discipline and order that would hardly have been tolerated on board a man-o'-war of _any_ nation, although most of the foreigners were a great deal more free and easy in that respect than ourselves. the conclusion at which we ultimately arrived, therefore, was that she was a slaver with her cargo on board, and "carrying-on" to make a quick passage. but, fast as she was travelling, we were going through the water still faster, despite our drag, for we were carrying the wind almost square over our taffrail, and ryan, in order the more thoroughly to hoodwink the craft astern, had double-reefed and set our big mainsail, as though we had been somewhat suspicious of her character, and anxious to keep her at as great a distance as possible; we were therefore foaming along at a speed of fully eight knots, and rising the stranger ahead so rapidly, that when she crossed our hawse she was not more than eight miles distant, and we had a clear view of her from our topsail-yard. she now hoisted spanish colours; and we, not to be outdone in politeness, did the same, as also did the craft astern of us, each of us, i suppose, accepting the exhibition of bunting on board the others for just what it was worth. ryan and i had by this time pretty well made up our minds as to the character of both our neighbours; and as the stranger astern--a large brig--was now barely half-a-mile distant from us, and drawing rapidly up on our starboard quarter, it was necessary to make up our minds without delay as to the course to be pursued; the question being whether we should meddle at all with the brig, and thus run the risk of exciting the barque's suspicions, or whether we should devote our whole energies to the pursuit of the latter. i was all for letting the brig go, for we knew, by the course she was steering, that she had no slaves on board, and the chances were even that we should find nothing else on board her sufficiently compromising to secure her condemnation by the mixed commission. ryan, on the other hand, could not make up his mind to let the chance go by of making two prizes instead of one. "`a bird in hand is worth two in the bush, harry, me bhoy,'" he remarked to me as we stood together near the binnacle, watching the approach of the brig, which was now foaming along not a quarter of a mile away from us; "and i look upon that brig as being quite as much in our hand as though you and i stood upon her quarter-deck, with all her crew safe under hatches. steady there!" he continued, to the man at the tiller; "mind your weather-helm, my man, or you'll be having that mainsail jibing over, and i need not tell you what _that_ means in a breeze like this. don't meet her quite so sharply; if she seems inclined to take a sheer to starboard, let her go; i will take care that the brig does not run over us. just look at her," he went on, turning again to me, "isn't she a beauty? why, she's almost as handsome, and as big too, as the _mercedes_! d'ye mean to tell me that such a hull as that would ever be employed in the humdrum trade of carrying palm-oil? why, it would be nothing short of a waste of skilful modelling! no, _sorr_, she was built for a slaver, and a slaver she is, or i'll eat this hat of mine, puggaree and all, for breakfast!" "i grant all that you say," admitted i, "but if she has nothing incriminating on board her, what then? we shall only be wasting our time by boarding her, while we shall certainly give the alarm to the barque yonder, and, as likely as not, lose her for our pains." ryan took a good long look at the barque, that was now about two points before our larboard beam, and some six miles distant, thrashing along in a style that did one's heart good to see, and plunging into the heavy head-sea, against which she was beating until her foresail was dark with wet half-way up the weather-leech, and the spray was flying clean over her, and drifting away like smoke to leeward. then he turned and looked at the brig on our opposite quarter. "it's risky," he remarked to me through his set teeth, "but, by the powers, i'll chance it! if we happen to be mistaken, why, i'll make the skipper a handsome apology; if he's a true man, that ought to satisfy him. mr bartlett"--to the boatswain--"cast off that drag and get it inboard over the port-rail with as little fuss as may be, so that if those fellows in the brig are watching us they may not know what we're about; i want to keep that conthrivance a saycret as long as i can. be as smart as you like about it. mr dugdale, i want twenty men to arm themselves forthwith, and then creep into the waist under the lee of the starboard bulwarks, taking care that they are not seen; pick me out the best men in the ship, if you please. ah, here is gowland, the very man i wanted to see! mr gowland, you see that brig--" and as i turned away to muster the men, and see that they were properly armed, he drew gowland away to the other side of the deck, and began to communicate something to him in a very rapid, earnest manner. by the time that the drag had been got inboard and stowed away, i had picked out the required men, and had contrived to get them by twos and threes under the starboard bulwarks without--so far as i knew--being seen by those on board the brig, watching the roll of the schooner and giving the word for the men to pass up through the scuttle and make a crouching run for it as the schooner rolled to port and hid her deck from the brig. that craft had by this time overhauled us, and was far enough ahead to permit of our reading her name--the _conquistador_, of havana--upon her stern; while our helmsman, taking ryan's hint, had steered so wildly, that he had sheered the schooner almost to within biscuit-toss of her neighbour. meanwhile, now that the drag was no longer impeding us, we were gradually lessening the small space of water that separated us from the brig, and we could see that the schooner and her movements were exciting much curiosity and speculation, if not actual suspicion, in the minds of three men who stood right aft on her monkey-poop, intently watching us. "go for'ard and hail them," said ryan to me; "i want to get a little closer if i can without unduly exciting their suspicions. you can affect to be deaf if you like; perhaps that will give us a chance." i took the speaking-trumpet in my hand and, clambering leisurely into the fore-rigging, hailed in spanish-- "ho, the brig ahoy! what brig is that?" "the _conquistador_, of havana," was the reply. "what schooner is that?" i turned to one of the men who was standing near me and asked, in the most natural manner in the world, "what did he say?" "the _conkistee_--something, of hawaner, it sounded like to me, sir," answered the man. "what did you say?" i yelled at the brig, raising the trumpet again to my mouth. "the _con-quist-a-dor_, of havana. what schooner is that?" i assumed the most utter look of bewilderment i could upon the spur of the moment, and then, waving my arm impatiently at our helmsman to sheer still closer alongside the brig, whose quarter was now fair abreast of our fore-rigging, repeated my question-- "_what_ did you say?" my interlocutor, who was evidently the skipper of the brig, stamped on the deck with vexation as he raised his hands to his mouth, and yelled at the top of his voice-- "the _con-quist-a-dor_, of havana! do not sheer so close to me, if you please, senor. you will be foul of me if you do not look out!" "that will do, mr dugdale," shouted ryan in english, to the evident astonishment and consternation of the brig's people, "we can manage now. stand by to jump aboard with me. i shall want you to act as interpreter, for the deuce a word do i understand of their confounded lingo." and as he spoke he waved his hand to the helmsman, while at the same moment gowland, who stood close by, hauled down the spanish and ran up the british ensign to our peak. there was a shout of dismay from those on board the brig, and a quick trampling of feet as her crew rushed to their stations and hurriedly threw the coiled-up braces, halliards, and sheets off the pins with some confused notion of doing something to evade us even at the last moment. but they were altogether too late; somers, the quarter-master, who had seen what was afoot, and had gradually worked his way aft, sprang to the tiller, and jamming it over to port, sheered us very cleverly alongside the brig in the wake of her main-rigging, into which ryan and i instantly leaped, followed by our twenty armed men. the surprise was so sudden and so complete that there was no time for resistance, even had the spaniards been disposed to offer any, and in another moment we had reached the brig's deck and she was in our possession, the schooner instantly sheering off again to a short distance in order that the two craft might not do any damage to each other. having taken so very decisive a step as to board and carry the brig, there was now of course nothing for us but to go through with the affair in the same high-handed fashion. i therefore demanded at once to see the ship's papers; and after many indignant protests they were produced and flung down upon the cabin table for our inspection. these fully established the identity of the brig; and as an examination of her hold revealed that she was fitted with a slave-deck, large coppers for the preparation of food for the unfortunate blacks her captain hoped to secure, a stock of water, and farina ample enough to meet the wants of a large "cargo," and an abundance of slave-irons, we were fully justified in taking possession of her, which we did forthwith. half-an-hour sufficed for us to secure our capture and put a prize-crew on board under gowland's command, and we then parted company; the brig to stand on for an hour as she was going--so as not to needlessly alarm the barque--and then to haul up and shape a course for sierra leone, while we at once hauled our wind in pursuit of our new quarry, which bore by this time well upon our port-quarter--as we had hitherto been going-- with her topsails just showing above the horizon. we had no sooner trimmed sail in chase of the barque than we found, to our unspeakable gratification, that we were still far enough to windward to lay well up for her, she being at the commencement of the chase not more than a point and a half upon our weather bow, while, from the superiority of our rig, we were able to look quite that much higher than she did. the question now was whether, in the strong wind and heavy sea that we had to contend against, we could hold our own with a craft so much more powerful than ourselves. we had of course taken the precaution to get down a couple of reefs in our topsail, and the same in the foresail, as well as to haul down the squaresail and get the bonnet off the jib before leaving the _conquistador_, but it was not until we had hauled our wind and put the schooner on a taut bowline, that we were able to realise how hard it was actually blowing. up to then the wind had seemed no more to us than a brisk, pleasant breeze, while the schooner rode the long, creaming surges lightly as a gull. _now_, however, we had to doff our straw hats in a hurry to save them from being blown away, and to don close-fitting cloth caps instead, as well as our oil-skins, while it was positively hard work to cross the deck against the wind. as for the schooner, she behaved like a mad thing, careening to her gunwale as she soared to the crest of a wave and cleft its foaming summit in a blinding deluge of spray that swept her decks from the weather cat-head right aft to the companion, and plunging next moment into the trough with a strong roll to windward, and a very bedlam of yells and shrieks aloft as the gale swept between her straining masts and rigging. she shuddered as if terrified at every headlong plunge that she took, while the milk-white spume brimmed to the level of her figure-head, and roared away from her bows in a whole acre of boiling, glistening foam. the creaking and groaning of her timbers and bulkheads raised such a din that a novice would have been quite justified in fearing that the little hooker was rapidly straining herself to pieces, while more than one crash of crockery below, faintly heard through the other multitudinous sounds, told us that the wild antics of the barkie were making a very pretty general average among our domestic utensils. but, with all her creaking and groaning, the schooner now proved herself to be a truly superb sea-boat, scarcely shipping so much as a bucketful of green water, despite the merciless manner in which we were driving her; and the way in which she surmounted sea after sea, turning up her streaming weather-bow to receive its buffet, and gaily "shaking her feathers" after every plunge, was enough to make a sailor's heart leap with pride and exultation that was not to be lessened even by the awe-inspiring spectacle of the mountains of water that in continuous procession soared up from beneath her keel and went roaring away to leeward with foaming crests that towered to the height of the cross-trees. our first anxiety, of course, was to ascertain whether we were gaining upon the chase, or whether she was maintaining her distance from us; as soon, therefore, as we had secured our morning altitude of the sun for the determination of the longitude, we measured as accurately as we could the angle subtended by that portion of the barque's main-mast which showed above the horizon. the task was one of very considerable difficulty owing to the violent motion of the two craft, and when we had done our best we were by no means satisfied with the result, but we thought it might possibly be some help to us; so when we had at length agreed upon the actual value of the angle, we clamped our instruments, and, taking them below, stowed them carefully away in our bunks, where there was not much danger of their coming to harm through the frantic plunging of the schooner, our purpose of course being to compare the angle then obtained with another to be measured an hour or two later. if the second angle should prove to be greater than the first, it would show that we had gained on the chase; if, on the contrary, it should prove to be less, it would show that the chase had increased her distance from us. it was shortly before noon when we again brought our sextants on deck, opinion being meanwhile strongly divided as to whether or not we were gaining; some asserting positively that we were, while others as stoutly maintained that we were not. but even our sextants failed to settle the question, for if there was any difference at all in the angle, it was too minute for detection, and we were left in almost the same state of suspense as before. the only relief afforded us was the assurance that we were practically holding our own with the barque, and that unless the weather grew still worse than it was, we stood a fairly good chance of catching her eventually. one thing was certain; light as our draught of water was, and small as was the schooner's area of lateral resistance compared with that of the barque, we were slowly but certainly eating our way out upon her weather quarter, her main and foremasts having been visible to leeward of her mizenmast when the chase commenced, while now they just showed clear of each other to windward, thus conclusively demonstrating that we were gaining the weather-gauge of her, despite the heavy sea. this was certainly a most comforting reflection, and greatly helped to console us for the otherwise slow progress that we were making in the chase. ryan seemed to be the most disappointed man among us all; he was very impetuous and hot-headed; he liked to do everything on the instant and with a rush; and upon the discovery that we were not gaining perceptibly, he muttered something about giving the schooner more canvas. luckily, before giving the order he paused long enough to allow the fact to be borne in upon him that the masts were already whipping and bending like fishing-rods, and the gear taxed to its utmost capacity of resistance; and being, despite the characteristics above-mentioned, a reasonably prudent and careful officer, the sight restrained him, and he forbore to attempt anything so risky as the further over-driving of the already greatly over-driven craft. not so with the skipper of the barque. it was, of course, impossible for us to know whether he had observed the capture of the _conquistador_--we hoped and believed not; but, however that may have been, it was certain that he had been keeping his eyes sufficiently open to promptly become aware of the fact that the schooner had altered her course and was standing after him under a very heavy press of sail, and if our surmises as to his character were anywhere near the truth, that circumstance alone would be quite sufficient to fully arouse his easily-awakened apprehensions and to urge him to keep us at arm's-length at all risks. be that as it may, we had just made it noon when the quarter-master called our attention to the fact that the barque's people had loosed their main-topgallant-sail and were sheeting it home over the double-reefed topsail. it was an imprudent thing to do, however, for the sail had scarcely been set ten minutes when the topgallant-mast went over the side, snapped short off by the cap. her skipper instantly availed himself of the pretext afforded by this accident to bear away three or four points while clearing the wreck, his object doubtless being to determine beyond all question whether we really were after him or not; and if this was his purpose, we did not leave him long in doubt upon the point, our own helm being put up the instant that we saw what he was about. realising, by this move on our part, the true state of affairs, he now squared dead away before the wind, shook out all his reefs, and set his fore-topgallant-sail, as well as topmast and lower studding-sails. this was piling on the canvas with a vengeance, but ryan was not the man to be bluffed by any such move as that; every glass we had was now levelled at the barque, and no sooner were her people seen in the rigging than away went our own, and so much smarter were our people than those belonging to the barque, that our own studding-sails were set and dragging like cart-horses while theirs were still being sent aloft. this experiment was tried for about half-an-hour, by which time it became evident that the schooner was fully as good off the wind as was the barque, if not a trifle better; she seemed to fairly _fly_, while at times, when the breeze happened to freshen a trifle, it really seemed as though she would be lifted out of the water altogether; and i am quite persuaded that but for the preventers we had rigged for the purpose of relieving the masts when she was rolling so heavily during the preceding calm--and which still remained aloft and were doing splendid service--we must have lost both our sticks and been reduced to a sheer hulk long before the half-hour had expired. i have said that we were doing quite as well as, if not a trifle better than, the barque; for while we held our own with her, so that she was unable to appreciably alter her bearing from us, we were steadily edging up toward her, our gain in this respect being so great that ere the next manoeuvre was attempted we had risen her high enough to get a momentary glimpse of the whole length of her rail when she floated up on the crest of a sea. it was clear, therefore, that the barque had gained nothing by running off the wind; on the contrary, we had neared her fully a mile; her skipper, therefore, having given the unsuccessful experiment a fair trial, suddenly took in all his studding-sails again, reduced his canvas once more to a couple of reefs, and braced sharp up to the wind, as before. but here again we had the advantage of him through the superior smartness of our own crew, for he no sooner began to shorten sail than we did the same, handling our canvas so quickly that we were ready nearly five minutes before him, the result being that we had gained another half-mile upon him and had placed ourselves a good quarter of a mile upon his weather quarter by the time that he had sweated up his top sail-halliards. we now felt that, barring accidents, the barque was ours; she could escape us neither to leeward nor to windward. instead, therefore, of continuing to jam the schooner as close into the wind's eye as she would sail, with the object of weathering out on the barque, we pointed the little vixen's jib-boom fair and square at the chase, checked the sheets and braces a few inches fore and aft, and put her along for all that she was worth. it is astonishing to note the advantageous effect that is produced upon the sailing of a ship when it becomes possible to check the sheets and braces even a few paltry inches; it was distinctly noticeable in the case of the schooner; her movements were perceptibly freer and easier, she no longer drove her keen cut-water into the heart of the seas, receiving their blows upon the rounding of her weather bow with a force sufficient to shake her from stem to stern and almost to stop her way for an appreciable instant of time; she now slid smoothly up the breast of the wave, taking its stroke fairly in the wake of the fore-rigging, where it had little or no retarding effect upon her, surmounted its crest with a long, easy roll, and then sank with equal smoothness down into the trough, along which she sped lightly and swiftly as a petrel. it added a good half-a-knot to her speed. it was soon apparent that even this comparatively trifling advantage on our part had not escaped the notice of our wary friend the skipper of the barque; it suggested to him yet one more experiment, and he was not slow to make it, keeping his ship away about a point and a half and checking his braces accordingly. this proved very much more satisfactory so far as he was concerned; for by four bells in the afternoon watch we had lost sight of the barque's hull again, and it was unmistakably evident that she was increasing her distance from us. we held on, however, straight after her, as before; for although it was undeniable that she was now drawing away from us, it was but slowly; it would take her a good many hours to run us out of sight at that rate, and we felt pretty confident that when the weather moderated--which we hoped would be before long, as the glass indicated a slight rising tendency--we should have her at our mercy. meanwhile, however, we felt that we must not count our chickens before they were hatched; for there would be nearly an hour and a half of darkness between sunset and moonrise, and in that time our crafty friend would be pretty certain to attempt some new trickery if there seemed a ghost of a chance of its proving successful. chapter seven. the slaver's ruse. the sun set that night in a broad bank of horizontal, mottled grey cloud, through which his beams darted in golden splendour at brief intervals for nearly half-an-hour after we had lost sight of the great luminary himself; and just about the time that the spars and canvas of the distant barque began to grow indistinct in the fast-gathering dusk of evening, there occurred a noticeable decrease in the strength of the wind, with every prospect of a tolerably fine night. of course our glasses were never off the chase for more than five minutes at a time, but up to the moment when it became impossible to any longer distinguish the movements of those on board, no attempt to increase her spread of canvas had been observed. whether by this apparent apathy her people hoped to lull us into a condition of equal carelessness, it is of course impossible for me to say; but, if so, they signally failed, for immediately that the barque's outline faded into an indistinct blur in the growing darkness, we went to work and shook out a reef all round, never doubting but that they were at that moment doing precisely the same thing. and our supposition was most probably correct--ryan, indeed, who had sent for his night-glass and brought it to bear upon her, declared that he could detect an increase in the area of her shadowy canvas--for even after we had made sail we could not perceive that we were in any wise decreasing the distance between the two vessels. as the swift, tropical night shut down upon us every eye in the ship became strained to its utmost power in the effort to keep sight of the chase, for now that there could no longer be any doubt in the minds of her people that we were after them, we felt convinced that should an opportunity present itself for them to elude us in the darkness they would assuredly embrace it; and, being new to the coast and to the service, as most of us were, we had yet to learn by vexatious experience the fertility of resource which had been developed in the slave-trafficking fraternity by the unflagging pursuit to which they were subjected by the slave-squadron, and of which they never missed a chance to avail themselves. we had heard many an amusing story of the extraordinarily clever devices that these gentry had resorted to--very often successfully--in their endeavours to elude pursuit, and while we had laughed heartily at the recital of them, or commented admiringly upon their ingenuity, as the case might be, we had no fancy for further illustrating in our own persons their superiority in the art of mystification. and we were rendered all the more anxious by the fact that with nightfall the sky became overspread with a thin canopy of cloud that, while not sufficiently dense to wholly obscure the stars, so dimmed their lustre that it became difficult to distinguish, even through our night-glasses, the forms of the waves at a greater distance than half-a-mile; while as for the chase, we were at length reluctantly compelled to admit to each other that we had lost sight of her altogether, or at least that we could not be absolutely certain whether we could still see her or not; sometimes we were confident that we could, at other times we utterly failed to make her out. it was while we were in this painful condition of uncertainty that ryan--who like myself had remained on deck, diligently working away with his glass, and utterly deaf to the more than once repeated statement of the steward that the dinner was on the cabin table--turned quickly to me and said-- "do you see that greenish-looking star just glimmering through the clouds right over our jib-boom end? here, stand exactly where i am, and when she pitches you will see it showing about ten degrees above the horizon. there! do you see the star i mean?" "yes," said i, catching sight of the pale green glimmer as he placed me in position. "yes, i see it. what of it?" "just carry your eye from it down to the horizon at an angle of about forty-five degrees in an easterly direction, and tell me if you see anything particular." i did so, and after two or three attempts thought i caught a faint gleam like the light of a lamp shining through a red curtain. "yes," i answered, "i fancy i can just make out a dim something." and i described what i saw. "precisely!" exclaimed ryan delightedly. "there! now i have it in my glass--no, it is gone again--this jump of a sea renders it almost impossible to use one's telescope on the deck of such a lively little hooker as this--not that i've a word to say against her, god bless her, she's a beauty, every inch of her, but i wish she'd remain steady for a second or two. there, i have it again! yes, it's a light in the barque's after-cabin. they've drawn the curtains, never suspecting that the light would show through. yes, there's no mistake about it, i can see it quite plainly now; upon my word i believe we are overhauling her now that the breeze has dropped a bit. mr pierrepoint, d'ye see that light?" "where away, sir?" it was pointed out to the lad, and after some searching and prying--for it was so very dim that it was almost impossible to distinguish it with the naked eye--he caught sight of it. "very well, then," remarked ryan, with a return to his old, humorous manner that showed how great a relief to him was the appearance of the faint ruddy gleam, "keep your eye upon it, my bhoy, until i give ye a shpell. mr dugdale and oi are now goin' below to dinner, and if ye lose soight of that loight, bedad i'll--i'll keelhaul ye, ye shpalpeen. he's edgin' away off the wind, d'ye see, the blagguard! i wouldn't be surprised if he was to up helm and shquare away before it in a minute or two, hopin' to run us out of soight before the moon rises, so don't let your oye go off that light for a single inshtant if ye value your shkin. keep her away a bit"--to the man at the helm--"let her go off a point! so! steady as you go! there, masther freddy, the light is right forninst your jib-boom end now. mind that ye kape it there. we're certainly gaining on her." and, patting the lad affectionately on the shoulder, the warm-hearted irishman turned and beckoned me to follow him down into the cabin. we had been below about half-an-hour, and were getting well forward with our dinner, when we heard the voices of pierrepoint and the quarter-master in earnest conversation over the open skylight, and an occasional word or two that reached us seemed to indicate that they were in doubt about something. we both pricked up our ears a little; and presently we heard pierrepoint ejaculate in a tone of impatience and with a stamp of his foot on the deck-- "i'll be shot if i can understand it at all, somers; i shall call the captain." "i really think i would, sir, if i was you. i don't believe that's the barque at all; it's some circumwenting trick that they've been playing us, that's my opinion!" at this ryan started to his feet and, hailing through the skylight, asked-- "what is the matter, mr pierrepoint; have you lost sight of the light?" "no, sir," answered poor freddy, in a tone of distress; "the light is still straight ahead of us, and we seem to be nearing it fast, but i can't make out anything like the loom of the sails or hull of the barque, and if she is there i think we ought to see her by this time. the red light shows quite plainly in the glass." "i will join you on deck and have a look at it," exclaimed ryan; and, rising from the table, he sprang up the companion-ladder three steps at a time, i following close at his heels. yes; there was the light, sure enough, right ahead of us; and a glance aloft as well as the feel of the breeze on our faces told us in an instant that the schooner had been further kept away, and was now running well off the wind, although the change had been so gradual that we had not noticed it while sitting in the cabin. ryan took the glass from pierrepoint and brought it to bear on the light. "yes," he remarked, with the telescope still at his eye, "that is the light, beyond a doubt; but, as you say, mr pierrepoint, i can see no sign of the barque herself. yet she _must_ be there, for that light is obviously moving, and i observe that you have, very properly, kept away to follow it. surely," he continued, with an accent of impatience and perplexity, "we have not been following some other craft that has hove above the horizon since the darkness set in? and, even so, i can see nothing of the craft herself. obviously, however, we are nearing the light--whatever it is--fast, for i can see it quite distinctly in the glass, i even fancy that i can see it rising and falling. take the glass, dugdale, and tell me what you can make of it." i took the glass, and, after a long and patient scrutiny of the mysterious light, pronounced my opinion. "to me, sir," said i, "it has the appearance of an ordinary ship's lantern wrapped in a strip of red bunting and hung from a pole, or something of that sort. for, if you will look at it closely, you will notice that it _sways_ with the wash of the sea, and now and then seems to swing for an instant behind a slender object like a light spar. but i could almost take my oath that there is no barque or any other kind of craft there." once again ryan took the telescope, and after a further prolonged scrutiny, he exclaimed-- "by the powers, but i believe you are right, and if so we have been done! it certainly _has_ very much the appearance that you describe. but what in the world can it be? it is a moving object, beyond all doubt, for see how we have been obliged to run off the wind in chase of it! however, we are close to it now, for i can make out the swinging of the lantern--and a lantern it _is_--with the naked eye. it is some confounded contrivance for leading us astray, that is what it is! but since we are so close to it, we may as well ascertain its character, if only to be awake to the trick if it ever happens to be played upon us a second time. hands by the braces here, and stand by to back the topsail. and get two or three lanterns ready to swing over the side, so that we may see just exactly what the thing is." we had by this time approached the mysterious object so nearly that another three or four minutes sufficed to bring it within a couple of hundred feet of the schooner's weather bow, when the topsail was laid to the mast, and our way checked sufficiently to permit of a careful examination of the thing, whatever it was. by the time that we had forged ahead far enough to bring it on our weather beam it was close aboard of us, and then the light of our lanterns disclosed the nature of the contrivance by which we had been so cleverly tricked. it was in fact nothing more than a raft composed of five nine-inch planks laid parallel to each other with a space of about a foot between each, and firmly secured together by a couple of stout cross-pieces nailed athwart the whole concern. the fore-ends of the planks had been sawn away to the shape of a sharp wedge to facilitate the movement of the raft through the water, and on the foremost cross-piece had been rigged an oar for a mast, upon which was set a hastily-contrived squaresail, made out of a piece of old tarpaulin. to the head of the mast was securely lashed an old lantern with a short length of candle, still burning, in it; the lantern being cunningly draped in red bunting to represent the appearance of a lamp shining through a curtain. and the whole contrivance was rendered self-steering by the attachment of a few fathoms of line to the after-end of the middle plank, at the other extremity of which a drogue, consisting of a short length of plank, was attached. this drogue had the effect of keeping the raft running dead before the wind, and it travelled at a very respectable pace, too--quite five knots an hour, we estimated its speed at--for the sail was quite a big one for so small an affair; and since we had been steering for it for just about an hour, it meant that we had been decoyed some five miles to leeward of our proper course. the question now was: where was the barque? it did not take us very long to make up our minds upon this point. it was pretty evident that since her skipper had been at so much pains to entice us away down to leeward, he would have held his wind all this time; and to windward therefore must we look for him. whether, however, he had tacked and stood away to the westward immediately after launching his raft, or whether he had held on upon the port tack to the northward, we could not possibly tell, for a diligent and prolonged use of our night-glasses failed to reveal the slightest indication of his whereabouts. ryan, however, was not long in arriving upon a conclusion in the matter. he argued that if he had tacked we ought also to tack forthwith, because, if we stood on as we were going until the moon rose, we might run out of sight of him; whereas, if he had _not_ tacked, he would be at that moment somewhere about broad on our weather bow. if therefore he _had_ tacked, we should be doing the right thing to tack also, since we should then be standing directly after him; while if he had not tacked, we should still be doing right to heave about, since even in that case we should probably see something of him from our mast-head when the moon rose, as she would in less than half-an-hour. we therefore at once put the helm down and hove round on the starboard tack, keeping the schooner as close to the wind as she would lie, while still allowing her to go along through the water. a faint brightening in the sky by and by announced the welcome approach of the moon upon the scene; and shortly afterwards the beautiful planet herself, considerably shrunken from her full-orbed splendour, rose slowly into view above the horizon, her curtailed disc showing of a deep, ruddy orange-colour through the dense, humid vapours of the lower atmosphere. two hands were at once sent up to the topgallant-yard to take a look round; but even after they had been there an hour--by which time the moon had risen high enough to give us plenty of light--they failed to discover any sign of the barque or anything else; and we were at length reluctantly compelled to admit that we had been very cleverly tricked, and that our cunning neighbour had fairly given us the slip. "but i'll not give him up, even now!" exclaimed ryan, when this conviction had fairly forced itself upon us. "come down below, dugdale, and let us reason this thing out." we accordingly descended to our snug little cabin and seated ourselves at the table, ryan producing a sheet of paper, a scale, and a pencil wherewith to graphically illustrate our line of reasoning. "now, here," said he, drawing an arrow near one margin of the paper, "is the wind, coming out at west as nearly as may be; and here," laying the scale upon the paper, measuring off a distance, and making two pencil dots, "are the positions of the barque and the schooner when the former was last seen. now, i estimate that the barque was going about eight and a half knots, and we were reeling off nine by the log at that time; and this state of affairs continued at least until the light was seen, which was about half-an-hour after we lost sight of our friend. consequently, when the light was first seen, the schooner was here"-- making another dot--"and the barque there," making a fourth. "now, what would the blagguard be most likely to do when he had safely launched his raft? he knew that it would go skimming away to leeward, taking us with it; and i therefore think it most probable that he would tack at once, going off in this direction," laying down a line upon the paper. "meanwhile, the raft went scudding away to leeward until we met it there," making another dot. "then we tacked, and, laying a point higher than he can, stood along this line," ruling one carefully in as he spoke. "now, we have been travelling along this line, say an hour and a quarter, which brings us here. but where is the barque? if she had tacked, and _continued to stand on_ until now, she would be _there_, eleven or twelve miles away, and we should see her. supposing, however, that she continued to stand on as she was going when we last saw her, she would now be _there_, twenty-eight miles away! phew! i was a long way out of my reckoning when i thought that we should still have her in sight, even if we tacked. we've lost her, harry, my bhoy, and that's a fact. however, we know where she's bound to, and that's the island of cuba, or i'm a dutchman. very well. having given us the slip she will make the best of her way there without further delay; and it is my opinion that _if_ she is still standing to the northward she will not continue to do so for very much longer, because, d'ye see, my bhoy, she'll be afraid of falling in with some of our cruisers if she stands in too close to the coast. therefore, as we can hug the wind closer than she can, we'll just stand on as we are going for a day or two longer, or until the wind changes--in fact, we will shape a course for cuba--and if we don't fall in with her again within the next seventy-two hours i shall give her up. meanwhile the wind is dropping fast, so we will get some more muslin upon the little hooker." as ryan had said, the wind was dropping fast, so rapidly, indeed, that when eight bells was struck at midnight the schooner was under all the canvas that we could set, and even then was only creeping along at a speed of some two and a half knots per hour. oh, how fervently we wished then that we could see even as much as the mere mastheads of the barque! for we felt certain that in such a light air the schooner would make short work of overtaking her. but nothing hove in sight; and when the next morning dawned we were still alone upon the face of the vast ocean. with the rising of the sun the small draught of air that still remained to us fell dead; and we had it calm the whole day and well on into the succeeding night. then the weather became unsettled and thundery, with light baffling airs interspersed with fierce squalls from all quarters of the compass, during which we made scarcely sixty miles in the twenty-four hours. it was about midnight of the third day after we had lost sight of the barque, and the seventy-two hours that ryan had allowed himself in which to find her again were fully spent, without affording us another glimpse of her. all hands, from ryan himself down to the smallest boy in the ship, were dreadfully disgusted and crestfallen at our want of success; and we were only waiting for a breeze to spring up from somewhere to enable us to shape a course back to our cruising ground. the weather, however, was still very overcast and lowering, with signs not wanting that another heavy thunderstorm was brewing, which would probably bring us the desired breeze. there was not much swell running, but sufficient, nevertheless, to tumble the schooner about a good deal; and i had accordingly taken it upon myself to clew up, haul down, and furl every stitch of canvas, in order to save the sails from battering themselves to rags. the thunder had been gradually working up ever since sunset, and in fact even before that, and when eight bells struck at midnight, and my watch below came round, the weather had such a curious and portentous look, and the atmosphere was moreover so close and heavy, that i determined to stretch myself out "all standing" on the stern grating instead of going below, so that i might be all ready in case my presence should be required. it was shortly after two bells when pierrepoint came and roused me out with the remark-- "i am sorry to disturb you, dugdale, but i think it is going to rain very shortly, and if you remain there you stand a very good chance of getting soaked to the skin. and what do you think of the weather? is it merely a thunder-squall that has been brewing all this time, or what is it? just look at those clouds overhead, their edges look quite red, as though there was a fire somewhere behind them. do you think i should call the captain?" it was as he had said. the sky was banked up from horizon to zenith, all round, with enormous cloud-piles, black as ink in the body of them, but their fringes or edges, which had a curiously tattered appearance, were of a distinct fiery red hue. all this time there was not a breath of wind save what was created by the schooner as she rolled heavily on the gathering swell; not a sound save those which arose within her as the bulkheads and timbers creaked and groaned dismally, the cabin-doors rattled, the rudder kicked as the water swirled and gurgled about it and under her counter with the heave of her, and the jerk of the spars aloft, or the slatting of the braces as she swayed, pendulum-like, from side to side. "what does the glass say?" inquired i, in response to pierrepoint's last question. i walked to the open skylight and peered down through it at the barometer, the tube of which was just sufficiently illuminated by the turned-down cabin lamp to permit of its condition being noted. it had fallen an inch since i last looked at it, during my watch on deck! "phew!" ejaculated i, "there must surely be something the matter with the thing; it can never have fallen that much in scarcely two hours!" i hurried below and, turning up the lamp, subjected the instrument to a careful examination; but, as far as i could make out, there seemed to be nothing wrong with it; the fall had all the appearance of being perfectly genuine. but, whether or not, it was certain that the captain ought at once to be made acquainted with the state of affairs; i therefore went forthwith to his cabin and aroused him. "ay, ay," he answered sleepily, to my call. "what is it, mr dugdale? has the barque hove in sight?" "no such luck, sir, i am sorry to say," replied i. "but i think you ought to know that the weather has a very peculiar and threatening appearance; and the glass has dropped a full inch within the last two hours." "an inch?" ejaculated ryan, starting up in his bunk. "an inch? surely, dugdale, you must be mistaken!" "indeed, sir, i am not," said i. "i examined the barometer very carefully, and satisfied myself that i had made no mistake before calling you." "by jove, then, it is high time that i was on deck!" exclaimed he, leaping out of his bunk. "just put a match to my lamp, harry, my lad, will ye; you will find a box there on the shelf. is there any wind?" "not a breath, sir; but i shall not be surprised if we have a great deal more than we want before long," i answered. "um!" said he. "well, almost anything short of a hurricane would be better than these exasperating calms. the swell seems to have risen a bit since i turned in, hasn't it?" "quite perceptibly," said i, "and it seems to be coming more out from the northward than at first." "well," said he, thrusting his bare feet into his slippers, "let us go on deck and take a look round." and, he leading the way, we forthwith trundled up the companion-ladder and stepped out on deck. it seemed to have grown blacker and more threatening than ever during the short time that i had been below, although that may have been due to the contrast between the light of the cabin and the darkness on deck; the ruddy tinge on the cloud edges, however, was even more pronounced than before, the colour having slightly changed and grown more like the hue of red-hot copper. ryan was evidently much astonished--and, i thought, somewhat dismayed--by what he saw. "by the powers!" he ejaculated, "you did right to call me, dugdale. if we were in the indian ocean, now, i would say that a cyclone was brewing; and, now i come to think of it, there is no act of parliament against one brewing here. how is the glass _now_? has it dropped anything since you last looked at it?" i went to the skylight and once more peered at the mercury. "yes, indeed, sir, it has," answered i, "it has gone down nearly one-tenth!" "then, by the piper, we're in for something out of the common, and the sooner we set about preparing for it, the better!" exclaimed ryan. "ah! i see you have already furled everything; well, that leaves us so much the less to be still done. call all hands, however, for we may have it upon us at any moment, by the look of things up there," pointing to the frowning, ruddy sky. "rig in the jib-boom, and send down all but the lower-yard on deck, and both topmasts as well. set some of the men to secure the canvas with double gaskets; and close-reef the boom-foresail and set it. let the carpenter look to the hatches and see that they are securely battened down, and he had better examine the pumps also; our lives may depend upon them before all is over. where is the boatswain? oh, is that you, bartlett? give an eye to the boats' gripes, will you, and see that they are all right. i have known a boat to be blown clean from the davits before now. hurrah, men! look alive with those yards, and let us have them down here on deck as quickly as possible." the schooner was by this time as busy as a beehive in swarming-time, the men working with a will, since they knew, from the sharp, incisive tones in which ryan issued his orders, as well as by the menacing aspect of the sky, that the occasion was pressing. fortunately, in so small and lightly-rigged a craft as the _felicidad_, the task of preparing her for the forthcoming battle with the elements was not a heavy one, and, being well manned for our size, we were soon ready. none too soon, however. for hardly had the finishing touches been given to our preparations, and the guns and boats made thoroughly secure, than we were momentarily dazzled and blinded by a terrific flash of blue lightning that seemed to dart from the clouds immediately overhead, and to strike the water close to us, filling the dead and heavy air with a strong odour of brimstone, while simultaneously we were deafened and stunned by a most awful, ear-splitting _crack_ of thunder that made the schooner quiver from stem to stern as though she had been struck by a heavy shot. ryan, pierrepoint, and i were all standing close together near the companion at the moment when the lightning flashed out, illumining the whole scene for an instant with a light as brilliant as that of the noonday sun, and while i was still in process of recovering from the shock produced by the terrifying crash of the thunder, i heard my fellow-mid exclaim to the captain-- "there! did you see that, sir? there is a craft of some sort away out there," pointing in a north-easterly direction. "i saw her as distinctly as possible. she is about six miles away, and is stripped to her close-reefed topsails--" "did you see that ship out there on our port-quarter, sir?" hailed one of the men from the forecastle, interrupting master freddy in his tale. "no," answered ryan sharply. "i wasn't looking that way. what did she look like?" "she is a square-rigged craft of about three or four hundred tons, under close-reefed topsails, lying end-on to us, sir," answered the man. "surely it can't be our old friend the barque that has drifted within view of us again during the darkness?" exclaimed ryan excitedly. "keep a good look-out for her, lads, when the next flash comes," he added in an eager tone of voice, that showed conclusively how secondary a matter the impending outburst of the elements had already become to him in view of this new discovery. no second flash came, however, but instead of it, and almost as the last words left ryan's lips, the clouds above us burst, and there descended from them the heaviest downpour of rain that i had ever up to that time witnessed. those who have never beheld a tropical thunder-shower can form no conception of what it is like. imagine yourself to be standing immediately under a large tank of warm water, and then further imagine that the contents of this tank are suddenly capsized right on top of you; multiply the quantity of falling water a million times, and suppose the descent of the water to be continued for from three to six or seven minutes, and you will then have an imperfect conception of the sort of drenching that we received on the occasion of which i am now speaking. the decks were flooded in an instant, and before i could wriggle into my oil-skins i was soaked to the skin, and the warm water was washing above my ankles with the roll of the schooner. the scuppers were wholly inadequate to the occasion, and we were obliged to open the ports to get rid of the water and prevent it from getting below. the downpour lasted some four minutes or so, ceasing as abruptly and with as little warning as it had commenced; but in that time it had beaten down the swell so effectually that our motion was scarcely more perceptible than it would have been in a well-sheltered roadstead; and the effect of the sudden cessation of the noises that had been so recently sounding in our ears, and of the crash of the downpour, was very weird and curious, the dead silence now being broken only by an occasional faint creak or jar of bulkhead or boom, and the loud gush and gurgle of the water pouring from the scuppers. the silence was of no long duration, however, for we had scarcely found time to become sensible of it when a faint moaning sound arose in the air, coming from no one knew where; and, presently, with a still louder moan, a sudden, furious, scuffle of wind swept past us, causing our reefed foresail to flap loudly, and was gone. the moanings grew louder and more weird, sounding now on the port-quarter, now on the starboard bow, then broad abeam, and anon high over our mastheads; it was clear that small, partial currents of air were in violent motion all round us, and that the crisis was at hand. the pirate slaver--by harry collingwood chapter eight. caught in a cyclone. the watch below had been dismissed upon the completion of our work of preparation, but not a man had left the deck, their anxiety to see and know the worst of what was to befall having completely overcome their usual propensity to make the utmost of every moment allotted to them for necessary rest, and they were now all huddled and clustered together upon the forecastle, discussing the situation in low, murmured tones, and holding themselves in readiness, like hounds in the leash, to spring into activity at the first word of command. the moaning and wailing sounds were now floating all round us, and presently, making itself rapidly audible above them, we became conscious of a deep, fierce, bellowing roar that seemed to be approaching us on our starboard beam, the schooner's head being then about north-west. "here it comes!" exclaimed ryan, in a hoarse tone of suppressed excitement. "get hold of a belaying-pin each, you two, or you will stand a very good chance of being blown overboard. starboard your helm; hard over with it, my man. get under the lee of the starboard bulwarks, men. carpenter, are your axes ready in case we should be obliged to cut anything away?" "all ready, sir," came the reply, scarcely audible above the roar of the tempest that was now close upon us; and as the man spoke a fierce gust of wind laden with salt mist swooped down upon us and careened the schooner almost to her covering-board as it filled the foresail with a jar and a report like that of a nine-pounder. this blast was only momentary, however, it was upon us and gone again in an instant, but it was quickly succeeded by others; and then, away in the gloom, right abeam of us, appeared a white, spectral glimmer swooping down upon the schooner with the speed of a race-horse, and spreading momentarily wider athwart the blackness as it came. it was a line of white foam churned up on the surface of the sea by the advancing hurricane, and all behind it the ocean was white as milk. the air was now in violent motion all about us, fierce eddies swooping hither and thither, but generally in the same direction as that from which the gale was approaching. another heavy salt-laden gust struck us, lasting just long enough to give the schooner way and render her obedient to her helm, and then the deep bass roar rose into a deafening, yelling medley of indescribable sounds as the gale struck us, and the poor little schooner bowed beneath the blow until the water poured in over her lee gunwale and i thought that she was going to "turn the turtle" with us. the foresail stood the strain for just an instant, and then it split to ribbons, and was torn from the bolt-ropes as cleanly as though the work had been done with a knife. but the good sail had already done its work before the hurricane proper had struck us, in that it had imparted some life, even though ever so little, to the schooner; she was already paying slowly off when the first stroke of the hurricane beat her down, and she continued to do so until, as she got dead before it, she rose suddenly to an even keel and went scudding away to leeward like a frightened sea-bird. the awful volume of sound given out by the fierce, headlong swoop of the wind as it bore down upon us quite prepared me to see both masts blown clean out of the schooner; but all her gear fortunately happened to be sound and good, and the loss of the foresail was the full extent of the damage sustained by us. having satisfied myself upon that point, i ventured to raise my head a little above the bulwarks to see how the strange sail was faring. pierrepoint had reported her as being visible in the north-eastern quarter, and if this were so she ought now to be somewhere astern of us, since we were running off about south-west; and, sure enough, there she was, about a point and a half on our starboard quarter, just visible in the midst of the ghostly glare of the phosphorescent foam. she was, like ourselves, running dead before the gale, and i thought i could make out that her topsails had withstood the tremendous strain of the outburst and were still doing their duty. if this were so, since we were scudding under bare poles, she would soon overtake and pass us quite as closely as would be at all consistent with the safety of the two craft, and we should be afforded an opportunity to learn something of her character, and to judge whether she was the barque that we had been so industriously seeking. i made my way over to ryan, who was standing--as well as he could against the violence of the wind that threatened to sweep him off his feet--close to the helmsman, pointed toward the stranger, and, clinging to the companion, we stood and watched her for a minute or two, half suffocated with the difficulty of breathing in so furious a tempest. she was now about four miles from us, and it soon became apparent that she was overhauling us fast, although by no means so fast as i expected; and she was so nearly end-on to us that i suggested to ryan the advisability of our showing a light, as it looked very much as though she had not yet seen us and might approach us so closely as to put both craft in imminent peril. "all in good time," shouted the captain in my ear, in response to this suggestion. "i do not believe that she _has_ seen us yet; but that is not of much consequence, since both of us are steering as steadily as pleasure-boats on a river, and i will take care to make her acquainted with our whereabouts if there appears to be the slightest danger of her running over us. but i want her to pass as near us as possible, so that we may have a good view of her. for there seems to me to be a something familiar-looking about her, as though i had seen her before; and, between you and me, harry, i believe her to be our old friend the barque again. and, if so, we must keep up with her at all costs until the weather moderates sufficiently to bring her to; so just step for'ard, will you, my lad, and get the fore-trysail on deck and bent ready for setting in case we need it. and let one hand bring aft a lantern, _not_ lighted, mind ye; he can take it below, light it _there_, and leave it at the foot of the companion-ladder all ready to show a light if yonder stranger seems likely to sheer too close to us in passing." i went forward, as requested, and found that the watch below had already returned to their hammocks, the crisis having passed, and the schooner scudding as comfortably as could be before the gale. the trysail was got up from below, bent, halliards and sheets hooked on, and, in short, made all ready for setting, and i returned aft to ryan's side, having to claw my way to him along the rail in preference to creeping along the deck upon all fours, which seemed to be the only alternative method of making headway against the wind. the sea was by this time getting up, and the air was full of spume and scud-water, caught up from the surface of the sea and the crests of the waves and swept along in a blinding, drenching shower by the gale. my superior officer was still clinging to the companion, with his eyes intently fixed upon the strange sail astern, which, now that the dense masses of cloud overhead were torn into shreds of flying scud by the fury of the wind, was pretty distinctly visible, at a distance of about a mile and a half, by the dim, misty moonlight that filtered through. "i've been trying to get a peep at her through my night-glass," exclaimed ryan, with a wave of his hand toward the dark blotch in the midst of the white foam, "but there is no holding it in such a breeze as this; you have to keep a tight grip on the thing or the wind will take it away from you altogether. but i'm pretty certain that it is the barque; and if so i'll stick to her as long as this schooner will hang together." "do you think that she has seen us yet?" i asked. "yes, i fancy so," answered ryan. "she appears to me to be edging away a trifle, so as to pass us to starboard, giving us as wide a berth as possible. but even although she may have seen us, i do not believe that we are recognised, as yet; indeed, how should we be? at this distance, and end-on as we are, with no canvas set and our topmasts struck, we must look like little more than a dot on the water." this was quite true, and i fully believed, with ryan, that we had _not_ been recognised, for although our companion had indeed manifested signs of an inclination to edge away from us, the tendency was only to a sufficient extent to insure her passing us in safety. had she suspected us of being an enemy, it would not have been positively dangerous for her to have altered her course fully a point, although, blowing as it then did, it would have been exceedingly imprudent to have attempted more than that. in about half-an-hour after i had joined ryan the strange craft overtook us; but while she was yet some half-a-mile astern of us we had made her out to be a barque of just about the same size as the one that we had been hunting for; and when she came up abreast of us at a distance of not more than a quarter of a mile, we saw that her main-topmast had gone just at the cap, and her people were still busy with the wreck of it; a pretty tough job they seemed to be having with it, too. that she was much more strongly-manned than is usually the case with a merchantman of her size was also evident, for we could see that while one gang was at work clearing away the wreck, another was busy securing the fore-topmast by getting up preventer-backstays, and so on. how they managed to work aloft at all in such terrific weather passed my comprehension; but there they were, at least _trying_ to do something. and, as ryan remarked, it showed conclusively what a resolute set of fellows they were on board her, and afforded us a clue as to the sort of resistance we were likely to meet with should it ever come to a game of fisticuffs between them and ourselves. having once overtaken us she seemed to very quickly pass ahead, and when she was once more about two miles distant, ryan gave the order to set the storm fore-trysail, a step that we might then very well take without exciting any very strong suspicion on board the barque as to our ulterior intentions, since the sea was by this time getting up to an extent which made the exhibition of a small amount of canvas on board the schooner not only justifiable but absolutely necessary. the sail was accordingly set, and all risk of being pooped was, for the time at least, done away with, and what was almost of equal importance in our eyes, we now appeared to be holding our own with the sail ahead. the watch had just been called when we noticed that the wind was backing further round from the northward--a pretty conclusive indication that it was a cyclone, or revolving storm, that we had encountered--and ryan began to be exceedingly anxious upon the subject of heaving-to, since, as he explained to me, every mile that we now travelled carried us nearer to the terrible vortex or "eye" of the storm. still he could not bring himself to do so while the barque held on, thus allowing her to effect her escape from us a second time--assuming, of course, that she really was, as we very strongly suspected, our former acquaintance; it was therefore with a feeling of considerable satisfaction that we shortly afterwards saw her start her fore-topsail sheets with the evident intention of clewing up the sail, if possible, preparatory to heaving-to. "ah!" exclaimed ryan, admiringly, "that fellow is no fool; he scents danger ahead; he has been in a cyclone before to-day, i'll warrant, and seems to know exactly what he is about. there goes his topsail, clean out of the bolt-ropes, as i expected it would; but i do not suppose he ever seriously hoped to save the sail. and now over goes his helm, and there he rounds-to--ah-h! look at _that_! on her beam-ends, by all that's--no--no--she is righting again--good! very prettily done, _v-e-r-y_ prettily done indeed! _now_ she luffs!--excellent! capital! you are all safe now, my man. we will run down to him, harry, my bhoy, and heave-to about a mile to leeward of him; then perhaps he will not suspect us; he will gradually settle down towards us, as we shall lie closer than he will; and when the wind drops we shall have him to do as we like with." it was a very anxious moment with us when, having run down to the spot selected by ryan, we eased the helm over to bring the schooner to _on the starboard tack_--that being the correct tack upon which to heave-to in a cyclone in the northern hemisphere--and i shall never forget the feeling of absolute helplessness that seized me when, as our little craft gradually presented her broadside to the gale, i felt her going over--over--over--until the water poured in a raging cataract over her lee rail, and she laid down beneath the strength of the howling blast-- that now seemed to have suddenly increased to twice its former fury-- until the lee side of her deck was buried almost to the combings of the hatchways. but as her bows came round and presented themselves more obliquely to the gale she righted somewhat, and although she still careened until her lee rail was all but awash, she rode the furious seas as gallantly and buoyantly as a gull. ryan had displayed a very considerable amount of judgment in conducting the schooner down to the berth he had chosen for her, and had placed her there in so natural a manner that we scarcely believed it possible that our presence so near the barque would be likely to arouse any suspicions of our intentions in the minds of her crew; and as we had never been very near her during the time of our former pursuit of her, we were in hopes that we should not now be recognised. we had taken up a position exactly to leeward of our neighbour; and, as ryan had anticipated, we soon found that the schooner was looking up a full point higher than the bigger craft; but this was very evenly balanced by the greater amount of lee drift that we made, in consequence of our much lighter draught; we therefore, contrived to maintain our position with almost perfect exactitude, except that the schooner manifested the greater tendency to forge ahead, thus placing herself gradually further upon the barque's lee bow. the wind continued to blow with unabated fury, and when day broke and we were able to look about us, the scene was grand and awful beyond all power of description. the sky was of an uniform deep, slaty, purple-grey hue, across the face of which careered a constant succession of lighter grey, smoky-looking clouds, all shredded and torn to tatters by the headlong sweep of the gale. the colour of the sea was a dirty green, deepening in tint to purple-black in the hollows, and capped by long ridges of dirty yellowish foam, that was continuously snatched up by the wind and hurled through the air in drenching sheets that cut and stung the skin like the lash of a whip. the sea, although not so high as might have been expected from the force of the wind, was still formidable enough to be almost terrifying in its aspect as it swept down upon the schooner in long, steep, mountain-like ridges, that soared to nearly half the height of our main cross-trees, with a hollow of fully one hundred and eighty feet in width between them, each wave crowned with a roaring, foaming crest that reared itself above our low hull as though eager to hurl itself upon and destroy us. as the day wore on we received a temporary addition to our company, in the shape of a brig. she hove in sight in the eastern quarter, about six bells in the forenoon watch; and the first sight that we got of her revealed that her jib-boom and both her topmasts were gone. she was showing a storm-staysail; and at first sight we supposed her to be hove-to; but she drove down towards us so fast that we soon came to the conclusion that there must be something wrong with her steering-gear, and as she drew nearer it became evident that she was unmanageable, falling off occasionally until she was almost dead before the wind; and we could see that whenever this happened the sea made a clean breach over her. when within about a mile of us she showed the russian ensign, upside down, in her main-rigging, to which we responded by hoisting spanish colours--to lull any doubts that might possibly be lurking in the minds of our friends on board the barque, who did not condescend to favour us with a sight of their bunting. as for the brig, she drove straight down towards us, occasioning us a considerable amount of anxiety, for so erratic were her movements that when she had arrived within a couple of cables' lengths of us it became impossible to say whether she would pass ahead or astern of us. the only thing that we could do to avoid her was to fill upon the schooner and forge ahead out of her way, and this we would have done but for the possibility that after our having done so the brig might take a sheer in the wrong direction and fall foul of us, when the destruction of the schooner, if not of both vessels, must inevitably have happened. at length it became evident that something must be done, for she was settling bodily down upon us, and another two minutes would bring the two craft into collision. ryan therefore ordered the helm to be shifted, and we were just forging clear, as we thought, and leaving her room to pass under our stern, when a terrific sea swept down upon her, throwing her quarter round, sweeping her from stem to stern, and driving her crew into the rigging, and in an instant there she was, driving along stem-on right for us--or, rather, for the spot that we should occupy when she reached it. there was now only one way of avoiding a disastrous collision, and that was by putting our helm hard up, and, at all risks, jibing round upon the other tack; and this we accordingly did, missing the brig by a hair's-breadth, but springing our foremast-head so badly as the trysail jibed over, that we had to get in the sail at once, and set a close-reefed main-staysail instead. as for the brig, she was little better than a wreck, for as she drove past us we saw that her rudder was gone, her bulwarks carried away on both sides, from cat-head to taffrail, and her decks swept of everything that was movable. it was of course utterly impossible for us to help them in any way in the wind and sea that then raged; nor could we follow them in their helpless progress to leeward, and stand by them, the damage to our foremast being so serious as to utterly preclude the possibility of getting any headsail upon the schooner until it had been at least temporarily repaired, while the little hooker, having again been brought-to on the starboard tack, absolutely refused to pay off under her staysail only, which was perhaps just as well, so far as we were concerned, since any attempt on our part to run to leeward would almost certainly have resulted in the swamping of the schooner. what became of the brig, and whether she outlived the gale or not, we never knew, for she continued her erratic course to leeward, and we lost sight of her in about an hour and a half from the time when she so nearly fell on board us, and we saw her no more. but she was driving in a direction that would carry her right into the track of the vortex of the storm, to encounter which, in her wrecked and helpless condition, would infallibly mean her destruction. as the day wore on, the wind gradually shifted round further from the eastward, and by nightfall it was blowing from about east-south-east, and showing some signs of moderating, although it still blew very heavily; much too heavily indeed to justify us in sending any hands aloft to fish our sprung mast-head. nevertheless, every preparation was made for the commencement of the operation at the earliest possible moment, as we had detected signs on board the barque indicative of an intention to send a new main-topmast up without delay; which might or might not mean that a suspicion as to our true character had begun to dawn upon them. by midnight the gale had moderated to a strong breeze, and the sky had cleared sufficiently to permit of a little moonlight percolating through between the denser clouds, and we were then able to make out--to our inexpressible chagrin--that the barque's people had already got their new topmast aloft and ridded, and were getting their main-topsail-yard across, having been hard at work, doubtless, ever since darkness set in, though how they had managed to perform their task was a puzzle to us. it was, however, another evidence of the resolute character of their skipper; another hint to us that we should have all our work cut out to bag him; and the carpenter was therefore at once sent for, and set forthwith to the task of fishing our mast-head with all possible expedition. the task was not half executed, however, when we had the mortification to see our neighbour sheet home his double-reefed topsails and make sail to the westward. this sight put our men upon their mettle; they could vividly picture to themselves the laugh that the slavers would be enjoying at our expense, should they have suspected our intentions toward them, and before the barque was absolutely out of sight from aloft, chips had managed to make such a job of his work as enabled us to make sail also. daylight brought with it a clear sky, dappled with high, fleecy, white, fine-weather clouds, and a moderate breeze from the south-east, with a very heavy, confused sea still running, however; and as the barque's royals were still in sight above the horizon, we cracked on after her, although the carpenter had warned ryan that the work done during the night was scarcely as satisfactory as might be, and that the mast-head was hardly to be trusted. but the fellow was a thoroughly good man, and eager to avoid all possibility of it being said that we had lost the chance of a prize through him. as soon therefore as it was light enough to see, he was aloft again; and by eight bells he had finished his work, and reported that we might now pack sail upon the schooner to our hearts' content, which we forthwith did, giving her everything that would draw, from the royal down, the wind being very nearly aft, that is to say, about two points on the larboard quarter. by noon it became apparent that we were gaining, although but slowly, on the barque, her royals and half her topgallant-sails being by this time above the horizon; and now all was anxiety on board the schooner as to the character of the coming night; for we had no doubt that, seeing, as they now must, that we were following them, the ever-vigilant suspicions of the barque's people would prompt them to avoid us should the night prove dark enough to permit of such a manoeuvre. the indications were all for fine weather, however; the glass was rising steadily, the sky was becoming of a deeper clearer blue; the white clouds were melting away, promising a clear, star-lit night between the hours of sunset and moonrise, and, what was equally as much in our favour, both wind and sea were going down steadily. toward eight bells in the afternoon watch we sighted another sail--a schooner this time; she was beating up to the eastward, and crossed the hawse of the barque at no great distance, exchanging signals with her, although what was their nature we could not see, and even had we been near enough to have made out the flags, it is exceedingly improbable that we should have understood them. we had a suspicion, however, that they in some way referred to us; for shortly afterwards the schooner tacked and stood towards us, crossing our bows at a distance of about a mile, and exhibiting the french ensign. we replied by showing spanish colours, as before; upon which the stranger threw out some signal that we could not understand, and after displaying it for some few minutes hauled it down and hoisted another. we thought it would never do to display a total ignorance of the signals; ryan therefore ordered the signal-bag to be produced, and we strung some flags together haphazard, and hoisted them. this signal the schooner acknowledged, tacking at the same time and standing toward us once more; but we were far too busy to wait for her, for although she had all the looks of a slaver, we knew, from the course she was steering, that she could have no slaves on board, and was therefore altogether unworthy of our attention with so promising a craft as the barque in plain view. she made no attempt to follow us, and in an hour was out of sight to the northward. by sunset that night the weather was everything that we could wish, and we had risen the chase to her topsails; everybody on board the _felicidad_ was therefore in the highest spirits, and hope ran high that by daybreak on the morrow we should have our neighbour under our guns, and be able to give her an overhaul. the stars came out brilliantly, and although the moon would not rise until after midnight--and would not give us much light even then, since she had entered her fourth quarter-- we soon found that we should have light enough to prevent the barque from giving us the slip, provided that we kept both eyes open. nevertheless, darkness had no sooner set in, than she made an effort to do so by edging off to the northward, a couple of points, which move, however, we soon detected and frustrated by steering directly after her. during the night the wind breezed up again somewhat, and this gave the chase so great an advantage that at daybreak she was still about eight miles ahead. shortly after sunrise, however, it dwindled away again, and gradually dropped to a gentle air that barely fanned us along at a speed of five knots. by noon we had brought the chase to within five miles of us, and ryan deemed that the time had now arrived for us to declare ourselves; we accordingly hoisted british colours, and fired a gun as a signal to the barque to heave-to; the only notice taken of which was the exhibition of spanish colours by the chase, and the firing of a shotted gun of defiance; so now at last we knew each other. meanwhile the wind was very gradually dropping, and the schooner as gradually gaining upon the craft ahead, until at length, late in the afternoon, we had reached within a mile and a half of her. and then began one of those barbarous practices that i had heard of, but had hitherto been scarcely able to credit as sober truth, namely, the throwing of slaves overboard in order to retard pursuit by causing the pursuer to stop and pick up the poor wretches, as british men-o'-war invariably did whenever it was at all practicable. the mode of procedure was generally to launch the unhappy black overboard, securely lashed to a plank or piece of timber large enough to float him, and as he was dropped exactly in the track of the pursuing man-o'-war, he was certain to be seen by some one on board, and an effort made to pick him up. in waters infested by sharks, however, this had been found to be of very doubtful utility, since it happened as often as not that long before the unfortunate wretch had served the purpose for which he was sacrificed, the sharks had found him and torn him to pieces. in order, therefore, that certain hundreds of good dollars--or their value--might not be wasted, and not from any motives of humanity to the slave, or any desire to give him a better chance for his life, but merely that he might last long enough to delay the man-o'-war to the extent of picking him up, an improved plan had been devised for use on occasions where the presence of sharks might be expected; this plan consisting simply in _heading the black up in a cask_! this was the plan now adopted by the people on board the barque. chapter nine. the governor's communication. at the distance which now separated us from the barque all the movements of her crew were distinctly visible to us with the aid of our glasses-- which of course were scarcely off her for a moment--and we accordingly witnessed the launching of the first slave overboard. the unhappy creature was placed in a cask, and, as i have said before, headed up therein, an aperture being cut in the two halves of the head just sufficient to admit his neck; and the cask was then slung by a whip from the main-yard-arm, and secured by a toggle, the withdrawal of which at the right moment, by means of a lanyard, enabled the cask to be dropped gently, right end up, in the water, where it floated, with its inmate a helpless prisoner, to be picked up or not as the case might be. to render this ruse of real service, a smart breeze should be blowing, because under these conditions the pursuer has not only to lower a boat to pick up the floating black, but she has also to heave-to and wait for her boat; and however smartly the operations of lowering, picking up, and hooking on again may be performed, they still absorb quite an appreciable amount of time, during which the fugitive craft increases her lead more or less according to her speed. in the present case, however, the conditions were by no means favourable to the pursued craft; for, since we were only moving through the water at a speed of about three knots, it was an easy matter for us to drop a boat into the water and send her on ahead to pick up the man, and pull alongside again without detaining the schooner for an instant. the slaver tried the trick four times in succession, and then, finding that it did not answer, gave it up. the sun was just dipping beneath the horizon in a magnificent array of light cirrus clouds, painted by his last rays in tinctures of the most brilliant purple and rose and gold, and the wind had died away to the merest zephyr when we arrived within gun-shot of the chase; and ryan at once ordered the long eighteen between the masts to be cleared away and a shot fired as close to the barque as possible without hitting her, just by way of a gentle hint that we were disposed to stand no more nonsense, and that the time had now arrived for her to surrender without giving us any further trouble. but evidently the last thought in the mind of her skipper was to yield, for instead of hauling down his colours like a good sensible man, he blazed away at us in return with a couple of twelve-pounders that he had run out through his stern-ports. the shots were well aimed, but did not quite reach us, striking the water twice fair in line with us, and then making their final scurry, and sinking within about thirty yards of our bows. "by the piper, i believe the fellow intends to fight us!" exclaimed ryan. "as a rule these gentlemen are particularly careful of their skins, and have no fancy for hard knocks, giving in when they find that their only choice lies between a fight and surrendering, but there are occasional exceptions to this rule, and i fancy that this fellow will prove to be one of them. now, harry, me bhoy, we must be careful what we are after when it comes to boarding and carrying yonder gintleman; for if he happen to be one of the reckless desperado kind he may play us a scurvy trick. i have heard of men who blew their ship and everybody in her into the air rather than allow her to be captured; and, for aught that we can tell to the contrary, the fellow who commands the barque may be one of that stamp. now, if he is, we may rest assured that he will do nothing desperate until the capture of the ship is certain; until then he will be the foremost man in the fray; so we must both keep a sharp look-out for him and put him _hors de combat_ before he has the chance to do any harm. i hope this breeze will hold long enough to enable us to get alongside; should we be becalmed and have to attack him with the boats, it will give him an important advantage, and perhaps result in the loss of some of our men." this hope of ryan's was destined to disappointment; for the wind continued to dwindle after sunset until it finally died away altogether, and left both craft without steerage-way. by this time, however, we had drifted within range of the barque's guns, and she had opened a rather desultory but well-directed fire upon us whenever any of her guns could be brought to bear, the result of which was that one of our men had already been hurt by a splinter, while the schooner's rigging was beginning to be a good deal cut up. meanwhile we were precluded from returning the barque's fire lest we should injure or kill any of the unhappy wretches pent up in her hold. at length a round-shot entered the schooner's bows, traversed the decks, and passed out over the taffrail, glancing hither and thither as it went, and, although it did no material damage, affording several of the men a very narrow escape. "why, this will never do!" exclaimed ryan, as the shot made its exit after passing between the legs of the man who was standing at the now idle tiller. "a few of those fellows, as well aimed as that one was, would make a very pretty general average among us. we shall have to get out the boats--or, stop!--yes, i think that will be better; we will arm the men and make all ready for boarding; load the guns with a double charge of grape; and then man the sweeps, and sweep the schooner alongside, firing our guns as we heave the grappling-irons, and boarding in the smoke. we shall thus have all hands available when we get alongside, and our bulwarks will meanwhile afford the men a certain amount of protection." the necessary orders were accordingly given, and a few minutes later the men, stripped to the waist, had rigged out the heavy sweeps and were toiling away at them. and now the advantages of the schooner's light scantling, light draught, and fine lines made themselves fully apparent, for, having once overcome the inertia of the hull and put it in motion, the men found the little craft very easy on her sweeps, and capable of being moved at quite a respectable pace through the water. the barque was of course much too large and unwieldy a craft to be moved by the same means, and nothing of the kind was even attempted; her crew, however, maintained a smart fire upon us as we approached; but as we were careful to keep her end-on so that only her two stern-chasers could be brought to bear upon us, and as we kept up a hot musketry fire upon that particular part of her, we did not suffer very severely; and without any further casualties we at length arrived near enough, with good way on, to permit of the sweeps being laid in, preparatory to our ranging up alongside. ryan now divided the boarders into two parties, one to be led by himself from aft, while i was instructed to head the other party from our forecastle, the idea being to pin the slaver's crew between the two parties, thus attacking them simultaneously in front and rear as it might be. ryan himself conned the schooner alongside; and when we were within some ten yards of the barque, our guns having previously been trained well forward, the whole of our small broadside was poured in upon her deck, with terribly destructive effect it would seem from the outburst of shrieks and groans and curses that immediately arose on board her. our fire was instantly returned, but in such a partial irregular way as only tended to confirm the impression that the slaver's crew had suffered severely, yet it gave us a tolerably clear idea of what would have been the result to us had we withheld our fire for just a second or two longer. then, while both craft were still enveloped in the motionless smoke-wreaths, we felt the schooner's sides rasping against those of the barque; and, with a shout to my little party to follow, i sprang upon our own bulwarks, from thence to those of the barque, and so down on the slaver's deck--for a slaver she was, as our olfactory nerves now assured us beyond dispute. it was by this time quite dark, or at least as dark as it was likely to be at all that night; but the sky was cloudless, the atmosphere was clear, and the stars were shining with a lustre quite unknown in our more temperate clime; we therefore had but little difficulty in seeing what we were about, or in distinguishing friend from foe; still, i must confess that i felt a little awkward, and, having commenced by discharging both my pistols into the thickest of the crowd that i found opposed to me, confined myself pretty much to a random system of slashing right and left with my cutlass, my principle--if i had one-- being to strike the blows, leaving to others the task of warding them if they could. the fight that now ensued was brief, but sharp; the slavers disputing every inch of their deck with us; but our fellows were not to be resisted; there was a brief space of time during which the air seemed full of the sound of clashing steel, popping pistols, shouts, shrieks, groans, and execrations, and the barque was ours, her crew throwing away their weapons and crying loudly for quarter, which of course was granted to them. the fight being over i at once made my way aft, and was greatly shocked to find that during the brief struggle poor ryan had been badly wounded in a hand-to-hand fight with the skipper of the barque, whom he had at once singled out and engaged. it afterwards appeared that as soon as matters seemed to be going badly for the barque's people her skipper had attempted to slip out of the fight and slink below; but ryan, suspecting some sinister object in this projected movement, had stuck to the man so closely, getting between him and the companion, that his object, if he had one, was frustrated; and in his desperation he had struck a blow at ryan that clove the unfortunate irishman's skull open, only to be impaled himself upon our dashing captain's sword at the same moment. ryan had thus fulfilled his purpose of putting the slaver's skipper _hors de combat_, but at serious cost to himself; the poor fellow was so desperately hurt that he could do nothing but murmur his gratification at finding that i had emerged from the fray unhurt, and an injunction to me to take the command, when he fainted, and i at once had him carefully conveyed to his own cabin on board the schooner, where armstrong the surgeon immediately took him in hand. our capture was named the _san sebastian_, and hailed from havana; she had four hundred and twenty-one slaves on board, out of a total of four hundred and seventy-six that she had brought out of the gaboon river only ten days before; she was a very fine handsome vessel of three hundred and forty-five tons measurement; and our recent experiences with her had proved that she sailed like a witch. we secured our prisoners; conveyed our own wounded--amounting to nine in all--on board the schooner; and then, having put pierrepoint and a prize-crew on board the barque, both vessels made sail in company for sierra leone, where we arrived safely, after a passage of exactly a week, and where we were rejoined by gowland and the prize-crew of the _conquistador_, which vessel had arrived six days before us. here, as the repairing of our damages and the provision of a new foremast for the schooner threatened us with a considerable amount of delay, ryan went ashore to the hospital, where he made pretty fair progress toward recovery, although the improvement was not so marked or rapid as it had been on board the schooner at sea; the intense heat, he complained, was against him, and his first inquiry every morning when i went to see him was, "when did i think the schooner would be ready for sea again?" it was therefore with a feeling of intense satisfaction that i was at length able to inform him that another day would see us out of the hands of the shipwrights and riggers, and that we might sail on the day following if he so pleased. this news acted like a cordial upon his spirits; he brightened up wonderfully, and improved more rapidly within the ensuing twenty-four hours than he had done during the whole time of his sojourn in hospital, and but for the firmness of the doctor, would at once have taken his discharge, and actually busied himself about the final preparations for our departure. he, however, insisted upon joining me in the acceptance of an invitation to dine with the governor that evening; and at the appointed hour i called for him, and we sauntered slowly to government house together. the party was not a very large one, nor did we sit very late; but as the other guests were taking their leave, his excellency intimated that he desired to have a word or two with us in private, and we accordingly deferred our departure. when at length we were alone, our host invited us to light up another cigar, and, himself setting us the example, proceeded to a cabinet that stood in the corner of the room, opening which he produced a folded document from a drawer, and unfolding it, laid it before us. "this, gentlemen," said he, "is a rough sketch-chart of the embouchure of the congo. it does not profess to be drawn to scale; but i am told that it shows with approximate accuracy the relative positions of the various creeks and indentations that discharge into the main river, up to the narrows. now, the individual from whom i obtained this chart informs me that at a distance of about two and a half miles up a certain creek on the south bank--this one, the mouth of which is indicated by a star--there is a rather considerable native settlement, ruled by a savage, known to the few europeans who possess the doubtful honour of his acquaintance as king plenty. and, if my informant is to be depended upon, this potentate, whose chief characteristics are avarice and brutal ferocity, has discovered a very simple method of combining business with pleasure by making ruthless war upon his neighbours, and, after his lust for slaughter is satisfied, disposing of his prisoners to certain slave-dealers, who have established themselves on the southern bank of the creek, where they have erected barracoons, factories, and every convenience for carrying on their nefarious trade. i am told that within the last six months this spot, known only to a select few, has been frequently visited, and large numbers of slaves have been carried away from it; its natural characteristics rendering it especially suitable for the traffic. for instance, it would appear that this creek, like most of the others that discharge into the congo, and like the african rivers generally, has its own little bar at its mouth, upon which there is only one and three-quarter fathoms of water, and is therefore unapproachable by any of the men-o'-war on the station-- excepting perhaps the _barracouta_, and she is away cruising just now-- while the character of the banks is such as to afford every facility for a galling and continuous fire upon a flotilla of boats advancing up the creek. i have therefore thought that the breaking up and destruction of this slave-trading station would be a piece of work admirably suited to the _felicidad_ and her gallant crew"--ryan and i simultaneously bowed our appreciation of the compliment--"because it is especially a case wherein valour and discretion must go hand-in-hand, the service being of an especially hazardous nature; and i feel that in no one are the two qualities that i have mentioned more admirably combined than in the person of captain ryan." ryan bowed again, and remarked-- "i am obliged for your excellency's good opinion of me; and still more so for the information that you have been good enough to give us to-night. i have been very fortunate, so far, in the schooner, and i suppose i may reckon upon my promotion as certain; but i am eager to have further opportunities of distinguishing myself, and if we can only be lucky enough to find two or three slavers up that creek, and to capture them, it would afford me just the opportunity that i require. i shall sail to-morrow, and shall hope to be back here again in a month or six weeks, with two or three prizes in company, and the assurance that the establishment in question is completely destroyed." we sat a few minutes longer, drank a final glass of wine, and then took our leave and walked down to the schooner together, ryan having determined to sleep on board her that night. we sailed from sierra leone on the following day, as ryan had resolved we should; but, as usually happens when matters are hurried, we met with an endless succession of petty delays at the last moment that detained us at anchor until nearly nightfall, and occasioned us a vast amount of trotting about in the broiling sun to put some life into the dilatory people who were keeping us waiting; the consequence of which was that when at last we lifted the anchor and stood out of the bay with the very last of the sea-breeze, to run into a calm when we had attained an offing of some two miles, i felt altogether too tired and knocked up to eat or drink; while, as for ryan, he was in a state of high fever once more. we got the land breeze about eight o'clock that night, and stood away to the southward and westward until midnight, in order that we might obtain a good offing, when we hauled up on a south-east course for the congo. i remained on deck until midnight--at which hour i was relieved by pierrepoint--and then was obliged to send for the doctor, who, after feeling my pulse, ordered me to my bunk at once, and when i was there administered to me a tremendous dose of some frightfully bitter concoction, telling me at the same time, for my comfort, that he would not be in the least surprised if, when he next visited me, he should find me suffering from a severe attack of coast fever. happily, his anticipations, so far as i was concerned, were unfounded; but by daybreak poor ryan was in a state of raving delirium, with three men in his cabin told off to keep him in his bunk and prevent him from inflicting upon himself some injury. as for me, the medicine that i had taken threw me first into a profuse perspiration, and afterwards into a deep sleep, from which i awoke next morning cool, free from pain, and with a quiet, steady pulse, but very weak; and i did not fully recover my strength until a day or two before we made the land about the congo mouth, which we did after a long passage that was uneventful in everything save the persistency with which we were beset by calms and light, baffling airs. by this time ryan, too, had recovered to a certain extent; that is to say, he was able to leave his bunk and to stagger up on deck for an hour or so at a time, but he was still frightfully weak; and it often appeared to me, from the rather wild talk in which he sometimes indulged, that he had not thus far fully recovered his mental balance. we made the land about six bells in the forenoon watch, and stood straight in for shark point, which we hugged pretty closely, in order to cheat the current, which, as usual at that time of the year, was running out pretty strongly. the sea-breeze was blowing half a gale, however, and despite the current the little _felicidad_ slid over the ground bravely, arriving abreast the mouth of the creek to which we were bound about four bells in the afternoon watch. we here cleared the schooner for action, sent the men to their quarters, and, with a leadsman in the fore-chains, both on the port and on the starboard sides, and with ryan, sketch-chart in hand, conning the vessel, steered boldly into the creek. the soundings which we obtained at the entrance proved the chart to be so far correct, and with our confidence thus strengthened we glided gently forward over the glassy waters of the creek, every eye being directed anxiously ahead, for we knew not at what moment we might encounter our enemy, nor in what force he might be. to me it appeared that we were acting in rather a foolhardy manner in thus rushing blindfold as it were upon the unknown, and earlier in the day--in fact, just after we had entered the river--i had suggested to ryan the advisability of taking the schooner somewhat higher up the stream and anchoring her in a snug and well-sheltered spot that we had noticed when last in the river in the _barracouta_, and sending the boats away at night to reconnoitre. but this happened to be one of the captain's bad days--by which i mean that it was one of the days when the fever from which he had been suffering seemed to partially regain its hold upon him, making him impatient, irritable, and unwilling to receive anything in the shape of a suggestion from anybody; and my proposal was therefore scouted as savouring of something approaching to timidity. i had long ago got over any such feeling, however; and even now, when we momentarily expected to come face to face with the enemy, i found myself sufficiently calm and collected to note and admire the many beauties of the scene as the creek opened up before us. for the scene _was_ beautiful exceedingly with a wild, tropical lavishness of strange and, in some cases, grotesque forms and rich magnificence of colour that no words can adequately describe, and even the artist's palette would be taxed to its utmost capacity to merely suggest. the creek was, as usual in the congo, lined with an almost unbroken, impassable belt of mangroves, their multitudinous roots, gnarled and twisted, springing from the thick, mud-stained water, and presenting a confused, inextricable tangle to the eye, from the deep shadows of which flitted kingfishers of many species and brilliant plumage; while above swayed and rustled in the gentle breeze the delicate grey-green foliage of the trees themselves, now in full and luxuriant leaf, affording a delicious contrast of cool green shadow, with the glints of dazzling sunshine that streamed here and there through the verdant masses. great clusters of magnificent orange-tinted orchids gleamed like galaxies of golden stars between the mangrove trunks at frequent intervals; clumps of feathery bamboo swayed gently in the soft warm breeze; the dense background of bush displayed every conceivable tint of foliage, from brilliant gold to deepest purple bronze; and magnificent forest trees towered in stately majesty over all, rearing their superb heads a hundred and fifty feet into the intense blue of the cloudless sky; while everywhere, over bush and tree and withered stump, blazed in thousands the trailing blossoms of brilliant-hued climbing plants that loaded the air to intoxication with the sweetness of their mingled perfumes. parrots and other gaily-plumaged birds flitted busily hither and thither with loud and--it must be admitted--more or less discordant cries; inquisitive monkeys swung from branch to branch, and either peered curiously at us as we passed, or dashed precipitately, with loud cries of alarm, into the concealment of the deepest shadows at our approach; and at one point, where the belt of mangroves was interrupted, and a small, open, grassy space reached down to the water's edge, a stately antelope stepped daintily down into the water, as though to slake his thirst, but catching sight of the approaching schooner, bounded off again into the contiguous bush, where he was instantly lost sight of in the sombre green gloom. at a distance of about two miles from the mouth of the creek we reached a spot where it forked, one arm--the wider of the two--running in a due east-by-south direction, while the other trended away to the west-south-west, communicating--as we afterwards discovered--with another creek which, although too shoal for navigation by sea-going craft, would have afforded us excellent facilities for a reconnaissance with the boats. at this point the southern shore of the creek exhibited signs of cultivation, small patches of bush having been cleared here and there and planted with maize, or sugarcane, or yams, a small reed-hut thatched with palm-leaves usually standing in one corner of the plot, with a tethered goat close by, a few fowls, or other traces of its being inhabited. of the human inhabitants themselves, however, strangely enough, nothing was to be seen. but it was clear that we were nearing our goal; and word was passed along the deck for the men to hold themselves prepared for instant action. there were several memoranda jotted down upon the chart for our guidance, and among these was an intimation to look out for a clump of exceptionally tall trees on the southern bank of the creek, under the broad shadow of which the slave barracoons were stated to be built. a few minutes after passing the branch creek already referred to we arrived at a bend, and as the schooner glided round it, and entered a new reach, these trees swept into view; there could be no mistaking them, for they lifted their majestic heads--there were five of them-- fully fifty feet clear above those of their brethren. moreover, they stood quite close to the margin of the creek, thus confirming the statement made upon the sketch-chart. but had there been any lurking doubt in our minds about the matter they would have been quickly dispelled, for as we glided forward, a small sandy beach--also referred to in the chart--was made out projecting from the southern bank, at which some twenty or thirty large canoes lay with their bows hauled sufficiently out of the water to prevent their going adrift. that a vigilant watch was being kept upon the waters of the creek became quickly apparent, for we had scarcely made out the canoes when we saw several negroes rush down to one of them, launch it, and paddle swiftly away up the creek and round another bend, while, as we advanced, a crowd of naked blacks, armed with spears, shields, and muskets, gathered upon the beach, and, from their actions, seemed fully prepared to forcibly resist any attempt on our part to effect a landing. still advancing up the creek, we gradually opened the vista of the reach beyond--that in which the canoe had a few minutes previously vanished-- and at length, when only a short half-mile intervened between us and the beach--which projected boldly nearly half-way across the channel--the main-mast of a schooner crept into view beyond the concealment of the hitherto intervening bush and trees; and bringing our glasses to bear upon her, we detected signs of great bustle and confusion on board her, and made out that her crew were busily engaged in tricing up boarding nettings, and otherwise making preparations for her defence. ryan now ordered our ensign and pennant to be hoisted, thus boldly announcing at once our nationality and the fact of our being an enemy-- an announcement which i should have deemed it perfectly justifiable to defer until the last possible moment--and the schooner at once replied by hoisting french colours and firing a gun of defiance. this greatly amused our people, to whom the act seemed a piece of ridiculous braggadocio--for the stranger was no bigger than ourselves--but the laugh left their faces and was succeeded by a look of grim resolution when presently we opened out another and a larger schooner and a heavy, handsome brigantine, the first flying spanish colours and the brigantine _a black flag_! but this was not all, for before we arrived abreast the beach we had opened out still another schooner with the spanish flag floating from her mast-head; and by what we saw going on board the four craft it became evident that we had by no means caught these bold rovers napping, and that we might confidently reckon upon meeting with a very warm reception. moreover, it was clear that, snug as was their place of concealment, and unlikely as it was to be discovered save, as in our case, by betrayal, they had left nothing to chance, but had taken every possible precaution to insure their safety, the four craft being moored in pairs, with springs on their cables, stern to stern right across the stream, so that, the fair-way being very narrow, they would have to be fought and taken in succession, a necessity which i at once recognised, and which, to my limited experience, seemed to militate very strongly against our chances of success. it was, however, altogether too late now to hesitate or alter our plans; we had plunged headlong and, as it were, blindfold into a hornet's nest from which nothing but the coolest courage and determination could extricate us, and, while i had long ago completely conquered the feeling of trepidation and anxiety that almost everybody experiences more or less when going into action for the first time, i could not altogether suppress a doubt as to whether ryan, in his then very indifferent state of health, possessed quite all the coolness and clear-headedness as well as the nerve that i anticipated would be necessary to see us safely out of our present entanglement. chapter ten. a disastrous expedition. upon arriving abreast the beach, which we were obliged to hug pretty closely in consequence of the contracted width of the channel and the fact that the deepest water lay close to it, we found it occupied by fully five hundred naked blacks, all of whom appeared to be profoundly excited, for they yelled continuously at the top of their voices and fiercely brandished their weapons. they appeared to be acting under the leadership of a very tall and immensely powerful man who wore a leopard-skin cloak upon his shoulders, and a head-dress of brilliantly-coloured feathers. he was armed with _two_ muskets, and had a ship's cutlass girt about his waist. a white man--or a half-caste, it was difficult to tell which at that distance, so deeply bronzed was he-- accompanied him; a man attired in a suit of white drill topped off with a broad-brimmed panama hat wrapped round with a white puggaree; and it appeared that all the excitement and animosity manifested by the blacks at our approach was instigated by him, for we saw him speaking earnestly to the apparent leader of the blacks, gesticulating violently in our direction as he did so, while the savage now and then turned to his followers and addressed a few sentences to them which seemed to arouse them to a higher pitch of frenzy than ever. beyond the sand beach a wide open space extended that had evidently at one time been carpeted with grass, for small tufts and patches of it still remained here and there, but for the most part the rich, deep chocolate-coloured earth was worn bare by the trampling of many feet. this open space was occupied by a native village of considerable dimensions, the houses--or huts, rather--being for the most part square or quadrangular structures, although there were a few circular ones among them, built of upright logs with panels of mud and leaves between them, roofed in with palm-leaf thatch, the eaves projecting sufficiently at each end to form a verandah some six or eight feet deep. at a little distance from the village, a hundred yards or so, towered the clump of lofty trees under which the slave barracoons were said to be erected; but whether this was so or not we could not tell, as a belt of bush interposed between us and the trees, affording an effectual screen to any buildings that might stand beneath their shadow. as the schooner glided up abreast of the beach, with the hands at the sheets, halliards, and downhauls, clewing up and hauling down preparatory to running alongside the schooner nearest us, a great shout was raised by the negroes, immediately followed by a confused discharge of their muskets and the hurling of a few spears, but where the bullets went we never knew, for certainly none of them came near us, and as for the spears, they fell short and dropped harmlessly into the water. to this salute we of course made no reply, as our business was not to make war upon the natives unless absolutely compelled to do so, and three minutes later, having taken as much room as the width of the creek would permit, our helm was eased over and the _felicidad_ swept round toward the object of her first attack, which was the schooner flying french colours. a death-like and ominous silence now prevailed on board the four craft that we were so audaciously attacking, and not a man was to be seen on board either of them. this state of things continued until we were within forty fathoms of the nearest craft, when a shouted command arose from on board the _brigantine_--which was the third craft away from us--and instantly the ports of the two nearest schooners were thrown open, and a rattling broadside of nine guns loaded with round and grape was poured into us with terrible effect, for we were almost bows-on at the moment, and the shot swept our deck fore and aft. no less than eleven of our people went down before that murderous discharge, and as five of them lay motionless, i greatly feared that the poor fellows would never rise again. we reserved our fire until the sides of our own schooner and the frenchman were almost touching, and then gave him our broadside and the contents of long tom as well; then, as the _felicidad_ struck her opponent pretty violently, ryan waved his sword above his head, snatched a pistol from his belt with his left hand, and shouted-- "heave the grapnels! come along, lads, follow me, and hurroo for ould oireland!" the two schooners being fast together, every man jack of us sprang after our leader, only to be confronted by the boarding nettings triced up on board our antagonist, however; and as we sprang on the bulwarks and commenced hacking away at the obstruction they opened a hot and most destructive fire upon us with their muskets and pistols. i saw our men dropping to right and left of me, and then one of the tricing-lines of the netting gave way--one of our lads had shinned aloft and cut it--and we half tumbled, half scrambled down upon her deck all in a heap, and were instantly engaged in a desperate hand-to-hand struggle with her crew, who greatly out-numbered ourselves, weakened as we were by the casualties that had already seriously reduced our force. moreover, we soon discovered that our antagonists were by no means the despicable poltroons that we are perhaps too prone at all times to believe them to be; on the contrary, they fought manfully, and held their own with a sturdy determination worthy of a better cause. the casualties were rapidly multiplying on both sides, yet we were slowly driving the frenchmen forward, when they were unexpectedly reinforced by a crowd of at least sixty people who had come alongside in boats from the other craft, boarding on the larboard side of the schooner, on which side, as it had been impossible for us to reach it with the _felicidad_, the nettings had not been triced up, and in an instant we found ourselves confronted by overwhelming odds. above the tumult of shouts and oaths and groans, of pistol-shots and clashing steel, i heard ryan give a ringing cheer and an encouraging shout of "hurroo, bhoys, the more the merrier! lay on with a will, now, and make short work of it;" and i saw him at the head of a small division of our men laying about him manfully and driving himself and his little band wedge-like through the thickest of the crowd, and i turned and struck out right and left to get to his assistance, for it seemed to me that he must be speedily overpowered. before i could reach him, however, he suddenly threw up his hands, and striking one of them to his temples sank in an inert heap to the deck, and at the same instant a sickening blow fell upon my head, the whole scene whirled confusedly before my eyes for the fraction of an instant, and for a time i knew no more. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ when at length i recovered my senses i found that i was undressed and comfortably stowed away in a bunk in a small but light and airy state-room that certainly was not my own, nor had i ever seen it before. the snuggery was very tastefully fitted up, the bunk itself being of polished mahogany, enclosed with handsome lace curtains, that i presumed were intended as a protection against the mosquitoes, the sharp, ringing buzz of multitudes of which pertinacious tormentors i heard distinctly as i lay, weak, sick, and with a most distracting headache, safe within the shelter of the curtains. these curtains were suspended from a polished brass rod that traversed the underside of the deck above close to the ship's side, so that they sloped over the bunk tent-fashion, an ingenious arrangement of frilling along the upper edge imparting a sufficient stiffness to the flimsy material to cause it to stand up close to the planking, thus leaving no opening by which the persevering little insects could obtain access to the interior. the bulkhead was panelled with pilasters of satin-wood supporting a handsomely-carved cornice, and the panels, like the underside of the deck, were painted a delicate cream colour, the former being decorated with a thin gilt moulding which formed the framework of a series of beautifully-painted pictures of tropical flowers, butterflies, and birds. there was a polished mahogany wash-stand in one corner of the room, and a small mahogany swing-table against the bulkhead between the bunk and the closed door of the berth; a horsehair sofa ran along the ship's side, opposite the doorway; a small lamp, apparently of silver, hung in gimbals from the ship's side, near the head of the bunk, and the apartment was amply lighted by a large round open port or scuttle, through which the gentle sigh of the evening breeze came pleasantly, and the rich, orange beams of the setting sun poured with so brilliant an effulgence that i could scarcely endure the dazzling light, and was obliged to close my eyes again. where was i? certainly not on board the _felicidad_; for she had no such luxurious sleeping-accommodation as this on board her. then, if not on board her, i must most probably be on board the french schooner; a surmise that was to some extent confirmed by the powerful effluvium that pervaded the ship, and proclaimed her character beyond all question. then there were sounds on deck--the voices of men laughing and jesting together, and addressing occasional brutal remarks to, presumably, the wearers of certain chains, the clanking of which, together with the sounds of boats or canoes coming alongside, and an occasional order issued by some one nearly overhead, powerfully suggested the idea that the craft, whatever she was, was now taking in her human cargo. i soon recognised, however, that the orders and conversation generally were in spanish, not french; still, this proved nothing, for slavers were as a rule by no means particular as to the colour of the flag that they fought or sailed under, often hoisting the first ensign that happened to come to hand. but spanish or french, the vessel on board which i now found myself could scarcely be other than one of those that we had engaged earlier in the afternoon; and if so, i was in the hands of the enemy--an enemy, be it said, that, if report spoke truly, showed but scant mercy to such of its legalised opponents as happened to fall into his hands. yet this scarcely tallied with the evident care that had been taken of me, and the exceedingly comfortable--not to say luxurious--quarters wherein i now found myself. i was parched with thirst, and looked round the state-room for some liquid wherewith i might quench it. there was none; but i now observed a small mahogany shelf, close to the head of the bunk, which had hitherto escaped my notice, and upon it stood a small silver hand-bell, quaint of shape, and elegantly adorned with _repousse_ work. with considerable pain and giddiness i contrived to turn my body far enough round to seize the bell and ring it; in instant response to which the state-room door opened--revealing a glimpse of a small but elegantly-furnished cabin--and a young mustee lad, clad only in a white shirt thrown open at the neck, and white drill trousers girt to his slender figure by a crimson sash, entered, and demanded in spanish-- "can i do anything for you, senor?" "what is your name, my lad?" said i, answering his question with another. "i am called pedro, senor." "well then, pedro," said i, "you can do two things for me, if you will. in the first place you can get me something to drink, if you will be so kind; and, in the next, you can tell me the name of this ship and her captain." "i will willingly do both, senor, with pleasure. the drink first," answered the lad, with a bright smile that disclosed an array of small and beautifully regular, ivory-white teeth. and, turning on his bare heel, he retired as noiselessly as he had entered, only to reappear, a moment later, with a tumbler in one hand, and a large glass jug full to within an inch of the brim with lemonade, upon the surface of which floated two or three slices of the fruit and a curl of the rich golden green rind. he filled and handed me a bumper, which i instantly drained and begged for another. the lad laughed, and handed me a second tumblerful, which i also drained. the liquid was deliciously cool, and of that peculiar acid and slightly bitter flavour that seems so ineffably refreshing when one is parched with fever. "another yet, senor?" asked pedro, with a laugh, as i handed the glass back to him. "well--n-o--not just now, i think, thank you," answered i. "and now, pedro, my boy, tell me about this ship and her captain, and how i came to be here." "that is easily done, senor," answered the lad. "in the first place, the brigantine is named the _francesca_ after my mother; she hails from havana; and is commanded by my father, don fernando de mendouca; and you were brought here by him, when he found you lying apparently dead upon the deck of the _requin_ after your people had been driven off and compelled to beat a retreat." "_what_?" i exclaimed. "driven off? compelled to retreat?" "certainly, senor," the lad answered proudly. "you surely did not seriously expect to capture all four of us with that paltry schooner of yours, and so small a force as you brought against us, did you?" "well," i admitted, "i must confess that when i saw what we had to contend with, i had my doubts as to the issue. but then, you see, i was not the captain." "your captain must have been _mad_ to have attacked us in broad daylight, as he did. and, indeed, he _seemed_ to be mad by the desperation with which he fought. i never saw anything like it in my life." "_you_?" i exclaimed again. "do you mean to say that you took part in the fight?" "certainly, senor; why not?" demanded pedro haughtily. "true, i am very young; but i am strong. and i am bigger than the little officer who was fighting near you when the french sailor struck you down with the handspike." "yes; that is very true," i agreed, knowing, from the lad's description, that he was referring to freddy pierrepoint. "so you were in the fight, and saw our captain, eh, pedro? can you tell me what became of him?" "he was shot--by one of our men, i believe; and i think he was killed, but am not quite sure. he was carried back into his own schooner by two of his men; and after the fight had lasted about two minutes longer a very handsome, light-haired officer appeared to take the command, and seemed to order a retreat; for your men steadily retired to their own vessel, and, fighting to the very last, cast her adrift, set the sails, and retired, hotly pursued by the _requin_." "phew!" exclaimed i; "we seem to have made rather a mess of it this time. poor ryan! i am sorry for him; very sorry indeed. you are right, pedro, our captain _was_ mad; the poor fellow was badly wounded in the head not long ago, and he had by no means recovered from his injuries. and now he is wounded again, if not killed outright. i am _very_ sorry for him. and now, pedro, can you tell me how your father proposes to dispose of _me_?" "no, senor, i cannot. nor can he at present, i think," answered the lad. "it was at my entreaty that he brought you on board here; otherwise you would have been thrown overboard to the crocodiles that swarm in the creek just here. he said that prisoners were only a useless encumbrance and an embarrassment; but somehow i liked your looks as you lay, white and still, upon the french schooner's deck, and i begged him so hard to save you that he could not deny me. and i am sure that we shall be friends--you and i--shall we not? there is no one on board here that i can be intimate with--except my father, of course--and he is so much older than i, that i can scarcely look upon him as a companion. besides--" the lad stopped, embarrassed. "besides what?" demanded i. "well--i--perhaps i ought not to say. you see we are strangers yet, and father has often said that it is a great mistake to be confidential with strangers. some other day perhaps i may feel that i can speak more freely. and that reminds me that i have let you talk far too much already; you need rest and perfect quiet at present, if you are to escape a bad attack of fever, so i shall leave you for a little while to sleep if you can. but first let me bathe your wound for you, and bandage it afresh." "you are very kind, pedro," remarked i, as the lad with singular deftness proceeded to remove the stiff and blood-stained bandage from my head. "and i must not allow you to leave me until i have thanked you-- as i now do, very heartily--for having saved my life. perhaps i may have an opportunity some day to show my gratitude in some more convincing form than that of mere words, and if so, you may depend upon me to do so. meanwhile, i see no reason whatever why we should not be friends, and good friends too, if your father is willing that it should be so. at the same time--but there, we can talk about that too, when we know a little more of each other, and understand each other better. thanks, pedro; that is very soothing and comfortable indeed. now, another drink of lemonade, if you please--by the way, you may as well leave the jug and glass within my reach--and then, if you insist upon running away, why, good-bye for the present." the lad left me, and i fell into a rather gloomy reverie upon the fate of poor ryan and that of the gallant fellows who had fallen in our ill-planned attack upon the occupants of this unlucky creek, as well as upon my own future, the uncertainty of which stood out the more clearly the longer i looked at it. i think i must have become slightly light-headed eventually, for twice or thrice i caught myself muttering aloud in a rather excited fashion, now imagining myself to be in the thick of the fight once more, and anon fancying myself to be one of the slaves that were imprisoned in the brigantine's noisome hold; until finally my ideas became so hopelessly jumbled together that i could make nothing of them, and then followed a period of oblivion from which i awoke to find the state-room faintly illumined by the turned-down lamp screwed to the ship's side near the head of my bunk, and by the more brilliant rays of a lamp in the main cabin, the light of which streamed through the lattices in the upper panel of the state-room door. the ship was heeling slightly, and i knew by the gurgle and wash of water along her side that she was under weigh, but still in perfectly smooth water, for i was unable to detect the slightest heave, or rising and falling motion in her. there was an intermittent faint murmur of voices overhead, an occasional footfall on the deck, and now and then the creak and clank of the wheel-chains following a call from the forecastle, all of which led me to the conclusion that the brigantine was effecting the passage of the creek on her way seaward. this state of things continued for perhaps a quarter of an hour, when i felt the vessel lift as if to a small swell, the wash and splash of the water along her side became more pronounced, then came a light plunge, with a corresponding roar of the bow wave; her heel perceptibly increased, and the pipe of the wind took a more sonorous sound; an expression or two in tones that seemed to indicate a feeling of relief and satisfaction passed between the persons overhead, and then a string of orders pealed forth from one of them, followed by the clatter of ropes thrown down on the deck, and the cries of the crew as they made sail upon the vessel. the movements of the craft now rapidly grew more lively; she heeled still more steeply under the pressure of the wind; the splash and rush of water alongside grew momentarily more confused; bulkheads began to creak, and cabin-doors to jar and rattle upon their hooks; the two people overhead began to pace the deck to and fro; the wind whistled and blustered with increasing loudness through the rigging; and as the craft plunged more sharply i caught the sound of an occasional clatter of spray upon the deck forward. this went on for some considerable time, and then i became aware of the sound of surf booming distantly, but rapidly increasing in strength and volume, until after a period of perhaps ten minutes its thunder seemed to suddenly fill the air, as the brigantine brought it square abeam; then it rapidly died away again until it was lost altogether in the tumult of wind and sea that now stormed about the vessel, and i knew that we had passed close to either shark or french point, and were fairly at sea. this conviction was confirmed a few minutes later by the descent of some one--presumably the captain--into the cabin, where, as i could tell by the clink of bottle and glass and the gurgle of fluids, he mixed and tossed off a glass of grog, after which he retired to a state-room on the opposite side of the cabin and closed the door. then, lulled by the motion of the ship and the sound of the wind and sea, i gradually sank into a feverish sleep, from which i did not fairly awake until the sun was streaming strongly in through the glazed scuttle of my state-room next morning. shortly afterwards pedro entered and bade me good-morning with a cheery smile. "you are looking better, senor," he remarked; "your eyes are brighter, and there is more colour in your face. i hope you were not greatly disturbed last night by the noise of getting the ship under weigh?" "not at all," i answered; "on the contrary, i did not awake until you were clear of your moorings and passing down the creek. i remained awake until the ship seemed to be fairly at sea, and then i went to sleep again. i suppose we are out of sight of land by this time?" "yes, thanks be to the blessed virgin! and i hope we shall see no more until we make anegada," was the reply. "anegada?" i queried. "where is that?" "what!" exclaimed pedro, "do you not know anegada? then you have never been to the west indies?" "that is very true," i admitted. "i have never been to the other side of the atlantic." "i was certain of it, or you would know anegada," answered pedro. "anegada is the most easterly of the virgin islands; and my father always endeavours to pick it up on his westerly runs. it makes a good landfall, and enables us to continue the rest of our run with confidence, and to dodge those pestilent cruisers of yours. anegada once sighted, my father knows every inch of the rest of the way, and could take his ship from thence to havana blindfold, i believe. but while we are talking this water is cooling, and i want to bathe your wound and bind it up afresh. so; am i hurting you?" "not at all," i answered. "your touch is as light as a woman's. by the way, where are my clothes, pedro? i shall turn out as soon as you have done with me, if you will kindly send somebody with some water. that ewer seems to be empty." "it can soon be filled, however," remarked the lad. "as to your clothes, they are forward, drying. they were so stained and stiff with blood that you could not possibly have put them on again, so i had them washed. you see my clothes would not be big enough for you, while my father's would be too big; so you will be obliged to make shift with what you have until we reach havana. i am glad that you feel well enough to dress, for i am anxious that you should meet my father as soon as possible. i fervently hope that you will succeed in impressing him favourably." "why?" i demanded, laughingly. "is he so very formidable a personage, then?" "formidable enough, for one in your situation, if he should happen to take a dislike to you," the lad answered gravely. "not that i have very much fear of that, however," he continued; "and in any case, my father is all right except when anything has occurred to vex him." "well, i suppose that holds good of most people," i remarked. "however, we must hope for the best. and now, since you have coopered me up so nicely, if you will let me have some water and my clothes, i will make my toilet as far as i can." upon leaving my bunk i found that i was still very shaky, with a tendency to giddiness, added to which my head was aching most distressingly; but i thought it possible that these disagreeable symptoms would perhaps pass off as soon as i found myself in the open air; i therefore dressed as quickly as possible, and made my way on deck. the morning was brilliantly fine, with a slashing breeze from about east, a trifle northerly, and the brigantine was bowling along before it, with all studding-sails set on the starboard side, in a manner that fairly made me stare with astonishment, although i had been accustomed to fast vessels. the _francesca_ was an exceedingly fine and handsome vessel, of enormous beam, and sitting very low upon the water, but the pace at which she was travelling conclusively demonstrated that, beamy as she was, her lines must be the very perfection of draughting; indeed this was proved by the ease with which she appeared to glide along the surface of, rather than _through_, the water, her progress being marked by singularly little disturbance of the element, considering her very high rate of speed. her sails were magnificently cut, setting to a nicety, and drawing to perfection, and they were white enough to have graced the spars of a yacht. i noticed, too, that the inside of the bulwarks, her deck-fittings, brass-work, and guns, were all scrupulously clean and bright, while every rope was carefully coiled upon its proper pin, the principal halliards and sheets being flemish-coiled on the deck. in fact, the whole appearance of the vessel was far more suggestive of the british man-o'-war than of the slaver. the watch on deck consisted of about a dozen men--one or two of whom looked remarkably like englishmen--and it did not escape me that, one and all, they had the look of resolute, reckless fellows, who would be quite ready to fight to the last gasp, if need be. and i was impressed, at the very first glance, with the fact that they were all quietly and steadily going about their work, talking quietly together, and behaving without a single trace of that lawlessness that i had expected to prevail among a slaver's crew. chapter eleven. don fernando de mendouca. the most striking figure in the ship, however, was, beyond all question, a tall, well-built man, with a firmly-knit, powerful frame, every movement of which was eloquent of health and strength and inexhaustible endurance, while it was characterised by that light and easy _floating_ grace that is only to be acquired by the habitual treading of such an unstable platform as a ship's deck. he was very dark, his hair, moustache, and beard being coal-black and wavy, while his skin--or at least the exposed parts that met my eye--was tanned to so deep a bronze as to give him quite the complexion of a mulatto. but there was not a drop of black blood in him; his nose alone--thin, shapely, and slightly aquiline--was evidence enough of that. he was clad in the inevitable suit of white drill, girt about the waist with a crimson cummerbund; his head-covering was the equally inevitable panama broad-brimmed hat, and his otherwise naked feet were thrust into a pair of turkish slippers of red morocco, embroidered with gold thread. and, early as was the hour, he held a half-smoked cigar between his large, even, white teeth. as i emerged from the companion he was standing to windward, near the helmsman, critically eyeing the set of the brigantine's beautifully cut canvas; and upon seeing me he--without moving from his position or offering me his hand--bowed with all the stately grace of a spanish hidalgo, and exclaimed in spanish, in a firm, strong, and decidedly musical voice-- "good-morning, senor! i congratulate you upon being sufficiently recovered to leave your cabin. i suppose i ought, by every rule of good manners, to bid you welcome to my ship; but i have discarded conventional forms of speech--among other things--and now make a practice of speaking only the strict truth; and--as pedro has probably told you--i had little to do with your being here beyond the mere issue of the order for your transfer from the deck of the french schooner. but, if i cannot at this moment truthfully bid you welcome, i can at least say that i sincerely hope we shall be good friends; and should that come about, you shall be welcome not only to my ship, but, as we spaniards say, to my house and all that is in it." "thank you, don fernando," i answered. "i can easily understand that you find it exceedingly difficult to regard me as a welcome guest, and believe me, i am not going to be so foolish as to feel hurt at your frankly telling me so. and i heartily unite with you in the hope that as long as we may be compelled into intimate association with each other, we shall be able to forget that our professions are antagonistic, and that personally it may be quite possible for us to be good friends. and now, senor, permit me to seize this, the first opportunity that has presented itself, to express to you my most grateful thanks for having saved my life yesterday--" "stop, senor, if you please," he interrupted, holding up his hand. "i have already explained to you that i had absolutely nothing to do with that beyond the mere issuing of an order. to be perfectly frank with you, i was in no mood to show mercy to any one just then, for you and your pestilent, meddlesome crew fought like fiends, and cost me several good men that i could ill spare. your gratitude, therefore," and i thought i detected an echo of something very like scorn in his voice, "is due solely to my boy pedro, whose whim of saving you i did not even then care to thwart. but enough of this; you are my guest, and may, if you will, become my friend. i hope your accommodation is to your liking?" "excellent, indeed," answered i, glad enough to get away from a topic that seemed to be somewhat distasteful to my host. "excellent, indeed, and far more luxurious than anything to which i have been accustomed on board my own ship." "yes," he smiled; "the english are clearly anxious that their officers shall not become enervated through overmuch luxury. i have been on board several of your ships, and saw but little to admire in the accommodation provided for and the arrangements made for the comfort of their officers. how long have you been on the west african station, senor?" i told him, and the conversation gradually took a more agreeable turn, my host proving himself, not only a thorough man of the world, but also surprisingly well educated and well read for a spaniard. he was well acquainted with several of our best english writers, and professed an admiration for our literature as great and thorough as was his evident hatred of ourselves and our institutions as a nation. he had very considerably thawed out of his original coldness of manner, and was discussing with much animation and in well-chosen language the british drama, and especially shakspeare, when we were summoned to breakfast and found pedro waiting for us in the cabin. the lad was very demonstrative in his delight at finding me so much better, and i could see that he was also greatly pleased--and i thought relieved--at the prospect of amicable if not cordial relations becoming established between his father and myself. i have said that the morning was brilliantly fine, and so it was; but i had noticed even when i first went on deck, that there was a certain pallor and haziness in the blue of the sky, the appearance of which i did not altogether like; and when after breakfast we went on deck-- mendouca with his sextant in his hand, for the purpose of finding the ship's longitude--our first glance aloft showed us that a large halo had gathered round the sun, and certain clouds that had risen above the horizon were carrying windgalls in their skirts. i drew mendouca's attention to these portents, and he agreed with me that we were probably about to have bad weather. and sure enough we had, for that afternoon it came on to blow heavily from the eastward, and after running before it as long as we dared--indeed a good deal longer than in my opinion was at all prudent--we were compelled to heave-to; and we thus remained for sixty-two consecutive hours, during which mendouca fumed and raved like a madman; for the sea was making clean breaches over the brigantine during the whole of that time, so that a considerable portion of our bulwarks and everything that was not securely lashed was washed away, and, worst of all, it was imperatively necessary to keep the hatches battened down during the entire continuance of the gale, thus depriving the unhappy slaves pent up below of all air save such as could penetrate through a small opening in the fore-bulkhead, communicating with the forecastle, and used for the purpose of gaining access to the hold in bad weather, in order to supply the slaves with food and water. as, however, the sea was breaking more heavily over the fore-deck than anywhere else, the utmost care had to be exercised in opening the fore-scuttle, a favourable opportunity having to be watched for, and the hatch whipped off and on again in a moment. very little air, therefore, was obtainable from that source, and none whatever from elsewhere; the blacks, therefore, were dying below like rotten sheep, of suffocation, as was reported by those who came up from time to time after attending to the most pressing wants of the miserable creatures. and to make what was already bad enough still worse, it was impossible to remove the dead from among the living so long as the bad weather continued. when at length the gale moderated and the sea went down sufficiently to permit of sail being once more made, the hatches were lifted; and never to my dying day shall i forget the awful, poisonous stench that arose from the brigantine's hold. the fumes could be actually _seen_ rising through the hatchway in the form of a dense steam that continued to pour up for several minutes, and when the men were ordered below to pass up the dead bodies, even the toughest and most hardened of them recoiled from the task, and staggered away forward literally as sick as dogs. at length, however, after the lapse of about a quarter of an hour, a gang ventured down into the now comparatively pure atmosphere, and the work of passing up the dead bodies began. i stood to windward, as near the hatchway as i could get without being sickened by the still pestilential effluvium that even now arose from the hold, and watched the operation, not from any feeling of morbid curiosity, but in order that i might become aware, by the evidence of my own eyesight, of some of the blacker horrors of this most foul and accursed trade, and the sights that i then witnessed literally beggar description. the unhappy wretches had been packed so tightly together that they had been unable to move more than an inch or so, while the slave-deck was so low that a sitting posture with the head bowed to the knees and the hands clasped in front of them had been absolutely necessary; and the miserable creatures had died and stiffened in this cramped and painful posture; it was gruesome enough, therefore, to see the bodies passed up and thrown overboard in so woeful an attitude; but the worst sight of all was in those cases where, in the dying agony, some unfortunate wretch had writhed his head back until it looked as though the neck had become dislocated, thus revealing the distorted features, with the eye balls rolled back until only the whites were visible, and the mouth wide open as though gasping for air. the brigantine had left the congo with four hundred and fifty-five slaves on board, about three-fifths of whom were men, the remainder being young women and children; and of these every woman and child, and one hundred and twenty-seven men had succumbed, leaving, out of the grand total, the miserable moiety of only one hundred and forty-six survivors! it was horrible beyond the power of words to express, and to crown all, as the work went on, the water in the ship's wake became alive with sharks, who fought and struggled with each other for their prey, literally tearing the bodies limb from limb in their frantic struggles to secure a morsel. it was a sight that, one might have thought, would have excited pity in the breast of the arch-fiend himself, but with mendouca it only had the effect of goading him into a state of mad, ungovernable fury. "see," he exclaimed at last, stalking up to me and grasping me savagely by the arm--"see the result of the thrice accursed meddlesome policy of your wretched, contemptible little england and the countries who have united with her in the hopeless task of suppressing the slave-trade! but for that, these negroes might have been comfortably stowed in three or four ships, instead of being packed like herrings in a barrel in the hold of one only, and then all this loss of life and money might have been avoided. by this infernal mishap i am a loser to the extent of over thirty thousand dollars, and all for what? why, simply because you british, with your sickly sentimentality, choose to regard the blacks as human beings like yourselves. you are all virtuous indignation because forsooth we slave-traders have bethought ourselves of the plan of removing them from their own country, where their lives would have been passed in a condition of the lowest and most degrading barbarism, and transporting them to another where they can be rendered useful and valuable; where, in return for their labour, they are fed, clothed, tended in sickness, and provided with comfortable homes; where their lives may be passed in peace and comfort and perfect freedom from all care; and where, if indeed they _are_ human, like ourselves, which i very much doubt, they may be converted to christianity. you violently object to this amelioration of the lot of the negro savage; but you shut your eyes to the fact that thousands of your own countrymen and women are actually slaves of the most abject type, made so by your own insatiable and contemptible craving for _cheap_ clothing, _cheap_ food, cheap every thing, to satisfy which, and to, at the same time, gratify his own perfectly legitimate desire to make a living, the employer of labour has to grind his employes down in the matter of wage until their lives are a living lingering death to them, in comparison with which the future of those blacks down below will be a paradise. bah! such hypocrisy sickens me. and yet, in support of this disgusting pharisaism, you, and hundreds more like you, claiming to be intelligent beings, willingly endure hardships and face the perils of sickness, shipwreck, shot and steel with a persistent heroism that almost compels one's admiration, despite the mistaken enthusiasm which is its animating cause. nay, do not speak, senor; i know exactly what you would say; i have heard, until i have become sick of it, the canting jargon of those meddlesome busy-bodies who, knowing nothing of the actual facts of slavery, or for their own purposes, hunt out exceptional cases of tyranny which they hold up to public execration as typical of the system--i have heard it all so often that i have long passed the point where it was possible to listen to it with even the faintest semblance of patience; so do not attempt the utterly useless and impossible task of trying to convert me, i pray you, lest in my anger i should say words that would offend you." good heavens! did the man suppose that he had not offended me already? i saw, however, that i might as well attempt to quell the hurricane as argue with him in his present mood; moreover i am but a poor hand at argument; i therefore bowed in silence, turned away and went below, fully determined to have the matter out with the fiery spaniard the first time that i caught him in a more amenable temper. pedro would have followed me, and indeed attempted to do so, but as i entered the companion, i heard his father call him back and bid him remain on deck. with the moderating of the gale the wind had come out dead ahead, and the brigantine was consequently on a taut bowline on the starboard tack when the hatches were opened and the bodies of the suffocated negroes were passed up on deck and thrown overboard. she remained so for the rest of that day; but when i awoke next morning, i at once became aware, from the steady, long, pendulum-like roll of the ship, that she was once more before the wind, and i naturally concluded that the wind had again become fair. to my great surprise, however, when i emerged from my state-room and caught a glimpse of the tell-tale compass hanging in gimbals in the skylight opening of the main cabin, i saw that the ship was heading to the _eastward_! wondering what might be the meaning of this, i went on deck, but neither mendouca nor pedro was visible, and i did not choose to question the mate--a surly, hang-dog, cut-throat-looking scoundrel, who had chosen to manifest an implacable hostility to myself from the moment that our eyes had first met. however, i had not been on deck long when mendouca made his appearance, and in response to his salutation i said-- "good-morning, captain; i see you have shifted your helm during the night." i saw, when it was too late, that my remark was an unfortunate one, for mendouca scowled as he replied-- "yes; it was not worth while to make the trip across the atlantic and back for the mere purpose of landing one hundred and forty odd negroes-- even could we have got them over without further loss, which i greatly doubt--so i am going back to the coast for more--unless i can pick them up without going so far," he added, after a momentary pause, and with a peculiar look which i could not at the moment fathom. "and all this loss of life, and money, and time, and all this extra risk are forced upon me by the meddlesome policy of great britain. _great_! faugh! could she but see herself as others see her she would, for very shame, strike out that vaunting prefix, and take that obscure place among the nations which properly befits her. senor dugdale, do you value your life?" "well, yes, to a certain extent i do," i replied. "it is the only one i have, you see; and were i to lose it the loss would occasion a considerable amount of distress to my friends. for that reason, therefore, if for no other, i attach a certain amount of value to it, and feel bound to take care of it so far as i may, with honour." "very well, then," remarked mendouca, with a sneer, "so far as you can _with honour_, refrain, i pray you, from thrusting your nationality into my face; for i may as well tell you that i have the utmost hatred and contempt for the english; i would sweep every one of them off the face of the earth if i could; and some day, when this feeling is particularly strong upon me, i may blow your brains out if i happen to remember that you are an englishman." "i hope it will not come to that, don fernando, for many reasons," i remarked, with a rather forced laugh, "and among them i may just mention the base cowardice of murdering an unarmed man. i rather regret that you should be so completely as you appear to be under the dominion of this feeling of hatred for my nation; it must be as unpleasant for you as it is for me that we are thus forcibly thrown together; but it need not last long; you can put me out of the ship at the first land that we touch, and i must take my chance of making my way to a place of safety. it will be unpleasant for me, of course, but it will remove from you a constant source of temptation to commit murder." mendouca laughed--it was rather a harsh and jarring laugh, certainly-- and said-- "upon my honour as a spanish gentleman, you appear to be mightily concerned to preserve me from the crime of bloodshed, young gentleman. but do you suppose it would not be murder to put you ashore, as you suggest, at the first land that we reach? why, boy, were i to do so, within six hours you would be in the hands of the natives, and lashed to the torture-stake! and would not your death then be just as much my act as though i were to shoot you through the head this moment?" and to my astonishment--and somewhat to my consternation, i must admit-- he whipped a pistol out of his belt and levelled it full at my head, cocking it with his thumb as he did so. "i presume it would," i answered steadily; "and on the whole i believe that to shoot me would be the more merciful act of the two. so fire by all means, senor, if you _must_ take my life." "by the living god, but you carry the thing off bravely, young cockerel!" he exclaimed. "do you _dare_ me to fire?" "yes," i exclaimed stoutly. "i dare you to fire, if you can bring yourself to perpetrate so rank an act of cowardice!" "well," he returned, laughing, as he lowered the pistol, uncocked it, and replaced it in his belt; "you are right. i cannot; at least not in cold blood. i dare say i am pretty bad, according to your opinion, but my worst enemy cannot accuse me of cowardice. and, as to putting you ashore, i shall do nothing of the kind; on the contrary, widely as our opinions at present diverge upon the subject of my calling, i hope yet to induce you to join me. you can be useful to me," he added, in pure english, to my intense astonishment; "i want just such a cool, daring young fellow as yourself for my right hand, to be a pair of extra eyes and ears and hands to me, and to take command in my absence. i can make it well worth your while, so think it over; i do not want an answer now." "but i _must_ answer now," i returned, also in english; "i cannot allow a single minute to elapse without assuring you, don fernando, that you altogether mistake my character if you suppose me capable of any participation whatever in a traffic that i abhor and detest beyond all power of expression; a traffic that inflicts untold anguish upon thousands, and, not infrequently, i should imagine, entails such a fearful waste of human life as i witnessed yesterday. moreover, it has just occurred to me that when we attacked you and your friends in the creek this brigantine was flying a _black_ flag. if that means anything it means, i presume, that you are a pirate as well as a slaver?" "precisely," he assented. "i am both. some day, when we know each other better, i will tell you my story, and, unlikely as you may now think it, i undertake to say that when you have heard it you will acknowledge that i have ample justification for being both." "do not believe it, don fernando," i answered. "your story is doubtless that of some real or fancied wrong that you have suffered at the hands of society; but _no_ wrong can justify a man to become an enemy to his race. i will hear your story, of course, if it will afford you any satisfaction to tell it me; but i warn you that neither it nor anything that you can possibly say will have the effect of converting me to your views." "you think so now, of course," he answered, with a laugh; "but we shall see, we shall see. meanwhile, there is my steward poking his ugly visage up through the companion to tell us that breakfast is ready, so come below, my friend, and take the keen edge off your appetite." it was on the day but one after this, that, about four bells in the forenoon watch, one of the hands, having occasion to go aloft to perform some small job of work on the rigging, reported a strange sail ahead. the brigantine was still running before a fair wind, but the breeze had fallen light, and it looked rather as though we were in for a calm spell, with thunder, perhaps, later on. we were going about four or maybe four and a half knots at the time, and the report of the strange sail created as much excitement on board us as though we had been a man-o'-war. for some time there seemed to be a considerable amount of doubt as to the course that the stranger was steering; for, as seen from aloft, she appeared to be heading all round the compass; but it was eventually concluded that, in general direction, her course was the same as our own. as the morning wore on the wind continued to drop, while a heavy bank of thunder-cloud gathered about the horizon ahead, piling itself steadily but imperceptibly higher, until by noon it was as much as mendouca could do to get the sun for his latitude. by this time we had risen the stranger until we had brought her hull-up on the extreme verge of the horizon; and the nearer that we drew to her the more eccentric did her manoeuvres appear to be; she was heading all round the compass, and but for the fact that we could see from time to time that her yards were being swung, and some of her canvas hauled down and hoisted again in the most extraordinary manner, we should have set her down as a derelict. i ought, by the way, to have said that she was a small brig of, apparently, about one hundred and forty tons. mendouca was thoroughly perplexed at her extraordinary antics; his glass was scarcely ever off her, and when he removed it from his eye it was only to hand it to me and impatiently demand whether i could not make out something to elucidate the mystery. at length, after witnessing through the telescope some more than usually extraordinary performance with the canvas, i remarked-- "i think there is one thing pretty clear about that brig, and that is that she is in the possession of people who have not the remotest notion how to handle her." "eh? what is that you say?" demanded mendouca. "don't know how to handle her? well, it certainly appears that they do not," as the fore-topsail-halliard was started and the yard slid slowly down the mast, leaving the topgallant-sail and royal fully set above it. "by jove, i have it!" he suddenly continued, slapping his thigh energetically. "yonder brig is in possession of a cargo of slaves who have somehow been allowed to rise and overpower her crew! yes, by heaven, that must be the explanation of it! at all events we will run down and see. blow, good breeze, blow!" and he whistled energetically after the manner of seamen in want of a wind. the breeze, however, utterly refused to blow; on the contrary, it was growing more languid every minute, while our speed had dwindled down to a bare two knots; and the thunder-clouds were piling up overhead blacker and more menacing every minute. at length, when we were a bare three miles from the brig, the helmsman reported that we no longer had steerage-way, and as the _francesca_ slowly swung round upon her heel, bringing the brig broad on her starboard quarter, mendouca stamped irritably on the deck, and cursed the weather, the brig, the brigantine; in fact he cursed "everything above an inch high," as we say in the navy when we wish to describe a thorough, comprehensive outburst of profanity. at length, having given free vent to his impatience, he stood for a moment intently studying the lowering heavens, strode across the deck and glanced through the open skylight at the barometer, then turned to me and said, in english-- "what think you, dugdale; would it be safe, in your opinion, to send away a couple of boats to take possession of that brig? the glass has dropped nothing to speak of since it was set this morning, and that stuff up there promises nothing worse than a sharp thunderstorm and a pelting downpour of rain. the boats could reach her in forty minutes, when their crews would take possession, shorten sail, and wait for us to join. i'll be bound there is sufficient `black ivory' aboard there to spare me the necessity to return to the coast and to make good all my losses." in my turn i too looked at the sky intently. "i hardly know what to make of it," i answered at length. "it may be, as you say, that there is nothing worse than thunder brewing up there; yet there is something in the look of those clouds that i do not altogether like; their colour, for instance, is too livid a purple for thunder alone, according to my idea, and i do not like the way in which they are working; why, they are as busy as a barrel of yeast; depend on it, senor, there is wind, and plenty of it, up there. as to how long it may be before the outburst comes, you have had more experience than i of this part of the world, and ought to know the weather better than i do." "well, i dare say i do," he assented, with apparent relief, and again raised his eyes and anxiously scrutinised the clouds. "i'll risk it," he at length exclaimed, decisively, and forthwith turned and issued the necessary orders to his chief mate, who trundled away forward, bawling to the men as he went; and in a few minutes all was bustle and activity about our decks, the arm-chests being brought on deck, and the selected boats' crews coming aft and receiving their weapons from mendouca himself, while the gunner served out the ammunition. the rascals were a smart, active lot--i will give them credit for so much--and in less than ten minutes from the announcement of mendouca's decision, the boats, two of them, with ten men in each, were in the glassy water, and their crews stretching out lustily for the brig. it was perfectly evident to me that mendouca was possessed by a feeling that his eagerness to acquire the brig's cargo of negroes had warped his judgment and egged him on to an unduly risky course of action in sending his boats and so many of his people away in the face of that threatening sky; the boats had no sooner shoved off than he became consumed by anxiety, and, oblivious of the suffocating heat and closeness of the atmosphere, proceeded to pace the deck to and fro with hasty, impatient strides, halting abruptly at frequent intervals to scrutinise the aspect of the sky, and, anon, to watch the progress of the boats. the crews of the latter were evidently quite aware that the expedition upon which they were engaged was by no means free from peril, for until they had reached a distance too great to enable us to distinguish their actions, i could see first one and then another glancing aloft and over his shoulder at the sky, the action being invariably followed by the exhibition of increased energy at the oar. they were clearly doing their utmost, one and all; in fact the boats were making a downright race of it for the brig; the men bending their backs and throwing their whole strength into every stroke, churning the oily-looking surface of the water into foam with their oar-blades, and leaving a long, wedge-like wake behind them, while the two mates in charge, and who had hold of the yoke-lines, were bowing forward at every stroke in true racing style. yet, rapid as their progress was, it did not satisfy mendouca, who, every time that he paused to watch their progress, stamped upon the deck with impatience, and cursed the oarsmen for a set of lazy, good-for-nothing lubbers. and there was ample, justification for his anxiety; for scarcely had the boats reached a quarter of a mile from the _francesca_ than there was a sudden and very perceptible darkening of the heavens, followed by a vivid flash of lightning low down toward the eastern horizon, the low, muffled boom of the thunder coming reverberating across the glassy water with the sound of a cannon-shot rolled slowly along a timber floor. chapter twelve. an awful catastrophe. presently, after one of his frequent halts, mendouca turned and gave orders to shorten sail. "clew up and haul down fore and aft; stow everything except the main-staysail; and see that you make a snug furl of it, men!" he cried; adding, as he turned to me-- "we might as well be snugging down as doing nothing; and perhaps the sight will put some life into the movements of those lazy rascals yonder," pointing with his cigar as he spoke towards the boats. "possibly," i agreed. "and in any case it appears to me that the time has fully arrived for the commencement of such preparations as you may think fit to make for the coming blow, which, in my humble opinion, is going to be rather sharp while it lasts." "yes; no doubt," mendouca assented. "curse those lazy hounds! have they no eyes in their heads to see what is brewing? if they don't wake up, they will have the squall upon them before they reach the brig." "in which case," said i, "you may say good-bye to the brig and to the slaves in her; and may think yourself lucky if you are able to recover your boats." i do not know whether he heard me or not. i think it probable that he did; but he made no reply, turning his back upon me, and keeping his glances alternately roving between the boats and the sky, which latter had by this time assumed a most sinister and threatening aspect, so much so, indeed, that had i been in mendouca's place i should have recalled the boats without another moment's delay. but i could see that he had set his heart upon securing possession of the brig, and was willing to run a considerable amount of risk in the effort to do so. at length, when the boats were, according to my estimation, a little better than half-way to the brig, another flash of lightning, vivid and blinding, blazed forth, this time from almost overhead, only the very smallest perceptible interval of time elapsing between it and the accompanying thunder-crash, which was so appallingly loud and startling that for a moment i felt fairly deaf and stunned with it, and before i had fairly recovered my dazed senses the rain came pelting down in drops as large as crown-pieces. the rain lasted for only three or four seconds, however, and then ceased again abruptly, while almost at the same instant a brief scurry of wind swept past us, just lifting the staysail--which was by this time the only sail remaining set on board us--and causing it to flap feebly for a moment, when it was once more calm again; but we could trace the puff a long distance to the westward by its track along the oily surface of the water. mendouca turned to me with an oath. "when it comes, it will come to us dead on end from the brig!" he exclaimed. "it is just like my cursed luck! do you think it is too late to recall the boats?" "yes," i answered decidedly. "they are now nearer the brig than they are to us, and their best chance certainly is to keep on as they are going." mendouca turned and bestowed upon the boats yet another long scrutinising glance; and then said, with his eyes still fixed upon them-- "i do not agree with you. i think they are quite as near to us as they are to the brig; and if they keep on and the squall bursts before they reach the brig, they will have to pull against it, and may perhaps not fetch her after all, whereas if i recall them, and they are overtaken before they reach us, they will have the wind all in their favour instead of dead against them." "that is very true," i assented. "it appears to me, however, that the whole question hinges upon the point whether they are nearer to us or to the brig; and in my opinion they are much nearer to the latter." for fully another minute mendouca continued to watch the boats; then he suddenly exclaimed-- "i shall recall them. clear away the bow gun there, and fire it with a blank cartridge; and, pedro, get out the recall signal, and stand by to run it up to the main-truck at the flash of the gun." the signal was made, the boom of the gun seeming to echo with a hollow, long-drawn-out reverberation between sea and sky; and within a minute the boats, with seeming reluctance, had turned and were pulling back to the brigantine. meanwhile the heavens had continued to darken, until, by the time that the boats had turned, the whole scene had become involved in a murky twilight, through the gloom of which the brig, still with every stitch of canvas set, could with difficulty be made out. still, although it seemed to me that the brooding squall might burst upon us at any moment, the atmosphere maintained its ominous condition of stagnation until the boats had reached within some four cables' lengths--or somewhat less than half-a-mile--of us; when, as i was intently watching their progress, i saw the sky suddenly break along the horizon just above them, the clouds appearing as though rent violently apart for a length of some ten or twelve degrees of arc, while the rent was filled with a strong yet misty glare of coppery-yellow light, in the very centre of which the brig stood out sharply-defined, and as black as a shape cut out of silhouette paper. "here it comes, at last!" i exclaimed; and as the words passed my lips i felt a spot of rain upon my face, and in another instant down it came, a regular deluge, but only for about half a minute, when it ceased abruptly, and, looking toward the brig, i saw a long line of white foam sweeping down towards her. "god help those poor, unhappy blacks!" i cried. "if that craft's spars and rigging happen to be good she will turn the turtle with them, and probably not one of them will escape!" "it is a just punishment upon them for rising against the crew," exclaimed mendouca savagely; "but if i had only succeeded in laying hands upon them i would have inflicted a worse punishment upon them than drowning. i would have--ah! look at that! now the squall strikes her, and over she goes. taken flat aback, by heaven!" it was as mendouca had said; the brig when struck by the squall happened to be lying head on to it, and her topmasts bent like reeds ere they yielded to the pressure, and snapped short off by the caps. then, gathering stern-way, she paid off until she was nearly broadside on to us, and we could see that her stern was becoming more and more depressed as it was forced against the comparatively stubborn and unyielding water, while her bow was raised proportionally high in the air. foot by foot, and second by second, her stern sank deeper and deeper into the water until the latter was flush with her taffrail, and then, with the aid of a telescope, i saw it go foaming and boiling in upon her deck, driving the dense crowd of negroes forward foot by foot. by this time her forefoot was raised clear out of the water, and, enveloped in mist and spray though she was, i could see the bright, glassy glare of the sky beyond and below it. for a second she remained thus; then her bow rose still higher in the air, and, with a long sliding plunge, she disappeared stern foremost. "gone to the bottom, every mother's _son of them_--as they richly deserved!" exclaimed mendouca, with a savage curse. "and if those loafing vagabonds of mine don't bestir themselves they will follow in double-quick time! what do you think, dugdale? shall we be able to save them?" i shook my head. "i would not give very much for their chance," i replied. "it is a pity that you recalled them, i think. they would have had time to reach the brig, and could at least have got her before the wind, even had they no time to do more." "yes," he assented; "as it happened, they could. but how was a man to know that the squall was going to hold off so long, and then burst at the most unfortunate moment possible?" all this, it must be understood, had happened in a very much shorter time than it has taken to tell of it, and the squall had not reached as far as the boats when the brig disappeared; while, as for us, we were lying motionless in a still stagnant atmosphere, with our starboard broadside presented fair to the approaching squall. but as the last words left mendouca's lips the squall swooped down upon the boats, and in an instant they were lost sight of in a smother of mist and spray, while the roar of the approaching squall, that had come to us at first as a faint low murmur, grew deeper and hoarser, and more deadly menacing in its overpowering volume of tone. then the air suddenly grew damp, with a distinct taste of salt in it; the roar increased to a deafening bellow, and with a fierce, yelling shriek the squall burst upon us, and the brigantine bowed beneath the stroke until her lee rail was buried, and the water foamed in on deck from the cat-head to the main-rigging. i thought for a moment that she, too, was going to turn turtle with us, and i believe she would, had the staysail stood; but luckily at the very moment when it seemed all up with us, the sheet parted with a report that sounded even above the yell of the gale; there was a concussion as though the ship had struck something solid, and with a single flap the sail split in ribbons and blew clean out of the bolt-ropes. meanwhile mendouca had sprung to the wheel and lent his strength to the efforts of the helmsman to put it hard up, and, after hanging irresolute for a moment, as _though undecided whether to capsize_ or not, the _francesca_ gathered way, and in obedience to the helm gradually paid off until she was dead before it, when she suddenly righted and began to scud like a terrified thing. the boats were of course left far behind; and i made up my mind that we should never see them again. the squall was as sharp a thing of its kind as i had ever beheld, and it was _fully_ three-quarters of an hour before it became possible to bring the ship to the wind again, which mendouca did the moment that he could with safety. the wind continued quite fresh for another half-hour after the squall had blown itself out, and then it dwindled away to a very paltry breeze again, the clouds cleared away, the sun re-appeared and shone with a heat that was almost overpowering, and the weather became brilliantly fine again; much too fine, indeed, for mendouca's purpose, he being anxious to get back again as quickly as possible to the spot where he had been obliged to abandon his boats, a lingering hope possessing him that perchance they might have outlived the squall, and that he might recover his men. i may perhaps be doing the man an injustice in saying so much, but i firmly believe that this desire on his part was prompted, not by any feeling of humanity or regard for the men, but simply because the loss of so many out of his ship's company would leave him very short-handed, and seriously embarrass him until he could obtain others to fill their places; and i formed this opinion from the fact that his many expressions of regret at being blown away from his boats were every one of them coupled with a petulant repetition of the remark that his hands would be completely tied should he fail to recover their crews. so persistently did he hang upon this phase of the mishap, that at length i ventured to ask him whether there were none of them that he would be sorry to lose for their own sakes, apart from any question of inconvenience; in reply to which he stated, with a brutal laugh, that they were, one and all, a lazy set of worthless rascals, of whom he should have rid himself in any case on his arrival in havana. however, be his motive what it might, he cracked on every stitch of canvas that the brigantine would bear, as soon as the strength of the squall had sufficiently abated to permit of his bringing her to the wind, making sail from time to time as the wind further dwindled, until he had her under everything that would draw, from the trucks down. to add to his anxiety, it was about two bells in the first dog-watch before he could bring the ship to the wind, and he feared, not without reason, that it would be dark before he could work back near enough to the spot at which we had left the boats, to see them again--always supposing, of course, that they still floated. however, he did everything that a seaman could do, sending a hand aloft to the royal-yard to keep a look-out as soon as the ship had been got upon a wind, and making short boards to windward--the first one of a quarter of an hour's duration, and the others of half-an-hour each, so as to thoroughly cover the ground previously passed over--as long as the daylight lasted. but when, all too soon, the sun went down in a blaze of golden and crimson and purple splendour, no sign of the boats had been seen; mendouca, therefore, worked out a calculation of the distance run by the brigantine from the spot where the squall first struck her, subtracted from it the distance that the boats would probably traverse in the same time, and having worked up to this spot as nearly as he could calculate, he hove-to for the night, with a bright lantern at his main-truck, firing signal rockets at intervals of a quarter of an hour, and wearing the ship round on the other tack every two hours. the night was brilliantly star-lit, but without a moon, still there was light enough upon the water to have revealed the boats at a distance of half-a-mile, while the weather was so fine that a shout raised at twice that distance to windward of the ship might have been heard on board her above the soft sigh of the night wind, and the gentle lap of the water along the bends; moreover, apart from the rockets fired, she might have been plainly seen against the sky at a distance of fully three miles from the boats, while her progress through the water was so slow that they could have pulled alongside her without difficulty; when, therefore, midnight arrived without any news of them, i gave them up for lost, and turned in. not so mendouca, he would not give them up; moreover, he refused to leave the deck--declaring that now he had lost his two mates he had nobody on board that he could trust in charge--preferring to have a mattress laid for him upon the skylight bench, where he snatched catnaps between the intervals of wearing the ship round. however, the matter was cleared up shortly after sunrise next morning, when mendouca again sent a hand aloft to look round, for the fellow had only got as far as the foretop when he reported two objects that looked like the boats, about five miles to leeward; adding, that if they _were_ the boats, they were capsized. the topsail was accordingly filled, and the ship kept away, when, after about an hour's run, first one boat and then the other was found, the first being capsized, while the second was full of water and floating with the gunwale awash. one drowned seaman was found under the capsized boat, but the rest were nowhere to be seen. both boats were easily secured, and found to be undamaged; and several of the oars and loose bottom-boards were also recovered, being found floating at no great distance from the boats. the drowned seaman, i may as well mention, was not brought on board, but instead of this a boat was sent away with a canvas bag containing three nine-pound shot, which they secured to the poor wretch's ankles, and so sunk him. mendouca now, in no very amiable mood, resumed his course toward the coast; and that same afternoon--having meanwhile been engaged apparently in a tolerably successful effort to recover his temper--approached me with a proposal that he should tell me the story of his life, to which i of course cheerfully assented. i will not inflict upon the reader the tale that he told me, because it has no direct bearing upon this present history; suffice it to say, that i now learned with some astonishment that he was a born englishman, and that, moreover, he had begun his career in the british navy, from which--if his story were strictly true, as i afterwards had the opportunity of learning was the case--he had been ousted by a quite unusual piece of tyranny, and a most singular and deplorable miscarriage of justice. it was the latter, i gathered, even more than the former, that had soured him, and warped everything that was good out of his character; for it appeared that he had a keen sense of justice, and a very exalted idea of it; he had undoubtedly been most cruelly ill-used-- he had in fact been adjudged guilty of a crime that he had never committed--and this appeared to have utterly ruined the character of a man who might otherwise have been an ornament to the service, distorted all his views of right and wrong, and filled him to the brim with a wild, unreasoning, insatiable desire for vengeance. this much for the man's story, which, however, i soon found had been told me with a purpose; that purpose being nothing less than the inducing of me to join him and take the place of his lost chief mate, whereby--according to his showing--i might speedily become a rich man. had the proposal come before i had heard his story i should have resented it as an insult, but the recital to which he had treated me, and the sentiments expressed during its narration, convinced me that his sense of honour had been so completely warped that he could see no disgrace in the abandonment of a service and a country capable of treating any other man--myself, for instance, as he carefully pointed out--as he had been treated; i therefore contented myself with a simple refusal, coupled with an assurance that such a step would be wholly discordant with my sense of right and wrong, utterly irreconcilable, to my conscience, and not at all in accord with my views. i had expected him to be furiously angry at my refusal, but to my great surprise he was not; on the contrary, he frankly admitted that he had been fully prepared for a refusal--at first--but that he still believed my views might alter upon more mature reflection. "meanwhile," said he, "you see how i am situated; i have lost both my officers, and have no one on board but yourself in the least capable of taking their places. i saved your life--or spared it, which comes to the same thing--and i now ask you to make me the only return in your power by assisting me in my difficulty." "before i give you any answer to that," said i, "i must ask you to explicitly define and accurately set forth the nature of the assistance that you desire me to render." "certainly," said mendouca. "all that i ask of you at present is to relieve me by taking charge of a watch, and assisting me to navigate the ship. with regard to the latter, i consider myself capable of taking the ship anywhere, and have as much confidence in myself as a man ought to have; but `to err is human,' and it increases one's confidence, and confers a feeling of security, to have some one to check one's calculations. and as to the watch, unless you will consent to keep one for me, i shall be compelled to keep the deck night and day. now, it is no great thing that i am asking of you _in return for your life_; will you do it?" "give me half-an-hour to consider the matter, and you shall then have my reply," said i. "so be it," he answered. and then the matter ended, for the moment. it was a question that i found it by no means easy to decide. here was i, an officer in the service of a country pledged to do its utmost to suppress the abominable slave-traffic, actually invited to assist in the navigation of a ship avowedly engaged not only in that traffic but-- according to the acknowledgment of her captain--also in, at least, occasional acts of piracy! what was i to do? on the one hand, i was fully determined to do nothing that could be construed into even the semblance of tacit acquiescence in mendouca's lawless vocation; while, on the other, i undoubtedly owed my life to the man, and therefore shrank from the idea of behaving in a manner that might appear churlish. moreover, it appeared to me that by rendering the trifling service demanded of me, i should find myself in a position to very greatly ameliorate in many ways the condition of the unhappy blacks down in the dark, noisome hold. the end of it all was, therefore, that at the expiration of the half-hour i had determined--perhaps weakly and foolishly--to accede to mendouca's request. i accordingly went to him and said-- "senor mendouca, i have considered your request, and have decided to accede to it upon certain conditions." "name them," answered mendouca. "they are these," said i. "first, that my services shall be strictly confined to the keeping of a watch and the checking of your astronomical observations. secondly, that you undertake to perpetrate no act of piracy while i am on board. and, thirdly, that you will allow me to leave your ship upon the first occasion that we happen to encounter a sail of a nationality friendly to great britain." "is that _all_?" demanded mendouca. "by my faith, but you appear to attach a somewhat high value to your services, senor midshipman! i spared your life; yet that does not appear to be a sufficient reason why you should afford me the small amount of help i require without hedging your consent about with ridiculous and impossible restrictions! i am surprised that, while you were about it, you did not also stipulate that i should abandon the slave-trade while the ship is honoured by your presence! i am obliged to you, senor dugdale, for your condescension in giving your distinguished consideration at all to my request, but your terms are too high; i can do better without your help than with it, if it is to be bought at the price of such restraint as you demand." and he turned his back upon me and walked over to the other side of the deck. presently he turned and re-crossed the deck to my side, and remarked, in english-- "look here, dugdale, don't be a fool! in coupling your consent to help me with those restrictions, you doubtless suspected me of an intention to involve you in some of those acts that you deem unlawful, and then to renew my proposal that you should join me. well, if you did you were not so very far from the truth; i confess that i _do_ wish you to join me. i have somehow taken a fancy to you, despite those old-fashioned and absurd notions of yours about conscience, and duty, and the like. why, if you would only put them away from you it would be the making of you, and you would be just the sort of fellow that i want; you are pluck all through, and, once free from the trammels of the thing that you call conscience, you would stick at nothing, and with you as my right hand i should feel myself free to undertake deeds that i have only dared to _dream_ of thus far, while, with our views brought into accord, we should be as brothers to each other. i am ambitious, dugdale, and i tell you that if you will join me we _can_ and _will_ revive the glories of the old buccaneering days and make ourselves feared and reverenced all over the globe; we will be sea-kings, you and i. what need is there for hesitation in the matter? nay"--and he held up his hand as he saw that i was about to speak--"do not inflict upon me those musty platitudes about _conscience_ and _duty_ that i have heard so often in the old days, and that have been made the excuse for so many acts of gross tyranny and injustice that my gorge rises in loathing whenever i hear them mentioned. what _is_ conscience? the inward monitor that points out your duty to god and restrains--or tries to restrain--you from doing wrong, you will perhaps say. well, let us accept that as an answer. i will then ask you another question. do you really believe in the existence of the being you call god? no, i am sure you do not; you cannot, my dear fellow, and remain consistent. for what is our conception of god? or, rather, what is the picture of him that our ghostly advisers and teachers have drawn of him? are we not assured that he is the personification and quintessence of justice, and love, and mercy? very well. then, if such a being really exists, would the tyranny, the injustice, the cruelty, and the suffering that have afflicted poor humanity, from adam down to ourselves, have been permitted? certainly not! therefore i unhesitatingly say that he cannot exist, and that the belief in him is a mere idle, foolish superstition, unworthy of entertainment by intelligent, reasonable, and reasoning beings. and if there is no god, whence do we derive our conception of duty? i tell you, dugdale, there is no such thing as duty save to one's self; the duty of protecting, and providing for, and avenging one's self, as i am doing, and as you may do if you choose to join me." "have you finished?" i asked, as he paused and looked eagerly into my face. "very well, then; i will answer in a few words, if facts were as you so confidently state them to be, i might possibly be induced to cast in my lot with yours; but, fortunately for humanity, they are not so, and i must therefore most emphatically decline." "then i presume," said he, with a sneer, "you still believe in the existence of god, and his power to work his will here on earth?" "certainly," i answered, without hesitation. "do you believe that he is more potent than i am!" "i really must decline to answer so absurd a question," said i, and turned away to leave him. "stop!" he thundered, his eyes suddenly blazing with demoniac fury. "answer me, yes or no, _if you are not afraid_! if your faith in him is as perfect as you would have me believe, answer me!" i hesitated for a moment--i confess it with shame--for i felt convinced that in the man's present mood a reply in the affirmative would assuredly provoke him to some dreadful act in proof of the contrary; the hesitation was but momentary, however, and, that moment past, i replied-- "yes; i believe him to be omnipotent, both on earth and in heaven." it was as i had expected--my reply had provoked him to murder; for as the words left my lips he, for the second time, drew his pistol from his belt, cocked it, and deliberately pressed the muzzle of the barrel to my temple, exclaiming, as he did so-- "very well. then let us see whether he has the power to save you from my bullet!" and, glaring like a madman straight into my eyes, he held it there while one might perhaps have slowly counted ten, and then pulled the trigger. there was a sharp click and a little shower of sparks as the flint-lock fell, and--that was all. "missed fire, by all the furies!" he exclaimed, dashing the weapon violently to the deck, _where it instantly exploded_. "well, you have proved your faith, at all events, and have escaped with your life by the mere accident of my pistol having missed fire, and there is an end of it for the present. here, take my hand; you are a plucky young dog and no mistake, but you did wrong to provoke me; take my advice and don't do it again, lest worse befall you." "no," said i, "i will _not_ take your hand. you saved--or rather, spared--my life once, it is true, but you have threatened it twice, and it is no thanks to you that i am alive at this moment. we are now quits, for this last act of yours has wiped out whatever obligation i may have owed you for your former clemency. i will not take your hand; and i warn you that i will leave your ship on the first opportunity that presents itself." and i turned away and left him. shortly afterwards mendouca went below; and a few minutes after his disappearance the steward came up to me and informed me that "supper"-- as the evening meal is called at sea--was ready. "i shall not go below, steward," i said. "if captain mendouca will allow you to do so, i should like you to bring me a cup of coffee and a biscuit up here." "very well, senor," the man answered. "i will bring them." he disappeared, but returned, after an interval of a minute or two, and handed me a note scrawled on a small slip of paper. it was written in english, and read as follows-- "you are the last fellow i should ever have suspected of so contemptible a weakness as sulking. come below, like a sensible lad; i have that to say to you which i do not choose to say on deck in the presence of the men. "mendouca." "oh!" thought i, "so he has returned to his right mind, has he? very well, i will go below and hear what he has to say; for it would certainly be unpleasant to be in a ship for any length of time with the captain of which one is not on speaking terms." accordingly i descended the companion, and as i entered the cabin mendouca rose from a sofa-locker upon which he had flung himself, and again stretched forth his hand. "i want you to forgive me, dugdale," said he, with great earnestness. "nay, but you must; i will take no denial. i am not prone to feel ashamed of anything that i do, but i frankly confess that i _am_ ashamed of my behaviour to you this afternoon, and i ask your pardon for it. to tell you the whole truth, i believe that there is a taint of madness in my blood, for there have been occasions when i have felt myself irresistibly impelled to actions for which i have afterwards been sorry, and that of this afternoon was one of them." i believed him; i really believed that, as he had said, there was a touch of madness in his composition, and that he was not always fully accountable for his actions. i therefore somewhat reluctantly accepted his proffered hand and the reconciliation that went with it, and with a suggestion that perhaps it would be as well henceforth to avoid theological arguments, took my accustomed seat at the cabin table. later in the evening, while mendouca was reading in his cabin, my friend pedro joined me on deck, and, with many expressions of poignant distress at his father's behaviour to me, endeavoured to excuse it upon the plea of irresponsibility already urged by mendouca himself; the poor lad assuring me that even he was not always safe from the consequences of his father's violence. and during the half-hour's chat that ensued i learnt enough to convince me that mendouca was in very truth afflicted with paroxysmal attacks of genuine, undoubted madness; and that, in my future dealings with him, i should have to bear that exceedingly alarming and disconcerting fact in mind. chapter thirteen. how mendouca replenished his "cargo." i could see that mendouca was pretty thoroughly ashamed of himself, for despite his utmost efforts, there was a perceptible shrinking and embarrassment of manner apparent in him during the progress of the meal. nevertheless, he exerted himself manfully to obliterate the exceedingly disagreeable impression that he knew had been made upon me by his late conduct; and it was evident that he was sincerely desirous of re-establishing friendly relations between us, whether from any selfish motive or not i cannot of course say, but i think not--i believe his pride was hurt at his late lamentable exhibition of weakness, and he was chiefly anxious to recover his own self-respect. whatever his motive may have been, his demeanour was a perfect blending of politeness and cordiality that won upon me in spite of myself; and before the meal was over i had determined to render him the small amount of assistance that he had asked of me, reserving to myself the right to withdraw it at any moment that i might deem fit. he seemed sincerely grateful for my offer, and accepted it frankly and cordially with the reservation that i had attached to it; and having accompanied me on deck and turned the hands up, he informed them that i had offered to temporarily perform the duties of chief mate, and that they were to obey my orders as implicitly as they would those from his own lips; after which, as i had offered to take charge until midnight, he said that he was tired and would try to get a little sleep, and so retired below to his own cabin. the breeze continued easterly, and very moderate, frequently dropping almost calm, on which occasion we were almost invariably treated to deluges of rain, with occasional thunder and lightning. our progress to the eastward was therefore slow, and for three whole days and nights nothing occurred to break the monotony of the voyage. on the morning of the fourth day, however, when i went on deck just before eight bells--it having been my eight hours in, that night--i found the brigantine once more before the wind, with a slashing breeze blowing after her, and she with every rag of canvas packed upon her that could be induced to draw. but, to my exceeding surprise, we were heading to the _westward_, and, hull-down about ten miles distant, was another craft dead ahead of us, also carrying a press of canvas. i turned to mendouca for an explanation; and in answer to my look of inquiry he said-- "yes, i want to overtake that brig, if i can. i am ashamed to say that among us we let her slip past in the darkness of the early part of the last watch, and so i missed the opportunity of speaking her. but i believe i know her; and if my surmise as to her identity proves correct, i think i shall have no difficulty in persuading her skipper to transfer his cargo to me, and so save me the trouble and risk of returning to the coast for one--a risk which was every day growing greater as we drew nearer to the ground haunted by your lynx-eyed cruisers, to fall in with one of which just now, with those niggers down in the hold, would mean our inevitable condemnation, as i need scarcely tell you." "quite so," i assented. "but should you fail to overtake yonder craft, you will lose a good deal of ground, will you not?" "oh, we shall overhaul her, if she be the brig i believe her to be, and i have very little doubt upon that point," answered mendouca. "she is a smart craft, i admit, but the _francesca_ can beat her upon any point of sailing, and in any breeze that blows; and, that being the case, the distance that we may have to run to leeward before getting alongside her is a matter of indifference to me, since it will be so much of our voyage accomplished." "have you gained anything on her since you bore up in chase?" i asked. "about a couple of miles, i should think. but then the wind has been light with us until within the last hour. if this breeze holds i expect to be alongside her about four bells in the afternoon watch." "by which time we shall have run close upon seventy miles to leeward," i remarked. "nearer eighty," observed mendouca. "we are going close upon thirteen now. but, as i said before, that does not trouble me in the least, since we shall be that much nearer cuba." this was serious news to me, for cuba was about the last place that i desired to visit, at least on board the _francesca_, for i foresaw that if once we got over there the difficulty of effecting my escape from the accursed craft would be very greatly increased; indeed, i had quite reckoned upon her being fallen in with and captured by one of our cruisers, either while standing in for a fresh cargo of slaves, or when coming out again with them on board, to which chance alone could i look with any reason for the prospect of deliverance from my present embarrassing and disagreeable situation. true, there was just a possibility of our being picked up by one of the west indian squadron; but i had not much hope of that, our vessels on that station being mostly slow, deep-draught craft, altogether unsuited for the pursuit and capture of the swift, light-draught slavers, who, unless caught at advantage in open water, could laugh us to scorn by the simple expedient of taking short cuts across shoals, or seeking refuge among the shallow lagoons that abound among the islands, and are especially plentiful and spacious along the northern coast of cuba. however, there was no use in worrying over a state of things that i had no power to mend; i therefore assumed charge of the deck, and allowed matters to take their course-- since i needs must. the breeze continued to freshen as the sun increased his distance above the horizon, and we went bowling along at a most exhilarating pace, overhauling the brig ahead, slowly but surely; and when at one o'clock the steward summoned me to the cabin to dinner, a space of barely two miles separated the two craft. she had just hoisted portuguese colours, of which, however, mendouca took no notice, somewhat to my surprise, since he reiterated the statement that she was the craft he had believed her to be, and that the captain of her and he were old friends. it was my afternoon watch below; so when i rose from the dinner-table i said-- "captain mendouca, i have no wish to identify myself in any way with the transaction you are about to negotiate; you must excuse me therefore if, it being my watch below, i retire to my cabin." "very well, dugdale," he answered, quite good-humouredly, "i can manage the business perfectly well without you; if therefore _your conscience_"--with just the faintest suggestion of a sneer--"will not permit you to take an active part in it, you are quite welcome to stay below until the affair is at an end, when i will call you." i even thought that he spoke with an air of relief, as though my withdrawal had smoothed away a difficulty. about an hour later i was awakened from a nap by the sound of hailing in a language which i did not understand, but which, from its decided resemblance to spanish, i concluded to be portuguese. i could not hear what passed, nor did i attempt to do so, being of opinion that the less prominently i was mixed up with the affair, and the less i knew about it, the better. the hailing soon ceased, and then the brigantine was hove-to, as i could tell by the difference in her movements. i had the curiosity to rise from my bunk and take a peep through the scuttle at the sea, but it was bare as far as my eye could reach; so, as my state-room was to windward as the _francesca_ then lay, i came to the conclusion that the brig was hove-to to leeward of us. the moment that our topsail was backed i heard the creaking of davit blocks, and the other sounds of a boat being lowered; and a few minutes later i heard the roll of the oars in the rowlocks as she was pulled away from the ship. then the hatches were taken off fore and aft, and in about half-an-hour from the time of our having hove-to i became aware that the first boat-load of slaves had arrived alongside and were being driven down into the hold. the boats now began to arrive in rapid succession, and there was a good deal of bustle and confusion on deck, which lasted until close upon sunset, and in the midst of it i laid down and went to sleep again, for want of something better to do. when i awoke the dusk was thick upon the glass of my scuttle, the steward was lighting the lamp in the main cabin, and i could feel that we were once more under way again; concluding, therefore, that the exchange had been completed, i rolled out of my bunk and, slipping my feet into my shoes, left my state-room and went on deck, where i found mendouca in jubilant spirits, but rather disconcerted, i thought, at my appearance. "hillo!" he exclaimed in english, "where the deuce did you come from, and how long have you been on deck?" "i came from my state-room, and have but this moment emerged from the companion. why do you ask?" said i. "because," he answered, "to tell you the truth you startled me, making your appearance in that quiet manner. i thought you were going to stay below until i called you?" "it was _you_ who said that, not i," answered i. "and, to tell you the truth, i felt tired of being below, and so--finding that you were under way again--came on deck." the brig was about five miles astern, and, as far as i could see in the fast-gathering darkness, still hove-to, which struck me as being so peculiar that i made some remark to that effect. "oh no; nothing strange about it at all," answered mendouca carelessly. "her people are getting their supper, probably, and are too lazy to start tack or sheet until they have finished their meal. bless you, you have no idea what lazy rascals the portuguese are; their laziness is absolutely phenomenal; they are positively too lazy to live long, and so most of them die early. more over, i expect her skipper is still below poring over his charts and trying to make up what he is pleased to call his mind what spot to steer for in order to get another cargo." "very possibly," i assented, with a laugh. "by the way, it is curious, but i could almost fancy her deeper in the water than she was; does it not strike you so?" "deeper in the water?" he exclaimed sharply. "no, i cannot say that it does; and even were such a thing possible, it would need an uncommonly sharp eye to discern it in such a light as this. she may be, however, for that rascal jose wrung enough good spanish dollars out of me, for his rubbish, to sink her to her waterways. but come, here is the steward, so i suppose supper is ready, and if so we may as well go below and get it, for i must plead guilty to being most ravenously hungry." notwithstanding which statement i could not avoid noticing that he toyed a great deal with his food and ate very little; which was not to be wondered at under the circumstances, for i afterwards learned that while i was below in my berth, suspecting nothing worse than the purchase and transfer of a cargo of slaves from one ship to another, a most atrocious and cold-blooded act of piracy had been committed, and that, too, under the shadow and disguise of the british flag; mendouca having coolly hoisted british colours the moment that i left the deck, and, in the guise of a british cruiser, compelled the portuguese brig to heave-to and disgorge her cargo; after which he had confined the crew below, bound hand and foot, and had scuttled their ship, leaving them to perish in her when she went down! but of this i had not the faintest suspicion until the tale was told me some time afterwards by one of the _francesca's_ own crew. with the setting of the sun the wind evinced a very decided tendency to drop, growing steadily lighter all through the first watch, until when mendouca relieved me at midnight the ship was moving at a rate of barely five knots, although she was carrying studding-sails on both sides; and when i went on deck again at four o'clock next morning it was a flat calm, and the ship was lying motionless upon the water, with her head swung round to the south-east; the swell, too, had gone down, and there was every appearance of the calm lasting for several hours at least. the appearance of the sun, as he rose, also confirmed this impression, the sky being--for a wonder in that latitude--perfectly cloudless, and of a clear, pure, soft, crystalline blue, into which the great luminary leapt in dazzling splendour, palpitating with breathless heat that promised to soon become almost unendurable. it was my custom to indulge in a saltwater bath every morning in the ship's head, one of the men playing the hose upon me for a quarter of an hour or so, and never did that bath seem a greater luxury to me than on this particular morning, for the heat came with the sun, and i envied the fish their ability to escape it by sinking deep into the cool, blue, crystalline depths; indeed i should most probably have been tempted to imitate them as far as possible by plunging overboard and swimming twice or thrice round the ship, had i not happened to have noticed a large shark under her counter, when, to test the clearness of the water, i happened to lean over the taffrail to look at the rudder and stern-post. even the men dawdled over the job of washing decks that morning, using a much greater quantity of water than usual, and placing themselves where there was a chance to get the hose played upon their bare feet and legs. and if it was hot on deck, what must it have been down in the crowded hold? it was mendouca's habit to have the gratings put on the hatchways and secured every night--when the weather would permit of the use of them instead of the solid hatches--in order to prevent anything in the shape of a rising on the part of the negroes; and all night long a thin, pungent vapour had been rising through them, telling an eloquent tale of the frightful closeness and heat of the atmosphere down there, while at frequent intervals could be heard the sound of a restless stirring on the part of the living cargo, accompanied by a long-drawn, gasping sigh, as if for breath. there was usually a good deal of carelessness and remissness manifested by the men in the removal of the gratings in the morning. i have frequently gone on deck at seven bells--when it was my eight hours in--and found them still on, although it was well understood that they were to be taken off at four bells. i was always very particular, when it was my morning watch on deck, to have the gratings removed prompt to time; on this particular morning, however, i did not wait until four bells, but took it upon myself to have the hatches thrown open as soon as there was daylight enough to enable us to see, clearly, and i am sure that the poor wretches below were grateful for even so small a measure of relief. as the day advanced the heat grew intolerable, and the consequent suffering of the blacks more intense. it is the custom on board slavers, i believe--at least it was so on board the _francesca_--to feed the slaves twice a day, the food consisting of a fairly liberal quantity of boiled rice, farina, or calavance beans--these latter being used on account of their great fattening powers, whereby the slaves are maintained in a tolerably good condition of body--with a pint of water at each meal. mendouca made it a rule to vary the diet of the slaves as much as possible on these three articles, one or the other of which was given every third day, he having found that the poor wretches thus thrived better, and took their food with more enjoyment than when fed during the entire voyage upon one kind of food only; and whenever the weather was sufficiently moderate to permit of it, he always had one-half of the slaves on deck for an airing during the time that the other half were being fed below, thus allowing room for the men who dispensed the food and water to move about, and also for the slaves to use their hands in the process of feeding; and on the particular morning of which i am now writing it was unspeakably moving and pathetic to note, as i did, the feverish eagerness and longing with which the unhappy creatures waited and watched for the arrival of the moment when they might come on deck and breathe for a few brief minutes the pure and--to them--cool and refreshing outer atmosphere. my heart ached with pity for them, and i determined that i would utilise my presence on board this accursed ship by doing everything in my power to ameliorate as far as possible the condition of the unfortunates that were imprisoned within her. and i made up my mind to begin on that very morning, if, when mendouca made his appearance, he seemed to be in a temper amenable to persuasion. when he came on deck, however, the conditions appeared anything but promising, for he was in a frightfully bad humour at the calm, cursing the weather, his own ill-luck, and everything else that he could think of to execrate. i allowed him to give unrestrained vent to his ill-humour for some minutes, and when at length he had calmed down somewhat i said-- "and yet it appears to me that this calm, about which you are complaining so bitterly, may be made excellent use of, if you will, to benefit and increase the value of your property." "indeed? in what way, pray?" he demanded. "well," said i, "there is no sail trimming to be done in this weather, and it would be downright cruelty to send the men aloft to work about the rigging in this blazing heat; why not therefore spread an awning aft, here, and set the entire watch to work, beneath its shade, to patch up such of your canvas as needs repairing? and while they are engaged upon that job i will see--if you approve of the plan--whether i cannot get the negroes to take a bath in batches in a studding-sail rigged on the fore-deck, and thus rid themselves of some of the filth that is fast accumulating on their bodies; it will do them more good and tend more to keep them in health than a double allowance of food for the remainder of the voyage. and when they have done that they can be divided into two gangs, one on deck to draw and pass water, and the other below, with all the scrubbing-brushes and swabs that can be mustered, to give the slave-deck a thorough cleansing. that is what i should do, were they my property." "well," he said musingly, "i dare say it would do the rascals a lot of good, and would certainly make the ship sweeter--i'll be bound that she could be scented a mile away in her present condition. but who is to undertake the supervision of such work? not _i_, i tell you, frankly; and i believe the hands would refuse, to a man, were i to attempt to set them to such work." "if they will rig me a studding-sail, or an old fore-course for'ard, i will do the rest--or _try_ to do it," said i. "will you?" exclaimed mendouca, in surprise. "then i am sure you may, and i heartily wish you joy of the job." "very well, then, i will set about it the first thing after breakfast," said i. and i did. i got the poor wretches forward in batches of thirty, induced them to stand in the basin-like hollow of the sail, and then set half-a-dozen of their number pumping and drawing water, and playing upon their fellows with the hose, or sluicing buckets of water over them, and the exquisite enjoyment, the unspeakable luxury of that bath, as the cool, sparkling liquid dashed upon the filth and sweat-begrimed bodies, was a sight to see! enjoyed it? why they revelled in it, so that it was with difficulty that i could get them out; the stony look of hopeless, utter despair faded temporarily out of their eyes, and some of them actually _laughed_! it was by no means a pleasant or a savoury job that i had undertaken, but witnessing the keen enjoyment that i had thus bestowed made it the most delightful that i had ever been engaged in. it occupied me the whole morning to pass the entire cargo through the bath and secure the thorough cleansing of their persons, and the whole of the afternoon to get the slave-deck properly cleansed and purified; but when the sun set that evening the ship was once more sweet and wholesome, while the slaves had--taking one with another--been on deck and actively exercised for about half a day instead of about twenty minutes morning and evening. as i had said, it did them more good than double rations for the entire voyage. even mendouca was fain to acknowledge that the day, instead of being wasted, had been well spent. we had been hoping all day that with sunset a breeze would spring up from _somewhere_--i think nobody was very particular as to the quarter from which it should come, so long as it came at all--but our hopes were doomed to disappointment; the sun went down in a perfectly clear sky, and there was no sign whatever of wind from any quarter. the same weather conditions prevailed all through the night; and when the sun rose next morning there was still not the slightest sign of wind, while the glass exhibited a slight tendency to rise. under these circumstances i thought i would endeavour to secure a repetition of the proceedings of the previous day, and so well pleased was mendouca with the improved appearance of the blacks when, as usual, half of them came on deck at breakfast-time, that he readily gave his consent; and accordingly the poor creatures were again treated to the luxury of the bath, while the slave-deck received another thorough scrubbing to cleanse it from the filth accumulated during the night. and thus the negroes were enabled to pass a second day in pure air, to the great improvement of their health and spirits; indeed, the ecstatic delight with which they lingered over their bath, and the cheerfulness with which they afterwards worked at their task of drawing water and scrubbing, chattering almost gaily together all the time, were, to me, most eloquent testimony as to the miseries that they had previously endured, cooped up, tightly wedged together, _day and night_, in the close and noisome hold. i must not omit to mention a very curious phenomenon of which i had often heard, but had never before beheld until this day. it is known among sailors as the phenomenon of "the ripples." i was on the forecastle superintending the bathing operations when it first made its appearance, the sky being at the time clear and cloudless, with the sun blazing in its midst like a huge ball of living flame, while the water was so oil-smooth and glassy that it was quite impossible to distinguish the horizon, or to determine where the sea ended and the sky began. it was hotter than i had ever felt it before; dressed only in a thin shirt and the thinnest of white trousers, the perspiration was gushing so freely from every pore of my body that my light and airy garments were saturated with it, while the atmosphere was so stagnant that it seemed impossible to inhale a sufficiency of air for breathing purposes. under these trying conditions we were, of course, all anxiously watching for a breeze; and it was with a feeling of exquisite delight that, happening to look abroad toward the north, i saw the horizon strongly marked with a line of delicate blue, indicating, as i believed, the approach of a thrice-welcome breeze. in the exuberance of my delight i shouted to mendouca, who was reclining in a hammock aft slung from the main-boom, and, of course, under the shelter of the awning-- "hurrah! here comes a breeze at last, although i do not know where it has sprung from, for there is not a cloud to be seen." mendouca sprang up in his hammock at this news, and looked in the direction to which i was pointing; then sank back again, disgustedly. "pshaw, that is no breeze--worse luck!" he cried. "that is only `the ripples.'" "the ripples?" i ejaculated. "surely not. it has every appearance of a genuine breeze!" mendouca, however, was too intensely disgusted to reply. meanwhile, the streak of blue, stretching right athwart the horizon, was advancing rapidly, bearing straight down upon the brigantine, and soon it became possible to see the tiny wavelets sparkling in the dazzling sunlight, and to detect a soft, musical, liquid-tinkling sound, such as one may hear when the tide is rising on a flat, sandy beach on a calm summer's day. but by this time i had made the disappointing discovery that the blue line was merely a belt of rippling water about a quarter of a mile wide, with a perfectly calm, glassy surface beyond it, and, as there was no advance-guard of cat's-paws, such as may usually be seen playing on the surface of the water as forerunners of an approaching breeze, i was reluctantly compelled to acknowledge to myself that mendouca was right. and so it proved; for although the line--or rather belt--of rippling water not only advanced right up to the ship, giving forth a most pleasant and refreshing liquid sound as it came, and lapping musically against the brigantine's sides for a few minutes when it reached her, but also passed on and traversed the entire visible surface of the ocean, finally disappearing beyond the southern horizon, the whole phenomenon was absolutely unaccompanied by the slightest perceptible movement of the air. this curious disturbance of the ocean's surface was twice repeated on that same day. the long, hot, breathless, and wearisome day at length drew to an end, and still there was no sign of wind; the night passed; another day dawned; and still we lay, like the craft in coleridge's _ancient mariner_, "as idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean." that day too waxed and waned without the sign of so much as a cat's-paw to revive our drooping hopes; and although during the succeeding night we were visited by a terrific thunderstorm, accompanied by a perfect deluge of rain, during which a few evanescent puffs intermittently filled our sails, and moved us perhaps a mile nearer cuba, when day again dawned there was a further recurrence of the same staring, cloudless sky of dazzling blue, the same blazing sun, the same breathless atmosphere, and the same oil-smooth sea. and as these days of calm and stagnation succeeded each other with relentless persistency, i kept up the custom of bathing the negroes and thoroughly cleansing the slave-deck, until at length the poor creatures actually grew fat and merry, so that mendouca, despite his fast-growing impatience and irritability at the continued calm, was obliged to admit that he had never seen a cargo of "black ivory" in such promising condition before. this, however, was not all; for while superintending these bathing and scrubbing operations i talked cheerfully and pleasantly to the fellows, giving them such names as tom, bob, joe, snowball, and so on, to which they readily answered, instead of abusing them and ordering them about with brutal oaths and obscenity, as was the habit of the crew; and although the poor wretches understood not a word of what was spoken to them either by the crew or by myself, yet they readily enough distinguished the difference of manner, and not only so, but they seemed to possess the faculty of interpreting one's meaning from the tones of one's voice, so that they quickly grew to understand what i wanted them to do, and did it cheerfully and with alacrity. in this manner, with persistent calm recurring day after day, we passed no less than the almost incredible time of over three weeks without moving as many miles from the spot where the wind had deserted us, mendouca's temper growing steadily worse every day, until at length he became absolutely unbearable, and i spoke to him as little as possible. and the climax was reached when one day the steward, who had been sent down into the hold to overhaul the stores, came on deck with a face as long as the main-bowline, and reported that there was only food and water enough in the ship to last ten days longer. chapter fourteen. mendouca becomes communicative. "only ten days longer?" roared mendouca, his face livid with fury and consternation. "nonsense, juan! you must have made some stupid mistake; there surely is--there _must_ be--more than that!" "i have not made any mistake at all, senor," answered the man sulkily; "it is just as i have said; there are only provisions and water enough to last us, on a full allowance, ten days longer." "then, if that is the case, all hands must be put on short allowance-- half rations--at once!" exclaimed mendouca, with an oath. "but, stop a little; there _must_ be some mistake. light your lantern again, and i will go down below with you, and satisfy myself on the point." accordingly mendouca and the steward went down into the hold together, and gave the stores an exhaustive overhaul, with the result that the original report of the latter was fully confirmed! mendouca came up from the hold, raging like a maniac, cursing the weather, the provisions, and everything else that he could think of, including myself, whom he denounced as a jonah, his ill-luck having commenced, according to his assertion, with the sparing of my life and my reception on board the _francesca_. as for the calm, he declared that it should detain him no longer; and, having searched the sky and examined the barometer in vain for any signs of a change, he gave orders for all canvas to be furled, and for the negroes to be set to work forthwith upon the sweeps, his intention being, as he stated, to keep them at it in relays or gangs until the region of apparently eternal calm had been left, and a breeze of some sort found. there were ten of these sweeps, or long, heavy oars, working through the ports, in beckets firmly lashed to ringbolts in the stanchions, that were evidently placed there expressly for that particular purpose. the loom of the sweep was long enough to admit of four men working at it, and accordingly the boatswain, having received his orders from mendouca, selected forty of the strongest-looking of the negroes, and set them to this exhausting labour, the rest of the unfortunate creatures being driven below out of the way. the vessel, lying there inert as a log on the water, proved very heavy to start, especially as the blacks knew not how to handle the sweeps, having evidently never touched one before; but, once fairly started, the craft was kept moving with comparative ease at a speed of about three and a half knots per hour. but it was cruel work for the unhappy blacks, who, naked as when they were born, were remorselessly kept at it by the boatswain and his mate, both of whom paced the deck, fore and aft, armed with a heavy "colt," which they plied unmercifully upon the shoulders of any man whom they chose to believe was not fully exerting himself, although the perspiration poured from the dark naked hides like rain. "short spells and hard work" was, however, the order of the day, and after half-an-hour of almost superhuman exertion a relief was called, a fresh gang was set to work, and the exhausted toilers were hustled below to rest and recover themselves as best they could. i remonstrated hotly with mendouca upon the needless cruelty practised by the boatswain and his mate, but i was roughly told that i did not know what i was talking about; that negroes would never work unless kept continually in wholesome dread of the lash; and that it was absolutely necessary to get every ounce of work out of them if we were not one and all to perish miserably of hunger and thirst. so, as i could do no better, i got a piece of the oldest and softest canvas i could find, and a bucket of water, with which i descended to the slave-deck and carefully bathed the poor lacerated shoulders of those unfortunates who had suffered most severely at the hands of the boatswain and his mate, a little piece of attention that i saw was most gratefully received. we made fully twenty miles of westing that day, from the time when the negroes were first set to work up to sunset, to mendouca's great gratification. indeed, so delighted was he with his own brilliant idea, that he did that night what i had never known him to do before, he indulged rather too freely in the contents of the rum-bottle. and, as a consequence, he grew garrulous and good-humouredly sarcastic over the efforts made for the suppression of the slave-trade, which he emphatically asserted would never be put down. "one very serious disadvantage which you labour under," he remarked, referring particularly to the operations of the british slave-squadron, "is that you are altogether too confiding and credulous; you accept every man as honest and straightforward until you have learned, to your cost, that he is the reverse. take the case, for example, of your attack upon chango creek. you were led to undertake it upon the representations made and the information given by lobo, the portuguese trader of banana point, weren't you? oh, i know all about it, i have heard the whole story," he interrupted himself to say, in reply to my ejaculation of surprise. "you were all very much obliged to lobo, of course; and your captain paid him handsomely for his information and assistance. i suppose there was not one of you, from the captain downward, who ever had the ghost of a suspicion that the fellow was playing you false, and that the affair was a bold yet carefully arranged plot to exterminate the whole of you, and destroy your ship, eh? no; of course you hadn't; yet i give you my word that it _was_. ay; and the only wonder to me was that it did not succeed. i suppose it was that you had a good deal more fight in you than any of them gave you credit for; and that is where so many excellently arranged traps have failed; the plotters have never made sufficient allowance for the fighting powers of the british, as i have told them over and over again. it was just that important oversight that caused what ought to have been a splendid success to result in a serious disaster; the intention was good, but, as is much too often the case, they had reckoned without their host." "but i do not understand," i cut in, as mendouca paused. "what was the plot? and how was lobo concerned in it? it appears to me that the man acted in perfect good faith; he gave us certain information which proved to be substantially correct--except that he was mistaken as to the force that we should have to encounter--and he safely piloted us to the spot from which our boat attack was to be made; i can see nothing like a plot or treachery in that." "no; of course you cannot, you sweet innocent," retorted mendouca, with fine sarcasm, "for the simple reason, as i say, that the british are altogether too trustful and confiding to see treachery or double-dealing until it is thrust openly in their faces. you are altogether too simple and unsuspicious, you navy men, to deal with the tricks and ruses of the slave-dealing fraternity; and before your eyes are opened you either die of fever, or are killed in some brush with us, or are invalided home." "it may be so," i agreed; "but so general a statement as that does not in the least help me to see what was the character of lobo's plot, or even that there was a plot at all." "well, i will tell you," said mendouca thickly, helping himself to another caulker of rum--he had already swallowed two tumblers of stiff grog since the subject had been broached, in addition to what he had previously taken--"i will tell you, because, having made up my mind that you shall never rejoin your own people, the information is not likely to do lobo any harm. when you arrived at banana point on that particular morning, your presence seriously threatened to entirely upset a very important transaction which senor lobo had in hand, namely, the disposal and shipment of a prime lot of nearly a thousand able-bodied, full-grown, male blacks that he had got snugly stowed away in two big barracoons a short distance up the creek from his factory. had your captain taken it into his head to land a party and make a search of the peninsula, the barracoons would have been discovered, and friend lobo would have been a ruined man. so, as soon as your brig was identified as a man-o'-war--and that was as soon as she could be distinctly made out--another mistake that you man-o'-war's men make, friend dugdale; you can scarcely ever bring yourselves to disguise your ships; they declare their character as far as it is possible to see them.--let me see, what was i saying? i have run clean off my course, and don't know where i am." "you were going to tell me what happened when the _barracouta_ was identified from banana point as a man-o'-war," said i. "ah, yes, exactly," answered mendouca. "well, as soon as it was discovered that your brig was a british man-o'-war, every available hand was set to work to clear everything of an incriminating character out of the two brigs that were going to ship the slaves; so that, should you overhaul them--as i was told you did--nothing might be found on board to justify their seizure. this job was successfully completed only a few minutes before you entered the creek. but that would have availed lobo nothing had your captain happened to have thought of landing upon the peninsula; the next thing, therefore, was to furnish him with a totally different subject to think about; and this lobo found in the opportune presence of the four craft in chango creek. the captains of three out of the four vessels happened to be down at banana when you arrived; and lobo--who is gifted with quite an unusual measure of persuasiveness--had very little difficulty in convincing them that you would be absolutely certain to discover their hiding-place sooner or later, and that consequently it would be a good plan to inveigle you into making an immediate attack upon them; when, by concerting proper measures of defence, they might succeed in practically annihilating you, and so sweeping a formidable enemy out of their path. the three skippers fell in readily with his plan, when he had propounded it, and also undertook to secure the cooperation of the fourth; and as the creek offered exceptional facilities for a successful defence, it was accepted that you were all as good as done for, especially as lobo had undertaken to cut the brig adrift at the right moment, so that she might be driven ashore and rendered useless for the time being, if not altogether. this matter arranged, the slave-captains left banana forthwith to carry out their plans for the defence of the creek, taking a short cut by way of the back of the creek, and taking with them also every available man that lobo could spare; the idea being to allow you to advance unmolested as far as the boom--which, they never dreamed that you would succeed in forcing--and then destroy you by a musketry fire from the banks, when, weakened by your unavailing attack upon the boom, you should at length be compelled to retire. your astounding pluck and perseverance in forcing the boom completely upset all their plans, and converted what would have been for them an easy and bloodless victory into a disastrous defeat, while it saved the lives of the survivors of the attacking party. but though it turned out disastrously for aravares, of the _mercedes_, and his friends, the plot served lobo's purpose perfectly; the shipping of the slaves on board the two brigs which were waiting for them proceeding immediately that you were clear of the creek, and both vessels getting away to sea that same night. so that, you see, it is by no means as difficult a matter to deceive and hoodwink you man-o'-war people as you choose to suppose." "no," answered i; "so it would seem. yet, by your own showing, we were not the only deceived parties; and, after all, the attack was successful, so far as we were concerned." "that is very true, and only confirms what i have always insisted upon; namely, that, in making their plans, foreigners do not allow sufficiently for british pluck and obstinacy. now _i_ do; i never leave anything to chance, but always lay my plans so carefully that the destruction or capture of my enemies is an absolute certainty. but for such careful forethought on my part, the _sapphire's_ two boats would never have fallen into my power." "the _sapphire's_ boats?" i exclaimed. "surely you do not mean to tell me that _you_ are responsible for the massacre of those two boats' crews?" "no, not the massacre of them, certainly, but their capture," answered mendouca, with a smile of gratified pride. "and are the people still alive, then?" i asked. "they were when i last heard of them," answered mendouca. "but it is quite possible that by this time they--or at least a part of them--have been tortured to death by matadi--the chief to whom i sold them--as a sacrifice to his fetish." "gracious powers, how horrible!" i exclaimed. "and to think that you, an englishman, could consign your fellow-countrymen to such a fate as that!" "why not?" demanded mendouca fiercely; "why should i be more gentle to my countrymen than they have been to me? do you think that, because i carry my fate lightly and gaily, i do not feel keenly the depth to which i have fallen? i might have been a post-captain by this time, honoured and distinguished for great services worthily rendered; but i am instead a slaver and a pirate masquerading under the disguise of a spanish name. do you think i am insensible of the immeasurable gulf that separates me from what i might have been? and it is my own countrymen who have opened that gulf--who have robbed me of the opportunity of reaching that proud eminence that was at one time all but within my reach, and have hurled me into the abyss of crime and infamy in which you find me. and you are surprised, forsooth, that i should avenge myself whenever the opportunity comes!" i knew now from experience that it was quite useless to argue with mendouca when he got upon the subject of his grievances; i therefore gave the conversation a turn by asking-- "where, then, are these wretched people now, if indeed they are still alive?" "i presume," answered he, "that, if still alive, as you say, they are where i last heard of them; namely, at matadi's village; a place on the south bank of the congo, about one hundred miles, or rather more, from its mouth. but why do you take such a profound interest in them?" he asked. "possibly you are contemplating the formation of an expedition for their rescue, as soon as you have effected your escape from me?" and he laughed satirically. my reply and his laugh were alike cut short by the sound of heavy footsteps on the companion-ladder outside the cabin, and the next moment the boatswain made his appearance in the doorway with the intimation that a craft of some sort had just been made out, at a distance of about three miles broad on the starboard bow; and he wished to know whether the course of the brigantine was to be altered or not. mendouca sprang to his feet and hurried on deck, i following him. on our first emergence from the brilliantly-lighted cabin the night appeared to be dark; but as our eyes accommodated themselves to the change of conditions, it became apparent that the cloudless sky was thickly gemmed and powdered with stars of all magnitudes, from those of the first order down to the star-dust constituting the broad belt of the milky way, all gleaming with that soft, resplendent lustre that is only to be witnessed within the zone of the tropics. moreover, there was a young moon, a delicate, crescent-shaped paring, about two days old, hanging low in the western sky, yet capable, in that pure, translucent atmosphere, of yielding quite an appreciable amount of light. the water was still smooth as polished glass, even the swell having gone down so completely that its undulations were not to be detected by even the delicate test of watching the star reflections in the polished depths, while the brigantine was as steady as though still on the stocks where she took form and substance. the negroes were still toiling at the sweeps, and the watch, armed to the teeth, were clustered fore and aft, on the alert to guard against any attempt at an outbreak among them. the canvas was all closely furled, so that we had an uninterrupted view of the sky from horizon to zenith, all around, toward the latter of which the delicate, tapering, naked spars pointed as steadily as the spires of a church. the boatswain, however, was eagerly directing mendouca's attention toward small, dark object, broad on our starboard bow; and turning my gaze toward it, i made out a brig under her two topsails, jib, and trysail, with her courses in the brails. mendouca had already seized the night-glass, and with its aid was subjecting her to a prolonged and searching scrutiny, upon the completion of which he handed the instrument to me, with the remark, in english-- "take a good look at her, dugdale, and tell me what you think of her?" i took the glass, and, having brought the stranger into its field, soon managed, by an adjustment of the focus, to get a clear, sharply-defined image of her, as she floated motionless, a black silhouette, against the deep, velvety, purple-black, star-spangled sky. and as i did so a certain sense of familiarity with the delicate, diminutive, black picture upon which i was gazing thrilled through me. surely i knew that low, long, shapely hull; those lofty, slightly-raking masts; those spacious topsails? even the very steeve of the bowsprit seemed familiar to me, and i felt certain that the superbly cut jib and handsome trysail could belong only to the _barracouta_! and, if so, how was i to act? it was plainly my duty to do anything and everything that might be in my power to promote the capture of the daring slaver and unscrupulous pirate, whose guest--or prisoner--i was; but had i the power to do _anything_? with that now thoroughly alert and even suspicious individual at my side, and the watch on deck all about me, it was clearly evident that nothing in the shape of signalling could even be attempted with the slightest hope or chance of success; and the only other mode of action that remained to me appeared to be to carefully conceal my knowledge--or, rather, very strong suspicion--as to the identity of the brig. i had barely arrived at this conclusion when mendouca, with an accent of impatience, interrupted my reverie with the exclamation-- "well, surely you have seen all that it is possible to see by this time? or cannot you quite make up your mind as to her character?" "i have an impression that i have seen her before, and it seems to me that she bears a very striking resemblance to the spanish brig that was lying off lobo's factory on the day of our first arrival in the congo," said i; the happy idea suggesting itself to me, as i began to speak, that i might safely make this statement without any breach of the truth, all of us on board the _barracouta_ having observed and remarked upon the striking resemblance between the two craft. "um! it _may_ be so," muttered mendouca, with a strong accent of doubt in his voice, however. "let me have another look at her." i handed over the glass with alacrity, for it was about my last wish just then to be questioned too closely as to the character of the stranger; and mendouca subjected her to a further long and exhaustive scrutiny. at its termination he turned to me, and, with an accent of unmistakable suspicion, inquired-- "it hasn't suggested itself to you, i suppose, that yonder craft may be a british man-o'-war? you have seen nothing so like her in your own squadron as to lead to the suspicion that she may be a dangerous enemy whom i ought to be promptly warned to avoid?" now, had i not known that he had never seen the _barracouta_, i should have scarcely known what reply to give to this home question; as it was, however, i answered at hazard-- "well, at this distance yonder vessel offers to my eye very little resemblance to the usual type of british gun-brig; she is longer, and much lower in the water, and her masts are certainly further apart than is the case with our brigs generally, you must see that for yourself; and it would be unreasonable to expect me to give a more decided opinion at this distance and in so vague a light." "will you swear to me that you are honestly of opinion that yon brig is _not_ a man-o'-war?" "certainly not," answered i, with pretended annoyance at his pertinacity. "she may be, or she may not be; it is quite impossible to express a more decided opinion, under the circumstances, and i therefore must decline to do so." and i turned and walked away from him with an air of petulance. mendouca laid down the telescope, walked to the binnacle, and peered intently for a moment at the compass. "keep her way two points more to the southward," he ordered the helmsman. this alteration in our course brought the brig about one point before our beam, distant about two and a half miles, and if persisted in, would soon have the effect of increasing the distance between the two craft; and, unless we were already seen, rendered it quite possible that we might slip past unobserved, our spars standing naked to the dark sky, and our hull lying low upon the equally dark water. there was, however, the hope that, even at the distance separating the two vessels, the roll and grinding of the heavy sweeps would be heard in the perfect stillness of air and water; and i felt confident that, if yonder brig were indeed the _barracouta_, and the sounds referred to extended so far as to reach the sharp ears on board her, they would be identified, and their significance at once understood. but even as the thought passed through my mind it seemed to have also occurred to mendouca; for he strode toward the waist and exclaimed in a low, clear voice that was distinctly audible fore and aft, but which would probably not have been audible half a cable's length away-- "let those niggers knock off sweeping for the present, and send them below. and as soon as they are there and you have clapped the hatches on--noiselessly, mind--let all hands set to work to muffle the sweeps with mats, old canvas, pads of oakum, or anything else that you can lay your hands upon. it is unfortunate that this was not thought of before; but it may not yet be too late." the negroes, grateful for this unexpected respite from their exhausting toil, and of course quite ignorant as to its cause, gladly tumbled below, and the gratings were carefully secured over them. meanwhile the boatswain, with one hand, dived below, and in a short time the two men re-appeared with a load of miscellaneous stuff and some balls of spun-yarn; and all hands went diligently to work under mendouca's personal supervision, to muffle the sweeps, which was so effectually done that when, half-an-hour later, they were again manned, they worked with scarcely a sound beyond the rather heavy splash of their blades in the water. meanwhile, during the progress of the muffling process--in which i had not offered to participate--i kept a keen watch upon the distant brig, taking an occasional squint at her through the night-glass when i thought it possible to do so without attracting mendouca's attention. i do not quite know what i expected to see, for of course i knew perfectly well that every eye in the brig might be steadfastly watching us, without our being able to detect any sign of such scrutiny; and i was moreover fully aware that should we have been discovered, and our character suspected, no visible indication of such discovery or suspicion would be permitted to reveal itself to our eyes; and the same studied concealment would equally apply to the preparations for any investigation that they might be moved to undertake. still, i thought it just barely possible that by maintaining a strict watch i might chance to detect some sign of alertness on board the brig, if she were indeed the _barracouta_, as i strongly suspected. nor was i disappointed, for i did at length detect such an indication, not on board the brig herself, but at some considerable distance from her, and immediately under the slender crescent of the setting moon, where, while sweeping the surface of the water, moved by some vague instinct, i caught two faint momentary flashes of dim orange radiance that to me had very much the appearance of reflected moonlight glancing off the wet blades of oars. and if this were so it meant that we had been seen, our character very shrewdly suspected--most probably from the steady plying of the sweeps for no more apparently urgent reason than that we were becalmed--and that a surprise attack was about to be attempted from the very quarter where, under the circumstances, it was least likely to be looked for, namely, straight ahead. of course what i had seen might merely have been a ray of moonlight glancing off the wet body of a porpoise, a whale, or some other sea creature risen to the surface to breathe; but it had so much the appearance of the momentary flash of oars that i was loath to believe it anything else. assuming it to be what i hoped, my cue was now of course to distract attention as much as possible from that part of the ocean that lay immediately ahead of us; and this could not be better done than by concentrating it upon the brig, which now lay practically abeam of us, a short three miles away. i therefore--no longer surreptitiously but ostentatiously--again brought the night-glass to bear upon her, and allowed myself to be found thus when mendouca came aft, after having personally superintended the muffling of the sweeps and the putting of them in motion again. "well," he said, as he rejoined me, "have you not yet been able to satisfy yourself as to the character of that brig?" "no," said i; "but, whatever she is, they all seem to be asleep on board her. if she is a slaver, her skipper has more care and consideration for his property than you have, for he at least allows his slaves to rest at night." "that is quite patent to us all," answered mendouca drily. "but then, you know, he may not be running short of food and water, as we are. or--he may not be a slaver." "of course," i assented, with the best accent of indifference that i could assume. "but, slaver or no slaver, i have not been able to detect a sign of life on board that brig for the last half-hour, or indeed from the moment when i first began to watch her. i can make out the faint light of her binnacle lamps, and that is all. but the fact of their being allowed to continue shining would seem to argue, to my mind at least, that, be they what they may, they have no reason for attempting to conceal their presence from us. if you feel differently toward them i think you would do well to extinguish your binnacle lights for awhile; the helmsman can steer equally well by a star, of which there are plenty to choose from." "yes, of course; you are right," he assented hastily; "there can be no harm in doing that." and going to the binnacle, he glanced into it, saw that the ship was heading on the course he had last set for her, directed the helmsman to choose a star to steer by, and then himself carefully withdrew the lamps and extinguished them. chapter fifteen. the affair of the `francesca' and the `barracouta's' boats. i continued to industriously scrutinise the brig through the night-glass, and, by so doing, contrived to keep mendouca's attention also pretty closely centred upon her; but i could see that he was fully on the alert. he appeared to instinctively scent danger in the air, for he frequently assumed an anxious, listening attitude, with a growing irritability that manifested itself in repeated execration of the slaves for the quite unavoidable splashing sounds that they made in working the sweeps. he was also intently watching the thin crescent of the setting moon that was by this time hanging on the very verge of the western horizon; and i suspected that he was awaiting her disappearance to put in practice some stratagem--such as, perhaps, a further alteration of the ship's course--as an additional safeguard. but, whatever may have been his intentions, they were all altered by an unlucky discovery made by one of the men on the forecastle, who, at the very moment when the moon was in the act of sinking behind the horizon, caught sight for a moment of a large boat full of men strongly outlined against the golden crescent, and immediately reported the fact, coming aft that he might do so without raising his voice. "a boat!" exclaimed mendouca anxiously, when the man had told what he had seen. "are you _quite_ sure?" "as sure as i am that i am now standing here speaking to you, senor," answered the man, in a tone of conviction. "jose saw it also. we were both watching the disappearing moon, and when she was about half-way below the horizon we suddenly saw a large boat, pulling, i should say, at least twelve oars, glide swiftly across her face, as though steering to the southward on a line that would cross our course." "phew!" ejaculated mendouca; "that looks serious. for it undoubtedly means that the brig's people are by no means as fast asleep as you have imagined them to be, dugdale. how far off did you judge the boat to be when you saw her?" he demanded, turning again to the seaman. "a matter of a mile and a half, or perhaps a trifle more," was the answer. "very well, then, that will do," answered mendouca. "`forewarned is forearmed,' as the english say. as you go forward pass the word along for the sweeps to be laid in and stowed away, and for the negroes to be sent below, and the hatch gratings put on and secured. and, do you hear, everything must be done as noiselessly as possible." "bueno, senor," answered the man, as he turned away to do mendouca's bidding; and in a few minutes the sweeps were laid in and stowed away, and the brigantine's head gently turned more to the southward, in order that she might drift in that direction as long as she retained her way. then, the slaves having been driven below and secured, the decks were rapidly but noiselessly cleared for action, the guns were cast loose and loaded, a liberal supply of grape and canister was passed on deck, arms were served out to the men, and the boarding nettings were triced up all round the ship. the whole of the work was executed so rapidly and silently as to clearly demonstrate that the crew was a thoroughly seasoned one, inured to fighting, and by no means averse to it when the chances were in their favour, as they certainly were in the present instance; and i was filled with chagrin and disgust at the thought of how simple an accident had sufficed to mar and defeat what might otherwise have proved a perfect surprise to mendouca and his crew. still, although i could not conceal from myself the fact that this apparently trivial accident had placed the attacking party at a woeful disadvantage, by warning their antagonists of the intended attack, and thus putting them on the alert, i had seen enough of british pluck to hope that even yet, despite all, it might still prove successful; and i awaited the event with no small anxiety, quite determined that if the slightest chance offered of affording any aid to the assailants, i would avail myself of it, let the consequences to myself be what they would. but mendouca soon proved that he was not the man to overlook any such peril as this; for presently, when by personal inspection he had satisfied himself that everything was in readiness, he came up to me and said, with just the suspicion of a sneer in the tones of his voice-- "now, dugdale, i will not pay you so poor a compliment as to suppose you capable of treacherously making use of your present position on board my ship, to raise your hand against the man who gave you your life, at the moment when his whole attention will be needed to protect himself against outside enemies. still, your conscience appears to be a very curious and inscrutable thing, and there is no knowing what it may prompt you to do under the influence of excitement and misguided enthusiasm. in order therefore that you may be placed beyond the danger of temptation to do something that you would probably afterwards have cause to bitterly regret, i will ask you to go below to your cabin, where, for your own safety's sake, i will take the liberty of locking you in, with a companion whose duty it will be to see that you remain there and do not commit yourself by any rash act." "oh, certainly!" i answered, rather bitterly. "needs must when the devil drives; so lead on, most courteous senor." "look here, dugdale," said he, apparently rather hurt by my tone, "you must not feel yourself aggrieved at my action in this matter. what i propose to do is for your own good and safety, quite as much as by way of a safeguard of my own. my men are fairly amenable to discipline in their calmer moments, as you have doubtless discovered by this time; but i should be sorry to answer for them in the excitement of a fiercely-contested fight, such as this is likely to be; and since you have persistently refused to join us out and out, i honestly think it will be safer for you to be below out of sight until we have driven those meddlesome boats off." "very well," said i; "it must of course be as you please. only, for mercy's sake, spare me the humiliation of mounting a guard over me!" he looked me intently in the eyes for a moment, and then said-- "all right, i will; you shall be locked up by yourself. only, for your own sake, be careful to behave exactly as you would in the presence of a guard; for i promise you that, if i have the slightest reason to suspect any treachery on your part, you will be sorry that i ever spared your life. now, come along, for there is no time to spare." i accordingly followed him below and entered my cabin, closing the door behind me, and i immediately heard him turn the key and withdraw it from the lock, after which he went on deck again; and for a time the most perfect stillness and silence reigned throughout the ship. the silence was not of long duration, however; for i had scarcely been in my cabin ten minutes when i heard a low murmur of voices overhead, and the next instant mendouca's voice pealed outs loud and clear, in english-- "ho, the boats ahoy! who are you, and what do you want?" there was some reply that i could not catch, the voice evidently coming from a point at some distance from the ship, on the opposite side to that occupied by my cabin. it was probably an inquiry as to name and destination of the brigantine, for mendouca shouted-- "the _nubian queen_, of and for liverpool, from the brass river, with oil and ivory. keep off, or i will fire into you! i warn you that we are armed, and are quite prepared to defend ourselves." a long hail from the boats now followed, to which mendouca replied-- "if you do it will be at your peril; i have been cleared out once before just about this same spot, and i do not intend to be robbed a second time. keep off, i tell you! if you advance another stroke i will fire!" and instantly afterwards i heard him say to his own men in spanish-- "now, lads, you have them all in a cluster, let them have it. fire!" the sharp, ringing report of the brigantine's nine-pounders immediately pealed out, and even through the shock and concussion of the discharge i thought that, as i stood with my ear at the open port, i caught the sound of a crash. whether this was so or not, there could be no mistake about the screams and groans of agony that came floating over the water in response to our broadside, mingled with cries of command, the roll and dash of oars in the water, a rattling volley of musketry, and the deeper notes of two boat-guns fired almost together, the shot of one at least of which i heard and felt strike the hull of the brigantine. all was now in an instant noise and confusion on deck; the silence that had held the tongues of the crew was now no longer necessary, and the jabber, the oaths, the shouting, the loud, defiant laughs, the rumbling of the gun-carriages, the creaking of tackle-blocks, the thud of rammers and sponges, the calls for cartridges, all combined to create a hubbub that would not have shamed the builders of babel; and through all and above all rose mendouca's voice in short, sharp sentences of appeal, encouragement, and direction to his men. i could hear, by the furious grinding of handspikes, the breathless ejaculations of the men, and the crash of the gun-carriages as the guns were run out, that the _francesca's_ crew were working like demons; and almost before i could have believed it possible, they had again loaded their guns and a second broadside rang out over the still water, to be again followed by a still more gruesome chorus of cries and groans, and the sudden cessation of the sound of the oars, loud above which rose the exultant cheers of the ruffians on deck. "hurrah, lads!" i heard mendouca exclaim joyously; "load again smartly, but with grape and canister only this time. we have checked them for a moment, but they have not yet had enough, i fear; they will come at us again as soon as they have picked up their shipmates, so now is your time; load and let them have it while they are stationary!" and while he was speaking i could also hear a voice--that, unless i was greatly mistaken, belonged to young, the first luff of the _barracouta_--exclaiming at no great distance-- "pull starboard, back port; now back, hard, all, and let us pick up those poor fellows before the sharks get the scent of them! easy all; steady, lads, steady; hold water! now then, my hearties, lay hold of the oars and let us get you inboard sharp; we can't afford to lie here to be peppered. help the wounded, those of you who are unhurt. that's your sort, styles, bring him along here; is he still alive, do you think? all right, i have him! now then, coxswain, heave with a will, but don't hurt the poor fellow more than you can help. gently, man, gently; now lift handsomely, so--" _crash_! the relentless broadside of the _francesca_ again pealed forth, and again uprose that dismal wail of shrieks in testimony of its too terribly truthful aim. frantic cheers and shouts of exultation burst from the lips of the slaver's crew, in the midst of which mendouca's voice rang out-- "now, stand by, men! here they come; but there is only one boat-load of them, and half their number must be killed or wounded. stand by with your pikes, pistols, and cutlasses, and let not one of them show his head above the rail. give them a volley from your pistols as they range alongside, and then trust to cold steel for the rest. _now_ is your time! fire!" and at the word there followed a tremendous popping of pistols, mingled with the yells of the men on deck, a british cheer that sent the blood tingling through my veins and made me anathematise my helpless condition, the sharp, ringing clash of steel upon steel, and a furious trampling of bare feet upon the planks overhead. the scuffle continued for fully three minutes, and must have been very hot while it lasted, for all through the hubbub the cries and groans of the freshly-wounded were continuous. i could hear the dull crunching sound of the sharp cutlasses shearing through bone and muscle, the shrill scream of agony, the heavy thud of bodies falling to the deck, oaths and execrations both in spanish and in english, shouts of mutual encouragement, yells of deadly hatred, the ceaseless trampling of feet, and all the indescribable medley of sounds that accompany a sharp and stubbornly-contested hand-to-hand conflict; and in my feverish anxiety to share in the struggle i forgot all about mendouca's warning, and dashed myself frantically against the stout cabin-door in an effort to burst my way out. before, however, i could succeed the hurly-burly suddenly ceased, to be almost instantly followed by a yell of exultation from the crowd overhead as the hasty rattle and splash of oars proclaimed that the attacking party had been driven off. "now, men, to your guns again, quick! load smartly and give them another broadside before they get out of range!" shouted mendouca. "sweep them off the face of the water, if you can; let not one of them escape to tell the tale!" a loud shout of exulting assent to this brutal exhortation pealed forth; and i heard the rumbling of the wheels on the deck as the guns were run in. this was more than i could endure; and again hurling myself furiously against the cabin-door, i at length succeeded in bursting it off its hinges. to emerge from the cabin and rush on deck was the work of a moment, and i reached the scene of action just as the loaded guns were being run out. "stop!" i shouted. "what are you about to do, men? you have utterly mistaken your captain's orders if you suppose he meant you to fire upon that boat! order them to secure the guns," i continued, turning to mendouca; "it surely _cannot_ be that you are going to allow the excitement of battle to betray you into the committal of a cold-blooded murder? you have beaten off your enemies, and they are in full retreat; let that satisfy you. hitherto you have been _fighting_, and, as you are aware, the present state of the law is such that you are held justifiable in your act of self-defence; but should you fire upon that boat now it will be _murder_, and i swear to you that if you do i will testify against you for the deed, if i live so long. man, have you no regard for _yourself_? do you suppose that the captain of yonder brig will be content to take the beating off of his boats as a final settlement of this night's doings? i tell you he will follow you and hunt you to the world's end, ay, and _take_ you, sooner or later! and what do you suppose will be your fate if you murder that retreating boat's crew? why, you will swing for the deed, as certainly as that you now stand there glaring at me!" "have you finished?" he demanded, in a voice almost inarticulate with fury, his hand resting meanwhile upon the butt of a pistol that was stuck in his sash. "yes," said i, "i have. that is to say, i have finished if i have succeeded in preventing the perpetration of an act of miserable cowardice that in your cooler moments would cause you to hate and despise yourself for the remainder of your life; not otherwise." slowly he removed his hand from the butt of his pistol and, with a bitter laugh, drew a cigar from his pocket and lighted it. "secure the guns!" he shouted to his men. then walking up to me and clutching me by the shoulder, he said-- "you have triumphed again. but i warn you that some day you will go too far, and pay for your temerity with your life. do you know that while you were speaking you were actually tottering upon the very brink of the grave? why i did not blow your brains out, i do not know. boy, if you have any wish to live out your days, never taunt me with cowardice again! there, go below, and do not let me see you again until i have recovered my self-command, or even yet i shall do you a mischief." "no," i said, "i will _not_ go below; it is my watch on deck, and i mean to keep it. i have no fear of your temper getting the better of you now, so i shall remain where i am--that is, if you will trust me with the charge of the deck. i am fresh, while you are fagged with exertion and excitement, so it is for _you_ to go below and get some rest, not i." mendouca laughed again, this time quite genially, and said-- "very well, let it be as you say; i _will go_ below and rest. and if it is any comfort to you to know it, i do not mind acknowledging _now_ that i am glad you intervened to prevent me from firing on that boat. keep her as she is going and let the niggers man the sweeps again; you are right about that brig, she will follow us to the world's end--if she can, so we must put all the distance possible between ourselves and her while this calm lasts." and, repeating to the boatswain his orders respecting the manning of the sweeps, this singular man nodded shortly to me and dived out of sight down the companion-way. in a few minutes a gang of slaves was again brought on deck and put to the sweeps; and steering a course of about south-south-west, we were soon once more moving through the water at a speed of about three knots. this course was followed all through the night and up to eight o'clock the next morning, at which hour--one of the men having been sent aloft as far as the royal-yard to see whether any sign of the brig could be discovered, and having returned to the deck again with an intimation that the horizon was clear all round--the brigantine's position was pricked off upon the chart and her head once more pointed straight for cuba. we had by this time traversed a distance of fully sixty miles under the impulsion of the sweeps alone, and everybody was anxiously watching for some sign of a coming breeze; yet, despite the already long continuance of the calm, the heavens were still as brass to us, clear, cloudless, blue as the fathomless depths beneath our feet, not the merest vestige of cloud to be seen, the mercury still persistently steady at an abnormal height, the sea as smooth and motionless as a sheet of glass, and not the smallest sign to justify us in hoping for any change. the heat was something absolutely phenomenal; the deck planking was so hot that we all had to wear shoes to protect our feet from being scorched; a gang of negroes was kept constantly at work drawing water with which to flood the deck; yet, despite this precaution, and despite, too, the awnings which were now spread fore and aft, the pitch in the seams of the planking became so soft that if i stood still for only a few seconds i found myself stuck fast. i pitied the unfortunate blacks from the bottom of my heart, for they were relentlessly kept toiling at those horrible sweeps without intermission all through the day, and that, too, upon a short allowance of water; but it was useless to interfere, for even i had begun to understand by this time that, unless the brigantine could be taken out of that awful region of apparently eternal calm, every one of us, black and white together, must inevitably perish miserably of thirst. this terrible weather lasted all through that and the following day, during which, with torment indescribable from thirst and the lash of the boatswains' colts, the miserable slaves propelled the ship no less a distance than one hundred and fifty miles. oh, how fervently i begged and entreated mendouca to have mercy upon the unhappy creatures, and to at least give orders that they must be no more flogged, even if inexorable necessity demanded that they must be kept toiling at the sweeps. but the wretch was as adamant, he laughed and jeered at my sympathy with the poor creatures, and--as much, i believe, to annoy me as for any other reason--persistently refused to give the order, declaring that, since they would receive many a sound flogging when they got ashore--if indeed they ever lived to reach it--it was just as well that they should learn to endure the lash at once. at which brutal statement i went temporarily mad, i think--at all events i did what looked like a thoroughly mad thing; i went on deck and, walking up to the boatswain, informed him that if he or his mate dared to strike a negro again i would knock them both down. mendouca, highly amused at my heat and excitement on behalf of the negroes, had followed me on deck, probably to see what i would next do; and upon hearing this threat he called out, jeeringly-- "look out, jose, my man! senor dugdale has warned you, and you may be sure that if you strike one of those niggers again he will carry out his threat!" the boatswain saw at once how the land lay, and that mendouca was only amusing himself at my expense; feeling confident therefore of his captain's countenance and protection, i suppose, he, for answer, raised his colt and smote the nearest negro a savage blow over the shoulders with it. of course, after my possibly foolhardy threat there was but one thing to do, and i did it forthwith, hitting out with my whole strength, catching the boatswain fair between the eyes, and rolling him over like a ninepin. "ha, ha! well hit!" exclaimed mendouca, laughing heartily at the sight of the boatswain as he reeled and fell under the feet of the negroes. "i warned you, jose, my lad; and now you see the evil results of neglecting my warning! no, no," he hastily continued, starting to his feet; "put up your knife, man; that will never do! i cannot afford to spare senor dugdale--at least not just yet--ah! would you? look out, dugdale! bravo! well hit again! serves you right, jose; you should never draw your knife upon an unarmed man." for the fellow had hastily scrambled to his feet, and, with his drawn knife in his hand, made a rush at me, his eyes blazing with fury. and, as the only way of defending myself at the moment, i had seized his uplifted right hand with my left, giving it a wrench that sent the knife spinning over the bulwarks into the sea, while with my right i again knocked him down. "now, jose," exclaimed mendouca, "that ends the matter; do you hear? i cannot spare senor dugdale, so if he is found with a knife between his ribs i shall hold you responsible for it, and i give you my solemn promise that i will run you up to the yard-arm and leave you there until it will not matter to you what becomes of your miserable carcase. and i hope that the thrashing you have received will make you use a little more discrimination in the use of your colt. if a nigger _won't_ work, _make_ him, by all means; but so long as they are willing to work without thrashing, leave them alone, i say. as for you, dugdale," he continued, in english, "had i suspected that you really meant to carry out your threat, i would have taken steps to prevent it. i will not have my men interfered with in the execution of their duty. if they do not perform their duty to my satisfaction, _i_ will take such steps as may seem necessary for their correction, so you need not trouble yourself further in that direction. why, man, if i were to give you a free hand, we should have a mutiny in less than a week. moreover, you have made one deadly enemy by knocking jose down, and you may consider yourself exceedingly fortunate if my authority proves sufficient to protect you from his knife. take care you make no other enemies among the men, or i will not be answerable for your safety." this occurred shortly before sunset, and all through the hot and breathless night the unhappy negroes were kept toiling at the sweeps in gangs or relays, the result being that when morning dawned the poor wretches seemed, one and all, to be utterly worn-out. yet still there was no respite for them; and when i again attempted to remonstrate with mendouca, that individual simply pointed to the serene, cloudless sky, with the blazing, merciless sun in the midst, and savagely asked whether i wanted all hands to perish of hunger and thirst. this occurred while we were at breakfast; and when we went on deck at the conclusion of the meal, my enemy the boatswain drew mendouca's attention to the upper spars and sails of a ship just rising slowly above the horizon on our starboard bow. i never saw so sudden a change in a man's demeanour as took place in that of mendouca when his eye rested upon that distant object; hitherto he had been growing every day more savage and morose, but now his good-humour suddenly returned to him, and, ordering the brigantine's head to be pointed straight for the stranger, he shouted, in the gladness of his heart-- "hurrah, lads, there is relief for us at last! we shall find what we want--food and water--on board yon stranger, and also a way of persuading them to let us have it, or i am greatly mistaken!" the significance of the last part of this remark was, to my mind, unmistakable. if he could not get by fair means what he wanted, mendouca had already made up his mind to take it by force; in other words, to commit an act of piracy. i was sorry for the crew of the unlucky craft, for i felt convinced that mendouca would have but scant consideration for their future wants while satisfying his own; yet the sight of the stranger filled me with almost delirious delight, for here was a chance--if i could but contrive to avail myself of it--to make my escape from my present surroundings. true, if i were permitted, or could contrive, to throw in my lot with those people yonder, i should probably have to face terrible suffering in the shape of hunger and thirst, but, after all, that would be less unendurable than my present situation; and i determined that, whatever might happen, i would certainly make an attempt to join them, always provided, of course, that the craft was honest, and not of a similar character to the _francesca_. as we neared the stranger she proved to be a handsome, full-rigged ship of about a thousand tons measurement, or thereabouts, and i thought that she had somewhat of the look of one of the new british clipper indiamen that were just at this time beginning to supersede the old-fashioned, slow, lumbering tubs that had been considered the correct kind of thing by john company; if she were, she would probably have a crew strong enough not only to successfully resist the demands of mendouca, but also to protect me, should i be able by any pretext to get on board her. the difficulty, of course, would be to do this; but if, as i rather expected, mendouca should elect to lay the _francesca_, alongside the ship and endeavour to carry the latter by a _coup de main_, i would board with the rest, taking my chance of being run through or shot down in the attempt, and immediately place myself under the protection of the stranger's crew. it was of course easy enough to arrange this scheme in my own mind, but even a very slight deviation on mendouca's part from the programme which i expected him to adopt might suffice to nullify it; nevertheless, it appeared probable that my surmise as to mendouca's intentions would prove correct, for if he did not mean to lay the stranger aboard and carry her with a rush, i could scarcely understand the boldness with which he was approaching her in broad daylight, with his strongly-manned sweeps proclaiming to the most unsuspicious eye the dubious character of the brigantine. chapter sixteen. the capture and plundering of the `bangalore,' indiaman. it was just six bells in the afternoon watch when we at length arrived within a distance of about half-a-mile of the stranger, which had by this time been unmistakably made out to be a british passenger ship of one of the crack lines; first by her having hoisted british colours some time before, and secondly by the crowd of well-dressed ladies and gentlemen that, with the aid of the telescope, we could see congregated on her poop. mendouca also had hoisted the british ensign, and, to my supreme indignation, a man-o'-war's pennant, his object in doing so being, of course, to disarm suspicion as long as possible, and thus leave the ship only a very brief length of time to prepare for defence when our intention to attack her became no longer possible of concealment. i remonstrated with him upon this desecration of the colours that he had once fought and hoped to win fame under; but of course my remonstrance was quite useless, the rascal only laughed at me. having arrived within the above-named distance of the ship, mendouca ordered the sweeps to be laid in, and the slaves to be driven below and secured. this done, to my disgust his next order was to hoist out the boats--of which the _francesca_, unlike most slavers, carried three; and as soon as they were in the water, the entire crew were armed, and the whole of them, except my especial enemy, jose, and an englishman--a very quiet, inoffensive fellow, whom i was surprised to find among a crew of such ruffians--were ordered down over the side. this completely upset my plans, for, of course, the only way now of reaching the stranger was by means of the boats, or by swimming; and while i would gladly have gone in one of the boats, and taken my chance of reaching the stranger's deck alive, i was not quite prepared to throw away my life in an unsuccessful effort to swim to the ship--for that is what it would have meant, the water being alive with sharks that had followed us, day after day, with alarming persistency, ever since we had taken to the use of the sweeps. besides which, i should of course not have been permitted to make the attempt. of course, had i chosen to tell a deliberate falsehood, and declared my readiness to throw in my lot with mendouca and his crew, it is possible that i might have been given the command of one of the boats; but not even for the purpose of effecting my escape did i consider that such a course would be justifiable. so i had perforce to remain where i was, under the jealously watchful eye of jose, if not of the englishman also; mendouca asking me ironically, as he went down the side last of all, whether i had no letters for home or elsewhere that i would like to forward by means of the stranger. now that the sweeps were laid in, and their everlasting grind and roll and splash were no longer heard, the silence of nature seemed so profound as to be almost awe-inspiring; there was literally not a sound to be heard save such as were caused by human agency, such as the movements and voices of the men in the boats, or the gasping sighs of the unhappy negroes cooped up below in the stifling hold. occasionally a slight murmur of sound reached us from the distant ship; the call of an officer uttering a command, the "yo-heave-oh" of the crew, or a gang of them, engaged upon some heavy job, and an occasional rumbling that to my ear sounded very much like that of carronade slides in process of being trained to bear upon some object. but if the ship was armed there was no sign of it, her sides being decorated with _painted_ ports only, so far as i could see. when, however, the boats had traversed about half the distance between the brigantine and the ship, a man appeared in the mizen rigging of the latter, and, hailing them in english in a voice which rendered his words perfectly audible to us on board the _francesca_, demanded to know what they wanted. i saw mendouca rise in the stern-sheets of his boat, and heard him make some reply, but i could not distinguish what it was, perhaps because he had intentionally made it unintelligible. whatever the words may have been, they were clearly unsatisfactory; for the figure in the rigging waved its hand warningly, and shouted-- "keep off, whoever you are; you are far too strong a party to be allowed to come alongside us; and i warn you that if you attempt to do so we shall fire upon you! if you have any legitimate business with us let _one_ boat, with a crew of not more than five, come alongside, and welcome; but we will not have the whole of you if we can help it, and i think we can!" the boats had, up to this time, been paddling quietly and composedly along, the men evidently husbanding their strength for a final effort; but now, in response to a shout from mendouca, they bent to their work, and sent the boats foaming along in a style for which i certainly should never have given them credit; they could scarcely have done better had they been the british man-o'-war's men that they had pretended to be; the oars bent, the water was churned into foam, and a miniature surge gathered under each boat's bow as the little craft was suddenly urged to racing speed. then the figure in the ship's mizen rigging waved an arm, and stepped quietly down on to the poop, which by this time was occupied only by a band of men--evidently passengers--who, under the leadership of a military-looking man, were handling their muskets and making ready to open fire. at the signal given by the individual who had just stepped out of the ship's rigging--and who was no doubt her captain-- eight hitherto closed ports in the stranger's bulwarks were suddenly thrown open, as many dark, threatening, iron muzzles appeared, and, at a second command, the whole eight blazed forth, and their contents, consisting of round-shot with a charge of grape on top of each, went hurtling through the air in the direction of the boats. the aim was excellent, the shot flashing up the water all round the boats; but, so far as i could see, not a man among either of their crews was touched. i heard mendouca cheer his men on, urging them to stretch out, and get so close to the ship, that by the time that the guns were again loaded, it would be impossible to depress the muzzles sufficiently to hit the boats; and the men responded with the nearest approach to a cheer that, i suppose, a spaniard can give, pulling manfully the while. the ship's crew were, however, too quick for them, and managed to give them another broadside just before the boats got within the critical limit where it would have been impossible to touch them; and this time the discharge was very much more effective, a round-shot striking mendouca's own boat square on the stem just at the water-line, destroying her bows and tearing several feet of her keel away, while the accompanying charge of grape bowled over three of her men and shattered mendouca's left arm at the elbow. the crews of the other two boats suffered nearly as badly, one of them losing three men, while the other lost one man killed and five more or less severely wounded, besides having to stop and pick up mendouca and his crew, his boat sinking almost immediately. i thought that this severe punishment would have sufficed the spaniards, and that they would have abandoned the attack, and so, i imagine, thought the skipper of the ship, for while they were in this perilous predicament, he magnanimously withheld his fire, giving them an opportunity to retire without further loss. and so they would, in all probability, had mendouca been a born spaniard. but, renegade as he was, the british blood in his veins still told, and, despite the anguish of his terrible wound, he no sooner found himself in the boat that picked him up than his voice again rang out almost as loudly and clearly as before, still urging his men to press forward, and reminding them that they were fighting for their lives, or--what was the same thing-- food and water. it was probably this reminder that turned the scale among the waverers, for at the mention of the word "water" they again seized their oars, and with a yell gave way for the ship. evidently exasperated at this quite unexpected exhibition of determination on the part of the pirates, the little band on the poop now opened a smart and very galling fire with their muskets upon the boats, and i saw three or four pairs of arms tossed skyward as the discharge rattled forth. but before the weapons of this little party of volunteers could be reloaded the boats were alongside the ship, the pirates dropped their oars, and made a simultaneous dash for the fore and main channels, and there instantly ensued a desperate _melee_ in which the popping of pistols was for the first half-minute or so a very prominent feature. i fully expected to see mendouca and his crew driven back into their boats with a very heavy loss; but, to my astonishment and sorrow, i soon saw that they were more than holding their own, and in less than three minutes they had actually forced their way inboard, and the right was transferred to the ship's decks. it was evident that the british crew were now making a most determined and desperate resistance, for the fight was protracted to fully a quarter of an hour, the clink and clash of steel, the shouts of the combatants, and the cries of the wounded being distinctly audible to us on the deck of the _francesca_. then the hubbub suddenly lulled, and i heard cries for quarter, cries which, to my bitter grief, i knew to be the sure indication of defeat on the part of the british crew. then utter silence fell upon the unfortunate ship for a few minutes, to be broken by the muffled sound of women's shrieks, men's voices uplifted in fierce, impotent anger and denunciation, two or three pistol-shots that sounded as though they had been fired in the ship's cabin, and then silence again; an ominous, dreadful silence that to my foreboding mind might mean the perpetration of horrors to which those already enacted on the blood-stained decks were as nothing. this silence prevailed for fully an hour, during which no sign of life was visible on board the ship; then arose the sound of hilarious shouts and drunken laughter; there was a sudden stir and commotion about the decks; a crowd of men gathered on the poop, many of them with their hands bound behind them--as i could see with the aid of a telescope-- while others had their heads swathed in blood-stained bandages; a long plank was rigged out over the taffrail; and then mendouca appeared to be making some sort of a speech. if such was the case the speech was a very brief one; and when it terminated a short pause ensued, and i saw that a few of the prisoners--perhaps three or four, as nearly as i could make out--were being released from their bonds. then occurred another short pause, at the expiration of which a man was led forward, blindfolded, and guided to the inner extremity of the plank, along which i could see that they were urging him to walk. he advanced a few paces, paused, as though he had been addressed, and i distinctly saw him shake his head. as though this movement of the head were a prearranged signal, the inner end of the plank suddenly tilted up, and the unfortunate man, with a staggering movement as though to save himself fell with a resounding splash into the sea, where for a few seconds he seemed to struggle desperately. not for long, however; the sharks that had been haunting us for so many days heard the splash, and after a few restless movements, as though unwilling to leave us, darted off toward the ship. i saw the horrid triangular fins cleaving the surface of the glassy water, each leaving its own delicate wedge-shaped wake spreading astern as it went, until the small ripples of the different wakes met and crossed each other; then, as the distance between them and their prey lessened, there was a sudden increase of speed which soon became a rush, the black fins merged toward each other, the water swirled round the drowning man, there was a single ear-piercing shriek of agony, and the poor wretch had disappeared. this dreadful spectacle appeared to have had its desired effect, for i saw that several more of the prisoners were now being released from their bonds, the released men, one and all, slinking down off the poop and away forward toward the forecastle. there were others, however-- fifteen in all, for i counted them--whose courage was not to be shaken even by this awful ordeal, and one after the other they boldly trod the fatal plank, and went to meet their dreadful doom! all honour to them, say i, for the lofty courage that enabled them to choose death rather than an ignoble and crime-stained life. then there was another long pause, during which, as i afterwards learned, the _francesca's_ crew were rummaging the ship--a homeward-bound indiaman, named the _bangalore_--and loading her decks with booty of every imaginable description, preparatory to its transfer to the brigantine. mendouca, i must mention, had already compelled the _bangalore's_ surgeon to dress his wound for him; and now, having given his orders to one of the men whom he considered the most reliable and trustworthy of his crew, he returned to the _francesca_, and, with the aid of his son pedro, was got into his bunk, where i could hear him from time to time grinding his teeth in agony, although, such was the spirit of the man, not a groan would he permit to escape him. the sun had set, and the velvet dusk of the tropics was closing down upon the scene, when at length the _bangalore's_ boats were hoisted out, and the work of transhipping the booty began. mendouca must have felt himself a second kidd, for the ship was almost as rich a prize as one of the old acapulco galleons; there were bales of rich silks and shawls, spices, caskets of gems, ingots of gold, exquisite embroidered muslins, and i know not what beside--goods of a value sufficient, it seemed to me, to make every rascal on the books of the _francesca_ rich for the remainder of his life, although they were of course unable to take more than a comparatively small quantity of the _bangalore's_ entire cargo. nevertheless, they contrived to find room for a goodly proportion of the most costly and valuable contents of the vessel's hold, the transfer of which, and of as much food and water as they deemed necessary to their requirements, occupied the crew until midnight; for in mendouca's absence, as may be supposed, they did not trouble to exert themselves overmuch. moreover, a large proportion of them were in such a state of intoxication they scarcely knew what they were doing--my especial _bete-noir_ the boatswain among the number, he having seized an early opportunity to board the ship after mendouca had been safely bestowed in his own cabin. i did not know this until told so by simpson, the english man whom i have already mentioned as having been left on board the _francesca_ that afternoon with the boatswain and myself, who added to his information-- "better keep your weather-eye liftin', mr dugdale, sir; that jose's full of spite as an egg's full of meat; he have never forgiven you for knockin' him down, and have swore over and over again to put his knife into you. and now that he's full of drink, and the skipper's on his beam-ends, he's just as likely as not to try it." "yes, i suppose he is. thank you for the warning, simpson," said i. the man put his finger to his forehead in acknowledgment of my thanks, but continued to linger near me; and presently it dawned upon me that he had something further to say. so i turned to him and inquired-- "is there anything particular that you wish to say to me, simpson?" "well, yes, sir, there is, if i only knowed how to say it," answered the man, in a low, cautious tone of voice and with a somewhat hesitating manner. he paused for a second or two, as though in consideration, and then, looking me full in the face, said-- "i hopes you'll excuse me askin' of you the question, mr dugdale, but might you be a-thinkin' of gettin' away out o' this here brigantine, supposin' that you sees a good chance for to do so? i ain't askin' out of any impertinence or curiosity, sir, i beg you to believe; but my meanin' is this here, if so be as it happens that you _was_ thinkin' of any such thing, i was wonderin' whether we mightn't be able to go together, and be of sarvice to one another in a manner of speakin'." "oh," said i, "that is your idea, is it? are you not satisfied with your present berth then, simpson?" "no, sir, i'm not, to tell the truth of it," answered the man. "i know that it's rather a risky thing to say aboard of this here wessel; but the truth is that i _ain't_ satisfied at all, and haven't been for a long while; not since mr arrowsmith--or senor mendouca, as he now calls hisself--took up to the piratin' business. so long as it was just a matter of runnin' a cargo of slaves across the atlantic, i didn't mind so much, for there was plenty of dollars goin', and i didn't see that there was much harm in it, for i don't suppose the poor beggars is any worse off on the sugar and 'baccy plantations than they are in their own country. but when it comes to work like what's been done to-day, i wants to be out of it; and i don't mind sayin' so to you straight out, mr dugdale, because you're a naval hofficer, you are, sir, and of course as such you're bound to be dead against such things as has happened since you've been aboard here. besides, i've been a-watchin' of you, sir--askin' your pardon for the same, mr dugdale--and i've seen that this ship and her doin's ain't no more to your taste than they are to mine." "you are right, simpson, they are not," said i; "and since you have been so frank with me, i will be equally so with you. you have rightly guessed that i would gladly make my escape from this accursed brigantine, if i could; and i had quite made up my mind that if, as i fully expected, captain mendouca had run alongside that ship this afternoon, i would board with the rest, and then join the british crew in their defence of their own ship." "it's perhaps just as well then for you, sir, and for me too, that matters was arranged different," answered simpson; "because, if the thing had come off as you planned it, i don't suppose that your joinin' of the other side would have made that much difference that they'd have beat off the skipper and his lot; and if they hadn't, and you'd fallen alive into the hands of the skipper, he'd have--well, i don't know what he wouldn't have done to you; but i'm mortal sure that you wouldn't have been alive now. but perhaps, sir, you've been thinkin', as i have, that even now it mayn't be too late to do somethin'." "yes," said i, "i have. while you have been talking to me a multitude of ideas have thronged through my mind, disconnected and vague, certainly, but still capable perhaps of being worked into shape. and i do not mind admitting to you, simpson, that your proposal to join me in any attempt that i may be disposed to make simplifies matters a great deal. the most important factor in the problem before us is: how will yonder ship be dealt with when the _francesca's_ people have done with her? will she be destroyed, or will she be left, with those unfortunate passengers--most probably with no knowledge whatever of nautical matters--to drift about at the mercy of wind and sea, to take her chance of being fallen in with, or to founder in the first gale of wind that happens to come her way?" "no, sir, no," answered simpson. "you may take your oath that captain mendouca won't run the risk of leavin' her afloat to be picked up and took into port, where her passengers could tell what tales they liked about him and his doin's. she'll be scuttled, sir, and left to go down with all them passengers in her, the same as that unfortunit' portugee brig was that we took the slaves out of. but i've been thinkin', sir, that, even so, two sailor-men, like you and me, might do a good deal, with the help of the gentlemen passengers, to put together some sort of a raft that would hold all hands of us and keep us above water until somethin' comes along and picks us up. of course i knows quite well that it'll be a mighty poor look-out for the strongest of us, and a dreadful bad time for the poor women-folk, to be obliged to take to a raft; but i expect they'd rather do that and take their chance of bein' picked up than go down with the ship; and if you're willin' to face the job, _i_ am too, sir, and there's my hand on it." i took the fellow's proffered hand and grasped it warmly. "you are a good fellow, simpson, and a true british seaman, whatever your past may have been," said i, "and i accept your proposal, which i can see is made in perfect good faith. now, it seems to me that all that we have to do, in the first place, is to get on board yonder ship. the question is: how is it to be done without the knowledge of any of the _francesca's_ people?" "well, sir," said simpson, "i don't think as there'll be any great difficulty about that, so far as i'm concerned; and i don't think there need be much with you neither, if you wouldn't mind changing your rig and shiftin' into some togs of mine, so as these chaps of the _francesca_, won't recognise you. then, when the next boat comes from the ship, we'll tumble down into her and offer to give two of the others a spell; they'll be only too glad of the chance to get a little relief from the job of pullin' backwards and for'ards and the handlin' of a lot of stuff, and, once aboard the ship, we can stow ourselves out of sight until they leave her for good and all." "very well," said i, "that seems as good a plan as any, and we will try it. let me have some of your old clothes, simpson--a flannel shirt and a pair of canvas trousers will do--and i will shift into them at once. and there is another thing that occurs to me. if we could manage to secure a little further help it would be so much the better. now, if i am not mistaken, a good many of the crew of yonder ship joined the _francesca_ this afternoon as the only means of saving their lives. we must get hold of a few of them, if we can, and, by means of a few judicious questions, find out whether they would be willing to throw in their lot with us and take their chance of ultimate escape, rather than become slavers and pirates. with only half-a-dozen stout, willing seamen a great deal might be done to better the state of affairs generally." "you are right, sir, it would make a lot of difference, and i'll see what can be done," answered simpson. "and now, sir, shall i go and get you the togs? i s'pose that whatever we do might as well be done at once?" "certainly," said i, "the sooner the better. i can see no object in delaying our movements, now that we have determined upon a definite plan." "all right, sir, then here goes," answered simpson. "i'll be back with the duds in a jiffey." simpson's "jiffey" proved to be a pretty long one, for it was fully twenty minutes before he returned with the clothes--a thin flannel shirt that had seen its best days, and was so faded from its original colour and so thoroughly stained with tar and grease that it was difficult to say what that original colour had been, but was therefore so much the better suited to the purpose of a disguise--a pair of equally faded dungaree trousers, and a knitted worsted cap. but his delay had not been profitless, for happening to find in the forecastle two of the crew of the _bangalore_, who had been compelled to join the _francesca_, and who, from their dejected appearance, he conjectured were not altogether pleased or satisfied with the arrangement, he entered into conversation with them, and soon contrived to elicit from them that his conjecture was well founded. thereupon, as there was no time to lose, he took the bold course of asking them outright whether, in the event of there being a scheme afoot on the part of others to escape from the brigantine to the ship, they would be disposed to join in it, to which they replied that they would gladly, and that indeed they had been discussing the possibilities of such an attempt when he interrupted them by his descent into the forecastle. this was enough for simpson, who at once brought them aft to me, and i, finding them fully in earnest in their expressed desire to have nothing to do with the pirates, forthwith unfolded my plans to them, carefully directing their attention to the somewhat desperate aspect of the adventure, but at the same time pointing out to them that every additional seaman whose help we could secure added very materially to the chances of a successful issue. what i said seemed only to render them the more determined to sever their brief connection with the pirates at any cost, and they unhesitatingly declared their readiness to join me, and to implicitly obey my orders. more than this, they informed me that there were others of the _bangalore_ crew who, they were sure, would be equally ready with themselves, if permitted, to take part in the adventure, and they consented to hunt up as many of these men as possible at once, and to have them ready to meet me on the forecastle to discuss the matter in a quarter of an hour. my scheme, which, prior to my conversation with simpson, had been of the most vague and nebulous character, had now taken shape and wore so promising an appearance that i felt sanguine of its ultimate success; so without further ado i retired right aft to the wheel grating--that part of the brigantine being now quite deserted, and wrapped in total darkness save for the dim and diffused light that issued from the cabin skylight--and there, unseen, shifted into the clothes that simpson had brought me. they were not particularly comfortable nor quite so well-savoured as i could have wished; but it was no time for ultra-squeamishness, and i was soon transformed into a very colourable imitation of a fo'c's'le hand. this done, i went forward, past the open hatchway down which the plunder from the _bangalore_ was being struck, noticing with bitter distress and anger the forlorn, dejected, worn-out, and despairing attitudes of the unfortunate blacks closely huddled together on the slave-deck, their forms faintly indicated in the yellow, smoky light of the lanterns which the men were working by, and noticing too, with keen satisfaction, that most of the crew had reached that stage of intoxication wherein the victim's whole attention is required for the conduct of his own affairs, with none to spare for those of others. many had gone considerably beyond this stage, and were staggering about, pulling and hauling aimlessly at the first object that they could lay their hands upon, and proving far more of a hindrance than a help to their less intoxicated comrades; while there were some who had reached the final stage of bestiality, and were lying about the decks in a helpless condition of drunken stupor. nothing more favourable for our scheme than this condition of general intoxication could possibly have happened, unless it were that pedro was below, fully occupied in attending to his father, and was therefore the less likely to discover my absence from the brigantine until it should be too late to take any steps toward the investigation of the phenomenon; i therefore hurried to the rendezvous with a sudden feeling of elation and joyousness and confidence in the conviction that the time of release from my exceedingly uncongenial and disagreeable, if not absolutely hopeless, situation had at length arrived. upon reaching the forecastle-head--the appointed spot of our rendezvous--i found it tenantless; but presently a man came lounging up to me from the group of workers about the hatchway, and, after peering into my face, inquired-- "got any 'baccy about you, mate? mine's down below in my chest, and i haven't unlashed it yet. if you've got any, just give me a chaw, will ye, and maybe i'll do as much for you another time." "i am sorry to say that i have not any," i answered. "i do not use it except in the form of a cigar now and then. but i expect my mate simpson on deck every moment, and i have no doubt that he will be able to accommodate you. you are one of the new hands, shipped from the _bangalore_, are you not? i don't seem to remember having seen your face before." "no, perhaps not, and it's precious little you can see now, i should think, unless you've got cat's eyes, and can see in the dark," was the somewhat surly response. "yes," he continued, "i'm joe maxwell, late carpenter of the _bangalore_, and--well, yes, `shipped' is the word, i suppose. and pray who may _you_ be, my buck, with your dandified talk-- which, to my mind, is about as like any fo'c's'le lingo that i ever heard as chalk is like cheese? are all hands aboard this dashin' rover of the same kidney as yourself?" "scarcely that, i think, as you seem to have already had an opportunity of judging," i answered, laughingly, as i glanced in the direction of the hatchway. "no," i continued, determined to sound him forthwith, as his speech and manner seemed to indicate that he was by no means satisfied with his changed lot, "i am a naval officer, and a prisoner, i suppose i must call myself, although, as you see, i have the liberty of the ship. and now, having told you thus much, i should like you to tell me candidly, maxwell, did you join this afternoon of your own free will, or under compulsion?" the man looked at me searchingly for a moment, and then said-- "well, i suppose when a man is asked a straightforward question the best plan is to give a straightfor'ard answer. so, mister, i don't mind tellin' you that i j'ined because i was obliged to; 'twas either that or a walk along a short plank." "in fact, you joined merely to save your life," i suggested. "ay; pretty much as you, yourself, may have done," was the answer. "i?" i exclaimed. "surely, my good fellow, you do not mean to say that you imagine me--a naval officer--to have joined this crew of thieves and murderers?" "blest if i know, or care," the fellow answered roughly. "only, if you're a naval officer, as you say, and haven't joined the `thieves and murderers,' as you call 'em, i should like to know how you come to be rigged like a fo'c's'le jack?" i saw that the man was suspicious of me--perhaps thought i was endeavouring, for purposes of espionage, to fathom his real feelings with regard to the service into which he had been pressed; i saw, moreover, that my conjecture was correct, and that, despite his cautious replies, he was by no means satisfied with the arrangement, and so determined to be frank with him at once, tell him what i contemplated, and invite him to join me. as carpenter of the _bangalore_ he would be an especially valuable acquisition to our party. i accordingly did so; and before i had finished i had the satisfaction of seeing that his suspicions had completely disappeared, and that he was listening to me intently and respectfully. when i had brought my disclosure and proposition to an end, he at once said-- "i'm with you, sir, heart and soul! _anything_--even a raft--will be better than this thievin' and murderin' hooker and her cut-throat crew! yes, sir, i'm with you, for life or death. but, please god, it shall be life and not death for all hands of us. let us get away aboard at once, sir; i'm just longin' to tread the beauty's planks again; and as to scuttlin' her--why, i'll make it my first business, when i get aboard, to shape out a few plugs and take 'em down into the run with me--that's the only place where they'll be able to get at her under-water plankin'--and as soon as they've gone i'll plug up them holes so that she'll be as tight as a bottle, and never a penny the worse for what little they're likely to do to her. but it would please me a precious sight better to knock out the brains of whoever dares to go down below to do the scuttlin' business." "no, no," said i, "that would never do; the man would be missed, a search would be instituted, and heaven only knows what the consequences would be. no, the scuttling must be allowed to proceed, and the pirates must finally leave the ship with the conviction that she is slowly but surely sinking. if all goes well this craft will be out of sight before morning, and then, once clear of them, we shall have leisure to make our plans and carry them out." "right you are, sir, and right it is," answered maxwell. "you'll have to be our skipper now, sir, for poor capt'n mason and all three of the mates is gone--one on 'em--mr king--killed in the scrimmage, and t'others made to walk the plank--so you'll be the only navigator that we can muster among the lot of us, as well as the 'riginator of this here scheme for gettin' the better of these here spaniards, so' you're the fittest and properest person to take charge. all that you've got to do, sir, is to give your orders, and i'll answer for it as they'll be obeyed." chapter seventeen. i escape from the brigantine. at this moment simpson rejoined me, bringing with him three more of the _bangalore's_ crew; and while i was talking to them the other two men-- those whom simpson had previously discovered--came forward from the hatchway, where they had been lending a hand to strike the booty down into the hold, and informed me that they had found and spoken to eight of their shipmates, at work at the gangway and hatchway, all of whom were quite ready and more than willing to join me at any moment when the signal should be given. a little further inquiry elicited the information that our party now comprised all the survivors of the _bangalore's_ crew who had, so to speak, made a virtue of necessity and shipped under mendouca in order to save their lives; there being four others who had shipped _willingly_, and whom it had, therefore, been deemed inexpedient to approach with a proposal to join us, lest, in their zeal for their new chief, they should refuse and betray us all. our party, therefore, was now complete, and all that remained to be done was to carry out our plans with as little delay as possible, and with twelve men at my back i felt tolerably confident of success; indeed, when i first learned our full strength, the wild idea flashed through my mind of attempting not only to save the _bangalore_, but also to capture the _francesca_. a moment's reflection, however, convinced me of the impracticability of this scheme, for although, with the assistance of the ten male passengers who, i learned, were at that moment prisoners in their own cabins on board the indiaman, it might be possible to capture the _francesca_, in the then disorganised condition of her crew, it would certainly involve some loss of life on our side, which we could not spare, and we should be able to do nothing with her when we had her, our whole available strength being hardly sufficient to handle and take care of the ship, should it come on to blow, much less to look after a prize as well. i therefore abandoned the idea, the more readily that i knew my story need only be told to the proper authorities to cause the brigantine to be hunted off the ocean, and her atrocities put an end to at once and for all. our arrangements, therefore, were soon made; and this done, we sauntered away to the hatchway, singly and by twos at a time, and began to lend a hand in getting the plunder out of the boats and sending it below. presently the _bangalore's_ long-boat came alongside, loaded down to the gunwale with booty, and manned by half-a-dozen spaniards who were so drunk that they could scarcely stand. one of them, indeed, would have lost his life but for simpson and maxwell; for the boat was steered alongside stem-on, and the shock of her collision with the brigantine completely upset the balance of the man who was standing in the bows to fend her off, so that he fell overboard between the boat and the brigantine's side. the fellow was partially sobered by his sudden immersion, and finding himself overboard, began at once to sing out lustily for help, fully aware that there were probably several sharks still hanging about the two vessels, and momentarily expecting to feel their teeth; whereupon simpson and maxwell, both of whom happened to be at the gangway at the moment of the accident, sprang down into the boat and succeeded in dragging the fellow safely out of the water, though not a moment too soon, the water being all a-swirl with the rush of the sea-monsters as the man was dragged inboard. the fright that he had received completely sobered him, but at the same time so thoroughly shook his nerves that he at once scrambled on board the brigantine, declaring with many oaths that he had had enough of boating for one night. his mates were but little better, and were glad enough to leave the boat at my suggestion and allow me and my party to take their places. we quickly roused the boat's cargo out of her, and then shoved off for the ship again, making a great fuss and splash with the oars as we did so. when a few fathoms away from the brigantine, however, where in the darkness our movements were not likely to attract a too curious attention, first one oar and then another was laid in until all had been laid in but one; and this one we shifted aft, sculling the boat with it not to the _bangalore's_ larboard gangway, at which the other boats were working, but under the ship's stern and to her starboard mizen channels, where we made her fast, and cautiously scrambled up on to the poop, one by one. here we separated, the carpenter boldly making his way forward past the noisy, jabbering, drunken crowd who were grouped about the main-hatchway, engaged in hoisting on deck the goods that the boatswain, down in the hold, was selecting from the ship's heterogeneous cargo, while the rest--excepting simpson and myself--quietly stole up the mizen rigging, three of them concealing themselves in the top, while the rest, continuing on up the topmast rigging, made for the main and foretops by way of the stays; the lanterns which were being used to light the pirates at their work about the main-hatchway so effectually dazzling the drunken ruffians' eyes, that there was not the slightest fear of any of the silent, sober figures stealthily moving about aloft being seen by them; indeed so deep was the gloom created between the masts by the towering expanses of the indiaman's canvas that even i, far away as i was from the dazzling light of the lanterns, was unable to follow with my eye the dusky, indistinctly-seen figures any further than the rim of the mizen-top. as for simpson, it was quite possible for him to move freely about the ship and go wherever he pleased without exciting any suspicion, he being one of the _francesca's_ regular crew; i therefore instructed him to go down into the saloon and ascertain whether any of his quondam shipmates were there, and to return to me with his information as speedily as possible. while he was gone i had time to look about me a little, and note such of the most prominent characteristics of the ship as were to be seen by the dim light of the stars. she was a noble craft, as big as the generality of our first-class frigates, though not quite so beamy, perhaps, in proportion to her length, not quite so high out of the water, and of course not so heavily rigged. she carried a magnificent full poop that reached as far forward as to within about twenty-five feet of the main-mast, with companion, skylight, deck-fittings generally, and poop ladders of polished teak, handsomely and elaborately carved. the fore-part of the poop extended some six feet beyond the cabin front, and underneath it her steering-wheel was placed, with a door on each side of it giving access to the grand saloon. a long row of hencoops ran along each side of the poop; and the deck was further littered with a large number of deck-chairs that had been hurriedly bundled out of the way behind the companion, probably when it was seen that the brigantine undoubtedly meant to attack. the main-deck exhibited all the confusion incidental to a sea-fight, the guns--sixteen twelve-pound carronades-- still unsecured, with their rammers and sponges flung down on the deck beside them, shot lying in the scuppers, overturned wadding-tubs, cutlasses, pistols, boarding-pikes, strewed all over the deck, and-- horrible sight--several dark, silent figures lying stark and still in pools of blood, just as they had fallen in the fight. the ship's davits were empty, both her gigs having been lowered to facilitate the transfer of the plunder to the brigantine; her long-boat also was in the water, as already stated, but there were two fine cutters lying bottom up over the quarter-deck, their sterns resting on the break of the poop and their bows-on the gallows. it was a strange sight to look abroad into the dusky star-lit night and observe the boundless atlantic stretching silent and still on every hand, and then to turn one's eyes inboard and note the noisy, drunken, ruffianly rabble grouped about the hatchway, naked to the waist, and toiling in the dim lantern light at the tackles by which they were hoisting the bales of costly merchandise out of the hold. but i had not much time to devote to moralising upon the incongruous sight, for after an absence of some three minutes simpson re-appeared from the saloon with the information that the place was clear, and that, judging from the sounds he had heard, the passengers had all locked themselves, or been locked, into their cabins. this being the case, i determined to go below and make a brief investigation of the condition of the unfortunate passengers, as well as to afford them such comfort as was to be derived from a communication to them of my intentions. i accordingly descended the companion-way leading down from the poop, and found myself in a small vestibule, the arrangement of which i could not very well see, as it was unlighted, save for the lamplight that issued from the open door of the saloon; i caught a glimpse, however, of polished panels of rare, ornamental woods, with gleams of gilded mouldings and polished metal handrails, and found my feet sinking into the pile of a soft, thick carpet, which gave me a hint as to the luxurious appointments of the ship. from this vestibule i passed into the saloon itself by a partially open door on the port side, and at once found myself in an exceedingly handsome and luxuriously furnished apartment. it was long and rather narrow in its proportions, having state-rooms on each side, as i could tell at a glance by the doors with venetian slatted upper panels that occurred at regular intervals in the longitudinal bulkheads on each side of the cabin. these bulkheads were divided into panels by fluted pilasters with richly-carved and gilded capitals, supporting a heavily-carved cornice picked out with gold. the panels and pilasters were enamelled in a delicate tint of cream, with mouldings picked out in french grey, the former being decorated with very handsome paintings illustrative of oriental views and scenery. richly-upholstered divans occupied the spaces along the bulkheads between the several state-room doors; a long table of polished mahogany, having sofa seats with reversible backs on each side of it, stretched down the centre of the saloon, with another and shorter table flanking it athwartships at the after-end; a buffet loaded with richly-cut decanters and glass, backed up by a large gilt-framed mirror, occupied the whole space against the fore-bulkhead between the two entrance doors; and a very handsome piano, open, and with some music on it, occupied a similar position at the after-end of the saloon, two doors in the after-bulkhead proclaiming the existence of at least two more state-rooms. the apartment was lighted during the day by a large skylight filled in with painted glass--in which were fixed opposite each other a barometer and a tell-tale compass--and at night by two very fine silver-plated chandeliers each carrying six lamps, only four of which, however, were now lighted; and the deck was covered with a rich, thick carpet, apparently of oriental manufacture, into which one's feet sank with noiseless tread. the state-rooms were all in total darkness apparently, for i could catch no gleam of light issuing from the pierced upper panels of any of them; but the sound of an occasional sob or moan told me that some at least of them were occupied. i located one of the cabins from which these sounds came, and tapped gently at the door; there was no response, but the sounds instantly ceased. i tapped again, and said-- "will you open the door, please? i am a friend, and have some intelligence to communicate that may be interesting to you." still no response; but from the next cabin there now issued a man's voice, inquiring-- "do i hear some one out there proclaiming himself _a friend_?" "yes," answered i. "i _am_ a friend; and my present object is to communicate to you some intelligence that i hope may prove agreeable and comforting. i am quite alone and unarmed, and you may therefore open your cabin-door without fear." "sir," replied the voice, "i know not who you are, or how you come to be on board this most ill-starred ship. your voice, however, has a reassuring tone in it, and i would risk opening my door to you if i could; but i cannot, for--like all the rest of the passengers, i believe--i am bound and absolutely helpless, and i think that, if you will take the trouble to try, you will find that we are all locked in. pray, who are you, sir? and how did you find your way on board the _bangalore_? are the pirates gone yet?" "no," said i, as i tried the door and found that it was indeed locked. "i regret to say that they are not, and therefore i am for the present obliged to leave you in your uncomfortable situation. but take comfort, and believe me that it shall not be for one moment longer than i can help; the pirates are unlikely to very much prolong their stay now, and as soon as they are at a safe distance i will come again and release you all--provided, of course, that my plans do not go amiss. my name is dugdale, and i am a naval officer--a midshipman--who has been unfortunate enough to fall into the hands of the pirates in an unsuccessful attack upon them more than a month ago, and this is the first opportunity that i have had to attempt my escape. i must go again now, as my discovery on board here by the pirates would mean utter ruin to us all; but i will return as soon as i can with prudence. meanwhile," slightly raising my voice so that all might hear, "take comfort, and hope for the best." "good-bye! heaven bless and prosper you!" fervently ejaculated the unknown, as i moved away from the door; and i thought i heard faint murmurs of a similar import from some of the other cabins, but could not be certain, as one of the outer doors giving direct access to the main-deck suddenly opened, and i had to make a dash of it for the dark vestibule in order to reach the concealment of the still darker companion-way to avoid detection. my alarm was groundless, however; for the newcomer proved to be joe maxwell, the carpenter, whom i saw enter the saloon, after a careful reconnaissance of its interior, with several plugs under one arm, and a maul in his hand. seeing who it was, i followed him, and unexpectedly ran against him as he was again coming out. "who the--oh, it's you, sir! beg your pardon, i'm sure, but i thought it was one of them sneakin' pirate chaps a-prowlin' round," he exclaimed. "i thought i heard a sound o' some sort as i comed in from the deck, and thinks i, `that's one o' them cowardly villains that has sneaked aft for some purpose of his own that ain't no good, i dare swear. i'll just see what the scoundrel's up to, and if he's after anything _very_ houtragis, i'll maybe take the liberty of smashin' his skull with this here maul, and droppin' him over the starn to the sharks, where many a better man than he went this a'ternoon.' lucky for him that it's you, sir, as the irishman says. i'm just a-goin' to make my way down into the run, so as to be all handy for pluggin' up the holes again that these here murderin' thieves intends to bore through the dear old gal's skin. i _think_ they'll be pretty sure to come aft to do it; it'll either be there or down in the fore-peak, where they'd have to shovel away a lot of coal to get at her below the water-line, so i expect they'll make for the run. now, sir, it's a very good job as i met you just here, because i can show you the lazarette hatch--here it is, under our feet." and he turned back a large mat upon which we were standing, disclosing a small, square hatch flush with the deck. "now, sir," he continued, "i'll be off below at once; because, from what i saw as i comed aft, i fancy them spanish thieves is thinkin' about toppin' their booms, and if so, we've no time to spare. there," as he raised the hatch and dropped through the opening, "i'm all right now, sir; i can make my way well enough without a light, though i've got a candle and matches in my pocket that'll give light enough to work by as soon as them villains have cleared out. now, sir, please put on the hatch again, will ye, and don't forget to spread the mat over it. and when them blackguards have gone you can send somebody to let me out." "all right, maxwell, never fear; i'll see to that," i answered, as the man disappeared in the gloom. "good luck to you. and whatever those fellows may do, be sure that you keep silent and do not attempt to interfere with them; let them do their work and go away, and as soon as you hear the hatch close after them, go ahead and plug the holes as quickly as you like, and be sure that you make a thorough job of it." "ay, ay, sir," came his reply, already muffled by distance and the intervening casks and cases among which he was making his way, "you may trust me for that." i carefully replaced the hatch, adjusted the mat over it, and made my way cautiously up on the poop. it was evident, from what i now saw, that maxwell was only just in time; for the pirates had knocked off work and were coming up out of the hold, refreshing themselves as they emerged by copious draughts from a tub of strong grog that stood on the deck conveniently near the hatchway. they were all pretty far gone in a state of intoxication, and were singing a jumble of at least a dozen forecastle ditties in tones of maudlin sentiment, or laughing and jeering at nothing in particular as they reeled and staggered about the deck. disgusting as was the sight, i was glad to see it, for i felt that men in their condition would never notice the absence of simpson or myself from the brigantine, still less that of the unaccustomed faces of those of the _bangalore's_ crew who had joined me and were now snugly concealed aloft. nor were they capable of doing very much more mischief, unless perchance they should accidentally set the ship on fire, which was what i most greatly dreaded; if, happily, we escaped this danger all might yet be well, for i felt convinced that, once on board the brigantine again, and the unhappy negroes once more set to the sweeps, nearly every man in the accursed craft's forecastle would betake himself to his hammock and stay there until morning. there was of course the risk that mendouca might send for me and ask me to look after his vessel for him through the night, knowing or guessing as he would the condition of his crew; but i did not believe that he would, at least not so soon after the perpetration of such fearful atrocities as he had openly committed that afternoon. the men having helped themselves freely from the grog-tub, until it seemed that they could take no more, tumbled rather than scrambled down into the boat alongside, and i was just beginning to cherish the hope that after all they would go away forgetting to scuttle the ship, when i saw jose, the boatswain--who appeared to have assumed the command of the party--seize and detain the only man except himself who still remained on the ship's deck. he said something to this man, and then they both staggered away forward and i lost sight of them in the deep shadows that enshrouded the fore-part of the ship. they were gone about ten minutes; and then they re-appeared, the boatswain armed with a large auger. as they passed the main-hatchway, on their way aft, jose seized one of the still lighted lanterns that were standing on the deck, and seemed to direct his companion to take another. this the man did, and continuing their way aft, the pair entered the saloon from the main-deck; and presently, peering cautiously down through the open skylight, i saw that the two ruffians were groping about under the cabin table, no doubt searching for the lazarette hatch. their search was of course in vain; and at length i overheard the boatswain assert with an oath that it was useless to search for it any longer, they must get the steward out of his pantry, and make him show them where it was. they then left the saloon, and there was silence for a few minutes; then, going to the head of the companion-ladder, i heard jose demanding in broken english, with a profusion of expletives, where was the opening of the lazarette. a strange voice replied in trembling tones; and then i heard the mat flung back and the hatch wrenched off with a clatter. a few more oaths followed, there was a scrambling sound, and i concluded that the two miscreants had descended to the performance of their dastardly task. then ensued what seemed like a very long--although it was actually a comparatively short--period of anxious suspense, for completely successful as we had been thus far, our absence from the brigantine might easily be discovered at any moment; and in that case there was no alternative for us between fighting to the death and ignominious surrender. i was more anxious on my own behalf than on that of the others, for their absence was scarcely likely to be noted by their drunken comrades until the next morning, while, as for me, should mendouca take it into his head to require my presence, it would no sooner be reported to him that i was not to be found than he would have a very shrewd suspicion of what had happened; and i felt convinced that, with my knowledge of the enormities that he had perpetrated on that dreadful day, he would never willingly suffer me to escape from him alive. then there was pedro, too. the lad had, for some inscrutable reason, taken a violent fancy for me, and, although i have not very frequently referred to him in the telling of this story, had attached himself to me with almost the fidelity of a dog, sharing in my watch, and seizing every opportunity to be in my company. should he find himself at liberty to seek me i should be lost, for he would not be content until he had found me. there were just two chances in my favour against many adverse possibilities: the first being that mendouca's condition would confine the lad to his side all through the night; the second lying in the fact that i had taken the precaution to lock my cabin-door and remove the key before leaving the brigantine, so that should it chance that i was sought for, it might be thought that i had locked myself into my cabin in anger at the piratical deed that had been perpetrated. but i grew increasingly uneasy as the minutes dragged their slow length along, expecting every moment to hear a hail from the brigantine inquiring as to my whereabouts. it was therefore with a feeling of keen delight that, at the expiration of about twenty-five minutes, when my state of suspense had become almost unendurable, as i stood listening at the head of the companion-way i heard jose's voice again, and the sounds of his own and his companion's emergence from the lazarette. "there," i heard him exclaim in spanish, in a drunken voice and with a jeering laugh, "that job is done, and pretty effectually, too; i don't suppose she will float longer than three hours more, or four at the most, and then who is to know what has become of her? it will be supposed that she foundered in a gale; and that will be the end of the matter. it is a pity, miguel, that we should be obliged to destroy so fine a ship, but she could never be of any use to us, and necessity has no law, you know. now--let me consider--there is one thing more to be done before we leave; what is it? it was in my mind a moment ago! ah, yes, of course, that is it; we have to put this miserable poltroon of a steward back into his pantry, lock the door upon him, and--yes, that is all, i think. come along, _amigo_!" i heard the steward begging piteously not to be locked up again; for although the fellow had probably not understood a single word of what jose had said, he had sense enough to know that the two ruffians before him had scuttled the ship, and that if locked up in his pantry again he would probably drown there, like a rat in a trap. his entreaties, however, were of course unavailing with two men who knew not the meaning of mercy; there was a spanish oath or two, the sound of a scuffle, mingled with further cries of distress from the steward, the slamming of a door, the sharp click of a lock; and a moment later jose and his companion emerged upon the deck, staggered to the gangway, scrambled down the side, and the boat was shoved off. i waited until the boat was fairly away from the ship's side, and then, slipping down the dark companion-way, groped about until i had found the pantry, which i unlocked, to find the unhappy steward, bound hand and foot, prostrate on the deck, weeping bitterly. in reply to my question he told me where i could lay my hand upon a knife, finding which i cut him adrift, and directed him to go forward to the forecastle to ascertain whether any of the crew were imprisoned down there. then, making my way to the still open lazarette, i swung myself down into it, and called maxwell's name as loudly as i dared. he heard and answered me at once. "the rascals have left the ship," i cried, "so you may ram those plugs home as tightly as you can, and perhaps even venture to give them a gentle tap or two, but we must leave the final driving until the brigantine has moved off; everything has gone right thus far, and it will never do to spoil it all now by being impatient. has she taken in much water?" "not more than we can pump out of her in ten minutes," was the reply, as i sighted him creeping toward me along the narrow space underneath the beams. "they only bored five holes through her, and i've already plugged 'em tight enough to stop the water from comin' in--though of course they'll want a few good taps on the head to make 'em all secure. but that job can wait until the brigantine is a mile or two further away." "had you any difficulty in plugging the holes?" i asked, as honest joe emerged into the more open spaces about the hatchway. "not a bit, sir," he answered. "you see the way of it was this: as soon as i got to understand that they was likely to scuttle the ship, the first thing i says to myself was: `i wonder,' i says, `what size auger them murderin' scoundrels is likely to use? because if i only knowed that, i could make my plugs to fit the holes.' then the next thing i thought was that prob'ly they wouldn't remember to bring a tool aboard with 'em, and that they'd hunt for some'at of the sort aboard here. so i goes to my cabin, gets out a inch and a half auger, a chisel, a hammer and some nails, and places 'em on the tarpaulin of the fore-hatch, where anybody going for'ard couldn't help seein' of 'em; and `there,' i says to myself, `if those fellers haven't brought no auger aboard with 'em, that's the tool they'll use.' so i chanced it, and made my plugs to fit a inch and a half hole; and, as it turned out, i was right; they used my auger what i had left for 'em, and as soon as their backs was turned i slipped down and screwed the plugs into the holes." "excellent!" said i. "and now, maxwell, the next job is to break open the state-rooms and release the poor ladies and gentlemen who are confined there. do you think you can do it without making much noise?" "lord bless you, yes, sir," was the cheerful reply. "i'll just go for'ard and get a bit of wire, and i'll pick the locks of them cabin-doors in next to no time, and make no noise about it either." "then come along and let us get it done at once. that must be our first job," said i. chapter eighteen. re-appearance of the `francesca'. while maxwell stole forward to get his wire, i crept up on the poop again, and carefully avoiding the skylight, so that my figure might not be revealed by the coloured rays that streamed from it, found that the boat with jose and his companions, and the last of the plunder, was just going alongside the brigantine. the first to scramble out of her was jose; and there was light enough about the brigantine's decks to enable me to see that he went straight aft to the companion, which he descended. he was absent from the deck but a very few minutes, however; and when he re-appeared i supposed that he had been below to make his report to mendouca and to receive that individual's orders, for as he passed along the deck i heard him shout to the crew-- "now, then, look alive there with those bales, and get the deck clear as quickly as possible, so that we can get the niggers on deck and the sweeps at work once more. we've got all that we can take from the englishman, and now the sooner we are off the better, for she won't float above two or three hours longer; and if a breeze was to spring up, and bring a cruiser along with it, it would be bad for us if we were found in this neighbourhood. so bundle those bales down the hatchway anyhow, men, and clear the decks at once. we must stow the goods properly afterwards." this was excellent--very much better than i had expected; for a dreadful idea had suggested itself to me, that mendouca might take it into his head to remain by the ship until she should show unmistakable signs of sinking, in which case there would be nothing for us but another fight, which, short-handed as we were, would not suit our book at all. the men on board the _francesca_, woke up a little at jose's order, and soon had the last boat unloaded and the decks clear; the slaves were then ordered on deck, the _bangalore's_ boats cast adrift, the sweeps rigged out, and, with i think the most fervent emotion of gratitude and delight that i had ever experienced, i at length had the satisfaction of seeing the brigantine stir sluggishly against the background of the star-spangled heavens, turn her bows slightly away from us, and finally glide off, with a quiet, gentle, scarcely-perceptible motion, in a westerly direction. while i was still watching her i caught sight of maxwell creeping along the deck from forward, under the shelter of the bulwarks, so that the light from the still burning lanterns that the pirates had left behind them might not disclose his moving figure to any of the eyes on board the _francesca_ that might be turned upon the ship; and making my way down the companion, i joined him in the vestibule, and we entered the cabin together. i led him straight to the door of the state-room with the occupant of which i had previously held a short conversation, and directed maxwell to open it, at the same time knocking upon the panel and saying-- "sir, i am happy to inform you that the pirates have at length left us, and we are about to make an attempt to release you." "thank god for that!" fervently ejaculated a voice that i had not heard before. "be as quick as you can, pray, for i fear that my poor husband here is dead or dying; and he should be attended to without a moment's delay." "that's mrs maynard's voice!" exclaimed the carpenter, as he worked away with his wire; "i know it well. somebody told me that the colonel was hurt--stabbed, i think they said, in protectin' his daughters from the ill-usage of some of them spanish ruffians." "say you so, man?" i exclaimed. "then never mind fiddling with that wire any longer. let us put our shoulders to the door and burst it open!" "half a second, sir; i've got the thing now, and--there, that's all right! now try the door, sir!" as the man spoke i heard the click of the lock as it went back, and, turning the handle, the door opened, and i entered. the cabin was a fine, roomy one, and of good height, as cabins went in those days; it contained two standing bunks, one above the other, fitted with brass rods and damask curtains, a sofa against the side of the ship, a wash-stand in a recess between the bunks and the bulkhead adjoining the saloon, a framed mirror above it, a folding mahogany table against the transverse bulkhead, brass pins upon which to hang clothing, a curtain to draw across the doorway, a handsome lamp with a ground-glass globe hung in gimbals in the centre of the transverse bulkhead, two large travelling trunks and three or four smaller cases, broken open and the contents strewn upon the carpeted deck, and prone among them, bound hand and foot and lashed together, were the figures of a man and woman, both evidently elderly, although their precise ages could hardly be guessed by the imperfect light that streamed in from the saloon through the open door. as i entered the apartment, noting these details in a single comprehensive glance, the woman moaned-- "oh, sir, for the love of god pray release us from these cruel bonds as quickly as possible; they are bound so tightly that the circulation of the blood is stopped, and we have been suffering the most excruciating agony for hours." "i will cut you adrift at once, madam," said i, unsheathing the long knife which was attached to the belt that simpson had lent me with the clothes. "had i known that you were in this cruel plight, i would have risked everything in the endeavour to release you when i first entered the cabin." i cut the unfortunate couple adrift, and, having first taken the precaution to draw the curtain of the side-light, lighted the lamp, and, with maxwell's assistance, raised the lady into a sitting position; after which we lifted her husband and placed him on the bed in the lower berth. he was a very fine, handsome man of about fifty years of age, with that indescribable and unmistakable look of the soldier about him that seems to set its mark upon every military man. his wife was perhaps seven or eight years his junior, still exceedingly good-looking, and must, at her best, have been a singularly lovely woman. the colonel, it appeared, had, in common with the other passengers who had any womankind on board, locked his wife and daughters into their cabins when it was foreseen that an attack upon the ship was inevitable; and it was after the fight was over that he was severely stabbed in resisting an attempt on the part of one of the _francesca's_ crew to force open his daughters' cabin. probably the poor man would have been murdered outright but for the opportune appearance of mendouca, who sternly ordered every one of his men out of the cabin, except two, whom he personally supervised as they executed his order to bind all the survivors hand and foot and confine them in the cabins. luckily for the unfortunate passengers, the first thought of the men had been drink, and the second, plunder; and by the time that these two appetites had been satisfied, all thought of further violence had passed out of their heads. the first thing now to be done was to find the ship's surgeon--if he were still alive; so, leaving maxwell in the cuddy to continue his lock-picking operations, i sallied out on deck and, first softly calling to the men aloft that they might now venture to come down, hunted up the steward, and inquired of him whether he knew where the surgeon was to be found. he answered that the surgeon, purser, and three mates were all berthed in the after-house, between the main-mast and the main-hatch, and that probably the man i wanted would be found there, adding that, as he believed the pirates had flung all the keys overboard, he would take the liberty of going into poor captain mason's cabin, and bringing me a bunch of spare keys that he knew were always kept there. this he did, and, finding the key of the after-house, we entered it together, to find the unhappy surgeon and purser bound hand and foot, and lashed together in such a manner that neither of them could move, upon the floor of the cabin. to release the pair was but the work of a moment; after which, having directed the doctor to hasten to the cuddy and attend to the colonel's injuries, i made a survey of the decks with the result that fourteen more of the _bangalore's_ crew were found, of whom six were dead, and eight more or less seriously wounded; the latter were removed to their bunks in the forecastle forthwith and attended to by mr grant, the surgeon, as soon as he had dressed the wounds of colonel maynard and two other passengers. i may as well say here, to save time, that, thanks to grant's skill and unremitting attention, all the wounded were reported to be doing well and, with the exception of colonel maynard, out of danger. the keys of all the cabins having been found, and the doors unlocked by the steward, maxwell's services were no longer required in the cuddy; as therefore the brigantine had by this time reached the tolerably safe distance of a mile from us, i sent him down into the run again to drive the plugs well home and make them perfectly secure, and set to work with the steward to release the remaining passengers from their exceedingly uncomfortable condition. this was not a long task, and when it was completed i found that we mustered nine gentlemen, of whom three were wounded, eleven ladies, three children--two boys and a girl--seven maids, and an indian ayah or nurse. one family, consisting of a lady and her daughter, were in a dreadful state of distress, the husband and father--a mr richard temple, resident magistrate of one of the up-country districts--having been shot dead while gallantly fighting in defence of the ship. the rest were in fairly good spirits, now that they found that there was a hope of ultimate escape from the perils that had so unexpectedly beset them; for i learned that although their personal baggage had been rifled and all money and jewellery taken, they had been spared any further outrage than that of being bound with unnecessary and cruel rigour and confined to their cabins. the poor souls had been without food or drink since tiffin. i thought therefore that it would not be amiss to set them down to a good meal, and with that object directed the steward to find his mates and also the cook, if possible, it appearing that none of the individuals named had been seen either during or since the attack, which gave rise to the suspicion that they had contrived to conceal themselves somewhere about the ship. this proved to be the case, the cook, with his mates, and the three under-stewards being eventually discovered in a disused pig-sty under the topgallant-forecastle, carefully concealed beneath a lot of lumber that they had dragged over themselves. from this secluded retreat they were speedily routed out, and, being solemnly assured that all danger was now past, were at length prevailed upon to resume their duty and to prepare a long-delayed dinner--or supper, as it might be more appropriately called--for the cuddy occupants. when at length the meal was served, i took the liberty of occupying the poor murdered captain's seat at the table; and while we were eating and drinking, i managed to gain a pretty clear idea of the incidents of the attack upon the _bangalore_ each one having passed through some more or less trying experience which he or she was anxious to relate to the rest; and when the meal was over mr molyneux, a calcutta merchant, rose to his feet and, while formally thanking me on behalf of himself and his fellow-passengers for what i had already done, expressed their perfect concurrence in the wish of the surviving crew that i should take command of the ship, merely suggesting the great desirability of navigating her forthwith to the nearest civilised port. this, of course, was my own fixed intention, and i suggested sierra leone as the most suitable spot for which to make, it being as near as any other, with the advantage that the necessary officers to navigate the ship home, and a sufficient number of men to make up the full complement of the crew, might almost certainly be reckoned upon being found there. the brigantine had left us, and with her departure everybody appeared to consider the danger as past. this, however, was an opinion which i by no means shared; for, knowing mendouca so well as i did, i felt that it was by no means unlikely that, having reached an offing of some ten or twelve miles, he might order the sweeps to be laid in until daylight, in order that he might remain in our neighbourhood and assure himself by the actual demonstration of his own--or pedro's--eyesight that the _bangalore_ had foundered, taking with her to the bottom all evidence of the atrocious crime of which he and his crew had been guilty. and, even should no uncomfortable doubts on this point assail him, he _must_ learn, ere the lapse of many hours, that i and others were missing; and then, guessing, as he would at once, at the explanation of our absence, nothing would prevent him from returning and taking, or attempting to take, such measures as would insure our eternal silence. i therefore considered it a singular if not an actually providential occurrence that when i went out on deck after dinner--or supper--the sky should have become overcast, with scarcely a star to be seen, with every appearance of both wind and rain ere long. it had become exceedingly dark, so much so that no sign of the brigantine was to be discovered, but by listening intently the roll and clatter of her sweeps were still to be caught; and it was with very deep and fervent thankfulness that, after listening intently for several minutes, i felt convinced that she was still receding from us. i had given strict orders that the lanterns should be allowed to remain burning on deck, just as the pirates had left them, that no other lights should be kindled anywhere about the ship except where it was possible to effectually mask their light, and that no one should show anything of himself above the level of the topgallant-rail upon any consideration; but now, the brigantine having been gone from us rather more than two hours, i gave instructions that all the lanterns on deck and all lights of every kind visible from outside the ship might be simultaneously extinguished, so that, should anybody happen to be watching our lights, they might come to the conclusion that the ship had filled and we were gone to the bottom. this done, i mustered my entire crew and, first hoisting in the long-boat, sent them aloft to stow all the lighter sails, so that we might not be wholly unprepared should the change of weather that now seemed impending be ushered in with a squall. this occupied the men a full hour and a half, at the end of which, having brought the ship into tolerably manageable condition, i gave them permission to lie down and snatch a nap if they could, but to hold themselves ready for any emergency that might arise. it was by this time long past midnight, and so pitchy dark that, all lights having been extinguished, it was impossible to see one end of the poop from the other. the stars had all vanished, and the silence was so profound as to be quite oppressive, not even the sound of the pirate's sweeps now being audible; though whether they had been laid in, or whether the vessel had increased her distance so greatly as to have passed beyond the range of sound, i knew not, but i strongly suspected the former contingency. this profound silence was maintained for nearly an hour, and then my hearing--rendered unusually acute no doubt by the intense darkness that enveloped me--once more became conscious of a regular, measured, rhythmical sound, the sound of sweeps again being plied, and, without doubt, on board the _francesca_. what did it mean? had mendouca, in his feverish and painful condition, grown impatient of delay and ordered the sweeps to be again manned, after having given instructions for them to be laid in? or, as my forebodings whispered to me, had the absence of myself and others been already discovered, and was the brigantine returning in search of us? for the first quarter of an hour or so after the sounds had once again broken in upon the silence this was a question very difficult to decide; but when half-an-hour had passed the fact was indisputable that the pirates _were returning_, for the sounds had become distinctly clearer and stronger than they had at first been. what was now to be done? there was but one course for us; namely, to take every possible measure for the defence of the ship to our last gasp, for i felt assured that, should mendouca recover possession of her, his fury at the trick that we had played him would be sated by nothing short of our absolute destruction. having quickly made up my mind upon this point, i was in the act of groping my way along the poop, with the object of calling the men, when i thought i felt a faint stirring of the air, and, pausing for a moment, i moistened the back of my hand and held it up, turning it this way and that until i felt a distinct sensation of coolness. yes, there was no doubt about it, i had felt a cat's-paw, and it seemed to be coming over our starboard quarter; while the sound of the sweeps was away broad on our port bow. i could scarcely restrain a cheer as the hope of a breeze thus came to encourage me at the very moment when a new and terrible danger was threatening us. i paused for an instant and reflected; and my thoughts took somewhat this shape: "if mendouca is returning--and he undoubtedly is--it is because through some unfortunate combination of circumstances my absence has already been discovered, and he has at once jumped to the correct conclusion that i have somehow contrived to escape from the brigantine to the ship. and he knows me well enough to feel assured that, once here, i shall not tamely allow the indiaman to go down under my feet; or, if that should prove unpreventible, that i shall at least release the prisoners and concoct with them some plan of escape, such as taking to the boats, or constructing a raft. and he also knows that, in either case, should we succeed in preserving our lives until we are fallen in with, or picked up, his atrocious act of piracy and murder will be proclaimed, and every craft in the squadron will be specially ordered to keep a look-out for him and effect his capture at all hazards. therefore he will spare no effort to find the ship and destroy her. now--ah, there is another little breath of wind, i felt it distinctly that time!--should he fail to find us, what course will he pursue? why, he will certainly expect us to make our way northward--for sierra leone, most probably, the port that we have already determined to steer for-- and he will do his best to overtake and recapture us. therefore our best course will obviously be to head to the _southward_, and thus increase the distance between the two craft as rapidly as possible, so that they may be out of sight of each other at daybreak; and then to proceed upon our proper course under easy sail." this seemed to me to be a very fair and sound line of reasoning, and i determined to act upon it forthwith. i accordingly made my way forward, routed out the men, told them there was a breeze coming, and ordered them to brace up the yards and trim the sheets aft for a close-hauled stretch on the port tack, at the same time cautioning them to work silently, as i had only too much reason to fear that the pirates were returning to search for the ship. this news, confirmed as it was by the now perfectly audible sound of the sweeps, was enough for them, and they went about the decks so silently, speaking in whispers, and carefully taking each rope off its belaying-pin, and _laying_ it down on deck, instead of flinging it down with clatter enough to wake the seven sleepers, that i am certain no one in the cabins, even had they been awake, could possibly have been aware of what was happening. by the time that we had got our canvas trimmed the breeze had become quite perceptible, and the ship had gathered steerage-way; we therefore wore her round, and presently had the ineffable satisfaction of hearing a slight but distinct tinkling and gurgle of water under the bows. with the springing up of this most welcome little breeze the sound of the sweeps first became by imperceptible degrees less audible and then was lost altogether, but whether this arose from the fact that the wind carried the sound away from us, or whether it was that they had laid in the sweeps, and were making sail upon the brigantine, it was impossible to tell, nor did i greatly care, provided that the breeze freshened sufficiently to carry us out of sight before daybreak, this now being my great anxiety. maxwell assured me that the _bangalore_ was a real clipper, easily beating everything that they had fallen in with, both on the passage out and on their homeward voyage. but no ship can sail fast without a fair amount of wind, and so far this breeze that had come to us was a mere breathing, just enough perhaps to waft us along at a speed of about two knots, or two and a half, maybe, whereas what i wanted was at least a seven-knot breeze, that would take us clean out of sight of our starting-point before dawn. for i knew that, if the _bangalore_ was a clipper, so too was the _francesca_; and if her people once caught sight of so much as the heads of our royals from their own royal-yard, they would chase us as long as there was the slightest hope of overhauling us. and the knowledge of this fact made me wonder whether i had not acted rather imprudently in stowing all the lighter sails, instead of leaving them abroad to give us all the help of which they were capable. i was just inwardly debating this point, and had arrived at the conclusion that we ought to set them again, when the atmosphere seemed suddenly to grow more dense, and in a moment down came the rain in a regular tropical deluge, like the bursting of a waterspout, the sails flapped to the masts, and we were becalmed again. this was horribly vexatious, not to say disheartening; but, happily for our peace of mind, it was a state of things that did not last long; it merely meant a shift of wind, for presently, when the shower had ceased as abruptly as it had begun, the breeze sprang up again, this time coming out from the northward, and with gay and thankful hearts we squared away before it, or rather, headed just far enough to the eastward of south to permit everything set to draw properly. moreover, the breeze gradually but steadily freshened, until in about an hour from the time when the ship first began to move we were going seven knots at the very least. this was so far satisfactory, especially as the sky remained overcast and the night intensely dark, rendering it utterly impossible to see anything beyond a distance of three or four of the ship's lengths on either hand, and i now had good hopes of running the brigantine out of sight before daylight. that she was still engaged in the search for us, however, soon became evident; for about three-quarters of an hour after the springing up of the true breeze our attention was suddenly attracted by the outburst of a brilliant glare of bluish-white light on our port-quarter, which was nothing less than the brigantine burning port-fires, probably in an attempt to discover our whereabouts by the reflection of the light on our sails, or possibly in the expectation of catching sight, by means of the light, either of our boats, or a raft, or perhaps a hen-coop and grating or two floating about as evidence of our having gone down. however, she was about five miles distant from us at that time, and although the light of the port-fires rendered her perfectly visible to us, i had little or no fear that it would betray our whereabouts to her people. she remained dodging about and occasionally burning port-fires for fully another hour--by which time we had sunk her to her foreyard below the horizon, as viewed from our deck--and then, as she discontinued her pyrotechnic display, we lost sight of her. at daybreak i sent a man right up to the main-royal-yard, where he remained until the light was thoroughly strong, and then came down with the report that the horizon was clear. this was highly satisfactory, inasmuch as it confirmed my hope that if mendouca was still prosecuting a search for us--as i felt sure he was, he having of course failed to discover any evidence of the ship having foundered--he was looking for us in a northerly direction, very probably cracking on in the belief that we had gone that way and that there was still a chance of overtaking us. at eight bells in the morning watch we brought the ship to the wind on the larboard tack, with her head about east-north-east, and i then divided my scanty crew into two watches, with joe maxwell, the carpenter, as my chief mate, and a very smart a.b., named tom sutcliffe, as second. this done, the watch was set, and put to the job of straightening-up generally and pumping out the ship, this latter job being accomplished and the pumps sucking in just under the ten minutes that maxwell had allowed for it. it was clear, therefore, that our hull was sound, and that in that respect, at all events, with the best--or rather the worst--intentions in the world, the pirates had done us little or no harm. our most serious difficulty was the want of water, mendouca having literally cleared the ship of every drop she possessed, save some eight or ten gallons in the scuttle-butt, which they had either overlooked, or perhaps had considered not worth taking. but here again it appeared as though god in his infinite mercy had taken compassion on us; for about noon the wind died away, and i had only just time to take my meridian observation for the latitude when the heavens clouded over, and toward the close of the afternoon we were visited by a terrific thunderstorm accompanied by a perfect deluge of rain, during which, by loosely spreading all the awnings fore and aft, we were enabled to catch a sufficient quantity of water to carry us without stint as far at least as sierra leone. it remained calm until about midnight, when a little breeze sprang up from the eastward which enabled us to lay our course nicely while it fanned us along at a speed of about five knots. the next morning broke bright and clear; and with the first of the light the look-out reported a sail broad on our weather bow. maxwell, fearing that it might be our old enemy, the _francesca_ showing up again, came down at once and called me, stating his fears, and causing me to rush up on the poop just as i had sprung from my cot, quite regardless of appearances, although i could scarcely believe that mendouca, if indeed we should be so unfortunate as to fall in with him again, would make his appearance in the eastern board. i must confess, however, that when i first reached the deck and beheld the stranger, i experienced a slight qualm of apprehension, for the craft was undoubtedly square-rigged, forward at least, and she was steering as straight as a hair for us, with studding-sails set on both sides, and coming down very fast. a few minutes' work with the telescope, however, sufficed to remove our apprehensions, so far at least as the _francesca_ was concerned, for as the light grew brighter we were enabled to discern that the stranger was a brig, and as i continued working away with the glass the vessel seemed to assume a familiar aspect, as though i had seen her before. at first i thought that it might possibly prove to be the spanish brig that had been anchored just ahead of us off banana peninsula; but as she drew nearer i recognised with intense delight that it was none other than the dear old _barracouta_ herself. "and with her appearance," thought i, "all my troubles are ended; for doubtless captain stopford will not only lend me men enough to carry the ship to sierra leone, but will also escort me thither." chapter nineteen. to the congo again upon a special mission. there was very great delight manifested fore and aft when i was able to announce that it was a british man-o'-war that was bearing down upon us; for all hands felt, like myself, that we had only to state our recent experiences to secure her protection at least until our arrival in safer waters. there was one exception to this, however, in the person of simpson, who no sooner learned the true character of the strange sail, than he came aft and told me his story; which, in brief, was to the effect that he had originally belonged to our navy, but had deserted, out of affection for mendouca--who had shown him great kindness--when that individual chose to shake off his allegiance and abjure his country. and now, of course, he dreaded nothing so much as recognition and seizure, for not only was he a deserter, but he had also been guilty of taking an active part in more than one deed of piracy perpetrated by his chief; he therefore implored me to let him keep below out of sight during the presence of the man-o'-war--which clearly meant to speak us-- and also to omit all mention of or reference to him in the narrative of my own personal adventures. this i readily promised to do; for although i was fully conscious that, in making such a promise, i was screening an individual who had most seriously transgressed the laws of his country, i could not help feeling that he had also contributed in a very important degree toward the saving of the _bangalore_, and all on board her; and i considered that this to a very great extent made amends for his past misdeeds, although it was quite probable that if he were arraigned for it, his judges might not take quite as lenient a view of the case. there it was, however; but for him i might never have succeeded in effecting my escape from the _francesca_, and in that case the _bangalore_ and all on board her would have gone to the bottom. i therefore felt fully justified in promising to afford him all the protection that lay in my power. when the brig was within a mile of us she hoisted british colours, and fired a gun for us to heave-to, which we of course at once did, displaying our ensign at the mizen-peak at the same time. the ladies and gentlemen in the cuddy, learning from the stewards what was happening, at once turned out to do honour to the occasion, so that when, a few minutes later, the _barracouta_, with all her studding-sails collapsing and coming in together, rounded-to within biscuit-toss of our weather quarter, our poop must have presented quite an animated appearance. as the beautiful craft swept gracefully yet with a rush up into the wind, a figure that i recognised with delight as that of young, our beloved first luff, sprang on to the hammock-rail with a speaking-trumpet in his hand. the next moment he had raised it to his lips, and was hailing-- "ho, the ship ahoy! what ship is that?" "the _bangalore_, eighty-two days out from calcutta, bound to london; and plundered two days ago by a pirate. i hope you are none the worse for your boat adventure, mr young, in the attack upon that same pirate last week? i have news and to spare for you, so shall i lower a boat, or will you? if you can conveniently do so it will perhaps be better, for i am rather short-handed," i replied. i saw young staring at me with all his eyes; evidently he had not as yet recognised me in the longshore rig with which i had been fitted by the kindness of one of the cuddy passengers. he raised the trumpet to his lips, and began-- "who in the name of ---?" when i saw little freddy pierrepoint scramble up alongside him excitedly and utterly regardless of etiquette, and say something eagerly. young lowered the trumpet, stared hard at me, raised it again, and roared through it-- "can it be possible that you are dugdale--the harry dugdale that we have all been mourning as lost?" "ay, ay, mr young, it is myself, sure enough, alive and well, i am thankful to say; and more glad than i can express to see the dear old _barracouta_ again!" as i uttered these words the watch on deck gave a ringing cheer, which thrilled me to the heart, for it told me better than words how sincerely attached to me the honest fellows were, and how delighted to see me again; and although the outburst was by no means in accordance with strict discipline, young--thoroughly good fellow that he was--never checked them, but, as their voices died away, simply waved his trumpet, and shouted, "i will come on board you!" and disappeared behind the brig's high bulwarks. a short pause now ensued, during which i suspected that the first luff was conferring with captain stopford, the _barracouta's_ people gazing curiously at us meanwhile through the brig's open ports; and then the sound of the boatswain's pipe came floating to us from the brig across the tumbling waters, and we heard his gruff voice bellowing--"gigs away!" the call was followed by a slight, muffled scurrying of feet, and the gig's crew were seen leaping, light as figures of india-rubber, into the elegantly-moulded craft that hung at the brig's davits, the falls were eased away, and in a moment the boat, light as a bubble, was dancing upon the sparkling blue tumble at the brig's lee gangway. then the first lieutenant and freddy pierrepoint appeared at the head of the side-ladder, the latter descending first and the lieutenant instantly following, the boat's bow was borne off from the ship's side, the oars dropped with a clean cut into the water, the men bent their backs as they gave way, and the dancing craft came bounding over the long surges towards us. meanwhile, on board the _bangalore_ i had caused the side-ladder to be shipped and the ropes rove in readiness for the lieutenant's arrival; and in a few minutes he and freddy were standing on the indiaman's broad deck and greeting me with a hand grip the heartiness of which there was no mistaking. i told my story as briefly as possible, and at its conclusion young said-- "well, we must of course let you have a few men; but it will be a few only that we shall be able to spare, for i am sorry to say that our loss was terribly heavy in our boat attack upon your friend mendouca, no less than eight killed and twenty-three wounded, only four of the latter having as yet been able to return to duty. you must, however, lay your case before captain stopford--who, by the way, hopes you will take breakfast with him--and i dare say that when he learns how very short-handed you are, he will strain a point to spare you a dozen men to take the ship to sierra leone. and now, suppose you introduce us to your passengers, who, judging from what i have been able to see of them from here, appear to be a very pleasant lot of people." upon this hint i led the way to the poop, where by this time nearly the entire cuddy party had assembled, and introduced my companions in due form, and in a few minutes young and freddy were each surrounded by a large party, master freddy's, i noticed, being mainly composed of the younger members of the gentler sex, who petted and made much of the juvenile warrior, to that young gentleman's entire content. in due time i proceeded on board my old ship; and on reaching the deck was fully repaid for all that i had gone through by the heartiness of the greeting that i received from my shipmates, one and all of whom seemed sincerely delighted at finding that i was still in the land of the living. for, as fate would have it, the _barracouta_ had fallen in with the _felicidad_ with the french schooner _mouette_ in company as a prize--the latter vessel having pursued the _felicidad_ out of the creek, only to find that she had caught a tartar, which captured her after a short but determined struggle--and from her the _barracouta's_ people had learned all particulars of our somewhat disastrous enterprise, including the news that i was missing, and was believed to have been killed in the unsuccessful attack upon the schooner in the creek. captain stopford was kindness itself in his reception of me, commiserating with me upon all the hardships of my late adventure, and heartily congratulating me upon my escape from the _francesca_, and the saving of the indiaman, the latter of which, he assured me, he would take care to report in the proper quarter in such a way as should further my advancement in the service. with regard to supplying me with men, he promised to do the best that he could; and at young's suggestion--he being one of the rather large party that the captain had invited to meet me at breakfast--it was arranged that i should have a dozen; and as he fully agreed with me that there was just a chance that the _francesca_, might be at no great distance to the northward, still actively pursuing her search for us, it was further arranged that i should crowd sail for sierra leone, in the hope of turning the tables upon mendouca by overtaking him, in which case we were to do our best to detain him until the arrival of the _barracouta_ upon the scene, it being the captain's plan to follow us at a distance of some fifteen or twenty miles. as an incentive to expedition--and no doubt, incidentally, to the promotion of the capture of the _francesca_--the captain informed me that if we managed to accomplish a quick run to sierra leone, i should probably be in time to rejoin the _felicidad_, which schooner was then at that port, refitting after her engagement with the _mouette_. i was very grieved to learn that poor ryan, although not nearly so severely wounded as i had believed, was lying in the hospital at sierra leone, prostrate with a bad attack of fever, from which, when the _barracouta_ left, it was greatly feared that he would not recover. as soon as breakfast was over the crew were mustered, and young picked out for me twelve good, stout men, who were ordered to pass their bags down into the boat and go on board the _bangalore_ with me; and, this most welcome addition to our crew having been received, i made sail, packing upon the good ship every rag that would draw, the _barracouta_ remaining hove-to until we had placed a sufficient distance between her and ourselves. but although we carried on day and night--the indiaman proving such a flyer that the _barracouta's_ people had their hands full to keep us in sight--nothing more was seen of the _francesca_, and we were at length driven to the conclusion that, failing to find us, mendouca had resumed his voyage at a much earlier period than we had anticipated. we reached sierra leone on the afternoon of the third day after falling in with the _barracouta_; and there i left the indiaman, which, after a detention of four days, sailed for england with a full complement, made up of the officers and men of a large barque that had been wrecked upon the coast only a week or two before, supplemented by a few out of the many white seamen who had been left behind in hospital when their ships were ready to sail for home, and who, contrary to the general rule, had recovered from, instead of succumbing to, the deadly malaria of the coast. as for me, i found that i had arrived most opportunely, so far as the _felicidad_ was concerned, for the repairs to that small hooker were completed, as it happened, on the very day of our arrival; and captain stopford very generously offered me the command of her, asserting that my conduct with regard to the indiaman had conclusively demonstrated my entire fitness for the post, and that if i chose to accept it he should have no anxiety whatever, either on the score of my courage or my discretion. ryan, poor fellow, was, contrary to expectation, still alive, and hopes were now entertained that he might ultimately recover; but he was still so weak that when i went to the hospital to see him, he was so overcome with emotion at the sight of me--although he had been carefully prepared for the meeting--that he burst into tears and was seized with a fit of hysterical sobbing so violent that i had to retire again at once without exchanging a word with him; and, to my very deep regret, i had not another opportunity to see him. i grieve to say that although, when i paid him that unfortunate visit, he appeared to be making slow but sure progress toward recovery, he suffered a relapse a few days afterwards, from which he never rallied; and his ashes now repose, with those of many another gallant spirit, in the spot that is known throughout the world as "the white man's grave." the repairs to the _felicidad_ being completed, her final preparations for sea were vigorously pushed forward, and on the third day after our arrival, having first visited the _bangalore_ and bade farewell to her passengers--each and every one of whom insisted that he (or she) owed his (or her) life to me, and that henceforward i must regard myself as a dearly cherished friend--i joined the little hooker as her commander, and sailed the same afternoon for the congo; my especial mission being to test the truth, or otherwise, of mendouca's statement respecting the fate of the _sapphire's_ boats' crews, and--in the event of its being true--to attempt the rescue of any of the unfortunate people who might perchance be still alive. we made the high land to the northward of the river mouth about midnight, after a rather long and uneventful passage; and, the wind being light, and the river current strong, even at a considerable distance from the entrance, we then reached in toward the land, and anchored in fourteen fathoms, at about as many miles from the shore, where we remained, rolling and tumbling about on the heavy swell, until the sea-breeze set in, about eight o'clock the next morning. we then hove up our mud-hook, and ran in, anchoring in banana creek, opposite lobo's factory, about six bells in the forenoon. there was only one other vessel in the creek at the time, a portuguese brig; and her build and general appearance so unmistakably proclaimed her honest, that i never gave her a second thought. besides, i had a special mission to accomplish--namely, the discovery and deliverance, if possible, of between thirty and forty of my own countrymen, languishing in a bitter captivity, and in daily, if not hourly, peril of death by torture as cruel and protracted as the fiendish malignity of merciless savages can possibly devise. now, i was as well equipped for such an expedition as i could possibly wish, save in one particular. i had a smart, light-draught vessel, capable of "going anywhere where a duck can swim," as we say at sea; we were well armed, had plenty of ammunition, mustered a crew of twenty-six prime seamen, the pick of the _barracouta's_ crew--men who would go anywhere, and face anything--we carried an ample supply of blankets, beads, brass wire, old muskets, and tawdry finery of various descriptions, priceless in the eyes of savages, for the purpose of peaceable ransom, if such could be accomplished; but we lacked an interpreter, a man acquainted with the barbaric language of the up-river natives, through whom we should be able to communicate with them and carry on the necessary negotiations. and such a man it was now my first duty and anxiety to secure. i had given this matter a great deal of careful consideration during our passage, and had at length determined upon the course of action that seemed to promise the most successful results; and it was in accordance with this determination that i anchored in banana creek instead of proceeding forthwith up the river to the spot named by mendouca as the scene of the captivity of the _sapphire's_ boats' crews. i entered the river without any disguise of any sort, showing british colours and the man-o'-war's pennant; and, as i had expected, our old friend lobo soon came alongside in his gig, with his usual stereotyped smiles and bows, and offers to supply us with anything and everything that we might happen to want. i took care to be below when he boarded us; and, in accordance with previous arrangements, gowland, who met the fellow upon his arrival, proposed that he should go down into the cabin and see me personally upon the business of his visit. he at once assented, willingly, gowland following him down, and when the two had entered, the sentry at the cabin-door closed it after them. "ah, good-morning, sar," exclaimed lobo to me, as he entered. "glad to see you back in the river, sar! i hope dat de capitan and officers of de beautiful _barracouta_ are all well? ah, gentlemen, dat was a ver' fine bit of vork, dat attack of yours upon chango creek; ver' fine and ver' successful. i 'ave alvays been proud of _my_ share in dat exploit. but, gentlemen, you mus' please never so much as vhisper dat i, joaquin miguel lobo, had anything to do vid it. my vord, if you did, de rascal slavers vould cut my t'roat for me, and de man-o'-war gentlemen vould lose a fait'ful ally." "no doubt, senor lobo," agreed i genially. "but, never fear, you are perfectly safe from betrayal to the slavers, so far as we are concerned; you shall find us as faithful to you as you have been to us. but sit down, man, and let me offer you a glass of wine." with many bows and wreathed smiles, and deprecating elevations of the shoulders, lobo took the seat to which i pointed him, and i touched a bell. "steward, put the wine and some glasses on the table, will you; and also a box of cigars that you will find on the shelf in my cabin." the wine and cigars were brought; we helped ourselves; and i began-- "i am very much obliged to you for coming aboard, senor lobo, for you are the very man that i most desired to see. i require some assistance of a rather peculiar kind, and i believe that you, above all others, are the one who can best help me to it." lobo bowed and smiled, sipped his wine, and assured us that he was in all things our very obedient, humble servant, and that nothing pleased him so much as to be of assistance to the man-o'-war gentlemen, who honoured the river by paying it an occasional visit. at the same time-- he pointed out--his friendly relations with those same man-o'-war gentlemen, and the services that he had been so glad to render them from time to time were, if not well known, at least very strongly suspected by the slavers and slave-dealing fraternity generally who used the congo for their nefarious purposes; and in incurring this suspicion he also incurred a very serious risk, both to property and life, for which he considered that he was justly entitled to be remunerated on a generous scale. "most assuredly," i agreed. "and i may tell you at once, senor lobo, that i am prepared to reward you very munificently for the efficient and faithful performance of the service that i require of you; i am prepared, in fact, to offer you no less a reward than _your life_. ah, you turn pale, i see; and well you may when i inform you that your true character is by this time known to probably every british commander on the coast; you are known as a bare-faced traitor to the cause that you have pretended so zealously to serve, and i don't mind mentioning to you, in confidence, that, if this ship had happened to be the _barracouta_ instead of the _felicidad_ you would now in all probability have been dangling from one of that ship's yard-arms, as a wholesome warning and example to all betrayers--nay, keep your seat, man; there is a sentry outside the door, and you are a prisoner beyond all possibility of escape. but you have no cause for fear on that account, provided that you can prevail upon yourself to act honestly for once. i require a certain service from you, and i promise you that if you render that service faithfully i will set you free at the termination of the adventure, with full liberty to seek safety by flight elsewhere. but until the adventure of which i speak is brought to a favourable conclusion, you are my prisoner; and i give you my word of honour that upon the first attempt to escape which you may be ill-advised enough to make, i will put you in irons and chain you to the deck. if, therefore, you are wise, you will submit to your present predicament with a good grace, rather than tempt a worse one. and now, tell me everything you know with regard to the fate of the crews of the _sapphire's_ boats." "the _sapphire's_ boats?" ejaculated the now thoroughly terrified wretch. "i swear to gad, sar, dat i had not'ing to do vid dat! i know not'ing about dem; not'ing whatever! but i can tell you de name of de man who had; ay, and i can put him into your power, if you like; he is a villain, and it would be only doing a good action to betray him to justice. i vill do it, too, if you vill release me at vonce; i vill tell you all about him, vhere he is to be found vhen he visits de river, de name of his cheep, and--and--all dat is necessairey for you to know." "yes; no doubt," i answered. "but you will have to purchase your release in some other way, senor; unfortunately for you we know all about don fernando de mendouca, captain of the brigantine _francesca_ and have every confidence in our ability to get hold of him without your assistance. and i may tell you that, _up to the present_, no charge has been made against you in connection with the disappearance of the _sapphire's_ boats; you have therefore nothing to fear from us just now on that score. _now_, will you tell us what you know about those unfortunate missing men?" "yes; yes, i vill, gentlemen; i vill tell you all dat i know; but it is not much," answered lobo, with evident relief. "i only know dat de scoundrel mendouca managed to trap de two boats in some vay--how, i know not--and dat he gave dem de choice of being massacred, dere and den, or of surrendering and having dheir lives spared. and vhen dhey had surrendered he exchanged dhem to matadi for slaves--t'ree slaves for every white man--so dat matadi might have plenty of victims--white victims dhey consider _very_ good--for de annual--de annual--what you call it, eh? festa." "festival, i suppose you mean," said i, with an involuntary shudder. "and, pray, senor lobo, do you happen to know the date of this festival?" "no, i cannot say dat i do; but i t'ink about one week from now," was the answer. "then, thank god, we are still in time!" i ejaculated. "now, senor lobo, i presume you are acquainted with this chief, matadi, are you not? you have probably had dealings with him, eh? do not be afraid to give a truthful answer, because by so doing you cannot betray anything about yourself that we do not know already. we are fully aware, for instance, that you are a slave-dealer--among other things--and i have very little doubt that, if i chose to land a party, we should find a choice lot of negroes in that barracoon of yours in the bush, yonder--you look surprised, but, you see, i know all about you; so your best plan will be to answer my questions truthfully and unreservedly. now, as to this matadi, who is he, and what is he?" "sair," said lobo, in great perturbation, "i see dat you know all about me, so i will be perfectly open and frank wid you. i _do_ know matadi. he is a very powerful chief, de head of a tribe numbering quite t'ree t'ousand warriors; and his chief town is far up de river--four, five days' journey in a canoe. it lies on de sout' bank of de river 'bout eight miles below de first--what you call?--where de water runs very furious over de rocks, boiling like--like de water in a pot." "ah, rapids, you mean, i suppose?" suggested i. "yes, yes; rapids; dat is de word," agreed lobo. "his town is near de first rapids; and he is very powerful, very dangerous, very fierce. what do you want wid him, senor?" "i want those white men that he holds in captivity; and i mean to have them, by fair means or foul!" said i. "i will buy them of him, if he is willing to part with them in that way; and if not, i intend to take them from him by force, for have them i _must_ and _will_ and i require your assistance in this matter, senor, as an interpreter, through whom i can treat with the fellow and carry on the necessary negotiations; and if those negotiations are successful, you will be released on our return here, and allowed thirty days to complete your arrangements for removal elsewhere. but if we fail you will be retained as a prisoner, and taken to sierra leone, to be dealt with as your past treacheries deserve. now, do you quite understand the position?" "yes, senor, i understand," answered lobo, in great distress. "but, oh, gentlemen, i beg, i pray you, do not take me away from my business; it will all go wrong widout me, and i shall lose hundreds, t'ousands of dollars, _all_ my property will be gone before i can get back! i shall be ruin'!" "i am sorry to hear that," i remarked; "but even supposing that matters go as badly with you as you seem to fear, that will be better than _hanging_, will it not? and, you see, i _must_ have somebody with me, as interpreter, whose interest it will be that i shall be successful in my mission; and i know of no one whose interests can be made more completely identical with my own than yourself, senor. therefore i shall take you with me, regardless of consequences. but if you have any assistants ashore to whom you would like to send a very brief message to the effect that you are taking a little business-trip up the river with me for a few days, and that they must do the best they can for you during your absence, i have no objection to your sending it. otherwise, i will dismiss your boat; for we must not miss this fine sea-breeze, which ought to take us a good many miles up-stream before it dies away." "well, gentlemen, if you are quite determined, i must submit," answered lobo, with a very disconsolate air. "but i protest against being thus carried off against my will; i protest against it as a--an--a--what do you call him?--yes, an outrage--an outrage, gentlemen; and the portuguese government will inquire into the matter." "all right," said i cheerfully; "there can be no objection to that, so far as _we_ are concerned. and now that we have arranged this little matter, shall i dismiss your boat?" "no, no; not yet, not yet," hastily answered lobo. "give me one littl' piece of paper, if you please, and i will write a few words to diego, my manager, telling him what to do in my absence." "no," said i determinedly, "i can permit no written messages; a _verbal_ one, if you like, but nothing more." "ver' well," answered lobo resignedly. "then i will go up and speak to my boatmen." "no need for that," said i. "tell us which of your men you wish to see, and i will send for him to come here." poor lobo made a gesture of impatience, but saw that i had quite determined to afford him no shadow of an opportunity to make any secret communication whatever; so he submitted to the inevitable, and sent for one of his men, to whom he delivered such a message as i suggested, adding a request that a small supply of clothing might be sent off to him at once. this ended the matter, so far as the obtaining of an efficient interpreter was concerned; the clothes were brought off; and shortly after noon we weighed and, with a brisk breeze, stood out of the creek on our way up the river. for the first twelve miles or so our course was the same as that which we had followed in our memorable expedition to attack chango creek; the river being, up to that point, about three miles wide, with a fine deep channel averaging perhaps a quarter of that width up as far as abreast the southern extremity of monpanga island, where this deep channel terminates, and the average depth of the entire stream dwindles to about six fathoms for the next fourteen miles, the channel at the same time narrowing down to a width varying from about two miles to less than half-a-mile in some parts, notably at the spot where it begins to thread its devious way among the islands that cumber the stream for a length of fully thirty miles, at a distance of about twenty-eight miles from shark point. by carrying a press of sail, and hugging the northern bank, keeping as close to the shore as our little draught of water would permit, thus to a great extent cheating the current, we contrived to get as far as the spot where the above-mentioned chain of islands commences; and there, the wind failing us toward sunset, we came to an anchor close to the southern shore, on a sand-bank, in three fathoms, under the lee of a large island that sheltered us from the rush of the main current; and there we remained all night, a strict anchor-watch of course being kept not only to see that the schooner did not drive from her berth, but also to guard against possible attack on the part of the natives. in this spot, to my inexpressible chagrin, we were compelled to spend the following two days, the wind blowing down the river, when it blew at all, a little variety being infused into the weather by the outburst of a most terrific thunderstorm which brought with it a perfect hurricane of wind and a deluge of rain; after which we again got a fair wind and were able to pursue our way for a time, getting ashore occasionally upon unsuspected sand-banks, but always contriving to heave off again, undamaged, thanks to the fact that we were proceeding up-stream against the current instead of down-stream with it. and--not to dwell unduly upon incidents that were exciting enough to us, although the recital of them would prove of but little interest to the reader--in this way we contrived to creep up the river the hundred and twelve miles or so that were necessary to bring us to matadi's town--having passed, and with some difficulty avoided, two whirlpools on the way, reaching our destination about two bells in the afternoon watch on the fifth day after leaving banana creek. chapter twenty. success. the fate of the pirate slaver. matadi's "town" was situate, as lobo had informed us, on the south bank of the stream, on the sloping side of a hill that rose rather steeply from the water's edge; the scenery of this part of the river being totally different from that of the mouth; the change occurring gradually, but becoming quite decided about the point where the chain of islands is left behind on the traveller's upward way. for whereas on the lower reaches of the congo--that is to say, for the first forty miles or so from its mouth--the banks of the river are low and flat, and to a great extent mangrove-lined, beyond this point their tendency is to become higher and steeper, in some places, indeed, quite precipitous, until where we now were the ground sloped up from the river margin to a height of fully four hundred feet, for the most part densely covered with bush interspersed here and there with masses of noble forest trees. matadi's town was situate, as i have said, upon the sloping hillside that constituted the south bank of the river, and consisted of some four or five hundred buildings arranged with tolerable regularity on either side of two broad streets or roads that crossed each other at right angles, their point of intersection being a spacious square, in the centre of which stood a circular structure with a high-peaked, pointed roof of thatch, that lobo informed me was the fetish-house. i was greatly surprised at the neatness and skill displayed in the construction of the buildings in this important town; for while they were insignificant in size, as compared with the dwellings of a civilised race, being about the size of a small two-roomed cottage, such as may be found in almost any rural district in england, they were very considerably larger and more carefully and substantially-built than the huts that we had noticed in king plenty's town, when we made our disastrous attack upon mendouca and his consorts. there was even a certain attempt at ornamentation discernible in the larger structures, many of which had what i believe is called in england a barge-board, elaborately carved, under the projecting eaves of the roof that formed the verandah, the wooden posts that supported those same projecting eaves being also boldly sculptured. these particulars i noted through my telescope on rounding the bend of the river just beyond the town; and i could not help feeling that a community of savages intellectual enough to find pleasure in the adornment of their houses would be likely to prove very difficult to deal with unless i could contrive to make their inclination coincide with my own wishes. our appearance--the _felicidad_ being probably the first ship that had ever penetrated so far up the river--created a profound sensation in the town, the inhabitants rushing in and out of their dwellings and about the streets for all the world like an alarmed colony of ants, and finally congregating along the margin of the river to the extent of fully one thousand, most of them being men, every one of whom, so far as i could make out, was armed; the weapons being spears, bows and arrows, and clubs with heavy knobs on the end. they seemed to be a fine, powerful race, evidently accustomed to warfare, if one might judge by the readiness with which, at the command of an immensely stout and powerful man--whom lobo declared to be none other than matadi himself-- they formed themselves up into compact and orderly squadrons, and i thought, ruefully, that if it became necessary to resort to forcible measures for the release of our countrymen, we were likely to have a pretty bad time. to attempt to open communications with a thousand armed savages, whose evident purpose in mustering on the river bank immediately in front of their town was to resolutely oppose any attempt at landing on our part, was a rather delicate operation; still, it had to be done, and it was worse than useless to exhibit any sign of trepidation or hesitation. i therefore ordered the gig to be lowered, and with four men, fully armed, at the oars, and lobo and myself in the stern-sheets, pushed off for the shore. this bold action on our part created a profound sensation upon the savages massed upon the shore, the boat being no sooner under way than they raised their spears above their heads, shook them furiously until the blades clashed upon each other with the sound of a falling torrent of water, and emitted a blood-curdling yell that almost drove poor lobo out of his senses. we had, however--at lobo's suggestion-- provided ourselves with palm branches, cut on the night before at our previous anchorage, and now, seizing one of these, the portuguese scrambled forward into the eyes of the boat and stood there, waving the branch violently and pointing it toward the savages. this demonstration had the effect of quelling the tumult, the blacks subsiding into quietude almost instantly, at the command of matadi; but it was evident that they had no intention of permitting us to land, for at a second command from the chief they advanced, as steadily as a band of civilised troops, across the short intervening space of greensward between themselves and the water's edge, at which they halted, forming up three deep in a long, compact line along the river margin. we continued to pull shoreward until we were within easy speaking distance; when the boat's bows were turned up-stream, and while the men continued to paddle gently ahead, using just sufficient strength to enable the boat to stem the current and maintain her position abreast the centre of the line of savages, lobo opened the palaver by informing matadi that we were there by command of the great white queen to procure the release of the white men held by him as prisoners, and that we were fully prepared to pay a handsome ransom for them; it was only for matadi to name his price, and it should be cheerfully paid. to this the chief replied by inquiring what white men we referred to; he knew nothing about white men, and indeed had never seen any except ourselves. and he strongly advised us to lose no time in making our way back down the river again, as his soldiers were very angry at our presumption in invading his territory, and he could not answer for it that he would be able to restrain them should they take into their heads to actively resent our intrusion by attacking the ship. i knew from this reply, which lobo duly translated to me, that our friend matadi was an adept in the art--so peculiarly characteristic of the african savage--of lying, and must be dealt with accordingly. so i said to lobo-- "tell him that he is mistaken. say that the circumstance was doubtless of so trivial a character as to escape the recollection of a great chief like matadi; but that, nevertheless, we _know_ it to be a fact that about six moons ago some thirty or forty white men were sold to him by one mendouca, a slave-buyer; and that it is those men we are seeking, our instructions being that we are not to return without them, even should we be obliged to destroy matadi's town with our thunder and lightning in the process of securing them." my scarcely-veiled threat to destroy his town was received by matadi with scornful laughter, the savage declaring in set terms that he did not believe in the power of the white men to produce either lightning or thunder; and as to our accomplishing the threatened destruction without those means--why, there were a few of his warriors present who would have a word to say upon that matter. touching the question of the white men said to have been sold to him, matadi admitted that he now thought he remembered some transaction of the kind, but had not the remotest idea of what had become of them; he would make inquiries, however, and if we would go away, and return again about the same time next moon he would perhaps be able to give us some news of them. but before troubling himself to make any such inquiries he must be propitiated with a present; and he would also like to know what price we were prepared to pay for each white man, should any be found. "tell him," said i, "that this is a case of `no white man, no present'; but that if the white men are found, i will not only buy them of him at so much per head, but also make him a handsome present into the bargain. say that the goods to be paid as ransom are aboard the schooner, and that they consist of guns, beads, brass wire, beautiful printed calicoes, suitable for the adornment of any african king's wives; handsome red coats with resplendent brass buttons and gorgeous worsted epaulettes, admirably calculated to set off matadi's own kingly figure; and superb blankets, red, blue, green--in fact, all the colours of the rainbow. if he and two or three of his chiefs would like to come aboard and see these magnificent articles, i shall be very pleased to exhibit them." this speech being translated by lobo, there ensued a long palaver, the result of which was that matadi declined to go on board the schooner, but had no objection to come off alongside and inspect them from a distance, provided that we would first return and hoist up our own boat. the fact evidently was that the fellow, treacherous himself, suspected everybody else of being the same, and was clearly indisposed to put himself in our power, while he was at the same time devoured with curiosity to see the articles of which i had given such a glowing description. of course, as i wished above all things to excite his cupidity to the point of determining to possess the goods, even at the cost of having to give up the white men, i readily agreed to his proposal; and at once returned to the schooner and ordered the boat to be hoisted to the davits. it was evident that my endeavour to excite matadi's curiosity had been completely successful; for no sooner was the gig out of the water than a large canoe was launched, into which matadi and three or four other negroes--presumably subordinate chiefs--scrambled, when she was at once shoved off and, paddled by twenty natives, brought to within about twenty yards of the schooner, that being considered, i suppose, about the shortest distance within which it would be safe to approach us. i tried to persuade them to come a little nearer, if not actually on board, but matadi resolutely refused; and as he seemed half inclined to go back again without even waiting to see what i had to show him, i ordered the steward to open the boxes at once, and forthwith proceeded to exhibit my coils of wire, strings of beads, bandana handkerchiefs, rolls of gaudily-coloured prints, old military uniforms, and muskets, and other odds and ends, the exhibition proving so attractive that before its conclusion the canoe had been gradually sheered nearer and nearer to the schooner until she was brought fairly alongside, and they had even consented to accept a rope's-end to hang on by. matadi badly wanted us to pass some of the articles down over the side that he might examine them still more minutely, but i would not permit this, thinking it best to still leave some of his curiosity unsatisfied, and at length, after they had been alongside nearly an hour and a half, and had asked for a second and even a third sight of most of the goods, they reluctantly retired, their eyes glistening with cupidity, matadi promising to institute an immediate inquiry as to the whereabouts of the white men, and to let me know the result as soon as possible. i was very well satisfied with this interview, for i felt convinced that i had so powerfully excited the covetousness of the savages that they would determine to possess the goods that i had shown them at any cost. and so, as it turned out, i had, although, consequent upon my omission to take into consideration the natural treachery of the savage character, i was wholly mistaken as to the form in which that determination would manifest itself. it was clear that matadi still entertained a wholesome, whole-souled distrust of us; for when he landed the troops of warriors were still left drawn up along the river bank, with the evident intention of preventing any attempt on our part to go ashore and satisfy our curiosity by an inspection of his town; we therefore accepted the palpable hint thus conveyed, and stuck to the ship, which, i need scarcely say, had been cleared for action and held ready for any emergency from the moment of our arrival abreast the town. it was by this time growing late in the afternoon, and as i was anxious to obtain possession of my unfortunate countrymen and leave matadi's rather dangerous neighbourhood before nightfall, we watched the proceedings in the town narrowly and with a great deal of interest. but although we were enabled with the aid of our telescopes to follow matadi and his little coterie of chiefs to a large building abutting on the square at the intersection of the cross streets, and which we took to be the "palace," we were unable to detect anything of an unusual character in the appearance or movements of the people until close upon sunset, when we observed a small canoe coming off to the schooner--a craft propelled by four paddlers, with a single individual sitting in the stern. this person we presently recognised as one of the chiefs who had accompanied matadi alongside earlier in the day; and he brought a message to the effect that the king had ascertained that the white men about whom we had inquired were all safe in a village a day's march distant, and that matadi would send for them on the morrow, unless we were prepared to make him a present of a musket, five strings of beads, a bandana handkerchief, and a roll of printed calico, in which case he would so far discommode himself as to send off a messenger at once. this was of course very annoying, and i did not at all like the idea of giving these savages anything without a tangible return for it; still, after considering the matter a little, i arrived at the conclusion that to expedite affairs by twelve hours was quite worth the price asked, and the articles were accordingly handed over, not without grave misgivings as to the wisdom of the proceeding. soon after this it fell dark, the stars sparkled out one after another, lighting up the scene with their soft effulgence, the noises in the town became hushed, save for the occasional barking of a dog here and there, and a deep, solemn hush fell upon us, in which the deep, hoarse, tumbling roar of a whirl-pool at no great distance, and the gurgle and rush of the turbid river past the schooner's hull became almost startlingly audible. but as long as we were able to see them the lines of native warriors still stood, silent and motionless, guarding the whole river front of the town. as a matter of precaution, i now ordered the boarding nettings to be triced up all round the ship, the guns to be loaded with grape and canister, the small arms to be prepared for immediate service, a double anchor-watch to be kept, and the men to hold themselves ready for any emergency, after the bustle of which preparations the schooner subsided again into silence and darkness, the men for the most part "pricking for a soft plank" on deck, and coiling themselves away thereon in preference to seeking repose in the stifling forecastle. as for gowland and myself, we paced the deck contemplatively together until about ten o'clock, discussing the chances of getting away on the morrow, and then, everything seeming perfectly quiet and peaceful, we had our mattresses brought on deck, and stretched ourselves out thereon in the small clear space between the companion and the wheel. i had been asleep about two hours, when i was awakened by a light touch, and, starting up, found that it was one of the anchor-watch, who was saying-- "better go below, sir, i think, because it looks as though it was goin' to rain. and bill and me, sir, we thinks as you ought to know that we fancies we've heard the dip o' paddles occasionally round about the ship within the last ten minutes." "the dip of paddles, eh?" exclaimed i, in a whisper. "where away, roberts?" "well, first here and then there, sir," answered the man, in an equally low and cautious tone of voice; "both ahead and astarn of us; sometimes on one side, and then on t'other. but we ain't by no means certain about it; that there whirl-pool away off on our port-quarter a little ways down-stream is makin' such a row that perhaps we're mistaken, and have took the splash of the water in it for the sound of paddles. and it's so dark that there ain't a thing to be seen." it was as the man had said. it was evident that a heavy thunderstorm was about to break over us, for the heavens had become black with clouds, and the darkness was so profound that it was impossible to see from one side of the deck to the other. i scrambled to my naked feet and went first to the taffrail, then along the port side of the deck forward, returning aft along the starboard side of the deck, listening intently, and i certainly fancied that once or twice i detected a faint sound like that of a paddle stroke, but i could not be certain; and as to seeing anything, that was utterly out of the question. "find warren, and tell him to bring a port-fire on deck, and light it," said i. "it can do no harm to take a look round, just to satisfy ourselves; and it is never safe to trust these savages too much. look alive, roberts; moments may be precious if it be as you suspect." "ay, ay, sir," answered the man, as he trundled away forward to find the gunner. and meanwhile, as it was evident that a heavy downpour was imminent, i roused up gowland, and we carried our mattresses below, i repeating to him, as we went, what roberts had told me. by the time that we got back on deck again the gunner was aft, waiting for us, with the port-fire all ready in his hand, and i instructed him to go aloft as far as the fore-cross-trees and light it there. a few seconds elapsed, and then, with startling distinctness, came down to us the cry-- "all ready, sir, with the port-fire!" "then light it at once," answered i, "and we will see what there is to be seen." the livid, blue-white glare of the port-fire almost instantly burst forth, shedding its unearthly radiance far across the glassy, swirling surface of the rushing stream, and by its light we saw a startling sight indeed, the schooner being surrounded by a flotilla of at least twenty large canoes, each manned by from thirty to forty dusky warriors, fully armed with spears, bows, and war-clubs. they were about a cable's length from us, and had evidently taken up their positions with the utmost care, so that they might close in upon and reach us simultaneously, as they were now doing. as the brilliant light of the port-fire blazed forth, a shout of astonishment, not very far removed from dismay, burst from the occupants of the canoes, and a momentary tendency to sheer off precipitately became apparent; but this was instantly checked by a loud and authoritative call from the largest canoe--the voice sounding very much like that of matadi himself--and with an answering yell the savages at once turned the bows of their canoes toward the schooner and began to paddle for dear life. "call all hands," shouted i, "and pipe to quarters. pass the word that the men are not to wait to dress. another minute and the savages will be upon us!" the men needed no second order; they had all been sleeping on deck, and had awakened at the gunner's call from aloft, and the glare of the port-fire striking through their closed eyelids, and before the words were well out of my lips they were standing to their guns and awaiting my next order. "depress the muzzles of your guns as much as you can, and give the treacherous rascals their contents as you bring them to bear," cried i. "we shall only have time for one round, and if that does not stop them we shall be obliged to fight them hand to hand!" the whole of the schooner's guns were fired, one after the other, but the port-fire unfortunately burnt out just about that time, so that we were unable to ascertain what effect had been produced, and before another could be found and lighted we heard and felt the light shocks of collision as the canoes dashed alongside, and in a moment found ourselves engaged in attempting to check the onset of a perfect _wall_ of savages that hemmed us in on every side, and surged, and struggled, and writhed, and panted as they endeavoured to force a way through the stubborn boarding nettings. it was just the tricing up of those nettings that saved us; but for them the schooner's decks would have been overrun, and we should have been massacred in a moment. as it was, this unexpected obstacle, which of course none of them had observed in the afternoon--the nettings not being then triced up--daunted them, for they could neither displace it nor force a way through it, and while they clung there, like a lot of bees, vainly striving to find or make a passage through it, our men were blazing away with musket and pistol at the black wall of writhing, yelling humanity, and bowling them over by dozens at a time. when at length another port-fire was found and lighted, it disclosed to us an appalling picture of dusky, panting bodies, blazing eyeballs, waving skins and plumes, gleaming spear-points, and upraised war-clubs hemming us in on both sides, from stem to stern, every separate individual glaring at us with demoniac hate and fury as he strove ineffectually to get at us. the savages fell in scores at a time beneath our close and withering fire, and at length, finding the netting impassable, and themselves being shot down to no purpose, they suddenly abandoned the attack and flung themselves back into their canoes, in which they made off with all speed for the shore, subjected meanwhile to a galling fire of grape and canister from our guns, which i very regretfully allowed to be maintained, believing that our only chance of safety lay in inflicting upon them a severe enough lesson to utterly discourage them from any renewal of the attack. we continued firing until the last canoe had reached the shore, by which time eleven of them had been utterly destroyed and several others badly damaged, resulting in a loss to matadi of, according to my estimate, not far short of three hundred men. we had just ceased firing, and the men were busy securing the guns again, when the threatened storm burst forth, and our fight terminated with one of the most terrific tempests of thunder, lightning, and rain that i had ever been exposed to. it; lasted until about three o'clock the next morning, and then passed off, leaving the heavens calm, clear, and serene once more, and the stars even more brilliant than they had been before the gathering of the storm. of course, after the attempted surprise of the schooner by the savages, there was no more sleep for me that night, and before dawn i had resolved to send a boat ashore, demanding the surrender of matadi and his chiefs, as hostages for the good behaviour of their people until the delivery of the english prisoners, the alternative, in case of refusal, being the destruction of the town. accordingly, as the rising sun was gilding the hill-tops, i ordered the boat to be lowered, and sent her away in gowland's charge, with lobo to act as interpreter, with a message to that effect. the guard of warriors still held the landing-place, and to the chief in command of them the message was given; its receipt, as gowland subsequently informed me, producing a very considerable amount of consternation. the reply was that matadi had been very severely wounded in the _accidental_ engagement of the previous night, and was believed to be dying; but that the chief to whom the message had been given would communicate with his brother chiefs, and that we should receive their reply on the following morning. and to this gowland had replied that if the white prisoners were not surrendered, safe and sound, or the whole of the chiefs, matadi included, on board the schooner when the sun stood over a certain hill-top--which would be in about an hour from that moment--the schooner's guns would open fire upon the town and continue its bombardment until every house in it was razed to the ground. and therewith the gig returned to the ship, and was again hoisted to the davits. this peremptory message, coupled no doubt with the experiences of the preceding night, had its desired effect; for while the sun was still a quarter of an hour distant from that part of the heavens that gowland had indicated, we saw a procession issue from the fetish-house in the centre of the town, which our telescopes enabled us to make out as consisting of a group of white men, closely guarded by a body of some two hundred armed warriors, detailed, it would appear, for the purpose of guarding the whites from the fury of the witch-doctors, or priests, who were thus most unwillingly deprived of their prey, and who accompanied the party right down to the shore, doing their best to instigate the people to attack the escort and recapture the released prisoners. there was a terrific hubbub over the affair, repeated rushes being made at the party; but the guards appeared to use their clubs with great freedom, and eventually the cortege reached the river, and the whites were safely embarked in three large canoes which, manned by natives, and apparently in charge of some authoritative person, at once shoved off for the schooner. upon the arrival of this little flotilla alongside it was found that the white prisoners brought off for surrender numbered twenty-eight, all of whom were in a most wretched plight from sickness and the barbarous neglect with which they had been treated during their long and wearisome captivity. they consisted of the _sapphire's_ late second and third lieutenants, one midshipman, nine marines, and sixteen seamen; one midshipman, three marines, and two seamen having died of fever during the time that they had been in matadi's hands. so frightfully were they reduced by suffering and despair, that when the poor little surviving mid--a mere lad of sixteen--was helped up the side to the schooner's low deck his nerve entirely gave way, and he fell upon the planks in a paroxysm of hysterical tears, and wild, incoherent ejaculations of gratitude to god for having delivered him from a living death; while as for the others, they were too deeply moved and shaken to utter more than a husky word or two for the moment, but the convulsive grip of their emaciated hands, their quivering lips, and the look of almost incredulous delight with which they gazed about them and into our faces, spoke far more eloquently than words. needless to say, we gave them a most hearty and fraternal welcome, at once and before every thing else providing as far as we could for their physical comfort, while armstrong, our warm-hearted scotch surgeon, immediately took them in hand with a good-will that promised wonders in the way of speedy restoration to health and strength. during all this while the three canoes had remained alongside; and by and by, when i had once more time to think of other matters than those more immediately concerning my guests, lobo came to me and informed me that the chiefs who had brought off the released white men were waiting for the payment of the promised ransom. i thought this tolerably cool, after the treacherous manner in which they had attacked us during the preceding night; but i was too greatly rejoiced at the success of my mission to be very severe or retributive in my behaviour just then. i therefore paid the full amount agreed upon, but directed lobo to say that although i paid it i did not consider that matadi was entitled to claim a single article in view of his unprovoked attack upon the schooner, and the miserable condition in which he had delivered up his captives. but i paid it in order that he might practically learn that an englishman never breaks a promise that he has once made. and having duly impressed this upon them, i gave them further to understand that, should it ever happen that other white men fell into their hands, they would be expected to treat them with the utmost kindness and consideration, upon pain of condign punishment should they fail to do so, and that upon delivering any such whites, safe and sound, to the first warship that might happen to enter the river, they would be handsomely rewarded. this matter settled, our business with matadi was at an end, and although there happened to be not a breath of wind stirring, i determined to make a start down the river at once, and get to sea as soon as possible, in order that the rescued men might not be deprived, for one moment longer than was absolutely necessary, of the restorative effects of the pure salt breeze. we accordingly manned the capstan forthwith, hove short, and then proceeded down-stream by the process of navigation known as "dredging"; that is to say, we kept the schooner in the proper channel by means of the anchor and the rudder combined, allowing the anchor to just touch and drag along the ground when it became necessary to sheer the ship away from a danger, and at other times heaving it off the ground a few feet and allowing the craft to drift with the current. and so strong was the rush of the river just then, that by its means alone we accomplished a descent of no less than thirty miles that day before sunset, anchoring for the night in a very snug cove on the northern bank of the river, under the shadow of some high hills. then, during the night, a light southerly air sprang up, freshening towards morning into a spanking breeze that soon became half a gale of wind, and under its welcome impulse--although we found it rather shy with us in some of the narrowest and most intricate parts of the navigation--we contrived to complete the descent of the remaining portion of the river on our second day out from matadi's town, arriving off the mouth of banana creek about an hour before sunset. here, in fulfilment of my promise, i released lobo, who, to do him justice, had served us well when he found that it was to his interest to do so. and i may now dismiss him finally from my story by saying that when one of the ships of our squadron put into the river about three weeks later, it was found that senor lobo had profited by my advice to the extent that he had disposed of his factory and other property, just as it stood, to his former manager--the purchase-money being paid three-fourths down, the remainder to be paid by instalments at three and six months' date. and a very excellent bargain he contrived to make, too, so i understood, the unfortunate buyer suffering a heavy loss when the captain of the cruiser made it his first business to destroy the barracoon, which formed a portion of the property, although the aforesaid buyer of course made a point of vowing most emphatically that he had no intention whatever of using the structure for slave-dealing purposes, to which also, as a matter of course, he declared that he had a most righteous aversion. having landed lobo, we proceeded to sea that same night, carrying the southerly breeze with us all through the night, and then falling in with a regular twister from the eastward that carried us right across the line to about latitude degrees minutes north. from thence we had light and variable breezes to sierra leone, despite which we made an excellent passage, arriving in the anchorage in just three days short of a month from the date of our leaving it upon our rescuing expedition; and i am happy to say that when we landed the rescued party they had all so far rallied as to render their perfect recovery merely a matter of time, provided, of course, that the deadly fever of the coast did not carry them off in the meanwhile. on our arrival in sierra leone i was greatly surprised to find the _barracouta_ still in harbour; and i of course lost no time in going on board to report myself and, incidentally, to find out the reason of her prolonged stay in port. but on presenting myself on board i discovered that i had been mistaken in supposing her to have lain there idle during the whole period of my cruise--on the contrary, she had only arrived three days before the _felicidad_; and after i had told my story and received the compliments of the captain and the rest of the officers upon what they were pleased to term the boldness and judgment with which i had executed my mission, i had to listen in return to a story as gruesome as can well be imagined, although it was told in very few words. it appeared, then, that a day or two after my departure, the _barracouta_ again put to sea with the fixed but unexpressed determination to prosecute a further search for the _francesca_, the wind and weather having meanwhile been such as to encourage captain stopford in the hope that by adopting certain measures he might yet contrive to fall in with her. and he had done so, though by no means in the manner that he had expected, the cruise being without result in the direction in which he had hoped to meet with success. some days later, however, after the search had been reluctantly abandoned, and while the brig was edging in towards the coast again, hoping to pick up a prize to recompense them in a measure for their disappointment, they had unexpectedly fallen in with the _francesca_, again, and were not long in coming to the conclusion that something was seriously wrong on board her, both her topmasts being carried away close to the caps and hanging suspended by the rigging, with no apparent effort being made to clear away the wreck, although the weather was then quite fine. sail was of course at once made to close with the dismantled craft, and then another surprise met them, for although the intention of the brig must have been from the first moment unmistakable, no attempt was made to avoid the encounter, which, however, was accounted for a little later by the fact that the _francesca_ appeared to be in an unmanageable condition. then, as the brig neared her still more closely, it was seen that the sweeps were rigged out but not manned, although the deck was crowded with people, unmistakably blacks. and then it was that for the first time the dreadful surmise dawned upon captain stopford's mind--a surmise that soon proved to be true--that the negroes, doubtless goaded to frenzy by their continued ill-treatment, had risen upon and massacred the entire crew and taken possession of the brigantine, which of course they had not the remotest idea how to handle. the _barracouta_ soon arrived upon the _francesca's_ weather quarter, and the evidences of the fearful deed then became unmistakable, the scuppers still bearing the stains of the ensanguined stream that had poured from them, while among the whole of that crowd of yelling, fiercely gesticulating blacks, not a single white face was to be seen. boats were at once lowered and a strong crew sent away to take possession of the disabled vessel, but the emancipated slaves, maddened at the thought of again falling into the hands of the hated whites, and, of course, unaware of the fact that the brig's crew were anxious only to render them a service, offered so desperate a resistance to the boarders that young, who led the latter, recognising the impossibility of taking the brigantine without serious loss of life, withdrew to consult with captain stopford as to the best course to pursue. meanwhile, the wind fell away to a calm, of which circumstance the slaves took advantage by manning the sweeps and gradually withdrawing from the vicinity of the _barracouta_, this was about sunset; and three hours later a bright blaze upon the horizon proclaimed that the notorious _francesca_ had either caught or been set on fire in some inexplicable way. the brig's boats were at once manned and dispatched to the rescue of the unhappy blacks, or as many of them as it might be possible to save; but the brigantine was by this time some nine miles away, the flames burnt with ever-increasing fury, and while the boats were still some three miles distant the doomed ship blew up, and the occupants of the boats saw the bodies of the miserable blacks hurled high in the air in the midst of a dazzling sheet of flame and a cloud of smoke. when the boats arrived upon the scene of the disaster, all that remained of the once gallant but guilty _francesca_ consisted of a few charred timbers and fragments of half-burnt planking, in the midst of which floated some forty or fifty dead bodies of negroes; the rest had vanished--whither? such, reader, is the story, and such was the end of the pirate slaver, the terrible doom of which, when it became known, caused such a thrill of horror in the breasts of those who had emulated her crew in their career of crime, that from that time forward there was a noticeable falling-off in the number of vessels frequenting the west african rivers in search of slaves; and finally, a year or two later, the appearance of fast steamers in the slave-squadron rendered the chances of success so remote that but a few of the most enterprising had heart to continue the pursuit of so risky and unprofitable a business. and when these were one by one captured and their vessels condemned, the infamous trade dwindled more and more, until it finally died out altogether, never, let us hope, to be revived again. the end. scanned by jc byers, (www.wollamshram.ca/ ) proofread by the volunteers of the distributed proofreaders site. (http://charlz.dns go.com/gutenberg/) two trips to gorilla land and the cataracts of the congo. by richard f. burton. in two volumes vol. ii. london: contents of vol. i. chapter i. from fernando po to loango bay.--the german expedition chapter ii. to são paulo de loanda chapter iii. the festival.--a trip to calumbo--portuguese hospitality chapter iv. the cruise along shore--the granite pillar of kinsembo chapter v. into the congo river.--the factories.--trip to shark's point.--the padrao and pinda chapter vi. up the congo river.--the slave depot.--porto da lenha.-arrival at boma chapter vii. boma.--our outfit for the interior chapter viii. a visit to banza chisalla chapter ix. up the congo to banza nokki chapter x. notes on the nzadi or congo river chapter xi. life at banza nokki chapter xii. preparations for the march chapter xiii. the march to banza nkulu chapter xiv. the yellala of the congo chapter xv. return to the congo mouth chapter xvi. the slaver and the missionary in the congo river chapter xvii. concluding remarks appendix:-- i. meteorological ii. plants collected in the congo, at dahome, and the island of annabom, by mr. consul burton iii. heights of stations, west coast of africa, computed from observations made by captain burton iv. immigration africaine part ii. the cataracts of the congo. "allí o mui grande reino está de congo, por nós ja convertido à fé de christo, por onde o zaire passa claro e longo, rio pelos antiguos nunca visto." "here lies the congo kingdom, great and strong, already led by us to christian ways; where flows zaïre, the river clear and long, a stream unseen by men of olden days." the lusiada, v. . part ii. the cataracts of the congo. chapter i. from fernando po to loango bay.--the german expedition. during the hot season of , "nanny po," as the civilized african calls this "lofty and beautiful island," had become a charnel-house, a "dark and dismal tomb of europeans." the yellow fever of the last year, which wiped out in two months one-third of the white colony--more exactly, out of --had not reappeared, but the conditions for its re-appearance were highly favourable. the earth was all water, the vegetation all slime, the air half steam, and the difference between wet and dry bulbs almost nil. thoroughly dispirited for the first time, i was meditating how to escape, when h. m. steamship "torch" steamed into clarence cove, and commander smith hospitably offered me a passage down south. to hear was to accept. two days afterwards (july , ) i bade a temporary "adios" to the enemy. the bitterness of death remained behind as we passed out of the baneful bights. wind and wave were dead against us, yet i greatly enjoyed the gradual emerging of the sun through his shroud of "smokes;" the increasing consciousness that a moon and stars really exist; the soft blue haze of the sky, and the coolness of ° f. at a.m. in the captain's cabin. i had also time to enjoy these charms. the "torch" was not provided with "despatch- boilers:" she was profoundly worm-eaten, and a yard of copper, occasionally clapped on, did not prevent her making some four feet of water a day. so we rolled leisurely along the well-known gaboon shore, and faintly sighted from afar capes lopez and st. catherine, and the fringing ranges of mayumba-land, a blue line of heights based upon gently rising banks, ruddy and white, probably of shaly clay. the seventh day (august ) placed us off the well-known "red hills" of loango-land. the country looks high and bold after the desperate flatness of the bights, and we note with pleasure that we have left behind us the "impervious luxuriance of vegetation which crowns the lowlands, covers the sides of the rises, and caps their summits." during the rains after october the grass, now showing yellow stubble upon the ruddy, rusty plain, becomes a cane fence, ten to twelve feet tall; but instead of matted, felted jungle, knitted together by creepers of cable size, we have scattered clumps of dark, lofty, and broad-topped trees. a nearer view shows great cliffs, weather-worked into ravines and basins, ribs and ridges, towers and pinnacles. above them is a joyful open land, apparently disposed in two successive dorsa or steps, with bright green tiers and terraces between, and these are pitted with the crater-like sinks locally called "holes," so frequent in the gaboon country. southwards the beauty of eternal verdure will end, and the land will become drier, and therefore better fitted for europeans, the nearer it approaches mossamedes bay. south of "little fish," again, a barren tract of white sand will show the "last tree," an inhospitable region, waterless, and bulwarked by a raging sea. loango is a "pool harbour," like the ancient portus lemanus (hythe), a spit of shingle, whose bay, north-east and south-west, forms an inner lagoon, bounded landwards by conspicuous and weather-tarnished red cliffs. this "lingula" rests upon a base of terra firma whose westernmost projection is indian point. from the latter runs northwards the "infamous" indian bar, compared by old sailors with a lengthened bill of portland; a reef some three miles long, which the waves assault with prodigious fury; a terror to slavers, especially in our autumn, when the squalls and storms begin. the light sandy soil of the mainland rests upon compact clay, and malaria rises only where the little drains, which should feed the lagoon, evaporate in swamps. here and there are clumps of tall cocoas, a capot, pullom or wild cotton-tree, and a neat village upon prairie land, where stone is rare as on the pampas. southwards the dry tract falls into low and wooded ground. the natural basin, entered by the north-east, is upwards of a mile in length, and the narrow, ever-shifting mouth is garnished with rocks, the sea breaking right across. gunboats have floated over during the rains, but at dead low water in the dry season we would not risk the gig. guided by a hut upon the beach fronting french factory and under lee of the breakers off indian bar, i landed near a tree-motte, in a covelet smoothed by a succession of sandpits. the land sharks flocked down to drag the boat over the breakwater of shingle. they appeared small and effeminate after the burly negroes of the bights, and their black but not comely persons were clad in red and white raiment. it is a tribe of bumboat men, speaking a few words of english, french, and portuguese, and dealing in mats and pumpkins, parrots, and poultry, cages, and fetish dolls called "idols." half a mile of good sandy path led to the english factory, built upon a hill giving a charming view. to the south-east, and some three miles inland from the centre of the bay, we were shown "looboo wood," a thick motte conspicuously crowning a ridge, and forming a first-rate landmark. its shades once sheltered the nyáre, locally called buffalo, the gorilla, and perhaps the more monstrous "impungu" (mpongo). eastward of the factory appears chomfuku, the village of jim potter, with a tree-clad sink, compared by old voyagers with "the large chalkpit on portsdown hill," and still much affected by picnickers. at loanghili, or loanguilli, south of looboo wood, and upon the right bank of a streamlet which trickles to the sea, is the cemetery, where the kings are buried in gun-boxes. the ma-loango (for mwani, "lord" of loango), the great despot who ruled as far as the congo river, who used to eat in one house, drink in another, and put to death man or beast that saw him feeding, is a thing of the past. yet five miles to the eastward (here held to be a day's march) king monoyambi governs "big loango town," whose modern native name, i was told, is mangamwár. he shows his power chiefly by forbidding strangers to enter the interior. the factory (messrs. hatton and cookson) was a poor affair of bamboos and mats, with partition-walls of the same material, and made pestilent by swamps to landward. little work was then doing in palm oil, and the copper mines of the interior had ceased to send supplies. we borrowed hammocks to cross the swamps, and we found french factory a contrast not very satisfactory to our insular pride. m. charles de gourlet, of the maison régis, was living, not in a native hut lacking all the necessaries of civilized man, but in a double-storied stone house, with barracoons, hospital, public room, orchestra, and so forth, intended for the "emigrants." instead of water, the employés had excellent cognac and vermouth, and a succulent cuisine replaced the poor britishers' two barrels of flour and biscuit. no wonder that in our half-starved fellow countrymen we saw little of the "national failing, a love of extravagant adventure." the frenchmen shoot, or at least go out shooting, twice a week, they walk to picnics, learn something of the language, and see something of the country. they had heard a native tradition of mr. gorilla's "big brother," but they could give no details. i will conclude this chapter with a notice of what has taken place on the loango coast a decade after my departure. although africa has changed but little, europe has, and we can hardly envy the german nation its eminence and unexpected triumphs in war when we see the energy and persistency with which they are applying themselves to the arts of peace--especially of exploration. and nowhere have they been more active than in this part of the world, where their old rivals, the english, are apparently contented to sit at home in ease, working their factories and counting out their money. to begin with the beginning. the year found the berlin geographical society intent upon "planting a lance in africa," and upon extending and connecting the discoveries of livingstone, du chaillu, schweinfurth, and other travellers. delegates from the various associations of germany met in congress, and organized (april , ) the germanic "afrikanische gesellschaft." ex-president dr. adolf bastian, a well-known traveller in siam, cambodia, china, and the indian archipelago, and who, moreover, had visited ambassi or salvador do congo, the old missionary capital, in , was at once sent out as pioneer and vanguard to prospect the coast for a suitable station and a point de départ into the interior--a scientific step dictated by trained and organized common sense. the choice of leader fell upon dr. gussfeldt, herr von hattorf being his second in command, and with them were associated dr. falkenstein as zoologist, and dr. soyaux as botanist. a geologist, dr. lenz, of hamburg, was sent to connect the ogobe and okanda rivers with, the loango coast, unless he found a likely northeastern route. in this case, the society would take measures to supply him with the necessary equipment. the expedition began unfortunately, by the loss of outfit and instruments in the "nigritia," wrecked off sierra leone: it persevered, however, and presently met dr. bastian and professor von gorschen at cabinda. the former had collected much information about the coast. he had learned from slaves that the old kingdoms of loango, mahango, and angay are bounded eastwards, or inland, by mayombe, a belt of forest, the threshold of the unknown interior. it begins the up-slope to the great ghat ridge, which, visible after a day's journey, separates the coast from the central basin. a fortnight or three weeks' march leads to an open country, a land of metalliferous hills, where the people barter their goods against gunpowder and weapons, brought by traders from the east. these "orientals" are now heard of almost all along the west african coast, and doubtless, in several places, the report will prove true. the prospector had also visited, in search of a depôt, futila in cabinda-land; the tschiluango (chiloango), or cacongo river, a fine navigable stream, where the people float down their palm oil; landana; "chinsonso" (chinxoxo, pronounced chinshosho), chicambo, loango, and the quillu (kwillu) stream, the latter breaking through the coast range, disemboguing near loango bay, and reported to be connected with the great congo. he found the old despotism of loango to be insignificant, reduced, in fact, to the strip of coast between the quillu and the luema-lukallo rivers. the slave trade, once a monopoly of kings, princes, and chiefs, is now no more; legitimate commerce has levelled ranks, and the real power is in the hands of the wealthiest merchants. from the abbé durand, librarian of the paris geographical society, we learn: . that loango is in the province of cacongo; . that cacongo is considered a province of loango; . that cacongo forms a kingdom of itself, with a capital, ringwele. the name of the late king was "dom joão, capitão mempolo," and, though he had died some years ago, he was not buried, for the usual reasons, in early . meanwhile his nephew and successor, mwátá bona, was acting regent until the obsequies shall take place. the station finally chosen by the german explorers was chinxoxo, or, as herr kiepert uncompromisingly writes it, "tschinschonkscho." it is within easy distance of the chiloango or "luiza loango" river; and its port, landana in cabindaland, has become a thoroughly europeanized settlement, with five trading stations up stream. an empty dutch factory was repaired, and the house, containing a parlour, three small bed rooms, and the usual offices, was ready for habitation by the second week in october. on october th, dr. güssfeldt, after shaking off the "seasoning fever" at ponta negra, proceeded to make a trial trip, and a route survey with compass and chronometer, up the important quillu river. as usual, it has a bar; within the last few years the right bank has been carried away by the floods, and some of the old factories are under water. the average breadth is paces, which diminishes to at the rocky "gates" near kama- chitoma, manyamatal and gotu. at direct miles from the mouth lies "chimbak," a trading station, where dr. güssfeldt rested and recruited strength for a month. thence he went leisurely up stream to the bumina rapids, and found the easterly rhumb of the river bending to the n.e. and the n.n.e.; its channel did not exceed yards in width, and precipitous rock-walls rose on either hand. at bumina as at gotu the quillu breaks through the parallel lines of ghats, whose trend is from n.w. to s.e.; in fact, these "katarakten" are the yellalas of the congo. a march of four hours brought him to the mayombe country (circ. s. lat. °), which must not be confounded with the ma-yumba or northernmost possession of the congo kingdom; the latter word properly means "king of yumba," as ma-loango is mwani-loango. the mayombe chief proved friendly, and assisted dr. güssfeldt to hire bearers (november ) for yangela, where his excursion ended. the boundary-line is marked by a large gate, like the two openings in the wooden wall denoting the loango frontier between the quillu and luema rivers. the character of the country changed to the normal park-like aspect of africa above the ghats; the dense forests waxed thin; picturesque views presented themselves, reminding the wayfarer of switzerland; and bare, dome-shaped mountains formed the background. at nsunsi, about , feet above sea-level, the eye ranged over the yangela country, as far as the land of the batetye, whose grassy plains are traversed by ranges trending to the w.s.w., and apparently culminating to the south. at the tondo village the skull of a gorilla was remarked. the upper quillu, after its great bend, proved to be to paces broad; and the traveller ascertained that, instead of being connected with the great artery, it rises in a lake nearly due north of nsundi (sundi), near the country of the babongo and the babum. dr. güssfeldt returned to the coast on december , and prepared for the great march into the interior. dr. falkenstein, the medicus and zoologist, in november reported favourably of chinxoxo. the station is situated on a hilly ridge commanding a view of the sea. "it looks imposing enough, but it would produce more effect if we could hoist the german flag, as the other establishments here do those of their respective nations. german ships would then take home news of the progress of our undertaking, and the natives would see at a distance this token of the enterprising spirit of the german nation, and come to us with provisions and other natural products." he adds, "in fernando po, an island which i would recommend as a sanatorium for wealthy hypochondriacs, we found an extraordinary abundance of fruit, cocoa-nuts, bananas, mangoes, delicious oranges, and pine-apples...the ivory trade on the gaboon is very flourishing. a german firm which i visited exports, £ , worth per annum, the value of total exports being, £ , . the tusks are very large; one weighed about lbs., and some have ranged to lbs. the other articles exported are gum and ebony, which are brought by the natives, especially the fans and mpangwes (sic) from the interior. the slave trade is said still to be carried on by europeans, though it is not known where the slaves go to " (of course to são thomé and prince's island). "in the immediate vicinity of our station the chief trade is in palm oil and ground nuts..... rings, chains, crosses, watches, &c., are readily taken by the savages in exchange for native goods, and i obtained a valuable fetish for a chain and a cross worth a silbergroschen." after three months spent upon the coast, and much suffering from fever, the energetic dr. bastian was welcomed home on december , . his present book[fn# ] makes only one instalment of the work, the other being the "correspondenzblätter der afrikanischen gesellschaft." briefly, everything has been done to lay the foundation for success and to advertise the undertaking. finally, not satisfied with these steps, the german society for the exploration of equatorial africa organized in september, , a second expedition. captain alexander von homeyer, a well-known ornithologist, will lead it viâ s. paulo de loanda and cassange (kasanji) to the mysterious lands of the mwata ya nvo, and thus supplement the labours of portuguese travellers. this fine undertaking set out early in . chapter ii. to são paulo de loanda. at loango, by invitation of commander hoskins, r.n., i transferred myself on board h.m. steamship "zebra," one of the nymphs of the british navy, and began the miles southwards. there was no wind except a slant at sunset, and the current often carried us as far backwards as the sails drove us onwards. the philosophic landlubber often wonders at the eternal restlessness of his naval brother-man, who ever sighs for a strong wind to make the port, and who in port is ever anxious to get out of it. i amused myself in the intervals of study with watching the huge gulls, which are skinned and found good food at fernando po, and in collecting the paper-nautilus. the ocythoë cranchii was often found inside the shell, and the sea was streaked as with cotton- flecks by lines of eggs several inches long, a mass of mucus with fine membraneous structure adhering to the rocks, and coagulating in spirits or salt water. the drum-fish was not heard except when we were at anchor; its sound somewhat suggests a distant frog- concert, and i soon learned to enjoy what m. dufosse has learnedly named "ichthyopsophosis," the song of the fish. passing cabinda, miles from loanda, but barely in sight, we fell in with h.m. steamship "espoir," commander douglas, who had just made his second capture of a slave-schooner carrying some head of congos. in these advanced days, the representative man walks up to you as you come on board; touches his cap or his wool, and expresses his best thanks in west coast english; when you offer him a dram he compares it with the trade article which "only �ting, he no burn." the characteristic sights are the captured moleques or negrokins, who, habited in sacks to the knees, choose an m.c. to beat time, whilst they sing in chorus, extending the right arm, and foully abusing their late masters, who skulk about the forecastle. ten days sped by before we sighted the beginning of the end, cape spilemberta and dande point, two bluffs in distinct serrations; the aspect of the land was pleasant, a vista of tall cliffs, white or red, rising wall-like from a purple sea, jagged with sharp, black reef and "diabolito," and bearing on the summit a plateau well grown with grass and tree. we then opened a deep bight, which has the honour of being entitled the longest indentation from cape lopez to great fish bay, some ° or a thousand miles of coast. a gap in the cliff line and darker vegetation showed the zenza river, generally called bengo from the district (icolo e bengo) which it traverses. here was once a busy settlement much frequented by shipping, which thus escaped harbour dues. the mosquito-haunted stream, clear in the dries, and, as usual, muddy during the rains, supports wild duck, and, carried some ten miles in "dongos" or flat-bottomed boats, supplies the capital of angola with drinking water and dysentery. as we glide towards the anchorage two features attract my attention: the morro or hill-ridge on the mainland, and the narrow strip which forms the harbour. the escarpment, sweeping from a meridian to a parallel, juts westward in the bluff cape lagostas (lobsters), a many-coloured face, in places not unlike the white cliffs of dover; it then trends from north-east to south-west, bending at last in a picturesque bow, with a shallow sag. the material is the tauá or blood-red marl of the brazil, banded with white and brown, green, chocolate, and yellow; huge heaps of "rotten earth," washed down by the rains, cumber the base of the ruined sea-wall north of the town; in front is a pellucid sea with the usual trimmings, while behind roll the upland stubbles of autumn, here mottled black with fire, there scattered with the wild ficus and the cashew, a traveller from the opposite hemisphere. the ilha de loanda, which gave its name to the city, according to mr. w. winwood reade ("savage africa," chapter xxv.), is "derived from a native word meaning bald:" i believe it to be the angolan luánda, or tribute. forming the best harbour of the south african coast, it is made by the missionaries of the seventeenth century to extend some ten leagues long. james barbot's plan (a.d. ) shows seven leagues by one in breadth, disposed from north-east to south-west, and, in the latter direction, fitting into the "mar aparcelado" or shoaly sea, a curious hook-shaped bight with a southern entrance, the "barra de curinba" (corimba). but the influences which formed the island, or rather islands (for there are two) have increased the growth, reducing the harbour to three and a half miles by two in breadth, and they are still contracting it; even in the early nineteenth century large ships floated off the custom house, and it is dry land where boats once rode. dr. livingstone ("first expedition," chapter xx.) believes the causa causans to be the sand swept over the southern part of the island: douville more justly concludes that it is the gift of the cuanza river, whose mud and ooze, silt and débris are swept north by the great atlantic current. others suppose that it results from the meeting of the cuanza and the bengo streams; but the latter outfall would be carried up coast. the people add the washings of the morro, and the sand and dust of the sea-shore south of the city. this excellent natural breakwater perfectly shelters the shipping from the "calemas," or perilous breakers on the seaward side, and the surface is dotted with huts and groves, gardens and palm orchards. at the ponta do norte once stood a fort appropriately called na. sa. flór de rosa; it has wholly disappeared, but lately, when digging near the sea, heaps of building stone were found. barbot here shows a "toll-house to collect the customs," and at the southern extremity a star-shaped "fort fernand." this island was the earliest of portuguese conquests on this part of the coast. the conquistador paulo dias de novaes, a grandson of bartholomeo dias, was sent a second time, in a.d. , to treat with the king of "dongo," who caused trouble to trade. accompanied by portuguese, he reached the cuanza river, coasted north, and entered by the barra de corimba, then accessible to caravels. he landed without opposition amongst a population already christianized, and, after occupying for a few months the island, which then belonged to congo, he founded, during the next year, the villa de são paulo de loanda on the mainland. the importance of the island arose from its being the great money bank of the natives, who here collected the zimbo, buzio, cowrie, or cypræa moneta. ample details concerning this industry are given by the old writers. the shell was considered superior to the "impure or braziles," brought from the opposite bahia (de todos os santos), though much coarser than the small indian, and not better than the large blue zanzibar. m. du chaillu ("second expedition," chap, iv.) owns to having been puzzled whence to derive the four sacred cowries: "they are unknown on the fernand vaz, and i believe them to have come across the continent from eastern africa." there are, indeed, few things which have travelled so far and have lasted so long as cowries--they have been found even amongst "anglo-saxon" remains. the modern muxi-loandas hold aloof from the shore-folk, who return the compliment in kind. they dress comparatively well, and they spend considerable sums in their half-heathen lembamentos (marriages) and mutambé (funerals). as might be expected, after three centuries of occupation, the portuguese, both in east and west africa, have naturalized a multitude of native words, supplying them with a lusitanian termination. the practice is very useful to the traveller, and the despair of the lexicographer. during the matumbé the relations "wake" the toasted, swaddled, and aromatized corpse with a singular vigour of drink and general debauchery. i arrived with curiosity at the capital of angola, the first portuguese colony visited by me in west africa. the site is pleasing and picturesque, contrasting favourably with all our english settlements and with the french gaboon; for the first time after leaving teneriffe, i saw something like a city. the escarpment and the sea-bordering shelf, allowing a double town like athenæ or thebæ, a cidade alta and a cidade baixa, are favourites with the lusitanians from lisbon to the china seas, and african são paulo is reflected in the brazilian bahia. so greece affected the acropolis, and rome everywhere sought to build a capitol. the two lines follow the shore from north-east to south-west, and they form a graceful amphitheatre by bending westward at the jutting headland, morro de são miguel, of old de são paulo. three hundred years of possession have built forts and batteries, churches and chapels, public buildings and large private houses,white or yellow, withample green verandahs--each an ugly cube, but massing well together. the general decline of trade since , and especially the loss of the lucrative slave export, leave many large tenements unfinished or uninhabited, while the aspect is as if a bombardment had lately --- taken place. africa shows herself in heaps of filthy hovels, wattle and daub and dingy thatch; in "umbrella-trees" (ficus), acacias and calabashes, palms and cotton-trees, all wilted, stunted, and dusty as at cairo. we are in the latitude of east african kilwa and of brazilian pernambuco; but this is a lee-land, and the suffering is from drought. yet, curious to say, the flora, as will appear, is here richer than in the well- watered eastern regions. steaming onwards, at one mile off shore, we turned from south- east to south-west, and presently rounded the north-east point of loanda island, where a moored boat and a lantern showed the way. we passed the first fort, são pedro do morro (da cassandama), which reminded me of the aguada at the mouth of goa harbour. the two bastions and their batteries date from a.d. , and have been useful in administering a strongish hint--in a.d. they fired into captain owen. the next work is the little four-gun work, na. sa. da conceição. we anchored in five fathoms about , yards off shore, in company with some fifteen craft, large and small, including a neat despatch cruizer, built after the "nimrod" model. fort são francisco, called "do penedo," because founded upon and let into a rock, with the double-tiered batteries à la vauban, carefully whitewashed and subtended by any amount of dead ground, commands the anchorage and the northern road, where strings of carregadores, like driver-ants, fetch and carry provisions to town. a narrow causeway connects with the gate, where blacks on guard lounge in fantastic uniform, and below the works are the coal-sheds. here the first turf was lately turned by an english commodore--this tramway was intended to connect with the water edge, and eventually to reach the cuanza at calumbo. so portugal began the rail system in west africa. the city was preparing for her ecclesiastical festival, and i went ashore at once to see her at her best. the landing-place is poor and mean, and the dusty and sandy walk is garnished with a single row of that funereal shrub, the milky euphorbia. the first sensation came from the pillars of an unfinished house-- "care colonne, che fate quà? --non sappiamo in verità!" the ponta de isabel showed the passeio, or promenade, with two brick ruins: its "five hundred fruit-trees of various descriptions" have gone the way of the camphor, the tea-shrub, and the incense-tree, said to have been introduced by the jesuits. "the five pleasant walks, of which the central one has nine terraces, with a pyramid at each extremity, and leads to the casa de recreio, or pleasure-house of the governor-general, erected in by governor vice-admiral luiz da motta feio," have insensibly faded away; the land is a waste, poor grazing ground for cattle landed from the south coast, whilst negrokins scream and splash in the adjoining sea. beyond the government gardens appears the old ermida (chapel), na sa. da nazareth, which english writers have dubbed, after madeiran fashion, the convent. the frontage is mean as that of colonial ecclesiastical buildings in general, and even the epauletted façades of old são paulo do not deserve a description. here, according to local tradition, was buried the head of the "intrepid and arrogant king of congo," dom antonio, whose , warriors were defeated at ambuilla (jan. ist, ) by captain luiz lopes de sequeira, the good soldier who lost his life, by a portuguese hand, at the battle of matamba (sept. th, ). a picture in dutch tiles (azulejos) was placed on the right side of the altar to commemorate the feat. after the ermida are more ruined houses and ragged plantations upon the narrow shelf between the sea-cliff and the sea: they lead to the hot and unhealthy low town skirting the harbour, a single street with small offsets. a sandy strip spotted with cocoa-nuts, represents the praia do bungo (bungo beach), perhaps corrupted from bunghi, a praça, or square; it debouches upon the quitanda pequena, a succursale market-place, where, on working- days, cloth and beads, dried peppers, and watered rum are sold. then come a single large building containing the trem, or arsenal, the cavalry barracks, the "central post-office," and the alfandega, or custom-house, which has a poor platform, but no pier. the stables lodge some half-a-dozen horses used by mounted orderlies--they thrive, and, to judge from their high spirits, the climate suits them. in captain owen's time (a.d. ) there was "a respectable corps of cavalry." passing the acting cathedral for the see of angola and congo, which deserves no notice, you reach the quitanda grande, where business is brisker. there is a sufficiency of beef and mutton, the latter being thin-tailed, and not "five-quartered." fish is wisely preferred to meat by the white man, "affirming that it is much easier digested;" and a kind of herring, and the sparus known upon the brazilian coast as the "tainha," the west african "vela," and the french "mulet," at times superabound. all the tropical fruits flourish, especially the orange; the exotic vegetables are large and sightly, but tasteless and insipid, especially peas and radishes: the indigenous, as tomatoes, are excellent, but the list is small. gardens are rare where the soil is so thin, and the indispensable irrigation costs money. the people still "choke for want of water," which must be bought: there is only one good well sunk in the upper town, about , when the conde de bomfim was minister of marine and the colonies,--it is a preserve for government officials. living in the native style is cheap; but cooks are hardly procurable, and a decent table is more expensive than in an english country town. a single store (m. schutz) supplies "europe" articles, of course at fancy prices, and here a travelling outfit may be bought. it has been remarked that loanda has no shop that sells "food for the mind;" this is applicable, not only to all east and west africa, but to places far more progressive. a kind of cafe-billard supplies a lounge and tepid beer. the attendants in portuguese houses are slaves; the few english prefer cabindas, a rude form of the rude kru-boy, and the lowest pay of the lowest labourer is d. per diem. the "calçada nova," a fine old paved "ramp"--to speak gibraltar- english--connects basse ville and hauteville. the latter was once a scatter of huge if not magnificent buildings, now in ruins; we shall pass through it en route to calumbo. here are the remains of the three chief convents, the jesuit, the carmelite, and the third order of st. francis. the citadel de são miguel, lately blown up, has been restored; the extensive works of dressed freestone, carefully whitewashed, stand out conspicuously from the dark bush dotting the escarpment top. here also is the alto das cruzes, the great cemetery, and the view from the sheer and far-jutting headland is admirable. a stroll over this cool and comparatively healthy escarpment ended by leaving a card at the paço do governo. lopes de lima (vol. iii. part ii.) gives são paulo in a total of , whites, mulattoes, and blacks, distributed into , hearths; the census of - raised the number to , , including , negroes, of whom , were serviles; in the figure was understood to have diminished rather than to have increased. old authors divided the population into five orders. the first was of ecclesiastics, the second contained those who were settled for command or trade, and the third were convicts, especially new christians of jewish blood, who were prevented from attending the sacred functions for a scandalous reason. then ranked the pomberos, or pombeiros, mostly mulattoes, free men, and buyers of slaves; their morals seem to have been abominable. last and least were the natives, that is, the "chattels." amongst the latter the men changed wives for a time, "alleging, in case of reproof, that they are not able to eat always of the same dish;" and the women were rarely allowed by their mistresses to marry--with the usual results. the missionaries are very severe upon the higher ranks of colonists. father carli (a.d. ) found the whites the most deceitful and the wickedest of men,--an effect caused by the penal settlement. father merolla (a.d. ) declares that "the women, being bred among blacks, suffer themselves to be much perverted--they scarcely retain anything white about them except their skins." j. c. fêo cardoso (memoir published in paris in ) attributes the decadence of angola and benguela to three reasons; rare marriages amongst the higher orders; poverty amongst the lower; and the immorality and incontinence of both. lopes de lima (p. loc. cit.) traces the decline and fall of christianity in the eighteenth century to the want of priests, to the corruption of the regular clergy (carmelites and franciscans), for whom west africa, like syria and palestine, was made a kind of convict station, and to the inhuman slave-export, as opposed to domestic slavery. all has now changed for the better; society in angola is not a whit inferior to that of any english colony in west africa, and, as a convict establishment, loanda is a great success. the theoretical garrison is one regiment of the line, a squadron of cavalry, and two companies of artillery with three-pounders; the real force is of some men, mostly convicts. no difference is made between white and black, nor is the corps force, which was once very cruelly used, severely treated as the légion etrangère of algeria. most of the men have been found guilty of capital crimes, yet they are allowed to carry arms, and they are intrusted with charge of the forts. violence is almost unheard of amongst them: if an english sailor be stabbed, it is generally by the free mulattoes and blacks, who hate the uniform for destroying their pet trade of man-selling. it is true that these convicts have hopes of pardon, but i prefer to attribute their remarkable gentleness and good behaviour to the effects of the first fever, which, to quote from the latin grammar, "emollit mores nec sinit esse feros." the negroes of loanda struck me as unusually ill-favoured; short, "stumpy," and very dark, or tinged with unclean yellow. lepers and hideous cripples thrust their sores and stumps in the face of charity. there was no local colouring compared with the carregadores, or coolies, from the northeast, whose thrum-mop heads and single monkey skins for fig-leaves, spoke of the wold and the wild. the body-dress of both sexes is the tángá, pagne, or waist-cloth, unless the men can afford trousers and ragged shirts, and the women a "veo preto," or dingy black sheet, ungracefully worn, like the graceful sárí of hindostan, over the bright foulard which confines the wool. "it is mighty ridiculous to observe," says the old missionary, "that the women, contrary to the custom of all other nations, buy and sell, and do all things which the men ought to do, whilst their husbands stay at home and spin or weave cotton, or busy themselves in such other effeminate actions." this is not wholly true in � . the "munengana,"or machila-man, is active in offering his light cane palanquin, and he chaffs the "mean white" who is compelled to walk, bitterly as did the sedan-chairmen of bath before the days of beau nash. of course the quitandeira, or market-woman, holds her own. the rest of the street population seems to consist of negro "infantry" and black portuguese pigs, gaunt and long- legged. the favourite passe-temps is to lie prone in sun or shade, chattering and smoking the cachimbo, a heavy clay pipe, with peculiar stem--"to sleep supine," say the arabs, "is the position of saints; on the dexter side, of kings; on the sinister, of learned men; and on the belly, of devils." chapter iii. the festival--a trip to calumbo--portuguese hospitality. my first step after reaching s. paolo de loanda was to call upon mr. commissioner vredenburg, who had lately taken up the undesirable appointment, and who, moreover, had brought a pretty french wife from pará. i had warned him that he was risking her life and that of her child; he bravely made the attempt and nearly lost them both. i have reason to be grateful to him and to mr. vice-consul e. h. hewett for hospitality during my stay at the angolan capital. there is a place called an hotel, but it is in the seven dials of the african city, and--nothing more need be said. fortunately for me, as for herself, loanda had got rid of mr. vredenburg's predecessor, who soon followed the lamented richard brand, first british consul, appointed in . the "real whole- hearted englishman" was after that modern type, of which la grundy so highly approves. an honest man, who does not hold to the british idea that "getting on in the world" is nature's first law, would be sorely puzzled by such a career. the day after my arrival was the festival which gives to são paulo de loanda its ecclesiastical name "da assumpção." the ceremonies of the day were duly set forth in the boletim official do governo geral da provincia de angola. a military salute and peals of bells aroused us at dawn; followed a review of the troops, white and black; and a devout procession, flags flying and bands playing, paced through the chief streets to the cathedral. a visit of ceremony in uniform to the governor- general, captain josé baptista de andrade, a historic name in angola, led to an invitation for the evening, a pleasant soirée of both sexes. the reception was cordial: whatever be the grievances of statesmen and historians, lawyers and slave- mongers, portuguese officers are always most friendly to their english brethren. the large and airy rooms were hung with portraits of the several dignitaries, and there was an old world look about government house, like the paço at pangim (goa). fifty years ago colonial society was almost entirely masculine; if you ever met a white woman it was in a well-curtained manchila surrounded by "mucambas" or "mucacamas, negro waiting maids:" as the old missioner tells us, "when they go abroad, which is seldom, they are carried in a covered net with attendance of captives." all this is changed, except as regards leaving the house, which is never done during the day: constitutionals are not wanted in the tropics, and the negroes everywhere make the streets unfit, except for any but the very strongest-minded of the weaker sex. the evenings at government house are passed with music and dancing, and petits jeux innocents for the juniors, whilst the seniors talk and play voltarete till midnight. i well remember one charming face, but i fear to talk about it--ten years in africa cannot pass without the saddest changes. with an eye to future exploration, i was anxious to see something of the style of travel in angola, and to prospect the proposed line of railway intended to checkmate the bar of the river cuanza. the cassange (kasanjí) war on the eastern frontier had just ended honourably to portuguese arms, but it proved costly; the rich traffic of the interior had fallen off, and the well- known feira was sending down its fairings to independent kinsembo. moreover, in order to raise funds for the rail, the local government talked of granting the land to an english company for growing the highly prized gossypium arboreum. sr. joão soares caldeira, c.e., kindly asked me to join his party, which started early on august . all rode the tipoia, a mere maca or hammock sadly heating to the back, but handier than the manchila: the bearers wore loose waistbelts, with a dozen small sheep's bells on the crupper, intended to proclaim our importance, and supposed to frighten away wild beasts. these gentry often require the stimulus of "ndokwe" (go on), but seldom the sedative of "malemba" (gently) or "quinga" (stop). the "boi- cavallo," the riding bull (not ox) of the interior, which costs about £ , is never used in these fashionable localities. i failed to remark the line of trenches supposed to defend the land-side, but i did remark the "maiangas," said to be indigo vats made by the jesuits. after a hot depression we ascended a rough zigzag, and halting we enjoyed a charming view of st. paul. the domed morro concealing the squalid lower town was crowned with once lordly buildings--cathedral, palace, treasury, and fort; the colours of the ground-swell were red and white, with here and there a dot of green; and the blue sea rose in its loveliness beyond the hill horizon. for a whole league we were in the region of "arimos," or outside farms, where villages, villas, and plantations, threaded by hot and sandy lanes with hedges of green euphorbia, showed the former prosperity of the country. beyond it the land forms, as in yoruba, lines of crescents bulging west or seaward, quartz and pebbles showing here and there an old true coast. after a five hours' ride we reached cavúa, the half-way house, where breakfast had been sent on; the habitations are wretched thatches, crowded with pigs and mosquitoes. clearings had all ended, and the red land formed broken waves of poor soil, almost nude of vegetation at this mid-winter of the tropics, except thickets of "milk plant" and forests of quadrangular cactus; the latter are quaint as the dragon-tree, some twenty feet tall and mostly sun-scorched to touchwood. the baobab (adansonia) is apparently of two kinds, the "imbundeiro," hung with long- stringed calabashes, which forms swarming-places for bees; and the "aliconda" (nkondo), whose gourd is almost sessile, and whose bark supplies fibre for cloth and ropes. the haskúl or big-aloe of somali-land was not absent, and, amongst other wild fruits, i saw scattered over the ground the husks of a strychnine, like the east african species. deer, hares, and partridges are spoken of in these solitudes, but they must be uncommonly hard to find at such a season. about three hours after leaving cavúa were spent upon this high, dry, and healthy desert, when suddenly we sighted the long reaches of the cuanza river, sharply contrasting, like the nile, with the tawny yellow grounds about its valley. a steep descent over water-rolled pebbles showed the old bank; the other side, far and blue, gave a goodly breadth of five miles; then we plunged into the green selvage of the modern stream, following muddy paths where the inundation had extended last june. here tobacco, orchilla, and indigo in the higher, and sugar-cane, rice, and ricinus on the lower lands flourish to perfection. the angolan orchilla was first sent to lisbon by sr. f. r. batalha: it is a moss, like the tillandsia of the southern united states, and i afterwards recognized it in the island of annobom. passing pembe and other outlying hamlets, after nine hours of burning sun, we entered calumbo town, and were hospitably lodged by the portuguese commandant. we had followed the highway, as a line for the intended railway had not yet been marked out, and the distance measured , metres (= . english miles). calumbo is now a poor place, with a few dilapidated stone houses in a mass of wattle and daub huts, surrounded by large "arimos." the whole "districto da barra do calumbo" contains only hearths. a little stone pier, which loanda wants, projects into the stream; the lime was formerly procured from shells, but in calcareous stone was found near the dande stream. the sightliest part is the vegetation, glorious ceibas (bombax) used for dug-outs; baobabs, tamarinds which supply cooling fruit and distilled waters; limes and bitter oranges. the most remarkable growth is the kaju or cashew nut: an old traveller quaintly describes it "as like st. john's apple with a chestnut at the end of it." m. valdez ("six years of a traveller's life," vol. ii. ), calls it "a strange kind of fruit," though it was very familiar to his cousins in the brazil, of which it is an aborigine. here it is not made into wine as at goa: "kaju-brandy" is unknown, and the gum, almost equal to that of the acacia, is utterly neglected. a dense and shady avenue of these trees, ten paces apart, leads from the river to the parish church of s. josé, mentioned by carli in : an inscription informs us that it was rebuilt in , but the patron is stored away in a lumber-room, and the bats have taken the place of the priest. portugal has perhaps gone too far in abolishing these church establishments, but it is a reaction which will lead to the golden mean. the site of calumbo is well chosen, commanding a fine view, and raised above the damps of the cold cuanza, whose stagnant lagoon, the lagôa do muge on the other side, is divided from the main branch by a low islet with palms and some cultivation. at the base of church hill are huts of the mubiri or blacksmiths, who gipsy-like wander away when a tax is feared; they are not despised, but they are considered a separate caste. i was shown a little north of the town a place where the dutch, true to their national instincts, began a canal to supply loanda with sweet and wholesome drinking material and water communication; others place it with more probability near the confluence of the cuanza and the lucala, the first great northern fork, where massangano was built by the conquistadores. this "leat" was left incomplete, the terminus being three miles from st. paul's; the governor-general josé de oliveira barbosa, attempted to restore it, but was prevented by considerations of cost. calumbo must be a gruesome place to all except its natives. whilst loanda has improved in climate since captain owen's day ( ), this has become deadly as rome in . the raw mists in early morning and the hot suns, combined with the miasmas of the retreating waters, sometimes produce a "carneirado" (bilious remittent) which carries off half the inhabitants. dysenteries are everywhere dangerous between the guinea coast and mossamedes, the cause being vile water. all the people looked very sickly; many wore milongos, fetish medicines in red stripes, and not a few had whitewashed faces in token of mourning. i observed that my portuguese companions took quinine as a precaution. formerly a few foreign merchants were settled here, but they found the hot seasons fatal, and no wonder, with ° (f.) in the shade! the trade from the upper river, especially from the presidio das pedras negras de pungo andongo,[fn# ] consists of hides, cattle tame and wild (cefos); saltpetre washed from earth in sieves, mucocote or gum anime (copal), said by lopes de lima to be found in all the forests of pungo andongo; wax, white and yellow; oil of the dendêm (elaïs guineënsis) and mandobim, here called ginguba (arachis); mats, manioc-flour, and sometimes an ivory. calumbo was built as early as by the conquistador porcador and first capitão mór paulo dias ii., a gallant soldier, who died in at massangano, the "presidium," which he had founded between - , and who was buried in the church of na. sa. da vittoria; he is said also to have built the church of santa cruz. equidistant from loanda and the sea, the settlement soon had a wealthy trade with the fortified stations of the interior, and large government stores filled with merchandize. in a number of schooners, pinnaces, and small crafts plied up and down to muchimo, massangano, cambembe, and other inland settlements; now we find out only a few canoes. the cuanza at "sleepers' bay" has one of the worst shifting bars on the whole coast. at this distance, five leagues from the mouth, its width is one hundred fathoms, and the depth varies from eight to nine. it breeds good fish; the manatus is common, people talk of fresh-water sharks, and the jacare (crocodile) is fatal to many a pig even in the village. it is navigable for schooners, they say, six days, or miles, to the large "presidio de cambembe," where andrew battel ( - ) visited a "perpendicular water-fall, which made such a noise as to be heard thirty miles' distance." this and another water-fall higher up are laid down in the map of dr. livingstone's admirable first journey. above cambembe the river- bed is broken by archipelagoes, and the shoals render it fit only for boats. the cuanza head has been explored only lately, although a royal order to that effect was issued on march , . after receiving and returning the visits of the principal whites, all habited in frocks and continuations of the blackest and heaviest broadcloth, we feasted with the excellent commandant, who was hospitality itself. the mosquitoes soon roused us from any attempt at sleep, and we passed the night after a fashion which sometimes leads to red eyes and "hot coppers" in the morning. i left early, for my companions had business at calumbo; as they were no longer present to control the bearers, a race soft as putty, and i was not used to manage them, the gang became unbearable. the soldier sent to keep them in order did his best with his "supple-jack," and the consequence was that all bolted into the bush. at cavúa two men were forcibly enlisted, but i preferred walking in. when at home in the red house (mr. hewett's) the hammock men came complaining of my deserting them, and begging bakhshish. it was another lesson to me--the gaboon had lately administered one--that, however well you may know the negro generally, each tribe requires a specific study. this, however, would not take long, and with a little knowledge of the language there would be no difficulty in following the footsteps of joaquim rodrigues graça; letters would be required to the several commandants, the season of setting out should be in early cacimbo (april), and the up march would take six months, with about four to return. but, unless active measures are adopted, only the seaboard will remain to the portuguese. this is an exploration which i had kept "dark" for myself; but captain von homeyer has gained the day, and nothing remains for me but to give the gallant officer god speed. after a short but exceedingly pleasant visit, i left the capital of angola with regret. all seemed anxious to further my views of travel; the authorities gave me the very best advice, and offered me introductions to all the district commandants, sr. moses abecasis, and sr. francisco a. flores, sir henry huntley's host, obliged me with recommendations to the most influential agents at porto da lenha on the congo river. mr. essex of st. helena placed me in the hands of his compatriot, mr. scott, and captain hoskins, r.n., ended his kindness with ordering for me a passage on board h.m. steamship "griffon," an old acquaintance in the gaboon river. briefly, i quitted são paulo with the best wishes for one and all who had befriended me. chapter iv. the cruise along shore--the granite pillar of kinsembo. on august nd we left loanda, and attacked the miles separating it from the congo mouth. steaming along shore we enjoyed the vanishing perspective of the escarpment disappearing in the misty distance. the rivers bengo, dande, and onze are denoted by densely wooded fissures breaking the natural sea-wall, and, as usual in west africa, these lines are the favourite sites for settlements. the onze or the lifune of mazula bay--which the hydrographic chart (republished march , ) changes into "river mazulo," and makes the mouth of the "river onzo"--is chosen by bowdich and writers of his day as the northern boundary of angola, greatly to the disgust of the portuguese, whose pretensions extend much farther north. volumes of daily smoke and --- nightly flame suggest the fires of st. john lighted by the goatherds of tenerife. they greatly excite the gallant "griffons," who everywhere see slaver-signals, and the system is old upon this coast as the days of hanno and herodotus. at this season they are an infallible sign that the dries are ending; the women burn the capim (tall grass) for future forage, and to manure the land for manioc, maize, and beans. the men seek present "bush-beef:" as the flames blow inland, they keep to seaward, knowing that game will instinctively and infallibly break cover in that direction, and they have learned the "wrinkle" of the prairie traveller to make a "little zoar" in case of accidental conflagration. at p.m. on the th we were abreast of ambriz, an important settlement, where a tall red and white cliff, with a background of broken blue hill, showed a distinct "barra," or river mouth, not to be confounded with the english "bar." the north point of the rio dos ambres, of the "green" or "raw copal," is low and mangrove-grown, throwing into high relief its sister formation, ambriz head or strong-tide corner, which stands up gaunt and bluff. a little to the south-east lies the fort, flying the argent and azure flag, and garrisoned by some men; five large whitewashed houses and the usual bunch of brown huts compose the settlement. this nest of slavers was temporarily occupied in may , . the governor-general, senor coelho de amaral, reinforced by , soldiers from home, and levying , "empacasseiros,"[fn# ] embarked from loanda in the "dorn fernando" frigate, landed here, once more burnt the barracoons, and built the fort. in a force was sent under colonel francisco salles ferreira, to re-open a communication with the bembe mines of copper and malachite. that energetic officer marched on são salvador, the old capital of congo, and crowned dom pedro v., whose predecessor died the year before. he there fell a victim to fever, and his second in command, major andrade, was nearly cut off on his return. shortly afterwards the natives blockaded, but were driven from, bembe, and they attempted in vain to carry ambriz. the far-famed copper mines were granted to the portuguese in the sixteenth century by the king of congo. they were the property of his feudatory, the (black) "marquess of pemba" (bembe): barbot mentions their being mistaken for gold, and feels himself bound to warn his readers that the metal was brought "from sondy, not from abyssinia or the empire of prester john." they lost all their mystery about a.d. , when they were undertaken by an english company, messrs. john taylor & co. of london, after agreement with the concessionists, messrs. francisco a. flores and pinto perez of loanda. between ambriz and bembe, on the lunguila (lufula?) river, and feet above sea-level, the angolan government built four presidios, matuta, quidilla, quileala, and quimalenco. but the garrison was not strong enough to keep the country quiet, and the climate proved deadly to white men. the sappers and linesmen extracted nearly , lbs. of gangue per diem, when the english manager and his assistant, with four of the ten miners died, and the plant was destroyed by fire. i was assured that this line (ambriz-bembe) was an easy adit to the interior, and so far the information is confirmed by the late livingstone-congo expedition under lieutenant grandy. in the coast was still in confusion. the portuguese claimed too much seaboard according to the british: the british government ignored the just claims of portugal, and the political bickerings were duly embittered by a demoralized race of english traders, who perpetually applied for cruisers, complaining that the troops interfered with their trade. even in the seventeenth century the portuguese had asserted their rights to the reino do congo, extending between the great stream of that name and the ambriz, also called the loge and doce river. in the older maps-- for instance, lopes de lima--the loge is an independent stream placed north of the ambriz river; in fact, it represents the rue or lue river of kinsembo, which is unknown to our charts. within the doce and the cuanza lies the reino de angola, of which, they say, the congo was a dependency, and south of the cuanza begins the reino de benguela. the government-general of loanda thus contained four provinces-congo (now reduced to ambriz), angola, benguela, and mossamedes. the english government has now agreed to recognize the left or southern bank of the ambriz as the northern frontier of angola and of portuguese rule. passing the river mouth, we were alongside of independent lands, and new to us. boobies (pelecanus sula), gulls, petrels, and men- of-war birds (p. aquila), flew about the ship; according to the experts, they were bound for fetid marshes which outlie the loge river. before nightfall we were off the lue or rue river of kinsembo, which disputes with landána (not "landano"[fn# ]) the palm of bad landing. at this season boats are --- sometimes kept waiting fourteen days, and the "barreiras" (cliffs) are everywhere at unbounded war with the waters. i determined to land and to inspect the "remarkable lofty granite pillar," which was dimly visible from our deck; but we rowed in vain along the tall and rusty sea-walls. no whaler could attack the huge rollers that raised their monstrous backs, plunged over with a furious roar, and bespread the beach with a swirl of foam. at last, seeing a fine surf-boat, artistically raised at stern and bow, and manned by cabindas, the kruboys of the coast, made fast to a ship belonging to messrs. tobin of liverpool, we boarded it, and obtained a passage. the negroes showed their usual art. paddling westward they rounded the high red and white south point, where a projecting reef broke the rollers. we waited for some twenty minutes for a lull; at the auspicious moment every throat was strained by a screaming shout, and the black backs bent doughtily to their work. we were raised like infants in the nurse's arms; the good craft was flung forward with the seething mass, and as she touched shore we sprang out, whilst our conveyance was beached by a crowd of stragglers. the dreaded bar is as usual double: in the heaviest weather boats make for a solitary palm-tree at the bottom of the sandy bay. some of the dug-outs are in pairs like the brazilian ajoujo; the sides are lashed together or fastened by thwarts, and both are made to bend a little too much inwards. it was dark when we climbed up the stiff jacob's ladder along the landward side of the white kinsembo bluff. there are three ramps: the outermost is fit only for unshod feet; the central is better for those who can squeeze through the rocky crevices, and the furthest is tolerably easy; but it can be reached only by canoeing across the stream. mr. hunter of messrs. tobin's house received us in the usual factory of the south coast, a ground- floor of wicker-work, windowless, and thatched after native fashion. the chief agent, who shall be nameless, was drunk arid disorderly: it is astonishing that men of business can trust their money to such irresponsible beings; he had come out to blackland a teetotaller, and presently his condition became a living lecture upon geographical morality. the night gave us a fine study of the kinsembo mosquito, a large brown dipter, celebrated even upon this coast. a barrel of water will act as nursery; at times the plagues are said to extinguish a lantern, and to lie an inch deep at the bottom. i would back them against a man's life after two nights of full exposure: the brazilian "marimbondo" is not worse. at a.m. on the next day we descended the easiest of the ramps, which are common upon this coast, and were paddled over the kinsembo river. eleven miles off, it issues from masses of high ground, and at this season it spreads out like the ambriz in broad stagnant sheets, bordered with reeds and grass supplying fish and crabs, wild ducks and mosquitoes. presently, when the cacimbo ends in stormy rains and horrid rollers, its increased volume and impetus will burst the sand-strip which confines it, and the washed-away material will recruit the terrible bar. leaving the ferry, wre mounted the "tipoias," which englishmen call "hammocks" after the caribs of jamaica, and i found a strange contrast between the men of kinsembo and of são paulo. the former are admirable bearers, like their brethren of ambrizette, famed as the cream of the coast: four of them carried us at the rate of at least six miles an hour; apparently they cannot go slowly, and they are untireable as black ants. like the bahian cadeira-men, they use shoulder-pads, and forked sticks to act as levers when shifting; the bamboo-pole has ivory pegs, to prevent the hammock-clews slipping, and the sensation is somewhat that of being tossed in a blanket. quitting the creeper-bound sand, we crossed a black and fetid mire, and struck inland to a higher and drier level. the vegetation was that of the calumbo road, but not so utterly sunburnt: there were dwarf fields of manioc and thur (cajanus indicus), and the large wild cotton shrubs showed balls of shortish fibre. as we passed a euphorbia-hedged settlement, kizúlí yá mú, "seabeach village," a troop of women and girls, noisy as those of ugogo, charged us at full gallop: a few silver bits caused prodigious excitement in the liberal display of charms agitated by hard exercise. the men were far less intrusive, they are said not to be jealous of european rivals, but madly so amongst themselves: even on suspicion of injury, the husband may kill his wife and her lover. at kilwanika, the next hamlet, there was a "king;" and it would not have been decent to pass the palace unvisited. outside the huts stood a bamboo-girt "compound," which we visited whilst h.m. was making his toilette, and where, contrary to congo usage, the women entered with us. twenty-two boys aged nine or ten showed, by faces whitened with ashes, that they had undergone circumcision, a ceremony which lasts three months: we shall find these jinkimba in a far wilder state up the congo. the rival house is the casa das tinta, where nubile girls are decorated by the nganga, or medicine-man, with a greasy crimson-purple pigment and, preparatory to entering the holy state of matrimony, receive an exhaustive lecture upon its physical phases. father merolla tells us that the congoese girls are locked up in pairs for two or three months out of the sight of man, bathing several times a day, and applying "taculla," the moistened dust of a red wood; without this "casket of water" or "of fire," as they call it, barrenness would be their lot. after betrothal the bride was painted red by the "man-witch" for one month, to declare her engagement, and the mask was washed off before nuptials. hence the "paint house" was a very abomination to the good fathers. amongst the timni tribe, near sierra leone, the semo, or initiation for girls, begins with a great dance, called colungee (kolangí), and the bride is "instructed formally in such circumstances as most immediately concern women." after halting for half an hour, ringed by a fence of blacks, we were summoned to the presence, where we found a small boy backed by a semi-circle of elders, and adorned with an old livery coat, made for a full-grown "jeames." with immense dignity, and without deigning to look at us, he extended a small black paw like a chimpanzee's, and received in return a promise of rum--the sole cause of our detention. and, as we departed through the euphorbia avenue, we were followed by the fastest trotters, the flora temples and the ethan allens, of the village. beyond kilwanika the land became rougher and drier, whilst the swamps between the ground-waves were deeper and stickier, the higher ridges bearing natural stonehenges, of african, not english, proportions at last we dismounted, ascended a rise, the most northerly of these "aravat hills," and stood at the base of the "lumba" the pillar of kmsembo is composed of two huge blocks, not basaltic, but of coarse-grained reddish granite the base measures twenty and the shaft forty feet high. with a little trimming it might be converted into a superior pompey's pillar: we shall see many of these monoliths in different parts of the congo country. the heat of the day was passed in the shade of the lumba, enjoying the sea-breeze and the novel view. it was debated whether we should return viâ masera, a well-known slaving village, whose barracoons were still standing. but the bearers dissuaded us, declaring that they might be seized as "dash," unless the white men paid heavy "comey" like those who shipped black cargoes: they cannot shake off this old practice of claiming transit money. so we returned without a halt, covering some twelve of the roughest miles in two hours and a quarter. the morning of the th showed an ugly sight from the tall kinsembo cliff. as far as the eye could reach long green-black lines, fronted and feathered with frosted foam, hurried up to the war with loud merciless roars, and dashed themselves in white destruction against the reefs and rock-walls. we did not escape till the next day. kinsembo does not appear upon the old maps, and our earliest hydrographic charts place it six miles wrong.[fn# ] the station was created in - by the mistaken policy of loanda, which determined to increase the customs three per cent, and talked of exacting duties at ambriz, not according to invoice prices, but upon the value which imported goods represented amongst the natives. it was at once spread abroad that the object was to drive the wax and ivory trade to são paulo, and to leave ambriz open to slavers. the irrepressible briton transferred himself to kinsembo, and agreed to pay the king £ in kind, after "country fashion," for every ship. in the building of the new factories was opposed by the portuguese, and was supported by english naval officers, till the two governments came to an arrangement. in february, , the kinsembo people seized an english factory, and foully murdered a congo prince and portuguese subject, d. nicoláo de agua rosada, employed in the treasury department, ambriz. thereupon the governor-general sent up two vessels, with thirty guns and troops; crossed the loge river, now a casus belli; and, on march rd, burned down the inland town of kinsembo. on the return march the column debouched upon the foreign factories. about one mile in front of the point, captain brerit, u.s. navy, and commander a. g. fitzroy, r.n., had drawn up of their men by way of guard. leave was asked by the portuguese to refresh their troops, and to house six or seven wounded men. the foreign agents, headed by a disreputable m--m--, now dead, protested, and, after receiving this unsoldierlike refusal, the portuguese, harassed by the enemy, continued their return march to ambriz. the natives of this country have an insane hate for their former conquerors, and can hardly explain why: probably the cruelties of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, not peculiar to the lusitanians, have rankled in the national memory. a stray portuguese would infallibly be put to death, and it will, i fear, be long before m. valdez sees "spontaneous declarations of vassalage on the part of the king of molembo (malemba) and others." in the trade of kinsembo amounted to some £ , , divided amongst four houses, two english, one american, and one rotterdam (pencoff and kerdyk). the cassange war greatly benefited the new station by diverting coffee and other produce of the interior from loanda. there are apochryphal tales of giant tusks brought from a five months' journey, say miles, inland. i was shown two species of copal (gum anime) of which the best is said to come from the mosul country up the ambriz river: one bore the goose-skin of zanzibar, and i was assured that it does not viscidize in the potash-wash. the other was smooth as if it had freshly fallen from the tree. it was impossible to obtain any information; no one had been up country to see the diggings, and yet all declared that the interior was open; that it would be easy to strike the coango (quango) before it joins the congo river, and that miles, which we may perhaps reduce by a third, would lodge the traveller in the unknown lands of "hnga." bidding kindly adieu to mr. hunter and wishing him speedy deliverance from his dreadful companion, we resumed our travel over the now tranquil main. always to starboard remained the narrow sea-wall, a length without breadth which we had seen after the lowlands of cape lopez, coloured rosy, rusty-red, or white, and sometimes backed by a second sierra of low blue rises, which suggests the sanatorium. forty miles showed us the tall trees of point palmas on the northern side of the conza river; on the south of the gap-like mouth lies the ambrizette settlement, with large factories, portuguese and american, gleaming against the dark verdure, and with conza hill for a background. the cabeça de cobra, or "margate head," led to makula, alias mangal, or mangue grande, lately a clump of trees and a point; now the site of english, american, and dutch factories. here the hydrographic charts of and greatly vary, and one has countermarched the coast-line some miles: beginning with the congo river, it lays down mangue pegueno (where grande should be), cobra, and mangue grande (for pequeno) close to ambrizette. then hard ahead rose cape engano, whose "deceit" is a rufous tint, which causes many to mistake it for cape or point padrão. to-morrow, as the dark-green waters tell us, we shall be in the congo river. chapter v. into the congo river.--the factories.--trip to shark's point.-- the padrão and pinda. the best preparation for a first glance at the congo river is to do as all do, to study the quaint description which old purchas borrowed from the "chronica da companhia de jesus em portugal." "the zaire is of such force that no ship can get in against the current but near to the shore; yea, it prevails against the ocean's saltness three-score, and as some say, four-score miles within the sea, before his proud waves yield their full homage, and receive that salt temper in token of subjection. such is the haughty spirit of that stream, overrunning the low countries as it passeth, and swollen with conceit of daily conquests and daily supplies, which, in armies of showers, are, by the clouds, sent to his succour, runnes now in a furious rage, thinking even to swallow the ocean, which before he never saw, with his mouth wide gaping eight-and-twenty miles, as lopez[fn# ] affirmeth, in the opening; but meeting with a more giant-like enemie which lies lurking under the cliffes to receive his assault, is presently swallowed in that wider womb, yet so as, always being conquered, he never gives over, but in an eternall quarrel, with deeper and indented frownes in his angry face, foaming with disclaine, and filling the aire with noise (with fresh helpe), supplies those forces which the salt sea hath consumed." i was disappointed after the gambia and gaboon rivers in the approach to the congo. about eight miles south of the mouth the green sea changed to a clear brown which will be red during the flood. some three degrees (f. ° to °) cooler than the salt tide, the lighter water, which was fresh as rain, feathered out like a fan; a rippling noise was faintly audible, and the clear lines of white foam had not time to melt into the coloured efflux. the flow was diverted into a regular curve northwards by the south atlantic current; voyagers from ascension island to the north-west therefore feel the full throb of the great riverine pulse, and it has been recognized, they say, at a distance of miles. lopez, merolla, and dapper[fn# ] agree that the congo freshens the water at thirty miles from the mouth, and that it can be distinguished thirty leagues off. the amazonas tinges the sea along the guiana coast miles, and the effect of the ganges extends to about twenty leagues. at this season, of course, we saw none of the floating islands which during the rains sail out sixty to seventy leagues from land. "tuckey's expedition" informs us, that the hon. captain irby, h.m.s. "amelia," when anchored twelve miles from the south point, in fifteen fathoms, "observed on the ocean large floating islands covered with trees and bushes, which had been torn from the banks by the violent current." the journal of captain scobell, h.m.s. "thais," remarks: "in crossing this stream i met several floating islands or broken masses from the banks of that noble river." we shall find them higher up the bed, only forming as the inundation begins; i doubt, however, that at any time they equal the meadows which stud the mouth of the rio formoso (benin river). historic point padrao, the "mouta seca," or dry bush, of the modern portuguese, showed no signs of hospitality. the fierce rollers of the spumous sea broke and recoiled, foaming upon the sandy beach, which they veiled with a haze of water-dust, almost concealing the smoke that curled from the mangrove-hedged "king antonio's town." then, steaming to the north-east, we ran five miles to turtle cove, formerly turtle corner, a shallow bay, whose nearest point is "twitty twa bush," the baptismal effort of some english trader. and now appeared the full gape of the congo mouth, yawning seven sea-miles wide; the further shore trending to the north-west in a low blue line, where moanda and vista, small "shipping-ports" for slaves, were hardly visible in the hazy air. as we passed the projecting tooth of shark point, a sandspit garnished with mangroves and dotted with palmyras, the land-squali flocked from their dirty-brown thatches to the beach, where flew the symbolic red flag. unlike most other settlements, which are so buried in almost impenetrable bush that the traveller may pass by within a few yards without other sign but the human voice, this den of thieves and wreckers, justly named in more ways than one, flaunts itself in the face of day. the congo disclaims a bore, but it has a very distinct bar, the angle pointing up stream, and the legs beginning about bananal bank (n.) and alligator river (s.). here the great depth above and below ( and fathoms) shallows to - . despite the five-knot current we were "courteously received into the embraces of the river;" h.m. steamship "griffon" wanted no "commanding sea-breeze," she found none of the difficulties which kept poor tuckey's "brute of a transport" drifting and driving for nearly a week before he could anchor off fuma or sherwood's creek, the "medusa" of modern charts (?) and which made shark point, with its three-mile current, a "more redoubtable promontory than that of good hope was to early navigators." we stood boldly e.n.e. towards the high blue clump known as bulambemba, and, with the dirty yellow breakers of mwáná mazia bank far to port, we turned north to french point, and anchored in a safe bottom of seven fathoms. here we at once saw the origin of the popular opinion that the congo has no delta. on both sides, the old river valley, miles broad, is marked out by grassy hills rolling about feet high, trending from e.n.e. to w.s.w., and forming on the right bank an acute angle with the ghats. but, whilst the northern line approaches within five or six miles, the southern bank, which diverges about the place where "king plonly's town" appears in charts, sweeps away some seventeen miles down coast, and leaves a wide tract of mangrove swamps. these, according to the portuguese traders, who have their own plans of the river, extend some seventy miles south to ambrizette: slavers keep all such details very close, and doubtless for good reasons--"short-cuts" greatly facilitate shipping negroes. the lesser congo delta is bounded north by the banana or malela stream, whose lower fork is "pirates' creek;" and south by the mangrove-clad drains, which subtend the main line: the base measures - miles. at the highest station, boma, i shall have something to say about the greater delta. the left bank of the embouchure projects further seaward, making it look "under hung," representing in charts a lower jaw, and the projection of shark point the teeth, en profile. my first care was to collect news at the factories. french point is a long low spit, which supports two establishments where the chart (september ) gives "emigration depot." it is the old banana point, and probably the older palmeirinha point of james barbot, who places it in the territory of goy (ngoy), now cabinda. this part has greatly changed since ; either the banana river requires removing two miles to the north, or french point must be placed an equal distance south. the principal establishment, m. régis' of marseilles, is built in his best style; a two-storied and brilliantly "chunam'd" house, containing a shop and store on the ground-floor, defended by a three- pounder. behind it a square "compound," with high walls, guards the offices and the other requisites of a bar racoon. it is fronted by a little village where "laptots," senegal moslems, and men-at-arms live with their families and slaves. in the rear stands the far more modest and conscientious establishment of messrs. pencoff and kerdyk: their plank bungalow is full of work, whilst the other lies idle; so virtue here is not, as in books, its own reward. m. victor parrot, the young swiss agent of m. régis, hospitably asked us to take up our quarters with him, and promised to start us up stream without delay; his employer fixes the tariff of every article, and no discretion is left to the subordinates. we called upon m. elkman of the dutch factory. his is a well-known name on the river, and, though familiar with the people, he has more than once run some personal risk by assisting our cruizers to make captures. he advised us to lose no time in setting out before the impending rains: i wanted, however, a slight preparation for travel, and determined to see something of the adjoining villages, especially the site of the historic padrão. whilst crossing the stream, we easily understood how the river was supposed to be in a perpetual state of inundation. the great breadth and the shallows near either jaw prevent the rain-floods being perceptible unless instruments are used, and "hydrometry," still in an imperfect state, was little to be depended upon in the days when european ideas concerning the congo river were formed. twenty miles up stream the high-water mark becomes strongly marked, and further on, as will be seen, it shows even better. if barbot's map have any claim to correctness, the southern shore has changed greatly since a.d. . a straight line from cape padrão to chapel point, now shark point, was more than double the breadth of the embouchure. it is vain to seek for the "island of calabes" mentioned by andrew battel, who was "sent to a place called zaire on the river congo, to trade for elephants' teeth, wheat, and palm oil." it may be a mistake for cavallos, noticed in the next chapter; but the "town on it" must have been small, and has left, they say, no traces. after a scramble through the surf, we were received at shark point, where, at this season, the current is nearer five than three knots, by mr. tom peter, mafuka, or chief trader, amongst these "musurungus." he bore his highly respectable name upon the frontal band of his "berretta" alias "corôa," an open-worked affair, very like the old-fashioned jelly-bag night cap. this head-gear of office made of pine-apple fibre-- tuckey says grass--costs ten shillings; it is worn by the kinglets, who now distribute it to all the lieges whose fortunes exceed some fifty dollars. most of the squaline villagers appeared to be women, the men being engaged in making money elsewhere. besides illicit trade, which has now become very dangerous, a little is done in the licit line: grotesquely carved sticks, calabashes rudely ornamented with ships and human figures, the neat bead-work grass-strings used by the women to depress the bosom, and cashimbos or pipes mostly made about boma. all were re-baptized in , but they show no sign of christianity save crosses, and they are the only prostitutes on the river. following tom peter, and followed by a noisy tail, we walked to the west end of shark point, to see if aught remained of the padrão, the first memorial column, planted in by the explorer diogo cam, knight of the king's household, dom joão ii. "o principe perfeito," who, says de barros ("asia," decad. i. lib. iii. chap. ), "to immortalize the memory of his captains," directed them to plant these pillars in all remarkable places. the padrões, which before the reign of d. joão were only wooden crosses, assumed the shape of "columns, twice the height of a man (estado), with the scutcheon bearing the royal arms. at the sides they were to be inscribed in latin and portuguese (to which james barbot adds arabic), with the name of the monarch who sent the expedition, the date of discovery, and the captain who made it; on the summit was to be raised a stone cross cramped in with lead." according to others, the inscription mentioned only the date, the king, and the captain. the padrão of the congo was especially called from the "lord of guinea's favourite saint, de são jorge"--sit faustum! as carli shows, the patron of congo and angola was santiago, who was seen bodily assisting at a battle in which dom affonso, son of giovi (emmanuel), first christian king of congo, prevailed against a mighty host of idolaters headed by his pagan brother "panso aquitimo." in sir home popham found a marble cross on a rock near angra dos ilheos or pequena (south latitude ° '), with the arms of portugal almost effaced. till lately the jasper pillar at cabo negro bore the national arms. doubtless much latitude was allowed in the make and material of these padrões; that which i saw near cananea in the brazil is of saccharine marble, four palms high by two broad; it bears a scutcheon charged with a cross and surmounted by another. there is some doubt concerning the date of this mission. de barros (i. iii. ) says a.d. . lopes de limn (iv. i. ) gives the reason why a.d. is generally adopted, and he believes that the cruise of the previous year did not lead to the congo river. the explorer, proceeding to inspect the coast south of cape st. catherine (south latitude ° '), which he had discovered in , set out from são jorge da mina, now elmina. he was accompanied by martin von behaim of nürnberg (nat. circ. a.d. , ob. a.d. ), a pupil of the mathematician john müller (regiomontanus); and for whom the discovery of the new world has been claimed. after doubling his last year's terminus, diogo cam chanced upon a vast embouchure, and, surprised by the beauty of the scenery and the volume of the stream, he erected his stone padrão, the first of its kind. finding the people unintelligible to the interpreters, he sent four of his men with a present of hawk's bells (cascaveis) and blue glass beads to the nearest king, and, as they did not soon return, he sailed back to portugal with an equal number of natives as hostages, promising to return after fifteen moons. one of them, caçuta (zacuten of barbot), proved to be a "fidalgo" of sonho, and, though the procedure was contrary to orders, it found favour with the "perfect prince." from these men the portuguese learned that the land belonged to a great monarch named the mwani-congo or lord of congo, and thus they gave the river a name unknown to the riverine peoples. diogo cam, on his second visit, sent presents to the ruler with the hostages, who had learned as much portuguese and christianity as the time allowed; recovered his own men, and passed on to angola, benguela and cabo negro, adding to his discoveries leagues of coast. when homeward bound, he met the mwani-sonho, and visited the mwani-congo, who lived at ambasse congo (são salvador), distant leagues (?). the ruler of the "great and wonderful river zaire," touched by his words, sent with him sundry youths, and the fidalgo caçuta, who was baptized into dom joao, to receive instruction, and to offer a present of ivory and of palm cloth which was remarkably strong and bright. a request for a supply of mechanics and missionaries brought out the first mission of dominicans. they sailed in december, , under gonçalo de sousa; they were followed by others, and in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the country was fairly over- run by the propaganda. a future page will enter into more details, and show the results of their labours. the original padrão was destroyed by the dutch in , an act of barbarism which is justly called "vandalica façanha." father merolla says ( ), "the hollanders, out of envy, broke the fine marble cross to pieces; nevertheless, so much remained of it, when i was there, as to discover plainly the portuguese arms on the ruins of the basis, with an inscription under them in gothic characters, though not easy to be read." in a new one was placed in turtle cove, a few yards south-west of shark point; but the record was swept away by an unusually high tide, and no further attempt has been made. we were then led down a sandy narrow line in the bush, striking south-east, and, after a few yards, we stood before two pieces of marble in a sandy hollow. the tropical climate, more adverse than that of london, had bleached and marked them till they looked like pitted chalk: the larger stump, about two feet high, was bandaged, as if after amputation, with cloths of many colours, and the other fragment lay at its feet. tom peter, in a fearful lingua-franca, negro-anglo-portuguese, told us that his people still venerated the place as part of a religious building; it is probably the remnant thus alluded to by lopes de lima (iii. - ): "behind this point (padrão) is another monument of the piety of our monarchs, and of the holy objects which guided them to the conquest of guinea, a capuchin convent intended to convert the negroes of sonho; it has long been deserted, and is still so. even in a.d. , d. garcia v., the king of congo, complained in a letter to our sovereign of the want of missionaries." possibly the ruined convent is the church which we shall presently visit. striking eastward, we soon came to a pool in the bush sufficiently curious and out of place to make the natives hold it "fetish;" they declare that it is full of fish, but it kills all men who enter it--"all men" would not include white men. possibly it is an old piscina; according to the abbé proyart, the missionaries taught the art of pisciculture near the village of kilonga, where they formed their first establishment. the place is marked "salt-pond" in barbot, who tells us that the condiment was made there and carried inland. a short walk to a tall tree backing the village showed us, amongst twenty-five european graves, five tombs or cenotaphs of english naval officers, amongst whom two fell victims to mangrove-oysters, and the rest to the deadly "calenture" of the lower congo. we entered the foul mass of huts, "domus non ullo robore fulta sed sterili junco cannâque intecta palustri." it was too early for the daily debauch of palm wine, and the interiors reeked with the odours of nocturnal palm oil. the older travellers were certainly not blasés; they seemed to find pleasure and beauty wherever they looked: ca da mosto ( ), visiting the senegal, detected in this graveolent substance, fit only for wheel-axles, a threefold property, that of smelling like violets, of tasting like oil of olives, and tinging victuals like saffron, with a colour still finer. even mungo park preferred the rancid tallow-like shea butter to the best product of the cow. we chatted with the shark point wreckers, and found that they thought like arthegal, "for equal right in equal things doth stand." moreover, here, as in the shetlands of the early nineteenth century, when the keel touches bottom the seaman loses his rights, and she belongs to the shore. tom peter offered to show us other relics of the past if we would give him two days. a little party was soon made up, mr. j. c. bigley, the master, and mr. richards, the excellent gunner of the "griffon," were my companions. we set out in a south-by-easterly direction to the bottom of sonho, or diogo's bay, which barbot calls "bay of pampus rock." thence we entered alligator river, a broad lagoon, the raphael creek of maxwell's map, not named in the hydrographic chart of . leading south with many a bend, it is black water and thick, fetid mud, garnished with scrubby mangrove, where kru-boys come to cut fuel and catch fever; here the dew seemed to fall in cold drops. after nine miles we reached a shallow fork, one tine of which, according to our informants, comes from the congo grande, or são salvador, distant a week's march. leaving the whaler in charge of a kru-man, we landed, and walked about half a mile over loose sand bound by pine-apple root, to the banza sonho, or, as we call it, king antonio's town- -not to be mistaken for that placed in the charts behind point padron. our object being unknown, there was fearful excitement in the thatched huts scattered under the palm grove, till tom peter introduced us, and cleared for us a decent hut. the buildings, if they can be so called, are poor and ragged, copies of those which we shall see upon the uplands. presently we were visited by the king named after that saint "of whom the evil one was parlous afraid." this descendant of the "counts of sonho," in his dirty night-cap and long coat of stained red cloth, was a curious contrast to the former splendour of the "count's habit," with cap of stitched silk which could be worn only by him and his nobles, fine linen shirt, flowered silk cloak, and yellow stockings of the same material. when king affonso iii. gave audience to the missioners (a.d. ), the negro grandee "had on a vest of cloth set with precious stones, and in his hat a crown of diamonds, besides other stones of great value. he sat on a chair under a canopy of rich crimson velvet, with gilt nails, after the manner of europe; and under his feet was a great carpet, with two stools of the same colour, and silk laced with gold." after the usual palaver we gave the black earl a cloth and bottle of rum for leave to pass on, but no one would accompany us that evening, all pretending that they wanted time to fit up the hammocks. at night a body of armed bushmen marched down to inspect us. the demands for porterage were so exorbitant next morning, that we set out on foot under the guidance of tom peter. we passed southwards over large tracts of bush and gramineous plants, with patches of small plantations, manioc and thur; and settlements girt by calabash-trees, cocoas, palmyra and oil palms. the people poured out, threatened impotent vengeance on those who brought the white men to "make their country," that is, to seize and settle in it. the only animals were fowls and pigs; small strong cages acting as hogstyes showed that leopards were dangerous; in lieutenant hawkey found signs of these animals, together with elephant, wild boar, and antelope. now there is no sport below the cataracts, and possibly very little, except in the water, above them. thence we debouched upon rolling land, loose and sandy waves, sometimes divided by swamps; it is the lower end of the high yellow band seen from the south of the river, the true coast of alluvial soil, scattered here and there with quartz and pebbles. then the bush opened out, and showed to the north- east stretches of grassy land, where the wild fig-tree drooped its branches, laden with thick fleshy leafage, to the ground; these are the black dots which are seen from afar studding the tawny desert-like surface. flowers were abundant despite the lateness of the season, and the sterility of the soil was evidenced by cactus and euphorbia. after a walk of six miles tom peter pompously announced that we had reached the church. we saw only an oblong furrow and a little worm-eaten wood near three or four of the most miserable "magalia;" but a bell, hung to a dwarf gallows, was dated , and inscribed, "si deus cum nobis qis (sic) contra nos?" the aspect of this article did not fail to excite mr. richards' concupiscence: i looked into the empty huts, and in the largest found a lot of old church gear, the virgin (our lady of pinda), saints, and crucifixes, a tank-like affair of iron that acted as font, and tattered bundles of old music-scores in black and red ink. in captain tuckey's day some of the sonho men could read the latin litany; there was a priest ordained by the capuchins of loanda, a bare-footed (and bare-faced) black apostle, with a wife and five handmaids; and a multitude of converts loaded with crucifixes and satchels of relics. our home march was enlivened by glimpses of the magnificent river seen through the perennial tropical foliage, and it did not suggest trite reflections upon the meanness of man's highest aspirations in presence of eternal nature. we had been treading upon no vulgar spot. we are now in the earldom of sonho, bounded north by the congo river and south by the ambriz, westward by the atlantic, and eastward by the "duchy of bamba." it was one of the great divisions of the congo kingdom, and "absolute, except only its being tributary to the lord paramount." the titles of portugal were adopted by the congoese, according to father cavazzi, after a.d. , when the king constituted himself a vassal of the portuguese crown. here was the pinda whose port and fort played an important part in local history. "built by the sonhese army at the mouth of the river zaire," it commanded both the stream and sea: it was plundered in by four french pirates. according to carli ( - ) "the count of sonho, the fifth dignitary of the empire, resided in the town of sonho, a league from the river zaire." pinda was for a time the head-quarters of the portuguese mission, subject only to that of são salvador; it consisted of an apartment two stories high, which caused trouble, being contrary to country custom. at the french factory i found the employés well "up" in the travels of the unfortunate adventurer douville ("voyage au congo et dans l'intérieur de l'afrique equinoxiale fait dans les années , , et . par j. b. douville, secrétaire de la société de géographic de paris pour l'année , etmembre de plusieurs sociétés savantes françoises et étrangères. ouvrage auquel la société de géographic a décerné le prix dans sa séance du mars, . tomes. vo. paris, "). dr. gardner, in his brazilian travels, gives an account of douville's murder, the consequence of receiving too high fees for medical attendance on the banks of the são francisco. so life like are his descriptions of the country and its scenery, that no one in the factory would believe him to have been an impostor, and the frenchmen evidently held my objections to be "founded on nationality." the besetting sins of the three volumes are inordinate vanity and inconséquence, but these should not obscure our vision as to their solid and remarkable merits. compare the picturesque account of são paulo with those of the latest english travellers, and the anthropology of the people, their religion, their ceremonies, their magic, their dress and costume, their trade, their manufactures, their maladies (including earth-eating), their cannibalism, the condition of their women, and the necessity of civilizing them by education before converting them, all subjects of the highest interest, with that of mungo park, for instance, arid we have a fair measure of the french traveller's value. the native words inserted into the text are for the most part given with unusual correctness, and the carping criticism which would correct them sadly requires correction itself. "thus the word which he writes mouloundu in his text, and mulundu in his vocabulary, is not singular, as he supposes, but the plural of loondu, a mountain" (p. of the" review"). firstly, douville has warned the reader that the former is the spelling best adapted to french, the latter to portuguese. secondly, "mulundu" in angolan is singular, the plural being "milundu"--a handful, the persians say, is a specimen of the heap. the excess of female births in low and unhealthy places ( , ) and as the normal result of polygamy ( , ), is a highly interesting subject still awaiting investigation. i do not mean that douville was the first to observe this phenomenon, which forced itself upon the notice of physiologists in ancient times. foster ("cook's third voyage") remarks that, wherever men and animals have many females, the feminine births preponderate over the masculine; a fact there explained by the "organic molecule" of buffon. pigafetta, the circumnavigator, gives the king of tidor eighteen daughters to eight sons. the french traveller does not pretend to be a mineralogist, but he does his best to lay open the metallic riches of the country; he gives careful observations of temperature, in water as well as air, he divines the different proportions of oxygen in the atmosphere, and he even applies himself to investigating the comparative heat of the negro's blood, an inquiry still far from being exhausted. the most remarkable part is certainly the medical, and here the author was simply in advance of his age. instead of the lancet, the drastic cathartics, and the calomel with which our naval surgeons slew their patients, he employed emetics and tonics to an extent that would have charmed my late friend, dr. dickson, the chromothermalist, and he preceded dr. hutchinson in the use of quinine wine. indeed, the peculiar aptitude for medicine shown in these pages led to the traveller's adopting the destructive art of healing as a profession, and caused his unhappy end. the curious mixture of utter imposture and of genius for observation which a traveller can detect in douville renders him worthy of a monograph. chapter vi. up the congo river.--the slave depot, porto da lenha.--arrival at boma. m. parrot was as good as his word. by august st, "l'espérance," a fine schooner-rigged palhabote (launch) of thirty-five tons, heavily sparred and carrying lots of "muslin," was ready to receive my outfit. the party consisted of the commander, mr. bigley, and five chosen "griffons," including william deane, boatswain's mate, as good a man as his namesake in blake's day, and the estimable friend, captain's cook and figaro in general. m. pissot, an arlésien, clerk to the factory, went up on business with a crew of eight useless cabindas under frank, their pagan "patron," who could only run us aground. finally, there was a guard of half-a-dozen "laptots," equally good sailors and soldiers. the french squadron in west africa has the advantage over ours of employing these men, --- who are clean, intelligent, and brave; whilst we are reduced to the unprogressive kru-man, who is, moreover, a model coward, a poltroon on principle. at p.m. our huge canvas drove us rapidly over the shoals and shallows of this imperfectly known sea: the ethiopic directory justly grumbles, "it is a subject of regret that navigators who have had occasion to enter the congo, and to remain there some time, have not furnished us with more information about the tides." this will be a work of labour and endurance; detached observations are of very little use. we at once remarked the complication caused by the upper, surface, or freshwater current of to knots an hour, meeting the under, or oceanic inflow. there is a short cut up pirate's creek, but we avoided it for the usual reason, fear of finding it very long. passing a low point to port, subtended north and south by the bananal river and pirate's creek, after some six knots we were abreast of bulambemba (the boulem beembo of tuckey's vocabulary). it is interpreted "answer," hence our "echo point"(?); but others render it, "hold your tongue." the former is correct, and the thick high screen of trees explains the native and english names. old writers call it fathomless point, which it is not now; a bank, the south-eastern projection of the great mwáná mázia shoal, has formed a few feet below the surface; but the term will apply at the distance of a mile further south. this acute angle shows a glorious clump, the "tall trees," white mangroves rising a hundred feet, and red mangroves based upon pyramidal cages of roots; and beyond it the immediate shore is covered with a dense tropical vegetation, a tangle of bush, palms, and pandanus, matted with creepers and undergrowth, and rhyzophoras of many varieties delighting in brackish water. we passed on the right the ponta de jacaré (point of the crocodile), fronting point senegal on the other side. the natives call the former ngándu (li. jigándu), and farcical tales are told about it: in the lower settlements europeans will not go abroad by night without a lantern. during my trip i sighted only one startled crocodile that floated log-like a mile off, and captain baak, of the dutch house, had not seen one during a whole year at banana point. we anchored for the night off the south side of the zungá chyá ngombe, in portuguese ilha do boi (bullock), the rhinoceros island of our early charts. it emerges from the waters of the right bank, a mere "ponton" plumed with dark mangroves and streaked with spar-like white trunks. this is probably the "island of horses," where the portuguese, flying from the victorious hollanders, were lodged and fed by the courteous count of sonho; perhaps it is battel's "isle calabes." the place is backed by the monpanga or mombang, the "look-out islands" of the chart, which has greatly changed since the beginning of the century; the dark mass of mangroves is now apparently part of the northern shore. almost due south of the ilha do boi is the zungá chyá kampenzi, whence our word chimpanzee: in the hydrographic chart it is miswritten zoonga campendi, and in tuckey's map, which contradicts his text, "zoonga casaquoisa." his "zoonga kampenzey," also named "halcyon island," appears to be the draper's island or the "monkey island" of mr. maxwell: the latter in modern charts is more to the north-east, that is, above porto da lenha, than the former. the simiads have been killed out; captain tuckey going up the river saw upwards of twenty which, but for their tails, might have been mistaken for negroes. merolla says that wild men and women (gorillas?) have been captured in sonho, and he carefully distinguishes them from baboons: one of them was presented to a friar of his order, who "bestowed it on the portuguese governor of loanda." chimpanzee island may be the zariacacongo of father merolla, who makes cacongo (great congo) a large and independent kingdom" lying in the middle between congo and loango." he describes zariacacongo, "none of the smallest, and situate in the midst of the river zaire." it abounded in all sorts of provisions, was well peopled, consisted of a plain raised eight fathoms above water, and was divided from the kingdom of congo by a river, over which there was a bridge. after a pleasant breezy night upon the brown waters, on september st we hove anchor betimes and made for scotchman's head, a conspicuous mangrove bluff forming a fine landmark on the left bank. the charts have lately shifted it some two miles west of its old position. six or seven miles beyond it rise the blue uplands of the "earldom of sonho." on our right, in mid-stream, lay a "crocodile bank," a newly fixed grass islet, a few square feet of green and gold, which the floods will presently cover or carry away. to the left, above the easternmost "mombang" and the network of islands behind it, opens the gape of the malela river, a short cut to french point, found useful when a dangerous tide- rip is caused by the strong sea-breeze meeting the violent current of the thalweg. above it lies a curious formation like concentric rings of trees inclosing grass: it is visible only from the north-east. several slave factories now appear on either shore, single-storied huts of wood and thatch, in holes cut out of the densest bush, an impenetrable forest whose sloppy soil and miry puddles seem never to dry. the tenements serve as videttes and outposts, enabling cargoes to ship without the difficulties of passing palm point, and thus to make a straight run down stream. there are three on the north bank, viz. m. rágis (aîné), now deserted, sr. lima viana, and sr. antonio fernandez; and three on the left side, sr. alessandro ferreira, sr. guilherme, and sr. fonseca. those on the southern or left bank facilitate overland transit to mangue, ambrizette, and other dépôts. at present it is "tiempo seco" (dull time), and the gérants keep their hands in by buying ground-nuts and palm oil. the slave trade, however, makes , not , per cent., and the agents are naturally fond of it, their mere salaries being only some francs a month. landing at the factory of sr. fernandez, we were received by his agent, sr. silva, in a little bungalow of bamboo and matting, paved with tamped earth and old white ostreoid shells, a kind of mya, relished by the natives but not eaten by europeans. to these, doubtless, mr. w. winwood reacle refers ("savage africa," chap, xxxvii.), "the traders say that in congo there are great heaps of oyster-shells, but no oysters. these shells the negroes also burn for lime." i did not hear of any of these "ostreiras," which, if they exist, must reflect the sambaquis of the opposite brazilian shore. the house was guarded by three wooden figures, "clouterly carved," and powdered with ochre or red wood; two of them, representing warriors in studded coatings of spike nails, with a looking-glass fixed in the stomach, raised their hands as if to stab each other. these figures are sometimes found large as life: according to the agents, the spikes are driven in before the wars begin, and every one promises the hoped-for death of an enemy. behind them the house was guarded by a sentinel with drawn sword. the unfortunate tenant, who looked a martyr to ague, sat "in palaver" with a petty island "king," and at times the tap of a war-drum roused my experienced ear. the monarch, habited in a shabby cloth coat, occupied a settee, with a "minister" on either side; he was a fat senior of light complexion, with a vicious expression upon features, which were not those of the "tobacconist nigger," nor had he the effeminate aspect of the congoese. i looked curiously at these specimens of the musulungu or musurungu, a wilder race than that of shark point: the english, of course, call them missolonghi, because lord byron died there. here the people say "le" for "re," and "rua" for "lua," confounding both liquids, which may also be found in the kibundo tongue. in loango, according to the abbé proyart, the national organ does not admit the roughness of the r, which is changed to l. monteiro and gamitto assert (xxii.) that the "cazembes or lundas do not pronounce the letter r, in whose place they use l." the "ibos" of the lower congo, dwelling on the southern shore between the mouth and the porto da lenha, above which they are harmless, these men have ever been dangerous to strangers, and the effect of the slave-trade has been to make them more formidable. lieutenant boteler ( ) was attacked by twenty- eight canoes, carrying some men, who came on boldly, "ducking" at the flash, and who were driven off only by a volley of musketry and a charge of grape. in a whaler and crew were attacked by their war-canoes sallying out from behind scotchman's head. these craft are of two kinds, one shaped like a horse- trough, the other with a lean and snaky head. the "wrangler" lost two of her men near zungá chyá kampenzi, and the "griffon" escaped by firing an armstrong conical shell. they have frequently surprised and kept for ransom the white agents, whom "o negocio" deterred from reprisals. m. pissot, our companion, was amarré by them for some weeks, and the most unpleasant part of his captivity was the stunning concert of songs and instruments kept up during the day to prevent his escaping by night. the more sensible traders at boma pay them black mail by employing them as boats' crews, upon our anglo-indian principle of the "paggi" and the "ramosi." merolla calls these men musilongo or sonhese. the word appears to me opprobrious, as if each tribe termed itself mushi-congo (congo people), and its neighbours musulungus: barbot writes as a frenchman moutsie, the portuguese muxi (mushi). mushi-longo would perhaps mean loango-people; but my ear could not detect any approach to "loango" in "musulungu." the first syllable, mu, in fiote or congoese, would be a contraction of muntu (plural wántú). they inhabit the islands, own a part of the north bank, and extend southwards to ambriz: eastward they are bounded by the fiote or congo-speaking peoples, to whom their tongue is intelligible. they have no tattoo, but they pierce the nose septum and extract the two central and upper incisors; the muxi- congoes or lower congoese chip or file out a chevron in the near sides of the same teeth-- an ornament possibly suggested by the weight of the native pipe. the chipping and extracting seem to be very arbitrary and liable to change: sometimes the upper, at other times the lower teeth are operated upon. the fashionable mutilation is frequently seen in eastern africa, and perhaps it is nothing but a fashion. they are the "kallistoi" and "megistoi" of the congoese bodies, taller and darker, fiercer and braver than their neighbours, nor will they cease to be river pirates till the illicit trade dies. after taking leave of sr. silva we resumed our way, the thermometer (f.) showing at . p.m. ° in the air when the sun was obscured, and the mirage played the usual fantastic tricks. the mangrove, which tuckey's introduction prolongs to fifty miles from the mouth, now disappears; in fact, it does not extend much above bullock island, nineteen direct miles on the chart from shark point and, as usual, it enables us to measure the extreme limit where the salt-tide ascends. the palhabote went gallantly, "the water round her bows dancing as round a drinking cup." small trembling waves poppled and frothed in mid-stream, where the fresh water met wind and tide; and by the "boiling" of the surface we saw that there was still a strong under-current flowing against the upper layer. a little beyond the factory we were shown on the northern bank mariquita nook, where the slaver of that name, commanded by a captain bowen, had shipped some men. she was captured by h.m. steamship "zebra," commander hoskins, after being reported by a chief, whom her captain had kicked, to a trader at the river mouth, and by him to the cruizer. slavers used to show their sense by starting on sundays, when the squadron kept a careless look-out; but their inevitable danger was the general "drunk" of the officers and crew to celebrate the event, and this libation often caused delays which led to seizure. it was an admirable site, a bit of golden sand fronting the cleared bush, commanding an unbroken sweep of vision to the embouchure, and masked by forest from porto da lenha. it is easily known by its two tall trees, and that nearest the sea, when viewed from the east, appears surmounted by what resemble the "kangaroo's head:" they are cones of regular shape, covered to the topmost twig with the lightest green flagellaria. the "bush" now becomes beautiful, rolling in bulging masses of verdure to the very edge of the clear brown stream. as in the rivers of guinea, the llianas form fibrous chains, varying in size from a packthread to a cable; now straight, then twisted; investing the trees with an endless variety of folds and embraces, and connecting neighbours by graceful arches like the sag of an acrobat's rope. here and there a grotesque calabash contrasted with the graceful palms towering in air for warmth and light, or bending over water like prince of wales's feathers. the unvarying green was enlivened by yew-like trees with scarlet flowers, the "burning bush" of sierra leone, setting off the white boles of the cotton-trees; and the whole was edged by the yellow green of the quaint pandanus hung with heavy fruit. a little beyond "mariquita nook" the right bank becomes a net- work of creeks, "obscure channels," tortuous, slimy with mud, banked with the snake-like branches of trees, and much resembling the lower course of the benin, or any other north equatorial african river; the forest is also full of large villages, invisible like the streams till entered. a single tree, apparently growing out of the great stream-bed, showed shallow water as we passed the ponte de tres palmeiras; the three oil- palms are still there, but the easternmost is decaying. at p.m. we were in sight of the chief slaving settlement on the congo, the whydah of the river, porto da lenha. our charts have "ponta de linha," three mistakes in as many words. some authorities, however, prefer ponta da lenha, "woody point," from the piles flanking the houses; others, ponte da lenha, from a bridge built by the agent of messrs. tobin's house over the single influent that divides the settlement. cruizers have often ascended thus far; the baltimore barque of tons went up and down safely in , but now square-rigged ships, which seldom pass zungá chyá kampenzi, send up boats when something is to be done higher up. porto da lenha dates like abeokuta from the second decade of the present century. in tuckey's time the projection from the northern bank was known as "tall trees," a term common to several places in the "oil rivers;" no factories existed, schooners sailed to boma for cargo, and dropped down stream as soon as loaded. from french point it is distant , measured metres (= statute miles and , yards); our charts show . nautical miles (= , metres in round numbers). the river opposite the projection narrows to a gate barely a mile and a half broad, whilst the valley stretches some five miles, and the blue hills inhabited by the musulungus are clearly visible; the flood rises four or five feet, and drinking water must be brought from up stream. the site of the settlement is on the right or northern bank behind the projection, a slip of morass backed by swamps and thick growths, chiefly bombax, palm and acacia, lignum vitae, the mammee-apple and the cork-tree, palmyra, pandanus, and groves of papyrus. low and deeply flooded during the rains, the place would be fatal without the sea-breeze; as it is, the air is exceedingly unwholesome. there is no quay, the canoe must act gondola; the wharf is a mere platform with steps, and in places the filthy drains are not dry even at this season. the length of the station is about one mile, and of no depth except what is taken up by the neat and expensive gardens. eastward or up stream it thins out, and the foundations give considerable trouble; the inhabitants are condemned to do beavers' work, to protect the bank with strong piles, and to heap up earth for a base, whilst, despite all their toil, the water often finds its way in. the sixteen houses look well; they are substantial bungalows, built country fashion, with timber and matting; they have large and shady verandahs, and a series of inner rooms. each house has a well- kept pottage plot, inferior, however, to those up stream. the tenure of ground here, as at borna, is by yearly rent to the two "kings," nengongo and nenzalo, each of whom claims a half. like the chiefs of porto novo, the despot of dahome, the rulers of many nigerian tribes, and even the fernandian "bube," these potentates may not look at the sea nor at the river. their power is, therefore, deputed to "linguisters" or interpreters, linguistele ya nchinu, "linguist to the king," being the official titles of these worthies, who massacre the portuguese language, and who are empowered to receive "comey" (customs) and rent. the revenue is composed of three principal items; an ounce ($ ) per head of negro embarked at porto da lenha; four per cent, on all goods sold, and, lastly, a hundred hard dollars monthly ground- rent--£l (english pound symbol) a year. the linguist becomes more powerful than the chief, who is wholly in his power, and always receives the best presents. neagongo's fattore is old shimbah, an ignoble aspect with a "kink in his leg;" mashel or machela, a corruption of the portuguese maciel, died about two months aeo: we shall see him disembarked for burial at boma. it is evident that the slavers were wrong not to keep hulks like those of the bonny river; health would have gained, and the procedure might have modified negro "sass." the chiefs begin early morning by going their rounds for drink, and end business between and a.m. everywhere on this coast a few hours of work support a "gentleman;" even the comparatively industrious and hard-working egbas rarely do anything after noon. these lords and masters are fully aware that the white men are their willing slaves as long as the large profits last. if a glass of watered rum, which they detect more easily than we do watered milk, be offered to them, it will be thrown in the donor's face. every factory must keep a barrel of spirits ready broached if the agents would buy eggs and yams, and the poorest negro comes regularly with his garrafa. the mixed stuff costs per bottle only a hundred reis (= fourpence), and thoroughly demoralizes the black world. we landed at once, sent our letters to m. monteiro, who hospitably offered his house, and passed the day quickly enough in a round of visits. despite the general politeness and attention to us, we found a gloom overhanging the place: as at whydah, its glories have departed, nor shall they ever return. the jollity, the recklessness, the gold ounces thrown in handfuls upon the monte-table, are things of the past: several houses are said to be insolvent, and the dearth of cloth is causing actual misery. palm and ground-nut oil enable the agents only to buy provisions; the trade is capable of infinite expansion, but it requires time--as yet it supports only the two non-slaving houses, english and dutch. the forty or fifty tons brought in every month pay them cent, per cent.; the bag of half a hundred weight being sold for four fathoms of cloth; or two hatchets, one bottle of rum, and a jug or a plate. early next day i went to the english factory for the purpose of completing my outfit. unfortunately, mr. p. maculloch, the head agent, who is perfectly acquainted with the river and the people, was absent, leaving the business in the hands of two "mean whites," walking buccras, english pariahs. the factory--a dirty disgrace to the name--was in the charge of a clerk, whom we saw being rowed about bareheaded through the sun, accompanied by a black girl, both as far from sober as might be. the cooper, who was sitting moony with drink, rose to receive us and to weigh out the beads which i required; under the excitement he had recourse to a gin-bottle, and a total collapse came on before half the work was done. why should south latitude °, the parallel of zanzibar, be so fatal to the briton? at . p.m. on september , we left porto da lenha, and passed mashel's creek, on whose right bank is the village of makatalla; the charts call it foomou, and transfer it to the left. here we enter upon the riverine archipelago. the great stream before one, now divides into three parallel branches, separated by long narrow islands and islets, banks and shallows. the northernmost channel in our maps, "maxwell river," is known to europeans and natives as noangwa; mamballa or the central line is called by the moderns nshibúl, and the southern is dubbed by the hydrographer, "rio konio," a truly terrible mistake for sonho. as a rule, the noangwa, though infested during the rains by cruel mosquitoes, is preferred for the ascent, and the central for dropping down stream. the maximum breadth of the congo bed, more than half island, is here five miles; and i was forcibly reminded of it when winding through the dalmatian archipelago. the river still maintained its alluvial aspect as we passed along the right bank. the surface was a stubble strewn with the usual trees; the portly bombax; the calabash, now naked and of wintry aspect; and the dark evergreen palmyra, in dots and streaks upon the red-yellow field, fronted by an edging of grass, whose king, cyperus papyrus, is crowned with tall heads waving like little palms. this egyptian bush extends from the congo mouth to banza nokki, our landing-place; it grows thickest about porto da lenha, and it thins out above and below: i afterwards observed it in the sweet water marshes of syria and the brazils. we passed sundry settlements--loango pequeno, loango grande, and others--and many canoes were seen plying up and down. on the left or to the south was nothing but dense reedy vegetation upon the low islands, which here are of larger dimensions than the northern line. as evening drew near, the grasshoppers and the tree frogs chirped a louder song, and the parrots whistled as they winged their rapid flight high overhead. presently we passed out of the lower archipelago, and sighted the first high land closing upon the stream, rolling hills, which vanished in blue perspective, and which bore streaks of fire during the dark hours. our cabinda patron grounded us twice, and even the high night breeze hardly enabled us to overcome the six-knot current off the narrow, whose right side is called ponta da diabo. devil's point is not so named in the chart: the place is marked "strong tide" (no. ), opposite chombae island, which the natives term zungá chyá bundika, hence probably the name of the village bemandika (boma ndika). at this satanic headland, where the banks form a gate three miles broad, a man hailed us from the bank; none understood him, but all made up their minds that he threatened to visit us during the night. a light breeze early next morning fortunately freshened as we approached "strong tide" (no. ). we ran north of the second archipelago above the gate; south of us lay the "low islands" of the chart, with plantations of beans and tobacco; the peasants stood to stare like icelanders, leaning on oblong-bladed paddles six feet long, or upon alpen-stocks capped with bayonets; the "scare-crows" were grass figures, with pots for heads and wooden rattles suspended to bent poles. on the right bank a block of hills narrows the stream, and its selvage of light green grasses will contribute to the "floating islands." higher up, blocks and boulders of all sizes rise from the vegetation, and prolong themselves into the shallower waters. there are two distinct bluffs, the westernmost marked by a tree-clump at its feet, and between them lies a baylet, where a dozen palms denote the once dreaded village bemandika. the second block, to feet high, bears on its rounded summit the stone of lightning, called by the people tadi nzázhí, vulgò, taddy enzazzi. the fiote language has the persian letter zh (j), sounding like the initial of the french "jour:" so lander ("on the course and termination of the niger," "journal royal geographical society," vol. i. p. ) says of the island zegozhe, that "zh is pronounced like z in azure." this upright mass, apparently feet high, and seeming, like the "lumba" of kinsembo to rest upon a basement, is very conspicuous from the east, where it catches the eye as a watch- tower would. at the bluff-base, a huge slab, an irregular parallelogram, slopes towards the water and, viewed far up stream, it passably represents a kaffir's pavoise. this fingal's shield, a name due to the piety of mr. george maxwell, is called by the french la pierre fétiche: it must not be confounded with our fetish rock (tádi ya muingu) on the southern bank at the entrance of the nshibúl and sonho branches. i can add nothing to tuckey's description or lieutenant hawkey's tracing of the rude figures which distinguish a not unusual feature. tuckey (p. ) calls fingal's shield taddy d'ya m'wangoo, and professor smith, taddi moenga (p. ); the only defect in lieutenant hawkey's sketch is that of exaggerating the bluff, a mere mamelon, one of many lumps upon a continued level. both rocks are of the oldest granite, much weather-worn and mixed and banded with mica and quartz. m. charles konig found in the finer-grained varieties "minute noble garnets," which also appeared in the mica-slate of "gombac" higher up stream, and in the primitive greenstone of "boka embomma."[fn# ] beyond this point, where boma is first sighted, lies the large marauding village of twáná. here also a man shouted to us from the bank "muliele! muliele!" for the portuguese "mulher," one of the interminable corruptions of the tongue--a polite offer, as politely declined. the next feature is the rio jo jacaré, a narrow sedgy stream on the right bank, which, winding northward through rolling lines of hills, bends westward, and joins, they say, the rio lukullu (lukallo?) of cabinda bay. men have descended, i am told, three leagues, but no one has seen the junction, consequently there may be a portage between the drains. if not, this is the apex of the greater congo delta, a false formation, whose base between cabinda bay (s. lat. ° ') and ambrizette (s. lat. ° ') measures ° ', equal to direct geographical miles, whilst its depth inland would be sixty. chapter vii. boma.--our outfit for the interior we now reach boma, the furthest portuguese factory, about thirty, usually reckoned thirty-eight, nautical miles from porta da lenha, and a total of . from french point. the upper dépôt of the congo lies upon the north bank, accidenté ground, poor, stony, and sandy soil, with rounded, grass-clad hills, the southern is less broken; there are long slopes and waves of land which trend in graceful lines, charmingly diversified, to the uplands, where the old capital, são salvador, is situated; and upon the undulating blue ridges, distance behind distance, appear markings by nature's hand, which the stranger's eye can hardly distinguish from villa or village. the view explains how the old expedition felt "every day more in love with this beautiful country," the sea-like river wants nothing but cattle on its banks to justify the description-- "appunto una scena pastorale, a cui fanno quinci il mar, quinci i colli, e d' ogn' intorno i fior, le piante, e l' ombre, e l' onde, e �l cielo. unteatro pomposo." in the centre of the broad stream, whose southern arm is not visible, are three islets. the western most, backed by a long, grassy, palm-tasselled bank, is called zungá chyá bundiká. this chombae island of the charts is a rocky cone, dark with umbrella- shaped trees. its north-eastern neighbour, simúle kete, the molyneux island of mr. maxwell, the hekay of tuckey, and the kekay of the chart, contrasts sharply with the yellow stubbles and the flat lines of zungá chyá ngándi. here, since tuckey's time, the trees have made way for grass and stones; the only remnants are clumps in the south-eastern, which is not only the highest point, but also the windy and watery direction. on the congo course the foul weather is mostly from the "sirocco," where the african interior is a mass of swamps. at the mouth tornadoes come down the line of stream from the north-east, and i heard traditions of the sea-tornado, which blows in shore instead of offshore as usual. about the close of the last century one or other of these islands was proposed as a dépôt and settlement, which a few simple works would convert into a small gibraltar. the easternmost buka, the booka embomma of the charts and maps, will presently be described. in this direction the zaire assumes the semblance of a mountain lake, whilst down stream the broad bosom of the nshibúl branch forms almost a sea-horizon, with dots showing where tall, scattered palms spring from the watery surface. we cannot but admire the nightly effects of the wintry bush-fires. during the day livid volumed smoke forms cumuli that conceal their enemy, the sun, and discharge a rain of blacks ten times the size of londoners. in the darkened air we see storms of fire fiercely whirling over the undulating ranges, here sweeping on like torrents, there delaying, whilst the sheets meet at the apex, and a giant beard of flame (<greek> ) flouts the moon. the land must be splendidly grassed after the rains. the boma factories are like those of porto da lenha, but humbler in size, and more resembling the wicker-work native houses. the river, which up stream will show a flood mark of twelve feet, here seldom rises above five, and further down three and four; consequently piles are not required, and the swiftness of the current keeps off the jacaré. formerly there were fourteen establishments, which licit trade in palm oil and ground-nuts, instead of men, women, and children, have reduced to ten. the air is sensibly drier and healthier than at the lower settlement, and apparently there is nothing against the place but deadly ennui and monotony. we landed at once, and presented our letters to sr. antonio vicente pereira, who at once made us at home: he had seen goa as well as macáo, so we found several subjects in common. the factory enjoyed every comfort: the poultry yard throve, far better than at porto da lenha; we saw fowls and pigeons, "manilla" ducks and ducklings, and a fine peacock from portugal, which seemed to enjoy the change. the fish is not so good as that caught further down, and the natives have a habit of narcotizing it: the silurus electricus is exceptionally plentiful. the farmyard contained tame deer, and a house-dog fierce as a tethered mastiff; goats were brought whenever wanted, and the black-faced, thin-tailed sheep gave excellent mutton. beef was impossible; the portuguese, like the natives, care little for milk, and of the herd, which strangers had attempted to domesticate, remained only a bull and a cow in very poor condition--the deaths were attributed to poisonous grass, but i vehemently suspect tsetse. a daily "quitanda," or market, held under the huge calabashes on a hill behind the house, supplied what was wanted. upon market hill executions also take place, the criminal being shot through the heart. m. pereira's garden produces all that porta da lenha can grow, with less trouble and of a superior kind. water-melons, tomatoes, onions, and pimento, or large pepper (pimentão, siliquastrum, ndungu ya yenéne), useful to produce "crocodiles' tears;" mint, and parsley flourish remarkably; turnips are eatable after two months; cabbage and lettuce, beet, carrot, and endive after three or four. it is a waste of ground to plant peas; two rows, twelve feet by four, hardly produce a plateful. manioc ripens between the sixth and ninth month, plantains and bananas once a year, cotton and rice in four months, and maize in forty days--with irrigation it is easy to grow three annual crops. the time for planting is before the rains, which here last six weeks to two months, september and october. the staple of commerce is now the nguba, or ground-nut (plural, jinguba), which merolla calls incumba, with sometimes a little milho (maize), and calavance beans. of fruits we find trellised grapes, pines, and guavas, which, as at fernando po, are a weed. the agrumi, limes, oranges and citrons are remarkably fine, and hold, as of old, a high place in the simple medicines of the country. a cup of lime-leaf tea, drunk warm in the morning, is the favourite emetic and cathartic: even in pliny's day we find "malus assyria, quam alii vocant medicam (mediam?, venenis medetur" (xii. ). on the gold coast and in the gaboon region, colic and dysentery are cured by a calabash full of lime- juice, "laced" with red pepper. the peculiarity of european vegetables throughout maritime congo and angola is the absence of all flavour combined with the finest appearance; it seems as though something in the earth or atmosphere were wanting to their full development. similarly, though in the upper regions the climate is delicious, the missionaries could not keep themselves alive, but died of privation, hardship, and fatigue. chapter viii. a visit to banza chisalla, boma, at the head of the congo delta, the great dépôt between the interior and the coast, owes its existence wholly to "the cruel trade which spoils unhappy afric of her sons." father merolla ( ), who visited it from "angoij," our "cabinda," speaks of it as a pretty large island, tributary to the mani-congo, extremely populous, well supplied with provisions, and outlaid by islets belonging to the count of sonho. tuckey's embomma was an inland banza or town, and the site of the factories was called market point; the expedition map and the hydrographic chart term it loombee, the latter being properly the name of a large quitanda (market) lying two miles to the north-west. early in the present century it is described as a village of a hundred huts, opposite which trading vessels anchored under charge of the "fuka or king's merchant;" no market was held there, lest, in case of dispute, the royal person might suffer. although the main features of our maps are still correct, there have been great changes in the river-bed between porto da lenha and boma, especially about the latter place, which should be transferred from its present site to lumbi. the broad chisalla creek, which mr. maxwell calls logan, between the northern bank and the island "booka embomma," is now an arm only feet wide. in fact all the bank about boma, like the lower delta, urgently calls for re-surveying. this part of the river belongs to the "rei dos reis," nessalla, under whom are some ten chief officers called "kings," who buy and sell; indeed, africa knows no other. the title is prostituted throughout the west coast, but it is nowhere so degraded as in the congo regions; the whites abuse it to flatter the vanity of the astute negro, who accepts it with a view to results--a "king- dash" must, of course, be greater than that of a subject. every fellow with one black coat becomes a "preese" (prince), and if he has two he styles himself a "king." without permission of the "king of kings" we could obtain neither interpreter, canoe, nor crew; a visit to banza chisalal was therefore necessary and, as it would have been vain to ask anything empty-handed, i took with me a fine spangled cloak, a piece of chintz, and a case of ship's rum, the whole worth £ . at . a.m. on september th we set out up stream in a fine canoe, wall-sided and rather crank, but allowing the comfort of chairs. she was of mayumba make, superior to anything built on the river, and the six men that drove her stood up to pole, and paddle. above boma the hills, which are the outlines of the west african ghats, form a graceful semicircle, separated from the water by a flat terrace garnished with little villages and tree- islets. on the north bank are many of the crater-like sinks which dot the coast from the gaboon to loango. we hugged the right side to avoid the rapid swirl; there was no backwater at the points, and hard work was required to prevent our being swept against the boulders of gneiss, schiste, and pudding-stone edging the shores and stretching into the stream. here the fish is excellent as at porto cla lenha, and we found the people catching it in large spoon-shaped basins: i enquired about the peixe mulher (woman- fish), the french sirène, which old missioners describe as an african mermaid, not exactly as she appeared to the "lovely lord of colonsay," and which barbot figures with "two strutting breasts." he makes the flesh taste like pork, and tells us that the small bones of the hand were good for gravel, whilst bracelets made of the left rib were worn near the heart, to stop bleeding. this manatus, like the elephant and the hippopotamus, has long disappeared before the gun. after some three quarters of an hour we reached the entrance of chisalla creek, which is the northernmost branch of the main stream. on the left (north) was a plain showing traces of a large village, and we sighted our first grass-island--a compact mass of fibrous, earth-washed roots and reedy vegetation, inhabited by serpents and ardeine birds. to the right, or southward, rises the tall island of boma, rocky and wooded, which a narrow channel separates from its eastern neighbour, chisalla islet. the latter is the royal pere la chaise, the graves being kept carefully concealed; white men who have visited the ground to shoot antelope have had reason to regret the step. here also lie three officers of the congo expedition-- messrs. galwey, tudor, and cranch--forgotten, as gamboa and reitz at mombasah. the banks of the winding creek were beautified with the malaguetta pepper, the ipomsea, the hibiscus, and a yellow flower growing upon an aquatic plant like a magnified water-cress. animal life became somewhat less rare; we saw sandpipers, hawks, white and black fish-eagles, and long-legged water-hens, here supposed to give excellent sport. an embryo rapid, formed by a gneiss-band connecting the north bank with the islet, delayed us, and the rocks on the right showed pot-holes dug by the poling- staves; during the rains canoes from boma avoid this place, and seek fuel down stream. after a total of two hours and a quarter we reached banza chisalla: it is a "small country," in african parlance, a succursal of boma proper, the banza on the hills beyond the reedy, grassy plain. the site is charming--a flat palm-orchard backed by an amphitheatre of high-rolling ground, and the majestic stream approaches it through a gate, whose right staple is the tall chisalla, and whose left is a rocky islet with outlying needles. we ascended the river-bank, greeted by the usual accidents of an african reception; the men shouted, the women rushed screaming under cover, and the children stood howling at the horrible sight. a few paces placed us at the "palace," a heap of huts, surrounded by an old reed-fence. the audience-room was a trifle larger than usual, with low shady eaves, a half-flying roof, and a pair of doorways for the dangerous but indispensable draught; a veteran sofa and a few rickety chairs composed the furniture, and the throne was known by its boarded seat, which would have been useful in taking a "lamp-bath." presently entered the "rei dos reis," nessalla: the old man, whose appearance argued prosperity, was en grande tenue, the state costume of tuckey's, not of merolla's day. the crown was the usual "berretta" (night-cap) of open work; the sceptre, a drum-major's staff; the robes, a "parochial" beadle's coat of scarlet cloth, edged with tinsel gold lace. his neck was adorned with hair circlets of elephants' tails, strung with coral and beads; the effect, to compare black with white, was that of beau brummell's far-famed waterfall tie, and the head seemed supported as if on a narrow-rimmed "charger." the only other ornament was a broad silver ring welded round the ankle, and drawing attention to a foot which, all things considered, was small and well shaped. some of the chiefs had copper rings of home manufacture, with neatly cut raised figures. the king held in his right hand an article which at first puzzled us--a foot's length of split reed, with the bulbous root attached. he may not, like his vassals, point with the finger, and without pointing an african can hardly give an order. moreover, the sangálávú or malaguetta pepper (amomum granum paradisi), fresh or old, is not only a toothstick, but a fetish of superior power when carried on journeys. professor smith writes "sangala woo," and tells us that it was always kept fresh in the house, to be rolled in the hands when invoking the fetish during war-time; moreover, it was chewed to be spat at the enemy. possibly he confuses it with the use as a tooth-stick, the article which asia and africa prefer to the unclean hog's- bristle brush of europe. on the left of the throne sat the nchinu, or "second king," attired in a footman's livery of olive-coloured cloth, white-worn at the seams, and gleaming with plated buttons, upon which was the ex-owner's crest--a cubit arm. the stranger in africa marvels why men, who, as dahome shows, can affect a tasteful simplicity, will make themselves such "guys." when looking at these caricatures, he is tempted to read (literally) learned montesquieu, "it is hardly to be believed that god, who is a wise being, should place a soul, especially a good soul, in such a black, ugly body," and to consider the few exceptions as mere "sporting plants." but the negro combines with inordinate love of finery the true savage taste--an imitative nature,--and where he cannot copy the asiatic he must ape the european; only in the former pursuit he rises above, in the latter he sinks below his own proper standard. similarly, as a convert, he is ennobled by el islam; in rare cases, which may be counted upon the fingers, he is civilized by christianity; but, as a rule, the latter benefits him so far only as it abolishes the barbarous and murderous rites of paganism. but there is also a sound mundane reason which causes the african "king" to pose in these cast-off borrowed plumes. contrast with his three-quarter nude subjects gives him a name; the name commands respect; respect increases "dash;" and dash means dollars. for his brain, dense and dead enough to resist education, is ever alive and alert to his own interest; whilst the concentration of its small powers prevails against those who, in all other points, are notably his superiors. the whole of negro africa teaches this lesson. "the ethiopians," says father merolla, "are not so dull and stupid as is commonly imagined, but rather more subtle and cunning than ordinary;" and he adds an instance of far-sighted treachery, which would not have been despicable even in a hindoo. a desultory palaver "came up;" the soul of the meeting not being present. m. pissot explained my wish to "take walk and make book," carefully insisting upon the fact that i came to spend, not to gain money. the grizzled senior's face, before crumpled like a "wet cloak ill laid up," expanded at these last words, and with a grunt, which plainly meant "by' m' by," he rose, and retired to drink-- a call of nature which the decencies of barbarous dignity require to be answered in private. he returned accompanied by his nephew, manbuku prata (pronounced pelata), the "silver chief officer," as we might say, golden ball. the title is vulgarly written mambuco; the abbé proyart prefers ma-nboukou, or "prince who is below the makaia in dignity." the native name of this third personage was gidifuku. it was a gorgeous dignitary: from the poll of his night-cap protruded a dozen bristles of elephant's tail hair, to which a terminal coral gave the graceful curve of a pintado's crest, and along his ears, like the flaps of a travelling casquette, hung two dingy little mirrors of talc from cacongo, set in clumsy frames of ruddled wood. masses of coral encircled his neck, and the full-dress naval uniform of a french officer, with epaulettes of stupendous size, exposed a zebra'd guernsey of equivocal purity. a long black staff, studded with broad-headed brass beads, served to clear the room of the lieges, who returned as fast as they were turned out--the baton was evidently not intended to be used seriously. but the manbuku prata is not a mere "punch in a puppet show." his face expresses more intelligence and resolution than usual, and his portuguese is not the vile article of the common trader. he means business. when other chiefs send their "sons," that is their slaves, to fight, he leads them in person--venite, non ite. the french "emigration libre" put , dollars into his pocket, and he still hopes against hope to ship many a cargo for the banana factory. he has some armed serviles at chinímí and lámbá, two villages perched like condors' nests upon hills commanding the river's northern bank, and, despite the present dearth of "business," he still owns some , francs in cloth and beads, rum and gunpowder. as the "silver minister" took his seat upon the ground before the king, all removed their caps with a simultaneous grunt and performed the "sákilá" or batta-palmas; this hand-clapping must be repeated whenever the simplest action is begun or ended by king or chief. monteiro and gamitto (pp. et seg.) refer to the practice everywhere on the line of country which they visited: there it seems to be even a more ceremonious affair than in the congo. the claps were successively less till they were hardly audible; after a pause five or six were given, and the last two or three were in hurried time, the while without pronouncing a word. the palaver now opened steadily with a drink: a bottle of trade "fizz" was produced for the white man, and rum for his black congeners; then the compliment of healths went all round. after this we fell to work at business. by dint of abundant wrangling and with an immense display of suspicion, natural under the circumstances, it was arranged that the king should forward me in a couple of his own canoes to banza nokki, the end of river navigation, as we were told, and falsely told; in my turn i was to pay goods valued about £ , at least three times the usual tariff. they consisted of fourteen red caps, as many "sashes," and fifty-two fathoms of cloth for the crew; ten peças de lei or chiloes for each interpreter, and two pieces for the canoes. i should have given four fathoms for each man and the same for each boat. the final scene was most gratifying to the african mind: i solemnly invested old nessala with the grand cloak which covered his other finery; grinning in the ecstasy of vanity, he allowed his subjects to turn him round and round, as one would a lay figure, yet with profound respect, and, lastly, he retired to charm his wives. this part of the negotiations ended with presenting some "satin stripe" and rum to the nchinu and manbuku prata, and with shaking hands--a dangerous operation. the people are cleanly; they wash when rising, and before as well as after every meal; they are always bathing, yet from prince to pauper, from baby to grey beard, they are affected with a psora known by its portuguese name, "sarnas." the congo "fiddle" appears first between the articulations of the fingers, and bleaches the hands and wrists as if it were leprosy. yet i did not see a single case of true lepra arabum, or its modifications, the huge barbadoes leg (elephantiasis), and the sarcoma scrotale and sarcocele of zanzibar and east africa. from the extremities the gale extends over the body, especially the shins, and the people, who appear in the perpetual practice of scalpturigo, attribute it to the immoderate use of palm wine. i observed, however, that europeans, in the river, who avoid the liquor, are hardly ever free from this foul blood-poison, and a jar of sulphur mixture is a common article upon the table. hydrocele is not unfrequent, but hardly so general as in the eastern island; one manner of white man, a half caste from macáo, was suffering with serpigo, and boasted of it. all predicted to me a similar fate from the "botch of congo," but happily i escaped. indeed, throughout the west african coast, travellers risk "craw-craw," a foul form of the disease, seen on board the african steamers. kru-men touching the rails of the companion ladders, have communicated it to passengers, and these to their wives and families. the town was neat and clean as the people. the houses were built upon raised platforms, and in the little fenced fields the cajanus indicus vetch was conspicuous. in hindostani it is called thur, or doll-plant, by the eastern arab turiyan, in kisawahili mbarazi, in angola voando (merolla's ouuanda), and in the brazil guandu.[fn# ] the people had lost their fear, and brought their exomphalous little children, who resembled salmon fry in the matter of umbilical vesicles, to be patted by the white man; a process which caused violent screams and in some cases nearly induced convulsions-- the mothers seemed to enjoy the horror displayed by their hopefuls. there is little beauty amongst the women, and settled europeans prefer cabinda girls. the latter have perhaps the most wiry and wig-like hair on the whole west african coast, where all hair is more or less wiry and wig- like. cloth was less abundant in the village than a smear of red; the bosom even after marriage was unveiled, and the rule of fashion was shown by binding it tightly down. the rich wore armlets and leglets of staircase rods, brass and copper, like the metal gaiters and gauntlets of the gaboon river. the only remarkable object was the quesango, a wooden effigy of a man placed in the middle of the settlement: battel mentions it amongst the "gagas or guides," and barbot terms it "likoku mokisi." three faint hurrahs, a feeble african echo of england like the "hoch!" of vienna, and the discharge of a four- pounder were our parting honours. we returned viâ the gateway between the two islets. on the south- eastern flank of chisalla is a dwarf precipice called mbondo la zumba and, according to the interpreters, it is the lovers' leap of tuckey. but its office must not be confounded with that attributed to the sinister-looking scaur of leucadia; here the erring wives of the kings of boma and their paramours found a bosphorus. the commander of the first congo expedition applies the name to a hanging rock on the northern shore, about eighteen miles higher up stream. a portentous current soon swept us past père la chaise, and shortly after noon we were comfortably at breakfast with sr. pereira. during the last night we had been kept awake by the drumming and fifing, singing and shouting, weeping and howling, pulling at accordions and striking the monotonous shingungo. merolla names this cymbal longa, and describes it justly as two iron bells joined by an arched bar: i found it upon the tanganyika lake, and suffered severely from its monotonous horrors. monteiro and gamitto (p. ) give an illustration of what is known in the cazembe's country as "gomati:" the mchua or gong-gong of ashanti has a wooden handle connecting the cones. our palhabote had brought up the chief mashel's bier, and to-day we have the satisfaction of seeing it landed. a kind of palanquin, covered with crimson cloth and tinsel gold like a bombay "tabút," it had three horns or prominences, two capped with empty black bottles, and the central bearing the deceased's helmet; it was a fancy article, which might have fitted him of gath, with a terrific plume and the spoils of three horses in the sanguine hues of war. although eight feet long by five broad, the coffin was said to be quite full. the immense respect which the congoese bear to their rulers, dead as well as alive, prevented my verifying the accounts of the slave dealers. i knew that the chief who had died at kinsembo, had been dried on a bamboo scaffolding over a slow fire, and lay in state for some weeks in flannel stockings and a bale of baize, but these regions abound in local variations of custom. some declared, as we find in proyart, that the corpse had been mummified by the rude process of smoking; others that it had been exposed for some days to the open air, the relatives sitting round to keep off the flies till preliminarily bandaged. according to barbot (iii. ), the people of fetu on the gold coast and the men of benin used to toast the corpse on a wooden gridiron; and the vei tribe, like the congoese, still fumigate their dead bodies till they become like dried hams. this rude form of the egyptian rite is known to east as well as to west africa: kimera, late king of uganda, was placed upon a board covering the mouth of a huge earthern pot heated from below. instances are known of bodies in the congo region remaining a year or two above ground till the requisite quantity of fine stuffs has been procured--the larger the roll the greater the dignity, and sometimes the hut must be pulled down before it can be removed. here, as on the gold coast, we find the jewish practice recorded by josephus of converting the tomb into a treasury; in the case of mashel some £ in gold and silver, besides cloth, beads, and ornaments, shared, they say, his fate. the missionaries vainly fought against these customs, which are evidently of sentimental origin-- "now bring the last sad gifts, with these the last lament be said; let all that pleased and still may please be buried with the dead." the bier was borne by slaves, as the head men would not even look at it; at times the carriers circled round, as if to deprecate the idea that they were hurrying it to its bourne. the grave was a pit fifteen to twenty feet deep, cut like a well, covered with stones to keep out wild beasts, and planted round with the cylindrical euphorbia by way of immortelles. i could not find out if the congoese still practise the vivi- sepulture so common on the western coast--the "infernal sacrifices of man's flesh to the memory of relatives and ancestors," as the old missioners energetically expressed themselves. according to battel, the "giaghi" corpse was seated as if alive in a vault; in this "infernal and noisome dungeon" were placed two wives with their arms broken, and thus there was no danger of the zumbi or ghost killing men by reapparition. when the king of old calabar died, a huge hole was dug, with an off chamber for two sofas, one of which supported the dressed and ornamented corpse. personal attendants, such as the umbrella, sword, and snuff-box bearers, holding the insignia of their offices, together with sundry virgins, were either slaughtered or thrown in alive, a rude in pace. quantities of food and trade goods, especially coppers, were heaped up; after which the pit was filled and the ground was levelled. the less wealthy sort of "gentlemen" here are placed in smaller graves near the villages; and the slaves are still "buried with the burial of an ass,"-- cast forth into the bush. yet, by way of showing themselves kind to the dead, the congoese are "commonly very cruel to the living." lately, a chief, called from his wealth, "chico de ouro" (golden frank) died somewhat suddenly. the nganga or medicine man who, on such occasions, here as elsewhere, has the jus vitæ et necis, was called in; he charged one of the sons with parricide by witchcraft, and the youth was at once pierced by the bayonets of his brothers. "golden frank" was peculiar in his ways. he used to entertain the factors at dinner, imitating them from soup to cheese; his only objections were to tea, and to drinking toasts out of anything but the pet skull of an enemy: it was afterwards placed upon his grave. boma is no longer "the emporium of the congo empire," if it ever did deserve that title. like porto da lenha, it is kept up by the hopes of seeing better days, which are not doomed to dawn. even at the time of my visit some to negroes were under guard in a deserted factory, and, whilst we were visiting nessalla, they were marched down to bathe. when i returned from the cataracts, the barracoon contained only fifty or sixty, the rest having been shunted off to some unguarded point. at a day's notice a thousand, and within a week , head could be procured from the adjoining settlements, where the chattels are kept at work. as in tuckey's day, "those exported are either captives in war or condemned criminals." during the free emigration as much as $ have been paid per man, a large sum for "congoes:" whilst a cargo of "minas" (guinea negroes) loses at most per cent., these less hardy gangs seldom escape without at least double the deaths by dysentery or some other epidemic. now they are freely offered for $ to $ , but there are no buyers; the highest bid of which i heard was $ for a house-"help." the slave-traders in the congo look upon their employment as did the contrabandist in the golden days of smuggling; the "free sailor" whom marryatt depicts, a law-breaker, yet not less a very pleasant, companionable fellow. the unhappy differences between the late british commissioner for loanda and the judge of the mixed court, sr. josé julio rodriguez, who followed his enemy to the grave on april , , rendered são paulo anything but a pleasant place to an english resident; but the rancour had not extended to the congo, and, so far from showing chagrin, the agents declared that without the "coffin squadron," negroes would have been a mere drug in the market. the only déplaisir is that which i had already found in a gaboon factory, the excessive prevalence of petty pilfering. the moleques or house-boys steal like magpies, even what is utterly useless to them; these young clerks of st. nicholas will scream and writhe, and confess and beg pardon under the lash, and repeat the offence within the hour: as they are born serviles, we cannot explain the habit by homer's, "jove fixed it certain that whatever day makes man a slave takes half his worth away." one of our watches was found in the pocket of a noble interpreter, who, unabashed, declared that he placed it there for fear of its being injured; and the traders are constantly compelled to call in the fetishman for the protection of their stores against the prigging chiefs. yet in tuckey's time there was only one thief at boma, a boy who stole a knife, confessed, and restored it. during a month's residence amongst the pagans of the interior, where the houses swarmed with serviles, and where my outfit, which was never locked up, must have represented a plate-chest in england, not the smallest article was "found missing," nor could anything be touched except by collusion with the head man. chapter ix. up the congo to banza nokki. for a wonder the canoes came in time, and, despite their mat- sails, we could not complain of them. there were twelve paddlers two for the stem, and two for the stern of each craft, under a couple of interpreters, jotakwassi and nchama-chamvu, who were habited in european frock-coats of broadcloth, and in native terminations mostly "buff." our excellent host bade us a kindly adieu, with many auguries of success--during the last night the frogs had made a noise in the house. briefly, we set out on september th. in the forty-five miles between boma, where we enter the true trough of the congo, and the landing-place of banza nokki below the cataracts, there are half-a-dozen reaches, the shortest of three, the longest of fifteen miles. they are not straight, as upon the chart; the windings of the bed exclude direct vision, and the succession of points and bays suggest, like parts of the rhine, a series of mountain-tarns. the banks show the high-water level in a low shelf, a ribbon of green, backed by high rolling hills, rounded and stony, with grass dry at this season; the formation is primitive, and the material of the lower bed has been held to "prove the probability that the mountains of pernambuco, rio de janeiro, and other adjacent parts of south america, were primevally connected with the opposite chains, that traverse the plains of congo and loango." in parts the rocks fall bluff into the river, and here the current rushes past like a mill-race without a shadow of backwater. the heights are intersected by gullies and ravines, of which i counted sixty-nine on the right and fifty-four on the left bank; many of them are well wooded, and others are fronted by plains of the reeds and flags, which manufacture floating islands, cast loose, like those of the niger, about the end of july by the "malka" rains. about a dozen contained running water: captain tuckey did not see one that would turn a mill in august and september; but in november and december all these fiumaras will discharge torrents. the breadth of the entroughed bed varies from yards to two miles where it most dispreads itself. the current increases from the normal three to five knots in rare places; the surface loses the glassiness of the lower section, and at once shows the boiling and swirling which will be noticed near the cataracts. the shores are often foul, but the midway is mostly clear, and, where sunken rocks are, they are shown by whirlpools. the flow of the tide, or rather the damming up of the lower waters between porto da lenha and the mouth, causes a daily rise, which we found to measure about a foot; thus it assists in forming a treble current, the rapid down-flow in the thalweg being subtended by a strong backwater on either side carrying a considerable portion in a retrograde direction, and showing a sensible reflux; this will continue as far as the rapids. in the amazonas the tides are felt a hundred leagues from the mouth; and, whilst the stream moves seawards, the level of the water rises, proving an evident under-current. mr. bates has detected the influence of oceanic tides at a point on the tapajos, miles distant from its mouth, such is the amazing flatness of the country's profile: here we find the reverse. the riverine trough acts as wind-conductor to a strong and even violent sea-breeze; on the lower section it begins as a ground- current--if the "bull" be allowed--a thin horizontal stratum near the water, it gradually curves and slides upwards as it meets the mountain flanks, forming an inverted arch, and extending some , to , feet above the summits. at this season it is a late riser, often appearing about p.m., and sometimes its strength is not exhausted before midnight. the brown water, grass-sheeted at the sides, conceals the bright yellow sand of the bed; when placed in a tumbler it looks clear and colourless, and the taste is perfectly sweet--brackishness does not extend far above porto da lenha. yet at boma the residents prefer a spring near the factories, and attribute dysentery to the use of river-water. according to mr. george maxwell, the supply of the lower bed has the quality of rotting cables, and the same peculiarity was attributed to the tanganyika. of late years no ship has ventured above boma, and boats have ascended with some difficulty, owing to the "buffing stream." yet there is no reason why the waters should not be navigated, as proposed in , by small steamers of good power, and the strong sea-breeze would greatly facilitate the passage. in older and more enterprising days merchant-schooners were run high up the zaire. the master of a vessel stated to tuckey that he "had been several voyages up to the distance of miles from the mouth" without finding any difficulty. our course passed by banza chisalla where, as we had paid double, there was a vain attempt to make us pay treble. travelling up the south-eastern reach, we passed a triangular insulated rock off the southern bank, and then the "diabolitos" outlying point kilu, opposite banza vinda on the other side. a second reach winding to the north-east showed on the right makula (annan) river, and a little further munga-mungwa (woodhouslee); between them is the terminus of the são salvador road. on the northern bank where the hills now become rounded mountains, , feet above the stream, perches chinimi the village of manbuku prata, who expects canoes here to await his orders; and who was sorely offended because i passed down without landing. the next feature of the chart, matádi "memcandi," is a rocky point, not an island. turning a projection, point makula (clough corner), we entered no. , elbow bending southeast; on its concave northern side appeared the settlement vinda la nzádi. this is the vinda le zally of tuckey; on the chart veinde len zally, and according to others vinda de nzadi, or village of the zaire river. it is probably the "benda" of the introduction (p. xxxiv.); and as b and v sound alike in fiote, cabinda, cabenda or kabendah is evidently ca-vinda--great village. our terminus that day was the usual resting-place of travellers, "mfumba" behind nkumungu (point) kaziwa, a mass of granitoid slabs, with a single tree for landmark. opposite us was sandi ya nzondo, which others call sanga ya ngondo; in the chart this one- tree island is written "catlo zonda," it is the first of two similar formations. oscar rock, its western (down stream) neighbour, had shared the fate of "soonga lem paccula," (zunga chya makula?) a stone placed in the map north-east of the makula or annan debouchure; both were invisible, denoted only by swirls in the water. we had taken seven hours to cover what we easily ran down in two, and we slept comfortably with groan of rock and roar of stream for lullaby. september .--our course now lay uninterruptedly along the left bank, where the scenery became yet more rhine-like, in natural basins, reaches on the chart: here and there rugged uprocks passably simulated ruined castles. the dwarf bays of yellow sand were girt by a goodly vegetation, the palm and the calabash only telling us that we were in africa. our men pointed to the work of a nguvu or hippopotamus, which they say sometimes attacks canoes; they believe with tuckey that the river-horses cause irregularity of soundings by assembling and trampling deep holes in the bed; but the ngadi is a proof that they do not, as m. du chaillu supposes, exclusively affect streams with shoals and shallows. the jacaré (crocodile) is known especially to avoid the points where the current sweeps swiftly past, yet no one will hang his hand over the canoe into the water: we did not see any of these wretches, but at boma coxswain deane observed one about sixteen feet long. curls of smoke arose from the mountain-walls of the trough, showing that the bush was being burned; and spired up from a grassy palm-dotted plain, between two rocky promontories on the left bank, the site of the chacha or wembo village: in a gap of the herbage stood half-finished canoes, and a man was bobbing with rod, line, and float. after an hour's paddling we halted for breakfast under "alecto rock," a sheer bluff of reddish schist, feet high; here a white trident, inverted and placed ten feet above the water, showed signs of h.m. ship "alecto," (late) captain hunt, whose boat passed up in . the people call it chimbongolo. the river is now three quarters of a mile wide, and the charming cove shows the brightest of sands and the densest of vegetation waving in the cool land-wind. resuming our way at p.m., we passed on the left "scylla rocks," then a wash, and beyond them four high and tree-clad heads off the right bank. three are islets, the zunga chya gnombe--of the bull--formed by a narrow arm passing round them to the north: other natives called them zunga chya umbinda, but all seem to differ. these are the gombac islands of the chart, hall island being the easternmost, and the northern passage between the three horns and the main is called by us "gombac creek." half an hour beyond was a mass of villages, in a large, grassy low-land of the left bank, girt by mountains higher than those down stream. some outlying huts were called by the interpreters suko nkongo, and formed the "beach town" of large interior settlements, suko do wembo and mbinda. others said lasugu or sugo nkongo, the sooka congo of the charts: others again for "mbinda" proposed "mpeso birimba." this is probably the place where according to the mail of november, � , diamonds were found, and having been submitted to "dr. basham (dr. bastian before mentioned), director of the museum of berlin," were pronounced to be of very fine water. it is possible that the sandstone may afford precious stones like the itacolumite of the brazil ("highlands of the brazil," i. ), but the whole affair proved a hoax. in mid-stream rose no. , "one-tree island," zunga chya nlemba or shika chya nzondo; in tuckey it is called boola beca or blemba (the husband) rock; the old ficus dying at the head, was based upon a pedestal which appeared groin-shaped from the east. here the mirage was very distinct, and the canoes seemed to fly, not to swim-- "as when far out of sea a fleet descried, hangs in the clouds." the northern bank shows a stony projection called by maxwell "fiddler's elbow;" it leads to the fourth reach, the second of the north-eastern series; and the breadth of the stream, once more a mountain lake, cannot be less than two miles. i foresaw trouble in passing these settlements. presently a snake-like war canoe with hawser-holes like eyes, crept out from the southern shore; a second fully manned lay in reserve, lurking along the land, and armed men crowned the rocks jutting into the stream. we were accosted by the first craft, in which upon the central place of honour sat mpeso birimbá, a petty chief of suko nkongo; a pert rascal of the french factory, habited in a red cap, a green velvet waistcoat, and a hammock-shaped tippet of pine-apple fibre; his sword was a short sollingen blade. the visit had the sole object of mulcting me in rum and cloth, and my only wish was naturally to expend as little as possible in mere preliminaries. the name of manbuku prata was duly thrown at him with but little effect: these demands are never resisted by the slave-dealers. after much noise and cries of "mwendi" (miser, skin-flint) on the part of the myrmidons, i was allowed to proceed, having given up a cloth twenty-four yards long, and i felt really grateful to the "trade" which had improved off all the other riverine settlements. beyond this point we saw nothing but their distant smokes. before the second north-eastern reach, the interpreters exclaimed "yellala falla"--"the cataract is speaking," and we could distinctly hear the cheering roar. the stream now assumed the aspect of niagara below the falls, and the circular eddies boiling up from below, and showing distinct convexity, suggested the dangerous "wells" of the northern seas. passing the "three weird sisters," unimportant rocks off, the right bank, we entered upon the remarkably long stretch, extending upwards of five miles, and, from its predominating growth, we proposed to call it "palmyra reach." the immediate river banks were clad with sedge, and the broad leaves of the nymphæa, a plant like the calamus of asia, but here used only as a toothpick, began to oust the rushy and flaggy growth of the lower bed. the pink balls of the spinous mimosa, and bright flowers, especially the convolvulus and ipomaea, illuminated the dull green. the grassy land at the foot of the mountains was a mere edging, faced by outlying rocks, and we were shown the site of a village long ago destroyed. the nteba, or palmyra nobilis, mixed here and there with a glorious tamarind, bombax or calabash, forms a thin forest along the reach, and rarely appears upon the upper hills, where we should expect it. the people use both fruit and wine, preferring, however, the liquor of the ebah (oil palm-tree), and the autumnal fires can hardly affect so sturdy a growth. the other trees are the mfuma, cotton-tree or bombax (pentandria truncospinoso, smith), much valued as a canoe: merolla uses mafuma, a plural form, and speaks of its "wonderful fine wool." the wild figs show glorious stature, a truly noble growth, whose parents were sun and water. the birds were lank black clivers (plotus), exceedingly wild; the african roller (coracias); halcyons of several species, especially a white and black kingfisher, nimble and comely; many swallows, horn-bills, and wild pigeons which made the bush resound; ardeine birds, especially a heron, like the large indian "kullum;" kites, crows, "whip-poor-wills," and a fine haliaetus, which flies high and settles upon the loftiest branches. one of these eagles was shot, after a gorge of the electric fish here common; its coat was black and white, and the eyes yellow, with dark pupils. various lizards ran over the rocks; and we failed to secure a water-snake, the only specimen seen on the whole trip. about noon we struggled past point masalla, our "diamond rock," a reef ending in a triangular block, towering abruptly, and showing by drift-wood a flood-line now twelve feet high. there are several of these "bench-marks;" and the people declare that after every few years an unusual freshet takes place. here the current impinges directly upon the rocks, making a strong eddy. "they die each time," said the interpreters, as the canoemen, with loud shouts of "vai ou nao vai? vai sempre! vai direito, ya mondele!" and "arister," a mariner's word, after failing to force the way, tumbled overboard, with a hawser of lliana to act as tow-line. "vai direito," according to father ciprani, also applies to a "wonderful bird, whose song consists in these plain words;" and "mondele" is synonymous with the utangáni of the gaboon and the east african muzungu, a white man. this bend was in former days the terminus of canoe travel up stream. grisly tales of mishap are told; and even now a musketry salute is fired when boats pass without accident. beyond diamond rock is a well-wooded, stony cove, "salan kunkati:" captain tuckey makes this the name of the diamond rock, and translates it "the strong feather." quartz, before in lines and bands, now appears in masses: the "coal rock," which the chart places near insála (bechope point) on the northern bank, was probably submerged. high cliffs towered above us, and fragments which must have weighed twenty tons had slipped into the water; one of them bore an adansonia, growing head downwards. the next feature was npunga bay, low and leek-green, between the blue-brown water, here some yards broad, and the yellow sun- burnt trough-sides. a little further on, at p.m., the canoe-men halted beyond a sandy point with two large "bondeiro" trees, and declared their part of the bargain to have been fulfilled. "bonderro" is a corruption of the lusitanianized imbundeiro, the calabash, or adansonia (digitata?): the other baobab is called nkondo, probably the aliconda and elicandy of battel and old travellers, who describe the water-tanks hollowed in its huge trunk, and the cloth made from the bark fibre. thus the "condo sonio" of the chart should be "nkondo sonho," the latter a proper name. it is seldom that we find trees turned to all the uses of which they are capable: the congo people despise the nutritious and slightly laxative flour of the "monkey bread," and the young leaves are not used as pickles; the bast is not valued for cloth and ropes, nor are the boles cut into cisterns. as will be seen, we ought to have insisted upon being paddled to kala cliff and bight, the mayumba bay of the chart, where the bed trends west-east, and shows the lowest rapids: the first congo expedition went up even higher. at nkongo ka lunga, the point marked by two calabashes, we inquired for the nokki congo, of which we had heard at chisalla, and which still exists upon the chart,--districts and villages being often confounded. all laughed, and declared that the "port-town" had long been sold off, the same had been the case, even in tuckey's day, with the next settlement, "condo sonio" (the baobab of sonho), formerly the great up-stream mart, where the slave-traders transacted their business. all the population was now transferred inland and, like our predecessors, we were promised a two hours' climb over the rough, steep highland which lay in front. then we understood that "nokki" was the name of a canton, not of a settlement. its south-eastern limits may have contained the "city of norchie, the best situated of any place hitherto seen in ethiopia," where father merolla (p. ) baptized souls,--and this is rendered probable by the crucifixes and coleworts which were found by the first congo expedition. here, then, at . miles from the sea, ended our clan's cruize. we could only disembark upon the clean sand, surrounded by cool shade and blocks of gneiss, the favourite halting-place, as the husks of ground-nuts show. nchama chamvu was at once sent off with a present of gin and a verbal report of arrival to nessudikira nchinu, (king), of banza nkaye, whilst we made ready for a night's lodging à la belle étoile. the mesenger returned, bringing a goat, and the good news that porters would be sent early next morning. we slept well in the cool and dewless air, with little trouble from mosquitoes. the voice of the cataract in its "sublime same-soundingness" alone broke the silence, and the scenery suggested to us, as to the first britishers, that we might be bivouacking among the "blue misty hills of morven." september .--shortly after sunrise appeared gidi mavunga, father to the "king," accompanied by five "princes," in the usual black coats, and some forty slaves, armed with pistols, blunderbusses, and guns of french and yankee build. our visitors wore the official berretta, european shirts, that contrasted with coral necklaces and rings of zinc, brass, and copper, and handsome waistcoats, fronted by the well-tanned spoil of some "bush" animal, generally a wild cat, hanging like a scotch sporran--this is and has long been the distinctive sign of a "gentleman." according to john barbot (supplement, churchill, v. ), all men in loango were bound to wear a furskin over their clothes, viz., of an otter, a tame cat, or a cat-o'-mountain; a "great wood or wild cat, or an angali (civet-cat). besides which, they had very fine speckled spelts, called � enkeny,' which might be worn only by the king and his peculiar favourites." on the great man's mat was placed a large silver-handled dagger, shaped somewhat like a fish-slicer; and the handsome hammocks of bright-dyed cottons brought down for our use shamed our humble ship's canvas. the visitors showed all that african câlinerie, which, as fatal experience told me, would vanish for ever, changing velvet paw to armed claws, at the first question of cloth or rum. meanwhile, we had only to visit their village "upon the head of gidi mavunga." about a.m. we attacked a true via dolorosa, the normal road of the lower congo. the steep ascent of dry, clayey soil was strewed with schist and resplendent silvery gneiss; quartz appeared in every variety, crystallized and amorphous, transparent white, opaque, dusky, and rusty. tuckey's mica slate appears to be mostly schist or gneiss: i saw only one piece of true slate which had been brought from the upper bed. merolla's talc is mostly mica. followed an equally rough descent to a water set in fetid mud, its iridescence declaring the presence of iron; oozing out of the ground, it discharges during rains into the river: and, throughout the dry season, it keeps its little valley green with trees and shrubs. i observed what appeared to be the esere or calabar bean (physostigma venenosum), whose hairy pod is very distasteful to the travelling skin: it was a "mucuna urens." another scramble upon a highly inclined hogsback, where weather- worn brown-black granite, protruded bone-like from the clay flesh, placed us at the outlying village of kinbembu, with its line of palms; here the aneroid showed , feet. after a short rest, the hammock men resumed work over a rough plateau: the rises were scattered with brush-wood, and the falls were choked with the richest vegetation. every hill discharged its own rivulet bubbling over the rock, and the waters were mostly chalybeate. presently appeared a kind of barracoon, a large square of thick cane-work and thatch about eight feet high, the fetish house of the "jinkimba" or circumcised boys, who received us with unearthly yells. after a march of an hour and three quarters,'covering five indirect and three direct miles in a south-eastern rhumb, we reached banza nkaye, the royal village, where the sympiesometer showed feet. our bearers yelled "abububu!" showing that we had reached our destination, and the villagers answered with a cry of "abía-a-a!" the entrance was triumphal: we left the river with a tail of fifty-six which had swelled to ragged followers. after a short delay we proceeded to the "palace," which was distinguished from afar by a long projecting gable, forming a cool verandah. descending some three hundred feet, we passed a familiar sight in africa, where "arboribus suus horror inest." a tree-trunk bore three pegged skulls somewhat white with age; eight years ago they were taken off certain wizards who had bewitched their enemies. a labyrinthine entrance of transparent cane-work served to prevent indecent haste, and presently we found ourselves in presence of the mfumo, who of course takes the title of "le rei." nessudikira was a "blanc-bec," aged twenty or twenty-one, who till lately had been a trading lad at boma--now he must not look upon the sea. he appeared habited in the usual guy style: a gaudy fancy helmet, a white shirt with limp byronic collar, a broad-cloth frock coat, a purple velvet gold-fringed loin-wrap: a theatrical dagger whose handle and sheath bore cut- glass emeralds and rubies, stuck in the waist-belt; brass anklets depended over naked feet, and the usual beadle's cloak covered the whole. truly a change for the worse since tuckey's day, when a "savage magnificence" showed itself in the display of lions' and leopards' skins; when no women were allowed to be present, and when the boys could only clap hands: now the verandah is surrounded by a squatting crowd and resounds with endless chatter and scream. nessudikira, whose eyes by way of grandeur never wandered from the floor, shook hands with us without rising from his chair, somewhat after the fashion of certain women in civilized society, who would be dignified, and who are not. his father, gidi mavunga, knelt before him on the ground, a mat being forbidden in the presence: he made the "batta-palmas" before he addressed his "filho de pistola," as he called him, in opposition to filho de fazenda. the "king" had lately been crowned in virtue of his mother being a uterine sister of his predecessor. here the goods and dignity of the father revert after death to his eldest maternal brother; to his eldest nephew, that is, the eldest son of the eldest uterine sister, and, all others failing, to the first born of the nearest maternal relative. this subjection of sire to son is, however, mainly ceremonious: in private life the king wears a cotton pagne, and his "governor" asserts his birth- right even by wigging royalty. we disposed ourselves upon seamen's chests covered with red baize, fronting the semi-circle of frock-coated "gentlemen" and half-naked dependants and slaves. proceedings began with the "mata-bicho" de rigueur, the inevitable preliminary and conclusion of all life-business between birth and burial. the congo traveller will hear "nganna! mata bicho" (master! kill the worm, i.e., give me a dram), till the words seem, like "bakhshish" further east, to poison his ears. this excuse for a drink arose, or is said to have arisen, from some epidemic which could be cured only by spirits, and the same is the tradition in the new world ("highlands of the brazil," i. chap. ). similarly the fulas of the windward coast, who as strict moslem will not drink fermented liquors, hold a cup of rum to be the sovereignest thing in the world for taenia. the entozoon of course gives rise to a variety of stale and melancholy jokes about the early bird, the worm that dieth not, and so forth. a greybeard of our gin was incontinently opened and a tumbler in a basin was filled to overflowing; even when buying ground-nuts, the measure must be heaped up. the glass was passed round to the "great gentlemen," who drank it african fashion, expanding the cheeks, rinsing the mouth so that no portion of the gums may lose their share, and swallowing the draught with an affectedly wry face. the basin then went to the "little gentlemen" below the salt, they have the "vinum garrulum," and they scrambled as well as screamed for a sup of the precious liquor. i need hardly quote caliban and his proposed genuflections. i had been warned by all the traders of the lower river that banza nokki would be to me the far-famed point of which it was said, "quern passar o cabo de nam ou tornará, ou n o," and prepared accordingly. old shimbal, the linguist, had declared that a year would be required by the suspicious "bush-men" to palaver over the knotty question of a stranger coming only to "make mukanda," that is to see and describe the country. m. pissot was forbidden by etiquette to recognize his old employé (honours change manners here as in europe), yet he set about the work doughtily. my wishes were expounded, and every possible promise of hammocks and porters, guides and interpreters, was made by the hosts. the royal helmet was then removed, and a handsome burnous was drawn over the king's shoulders, the hood covering the berretta in most grotesque guise. after which the commander and m. pissot set out for the return march, leaving me with my factotum selim and the youth nchama chamvu. to the question "quid muliere levius?" the scandalous latin writer answers "nihil," for which i would suggest "niger." at the supreme moment the interpreter, who had been deaf to the charmer's voice (offering fifty dollars) for the last three days, succumbed to the "truant fever." he knew something of portuguese; and, having been employed by the french factory, he had scoured the land far and wide in search of "emigrants." he began well; cooked a fowl, boiled some eggs, and made tea; after which he cleared out a hut that was declared très logeable, and found a native couch resembling the egyptian kafas. we slept in a new climate: at night the sky was misty, and the mercury fell to ° (f.). there was a dead silence; neither beast nor bird nor sound of water was heard amongst the hills; only at times high winds in gusts swept over the highlands with a bullying noise, and disappeared, leaving everything still as the grave. i felt once more "at home in the wilderness"--such, indeed, it appeared after boma, where the cockney-taint yet lingered. chapter x. notes on the nzadi or congo river. and first, touching the name of this noble and mysterious stream. diogo cam, the discoverer in , called it river of congo, martin von behaim rio de padrao, and de barros "rio zaire." the portuguese discoveries utilized by dapper thus corrupted to the sonorous zaïre, the barbarous nzadi applied by the natives to the lower bed. the next process was that of finding a meaning. philippo pigafetta of vicenza,[fn# ] translated zaïre by "so, cioè sapio in latino;" hence sandoval[fn# ] made it signify "rio de intendimiento," of understanding. merolla duly records the contrary. "the king of portugal, dom john ii., having sent a fleet under d. diego cam to make discoveries in this southern coast of africa, that admiral guessed at the nearness of the land by nothing so much as by the complexion of the waters of the zaire; and, putting into it, he asked of the negroes what river and country that was, who not understanding him answered �zevoco,' which in the congolan tongue is as much as to say �i cannot tell;' from whence the word being corrupted, it has since been called zairo." d'anville ( ), with whom critical african geography began, records "barbela," a southern influent, perhaps mythical, named by his predecessors, and still retained in our maps: it is the verbele of pigafetta and the barbele of linschoten, who make it issue either from the western lake-reservoir of the nile, or from the "aquilunda" water, a name variously derived from o-calunga, the sea (?), or from a-kilunda, of kilunda (?) the industrious compiler, james barbot ( ), mentions the "umbre," the modern wambre, rising in the northern mountains or, according to p. labat, in a lake: dapper ( ), who so greatly improved the outline of africa, had already derived with de barros the "rio zaïre" from a central reservoir "zaïre," whose island, the zembre, afterwards became the vambere, wambre, and zambere, now identified through the zambeze with the maravi, nyassa or kilwa water. the second or northernmost branch is the bancora of modern maps, the brankare of pigafetta, and the bancari of cavazzi; it flows from the same mountain as the umbre, and duarte lopez ( ) causes it to mingle with the zaire on the eastern borders of pango, at the foot of the sierra del crystal. in certain modern maps the bankare fork is called "lekure,"and is made to receive the "bambaye." the barbela again anastomoses with the luba (?) or northern section of the coango, including its influent, the lubilash; the kasai (kasabi) also unites with the coango, and other dotted lines show the drainage of the lualaba into the kasai. the portuguese, according to vasconcello, shunning all fanciful derivations, were long satisfied to term the congo "rio de patron" (rio do padrao) from the first of memorial columns built at its mouth. in captain tuckey's expedition learned with maxwell that the stream should be called, not zaire, but moienzi enzaddi, the "great river" or the "river which absorbs all other rivers." this thoroughly corrupted name, which at once found its way into popular books, and which is repeated to the present day even by scientific geographers, suggested to some theorists "zadi," the name of the niger at wassenah according to sidi harriet, as related by the american, james riley, of the brig "commerce," wrecked on august , : others remembered "zad" which shaykh yusuf (hornemann), misleading mungo park, learned to be the niger east of tinbuktu, "where it turns off to the southward." i need hardly say that this "zadi" and "zad" are evident corruptions of bahr shady, shary, shari, chad, tsad, and chadda, the swampy lake, alternately sweet and brackish, which was formerly thrown by mistake into the chadda river, now called the binue or bimúwe, the great eastern fork of the negro-land nile: the true drainage of the chadda in ancient times has lately been determined by the adventurous dr. nachtigal. mr. cooley[fn# ] applied, as was his wont, a superficial knowledge of kibundo to fiote or congoese, and further corrupted moienzi enzaddi to muenya (for menha or menya) zinzádi-this angolan "emendation," however, was not adopted. the natives dwelling upon the congo banks have, as usual in africa, no comprehensive generic term for the mighty artery of the west coast. each tribe calls it by its own name. thus even in fiote we find "mulángo," or "lángo," the water; "nkoko," the stream, "mwánza," the river, and "mwanza nnenne," the great river, all used synonymously at the several places. the only proper name is mwánza nzádi, the river nzadi: hence zaire, zaïre, zahir, zaira the "flumen congo olim zaida" (c. barlé)--all corruptions more or less common. the homogeneous form of the african continent causes a whimsical family resemblance, allowing for the difference of northern and southern hemispheres, in its four arterial streams--the nile and niger, the congo and zambeze. i neglect the limpopo, called in its lower bed espirito santo, maniça, manhiça (manyisa), and delagoa river; the cunene (nourse) river, the orange river, and others, which would be first-rate streams in europe, but are mere dwarfs in the presence of the four african giants. the nile and niger, being mainly tenanted by moslemized and comparatively civilized races, have long been known, more or less, to europe. the zambeze, owing to the heroic labours of dr. livingstone, is fast becoming familiar to the civilized world; and the congo is in these days ( ) beginning at last to receive the attention which it deserves. it is one of the noblest known to the world. whilst the mississippi drains a basin of , , english square miles, and at carrollton, in louisiana, discharges as its mean volume for the year , cubic feet of water per second, the congo, with a valley area of , square miles, rolls at least , , feet. moreover, should it prove a fact that the nzadi receives the chambeze and its lakes, the bangweolo (or bemba), the moero, near which stands the capital of the cazembe, the kamalondo, lui or ulenge, "lake lincoln" (chibungo), and other unvisited waters, its area of drainage will nearly equal that of the nile. the four arteries all arise in inner regions of the secondary age, subtended east and west by ghats, or containing mountains mostly of palaeozoic or primary formation, the upheaval of earthquakes and volcanoes. these rims must present four distinct water-sheds. the sea-ward slopes discharge their superabundance direct to the ocean often in broad estuaries like the gambia and the gaboon, still only surface drains; whilst the counterslopes pour inland, forming a network of flooded plains, perennial swamps, streams, and lakes. the latter, when evaporation will not balance the supply to a "sink," "escape from the basin of the central plateau-lands, and enter the ocean through deep lateral gorges, formed at some ancient period of elevation and disturbance, when the containing chains were subject to transverse fractures." all four head in the region of tropical rains, the home of the negro proper, extending ° along the major axis of the continent, between lake chad (north latitude ° to °), and the noka a batletle or hottentot lake, known to the moderns as ngami (south latitude ° to °). consequently all are provided with lacustrine reservoirs of greater or smaller extent, and are subject to periodical inundations, varying in season, according as the sun is north or south of the line. those of the northern hemisphere swell with the "summer rains of ethiopia," a fact known in the case of the nile to democritus of abdera ( th cent. b.c.), to agatharchidas of cnidos ( nd cent. b.c.) to pomponius nida, to strabo (xvii. ), who traces it through aristotle up to homer's "heaven-descended stream" and to pliny (v. ). for the same reason the reverse is the case with the two southern arteries; their high water, with certain limitations in the case of the congo, is in our winter. by the condition of their courses, all the four magnates are broken into cataracts and rapids at the gates where they burst through the lateral chains; the mosi-wa-túnya (smoke that thunders) of the zambeze, and the ripon falls discovered by captains speke and grant upon the higher nile, are the latest acquisitions to geography, whilst the "mai waterfall," reported to break the upper congo, still awaits exploration. this accident of form suggests a division of navigation on the maritime section and on the plateau-bed which, in due time, will be connected, like the st. lawrence, by canals and railways. all but the nzadi, and perhaps even this, have deltas, where the divided stream, deficient in water-shed, finds its sluggish way to the sea. the largest delta at present known is the nigerian, whose base measures direct geographical miles between the rivers kontoro east, and benin west. pliny (v. ) makes the nile delta extend roman miles, from the canopic or african to the pelusiac or asiatic mouth, respectively distant from the apex and miles; the modern feature has been reduced to miles from east to west, and a maximum of from north to south. the zambeze extends miles between the kilimani or northern and the west luabo, cuama or southern outlet-at least, if these mouths are not to be detached. the nzadi is the smallest, measuring a maximum of only to miles from the malela or bananal creek to the mangrove ditches of the southern shore. in these depressed regions the comparatively salubrious climates of the uplands become dangerous to the european; the people also are degraded, mostly pirates and water-thieves, as the nigerian ibos, the congoese musulungus, and the landim (amalandi) kafirs about the lower zambeze. there is a notable similarity in their productions, partly known to pliny (v. ), who notices "the calamus, the papyrus, and the animals" of the nigris and the nile. the black-maned lion and the leopard rule the wold; the gorilla, the chimpanzee, and other troglodytes affect the thinner forests; the giraffe, the zebra, and vast hosts of antelopes scour the plains; the turtle swims the seas; and the hippopotamus, the crocodile, and various siluridae, some of gigantic size, haunt the lakes and rivers. the nymphæa, lotus or water-lily, forms rafts of verdure; and the stream-banks bear the calabash, the palmyra, the oil-palm, and the papyrus. until late years it was supposed that the water-lily, sacred to isis, had been introduced into egypt from india, where it is also a venerated vegetable, and that it had died out with the form of fetishism which fostered it. it has simply disappeared like the crocodile from the lower nile. finally, to conclude this rapidly outlined sketch, all at the present moment happily share the same fate; they are being robbed of their last mysteries; the veil of isis is fast yielding to the white man's grasp. we can hardly as yet answer the question whether the congo was known to the ancients. our acquaintance with the oldest explorations is at present fragmentary, and we are apt to assume that the little told us in our school-books is the sum-total of former exploits. but possibly inscriptions in the new world, as well as in the old, may confirm the "first circumnavigation" so simply recounted by herodotus, especially that of the phoenicians, who set out from the red sea, and in three years returned to the mediterranean. the expression, "they had the sun to the right," is variously explained. in the southern hemisphere the sailors facing west during our winter would see the sun at noon on the right, and in the northern hemisphere on the left. but why should they face west? in the "chronicle" of schedel (p. ccxc., printed in , pigafetta, pinkerton, xi. ) we read: "these two, (i.e. jacob cam and martin behem, or behaim) by the help of the gods, ploughing the sea at short distance from shore, having passed the equinoctial line, entered the nether hemisphere, where, fronting the east, their shadow fell towards the south, and on their right hand." perhaps it may simply allude to the morning sun, which would rise to port as they went southwards, and to starboard as they returned north. again, the "first overland expedition" is related by the father of history with all the semblance of truth. we see no cause to doubt that the nasammones or nasamones (nás amún), the five young lybians of the great syrtis (fezzan) crossed the <greek> (watered strip along the mediterranean), passed through the <greek> (the "bush") on the frontier, still famed for lions, and the immeasurably sandy wastes (the sahara proper, across which caravan lines run). the "band of little black men" can no longer be held fabulous, since miani and schweinfurth added the akya to m. du chaillu's obongo. the extensive marshes were the northern limit of the tropical rains, and the "city of enchanters" is the type of many still existing in inner africa. the great river flowing from west to east, whose crocodiles showed it to be the nile, must have been the niger. the ancients knew middle ethiopia to be a country watered by lakes and streams: strabo (xvii. ) tells us that "some suppose that even the nile-sources are near the extremities of mauritania." hence, too, the nilides, or lake of standing water in pliny (v. ). for the most part they made a great central river traverse the northern continent from west to east, whereas the arabian geographers of the middle ages, who were followed by the portuguese, inverted the course. both may be explained by the lay of the quorra and the binúwe, especially the latter; it was chronically confounded with the true nile, whose want of western influents was not so well known then as now. the generation which has discovered the "moabite stone," the ruins of troy (schliemann), and the key to the inscriptions of etruria (corssen), need not despair of further progress. it has been well remarked that, whereas the course of modern exploration has generally been maritime, the ancients, whose means of navigation were less perfect, preferred travelling by land. we are, doubtless, far better acquainted with the outlines of the african coast, and the immediately maritime region, than the egyptians, the greeks, the romans, and the arabs. but it is still doubtful whether their information respecting the interior did not surpass ours. eratosthenes, librarian of alexandria (b. c. - ) expresses correct notions concerning the upper course of the nile; marinus of tyre[fn# ] had the advantage of borrowing from the pilot, diogenes, who visited the nile reservoirs of central inter-tropical africa, and ptolemy has been justified in certain important points by our latest explorations. no trace of the nzadi or congo is to be found in the pelusian geographer, whose furthest point is further north. in the "tabula rotunda rogeriana" of a. d. (lelewel, no. x.) two lakes are placed upon the equator, and the north-western discharges to the atlantic the river kauga or kanga, which the learned mr. hogg suspected to be the congo. marino sanudo ( ), who has an idea of guinea (ganuya) and of zanzibar (zinziber), here bends africa to the south-east, and inscribes, "regio inhabitabilis propter calorem." fra mauro ( ) reduces "ethiopia occidentalis et australis" to the minimum, and sheds the stream into the f. xebe (webbe or galla-somal river). martin von behaim of nürnberg ( ) in whose day africa began to assume her present form, makes the rio de padron drain the western face of the montes lunae. diogo ribera, chief pilot of the indies under charles v. (seville, ) further corrects the shape of the continent, and places the r. do padrão north, and the rio dos boms sinhaes (zambeze) south of the montes lunae. mercator and henry hondt ( ) make the zaire lacus the northern part of the zembre lacus. john senex (circ. ) shows the "r. coango," the later quango, believed to be the great south-western fork of the congo. it is not a little peculiar that the last of the classics, claudius claudianus, an alexandrian christian withal, describes the gir, or girrhaeus, with peculiarly congoese features. in "de laud. stilicho." (lib. i. ) we have-- "gir, notissimus amnis Æthiopum, simili mentitus gurgite nilum." and again ("eidyll. in nilum," ): "hunc bibit infrenis garamas, domitorque ferarum girrhæus, qui vasta colit sub rupibus antra, qui ramos ebeni, qui denies vellit eburnos." here we find a wady or torrent discharging into the mediterranean, made equal to "egypt's heaven-descended stream;" caused to flow under great rocks, as the niger was long believed to pass underground to the nile, of which it was a western branch; and said to supply ebony, which is the characteristic not even of the niger regions, but of the zaire.[fn# ] a little of this peculiar and precious commodity is produced by old calabar, east of the nigerian delta, and southwards it becomes common. pliny (v. i) places his gir (which some editions read "niger") "some distance" beyond the snowy atlas. ptolemy (iv. ) tells us "in mediterraneâ verò fluunt amnes maximi, nempe gir conjungens usargalam montem et vallem garamanticam, à quo divertens amnis continet secundum situm (east longitude) ° (north latitude)-- °." again: "et nigir fluvius jungens et ipse mandrum" (mandara, south of lake chad?) "et thala montes" (the range near the western coast on the parallel of cabo blanco?). "facit autem et hic nigritem paludem" (lake dibbie or debu, north-east of sego and sansanding?) cujus situs °- °." here the gir, ger, gar, or geir is clearly laid down as a mediterranean stream, whilst "niger" gave rise to the confusion of the senegal with the true niger. the name has greatly exercised commentators' ingenuity. d'anville believes the niger and the gir to end in the same quarter of africa, and the latter to be entirely unknown. gosselin, agreeing with pliny, whose ger is the nigir of the greeks, places them south of the atlas. mr. leake (loc. cit.) holds all conjecture useless. not so the rev. m. tristram, whose geography is of the ornithological or bird's- eye order. in "the great sahara" (pp. - , appendix i.), he asks, "may not the name giris or gir be connected with djidi?" i. e. the wadi mzi, a mean sink in el areg, south of algeria. gräberg ("morocco") had already identified it with the ghir, which flows through sagelmessa; burckhardt with the jir, "a large stream coming from about north latitude °, and flowing north- west through the wadaí, west of the borders of dar-fur." no wonder that some geographers are disposed to believe gir, giris, ger, and geir to be "a general native name for a river, like bá" (bahr), "bi" (in many central african tongues a river, schweinfurth, ii. ), "quorra (kwara), gulbi and gambaru (the yeou), shadda, and enzaddi." it is still interesting to consider the circumstances which gave rise to captain tuckey's disastrous expedition. as any map of africa during the early quarter of the present century, bowdich or dupuis for instance, may prove, the course of the niger was laid down, now according to the ancients, then after arab information. the dark continent, of which d'anville justly said that writers abused, "pour ainsi dire, de la vaste carrière que l'intérieur y laissait prendre" ("mém. de l'acad. des inscriptions," xxvi. ), had not been subjected to scientific analysis; this was reserved for the presidential address to the royal geographical society by the late sir r. i. murchison, . geographers did not see how to pass the niger through the" kong mountains, which, uniting with the jebel komri, are supposed to run in one unbroken chain across the continent;" and these lunar mountains of the moslems, which were "stretched like a chaplet of beads from east to west," undoubtedly express, as m. du chaillu contends, a real feature, the double versant, probably a mere wave of ground between the great hydrographic basins of the niger and the congo, of north africa and of central africa. men still wasted their vigour upon the nigritis palus, the chelonídes waters, the mount caphas, and the lakes of wangara, variously written vancara and vongara, not to mention other ways. maps place "wangara"to the north-west of dahome, where the natives utterly ignore the name. dupuis ("ashantee," ) suggests that, like "takrúr," it is an obsolete moslem term for the miles of maritime region between cape lahu and the rio formoso or the old calabar river. this would include the three despotisms, ashanti, dahome, and benin, with the tribes who, from a distance of twenty-five days, bring gold to tinbuktu (the tungubutu of de barros, i. ). thus the lakes of wangara would be the lagoons of the slave-coast, in which the niger may truly be said to lose itself. at length m. reichard, of lobenstein ("ephémerides géographiques," weimar, ), theoretically discovered the mouth of the niger, by throwing it into the bight of benin. he was right in essentials and wrong in details; for instance, he supposed the rio formoso or benin river and the rio del rey to join in one great stream beyond the flat alluvial delta: whereas the former is indirectly connected through the wari with the niger, and the latter has no connection with it at all. the truth was received with scant courtesy, and the hypothesis was pronounced to be "worthy of very little attention." there were, however, honourable exceptions. in , the learned malte-brun ("précis de la géographie universelle," vol. iv. ) sanctioned the theory hinted at by mungo park, and in the well-abused caillié, a frenchman who had dared to excel bruce and mungo park, wrote these remarkable words: "if i may be permitted to hazard an opinion as to the course of the river dhioliba, i should say that it empties itself by several mouths into the bight of benin." in , fortified by clapperton's opinion, my late friend, james macqueen, who to immense industry added many qualifications of a comparative geographer, recommended a careful examination of the estuaries between the rio formoso and old calabar. the question was not finally set at rest till (november th), when richard and john lander entered yoruba viâ badagry and, triumphantly descending the lower niger, made the sea by the "nun" and brass embouchures. meanwhile, mr. george maxwell, a scotchman who had long traded in the congo, and who subsequently published a chart of the lower river proposed, at the end of the last century, to take from england six supernumerary boats for rowing and sailing, which could be carried by thirty people and portaged round the cataracts. this gave rise to captain tuckey's first error, depending upon labour and provisions, which were not to be had "for love or money" anywhere on the congo above the yellala. with thirty or forty black rowers, probably cabinda men, maxwell advised navigating the river about may, when the cacimbo or dry season begins; and with arms, provisions, and merchandize he expected to reach the sources in six weeks. the scheme, which was rendered abortive by the continental war of , had two remarkable results. it caused mungo park's fatal second journey, and it led to the twin expeditions of tuckey and peddie. in july, , the ardent and irrepressible scot wrote from prior's lynn, near longtown, to a friend, mr. william kier, of milholm, that the river "enzaddi" was frequented by portuguese, who found the stream still as large as near the mouth, after ascending miles. it is useful to observe how these distances are obtained. the slave-touters for the liverpool and other dealers used, we are told, to march one month up country, and take two to return. thirty days multiplied by twenty miles per diem give miles. i need hardly point out that upon such a mission the buyer would be much more likely to travel miles than in a single month, and i believe that the natives of the lower river never went beyond nsundi, or indirect miles from point padrão. with truly national tenacity and plausibility perfervidum ingenium contended that the congo or zaire was the nigerian debouchure. major rennell, who had disproved the connection of the niger and the egyptian nile by bruce's barometric measurements on the course of the mountain-girt bahr el azrak, and by brown's altitudes at darfur, condemned the bold theory for the best of reasons. mungo park, after a brief coldness and coquetting with it, hotly adopted to the fullest extent the wild scheme. before leaving england (oct. , ), he addressed a memoir to lord camden, explaining the causes of his conversion. it is curious to note his confusion of "zad," his belief that the "congo waters are at all seasons thick and muddy," and his conviction that "the annual flood," which he considered perpetual, "commences before the rains fall south of the equator." the latter is to a certain extent true; the real reason will presently be given. infected by the enthusiasm of his brother scot, he adds, "considered in a commercial point of view, it is second only to the discovery of the cape of good hope; and, in a geographical point of view, it is certainly the greatest discovery that remains to be made in this world." thereupon the traveller set out for the upper niger with the conviction that he would emerge by the congo, and return to england viâ the west indies. from the fragments of his journal, and his letters to lord camden, to sir joseph banks, and to his wife, it is evident that at san-sanding he had modified his theories, and that he was gradually learning the truth. to the former he writes, "i am more and more inclined to think that it (the niger) can end nowhere but in the sea;" and presently a guide, who had won his confidence, assured him that the river, after passing kashna, runs directly to the right hand, or south, which would throw it into the gulf of guinea. the fatal termination of park's career in lulled public curiosity for a time, but it presently revived. the geographical mind was still excited by the mysterious stream which evaporation or dispersion drained into the lake-swamps of wangara, and to this was added not a little curiosity concerning the lamented and popular explorer's fate. we find instructions concerning mungo park issued even to cruizers collecting political and other information upon the east african coast; e.g., to captain smee, sent in by the bombay government. his companion, lieutenant hardy, converted usagára, west of the zanzibar seaboard, into "wangarah," and remarks, "a white man, supposed to be park, is said to have travelled here twenty years ago" ("observations," &c.). about ten years after mungo park's death, two expeditions were fitted out by government to follow up his discovery. major peddie proceeded to descend the niger, and captain tuckey to ascend the congo. we have nothing to say of the former journey except that, as in the latter, every chief european officer died--major peddie, captain campbell, lieutenant stokoe, and m. kummer, the naturalist. the expedition, consisting of men and animals, reached kakundy june , , and there fell to pieces. concerning the zaire expedition, which left deptford on february , , a few words are advisable. the personnel was left to the choice of the leader, commander j. k. tuckey, r. n. (died). there were six commissioned officers-- lieutenant john hawkey, r.n. (died); mr. lewis fitz-maurice, master and surveyor; mr. robert hodder and mr. robert beecraft, master's mates; mr. john eyre, purser (died); and mr. james mckerrow, assistant surgeon. under these were eight petty officers, four carpenters, two blacksmiths, and fourteen able seamen. the marines numbered one sergeant, one corporal, and twelve privates. grand total of combatants, forty-nine. to these were added five "savants": professor chetien smith, a norwegian botanist and geologist (died); mr. cranch, collector of objects of natural history (died); mr. tudor, comparative anatomist (died); mr. galway, irishman and volunteer naturalist (died); and "lockhart, a gardener" (of his majesty's gardens, kew). there were two congo negroes, benjamin benjamins and somme simmons; the latter, engaged as a cook's mate, proved to be a "prince of the blood," which did not prevent his deserting for fear of the bushmen. the allusions made to mr. cranch, a "joined methodist," and a "self-made man," are not complimentary. "cranch, i fear," says professor smith, "by his absurd conduct, will diminish the liberality of the captain towards us: he is like a pointed arrow to the company." and, again, "poor cranch is almost too much the object of jest; galway is the principal banterer."in the professor's remarks on the" fat purser,"we can detect the foreigner, who, on such occasions, should never be mixed up with englishmen. sir joseph banks had suggested a steamer drawing four feet, with twenty-four horse-power; an admirable idea, but practical difficulties of construction rendered the "congo" useless. of the fifty-four white men, eighteen, including eleven of the "congo" crew, died in less than three months. fourteen out of a party of thirty officers and men, who set out to explore the cataracts viâ the northern bank, lost their lives; and they were followed by four more on board the "congo," and one at bahia. the expedition remained in the river between july th and october th, little more than three months; yet twenty-one, or nearly one-third, three of the superior officers and all the scientific men, perished. captain tuckey died of fatigue and exhaustion (oct. th) rather than of disease; lieutenant hawkey, of fatal typhus (which during followed the yellow fever, in the bonny and new calabar rivers); and mr. eyre, palpably of bilious remittent. professor smith had been so charmed with the river, that he was with difficulty persuaded to return. prostrated four days afterwards by sickness on board the transport, he refused physic and food, because his stomach rejected bark, and, preferring cold water, he became delirious; apparently, he died of disappointment, popularly called a "broken heart." messrs. tudor and cranchalso fell victims to bilious remittents, complicated, in the case of the latter, by the "gloomy view taken of christianity by that sect denominated methodists." mr. galway, on september th, visited sangala, the highest rapid ("narrative," p. ). in the introduction, p. , we are wrongly told that he went to banza ninga, whence, being taken ill on august th, he was sent down stream. he, like his commander, had to sleep in the open, almost without food, and he also succumbed to fever, fatigue, and exhaustion. the cause of this prodigious mortality appears in the records of the expedition. officers and men were all raw, unseasoned, and unacclimatized. captain tuckey, an able navigator, the author of "maritime geography and statistics," had served in the tropics; his biographer, however, writes that a long imprisonment in france and "residence in india had broken down his constitution, and at the age of thirty (ob. æt. thirty-nine) his hair was grey and his head nearly bald." the men perished, exactly like the missionaries of old, by hard work, insufficient and innutritious food, physical exhaustion, and by the doctor. at first "immediate bleeding and gentle cathartics" are found to be panaceas for mild fevers (p. ): presently the surgeon makes a discovery as follows: "with regard to the treatment i shall here only observe that bleeding was particularly unsuccessful. cathartics were of the greatest utility, and calomel, so administered as speedily to induce copious salivation, generally procured a remission of all the violent symptoms." the phlebotomy was inherited from the missioners, who own almost to have blinded themselves by it. when one was "blooded" fifteen times and died, his amateur sangrado said, "it had been better to have bled him thirty times:" the theory was that in so hot a climate all the european blood should be replaced by african. one of the entries in captain tuckey's diary is, "awaking extremely unwell, i directly swallowed five grains of calomel"--a man worn out by work and sleeping in the open air! the "congo" sloop was moored in a reach surrounded by hills, instead of being anchored in mid stream where the current of water creates a current of air; those left behind in her died of palm wine, of visits from native women, and of exposure to the sun by day and to the nightly dews. on the line of march the unfortunate marines wore pigtails and cocked hats; stocks and cross-belts; tight-fitting, short-waisted red coats, and knee- breeches with boots or spatter-dashes--even the stout lord clyde in his latest days used to recall the miseries of his march to margate, and declare that the horrid dress gave him more pain than anything he afterwards endured in a life-time of marching. none seemed capable of calculating what amount of fatigue and privation the european system is able to support in the tropics. and thus they perished, sometimes of violent bilious remittents, more often of utter weariness and starvation. peace to their manes!--they did their best, and "angels can no more." they played for high stakes, existence against fame-- "but the fair guerdon when we hope to find, comes the blind fury with th' abhorred shears, and slits the thin-spun life." "the narrative of an expedition to explore the river zaire" (london, john murray, ), published by permission of the lords commissioners of the admiralty, was necessarily a posthumous work. the introduction of eighty-two pages and the general observations (fifty-three pages) are by anonymous hands; follow captain tuckey's narrative, professor smith's journal, and an appendix with seven items; , vocabularies of the malemba and embomma (fiote or congo) languages; , , and , zoology; , botany; , geology; and , hydrography. the most valuable is no. , an admirable paper entitled "observations, systematical and geographical, on professor christian smith's collection of plants from the vicinity of the river congo, by robert brown, f.r.s." the "geology," by mr. charles konig, of the british museum, is based upon very scanty materials. the folio must not be severely criticized; had the writers lived, they might have worked up their unfinished logs into interesting and instructive matter. but evidently they had not prepared themselves for the work; no one knew the periods of rain at the equator; there was no linguist to avoid mistakes in the vocabulary; moreover, professor smith's notes, being kept in small and ill-formed danish characters, caused such misprints as "poppies" for papaws. some few of the mistakes should be noticed for the benefit of students. the expedition appears to have confused são salvador, the capital, with st. antonio placed seven days from the river mouth (p. ). it calls santo antão (cape verds) "san antonio;" the ilha das rôlas (of turtle doves) rolle's island; "morfil" bristles of the elephant's tail, and manafili ivory, both being from the portuguese marfim; moudela for mondele or mondelle, a white man; malava, "presents," for mulavu (s. s. as msámbá, not maluvi, douville), palm wine, which in the form mulavu m'putu (portuguese) applies to wine and spirits. we have also "leimba" for lyámba or dyámba (cannabis saliva); "macasso, a nut chewed by great people only," for makazo, the bean of the kola (sterculia); "hyphæa" and "dom" for palmyra flabelliformis, whose "fruit hangs down in bunched clusters;" "raphia" for raphia vinifera, commonly called the bamboo or wine palm, and "casa," a purgative legumen, for nkasa, "sass," or poison wood, identified with the red-water tree of sierra leone, the erythropheum of professor afzelius, of the order cæalpineae, which gave a name to the brazil. the next important visit to the congo river was paid by captain owen's expedition, when homeward bound in . the "leven" and "barracouta" surveyed the stream twenty-five miles from its mouth during a week, beginning with january , just after the highest flood. at thirteen miles out at sea the water was fresh and of a dingy red; it fermented and remained in a highly putrescent state for some days, tarnishing silver; kept for four months, it became perfectly clear and colourless, without depositing any sediment. this reminds us of the changing colours, green, red and milky white, to which the nile and all great african rivers that flood periodically are subject.[fn# ] the next traveller that deserves notice is the unfortunate douville,[fn# ] through whose tissue of imposture runs a golden thread of truth. as his first journey, occupying nearly two of the three volumes, was probably confined to the valley of the cuanza river, so his second, extending beyond the equator, and to a meridian ° east of paris, becomes fable as he leaves the course of the loge stream. yet, although he begins by doubting that the coango and the zaire are the same waters, he ends by recognizing the fact, and his map justly lays down the fleuve couango dit zaire à son embouchure. whether the tale of the mulatto surveyor be fact or not is of little matter: the adventurer had an evident inkling of the truth. a flood of side light is thrown upon the head waters of the congo river by dr. livingstone's first memorable journey ( - ), across africa, and by the more dubious notices of his third expedition the introduction (p. xviii.) to captain tuckey's narrative had concluded from the fact of the highest flood being in march, and the lowest level about the end of august, that at least one branch of the river must pass through some portion of the northern hemisphere. the general observations affixed to "narrative" (p. ), contain these words: "if the rise of the zaire had proceeded from rains to the southward of the line, swelling the tributary streams and pouring in mountain torrents the waters into the main channel, the rise would have been sudden and impetuous." of course the writer had recourse to the "lakes of wangara," in north latitude ° to °: that solution of the difficulty belonged inevitably to his day. captain tuckey (p. ) learned, at mavunda, that ten days of canoeing would take him beyond all the rapids to a large sandy islet which makes two channels, one to the north-west, the other to the north-east. in the latter there is a fall above which canoes are procurable: twenty days higher up the river issues, by many small streams, from a great marsh or lake of mud.[fn# ] again, a private letter written from the "yellala" (p. ) declares that "the zaire would be found to issue from a lake or a chain of lakes considerably to the north of the line; and, so far from the low state of the river in july and august militating against the hypothesis, it gives additional weight, provided the river swell in early september"--which it did. in his "journal" (p. ), we find a memorandum, written as it were with a dying hand, "hypothesis confirmed. the water..." on february , , dr. livingstone, after leaving what he calls the "dilolo lake," found on an almost level plain, some , to , feet high and then flooded after rains, a great water parting between the eastern and the western continental shores. i have carefully considered the strictures upon this subject by the author of "dr. livingstone's errors" (p. ), and have come to the conclusion that the explorer was too experienced to make the mistakes attributed to him by the cabinet geographer. the translation "despair" for "bitterness" (of the fish?) and the reference to noah's deluge may be little touches ad captandum; but the kibundo or angolan tongue certainly has a dental though it lacks a cerebral d. the easterly flow was here represented by the leeba or upper course of the "leeambye," the "diambege of ladislaus magyar, that great northern and north-western course of the zambeze across which older geographers had thrown a dam of lofty mountains, where the mosi-wa-tunya cataract was afterwards discovered. the opposite versant flowing to the north was the kasai or kasye (livingstone), the casais of the pombeiros, the casati of douville, the casasi and casézi of m. cooley (who derives it from casezi, a priest, the corrupted arabic kissis ); the kassabi (casabi) of beke, the cassaby of monteiro and gamitto (p. ), and the kassaby or cassay of valdez. its head water is afterwards called by the explorer lomame and loke, possibly for lu-oke, because it drains the highlands of mossamba and the district of ji-oke, also called ki-oke, kiboke, and by the portuguese "quiboque." the stream is described as being one hundred yards broad, running through a deep green glen like the clyde. the people attested its length by asserting, in true african style, "if you sail along it for months, you will turn without seeing the end of it:" european geographers apparently will not understand that this declaration shows only the ignorance of the natives concerning everything a few miles beyond their homes. the explorer (february , ) places the ford in south latitude ° ' ", and his map shows east longitude (g.), ° ' ", about ° ' (= direct geographical miles) from novo redondo on the western coast. he dots its rise in the "balobale country," south latitude ° to °, and east longitude ° to °. pursuing his course, dr. livingstone (march ) first sighted the quango (coango) as it emerged from the dark jungles of londa, a giant clyde, some yards broad, flowing down an enormous valley of denudation. he reached it on april, , in south latitude ° ', and east longitude (g.) ° ', about geographical linear miles from the atlantic. three days to the west lies the easternmost station of angola, cassange: no portuguese lives, or rather then lived, beyond the coango valley. the settlers informed him that eight days' or about miles' march south of this position, the sources are to be found in the "mosamba range" of the basongo country; this would place them in about south latitude ° to ° and east longitude (g.) ° to °. the heights are also called in benguela nanos, nannos, or nhanos (highlands);[fn# ] and in our latest maps they are made to discharge from their seaward face the coango and cuanza to the west and north, the kasai to the north-east and possibly to the congo, the cunene south-westwards to the atlantic, and southwards the kubango, whose destination is still doubtful. dr. charles beke ("athenæum," no. , february , ), judged from various considerations that the "kassábi" rising in the primeval forests of olo-vihenda, was the "great hydrophylacium of the continent of africa, the central point of division between the waters flowing to the mediterranean, to the atlantic, and to the indian ocean"--in fact, the head-water of the nile. i believe, however, that our subsequent information made my late friend abandon this theory. on his return march to linyanti, dr. livingstone, who was no longer incapacitated by sickness and fatigue, perceived that all the western feeders of the "kasa" flow first from the western side towards the centre of the continent, then gradually turn with the main stream itself to the north, and "after the confluence of the kasai with the quango, an immense body of water collected from all these branches, finds its way out of the country by means of the river congo or zaire, on the western coast" (chap. xxii.). he adds: "there is but one opinion among the balonda respecting the kasai and the quango. they invariably describe the kasai as receiving the quango, and beyond the confluence assuming the name of zairé or zerézeré. and thus he verifies the tradition of the portuguese, who always speak of the casais and the coango as "suppôsto congo." it is regrettable that dr. livingstone has not been more explicit upon the native names. the balonda could hardly have heard of the semi-european term zaire, which is utterly unknown even at the yellalas. on the other hand, it must be borne in mind that maxwell was informed by native travellers that the river miles up country was still called "enzaddi," and perhaps the explorer merely intends zairé to explain zerézeré. it is hardly necessary to notice douville's assertion (ii. ). meanwhile the late ladislaus magyar, who had previously informed the benguelan government that the casais was reported to fall into the indian ocean at some unknown place, in followed this great artery lower than any known traveller. he heard that, beyond his furthest exploration point (about south latitude ° ,[fn# ] and east longitude, g. °), it pursues a north- easterly direction and, widening several miles, it raises waves which are dangerous to canoes. the waters continue to be sweet and fall into a lake variously called mouro or moura (moráve or marávi?), uhanja or uhenje (nyanza?), which is suspected to be the urenge or ulenge, of which livingstone heard in about south latitude °, and east longitude (g.) °. the hungarian traveller naturally identified it with the mythical lake nyassa which has done such portentous mischief in a day now gone by. ladislaus magyar also states:[fn# ] "the congo rises, i have convinced myself by reports, in the swamp named inhan-ha occupying the high plateau of moluwa, in the lands of the luba, uniting with the many streams of this region; at a distance of about five days from the source it becomes a deep though narrow river, which flows to the westward, through a level country covered with dense forests, whose frequent streams coming from the north (?) and south are taken up "by the river; then it bends north-westward under the name of kuango." here we find the drowned lands, the "sponges" of livingstone, who, however, placed the sources much further to the south-east. dr. livingstone's third and last expedition, which began on march , , and which ended ( ) with fatal fitness in the swamps of the bangweolo, suggests a new and more distant derivation for the mighty congo. after travelling from the rovuma river to lake nyassa, the great explorer in l - came upon an "earthern mound," west of lake bangweolo or bemba, in about south latitude °; and here he places the sources of the nile, where geographers have agreed provisionally to place the sources of the congo. already, in , fernandez de enciso (suma de geographia), the "theoretical discoverer" of kilimanjaro, was told by the congoese that their river rises in high mountains, from which another great stream flows in an opposite direction-- but this might apply to more watersheds than one. the subject is treated at considerable length in an article by dr. e. behm,[fn# ] certain of whose remarks i shall notice at the end of this chapter. the article proves hypsometrically that the lualaba, in which the explorer found the head waters of the egyptian river, cannot feed the tanganyika nor the lake nzige (n'zíghe, mwutan, chowambe, or albert nyanza lake), nor even the bahr el ghazal, as was once suspected. from the latter, indeed, it is barred by the water parting of the welle, the "babura" of jules poncet ( ), in the land of the monbuttú; whose system the later explorer, dr. schweinfurth, is disposed to connect with the shari. hydrometrically considered, the lualaba, which at nyangwe, the most northerly point explored by dr. livingstone ( ), rolls a flood of , cubic feet per second in the dry season, cannot be connected either with the welle ( , cubic feet), nor with the bahr el ghazal ( , to , cubic feet), nor with the nile below the mouth of the bahr el ghazal ( , ); nor with the shari ( , ); nor with the shallow ogobe, through its main forks the rembo okanda and the rembo nguye. but the lualaba may issue through the congo. the former is made one of the four streams ferried over by those travelling from the cazembe to the mwata ya nvo, and dr. de lacarda[fn# ] records it as the "guarava," probably a dialectic form of lualava. it is the luapula of the "geographer of n'yassi," who, with his usual felicity and boldness of conjecture (p. ), bends it eastward, and discharges it into his mythical central sea. dr. behm greatly under-estimates the congo when he assigns to it only , , cubic feet per second. he makes the great artery begin to rise in november instead of september and decrease in april, without noticing the march-june freshets, reported by all the natives to measure about one-third of the autumnal floods. his elements are taken from tuckey, who found off the "diamond rock" a velocity of . knots an hour, and from vidal's chart, showing , english feet or . nautical miles in a thalweg fifty fathoms deep. thus he assumes only two nautical miles for the current, or sixty inches per second, which must be considerably increased, and an average depth of ten fathoms, which again is too little. for , , cubic feet of water per second, which tuckey made , , , we may safely read , , . dr. livingstone himself was haunted by the idea that he was exploring the upper congo, not the nile. from a portuguese subordinate he "learned that the luapula went to angola." he asks with some truth, "who would care to risk being put into a cannibal pot, and be converted into blackman for anything less than the grand old nile?" and the late sir roderick i. murchison, whose geographical forecasts were sometimes remarkable, suspected long ago[fn# ] that his "illustrious friend" would follow the drainage of the country to the western coast. the "extraordinary quiet rise of the periodical flood," proved by the first expedition, argues that the congo "issues from the gradual overflowing of a lake or a chain of lakes." the increment in the lower bed, only eight to twelve feet where the nile and the ganges rise thirty and the binuwe fifty, would also suggest that it is provided with many large reservoirs. the introduction to tuckey's "narrative" (p. xviii.) assumes that the highest water is in march, but he entered the stream only on july , and the expedition ended in mid-october. the best informants assured me that from march till june there are heavy freshets. as in the ogobe, the flood begins in early september, somewhat preceding that of the lualaba, but, unlike the former stream, it attains its highest in november and december, and it gradually subsides from the end of june till august, about which time the water is lowest. in the middle region of the tanganyika, i found the rainy season lasting from september to may. at lake liemba, the south-eastern projection of the tanganyika, dr. livingstone in saw no rain from may to september, and in many-wema-land, west of the central tanganyika, about south latitude °, the wet season began in november, and continued till july with intervals, marking the passage of the belt of calms. but, for the congo to rise in september, we must assume the rains to have fallen in early august, allowing ten or fifteen days for the streams to descend, and the rest for the saturation of the land. this postulates a supply from the central african regions far north of the equator. even for the march-june freshets, we must also undoubtedly go north of the line, yet herr h. kiepert[fn# ] places the northernmost influent of congo some miles south of the equator. under these limitations i agree with dr. behm:--"taking everything into consideration, in the present state of our knowledge, there is the strongest probability that the lualaba is the head stream of the congo, and the absolute certainty that it has no connection with the nile or any other river (system) of the northern hemisphere." and again: "as surely as the sun stands over the southern hemisphere in our winter and the northern in our summer, bringing the rains and the swellings of the tropical rivers when it is in the zenith with regard to them, so surely can it be predicated, from a comparison of the rainy seasons and times of rising, that the lualaba belongs to no river of the northern hemisphere; in the southern hemisphere africa possesses only one river, the congo, which could take up the vast water supply of the lualaba." the brazil shows the curious feature of widely different and even opposite rainy seasons in the same parallel of latitude; but this is not the place to discuss the subject. since these lines were written, i have to lament the collapse of the livingstone-congo expedition. in the great explorer's friends, taking into consideration the prospect of his turning westward, organized a "relief" from west as well as from east africa. mr. j. young, of kelly, generously supplied the sinews of travel, and mr. clements r. markham, secretary of the royal geographical society, lent important aid in preparing the exploration. navigating-lieutenant w. j. grandy, who had seen service on the eastern coast of africa, landed at s. paulo de loanda in early , and set out from ambriz in march of that year. the usual difficulties were met and overcome, when lieutenant grandy was summarily recalled. the official explanation ("royal geographical society," december th, ), is that the measure was in consequence of livingstone's death. the traveller himself says:--"complying with instructions, we, with many regrets at the idea of leaving our work unfinished when all seemed so full of promise, commenced preparations for the return, leaving good presents with the chiefs, in order to procure a good reception for those who might come after us." an ex-president of the royal geographical society had asserted, "the ascent of the (upper) congo ought to be more productive of useful geographical results than any other branch of african exploration, as it will bring to the test of experiment the navigability of the congo above the falls, and thus possibly open out a means of introducing traffic by steam into the heart of the continent at least two thousand miles from the mouth of the river." with this explicit and stimulating assertion before us, we must lament that england, once the worthy rival in exploration of spain, portugal, and the netherlands, is now too poor to support a single exploration on the west african coast, when germany is wealthy enough liberally to subsidize two. note. a nous deux, dr. e. behm! my objections to your paper are the three following: . it generally understates the volume of the nzadi, by not allowing sufficiently for the double equinoctial periods of high water, march to june, as well as september to december; and by ignoring the north-equatorial supply. . it arbitrarily determines the question of the tanganyika, separating it from the nile-system upon the insufficient strength of a gorilla, and of an oil-palm which is specifically different from that of the western coast; and . it wilfully misrepresents dr. livingstone in the matter of the so-called victoria nyanza. my first objection has been amply discussed. i therefore proceed to consider the second. as mr. alexander g. findlay observed ("proceedings of the royal geographical society," no. , vol. xvii. of july , ):--"up to the time of stanley's arrival at ujiji, and his journey to the north of the lake, livingstone was fully impressed with the conviction that the tanganyika is nothing more than what he called a �lacustrine river' ( miles long by twenty of average breadth); flowing steadily to the north and forming a portion of the great nile basin. the letters contained his reasons for forming that opinion, stating that he had been for weeks and months on the shores of the lake watching the flow of the water northwards" (at the rate of a knot per hour). at times the current appeared to run southwards, but that was under the influence of strong northerly winds. also by dr. livingstone's letters to sir thomas maclear and dr. mann (" proceedings of the royal geographical society,"no. i of , pp. - ), it is evident that the explorer believed only in the lake outlet north of ujiji. again, mr. findlay, after attentively considering the unsatisfactory visit of dr. livingstone and mr. stanley to the rusizi river in november and december, , holds it to be a mere marsh-drain, which when the south winds prevail, would possibly flow in the opposite direction; and he still believes that captain speke and i, when at uvira, were within five or six miles of the head. since dr. livingstone's visit we have heard more upon this disputed subject. a native of karagwah assured my friend sir samuel baker--who, despite all prepossessions, candidly accepted the statement--that it is possible and feasible to canoe from chibero,on the so-called albert nyanza, past uvira, where the stream narrows and where a pilot is required, to the arab dépôt, ujiji. he described the northern portion of the tanganyika as varying much in breadth, immensely wide beyond vacovia, and again contracting at uvira. his report was confirmed by a msawahíli, sent by king mtesa, with whom he had lived many years, to communicate with baker pasha at fatiko; this man knew both uvira and ujiji, which he called "uyiyi." nothing can be more substantial than this double testimony, which wears all the semblance of truth. on the other hand, lieut. cameron, whose admirable work has, so to speak, re-constructed the tanganyika lake, discovered, on the rd of may, - , the lukuga river, which he supposes to form the outlet. it lies direct miles to the south of the kasenge archipelago, numbering seventeen isles, visited by captain speke in march, . dr. livingstone touched here on july , , and heard nothing of the outlet; he describes a current sweeping round kasenge to south-east or southwards according to the wind, and carrying trees at the rate of a knot an hour. but mr. stanley (pp. et passim) agrees with dr. krapf, who made a large river issue from "the lake" westwards, and who proposed, by following its course, to reach the atlantic. the "discoverer of livingstone" evidently inclines to believe that the tanganyika drains through the caverns of kabogo near uguhha, and he records the information of native travellers that "kabogo is a great mountain on the other side of the tanganyika, full of deep holes, into which the water rolls; "moreover, that at the distance of over a hundred miles he himself heard the" sound of the thundering surf which is said to roll into the caves of kabogo."in his map he �cutely avoids inserting anything beyond "kabogo mountains, , to , feet high." the gallant young naval lieutenant's exploration of the lukuga has not yet reached us in a satisfactory form. he found the current sluggishly flowing at the rate of . knots per hour; he followed it for four or five miles, and he was stopped by floating grass and enormous rushes (papyri?). a friendly chief told him that the lukuga feeds the lualaba which, beyond nyangwe (livingstone's furthest point, in about south latitude °) takes the name of ugarowwa. an arab had descended this stream fifty- five marches, and reached a place where there were ships and white merchants who traded largely in palm-oil and ivory, both rare on the congo river. and, unfortunately, "the name (river) congo was also mentioned," a term utterly unknown except to the few portuguese-speaking natives. at present, therefore, we must reserve judgment, and the only conclusion to which the unprofessional reader would come is that the weight of authority is in favour of a double issue for the tanganyika, north and west. the wilful misrepresentation is couched in these words: "the reports obtained by livingstone are if anything favourable to the unity of the victoria nyanza (ukerewe, ukara,) because along with it he names only such lakes as were already known to have a separate existence from it." as several were recognized, ergo it is one! dr. livingstone heard from independent sources that the so-called victoria nyanza is a lake region, not a lake; his account of the okara (ukara), and the three or four waters run into a single huge sheet, is substantially the same as that which, after a study of the rev. mr. wakefield's reports i offered to the royal geographical society, and which i subsequently published in "zanzibar city, island, and coast." you, dr. behm, are apparently satisfied with a lake drained by an inverted delta of half-a-dozen issues--i am not. nor can i agree with you that "whether the victoria nyanza is one lake or several is a point of detail of less importance," when it has disfigured the best maps of africa for nearly a score of years. the last intelligence concerning the "unity" of the lake is from colonel c. c. long, a staff-officer in the service of his highness the khedive, who was sent by colonel gordon on a friendly mission to king mtesa of uganda. with permission to descend "murchison creek," and to view "lake victoria nyanza," colonel long, after a march of three hours, took boat. he sounded the waters of the lake, and found a depth of from to feet; in clear weather the opposite shore was visible, appearing "to an unnautical eye" from to miles distant; nor could this estimate be greatly wrong. after much negotiation and opposition he obtained leave to return to egyptian territory by water, and on the way, in north latitude ° ', he discovered a second lake or "large basin," at least to miles wide. the geography is somewhat hazy, but the assertions are not to be mistaken. finally, i read with regret such statements as the following, made by so well-known a geographer as yourself: "speke's views have been splendidly confirmed; the attacks of his opponents, especially of burton, who was most inimically inclined to him, collapse into nothing." this unwarrantable style of assertion might be expected from the "mittheilungen," but it is not honourable to a man of science. there are, you well know, three main points of difference between the late captain speke and myself. the first is the horse-shoe of mountains blocking up the northern end of the tanganyika; this, after a dozen years, i succeeded in abolishing. the second is the existence of the victoria nyanza, which i assert to be a lake region, not a lake; it is far from being a "point of detail," and i hope presently to see it follow the way of the horse-shoe. thirdly is the drainage of the tanganyika, which captain speke threw southward to the zambeze, a theory now universally abandoned. this may be your view of "splendid confirmation"--i venture to think that it will not be accepted by the geographical world. chapter xi. life at banza nokki. i was now duly established with my books and instruments at nkaye, and the inevitable delay was employed in studying the country and the people, and in making a botanical collection. but the season was wholly unpropitious. a naval officer, who was considered an authority upon the coast, had advised me to travel in september, when a journey should never begin later than may. the vegetation was feeling the effect of the cacimbo; most of the perennials were in seed, and the annuals were nearly dried up. the pictorial effects were those of "autumn laying here and there a fiery finger on the leaves." yet, with factotum selim's assistance, i managed to collect some specimens within the fortnight. we had not the good fortune of the late dr. welwitsch (welwitschia mirabilis), but there is still a copious treasure left for those who visit the congo river in the right season. i was delighted with the country, a counterpart of the usumbara hills in eastern africa, disposed upon nearly the same parallel. the cacimbo season corresponded with the harmattan north of the line; still, grey mornings, and covered, rainless noons, so distasteful to the expedition, which complained that, from four to five days together, it could not obtain an altitude. the curious contrast in a region of evergreens was not wanting, the varied tintage of winter on one tree, and upon another the brightest hues of budding spring. the fair land of grass and flowers "rough but beautiful," of shrubbery-path, and dense mottes or copse islets, with clear fountains bubbling from the rocks, adorned by noble glimpses of the lake-like river, and of a blue horizon, which suggested the ocean--ever one of the most attractive points in an african landscape,--was easily invested by the eye of fancy with gold and emerald and steely azure from above, whilst the blue masses of bare mountain, thrown against a cloudless sky, towered over the black-green sea of vegetation at their base, like icebergs rising from the bosom of the atlantic. as in the brazilian rio de são francisco, the few miles between the mouth and the hill-region cause a radical change of climate. here the suns are never too hot, nor are the moons too cold; the nights fall soft and misty, the mornings bring the blessing of freshness; and i was never weary of enjoying the effects of dying and reviving day. the most delicate sharpness and purity of outline took the place of meridian reek and blur; trees, rocks, and chalets were picked out with an utter disregard to the perspective of distance, and the lowest sounds were distinctly heard in the hard, clear atmosphere. the damp and fetid vegetation of the coast wholly disappeared. by the benefit of purest air and water, with long walks and abundant palm wine from the trees hung with calabashes, the traces of "nanny po" soon vanished; appetite and sleep returned, nightly cramps were things unknown, and a healthy glow overspread the clammy, corpse-like skin. when the lower congo shall become the emporium of lawful trade, the white face will find a sanatorium in these portals of the sierra del crystal,--the vine will flourish, the soil will produce the cereals as well as the fruits and vegetables of europe, and this region will become one of the "paradises of africa." the banzas of congo-land show the constitution of native society, which, as in syria, and indeed in most barbarous and semi- barbarous places, is drawn together less by reciprocal wants than by the ties of blood. here families cannot disperse, and thus each hamlet is a single house, with its patriarch for president and judge. when the population outgrows certain limits, instead of being confounded with its neighbours, it adds a settlement upon neighbouring ground, and removal is the work of a single day. the towns are merely big villages, whose streets are labyrinths of narrow pathways, often grass-grown, because each man builds in his own way. some translate the word "banza" by city, unaware that central african people do not build cities. professor smith rightly explains it "a village, which with them means a paterfamilias, and his private dependants." so the maligned douville (i. )--"on donne le nom de banza à la ville ou réside le chef d'une peuplade ou nation nègre. on l'attribue aussi à l'enceinte que le chef ou souverain habite avec les femmes et sa cour. dans ce dernier sens le mot banza veut dire palais du chef." our situation is charming, high enough to be wholesome, yet in a sheltered valley, an amphitheatre opening to the south-east or rainy quarter; the glorious trees, here scattered, there gathered in clumps and impenetrable bosquets, show the exuberant fertility of the soil. behind and above the village rises a dwarf plateau, rich with plantains and manioc. after the deserted state of the river banks,--the effect of kidnapping,--we are surprised to find so populous a region. within cannon-shot, there are not less than twelve villages, with a total, perhaps, of , souls. banza nkaye, as usual uninclosed, contains some forty habitations, which may lodge two hundred head. the tenements are built upon platforms cut out of the hill slopes; and the make proves that, even during the rains, there is little to complain of climate. ten of these huts belong to royalty, which lives upon the lowest plane; and each wife has her own abode, whilst the "senzallas" of the slaves cluster outside. the foundation is slightly raised, to prevent flooding. the superstructure strikes most travellers as having somewhat the look of a châlet, although proyart compares it with a large basket turned upside down. two strong uprights, firmly planted, support on their forked ends a long strut-beam, tightly secured; the eaves are broad to throw off the rain, and the neat thatch of grass, laid with points upwards in regular courses, and kept in site by bamboo strips, is renewed before the stormy season. the roof and walls are composed of six screens; they are made upon the ground, often occupying months, and they can be put together in a few minutes. the material, which an old traveller says is of "leaves interwoven not contemptibly with one another," is a grass growing everywhere on the hills, plaited and attached to strips of cane or bamboo- palm (raphia vinifera); the gable "walls" are often a cheque- pattern, produced by twining "tie-tie," "monkey rope," or creepers, stained black, round the dull-yellow groundwork; and one end is pierced for a doorway, that must not front the winds and rains. it is a small square hole, keeping the interior dark and cool; and the defence is a screen of cane-work, fastened with a rude wooden latch. the flooring is hard, tamped clay, in the centre of which the fire is laid; the cooking, however, is confined to the broad eaves, or to the compound which, surrounded with neat walls, backs the house. the interior is divided into the usual "but" and "ben." the latter communicates with the former by a passage, masked with a reed screen; it is the sleeping-place and the store-room; and there is generally a second wicket for timely escape. the only furniture consists of mats, calabashes, and a standing bedstead of rude construction, or a bamboo cot like those built at lagos,--in fact, the four bare walls suggest penury. but in the "small countries," as the "landward towns" are called, where the raid and the foray are not feared, the householder entrusts to some faithful slave large stores of cloth and rum, of arms and gunpowder. the abodes suggest those of our semi-barbarous ancestors, as described by holingshed, where earth mixed with lime formed the floor; where the fire was laid to the wall; where the smoke, which, besides hardening timber, was "expected to keep the good man and his family from quake and fever, curled from the door; and where the bed was a straw pallet, with a log of wood for a pillow. but the congoese is better lodged than we were before the days of queen elizabeth; what are luxuries in the north, broad beds and deep arm-chairs, would here be far less comfortable than the mats, which serve for all purposes. i soon civilized my hut with a divan, the hindostani chabutarah, the spanish estrada, the "mud bank" or "bunting" of sierra leone, a cool earth-bench running round the room, which then wanted only a glass window. but no domestic splendour was required; life in the open air is the life for the tropics: even in england a greater proportion of it would do away with much neuralgia and similar complaints. and, if the establishment be simple, it is also neat and clean: we never suffered from the cimex and pulex of which captain tuckey complains so bitterly, and the fourmis voyageuses (drivers), mosquitoes, scorpions, and centipedes were unknown to us. the people much resemble those of the gaboon. the figure is well formed, except the bosom, whose shape prolonged lactation, probably upon the principle called malthusian, soon destroys; hence the first child is said to "make the breasts fall." the face is somewhat broad and flat, the jowl wide, deep, and strong, and the cerebellum is highly developed as in the slav. the eye is well opened, with thick and curly lashes, but the tunica conjunctiva is rarely of a pure white; the large teeth are of good shape and colour. extensive tattoos appear on breasts, backs, and shoulders; the wearers are generally slaves, also known by scantier clothing, by darker skins, and by a wilder expression of countenance. during their "country nursing," the children run about wholly nude, except the coating of red wood applied by the mothers, or the dust gathered from the ground. i could not hear of the weaning custom mentioned by merolla, the father lifting the child by the arm, and holding him for a time hanging in the air, "falsely believing that by those means he will become more strong and robust." whilst the men affect caps, the women go bare-headed, either shaving the whole scalp, or leaving a calotte of curly hair on the poll; it resembles the shúshah of western arabia and east africa, but it is carried to the fore like a toucan's crest. some, by way of coquetterie, trace upon the scalp a complicated network, showing the finest and narrowest lines of black wool and pale skin: so the old traveller tells us "the heads of those who aspire to glory in apparel resemble a parterre, you see alleys and figures traced on them with a great deal of ingenuity." the bosom, elaborately bound downwards, is covered with a square bit of stuff, or a calico pagne--most ungraceful of raiment-wrapped under the arms, and extending to the knees: "in longitude'tis sorely scanty, but �tis their best, and they are vaunty." the poor and the slaves content themselves with grass cloth. the ornaments are brass earrings, beads and imitation coral; heavy bangles and manillas of brass and copper, zinc and iron, loading the ankles, and giving a dainty elephantine gait; the weight also produces stout mollets, which are set off by bead-garters below the knees. the leg, as amongst hill people generally, is finely developed, especially amongst the lower orders: the "lady's" being often lank and spindled, as in paris and naples, where the carriage shrinks the muscles as bandages cramp chinese feet. in these hamlets women are far more numerous than men. marriage being expensive amongst the "mfumo" or gentry, the houses are stocked with hagars, and the children inherit their father's rank as mwana mfumos, opposed to mwanangambe, labouring people, or wantu, slaves. the missionaries found a regular system of "hand-fasting." their neophytes did not approve of marriage in facie ecclesiæ, "for they must first be satisfied whether their wife will have children; whether she will be diligent in her daily labour, and, lastly, whether she will prove obedient, before they will marry her. if they find her faulty in any of these points, they immediately send her back again to her parents." the woman, not being looked upon the worse for being returned into stores, soon afterwards underwent another trial, perhaps with success. converts were fined nine crowns for such irregularities. "but, oh!" exclaims a good father, "what pains do we take to bring them to marry the lover, and how many ridiculous arguments and reasons do they bring to excuse themselves from this duty and restraint." he tells us how he refused absolution to a dying woman, unless she compelled her daughter to marry a man with whom she was "living upon trial." the mother answered wisely enough, "father, i will never give my daughter cause to curse me after i am dead, by obliging her to wedlock where she does not fancy." whereupon the priest replied, "what! do you not stand more in awe of a temporal than an eternal curse?" and, working upon the feelings of the girl, who began to tremble and to weep, extorted from her a promise to accept the "feigned husband." he adds, "notwithstanding this, some obstinate mothers have rather chosen to die unconfessed, than to concern themselves with the marriage of their daughters." being obliged to attend communion at easter, these temporary couples would part on the first day of lent; obtain absolution and, a week afterwards, either cohabit once more or find otherpartners. the "indiscreet method of courtship," popularly known as "bundling," here existed, and was found by caillié amongst the southern moors: "when everybody is at rest, the man creeps into his intended's tent, and remains with her till daybreak." an energetic attempt was made to abolish polygamy, which, instead of diminishing population as some sciolists pretend, caused the country to swarm like maritime china. father carli, who also dilates upon the evil practice of the sexes living together on trial, ca. didly owns that his main difficulty lay in "bringing the multitude to keep to one wife, they being wholly averse to that law." yet old travellers declare that when the missionaries succeeded, the people "lived so christian-like and lovingly together, that the wife would suffer herself to be cut to pieces rather than deceive her husband." merolla, indeed, enlarges on the constancy of women, whether white or black, when lawfully married to their mates; and praises them for living together in all manner of love and amity. "hence may be learned what a propensity the women have to chastity in these parts, many of whom meet together on the first day of lent, and oblige themselves, under pain of severe penance, to a strict continence till easter." in case of adultery the husband could divorce the wife; he was generally satisfied by her begging his pardon, and by taking a slave from the lover. widowed "countesses," proved guilty of "immorality," suffered death by fire or sword. on the other hand, the "princess" had a right to choose her husband; but, as in persia, the day of his splendid wedding was the last of his liberty. he became a prisoner and a slave; he was surrounded by spies; he was preceded by guards out of doors, and at the least "écart" his head was chopped off and his paramour was sold. these ladies amply revenged the servitude of their sex- - "asperius nihil est humili cum surgit in altum." rich women were allowed to support quasihusbands until they became mothers; and the slaves of course lived together without marriage. since the days of the expedition a change for the better has come over the gentil sesso. the traveller is no longer in the "dilemma of frère jean," and, except at the river-mouth and at the adjacent villages, there is none of that officious complaisance which characterizes every hamlet in the gaboon country. the men appear peculiarly jealous, and the women fearful of the white face. whenever we approached a feminine group, it would start up and run away; if cooking ground-nuts, the boldest would place a little heap upon the bottom of an upturned basket, push it towards us and wave us off. the lowest orders will submit to a kind of marriage for four fathoms of cloth; exactly double the tariff paid in tuckey's time (pp. - ); and this ratio will apply to all other articles of living. amongst themselves nubile girls are not remarkably strict; but as matrons they are rigid. the adulterer is now punished by a heavy fine, and, if he cannot pay, his death, as on many parts of the southern coast, is lawful to the husband. the life is regular, and society is simple and patriarchal, as amongst the iroquois and mohawks, or in the shetlands two centuries ago. the only excitement, a fight or a slave hunt, is now become very rare. yet i can hardly lay down the "curriculum vitae" as longer than fifty-five years, and there are few signs of great age. merolla declares the women to be longer-lived than the men. gidi mavunga, who told me that the congo expedition visited their banza when his mother was a child, can hardly be forty-five, as his eldest son shows, and yet he looks sixty. the people rise at dawn and, stirring up the fire, light the cachimbos or large clay pipes which are rarely out of their mouths. tobacco (nsunza) grows everywhere and, when rudely cured, it is sold in ringlets or twisted leaves; it is never snuffed, and the only chaw is the mákázo or kola nut which grows all over these hills; of these i bought for coloured porcelain beads, probably paying treble the usual price. no food is eaten at dawn, a bad practice, which has extended to the brazil and the argentine republic; but if a dram be procurable it is taken "por la manana." the slave-women, often escorted by one of the wives, and accompanied by the small girls, who must learn to work whilst their brothers are idling with their rattles, set out with water- pots balanced on their astrachan wool, or with baskets for grain and firewood slung by a head-strap to the back the free-born remain at home, bathing and anointing with palm-oil, which renders the skin smooth and supple, but leaves a peculiar aroma; they are mostly cross enough till they have thoroughly shaken off sleep, and the morning generally begins with scolding the slaves or a family wrangle. i have seen something of the kind in europe. visiting, chatting, and strolling from place to place, lead to the substantial breakfast or first dinner between and a.m. meat rarely appears; river fish, fresh or sun-dried, is the usual "kitchen," eaten with manioc, toasted maize, and peeled, roasted, and scraped plantain: vegetables and palm-oil obtained by squeezing the nut in the hands, are the staple dish, and beans are looked upon rather as slaves' food. they have no rice and no form of "daily bread:" i happened to take with me a few boxes of "twice-baked," and this mbolo was the object of every chiefs ambition. "coleworts" are noticed by merolla as a missionary importation; he tells us that they produce no seed; and are propagated by planting the sprouts, which grow to a great height. the greens, cabbages, spinach, and french beans, mentioned by tuckey, have been allowed to die out. tea, coffee, sugar, and all such exotics, are unappreciated, if not unknown; chillies, which grow wild, enter into every dish, and the salt of native manufacture, brown and earthy, is bought in little baskets. between breakfast and midday there is a mighty drink. the palm- wine, here called "msámbá," and on the lower river "manjewa," is not brought in at dawn, or it would be better. the endogen in general use is the elai's, which is considered to supply a better and more delicate liquor than the raphia. the people do not fell the tree like the kru-men, but prefer the hoop of "supple-jack" affected by the natives of fernando po and camarones. a leaf folded funnel-wise, and inserted as usual in the lowest part of the frond before the fruit forms, conveys the juice into the calabashes, often three, which hang below the crown; and the daily produce may be ten quarts. on the first day of tapping, the sap is too sweet; it is best during the following week and, when it becomes tart, no more must be drawn or the tree will be injured. it cannot be kept; acetous fermentation sets in at once, and presently it coagulates and corrupts. at banana and boma it is particularly good; at porto da lenha it is half water, but the agents dare not complain, for the reason which prevents them offering "spliced grog" to the prepotent negro. europeans enjoy the taste, but dislike the smell of palm-wine; those in whom it causes flatulence should avoid it, but where it agrees it is a pleasant stimulant, pectoral, refreshing, and clearing the primæ vice. mixed with wine or spirits, it becomes highly intoxicating. the rude beers, called by merolla guallo and by tuckey (p. ) baamboo, the oualo of douville, and the pombeof east africa, mentioned by almost every traveller, are not now found on the lower river. about noon the slaves return from handling their trowel-shaped iron hoes, and the "gentleman" takes a siesta proportioned to his drink. the poorer classes sit at home weaving, spinning, or threading beads, whilst the wives attend to household work, prepare the meals, buy and sell, dig and delve. europeans often pity the sex thus "doomed to perform the most laborious drudgery;" but it is a waste of sentiment. the women are more accustomed to labour in all senses of the word, and the result is that they equal their mates in strength and stature; they enjoy robust health, and their children, born without difficulty, are sturdy and vigorous. the same was the case amongst the primitive tribes of europe; zamacola (anthrop. mem. ii. ), assures us that the basque women were physically powerful as the men, with whom they engaged in prize-fights. the master awakes about p.m. and smokes, visits, plays with his children, and dawdles away his time till the cool sunset, when a second edition of the first meal is served up. if there be neither dance nor festival, all then retire to their bens, light the fire, and sit smoking tobacco or bhang, with frequent interruptions of palm wine or rum, till joined by their partners. douville (ii. ), says that the pangué or chanvre, "croît naturellement dans lepays" i believe the questions to be still sub judice, whether the intoxicating cannabis be or be not indigenous to africa as well as to asia; and whether smoking was not known in the old world, as it certainly was in the new, before tobacco was introduced. the cannabis indica was the original anæsthetic known to the arabs and to civilized orientals many centuries before the west invented ether and chloroform. our landlord has two wives, but one is a mother and will not rejoin him till her child can carry a calabash of water unaided. to avoid exciting jealousy he lives in a hut apart, surrounded by seven or eight slaves, almost all of them young girls. this regular life is varied by a little extra exertion at seed-time and harvest, by attending the various quitandas or markets of the country side, and by an occasional trip to "town" (boma). when the bush is burning, all sally out with guns, clubs, and dogs, to bring home "beef." and thus they dwell in the presence of their brethren, thinking little of to-day, and literally following the precept, "take no thought for the morrow." as the old missioners testify, they have happy memories, their tempers are mild, and quarrels rarely lead to blows; they are covetous, but not miserly; they share what they have, and they apply the term "close-fist" to the european who gives "nuffin for nuffin." the most superstitious of men, they combine the two extremes of belief and unbelief; they have the firmest conviction in their own tenets, whilst those of others flow off their minds like water from a greased surface. the catholic missioners laboured amongst them for nearly two hundred years; some of these ecclesiastics were ignorant and bigoted as those whom we still meet on the west african coast, but not a few were earnest and energetic, scrupulous and conscientious, able and learned as the best of our modern day. all did not hurry over their superficial tasks like the neapolitan father jerome da montesarchio, who baptized , souls; and others, who sprinkled children till their arms were tired. many lived for years in the country, learning the language and identifying themselves with their flocks. yet the most they ever effected was to make their acolytes resemble the assyrians whom shalmaneser transplanted to assyria, who "feared the lord and served their graven images" ( kings, xvii. - ). their only traces are the word "deus," foully perverted like the chinese "joss;" and an occasional crucifix which is called cousa de branco--white man's thing. tuckey was justified in observing at nokki that the crucifixes, left by missioners, were strangely mixed with native fetishes, and that the people seemed by no means improved by the muddle of christian and pagan idolatry. the system is at once complicated and unsettled. there is, apparently, the sensus numinis; the vague deity being known as nzambi or njambi, which the missionaries translated into god, as nganna zambi--lord zambi. merolla uses zambiabungù, and in the vocabulary, zabiambunco, for the "spirit above" (zambi-a-npungo): battel tells us that the king of loango was called "sambee and pango, which mean god." the abbé proyart terms the supreme "zambi," and applies zambi-a-n-pongou to a species of malady brought on by perjury. he also notices the manichæan idea of zambi-a-nbi, or bad-god, drawing the fine distinction of european belief in a deity supremely good, who permits evil without participating in it. but the dualism of moral light and darkness, noticed by all travellers,[fn# ] is a bonâ fide existence with africans, and the missionaries converted the angolan "cariapemba" into the aryo-semitic devil. zambi is the anyambia of the gaboon country, a vox et præterea nihil. dr. livingstone ("first expedition," p. ), finds the word general amongst the balonda, or people of lunda: with the "cazembes" the word is "pambi," or "liza," and "o muata cazembe" (p. ) mentions the proverb, "ao pambi e ao mambi (the king) nada iguala." in the "vocabulario da lingua cafrial" we see (p. ) that "murungo" means god or thunder. it is the rudimental idea of the great zeus, which the greeks worked out, the god of Æther, the eternal, omnipotent, and omniscient, "who was, who is, and who is to come," the unknown and unknowable, concerning whom st. paul quoted aristæus on mars' hill. but the african brain naturally confused it with a something gross and material: thus nzambi-a-npungu is especially the lightning god. cariambemba is, properly, kadi mpemba or ntangwa, the being that slays mankind: merolla describes it as an "abominable idol;" and the word is also applied to the owl, here as in dahome the object of superstition. i could trace no sign of worship paid to the sun (tangwa or muinyi), but there are multitudes of minor gods, probably deified ghosts, haunting particular places. thus, "simbi" presides over villages and the "tadi nzazhi," or lightning rock, near boma; whilst the yellala is the abode of an evil being which must be propitiated by offerings. as usual amongst fetish worshippers, the only trace of belief in a future state is faith in revenants--returning men or ghosts. each village has an idol under a little wall-less roof, apparently an earthern pot of grease and feathers, called mavunga. this may be the ovengwa of the "camma people," a "terrible catcher and eater of men, a vampire of the dead; personal, whilst the ibamba are indistinct; tall as a tree; wandering through the woods, ever winking; whereas the greek immortals were known by their motionless eyelids. "ngolo wanga" is a man-shaped figure of unpainted wood, kept in the hut. every house is stuck inside and outside with idols and fetishes, interpreters of the deity, each having its own jurisdiction over lightning, wind, and rain; some act as scarecrows; others teach magic, avert evils, preserve health and sight, protect cattle, and command fish in the sea or river. they are in all manner of shapes, strings of mucuna and poison-beans; carved images stuck over with feathers and tassels; padlocks with a cowrie or a mirror set in them; horns full of mysterious "medicine;" iron- tipped poles; bones; birds' beaks and talons; skins of snakes and leopards, and so forth. we shall meet them again upon our travels. no man walks abroad without his protecting charms, nkisi or nkizi, the monda of the gaboon, slung en baudrier, or hanging from his shoulder. the portable fetish of our host is named "báká chyá mázínga: professor smith (p. ) makes "mázengá" to be "fetishes for the detection of theft." these magicæ vanitates are prophylactics against every evil to which man's frailty is heir. the missioners were careful not to let their congo converts have anything from their bodies, like hair or nail parings, for fear lest it be turned to superstitious use; and a beard (the price of conversion) was refused to the "king of micocco." like the idols, these talismans avert ill luck, bachelorhood, childlessness, poverty, and ill health; they are equally powerful against the machinations of foes, natural or supernatural; against wild beasts, the crocodile, the snake, and the leopard; and against wounds of lead and steel. they can produce transformation; destroy enemies; cause rain or drought, fine or foul weather; raise and humble, enrich and impoverish countries; and, above all things, they are sovereign to make man brave in battle. shortly before we entered banza nkaye a propitiation of the tutelary gods took place: coxswain deane had fired an enfield, and the report throughout the settlement was that our guns would kill from the river-bank. the nganga of congo-land, the mganga of the wasawahili and the uganga of the gaboon, exactly corresponds with m. michelet's sorcière of the middle ages, "physicienne," that is doctor for the people and poisoner; we cannot, however, apply in africa the adage of louis xiii.'s day, "to one wizard ten thousand witches." in the "muata cazembe" (pp. , et passim) we read "o ganga or o surjão;" the magician is there called "muroi," which, like "fite," is also applied to magic. the abbé proyart opines of his professional brother, "he is ignorant as the rest of the people, but a greater rogue,"--a pregnant saying. yet here "the man of two worlds" is not l'homme de révolution, and he suffices for the small "spiritual wants" of his flock. he has charge of the "kizila," the "chigella" of merolla and the "quistilla" of james barbot--anglicè putting things in fetish, which corresponds with the tahitian tapu or taboo. the african idea is, that he who touches the article, for instance, gold on the eastern coast of guinea, will inevitably come to grief. when "fetish is taken off," as by the seller of palm wine who tastes it in presence of the buyer, the precaution is evidently against poison. many of these "kizila" are self-imposed, for instance a water melon may never enter banza nokki, and, though slaves may eat bananas upon a journey, the master may not. others refuse the flesh of a fowl until it has been tasted by a woman. these rules are delivered to the young, either by the fetishman or the parents, and, when broken, they lead to death, doubtless often the consequence of strong belief. the nganga superintends, as grand inquisitor, the witch-ordeal, by causing the accused to chew red-wood and other drugs in this land ferax venenorum. park was right: "by witchcraft is meant pretended magic, affecting the lives and healths of persons, in other words it is the administering of poison." european "narratives of sorcery and magic" exactly explain the african idea, except in one point: there the witch "only suffered from not being able to prove to satan how much she burned to suffer for his sake;" here she has no satan. both european and african are the firmest believers in their own powers; they often confess, although knowing that the confession leads directly to torture and death, with all the diabolical ingenuity of which either race was capable. in tuckey's time a bargain was concluded by breaking a leaf or a blade of grass, and this rite it was "found necessary to perform with the seller of every fowl:" apparently it is now obsolete. finally, although the fetish man may be wrong, the fetish cannot err. if a contretemps occur, a reason will surely be found; and, should the "doctor" die, he has fallen a victim to a rival or an enemy more powerful than himself. a striking institution of the congo region is that of the jinkemba, which, curious to say, is unnoticed by tuckey. it is not, however, peculiar to the congo; it is the "semo" of the susus or soosoos of the windward coast, and the "purrah" of the sherbro-balloms or bulloms, rendered anglicè by "free-masonry." the novitiate there lasts for seven or eight years, and whilst the boys live in the woods food is placed for them by their relations: the initiation, indeed, appears to be especially severe. here all the free-born males are subjected to the wrongly called "mosaic rite." merolla tells us that the wizards circumcise children on the eighth day (like the jews), not out of regard for the law, but with some wicked end and purpose of their own. at any time between the ages of five and fifteen (eight to ten being generally preferred), boys are taken from their parents (which must be an exceeding comfort to the latter), and for a native year, which is half of ours, they must dwell in the vivála ya ankimba, or casa de feitiço, like that which we passed before reaching banza nokki. they are now instructed by the nganga in the practices of their intricate creed; they are taught the mysteries under solemn oaths, and, in fine, they are prepared for marriage. upon the congo they must eat no cooked food, living wholly upon roots and edibles; but they are allowed to enter the villages for provisions, and here they often appear armed with matchets, bayonets, and wooden swords. their faces and necks, bodies and arms, are ghastly white with chalk or ashes; the hair is left in its original jet, and the dingy lower limbs contrast violently with the ghostlike absence of colour above. the dress is a crinoline of palm-fronds, some fresh and green, others sere and brown; a band of strong mid-rib like a yellow hoop passed round the waist spreads out the petticoat like a farthingale, and the ragged ends depend to the knees; sometimes it is worn under the axillae, but in all cases the chalked arms must be outside. the favourite attitude is that of the rhodian colossus, with the elbows bent to the fore and the hands clasped behind the head. to increase their prestige of terror, the jinkomba abjure the use of human language, and, meeting a stranger, ejaculate with all their might, "hár-rr-rr-rr-rr!" and "jojolo! jojolo!" words mystic and meaningless. when walking in procession, they warn the profane out of the way by striking one slip of wood upon another. they are wilder in appearance than the hindu jogi or sanyasi, who also affects the use of ashes, but neglects that of the palm-thatch. it is certainly enough to startle a man of impressible nerves-- one, for instance, who cannot enter a room without a side-long glance at an unexpected coffin--to see these hideous beings starting with their savage cry from the depths of an african forest. evidently, also, such is the intention of the costume. contrasting the congoese with the goanese, we obtain a measure of difference between the african and the asiatic. both were portuguese colonies founded about the same time, and under very similar circumstances; both were catechized and christianized in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; both had governors and palaces, bishops and cathedrals, educational establishments and a large staff of missioners. but asia was not so inimical, mentally or bodily, to the european frame as africa; the goanese throve after a fashion, the mixed breed became the staple population, and thus it continues till this day. on the other hand the hamitic element so completely asserted its superiority over insititious japheth, that almost every trace has disappeared in a couple of centuries. there lingers, it is true, amongst the congoese of the coast-regions a something derived from the olden age, still distinguishing them from the wild people of the interior, and at times they break out naturally in the tongue of their conquerors. but it requires a practised eye to mark these minutiae. the congoese are passably brave amongst themselves; crafty and confined in their views, they carry "knowledge of life" as far as it is required, and their ceremonious intercourse is remarkable and complicated. they have relapsed into the analphabetic state of their ancestors; they are great at eloquence; and, though without our poetical forms, they have a variety of songs upon all subjects and they improvise panegyrics in honour of chiefs and guests. their dances have been copied in europe. without ever inventing the modes of the greeks, which are still preserved by the hindoos, they have an original music, dealing in harmony rather than in tune, and there are motives, of course all in the minor key, which might be utilized by advanced peoples; these sons of nature would especially supply material for that recitative which verdi first made something better than a vehicle for dialogue. hence the old missioners are divided in opinion; whilst some find the sound of the "little guitar," with strings of palm-thread and played with the thumbs of both hands, "very low, but not ungrateful," others speak of the "hellish harmony" of their neophytes' bands. the instrument alluded to is the nsambi or nchambi; four strings are attached to bent sticks springing from the box; it is the wambi of the shekyanis (du chaillu, chap. xii), but the bridge, like that of our violin, gives it an evident superiority, and great care and labour are required in the maker. this form of the universal marimba is a sounding-board of light wood, measuring eight inches by five; some eight to eleven iron keys, flat strips of thin metal, pass over an upright bamboo bridge, fixed by thongs to the body, and rest at the further end upon a piece of skin which prevents "twanging." the tocador or performer brings out soft and pleasing tones with the sides of the thumbs and fingers. they have drums and the bell-like cymbals called chingufu: m. valdez (ii. et passim), writes "clincufo," which he has taken from a misprint in monteiro and gamitto. the chingufu of east africa is a hollow box performed upon with a drum-stick of caoutchouc. the pipes are wooden tubes with sundry holes and a bridge below the mouth-piece; they are played over edge like our flutes. the "hellish harmonies" mostly result from an improvised band, one strumming the guitar, another clapping the sticks, and the third beating the bell-shaped irons that act as castanets. the language of the people on and near the congo river is called "fiote," a term used by old travellers to denote a black man as opposed to mundele (white), and also applied to things, as bondefiote or black baft. james barbot (p. ) gives specimens of some thirty-three words and the numerals in the "angoy language, spoken at cabinde," which proves to be that of the river. of these many are erroneous: for instance, "nova," to sleep (ku-núa); "sursu," a hen (nsusu): while "fina," scarlet; "bayeta," baize; and "fumu," tobacco, are corrupted portuguese. a young lad, "muleche" (moleque), father merolla's "molecchas, a general name among the negroes," for which douville prefers "moleke" (masc.) and "molecka" (fem.), is applied only to a slave, and in this sense it has extended west of the atlantic. in the numerals, "wale" ( ) should be "kwále," "quina" ( ) "kúyá," and "evona" ( ) "iowá." we may remark the pentenary system of the windward coast and the gaboon negroes; e.g., is "sambano" ("mose" and "tano" + ), and is "sambwale" ("mose" and "kwale") and so forth, whilst "kumi" ( ), possibly derived from neighbouring races, belongs to the decimal system. the first attempt at a regular vocabulary was made by douville, (vol. iii. p. ): "vocabidaire de la langue mogialoua, et des deux dialectcs principaux abunda (angolan) et congo" (fiote); it is also very incorrect. the best is that published in appendix no. i. to the congo expedition, under the name of "embomma;" we may quote the author's final remark: "this vocabulary i do not consider to be free from mistakes which i cannot now find time to discover. all the objects of the senses are, however, correct." m. parrot showed me a ms. left at banana point by a french medical officer, but little could be said in its praise. monteiro and gamitto (pp. - ) give seventeen "conguez" words, and the congo numerals as opposed to the "bundo." the fiote is a member of the great south african family; some missionaries argued, from its beauty and richness, that it had formerly been written, but of this there is no proof. m. malte- brun supposes the congoese dialects to indicate "a meditative genius foreign to the habitual condition of these people," ignoring the fact that the most complicated and laborious tongues are those of barbarous nations, whilst modern civilization in variably labours to simplify. it is copious; every place, tree, shrub, or plant used by the people has its proper name; it is harmonious and pleasing, abounding in vowels and liquids, destitute of gutturals, and sparing in aspirates and other harsh consonants. at the same time, like the rest of the family, it is clumsy and unwieldy, whilst immense prolixity and frequent repetition must develope the finer shades of meaning. its peculiarity is a greater resemblance to the zanzibarian kisawahili than any tongue known to me on the western coast: often a question asked by the guide, as "njia hápá?" (is this the road?) and "jina lako nani?" (what's your name?) was perfectly intelligible to me.the latter is a fair specimen of the peculiar euphony which i have noticed in "zanzibar" (vol. i. chap. x.). we should expect "jina jako," whereas this would offend the native ear. it requires a scholar-like knowledge of the tongue to apply the curious process correctly, and the self-sufficient critic should beware how he attempts to correct quotations from the native languages. i need hardly say that the speakers are foul-mouthed as the anglo-african of s'a leone and the "english" coast; they borrow the vilest words from foreign tongues; a spade is called a spade with a witness, and feminine relatives are ever the subject of abuse; a practice which, beginning in europe with the slav race, extends more or less throughout the old world. i specify the old world, because the so-called "indians" of north and south america apparently ignore the habit except where they have learned it from southern europe. finally, cursing takes the place of swearing, the latter being confined, i believe, to the scandinavians, the teutons, and their allied races. nothing can be more unpleasant than the portuguese spoken by the congoman. he transposes the letters lacking the proper sounds in his own tongue; for instance, "sinholo" (sinyolo) is "senhor;" "munyele" or "minyele" is "mulher;" "o luo" stands in lieu of "o rio," (the river); "rua" of "lua" (luna), and so forth. for to- morrow you must use "cedo" as "manhaa" would not be understood, and the prolixity of the native language is transferred to the foreign idiom. for instance, if you ask, "what do you call this thing?" the paraphrase to be intelligible would be, "the white man calls this thing so-and-so; what does the fiote call this thing?" sixteen words for six. i have elsewhere remarked how englishmen make themselves unintelligible by transferring to hindostani and other asiatic tongues the conciseness of their own idiom, in which as much is understood as is expressed. we can well understand the outraged feelings with which poor father cannecattim heard his sermons travestied by the abundo negroes do paiz or linguists, the effect of which was to make him compose his laborious dictionary in angolan, latin, and portuguese. his wrath in reflecting upon "estos homems ou estos brutos" drives the ecclesiastic to imitate the ill-conditioned layman who habitually addresses his slave as "o bruto! o burro! o bicho! o diabo!" when he does not apply the more injurious native terms as "konongwako" and "vendengwandi." it is only fair to confess that no race is harsher in its language and manners to its "black brethren," than the liberated africans of the english settlements. at banza nokki i saw the first specimen of a mundongo slave girl. the tribe is confounded with the mandingo (mandenga) moslems by the author of the "introduction to tuckey's journey" (p. ixxxi.); by tuckey (p. ), who also calls them mandonzo (p. ), and by prof. smith (p. ); but not by the accurate marsden (p. ). she described her tribe as living inland to the east and north- east of the congo peoples, distant two moons--a detail, of course, not to be depended upon. i afterwards met many of these "captives," who declared that they had been sold after defeats: a fine, tall race, one is equal to two congo men, and the boldness of demeanour in both sexes distinguishes them from other serviles. apparently under this name there are several tribes inhabiting lands of various elevations; some are coloured café au lait, as if born in a high and healthy region; others are almost jet black with the hair frightfully "wispy," like a mop. generally the head is bullet-shaped, the face round, the features negroid, not negro, and the hands and feet large but not ill- shaped. some again have the hausa mark, thread-like perpendicular cuts from the zygomatic arches running parallel with the chin; in other cases the stigmata are broad beauty-slashes drawn transversely across the cheeks to the jawbone, and forming with the vertical axis an angle of °. all are exceedingly fond of meat, and, like the kru-men, will devour it semi-putrified. the congoese declare them to be "papagentes" (cannibals), a term generally applied by the more advanced to the bushmen living beyond their frontier, and useful to deter travellers and runaways. they themselves declare that they eat the slain only after a battle--the sentimental form of anthropophagy. the slave- girl produced on this occasion was told to sing; after receiving some beads, without which she would not open her lips, we were treated to a "criard" performance which reminded me of the "heavenly muse" in the lake regions of central africa. the neighbours of the mundonoros are the mubangos, the muyanji (muyanzi?), and the mijolo, by some called mijere. possibly tuckey alludes to the mijolos when he tells us (p. ), that the "mandingo" slave whom he bought on the upper river, called his country "m'intolo." i have seen specimens of the three, who are so similar in appearance that a stranger distinguishes them only by the tattoo. no. gashes a line from the root of the hair to the commissure of the nose: no. has a patch of cuts, five in length and three in depth, extending from the bend of the eye- brow across the zygomata to the ear, and no. wears cuts across the forehead. i was shown a sword belonging to the mijolo: all declared that it is of native make; yet it irresistibly suggested the old two-handed weapon of europe, preserved by the bedawin and the eastern arabs, who now mostly derive it from sollingen. the long, straight, flexible, and double-edged blade is neatly mounted by the tang in a handle with a pommel, or terminating knob, of ivory; others prefer wood. the guard is very peculiar, a thin bar of iron springing from the junction of blade and grip, forming an open oval below, and prolonged upwards and downwards in two branches parallel with the handle, and protecting the hand. they dance, brandishing this weapon, according to the slaves, in the presence of their princes. i inquired vainly about the anzicos, anzichi, anzigui, anzigi, or anziki, whose king, makoko, the ruler of thirteen kingdoms, was placed by dapper north-west of monemugi (unyamwezi), and whom pigafetta (p. ) located close to the congo, and near his northern lake. "it is true that there are two lakes, not, however, lying east and west (ptolemy's system), but north and south of each other, and about miles asunder. the first is in south latitude °. the nile, issuing from it, does not, according to odoardo (duarte lopez), sink in the earth nor conceal itself, but, after flowing northwards, it enters the second lake, which is miles in extent, and is called by the natives a sea." if the tanganyika shall be found to connect with the luta nzige or mwutan lake, this passage will be found wonderfully truthful. the tanganyika's southern versant is now placed in south latitude ° ' ", or in round numbers °, and the other figures are nearly as correct. james barbot causes these anzikos to wander "almost through all africa," from nubia to the congo, like negro bedawin or scythians; the common food was man's flesh fattened for the market and eaten by the relatives, even of those who died diseased. their "capital," monsol, was built by d'anville, close to the equator in the very centre of africa (east longitude greenwich, ° ') hard by douville's "yanvo;" and the "opener of inner africa in " (pp. , , ), with equal correctness, caused them to "occupy the hills opposite to sundi, and extending downwards to emboma below the falls." mr. cooley ("ocean highways," june, ), now explains the word as a-nzi-co, "people not of the country," barbarians, bushmen. this kind of information, derived from a superficial knowledge of an angolan vocabulary, is peculiarly valueless. i doubt that a negative can thus be suffixed to a genitive. the name may simply have been a-nziko (man) of the back-settlement. in , mr. cooley writes: "the nation of the anziko (or ngeco):" in , "the anziki, north of congo:" in , "the micoco or king of the anziko"--und so weiter. what can we make of this geographical proteus? the first congo expedition who covered all the ground where the creator of the great central sea places the anzikos, never heard of them--nor will the second. not being then so well convinced of the nonexistence of the giaghi, giagas, gagas, or jagas as a nation, i inquired as vainly for those terrible cannibals who had gone the way of all the anzikos. according to lopez, battel, merolla, and others, they "consider human flesh as the most delicious food, and goblets of warm blood as the most exquisite beverage." this act on the part of savage warriors might have been a show of mere bravado. but i cannot agree with the editor of tuckey's "narrative," "from the character and disposition of the native african, it may fairly be doubted whether, throughout the whole of this great continent, a negro cannibal has any existence." the year was the augustan age of outrageous negrophilism and equally extreme anti- napoleonism. "if a french general" (introduction, p. i), "brutally seized the person and papers of a british naval officer, on his return from a voyage of discovery," who, i would ask, plundered and destroyed the fine botanical collection made at risk of health and life, during fifteen months of hard labour, by the learned palisot de beauvois, author of the "flore d'oware?" the "reviewer" of douville (p. ) as sensibly declares that cannibalism "has hitherto continually retired before the investigation of sober-minded, enlightened men," when, after a century or two of intercourse with white traders, it still flourishes on the bonny and new calabar rivers. we are glad to be rid of the jagas, a subject which has a small literature of its own; the savage race appeared everywhere like a "deus ex machina," and it became to intertropical africa what the "lost tribes" were and even now are in some cases, to asia and not rarely to europe. even the sensible mr. wilson ("west africa," p. ) has "no doubt of the jagas being the same people with the more modernly discovered pangwes" (fans); and this is duly copied by m. du chaillu (chap. viii.). m. valdez (ii. ) more sensibly records that the first jaga established in portuguese territory was called colaxingo (kolashingo), and that his descendants were named "jagas," like the egyptian pharaohs, the roman ceesars, the austrian kaisers, and the russian czars: he also reminds us (p. ) that the chief of the bangalas inhabiting cassange (= kasanjí) was the jaga or ruler par excellence. early on the morning of september , i was aroused by a "bob" in the open before us. we started up, fearing that some death by accident had taken place: the occasion proved, on the contrary, to be one of ushering into life. the women were assembled in a ring round the mother, and each howled with all the might of her lungs, either to keep off some evil spirit or to drown the sufferer's cries. in some parts of africa, the gold coast for instance, it is considered infamous for a woman thus to betray her pain, but here we are amongst a softer race. chapter xii. preparations for the march. gidi mavunga, finding me in his power, began, like a thoroughbred african, to raise obstacles. we must pass through the lands of two kings, the mfumo ma vivi (bibbie of tuckey) and the mfumu nkulu or nkuru (cooloo). the distance was short, but it would occupy five days, meaning a week. before positively promising an escort he said it would be necessary to inspect my outfit; i at once placed it in the old man's hands, the better to say, "this is not mine, ask gidi mavunga for it." my patience had been severely tried on first arrival at banza nokki. from ruler to slave every one begged for cloth and rum, till i learned to hate the names of these necessaries. besides the five recognized kings of the district, who wore black cloth coats, all the petty chiefs of the neighbourhood flocked in, importunate to share the spoils. a tariff, about one-third higher than at boma, was set upon every article and, if the most outrageous price was refused, the seller, assuming an insipid expression of countenance, declared that great white men travelled with barrels, not with bottles of aguardente, and that without liberality it would be impossible to leave the village. nsundi, the settlement above the falls, was a journey of two moons, and none of the ten "kings" on the way would take less than nessudikira's "dash." congo grande, as the people call são salvador, was only four marches to the e.s.e.; the road, however, was dangerous, and an escort of at least fifty men would be necessary. but when i was "upon the head of gidi mavunga" matters changed for the better. shortly after he took charge, one tetu mayella, "king" of neprat, accompanied by some twenty followers, entered the village with a view to the stranger's rum: by referring them to the new owner they perforce contented themselves after three hours' "parliamenting," with a single bottle. the ruler of nokki wanted, besides gin and cloth, a pair of shoes for his poor feet, which looked clad in alligator's skin; i referred him to his father, and he got little by that motion. on the evening of september , gidi mavunga, who had been visiting his "small country," returned, and declared himself ready to set out. he placed before me ten heaps, each of as many ground-nuts, and made me understand that, for visiting nsundi and s. salvador, he would take fifty short "pieces" (of cloth) for himself and the same number for his slaves; one moiety to be advanced before the first trip to the cataracts and the rest to follow. for half my store of beads he undertook to ration his men; a work which would have given us endless trouble. as i agreed to all his conditions he promised to move on the next day- -without the least intention of carrying out any one of his conditions. these people are rich, and not easily tempted to hard work. during the french émigration, the district of banza nokki drove slaves to the value of , dollars per annum, and the dollar is to the african the pound sterling of europe. it is one of the hundred out-stations which supplied the main dépôts, boma and porto da lenha. small parties went out at certain seasons provided with rum, gunpowder, and a little cloth; and either bought the "chattels" or paid earnest money, promising to settle the whole debt at their villages. gidi mavunga, like most of the elders, was perfectly acquainted with the routes to nsundi, s. salvador, and other frontier places, where the bush people brought down their criminals and captives for barter. beyond those points his information was all from hearsay. besides the large stores in their "small countries," the middle- men have a multitude of retainers, who may at any moment be converted into capital. yet "slave" is a term hardly applicable to such "chattels," who, as a rule, are free as their lords. they hold at their disposal all that the master possesses, except his wives; they sleep when they choose, they work when they like; they attend to their private affairs, and, if blamed or punished, they either run away, as at zanzibar, to their own country, or they take sanctuary with some neighbouring mfumo, who, despite the inevitable feud, is bound by custom to protect them. cold and hunger, the torments of the poor in europe, are absolutely unknown to them, and their condition contrasts most favourably with the "vassus" and the "servus" of our feudal times. their wives and children are their own: the master cannot claim the tyrannous marriage-rights of the baron; no "wedding-dish" is carried up to the castle; nor is the eldest born "accounted the son of the serf's lord, for he perchance it was who begat him." the brutality of slavery, i must repeat, is mainly the effect of civilization. "i shall never forget," says captain boteler, "the impatient tosses of the head and angry looks displayed by a-- lady--when the subject was canvassed. �a negro, a paltry negro, ever understand or conform to the social tie of wedlock! no, never! never!' yet this lady was an english-woman." and when james barbot's supercargo begins to examine his negroes like cattle he is begged, for decency's sake, to do it in a private place, "which shows these blacks are very modest." it rather proved the whites to be the reverse. at . a.m. on september , the "moleques" seized our luggage, and we suddenly found ourselves on the path. gidi mavunga, wearing pagne and fetish-bag, and handling a thin stick in which two bulges had been cut, led us out of banza nokki, and took a s.s.w. direction. the uneven ground was covered with a bitter tomato (nenga) and with the shrub which, according to herodotus, bears wool instead of fruit. i sent home specimens of this gossypium arboreum, which everywhere grows wild and which is chiefly used for wicks. there is scant hope of cotton-culture amongst a people whose industry barely suffices for ground-nuts. the stiff clay soil everywhere showed traces of iron, and the guide pointed out a palm-tree which had been split by the electric fluid, and a broad, deep furrow, several feet long, ending in a hole. the nzazhi (lightning) is as dangerous and as much dreaded on these hills as in uganda: the south-west trade meets the land wind from the north-east; strata of clouds in different states of electricity combine, says the popular theory, to produce the thunder and lightning which accompany rain like the storms upon the mountains of yemen. after ' (- . miles) we reached our destination, banza chinguvu, the head-quarters of gidi mavunga. as we entered it he pointed to a pot full of greasy stuff under a dwarf shed, saying, "isso è meu deus:" it was in fact his baka chya mazinga. beyond it stood the temple of nbambi; two suspended pieces of wood, cut in the shape of horns, bore monkey skins on both sides of a dead armadillo, an animal supposed to attract lightning when alive, and to repel it after death. the banza was beautifully situated on a dwarf platform, catching the full force of the sea-breeze, and commanding to the north- west a picturesque glimpse of the "waters rippling, flowing, flashing along the valley to the sea;" a mountain tarn representing the mighty stream. on the right lay fields, dotted with papaw-trees, and plantations of maize and manioc, thur (cajanus), and sweet potatoes, a vegetable now common, but not noticed by tuckey; on the left, a deep ravine, densely forested with noble growth, and supplying the best of water, divides it from tadi ja mfimo, a pile of rock on the opposite hill-side; here lay the itombo village, belonging to gidi mavunga's eldest son. beyond it, the tree-clad heights, rolling away into the distance, faded from blue-brown to the faintest azure, hardly to be distinguished from the empyrean above. the climate of these breezy uplands is superior even to that of banza nokki, which lies some feet lower; and the nights are sensibly cooler. a few fathoms of altitude here make a surprising difference. the little valleys with their chalet-like huts reminded me of the maroro and kisanga basins, in the sister formation, the east african ghats, but now we have a hill-climate without ague and fever. our parallel is that of yorukan abokuta, where the people are anti-oeci, both being about ° distant from the line,-- those north, these south. there the bush is fetid, and the clammy air gives a sense of deadly depression; here the atmosphere is pure, the land is open, and there is enjoyment in the mere sense of life. the effete matter in the blood and the fatty degeneration of the muscles, the results of inactivity, imperfect respiration, and f. po, were soon consumed by the pure oxygen of the highland air. i can attribute this superiority of the congo region only to the labours of an old civilization now obsolete; none but a thick and energetic population could have cleared off the forest, which at one time must have covered their mountains. the banza consists of about fifty cottages, which are being new- thatched before the rains, and the population may number . our host assigned to us one of his own huts; it fronted west, and was a facsimile of that which we had just left. the old fox, determined not to be "taken alive," has provided his earth with three holes, opening to the north, to the east, and to the west. we often detected him in the "ben," the matrimonial sanctum, listening to private conversations which he could not understand. gidi mavunga is decidedly a "serious person." the three walls round the standing bedstead are hung with charms and amulets, like the sacred pictures in country parts of europe; and at the head is his "mavunga," of which tuckey says (p. ), "each village has a grand kissey (nkisi), or presiding divinity, named mevonga:" it is an anthropoid log, about three feet high, red, white, and black, the former colour predominating. two bits of looking-glass represent the eyes, the nose is patulous, as though offended by evil savour; the upper lip is drawn up in disdain, the under overlaps the chin; and a little mirror is inserted into the umbilical region. mavunga's dress is represented by an english billy-cock hat; while all kinds of "medicines," calabashes, and a coarse knife depend from his neck to his shoulders. the figures at the door are generally called "ngolowándá." it is said, i believe, of the englishwoman- "if she will, she will, you may depend on't; if she won't, she won't, and there's an end on't." i may safely predicate the same of the negro, who owns, like the goose, a "singularly inflexible organization." whenever he can, he will, and he must, have his head. gidi mavunga would not even break his fast before touching the cloth and beads, which are to pay for guidance and carriage. the hut-door was closed, and in half an hour all was settled to every one's satisfaction. yet the veteran did not disdain a little rascality. awaiting his opportunity, he tossed into a dark corner a little bundle of two fancy cloths which i had given the "linguistero" and, when detected, he shamelessly declared that such people have no right to trade. finally, our departure was settled for the next morning, and the women at once began their preparations. although they have sperm- candles, torches are preferred for the road; odoriferous gums are made up, as in the gaboon, with rags or splints of bark; hence the old writers say, "instead of putting wicks into the torches, they put torches into the wicks." the travelling foods are mostly boiled batatas (sweet potatoes), kwanga, a hard and innutritious pudding-like preparation of cassava which the "expedition" (p. ) calls "coongo, a bitter root, that requires four days' boiling to deprive it of its pernicious quality;" this is probably the black or poisonous manioc. the national dish, "chindungwa," would test the mouth of any curry-eater in the world: it is composed of boiled ground-nuts and red peppers in equal proportions, pounded separately in wooden mortars, mixed and squeezed to drain off the oil; the hard mass, flavoured with salt or honey, will keep for weeks. the bees are not hived in congo-land, but smoked out of hollow trees: as in f. po and camarones peaks, they rarely sting, like the harmless angelito of the caraccas, "silla," or saddleback; which humboldt ("personal narrative," chap. xiii.) describes as a "little hairy bee, a little smaller than the honey-bee of the north of europe." captain hall found the same near tampico; and a hive-full was sent to the blind but ingenious francis huber of geneva, who died in . this seems to be the case with the busy hymenopter generally in the highlands of africa; the lowland swarms have been the terror of travellers from mungo park's day to that of the first east african expedition. about noon we were visited by the confidential slaves of a neighbouring chief, who prospectively welcomed us to his territory. these men were gaudily attired in cast-off clothes, and in the crimson night-caps formerly affected by the english labourer: on the mountains, where the helmet is confined to royalty, it is the head-dress used for state occasions. they sat in the hut, chatting, laughing, and discussing palm wine by the gallon, till they had their wicked will in the shape of a bottle of gin; after this, they departed with many low congés. it was a study to see gidi mavunga amidst the vassals and serfs of his own village. he had no moated castle, no "quinquengrogne;" but his habitation was grander far,--that glorious hill-side, with all its prospects of mountain and river, field and forest, valley and village. as he sat upon the mat under his little piazza, all the dependants gathered in an outer semicircle, the children, dogs, and cats forming an inner chord. a crowd of "moleques" placed before him three black pots, one containing a savoury stew, the others beans and vegetables, which he transferred to a deep platter, and proved himself no mean trencherman. the earthenware is of native make, by no means ornamental, but useful because it retains the heat; it resembles the produce of the gold coast, and the "pepper-pot" platter of the west indies. his cup was filled as fast as he drained the palm wine, and, at times, he passed a huge mouthful to a small son or daughter, smiling at the serious and awkward attempts at deglutition. the washing of hands and mouth before and after feeding shows progress after tuckey's day (p. ). we were not asked to join him: an african, when upon a journey, will beg for everything he sees you eat or drink, but there is no return in kind. i have read of negro hospitality, but it has never been my fate to witness an approach to that virtue. the chief will, it is true, quarrel with you if his house be passed without a visit; but his object in taking you in is to make all he can of you. if a purse be pulled out, he waxes wroth, because he wishes to secure at once the reputation of generosity and the profits of a present doubling the worth of a regular "addition." when gidi mavunga rose from his meal, the elder dependants took his place; the junior bipeds followed, and the remnants were thrown to the quadrupeds. it was a fair copy in black of a baronial and mediæval life. the dogs were not neglected during the meal; but over-eagerness was repressed by a stout truncheon lying handily near the old negro jarl. the animals are small and stunted, long-nosed and crooked-limbed, with curly tails often cut, sharp ears which show that they have not lost the use of the erecting muscles, and so far wild that they cannot bark. the colour is either black and white or yellow and white, as in stambul and india. overrun with ticks and foul with mange, they are too broken-spirited to rob, except by secretly sneaking into the huts, and, however often beaten off, they return to the charge like sitting hens. the people prize these wretched tikes, because they are ever ready to worry a stranger, and are useful in driving game from the bush. yet they barbarously ill-treat them. the hungry cats are as poor a breed as the pure english, and, though no one feeds them, these domesticated tigerkins swarm. the only happy pets are the parrots. every village swarms with hogs, the filthy wealth of the old saxon proprietor, and their habits are disgusting as their forms are obscene. every anglo-indian will understand what i mean. my memory of "congo chop" is all in its favour: i can recommend it even to "fin bee." the people of s'a leone declare that your life is safe when you can enjoy native food. perhaps this means that, during the time required to train the palate, strangers will have escaped their "seasoning" fevers and chills. but foreigners will certainly fare better and, cæteris paribus, outlive their brother whites, when they can substitute african stews for the roast and boiled goat and cow, likest to donkey- meat, for the waxy and insipid potato and for heavy pudding and tart, with which their jaded stomach is laden, as if it had the digestion of north latitude °. it is popularly believed that the germans, who come from the land of greatest extremes, live longer at the white man's grave than the english, whereas the spaniards are the most short-lived, one consul per annum being the normal rate. perhaps the greater "adaptability" of the teuton explains the cause. the evening began with a game of ball in the large open space amongst the houses forming the village square. the implement was a roll of palm-coir tightly bound with the central fibre of the plantain-leaf. the players, two parties of some twenty slaves, of all ages and sizes, mingled, each side striving to catch the ball, and with many feints and antics to pass it on to a friend. when it fell out of bounds, the juniors ran to pick it up with frantic screams. it was interesting, as showing the difference between the highlander and the lowlander; one might pass years on the congo plains without seeing so much voluntary exertion: yet a similar game of ball is described by the rev. mr. waddell ("twenty-nine years in the west indies and central africa," chap. xvii. london, nelsons, ). the evening ended, as it often does before a march, when rest is required, with extra hard work, a drinking bout deep as the rhineland baron's in the good old time, and a dance in which both sexes joined. as there were neither torches nor moon, i did not attend; the singing, the shouting, and the drumming, which lasted till midnight, spoke well for the agility and endurance of the fair montagnardes. what lightens gidi mavunga's steps is the immediate prospect of the munlola or preliminary showers, which, beginning in mid- september, last, with a certain persistence of fall, till october. during the munlola, the sea-breeze is silent, and the sky is clad with a very thin mist, which, however, supplies abundant downfalls. the year in the lower congo corresponds with that of the gaboon in practice, if not in theory, and the storms are furious as those of yoruba, where the seasons are, of course, inverted, the great rains extending from may to august. the climate is capricious, as everywhere about the equator, and the nearer the river the heavier are the showers. the people double their lives by reckoning the rains as one year, and the dries as another: when the old missionaries wished to explain that the saviour offered himself for the sins of man at the age of thirty- three, they said that he was sixty-six seasons old. after the light rains of the autumnal equinox, come the mvula za chintomba, the "chuvas grandes" of the portuguese, lasting to the end of november. they are heavy, accompanied by violent tornadoes and storms, greatly feared by the people. the moisture of the atmosphere, not being gradually condensed by forests, must be precipitated in violent downfalls, and this is perhaps the principal evil of clearing the country. december begins the "little dries," which extend to february and march; then set in the rains of the vernal equinox, with furious discharges of electricity; june is the wettest month on the highlands, but not on the lower river. in mid-july commence the "middle-dries," here called ngondi asivu (tuckey's "gondy assivoo"); upon the upper river this cacimbo lasts between april and september; when it passes over the bush is burned, and the women hoe the ground to receive its seed. carli well describes this season when he says:- -"the winter of the kingdom of congo is the mild spring or autumn of italy; it is not subject to rains, but every morning there falls a dew which fertilizes the earth." this meteor was not observed on the highlands of banza nokki and nkulu; it is probably confined to the low country, where i found it falling heavily. chapter xiii. the march to banza nkulu. but revelry at night brings morning headache, and we did not set out, as agreed, at dawn. by slow degrees the grumbling, loitering party was mustered. the chiefs were gidi mavunga, head guide, and his son papagayo, a dull quiet body; chico mpamba, "french landlord" of banza nokki, and my interpreter nchama chamvu. fourteen armed moleques carried our hammocks and our little viaticum in the shape of four bottles of present-gin, two costa- finas, (= twenty-four yards of fancy cotton), and fourteen fathoms of satin-stripe, the latter a reserved fund. the boy "lendo," whose appropriate name means "the go," bore a burden of his own size all day, and acted as little foot-page at the halt. the "gentlemen" were in full travelling costume. slung by a thong to the chief guide's left shoulder were a tiger-cat skin, cardamom-sheaths and birds' beaks and claws clustering round a something in shape like the largest german sausage, the whole ruddled with ochre: this charm must not be touched by the herd; a slave-lad, having unwittingly offended, knelt down whilst the wearer applied a dusty big toe between his eyebrows. papagayo had a bag of grass-cloth and bits of cane, from which protruded strips of leather and scarlet broadcloth. at . a.m. on saturday, september , we exchanged the fields surrounding banza chinguvu for a ridge or narrow plateau trending to the north-east and bending to the magnetic north. a few minutes led to a rock-slope, fit only for goat-hoofs or nude- footed natives. winding along the hill-sides, we passed out of the nokki territory into that of ntombo, the property of mfumo nelongo: here we descended into a little vale or gorge bright as verdure could make it-- "arborets and flowers imborder'd on each bank" of a bubbling brook, a true naiad of the hills, which ran to the embrace of the mighty stream; it characteristically stained its bed with iron. on our right was a conspicuous landmark, zululu ke sombe, a tall rock bearing the semblance of an elephant from the north-east, visible from the congo's right bank and commanding a view of all the hills. banza vivi, our first destination, perching high on the farther side of the blue depression, bore due north. we then struck the roughest of descents, down broken outcrops and chines of granite--no wonder that the women have such grand legs. this led us into a dark green depression where lay banza chinsavu, the abode of king nelongo. our course had been three miles to the north-north-east. nothing can be more charming than the site, a small horseshoe valley, formed by a wady or fiumara, upon whose raised left bank stands the settlement, sheltered by palms, plantations, and wild figs. eastward is a slope of bare rock polished by the rain- torrents; westward rise the grassy hills variegated with bush and boulder. we next crossed a rocky divide to the north and found a second basin also fertilized by its own stream; here the cactus and aloes, the vegetation of the desert, contrasted with half-a- dozen shades of green, the banana, the sycamore, the egg-plant, the sweet potato, the wild pepper, and the grass, whose colours were paling, but not so rapidly as in the lower lands. we dismounted in state from our tipoias at the verandah of an empty house, where a chair had been placed; and we prepared for the usual delay and display. the guides will not leave these villages unvisited lest a "war" result; all the chiefs are cousins and one must not monopolize the plunder. a great man takes an hour to dress, and nelongo was evidently soothing the toils of the toilette with a musical bellows called an accordeon. he sent us some poor, well-watered msámbá (palm toddy), and presently he appeared, a fat, good-natured man, as usual, ridiculously habited. he took the first opportunity of curtly saying in better portuguese than usual, "there is no more march to-day!" this was rather too much for a somewhat testy traveller, when he changed his tone, begged me not to embroil him with a powerful neighbour, and promised that we should set out that evening. he at once sent for provisions, fowls, and a small river-fish, sugar-cane, and a fine bunch of s. thomé bananas. about noon appeared chico furano, son of the late chico de ouro, in his quality of "english linguister;" a low position to which want of "savvy" has reduced him. his studies of our tongue are represented by an eternal "yes!" his wits by the negative; he boasts of knowing how to "tratar com o branco" and, declining to bargain, he robs double. he is a short, small, dark man with mountaineer legs, a frightful psora, and an inveterate habit of drink. he saluted his superior, nelongo, with immense ceremony, dating probably from the palmy times of the mwani-congo. equals squat before one another, and shaking hands crosswise clap palms. chico furano kneels, places both "ferients" upon the earth and touches his nose-tip; he then traces three ground-crosses with the jovian finger; again touches his nose; beats his "volæ" on the dust, and draws them along the cheeks; then he bends down, applying firstly the right, secondly the left face side, and lastly the palms and dorsa of the hands to mother earth. both superior and inferior end with the sakila or batta-palmas,[fn# ] three bouts of three claps in the best of time separated by the shortest of pauses, and lastly a "tiger" of four claps. the ceremony is more elaborate than the "wallowings" and dust- shovellings described by ibn batuta at the asiatic courts, by jobson at tenda,by chapperton at oyo,by denham amongst the mesgows, and by travellers to dahome and to the cazembe. yet the system is virtually the same in these distant kingdoms, which do not know one another's names. chico furano brought a mundongo slave, a fine specimen of humanity, some six feet high, weighing perhaps thirteen stone, all bone and muscle, willing and hard-working, looking upon the congo men as if they were women or children. he spoke a few words of portuguese, and with the master's assistance i was able to catechize him. he did not deny that his people were "papagentes," but he declared that they confined the practice to slain enemies. he told a number of classical tales about double men, attached, not like the siamese twins, but dos-à-dos; of tribes whose feet acted as parasols, the plinian sciapodæ and the persian tasmeh- pa, and of mermen who live and sleep in the inner waters--i also heard this from m. parrot, a palpable believer. he described his journey down the great river, and declared that beyond his country's frontier the nzadi issues from a lake which he described as having a sea-horizon, where canoes lose sight of land, and where they are in danger from violent storms; he described the latter with great animation, and his descriptions much reminded me of dibbie, the "dark lake." probably this was genuine geography, although he could not tell the name of the inner sea, the achelunda of old cosmographers. tuckey's map also lays down in n. lat. ° to ° and in e. long. (g.) ° to ° a great swamp draining to the south; and his "narrative" (p. ) tells us that some thirty days above banza mavunda, which is to miles above the yellala, "the river issues by many small streams from a great marsh or lake of mud." this would suggest a reservoir alternately flooded and shrinking; possibly lacustrine bays and the bulges formed by the middle course of the lualaba. despite the promise, we were delayed by king nekorado, whose town, palabala, lies at some distance, and who, negro-like, will consult only his own convenience. in the afternoon we were visited by a royal son, who announced that his royal father feared the heat, but would appear with the moon, which was equivalent to saying that we might expect him on the morrow. he is known to be a gueux, and gidi mavunga boasts of having harried and burned sundry of his villages, so he must make up by appearance for deficient reality. his appearance was announced by the mpungi, the egyptian zagharit, the persian kil; this "lullilooing" in the bush country becomes an odd moaning howl like the hyaena's laugh. runners and criers preceded the hammock, which he had probably mounted at the first field; a pet slave carried his chair, covered with crimson cloth, and frédérique his "linguister" paced proudly by its side. after robing himself in nelongo's house, king nekorado held a levee under the shadiest fig, which acted bentang-tree; all the moleques squatting in a demi-lune before the presence. a short black man, with the round eyes, the button-like nose, the fat circular face, and the weakly vanishing chin which denote the lower type of congoese, he coldly extended a chimpanzee's paw without rising or raising his eyes, in token that nothing around him deserved a glance. i made him au-fait as to my intentions, produced, as "mata-bicho," a bottle of gin, and sent a dash of costa-fina, to which a few yards of satin-stripe were thrown in. the gin was drunk with the usual greed, and the presents were received with the normal objections. "why should not i, a king like nessudikira, receive a �dash' equal to his?" "he is my host, i pay him for bed and board!" "we are all cousins; why shall one be treated better than the other?" "as you please! you have received your due, and to-day we march." after this i rose and returned to my hut ready for the inevitable "row." it was not long coming; the new arrivals set up the war-song, and gidi mavunga thought it time to make a demonstration. drawing an old cutlass and bending almost double, he began to rush about, slashing and cutting down imaginary foes, whilst his men looked to their guns. the greenhorn would have expected a regular stand- up fight, ending in half-a-dozen deaths, but the papagayo snatched away his father's rusty blade, and chico furano, seizing the warrior's head, despite the mildest of resistance, bent it almost to the ground. thus valour succumbed to numbers. "he is a great man," whispered my interpreter, "and if they chaunt their battle-song, he must show them his bravery." the truly characteristic scene ended in our being supplied with some fourteen black pots full of flesh, fowl, beans, and manioc, together with an abundance of plantains and sugar-cane; a select dish was "put in fetish" (set aside) for gidi mavunga, and the friendly foes all sat down to feast. the querelle d'allemand ended with a general but vain petition for "t'other bottle." fahrenheit showed ° in the shade, as we bade adieu to the little land-bay, and made for the high rugged wall to the north- north-east separating the river valley from the inner country. on the summit we halted to enjoy the delicious sea-breeze with its ascending curve, and the delightful prospect far below. some , feet beneath us appeared the nzadi, narrowed to a torrent, and rushing violently down its highly inclined bed, a straight reach running east and west, in length from four and a half to five miles. as we fronted north, the morro (cliff) kala fell bluff towards its blue bight, the mayumba bay of the chart, on our left; to the right a black gate formed by twin cliffs shut out the upper stream from view. the panorama of hill-fold and projection, each bounded by deep green lines, which argued torrents during the rains; the graceful slopes sinking towards the river and indenting the bed and the little tree-clad isle, zun gáchyá idí (tuckey's "zunga tooly calavangoo") hugging the northern side, where the lufu torrent adds its tribute to the waters, convinced me that the charms of congo scenery had not been exaggerated. yet the prospect had its element of sadness; the old ruffian, gidi mavunga, recounted how he had burned this place and broken that, where palm-clumps, grass-clearings, and plantations lying waste denoted the curse of ham upon the land. our course now wound north-eastwards along hill-shoulders, rich in flowery plants and scented mimosa. after two hours' walking, we came suddenly upon the morro or cliff of the river-trough, now about , feet deep. here the prospect again shifted; the black gate opened, showing the lowest of the long line of rapids called borongwa ya vivi, with the natives and their canoes, like flies upon bits of straw. on the southern bank was a small perennial influent, lined with bright green above, and with chocolate brown below, within some twenty yards of its mouth. it arises, they say, near s. salvador, and is not navigable, although in places it bears canoes. the people call it npozo, possibly it represents the s. salvador river of old travellers. the distance was three direct or five indirect miles north of the stony cone, zululu ke sombe. the descent was a malevoie, over slabs and boulders, loose stones and clayey ground, slippery as ice after rain. the moleques descended like chamois within twenty minutes: selim and i, with booted feet, took double the time, but on return we ascended it in forty-five minutes. viewed from below, the base rests upon cliffs of gneiss, with debris and quartz in masses, bands and pebbles, pure and impure, white and rusty. upon it rises a stratum of ferruginous clay, with large hard-heads of granite, gneiss, and schist, blocks of conglomerate, and nodules of ironstone. higher still is the bank of yellow clay, capped with shallow humus. the waving profile is backed by steep hills, with rocky sides and long ridges of ground, the site of the palm- hidden banzas. reaching the base, a heap of tumbled boulders, we crossed in a canoe the mouth of the npozo to a sandy cove in the southern bank, the terminus of river navigation. the people called it unyenge assiku: i cannot but suspect that this is the place where tuckey left his boats, and which he terms "nomaza cove." the name is quite unknown, and suggests that the interpreters tried to explain by "no majia" (water) that here the voyage must end. off this baylet are three rocky islets, disposed in a triangle, slabs collected by a broken reef, and collectively known as zunga nuapozo; the clear-way is between them and the southern bank, which is partly provided with a backwater; the northern three quarters of the bed show something like a scour and a rapid. zunga chya ingololo, the northernmost and smallest, bears a single tree, and projects a bar far into the stream: the central and westernmost is a rock with a canoe passage between it and the southern and largest, zunga chya tuvi. the latter has three tree- clumps; and a patch of clean white sand on its western side measures the daily rise of the water, eight inches to a foot, and shows the highest level of the flood, here twelve to thirteen feet. the fishermen use it as a drying-ground for their game. they also crowd every day to two sandy covelets on the southern bank, separated by a tongue of rough boulders. here naked urchins look on whilst their fathers work, or aid in drying the nets, or lie prone upon the sand, exposing their backs to the broiling sun. the other denizens of the place are fish-eagles, who sit en faction upon the topmost branches of withered trees. i saw only two kinds of fish, one small as a minnow, and the other approaching the size of a herring. up stream they are said to be much larger. they are not salted, but smoked or sun-dried when the weather serves: stuffed with chillies and fried with oil, they are good eating as the kinnam of the gold coast. we prepared to bivouac under a fine shady saffu, or wild fig, a low, thick trunk whose dark foliage, fleshy as the lime-leaf, so often hangs its tresses over the river, and whose red berries may feed man as well as monkey. the yellow flowers of hypericum, blooming around us, made me gratefully savour our escape from mangrove and pandamus. about sunset a gentle shower, the first of the season, caused the fisher-boys to dance with joy; it lasted two good hours, and then it was dispersed by a strong westerly breeze. canoes and lights flashed before our eyes during half the night; and wild beasts, answering one another from rock to rock, hundreds of feet above us, added a savage, african feature to the goodly mise-en-scène. arising early next morning, i was assured that it is necessary to cross the stream in order to reach the cataracts. tuckey did so, but further inquiry convinced me that it is a mistake to march along the northern bank. of course, in skirting the southern side, we should not have approached so near the stream, where bluffs and débris rendered travelling hopeless. the amiable ichthyophagi agreed for two fathoms of fancy cloth to ferry us across the river, which is here half a mile broad. the six-knot current compels canoes to run up the left shore by means of its backwater, and, when crossing, to make allowance for the drift downwards. the aneroid now showed feet of absolute altitude, and about sixty-five feet above the landing-place of banza nokki; the distance along the stream is fourteen miles, and thus the fall will be about five feet per mile below the borongwa ya vivi. we could see from a level the "smaller rapids of vivi" bursting through their black gate with angry foam, flashing white from side to side. no canoe could shoot this "cachoeira," but i do not think that a nile dahabiyah or a brazilian ajôjô would find great difficulty. between us and the rapids, the concavity of the southern bank forms a bight or bay. the vortices, in which tuckey's sloop was whirled round despite oars and sails, and in whose hollow the punt entirely disappeared, "so that the depression must have been three or four feet deep," were nowhere seen at this fuller season. the aspect of the surface is that of every large deep stream with broken bottom; the water boils up in ever widening domes, as though a system of fountains sprang from below. each centre is apparently higher than its circle; it spreads as if a rock had been thrown into it, and the outer rim throws off little eddies and whirls no larger than a thimble. the mirrory surface of the lower river thus becomes mottled with light and shade, and the reflected image of the trough-cliff is broken into the most fantastic shapes. fifteen minutes of hard paddling landed us at selele, a stony point between two sandy baylets: amongst the mass of angular boulders a tree again showed the highest flood-mark to be feet. here for the first time i remarked the black glaze concerning which so much has been written.[fn# ] the colour is a sunburnt black, tinted ferruginous red like meteoric stones, and it is generally friable, crumbling under the nails. it tastes strongly of iron, which flavours almost every spring in the country, yet the most likely places do not show this incrustation. sometimes it looks like a matrix in which pudding- stone has been imbedded; it may be two or three lines in thickness and it does not colour the inside. at other times it hardly measures the thickness of paper, coating the gneiss slabs like plumbago. humboldt tells us ("personal narrative," ii. , bohn), that the "indians" of the atures declare the rocks to be burnt (carbonized) by the sun's rays, and i have often found the same black glaze upon the marly sandstones that alternate with calcareous formations where no stream ever reached them--for instance, on the highlands of judea, between jerusalem and the dead sea; in inner istria, and in most countries upon the borders of the mediterranean. leaving selele, we ascended a steep hill with many glissadès, the effect of last night's rain. these hammock-journeys are mostly equivalent to walking and paying for carriage; it would be cruelty to animals were one to ride except when entering the villages. after threading for half an hour lanes of grass, we were received in a little village of the banza vivi district by nessala, linguistère to king luvungungwete. the guest room was furnished with every luxury; hides of a fine antelope described as the kudu; cruets, basins, bottles, and other vases; "lustre mugs," john andersons and toby philpots. a good calabash, full of "freshening wine more bounteous far than all the frantic juice which bacchus pours," was produced, although the drought and scarcity of june rain had dried the palms. before i outstretched myself, the fairer half of the population sent a message to say that they had never seen a white man: what less could be done than to distribute a few beads and pat the children, who screamed like sucking pigs and "squirmed" like young monkeys? the chrononhotonthologus of a king came in the afternoon with a tail of a hundred vertebræ: he was a milder specimen than usual; he had neither mambrino's helmet nor beadle's cloak, and perhaps his bashfulness in the presence of strangers arose from a consciousness that his head-gear and robes were not in keeping with his station. but he did not fail to grumble at his "dash;" indeed, he must be more than african who shall say, "hold! enough." he vouchsafed a small return in fowls and "beneficent manioc," and sent with us three slaves, to serve, not as guides, but as a basis for a separate charge. after sunset all was made ready for the batuque. the ball-room was the village square; the decorations were the dense trees; the orchestra consisted of two drums, a grande caisse eight feet and a half long, placed horizontally, and a smaller specimen standing on a foot like that of an old-fashioned champagne-glass; the broader ends were covered with deer skins, upon which both hands perform; and the illuminations were flaming heaps of straw, which, when exhausted, were replaced by ground-nuts spitted upon a bamboo splint. this contrivance is far simpler than a dip- candle, the arachis is broken off as it chars, and, when the lamp dims, turning it upside down causes a fresh flow of oil. the ruder sex occupied one half of the ring, and the rest was appropriated to dame and damsel. the batuque is said to be the original cachucha; barbot calls it a danse des filoux, and it has the merit of perfectly expressing, as captain cook's companions remarked of the performances in the south sea islands, what it means. the hero of the night was chico mpamba; he must have caused a jealous pang to shoot through many a masculine bosom. with bending waist, arms gracefully extended forwards, and fingers snapping louder than castanets; with the upper half of the body fixed as to a stake, and with the lower convulsive as a scotched snake, he advanced and retired by a complicated shuffle, keeping time with the tom-tom and jingling his brass anklets, which weighed at least three pounds, and which, by the by, lamed him for several days. but he was heroic as the singer who broke his collar-bone by the ut di petto. a peculiar accompaniment was a dulcet whistle with lips protruded; hence probably the fable of pliny's astomoi, and the africans of eudoxus, whose joined lips compelled them to eat a single grain at a time, and to drink through a cane before sherry-cobblers were known. others joined him, dancing either vis-à-vis or by his side; and more than one girl, who could no longer endure being a wall-flower, glided into the ring and was received with a roar of applause. in the feminine performance the eyes are timidly bent upon the ground; the steps are shorter and daintier, and the ritrosa appears at once to shun and to entice her cavalier, who, thus repulsed and attracted, redoubles the exciting measure till the delight of the spectators knows no bounds. old gidi mavunga flings off his upper garment, and with the fire of a youth of twenty enters the circle, where his performance is looked upon with respect, if not with admiration. wilder and wilder waxeth the "devil's delight," till even the bystanders, especially the women, though they keep their places in the outer circle, cannot restrain that wonderful movement of haunch and flank. i laughed till midnight, and left the dancers dancing still. at a.m. the strayed revellers found to their disgust a thick fog, or rather a thin drizzle, damping grass and path, and suggesting anything but a pleasant trudge. they declared that starvation awaited us, as the "fancy cloths" were at an end, but i stopped that objection by a reference to the reserved fund. after an hour of sulky talk we set out towards the upper part of banza vivi, passing a small but pretty hill plain, with manioc- fields, gum-trees, and the bombax very symmetrical. we saw no animals: here and there appeared the trail of a hyaena, the only larger carnivor that now haunts the mountains. the song of mkuka mpela, the wild pigeon, and fungú, the cuckoo, were loud in the brake: the abbé proyart makes the male cuculus chant his coo, coo, coo; mounting one note above another with as much precision as a musician would sound his ut, re, mi: when he reached the third note, his mate takes it up and ascends to the octave. after this both recommence the same song. the stiff ascent gave us lovely views of the lake-like river and both its banks: after three quarters of an hour we reached vivi of banza simbo. the people vainly called to us, "wiza!"-- "come thou!" and "luiza! luiza kwenu!"-- "come, come here!" our moleques, disliking the dangerous proximity, advanced at a walk which might be called a canter. presently we reached the dividing ridge, , feet high, between banza vivi and nkulu, whose palm-trees, thrown out against the sky, bore ° (m.) looking to the north with easting, we had a view of no less than six distinct distances. the actual foreground, a hollow between two land-waves, could not conceal the "crocodile's head:" the latter, five miles off and bearing ° (m.), forms the southern staple of the yellala gate, whose rapids were not visible, and it fronts the quoin, which hems in the stream on the other side. the key-stone of the inverted arch between them was a yellow-flanked, tree-topped hill, rising immediately above the great rapids: beyond if waved, in far succession, three several swells of ground, each flatter and bluer than its nearer neighbour, and capping the whole stood kongo de lemba, a tall solitary sugarloaf, bearing ° (m.), with its outlying conelets concealing like a mass of smoke the world that lay beyond. the ridges appeared to trend north and south, and to approach the river's bending bed at different angles; their sides were steep, and in places scarped where they fell into the intervening hollows. the valleys conducted many a water to the main drain, and during the wet season they must be well-nigh impassable. at the end of the dries the only green is in the hill-folds and the basin-sinks, where the trees muster strong enough to defend themselves from the destructive annual fires. these bush-burnings have effectually disforested the land, and in some places building timber and even fuel have become scarce. in the abrus, barely two feet high, i could hardly recognize the tall tree of eastern africa, except by its scarlet "carats," which here the people disdain to use as beads. the scorching of the leaves stunts the shrubs, thickens the bark, and makes the growth scrubby, so that the labourer has nothing to do but to clear away the grass: i afterwards remarked the same effects on the brazilian campos. we descended the dividing ridge, which is also painfully steep, especially near the foot, and crossed the rolling hollow with its three chalybeate brooks, beyond which lay our destination. tuckey describes the hills between boma and nkulu as stony and barren, which is perhaps a little too strong. the dark red clay soil, dried almost to the consistency of laterite, cannot be loosened by rain or sun, and in places it is hardened like that of brazilian porto seguro, where the people complain that they cannot bury their dead. all the uplands, however, grow grass which is sometimes ten to twelve feet tall, and in places there are shrubs and trees. about nkulu the highlands are rightly described as "steep hills of quartz, ferruginous earth, and syenite with fertile tops:" rocks and stones are rare upon the plateaux: they are rich enough to produce everything from wheat to coffee, and hardly a hundredth part is cultivated. thin and almost transparent lines of palms denote the several banzas on the ridges, and in the valley are rock circles like magnified and prostrated stonehenges. the "termes arborum" is universal, and anthills form a prominent feature. it has been remarked that these buildings are the most conspicuous architectural efforts of the country, and the abbé proyart observes that here more effectually than in any other land man ought to be sent to the ant school. the material is of dark and sometimes black earth as in the gaboon, and the shape is the umbrella, rarely double or pagoda-roofed. the column may be twelve to eighteen inches high, and the diameter of the capital attains two feet: i never saw, however, a "gigantic toadstool as high as a one-storied house."[fn# ] nor are the mushroom tops now used as chafing-dishes. the grateful tamarind grows everywhere, but nowhere so gloriously as on the lower elevations. the only true sycomores which i saw were stunted specimens near the yellala. they contrasted poorly with the growth of the ugogi dhun, a noble patriarch, whose circle of shade under a vertical sun was feet, and which i thought worthy of a portrait in "lake regions of central africa" (p. , vol. i.). i need hardly warn the reader that, properly speaking, it is the "sycamine which produces the fruit called syconwrus or fig-mulberry;" but we apply the term "sycomore" to the tree as well as to its fruit. after three hours of actual marching (= seven miles) in an east- north-easterly direction, we ascended a path greasy with drizzle, parquetted by negro feet and infested with "drivers," which now became troublesome. it led to banza nkulu, a shabby settlement of unclean plantations and ragged huts of far inferior construction: stacks of grass were piled upon the ground, and this new thatch was greatly wanted. here the lands of the "bush-men" begin: instead of marching directly to the chief's house, we sat in our wet clothes under a friendly wild fig. the women flocked out at the cry of the hammock-bearers and, nursing their babies, sat down to the enjoyment of a stare; they had lost, however, the merriment of their more civilized sisters, and they hardly ever vouchsafed a laugh or a smile. the curiosity of the "zinkomba" knew no bounds; all were unusually agitated by the aspect of a man coloured like themselves; they jerked out their leafy crinolines by forward movements of the lower body, swayed violently from side to side, and cried "ha-rr-rr-rr-rr!" and "jojolo! jojolo!" till they were hoarse. as usual, the adults would not allow me to approach them, and i was obliged to rest contented with sketching their absurdities. to punish this daring, the jinkomba brought a man masked like a white, with beard and whiskers, who is supposed to strike the stranger with awe: it was all in vain, i had learned to trill the r as roundly as themselves, and they presently left me as a "perdido," an incorrigible. in the days of the expedition, nkulu had but one ruler, of whom tuckey says (p. ), that he found less pomp and noise, but much more civility and hospitality than from the richer kings he had visited. now there are three who require their "dashes," and each has his linguister, who must not be passed by without notice. moreover, as population and luxury have increased on the line of route, bark-cloth has disappeared and even the slaves are dressed in cottons. we waited, patiently hungry, till p.m. because the interpreters had gone on some "fish palaver" to the river. at that hour a procession of some two hundred and fifty men headed by a drum and chingufu (cymbal-bells) defiled before us, crowding round three umbrellas, trade-articles in the last stage of "seediness." these comforts protected from the sun, which was deep hid behind a purple nimbus, an equal number of great men in absurd red nightcaps or old felt wideawakes, shirts of coloured cotton, and second-hand waistcoats of silk or satin. the only signs of luxury were here and there a well-carved ebony stick, and a gunstock resplendent with brass tacks. all sat down in a semi-circle before us, six or seven deep in front and four or five at the sides: the women and children took their places in the rear, and one of them fondled a prick-eared cur with an attempt at a ribbon round its neck. the head linguister, who, like "persian interpreters" to commanders in chief of india during my clay, could not speak a word of any language but his own, after clapping hands, congratulated us in the name of the great king nekulu; he lives, it appears, in a banza at some distance to the north or north- east, out of sight of the river, and he cannot be visited without great outlay of gunpowder and strong waters. we returned compliments, and after the usual complications we came to the main point, the "dash." i had privily kept a piece of satin- stripe, and this was produced as the very last of our viaticum. the interpreter, having been assured that we had nothing else to give, retired with his posse to debate; whilst we derided the wild manners of these "bush-folk," who feared to shake hands with us. after an hour or so the council returned, clapped palms, sat clown, grumbled at the gift and gave formal leave to see the yellala--how the word now jarred in my ears after its abominable repetition! had these men been told a month before that a white would have paid for permission to visit what they considered common property, they would have refused belief: with characteristic readiness, however, the moment they saw an opportunity of "making money," they treated the novelty as a matter of course. this palaver settled, the chiefs danced within a ring formed by their retainers; the speeches were all sung, not spoken; and obeisances and dustings of elaborate complexity concluded the eventful meeting, which broke up as it began with drum and chingufu. there was not a symptom of hospitality; we had preserved some provaunt from our last station, or we should have been famished. my escort forgot their disappointments in a "ball," which lasted through the cool, clear and dewy night till nearly dawn. it is evidently a happy temperament which can dance off hunger and fatigue. chapter xiv. the yellala of the congo. at dawn (september ), i began the short march leading to the yellala.[fn# ] by stepping a few paces south of nkulu, we had a fine view of the borongwa ya vivi, the lowest rapids, whose foaming slope contrasted well with the broad, smooth basin beyond. palabala, the village of nekorado on the other side of the stream, bore south (mag.), still serving as a landmark; and in this direction the ridges were crowned with palm orchards and settlements. but the great yellala was hidden by the hill- shoulder. we at once fell into a descent of some feet, which occupied an hour. the ground was red iron-clay, greasy and slippery; dew- dripping grass, twelve to fifteen feet tall, lined the path; the surface was studded with dark ant-hills of the mushroom shape; short sycomores appeared, and presently we came to rough gradients of stone, which severely tried the "jarrets." after an hour, we crossed at the trough-foot a brook of pure water, which, uniting with two others, turns to the north-east, and, tumbling over a little ledge, discharges itself into the main drain. an ascent then led over a rounded hill with level summit, and precipitous face all steps and drops of rock, some of them six and seven feet high, opposed to the stream. another half hour, and a descent of feet placed us under a stunted calabash, feet above the water, and commanding a full view of the yellala. on the whole, the impression was favourable. old shimbah, the linguister at porto da lenha, and other natives had assured me that the cataracts were taller than the tallest trees. on the other hand, the plain and unadorned narrative of the "expedition" had prepared me for a second-rate stream bubbling over a strong bed. the river here sweeps round from the north-west, and bends with a sharp elbow first to the south-west and then to the south- east, the length of the latter reach being between four and five miles. as far as the eye can see, the bed, which narrows from to and yards, is broken by rocks and reefs. a gate at the upper end pours over its lintel a clear but dwarf fall, perhaps two feet high. the eastern staple rises at first sheer from the water's edge to the estimated altitude of a thousand feet,--this is the "crocodile's head" which we saw on the last march, and already the thin rains are robing its rocky surface with tender green. the strata are disposed at angles, varying from ° to °, and three streaks of bright trees denote fiumaras about to be filled. opposite it is the "quoin hill," bluff to the stream, and falling west with gradual incline. the noise of this higher fall can hardly be heard at nkulu, except on the stillest nights. below the upper gate, the bed, now narrowing to yards, shows the great yellala; the waters, after breaking into waves for a mile and a half above, rush down an inclined plane of some thirty feet in yards, spuming, colliding and throwing up foam, which looks dingy white against the dull yellow-brown of the less disturbed channel--the movement is that of waves dashing upon a pier. the bed is broken by the zunga chya malemba, which some pronounced sanga chya malemba, an oval islet in mid-stream, whose greater diameter is disposed along the axis of the bed. the north-western apex, raised about fifty feet above the present level of the waters, shows a little bay of pure sand, the detritus of its rocks, with a flood-mark fifteen feet high, whilst the opposite side bears a few wind-wrung trees. the materials are gneiss and schist, banded with quartz--tuckey's great masses of slate. this is the "terrapin" of the nzadi. the eastern fork, about yards broad, is a mountain-torrent, coursing unobstructed down its sandy trough, and, viewed from an eminence, the waters of the mid-channel appear convex, a shallow section of a cylinder,--it is a familiar shape well marked upon the st. lawrence rapids. the western half is traversed by a reef, connecting the islets with the right bank. during august, this branch was found almost dry; in mid-september, it was nearly full, and here the water breaks with the greatest violence. the right bank is subtended for some hundred yards by blocks of granite and greenstone, pitted with large basins and pot-holes, delicately rounded, turned as with a lathe by the turbid waters. the people declare that this greenstone contains copper, and professor smith found particles in his specimens. the portuguese agents, to whom the natives carefully submit everything curious, doubt the fact, as well as all reports of gold; yet there is no reason why the latter should not be found. the current whirls and winds through its tortuous channels, which are like castings of metal, in many distinct flows; some places are almost stagnant, suggesting passages for canoes. here the fishermen have planted their weirs; some are wading in the pools, others are drying their nets upon the stony ledges. during the floods, however, this cheval-de-frise of boulders must all be under water, and probably impassable. tuckey supposes that the inundation must produce a spectacle which justifies the high- flown description of the people. i should imagine the reverse to be the case; and dr. livingstone justly remarked[fn# that, when the river was full, the yellala rapids would become comparatively smooth, as he had found those of the zambeze; and that therefore a voyage pittoresque up the congo should be made at that season. before leaving the yellala, i wandered along the right bank, and found a cliff, whose overhanging brow formed a fine cavern; it remarkably resembled the martianez fountain under the rock near the beautiful puerto de orotava. here the fishermen were disporting themselves, and cooking their game, which they willingly exchanged for beads. all were of the silurus family, varying from a few inches to two feet. fish-eagles sat upon the ledges overhanging the stream, and a flight of large cranes wheeled majestically in the upper air: according to the people, they are always to be seen at the yellalas. the extent of a few hundred feet afforded a good bird's eye view of the scene. the old river-valley, shown by the scarp of the rocks, must have presented gigantic features, and the height of the trough-walls, at least a thousand feet, gives the yellala a certain beauty and grandeur. the site is apparently the highest axis of the dividing ridge separating the maritime lowlands from the inner plateau. looking eastward the land smoothens, the dorsa fall more gently towards the counter-slope, and there are none of the "morros" which we have traversed. with the members of the congo expedition, i was somewhat startled by the contrast between the apparently shrunken volume of waters and the vast breadth of the lower river; hence professor smith's theory of underground caverns and communications, in fact of a subterraneous river, a favourite hobby in those days. but there is not a trace of limestone formation around, nor is there the hollow echo which inevitably would result from such a tunnel. evidently the difference is to be accounted for by the rapidity of the torrent, the effect of abnormal slope deceiving the eye. at the mosî-wa-tunya falls the gigantic zambeze, from a breadth of a thousand yards suddenly plunges into a trough only forty- five to sixty feet wide: the same is the case with the brazilian são francisco, which, a mile wide above the cachoeira de paulo affonso, is choked to a minimum breadth of fifty-one feet. at the pongo (narrows) de manseriche also, the amazonas, "already a noble river, is contracted at its narrowest part to a width of only twenty-five toises, bounded on each margin by lofty perpendicular cliffs, at the end of which the andes are fairly passed, and the river emerges on the great plain."[fn# ] thus the yellala belongs to the class of obstructed rapids like those of the nile, compared with the unobstructed, of which a fine specimen is the st. lawrence. it reminded me strongly of the búsa (boussa) described by richard lander, where the breadth of the niger is reduced to a stone-throw, and the stream is broken by black rugged rocks arising from mid-channel. it is probably a less marked feature than the congo, for in june, after the "malka" or fourteen days of incessant rain, the author speaks of whirlpools, not of a regular break. i thus make the distance of the yellala from the mouth between and miles and the total fall feet, of which about one half ( ) occurs in the sixty-four miles between boma and the yellala: of this figure again feet belong to the section of five miles between the vivi and the great rapids. the zambeze, according to dr. livingstone ("first expedition," p. ), has a steeper declivity than some other great rivers, reaching even inches per mile. with to inches, the ganges, the amazonas, and the mississippi flow at the rate of three knots an hour in the lowest season and five or six during the flood: what, then, may be expected from the nzadi? according to the people, beyond the small upper fall where projections shut out the view, the channel smoothens for a short space and carries canoes. native travellers from nkulu usually take the mountain-path cutting across an easterly bend of the bed to banza menzi, the manzy of tuckey's text and the menzi macooloo of his map. it is situated on a level platform miles north of nkulu, and they find the stream still violent. the second march is to banza ninga, by the first expedition called "inga," an indirect line of five hours = miles. the third, of about the same distance, makes banza mavunda where, to miles above the yellala, tuckey found the river once more navigable, clear in the middle and flowing at the rate of two miles an hour--a retardation evidently caused by the rapids beyond: i have remarked this effect in the brazilian "cachoeiras."[fn# ] above it the nzadi widens, and canoeing is practicable with portages at the two sangallas. the southern feature, double like the yellala, shows an upper and a lower break, separated by two miles, the rapids being formed as usual by sunken ledges of rock. two days' paddling lead to the northern or highest sangalla, which obstructs the stream for miles: tuckey (p. ) makes his songo sangalla contain three rapids; prof. smith, whose topography is painfully vague, doubles the number, at the same time he makes sanga jalala (p. ) the "uppermost fall but one and the highest." finally, at nsundi (on the map soondy n'sanga), which was reached on sept. , a picturesque sandy cove at the opening of a creek behind along projecting point, begins a lake- like river, three miles broad, with fine open country on both banks: the explorer describes it as "beautiful scenery equal to anything on the banks of the thames." here the nzadi is bounded by low limestone hills already showing the alluvial basin of central africa; and the land is well populated, because calcareous districts are fertile in the tropics and provisions are plentiful. prof. smith (p. ) was "so much enraptured with the improved appearance of the country and the magnificence of the river, that it was with the greatest difficulty he was prevailed on to return." of course, the coaster middle-men report the people to be cannibals. from the vivi rapids to nsundi along the windings of the bed is a total of miles, about the distance of vivi to the sea; the direct land march was miles. captain tuckey heard nothing of the lumini river entering leagues above the yellala, and he gives no professional opinion touching the navigability of the total of six greater rapids which, to judge from what i saw, can hardly offer any serious obstruction to the development of the nzadi. at nkulu an intelligent native traveller whom i examined through the interpreters, strongly advised the line of the southern bank: five stages would lead to nsundi, and the ten "kings" on the road are not such "rapacious gentlemen" as our present hosts. a glance at tuckey's map shows that this southern line cuts across a long westerly deflection of the bed. i had been warned when setting out that a shipful of goods would not take me past nkulu. this was soon confirmed. on the evening after arrival i had directed my interpreter to sound the "bush- kings" touching the expense of a march to nsundi. they modestly demanded lbs. of beads, fifty kegs of powder, forty demijohns of rum, twelve uniforms, ten burnuses, a few swords, and whole pieces of various expensive cloths, such as costa finas, riscados, and satin stripes,--briefly, about £ for three days' march. it suggested the modest demand made by king adooley of badagry, from the brothers lander. the air of nkulu was a cordial; the aspect of the land suggested that it is the threshold to a country singularly fertile and delicious, in fact, the paradise which bishop berkeley (gaudentio di lucca) placed in central africa. the heat of the lowlands had disappeared,-- "the scorching ray here pierceth not, impregnate with disease." the thermometer, it is true, did not sink below ° (f.), whilst the "expedition" (p. ) had found it ° in august, even at boma during the dewy nights. the lowest temperature of the water was °, and the highest °, whereas at the mouth it is sometimes °; tuckey gives °- °; ° in the upper river above the falls, and ° where there are limestone springs. the oxydization of iron suddenly ceased; after a single day's drying, the plants were ready for a journey to england, and meat which wrill hardly keep one day in the lowlands is here eatable on the fifth. whilst the important subject of "dash" was being discussed i set out in my hammock to visit a quitanda or market held hard by. as we started, the women sang, "lungwá u telemene ko mwanza ko yellala o kwenda." "the boat that arrives at the mwanza (the river) the same shall go up to the yellala" (rapids). it is part of a chant which the mothers of men now old taught them in childhood, and the sole reminiscence of the congo expedition, whose double boats, the ajôjôs of the brazil, struck their rude minds half a century ago. these quitandas are attended by people living a dozen miles off, and they give names to the days, which consequently everywhere vary. thus at boma friday, saturday, sunday, and monday are respectively called "nkenge," "sona," "kandu," and "konzo." this style of dividing time, which is common throughout pagan west africa, is commonly styled a week: thus the abbé proyart tells us that the loango week consists of four days, and that on the fourth the men "rest" by hunting and going to market. tuckey also recognizes the "week of four days," opposed to the seven days' week of the gold coast. after half an hour's run to the north-west my bearers, raising loud shouts of "alii! vai sempre!" dashed into the market-place where about a hundred souls were assembled. the women rose in terror from their baskets and piles of vendibles; some began hastily to pack up, others threw themselves into the bush. order was soon restored by the interpreter; both sexes and all ages crowded round me with hootings of wonder, and, when they had stared their fill, allowed me to sit down under a kind of ficus, not unlike the banyan-tree (ficus indica). tuckey (p. ) says that this fig is planted in all market-places and is considered sacred; his people got into trouble by piling their muskets against one of them: i heard of nothing of the kind. the scanty supplies--a few fowls, sun-dried fish, kola-nuts, beans, and red peppers--were spread upon skins, or stored in well-worked baskets, an art carried to perfection in africa; even the somali bedawin weave pots that will hold water. the small change was represented by a medium which even montesquieu would not set down as a certain mark of civilization. the horse-shoe of loggun (denham and clapperton), the fán fleam, the "small piece of iron like an ace of spades on the upper nile" (baker), and the iron money of the brachycephalic nyam-nyams described and drawn by schwein furth (i. ), here becomes a triangle or demi-square of bast-cloth, about inches of max. length, fringed, coloured like a torchon after a month of kitchen use, and worth one-twentieth of the dollar or fathom of cloth. these money-mats or coin-clouts are known to old travellers as macuitas and libonges (in angolan libangos). carli and merolla make them equivalent to brass money; the former were grass-cloth a yard long, and ten = reis; in they were changed at angola for a small copper coin worth / d., and the change caused a disturbance for which five soldiers were shot. silver was represented by "intagas," thick cottons the size of two large kerchiefs (=. is. d.) and "folingas," finer sorts used for waist-cloths (=. s. d.); and gold by beirames (alii biramis): carli says the latter are coarse indian cottons ells long and each = reis; others describe them as fine linen each piece worth s. d. to s. the bank-note was the "indian piece or mulech, a young black about twenty years of age, worth mil keys (dollars) each." (carli.) in the barbots' day each "coin-clout") was equivalent to d.; some were unmarked, whilst others bore the portuguese arms single or double. the wilder kru-men still keep up their "buyapart" (= cents), a cloth inches square and thickly sewn over with cowries. the only liquor was palm wine in huge calabashes. the smoking of lyamba (bhang or cannabis sativa) seems to become more common as we advance. i did not find the plant growing, as did dr. livingstone at linyanti and amongst the batoka ("first expedition," , ). the pipe is the gourd of a baobab, which here sometimes grows a foot and a half long; it is cleared, filled with water and provided with a wooden tube fixed in the upper part away from the mouth, and supporting a small "chillam" or bowl of badly baked clay. the people when smoking affect the bunched shoulders, the deep inhalation, and the loud and body- shaking bark, which seems inseparable from the enjoyment of this stimulant. i have used it for months together, and my conclusion is, that mostly the cough is an affectation. tobacco is smoked in the usual heavy clay pipes, with long mouthpieces of soft wood, quite as civilized as the best european. "progress" seems unknown to the pipe; the most advanced nations are somewhat behind the barbarians, and in the matter of snuff the tupi or brazilian savage has never been rivalled. the greater part of the vendors seemed to be women, of the buyers men; there was more difference of appearance than in any european fair, and the population about nkulu seemed to be a very mixed race. some were ultra-negro, of the dead dull-black type, prognathous and long-headed like apes; others were of the red variety, with hair and eyes of a brownish tinge, and a few had features which if whitewashed could hardly be distinguished from europeans. the tattoo was remarkable as amongst the tribes of the lower zambeze.[fn# ] there were waistcoats, epaulettes, braces and cross-belts of huge welts, and raised polished lumps which must have cost not a little suffering; the skin is pinched up between the fingers and sawn across with a bluntish knife, the deeper the better; various plants are used as styptics, and the proper size of the cicatrice is maintained by constant pressure, which makes the flesh protrude from the wound. the teeth were as barbarously mutilated as the skin; these had all the incisors sharp-tipped; those chipped a chevron-shaped hole in the two upper or lower frontals, and not a few seemed to attempt converting the whole denture into molars. the legs were undeniably fine; even hieland mary's would hardly be admired here. whilst the brown mothers smoked and carried their babies, the men bore guns adorned with brass tacks, or leaned upon their short, straight, conical "spuds" and hoes, long-handled bits of iron whose points, after african fashion, passed through the wood. i nowhere saw the handsome carved spoons, the hafts and knife-sheaths figured by the congo expedition. we left the quitanda with the same shouting and rushing which accompanied my appearance. chapter xv. return to the congo mouth. in the evening there was a palaver. i need hardly say that my guide, after being paid to show me nsundi, never had the slightest intention to go beyond the yellala. irritated by sleeping in the open air, and by the total want of hospitality amongst the bushmen, he and his moleques had sat apart all day, the picture of stubborn discontent, and "not a man in the place but had discontent written large in his face." i proposed to send back a party for rum, powder, and cloth to the extent of £ , or half the demand, and my factotum, selim, behaved like a trump. gidi mavunga, quite beyond self-control, sprang up, and declared that, if the mundele would not follow him, that obstinate person might remain behind. the normal official deprecation, as usual, made him the more headstrong; he rushed off and disappeared in the bush, followed by a part of his slaves, the others crying aloud to him, "wenda!"-- get out! seeing that the three linguisters did not move, he presently returned, and after a furious address in fiote began a portuguese tirade for my benefit. this white man had come to their country, and, instead of buying captives, was bent upon enslaving their mfumos; but that "branco" should suffer for his attempt; no "mukanda" or book (that is, letter) should go down stream; all his goods belonged of right to his guide, and thus he would learn to sit upon the heads of the noblesse, with much of the same kind. there are times when the traveller either rises above or sinks to the level of, or rather below, his party. i had been sitting abstractedly, like the great quietist, buddha, when the looks of the assembly suggested an "address." this was at once delivered in portuguese, with a loud and angry voice. gidi mavunga, who had been paid for nsundi, not for the yellala, had spoken like a "small boy" (i.e., a chattel). i had no wish to sit upon other men's heads, but no man should sit on mine. englishmen did not want slaves, nor would they allow others to want them, but they would not be made slaves themselves. my goods were my own, and king nessala, not to speak of mambuco prata--the name told--had made themselves responsible for me. lastly, if the senhor gidi mafung wanted to quarrel, the contents of a colt's six-shooter were at his disposal. such a tone would have made a european furious; it had a contrary effect upon the african. gidi mavunga advanced from his mat, and taking my hand placed it upon his head, declaring me his "mwenemputo." the linguisters then entered the circle, chanted sundry speeches, made little dances, then bent their knuckles to earth, much in the position of boys preparing to jump over their own joined hands, dusted themselves, and clapped palms. very opportunely arrived a present from the king of fowls, dried fish and plantains, which restored joy to the camp. "mwenemputo," i must explain, primarily meaning "the king of portugal," is applied in east central africa to a negro king and chiefs ("the lands of the cazembe," p. ). in loango also it is the name of a high native official, and, when used as in the text, it is equivalent to mfumo, chief or head of family. at night gidi mavunga came to our quarters and began to talk sense. knowing that my time was limited, he enlarged upon the badness of the road and the too evident end of the travelling season, when the great rains would altogether prevent fast travel. banza ninga, the next stage, was distant two or three marches, and neither shelter nor provisions were to be found on the way. here a canoe would carry us for a day ( miles) to the sangala rapids: then would come the third portage of two days ( miles) to nsundi. my outfit at banza nokki was wholly insufficient; the riverine races were no longer tractable as in the days of his father, when white men first visited the land. my best plan was to return to boma at once, organize a party, and march upon congo grande (s. salvador); there i should find whites, portuguese, englishmen and their "kru-men" the term generally applied on the southern coast to all native employés of foreign traders. if determined upon bring "converted into black man" i might join some trading party into the interior. as regards the cloth and beads advanced by me for the journey to nsundi, a fair proportion would be returned at banza nokki. and so saying the old fox managed to look as if he meant what he said. all this, taken with many a grain, was reasonable. the edge of my curiosity had been taken off by the yellala, and nothing new could be expected from the smaller formations up stream. time forbade me to linger at banza nkulu. the exorbitant demand had evidently been made by express desire of gidi mavunga, and only a fortnight's delay could have reduced it to normal dimensions. yet with leisure success was evident. all the difficulties of the nsundi road would have vanished when faced. the wild people showed no feeling against foreigners, and the nkulu linguisters during their last visit begged me to return as soon as possible and "no tell lie." i could only promise that their claims should be laid before the public. accordingly a report of this trip was at once sent in to her majesty's foreign office, and a paper was read before the british association of september, . early on thursday morning (sept. ) we began the down march. it was a repetition of the up march, except that all were bent upon rushing home, like asses to their stables; none of those posés, or regular halts on the line of march, as practised by well- trained voyageurs, are known to congo-land. there was some reason for the hurry, and travellers in these regions will do well to remember it, or they may starve with abundance around them. the kings and chiefs hold it their duty to entertain the outward bound; but when cloth, beads, and rum have been exhausted, the returning wanderer sits under a tree instead of entering the banza, and it is only an exceptional householder who will send him a few eggs or plantains. they "cut" you, as a rule, more coolly than ever town man cut a continental acquaintance. finally, the self-imposed hardships of the down march break men's spirits for further attempts, and their cupidity cannot neutralize their natural indolence thus reinforced. we entered on the next afternoon gidi mavunga's village, where the lieges received him with shouts and hand-clappings: at the papagayo's there was a dance which lasted through that night and the next. i stayed three days at chinguvu finishing my sketches, but to have recovered anything from the guide would have required three weeks. the old villain relaxed his vigilance over the women, who for the first time were allowed to enter the doors without supervision: merolla treats of this stale trick, and exclaims,-- "ah pereat! didicit fallere si qua virum." i was reminded of the classical sentiment upon the rio de s. francisco ("highlands of the brazil," ii. chap, xiv.), where, amongst other sentiments, the boatmen severely denounce in song "mulher que engana tropeiro." as a rule throughout west africa, where even the wildest tribes practise it, the "panel dodge" served, as dupuis remarked, to supply the slave-trade, and in places like abeokuta it became a nuisance: the least penalty to which it leads is the confiscation of the lothario's goods and chattels. foiled in his benevolent attempt, the covetous senior presently entered the hut, and began unceremoniously to open a package of cloth which did not belong to him. selim cocked his revolver, and placed it handy, so the goods were afterwards respected. at length, on sept. , a piece of cloth (= yards) procured a canoe. but calico and beads are not removed from an african settlement without disturbance: my factotum has given a detailed account of the scene.[fn# ] gidi mavunga so managed that the porters, instead of proceeding straight to the stream, marched upon banza nokki where his royal son was awaiting us. worse still, nessudikira's royal mother was there, a large old virago, who smoked like a steam-engine and who "swore awful." the moleques were armed, but none liked proceeding to extremes; so, after an unusually loud quarrel, we reached the river in three hours, and at . a.m. we set out for boma. the down voyage was charming. instead of hugging the southern bank, we raced at a swinging pace down mid-stream. a few showers had wonderfully improved the aspect of the land, where "every tree well from his fellow grew with branches broad, laden with leaves new, that springen out against the sunny sheen, some very red and some a glad light green;" and the first breath of spring gave life to the queer antediluvian vegetation--calabash and cactus, palmyra, bombax, and fern. an admirable mirage lifted the canoes which preceded us clean out of the river, and looking down stream the water seemed to flow up hill, as it does, according to mrs.---, in the aqueducts of madeira. although the tide began to flow up shortly after a.m., and the sea-breeze wafe unusually strong, we covered the forty-five miles in hrs. m. amidst shouts of "izakula mundeh,"--white men cum agen!--we landed at boma, and found that the hospitable sr. pereira had waited dinner, to which i applied myself most "wishedly." once more in civilization, we prepared for a march upon s. salvador. no white man at boma knew anything of the road to the old capital; but, as a letter had been received from it after three days' march, there was evidently no difficulty. i wrote to porto da lenha for an extra supply of "black money," which was punctually forwarded; both chico furano and nihama chamvu volunteered for the journey, and preparations were progressing as rapidly as could be expected in these slow-moving lands, when they were brought to the abruptest conclusion. on the th sept. a letter from the commodore of the station informed me that i had been appointed h. m.'s commissioner to dahome, and that, unless i could at once sail in h.m.s. "griffon," no other opportunity would be found for some time. the only step left was to apply for a canoe, and, after a kindly farewell to my excellent host, i left boma on the evening of sept. . with a view of "doing" the mosquitoes, we ran down the nshibul or central arm of the nzadi, and found none of the whirlpools mentioned by the "expedition" near fetish rock. the bright clear night showed us silhouettes of dark holms, high and wooded to the north, and southwards banks of papyrus outlying long straggling lines of thin islands like a huge caterpillar. the canoe-men attempted to land at one place, declaring that some king wanted "dash," but we were now too strong for them: these fellows, if allowed, will halt to speak every boat on the river. the wind fell to a dead calm, and five hours and a half sufficed to cover the thirty miles between boma and porto da lenha. here mr. scott supplied me with a fine canoe and a fresh crew of seven paddles. the noon was grey and still as we left the whydah of the south, but at p.m. the sea-breeze came up stiff and sudden, the tide also began to flow; the river roared; the meeting of wind and water produced what the indus boatmen call a "lahar" (tide rip), and the thalweg became almost as rough as the yellala. our canoe was literally "laying her whole side on the sea, as a leaping fish does." unwilling to risk swamping my instruments, i put into the northern bank, where our friend, the palhabote espérance, passed under a tricolour, and manned only by laptots. as we waved a signal to them, they replied with a straggling fire of musketry to what they considered a treacherous move on the part of plundering musurungus. at sunset a lump of scirrhus before the sun was so dense that its dark shadow formed a brush like the trabes of a comet. this soon melted away, and a beautifully diaphanous night tempted us to move towards the dreary funnel of darkness which opened ahead. the clouds began to pour; again the stream became rough, and the swift upper or surface current meeting the cross-tide below represented an agitated "race of portland." wet and weary we reached banana point on sunday, sept. , , fortunately not too "late for the mail," and, next day, i was on board "griffon," ready for dahome and for my late host king gelele. chapter xvi. the slaver and the missionary in the congo river. in the preceding pages some details have been given concerning domestic slavery upon the congo river. like polygamy, the system of barbarous and semi-barbarous races, it must be held provisional, but in neither case can we see any chance of present end. should the moslem wave of conquest, in a moral as well as a material form, sweep--and i am persuaded that it will sweep--from north africa across the equator, the effect will be only to establish both these "patriarchal institutions" upon a stronger and a more rational basis. all who believe in "progress" are socially anti-slavers, as we all are politically republicans. but between the two extremes, between despotism, in which society is regimented like an army, and liberty, where all men are theoretically free and equal, there are infinite shades of solid rule and government which the wisdom of nations adapts to their wants. the medium of constitutional monarchy or hereditary presidentship recommends itself under existing circumstances to the more advanced peoples, and with good reason; we nowhere find a prevalence of those manly virtues, disinterestedness and self-sacrifice to the "respublica," which rendered the endurance of ancient republics possible. rome could hardly have ruled the world for centuries had her merchants supplied carthage with improved triremes or furnished the parthians with the latest style of weapons. we must be wise and virtuous before we can hope to be good republicans, and man in the mass is not yet "homo sapiens;" he is not wise, and certainly he is not virtuous. the present state of africa suggests two questions concerning the abolition of the export slave-trade, which must be kept essentially distinct from domestic servitude. the first is, "does the change benefit the negro?" into this extensive subject i do not propose to enter, contenting myself with recording a negative answer. but upon the second, "is the world ready for its abolition?" i would offer a few remarks. they will be ungrateful to that small but active faction which has laboured so long and so hard to misinform the english public concerning africa, and which is as little fitted to teach anything about the african as to legislate for mongolian tartary. it has prevailed for a time to the great injury of the cause, and we cannot but see its effects in almost every step taken by the englishman, civilian or soldier, who lands his british opinions and prejudices on the west coast, and who, utterly ignoring the fact that the african, as far as his small interests are concerned, is one of the clearest sighted of men, unhesitatingly puts forth addresses and proclamations which he would not think of submitting to europeans. but i have faith in my countrymen. if there be any nation that deserves to be looked upon as the arbiter of public opinion in europe, it is england proper, which, to the political education of many generations, adds an innate sense of moderation, of justice, and of fair play, and a suspicion of extreme measures however theoretically perfect, which do not exist elsewhere. heinrich heine expressed this idea after his maccabean fashion, "ask the stupidest englishman a question of politics, and he will say something clever; ask the cleverest englishman a question of religion and he will say something stupid." hence the well-wishers of england can feel nothing but regret when they find her clear and cold light of reason obscured, as it has been, upon the negro question by the mists and clouds of sentimental passion, and their first desire is to see this weakness pass away. i unhesitatingly assert--and all unprejudiced travellers will agree with me--that the world still wants the black hand. enormous tropical regions yet await the clearing and the draining operations by the lower races, which will fit them to become the dwelling-place of civilized man. but slave-exportation is practically dead; we would not revive it, nor indeed could we, the revival would be a new institution, completely in disaccord with the spirit of the age. it is for us to find something which shall take its place, and which shall satisfy the just aspirations of those who see their industry and energy neutralized by want of labour. i need hardly say that all requirements would be met by negro-emigration; and that not only africa, but the world of the east as well as of the west, call for some measure of the kind. the "cooly" from hindostan may in time become a valuable article, but it will be long before he can be induced to emigrate in sufficient numbers: the chinese will be a mistake when the neglected resources of the mighty "central empire," mineral and others, shall be ready to be developed, as they soon must, under the supervision of europeans. it remains only for us to draw upon the great labour-bank of negro-land. a bonâ fide emigration, a free engagé system, would be a boon to western and inner africa, where the tribes live in an almost continual state of petty warfare. the anti-slavers and the abolitionists, of course, represent this to be the effect of the european trade in man's flesh and blood; but it prevails, and has ever prevailed, and long will prevail, even amongst peoples which have never sent a head of negro to the coast. and there is a large class of men captured in battle, and a host of those condemned to death by savage superstition, whose lives can be saved only by their exportation, which, indeed, is the african form of transportation. "we believe," says the abbé proyart ( ), "that the father sells his son and the prince his subjects; he only who has lived among them can know that it is not even lawful for a man to sell his slave, if he be born in the country, unless he have incurred that penalty by certain crimes specified by law." it will be objected that any scheme of the kind must be so involved in complicated difficulties that it cannot fail to degenerate into the old export slave-trade. this i deny. admitting that such must at first be its tendency, i am persuaded that the details can so be controlled as to secure the use without the abuse. women and children, for instance, should never be allowed on board ship, unless accompanying husbands and parents. those who speak some words of a foreign tongue, english, french, spanish, or portuguese, and on the eastern coast hindostani, might lead the way, to be followed in due time by the wilder races. probably the best ground for the trial would be the island of zanzibar, where we can completely control its operations. and what should lend us patience and courage to meet and to beat down all difficulties is the consideration that success will be the sole possible means, independent of el islam, of civilizing, or rather of humanizing, the dark continent. the excellent abbé proyart begins his "history of loango" with the wise and memorable words: "touching the africans, these people have vices,--what people is exempt from vice? but, were they even more wicked and more vicious, they would be so much the more entitled to the commiseration and good offices of their fellow- men, and, should the missionary despair of making them christians, men ought still to endeavour to make them men." the "free emigration" schemes hitherto attempted have been mere snares and delusions; chiefly, i hold, because the age was not ripe for them. in three agencies were established at sierra leone for supplying hands to british guiana, trinidad and jamaica. as wages they offered per diem $ . to $ , with leave to return at pleasure; the "liberated" preferred, however, to live upon sixpence at home, suspecting that the bait was intended as a lure to captivity. nor were their fears lulled by the fact that the agents shipped amongst "volunteers" some seventy-six wild slaves, fresh captives, who were not allowed to communicate with their fellow-countrymen ashore. in certain correspondents from liverpool inquired of king "eyo honesty" if he could provide for service in the west indies , men, women, and children, as the "quotum from the old calabar river," which would mean , from the west coast. "he be all same ole slave-trade," very justly remarked that knowing potentate: he added, that he would respect the suppression treaty with england, and that he personally preferred palm-oil, but that all the "calabar gentlemen" and the neighbouring kings would be glad to supply slaves at a fixed price, four boxes of brass and copper rods. followed, in - , the gigantic scheme of mm. régis et cie, which began operations upon the east as well as the west coast of africa. having studied it on both sides of the continent, i could not help forming the worst opinion of the attempt. the agents never spoke of it except as a slave- trade; the facetiæ touching "achat" and "rachat" were highly suited to african taste, and i have often heard them declare before the people that "captives" are the only articles which can profitably be exported from the coasts--in fact, as old caspar barlé said, "precipuæ merces ipsi ethiopes sunt." i subjoin to this chapter the form of french passport; it will serve, when a bonâ fide emigration shall be attempted, to show "how not to do it." happily this "emigration" has come to an end": m. régis, seeing no results, gave orders to sell off all the goods in his factories, and to retain only one clerk as housekeeper. the ouvriers libres deserted and fled in all directions, for fear of being "put in a cannibal pot" and being eaten by the white anthropophagi. the history of missionary enterprise in the congo regions is not less interesting than the slave-trade. the first missioners sailed in december, , under goncalo de sousa; of the three one were killed by the heat, and another having made himself "chaplain to the congolan army," by a "giaghi" chief. the seed sown by these friars was cultivated by twelve franciscans of the order of observants. the right reverend fathers of the company appeared in with the conquistador paulo dias de novaes. according to lopez de lima, who seems to endorse the saying, "si cum jesuitis, non cum jesu itis," they worried one captain- general to death, and they attempted to found in congo-land another uruguay or paraguay. but here they totally failed, and, as yet indeed, they have not carried out, either in east or west africa, the celebrated boast popularly attributed to their general, borgia ( ): "we shall come in like the lambs; we shall be driven out like the dogs, we shall rush like the wolves; we shall be icnewed like the eagles." the baptism of d. alvaro i. ( ), the founding of the cathedral at s. salvador ( ), the appointment of the bishop and chapter, and their transfer to são paulo de loanda ( ), have already been alluded to. according to fathers carli and merolla, pope alexander vii. sent twelve to fifteen capuchins and apostolic missioners, who baptized the king and queen of congo and the count of sonho. between a.d. and were the palmy days of christianity in congo-land, and for two centuries it was more or less the state religion. after this great effort missionary zeal seems to have waxed cold, and disestablishment resulted, as happens in such cases, from unbelief within and violent assaults from without. under the attacks of the dutch and french the church seems to have lost ground during the eighteenth century. in a.d. the number of propagandists in sonho fell from a father superior and six missioners to two (merolla). in a.d. james barbot found at sonho only two portuguese friars of the order of bernardins. in a.d. the loango mission was established, and in a.d. the fathers were followed by four italian priests sent by the propaganda for the purpose of re-christianizing sonho. embarking at la rochelle they entered the nzadi, where one died of poison, and the survivors escaped only by stratagem. christianity fell before the old heathenism, and in we find the king of congo, d. garcia v., complaining to his most faithful majesty that missioners were sadly wanted. captain tuckey's "expedition" (a.d. ) well sets forth the spiritual destitution of the land. he tells us that three years before his arrival some missionaries had been murdered by the sohnese; the only specimen he met was an ignorant half-caste with a diploma from the capuchins of loanda, and a wife plus five concubines. in i found that all traces of christianity had disappeared. these reverends--who were allowed to dispense with any "irregularity" except bigamy or wilful murder, and "to read forbidden books except machiavel,"--took the title of nganga mfumo[fn# ]--lord medicine-man. in the fulness of early zeal they built at s. salvador the cathedral of santa cruz, a jesuit college, a capuchin convent, the residence of the father superior, maintained by the king of portugal; a religious house for the franciscans, an establishment for the bishop and his chapter, and half-a-dozen stone churches. all these edifices have long been in ruins. father cavazzi da monte cuccoli, denis de carli, and merolla, themselves missioners, have left us ample accounts of the ecclesiastical rule which, during its short tenure of office, bore a remarkable family resemblance to that of the jesuit missions in south america. the religious despotism was complete, a tyranny grossly aggravated by the credulity, the bigotry, and the superstition,--i will not say of the age, because such things are of all ages, but of the imperfect education which the age afforded. there was no improvement, but rather a deterioration from the days of pliny. one father tells the converts that comets forbode ill to the world. another describes a bird not much unlike a sparrow, at first sight it seems wholly black, but upon a nearer view it looks blue; the excellency of its song is that it harmoniously and articulately pronounces the name of jesus christ. a third remarks, "they (the heathen) are excited by the heavens forming a cross under the zone; they are excited by the mountains which have the cross carved on them, without knowing by whom; they are excited by the earth which draws the crucifix in its fruit called nicefo." yet all these things are of little force to move the hearts of those gentiles who scoffingly cry, "when we are sick, forsooth, the wood of this cross will cure us!" another father, resolving to denounce certain heathen practices, placed on the feast of purification an image of the virgin in relievo upon the altar, and "with a dagger struck through her breast on which the blood followed:" like mark antony, he "improved the occasion," and sent home the fathers of families to thrash their wives and daughters who were shut up in the "paint houses." it is gravely related how a hungry friar dines copiously on fish with an angel; how another was saved by the "father of miracles, the glorious saint anthony of padua," whom another priest, taking as his patron, sees before his hammock. a woman, bearing a child in her arms and supposed to be the virgin, attends the portuguese army, and she again appears in the shape of a "beautiful beggar." the miraculous resurrection of a boiled cock is gravely chronicled. a certain man lived years "at the intercession of saint francis d'assise." of course, the missioners saw water-monsters in the congo river. a child "came from his mother's womb with a beard and all his teeth, perhaps to show he was born into the world grown old in vice." a certain scoffer "being one day to pass a river with two companions, was visibly taken up by an invisible hand into the air. one of his companions, going to take hold of him by the feet, had such a cuff given him that he fell down in the boat, and the offender was seen no more." father merolla talks of a breed in the cabo verde islands "between bulls and she-asses, which they compassed by binding a cow's hide upon the latter:" it would be worth inquiring if this was ever attempted, and it might add to our traditions about the "jumart." and the tale of the elephant-hunters deceiving the animals by anointing themselves with their droppings deserves investigation. wounds of poisoned arrows are healed by that which produced them. a woman's milk cures the venomous foam which cobras spit into the eyes. a snake as big as a beam kills and consumes men with its look. an "ill liver," reprimanded by his father for vicious inclinations, fires a pistol at him; the rebound of the bullet from the paternal forehead, which remains whole, severely wounds the would-be parricide: the ablest surgeons cannot heal the hurt, and the flesh ever continues to be sore and raw upon the forehead, acting like the brand of cain. it is said that two of a trade never agree, and accordingly we find the hottest wrath of the missioners vented upon their rival brethren, the ngangas or medicine-men in africa, and the pages or tupi doctors in south america. the priestly presence deprives an idol of all its powers, the sacerdotal power annihilates all charms and devices, "thereby showing that the performances of christ's ministers are always above those of the devil's." these "scinghili," or "gods of the earth" (magicians), can sink boats, be ferried over rivers by crocodiles, and "converse with tigers, serpents, lions and other wild animals." the "great ugly wizards" are "sent martyrs to the devil" on all possible occasions. one father soundly belabours one of these "wicked magi" with the cord of his order, invoking all the while the aid of saint michael and the rest of the saints: he enters the "hellish tabernacle, arming himself frequently with the sign of the cross," but he retreats for fear of a mischief from the "poor deluded pagans,"--showing that he is, after all, but an "unbelieving thomas." on the other hand, the wizards solidly revenged themselves by killing and eating father philip da salesia. and the deluded ones must have found some difficulty in discovering the superiority of exotic over indigenous superstitions. when there is a calm at sea the sailors stick their patron against the mast, and kneeling before him say, "saint antony, our countryman, you shall be pleased to stand there, till you have given us a fair wind to continue our voyage!" a certain bishop of congo makes the sign of the cross upon a "banyan-tree," whereupon it immediately died, like the fig-tree cursed by our-saviour. a ship is "sunk in a trice" for not having a chaplain on board her. the missioners strongly recommend medals, relics, agni-dei, and palm-leaves consecrated on palm sundays. they rage furiously against and they flog those who wear "wizards' mats," against magic cords fastened round young children as amulets, and against the teeth and bones of animals, and cloth made from the rind of certain trees carried as preservatives from disease and supernatural influences: even banners in burial-places are "superstitious and blamable." they claim the power of stopping rain by cursing the air, and of producing it by prayer, and by "a devout procession to our lady of pinda," a belief truly worthy of the nganga; and a fast ship is stranded that "men may learn to honour holidays better." when the magicians swear falsely they either burst like judas or languish and die--"a warning to be more cautious how they jest with god." an old hag, grumbling after a brutish manner, proceeds to bewitch a good father to death by digging a hole and planting a certain herb. the ecclesiastic resolved to defeat her object by not standing long in one place. he remembers the saying of the wise man, "mulier nequam plaga mortis;" and at last by ordering her off in the name of the blessed trinity and the holy virgin, "withal gently blowing towards her," she all of a sudden giving three leaps, and howling thrice, flies away in a trice. the bolungo or chilumbo oath or ordeal is, of course, a "hellish ceremony." demons play as active a part in africa as in china. the portuguese nuncio permits the people in their simplicity to light candles before and to worship the so-called "bull of the blessed sacrament," that by which urban viii. allowed the congo kings to be crowned after the catholic manner by the capuchins, because the paper bears the "venerable effigies." priests may be good servants, but they are, mundanely speaking, bad masters. the ecclesiastical tyranny exercised upon the people from the highest to the lowest goes far to account for the extinction of christianity in the country where so much was done to spread it. the kings of congoland, who "tread on the lion in the kingdom of their mothers" must abjectly address their spiritual lords. "i conjure you, prostrate at your holy feet, to hearken to my words." whilst the friars talk of "that meekness which becomes a missioner," their unwise and unwarrantable interference extends to the count of sonho himself; whose election was not valid unless published in the church, owning withal that, "though a black, he is an absolute prince; and not unworthy of a crown, though he were even in italy, considering the number of his servants and the extent of his dominions." they issue eight ordinances or "spiritual memorandums" degrading governors of cities and provinces who are not properly married, who neglect mass, or who do not keep saints' festivals. flogging seems to have been the punishment of all infractions of discipline, for those who used "magic guards" to their fields instead of "setting the sign of the cross;" and for all who did not teach their children "to repeat, so many times a day, the rosary or the crown, in honour of the blessed virgin, to fast on saturdays, to eat no flesh on wednesdays, and such things used among christians." one of the mwanis (governors) refuses to grub up and level with his own hands a certain grove where the "hellish trade" (magic) was practised; he is commanded to discipline himself in the church during the whole time of celebrating mass. if the governor is negligent in warning the people that a missioner has arrived, "he will receive a deserved punishment, for we make it our business to get such a person removed from his employment, even within his year,"--a system of temporal penalties affixed to spiritual lâches not unknown elsewhere. the following anecdote will show the style of reproof. father benedict da belvedere, a neapolitan who had preached at rome and was likewise confessor to the nuns, heard the chief elector, one of the principal nobles, asking the heretical question, "are we not all to be saved by baptism?" a "sound box on the ear" was the reply, and it led to a tumult. the head of the mission sent for the offended dignitary, and offered him absolution if he would sincerely recant his words and beg pardon of the churchman militant. the answer was, "that would be pleasant indeed; he was the aggressor, yet i must make the excuse! must i receive a blow, and, notwithstanding, be thought to have done wrong?" but the peace-maker explained that the blow was given not to offend, but to defend from hearkening to heresies; that it was administered, moreover, out of paternal affection by a spiritual father, whom it did not mis-become, to a son who was not dishonoured by receiving it. the unfortunate elector not only suffered in the ear, but was also obliged to make an abject apology, and to kiss the offender's feet before he was re-admitted to communion. at maopongo the priests lost favour with the court and the women by whipping the queen, and, by the same process they abated the superhuman pretensions of the blacksmith. when the chiefs and princes were so treated, what could the subjects expect? the smallest ecclesiastical faults were punished with fining and a talmudic flogging, and for disobedience, a man was sent "bound to brazil, a thing they are more than ordinarily afraid of." a man taking to wife, after the mosaic law, a woman left in widow-hood by his kinsman, is severely scourged, and the same happens to a man who marries his cousin, besides being deprived of a profitable employment. every city and town in sonho had a square with a central cross, where those who had not satisfied the easter command or who died unconfessed were buried without privilege of clergy. the missioners insist upon their privilege of travelling free of expense, and make a barefaced use of the corvée. the following is the tone of a mild address to the laity: "some among you are like your own maccacos or monkeys amongst us who, keeping possession of anything they have stolen, will sooner suffer themselves to be taken and killed, than to let go their prey. so impure swine wallow in their filth and care not to be cleansed." a perpetual source of trouble was of course the slave-trade: negroes being the staple of the land, and ivory the other and minor item, the great profits could not fail to render it the subject of contention. the reasons why the portuguese never succeeded in making themselves masters of sonho are reduced by the missioner annalists to three. firstly, the opposition of the people caused by fear; secondly, the objections of the sonhese to buying arms and ammunition; and, thirdly, the small price paid by the portuguese for "captives." the "most reverend cardinal cibo," writing in the name of the sacred college, complained that the "pernicious and abominable abuse of slave-selling" was carried on under the eyes of the missioners, and peremptorily ordered them to remedy the evil. finding this practically impossible, the holy men salved their consciences by ordering their flocks not to supply negroes to the heretical hollanders and english, "whose religion is so very contrary to ours," but to the portuguese, who would "withdraw the poor souls out of the power of lucifer." one father goes so far, in his fear of heretical influences, as to remunerate by the gift of a slave the dealer ferdinando gomez, who had supplied him with "a flask of wine for the sacrament and some other small things," yet he owns f. gomez to be a rogue. as the portuguese would not pay high prices like the heretics, disturbances resulted, and these were put down by the desperate expedient of shutting the church-doors--a suicidal act not yet quite obsolete. whereupon the count of sonho, we are told, "changed his countenance almost from black to yellow," and complained to the bishop at loanda that the sacraments were not administered: the appeal was in vain, and, worse, an extra aid was sent to the truculent churchmen. happily for them, the small- pox broke out, and the ruler was persuaded by his subjects to do the required penance. appearing at the convent, unattended, with a large rope round his neck, clad in sackcloth, crowned with thorns, unshod, and carrying a crucifix, he knelt down and kissed the feet of the priest, who said to him, "if thou hast sinned like david, imitate him likewise in thy repentance!" the schismatics caused abundant trouble captain cornelius clas "went about sowing heretical tares amidst the true corn of the gospel;" amongst other damnable doctrines and subtleties, this nautical and volunteer theologian persuaded the blacks, whom he knew to be desirous of greater liberty in such matters, that baptism is the only sacrament necessary to salvation, because it takes away original sin, as the blood of the saviour actual sin. he furthermore (impudently) disowned the real presence in the consecrated host; he invoked saint anthony, although his tribe generally denies that praying to saints can be of any use to man; and he declared that priests should preach certain doctrines (which, by the way, were perniciously heretical). thus in a single hour he so prevailed upon those miserable negroes that their hearts became quite as black as their faces. an especially offensive practice of the hollanders, in the eyes of the good shepherds, was that of asking the feminine sheep for a whiff of tobacco--it being a country custom to consider the taking a pipe from a woman's mouth a "probable earnest of future favours." when an english ship entered the river, the priests forbade by manifesto the sale of slaves to the captain, he being a briton, ergò a heretic, despite the duke of york. the count of sonho disobeyed, and was excommunicated accordingly: he took his punishment with much patience, although upon occasions of reproof he would fly into passions and disdains; he was reconciled only after obliging couples that lived in concubinage to lawful wedlock, and thus a number of "strayed souls was reduced to matrimony." we can hardly wonder that, under such discipline, a large ecclesiastical body was necessary to "maintain the country in its due obedience to the christian faith," and that, despite their charity in alms and their learning, no permanent footing was possible for the strangers. nor can we be astonished that the good fathers so frequently complain of being poisoned. on one occasion a batch of six was thus treated near bamba. in this matter perhaps they were somewhat fanciful, as the white man in india is disposed to be. one of them, for instance cured himself with a "fruit called a lemon" and an elk-hoof, from what he took to be poison, but what was possibly the effect of too much pease and pullet broth. in "o muata cazembe "(pp. - ), we find that the asiatic portuguese attach great value to the hoof of the nhumbo (a. gnu), they call it "unha de grãbesta," and use it even in the gotta-coral (epilepsy). and yet many of these ecclesiastics, whom lopez de lima justly terms "fabulistas," were industrious and sensible men, where religion was not concerned. they carefully studied the country, its "situation, possessions, habitations, and clothing." they formed always outside their faith the justest estimate of their black fellow-creatures. i cannot too often repeat father merolla's dictum, "the reader may perceive that the negroes are both a malicious and subtle people that spend the most part of their time in circumventing and deceiving." nor has spiritual despotism been confined to the catholic missions in west africa: certain john knoxes in the old calabar river have repeated, especially in the case of the king "young eyo," whom they excluded from communion, all the abuses and the errors of judgment of the seventeenth century with the modifications of the nineteenth. and we must not readily endorse dr. livingstone's professional opinion. "in view of the desolate condition of this fine missionary field, it is more than probable that the presence of a few protestants would soon provoke the priests, if not to love, to good works." such is not the history of our propagandism about the cape of good hope. dr. gustav fritsch ("the natives of south africa," ), thus speaks of the missionary livingstone, who must not be confounded with the great explorer livingstone: "a man who is borne onward by religious enthusiasm and a glowing ambition, without our being able to say which of these two levers works more powerfully in his soul. certain it is that he endured more labours and overcame more geographical difficulties than any other african traveller either before or after him; yet it is also sure that, on account of the defective natural-historical education of the author, and the indiscreet partisanship for the natives against the settlers, his works have spread many false views concerning south africa." this, i doubt not, will be the verdict of posterity. see "anthropologia," in which are included the proceedings of the london anthropological society (inaugurated january, . no. , october, . london: baillière, tindall, and co.) the review (pp. - ), bears the well-known initials j. b. d., and it is not saying too much that no man in england is so well fitted as dr. davis to write it. i quote these passages without any feeling of disrespect for the memory of the great african explorer. truth is a higher duty even than generous appreciation of a heroic name, and the time will come when negrophilism must succumb to fact. chapter xvii. concluding remarks. i have thus attempted to trace a picture of the congo river in the latter days of the slave-trade, and of its lineal descendant, "l'immigration africaine." the people at large are satisfied, and the main supporters of the traffic--the chiefs, the "medicine- men," and the white traders--have at length been powerless to arrest its destruction. and here we may quote certain words of wisdom from the "congo expedition" in : "it is not to be expected that the effects of abolition will be immediately perceptible; on the contrary, it will probably require more than one generation to become apparent: for effects, which have been the consequence of a practice of three centuries, will certainly continue long after the cause is removed." the allusion in the sentence which i have italicized, is of course, to the american exportation--domestic slavery must date from the earliest ages. these sensible remarks conclude with advocating "colonization in the cause of civilization;" a process which at present cannot be too strongly deprecated. that the nzadi is capable of supplying something better than slaves may be shown by a list of what its banks produce. merolla says in : "cotton here is to be gathered in great abundance, and the shrubs it grows on are so prolific, that they never almost leave sprouting." captain tuckey ("narrative," p. ) declares "the only vegetable production at boma of any consequence in commerce is cotton, which grows wild most luxuriantly, but the natives have ceased to gather it since the english have left off trading to the river," i will not advocate tobacco, cotton and sugar; they are indigenous, it is true, but their cultivation is hardly fitted to the african in africa. copper in small quantities has been brought from the interior, but the mineral resources of the wide inland regions are wholly unknown. if reports concerning mines on the plateau be trustworthy, there will be a rush of white hands, which must at once change, and radically change, all the conditions of the riverine country. wax might be supplied in large quantities; the natives, however, have not yet learnt to hive their bees. ivory was so despised by the slave-trade, that it was sent from the upper congo to mayumba and the other exporting harbours; demand would certainly produce a small but regular supply. the two staples of commerce are now represented by palm-oil, which can be produced in quantities over the lowlands upon the whole river delta, and along the banks from the mouth to boma, a distance of at least fifty direct miles. the second, and the more important, is the arachis, or ground-nut, which flourishes throughout the highlands of the interior, and which, at the time of my visit, was beginning to pay. as the experience of some thirty years on different parts of the west coast has proved, both these articles are highly adapted to the peculiarities of the negro cultivator; they require little labour, and they command a ready, a regular, and a constant sale. when time shall be ripe for a bonâ fide emigration, the position of boma, at the head of the delta, a charming station, with healthy air and delicious climate, points it out as the head- quarters. houses can be built for nominal sums, the neighbouring hills offer a sanatorium, and due attention to diet and clothing will secure the white man from the inevitable sufferings that result from living near the lower course. with respect to the exploration of the upper stream, these pages, compared with the records of the "first congo expedition," will show the many changes which time has brought with it, and will suggest the steps most likely to forward the traveller's views. at some period to come explorers will follow the line chosen by the unfortunate tuckey; but the effects of the slave-trade must have passed away before that march can be made without much obstruction. when lieutenant grandy did me the honour of asking my advice, i suggested that he might avoid great delay and excessive outlay by "turning" the obstacle and by engaging "cabindas" instead of sierra leone men. at the royal geographical society (dec. th, ) he thus recorded his decision: "for the guidance of future travellers in the congo country, i would suggest that all the carriers be engaged at sierra leone, where any number can be obtained for s. d. a day. from my experience of them i can safely say they will be found to answer every requirement, and the employment of them would render an expedition entirely independent of the natives, who, by their cowardice and constant desertion, entailed upon us such heavy expenses and serious delays. my conviction, after nearly four years of travel upon the west african coast, is this: if sierra leone men be used, they must be mixed with cabindas and with congoese "carregadores," registered in presence of the portuguese authorities at s. paulo de loanda. i conclude with the hope that the great nzadi, one of the noblest, and still the least known of the four principal african arteries, will no longer be permitted to flow through the white blot, a region unexplored and blank to geography as at the time of its creation, and that my labours may contribute something, however small, to clear the way for the more fortunate explorer. appendix i. meteorlogical instruments used for altitudes:-- pocket aneroid, corrected + . , "r.g.s" casella's alpine sympiesometer, corrected to ° (f.). n.b.-- returning to fernando po, found that part of the liquid has lodged in upper bulb, and therefore corrected index error by standard aneroid . (symp. = . , and standard, . ). observations at the congo mouth in february, (from log of h.m.s. "griffon"). thermometer barometer winds place engine in sea. force & direction room. a.m. p.m. ° ° . ( ) s.e. ( ) n.n.w. loanda. ° ° . ( ) s.w. ( ) w.n.w. en route to congo. ° ° . ( ) s. ( ) s.s.w. en route to congo. ° ° . ( ) s. ( ) w. en route to congo. ° ° . ( ) s.w. ( ) s.s.w. en route to congo. ° ° . ( ) s.e. ( ) s.w. en route to congo. ° ° . ( ) s. ( - )s. congo. ° ° . ( ) calm ( ) w. congo. (signed) f. f. flynne, assistant-surgeon in charge. place and date. time of day. thermometer. symp. remarks. th september a.m. ° . cor. . cold morning, light wind from n.n.e., banza nokki a.m. ° . cor. . threatened rain, a.m.; noon misty, on hills above noon. ° . cor. . day hazy; p.m., sun hot, wind cooler river p.m. . ° . cor. . from west; evening, stiff sea-breeze, p.m. ° . cor. . people complain of cold; night, heavy dew. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . misty morning, warm at a.m., wind; noon, same place, a.m. ° . cor. . hot sun, high sea-breeze; p.m., hot nokki. noon. ° . cor. . sun, cool west wind; cloudy evening; p.m. ° . cor. . windy night, dew cold and heavy. p.m. ° . cor. . altitude of nokki above sea, , feet. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . misty morning, warm but clouding over; banza noon. ° . cor. . at noon high sea-breeze, glare and hot chingufu p.m. ° . cor. . sun, when clouds break ° in sun, above nokki; p.m. ° . cor. . p.m.; p.m., high sea-breeze up see also th river; p.m., cold sea-breeze, cloudy and th sept. sky. altitude of chingufu, , feet. chingufu th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . clear fine morning; high west wind first observation nekolo. at a.m.; pocket aneroid . chingufu, a.m. ° . cor. . shady verandah facing to west; at others at nekolo noon. ° . cor. . noon aneroid . ; p.m., hot lower down & near p.m. ° . cor. . sun, westerly breeze, few clouds; river. p.m. ° . cor. . p.m., very clear, east wind strong; no dew at night. negolo nkulu. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . close cloudy morning; a.m., negolo and near a.m. ° . cor. . alternately clear and cloudy, congo river. noon. ° . cor. . glare, no wind; noon bright and sultry, no clouds; p.m., in shady cove feet above river; rain at . p.m., lasted two hours; dispersed by westerly breeze. cove near river. p.m. ° . cor. . height of negolo, feet. left bank. th sept a.m. ° . cor . dull, warm, and cloudy. right bank. banza vivi on a.m. ° . cor. . aneroid . , dull day. hills above right noon. ° . cor. . anerodi . dull day, very little bank. p.m. ° . cor. . breeze, village shut in, clouds p.m. ° . cor. . from west banza vivi. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . thick drizzle from west, no wind. at banza simbo, half way up vivi range, aneroid . . banza nkulu noon ° . cor. . under tree facing north; puffs of above rapids. west wind, threatened rain, none came. p.m. ° . cor. . in veranda facing north-east; clear night, heavy dew. banza nkulu. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . grass wet, heavy dew, rain threatened, aneroid . . feet above rapids. . a.m. ° . cor. . aneroid . . banza nkulu again noon. ° . cor. . aneroid . , dull, cloudy, rain threatened. p.m. ° . cor. . dull day, clearer towards evening, p.m. ° . cor. . very heavy dew. altitude of nkulu, feet. altitude of yellala rapids, feet. nkulu. th sept. . a.m. ° . cor. . grey, cool; threatens sunny day. right bank of river. . a.m. ° . cor. . cool west wind. in canoe on river below little rapids. . a.m. ° . cor. . aneroid . ( ) left bank feet above water, under fig-tree facing north. noon. ° . cor. . aneroid . . negolo town p.m. ° . cor. . day hot, aneroid in verandah . . banza chingufu. p.m. ° . cor. . clear evening, misty towards night, young moon with halo. height of river below vivi fall, feet. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . cool, grey, no wind. at chingufu as a.m. ° . cor. . strong land wind, from east, no before. sun, heavy clouds n.e. noon. ° . cor. . high west wind, hot sun. . p.m. ° . cor. . clear at p.m., thermometer ° little wind, sun hot. p.m. ° . cor. . clear evening, no dew, misty moon, high sea-breeze at night. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . still grey morning, no wind. at chingufu. . a.m. ° . cor. . lighter, wind from west. noon. ° . cor. . dull, light west wind. p.m. ° . cor. . cloudy and sunny, west wind. p.m. ° . cor. . clear, fine, little wind. how do these agree with september ? chingufu. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . fine, clear, and still morning. on river. down river a.m. ° . cor. . hot day, aneroid . ; at a.m. . . off chacha village on river. noon. ° . cor. . sea-breeze, sun hot, but obscured by smoke of bush fires. on river. p.m. ° . cor. . aneroid . , stiff sea breeze. last observation taken about miles above boma. sept. a.m. ° . cor. . cool, cloudy, pleasant. at boma. noon. . ° . cor. . dull, threatens rain. p.m. ° . cor. . dull, muggy, cloudy. nd sept. a.m. ° . cor. . dull, cloudy, cool; instrument in boma. verandah facing south-west. a.m. ° . cor. . noon. ° . cor. . dull and warm. p.m. ° . cor. . very dull, strong sea-breeze comes up in afternoon, and lasts till p.m. p.m. ° . cor. . dull night. mean altitude of boma (commonly called embomma), feet. rd sept. a.m. . ° . cor. . dull morning boma. a.m. . ° . cor. . clear and sunny. p.m. ° . cor. . clear, hot, and sunny. p.m. ° . cor. . high wind, sun. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . cool and clear. boma. a.m. ° . cor. . hot and clear. . p.m. . ° . cor. . hot and clear. p.m. . ° . cor. . very strong sea-breeze till late at night. p.m. . ° . cor. . very strong sea-breeze till late at night. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . dull, no sun, rain threatened. noon. ° . cor. . p.m. ° . cor. . aneroid . . p.m. ° . cor. . dull, no sun, wind subsided at night. porto da senha at factory. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . aneroid . , day clear. a.m. ° . cor. . aneroid . , hot sun. on passage in canoe down river. noon. ° . cor. . aneroid . . p.m. . ° . cor. . aneroid . . mean altitude of porto da lenha, feet. th sept. a.m. . ° . cor. . dry, cloudy morning. banana factory, a.m. ° . cor. . calm, land and sea breezes very mouth of river, regular. feet above noon. ° . cor. . at noon thermometer at seaside in sea level. sun (overcast) . °. p.m. . ° . cor. . p.m. ° . cor. . symp. (corrected) . °. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . weather calm; at seaside in sun same place. a.m. ° . cor. . (overcast) thermometer . °. noon. ° . cor. . p.m. ° . cor. . symp. (corrected) . °. p.m. ° . cor. . night cold and windy. th sept. a.m. ° . cor. . clear weather, high wind. same place. a.m. ° . cor. . ii. plants collected in the congo, at dahome, and the island of annabom, by mr. consul burton. received at the herbarium, royal gardens, kew, september, . argemone mexicana dahome. cleome guineensis, hf. congo. gynardropsis pentaphylla, d. c. ditto. ritcheia fragrans. br. dahome. alsodeia sp. congo. flacourtia sp. dahome. polygala avenaria, willd. congo. polycarpæa linearifolia dahome (not laid in). seda cordifolia, l. congo. seda an s. humilis (?) ditto. seda urens, l. ditto. abutilon sp. ditto. urena lobata, l. annabom and congo. hibiscus cannabinus, l. dahome. hibiscus vitifolius, l. congo. hibiscus (abelmoschus) moschatus, moench ditto. hibiscus aff. h. sabdariffæ dahome. gossypium sp. congo. walthenia indica, l. dahome. walthenia (?) congo. triumfetta rhomboidea (?) congo, annabom, dahome. acridocarpus sp. congo. citrus aurantium (?) annabom (not laid in). citrus sp. annabom (not laid in). cardiospermum helicacabum, l. annabom. anacardium occidentale, l. congo and annabom. spondias dubia? reich. annabom. cnestis(?) sp. dahome. cnestis(?) sp. congo. (?)spondias sp. (very young) ditto (not laid in). (?)soindeia sp. fl. ft. congo. rosa sp. ditto (not laid in). jussieua acuminata, jno. congo. jussieua linifolia(?) vahl. ditto. mollugo spergula, l. ditto. combretum spinosum(?) dahome (fl. only). combretum sp. congo. quisqualis ebracteata(?) ditto. combretum sp. (fruct.) ditto (not laid in). combretum sp. congo. modeeca tamnifolia(?), kl. annabom. syzygium avariense, kth. congo. melothria triangularis(?), kth. ditto. melothria(?) sp. ditto. cucurbitaceæ ( other spp. very imperfect and not laid in). umbelliferæ congo. desmodium mauritianum(?), d.c. ditto, annabom(?) desmodium do. v. adscendens congo. desmodium latifolium, d.c. dahome. desmodium gargeticum (?), d. c. annabom. cajanus indicus, l. congo. eniosema cajanoides ditto. eniosema aff. id. ditto. eniosema aff. glomerata ditto. abrus precatorius(?) annabom. pisum sativum congo. phaseolus sp. annabom. rhynchaesia sp. congo. tephrosia sp. ditto. milletia(?) sp. ditto. milletia(?) ditto. milletia or lonchocarpus (?) congo. indigofera af. i. endeeaphylla. jacq. annabom. indigofera sp. congo. indigofera sp. dahome. indigofera sp. ditto. sesbania sp. congo. crotalaria sp. dahome. glycine labialis (?) annabom. erythrina sp. (?) dahome. berlinia sp. (?) congo. cassia occidentalis, l. ditto (not laid in) cassia mimosoides (?), l. congo. dichrostachys nutans (?) ditto. mimosa asperata (?), l. congo (not laid in) zygia fastigiata (?) ela dahome. vernonia (decaneuron), senegalensis ditto, annabom. vernonia congo. vernonia an v. pandurata (?) ditto. vernonia cinerea ditto. ethulia conyzoides ditto. vernonia an v. pauciflora (?) dahome. vernonia stæchadifolia, sch. ditto. ageratum conyzoides, l. annabom, congo. mikania chenopodiifolia, wild. ditto. grangea, sp. congo. bidens pilosa, l. ditto. coronocarpus (?) dahome. blumea (?) sp. ditto. blumea sp. ditto. blumea sp. ditto. chrysanthellum sengalense (?), d.c. dahome. verbesinoid. dub. congo. gnaphalium an luteo-album (?) ditto. hedyotis corymbosa, l. ditto. otomeria guineensis (?), kth. ditto. randia longistyla, d. c. dahome. borreria ramisparsa (?), d. c. var. ditto. octodon (?) sp. dahome. spermacoce ruelliæ (?), d. c. ditto. baconia corymbosa, d. c. ditto. baconia aff. d. annabom. rubiaceæ, dub. congo. rubiaceæ ditto. rubiaceæ annabom. diospyros (?) sp. congo. cynoctonum (?) aff. ditto. ipomæa sp. (?). ditto. ipomæa sp. ditto. ipomæa sp. ditto. ipomæa sp. dahome. ipomæa filicaulis, bl. congo. ipomæa sp. ditto. ipomæa involucrata. dahome. ipomæa sessiliflora (?) clius (?) ditto, congo. leonotis nepetifolia. bil. congo. ocymum an o. gratissimum (?) ditto (not laid in). moschoesma polystachya (?) ditto (ditto). heliophytum indicum, d. c. ditto. heliotropium strigosum (?), willd. dahome. brillantaisia an b. patula, p. a. (?) congo. dicliptera verticillaris (?), juss. ditto. asystasia coromandeliana (?) dahome. justicia galeopsis ditto. lycopersicum esculentum congo. capsicum an c. frutescens (?) ditto (ditto). solanum ditto (ditto). solanum annabom (ditto). solanum congo (ditto). schwenckia americana, l. ditto. scoparia dulcis, l. congo (not laid in). spathodea lævis (?) dahome. sesamum indicum, var. ditto. plumbago zeylanica, l. congo (ditto.) clerodendron multiflorum (?), don. ditto, imp., ditto. clerodendron sp. congo. lippia sp. ditto. lippia an l. adoensis? ditto. stachytarphita jamaicensis, v. dahome. celosia trigyna (?), l. congo. erua lanata ditto (ditto). pupalia lappacea, moq. annabom. achyranthes involucrata, moq. dahome. achyranthes argentea (?), lam. congo. celosia argentea, l. dahome (ditto). amaranthus paniculatus, l. congo. euxolus irridis congo. phyllanthus pentandrus (?) dahome. phyllanthus nivari, l. congo. acalypha sp. ditto. manihot utilissima (?) ditto. antidesma venosum ditto. euphorbia pilulifera, l. annabom. croton lobatum dahome. phytolacca an p. abyssinica (?) congo (bad, not laid in). ricinus communis (?) congo (not laid in). phyllanthus sp. ditto. cannabis sativa, l. ditto (ditto). boerhaavia paniculata ditto (ditto). polygonum senegalense, meiss ditto. castus afch. ditto (ditto). aneilema adhærens (?) ditto. aneilema an a. ovato-oblongeum ditto. aneilema beninense congo. commolyna (?) dahome. fragts. commolyneæ (not laid in). ph�nix (?) spadix congo. canna indica (?) congo and annabom. chloris varbata (?), sw. congo (not laid in). andropogon (cymbopogon) sp. (?) ditto. andropogon, an sorghum (?) ditto (ditto). panicum an oplismenus (?) ditto (ditto). panicum sp. congo and annabom. (?) eleusine indica annabom (not laid in). eragrostis megastachya, lk. congo. leptochloa sp (?) ditto. pennisetum sp. ditto. pennisetum sp. dahome. pennisetum sp. congo. mariscus sp. annabom. cy. flagellatus (?) hochst congo. cy. sphacelatus annabom. scleria an s. racemosa congo. iii. heights of stations, west coast of africa, computed from observations made by capt. burton. . feet. sept. .-- on route to banza nokki sept. . nokki sept. .-- nokki, on hills \ above river. | " | " | sept. . " |- mean = feet. " | " | " | " / sept. .-- chingufu above \ nokki | mean feet: " | see sept. ., &c. sept. . " / nelongo's village, lower down -\ and nearer village. | " | " |-mean = feet. sept. . " | " | " -/ sept. .-- cove near congo river feet. sept. .-- hills above banza river. " sept. .-- banza river at level of river. banza nkulu above \ rapids. |-mean = . sept. . " / banza nkulu \ " |-mean = . " | sept. . " / nelongo's village� negolo banza chingufu sept. .-- chingufu. \ " | " | " | " | sept. . " |-mean = feet. " | see sept. . " | " | " | sept. . " / sept. . boma. \ " | " | " | sept. . " | " | " | " | sept. . " | " | " |-mean = feet. " | sept. . " | " | " | " | " | sept. . " | " | " | " / sept. .-- porto de lenha. sept. .-- banana factory. \ " | " | " | " | sept. . " |-mean = feet. " | " | " | " | sept. . " | " / iv. (form of french passport.) immigration africaine. ce jourd'hui _______________ mil huit cent soixante _______________ par devant nous _______________ commissaire du gouvernement français, agent d'émigration, conformément à l'article du décret du mars , assisté de _______________ témoins requis, a comparu le nommé _______________ noir libre, né au village de _______________ côte de _______________ âgé de _______________ lequel nous a déclaré consentir librement et de son plein gré à partir pour une des colonies françaises d'amérique pour y contracter l'engagement de travail ci-après détaillé et présenté par m _______________ au nom de m. régis, au profit de l'habitant qui sera désigné par l'administration locale à son arrivée dans la colonie. les conditions d'engagement de travail sont les suivantes: art. . le nommé ______________________________ s'engage, tant pour les travaux de culture et de fabrication sucrière &c. que pour tous autres d'exploitation agricole et industrielle auxquels l'engagiste jugera convenable de l'employer et généralement pour tous les travaux quelconques de domesticité. art. . le présent engagement de travail est de dix années à partir du jour de l'entrée au service de l'engagiste. l'engagé doit jours de travail effectifs et complets par mois; les gages ne seront dus qu'après jours de travail. la journée de travail ordinaire sera celle établie par les règlements existant dans la colonie. a l'époque de la manipulation l'engagé sera tenu de travailler sans augmentation de salaires suivant les besoins de l'établissement où il sera employé. (the employer can thus overwork his slaves as much as he pleases.) art. . l'engagiste aura le droit de céder et transporter à qui bon lui semblera, sous le contrôle de l'administration le présent engagement de travail contracté à son profit. (n.b.--the owner can thus separate families.) art. . l'engagé sera logé sur l'établissement où il sera employé; il aura droit, de la part de l'engagiste aux soins médicaux, à sa nourriture, laquelle sera conforme aux règlements et à l'usage adopté dans la colonie pour les gens de travail du pays. bien entendu que toute maladie contractée par un fait étranger, soit à ses travaux, soit à ses occupations, sera à ses frais. (thus bed and board are at the discretion of the employer, and the gate of fraud is left open.) art. . le salaire de l'engagé est de: francs pour les hommes, francs pour les femmes, francs pour les enfants de à ans., par mois de jours de travail, comme il est dit à l'article , à partir de jours après son débarquement dans la colonie. moitié de cette somme lui sera payée fin chaque mois, l'autre moitié le sera fin de chaque année. (not even festivals allowed as holidays.) art. . l'engagé reconnait avoir reçu en avance, du représentant de m. régis, la somme de deux cents francs dont il s'est servi pour sa libération et pour divers frais à son compte, ces avances seront retenues sur ses salaires à raison de par mois. art. . l'engagé déclare par avance se soumettre aux règlements rendus dans la colonie pour la police du travail et de l'immigration. art. . a l'expiration de son temps d'engagement le rapatriement sera accordé à l'immigrant pour lui, sa femme, et ses enfants non adultes, à la condition par celui-ci de verser mensuellement à la caisse d'immigration le dixième de son salaire. si l'engagé renonce à son rapatriement, toute somme versée par lui lui sera remboursée. en cas de réengagement les conditions en seront débattues de gré-à-gré entre l'engagé et le propriétaire engagiste. fait et signé de bonne foi, le certifié par le délégué de l'administration faisant fonctions d'agent d'émigration. [fn# ] "die deutsche expedition an der loango küuste, nebst älteren nachrichten über die zu erforschenden länder." von adolf bastian. jena and london (trübner and co.), . [fn# ] see "the lands of the cazembe," p. , royal geographical society, london, . [fn# ] see "the lands of the cazembe" (p. , note), where, however, the word has taken the form of "impaçeiro." at p. , line , a parenthesis has been misplaced before and after "impalancas," a word differently interpreted by portuguese writers. [fn# ] the directory and charts. [fn# ] that of the hydrographic office, dated , assigns it to s. lat. ° ', and e. long. ° '; and the granite pillar to s. lat. ° ' ", and e. long. ° ' ". [fn# ] duarte lopez, the portuguese captain, whose journals were used by pigafetta. he went to the congo regions in , and stayed there ten years. "philipp's voyages," vol. iii. p. . [fn# ] "philipp's voyages," vol. iii. p. . [fn# ] appendix to tuckey's "expedition," no. . [fn# ] see the note of the learned robert brown, p. , appendix v., tuckey's "congo." [fn# ] "relazione del reame di congo, e delle circonvicine contrade, tratta dagli scritti e raggionamenti di odoardo lopez, portogheze, per philippo pigafetta." roma, , fol. [fn# ] "historia de etiopia," p. . [fn# ] "geography of n'yassi," note, p. . [fn# ] see "zanzibar city, island, and coast," vol. i. p. . "marinus of tyre" became by misprint "mariners of tyre." [fn# ] chap. xvii. of the rev. mr. waddell's "twenty-nine years in the west indies and central africa." [fn# ] "narrative of a voyage of discovery to africa and arabia," by captain thomas boteler. london: bentley, ; repeated from owen's "voyages to africa, arabia," &c. london: bentley, . lt. wolf, r.n., has given an able analysis of this great surveying undertaking in the "journal of the geographical society," vol. iii. of . [fn# ] see chap. v. [fn# ] of this lake i shall have something to say in chap. xii. [fn# ] see "the lands of the cazembe," p. . [fn# ] petermann's "geog. mitt." of , pp. - . i have duly obtained at pest the permission of professor hunfálvy, who in edited the hungarian and german issues, to translate into english the highly interesting volume, the only remains of ladislaus magyar, the traveller having died, nov. , , after visiting large and previously unknown tracts of south-western africa. the work has been undertaken by the rev. r. c. g. o'callaghan, consular chaplain, trieste, and i hope that it will soon appear with notes by myself. it will be a fitting pendant to dr. de lacerda's "journey to the lands of the cazembe." [fn# ] "geog. mitt." , p. . [fn# ] proofs of the identity of the lualaba with the congo;" translated by mr. keith johnston from the "geogr. mittheilungen," i. , bund, , and published in the "proceedings of the royal geographical society," no. i, vol. xviii. of feb. , . [fn# ] "the lands of the cazembe," p. . [fn# ] "daily telegraph," sept. , . [fn# ] "erläuterungen," &c. berlin: dietrich reimer, . [fn# ] tuckey (p. ), and the general observations prefixed to the diaries. [fn# ] this palm-clapping is often alluded to in "o muata cazembe" (pp. et passim). [fn# ] "highlands of the brazil," vol. ii. chap. xv. the red clay of the congo region is an exact copy of what is found on the opposite side of the atlantic. [fn# ] "journal of an african cruiser," by an officer of the united states navy, p. . london, . tuckey ("narrative," ) gives a sketch of the building. [fn# ] see frontispiece. [fn# ] at the memorable bath meeting of the british association, sept. . [fn# ] mr. richard spruce, "ocean highways," august, , p. . [fn# ] "lowlands of the brazil," chap. xvii. tinsleys, . ii. [fn# ] "journal of the royal geographical society," vol. iii. p. , . [fn# ] in the "geographical magazine" for february, . [fn# ] in carli gramga and fomet, evident cacography. end of volume of two trips to gorilla land. travels in west africa (congo francais, corisco and cameroons) by mary h. kingsley. to my brother, c. g. kingsley this book is dedicated. contents preface. preface to the abridged edition of travels in west africa. introduction. chapter i. liverpool to sierra leone and the gold coast. chapter ii. fernando po and the bubis. chapter iii. voyage down coast. chapter iv. the ogowe. chapter v. the rapids of the ogowe. chapter vi. lembarene. chapter vii. on the way from kangwe to lake ncovi. chapter viii. from ncovi to esoon. chapter ix. from esoon to agonjo. chapter x. bush trade and fan customs. chapter xi. down the rembwe. chapter xii. fetish. chapter xiii. fetish--(continued). chapter xiv. fetish--(continued). chapter xv. fetish--(continued). chapter xvi. fetish--(concluded). chapter xvii. ascent of the great peak of cameroons. chapter xviii. the great peak of cameroons--(continued). chapter xix. the great peak of cameroons--(continued). chapter xx. the great peak of cameroons--(concluded). chapter xxi. trade and labour in west africa. chapter xxii. disease in west africa. appendix. the invention of the cloth loom. preface to the reader.--what this book wants is not a simple preface but an apology, and a very brilliant and convincing one at that. recognising this fully, and feeling quite incompetent to write such a masterpiece, i have asked several literary friends to write one for me, but they have kindly but firmly declined, stating that it is impossible satisfactorily to apologise for my liberties with lindley murray and the queen's english. i am therefore left to make a feeble apology for this book myself, and all i can personally say is that it would have been much worse than it is had it not been for dr. henry guillemard, who has not edited it, or of course the whole affair would have been better, but who has most kindly gone through the proof sheets, lassoing prepositions which were straying outside their sentence stockade, taking my eye off the water cask and fixing it on the scenery where i meant it to be, saying firmly in pencil on margins "no you don't," when i was committing some more than usually heinous literary crime, and so on. in cases where his activities in these things may seem to the reader to have been wanting, i beg to state that they really were not. it is i who have declined to ascend to a higher level of lucidity and correctness of diction than i am fitted for. i cannot forbear from mentioning my gratitude to mr. george macmillan for his patience and kindness with me,--a mere jungle of information on west africa. whether you my reader will share my gratitude is, i fear, doubtful, for if it had not been for him i should never have attempted to write a book at all, and in order to excuse his having induced me to try i beg to state that i have written only on things that i know from personal experience and very careful observation. i have never accepted an explanation of a native custom from one person alone, nor have i set down things as being prevalent customs from having seen a single instance. i have endeavoured to give you an honest account of the general state and manner of life in lower guinea and some description of the various types of country there. in reading this section you must make allowances for my love of this sort of country, with its great forests and rivers and its animistic-minded inhabitants, and for my ability to be more comfortable there than in england. your superior culture-instincts may militate against your enjoying west africa, but if you go there you will find things as i have said. january, . preface to the abridged edition of travels in west africa. when on my return to england from my second sojourn in west africa, i discovered, to my alarm, that i was, by a freak of fate, the sea- serpent of the season, i published, in order to escape from this reputation, a very condensed, much abridged version of my experiences in lower guinea; and i thought that i need never explain about myself or lower guinea again. this was one of my errors. i have been explaining ever since; and, though not reconciled to so doing, i am more or less resigned to it, because it gives me pleasure to see that english people can take an interest in that land they have neglected. nevertheless, it was a shock to me when the publishers said more explanation was required. i am thankful to say the explanation they required was merely on what plan the abridgment of my first account had been made. i can manage that explanation easily. it has been done by removing from it certain sections whole, and leaving the rest very much as it first stood. of course it would have been better if i had totally reformed and rewritten the book in pellucid english; but that is beyond me, and i feel at any rate this book must be better than it was, for there is less of it; and i dimly hope critics will now see that there is a saving grace in disconnectedness, for owing to that disconnectedness whole chapters have come out without leaving holes. as for the part that is left in, i have already apologised for its form, and i cannot help it, for lower guinea is like what i have said it is. no one who knows it has sent home contradictions of my description of it, or its natives, or their manners or customs, and they have had by now ample time and opportunity. the only complaints i have had regarding my account from my fellow west coasters have been that i might have said more. i trust my forbearance will send a thrill of gratitude through readers of the -page edition. there is, however, one section that i reprint, regarding which i must say a few words. it is that on the trade and labour problem in west africa, particularly the opinion therein expressed regarding the liquor traffic. this part has brought down on me much criticism from the missionary societies and their friends; and i beg gratefully to acknowledge the honourable fairness with which the controversy has been carried on by the great wesleyan methodist mission to the gold coast and the baptist mission to the congo. it has not ended in our agreement on this point, but it has raised my esteem of missionary societies considerably; and anyone interested in this matter i beg to refer to the baptist magazine for october, . therein will be found my answer, and the comments on it by a competent missionary authority; for the rest of this matter i beg all readers of this book to bear in mind that i confine myself to speaking only of the bit of africa i know--west africa. during this past summer i attended a meeting at which sir george taubman goldie spoke, and was much struck with the truth of what he said on the difference of different african regions. he divided africa into three zones: firstly, that region where white races could colonise in the true sense of the word, and form a great native-born white population, namely, the region of the cape; secondly, a region where the white race could colonise, but to a less extent--an extent analogous to that in india--namely, the highlands of central east africa and parts of northern africa; thirdly, a region where the white races cannot colonise in a true sense of the word, namely, the west african region, and in those regions he pointed out one of the main elements of prosperity and advance is the native african population. i am quoting his words from memory, possibly imperfectly; but there is very little reliable printed matter to go on when dealing with sir george taubman goldie, which is regrettable because he himself is an experienced and reliable authority. i am however quite convinced that these aforesaid distinct regions are regions that the practical politician dealing with africa must recognise, and keep constantly in mind when attempting to solve the many difficulties that that great continent presents, and sincerely hope every reader of this work will remember that i am speaking of that last zone, the zone wherein white races cannot colonise in a true sense of the word, but which is nevertheless a vitally important region to a great manufacturing country like england, for therein are vast undeveloped markets wherein she can sell her manufactured goods and purchase raw material for her manufactures at a reasonable rate. having a rooted, natural, feminine hatred for politics i have no inclination to become diffuse on them, as i have on the errors of other people's cooking or ideas on decoration. i know i am held to be too partial to france in west africa; too fond of pointing out her brilliant achievements there, too fond of saying the native is as happy, and possibly happier, under her rule than under ours; and also that i am given to a great admiration for germans; but this is just like any common-sense englishwoman. of course i am devoted to my own john; but still monsieur is brave, bright, and fascinating; mein herr is possessed of courage and commercial ability in the highest degree, and, besides, he takes such a lot of trouble to know the real truth about things, and tells them to you so calmly and carefully--and our own john--well, of course, he is everything that's good and great, but he makes a shocking fool of himself at times, particularly in west africa. i should enjoy holding what one of my justly irritated expurgators used to call one of my little thanksgiving services here, but i will not; for, after all, it would be impossible for me to satisfactorily thank those people who, since my publication of this book, have given me help and information on the subject of west africa. chief amongst them have been mr. a. l. jones, sir. r. b. n. walker, mr. irvine, and mr. john holt. i have not added to this book any information i have received since i wrote it, as it does not seem to me fair to do so. my only regret regarding it is that i have not dwelt sufficiently on the charm of west africa; it is so difficult to explain such things; but i am sure there are amongst my readers people who know by experience the charm some countries exercise over men--countries very different from each other and from west africa. the charm of west africa is a painful one: it gives you pleasure when you are out there, but when you are back here it gives you pain by calling you. it sends up before your eyes a vision of a wall of dancing white, rainbow-gemmed surf playing on a shore of yellow sand before an audience of stately coco palms; or of a great mangrove- watered bronze river; or of a vast aisle in some forest cathedral: and you hear, nearer to you than the voices of the people round, nearer than the roar of the city traffic, the sound of the surf that is breaking on the shore down there, and the sound of the wind talking on the hard palm leaves and the thump of the natives' tom- toms; or the cry of the parrots passing over the mangrove swamps in the evening time; or the sweet, long, mellow whistle of the plantain warblers calling up the dawn; and everything that is round you grows poor and thin in the face of the vision, and you want to go back to the coast that is calling you, saying, as the african says to the departing soul of his dying friend, "come back, come back, this is your home." m. h. kingsley. october, . [note.--the following chapters of the first edition are not included in this edition: --chap. ii., the gold coast; chap. iv., lagos bar; chap. v., voyage down coast; chap. vi., libreville and glass; chap. viii., talagouga; chap. xvi., congo francais; chap. xvii., the log of the lafayette; chap. xviii., from corisco to gaboon; chap. xxviii., the islands in the bay of amboises; appendix ii., disease in west africa; appendix iii., dr. a. gunther on reptiles and fishes; appendix iv., orthoptera, hymenoptera, and hemiptera.] introduction. relateth the various causes which impelled the author to embark upon the voyage. it was in that, for the first time in my life, i found myself in possession of five or six months which were not heavily forestalled, and feeling like a boy with a new half-crown, i lay about in my mind, as mr. bunyan would say, as to what to do with them. "go and learn your tropics," said science. where on earth am i to go? i wondered, for tropics are tropics wherever found, so i got down an atlas and saw that either south america or west africa must be my destination, for the malayan region was too far off and too expensive. then i got wallace's geographical distribution and after reading that master's article on the ethiopian region i hardened my heart and closed with west africa. i did this the more readily because while i knew nothing of the practical condition of it, i knew a good deal both by tradition and report of south east america, and remembered that yellow jack was endemic, and that a certain naturalist, my superior physically and mentally, had come very near getting starved to death in the depressing society of an expedition slowly perishing of want and miscellaneous fevers up the parana. my ignorance regarding west africa was soon removed. and although the vast cavity in my mind that it occupied is not even yet half filled up, there is a great deal of very curious information in its place. i use the word curious advisedly, for i think many seemed to translate my request for practical hints and advice into an advertisement that "rubbish may be shot here." this same information is in a state of great confusion still, although i have made heroic efforts to codify it. i find, however, that it can almost all be got in under the following different headings, namely and to wit: - the dangers of west africa. the disagreeables of west africa. the diseases of west africa. the things you must take to west africa. the things you find most handy in west africa. the worst possible things you can do in west africa. i inquired of all my friends as a beginning what they knew of west africa. the majority knew nothing. a percentage said, "oh, you can't possibly go there; that's where sierra leone is, the white mans grave, you know." if these were pressed further, one occasionally found that they had had relations who had gone out there after having been "sad trials," but, on consideration of their having left not only west africa, but this world, were now forgiven and forgotten. i next turned my attention to cross-examining the doctors. "deadliest spot on earth," they said cheerfully, and showed me maps of the geographical distribution of disease. now i do not say that a country looks inviting when it is coloured in scheele's green or a bilious yellow, but these colours may arise from lack of artistic gift in the cartographer. there is no mistaking what he means by black, however, and black you'll find they colour west africa from above sierra leone to below the congo. "i wouldn't go there if i were you," said my medical friends, "you'll catch something; but if you must go, and you're as obstinate as a mule, just bring me--" and then followed a list of commissions from here to new york, any one of which--but i only found that out afterwards. all my informants referred me to the missionaries. "there were," they said, in an airy way, "lots of them down there, and had been for many years." so to missionary literature i addressed myself with great ardour; alas! only to find that these good people wrote their reports not to tell you how the country they resided in was, but how it was getting on towards being what it ought to be, and how necessary it was that their readers should subscribe more freely, and not get any foolishness into their heads about obtaining an inadequate supply of souls for their money. i also found fearful confirmation of my medical friends' statements about its unhealthiness, and various details of the distribution of cotton shirts over which i did not linger. from the missionaries it was, however, that i got my first idea about the social condition of west africa. i gathered that there existed there, firstly the native human beings--the raw material, as it were--and that these were led either to good or bad respectively by the missionary and the trader. there were also the government representatives, whose chief business it was to strengthen and consolidate the missionary's work, a function they carried on but indifferently well. but as for those traders! well, i put them down under the dangers of west africa at once. subsequently i came across the good old coast yarn of how, when a trader from that region went thence, it goes without saying where, the fallen angel without a moment's hesitation vacated the infernal throne (milton) in his favour. this, i beg to note, is the marine form of the legend. when it occurs terrestrially the trader becomes a liverpool mate. but of course no one need believe it either way--it is not a missionary's story. naturally, while my higher intelligence was taken up with attending to these statements, my mind got set on going, and i had to go. fortunately i could number among my acquaintances one individual who had lived on the coast for seven years. not, it is true, on that part of it which i was bound for. still his advice was pre- eminently worth attention, because, in spite of his long residence in the deadliest spot of the region, he was still in fair going order. i told him i intended going to west africa, and he said, "when you have made up your mind to go to west africa the very best thing you can do is to get it unmade again and go to scotland instead; but if your intelligence is not strong enough to do so, abstain from exposing yourself to the direct rays of the sun, take grains of quinine every day for a fortnight before you reach the rivers, and get some introductions to the wesleyans; they are the only people on the coast who have got a hearse with feathers." my attention was next turned to getting ready things to take with me. having opened upon myself the sluice gates of advice, i rapidly became distracted. my friends and their friends alike seemed to labour under the delusion that i intended to charter a steamer and was a person of wealth beyond the dreams of avarice. this not being the case, the only thing to do was to gratefully listen and let things drift. not only do the things you have got to take, but the things you have got to take them in, present a fine series of problems to the young traveller. crowds of witnesses testified to the forms of baggage holders they had found invaluable, and these, it is unnecessary to say, were all different in form and material. with all this embarras de choix i was too distracted to buy anything new in the way of baggage except a long waterproof sack neatly closed at the top with a bar and handle. into this i put blankets, boots, books, in fact anything that would not go into my portmanteau or black bag. from the first i was haunted by a conviction that its bottom would come out, but it never did, and in spite of the fact that it had ideas of its own about the arrangement of its contents, it served me well throughout my voyage. it was the beginning of august ' when i first left england for "the coast." preparations of quinine with postage partially paid arrived up to the last moment, and a friend hastily sent two newspaper clippings, one entitled "a week in a palm-oil tub," which was supposed to describe the sort of accommodation, companions, and fauna likely to be met with on a steamer going to west africa, and on which i was to spend seven to the graphic contributor's one; the other from the daily telegraph, reviewing a french book of "phrases in common use" in dahomey. the opening sentence in the latter was, "help, i am drowning." then came the inquiry, "if a man is not a thief?" and then another cry, "the boat is upset." "get up, you lazy scamps," is the next exclamation, followed almost immediately by the question, "why has not this man been buried?" "it is fetish that has killed him, and he must lie here exposed with nothing on him until only the bones remain," is the cheerful answer. this sounded discouraging to a person whose occupation would necessitate going about considerably in boats, and whose fixed desire was to study fetish. so with a feeling of foreboding gloom i left london for liverpool--none the more cheerful for the matter-of-fact manner in which the steamboat agents had informed me that they did not issue return tickets by the west african lines of steamers. i will not go into the details of that voyage here, much as i am given to discursiveness. they are more amusing than instructive, for on my first voyage out i did not know the coast, and the coast did not know me and we mutually terrified each other. i fully expected to get killed by the local nobility and gentry; they thought i was connected with the world's women's temperance association, and collecting shocking details for subsequent magic-lantern lectures on the liquor traffic; so fearful misunderstandings arose, but we gradually educated each other, and i had the best of the affair; for all i had got to teach them was that i was only a beetle and fetish hunter, and so forth, while they had to teach me a new world, and a very fascinating course of study i found it. and whatever the coast may have to say against me--for my continual desire for hair-pins, and other pins, my intolerable habit of getting into water, the abominations full of ants, that i brought into their houses, or things emitting at unexpectedly short notice vivid and awful stenches--they cannot but say that i was a diligent pupil, who honestly tried to learn the lessons they taught me so kindly, though some of those lessons were hard to a person who had never previously been even in a tame bit of tropics, and whose life for many years had been an entirely domestic one in a university town. one by one i took my old ideas derived from books and thoughts based on imperfect knowledge and weighed them against the real life around me, and found them either worthless or wanting. the greatest recantation i had to make i made humbly before i had been three months on the coast in . it was of my idea of the traders. what i had expected to find them was a very different thing to what i did find them; and of their kindness to me i can never sufficiently speak, for on that voyage i was utterly out of touch with the governmental circles, and utterly dependent on the traders, and the most useful lesson of all the lessons i learnt on the west coast in was that i could trust them. had i not learnt this very thoroughly i could never have gone out again and carried out the voyage i give you a sketch of in this book. thanks to "the agent," i have visited places i could never otherwise have seen; and to the respect and affection in which he is held by the native, i owe it that i have done so in safety. when i have arrived off his factory in a steamer or canoe unexpected, unintroduced, or turned up equally unheralded out of the bush in a dilapidated state, he has always received me with that gracious hospitality which must have given him, under coast conditions, very real trouble and inconvenience--things he could have so readily found logical excuses against entailing upon himself for the sake of an individual whom he had never seen before--whom he most likely would never see again--and whom it was no earthly profit to him to see then. he has bestowed himself--allah only knows where--on his small trading vessels so that i might have his one cabin. he has fished me out of sea and fresh water with boat-hooks; he has continually given me good advice, which if i had only followed would have enabled me to keep out of water and any other sort of affliction; and although he holds the meanest opinion of my intellect for going to such a place as west africa for beetles, fishes and fetish, he has given me the greatest assistance in my work. the value of that work i pray you withhold judgment on, until i lay it before you in some ten volumes or so mostly in latin. all i know that is true regarding west african facts, i owe to the traders; the errors are my own. to dr. gunther, of the british museum, i am deeply grateful for the kindness and interest he has always shown regarding all the specimens of natural history that i have been able to lay before him; the majority of which must have had very old tales to tell him. yet his courtesy and attention gave me the thing a worker in any work most wants--the sense that the work was worth doing--and sent me back to work again with the knowledge that if these things interested a man like him, it was a more than sufficient reason for me to go on collecting them. to mr. w. h. f. kirby i am much indebted for his working out my small collection of certain orders of insects; and to mr. thomas s. forshaw, for the great help he has afforded me in revising my notes. it is impossible for me even to catalogue my debts of gratitude still outstanding to the west coast. chiefly am i indebted to mr. c. g. hudson, whose kindness and influence enabled me to go up the ogowe and to see as much of congo francais as i have seen, and his efforts to take care of me were most ably seconded by mr. fildes. the french officials in "congo francais" never hindered me, and always treated me with the greatest kindness. you may say there was no reason why they should not, for there is nothing in this fine colony of france that they need be ashamed of any one seeing; but i find it is customary for travellers to say the french officials throw obstacles in the way of any one visiting their possessions, so i merely beg to state this was decidedly not my experience; although my deplorable ignorance of french prevented me from explaining my humble intentions to them. the rev. dr. nassau and mr. r. e. dennett have enabled me, by placing at my disposal the rich funds of their knowledge of native life and idea, to amplify any deductions from my own observation. mr. dennett's work i have not dealt with in this work because it refers to tribes i was not amongst on this journey, but to a tribe i made the acquaintance with in my ' voyage--the fjort. dr. nassau's observations i have referred to. herr von lucke, vice- governor of cameroon, i am indebted to for not only allowing me, but for assisting me by every means in his power, to go up cameroons peak, and to the governor of cameroon, herr von puttkamer, for his constant help and kindness. indeed so great has been the willingness to help me of all these gentlemen, that it is a wonder to me, when i think of it, that their efforts did not project me right across the continent and out at zanzibar. that this brilliant affair did not come off is owing to my own lack of enterprise; for i did not want to go across the continent, and i do not hanker after zanzibar, but only to go puddling about obscure districts in west africa after raw fetish and fresh-water fishes. i owe my ability to have profited by the kindness of these gentlemen on land, to a gentleman of the sea--captain murray. he was captain of the vessel i went out on in , and he saw then that my mind was full of errors that must be eradicated if i was going to deal with the coast successfully; and so he eradicated those errors and replaced them with sound knowledge from his own stores collected during an acquaintance with the west coast of over thirty years. the education he has given me has been of the greatest value to me, and i sincerely hope to make many more voyages under him, for i well know he has still much to teach and i to learn. last, but not least, i must chronicle my debts to the ladies. first to those two courteous portuguese ladies, donna anna de sousa coutinho e chichorro and her sister donna maria de sousa coutinho, who did so much for me in kacongo in , and have remained, i am proud to say, my firm friends ever since. lady macdonald and miss mary slessor i speak of in this book, but only faintly sketch the pleasure and help they have afforded me; nor have i fully expressed my gratitude for the kindness of madame jacot of lembarene, or madame forget of talagouga. then there are a whole list of nuns belonging to the roman catholic missions on the south west coast, ever cheery and charming companions; and frau plehn, whom it was a continual pleasure to see in cameroons, and discourse with once again on things that seemed so far off then--art, science, and literature; and mrs. h. duggan, of cameroons too, who used, whenever i came into that port to rescue me from fearful states of starvation for toilet necessaries, and lend a sympathetic and intelligent ear to the "awful sufferings" i had gone through, until cameroons became to me a thing to look forward to. when in the canaries in , i used to smile, i regretfully own, at the conversation of a gentleman from the gold coast who was up there recruiting after a bad fever. his conversation consisted largely of anecdotes of friends of his, and nine times in ten he used to say, "he's dead now." alas! my own conversation may be smiled at now for the same cause. many of my friends mentioned even in this very recent account of the coast "are dead now." most of those i learnt to know in ; chief among these is my old friend captain boler, of bonny, from whom i first learnt a certain power of comprehending the african and his form of thought. i have great reason to be grateful to the africans themselves--to cultured men and women among them like charles owoo, mbo, sanga glass, jane harrington and her sister at gaboon, and to the bush natives; but of my experience with them i give further details, so i need not dwell on them here. i apologise to the general reader for giving so much detail on matters that really only affect myself, and i know that the indebtedness which all african travellers have to the white residents in africa is a matter usually very lightly touched on. no doubt my voyage would seem a grander thing if i omitted mention of the help i received, but--well, there was a german gentleman once who evolved a camel out of his inner consciousness. it was a wonderful thing; still, you know, it was not a good camel, only a thing which people personally unacquainted with camels could believe in. now i am ambitious to make a picture, if i make one at all, that people who do know the original can believe in--even if they criticise its points--and so i give you details a more showy artist would omit. chapter i. liverpool to sierra leone and the gold coast. setting forth how the voyager departs from england in a stout vessel and in good company, and reaches in due course the island of the grand canary, and then the port of sierra leone: to which is added some account of this latter place and the comeliness of its women. wherein also some description of cape coast and accra is given, to which are added divers observations on supplies to be obtained there. the west coast of africa is like the arctic regions in one particular, and that is that when you have once visited it you want to go back there again; and, now i come to think of it, there is another particular in which it is like them, and that is that the chances you have of returning from it at all are small, for it is a belle dame sans merci. i succumbed to the charm of the coast as soon as i left sierra leone on my first voyage out, and i saw more than enough during that voyage to make me recognise that there was any amount of work for me worth doing down there. so i warned the coast i was coming back again and the coast did not believe me; and on my return to it a second time displayed a genuine surprise, and formed an even higher opinion of my folly than it had formed on our first acquaintance, which is saying a good deal. during this voyage in , i had been to old calabar, and its governor, sir claude macdonald, had heard me expatiating on the absorbing interest of the antarctic drift, and the importance of the collection of fresh-water fishes and so on. so when lady macdonald heroically decided to go out to him in calabar, they most kindly asked me if i would join her, and make my time fit hers for starting on my second journey. this i most willingly did. but i fear that very sweet and gracious lady suffered a great deal of apprehension at the prospect of spending a month on board ship with a person so devoted to science as to go down the west coast in its pursuit. during the earlier days of our voyage she would attract my attention to all sorts of marine objects overboard, so as to amuse me. i used to look at them, and think it would be the death of me if i had to work like this, explaining meanwhile aloud that "they were very interesting, but haeckel had done them, and i was out after fresh- water fishes from a river north of the congo this time," fearing all the while that she felt me unenthusiastic for not flying over into the ocean to secure the specimens. however, my scientific qualities, whatever they may amount to, did not blind this lady long to the fact of my being after all a very ordinary individual, and she told me so--not in these crude words, indeed, but nicely and kindly--whereupon, in a burst of gratitude to her for understanding me, i appointed myself her honorary aide-de- camp on the spot, and her sincere admirer i shall remain for ever, fully recognising that her courage in going to the coast was far greater than my own, for she had more to lose had fever claimed her, and she was in those days by no means under the spell of africa. but this is anticipating. it was on the rd of december, , that we left liverpool in the batanga, commanded by my old friend captain murray, under whose care i had made my first voyage. on the th we sighted the peak of teneriffe early in the afternoon. it displayed itself, as usual, as an entirely celestial phenomenon. a great many people miss seeing it. suffering under the delusion that el pico is a terrestrial affair, they look in vain somewhere about the level of their own eyes, which are striving to penetrate the dense masses of mist that usually enshroud its slopes by day, and then a friend comes along, and gaily points out to the newcomer the glittering white triangle somewhere near the zenith. on some days the peak stands out clear from ocean to summit, looking every inch and more of its , ft.; and this is said by the canary fishermen to be a certain sign of rain, or fine weather, or a gale of wind; but whenever and however it may be seen, soft and dream-like in the sunshine, or melodramatic and bizarre in the moonlight, it is one of the most beautiful things the eye of man may see. soon after sighting teneriffe, lancarote showed, and then the grand canary. teneriffe is perhaps the most beautiful, but it is hard to judge between it and grand canary as seen from the sea. the superb cone this afternoon stood out a deep purple against a serpent-green sky, separated from the brilliant blue ocean by a girdle of pink and gold cumulus, while grand canary and lancarote looked as if they were formed from fantastic-shaped sunset cloud-banks that by some spell had been solidified. the general colour of the mountains of grand canary, which rise peak after peak until they culminate in the pico de las nieves, some , feet high, is a yellowish red, and the air which lies among their rocky crevices and swathes their softer sides is a lovely lustrous blue. just before the sudden dark came down, and when the sun was taking a curve out of the horizon of sea, all the clouds gathered round the three islands, leaving the sky a pure amethyst pink, and as a good- night to them the sun outlined them with rims of shining gold, and made the snow-clad peak of teneriffe blaze with star-white light. in a few minutes came the dusk, and as we neared grand canary, out of its cloud-bank gleamed the red flash of the lighthouse on the isleta, and in a few more minutes, along the sea level, sparkled the five miles of irregularly distributed lights of puerto de la luz and the city of las palmas. we reached sierra leone at a.m. on the th of january, and as the place is hardly so much in touch with the general public as the canaries are { } i may perhaps venture to go more into details regarding it. the harbour is formed by the long low strip of land to the north called the bullam shore, and to the south by the peninsula terminating in cape sierra leone, a sandy promontory at the end of which is situated a lighthouse of irregular habits. low hills covered with tropical forest growth rise from the sandy shores of the cape, and along its face are three creeks or bays, deep inlets showing through their narrow entrances smooth beaches of yellow sand, fenced inland by the forest of cotton-woods and palms, with here and there an elephantine baobab. the first of these bays is called pirate bay, the next english bay, and the third kru bay. the wooded hills of the cape rise after passing kru bay, and become spurs of the mountain, , feet in height, which is the sierra leone itself. there are, however, several mountains here besides the sierra leone, the most conspicuous of them being the peak known as sugar loaf, and when seen from the sea they are very lovely, for their form is noble, and a wealth of tropical vegetation covers them, which, unbroken in its continuity, but endless in its variety, seems to sweep over their sides down to the shore like a sea, breaking here and there into a surf of flowers. it is the general opinion, indeed, of those who ought to know that sierra leone appears at its best when seen from the sea, particularly when you are leaving the harbour homeward bound; and that here its charms, artistic, moral, and residential, end. but, from the experience i have gained of it, i have no hesitation in saying that it is one of the best places for getting luncheon in that i have ever happened on, and that a more pleasant and varied way of spending an afternoon than going about its capital, free town, with a certain irish purser, who is as well known as he is respected among the leviathan old negro ladies, it would be hard to find. still it must be admitted it is rather hot. free town its capital is situated on the northern base of the mountain, and extends along the sea-front with most business-like wharves, quays, and warehouses. viewed from the harbour, "the liverpool of west africa," { } as it is called, looks as if it were built of gray stone, which it is not. when you get ashore, you will find that most of the stores and houses--the majority of which, it may be remarked, are in a state of acute dilapidation--are of painted wood, with corrugated iron roofs. here and there, though, you will see a thatched house, its thatch covered with creeping plants, and inhabited by colonies of creeping insects. some of the stores and churches are, it is true, built of stone, but this does not look like stone at a distance, being red in colour-- unhewn blocks of the red stone of the locality. in the crannies of these buildings trailing plants covered with pretty mauve or yellow flowers take root, and everywhere, along the tops of the walls, and in the cracks of the houses, are ferns and flowering plants. they must get a good deal of their nourishment from the rich, thick air, which seems composed of per cent. of warm water, and the remainder of the odours of frangipani, orange flowers, magnolias, oleanders, and roses, combined with others that demonstrate that the inhabitants do not regard sanitary matters with the smallest degree of interest. there is one central street, and the others are neatly planned out at right angles to it. none of them are in any way paved or metalled. they are covered in much prettier fashion, and in a way more suitable for naked feet, by green bahama grass, save and except those which are so nearly perpendicular that they have got every bit of earth and grass cleared off them down to the red bed-rock, by the heavy rain of the wet season. in every direction natives are walking at a brisk pace, their naked feet making no sound on the springy turf of the streets, carrying on their heads huge burdens which are usually crowned by the hat of the bearer, a large limpet-shaped affair made of palm leaves. while some carry these enormous bundles, others bear logs or planks of wood, blocks of building stone, vessels containing palm-oil, baskets of vegetables, or tin tea-trays on which are folded shawls. as the great majority of the native inhabitants of sierra leone pay no attention whatever to where they are going, either in this world or the next, the confusion and noise are out of all proportion to the size of the town; and when, as frequently happens, a section of actively perambulating burden-bearers charge recklessly into a sedentary section, the members of which have dismounted their loads and squatted themselves down beside them, right in the middle of the fair way, to have a friendly yell with some acquaintances, the row becomes terrific. in among these crowds of country people walk stately mohammedans, mandingoes, akers, and fulahs of the arabised tribes of the western soudan. these are lithe, well-made men, and walk with a peculiarly fine, elastic carriage. their graceful garb consists of a long white loose-sleeved shirt, over which they wear either a long black mohair or silk gown, or a deep bright blue affair, not altogether unlike a university gown, only with more stuff in it and more folds. they are undoubtedly the gentlemen of the sierra leone native population, and they are becoming an increasing faction in the town, by no means to the pleasure of the christians. but to the casual visitor at sierra leone the mohammedan is a mere passing sensation. you neither feel a burning desire to laugh with, or at him, as in the case of the country folks, nor do you wish to punch his head, and split his coat up his back--things you yearn to do to that perfect flower of sierra leone culture, who yells your bald name across the street at you, condescendingly informs you that you can go and get letters that are waiting for you, while he smokes his cigar and lolls in the shade, or in some similar way displays his second-hand rubbishy white culture--a culture far lower and less dignified than that of either the stately mandingo or the bush chief. i do not think that the sierra leone dandy really means half as much insolence as he shows; but the truth is he feels too insecure of his own real position, in spite of all the "side" he puts on, and so he dare not be courteous like the mandingo or the bush fan. it is the costume of the people in free town and its harbour that will first attract the attention of the newcomer, notwithstanding the fact that the noise, the smell, and the heat are simultaneously making desperate bids for that favour. the ordinary man in the street wears anything he may have been able to acquire, anyhow, and he does not fasten it on securely. i fancy it must be capillary attraction, or some other partially-understood force, that takes part in the matter. it is certainly neither braces nor buttons. there are, of course, some articles which from their very structure are fairly secure, such as an umbrella with the stick and ribs removed, or a shirt. this last-mentioned treasure, which usually becomes the property of the ordinary man from a female relative or admirer taking in white men's washing, is always worn flowing free, and has such a charm in itself that the happy possessor cares little what he continues his costume with--trousers, loin cloth, red flannel petticoat, or rice-bag drawers, being, as he would put it, "all same for one" to him. the ladies are divided into three classes; the young girl you address as "tee-tee"; the young person as "seester"; the more mature charmer as "mammy"; but i do not advise you to employ these terms when you are on your first visit, because you might get misunderstood. for, you see, by addressing a mammy as seester, she might think either that you were unconscious of her dignity as a married lady--a matter she would soon put you right on--or that you were flirting, which of course was totally foreign to your intention, and would make you uncomfortable. my advice is that you rigidly stick to missus or mammy. i have seen this done most successfully. the ladies are almost as varied in their costume as the gentlemen, but always neater and cleaner; and mighty picturesque they are too, and occasionally very pretty. a market-woman with her jolly brown face and laughing brown eyes--eyes all the softer for a touch of antimony--her ample form clothed in a lively print overall, made with a yoke at the shoulders, and a full long flounce which is gathered on to the yoke under the arms and falls fully to the feet; with her head done up in a yellow or red handkerchief, and her snowy white teeth gleaming through her vast smiles, is a mighty pleasant thing to see, and to talk to. but, allah! the circumference of them! the stone-built, white-washed market buildings of free town have a creditably clean and tidy appearance considering the climate, and the quantity and variety of things exposed for sale--things one wants the pen of a rabelais to catalogue. here are all manner of fruits, some which are familiar to you in england; others that soon become so to you in africa. you take them as a matter of course if you are outward bound, but on your call homeward (if you make it) you will look on them as a blessing and a curiosity. for lower down, particularly in "the rivers," these things are rarely to be had, and never in such perfection as here; and to see again lettuces, yellow oranges, and tomatoes bigger than marbles is a sensation and a joy. one of the chief features of free town are the jack crows. some writers say they are peculiar to sierra leone, others that they are not, but both unite in calling them picathartes gymnocephalus. to the white people who live in daily contact with them they are turkey buzzards; to the natives, yubu. anyhow they are evil-looking fowl, and no ornament to the roof-ridges they choose to sit on. the native christians ought to put a row of spikes along the top of their cathedral to keep them off; the beauty of that edifice is very far from great, and it cannot carry off the effect produced by the row of these noisome birds as they sit along its summit, with their wings arranged at all manner of different angles in an "all gone" way. one bird perhaps will have one straight out in front, and the other casually disposed at right-angles, another both straight out in front, and others again with both hanging hopelessly down, but none with them neatly and tidily folded up, as decent birds' wings should be. they all give the impression of having been extremely drunk the previous evening, and of having subsequently fallen into some sticky abomination--into blood for choice. being the scavengers of free town, however, they are respected by the local authorities and preserved; and the natives tell me you never see either a young or a dead one. the latter is a thing you would not expect, for half of them look as if they could not live through the afternoon. they also told me that when you got close to them, they had a "'trong, 'trong 'niff; 'niff too much." i did not try, but i am quite willing to believe this statement. the other animals most in evidence in the streets are, first and foremost, goats and sheep. i have to lump them together, for it is exceedingly difficult to tell one from the other. all along the coast the empirical rule is that sheep carry their tails down, and goats carry their tails up; fortunately you need not worry much anyway, for they both "taste rather like the nothing that the world was made of," as frau buchholtz says, and own in addition a fibrous texture, and a certain twang. small cinnamon-coloured cattle are to be got here, but horses there are practically none. now and again some one who does not see why a horse should not live here as well as at accra or lagos imports one, but it always shortly dies. some say it is because the natives who get their living by hammock- carrying poison them, others say the tsetse fly finishes them off; and others, and these i believe are right, say that entozoa are the cause. small, lean, lank yellow dogs with very erect ears lead an awful existence, afflicted by many things, but beyond all others by the goats, who, rearing their families in the grassy streets, choose to think the dogs intend attacking them. last, but not least, there is the pig--a rich source of practice to the local lawyer. cape coast castle and then accra were the next places of general interest at which we stopped. the former looks well from the roadstead, and as if it had very recently been white-washed. it is surrounded by low, heavily-forested hills, which rise almost from the seashore, and the fine mass of its old castle does not display its dilapidation at a distance. moreover, the three stone forts of victoria, william, and macarthy, situated on separate hills commanding the town, add to the general appearance of permanent substantialness so different from the usual ramshackledom of west coast settlements. even when you go ashore and have had time to recover your senses, scattered by the surf experience, you find this substantialness a true one, not a mere visual delusion produced by painted wood as the seeming substantialness of sierra leone turns out to be when you get to close quarters with it. it causes one some mental effort to grasp the fact that cape coast has been in european hands for centuries, but it requires a most unmodern power of credence to realise this of any other settlement on the whole western seaboard until you have the pleasure of seeing the beautiful city of san paul de loanda, far away down south, past the congo. my experience of cape coast on this occasion was one of the hottest, but one of the pleasantest i have ever been through on the gold coast. the former attribute was due to the climate, the latter to my kind friends, mr. batty, and mr. and mrs. dennis kemp. i was taken round the grand stone-built houses with their high stone- walled yards and sculpture-decorated gateways, built by the merchants of the last century and of the century before, and through the great rambling stone castle with its water-tanks cut in the solid rock beneath it, and its commodious accommodation for slaves awaiting shipment, now almost as obsolete as the guns it mounts, but not quite so, for these cool and roomy chambers serve to house the native constabulary and their extensive families. this being done, i was taken up an unmitigated hill, on whose summit stands fort william, a pepper-pot-like structure now used as a lighthouse. the view from the top was exceedingly lovely and extensive. beneath, and between us and the sea, lay the town in the blazing sun. in among its solid stone buildings patches of native mud-built huts huddled together as though they had been shaken down out of a sack into the town to serve as dunnage. then came the snow-white surf wall, and across it the blue sea with our steamer rolling to and fro on the long, regular swell, impatiently waiting until sunday should be over and she could work cargo. round us on all the other sides were wooded hills and valleys, and away in the distance to the west showed the white town and castle of elmina and the nine-mile road thither, skirting the surf-bound seashore, only broken on its level way by the mouth of the sweet river. over all was the brooding silence of the noonday heat, broken only by the dulled thunder of the surf. after seeing these things we started down stairs, and on reaching ground descended yet lower into a sort of stone-walled dry moat, out of which opened clean, cool, cellar-like chambers tunnelled into the earth. these, i was informed, had also been constructed to keep slaves in when they were the staple export of the gold coast. they were so refreshingly cool that i lingered looking at them and their massive doors, ere being marched up to ground level again, and down the hill through some singularly awful stenches, mostly arising from rubber, into the big wesleyan church in the middle of the town. it is a building in the terrible africo-gothic style, but it compares most favourably with the cathedral at sierra leone, particularly internally, wherein, indeed, it far surpasses that structure. and then we returned to the mission house and spent a very pleasant evening, save for the knowledge (which amounted in me to remorse) that, had it not been for my edification, not one of my friends would have spent the day toiling about the town they know only too well. the wesleyan mission on the gold coast, of which mr. dennis kemp was at that time chairman, is the largest and most influential protestant mission on the west coast of africa, and it is now, i am glad to say, adding a technical department to its scholastic and religious one. the basel mission has done a great deal of good work in giving technical instruction to the natives, and practically started this most important branch of their education. there is still an almost infinite amount of this work to be done, the african being so strangely deficient in mechanical culture; infinitely more so, indeed, in this than in any other particular. after leaving cape coast our next port was accra which is one of the five west coast towns that look well from the sea. the others don't look well from anywhere. first in order of beauty comes san paul de loanda; then cape coast with its satellite elmina, then gaboon, then accra with its satellite christiansborg, and lastly, sierra leone. what there is of beauty in accra is oriental in type. seen from the sea, fort st. james on the left and christiansborg castle on the right, both almost on shore level, give, with an outcrop of sandy dwarf cliffs, a certain air of balance and strength to the town, though but for these and the two old castles, accra would be but a poor place and a flimsy, for the rest of it is a mass of rubbishy mud and palm-leaf huts, and corrugated iron dwellings for the europeans. corrugated iron is my abomination. i quite understand it has points, and i do not attack from an aesthetic standpoint. it really looks well enough when it is painted white. there is, close to christiansborg castle, a patch of bungalows and offices for officialdom and wife that from a distance in the hard bright sunshine looks like an encampment of snow-white tents among the coco palms, and pretty enough withal. i am also aware that the corrugated-iron roof is an advantage in enabling you to collect and store rain-water, which is the safest kind of water you can get on the coast, always supposing you have not painted the aforesaid roof with red oxide an hour or two before so collecting, as a friend of mine did once. but the heat inside those iron houses is far greater than inside mud-walled, brick, or wooden ones, and the alternations of temperature more sudden: mornings and evenings they are cold and clammy; draughty they are always, thereby giving you chill which means fever, and fever in west africa means more than it does in most places. going on shore at accra with lady macdonald gave me opportunities and advantages i should not otherwise have enjoyed, such as the hospitality of the governor, luxurious transport from the landing place to christiansborg castle, a thorough inspection of the cathedral in course of erection, and the strange and highly interesting function of going to a tea-party at a police station to meet a king,--a real reigning king,--who kindly attended with his suite and displayed an intelligent interest in photographs. tackie (that is his majesty's name) is an old, spare man, with a subdued manner. his sovereign rights are acknowledged by the government so far as to hold him more or less responsible for any iniquity committed by his people; and as the government do not allow him to execute or flagellate the said people, earthly pomp is rather a hollow thing to tackie. on landing i was taken in charge by an assistant inspector of police, and after a scrimmage for my chief's baggage and my own, which reminded me of a long ago landing on the distant island of guernsey, the inspector and i got into a 'rickshaw, locally called a go-cart. it was pulled in front by two government negroes and pushed behind by another pair, all neatly attired in white jackets and knee breeches, and crimson cummerbunds yards long, bound round their middles. now it is an ingrained characteristic of the uneducated negro, that he cannot keep on a neat and complete garment of any kind. it does not matter what that garment may be; so long as it is whole, off it comes. but as soon as that garment becomes a series of holes, held together by filaments of rag, he keeps it upon him in a manner that is marvellous, and you need have no further anxiety on its behalf. therefore it was but natural that the governmental cummerbunds, being new, should come off their wearers several times in the course of our two mile trip, and as they wound riskily round the legs of their running wearers, we had to make halts while one end of the cummerbund was affixed to a tree-trunk and the other end to the man, who rapidly wound himself up in it again with a skill that spoke of constant practice. the road to christiansborg from accra, which runs parallel to the sea and is broad and well-kept, is in places pleasantly shaded with pepper trees, eucalyptus, and palms. the first part of it, which forms the main street of accra, is remarkable. the untidy, poverty- stricken native houses or huts are no credit to their owners, and a constant source of anxiety to a conscientious sanitary inspector. almost every one of them is a shop, but this does not give rise to the animated commercial life one might imagine, owing, i presume, to the fact that every native inhabitant of accra who has any money to get rid of is able recklessly to spend it in his own emporium. for these shops are of the store nature, each after his kind, and seem homogeneously stocked with tin pans, loud-patterned basins, iron pots, a few rolls of cloth and bottles of american rum. after passing these there are the haussa lines, a few european houses, and the cathedral; and when nearly into christiansborg, a cemetery on either side of the road. that to the right is the old cemetery, now closed, and when i was there, in a disgracefully neglected state: a mere jungle of grass infested with snakes. opposite to it is the cemetery now in use, and i remember well my first visit to it under the guidance of a gloomy government official, who said he always walked there every afternoon, "so as to get used to the place before staying permanently in it,"--a rank waste of time and energy, by the way, as subsequent events proved, for he is now safe off the gold coast for good and all. he took me across the well-kept grass to two newly dug graves, each covered with wooden hoods in a most business-like way. evidently those hoods were regular parts of the cemetery's outfit. he said nothing, but waved his hand with a "take-your-choice,-they-are-both- quite-ready" style. "why?" i queried laconically. "oh! we always keep two graves ready dug for europeans. we have to bury very quickly here, you know," he answered. i turned at bay. i had had already a very heavy dose of details of this sort that afternoon and was disinclined to believe another thing. so i said, "it's exceedingly wrong to do a thing like that, you only frighten people to death. you can't want new-dug graves daily. there are not enough white men in the whole place to keep the institution up." "we do," he replied, "at any rate at this season. why, the other day we had two white men to bury before twelve o'clock, and at four, another dropped in on a steamer." "at . ," said a companion, an exceedingly accurate member of the staff. "how you fellows do exaggerate!" subsequent knowledge of the gold coast has convinced me fully that the extra funeral being placed half-an-hour sooner than it occurred is the usual percentage of exaggeration you will be able to find in stories relating to the local mortality. and at accra, after i left it, and all along the gold coast, came one of those dreadful epidemic outbursts sweeping away more than half the white population in a few weeks. but to return to our state journey along the christiansborg road. we soon reached the castle, an exceedingly roomy and solid edifice built by the danes, and far better fitted for the climate than our modern dwellings, in spite of our supposed advance in tropical hygiene. we entered by the sentry-guarded great gate into the courtyard; on the right hand were the rest of the guard; most of them asleep on their mats, but a few busy saying dhikr, etc., towards mecca, like the good mohammedans these haussas are, others winding themselves into their cummerbunds. on the left hand was sir brandford griffiths' hobby--a choice and select little garden, of lovely eucharis lilies mostly in tubs, and rare and beautiful flowers brought by him from his barbadian home; while shading it and the courtyard was a fine specimen of that superb thing of beauty--a flamboyant tree--glorious with its delicate-green acacia-like leaves and vermilion and yellow flowers, and astonishing with its vast beans. a flight of stone stairs leads from the courtyard to the upper part of the castle where the living rooms are, over the extensive series of cool tunnel-like slave barracoons, now used as store chambers. the upper rooms are high and large, and full of a soft pleasant light and the thunder of the everlasting surf breaking on the rocky spit on which the castle is built. from the day the castle was built, now more than a hundred years ago, the surf spray has been swept by the on-shore evening breeze into every chink and cranny of the whole building, and hence the place is mouldy--mouldy to an extent i, with all my experience in that paradise for mould, west africa, have never elsewhere seen. the matting on the floors took an impression of your foot as a light snowfall would. beneath articles of furniture the cryptogams attained a size more in keeping with the coal period than with the nineteenth century. the gold coast is one of the few places in west africa that i have never felt it my solemn duty to go and fish in. i really cannot say why. seen from the sea it is a pleasant looking land. the long lines of yellow, sandy beach backed by an almost continuous line of blue hills, which in some places come close to the beach, in other places show in the dim distance. it is hard to think that it is so unhealthy as it is, from just seeing it as you pass by. it has high land and has not those great masses of mangrove-swamp one usually, at first, associates with a bad fever district, but which prove on acquaintance to be at any rate no worse than this well-elevated open-forested gold coast land. there are many things to be had here and in lagos which tend to make life more tolerable, that you cannot have elsewhere until you are south of the congo. horses, for example, do fairly well at accra, though some twelve miles or so behind the town there is a belt of tsetse fly, specimens of which i have procured and had identified at the british museum, and it is certain death to a horse, i am told, to take it to aburi. the food-supply, although bad and dear, is superior to that you get down south. goats and sheep are fairly plentiful. in addition to fresh meat and tinned you are able to get a quantity of good sea fish, for the great west african bank, which fringes the coast in the bight of benin, abounds in fish, although the native cook very rarely knows how to cook them. then, too, you can get more fruit and vegetables on the gold coast than at most places lower down: the plantain, { } not least among them and very good when allowed to become ripe, and then cut into longitudinal strips, and properly fried; the banana, which surpasses it when served in the same manner, or beaten up and mixed with rice, butter, and eggs, and baked. eggs, by the way, according to the great mass of native testimony, are laid in this country in a state that makes them more fit for electioneering than culinary purposes, and i shall never forget one tribe i was once among, who, whenever i sat down on one of their benches, used to smash eggs round me for ju-ju. they meant well. but i will nobly resist the temptation to tell egg stories and industriously catalogue the sour-sop, guava, grenadilla, aubergine or garden-egg, yam, and sweet potato. the sweet potato should be boiled, and then buttered and browned in an oven, or fried. when cooked in either way i am devoted to them, but in the way i most frequently come across them i abominate them, for they jeopardise my existence both in this world and the next. it is this way: you are coming home from a long and dangerous beetle-hunt in the forest; you have battled with mighty beetles the size of pie dishes, they have flown at your head, got into your hair and then nipped you smartly. you have been also considerably stung and bitten by flies, ants, etc., and are most likely sopping wet with rain, or with the wading of streams, and you are tired and your feet go low along the ground, and it is getting, or has got, dark with that ever-deluding tropical rapidity, and then you for your sins get into a piece of ground which last year was a native's farm, and, placing one foot under the tough vine of a surviving sweet potato, concealed by rank herbage, you plant your other foot on another portion of the same vine. your head you then deposit promptly in some prickly ground crop, or against a tree stump, and then, if there is human blood in you, you say d--n! then there are also alligator-pears, limes, and oranges. there is something about those oranges i should like to have explained. they are usually green and sweetish in taste, nor have they much white pith, but now and again you get a big bright yellow one from those trees that have been imported, and these are very pithy and in full possession of the flavour of verjuice. they have also got the papaw on the coast, the carica papaya of botanists. it is an insipid fruit. to the newcomer it is a dreadful nuisance, for no sooner does an old coaster set eyes on it than he straightway says, "paw- paws are awfully good for the digestion, and even if you just hang a tough fowl or a bit of goat in the tree among the leaves, it gets tender in no time, for there is an awful lot of pepsine in a paw- paw,"--which there is not, papaine being its active principle. after hearing this hymn of praise to the papaw some hundreds of times, it palls, and you usually arrive at this tired feeling about the thing by the time you reach the gold coast, for it is a most common object, and the same man will say the same thing about it a dozen times a day if he gets the chance. i got heartily sick of it on my first voyage out, and rashly determined to check the old coaster in this habit of his, preparatory to stamping the practice out. it was one of my many failures. i soon met an old coaster with a papaw fruit in sight, and before he had time to start, i boldly got away with "the paw-paw is awfully good for the digestion," hoping that this display of knowledge would impress him and exempt me from hearing the rest of the formula. but no. "right you are," said he solemnly. "it's a powerful thing is the paw-paw. why, the other day we had a sad case along here. you know what a nuisance young assistants are, bothering about their chop, and scorpions in their beds and boots, and what not and a half, and then, when you have pulled them through these, and often enough before, pegging out with fever, or going on the fly in the native town. did you know poor b---? well! he's dead now, had fever and went off like a babe in eight hours though he'd been out fourteen years for a--- and d---. they sent him out a new book-keeper, a tender young thing with a dairymaid complexion and the notion that he'd got the indigestion. he fidgeted about it something awful. one night there was a big paw-paw on the table for evening chop, and so b---, who was an awfully good chap, told him about how good it was for the digestion. the book-keeper said his trouble always came on two hours after eating, and asked if he might take a bit of the thing to his room. 'certainly,' says b---, and as the paw-paw wasn't cut at that meal the book-keeper quietly took it off whole with him. "in the morning time he did not turn up. b---, just before breakfast, went to his room and he wasn't there, but he noticed the paw-paw was on the bed and that was all, so he thought the book- keeper must have gone for a walk, being, as it were, a bit too tender to have gone on the fly as yet. so he just told the store clerk to tell the people to return him to the firm when they found him straying around lost, and thought no more about it, being, as it was, mail-day, and him busy. "well! fortunately the steward boy put that paw-paw on the table again for twelve o'clock chop. if it hadn't been for that, not a living soul would have known the going of the book-keeper. for when b--- cut it open, there, right inside it, were nine steel trouser- buttons, a waterbury watch, and the poor young fellow's keys. for you see, instead of his digesting his dinner with that paw-paw, the paw-paw took charge and digested him, dinner and all, and when b--- interrupted it, it was just getting a grip on the steel things. there's an awful lot of pepsine in a paw-paw, and if you hang, etc., etc." i collapsed, feebly murmuring that it was very interesting, but sad for the poor young fellow's friends. "not necessarily," said the old coaster. so he had the last word, and never again will i attempt to alter the ways of the genuine old coaster. what you have got to do with him is to be very thankful you have had the honour of knowing him. still i think we do over-estimate the value of the papaw, although i certainly did once myself hang the leg of a goat no mortal man could have got tooth into, on to a papaw tree with a bit of string for the night. in the morning it was clean gone, string and all; but whether it was the pepsine, the papaine, or a purloining pagan that was the cause of its departure there was no evidence to show. yet i am myself, as hans breitmann says, "still skebdigal" as to the papaw, and i dare say you are too. but i must forthwith stop writing about the gold coast, or i shall go on telling you stories and wasting your time, not to mention the danger of letting out those which would damage the nerves of the cultured of temperate climes, such as those relating to the youth who taught himself french from a six months' method book; of the man who wore brass buttons; the moving story of three leeches and two gentlemen; the doctor up a creek; and the reason why you should not eat pork along here because all the natives have either got the guinea-worm, or kraw-kraw or ulcers; and then the pigs go and--dear me! it was a near thing that time. i'll leave off at once. chapter ii. fernando po and the bubis. giving some account of the occupation of this island by the whites and the manners and customs of the blacks peculiar to it. our outward voyage really terminated at calabar, and it terminated gorgeously in fireworks and what not, in honour of the coming of lady macdonald, the whole settlement, white and black, turning out to do her honour to the best of its ability; and its ability in this direction was far greater than, from my previous knowledge of coast conditions, i could have imagined possible. before sir claude macdonald settled down again to local work, he and lady macdonald crossed to fernando po, still in the batanga, and i accompanied them, thus getting an opportunity of seeing something of spanish official circles. i had heard sundry noble legends of fernando po, and seen the coast and a good deal of the island before, but although i had heard much of the governor, i had never met him until i went up to his residence with lady macdonald and the consul-general. he was a delightful person, who, as a spanish naval officer, some time resident in cuba, had picked up a lot of english, with a strong american accent clinging to it. he gave a most moving account of how, as soon as his appointment as governor was announced, all his friends and acquaintances carefully explained to him that this appointment was equivalent to execution, only more uncomfortable in the way it worked out. during the outward voyage this was daily confirmed by the stories told by the sailors and merchants personally acquainted with the place, who were able to support their information with dates and details of the decease of the victims to the climate. still he kept up a good heart, but when he arrived at the island he found his predecessor had died of fever; and he himself, the day after landing, went down with a bad attack and he was placed in a bed--the same bed, he was mournfully informed, in which the last governor had expired. then he did believe, all in one awful lump, all the stories he had been told, and added to their horrors a few original conceptions of death and purgatory, and a lot of transparent semi-formed images of his own delirium. fortunately both prophecy and personal conviction alike miscarried, and the governor returned from the jaws of death. but without a moment's delay he withdrew from the port of clarence and went up the mountain to basile, which is in the neighbourhood of the highest native village, where he built himself a house, and around it a little village of homes for the most unfortunate set of human beings i have ever laid eye on. they are the remnant of a set of spanish colonists, who had been located at some spot in the spanish possessions in morocco, and finding that place unfit to support human life, petitioned the government to remove them and let them try colonising elsewhere. the spanish government just then had one of its occasional fits of interest in fernando po, and so shipped them here, and the governor, a most kindly and generous man, who would have been a credit to any country, established them and their families around him at basile, to share with him the advantages of the superior elevation; advantages he profoundly believed in, and which he has always placed at the disposal of any sick white man on the island, of whatsoever nationality or religion. undoubtedly the fever is not so severe at basile as in the lowlands, but there are here the usual drawbacks to west african high land, namely an over supply of rain, and equally saturating mists, to say nothing of sudden and extreme alternations of temperature, and so the colonists still fall off, and their children die continuously from the various entozoa which abound upon the island. when the governor first settled upon the mountain he was very difficult to get at for business purposes, and a telephone was therefore run up to him from clarence through the forest, and spain at large felt proud at this dashing bit of enterprise in modern appliance. alas! the primaeval forests of fernando po were also charmed with the new toy, and they talked to each other on it with their leaves and branches to such an extent that a human being could not get a word in edgeways. so the governor had to order the construction of a road along the course of the wire to keep the trees off it, but unfortunately the telephone is still an uncertain means of communication, because another interruption in its usefulness still afflicts it, namely the indigenous natives' habit of stealing bits out of its wire, for they are fully persuaded that they cannot be found out in their depredations provided they take sufficient care that they are not caught in the act. the governor is thus liable to be cut off at any moment in the middle of a conversation with clarence, and the amount of "hellos" "are you theres?" and "speak louder, pleases" in spanish that must at such times be poured out and wasted in the lonely forests before the break is realised and an unfortunate man sent off as a messenger, is terrible to think of. but nothing would persuade the governor to come a mile down towards clarence until the day he should go there to join the vessel that was to take him home, and i am bound to say he looked as if the method was a sound one, for he was an exceedingly healthy, cheery- looking man. fernando po is said to be a comparatively modern island, and not so very long ago to have been connected with the mainland, the strait between them being only nineteen miles across, and not having any deep soundings. { } i fail to see what grounds there are for these ideas, for though fernando po's volcanoes are not yet extinct, but merely have their fires banked, yet, on the other hand, the island has been in existence sufficiently long to get itself several peculiar species of animals and plants, and that is a thing which takes time. i myself do not believe that this island was ever connected with the continent, but arose from the ocean as the result of a terrific upheaval in the chain of volcanic activity which runs across the atlantic from the cameroon mountains in a ssw. direction to anno bom island, and possibly even to the tristan da cunha group midway between the cape and south america. these volcanic islands are all of extreme beauty and fertility. they consist of fernando po ( , ft.); principe ( ft.); san thome ( , ft.); and anno bom ( , ft.). san thome and principe are portuguese possessions, fernando po and anno bom spanish, and they are all exceedingly unhealthy. san thome is still called "the dutchman's church-yard," on account of the devastation its climate wrought among the hollanders when they once occupied it; as they seem, at one time or another, to have occupied all portuguese possessions out here, during the long war these two powers waged with each other for supremacy in the bights, a supremacy that neither of them attained to. principe is said to be the most unhealthy, and the reason of the difference in this particular between principe and anno bom is said to arise from the fact that the former is on the guinea current--a hot current--and anno bom on the equatorial, which averages degree cooler than its neighbour. the shores of san thome are washed by both currents, and the currents round fernando po are in a mixed and uncertain state. it is difficult, unless you have haunted these seas, to realise the interest we take down there in currents; particularly when you are navigating small sailing boats, a pursuit i indulge in necessarily from my fishing practices. their effect on the climate too is very marked. if we could only arrange for some terrific affair to take place in the bed of the atlantic, that would send that precious guinea current to the place it evidently comes from, and get the cool equatorial alongside the mainland shore, west africa would be quite another place. fernando po is the most important island as regards size on the west african coast, and at the same time one of the most beautiful in the world. it is a great volcanic mass with many craters, and culminates in the magnificent cone, clarence peak, called by the spaniards, pico de santa isabel, by the natives of the island o wassa. seen from the sea or from the continent it looks like an immense single mountain that has floated out to sea. it is visible during clear weather (and particularly sharply visible in the strange clearness you get after a tornado) from a hundred miles to seawards, and anything more perfect than fernando po when you sight it, as you occasionally do from far-away bonny bar, in the sunset, floating like a fairy island made of gold or of amethyst, i cannot conceive. it is almost equally lovely at close quarters, namely from the mainland at victoria, nineteen miles distant. its moods of beauty are infinite; for the most part gentle and gorgeous, but i have seen it silhouetted hard against tornado-clouds, and grandly grim from the upper regions of its great brother mungo. and as for fernando po in full moonlight--well there! you had better go and see it yourself. the whole island is, or rather i should say was, heavily forested almost to its peak, with a grand and varied type of forest, very rich in oil palms and tree-ferns, and having an undergrowth containing an immense variety and quantity of ferns and mosses. sugar-cane also grows wild here, an uncommon thing in west africa. the last botanical collection of any importance made from these forests was that of herr mann, and its examination showed that abyssinian genera and species predominated, and that many species similar to those found in the mountains of mauritius, the isle de bourbon, and madagascar, were present. the number of european plants (forty-three genera, twenty-seven species) is strikingly large, most of the british forms being represented chiefly at the higher elevations. what was more striking was that it showed that south african forms were extremely rare, and not one of the characteristic types of st. helena occurred. cocoa, coffee, and cinchona, alas! flourish in fernando po, as the coffee suffers but little from the disease that harasses it on the mainland at victoria, and this is the cause of the great destruction of the forest that is at present taking place. san thome, a few years ago, was discovered by its surprised neighbours to be amassing great wealth by growing coffee, and so fernando po and principe immediately started to amass great wealth too, and are now hard at work with gangs of miscellaneous natives got from all parts of the coast save the kru. for to the kruboy, "panier," as he calls "spaniard," is a name of horror worse even than portugee, although he holds "god made white man and god made black man, but dem debil make portugee," and he also remembers an unfortunate affair that occurred some years ago now, in connection with coffee-growing. a number of krumen engaged themselves for a two years' term of labour on the island of san thome, and when they arrived there, were set to work on coffee plantations by the portuguese. now agricultural work is "woman's palaver," but nevertheless the krumen made shift to get through with it, vowing the while no doubt, as they hopefully notched away the moons on their tally-sticks, that they would never let the girls at home know that they had been hoeing. but when their moons were all complete, instead of being sent home with their pay to "we country," they were put off from time to time; and month after month went by and they were still on san thome, and still hoeing. at last the home-sick men, in despair of ever getting free, started off secretly in ones and twos to try and get to "we country" across hundreds of miles of the storm- haunted atlantic in small canoes, and with next to no provisions. the result was a tragedy, but it might easily have been worse; for a few, a very few, were picked up alive by english vessels and taken back to their beloved "we country" to tell the tale. but many a canoe was found with a dead kruboy or so in it; and many a one which, floating bottom upwards, graphically spoke of madness caused by hunger, thirst, and despair having driven its occupants overboard to the sharks. my portuguese friends assure me that there was never thought of permanently detaining the boys, and that they were only just keeping them until other labourers arrived to take their place on the plantations. i quite believe them, for i have seen too much of the portuguese in africa to believe that they would, in a wholesale way, be cruel to natives. but i am not in the least surprised that the poor krumen took the portuguese logo and amanha for eternity itself, for i have frequently done so. the greatest length of the island lies n.e. and s.w., and amounts to thirty-three miles; the mean breadth is seventeen miles. the port, clarence cove, now called santa isabel by the spaniards--who have been giving spanish names to all the english-named places without any one taking much notice of them--is a very remarkable place, and except perhaps gaboon the finest harbour on the west coast. the point that brings gaboon anchorage up in line with clarence cove is its superior healthiness; for clarence is a section of a circle, and its shores are steep rocky cliffs from to feet high, and the place, to put it very mildly, exceedingly hot and stuffy. the cove is evidently a partly submerged crater, the submerged rim of the crater is almost a perfect semi-circle seawards--having on it , , , , and fathoms of water save almost in the centre of the arc where there is a passage with to fathoms. inside, in the crater, there is deeper water, running in places from to fathoms, and outside the submerged rim there is deeper water again, but rocky shoals abound. on the top of the shore cliffs stands the dilapidated little town of clarence, on a plateau that falls away slightly towards the mountain for about a mile, when the ground commences to rise into the slopes of the cordillera. on the narrow beach, tucked close against the cliffs, are a few stores belonging to the merchants, where goods are placed on landing, and there is a little pier too, but as it is usually having something done to its head, or else is closed by the authorities because they intend doing something by and by, the chances are against its being available for use. hence it usually comes about that you have to land on the beach, and when you have done this you make your way up a very steep path, cut in the cliffside, to the town. when you get there you find yourself in the very dullest town i know on the coast. i remember when i first landed in clarence i found its society in a flutter of expectation and alarm not untinged with horror. clarence, nay, the whole of fernando po, was about to become so rackety and dissipated as to put paris and monte carlo to the blush. clarence was going to have a cafe; and what was going to go on in that cafe i shrink from reciting. i have little hesitation now in saying this alarm was a false one. when i next arrived in clarence it was just as sound asleep and its streets as weed-grown as ever, although the cafe was open. my idea is that the sleepiness of the place infected the cafe and took all the go out of it. but again it may have been that the inhabitants were too well guarded against its evil influence, for there are on the island fifty-two white laymen, and fifty-four priests to take charge of them { }--the extra two being, i presume, to look after the governor's conduct, although this worthy man made a most spirited protest against this view when i suggested it to him; and in addition to the priests there are several missionaries of the methodist mission, and also a white gentleman who has invented a new religion. anyhow, the cafe smoulders like a damp squib. when you spend the day on shore and when, having exhausted the charms of the town,--a thing that usually takes from between ten minutes to a quarter of an hour,--you apply to an inhabitant for advice as to the disposal of the rest of your shore leave, you are told to "go and see the coals." you say you have not come to tropical islands to see a coal heap, and applying elsewhere for advice you probably get the same. so, as you were told to "go and see the coals" when you left your ship, you do as you are bid. these coals, the remnant of the store that was kept here for the english men-of-war, were left here when the naval station was removed. the spaniards at first thought of using them, and ran a tram-way from clarence to them. but when the tramway was finished, their activity had run out too, and to this day there the coals remain. now and again some one has the idea that they are quite good, and can be used for a steamer, and some people who have tried them say they are all right, and others say they are all wrong. and so the end of it will be that some few thousand years hence there will be a serious quarrel among geologists on the strange pocket of coal on fernando po, and they will run up continents, and raise and lower oceans to explain them, and they will doubtless get more excitement and pleasure out of them than you can nowadays. the history of the english occupation of fernando po seems often misunderstood, and now and then one hears our government reviled for handing it over to the spaniards. but this was unavoidable, for we had it as a loan from spain in as a naval station for our ships, at that time energetically commencing to suppress the slave trade in the bights; the idea being that this island would afford a more healthy and convenient spot for a naval depot than any port on the coast itself. more convenient fernando po certainly was, but not more healthy, and ever since it has been accumulating for itself an evil reputation for unhealthiness which is only languishing just at present because there is an interval between its epidemics--fever in fernando po, even more than on the mainland, having periodic outbursts of a more serious type than the normal intermittent and remittent of the coast. moreover, fernando po shares with senegal the undoubted yet doubtful honour of having had regular yellow fever. in and this disease was imported by a ship that had come from havana. since then it has not appeared in the definite south american form, and therefore does not seem to have obtained the foothold it has in senegal, where a few years ago all the money voted for the keeping of the fete nationale was in one district devoted by public consent to the purchase of coffins, required by an overwhelming outbreak of yellow jack. in the spanish government thinking, presumably, that the slave trade was suppressed enough, or at any rate to a sufficiently inconvenient extent, re-claimed fernando po, to the horror of the baptist missionaries who had settled in clarence apparently under the erroneous idea that the island had been definitely taken over by the english. this mission had received from the west african company a large grant of land, and had collected round it a gathering of sierra leonians and other artisan and trading africans who were attracted to clarence by the work made by the naval station; and these people, with the english traders who also settled here for a like reason, were the founders of clarence town. the declaration of the spanish government stating that only roman catholic missions would be countenanced caused the baptists to abandon their possessions and withdraw to the mainland in ambas bay, where they have since remained, and nowadays protestantism is represented by a methodist mission which has a sub-branch on the mainland on the akwayafe river and one on the qua ibo. the spaniards, on resuming possession of the island, had one of their attacks of activity regarding it, and sent out with don carlos chacon, who was to take over the command, four jesuit priests, a secretary, a commissariat officer, a custom-house clerk, and a transport, the santa maria, with a number of emigrant families. this attempt to colonise fernando po should have at least done the good of preventing such experiments ever being tried again with women and children, for of these unfortunate creatures--for whom, in spite of its being the wet season, no houses had been provided--more than per cent. died in the space of five months. mr. hutchinson, who was english consul at the time, tells us that "in a very short time gaunt figures of men, women, and children might be seen crawling through the streets, with scarcely an evidence of life in their faces, save the expression of a sort of torpid carelessness as to how soon it might be their turn to drop off and die. the portino, a steamer, carried back fifty of them to cadiz, who looked when they embarked more like living skeletons of skin and bone than animated human beings." { } i quote this not to cast reproach on the spanish government, but merely to give a fact, a case in point, of the deadly failure of endeavours to colonise on the west coast, a thing which is even now occasionally attempted, always with the same sad results, though in most cases these attempts are now made by religious but misinformed people under bishop taylor's mission. the spaniards did not entirely confine their attention to planting colonists in a ready-made state on the island. as soon as they had settled themselves and built their barracks and government house, they set to work and cleared away the bush for an area of from four to six miles round the town. the ground soon became overgrown again, but this clearing is still perceptible in the different type of forest on it, and has enabled the gardens and little plantations round clarence to be made more easily. my spanish friends assure me that the portuguese, who discovered the island in , { a} and who exchanged it and anno bom in to the spaniards for the little island of catalina and the colony of sacramento in south america, did not do anything to develop it. when they, the spaniards, first entered into possession they at once set to work to colonise and clear. then the colonisation scheme went to the bad, the natives poisoned the wells, it is said, and the attention of the spaniards was in those days turned, for some inscrutable reason, to the eastern shores of the island--a district now quite abandoned by whites, on account of its unhealthiness--and they lost in addition to the colonists a terrible quantity of their sailors, in concepcion bay. { b} a lull then followed, and the spaniards willingly lent the place to the english as aforesaid. they say we did nothing except establish clarence as a headquarters, which they consider to have been a most excellent enterprise, and import the baptist mission, which they hold as a less estimable undertaking; but there! that's nothing to what the baptist mission hold regarding the spaniards. for my own part, i wish the spaniards better luck this time in their activity, for in directing it to plantations they are on a truer and safer road to wealth than they have been with their previous importations of cuban political prisoners and ready-made families of colonists, and i hope they will send home those unfortunate wretches they have there now, and commence, in their expected two years, to reap the profits of the coffee and cocoa. certainly the chances are that they may, for the soil of fernando po is of exceeding fertility; mr. hutchinson says he has known indian corn planted here on a monday evening make its appearance four inches above ground on the following wednesday morning, within a period, he carefully says, of thirty-six hours. i have seen this sort of thing over in victoria, but i like to get a grown, strong man, and a consul of her britannic majesty, to say it for me. having discoursed at large on the various incomers to fernando po we may next turn to the natives, properly so-called, the bubis. these people, although presenting a series of interesting problems to the ethnologist, both from their insular position, and their differentiation from any of the mainland peoples, are still but little known. to a great extent this has arisen from their exclusiveness, and their total lack of enthusiasm in trade matters, a thing that differentiates them more than any other characteristic from the mainlanders, who, young and old, men and women, regard trade as the great affair of life, take to it as soon as they can toddle, and don't even leave it off at death, according to their own accounts of the way the spirits of distinguished traders still dabble and interfere in market matters. but it is otherwise with the bubi. a little rum, a few beads, and finish--then he will turn the rest of his attention to catching porcupines, or the beautiful little gazelles, gray on the back, and white underneath, with which the island abounds. and what time he may have on hand after this, he spends in building houses and making himself hats. it is only his utterly spare moments that he employs in making just sufficient palm oil from the rich supply of nuts at his command to get that rum and those beads of his. cloth he does not want; he utterly fails to see what good the stuff is, for he abhors clothes. the spanish authorities insist that the natives who come into the town should have something on, and so they array themselves in a bit of cotton cloth, which before they are out of sight of the town on their homeward way, they strip off and stuff into their baskets, showing in this, as well as in all other particulars, how uninfluencible by white culture they are. for the spaniards, like the portuguese, are great sticklers for clothes and insist on their natives wearing them--usually with only too much success. i shall never forget the yards and yards of cotton the ladies of loanda wore; and not content with making cocoons of their bodies, they wore over their heads, as a mantilla, some dozen yards or so of black cloth into the bargain. moreover this insistence on drapery for the figure is not merely for towns; a german officer told me the other day that when, a week or so before, his ship had called at anno bom, they were simply besieged for "clo', clo', clo';" the anno bomians explaining that they were all anxious to go across to principe and get employment on coffee plantations, but that the portuguese planters would not engage them in an unclothed state. you must not, however, imagine that the bubi is neglectful of his personal appearance. in his way he is quite a dandy. but his idea of decoration goes in the direction of a plaster of "tola" pomatum over his body, and above all a hat. this hat may be an antique european one, or a bound-round handkerchief, but it is more frequently a confection of native manufacture, and great taste and variety are displayed in its make. they are of plaited palm leaf-- that's all you can safely generalise regarding them--for sometimes they have broad brims, sometimes narrow, sometimes no brims at all. so, too, with the crown. sometimes it is thick and domed, sometimes non-existent, the wearer's hair aglow with red-tail parrots' feathers sticking up where the crown should be. as a general rule these hats are much adorned with oddments of birds' plumes, and one chief i knew had quite a regent-street dolly varden creation which he used to affix to his wool in a most intelligent way with bonnet- pins made of wood. these hats are also a peculiarity of the bubi, for none of the mainlanders care a row of pins for hats, except "for dandy," to wear occasionally, whereas the bubi wears his perpetually, although he has by no means the same amount of sun to guard against owing to the glorious forests of his island. for earrings the bubi wears pieces of wood stuck through the lobe of the ear, and although this is not a decorative habit still it is less undecorative than that of certain mainland friends of mine in this region, who wear large and necessarily dripping lumps of fat in their ears and in their hair. his neck is hung round with jujus on strings--bits of the backbones of pythons, teeth, feathers, and antelope horns, and occasionally a bit of fat in a bag. round his upper arm are bracelets, preferably made of ivory got from the mainland, for celluloid bracelets carefully imported for his benefit he refuses to look at. often these bracelets are made of beads, or a circlet of leaves, and when on the war-path an armlet of twisted grass is always worn by the men. men and women alike wear armlets, and in the case of the women they seem to be put on when young, for you see puffs of flesh growing out from between them. they are not entirely for decoration, serving also as pockets, for under them men stick a knife, and women a tobacco pipe, a well-coloured clay. leglets of similar construction are worn just under the knee on the right leg, while around the body you see belts of tshibbu, small pieces cut from achatectonia shells, which form the native currency of the island. these shells are also made into veils worn by the women at their wedding. this native coinage-equivalent is very interesting, for such things are exceedingly rare in west africa. the only other instance i personally know of a tribe in this part of the world using a native- made coin is that of the fans, who use little bundles of imitation axe-heads. dr. oscar baumann, who knows more than any one else about these bubis, thinks, i believe, that these bits of achatectonia shells may have been introduced by the runaway angola slaves in the old days, who used to fly from their portuguese owners on san thome to the spaniards on fernando po. the villages of the bubis are in the forest in the interior of the island, and they are fairly wide apart. they are not a sea-beach folk, although each village has its beach, which merely means the place to which it brings its trade, these beaches being usually the dwelling places of the so-called portos, { } negroes, who act as middle-men between the bubis and the whites. you will often be told that the bubis are singularly bad house- builders, indeed that they make no definite houses at all, but only rough shelters of branches. this is, however, a mistake. shelters of this kind that you come across are merely the rough huts put up by hunters, not true houses. the village is usually fairly well built, and surrounded with a living hedge of stakes. the houses inside this are four-cornered, the walls made of logs of wood stuck in edgeways, and surmounted by a roof of thatch pitched at an extremely stiff angle, and the whole is usually surrounded with a dug-out drain to carry off surface water. these houses, as usual on the west coast, are divisible into two classes--houses of assembly, and private living houses. the first are much the larger. the latter are very low, and sometimes ridiculously small, but still they are houses and better than those awful loango grass affairs you get on the congo. herr baumann says that the houses high up on the mountain have double walls between which there is a free space; an arrangement which may serve to minimise the extreme draughtiness of an ordinary bubi house--a very necessary thing in these relatively chilly upper regions. i may remark on my own account that the bubi villages do not often lie right on the path, but, like those you have to deal with up the calabar, some little way off it. this is no doubt for the purpose of concealing their whereabouts from strangers, and it does it successfully too, for many a merry hour have i spent dodging up and down a path trying to make out at what particular point it was advisable to dive into the forest thicket to reach a village. but this cultivates habits of observation, and a short course of this work makes you recognise which tree is which along miles of a bush path as easily as you would shops in your own street at home. the main interest of the bubi's life lies in hunting, for he is more of a sportsman than the majority of mainlanders. he has not any big game to deal with, unless we except pythons--which attain a great size on the island--and crocodiles. elephants, though plentiful on the adjacent mainland, are quite absent from fernando po, as are also hippos and the great anthropoid apes; but of the little gazelles, small monkeys, porcupines, and squirrels he has a large supply, and in the rivers a very pretty otter (lutra poensis) with yellow brown fur often quite golden underneath; a creature which is, i believe, identical with the angola otter. the bubis use in their hunting flint-lock guns, but chiefly traps and nets, and, i am told, slings. the advantage of these latter methods are, i expect, the same as on the mainland, where a distinguished sportsman once told me: "you go shoot thing with gun. berrah well--but you no get him thing for sure. no, sah. dem gun make nize. berrah well. you fren hear dem nize and come look him, and you hab to go share what you done kill. or bad man hear him nize, and he come look him, and you no fit to get share--you fit to get kill yusself. chii! chii! traps be best." i urged that the traps might also be robbed. "no, sah," says he, "them bian (charm) he look after them traps, he fit to make man who go tief swell up and bust." the bubis also fish, mostly by basket traps, but they are not experts either in this or in canoe management. their chief sea- shore sport is hunting for the eggs of the turtles who lay in the sand from august to october. these eggs--about in each nest-- are about the size of a billiard-ball, with a leathery envelope, and are much valued for food, as are also the grubs of certain beetles got from the stems of the palm-trees, and the honey of the wild bees which abound here. their domestic animals are the usual african list; cats, dogs, sheep, goats, and poultry. pigs there are too, very domestic in clarence and in a wild state in the forest. these pigs are the descendants of those imported by the spaniards, and not long ago became such an awful nuisance in clarence that the government issued instructions that all pigs without rings in their noses--i.e. all in a condition to grub up back gardens--should be forthwith shot if found abroad. this proclamation was issued by the governmental bellman thus: --"i say--i say--i say--i say. suppose pig walk--iron no live for him nose! gun shoot. kill him one time. hear re! hear re!" however a good many pigs with no iron living in their noses got adrift and escaped into the interior, and have flourished like the green bay-tree, destroying the bubi's plantation and eating his yams, while the bubi retaliating kills and eats them. so it's a drawn battle, for the bubi enjoys the pig and the pig enjoys the yams, which are of singular excellence in this island and celebrated throughout the bight. now, i am told, the government are firmly discouraging the export of these yams, which used to be quite a little branch of fernando po trade, in the hope that this will induce the native to turn his attention to working in the coffee and cacao plantations. hope springs eternal in the human breast, for the bubi has shown continually since the th century that he takes no interest in these things whatsoever. now and again a man or woman will come voluntarily and take service in clarence, submit to clothes, and rapidly pick up the ways of a house or store. and just when their owner thinks he owns a treasure, and begins to boast that he has got an exception to all bubidom, or else that he knows how to manage them better than other men, then a hole in that man's domestic arrangements suddenly appears. the bubi has gone, without giving a moment's warning, and without stealing his master's property, but just softly and silently vanished away. and if hunted up the treasure will be found in his or her particular village-- clothes-less, comfortable, utterly unconcerned, and unaware that he or she has lost anything by leaving clarence and civilisation. it is this conduct that gains for the bubi the reputation of being a bigger idiot than he really is. for west africans their agriculture is of a fairly high description- -the noteworthy point about it, however, is the absence of manioc. manioc is grown on fernando po, but only by the portos. the bubi cultivated plants are yams (dioscorea alata), koko (colocasia esculenta--the taro of the south seas,) and plantains. their farms are well kept, particularly those in the grass districts by san carlos bay. the yams of the cordillera districts are the best flavoured, but those of the east coast the largest. palm-oil is used for domestic purposes in the usual ways, and palm wine both fresh and fermented is the ordinary native drink. rum is held in high esteem, but used in a general way in moderation as a cordial and a treat, for the bubi is, like the rest of the west african natives, by no means an habitual drunkard. gin he dislikes. { } and i may remark you will find the same opinion in regard to the dualla in cameroons river--on the undeniable authority of dr. buchner, and my own extensive experience of the west coast bears it out. physically the bubis are a fairly well-formed race of medium height; they are decidedly inferior to the benga or the krus, but quite on a level with the effiks. the women indeed are very comely: their colour is bronze and their skin the skin of the bantu. beards are not uncommon among the men, and these give their faces possibly more than anything else, a different look to the faces of the effiks or the duallas. indeed the people physically most like the bubis that i have ever seen, are undoubtedly the bakwiri of cameroons mountain, who are also liable to be bearded, or possibly i should say more liable to wear beards, for a good deal of the african hairlessness you hear commented on--in the west african at any rate--arises from his deliberately pulling his hair out--his beard, moustache, whiskers, and, occasionally, as among the fans, his eyebrows. dr. baumann, the great authority on the bubi language says it is a bantu stock. { } i know nothing of it myself save that it is harsh in sound. their method of counting is usually by fives but they are notably weak in arithmetical ability, differing in this particular from the mainlanders, and especially from their negro neighbours, who are very good at figures, surpassing the bantu in this, as indeed they do in most branches of intellectual activity. but the most remarkable instance of inferiority the bubis display is their ignorance regarding methods of working iron. i do not know that iron in a native state is found on fernando po, but scrap-iron they have been in touch with for some hundreds of years. the mainlanders are all cognisant of native methods of working iron, although many tribes of them now depend entirely on european trade for their supply of knives, etc., and this difference between them and the bubis would seem to indicate that the migration of the latter to the island must have taken place at a fairly remote period, a period before the iron-working tribes came down to the coast. of course, if you take the bubi's usual explanation of his origin, namely that he came out of the crater on the top of clarence peak, this argument falls through; but he has also another legend, one moreover which is likewise to be found upon the mainland, which says he was driven from the district north of the gaboon estuary by the coming of the m'pongwe to the coast, and as this legend is the more likely of the two i think we may accept it as true, or nearly so. but what adds another difficulty to the matter is that the bubi is not only unlearned in iron lore, but he was learned in stone, and up to the time of the youth of many porto-negroes on fernando po, he was making and using stone implements, and none of the tribes within the memory of man have done this on the mainland. it is true that up the niger and about benin and axim you get polished stone celts, but these are regarded as weird affairs,--thunderbolts--and suitable only for grinding up and making into medicine; there is no trace in the traditions of these places, as far as i have been able to find, of any time at which stone implements were in common use, and certainly the m'pongwe have not been a very long time on the coast, for their coming is still remembered in their traditions. the bubi stone implements i have seen twice, but on neither occasion could i secure one, and although i have been long promised specimens from fernando po, i have not yet received them. they are difficult to procure, because none of the present towns are on really old sites, the bubi, like most bantus, moving pretty frequently, either because the ground is witched, demonstrated by outbreaks of sickness, or because another village-full of his fellow creatures, or a horrid white man plantation-making, has come too close to him. a roman catholic priest in ka congo once told me a legend he laughed much over, of how a fellow priest had enterprisingly settled himself one night in the middle of a bubi village with intent to devote the remainder of his life to quietly but thoroughly converting it. next morning, when he rose up, he found himself alone, the people having taken all their portable possessions and vanished to build another village elsewhere. the worthy father spent some time chivying his flock about the forest, but in vain, and he returned home disgusted, deciding that the creator, for some wise purpose, had dedicated the bubis to the devil. the spears used by this interesting people are even to this day made entirely of wood, and have such a polynesian look about them that i intend some time or other to bring some home and experiment on that learned polynesian-culture-expert, baron von hugel, with them: -- intellectually experiment, not physically, pray understand. the pottery has a very early-man look about it, but in this it does not differ much from that of the mainland, which is quite as poor, and similarly made without a wheel, and sun-baked. those pots of the bubis i have seen have, however, not had the pattern (any sort of pattern does, and it need not be carefully done) that runs round mainland pots to "keep their souls in"--i.e. to prevent their breaking up on their own account. the basket-work of the bubis is of a superior order: the baskets they make to hold the palm oil are excellent, and will hold water like a basin, but i am in doubt whether this art is original, or imported by the portuguese runaway slaves, for they put me very much in mind of those made by my old friends the kabinders, from whom a good many of those slaves were recruited. i think there is little doubt that several of the musical instruments own this origin, particularly their best beloved one, the elibo. this may be described as a wooden bell having inside it for clappers several (usually five) pieces of stick threaded on a bit of wood jammed into the dome of the bell and striking the rim, beyond which the clappers just protrude. these bells are very like those you meet with in angola, but i have not seen on the island, nor does dr. baumann cite having seen, the peculiar double bell of angola--the engongui. the bubi bell is made out of one piece of wood and worked--or played-- with both hands. dr. baumann says it is customary on bright moonlight nights for two lines of men to sit facing each other and to clap--one can hardly call it ring--these bells vigorously, but in good time, accompanying this performance with a monotonous song, while the delighted women and children dance round. the learned doctor evidently sees the picturesqueness of this practice, but notes that the words of the songs are not "tiefsinnige" (profound), as he has heard men for hours singing "the shark bites the bubi's hand," only that over and over again and nothing more. this agrees with my own observations of all bantu native songs. i have always found that the words of these songs were either the repetition of some such phrase as this, or a set of words referring to the recent adventures or experiences of the singer or the present company's little peculiarities; with a very frequent chorus, old and conventional. the native tunes used with these songs are far superior, and i expect many of them are very old. they are often full of variety and beauty, particularly those of the m'pongwe and igalwa, of which i will speak later. the dances i have no personal knowledge of, but there is nothing in baumann's description to make one think they are distinct in themselves from the mainland dances. i once saw a dance at fernando po, but that was among portos, and it was my old friend the batuco in all its beauty. but there is a distinct peculiarity about the places the dances are held on, every village having a kept piece of ground outside it which is the dancing place for the village--the ball-room as it were; and exceedingly picturesque these dances must be, for they are mostly held during the nights of full moon. these kept grounds remind one very much of the similar looking patches of kept grass one sees in villages in ka congo, but there is no similarity in their use, for the ka congo lawns are of fetish, not frivolous, import. the bubis have an instrument i have never seen in an identical form on the mainland. it is made like a bow, with a tense string of fibre. one end of the bow is placed against the mouth, and the string is then struck by the right hand with a small round stick, while with the left it is scraped with a piece of shell or a knife- blade. this excruciating instrument, i warn any one who may think of living among the bubis, is very popular. the drums used are both the dualla form--all wood--and the ordinary skin-covered drum, and i think if i catalogue fifes made of wood, i shall have nearly finished the bubi orchestra. i have doubts on this point because i rather question whether i may be allowed to refer to a very old bullock hide--unmounted--as a musical instrument without bringing down the wrath of musicians on my head. these stiff, dry pelts are much thought of, and played by the artistes by being shaken as accompaniments to other instruments--they make a noise, and that is after all the soul of most african instrumental music. these instruments are all that is left of certain bullocks which many years ago the spaniards introduced, hoping to improve the food supply. they seemed as if they would have flourished well on the island, on the stretches of grass land in the cordillera and the east, but the bubis, being great sportsmen, killed them all off. the festivities of the bubis--dances, weddings, feasts, etc.,--at which this miscellaneous collection of instruments are used in concert, usually take place in november, the dry season; but the bubi is liable to pour forth his soul in the bosom of his family at any time of the day or night, from june to january, and when he pours it forth on that bow affair it makes the lonely european long for home. divisions of time the bubi can hardly be said to have, but this is a point upon which all west africans are rather weak, particularly the bantu. he has, however, a definite name for november, december, and january--the dry season months--calling them lobos. the fetish of these people, although agreeing on broad lines with the bantu fetish, has many interesting points, as even my small knowledge of it showed me, and it is a subject that would repay further investigation; and as by fetish i always mean the governing but underlying ideas of a man's life, we will commence with the child. nothing, as far as i have been able to make out, happens to him, for fetish reasons, when he first appears on the scene. he receives at birth, as is usual, a name which is changed for another on his initiation into the secret society, this secret society having also, as usual, a secret language. about the age of three or five years the boy is decorated, under the auspices of the witch doctor, with certain scars on the face. these scars run from the root of the nose across the cheeks, and are sometimes carried up in a curve on to the forehead. tattooing, in the true sense of the word, they do not use much, but they paint themselves, as the mainlanders do, with a red paint made by burning some herb and mixing the ash with clay or oil, and they occasionally--whether for ju-ju reasons or for mere decoration i do not know--paint a band of yellow clay round the chest; but of the bubi secret society i know little, nor have i been able to find any one who knows much more. hutchinson, { } in his exceedingly amusing description of a wedding he was once present at among these people, would lead one to think the period of seclusion of the women's society was twelve months. the chief god or spirit, o wassa, resides in the crater of the highest peak, and by his name the peak is known to the native. another very important spirit, to whom goats and sheep are offered, is lobe, resident in a crater lake on the northern slope of the cordilleras, and the grass you sometimes see a bubi wearing is said to come from this lake and be a ju-ju of lobe's. dr. baumann says that the lake at riabba from which the spirit uapa rises is more holy, and that he is small, and resides in a chasm in a rock whose declivity can only be passed by means of bush ropes, and in the wet season he is not get-at-able at all. he will, if given suitable offerings, reveal the future to bubis, but bubis only. his priest is the king of all the bubis, upon whom it is never permitted to a white man, or a porto, to gaze. baumann also gives the residence of another important spirit as being the grotto at banni. this is a sea-cave, only accessible at low water in calm weather. i have heard many legends of this cave, but have never had an opportunity of seeing it, or any one who has seen it first hand. the charms used by these people are similar in form to those of the mainland bantu, but the methods of treating paths and gateways are somewhat peculiar. the gateways to the towns are sometimes covered by freshly cut banana leaves, and during the religious feast in november, the paths to the villages are barred across with a hedge of grass which no stranger must pass through. the government is a peculiar one for west africa. every village has its chief, but the whole tribe obey one great chief or king who lives in the crater-ravine at riabba. this individual is called moka, but whether he is now the same man referred to by rogoszinsky, mr. holland, and the rev. hugh brown, who attempted to interview him in the seventies, i do not feel sure, for the bubis are just the sort of people to keep a big king going with a variety of individuals. even the indefatigable dr. baumann failed to see moka, though he evidently found out a great deal about the methods of his administration and formed a very high opinion of his ability, for he says that to this one chief the people owe their present unity and orderliness; that before his time the whole island was in a state of internecine war: murder was frequent, and property unsafe. now their social condition, according to the doctor's account, is a model to europe, let alone africa. civil wars have been abolished, disputes between villages being referred to arbitration, and murder is swiftly and surely punished. if the criminal has bolted into the forest and cannot be found, his village is made responsible, and has to pay a fine in goats, sheep and tobacco to the value of pounds. theft is extremely rare and offences against the moral code also, the bubis having an extremely high standard in this matter, even the little children having each a separate sleeping hut. in old days adultery was punished by cutting off the offender's hand. i have myself seen women in fernando po who have had a hand cut off at the wrist, but i believe those were slave women who had suffered for theft. slaves the bubis do have, but their condition is the mild, poor relation or retainer form of slavery you find in calabar, and differs from the dualla form, for the slaves live in the same villages as their masters, while among the duallas, as among most bantu slave-holding tribes, the slaves are excluded from the master's village and have separate villages of their own. for marriage ceremonies i refer you to mr. hutchinson. burial customs are exceedingly quaint in the southern and eastern districts, where the bodies are buried in the forest with their heads just sticking out of the ground. in other districts the body is also buried in the forest, but is completely covered and an erection of stones put up to mark the place. little is known of all west african fetish, still less of that of these strange people. dr. oscar baumann brought to bear on them his careful unemotional german methods of observation, thereby giving us more valuable information about them and their island than we otherwise should possess. mr. hutchinson resided many years on fernando po, in the capacity of h. b. m.'s consul, with his hands full of the affairs of the oil rivers and in touch with the portos of clarence, but he nevertheless made very interesting observations on the natives and their customs. the polish exile and his courageous wife who ascended clarence peak, mr. rogoszinsky, and another polish exile, mr. janikowski, about complete our series of authorities on the island. dr. baumann thinks they got their information from porto sources--sources the learned doctor evidently regards as more full of imagination than solid fact, but, as you know, all african travellers are occasionally in the habit of pooh- poohing each other, and i own that i myself have been chiefly in touch with portos, and that my knowledge of the bubi language runs to the conventional greeting form: --"ipori?" "porto." "ke soko?'" "hatsi soko": --"who are you?" "porto." "what's the news?" "no news." although these portos are less interesting to the ethnologist than the philanthropist, they being by-products of his efforts, i must not leave fernando po without mentioning them, for on them the trade of the island depends. they are the middlemen between the bubi and the white trader. the former regards them with little, if any, more trust than he regards the white men, and his view of the position of the spanish governor is that he is chief over the portos. that he has any headship over bubis or over the bubi land--itschulla as he calls fernando po--he does not imagine possible. baumann says he was once told by a bubi: "white men are fish, not men. they are able to stay a little while on land, but at last they mount their ships again and vanish over the horizon into the ocean. how can a fish possess land?" if the coffee and cacao thrive on fernando po to the same extent that they have already thriven on san thome there is but little doubt that the bubis will become extinct; for work on plantations, either for other people, or themselves, they will not, and then the portos will become the most important class, for they will go in for plantations. their little factories are studded all round the shores of the coast in suitable coves and bays, and here in fairly neat houses they live, collecting palm-oil from the bubis, and making themselves little cacao plantations, and bringing these products into clarence every now and then to the white trader's factory. then, after spending some time and most of their money in the giddy whirl of that capital, they return to their homes and recover. there is a class of them permanently resident in clarence, the city men of fernando po, and these are very like the sierra leonians of free town, but preferable. their origin is practically the same as that of the free towners. they are the descendants of liberated slaves set free during the time of our occupation of the island as a naval depot for suppressing the slave trade, and of sierra leonians and accras who have arrived and settled since then. they have some of the same "black gennellum, sar" style about them, but not developed to the same ridiculous extent as in the sierra leonians, for they have not been under our institutions. the "nanny po" ladies are celebrated for their beauty all along the west coast, and very justly. they are not however, as they themselves think, the most beautiful women in this part of the world. not at least to my way of thinking. i prefer an elmina, or an igalwa, or a m'pongwe, or--but i had better stop and own that my affections have got very scattered among the black ladies on the west coast, and i no sooner remember one lovely creature whose soft eyes, perfect form and winning, pretty ways have captivated me than i think of another. the nanny po ladies have often a certain amount of spanish blood in them, which gives a decidedly greater delicacy to their features-- delicate little nostrils, mouths not too heavily lipped, a certain gloss on the hair, and a light in the eye. but it does not improve their colour, and i am assured that it has an awful effect on their tempers, so i think i will remain, for the present, the faithful admirer of my sable ingramina, the igalwa, with the little red blossoms stuck in her night-black hair, and a sweet soft look and word for every one, but particularly for her ugly husband isaac the "jack wash." chapter iii. voyage down coast. wherein the voyager before leaving the rivers discourses on dangers, to which is added some account of mangrove swamps and the creatures that abide therein. i left calabar in may and joined the benguela off lagos bar. my voyage down coast in her was a very pleasant one and full of instruction, for mr. fothergill, who was her purser, had in former years resided in congo francais as a merchant, and to congo francais i was bound with an empty hold as regards local knowledge of the district. he was one of that class of men, of which you most frequently find representatives among the merchants, who do not possess the power so many men along here do possess (a power that always amazes me), of living for a considerable time in a district without taking any interest in it, keeping their whole attention concentrated on the point of how long it will be before their time comes to get out of it. mr. fothergill evidently had much knowledge and experience of the fernan vaz district and its natives. he had, i should say, overdone his experiences with the natives, as far as personal comfort and pleasure at the time went, having been nearly killed and considerably chivied by them. now i do not wish a man, however much i may deplore his total lack of local knowledge, to go so far as this. mr. fothergill gave his accounts of these incidents calmly, and in an undecorated way that gave them a power and convincingness verging on being unpleasant, although useful, to a person who was going into the district where they had occurred, for one felt there was no mortal reason why one should not personally get involved in similar affairs. and i must here acknowledge the great subsequent service mr. fothergill's wonderfully accurate descriptions of the peculiar characteristics of the ogowe forests were to me when i subsequently came to deal with these forests on my own account, as every district of forest has peculiar characteristics of its own which you require to know. i should like here to speak of west coast dangers because i fear you may think that i am careless of, or do not believe in them, neither of which is the case. the more you know of the west coast of africa, the more you realise its dangers. for example, on your first voyage out you hardly believe the stories of fever told by the old coasters. that is because you do not then understand the type of man who is telling them, a man who goes to his death with a joke in his teeth. but a short experience of your own, particularly if you happen on a place having one of its periodic epidemics, soon demonstrates that the underlying horror of the thing is there, a rotting corpse which the old coaster has dusted over with jokes to cover it so that it hardly shows at a distance, but which, when you come yourself to live alongside, you soon become cognisant of. many men, when they have got ashore and settled, realise this, and let the horror get a grip on them; a state briefly and locally described as funk, and a state that usually ends fatally; and you can hardly blame them. why, i know of a case myself. a young man who had never been outside an english country town before in his life, from family reverses had to take a situation as book-keeper down in the bights. the factory he was going to was in an isolated out-of-the-way place and not in a settlement, and when the ship called off it, he was put ashore in one of the ship's boats with his belongings, and a case or so of goods. there were only the firm's beach-boys down at the surf, and as the steamer was in a hurry the officer from the ship did not go up to the factory with him, but said good-bye and left him alone with a set of naked savages as he thought, but really of good kindly kru boys on the beach. he could not understand what they said, nor they what he said, and so he walked up to the house and on to the verandah and tried to find the agent he had come out to serve under. he looked into the open-ended dining-room and shyly round the verandah, and then sat down and waited for some one to turn up. sundry natives turned up, and said a good deal, but no one white or comprehensible, so in desperation he made another and a bolder tour completely round the verandah and noticed a most peculiar noise in one of the rooms and an infinity of flies going into the venetian shuttered window. plucking up courage he went in and found what was left of the white agent, a considerable quantity of rats, and most of the flies in west africa. he then presumably had fever, and he was taken off, a fortnight afterwards, by a french boat, to whom the natives signalled, and he is not coming down the coast again. some men would have died right out from a shock like this. but most of the new-comers do not get a shock of this order. they either die themselves or get more gradually accustomed to this sort of thing, when they come to regard death and fever as soldiers, who on a battle-field sit down, and laugh and talk round a camp fire after a day's hard battle, in which they have seen their friends and companions falling round them; all the time knowing that to-morrow the battle comes again and that to-morrow night they themselves may never see. it is not hard-hearted callousness, it is only their way. michael scott put this well in tom cringle's log, in his account of the yellow fever during the war in the west indies. fever, though the chief danger, particularly to people who go out to settlements, is not the only one; but as the other dangers, except perhaps domestic poisoning, are incidental to pottering about in the forests, or on the rivers, among the unsophisticated tribes, i will not dwell on them. they can all be avoided by any one with common sense, by keeping well out of the districts in which they occur; and so i warn the general reader that if he goes out to west africa, it is not because i said the place was safe, or its dangers overrated. the cemeteries of the west coast are full of the victims of those people who have said that coast fever is "cork fever," and a man's own fault, which it is not; and that natives will never attack you unless you attack them: which they will--on occasions. my main aim in going to congo francais was to get up above the tide line of the ogowe river and there collect fishes; for my object on this voyage was to collect fish from a river north of the congo. i had hoped this river would have been the niger, for sir george goldie had placed at my disposal great facilities for carrying on work there in comfort; but for certain private reasons i was disinclined to go from the royal niger protectorate into the royal niger company's territory; and the calabar, where sir claude macdonald did everything he possibly could to assist me, i did not find a good river for me to collect fishes in. these two rivers failing me, from no fault of either of their own presiding genii, my only hope of doing anything now lay on the south west coast river, the ogowe, and everything there depended on mr. hudson's attitude towards scientific research in the domain of ichthyology. fortunately for me that gentleman elected to take a favourable view of this affair, and in every way in his power assisted me during my entire stay in congo francais. but before i enter into a detailed description of this wonderful bit of west africa, i must give you a brief notice of the manners, habits and customs of west coast rivers in general, to make the thing more intelligible. there is an uniformity in the habits of west coast rivers, from the volta to the coanza, which is, when you get used to it, very taking. excepting the congo, the really great river comes out to sea with as much mystery as possible; lounging lazily along among its mangrove swamps in a what's-it-matter-when-one-comes-out and where's-the- hurry style, through quantities of channels inter-communicating with each other. each channel, at first sight as like the other as peas in a pod, is bordered on either side by green-black walls of mangroves, which captain lugard graphically described as seeming "as if they had lost all count of the vegetable proprieties, and were standing on stilts with their branches tucked up out of the wet, leaving their gaunt roots exposed in midair." high-tide or low- tide, there is little difference in the water; the river, be it broad or narrow, deep or shallow, looks like a pathway of polished metal; for it is as heavy weighted with stinking mud as water e'er can be, ebb or flow, year out and year in. but the difference in the banks, though an unending alternation between two appearances, is weird. at high-water you do not see the mangroves displaying their ankles in the way that shocked captain lugard. they look most respectable, their foliage rising densely in a wall irregularly striped here and there by the white line of an aerial root, coming straight down into the water from some upper branch as straight as a plummet, in the strange, knowing way an aerial root of a mangrove does, keeping the hard straight line until it gets some two feet above water-level, and then spreading out into blunt fingers with which to dip into the water and grasp the mud. banks indeed at high water can hardly be said to exist, the water stretching away into the mangrove swamps for miles and miles, and you can then go, in a suitable small canoe, away among these swamps as far as you please. this is a fascinating pursuit. but it is a pleasure to be indulged in with caution; for one thing, you are certain to come across crocodiles. now a crocodile drifting down in deep water, or lying asleep with its jaws open on a sand-bank in the sun, is a picturesque adornment to the landscape when you are on the deck of a steamer, and you can write home about it and frighten your relations on your behalf; but when you are away among the swamps in a small dug-out canoe, and that crocodile and his relations are awake--a thing he makes a point of being at flood tide because of fish coming along--and when he has got his foot upon his native heath--that is to say, his tail within holding reach of his native mud--he is highly interesting, and you may not be able to write home about him- -and you get frightened on your own behalf; for crocodiles can, and often do, in such places, grab at people in small canoes. i have known of several natives losing their lives in this way; some native villages are approachable from the main river by a short cut, as it were, through the mangrove swamps, and the inhabitants of such villages will now and then go across this way with small canoes instead of by the constant channel to the village, which is almost always winding. in addition to this unpleasantness you are liable-- until you realise the danger from experience, or have native advice on the point--to get tide-trapped away in the swamps, the water falling round you when you are away in some deep pool or lagoon, and you find you cannot get back to the main river. of course if you really want a truly safe investment in fame, and really care about posterity, and posterity's science, you will jump over into the black batter-like, stinking slime, cheered by the thought of the terrific sensation you will produce , years hence, and the care you will be taken of then by your fellow-creatures, in a museum. but if you are a mere ordinary person of a retiring nature, like me, you stop in your lagoon until the tide rises again; most of your attention is directed to dealing with an "at home" to crocodiles and mangrove flies, and with the fearful stench of the slime round you. what little time you have over you will employ in wondering why you came to west africa, and why, after having reached this point of folly, you need have gone and painted the lily and adorned the rose, by being such a colossal ass as to come fooling about in mangrove swamps. still, even if your own peculiar tastes and avocations do not take you in small dug-out canoes into the heart of the swamps, you can observe the difference in the local scenery made by the flowing of the tide when you are on a vessel stuck on a sand-bank, in the rio del rey for example. moreover, as you will have little else to attend to, save mosquitoes and mangrove flies, when in such a situation, you may as well pursue the study. at the ebb gradually the foliage of the lower branches of the mangroves grows wet and muddy, until there is a great black band about three feet deep above the surface of the water in all directions; gradually a network of gray-white roots rises up, and below this again, gradually, a slope of smooth and lead-grey slime. the effect is not in the least as if the water had fallen, but as if the mangroves had, with one accord, risen up out of it, and into it again they seem silently to sink when the flood comes. but by this more safe, if still unpleasant, method of observing mangrove-swamps, you miss seeing in full the make of them, for away in their fastnesses the mangroves raise their branches far above the reach of tide line, and the great gray roots of the older trees are always sticking up in mid-air. but, fringing the rivers, there is always a hedge of younger mangroves whose lower branches get immersed. at corners here and there from the river face you can see the land being made from the waters. a mud-bank forms off it, a mangrove seed lights on it, and the thing's done. well! not done, perhaps, but begun; for if the bank is high enough to get exposed at low water, this pioneer mangrove grows. he has a wretched existence though. you have only got to look at his dwarfed attenuated form to see this. he gets joined by a few more bold spirits and they struggle on together, their network of roots stopping abundance of mud, and by good chance now and then a consignment of miscellaneous debris of palm leaves, or a floating tree-trunk, but they always die before they attain any considerable height. still even in death they collect. their bare white stems remaining like a net gripped in the mud, so that these pioneer mangrove heroes may be said to have laid down their lives to make that mud-bank fit for colonisation, for the time gradually comes when other mangroves can and do colonise on it, and flourish, extending their territory steadily; and the mud-bank joins up with, and becomes a part of, africa. right away on the inland fringe of the swamp--you may go some hundreds of miles before you get there--you can see the rest of the process. the mangroves there have risen up, and dried the mud to an extent that is more than good for themselves, have over civilised that mud in fact, and so the brackish waters of the tide--which, although their enemy when too deep or too strong in salt, is essential to their existence--cannot get to their roots. they have done this gradually, as a mangrove does all things, but they have done it, and down on to that mud come a whole set of palms from the old mainland, who in their early colonisation days go through similarly trying experiences. first the screw-pines come and live among them; then the wine-palm and various creepers, and then the oil-palm; and the debris of these plants being greater and making better soil than dead mangroves, they work quicker and the mangrove is doomed. soon the salt waters are shut right out, the mangrove dies, and that bit of africa is made. it is very interesting to get into these regions; you see along the river-bank a rich, thick, lovely wall of soft-wooded plants, and behind this you find great stretches of death;--miles and miles sometimes of gaunt white mangrove skeletons standing on gray stuff that is not yet earth and is no longer slime, and through the crust of which you can sink into rotting putrefaction. yet, long after you are dead, buried, and forgotten, this will become a forest of soft-wooded plants and palms; and finally of hard-wooded trees. districts of this description you will find in great sweeps of kama country for example, and in the rich low regions up to the base of the sierra del cristal and the rumby range. you often hear the utter lifelessness of mangrove-swamps commented on; why i do not know, for they are fairly heavily stocked with fauna, though the species are comparatively few. there are the crocodiles, more of them than any one wants; there are quantities of flies, particularly the big silent mangrove-fly which lays an egg in you under the skin; the egg becomes a maggot and stays there until it feels fit to enter into external life. then there are "slimy things that crawl with legs upon a slimy sea," and any quantity of hopping mud-fish, and crabs, and a certain mollusc, and in the water various kinds of cat-fish. birdless they are save for the flocks of gray parrots that pass over them at evening, hoarsely squarking; and save for this squarking of the parrots the swamps are silent all the day, at least during the dry season; in the wet season there is no silence night or day in west africa, but that roar of the descending deluge of rain that is more monotonous and more gloomy than any silence can be. in the morning you do not hear the long, low, mellow whistle of the plantain-eaters calling up the dawn, nor in the evening the clock-bird nor the handel-festival-sized choruses of frogs, or the crickets, that carry on their vesper controversy of "she did"--"she didn't" so fiercely on hard land. but the mangrove-swamp follows the general rule for west africa, and night in it is noisier than the day. after dark it is full of noises; grunts from i know not what, splashes from jumping fish, the peculiar whirr of rushing crabs, and quaint creaking and groaning sounds from the trees; and--above all in eeriness--the strange whine and sighing cough of crocodiles. great regions of mangrove-swamps are a characteristic feature of the west african coast. the first of these lies north of sierra leone; then they occur, but of smaller dimensions--just fringes of river- outfalls--until you get to lagos, when you strike the greatest of them all: --the swamps of the niger outfalls (about twenty-three rivers in all) and of the sombreiro, new calabar, bonny, san antonio, opobo (false and true), kwoibo, old calabar (with the cross akwayafe qwa rivers) and rio del rey rivers. the whole of this great stretch of coast is a mangrove-swamp, each river silently rolling down its great mass of mud-laden waters and constituting each in itself a very pretty problem to the navigator by its network of intercommunicating creeks, and the sand and mud bar which it forms off its entrance by dropping its heaviest mud; its lighter mud is carried out beyond its bar and makes the nasty-smelling brown soup of the south atlantic ocean, with froth floating in lines and patches on it, for miles to seaward. in this great region of swamps every mile appears like every other mile until you get well used to it, and are able to distinguish the little local peculiarities at the entrance of the rivers and in the winding of the creeks, a thing difficult even for the most experienced navigator to do during those thick wool-like mists called smokes, which hang about the whole bight from november till may (the dry season), sometimes lasting all day, sometimes clearing off three hours after sunrise. the upper or north-westerly part of the swamp is round the mouths of the niger, and it successfully concealed this fact from geographers down to , when the series of heroic journeys made by mungo park, clapperton, and the two landers finally solved the problem--a problem that was as great and which cost more men's lives than even the discovery of the sources of the nile. that this should have been so may seem very strange to us who now have been told the answer to the riddle; for the upper waters of this great river were known of before christ and spoken of by herodotus, pliny and ptolemy, and its mouths navigated continuously along by the seaboard by trading vessels since the fifteenth century, but they were not recognised as belonging to the niger. some geographers held that the senegal or the gambia was its outfall; others that it was the zaire (congo); others that it did not come out on the west coast at all, but got mixed up with the nile in the middle of the continent, and so on. yet when you come to know the swamps this is not so strange. you find on going up what looks like a big river--say forcados, two and a half miles wide at the entrance and a real bit of the niger. before you are up it far great, broad, business-like-looking river entrances open on either side, showing wide rivers mangrove-walled, but two-thirds of them are utter frauds which will ground you within half an hour of your entering them. some few of them do communicate with other main channels to the great upper river, and others are main channels themselves; but most of them intercommunicate with each other and lead nowhere in particular, and you can't even get there because of their shallowness. it is small wonder that the earlier navigators did not get far up them in sailing ships, and that the problem had to be solved by men descending the main stream of the niger before it commences to what we in devonshire should call "squander itself about" in all these channels. and in addition it must be remembered that the natives with whom these trading vessels dealt, first for slaves, afterwards for palm-oil, were not, and are not now, members of the lo family of savages. far from it: they do not go in for "gentle smiles," but for murdering any unprotected boat's crew they happen to come across, not only for a love of sport but to keep white traders from penetrating to the trade-producing interior, and spoiling prices. and the region is practically foodless. the rivers of the great mangrove-swamp from the sombreiro to the rio del rey are now known pretty surely not to be branches of the niger, but the upper regions of this part of the bight are much neglected by english explorers. i believe the great swamp region of the bight of biafra is the greatest in the world, and that in its immensity and gloom it has a grandeur equal to that of the himalayas. take any man, educated or not, and place him on bonny or forcados river in the wet season on a sunday--bonny for choice. forcados is good. you'll keep forcados scenery "indelibly limned on the tablets of your mind when a yesterday has faded from its page," after you have spent even a week waiting for the lagos branch-boat on its inky waters. but bonny! well, come inside the bar and anchor off the factories: seaward there is the foam of the bar gleaming and wicked white against a leaden sky and what there is left of breaker island. in every other direction you will see the apparently endless walls of mangrove, unvarying in colour, unvarying in form, unvarying in height, save from perspective. beneath and between you and them lie the rotting mud waters of bonny river, and away up and down river, miles of rotting mud waters fringed with walls of rotting mud mangrove-swamp. the only break in them--one can hardly call it a relief to the scenery--are the gaunt black ribs of the old hulks, once used as trading stations, which lie exposed at low water near the shore, protruding like the skeletons of great unclean beasts who have died because bonny water was too strong even for them. raised on piles from the mud shore you will see the white-painted factories and their great store-houses for oil; each factory likely enough with its flag at half-mast, which does not enliven the scenery either, for you know it is because somebody is "dead again." throughout and over all is the torrential downpour of the wet-season rain, coming down night and day with its dull roar. i have known it rain six mortal weeks in bonny river, just for all the world as if it were done by machinery, and the interval that came then was only a few wet days, where-after it settled itself down to work again in the good west coast waterspout pour for more weeks. while your eyes are drinking in the characteristics of bonny scenery you notice a peculiar smell--an intensification of that smell you noticed when nearing bonny, in the evening, out at sea. that's the breath of the malarial mud, laden with fever, and the chances are you will be down to-morrow. if it is near evening time now, you can watch it becoming incarnate, creeping and crawling and gliding out from the side creeks and between the mangrove-roots, laying itself upon the river, stretching and rolling in a kind of grim play, and finally crawling up the side of the ship to come on board and leave its cloak of moisture that grows green mildew in a few hours over all. noise you will not be much troubled with: there is only that rain, a sound i have known make men who are sick with fever well- nigh mad, and now and again the depressing cry of the curlews which abound here. this combination is such that after six or eight hours of it you will be thankful to hear your shipmates start to work the winch. i take it you are hard up when you relish a winch. and you will say--let your previous experience of the world be what it may-- good heavens, what a place! five times have i been now in bonny river and i like it. you always do get to like it if you live long enough to allow the strange fascination of the place to get a hold on you; but when i first entered it, on a ship commanded by captain murray in ' , in the wet season, i.e. in august, in spite of the confidence i had by this time acquired in his skill and knowledge of the west coast, a sense of horror seized on me as i gazed upon the scene, and i said to the old coaster who then had charge of my education, "good heavens! what an awful accident. we've gone and picked up the styx." he was evidently hurt and said, "bonny was a nice place when you got used to it," and went on to discourse on the last epidemic here, when nine men out of the resident eleven died in about ten days from yellow fever. next to the scenery of "a river," commend me for cheerfulness to the local conversation of its mangrove-swamp region; and every truly important west african river has its mangrove-swamp belt, which extends inland as far as the tide waters make it brackish, and which has a depth and extent from the banks depending on the configuration of the country. above this belt comes uniformly a region of high forest, having towards the river frontage clay cliffs, sometimes high, as in the case of the old calabar at adiabo, more frequently dwarf cliffs, as in the forcados up at warree, and in the ogowe,--for a long stretch through kama country. after the clay cliffs region you come to a region of rapids, caused by the river cutting its way through a mountain range; such ranges are the pallaballa, causing the livingstone rapids of the congo; the sierra del cristal, those of the ogowe, and many lesser rivers; the rumby and omon ranges, those of the old calabar and cross rivers. naturally in different parts these separate regions vary in size. the mangrove-swamp may be only a fringe at the mouth of the river, or it may cover hundreds of square miles. the clay cliffs may extend for only a mile or so along the bank, or they may, as on the ogowe, extend for . and so it is also with the rapids: in some rivers, for instance the cameroons, there are only a few miles of them, in others there are many miles; in the ogowe there are as many as ; and these rapids may be close to the river mouth, as in most of the gold coast rivers, save the ancobra and the volta; or they may be far in the interior, as in the cross river, where they commence at about miles; and on the ogowe, where they commence at about miles from the sea coast; this depends on the nearness or remoteness from the coast line of the mountain ranges which run down the west side of the continent; ranges (apparently of very different geological formations), which have no end of different names, but about which little is known in detail. { } and now we will leave generalisations on west african rivers and go into particulars regarding one little known in england, and called by its owners, the french, the greatest strictly equatorial river in the world--the ogowe. chapter iv. the ogowe. wherein the voyager gives extracts from the log of the move and of the eclaireur, and an account of the voyager's first meeting with "those fearful fans," also an awful warning to all young persons who neglect the study of the french language. on the th of may i reached gaboon, now called libreville--the capital of congo francais, and, thanks to the kindness of mr. hudson, i was allowed a passage on a small steamer then running from gaboon to the ogowe river, and up it when necessary as far as navigation by steamer is possible--this steamer is, i deeply regret to say, now no more. as experiences of this kind contain such miscellaneous masses of facts, i am forced to commit the literary crime of giving you my ogowe set of experiences in the form of diary. june th, .--off on move at . . passengers, mr. hudson, mr. woods, mr. huyghens, pere steinitz, and i. there are black deck- passengers galore; i do not know their honourable names, but they are evidently very much married men, for there is quite a gorgeously coloured little crowd of ladies to see them off. they salute me as i pass down the pier, and start inquiries. i say hastily to them: "farewell, i'm off up river," for i notice mr. fildes bearing down on me, and i don't want him to drop in on the subject of society interest. i expect it is settled now, or pretty nearly. there is a considerable amount of mild uproar among the black contingent, and the move firmly clears off before half the good advice and good wishes for the black husbands are aboard. she is a fine little vessel; far finer than i expected. the accommodation i am getting is excellent. a long, narrow cabin, with one bunk in it and pretty nearly everything one can wish for, and a copying press thrown in. food is excellent, society charming, captain and engineer quite acquisitions. the saloon is square and roomy for the size of the vessel, and most things, from rowlocks to teapots, are kept under the seats in good nautical style. we call at the guard-ship to pass our papers, and then steam ahead out of the gaboon estuary to the south, round pongara point, keeping close into the land. about forty feet from shore there is a good free channel for vessels with a light draught which if you do not take, you have to make a big sweep seaward to avoid a reef. between four and five miles below pongara, we pass point gombi, which is fitted with a lighthouse, a lively and conspicuous structure by day as well as night. it is perched on a knoll, close to the extremity of the long arm of low, sandy ground, and is painted black and white, in horizontal bands, which, in conjunction with its general figure, give it a pagoda-like appearance. alongside it are a white-painted, red-roofed house for the lighthouse keeper, and a store for its oil. the light is either a flashing or a revolving or a stationary one, when it is alight. one must be accurate about these things, and my knowledge regarding it is from information received, and amounts to the above. i cannot throw in any personal experience, because i have never passed it at night-time, and seen from glass it seems just steady. most lighthouses on this coast give up fancy tricks, like flashing or revolving, pretty soon after they are established. seventy-five per cent. of them are not alight half the time at all. "it's the climate." gombi, however, you may depend on for being alight at night, and i have no hesitation in saying you can see it, when it is visible, seventeen miles out to sea, and that the knoll on which the lighthouse stands is a grass-covered sand cliff, about forty or fifty feet above sea-level. as we pass round gombi point, the weather becomes distinctly rough, particularly at lunch-time. the move minds it less than her passengers, and stamps steadily along past the wooded shore, behind which shows a distant range of blue hills. silence falls upon the black passengers, who assume recumbent positions on the deck, and suffer. all the things from under the saloon seats come out and dance together, and play puss- in-the-corner, after the fashion of loose gear when there is any sea on. as the night comes down, the scene becomes more and more picturesque. the moonlit sea, shimmering and breaking on the darkened shore, the black forest and the hills silhouetted against the star-powdered purple sky, and, at my feet, the engine-room stoke-hole, lit with the rose-coloured glow from its furnace, showing by the great wood fire the two nearly naked krumen stokers, shining like polished bronze in their perspiration, as they throw in on to the fire the billets of red wood that look like freshly-cut chunks of flesh. the white engineer hovers round the mouth of the pit, shouting down directions and ever and anon plunging down the little iron ladder to carry them out himself. at intervals he stands on the rail with his head craned round the edge of the sun deck to listen to the captain, who is up on the little deck above, for there is no telegraph to the engines, and our gallant commander's voice is not strong. while the white engineer is roosting on the rail, the black engineer comes partially up the ladder and gazes hard at me; so i give him a wad of tobacco, and he plainly regards me as inspired, for of course that was what he wanted. remember that whenever you see a man, black or white, filled with a nameless longing, it is tobacco he requires. grim despair accompanied by a gusty temper indicates something wrong with his pipe, in which case offer him a straightened-out hairpin. the black engineer having got his tobacco, goes below to the stoke-hole again and smokes a short clay as black and as strong as himself. the captain affects an immense churchwarden. how he gets through life, waving it about as he does, without smashing it every two minutes, i cannot make out. at last we anchor for the night just inside nazareth bay, for nazareth bay wants daylight to deal with, being rich in low islands and sand shoals. we crossed the equator this afternoon. june th.--off at daybreak into nazareth bay. anxiety displayed by navigators, sounding taken on both sides of the bows with long bamboo poles painted in stripes, and we go "slow ahead" and "hard astern" successfully, until we get round a good-sized island, and there we stick until four o'clock, high water, when we come off all right, and steam triumphantly but cautiously into the ogowe. the shores of nazareth bay are fringed with mangroves, but once in the river the scenery soon changes, and the waters are walled on either side with a forest rich in bamboo, oil and wine-palms. these forest cliffs seem to rise right up out of the mirror-like brown water. many of the highest trees are covered with clusters of brown-pink young shoots that look like flowers, and others are decorated by my old enemy the climbing palm, now bearing clusters of bright crimson berries. climbing plants of other kinds are wreathing everything, some blossoming with mauve, some with yellow, some with white flowers, and every now and then a soft sweet heavy breath of fragrance comes out to us as we pass by. there is a native village on the north bank, embowered along its plantations with some very tall cocoa-palms rising high above them. the river winds so that it seems to close in behind us, opening out in front fresh vistas of superb forest beauty, with the great brown river stretching away unbroken ahead like a broad road of burnished bronze. astern, it has a streak of frosted silver let into it by the move's screw. just about six o'clock, we run up to the fallaba, the move's predecessor in working the ogowe, now a hulk, used as a depot by hatton and cookson. she is anchored at the entrance of a creek that runs through to the fernan vaz; some say it is six hours' run, others that it is eight hours for a canoe; all agree that there are plenty of mosquitoes. the fallaba looks grimly picturesque, and about the last spot in which a person of a nervous disposition would care to spend the night. one half of her deck is dedicated to fuel logs, on the other half are plank stores for the goods, and a room for the black sub- trader in charge of them. i know that there must be scorpions which come out of those logs and stroll into the living room, and goodness only knows what one might not fancy would come up the creek or rise out of the floating grass, or the limitless-looking forest. i am told she was a fine steamer in her day, but those who had charge of her did not make allowances for the very rapid rotting action of the ogowe water, so her hull rusted through before her engines were a quarter worn out; and there was nothing to be done with her then, but put a lot of concrete in, and make her a depot, in which state of life she is very useful, for during the height of the dry season, the move cannot get through the creek to supply the firm's fernan vaz factories. subsequently i heard much of the fallaba, which seems to have been a celebrated, or rather notorious, vessel. every one declared her engines to have been of immense power, but this i believe to have been a mere local superstition; because in the same breath, the man who referred to them, as if it would have been quite unnecessary for new engines to have been made for h.m.s. victorious if those fallaba engines could have been sent to chatham dockyard, would mention that "you could not get any pace up on her"; and all who knew her sadly owned "she wouldn't steer," so naturally she spent the greater part of her time on the ogowe on a sand-bank, or in the bush. all west african steamers have a mania for bush, and the delusion that they are required to climb trees. the fallaba had the complaint severely, because of her defective steering powers, and the temptation the magnificent forest, and the rapid currents, and the sharp turns of the creek district, offered her; she failed, of course--they all fail--but it is not for want of practice. i have seen many west coast vessels up trees, but never more than fifteen feet or so. the trade of this lower part of the ogowe, from the mouth to lembarene, a matter of miles, is almost nil. above lembarene, you are in touch with the rubber and ivory trade. this fallaba creek is noted for mosquitoes, and the black passengers made great and showy preparations in the evening time to receive their onslaught, by tying up their strong chintz mosquito bars to the stanchions and the cook-house. their arrangements being constantly interrupted by the white engineer making alarums and excursions amongst them; because when too many of them get on one side the move takes a list and burns her boilers. conversation and atmosphere are full of mosquitoes. the decision of widely experienced sufferers amongst us is, that next to the lower ogowe, new orleans is the worst place for them in this world. the day closed with a magnificent dramatic beauty. dead ahead of us, up through a bank of dun-coloured mist rose the moon, a great orb of crimson, spreading down the oil-like, still river, a streak of blood-red reflection. right astern, the sun sank down into the mist, a vaster orb of crimson, and when he had gone out of view, sent up flushes of amethyst, gold, carmine and serpent-green, before he left the moon in undisputed possession of the black purple sky. forest and river were absolutely silent, but there was a pleasant chatter and laughter from the black crew and passengers away forward, that made the move seem an island of life in a land of death. i retired into my cabin, so as to get under the mosquito curtains to write; and one by one i heard my companions come into the saloon adjacent, and say to the watchman: "you sabe six o'clock? when them long arm catch them place, and them short arm catch them place, you call me in the morning time." exit from saloon--silence--then: "you sabe five o'clock? when them long arm catch them place, and them short arm catch them place, you call me in the morning time." exit--silence--then: "you sabe half-past five o'clock? when them long arm--" oh, if i were a watchman! anyhow, that five o'clocker will have the whole ship's company roused in the morning time. june th.--every one called in the morning time by the reflex row from the rousing of the five o'clocker. glorious morning. the scene the reversal of that of last night. the forest to the east shows a deep blue-purple, mounted on a background that changes as you watch it from daffodil and amethyst to rose-pink, as the sun comes up through the night mists. the moon sinks down among them, her pale face flushing crimson as she goes; and the yellow-gold sunshine comes, glorifying the forest and gilding the great sweep of tufted papyrus growing alongside the bank; and the mist vanishes, little white flecks of it lingering among the water reeds and lying in the dark shadows of the forest stems. the air is full of the long, soft, rich notes of the plantain warblers, and the uproar consequent upon the move taking on fuel wood, which comes alongside in canoe loads from the fallaba. pere steinitz and mr. woods are busy preparing their respective canoes for their run to fernan vaz through the creek. their canoes are very fine ones, with a remarkably clean run aft. the pere's is quite the travelling canoe, with a little stage of bamboo aft, covered with a hood of palm thatch, under which you can make yourself quite comfortable, and keep yourself and your possessions dry, unless something desperate comes on in the way of rain. by . we have got all our wood aboard, and run off up river full speed. the river seems broader above the fallaba, but this is mainly on account of its being temporarily unencumbered with islands. a good deal of the bank we have passed by since leaving nazareth bay on the south side has been island shore, with a channel between the islands and the true south bank. the day soon grew dull, and looked threatening, after the delusive manner of the dry season. the climbing plants are finer here than i have ever before seen them. they form great veils and curtains between and over the trees, often hanging so straight and flat, in stretches of twenty to forty feet or so wide, and thirty to sixty or seventy feet high, that it seems incredible that no human hand has trained or clipped them into their perfect forms. sometimes these curtains are decorated with large bell-shaped, bright-coloured flowers, sometimes with delicate sprays of white blossoms. this forest is beyond all my expectations of tropical luxuriance and beauty, and it is a thing of another world to the forest of the upper calabar, which, beautiful as it is, is a sad dowdy to this. there you certainly get a great sense of grimness and vastness; here you have an equal grimness and vastness with the addition of superb colour. this forest is a cleopatra to which calabar is but a quaker. not only does this forest depend on flowers for its illumination, for there are many kinds of trees having their young shoots, crimson, brown-pink, and creamy yellow: added to this there is also the relieving aspect of the prevailing fashion among west african trees, of wearing the trunk white with here and there upon it splashes of pale pink lichen, and vermilion-red fungus, which alone is sufficient to prevent the great mass of vegetation from being a monotony in green. all day long we steam past ever-varying scenes of loveliness whose component parts are ever the same, yet the effect ever different. doubtless it is wrong to call it a symphony, yet i know no other word to describe the scenery of the ogowe. it is as full of life and beauty and passion as any symphony beethoven ever wrote: the parts changing, interweaving, and returning. there are leit motifs here in it, too. see the papyrus ahead; and you know when you get abreast of it you will find the great forest sweeping away in a bay- like curve behind it against the dull gray sky, the splendid columns of its cotton and red woods looking like a facade of some limitless inchoate temple. then again there is that stretch of sword-grass, looking as if it grew firmly on to the bottom, so steady does it stand; but as the move goes by, her wash sets it undulating in waves across its broad acres of extent, showing it is only riding at anchor; and you know after a grass patch you will soon see a red dwarf clay cliff, with a village perched on its top, and the inhabitants thereof in their blue and red cloths standing by to shout and wave to the move, or legging it like lamp-lighters from the back streets and the plantation to the river frontage, to be in time to do so, and through all these changing phases there is always the strain of the vast wild forest, and the swift, deep, silent river. at almost every village that we pass--and they are frequent after the fallaba--there is an ostentatious display of firewood deposited either on the bank, or on piles driven into the mud in front of it, mutely saying in their uncivilised way, "try our noted chunks: best value for money"--(that is to say, tobacco, etc.), to the move or any other little steamer that may happen to come along hungry for fuel. we stayed a few minutes this afternoon at ashchyouka, where there came off to us in a canoe an enterprising young frenchman who has planted and tended a coffee plantation in this out-of-the-way region, and which is now, i am glad to hear, just coming into bearing. after leaving ashchyouka, high land showed to the n.e., and at . , without evident cause to the uninitiated, the move took to whistling like a liner. a few minutes later a factory shows up on the hilly north bank, which is woermann's; then just beyond and behind it we see the government post; then hatton and cookson's factory, all in a line. opposite hatton and cookson's there was a pretty little stern-wheel steamer nestling against the steep clay bank of lembarene island when we come in sight, but she instantly swept out from it in a perfect curve, which lay behind her marked in frosted silver on the water as she dropt down river. i hear now she was the eclaireur, the stern-wheeler which runs up and down the ogowe in connection with the chargeurs reunis company, subsidised by the government, and when the move whistled, she was just completing taking on , billets of wood for fuel. she comes up from the cape (lopez) stoking half wood and half coal as far as njole and back to lembarene; from lembarene to the sea downwards she does on wood. in a few minutes we have taken her berth close to the bank, and tied up to a tree. the white engineer yells to the black engineer "tom-tom: haul out some of them fire and open them drains one time," and the stokers, with hooks, pull out the glowing logs on to the iron deck in front of the furnace door, and throw water over them, and the move sends a cloud of oil-laden steam against the bank, coming perilously near scalding some of her black admirers assembled there. i dare say she felt vicious because they had been admiring the eclaireur. after a few minutes, i am escorted on to the broad verandah of hatton and cookson's factory, and i sit down under a lamp, prepared to contemplate, until dinner time, the wild beauty of the scene. this idea does not get carried out; in the twinkling of an eye i am stung all round the neck, and recognise there are lots too many mosquitoes and sandflies in the scenery to permit of contemplation of any kind. never have i seen sandflies and mosquitoes in such appalling quantities. with a wild ping of joy the latter made for me, and i retired promptly into a dark corner of the verandah, swearing horribly, but internally, and fought them. mr. hudson, agent-general, and mr. cockshut, agent for the ogowe, walk up and down the beach in front, doubtless talking cargo, apparently unconscious of mosquitoes; but by and by, while we are having dinner, they get their share. i behave exquisitely, and am quite lost in admiration of my own conduct, and busily deciding in my own mind whether i shall wear one of those plain ring haloes, or a solid plate one, a la cimabue, when mr. hudson says in a voice full of reproach to mr. cockshut, "you have got mosquitoes here, mr. cockshut." poor mr. cockshut doesn't deny it; he has got four on his forehead and his hands are sprinkled with them, but he says: "there are none at njole," which we all feel is an absurdly lame excuse, for njole is some ninety miles above lembarene, where we now are. mr. hudson says this to him, tersely, and feeling he has utterly crushed mr. cockshut, turns on me, and utterly failing to recognise me as a suffering saint, says point blank and savagely, "you don't seem to feel these things, miss kingsley." not feel them, indeed! why, i could cry over them. well! that's all the thanks one gets for trying not to be a nuisance in this world. after dinner i go back on to the move for the night, for it is too late to go round to kangwe and ask mme. jacot, of the mission evangelique, if she will take me in. the air is stiff with mosquitoes, and saying a few suitable words to them, i dash under the mosquito bar and sleep, lulled by their shrill yells of baffled rage. june th.--in the morning, up at five. great activity on beach. move synchronously taking on wood fuel and discharging cargo. a very active young french pastor from the kangwe mission station is round after the mission's cargo. mr. hudson kindly makes inquiries as to whether i may go round to kangwe and stay with mme. jacot. he says: "oh, yes," but as i find he is not m. jacot, i do not feel justified in accepting this statement without its having personal confirmation from mme. jacot, and so, leaving my luggage with the move, i get them to allow me to go round with him and his cargo to kangwe, about three-quarters of an hour's paddle round the upper part of lembarene island, and down the broad channel on the other side of it. kangwe is beautifully situated on a hill, as its name denotes, on the mainland and north bank of the river. mme. jacot most kindly says i may come, though i know i shall be a fearful nuisance, for there is no room for me save m. jacot's beautifully neat, clean, tidy study. i go back in the canoe and fetch my luggage from the move; and say good-bye to mr. hudson, who gave me an immense amount of valuable advice about things, which was subsequently of great use to me, and a lot of equally good warnings which, if i had attended to, would have enabled me to avoid many, if not all, my misadventures in congo francais. i camped out that night in m. jacot's study, wondering how he would like it when he came home and found me there; for he was now away on one of his usual evangelising tours. providentially mme. jacot let me have the room that the girls belonging to the mission school usually slept in, to my great relief, before m. jacot came home. i will not weary you with my diary during my first stay at kangwe. it is a catalogue of the collection of fish, etc., that i made, and a record of the continuous, never-failing kindness and help that i received from m. and mme. jacot, and of my attempts to learn from them the peculiarities of the region, the natives, and their language and customs, which they both know so well and manage so admirably. i daily saw there what it is possible to do, even in the wildest and most remote regions of west africa, and recognised that there is still one heroic form of human being whose praise has never adequately been sung, namely, the missionary's wife. wishing to get higher up the ogowe, i took the opportunity of the river boat of the chargeurs reunis going up to the njole on one of her trips, and joined her. june nd.--eclaireur, charming little stern wheel steamer, exquisitely kept. she has an upper and a lower deck. the lower deck for business, the upper deck for white passengers only. on the upper deck there is a fine long deck-house, running almost her whole length. in this are the officers' cabins, the saloon and the passengers' cabins (two), both large and beautifully fitted up. captain verdier exceedingly pleasant and constantly saying "n'est-ce pas?" a quiet and singularly clean engineer completes the white staff. the passengers consist of mr. cockshut, going up river to see after the sub-factories; a french official bound for franceville, which it will take him thirty-six days, go as quick as he can, in a canoe after njole; a tremendously lively person who has had black water fever four times, while away in the bush with nothing to live on but manioc, a diet it would be far easier to die on under the circumstances. he is excellent company; though i do not know a word he says, he is perpetually giving lively and dramatic descriptions of things which i cannot but recognise. m. s---, with his pince- nez, the doctor, and, above all, the rapids of the ogowe, rolling his hands round and round each other and clashing them forward with a descriptive ejaculation of "whish, flash, bum, bum, bump," and then comes what evidently represents a terrific fight for life against terrific odds. wish to goodness i knew french, for wishing to see these rapids, i cannot help feeling anxious and worried at not fully understanding this dramatic entertainment regarding them. there is another passenger, said to be the engineer's brother, a quiet, gentlemanly man. captain argues violently with every one; with mr. cockshut on the subject of the wicked waste of money in keeping the move and not shipping all goods by the eclaireur, "n'est-ce pas?" and with the french official on goodness knows what, but i fancy it will be pistols for two and coffee for one in the morning time. when the captain feels himself being worsted in argument, he shouts for support to the engineer and his brother. "n'est-ce pas?" he says, turning furiously to them. "oui, oui, certainement," they say dutifully and calmly, and then he, refreshed by their support, dashes back to his controversial fray. he even tries to get up a row with me on the subject of the english merchants at calabar, whom he asserts have sworn a kind of blood oath to ship by none but british and african company's steamers. i cannot stand this, for i know my esteemed and honoured friends the calabar traders would ship by the flying dutchman or the devil himself if either of them would take the stuff at shillings the ton. we have, however, to leave off this row for want of language, to our mutual regret, for it would have been a love of a fight. soon after leaving lembarene island, we pass the mouth of the chief southern affluent of the ogowe, the ngunie; it flows in unostentatiously from the e.s.e., a broad, quiet river here with low banks and two islands (walker's islands) showing just off its entrance. higher up, it flows through a mountainous country, and at samba, its furthest navigable point, there is a wonderfully beautiful waterfall, the whole river coming down over a low cliff, surrounded by an amphitheatre of mountains. it takes the eclaireur two days steaming from the mouth of the ngunie to samba, when she can get up; but now, in the height of the long dry season neither she nor the move can go because of the sandbanks; so samba is cut off until next october. hatton and cookson have factories up at samba, for it is an outlet for the trade of achango land in rubber and ivory, a trade worked by the akele tribe, a powerful, savage and difficult lot to deal with, and just in the same condition, as far as i can learn, as they were when du chaillu made his wonderful journeys among them. while i was at lembarene, waiting for the eclaireur, a notorious chief descended on a ngunie sub-factory, and looted it. the wife of the black trading agent made a gallant resistance, her husband was away on a trading expedition, but the chief had her seized and beaten, and thrown into the river. an appeal was made to the doctor then administrator of the ogowe, a powerful and helpful official, and he soon came up with the little canoniere, taking mr. cockshut with him and fully vindicated the honour of the french flag, under which all factories here are. the banks of the ogowe just above lembarene island are low; with the forest only broken by village clearings and seeming to press in on those, ready to absorb them should the inhabitants cease their war against it. the blue ntyankala mountains of achango land show away to the e.s.e. in a range. behind us, gradually sinking in the distance, is the high land on lembarene island. soon we run up alongside a big street of a village with four high houses rising a story above the rest, which are strictly ground floor; it has also five or six little low open thatched huts along the street in front. { } these may be fetish huts, or, as the captain of the sparrow would say, "again they mayn't." for i have seen similar huts in the villages round libreville, which were store places for roof mats, of which the natives carefully keep a store dry and ready for emergencies in the way of tornadoes, or to sell. we stop abreast of this village. inhabitants in scores rush out and form an excited row along the vertical bank edge, several of the more excited individuals falling over it into the water. yells from our passengers on the lower deck. yells from inhabitants on shore. yells of vite, vite from the captain. dogs bark, horns bray, some exhilarated individual thumps the village drum, canoes fly out from the bank towards us. fearful scrimmage heard going on all the time on the deck below. as soon as the canoes are alongside, our passengers from the lower deck, with their bundles and their dogs, pour over the side into them. canoes rock wildly and wobble off rapidly towards the bank, frightening the passengers because they have got their best clothes on, and fear that the eclaireur will start and upset them altogether with her wash. on reaching the bank, the new arrivals disappear into brown clouds of wives and relations, and the dogs into fighting clusters of resident dogs. happy, happy day! for those men who have gone ashore have been away on hire to the government and factories for a year, and are safe home in the bosoms of their families again, and not only they themselves, but all the goods they have got in pay. the remaining passengers below still yell to their departed friends; i know not what they say, but i expect it's the fan equivalent for "mind you write. take care of yourself. yes, i'll come and see you soon," etc., etc. while all this is going on, the eclaireur quietly slides down river, with the current, broadside on as if she smelt her stable at lembarene. this i find is her constant habit whenever the captain, the engineer, and the man at the wheel are all busy in a row along the rail, shouting overside, which occurs whenever we have passengers to land. her iniquity being detected when the last canoe load has left for the shore, she is spun round and sent up river again at full speed. we go on up stream; now and again stopping at little villages to land passengers or at little sub-factories to discharge cargo, until evening closes in, when we anchor and tie up at o'saomokita, where there is a sub-factory of messrs. woermann's, in charge of which is a white man, the only white man between lembarene and njole. he comes on board and looks only a boy, but is really aged twenty. he is a frenchman, and was at hatton and cookson's first, then he joined woermann's, who have put him in charge of this place. the isolation for a white man must be terrible; sometimes two months will go by without his seeing another white face but that in his looking-glass, and when he does see another, it is only by a fleeting visit such as we now pay him, and to make the most of this, he stays on board to dinner. june rd.--start off steaming up river early in the morning time. land ahead showing mountainous. rather suddenly the banks grow higher. here and there in the forest are patches which look like regular hand-made plantations, which they are not, but only patches of egombie-gombie trees, showing that at this place was once a native town. whenever land is cleared along here, this tree springs up all over the ground. it grows very rapidly, and has great leaves something like a sycamore leaf, only much larger. these leaves growing in a cluster at the top of the straight stem give an umbrella-like appearance to the affair; so the natives call them and an umbrella by the same name, but whether they think the umbrella is like the tree or the tree is like the umbrella, i can't make out. i am always getting myself mixed over this kind of thing in my attempts "to contemplate phenomena from a scientific standpoint," as cambridge ordered me to do. i'll give the habit up. "you can't do that sort of thing out here--it's the climate," and i will content myself with stating the fact, that when a native comes into a store and wants an umbrella, he asks for an egombie-gombie. the uniformity of the height of the individual trees in one of these patches is striking, and it arises from their all starting fair. i cannot make out other things about them to my satisfaction, for you very rarely see one of them in the wild bush, and then it does not bear a fruit that the natives collect and use, and then chuck away the stones round their domicile. anyhow, there they are all one height, and all one colour, and apparently allowing no other vegetation to make any headway among them. but i found when i carefully investigated egombie-gombie patches that there were a few of the great, slower-growing forest trees coming up amongst them, and in time when these attain a sufficient height, their shade kills off the egombie-gombie, and the patch goes back into the great forest from which it came. the frequency of these patches arises from the nomadic habits of the chief tribe in these regions, the fans. they rarely occupy one site for a village for any considerable time on account--firstly, of their wasteful method of collecting rubber by cutting down the vine, which soon stamps it out of a district; and, secondly, from their quarrelsome ways. so when a village of fans has cleared all the rubber out of its district, or has made the said district too hot to hold it by rows with other villages, or has got itself very properly shelled out and burnt for some attack on traders or the french flag in any form, its inhabitants clear off into another district, and build another village; for bark and palm thatch are cheap, and house removing just nothing; when you are an unsophisticated cannibal fan you don't require a pantechnicon van to stow away your one or two mushroom- shaped stools, knives, and cooking-pots, and a calabash or so. if you are rich, maybe you will have a box with clothes in as well, but as a general rule all your clothes are on your back. so your wives just pick up the stools and the knives and the cooking-pots, and the box, and the children toddle off with the calabashes. you have, of course, the gun to carry, for sleeping or waking a fan never parts with his gun, and so there you are "finish," as m. pichault would say, and before your new bark house is up, there grows the egombie- gombie, where your house once stood. now and again, for lack of immediate neighbouring villages to quarrel with, one end of a village will quarrel with the other end. the weaker end then goes off and builds itself another village, keeping an eye lifting for any member of the stronger end who may come conveniently into its neighbourhood to be killed and eaten. meanwhile, the egombie-gombie grows over the houses of the empty end, pretending it's a plantation belonging to the remaining half. i once heard a new-comer hold forth eloquently as to how those fans were maligned. "they say," said he, with a fine wave of his arm towards such a patch, "that these people do not till the soil--that they are not industrious-- that the few plantations they do make are ill-kept--that they are only a set of wandering hunters and cannibals. look there at those magnificent plantations!" i did look, but i did not alter my opinion of the fans, for i know my old friend egombie-gombie when i see him. this morning the french official seems sad and melancholy. i fancy he has got a monday head (kipling), but he revives as the day goes on. as we go on, the banks become hills and the broad river, which has been showing sheets of sandbanks in all directions, now narrows and shows only neat little beaches of white sand in shallow places along the bank. the current is terrific. the eclaireur breathes hard, and has all she can do to fight her way up against it. masses of black weathered rock in great boulders show along the exposed parts of both banks, left dry by the falling waters. each bank is steep, and quantities of great trees, naked and bare, are hanging down from them, held by their roots and bush-rope entanglement from being swept away with the rushing current, and they make a great white fringe to the banks. the hills become higher and higher, and more and more abrupt, and the river runs between them in a gloomy ravine, winding to and fro; we catch sight of a patch of white sand ahead, which i mistake for a white painted house, but immediately after doubling round a bend we see the houses of the talagouga mission station. the eclaireur forthwith has an hysteric fit on her whistle, so as to frighten m. forget and get him to dash off in his canoe to her at once. apparently he knows her, and does not hurry, but comes on board quietly. i find there will be no place for me to stay at at njole, so i decide to go on in the eclaireur and use her as an hotel while there, and then return and stay with mme. forget if she will have me. i consult m. forget on this point. he says, "oh, yes," but seems to have lost something of great value recently, and not to be quite clear where. only manner, i suppose. when m. forget has got his mails he goes, and the eclaireur goes on; indeed, she has never really stopped, for the water is too deep to anchor in here, and the terrific current would promptly whisk the steamer down out of talagouga gorge were she to leave off fighting it. we run on up past talagouga island, where the river broadens out again a little, but not much, and reach njole by nightfall, and tie up to a tree by dumas' factory beach. usual uproar, but as mr. cockshut says, no mosquitoes. the mosquito belt ends abruptly at o'soamokita. next morning i go ashore and start on a walk. lovely road, bright yellow clay, as hard as paving stone. on each side it is most neatly hedged with pine-apples; behind these, carefully tended, acres of coffee bushes planted in long rows. certainly coffee is one of the most lovely of crops. its grandly shaped leaves are like those of our medlar tree, only darker and richer green, the berries set close to the stem, those that are ripe, a rich crimson; these trees, i think, are about three years old, and just coming into bearing; for they are covered with full-sized berries, and there has been a flush of bloom on them this morning, and the delicious fragrance of their stephanotis-shaped and scented flowers lingers in the air. the country spreads before me a lovely valley encompassed by purple-blue mountains. mount talagouga looks splendid in a soft, infinitely deep blue, although it is quite close, just the other side of the river. the road goes on into the valley, as pleasantly as ever and more so. how pleasant it would be now, if our government along the coast had the enterprise and public spirit of the french, and made such roads just on the remote chance of stray travellers dropping in on a steamer once in ten years or so and wanting a walk. observe extremely neatly igalwa built huts, people sitting on the bright clean ground outside them, making mats and baskets. "mboloani," say i. "ai! mbolo," say they, and knock off work to stare. observe large wired-in enclosures on left-hand side of road--investigate--find they are tenanted by animals--goats, sheep, chickens, etc. clearly this is a jardin d'acclimatation. no wonder the colony does not pay, if it goes in for this sort of thing, miles inland, with simply no public to pay gate-money. while contemplating these things, hear awful hiss. serpents! no, geese. awful fight. grand things, good, old-fashioned, long skirts are for africa! get through geese and advance in good order, but somewhat rapidly down road, turn sharply round corner of native houses. turkey cock--terrific turn up. flight on my part forwards down road, which is still going strong, now in a northerly direction, apparently indefinitely. hope to goodness there will be a turning that i can go down and get back by, without returning through this ferocious farmyard. intent on picking up such an outlet, i go thirty yards or so down the road. hear shouts coming from a clump of bananas on my left. know they are directed at me, but it does not do to attend to shouts always. expect it is only some native with an awful knowledge of english, anxious to get up my family history--therefore accelerate pace. more shouts, and louder, of "madame gacon! madame gacon!" and out of the banana clump comes a big, plump, pleasant-looking gentleman, clad in a singlet and a divided skirt. white people must be attended to, so advance carefully towards him through a plantation of young coffee, apologising humbly for intruding on his domain. he smiles and bows beautifully, but--horror!--he knows no english, i no french. situation tres inexplicable et tres interessante, as i subsequently heard him remark; and the worst of it is he is evidently bursting to know who i am, and what i am doing in the middle of his coffee plantation, for his it clearly is, as appears from his obsequious bodyguard of blacks, highly interested in me also. we gaze at each other, and smile some more, but stiffly, and he stands bareheaded in the sun in an awful way. it's murder i'm committing, hard all! he, as is fitting for his superior sex, displays intelligence first and says, "interpreter," waving his hand to the south. i say "yes," in my best fan, an enthusiastic, intelligent grunt which any one must understand. he leads the way back towards those geese--perhaps, by the by, that is why he wears those divided skirts--and we enter a beautifully neatly built bamboo house, and sit down opposite to each other at a table and wait for the interpreter who is being fetched. the house is low on the ground and of native construction, but most beautifully kept, and arranged with an air of artistic feeling quite as unexpected as the rest of my surroundings. i notice upon the walls sets of pictures of terrific incidents in algerian campaigns, and a copy of that superb head of m. de brazza in arab headgear. soon the black minions who have been sent to find one of the plantation hands who is supposed to know french and english, return with the "interpreter." that young man is a fraud. he does not know english--not even coast english--and all he has got under his precious wool is an abysmal ignorance darkened by terror; and so, after one or two futile attempts and some frantic scratching at both those regions which an african seems to regard as the seats of intellectual inspiration, he bolts out of the door. situation terrible! my host and i smile wildly at each other, and both wonder in our respective languages what, in the words of mr. squeers as mentioned in the classics--we "shall do in this 'ere most awful go." we are both going mad with the strain of the situation, when in walks the engineer's brother from the eclaireur. he seems intensely surprised to find me sitting in his friend the planter's parlour after my grim and retiring conduct on the eclaireur on my voyage up. but the planter tells him all, sousing him in torrents of words, full of the violence of an outbreak of pent-up emotion. i do not understand what he says, but i catch "tres inexplicable" and things like that. the calm brother of the engineer sits down at the table, and i am sure tells the planter something like this: "calm yourself, my friend, we picked up this curiosity at lembarene. it seems quite harmless." and then the planter calmed, and mopped a perspiring brow, and so did i, and we smiled more freely, feeling the mental atmosphere had become less tense and cooler. we both simply beamed on our deliverer, and the planter gave him lots of things to drink. i had nothing about me except a head of tobacco in my pocket, which i did not feel was a suitable offering. now the engineer's brother, although he would not own to it, knew english, so i told him how the beauty of the road had lured me on, and how i was interested in coffee-planting, and how much i admired the magnificence of this plantation, and all the enterprise and energy it represented. "oui, oui, certainement," said he, and translated. my friend the planter seemed charmed; it was the first sign of anything approaching reason he had seen in me. he wanted me to have eau sucree more kindly than ever, and when i rose, intending to bow myself off and go, geese or no geese, back to the eclaireur, he would not let me go. i must see the plantation, toute la plantation. so presently all three of us go out and thoroughly do the plantation, the most well-ordered, well-cultivated plantation i have ever seen, and a very noble monument to the knowledge and industry of the planter. for two hot hours these two perfect gentlemen showed me over it. i also behaved well, for petticoats, great as they are, do not prevent insects and catawumpuses of sorts walking up one's ankles and feeding on one as one stands on the long grass which has been most wisely cut and laid round the young trees for mulching. this plantation is of great extent on the hill-sides and in the valley bottom, portions of it are just coming into bearing. the whole is kept as perfectly as a garden, amazing as the work of one white man with only a staff of unskilled native labourers--at present only eighty of them. the coffee planted is of three kinds, the elephant berry, the arabian, and the san thome. during our inspection, we only had one serious misunderstanding, which arose from my seeing for the first time in my life tree-ferns growing in the ogowe. there were three of them, evidently carefully taken care of, among some coffee plants. it was highly exciting, and i tried to find out about them. it seemed, even in this centre of enterprise, unlikely that they had been brought just "for dandy" from the australasian region, and i had never yet come across them in my wanderings save on fernando po. unfortunately, my friends thought i wanted them to keep, and shouted for men to bring things and dig them up; so i had a brisk little engagement with the men, driving them from their prey with the point of my umbrella, ejaculating kor kor, like an agitated crow. when at last they understood that my interest in the ferns was scientific, not piratical, they called the men off and explained that the ferns had been found among the bush, when it was being cleared for the plantation. ultimately, with many bows and most sincere thanks from me, we parted, providentially beyond the geese, and i returned down the road to njole, where i find mr. cockshut waiting outside his factory. he insists on taking me to the post to see the administrator, and from there he says i can go on to the eclaireur from the post beach, as she will be up there from dumas'. off we go up the road which skirts the river bank, a dwarf clay cliff, overgrown with vegetation, save where it is cleared for beaches. the road is short, but exceedingly pretty; on the other side from the river is a steep bank on which is growing a plantation of cacao. lying out in the centre of the river you see njole island, a low, sandy one, timbered not only with bush, but with orange and other fruit trees; for formerly the post and factories used to be situated on the island--now only their trees remain for various reasons, one being that in the wet season it is a good deal under water. everything is now situated on the mainland north bank, in a straggling but picturesque line; first comes woermann's factory, then hatton and cookson's, and john holt's, close together with a beach in common in a sweetly amicable style for factories, who as a rule firmly stockade themselves off from their next door neighbours. then dumas' beach, a little native village, the cacao patch and the post at the up river end of things european, an end of things european, i am told, for a matter of miles. immediately beyond the post is a little river falling into the ogowe, and on its further bank a small village belonging to a chief, who, hearing of the glories of the government, came down like the queen of sheba--in intention, i mean, not personal appearance--to see it, and so charmed has he been that here he stays to gaze on it. although mr. cockshut hunted the administrator of the ogowe out of his bath, that gentleman is exceedingly amiable and charming, all the more so to me for speaking good english. personally, he is big, handsome, exuberant, and energetic. he shows me round with a gracious enthusiasm, all manner of things--big gorilla teeth and heads, native spears and brass-nail-ornamented guns; and explains, while we are in his study, that the little model canoe full of kola nuts is the supply of kola to enable him to sit up all night and work. then he takes us outside to see the new hospital which he, in his capacity as administrator, during the absence of the professional administrator on leave in france, has granted to himself in his capacity as doctor; and he shows us the captive chief and headmen from samba busily quarrying a clay cliff behind it so as to enlarge the governmental plateau, and the ex-ministers of the ex- king of dahomey, who are deported to njole, and apparently comfortable and employed in various non-menial occupations. then we go down the little avenue of cacao trees in full bearing, and away to the left to where there is now an encampment of adoomas, who have come down as a convoy from franceville, and are going back with another under the command of our vivacious fellow passenger, who, i grieve to see, will have a rough time of it in the way of accommodation in those narrow, shallow canoes which are lying with their noses tied to the bank, and no other white man to talk to. what a blessing he will be conversationally to franceville when he gets in. the adooma encampment is very picturesque, for they have got their bright-coloured chintz mosquito-bars erected as tents. dr. pelessier then insists on banging down monkey bread-fruit with a stick, to show me their inside. of course they burst over his beautiful white clothes. i said they would, but men will be men. then we go and stand under the two lovely odeaka trees that make a triumphal-arch-like gateway to the post's beach from the river, and the doctor discourses in a most interesting way on all sorts of subjects. we go on waiting for the eclaireur, who, although it is past four o'clock, is still down at dumas' beach. i feel nearly frantic at detaining the doctor, but neither he nor mr. cockshut seem in the least hurry. but at last i can stand it no longer. the vision of the administrator of the ogowe, worn out, but chewing kola nut to keep himself awake all night while he finishes his papers to go down on the eclaireur to-morrow morning, is too painful; so i say i will walk back to dumas' and go on the eclaireur there, and try to liberate the administrator from his present engagements, so that he may go back and work. no good! he will come down to dumas' with mr. cockshut and me. off we go, and just exactly as we are getting on to dumas' beach, off starts the eclaireur with a shriek for the post beach. so i say good-bye to mr. cockshut, and go back to the post with dr. pelessier, and he sees me on board, and to my immense relief he stays on board a good hour and a half, talking to other people, so it is not on my head if he is up all night. june th.--eclaireur has to wait for the administrator until ten, because he has not done his mails. at ten he comes on board like an amiable tornado, for he himself is going to cape lopez. i am grieved to see them carrying on board, too, a french official very ill with fever. he is the engineer of the canoniere and they are taking him down to cape lopez, where they hope to get a ship to take him up to gaboon, and to the hospital on the minerve. i heard subsequently that the poor fellow died about forty hours after leaving njole at achyouka in kama country. we get away at last, and run rapidly down river, helped by the terrific current. the eclaireur has to call at talagouga for planks from m. gacon's sawmill. as soon as we are past the tail of talagouga island, the eclaireur ties her whistle string to a stanchion, and goes off into a series of screaming fits, as only she can. what she wants is to get m. forget or m. gacon, or better still both, out in their canoes with the wood waiting for her, because "she cannot anchor in the depth," "nor can she turn round," and "backing plays the mischief with any ship's engines," and "she can't hold her own against the current," and--then captain verdier says things i won't repeat, and throws his weight passionately on the whistle string, for we are in sight of the narrow gorge of talagouga, with the mission station apparently slumbering in the sun. this puts the eclaireur in an awful temper. she goes down towards it as near as she dare, and then frisks round again, and runs up river a little way and drops down again, in violent hysterics the whole time. soon m. gacon comes along among the trees on the bank, and laughs at her. a rope is thrown to him, and the panting eclaireur tied up to a tree close in to the bank, for the water is deep enough here to moor a liner in, only there are a good many rocks. in a few minutes m. forget and several canoe loads of beautiful red-brown mahogany planks are on board, and things being finished, i say good-bye to the captain, and go off with m. forget in a canoe, to the shore. chapter v. the rapids of the ogowe. the log of an adooma canoe during a voyage undertaken to the rapids of the river ogowe, with some account of the divers disasters that befell thereon. mme. forget received me most kindly, and, thanks to her ever thoughtful hospitality, i spent a very pleasant time at talagouga, wandering about the forest and collecting fishes from the native fishermen: and seeing the strange forms of some of these talagouga region fishes and the marked difference between them and those of lembarene, i set my heart on going up into the region of the ogowe rapids. for some time no one whom i could get hold of regarded it as a feasible scheme, but, at last, m. gacon thought it might be managed; i said i would give a reward of francs to any one who would lend me a canoe and a crew, and i would pay the working expenses, food, wages, etc. m. gacon had a good canoe and could spare me two english-speaking igalwas, one of whom had been part of the way with mm. allegret and teisseres, when they made their journey up to franceville and then across to brazzaville and down the congo two years ago. he also thought we could get six fans to complete the crew. i was delighted, packed my small portmanteau with a few things, got some trade goods, wound up my watch, ascertained the date of the day of the month, and borrowed three hair-pins from mme. forget, then down came disappointment. on my return from the bush that evening, mme. forget said m. gacon said "it was impossible," the fans round talagouga wouldn't go at any price above njole, because they were certain they would be killed and eaten by the up-river fans. internally consigning the entire tribe to regions where they will get a rise in temperature, even on this climate, i went with mme. forget to m. gacon, and we talked it over; finally, m. gacon thought he could let me have two more igalwas from hatton and cookson's beach across the river. sending across there we found this could be done, so i now felt i was in for it, and screwed my courage to the sticking point--no easy matter after all the information i had got into my mind regarding the rapids of the river ogowe. i establish myself on my portmanteau comfortably in the canoe, my back is against the trade box, and behind that is the usual mound of pillows, sleeping mats, and mosquito-bars of the igalwa crew; the whole surmounted by the french flag flying from an indifferent stick. m. and mme. forget provide me with everything i can possibly require, and say that the blood of half my crew is half alcohol; on the whole it is patent they don't expect to see me again, and i forgive them, because they don't seem cheerful over it; but still it is not reassuring--nothing is about this affair, and it's going to rain. it does, as we go up the river to njole, where there is another risk of the affair collapsing, by the french authorities declining to allow me to proceed. on we paddled, m'bo the head man standing in the bows of the canoe in front of me, to steer, then i, then the baggage, then the able-bodied seamen, including the cook also standing and paddling; and at the other extremity of the canoe- -it grieves me to speak of it in this unseamanlike way, but in these canoes both ends are alike, and chance alone ordains which is bow and which is stern--stands pierre, the first officer, also steering; the paddles used are all of the long-handled, leaf-shaped igalwa type. we get up just past talagouga island and then tie up against the bank of m. gazenget's plantation, and make a piratical raid on its bush for poles. a gang of his men come down to us, but only to chat. one of them, i notice, has had something happen severely to one side of his face. i ask m'bo what's the matter, and he answers, with a derisive laugh, "he be fool man, he go for tief plantain and done got shot." m'bo does not make it clear where the sin in this affair is exactly located; i expect it is in being "fool man." having got our supply of long stout poles we push off and paddle on again. before we reach njole i recognise my crew have got the grumbles, and at once inquire into the reason. m'bo sadly informs me that "they no got chop," having been provided only with plantain, and no meat or fish to eat with it. i promise to get them plenty at njole, and contentment settles on the crew, and they sing. after about three hours we reach njole, and i proceed to interview the authorities. dr. pelessier is away down river, and the two gentlemen in charge don't understand english; but pierre translates, and the letter which m. forget has kindly written for me explains things and so the palaver ends satisfactorily, after a long talk. first, the official says he does not like to take the responsibility of allowing me to endanger myself in those rapids. i explain i will not hold any one responsible but myself, and i urge that a lady has been up before, a mme. quinee. he says "yes, that is true, but madame had with her a husband and many men, whereas i am alone and have only eight igalwas and not adoomas, the proper crew for the rapids, and they are away up river now with the convoy." "true, oh king!" i answer, "but madame quinee went right up to lestourville, whereas i only want to go sufficiently high up the rapids to get typical fish. and these igalwas are great men at canoe work, and can go in a canoe anywhere that any mortal man can go"--this to cheer up my igalwa interpreter--"and as for the husband, neither the royal geographical society's list, in their 'hints to travellers,' nor messrs. silver, in their elaborate lists of articles necessary for a traveller in tropical climates, make mention of husbands." however, the official ultimately says yes, i may go, and parts with me as with one bent on self destruction. this affair being settled i start off, like an old hen with a brood of chickens to provide for, to get chop for my men, and go first to hatton and cookson's factory. i find its white agent is down river after stores, and john holt's agent says he has got no beef nor fish, and is precious short of provisions for himself; so i go back to dumas', where i find a most amiable french gentleman, who says he will let me have as much fish or beef as i want, and to this supply he adds some delightful bread biscuits. m'bo and the crew beam with satisfaction; mine is clouded by finding, when they have carried off the booty to the canoe, that the frenchman will not let me pay for it. therefore taking the opportunity of his back being turned for a few minutes, i buy and pay for, across the store counter, some trade things, knives, cloth, etc. then i say goodbye to the agent. "adieu, mademoiselle," says he in a for-ever tone of voice. indeed i am sure i have caught from these kind people a very pretty and becoming mournful manner, and there's not another white station for miles where i can show it off. away we go, still damp from the rain we have come through, but drying nicely with the day, and cheerful about the chop. the ogowe is broad at njole and its banks not mountainous, as at talagouga; but as we go on it soon narrows, the current runs more rapidly than ever, and we are soon again surrounded by the mountain range. great masses of black rock show among the trees on the hillsides, and under the fringe of fallen trees that hang from the steep banks. two hours after leaving njole we are facing our first rapid. great gray-black masses of smoothed rock rise up out of the whirling water in all directions. these rocks have a peculiar appearance which puzzle me at the time, but in subsequently getting used to it i accepted it quietly and admired. when the sun shines on them they have a soft light blue haze round them, like a halo. the effect produced by this, with the forested hillsides and the little beaches of glistening white sand was one of the most perfect things i have ever seen. we kept along close to the right-hand bank, dodging out of the way of the swiftest current as much as possible. ever and again we were unable to force our way round projecting parts of the bank, so we then got up just as far as we could to the point in question, yelling and shouting at the tops of our voices. m'bo said "jump for bank, sar," and i "up and jumped," followed by half the crew. such banks! sheets, and walls, and rubbish heaps of rock, mixed up with trees fallen and standing. one appalling corner i shall not forget, for i had to jump at a rock wall, and hang on to it in a manner more befitting an insect than an insect-hunter, and then scramble up it into a close-set forest, heavily burdened with boulders of all sizes. i wonder whether the rocks or the trees were there first? there is evidence both ways, for in one place you will see a rock on the top of a tree, the tree creeping out from underneath it, and in another place you will see a tree on the top of a rock, clasping it with a network of roots and getting its nourishment, goodness knows how, for these are by no means tender, digestible sandstones, but uncommon hard gneiss and quartz which has no idea of breaking up into friable small stuff, and which only takes on a high polish when it is vigorously sanded and canvassed by the ogowe. while i was engaged in climbing across these promontories, the crew would be busy shouting and hauling the canoe round the point by means of the strong chain provided for such emergencies fixed on to the bow. when this was done, in we got again and paddled away until we met our next affliction. m'bo had advised that we should spend our first night at the same village that m. allegret did: but when we reached it, a large village on the north bank, we seemed to have a lot of daylight still in hand, and thought it would be better to stay at one a little higher up, so as to make a shorter day's work for to-morrow, when we wanted to reach kondo kondo; so we went against the bank just to ask about the situation and character of the up-river villages. the row of low, bark huts was long, and extended its main frontage close to the edge of the river bank. the inhabitants had been watching us as we came, and when they saw we intended calling that afternoon, they charged down to the river-edge hopeful of excitement. they had a great deal to say, and so had we. after compliments, as they say, in excerpts of diplomatic communications, three of their men took charge of the conversation on their side, and m'bo did ours. to m'bo's questions they gave a dramatic entertainment as answer, after the manner of these brisk, excitable fans. one chief, however, soon settled down to definite details, prefacing his remarks with the silence-commanding "azuna! azuna!" and his companions grunted approbation of his observations. he took a piece of plantain leaf and tore it up into five different sized bits. these he laid along the edge of our canoe at different intervals of space, while he told m'bo things, mainly scandalous, about the characters of the villages these bits of leaf represented, save of course about bit a, which represented his own. the interval between the bits was proportional to the interval between the villages, and the size of the bits was proportional to the size of the village. village number four was the only one he should recommend our going to. when all was said, i gave our kindly informants some heads of tobacco and many thanks. then m'bo sang them a hymn, with the assistance of pierre, half a line behind him in a different key, but every bit as flat. the fans seemed impressed, but any crowd would be by the hymn-singing of my crew, unless they were inmates of deaf and dumb asylums. then we took our farewell, and thanked the village elaborately for its kind invitation to spend the night there on our way home, shoved off and paddled away in great style just to show those fans what igalwas could do. we hadn't gone yards before we met a current coming round the end of a rock reef that was too strong for us to hold our own in, let alone progress. on to the bank i was ordered and went; it was a low slip of rugged confused boulders and fragments of rocks, carelessly arranged, and evidently under water in the wet season. i scrambled along, the men yelled and shouted and hauled the canoe, and the inhabitants of the village, seeing we were becoming amusing again, came, legging it like lamp-lighters, after us, young and old, male and female, to say nothing of the dogs. some good souls helped the men haul, while i did my best to amuse the others by diving headlong from a large rock on to which i had elaborately climbed, into a thick clump of willow-leaved shrubs. they applauded my performance vociferously, and then assisted my efforts to extricate myself, and during the rest of my scramble they kept close to me, with keen competition for the front row, in hopes that i would do something like it again. but i refused the encore, because, bashful as i am, i could not but feel that my last performance was carried out with all the superb reckless abandon of a sarah bernhardt, and a display of art of this order should satisfy any african village for a year at least. at last i got across the rocks on to a lovely little beach of white sand, and stood there talking, surrounded by my audience, until the canoe got over its difficulties and arrived almost as scratched as i; and then we again said farewell and paddled away, to the great grief of the natives, for they don't get a circus up above njole every week, poor dears. now there is no doubt that that chief's plantain-leaf chart was an ingenious idea and a credit to him. there is also no doubt that the fan mile is a bit irish, a matter of nine or so of those of ordinary mortals, but i am bound to say i don't think, even allowing for this, that he put those pieces far enough apart. on we paddled a long way before we picked up village number one, mentioned in that chart. on again, still longer, till we came to village number two. village number three hove in sight high up on a mountain side soon after, but it was getting dark and the water worse, and the hill- sides growing higher and higher into nobly shaped mountains, forming, with their forest-graced steep sides, a ravine that, in the gathering gloom, looked like an alley-way made of iron, for the foaming ogowe. village number four we anxiously looked for; village number four we never saw; for round us came the dark, seeming to come out on to the river from the forests and the side ravines, where for some hours we had seen it sleeping, like a sailor with his clothes on in bad weather. on we paddled, looking for signs of village fires, and seeing them not. the erd-geist knew we wanted something, and seeing how we personally lacked it, thought it was beauty; and being in a kindly mood, gave it us, sending the lovely lingering flushes of his afterglow across the sky, which, dying, left it that divine deep purple velvet which no one has dared to paint. out in it came the great stars blazing high above us, and the dark round us was be-gemmed with fire-flies: but we were not as satisfied with these things as we should have been; what we wanted were fires to cook by and dry ourselves by, and all that sort of thing. the erd-geist did not understand, and so left us when the afterglow had died away, with only enough starlight to see the flying foam of the rapids ahead and around us, and not enough to see the great trees that had fallen from the bank into the water. these, when the rapids were not too noisy, we could listen for, because the black current rushes through their branches with an impatient "lish, swish"; but when there was a rapid roaring close alongside we ran into those trees, and got ourselves mauled, and had ticklish times getting on our course again. now and again we ran up against great rocks sticking up in the black water--grim, isolated fellows, who seemed to be standing silently watching their fellow rocks noisily fighting in the arena of the white water. still on we poled and paddled. about p.m. we came to a corner, a bad one; but we were unable to leap on to the bank and haul round, not being able to see either the details or the exact position of the said bank, and we felt, i think naturally, disinclined to spring in the direction of such bits of country as we had had experience of during the afternoon, with nothing but the aid we might have got from a compass hastily viewed by the transitory light of a lucifer match, and even this would not have informed us how many tens of feet of tree fringe lay between us and the land, so we did not attempt it. one must be careful at times, or nasty accidents may follow. we fought our way round that corner, yelling defiance at the water, and dealt with succeeding corners on the vi et armis plan, breaking, ever and anon, a pole. about . we got into a savage rapid. we fought it inch by inch. the canoe jammed herself on some barely sunken rocks in it. we shoved her off over them. she tilted over and chucked us out. the rocks round being just awash, we survived and got her straight again, and got into her and drove her unmercifully; she struck again and bucked like a broncho, and we fell in heaps upon each other, but stayed inside that time--the men by the aid of their intelligent feet, i by clinching my hands into the bush rope lacing which ran round the rim of the canoe and the meaning of which i did not understand when i left talagouga. we sorted ourselves out hastily and sent her at it again. smash went a sorely tried pole and a paddle. round and round we spun in an exultant whirlpool, which, in a light-hearted, maliciously joking way, hurled us tail first out of it into the current. now the grand point in these canoes of having both ends alike declared itself; for at this juncture all we had to do was to revolve on our own axis and commence life anew with what had been the bow for the stern. of course we were defeated, we could not go up any further without the aid of our lost poles and paddles, so we had to go down for shelter somewhere, anywhere, and down at a terrific pace in the white water we went. while hitched among the rocks the arrangement of our crew had been altered, pierre joining m'bo in the bows; this piece of precaution was frustrated by our getting turned round; so our position was what you might call precarious, until we got into another whirlpool, when we persuaded nature to start us right end on. this was only a matter of minutes, whirlpools being plentiful, and then m'bo and pierre, provided with our surviving poles, stood in the bows to fend us off rocks, as we shot towards them; while we midship paddles sat, helping to steer, and when occasion arose, which occasion did with lightning rapidity, to whack the whirlpools with the flat of our paddles, to break their force. cook crouched in the stern concentrating his mind on steering only. a most excellent arrangement in theory and the safest practical one no doubt, but it did not work out what you might call brilliantly well; though each department did its best. we dashed full tilt towards high rocks, things twenty to fifty feet above water. midship backed and flapped like fury; m'bo and pierre received the shock on their poles; sometimes we glanced successfully aside and flew on; sometimes we didn't. the shock being too much for m'bo and pierre they were driven back on me, who got flattened on to the cargo of bundles which, being now firmly tied in, couldn't spread the confusion further aft; but the shock of the canoe's nose against the rock did so in style, and the rest of the crew fell forward on to the bundles, me, and themselves. so shaken up together were we several times that night, that it's a wonder to me, considering the hurry, that we sorted ourselves out correctly with our own particular legs and arms. and although we in the middle of the canoe did some very spirited flapping, our whirlpool-breaking was no more successful than m'bo and pierre's fending off, and many a wild waltz we danced that night with the waters of the river ogowe. unpleasant as going through the rapids was, when circumstances took us into the black current we fared no better. for good all-round inconvenience, give me going full tilt in the dark into the branches of a fallen tree at the pace we were going then--and crash, swish, crackle and there you are, hung up, with a bough pressing against your chest, and your hair being torn out and your clothes ribboned by others, while the wicked river is trying to drag away the canoe from under you. after a good hour and more of these experiences, we went hard on to a large black reef of rocks. so firm was the canoe wedged that we in our rather worn-out state couldn't move her so we wisely decided to "lef 'em" and see what could be done towards getting food and a fire for the remainder of the night. our eyes, now trained to the darkness, observed pretty close to us a big lump of land, looming up out of the river. this we subsequently found out was kembe island. the rocks and foam on either side stretched away into the darkness, and high above us against the star-lit sky stood out clearly the summits of the mountains of the sierra del cristal. the most interesting question to us now was whether this rock reef communicated sufficiently with the island for us to get to it. abandoning conjecture; tying very firmly our canoe up to the rocks, a thing that seemed, considering she was jammed hard and immovable, a little unnecessary--but you can never be sufficiently careful in this matter with any kind of boat--off we started among the rock boulders. i would climb up on to a rock table, fall off it on the other side on to rocks again, with more or less water on them--then get a patch of singing sand under my feet, then with varying suddenness get into more water, deep or shallow, broad or narrow pools among the rocks; out of that over more rocks, etc., etc., etc.: my companions, from their noises, evidently were going in for the same kind of thing, but we were quite cheerful, because the probability of reaching the land seemed increasing. most of us arrived into deep channels of water which here and there cut in between this rock reef and the bank, m'bo was the first to find the way into certainty; he was, and i hope still is, a perfect wonder at this sort of work. i kept close to m'bo, and when we got to the shore, the rest of the wanderers being collected, we said "chances are there's a village round here"; and started to find it. after a gay time in a rock-encumbered forest, growing in a tangled, matted way on a rough hillside, at an angle of degrees, m'bo sighted the gleam of fires through the tree stems away to the left, and we bore down on it, listening to its drum. viewed through the bars of the tree stems the scene was very picturesque. the village was just a collection of palm mat-built huts, very low and squalid. in its tiny street, an affair of some sixty feet long and twenty wide, were a succession of small fires. the villagers themselves, however, were the striking features in the picture. they were painted vermilion all over their nearly naked bodies, and were dancing enthusiastically to the good old rump-a-tump-tump-tump tune, played energetically by an old gentleman on a long, high-standing, white- and-black painted drum. they said that as they had been dancing when we arrived they had failed to hear us. m'bo secured a--well, i don't exactly know what to call it--for my use. it was, i fancy, the remains of the village club-house. it had a certain amount of palm-thatch roof and some of its left-hand side left, the rest of the structure was bare old poles with filaments of palm mat hanging from them here and there; and really if it hadn't been for the roof one wouldn't have known whether one was inside or outside it. the floor was trodden earth and in the middle of it a heap of white ash and the usual two bush lights, laid down with their burning ends propped up off the ground with stones, and emitting, as is their wont, a rather mawkish, but not altogether unpleasant smell, and volumes of smoke which finds its way out through the thatch, leaving on the inside of it a rich oily varnish of a bright warm brown colour. they give a very good light, provided some one keeps an eye on them and knocks the ash off the end as it burns gray; the bush lights' idea of being snuffed. against one of the open-work sides hung a drum covered with raw hide, and a long hollow bit of tree trunk, which served as a cupboard for a few small articles. i gathered in all these details as i sat on one of the hard wood benches, waiting for my dinner, which isaac was preparing outside in the street. the atmosphere of the hut, in spite of its remarkable advantages in the way of ventilation, was oppressive, for the smell of the bush lights, my wet clothes, and the natives who crowded into the hut to look at me, made anything but a pleasant combination. the people were evidently exceedingly poor; clothes they had very little of. the two head men had on old french military coats in rags; but they were quite satisfied with their appearance, and evidently felt through them in touch with european culture, for they lectured to the others on the habits and customs of the white man with great self-confidence and superiority. the majority of the village had a slight acquaintance already with this interesting animal, being, i found, adoomas. they had made a settlement on kembe island some two years or so ago. then the fans came and attacked them, and killed and ate several. the adoomas left and fled to the french authority at njole and remained under its guarding shadow until the french came up and chastised the fans and burnt their village; and the adoomas--when things had quieted down again and the fans had gone off to build themselves a new village for their burnt one--came back to kembe island and their plantain patch. they had only done this a few months before my arrival and had not had time to rebuild, hence the dilapidated state of the village. they are, i am told, a congo region tribe, whose country lies south-west of franceville, and, as i have already said, are the tribe used by the french authorities to take convoys up and down the ogowe to franceville, more to keep this route open than for transport purposes; the rapids rendering it impracticable to take heavy stores this way, and making it a thirty-six days' journey from njole with good luck. the practical route is via loango and brazzaville. the adoomas told us the convoy which had gone up with the vivacious government official had had trouble with the rapids and had spent five days on kondo kondo, dragging up the canoes empty by means of ropes and chains, carrying the cargo that was in them along on land until they had passed the worst rapid and then repacking. they added the information that the rapids were at their worst just now, and entertained us with reminiscences of a poor young french official who had been drowned in them last year--indeed they were just as cheering as my white friends. as soon as my dinner arrived they politely cleared out, and i heard the devout m'bo holding a service for them, with hymns, in the street, and this being over they returned to their drum and dance, keeping things up distinctly late, for it was . p.m. when we first entered the village. while the men were getting their food i mounted guard over our little possessions, and when they turned up to make things tidy in my hut, i walked off down to the shore by a path, which we had elaborately avoided when coming to the village, a very vertically inclined, slippery little path, but still the one whereby the natives went up and down to their canoes, which were kept tied up amongst the rocks. the moon was rising, illumining the sky, but not yet sending down her light on the foaming, flying ogowe in its deep ravine. the scene was divinely lovely; on every side out of the formless gloom rose the peaks of the sierra del cristal. lomba- ngawku on the further side of the river surrounded by his companion peaks, looked his grandest, silhouetted hard against the sky. in the higher valleys where the dim light shone faintly, one could see wreaths and clouds of silver-gray mist lying, basking lazily or rolling to and fro. olangi seemed to stretch right across the river, blocking with his great blunt mass all passage; while away to the n.e. a cone-shaped peak showed conspicuous, which i afterwards knew as kangwe. in the darkness round me flitted thousands of fire- flies and out beyond this pool of utter night flew by unceasingly the white foam of the rapids; sound there was none save their thunder. the majesty and beauty of the scene fascinated me, and i stood leaning with my back against a rock pinnacle watching it. do not imagine it gave rise, in what i am pleased to call my mind, to those complicated, poetical reflections natural beauty seems to bring out in other people's minds. it never works that way with me; i just lose all sense of human individuality, all memory of human life, with its grief and worry and doubt, and become part of the atmosphere. m'bo, i found, had hung up my mosquito-bar over one of the hard wood benches, and going cautiously under it i lit a night- light and read myself asleep with my damp dilapidated old horace. woke at a.m. lying on the ground among the plantain stems, having by a reckless movement fallen out of the house. thanks be there are no mosquitoes. i don't know how i escaped the rats which swarm here, running about among the huts and the inhabitants in the evening, with a tameness shocking to see. i turned in again until six o'clock, when we started getting things ready to go up river again, carefully providing ourselves with a new stock of poles, and subsidising a native to come with us and help us to fight the rapids. the greatest breadth of the river channel we now saw, in the daylight, to be the s.s.w. branch; this was the one we had been swept into, and was almost completely barred by rock. the other one to the n.n.w. was more open, and the river rushed through it, a terrific, swirling mass of water. had we got caught in this, we should have got past kembe island, and gone to glory. whenever the shelter of the spits of land or of the reefs was sufficient to allow the water to lay down its sand, strange shaped sandbanks showed, as regular in form as if they had been smoothed by human hands. they rise above the water in a slope, the low end or tail against the current; the down-stream end terminating in an abrupt miniature cliff, sometimes six and seven feet above the water; that they are the same shape when they have not got their heads above water you will find by sticking on them in a canoe, which i did several times, with a sort of automatic devotion to scientific research peculiar to me. your best way of getting off is to push on in the direction of the current, carefully preparing for the shock of suddenly coming off the cliff end. we left the landing place rocks of kembe island about , and no sooner had we got afloat, than, in the twinkling of an eye, we were swept, broadside on, right across the river to the north bank, and then engaged in a heavy fight with a severe rapid. after passing this, the river is fairly uninterrupted by rock for a while, and is silent and swift. when you are ascending such a piece the effect is strange; you see the water flying by the side of your canoe, as you vigorously drive your paddle into it with short rapid strokes, and you forthwith fancy you are travelling at the rate of a north- western express; but you just raise your eyes, my friend, and look at that bank, which is standing very nearly still, and you will realise that you and your canoe are standing very nearly still too; and that all your exertions are only enabling you to creep on at the pace of a crushed snail, and that it's the water that is going the pace. it's a most quaint and unpleasant disillusionment. above the stretch of swift silent water we come to the isangaladi islands, and the river here changes its course from n.n.w., s.s.e. to north and south. a bad rapid, called by our ally from kembe island "unfanga," being surmounted, we seem to be in a mountain- walled lake, and keeping along the left bank of this, we get on famously for twenty whole restful minutes, which lulls us all into a false sense of security, and my crew sing m'pongwe songs, descriptive of how they go to their homes to see their wives, and families, and friends, giving chaffing descriptions of their friends' characteristics and of their failings, which cause bursts of laughter from those among us who recognise the allusions, and how they go to their boxes, and take out their clothes, and put them on- -a long bragging inventory of these things is given by each man as a solo, and then the chorus, taken heartily up by his companions, signifies their admiration and astonishment at his wealth and importance--and then they sing how, being dissatisfied with that last dollar's worth of goods they got from "holty's," they have decided to take their next trade to hatton and cookson, or vice versa; and then comes the chorus, applauding the wisdom of such a decision, and extolling the excellence of hatton and cookson's goods or holty's. these m'pongwe and igalwa boat songs are all very pretty, and have very elaborate tunes in a minor key. i do not believe there are any old words to them; i have tried hard to find out about them, but i believe the tunes, which are of a limited number and quite distinct from each other, are very old. the words are put in by the singer on the spur of the moment, and only restricted in this sense, that there would always be the domestic catalogue--whatever its component details might be--sung to the one fixed tune, the trade information sung to another, and so on. a good singer, in these parts, means the man who can make up the best song--the most impressive, or the most amusing; i have elsewhere mentioned pretty much the same state of things among the ga's and krumen and bubi, and in all cases the tunes are only voice tunes, not for instrumental performance. the instrumental music consists of that marvellously developed series of drum tunes--the attempt to understand which has taken up much of my time, and led me into queer company--and the many tunes played on the 'mrimba and the orchid- root-stringed harp: they are, i believe, entirely distinct from the song tunes. and these peaceful tunes my men were now singing were, in their florid elaboration very different from the one they fought the rapids to, of--so sir--so sur--so sir--so sur--ush! so sir, etc. on we go singing elaborately, thinking no evil of nature, when a current, a quiet devil of a thing, comes round from behind a point of the bank and catches the nose of our canoe; wringing it well, it sends us scuttling right across the river in spite of our ferocious swoops at the water, upsetting us among a lot of rocks with the water boiling over them; this lot of rocks being however of the table-top kind, and not those precious, close-set pinnacles rising up sheer out of profound depths, between which you are so likely to get your canoe wedged in and split. we, up to our knees in water that nearly tears our legs off, push and shove the canoe free, and re-embarking return singing "so sir" across the river, to have it out with that current. we do; and at its head find a rapid, and notice on the mountain-side a village clearing, the first sign of human habitation we have seen to-day. above this rapid we get a treat of still water, the main current of the ogowe flying along by the south bank. on our side there are sandbanks with their graceful sloping backs and sudden ends, and there is a very strange and beautiful effect produced by the flakes and balls of foam thrown off the rushing main current into the quiet water. these whirl among the eddies and rush backwards and forwards as though they were still mad with wild haste, until, finding no current to take them down, they drift away into the landlocked bays, where they come to a standstill as if they were bewildered and lost and were trying to remember where they were going to and whence they had come; the foam of which they are composed is yellowish-white, with a spongy sort of solidity about it. in a little bay we pass we see eight native women, fans clearly, by their bright brown faces, and their loads of brass bracelets and armlets; likely enough they had anklets too, but we could not see them, as the good ladies were pottering about waist-deep in the foam-flecked water, intent on breaking up a stockaded fish-trap. we pause and chat, and watch them collecting the fish in baskets, and i acquire some specimens; and then, shouting farewells when we are well away, in the proper civil way, resume our course. the middle of the ogowe here is simply forested with high rocks, looking, as they stand with their grim forms above the foam, like a regiment of strange strong creatures breasting it, with their straight faces up river, and their more flowing curves down, as though they had on black mantles which were swept backwards. across on the other bank rose the black-forested spurs of lomba-njaku. our channel was free until we had to fight round the upper end of our bay into a long rush of strong current with bad whirlpools curving its face; then the river widens out and quiets down and then suddenly contracts--a rocky forested promontory running out from each bank. there is a little village on the north bank's promontory, and, at the end of each, huge monoliths rise from the water, making what looks like a gateway which had once been barred and through which the ogowe had burst. for the first time on this trip i felt discouraged; it seemed so impossible that we, with our small canoe and scanty crew, could force our way up through that gateway, when the whole ogowe was rushing down through it. but we clung to the bank and rocks with hands, poles, and paddle, and did it; really the worst part was not in the gateway but just before it, for here there is a great whirlpool, its centre hollowed some one or two feet below its rim. it is caused, my kembe islander says, by a great cave opening beneath the water. above the gate the river broadens out again and we see the arched opening to a large cave in the south bank; the mountain-side is one mass of rock covered with the unbroken forest; and the entrance to this cave is just on the upper wall of the south bank's promontory; so, being sheltered from the current here, we rest and examine it leisurely. the river runs into it, and you can easily pass in at this season, but in the height of the wet season, when the river level would be some twenty feet or more above its present one, i doubt if you could. they told me this place is called boko boko, and that the cave is a very long one, extending on a level some way into the hill, and then ascending and coming out near a mass of white rock that showed as a speck high up on the mountain. if you paddle into it you go "far far," and then "no more water live," and you get out and go up the tunnel, which is sometimes broad, sometimes narrow, sometimes high, sometimes so low that you have to crawl, and so get out at the other end. one french gentleman has gone through this performance, and i am told found "plenty plenty" bats, and hedgehogs, and snakes. they could not tell me his name, which i much regretted. as we had no store of bush lights we went no further than the portals; indeed, strictly between ourselves, if i had had every bush light in congo francais i personally should not have relished going further. i am terrified of caves; it sends a creaming down my back to think of them. we went across the river to see another cave entrance on the other bank, where there is a narrow stretch of low rock-covered land at the foot of the mountains, probably under water in the wet season. the mouth of this other cave is low, between tumbled blocks of rock. it looked so suspiciously like a short cut to the lower regions, that i had less exploring enthusiasm about it than even about its opposite neighbour; although they told me no man had gone down "them thing." probably that much-to-be-honoured frenchman who explored the other cave, allowed like myself, that if one did want to go from the equator to hades, there were pleasanter ways to go than this. my kembe island man said that just hereabouts were five cave openings, the two that we had seen and another one we had not, on land, and two under the water, one of the sub-fluvial ones being responsible for the whirlpool we met outside the gateway of boko boko. the scenery above boko boko was exceedingly lovely, the river shut in between its rim of mountains. as you pass up it opens out in front of you and closes in behind, the closely-set confused mass of mountains altering in form as you view them from different angles, save one, kangwe--a blunt cone, evidently the record of some great volcanic outburst; and the sandbanks show again wherever the current deflects and leaves slack water, their bright glistening colour giving a relief to the scene. for a long period we paddle by the south bank, and pass a vertical cleft-like valley, the upper end of which seems blocked by a finely shaped mountain, almost as conical as kangwe. the name of this mountain is njoko, and the name of the clear small river, that apparently monopolises the valley floor, is the ovata. our peace was not of long duration, and we were soon again in the midst of a bristling forest of rock; still the current running was not dangerously strong, for the river-bed comes up in a ridge, too high for much water to come over at this season of the year; but in the wet season this must be one of the worst places. this ridge of rock runs two-thirds across the ogowe, leaving a narrow deep channel by the north bank. when we had got our canoe over the ridge, mostly by standing in the water and lifting her, we found the water deep and fairly quiet. on the north bank we passed by the entrance of the okana river. its mouth is narrow, but, the natives told me, always deep, even in the height of the dry season. it is a very considerable river, running inland to the e.n.e. little is known about it, save that it is narrowed into a ravine course above which it expands again; the banks of it are thickly populated by fans, who send down a considerable trade, and have an evil reputation. in the main stream of the ogowe below the okana's entrance, is a long rocky island called shandi. when we were getting over our ridge and paddling about the okana's entrance my ears recognised a new sound. the rush and roar of the ogowe we knew well enough, and could locate which particular obstacle to his headlong course was making him say things; it was either those immovable rocks, which threw him back in foam, whirling wildly, or it was that fringe of gaunt skeleton trees hanging from the bank playing a "pull devil, pull baker" contest that made him hiss with vexation. but this was an elemental roar. i said to m'bo: "that's a thunderstorm away among the mountains." "no, sir," says he, "that's the alemba." we paddled on towards it, hugging the right-hand bank again to avoid the mid-river rocks. for a brief space the mountain wall ceased, and a lovely scene opened before us; we seemed to be looking into the heart of the chain of the sierra del cristal, the abruptly shaped mountains encircling a narrow plain or valley before us, each one of them steep in slope, every one of them forest-clad; one, whose name i know not unless it be what is sometimes put down as mt. okana on the french maps, had a conical shape which contrasted beautifully with the more irregular curves of its companions. the colour down this gap was superb, and very japanese in the evening glow. the more distant peaks were soft gray-blues and purples, those nearer, indigo and black. we soon passed this lovely scene and entered the walled-in channel, creeping up what seemed an interminable hill of black water, then through some whirlpools and a rocky channel to the sand and rock shore of our desired island kondo kondo, along whose northern side tore in thunder the alemba. we made our canoe fast in a little cove among the rocks, and landed, pretty stiff and tired and considerably damp. this island, when we were on it, must have been about half a mile or so long, but during the long wet season a good deal of it is covered, and only the higher parts--great heaps of stone, among which grows a long branched willow-like shrub--are above or nearly above water. the adooma from kembe island especially drew my attention to this shrub, telling me his people who worked the rapids always regarded it with an affectionate veneration; for he said it was the only thing that helped a man when his canoe got thrown over in the dreaded alemba, for its long tough branches swimming in, or close to, the water are veritable life lines, and his best chance; a chance which must have failed some poor fellow, whose knife and leopard-skin belt we found wedged in among the rocks on kondo kondo. the main part of the island is sand, with slabs and tables of polished rock sticking up through it; and in between the rocks grew in thousands most beautiful lilies, their white flowers having a very strong scent of vanilla and their bright light-green leaves looking very lovely on the glistening pale sand among the black-gray rock. how they stand the long submersion they must undergo i do not know; the natives tell me they begin to spring up as soon as ever the water falls and leaves the island exposed; that they very soon grow up and flower, and keep on flowering until the ogowe comes down again and rides roughshod over kondo kondo for months. while the men were making their fire i went across the island to see the great alemba rapid, of which i had heard so much, that lay between it and the north bank. nobler pens than mine must sing its glory and its grandeur. its face was like nothing i have seen before. its voice was like nothing i have heard. those other rapids are not to be compared to it; they are wild, headstrong, and malignant enough, but the alemba is not as they. it does not struggle, and writhe, and brawl among the rocks, but comes in a majestic springing dance, a stretch of waltzing foam, triumphant. the beauty of the night on kondo kondo was superb; the sun went down and the afterglow flashed across the sky in crimson, purple, and gold, leaving it a deep violet-purple, with the great stars hanging in it like moons, until the moon herself arose, lighting the sky long before she sent her beams down on us in this valley. as she rose, the mountains hiding her face grew harder and harder in outline, and deeper and deeper black, while those opposite were just enough illumined to let one see the wefts and floating veils of blue-white mist upon them, and when at last, and for a short time only, she shone full down on the savage foam of the alemba, she turned it into a soft silver mist. around, on all sides, flickered the fire-flies, who had come to see if our fire was not a big relation of their own, and they were the sole representatives, with ourselves, of animal life. when the moon had gone, the sky, still lit by the stars, seeming indeed to be in itself lambent, was very lovely, but it shared none of its light with us, and we sat round our fire surrounded by an utter darkness. cold, clammy drifts of almost tangible mist encircled us; ever and again came cold faint puffs of wandering wind, weird and grim beyond description. i will not weary you further with details of our ascent of the ogowe rapids, for i have done so already sufficiently to make you understand the sort of work going up them entails, and i have no doubt that, could i have given you a more vivid picture of them, you would join me in admiration of the fiery pluck of those few frenchmen who traverse them on duty bound. i personally deeply regret it was not my good fortune to meet again the french official i had had the pleasure of meeting on the eclaireur. he would have been truly great in his description of his voyage to franceville. i wonder how he would have "done" his unpacking of canoes and his experiences on kondo kondo, where, by the by, we came across many of the ashes of his expedition's attributive fires. well! he must have been a pleasure to franceville, and i hope also to the good fathers at lestourville, for those places must be just slightly sombre for parisians. going down big rapids is always, everywhere, more dangerous than coming up, because when you are coming up and a whirlpool or eddy does jam you on rocks, the current helps you off--certainly only with a view to dashing your brains out and smashing your canoe on another set of rocks it's got ready below; but for the time being it helps, and when off, you take charge and convert its plan into an incompleted fragment; whereas in going down the current is against your backing off. m'bo had a series of prophetic visions as to what would happen to us on our way down, founded on reminiscence and tradition. i tried to comfort him by pointing out that, were any one of his prophecies fulfilled, it would spare our friends and relations all funeral expenses; and, unless they went and wasted their money on a memorial window, that ought to be a comfort to our well-regulated minds. m'bo did not see this, but was too good a christian to be troubled by the disagreeable conviction that was in the minds of other members of my crew, namely, that our souls, unliberated by funeral rites from this world, would have to hover for ever over the ogowe near the scene of our catastrophe. i own this idea was an unpleasant one--fancy having to pass the day in those caves with the bats, and then come out and wander all night in the cold mists! however, like a good many likely-looking prophecies, those of m'bo did not quite come off, and a miss is as good as a mile. twice we had a near call, by being shot in between two pinnacle rocks, within half an inch of being fatally close to each other for us; but after some alarming scrunching sounds, and creaks from the canoe, we were shot ignominiously out down river. several times we got on to partially submerged table rocks, and were unceremoniously bundled off them by the ogowe, irritated at the hindrance we were occasioning; but we never met the rocks of m'bo's prophetic soul--that lurking, submerged needle, or knife-edge of a pinnacle rock which was to rip our canoe from stem to stern, neat and clean into two pieces. the course we had to take coming down was different to that we took coming up. coming up we kept as closely as might be to the most advisable bank, and dodged behind every rock we could, to profit by the shelter it afforded us from the current. coming down, fallen- tree-fringed banks and rocks were converted from friends to foes; so we kept with all our power in the very centre of the swiftest part of the current in order to avoid them. the grandest part of the whole time was coming down, below the alemba, where the whole great ogowe takes a tiger-like spring for about half a mile, i should think, before it strikes a rock reef below. as you come out from among the rocks in the upper rapid it gives you--or i should perhaps confine myself to saying, it gave me--a peculiar internal sensation to see that stretch of black water, shining like a burnished sheet of metal, sloping down before one, at such an angle. all you have got to do is to keep your canoe-head straight--quite straight, you understand--for any failure so to do will land you the other side of the tomb, instead of in a cheerful no-end-of-a-row with the lower rapid's rocks. this lower rapid is one of the worst in the dry season; maybe it is so in the wet too, for the river's channel here turns an elbow-sharp curve which infuriates the ogowe in a most dangerous manner. i hope to see the ogowe next time in the wet season--there must be several more of these great sheets of water then over what are rocky rapids now. just think what coming down over that ridge above boko boko will be like! i do not fancy however it would ever be possible to get up the river, when it is at its height, with so small a crew as we were when we went and played our knock-about farce, before king death, in his amphitheatre in the sierra del cristal. chapter vi. lembarene. in which is given some account of the episode of the hippopotame, and of the voyager's attempts at controlling an ogowe canoe; and also of the igalwa tribe. i say good-bye to talagouga with much regret, and go on board the eclaireur, when she returns from njole, with all my bottles and belongings. on board i find no other passenger; the captain's english has widened out considerably; and he is as pleasant, cheery, and spoiling for a fight as ever; but he has a preoccupied manner, and a most peculiar set of new habits, which i find are shared by the engineer. both of them make rapid dashes to the rail, and nervously scan the river for a minute and then return to some occupation, only to dash from it to the rail again. during breakfast their conduct is nerve-shaking. hastily taking a few mouthfuls, the captain drops his knife and fork and simply hurls his seamanlike form through the nearest door out on to the deck. in another minute he is back again, and with just a shake of his head to the engineer, continues his meal. the engineer shortly afterwards flies from his seat, and being far thinner than the captain, goes through his nearest door with even greater rapidity; returns, and shakes his head at the captain, and continues his meal. excitement of this kind is infectious, and i also wonder whether i ought not to show a sympathetic friendliness by flying from my seat and hurling myself on to the deck through my nearest door, too. but although there are plenty of doors, as four enter the saloon from the deck, i do not see my way to doing this performance aimlessly, and what in this world they are both after i cannot think. so i confine myself to woman's true sphere, and assist in a humble way by catching the wine and vichy water bottles, glasses, and plates of food, which at every performance are jeopardised by the members of the nobler sex starting off with a considerable quantity of the ample table cloth wrapped round their legs. at last i can stand it no longer, so ask the captain point-blank what is the matter. "nothing," says he, bounding out of his chair and flying out of his doorway; but on his return he tells me he has got a bet on of two bottles of champagne with woermann's agent for njole, as to who shall reach lembarene first, and the german agent has started off some time before the eclaireur in his little steam launch. during the afternoon we run smoothly along; the free pulsations of the engines telling what a very different thing coming down the ogowe is to going up against its terrific current. every now and again we stop to pick up cargo, or discharge over-carried cargo, and the captain's mind becomes lulled by getting no news of the woermann's launch having passed down. he communicates this to the engineer; it is impossible she could have passed the eclaireur since they started, therefore she must be some where behind at a subfactory, "n'est-ce pas?" "oui, oui, certainement," says the engineer. the engineer is, by these considerations, also lulled, and feels he may do something else but scan the river a la sister ann. what that something is puzzles me; it evidently requires secrecy, and he shrinks from detection. first he looks down one side of the deck, no one there; then he looks down the other, no one there; good so far. i then see he has put his head through one of the saloon portholes; no one there; he hesitates a few seconds until i begin to wonder whether his head will suddenly appear through my port; but he regards this as an unnecessary precaution, and i hear him enter his cabin which abuts on mine and there is silence for some minutes. writing home to his mother, think i, as i go on putting a new braid round the bottom of a worn skirt. almost immediately after follows the sound of a little click from the next cabin, and then apparently one of the denizens of the infernal regions has got its tail smashed in a door and the heavy hot afternoon air is reft by an inchoate howl of agony. i drop my needlework and take to the deck; but it is after all only that shy retiring young man practising secretly on his clarionet. the captain is drowsily looking down the river. but repose is not long allowed to that active spirit; he sees something in the water-- what? "hippopotame," he ejaculates. now both he and the engineer frequently do this thing, and then fly off to their guns--bang, bang, finish; but this time he does not dash for his gun, nor does the engineer, who flies out of his cabin at the sound of the war shout "hippopotame." in vain i look across the broad river with its stretches of yellow sandbanks, where the "hippopotame" should be, but i can see nothing but four black stumps sticking up in the water away to the right. meanwhile the captain and the engineer are flying about getting off a crew of blacks into the canoe we are towing alongside. this being done the captain explains to me that on the voyage up "the engineer had fired at, and hit a hippopotamus, and without doubt this was its body floating." we are now close enough even for me to recognise the four stumps as the deceased's legs, and soon the canoe is alongside them and makes fast to one, and then starts to paddle back, hippo and all, to the eclaireur. but no such thing; let them paddle and shout as hard as they like, the hippo's weight simply anchors them. the eclaireur by now has dropped down the river past them, and has to sweep round and run back. recognising promptly what the trouble is, the energetic captain grabs up a broom, ties a light cord belonging to the leadline to it, and holding the broom by the end of its handle, swings it round his head and hurls it at the canoe. the arm of a merciful providence being interposed, the broom-tomahawk does not hit the canoe, wherein, if it had, it must infallibly have killed some one, but falls short, and goes tearing off with the current, well out of reach of the canoe. the captain seeing this gross dereliction of duty by a chargeur reunis broom, hauls it in hand over hand and talks to it. then he ties the other end of its line to the mooring rope, and by a better aimed shot sends the broom into the water, about ten yards above the canoe, and it drifts towards it. breathless excitement! surely they will get it now. alas, no! just when it is within reach of the canoe, a fearful shudder runs through the broom. it throws up its head and sinks beneath the tide. a sensation of stun comes over all of us. the crew of the canoe, ready and eager to grasp the approaching aid, gaze blankly at the circling ripples round where it sank. in a second the captain knows what has happened. that heavy hawser which has been paid out after it has dragged it down, so he hauls it on board again. the eclaireur goes now close enough to the hippo-anchored canoe for a rope to be flung to the man in her bows; he catches it and freezes on gallantly. saved! no! oh horror! the lower deck hums with fear that after all it will not taste that toothsome hippo chop, for the man who has caught the rope is as nearly as possible jerked flying out of the canoe when the strain of the eclaireur contending with the hippo's inertia flies along it, but his companion behind him grips him by the legs and is in his turn grabbed, and the crew holding on to each other with their hands, and on to their craft with their feet, save the man holding on to the rope and the whole situation; and slowly bobbing towards us comes the hippopotamus, who is shortly hauled on board by the winners in triumph. my esteemed friends, the captain and the engineer, who of course have been below during this hauling, now rush on to the upper deck, each coatless, and carrying an enormous butcher's knife. they dash into the saloon, where a terrific sharpening of these instruments takes place on the steel belonging to the saloon carving-knife, and down stairs again. by looking down the ladder, i can see the pink, pig-like hippo, whose colour has been soaked out by the water, lying on the lower deck and the captain and engineer slitting down the skin intent on gralloching operations. providentially, my prophetic soul induces me to leave the top of the ladder and go forward--"run to win'ard," as captain murray would say--for within two minutes the captain and engineer are up the ladder as if they had been blown up by the boilers bursting, and go as one man for the brandy bottle; and they wanted it if ever man did; for remember that hippo had been dead and in the warm river-water for more than a week. the captain had had enough of it, he said, but the engineer stuck to the job with a courage i profoundly admire, and he saw it through and then retired to his cabin; sand-and-canvassed himself first, and then soaked and saturated himself in florida water. the flesh gladdened the hearts of the crew and lower-deck passengers and also of the inhabitants of lembarene, who got dashes of it on our arrival there. hippo flesh is not to be despised by black man or white; i have enjoyed it far more than the stringy beef or vapid goat's flesh one gets down here. i stayed on board the eclaireur all night; for it was dark when we reached lembarene, too dark to go round to kangwe; and next morning, after taking a farewell of her--i hope not a final one, for she is a most luxurious little vessel for the coast, and the feeding on board is excellent and the society varied and charming--i went round to kangwe. i remained some time in the lembarene district and saw and learnt many things; i owe most of what i learnt to m. and mme. jacot, who knew a great deal about both the natives and the district, and i owe much of what i saw to having acquired the art of managing by myself a native canoe. this "recklessness" of mine i am sure did not merit the severe criticism it has been subjected to, for my performances gave immense amusement to others (i can hear lembarene's shrieks of laughter now) and to myself they gave great pleasure. my first attempt was made at talagouga one very hot afternoon. m. and mme. forget were, i thought, safe having their siestas, oranie was with mme. gacon. i knew where mme. gacon was for certain; she was with m. gacon; and i knew he was up in the sawmill shed, out of sight of the river, because of the soft thump, thump, thump of the big water-wheel. there was therefore no one to keep me out of mischief, and i was too frightened to go into the forest that afternoon, because on the previous afternoon i had been stalked as a wild beast by a cannibal savage, and i am nervous. besides, and above all, it is quite impossible to see other people, even if they are only black, naked savages, gliding about in canoes, without wishing to go and glide about yourself. so i went down to where the canoes were tied by their noses to the steep bank, and finding a paddle, a broken one, i unloosed the smallest canoe. unfortunately this was fifteen feet or so long, but i did not know the disadvantage of having, as it were, a long-tailed canoe then--i did shortly afterwards. the promontories running out into the river on each side of the mission beach give a little stretch of slack water between the bank and the mill-race-like current of the ogowe, and i wisely decided to keep in the slack water, until i had found out how to steer--most important thing steering. i got into the bow of the canoe, and shoved off from the bank all right; then i knelt down--learn how to paddle standing up by and by--good so far. i rapidly learnt how to steer from the bow, but i could not get up any pace. intent on acquiring pace, i got to the edge of the slack water; and then displaying more wisdom, i turned round to avoid it, proud as a peacock, you understand, at having found out how to turn round. at this moment, the current of "the greatest equatorial river in the world," grabbed my canoe by its tail. we spun round and round for a few seconds, like a teetotum, i steering the whole time for all i was worth, and then the current dragged the canoe ignominiously down river, tail foremost. fortunately a big tree was at that time temporarily hanging against the rock in the river, just below the sawmill beach. into that tree the canoe shot with a crash, and i hung on, and shipping my paddle, pulled the canoe into the slack water again, by the aid of the branches of the tree, which i was in mortal terror would come off the rock, and insist on accompanying me and the canoe, via kama country, to the atlantic ocean; but it held, and when i had got safe against the side of the pinnacle-rock i wiped a perspiring brow, and searched in my mind for a piece of information regarding navigation that would be applicable to the management of long-tailed adooma canoes. i could not think of one for some minutes. captain murray has imparted to me at one time and another an enormous mass of hints as to the management of vessels, but those vessels were all pre- supposed to have steam power. but he having been the first man to take an ocean-going steamer up to matadi on the congo, through the terrific currents that whirl and fly in hell's cauldron, knew about currents, and i remembered he had said regarding taking vessels through them, "keep all the headway you can on her." good! that hint inverted will fit this situation like a glove, and i'll keep all the tailway i can off her. feeling now as safe as only a human being can feel who is backed up by a sound principle, i was cautiously crawling to the tail-end of the canoe, intent on kneeling in it to look after it, when i heard a dreadful outcry on the bank. looking there i saw mme. forget, mme. gacon, m. gacon, and their attributive crowd of mission children all in a state of frenzy. they said lots of things in chorus. "what?" said i. they said some more and added gesticulations. seeing i was wasting their time as i could not hear, i drove the canoe from the rock and made my way, mostly by steering, to the bank close by; and then tying the canoe firmly up i walked over the mill stream and divers other things towards my anxious friends. "you'll be drowned," they said. "gracious goodness!" said i, "i thought that half an hour ago, but it's all right now; i can steer." after much conversation i lulled their fears regarding me, and having received strict orders to keep in the stern of the canoe, because that is the proper place when you are managing a canoe single-handed, i returned to my studies. i had not however lulled my friends' interest regarding me, and they stayed on the bank watching. i found first, that my education in steering from the bow was of no avail; second, that it was all right if you reversed it. for instance, when you are in the bow, and make an inward stroke with the paddle on the right-hand side, the bow goes to the right; whereas, if you make an inward stroke on the right-hand side, when you are sitting in the stern, the bow then goes to the left. understand? having grasped this law, i crept along up river; and, by allah! before i had gone twenty yards, if that wretch, the current of the greatest, etc., did not grab hold of the nose of my canoe, and we teetotummed round again as merrily as ever. my audience screamed. i knew what they were saying, "you'll be drowned! come back! come back!" but i heard them and i heeded not. if you attend to advice in a crisis you're lost; besides, i couldn't "come back" just then. however, i got into the slack water again, by some very showy, high-class steering. still steering, fine as it is, is not all you require and hanker after. you want pace as well, and pace, except when in the clutches of the current, i had not so far attained. perchance, thought i, the pace region in a canoe may be in its centre; so i got along on my knees into the centre to experiment. bitter failure; the canoe took to sidling down river broadside on, like mr. winkle's horse. shouts of laughter from the bank. both bow and stern education utterly inapplicable to centre; and so, seeing i was utterly thrown away there, i crept into the bows, and in a few more minutes i steered my canoe, perfectly, in among its fellows by the bank and secured it there. mme. forget ran down to meet me and assured me she had not laughed so much since she had been in africa, although she was frightened at the time lest i should get capsized and drowned. i believe it, for she is a sweet and gracious lady; and i quite see, as she demonstrated, that the sight of me, teetotumming about, steering in an elaborate and showy way all the time, was irresistibly comic. and she gave a most amusing account of how, when she started looking for me to give me tea, a charming habit of hers, she could not see me in among my bottles, and so asked the little black boy where i was. "there," said he, pointing to the tree hanging against the rock out in the river; and she, seeing me hitched with a canoe against the rock, and knowing the danger and depth of the river, got alarmed. well, when i got down to lembarene i naturally went on with my canoeing studies, in pursuit of the attainment of pace. success crowned my efforts, and i can honestly and truly say that there are only two things i am proud of--one is that doctor gunther has approved of my fishes, and the other is that i can paddle an ogowe canoe. pace, style, steering and all, "all same for one" as if i were an ogowe african. a strange, incongruous pair of things: but i often wonder what are the things other people are really most proud of; it would be a quaint and repaying subject for investigation. mme. jacot gave me every help in canoeing, for she is a remarkably clear-headed woman, and recognised that, as i was always getting soaked, anyhow, i ran no extra danger in getting soaked in a canoe; and then, it being the dry season, there was an immense stretch of water opposite andande beach, which was quite shallow. so she saw no need of my getting drowned. the sandbanks were showing their yellow heads in all directions when i came down from talagouga, and just opposite andande there was sticking up out of the water a great, graceful, palm frond. it had been stuck into the head of the pet sandbank, and every day was visited by the boys and girls in canoes to see how much longer they would have to wait for the sandbank's appearance. a few days after my return it showed, and in two days more there it was, acres and acres of it, looking like a great, golden carpet spread on the surface of the centre of the clear water--clear here, down this side of lembarene island, because the river runs fairly quietly, and has time to deposit its mud. dark brown the ogowe flies past the other side of the island, the main current being deflected that way by a bend, just below the entrance of the nguni. there was great rejoicing. canoe-load after canoe-load of boys and girls went to the sandbank, some doing a little fishing round its rim, others bringing the washing there, all skylarking and singing. few prettier sights have i ever seen than those on that sandbank-- the merry brown forms dancing or lying stretched on it: the gaudy- coloured patchwork quilts and chintz mosquito-bars that have been washed, spread out drying, looking from kangwe on the hill above, like beds of bright flowers. by night when it was moonlight there would be bands of dancers on it with bush-light torches, gyrating, intermingling and separating till you could think you were looking at a dance of stars. they commenced affairs very early on that sandbank, and they kept them up very late; and all the time there came from it a soft murmur of laughter and song. ah me! if the aim of life were happiness and pleasure, africa should send us missionaries instead of our sending them to her--but, fortunately for the work of the world, happiness is not. one thing i remember which struck me very much regarding the sandbank, and this was that mme. jacot found such pleasure in taking her work on to the verandah, where she could see it. i knew she did not care for the songs and the dancing. one day she said to me, "it is such a relief." "a relief?" i said. "yes, do you not see that until it shows there is nothing but forest, forest, forest, and that still stretch of river? that bank is the only piece of clear ground i see in the year, and that only lasts a few weeks until the wet season comes, and then it goes, and there is nothing but forest, forest, forest, for another year. it is two years now since i came to this place; it may be i know not how many more before we go home again." i grieve to say, for my poor friend's sake, that her life at kangwe was nearly at its end. soon after my return to england i heard of the death of her husband from malignant fever. m. jacot was a fine, powerful, energetic man, in the prime of life. he was a teetotaler and a vegetarian; and although constantly travelling to and fro in his district on his evangelising work, he had no foolish recklessness in him. no one would have thought that he would have been the first to go of us who used to sit round his hospitable table. his delicate wife, his two young children or i would have seemed far more likely. his loss will be a lasting one to the people he risked his life to (what he regarded) save. the natives held him in the greatest affection and respect, and his influence over them was considerable, far more profound than that of any other missionary i have ever seen. his loss is also great to those students of africa who are working on the culture or on the languages; his knowledge of both was extensive, particularly of the little known languages of the ogowe district. he was, when i left, busily employed in compiling a dictionary of the fan tongue, and had many other works on language in contemplation. his work in this sphere would have had a high value, for he was a man with a university education and well grounded in latin and greek, and thoroughly acquainted with both english and french literature, for although born a frenchman, he had been brought up in america. he was also a cultivated musician, and he and mme. jacot in the evenings would sing old french songs, swiss songs, english songs, in their rich full voices; and then if you stole softly out on to the verandah, you would often find it crowded with a silent, black audience, listening intently. the amount of work m. and mme. jacot used to get through was, to me, amazing, and i think the ogowe protestant mission sadly short- handed--its missionaries not being content to follow the usual protestant plan out in west africa, namely, quietly sitting down and keeping house, with just a few native children indoors to do the housework, and close by a school and a little church where a service is held on sundays. the representatives of the mission evangelique go to and fro throughout the district round each station on evangelising work, among some of the most dangerous and uncivilised tribes in africa, frequently spending a fortnight at a time away from their homes, on the waterways of a wild and dangerous country. in addition to going themselves, they send trained natives as evangelists and bible-readers, and keep a keen eye on the trained native, which means a considerable amount of worry and strain too. the work on the stations is heavy in ogowe districts, because when you have got a clearing made and all the buildings up, you have by no means finished with the affair, for you have to fight the ogowe forest back, as a dutchman fights the sea. but the main cause of work is the store, which in this exhausting climate is more than enough work for one man alone. payments on the ogowe are made in goods; the natives do not use any coinage-equivalent, save in the strange case of the fans, which does not touch general trade and which i will speak of later. they have not even the brass bars and cheetems that are in us in calabar, or cowries as in lagos. in order to expedite and simplify this goods traffic, a written or printed piece of paper is employed-- practically a cheque, which is called a "bon" or "book," and these "bons" are cashed--i.e. gooded, at the store. they are for three amounts. five fura = a dollar. one fura = a franc. desu = fifty centimes = half a fura. the value given for these "bons" is the same from government, trade, and mission. although the mission evangelique does not trade--i.e. buy produce and sell it at a profit, its representatives have a great deal of business to attend to through the store, which is practically a bank. all the native evangelists, black teachers, bible-readers and labourers on the stations are paid off in these bons; and when any representative of the mission is away on a journey, food bought for themselves and their canoe crews is paid for in bons, which are brought in by the natives at their convenience, and changed for goods at the store. therefore for several hours every weekday the missionary has to devote himself to store work, and store work out here is by no means playing at shop. it is very hard, tiring, exasperating work when you have to deal with it in full, as a trader, when it is necessary for you to purchase produce at a price that will give you a reasonable margin of profit over storing, customs' duties, shipping expenses, etc., etc. but it is quite enough to try the patience of any saint when you are only keeping store to pay on bons, a la missionary; for each class of article used in trade--and there are some hundreds of them--has a definite and acknowledged value, but where the trouble comes in is that different articles have the same value; for example, six fish hooks and one pocket-handkerchief have the same value, or you can make up that value in lucifer matches, pomatum, a mirror, a hair comb, tobacco, or scent in bottles. now, if you are a trader, certain of these articles cost you more than others, although they have an identical value to the native, and so it is to your advantage to pay what we should call, in cameroons, "a kru, cheap copper," and you have a lot of worry to effect this. to the missionary this does not so much matter. it makes absolutely no difference to the native, mind you; so he is by no means done by the trader. take powder for an example. there is no profit on powder for the trader in congo francais, but the native always wants it because he can get a tremendous profit on it from his black brethren in the bush; hence it pays the trader to give him his bon out in boma check, etc., better than in gunpowder. this is a fruitful spring of argument and persuasion. however, whether the native is passing in a bundle of rubber or a tooth of ivory, or merely cashing a bon for a week's bush catering, he is in congo francais incapable of deciding what he will have when it comes to the point. he comes into the shop with a bon in his hand, and we will say, for example, the idea in his head that he wants fish- hooks--"jupes," he calls them--but, confronted with the visible temptation of pomatum, he hesitates, and scratches his head violently. surrounding him there are ten or twenty other natives with their minds in a similar wavering state, but yet anxious to be served forthwith. in consequence of the stimulating scratch, he remembers that one of his wives said he was to bring some lucifer matches, another wanted cloth for herself, and another knew of some rubber she could buy very cheap, in tobacco, of a fan woman who had stolen it. this rubber he knows he can take to the trader's store and sell for pocket-handkerchiefs of a superior pattern, or gunpowder, or rum, which he cannot get at the mission store. he finally gets something and takes it home, and likely enough brings it back, in a day or so, somewhat damaged, desirous of changing it for some other article or articles. remember also that these bantu, like the negroes, think externally, in a loud voice; like mr. kipling's 'oont, "'e smells most awful vile," and, if he be a fan, he accompanies his observations with violent dramatic gestures, and let the customer's tribe or sex be what it may, the customer is sadly, sadly liable to pick up any portable object within reach, under the shadow of his companions' uproar, and stow it away in his armpits, between his legs, or, if his cloth be large enough, in that. picture to yourself the perplexities of a christian minister, engaged in such an occupation as storekeeping under these circumstances, with, likely enough, a touch of fever on him and jiggers in his feet; and when the store is closed the goods in it requiring constant vigilance to keep them free from mildew and white ants. then in addition to the store work, a fruitful source of work and worry are the schools, for both boys and girls. it is regarded as futile to attempt to get any real hold over the children unless they are removed from the influence of the country fashions that surround them in their village homes; therefore the schools are boarding; hence the entire care of the children, including feeding and clothing, falls on the missionary. the instruction given in the mission evangelique schools does not include teaching the boys trades. the girls fare somewhat better, as they get instruction in sewing and washing and ironing, but i think in this district the young ladies would be all the better for being taught cooking. it is strange that all the cooks employed by the europeans should be men, yet all the cooking among the natives themselves is done by women, and done abominably badly in all the bantu tribes i have ever come across; and the bantu are in this particular, and indeed in most particulars, far inferior to the true negro; though i must say this is not the orthodox view. the negroes cook uniformly very well, and at moments are inspired in the direction of palm-oil chop and fish cooking. not so the bantu, whose methods cry aloud for improvement, they having just the very easiest and laziest way possible of dealing with food. the food supply consists of plantain, yam, koko, sweet potatoes, maize, pumpkin, pineapple, and ochres, fish both wet and smoked, and flesh of many kinds--including human in certain districts--snails, snakes, and crayfish, and big maggot-like pupae of the rhinoceros beetle and the rhyncophorus palmatorum. for sweetmeats the sugar-cane abounds, but it is only used chewed au naturel. for seasoning there is that bark that tastes like an onion, an onion distinctly passe, but powerful and permanent, particularly if it has been used in one of the native- made, rough earthen pots. these pots have a very cave-man look about them; they are unglazed, unlidded bowls. they stand the fire wonderfully well, and you have got to stand, as well as you can, the taste of the aforesaid bark that clings to them, and that of the smoke which gets into them during cooking operations over an open wood fire, as well as the soot-like colour they impart to even your own white rice. out of all this varied material the natives of the congo francais forests produce, dirtily, carelessly and wastefully, a dull, indigestible diet. yam, sweet potatoes, ochres, and maize are not so much cultivated or used as among the negroes, and the daily food is practically plantain--picked while green and the rind pulled off, and the tasteless woolly interior baked or boiled and the widely distributed manioc treated in the usual way. the sweet or non-poisonous manioc i have rarely seen cultivated, because it gives a much smaller yield, and is much longer coming to perfection. the poisonous kind is that in general use; its great dahlia-like roots are soaked in water to remove the poisonous principle, and then dried and grated up, or more commonly beaten up into a kind of dough in a wooden trough that looks like a model canoe, with wooden clubs, which i have seen the curiosity hunter happily taking home as war clubs to alarm his family with. the thump, thump, thump of this manioc beating is one of the most familiar sounds in a bush village. the meal, when beaten up, is used for thickening broths, and rolled up into bolsters about a foot long and two inches in diameter, and then wrapped in plantain leaves, and tied round with tie-tie and boiled, or more properly speaking steamed, for a lot of the rolls are arranged in a brass skillet. a small quantity of water is poured over the rolls of plantain, a plantain leaf is tucked in over the top tightly, so as to prevent the steam from escaping, and the whole affair is poised on the three cooking-stones over a wood fire, and left there until the contents are done, or more properly speaking, until the lady in charge of it has delusions on the point, and the bottom rolls are a trifle burnt or the whole insufficiently cooked. this manioc meal is the staple food, the bread equivalent, all along the coast. as you pass along you are perpetually meeting with a new named food, fou-fou on the leeward, kank on the windward, m'vada in corisco, ogooma in the ogowe; but acquaintance with it demonstrates that it is all the same--manioc. it is a good food when it is properly prepared; but when a village has soaked its soil-laden manioc tubers in one and the same pool of water for years, the water in that pool becomes a trifle strong, and both it and the manioc get a smell which once smelt is never to be forgotten; it is something like that resulting from bad paste with a dash of vinegar, but fit to pass all these things, and has qualities of its own that have no civilised equivalent. i believe that this way of preparing the staple article of diet is largely responsible for that dire and frequent disease "cut him belly," and several other quaint disorders, possibly even for the sleep disease. the natives themselves say that a diet too exclusively maniocan produces dimness of vision, ending in blindness if the food is not varied; the poisonous principle cannot be anything like soaked out in the surcharged water, and the meal when it is made up and cooked has just the same sour, acrid taste you would expect it to have from the smell. the fish is boiled, or wrapped in leaves and baked. the dried fish, very properly known as stink-fish, is much preferred; this is either eaten as it is, or put into stews as seasoning, as also are the snails. the meat is eaten either fresh or smoked, boiled or baked. by baked i always mean just buried in the ground and a fire lighted on top, or wrapped in leaves and buried in hot embers. the smoked meat is badly prepared, just hung up in the smoke of the fires, which hardens it, blackening the outside quickly; but when the lumps are taken out of the smoke, in a short time cracks occur in them, and the interior part proceeds to go bad, and needless to say maggoty. if it is kept in the smoke, as it often is to keep it out of the way of dogs and driver ants, it acquires the toothsome taste and texture of a piece of old tarpaulin. now i will ask the surviving reader who has waded through this dissertation on cookery if something should not be done to improve the degraded condition of the bantu cooking culture? not for his physical delectation only, but because his present methods are bad for his morals, and drive the man to drink, let alone assisting in riveting him in the practice of polygamy, which the missionary party say is an exceedingly bad practice for him to follow. the inter- relationship of these two subjects may not seem on the face of it very clear, but inter-relationships of customs very rarely are; i well remember m. jacot coming home one day at kangwe from an evangelising visit to some adjacent fan towns, and saying he had had given to him that afternoon a new reason for polygamy, which was that it enabled a man to get enough to eat. this sounds sinister from a notoriously cannibal tribe; but the explanation is that the fans are an exceedingly hungry tribe, and require a great deal of providing for. it is their custom to eat about ten times a day when in village, and the men spend most of their time in the palaver- houses at each end of the street, the women bringing them bowls of food of one kind or another all day long. when the men are away in the forest rubber or elephant-hunting, and have to cook their own food, they cannot get quite so much; but when i have come across them on these expeditions, they halted pretty regularly every two hours and had a substantial snack, and the gorge they all go in for after a successful elephant hunt is a thing to see--once. there are other reasons which lead to the prevalence of this custom, beside the cooking. one is that it is totally impossible for one woman to do the whole work of a house--look after the children, prepare and cook the food, prepare the rubber, carry the same to the markets, fetch the daily supply of water from the stream, cultivate the plantation, etc., etc. perhaps i should say it is impossible for the dilatory african woman, for i once had an irish charwoman, who drank, who would have done the whole week's work of an african village in an afternoon, and then been quite fresh enough to knock some of the nonsense out of her husband's head with that of the broom, and throw a kettle of boiling water or a paraffin lamp at him, if she suspected him of flirting with other ladies. that woman, who deserves fame in the annals of her country, was named harragan. she has attained immortality some years since, by falling down stairs one saturday night from excitement arising from "the image's" (mr. harragan) conduct; but we have no mrs. harragan in africa. the african lady does not care a travelling whitesmith's execration if her husband does flirt, so long as he does not go and give to other women the cloth, etc., that she should have. the more wives the less work, says the african lady; and i have known men who would rather have had one wife and spent the rest of the money on themselves, in a civilised way, driven into polygamy by the women; and of course this state of affairs is most common in nonslave- holding tribes like the fan. mission work was first opened upon the ogowe by dr. nassau, the great pioneer and explorer of these regions. he was acting for the american presbyterian society; but when the french government demanded education in french in the schools, the stations on the ogowe, lembarene (kangwe), and talagouga were handed over to the mission evangelique of paris, and have been carried on by its representatives with great devotion and energy. i am unsympathetic, in some particulars, for reasons of my own, with christian missions, so my admiration for this one does not arise from the usual ground of admiration for missions, namely, that however they may be carried on, they are engaged in a great and holy work; but i regard the mission evangelique, judging from the results i have seen, as the perfection of what one may call a purely spiritual mission. lembarene is strictly speaking a district which includes adanlinan langa and the island, but the name is locally used to denote the great island in the ogowe, whose native name is nenge ezangy; but for the sake of the general reader i will keep to the everyday term of lembarene island. lembarene island is the largest of the islands on the ogowe. it is some fifteen miles long, east and west, and a mile to a mile and a half wide. it is hilly and rocky, uniformly clad with forest, and several little permanent streams run from it on both sides into the ogowe. it is situated miles from the sea, at the point, just below the entrance of the n'guni, where the ogowe commences to divide up into that network of channels by which, like all great west african rivers save the congo, it chooses to enter the ocean. the island, as we mainlanders at kangwe used to call it, was a great haunt of mine, particularly after i came down from talagouga and saw fit to regard myself as competent to control a canoe. from andande, the beach of kangwe, the breadth of the arm of the ogowe to the nearest village on the island, was about that of the thames at blackwall. one half of the way was slack water, the other half was broadside on to a stiff current. now my pet canoe at andande was about six feet long, pointed at both ends, flat bottomed, so that it floated on the top of the water; its freeboard was, when nothing was in it, some three inches, and the poor thing had seen trouble in its time, for it had a hole you could put your hand in at one end; so in order to navigate it successfully, you had to squat in the other, which immersed that to the water level but safely elevated the damaged end in the air. of course you had to stop in your end firmly, because if you went forward the hole went down into the water, and the water went into the hole, and forthwith you foundered with all hands--i.e., you and the paddle and the calabash baler. this craft also had a strong weather helm, owing to a warp in the tree of which it had been made. i learnt all these things one afternoon, paddling round the sandbank; and the next afternoon, feeling confident in the merits of my vessel, i started for the island, and i actually got there, and associated with the natives, but feeling my arms were permanently worn out by paddling against the current, i availed myself of the offer of a gentleman to paddle me back in his canoe. he introduced himself as samuel, and volunteered the statement that he was "a very good man." we duly settled ourselves in the canoe, he occupying the bow, i sitting in the middle, and a mrs. samuel sitting in the stern. mrs. samuel was a powerful, pretty lady, and a conscientious and continuous paddler. mr. s. was none of these things, but an ex-bible reader, with an amazing knowledge of english, which he spoke in a quaint, falsetto, far-away sort of voice, and that man's besetting sin was curiosity. "you be christian, ma?" said he. i asked him if he had ever met a white man who was not. "yes, ma," says samuel. i said "you must have been associating with people whom you ought not to know." samuel fortunately not having a repartee for this, paddled on with his long paddle for a few seconds. "where be your husband, ma?" was the next conversational bomb he hurled at me. "i no got one," i answer. "no got," says samuel, paralysed with astonishment; and as mrs. s., who did not know english, gave one of her vigorous drives with her paddle at this moment, samuel as near as possible got jerked head first into the ogowe, and we took on board about two bucketfuls of water. he recovered himself, however and returned to his charge. "no got one, ma?" "no," say i furiously. "do you get much rubber round here?" "i no be trade man," says samuel, refusing to fall into my trap for changing conversation. "why you no got one?" the remainder of the conversation is unreportable, but he landed me at andande all right, and got his dollar. the next voyage i made, which was on the next day, i decided to go by myself to the factory, which is on the other side of the island, and did so. i got some goods to buy fish with, and heard from mr. cockshut that the poor boy-agent at osoamokita, had committed suicide. it was a grievous thing. he was, as i have said, a bright, intelligent young frenchman; but living in the isolation, surrounded by savage, tiresome tribes, the strain of his responsibility had been too much for him. he had had a good deal of fever, and the very kindly head agent for woermann's had sent dr. pelessier to see if he had not better be invalided home; but he told the doctor he was much better, and as he had no one at home to go to he begged him not to send him, and the doctor, to his subsequent regret, gave in. no one knows, who has not been to west africa, how terrible is the life of a white man in one of these out-of-the-way factories, with no white society, and with nothing to look at, day out and day in, but the one set of objects--the forest, the river, and the beach, which in a place like osoamokita you cannot leave for months at a time, and of which you soon know every plank and stone. i felt utterly wretched as i started home again to come up to the end of the island, and go round it and down to andande; and paddled on for some little time, before i noticed that i was making absolutely no progress. i redoubled my exertions, and crept slowly up to some rocks projecting above the water; but pass them i could not, as the main current of the ogowe flew in hollow swirls round them against my canoe. several passing canoefuls of natives gave me good advice in igalwa; but facts were facts, and the ogowe was too strong for me. after about twenty minutes an old fan gentleman came down river in a canoe and gave me good advice in fan, and i got him to take me in tow--that is to say, he got into my canoe and i held on to his and we went back down river. i then saw his intention was to take me across to that disreputable village, half fan, half bakele, which is situated on the main bank of the river opposite the island; this i disapproved of, because i had heard that some senegal soldiers who had gone over there, had been stripped of every rag they had on, and maltreated; besides, it was growing very late, and i wanted to get home to dinner. i communicated my feelings to my pilot, who did not seem to understand at first, so i feared i should have to knock them into him with the paddle; but at last he understood i wanted to be landed on the island and duly landed me, when he seemed much surprised at the reward i gave him in pocket- handkerchiefs. then i got a powerful young igalwa dandy to paddle me home. i did not go to the island next day, but down below fula, watching the fish playing in the clear water, and the lizards and birds on the rocky high banks; but on my next journey round to the factories i got into another and a worse disaster. i went off there early one morning; and thinking the only trouble lay in getting back up the ogowe, and having developed a theory that this might be minimised by keeping very close to the island bank, i never gave a thought to dangers attributive to going down river; so, having by now acquired pace, my canoe shot out beyond the end rocks of the island into the main stream. it took me a second to realise what had happened, and another to find out i could not get the canoe out of the current without upsetting it, and that i could not force her back up the current, so there was nothing for it but to keep her head straight now she had bolted. a group of native ladies, who had followed my proceedings with much interest, shouted observations which i believe to have been "come back, come back; you'll be drowned." "good-bye, susannah, don't you weep for me," i courteously retorted; and flew past them and the factory beaches and things in general, keenly watching for my chance to run my canoe up a siding, as it were, off the current main line. i got it at last--a projecting spit of land from the island with rocks projecting out of the water in front of it bothered the current, and after a wild turn round or so, and a near call from my terrified canoe trying to climb up a rock, i got into slack water and took a pause in life's pleasures for a few minutes. knowing i must be near the end of the island, i went on pretty close to the bank, finally got round into the kangwe branch of the ogowe by a connecting creek, and after an hour's steady paddling i fell in with three big canoes going up river; they took me home as far as fula, whence a short paddle landed me at andande only slightly late for supper, convinced that it was almost as safe and far more amusing to be born lucky than wise. now i have described my circumnavigation of the island, i will proceed to describe its inhabitants. the up-river end of lembarene island is the most inhabited. a path round the upper part of the island passes through a succession of igalwa villages and by the roman catholic missionary station. the slave villages belonging to these igalwas are away down the north face of the island, opposite the fan town of fula, which i have mentioned. it strikes me as remarkable that the igalwa, like the dualla of cameroons, have their slaves in separate villages; but this is the case, though i do not know the reason of it. these igalwa slaves cultivate the plantations, and bring up the vegetables and fruit to their owners' villages and do the housework daily. the interior of the island is composed of high, rocky, heavily forested hills, with here and there a stream, and here and there a swamp; the higher land is towards the up-river end; down river there is a lower strip of land with hillocks. this is, i fancy, formed by deposits of sand, etc., catching in among the rocks, and connecting what were at one time several isolated islands. there are no big game or gorillas on the island, but it has a peculiar and awful house ant, much smaller than the driver ant, but with a venomous, bad bite; its only good point is that its chief food is the white ants, which are therefore kept in abeyance on lembarene island, although flourishing destructively on the mainland banks of the river in this locality. i was never tired of going and watching those igalwa villagers, nor were, i think, the igalwa villagers ever tired of observing me. although the physical conditions of life were practically identical with those of the mainland, the way in which the igalwas dealt with them, i.e. the culture, was distinct from the culture of the mainland fans. the igalwas are a tribe very nearly akin, if not ethnically identical with, the m'pongwe, and the culture of these two tribes is on a level with the highest native african culture. african culture, i may remark, varies just the same as european in this, that there is as much difference in the manners of life between, say, an igalwa and a bubi of fernando po, as there is between a londoner and a laplander. the igalwa builds his house like that of the m'pongwe, of bamboo, and he surrounds himself with european-made articles. the neat houses, fitted with windows, with wooden shutters to close at night, and with a deal door--a carpenter-made door--are in sharp contrast with the ragged ant-hill looking performances of the akkas, or the bark huts of the fan, with no windows, and just an extra broad bit of bark to slip across the hole that serves as a door. on going into an igalwa house you will see a four-legged table, often covered with a bright-coloured tablecloth, on which stands a water bottle, with two clean glasses, and round about you will see chairs--windsor chairs. these houses have usually three, sometimes more rooms, and a separate closed-in little kitchen, built apart, wherein you may observe european-made saucepans, in addition to the ubiquitous skillet. outside, all along the clean sandy streets, the inhabitants are seated. the igalwa is truly great at sitting, the men pursuing a policy of masterly inactivity, broken occasionally by leisurely netting a fishing net, the end of the netting hitched up on to the roof thatch, and not held by a stirrup. the ladies are employed in the manufacture of articles pertaining to a higher culture--i allude, as mr. micawber would say, to bed-quilts and pillow-cases--the most gorgeous bed-quilts and pillow-cases--made of patchwork, and now and again you will see a mosquito-bar in course of construction, of course not made of net or muslin because of the awesome strength and ferocity of the lembarene strain of mosquitoes, but of stout, fair-flowered and besprigged chintzes; and you will observe these things are often being sewn with a sewing machine. the women who may not be busy sewing are busy doing each other's hair. hair-dressing is quite an art among the igalwa and m'pongwe women, and their hair is very beautiful; very crinkly, but fine. it is plaited up, close to the head, partings between the plaits making elaborate parterres. into the beds of plaited hair are stuck long pins of river ivory (hippo), decorated with black tracery and openwork, and made by their good men. a lady will stick as many of these into her hair as she can get, but the prevailing mode is to have one stuck in behind each ear, showing their broad, long heads above like two horns; they are exceedingly becoming to these black but comely ladies, verily, i think, the comeliest ladies i have ever seen on the coast. very black they are, blacker than many of their neighbours, always blacker than the fans, and although their skin lacks that velvety pile of the true negro, it is not too shiny, but it is fine and usually unblemished, and their figures are charmingly rounded, their hands and feet small, almost as small as a high-class calabar woman's, and their eyes large, lustrous, soft and brown, and their teeth as white as the sea surf and undisfigured by filing. the native dress for men and women alike is the cloth or paun. the men wear it by rolling the upper line round the waist, and in addition they frequently wear a singlet or a flannel shirt worn more africano, flowing free. rich men will mount a european coat and hat, and men connected with the mission or trading stations occasionally wear trousers. the personal appearance of the men does not amount to much when all's done, so we will return to the ladies. they wrap the upper hem of these cloths round under the armpits, a graceful form of drapery, but one which requires continual readjustment. the cloth is about four yards long and two deep, and there is always round the hem a border, or false hem, of turkey red twill, or some other coloured cotton cloth to the main body of the paun. in addition to the cloth there is worn, when possible, a european shawl, either one of those thick cotton cloth ones printed with chinese-looking patterns in dull red on a dark ground, this sort is wrapped round the upper part of the body: or what is more highly esteemed is a bright, light-coloured, fancy wool shawl, pink or pale blue preferred, which being carefully folded into a roll is placed over one shoulder, and is entirely for dandy. i am thankful to say they do not go in for hats; when they wear anything on their heads it is a handkerchief folded shawl-wise; the base of the triangle is bound round the forehead just above the eyebrows, the ends carried round over the ears and tied behind over the apex of the triangle of the handkerchief, the three ends being then arranged fan-wise at the back. add to this costume a sober-coloured silk parasol, not one of your green or red young tent-like, brutally masculine, knobby-sticked umbrellas, but a fair, lady-like parasol, which, being carefully rolled up, is carried handle foremost right in the middle of the head, also for dandy. then a few strings of turquoise-blue beads, or imitation gold ones, worn round the shapely throat; and i will back my igalwa or m'pongwe belle against any of those south sea island young ladies we nowadays hear so much about, thanks to mr. stevenson, yea, even though these may be wreathed with fragrant flowers, and the african lady very rarely goes in for flowers. the only time i have seen the african ladies wearing them for ornament has been among these igalwas, who now and again stud their night-black hair with pretty little round vividly red blossoms in a most fetching way. i wonder the africans do not wear flowers more frequently, for they are devoted to scent, both men and women. the igalwas are a proud race, one of the noble tribes, like the m'pongwe and the ajumba. the women do not intermarry with lower- class tribes, and in their own tribe they are much restricted, owing to all relations on the mother's side being forbidden to intermarry. this well-known form of accounting relationships only through the mother (mutterrecht) is in a more perfected and elaborated form among the igalwa than among any other tribe i am personally acquainted with; brothers and cousins on the mother's side being in one class of relationship. the father's responsibility, as regards authority over his own children, is very slight. the really responsible male relative is the mother's elder brother. from him must leave to marry be obtained for either girl, or boy; to him and the mother must the present be taken which is exacted on the marriage of a girl; and should the mother die, on him and not on the father, lies the responsibility of rearing the children; they go to his house, and he treats and regards them as nearer and dearer to himself than his own children, and at his death, after his own brothers by the same mother, they become his heirs. marriage among the igalwa and m'pongwe is not direct marriage by purchase, but a certain fixed price present is made to the mother and uncle of the girl. other propitiatory presents (kueliki) are made, but do not count legally, and have not necessarily to be returned in case of post-nuptial differences arising leading to a divorce--a very frequent catastrophe in the social circle; for the igalwa ladies are spirited, and devoted to personal adornment, and they are naggers at their husbands. many times when walking on lembarene island, have i seen a lady stand in the street and let her husband, who had taken shelter inside the house, know what she thought of him, in a way that reminded me of some london slum scenes. when the husband loses his temper, as he surely does sooner or later, being a man, he whacks his wife--or wives, if they have been at him in a body. he may whack with impunity so long as he does not draw blood; if he does, be it never so little, his wife is off to her relations, the present he has given for her is returned, the marriage is annulled, and she can re-marry as soon as she is able. her relations are only too glad to get her, because, although the present has to be returned, yet the propitiatory offerings remain theirs, and they know more propitiatory offerings as well as another present will accrue with the next set of suitors. this of course is only the case with the younger women; the older women for one thing do not nag so much, and moreover they have usually children willing and able to support them. if they have not, their state is, like that of all old childless women in africa, a very desolate one. infant marriage is now in vogue among the igalwa, and to my surprise i find it is of quite recent introduction and adoption. their own account of this retrograde movement in culture is that in the last generation--some of the old people indeed claim to have known him-- there was an exceedingly ugly and deformed man who could not get a wife, the women being then, as the men are now, great admirers of physical beauty. so this man, being very cunning, hit on the idea of becoming betrothed to one before she could exercise her own choice in the matter; and knowing a family in which an interesting event was likely to occur, he made heavy presents in the proper quarters and bespoke the coming infant if it should be a girl. a girl it was, and thus, say the igalwa, arose the custom; and nowadays, although they do not engage their wives so early as did the founder of the custom, they adopt infant marriage as an institution. i inquired carefully, in the interests of ethnology, as to what methods of courting were in vogue previously. they said people married each other because they loved each other. i hope other ethnologists will follow this inquiry up, for we may here find a real golden age, which in other races of humanity lies away in the mists of the ages behind the kitchen middens and the cambrian rocks. my own opinion in this matter is that the earlier courting methods of the igalwa involved a certain amount of effort on the man's part, a thing abhorrent to an igalwa. it necessitated his dressing himself up, and likely enough fighting that impudent scoundrel who was engaged in courting her too; and above all serenading her at night on the native harp, with its strings made from the tendrils of a certain orchid, or on the marimba, amongst crowds of mosquitoes. any institution that involved being out at night amongst crowds of those lembarene mosquitoes would have to disappear, let that institution be what it might. the igalwa are one of the dying-out coast tribes. as well as on lembarene island, their villages are scattered along the banks of the lower ogowe, and on the shores and islands of eliva z'onlange. on the island they are, so far, undisturbed by the fan invasion, and laze their lives away like lotus-eaters. their slaves work their large plantations, and bring up to them magnificent yams, ready prepared ogooma, sweet-potatoes, papaw, etc., not forgetting that delicacy odeaka cheese; this is not an exclusive inspiration of theirs, for the m'pongwe and the benga use it as well. it is made from the kernel of the wild mango, a singularly beautiful tree of great size and stately spread of foliage. i can compare it only in appearance and habit of growth to our irish, or evergreen, oak, but it is an idealisation of that fine tree. its leaves are a softer, brighter, deeper green, and in due season (august) it is covered-- not ostentatiously like the real mango, with great spikes of bloom, looking each like a gigantic head of mignonette--but with small yellow-green flowers tucked away under the leaves, filling the air with a soft sweet perfume, and then falling on to the bare shaded ground beneath to make a deep-piled carpet. i do not know whether it is a mango tree at all, for i am no botanist: but anyhow the fruit is rather like that of the mango in external appearance, and in internal still more so, for it has a disproportionately large stone. these stones are cracked, and the kernel taken out. the kernels are spread a short time in the shade to dry; then they are beaten up into a pulp with a wooden pestle, and the pulp put into a basket lined carefully with plantain leaves and placed in the sun, which melts it up into a stiff mass. the basket is then removed from the sun and stood aside to cool. when cool, the cheese can be turned out in shape, and can be kept a long time if it is wrapped round with leaves and a cloth, and hung up inside the house. its appearance is that of almond rock, and it is cut easily with a knife; but at any period of its existence, if it is left in the sun it melts again rapidly into an oily mass. the natives use it as a seasoning in their cookery, stuffing fish and plantains with it and so on, using it also in the preparation of a sort of sea-pie they make with meat and fish. to make this, a thing well worth doing, particularly with hippo or other coarse meat, reduce the wood fire to embers, and make plantain leaves into a sort of bag, or cup; small pieces of the meat should then be packed in layers with red pepper and odeaka in between. the tops of the leaves are then tied together with fine tie-tie, and the bundle, without any saucepan of any kind, stood on the glowing embers, the cook taking care there is no flame. the meat is done, and a superb gravy formed, before the containing plantain leaves are burnt through--plantain leaves will stand an amazing lot in the way of fire. this dish is really excellent, even when made with python, hippo, or crocodile. it makes the former most palatable; but of course it does not remove the musky taste from crocodile; nothing i know of will. the great and important difference between the m'pongwe, { } igalwa, and ajumba fetish, and the fetish of those tribes round them, consists in their conception of a certain spirit called o mbuiri. they have, as is constant among the bantu races of south- west africa, a great god--the creator, a god who has made all things, and who now no longer takes any interest in the things he has created. their name for this god is anyambie, which when pronounced sounds to my ears like anlynlae--the l's being very weak,--the derivation of this name, however, is from anyima a spirit, and mbia, good. this god, unlike other forms of the creating god in fetish, has a viceroy or minister who is a god he has created, and to whom he leaves the government of affairs. this god is o mbuiri or o mbwiri, and this o mbwiri is of very high interest to the student of comparative fetish. he has never been, nor can he ever become, a man, i.e. be born as a man, but he can transfuse with his own personality that of human beings, and also the souls of all those things we white men regard as inanimate, such as rocks, trees, etc., in a similar manner. the m'pongwe know that his residence is in the sea, and some of them have seen him as an old white man, not flesh-colour white, but chalk white. there is another important point here, but it wants a volume to itself, so i must pass it. o mbuiri's appearance in a corporeal form denotes ill luck, not death to the seer, but misfortune of a severe and diffused character. the ruin of a trading enterprise, the destruction of a village or a family, are put down to o mbuiri's action. yet he is not regarded as a malevolent god, a devil, but as an avenger, or punisher of sin; and the m'pongwe look on him as the being to whom they primarily owe the good things and fortunes of this life, and as the being who alone has power to govern the host of truly malevolent spirits that exist in nature. the different instruments with which he works in the shaping of human destiny bear his name when in his employ. when acting by means of water, he is o mbuiri aningo; when in the weather, o mbuiri ngali; when in the forests, o mbuiri ibaka; when in the form of a dwarf, o mbuiri akoa, and so on. the great difference between o mbuiri and the lesser spirits is this: --the lesser spirits cannot incarnate themselves except through extraneous things; o mbuiri can, he can become visible without anything beyond his own will to do so. the other spirits must be in something to become visible. this is an extremely delicate piece of fetish which it took me weeks to work out. i think i may say another thing about o mbuiri, though i say it carefully, and that is, that among the m'pongwe and the tribe who are the parent tribe of the m'pongwe--the now rapidly dying out ajumba, and their allied tribe the igalwa--o mbuiri is a distinct entity, while among the neighbouring tribes he is a class, i.e. there are hundreds of o mbuiri or ibwiri, one for every remarkable place or thing, such as rock, tree, or forest thicket, and for every dangerous place in a river. had i not observed a similar state of affairs regarding sasabonsum, a totally different kind of spirit on the windward coast, i should have had even greater trouble than i had, in finding a key to what seemed at first a mass of conflicting details regarding this important spirit o mbuiri. there is one other very important point in m'pongwe fetish; and that is that the souls of men exist before birth as well as after death. this is indeed, as far as i have been able to find out, a doctrine universally held by the west african tribes, but among the m'pongwe there is this modification in it, which agrees strangely well with the idea i found regarding reincarnated diseases, existent among the okyon tribes (pure negroes). the malevolent minor spirits are capable of being born with, what we will call, a man's soul, as well as going in with the man's soul during sleep. for example, an olaga may be born with a man and that man will thereby be born mad; he may at any period of his life, given certain conditions, become possessed by an evil spirit, onlogho abambo, injembe, nkandada, and become mad, or ill; but if he is born mad, or sickly, one of the evil spirits such as an olaga or an obambo, the soul of a man that has not been buried properly, has been born with him. the rest of the m'pongwe fetish is on broad lines common to other tribes, so i relegate it to the general collection of notes on fetish. m'pongwe jurisprudence is founded on the same ideas as those on which west african jurisprudence at large is founded, but it is so elaborated that it would be desecration to sketch it. it requires a massive monograph. chapter vii. on the way from kangwe to lake ncovi. in which the voyager goes for bush again and wanders into a new lake and a new river. july nd, .--left kangwe. the four ajumba { } did not turn up early in the morning as had been arranged, but arrived about eight, in pouring rain, so decided to wait until two o'clock, which will give us time to reach their town of arevooma before nightfall, and may perhaps give us a chance of arriving there dry. at two we start. we go down river on the kangwe side of lembarene island, make a pause in front of the igalwa slave town, which is on the island and nearly opposite the fan town of fula on the mainland bank, our motive being to get stores of yam and plantain--and magnificent specimens of both we get--and then, when our canoe is laden with them to an extent that would get us into trouble under the act if it ran here, off we go again. every canoe we meet shouts us a greeting, and asks where we are going, and we say "rembwe"--and they say "what! rembwe!"--and we say "yes, rembwe," and paddle on. i lay among the luggage for about an hour, not taking much interest in the rembwe or anything else, save my own headache; but this soon lifted, and i was able to take notice, just before we reached the ajumba's town, called arevooma. the sandbanks stretch across the river here nearly awash, so all our cargo of yams has to be thrown overboard on to the sand, from which they can be collected by being waded out to. the canoe, thus lightened, is able to go on a little further, but we are soon hard and fast again, and the crew have to jump out and shove her off about once every five minutes, and then to look lively about jumping back into her again, as she shoots over the cliffs of the sandbanks. when we reach arevooma, i find it is a very prettily situated town, on the left-hand bank of the river--clean and well kept, and composed of houses built on the igalwa and m'pongwe plan with walls of split bamboo and a palm thatch roof. i own i did not much care for these ajumbas on starting, but they are evidently going to be kind and pleasant companions. one of them is a gentlemanly-looking man, who wears a gray shirt; another looks like a genial irishman who has accidentally got black, very black; he is distinguished by wearing a singlet; another is a thin, elderly man, notably silent; and the remaining one is a strapping, big fellow, as black as a wolf's mouth, of gigantic muscular development, and wearing quantities of fetish charms hung about him. the two first mentioned are christians; the other two pagans, and i will refer to them by their characteristic points, for their honourable names are awfully alike when you do hear them, and, as is usual with africans, rarely used in conversation. gray shirt places his house at my disposal, and both he and his exceedingly pretty wife do their utmost to make me comfortable. the house lies at the west end of the town. it is one room inside, but has, i believe, a separate cooking shed. in the verandah in front is placed a table, an ivory bundle chair and a gourd of water, and i am also treated to a calico tablecloth, and most thoughtfully screened off from the public gaze with more calico so that i can have my tea in privacy. after this meal, to my surprise ndaka turns up. certainly he is one of the very ugliest men--black or white--i have ever seen, and i fancy one of the best. he is now on a holiday from kangwe, seeing to the settlement of his dead brother's affairs. the dead brother was a great man in arevooma and a pagan, but ndaka, the christian bible-reader, seems to get on perfectly with the family and is holding tonight a meeting outside his brother's house and comes with a lantern to fetch me to attend it. of course i have to go, headache or no headache. most of the town was there, mainly as spectators. ndaka and my two christian boatmen manage the service between them, and what with the hymns and the mosquitoes the experience is slightly awful. we sit in a line in front of the house, which is brilliantly lit up--our own lantern on the ground before us acting as a rival entertainment to the house lamps inside for some of the best insect society in africa, who after the manner of the insect world, insist on regarding us as responsible for their own idiocy in getting singed; and sting us in revenge, while we slap hard, as we howl hymns in the fearful igalwa and m'pongwe way. next to an english picnic, the most uncomfortable thing i know is an open-air service in this part of africa. service being over, ndaka takes me over the house to show its splendours. the great brilliancy of its illumination arises from its being lit by two hanging lamps burning paraffin oil. the most remarkable point about the house is the floor, which is made of split, plaited bamboo. it gives under your feet in an alarming way, being raised some three or four feet above the ground, and i am haunted by the fear that i shall go through it and give pain to myself, and great trouble to others before i could be got out. it is a beautiful piece of workmanship, and arevooma has every reason to be proud of it. having admired these things, i go, dead tired and still headachy, down the road with my host who carries the lantern, through an atmosphere that has per cent. of solid matter in the shape of mosquitoes; then wishing him good-night, i shut myself in, and illuminate, humbly, with a candle. the furniture of the house consists mainly of boxes, containing the wealth of gray shirt, in clothes, mirrors, etc. one corner of the room is taken up by great calabashes full of some sort of liquor, and there is an ivory bundle chair, a hanging mirror, several rusty guns, and a considerable collection of china basins and jugs. evidently gray shirt is rich. the most interesting article to me, however, just now is the bed hung over with a clean, substantial, chintz mosquito bar, and spread with clean calico and adorned with patchwork-covered pillows. so i take off my boots and put on my slippers; for it never does in this country to leave off boots altogether at anytime and risk getting bitten by mosquitoes on the feet, when you are on the march; because the rub of your boot on the bite always produces a sore, and a sore when it comes in the gorilla country, comes to stay. no sooner have i carefully swished all the mosquitoes from under the bar and turned in, than a cat scratches and mews at the door--turn out and let her in. she is evidently a pet, so i take her on to the bed with me. she is a very nice cat--sandy and fat--and if i held the opinion of pythagoras concerning wild fowl, i should have no hesitation in saying she had in her the soul of dame juliana berners, such a whole-souled devotion to sport does she display, dashing out through the flaps of the mosquito bar after rats which, amid squeals from the rats and curses from her, she kills amongst the china collection. then she comes to me, triumphant, expecting congratulations, and accompanied by mosquitoes, and purrs and kneads upon my chest until she hears another rat. tuesday, july rd.--am aroused by violent knocking at the door in the early gray dawn--so violent that two large centipedes and a scorpion drop on to the bed. they have evidently been tucked away among the folds of the bar all night. well "when ignorance is bliss 'tis folly to be wise," particularly along here. i get up without delay, and find myself quite well. the cat has thrown a basin of water neatly over into my bag during her nocturnal hunts; and when my tea comes i am informed a man "done die" in the night, which explains the firing of guns i heard. i inquire what he has died of, and am told "he just truck luck, and then he die." his widows are having their faces painted white by sympathetic lady friends, and are attired in their oldest, dirtiest clothes, and but very few of them; still, they seem to be taking things in a resigned spirit. these ajumba seem pleasant folk. they play with their pretty brown children in a taking way. last night i noticed some men and women playing a game new to me, which consisted in throwing a hoop at each other. the point was to get the hoop to fall over your adversary's head. it is a cheerful game. quantities of the common house-fly about--and, during the early part of the morning, it rains in a gentle kind of way; but soon after we are afloat in our canoe it turns into a soft white mist. we paddle still westwards down the broad quiet waters of the o'rembo vongo. i notice great quantities of birds about here--great hornbills, vividly coloured kingfishers, and for the first time the great vulture i have often heard of, and the skin of which i will take home before i mention even its approximate spread of wing. there are also noble white cranes, and flocks of small black and white birds, new to me, with heavy razor-shaped bills, reminding one of the devonian puffin. the hornbill is perhaps the most striking in appearance. it is the size of a small, or say a good-sized hen turkey. gray shirt says the flocks, which are of eight or ten, always have the same quantity of cocks and hens, and that they live together "white man fashion," i.e. each couple keeping together. they certainly do a great deal of courting, the cock filling out his wattles on his neck like a turkey, and spreading out his tail with great pomp and ceremony, but very awkwardly. to see hornbills on a bare sandbank is a solemn sight, but when they are dodging about in the hippo grass they sink ceremony, and roll and waddle, looking--my man said--for snakes and the little sand-fish, which are close in under the bank; and their killing way of dropping their jaws--i should say opening their bills--when they are alarmed is comic. i think this has something to do with their hearing, for i often saw two or three of them in a line on a long branch, standing, stretched up to their full height, their great eyes opened wide, and all with their great beaks open, evidently listening for something. their cry is most peculiar and can only be mistaken for a native horn; and although there seems little variety in it to my ear, there must be more to theirs, for they will carry on long confabulations with each other across a river, and, i believe, sit up half the night and talk scandal. there were plenty of plantain-eaters here, but, although their screech was as appalling as i have heard in angola, they were not regarded, by the ajumba at any rate, as being birds of evil omen, as they are in angola. still, by no means all the birds here only screech and squark. several of them have very lovely notes. there is one who always gives a series of infinitely beautiful, soft, rich-toned whistles just before the first light of the dawn shows in the sky, and one at least who has a prolonged and very lovely song. this bird, i was told in gaboon, is called telephonus erythropterus. i expect an ornithologist would enjoy himself here, but i cannot-- and will not--collect birds. i hate to have them killed any how, and particularly in the barbarous way in which these natives kill them. the broad stretch of water looks like a long lake. in all directions sandbanks are showing their broad yellow backs, and there will be more showing soon, for it is not yet the height of the dry. we are perpetually grounding on those which by next month will be above water. these canoes are built, i believe, more with a view to taking sandbanks comfortably than anything else; but they are by no means yet sufficiently specialised for getting off them. their flat bottoms enable them to glide on to the banks, and sit there, without either upsetting or cutting into the sand, as a canoe with a keel would; but the trouble comes in when you are getting off the steep edge of the bank, and the usual form it takes is upsetting. so far my ajumba friends have only tried to meet this difficulty by tying the cargo in. i try to get up the geography of this region conscientiously. fortunately i find gray shirt, singlet, and pagan can speak trade english. none of them, however, seem to recognise a single blessed name on the chart, which is saying nothing against the chart and its makers, who probably got their names up from m'pongwes and igalwas instead of ajumba, as i am trying to. geographical research in this region is fraught with difficulty, i find, owing to different tribes calling one and the same place by different names; and i am sure the royal geographical society ought to insert among their "hints" that every traveller in this region should carefully learn every separate native word, or set of words, signifying "i don't know,"--four villages and two rivers i have come across out here solemnly set down with various forms of this statement, for their native name. really i think the old portuguese way of naming places after saints, etc., was wiser in the long run, and it was certainly pleasanter to the ear. my ajumba, however, know about my ngambi and the vinue all right and eliva z'ayzingo, so i must try and get cross bearings from these. we have an addition to our crew this morning--a man who wants to go and get work at john holt's sub-factory away on the rembwe. he has been waiting a long while at arevooma, unable to get across, i am told, because the road is now stopped between ayzingo and the rembwe by "those fearful fans." "how are we going to get through that way?" says i, with natural feminine alarm. "we are not, sir," says gray shirt. this is what lady macdonald would term a chatty little incident; and my hair begins to rise as i remember what i have been told about those fans and the indications i have already seen of its being true when on the upper ogowe. now here we are going to try to get through the heart of their country, far from a french station, and without the french flag. why did i not obey mr. hudson's orders not to go wandering about in a reckless way! anyhow i am in for it, and fortune favours the brave. the only question is: do i individually come under this class? i go into details. it seems pagan thinks he can depend on the friendship of two fans he once met and did business with, and who now live on an island in lake ncovi-- ncovi is not down on my map and i have never heard of it before-- anyhow thither we are bound now. each man has brought with him his best gun, loaded to the muzzle, and tied on to the baggage against which i am leaning--the muzzles sticking out each side of my head: the flint locks covered with cases, or sheaths, made of the black-haired skins of gorillas, leopard skin, and a beautiful bright bay skin, which i do not know, which they say is bush cow--but they call half a dozen things bush cow. these guns are not the "gas-pipes" i have seen up north; but decent rifles which have had the rifling filed out and the locks replaced by flint locks and converted into muzzle loaders, and many of them have beautiful barrels. i find the ajumba name for the beautiful shrub that has long bunches of red, yellow and cream- coloured young leaves at the end of its branches is "obaa." i also learn that in their language ebony and a monkey have one name. the forest on either bank is very lovely. some enormously high columns of green are formed by a sort of climbing plant having taken possession of lightning-struck trees, and in one place it really looks exactly as if some one had spread a great green coverlet over the forest, so as to keep it dry. no high land showing in any direction. pagan tells me the extinguisher-shaped juju filled with medicine and made of iron is against drowning--the red juju is "for keep foot in path." beautiful effect of a gleam of sunshine lighting up a red sandbank till it glows like the nibelungen gold. indeed the effects are turneresque to-day owing to the mist, and the sun playing in and out among it. the sandbanks now have their cliffs to the n.n.w. and n.w. at . , the broad river in front of us is apparently closed by sandbanks which run out from the banks thus: - yellow} s. bank bright-red} n. bank. yellow} current running strong along south bank. this bank bears testimony of this also being the case in the wet season, for a fringe of torn- down trees hangs from it into the river. pass seke, a town on north bank, interchanging the usual observations regarding our destination. the river seems absolutely barred with sand again; but as we paddle down it, the obstructions resolve themselves into spits of sand from the north bank and the largest island in mid-stream, which also has a long tail, or train, of sandbank down river. here we meet a picturesque series of canoes, fruit and trade laden, being poled up stream, one man with his pole over one side, the other with his pole over the other, making a st. andrew's cross as you meet them end on. most luxurious, charming, and pleasant trip this. the men are standing up swinging in rhythmic motion their long, rich red wood paddles in perfect time to their elaborate melancholy, minor key boat song. nearly lost with all hands. sandbank palaver--only when we were going over the end of it, the canoe slips sideways over its edge. river deep, bottom sand and mud. this information may be interesting to the geologist, but i hope i shall not be converted by circumstances into a human sounding apparatus again to-day. next time she strikes i shall get out and shove behind. we are now skirting the real north bank, and not the bank of an island or islands as we have been for some time heretofore. lovely stream falls into this river over cascades. the water is now rough in a small way and the width of the river great, but it soon is crowded again with wooded islands. there are patches and wreaths of a lovely, vermilion-flowering bush rope decorating the forest, and now and again clumps of a plant that shows a yellow and crimson spike of bloom, very strikingly beautiful. we pass a long tunnel in the bush, quite dark as you look down it--evidently the path to some native town. the south bank is covered, where the falling waters have exposed it, with hippo grass. terrible lot of mangrove flies about, although we are more than one hundred miles above the mangrove belt. river broad again--tending w.s.w., with a broad flattened island with attributive sandbanks in the middle. the fair way is along the south bank of the river. gray shirt tells me this river is called the o'rembo vongo, or small river, so as to distinguish it from the main stream of the ogowe which goes down past the south side of lembarene island, as well i know after that canoe affair of mine. ayzingo now bears due north--and native mahogany is called "okooma." pass village called welli on north bank. it looks like some gipsy caravans stuck on poles. i expect that village has known what it means to be swamped by the rising river; it looks as if it had, very hastily in the middle of some night, taken to stilts, which i am sure, from their present rickety condition, will not last through the next wet season, and then some unfortunate spirit will get the blame of the collapse. i also learn that it is the natal spot of my friend kabinda, the carpenter at andande. now if some of these good people i know would only go and distinguish themselves, i might write a sort of county family history of these parts; but they don't, and i fancy won't. for example, the entrance--or should i say the exit?--of a broadish little river is just away on the south bank. if you go up this river--it runs s.e.--you get to a good-sized lake; in this lake there is an island called adole; then out of the other side of the lake there is another river which falls into the ogowe main stream-- but that is not the point of the story, which is that on that island of adole, ngouta, the interpreter, first saw the light. why he ever did--there or anywhere--heaven only knows! i know i shall never want to write his biography. on the western bank end of that river going to adole, there is an igalwa town, notable for a large quantity of fine white ducks and a clump of indian bamboo. my informants say, "no white man ever live for this place," so i suppose the ducks and bamboo have been imported by some black trader whose natal spot this is. the name of this village is wanderegwoma. stuck on sandbank--i flew out and shoved behind, leaving ngouta to do the balancing performances in the stern. this o'rembo vongo divides up just below here, i am told, when we have re-embarked, into three streams. one goes into the main ogowe opposite ayshouka in nkami country--nkami country commences at ayshouka and goes to the sea--one into the ngumbi, and one into the nunghi--all in the ouroungou country. ayzingo now lies n.e. according to gray shirt's arm. on our river there is here another broad low island with its gold-coloured banks shining out, seemingly barring the entire channel, but there is really a canoe channel along by both banks. we turn at this point into a river on the north bank that runs north and south--the current is running very swift to the north. we run down into it, and then, it being more than time enough for chop, we push the canoe on to a sandbank in our new river, which i am told is the karkola. i, after having had my tea, wander off, and find behind our high sandbank, which like all the other sandbanks above water now, is getting grown over with hippo grass--a fine light green grass, the beloved food of both hippo and manatee--a forest, and entering this i notice a succession of strange mounds or heaps, made up of branches, twigs, and leaves, and dead flowers. many of these heaps are recent, while others have fallen into decay. investigation shows they are burial places. among the debris of an old one there are human bones, and out from one of the new ones comes a stench and a hurrying, exceedingly busy line of ants, demonstrating what is going on. i own i thought these mounds were some kind of bird's or animal's nest. they look entirely unhuman in this desolate reach of forest. leaving these, i go down to the water edge of the sand, and find in it a quantity of pools of varying breadth and expanse, but each surrounded by a rim of dark red-brown deposit, which you can lift off the sand in a skin. on the top of the water is a film of exquisite iridescent colours like those on a soap bubble, only darker and brighter. in the river alongside the sand, there are thousands of those beautiful little fish with a black line each side of their tails. they are perfectly tame, and i feed them with crumbs in my hand. after making every effort to terrify the unknown object containing the food--gallant bulls, quite two inches long, sidling up and snapping at my fingers- -they come and feed right in the palm, so that i could have caught them by the handful had i wished. there are also a lot of those weird, semi-transparent, yellow, spotted little sandfish with cup- shaped pectoral fins, which i see they use to enable them to make their astoundingly long leaps. these fish are of a more nervous and distrustful disposition, and hover round my hand but will not come into it. indeed i do not believe the other cheeky little fellows would allow them to. the men, having had their rest and their pipes, shout for me, and off we go again. the karkola { } soon widens to about feet; it is evidently very deep here; the right bank (the east) is forested, the left, low and shrubbed, one patch looking as if it were being cleared for a plantation, but no village showing. a big rock shows up on the right bank, which is a change from the clay and sand, and soon the whole character of the landscape changes. we come to a sharp turn in the river, from north and south to east and west--the current very swift. the river channel dodges round against a big bank of sword grass, and then widens out to the breadth of the thames at putney. i am told that a river runs out of it here to the west to ouroungou country, and so i imagine this karkola falls ultimately into the nazareth. we skirt the eastern banks, which are covered with low grass with a scanty lot of trees along the top. high land shows in the distance to the s.s.w. and s.w., and then we suddenly turn up into a broad river or straith, shaping our course n.n.e. on the opposite bank, on a high dwarf cliff, is a fan town. "all fan now," says singlet in anything but a gratified tone of voice. it is a strange, wild, lonely bit of the world we are now in, apparently a lake or broad--full of sandbanks, some bare and some in the course of developing into permanent islands by the growth on them of that floating coarse grass, any joint of which being torn off either by the current, a passing canoe, or hippos, floats down and grows wherever it settles. like most things that float in these parts, it usually settles on a sandbank, and then grows in much the same way as our couch grass grows on land in england, so as to form a network, which catches for its adopted sandbank all sorts of floating debris; so the sandbank comes up in the world. the waters of the wet season when they rise drown off the grass; but when they fall, up it comes again from the root, and so gradually the sandbank becomes an island and persuades real trees and shrubs to come and grow on it, and its future is then secured. we skirt alongside a great young island of this class; the sword grass some ten or fifteen feet high. it has not got any trees on it yet, but by next season or so it doubtless will have. the grass is stabbled down into paths by hippos, and just as i have realised who are the road-makers, they appear in person. one immense fellow, hearing us, stands up and shows himself about six feet from us in the grass, gazes calmly, and then yawns a yawn a yard wide and grunts his news to his companions, some of whom--there is evidently a large herd--get up and stroll towards us with all the flowing grace of pantechnicon vans in motion. we put our helm paddles hard a starboard and leave that bank. our hasty trip across to the bank of the island on the other side being accomplished, we, in search of seclusion and in the hope that out of sight would mean out of mind to hippos, shot down a narrow channel between semi-island sandbanks, and those sandbanks, if you please, are covered with specimens--as fine a set of specimens as you could wish for--of the west african crocodile. these interesting animals are also having their siestas, lying sprawling in all directions on the sand, with their mouths wide open. one immense old lady has a family of lively young crocodiles running over her, evidently playing like a lot of kittens. the heavy musky smell they give off is most repulsive, but we do not rise up and make a row about this, because we feel hopelessly in the wrong in intruding into these family scenes uninvited, and so apologetically pole ourselves along rapidly, not even singing. the pace the canoe goes down that channel would be a wonder to henley regatta. when out of ear-shot i ask pagan whether there are many gorillas, elephants, or bush cows round here. "plenty too much," says he; and it occurs to me that the corn-fields are growing golden green away in england; and soon there rises up in my mental vision a picture that fascinated my youth in the fliegende blatter, representing "friedrich gerstaeker auf der reise." that gallant man is depicted tramping on a serpent, new to m. boulenger, while he attempts to club, with the butt end of his gun, a most lively savage who, accompanied by a bison, is attacking him in front. a terrific and obviously enthusiastic crocodile is grabbing the tail of the explorer's coat, and the explorer says "hurrah! das gibt wieder einen prachtigen artikel fur die allgemeine zeitung." i do not know where in the world gerstaeker was at the time, but i should fancy hereabouts. my vigorous and lively conscience also reminds me that the last words a most distinguished and valued scientific friend had said to me before i left home was, "always take measurements, miss kingsley, and always take them from the adult male." i know i have neglected opportunities of carrying this commission out on both those banks, but i do not feel like going back. besides, the men would not like it, and i have mislaid my yard measure. the extent of water, dotted with sandbanks and islands in all directions, here is great, and seems to be fringed uniformly by low swampy land, beyond which, to the north, rounded lumps of hills show blue. on one of the islands is a little white house which i am told was once occupied by a black trader for john holt. it looks a desolate place for any man to live in, and the way the crocodiles and hippo must have come up on the garden ground in the evening time could not have enhanced its charms to the average cautious man. my men say, "no man live for that place now." the factory, i believe, has been, for some trade reason, abandoned. behind it is a great clump of dark-coloured trees. the rest of the island is now covered with hippo grass looking like a beautifully kept lawn. we lie up for a short rest at another island, also a weird spot in its way, for it is covered with a grove of only one kind of tree, which has a twisted, contorted, gray-white trunk and dull, lifeless-looking, green, hard foliage. i learn that these good people, to make topographical confusion worse confounded, call a river by one name when you are going up it, and by another when you are coming down; just as if you called the thames the london when you were going up, and the greenwich when you were coming down. the banks all round this lake or broad, seem all light-coloured sand and clay. we pass out of it into a channel. current flowing north. as we are entering the channel between banks of grass-overgrown sand, a superb white crane is seen standing on the sand edge to the left. gray shirt attempts to get a shot at it, but it--alarmed at our unusual appearance--raises itself up with one of those graceful preliminary curtseys, and after one or two preliminary flaps spreads its broad wings and sweeps away, with its long legs trailing behind it like a thing on a japanese screen. the river into which we ran zigzags about, and then takes a course s.s.e. it is studded with islands slightly higher than those we have passed, and thinly clad with forest. the place seems alive with birds; flocks of pelican and crane rise up before us out of the grass, and every now and then a crocodile slides off the bank into the water. wonderfully like old logs they look, particularly when you see one letting himself roll and float down on the current. in spite of these interests i began to wonder where in this lonely land we were to sleep to-night. in front of us were miles of distant mountains, but in no direction the slightest sign of human habitation. soon we passed out of our channel into a lovely, strangely melancholy, lonely-looking lake--lake ncovi, my friends tell me. it is exceedingly beautiful. the rich golden sunlight of the late afternoon soon followed by the short-lived, glorious flushes of colour of the sunset and the after-glow, play over the scene as we paddle across the lake to the n.n.e.--our canoe leaving a long trail of frosted silver behind her as she glides over the mirror-like water, and each stroke of the paddle sending down air with it to come up again in luminous silver bubbles--not as before in swirls of sand and mud. the lake shore is, in all directions, wreathed with nobly forested hills, indigo and purple in the dying daylight. on the n.n.e. and n.e. these come directly down into the lake; on n.w., n., s.w., and s.e. there is a band of well-forested ground, behind which they rise. in the north and north-eastern part of the lake several exceedingly beautiful wooded islands show, with gray rocky beaches and dwarf cliffs. sign of human habitation at first there was none; and in spite of its beauty, there was something which i was almost going to say was repulsive. the men evidently felt the same as i did. had any one told me that the air that lay on the lake was poison, or that in among its forests lay some path to regions of utter death, i should have said--"it looks like that"; but no one said anything, and we only looked round uneasily, until the comfortable-souled singlet made the unfortunate observation that he "smelt blood." { } we all called him an utter fool to relieve our minds, and made our way towards the second island. when we got near enough to it to see details, a large village showed among the trees on its summit, and a steep dwarf cliff, overgrown with trees and creeping plants came down to a small beach covered with large water-washed gray stones. there was evidently some kind of a row going on in that village, that took a lot of shouting too. we made straight for the beach, and drove our canoe among its outlying rocks, and then each of my men stowed his paddle quickly, slung on his ammunition bag, and picked up his ready loaded gun, sliding the skin sheath off the lock. pagan got out on to the stones alongside the canoe just as the inhabitants became aware of our arrival, and, abandoning what i hope was a mass meeting to remonstrate with the local authorities on the insanitary state of the town, came--a brown mass of naked humanity--down the steep cliff path to attend to us, whom they evidently regarded as an imperial interest. things did not look restful, nor these fans personally pleasant. every man among them-- no women showed--was armed with a gun, and they loosened their shovel-shaped knives in their sheaths as they came, evidently regarding a fight quite as imminent as we did. they drew up about twenty paces from us in silence. pagan and gray shirt, who had joined him, held out their unembarrassed hands, and shouted out the name of the fan man they had said they were friendly with: "kiva- kiva." the fans stood still and talked angrily among themselves for some minutes, and then, silence said to me, "it would be bad palaver if kiva no live for this place," in a tone that conveyed to me the idea he thought this unpleasant contingency almost a certainty. the passenger exhibited unmistakable symptoms of wishing he had come by another boat. i got up from my seat in the bottom of the canoe and leisurely strolled ashore, saying to the line of angry faces "m'boloani" in an unconcerned way, although i well knew it was etiquette for them to salute first. they grunted, but did not commit themselves further. a minute after they parted to allow a fine-looking, middle-aged man, naked save for a twist of dirty cloth round his loins and a bunch of leopard and wild cat tails hung from his shoulder by a strip of leopard skin, to come forward. pagan went for him with a rush, as if he were going to clasp him to his ample bosom, but holding his hands just off from touching the fan's shoulder in the usual way, while he said in fan, "don't you know me, my beloved kiva? surely you have not forgotten your old friend?" kiva grunted feelingly, and raised up his hands and held them just off touching pagan, and we breathed again. then gray shirt made a rush at the crowd and went through great demonstrations of affection with another gentleman whom he recognised as being a fan friend of his own, and whom he had not expected to meet here. i looked round to see if there was not any fan from the upper ogowe whom i knew to go for, but could not see one that i could on the strength of a previous acquaintance, and on their individual merits i did not feel inclined to do even this fashionable imitation embrace. indeed i must say that never--even in a picture book--have i seen such a set of wild wicked-looking savages as those we faced this night, and with whom it was touch-and-go for twenty of the longest minutes i have ever lived, whether we fought--for our lives, i was going to say, but it would not have been even for that, but merely for the price of them. peace having been proclaimed, conversation became general. gray shirt brought his friend up and introduced him to me, and we shook hands and smiled at each other in the conventional way. pagan's friend, who was next introduced, was more alarming, for he held his hands for half a minute just above my elbows without quite touching me, but he meant well; and then we all disappeared into a brown mass of humanity and a fog of noise. you would have thought, from the violence and vehemence of the shouting and gesticulation, that we were going to be forthwith torn to shreds; but not a single hand really touched me, and as i, pagan, and gray shirt went up to the town in the midst of the throng, the crowd opened in front and closed in behind, evidently half frightened at my appearance. the row when we reached the town redoubled in volume from the fact that the ladies, the children, and the dogs joined in. every child in the place as soon as it saw my white face let a howl out of it as if it had seen his satanic majesty, horns, hoofs, tail and all, and fled into the nearest hut, headlong, and i fear, from the continuance of the screams, had fits. the town was exceedingly filthy--the remains of the crocodile they had been eating the week before last, and piles of fish offal, and remains of an elephant, hippo or manatee--i really can't say which, decomposition was too far advanced--united to form a most impressive stench. the bark huts are, as usual in a fan town, in unbroken rows; but there are three or four streets here, not one only, as in most cases. the palaver house is in the innermost street, and there we went, and noticed that the village view was not in the direction in which we had come, but across towards the other side of the lake. i told the ajumba to explain we wanted hospitality for the night, and wished to hire three carriers for to-morrow to go with us to the rembwe. for an hour and three-quarters by my watch i stood in the suffocating, smoky, hot atmosphere listening to, but only faintly understanding, the war of words and gesture that raged round us. at last the fact that we were to be received being settled, gray shirt's friend led us out of the guard house--the crowd flinching back as i came through it--to his own house on the right-hand side of the street of huts. it was a very different dwelling to gray shirt's residence at arevooma. i was as high as its roof ridge and had to stoop low to get through the door-hole. inside, the hut was fourteen or fifteen feet square, unlit by any window. the door-hole could be closed by pushing a broad piece of bark across it under two horizontally fixed bits of stick. the floor was sand like the street outside, but dirtier. on it in one place was a fire, whose smoke found its way out through the roof. in one corner of the room was a rough bench of wood, which from the few filthy cloths on it and a wood pillow i saw was the bed. there was no other furniture in the hut save some boxes, which i presume held my host's earthly possessions. from the bamboo roof hung a long stick with hooks on it, the hooks made by cutting off branching twigs. this was evidently the hanging wardrobe, and on it hung some few fetish charms, and a beautiful ornament of wild cat and leopard tails, tied on to a square piece of leopard skin, in the centre of which was a little mirror, and round the mirror were sewn dozens of common shirt buttons. in among the tails hung three little brass bells and a brass rattle; these bells and rattles are not only "for dandy," but serve to scare away snakes when the ornament is worn in the forest. a fine strip of silky-haired, young gorilla skin made the band to sling the ornament from the shoulder when worn. gorillas seem well enough known round here. one old lady in the crowd outside, i saw, had a necklace made of sixteen gorilla canine teeth slung on a pine- apple fibre string. gray shirt explained to me that this is the best house in the village, and my host the most renowned elephant hunter in the district. we then returned to the canoe, whose occupants had been getting uneasy about the way affairs were going "on top," on account of the uproar they heard and the time we had been away. we got into the canoe and took her round the little promontory at the end of the island to the other beach, which is the main beach. by arriving at the beach when we did, we took our fan friends in the rear, and they did not see us coming in the gloaming. this was all for the best, it seems, as they said they should have fired on us before they had had time to see we were rank outsiders, on the apprehension that we were coming from one of the fan towns we had passed, and with whom they were on bad terms regarding a lady who bolted there from her lawful lord, taking with her--cautious soul!--a quantity of rubber. the only white man who had been here before in the memory of man, was a french officer who paid kiva six dollars to take him somewhere, i was told--but i could not find out when, or what happened to that frenchman. { } it was a long time ago, kiva said, but these folks have no definite way of expressing duration of time nor, do i believe, any great mental idea of it; although their ideas are, as usual with west africans, far ahead of their language. all the goods were brought up to my hut, and while ngouta gets my tea we started talking the carrier palaver again. the fans received my offer, starting at two dollars ahead of what m. jacot said would be enough, with utter scorn, and every dramatic gesture of dissent; one man, pretending to catch gray shirt's words in his hands, flings them to the ground and stamps them under his feet. i affected an easy take-it-or-leave-it-manner, and looked on. a woman came out of the crowd to me, and held out a mass of slimy gray abomination on a bit of plantain leaf--smashed snail. i accepted it and gave her fish hooks. she was delighted and her companions excited, so she put the hooks into her mouth for safe keeping. i hurriedly explained in my best fan that i do not require any more snail; so another lady tried the effect of a pine-apple. there might be no end to this, so i retired into trade and asked what she would sell it for. she did not want to sell it--she wanted to give it me; so i gave her fish hooks. silence and singlet interposed, saying the price for pine-apples is one leaf of tobacco, but i explained i was not buying. ngouta turned up with my tea, so i went inside, and had it on the bed. the door-hole was entirely filled with a mosaic of faces, but no one attempted to come in. all the time the carrier palaver went on without cessation, and i went out and offered to take gray shirt's and pagan's place, knowing they must want their chop, but they refused relief, and also said i must not raise the price; i was offering too big a price now, and if i once rise the fan will only think i will keep on rising, and so make the palaver longer to talk. "how long does a palaver usually take to talk round here?" i ask. "the last one i talked," says pagan, "took three weeks, and that was only a small price palaver." "well," say i, "my price is for a start to-morrow--after then i have no price--after that i go away." another hour however sees the jam made, and to my surprise i find the three richest men in this town of m'fetta have personally taken up the contract--kiva my host, fika a fine young fellow, and wiki, another noted elephant hunter. these three fans, the four ajumba and the igalwa, ngouta, i think will be enough. moreover i fancy it safer not to have an overpowering percentage of fans in the party, as i know we shall have considerable stretches of uninhabited forest to traverse; and the ajumba say that the fans will kill people, i.e. the black traders who venture into their country, and cut them up into neat pieces, eat what they want at the time, and smoke the rest of the bodies for future use. now i do not want to arrive at the rembwe in a smoked condition, even should my fragments be neat, and i am going in a different direction to what i said i was when leaving kangwe, and there are so many ways of accounting for death about here--leopard, canoe capsize, elephants, etc.--that even if i were traced--well, nothing could be done then, anyhow--so will only take three fans. one must diminish dead certainties to the level of sporting chances along here, or one can never get on. no one, either ajumba or fan, knew the exact course we were to take. the ajumba had never been this way before--the way for black traders across being via lake ayzingo, the way mr. goode of the american mission once went, and the fans said they only knew the way to a big fan town called efoua, where no white man or black trader had yet been. there is a path from there to the rembwe they knew, because the efoua people take their trade all to the rembwe. they would, they said, come with me all the way if i would guarantee them safety if they "found war" on the road. this i agreed to do, and arranged to pay off at hatton and cookson's subfactory on the rembwe, and they have "look my mouth and it be sweet, so palaver done set." every load then, by the light of the bush lights held by the women, we arranged. i had to unpack my bottles of fishes so as to equalise the weight of the loads. every load is then made into a sort of cocoon with bush rope. i was left in peace at about . p.m., and clearing off the clothes from the bench threw myself down and tried to get some sleep, for we were to start, the fans said, before dawn. sleep impossible--mosquitoes! lice!!--so at . i got up and slid aside my bark door. i found pagan asleep under his mosquito bar outside, across the doorway, but managed to get past him without rousing him from his dreams of palaver which he was still talking aloud, and reconnoitred the town. the inhabitants seemed to have talked themselves quite out and were sleeping heavily. i went down then to our canoe and found it safe, high up among the fan canoes on the stones, and then i slid a small fan canoe off, and taking a paddle from a cluster stuck in the sand, paddled out on to the dark lake. it was a wonderfully lovely quiet night with no light save that from the stars. one immense planet shone pre-eminent in the purple sky, throwing a golden path down on to the still waters. quantities of big fish sprung out of the water, their glistening silver-white scales flashing so that they look like slashing swords. some bird was making a long, low boom-booming sound away on the forest shore. i paddled leisurely across the lake to the shore on the right, and seeing crawling on the ground some large glow-worms, drove the canoe on to the bank among some hippo grass, and got out to get them. while engaged on this hunt i felt the earth quiver under my feet, and heard a soft big soughing sound, and looking round saw i had dropped in on a hippo banquet. i made out five of the immense brutes round me, so i softly returned to the canoe and shoved off, stealing along the bank, paddling under water, until i deemed it safe to run out across the lake for my island. i reached the other end of it to that on which the village is situated; and finding a miniature rocky bay with a soft patch of sand and no hippo grass, the incidents of the fan hut suggested the advisability of a bath. moreover, there was no china collection in that hut, and it would be a long time before i got another chance, so i go ashore again, and, carefully investigating the neighbourhood to make certain there was no human habitation near, i then indulged in a wash in peace. drying one's self on one's cummerbund is not pure joy, but it can be done when you put your mind to it. while i was finishing my toilet i saw a strange thing happen. down through the forest on the lake bank opposite came a violet ball the size of a small orange. when it reached the sand beach it hovered along it to and fro close to the ground. in a few minutes another ball of similarly coloured light came towards it from behind one of the islets, and the two waver to and fro over the beach, sometimes circling round each other. i made off towards them in the canoe, thinking--as i still do--they were some brand new kind of luminous insect. when i got on to their beach one of them went off into the bushes and the other away over the water. i followed in the canoe, for the water here is very deep, and, when i almost thought i had got it, it went down into the water and i could see it glowing as it sunk until it vanished in the depths. i made my way back hastily, fearing my absence with the canoe might give rise, if discovered, to trouble, and by . i was back in the hut safe, but not so comfortable as i had been on the lake. a little before five my men are stirring and i get my tea. i do not state my escapade to them, but ask what those lights were. "akom," said the fan, and pointing to the shore of the lake where i had been during the night they said, "they came there, it was an 'aku'"--or devil bush. more than ever did i regret not having secured one of those sort of two phenomena. what a joy a real devil, appropriately put up in raw alcohol, would have been to my scientific friends! wednesday, july th.--we get away about . , the fans coming in a separate canoe. we call at the next island to m'fetta to buy some more aguma. the inhabitants are very much interested in my appearance, running along the stony beach as we paddle away, and standing at the end of it until we are out of sight among the many islands at the n.e. end of lake ncovi. the scenery is savage; there are no terrific cliffs nor towering mountains to make it what one usually calls wild or romantic, but there is a distinction about it which is all its own. this n.e. end has beautiful sand beaches on the southern side, in front of the forested bank, lying in smooth ribbons along the level shore, and in scollops round the promontories where the hills come down into the lake. the forest on these hills, or mountains--for they are part of the sierra del cristal--is very dark in colour, and the undergrowth seems scant. we presently come to a narrow but deep channel into the lake coming from the eastward, which we go up, winding our course with it into a valley between the hills. after going up it a little way we find it completely fenced across with stout stakes, a space being left open in the middle, broader than the spaces between the other stakes; and over this is poised a spear with a bush rope attached, and weighted at the top of the haft with a great lump of rock. the whole affair is kept in position by a bush rope so arranged just under the level of the water that anything passing through the opening would bring the spear down. this was a trap for hippo or manatee (ngany 'imanga), and similar in structure to those one sees set in the hippo grass near villages and plantations, which serve the double purpose of defending the vegetable supply, and adding to the meat supply of the inhabitants. we squeeze through between the stakes so as not to let the trap off, and find our little river leads us into another lake, much smaller than ncovi. it is studded with islands of fantastic shapes, all wooded with high trees of an equal level, and with little or no undergrowth among them, so their pale gray stems look like clusters of columns supporting a dark green ceiling. the forest comes down steep hill sides to the water edge in all directions; and a dark gloomy-looking herb grows up out of black slime and water, in a bank or ribbon in front of it. there is another channel out of this lake, still to the n.e. the fans say they think it goes into the big lake far far away, i.e., lake ayzingo. from the look of the land, i think this river connecting ayzingo and lake ncovi wanders down this valley between the mountain spurs of the sierra del cristal, expanding into one gloomy lake after another. we run our canoe into a bank of the dank dark- coloured water herb to the right, and disembark into a fitting introduction to the sort of country we shall have to deal with before we see the rembwe--namely, up to our knees in black slime. chapter viii. from ncovi to esoon. concerning the way in which the voyager goes from the island of m'fetta to no one knows exactly where, in doubtful and bad company, and of what this led to and giving also some accounts of the great forest and of those people that live therein. i will not bore you with my diary in detail regarding our land journey, because the water-washed little volume attributive to this period is mainly full of reports of law cases, for reasons hereinafter to be stated; and at night, when passing through this bit of country, i was usually too tired to do anything more than make an entry such as: " s., r. a., n.e ebony. t. - , etc., etc."--entries that require amplification to explain their significance, and i will proceed to explain. our first day's march was a very long one. path in the ordinary acceptance of the term there was none. hour after hour, mile after mile, we passed on, in the under-gloom of the great forest. the pace made by the fans, who are infinitely the most rapid africans i have ever come across, severely tired the ajumba, who are canoe men, and who had been as fresh as paint, after their exceedingly long day's paddling from arevooma to m'fetta. ngouta, the igalwa interpreter, felt pumped, and said as much, very early in the day. i regretted very much having brought him; for, from a mixture of nervous exhaustion arising from our m'fetta experiences, and a touch of chill he had almost entirely lost his voice, and i feared would fall sick. the fans were evidently quite at home in the forest, and strode on over fallen trees and rocks with an easy, graceful stride. what saved us weaklings was the fans' appetites; every two hours they sat down, and had a snack of a pound or so of meat and aguma apiece, followed by a pipe of tobacco. we used to come up with them at these halts. ngouta and the ajumba used to sit down, and rest with them, and i also, for a few minutes, for a rest and chat, and then i would go on alone, thus getting a good start. i got a good start, in the other meaning of the word, on the afternoon of the first day when descending into a ravine. i saw in the bottom, wading and rolling in the mud, a herd of five elephants. i remembered, hastily, that your one chance when charged by several elephants is to dodge them round trees, working down wind all the time, until they lose smell and sight of you, then to lie quiet for a time, and go home. it was evident from the utter unconcern of these monsters that i was down wind now, so i had only to attend to dodging, and i promptly dodged round a tree, and lay down. seeing they still displayed no emotion on my account, and fascinated by the novelty of the scene, i crept forward from one tree to another, until i was close enough to have hit the nearest one with a stone, and spats of mud, which they sent flying with their stamping and wallowing came flap, flap among the bushes covering me. one big fellow had a nice pair of lb. or so tusks on him, singularly straight, and another had one big curved tusk and one broken one. some of them lay right down like pigs in the deeper part of the swamp, some drew up trunkfuls of water and syringed themselves and each other, and every one of them indulged in a good rub against a tree. presently when they had had enough of it they all strolled off up wind, through the bush in indian file, now and then breaking off a branch, but leaving singularly little dead water for their tonnage and breadth of beam. when they had gone i rose up, turned round to find the men, and trod on kiva's back then and there, full and fair, and fell sideways down the steep hillside until i fetched up among some roots. it seems kiva had come on, after his meal, before the others, and seeing the elephants, and being a born hunter, had crawled like me down to look at them. he had not expected to find me there, he said. i do not believe he gave a thought of any sort to me in the presence of these fascinating creatures, and so he got himself trodden on. i suggested to him we should pile the baggage, and go and have an elephant hunt. he shook his head reluctantly, saying "kor, kor," like a depressed rook, and explained we were not strong enough; there were only three fans--the ajumba, and ngouta did not count--and moreover that we had not brought sufficient ammunition owing to the baggage having to be carried, and the ammunition that we had must be saved for other game than elephant, for we might meet war before we met the rembwe river. we had by now joined the rest of the party, and were all soon squattering about on our own account in the elephant bath. it was shocking bad going--like a ploughed field exaggerated by a terrific nightmare. it pretty nearly pulled all the legs off me, and to this hour i cannot tell you if it is best to put your foot into a footmark--a young pond, i mean--about the size of the bottom of a madeira work arm-chair, or whether you should poise yourself on the rim of the same, and stride forward to its other bank boldly and hopefully. the footmarks and the places where the elephants had been rolling were by now filled with water, and the mud underneath was in places hard and slippery. in spite of my determination to preserve an awesome and unmoved calm while among these dangerous savages, i had to give way and laugh explosively; to see the portly, powerful pagan suddenly convert himself into a quadruped, while gray shirt poised himself on one heel and waved his other leg in the air to advertise to the assembled nations that he was about to sit down, was irresistible. no one made such palaver about taking a seat as gray shirt; i did it repeatedly without any fuss to speak of. that lordly elephant-hunter, the great wiki, would, i fancy, have strode over safely and with dignity, but the man who was in front of him spun round on his own axis and flung his arms round the fan, and they went to earth together; the heavy load on wiki's back drove them into the mud like a pile-driver. however we got through in time, and after i had got up the other side of the ravine i saw the fan let the ajumba go on, and were busy searching themselves for something. i followed the ajumba, and before i joined them felt a fearful pricking irritation. investigation of the affected part showed a tick of terrific size with its head embedded in the flesh; pursuing this interesting subject, i found three more, and had awfully hard work to get them off and painful too for they give one not only a feeling of irritation at their holding-on place, but a streak of rheumatic-feeling pain up from it. on completing operations i went on and came upon the ajumba in a state more approved of by praxiteles than by the general public nowadays. they had found out about elephant ticks, so i went on and got an excellent start for the next stage. by this time, shortly after noon on the first day, we had struck into a mountainous and rocky country, and also struck a track--a track you had to keep your eye on or you lost it in a minute, but still a guide as to direction. the forest trees here were mainly ebony and great hard wood trees, { } with no palms save my old enemy the climbing palm, calamus, as usual, going on its long excursions, up one tree and down another, bursting into a plume of fronds, and in the middle of each plume one long spike sticking straight up, which was an unopened frond, whenever it got a gleam of sunshine; running along the ground over anything it meets, rock or fallen timber, all alike, its long, dark- coloured, rope-like stem simply furred with thorns. immense must be the length of some of these climbing palms. one tree i noticed that day that had hanging from its summit, a good one hundred and fifty feet above us, a long straight ropelike palm stem. the character of the whole forest was very interesting. sometimes for hours we passed among thousands upon thousands of gray-white columns of uniform height (about - feet); at the top of these the boughs branched out and interlaced among each other, forming a canopy or ceiling, which dimmed the light even of the equatorial sun to such an extent that no undergrowth could thrive in the gloom. the statement of the struggle for existence was published here in plain figures, but it was not, as in our climate, a struggle against climate mainly, but an internecine war from over population. now and again we passed among vast stems of buttressed trees, sometimes enormous in girth; and from their far-away summits hung great bush- ropes, some as straight as plumb lines, others coiled round, and intertwined among each other, until one could fancy one was looking on some mighty battle between armies of gigantic serpents, that had been arrested at its height by some magic spell. all these bush- ropes were as bare of foliage as a ship's wire rigging, but a good many had thorns. i was very curious as to how they got up straight, and investigation showed me that many of them were carried up with a growing tree. the only true climbers were the calamus and the rubber vine (landolphia), both of which employ hook tackle. some stretches of this forest were made up of thin, spindly stemmed trees of great height, and among these stretches i always noticed the ruins of some forest giant, whose death by lightning or by his superior height having given the demoniac tornado wind an extra grip on him, had allowed sunlight to penetrate the lower regions of the forest; and then evidently the seedlings and saplings, who had for years been living a half-starved life for light, shot up. they seemed to know that their one chance lay in getting with the greatest rapidity to the level of the top of the forest. no time to grow fat in the stem. no time to send out side branches, or any of those vanities. up, up to the light level, and he among them who reached it first won in this game of life or death; for when he gets there he spreads out his crown of upper branches, and shuts off the life-giving sunshine from his competitors, who pale off and die, or remain dragging on an attenuated existence waiting for another chance, and waiting sometimes for centuries. there must be tens of thousands of seeds which perish before they get their chance; but the way the seeds of the hard wood african trees are packed, as it were in cases specially made durable, is very wonderful. indeed the ways of providence here are wonderful in their strange dual intention to preserve and to destroy; but on the whole, as peer gynt truly observes, "ein guter wirth--nein das ist er nicht." we saw this influence of light on a large scale as soon as we reached the open hills and mountains of the sierra del cristal, and had to pass over those fearful avalanche-like timber falls on their steep sides. the worst of these lay between efoua and egaja, where we struck a part of the range that was exposed to the south-east. these falls had evidently arisen from the tornados, which from time to time have hurled down the gigantic trees whose hold on the superficial soil over the sheets of hard bed rock was insufficient, in spite of all the anchors they had out in the shape of roots and buttresses, and all their rigging in the shape of bush ropes. down they had come, crushing and dragging down with them those near them or bound to them by the great tough climbers. getting over these falls was perilous, not to say scratchy work. one or another member of our party always went through; and precious uncomfortable going it was, i found, when i tried it in one above egaja; ten or twelve feet of crashing creaking timber, and then flump on to a lot of rotten, wet debris, with more snakes and centipedes among it than you had any immediate use for, even though you were a collector; but there you had to stay, while wiki, who was a most critical connoisseur, selected from the surrounding forest a bush-rope that he regarded as the correct remedy for the case, and then up you were hauled, through the sticks you had turned the wrong way on your down journey. the duke had a bad fall, going twenty feet or so before he found the rubbish heap; while fika, who went through with a heavy load on his back, took us, on one occasion, half an hour to recover; and when we had just got him to the top, and able to cling on to the upper sticks, wiki, who had been superintending operations, slipped backwards, and went through on his own account. the bush-rope we had been hauling on was too worn with the load to use again, and we just hauled wiki out with the first one we could drag down and cut; and wiki, when he came up, said we were reckless, and knew nothing of bush ropes, which shows how ungrateful an african can be. it makes the perspiration run down my nose whenever i think of it. the sun was out that day; we were neatly situated on the equator, and the air was semisolid, with the stinking exhalations from the swamps with which the mountain chain is fringed and intersected; and we were hot enough without these things, because of the violent exertion of getting these twelve to thirteen-stone gentlemen up among us again, and the fine varied exercise of getting over the fall on our own account. when we got into the cool forest beyond it was delightful; particularly if it happened to be one of those lovely stretches of forest, gloomy down below, but giving hints that far away above us was a world of bloom and scent and beauty which we saw as much of as earth-worms in a flower-bed. here and there the ground was strewn with great cast blossoms, thick, wax-like, glorious cups of orange and crimson and pure white, each one of which was in itself a handful, and which told us that some of the trees around us were showing a glory of colour to heaven alone. sprinkled among them were bunches of pure stephanotis-like flowers, which said that the gaunt bush-ropes were rubber vines that had burst into flower when they had seen the sun. these flowers we came across in nearly every type of forest all the way, for rubber abounds here. i will weary you no longer now with the different kinds of forest and only tell you i have let you off several. the natives have separate names for seven different kinds, and these might, i think, be easily run up to nine. a certain sort of friendship soon arose between the fans and me. we each recognised that we belonged to that same section of the human race with whom it is better to drink than to fight. we knew we would each have killed the other, if sufficient inducement were offered, and so we took a certain amount of care that the inducement should not arise. gray shirt and pagan also, their trade friends, the fans treated with an independent sort of courtesy; but silence, singlet, the passenger, and above all ngouta, they openly did not care a row of pins for, and i have small doubt that had it not been for us other three they would have killed and eaten these very amiable gentlemen with as much compunction as an english sportsman would kill as many rabbits. they on their part hated the fan, and never lost an opportunity of telling me "these fan be bad man too much." i must not forget to mention the other member of our party, a fan gentleman with the manners of a duke and the habits of a dustbin. he came with us, quite uninvited by me, and never asked for any pay; i think he only wanted to see the fun, and drop in for a fight if there was one going on, and to pick up the pieces generally. he was evidently a man of some importance from the way the others treated him; and moreover he had a splendid gun, with a gorilla skin sheath for its lock, and ornamented all over its stock with brass nails. his costume consisted of a small piece of dirty rag round his loins; and whenever we were going through dense undergrowth, or wading a swamp, he wore that filament tucked up scandalously short. whenever we were sitting down in the forest having one of our nondescript meals, he always sat next to me and appropriated the tin. then he would fill his pipe, and turning to me with the easy grace of aristocracy, would say what may be translated as "my dear princess, could you favour me with a lucifer?" i used to say, "my dear duke, charmed, i'm sure," and give him one ready lit. i dared not trust him with the box whole, having a personal conviction that he would have kept it. i asked him what he would do suppose i was not there with a box of lucifers; and he produced a bush-cow's horn with a neat wood lid tied on with tie tie, and from out of it he produced a flint and steel and demonstrated. the first day in the forest we came across a snake { }--a beauty with a new red-brown and yellow-patterned velvety skin, about three feet six inches long and as thick as a man's thigh. ngouta met it, hanging from a bough, and shot backwards like a lobster, ngouta having among his many weaknesses a rooted horror of snakes. this snake the ogowe natives all hold in great aversion. for the bite of other sorts of snakes they profess to have remedies, but for this they have none. if, however, a native is stung by one he usually conceals the fact that it was this particular kind, and tries to get any chance the native doctor's medicine may give. the duke stepped forward and with one blow flattened its head against the tree with his gun butt, and then folded the snake up and got as much of it as possible into his bag, while the rest hung dangling out. ngouta, not being able to keep ahead of the duke, his grace's pace being stiff, went to the extreme rear of the party, so that other people might be killed first if the snake returned to life, as he surmised it would. he fell into other dangers from this caution, but i cannot chronicle ngouta's afflictions in full without running this book into an old fashioned folio size. we had the snake for supper, that is to say the fan and i; the others would not touch it, although a good snake, properly cooked, is one of the best meats one gets out here, far and away better than the african fowl. the fans also did their best to educate me in every way: they told me their names for things, while i told them mine. i found several european words already slightly altered in use among them, such as "amuck"--a mug, "alas"--a glass, a tumbler. i do not know whether their "ami"--a person addressed, or spoken of--is french or not. it may come from "anwe"--m'pongwe for "ye," "you." they use it as a rule in addressing a person after the phrase they always open up conversation with, "azuna"--listen, or i am speaking. they also showed me many things: how to light a fire from the pith of a certain tree, which was useful to me in after life, but they rather overdid this branch of instruction one way and another; for example, wiki had, as above indicated, a mania for bush-ropes and a marvellous eye and knowledge of them; he would pick out from among the thousands surrounding us now one of such peculiar suppleness that you could wind it round anything, like a strip of cloth, and as strong withal as a hawser; or again another which has a certain stiffness, combined with a slight elastic spring, excellent for hauling, with the ease and accuracy of a lady who picks out the particular twisted strand of embroidery silk from a multi-coloured tangled ball. he would go into the bush after them while other people were resting, and particularly after the sort which, when split, is bright yellow, and very supple and excellent to tie round loads. on one occasion, between egaja and esoon, he came back from one of these quests and wanted me to come and see something, very quietly; i went, and we crept down into a rocky ravine, on the other side of which lay one of the outermost egaja plantations. when we got to the edge of the cleared ground, we lay down, and wormed our way, with elaborate caution, among a patch of koko; wiki first, i following in his trail. after about fifty yards of this, wiki sank flat, and i saw before me some thirty yards off, busily employed in pulling down plantains, and other depredations, five gorillas: one old male, one young male, and three females. one of these had clinging to her a young fellow, with beautiful wavy black hair with just a kink in it. the big male was crouching on his haunches, with his long arms hanging down on either side, with the backs of his hands on the ground, the palms upwards. the elder lady was tearing to pieces and eating a pine-apple, while the others were at the plantains destroying more than they ate. they kept up a sort of a whinnying, chattering noise, quite different from the sound i have heard gorillas give when enraged, or from the one you can hear them giving when they are what the natives call "dancing" at night. i noticed that their reach of arm was immense, and that when they went from one tree to another, they squattered across the open ground in a most inelegant style, dragging their long arms with the knuckles downwards. i should think the big male and female were over six feet each. the others would be from four to five. i put out my hand and laid it on wiki's gun to prevent him from firing, and he, thinking i was going to fire, gripped my wrist. i watched the gorillas with great interest for a few seconds, until i heard wiki make a peculiar small sound, and looking at him saw his face was working in an awful way as he clutched his throat with his hand violently. heavens! think i, this gentleman's going to have a fit; it's lost we are entirely this time. he rolled his head to and fro, and then buried his face into a heap of dried rubbish at the foot of a plantain stem, clasped his hands over it, and gave an explosive sneeze. the gorillas let go all, raised themselves up for a second, gave a quaint sound between a bark and a howl, and then the ladies and the young gentleman started home. the old male rose to his full height (it struck me at the time this was a matter of ten feet at least, but for scientific purposes allowance must be made for a lady's emotions) and looked straight towards us, or rather towards where that sound came from. wiki went off into a paroxysm of falsetto sneezes the like of which i have never heard; nor evidently had the gorilla, who doubtless thinking, as one of his black co- relatives would have thought, that the phenomenon favoured duppy, went off after his family with a celerity that was amazing the moment he touched the forest, and disappeared as they had, swinging himself along through it from bough to bough, in a way that convinced me that, given the necessity of getting about in tropical forests, man has made a mistake in getting his arms shortened. i have seen many wild animals in their native wilds, but never have i seen anything to equal gorillas going through bush; it is a graceful, powerful, superbly perfect hand-trapeze performance. { } after this sporting adventure, we returned, as i usually return from a sporting adventure, without measurements or the body. our first day's march, though the longest, was the easiest, though, providentially i did not know this at the time. from my woermann road walks i judge it was well twenty-five miles. it was easiest however, from its lying for the greater part of the way through the gloomy type of forest. all day long we never saw the sky once. the earlier part of the day we were steadily going up hill, here and there making a small descent, and then up again, until we came on to what was apparently a long ridge, for on either side of us we could look down into deep, dark, ravine-like valleys. twice or thrice we descended into these to cross them, finding at their bottom a small or large swamp with a river running through its midst. those rivers all went to lake ayzingo. we had to hurry because kiva, who was the only one among us who had been to efoua, said that unless we did we should not reach efoua that night. i said, "why not stay for bush?" not having contracted any love for a night in a fan town by the experience of m'fetta; moreover the fans were not sure that after all the whole party of us might not spend the evening at efoua, when we did get there, simmering in its cooking-pots. ngouta, i may remark, had no doubt on the subject at all, and regretted having left mrs. n. keenly, and the andande store sincerely. but these fans are a fine sporting tribe, and allowed they would risk it; besides, they were almost certain they had friends at efoua; and, in addition, they showed me trees scratched in a way that was magnification of the condition of my own cat's pet table leg at home, demonstrating leopards in the vicinity. i kept going, as it was my only chance, because i found i stiffened if i sat down, and they always carefully told me the direction to go in when they sat down; with their superior pace they soon caught me up, and then passed me, leaving me and ngouta and sometimes singlet and pagan behind, we, in our turn, overtaking them, with this difference that they were sitting down when we did so. about five o'clock i was off ahead and noticed a path which i had been told i should meet with, and, when met with, i must follow. the path was slightly indistinct, but by keeping my eye on it i could see it. presently i came to a place where it went out, but appeared again on the other side of a clump of underbush fairly distinctly. i made a short cut for it and the next news was i was in a heap, on a lot of spikes, some fifteen feet or so below ground level, at the bottom of a bag-shaped game pit. it is at these times you realise the blessing of a good thick skirt. had i paid heed to the advice of many people in england, who ought to have known better, and did not do it themselves, and adopted masculine garments, i should have been spiked to the bone, and done for. whereas, save for a good many bruises, here i was with the fulness of my skirt tucked under me, sitting on nine ebony spikes some twelve inches long, in comparative comfort, howling lustily to be hauled out. the duke came along first, and looked down at me. i said, "get a bush-rope, and haul me out." he grunted and sat down on a log. the passenger came next, and he looked down. "you kill?" says he. "not much," say i; "get a bush-rope and haul me out." "no fit," says he, and sat down on the log. presently, however, kiva and wiki came up, and wiki went and selected the one and only bush- rope suitable to haul an english lady, of my exact complexion, age, and size, out of that one particular pit. they seemed rare round there from the time he took; and i was just casting about in my mind as to what method would be best to employ in getting up the smooth, yellow, sandy-clay, incurved walls, when he arrived with it, and i was out in a twinkling, and very much ashamed of myself, until silence, who was then leading, disappeared through the path before us with a despairing yell. each man then pulled the skin cover off his gun lock, carefully looked to see if things there were all right and ready loosened his knife in its snake-skin sheath; and then we set about hauling poor silence out, binding him up where necessary with cool green leaves; for he, not having a skirt, had got a good deal frayed at the edges on those spikes. then we closed up, for the fans said these pits were symptomatic of the immediate neighbourhood of efoua. we sounded our ground, as we went into a thick plantain patch, through which we could see a great clearing in the forest, and the low huts of a big town. we charged into it, going right through the guard-house gateway, at one end, in single file, as its narrowness obliged us, and into the street-shaped town, and formed ourselves into as imposing a looking party as possible in the centre of the street. the efouerians regarded us with much amazement, and the women and children cleared off into the huts, and took stock of us through the door-holes. there were but few men in the town, the majority, we subsequently learnt, being away after elephants. but there were quite sufficient left to make a crowd in a ring round us. fortunately wiki and kiva's friends were present, and as a result of the confabulation, one of the chiefs had his house cleared out for me. it consisted of two apartments almost bare of everything save a pile of boxes, and a small fire on the floor, some little bags hanging from the roof poles, and a general supply of insects. the inner room contained nothing save a hard plank, raised on four short pegs from the earth floor. i shook hands with and thanked the chief, and directed that all the loads should be placed inside the huts. i must admit my good friend was a villainous-looking savage, but he behaved most hospitably and kindly. from what i had heard of the fan, i deemed it advisable not to make any present to him at once, but to base my claim on him on the right of an amicable stranger to hospitality. when i had seen all the baggage stowed i went outside and sat at the doorway on a rather rickety mushroom-shaped stool in the cool evening air, waiting for my tea which i wanted bitterly. pagan came up as usual for tobacco to buy chop with; and after giving it to him, i and the two chiefs, with gray shirt acting as interpreter, had a long chat. of course the first question was, why was i there? i told them i was on my way to the factory of h. and c. on the rembwe. they said they had heard of "ugumu," i.e., messrs hatton and cookson, but they did not trade direct with them, passing their trade into towns nearer to the rembwe, which were swindling bad towns, they said; and they got the idea stuck in their heads that i was a trader, a sort of bagman for the firm, and gray shirt could not get this idea out, so off one of their majesties went and returned with twenty-five balls of rubber, which i bought to promote good feeling, subsequently dashing them to wiki, who passed them in at ndorko when we got there. i also bought some elephant-hair necklaces from one of the chiefs' wives, by exchanging my red silk tie with her for them, and one or two other things. i saw fish- hooks would not be of much value because efoua was not near a big water of any sort; so i held fish-hooks and traded handkerchiefs and knives. one old chief was exceedingly keen to do business, and i bought a meat spoon, a plantain spoon, and a gravy spoon off him; and then he brought me a lot of rubbish i did not want, and i said so, and announced i had finished trade for that night. however the old gentleman was not to be put off, and after an unsuccessful attempt to sell me his cooking-pots, which were roughly made out of clay, he made energetic signs to me that if i would wait he had got something that he would dispose of which gray shirt said was "good too much." off he went across the street, and disappeared into his hut, where he evidently had a thorough hunt for the precious article. one box after another was brought out to the light of a bush torch held by one of his wives, and there was a great confabulation between him and his family of the "i'm sure you had it last," "you must have moved it," "never touched the thing," sort. at last it was found, and he brought it across the street to me most carefully. it was a bundle of bark cloth tied round something most carefully with tie tie. this being removed, disclosed a layer of rag, which was unwound from round a central article. whatever can this be? thinks i; some rare and valuable object doubtless, let's hope connected with fetish worship, and i anxiously watched its unpacking; in the end, however, it disclosed, to my disgust and rage, an old shilling razor. the way the old chief held it out, and the amount of dollars he asked for it, was enough to make any one believe that i was in such urgent need of the thing, that i was at his mercy regarding price. i waved it off with a haughty scorn, and then feeling smitten by the expression of agonised bewilderment on his face, i dashed him a belt that delighted him, and went inside and had tea to soothe my outraged feelings. the chiefs made furious raids on the mob of spectators who pressed round the door, and stood with their eyes glued to every crack in the bark of which the hut was made. the next door neighbours on either side might have amassed a comfortable competence for their old age, by letting out seats for the circus. every hole in the side walls had a human eye in it, and i heard new holes being bored in all directions; so i deeply fear the chief, my host, must have found his palace sadly draughty. i felt perfectly safe and content, however, although ngouta suggested the charming idea that "p'r'aps them m'fetta fan done sell we." as soon as all my men had come in, and established themselves in the inner room for the night, i curled up among the boxes, with my head on the tobacco sack, and dozed. after about half an hour i heard a row in the street, and looking out,--for i recognised his grace's voice taking a solo part followed by choruses,--i found him in legal difficulties about a murder case. an alibi was proved for the time being; that is to say the prosecution could not bring up witnesses because of the elephant hunt; and i went in for another doze, and the town at last grew quiet. waking up again i noticed the smell in the hut was violent, from being shut up i suppose, and it had an unmistakably organic origin. knocking the ash end off the smouldering bush-light that lay burning on the floor, i investigated, and tracked it to those bags, so i took down the biggest one, and carefully noted exactly how the tie-tie had been put round its mouth; for these things are important and often mean a lot. i then shook its contents out in my hat, for fear of losing anything of value. they were a human hand, three big toes, four eyes, two ears, and other portions of the human frame. the hand was fresh, the others only so so, and shrivelled. replacing them i tied the bag up, and hung it up again. i subsequently learnt that although the fans will eat their fellow friendly tribesfolk, yet they like to keep a little something belonging to them as a memento. this touching trait in their character i learnt from wiki; and, though it's to their credit, under the circumstances, still it's an unpleasant practice when they hang the remains in the bedroom you occupy, particularly if the bereavement in your host's family has been recent. i did not venture to prowl round efoua; but slid the bark door aside and looked out to get a breath of fresh air. it was a perfect night, and no mosquitoes. the town, walled in on every side by the great cliff of high black forest, looked very wild as it showed in the starlight, its low, savage-built bark huts, in two hard rows, closed at either end by a guard-house. in both guard-houses there was a fire burning, and in their flickering glow showed the forms of sleeping men. nothing was moving save the goats, which are always brought into the special house for them in the middle of the town, to keep them from the leopards, which roam from dusk to dawn. dawn found us stirring, i getting my tea, and the rest of the party their chop, and binding up anew the loads with wiki's fresh supple bush-ropes. kiva amused me much; during our march his costume was exceeding scant, but when we reached the towns he took from his bag garments, and attired himself so resplendently that i feared the charm of his appearance would lead me into one of those dreadful wife palavers which experience had taught me of old to dread; and in the morning time he always devoted some time to repacking. i gave a big dash to both chiefs, and they came out with us, most civilly, to the end of their first plantations; and then we took farewell of each other, with many expressions of hope on both sides that we should meet again, and many warnings from them about the dissolute and depraved character of the other towns we should pass through before we reached the rembwe. our second day's march was infinitely worse than the first, for it lay along a series of abruptly shaped hills with deep ravines between them; each ravine had its swamp and each swamp its river. this bit of country must be absolutely impassable for any human being, black or white, except during the dry season. there were representatives of the three chief forms of the west african bog. the large deep swamps were best to deal with, because they make a break in the forest, and the sun can come down on their surface and bake a crust, over which you can go, if you go quickly. from experience in devonian bogs, i knew pace was our best chance, and i fancy i earned one of my nicknames among the fans on these. the fans went across all right with a rapid striding glide, but the other men erred from excess of caution, and while hesitating as to where was the next safe place to plant their feet, the place that they were standing on went in with a glug. moreover, they would keep together, which was more than the crust would stand. the portly pagan and the passenger gave us a fine job in one bog, by sinking in close together. some of us slashed off boughs of trees and tore off handfuls of hard canna leaves, while others threw them round the sinking victims to form a sort of raft, and then with the aid of bush-rope, of course, they were hauled out. the worst sort of swamp, and the most frequent hereabouts, is the deep narrow one that has no crust on, because it is too much shaded by the forest. the slopes of the ravines too are usually covered with an undergrowth of shenja, beautiful beyond description, but right bad to go through. i soon learnt to dread seeing the man in front going down hill, or to find myself doing so, for it meant that within the next half hour we should be battling through a patch of shenja. i believe there are few effects that can compare with the beauty of them, with the golden sunlight coming down through the upper forest's branches on to their exquisitely shaped, hard, dark green leaves, making them look as if they were sprinkled with golden sequins. their long green stalks, which support the leaves and bear little bunches of crimson berries, take every graceful curve imaginable, and the whole affair is free from insects; and when you have said this, you have said all there is to say in favour of shenja, for those long green stalks of theirs are as tough as twisted wire, and the graceful curves go to the making of a net, which rises round you shoulder high, and the hard green leaves when lying on the ground are fearfully slippery. it is not nice going down through them, particularly when nature is so arranged that the edge of the bank you are descending is a rock-wall ten or twelve feet high with a swamp of unknown depth at its foot; this arrangement was very frequent on the second and third day's marches, and into these swamps the shenja seemed to want to send you head first and get you suffocated. it is still less pleasant, however, going up the other side of the ravine when you have got through your swamp. you have to fight your way upwards among rough rocks, through this hard tough network of stems; and it took it out of all of us except the fans. these narrow shaded swamps gave us a world of trouble and took up a good deal of time. sometimes the leader of the party would make three or four attempts before he found a ford, going on until the black, batterlike ooze came up round his neck, and then turning back and trying in another place; while the rest of the party sat upon the bank until the ford was found, feeling it was unnecessary to throw away human life, and that the more men there were paddling about in that swamp, the more chance there was that a hole in the bottom of it would be found; and when a hole is found, the discoverer is liable to leave his bones in it. if i happened to be in front, the duty of finding the ford fell on me; for none of us after leaving efoua knew the swamps personally. i was too frightened of the fan, and too nervous and uncertain of the stuff my other men were made of, to dare show the white feather at anything that turned up. the fan took my conduct as a matter of course, never having travelled with white men before, or learnt the way some of them require carrying over swamps and rivers and so on. i dare say i might have taken things easier, but i was like the immortal schmelzle, during that omnibus journey he made on his way to flaetz in the thunder-storm--afraid to be afraid. i am very certain i should have fared very differently had i entered a region occupied by a powerful and ferocious tribe like the fan, from some districts on the west coast, where the inhabitants are used to find the white man incapable of personal exertion, requiring to be carried in a hammock, or wheeled in a go-cart or a bath-chair about the streets of their coast towns, depending for the defence of their settlement on a body of black soldiers. this is not so in congo francais, and i had behind me the prestige of a set of white men to whom for the native to say, "you shall not do such and such a thing;" "you shall not go to such and such a place," would mean that those things would be done. i soon found the name of hatton and cookson's agent- general for this district, mr. hudson, was one to conjure with among the trading tribes; and the ajumba, moreover, although their knowledge of white men had been small, yet those they had been accustomed to see were fine specimens. mr. fildes, mr. cockshut, m. jacot, dr. pelessier, pere lejeune, m. gacon, mr. whittaker, and that vivacious french official, were not men any man, black or white, would willingly ruffle; and in addition there was the memory among the black traders of "that white man mactaggart," whom an enterprising trading tribe near fernan vaz had had the hardihood to tackle, shooting him, and then towing him behind a canoe and slashing him all over with their knives the while; yet he survived, and tackled them again in a way that must almost pathetically have astonished those simple savages, after the real good work they had put in to the killing of him. of course it was hard to live up to these ideals, and i do not pretend to have succeeded, or rather that i should have succeeded had the real strain been put on me. but to return to that gorilla-land forest. all the rivers we crossed on the first, second, and third day i was told went into one or other of the branches of the ogowe, showing that the long slope of land between the ogowe and the rembwe is towards the ogowe. the stone of which the mountains were composed was that same hard black rock that i had found on the sierra del cristal, by the ogowe rapids; only hereabouts there was not amongst it those great masses of white quartz, which are so prominent a feature from talagouga upwards in the ogowe valley; neither were the mountains anything like so high, but they had the same abruptness of shape. they look like very old parts of the same range worn down to stumps by the disintegrating forces of the torrential rain and sun, and the dense forest growing on them. frost of course they had not been subject to, but rocks, i noticed, were often being somewhat similarly split by rootlets having got into some tiny crevice, and by gradual growth enlarged it to a crack. of our troubles among the timber falls on these mountains i have already spoken; and these were at their worst between efoua and egaja. i had suffered a good deal from thirst that day, unboiled water being my ibet and we were all very nearly tired out with the athletic sports since leaving efoua. one thing only we knew about egaja for sure, and that was that not one of us had a friend there, and that it was a town of extra evil repute, so we were not feeling very cheerful when towards evening time we struck its outermost plantations, their immediate vicinity being announced to us by silence treading full and fair on to a sharp ebony spike driven into the narrow path and hurting himself. fortunately, after we passed this first plantation, we came upon a camp of rubber collectors-- four young men; i got one of them to carry silence's load and show us the way into the town, when on we went into more plantations. there is nothing more tiresome than finding your path going into a plantation, because it fades out in the cleared ground, or starts playing games with a lot of other little paths that are running about amongst the crops, and no west african path goes straight into a stream or a plantation, and straight out the other side, so you have a nice time picking it up again. we were spared a good deal of fine varied walking by our new friend the rubber collector; for i noticed he led us out by a path nearly at right angles to the one by which we had entered. he then pitched into a pit which was half full of thorns, and which he observed he did not know was there, demonstrating that an african guide can speak the truth. when he had got out, he handed back silence's load and got a dash of tobacco for his help; he left us to devote the rest of his evening by his forest fire to unthorning himself, while we proceeded to wade a swift, deepish river that crossed the path he told us led into egaja, and then went across another bit of forest and downhill again. "oh, bless those swamps!" thought i, "here's another," but no--not this time. across the bottom of the steep ravine, from one side to another, lay an enormous tree as a bridge, about fifteen feet above a river, which rushed beneath it, over a boulder-encumbered bed. i took in the situation at a glance, and then and there i would have changed that bridge for any swamp i have ever seen, yea, even for a certain bush-rope bridge in which i once wound myself up like a buzzing fly in a spider's web. i was fearfully tired, and my legs shivered under me after the falls and emotions of the previous part of the day, and my boots were slippery with water soaking. the fans went into the river, and half swam, half waded across. all the ajumba, save pagan, followed, and ngouta got across with their assistance. pagan thought he would try the bridge, and i thought i would watch how the thing worked. he got about three yards along it and then slipped, but caught the tree with his hands as he fell, and hauled himself back to my side again; then he went down the bank and through the water. this was not calculated to improve one's nerve; i knew by now i had got to go by the bridge, for i saw i was not strong enough in my tired state to fight the water. if only the wretched thing had had its bark on it would have been better, but it was bare, bald, and round, and a slip meant death on the rocks below. i rushed it, and reached the other side in safety, whereby poor pagan got chaffed about his failure by the others, who said they had gone through the water just to wash their feet. the other side, when we got there, did not seem much worth reaching, being a swampy fringe at the bottom of a steep hillside, and after a few yards the path turned into a stream or backwater of the river. it was hedged with thickly pleached bushes, and covered with liquid water on the top of semi-liquid mud. now and again for a change you had a foot of water on top of fearfully slippery harder mud, and then we light-heartedly took headers into the bush, sideways, or sat down; and when it was not proceeding on the evil tenor of its way, like this, it had holes in it; in fact, i fancy the bottom of the holes was the true level, for it came near being as full of holes as a fishing-net, and it was very quaint to see the man in front, who had been paddling along knee-deep before, now plop down with the water round his shoulders; and getting out of these slippery pockets, which were sometimes a tight fit, was difficult. however that is the path you have got to go by, if you're not wise enough to stop at home; the little bay of shrub overgrown swamp fringing the river on one side and on the other running up to the mountain side. at last we came to a sandy bank, and on that bank stood egaja, the town with an evil name even among the fan, but where we had got to stay, fair or foul. we went into it through its palaver house, and soon had the usual row. i had detected signs of trouble among my men during the whole day; the ajumba were tired, and dissatisfied with the fans; the fans were in high feather, openly insolent to ngouta, and anxious for me to stay in this delightful locality, and go hunting with them and divers other choice spirits, whom they assured me we could easily get to join us at efoua. i kept peace as well as i could, explaining to the fans i had not enough money with me now, because i had not, when starting, expected such magnificent opportunities to be placed at my disposal; and promising to come back next year--a promise i hope to keep--and then we would go and have a grand time of it. this state of a party was a dangerous one in which to enter a strange fan town, where our security lay in our being united. when the first burst of egaja conversation began to boil down into something reasonable, i found that a villainous-looking scoundrel, smeared with soot and draped in a fragment of genuine antique cloth, was a head chief in mourning. he placed a house at my disposal, quite a mansion, for it had no less than four apartments. the first one was almost entirely occupied by a bedstead frame that was being made up inside on account of the small size of the door. this had to be removed before we could get in with the baggage at all. while this removal was being effected with as much damage to the house and the article as if it were a quarter-day affair in england, the other chief arrived. he had been sent for, being away down the river fishing when we arrived. i saw at once he was a very superior man to any of the chiefs i had yet met with. it was not his attire, remarkable though that was for the district, for it consisted of a gentleman's black frock-coat such as is given in the ivory bundle, a bright blue felt sombrero hat, an ample cloth of boma check; but his face and general bearing was distinctive, and very powerful and intelligent; and i knew that egaja, for good or bad, owed its name to this man, and not to the mere sensual, brutal- looking one. he was exceedingly courteous, ordering his people to bring me a stool and one for himself, and then a fly-whisk to battle with the evening cloud of sand-flies. i got pagan to come and act as interpreter while the rest were stowing the baggage, etc. after compliments, "tell the chief," i said, "that i hear this town of his is thief town." "better not, sir," says pagan. "go on," said i, "or i'll tell him myself." so pagan did. it was a sad blow to the chief. "thief town, this highly respectable town of egaja! a town whose moral conduct in all matters (shedule) was an example to all towns, called a thief town! oh, what a wicked world!" i said it was; but i would reserve my opinion as to whether egaja was a part of the wicked world or a star-like exception, until i had experienced it myself. we then discoursed on many matters, and i got a great deal of interesting fetish information out of the chief, which was valuable to me, because the whole of this district had not been in contact with white culture; and altogether i and the chief became great friends. just when i was going in to have my much-desired tea, he brought me his mother--an old lady, evidently very bright and able, but, poor woman, with the most disgusting hand and arm i have ever seen. i am ashamed to say i came very near being sympathetically sick in the african manner on the spot. i felt i could not attend to it, and have my tea afterwards, so i directed one of the canoe-shaped little tubs, used for beating up the manioc in, to be brought and filled with hot water, and then putting into it a heavy dose of condy's fluid, i made her sit down and lay the whole arm in it, and went and had my tea. as soon as i had done i went outside, and getting some of the many surrounding ladies to hold bush-lights, i examined the case. the whole hand was a mass of yellow pus, streaked with sanies, large ulcers were burrowing into the fore-arm, while in the arm-pit was a big abscess. i opened the abscess at once, and then the old lady frightened me nearly out of my wits by gently subsiding, i thought dying, but i soon found out merely going to sleep. i then washed the abscess well out, and having got a lot of baked plantains, i made a big poultice of them, mixed with boiling water and more condy in the tub, and laid her arm right in this; and propping her up all round and covering her over with cloths i requisitioned from her son, i left her to have her nap while i went into the history of the case, which was that some forty-eight hours ago she had been wading along the bank, catching crawfish, and had been stung by "a fish like a snake"; so i presume the ulcers were an old-standing palaver. the hand had been a good deal torn by the creature, and the pain and swelling had been so great she had not had a minute's sleep since. as soon as the poultice got chilled i took her arm out and cleaned it again, and wound it round with dressing, and had her ladyship carried bodily, still asleep, into her hut, and after rousing her up, giving her a dose of that fine preparation, pil. crotonis cum hydrargi, saw her tucked up on her own plank bedstead for the night, sound asleep again. the chief was very anxious to have some pills too; so i gave him some, with firm injunctions only to take one at the first time. i knew that that one would teach him not to take more than one forever after, better than i could do if i talked from june to january. then all the afflicted of egaja turned up, and wanted medical advice. there was evidently a good stiff epidemic of the yaws about; lots of cases of dum with the various symptoms; ulcers of course galore; a man with a bit of a broken spear head in an abscess in the thigh; one which i believe a professional enthusiast would call a "lovely case" of filaria, the entire white of one eye being full of the active little worms and a ridge of surplus population migrating across the bridge of the nose into the other eye, under the skin, looking like the bridge of a pair of spectacles. it was past eleven before i had anything like done, and my men had long been sound asleep, but the chief had conscientiously sat up and seen the thing through. he then went and fetched some rolls of bark cloth to put on my plank, and i gave him a handsome cloth i happened to have with me, a couple of knives, and some heads of tobacco and wished him goodnight; blockading my bark door, and picking my way over my sleeping ajumba into an inner apartment which i also blockaded, hoping i had done with egaja for some hours. no such thing. at . the whole town was roused by the frantic yells of a woman. i judged there was one of my beauties of fans mixed up in it, and there was, and after paying damages, got back again by . a.m., and off to sleep again instantly. at four sharp, whole town of egaja plunged into emotion, and worse shindy. i suggested to the ajumba they should go out; but no, they didn't care a row of pins if one of our fans did get killed, so i went, recognising kiva's voice in high expostulation. kiva, it seems, a long time ago had a transaction in re a tooth of ivory with a man who, unfortunately, happened to be in this town to- night, and kiva owed the said man a coat. { } kiva, it seems, has been spending the whole evening demonstrating to his creditor that, had he only known they were to meet, he would have brought the coat with him--a particularly beautiful coat--and the reason he has not paid it before is that he has mislaid the creditor's address. the creditor says he has called repeatedly at kiva's village, that notorious m'fetta, and kiva has never been at home; and moreover that kiva's wife (one of them) stole a yellow dog of great value from his (the creditor's) canoe. kiva says, women will be women, and he had gone off to sleep thinking the affair had blown over and the bill renewed for the time being. the creditor had not gone to sleep; but sat up thinking the affair over and remembered many cases, all cited in full, of how kiva had failed to meet his debts; also kiva's brother on the mother's side and uncle ditto; and so has decided to foreclose forthwith on the debtor's estate, and as the estate is represented by and consists of kiva's person, to take and seize upon it and eat it. it is always highly interesting to observe the germ of any of our own institutions existing in the culture of a lower race. nevertheless it is trying to be hauled out of one's sleep in the middle of the night, and plunged into this study. evidently this was a trace of an early form of the bankruptcy court; the court which clears a man of his debt, being here represented by the knife and the cooking pot; the whitewashing, as i believe it is termed with us, also shows, only it is not the debtor who is whitewashed, but the creditors doing themselves over with white clay to celebrate the removal of their enemy from his sphere of meretricious activity. this inversion may arise from the fact that whitewashing a creditor who was about to be cooked would be unwise, as the stuff would boil off the bits and spoil the gravy. there is always some fragment of sound sense underlying african institutions. kiva was, when i got out, tied up, talking nineteen to the dozen; and so was every one else; and a lady was working up white clay in a pot. i dare say i ought to have rushed at him and cut his bonds, and killed people in a general way with a revolver, and then flown with my band to the bush; only my band evidently had no flying in them, being tucked up in the hut pretending to be asleep, and uninterested in the affair; and although i could have abandoned the band without a pang just then, i could not so lightheartedly fly alone with kiva to the bush and leave my fishes; so i shouted azuna to the bankruptcy court, and got a fan who spoke trade english to come and interpret for me; and from him i learnt the above stated outline of the proceedings up to the time. regarding the original iniquity of kiva, my other fans held the opinion that the old scotch lady had regarding certain passages in the history of the early jews--that it was a long time ago, and aiblins it was no true. fortunately for the reader it is impossible for me to give in full detail the proceedings of the court. i do not think if the whole of mr. pitman's school of shorthand had been there to take them down the thing could possibly have been done in word-writing. if the late richard wagner, however, had been present he could have scored the performance for a full orchestra; and with all its weird grunts and roars, and pistol-like finger clicks, and its elongated words and thigh slaps, it would have been a masterpiece. i got my friend the chief on my side; but he explained he had no jurisdiction, as neither of the men belonged to his town; and i explained to him, that as the proceedings were taking place in his town he had a right of jurisdiction ipso facto. the fan could not translate this phrase, so we gave it the chief raw; and he seemed to relish it, and he and i then cut into the affair together, i looking at him with admiration and approval when he was saying his say, and after his "azuna" had produced a patch of silence he could move his tongue in, and he similarly regarding me during my speech for the defence. we neither, i expect, understood each other, and we had trouble with our client, who would keep pleading "not guilty," which was absurd. anyhow we produced our effect, my success arising from my concluding my speech with the announcement that i would give the creditor a book on hatton and cookson for the coat, and i would deduct it from kiva's pay. but, said the court: "we look your mouth and it be sweet mouth, but with hatton and cookson we can have no trade." this was a blow to me. hatton and cookson was my big ju ju, and it was to their sub- factory on the rembwe that i was bound. on inquiry i elicited another cheerful little fact which was they could not deal with hatton and cookson because there was "blood war on the path that way." the court said they would take a book on holty, but with holty i.e. mr. john holt, i had no deposit of money, and i did not feel justified in issuing cheques on him, knowing also he could not feel amiable towards wandering scientists, after what he had recently gone through with one. not that i doubt for one minute but that his representatives would have honoured my book; for the generosity and helpfulness of west african traders is unbounded and long-suffering. but i did not like to encroach on it, all the more so from a feeling that i might never get through to refund the money. so at last i paid the equivalent value of the coat out of my own trade-stuff; and the affair was regarded by all parties as satisfactorily closed by the time the gray dawn was coming up over the forest wall. i went in again and slept in snatches until i got my tea about seven, and then turned out to hurry my band out of egaja. this i did not succeed in doing until past ten. one row succeeded another with my men; but i was determined to get them out of that town as quickly as possible, for i had heard so much from perfectly reliable and experienced people regarding the treacherousness of the fan. i feared too that more cases still would be brought up against kiva, from the resume of his criminal career i had had last night, and i knew it was very doubtful whether my other three fans were any better than he. there was his grace's little murder affair only languishing for want of evidence owing to the witnesses for the prosecution being out elephant-hunting not very far away; and wiki was pleading an alibi, and a twin brother, in a bad wife palaver in this town. i really hope for the sake of fan morals at large, that i did engage the three worst villains in m'fetta, and that m'fetta is the worst town in all fan land, inconvenient as this arrangement was to me personally. anyhow, i felt sure my pappenheimers would take a lot of beating for good solid crime, among any tribe anywhere. moreover, the ajumba wanted meat, and the fans, they said, offered them human. i saw no human meat at egaja, but the ajumba seem to think the fans eat nothing else, which is a silly prejudice of theirs, because the fans do. i think in this case the ajumba thought a lot of smoked flesh offered was human. it may have been; it was in neat pieces; and again, as the captain of the late s.s. sparrow would say, "it mayn't." but the ajumba have a horror of cannibalism, and i honestly believe never practise it, even for fetish affairs, which is a rare thing in a west african tribe where sacrificial and ceremonial cannibalism is nearly universal. anyhow the ajumba loudly declared the fans were "bad men too much," which was impolitic under existing circumstances, and inexcusable, because it by no means arose from a courageous defiance of them; but the west african! well! "'e's a devil an' a ostrich an' a orphan child in one." the chief was very anxious for me to stay and rest, but as his mother was doing wonderfully well, and the other women seemed quite to understand my directions regarding her, i did not feel inclined to risk it. the old lady's farewell of me was peculiar: she took my hand in her two, turned it palm upwards, and spat on it. i do not know whether this is a constant form of greeting among the fan; i fancy not. dr. nassau, who explained it to me when i saw him again down at baraka, said the spitting was merely an accidental by- product of the performance, which consisted in blowing a blessing; and as i happened on this custom twice afterwards, i feel sure from observation he is right. the two chiefs saw us courteously out of the town as far as where the river crosses the out-going path again, and the blue-hatted one gave me some charms "to keep my foot in path," and the mourning chief lent us his son to see us through the lines of fortification of the plantation. i gave them an equal dash, and in answer to their question as to whether i had found egaja a thief-town, i said that to call egaja a thief-town was rank perjury, for i had not lost a thing while in it; and we parted with mutual expression of esteem and hopes for another meeting at an early date. the defences of the fine series of plantations of egaja on this side were most intricate, to judge from the zigzag course our guide led us through them. he explained they had to be because of the character of the towns towards the rembwe. after listening to this young man, i really began to doubt that the cities of the plain had really been destroyed, and wondered whether some future revision committee will not put transported for destroyed. this young man certainly hit off the character of sodom and gomorrah to the life, in describing the towns towards the rembwe, though he had never heard sodom and gomorrah named. he assured me i should see the difference between them and egaja the good, and i thanked him and gave him his dash when we parted; but told him as a friend, i feared some alteration must take place, and some time elapse before he saw a regular rush of pilgrim worshippers of virtue coming into even egaja the good, though it stood just as good a chance and better than most towns i had seen in africa. we went on into the gloom of the great forest again; that forest that seemed to me without end, wherein, in a lazy, hazy-minded sort of way, i expected to wander through by day and drop in at night to a noisy savage town for the rest of my days. we climbed up one hill, skirted its summit, went through our athletic sports over sundry timber falls, and struck down into the ravine as usual. but at the bottom of that ravine, which was exceeding steep, ran a little river free from swamp. as i was wading it i noticed it had a peculiarity that distinguished it from all the other rivers we had come through; and then and there i sat down on a boulder in its midst and hauled out my compass. yes, by allah! it's going north-west and bound as we are for rembwe river. i went out the other side of that river with a lighter heart than i went in, and shouted the news to the boys, and they yelled and sang as we went on our way. all along this bit of country we had seen quantities of rubber vines, and between egaja and esoon we came across quantities of rubber being collected. evidently there was a big camp of rubber hunters out in the district very busy. wiki and kiva did their best to teach me the trade. along each side of the path we frequently saw a ring of stout bush rope, raised from the earth on pegs about a foot to eighteen inches. on the ground in the middle stood a calabash, into which the ends of the pieces of rubber vine were placed, the other ends being supported by the bush rope ring. round the outside of some of these rings was a slow fire, which just singes the tops of the bits of rubber vine as they project over the collar or ring, and causes the milky juice to run out of the lower end into the calabash, giving out as it does so a strong ammoniacal smell. when the fire was alight there would be a group of rubber collectors sitting round it watching the cooking operations, removing those pieces that had run dry and placing others, from a pile at their side, in position. on either side of the path we continually passed pieces of rubber vine cut into lengths of some two feet or so, and on the top one or two leaves plaited together, or a piece of bush rope tied into a knot, which indicated whose property the pile was. the method of collection employed by the fan is exceedingly wasteful, because this fool of a vegetable landolphia florida (ovariensis) does not know how to send up suckers from its root, but insists on starting elaborately from seeds only. i do not, however, see any reasonable hope of getting them to adopt more economical methods. the attempt made by the english houses, when the rubber trade was opened up in on the gold coast, to get the more tractable natives there to collect by incisions only, has failed; for in the early days a man could get a load of rubber almost at his own door on the gold coast, and now he has to go fifteen days' journey inland for it. when a fan town has exhausted the rubber in its vicinity, it migrates, bag and baggage, to a new part of the forest. the young unmarried men are the usual rubber hunters. parties of them go out into the forest, wandering about in it and camping under shelters of boughs by night, for a month and more at a time, during the dry seasons, until they have got a sufficient quantity together; then they return to their town, and it is manipulated by the women, and finally sold, either to the white trader, in districts where he is within reach, or to the m'pongwe trader who travels round buying it and the collected ivory and ebony, like a norfolk higgler. in districts like these i was in, remote from the m'pongwe trader, the fans carry the rubber to the town nearest to them that is in contact with the black trader, and sell it to the inhabitants, who in their turn resell it to their next town, until it reaches him. this passing down of the rubber and ivory gives rise between the various towns to a series of commercial complications which rank with woman palaver for the production of rows; it being the sweet habit of these fans to require a life for a life, and to regard one life as good as another. also rubber trade and wife palavers sweetly intertwine, for a man on the kill in re a wife palaver knows his best chance of getting the life from the village he has a grudge against lies in catching one of that village's men when he may be out alone rubber hunting. so he does this thing, and then the men from the victim's village go and lay for a rubber hunter from the killer's village; and then of course the men from the killer's village go and lay for rubber hunters from victim number one's village, and thus the blood feud rolls down the vaulted chambers of the ages, so that you, dropping in on affairs, cannot see one end or the other of it, and frequently the people concerned have quite forgotten what the killing was started for. not that this discourages them in the least. really if dr. nassau is right, and these fans are descendants of adam and eve, i expect the cain and abel killing palaver is still kept going among them. wiki, being great on bush rope, gave me much information regarding rubber, showing me the various other vines besides the true rubber vine, whose juice, mingled with the true sap by the collector when in the forest, adds to the weight; a matter of importance, because rubber is bought by weight. the other adulteration gets done by the ladies in the villages when the collected sap is handed over to them to prepare for the markets. this preparation consists of boiling it in water slightly, and adding a little salt, which causes the gummy part to separate and go to the bottom of the pot, where it looks like a thick cream. the water is carefully poured off this deposit, which is then taken out and moulded, usually in the hands; but i have seen it run into moulds made of small calabashes with a stick or piece of iron passing through, so that when the rubber is set this can be withdrawn. a hole being thus left the balls can be threaded on to a stick, usually five on one stick, for convenience of transport. it is during the moulding process that most of the adulteration gets in. down by the side of many of the streams there is a white chalky-looking clay which is brought up into the villages, powdered up, and then hung up over the fire in a basket to attain a uniform smuttiness; it is then worked into the rubber when it is being made up into balls. then a good chunk of koko, arum esculentum (koko is better than yam, i may remark, because it is heavier), also smoked approximately the right colour, is often placed in the centre of the rubber ball. in fact, anything is put there, that is hopefully regarded as likely to deceive the white trader. so great is the adulteration, that most of the traders have to cut each ball open. even the kinsembo rubber, which is put up in clusters of bits shaped like little thimbles formed by rolling pinches of rubber between the thumb and finger, and which one would think difficult to put anything inside of, has to be cut, because "the simple children of nature" who collect it and bring it to that "swindling white trader" struck upon the ingenious notion that little pieces of wood shaped like the thimbles and coated by a dip in rubber were excellent additions to a cluster. the pure rubber, when it is made, looks like putty, and has the same dusky-white colour; but, owing to the balls being kept in the huts in baskets in the smoke, and in wicker-work cages in the muddy pools to soak up as much water as possible before going into the hands of the traders, they get almost inky in colour. chapter ix. from esoon to agonjo. in which the voyager sets forth the beauties of the way from esoon to n'dorko, and gives some account of the local swamps. our next halting place was esoon, which received us with the usual row, but kindly enough; and endeared itself to me by knowing the rembwe, and not just waving the arm in the air, in any direction, and saying "far, far plenty bad people live for that side," as the other towns had done. of course they stuck to the bad people part of the legend; but i was getting quite callous as to the moral character of new acquaintances, feeling sure that for good solid murderous rascality several of my old fan acquaintances, and even my own party, would take a lot of beating; and yet, one and all, they had behaved well to me. esoon gave me to understand that of all the sodoms and gomorrahs that town of egaja was an easy first, and it would hardly believe we had come that way. still egaja had dealt with us well. however i took less interest--except, of course, as a friend, in some details regarding the criminal career of chief blue- hat of egaja--in the opinion of esoon regarding the country we had survived, than in the information it had to impart regarding the country we had got to survive on our way to the big river, which now no longer meant the ogowe, but the rembwe. i meant to reach one of hatton and cookson's sub-factories there, but--strictly between ourselves--i knew no more at what town that factory was than a kindergarten board school child does. i did not mention this fact; and a casual observer might have thought that i had spent my youth in that factory, when i directed my inquiries to the finding out the very shortest route to it. esoon shook its head. "yes, it was close, but it was impossible to reach uguma's factory." "why?" "there was blood war on the path." i said it was no war of mine. but esoon said, such was the appalling depravity of the next town on the road, that its inhabitants lay in wait at day with loaded guns and shot on sight any one coming up the esoon road, and that at night they tied strings with bells on across the road and shot on hearing them. no one had been killed since the first party of esoonians were fired on at long range, because no one had gone that way; but the next door town had been heard by people who had been out in the bush at night, blazing down the road when the bells were tinkled by wild animals. clearly that road was not yet really healthy. the duke, who as i have said before, was a fine courageous fellow, ready to engage in any undertaking, suggested i should go up the road--alone by myself--first--a mile ahead of the party--and the next town, perhaps, might not shoot at sight, if they happened to notice i was something queer; and i might explain things, and then the rest of the party would follow. "there's nothing like dash and courage, my dear duke," i said, "even if one display it by deputy, so this plan does you great credit; but as my knowledge of this charming language of yours is but small, i fear i might create a wrong impression in that town, and it might think i had kindly brought them a present of eight edible heathens--you and the remainder of my followers, you understand." my men saw this was a real danger, and this was the only way i saw of excusing myself. it is at such a moment as this that the giant's robe gets, so to speak, between your legs and threatens to trip you up. going up a forbidden road, and exposing yourself as a pot shot to ambushed natives would be jam and fritters to mr. mactaggart, for example; but i am not up to that form yet. so i determined to leave that road severely alone, and circumnavigate the next town by a road that leaves esoon going w.n.w., which struck the rembwe by n'dorko, i was told, and then follow up the bank of the river until i picked up the sub-factory. subsequent experience did not make one feel inclined to take out a patent for this plan, but at the time in esoon it looked nice enough. some few of the more highly cultured inhabitants here could speak trade english a little, and had been to the rembwe, and were quite intelligent about the whole affair. they had seen white men. a village they formerly occupied nearer the rembwe had been burnt by them, on account of a something that had occurred to a catholic priest who visited it. they were, of course, none of them personally mixed up in this sad affair, so could give no details of what had befallen the priest. they knew also "the move," which was a great bond of union between us. "was i a wife of them move white man," they inquired--"or them other white man?" i civilly said them move men were my tribe, and they ought to have known it by the look of me. they discussed my points of resemblance to "the move white man," and i am ashamed to say i could not forbear from smiling, as i distinctly recognised my friends from the very racy description of their personal appearance and tricks of manner given by a lively esoonian belle who had certainly met them. so content and happy did i become under these soothing influences, that i actually took off my boots, a thing i had quite got out of the habit of doing, and had them dried. i wanted to have them rubbed with palm oil, but i found, to my surprise, that there was no palm oil to be had, the tree being absent, or scarce in this region, so i had to content myself with having them rubbed with a piece of animal fat instead. i chaperoned my men, while among the ladies of esoon--a forward set of minxes--with the vigilance of a dragon; and decreed, like the mikado of japan, "that whosoever leered or winked, unless connubially linked, should forthwith be beheaded," have their pay chopped, i mean; and as they were beginning to smell their pay, they were careful; and we got through esoon without one of them going into jail; no mean performance when you remember that every man had a past--to put it mildly. esoon is not situated like the other towns, with a swamp and the forest close round it; but it is built on the side of a fairly cleared ravine among its plantain groves. when you are on the southern side of the ravine, you can see esoon looking as if it were hung on the hillside before you. you then go through a plantation down into the little river, and up into the town--one long, broad, clean-kept street. leaving esoon you go on up the hill through another plantation to the summit. immediately after leaving the town we struck westwards; and when we got to the top of the next hill we had a view that showed us we were dealing with another type of country. the hills to the westward are lower, and the valleys between them broader and less heavily forested, or rather i should say forested with smaller sorts of timber. all our paths took us during the early part of the day up and down hills, through swamps and little rivers, all flowing rembwe-wards. about the middle of the afternoon, when we had got up to the top of a high hill, after having had a terrible time on a timber fall of the first magnitude, into which four of us had fallen, i of course for one, i saw a sight that made my heart stand still. stretching away to the west and north, winding in and out among the feet of the now isolated mound- like mountains, was that never to be mistaken black-green forest swamp of mangrove; doubtless the fringe of the river rembwe, which evidently comes much further inland than the mangrove belt on the ogowe. this is reasonable and as it should be, though it surprised me at the time; for the great arm of the sea which is called the gaboon is really a fjord, just like bonny and opobo rivers, with several rivers falling into it at its head, and this fjord brings the sea water further inland. in addition to this the two rivers, the 'como (nkama) and rembwe that fall into this gaboon, with several smaller rivers, both bring down an inferior quantity of fresh water, and that at nothing like the tearing, tide-beating back pace of the ogowe. as my brother would say, "it's perfectly simple if you think about it;" but thinking is not my strong point. anyhow i was glad to see the mangrove-belt; all the gladder because i did not then know how far it was inland from the sea, and also because i was fool enough to think that a long line i could see, running e. and w. to the north of where i stood, was the line of the rembwe river; which it was not, as we soon found out. cheered by this pleasing prospect, we marched on forgetful of our scratches, down the side of the hill, and down the foot slope of it, until we struck the edge of the swamp. we skirted this for some mile or so, going n.e. then we struck into the swamp, to reach what we had regarded as the rembwe river. we found ourselves at the edge of that open line we had seen from the mountain. not standing, because you don't so much as try to stand on mangrove roots unless you are a born fool, and then you don't stand long, but clinging, like so many monkeys, to the net of aerial roots which surrounded us, looking blankly at a lake of ink-black slime. it was half a mile across, and some miles long. we could not see either the west or east termination of it, for it lay like a rotten serpent twisted between the mangroves. it never entered into our heads to try to cross it, for when a swamp is too deep for mangroves to grow in it, "no bottom lib for them dam ting," as a kruboy once said to me, anent a small specimen of this sort of ornament to a landscape. but we just looked round to see which direction we had better take. then i observed that the roots, aerial and otherwise, were coated in mud, and had no leaves on them, for a foot above our heads. next i noticed that the surface of the mud before us had a sort of quiver running through it, and here and there it exhibited swellings on its surface, which rose in one place and fell in another. no need for an old coaster like me to look at that sort of thing twice to know what it meant, and feeling it was a situation more suited to mr. stanley than myself, i attempted to emulate his methods and addressed my men. "boys," said i, "this beastly hole is tidal, and the tide is coming in. as it took us two hours to get to this sainted swamp, it's time we started out, one time, and the nearest way. it's to be hoped the practice we have acquired in mangrove roots in coming, will enable us to get up sufficient pace to get out on to dry land before we are all drowned." the boys took the hint. fortunately one of the ajumbas had been down in ogowe, it was gray shirt, who "sabed them tide palaver." the rest of them, and the fans, did not know what tide meant, but gray shirt hustled them along and i followed, deeply regretting that my ancestors had parted prematurely with prehensile tails, for four limbs, particularly when two of them are done up in boots and are not sufficient to enable one to get through a mangrove swamp network of slimy roots rising out of the water, and swinging lines of aerial ones coming down to the water a la mangrove, with anything approaching safety. added to these joys were any quantity of mangrove flies, a broiling hot sun, and an atmosphere three-quarters solid stench from the putrefying ooze all round us. for an hour and a half thought i, why did i come to africa, or why, having come, did i not know when i was well off and stay in glass? before these problems were settled in my mind we were close to the true land again, with the water under us licking lazily among the roots and over our feet. we did not make any fuss about it, but we meant to stick to dry land for some time, and so now took to the side of a hill that seemed like a great bubble coming out of the swamp, and bore steadily e. until we found a path. this path, according to the nature of paths in this country, promptly took us into another swamp, but of a different kind to our last--a knee-deep affair, full of beautiful palms and strange water plants, the names whereof i know not. there was just one part where that abomination, pandanus, had to be got through, but, as swamps go, it was not at all bad. i ought to mention that there were leeches in it, lest i may be thought too enthusiastic over its charms. but the great point was that the mountains we got to on the other side of it, were a good solid ridge, running, it is true, e. and w., while we wanted to go n.; still on we went waiting for developments, and watching the great line of mangrove-swamp spreading along below us to the left hand, seeing many of the lines in its dark face, which betokened more of those awesome slime lagoons that we had seen enough of at close quarters. about four o'clock we struck some more plantations, and passing through these, came to a path running north-east, down which we went. i must say the forest scenery here was superbly lovely. along this mountain side cliff to the mangrove-swamp the sun could reach the soil, owing to the steepness and abruptness and the changes of curves of the ground; while the soft steamy air which came up off the swamp swathed everything, and although unpleasantly strong in smell to us, was yet evidently highly agreeable to the vegetation. lovely wine palms and rafia palms, looking as if they had been grown under glass, so deliciously green and profuse was their feather-like foliage, intermingled with giant red woods, and lovely dark glossy green lianes, blooming in wreaths and festoons of white and mauve flowers, which gave a glorious wealth of beauty and colour to the scene. even the monotony of the mangrove-belt alongside gave an additional charm to it, like the frame round a picture. as we passed on, the ridge turned n. and the mangrove line narrowed between the hills. our path now ran east and more in the middle of the forest, and the cool shade was charming after the heat we had had earlier in the day. we crossed a lovely little stream coming down the hillside in a cascade; and then our path plunged into a beautiful valley. we had glimpses through the trees of an amphitheatre of blue mist-veiled mountains coming down in a crescent before us, and on all sides, save due west where the mangrove-swamp came in. never shall i forget the exceeding beauty of that valley, the foliage of the trees round us, the delicate wreaths and festoons of climbing plants, the graceful delicate plumes of the palm trees, interlacing among each other, and showing through all a background of soft, pale, purple-blue mountains and forest, not really far away, as the practised eye knew, but only made to look so by the mist, which has this trick of giving suggestion of immense space without destroying the beauty of detail. those african misty forests have the same marvellous distinctive quality that turner gives one in his greatest pictures. i am no artist, so i do not know exactly what it is, but i see it is there. i luxuriated in the exquisite beauty of that valley, little thinking or knowing what there was in it besides beauty, as allah "in mercy hid the book of fate." on we went among the ferns and flowers until we met a swamp, a different kind of swamp to those we had heretofore met, save the little one last mentioned. this one was much larger, and a gem of beauty; but we had to cross it. it was completely furnished with characteristic flora. fortunately when we got to its edge we saw a woman crossing before us, but unfortunately she did not take a fancy to our appearance, and instead of staying and having a chat about the state of the roads, and the shortest way to n'dorko, she bolted away across the swamp. i noticed she carefully took a course, not the shortest, although that course immersed her to her armpits. in we went after her, and when things were getting unpleasantly deep, and feeling highly uncertain under foot, we found there was a great log of a tree under the water which, as we had seen the lady's care at this point, we deemed it advisable to walk on. all of us save one, need i say that one was myself? effected this with safety. as for me, when i was at the beginning of the submerged bridge, and busily laying about in my mind for a definite opinion as to whether it was better to walk on a slippy tree trunk bridge you could see, or on one you could not, i was hurled off by that inexorable fate that demands of me a personal acquaintance with fluvial and paludial ground deposits; whereupon i took a header, and am thereby able to inform the world, that there is between fifteen and twenty feet of water each side of that log. i conscientiously went in on one side, and came up on the other. the log, i conjecture, is odum or ebony, and it is some fifty feet long; anyhow it is some sort of wood that won't float. gray shirt says it is a bridge across an under-swamp river. having survived this and reached the opposite bank, we shortly fell in with a party of men and women, who were taking, they said, a parcel of rubber to holty's. they told us n'dorko was quite close, and that the plantations we saw before us were its outermost ones, but spoke of a swamp, a bad swamp. we knew it, we said, in the foolishness of our hearts thinking they meant the one we had just forded, and leaving them resting, passed on our way; half-a- mile further on we were wiser and sadder, for then we stood on the rim of one of the biggest swamps i have ever seen south of the rivers. it stretched away in all directions, a great sheet of filthy water, out of which sprang gorgeous marsh plants, in islands, great banks of screw pine, and coppices of wine palm, with their lovely fronds reflected back by the still, mirror-like water, so that the reflection was as vivid as the reality, and above all remarkable was a plant, { } new and strange to me, whose pale- green stem came up out of the water and then spread out in a flattened surface, thin, and in a peculiarly graceful curve. this flattened surface had growing out from it leaves, the size, shape and colour of lily of the valley leaves; until i saw this thing i had held the wine palm to be the queen of grace in the vegetable kingdom, but this new beauty quite surpassed her. our path went straight into this swamp over the black rocks forming its rim, in an imperative, no alternative, "come-along-this-way" style. singlet, who was leading, carrying a good load of bottled fish and a gorilla specimen, went at it like a man, and disappeared before the eyes of us close following him, then and there down through the water. he came up, thanks be, but his load is down there now, worse luck. then i said we must get the rubber carriers who were coming this way to show us the ford; and so we sat down on the bank a tired, disconsolate, dilapidated-looking row, until they arrived. when they came up they did not plunge in forthwith; but leisurely set about making a most nerve-shaking set of preparations, taking off their clothes, and forming them into bundles, which, to my horror, they put on the tops of their heads. the women carried the rubber on their backs still, but rubber is none the worse for being under water. the men went in first, each holding his gun high above his head. they skirted the bank before they struck out into the swamp, and were followed by the women and by our party, and soon we were all up to our chins. we were two hours and a quarter passing that swamp. i was one hour and three-quarters; but i made good weather of it, closely following the rubber-carriers, and only going in right over head and all twice. other members of my band were less fortunate. one and all, we got horribly infested with leeches, having a frill of them round our necks like astrachan collars, and our hands covered with them, when we came out. we had to pass across the first bit of open country i had seen for a long time--a real patch of grass on the top of a low ridge, which is fringed with swamp on all sides save the one we made our way to, the eastern. shortly after passing through another plantation, we saw brown huts, and in a few minutes were standing in the middle of a ramshackle village, at the end of which, through a high stockade, with its gateway smeared with blood which hung in gouts, we saw our much longed for rembwe river. i made for it, taking small notice of the hubbub our arrival occasioned, and passed through the gateway, setting its guarding bell ringing violently; i stood on the steep, black, mud slime bank, surrounded by a noisy crowd. it is a big river, but nothing to the ogowe, either in breadth or beauty; what beauty it has is of the niger delta type--black mud-laden water, with a mangrove swamp fringe to it in all directions. i soon turned back into the village and asked for ugumu's factory. "this is it," said an exceedingly dirty, good-looking, civil-spoken man in perfect english, though as pure blooded an african as ever walked. "this is it, sir," and he pointed to one of the huts on the right-hand side, indistinguishable in squalor from the rest. "where's the agent?" said i. "i'm the agent," he answered. you could have knocked me down with a feather. "where's john holt's factory?" said i. "you have passed it; it is up on the hill." this showed messrs. holt's local factory to be no bigger than ugumu's. at this point a big, scraggy, very black man with an irregularly formed face the size of a tea-tray and looking generally as if he had come out of a pantomime on the arabian nights, dashed through the crowd, shouting, "i'm for holty, i'm for holty." "this is my trade, you go 'way," says agent number one. fearing my two agents would fight and damage each other, so that neither would be any good for me, i firmly said, "have you got any rum?" agent number one looked crestfallen, holty's triumphant. "rum, fur sure," says he; so i gave him a five- franc piece, which he regarded with great pleasure, and putting it in his mouth, he legged it like a lamplighter away to his store on the hill. "have you any tobacco?" said i to agent number one. he brightened, "plenty tobacco, plenty cloth," said he; so i told him to give me out twenty heads. i gave my men two heads apiece. i told them rum was coming, and ordered them to take the loads on to hatton and cookson's agent's hut and then to go and buy chop and make themselves comfortable. they highly approved of this plan, and grunted assent ecstatically; and just as the loads were stowed holty's anatomy hove in sight with a bottle of rum under each arm, and one in each hand; while behind him came an acolyte, a fat, small boy, panting and puffing and doing his level best to keep up with his long-legged flying master. i gave my men some and put the rest in with my goods, and explained that i belonged to hatton and cookson's (it's the proper thing to belong to somebody), and that therefore i must take up my quarters at their store; but holty's energetic agent hung about me like a vulture in hopes of getting more five franc-piece pickings. i sent ngouta off to get me some tea, and had the hut cleared of an excited audience, and shut myself in with hatton and cookson's agent, and asked him seriously and anxiously if there was not a big factory of the firm's on the river, because it was self-evident he had not got anything like enough stuff to pay off my men with, and my agreement was to pay off on the rembwe, hence my horror at the smallness of the firm's n'dorko store. "besides," i said, "mr. glass (i knew the head rembwe agent of hatton and cookson was a mr. glass), you have only got cloth and tobacco, and i have promised the fans to pay off in whatever they choose, and i know for sure they want powder." "i am not mr. glass," said my friend; "he is up at agonjo, i only do small trade for him here." joy!!!! but where's agonjo? to make a long story short i found agonjo was an hour's paddle up the rembwe and the place we ought to have come out at. there was a botheration again about sending up a message, because of a war palaver; but i got a pencil note, with my letter of introduction from mr. cockshut to sanga glass, at last delivered to that gentleman; and down he came, in a state of considerable astonishment, not unmixed with alarm, for no white man of any kind had been across from the ogowe for years, and none had ever come out at n'dorko. mr. glass i found an exceedingly neat, well-educated m'pongwe gentleman in irreproachable english garments, and with irreproachable, but slightly floreate, english language. we started talking trade, with my band in the middle of the street; making a patch of uproar in the moonlit surrounding silence. as soon as we thought we had got one gentleman's mind settled as to what goods he would take his pay in, and were proceeding to investigate another gentleman's little fancies, gentleman number one's mind came all to pieces again, and he wanted "to room his bundle," i.e. change articles in it for other articles of an equivalent value, if it must be, but of a higher, if possible. oh ye shopkeepers in england who grumble at your lady customers, just you come out here and try to serve, and satisfy a set of fans! mr. glass was evidently an expert at the affair, but it was past p.m. before we got the orders written out, and getting my baggage into some canoes, that mr. glass had brought down from agonjo, for n'dorko only had a few very wretched ones, i started off up river with him and all the ajumba, and kiva, the fan, who had been promised a safe conduct. he came to see the bundles for his fellow fans were made up satisfactorily. the canoes being small there was quite a procession of them. mr. glass and i shared one, which was paddled by two small boys; how we ever got up the rembwe that night i do not know, for although neither of us were fat, the canoe was a one man canoe, and the water lapped over the edge in an alarming way. had any of us sneezed, or had it been daylight when two or three mangrove flies would have joined the party, we must have foundered; but all went well; and on arriving at agonjo mr. glass most kindly opened his store, and by the light of lamps and lanterns, we picked out the goods from his varied and ample supply, and handed them over to the ajumba and kiva, and all, save three of the ajumba, were satisfied. the three, gray shirt, silence, and pagan quietly explained to me that they found the rembwe price so little better than the lembarene price that they would rather get their pay off mr. cockshut, than risk taking it back through the fan country, so i gave them books on him. i gave all my remaining trade goods, and the rest of the rum to the fans as a dash, and they were more than satisfied. i must say they never clamoured for dash for top. the passenger we had brought through with us, who had really made himself very helpful, was quite surprised at getting a bundle of goods from me. my only anxiety was as to whether fika would get his share all right; but i expect he did, for the ajumbas are very honest men; and they were going back with my fan friends. i found out, by the by, the reason of fika's shyness in coming through to the rembwe; it was a big wife palaver. i had a touching farewell with the fans: and so in peace, good feeling, and prosperity i parted company for the second time with "the terrible m'pongwe," whom i hope to meet with again, for with all their many faults and failings, they are real men. i am faint- hearted enough to hope, that our next journey together, may not be over a country that seems to me to have been laid down as an obstacle race track for mr. g. f. watts's titans, and to have fallen into shocking bad repair. chapter x. bush trade and fan customs. wherein the voyager, having fallen among the black traders, discourses on these men and their manner of life; and the difficulties and dangers attending the barter they carry on with the bush savages; and on some of the reasons that makes this barter so beloved and followed by both the black trader and the savage. to which is added an account of the manner of life of the fan tribe; the strange form of coinage used by these people; their manner of hunting the elephant, working in iron; and such like things. i spent a few, lazy, pleasant days at agonjo, mr. glass doing all he could to make me comfortable, though he had a nasty touch of fever on him just then. his efforts were ably seconded by his good lady, an exceedingly comely gaboon woman, with pretty manners, and an excellent gift in cookery. the third member of the staff was the store-keeper, a clever fellow: i fancy a loango from his clean-cut features and spare make, but his tribe i know not for a surety. one of these black trader factories is an exceedingly interesting place to stay at, for in these factories you are right down on the bed rock of the trade. on the coast, for the greater part, the white traders are dealing with black traders, middle men, who have procured their trade stuff from the bush natives, who collect and prepare it. here, in the black trader factory, you see the first stage of the export part of the trade: namely the barter of the collected trade stuff between the collector and the middleman. i will not go into details regarding it. what i saw merely confirmed my opinion that the native is not cheated; no, not even by a fellow african trader; and i will merely here pause to sing a paean to a very unpopular class--the black middleman as he exists on the south- west coast. it is impossible to realise the gloom of the lives of these men in bush factories, unless you have lived in one. it is no use saying "they know nothing better and so don't feel it," for they do know several things better, being very sociable men, fully appreciative of the joys of a coast town, and their aim, object and end in life is, in almost every case, to get together a fortune that will enable them to live in one, give a dance twice a week, card parties most nights, and dress themselves up so that their fellow coast townsmen may hate them and their townswomen love them. from their own accounts of the dreadful state of trade; and the awful and unparalleled series of losses they have had, from the upsetting of canoes, the raids and robberies made on them and their goods by "those awful bush savages"; you would, if you were of a trustful disposition, regard the black trader with an admiring awe as the man who has at last solved the great commercial problem of how to keep a shop and live by the loss. nay, not only live, but build for himself an equivalent to a palatial residence, and keep up, not only it, but half a dozen wives, with a fine taste for dress every one of them. i am not of a trustful disposition and i accept those "losses" with a heavy discount, and know most of the rest of them have come out of my friend the white trader's pockets. still i can never feel the righteous indignation that i ought to feel, when i see the black trader "down in a seaport town with his nancy," etc., as sir w. h. s. gilbert classically says, because i remember those bush factories. mr. glass, however, was not a trader who made a fortune by losing those of other people; for he had been many years in the employ of the firm. he had risen certainly to the high post and position of charge of the rembwe, but he was not down giddy-flying at gaboon. his accounts of his experiences when he had been many years ago away up the still little known nguni river, in a factory in touch with the lively bakele, then in a factory among fans and igalwa on the ogowe, and now among fans and skekiani on the rembwe, were fascinating, and told vividly of the joys of first starting a factory in a wild district. the way in which your customers, for the first month or so, enjoyed themselves by trying to frighten you, the trader, out of your wits and goods, and into giving them fancy prices for things you were trading in, and for things of no earthly use to you, or any one else! the trader's existence during this period is marked by every unpleasantness save dulness; from that he is spared by the presence of a mob of noisy, dangerous, thieving savages all over his place all day; invading his cook-house, to put some nastiness into his food as a trade charm; helping themselves to portable property at large; and making themselves at home to the extent of sitting on his dining-table. at night those customers proceed to sleep all over the premises, with a view to being on hand to start shopping in the morning. woe betide the trader if he gives in to this, and tolerates the invasion, for there is no chance of that house ever being his own again; and in addition to the local flies, etc., on the table-cloth, he will always have several big black gentlemen to share his meals. if he raises prices, to tide over some extra row, he is a lost man; for the africans can understand prices going up, but never prices coming down; and time being no object, they will hold back their trade. then the district is ruined, and the trader along with it, for he cannot raise the price he gets for the things he buys. what that trader has got to do, is to be a "devil man." they always kindly said they recognised me as one, which is a great compliment. he must betray no weakness, but a character which i should describe as a compound of the best parts of those of cardinal richelieu, brutus, julius caesar, prince metternich, and mezzofanti, the latter to carry on the native language part of the business; and he must cast those customers out, not only from his house; but from his yard; and adhere to the "no admittance except on business" principle. this causes a good deal of unpleasantness, and the trader's nights are now cheered by lively war-dances outside his stockade; the accompanying songs advertising that the customers are coming over the stockade to raid the store, and cut up the trader "into bits like a fish." sometimes they do come--and then--finish; but usually they don't; and gradually settle down, and respect the trader greatly as "a devil man"; and do business on sound lines during the day. over the stockade at night, by ones and twos, stealing, they will come to the end of the chapter. moonlight nights are fairly restful for the bush trader, but when it is inky black, or pouring with rain, he has got to be very much out and about, and particularly vigilant has he got to be on tornado nights--a most uncomfortable sort of weather to attend to business in, i assure you. the factory at agonjo was typical; the house is a fine specimen of the igalwa style of architecture; mounted on poles above the ground; the space under the house being used as a store for rubber in barrels, and ebony in billets; thereby enabling the trader to hover over these precious possessions, sleeping and waking, like a sitting hen over her eggs. near to the house are the sleeping places for the beach hands, and the cook-house. in front, in a position commanded by the eye from the verandah, and well withdrawn from the stockade, are great piles of billets of red bar wood. the whole of the clean, sandy yard containing these things, and divers others, is surrounded by a stout stockade, its main face to the river frontage, the water at high tide lapping its base, and at low tide exposing in front of it a shore of black slime. although i cite this factory as a typical factory of a black trader, it is a specimen of the highest class, for, being in connection with messrs. hatton and cookson it is well kept up and stocked. firms differ much in this particular. messrs. hatton and cookson, like messrs. miller brothers in the bights, take every care that lies in their power of the people who serve them, down to the kruboys working on their beaches, giving ample and good rations and providing good houses. but this is not so with all firms on the coast. i have seen factories belonging to the swedish houses beside which this factory at agonjo is a palace although those factories are white man factories, and the unfortunate white men in them are expected by these firms to live on native chop--an expectation the agents by no means realise, for they usually die. black hands, however, do not suffer much at the hands of such firms, for the swedish agents are a quiet, gentlemanly set of men, in the best sense of that much misused term, and they do not employ on their beaches such a staff of black helpers as the english houses, so the two or three kruboys on a starvation beach can fairly well fend for themselves, for there is always an adjacent village, and in that village there are always chickens, and on the shore crabs, and in the river fish, and for the rest of his diet the kruboy flirts with the local ladies. although, as i have laid down, the bush factory at its best is a place, as mr. tracey tupman would say, more fitted for a wounded heart than for one still able to feast on social joys, it is a luxurious situation for a black trader compared to the other form of trading he deals with--that of travelling among the native villages in the bush. this has one hundred times the danger, and a thousand times the discomfort, and is a thoroughly unhealthy pursuit. the journeys these bush traders make are often remarkable, and they deserve great credit for the courage and enterprise they display. certainly they run less risk of death from fever than a white man would; but, on the other hand, their colour gives them no protection; and their chance of getting murdered is distinctly greater, the white governmental powers cannot revenge their death, in the way they would the death of a white man, for these murders usually take place away in some forest region, in a district no white man has ever penetrated. you will naturally ask how it is that so many of these men do survive "to lead a life of sin" as a missionary described to me their coast town life to be. this question struck me as requiring explanation. the result of my investigations, and the answers i have received from the men themselves, show that there is a reason why the natives do not succumb every time to the temptation to kill the trader, and take his goods, and this is twofold: firstly, all trade in west africa follows definite routes, even in the wildest parts of it; and so a village far away in the forest, but on the trade route, knows that as a general rule twice a year, a trader will appear to purchase its rubber and ivory. if he does not appear somewhere about the expected time, that village gets uneasy. the ladies are impatient for their new clothes; the gentlemen half wild for want of tobacco; and things coming to a crisis, they make inquiries for the trader down the road, one village to another, and then, if it is found that a village has killed the trader, and stolen all his goods, there is naturally a big palaver, and things are made extremely hot, even for equatorial africa, for that village by the tobaccoless husbands of the clothesless wives. herein lies the trader's chief safety, the village not being an atom afraid, or disinclined to kill him, but afraid of their neighbouring villages, and disinclined to be killed by them. but the trader is not yet safe. there is still a hole in his armour, and this is only to be stopped up in one way, namely, by wives; for you see although the village cannot safely kill him, and take all his goods, they can still let him die safely of a disease, and take part of them, passing on sufficient stuff to the other villages to keep them quiet. now the most prevalent disease in the african bush comes out of the cooking pot, and so to make what goes into the cooking pot-- which is the important point, for earthen pots do not in themselves breed poison--safe and wholesome, you have got to have some one who is devoted to your health to attend to the cooking affairs, and who can do this like a wife? so you have a wife--one in each village up the whole of your route. i know myself one gentleman whose wives stretch over miles of country, with a good wife base in a coast town as well. this system of judiciously conducted alliances, gives the black trader a security nothing else can, because naturally he marries into influential families at each village, and all his wife's relations on the mother's side regard him as one of themselves, and look after him and his interests. that security can lie in women, especially so many women, the so-called civilised man may ironically doubt, but the security is there, and there only, and on a sound basis, for remember the position of a travelling trader's wife in a village is a position that gives the lady prestige, the discreet husband showing little favours to her family and friends, if she asks for them when he is with her; and then she has not got the bother of having a man always about the house, and liable to get all sorts of silly notions into his head if she speaks to another gentleman, and then go and impart these notions to her with a cutlass, or a kassengo, as the more domestic husband, i am assured by black ladies, is prone to. you may now, i fear, be falling into the other adjacent error--from the wonder why any black trader survives, namely, into the wonder why any black trader gets killed; with all these safeguards, and wives. but there is yet another danger, which no quantity of wives, nor local jealousies avail to guard him through. this danger arises from the nomadic habits of the bush tribes, notably the fan. for when a village has made up its mind to change its district, either from having made the district too hot to hold it, with quarrels with neighbouring villages; or because it has exhausted the trade stuff, i.e. rubber and ivory in reach of its present situation; or because some other village has raided it, and taken away all the stuff it was saving to sell to the black trader; it resolves to give itself a final treat in the old home, and make a commercial coup at one fell swoop. then when the black trader turns up with his boxes of goods, it kills him, has some for supper, smokes the rest, and takes it and the goods, and departs to found new homes in another district. the bush trade i have above sketched is the bush trade with the fans. in those districts on the southern banks of the ogowe the main features of the trade, and the trader's life are the same, but the details are more intricate, for the igalwa trader from lembarene, fernan vaz, or njole, deals with another set of trading tribes, not first hand with the collectors. the fan villages on the trade routes may, however, be regarded as trade depots, for to them filters the trade stuff of the more remote villages, so the difference is really merely technical, and in all villages alike the same sort of thing occurs. the igalwa or m'pongwe trader arrives with the goods he has received from the white trader, and there are great rejoicing and much uproar as his chests and bundles and demijohns are brought up from the canoe. and presently, after a great deal of talk, the goods are opened. the chiefs of the village have their pick, and divide this among the principal men of the village, who pay for it in part with their store of collected rubber or ivory, and take the rest on trust, promising to collect enough rubber to pay the balance on the next visit of the trader. thereby the trader has a quantity of debts outstanding in each village, liable to be bad debts, and herein lies his chief loss. each chief takes a certain understood value in goods as a commission for himself--nyeno--giving the trader, as a consideration for this, an understood bond to assist him in getting in the trust granted to his village. this nyeno he utilises in buying trade stuff from villages not on the trade route. among the fans the men who have got the goods stand by with these to trade for rubber with the general public and bachelors of the village, in a way i will presently explain. in tribes like ajumbas, adooma, etc., the men having the goods travel off, as traders, among their various bush tribes, similarly paying their nyeno, and so by the time the goods reach the final producing men, only a small portion of them is left, but their price has necessarily risen. still it is quite absurd for a casual white traveller, who may have dropped in on the terminus of a trade route, to cry out regarding the small value the collector (who is often erroneously described as the producer) gets for his stuff, compared to the price it fetches in europe. for before it even reaches the factory of the coast settlement, that stuff has got to keep a whole series of traders. it appears at first bad that this should be the case, but the case it is along the west coast of the continent save in the districts commanded by the royal niger company, who, with courage and enterprise, have pushed far inland, and got in touch with the great interior trade routes--a performance which has raised in the breasts of the coast trader tribes who have been supplanted, a keen animosity, which like most animosity in africa, is not regardful of truth. the tribes that have had the trade of the bight of biafra passing through their hands have been accustomed, according to the german government who are also pressing inland, to make seventy-five per cent. profit on it, and they resent being deprived of this. a good deal is to be said in favour of their views; among other things that the greater part of the seaboard districts of west africa, i may say every part from sierra leone to cameroon, is structurally incapable of being self-supporting under existing conditions. below cameroon, on my beloved south-west coast, which is infinitely richer than the bight of benin, rich producing districts come down to the sea in most places until you reach the congo; but here again the middleman is of great use to the interior tribes, and if they do have to pay him seventy-five per cent, serve them right. they should not go making wife palaver, and blood palaver all over the place to such an extent that the inhabitants of no village, unless they go en masse, dare take a ten mile walk, save at the risk of their lives, in any direction, so no palaver live. we will now enter into the reason that induces the bush man to collect stuff to sell among the fans, which is the expensiveness of the ladies in the tribe. a bush fan is bound to marry into his tribe, because over a great part of the territory occupied by them there is no other tribe handy to marry into; and a fan residing in villages in touch with other tribes, has but little chance of getting a cheaper lady. for there is, in the congo francais and the country adjacent to the north of it (batanga), a regular style of aristocracy which may be summarised firstly thus: all the other tribes look down on the fans, and the fans look down on all the other tribes. this aristocracy has sub-divisions, the m'pongwe of gaboon are the upper circle tribe; next come the benga of corisco; then the bapuka; then the banaka. this system of aristocracy is kept up by the ladies. thus a m'pongwe lady would not think of marrying into one of the lower tribes, so she is restricted, with many inner restrictions, to her own tribe. a benga lady would marry a m'pongwe, or a benga, but not a banaka, or bapuka; and so on with the others; but not one of them would marry a fan. as for the men, well of course they would marry any lady of any tribe, if she had a pretty face, or a good trading connection, if they were allowed to: that's just man's way. to the south-east the fans are in touch with the bakele, a tribe that has much in common with the fan, but who differ from them in getting on in a very friendly way with the little dwarf people, the matimbas, or watwa, or akoa: people the fans cannot abide. with these bakele the fan can intermarry, but there is not much advantage in so doing, as the price is equally high, but still marry he must. a young fan man has to fend for himself, and has a scratchy kind of life of it, aided only by his mother until--if he be an enterprising youth--he is able to steal a runaway wife from a neighbouring village, or if he is a quiet and steady young man, until he has amassed sufficient money to buy a wife. this he does by collecting ebony and rubber and selling it to the men who have been allotted goods by the chief of the village, from the consignment brought up by the black trader. he supports himself meanwhile by, if the situation of his village permits, fishing and selling the fish, and hunting and killing game in the forest. he keeps steadily at it in his way, reserving his roysterings until he is settled in life. a truly careful young man does not go and buy a baby girl cheap, as soon as he has got a little money together; but works and saves on until he has got enough to buy a good, tough widow lady, who, although personally unattractive, is deeply versed in the lore of trade, and who knows exactly how much rubbish you can incorporate in a ball of india rubber, without the white trader, or the black bush factory trader, instantly detecting it. when the fan young man has married his wife, in a legitimate way on the cash system, he takes her round to his relations, and shows her off; and they make little presents to help the pair set up housekeeping. but the young man cannot yet settle down, for his wife will not allow him to. she is not going to slave herself to death doing all the work of the house, etc., and so he goes on collecting, and she preparing, trade stuff, and he grows rich enough to buy other wives--some of them young children, others widows, no longer necessarily old. but it is not until he is well on in life that he gets sufficient wives, six or seven. for it takes a good time to get enough rubber to buy a lady, and he does not get a grip on the ivory trade until he has got a certain position in the village, and plantations of his own which the elephants can be discovered raiding, in which case a percentage of the ivory taken from the herd is allotted to him. now and again he may come across a dead elephant, but that is of the nature of a windfall; and on rubber and ebony he has to depend during his early days. these he changes with the rich men of his village for a very peculiar and interesting form of coinage--bikei--little iron imitation axe-heads which are tied up in bundles called ntet, ten going to one bundle, for with bikei must the price of a wife be paid. you do not find bikei close down to libreville, among the fans who are there in a semi-civilised state, or more properly speaking in a state of disintegrating culture. you must go for bush. i thought i saw in bikei a certain resemblance in underlying idea with the early greek coins i have seen at cambridge, made like the fore-parts of cattle; and i have little doubt that the articles of barter among the fans before the introduction of the rubber, ebony, and ivory trades, which in their districts are comparatively recent, were iron implements. for the fans are good workers in iron; and it would be in consonance with well-known instances among other savage races in the matter of stone implements, that these things, important of old, should survive, and be employed in the matter of such an old and important affair as marriage. they thus become ju-ju; and indeed all west african legitimate marriage, although appearing to the casual observer a mere matter of barter, is never solely such, but always has ju-ju in it. we may as well here follow out the whole of the domestic life of the fan, now we have got him married. his difficulty does not only consist in getting enough bikei together but in getting a lady he can marry. no amount of bikei can justify a man in marrying his first cousin, or his aunt; and as relationship among the fans is recognised with both his father and his mother, not as among the igalwa with the latter's blood relations only, there are an awful quantity of aunts and cousins about from whom he is debarred. but when he has surmounted his many difficulties, and dodged his relations, and married, he is seemingly a better husband than the man of a more cultured tribe. he will turn a hand to anything, that does not necessitate his putting down his gun outside his village gateway. he will help chop firewood, or goat's chop, or he will carry the baby with pleasure, while his good lady does these things; and in bush villages, he always escorts her so as to be on hand in case of leopards, or other local unpleasantnesses. when inside the village he will lay down his gun, within handy reach, and build the house, tease out fibre to make game nets with, and plait baskets, or make pottery with the ladies, cheerily chatting the while. fan pottery, although rough and sunbaked, is artistic in form and ornamented, for the fan ornaments all his work; the articles made in it consist of cooking pots, palm-wine bottles, water bottles and pipes, but not all water bottles, nor all pipes are made of pottery. i wish they were, particularly the former, for they are occasionally made of beautifully plaited fibre coated with a layer of a certain gum with a vile taste, which it imparts to the water in the vessel. they say it does not do this if the vessel is soaked for two days in water, but it does, and i should think contaminates the stream it was soaked in into the bargain. the pipes are sometimes made of iron very neatly. i should imagine they smoked hot, but of this i have no knowledge. one of my ajumba friends got himself one of these pipes when we were in efoua, and that pipe was, on and off, a curse to the party. its owner soon learnt not to hold it by the bowl, but by the wooden stem, when smoking it; the other lessons it had to teach he learnt more slowly. he tucked it, when he had done smoking, into the fold in his cloth, until he had had three serious conflagrations raging round his middle. and to the end of the chapter, after having his last pipe at night with it, he would lay it on the ground, before it was cool. he learnt to lay it out of reach of his own cloth, but his fellow ajumbas and he himself persisted in always throwing a leg on to it shortly after, and there was another row. the fan basket-work is strongly made, but very inferior to the fjort basket-work. their nets are, however, the finest i have ever seen. these are made mainly for catching small game, such as the beautiful little gazelles (ncheri) with dark gray skins on the upper part of the body, white underneath, and satin-like in sleekness all over. their form is very dainty, the little legs being no thicker than a man's finger, the neck long and the head ornamented with little pointed horns and broad round ears. the nets are tied on to trees in two long lines, which converge to an acute angle, the bottom part of the net lying on the ground. then a party of men and women accompanied by their trained dogs, which have bells hung round their necks, beat the surrounding bushes, and the frightened small game rush into the nets, and become entangled. the fibre from which these nets are made has a long staple, and is exceedingly strong. i once saw a small bush cow caught in a set of them and unable to break through, and once a leopard; he, however, took his section of the net away with him, and a good deal of vegetation and sticks to boot. in addition to nets, this fibre is made into bags, for carrying things in while in the bush, and into the water bottles already mentioned. the iron-work of the fans deserves especial notice for its excellence. the anvil is a big piece of iron which is embedded firmly in the ground. its upper surface is flat, and pointed at both ends. the hammers are solid cones of iron, the upper part of the cones prolonged so as to give a good grip, and the blows are given directly downwards, like the blows of a pestle. the bellows are of the usual african type, cut out of one piece of solid but soft wood; at the upper end of these bellows there are two chambers hollowed out in the wood and then covered with the skin of some animal, from which the hair has been removed. this is bound firmly round the rim of each chamber with tie-tie, and the bag of it at the top is gathered up, and bound to a small piece of stick, to give a convenient hand hold. the straight cylinder, terminating in the nozzle, has two channels burnt in it which communicate with each of the chambers respectively, and half-way up the cylinder, there are burnt from the outside into the air passages, three series of holes, one series on the upper surface, and a series at each side. this ingenious arrangement gives a constant current of air up from the nozzle when the bellows are worked by a man sitting behind them, and rapidly and alternately pulling up the skin cover over one chamber, while depressing the other. in order to make the affair firm it is lashed to pieces of stick stuck in the ground in a suitable way so as to keep the bellows at an angle with the nozzle directed towards the fire. as wooden bellows like this if stuck into the fire would soon be aflame, the nozzle is put into a cylinder made of clay. this cylinder is made sufficiently large at the end, into which the nozzle of the bellows goes, for the air to have full play round the latter. the fan bellows only differ from those of the other iron-working west coast tribes in having the channels from the two chambers in one piece of wood all the way. his forge is the same as the other forges, a round cavity scooped in the ground; his fuel also is charcoal. his other smith's tool consists of a pointed piece of iron, with which he works out the patterns he puts at the handle-end of his swords, etc. i must now speak briefly on the most important article with which the fan deals, namely ivory. his methods of collecting this are several, and many a wild story the handles of your table knives could tell you, if their ivory has passed through fan hands. for ivory is everywhere an evil thing before which the quest for gold sinks into a parlour game; and when its charms seize such a tribe as the fans, "conclusions pass their careers." a very common way of collecting a tooth is to kill the person who owns one. therefore in order to prevent this catastrophe happening to you yourself, when you have one, it is held advisable, unless you are a powerful person in your own village, to bury or sink the said tooth and say nothing about it until the trader comes into your district or you get a chance of smuggling it quietly down to him. some of these private ivories are kept for years and years before they reach the trader's hands. and quite a third of the ivory you see coming on board a vessel to go to europe is dark from this keeping: some teeth a lovely brown like a well-coloured meerschaum, others quite black, and gnawed by that strange little creature--much heard of, and abused, yet little known in ivory ports--the ivory rat. ivory, however, that is obtained by murder is private ivory. the public ivory trade among the fans is carried on in a way more in accordance with european ideas of a legitimate trade. the greater part of this ivory is obtained from dead elephants. there are in this region certain places where the elephants are said to go to die. a locality in one district pointed out to me as such a place, was a great swamp in the forest. a swamp that evidently was deep in the middle, for from out its dark waters no swamp plant, or tree grew, and evidently its shores sloped suddenly, for the band of swamp plants round its edge was narrow. it is just possible that during the rainy season when most of the surrounding country would be under water, elephants might stray into this natural trap and get drowned, and on the drying up of the waters be discovered, and the fact being known, be regularly sought for by the natives cognisant of this. i inquired carefully whether these places where the elephants came to die always had water in them, but they said no, and in one district spoke of a valley or round-shaped depression in among the mountains. but natives were naturally disinclined to take a stranger to these ivory mines, and a white person who has caught-- as any one who has been in touch must catch--ivory fever, is naturally equally disinclined to give localities. a certain percentage of ivory collected by the fans is from live elephants, but i am bound to admit that their method of hunting elephants is disgracefully unsportsmanlike. a herd of elephants is discovered by rubber hunters or by depredations on plantations, and the whole village, men, women, children, babies and dogs turn out into the forest and stalk the monsters into a suitable ravine, taking care not to scare them. when they have gradually edged the elephants on into a suitable place, they fell trees and wreathe them very roughly together with bush rope, all round an immense enclosure, still taking care not to scare the elephants into a rush. this fence is quite inadequate to stop any elephant in itself, but it is made effective by being smeared with certain things, the smell whereof the elephants detest so much that when they wander up to it, they turn back disgusted. i need hardly remark that this preparation is made by the witch doctors and its constituents a secret of theirs, and i was only able to find out some of them. then poisoned plantains are placed within the enclosure, and the elephants eat these and grow drowsier and drowsier; if the water supply within the enclosure is a pool it is poisoned, but if it is a running stream this cannot be done. during this time the crowd of men and women spend their days round the enclosure, ready to turn back any elephant who may attempt to break out, going to and fro to the village for their food. their nights they spend in little bough shelters by the enclosure, watching more vigilantly than by day, as the elephants are more active at night, it being their usual feeding time. during the whole time the witch doctor is hard at work making incantations and charms, with a view to finding out the proper time to attack the elephants. in my opinion, his decision fundamentally depends on his knowledge of the state of poisoning the animals are in, but his version is that he gets his information from the forest spirits. when, however, he has settled the day, the best hunters steal into the enclosure and take up safe positions in trees, and the outer crowd set light to the ready-built fires, and make the greatest uproar possible, and fire upon the staggering, terrified elephants as they attempt to break out. the hunters in the trees fire down on them as they rush past, the fatal point at the back of the skull being well exposed to them. when the animals are nearly exhausted, those men who do not possess guns dash into the enclosure, and the men who do, reload and join them, and the work is then completed. one elephant hunt i chanced upon at the final stage had taken two months' preparation, and although the plan sounds safe enough, there is really a good deal of danger left in it with all the drugging and ju-ju. there were eight elephants killed that day, but three burst through everything, sending energetic spectators flying, and squashing two men and a baby as flat as botanical specimens. the subsequent proceedings were impressive. the whole of the people gorged themselves on the meat for days, and great chunks of it were smoked over the fires in all directions. a certain portion of the flesh of the hind leg was taken by the witch doctor for ju-ju, and was supposed to be put away by him, with certain suitable incantations in the recesses of the forest; his idea being apparently either to give rise to more elephants, or to induce the forest spirits to bring more elephants into the district. dr. nassau tells me that the manner in which the ivory gained by one of these hunts is divided is as follows: --"the witch doctor, the chiefs, and the family on whose ground the enclosure is built, and especially the household whose women first discovered the animals, decide in council as to the division of the tusks and the share of the flesh to be given to the crowd of outsiders. the next day the tusks are removed and each family represented in the assemblage cuts up and distributes the flesh." in the hunt i saw finished, the elephants had not been discovered, as in the case dr. nassau above speaks of, in a plantation by women, but by a party of rubber hunters in the forest some four or five miles from any village, and the ivory that would have been allotted to the plantation holder in the former case, went in this case to the young rubber hunters. such are the pursuits, sports and pastimes of my friends the fans. i have been considerably chaffed both by whites and blacks about my partiality for this tribe, but as i like africans in my way--not a la sierra leone--and these africans have more of the qualities i like than any other tribe i have met, it is but natural that i should prefer them. they are brave and so you can respect them, which is an essential element in a friendly feeling. they are on the whole a fine race, particularly those in the mountain districts of the sierra del cristal, where one continually sees magnificent specimens of human beings, both male and female. their colour is light bronze, many of the men have beards, and albinoes are rare among them. the average height in the mountain districts is five feet six to five feet eight, the difference in stature between men and women not being great. their countenances are very bright and expressive, and if once you have been among them, you can never mistake a fan. but it is in their mental characteristics that their difference from the lethargic, dying-out coast tribes is most marked. the fan is full of fire, temper, intelligence and go; very teachable, rather difficult to manage, quick to take offence, and utterly indifferent to human life. i ought to say that other people, who should know him better than i, say he is a treacherous, thievish, murderous cannibal. i never found him treacherous; but then i never trusted him, remembering one of the aphorisms of my great teacher captain boler of bonny, "it's not safe to go among bush tribes, but if you are such a fool as to go, you needn't go and be a bigger fool still, you've done enough." and captain boler's other great aphorism was: "never be afraid of a black man." "what if i can't help it?" said i. "don't show it," said he. to these precepts i humbly add another: "never lose your head." my most favourite form of literature, i may remark, is accounts of mountaineering exploits, though i have never seen a glacier or a permanent snow mountain in my life. i do not care a row of pins how badly they may be written, and what form of bumble-puppy grammar and composition is employed, as long as the writer will walk along the edge of a precipice with a sheer fall of thousands of feet on one side and a sheer wall on the other; or better still crawl up an arete with a precipice on either. nothing on earth would persuade me to do either of these things myself, but they remind me of bits of country i have been through where you walk along a narrow line of security with gulfs of murder looming on each side, and where in exactly the same way you are as safe as if you were in your easy chair at home, as long as you get sufficient holding ground: not on rock in the bush village inhabited by murderous cannibals, but on ideas in those men's and women's minds; and these ideas, which i think i may say you will always find, give you safety. it is not advisable to play with them, or to attempt to eradicate them, because you regard them as superstitious; and never, never shoot too soon. i have never had to shoot, and hope never to have to; because in such a situation, one white alone with no troops to back him means a clean finish. but this would not discourage me if i had to start, only it makes me more inclined to walk round the obstacle, than to become a mere blood splotch against it, if this can be done without losing your self-respect, which is the mainspring of your power in west africa. as for flourishing about a revolver and threatening to fire, i hold it utter idiocy. i have never tried it, however, so i speak from prejudice which arises from the feeling that there is something cowardly in it. always have your revolver ready loaded in good order, and have your hand on it when things are getting warm, and in addition have an exceedingly good bowie knife, not a hinge knife, because with a hinge knife you have got to get it open--hard work in a country where all things go rusty in the joints--and hinge knives are liable to close on your own fingers. the best form of knife is the bowie, with a shallow half moon cut out of the back at the point end, and this depression sharpened to a cutting edge. a knife is essential, because after wading neck deep in a swamp your revolver is neither use nor ornament until you have had time to clean it. but the chances are you may go across africa, or live years in it, and require neither. it is just the case of the gentleman who asked if one required a revolver in carolina and was answered, "you may be here one year, and you may be here two and never want it; but when you do want it you'll want it very bad." the cannibalism of the fans, although a prevalent habit, is no danger, i think, to white people, except as regards the bother it gives one in preventing one's black companions from getting eaten. the fan is not a cannibal from sacrificial motives like the negro. he does it in his common sense way. man's flesh, he says, is good to eat, very good, and he wishes you would try it. oh dear no, he never eats it himself, but the next door town does. he is always very much abused for eating his relations, but he really does not do this. he will eat his next door neighbour's relations and sell his own deceased to his next door neighbour in return; but he does not buy slaves and fatten them up for his table as some of the middle congo tribes i know of do. he has no slaves, no prisoners of war, no cemeteries, so you must draw your own conclusions. no, my friend, i will not tell you any cannibal stories. i have heard how good m. du chaillu fared after telling you some beauties, and now you come away from the fan village and down the rembwe river. chapter xi. down the rembwe. setting forth how the voyager descends the rembwe river, with divers excursions and alarms, in the company of a black trader, and returns safely to the coast. getting away from agonjo seemed as if it would be nearly as difficult as getting to it, but as the quarters were comfortable and the society fairly good, i was not anxious. i own the local scenery was a little too much of the niger delta type for perfect beauty, just the long lines of mangrove, and the muddy river lounging almost imperceptibly to sea, and nothing else in sight. mr. glass, however, did not take things so philosophically. i was on his commercial conscience, for i had come in from the bush and there was money in me. therefore i was a trade product--a new trade stuff that ought to be worked up and developed; and he found himself unable to do this, for although he had secured the first parcel, as it were, and got it successfully stored, yet he could not ship it, and he felt this was a reproach to him. many were his lamentations that the firm had not provided him with a large sailing canoe and a suitable crew to deal with this new line of trade. i did my best to comfort him, pointing out that the most enterprising firm could not be expected to provide expensive things like these, on the extremely remote chance of ladies arriving per bush at agonjo--in fact not until the trade in them was well developed. but he refused to see it in this light and harped upon the subject, wrapped up, poor man, in a great coat and a muffler, because his ague was on him. i next tried to convince mr. glass that any canoe would do for me to go down in. "no," he said, "any canoe will not do;" and he explained that when you got down the rembwe to 'como point you were in a rough, nasty bit of water, the gaboon, which has a fine confused set of currents from the tidal wash and the streams of the rembwe and 'como rivers, in which it would be improbable that a river canoe could live any time worth mentioning. progress below 'como point by means of mere paddling he considered impossible. there was nothing for it but a big sailing canoe, and there was no big sailing canoe to be had. i think mr. glass got a ray of comfort out of the fact that messrs. john holt's sub-agent was, equally with himself, unable to ship me. at this point in the affair there entered a highly dramatic figure. he came on to the scene suddenly and with much uproar, in a way that would have made his fortune in a transpontine drama. i shall always regret i have not got that man's portrait, for i cannot do him justice with ink. he dashed up on to the verandah, smote the frail form of mr. glass between the shoulders, and flung his own massive one into a chair. his name was obanjo, but he liked it pronounced captain johnson, and his profession was a bush and river trader on his own account. every movement of the man was theatrical, and he used to look covertly at you every now and then to see if he had produced his impression, which was evidently intended to be that of a reckless, rollicking skipper. there was a hallo-my-hearty atmosphere coming off him from the top of his hat to the soles of his feet, like the scent off a flower; but it did not require a genius in judging men to see that behind, and under this was a very different sort of man, and if i should ever want to engage in a wild and awful career up a west african river i shall start on it by engaging captain johnson. he struck me as being one of those men, of whom i know five, whom i could rely on, that if one of them and i went into the utter bush together, one of us at least would come out alive and have made something substantial by the venture; which is a great deal more than i could say, for example, of ngouta, who was still with me, as he desired to see the glories of gaboon and buy a hanging lamp. captain johnson's attire calls for especial comment and admiration. however disconnected the two sides of his character might be, his clothes bore the impress of both of his natures to perfection. he wore, when first we met, a huge sombrero hat, a spotless singlet, and a suit of clean, well-got-up dungaree, and an uncommonly picturesque, powerful figure he cut in them, with his finely moulded, well-knit form and good-looking face, full of expression always, but always with the keen small eyes in it watching the effect his genial smiles and hearty laugh produced. the eyes were the eyes of obanjo, the rest of the face the property of captain johnson. i do not mean to say that they were the eyes of a bad bold man, but you had not to look twice at them to see they belonged to a man courageous in the african manner, full of energy and resource, keenly intelligent and self-reliant, and all that sort of thing. i left him and the refined mr. glass together to talk over the palaver of shipping me, and they talked it at great length. finally the price i was to pay obanjo was settled and we proceeded to less important details. it seemed obanjo, when up the river this time, had set about constructing a new and large trading canoe at one of his homes, in which he was just thinking of taking his goods down to gaboon. next morning obanjo with his vessel turned up, and saying farewell to my kind host, mr. sanga glass, i departed. she had the makings of a fine vessel in her; though roughly hewn out of an immense hard-wood tree: her lines were good, and her type was that of the big sea-canoes of the bight of panavia. very far forward was a pole mast, roughly made, but european in intention, and carrying a long gaff. shrouds and stays it had not, and my impression was that it would be carried away if we dropped in for half a tornado, until i saw our sail and recognised that that would go to darning cotton instantly if it fell in with even a breeze. it was a bed quilt that had evidently been in the family some years, and although it had been in places carefully patched with pieces of previous sets of the captain's dungarees, in other places, where it had not, it gave "free passage to the airs of heaven"; which i may remark does not make for speed in the boat mounting such canvas. partly to this sail, partly to the amount of trading affairs we attended to, do i owe the credit of having made a record trip down the rembwe, the slowest white man time on record. fixed across the stern of the canoe there was the usual staging made of bamboos, flush with the gunwale. now this sort of staging is an exceedingly good idea when it is fully finished. you can stuff no end of things under it; and over it there is erected a hood of palm- thatch, giving a very comfortable cabin five or six feet long and about three feet high in the centre, and you can curl yourself up in it and, if you please, have a mat hung across the opening. but we had not got so far as that yet on our vessel, only just got the staging fixed in fact; and i assure you a bamboo staging is but a precarious perch when in this stage of formation. i made myself a reclining couch on it in the roman manner with my various belongings, and was exceeding comfortable until we got nearly out of the rembwe into the gaboon. then came grand times. our noble craft had by this time got a good list on her from our collected cargo-- ill stowed. this made my home, the bamboo staging, about as reposeful a place as the slope of a writing desk would be if well polished; and the rough and choppy sea gave our vessel the most peculiar set of motions imaginable. she rolled, which made it precarious for things on the bamboo staging, but still a legitimate motion, natural and foreseeable. in addition to this, she had a cataclysmic kick in her--that i think the heathenish thing meant to be a pitch--which no mortal being could foresee or provide against, and which projected portable property into the waters of the gaboon over the stern and on to the conglomerate collection in the bottom of the canoe itself, making obanjo repeat, with ferocity and feeling, words he had heard years ago, when he was boatswain on a steamboat trading on the coast. it was fortunate, you will please understand, for my future, that i have usually been on vessels of the british african or the african lines when voyaging about this west african sea-board, as the owners of these vessels prohibit the use of bad language on board, or goodness only knows what words i might not have remembered and used in the gaboon estuary. we left agonjo with as much bustle and shouting and general air of brisk seamanship as obanjo could impart to the affair, and the hopeful mind might have expected to reach somewhere important by nightfall. i did not expect that; neither, on the other hand, did i expect that after we had gone a mile and only four, as the early ballad would say, that we should pull up and anchor against a small village for the night; but this we did, the captain going ashore to see for cargo, and to get some more crew. there were grand times ashore that night, and the captain returned on board about a.m. with some rubber and pissava and two new hands whose appearance fitted them to join our vessel; for a more villainous-looking set than our crew i never laid eye on. one enormously powerful fellow looked the incarnation of the horrid negro of buccaneer stories, and i admired obanjo for the way he kept them in hand. we had now also acquired a small dug-out canoe as tender, and a large fishing-net. about a.m. in the moonlight we started to drop down river on the tail of the land breeze, and as i observed obanjo wanted to sleep i offered to steer. after putting me through an examination in practical seamanship, and passing me, he gladly accepted my offer, handed over the tiller which stuck out across my bamboo staging, and went and curled himself up, falling sound asleep among the crew in less time than it takes to write. on the other nights we spent on this voyage i had no need to offer to steer; he handed over charge to me as a matter of course, and as i prefer night to day in africa, i enjoyed it. indeed, much as i have enjoyed life in africa, i do not think i ever enjoyed it to the full as i did on those nights dropping down the rembwe. the great, black, winding river with a pathway in its midst of frosted silver where the moonlight struck it: on each side the ink-black mangrove walls, and above them the band of star and moonlit heavens that the walls of mangrove allowed one to see. forward rose the form of our sail, idealised from bed-sheetdom to glory; and the little red glow of our cooking fire gave a single note of warm colour to the cold light of the moon. three or four times during the second night, while i was steering along by the south bank, i found the mangrove wall thinner, and standing up, looked through the network of their roots and stems on to what seemed like plains, acres upon acres in extent, of polished silver--more specimens of those awful slime lagoons, one of which, before we reached ndorko, had so very nearly collected me. i watched them, as we leisurely stole past, with a sort of fascination. on the second night, towards the dawn, i had the great joy of seeing mount okoneto, away to the s.w., first showing moonlit, and then taking the colours of the dawn before they reached us down below. ah me! give me a west african river and a canoe for sheer good pleasure. drawbacks, you say? well, yes, but where are there not drawbacks? the only drawbacks on those rembwe nights were the series of horrid frights i got by steering on to tree shadows and thinking they were mud banks, or trees themselves, so black and solid did they seem. i never roused the watch fortunately, but got her off the shadow gallantly single-handed every time, and called myself a fool instead of getting called one. my nautical friends carp at me for getting on shadows, but i beg them to consider before they judge me, whether they have ever steered at night down a river quite unknown to them an unhandy canoe, with a bed-sheet sail, by the light of the moon. and what with my having a theory of my own regarding the proper way to take a vessel round a corner, and what with having to keep the wind in the bed-sheet where the bed-sheet would hold it, it's a wonder to me i did not cast that vessel away, or go and damage africa. by daylight the rembwe scenery was certainly not so lovely, and might be slept through without a pang. it had monotony, without having enough of it to amount to grandeur. every now and again we came to villages, each of which was situated on a heap of clay and sandy soil, presumably the end of a spit of land running out into the mangrove swamp fringing the river. every village we saw we went alongside and had a chat with, and tried to look up cargo in the proper way. one village in particular did we have a lively time at. obanjo had a wife and home there, likewise a large herd of goats, some of which he was desirous of taking down with us to sell at gaboon. it was a pleasant-looking village, with a clean yellow beach which most of the houses faced. but it had ramifications in the interior. i being very lazy, did not go ashore, but watched the pantomime from the bamboo staging. the whole flock of goats enter at right end of stage, and tear violently across the scene, disappearing at left. two minutes elapse. obanjo and his gallant crew enter at right hand of stage, leg it like lamplighters across front, and disappear at left. fearful pow-wow behind the scenes. five minutes elapse. enter goats at right as before, followed by obanjo and company as before, and so on da capo. it was more like a fight i once saw between the armies of macbeth and macduff than anything i have seen before or since; only our rembwe play was better put on, more supers, and noise, and all that sort of thing, you know. it was a spirited performance i assure you and i and the inhabitants of the village, not personally interested in goat- catching, assumed the role of audience and cheered it to the echo. we had another cheerful little incident that afternoon. while we were going along softly, softly as was our wont, in the broiling heat, i wishing i had an umbrella--for sitting on that bamboo stage with no sort of protection from the sun was hot work after the forest shade i had had previously--two small boys in two small canoes shot out from the bank and paddled hard to us and jumped on board. after a few minutes' conversation with obanjo one of them carefully sank his canoe; the other just turned his adrift and they joined our crew. i saw they were fans, as indeed nearly all the crew were, but i did not think much of the affair. our tender, the small canoe, had been sent out as usual with the big black man and another a. b. to fish; it being one of our industries to fish hard all the time with that big net. the fish caught, sometimes a bushel or two at a time, almost all grey mullet, were then brought alongside, split open, and cleaned. we then had all round as many of them for supper as we wanted, the rest we hung on strings over our fire, more or less insufficiently smoking them to prevent decomposition, it being obanjo's intention to sell them when he made his next trip up the 'como; for the latter being less rich in fish than the rembwe they would command a good price there. we always had our eye on things like this, being, i proudly remark, none of your gilded floating hotel of a ferry-boat like those cunard or white star liners are, but just a good trader that was not ashamed to pay, and not afraid of work. well, just after we had leisurely entered a new reach of the river, round the corner after us, propelled at a phenomenal pace, came our fishing canoe, which we had left behind to haul in the net and then rejoin us. the occupants, particularly the big black a. b., were shouting something in terror stricken accents. "what?" says obanjo springing to his feet. "the fan! the fan!" shouted the canoe men as they shot towards us like agitated chickens making for their hen. in another moment they were alongside and tumbling over our gunwale into the bottom of the vessel still crying "the fan! the fan! the fan!" obanjo then by means of energetic questioning externally applied, and accompanied by florid language that cast a rose pink glow smelling of sulphur, round us, elicited the information that about , fans, armed with knives and guns, were coming down the rembwe with intent to kill and slay us, and might be expected to arrive within the next half wink. on hearing this, the whole of our gallant crew took up masterly recumbent positions in the bottom of our vessel and turned gray round the lips. but obanjo rose to the situation like ten lions. "take the rudder," he shouted to me, "take her into the middle of the stream and keep the sail full." it occurred to me that perhaps a position underneath the bamboo staging might be more healthy than one on the top of it, exposed to every microbe of a bit of old iron and what not and a half that according to native testimony would shortly be frisking through the atmosphere from those fan guns; and moreover i had not forgotten having been previously shot in a somewhat similar situation, though in better company. however i did not say anything; neither, between ourselves, did i somehow believe in those fans. so regardless of danger, i grasped the helm, and sent our gallant craft flying before the breeze down the bosom of the great wild river (that's the proper way to put it, but in the interests of science it may be translated into crawling towards the middle). meanwhile obanjo performed prodigies of valour all over the place. he triced up the mainsail, stirred up his fainthearted crew, and got out the sweeps, i.e. one old oar and four paddles, and with this assistance we solemnly trudged away from danger at a pace that nothing slower than a thames dumb barge, going against stream, could possibly overhaul. still we did not feel safe, and i suggested to ngouta he should rise up and help; but he declined, stating he was a married man. obanjo cheering the paddlers with inspiriting words sprang with the agility of a leopard on to the bamboo staging aft, standing there with his gun ready loaded and cocked to face the coming foe, looking like a statue put up to himself at the public expense. the worst of this was, however, that while obanjo's face was to the coming foe, his back was to the crew, and they forthwith commenced to re-subside into the bottom of the boat, paddles and all. i, as second in command, on seeing this, said a few blood-stirring words to them, and obanjo sent a few more of great power at them over his shoulder, and so we kept the paddles going. presently from round the corner shot a fan canoe. it contained a lady in the bows, weeping and wringing her hands, while another lady sympathetically howling, paddled it. obanjo in lurid language requested to be informed why they were following us. the lady in the bows said, "my son! my son!" and in a second more three other canoes shot round the corner full of men with guns. now this looked like business, so obanjo and i looked round to urge our crew to greater exertions and saw, to our disgust, that the gallant band had successfully subsided into the bottom of the boat while we had been eyeing the foe. obanjo gave me a recipe for getting the sweeps out again. i did not follow it, but got the job done, for obanjo could not take his eye and gun off the leading canoe and the canoes having crept up to within some twenty yards of us, poured out their simple tale of woe. it seemed that one of those miscreant boys was a runaway from a fan village. he had been desirous, with the usual enterprise of young fans, of seeing the great world that he knew lay down at the mouth of the river, i.e. libreville gaboon. he had pleaded with his parents for leave to go down and engage in work there, but the said parents holding the tenderness of his youth unfitted to combat with coast town life and temptation, refused this request, and so the young rascal had run away without leave and with a canoe, and was surmised to have joined the well-known obanjo. obanjo owned he had (more armed canoes were coming round the corner), and said if the mother would come and fetch her boy she could have him. he for his part would not have dreamed of taking him if he had known his relations disapproved. every one seemed much relieved, except the causa belli. the fans did not ask about two boys and providentially we gave the lady the right one. he went reluctantly. i feel pretty nearly sure he foresaw more kassengo than fatted calf for him on his return home. when the fan canoes were well back round the corner again, we had a fine hunt for the other boy, and finally unearthed him from under the bamboo staging. when we got him out he told the same tale. he also was a runaway who wanted to see the world, and taking the opportunity of the majority of the people of his village being away hunting, he had slipped off one night in a canoe, and dropped down river to the village of the boy who had just been reclaimed. the two boys had fraternised, and come on the rest of their way together, lying waiting, hidden up a creek, for obanjo, who they knew was coming down river; and having successfully got picked up by him, they thought they were safe. but after this affair boy number two judged there was no more safety yet, and that his family would be down after him very shortly; for he said he was a more valuable and important boy than his late companion, but his family were an uncommon savage set. we felt not the least anxiety to make their acquaintance, so clapped heels on our gallant craft and kept the paddles going, and as no more fans were in sight our crew kept at work bravely. while obanjo, now in a boisterous state of mind, and flushed with victory, said things to them about the way they had collapsed when those two women in a canoe came round that corner, that must have blistered their feelings, but they never winced. they laughed at the joke against themselves merrily. the other boy's family we never saw and so took him safely to gaboon, where obanjo got him a good place. really how much danger there was proportionate to the large amount of fear on our boat i cannot tell you. it never struck me there was any, but on the other hand the crew and obanjo evidently thought it was a bad place; and my white face would have been no protection, for the fans would not have suspected a white of being on such a canoe and might have fired on us if they had been unduly irritated and not treated by obanjo with that fine compound of bully and blarney that he is such a master of. whatever may have been the true nature of the affair, however, it had one good effect, it got us out of the rembwe into the gaboon, and although at the time this seemed a doubtful blessing, it made for progress. i had by this time mastered the main points of incapability in our craft. a. we could not go against the wind. b. we could not go against the tide. while we were in the rembwe there was a state we will designate as c--the tide coming one way, the wind another. with this state we could progress, backwards if the wind came up against us too strong, but seawards if it did not, and the tide was running down. if the tide was running up, and the wind was coming down, then we went seaward, softly, softly alongside the mangrove bank, where the rip of the tide stream is least. when, however, we got down off 'como point, we met there a state i will designate as d--a fine confused set of marine and fluvial phenomena. for away to the north the 'como and boque and two other lesser, but considerable streams, were, with the rembwe, pouring down their waters in swirling, intermingling, interclashing currents; and up against them, to make confusion worse confounded, came the tide, and the tide up the gaboon is a swift strong thing, and irregular, and has a rise of eight feet at the springs, two-and-a-half at the neaps. the wind was lulled too, it being evening time. in this country it is customary for the wind to blow from the land from p.m. until a.m., from the south-west to the east. then comes a lull, either an utter dead hot brooding calm, or light baffling winds and draughts that breathe a few panting hot breaths into your sails and die. then comes the sea breeze up from the south-south- west or north-west, some days early in the forenoon, some days not till two or three o'clock. this breeze blows till sundown, and then comes another and a hotter calm. fortunately for us we arrived off the head of the gaboon estuary in this calm, for had we had wind to deal with we should have come to an end. there were one or two wandering puffs, about the first one of which sickened our counterpane of its ambitious career as a marine sail, so it came away from its gaff and spread itself over the crew, as much as to say, "here, i've had enough of this sailing. i'll be a counterpane again." we did a great deal of fine varied, spirited navigation, details of which, however, i will not dwell upon because it was successful. we made one or two circles, taking on water the while and then returned into the south bank backwards. at that bank we wisely stayed for the night, our meeting with the gaboon so far having resulted in wrecking our sail, making ngouta sea-sick and me exasperate; for from our noble vessel having during the course of it demonstrated for the first time her cataclysmic kicking power, i had had a time of it with my belongings on the bamboo stage. a basket constructed for catching human souls in, given me as a farewell gift by a valued friend, a witch doctor, and in which i kept the few things in life i really cared for, i.e. my brush, comb, tooth brush, and pocket handkerchiefs, went over the stern; while i was recovering this with my fishing line (such was the excellent nature of the thing, i am glad to say it floated) a black bag with my blouses and such essentials went away to leeward. obanjo recovered that, but meanwhile my little portmanteau containing my papers and trade tobacco slid off to leeward; and as it also contained geological specimens of the sierra del cristal, a massive range of mountains, it must have hopelessly sunk had it not been for the big black, who grabbed it. all my bedding, six equetta cloths, given me by mr. hamilton in opobo river before i came south, did get away successfully, but were picked up by means of the fishing line, wet but safe. after this i did not attempt any more roman reclining couch luxuries, but stowed all my loose gear under the bamboo staging, and spent the night on the top of the stage, dozing precariously with my head on my knees. when the morning broke, looking seaward i saw the welcome forms of konig (dambe) and perroquet (mbini) islands away in the distance, looking, as is their wont, like two lumps of cloud that have dropped on to the broad gaboon, and i felt that i was at last getting near something worth reaching, i.e. glass, which though still out of sight, i knew lay away to the west of those islands on the northern shore of the estuary. and if any one had given me the choice of being in glass within twenty-four hours from the mouth of the rembwe, or in paris or london in a week, i would have chosen glass without a moment's hesitation. much as i dislike west coast towns as a general rule, there are exceptions, and of all exceptions, the one i like most is undoubtedly glass gaboon; and its charms loomed large on that dank chilly morning after a night spent on a bamboo staging in an unfinished native canoe. the rembwe, like the 'como, is said to rise in the sierra del cristal. it is navigable to a place called isango which is above agonjo; just above agonjo it receives an affluent on its southern bank and runs through mountain country, where its course is blocked by rapids for anything but small canoes. obanjo did not seem to think this mattered, as there was not much trade up there, and therefore no particular reason why any one should want to go higher up. moreover he said the natives were an exceedingly bad lot; but obanjo usually thinks badly of the bush natives in these regions. anyhow they are fans--and fans are fans. he was anxious for me, however, to start on a trading voyage with him up another river, a notorious river, in the neighbouring spanish territory. the idea was i should buy goods at glass and we should go together and he would buy ivory with them in the interior. i anxiously inquired where my profits were to come in. obanjo who had all the time suspected me of having trade motives, artfully said, "what for you come across from ogowe? you say, see this country. ah! i say you come with me. i show you plenty country, plenty men, elephants, leopards, gorillas. oh! plenty thing. then you say where's my trade?" i disclaimed trade motives in a lordly way. then says he, "you come with me up there." i said i'd see about it later on, for the present i had seen enough men, elephants, gorillas and leopards, and i preferred to go into wild districts under the french flag to any flag. i am still thinking about taking that voyage, but i'll not march through coventry with the crew we had down the rembwe-- that's flat, as sir john falstaff says. picture to yourselves, my friends, the charming situation of being up a river surrounded by rapacious savages with a lot of valuable goods in a canoe and with only a crew to defend them possessed of such fighting mettle as our crew had demonstrated themselves to be. obanjo might be all right, would be i dare say; but suppose he got shot and you had eighteen stone odd of him thrown on your hands in addition to your other little worries. there is little doubt such an excursion would be rich in incident and highly interesting, but i am sure it would be, from a commercial point of view, a failure. trade has a fascination for me, and going transversely across the nine-mile-broad rough gaboon estuary in an unfinished canoe with an inefficient counterpane sail has none; but i return duty bound to this unpleasant subject. we started very early in the morning. we reached the other side entangled in the trailing garments of the night. i was thankful during that broiling hot day of one thing, and that was that if sister ann was looking out across the river, as was sister ann's invariable way of spending spare moments, sister ann would never think i was in a canoe that made such audaciously bad tacks, missed stays, got into irons, and in general behaved in a way that ought to have lost her captain his certificate. just as the night came down, however, we reached the northern shore of the grand gaboon at dongila, just off the mouth of the 'como, still some eleven miles east of konig island, and further still from glass, but on the same side of the river, which seemed good work. the foreshore here is very rocky, so we could not go close alongside but anchored out among the rocks. at this place there is a considerable village and a station of the roman catholic mission. when we arrived a nun was down on the shore with her school children, who were busy catching shell-fish and generally merry-making. obanjo went ashore in the tender, and the holy sister kindly asked me, by him, to come ashore and spend the night; but i was dead tired and felt quite unfit for polite society after the long broiling hot day and getting soaked by water that had washed on board. we lay off dongila all night, because of the tide. i lay off everything, dongila, canoe and all, a little after midnight. obanjo and almost all the crew stayed on shore that night, and i rolled myself up in an equetta cloth and went sound and happily asleep on the bamboo staging, leaving the canoe pitching slightly. about midnight some change in the tide, or original sin in the canoe, caused her to softly swing round a bit, and the next news was that i was in the water. i had long expected this to happen, so was not surprised, but highly disgusted, and climbed on board, needless to say, streaming. so, in the darkness of the night i got my portmanteau from the hold and thoroughly tidied up. the next morning we were off early, coasting along to glass, and safely arriving there, i attempted to look as unconcerned as possible, and vaguely hoped mr. hudson would be down in libreville; for i was nervous about meeting him, knowing that since he had carefully deposited me in safe hands with mme. jacot, with many injunctions to be careful, that there were many incidents in my career that would not meet with his approval. vain hope! he was on the pier! he did not approve! he had heard of most of my goings on. this however in no way detracts from my great obligation to mr. hudson, but adds another item to the great debt of gratitude i owe him; for had it not been for him i should never have seen the interior of this beautiful region of the ogowe. i tried to explain to him how much i had enjoyed myself and how i realised i owed it all to him; but he persisted in his opinion that my intentions and ambitions were suicidal, and took me out the ensuing sunday, as it were on a string. chapter xii. fetish. in which the voyager attempts cautiously to approach the subject of fetish, and gives a classification of spirits, and some account of the ibet and orunda. having given some account of my personal experiences among an african tribe in its original state, i.e. in a state uninfluenced by european ideas and culture, i will make an attempt to give a rough sketch of the african form of thought and the difficulties of studying it, because the study of this thing is my chief motive for going to west africa. since i have been collecting information in its native state regarding fetish, and i use the usual terms fetish and ju-ju because they have among us a certain fixed value--a conventional value, but a useful one. neither "fetish" nor "ju-ju" are native words. fetish comes from the word the old portuguese explorers used to designate the objects they thought the natives worshipped, and in which they were wise enough to recognise a certain similarity to their own little images and relics of saints, "feitico." ju-ju, on the other hand, is french, and comes from the word for a toy or doll, { } so it is not so applicable as the portuguese name, for the native image is not a doll or toy, and has far more affinity to the image of a saint, inasmuch as it is not venerated for itself, or treasured because of its prettiness, but only because it is the residence, or the occasional haunt, of a spirit. stalking the wild west african idea is one of the most charming pursuits in the world. quite apart from the intellectual, it has a high sporting interest; for its pursuit is as beset with difficulty and danger as grizzly bear hunting, yet the climate in which you carry on this pursuit--vile as it is--is warm, which to me is almost an essential of existence. i beg you to understand that i make no pretension to a thorough knowledge of fetish ideas; i am only on the threshold. "ich weiss nicht all doch viel ist mir bekannt," as faust said--and, like him after he had said it, i have got a lot to learn. i do not intend here to weary you with more than a small portion of even my present knowledge, for i have great collections of facts that i keep only to compare with those of other hunters of the wild idea, and which in their present state are valueless to the cabinet ethnologist. some of these may be rank lies, some of them mere individual mind-freaks, others have underlying them some idea i am not at present in touch with. the difficulty of gaining a true conception of the savage's real idea is great and varied. in places on the coast where there is, or has been, much missionary influence the trouble is greatest, for in the first case the natives carefully conceal things they fear will bring them into derision and contempt, although they still keep them in their innermost hearts; and in the second case, you have a set of traditions which are christian in origin, though frequently altered almost beyond recognition by being kept for years in the atmosphere of the african mind. for example, there is this beautiful story now extant among the cabindas. god made at first all men black--he always does in the african story--and then he went across a great river and called men to follow him, and the wisest and the bravest and the best plunged into the great river and crossed it; and the water washed them white, so they are the ancestors of the white men. but the others were afraid too much, and said, "no, we are comfortable here; we have our dances, and our tom-toms, and plenty to eat--we won't risk it, we'll stay here"; and they remained in the old place, and from them come the black men. but to this day the white men come to the bank, on the other side of the river, and call to the black men, saying, "come, it is better over here." i fear there is little doubt that this story is a modified version of some parable preached to the cabindas at the time the capuchins had such influence among them, before they were driven out of the lower congo regions more than a hundred years ago, for political reasons by the portuguese. in the bush--where the people have been little, or not at all, in contact with european ideas--in some ways the investigation is easier; yet another set of difficulties confronts you. the difficulty that seems to occur most easily to people is the difficulty of the language. the west african languages are not difficult to pick up; nevertheless, there are an awful quantity of them and they are at the best most imperfect mediums of communication. no one who has been on the coast can fail to recognise how inferior the native language is to the native's mind behind it--and the prolixity and repetition he has therefore to employ to make his thoughts understood. the great comfort is the wide diffusion of that peculiar language, "trade english"; it is not only used as a means of intercommunication between whites and blacks, but between natives using two distinct languages. on the south-west coast you find individuals in villages far from the sea, or a trading station, who know it, and this is because they have picked it up and employ it in their dealings with the coast tribes and travelling traders. it is by no means an easy language to pick up--it is not a farrago of bad words and broken phrases, but is a definite structure, has a great peculiarity in its verb forms, and employs no genders. there is no grammar of it out yet; and one of the best ways of learning it is to listen to a seasoned second mate regulating the unloading or loading, of cargo, over the hatch of the hold. no, my coast friends, i have not forgotten--but though you did not mean it helpfully, this was one of the best hints you ever gave me. another good way is the careful study of examples which display the highest style and the most correct diction; so i append the letter given by mr. hutchinson as being about the best bit of trade english i know. "to daddy nah tampin office, - ha daddy, do, yah, nah beg you tell dem people for me; make dem sally-own pussin know. do yah. berrah well. ah lib nah pademba road--one bwoy lib dah oberside lakah dem two docter lib overside you tampin office. berrah well. dah bwoy head big too much--he say nah militie ban--he got one long long ting so so brass, someting lib dah go flip flap, dem call am key. berrah well. had! dah bwoy kin blow!--she ah!--na marin, oh!--nah sun time, oh! nah evenin, oh!--nah middle night, oh!--all same--no make pussin sleep. not ebry bit dat, more lib da! one boney bwoy lib oberside nah he like blow bugle. when dem two woh- woh bwoy blow dem ting de nize too much too much. when white man blow dat ting and pussin sleep he kin tap wah make dem bwoy carn do so? dem bwoy kin blow ebry day eben sunday dem kin blow. when ah yerry dem blow sunday ah wish dah bugle kin go down na dem troat or dem kin blow them head-bone inside. do nah beg you yah tell all dem people 'bout dah ting wah dem two bwoy dah blow. till am amtrang boboh hab febah bad. till am titty carn sleep nah night. dah nize go kill me two pickin, oh! plabba done. good by daddy. crashey jane." now for the elementary student we will consider this letter. the complaint in crashey jane's letter is about two boys who are torturing her morning, noon, and night, sunday and weekday, by blowing some "long long brass ting" as well as a bugle, and the way she dwells on their staying power must bring a sympathetic pang for that black sister into the heart of many a householder in london who lives next to a ladies' school, or a family of musical tastes. "one touch of nature," etc. "daddy" is not a term of low familiarity but one of esteem and respect, and the "tampin office" is a respectful appellation for the office of the "new era" in which this letter was once published. "bwoy head big too much," means that the young man is swelled with conceit because he is connected with "militie ban." "woh woh" you will find, among all the natives in the bights, to mean extremely bad. i think it is native, having some connection with the root wo--meaning power, etc.; but mr. hutchinson may be right, and it may mean "a capacity to bring double woe." "amtrang boboh" is not the name of some uncivilised savage, as the uninitiated may think; far from it. it is bob armstrong--upside down, and slightly altered, and refers to the hon. robert armstrong, stipendiary magistrate of sierra leone, etc. "berrah well" is a phrase used whenever the native thinks he has succeeded in putting his statement well. he sort of turns round and looks at it, says "berrah well," in admiration of his own art, and then proceeds. "pickin" are children. "boney bwoy" is not a local living skeleton, but a native from bonny river. "sally own" is sierra leone. "blow them head-bone inside" means, blow the top off their heads. i have a collection of trade english letters and documents, for it is a language that i regard as exceedingly charming, and it really requires study, as you will see by reading crashey jane's epistle without the aid of a dictionary. it is, moreover, a language that will take you unexpectedly far in africa, and if you do not understand it, land you in some pretty situations. one important point that you must remember is that the african is logically right in his answer to such a question as "you have not cleaned this lamp?"--he says, "yes, sah"--which means, "yes, i have not cleaned the lamp." it does not mean a denial to your accusation; he always uses this form, and it is liable to confuse you at first, as are many other of the phrases, such as "i look him, i no see him "; this means "i have been searching for the thing but have not found it"; if he really meant he had looked upon the object but had been unable to get to it, he would say: "i look him, i no catch him," etc. the difficulty of the language is, however, far less than the whole set of difficulties with your own mind. unless you can make it pliant enough to follow the african idea step by step, however much care you may take, you will not bag your game. i heard an account the other day of a representative of her majesty in africa who went out for a day's antelope shooting. there were plenty of antelope about, and he stalked them with great care; but always, just before he got within shot of the game, they saw something and bolted. knowing he and the boy behind him had been making no sound and could not have been seen, he stalked on, but always with the same result; until happening to look round, he saw the boy behind him was supporting the dignity of the empire at large, and this representative of it in particular, by steadfastly holding aloft the consular flag. well, if you go hunting the african idea with the flag of your own religion or opinions floating ostentatiously over you, you will similarly get a very poor bag. a few hints as to your mental outfit when starting on this sport may be useful. before starting for west africa, burn all your notions about sun-myths and worship of the elemental forces. my own opinion is you had better also burn the notion, although it is fashionable, that human beings got their first notion of the origin of the soul from dreams. i went out with my mind full of the deductions of every book on ethnology, german or english, that i had read during fifteen years-- and being a good cambridge person, i was particularly confident that from mr. frazer's book, the golden bough, i had got a semi-universal key to the underlying idea of native custom and belief. but i soon found this was very far from being the case. his idea is a true key to a certain quantity of facts, but in west africa only to a limited quantity. i do not say, do not read ethnology--by all means do so; and above all things read, until you know it by heart, primitive culture, by dr. e. b. tylor, regarding which book i may say that i have never found a fact that flew in the face of the carefully made, broad- minded deductions of this greatest of ethnologists. in addition you must know your westermarck on human marriage, and your waitz anthropologie, and your topinard--not that you need expect to go measuring people's skulls and chests as this last named authority expects you to do, for no self-respecting person black or white likes that sort of thing from the hands of an utter stranger, and if you attempt it you'll get yourself disliked in west africa. add to this the knowledge of all a. b. ellis's works; burton's anatomy of melancholy; pliny's natural history; and as much of aristotle as possible. if you have a good knowledge of the greek and latin classics, i think it would be an immense advantage; an advantage i do not possess, for my classical knowledge is scrappy, and in place of it i have a knowledge of red indian dogma: a dogma by the way that seems to me much nearer the african in type than asiatic forms of dogma. armed with these instruments of observation, with a little industry and care you should in the mill of your mind be able to make the varied tangled rag-bag of facts that you will soon become possessed of into a paper. and then i advise you to lay the results of your collection before some great thinker and he will write upon it the opinion that his greater and clearer vision makes him more fit to form. you may say, why not bring home these things in their raw state? and bring them home in a raw state you must, for purposes of reference; but in this state they are of little use to a person unacquainted with the conditions which surround them in their native homes. also very few african stories bear on one subject alone, and they hardly ever stick to a point. take this fernando po legend. winwood reade (savage africa, p. ) gives it, and he says he heard it twice. i have heard it, in variants, four times--once on fernando po, once in calabar and twice in gaboon. so it is evidently an old story: - "the first man called all people to one place. his name was raychow. 'hear this, my people' said he, 'i am going to give a name to every place, i am king in this river.' one day he came with his people to the hole of wonga wonga, which is a deep pit in the ground from which fire comes at night. men spoke to them from the hole, but they could not see them. raychow said to his son, 'go down into the hole'--and his son went. the son of the king of the hole came to him and defied him to a contest of throwing the spear. if he lost he should be killed, if he won he should go back in safety. he won--then the son of the king of the hole said, 'it is strange you should have won, for i am a spirit. ask whatever you wish,' and the king's son asked for a remedy for every disease he could remember; and the spirit gave him the medicines, and when he had done so, he said, 'there is one sickness you have forgotten--it is the krawkraw, and of that you shall die.' "a tribe named ndiva was then strong but now none remain (winwood reade says four remain). they gave raychow's son a canoe and forty men, to take him back to his father's town, and when he saw his father he did not speak. his father said, 'my son, if you are hungry eat.' he did not answer, and his father said, 'do you wish me to kill a goat?' he did not answer; his father said, 'do you wish me to give you new wives?' he did not answer. then his father said, 'do you want me to build you a fetish hut?' then he answered, 'yes,' and the hut was built, and the medicines he had brought back from the hole were put into it. "'now,' said the son of king raychow, 'i go to make moondah enter the orongo' (gaboon); so he went and dug a canal and when this was finished all his men were dead. then he said, 'i will go and kill river-horse in the benito.' he killed four, and as he was killing the fifth, the people descended from the mountains against him. so he made fetish on his great war-spear and sang my spear, go kill these people, or these people will kill me; and the spear went and killed the people, except a few who got into canoes and flew to fernando po. then said their king, 'my people shall never wear cloth till we have conquered the m'pongwe,' and to this day the fernando poians go naked and hate with a special hatred the m'pongwe." now this is a noble story--there is a lot of fine confused feeding in it, as the scotchman said of boiled sheep's head. you learn from it - a. the name of the first man, and also that he was filled with a desire for topographical nomenclature. b. you hear of the hole wonga wonga, and this is most interesting because to this day, apart from the story, you are told by the natives of a hole that emits fire, and dr. nassau says it is always said to be north of gaboon; but so far no white man has any knowledge of an active volcano there, although the district is of volcanic origin. the crater of fernando po may be referred to in the legend because of the king's son being sent home in a canoe; but i do not think it is, because the hole is known not to be fernando po, and it has got, according to local tradition, a river running from it or close to it. c. the kraw-kraw is a frightfully prevalent disease; no one has a remedy for it, presumably owing to raychow's son's forgetfulness. d. the silence of the son to the questions is remarkable, because you always find people who have been among spirits lose their power of asking for what they want, for a time, and can only answer to the right question. e. the sudden way in which raychow's son gets fired with the desire to turn civil engineer just when he has got a magnificent opening in life as a doctor is merely the usual flightiness of young men, who do not see where their true advantages lie--and the conduct of the men in dying, after digging a canal is normal, and modern experiences support it, for men who dig canals down in west africa die plentifully, be they black, white, or yellow; so you can't help believing in those men, although it is strange a black man should have been so enterprising as to go in for canal digging at all. there is no other case of it extant to my knowledge, and a remarkable fact is, that the moondah does so nearly connect, by one creek, with the gaboon estuary that you can drag a boat across the little intervening bit of land. f. is a sporting story that turns up a little unexpectedly, certainly; but the benito is within easy distance north of the moondah, so the geography is all right. g. the inhabitants of fernando po have still an especial hatred for the m'pongwe, and both they and the m'pongwe have this account of the one tribe driving the other off the mainland. then the bubis { }--as the inhabitants on fernando po are called, from a confusion arising in the minds of the sailors calling at fernando po, between their stupidity and their word babi = stranger, which they use as a word of greeting--these bubis are undoubtedly a very early african race. their culture, though presenting some remarkable points, is on the whole exceedingly low. they never wear clothes unless compelled to, and their language depends so much on gesture that they cannot talk in it to each other in the dark. i give this as a sample of african stories. it is far more connected and keeps to the point in a far more business-like way than most of them. they are of great interest when you know the locality and the tribe they come from; but i am sure if you were to bring home a heap of stories like this, and empty them over any distinguished ethnologist's head, without ticketing them with the culture of the tribe they belonged to, the conditions it lives under, and so forth, you would stun him with the seeming inter- contradiction of some, and utter pointlessness of the rest, and he would give up ethnology and hurriedly devote his remaining years to the attempt to collect a million postage stamps, so as to do something definite before he died. remember, you must always have your original material--carefully noted down at the time of occurrence--with you, so that you may say in answer to his why? because of this, and this, and this. however good may be the outfit for your work that you take with you, you will have, at first, great difficulty in realising that it is possible for the people you are among really to believe things in the way they do. and you cannot associate with them long before you must recognise that these africans have often a remarkable mental acuteness and a large share of common sense; that there is nothing really "child-like" in their form of mind at all. observe them further and you will find they are not a flighty-minded, mystical set of people in the least. they are not dreamers, or poets, and you will observe, and i hope observe closely--for to my mind this is the most important difference between their make of mind and our own--that they are notably deficient in all mechanical arts: they have never made, unless under white direction and instruction, a single fourteenth-rate piece of cloth, pottery, a tool or machine, house, road, bridge, picture or statue; that a written language of their own construction they none of them possess. a careful study of the things a man, black or white, fails to do, whether for good or evil, usually gives you a truer knowledge of the man than the things he succeeds in doing. when you fully realise this acuteness on one hand and this mechanical incapacity on the other which exist in the people you are studying, you can go ahead. only, i beseech you, go ahead carefully. when you have found the easy key that opens the reason underlying a series of facts, as for example, these: a benga spits on your hand as a greeting; you see a man who has been marching regardless through the broiling sun all the forenoon, with a heavy load, on entering a village and having put down his load, elaborately steal round in the shelter of the houses, instead of crossing the street; you come across a tribe that cuts its dead up into small pieces and scatters them broadcast, and another tribe that thinks a white man's eye-ball is a most desirable thing to be possessed of--do not, when you have found this key, drop your collecting work, and go home with a shriek of "i know all about fetish," because you don't, for the key to the above facts will not open the reason why it is regarded advisable to kill a person who is making ikung; or why you should avoid at night a cotton tree that has red earth at its roots; or why combings of hair and paring of nails should be taken care of; or why a speck of blood that may fall from your flesh should be cut out of wood--if it has fallen on that- -and destroyed, and if it has fallen on the ground stamped and rubbed into the soil with great care. this set requires another key entirely. i must warn you also that your own mind requires protection when you send it stalking the savage idea through the tangled forests, the dark caves, the swamps and the fogs of the ethiopian intellect. the best protection lies in recognising the untrustworthiness of human evidence regarding the unseen, and also the seen, when it is viewed by a person who has in his mind an explanation of the phenomenon before it occurs. the truth is, the study of natural phenomena knocks the bottom out of any man's conceit if it is done honestly and not by selecting only those facts that fit in with his preconceived or ingrafted notions. and, to my mind, the wisest way is to get into the state of mind of an old marine engineer who oils and sees that every screw and bolt of his engines is clean and well watched, and who loves them as living things, caressing and scolding them himself, defending them, with stormy language, against the aspersions of the silly, uninformed outside world, which persists in regarding them as mere machines, a thing his superior intelligence and experience knows they are not. even animistic-minded i got awfully sat upon the other day in cameroon by a superior but kindred spirit, in the form of a first engineer. i had thoughtlessly repeated some scandalous gossip against the character of a naphtha launch in the river. "stuff!" said he furiously; "she's all right, and she'd go from june to january if those blithering fools would let her alone." of course i apologised. the religious ideas of the negroes, i.e. the west africans in the district from the gambia to the cameroon region, say roughly to the rio del rey (for the bakwiri appear to have more of the bantu form of idea than the negro, although physically they seem nearer the latter), differ very considerably from the religious ideas of the bantu south-west coast tribes. the bantu is vague on religious subjects; he gives one accustomed to the negro the impression that he once had the same set of ideas, but has forgotten half of them, and those that he possesses have not got that hold on him that the corresponding or super-imposed christian ideas have over the true negro; although he is quite as keen on the subject of witchcraft, and his witchcraft differs far less from the witchcraft of the negro than his religious ideas do. the god, in the sense we use the word, is in essence the same in all of the bantu tribes i have met with on the coast: a non-interfering and therefore a negligible quantity. he varies his name: anzambi, anyambi, nyambi, nzambi, anzam, nyam, ukuku, suku, and nzam, but a better investigation shows that nzam of the fans is practically identical with suku south of the congo in the bihe country, and so on. they regard their god as the creator of man, plants, animals, and the earth, and they hold that having made them, he takes no further interest in the affair. but not so the crowd of spirits with which the universe is peopled, they take only too much interest and the bantu wishes they would not and is perpetually saying so in his prayers, a large percentage whereof amounts to "go away, we don't want you." "come not into this house, this village, or its plantations." he knows from experience that the spirits pay little heed to these objurgations, and as they are the people who must be attended to, he develops a cult whereby they may be managed, used, and understood. this cult is what we call witchcraft. as i am not here writing a complete work on fetish i will leave nzam on one side, and turn to the inferior spirits. these are almost all malevolent; sometimes they can be coaxed into having creditable feelings, like generosity and gratitude, but you can never trust them. no, not even if you are yourself a well-established medicine man. indeed they are particularly dangerous to medicine men, just as lions are to lion tamers, and many a professional gentleman in the full bloom of his practice, gets eaten up by his own particular familiar which he has to keep in his own inside whenever he has not sent it off into other people's. i am indebted to the reverend doctor nassau for a great quantity of valuable information regarding bantu religious ideas--information which no one is so competent to give as he, for no one else knows the west coast bantu tribes with the same thoroughness and sympathy. he has lived among them since , and is perfectly conversant with their languages and culture, and he brings to bear upon the study of them a singularly clear, powerful, and highly-educated intelligence. i shall therefore carefully ticket the information i have derived from him, so that it may not be mixed with my own. i may be wrong in my deductions, but dr. nassau's are above suspicion. he says the origin of these spirits is vague--some of them come into existence by the authority of anzam (by which you will understand, please, the same god i have quoted above as having many names), others are self-existent--many are distinctly the souls of departed human beings, "which in the future which is all around them" retain their human wants and feelings, and the doctor assures me he has heard dying people with their last breath threatening to return as spirits to revenge themselves upon their living enemies. he could not tell me if there was any duration set upon the existence as spirits of these human souls, but two congo francais natives, of different tribes, benga and igalwa, told me that when a family had quite died out, after a time its spirits died too. some, but by no means all, of these spirits of human origin, as is the case among the negro effiks, undergo reincarnation. the doctor told me he once knew a man whose plantations were devastated by an elephant. he advised that the beast should be shot, but the man said he dare not because the spirit of his dead father had passed into the elephant. their number is infinite and their powers as varied as human imagination can make them; classifying them is therefore a difficult work, but doctor nassau thinks this may be done fairly completely into: - . human disembodied spirits--manu. . vague beings, well described by our word ghosts: abambo. . beings something like dryads, who resent intrusion into their territory, on to their rock, past their promontory, or tree. when passing the residence of one of these beings, the traveller must go by silently, or with some cabalistic invocation, with bowed or bared head, and deposit some symbol of an offering or tribute even if it be only a pebble. you occasionally come across great trees that have fallen across a path that have quite little heaps of pebbles, small shells, etc., upon them deposited by previous passers-by. this class is called ombwiri. . beings who are the agents in causing sickness, and either aid or hinder human plans--mionde. . there seems to be, the doctor says, another class of spirits somewhat akin to the ancient lares and penates, who especially belong to the household, and descend by inheritance with the family. in their honour are secretly kept a bundle of finger, or other bones, nail-clippings, eyes, brains, skulls, particularly the lower jaws, called in m'pongwe oginga, accumulated from deceased members of successive generations. dr. nassau says "secretly," and he refers to this custom being existent in non-cannibal tribes. i saw bundles of this character among the cannibal fans, and among the non-cannibal adooma, openly hanging up in the thatch of the sleeping apartment. . he also says there may be a sixth class, which may, however only be a function of any of the other classes--namely, those that enter into any animal body, generally a leopard. sometimes the spirits of living human beings do this, and the animal is then guided by human intelligence, and will exercise its strength for the purposes of its temporary human possessor. in other cases it is a non-human soul that enters into the animal, as in the case of ukuku. spirits are not easily classified by their functions because those of different class may be employed in identical undertakings. thus one witch doctor may have, i find, particular influence over one class of spirit and another over another class; yet they will both engage to do identical work. but in spite of this i do not see how you can classify spirits otherwise than by their functions; you cannot weigh and measure them, and it is only a few that show themselves in corporeal form. there are characteristics that all the authorities seem agreed on, and one is that individual spirits in the same class vary in power: some are strong of their sort, some weak. they are all to a certain extent limited in the nature of their power; there is no one spirit that can do all things; their efficiency only runs in certain lines of action and all of them are capable of being influenced, and made subservient to human wishes, by proper incantations. this latter characteristic is of course to human advantage, but it has its disadvantages, for you can never really trust a spirit, even if you have paid a considerable sum to a most distinguished medicine man to get a powerful one put up in a ju-ju, or monde, { } as it is called in several tribes. the method of making these charms is much the same among bantu and negroes: i have elsewhere described the gold coast method, so here confine myself to the bantu. this similarity of procedure naturally arises from the same underlying idea existing in the two races. you call in the medicine man, the "oganga," as he is commonly called in congo francais tribes. after a variety of ceremonies and processes, the spirit is induced to localise itself in some object subject to the will of the possessor. the things most frequently used are antelopes' horns, the large snail-shells, and large nutshells, according to doctor nassau. among the fan i found the most frequent charm-case was in the shape of a little sausage, made very neatly of pineapple fibre, the contents being the residence of the spirit or power, and the outside coloured red to flatter and please him--for spirits always like red because it is like blood. the substance put inside charms is all manner of nastiness, usually on the sea coast having a high percentage of fowl dung. the nature of the substance depends on the spirit it is intended to be attractive to--attractive enough to induce it to leave its present abode and come and reside in the charm. in addition to this attractive substance i find there are other materials inserted which have relation towards the work the spirit will be wanted to do for its owner. for example, charms made either to influence a person to be well disposed towards the owner, or the still larger class made with intent to work evil on other human beings against whom the owner has a grudge, must have in them some portion of the person to be dealt with--his hair, blood, nail- parings, etc.--or, failing that, his or her most intimate belonging, something that has got his smell in--a piece of his old waist-cloth for example. this ability to obtain power over people by means of their blood, hair, nails, etc., is universally diffused; you will find it down in devon, and away in far cathay, and the chinese, i am told, have in some parts of their empire little ovens to burn their nail- and hair-clippings in. the fear of these latter belongings falling into the hands of evilly-disposed persons is ever present to the west africans. the igalwa and other tribes will allow no one but a trusted friend to do their hair, and bits of nails and hair are carefully burnt or thrown away into a river; and blood, even that from a small cut or a fit of nose-bleeding, is most carefully covered up and stamped out if it has fallen on the earth. the underlying idea regarding blood is of course the old one that the blood is the life. the life in africa means a spirit, hence the liberated blood is the liberated spirit, and liberated spirits are always whipping into people who do not want them. charms are made for every occupation and desire in life--loving, hating, buying, selling, fishing, planting, travelling, hunting, etc., and although they are usually in the form of things filled with a mixture in which the spirit nestles, yet there are other kinds; for example, a great love charm is made of the water the lover has washed in, and this, mingled with the drink of the loved one, is held to soften the hardest heart. some kinds of charms, such as those to prevent your getting drowned, shot, seen by elephants, etc., are worn on a bracelet or necklace. a new-born child starts with a health-knot tied round the wrist, neck, or loins, and throughout the rest of its life its collection of charms goes on increasing. this collection does not, however, attain inconvenient dimensions, owing to the failure of some of the charms to work. that is the worst of charms and prayers. the thing you wish of them may, and frequently does, happen in a strikingly direct way, but other times it does not. in africa this is held to arise from the bad character of the spirits; their gross ingratitude and fickleness. you may have taken every care of a spirit for years, given it food and other offerings that you wanted for yourself, wrapped it up in your cloth on chilly nights and gone cold, put it in the only dry spot in the canoe, and so on, and yet after all this, the wretched thing will be capable of being got at by your rival or enemy and lured away, leaving you only the case it once lived in. finding, we will say, that you have been upset and half-drowned, and your canoe-load of goods lost three times in a week, that your paddles are always breaking, and the amount of snags in the river and so on is abnormal, you judge that your canoe-charm has stopped. then you go to the medicine man who supplied you with it and complain. he says it was a perfectly good charm when he sold it you and he never had any complaints before, but he will investigate the affair; when he has done so, he either says the spirit has been lured away from the home he prepared for it by incantations and presents from other people, or that he finds the spirit is dead; it has been killed by a more powerful spirit of its class, which is in the pay of some enemy of yours. in all cases the little thing you kept the spirit in is no use now, and only fit to sell to a white man as "a big curio!" and the sooner you let him have sufficient money to procure you a fresh and still more powerful spirit-- necessarily more expensive--the safer it will be for you, particularly as your misfortunes distinctly point to some one being desirous of your death. you of course grumble, but seeing the thing in his light you pay up, and the medicine man goes busily to work with incantations, dances, looking into mirrors or basins of still water, and concoctions of messes to make you a new protecting charm. human eye-balls, particularly of white men, i have already said are a great charm. dr. nassau says he has known graves rifled for them. this, i fancy, is to secure the "man that lives in your eyes" for the service of the village, and naturally the white man, being regarded as a superior being, would be of high value if enlisted into its service. a similar idea of the possibility of gaining possession of the spirit of a dead man obtains among the negroes, and the heads of important chiefs in the calabar districts are usually cut off from the body on burial and kept secretly for fear the head, and thereby the spirit, of the dead chief, should be stolen from the town. if it were stolen it would be not only a great advantage to its new possessor, but a great danger to the chief's old town; because he would know all the peculiar ju-ju relating to it. for each town has a peculiar one, kept exceedingly secret, in addition to the general ju-jus, and this secret one would then be in the hands of the new owners of the spirit. it is for similar reasons that brave general maccarthy's head was treasured by the ashantees, and so on. charms are not all worn upon the body, some go to the plantations, and are hung there, ensuring an unhappy and swift end for the thief who comes stealing. some are hung round the bows of the canoe, others over the doorway of the house, to prevent evil spirits from coming in--a sort of tame watch-dog spirits. the entrances to the long street-shaped villages are frequently closed with a fence of saplings and this sapling fence you will see hung with fetish charms to prevent evil spirits from entering the village and sometimes in addition to charms you will see the fence wreathed with leaves and flowers. bells are frequently hung on these fences, but i do not fancy ever for fetish reasons. at ndorko, on the rembwe, there were many guards against spirit visitors, but the bell, which was carefully hung so that you could not pass through the gateway without ringing it, was a guard against thieves and human enemies only. frequently a sapling is tied horizontally near the ground across the entrance. dr. nassau could not tell me why, but says it must never be trodden on. when the smallpox, a dire pestilence in these regions, is raging, or when there is war, these gateways are sprinkled with the blood of sacrifices, and for these sacrifices and for the payments of heavy blood fines, etc., goats and sheep are kept. they are rarely eaten for ordinary purposes, and these west coast africans have all a perfect horror of the idea of drinking milk, holding this custom to be a filthy habit, and saying so in unmitigated language. the villagers eat the meat of the sacrifice, that having nothing to do with the sacrifice to the spirits, which is the blood, for the blood is the life. { } beside the few spirits that the bantu regards himself as having got under control in his charms, he has to worship the uncontrolled army of the air. this he does by sacrifice and incantation. the sacrifice is the usual killing of something valuable as an offering to the spirits. the value of the offering in these s.w. coast regions has certainly a regular relationship to the value of the favour required of the spirits. some favours are worth a dish of plantains, some a fowl, some a goat and some a human being, though human sacrifice is very rare in congo francais, the killing of people being nine times in ten a witchcraft palaver. dr. nassau, however, says that "the intention of the giver ennobles the gift," the spirit being supposed, in some vague way, to be gratified by the recognition of itself, and even sometimes pleased with the homage of the mere simulacrum of a gift. i believe the only class of spirits that have this convenient idea are the imbwiri; thus the stones heaped by passers-by on the foot of some great tree, or rock, or the leaf cast from a passing canoe towards a promontory on the river, etc., although intrinsically valueless and useless to the ombwiri nevertheless gratify him. it is a sort of bow or taking off one's hat to him. some gifts, the doctor says, are supposed to be actually utilised by the spirit. in some part of the long single street of most villages there is built a low hut in which charms are hung, and by which grows a consecrated plant, a lily, a euphorbia, or a fig. in some tribes a rudely carved figure, generally female, is set up as an idol before which offerings are laid. i saw at egaja two figures about feet inches high, in the house placed at my disposal. they were left in it during my occupation, save that the rolls of cloth (their power) which were round their necks, were removed by the owner chief; of the significance of these rolls i will speak elsewhere. incantations may be divided into two classes, supplications analogous to our idea of prayers, and certain cabalistic words and phrases. the supplications are addresses to the higher spirits. some are made even to anzam himself, but the spirit of the new moon is that most commonly addressed to keep the lower spirits from molesting. dr. nassau gave me many instances out of the wealth of his knowledge. one night when he was stopping at a village, he saw standing out in the open street a venerable chief who addressed the spirits of the air and begged them, "come ye not into my town;" he then recounted his good deeds, praising himself as good, just, honest, kind to his neighbours, and so on. i must remark that this man had not been in touch with europeans, so his ideal of goodness was the native one--which you will find everywhere among the most remote west coast natives. he urged these things as a reason why no evil should befall him, and closed with an impassioned appeal to the spirits to stay away. at another time, in another village, when a man's son had been wounded and a bleeding artery which the doctor had closed had broken out again and the haemorrhage seemed likely to prove fatal, the father rushed out into the street wildly gesticulating towards the sky, saying, "go away, go away, go away, ye spirits, why do you come to kill my son?" in another case a woman rushed into the street, alternately objurgating and pleading with the spirits, who, she said, were vexing her child which had convulsions. "observe," said the doctor in his impressive way, "these were distinctly prayers, appeals for mercy, agonising protests, but there was no praise, no love, no thanks, no confession of sin." i said, considering the underlying idea, i did not see how that could be, thinking of the thing as they did, and the doctor and i had one of our little disagreements. i shall always feel grateful to him for his great toleration of me, but i am sure this arose from his feeling that i saw there was an underlying idea in the minds of the people he loved well enough to lay down his life for in the hope of benefiting and ennobling them, and that i did not, as many do, set them down as idiotic brutes, glorying in an aimless cruelty that would be a disgrace to a devil. regarding the cabalistic words and phrases, things which had long given me great trouble to get any comprehension of, the doctor gave me great help. he says some of these phrases and words are coined by the person himself, others are archaisms handed down from ancestors and believed to possess an efficacy, though their actual meaning is forgotten. he says they are used at any time as defence from evil, when a person is startled, sneezes, or stumbles. among these i think i ought to class that peculiar form of friendly farewell or greeting which the doctor poetically calls a "blown blessing" and the natives ibata. i thought the three times it was given to me that it was just spitting on the hand. practically it is so, but the doctor says the spitting is accidental, a by-product i suppose. the method consists in taking the right hand in both yours, turning it palm upwards, bending your head low over it, and saying with great energy and a violent propulsion of the breath, ibata. idols are comparatively rare in congo francais, but where they are used the people have the same idea about them as the true negroes have, namely, that they are things which spirits reside in, or haunt, but not in their corporeal nature adorable. the resident spirit in them and in the charms and plants, which are also regarded as residences of spirits, has to be placated with offerings of food and other sacrifices. you will see in the fetish huts above mentioned dishes of plantain and fish left till they rot. dr. nassau says the life or essence of the food only is eaten by the spirit, the form of the vegetable or flesh being left to be removed when its life is gone out. in cases of emergency a fowl with its blood is laid at the door of the fetish hut, or when pestilence is expected, or an attack by enemies, or a great man or woman is very ill, goats and sheep are sacrificed and the blood put in the fetish hut as well as on the gateways of the village. these sacrifices among the fan are made with a very peculiar-shaped knife, a fine specimen of which i secured by the kindness of captain davies; it is shaped like the head of a hornbill and is quite unlike the knives in common use among the tribes, which are either long, leaf-shaped blades sharpened along both edges, or broad, trowel-shaped, almost triangular daggers. all fan knives are fine weapons, superior to the knives of all other coast tribes i have met with, but the sacrifice knife is distinctly peculiar. i found to my great interest the same superstition in congo francais that i met with first in the oil rivers. its meaning i am unable to fully account for, but i believe it to be a form of sacrifice. in calabar each individual has a certain forbidden thing or things. these things are either forms of food, or the method of eating. in calabar this prohibition is called ibet, and when, in consequence of the influence of white culture, a man gives up his ibet, he is regarded by good sound ju-juists as leading an irregular and dissipated life, and even the unintentional breaking of the ibet is regarded as very dangerous. special days are set apart by each individual; on these days he eats only the smallest quantity and plainest quality of food. no one must eat with him, nor any dog, fowl, etc., feed off the crumbs, nor any one watch him while eating. i suspect on this day the ibet is eaten, but i have not verified this, only getting, from an untrustworthy source, a statement that supported it. dr. nassau told me that among congo francais tribes certain rites are performed for children during infancy or youth, in which a prohibition is laid upon the child as regards the eating of some particular article of food, or the doing of certain acts. "it is difficult," he said, "to get the exact object of the 'orunda.' certainly the prohibited article is not in itself evil, for others but the inhibited individual may eat or do with it as they please. most of the natives blindly follow the custom of their ancestors without being able to give any raison d'etre, but again, from those best able to give a reason, you learn the prohibited article is a sacrifice ordained for the child by its parents and the magic doctor as a gift to the governing spirit of its life. the thing prohibited becomes removed from the child's common use, and is made sacred to the spirit. any use of it by the child or man would therefore be a sin, which would bring down the spirit's wrath in the form of sickness or other evil, which can be atoned for only by expensive ceremonies or gifts to the magic doctor who intercedes for the offender." anything may be an orunda or ibet provided only that it is connected with food; i have been able to find no definite ground for the selection of it. the doctor said, for example, that "once when on a boat journey, and camped in the forest for the noon-day meal, the crew of four had no meat. they needed it. i had a chicken but ate only a portion, and gave the rest to the crew. three men ate it with their manioc meal, the fourth would not touch it. it was his orunda." "on another journey," said the doctor, "instead of all my crew leaving me respectfully alone in the canoe to have my lunch and going ashore to have theirs, one of them stayed behind in the canoe, and i found his orunda was only to eat over water when on a journey by water." "at another place, a chief at whose village we once anchored in a small steamer when a glass of rum was given him, had a piece of cloth held up before his mouth that the people might not see him drink, which was his orunda." i know some ethnologists will think this last case should be classed under another head, but i think the doctor is right. he is well aware of the existence of the other class of prohibitions regarding chiefs and i have seen plenty of chiefs myself up the rembwe who have no objection to take their drinks coram publico, and i have no doubt this was only an individual orunda of this particular rembwe chief. great care is requisite in these matters, because a man may do or abstain from doing one and the same thing for divers reasons. chapter xiii. fetish--(continued). in which the voyager discourses on deaths and witchcraft, and, with no intentional slur on the medical profession, on medical methods and burial customs, concluding with sundry observations on twins. it is exceedingly interesting to compare the ideas of the negroes with those of the bantu. the mental condition of the lower forms of both races seems very near the other great border-line that separates man from the anthropoid apes, and i believe that if we had the material, or rather if we could understand it, we should find little or no gap existing in mental evolution in this old, undisturbed continent of africa. let, however, these things be as they may, one thing about negro and bantu races is very certain, and that is that their lives are dominated by a profound belief in witchcraft and its effects. among both alike the rule is that death is regarded as a direct consequence of the witchcraft of some malevolent human being, acting by means of spirits, over which he has, by some means or another, obtained control. to all rules there are exceptions. among the calabar negroes, who are definite in their opinions, i found two classes of exceptions. the first arises from their belief in a bush-soul. they believe every man has four souls: a, the soul that survives death; b, the shadow on the path; c, the dream-soul; d, the bush-soul. this bush-soul is always in the form of an animal in the forest-- never of a plant. sometimes when a man sickens it is because his bush-soul is angry at being neglected, and a witch-doctor is called in, who, having diagnosed this as being the cause of the complaint, advises the administration of some kind of offering to the offended one. when you wander about in the forests of the calabar region, you will frequently see little dwarf huts with these offerings in them. you must not confuse these huts with those of similar construction you are continually seeing in plantations, or near roads, which refer to quite other affairs. these offerings, in the little huts in the forest, are placed where your bush-soul was last seen. unfortunately, you are compelled to call in a doctor, which is an expense, but you cannot see your own bush-soul, unless you are an ebumtup, a sort of second-sighter. but to return to the bush-soul of an ordinary person. if the offering in the hut works well on the bush-soul, the patient recovers, but if it does not he dies. diseases arising from derangements in the temper of the bush-soul however, even when treated by the most eminent practitioners, are very apt to be intractable, because it never realises that by injuring you it endangers its own existence. for when its human owner dies, the bush-soul can no longer find a good place, and goes mad, rushing to and fro--if it sees a fire it rushes into it; if it sees a lot of people it rushes among them, until it is killed, and when it is killed it is "finish" for it, as m. pichault would say, for it is not an immortal soul. the bush-souls of a family are usually the same for a man and for his sons, for a mother and for her daughters. sometimes, however, i am told all the children take the mother's, sometimes all take the father's. they may be almost any kind of animal, sometimes they are leopards, sometimes fish, or tortoises, and so on. there is another peculiarity about the bush-soul, and that is that it is on its account that old people are held in such esteem among the calabar tribes. for, however bad these old people's personal record may have been, the fact of their longevity demonstrates the possession of powerful and astute bush-souls. on the other hand, a man may be a quiet, respectable citizen, devoted to peace and a whole skin, and yet he may have a sadly flighty disreputable bush- soul which will get itself killed or damaged and cause him death or continual ill-health. there is another way by which a man dies apart from the action of bush-souls or witchcraft; he may have had a bad illness from some cause in his previous life and, when reincarnated, part of this disease may get reincarnated with him and then he will ultimately die of it. there is no medicine of any avail against these reincarnated diseases. the idea of reincarnation is very strong in the niger delta tribes. it exists, as far as i have been able to find out, throughout all africa, but usually only in scattered cases, as it were; but in the delta, most--i think i may say all--human souls of the "surviving soul" class are regarded as returning to the earth again, and undergoing a reincarnation shortly after the due burial of the soul. these two exceptions from the rule of all deaths and sickness being caused by witchcraft are, however, of minor importance, for infinitely the larger proportion of death and sickness is held to arise from witchcraft itself, more particularly among the bantu. witchcraft acts in two ways, namely, witching something out of a man, or witching something into him. the former method is used by both negro and bantu, but is decidedly more common among the negroes, where the witches are continually setting traps to catch the soul that wanders from the body when a man is sleeping; and when they have caught this soul, they tie it up over the canoe fire and its owner sickens as the soul shrivels. this is merely a regular line of business, and not an affair of individual hate or revenge. the witch does not care whose dream- soul gets into the trap, and will restore it on payment. also witch-doctors, men of unblemished professional reputation, will keep asylums for lost souls, i.e. souls who have been out wandering and found on their return to their body that their place has been filled up by a sisa, a low class soul i will speak of later. these doctors keep souls and administer them to patients who are short of the article. but there are other witches, either wicked on their own account, or hired by people who are moved by some hatred to individuals, and then the trap is carefully set and baited for the soul of the particular man they wish to injure, and concealed in the bait at the bottom of the pot are knives and sharp hooks which tear and damage the soul, either killing it outright, or mauling it so that it causes its owner sickness on its return to him. i knew the case of a kruman who for several nights had smelt in his dreams the savoury smell of smoked crawfish seasoned with red peppers. he became anxious, and the headman decided some witch had set a trap baited with this dainty for his dream-soul, with intent to do him grievous bodily harm, and great trouble was taken for the next few nights to prevent this soul of his from straying abroad. the witching of things into a man is far the most frequent method among the bantu, hence the prevalence among them of the post-mortem examination,--a practice i never found among the negroes. the belief in witchcraft is the cause of more african deaths than anything else. it has killed and still kills more men and women than the slave-trade. its only rival is perhaps the smallpox, the grand kraw-kraw, as the krumen graphically call it. at almost every death a suspicion of witchcraft arises. the witch- doctor is called in, and proceeds to find out the guilty person. then woe to the unpopular men, the weak women, and the slaves; for on some of them will fall the accusation that means ordeal by poison, or fire, followed, if these point to guilt, as from their nature they usually do, by a terrible death: slow roasting alive-- mutilation by degrees before the throat is mercifully cut--tying to stakes at low tide that the high tide may come and drown--and any other death human ingenuity and hate can devise. the terror in which witchcraft is held is interesting in spite of all its horror. i have seen mild, gentle men and women turned by it, in a moment, to incarnate fiends, ready to rend and destroy those who a second before were nearest and dearest to them. terrible is the fear that falls like a spell upon a village when a big man, or big woman is just known to be dead. the very men catch their breaths, and grow grey round the lips, and then every one, particularly those belonging to the household of the deceased, goes in for the most demonstrative exhibition of grief. long, low howls creep up out of the first silence--those blood-curdling, infinitely melancholy, wailing howls--once heard, never to be forgotten. the men tear off their clothes and wear only the most filthy rags; women, particularly the widows, take off ornaments and almost all dress; their faces are painted white with chalk, their heads are shaven, and they sit crouched on the earth in the house, in the attitude of abasement, the hands resting on the shoulders, palm downwards, not crossed across the breast, unless they are going into the street. meanwhile the witch-doctor has been sent for, if he is not already present, and he sets to work in different ways to find out who are the persons guilty of causing the death. whether the methods vary with the tribe, or with the individual witch-doctor, i cannot absolutely say, but i think largely with the latter. among the benga i saw a witch-doctor going round a village ringing a small bell which was to stop ringing outside the hut of the guilty. among the cabindas (fjort) i saw, at different times, two witch- doctors trying to find witches, one by means of taking on and off the lid of a small basket while he repeated the names of all the people in the village. when the lid refused to come off at the name of a person, that person was doomed. the other cabinda doctor first tried throwing nuts upon the ground, also repeating names. that method apparently failed. then he resorted to another, rubbing the flattened palms of his hands against each other. when the palms refused to meet at a name, and his hands flew about wildly, he had got his man. the accused person, if he denies the guilt, and does not claim the ordeal, is tortured until he not only acknowledges his guilt but names his accomplices in the murder, for remember this witchcraft is murder in the african eyes. if he claims the ordeal, as he usually does, he usually has to take a poison drink. among all the bantu tribes i know this is made from sass wood (sass = bad; sass water = rough water; sass surf = bad surf, etc.), and is a decoction of the freshly pulled bark of a great hard wood forest tree, which has a tall unbranched stem, terminating in a crown of branches bearing small leaves. among the calabar tribes the ordeal drink is of two kinds: one made from the calabar bean, the other, the great ju-ju drink mbiam, which is used also in taking oaths. in both the sass-wood and calabar bean drink the only chance for the accused lies in squaring the witch-doctor, so that in the case of the sass-wood drink it is allowed to settle before administration, and in the bean that you get a very heavy dose, both arrangements tending to produce the immediate emetic effect indicative of innocence. if this effect does not come on quickly you die a miserable death from the effects of the poison interrupted by the means taken to kill you as soon as it is decided from the absence of violent sickness that you are guilty. the mbiam is not poisonous, nor is its use confined, as the use of the bean is, entirely to witch palaver; but it is the most respected and dreaded of all oaths, and from its decision there is but one appeal, the appeal open to all condemned persons, but rarely made-- the appeal to long ju-ju. this long ju-ju means almost certain death, and before it a severe frightening that is worse to a negro mind than mere physical torture. the mbiam oath formula i was able to secure in the upper districts of the calabar. one form of it runs thus, and it is recited before swallowing the drink made of filth and blood: - "if i have been guilty of this crime, "if i have gone and sought the sick one's hurt, "if i have sent another to seek the sick one's hurt, "if i have employed any one to make charms or to cook bush, "or to put anything in the road, "or to touch his cloth, "or to touch his yams, "or to touch his goats, "or to touch his fowl, "or to touch his children, "if i have prayed for his hurt, "if i have thought to hurt him in my heart, "if i have any intention to hurt him, "if i ever, at any time, do any of these things (recite in full), "or employ others to do these things (recite in full), "then, mbiam! thou deal with me." this form i give was for use when a man was sick, and things were generally going badly with him, for it is not customary in cases of disease to wait until death occurs before making an accusation of witchcraft. in the case of mbiam being administered after a death this long and complicated oath would be worded to meet the case most carefully, the future intention clauses being omitted. in all cases, whenever it is used, the greatest care is taken that the oath be recited in full, oath-takers being sadly prone to kiss their thumb, as it were, particularly ladies who are taking mbiam for accusations of adultery, in conjunction with the boiling oil ordeal. indeed, so unreliable is this class of offenders, or let us rather say this class of suspected persons, that some one usually says the oath for them. from the penalty and inconveniences of these accusations of witchcraft there is but one escape, namely flight to a sanctuary. there are several sanctuaries in congo francais. the great one in the calabar district is at omon. thither mothers of twins, widows, thieves, and slaves fly, and if they reach it are safe. but an attempt at flight is a confession of guilt; no one is quite certain the accusation will fall on him, or her, and hopes for the best until it is generally too late. moreover, flying anywhere beyond a day's march, is difficult work in west africa. so the killing goes on and it is no uncommon thing for ten or more people to be destroyed for one man's sickness or death; and thus over immense tracts of country the death-rate exceeds the birth-rate. indeed some of the smaller tribes have thus been almost wiped out. in the calabar district i have heard of an entire village taking the bean voluntarily because another village had accused it en bloc of witchcraft. miss slessor has frequently told me how, during a quarrel, one person has accused another of witchcraft, and the accused has bolted off in a towering rage and swallowed the bean. the witch-doctor is not always the cause of people being subjected to the ordeal or torture. in calabar and the okyon districts all the widows of a dead man are subjected to ordeal. they have to go the next night after the death, before an assemblage of chiefs and the general surrounding crowd, to a cleared space where there is a fire burning. a fowl is tied to the right hand of each widow, and should that fowl fail to cluck at the sight of the fire the woman is held guilty of having bewitched her dead husband and is dealt with accordingly. among the bantu, although the killing among the wives from the accusation of witchcraft is high, some of them being almost certain to fall victims, yet there is not the wholesale slaughter of women and slaves sent down with the soul of the dead that there is among the negroes. in doubtful cases of death, i.e. in all cases not arising from actual violence, when blood shows in the killing, the bantu of the s.w. coast make post-mortem examinations. notably common is this practice among the cameroons and batanga region tribes. the body is cut open to find in the entrails some sign of the path of the injected witch. i am informed that it is the lung that is most usually eaten by the spirit. if the deceased is a witch-doctor it is thought, as i have mentioned before, that his familiar spirit has eaten him internally, and he is opened with a view of securing and destroying his witch. in i saw in a village in kacongo five unpleasant-looking objects stuck on sticks. they were the livers and lungs, and in fact the plucks, of witch-doctors, and the inhabitants informed me they were the witches that had been found in them on post-mortems and then been secured. mrs. grenfell, of the upper congo, told me in the same year, when i had the pleasure of travelling with her from victoria to matadi, that a similar practice was in vogue among several of the upper congo tribes. again in i came across another instance of the post-mortem practice. a woman had dropped down dead on a factory beach at corisco bay. the natives could not make it out at all. they were irritated about her conduct: "she no sick, she no complain, she no nothing, and then she go die one time." the post-mortem showed a burst aneurism. the native verdict was "she done witch herself," i.e. she was a witch eaten by her own familiar. the general opinion held by people living near a river is that the spirit of a witch can take the form of a crocodile to do its work in; those who live away from large rivers or in districts like congo francais, where crocodiles are not very savage, hold that the witch takes on the form of a leopard. still the crocodile spirit form is believed in in congo francais, and to a greater extent in kacongo, because here the crocodiles of the congo are very ferocious and numerous, taking as heavy a toll in human life as they do in the delta of the niger and the estuaries of the sierra leone and sherboro' rivers. one witch-doctor i know in kacongo had a strange professional method. when, by means of his hand rubbings, etc., he had got hold of a witch or a bewitched one, he always gave the unfortunate an emetic and always found several lively young crocodiles in the consequence, and the stories of the natives in this region abound in accounts of people who have been carried off by witch crocodiles, and kept in places underground for years. i often wonder whether this idea may not have arisen from the well-known habit of the crocodile of burying its prey on the bank. sometimes it will take off a limb of its victim at once, but frequently it buries the body whole for a few days before eating it. the body is always buried if it is left to the crocodile. i have a most profound respect for the whole medical profession, but i am bound to confess that the african representatives of it are a little empirical in their methods of treatment. the african doctor is not always a witch-doctor in the bargain, but he is usually. lady doctors abound. they are a bit dangerous in pharmacy, but they do not often venture on surgery, so on the whole they are safer, for african surgery is heroic. dr. nassau cited the worst case of it i know of. a man had been accidentally shot in the chest by another man with a gun on the ogowe. the native doctor who was called in made a perpendicular incision into the man's chest, extending down to the last rib; he then cut diagonally across, and actually lifted the wall of the chest, and groped about among the vitals for the bullet which he successfully extracted. patient died. no anaesthetic was employed. i came across a minor operation. a man had broken the ulna of the left arm. the native doctor got a piece--a very nice piece--of bamboo, drove it in through the muscles and integuments from the wrist to the elbow, then encased the limb in plantain leaves, and bound it round, tightly and neatly, needless to say with tie-tie. the arm and hand when i saw it, some six or seven months after the operation, was quite useless, and was withering away. many of their methods, however, are better. the dualla medicos are truly great on poultices for extracting foreign substances, such as bits of iron cooking-pot--a very frequent form of foreign substance in a man out here, owing to their being generally used as bullets. almost incredible stories are told by black and white of the efficacy of these poultices; one case i heard from a reliable source of a man who had been shot with fragments of iron pot in the thigh. the white doctor extracted several pieces and said he had got all out, but the man still went on suffering, and could not walk, so, at his request, a native doctor was called in, and he applied his poultice. in a few minutes he removed it, and on its face were two pieces of jagged iron pot. probably they had been in the poultice when it was applied, anyhow the patient recovered rapidly. baths accompanied by massage are much esteemed. the baths are sometimes of hot water with a few herbs thrown in, sometimes they are made by digging a hole in the earth and putting into it a quantity of herbs, and bruised cardamoms, and peppers. boiling water is then plentifully poured over these and the patient is placed in the bath and is covered over with the parboiled green stuff; a coating of clay is then placed over all, leaving just the head sticking out. the patient remains in this bath for a period of a few hours, up to a day and a half, and when taken out is well rubbed and kneaded. this form of bath i saw used by the m'pongwe and igalwas, and it is undoubtedly good for many diseases, notably for that curse of the coast, rheumatism, which afflicts black and white alike. rubbing and kneading and hot baths are, i think, the best native remedies, and the plaster of grains-of-paradise pounded up, and mixed with clay, and applied to the forehead as a remedy for malarial headache, or brow ague, is often very useful, but apart from these, i have never seen, in any of these herbal remedies, any trace of a really valuable drug. the calabar natives are notably behindhand in their medical methods, depending more on ju-ju than the bantus. in a case of rheumatism, for example, instead of ordering the hot bath, the local practitioner will "woka" his patient and extract from the painful part, even when it has not been wounded, pieces of iron pot, millipedes, etc., and, in cases of dysentery, bundles of shred-up palm-leaves. these things, he asserts, have been by witchcraft inserted into the patient. his conduct can hardly be regarded as professional; and moreover as he goes on to diagnose who has witched these things into the patient's anatomy, it is highly dangerous to the patient's friends, relations, and neighbours into the bargain. with no intentional slur on the medical profession, after this discussion on their methods i will pass on to the question of dying. dying in west africa particularly in the niger delta, is made very unpleasant for the native by his friends and relations. when a person is insensible, violent means are taken to recall the spirit to the body. pepper is forced up the nose and into the eyes. the mouth is propped open with a stick. the shredded fibres of the outside of the oil-nut are set alight and held under the nose and the whole crowd of friends and relations with whom the stifling hot hut is tightly packed yell the dying man's name at the top of their voices, in a way that makes them hoarse for days, just as if they were calling to a person lost in the bush or to a person struggling and being torn or lured away from them. "hi, hi, don't you hear? come back, come back. see here. this is your place," etc. this custom holds good among both negroes and bantus; but the funeral ceremonies vary immensely, in fact with every tribe, and form a subject the details of which i will reserve for a separate work on fetish. among the okyon tribes especial care is taken in the case of a woman dying and leaving a child over six months old. the underlying idea is that the spirit of the mother is sure to come back and fetch the child, and in order to pacify her and prevent the child dying, it is brought in and held just in front of the dead body of the mother and then gradually carried away behind her where she cannot see it, and the person holding the child makes it cry out and says, "see, your child is here, you are going to have it with you all right." then the child is hastily smuggled out of the hut, while a bunch of plantains is put in with the body of the woman and bound up with the funeral binding clothes. very young children they do not attempt to keep, but throw them away in the bush alive, as all children are thrown who have not arrived in this world in the way considered orthodox, or who cut their teeth in an improper way. twins are killed among all the niger delta tribes, and in districts out of english control the mother is killed too, except in omon, where the sanctuary is. there twin mothers and their children are exiled to an island in the cross river. they have to remain on the island and if any man goes across and marries one of them he has to remain on the island too. this twin-killing is a widely diffused custom among the negro tribes. there is always a sense of there being something uncanny regarding twins in west africa, and in those tribes where they are not killed they are regarded as requiring great care to prevent them from dying on their own account. i remember once among the tschwi { } trying to amuse a sickly child with an image which was near it and which i thought was its doll. the child regarded me with its great melancholy eyes pityingly, as much as to say, "a pretty fool you are making of yourself," and so i was, for i found out that the image was not a doll at all but an image of the child's dead twin which was being kept near it as a habitation for the deceased twin's soul, so that it might not have to wander about, and, feeling lonely, call its companion after it. the terror with which twins are regarded in the niger delta is exceedingly strange and real. when i had the honour of being with miss slessor at okyon, the first twins in that district were saved with their mother from immolation owing entirely to miss slessor's great influence with the natives and her own unbounded courage and energy. the mother in this case was a slave woman--an eboe, the most expensive and valuable of slaves. she was the property of a big woman who had always treated her--as indeed most slaves are treated in calabar--with great kindness and consideration, but when these two children arrived all was changed; immediately she was subjected to torrents of virulent abuse, her things were torn from her, her english china basins, possessions she valued most highly, were smashed, her clothes were torn, and she was driven out as an unclean thing. had it not been for the fear of incurring miss slessor's anger, she would, at this point, have been killed with her children, and the bodies thrown into the bush. as it was, she was hounded out of the village. the rest of her possessions were jammed into an empty gin case and cast to her. no one would touch her, as they might not touch to kill. miss slessor had heard of the twins' arrival and had started off, barefooted and bareheaded, at that pace she can go down a bush path. by the time she had gone four miles she met the procession, the woman coming to her and all the rest of the village yelling and howling behind her. on the top of her head was the gin-case, into which the children had been stuffed, on the top of them the woman's big brass skillet, and on the top of that her two market calabashes. needless to say, on arriving miss slessor took charge of affairs, relieving the unfortunate, weak, staggering woman from her load and carrying it herself, for no one else would touch it, or anything belonging to those awful twin things, and they started back together to miss slessor's house in the forest-clearing, saved by that tact which, coupled with her courage, has given miss slessor an influence and a power among the negroes unmatched in its way by that of any other white. she did not take the twins and their mother down the village path to her own house, for though had she done so the people of okyon would not have prevented her, yet so polluted would the path have been, and so dangerous to pass down, that they would have been compelled to cut another, no light task in that bit of forest, i assure you. so miss slessor stood waiting in the broiling sun, in the hot season's height, while a path was being cut to enable her just to get through to her own grounds. the natives worked away hard, knowing that it saved the polluting of a long stretch of market road, and when it was finished miss slessor went to her own house by it and attended with all kindness, promptness, and skill, to the woman and children. i arrived in the middle of this affair for my first meeting with miss slessor, and things at okyon were rather crowded, one way and another, that afternoon. all the attention one of the children wanted--the boy, for there was a boy and a girl--was burying, for the people who had crammed them into the box had utterly smashed the child's head. the other child was alive, and is still a member of that household of rescued children all of whom owe their lives to miss slessor. there are among them twins from other districts, and delicate children who must have died had they been left in their villages, and a very wonderful young lady, very plump and very pretty, aged about four. her mother died a few days after her birth, so the child was taken and thrown into the bush, by the side of the road that led to the market. this was done one market- day some distance from the okyon town. this particular market is held every ninth day, and on the succeeding market-day some women from the village by the side of miss slessor's house happened to pass along the path and heard the child feebly crying: they came into miss slessor's yard in the evening, and sat chatting over the day's shopping, etc., and casually mentioned in the way of conversation that they had heard the child crying, and that it was rather remarkable it should be still alive. needless to say, miss slessor was off, and had that waif home. it was truly in an awful state, but just alive. in a marvellous way it had been left by leopards and snakes, with which this bit of forest abounds, and, more marvellous still, the driver ants had not scented it. other ants had considerably eaten into it one way and another; nose, eyes, etc., were swarming with them and flies; the cartilage of the nose and part of the upper lip had been absolutely eaten into, but in spite of this she is now one of the prettiest black children i have ever seen, which is saying a good deal, for negro children are very pretty with their round faces, their large mouths not yet coarsened by heavy lips, their beautifully shaped flat little ears, and their immense melancholy deer-like eyes, and above these charms they possess that of being fairly quiet. this child is not an object of terror, like the twin children; it was just thrown away because no one would be bothered to rear it, but when miss slessor had had all the trouble of it the natives had no objection to pet and play with it, calling it "the child of wonder," because of its survival. with the twin baby it was very different. they would not touch it and only approached it after some days, and then only when it was held by miss slessor or me. if either of us wanted to do or get something, and we handed over the bundle to one of the house children to hold, there was a stampede of men and women off the verandah, out of the yard, and over the fence, if need be, that was exceedingly comic, but most convincing as to the reality of the terror and horror in which they held the thing. even its own mother could not be trusted with the child; she would have killed it. she never betrayed the slightest desire to have it with her, and after a few days' nursing and feeding up she was anxious to go back to her mistress, who, being an enlightened woman, was willing to have her if she came without the child. the main horror is undoubtedly of the child, the mother being killed more as a punishment for having been so intimately mixed up in bringing the curse, danger, and horror into the village than for anything else. the woman went back by the road that had been cut for her coming, and would have to live for the rest of her life an outcast, and for a long time in a state of isolation, in a hut of her own into which no one would enter, neither would any one eat or drink with her, nor partake of the food or water she had cooked or fetched. she would lead the life of a leper, working in the plantation by day, and going into her lonely hut at night, shunned and cursed. i tried to find out whether there was any set period for this quarantine, and all i could arrive at was that if--and a very considerable if--a man were to marry her and she were subsequently to present to society an acceptable infant, she would be to a certain extent socially rehabilitated, but she would always be a woman with a past--a thing the african, to his credit be it said, has no taste for. the woman's own lamentations were pathetic. she would sit for hours singing or rather mourning out a kind of dirge over herself: "yesterday i was a woman, now i am a horror, a thing all people run from. yesterday they would eat with me, now they spit on me. yesterday they would talk to me with a sweet mouth, now they greet me only with curses and execrations. they have smashed my basin, they have torn my clothes," and so on, and so on. there was no complaint against the people for doing these things, only a bitter sense of injury against some superhuman power that had sent this withering curse of twins down on her. she knew not why; she sang "i have not done this, i have not done that"--and highly interesting information regarding the moral standpoint a good deal of it was. i have tried to find out the reason of this widely diffused custom which is the cause of such a pitiful waste of life; for in addition to the mother and children being killed it often leads to other people, totally unconcerned in the affair, being killed by the relatives of the sufferer on the suspicion of having caused the calamity by witchcraft, and until one gets hold of the underlying idea, and can destroy that, the custom will be hard to stamp out in a district like the great niger delta. but i have never been able to hunt it down, though i am sure it is there, and a very quaint idea it undoubtedly is. the usual answer is, "it was the custom of our fathers," but that always and only means, "we don't intend to tell." funeral customs vary considerably between the negro and bantu, and i never yet found among the bantu those unpleasant death charms which are in vogue in the niger delta. the calabar people, when the consular eye is off them, bury under the house. in the case of a great chief the head is cut off and buried with great secrecy somewhere else, for reasons i have already stated. the body is buried a few days after death, but the really important part of the funeral is the burying of the spirit, and this is the thing that causes all the west africans, negro and bantu alike, great worry, trouble, and expense. for the spirit, no matter what its late owner may have been, is malevolent--all native-made spirits are. the family have to get together a considerable amount of wealth to carry out this burial of the spirit, so between the body-burying and the spirit-burying a considerable time usually elapses; maybe a year, maybe more. the custom of keeping the affair open until the big funeral can be made obtains also in cabinda and loango, but there, instead of burying the body in the meantime, { } it is placed upon a platform of wood, and slow fires kept going underneath to dry it, a mat roof being usually erected over it to keep off rain. when sufficiently dried, it is wrapped in clothes and put into a coffin, until the money to finish the affair is ready. the duallas are more tied down; their death-dances must be celebrated, i am informed, on the third, seventh, and ninth day after death. on these days the spirit is supposed to be particularly present in its old home. in all the other cases, i should remark, the spirit does not leave the home until its devil is made and if this is delayed too long he naturally becomes fractious. among the congo francais tribes there are many different kinds of burial--as the cannibalistic of the fan. i may remark, however, that they tell me themselves that it is considered decent to bury a relative, even if you subsequently dig him up and dispose of the body to the neighbours. then there is the earth-burial of the igalwas and m'pongwe, and the beating into unrecognisable pulp of the body which, i am told on good native authority, is the method of several upper ogowe tribes, including the adoomas. i had no opportunity of making quiet researches on burial customs when i was above njoli, because i was so busy trying to avoid qualifying for a burial myself; so i am not quite sure whether this method is the general one among these little-known tribes, as i am told by native traders, who have it among them that it is--or whether it is reserved for the bodies of people believed to have been possessed of dangerous souls. destroying the body by beating up, or by cutting up, is a widely diffused custom in west africa in the case of dangerous souls, and is universally followed with those that have contained wanderer- souls, i.e. those souls which keep turning up in the successive infants of a family. a child dies, then another child comes to the same father or mother, and that dies, after giving the usual trouble and expense. a third arrives and if that dies, the worm--the father, i mean--turns, and if he is still desirous of more children, he just breaks one of the legs of the body before throwing it in the bush. this he thinks will act as a warning to the wanderer-soul and give it to understand that if it will persist in coming into his family, it must settle down there and give up its flighty ways. if a fourth child arrives in the family, "it usually limps," and if it dies, the justly irritated parent cuts its body up carefully into very small pieces, and scatters them, doing away with the soul altogether. the kama country people of the lower ogowe are more superstitious and full of observances than the upper river tribes. particularly rich in fetish are the ncomi, a fernan vaz tribe. i once saw a funeral where they had been called in to do the honours, and m. jacot told me of an almost precisely similar occurrence that he had met with in one of his many evangelising expeditions from lembarene. i will give his version because of his very superior knowledge of the language. he was staying in a fan town where one of the chiefs had just died. the other chief (there are usually two in a fan town) decided that his deceased confrere should have due honour paid him, and resolved to do the thing handsomely. the fans openly own to not understanding thoroughly about death and life and the immortality of the soul, and things of that sort, and so the chief called in the ncomi, who are specialists in these subjects, to make the funeral customs. m. jacot said the chief made a speech to the effect that the fans did not know about these things, but their neighbours, the ncomi, were known to be well versed in them and the proper things to do, so he had called them in to pay honour to the dead chief. then the ncomi started and carried on their weird, complicated death-dance. the fans sat and stood round watching them in a ring for a long time, but to a rational, common-sense, shrewd, unimaginative set of people like the fans, just standing hour after hour gazing on a dance you do not understand, and which consists of a wriggle and a stamp, a wriggle and a stamp, in a solemn walk, or prance, round and round, to the accompaniment of a monotonous phrase thumped on a tom- tom and a monotonous, melancholy chant, uttered in a minor key interspersed every few minutes with an emphatic howl, produces a feeling of boredom, therefore the fans softly stole away and went to bed, which disgusted the ncomi, and there was a row. in the dance i saw the same thing happened, only when the ncomi saw the audience getting thin they complained and said that they were doing this dance in honour of the fans' chief, in a neighbourly way, and the very least the fans could do, as they couldn't dance themselves, was to sit still and admire people who could. the fan chief in my village quite saw it, and went and had the fans who had gone home early turned up and made them come and see the performance some more; this they did for a time, and then stole off again, or slept in their seats, and the ncomi were highly disgusted at those brutes of fans, whom they regarded, they said in their way, as philistines of an utterly obtuse and degraded type. the ncomi themselves put the body into coffins. a barrel is the usual one, but gun-cases or two trade boxes, the ends knocked out and the cases fitted together, is another frequent form of coffin used by them. these coffins are not buried, but are put into special places in the forest. along the bank of the ogowe you will notice here and there long stretches of uninhabited bush. these are not all mere stretches of swamp forest. if you land on some of these and go in a little way you will find the forest full of mounds--or rather heaps, because they have no mould over them--made of branches of trees and leaves; underneath each of these heaps there are the remains of a body. one very evil-looking place so used i found when i was on the karkola river. dr. nassau tells me they are the usual burying grounds (abe) of the ajumbas. chapter xiv. fetish--(continued). in which the voyager discourses on the legal methods of natives of this country, the ideas governing forms of burial, of their manner of mourning for their dead, and the condition of the african soul in the under-world. great as are the incidental miseries and dangers surrounding death to all the people in the village in which a death occurs, undoubtedly those who suffer most are the widows of a chief or free man. the uniform custom among both negroes and bantus is that those who escape execution on the charge of having witched the husband to death, shall remain in a state of filth and abasement, not even removing vermin from themselves, until after the soul-burial is complete--the soul of the dead man being regarded as hanging about them and liable to be injured. therefore, also to the end of preventing his soul from getting damaged, they are confined to their huts; this latter restriction is not rigidly enforced, but it is held theoretically to be the correct thing. they maintain the attitude of grief and abasement, sitting on the ground, eating but little food, and that of a coarse kind. in calabar their legal rights over property, such as slaves, are meanwhile considerably in abeyance, and they are put to great expense during the time the spirit is awaiting burial. they have to keep watch, two at a time, in the hut, where the body is buried, keeping lights burning, and they have to pay out of their separate estate for the entertainment of all the friends of the deceased who come to pay him compliment; and if he has been an important man, a big man, the whole district will come, not in a squadron, but just when it suits them, exactly as if they were calling on a live friend. thus it often happens that even a big woman is bankrupt by the expense. i will not go into the legal bearings of the case here, for they are intricate, and, to a great extent, only interesting to a student of negro law. the bantu women occupy a far inferior position in regard to the rights of property to that held by the negro women. the disposal of wives after the death of the husband among the m'pongwe and igalwa is a subject full of interest; but it is, like most of their law, very complicated. the brothers of the deceased are supposed to take them--the younger brother may not marry the elder brother's widows, but the elder brothers may marry those of the younger brother. should any of the women object to the arrangement, they may "leave the family." i own that the ground principle of african law practically is "the simple plan that they should take who have the power, and they should keep who can," and this tells particularly against women and children who have not got living, powerful relations of their own. unless the children of a man are grown up and sufficiently powerful on their own account, they have little chance of sharing in the distribution of his estate; but in spite of this abuse of power there is among negroes and bantus a definite and acknowledged law, to which an appeal can be made by persons of all classes, provided they have the wherewithal to set the machinery of it in motion. the difficulty the children and widows have in sharing in the distribution of the estate of the father and husband arises, i fancy, in the principle of the husband's brothers being the true heir, which has sunk into a fossilised state near the trading stations in the face of the white culture. the reason for this inheritance of goods passing from the man to his brother by the same mother has no doubt for one of its origins the recognition of the fact that the brother by the same mother must be a near relation, whereas, in spite of the strict laws against adultery, the relationship to you of the children born of your wives is not so certain. nevertheless this is one of the obvious and easy explanations for things it is well to exercise great care before accepting, for you must always remember that the african's mind does not run on identical lines with the european--what may be self- evident to you is not so to him, and vice versa. i have frequently heard african metaphysicians complain that white men make great jumps in their thought-course, and do not follow an idea step by step. you soon become conscious of the careful way a negro follows his idea. certain customs of his you can, by the exercise of great patience, trace back in a perfectly smooth line from their source in some natural phenomenon. others, of course, you cannot, the traces of the intervening steps of the idea having been lost, owing partly to the veneration in which old customs are held, which causes them to regard the fact that their fathers had this fashion as reason enough for their having it, and above all to the total absence of all but oral tradition. but so great a faith have i in the lack of inventive power in the african, that i feel sure all their customs, had we the material that has slipped down into the great swamp of time, could be traced back either, as i have said, to some natural phenomenon, or to the thing being advisable, for reasons of utility. the uncertainty in the parentage of offspring may seem to be such a utilitarian underlying principle, but, on the other hand, it does not sufficiently explain the varied forms of the law of inheritance, for in some tribes the eldest or most influential son does succeed to his father's wealth; in other places you have the peculiar custom of the chief slave inheriting. i think, from these things, that the underlying idea in inheritance of property is the desire to keep the wealth of "the house," i.e. estate, together, and if it were allowed to pass into the hands of weak people, like women and young children, this would not be done. another strong argument against the theory that it arises from the doubtful relationship of the son, is that certain ju-ju always go to the son of the chief wife, if he is old enough, at the time of the father's death, even in those tribes where the wealth goes elsewhere. certain tribes acknowledge the right of the women and children to share in the dead man's wealth, given that these are legally married wives, or the children of legally married wives; it is so in cameroons, for example. an esteemed friend of mine who helps to manage things for the fatherland down there was trying a palaver the other day with a patience peculiar to him, and that intelligent and elaborate care i should think only a mind trained on the methods of german metaphysicians could impart into that most wearisome of proceedings, wherein every one says the same thing over fourteen different times at least, with a similar voice and gesture, the only variation being in the statements regarding the important points, and the facts of the case, these varying with each individual. this palaver was made by a son claiming to inherit part of his father's property; at last, to the astonishment, and, of course, the horror, of the learned judge, the defendant, the wicked uncle, pleaded through the interpreter, "this man cannot inherit his father's property, because his parents married for love." there is no encouragement to foolishness of this kind in cameroon, where legal marriage consists in purchase. in bonny river and in opobo the inheritance of "the house" is settled primarily by a vote of the free men of the house; when the chief dies, their choice has to be ratified by the other chiefs of houses; but in bonny and opobo the white traders have had immense influence for a long time, so one cannot now find out how far this custom is purely native in idea. among the fans the uncle is, as i have before said, an important person although the father has more rights than among the igalwa, and here i came across a peculiar custom regarding widows. m. jacot cited to me a similar case or so, one of which i must remark was in an ajumba town. the widows were inside the dead husband's hut, as usual; the fan huts are stoutly built of sheets of flattened bark, firmly secured together with bark rope, and thatched--they never build them in any other way except when they are in the bush rubber- collecting or elephant-hunting, when they make them of the branches of trees. well, round the bark hut, with the widows inside, there was erected a hut made of branches, and when this was nearly completed, the fans commenced pulling down the inner bark hut, and finally cleared it right out, thatch and all, and the materials of which it had been made were burnt. i was struck with the performance because the fans, though surrounded by intensely superstitious tribes, are remarkably free from superstition { } themselves, taking little or no interest in speculative matters, except to get charms to make them invisible to elephants, to keep their feet in the path, to enable them to see things in the forest, and practical things of that sort, and these charms they frequently gave me to assist and guard me in my wanderings. the m'pongwe and igalwa have a peculiar funeral custom, but it is not confined in its operation to widows, all the near relatives sharing in it. the mourning relations are seated on the floor of the house, and some friend--dr. nassau told me he was called in in this capacity--comes in and "lifts them up," bringing to them a small present, a factor of which is always a piece of soap. this custom is now getting into the survival form in libreville and glass. nowadays the relatives do not thus sit, unwashed and unkempt, keenly requiring the soap. among the bush igalwa, i am told, the soap is much wanted. it is not only the widows that remain, either theoretically or practically unwashed; all the mourners do. the ibibios seem to me to wear the deepest crape in the form of accumulated dirt, and all the african tribes i have met have peculiar forms of hair cutting-- shaving the entire head, not shaving it at all, shaving half of it, etc.--when in mourning. the period of the duration of wearing mourning is, i believe, in all west coast tribes that which elapses between the death and the burial of the soul. i believe a more thorough knowledge would show us that there is among the bantu also a fixed time for the lingering of the soul on earth after death, but we have not got sufficient evidence on the point yet. the only thing we know is that it is not proper for the widow to re-marry while her husband's soul is still in her vicinity. among the calabar tribes the burial of his spirit liberates the woman. among the tschwi she requires special ceremonies on her own account. in togoland, among the ewe people, i know the period is between five and six weeks, during which time the widow remains in the hut, armed with a good stout stick, as a precaution against the ghost of her husband, so as to ward off attacks should he be ill- tempered. after these six weeks the widow can come out of the hut, but as his ghost has not permanently gone hence, and is apt to revisit the neighbourhood for the next six months, she has to be taken care of during this period. then, after certain ceremonies, she is free to marry again. so i conclude the period of mourning, in all tribes, is that period during which the soul remains round its old possessions, whether these tribes have a definite soul- burial or devil-making or not. the ideas connected with the under-world to which the ghost goes are exceedingly interesting. the negroes and bantus are at one on these subjects in one particular only, and that is that no marriages take place there. the tschwis say that this under-world, srahmandazi, is just the same as this world in all other particulars, save that it is dimmer, a veritable shadow-land where men have not the joys of life, but only the shadow of the joy. hence, says the tschwi proverb, "one day in this world is worth a year in srahmandazi." the tschwis, with their usual definiteness in this sort of detail, know all about their srahmandazi. its entrance is just east of the middle volta, and the way down is difficult to follow, and when the sun sets on this world it rises on srahmandazi. the bantus are vague on this important and interesting point. the benga, for example, although holding the absence of marriage there, do not take steps to meet the case as the tschwis do, and kill a supply of wives to take down with them. this reason for killing wives at a funeral is another instance that, however strange and cruel a custom may be here in west africa, however much it may at first appear to be the flower of a rootless superstition, you will find on close investigation that it has some root in a religious idea, and a common-sense element. the common-sense element in the killing of wives and slaves among both the tschwi and the calabar tribes consists in the fact that it discourages poisoning. a calabar chief elaborately explained to me that the rigorous putting down of killing at funerals that was being carried on by the government not only landed a man in the next world as a wretched pauper, but added an additional chance to his going there prematurely, for his wives and slaves, no longer restrained by the prospect of being killed at his death and sent off with him would, on very slight aggravation, put "bush in his chop." it is sad to think of this thorn being added to the rose-leaves of a west coast chief's life, as there are . per cent. of thorns in it already. i came across a similar case on the gold coast, when a chief complained to me of the way the government were preserving vermin, in the shape of witches, in the districts under its surveillance. you were no longer allowed to destroy them as of old, and therefore the vermin were destroying the game; for, said he, the witches here live almost entirely on the blood they suck from children at night. they used, in old days, to do this furtively, and do so now where native custom is unchecked; but in districts where the government says that witchcraft is utter nonsense, and killing its proficients utter murder which will be dealt with accordingly, the witch flourishes exceedingly, and blackmails the fathers and mothers of families, threatening that if they are not bought off they will have their child's blood; and if they are not paid, the child dies away gradually--poison again, most likely. i often think it must be the common-sense element in fetish customs that enables them to survive, in the strange way they do, in the minds of africans who have been long under european influence and education. in witching, for example, every intelligent native knows there is a lot of poison in the affair, but the explanation he gives you will not usually display this knowledge, and it was not until i found the wide diffusion of the idea of the advisability of administering an emetic to the bewitched person, that i began to suspect my black friends of sound judgment. the good ju-juist will tell you all things act by means of their life, which means their power, their spirit. dr. nassau tells me the efficacy of drugs is held to depend on their benevolent spirits, which, on being put into the body, drive away the malevolent disease-causing spirits--a leucocytes-versus-pathogenic-bacteria sort of influence, i suppose. on this same idea also depends the custom of the appeal to ordeal, the working of which is supposed to be spiritual. nevertheless, the intelligent native, believing all the time in this factor, squares the commonsense factor by bribing the witch-doctor who makes the ordeal drink. the feeling regarding the importance of funeral observances is quite greek in its intensity. given a duly educated african, i am sure that he would grasp the true inwardness of the antigone far and away better than any european now living can. a pathetic story which bears on this feeling was told me some time ago by miss slessor when she was stationed at creek town. an old blind slave woman was found in the bush, and brought into the mission. she was in a deplorable state, utterly neglected and starving, her feet torn by thorns and full of jiggers, and so on. every care was taken of her and she soon revived and began to crawl about, but her whole mind was set on one thing with a passion that had made her alike indifferent to her past sufferings and to her present advantages. what she wanted was a bit, only a little bit, of white cloth. now, i may remark, white cloth is anathema to the missions, for it is used for ju-ju offerings, and a rule has to be made against its being given to the unconverted, or the missionary becomes an accessory before the fact to pagan practices, so white cloth the old woman was told she could not have, she had been given plenty of garments for her own use and that was enough. the old woman, however, kept on pleading and saying the spirit of her dead mistress kept coming to her asking and crying for white cloth, and white cloth she must get for her, and so at last, finding it was not to be got at the mission station, she stole away one day, unobserved, and wandered off into the bush, from which she never again reappeared, doubtless falling a victim to the many leopards that haunted hereabouts. to provide a proper burial for the dead relation is the great duty of a negro's life, its only rival in his mind is the desire to avoid having a burial of his own. but, in a good negro, this passion will go under before the other, and he will risk his very life to do it. he may know, surely and well, that killing slaves and women at a dead brother's grave means hanging for him when their big consul knows of it, but in the delta he will do it. on the coast, leeward and windward, he will spend every penny he possesses and, on top, if need be, go and pawn himself, his wives, or his children into slavery to give a deceased relation a proper funeral. this killing at funerals i used to think would be more easily done away with in the delta than among the tschwi tribes, but a little more knowledge of the delta's idea about the future life showed me i was wrong. among the tschwi the slaves and women killed are to form for the dead a retinue, and riches wherewith to start life in srahmandazi (yboniadse of the oji), where there are markets and towns and all things as on this earth, and so the tschwi would have little difficulty in replacing human beings at funerals with gold-dust, cloth, and other forms of riches, and this is already done in districts under white influence. but in the delta there is no under-world to live in, the souls shortly after reaching the under- world being forwarded back to this, in new babies, and the wealth that is sent down with a man serves as an indication as to what class of baby the soul is to be repacked and sent up in. as wealth in the delta consists of women and slaves i do not believe the under-world gods of the niger would understand the status of a chief who arrived before them, let us say, with ten puncheons of palm oil, and four hundred yards of crimson figured velvet; they would say, "oh! very good as far as it goes, but where is your real estate? the chances are you are only a trade slave boy and have stolen these things"; and in consequence of this, killing at funerals will be a custom exceedingly difficult to stamp out in these regions. try and imagine yourself how abhorrent it must be to send down a dear and honoured relative to the danger of his being returned to this world shortly as a slave. there is no doubt a certain idea among the negroes that some souls may get a rise in status on their next incarnation. you often hear a woman saying she will be a man next time, a slave he will be a freeman, and so on, but how or why some souls obtain promotion i have not yet sufficient evidence to show. i think a little more investigation will place this important point in my possession. i once said to a calabar man, "but surely it would be easy for a man's friends to cheat; they could send down a chief's outfit with a man, though he was only a small man here?" "no," said he, "the other souls would tell on him, and then he would get sent up as a dog or some beast as a punishment." my first conception of the prevalence of the incarnation idea was also gained from a delta negro. i said, "why in the world do you throw away in the bush the bodies of your dead slaves? where i have been they tie a string to the leg of a dead slave and when they bury him bring the string to the top and fix it to a peg, with the owner's name on, and then when the owner dies he has that slave again down below." "they be fool men," said he, and he went on to explain that the ghost of that slave would be almost immediately back on earth again growing up ready to work for some one else, and would not wait for its last owner's soul down below, and out of the luxuriant jungle of information that followed i gathered that no man's soul dallies below long, and also that a soul returning to a family, a thing ensured by certain ju-jus, was identified. the new babies as they arrive in the family are shown a selection of small articles belonging to deceased members whose souls are still absent; the thing the child catches hold of identifies him. "why he's uncle john, see! he knows his own pipe;" or "that's cousin emma, see! she knows her market calabash," and so on. i remember discoursing with a very charming french official on the difficulty of eradicating fetish customs. "why not take the native in the rear, mademoiselle," said he, "and convert the native gods?" i explained that his ingenious plan was not feasible, because you cannot convert gods. even educating gods is hopeless work. all races of men through countless ages, have been attempting to make their peculiar deities understand how they are wanted to work, and what they are wanted to do, and the result is anything but encouraging. as i have dwelt on the repellent view of negro funeral custom, i must in justice to them cite their better view. there is a custom that i missed much on going south of calabar, for it is a pretty one. outside the villages in the calabar districts, by the sides of the most frequented roads, you will see erections of boughs. i do not think these are intended for huts, but for beds, for they are very like the calabar type of bed, only made in wood instead of clay. over them a roof of mats is put, to furnish a protection against rain. these shelters--graves or fetish huts they are wrongly called by europeans--are made by driving four longish stout poles into the ground while at the height of about three feet or so four more poles are tied so as to make a skeleton platform which is filled in with withies and made flat. another set of five poles is tied above, and to these the roof is affixed. on the platform, is placed the bedding belonging to the deceased, the undercloth, counterpane, etc., and at the head are laid the pillows, bolster-shaped and stuffed with cotton-tree fluff, or shredded palm-leaves, and covered with some gaily-coloured cotton cloth. in every case i have seen-- and they amount to hundreds, for you cannot take an hour's walk even from duke town without coming upon a dozen or so of these erections- -the pillows are placed so that the person lying on the bed would look towards the village. on the roof and on the bed, and underneath it on the ground, are placed the household utensils that belonged to the deceased; the calabashes, the basins, the spoons cut out of wood, and the boughten iron ones, as we should say in devon, and on the stakes are hung the other little possessions; there is one i know of made for the ghost of a poor girl who died, on to the stakes of which are hung the dolls and the little pincushions, etc., given her by a kind missionary. food is set out at these places and spirit poured over them from time to time, and sometimes, though not often, pieces of new cloth are laid on them. most of the things are deliberately damaged before they are put on the home for the spirit; i do not think this is to prevent them from being stolen, because all are not damaged sufficiently to make them useless. there was a beautifully made spoon with a burnt-in pattern on one of these places when i left calabar to go south, and on my return, some six months after, it was still there. on another there was a very handsome pair of market calabashes, also much decorated, that were only just chipped and in better repair than many in use in calabar markets, and i make no doubt the spoon and they are still lying rotting among the debris of the pillows, etc. these places are only attended to during the time the spirit is awaiting burial, as they are regarded merely as a resting-place for it while it is awaiting this ceremony. the body is not buried near them, i may remark. in spite, however, of the care that is taken to bury spirits, a considerable percentage from various causes--poverty of the relations, the deceased being a stranger in the land, accidental death in some unknown part of the forest or the surf--remain unburied, and hang about to the common danger of the village they may choose to haunt. many devices are resorted to, to purify the villages from these spirits. one which was in use in creek town, calabar, to within a few years ago, and which i am informed is still customary in some interior villages, was very ingenious, and believed to work well by those who employed it. in the houses were set up nbakim,--large, grotesque images carved of wood and hung about with cloth strips and gew-gaws. every november in creek town (i was told by some authorities it was every second november) there was a sort of festival held. offerings of food and spirits were placed before these images; a band of people accompanied by the rest of the population used to make a thorough round of the town, up and down each street and round every house, dancing, singing, screaming and tom-toming, in fact making all the noise they knew how to--and a calabar effik is very gifted in the power of making noise. after this had been done for what was regarded as a sufficient time, the images were taken out of the houses, the crowd still making a terrific row and were then thrown into the river, and the town was regarded as being cleared of spirits. the rationale of the affair is this. the wandering spirits are attracted by the images, and take shelter among their rags, like earwigs or something of that kind. the charivari is to drive any of the spirits who might be away from their shelters back into them. the shouting of the mob is to keep the spirits from venturing out again while they are being carried to the river. the throwing of the images, rags and all, into the river, is to destroy the spirits or at least send them elsewhere. they did not go and pour boiling water on their earwig-traps, as wicked white men do, but they meant the same thing, and when this was over they made and set up new images for fresh spirits who might come into the town, and these were kept and tended as before, until the next n'dok ceremony came round. it is owing to the spiritual view which the african takes of existence at large that ceremonial observances form the greater part of even his common-law procedure. there is, both among the negro and bantu, a recognised code of law, founded on principles of true but merciless justice. it is not often employed, because of the difficulty and the danger to the individual who appeals to it, should that individual be unbacked by power, but nevertheless the code exists. the african is particularly hard on theft; he by no means "compounds for sins he is inclined to by damning those he has no mind to," for theft is a thing he revels in. persons are tried for theft on circumstantial evidence, direct testimony, and ordeal. laws relating to mortgage are practically the same among negroes and bantu and europeans. torts are not recognised; unless the following case from cameroon points to a vague realisation of them. a. let his canoe out to b., in good order, so that b. could go up river, and fetch down some trade. b. did not go himself, but let c., who was not his slave, but another free man who also wanted to go up for trade, have the canoe on the understanding that in payment for the loan of the said canoe c. should bring down b's. trade. a. was not told about this arrangement at all. b. says a. was, only a. was so blind drunk at the time he did not understand. well, up river c. goes in the canoe, and fetches up on a floating stump in the river, and staves a hole you could put your head in, in the bow of the said canoe. c. returns it to b. in this condition. b. returns it to a. in this condition. a. sues b. before native chief, saying he lent his canoe to b. on the understanding, always implied in african loans, that it was to be returned in the same state as when lent, fair wear and tear alone excepted. b. tries first to get c. to pay for the canoe, and for the rent of the canoe on top, as a compensation for the delay in bringing down his, b's., trade. c. calls b. the illegitimate offspring of a greenhouse-lizard, and pleads further that the floating log was a force majeure--an act of god, and denies liability on all counts. b. then pleads this as his own defence in the case of a. and b. (authorities cited in support of this view); he also pleads he is not liable, because c. is a free man, and not his slave. the case went on for a week; the judge was drunk for five days in his attempt to get his head clear. the decision finally was that b. was to pay a. full compensation. b. v. c. is still pending. the laws against adultery are, theoretically, exceedingly severe. the punishment is death, and this is sometimes carried out. the other day king bell in cameroon flogged one of his wives to death, and the german government have deposed and deported him, for you cannot do that sort of thing with impunity within a stone's throw of a government head-quarters. but as a general rule all along the coast the death penalty for murder or adultery is commuted to a fine, or you can send a substitute to be killed for you, if you are rich. this is frequently done, because it is cheaper, if you have a seedy slave, to give him to be killed in your stead than to pay a fine which is often enormous. the adultery itself is often only a matter of laying your hand, even in self-defence from a virago, on a woman--or brushing against her in the path. these accusations of adultery are, next to witchcraft, the great social danger to the west coast native, and they are often made merely from motives of extortion or spite, and without an atom of truth in them. it is customary for a chief to put his wives frequently to ordeal on this point, and this is almost always done after there has been a big devil-making, or a dance, which his family have been gracing with their presence. the usual method of applying the ordeal is by boiling palm-oil--a pot is nearly filled with the oil, which is brought to the boil over a fire; when it is seething, the woman to be tried is brought out in front of it. she first dips her hands into water, and then has administered to her the m'biam oath saying or having said for her that long elaborate formula, in a form adjusted to meet the case. then she plunges her hand into the boiling oil for an instant, and shakes the oil off with all possible rapidity, and the next woman comes forward and goes through the same performance, and so on. next day, the hands of the women are examined, and those found blistered are adjudged guilty, and punished. in order to escape heavy punishment the woman will accuse some man of having hustled against her, or sat down on a bench beside her, and so on, and the accused man has to pay up. if he does not, in the calabar district, egbo will come and "eat the adultery," and there won't be much of that man's earthly goods left. sometimes the accusation is volunteered by the woman, and frequently the husband and wife conspire together and cook up a case against a man for the sake of getting the damages. there is nothing that ensures a man an unblemished character in west africa, save the possession of sufficient power to make it risky work for people to cast slurs on it. the ownership of children is a great source of palaver. the law among negroes and bantus is that the children of a free woman belong to her. in the case of tribes believing in the high importance of uncles considerable powers are vested in that relative, while in other tribes certain powers are vested in the father. the children of slave wives are the only children the father has absolute power over if he is the legal owner of the slave woman. if, as is frequently the case, a free man marries a slave woman who belongs to another man, all her children are the absolute property of her owner, not her husband; and the owner of the woman can take them and sell them, or do whatsoever he chooses with them, unless the free man father redeems them, as he usually does, although the woman may still remain the absolute property of the owner, recallable by him at any time. this law is the cause of the most brain-spraining palavers that come before the white authorities. there is naturally no statute of limitations in west africa, because the african does not care a row of pins about time. the wily a. will let his slave woman live with b. without claiming the redemption fees as they become due--letting them stand over, as it were, at compound interest. all the male as well as the female children of the first generation are a.'s property, and all the female children of these children are his property even unto the second and third generation and away into eternity. a. may die before he puts in his claim, in which case the ownership passes on into the hands of his heir or assignees, who may foreclose at once, on entering into their heritage, or may again let things accumulate for their heirs. anyhow, sooner or later the foreclosure comes and then there is trouble. x., y., z., etc., free men, have married some of the original a.'s slave woman's descendants. they have either bought them right out, or kept on conscientiously redeeming children of theirs as they arrived. of course a., or his heirs, contend that x., y., z., etc. have been wasting time and money by so doing, because the people x., y., z. have paid the money to had no legal title to the women. of course x., y., z. contend that their particular woman, or her ancestress, was duly redeemed from the legal owner. remember there is no documentary evidence available, and squads of equally reliable and oldest inhabitants are swearing hard--all both ways. just realise this, and that your government says that whenever native law is not blood-stained it must be supported, and you may be able to realise the giddy mazes of a native palaver, which if you conscientiously attempt to follow with the determination that justice shall be duly administered, will for certain lay you low with an attack of fever. the law of ownership is not all in favour of the owner, masters being responsible for damage done by their slaves, and this law falls very heavily and expensively on the owner of a bad slave. indeed, when one lives out here and sees the surrounding conditions of this state of culture, the conviction grows on you that, morally speaking, the african is far from being the brutal fiend he is often painted, a creature that loves cruelty and blood for their own sake. the african does not; and though his culture does not contain our institutions, lunatic asylums, prisons, workhouses, hospitals, etc., he has to deal with the same classes of people who require these things. so with them he deals by means of his equivalent institutions, slavery, the lash, and death. you have just as much right, my logical friend, to call the west coast chief hard names for his habit of using brass bars, heads of tobacco, and so on, in place of sixpenny pieces, as you have to abuse him for clubbing an inveterate thief. it's deplorably low of him, i own, but by what alternative plan of government his can be replaced i do not quite see, under existing conditions. in religious affairs, the affairs which lead him into the majority of his iniquities, his real sin consists in believing too much. in his witchcraft, the sin is the same. toleration means indifference, i believe, among all men. the african is not indifferent on the subject of witchcraft, and i do not see how one can expect him to be. put yourself in his place and imagine you have got hold of a man or woman who has been placing a live crocodile or a catawumpus of some kind into your own or a valued relative's, or fellow-townsman's inside, so that it may eat up valuable viscera, and cause you or your friend suffering and death. how would you feel? a little like lynching your captive, i fancy. i confess that the more i know of the west coast africans the more i like them. i own i think them fools of the first water for their power of believing in things; but i fancy i have analogous feelings towards even my fellow-countrymen when they go and violently believe in something that i cannot quite swallow. chapter xv. fetish--(continued). in which the voyager complains of the inconveniences arising from the method of african thought, and discourses on apparitions and deities. however much some of the african's mental attributes get under- rated, i am sure there are others of them for which he gets more credit than he deserves. one of these is his imagination. it strikes the new-comer with awe, and frequently fills him with rage, when he first meets it; but as he matures and gets used to the african, he sees the string. for the african fancy is not the "aerial fancy flying free," mentioned by our poets, but merely the aerial of the theatre suspended by a wire or cord. the wire that supports the african's fancy may be a very thin, small fact indeed, or in some cases merely his incapacity to distinguish between animate and inanimate objects, which give rise to his idea that everything is possessed of a soul. everything has a soul to him, and to make confusion worse confounded, he usually believes in the existence of matter apart from its soul. but there is little he won't believe in, if it comes to that; and i have a feeling of thankfulness that buddhism, theosophy, and above all atheism, which chases its tail and proves that nothing can be proved, have not yet been given the african to believe in. the african's want of making it clear in his language whether he is referring to an animate or inanimate thing, has landed me in many a dilemma, and his foolishness in not having a male and female gender in his languages amounts to a nuisance. for example, i am a most ladylike old person and yet get constantly called "sir." the other day, circumstances having got beyond my control during the afternoon, i arrived in the evening in a saturated condition at a white settlement, and wishing to get accommodation for myself and my men, i made my way to the factory of a firm from whose representatives i have always received great and most courteous help. the agent in charge was not at home, and his steward-boy said, "massa live for mr. b.'s house." "go tell him i live for come from," etc., said i, and "i fit for want place for my men." i had nothing to write on, or with, and i thought the steward-boy could carry this little message to its destination without dropping any of it, as mr. b.'s house was close by; but i was wrong. off he went, and soon returned with the note i here give a copy of: - "dear old man, "you must be in a deuce of a mess after the tornado. just help yourself to a set of my dry things. the shirts are in the bottom drawer, the trousers are in the box under the bed, and then come over here to the sing-song. my leg is dickey or i'd come across.-- yours," etc. had there been any smelling salts or sal volatile in this subdivision of the ethiopian region, i should have forthwith fainted on reading this, but i well knew there was not, so i blushed until the steam from my soaking clothes (for i truly was "in a deuce of a mess") went up in a cloud and then, just as i was, i went "across" and appeared before the author of that awful note. when he came round, he said it had taken seven years' growth out of him, and was intensely apologetic. i remarked it had very nearly taken thirty years' growth out of me, and he said the steward-boy had merely informed him that "white man live for come from x," a place where he knew there was another factory belonging to his firm, and he naturally thought it was the agent from x who had come across. you rarely, indeed i believe never, find an african with a gift for picturesque descriptions of scenery. the nearest approach to it i ever got was from my cook when we were on mungo mah lobeh. he proudly boasted he had been on a mountain, up cameroon river, with a german officer, and on that mountain, "if you fall down one side you die, if you fall down other side you die." graphic and vivid descriptions of incidents you often get, but it is not art. the effect is produced entirely by a bald brutality of statement, the african having no artistic reticence whatsoever. one fine touch, however, which does not come in under this class was told me by my lamented friend mr. harris of calabar. some years ago he had out a consignment of dutch clocks with hanging weights, as is natural to the dutch clock. they were immensely popular among the chiefs, and were soon disposed of save one, which had seen trouble on the voyage out and lost one of its weights. mr. harris, who was a man of great energy and resource, melted up some metal spoons and made a new weight and hung it on the clock. the day he finished this a chief came in, anxious for a dutch clock, and mr. harris forthwith sold him the repaired one. about a week elapsed, and then the chief turned up at the factory again with a rueful countenance, followed by a boy carrying something swathed in a cloth. it was the clock. "you do me bad too much, mr. harris," said the chief. mr. harris denied this on the spot with the vehemence of injured innocence. the chief shook his head and spat profusely and sorrowfully. "you no sabe him clock you done sell me?" said he. "when i look him clock it no be to-day, it be to morrow." mr. harris took the clock back, to see what was the cause of this strange state of affairs. of course it arose from his having been too liberal in the amount of spoon in the weight, and this being altered, the chief was not hurried onward to his grave at such a rattling pace; "but," said mr. harris, "that clock was a flyer to the last." but i will not go into the subject of african languages here, but only remark of them that although they are elaborate enough to produce, for their users, nearly every shade of erroneous statement, they are not, save perhaps m'pongwe, elaborate enough to enable a native to state his exact thought. some of them are very dependent on gesture. when i was with the fans they frequently said, "we will go to the fire so that we can see what they say," when any question had to be decided after dark, and the inhabitants of fernando po, the bubis, are quite unable to converse with each other unless they have sufficient light to see the accompanying gestures of the conversation. in all cases i feel sure the african's intelligence is far ahead of his language. the african is usually great at dreams, and has them very noisily; but he does not seem to me to attach immense importance to them, certainly not so much as the red indian does. i doubt whether there is much real ground for supposing that from dreams came man's first conception of the spirit world, and i think the origin of man's religious belief lies in man's misfortunes. there can be little doubt that the very earliest human beings found, as their descendants still find, their plans frustrated, let them plan ever so wisely and carefully; they must have seen their companions overtaken by death and disaster, arising both from things they could see and from things they could not see. the distinction between these two classes of phenomena is not so definitely recognised by savages or animals as it is by the more cultured races of humanity. i doubt whether a savage depends on his five senses alone to teach him what the world is made of, any more than a fellow of the royal society does. from this method of viewing nature i feel sure that the general idea arose--which you find in all early cultures--that death was always the consequence of the action of some malignant spirit, and that there is no accidental or natural death, as we call it; and death is, after all, the most impressive attribute of life. if a man were knocked on the head with a club, or shot with an arrow, the cause of death is clearly the malignancy of the person using these weapons; and so it is easy to think that a man killed by a fallen tree, or by the upsetting of a canoe in the surf, or in an eddy in the river, is also the victim of some being using these things as weapons. a man having thus gained a belief that there are more than human actors in life's tragedy, the idea that disease is also a manifestation of some invisible being's wrath and power seems to me natural and easy; and he knows you can get another man for a consideration to kill or harm a third party, and so he thinks that, for a consideration, you can also get one of these superhuman beings, which we call gods or devils, but which the african regards in another light, to do so. a certain set of men and women then specialise off to study how these spirits can be managed, and so arises a priesthood; and the priests, or medicine men as they are called in their earliest forms, gradually, for their own ends, elaborate and wrap round their profession with ritual and mystery. the savage is also conscious of another great set of phenomena which, he soon learns, take no interest in human affairs. the sun which rises and sets, the moon which changes, the tides which come and go: --what do they care? nothing; and what is more, sacrifice to them what you may, you cannot get them to care about you and your affairs, and so the savage turns his attention to those other spirits that do take only too much interest, as is proved by those unexpected catastrophes; and, as their actions show, these spirits are all malignant, so he deals with them just as he would deal with a bad man whom he was desirous of managing. he flatters and fees them, he deprives himself of riches to give to them as sacrifices, believing they will relish it all the more because it gives him pain of some sort to give it to them. he holds that they think it will be advisable for them to encourage him to continue the giving by occasionally doing what he asks them. naturally he never feels sure of them; he sees that you may sacrifice to a god for years, you may wrap him up--or more properly speaking, the object in which he resides--in your only cloth on chilly nights while you shiver yourself; you and your children, and your mother, and your sister and her children, may go hungry that food may rot upon his shrine; and yet, in some hour of dire necessity, the power will not come and save you--because he has been lured away by some richer gifts than yours. you white men will say, "why go on believing in him then?" but that is an idea that does not enter the african mind. i might just as well say "why do you go on believing in the existence of hansom cabs," because one hansom cab driver malignantly fails to take you where you want to go, or fails to arrive in time to catch a train you wished to catch. the african fully knows the liability of his fetish to fail, but he equally fully knows its power. one, to me, grandly tragic instance of this i learnt at opobo. there was a very great fetish doctor there, universally admired and trusted, who lived out on the land at the mouth of the great river. one day he himself fell sick, and he made ju-ju against the sickness; but it held on, and he grew worse. he made more ju-ju of greater power, but again in vain, and then he made the greatest ju-ju man can make, and it availed nought, and he knew he was dying; and so, with his remaining strength, he broke up and dishonoured and destroyed all the fetishes in which the spirits lived, and cast them out into the surf and died like a man. then horror came upon the people when they knew he had done this, and they burnt his house and all things belonging to him, and cried upon the spirits not to forsake them, not to lay this one man's deadly sin at their doors. in connection with the gods of west africa i may remark that in almost all the series of native tradition there, you will find accounts of a time when there was direct intercourse between the gods or spirits that live in the sky, and men. that intercourse is always said to have been cut off by some human error; for example, the fernando po people say that once upon a time there was no trouble or serious disturbance upon earth because there was a ladder, made like the one you get palm-nuts with, "only long, long;" and this ladder reached from earth to heaven so the gods could go up and down it and attend personally to mundane affairs. but one day a cripple boy started to go up the ladder, and he had got a long way up when his mother saw him, and went up in pursuit. the gods, horrified at the prospect of having boys and women invading heaven, threw down the ladder, and have since left humanity severely alone. the timneh people, north-east of sierra leone, say that in old times god was very friendly with men, and when he thought a man had lived long enough on earth, he sent a messenger to him telling him to come up into the sky, and stay with him; but once there was a man who, when the messenger of god came, did not want to leave his wives, his slaves, and his riches, and so the messenger had to go back without him; and god was very cross and sent another messenger for him, who was called disease, but the man would not come for him either, and so disease sent back word to god that he must have help to bring the man; and so god sent another messenger whose name was death; and disease and death together got hold of the man, and took him to god; and god said in future he would always send these messengers to fetch men. the fernando po legend may be taken as fairly pure african, but the timneh, i expect, is a transmogrified arabic story--though i do not know of anything like it among arabic stories; but they are infinite in quantity, and there is a certain ring about it i recognise, and these timnehs are much in contact with the mohammedan, mandingoes, etc. in none of the african stories is there given anything like the importance to dreams that there is given to attempts to account for accidents and death; and surely it must have been more impressive and important to a man to have got his leg or arm snapped off by a crocodile in the river, or by a shark in the surf, or to have got half killed, or have seen a friend killed by a falling tree in the forest in the day time, than to have experienced the most wonderful of dreams. he sees that however terrific his dream- experiences may have been, he was not much the worse for them. not so in the other case, a limb gone or a life gone is more impressive, and more necessary to account for. no trace of sun-worship have i ever found. the firmament is, i believe, always the great indifferent and neglected god, the nyan kupon of the tschwi, and the anzambe, nzam, etc., of the bantu races. the african thinks this god has great power if he would only exert it, and when things go very badly with him, when the river rises higher than usual and sweeps away his home and his plantations; when the smallpox stalks through the land, and day and night the corpses float down the river past him, and he finds them jammed among his canoes that are tied to the beach, and choking up his fish traps; and then when at last the death-wail over its victims goes up night and day from his own village, he will rise up and call upon this great god in a terror maddened by despair, that he may hear and restrain the evil workings of these lesser devils; but he evidently finds, as peer gynt says, "nein, er hort nicht. er ist taub wie gewohnlich" for there is no organised cult for anzam. accounts of apparitions abound in all the west coast districts, and although the african holds them all in high horror and terror, he does not see anything supernatural in his "duppy." it is a horrid thing to happen on, but there is nothing strange about it, and he is ten thousand times more frightened than puzzled over the affair. he does not want to "investigate" to see whether there is anything in it. he wants to get clear away, and make ju-ju against it, "one time." these apparitions have a great variety of form, for, firstly, there are all the true spirits, nature spirits; secondly, the spirits of human beings--these human spirits are held to exist before as well as during and after bodily life; thirdly, the spirits of things. probably the most horrid of class one is the tschwi's sasabonsum. whether sasabonsum is an individual or a class is not quite clear, but i believe he is a class of spirits, each individual of which has the same characteristics, the same manner of showing anger, the same personal appearance, and the same kind of residence. i am a devoted student of his cult and i am always coming across equivalent forms of him in other tribes as well as the tschwi, and i think he is very early. as the tschwi have got their religious notions in a most tidy and definite state, we will take their version of sasabonsum. he lives in the forest, in or under those great silk-cotton trees around the roots of which the earth is red. this coloured earth identifies a silk-cotton tree as being the residence of a sasabonsum, as its colour is held to arise from the blood it whips off him as he goes down to his under-world home after a night's carnage. all silk-cotton trees are suspected because they are held to be the roosts for duppies. but the red earth ones are feared with a great fear, and no one makes a path by them, or a camp near them at night. sasabonsum is a friend of witches. he is of enormous size, and of a red colour. he wears his hair straight and he waylays unprotected wayfarers in the forest at night, and in all districts except that of apollonia he eats them. round apollonia he only sucks their blood. natives of this district after meeting him have crawled home and given an account of his appearance, and then expired. ellis says he is believed to be implacable, and when angered can never be mollified or propitiated, but it is certain that human victims are constantly sacrificed to him in districts beyond white control; in districts under it, the equivalent value of a human sacrifice in sheep and goats is offered to him. in ashantee he has priests, and of course human sacrifice. away among the dahomeyan tribes--where he has kept his habits but got another name, and seems to have crystallised from a class into an individual--the usual way in which a god develops--he has priests and priestesses, and they are holy terrors; but among the tschwi, sasabonsum is mainly dealt with by witches, and people desirous of possessing the power of becoming witches. they derive their power from him in a remarkable way. i put myself to great personal inconvenience (fever risk, mosquito certainty, high leopard and snake palaver probability, and grave personal alarm and apprehension) to verify colonel ellis's account of the methods witches employ in this case, to obtain ehsuhman and i find his account correct. { } the chief use of a suhman is the power it gives its owner to procure the death of other people, not necessarily his own enemies, for he will sell charms made by the agency of his suhman to another person whose nerves have not been equal to facing sasabonsum on his own account. he can also provide by its agency other charms, such as those that protect houses from fire, and things and individuals from accidents on the road, or in canoes, and the home circle from good- looking but unprincipled young men, and so on. as a rule the person who has a suhman keeps the fact pretty quiet, for the possession of such an article would lead half the catastrophes in his district, from the decease of pigs, fowls, and babies, to fires, etc., to be accredited to him, which would lead to his neighbours making "witch palaver" over him, and he would have to undergo poison-ordeal and other unpleasantness to clear his character. he, however, always keeps a special day in his suhman's honour, and should he be powerful, as a king or big chief, he will keep this day openly. king kwoffi karri kari, whom we fought with in , used to make a big day for his suhman, which was kept in a box covered with gold plates, and he sacrificed a human victim to it every tuesday, with general festivities and dances in its honour. i should remark that sasabonsum is married. his wife, or more properly speaking his female form, is called shamantin. she is far less malignant than the male form. her name comes from srahman-- ghost or spirit; the termination "tin" is an abbreviation of sintstin--tall. she is of immense height, and white; perhaps this idea is derived from the white stem of the silk-cotton trees wherein she invariably abides. her method of dealing with the solitary wayfarer is no doubt inconvenient to him, but it is kinder than her husband's ways, for she does not kill and eat him, as sasabonsum does, but merely detains him some months while she teaches him all about the forest: what herbs are good to eat, or to cure disease; where the game come to drink, and what they say to each other, and so forth. i often wish i knew this lady, for the grim, grand african forests are like a great library, in which, so far, i can do little more than look at the pictures, although i am now busily learning the alphabet of their language, so that i may some day read what these pictures mean. do not go away with the idea, i beg, that goddesses as a general rule, are better than gods. they are not. there are stories about them which i could--i mean i could not--tell you. there is one belonging also to the tschwi. she lives at moree, a village five miles from cape coast. she is, as is usual with deities, human in shape and colossal in size, and as is not usual with deities, she is covered with hair from head to foot,--short white hair like a goat. her abode is on the path to surf-cursed anamabu near the sea-beach, and her name is aynfwa; a worshipper of hers has only got to mention the name of a person he wishes dead when passing her abode and aynfwa does the rest. she is the goddess of all albinoes, who are said to be more frequent in occurrence round moree than elsewhere. ellis says that in , when he was there, they were per cent. of the entire population. these albinoes are, ipso facto, her priests and priestesses, and in old days an albino had only to name anywhere a person aynfwa wished for, and that person was forthwith killed. i think i may safely say that every dangerous place in west africa is regarded as the residence of a god--rocks and whirlpools in the rivers--swamps "no man fit to pass"--and naturally, the surf. along the gold coast, at every place where you have to land through the surf, it fairly swarms with gods. a little experience with the said surf inclines you to think, as the dabblers in spiritualism say "that there is something in it." i will back this west coast surf-- "the calemma," as we call it down south, against any other malevolent abomination, barring only the english climate. its ways of dealing with human beings are cunning and deceitful. in its most ferocious moods it seizes a boat, straightway swamps it, and feeds its pet sharks with the boat's occupants. if the surf is merely sky-larking it lets your boat's nose just smell the sand, and then says "thought you were all right this time, did you though," and drags the boat back again under the incoming wave, or catches it under the stern and gaily throws it upside down over you and yours on the beach. variety, they say, is charming. let those who say it, and those who believe it, just do a course of surf-work, and i'll warrant they will change their minds. there is one thing about the surf that i do not understand, and that is why witches always walk stark naked along the beach by it at night, and eat sea crabs the while. that such is a confirmed habit of theirs is certain; and they tell me that while doing this the witches emit a bright light, and also that there is a certain medicine, which, if you have it with you, you can throw over the witch, and then he, or she, will remain blazing until morning time, running to and fro, crying out wildly, in front of the white, breaking, thundering surf wall, and when the dawn comes the fire burns the witch right up, leaving only a grey ash--and palaver set in this world and the next for that witch. a highly-esteemed native minister told me when i was at cape coast last, that a fortnight before, he had been away in the apollonia district on mission work. one evening he and a friend were walking along the beach and the night was dark, so that you could see only the surf. it is never too dark to see that, it seems to have light in itself. they saw a flame coming towards them, and after a moment's doubt they knew it was a witch, and feeling frightened, hid themselves among the bushes that edge the sandy shore. as they watched, it came straight on and passed them, and they saw it disappear in the distance. my informant laughed at himself, and very wisely said, "one has not got to believe those things here, one has in apollonia." to the surf and its spirits the sea-board-dwelling tschwis bring women who have had children and widows, both after a period of eight days from the birth of the child, or the death of the husband. a widow remains in the house until this period has elapsed, neglecting her person, eating little food, and sitting on the bare floor in the attitude of mourning. on the gold coast they bury very quickly, as they are always telling you, usually on the day after death, rarely later than the third day, even among the natives; and the spirit, or srah, of the dead man is supposed to hang about his wives and his house until the ceremony of purification is carried out. this is done, needless to say, with uproar. the relations of each wife go to her house with musical instruments--i mean tom-toms and that sort of thing--and they take a quantity of mint, which grows wild in this country, with them. this mint they burn, some of it in the house, the rest they place upon pans of live coals and carry round the widow as she goes in their midst down to the surf, her relatives singing aloud to the srah of the departed husband, telling him that now he is dead and has done with the lady he must leave her. this singing serves to warn all the women who are not relations to get out of the way, which of course they always carefully do, because if they were to see the widow their own husbands would die within the year. when the party has arrived at the shore, they strip every rag off the widow, and throw it into the surf; and a thoughtful female relative having brought a suit of dark blue baft with her for the occasion, the widow is clothed in this and returns home, where a suitable festival is held, after which she may marry again; but if she were to marry before this ceremony, the srah of the husband would play the mischief with husband number two or three, and so on, as the case might be. in the inland gold coast districts the widows remain in a state of mourning for several months, and a selection of them, a quantity of slaves, and one or two free men are killed to escort the dead man to srahmandazi; and as well as these, and in order to provide him with merchandise to keep up his house and state in the under-world, quantities of gold dust, rolls of rich velvets, silks, satins, etc., are thrown into the grave. among the dwellers in cameroon, when you are across the bantu border-line, velvets, etc., are buried with a big man or woman; but i am told it is only done for the glorification of his living relatives, so that the world may say, "so and so must be rich, look what a lot of trade he threw away at that funeral of his wife," or his father, or his son, as the case may be; but i doubt whether this is the true explanation. if it is, i should recommend my german friends, if they wish to intervene, to introduce the income tax into cameroon--that would eliminate this custom. the tschwis hold that there is a definite earthly existence belonging to each soul of a human kind. let us say, for example, a soul has a thirty years' bodily existence belonging to it. well, suppose that soul's body gets killed off at twenty-five, its remaining five years it has to spend, if it is left alone, in knocking about its old haunts, homes, and wives. in this state it is called a sisa, and is a nuisance. it will cause sickness. it will throw stones. it will pull off roofs, and it will play the very mischief with its wives' subsequent husbands, all because, not having reached its full term of life, it has not learnt its way down the dark and difficult path to srahmandazi, the entrance to which is across the volta river to the n.e. this knowledge of the path to srahmandazi is a thing that grows gradually on a man's immortal soul (the other three souls are not immortal), and naturally not having been allowed to complete his life, his knowledge is imperfect. a man's soul, however, can be taught the way, if necessary, in the funeral "custom" made by his relatives and the priests; but in a case of an incompletelifeonearthsoul, as a german would say, when it does arrive in the land of insrah (pl.) it is in a weak and feeble state from the difficulties of its journey, whereas a soul that has lived out its allotted span of life goes straightway off to srahmandazi as soon as its "custom" or "devil" is made and gives its surviving relatives no further trouble. still there is great difference of opinion among all the tschwis and ga men i have come across on this point, and ellis likewise remarks on this difference of opinion. some informants say that a soul that has been sent hence before its time, although it is exhausted by the hardships it has suffered on its journey down, yet recovers health in a month or so; while a soul that has run its allotted span on earth is as feeble as a new-born babe on arriving in srahmandazi, and takes years to pull round. other informants say they have no knowledge of these details, and state that all the difference they know of between the souls of men who have been killed and the men who have died, is that the former can always come back, and that really the safest way of disposing of this class of soul is, by suitable spells and incantations, to get it to enter into the body of a new-born baby, where it can live out the remainder of its life. before closing these observations on srahmandazi i will give the best account of that land that i am at present able to. some day perhaps i may share the fate of the oxford professor in in the wrong paradise and go there myself, but so far my information is second- hand. it is like this world. there are towns and villages, rivers, mountains, bush, plantations, and markets. when the sun rises here it sets in srahmandazi. it has its pleasures and its pains, not necessarily retributive or rewarding, but dim. all souls in it grow forward or backward into the prime of life and remain there, some informants say; others say that each inhabitant remains there at the same age as he was when he quitted the world above. this latter view is most like the south west one. the former is possibly only an attempt to make srahmandazi into a heaven in conformation with christian teaching, which it is not, any more than it is a hell. i have much curious information regarding its flora and fauna. a great deal of both is seemingly indigenous, and then there are the souls of great human beings, the asrahmanfw, and the souls of all the human beings, animals, and things sent down with them. the ghosts do not seem to leave off their interest in mundane affairs, for they not only have local palavers, but try palavers left over from their earthly existence; and when there is an outbreak of sickness in a fantee town or village, and several inhabitants die off, the opinion is often held that there is a big palaver going on down in srahmandazi and that the spirits are sending up on earth for witnesses, subpoenaing them as it were. medicine men or priests are called in to find out what particular earthly grievance can be the subject of the ghost palaver, and when they have ascertained this, they take the evidence of every one in the town on this affair, as it were on commission, and transmit the information to the court sitting in srahmandazi. this prevents the living being incommoded by personal journeys down below, and although the priests have their fee, it is cheaper in the end, because the witnesses' funeral expenses would fall heavier still. although far more elaborated and thought out than any other african underworld i have ever come across, the tschwi srahmandazi may be taken as a type of all the african underworlds. the bantu's idea of a future life is a life spent in much such a place. as far as i can make out there is no definite idea of eternity. i have even come across cases in which doubt was thrown on the present existence of the creating god, but i think this has arisen from attempts having been made to introduce concise conceptions into the african mind, conceptions that are quite foreign to its true nature and which alarm and worry it. you never get the strange idea of the difference between time and eternity--the idea i mean, that they are different things--in the african that one frequently gets in cultured europeans; and as for the human soul, the african always believes "that still the spirit is whole, and life and death but shadows of the soul." chapter xvi. fetish--(concluded). in which the discourse on apparitions is continued, with some observations on secret societies, both tribal and murder, and the kindred subject of leopards. apparitions are by no means always of human soul origin. all the tschwi and the ewe gods, for example, have the habit of appearing pretty regularly to their priests, and occasionally to the laity, like sasabonsum; but it is only to priests that these appearances are harmless or beneficial. the effect of sasabonsum's appearance to the layman i have cited above, and i could give many other examples of the bad effects of those of other gods, but will only now mention tando, the hater, the chief god of the northern tschwi, the ashantees, etc. he is terribly malicious, human in shape, and though not quite white, is decidedly lighter in complexion than the chief god of the southern tschwi, bobowissi. his hair is lank, and he carries a native sword and wears a long robe. his well-selected messengers are those awful driver ants (inkran) which it is not orthodox to molest in tando's territories. he uses as his weapons lightning, tempest, and disease, but the last is the most favourite one. there is absolutely no trick too mean or venomous for tando. for example, he has a way of appearing near a village he has a grudge against in the form of a male child, and wanders about crying bitterly, until some kind-hearted, unsuspecting villager comes and takes him in and feeds him. then he develops a contagious disease that clears that village out. this form of appearance and subsequent conduct is, unhappily, not rigidly confined to tando, but is used by many spirits as a method of collecting arrears in taxes in the way of sacrifices. i have found traces of it among bantu gods or spirits, and it gives rise to a general hesitation in west africa to take care of waifs and strays of unexplained origin. other things beside gods and human spirits have the habit of becoming incarnate. once i had to sit waiting a long time at an apparently perfectly clear bush path, because in front of us a spear's ghost used to fly across the path about that time in the afternoon, and if any one was struck by it they died. a certain spring i know of is haunted by the ghost of a pitcher. many ladies when they have gone alone to fill their pitchers in the evening time at this forest spring have noticed a very fine pitcher standing there ready filled, and thinking exchange is no robbery, or at any rate they would risk it if it were, have left their own pitcher and taken the better looking one; but always as soon as they have come within sight of the village huts, the new pitcher has crumbled into dust, and the water in it been spilt on the ground; and the worst of it is, when they have returned to fetch their own discarded pitcher, they find it also shattered into pieces. there is also another class of apparition, of which i have met with two instances, one among pure negroes (okyon); the other among pure bantu (kangwe). i will give the bantu version of the affair, because at okyon the incident had happened a good time before the details were told me, and in the bantu case they had happened the previous evening. but there was very little difference in the main facts of the case, and it was an important thing because in both cases the underlying idea was sacrificial. the woman who told me was an exceedingly intelligent, shrewd, reliable person. she had been to the factory with some trade, and had got a good price for it, and so was in a good temper on her return home in the evening. she got out of her canoe and leaving her slave boy to bring up the things, walked to her house, which was the ordinary house of a prosperous igalwa native, having two distinct rooms in it, and a separate cook-house close by in a clean, sandy yard. she trod on some nastiness in the yard, and going into the cook-house found the slave girls round a very small and inefficient fire, trying to cook the evening meal. she blew them up for not having a proper fire; they said the wood was wet, and would not burn. she said they lied, and she would see to them later, and she went into the chamber she used for a sleeping apartment, and trod on something more on the floor in the dark; those good-for- nothing hussies of slaves had not lit her palm-oil lamp, and mentally forming the opinion that they had been out flirting during her absence, and resolving to teach them well the iniquity of such conduct, she sat down on her bed into a lot of messy stuff of a clammy, damp nature. now this fairly roused her, for she is a notable housewife, who keeps her house and slaves in exceedingly good order. so dismissing from her mind the commercial consideration she had intended to gloat over when she came into her room, she called ingremina and others in a tone that brought those young ladies on the spot. she asked them how they dared forget to light her lamp; they said they had not, but the lamp in the room must have gone out like the other lamps had, after burning dim and spluttering. they further said they had not been out, but had been sitting round the fire trying to make it burn properly. she duly whacked and pulled the ears of all within reach. i say within reach for she is not very active, weighing, i am sure, upwards of eighteen stone. then she went back into her room and got out her beautiful english paraffin lamp, which she keeps in a box, and taking it into the cook-house, picked up a bit of wood from the hissing, spluttering fire, and lit it. when she picked up the wood she noticed that it was covered with the same sticky abomination she had met before that evening, and it smelt of the same faint smell she had noticed as soon as she had reached her house, and by now the whole air seemed oppressive with it. as soon as the lamp was alight she saw what the stuff was, namely, blood. blood was everywhere, the rest of the sticks in the fire had it on them, it sizzled at the burning ends, and ran off the other in rills. there were pools of it about her clean, sandy yard. her own room was reeking, the bed, the stools, the floor; it trickled down the door-post; coagulated on the lintel. she herself was smeared with it from the things she had come in contact with in the dark, and the slaves seemed to have been sitting in pools of it. the things she picked up off the table and shelf left rims of it behind them; there was more in the skillets, and the oil in the open palm- oil lamps had a film of it floating on the oil. investigation showed that the whole of the rest of her house was in a similar mess. the good lady gave a complete catalogue of the household furniture and its condition, which i need not give here. the slave girls when the light came were terrified at what they saw, and she called in the aristocracy of the village, and asked them their opinion on the blood palaver. they said they could make nothing of it at first, but subsequently formed the opinion that it meant something was going to happen, and suggested with the kind, helpful cheerfulness of relatives and friends, that they should not wonder if it were a prophecy of her own death. this view irritated the already tried lady, and she sent them about their business, and started the slaves on house-cleaning. the blood cleaned up all right when you were about it, but kept on turning up in other places, and in the one you had just cleaned as soon as you left off and went elsewhere; and the morning came and found things in much the same state until "before suntime," say about o'clock, when it faded away. i cautiously tried to get my stately, touchy dowager duchess to explain how it was that there was such a lot of blood, and how it was it got into the house. she just said "it had to go somewhere," and refused to give rational explanations as chambers's journal does after telling a good ghost story. i found afterwards that it was quite decided it was a case of "blood come before," and at okyon, miss slessor told me, in regard to the similar case there, that this was the opinion held regarding the phenomenon. it is always held uncanny in africa if a person dies without shedding blood. you see, the blood is the life, and if you see it come out, you know the going of the thing, as it were. if you do not, it is mysterious. at okyon, a few days after the blood appeared, a nephew of the person whose house it came into was killed while felling a tree in the forest; a bough struck him and broke his neck, without shedding a drop of blood, and this bore out the theory, for the blood having "to go somewhere" came before. in the bantu case i did not hear of such a supporting incident happening. certain african ideas about blood puzzle me. i was told by a batanga friend, a resident white trader, that a short time previously a man was convicted of theft by the natives of a village close to him. the hands and feet of the criminal were tied together, and he was flung into the river. he got himself free, and swam to the other bank, and went for bush. he was recaptured, and a stone tied to his neck, and in again he was thrown. the second time he got free and ashore, and was recaptured, and the chief then, most regretfully, ordered that he was to be knocked on the head before being thrown in for a third time. this time palaver set, but the chief knew that he would die himself, by spitting the blood he had spilt, from his own lungs, before the year was out. i inquired about the chief when i passed this place, more than eighteen months after, and learnt from a native that the chief was dead, and that he had died in this way. the objection thus was not to shedding blood in a general way, but to the shedding in the course of judicial execution. there may be some idea of this kind underlying the ingenious and awful ways the negroes have of killing thieves, by tying them to stakes in the rivers, or down on to paths for the driver ants to kill and eat, but this is only conjecture; i have not had a chance yet to work this subject up; and getting reliable information about underlying ideas is very difficult in africa. the natives will say "yes" to any mortal thing, if they think you want them to; and the variety of their languages is another great hindrance. were it not for the prevalence of kru english or trade english, investigation would be almost impossible; but, fortunately, this quaint language is prevalent, and the natives of different tribes communicate with each other in it, and so round a fire, in the evening, if you listen to the gossip, you can pick up all sorts of strange information, and gain strange and often awful lights on your absent white friends' characters, and your present companions' religion. for example, the other day i had a set of porters composed of four bassa boys, two wei weis, one dualla, and two yorubas. none of their languages fitted, so they talked trade english, and pretty lively talk some of it was, but of that anon. i cannot close this brief notice of native ideas without mentioning the secret societies; but to go fully into this branch of the subject would require volumes, for every tribe has its secret society. the poorah of sierra leone, the oru of lagos, the egbo of calabar, the isyogo of the igalwa, the ukuku of the benga, the okukwe of the m'pongwe, the ikun of the bakele, and the lukuku of the bachilangi baluba, are some of the most powerful secret societies on the west african coast. these secret societies are not essentially religious, their action is mainly judicial, and their particularly presiding spirit is not a god or devil in our sense of the word. the ritual differs for each in its detail, but there are broad lines of agreement between them. there are societies both for men and for women, but mixed societies for both sexes are rare. those that i have mentioned above are all male, except the lukuku, and women are utterly forbidden to participate in the rites or become acquainted with their secrets, for one of the chief duties of these societies is to keep the women in order; and besides it is undoubtedly held that women are bad for certain forms of ju-ju, even when these forms are not directly connected, as far as i can find out, with the secret society. for example, the other day a chief up the mungo river deliberately destroyed his ju-ju by showing it to his women. it was a great ju- ju, but expensive to keep up, requiring sacrifices of slaves and goats, so what with trade being bad, fall in the price of oil and ivory and so on, he felt he could not afford that ju-ju, and so destroyed its power, so as to prevent its harming him when he neglected it. the general rule with these secret societies is to admit the young free people at an age of about eight to ten years, the boys entering the male, the girls the female society. both societies are rigidly kept apart. a man who attempts to penetrate the female mysteries would be as surely killed as a woman who might attempt to investigate the male mysteries; still i came, in , across an amusing case which demonstrates the inextinguishable thirst for knowledge, so long as that knowledge is forbidden, which characterises our sex. it was in the district just south of big batanga. the male society had been very hard on the ladies for some time, and one day one star-like intellect among the latter told her next-door neighbour, in strict confidence, that she did not believe ikun was a spirit at all, but only old so-and-so dressed up in leaves. this rank heresy spread rapidly, in strict confidence, among the ladies at large, and they used to assemble together in the house of the foundress of the theory, secretly of course, because husbands down there are hasty with the cutlass and the kassengo, and they talked the matter over. somehow or other, this came to the ears of the men. whether the ladies got too emancipated and winked when ikun was mentioned, or asked how mr. so-and-so was this morning, in a pointed way, after an ikun manifestation, i do not know; some people told me this was so, but others, who, i fear, were right, considering the acknowledged slowness of men in putting two and two together, and the treachery of women towards each other, said that a woman had told a man that she had heard some of the other women were going on in this heretical way. anyhow, the men knew, and were much alarmed; scepticism had spread by now to such an extent that nothing short of burning or drowning all the women could stamp it out and reintroduce the proper sense of awe into the female side of society, and after a good deal of consideration the men saw, for men are undoubtedly more gifted in foresight than our sex, that it was no particular use reintroducing this awe if there was no female half of society to be impressed by it. it was a brain-spraining problem for the men all round, for it is clear society cannot be kept together without some superhuman aid to help to keep the feminine portion of it within bounds. grave councils were held, and it was decided that the woman at whose house these treasonable meetings were held should be sent away early one morning on a trading mission to the nearest factory, a job she readily undertook; and while the other women were away in the plantation or at the spring, certain men entered her house secretly and dug a big chamber out in the floor of the hut, and one of them, dressed as ikun, and provided with refreshments for the day, got into this chamber, and the whole affair was covered over carefully and the floor re-sanded. that afternoon there was a big manifestation of ikun. he came in the most terrible form, his howls were awful, and he finally went dancing away into the bush as the night came down. the ladies had just taken the common-sense precaution of removing all goats, sheep, fowls, etc., into enclosed premises, for, like all his kind, he seizes and holds any property he may come across in the street, but there was evidently no emotional thrill in the female mind regarding him, and when the leading lady returned home in the evening the other ladies strolled into their leader's hut to hear about what new cotton prints, beads, and things mr.--- had got at his factory by the last steamer from europe, and interesting kindred subjects bearing on mr.---. when they had threshed these matters out, the conversation turned on to religion, and what fools those men had been making of themselves all the afternoon with their ikun. no sooner was his name uttered than a venomous howl, terminating in squeals of rage and impatience, came from the ground beneath them. they stared at each other for one second, and then, feeling that something was tearing its way up through the floor, they left for the interior of africa with one accord. ikun gave chase as soon as he got free, but what with being half-stifled and a bit cramped in the legs, and much encumbered with his vegetable decorations, the ladies got clear away and no arrests were made--but society was saved. scepticism became in the twinkling of an eye a thing of the past; and, although no names were taken, the men observed that certain ladies were particularly anxious, and regardless of expense, in buying immunity from ikun, and they fancied that these ladies were probably in that hut on that particular evening, but they took no further action against them, save making ikun particularly expensive. there ought to be a moral to an improving tale of this order, i know, but the only one i can think of just now is that it takes a priest to get round a woman; and i always feel inclined to jump on to the table myself when i think of those poor dear creatures sitting on the floor and feeling that awful thing clapper-clawing its way up right under them. tattooing on the west coast is comparatively rare, and i think i may say never used with decorative intent only. the skin decorations are either paint or cicatrices--in the former case the pattern is not kept always the same by the individual. a peculiar form of it you find in the rivers, where a pattern is painted on the skin, and then when the paint is dry, a wash is applied which makes the unpainted skin rise up in between the painted pattern. the cicatrices are sometimes tribal marks, but sometimes decorative. they are made by cutting the skin and then placing in the wound the fluff of the silk cotton tree. the great point of agreement between all these west african secret societies lies in the methods of initiation. the boy, if he belongs to a tribe that goes in for tattooing, is tattooed, and is handed over to instructors in the societies' secrets and formula. he lives, with the other boys of his tribe undergoing initiation, usually under the rule of several instructors, and for the space of one year. he lives always in the forest, and is naked and smeared with clay. the boys are exercised so as to become inured to hardship; in some districts, they make raids so as to perfect themselves in this useful accomplishment. they always take a new name, and are supposed by the initiation process to become new beings in the magic wood, and on their return to their village at the end of their course, they pretend to have entirely forgotten their life before they entered the wood; but this pretence is not kept up beyond the period of festivities given to welcome them home. they all learn, to a certain extent, a new language, a secret language only understood by the initiated. the same removal from home and instruction from initiated members is also observed with the girls. however, in their case, it is not always a forest-grove they are secluded in, sometimes it is done in huts. among the grain coast tribes however, the girls go into a magic wood until they are married. should they have to leave the wood for any temporary reason, they must smear themselves with white clay. a similar custom holds good in okyon, calabar district, where, should a girl have to leave the fattening-house, she must be covered with white clay. i believe this fattening-house custom in calabar is not only for fattening up the women to improve their appearance, but an initiatory custom as well, although the main intention is now, undoubtedly, fattening, and the girl is constantly fed with fat-producing foods, such as fou-fou soaked in palm oil. i am told, but i think wrongly, that the white clay with which a calabar girl is kept covered while in the fattening-house, putting on an extra coating of it should she come outside, is to assist in the fattening process by preventing perspiration. the duration of the period of seclusion varies somewhat. san salvador boys are six months in the wood. cameroon boys are twelve months. in most districts the girls are betrothed in infancy, and they go into the wood or initiatory hut for a few months before marriage. in this case the time seems to vary with the circumstances of the individual; not so with the boys, for whom each tribal society has a duly appointed course terminating at a duly appointed time; but sometimes, as among some of the yoruba tribes, the boy has to remain under the rule of the presiding elders of the society, painted white, and wearing only a bit of grass cloth, if he wears anything, until he has killed a man. then he is held to have attained man's estate by having demonstrated his courage and also by having secured for himself the soul of the man he has killed as a spirit slave. the initiation of boys into a few of the elementary dogmas of the secret society by no means composes the entire work of the society. all of them are judicial, and taken on the whole they do an immense amount of good. the methods are frequently a little quaint. rushing about the streets disguised under masks and drapery, with an imitation tail swinging behind you, while you lash out at every one you meet with a whip or cutlass, is not a european way of keeping the peace, or perhaps i should say maintaining the dignity of the law. but discipline must be maintained, and this is the west african way of doing it. the egbo of calabar is a fine type of the secret society. it is exceedingly well developed in its details, not sketchy like isyogo, nor so red-handed as poorah. unfortunately, however, i cannot speak with the same amount of knowledge of egbo as i could of poorah. egbo has the most grades of initiation, except perhaps poorah, and it exercises jurisdiction over all classes of crime except witchcraft. any effik man who desires to become an influential person in the tribe must buy himself into as high a grade of egbo as he can afford, and these grades are expensive, , pounds or , pounds english being required for the higher steps, i am informed. but it is worth it to a great trader, as an influential effik necessarily is, for he can call out his own class of egbo and send it against those of his debtors who may be of lower grades, and as the egbo methods of delivering its orders to pay up consist in placing egbo at a man's doorway, and until it removes itself from that doorway the man dare not venture outside his house, it is most successful. of course the higher a man is in egbo rank, the greater his power and security, for lower grades cannot proceed against higher ones. indeed, when a man meets the paraphernalia of a higher grade of egbo than that to which he belongs, he has to act as if he were lame, and limp along past it humbly, as if the sight of it had taken all the strength out of him, and, needless to remark, higher grade debtors flip their fingers at lower grade creditors. after talking so much about the secret society spirits, it may be as well to say what they are. they are, one and all, a kind of a sort of a something that usually (the exception is ikun) lives in the bush. last february i was making my way back toward duke town-- late, as usual; i was just by a town on the qwa river. as i was hurrying onward i heard a terrific uproar accompanied by drums in the thick bush into which, after a brief interval of open ground, the path turned. i became cautious and alarmed, and hid in some dense bush as the men making the noise approached. i saw it was some ju-ju affair. they had a sort of box which they carried on poles, and their dresses were peculiar, and abnormally ample over the upper part of their body. they were prancing about in an ecstatic way round the box, which had one end open, beating their drums and shouting. they were fairly close to me, but fortunately turned their attention to another bit of undergrowth, or that evening they would have landed another kind of thing to what they were after. the bushes they selected they surrounded and evidently did their best to induce something to come out of them and go into their box arrangement. i was every bit as anxious as they were that they should succeed, and succeed rapidly, for you know there are a nasty lot of snakes and things in general, not to mention driver ants, about that calabar bush, that do not make it at all pleasant to go sitting about in. however, presently they got this something into their box and rejoiced exceedingly, and departed staggering under the weight. i gave them a good start, and then made the best of my way home; and all that night duke town howled, and sang, and thumped its tom-toms unceasingly; for i was told egbo had come into the town. egbo is very coy, even for a secret society spirit, and seems to loathe publicity; but when he is ensconced in this ark he utters sententious observations on the subject of current politics, and his word is law. the voice that comes out of the ark is very strange, and unlike a human voice. i heard it shortly after egbo had been secured. i expect, from what i saw, that there was some person in that ark all the time, but i do not know. it is more than i can do to understand my ju-ju details at present, let alone explain them on rational lines. i hear that there is a tribe on the slave coast who have been proved to keep a small child in the drum that is the residence of their chief spirit, and that when the child grows too large to go in it is killed, and another one that has in the meantime been trained by the priests takes the place of the dead one, until it, in its turn, grows too big and is killed, and so on. i expect this killing of the children is not sacrificial, but arises entirely from the fact that as ex-kings are dangerous to the body politic, therefore still more dangerous would ex-gods be. very little is known by outsiders regarding egbo compared to what there must be to be known, owing to a want of interest or to a sense of inability on the part of most white people to make head or tail out of what seems to them a horrid pagan practice or a farrago of nonsense. it is still a great power, although its officials in duke or creek town are no longer allowed to go chopping and whipping promiscuous- like, because the consul-general has a prejudice against this sort of thing, and the effik is learning that it is nearly as unhealthy to go against his consul-general as against his ju-ju. so i do not believe you will ever get the truth about it in duke town, or creek town. if you want to get hold of the underlying idea of these societies you must go round out-of-the-way corners where the natives are not yet afraid of being laughed at or punished. of the south-west coast secret societies the ukuku seems the most powerful. the isyogo belonging to those indolent igalwas, and m'pongwe is now little more than a play. you pretty frequently come upon isyogo dances just round libreville. you will see stretched across the little street in a cluster of houses, a line from which branches are suspended, making a sort of screen. the women and children keep one side of this screen, the men dancing on the other side to the peculiar monotonous isyogo tune. poorah i have spoken of elsewhere. i believe that these secret societies are always distinct from the leopard societies. i have pretty nearly enough evidence to prove that it is so in some districts, but not in all. so far my evidence only goes to prove the distinction of the two among the negroes, not among the bantu, and in all cases you will find some men belonging to both. some men, in fact, go in for all the societies in their district, but not all the men; and in all districts, if you look close, you will find several societies apart from the regular youth- initiating one. these other societies are practically murder societies, and their practices usually include cannibalism, which is not an essential part of the rites of the great tribal societies, isyogo or egbo. in the calabar district i was informed by natives that there was a society of which the last entered member has to provide, for the entertainment of the other members, the body of a relative of his own, and sacrificial cannibalism is always breaking out, or perhaps i should say being discovered, by the white authorities in the niger delta. there was the great outburst of it at brass, in , and the one chronicled in the liverpool mercury for august th, , as occurring at sierra leone. this account is worth quoting. it describes the hanging by the authorities of three murderers, and states the incidents, which took place in the imperi country behind free town. one of the chief murderers was a man named jowe, who had formerly been a sunday-school teacher in sierra leone. he pleaded in extenuation of his offence that he had been compelled to join the society. the others said they committed the murders in order to obtain certain parts of the body for ju-ju purposes, the leg, the hand, the heart, etc. the mercury goes on to give the statement of the reverend father bomy of the roman catholic mission. "he said he was at bromtu, where the st. joseph mission has a station, when a man was brought down from the imperi country in a boat. the poor fellow was in a dreadful state, and was brought to the station for medical treatment. he said he was working on his farm, when he was suddenly pounced upon from behind. a number of sharp instruments were driven into the back of his neck. he presented a fearful sight, having wounds all over his body supposed to have been inflicted by the claws of the leopard, but in reality they were stabs from sharp-pointed knives. the native, who was a powerfully- built man, called out, and his cries attracting the attention of his relations, the leopards made off. the poor fellow died at bromtu from the injuries. it was only his splendid physique that kept him alive until his arrival at the mission." the mercury goes on to quote from the pall mall, and i too go on quoting to show that these things are known and acknowledged to have taken place in a colony like sierra leone, which has had unequalled opportunities of becoming christianised for more than one hundred years, and now has more than one hundred and thirty places of christian worship in it. "some twenty years ago there was a war between this tribe taima and the paramas. the paramas sent some of their war boys to be ambushed in the intervening country, the imperi, but the imperi delivered these war boys to the enemy. in revenge, the paramas sent the fetish boofima into the imperi country. this fetish had up to that time been kept active and working by the sacrifice of goats, but the medicine men of the paramas who introduced it into the imperi country decreed at the same time that human sacrifices would be required to keep it alive, thereby working their vengeance on the imperi by leading them to exterminate themselves in sacrifice to the fetish. the country for years has been terrorised by this secret worship of boofima and at one time the imperi started the tonga dances, at which the medicine men pointed out the supposed worshippers of boofima--the so-called human leopards, because when seizing their victims for sacrifice they covered themselves with leopard skins, and imitating the roars of the leopard, they sprang upon their victim, plunging at the same time two three-pronged forks into each side of the throat. the government some years ago forbade the tonga dances, and are now striving to suppress the human leopards. there are also human alligators who, disguised as alligators, swim in the creeks upon the canoes and carry off the crew. some of them have been brought for trial but no complete case has been made out against them!" in comment upon this account, which is evidently written by some one well versed in the affair, i will only remark that sometimes, instead of the three-pronged forks, there are fixed in the paws of the leopard skin sharp-pointed cutting knives, the skin being made into a sort of glove into which the hand of the human leopard fits. in one skin i saw down south this was most ingeniously done. the knives were shaped like the leopard's claws, curved, sharp-pointed, and with cutting edges underneath, and i am told the american mendi mission, which works in the sierra leone districts, have got a similar skin in their possession. the human alligator mentioned, is our old friend the witch crocodile--the spirit of the man in the crocodile. i never myself came across a case of a man in his corporeal body swimming about in a crocodile skin, and i doubt whether any native would chance himself inside a crocodile skin and swim about in the river among the genuine articles for fear of their penetrating his disguise mentally and physically. in calabar witch crocodiles are still flourishing. there is an immense old brute that sporting vice-consuls periodically go after, which is known to contain the spirit of a duke town chief who shall be nameless, because they are getting on at such a pace just round duke town that haply i might be had up for libel. when i was in calabar once, a peculiarly energetic officer had hit that crocodile and the chief was forthwith laid up by a wound in his leg. he said a dog had bit him. they, the chief and the crocodile, are quite well again now, and i will say this in favour of that chief, that nothing on earth would persuade me to believe that he went fooling about in the calabar river in his corporeal body, either in his own skin or a crocodile's. the introduction of the fetish boofima into the country of the imperi is an interesting point as it shows that these different tribes have the same big ju-ju. similarly, calabar egbo can go into okyon, and will be respected in some of the new calabar districts, but not at brass, where the secret society is a distinct cult. often a neighbouring district will send into calabar, or brass, where the big ju-ju is, and ask to have one sent up into their district to keep order, but egbo will occasionally be sent into a district without that district in the least wanting it; but, as in the imperi case, when it is there it is supreme. but say, for example, you were to send egbo round from calabar to cameroon. cameroon might be barely civil to it, but would pay it no homage, for cameroon has got no end of a ju-ju of its own. it can rise up as high as the peak, , feet. i never saw the cameroon ju-ju do this, but i saw it start up from four feet to quite twelve feet in the twinkling of an eye, and i was assured that it was only modest reticence on its part that made it leave the other , feet out of the performance. doctor nassau seems to think that the tribal society of the corisco regions is identical with the leopard societies. he has had considerable experience of the workings of the ukuku, particularly when he was pioneering in the benito regions, when it came very near killing him. he says the name signifies a departed spirit. "it is a secret society into which all the males are initiated at puberty, whose procedure may not be seen by females, nor its laws disobeyed by any one under pain of death, a penalty which is sometimes commuted to a fine, a heavy fine. its discussions are uttered as an oracle from any secluded spot by some man appointed for the purpose. "on trivial occasions any initiated man may personate ukuku or issue commands for the family. on other occasions, as in shiku, to raise prices, the society lays its commands on foreign traders." some cases of ukuku proceedings against white traders have come under my own observation. a friend of mine, a trader in the batanga district, in some way incurred the animosity of the society's local branch. he had, as is usual in the south-west coast trade several sub-factories in the bush. he found himself boycotted; no native came in to his yard to buy or sell at the store, not even to sell food. he took no notice and awaited developments. one evening when he was sitting on his verandah, smoking and reading, he thought he heard some one singing softly under the house, this, like most european buildings hereabouts, being elevated just above the earth. he was attracted to the song and listened: it was evidently one of the natives singing, not one of his own kruboys, and so, knowing the language, and having nothing else particular to do, he attended to the affair. it was the same thing sung softly over and over again, so softly that he could hardly make out the words. but at last, catching his native name among them, he listened more intently than ever, down at a knot-hole in the wooden floor. the song was--"they are going to attack your factory at . . . to-morrow. they are going to attack your factory at . . . to-morrow," over and over again, until it ceased; and then he thought he saw something darker than the darkness round it creep across the yard and disappear in the bush. very early in the morning he, with his kruboys and some guns, went and established themselves in that threatened factory in force. the ukuku society turned up in the evening, and reconnoitred the situation, and finding there was more in it than they had expected, withdrew. in the course of the next twenty-four hours he succeeded in talking the palaver successfully with them. he never knew who his singing friend was, but suspected it was a man whom he had known to be grateful for some kindness he had done him. indeed there were, and are, many natives who have cause to be grateful to him, for he is deservedly popular among his local tribes, but the man who sang to him that night deserves much honour, for he did it at a terrific risk. sometimes representatives of the ukuku fraternity from several tribes meet together and discuss intertribal difficulties, thereby avoiding war. dr. nassau distinctly says that the bantu region leopard society is identical with the ukuku, and he says that although the leopards are not very numerous here they are very daring, made so by immunity from punishment by man. "the superstition is that on any man who kills a leopard will fall a curse or evil disease, curable only by ruinously expensive process of three weeks' duration under the direction of ukuku. so the natives allow the greatest depredations and ravages until their sheep, goats, and dogs are swept away, and are roused to self-defence only when a human being becomes the victim of the daring beast. with this superstition is united another similar to the werewolf of germany, viz., a belief in the power of human metamorphosis into a leopard. a person so metamorphosed is called 'uvengwa.' at one time in benito an intense excitement prevailed in the community. doors and shutters were rattled at the dead of night, marks of leopard claws were scratched on door-posts. then tracks lay on every path. women and children in lonely places saw their flitting forms, or in the dusk were knocked down by their spring, or heard their growl in the thickets. it is difficult to decide in many of these reports whether it is a real leopard or only an uvengwa--to native fears they are practically the same,--we were certain this time the uvengwa was the thief disguised in leopard's skin, as theft is always heard of about such times." when i was in gaboon in september, , there was great uvengwa excitement in a district just across the other side of the estuary, mainly at a village that enjoyed the spacious and resounding name of rumpochembo, from a celebrated chief, and all these phenomena were rife there. again, when i was in a village up the calabar there were fourteen goats and five slaves killed in eight days by leopards, the genuine things, i am sure, in this case; but here, as down south, there was a strong objection to proceed against the leopard, and no action was being taken save making the goat-houses stronger. in okyon, when a leopard is killed, its body is treated with great respect and brought into the killer's village. messages are then sent to the neighbouring villages, and they send representatives to the village and the gall-bladder is most carefully removed from the leopard and burnt coram publico, each person whipping their hands down their arms to disavow any guilt in the affair. this burning of the gall, however, is not ju-ju, it is done merely to destroy it, and to demonstrate to all men that it is destroyed, because it is believed to be a deadly poison, and if any is found in a man's possession the punishment is death, unless he is a great chief--a few of these are allowed to keep leopards' gall in their possession. john bailey tells me that if a great chief commits a great crime, and is adjudged by a conclave of his fellow chiefs to die, it is not considered right he should die in a common way, and he is given leopards' gall. a precisely similar idea regarding the poisonous quality of crocodiles' gall holds good down south. the ju-ju parts of the leopard are the whiskers. you cannot get a skin from a native with them on, and gay, reckless young hunters wear them stuck in their hair and swagger tremendously while the elders shake their heads and keep a keen eye on their subsequent conduct. i must say the african leopard is an audacious animal, although it is ungrateful of me to say a word against him, after the way he has let me off personally, and i will speak of his extreme beauty as compensation for my ingratitude. i really think, taken as a whole, he is the most lovely animal i have ever seen; only seeing him, in the one way you can gain a full idea of his beauty, namely in his native forest, is not an unmixed joy to a person, like myself, of a nervous disposition. i may remark that my nervousness regarding the big game of africa is of a rather peculiar kind. i can confidently say i am not afraid of any wild animal--until i see it--and then-- well i will yield to nobody in terror; fortunately as i say my terror is a special variety; fortunately, because no one can manage their own terror. you can suppress alarm, excitement, fear, fright, and all those small-fry emotions, but the real terror is as dependent on the inner make of you as the colour of your eyes, or the shape of your nose; and when terror ascends its throne in my mind i become preternaturally artful, and intelligent to an extent utterly foreign to my true nature, and save, in the case of close quarters with bad big animals, a feeling of rage against some unknown person that such things as leopards, elephants, crocodiles, etc., should be allowed out loose in that disgracefully dangerous way, i do not think much about it at the time. whenever i have come across an awful animal in the forest and i know it has seen me i take jerome's advice, and instead of relying on the power of the human eye rely upon that of the human leg, and effect a masterly retreat in the face of the enemy. if i know it has not seen me i sink in my tracks and keep an eye on it, hoping that it will go away soon. thus i once came upon a leopard. i had got caught in a tornado in a dense forest. the massive, mighty trees were waving like a wheat-field in an autumn gale in england, and i dare say a field mouse in a wheat-field in a gale would have heard much the same uproar. the tornado shrieked like ten thousand vengeful demons. the great trees creaked and groaned and strained against it and their bush-rope cables groaned and smacked like whips, and ever and anon a thundering crash with snaps like pistol shots told that they and their mighty tree had strained and struggled in vain. the fierce rain came in a roar, tearing to shreds the leaves and blossoms and deluging everything. i was making bad weather of it, and climbing up over a lot of rocks out of a gully bottom where i had been half drowned in a stream, and on getting my head to the level of a block of rock i observed right in front of my eyes, broadside on, maybe a yard off, certainly not more, a big leopard. he was crouching on the ground, with his magnificent head thrown back and his eyes shut. his fore-paws were spread out in front of him and he lashed the ground with his tail, and i grieve to say, in face of that awful danger--i don't mean me, but the tornado--that depraved creature swore, softly, but repeatedly and profoundly. i did not get all these facts up in one glance, for no sooner did i see him than i ducked under the rocks, and remembered thankfully that leopards are said to have no power of smell. but i heard his observation on the weather, and the flip-flap of his tail on the ground. every now and then i cautiously took a look at him with one eye round a rock-edge, and he remained in the same position. my feelings tell me he remained there twelve months, but my calmer judgment puts the time down at twenty minutes; and at last, on taking another cautious peep, i saw he was gone. at the time i wished i knew exactly where, but i do not care about that detail now, for i saw no more of him. he had moved off in one of those weird lulls which you get in a tornado, when for a few seconds the wild herd of hurrying winds seem to have lost themselves, and wander round crying and wailing like lost souls, until their common rage seizes them again and they rush back to their work of destruction. it was an immense pleasure to have seen the great creature like that. he was so evidently enraged and baffled by the uproar and dazzled by the floods of lightning that swept down into the deepest recesses of the forest, showing at one second every detail of twig, leaf, branch, and stone round you, and then leaving you in a sort of swirling dark until the next flash came; this, and the great conglomerate roar of the wind, rain and thunder, was enough to bewilder any living thing. i have never hurt a leopard intentionally; i am habitually kind to animals, and besides i do not think it is ladylike to go shooting things with a gun. twice, however, i have been in collision with them. on one occasion a big leopard had attacked a dog, who, with her family, was occupying a broken-down hut next to mine. the dog was a half-bred boarhound, and a savage brute on her own account. i, being roused by the uproar, rushed out into the feeble moonlight, thinking she was having one of her habitual turns-up with other dogs, and i saw a whirling mass of animal matter within a yard of me. i fired two mushroom-shaped native stools in rapid succession into the brown of it, and the meeting broke up into a leopard and a dog. the leopard crouched, i think to spring on me. i can see its great, beautiful, lambent eyes still, and i seized an earthen water- cooler and flung it straight at them. it was a noble shot; it burst on the leopard's head like a shell and the leopard went for bush one time. twenty minutes after people began to drop in cautiously and inquire if anything was the matter, and i civilly asked them to go and ask the leopard in the bush, but they firmly refused. we found the dog had got her shoulder slit open as if by a blow from a cutlass, and the leopard had evidently seized the dog by the scruff of her neck, but owing to the loose folds of skin no bones were broken and she got round all right after much ointment from me, which she paid me for with several bites. do not mistake this for a sporting adventure. i no more thought it was a leopard than that it was a lotus when i joined the fight. my other leopard was also after a dog. leopards always come after dogs, because once upon a time the leopard and the dog were great friends, and the leopard went out one day and left her whelps in charge of the dog, and the dog went out flirting, and a snake came and killed the whelps, so there is ill-feeling to this day between the two. for the benefit of sporting readers whose interest may have been excited by the mention of big game, i may remark that the largest leopard skin i ever measured myself was, tail included, feet inches. it was a dried skin, and every man who saw it said, "it was the largest skin he had ever seen, except one that he had seen somewhere else." the largest crocodile i ever measured was feet inches, the largest gorilla feet inches. i am assured by the missionaries in calabar, that there was a python brought into creek town in the rev. mr. goldie's time, that extended the whole length of the creek town mission-house verandah and to spare. this python must have been over feet. i have not a shadow of doubt it was. stay-at- home people will always discredit great measurements, but experienced bushmen do not, and after all, if it amuses the stay-at- homes to do so, by all means let them; they have dull lives of it and it don't hurt you, for you know how exceedingly difficult it is to preserve really big things to bring home, and how, half the time, they fall into the hands of people who would not bother their heads to preserve them in a rotting climate like west africa. the largest python skin i ever measured was a damaged one, which was feet. there is an immense one hung in front of a house in san paul de loanda which you can go and measure yourself with comparative safety any day, and which is, i think, over feet. i never measured this one. the common run of pythons is - feet, or rather i should say this is about the sized one you find with painful frequency in your chicken-house. of the lubuku secret society i can speak with no personal knowledge. i had a great deal of curious information regarding it from a bakele woman, who had her information second-hand, but it bears out what captain latrobe bateman says about it in his most excellent book the first ascent of the kasai (george phillip, ), and to his account in note j of the appendix, i beg to refer the ethnologist. my information also went to show what he calls "a dark inference as to its true nature," a nature not universally common by any means to the african tribal secret society. in addition to the secret society and the leopard society, there are in the delta some ju-jus held only by a few great chiefs. the one in bonny has a complete language to itself, and there is one in duke town so powerful that should you desire the death of any person you have only to go and name him before it. "these jujus are very swift and sure." i would rather drink than fight with any of them--yes, far. chapter xvii. ascent of the great peak of cameroons. setting forth how the voyager is minded to ascend the mountain called mungo mah lobeh, or the throne of thunder, and in due course reaches buea, situate thereon. after returning from corisco i remained a few weeks in gaboon, and then left on the niger, commanded by captain davies. my regrets, i should say, arose from leaving the charms and interests of congo francais, and had nothing whatever to do with taking passage on one of the most comfortable ships of all those which call on the coast. the niger was homeward-bound when i joined her, and in due course arrived in cameroon river, and i was once again under the dominion of germany. it would be a very interesting thing to compare the various forms of european government in africa--english, french, german, portuguese, and spanish; but to do so with any justice would occupy more space than i have at my disposal, for the subject is extremely intricate. each of these forms of government have their good points and their bad. each of them are dealing with bits of africa differing from each other--in the nature of their inhabitants and their formation, and so on--so i will not enter into any comparison of them here. from the deck of the niger i found myself again confronted with my great temptation--the magnificent mungo mah lobeh--the throne of thunder. now it is none of my business to go up mountains. there's next to no fish on them in west africa, and precious little good rank fetish, as the population on them is sparse--the african, like myself, abhorring cool air. nevertheless, i feel quite sure that no white man has ever looked on the great peak of cameroon without a desire arising in his mind to ascend it and know in detail the highest point on the western side of the continent, and indeed one of the highest points in all africa. so great is the majesty and charm of this mountain that the temptation of it is as great to me to-day as it was on the first day i saw it, when i was feeling my way down the west coast of africa on the s.s. lagos in , and it revealed itself by good chance from its surf-washed plinth to its skyscraping summit. certainly it is most striking when you see it first, as i first saw it, after coasting for weeks along the low shores and mangrove-fringed rivers of the niger delta. suddenly, right up out of the sea, rises the great mountain to its , feet, while close at hand, to westward, towers the lovely island mass of fernando po to , feet. but every time you pass it by its beauty grows on you with greater and greater force, though it is never twice the same. sometimes it is wreathed with indigo-black tornado clouds, sometimes crested with snow, sometimes softly gorgeous with gold, green, and rose-coloured vapours tinted by the setting sun, sometimes completely swathed in dense cloud so that you cannot see it at all; but when you once know it is there it is all the same, and you bow down and worship. there are only two distinct peaks to this glorious thing that geologists brutally call the volcanic intrusive mass of the cameroon mountains, viz., big cameroon and little cameroon. the latter, mungo mah etindeh, has not yet been scaled, although it is only , feet. one reason for this is doubtless that the few people in fever-stricken, over-worked west africa who are able to go up mountains, naturally try for the adjacent big cameroon; the other reason is that mungo mah etindeh, to which burton refers as "the awful form of little cameroon," is mostly sheer cliff, and is from foot to summit clothed in an almost impenetrable forest. behind these two mountains of volcanic origin, which cover an area on an isolated base of between and square miles in extent, there are distinctly visible from the coast two chains of mountains, or i should think one chain deflected, the so-called rumby and omon ranges. these are no relations of mungo, being of very different structure and conformation; the geological specimens i have brought from them and from the cameroons being identified by geologists as respectively schistose grit and vesicular lava. after spending a few pleasant days in cameroon river in the society of frau plehn, my poor friend mrs. duggan having, i regret to say, departed for england on the death of her husband, i went round to victoria, ambas bay, on the niger, and in spite of being advised solemnly by captain davies to "chuck it as it was not a picnic," i started to attempt the peak of cameroons as follows. september th, .--left victoria at . , weather fine. herr von lucke, though sadly convinced, by a series of experiments he has been carrying on ever since i landed, and i expect before, that you cannot be in three places at one time, is still trying to do so; or more properly speaking he starts an experiment series for four places, man-like, instead of getting ill as i should under the circumstances, and he kindly comes with me as far as the bridge across the lovely cascading lukole river, and then goes back at about seven miles an hour to look after victoria and his sick subordinates in detail. i, with my crew, keep on up the grand new road the government is making, which when finished is to go from ambas bay to buea, , feet up on the mountain's side. this road is quite the most magnificent of roads, as regards breadth and general intention, that i have seen anywhere in west africa, and it runs through a superbly beautiful country. it is, i should say, as broad as oxford street; on either side of it are deep drains to carry off the surface waters, with banks of varied beautiful tropical shrubs and ferns, behind which rise, to feet high, walls of grand forest, the column-like tree-stems either hung with flowering, climbing plants and ferns, or showing soft red and soft grey shafts sixty to seventy feet high without an interrupting branch. behind this again rise the lovely foot hills of mungo, high up against the sky, coloured the most perfect soft dark blue. the whole scheme of colour is indescribably rich and full in tone. the very earth is a velvety red brown, and the butterflies--which abound--show themselves off in the sunlight, in their canary- coloured, crimson, and peacock-blue liveries, to perfection. after five minutes' experience of the road i envy those butterflies. i do not believe there is a more lovely road in this world, and besides, it's a noble and enterprising thing of a government to go and make it, considering the climate and the country; but to get any genuine pleasure out of it, it is requisite to hover in a bird- or butterfly-like way, for of all the truly awful things to walk on, that road, when i was on it, was the worst. of course this arose from its not being finished, not having its top on in fact: the bit that was finished, and had got its top on, for half a mile beyond the bridge, you could go over in a bath chair. the rest of it made you fit for one for the rest of your natural life, for it was one mass of broken lava rock, and here and there leviathan tree-stumps that had been partially blown up with gunpowder. when we near the forest end of the road, it comes on to rain heavily, and i see a little house on the left-hand side, and a european engineer superintending a group of very cheerful natives felling timber. he most kindly invites me to take shelter, saying it cannot rain as heavily as this for long. my men also announce a desire for water, and so i sit down and chat with the engineer under the shelter of his verandah, while the men go to the water-hole, some twenty minutes off. after learning much about the congo free state and other matters, i presently see one of my men sitting right in the middle of the road on a rock, totally unsheltered, and a feeling of shame comes over me in the face of this black man's aquatic courage. into the rain i go, and off we start. i conscientiously attempt to keep dry, by holding up an umbrella, knowing that though hopeless it is the proper thing to do. we leave the road about fifty yards above the hut, turning into the unbroken forest on the right-hand side, and following a narrow, slippery, muddy, root-beset bush-path that was a comfort after the road. presently we come to a lovely mountain torrent flying down over red-brown rocks in white foam; exquisitely lovely, and only a shade damper than the rest of things. seeing this i solemnly fold up my umbrella and give it to kefalla. i then take charge of fate and wade. this particular stream, too, requires careful wading, the rocks over which it flows being arranged in picturesque, but perilous confusion; however all goes well, and getting to the other side i decide to "chuck it," as captain davies would say, as to keeping dry, for the rain comes down heavier than ever. now we are evidently dealing with a foot-hillside, but the rain is too thick for one to see two yards in any direction, and we seem to be in a ghost-land forest, for the great palms and red-woods rise up in the mist before us, and fade out in the mist behind, as we pass on. the rocks which edge and strew the path at our feet are covered with exquisite ferns and mosses--all the most delicate shades of green imaginable, and here and there of absolute gold colour, looking as if some ray of sunshine had lingered too long playing on the earth, and had got shut off from heaven by the mist, and so lay nestling among the rocks until it might rejoin the sun. the path now becomes an absolute torrent, with mud-thickened water, which cascades round one's ankles in a sportive way, and round one's knees in the hollows in the path. on we go, the path underneath the water seems a pretty equal mixture of rock and mud, but they are not evenly distributed. plantations full of weeds show up on either side of us, and we are evidently now on the top of a foot-hill. i suspect a fine view of the sea could be obtained from here, if you have an atmosphere that is less than . per cent. of water. as it is, a white sheet--or more properly speaking, considering its soft, stuffy woolliness, a white blanket--is stretched across the landscape to the south-west, where the sea would show. we go down-hill now, the water rushing into the back of my shoes for a change. the path is fringed by high, sugar-cane-like grass which hangs across it in a lackadaisical way, swishing you in the face and cutting like a knife whenever you catch its edge, and pouring continually insidious rills of water down one's neck. it does not matter. the whole atlantic could not get more water on to me than i have already got. ever and again i stop and wring out some of it from my skirts, for it is weighty. one would not imagine that anything could come down in the way of water thicker than the rain, but it can. when one is on the top of the hills, a cold breeze comes through the mist chilling one to the bone, and bending the heads of the palm trees, sends down from them water by the bucketful with a slap; hitting or missing you as the case may be. both myself and my men are by now getting anxious for our "chop," and they tell me, "we look them big hut soon." soon we do look them big hut, but with faces of undisguised horror, for the big hut consists of a few charred roof-mats, etc., lying on the ground. there has been a fire in that simple savage home. our path here is cut by one that goes east and west, and after a consultation between my men and the bakwiri, we take the path going east, down a steep slope between weedy plantations, and shortly on the left shows a steep little hill-side with a long low hut on the top. we go up to it and i find it is the habitation of a basel mission black bible- reader. he comes out and speaks english well, and i tell him i want a house for myself and my men, and he says we had better come and stay in this one. it is divided into two chambers, one in which the children who attend the mission-school stay, and wherein there is a fire, and one evidently the abode of the teacher. i thank the bible-reader and say that i will pay him for the house, and i and the men go in streaming, and my teeth chatter with cold as the breeze chills my saturated garment while i give out the rations of beef, rum, blankets, and tobacco to the men. then i clear my apartment out and attempt to get dry, operations which are interrupted by kefalla coming for tobacco to buy firewood off the mission teacher to cook our food by. presently my excellent little cook brings in my food, and in with it come two mission teachers--our first acquaintance, the one with a white jacket, and another with a blue. they lounge about and spit in all directions, and then chiefs commence to arrive with their families complete, and they sidle into the apartment and ostentatiously ogle the demijohn of rum. they are, as usual, a nuisance, sitting about on everything. no sooner have i taken an unclean-looking chief off the wood sofa, than i observe another one has silently seated himself in the middle of my open portmanteau. removing him and shutting it up, i see another one has settled on the men's beef and rice sack. it is now about three o'clock and i am still chilled to the bone in spite of tea. the weather is as bad as ever. the men say that the rest of the road to buea is far worse than that which we have so far come along, and that we should never get there before dark, and "for sure" should not get there afterwards, because by the time the dark came down we should be in "bad place too much." therefore, to their great relief, i say i will stay at this place--buana--for the night, and go on in the morning time up to buea; and just for the present i think i will wrap myself up in a blanket and try and get the chill out of me, so i give the chiefs a glass of rum each, plenty of head tobacco, and my best thanks for their kind call, and then turn them all out. i have not been lying down five minutes on the plank that serves for a sofa by day and a bed by night, when charles comes knocking at the door. he wants tobacco. "missionary man no fit to let we have firewood unless we buy em." give charles a head and shut him out again, and drop off to sleep again for a quarter of an hour, then am aroused by some enterprising sightseers pushing open the window-shutters; when i look round there are a mass of black heads sticking through the window-hole. i tell them respectfully that the circus is closed for repairs, and fasten up the shutters, but sleep is impossible, so i turn out and go and see what those men of mine are after. they are comfortable enough round their fire, with their clothes suspended on strings in the smoke above them, and i envy them that fire. i then stroll round to see if there is anything to be seen, but the scenery is much like that you would enjoy if you were inside a blanc-mange. so as it is now growing dark i return to my room and light candles, and read dr. gunther on fishes. room becomes full of blacks. unless you watch the door, you do not see how it is done. you look at a corner one minute and it is empty, and the next time you look that way it is full of rows of white teeth and watching eyes. the two mission teachers come in and make a show of teaching a child to read the bible. after again clearing out the rank and fashion of buana, i prepare to try and get a sleep; not an elaborate affair, i assure you, for i only want to wrap myself round in a blanket and lie on that plank, but the rain has got into the blankets and horror! there is no pillow. the mission men have cleared their bed paraphernalia right out. now you can do without a good many things, but not without a pillow, so hunt round to find something to make one with; find the bible in english, the bible in german, and two hymn-books, and a candle-stick. these seem all the small articles in the room--no, there is a parcel behind the books--mission teachers' sunday trousers--make delightful arrangement of books bound round with trousers and the whole affair wrapped in one of my towels. never saw till now advantage of africans having trousers. civilisation has its points after all. but it is no use trying to get any sleep until those men are quieter. the partition which separates my apartment from theirs is a bamboo and mat affair, straight at the top so leaving under the roof a triangular space above common to both rooms. also common to both rooms are the smoke of the fire and the conversation. kefalla is holding forth in a dogmatic way, and some of the others are snoring. there is a new idea in decoration along the separating wall. mr. morris might have made something out of it for a dado. it is composed of an arrangement in line of stretched out singlets. vaseline the revolver. wish those men would leave off chattering. kefalla seems to know the worst about most of the people, black and white, down in ambas bay, but i do not believe those last two stories. evidently great jokes in next room now; kefalla has thrown himself, still talking, in the dark, on to the top of one of the mission teachers. the women of the village outside have been keeping up, this hour and more, a most melancholy coo-ooing. those foolish creatures are evidently worrying about their husbands who have gone down to market in ambas bay, and who, they think, are lost in the bush. i have not a shadow of a doubt that those husbands who are not home by now are safely drunk in town, or reposing on the grand new road the kindly government have provided for them, either in one of the side drains, or tucked in among the lava rock. september st.--coo-ooing went on all night. i was aroused about . p.m., by uproar in adjacent hut: one husband had returned in a bellicose condition and whacked his wives, and their squarks and squalls, instead of acting as a warning to the other ladies, stimulate the silly things to go on coo-ooing louder and more entreatingly than ever, so that their husbands might come home and whack them too, i suppose, and whenever the unmitigated hardness of my plank rouses me i hear them still coo-ooing. no watchman is required to wake you in the morning on the top of a cameroon foot-hill by . , because about a.m. the dank chill that comes before the dawn does so most effectively. one old chief turned up early out of the mist and dashed me a bottle of palm wine; he says he wants to dash me a fowl, but i decline, and accept two eggs, and give him four heads of tobacco. the whole place is swathed in thick white mist through which my audience arrive. but i am firm with them, and shut up the doors and windows and disregard their bangings on them while i am dressing, or rather re-dressing. the mission teachers get in with my tea, and sit and smoke and spit while i have my breakfast. give me cannibal fans! it is pouring with rain again now, and we go down the steep hillock to the path we came along yesterday, keep it until we come to where the old path cuts it, and then turn up to the right following the old path's course and leave buana without a pang of regret. our road goes n.e. oh, the mud of it! not the clearish cascades of yesterday but sticky, slippery mud, intensely sticky, and intensely slippery. the narrow path which is filled by this, is v-shaped underneath from wear, and i soon find the safest way is right through the deepest mud in the middle. the white mist shuts off all details beyond ten yards in any direction. all we can see, as we first turn up the path, is a patch of kokos of tremendous size on our right. after this comes weedy plantation, and stretches of sword grass hanging across the road. the country is even more unlevel than that we came over yesterday. on we go, patiently doing our mud pulling through the valleys; toiling up a hillside among lumps of rock and stretches of forest, for we are now beyond buana's plantations; and skirting the summit of the hill only to descend into another valley. evidently this is a succession of foot-hills of the great mountain and we are not on its true face yet. as we go on they become more and more abrupt in form, the valleys mere narrow ravines. in the wet season (this is only the tornado season) each of these valleys is occupied by a raging torrent from the look of the confused water-worn boulders. now among the rocks there are only isolated pools, for the weather for a fortnight before i left victoria had been fairly dry, and this rich porous soil soaks up an immense amount of water. it strikes me as strange that when we are either going up or down the hills, the ground is less muddy than when we are skirting their summits, but it must be because on the inclines the rush of water clears the soil away down to the bed rock. there is an outcrop of clay down by buana, but though that was slippery, it is nothing to the slipperiness of this fine, soft, red-brown earth that is the soil higher up, and also round ambas bay. this gets churned up into a sort of batter where there is enough water lying on it, and, when there is not, an ice slide is an infant to it. my men and i flounder about; thrice one of them, load and all, goes down with a squidge and a crash into the side grass, and says "damn!" with quite the european accent; as a rule, however, we go on in single file, my shoes giving out a mellifluous squidge, and their naked feet a squish, squash. the men take it very good temperedly, and sing in between accidents; i do not feel much like singing myself, particularly at one awful spot, which was the exception to the rule that ground at acute angles forms the best going. this exception was a long slippery slide down into a ravine with a long, perfectly glassy slope up out of it. after this we have a stretch of rocky forest, and pass by a widening in the path which i am told is a place where men blow, i.e. rest, and then pass through another a little further on, which is buea's bush market. then through an opening in the great war-hedge of buea, a growing stockade some fifteen feet high, the lower part of it wattled. at the sides of the path here grow banks of bergamot and balsam, returning good for evil and smiling sweetly as we crush them. thank goodness we are in forest now, and we seem to have done with the sword-grass. the rocks are covered with moss and ferns, and the mist curling and wandering about among the stems is very lovely. in our next ravine there is a succession of pools, part of a mountain torrent of greater magnitude evidently than those we have passed, and in these pools there are things swimming. spend more time catching them, with the assistance of bum. i do not value kefalla's advice, ample though it is, as being of any real value in the affair. bag some water-spiders and two small fish. the heat is less oppressive than yesterday. all yesterday one was being alternately smothered in the valley and chilled on the hill-tops. to-day it is a more level temperature, about degrees, i fancy. the soil up here, about , feet above sea-level, though rock- laden is exceedingly rich, and the higher we go there is more bergamot, native indigo, with its underleaf dark blue, and lovely coleuses with red markings on their upper leaves, and crimson linings. i, as an ichthyologist, am in the wrong paradise. what a region this would be for a botanist! the country is gloriously lovely if one could only see it for the rain and mist; but one only gets dim hints of its beauty when some cold draughts of wind come down from the great mountains and seem to push open the mist-veil as with spirit hands, and then in a minute let it fall together again. i do not expect to reach buea within regulation time, but at . my men say "we close in," and then, coming along a forested hill and down a ravine, we find ourselves facing a rushing river, wherein a squad of black soldiers are washing clothes, with the assistance of a squad of black ladies, with much uproar and sky-larking. i too think it best to wash here, standing in the river and swishing the mud out of my skirts; and then wading across to the other bank, i wring out my skirts. the ground on the further side of the river is cleared of bush, and only bears a heavy crop of balsam; a few steps onwards bring me in view of a corrugated iron-roofed, plank-sided house, in front of which, towards the great mountain which now towers up into the mist, is a low clearing with a quadrangle of native huts--the barracks. i receive a most kindly welcome from a fair, grey-eyed german gentleman, only unfortunately i see my efforts to appear before him clean and tidy have been quite unavailing, for he views my appearance with unmixed horror, and suggests an instant hot bath. i decline. men can be trying! how in the world is any one going to take a bath in a house with no doors, and only very sketchy wooden window-shutters? the german officer is building the house quickly, as ollendorff would say, but he has not yet got to such luxuries as doors, and so uses army blankets strung across the doorway; and he has got up temporary wooden shutters to keep the worst of the rain out, and across his own room's window he has a frame covered with greased paper. thank goodness he has made a table, and a bench, and a washhand-stand out of planks for his spare room, which he kindly places at my disposal; and the fatherland has evidently stood him an iron bedstead and a mattress for it. but the fatherland is not spoiling or cosseting this man to an extent that will enervate him in the least. the mist clears off in the evening about five, and the surrounding scenery is at last visible. fronting the house there is the cleared quadrangle, facing which on the other three sides are the lines of very dilapidated huts, and behind these the ground rises steeply, the great s.e. face of mungo mah lobeh. it looks awfully steep when you know you have got to go up it. this station at buea is , feet above sea-level, which explains the hills we have had to come up. the mountain wall when viewed from buea is very grand, although it lacks snowcap or glacier, and the highest summits of mungo are not visible because we are too close under them, but its enormous bulk and its isolation make it highly impressive. the forest runs up it in a great band above buea, then sends up great tongues into the grass belt above. but what may be above this grass belt i know not yet, for our view ends at the top of the wall of the great s.e. crater. my men say there are devils and gold up beyond, but the german authorities do not support this view. those germans are so sceptical. this station is evidently on a ledge, for behind it the ground falls steeply, and you get an uninterrupted panoramic view of the cameroon estuary and the great stretches of low swamp lands with the mungo and the bimbia rivers, and their many creeks and channels, and far away east the strange abrupt forms of the rumby mountains. herr liebert says you can see cameroon government buildings from here, if only the day is clear, though they are some forty miles away. this view of them is, save a missionary of the basel mission, the only white society available at buea. i hear more details about the death of poor freiherr von gravenreuth, whose fine monument of a seated lion i saw in the government house grounds in cameroons the other day. bush fighting in these west african forests is dreadfully dangerous work. hemmed in by bush, in a narrow path along which you must pass slowly in single file, you are a target for all and any natives invisibly hidden in the undergrowth; and the war-hedge of buea must have made an additional danger and difficulty here for the attacking party. the lieutenant and his small band of black soldiers had, after a stiff fight, succeeded in forcing the entrance to this, when their ammunition gave out, and they had to fall back. the bueans, regarding this as their victory, rallied, and a chance shot killed the lieutenant instantly. a further expedition was promptly sent up from victoria and it wiped the error out of the buean mind and several bueans with it. but it was a very necessary expedition. these natives were a constant source of danger to the more peaceful trading tribes, whom they would not permit to traverse their territory. the bueans have been dealt with mercifully by the germans, for their big villages, like sapa, are still standing, and a continual stream of natives come into the barrack-yard, selling produce, or carrying it on down to victoria markets, in a perfectly content and cheerful way. i met this morning a big burly chief with his insignia of office--a great stick. he, i am told, is the chief or sapa whom herr von lucke has called to talk some palaver with down in victoria. at last i leave herr liebert, because everything i say to him causes him to hop, flying somewhere to show me something, and i am sure it is bad for his foot. i go and see that my men are safely quartered. kefalla is laying down the law in a most didactic way to the soldiers. herr liebert has christened him "the professor," and i adopt the name for him, but i fear "windbag" would fit him better. at . a heavy tornado comes rolling down upon us. masses of indigo cloud with livid lightning flashing in the van, roll out from over the wall of the great crater above; then with that malevolence peculiar to the tornado it sees all the soldiers and their wives and children sitting happily in the barrack yard, howling in a minor key and beating their beloved tom-toms, so it comes and sits flump down on them with deluges of water, and sends its lightning running over the ground in livid streams of living death. oh, they are nice things are tornadoes! i wonder what they will be like when we are up in their home; up atop of that precious wall? i had no idea mungo was so steep. if i had--well, i am in for it now! chapter xviii. ascent of the great peak of cameroons--(continued). wherein is recounted how the voyager sets out from buea, and goes up through the forest belt to the top of the s.e. crater of mungo mah lobeh, with many dilemmas and disasters that befell on the way. september nd.--wake at . fine morning. fine view towards cameroon river. the broad stretch of forest below, and the water- eaten mangrove swamps below that, are all a glorious indigo flushed with rose colour from "the death of the night," as kiva used to call the dawn. no one stirring till six, when people come out of the huts, and stretch themselves and proceed to begin the day, in the african's usual perfunctory, listless way. my crew are worse than the rest. i go and hunt cook out. he props open one eye, with difficulty, and yawns a yawn that nearly cuts his head in two. i wake him up with a shock, by saying i mean to go on up to-day, and want my chop, and to start one time. he goes off and announces my horrible intention to the others. kefalla soon arrives upon the scene full of argument, "you no sabe this be sunday, ma?" says he in a tone that tells he considers this settles the matter. i "sabe" unconcernedly; kefalla scratches his head for other argument, but he has opened with his heavy artillery; which being repulsed throws his rear lines into confusion. bum, the head man, then turns up, sound asleep inside, but quite ready to come. bum, i find, is always ready to do what he is told, but has no more original ideas in his head than there are in a chair leg. kefalla, however, by scratching other parts of his anatomy diligently, has now another argument ready, the two bakwiris are sick with abdominal trouble, that requires rum and rest, and one of the other boys has hot foot. herr liebert now appears upon the scene, and says i can have some of his labourers, who are now more or less idle, because he cannot get about much with his bad foot to direct them, so i give the bakwiris and the two hot foot cases "books" to take down to herr von lucke who will pay them off for me, and seeing that they have each a good day's rations of rice, beef, etc., eliminate them from the party. in addition to the labourers, i am to have as a guide sasu, a black sergeant, who went up the peak with the officers of the hyaena, and i get my breakfast, and then hang about watching my men getting ready very slowly to start. off we get about , and start with all good wishes, and grim prophecies, from herr liebert. led by sasu, and accompanied by "to-morrow," a man who has come to buea from some interior unknown district, and who speaks no known language, and whose business it is to help to cut a way through the bush, we go down the path we came and cross the river again. this river seems to separate the final mass of the mountain from the foot-hills on this side. immediately after crossing it we turn up into the forest on the right hand side, and "to-morrow" cuts through an over-grown track for about half-an-hour, and then leaves us. everything is reeking wet, and we swish through thick undergrowth and then enter a darker forest where the earth is rocky and richly decorated with ferns and moss. for the first time in my life i see tree-ferns growing wild in luxuriant profusion. what glorious creations they are! then we get out into the middle of a koko plantation. next to sweet-potatoes, the premier abomination to walk through, give me kokos for good all-round tryingness, particularly when they are wet, as is very much the case now. getting through these we meet the war hedge again, and after a conscientious struggle with various forms of vegetation in a muddled, tangled state, sasu says, "no good, path done got stopped up," so we turn and retrace our steps all the way, cross the river, and horrify herr liebert by invading his house again. we explain the situation. grave headshaking between him and sasu about the practicability of any other route, because there is no other path. i do not like to say "so much the better," because it would have sounded ungrateful, but i knew from my ogowe experiences that a forest that looks from afar a dense black mat is all right underneath, and there is a short path recently cut by herr liebert that goes straight up towards the forest above us. it had been made to go to a clearing, where ambitious agricultural operations were being inaugurated, when herr liebert hurt his foot. up this we go, it is semi-vertical while it lasts, and it ends in a scrubby patch that is to be a plantation; this crossed we are in the urwald, and it is more exquisite than words can describe, but not good going, particularly at one spot where a gigantic tree has fallen down across a little rocky ravine, and has to be crawled under. it occurs to me that this is a highly likely place for snakes and an absolutely sure find for scorpions, and when we have passed it three of these latter interesting creatures are observed on the load of blankets which is fastened on to the back of kefalla. we inform kefalla of the fact on the spot. a volcanic eruption of entreaty, advice, and admonition results, but we still hesitate. however, the gallant cook tackles them in a sort of tip-cat way with a stick, and we proceed into a patch of long grass, beyond which there is a reach of amomums. the winged amomum i see here in africa for the first time. horrid slippery things amomum sticks to walk on, when they are lying on the ground; and there is a lot of my old enemy the calamus about. on each side are deep forested dells and ravines, and rocks show up through the ground in every direction, and things in general are slippery, and i wonder now and again, as i assume with unnecessary violence a recumbent position, why i came to africa; but patches of satin-leaved begonias and clumps of lovely tree-ferns reconcile me to my lot. cook does not feel these forest charms, and gives me notice after an hour's experience of mountain forest-belt work; what cook would not? as we get higher we have to edge and squeeze every few minutes through the aerial roots of some tremendous kind of tree, plentiful hereabouts. one of them we passed through i am sure would have run any indian banyan hard for extent of ground covered, if it were measured. in the region where these trees are frequent, the undergrowth is less dense than it is lower down. imagine a vast, seemingly limitless cathedral with its countless columns covered, nay, composed of the most exquisite dark-green, large-fronded moss, with here and there a delicate fern embedded in it as an extra decoration. the white, gauze-like mist comes down from the upper mountain towards us: creeping, twining round, and streaming through the moss-covered tree columns--long bands of it reaching along sinuous, but evenly, for fifty and sixty feet or more, and then ending in a puff like the smoke of a gun. soon, however, all the mist-streams coalesce and make the atmosphere all their own, wrapping us round in a clammy, chill embrace; it is not that wool-blanket, smothering affair that we were wrapped in down by buana, but exquisitely delicate. the difference it makes to the beauty of the forest is just the same difference you would get if you put a delicate veil over a pretty woman's face or a sack over her head. in fact, the mist here was exceedingly becoming to the forest's beauty. now and again growls of thunder roll out from, and quiver in the earth beneath our feet. mungo is making a big tornado, and is stirring and simmering it softly so as to make it strong. i only hope he will not overdo it, as he does six times in seven, and make it too heavy to get out on to the atlantic, where all tornadoes ought to go. if he does the thing will go and burst on us in this forest to-night. the forest now grows less luxuriant though still close--we have left the begonias and the tree-ferns, and are in another zone. the trees now, instead of being clothed in rich, dark-green moss, are heavily festooned with long, greenish-white lichen. it pours with rain. at last we reach the place where the sergeant says we ought to camp for the night. i have been feeling the time for camping was very ripe for the past hour, and kefalla openly said as much an hour and a half ago, but he got such scathing things said to him about civilians' legs by the sergeant that i did not air my own opinion. we are now right at the very edge of the timber belt. my head man and three boys are done to a turn. if i had had a bull behind me or mr. fildes in front, i might have done another five or seven miles, but not more. the rain comes down with extra virulence as soon as we set to work to start the fire and open the loads. i and peter have great times getting out the military camp-bed from its tight, bolster-like case, while kefalla gives advice, until, being irritated by the bed's behaviour, i blow up kefalla and send him to chop firewood. however, we get the thing out and put up after cutting a place clear to set it on; owing to the world being on a stiff slant hereabouts, it takes time to make it stand straight. i get four stakes cut, and drive them in at the four corners of the bed, and then stretch over it herr von lucke's waterproof ground-sheet, guy the ends out to pegs with string, feel profoundly grateful to both herr liebert for the bed and herr von lucke for the sheet, and place the baggage under the protection of the german government's two belongings. then i find the boys have not got a fire with all their fuss, and i have to demonstrate to them the lessons i have learnt among the fans regarding fire-making. we build a fire-house and then all goes well. i notice they do not make a fire fan fashion, but build it in a circle. evidently one of the labourers from buea, named xenia, is a good man. equally evidently some of my other men are only fit to carry sandwich-boards for day and martin's blacking. i dine luxuriously off tinned fat pork and hot tea, and then feeling still hungry go on to tinned herring. excellent thing tinned herring, but i have to hurry because i know i must go up through the edge of the forest on to the grass land, and see how the country is made during the brief period of clearness that almost always comes just before nightfall. so leaving my boys comfortably seated round the fire having their evening chop, i pass up through the heavily lichen-tasselled fringe of the forest-belt into deep jungle grass, and up a steep and slippery mound. in front the mountain-face rises like a wall from behind a set of hillocks, similar to the one i am at present on. the face of the wall to the right and left has two dark clefts in it. the peak itself is not visible from where i am; it rises behind and beyond the wall. i stay taking compass bearings and look for an easy way up for to-morrow. my men, by now, have missed their "ma" and are yelling for her dismally, and the night comes down with great rapidity for we are in the shadow of the great mountain mass, so i go back into camp. alas! how vain are often our most energetic efforts to remove our fellow creatures from temptation. i knew a sunday down among the soldiers would be bad for my men, and so came up here, and now, if you please, these men have been at the rum, because bum, the head man, has been too done up to do anything but lie in his blanket and feed. kefalla is laying down the law with great detail and unction. cook who has been very low in his mind all day, is now weirdly cheerful, and sings incoherently. the other boys, who want to go to sleep, threaten to "burst him" if he "no finish." it's no good--cook carols on, and soon succumbing to the irresistible charm of music, the other men have to join in the choruses. the performance goes on for an hour, growing woollier and woollier in tone, and then dying out in sleep. i write by the light of an insect-haunted lantern, sitting on the bed, which is tucked in among the trees some twenty yards away from the boys' fire. there is a bird whistling in a deep rich note that i have never heard before. september rd.--morning gloriously fine. rout the boys out, and start at seven, with sasu, head man, xenia, black boy, kefalla and cook. the great south-east wall of the mountain in front of us is quite unflecked by cloud, and in the forest are thousands of bees. we notice that the tongues of forest go up the mountain in some places a hundred yards or more above the true line of the belt. these tongues of forest get more and more heavily hung with lichen, and the trees thinner and more stunted, towards their ends. i think that these tongues are always in places where the wind does not get full play. all those near our camping place on this south-east face are so. it is evidently not a matter of soil, for there is ample soil on this side above where the trees are, and then again on the western side of the mountain--the side facing the sea--the timber line is far higher up than on this. nor, again, is it a matter of angle that makes the timber line here so low, for those forests on the sierra del cristal were growing luxuriantly over far steeper grades. there is some peculiar local condition just here evidently, or the forest would be up to the bottom of the wall of the crater. i am not unreasonable enough to expect it to grow on that, but its conduct in staying where it does requires explanation. we clamber up into the long jungle grass region and go on our way across a series of steep-sided, rounded grass hillocks, each of which is separated from the others by dry, rocky watercourses. the effects produced by the seed-ears of the long grass round us are very beautiful; they look a golden brown, and each ear and leaf is gemmed with dewdrops, and those of the grass on the sides of the hillocks at a little distance off show a soft brown-pink. after half an hour's climb, when we are close at the base of the wall, i observe the men ahead halting, and coming up with them find monrovia boy down a hole; a little deep blow-hole, in which, i am informed, water is supposed to be. but monrovia soon reports "no live." i now find we have not a drop of water, either with us or in camp, and now this hole has proved dry. there is, says the sergeant, no chance of getting any more water on this side of the mountain, save down at the river at buea. this means failure unless tackled, and it is evidently a trick played on me by the boys, who intentionally failed to let me know of this want of water before leaving buea, where it seems they have all learnt it. i express my opinion of them in four words and send monrovia boy, who i know is to be trusted, back to buea with a scribbled note to herr liebert asking him to send me up two demijohns of water. i send cook with him as far as the camp in the forest we have just left with orders to bring up three bottles of soda water i have left there, and to instruct the men there that as soon as the water arrives from buea they are to bring it on up to the camp i mean to make at the top of the wall. the men are sulky, and sasu, peter, kefalla, and head man say they will wait and come on as soon as cook brings the soda water, and i go on, and presently see xenia and black boy are following me. we get on to the intervening hillocks and commence to ascend the face of the wall. the angle of this wall is great, and its appearance from below is impressive from its enormous breadth, and its abrupt rise without bend or droop for a good , feet into the air. it is covered with short, yellowish grass through which the burnt-up, scoriaceous lava rock protrudes in rough masses. i got on up the wall, which when you are on it is not so perpendicular as it looks from below, my desire being to see what sort of country there was on the top of it, between it and the final peak. sasu had reported to herr liebert that it was a wilderness of rock, in which it would be impossible to fix a tent, and spoke vaguely of caves. here and there on the way up i come to holes, similar to the one my men had been down for water. i suppose these holes have been caused by gases from an under hot layer of lava bursting up through the upper cool layer. as i get higher, the grass becomes shorter and more sparse, and the rocks more ostentatiously displayed. here and there among them are sadly tried bushes, bearing a beautiful yellow flower, like a large yellow wild rose, only scentless. it is not a rose at all, i may remark. the ground, where there is any basin made by the rocks, grows a great sedum, with a grand head of whity-pink flower, also a tall herb, with soft downy leaves silver grey in colour, and having a very pleasant aromatic scent, and here and there patches of good honest parsley. bright blue, flannelly-looking flowers stud the grass in sheltered places and a very pretty large green orchid is plentiful. above us is a bright blue sky with white cloud rushing hurriedly across it to the n.e. and a fierce sun. when i am about half-way up, i think of those boys, and, wanting rest, sit down by an inviting-looking rock grotto, with a patch of the yellow flowered shrub growing on its top. inside it grow little ferns and mosses, all damp; but alas! no water pool, and very badly i want water by this time. below me a belt of white cloud had now formed, so that i could see neither the foot-hillocks nor the forest, and presently out of this mist came xenia toiling up, carrying my black bag. "where them black boy live?" said i. "black boy say him foot be tire too much," said xenia, as he threw himself down in the little shade the rock could give. i took a cupful of sour claret out of the bottle in the bag, and told xenia to come on up as soon as he was rested, and meanwhile to yell to the others down below and tell them to come on. xenia did, but sadly observed, "softly softly still hurts the snail," and i left him and went on up the mountain. when i had got to the top of the rock under which i had sheltered from the blazing sun, the mist opened a little, and i saw my men looking like so many little dolls. they were still sitting on the hillock where i had left them. buea showed from this elevation well. the guard house and the mission house, like little houses in a picture, and the make of the ground on which buea station stands, came out distinctly as a ledge or terrace, extending for miles n.n.e. and s.s.w. this ledge is a strange-looking piece of country, covered with low bush, out of which rise great, isolated, white- stemmed cotton trees. below, and beyond this is a denser band of high forest, and again below this stretches the vast mangrove-swamp fringing the estuary of the cameroons, mungo, and bimbia rivers. it is a very noble view, giving one an example of the peculiar beauty one oft-times gets in this west african scenery, namely colossal sweeps of colour. the mangrove-swamps looked to-day like a vast damson-coloured carpet threaded with silver where the waterways ran. it reminded me of a scene i saw once near cabinda, when on climbing to the top of a hill i suddenly found myself looking down on a sheet of violet pink more than a mile long and half a mile wide. this was caused by a climbing plant having taken possession of a valley full of trees, whose tops it had reached and then spread and interlaced itself over them, to burst into profuse glorious laburnum-shaped bunches of flowers. after taking some careful compass bearings for future use regarding the rumby and omon range of mountains, which were clearly visible and which look fascinatingly like my beloved sierra del cristal, i turned my face to the wall of mungo, and continued the ascent. the sun, which was blazing, was reflected back from the rocks in scorching rays. but it was more bearable now, because its heat was tempered by a bitter wind. the slope becoming steeper, i gradually made my way towards the left until i came to a great lane, as neatly walled with rock as if it had been made with human hands. it runs down the mountain face, nearly vertically in places and at stiff angles always, but it was easier going up this lane than on the outside rough rock, because the rocks in it had been smoothed by mountain torrents during thousands of wet seasons, and the walls protected one from the biting wind, a wind that went through me, for i had been stewing for nine months and more in tropic and equatorial swamps. up this lane i went to the very top of the mountain wall, and then, to my surprise, found myself facing a great, hillocky, rock- encumbered plain, across the other side of which rose the mass of the peak itself, not as a single cone, but as a wall surmounted by several, three being evidently the highest among them. i started along the ridge of my wall, and went to its highest part, that to the s.w., intending to see what i could of the view towards the sea, and then to choose a place for camping in for the night. when i reached the s.w. end, looking westwards i saw the south atlantic down below, like a plain of frosted silver. out of it, barely twenty miles away, rose fernando po to its , feet with that majestic grace peculiar to a volcanic island. immediately below me, some , feet or so, lay victoria with the forested foot-hills of mungo mah lobeh encircling it as a diadem, and ambas bay gemmed with rocky islands lying before it. on my left away s.e. was the glorious stretch of the cameroon estuary, with a line of white cloud lying very neatly along the course of cameroon river. in one of the chasms of the mountain wall that i had come up--in the one furthest to the north--there was a thunderstorm brewing, seemingly hanging on to, or streaming out of the mountain side, a soft billowy mass of dense cream-coloured cloud, with flashes of golden lightnings playing about in it with soft growls of thunder. surely mungo mah lobeh himself, of all the thousands he annually turns out, never made one more lovely than this. soon the white mists rose from the mangrove-swamp, and grew rose-colour in the light of the setting sun, as they swept upwards over the now purple high forests. in the heavens, to the north, there was a rainbow, vivid in colour, one arch of it going behind the peak, the other sinking into the mist sea below, and this mist sea rose and rose towards me, turning from pale rose-colour to lavender, and where the shadow of mungo lay across it, to a dull leaden grey. it was soon at my feet, blotting the under-world out, and soon came flowing over the wall top at its lowest parts, stretching in great spreading rivers over the crater plain, and then these coalescing everything was shut out save the two summits: that of cameroon close to me, and that of clarence away on fernando po. these two stood out alone, like great island masses made of iron rising from a formless, silken sea. the space around seemed boundless, and there was in it neither sound nor colour, nor anything with form, save those two terrific things. it was like a vision, and it held me spell-bound, as i stood shivering on the rocks with the white mist round my knees until into my wool-gathering mind came the memory of those anything but sublime men of mine; and i turned and scuttled off along the rocks like an agitated ant left alone in a dead universe. i soon found the place where i had come up into the crater plain and went down over the wall, descending with twice the rapidity, but ten times the scratches and grazes, of the ascent. i picked up the place where i had left xenia, but no xenia was there, nor came there any answer to my bush call for him, so on i went down towards the place where, hours ago, i had left the men. the mist was denser down below, but to my joy it was warmer than on the summit of the wind-swept wall. i had nearly reached the foot of this wall and made my mind up to turn in for the night under a rock, when i heard a melancholy croak away in the mist to the left. i went towards it and found xenia lost on his own account, and distinctly quaint in manner, and then i recollected that i had been warned xenia is slightly crazy. nice situation this: a madman on a mountain in the mist. xenia, i found, had no longer got my black bag, but in its place a lid of a saucepan and an empty lantern. to put it mildly, this is not the sort of outfit the r.g.s. hints to travellers would recommend for african exploration. xenia reported that he gave the bag to black boy, who shortly afterwards disappeared, and that he had neither seen him nor any of the others since, and didn't expect to this side of srahmandazi. in a homicidal state of mind, i made tracks for the missing ones followed by xenia. i thought mayhap they had grown on to the rocks they had sat upon so long, but presently, just before it became quite dark, we picked up the place we had left them in and found there only an empty soda-water bottle. xenia poured out a muddled mass of observations to the effect that "they got fright too much about them water palaver." i did not linger to raise a monument to them, but i said i wished they were in a condition to require one, and we went on over our hillocks with more confidence now that we knew we had stuck well to our unmarked track. "the moving moon went up the sky, and nowhere did abide: softly she was going up, and a star or two beside." only she was a young and inefficient moon, and although we were below the thickest of the mist band, it was dark. finding our own particular hole in the forest wall was about as easy as finding "one particular rabbit hole in an unknown hay-field in the dark," and the attempt to do so afforded us a great deal of varied exercise. i am obliged to be guarded in my language, because my feelings now are only down to one degree below boiling point. the rain now began to fall, thank goodness, and i drew the thick ears of grass through my parched lips as i stumbled along over the rugged lumps of rock hidden under the now waist-high jungle grass. our camp hole was pretty easily distinguishable by daylight, for it was on the left-hand side of one of the forest tongues, the grass land running down like a lane between two tongues here, and just over the entrance three conspicuously high trees showed. but we could not see these "picking-up" points in the darkness, so i had to keep getting xenia to strike matches, and hold them in his hat while i looked at the compass. presently we came full tilt up against a belt of trees which i knew from these compass observations was our tongue of forest belt, and i fired a couple of revolver shots into it, whereabouts i judged our camp to be. this was instantly answered by a yell from human voices in chorus, and towards that yell in a slightly amiable--a very slightly amiable--state of mind i went. i will draw a veil over the scene, particularly over my observations to those men. they did not attempt to deny their desertion, but they attempted to explain it, each one saying that it was not he but the other boy who "got fright too much." i closed the palaver promptly with a brief but lurid sketch of my opinion on the situation, and ordered food, for not having had a thing save that cup of sour claret since . a.m., and it being now p.m., i felt sinkings. then arose another beautiful situation before me. it seems when cook and monrovia got back into camp this morning master cook was seized with one of those attacks of a desire to manage things that produce such awful results in the african servant, and sent all the beef and rice down to buea to be cooked, because there was no water here to cook it. therefore the men have got nothing to eat. i had a few tins of my own food and so gave them some, and they became as happy as kings in a few minutes, listening and shouting over the terrible adventures of xenia, who is posing as the hero of the great cameroon. i get some soda-water from the two bottles left and some tinned herring, and then write out two notes to herr liebert asking him to send me three more demijohns of water, and some beef and rice from the store, promising faithfully to pay for them on my return. i would not prevent those men of mine from going up that peak above me after their touching conduct to-day. oh! no; not for worlds, dear things. chapter xix. the great peak of cameroons--(continued). setting forth how the voyager for a second time reaches the s.e. crater, with some account of the pleasures incidental to camping out in the said crater. september th.--lovely morning, the grey-white mist in the forest makes it like a dream of fairyland, each moss-grown tree stem heavily gemmed with dewdrops. at . i stir the boys, for sasu, the sergeant, says he must go back to his military duties. the men think we are all going back with him as he is our only guide, but i send three of them down with orders to go back to victoria--two being of the original set i started with. they are surprised and disgusted at being sent home, but they have got "hot foot," and something wrong in the usual seat of african internal disturbances, their "tummicks," and i am not thinking of starting a sanatorium for abdominally-afflicted africans in that crater plain above. black boy is the other boy returned, i do not want another of his attacks. they go, and this leaves me in the forest camp with kefalla, xenia, and cook, and we start expecting the water sent for by monrovia boy yesterday forenoon. there are an abominable lot of bees about; they do not give one a moment's peace, getting beneath the waterproof sheets over the bed. the ground, bestrewn with leaves and dried wood, is a mass of large flies rather like our common house-fly, but both butterflies and beetles seem scarce; and i confess i do not feel up to hunting much after yesterday's work, and deem it advisable to rest. my face and particularly my lips are a misery to me, having been blistered all over by yesterday's sun, and last night i inadvertently whipped the skin all off one cheek with the blanket, and it keeps on bleeding, and, horror of horrors, there is no tea until that water comes. i wish i had got the mountaineering spirit, for then i could say, "i'll never come to this sort of place again, for you can get all you want in the alps." i have been told this by my mountaineering friends--i have never been there--and that you can go and do all sorts of stupendous things all day, and come back in the evening to table d'hote at an hotel; but as i have not got the mountaineering spirit, i suppose i shall come fooling into some such place as this as soon as i get the next chance. about . , to our delight, the gallant monrovia boy comes through the bush with a demijohn of water, and i get my tea, and give the men the only half-pound of rice i have and a tin of meat, and they eat, become merry, and chat over their absent companions in a scornful, scandalous way. who cares for hotels now? when one is in a delightful place like this, one must work, so off i go to the north into the forest, after giving the rest of the demijohn of water into the monrovia boy's charge with strict orders it is not to be opened till my return. quantities of beetles. a little after two o'clock i return to camp, after having wandered about in the forest and found three very deep holes, down which i heaved rocks and in no case heard a splash. in one i did not hear the rocks strike, owing to the great depth. i hate holes, and especially do i hate these african ones, for i am frequently falling, more or less, into them, and they will be my end. the other demijohns of water have not arrived yet, and we are getting anxious again because the men's food has not come up, and they have been so exceedingly thirsty that they have drunk most of the water--not, however, since it has been in monrovia's charge; but at . another boy comes through the bush with another demijohn of water. we receive him gladly, and ask him about the chop. he knows nothing about it. at . another boy comes through the bush with another demijohn of water; we receive him kindly; he does not know anything about the chop. at . another boy comes through the bush with another demijohn of water, and knowing nothing about the chop, we are civil to him, and that's all. a terrific tornado which has been lurking growling about then sits down in the forest and bursts, wrapping us up in a lively kind of fog, with its thunder, lightning, and rain. it was impossible to hear, or make one's self heard at the distance of even a few paces, because of the shrill squeal of the wind, the roar of the thunder, and the rush of the rain on the trees round us. it was not like having a storm burst over you in the least; you felt you were in the middle of its engine-room when it had broken down badly. after half an hour or so the thunder seemed to lift itself off the ground, and the lightning came in sheets, instead of in great forks that flew like flights of spears among the forest trees. the thunder, however, had not settled things amicably with the mountain; it roared its rage at mungo, and mungo answered back, quivering with a rage as great, under our feet. one feels here as if one were constantly dropping, unasked and unregarded, among painful and violent discussions between the elemental powers of the universe. mungo growls and swears in thunder at the sky, and sulks in white mist all the morning, and then the sky answers back, hurling down lightnings and rivers of water, with total disregard of mungo's visitors. the way the water rushes down from the mountain wall through the watercourses in the jungle just above, and then at the edge of the forest spreads out into a sheet of water that is an inch deep, and that flies on past us in miniature cascades, trying the while to put out our fire and so on, is--quite interesting. (i exhausted my vocabulary on those boys yesterday.) as soon as we saw what we were in for, we had thrown dry wood on to the fire, and it blazed just as the rain came down, so with our assistance it fought a good fight with its fellow elements, spitting and hissing like a wild cat. it could have managed the water fairly well, but the wind came, very nearly putting an end to it by carrying away its protecting bough house, which settled on "professor" kefalla, who burst out in a lecture on the foolishness of mountaineering and the quantity of devils in this region. just in the midst of these joys another boy came through the bush with another demijohn of water. we did not receive him even civilly; i burst out laughing, and the boys went off in a roar, and we shouted at him, "where them chop?" "he live for come," said the boy, and we then gave him a hearty welcome and a tot of rum, and an hour afterwards two more boys appear, one carrying a sack of rice and beef for the men, and the other a box for me from herr liebert, containing a luxurious supply of biscuits, candles, tinned meats, and a bottle of wine and one of beer. we are now all happy, though exceeding damp, and the boys sit round the fire, with their big iron pot full of beef and rice, busy cooking while they talk. wonderful accounts of our prodigies of valour i hear given by xenia, and terrible accounts of what they have lived through from the others, and the men who have brought up the demijohns and the chop recount the last news from buea. james's wife has run away again. i have taken possession of two demijohns of water and the rum demijohn, arranging them round the head of my bed. the worst of it is those tiresome bees, as soon as the rain is over, come in hundreds after the rum, and frighten me continually. the worthless wretches get intoxicated on what they can suck from round the cork, and then they stagger about on the ground buzzing malevolently. when the boys have had the chop and a good smoke, we turn to and make up the loads for to-morrow's start up the mountain, and then, after more hot tea, i turn in on my camp bed--listening to the soft sweet murmur of the trees and the pleasant, laughing chatter of the men. september th.--rolled off the bed twice last night into the bush. the rain has washed the ground away from under its off legs, so that it tilts; and there were quantities of large longicorn beetles about during the night--the sort with spiny backs; they kept on getting themselves hitched on to my blankets and when i wanted civilly to remove them they made a horrid fizzing noise and showed fight-- cocking their horns in a defiant way. i awake finally about a.m. soaked through to the skin. the waterproof sheet has had a label sewn to it, so is not waterproof, and it has been raining softly but amply for hours. about seven we are off again, with xenia, head man, cook, monrovia boy and a labourer from buea--the water-carriers have gone home after having had their morning chop. we make for the face of the wall by a route to the left of that i took on monday, and when we are clambering up it, some feet above the hillocks, swish comes a terrific rain-storm at us accompanied by a squealing, bitter cold wind. we can hear the roar of the rain on the forest below, and hoping to get above it we keep on; hoping, however, is vain. the dense mist that comes with it prevents our seeing more than two yards in front, and we get too far to the left. i am behind the band to-day, severely bringing up the rear, and about o'clock i hear shouts from the vanguard and when i get up to them i find them sitting on the edge of one of the clefts or scars in the mountain face. i do not know how these quarry-like chasms have been formed. they both look alike from below--the mountain wall comes down vertically into them--and the bottom of this one slopes forward, so that if we had had the misfortune when a little lower down to have gone a little further to the left, we should have got on to the bottom of it, and should have found ourselves walled in on three sides, and had to retrace our steps; as it is we have just struck its right- hand edge. and fortunately, the mist, thick as it is, has not been sufficiently thick to lead the men to walk over it; for had they done so they would have got killed, as the cliff arches in under so that we look straight into the bottom of the scar some or feet below, when there is a split in the mist. the sides and bottom are made of, and strewn with, white, moss-grown masses of volcanic cinder rock, and sparsely shrubbed with gnarled trees which have evidently been under fire--one of my boys tells me from the burning of this face of the mountain by "the major from calabar" during the previous dry season. we keep on up a steep grass-covered slope, and finally reach the top of the wall. the immense old crater floor before us is to-day the site of a seething storm, and the peak itself quite invisible. my boys are quite demoralised by the cold. i find most of them have sold the blankets i gave them out at buana; and those who have not sold them have left them behind at buea, from laziness perhaps, but more possibly from a confidence in their powers to prevent us getting so far. i believe if i had collapsed too--the cold tempted me to do so as nothing else can--they would have lain down and died in the cold sleety rain. i sight a clump of gnarled sparsely-foliaged trees bedraped heavily with lichen, growing in a hollow among the rocks; thither i urge the men for shelter and they go like storm-bewildered sheep. my bones are shaking in my skin and my teeth in my head, for after the experience i had had of the heat here on monday i dared not clothe myself heavily. the men stand helpless under the trees, and i hastily take the load of blankets herr liebert lent us off a boy's back and undo it, throwing one blanket round each man, and opening my umbrella and spreading it over the other blankets. then i give them a tot of rum apiece, as they sit huddled in their blankets, and tear up a lot of the brittle, rotten wood from the trees and shrubs, getting horrid thorns into my hands the while, and set to work getting a fire with it and the driest of the moss from beneath the rocks. by the aid of it and xenia, who soon revived, and a carefully scraped up candle and a box of matches, the fire soon blazes, xenia holding a blanket to shelter it, while i, with a cutlass, chop stakes to fix the blankets on, so as to make a fire tent. the other boys now revive, and i hustle them about to make more fires, no easy work in the drenching rain, but work that has got to be done. we soon get three well alight, and then i clutch a blanket--a wringing wet blanket, but a comfort--and wrapping myself round in it, issue orders for wood to be gathered and stored round each fire to dry, and then stand over cook while he makes the men's already cooked chop hot over our first fire, when this is done getting him to make me tea, or as it more truly should be called, soup, for it contains bits of rice and beef, and the general taste of the affair is wood smoke. kefalla by this time is in lecturing form again, so my mind is relieved about him, although he says, "oh, ma! it be cold, cold too much. too much cold kill we black man, all same for one as too much sun kill you white man. oh, ma!. . .," etc. i tell him they have only got themselves to blame; if they had come up with me on monday we should have been hot enough, and missed this storm of rain. when the boys have had their chop, and are curling themselves up comfortably round their now blazing fires xenia must needs start a theory that there is a better place than this to camp in; he saw it when he was with an unsuccessful expedition that got as far as this. kefalla is fool enough to go off with him to find this place; but they soon return, chilled through again, and unsuccessful in their quest. i gather that they have been to find caves. i wish they had found caves, for i am not thinking of taking out a patent for our present camp site. the bitter wind and swishing rain keep on. we are to a certain extent sheltered from the former, but the latter is of that insinuating sort that nothing but a granite wall would keep off. just at sundown, however, as is usual in this country, the rain ceases for a while, and i take this opportunity to get out my seaman's jersey. when i have fought my way into it, i turn to survey our position, and find i have been carrying on my battle on the brink of an abysmal hole whose mouth is concealed among the rocks and scraggly shrubs just above our camp. i heave rocks down it, as we in fanland would offer rocks to an ombwiri, and hear them go "knickity-knock, like a pebble in carisbrook well." i think i detect a far away splash, but it was an awesome way down. this mountain seems set with these man-traps, and "some day some gentleman's nigger" will get killed down one. the mist has now cleared away from the peak, but lies all over the lower world, and i take bearings of the three highest cones or peaks carefully. then i go away over the rocky ground southwards, and as i stand looking round, the mist sea below is cleft in twain for a few minutes by some fierce down-draught of wind from the peak, and i get a strange, clear, sudden view right down to ambas bay. it is just like looking down from one world into another. i think how odin hung and looked down into nifelheim, and then of how hot, how deliciously hot, it was away down there, and then the mist closes over it. i shiver and go back to camp, for night is coming on, and i know my men will require intellectual support in the matter of procuring firewood. the men are now quite happy; over each fire they have made a tent with four sticks with a blanket on, a blanket that is too wet to burn, though i have to make them brace the blankets to windward for fear of their scorching. the wood from the shrubs here is of an aromatic and a resinous nature, which sounds nice, but it isn't; for the volumes of smoke it gives off when burning are suffocating, and the boys, who sit almost on the fire, are every few moments scrambling to their feet and going apart to cough out smoke, like so many novices in training for the profession of fire-eaters. however, they soon find that if they roll themselves in their blankets, and lie on the ground to windward they escape most of the smoke. they have divided up into three parties: kefalla and xenia, who have struck up a great friendship, take the lower, the most exposed fire. head man, cook, and monrovia boy have the upper fire, and the labourer has the middle one--he being an outcast for medical reasons. they are all steaming away and smoking comfortably. i form the noble resolution to keep awake, and rouse up any gentleman who may catch on fire during the night, and see to wood being put on the fires, so elaborately settle myself on my wooden chop-box, wherein i have got all the lucifers which are not in the soap-box. owing to there not being a piece of ground the size of a sixpenny piece level in this place, the arrangement of my box camp takes time, but at last it is done to my complete satisfaction, close to a tree trunk, and i think, as i wrap myself up in my two wet blankets and lean against my tree, what a good thing it is to know how to make one's self comfortable in a place like this. this tree stem is perfection, just the right angle to be restful to one's back, and one can rely all the time on nature hereabouts not to let one get thoroughly effete from luxurious comfort, so i lazily watch and listen to xenia and kefalla at their fire hard by. they begin talking to each other on their different tribal societies; kefalla is a vey, xenia a liberian, so in the interests of science i give them two heads of tobacco to stimulate their conversation. they receive them with tragic grief, having no pipe, so in the interests of science i undo my blankets and give them two out of my portmanteau; then do myself up again and pretend to be asleep. i am rewarded by getting some interesting details, and form the opinion that both these worthies, in their pursuit of their particular ju-jus, have come into contact with white prejudices, and are now fugitives from religious persecution. i also observe they have both their own ideas of happiness. kefalla holds it lies in a warm shirt, xenia that it abides in warm trousers; and every half- hour the former takes his shirt off, and holds it in the fire smoke, and then puts it hastily on; and xenia, who is the one and only trouser wearer in our band, spends fifty per cent. of the night on one leg struggling to get the other in or out of these garments, when they are either coming off to be warmed, or going on after warming. there seem but few insects here. i have only got two moths to- night--one pretty one with white wings with little red spots on, like an old-fashioned petticoat such as an early victorian-age lady would have worn--the other a sweet thing in silver. (later, i.e., . a.m.). i have been asleep against that abominable vegetable of a tree. it had its trunk covered with a soft cushion of moss, and pretended to be a comfort--a right angle to lean against, and a softly padded protection to the spine from wind, and all that sort of thing; whereas the whole mortal time it was nothing in this wretched world but a water-pipe, to conduct an extra supply of water down my back. the water has simply streamed down it, and formed a nice little pool in a rocky hollow where i keep my feet, and i am chilled to the innermost bone, so have to scramble up and drag my box to the side of kefalla and xenia's fire, feeling sure i have contracted a fatal chill this time. i scrape the ashes out of the fire into a heap, and put my sodden boots into them, and they hiss merrily, and i resolve not to go to sleep again. a.m.--have been to sleep twice, and have fallen off my box bodily into the fire in my wet blankets, and should for sure have put it out like a bucket of cold water had not xenia and kefalla been roused up by the smother i occasioned and rescued me--or the fire. it is not raining now, but it is bitter cold and cook is getting my tea. i give the boys a lot of hot tea with a big handful of sugar in, and they then get their own food hot. chapter xx. the great peak of cameroons--(continued). setting forth how the voyager attains the summit of mungo mah lobeh, and descends therefrom to victoria, to which is added some remarks on the natural history of the west coast porter, and the native methods of making fire. september th.--the weather is undecided and so am i, for i feel doubtful about going on in this weather, but i do not like to give up the peak after going through so much for it. the boys being dry and warm with the fires have forgotten their troubles. however, i settle in my mind to keep on, and ask for volunteers to come with me, and bum, the head man, and xenia announce their willingness. i put two tins of meat and a bottle of herr liebert's beer into the little wooden box, and insist on both men taking a blanket apiece, much to their disgust, and before six o'clock we are off over the crater plain. it is a broken bit of country with rock mounds sparsely overgrown with tufts of grass, and here and there are patches of boggy land, not real bog, but damp places where grow little clumps of rushes, and here and there among the rocks sorely- afflicted shrubs of broom, and the yellow-flowered shrub i have mentioned before, and quantities of very sticky heather, feeling when you catch hold of it as if it had been covered with syrup. one might fancy the entire race of shrubs was dying out; for one you see partially alive there are twenty skeletons which fall to pieces as you brush past them. it is downhill the first part of the way, that is to say, the trend of the land is downhill, for be it down or up, the details of it are rugged mounds and masses of burnt-out lava rock. it is evil going, but perhaps not quite so evil as the lower hillocks of the great wall where the rocks are hidden beneath long slippery grass. we wind our way in between the mounds, or clamber over them, or scramble along their sides impartially. the general level is then flat, and then comes a rise towards the peak wall, so we steer n.n.e. until we strike the face of the peak, and then commence a stiff rough climb. we keep as straight as we can, but get driven at an angle by the strange ribs of rock which come straight down. these are most tiresome to deal with, getting worse the higher we go, and so rotten and weather-eaten are they that they crumble into dust and fragments under our feet. head man gets half a dozen falls, and when we are about three parts of the way up xenia gives in. the cold and the climbing are too much for him, so i make him wrap himself up in his blanket, which he is glad enough of now, and shelter in a depression under one of the many rock ridges, and head man and i go on. when we are some feet higher the iron-grey mist comes curling and waving round the rocks above us, like some savage monster defending them from intruders, and i again debate whether i was justified in risking the men, for it is a risk for them at this low temperature, with the evil weather i know, and they do not know, is coming on. but still we have food and blankets with us enough for them, and the camp in the plain below they can reach all right, if the worst comes to the worst; and for myself--well--that's my own affair, and no one will be a ha'porth the worse if i am dead in an hour. so i hitch myself on to the rocks, and take bearings, particularly bearings of xenia's position, who, i should say, has got a tin of meat and a flask of rum with him, and then turn and face the threatening mist. it rises and falls, and sends out arm-like streams towards us, and then bum, the head man, decides to fail for the third time to reach the peak, and i leave him wrapped in his blanket with the bag of provisions, and go on alone into the wild, grey, shifting, whirling mist above, and soon find myself at the head of a rock ridge in a narrowish depression, walled by massive black walls which show fitfully but firmly through the mist. i can see three distinctly high cones before me, and then the mist, finding it cannot drive me back easily, proceeds to desperate methods, and lashes out with a burst of bitter wind, and a sheet of blinding, stinging rain. i make my way up through it towards a peak which i soon see through a tear in the mist is not the highest, so i angle off and go up the one to the left, and after a desperate fight reach the cairn--only, alas! to find a hurricane raging and a fog in full possession, and not a ten yards' view to be had in any direction. near the cairn on the ground are several bottles, some of which the energetic german officers, i suppose, had emptied in honour of their achievement, an achievement i bow down before, for their pluck and strength had taken them here in a shorter time by far than mine. i do not meddle with anything, save to take a few specimens and to put a few more rocks on the cairn, and to put in among them my card, merely as a civility to mungo, a civility his majesty will soon turn into pulp. not that it matters--what is done is done. the weather grows worse every minute, and no sign of any clearing shows in the indigo sky or the wind-reft mist. the rain lashes so fiercely i cannot turn my face to it and breathe, the wind is all i can do to stand up against. verily i am no mountaineer, for there is in me no exultation, but only a deep disgust because the weather has robbed me of my main object in coming here, namely to get a good view and an idea of the way the unexplored mountain range behind calabar trends. i took my chance and it failed, so there's nothing to complain about. comforting myself with these reflections, i start down to find bum, and do so neatly, and then together we scramble down carefully among the rotten black rocks, intent on finding xenia. the scene is very grand. at one minute we can see nothing save the black rocks and cinders under foot; the next the wind-torn mist separates now in one direction, now in another, showing us always the same wild scene of great black cliffs, rising in jagged peaks and walls around and above us. i think this walled cauldron we had just left is really the highest crater on mungo. { } we soon become anxious about xenia, for this is a fearfully easy place to lose a man in such weather, but just as we get below the thickest part of the pall of mist, i observe a doll-sized figure, standing on one leg taking on or off its trousers--our lost xenia, beyond a shadow of a doubt, and we go down direct to him. when we reach him we halt, and i give the two men one of the tins of meat, and take another and the bottle of beer myself, and then make a hasty sketch of the great crater plain below us. at the further edge of the plain a great white cloud is coming up from below, which argues badly for our trip down the great wall to the forest camp, which i am anxious to reach before nightfall after our experience of the accommodation afforded by our camp in the crater plain last night. while i am sitting waiting for the men to finish their meal, i feel a chill at my back, as if some cold thing had settled there, and turning round, see the mist from the summit above coming in a wall down towards us. these mists up here, as far as my experience goes, are always preceded by a strange breath of ice-cold air--not necessarily a wind. bum then draws my attention to a strange funnel-shaped thing coming down from the clouds to the north. a big waterspout, i presume: it seems to be moving rapidly n.e., and i profoundly hope it will hold that course, for we have quite as much as we can manage with the ordinary rain-water supply on this mountain, without having waterspouts to deal with. we start off down the mountain as rapidly as we can. xenia is very done up, and head man comes perilously near breaking his neck by frequent falls among the rocks; my unlucky boots are cut through and through by the latter. when we get down towards the big crater plain, it is a race between us and the pursuing mist as to who shall reach the camp first, and the mist wins, but we have just time to make out the camp's exact position before it closes round us, so we reach it without any real difficulty. when we get there, about one o'clock, i find the men have kept the fires alight and cook is asleep before one of them with another conflagration smouldering in his hair. i get him to make me tea, while the others pack up as quickly as possible, and by two we are all off on our way down to the forest camp. the boys are nervous in their way of going down over the mountain wall. the misadventures of cook alone would fill volumes. monrovia boy is out and away the best man at this work. just as we reach the high jungle grass, down comes the rain and up comes the mist, and we have the worst time we have had during our whole trip, in our endeavours to find the hole in the forest that leads to our old camp. unfortunately, i must needs go in for acrobatic performances on the top of one of the highest, rockiest hillocks. poising myself on one leg i take a rapid slide sideways, ending in a very showy leap backwards which lands me on the top of the lantern i am carrying to- day, among miscellaneous rocks. there being fifteen feet or so of jungle grass above me, all the dash and beauty of my performance are as much thrown away as i am, for my boys are too busy on their own accounts in the mist to miss me. after resting some little time as i fell, and making and unmaking the idea in my mind that i am killed, i get up, clamber elaborately to the top of the next hillock, and shout for the boys, and "ma," "ma," comes back from my flock from various points out of the fog. i find bum and monrovia boy, and learn that during my absence xenia, who always fancies himself as a path-finder, has taken the lead, and gone off somewhere with the rest. we shout and the others answer, and we join them, and it soon becomes evident to the meanest intelligence that xenia had better have spent his time attending to those things of his instead of going in for guiding, for we are now right off the track we made through the grass on our up journey, and we proceed to have a cheerful hour or so in the wet jungle, ploughing hither and thither, trying to find our way. at last we pick up the top of a tongue of forest that we all feel is ours, but we--that is to say, xenia and i, for the others go like lambs to the slaughter wherever they are led--disagree as to the path. he wants to go down one side of the tongue, i to go down the other, and i have my way, and we wade along, skirting the bushes that fringe it, trying to find our hole. i own i soon begin to feel shaky about having been right in the affair, but soon xenia, who is leading, shouts he has got it, and we limp in, our feet sore with rugged rocks, and everything we have on, or in the loads, wringing wet, save the matches, which providentially i had put into my soap- box. anything more dismal than the look of that desired camp when we reach it, i never saw. pools of water everywhere. the fire-house a limp ruin, the camp bed i have been thinking fondly of for the past hour a water cistern. i tilt the water out of it, and say a few words to it regarding its hide-bound idiocy in obeying its military instructions to be waterproof; and then, while the others are putting up the fire-house, head man and i get out the hidden demijohn of rum, and the beef and rice, and i serve out a tot of rum each to the boys, who are shivering dreadfully, waiting for cook to get the fire. he soon does this, and then i have my hot tea and the men their hot food, for now we have returned to the luxury of two cooking pots. their education in bush is evidently progressing, for they make themselves a big screen with boughs and spare blankets, between the wind and the fire-house, and i get xenia to cut some branches, and place them on the top of my waterproof sheet shelter, and we are fairly comfortable again, and the boys quite merry and very well satisfied with themselves. unfortunately the subject of their nightly debating society is human conduct, a subject ever fraught with dangerous elements of differences of opinion. they are busy discussing, with their mouths full of rice and beef, the conduct of an absent friend, who it seems is generally regarded by them as a spendthrift. "he gets plenty money, but he no have none no time." "he go frow it away--on woman, and drink." "he no buy clothes." this last is evidently a very heavy accusation, but kefalla says, "what can a man buy with money better than them thing he like best?" there is a very peculiar look on the rotten wood on the ground round here; to-night it has patches and flecks of iridescence like one sees on herrings or mackerel that have been kept too long. the appearance of this strange eerie light in among the bush is very weird and charming. i have seen it before in dark forests at night, but never so much of it. september th.--fine morning. it's a blessing my pappenheimers have not recognised what this means for the afternoon. we take things very leisurely. i know it's no good hurrying, we are dead sure of getting a ducking before we reach buea anyhow, so we may as well enjoy ourselves while we can. i ask my boys how they would "make fire suppose no matches live." not one of them thinks it possible to do so, "it pass man to do them thing suppose he no got live stick or matches." they are coast boys, all of them, and therefore used to luxury, but it is really remarkable how widely diffused matches are inland, and how very dependent on them these natives are. when i have been away in districts where they have not penetrated, it is exceedingly rarely that the making of fire has to be resorted to. i think i may say that in most african villages it has not had to be done for years and years, because when a woman's fire has gone out, owing to her having been out at work all day, she just runs into some neighbour's hut where there is a fire burning, and gives compliments, and picks up a burning stick from the fire and runs home. from this comes the compliment, equivalent to our "oh! don't go away yet," of "you come to fetch fire." this will be said to you all the way from sierra leone to loanda, as far as i know, if you have been making yourself agreeable in an african home, even if the process may have extended over a day or so. the hunters, like the fans, have to make fire, and do it now with a flint and steel; but in districts where their tutor in this method--the flint-lock gun--is not available, they will do it with two sticks, not always like the american indians' fire-sticks. one stick is placed horizontally on the ground and the other twirled rapidly between the palms of the hands, but sometimes two bits of palm stick are worked in a hole in a bigger bit of wood, the hole stuffed round with the pith of a tree or with silk cotton fluff, and the two sticks rotated vigorously. again, on one occasion i saw a bakele woman make fire by means of a slip of rafia palm drawn very rapidly, to and fro, across a notch in another piece of rafia wood. in most domesticated tribes, like the effiks or the igalwa, if they are going out to their plantation, they will enclose a live stick in a hollow piece of a certain sort of wood, which has a lining of its interior pith left in it, and they will carry this "fire box" with them. or if they are going on a long canoe journey, there is always the fire in the bow of the canoe put into a calabash full of sand, or failing that, into a bed of clay with a sand rim round it. by o'clock we are off down to buea. at . it pours as it can here; by . we are all in our normal condition of bedraggled saturation, and plodding down carefully and cheerfully among the rocks and roots of the forest, following the path we have beaten and cut for ourselves on our way up. it is dangerously slippery, particularly that part of it through the amomums, and stumps of the cut amomums are very likely to spike your legs badly--and, my friend, never, never, step on one of the amomum stems lying straight in front of you, particularly when they are soaking wet. ice slides are nothing to them, and when you fall, as you inevitably must, because all the things you grab hold of are either rotten, or as brittle as salviati glass-ware vases, you hurt yourself in no end of places, on those aforesaid cut amomum stumps. i am speaking from sad experiences of my own, amplified by observations on the experiences of my men. the path, when we get down again into the tree-fern region, is inches deep in mud and water, and several places where we have a drop of five feet or so over lumps of rock are worse work going down than we found them going up, especially when we have to drop down on to amomum stems. one abominable place, a v-shaped hollow, mud- lined, and with an immense tree right across it--a tree one of our tornadoes has thrown down since we passed--bothers the men badly, as they slip and scramble down, and then crawl under the tree and slip and scramble up with their loads. i say nothing about myself. i just take a flying slide of twenty feet or so and shoot flump under the tree on my back, and then deliberate whether it is worth while getting up again to go on with such a world; but vanity forbids my dying like a dog in a ditch, and i scramble up, rejoining the others where they are standing on a cross-path: our path going s.e. by e., the other s.s.w. two men have already gone down the s.w. one, which i feel sure is the upper end of the path sasu had led us to and wasted time on our first day's march; the middle regions of which were, as we had found from its lower end, impassable with vegetation. so after futile attempts to call the other two back, we go on down the s.e. one, and get shortly into a plantation of giant kokos mid-leg deep in most excellent fine mould--the sort of stuff you pay shillings a load for in england to start a conservatory bed with. upon my word, the quantities of things there are left loose in africa, that ought to be kept in menageries and greenhouses and not let go wild about the country, are enough to try a saint. we then pass through a clump of those lovely great tree-ferns. the way their young fronds come up with a graceful curl, like the top of a bishop's staff, is a poem; but being at present fractious, i will observe that they are covered with horrid spines, as most young vegetables are in africa. but talking about spines, i should remark that nothing save that precious climbing palm--i never like to say what i feel about climbing palms, because one once saved my life-- equals the strong bush rope which abounds here. it is covered with short, strong, curved thorns. it creeps along concealed by decorative vegetation, and you get your legs twined in it, and of course injured. it festoons itself from tree to tree, and when your mind is set on other things, catches you under the chin, and gives you the appearance of having made a determined but ineffectual attempt to cut your throat with a saw. it whisks your hat off and grabs your clothes, and commits other iniquities too numerous to catalogue here. years and years that bush rope will wait for a man's blood, and when he comes within reach it will have it. we are well down now among the tree-stems grown over with rich soft green moss and delicate filmy-ferns. i should think that for a botanist these south-eastern slopes of mungo mah lobeh would be the happiest hunting grounds in all west africa. the vegetation here is at the point of its supreme luxuriance, owing to the richness of the soil; the leaves of trees and plants i recognise as having seen elsewhere are here far larger, and the undergrowth particularly is more rich and varied, far and away. ferns seem to find here a veritable paradise. everything, in fact, is growing at its best. we come to another fallen tree over another hole; this tree we recognise as an old acquaintance near buea, and i feel disgusted, for i had put on a clean blouse, and washed my hands in a tea-cupful of water in a cooking pot before leaving the forest camp, so as to look presentable on reaching buea, and not give herr liebert the same trouble he had to recognise the white from the black members of the party that he said he had with the members of the first expedition to the peak; and all i have got to show for my exertion that is clean or anything like dry is one cuff over which i have been carrying a shawl. we double round a corner by the stockade of the station's plantation, and are at the top of the mud glissade--the new government path, i should say--that leads down into the barrack- yard. our arrival brings herr liebert promptly on the scene, as kindly helpful and energetic as ever, and again anxious for me to have a bath. the men bring our saturated loads into my room, and after giving them their food and plenty of tobacco, i get my hot tea and change into the clothes i had left behind at buea, and feeling once more fit for polite society, go out and find his imperial and royal majesty's representative making a door, tightening the boards up with wedges in a very artful and professional way. we discourse on things in general and the mountain in particular. the great south- east face is now showing clear before us, the clearness that usually comes before night-fall. it looks again a vast wall, and i wish i were going up it again to-morrow. when "the calabar major" set it on fire in the dry season it must have been a noble sight. the north-eastern edge of the slope of the mountain seems to me unbroken up to the peak. the great crater we went and camped in must be a very early one in the history of the mountain, and out of it the present summit seems to have been thrown up. from the sea face, the western, i am told the slope is continuous on the whole, although there are several craters on that side; seventy craters all told are so far known on mungo. the last reported eruption was in , when signs of volcanic activity were observed by a captain who was passing at sea. the lava from this eruption must have gone down the western side, for i have come across no fresh lava beds in my wanderings on the other face. herr liebert has no confidence in the mountain whatsoever, and announces his intention of leaving buea with the army on the first symptom of renewed volcanic activity. i attempt to discourage him from this energetic plan, pointing out to him the beauty of that roman soldier at pompeii who was found, centuries after that eruption, still at his post; and if he regards that as merely mechanical virtue, why not pursue the plan of the elder pliny? herr liebert planes away at his door, and says it's not in his orders to make scientific observations on volcanoes in a state of eruption. when it is he'll do so--until it is, he most decidedly will not. he adds pliny was an admiral and sailors are always as curious as cats. buea seems a sporting place for weather even without volcanic eruptions, during the whole tornado season (there are two a year), over-charged tornadoes burst in the barrack yard. from the th of june till the th of august you never see the sun, because of the terrific and continuous wet season downpour. at the beginning and end of this cheerful period occurs a month's tornado season, and the rest of the year is dry, hot by day and cold by night. they are talking of making buea into a sanatorium for the fever- stricken. i do not fancy somehow that it's a suitable place for a man who has got all the skin off his nerves with fever and quinine, and is very liable to chill; but all governments on the coast, english, german, or french, are stark mad on the subject of sanatoriums in high places, though the experience they have had of them has clearly pointed out that they are valueless in west africa, and a man's one chance is to get out to sea on a ship that will take him outside the three-mile-deep fever-belt of the coast. herr liebert gives me some interesting details about the first establishment of the station here and a bother he had with the plantations. only a short time ago the soldiers brought him in some black wood spikes, which they had found with their feet, set into the path leading to the station's koko plantations, to the end of laming the men. on further investigation there were also found pits, carefully concealed with sticks and leaves, and the bottoms lined with bad thorns, also with malicious intent. the local bakwiri chiefs were called in and asked to explain these phenomena existing in a country where peace had been concluded, and the chiefs said it was quite a mistake, those things had not been put there to kill soldiers, but only to attract their attention, to kill and injure their own fellow-tribesmen who had been stealing from plantations latterly. that's the west african's way entirely all along the coast; the "child-like" native will turn out and shoot you with a gun to attract your attention to the fact that a tribe you never heard of has been and stolen one of his ladies, whom you never saw. it's the sweet infant's way of "rousing up popular opinion," but i do not admire or approve of it. if i am to be shot for a crime, for goodness sake let me commit the crime first. september th.--down to victoria in one day, having no desire to renew and amplify my acquaintance with the mission station at buana. it poured torrentially all the day through. the old chief at buana was very nice to-day when we were coming through his territory. he came out to meet us with some of his wives. both men and women among these bakwiri are tattooed, and also painted, on the body, face and arms, but as far as i have seen not on the legs. the patterns are handsome, and more elaborate than any such that i have seen. one man who came with the party had two figures of men tattooed on the region where his waistcoat should have been. i gave the chief some tobacco though he never begged for anything. he accepted it thankfully, and handing it to his wives preceded us on our path for about a mile and a half and then having reached the end of his district, we shook hands and parted. after all the rain we have had, the road was of course worse than ever, and as we were going through the forest towards the war hedge, i noticed a strange sound, a dull roar which made the light friable earth quiver under our feet, and i remembered with alarm the accounts herr liebert has given me of the strange ways of rivers on this mountain; how by buea, about metres below where you cross it, the river goes bodily down a hole. how there is a waterfall on the south face of the mountain that falls right into another hole, and is never seen again, any more than the buea river is. how there are in certain places underground rivers, which though never seen can be heard roaring, and felt in the quivering earth under foot in the wet season, and so on. so i judged our present roar arose from some such phenomenon, and with feminine nervousness began to fear that the rotten water-logged earth we were on might give way, and engulf the whole of us, and we should never be seen again. but when we got down into our next ravine, the one where i got the fish and water-spiders on our way up, things explained themselves. the bed of this ravine was occupied by a raging torrent of great beauty, but alarming appearance to a person desirous of getting across to the other side of it. on our right hand was a waterfall of tons of water thirty feet high or so. the brown water wreathed with foam dashed down into the swirling pool we faced, and at the other edge of the pool, striking a ridge of higher rock, it flew up in a lovely flange some twelve feet or so high, before making another and a deeper spring to form a second waterfall. my men shouted to me above the roar that it was "a bad place." they never give me half the credit i deserve for seeing danger, and they said, "water all go for hole down there, we fit to go too suppose we fall." "don't fall," i yelled which was the only good advice i could think of to give them just then. each small load had to be carried across by two men along a submerged ridge in the pool, where the water was only breast high. i had all i could do to get through it, though assisted by my invaluable bakwiri staff. but no harm befell. indeed we were all the better for it, or at all events cleaner. we met five torrents that had to be waded during the day; none so bad as the first but all superbly beautiful. when we turned our faces westwards just above the wood we had to pass through before getting into the great road, the view of victoria, among its hills, and fronted by its bay, was divinely lovely and glorious with colour. i left the boys here, as they wanted to rest, and to hunt up water, etc., among the little cluster of huts that are here on the right-hand side of the path, and i went on alone down through the wood, and out on to the road, where i found my friend, the alsatian engineer, still flourishing and busy with his cheery gang of woodcutters. i made a brief halt here, getting some soda water. i was not anxious to reach victoria before nightfall, but yet to reach it before dinner, and while i was chatting, my boys came through the wood and the engineer most kindly gave them a tot of brandy apiece, to which i owe their arrival in victoria. i left them again resting, fearing i had overdone my arrangements for arriving just after nightfall and went on down that road which was more terrible than ever now to my bruised, weary feet, but even more lovely than ever in the dying light of the crimson sunset, with all its dark shadows among the trees begemmed with countless fire-flies--and so safe into victoria--sneaking up the government house hill by the private path through the botanical gardens. idabea, the steward, turned up, and i asked him to let me have some tea and bread and butter, for i was dreadfully hungry. he rushed off, and i heard tremendous operations going on in the room above. in a few seconds water poured freely down through the dining-room ceiling. it was bath palaver again. the excellent idabea evidently thought it was severely wanted, more wanted than such vanities as tea. fortunately, herr von lucke was away down in town, looking after duty as usual, so i was tidy before he returned to dinner. when he returned he had the satisfaction a prophet should feel. i had got half-drowned, and i had got an awful cold, the most awful cold in the head of modern times, i believe, but he was not artistically exultant over my afflictions. my men having all reported themselves safe i went to my comfortable rooms, but could not turn in, so fascinating was the warmth and beauty down here; and as i sat on the verandah overlooking victoria and the sea, in the dim soft light of the stars, with the fire-flies round me, and the lights of victoria away below, and heard the soft rush of the lukola river, and the sound of the sea-surf on the rocks, and the tom-tomming and singing of the natives, all matching and mingling together, "why did i come to africa?" thought i. why! who would not come to its twin brother hell itself for all the beauty and the charm of it! chapter xxi. trade and labour in west africa. as i am under the impression that the trade of the west african coast is its most important attribute, i hope i may be pardoned for entering into this subject. my chief excuse for so doing lies in the fact that independent travellers are rare in the bights. the last one i remember hearing of was that unfortunate gentleman who went to the coast for pleasure and lost a leg on lagos bar. now i have not lost any portion of my anatomy anywhere on the coast, and therefore have no personal prejudice against the place. i hold a brief for no party, and i beg the more experienced old coaster to remember that "a looker on sees the most of the game." first of all it should be remembered that africa does not possess ready-made riches to the extent it is in many quarters regarded as possessing. it is not an india filled with the accumulated riches of ages, waiting for the adventurer to enter and shake the pagoda tree. the pagoda tree in africa only grows over stores of buried ivory, and even then it is a stunted specimen to that which grew over the treasure-houses of delhi, seringapatam, and hundreds of others as rich as they in gems and gold. africa has lots of stuff in it; structurally more than any other continent in the world, but it is very much in the structure, and it requires hard work to get it out, particularly out of one of its richest regions, the west coast, where the gold, silver, copper, lead, and petroleum lie protected against the miner by african fever in its deadliest form, and the produce prepared by the natives for the trader is equally fever-guarded, and requires white men of a particular type to work and export it successfully--men endowed with great luck, pluck, patience, and tact. the first things to be considered are the natural resources of the country. this subject may be divided into two sub-sections--( ) the means of working these resources as they at present stand; ( ) the question of the possibility of increasing them by introducing new materials of trade-value in the shape of tea, coffee, cocoa, etc. with regard to the first sub-division the most cheerful things that there are to say on the west coast trade can be said; the means of transport being ahead of the trade in all districts save the gold coast. i know this is heresy, so i will attempt to explain the matter. first, as regards communication to europe by sea, the west coast is extremely well off, the two english lines of steamers managed by messrs. elder dempster, the british african, and the royal african, are most enterprisingly conducted, and their devotion to trade is absolutely pathetic. let there be but the least vague rumour (sometimes i have thought they have not waited for the rumour, but "gone in" as an experiment) of a puncheon of oil, or a log of timber waiting for shipment at an out-of-the-world, one house port, one of these vessels will bear down on that port, and have that cargo. in addition to the english lines there is the woermann line, equally devoted to cargo, i may almost say even more so, for it is currently reported that woermann liners will lie off and wait for the stuff to grow. this i will not vouch for, but i know the time allowed to a woermann captain by his owners between cameroons and big batanga just round the corner is eight days. these english and german lines, having come to a friendly understanding regarding freights, work the bights of benin, biafra, and panavia, without any rivals, save now and again the vessels chartered by the african association to bring out a big cargo, and the four sailing vessels belonging to the association which give an eighteenth-century look to the rivers, and have great adventures on the bars of opobo and bonny. { } the bristol ships on the half jack coast are not rivals, but a sort of floating factories, shipping their stuff home and getting it out by the regular lines of steamers. the english and german liners therefore carry the bulk of the trade from the whole coast. their services are complicated and frequent, but perfectly simple when you have grasped the fact that the english lines may be divided into two sub-divisions--liverpool boats and hamburg boats, either of which are liable when occasion demands to call at havre. the liverpool line is the mail line to the more important ports, the hamburg line being almost entirely composed of cargo vessels calling at the smaller ports as well as the larger. there is another classification that must be grasped. the english boats being divided into, firstly, a line having its terminus at sierra leone and calling at the isles do los; secondly, a line having its terminus at akassa; thirdly, a line having its terminus at old calabar; fourthly, a line having its terminus at san paul de loanda, and in addition, a direct line from antwerp to the congo, chartered by the congo free state government. division , the south-westers, are the quickest vessels as far as lagos, for they only call at the canaries, sierra leone, off the kru coast, at accra, and off lagos; then they run straight from lagos into cameroons, without touching the rivers, reaching cameroons in twenty-seven days from liverpool. after cameroons they cross to fernando po and run into victoria, and then work their way steadily down coast to their destination. thence up again, doing all they know to extract cargo, but never succeeding as they would wish, and so being hungry in the hold when they get back to the bight of benin, they are liable to smell cargo and go in after it, and therefore are not necessarily the quickest boats home. two french companies run to the french possessions, subsidised by their government (as the german line is, and as our lines are not)-- the chargeurs reunis and the fraissinet. the south-west coast liners of these companies run to gaboon and then to koutonu, up near lagos, then back to gaboon, and down as far as loango, calling on their way home at the other ports in congo francais. they are mainly carriers of import goods, because they run to time, and on the south-west coast unless time has an ameliorating touch of eternity in it you cannot get export goods off. below the congo the rivals of the english and german lines are the vessels of the portuguese line, empreza nacional. these run from lisbon to the cape verde islands, thence to san thome and principe, then to the ports of angola (loanda, benguella, mossamedes, ambrizette, etc.), and they carry the bulk of the angola trade at present, because of the preferential dues on goods shipped in portuguese bottoms. the service of english vessels to the west coast is weekly; to the rivers fortnightly; to the south-west coast monthly; and it is the chief thing in west coast trade enterprise that england has to be proud of. any one of the english boats will go anywhere that mortal boat can go; and their captains' local knowledge is a thing england at large should be proud of and the rest of the civilised world regard with awe-stricken admiration. that they leave no room for further development of ocean carriage has been several times demonstrated by the collapse of lines that have attempted to rival them--the prince line and more recently the general steam navigation. but although the west coast trader has at his disposal these vessels, he has by no means an easy time, or cheap methods, of getting his stuff on board, save at sierra leone and in the oil rivers. of the gold coast surf, and lagos bar i have already spoken, and the calemma as we call the south-west coast surf is nearly, if not quite as bad as that on the gold coast. indeed i hold it is worse, but then i have had more experience of it, and it has frequently to be worked in native dugouts, and not in the well- made surf boats used on the gold coast. but although these surf- boats are more safe they are also more expensive than canoes, as a fine or pounds surf-boat's average duration of life is only two years in the gold coast surf, so there is little to choose from a commercial standpoint between the two surfs when all is done. as regards interior transport, the difficulty is greater, but in the majority of the west coast possessions of european powers there exist great facilities for transport in the network of waterways near the coast and the great rivers running far into the interior. these waterways are utilised by the natives, being virtually roads; in many districts practically the only roads existing for the transport of goods in bulk, or in the present state of the trade required to exist. but there is room for more white enterprise in the matter of river navigation; and my own opinion is that if english capital were to be employed in the direction of small suitably-built river steamers, it would be found more repaying than lines of railway. waterways that might be developed in this manner exist in the cross river, the volta, and the ancobra. i do not say that there will be any immediate dividend on these river steamboat lines, but i do not think that there will be any dividend, immediate or remote, on railways in west africa. this question of transport is at present regarded as a burning one throughout the continent; and for the well-being of certain parts of the west coast railways are essential, such as at lagos, and on the gold coast. of lagos i do not pretend to speak. i have never been ashore there. of the gold coast i have seen a little, and heard a great deal more, and i think i may safely say that railway making would not be difficult on it, for it is good hard land, not stretches of rotten swamp. the great difficulty in making railroads here will consist in landing the material through the surf. this difficulty cannot be got over, except at enormous expense, by making piers, but it might be surmounted by sending the plant ashore on small bar boats that could get up the volta or ancobra. when up the volta it may be said, "it would be nowhere when any one wanted it," but the cast-iron idea that goods must go ashore at places where there are government headquarters like accra and cape coast, places where the surf is about at its worst, seems to me an erroneous one. the landing place at cape coast might be made safe and easy by the expenditure of a few thousands in "developing" that rock which at present gives shelter when you get round the lee side of it, but this would only make things safer for surf-boats. no other craft could work this bit of beach; and there is plenty of room for developing the volta, as it is a waterway which a vessel drawing six feet can ascend fifty miles from july till november, and thirty miles during the rest of the year. the worst point about the volta is the badness of its bar--a great semicircular sweep with heavy breakers--too bad a bar for boats to cross; but a steamer on the lagos bar boat plan might manage it, as the bull frog reported in nineteen to twenty-one feet on it, one hour before high water. the absence of this bar boat, and the impossibility of sending goods out in surf-boats across the bar, causes the goods from adda (riverside), the chief town on the volta, situated about six miles up the river from its mouth, to be carried across the spit of land to beach town, and then brought out through the shore surf--the worst bit of surf on the whole gold coast. the ancobra is a river which penetrates the interior, through a district very rich in gold and timber and more than suspected of containing petroleum. it is from eighty to one hundred yards wide up as far as akanko, and during the rains carries three and a half to four and a half fathoms, and boats are taken up to tomento about forty miles from its mouth with goods to the wassaw gold mines. but the bar of the ancobra is shallow, only giving six feet, although it is firm and settled, not like that of the volta and lagos; and the portuguese, in the sixteenth century, used to get up this river, and work the country to a better profit than we do nowadays. the other chief gold coast river, the bosum prah, that enters the sea at chama, is no use for navigation from the sea, being obstructed with rock and rapids, and its bar only carrying two feet; but whether these rivers are used or not for the landing of railroad plant, it is certain that that plant must be landed, and the railways made, for if ever a district required them the gold coast does. it is to be hoped it will soon enter into the phase of construction, for it is a return to the trade (from which it draws its entire revenue) that the local government owes, and owes heavily; and if our new acquisition of ashantee is to be developed, it must have a railway bringing it in touch with the coast trade, not necessarily running into coomassie, but near enough to coomassie to enable goods to be sold there at but a small advance on coast prices. it is an error, easily fallen into, to imagine that the natives in the interior are willing to give much higher prices than the sea- coast natives for goods. be it granted that they are compelled now to give say on an average seventy-five per cent. higher prices to the sea-coast natives who at present act as middlemen between them and the white trader, but if the white trader goes into the interior, he has to face, first, the difficulty of getting his goods there safely; secondly, the opposition of the native traders who can, and will drive him out of the market, unless he is backed by easy and cheap means of transport. take the case of coomassie now. a merchant, let us say, wants to take up from the coast to coomassie , pounds worth of goods to trade with. to transport this he has to employ , carriers at one shilling and three pence per day a head. the time taken is eight days there, and eight days back, = sixteen days, which figures out at , pounds, without allowing for loss and damage. in order to buy produce with these goods that will cover this, and all shipping expenses, etc., he would have to sell at a far higher figure in coomassie than he would on the sea- coast, and the native traders would easily oust him from the market. moreover so long as a district is in the hands of native traders there is no advance made, and no development goes forward; and it would be a grave error to allow this to take place at coomassie, now that we have at last done what we should have done in and taken actual possession, for coomassie is a grand position that, if properly managed for a few years, will become a great interior market, attracting to itself the routes of interior trade. it is not now a great centre; because of the oppression and usury which the kings of ashantee have inflicted on all in their power, and which have caused coomassie mainly to attract one form of trade, viz., slaves; who were used in their constant human sacrifices, and for whom a higher price was procurable here than from the mohammedan tribes to the north under french sway. and as for the other trade stuffs, they have naturally for years drained into the markets of the french soudan; instead of through such a country as ashantee, into the markets of the english gold coast; and so unless we run a railroad up to encourage the white traders to go inland, and make a market that will attract these trade routes into coomassie, we shall be a few years hence singing out "what's the good of ashantee?" and so forth, as is our foolish wont, never realising that the west coast is not good unless it is made so by white effort. the new regime on the gold coast is undoubtedly more active than the old--more alive to the importance of pushing inland and so forth-- and a road is going to be made twenty-five feet wide all the way to coomassie, and then beyond it, which is an excellent thing in its way. but it will not do much for trade, because the pacification of the country, and the greater security of personal property to the native, which our rule will afford will aid him in bringing his goods to the coast, but not so greatly aid our taking our goods inland, for the carriers will require just as much for carrying goods along a road, as they do for carrying goods along a bush path, and rightly too, for it is quite as heavy work for them, and heavier, as i know from my experience of the governmental road in cameroon. in such a country as west africa there can be no doubt that a soft bush path with a thick coating of moss and leaves on it, and shaded from the sun above by the interlacing branches, is far and away better going than a hard, sunny wide road. this road will be valuable for military expeditions possibly, but military expeditions are not everyday affairs on the gold coast; and it cannot be of use for draught animals, because of the horse-sickness and tsetse fly which occur as soon as you get into the forest behind the littoral region: so it must not be regarded as an equivalent for steam transport, as it will only serve to bring down the little trickle of native trade, and possibly not increase that trickle much. the question of transport of course is not confined to the gold coast. below lagos there is the great river system, towards which the trade slowly drains through native hands to the white man's factories on the river banks, but this trade being in the hands of native traders is not a fraction of what it would become in the hands of white men; and any mineral wealth there may be in the heavily-forested stretches of country remains unworked and unknown. the difficulty of transport here greatly hampers the exploitation of the timber wealth, it being utterly useless for the natives to fell even a fine tree, unless it is so close to a waterway that it can be floated down to the factory. this it is which causes the ebony, bar, and cam wood to be cut up by them into small billets which a man can carry. the french and germans are both now following the plan of getting as far as possible into the interior by the waterways, and then constructing railways. the construction of these railways is fairly easy, as regards gradients, and absence of dense forest, when your waterway takes you up to the great park-like plateau lands which extend, as a general rule, behind the forest belt, and the inevitable mountain range. the most important of these railways will be that of m. de brazza up the sanga valley in the direction of the chad. when this railway is constructed, it will be the death of the cameroon and oil river trade, more particularly of the latter, for in the cameroons the germans have broken down the monopoly of the coast tribes, which we in our possessions under the niger coast protectorate have not. the niger company has broken through, and taken full possession of a great interior, doing a bit of work of which every englishman should feel proud, for it is the only thing in west africa that places us on a level with the french and germans in courage and enterprise in penetrating the interior, and fortunately the regions taken over by the company are rich and not like the senegal "made of sand and savage savages." where in west africa outside the company will you find men worthy as explorers to be named in the same breath with de brazza, captain binger, and zintgraff? some day, i fear when it will be too late, we shall realise the foolishness of sticking down on the sea coast, tidying up our settlements, establishing schools, and drains, and we shall find our possessions in the rivers and along the gold coast valueless, particularly in the rivers, for the trade will surely drain towards the markets along the line of the french railroad behind them, for the middlemen tribe that we foster exact a toll of seventy-five per cent. on the trade that comes through their hands, and the english government is showing great signs of an inclination to impose such duties on the only stuff the native cares much for--alcohol--that he will take his goods to the market where he can get his alcohol; even if he pays a toll to these markets of fifty per cent. but of this i will speak later, and we will return to the question of transport. mr. scott elliot, { } speaking on this subject as regarding east african regions, has given us a most interesting contribution based on his personal experience, and official figures. as many of his observations and figures are equally applicable to the west coast, i hope i may be forgiven for quoting him. his criticism is in favour of the utilisation of every mile of waterway available. he says, regarding the victoria nyanza, that "it is possible to place on it a steamer at the cost of , pounds. taking the cost of maintenance, fuel and working expenses at , pounds a year (a large estimate) a capital expenditure of , pounds, ( , pounds for the steamer and , pounds to yield three per cent. interest) would enable this steamer to convey, say thirty tons at the rate of five to ten miles an hour for , pounds a year. this makes it possible to convey a ton at the rate of a halfpenny a mile, while it would require about , pounds to build a railway only eighteen miles long." the congo free state railway i am informed, has cost, at a rate per mile, something like eight times this. further on mr. elliot says: "in america the surplus population of europe, and the markets in the eastern states have made railway development profitable on the whole, but in africa, until pioneer work has been done, and the prospects of colonisation and plantation are sufficiently definite and settled to induce colonists to go out in considerable numbers, it will be ruinous to build a long railway line." i do not quote these figures to discourage the west coaster from his railway, but only to induce him to get his government to make it in the proper direction, namely, into the interior, where further development of trade is possible. judging from other things in english colonies, i should expect, if left to the spirit of english (west coast) enterprise, it would run in a line that would enable the engine drivers to keep an eye on the atlantic ocean instead of the direction in which it is high time our eyes should be turned. i confess i am not an enthusiast on civilising the african. my idea is that the french method of dealing with africa is the best at present. get as much of the continent as possible down on the map as yours, make your flag wherever you go a sacred thing to the native--a thing he dare not attack. then, when you have done this, you may abandon the french plan, and gradually develop the trade in an english manner, but not in the english manner a la sierra leone. but do your pioneer work first. there is a very excellent substratum for english pioneer work on our coasts in the trading community, for trade is the great key to the african's heart, and everywhere the english trader and his goods stand high in west african esteem. this pioneer work must be undertaken, or subsidised by the government as it has been in the french possessions, for the west coast does not offer those inducements to the ordinary traveller that, let us say, east africa with its magnificent herds of big game, or the northern frontier of india, with its mountains and its interesting forms, relics, and monuments of a high culture, offer. travel in west africa is very hard work, and very unhealthy. there are many men who would not hesitate for a moment to go there, were the dangers of the native savagery the chief drawback; but they hesitate before a trip which means, in all probability, month after month of tramping through wet gloomy forests with a swamp here and there for a change, { } and which will, the chances are to , end in their dying ignominiously of fever in some wretched squalid village. reckless expenditure of money in attempts to open up the country is to be deprecated, for this hampers its future terribly, even if attended with partial success, the mortgage being too heavy for the estate, as the congo free state finances show; and if it is attended with failure it discourages further efforts. what we want at present in west africa are three or four bingers and zintgraffs to extend our possessions northwards, eastwards, and south-eastwards, until they command the interior trade routes. and there is no reason that these men should enter from the west coast, getting themselves killed, or half killed, with fever, before they reach their work. uganda, if half one hears of it is true, would be a very suitable base for them to start from, and then travelling west they might come down to the present limit of our west coast possessions. this belt of territory across the continent would give us control of, and place us in touch with, the whole of the interior trade. a belt from north to south in africa--thanks to our supineness and folly--we can now never have. i will now briefly deal with the second sub-division i spoke of some pages back--the possibility of introducing new trade exports by means of cultivating plantations. the soil of west africa is extremely rich in places, but by no means so in all, for vast tracts of it are mangrove swamps, and other vast tracts of it are miserably poor, sour, sandy clay. it is impossible in the space at my disposal to enter into a full description of the localities where these unprofitable districts occur, but you will find them here and there all along the coast after leaving sierra leone. the sour clay seems to be new soil recently promoted into the mainland from dried- up mangrove swamps, and a good rough rule is, do not start a plantation on soil that is not growing hard-wood forest. considerable areas on the gold coast, even though the soil is good, are now useless for cultivation, on account of their having been deforested by the natives' wasteful way of making their farms, coupled with the harmattan and the long dry season. the regions of richest soil are not in our possessions, but in those of germany, france, spain, and portugal, namely, the cameroons and its volcanic island series, fernando po, principe, and san thome. the rich volcanic earths of these places will enable them to compete in the matter of plantations with any part of the known world. cameroons is undoubtedly the best of these, because of its superior river supply, and although not in the region of the double seasons it is just on the northern limit of them, and the height of the peak-- , feet--condenses the water-laden air from its surrounding swamps and the atlantic, so that rain is pretty frequent throughout the year. when within the region of the double seasons just south of cameroons you have a rainfall no heavier than that of the rivers, yet better distributed, an essential point for the prosperity of such plantations as those of tea and tobacco, which require showers once a month. to the north of cameroons there is no prospect of either of these well-paying articles being produced in a quantity, or quality, that would compete with south america, india, or the malayan regions, and they will have to depend in the matter of plantations on coffee and cacao. below cameroons, congo francais possesses the richest soil and an excellently arranged climate. the lower congo soil is bad and poor close to the river. kacongo, the bit of portuguese territory to the north of the congo banks, and that part of angola as far as the river bingo, are pretty much the same make of country as congo francais, only less heavily forested. the whole of angola is an immensely rich region, save just round loanda where the land is sand-logged for about fifty square miles, and those regions to the extreme south and south-east, which are in the kalahari desert regions. coffee grows wild throughout angola in those districts removed from the dry coast-lands--in the districts of golongo alto and cassengo in great profusion, and you can go through utterly uncultivated stretches of it, thirty miles of it at a time. the natives, now the merchants have taught them its value, are collecting this wild berry and bringing it in in quantities, and in addition the english firm of newton and carnegie have started plantations up at cassengo. the greater part of these plantations consist of clearing and taking care of the wild coffee, but in addition regularly planting and cultivating young trees, as it is found that the yield per tree is immensely increased by cultivation. six hundred to eight hundred bags a month were shipped from ambrizette alone when i was there in , and the amount has since increased and will still further increase when that leisurely, but very worthy little railroad line, which proudly calls itself the royal trans-african, shall have got its sections made up into the coffee district. it was about thirty miles off at ambaca when i was in angola, but by now it may have got further. however, i do not think it is very likely to have gone far, and i have a persuasion that that railroad will not become trans-african in my day; still it has an "immediate future" compared with that which any other west coast railway can expect; for besides the coffee, angola is rich in malachite and gum of high quality, and its superior government will attract the rubber from the kassai region of the congo free state. in our own possessions the making of plantations is being carried on with much energy by messrs. miller brothers on the gold coast, { } by several private capitalists, including mr. a. l. jones of liverpool, at lagos; by the royal niger company in their territory, and by several head agents in the niger coast protectorate. sir claude macdonald offered every inducement to this trade development, and gave great material help by founding a botanical station at old calabar, where plants could be obtained. he did his utmost to try and get the natives to embark on plantation-making, ably seconded by mr. billington, the botanist in charge of the botanical station, who wrote an essay in effik on coffee growing and cultivation at large for their special help and guidance. a few chiefs, to oblige, took coffee plants, but they are not enthusiastic, for the slaves that would be required to tend coffee and keep it clean, in this vigorous forest region, are more profitably employed now in preparing palm oil. of the coffee plantation at man o' war bay i have already spoken, and of those in congo francais, which, although not at present shipping like the german plantation, will soon be doing so. in addition to coffee and cacao attempts are being made in congo francais to introduce the para rubber tree, a large plantation of which i frequently visited near libreville, and found to be doing well. this would be an excellent tree to plant in among coffee, for it is very clean and tidy, and seems as if it would take to west africa like a duck to water, but it is not a quick cropper, and i am informed must be left at least three or four years before it is tapped at all, so, as the gardening books would say, it should be planted early. it is very possible many other trees producing tropical products valuable in commerce might be introduced successfully into west africa. the cultivation of cloves and nutmegs would repay here well, for allied species of trees and shrubs are indigenous, but the first of these trees takes a long time before coming into bearing and the cultivation of the second is a speculative affair. allspice i have found growing wild in several districts, but in no large quantity. cotton with a fine long staple grows wild in quantities wherever there is open ground, but it is not cultivated by the natives; and when attempts have been made to get them to collect it they do so, but bring it in very dirty, and the traders having no machinery to compress it like that used in america, it does not pay to ship. indigo is common everywhere along the coast and used by the natives for dyeing, as is also a teazle, which gives a very fine permanent maroon; and besides these there are many other dyes and drugs used by them--colocynth, datura soap bark, cardamom, ginger, peppers, strophanthus, nux vomica, etc., etc., but the difficulty of getting these things brought in to the traders in sufficient quantities prevents their being exported to any considerable extent. tea has not been tried, and is barely worth trying, though there is little doubt it would grow in cameroons and congo francais where it would have an excellent climate and pretty nearly any elevation it liked. but i believe tea has of late years been discovered to be like coffee, not such a stickler for elevation as it used to be thought, merely requiring not to have its roots in standing water. vanilla grows with great luxuriance in cameroons. in victoria a grove of gigantic cacao trees is heavily overgrown with this lovely orchid in a most perfect way. it does not seem to injure the cacaos in the least, and there are other kinds of trees it will take equally well to. i saw it growing happily and luxuriantly under the direction of the roman catholic mission at landana; but it requires a continuously damp climate. vanilla when once started gives little or no trouble, and its pods do not require any very careful manipulation before sending to europe, and this is a very important point, for a great hindrance--the great hindrance to plantation enterprise on the coast--is the difficulty of getting neat-handed labourers. i had once the pleasure of meeting a dutch gentleman--a plantation expert, who had been sent down the west coast by a firm trading there, and also in the malay archipelago--prospecting, at a heavy fee, to see whether it would pay the firm to open up plantations there better than in malaysia. i believe his final judgment was adverse to the west african plan, because of the difficulty of getting skilful natives to tend young plants, and prepare the products. tea he regarded as quite hopeless from this difficulty, and he said he did not think you would ever get africans at as cheap a rate, or so deftly fingered to roll tea, as you can get asiatics. no one knows until they have tried it the trouble it is to get an african to do things carefully; but it is a trouble, not an impossibility. if you don't go off with fever from sheer worry and vexation the thing can be done, but in the meantime he is maddening. i have had many a day's work on plantations instructing cheerful, willing, apparently intelligent ethiopians of various sexes and sizes on the mortal crime of hoeing up young coffee plants. they have quite seen it. "oh, lor! massa, i no fit to do dem thing." aren't they! you go along to-morrow morning, and you'll find your most promising pupils laying around them with their hoes, talking about the disgraceful way their dearest friends go on, and destroying young coffee right and left. they are just as bad, if not slightly worse, particularly the ladies, when it comes to picking coffee. as soon as your eye is off them, the bough is off the tree. i know one planter who leads the life of the surprise captain in w. h. s. gilbert's ballad, lurking among his groves, and suddenly appearing among his pickers. this, he says, has given them a feeling of uncertainty as to when and where he may appear, kassengo and all, that has done much to preserve his plantation; but it is a wearying life, not what he expected from his book on coffee- plantations, which had a frontispiece depicting a planter seated in his verandah, with a tumblerful of something cool at his right hand, and a pipe in his mouth, contemplating a large plantation full of industrious natives picking berries into baskets on all sides. labour.--the labour problem is one that must be studied and solved before west africa can advance much further than its present culture condition, because the climate is such that the country cannot be worked by white labourers; and that this state of affairs will remain as it is until some true specific is discovered for malaria, something important happens to the angle of the earth's axis, or some radical change takes place in the nature of the sun, is the opinion of all acquainted with the region. the west african climate shows no signs of improving whatsoever. if it shows any sign of alteration it is for the worse, for of late years two extremely deadly forms of fever have come into notice here, malarial typhoid and blackwater. the malarial typhoid seems confined to districts where a good deal of european attention has been given to drainage systems, which is in itself discouraging. the labour problem has been imported with european civilisation. the civilisation has not got on to any considerable extent, but the labour problem has; for, being a malignant nuisance, it has taken to west africa as a duck to water, and it is now flourishing. it has not yet, however, attained its zenith; it is just waiting for the abolition of domestic slavery for that--and then! meanwhile it grows with the demand for hands to carry on plantation work, and public works. on the west coast--that is to say, from sierra leone to cameroon--it is worse than on the south west coast from cameroon to benguella. the kruman, the accra, and the sierra leonian are at present on the west coast the only solution available. the first is as fine a ship-and-beach-man as you could reasonably wish for, but no good for plantation work. the second is, thanks to the practical training he has received from the basel mission, a very fair artisan, cook, or clerk, but also no good for plantation work, except as an overseer. the third is a poor artisan, an excellent clerk, or subordinate official, but so unreliable in the matter of honesty as to be nearly reliable to swindle any employer. lagos turns out a large quantity of educated natives, but owing to the growing prosperity of the colony, these are nearly all engaged in lagos itself. an important but somewhat neglected factor in the problem is the nature of the west african native, and as i think a calm and unbiassed study of this factor would give us the satisfactory solution to the problem, i venture to give my own observations on it. the kruboys, as the natives of the grain coast are called, irrespective of the age of the individual, by the white men--the menekussi as the effiks call them--are the most important people of west africa; for without their help the working of the coast would cost more lives than it already does, and would be in fact practically impossible. ever since vessels have regularly frequented the bights, the kruman has had the helpful habit of shipping himself off on board, and doing all the heavy work. their first tutors were the slavers, who initiated them into the habit, and instructed them in ship's work, that they might have the benefit of their services in working their vessels along the slave coast. and in order to prevent any kruboy being carried off as a slave by mistake, which would have prejudiced these useful allies, the slavers persuaded them always to tattoo a band of basket-work pattern down their foreheads and out on to the tip of their broad noses: this is the most extensive bit of real tattoo that i know of in west africa, and the kruboys still keep the fashion. their next tutors were the traders, who have taught and still teach them beach work; how to handle cargo, try oil, and make themselves generally useful in a factory,--"learn sense," as the kruboy himself puts it. to religious teaching the kruboy seems for an african singularly impervious, but the two lessons he has learnt--ship and shore work-- are the best that the white has so far taught the black, because unattended with the evil consequences that have followed the other lessons. unfortunately, the kruman of the grain coast and the cabinda of the south west coast, are the only two tribes that have had the benefit of this kind of education, but there are many other tribes who, had circumstances led the trader and the slaver to turn their attention to them, would have done their tutors quite as much credit. but circumstances did not, and so nowadays, just as a hundred years ago, you must get the kruboy to help you if you are going to do any work, missionary or mercantile, from sierra leone to cameroon. below cameroon the kruboy does not like to go, except to the beach of an english or german house, for he has suffered much from the congo free state, and from spaniards and portuguese, who have not respected his feelings in the matter of wanting to return every year, or every two years at the most, to his own country, and his rooted aversion to agricultural work and carrying loads about the bush. the pay of the kruboy averages pounds a month. there are modifications in the way in which this sum is reached; for example, some missionaries pay each man pounds a year, but then he has to find his own chop. some south-west coast traders pay pounds a year, but they find their boys entirely, and well, in food, and give them a cloth a week. english men-of-war on the west african station have, like other vessels to take them on to save the white crew, and they pay the kruboys the same as they pay the white men, i.e., pounds s. a month with rations. needless to say, men-of-war are popular, although service on board them cuts our friend off from almost every chance of stealing chickens and other things of which i may not speak, as herodotus would say. i do not know the manner in which men-of-war pay off the kruboy, but i think in hard cash. in the circles of society i most mix with on the coast--the mercantile marine and the trading--he is always paid in goods, in cloth, gin, guns, tobacco, gunpowder, etc., with little concessions to his individual fancy in the matter, for each of these articles has a known value, and just as one of our coins can be changed, so you can get here change for a gun or any other trade article. the kruboy much prefers being paid off in goods. i well remember an exquisite scene between captain --- and king koffee of the kru coast when the subject of engaging boys was being shouted over one voyage out. the captain at that time thought i was a w.w.t.a.a. and ostentatiously wanted koffee to let him pay off the boys he was engaging to work the ship in money, and not in gin and gunpowder. king koffee's face was a study. if captain ---, whom he knew of old, had stood on his head and turned bright blue all over with yellow spots, before his eyes, it would not have been anything like such a shock to his majesty. "what for good him ting, cappy?" he said, interrogation and astonishment ringing in every word. "what for good him ting for we country, cappy? i suppose you gib gin, tobacco, gun he be fit for trade, but money--" here his majesty's feelings flew ahead of the royal command of language, great as that was, and he expectorated with profound feeling and expression. captain ---'s expressive countenance was the battle ground of despair and grief at being thus forced to have anything to do with a traffic unpopular in missionary circles. he however controlled his feelings sufficiently to carefully arrange the due amount of each article to be paid, and the affair was settled. the somewhat cumbrous wage the kruboy gets at the end of his term of service, minus those things he has had on account and plus those things he has "found," is certainly a source of great worry to our friend. he obtains a box from the carpenter of the factory, or buys a tin one, and puts therein his tobacco and small things, and then he buys a padlock and locks his box of treasure up, hanging the key with his other ju-jus round his neck, and then he has peace regarding this section of his belongings. peace at present, for the day must some time dawn when an experimental genius shall arise among his fellow countrymen, who will try and see if one key will not open two locks. when this possibility becomes known i can foresee nothing for the kruboy but nervous breakdown; for even now, with his mind at rest regarding the things in his box, he lives in a state of constant anxiety about those out of it, which have to lie on the deck during the return voyage to his home. he has to keep a vigilant eye on them by day, and sleep spread out over them by night, for fear of his companions stealing them. why he should take all this trouble about his things on his voyage home i can't make out, if what is currently reported is true, that all the wages earned by the working boys become the property of the elders of his tribe when he returns to them. i myself rather doubt if this is the case, but expect there is a very heavy tax levied on them, for your kruboy is very much a married man, and the elders of his tribe have to support and protect his wives and families when he is away at work, and i should not wonder if the law was that these said wives and families "revert to the state" if the boy fails to return within something like his appointed time. there must be something besides nostalgia to account for the dreadful worry and apprehension shown by a detained kruboy. i am sure the tax is heavily taken in cloth, for the boys told me that if it were made up into garments for themselves they did not have to part with it on their return. needless to say, this makes our friend turn his attention to needlework during his return voyage and many a time i have seen the main deck looking as if it had been taken possession of by a demoniacal dorcas working party. strangely little is known of the laws and language of these krumen, considering how close the association is between them and the whites. this arises, i think, not from the difficulty of learning their language, but from the ease and fluency with which they speak their version of our own--kru-english, or "trade english," as it is called, and it is therefore unnecessary for a hot and wearied white man to learn "kru mouth." what particularly makes me think this is the case is, that i have picked up a little of it, and i found that i could make a kruman understand what i was driving at with this and my small stock of bassa mouth and timneh, on occasions when i wished to say something to him i did not want generally understood. but the main points regarding krumen are well enough known by old coasters--their willingness to work if well fed, and their habit of engaging for twelve-month terms of work and then returning to "we country." a trader who is satisfied with a boy gives him, when he leaves, a bit of paper telling the captain of any vessel that he will pay the boy's passage to his factory again, when he is willing to come. the period that a boy remains in his beloved "we country" seems to be until his allowance of his own earnings is expended. one can picture to one's self some sad partings in that far-away dark land. "my loves," says the kruboy to his families, his voice heavy with tears, "i must go. there is no more cloth, i have nothing between me and an easily shocked world but this decayed filament of cotton." and then his families weep with him, or, what is more likely, but not so literary, expectorate with emotion, and he tears himself away from them and comes on board the passing steamer in the uniform of gunga din--"nothing much before and rather less than half of that behind," and goes down coast on the strength of the little bit of paper from his white master which he has carefully treasured, and works like a nigger in the good sense of the term for another spell, to earn more goods for his home-folk. those boys who are first starting on travelling to work, and those without books, have no difficulty in getting passages on the steamers, for a captain is glad to get as many on board as he can, being sure to get their passage money and a premium for them, so great is the demand for kru labour. but even this help to working the west coast has been much interfered with of late years by the action of the french government in imposing a tax per head on all labourers leaving their ports on the ivory coast. this tax, i believe, is now removed or much reduced; but as for the liberian republic, it simply gets its revenue in an utterly unjustifiable way out of taxing the krumen who ship as labourers. the krumen are no property of theirs, and they dare not interfere with them on shore; but owing to that little transaction in the celebrated rubber monopoly, the liberians became possessed of some ready cash, which, with great foresight, they invested in two little gun-boats which enabled them to enforce their tax on the krumen in their small canoes. i do not feel so sympathetic with the krumen or their employers in this matter as i should, for the krumen are silly hens not to go and wipe out liberia on shore, and the white men are silly hens not to--but i had better leave that opinion unexpressed. the power of managing kruboys is a great accomplishment for any one working the west coast. one man will get per cent. more work out of his staff, and always have them cheerful, fit, and ready; while another will get very little out of the same set of men except vexation to himself, and accidents to his goods; but this very necessary and important factor in trade is not to be taught with ink. some men fall into the proper way of managing the boys very quickly, others may have years of experience and yet fail to learn it. the rule is, make them respect you, and make them like you, and then the thing is done; but first dealing with the kruboy, with all his good points, is very trying work, and they give the new hand an awful time of it while they are experimenting on him to see how far they can do him. they do this very cleverly, but shortsightedly, more africano, for they spoil the tempers of half the white men whom they have to deal with. it is not necessary to treat them brutally, in fact it does not pay to do so, but it is necessary to treat them severely, to keep a steady hand over them. never let them become familiar, never let them see you have made a mistake. when you make a mistake in giving them an order let it be understood that that way of doing a thing is a peculiarly artful dodge of your own, and if it fails, that it is their fault. they will quite realise this if it is properly managed. i speak from experience; for example, once, owing to the superior sex being on its back with fever and sending its temperature up with worrying about getting some ebony logs off to a bothering wretch of a river steamer that must needs come yelling along for cargo just then, i said, "you leave it to me, i'll get it shipped all right," and proceeded, with the help of three kruboys, to raft that ebony off. i saw as soon as i had embarked on the affair, from the kruboys' manner, i was down the wrong path, but how, or why, i did not see until a neat arrangement of ebony billets tied together with tie-tie was in the water. then i saw that i had constructed an excellent sounding apparatus for finding out the depth of water in the river; and that ebony had an affinity for the bottom of water, not for the top. the situation was a trying one and the way the captain of the vessel kept dancing about his deck saying things in a foreign tongue, but quite comprehensible, was distracting; but i did not devote myself to giving him the information he asked for, as to what particular kind of idiot i was, because he was neither a mad doctor nor an ethnologist and had no right to the information; but i put a raft on the line of a very light wood we had a big store of, and this held up the ebony, and the current carried it down to the steamer all right. then we hauled the line home and sent him some more on the patent plan, but, just to hurry up, you understand, and not delay the ship, a deadly crime, some of that ebony went off in a canoe and all ended happily, and the kruboys regarded themselves as having been the spectators of another manifestation of white intelligence. in defence of the captain's observations, i must say he could not see me because i was deploying behind a woodstack; nevertheless, i do not mean to say this method of shipping ebony is a good one. i shall not try it again in a hurry, and the situation cannot be pulled through unless you have, as allah gave me, a very swift current; and although, when the thing went well, i did say things from behind the woodstack to the captain, i did not feel justified in accepting his apologetic invitation to come on board and have a drink. my experiences with kruboys would, if written in full, make an excellent manual for a new-comer, but they are too lengthy for this chapter. my first experience with them on a small bush journey aged me very much; and ever since i have shirked chaperoning kruboys about the west african bush among ticklish-tempered native gentlemen and their forward hussies of wives. i have always admired men for their strength, their courage, their enterprise, their unceasing struggle for the beyond--the something else, but not until i had to deal with krumen did i realise the vastness to which this latter characteristic of theirs could attain. one might have been excused for thinking that a man without rates and taxes, without pockets, and without the manifold, want-creating culture of modern european civilisation and education would necessarily have been bounded, to some extent, in his desires. but one would have been wrong, profoundly wrong, in so thinking, for the kruman yearns after, and duns for, as many things for his body as the lamented faustus did for his soul, and away among the apes this interesting creature would have to go, at once, if the wanting of little were a crucial test for the determination of the family termed by the scientific world the hominidae. later, when i got to know the krumen well, i learnt that they desired not only the vast majority of the articles that they saw, but did more--obtained them- -at all events some of them, without asking me for them; such commodities, for example, as fowls, palm wine, old tins and bottles, and other gentlemen's wives were never safe. one of that first gang of boys showed self-help to such a remarkable degree that i christened him smiles. his name--you-be-d--d--being both protracted and improper, called for change of some sort, but even this brought no comfort to one still hampered with conventional ideas regarding property, and frequent roll-calls were found necessary, so that the crimes of my friend smiles and his fellows might not accumulate to an unmanageable extent. this used to be the sort of thing--"where them nettlerash lib?" "he lib for drunk, massa." "where them smiles?" "he lib for town, for steal, massa." "where them black man misery?" but i draw a veil over the confessional, for there is simply no artistic reticence about your kruman when he is telling the truth, or otherwise, regarding a fellow creature. after accumulating with this gang enough experience to fill a hat (remembering always "one of the worst things you can do in west africa is to worry yourself") i bethought me of the advice i had received from my cousin rose kingsley, who had successfully ridden through mexico when mexico was having a rather worse revolution than usual, "to always preserve a firm manner." i thought i would try this on those kruboys and said "no" in place of "i wish you would not do that, please." i can't say it was an immediate success. during this period we came across a trader's lonely store wherein he had a consignment of red parasols. after these appalling objects the souls of my krumen hungered with a great desire. "no," said i, in my severest tone, and after buying other things, we passed on. imagine my horror, therefore, hours afterwards and miles away, to find my precious crew had got a red parasol apiece. previous experience quite justified me in thinking that these had been stolen; and i pictured to myself my portuguese friends, whose territory i was then in, commenting upon the incident, and reviling me as another instance of how the brutal english go looting through the land. i found, however, i was wrong, for the parasols had been "dashed" my rapacious rascals "for top," and the last one connected with the affair who deserved pity was the trader from whom i had believed them stolen. it was i, not he, who suffered, for it was the wet season in west africa and those red parasols ran. to this day my scientific soul has never been able to account for the vast body of crimson dye those miserable cotton things poured out, plentifully drenching myself and their owners, the kruboys, and everything we associated with that day. i am quite prepared to hear that some subsequent wanderer has found a red trail in africa itself like that one so often sees upon the maps. when they do, i hereby claim that real red trail as mine. i confess i like the african on the whole, a thing i never expected to do when i went to the coast with the idea that he was a degraded, savage, cruel brute; but that is a trifling error you soon get rid of when you know him. the kruboy is decidedly the most likeable of all africans that i know. wherein his charm lies is difficult to describe, and you certainly want the patience of job, and a conscience made of stretching leather to deal with the kruboy in the african climate, and live. in his better manifestations he reminds me of that charming personality, the irish peasant, for though he lacks the sparkle, he is full of humour, and is the laziest and the most industrious of mankind. he lies and tells the truth in such a hopelessly uncertain manner that you cannot rely on him for either. he is ungrateful and faithful to the death, honest and thievish, all in one and the same specimen of him. ingratitude is a crime laid very frequently to the score of all africans, but i think unfairly; certainly i have never had to complain of it, and the krumen often show gratitude for good treatment in a grand way. the way those kruboys of gallant captain lane helped him work lagos bar and save lives by the dozen from the stranded ships on it and hauled their "massa" out from among the sharkey foam every time he went into it, on the lifeboat upsetting, would have done credit to deal or norfolk lifeboat men, but the secret of their devotion is their personal attachment. they do not save people out of surf on abstract moral principles. the african at large is not an enthusiast on moral principles, and one and all they'll let nature take its course if they don't feel keen on a man surviving. half the african's ingratitude, although it may look very bad on paper, is really not so very bad; for half the time you have been asking him to be grateful to you for doing to, or giving him things he does not care a row of pins about. i have quite his feelings, for example, for half the things in civilised countries i am expected to be glad to get. "oh, how nice it must be to be able to get about in cars, omnibuses and railway trains again!" is it? well i don't think so, and i do not feel glad over it. similarly, we will take an african case of ingratitude. a white friend of mine put himself to an awful lot of trouble to save the life of one of his sub-traders who had had an accident, and succeeded. it had been the custom of the man's wife to bring the trader little presents of fowls, etc., from time to time, and some time after the accident he met the lady and told her he had noticed a falling off in her offerings and he thought her very ungrateful after what he had done for her husband. she grunted and the next morning she brings in as a present the most forlorn, skinny, one-and-a-half-feathered chicken you ever laid eye on, and in answer to the trader's comments she said: "massa, fo sure them der chicken no be 'ticularly good chicken, but fo sure dem der man no be 'ticularly good man. they go" (they match each other). i have referred at great length to the krumen because of their importance, and also because they are the natives the white men have more to do with as servants than any other; but methods of getting on with them are not necessarily applicable to dealing with other forms of african labourers, such as plantation hands in the congo francais, angola, and cameroon. in cameroon the germans are now using largely the batanga natives on the plantations; the duallas, the great trading tribe in cameroon river, being too lazy to do any heavy work; and they have also tried to import labourers from togo land, but this attempt was not a success, ending in the revolt of , which lost several white lives. the public work is carried on, as it is in our own colonies, by the criminals in the chain- gang. the germans have had many accusations hurled against them by people of their own nationality, but on the whole these "atrocities" have been much exaggerated and only half understood; and certainly have not amounted to anything like the things that have gone on in the "philanthropic" congo free state. the food given out by the german government is the best government rations given on the whole west coast. when they have allowed me to have some of their native employes, as when i was up cameroon mountain, for example, i bought rations from the government stores for them, and was much struck by the soundness and good quality of both rice and beef, and the rations they gave out to those dahomeyans or togolanders who revolted was so much more than they could, or cared to eat, that they used to sell much of it to the duallas in bell town. this is not open to the criticism that the stuff was too bad for the togolanders to eat, as was once said to me by a philanthropic german who had never been to the coast, because the duallas are a rich tribe, perfectly free traders in the matter, able to go to the river factories and buy provisions there had they wished to, and so would not have bought the government rations unless they were worth having. the great point that has brought the germans into disrepute with the natives employed by them is their military spirit, which gives rise to a desire to regulate everything; and that other attribute of the military spirit, nagging. you should never nag an african, it only makes him bothered and then sulky, and when he's sulky he'll lie down and die to spite you. but in spite of the germans being over-given to this unpleasant habit of military regularity and so on, the natives from the kru coast and from bassa and the french ivory coast return to them time after time for spells of work, so there must be grave exaggeration regarding their bad treatment, for these natives are perfectly free in the matter. the french use loango boys for factory hands, and these people are very bright and intelligent, but as a m'pongwe, who knew them well, said: "they are much too likely to be devils to be good too much" and are undoubtedly given to poisoning, which is an unpleasant habit in a house servant. their military force are composed of senegalese laptot, very fine, fierce fellows, superior, i believe, as fighting men to our hausas, and very devoted to, and well treated by, their french officers. that the frenchman does not know how to push trade in his possessions, the trade returns, with the balance all on the wrong side, clearly show; still he does know how to get possession of africa better than we do, and this means he knows how to deal with the natives. the building up of congo francais, for example, has not cost one-third of the human lives, black or white, that an equivalent quantity of congo belge has, nor one-third of the expense of uganda or sierra leone. it is customary in england to dwell on the commercial failure, and deduce from it the erroneous conclusion that france will soon leave it off when she finds it does not pay. this is an error, because commercial success--the making the thing pay--is not the french ideal in the affair. it is our own, and i am the last person to say our ideal is wrong; but it is not the french ideal, and i am the last person to say france is wrong either. there may exist half a hundred or more right reasons for doing anything, and the reasons france has for her energetic policy in africa are sound ones; for they are the employment of her martial spirits where their activity will not endanger the state, the stowing of these spirits in paris having been found to be about as advisable as stowing over-proof spirits and gunpowder in a living- room with plenty of lighted lucifers blazing round; and her other reason is the opportunity african enterprise affords for sound military training. you will often hear in england regarding french annexation in africa, "oh! let her have the deadly hole, and much good may it do her." france knows very well what good it will do her, and she will cheerfully take all she is allowed to get quietly, as a sop for her quietness regarding egypt, and she will cheerfully fight you for the rest--small blame to her. she knows africa is a superb training ground for her officers. sham fights and autumn manoeuvres have a certain value in the formation of a fighting army, but the whole of these parlour-games, put together in a ten-year lump, are not to be compared to one month's work at real war, to fit an army for its real work, and france knows well the real work will come again some day--not far off--for her army. how soon it comes she little cares, for she has no ideal of peace before her, never has had, never will have, and the next time she tries conclusions with one of us teutonic nations, she will be armed with men who have learned their trade well on the burning sands of senegal, and they will take a lot of beating. we do not require africa as a training ground for our army; india is as magnificent a military academy as any nation requires; but we do require all the africa we can get, west, east, and south, for a market, and it is here we clash with france; for france not only does not develop the trade of her colonies for her own profit, but stamps trade at large out by her preferential tariffs, etc.; so that we cannot go into her colonies and trade freely as she and germany can come into ours. we can go into her colonies and do business with french goods, and this is done; but french goods are not so suitable, from their make, nor capable of being sold at a sufficient profit to make a big trade. but france throws few obstacles, if any, in the matter of plantation enterprise. still this enterprise being so hampered by the dearth of good labour is not at the present time highly remunerative in africa. foreign labour.--several important authorities have advocated the importation of foreign labour into africa. this seems to me to be a fatal error, for several reasons. for one thing, experience has by now fully demonstrated that the west coast climate is bad for men not native to it, whether those men be white, black, or yellow. the united presbyterian mission who work in old calabar was founded with the intention of inaugurating a mission which, after the white men had established it, was to be carried on by educated christian blacks from jamaica, where this mission had long been established and flourished. but it was found that these men, although primarily africans, had by their deportation from africa in the course, in some cases, of only one generation, lost the power of resistance to the deadly malarial climate their forefathers possessed, and so the mission is now carried on by whites; not that these good people have a greater resistance to the fever than the jamaica christians, but because they are more devoted to the evangelisation of the african; and what black assistance they receive comes, with the exception of mrs. fuller, from a few educated effiks of calabar. the congo free state have imported as labourers both west indian negroes--principally barbadians--and chinamen. in both cases the mortality has been terrible--more than the white mortality, which competent authorities put down for the congo at per cent., and the experiment has therefore failed. it may be said that much of this mortality has arisen from the way in which these labourers have been treated in the free state, but that this is not entirely the case is demonstrated by the case of the annamese in congo francais, who are well treated. these annamese are the political prisoners arising from the french occupation of tong-kin; and the mortality among one gang of of them who were employed to make the path through swampy ground from glass to libreville--a distance of two and a half miles--was seventy, and this although the swamp was nothing particularly bad as swamps go, and was swept by sea-air the whole way. even had the experiment of imported labour been successful for the time being, i hold it would be a grave error to import labour into africa. for this reason, that africa possesses in herself the most magnificent mass of labour material in the whole world, and surely if her children could build up, as they have, the prosperity and trade of the americas, she should, under proper guidance and good management, be able to build up her own. but good guidance and proper management are the things that are wanted--and are wanting. it is impossible to go into this complicated question fully here, and i will merely ask unprejudiced people who do not agree with me, whether they do not think that as so much has been done with one african tribe, the krumen--a tribe possessing no material difference in make of mind or body from hundreds of other tribes, but which have merely been trained by white men in a different way from other tribes--that there is room for great hope in the native labour supply? and would not a very hopeful outlook for west africa regarding the labour question be possible, if a regime of common sense were substituted for our present one? this is of course the missionary question--a question which i feel it is hopeless to attempt to speak of without being gravely misunderstood, and which i therefore would willingly shirk mentioning, but i am convinced that the future of africa is not to be dissociated from the future of its natives by the importation of yellow races or hindoos; and the missionary question is not to be dissociated from the future of the african natives; and so the subject must be touched on; and i preface my remarks by stating that i have a profound personal esteem for several missionaries, naturally, for it is impossible to know such men and women as mr. and mrs. dennis kemp, of the gold coast, mme. and m. jacot, and mme. and m. forget, and m. gacon, and dr. nassau, of gaboon, and many others without recognising at once the beauty of their natures, and the nobility of their intentions. indeed, taken as a whole, the missionaries must be regarded as superbly brave, noble-minded men who go and risk their own lives, and often those of their wives and children, and definitely sacrifice their personal comfort and safety to do what, from their point of view, is their simple duty; but it is their methods of working that have produced in west africa the results which all truly interested in west africa must deplore; and one is bound to make an admission that goes against one's insular prejudice--that the protestant english missionaries have had most to do with rendering the african useless. the bad effects that have arisen from their teaching have come primarily from the failure of the missionary to recognise the difference between the african and themselves as being a difference not of degree but of kind. i am aware that they are supported in this idea by several eminent ethnologists; but still there are a large number of anatomical facts that point the other way, and a far larger number still relating to mental attributes, and i feel certain that a black man is no more an undeveloped white man than a rabbit is an undeveloped hare; and the mental difference between the two races is very similar to that between men and women among ourselves. a great woman, either mentally or physically, will excel an indifferent man, but no woman ever equals a really great man. the missionary to the african has done what my father found them doing to the polynesians--"regarding the native minds as so many jugs only requiring to be emptied of the stuff which is in them and refilled with the particular form of dogma he is engaged in teaching, in order to make them the equals of the white races." this form of procedure works in very various ways. it eliminates those parts of the native fetish that were a wholesome restraint on the african. the children in the mission school are, be it granted, better than the children outside it in some ways; they display great aptitude for learning anything that comes in their way--but there is a great difference between white and black children. the black child is a very solemn thing. it comes into the world in large quantities and looks upon it with its great sad eyes as if it were weighing carefully the question whether or no it is a fit place for a respectable soul to abide in. four times in ten it decides that it is not, and dies. if, however, it decides to stay, it passes between two and three years in a grim and profound study-- occasionally emitting howls which end suddenly in a sob--whine it never does. at the end of this period it takes to spoon food, walks about and makes itself handy to its mother or goes into the mission school. if it remains in the native state it has no toys of a frivolous nature, a little hoe or a little calabash are considered better training; if it goes into the school, it picks up, with astonishing rapidity, the lessons taught it there--giving rise to hopes for its future which are only too frequently disappointed in a few years' time. it is not until he reaches years of indiscretion that the african becomes joyful; but, when he attains this age he always does cheer up considerably, and then, whatever his previous training may have been, he takes to what mr. kipling calls "boot" with great avidity--and of this he consumes an enormous quantity. for the next sixteen years, barring accidents, he "rips"; he rips carefully, terrified by his many fetish restrictions, if he is a pagan; but if he is in that partially converted state you usually find him in when trouble has been taken with his soul--then he rips unrestrained. it is most unfair to describe africans in this state as "converted," either in missionary reports or in attacks on them. they are not converted in the least. a really converted african is a very beautiful form of christian; but those africans who are the chief mainstay of missionary reports and who afford such material for the scoffer thereat, have merely had the restraint of fear removed from their minds in the mission schools without the greater restraint of love being put in its place. the missionary-made man is the curse of the coast, and you find him in european clothes and without, all the way down from sierra leone to loanda. the pagans despise him, the whites hate him, still he thinks enough of himself to keep him comfortable. his conceit is marvellous, nothing equals it except perhaps that of the individual rife among us which the saturday review once aptly described as "the suburban agnostic"; and the "missionary man" is very much like the suburban agnostic in his religious method. after a period of mission-school life he returns to his country-fashion, and deals with the fetish connected with it very much in the same way as the suburban agnostic deals with his religion, i.e. he removes from it all the inconvenient portions. "shouldn't wonder if there might be something in the idea of the immortality of the soul, and a future heaven, you know--but as for hell, my dear sir, that's rank superstition, no one believes in it now, and as for sabbath-keeping and food-restrictions--what utter rubbish for enlightened people!" so the backsliding african deals with his country-fashion ideas: he eliminates from them the idea of immediate retribution, etc., and keeps the polygamy and the dances, and all the lazy, hazy-minded native ways. the education he has received at the mission school in reading and writing fits him for a commercial career, and as every african is a born trader he embarks on it, and there are pretty goings on! on the west coast he frequently sets up in business for himself; on the south-west coast he usually becomes a sub-trader to one of the great english, french, or german firms. on both coasts he gets himself disliked, and brings down opprobrium on all black traders, expressed in language more powerful than select. this wholesale denunciation of black traders is unfair, because there are many perfectly straight trading natives; still the majority are recruited from missionary school failures, and are utterly bad. "post hoc non propter hoc" is an excellent maxim, but one that never seems to enter the missionary head down here. highly disgusted and pained at his pupils' goings-on, but absolutely convinced of the excellence of his own methods of instruction, and the spiritual equality, irrespective of colour, of christians; the missionary rises up, and says things one can understand him saying about the bad influence of the white traders; stating that they lure the pupils from the fold to destruction. these things are nevertheless not true. then the white trader hears them, and gets his back up and says things about the effect of missionary training on the african, which are true, but harsh, because it is not the missionaries' intent to turn out skilful forgers, and unmitigated liars, although they practically do so. my share when i drop in on this state of mutual recrimination is to get myself into hot water with both parties. the missionary thinks me misguided for regarding the african's goings-on as part of the make of the man, and the trader regards me as a soft-headed idiot when i state that it is not the missionary's individual blame that a lamb recently acquired from the fold has gone down the primrose path with the trust, or the rum. shade of sir john falstaff! what a life this is! the two things to which the missionary himself ascribes his want of success are polygamy and the liquor traffic. now polygamy is, like most other subjects, a difficult thing to form a just opinion on, if before forming the opinion you make a careful study of the facts bearing on the case. it is therefore advisable, if you wish to produce an opinion generally acceptable in civilised circles, to follow the usual recipe for making opinions--just take a prejudice of your own, and fix it up with the so-called opinion of that class of people who go in for that sort of prejudice too. i have got myself so entangled with facts that i cannot follow this plan, and therefore am compelled to think polygamy for the african is not an unmixed evil; and that at the present culture-level of the african it is not to be eradicated. this arises from two reasons; the first is that it is perfectly impossible for one african woman to do the work of the house, prepare the food, fetch water, cultivate the plantations, and look after the children attributive to one man. she might do it if she had the work in her of an english or irish charwoman, but she has not, and a whole villageful of african women do not do the work in a week that one of these will do in a day. then, too, the african lady is quite indifferent as to what extent her good man may flirt with other ladies so long only as he does not go and give them more cloth and beads than he gives her; and the second reason for polygamy lies in the custom well-known to ethnologists, and so widely diffused that one might say it was constant throughout all african tribes, only there are so many of them whose domestic relationships have not been carefully observed. as regards the drink traffic--no one seems inclined to speak the truth about it in west africa; and what i say i must be understood to say only about west africa, because i do not like to form opinions without having had opportunities for personal observation, and the only part of africa i have had these opportunities in has been from sierra leone to angola; and the reports from south africa show that an entirely different, and a most unhealthy state of affairs exists there from its invasion by mixed european nationalities, with individuals of a low type, greedy for wealth. west african conditions are no more like south african conditions than they are like indian. the missionary party on the whole have gravely exaggerated both the evil and the extent of the liquor traffic in west africa. i make an exception in favour of the late superintendent of the wesleyan mission on the gold coast, the rev. dennis kemp, who had enough courage and truth in him to stand up at a public meeting in liverpool, on july nd, , and record it as his opinion that, "the natives of the gold coast were remarkably abstemious; but spirits were, 'he believed,' of no benefit to the natives, and they would be better without them." i have quoted the whole of the remark, as it is never fair to quote half a man says on any subject, but i do not agree with the latter half of it, and the gold coast natives are not any more abstemious, if so much so, as other tribes on the coast. i have elsewhere { } attempted to show that the drink-traffic is by no means the most important factor in the mission failure on the west coast, but that it has been used in an unjustifiable way by the missionary party, because they know the cry against alcohol is at present a popular one in england, and it has also the advantage of making the subscribers at home regard the african as an innocent creature who is led away by bad white men, and therefore still more interesting and more worthy, and in more need of subscriptions than ever. i should rather like to see the african lady or gentleman who could be "led away"--all the leading away i have seen on the coast has been the other way about. i do not say every missionary on the west coast who makes untrue statements on this subject is an original liar; he is usually only following his leaders and repeating their observations without going into the evidence around him; and the missionary public in england and scotland are largely to blame for their perpetual thirst for thrilling details of the amount of baptisms and experiences among the people they pay other people to risk their lives to convert, or for thrilling details of the difficulties these said emissaries have to contend with. as for the general public who swallow the statements, i think they are prone, from the evidence of the evils they see round them directly arising from drink, to accept as true-- without bothering themselves with calm investigation--statements of a like effect regarding other people. i have no hesitation in saying that in the whole of west africa, in one week, there is not one-quarter the amount of drunkenness you can see any saturday night you choose in a couple of hours in the vauxhall road; and you will not find in a whole year's investigation on the coast, one- seventieth part of the evil, degradation, and premature decay you can see any afternoon you choose to take a walk in the more densely- populated parts of any of our own towns. i own the whole affair is no business of mine; for i have no financial interest in the liquor traffic whatsoever. but i hate the preying upon emotional sympathy by misrepresentation, and i grieve to see thousands of pounds wasted that are bitterly needed by our own cold, starving poor. i do not regard the money as wasted because it goes to the african, but because such an immense percentage of it does no good and much harm to him. it is customary to refer to the spirit sent out to west africa as "poisonous" and as raw alcohol. it is neither. i give an analysis of a bottle of van hoytima's trade-gin, which i obtained to satisfy my own curiosity on the point. "analysis of sample of trade-gin. "with reference to the bottle of the above i have the honour to report as follows: - it contains-- per cent. absolute alcohol . . . . . . acidity expressed as acetic acid . . ethers expressed as acetic acid . . aldehydes. . . . present in small quantity. furfural . . . . ditto ditto higher alcohols . . ditto ditto "the only alcohol that can be estimated quantitatively is ethyl alcohol. "there is no methyl, and the higher alcohols, as shown by savalie's method, only exist in traces. the spirit is flavoured by more than one essential oil, and apparently oil of juniper is one of these oils. "the liquid contains no sugar, and leaves but a small extract. in my opinion the liquid essentially consists of a pure distilled spirit flavoured with essential oils. "of course no attempt to identify these oils in the quantity sent, viz., c.c. (one bottle) was made. the ethers are returned as ethyl acetate, but from fractional distillation amyl acetate was found to be present. "i have the honour to be, etc., (signed) "g. h. robertson. "fellow of the chemical society, "associate of the institute of chemistry." in a subsequent letter mr. robertson observed that he had been "assisted in making the above analysis by an expert in the chemistry of alcohols, who said that the present sample differed in no material particulars from, and was neither more nor less deleterious to health than, gin purchased in different parts of london and submitted to analysis." in addition to this analysis i have also one of messrs. peters' gin, equally satisfactory, and as van hoytima and peters are the two great suppliers of the gin that goes to west africa, i think the above is an answer to the "poison" statements, and should be sufficient evidence against it for all people who are not themselves absolute teetotalers. absolute teetotalers are definite-minded people, and one respects them more than one does those who do not hold with teetotalism for themselves, but think it a good thing for other people, and moreover it is of no use arguing with them because they say all alcohol is poison, and won't appreciate any evidence to the contrary, so "palaver done set"; but a large majority of those who attack, or believe in the rectitude of the attack on, the african liquor traffic are not teetotalers and so should be capable of forming a just opinion. my personal knowledge of the district where most of the liquor goes in--the oil rivers--has been gained in duke town, old calabar. i have been there four separate times, and last year stayed there continuously for some months during a period in which if duke town had felt inclined to go on the bust, it certainly could have done so; for the police and most of the government officials were away at brass in consequence of the akassa palaver, and those few who were left behind and the white traders were down with an epidemic of malarial typhoid. but duke town did nothing of the kind. i used to be down in the heart of the town, at eyambas market by prince archebongs's house, night after night alone, watching the devil- makings that were going on there, and the amount of drunkenness i saw was exceedingly small. i did the same thing at the adjacent town of qwa. my knowledge of bonny, bell, and akkwa towns, libreville, lembarene, kabinda, boma, banana, nkoi, loanda, etc., is extensive and peculiar, and i have spent hours in them when the whole of the missionary and government people have been safe in their distant houses; so had the evils of the liquor traffic been anything like half what it is made out to be i must have come across it in appalling forms, and i have not. the figures of the case i will not here quote because they are easily obtainable from government reports by any one interested in the matter. i regard their value as being small unless combined with a knowledge of the west coast trade. the liquor goes in at a few ports on the west coast, and into the hands of those tribes who act as middlemen between the white trader and the interior trade- stuff-producing tribes; and is thereby diffused over an enormous extent of thickly inhabited country. we english are directly in touch with none of the interior trade--save in the territory of the royal niger company, and the delta tribes with whom we deal in the oil rivers subsist on this trade between the interior and the coast, and they prefer to use spirits as a buying medium because they get the highest percentage of profit from it, and the lowest percentage of loss by damage when dealing with it. it does not get spoilt by damp, like tobacco and cloth do; indeed, in addition to the amount of moisture supplied by their reeking climate, they superadd a large quantity of river water to the spirit before it leaves their hands, while with the other articles of trade it is one perpetual grind to keep them free from moisture and mildew. in their coast towns there are immense stores of gin in cases, which they would as soon think of drinking themselves as we, if we were butchers, would think of eating up the stock in the shop. a certain percentage of spirit is consumed in the delta, and if spirits are wanted anywhere they are wanted in the niger delta region; and about one-eighth part of that used here is used for fetish-worship, poured out on the ground and mixed with other things to hang in bottles over fish-traps, and so on to make residences for guardian spirits who are expected to come and take up their abode in them. spirits to the spirits, on the sweets to the sweet principle is universal in west africa; and those photographs you are often shown of dead chiefs' graves with bottles on them merely demonstrate that the deceased was taking down with him a little liquor for his own use in the under-world--which he holds to be possessed of a chilly and damp climate--and a little over to give a propitiatory peg to one of the ruling authorities there--or any old friend he may come across in the elysian fields. this is possibly a misguided heathen thing of him to do, and it is generally held in european circles that the under-world such an individual as he will go to is neither damp, nor chilly. but granting this, no one can contest but that the world he spends his life here in is damp, and that the natives of the niger delta live in a saturated forest swamp region that reeks with malaria. their damp mud-walled houses frequently flooded, they themselves spend the greater part of their time dabbling about in the stinking mangrove swamps, and then, for five months in the year, they are wrapped in the almost continuous torrential downpour of the west african wet season, followed in the delta by the so-called "dry" season, with its thick morning and evening mists, and the air rarely above dew- point. then their food is of poor quality and insufficient quantity, and in districts near the coast noticeably deficient in meat of any kind. i think the desire for spirits and tobacco, given these conditions, is quite reasonable, and that when they are taken in moderation, as they usually are, they are anything but deleterious. the african himself has not a shadow of a doubt on the point, and some form of alcohol he will have. when he cannot get white man's spirit--min makara, as he calls it in calabar--he takes black man's spirit min effik. this is palm wine, and although it has escaped the abuse heaped on rum and gin, it is worse for the native than either of the others, for he has to drink a disgusting quantity of it, because from the palm wine he does not get the stimulating effect quickly as from gin or rum, and the enormous quantity consumed at one sitting will distribute its effects over a week. you can always tell whether a native has had a glass too much rum, or half a gallon or so too much palm wine; the first he soon recovers from, while the palm wine keeps him a disgusting nuisance for days, and the constitutional effects of it are worse, for it produces a definite type of renal disease which, if it does not cut short the life of the sufferer in a paroxysm, kills him gradually with dropsy. there is another native drink which works a bitter woe on the african in the form of intoxication combined with a brilliant bilious attack. it is made from honey flavoured with the bark of a certain tree, and as it is very popular i had better not spread it further by giving the recipe. the imported gin keeps the african off these abominations which he has to derange his internal works with before he gets the stimulus that enables him to resist this vile climate; particularly will it keep him from his worst intoxicant lhiamba (cannabis sativa), a plant which grows wild on the south-west coast and on the west for all i know, as well as the african or bowstring hemp (sanseviera guiniensis). the plant that produces the lhiamba is a nettle-like plant growing six to ten feet high, and the natives collect the tops of the stems, with the seed on, in little bundles and dry them. it is evidently the seeds which are regarded by them as being the important part, although they do not collect these separately; but you hear great rows among them when buying and selling a little bundle, on the point of the seeds being shaken out, "chi! chi! chi!" says a., "this is worthless, there are no seeds." "ai, ai," says b., "never were there so many seeds in a bunch of lhiamba," etc. it is used smoked, like the ganja of india, not like the preparation bhang, and the way the africans in the congo used it was a very quaint one. they would hollow out a little hole in the ground, making a little dome over it; then in went a few hemp-tops; and on to them a few stones made red hot in a fire. then the dome was closed up and a reed stuck through it. then one man after another would go and draw up into his lungs as much smoke as he could with one prolonged deep inspiration; and then go apart and cough in a hard, hacking distressing way for ten minutes at a time, and then back to the reed for another pull. in addition to the worry of hearing their coughs, the lhiamba gives you trouble with the men, for it spoils their tempers, making them moody and fractious, and prone to quarrel with each other; and when they get an excessive dose of it their society is more terrifying than tolerable. i once came across three men who had got into this state and a fourth man who had not, but was of the party. they fought with him, and broke his head, and then we proceeded on our way, one gentleman taking flying leaps at some places, climbing up trees now and again, and embedding himself in the bush alongside the path "because of the pools of moving blood on it." ("if they had not kept moving," he said as he sat where he fell--"he could have managed it")--the others having grand times with various creatures, which, judging from their description of them, i was truly thankful were not there. the men's state of mind, however, soon cleared; and i must say this was the only time i came across this lhiamba giving such strong effects; usually the men just cough with that racking cough that lets you know what they have been up to, and quarrel for a short time. when, however, a whiff of lhiamba is taken by them in the morning before starting on a march, the effect seems to be good, enabling them to get over the ground easily and to endure a long march without being exhausted. but a small tot of rum is better for them by far. many other intoxicants made from bush are known to and used by the witch doctors. you may say: --well! if it is not the polygamy and not the drink that makes the west african as useless as he now is as a developer, or a means of developing the country, what is it? in my opinion, it is the sort of instruction he has received, not that this instruction is necessarily bad in itself, but bad from being unsuited to the sort of man to whom it has been given. it has the tendency to develop his emotionalism, his sloth, and his vanity, and it has no tendency to develop those parts of his character which are in a rudimentary state and much want it; thereby throwing the whole character of the man out of gear. the great inferiority of the african to the european lies in the matter of mechanical idea. i own i regard not only the african, but all coloured races, as inferior--inferior in kind not in degree--to the white races, although i know it is unscientific to lump all africans together and then generalise over them, because the difference between various tribes is very great. but nevertheless there are certain constant quantities in their character, let the tribe be what it may, that enable us to do this for practical purposes, making merely the distinction between negroes and bantu, and on the subject of this division i may remark that the negro is superior to the bantu. he is both physically and intellectually the more powerful man, and although he does not christianise well, he does often civilise well. the native officials cited by mr. hodgson in his letter to the times of january , , as having satisfactorily carried on all the postal and the governmental printing work of the gold coast colony, as well as all the subordinate custom-house officials in the niger coast protectorate-- in fact i may say all of them in the whole of the british possessions on the west coast--are educated negroes. i am aware that all sea-captains regard this latter class as poisonous nuisances, but then every properly constituted sea-captain regards custom-house officials, let their colour be what it may, as poisonous nuisances anywhere. in addition to these, you will find, notably in lagos, excellent pure-blooded negroes in european clothes, and with european culture. the best men among these are lawyers, doctors, and merchants, and i have known many ladies of africa who have risen to an equal culture level with their lords. on the west african seaboard you do not find the bantu equally advanced, except among the m'pongwe, and i am persuaded that this tribe is not pure bantu but of negro origin. the educated blacks that are not m'pongwe on the bantu coast (from cameroons to benguela), you will find are negroes, who have gone down there to make money, but this class of african is the clerk class, and we are now concerned with the labourer. the african's own way of doing anything mechanical is the simplest way, not the easiest, certainly not the quickest: he has all the chuckle-headedness of that overrated creature the ant, for his head never saves his heels. watch a gang of boat-boys getting a surf boat down a sandy beach. they turn it broadside on to the direction in which they wish it to go, and then turn it bodily over and over, with structure-straining bumps to the boat, and any amount of advice and recriminatory observations to each other. unless under white direction they will not make a slip, nor will they put rollers under her. watch again a gang of natives trying to get a log of timber down into the river from the bank, and you will see the same sort of thing--no idea of a lever, or any thing of that sort--and remember that, unless under white direction, the african has never made an even fourteenth-rate piece of cloth or pottery, or a machine, tool, picture, sculpture, and that he has never even risen to the level of picture-writing. i am aware of his ingenious devices for transmitting messages, such as the cowrie shells, strung diversely on strings, in use among the yoruba, but even these do not equal the picture-writing of the south american indians, nor the picture the red indian does on a raw elk hide; they are far and away inferior to the graphic sporting sketches left us of mammoth hunts by the prehistoric cave men. this absence of mechanical aptitude is very interesting, though it most likely has the very simple underlying reason that the conditions under which the african has been living have been such as to make no call for a higher mechanical culture. in his native state he does not want to get heavy surf-boats into the sea; his own light dug-out is easily slid down, he does not want to cut down heavy timber trees, and get them into the river, and so on; but this state is now getting disturbed by the influx of white enterprise, and not only disturbed, but destroyed, and so he must alter his ways or there will be grave trouble; but it is encouraging to remark that the african is almost as teachable and as willing to learn handicrafts as he is to assimilate other things, provided his mind has not been poisoned by fallacious ideas, and the results already obtained from the krumen and the accras are good. the accras are not such good workmen as they might be, because they are to a certain extent spoilt by getting, owing to the dearth of labour, higher wages and more toleration for indifferent bits of work than they deserve, or their work is worth; but they have not yet fallen under that deadly spell worked by so many of the white men on so many of the black--the idea that it is the correct and proper thing not to work with your own hands but to get some underling to do all that sort of thing for you, while you read and write. this false ideal formed by the native from his empirical observations of some of the white men around him, has been the cause of great mischief. he sees the white man is his ruling man, rich, powerful, and honoured, and so he imitates him, and goes to the mission-school classes to read and write, and as soon as an african learns to read and write he turns into a clerk. now there is no immediate use for clerks in africa, certainly no room for further development in this line of goods. what africa wants at present, and will want for the next years at least, are workers, planters, plantation hands, miners, and seamen; and there are no schools in africa to teach these things or the doctrine of the nobility of labour save the technical mission-schools. almost every mission on the coast has now a technical school just started or having collections made at home to start one; but in the majority of these crafts such as bookbinding, printing, tailoring, etc., are being taught which are not at present wanted. still any technical school is better than none, and apart from lay considerations, is of great religious value to the mission indirectly, for there are many instances in mission annals of a missionary receiving great encouragement from the natives when he first starts in a district. at first the converts flock in, get baptised in batches, go to church, attend school, and adopt european clothes with an alacrity and enthusiasm that frequently turns their devoted pastor's head, but after the lapse of a few months their conduct is enough to break his heart. dressing up in european clothes amuses the ladies and some of the young men for a long time, in some cases permanently, but the older men and the bolder youths soon get bored, and when an african is bored--and he easily is so--he goes utterly to the bad. it is in these places that an industrial mission would be so valuable to the spiritual cause, for by employing and amusing the largely preponderating lower faculties of the african's mind, it would give the higher faculties time to develop. i have frequently been told when advocating technical instruction, that there are objections against it from spiritual standpoints, which, as my own views do not enable me to understand them, i will not enter into. also several authorities, not mission authorities alone, state with ethnologists that the african is incapable of learning, except during the period of childhood. prof a. h. keane says--"their inherent mental inferiority, almost more marked than their physical characters, depends on physiological causes by which the intellectual faculties seem to be arrested before attaining their normal development"; and further on, "we must necessarily infer that the development of the negro and white proceeds on different lines. while with the latter the volume of the brain grows with the expansion of the brain-pan; in the former the growth of the brain is on the contrary arrested by the premature closing of the cranial sutures, and lateral pressure of the frontal bone." { } you will frequently meet with the statement that the negro child is as intelligent, or more so, than the white child, but that as soon as it passes beyond childhood it makes no further mental advance. burton says: "his mental development is arrested, and thenceforth he grows backwards instead of forwards." now it is nervous work contradicting these statements, but with all due respect to the makers of them i must do so, and i have the comfort of knowing that many men with a larger personal experience of the african than these authorities have, agree with me, although at the same time we utterly disclaim holding the opinion that the african is a man and a brother. a man he is, but not of the same species; and his cranial sutures do, i agree, close early; indeed i have seen them almost obliterated in skulls of men who have died quite young; but i think most anthropologists are nowadays beginning to see that the immense value they a few years since set upon skull measurements and cranial capacity, etc., has been excessive and not to have so great a bearing on the intelligence as they thought. there has been an enormous amount of material carefully collected, mainly by frenchmen, on craniology, which is exceedingly interesting, but full of difficulty, and giving very diverse indications. take the weights of brain given by topinard: - annamite . . . . grammes african negroes . . " african negroes . . " hottentot . . . . " and i think you will see for practical purposes such considerations as weight of brain, or closure of sutures, etc., are negligible, and so we need not get paralysed with respect for "physiological causes." moreover i may remark that the top-weight, the hottentot, was a lady, and that m. broca weighed one negro's brain which scaled , grammes, while english and scotchmen only gave an average of , . so i think we may make our minds easy on the safety of sticking to outside facts, and say that after all it does not much affect the question of capacity for industrial training in the african if he does choose to close up the top of his head early, and that the whole attempt to make out that the african is a child-form, "an arrested development," is--well, not supported by facts. the very comparison between white and black children's intelligence to the disadvantage of the former is all wrong. the white child is not his inferior; he is not so quick in picking up parlour tricks; but then where are either of the children at that alongside a french poodle? what happens to the african from my observations is just what happens to the european, namely, when he passes out of childhood, he goes into a period of hobbledehoyhood. during this period, his skull might just as well be filled inside with wool as covered outside with it. but after a time, during which he has succeeded in distracting and discouraging the white men who hoped so much of him when he was a child, his mind clears up again and goes ahead all right. it is utter rubbish to say "you cannot teach an adult african," and that "he grows backwards"; for even without white interference he gets more and more cunning as the time goes on. does any one who knows them feel inclined to tell me that those old palm-oil chiefs have not learnt a thing or two during their lives? or that a well-matured bush trader has not? go down to west africa yourself, if you doubt this, and carry on a series of experiments with them in subjects they know of--trade subjects--try and get the best of a whole series of matured adults, male or female, and i can promise you you will return a wiser and a poorer man, but with a joyful heart regarding the capacity of the african to grow up. whether he does this by adding convolutions or piling on his gray matter we will leave for the present. all that i wish to urge regarding the african at large is that he has been mismanaged of late years by the white races. the study of this question is a very interesting one, but i have no space to enter into it here in detail. in my opinion--i say my own, i beg you to remark, only when i am uttering heresy--this mismanagement has been a by-product of the wave of hysterical emotionalism that has run through white culture and for which i have an instinctive hatred. i have briefly pointed out the evil worked by misdirected missionary effort on the native mind, but it is not the missionary alone that is doing harm. the government does nearly as much. whether it does this because of the fear of exeter hall as representing a big voting interest, or whether just from the tendency to get everything into the hands of a council, or an office, to be everlastingly nagging and legislating and inspecting, matters little; the result is bad, and it fills me with the greatest admiration for my country to see how in spite of this she keeps the lead. that she will always keep it i believe, because i believe that it is impossible that this phase of emotionalism--no, it is not hypocrisy, my french friends, it is only a sort of fit--will last, and we shall soon be back in our clear senses again and say to the world, "we do this thing because we think it is right; because we think it is best for those we do it to and for ourselves, not because of the wickedness of war, the brotherhood of man, or any other notion bred of fear." the way in which the present ideas acting through the government do harm in africa are many. english government officials have very little and very poor encouragement given them if they push inland and attempt to enlarge the sphere of influence, which their knowledge of local conditions teaches them requires enlarging, because the authorities at home are afraid other nations will say we are rapacious landgrabbers. well, we always have been, and they will say it anyhow; and where after all is the harm in it? we have acted in unison with the nations who for good sound reasons of their own have cut down portuguese possessions in africa because we were afraid of being thought to support a nation who went in for slavery. i always admire a good move in a game or a brilliant bit of strategy, and that was a beauty; and on our head now lie the affairs of the congo free state, while france and germany smile sweetly, knowing that these affairs will soon be such that they will be able to step in and divide that territory up between themselves without a stain on their character--in the interests of humanity--the whole of that rich region, which by the name of livingstone, speke, grant, burton, and cameron, should now be ours. then again in commercial competition our attitude seems to me very lacking in dignity. we are now just beginning to know it is a fight, and this commercial war has been going on since --since, in fact, france and germany have recovered from their war of . and if we are to carry on this commercial war with any hope of success, we must abandon our "oh! that's not fair; i won't play" attitude--and above all we must have no more government restrictions on our foreign trade. in west africa governmental restriction settles, like dew in autumn, on the liquor traffic. it is a case of give a dog a bad name and hang him. moreover, raising the import dues on liquor may bring into the government a good revenue; but it is a short-sighted policy--for the liquor is the thing there is the best market for in west africa. the natives have no enthusiasm about cotton-goods, as they seem from some accounts to have in east central, and the supply of them they now get, and get cheap and good, is as much as they require. and if the question of the abstract morality of introducing clothes, or introducing liquor, to native races, were fairly gone into, the results would be interesting--for clothing native races in european clothes works badly for them and kills them off. indeed the whole of this question of trade with the lower races is full of curious and unexpected points. speaking at large, the introduction of european culture--governmental, religious, or mercantile--has a destructive action on all the lower races; many of them the governmental and religious sections have stamped right out; but trade has never stamped a race out when dissociated from the other two, and it certainly has had no bad effect in tropical africa. with regard to the liquor traffic, try and put yourself in the west african's place. imagine, for example, that you want a pair of boots. you go into a shop, prepared to pay for them, but the man who keeps the shop says, "my good friend, you must not have boots, they are immoral. you can have a tin of sardines, or a pocket-handkerchief, they are much better for you." would you take the sardines or the pocket-handkerchiefs? more particularly would you feel inclined to take them instead of your desired boots if you knew there was a shop in a neighbouring street where boots are to be had? and there is a neighbouring shop-street to all our west coast possessions which is in the hands of either france or germany. i do not for a moment deny that the liquor traffic requires regulation, but it requires more regulation in europe than it does in africa, because europe is more given to intoxication. in africa all that is wanted is that the spirit sent in should be wholesome, and not sold at a strength over degrees below proof. these requirements are fairly well fulfilled already on the west coast, and i can see no reason for any further restriction or additional impost. if further restrictions in the sale of it are wanted, it is not for interior trade where the natives are not given to excess, but in the larger coast towns, where there is a body of natives who are the debris of the disintegrating process of white culture. but even in those towns like sierra leone and lagos these men are a very small percentage of the population. { } if things are even made no worse for him than they are at present, the english trader may be trusted to hold the greater part of the trade of west africa for the benefit of the english manufacturers; if he is more heavily hampered, the english trade will die out, the english trader remain, because he is the best trader with the natives; but it will be small profit to the english manufacturers because the trader will be dealing in foreign-made stuff, as he is now in the possessions of france and germany. english manufacturers, i may remark, have succeeded in turning out the cloth goods best suited for the african markets, but there has of late years been an increase in the quantity of other goods made by foreigners used in the west coast trade. the imports from france and germany and the united states to the gold coast for (published ) were , pounds s. d., the exports , pounds s. d.; and the consular report ( ) for the gold coast says that while the trade with the united kingdom has increased from , , pounds s. d. in to , , pounds s. d in , or roughly per cent., the trade with foreign countries has increased upwards of per cent., namely, from , pounds s. d to , pounds s. d. in the lagos consular report (no. ) similar comparative statistics are not given, but the increase at that place is probably greater than on the gold coast, as a heavy percentage of the lagos trade goes through the hands of two german firms; but this increase in foreign trade in our colonies seems to be even greater in other parts of africa, for in a foreign office report from mozambique it is stated, regarding cape colony, that "while british imports show an otherwise satisfactory increase, german trade has more than trebled." { } there is a certain school of philanthropists in europe who say that it is not advisable to spread white trade in africa, that the native is provided by the bountiful earth with all that he really requires, and that therefore he should be allowed to live his simple life, and not be compelled or urged to work for the white man's gain. i have a sneaking sympathy with these good people, because i like the african in his bush state best; and one can understand any truly human being being horrified at the extinction of native races in the polynesian, melanesian, and american regions. but still their view is full of error as regards africa, for one thing i am glad to say the african does not die off as do those weaker races under white control, but increases; and herein lies the impossibility of accepting this plan as within the sphere of practical politics, most certainly in regard to all districts under white control, for the bountiful earth does not amount to much in africa with native methods of agriculture. it sufficed when a percentage of the population were shipped to america as slaves; now it suffices only to help to keep the natives in their low state of culture--a state that is only kept up even to its present level by trade. the condition of the african native will be a very dreadful one if this trade is not maintained; indeed, i may say if it is not increased proportionately to the increase of white government control--for this governmental control does many things that are good in themselves, and glorious on paper. it prevents the export slave trade; it suppresses human sacrifice; it stops internecine war among the natives--in short, it does everything save suppress the terrible infant mortality (why it does not do this i need not discuss) to increase the native population, without in itself doing anything to increase the means of supporting this population; nay, it even wants to decrease these by importing asiatics to do its work, in making roads, etc. it may be said there is no fear of the trade, which keeps the native, disappearing from the west coast, but it is well to remember that the stuff that this trade is dependent on, the stuff brought into the traders' factory by the native, is mainly--indeed, save for the south-west coast coffee and cacao, we may say, entirely--bush stuff, uncultivated, merely collected and roughly prepared, and it is so wastefully collected by the native that it cannot last indefinitely. take rubber, for example, one of the main exports. owing to the wasteful methods employed in its collection it gets stamped out of districts. the trade in it starts on a bit of coast; for some years so rich is the supply, that it can be collected almost at the native's back door, but owing to his cutting down the vine, he clears it off, and every year he has to go further and further afield for a load. but his ability to go further than a certain point is prevented by the savage interior tribes not under white control; and also on its paying him to go on these long journeys, for the price at home takes little notice of his difficulties because of the more carefully collected supply of rubber sent into the home markets by south america and india; therefore the native loses, and when he has cleared the districts reachable by him, the trade is finished there, and he has no longer the wherewithal to buy those things which in the days of his prosperity he has acquired a taste for. the oil rivers, which send out the greatest quantity of trade on the west coast possessions, subsist entirely on palm oil for it. were anything to happen to the oil palms in the way of blight, or were a cheap substitute to be found for palm oil at home, the population of the oil rivers, even at its present density, would starve. the development of trade is a necessary condition for the existence of the natives, and the discovery of products in the forests that will be marketable in europe, and the making of plantations whose products will help to take the place of those he so recklessly now destroys, will give him a safer future than can any amount of abolitions of domestic slavery, or institutions of trial by jury, etc. if white control advances and plantations are not made and trade with the interior is not expanded, the condition of the west african will be a very wretched one, far worse than it was before the export slave-trade was suppressed. in the more healthy districts the population will increase to a state of congestion and will starve. the coast region's malaria will always keep the black, as well as the white, population thinned down, but if deserted by the trader, and left to the government official and the missionary, without any longer the incentive of trade to make the native exert himself, or the resulting comforts which assist him in resisting the climate, which the trade now enables him to procure, the coast native will sink, via vice and degradation, to extinction, and most likely have this process made all the more rapid and unpleasant for him by incursions of the wild tribes from the congested interior. i do not cite this as an immediate future for the west african, but "a little more and how much it is, a little less and how far away." remember human beings are under the same rule as other creatures; if you destroy the things that prey on them, they are liable to overswarm the food-producing power of their locality. it may be said this is not the case; look at the polynesians, the south american indians, and so on. you may look at them as much as you choose, but what you see there will not enable you to judge the african. the african does not fade away like a flower before the white man--not in the least. look at the increase of the native in the cape territory; look at what he has stood on the west coast. christopher columbus visited him before he discovered the american indians. whaling captains, and seamen of all sorts and nationalities have dropped in on him "frequent and free." he has absorbed all sorts of doctrine from religious sects; cotton goods, patent medicines, foreign spirits, and--as the man who draws up the lagos annual colonial report poetically observes--twine, whisky, wine, and woollen goods. yet the west coast african is here with us by the million--playing on his tom-tom, paddling his dug-out canoe, living in his palm leaf or mud hut, ready and able to stand more "white man stuff." save for an occasional habit of going raving or melancholy mad when educated for the ministry, and dying when he, and more particularly she, is shut up in the broiling hot, corrugated-iron school-room with too many clothes on, and too much headwork to do, he survives in a way which i think you will own is interesting, and which commands my admiration and respect. but there is nowadays a new factor in his relationship with the white races--the factor of domestic control. i do not think the african will survive this and flourish, if it is to be of the nature that the present white ideas aim to make it. but, on the other hand, i do not believe that he will be called upon to try, for under the present conditions white control will not become very thorough; and in the event of an european war, governmental attention will be distracted from west africa, and the african will then do what he has done several times before when the white eye has been off him for a decade or so,--sink back to his old level as he has in congo after the jesuits tidied him up, and as he must have done after his intercourse with the phoenicians and egyptians. the travellers of a remote future will find him, i think, still with his tom-tom and his dug-out canoe--just as willing to sell as "big curios" the debris of our importations to his ancestors at a high price. exactly how much he will ask for a devos patent paraffin oil tin or a morton's tin, i cannot imagine, but it will be something stiff--such as he asks nowadays for the phoenician "aggry" beads. there will be then as there is now, and as there was in the past, individual africans who will rise to a high level of culture, but that will be all for a very long period. to say that the african race will never advance beyond its present culture-level, is saying too much, in spite of the mass of evidence supporting this view, but i am certain they will never advance above it in the line of european culture. the country he lives in is unfitted for it, and the nature of the man himself is all against it--the truth is the west coast mind has got a great deal too much superstition about it, and too little of anything else. our own methods of instruction have not been of any real help to the african, because what he wants teaching is how to work. bishop ingram would have been able to write a more cheerful and hopeful book than his sierra leone after years, if the sierra leonians had had a thorough grounding in technical culture, suited to the requirements of their country, instead of the ruinous instruction they have been given, at the cost of millions of money, and hundreds of good, if ill-advised, white men's lives. for it is possible for a west african native to be made by european culture into a very good sort of man, not the same sort of man that a white man is, but a man a white man can shake hands with and associate with without any loss of self-respect. it is by no means necessary, however, that the african should have any white culture at all to become a decent member of society at large. quite the other way about, for the percentage of honourable and reliable men among the bushmen is higher than among the educated men. i do not believe that the white race will ever drag the black up to their own particular summit in the mountain range of civilisation. both polygamy and slavery { } are, for divers reasons, essential to the well-being of africa--at any rate for those vast regions of it which are agricultural, and these two institutions will necessitate the african having a summit to himself. only--alas! for the energetic reformer--the african is not keen on mountaineering in the civilisation range. he prefers remaining down below and being comfortable. he is not conceited about this; he admires the higher culture very much, and the people who inconvenience themselves by going in for it--but do it himself? no. and if he is dragged up into the higher regions of a self-abnegatory religion, six times in ten he falls back damaged, a morally maimed man, into his old swampy country fashion valley. chapter xxii. disease in west africa. great as is the delay and difficulty placed in the way of the development of the immense natural resources of west africa by the labour problem, there is another cause of delay to this development greater and more terrible by far--namely, the deadliness of the climate. "nothing hinders a man, miss kingsley, half so much as dying," a friend said to me the other day, after nearly putting his opinion to a practical test. other parts of the world have more sensational outbreaks of death from epidemics of yellow fever and cholera, but there is no other region in the world that can match west africa for the steady kill, kill, kill that its malaria works on the white men who come under its influence. malaria you will hear glibly talked of; but what malaria means and consists of you will find few men ready to attempt to tell you, and these few by no means of a tale. it is very strange that this terrible form of disease has not attracted more scientific investigators, considering the enormous mortality it causes throughout the tropics and sub-tropics. a few years since, when the peculiar microbes of everything from measles to miracles were being "isolated," several bacteriologists isolated the malarial microbe, only unfortunately they did not all isolate the same one. a resume of the various claims of these microbes is impossible here, and whether one of them was the true cause, or whether they all have an equal claim to this position, is not yet clear; for malaria, as far as i have seen or read of it seems to be not so much one distinct form of fever as a group of fevers--a genus, not a species. many things point to this being the case; particularly the different forms so called malarial poisoning takes in different localities. this subject may be also subdivided and complicated by going into the controversy as to whether yellow fever is endemic on the west coast or not. that it has occurred there from time to time there can be no question: at fernando po in and , in senegal pretty frequently; and at least one epidemic at bonny was true yellow fever. but in the case of each of these outbreaks it is said to have been imported from south america, into fernando po, by ships from havana, and into bonny by a ship which had on her previous run been down the south american ports with a cargo of mules. the litter belonging to this mule cargo was not cleared out of her until she got into bonny, when it was thrown overside into the river, and then the yellow fever broke out. but, on the other hand, south america taxes west africa--the guinea coast--with having first sent out yellow fever in the cargoes of slaves. this certainly is a strange statement, because the african native rarely has malarial fever severely--he has it, and you are often informed so-and-so has got yellow fever, but he does not often die of it, merely is truly wretched and sick for a day or so, and then recovers. { } regarding the haematuria there is also controversy. a very experienced and excellent authority doubts whether this is entirely a malarial fever, or whether it is not, in some cases at any rate, brought on by over-doses of quinine, and dr. plehn asserts, and his assertions are heavily backed up by his great success in treating this fever, that quinine has a very bad influence when the characteristic symptoms have declared themselves, and that it should not be given. i hesitate to advise this, because i fear to induce any one to abandon quinine, which is the great weapon against malaria, and not from any want of faith in dr. plehn, for he has studied malarial fevers in cameroon with the greatest energy and devotion, bringing to bear on the subject a sound german mind trained in a german way, and than this, for such subjects, no better thing exists. his brother, also a doctor, was stationed in cameroon before him, and is now in the german east african possessions, similarly working hard, and when these two shall publish the result of their conjoint investigations, we shall have the most important contribution to our knowledge of malaria that has ever appeared. it is impossible to over-rate the importance of such work as this to west africa, for the man who will make west africa pay will be the scientific man who gives us something more powerful against malaria than quinine. it is too much to hope that medical men out at work on the coast, doctoring day and night, and not only obliged to doctor, but to nurse their white patients, with the balance of their time taken up by giving bills of health to steamers, wrestling with the varied and awful sanitary problems presented by the native town, etc., can have sufficient time or life left in them to carry on series of experiments and of cultures; but they can and do supply to the man in the laboratory at home grand material for him to carry the thing through; meanwhile we wait for that man and do the best we can. the net results of laboratory investigation, according to the french doctors, is that the mycetozoic malarial bacillus, the microbe of paludism, is amoeboid in its movements, acting on the red corpuscles, leaving nothing of them but the dark pigment found in the skin and organs of malarial subjects. { } the german doctors make a practice of making microscopic examinations of the blood of a patient, saying that the microbes appear at the commencement of an attack of fever, increase in quantity as the fever increases, and decrease as it decreases, and from these investigations they are able to judge fairly accurately how many remissions may be expected; in fact to judge of the severity of the case which, taken with the knowledge that quinine only affects malarial microbes at a certain stage of their existence, is helpful in treatment. there is, i may remark, a very peculiar point regarding haematuric disease, the most deadly form of west coast fever. this disease, so far as we know, has always been present on the south-west coast, at loando, the lower congo and gaboon, but it is said not to have appeared in the rivers until , and then to have spread along the west coast. my learned friend, dr. plehn, doubts this, and says people were less observant in those days, but the symptoms of this fever are so distinct, that i must think it also totally impossible for it not to have been differentiated from the usual remittent or intermittent by the old west coasters if it had occurred there in former times with anything like the frequency it does now; but we will leave these theoretical and technical considerations and turn to the practical side of the question. you will always find lots of people ready to give advice on fever, particularly how to avoid getting it, and you will find the most dogmatic of these are people who have been singularly unlucky in the matter, or people who know nothing of local conditions. these latter are the most trying of all to deal with. they tell you, truly enough no doubt, that the malaria is in the air, in the exhalations from the ground, which are greatest about sunrise and sunset, and in the drinking water, and that you must avoid chill, excessive mental and bodily exertion, that you must never get anxious, or excited, or lose your temper. now there is only one-- the drinking water--of this list that you can avoid, for, owing to the great variety and rapid growth of bacteria encouraged by the tropical temperature, and the aqueous saturation of the atmosphere from the heavy rainfall, and the great extent of swamp, etc., it is practically impossible to destroy them in the air to a satisfactory extent. i was presented by scientific friends, when i first went to the west coast, with two devices supposed to do this. one was a lamp which you burnt some chemical in; it certainly made a smell that nothing could live with--but then i am not nothing, and there are enough smells on the coast now. i gave it up after the first half-hour. the other device was a muzzle, a respirator, i should say. well! all i have got to say about that is that you need be a better-looking person than i am to wear a thing like that without causing panic in a district. then orders to avoid the night air are still more difficult to obey--may i ask how you are to do without air from . p.m. to . a.m.? or what other air there is but night air, heavy with malarious exhalations, available then? the drinking water you have a better chance with, as i will presently state; chill you cannot avoid. when you are at work on the coast, even with the greatest care, the sudden fall of temperature that occurs after a tornado coming at the end of a stewing-hot day, is sure to tell on any one, and as for the orders regarding temper neither the natives, nor the country, nor the trade, help you in the least. but still you must remember that although it is impossible to fully carry out these orders, you can do a good deal towards doing so, and preventive measures are the great thing, for it is better to escape fever altogether, or to get off with a light touch of it, than to make a sensational recovery from yellow jack himself. there is little doubt that a certain make of man has the best chance of surviving the coast climate--an energetic, spare, nervous but light-hearted creature, capable of enjoying whatever there may be to enjoy, and incapable of dwelling on discomforts or worries. it is quite possible for a person of this sort to live, and work hard on the coast for a considerable period, possibly with better health than he would have in england. the full-blooded, corpulent and vigorous should avoid west africa like the plague. one after another, men and women, who looked, as the saying goes, as if you could take a lease of their lives, i have seen come out and die, and it gives one a sense of horror when they arrive at your west coast station, for you feel a sort of accessory before the fact to murder, but what can you do except get yourself laughed at as a croaker, and attend the funeral? the best ways of avoiding the danger of the night air are--to have your evening meal about . or ,-- is too late; sleep under a mosquito curtain whether there are mosquitoes in your district or not, and have a meal before starting out in the morning, a good hot cup of tea or coffee and bread and butter, if you can get it, if not, something left from last night's supper or even aguma. regarding meals, of course we come to the vexed question of stimulants--all the evidence is in favour of alcohol, of a proper sort, taken at proper times, and in proper quantities, being extremely valuable. take the case of the missionaries, who are almost all teetotalers, they are young men and women who have to pass a medical examination before coming out, and whose lives on the coast are far easier than those of other classes of white men, yet the mortality among them is far heavier than in any other class. mr. stanley says that wine is the best form of stimulant, but that it should not be taken before the evening meal. certainly on the south-west coast, where a heavy, but sound, red wine imported from portugal is the common drink, the mortality is less than on the west coast. beer has had what one might call a thorough trial in cameroon since the german occupation and is held by authorities to be the cause in part of the number of cases of haematuric fever in that river being greater than in other districts. but this subject requires scientific comparative observation on various parts of the coast, for cameroons is at the beginning of the south-west coast, whereon the percentage of cases of haematuric to those of intermittent and remittent fevers is far higher than on the west coast. a comparative study of the diseases of the western division of the continent would, i should say, repay a scientific doctor, if he survived. the material he would have to deal with would be enormous, and in addition to the history of haematuric he would be confronted with the problem of the form of fever which seems to be a recent addition to west african afflictions, the so-called typhoid malaria, which of late years has come into the rivers, and apparently come to stay. this fever is, i may remark, practically unknown at present in the south-west coast regions where the "sun for garbage" plan is adhered to. at present the treatment of all white man's diseases on the coast practically consists in the treatment of malaria, because whatever disease a person gets hold of takes on a malarial type which masks its true nature. why, i knew a gentleman who had as fine an attack of the smallpox as any one would not wish to have, and who for days behaved as if he had remittent, and then burst out into the characteristic eruption; and only got all his earthly possessions burnt, and no end of carbolic acid dressings for his pains. i do not suppose this does much harm, as the malaria is the main thing that wants curing; unless dr. plehn is right and quinine is bad in haematuria. his success in dealing with this fever seems to support his opinion; and the french doctors on the coast, who dose it heavily with quinine, have certainly a very heavy percentage of mortality among their patients with the haematuric, although in the other forms of malarial fever they very rarely lose a patient. but to return to those preventive measures, and having done what we can with the air, we will turn our attention to the drinking water, for in addition to malarial microbes the drinking and washing water of west africa is liable to contain dermazoic and entozoic organisms, and if you don't take care you will get from it into your anatomy tinea versicolor, tinea decalvans, tinea circinata, tinea sycosis, tinea favosa, or some other member of that wretched family, let alone being nearly certain to import trichocephalus dispar, ascaris lumbricoides, oxyuris vermicularis, and eight varieties of nematodes, each of them with an awful name of its own, and unpleasant consequences to you, and, lastly, a peculiar abomination, a filaria. this is not, what its euphonious name may lead you to suppose, a fern, but it is a worm which gets into the white of the eye and leads there a lively existence, causing distressing itching, throbbing and pricking sensations, not affecting the sight until it happens to set up inflammation. i have seen the eyes of natives simply swarming with these filariae. a curious thing about the disease is that it usually commences in one eye, and when that becomes over-populated an emigration society sets out for the other eye, travelling thither under the skin of the bridge of the nose, looking while in transit like the bridge of a pair of spectacles. a similar, but not identical, worm is fairly common on the ogowe, and is liable to get under the epidermis of any part of the body. like the one affecting the eye it is very active in its movements, passing rapidly about under the skin and producing terrible pricking and itching, but very trifling inflammation in those cases which i have seen. the treatment consists of getting the thing out, and the thing to be careful of is to get it out whole, for if any part of it is left in, suppuration sets in, so even if you are personally convinced you have got it out successfully it is just as well to wash out the wound with carbolic or condy's fluid. the most frequent sufferers from these filariae are the natives, but white people do get them. do not confuse this filaria with the guinea worm, filaria medinensis, which runs up to ten and twelve feet in length, and whose habits are different. it is more sedentary, but it is in the drinking water inside small crustacea (cyclops). it appears commonly in its human host's leg, and rapidly grows, curled round and round like a watch-spring, showing raised under the skin. the native treatment of this pest is very cautiously to open the skin over the head of the worm and secure it between a little cleft bit of bamboo and then gradually wind the rest of the affair out. only a small portion can be wound out at a time, as the wound is very liable to inflame, and should the worm break, it is certain to inflame badly, and a terrible wound will result. you cannot wind it out by the tail because you are then, so to speak, turning its fur the wrong way, and it catches in the wound. i should, i may remark, strongly advise any one who likes to start early on a canoe journey to see that no native member of the party has a filaria medinensis on hand; for winding it up is always reserved for a morning job and as many other jobs are similarly reserved it makes for delay. i know, my friends, that you one and all say that the drinking water at your particular place is of singular beauty and purity, and that you always tell the boys to filter it; but i am convinced that that water is no more to be trusted than the boys, and i am lost in amazement at people of your intelligence trusting the trio of water, boys, and filter, in the way you do. one favourite haunt of mine gets its drinking water from a cemented hole in the back yard into which drains a very strong-smelling black little swamp, which is surrounded by a ridge of sandy ground, on which are situated several groups of native houses, whose inhabitants enhance their fortunes and their drainage by taking in washing. at fernando po the other day i was assured as usual that the water was perfection, "beautiful spring coming down from the mountain," etc. in the course of the afternoon affairs took me up the mountain to basile, for the first part of the way along the course of the said stream. the first objects of interest i observed in the drinking-water supply were four natives washing themselves and their clothes; the next was the bloated body of a dead goat reposing in a pellucid pool. the path then left the course of the stream, but on arriving in the region of its source i found an interesting little colony of spanish families which had been imported out whole, children and all, by the government. they had a nice, neat little cemetery attached, which his excellency the doctor told me was "stocked mostly with children, who were always dying off from worms." good, so far, for the drinking water! and as to what that beautiful stream was soaking up when it was round corners--i did not see it, so i do not know--but i will be bound it was some abomination or another. but it's no use talking, it's the same all along, sierra leone, grain coast, ivory coast, gold coast, lagos, rivers, cameroon, congo francais, kacongo, congo belge, and angola. when you ask your white friends how they can be so reckless about the water, which, as they know, is a decoction of the malarious earth, exposed night and day to the malarious air, they all up and say they are not; they have "got an awfully good filter, and they tell the boys," etc., and that they themselves often put wine or spirit in the water to kill the microbes. vanity, vanity! at each and every place i know, "men have died and worms have eaten them." the safest way of dealing with water i know is to boil it hard for ten minutes at least, and then instantly pour it into a jar with a narrow neck, which plug up with a wad of fresh cotton-wool--not a cork; and should you object to the flat taste of boiled water, plunge into it a bit of red-hot iron, which will make it more agreeable in taste. before boiling the water you can carefully filter it if you like. a good filter is a very fine thing for clearing drinking water of hippopotami, crocodiles, water snakes, catfish, etc., and i daresay it will stop back sixty per cent. of the live or dead african natives that may be in it; but if you think it is going to stop back the microbe of marsh fever--my good sir, you are mistaken. and remember that you must give up cold water, boiled or unboiled, altogether; for if you take the boiled or filtered water and put it into one of those water-coolers, and leave it hanging exposed to night air or day on the verandah, you might just as well save yourself the trouble of boiling it at all. next in danger to the diseases come the remedies for them. let the new-comer remember, in dealing with quinine, calomel, arsenic, and spirits, that they are not castor sugar nor he a glass bottle, but let him use them all--the two first fairly frequently--not waiting for an attack of fever and then ladling them into himself with a spoon. the third, arsenic--a drug much thought of by the french, who hold that if you establish an arsenic cachexia you do not get a malarial one--should not be taken except under a doctor's orders. spirit is undoubtedly extremely valuable when, from causes beyond your control, you have got a chill. remember always your life hangs on quinine, and that it is most important to keep the system sensitive to it, which you do not do if you keep on pouring in heavy doses of it for nothing and you make yourself deaf into the bargain. i have known people take sixty grains of quinine in a day for a bilious attack and turn it into a disease they only got through by the skin of their teeth; but the prophylactic action of quinine is its great one, as it only has power over malarial microbes at a certain state of their development,--the fully matured microbe it does not affect to any great degree--and therefore by taking it when in a malarious district, say, in a dose of five grams a day, you keep down the malaria which you are bound, even with every care, to get into your system. when you have got very chilled or over-tired, take an extra five grains with a little wine or spirit at any time, and when you know, by reason of aching head and limbs and a sensation of a stream of cold water down your back and an awful temper, that you are in for a fever, send for a doctor if you can. if, as generally happens, there is no doctor near to send for, take a compound calomel and colocynth pill, fifteen grains of quinine and a grain of opium, and go to bed wrapped up in the best blanket available. when safely there take lashings of hot tea or, what is better, a hot drink made from fresh lime-juice, strong and without sugar--fresh limes are almost always to be had--if not, bottled lime-juice does well. then, in the hot stage, don't go fanning about, nor in the perspiring stage, for if you get a chill then you may turn a mild dose of fever into a fatal one. if, however, you keep conscientiously rolled in your blanket until the perspiring stage is well over, and stay in bed till the next morning, the chances are you will be all right, though a little shaky about the legs. you should continue the quinine, taking it in five-grain doses, up to fifteen to twenty grains a day for a week after any attack of fever, but you must omit the opium pill. the great thing in west africa is to keep up your health to a good level, that will enable you to resist fever, and it is exceedingly difficult for most people to do this, because of the difficulty of getting exercise and good food. but do what you may it is almost certain you will get fever during a residence of more than six months on the coast, and the chances are two to one on the gold coast that you will die of it. but, without precautions, you will probably have it within a fortnight of first landing, and your chances of surviving are almost nil. with precautions, in the rivers and on the s.w. coast your touch of fever may be a thing inferior in danger and discomfort to a bad cold in england. yet remember, before you elect to cast your lot in with the west coasters, that per cent. of them die of fever or return home with their health permanently wrecked. also remember that there is no getting acclimatised to the coast. there are, it is true, a few men out there who, although they have been resident in west africa for years, have never had fever, but you can count them up on the fingers of one hand. there is another class who have been out for twelve months at a time, and have not had a touch of fever; these you want the fingers of your two hands to count, but no more. by far the largest class is the third, which is made up of those who have a slight dose of fever once a fortnight, and some day, apparently for no extra reason, get a heavy dose and die of it. a very considerable class is the fourth--those who die within a fortnight to a month of going ashore. the fate of a man depends solely on his power of resisting the so- called malaria, not in his system becoming inured to it. the first class of men that i have cited have some unknown element in their constitutions that renders them immune. with the second class the power of resistance is great, and can be renewed from time to time by a spell home in a european climate. in the third class the state is that of cumulative poisoning; in the fourth of acute poisoning. let the new-comer who goes to the coast take the most cheerful view of these statements and let him regard himself as preordained to be one of the two most favoured classes. let him take every care short of getting frightened, which is as deadly as taking no care at all, and he may--i sincerely hope he will--survive; for a man who has got the grit in him to go and fight in west africa for those things worth fighting for--duty, honour and gold--is a man whose death is a dead loss to his country. the cargoes from west africa truly may "wives and mithers maist despairing ca' them lives o' men." yet grievous as is the price england pays for her west african possessions, to us who know the men who risk their lives and die for them, england gets a good equivalent value for it; for she is the greatest manufacturing country in the world, and as such requires markets. nowadays she requires them more than new colonies. a colony drains annually thousands of the most enterprising and energetic of her children from her, leaving behind them their aged and incapable relations. moreover, a colony gradually becomes a rival manufacturing centre to the mother country, whereas west africa will remain for hundreds of years a region that will supply the manufacturer with his raw material, and take in exchange for it his manufactured articles, giving him a good margin of profit. and the holding of our west african markets drains annually a few score of men only--only too often for ever--but the trade they carry on and develop there--a trade, according to sir george baden-powell, of the annual value of nine millions sterling--enables thousands of men, women and children to remain safely in england, in comfort and pleasure, owing to the wages and profits arising from the manufacture and export of the articles used in that trade. so i trust that those at home in england will give all honour to the men still working in west africa, or rotting in the weed-grown, snake-infested cemeteries and the forest swamps--men whose battles have been fought out on lonely beaches far away from home and friends and often from another white man's help, sometimes with savages, but more often with a more deadly foe, with none of the anodyne to death and danger given by the companionship of hundreds of fellow soldiers in a fight with a foe you can see, but with a foe you can see only incarnate in the dreams of your delirium, which runs as a poison in burning veins and aching brain--the dread west coast fever. and may england never again dream of forfeiting, or playing with, the conquests won for her by those heroes of commerce, the west coast traders; for of them, as well as of such men as sir gerald portal, truly it may be said--of such is the kingdom of england. appendix. the invention of the cloth loom. this story is taken down from an eboe, but practically the same story can be found among all the cloth-making tribes in west africa. in the old times there was a man who was a great hunter; but he had a bad wife, and when he made medicine to put on his spear, she made medicine against his spear, but he knew nothing of this thing and went out after bush cow. by and by he found a big bush cow, and threw his spear at it, but the bush cow came on, and drove its horns through his thigh, so the man crept home, and lay in his house very sick, and the witch doctor found out which of his wives had witched the spear, and they killed her, and for many days the man could not go out hunting. but he was a great hunter, and his liver grew hot in him for the bush, so he dragged himself to the bush, and lay there every day. one day, as he lay, he saw a big spider making a net on a bush and he watched him. by and by he saw how the spider caught his game, and that the spider was a great hunter, and the man said "if i had hunted as this spider hunts, if i had made a trap like that and put it in the bush and then gone aside and let the game get into it and weary itself to death quickly,--quicker and safer than they do in pit-falls--that bush cow would not have gored me." and so after a time he tried to make a net like the spider's, out of bush rope, and he did this thing and put his net into the forest, and caught bush deer (gazelles) and earthpig (pangolins) and porcupines, and he made more nets, and every net he made was better, and he grew well, and became a greater hunter than before. one day he made a very fine net, and his wife said "this is a cloth, it is better than our cloth (bark cloth) because when the rain gets to it, it does not shrivel. make me a cloth like this and then i will beat it with the mallet and wear it." and the man tried to do this thing, but he could not get it a good shape and he said, "yet the spider gets a shape in his cloth. i will go and ask him again this thing." and he went to the spider, and took him another offering, and said: "oh, my lord, teach me more things." and he sat and watched him for many days. by and by he saw more (his eyes were opened) and he saw the spider made his net on sticks, and so he went home and got fine bush rope that he had collected, and taken there, to make his game nets with, and he brought them to the bush near the spider, and fixing the strings on to the bush he made a new net and he got shape into it, and he made more nets this way, and every net he made was better. and his wife was pleased and gave him sons, and by and by the man saw that he did not want all the sticks of a bush to make his net on, only some of them; and so he took these home and put them up in his house, and made his nets there, and after a time his wife said: "why do you make the stuff for me with that bush rope? why do you not make it with something finer?" and he went into the bush and took offerings to the spider and said: "oh, my lord, teach me more things!" and he sat and watched the spider, but the spider only went on making stuff out of his belly. and the man said: "oh, my lord, you pass me. i cannot do this thing." and as he went home he thought and saw that there are trees, and there are bush ropes, thick bush rope and thin bush rope, and then there is grass which was thinner still, and he took the grass, and tried to make a net with it, and did this thing and made more nets and every net he made was better. and his wife was pleased and said "this is good cloth." and the man lived to be very old and was a great chief and a great hunter. for it is good for a man to be a great hunter, and it is good for a man to please women. this is the origin of the cloth loom. it was in the old time, and men have got now thread on spools from the white man, for the white man is a great spider; but this is how the black man learnt to make cloth. notes. { } sierra leone has been known since the voyage of hanno of carthage in the sixth century b.c., but it has not got into general literature to any great extent since pliny. the only later classic who has noticed it is milton, who in a very suitable portion of paradise lost says of notus and afer, "black with thunderous clouds from sierra lona." our occupation of it dates from . { } lagos also likes to bear this flattering appellation, and has now-a-days more right to the title. { } along the coast, and in other parts of africa, the coarser, flat-sided kinds of banana are usually called plantains, the name banana being reserved for the finer sorts, such as the little "silver banana." { } from point limbok, the seaward extremity of cameroons mountain, to cape horatio, the most eastern extremity of fernando po, the soundings are, from the continent, , , , , , , , fathoms; close on to the island, and fathoms. { } i am informed that the allowance made to these priests exceeds by some pounds the revenues spain obtains from the island. in spanish possessions alone is a supporting allowance made to missionaries though in all the other colonies they obtain a government grant. { } ten years' wanderings among the ethiopians, t. j. hutchinson. { a} there is difference of opinion among authorities as to whether fernando po was discovered by fernando po or by lopez gonsalves. { b} from april till the end of , men out of the died of fever. { } porto is the bubi name for black men who are not bubis, these were in old days portuguese slaves, "porto" being evidently a corruption of "portuguese," but it is used alike by the bubi to designate sierra leonian and accras, in fact, all the outer barbarian blacks. the name for white men, mandara, used by the bubis, has a sort of resemblance to the effik name for whites, makara, i.e., the ruling one, but i do not know whether these two words have any connection. { } i am glad to find that my own observations on the drink question entirely agree with those of dr. oscar baumann, because he is an unprejudiced scientific observer, who has had great experience both in the congo and cameroon regions before he came to fernando po. in support of my statement i may quote his own words: --"die bube trinken namlich sehr gerne rum; gin verschmahen sie vollstandig, aber ausser tabak und salz gehort rum zu den gesuchtesten europaischen artikeln fur sie. wie bekannt hat sich in europa ein heftiges geschrei gegen die vergiftung der neger durch alcohol erhoben. wenn dasselbe schon fur die meisten stamme westafrikas der berechtigung fast vollstandig entbehrt und in die categorie verweisen worden muss die man mit dem nicht sehr schonen aber treffenden ausdrucke 'humanitatsduselei' bezeichnet, so ist es den bube gegenuber wohl mehr als zwecklos. es mag ja vorkommen dass ein bube wenn er sein palmol verkauft hat, sich ein oder zweimal im jahre mit rum ein rauschlein antrinkt. deshalb aber gleich von alkohol-vergiftung zu sprechen ware mindestens lacherlich. ich bin uberzeugt dass mancher jener herren die in wort und schrift so heftig gegen die alkolismus der neger zetern in ihren studenten- jahren allein mehr geistige getranke genossen haben als zehn bube wahrend ihres ganzen lebens. der handelsrum welcher wie ich mich ofters uberzeugt zwar recht verwassert aber keineswegs abstossend schlecht schmeckt, ist den bube gewohnlich nur eine delikatesse welche mit andacht schluckweise genossen wird. wenn ein arbeiter bei uns einen schluck branntwein oder ein glas bier geniesst um sich zu starken, so findet das jeder in der ordnung; der bube jedoch, welcher splitternackt tagelang in feuchten bergwaldern umher klettern muss, soll beliebe nichts als wasser trinken!" eine africanische tropen. insel fernando poo, dr. oscar baumann, edward holzer, wien, . { } "beitrage zur kenntniss der bubisprache auf fernando poo," o. baumann, zeitschrift fur afrikanische sprachen. berlin, . { } ten years' wanderings among the ethiopians. t. j. hutchinson. { } the sierra del cristal and the pallaballa range are, by some geographers, held to be identical; but i have reason to doubt this, for the specimens of rock brought home by me have been identified by the geological survey, those of the pallaballa range as mica schist and quartz; those of the sierra del cristal as "probably schistose grit, but not definitely determinable by inspection," and "quartz rock." the quantity of mica in the sands of the ogowe, i think, come into it from its affluents from the congo region because you do not get these mica sands in rivers which are entirely from the sierra del cristal, such as the muni. the rumby and omon ranges are probably identical with the sierra del cristal, for in them as in the sierra you do not get the glistening dove-coloured rock with a sparse vegetation growing on it, as you do in the pallaballa region. { } the villages of the fans and bakele are built in the form of a street. when in the forest there are two lines of huts, the one facing the other, and each end closed by a guard house. when facing a river there is one line of huts facing the river frontage. { } the m'pongwe speaking tribes are the m'pongwe, orungu, nkami, ajumba, inlenga and the igalwa. { } these four ajumba had been engaged, through the instrumentality of m. jacot, to accompany me to the rembwe river. the ajumba are one of the noble tribes and are the parent stem of the m'pongwe; their district is the western side of lake ayzingo. { } as this river is not mentioned on maps, and as i was the first white traveller on it, i give my own phonetic spelling; but i expect it would be spelt by modern geographers "kakola." { } a common african sensation among natives when alarmed, somewhat akin to our feeling some one walk over our graves. { } since my return i think the french gentleman may have been m. f. tenaille d'estais, who is down on the latest map (french) as having visited a lake in this region in , which is set down as lac ebouko. he seems to have come from and returned to lake ayzingo--on map lac azingo--but on the other hand "ebouko" was not known on the lake, ajumba and fans alike calling it ncovi. { } diospyros and copaifua mopane. { } vipera nasicornis; m'pongwe, ompenle. { } i have no hesitation in saying that the gorilla is the most horrible wild animal i have seen. i have seen at close quarters specimens of the most important big game of central africa, and, with the exception of snakes, i have run away from all of them; but although elephants, leopards, and pythons give you a feeling of alarm, they do not give that feeling of horrible disgust that an old gorilla gives on account of its hideousness of appearance. { } an european coat or its equivalent value is one of the constant quantities in an ivory bundle. { } specimen placed in herbarium at kew. { } it is held by some authorities to come from gru-gru, a mandingo word for charm, but i respectfully question whether gru-gru has not come from ju-ju, the native approximation to the french joujou. { } the proper way to spell this name is booby, i.e. silly, but as bubi is the accepted spelling, i bow to authority. { } this article has different names in different tribes; thus it is called a bian among the fan, a tarwiz, gree-gree, etc., on other parts of the coast. { } care must be taken not to confuse with sacrifices (propitiations of spirits) the killing of men and animals as offerings to the souls of deceased persons. { } pronounced tchwee. { } among the fjort the body cannot be buried until all the deceased's debts are paid. { } in speaking of native ideas i should prefer to use the good yorkshire term of "overthrowing" in place of "superstition," but as the latter is the accepted word for such matters i feel bound to employ it. { } "tshi-speaking people," colonel sir h. b. ellis. { } since my return to england i have read sir richard burton's account of his first successful attempt to reach the summit of the great cameroons in . his companions were herr mann, the botanist, and senor calvo. herr mann claimed to have ascended the summit a few days before the two others joined him, but burton seems to doubt this. the account he himself gives of the summit is: "victoria mountain now proved to be a shell of a huge double crater opening to the south-eastward, where a tremendous torrent of fire had broken down the weaker wall, the whole interior and its accessible breach now lay before me plunging down in vertical cliff. the depth of the bowl may be feet. the total diameter of the two, which are separated by a rough partition of lava, , feet. . . not a blade of grass, not a thread of moss, breaks the gloom of this plutonic pit, which is as black as erebus, except where the fire has painted it red or yellow." this ascent was made from the west face. i got into the "plutonic pit" through the s.e. break in its wall, and was said to be the first english person to reach it from the s.e., and the twenty-eighth ascender, according to my well- informed german friends. { } the african association now own two steamers. alexander miller brothers and co. also charter steamers. { } a naturalist in mid africa, . { } the accounts given by the various members of the stanley emin relief expedition well describe the usual sort of west african hinterland work, but the forests of the congo are less relieved by open park-like country than those of the rivers to the north or south. still the congo, in spite of this disadvantage, has greater facilities for transport in the way of waterways than is found east of the cross or cameroon. { } export of coffee from the gold coast, , given in the colonial report on that year published in , was of the value of , pounds s. d.; cocoa, pounds s. d. the greater part of this coffee goes to germany. export of coffee from lagos, given in colonial report for , published in , was of the value of pounds. no figures on this subject are given in the report, published in , but i cite these figures to show the delay in publishing these reports by the colonial office and the difficulty of getting reliable statistics on west african trade. { } "the development of dodos." national review, march, . { } ethnology, p. . a. h. keane, cambridge, . { } lagos annual consular report ( , p. ), : "there were only three cases of drunkenness. considering that in the island of lagos alone the population is over , , this clearly proves that drunkenness in this part of africa is uncommon, and that there is insufficient evidence for the contention which is advanced that the native is being ruined by what is so often spoken of as the heinous gin traffic; it is a well-known fact by those in a position best able to judge by long residence that the inhabitants of this country have a natural repugnance to intemperance." { } board of trade journal, august . { } by slavery, i mean the quasi-feudal system you find existing among the true negroes. i do not mean either the form of domestic slavery of egypt, or the system of labour existing in the congo free state; although i am of opinion that the suppression of his export slave trade to the americas was a grave mistake. it has been fraught with untold suffering to the african, which would have been avoided by altering the slave trade into a coolie system. { } bilious haemoglobinuric, black water fever. { } see also klebs and tommasi crudeli, arch. f. exp. path., xi.; ceci, ibid., xv.; tommasi crudeli, la malaria de rome, paris, ; nuovi studj sulla natura della malaria, rome, ; "malaria and the ancient drainage of the roman hills," practitioner, ii., ; instituzioni de anat. path., vol. i., turin, ; marchiafava e cuboni, nuovi studj sulla natura della malaria, acad. dei lincei, jan. , ; marchand, virch. arch., vol. lxxxviii.; laveran, nature parasitaire des accidents d'impaludisme, paris, ; richard, comptes rendus, ; steinberg, rep. nat. board of health (u.s.), . malaria-krankheiten, k. schwalbe; berlin, ; parkes, on the issue of a spirit ration in the ashantee campaign, churchill, ; zumsden, cyclopaedia of medicine; ague, dr. m. d. o'connell, calcutta, ; roman fever, north, appendix i. british central africa, sir h. h. johnstone. scanned by jc byers, (www.wollamshram.ca/ ) proofread by the volunteers of the distributed proofreaders site. (http://charlz.dns go.com/gutenberg/) two trips to gorilla land and the cataracts of the congo. by richard f. burton. in two volumes vol. i. london: "quisquis amat congi fines peragrare nigrantes, africæ et Æthiopum cernere regna, domus, * * * * * * * perlegat hunc librum." fra angelus de map. piccardus. "timbuctoo travels, voyages to the poles, are ways to benefit mankind as true perhaps as shooting them at waterloo."--don juan. trieste, jan. , . my dear sir george, our paths in life have been separated by a long interval. whilst inclination led you to explore and to'survey the wild wastes of the north, the arctic shores and the polar seas, with all their hardships and horrors; my lot was cast in the torrid regions of sind and arabia; in the luxuriant deserts of africa, and in the gorgeous tropical forests of the brazil. but the true traveller can always appreciate the record of another's experience, and perhaps the force of contrast makes him most enjoy the adventures differing the most from his own. to whom, then, more appropriately than to yourself, a discoverer of no ordinary note, a recorder of explorations, and, finally, an earnest labourer in the cause of geography, can i inscribe this plain, unvarnished tale of a soldier-traveller? kindly accept the trifle as a token of the warmest esteem, an earnest of my thankfulness for the interest ever shown by you in forwarding my plans and projects of adventure; and, in the heartfelt hope that allah may prolong your days, permit me to subscribe myself, your sincere admirer and grateful friend, richard f. burton. admiral sir george back, d.c.l., f.r.s., vice-pres. r.g.s., &c. preface. the notes which form the ground-work of these volumes have long been kept in the obscurity of manuscript: my studies of south america, of syria and palestine, of iceland, and of istria, left me scant time for the labour of preparation. leisure and opportunity have now offered themselves, and i avail myself of them in the hope that the publication will be found useful to more than one class of readers. the many who take an interest in the life of barbarous peoples may not be displeased to hear more about the fán; and the few who would try a fall with mister gorilla can learn from me how to equip themselves, whence to set out and whither to go for the best chance. travelling with m. paul b. du chaillu's "first expedition" in my hand, i jealously looked into every statement, and his numerous friends will be pleased to see how many of his assertions are confirmed by my experience. the second part is devoted to the nzadi or lower congo river, from the mouth to the yellala or main rapids, the gate by which the mighty stream, emerging from the plateau of inner africa, goes to its long home, the atlantic. some time must elapse before the second expedition, which left ambriz early in , under lieutenant grandy, r. n., can submit its labours to the public: meanwhile these pages will, i trust, form a suitable introduction to the gallant explorer's travel in the interior. it would be preposterous to publish descriptions of any european country from information gathered ten years ago. but africa moves slowly, and thus we see that the results of an abyssinian journey (m. antoine d'abbadie's "géodésic d'ethiopie," which took place about , are not considered obsolete in . after a languid conviction during the last half century of owning some ground upon the west coast of africa, england has been rudely aroused by a little war which will have large consequences. the causes that led to the "ashantee campaign," a negro copy of the negroid abyssinian, may be broadly laid down as general incuriousness, local mismanagement, and the operation of unprincipled journalism. it is not a little amusing to hear the complaints of the public that plain truth about the african has not been told. i could cite more than one name that has done so. but what was the result? we were all soundly abused by the negrophile; the multitude cared little about reading "unpopular opinions;" and then, when the fulness of time came, it turned upon us, and rent us, and asked why we had not spoken freely concerning ashanti and fanti, and all the herd. my "wanderings in west africa" is a case in point: so little has it been read, that a president of the royal geographical society (african section of the society of arts journal, feb. , ) could state, "if fantees are cowardly and lazy, krumen are brave;" the latter being the most notorious poltroons on the west african seaboard. the hostilities on the gold coast might have been averted with honour to ourselves at any time between and , by a colonial office mission and a couple of thousand pounds. i need hardly say what has been the case now. the first steps were taken with needless disasters, and the effect has been far different from what we intended or what was advisable. for a score of years we (travellers) have been advising the english statesman not to despise the cunning of barbarous tribes, never to attempt finessing with asiatic or african; to treat these races with perfect sincerity and truthfulness. i have insisted, and it is now seen with what reason, that every attempt at deception, at asserting the "thing which is not," will presently meet with the reward it deserves. i can only regret that my counsels have not made themselves heard. yet this ignoble war between barbarous tribes whom it has long been the fashion to pet, this poor scuffle between the breechloader and the birmingham trade musket, may yet in one sense do good. it must perforce draw public attention to the west coast of africa, and raise the question, "what shall we do with it?" my humble opinion, expressed early in to the right honourable mr. adderley, has ever been this. if we are determined not to follow the example of the french, the dutch, the portuguese, and the spaniards, and not to use the country as a convict station, resolving to consume, as it were, our crime at home, we should also resolve to retain only a few ports and forts, without territory, at points commanding commerce, after the fashion of the lusitanians in the old heroic days. the export slave-trade is now dead and buried; the want of demand must prevent its revival; and free emigration has yet to be created. as mr. bright rightly teaches, strong places and garrisons are not necessary to foster trade and to promote the success of missions. the best proof on the west african coast is to be found in the so-called oil rivers, where we have never held a mile of ground, and where our commerce prospers most. the great "tribune" will forgive my agreeing in opinion with him when he finds that we differ upon one most important point. it is the merchant, not the garrison, that causes african wars. if the home authorities would avoid a campaign, let them commit their difficulty to a soldier, not to a civilian. the chronic discontent of the so-called "civilized" african, the contempt of the rulers if not of the rule, and the bitter hatred between the three races, white, black, and black-white, fomented by many an unprincipled print, which fills its pocket with coin of cant and christian charity, will end in even greater scandals than the last disreputable war. if the damnosa licentia be not suppressed--and where are the strong hands to suppress it?--we may expect to see the scenes of jamaica revived with improvements at sierra leone. however unwilling i am to cut off any part of our great and extended empire, to renew anywhere, even in africa, the process of dismemberment--the policy which cast off corfu--it is evident to me that english occupation of the west african coast has but slightly forwarded the cause of humanity, and that upon the whole it has proved a remarkable failure. we can be wise in time. richard f. burton. p.s.--since these pages were written, a name which frequently occurs in them has become a memory to his friends--i allude to w. winwood reade, and i deplore his loss. the highest type of englishman, brave and fearless as he was gentle and loving, his short life of thirty-seven years shows how much may be done by the honest, thorough worker. he had emphatically the courage of his opinions, and he towered a cubit above the crowd by telling not only the truth, as most of us do, but the whole truth, which so few can afford to do. his personal courage in battle during the ashanti campaign, where the author of "savage africa" became correspondent of the "times," is a matter of history. his noble candour in publishing the "martyrdom of man" is an example and a model to us who survive him. and he died calmly and courageously as he lived, died in harness, died as he had resolved to die, like the good and gallant gentleman of ancient lineage that he was. contents of vol. i. chapter i. landing at the rio gabão (gaboon river).--le plateau, the french colony chapter ii. the departure.--the tornado.--arrival at "the bush" chapter iii. geography of the gaboon chapter iv. the minor tribes and the mpongwe chapter v. to sánga-tánga and back chapter vi. village life in pongo-land chapter vii. return to the river chapter viii. up the gaboon river chapter ix. a specimen day with the fán cannibals chapter x. to the mbíka (hill); the sources of the gaboon.-- return to the plateau chapter. xi. mr., mrs., and master gorilla chapter xii. corisco.--"home" to fernando po part i. the gaboon river and gorilla land. "it was my hint to speak, such was my process; and of the cannibals that each other eat, the anthropophagi, and men whose heads do grow beneath their shoulders."�othello. part i. trip to gorilla land. chapter i. landing at the rio gabão (gaboon river).--le plateau, the french colony. i remember with lively pleasure my first glance at the classic stream of the "portingal captains" and the "zeeland interlopers." the ten-mile breadth of the noble gaboon estuary somewhat dwarfed the features of either shore as we rattled past cape santa clara, a venerable name, "'verted" to joinville. the bold northern head, though not "very high land," makes some display, because we see it in a better light; and its environs are set off by a line of scattered villages. the vis-a-vis of louis philippe peninsula on the starboard bow (zuidhoeck), "sandy point" or sandhoeck, by the natives called pongára, and by the french péninsule de marie- amélie, shows a mere fringe of dark bristle, which is tree, based upon a broad red-yellow streak, which is land. as we pass through the slightly overhung mouth, we can hardly complain with a late traveller of the gaboon's "sluggish waters;" during the ebb they run like a mild mill-race, and when the current, setting to the north-west, meets a strong sea-breeze from the west, there is a criss-cross, a tide-rip, contemptible enough to a cruizer, but quite capable of filling cock-boats. and, nearing the end of our voyage, we rejoice to see that the dull down-pourings and the sharp storms of fernando po have apparently not yet migrated so far south. dancing blue wavelets, under the soft azure sky, plash and cream upon the pure clean sand that projects here and there black lines of porous ironstone waiting to become piers; and the water-line is backed by swelling ridges, here open and green- grassed, there spotted with islets of close and shady trees. mangrove, that horror of the african voyager, shines by its absence; and the soil is not mud, but humus based on gravels or on ruddy clays, stiff and retentive. the formation, in fact, is everywhere that of eyo or yoruba, the goodly region lying west of the lower niger, and its fertility must result from the abundant water supply of the equatorial belt. the charts are fearful to look upon. the embouchure, well known to old traders, has been scientifically surveyed in our day by lieutenant alph. fleuriot de langle, of la malouine ( ), and the chart was corrected from a survey ordered by capitaine bouët- willaumez ( ); in the latter year it was again revised by m. charles floix, of the french navy, and, with additions by the officers of her britannic majesty's service, it becomes our no. . the surface is a labyrinth of banks, rocks, and shoals, "ely," "nisus," "alligator," and "caraibe." in such surroundings as these, when the water shallows apace, the pilot must not be despised. her majesty's steam-ship "griffon," commander perry, found herself, at p.m. on monday, march, , , in a snug berth opposite le plateau, as the capital of the french colony is called, and amongst the shipping of its chief port, aumale road. the river at this neck is about five miles broad, and the scene was characteristically french. hardly a merchant vessel lay there. we had no less than four naval consorts "la caravane," guard-ship, store-ship, and hospital-hulk; a fine transport, "la riège," bound for goree; "la recherche," a wretched old sailing corvette which plies to assini and grand basam on the gold coast; and, lastly, "la junon," chef de division baron didelot, then one of the finest frigates in the french navy, armed with fifty rifled sixty-eight pounders. it is curious that, whilst our neighbours build such splendid craft, and look so neat and natty in naval uniform, they pay so little regard to the order and cleanliness of their floating homes. after visiting every english colony on the west coast of africa, i resolved curiously to examine my first specimen of our rivals, the "principal centre of trade in western equatorial africa." the earliest visit--in uniform, of course--was to baron didelot, whose official title is "commandant supérieur des Établissements de la côte d'or et du gabon;" the following was to m. h. s. l'aulnois, "lieutenant de vaisseau et commandant particulier du comptoir de gabon." these gentlemen have neat bungalows and gardens; they may spend their days ashore, but they are very careful to sleep on board. all the official whites appear to have a morbid horror of the climate; when attacked by fever, they "cave in" at once, and recovery can hardly be expected. this year also, owing to scanty rains, sickness has been rife, and many cases which began with normal mildness have ended suddenly and fatally. besides fear of fever, they are victims to ennui and nostalgia; and, expecting the comptoir to pay large profits, they are greatly disappointed by the reverse being the case. but how can they look for it to be otherwise? the modern french appear fit to manage only garrisons and military posts. they will make everything official, and they will not remember the protest against governing too much, offered by the burgesses of paris to louis le grand. they are always on duty; they are never out of uniform, mentally and metaphorically, as well as bodily and literally. nothing is done without delay, even in the matter of signing a ship's papers. a long procès-verbal takes the place of our summary punishment, and the gros canon is dragged into use on every occasion, even to enforce the payment of native debts. in the gaboon, also, there is a complication of national jealousy, suggesting the mastiff and the poodle. a perpetual war rages about flags. english craft may carry their colours as far up stream as coniquet island; beyond this point they must either hoist a french ensign, or sail without bunting--should the commodore permit. otherwise they will be detained by the commander of the hulk "l'oise," stationed at anenge-nenge, some thirty-eight to forty miles above le plateau. lately a captain gordon, employed by mr. francis wookey of taunton, was ordered to pull down his flag: those who know the "mariner of england" will appreciate his feelings on the occasion. small vessels belonging to foreigners, and employed in cabotage, must not sail with their own papers, and even a change of name is effected under difficulties. about a week before my arrival a certain pan- teutonic hamburgher, herr b--, amused himself, after a copious breakfast, with hoisting and saluting the union jack, in honour of a distinguished guest, major l--. report was at once spread that the tricolor had been hauled down "with extreme indignity;" and the commodore took the trouble to reprimand the white, and to imprison "tom case," the black in whose town the outrage had been allowed. this by way of parenthesis. my next step was to request the pleasure of a visit from messrs. hogg and kirkwood, who were in charge of the english factories at glass town and olomi; they came down stream at once, and kindly acted as ciceroni around le plateau. the landing is good; a reef has been converted into a jetty and little breakwater; behind this segment of a circle we disembarked without any danger of being washed out of the boat, as at s'a leone, cape coast castle, and accra. unfortunately just above this pier there is a dutch-like jardin d'été--beds of dirty weeds bordering a foul and stagnant swamp, while below the settlement appears a huge coal-shed: the expensive mineral is always dangerous when exposed in the tropics, and some thirty per cent. would be saved by sending out a hulk. the next point is the hotel and restaurant fischer--pronounced fi-cherre, belonging to an energetic german-swiss widow, who during six years' exile had amassed some , francs. in an evil hour she sent a thieving servant before the "commissaire de police;" the negress escaped punishment, but the verandah with its appurtenances caught fire, and everything, even the unpacked billiard-table, was burnt to ashes. still, madame the brave never lost heart. she applied herself valiantly as a white ant to repairing her broken home, and, wonderful to relate in this land of no labour, ruled by the maxim "festina lente," all had been restored within six months. we shall dine at her table d'hôte. our guide led up and along the river bank, where there is almost a kilometre of road facing six or seven kilometres of nature's highway--the stream. the swampy jungle is not cleared off from about the comptoir, and presently the perfume of the fat, rank weeds; and the wretched bridges, a few planks spanning black and fetid mud, drove us northwards or inland, towards the neat house and grounds of the "commandant particulier." the outside walls, built in grades with the porous, dark-red, laterite-like stone dredged from the river, are whitewashed with burnt coralline and look clean; whilst the house, one of the best in the place, is french, that is to say, pretty. near it is a cluster of native huts, mostly with walls of corded bamboo, some dabbed with clay and lime, and all roofed with the ever shabby-looking palm-leaf; none are as neat as those of the "bushmen" in the interior, where they are regularly and carefully made like baskets or panniers. the people appeared friendly; the men touched their hats, and the women dropped unmistakably significant curtsies. after admiring the picturesque bush and the natural avenues behind le plateau, we diverged towards the local père-la-chaise. the new cemetery, surrounded by a tall stone wall and approached by a large locked gate, contains only four tombs; the old burial ground opposite is unwalled, open, and painfully crowded; the trees have run wild, the crosses cumber the ground, the gravestones are tilted up and down; in fact the foul golgotha of santos, são paulo, the brazil, is not more ragged, shabby, and neglected. we were shown the last resting-place of m. du chaillu pere, agent to messrs. oppenheim, the old parisian house: he died here in . resuming our way parallel with, but distant from the river, we passed a bran-new military storehouse, bright with whitewash. outside the compound lay the lines of the "zouaves," some forty negroes whom goree has supplied to the gaboon; they were accompanied by a number of intelligent mechanics, who loudly complained of having been kidnapped, coolie-fashion. we then debouched upon fort aumale; from the anchorage it appears a whitewashed square, whose feet are dipped in bright green vegetation, and its head wears a dingy brown roof-thatch. a nearer view shows a pair of semi-detached houses, built upon arches, and separated by a thoroughfare; the cleaner of the two is a hospital; the dingier, which is decorated with the brown- green stains, the normal complexion of tropical masonry, lodges the station commandant and the medical officers. fronting the former and by the side of an avenue that runs towards the sea is an unfinished magazine of stone, and to the right, as you front the sun, lies the garden of the "commandant du comptoir," choked with tropical weeds. altogether there is a scattered look about the metropolis of the "gabon," which numbers one foot of house to a thousand of "compound." suddenly a bonnet like a pair of white gulls wings and a blue serge gown fled from us, despite the weight of years, like a young gazelle; the wearer was a sister of charity, one of five bonnes s�urs. their bungalow is roomy and comfortable, near a little chapel and a largish school, whence issue towards sunset the well-known sounds of the angelus. at some distance down stream and on the right or northern bank lies a convent, and a house superintended by the original establisher of the mission in , the bishop, mgr. bessieux, who died in , aged . there are extensive plantations, but the people are too lazy to take example from them. before we hear the loud cry à table, we may shortly describe the civilized career of the gaboon. in , when french and english rivalry, burning hot on both sides of the channel, extended deep into the tropics and spurned the equator, and when every naval officer, high and low, went mad about concluding treaties and conquering territory on paper, france was persuaded to set up a naval station in gorilla-land. the northern and the southern shore each had a king, whose consent, after a careless fashion, was considered decorous. his majesty of the north was old king glass[fn# ] and his chief "tradesman," that is, his premier, was the late toko, a shrewd and far-seeing statesman. his majesty of the south was rapwensembo, known to the english as king william, to the french as roi denis. matters being in this state, m. le comte bouët-willaumez, then capitaine de vaisseau and governor of senegal, resolved, coûte que coûte, to have his fortified comptoir. evidently the northern shore was preferable; it was more populous and more healthy, facing the fresh southerly winds. during the preliminary negotiations toko, partial to the english, whose language he spoke fluently, and with whom the glass family had ever been friendly, thwarted the design with all his might, and, despite threats and bribes, honestly kept up his opposition to the last. roi denis, on the other hand, who had been decorated with the légion d'honneur for saving certain shipwrecked sailors, who knew french well, and who hoped to be made king of the whole country, favoured to the utmost gallic views, taking especial care, however, to place the broad river between himself and his white friends. m. de moleon, capitaine de frégate, and commanding the brig "le zèbre," occupied the place, mr. wilson[fn# ]("western africa," p. ) says by force of arms, but that is probably an exaggeration. to bring our history to an end, the sons of japheth overcame the children of ham, and, as the natives said, "toko he muss love frenchman, all but out of (anglicè 'in') his heart." as in the streets of paris, so in every french city at home and abroad, "verborum vetus interit ætas," and an old colonial chart often reads like a lesson in modern history. here we still find under the empire the constitutional monarchy of - . mount bouët leads to fort "aumale:" point joinville, at the north jaw of the river, faces cap montagnies: parrot has become "adelaide," and coniquet "orleans" island. indeed the love of louis-philippe's family has lingered in many a corner where one would least expect to meet it, and in i found "port saeed" a hot-bed of orleanism. the hotel verandah was crowded with the minor officials, the surgeons, and the clerks of the comptoir, drinking absinthe and colicky vermouth, smoking veritable "weeds," playing at dominoes, and contending who could talk longest and loudest. at p.m. the word was given to "fall to." the room was small and exceedingly close; the social board was big and very rickety. the clientèle rushed in like backwoodsmen on board a mississippi floating- palace, stripped off their coats, tucked up their sleeves, and, knife in one hand and bread in the other, advanced gallantly to the fray. they began by quarrelling about carving; one made a sporting offer to découper la soupe, but he would go no farther; and madame, as the head of the table, ended by asking my factotum, selim agha, to "have the kindness." the din, the heat, the flare of composition candles which gave per cent. less of light than they ought, the blunders of the slaves, the objurgations of the hostess, and the spectacled face opposite me, were as much as i could bear, and a trifle more. no wonder that the resident english merchants avoid the table-d'hôte. provisions are dear and scarce at the gaboon, where, as in other parts of west africa, the negro will not part with his animals, unless paid at the rate of some twenty-two or twenty-three shillings for a lean goat or sheep. yet the dinner is copious; the employés contribute, their rations; and thus the table shows beef twice a week. black cattle are imported from various parts of the coast, north and south; perhaps those of the kru country stand the climate best; the government yard is well stocked, and the polite commodore readily allows our cruizers to buy bullocks. madame also is not a "bird with a long bill;" the dinner, including piquette, alias vin ordinaire, coffee, and the petit verre, costs five francs to the stranger, and one franc less pays the déjeuner a la fourchette--most men here eat two dinners. the soi-disant médoc (forty francs per dozen) is tolerable, and the cassis (thirty francs) is drinkable. i am talking in the present of things twelve years past. what a shadowy, ghostly table d'hôte it has now become to me! after dinner appeared cigar and pipe, which were enjoyed in the verandah: i sat up late, admiring the intense brilliancy of the white and blue lightning, but auguring badly for the future,-- natives will not hunt during the rains. a strong wind was blowing from the north-east, which, with the north-north-east, is here, as at fernando po and camaronen, the stormy quarter. a "dry tornado," however, was the only result that night. my trip to gorilla-land was limited by the cruise upon which h.m.s.s. "griffon" had been ordered, namely, to and from the south coast with mail-bags. many of those whom i had wished to see were absent; but mr. hogg set to work in the most business- like style. he borrowed a boat from the rev. william walker, of the gaboon mission, who kindly wrote that i should have something less cranky if i could wait awhile; he manned it with three of his own krumen, and he collected the necessary stores and supplies of cloth, pipes and tobacco, rum, white wine, and absinthe for the natives. my private stores cost some francs. they consisted of candles, sugar, bread, cocoa, desiccated milk, and potatoes; cognac and médoc; ham, sausages, soups, and preserved meats, the latter french and, as usual, very good and very dear. the total expenditure for twelve days was francs. my indispensables were reduced to three loads, and i had four "pull-a-boys," one a mpongwe, mwáká alias captain merrick, a model sluggard; and messrs. smoke, joe williams, and tom whistle- -kru-men, called kru-boys. this is not upon the principle, as some suppose, of the grey-headed post-boy and drummer-boy: all the kraoh tribes end their names in bo, e.g. worebo, from "wore," to capsize a canoe; grebo, from the monkey "gre" or "gle;" and many others. bo became "boy," even as sipahi (sepoy) became sea- pie, and sukhani (steersman) sea-coney. gaboon is french, with a purely english trade. gambia is english, with a purely french trade; the latter is the result of many causes, but especially of the large neighbouring establishments at goree, saint louis de sénégal, and saint joseph de galam. exchanging the two was long held the soundest of policy. the french hoped by it to secure their darling object,--exclusive possession of the maritime regions, as well as the interior, leading to the gold mines of the mandengas (mandingas), and allowing overland connection with their algerine colony. the english also seemed willing enough to "swop" an effete and dilapidated settlement, surrounded by more powerful rivals--a hot-bed of dysentery and yellow fever, a blot upon the fair face of earth, even african earth--for a new and fresh country, with a comparatively good climate, in which the thermometer ranges between ° (fahr.) and °, with a barometer as high as the heat allows; and where, being at home and unwatched, they could subject a lingering slave-trade to a regular british putting- down. but, when matters came to the point in - , the proposed bargain excited a storm of sentimental wrath which was as queer as unexpected. the french object to part with the gaboon, as the germans appear inclined to settle upon the ogobe river. in england, cotton, civilization, and even christianity were thrust forward by half-a-dozen merchants, and by a few venal colonial prints. the question assumed the angriest aspect; and, lastly, the prussian-french war underwrote the negotiations with a finis pro temp. i hope to see them renewed; and i hope still more ardently to see the day when we shall either put our so- called "colonies" on the west coast of africa to their only proper use, convict stations, or when, if we are determined upon consuming our own crime at home, we shall make up our minds to restore them to the negro and the hyaena, their "old inhabitants." at the time of my visit, the gaboon river had four english traders; viz. . messrs. laughland and co., provision-merchants, fernando po and glasgow. their resident agent was mr. kirkwood. . messrs. hatton and cookson, general merchants, liverpool. their chief agent, mr. r.b.n. walker, who had known the river for eleven years ( ), had left a few days before my arrival; his successor, mr. r.b. knight, had also sailed for cape palmas, to engage kru-men, and mr. hogg had been left in charge. . messrs. wookey and dyer, general merchants, liverpool. agents, messrs. gordon and bryant. . messrs. bruford and townsend, of bristol. agent, captain townsend. the resident agents for the hamburg houses were messrs. henert and bremer. the english traders in the gaboon are nominally protected by the consulate of sao paulo de loanda, but the distance appears too great for consul or cruizer. they are naturally anxious for some support, and they agitate for an unpaid consular agent: at present they have, in african parlance, no "back." a kruman, offended by a ration of plantains, when he prefers rice, runs to the plateau, and lays some fictitious complaint before the commandant. monsieur summons the merchant, condemns him to pay a fine, and dismisses the affair without even permitting a protest. hence, impudent robbery occurs every day. the discontent of the white reacts upon his clients the black men; of late, les gabons, as the french call the natives, have gone so far as to declare that foreigners have no right to the upper river, which is all private property. the line drawn by them is at fetish rock, off pointe française, near the native village of mpíra, about half a mile above the plateau; and they would hail with pleasure a transfer to masters who are not so uncommonly ready with their gros canons. the gaboon trade is chronicled by john barbot, agent-general of the french west african company, "description of the coast of south guinea," churchill, vol. v. book iv. chap. ; and the chief items were, and still are, ivory and beeswax. of the former, , lbs. may be exported when the home prices are good, and sometimes the total has reached tons. hippopotamus tusks are dying out, being now worth only s. per lb. other exports are caoutchouc, ebony (of which the best comes from the congo), and camwood or barwood (a tephrosia). m. du chaillu calls it the "ego-tree;" the natives (mpongwe) name the tree igo, and the billet ezígo. chapter ii. the departure.--the tornado.--arrival at "the bush." i set out early on march th, a day, at that time, to me the most melancholy in the year, but now regarded with philosophic indifference. a parting visit to the gallant "griffons," who threw the slipper, in the shape of three hearty cheers and a "tiger," wasted a whole morning. it was . p.m. before the mission boat turned her head towards the southern bank, and her crew began to pull in the desultory manner of the undisciplined negro. the morning had been clear but close, till a fine sea breeze set in unusually early. "the doctor" seldom rises in the gaboon before noon at this season; often he delays his visit till p.m., and sometimes he does not appear at all. on the other hand, he is fond of late hours. before we had progressed a mile, suspicious gatherings of slaty-blue cloud-heaps advanced from the north-east against the wind, with a steady and pertinacious speed, showing that mischief was meant. the "cruel, crawling sea" began to rough, purr, and tumble; a heavy cross swell from the south-west dandled the up-torn mangrove twigs, as they floated past us down stream, and threatened to swamp the deeply laden and cranky old boat, which was far off letter a of lloyd's. the oarsmen became sulky because they were not allowed to make sail, which, in case of a sudden squall, could not have been taken in under half an hour. patience! little can be done, on the first day, with these demi-semi-europeanized africans, except to succeed in the inevitable trial of strength. the purple sky-ground backing the gaboon's upper course admirably set off all its features. upon the sea horizon, where the river measures some thirty miles across, i could distinctly see the junction of the two main branches, the true olo' mpongwe, the main stream flowing from the eastern ghats, and the rembwe (ramboue) or south-eastern influent. at the confluence, tree- dots, tipping the watery marge, denoted what barbot calls the "pongo islands." these are the quoin-shaped mass "dámbe" (orleans island) alias "coniquet" (the conelet), often corrupted to konikey; the konig island of the old hollander,[fn# ] and the prince's island of the ancient briton. it was so called because held by the mwáni-pongo, who was to this region what the mwáni- congo was farther south. the palace was large but very mean, a shell of woven reeds roofed with banana leaves: the people, then mere savages, called their st. james' "goli-patta," or "royal house," in imitation of a more civilized race near cape lopez. the imperial islet is some six miles in circumference; it was once very well peopled, and here ships used to be careened. the northern point which starts out to meet it is ovindo (owëendo of old), alias red point, alias "rodney's," remarkable for its fair savannah, of which feature more presently. in mid-stream lies mbini (embenee), successively papegay, parrot--there is one in every europeo-african river--and adelaide island. between ovindo point, at the northern bend of the stream, stand the so-called "english villages," divided from the french by marshy ground submerged during heavy rains. the highest upstream is olomi, otonda-naga, or town of "cabinda," a son of the late king. next comes glass town, belonging to a dynasty which has lasted a century--longer than many of its european brethren. in a large ship-bell was sent as a token of regard by a bristol house, sydenham and co., to an old, old "king glass," whose descendants still reign. olomi and glass town are preferred by the english, as their factories catch the sea-breeze better than can le plateau: the nearer swamps are now almost drained off, and the distance from the "authorities" is enough for comfort. follow comba (komba) and tom case, the latter called after case glass, a scion of the glasses, who was preferred as captain's "tradesman" by captain vidal, r.n., in , because he had "two virtues which rarely fall to the lot of savages, namely, a mild, quiet manner, and a low tone of voice when speaking." tom qua ben, justly proud of the "laced coat of a mail coach guard," was chosen by captain boteler, r.n. the list concludes with butabeya, james town, and mpira. these villages are not built street-wise after mpongwe fashion. they are scatters of shabby mat-huts, abandoned after every freeman's death; and they hardly emerge from the luxuriant undergrowth of manioc and banana, sensitive plant and physic nut (jatropha curcas), clustering round a palm here and there. often they are made to look extra mean by a noble "cottonwood," or bombax (pentandrium), standing on its stalwart braces like an old sea-dog with parted legs; extending its roots over a square acre of soil, shedding filmy shade upon the surrounding underwood, and at all times ready, like a certain chestnut, to shelter a hundred horses. between the plateau and santa clara, beginning some two miles below the former, are those hated and hating rivals, louis town, qua ben, and prince krinje, the french settlements. the latter is named after a venerable villain who took in every white man with whom he had dealings, till the new colony abolished that exclusive agency, that monopoly so sacred in negro eyes, which here corresponded with the abbánat of the somal. mr. wilson (p. ) recounts with zest a notable trick played by this "little, old, grey-headed, humpback man" upon captain bouët-willaumez, and mr. w. winwood reade (chap, xi.) has ably dramatized "krinji, king george and the commandant." on another occasion, the whole population of the gaboon was compelled by a french man-o-war to pay "prince cringy's" debts, and he fell into disfavour only when he attempted to wreck a frigate by way of turning an honest penny. but soon we had something to think of besides the view. the tumultuous assemblage of dark, dense clouds, resting upon the river-surface in our rear, formed line or rather lines, step upon step, and tier on tier. while the sun shone treacherously gay, a dismal livid gloom palled the eastern sky, descending to the watery horizon; and the estuary, beneath the sable hangings which began to depend from the cloud canopy, gleamed with a ghastly whitish green. distant thunders rumbled and muttered, and flashes of the broadest sheets inclosed fork and chain lightning; the lift-fire zigzagged in tangled skeins here of chalk-white threads, there of violet wires, to the surface of earth and sea. presently nimbus-step, tier and canopy, gradually breaking up, formed a low arch regular as the bifröst bridge which odin treads, spanning a space between the horizon, ninety degrees broad and more. the sharply cut soffit, which was thrown out in darkest relief by the dim and sallow light of the underlying sky, waxed pendent and ragged, as though broken by a torrent of storm. what is technically called the "ox-eye," the "egg of the tornado," appeared in a fragment of space, glistening below the gloomy rain-arch. the wind ceased to blow; every sound was hushed as though nature were nerving herself, silent for the throe, and our looks said, "in five minutes it will be down upon us." and now it comes. a cold blast smelling of rain, and a few drops or rather splashes, big as gooseberries and striking with a blow, are followed by a howling squall, sharp and sudden puffs, pulsations and gusts; at length a steady gush like a rush of steam issues from that awful arch, which, after darkening the heavens like an eclipse, collapses in fragmentary torrents of blinding rain. in the midst of the spoon-drift we see, or we think we see, "la junon" gliding like a phantom-ship towards the river mouth. the lightning seems to work its way into our eyes, the air-shaking thunder rolls and roars around our very ears; the oars are taken in utterly useless, the storm-wind sweeps the boat before it at full speed as though it had been a bit of straw. selim and i sat with a large mackintosh sheet over our hunched backs, thus offering a breakwater to the waves; happily for us, the billow-heads were partly cut off and carried away bodily by the raging wind, and the opened fountains of the firmament beat down the breakers before they could grow to their full growth. otherwise we were lost men; the southern shore was still two miles distant, and, as it was, the danger was not despicable. these tornadoes are harmless enough to a cruiser, and under a good roof men bless them. but h.m.s. "heron" was sunk by one, and the venture of a cranky gig laden à fleur d'eau is what some call "tempting providence." stunned with thunder, dazzled by the vivid flashes of white lightning, dizzy with the drive of the boat, and drenched by the torrents and washings from above and below, we were not a little pleased to feel the storm-wind slowly lulling, as it had cooled the heated regions ahead, and to see the sky steadily clearing up behind, as the blackness of the cloud, rushing with racer speed, passed over and beyond us. the increasing stillness of the sea raised our spirits; "for nature, only loud when she destroys, is silent when she fashions." but the storm-demon's name is "tornado" (cyclone): it will probably veer round to the south, where, meeting the dry clouds that are gathering and massing there, it will involve us in another fray. meanwhile we are safe, and as the mist clears off we sight the southern shore. the humbler elevation, notably different from the northern bank, is dotted with villages and clearings. the péninsula de marie-amélie, alias "round corner," the innermost southern point visible from the mouth, projects to the north-north-east in a line of scattered islets at high tides, ending in le bois fétiche, a clump of tall trees somewhat extensively used for picnics. it has served for worse purposes, as the name shows. a total of two hours landed me from the comte de paris roads upon the open sandy strip that supports denistown; the single broad street runs at right angles from the river, the better to catch the sea-breeze, and most of the huts have open gables, a practice strongly to be recommended. le roi would not expose himself to the damp air; the consul was not so particular. his majesty's levée took place in the verandah of a poor bamboo hut, one of the dozen which compose his capital. seated in a chair and ready for business, he was surrounded by a crowd of courtiers, who listened attentively to every word, especially when he affected to whisper; and some pretty women collected to peep round the corners at the utangáni (white man). [fn# ] mr. wilson described roi denis in as a man of middle stature, with compact frame and well-made, of great muscular power, about sixty years old, very black by contrast with the snow-white beard veiling his brown face. "he has a mild and expressive eye, a gentle and persuasive voice, equally affable and dignified; and, taken altogether, he is one of the most king- like looking men i have ever met in africa," says the reverend gentleman. the account reminded me of kimwere the lion of usumbara, drawn by dr. krapf. perhaps six years had exercised a degeneratory effect upon roi denis, or perchance i have more realism than sentiment; my eyes could see nothing but a petit vieux vieux, nearer sixty than seventy, with a dark, wrinkled face, and an uncommonly crafty eye, one of those african organs which is always occupied in "taking your measure" not for your good. i read out the introductory letter from baron didelot--the king speaks a little french and english, but of course his education ends there. after listening to my projects and to my offers of dollars, liquor, and cloth, roi denis replied, with due gravity, that his chasseurs were all in the plantations, but that for a somewhat increased consideration he would attach to my service his own son ogodembe, alias paul. it was sometime before i found out the real meaning of this crafty move; the sharp prince, sent to do me honour, intended me to recommend him to mr. hogg as an especially worthy recipient of "trust." roi denis added an abundance of "sweet mouf," and, the compact ended, he condescendingly walked down with me to the beach, shook hands and exchanged a civilized "au revoir." i reentered the boat, and we pushed off once more. prince paul, a youth of the picaresque school, a hungry as well as a thirsty soul and vain with knowledge, which we know "puffeth up," having the true african eye on present gain as well as to future "trust," proceeded: "papa has at least a hundred sons," enough to make dan dinmont blush, "and say" (he was not sure), "a hundred and fifty daughters. father rules all the southern shore; the french have no power beyond the brack and there are no african rivals,"--the prince evidently thought that the new-comer had never heard of king george. like most juniors here, the youth knew french, or rather gaboon-french; it was somewhat startling to hear clearly and tolerably pronounced, "m'sieur, veux-tu des macacques?" but the jargon is not our s'a leone and west-coast "english;" the superior facility of pronouncing the neo-latin tongues became at once apparent. it is evident that european languages have been a mistake in africa: the natives learn a smattering sufficient for business purposes and foreigners remain without the key to knowledge; hence our small progress in understanding negro human nature. had we so acted in british india, we should probably have held the proud position which now contents us in china as in western africa, with factories and hulks at bombay, calcutta, karachi, and madras. from comte de paris roads the southern gaboon shore is called in charts le paletuvier, the mangrove bank; the rhizophora is the growth of shallow brackish water, and at the projections there are fringings of reefs and "diabolitos," dangerous to boats. after two hours we crossed the mombe (mombay) creek-mouth, with its outlying rocks, and passed the fishing village of nenga-oga, whence supplies are sent daily to the plateau. then doubling a point of leek-green grass, based upon comparatively poor soil, sand, and clay, and backed by noble trees, we entered the mbátá river, the toutiay of the chart and the batta creek of m. du chaillu's map. it comes from the south-west, and it heads much nearer the coast than is shown on paper. presently the blood-red sun sank like a fire-balloon into the west, flushing with its last fierce beams the higher clouds of the eastern sky, and lighting the white and black plume of the soaring fish-eagle. this gypohierax (angolensis) is a very wild bird, flushed at yards: i heard of, but i never saw, the gwanyoni, which m. du chaillu, (chapter xvi.) calls guanionian, an eagle or a vulture said to kill deer. rain fell at times, thunder, anything but "sweet thunder," again rolled in the distance; and lightning flashed and forked before and behind us, becoming painfully vivid in the shades darkening apace. we could see nothing of the channel but a steel-grey streak, like a damascus blade, in a sable sheathing of tall mangrove avenue; in places, however, tree-clumps suggested delusive hopes that we were approaching a region where man can live. on our return we found many signs of population which had escaped our sight during the fast-growing obscurity. the first two reaches were long and bulging; the next became shorter, and prince paul assured us that, after one to the right, and another to the left, we should fall into the direct channel. roi denis had promised us arrival at sunset; his son gradually protracted sunset till midnight. still the distance grew and grew. i now learned for the first time that the boat was too large for the channel, and that oars were perfectly useless ahead. at p.m. we entered what seemed a cul de sac; it looked like charging a black wall, except where a gleam of grey light suggested the further end of the box tunnel, and cheered our poor hearts for a short minute, whilst in the distance we heard the tantalizing song of the wild waves. the boughs on both sides brushed the boat; we held our hands before our faces to avoid the sharp stubs threatening ugly stabs, and to fend off the low branches, ready to sweep us and our belongings into the deep swirling water. the shades closed in like the walls of the italian's dungeon; until our eyes grew to it, the blackness of erebus weighed upon our spirits; perspiration poured from our brows, and in this watery mangrove-lane the pabulum vitæ seemed to be wanting. after forcing a passage through three vile "gates," the sheet-lightning announced a second tornado. we sighed for more vivid flashes, but after twenty minutes they dimmed and died away, still showing the "bush"-silhouette on either side. the tide rushed out in strength under the amphibious forest--all who know the west coast will appreciate the position. it was impossible to advance or to remain in this devil's den, the gig bumped at every minute, and the early flood would probably crush her against the trees. so we dropped down to the nearest "open," which we reached at . p.m. after enduring a third tornado we grounded, and the crew sprang ashore, saying that they were going to boil plantains on the bank. i made snug for the night with a wet waterproof and a strip of muslin, to be fastened round the mouth after the fashion of outram's "fever guard," and shut my lips to save my life, by the particular advice of dr. catlin. the first mosquito piped his "io pæan" at p.m.; another hour brought legions, and then began the battle for our blood. i had resolved not to sleep in the fetid air of the jungle; time, however, moved on wings of lead; a dull remembrance of a watery moon, stars dimly visible, a southerly breeze, and heavy drops falling from the trees long haunted me. about midnight, prince paul, who had bewailed the hardship of passing a night sans mostiquaire in the bush, and whose violent plungings showed that he failed to manage un somme, proposed to land and to fetch fire from l'habitation. "what habitation?" "oh! a little village belonging to papa." "and why the ---didn't you mention it?" "ah! this is mponbinda, and you know we're bound for mbátá!" nothing negrotic now astonishes us, there is nought new to me in africa. we landed upon a natural pier of rock ledge, and, after some yards of good path, we entered a neat little village, and found our crew snoring snugly asleep. we "exhorted them," refreshed the fire, and generously recruited exhausted nature with quinine, julienne and tea, potatoes and potted meats, pipes and cigars. so sped my annual unlucky day, and thus was spent my first jungle-night almost exactly under the african line. at a. m. the new morning dawned, the young tide flowed, the crabs disappeared, and the gig, before high and dry on the hard mud, once more became buoyant. forward again! the channel was a labyrinthine ditch, an interminable complication of over-arching roots, and of fallen trees forming gateways; the threshold was a maze of slimy stumps, stems, and forks in every stage of growth and decay, dense enough to exclude the air of heaven. in parts there were ugly snags, and everywhere the turns were so puzzling, that i marvelled how a human being could attempt the passage by night. the best time for ascending is half-flood, for descending half-ebb; if the water be too high, the bush chokes the way; if too low, the craft grounds. at the gaboon mouth the tide rises three feet; at the head of the mbátá creek, where it arrests the sweet water rivulet, it is, of course, higher. and now the scene improved. the hat-palm, a brab or wild date, the spine-palm (ph�nix spinosa), and the okumeh or cotton-tree disputed the ground with the foul rhizophora. then clearings appeared. at ejéné, the second of two landing-places evidently leading to farms, we transferred ourselves to canoes, our boat being arrested by a fallen tree. advancing a few yards, all disembarked upon trampled mud, and, ascending the bank, left the creek which supplies baths and drinking water to our destination. striking a fair pathway, we passed westward over a low wave of ground, sandy and mouldy, and traversed a fern field surrounded by a forest of secular trees; some parasite-grown from twig to root, others blanched and scathed by the fires of heaven; these roped and corded with runners and llianas, those naked and clothed in motley patches. at . a.m., after an hour's work, probably representing a mile, and a total of h. m., or six miles in a south-south-west direction from le plateau, we left the ugly cul de sac of a creek, and entered mbátá, which the french call "la plantation." women and children fled in terror at our approach--and no wonder: eyes like hunted boars, haggard faces, yellow as the sails at the cape verdes, and beards two days long, act very unlike cosmetics. a house was cleared for us by hotaloya, alias "andrew," of the baráka mission, the lord of the village, who, poor fellow! has only two wives; he is much ashamed of himself, but his excuse is, "i be boy now," meaning about twenty-two. after breakfast we prepared for a sleep, but the popular excitement forbade it; the villagers had heard that a white greenhorn was coming to bag and to buy gorillas, and they resolved to make hay whilst the sun shone. prince paul at once gathered together a goodly crowd of fathers and mothers, uncles and aunts, brothers and sisters, cousins and connections. a large and loud-voiced dame, "gozeli," swore that she was his "proper ngwe," being one of his numerous step mas, and she would not move without a head, or three leaves, of tobacco. hotaloya was his brother; mesdames azízeh and asúnye declared themselves his sisters, and so all. my little stock of goods began visibly to shrink, when i informed the greedy applicants that nothing beyond a leaf of tobacco and a demi verre of tafia would be given until i had seen my way to work. presently appeared the chief huntsman appointed by roi denis to take charge of me, he was named fortuna, a spanish name corrupted to forteune. a dash was then prepared for his majesty and for prince paul. i regret to say that this young nobleman ended his leave-taking by introducing a pretty woman, with very neat hands and ankles and a most mutine physiognomy, as his sister, informing me that she was also my wife pro temp. she did not seem likely to coiffer sainte cathérine, and here she is. the last thing the prince did was to carry off, without a word of leave, the mission boat and the three kru-boys, whom he kept two days. i was uneasy about these fellows, who, hating and fearing the gaboon "bush," are ever ready to bolt. forteune and hotaloya personally knew mpolo (paul du chaillu), and often spoke to me of his prowess as a chasseur and his knowledge of their tongue. but reputation as a linguist is easily made in these regions by speaking a few common sentences. the gorilla-hunter evidently had only a colloquial acquaintance with the half-dozen various idioms of the mpongwe and mpángwe (fán) bakele, shekyani, and cape lopez people. yet, despite verbal inaccuracies, his facility of talking gave him immense advantages over other whites, chiefly in this, that the natives would deem it useless to try the usual tricks upon travellers. forteune is black, short, and "trapu;" curls of the jettiest lanugo invest all his outward man; bunches of muscle stand out from his frame like the statues of crotonian milo; his legs are bandy; his hands and feet are large and patulous, and he wants only a hunch to make an admirable quasimodo. he has the frank and open countenance of a sportsman--i had been particularly warned by the plateau folk about his skill in cheating and lying. formerly a cook at the gaboon, he is a man of note in his tribe, as the hunter always is; he holds the position of a country gentleman, who can afford to write himself m.f.h.; he is looked upon as a man of valour; he is admired by the people, and he is adored by his wives--one of them at once took up her station upon the marital knee. perhaps the nimrod of mbátá is just a little henpecked--the mpongwe mostly are--and i soon found out that soigner les femmes is the royal road to getting on with the men. he supplies the village with "beef," here meaning not the roast of old england, but any meat, from a field-rat to a hippopotamus. he boasts that he has slain with his own hand upwards of a hundred gorillas and anthropoid apes, and, since the demand arose in europe, he has supplied mr. r.b.n. walker and others with an average of one per month, including a live youngster; probably most, if not all, of them were killed by his "bushmen," of whom he can command about a dozen. forteune began by receiving his "dash," six fathoms of "satin cloth," tobacco, and pipes. after inspecting my battery, he particularly approved of a smooth-bored double-barrel (beattie of regent street) carrying six to the pound. like all these people, he uses an old and rickety trade-musket, and, when lead is wanting, he loads it with a bit of tile: as many gorillas are killed with tools which would hardly bring down a wild cat, it is evident that their vital power cannot be great. he owned to preferring a charge of twenty buckshot to a single ball, and he received with joy a little fine gunpowder, which he compared complimentarily with the blasting article, half charcoal withal, to which he was accustomed. presently a decently dressed, white-bearded man of light complexion announced himself, with a flourish and a loud call for a chair, as prince koyálá, alias "young prince," father to forteune and hotaloya and brother to roi denis,--here all tribesmen are of course brethren. this being equivalent to "asking for more," it drove me to the limits of my patience. it was evidently now necessary to assume wrath, and to raise my voice to a roar. "my hands dey be empty! i see nuffin, i hear nuffin! what for i make more dash?" allow me, parenthetically, to observe that the african, like the scotch highlander, will interpose the personal or demonstrative pronoun between noun and verb: "sun he go down," means "the sun sets" and, as genders do not exist, you must be careful to say, "this woman he cry too much." the justice of my remark was owned by all; had it been the height of tyranny, the supple knaves would have agreed with me quite as politely. they only replied that "young prince," being a man of years and dignity, would be dishonoured by dismissal empty- handed, and they represented him as my future host when we moved nearer the bush. "now lookee here. this he be bad plábbá (palaver). this he be bob! i come up for white man, you come up for black man. all white man he no be fool, 'cos he no got black face!" ensued a chorus of complimentary palaver touching the infinite superiority of the aryan over the semite, but the point was in no wise yielded. at last young prince subsided into a request for a glass of rum, which being given "cut the palaver" (i.e. ended the business). i soon resolved to show my hosts, by threatening to leave them, the difference between traders and travellers. barbot relates that the mpongwe of olden time demanded his "dassy" before he consented to "liquor up," and boldly asked, "if he was expected to drink gratis?" the impertinence was humoured, otherwise not an ivory would have found its way to the factory. but the traveller is not bound to endure these whimsy-whamsies; and the sooner he declares his independence the better. many monkeys' skins were brought to me for sale, but i refused to buy, lest the people might think it my object to make money; moreover, all were spoilt for specimens by the "points" being snipped off. i happened during the first afternoon to show my hosts a picture of the bald-headed chimpanzee, nchígo mbúwwe (troglodytes calvus), here more generally called nchígo mpolo, "large chimpanzee," or nchígo njúe, "white-haired chimpanzee." they recognized it at once; but when i turned over to the cottage ("adventures," &c., p. ), with its neat parachute-like roof, all burst out laughing. "you want to look him nágo (house)?" asked hotaloya. "yes, for sure," i replied. forteune set out at once, carrying my gun, selim followed me, and the rear was brought up by a couple of little prick-eared curs with a dash of the pointer, probably from st. helena: the people will pay as much as ten dollars for a good dog. they are never used in hunting apes, as they start the game; on this occasion they nearly ran down a small antelope. the path led through a new clearing; a field of fern and some patches of grass breaking the forest, which, almost clear of thicket and undergrowth, was a charming place for deer. the soil, thin sand overlying humus, suggested rich crops of ground-nuts; its surface was everywhere cut by nullahs, now dry, and by brooks, running crystal streams; these, when deep, are crossed by tree-trunks, the brazilian "pingela." after twenty minutes or so we left the "picada" (foot-path) and struck into a thin bush, till we had walked about a mile. "look him house, nchígo house!" said hotaloya, standing under a tall tree. i saw to my surprise two heaps of dry sticks, which a schoolboy might have taken for birds' nests; the rude beds, boughs, torn off from the tree, not gathered, were built in forks, one ten and the other twenty feet above ground, and both were canopied by the tufted tops. every hunter consulted upon the subject ridiculed the branchy roof tied with vines, and declared that the nchigo's industry is confined to a place for sitting, not for shelter; that he fashions no other dwelling; that a couple generally occupies the same or some neighbouring tree, each sitting upon its own nest; that the nchígo is not a "hermit" nor a rare, nor even a very timid animal; that it dwells, as i saw, near villages, and that its cry, "aoo! aoo! aoo!" is often heard by them in the mornings and evenings. during my subsequent wanderings in gorilla land, i often observed tall and mushroom- shaped trees standing singly, and wearing the semblance of the umbrella roof. what most puzzles me is, that m. du chaillu ("second expedition," chap, iii.) "had two of the bowers cut down and sent to the british museum." he adds, "they are formed at a height of twenty to thirty feet in the trees, by the animals bending over and intertwining a number of the weaker boughs, so as to form bowers, under which they can sit, protected from the rains by the masses of foliage thus entangled together, some of the boughs being so bent that they form convenient seats." surely m. du chaillu must have been deceived by some vagary of nature. the gorilla-hunter's sketch had always reminded me of the rev. mr. moffat's account of the hylobian bakones, the aborigines of the matabele country. mr. thompson, a missionary to sherbro ("the palm land," chap. xiii), has, however, these words:--"it is said of the chimpanzees, that they build a kind of rude house of sticks in their wild state, and fill it with leaves; and i doubt it not, for when domesticated they always want some good bed, and make it up regularly." thus i come to the conclusion that the nchígo mpolo is a vulgar nest-building ape. the bushmen and the villagers all assured me that neither the common chimpanzee, nor the gorilla proper (troglodytes gorilla), "make 'im house." on the other hand, mr. w. winwood reade, writing to "the athenæum" from loanda (sept. , ), asserts,--"when the female is pregnant he (the gorilla) builds a nest (as do also the kulu-kamba and the chimpanzee), where she is delivered, and which is then abandoned." and he thus confirms what was told to dr. thomas savage ( ): "in the wild state their (i.e. the gorillas') habits are in general like those of the troglodytes niger, building their nests loosely in trees." chapter iii. geography of the gaboon. before going further afield i may be allowed a few observations, topographical and ethnological, about this highly interesting section of the west african coast. the gaboon country, to retain the now familiar term, although no one knows much about its derivation, is placed, by old travellers in "south guinea," the tract lying along the ethiopic, or south atlantic ocean, limited by the camarones mountain-block in north latitude °, and by cabo negro in south latitude ° ' ", a sea-line of nearly , miles. the gaboon proper is included between the camarones mountains to the north, and the "mayumba,"properly the "yumba" country southwards, in south latitude ° ',--a shore upwards of miles long. the inland depth is undetermined; geographically we should limit it to the western ghats, which rarely recede more than miles from the sea, and ethnologically no line can yet be drawn. the country is almost bisected by the equator, and by the rio de gabão, which discharges in north latitude ° ' " and east longitude ° ' "; and it corresponds in parallel with the somali-galla country and the juba river on the east coast. the general aspect of the region is prepossessing. it is a rolling surface sinking towards the atlantic, in parts broken by hills and dwarf chains, either detached or pushed out by the ghats; a land of short and abnormally broad rivers, which cannot, like the congo, break through the ridges flanking the central african basin, and which therefore are mere surface drains of the main ranges. the soil is mostly sandy, but a thin coat of rich vegetable humus, quickened by heavy rains and fiery suns, produces a luxuriant vegetation; whilst the proportion of area actually cultivated is nothing compared with the expanse of bush. in the tall forests, which abound in wild fruits, there are beautiful tracts of clear grassy land, and the woods, clear of undergrowth, resemble an english grove more than a tropical jungle. horses, which die of the tsetse (glossina morsitans) in the interior of north guinea, and of damp heat at fernando po, thrive on its downs and savannahs. the elais palm is rare, sufficing only for home use. the southern parts, about cape lopez and beyond it, resemble the oil river country in the biafran bight: the land is a mass of mangrove swamps, and the climate is unfit for white men. the eastern ghats were early known to the "iberians," as shown by the sierra del crystal, del sal, del sal nitro and other names, probably so called from the abundance of quartz in blocks and veins that seam the granite, as we shall see in the congo country, and possibly because they contain rock crystal. although in many places they may be descried subtending the shore in lumpy lines like detached vertebræ, and are supposed to represent the aranga mons of ptolemy, they are not noticed by barbot. between the camarones river and cape st. john (corisco bay), blue, rounded, and discontinuous masses, apparently wooded, rise before the mariner, and form, as will be seen, the western sub-ranges of the great basin-rim. to the north they probably anastomose with the camarones, the rumbi, the kwa, the fumbina north-east, and the niger-kong mountains.[fn# ] they are not wanting who declare them to be rich in precious metals. some thirty years ago an american super-cargo ascended the rembwe river, the south-eastern line of the gaboon fork, and is said to have collected "dirt" which, tested at new york, produced dollars per bushel. all the old residents in the gaboon know the story of the gold dust. the prospector was the late captain richard e. lawlin, of new york, who was employed by messrs. bishop of philadelphia, the same house that commissioned the chasseur de gorilles to collect "rubber" for them, and who was so eminently useful to the young french traveller that the scant notice of his name is considered curious. great would be my wonder if the west african as well as the east african ghats did not prove auriferous; both fulfil all the required conditions, and both await actual discovery. the mountains of the moon, so frequently mentioned by m. du chaillu and the gaboon mission, are doubtless the versants between the valleys of the niger and the congo. lately dr. schweinfurth found an equatorial range which, stretching northwards towards the bahr el ghazal, was seen to trend westward. according to mr. consul hutchinson ("ten years' wanderings among the ethiopians," p. ), the rev. messrs. mackey and clemens, of the corisco mission "explored more than a hundred miles of country across the sierra del crystal range of mountains" --i am inclined to believe that a hundred miles from the coast was their furthest point. we shall presently travel towards this mysterious range, and there is no difficulty in passing it, except the utter want of a commercial road, and the wildness of tribes that have never sighted a traveller nor a civilized man. the rivers of our region are of three kinds; little surface drains principally in the north; broad estuaries like the mersey and many streams of eastern scotland in the central parts, and a single bed, the ogobe, breaking through the subtending ghats, and forming a huge lagoon-delta. beginning at camarones are the boroa and borba waters, with the rio de campo, fifteen leagues further south; of these little is known, except that they fall into the bight of panari or pannaria. according to barbot (iv. ), the english charts give the name of point pan to a large deep bight in which lies the harbour-bay "porto de garapo" (garápa, sugar-cane juice?); and he calls the two rounded hillocks, extending inland from point pan to the northern banks of the rio de campo, "navia." the un-african word panari or pannaria is probably a corruption of páo de nao, the bay north of garapo, and "navia." these small features are followed by the rio de são bento, improperly called in our charts the st. benito, bonito, bonita, and boneto; the native name is lobei, and it traverses the kombi country, --such is the extent of our information. the next is the well-known muni, the ntambounay of m. du chaillu, generally called the danger river, in old charts "rio de são joão," and "rio da angra" (of the bight); an estuary which, like most of its kind, bifurcates above, and, receiving a number of little tributaries from the sierra, forms a broad bed and empties itself through a mass of mangroves into the innermost north-eastern corner of corisco bay. this sag in the coast is formed by ninje (nenge the island?), or the cabo de são joão (cape st. john) to the north, fronted south by a large square-headed block of land, whose point is called cabo das esteiras--of matting (barbot's estyras), an article of trade in the olden time. the southern part receives the munda (moondah) river, a foul and unimportant stream, which has been occupied by the american missionaries. we shall ascend the gaboon estuary to its sources. south of it, a number of sweet little water-courses break the shore-line as far as the nazareth river, which debouches north of urungu, or cape lopez (cabo de lopo gonsalvez), and which forms by anastomosing with a southern river the ogobe (ogowai of m. du chaillu), a complicated delta whose sea-front extends from north to south, at least eighty miles. beyond cape lopez is an outfall, known to europeans as the rio mexias: it is apparently a mesh in the net- work of the nazareth-ogobe. the same may be said of the rio fernão vaz, about miles south of the gaboon, and of yet another stream which, running lagoon-like some forty miles along the shore, has received in our maps the somewhat vague name of r. rembo or river river. orembo (simpongwe) being the generic term for a stream or river, is applied emphatically to the nkomo branch of the gaboon, and to the fernão vaz. the ogobe is the only river between the niger and the congo which escapes, through favouring depressions, from the highlands flanking the great watery plateau of inner africa. by its plainly marked double seasons of flood at the equinoxes, and by the time of its low water, we prove that it drains the belt of calms, and the region immediately upon the equator. the explorations of lieutenant serval and others, in "le pionnier" river-steamer, give it an average breadth of , feet, though broken by sand- banks and islands; the depth in the main channel, which at times is narrow and difficult to find, averages between sixteen and forty-eight feet; and, in the dry season of , the vessel ran up sixty english miles. before m. du chaillu's expeditions, "the rivers known to europeans," he tells us in his preface ("first journey," p. iv.), "as the nazareth, mexias, and fernam vaz, were supposed to be three distinct streams." in bowdich identified the "ogoowai" with the congo, and the rev. mr. wilson (p. ) shows us the small amount of knowledge that existed even amongst experts, five years before the "gorilla book" appeared. "from cape lopez, where the nazareth debouches, there is a narrow lagoon running along the sea-coast, and very near to it, all the way to mayumba. this lagoon is much traversed by boats and canoes, and, when the slave-trade was in vigorous operation, it afforded the portuguese traders great facilities for eluding the vigilance of british cruizers, by shifting their slaves from point to point, and embarking them, according to a preconcerted plan." m. du chaillu first proved that the ogobe was formed by two forks, the northern, or rembo okanda, and the southern, or rembo nguye. the former is the more important. mr. r.s.n. walker found this stream above the confluence to be from , to , feet wide, though half the bed was occupied by bare sand-banks. higher up, where rocks and rapids interfered with the boat-voyage, the current was considerable, but the breadth diminished to feet. the southern branch (also written ngunië) was found in apono land (s. lat. °), about the breadth of the thames at london bridge, feet. in june the depth was ten to fifteen feet, to which the rainy season added ten. m. du chaillu also established the facts that the nazareth river was the northern arm of the delta, and that the fernão vaz anastomosed with the delta's southern arm. the only pelagic islands off the gaboon coast are the brancas, great and little; corisco island, which we shall presently visit; great and little elobi, called by old travellers mosquito islands, probably for "moucheron," a dutchman who lost his ship there in . the land about the mouths of the ogobe is a mass of mangrove swamps, like the nigerian delta, which high tides convert into insular ground; these, however, must be considered terra firma in its infancy. the riverine islands of the gaboon proper will be noticed as we ascend the bed. pongo-land ignores all such artificial partitions as districts or parishes; the only divisions are the countries occupied by the several tribes. the gaboon lies in "africa-on-the-line," and a description of the year at zanzibar island applies to it in many points.[fn# ] the characteristic of this equatorial belt is uniformity of temperature: whilst the arabian and the australian deserts often show a variation of ° fahr. in a single day, the yearly range of the mercury at singapore is about °. the four seasons of the temperates are utterly unknown to the heart of the tropics--even in hindostan the poet who would sing, for instance, the charms of spring must borrow the latter word (buhar) from the persian. if the "bull" be allowed, the only rule here appears to be one of exceptions. the traveller is always assured that this time there have been no rains, or no dries, or no tornadoes, or one or all in excess, till at last he comes to the conclusion that the clerk of the weather must have mislaid his ledger. contrary to the popular idea, which has descended to us from the classics, the climate under the line is not of that torrid heat which a vertical sun suggests; the burning zone of the old world begins in the northern hemisphere, where the regular rains do not extend, beyond the tenth as far as the twenty-fifth degree. the equatorial climate is essentially temperate: for instance, the heat of sumatra, lying almost under the line, rarely exceeds ° r.= ° fahr. in the gaboon the thermometer ranges from ° to ° fahr., "a degree of heat," says dr. ford, "less than in many salubrious localities in other parts of the world." upon the gaboon the wet seasons are synchronous with the vertical suns at the vernal and autumnal equinoxes. "the rainy season of a place within the tropics always begins when the sun has reached the zenith of that place. then the tradewinds, blowing regularly at other seasons, become gradually weaker, and at length cease and give way to variable winds and calms. the trade-wind no longer brings its regular supply of cooler, drier air; the rising heats and calms favour an ascending current" (in the sea-depths, i may add, as well as on land), "which bears the damp air into the upper regions of the atmosphere, there to be cooled, and to occasion the heavy down-pour of each afternoon. the nights and mornings are for the most part bright and clear. when the sun moves away from the zenith, the trade-winds again begin to be felt, and bring with them the dry season of the year, during which hardly ever a cloud disturbs the serenity of the skies. "between the tropical limits and the equator, however, the sun comes twice to the zenith of each place. if now, between the going and coming of the sun, from the line to its furthest range, a sufficient pause intervenes, or if the sun's temporary distance from the zenith is great enough, the rainy season is divided into two portions, separated by a lesser dry season. closer to the tropical lines, where the sun remains but once in the zenith, the rainy season is a continuous one." such is the theory of the "allgemeine erdkunde" (hahn, hochstetter and pokorny, prague, ). an explanation should be added of the reason why the cool wind ceases to blow, at the time when the air, heated and raised by a perpendicular sun, might be expected to cause a greater indraught. we at once, i have said, recognize its correctness at sea. the gaboon, "in the belt of calms, with rain during the whole year," has two distinctly marked dry seasons, at the vernal and the autumnal equinoxes. the former or early rains (nchangyá?) are expected to begin in february, with violent tornadoes and storms, especially at the full and change, and to end in april. the heavy downfalls are mostly at night, possibly an effect of the sierra del crystal. i found march th ( ) very like damp weather at the end of an english may; april th was equally exceptional, raining from dawn to evening. during my trip to sánga-tánga and back (march th to th) we had frequent fogs, locally called "smokes," and almost daily tornadoes, sometimes from the south-east, whilst the lightning was dangerous as upon the western prairies. after an interval of fiery sun, with occasional rain torrents and discharges of electricity, begin the enomo (enun?), the "middle" or long dries, which last four months to september. the "enomo" is the angolan cacimbo, meaning cool and cloudy weather, when no umbrella is required, and when the invariably grey sky rarely rains. travellers are told that june and july are the cream of the year, the healthiest time for seasoned europeans, and this phantom of a winter renders the climate more supportable to the northern constitution. during the "middle dries," when the sun, retiring to the summer solstice, is most distant, land winds and sea breezes are strong and regular, and the people suffer severely from cold. in the gaboon heavy showers sometimes fall, july being the least subject to them, and the fiery sun, when it can disperse the clouds, turns the soil to dust. at the end of september appear the "latter rains," which are the more copious, as they seldom last more than six hours at a time. it is erroneous to assert that "the tract nearest the equator on both sides has the longest rainy season;" the measure chiefly depends upon altitude and other local conditions. the rainy seasons are healthier for the natives than the cold seasons; and the explorer is often urged to take advantage of them. he must, however, consult local experience. whilst ascending rivers in november, for instance, he may find the many feet of flood a boon or a bane, and his marching journeys are nearly sure to end in ulcerated feet, as was the case with poor dr. livingstone. the rains drench the country till the latter end of december, when the nángá or "little dries" set in for two months. the latter also are not unbroken by storms and showers, and they end with tornadoes, which this year ( ) have been unusually frequent and violent. thus we may distribute the twelve months into six of rains, vernal and autumnal, and six of dry weather, æstival and hibernal: the following table will show the sub-sections:-- early december to early february, the "little dries;" february to early april, the "former," early or spring rains; may to early june, the variable weather; june to early september, the cacimbo, enomo, long or middle dries; september to early december, the "latter rains." under such media the disease, par excellence, of the gaboon is the paroxysm which is variously called coast, african, guinea, and bullom fever. dr. ford, who has written a useful treatise upon the subject,[fn# ] finds hebdomadal periodicity in the attacks, and lays great stress upon this point of chronothermalism. he recognizes the normal stages, preparatory, invasional, reactionary, and resolutionary. like drs. livingstone and hutchinson, he holds fever and quinine "incompatibles," and he highly approves of the prophylactic adhibition of chinchona used by the unfortunate douville in . experience in his own person and in numerous patients "proves all theoretical objections to the use of six grains an hour, or fifty and sixty grains of quinine in one day or remission to be absolutely imaginary." he is "convinced that it is not a stimulant," and with many apologies he cautiously sanctions alcohol, which should often be the physician's mainstay. as he advocated ten-grain doses of calomel by way of preliminary cathartic, the american missionaries stationed on the river have adopted a treatment still more "severe"--quinine till deafness ensues, and half a handful of mercury, often continued till a passage opens through the palate, placing mouth and nose in directer communication. dr. ford also recommends during the invasion or period of chills external friction of mustard or of fresh red pepper either in tincture or in powder, a good alleviator always procurable; and the internal use of pepper-tea, to bring on the stages of reaction and resolution. few will agree with him that gruels and farinaceous articles are advisable during intermissions, when the patient craves for port, essence of beef, and consomme; nor can we readily admit the dictum that in the tropics "the most wholesome diet, without doubt, is chiefly vegetable." despite jacquemont and all the rice-eaters, i cry beef and beer for ever and everywhere! many can testify personally to the value of the unofficinal prescription which he offers in cases of severe lichen (prickly heat), leading to impetigo. it is as follows, and it is valuable:-- cold cream. . . . . . . . . . j. glycerine . . . . . . . . . . j. chloroform . . . . . . . . . ij. oil of bitter almonds . . gtt. x. chapter iv. the minor tribes and the mpongwe. the tribes occupying the gaboon country may roughly be divided into two according to habitat--the maritime and those of the interior, who are quasi-mountaineers. upon the sea-board dwell the banôkô (banaka), bapuka, and batanga; the kombe, the benga and mbiko, or people about corisco; the shekyani, who extend far into the interior, the urungu and aloa, clans of cape lopez; the nkommi, commi, camma or cama, and the mayumba races beyond the southern frontier. the inner hordes are the dibwe (m. du chaillu's "ibouay"), the mbúsha; the numerous and once powerful bákele, the cannibal fán (mpongwe), the osheba or 'sheba, their congeners, and a variety of "bush-folk," of whom little is known beyond the names. linguistically we may distribute them into three, namely, . the banôkô and batanga; . the mpongwe, including the minor ethnical divisions of benga, and shekyani; the urungu, the nkommi, the dongas or ndiva, and the mbúsha, and . the mpongwe and the tribes of the interior. lastly, there are only three peoples of any importance, namely, the mpongwe, the bákele, and the fán. the mpongwe, whom the french call "les gabons," are the aristocracy of the coast, the benga being the second, and the banôkô and bapuka ranking third. they are variously estimated at , to , head, serviles included. they inhabit both sides of the gaboon, extending about thirty-five miles along its banks, chiefly on the right; on the left only seawards of the shekyani. but it is a wandering race, and many a "mercator vagus" finds his way to corisco, cape lopez, batanga, and even fernando po. the two great families on the northern river bank are the quabens and the glass, who style themselves kings and princes; the southern side lodges king william (roi denis) near the mouth, and the powerful king george, about twenty-five miles higher up stream. there are also settlements scattered at various distances from the great highway of commerce to which they naturally cling, and upon the coniquet and parrot islands. barbot (iv. ) describes the "gaboon blacks" as "commonly tall, robust, and well-shaped;" they appeared to me rather below the average of west coast size and weight. both sexes, even when running to polysarcia, have delicate limbs and extremities, and the features, though negroid, are not the negro of the tobacconist's shop: i noticed several pyramidal and brachycephalic heads, contrary to the rule for african man and simiad. in the remarkable paper read ( ) by professor busk before the ethnological society, that eminent physiologist proved that the asiatic apes, typified by the ourang-outang, are brachycephalic, like the mongolians amongst whom they live, or who live amongst them; whilst the gorillas and the african anthropoids are dolichocephalic as the negroes. the gaboon men are often almost black, whilst the women range between dark brown and cafe au lait. the beard, usually scanty, is sometimes bien fournie, especially amongst the seniors, but, whenever i saw a light-coloured and well-bearded man, the suspicion of mixed blood invariably obtruded itself. it is said that during the last thirty years they have greatly diminished, yet their habitat is still that laid down half a century ago by bowdich, and all admit that the population of the river has not been materially affected. the mpongwe women have the reputation of being the prettiest and the most facile upon the west african coast. it is easy to distinguish two types. one is large-boned and heavy-limbed, hoarse-voiced, and masculine, like the "ibos" of bonny and new calabar, who equal the men in weight and stature, strength and endurance, suggesting a mixture of the male and female temperaments. some of the gaboon giantesses have, unlike their northern sisters, regular and handsome features. the other type is quasi-hindú in its delicacy of form, with small heads, oval faces, noses à la roxolane, lips sub-tumid but without prognathism, and fine almond-shaped eyes, with remarkably thick and silky lashes. the throat is thin, the bosom is high and well carried, or, as the admiring arab says, "nejdá;" the limbs are statuesque, and the hands and feet are norman rather than saxon. many europeans greatly admire these minois mutins et chiffonés.[fn# ] early in the present century the mpongwe braided whiskers and side curls, tipping the ends with small beads, and they plaited the front locks to project like horns, after the fashion of the present fán and other wild tribes. a custom noticed by barbot, but apparently obsolete in the days of bowdich, was to bore the upper lip, and to insert a small ivory pin, extending from nose to mouth. the painting and tattooing were fantastic and elaborate; and there was a hideous habit of splitting either lip, so as to "thrust the tongue through on ceremonial occasions." a curious reason is given for this practice. "they are subject to a certain distemper very common there, which on a sudden seizes them, and casts them into fits of so long a continuance, that they would inevitably be suffocated, if by means of the split at their upper lip they did not pour into their mouths some of the juice of a certain medicinal herb, which has the virtue of easing and curing the diseased person in a very short time." all these things, fits included, are now obsolete. the men shave a line in the hair like a fillet round the skull, and what is left is coiffe au coup de vent. the head-dress is a cap, a straw hat, a billy cock, or a tall silk "chimney pot," the latter denoting a chief; he also sports in full dress a broad coat, ending in a loin cloth of satin stripe or some finer stuff, about six feet long by four and a half broad; it is secured by a kerchief or an elastic waist belt; during work it is tucked up, but on ceremonial occasions it must trail upon the ground. the lieges wear european shirts, stuffed into a waist-cloth of cheaper material, calico or domestics; this tángá, or kilt, is, in fact, an article of general wear, and it would be an airy, comfortable, and wholesome travelling costume if the material were flannel. the ornaments are necklaces of venetian beads, the white pound, and the black and yellow seed: canutille or bugles of various patterns are preferred, and all are loaded with "mengo," grígrís (which old travellers call "gregories"), or talismans, chiefly leopards' teeth, rude bells, and horns. the monda are hunting prophylacteries, antelope horns filled with "fetish" medicines, leopard's hair, burnt and powdered heart mixed with leaves, and filth; the mouths are stopped with some viscid black stuff, probably gum. they are often attached to rude bells of iron or brass (igelenga, ngenge, nkendo, or wonga), like the chingufu of the congo regions and the metal cones which are struck for signals upon the tanganyika lake. a great man is known by his making himself a marvellous "guy," wearing, for instance, a dingily laced cocked hat, stuck athwart- ships upon an unwashed night-cap, and a naval or military uniform, fifty years old, "swearing" with the loin-cloth and the feet, which are always bare. the coiffure of the <greek> is peculiar and elaborate as that of the gold coast. these ladies seem to have chosen for their model the touraco or cockatoo,--they have never heard of "kikeriki,"--and the effect is at first wondrously grotesque. presently the eye learns to admire pretty fanny's ways; perhaps the pleureuse, the old english corkscrew ringlet, might strike the stranger as equally natural in a spaniel, and unnatural in a human. still a style so peculiar requires a toilette in keeping; the "king" in uniform is less ridiculous than the gaboon lady's chignon, contrasting with a tight-bodied and narrow-skirted gown of pink calico. the national "tire-valiant" is a galeated crest not unlike the cuirassier's helmet, and the hair, trained from the sides into a high ridge running along the cranium, not unfrequently projects far beyond the forehead. taste and caprice produce endless modifications. sometimes the crest is double, disposed in parallel ridges, with a deep hollow between; or it is treble, when the two lines of parting running along the mastoids make it remarkably like bears' ears, the central prism rises high, and the side hair is plaited into little pig-tails. others again train four parallel lines from nape to forehead, forming two cushions along the parietals. the crest is heightened by padding, and the whole of the hair is devoted to magnifying it,--at a distance, some of the bushwomen look as if they wore cocked hats. when dreaded baldness appears, rosettes of false hair patch the temples, and plaits of purchased wigs are interwoven to increase the bulk: the last resources of all are wigs and toupets of stained pine-apple fibre. the comb is unknown, its succedaneum being a huge bodkin, like that which the trasteverina has so often used as a stiletto. this instrument of castigation is made of ivory or metal, with a lozenge often neatly carved and ornamented at the handle. the hair, always somewhat "kinky," is anointed every morning with palm-oil, or the tallow-like produce of a jungle-nut; and, in full dress, it is copiously powdered with light red or bright yellow dust of pounded camwood, redwood, and various barks. the ears are adorned with broad rings of native make, and, near the trading stations, with french imitation jewellery. the neck supports many strings of beads, long and short, with the indispensable talismans. the body dress is a tobe or loin-cloth, like that of the men; but under the "námbá," or outer wrapper, which hangs down the feet, there is a "siri," or petticoat, reaching only to the knees. both are gathered in front like the shukkah of the eastern coast, and the bosom is left bare. few except the bush-folk now wear the ibongo, ipepe, or ndengi, the woven fibres and grass-cloths of their ancestry; amongst the hunters, however, a tángá, or grass-kilt, may still be seen. the exposure of the upper person shows the size and tumidity of the areola, even in young girls; being unsupported, the mammae soon become flaccid. the legs, which are peculiarly neat and well turned, are made by art a fitting set-off to the head. it is the pride of a mpongwe wife to cover the lower limb between knee and ankle with an armour of metal rings, which are also worn upon the wrists; the custom is not modern, and travellers of the seventeenth century allude to them. the rich affect copper, bought in wires two feet and a half long, and in two sizes; of the larger, four, of the smaller, eight, go to the dollar; the brass are cheaper, as : ; and i did not see iron or tin. the native smiths make the circles, and the weight of a full set of forty varies from fifteen to nineteen pounds. they are separate rings, not a single coil, like that used by the wagogo and other east african tribes; they press tightly on the limb, often causing painful chafes and sores. the ankle is generally occupied by a brass or iron chain, with small links. girls may wear these rings, of which the husband is expected to present a considerable number to his bride, and the consequence is, that when in full dress she waddles like a duck. commerce and intercourse with whites has made the mpongwe, once the rudest, now one of the most civilized of african tribes; and, upon the whole, there is an improvement. the exact barbot (iv. ) tells us "the gaboon blacks are barbarous, wild, bloody, and treacherous, very thievish and crafty, especially towards strangers. the women, on the contrary, are as civil and courteous to them, and will use all possible means to enjoy their company; but both sexes are the most wretchedly poor and miserable of any in guinea, and yet so very haughty, that they are perfectly ridiculous ... they are all excessively fond of brandy and other strong liquors of europe and america ... if they fancy one has got a mouthful more than another, and they are half drunk, they will soon fall a-fighting, even with their own princes or priests ... their exceeding greediness for strong liquors renders them so little nice and curious in the choice of them, that, though mixed with half water, and sometimes a little spanish soap put into it to give it a froth, to appear of proof by the scum it makes, they like it and praise it as much as the best and purest brandy." captain boteler remarks, in : "the women do not speak english; though, for the sake of what trifles they can procure for their husbands, they are in the habit of flocking on board the different vessels which visit the river, and will permit them to remain; and the wives are generally maintained in clothing by the proceeds of their intercourse with the whites." he further assures us, that mulatto girls thus born are not allowed to marry, although there is no such restriction for the males; and elsewhere, he concludes, that never having seen an infant or an adult offspring of mixed blood, abortion is practised as at delagoa and old calabar, where, in , i found only one child of mixed blood. if so, the mpongwe have changed for the better. half-castes are now not uncommon; there are several nice "yaller gals" well known on the river; and the number of old and sick speaks well for the humanity of the tribe. devoted to trade and become a people of brokers, of go-betweens, of middle-men, the mpongwe have now acquired an ease and propriety, a polish and urbanity of manner which contrasts strongly with the kru-men and other tribes, who, despite generations of intercourse with europeans, are rough and barbarous as their forefathers. the youths used to learn english, which they spoke fluently and with tolerable accent, but always barbarously; they are more successful with the easier neo-latin tongues. their one aim in life is not happiness, but "trust," an african practice unwisely encouraged by europeans; so old calabar but a few years ago was not a trust-river," and consequently the consul and the gunboat had little to do there. many of them have received advances of dollars by thousands, but the european merchant has generally suffered from his credulity or rapacity. in low cunning the native is more than a match for the stranger; moreover, he has "the pull" in the all-important matter of time; he can spend a fortnight haggling over the price of a tooth when the unhappy capitalist is eating his heart. like all the african aristocracy, they hold agriculture beneath the dignity of man and fit only for their women and slaves; the "ladies" also refuse to work at the plantations, especially when young and pretty, leaving them to the bush-folk, male and female. m. du chaillu repeatedly asserts (chap xix.) "there is no property in land," but this is a mistake often made in africa. labourers are hired at the rate of two to three dollars per mensem, and gangs would easily be collected if one of the chiefs were placed in command. no sum of money will buy a free-born mpongwe, and the sale is forbidden by the laws of the land. a half-caste would fetch one hundred dollars; a wild "nigger" near the river costs from thirty to thirty-five dollars; the same may be bought in the apinji country for four dollars' worth of assorted goods, the "bundle- trade" as it is called; but there is the imminent risk of the chattel's running away. a man's only attendants being now his wives and serviles, it is evident that plurality and domestic servitude will extend-- "far into summers which we shall not see;" in fact, till some violent revolution of society shall have introduced a servant class. the three grades of mpongwe may be considered as rude beginnings of caste. the first are the "sons of the soil," the "ongwá ntye" (contracted from onwana wi ntye), mpongwes of pure blood; the second are the "mbámbá," children of free-men by serviles; and lastly, "nsháká," in bákele "nsháká," represents the slaves. m. du chaillu's distribution (chap, iii.) into five orders, namely, pure, mixed with other tribes, half free, children of serviles, and chattels, is somewhat over-artificial; at any rate, now it is not generally recognized. like the high-caste hindu, the nobler race will marry women of lower classes; for instance, king njogoni's mother was a benga; but the inverse proceeding is a disgrace to the woman, apparently an instinctive feeling on the part of the reproducer, still lingering in the most advanced societies. old travellers record a belief that, unlike all other guinea races, the mpongwe marries his mother, sister, or daughter; and they compare the practice with that of the polished persians and the peruvian incas, who thus kept pure the solar and lunar blood. if this "breeding-in" ever existed, no trace of it now remains; on the contrary, every care is taken to avoid marriages of consanguinity. bowdich, indeed, assures us that a man may not look at nor converse with his mother-in-law, on pain of a heavy, perhaps a ruinous fine; "this singular law is founded on the tradition of an incest." marriage amongst the mpongwe is a purely civil contract, as in africa generally, and so perhaps it will some day be in europe, asia, and america. c�lebs pays a certain sum for the bride, who, where "marriage by capture" is unknown, has no voice in the matter. many promises of future "dash" are made to the girl's parents; and drinking, drumming, and dancing form the ceremony. the following is, or rather i should say was, a fair list of articles paid for a virgin bride. one fine silk hat, one cap, one coat; five to twenty pieces of various cottons, plain and ornamental; two to twenty silk kerchiefs; three to thirty jars of rum; twenty pounds of trade tobacco; two hatchets; two cutlasses; plates and dishes, mugs and glasses, five each; six knives; one kettle; one brass pan; two to three neptunes (caldrons, the old term being "neptune's pots"), a dozen bars of iron; copper and brass rings, chains with small links, and minor articles ad libitum. the "settlement" is the same in kind, but has increased during the last forty years, and specie has become much more common.[fn# ] after marriage there is a mutual accommodation system suggesting the cicisbeo or mariage à trois school; hence we read that wives, like the much-maligned xantippe, were borrowed and lent, and that not fulfilling the promise of a loan is punishable by heavy damages. where the husband acts adjutor or cavaliere to his friend's "omantwe"--female person or wife--and the friend is equally complaisant, wedlock may hardly be called permanent, and there can be no tie save children. the old immorality endures; it is as if the command were reversed by accepting that misprint which so scandalized the star chamber, "thou shalt commit adultery." yet, unpermitted, the offence is one against property, and moechus may be cast in damages ranging from $ to $ : what is known in low civilization as the "panel dodge" is an infamy familiar to almost all the maritime tribes of africa. he must indeed be a solomon of a son who, sur les bords du gabon, can guess at his own sire; a question so impertinent is never put by the ex-officio father. the son succeeds by inheritance to his father's relict, who, being generally in years, is condemned to be useful when she has ceased to be an ornament, and, if there are several, they are equally divided amongst the heirs. trading tribes rarely affect the pundonor which characterizes the pastoral and the predatory; these people traffic in all things, even in the chastity of their women. what with pre-nuptial excesses, with early unions, often infructuous, with a virtual system of community, and with universal drunkenness, it is not to be wondered at if the maritime tribes of africa degenerate and die out. such apparently is the modus operandi by which nature rids herself of the effete races which have served to clear the ground and to pave the way for higher successors. wealth and luxury, so generally inveighed against by poets and divines, injure humanity only when they injuriously affect reproduction; and poverty is praised only because it breeds more men. the true tests of the physical prosperity of a race, and of its position in the world, are bodily strength and the excess of births over deaths. separation after marriage can hardly be dignified on the gaboon by the name of divorce. whenever a woman has or fancies she has a grievance, she leaves her husband, returns to "the paternal" and marries again. quarrels about the sex are very common, yet, in cases of adultery the old murderous assaults are now rare except amongst the backwoodsmen. the habit was simply to shoot some man belonging to the seducer's or to the ravisher's village; the latter shot somebody in the nearest settlement, and so on till the affair was decided. in these days "violent retaliation for personal jealousy always 'be-littles' a man in the eyes of an african community." perhaps also he unconsciously recognizes the sentiment ascribed to mohammed, "laysa bi-zányatin ilia bi záni," "there is no adulteress without an adulterer," meaning that the husband has set the example. polygamy is, of course, the order of the day; it is a necessity to the men, and even the women disdain to marry a "one-wifer." as amongst all pluralists, from moslem to mormon, the senior or first married is no. ; here called "best wife:" she is the goodman's viceroy, and she rules the home-kingdom with absolute sway. yet the mpongwe do not, like other tribes on the west coast, practise that separation of the sexes during gestation and lactation, which is enjoined to the hebrews, recommended by catholicism, and commanded by mormonism--a system which partly justifies polygamy. in portuguese guinea the enceinte is claimed by her relatives, especially by the women, for three years, that she may give undivided attention to her offspring, who is rightly believed to be benefited by the separation, and that she may return to her husband with renewed vigour. meanwhile custom allows the man to co-habit with a slave girl. polygamy, also, in africa is rather a political than a domestic or social institution. a "judicious culture of the marriage tie" is necessary amongst savages and barbarians whose only friends and supporters are blood relations and nuptial connections; besides which, a multitude of wives ministers to the great man's pride and influence, as well as to his pleasures and to his efficiency. when the head wife ages, she takes charge of the girlish brides committed to her guardianship by the husband. i should try vainly to persuade the english woman that there can be peace in households so constituted: still, such is the case. messrs. wilson and du chaillu both assert that the wives rarely disagree amongst themselves. the sentimental part of love is modified; the common husband becomes the patriarch, not the paterfamilias; the wife is not the mistress, but the mère de famille. the alliance rises or sinks to one of interest and affection instead of being amorous or uxorious, whilst the underlying idea, "the more the merrier," especially in lands where free service is unknown, seems to stifle envy and jealousy. everywhere, moreover, amongst polygamists, the husband is strictly forbidden by popular opinion to show preference for a favourite wife; if he do so, he is a bad man. but polygamy here has not rendered the women, as theoretically it should, a down-trodden moiety of society; on the contrary, their position is comparatively high. the marriage connection is not "one of master and slave," a link between freedom and serfdom; the "weaker vessel" does not suffer from collision with the pot de fer; generally the fair but frail ones appear to be, as amongst the israelites generally, the better halves. despite the okosunguu or cow-hide "peacemaker," they have conquered a considerable latitude of conducting their own affairs. when poor and slaveless and, naturally, when no longer young, they must work in the house and in the field, but this lot is not singular; in journeys they carry the load, yet it is rarely heavier than the weapons borne by the man. on the other hand, after feeding their husbands, what remains out of the fruits of their labours is their own, wholly out of his reach--a boon not always granted by civilization. as in unyamwezi, they guard their rights with a truly feminine touchiness and jealousy. there is always, in the african mind, a preference for descent and inheritance through the mother, "the surer side,"--an unmistakable sign, by the by, of barbarism. the so-called royal races in the eight great despotisms of pagan africa--ashanti, dahome, and benin; karagwah, uganda, and unyoro; the mwátá yá nvo, and the mwátá cazembe-- allow the greatest liberty even to the king's sisters; they are expected only to choose handsome lovers, that the race may maintain its physical superiority; and hence, doubtless, the stalwart forms and the good looks remarked by every traveller. as a rule, the husband cannot sell his wife's children whilst her brother may dispose of them as he pleases--the vox populi exclaims, "what! is the man to go hungry when he can trade off his sister's brats?" the strong-minded of london and new york have not yet succeeded in thoroughly organizing and popularizing their clubs; the belles sauvages of the gaboon have. there is a secret order, called "njembe," a rights of woman association, intended mainly to counterbalance the nda of the lords of creation, which will presently be described. dropped a few years ago by the men, it was taken up by their wives, and it now numbers a host of initiated, limited only by heavy entrance fees. this form of freemasonry deals largely in processions, whose preliminaries and proceedings are kept profoundly secret. at certain times an old woman strikes a stick upon an "orega" or crescent-shaped drum, hollowed out of a block of wood; hearing this signal, the worshipful sisterhood, bedaubed, by way of insignia, with red and white chalk or clay, follow her from the village to some remote nook in the jungle, where the lodge is tiled. sentinels are stationed around whilst business is transacted before a vestal fire, which must burn for a fortnight or three weeks, in the awe- compelling presence of a brass pipkin filled with herbs, and a basin, both zebra'd like the human limbs. the rev. william walker was once detected playing "peeping tom" by sixty or seventy viragos, who attempted to exact a fine of forty dollars, and who would have handled him severely had he not managed to escape. the french officers, never standing upon ceremony in such matters, have often insisted upon being present. circumcision, between the fourth and eighth year, is universal in pongo-land, and without it a youth could not be married. the operation is performed generally by the chief, often by some old man, who receives a fee from the parents: the thumb nails are long, and are used after the jewish fashion:[fn# ] neat rum with red pepper is spirted from the mouth to "kill wound." it is purely hygienic, and not balanced by the excisio judaica, some physiologists consider the latter a necessary complement of the male rite; such, however, is not the case. the hebrews, who almost everywhere retained circumcision, have, in europe at least, long abandoned excision. i regret that the delicacy of the age does not allow me to be more explicit. the mpongwe practise a rite so resembling infant baptism that the missionaries have derived it from a corruption of abyssinian christianity which, like the flora of the camarones and fernandian highlands, might have travelled across the dark continent, where it has now been superseded by el islam. i purpose at some period of more leisure to prove an ancient intercourse and rapprochement of all the african tribes ranging between the parallels of north latitude ° and south latitude °. it will best be established, not by the single great family of language, but by the similarity of manners, customs, and belief; of arts and crafts; of utensils and industry. the baptism of pongo-land is as follows. when the babe is born, a crier, announcing the event, promises to it in the people's name participation in the rights of the living. it is placed upon a banana leaf, for which reason the plantain is never used to stop the water-pots; and the chief or the nearest of kin sprinkles it from a basin, gives it a name, and pronounces a benediction, his example being followed by all present. the man-child is exhorted to be truthful, and the girl to "tell plenty lie," in order to lead a happy life. truly a new form of the regenerative rite! a curious prepossession of the african mind, curious and yet general, in a land where population is the one want, and where issue is held the greatest blessing, is the imaginary necessity of limiting the family. perhaps this form of infanticide is a policy derived from ancestors who found it necessary. in the kingdom of apollonia (guinea) the tenth child was always buried alive; never a decimus was allowed to stand in the way of the nine seniors. the birth of twins is an evil portent to the mpongwes, as it is in many parts of central africa, and even in the new world; it also involves the idea of moral turpitude, as if the woman were one of the lower animals, capable of superfetation. there is no greater insult to a man, than to point at him with two fingers, meaning that he is a twin; of course he is not one, or he would have been killed at birth. albinos are allowed to live, as in dahome, in ashanti, and among some east african tribes, where i have been "chaffed" about a brother white, who proved to be an exceptional negro without pigmentum nigrum. there is no novelty in the mpongwe funeral rites; the same system prevails from the oil rivers to congo-land, and extends even to the wild races of the interior. the corpse, being still sentient, is accompanied by stores of raiment, pots, and goats' flesh; a bottle is placed in one hand and a glass in the other, and, if the deceased has been fond of play, his draught-board and other materials are buried with him. the system has been well defined as one in which the "ghost of a man eats the ghost of a yam, boiled in the ghost of a pot, over the ghost of a fire." the body, after being stretched out in a box, is carried to a lonely place; some are buried deep, others close to the surface. there is an immense show of grief, with keening and crocodiles' tears, perhaps to benefit the living by averting a charge of witchcraft, which would inevitably lead to "sassy" or poison-water. the wake continues for five days, when they "pull the cry," that is to say, end mourning. if these pious rites be neglected, the children incur the terrible reproach, "your father he be hungry." the widow may re-marry immediately after "living for cry," and, if young and lusty, she looks out for another consort within the week. the slave is thrown out into the bush--no one will take the trouble to dig a hole for him. the industry of the mpongwe is that of the african generally; every man is a host in himself; he builds and furnishes his house, he makes his weapons and pipes, and he ignores division of labour, except in the smith and the carpenter; in the potter, who works without a wheel, and in the dyer, who knows barks, and who fixes his colours with clay. the men especially pride themselves upon canoe-making; the favourite wood is the buoyant okumeh or bombax, that monarch of the african forest. i have seen a boat, feet inches by feet inches in beam, cut out of a single tree, with the mpáno or little adze, a lineal descendant of the silex implement, and i have heard of others measuring feet. these craft easily carry tons, and travel to miles, which, as mr. wilson remarks, would land them, under favourable circumstances, in south america. captain boteler found that the mpongwe boat combined symmetry of form, strength, and solidity, with safeness and swiftness either in pulling or sailing. and of late years the people have succeeded in launching large and fast craft built after european models. the favourite pleasures of the mpongwe are gross and gorging "feeds," drinking and smoking. they recall to mind the old woman who told "monk lewis" that if a glass of gin were at one end of the table, and her immortal soul at the other, she would choose the gin. they soak with palm-wine every day; they indulge in rum and absinthe, and the wealthy affect so-called cognac, with champagne and bordeaux, which, however, they pronounce to be "cold." i have seen master boro, a boy five years old, drain without winking a wineglassful of brandy. it is not wonderful that the adults can "stand" but little, and that a few mouthfuls of well-watered spirit make their voices thick, and paralyze their weak brains as well as their tongues. the persians, who commence drinking late in life, can swallow strong waters by the tumbler. men, women, and children when hardly "cremnobatic," have always the pipe in mouth. the favourite article is a "dudheen," a well culotté clay, used and worn till the bowl touches the nose. the poor are driven to a "kondukwe," a yard of plantain leaf, hollowed with a wire, and charged at the thicker end. the "holy herb" would of course grow in the country, and grow well, but it is imported from the states without trouble, and perhaps with less expense. some tribes make a decent snuff of the common trade article, but i never saw either sex chew--perhaps the most wholesome, and certainly the most efficacious form. the smoking of lyámbá, called dyámbá in the southern regions, is confined to debauchees. m. du chaillu asserts that this cannabis sativa is not found wild, and the people confirm his statement; possibly it has extended from hindostan to zanzibar, and thence across the continent. intoxicating hemp is now grown everywhere, especially in the nkommi country, and little packages, neatly bound with banana leaves, sell on the river for ten sous each. it is smoked either in the "kondukwe" or in the ojo. the latter, literally meaning a torch, is a polished cow-horn, closed at the thick end with wood, and banded with metal; a wooden stem, projecting from the upper or concave side, bears a neat "chillam" (bowl), either of clay or of brown steatite brought from the upper gaboon river. this rude hookah is half filled with water; the dried hemp in the bowl is covered with what syrians call a "kurs," a bit of metal about the size of half-a-crown, and upon it rests the fire. i at once recognized the implement in the brazil, where many slave- holders simply supposed it to be a servile and african form of tobacco-pipe. after a few puffs the eyes redden, a violent cough is caused by the acrid fumes tickling the throat; the brain, whirls with a pleasant swimming, like that of chloroform, and the smoker finds himself in gloriâ. my spanish friends at po tried but did not like it. i can answer for the hemp being stronger than the egyptian hashísh or the bhang of hindostan; it rather resembled the fasúkh of northern africa, the dakha and motukwane of the southern regions, and the wild variety called in sind "bang i jabalí." the religion of african races is ever interesting to those of a maturer faith; it is somewhat like the study of childhood to an old man. the jew, the high-caste hindú, and the guebre, the christian and the moslem have their holy writs, their fixed forms of thought and worship, in fact their grooves in which belief runs. they no longer see through a glass darkly; nothing with them is left vague or undetermined. continuation, resurrection, eternity are hereditary and habitual ideas; they have become almost inseparable and congenital parts of the mental system. this condition renders it nearly as difficult for us to understand the vagueness and mistiness of savage and unwritten creeds, as to penetrate into the modus agendi of animal instinct. and there is yet another obstacle in dealing with such people, their intense and childish sensitiveness and secretiveness. they are not, as some have foolishly supposed, ashamed of their tenets or their practices, but they are unwilling to speak about them. they fear the intentions of the cross-questioner, and they hold themselves safest behind a crooked answer. moreover, every mpongwe is his own "pontifex maximus," and the want, or rather the scarcity, of a regular priesthood must promote independence and discrepancy of belief. whilst noticing the fetishism of the gaboon i cannot help observing, by the way, how rapidly the civilization of the nineteenth century is redeveloping, together with the "religion of humanity" the old faith, not of paganism, but of cosmos, of nature; how directly it is, in fact, going back to its oldergods. the unknowable of our day is the brahm, the akarana-zaman, the gaboon anyambía, of which nothing can be predicated but an existence utterly unintelligible to the brain of man, a something free from the accidents of personality, of volition, of intelligence, of design, of providence; a something which cannot be addressed by veneration or worship; whose sole effects are subjective, that is, upon the worshipper, not upon the worshipped. nothing also can be more illogical than the awe and respect claimed by mr. herbert spencer for a being of which the very essence is that nothing can be known of it. and, as the idea grows, the several modes and forms of the unknowable, the hormuzd and ahriman of the dualist, those personifications of good and evil; the brahma, vishnu, and shiva, creation, preservation, and destruction; the beginning, the middle, and the end of all things; the triad, adored by all triadists under some modification, as that of osiris, isis, and horus, father, mother, and son, type of the family; or jupiter, neptune, and pluto, the three great elements; these outward and visible expressions lose force and significance, making place for that law of which they are the rude exponents. the marvellous spread of spiritualism, whose god is the unknowable, and whose prophet was swedenborg, is but the polished form of the mpongwe ibambo and ilogo; the beneficent phantasms have succeeded to the malevolent ghosts, the shadowy deities of man's childhood; as the god of love formerly took the place of the god of fear. the future of spiritualism, which may be defined as "hades with progress," is making serious inroads upon the coarse belief, worthy of the barbarous and the middle ages, in an eternity of punishment, easily expressed by everlasting fire, and in ineffable joys, which no one has ever successfully expressed. the ghosts of our childhood have now become bonâ fide objective beings, who rap, raise tables, display fireworks, rain flowers, and brew tea. we explain by "levitation" the riding of the witch upon the broom-stick to the sabbath; we can no longer refuse credence to canidia and all her spells. and the very vagueness of the modern faith serves to assimilate it the more to its most ancient forms, one of which we are studying upon the gaboon river. the missionary returning from africa is often asked what is the religion of the people? if an exact man, he will answer, "i don't know." and how can he know when the people themselves, even the princes and priests, are ignorant of it? a missionary of twenty years' standing in west africa, an able and conscientious student withal, assured me that during the early part of his career he had given much time to collecting and collating, under intelligent native superintendence, negro traditions and religion. he presently found that no two men thought alike upon any single subject: i need hardly say that he gave up in despair a work hopeless as psychology, the mere study of the individual. fetishism, i believe, is held by the orthodox to be a degradation of the pure and primitive "adamical dispensation," even as the negro has been supposed to represent the accursed and degraded descendants of ham and canaan. i cannot but look upon it as the first dawn of a faith in things not seen. and it must be studied by casting off all our preconceived ideas. for instance, africans believe, not in soul nor in spirit, but in ghost; when they called m. du chaillu a "mbwiri," they meant that the white man had been bleached by the grave as dante had been darkened by his visit below, and consequently he was a subject of fear and awe. they have a material, evanescent, intelligible future, not an immaterial, incomprehensible eternity; the ghost endures only for awhile and perishes like the memory of the little-great name. hence the ignoble dread in east and west africa of a death which leads to a shadowy world, and eventually to utter annihilation. seeing nought beyond the present-future, there is no hope for them in the grave; they wail and sorrow with a burden of despair. "ame-kwisha"--he is finished--is the east african's last word concerning kinsman and friend. "all is done for ever," sing the west africans. any allusion to loss of life turns their black skins blue; "yes," they exclaim, "it is bad to die, to leave house and home, wife and children; no more to wear soft cloth, nor eat meat, nor "drink" tobacco, and rum." "never speak of that" the moribund will exclaim with a shudder; such is the ever- present horror of their dreadful and dreary times of sickness, always aggravated by suspicions of witchcraft, the only cause which their imperfect knowledge of physics can assign to death-- even van helmont asserted, "deus non fecit mortem." the peoples, who, like those of dahome, have a distinct future world, have borrowed it, i cannot help thinking, from egypt. and when an african chief said in my presence to a yahoo-like naval officer, "when so be i die, i come up for white man! when so be you die, you come up for monkey!" my suspicion is that he had distorted the doctrine of some missionary. man would hardly have a future without a distinct priestly class whose interest it is to teach "another and a better,"--or a worse. certain missionaries in the gaboon river have detected evidences of judaism amongst the mpongwe, which deserve notice but which hardly require detailed refutation. . circumcision, even on the eighth day as amongst the efik of the old calabar river; but this is a familiar custom borrowed from egypt by the semites; it is done in a multitude of ways, which are limited only by necessity; the resemblance of the mpongwe rite to that of the jews, though remarkable, is purely accidental. . the division of tribes into separate families and frequently into the number twelve; but this again appears fortuitous; almost all the west african people have some such division, and they range upwards from three, as amongst the kru-men, the gallas, the wakwafi,and the wanyika.[fn# ] . exogamy or the rigid interdiction of marriage between clans and families nearly related; here again the hindu and the somal observe the custom rigidly, whilst the jews and arabs have ever taken to wife their first cousins. . sacrifices with blood- sprinkling upon altars and door-posts; a superstition almost universal, found in peru and mexico as in palestine, preserved in ashanti and probably borrowed by the hebrews from the african egyptians. . the formal and ceremonial observance of new moons; but the wanyamwezi and other tribes also hail the appearance of the lesser light, like the moslems, who, when they sight the hilal (crescent), ejaculate a short prayer for blessings throughout the month which it ushers in. . a specified time of mourning for the dead (common to all barbarians as to civilized races), during which their survivors wear soiled clothes (an instinctive sign of grief, as fine dresses are of joy), and shave their heads (doubtless done to make some difference from every- day times), accompanied with ceremonial purifications (what ancient people has not had some such whim?). . the system of runda or forbidden meats; but every traveller has found this practice in south as in east africa, and i noticed it among the somal who, even when starving, will not touch fish nor fowl. briefly, external resemblances and coincidences like these could be made to establish cousinhood between a cockney and a cockatoo; possibly such discovery of judaism dates from the days about , when men were mad to find the "lost tribes," as if they had not quite enough to do with the two which remain to them. the mpongwe and their neighbours have advanced a long step beyond their black brethren in eastern africa. no longer contented with mere fetishes, the egyptian charms in which the dreaded ghost "sits,"[fn# ] meaning, is "bound," they have invented idols, a manifest advance toward that polytheism and pantheism which lead through a triad and duad of deities to monotheism, the finial of the spiritual edifice. in eastern africa i know but one people, the wanyika near mombasah, who have certain images called "kisukas;" they declare that this great medicine, never shown to europeans, came from the west, and andrew battel ( ) found idols amongst the people whom he calls giagas or jagas, meaning congoese chiefs. moreover, the gaboon pagans lodge their idols. behind each larger establishment there is a dwarf hut, the miniature of a dwelling-place, carefully closed; i thought these were offices, but hotaloya andrews taught me otherwise. he called them in his broken english "compass-houses," a literal translation of "nágo mbwiri," and, sturdily refusing me admittance, left me as wise as before. the reason afterwards proved to be that "ologo he kill man too much." i presently found out that he called my pocket compass, "mbwiri," a very vague and comprehensive word. it represents in the highest signification the columbian manitou, and thus men talk of the mbwiri of a tree or a river; as will presently be seen, it is also applied to a tutelar god; and i have shown how it means a ghost. in "nágo mbwiri" the sense is an idol, an object of worship, a "medicine" as the north-american indians say, in contradistinction to munda, a grigri, talisman, or charm. every mpongwe, woman as well as man, has some mbwiri to which offerings are made in times of misfortune, sickness, or danger. i afterwards managed to enter one of these rude and embryonal temples so carefully shut. behind the little door of matting is a tall threshold of board; a bench lines the far end, and in the centre stands "ologo," a rude imitation of a human figure, with a gum-torch planted in the ground before it ready for burnt offerings. to the walls are suspended sundry mystic implements, especially basins, smeared with red and white chalk-mixture, and wooden crescents decorated with beads and ribbons. during worship certain objects are placed before the joss, the suppliant at the same time jangling and shaking the ncheke a rude beginning of the bell, the gong, the rattle, and the instruments played before idols by more advanced peoples. it is a piece of wood, hour-glass-shaped but flat, and some six inches and a half long; the girth of the waist is five inches, and about three more round the ends. the wood is cut away, leaving rude and uneven raised bands horizontally striped with white, black, and red. two brass wires are stretched across the upper and lower breadth, and each is provided with a ring or hinge holding four or five strips of wire acting as clappers. this "wicker-work rattle to drive the devil out" (m. du chaillu, chap, xxvi.) is called by the mpongwe "soke," and serves only, like that of the dahomans and the ashantis (bowdich, ) for dancing and merriment. the south american maraca was the sole object of worship known to the tupi or brazilian "indians." [fn# ] the beliefs and superstitions popularly attributed to the mpongwe are these. they are not without that which we call a first cause, and they name it anyambia, which missionary philologists consider a contraction of aninla, spirit (?), and mbia, good. m. du chaillu everywhere confounds anyambía, or, as he writes the word, "aniambié," with inyemba, a witch, to bewitch being "punga inyemba." mr. w. winwood reade seems to make anyambía a mysterious word, as was jehovah after the date of the moabite stone. like the brahm of the hindus, the god of epicurus and confucius, and the akárana-zaman or endless time of the guebres, anyambia is a vague being, a vox et præterea nihil, without personality, too high and too remote for interference in human affairs, therefore not addressed in prayer, never represented by the human form, never lodged in temples. under this "unknown god" are two chief agencies, working partners who manage the business of the world, and who effect what the civilized call "providence." mbwírí here becomes the osiris, jove, hormuzd or good god, the vishnu, or preserver, a tutelar deity, a lar, a guardian. onyámbe is the bad god, typhon, vejovis, the ahriman or semitic devil; shiva the destroyer, the third person of the aryan triad; and his name is never mentioned but with bated breath. they have not only fear of, but also a higher respect for him than for the giver of good, so difficult is it for the child- man's mind to connect the ideas of benignity and power. he would harm if he could, ergo so would his god. i once hesitated to believe that these rude people had arrived at the notion of duality, at the manichaeanism which caused mr. mill (sen.) surprise that no one had revived it in his time; at an idea so philosophical, which leads directly to the ne plus ultra of faith, el wahdaníyyeh or monotheism. nor should i have credited them with so logical an apparatus for the regimen of the universe, or so stout-hearted an attempt to solve the eternal riddle of good and evil. but the same belief also exists amongst the congoese tribes, and even in the debased races of the niger. captain william alien ("niger expedition," i. ) thus records the effect when, at the request of the commissioners, herr schon, the missionary, began stating to king obi the difference between the christian religion and heathenism: "herr schön. there is but one god. "king obi. i always understood there were two," &c. the mpongwe "mwetye" is a branch of male freemasonry into which women and strangers are never initiated. the bakele and shekyani, according to "western africa" (wilson, pp. - ), consider it a "great spirit." nothing is more common amongst adjoining negro tribes than to annex one another's superstitions, completely changing, withal, their significance. "ovengwá" is a vampire, the apparition of a dead man; tall as a tree, always winking and clearly seen, which is not the case with the ibámbo and ilogo, plurals of obambo and ologo. these are vulgar ghosts of the departed, the causes of "possession," disease and death; they are propitiated by various rites, and everywhere they are worshipped in private. mr. wilson opines that the "obambo are the spirits of the ancestors of the people, and inlâgâ are the spirits of strangers and have come from a distance," but this was probably an individual tenet. the mumbo-jumbo of the mandengas; the semo of the súsús; the tassau or "purrah-devil" of the mendis; the egugun of the egbas; the egbo of the duallas; and the mwetye and ukukwe of the bakele, is represented in pongo-land by the ndá, which is an order of the young men. ndá dwells in the woods and comes forth only by night bundled up in dry plantain leaves[fn# ] and treading on tall stilts; he precedes free adult males who parade the streets with dance and song. the women and children fly at the approach of this devil on two sticks, and with reason: every peccadillo is punished with a merciless thrashing. the institution is intended to keep in order the weaker sex, the young and the "chattels:" ndá has tried visiting white men and missionaries, but his visits have not been a success. the civilized man would be apt to imagine that these wild african fetishists are easily converted to a "purer creed." the contrary is everywhere and absolutely the case; their faith is a web woven with threads of iron. the negro finds it almost impossible to rid himself of his belief; the spiritual despotism is the expression of his organization, a part of himself. progressive races, on the other hand, can throw off or exchange every part of their religion, except perhaps the remnant of original and natural belief in things unseen--in fact, the fetishist portion, such as ghost-existence and veneration of material objects, places, and things. i might instance the protestant missionary who, while deriding the holy places at jerusalem, considers the "cedars of lebanon" sacred things, and sternly forbids travellers to gather the cones. the stereotyped african answer to europeans ridiculing these institutions, including wizard-spearing and witch-burning is, "there may be no magic, though i see there is, among you whites. but we blacks have known many men who have been bewitched and died." even in asia, whenever i spoke contemptuously to a moslem of his jinns, or to a hindu of his rákshasa, the rejoinder invariably was, "you white men are by nature so hot that even our devils fear you." witchcraft, which has by no means thoroughly disappeared from europe, maintains firm hold upon the african brain. the idea is found amongst christians, for instance, the "reduced indians" of the amazonas river; and it is evidently at the bottom of that widely spread superstition, the "evil eye," which remains throughout southern europe as strong as it was in the days of pliny. as amongst barbarians generally, no misfortune happens, no accident occurs, no illness nor death can take place without the agency of wizard or witch. there is nothing more odious than this crime; it is hostile to god and man, and it must be expiated by death in the most terrible tortures. metamorphosis is a common art amongst mpongwe magicians: this vulgar materialism, of which ovid sang, must not be confounded with the poetical hindu metempsychosis or transmigration of souls which explains empirically certain physiological mysteries. here the adept naturally becomes a gorilla or a leopard, as he would be a lion in south africa, a hyena in abyssinia and the somali country, and a loup-garou in brittany.[fn# ] the poison ordeal is a necessary corollary to witchcraft. the plant most used by the oganga (medicine man) is a small red rooted shrub, not unlike a hazel bush, and called ikázyá or ikájá. mr. wilson (p. ) writes "nkazya:" battel (loc. cit. ) terms the root "imbando," a corruption of mbundú. m. du chaillu (chap. xv.) gives an illustration of the "mboundou leaf" (half size): professor john torrey believes the active principle to be a vegeto-alkali of the strychnos group, but the symptoms do not seem to bear out the conjecture. the mpongwe told me that the poison was named either mbundú or olondá (nut) werere--perhaps this was what is popularly called "a sell." mbundú is the decoction of the scraped bark which corresponds with the "sassy- water" of the northern maritime tribes. the accused, after drinking the potion, is ordered to step over sticks of the same plant, which are placed a pace apart. if the man be affected, he raises his foot like a horse with string-halt, and this convicts him of the foul crime. of course there is some antidote, as the medicine-man himself drinks large draughts of his own stuff: in old calabar river for instance, mithridates boils the poison-nut; but europeans could not, and natives would not, tell me what the gaboon "dodge" is. according to vulgar africans, all test-poisons are sentient and reasoning beings, who search the criminal's stomach, that is his heart, and who find out the deep hidden sin; hence the people shout, "if they are wizards, let it kill them; if they are innocent, let it go forth!" moreover, the detected murderer is considered a bungler who has fallen into the pit dug for his brother. doubtless many innocent lives have been lost by this superstition. but there is reason in the order, "thou shalt not suffer a witch to live," without having recourse to the supernaturalisms and preternaturalisms, which have unobligingly disappeared when science most wants them. sorcery and poison are as closely united as the "black nightingales," and it evidently differs little whether i slay a man with my sword or i destroy him by the slow and certain torture of a mind diseased. the mpongwe have also some peculiarities in their notions of justice. if a man murder another, the criminal is put to death, not by the nearest of kin, as amongst the arabs and almost all wild people, but by the whole community; this already shows an advanced appreciation of the act and its bearings. the penalty is either drowning or burning alive: except in the case of a chief or a very rich man, little or no difference is made between wilful murder, justifiable homicide, and accidental manslaughter- -the reason of this, say their jurists, is to make people more careful. here, again, we find a sense of the sanctity of life the reverse of barbarous. cutting and maiming are punished by the fine of a slave. and now briefly to resume the character of the mpongwe, a nervous and excitable race of negroes. the men are deficient in courage, as the women are in chastity, and neither sex has a tincture of what we call morality. to commercial shrewdness and eagerness they add exceptional greed of gain and rascality; foreign rum and tobacco, dress and ornaments, arms and ammunition have been necessaries to them; they will have them, and, unless they can supply themselves by licit, they naturally fly to illicit means. yet, despite threats of poison and charges of witchcraft, they have arrived at an inkling of the dogma that "honesty is the best policy:" the east african has never dreamed it in the moments of his wildest imagination. pre-eminent liars, they are, curious to say, often deceived by the falsehoods of others, and they fairly illustrate the somewhat paradoxical proverb: "he who hates truth shall be the dupe of lies." unblushing mendicants, cunning and calculating, their obstinacy is remarkable; yet, as we often find the african, they are at the same time irresolute in the extreme. their virtues are vivacity, mental activity, acute observation, sociability, politeness, and hospitality: the fact that a white man can wander single-handed through the country shows a kindly nature. the brightest spot in their character is an abnormal development of adhesiveness, popularly called affection; it is somewhat tempered by capricious ruffianism, as in children; yet it entitles them to the gratítude of travellers. the language of the mpongwe has been fairly studied. t. edward bowdich ("mission from cape coast castle to ashantee," london, murray, ) when leaving the west coast for england, touched at the gaboon in a trading vessel, and visited naango (king george's town), on abaaga creek, which he places fifty miles up stream. he first gave (appendix vi.) a list of the mpongwe numerals. in the "missionaries of the a. b. c. f. m." gaboon mission, western africa, printed a "grammar of the mpongwe language, with vocabularies" (new york,snowden and pratt, vesey street), perhaps a little prematurely; it is the first of the four dialects on this part of the coast reduced to system by the american missionaries, especially by the rev. mr. leighton wilson, the others being bakele, benga, and fán. in , the same gentleman, who had taken the chief part in the first publication, made an able abstract and a comparison with the grebo and mandenga tongues ("western africa," part iv. chap. iv.). m. du chaillu further abridged this abridgement in his appendix without owning his authority, and in changing the examples he did all possible damage. in the transactions of the ethnological society of london (part ii. vol. i. new series), he also gave an abstract, in which he repeats himself. a "vocabulaire de la langue ponga" was printed in the "mémoires de la société ethnologique," tome ii., by m. p. h. delaporte. the other publications known to me are:-- . the book of proverbs, translated into the mpongwe language at the mission of the a. b. c. f. m., gaboon, west africa. new york. american bible society, instituted in the year mdcccxvi. . . the books of genesis, part of exodus, proverbs, and acts, by the same, printed at the same place and in the same year. the missionary explorers of the language, if i may so call them, at once saw that it belongs to the great south african family sichwáná, zulu, kisawahíli, mbundo (congoese), fiote, and others, whose characteristics are polysyllabism, inflection by systematic prefixes, and an alliteration, the mystery of whose reciprocal letters is theoretically explained by a euphony in many cases unintelligible, like the modes of hindú music, to the european ear.[fn# ] but they naturally fell into the universally accepted error of asserting "it has no known affinities to any of the languages north of the mountains of the moon," meaning the equatorial chain which divides the niger and nile valleys from the basin of the congo. this branch has its peculiarities. like italian--the coquette who grants her smiles to many, her favours to few--one of the easiest to understand and to speak a little, it is very difficult to master. whilst every native child can thread its way safely through its intricate, elaborate, and apparently arbitrary variations, the people comprehend a stranger who blunders over every sentence. mr. wilson thus limits the use of the accent: "whilst the mandenga ("a grammar of the mandenga language," by the rev. r. maxwell macbriar, london, john mason) and the grebo ("grammar," by the right rev. john payne, d.d. , nassau street, new york, ), distinguish between similar words, especially monosyllables, by a certain pitch of voice, the mpongwe repel accent, and rely solely upon the clear and distinct vowel sounds." but i found the negative past, present, and future forms of verbs wholly dependent upon a change of accent, or rather of intonation or voice-pitch, which the stranger's ear, unless acute, will fail to detect. for instance, mi taund would mean "i love;" mi taundá, "i do not love." the reverend linguist also asserts that it is almost entirely free from guttural and nasal sounds; the latter appeared to me as numerous and complicated as in the sanskrit. mr. wilson could hardly have had a nice ear, or he would not have written nchígo "ntyege," or njína "engena," which gives a thoroughly un-african distinctness to the initial consonant. the adjectival form is archaically expressed by a second and abstract substantive. this peculiarity is common in the south african family, as in ashanti; but, as bowdich observes, we also find it in greek, e.g. <greek> , "heresies of destruction" for destructive. another notable characteristic is the mpongwe's fondness for the passive voice, never using, if possible, the active; for instance, instead of saying, "he was born thus," he prefers, "the birth that was thus borned by him." the dialect changes the final as well as the initial syllable, a process unknown to the purest types of the south african family. as we advance north we find this phenomenon ever increasing; for instance in fernando po; but the mpongwe limits the change to verbs. another distinguishing point of these three gaboon tongues, as the rev. mr. mackey observes, is "the surprizing flexibility of the verb, the almost endless variety of parts regularly derived from a single root. there are, perhaps, no other languages in the world that approach them in the variety and extent of the inflections of the verb, possessing at the same time such rigid regularity of conjugation and precision of the meaning attached to each part." it is calculated that the whole number of tenses or shades of meaning which a mpongwe radical verb may be made to express, with the aid of its auxiliary particles, augmentatives, and negatives--prefixes, infixes, and suffixes--is between twelve and fifteen hundred, worse than an arabic triliteral. liquid and eminently harmonious, concise and capable of contraction, the mpongwe tongue does not deserve to die out. "the genius of the language is such that new terms may be introduced in relation to ethics, metaphysics, and science; even to the great truths of the christian religion." the main defect is that of the south african languages generally- -a deficiency of syntax, of gender and case; a want of vigour in sound; a too great precision of expression, rendering it clumsy and unwieldy; and an absence of exceptions, which give beauty and variety to speech. the people have never invented any form of alphabet, yet the abundance of tale, legend, and proverb which their dialect contains might repay the trouble of acquiring it. chapter v. to sánga-tánga and back. my objects in visiting mbátá, the reader will have understood, were to shoot a specimen or specimens of the gorilla, and, if possible, to buy or catch a youngster. even before landing, the pilot had assured me that a "baby" was on sale at the comptoir, but on inquiry it proved to have died. i was by no means sanguine of success--when the fight is against time, the old man usually wins the day. the short limits of my trip would not allow me to wander beyond the coast and the nearer riverine regions, where frequent villages and the constant firing of muskets have taught all wild animals that flight is their only defence; thus, besides being rare, they must be shy and timid, wary and knowing, "like an old hedgehog hunted for his grease." the first glance at the bush suggested, "surely it is impossible to find big game in such a land of farms and plantations." those who have shot under such circumstances will readily understand that everything depends upon "luck;" one man may beat the forest assiduously and vainly for five or six weeks; another will be successful on the first day. thus whilst i, without any fault of my own, utterly failed in shooting a gorilla, although i saw him and heard him, and came upon his trail, and found his mortal spoils, another traveller had hardly landed in the gaboon before he was so fortunate as to bring down a fine anthropoid. however, as man cannot command success, i was obliged to content myself with doing all in my power to deserve it. i offered five dollars, equalling the same number of sovereigns in england, to every huntsman for every fair shot, and ten dollars for each live ape. i implicitly obeyed all words of command, and my factotum selim agha was indefatigable in his zeal. indeed "luck" was dead against us during the whole of my stay in gorilla-land. we ran a fair risk of drowning in the first day's voyage; on the next march we were knocked down by lightning, and on the last trip i had a narrow escape from the fall of a giant branch that grazed my hammock. my first "bush" evening was spent in palm-wine, rum, and wassail; one must begin by humouring africans, under pain of being considered a churl; but the inevitable result is, that next day they will by some pretext or other shirk work to enjoy the headache. that old villain, "young prince," becoming very fou, hospitably offered me his daughter-in-law azizeh, forteune's second wife; and he was vigorously supported by the nimrod himself, who had drawn a horizontal line of white chalk above the eyebrows, a defence against the ibambo, those bad ghosts that cause fevers and sickness. forteune then hinted that perhaps i might prefer his daughter--"he be piccanniny; he be all same woman." marchandise offerte a le pied coupé, both offers were declined with, merci, non! sporting parties are often made up by the messieurs du plateau, i had been told at the comptoir; but such are the fascinations of les petites, that few ever progress beyond the first village. there was, consequently, wonder in the land as to what manner of utangáni this one might be. it is only fair to own that the ladies endured with great philosophy the spretæ injuria formæ, and made no difference in their behaviour on account of their charms being unappreciated. azízeh was a stout and sturdy personage of twenty-five, with thick wrists and ankles, a very dark skin, and a face rendered pleasing by good humour. and azízeh was childless, a sad reproach in these lands, where progeny forms a man's wealth and a woman's honour. the next day was perforce a halt, as had been expected; moreover, rains and tornadoes were a reasonable pretext for nursing the headache. the st was also wet and stormy, so nimrod hid himself and was not to be found. then the balivernes began. one asini, a mpongwe from the plateau, offered to show me a huge gorilla near his village; in the afternoon he was confronted with "young prince," and he would have blushed scarlet if he could. but he assured me plaintively that he must lie to live, and, after all, la prudence des souris n'est pas celle des chats. before dark, forteune appeared, and swore that he had spent the day in the forest, he had shot at a gorilla, but the gun missed fire--of course he had slept in a snug hut. this last determined me to leave mbátá; the three kru-men had returned; one of them was stationed in charge of the boat, and next morning we set out at a.m. for nche mpolo, the headquarters of "young prince." the well-wooded land was devoid of fetor, even at that early hour; we passed ndagola, a fresh clearing and newly built huts, and then we skirted a deep and forested depression, upon whose further side lay our bourne. it promised sand-flies, the prime pest of this region; a tall amphitheatre of trees on a dune to the west excluded the sea- breeze, and northwards a swampy hollow was a fine breeding place for m. maringouin. nche mpolo lies some three miles nearly due south of mbátá; the single street contains fourteen cottages and two palaver houses. we were received with distinction by "young prince's" daughter, a huge young woman, whose still huger mamma was from cape lopez. she placed mats upon the bamboo couch under the verandah, brought water to wash our feet, and put the kettle on that we might have tea. the sun was fiery and the day sultry; my companions complained of fatigue after a two hours' walk, and then busied themselves ostentatiously in cleaning their muskets, in collecting provisions, and in appointing certain bushmen to meet us on the morrow. before dark hotaloya returned to his village, declaring that he could find no bed at his papa's. probably the uxorious youth had been ordered home by his pet wife, who had once lived with a european trader, who spoke a few words of english, and who cooked with peculiar skill,--the solid merits of a "superior person." at dawn on the rd we set out for the southern bush, selim, forteune, and a carrier kru-man--to carry nothing. we passed through a fresh clearing, we traversed another village (three within five miles!), we crossed a bad bridge and a clear stream flowing to the south-east, and presently we found ourselves deep in the dew-dripping forest. the leaves no longer crackled crisp under foot, and the late rains had made the swamps somewhat odorous. after an hour of cautious walking, listening as we went, we saw evident signs of mister gorilla. boughs three inches in diameter strewed the ground; the husks of ntondo or ibere (wild cardamom) had been scattered about, and a huge hare's form of leaves lay some five yards from the tree where forteune declared that mistress and master gorilla had passed the night, paterfamilias keeping watch below. a little beyond we were shown a spot where two males had been fighting a duel, or where a couple had been indulging in dalliance sweet; the prints were inches long and across the huge round toes; whilst the hinder hand appeared almost bifurcate, the thumb forming nearly a half. this is explained in the "gorilla book" (chap, xx.): "only the ball of the foot, and that thumb which answers to our great toe, seem to touch the ground." presently we came upon the five bushmen who had been appointed to meet us. they were a queer-looking lot, with wild, unsteady eyes, receding brows, horizontal noses, and projecting muzzles; the cranium and the features seemed disposed nearly at a right angle, giving them a peculiar baboon-like semblance. each had his water- gourd and his flint-gun, the lock protected by a cover of monkey's skin or wild cow's hide, whilst gibècieres and ammunition-bags of grass-cloth hung from their shoulders. there were also two boys with native axes, small iron triangles, whose points passed through knob-sticks; these were to fell the trees in which our game might take refuge, and possibly they might have done so in a week. a few minutes with this party convinced me that i was wilfully wasting time; they would not separate, and they talked so loud that game would be startled a mile off. i proposed that they should station me in a likely place, form a circle, and drive up what was in it--they were far above acting beaters after that fashion. so we dismissed them and dispersed about the bush. my factotum shot a fine mboko (siurus eborivorus), ft. in. total length: the people declare that this squirrel gnaws ivory, whence its name. i had heard of it in east and central africa, but the tale appeared fabulous: here it is very common, half a dozen will be seen during the day; it has great vitality, and it will escape after severe wounds. the bushmen also brought a shoke (colubus satanas), a small black monkey, remarkably large limbed: the little unfortunate was timid, but not vicious; it worried itself to death on the next day. they also showed me the head of the njíwo antelope, which m. du chaillu (chap, xii.) describes as "a singular animal of the size of a donkey, with shorter legs, no horns, and black, with a yellow spot on the back."[fn# ] in the afternoon selim went to fetch my arsenical soap from mbátá, where i had left it en fitiché: as long as that "bad medicine" was within hotaloya's "ben," no one would dare to meddle with my goods. forteune walked in very tired about sunset. he had now added streaks of red to the white chalk upon his face, arms, and breast, for he suspected, we were assured, witchcraft. i told him to get ready for a march on the morrow to the shekyáni country, lying south-east, but he begged so hard, and he seemed so assured of showing sport, that the design was deferred, and again "perdidi diem." monday the th was a black monday, sultry and thundery. we went to the bush, and once more we returned, disgusted by the chattering of the wild men. as we discussed our plans for moving, forteune threw cold water upon every proposal. this puzzled me, and the difficulty was to draw his secret. at last kángá, a black youth, who, being one of the family, had attached himself uninvited to the party, blurted out in bad french that the shekyáni chief, to whose settlement we were bound, had left for the interior, and that the village women would not, or rather could not, give us "chop." this was a settler to my mpongwe friends. nimrod, however, declared that some bushmen had lately seen several gorillas in the direction of sánga-tánga, two marches down coast from mbátá, and about half-way to cape lopez. i did not believe a word of his intelligence; the direction is south-west instead of south-east, towards the sea instead of into the forest. but it was evidently hopeless to seek for the "ole man" in these parts, and i had long been anxious to see sánga- tánga; we therefore agreed nem. con. to set out before dawn on the next day. but the next day dawned, and the sun rose high, and the world was well heated and aired before the bushmen condescended to appear. after a two hours' battle with the sand-flies we set off at . a.m., forteune, hotaloya, and kángá at the head of the musketeers, one of them also carrying an axe; sixteen guns form a strong party for these regions. the viol (nchámbí) was not allowed to hang mute in mbata's halls, this instrument or the drum must never be neglected in african travel; its melody at the halt and the camp-fire are to the negro what private theatricals are to the european sailor half fossilized in the frozen seas. our specimen was strung with thin cords made from the fibre of a lliana; i was shown this growth, which looked much like a convolvulus. the people have a long list of instruments, and their music, though monotonous, is soft and plaintive: bowdich gives a specimen of it ("sketch of gaboon," p. ), and of a bard who seems to have been somewhat more frenzied than most poets. captain allen (iii. ) speaks of a harp at bimbia (camarones) tightly strung with the hard fibre of some creeping plant. the bákele harp (m. du chaillu, chap, xvi.) is called ngombi; the handle opposite the bow often has a carved face, and it might be a beginning of the article used by civilized europe-- wales for instance. the path plunged westward into the bush, spanned a dirty and grass-grown plantation of bananas, dived under thorn tunnels and arches of bush, and crossed six nullahs, neropotamoi, then dry, but full of water on our return. the ant-nests were those of yoruba and the mendi country; not the tall, steepled edifices built by the termites with yellow clay, as in eastern africa, but an eruption of blue-black, hard-dried mud and mucus, resembling the miniature pagodas, policeman's lanterns, mushrooms, or umbrellas one or two feet high, here single, there double, common in ashanti and congo-land. like most of their congeners, the animals die when exposed to the sun. the "bashikouay" and nchounou (nchu'u) of m. du chaillu are the common "driver-ant" of west africa (termes bellicosa). it is little feared in the gaboon; when its armies attack the mission-houses, they are easily stopped by lighting spirits of turpentine, or by a strew of quicklime, which combines with the formic acid. the different species are described in "palm land" and "western africa" (pp. - ), from which even the account of the "tubular bridge" is taken--mr. wilson less sensationally calls it what it is, a "live raft." the most common are the nkázeze, a large reddish and fetid ant, which is harmless to man; the njenge, a smaller red species, and the ibimbízí, whose bite is painful. we passed the mortal remains of a gorilla lashed to a pole; the most interesting parts had been sold to mr. r. b. n. walker, and were on their way to england. i was shown for the first time the ndámbo, or ndambié (bowdich, "olamboo"), which gives the india rubber of commerce; it is not a fat-leaved fig-tree (ficus elastica of asia) nor aeuphorbia (siphonia elastica), as in south america, but a large climbing ficus, a cable thick as a man's leg crossing the path, and "swarming up" to the top of the tallest boles; the yellow fruit is tart and pleasant to the taste. in the style of collecting the gum (olamboo) was to spread with a knife the glutinous milk as it oozed from the tree over the shaved breast and arms like a plaister; it was then taken off, rolled up in balls to play with or stretched over drums, no other use being known. the rev. mr. wilson declares (chap. ii.) that he "first discovered the gum elastic, which has been procured, as yet, only at corisco, gabun, and kama." in , mr. thompson (p. ) found it in the mendi country, near sherbro; he describes it as a vine with dense bark, which yields the gum when hacked, and which becomes soft and porous when old. the juice is milk-white, thick, and glutinous, soon stiffening, darkening, and hardening without aid of art. i should like to see the raw material tried for making waterproofs in the tropics, where the best vulcanized articles never last. the ndámbo tree has been traced a hundred miles inland from the liberian coast; that of the gallinas and sherbro is the best; at st. paul's river it is not bad; but on the junk river it is sticky and little prized. the difficulty everywhere is to make the negro collect it, and, when he does, to sell it un-adulterated: in east africa he uses the small branches of the ficus for flogging canes, but will not take the trouble even to hack the "mpira" tree. at a brook of the sweetest water, purling over the cleanest and brightest of golden sands, we filled the canteens, this being the last opportunity for some time. forest walks are thirsty work during the hot season; the air is close, fetid, and damp with mire; the sea-breeze has no power to enter, and perspiration streams from every pore. after heavy rains it is still worse, the surface of the land is changed, and paths become lines of dark puddles; the nullahs, before dry, roll muddy, dark-brown streams, and their mouths streak the sea with froth and scum. hardly a living object meets the eye, and only the loud, whirring flight of some large bird breaks the dreary silence. the music of the surf now sounded like the song of the sea-shell as we crossed another rough prism of stone and bush, whose counter-slope fell gently into a sand-flat overgrown with ipomaa and other bright flowering plants. after walking about an hour (equal to . miles) between south and south-west, we saluted the pleasant aspect of <greek> with a general cheer. northwards lay point ipizarala, southways nyonye, both looking like tree-clumps rising from the waves. i could not sufficiently admire, and i shall never forget the exquisite loveliness of land and sea; the graceful curve of the beach, a hundred feet broad, fining imperceptibly away till lost in the convexity of waters. the morning sun, half way to the zenith, burned bright in a cloudless sky, whilst in the east and west distant banks of purple mist coloured the liquid plain with a cool green-blue, a celadon tint that reposed the eye and the brain. the porpoise raised in sport his dark, glistening back to the light of day, and plunged into the cool depths as if playing off the "amate sponde" of the mediterranean; and sandpipers and curlews, the latter wild as ever, paced the smooth, pure floor. the shoreline was backed by a dark vegetable wall, here and there broken and fronted by single trees, white mangroves tightly corded down, and raised on stilted roots high above the tide. between wood and wave lay powdered sandstone of lively yellow, mixed with bright white quartz and débris of pink shells. upon the classic shores of greece i should have thought of poseidon and the nereids; but the lovely scene was in unromantic africa, which breeds no such visions of "the fair humanities of old religion." resuming our road, we passed the ruins of an "olako," the khámbí of east africa, a temporary encampment, whose few poles were still standing under a shady tree. we then came upon a blockaded lagoon; the sea-water had been imprisoned by a high bank which the waves had washed up, and it will presently be released by storms from the south-west. near the water, even at half-ebb, we find the floor firm and pleasant; it becomes loose walking at high tide, and the ribbed banks are fatiguing to ascend and descend under a hot sun and in reeking air. a seine would have supplied a man-of-war in a few hours; large turtle is often turned; in places young ones about the size of a dollar scuttled towards the sea, and hotaloya brought a nest of eggs, which, however, were too high in flavour for the european palate. the host of crabs lining the water stood alert, watching our approach, and when we came within a hundred yards they hurried sideways into the safer sea--the scene reminded me of the days when, after "tiffin," we used to "már kankrás" on the clifton sands in the unhappy valley. presently we came to a remarkable feature of this coast, the first specimen of which was seen at point ovindo in the gaboon river. the iberian explorers called them "sernas," fields or downs, opposed to corôas, sand-dunes or hills. they are clearings in the jungle made by nature's hand, fenced round everywhere, save on the sea side, by tall walls of dark vegetation.; averaging perhaps a mile long by yards broad, and broken by mounds and terraces regular as if worked by art. these prairies bear a green sward, seldom taller than three feet, and now ready for the fire,--here and there the verdure is dotted by a tree or two. it is universally asserted that they cannot be cultivated; and, if this be true, the cause would be worth investigating. in some places they are perfectly level, and almost flush with the sea; in others they swell gently to perhaps feet; in other parts, again, they look like scarps and earth-works, remarkably resembling the lower parasitic craters of a huge volcano; and here and there they are pitted with sinks like the sea-board of loango. these savannahs (savánas) add an indescribable charm to the gaboon coast, especially when the morning and evening suns strike them with slanting rays, and compel them to stand out distinct from the setting of eternal emerald. the aspect of the downs is civilized as the banks of the solent; and the coast wants nothing to complete the "fine, quiet old-country picture in the wilds of africa" but herds of kine grazing upon leas shining with a golden glory, or a country seat, backed by the noble virgin forest, such a bosquet as europe never knew. after another hour's walk, which carried us about three miles, we sighted in one of these prairillons a clump of seventeen huts. a negro in european clothes, after prospecting the party through a ship's glass, probably the gift of some slaver, came down to meet us, and led the way to his "town." finding his guest an englishman, the host, who spoke a few words of french and portuguese, at once began to talk of his "summer gîte" where pirogues were cut out, and boats were built; there were indeed some signs of this industrie, but all things wore the true barracoon aspect. two very fine girls were hid behind the huts, but did not escape my factotum's sharp eyes; and several of the doors were carefully padlocked: the pretty faces had been removed when he returned. this coast does an active retail business with são thomé and the ilha do principe,--about cape lopez the "ebony trade" still, i hear, flourishes on a small scale. during our halt for breakfast at the barracoon, we were visited by petit denis, a son of the old king. his village is marked upon the charts some four miles south-south-east of his father's; but at this season all the royalties, we are assured, affect the sea- shore. he was dressed in the usual loin-wrap, under a broadcloth coat, with the french official buttons. leading me mysteriously aside, he showed certificates from the officials at le plateau, dating from , recommending him strongly as a shipbroker for collecting émigrants libres, and significantly adding, les nègres ne manquent pas. petit denis's face was a study when i told him that, being an englishman, a dozen negroes were not worth to me a single "njína." slave cargoes of some eight to ten head are easily canoed down the rivers, and embarked in schooners for the islands: the latter sadly want hands, and should be assisted in setting on foot a system of temporary immigration. at . a.m. we resumed our march. the fiery sun had sublimated black clouds, the northeast quarter looked ugly, and i wished to be housed before the storm burst. the coast appeared populous; we met many bushmen, who were perfectly civil, and showed no fear, although some of them had probably never seen a white face. all were armed with muskets, and carried the usual hunting talismans, horns and iron or brass bells, hanging from the neck before and behind. we crossed four sweet-water brooks, which, draining the high banks, flowed fast and clear down cuts of loose, stratified sand, sometimes five feet deep: the mouths opened to the north- west, owing to the set of the current from the south-west, part of the great atlantic circulation running from the antarctic to the equator. those which are not bridged with fallen trees must be swum during the rains, as the water is often waist-deep. many streamlets, shown by their feathery fringes of bright green palm, run along the shore before finding an outlet; they are excellent bathing places, where the salt water can be washed off the skin. the sea is delightfully tepid, but it is not without risk,--it becomes deep within biscuit-toss, there is a strong under-tow, and occasionally an ugly triangular fin may be seen cruizing about in unpleasant proximity. as our naked feet began to blister, we suddenly turned to the left, away from the sea; and, after crossing about yards of prairillon, one of the prettiest of its kind, we found ourselves at bwámánge, the village of king lángobúmo. it was then noon, and we had walked about three hours and a half in a general south-south-west direction. his majesty's hut was at the entrance of the village, which numbered five scattered and unwalled sheds. he at once led us to his house, a large bamboo hall, with several inner sleeping rooms for the "harím;" placed couch, chair, and table, the civilization of the slave-trade; brought wife no. to shake hands, directed a fowl to be killed, and, sitting down, asked us the news in french. as a return for our information, he told us that the gorilla was everywhere to be found, even in the bush behind his town. the rain coming down heavily, i was persuaded to pass the night there, the king offering to beat the bush with us, to engage hunters, and to find a canoe which would carry the party to sánga-tánga, landing us at all the likely places. i agreed the more willingly to the suggestion of a cruize, as my mpongwe fashionables, like the congoese, and unlike the yorubans, proved to be bad and untrained walkers; they complained of sore feet, and they were always anticipating attacks of fever. when the delicious sea-breeze had tempered the heat, we set out for the forest, and passed the afternoon in acquiring a certainty that we had again been "done." however, we saw the new guides, and supplied them with ammunition for the next day. the evening was still and close; the ifúrú (sandflies) and the nchúná (a red gad-fly) were troublesome as usual, and at night the mosquitoes phlebotomized us till we hailed the dawn.[fn# ] a delightful bath of salt followed by fresh water, effectually quenched the fiery irritation of these immundicities. wednesday, as we might have expected, was wasted, although the cool and cloudy weather was perfection for a cruize. as we sat waiting for a boat, a youth rushed in breathless, reporting that he had just seen an "ole man gorilla" sitting in a tree hard by. i followed him incredulously at first, but presently the crashing of boughs and distant grunts, somewhat like huhh! huhh! huhh! caused immense excitement. after half a day's hard work, which resulted in nothing, i returned to bwámánge, and met the "boat- king," whose capital was an adjacent settlement of three huts. he was in rags, and my diary might have recorded, reçu un roi dans un très fichu état. he was accompanied by a young wife, with a huge toupel, and a gang of slaves, who sat down and stared till their eyes blinked and watered. for the loan of his old canoe he asked the moderate sum of fifteen dollars per diem, which finally fell to two dollars; but there was a suspicious reservation anent oars, paddles and rudder, mast and sail. meanwhile the sanguine selim compelled his guide to keep moving in the direction of the gorilla's grunt, and explaining his reluctance to advance by the fear of meeting the brute in the dark. savage africa, however, had as usual the better of the game, and showed his 'cuteness by planting my factotum in mud thigh-deep. after dark forteune returned. he had fired at a huge njína, but this time the cap had snapped. as the monster was close, and had shown signs of wrath, we were expected to congratulate nimrod on his escape. kindly observe the neat gradations, the artistic sorites of mpongwe lies. at . a.m. on the next day the loads were placed upon the crew's heads, and we made for the village, where the boat was still drawn up. the "monoxyle" was full of green-brown rain water, the oar-pins were represented by bits of stick, and all the furniture was wanting. after a time, the owner, duly summoned, stalked down from his hut, and began remarking that there was still a "palaver" on the stocks. i replied by paying him his money, and ordering the craft to be baled and launched. it was a spectacle to see the bushmen lying upon their bellies, kicking their heels in the air, and yep-yep-yeping uproariously when forteune, their master, begged of them to bear a hand. dean presto might have borrowed from them a hint for his yahoos. the threat to empty the alugu (rum) upon the sand was efficacious. one by one they rose to work, and in the slowest possible way were produced five oars, of which one was sprung, a ricketty rudder, a huge mast, and a sail composed half of matting and half of holes. at the last moment, the men found that they had no "chop;" a franc produced two bundles of sweet manioc, good travelling food, as it can be eaten raw, but about as nutritious as norwegian bark. at the last, last moment, lángobúmo, who was to accompany us, remembered that he had neither fine coat nor umbrella,--indispensable for dignity, and highly necessary for the delicacy of his complexion, which was that of an elderly buffalo. a lad was started to fetch these articles; and he set off at a hand-gallop, making me certain that behind the first corner he would subside into a saunter, and lie down to rest on reaching the huts. briefly, it was a.m. before we doubled point nyonye, which had now been so long in sight. with wind, tide, and current dead against us, we hugged the shore where the water is deep. the surf was breaking in heavy sheets upon a reef or shoal outside, and giving ample occupation to a hovering flock of fish-eating birds. whilst returning over water smooth as glass i observed the curious effect of the current. suddenly a huge billow would rear like a horse, assume the shape of a giant cobra's head, fall forward in a mass of foam, and subside gently rippling into the calm surface beyond; the shadowy hollow of the breakers made them appear to impinge upon a black rock, but when they disappeared the sea was placid and unbroken as before. this is, in fact, the typical "roller" of the gaboon coast--a happy hunting ground for slavers and a dangerous place for cruizers to attempt. as the sea-breeze came up strong, the swell would have swamped a european boat; but our conveyance, shaped like a ship's gig, but dalmatian or dutchman-like in the bows, topped the waves with the buoyancy of a cork, and answered her helm as the arab obeys the bit. to compact grain she added small specific gravity, and, though stout and thick, she advanced at a speed of which i could hardly believe her capable. past nyonye the coast forms another shallow bay, with about ten miles of chord, in every way a copy of its northern neighbour-- the same scene of placid beauty, the sea rimmed with opalline air, pink by contrast with the ultramarine blue; the limpid ether overhead; the golden sands, and the emerald verdure--a circe, however, whose caress is the kiss of death. the curve is bounded south by point dyánye, which appeared to retreat as we advanced. at p.m., when the marvellous clearness of the sky was troubled by a tornado forming in the north-east, we turned towards a little inlet, and, despite the heavy surf, we disembarked without a ducking. a creek supplied us with pure cold water, a spreading tree with a roof, and the soft clean shore with the most luxurious of couches--at p.m. i could hardly persuade myself that an hour had flown. as we approached dyánye, at last, a village hoisted the usual big flag on the normal tall pole, and with loud cries ordered us to land. lángobúmo, who was at the helm, began obeying, when i relieved him of his charge. seeing that our course was unaltered, a large and well-manned canoe put off, and the rest of the population walked down shore. i made signs for the stranger not to approach, when the head man, angílah, asked me in english what he had done to offend me, and peremptorily insisted upon my sleeping at his village. all these places are looking forward to the blessed day when a trader, especially a white trader, shall come to dwell amongst the "sons of the soil," and shall fill their pockets with "trust" money. on every baylet and roadstead stands the casa grande, a large empty bungalow, a factory in embryo awaiting the avatar; but, instead of attracting their "merchant" by collecting wax and honey, rubber and ivory, the people will not work till he appears. consequently, here, as in angola and in the lowlands of the brazil, it is a slight to pass by without a visit; and jealousy, a ruling passion amongst africans, suggests that the stranger is bound for another and rival village. they wish, at any rate, to hear the news, to gossip half the night, to drink the utangáni's rum, and to claim a cloth for escorting him, will he, nill he, to the next settlement. but what could i do? to indulge native prejudice would have stretched my cruize to a fortnight; and i had neither time, supplies, nor stomach for the task. so lángobúmo was directed to declare that they had a "wicked white man" on board who e'en would gang his ane gait, who had no goods but weapons, and who wanted only to shoot a njína, and to visit sánga-tánga, where his brother "mpolo" had been. all this was said in a sneaking, deprecating tone, and the crew, though compelled to ply their oars, looked their regrets at the exceedingly rude and unseemly conduct of their utangáni. angílah followed chattering till he had learned all the novelties; at last he dropped aft, growling much, and promising to receive me at sánga-tánga next morning--not as a friend. on our return, however, he prospected us from afar with the greatest indifference; we were empty- handed. there has been change since the days when lieutenant boteler, passing along this shore, was addressed by the canoe- men, "i say, you mate, you no big rogue? ship no big rogue?" at p. m. we weathered point dyánye, garnished, like nyonye, with a threatening line of breakers; the boat-passage along shore was about yards wide. darkness came on shortly after six o'clock, and the sultry weather began to look ominous, with a huge, angry, black nimbus discharging itself into the glassy livid sea northwards. i suggested landing, but lángobúmo was positive that the storm had passed westwards, and he objected, with some reason, that in the outer gloom the boat might be dashed to pieces. as we had not even a stone for an anchor, the plea proved, valid. we guided ourselves, by the fitful flashes of forked and sheet lightning combined, towards a ghostly point, whose deeper blackness silhouetted it against the shades. suddenly the boat's head was turned inland; a huge breaker, foaming along our gunwales, drove us forwards like the downwards motion of a "swing-swong," and, before we knew where we were, an ugly little bar had been crossed on the top of the curling scud. we could see the forest on both sides, but there was not light enough to trace the river line; i told hotaloya to tumble out; "plenty shark here, mas'r," was the only answer. we lost nearly half an hour of most valuable time in pottering and groping before all had landed. at that moment the rain-clouds burst, and in five minutes after the first spatter all were wet to the skin. selim and i stood close together, trying to light a match, when a sheet of white fire seemed to be let down from the black sky, passing between us with a simultaneous thundering crash and rattle, and a sulphurous smell, as if a battery had been discharged. i saw my factotum struck down whilst in the act of staggering and falling myself; we lay still for a few moments, when a mutual inquiry showed that both were alive, only a little shaken and stunned; the sensation was simply the shock of an electrical machine and the discharge of a woolwich infant --greatly exaggerated. we then gave up the partie; it was useless to contend against jupiter tonans as well as pluvialis. i opened my bedding, drank a "stiffener" of raw cognac, wrapped myself well, and at once fell asleep in the heavy rain, whilst the crew gathered under the sail. the gentlemen who stay at home at ease may think damp sheets dangerous, but malvern had long ago taught me the perfect safety of the wettest bivouac, provided that the body remains warm. at fernando po, as at zanzibar, a drunken sailor after a night in the gutter will catch fever, and will probably die. but he has exposed himself to the inevitable chill after midnight, he is unacclimatized, and both places are exceptionally deadly--to say nothing of the liquor. the experienced african traveller awaking with a chilly skin, swallows a tumbler of cold water, and rolls himself in a blanket till he perspires; there is only one alternative. next day i arose at a.m., somewhat cramped and stiff, but with nothing that would not yield to half a handful of quinine, a cup of coffee well "laced," a pipe, and a roaring fire. some country people presently came up, and rated us for sleeping in the bush; we retorted in kind, telling them that they should have been more wide-awake. whilst the boat was being baled, i walked to the shore, and prospected our day's work. the forest showed a novel feature: flocks of cottony mist-clouds curling amongst the trees, like opals scattered upon a bed of emeralds; a purple haze banked up the western horizon, whilst milk-white foam drew a delicate line between the deep yellow sand and the still deeper blue. far to the south lay the serna or prairillon of sánga-tánga, a rolling patch, "or, on a field vert," backed by the usual dark belt of the same, and fronted by straggling dots that emerged from the wave--they proved to be a thin line of trees along shore. we were lying inside the mouth of the "habanyaá" alias the shark river, which flows along the south of a high grassy dome, streaked here and there with rows of palms, and broken into the semblance of a verdure-clad crater. according to the people the nkonje (squalus) here is not a dangerous "sea-tiger" unless a man wear red or carry copper bracelets; it is caught with hooks and eaten as by the chinese and the suri arabs. the streamlet is a favourite haunt of the hippopotamus; a small one dived when it sighted us, and did not reappear. it was the only specimen that i saw during my three years upon the west african coast,--a great contrast to that of zanzibar, where half a dozen may be shot in a single day. the musket has made all the difference. at a.m. on friday, march , the boat was safely carried over the bar of shark river, and we found ourselves once more hugging the shore southwards. the day was exceptional for west africa, and much like damp weather at the end of an english may; the grey air at times indulged us with a slow drizzle. after two hours we passed another maritime village, where the farce of yesterday evening was re-acted, but this time with more vigour. ignorant of my morning's private work, hotaloya swore that it was sánga- tánga. i complimented him upon his proficiency in lying, and poor lángobúmo, almost in tears, confessed that he had pointed out to me the real place. whereupon hotaloya began pathetically to reproach him for being thus prodigal of the truth. núrya, the "head trader," coming down to the beach, with dignity and in force told me in english that i must land, and was chaffed accordingly. he then blustered and threatened instant death, at which it was easy to laugh. about a.m. we lay off our destination, some ten miles south of dyánye point. it was a beautiful site, the end of a grassy dune, declining gradually toward the tree-fringed sea; the yellow slopes, cut by avenues and broken by dwarf table-lands, were long afterwards recalled to my memory, when sighting the fair but desolate scenery south of paraguayan asuncion. these downs appear to be a sea-coast raised by secular upheaval, and much older than the flat tracts which encroach upon the atlantic. we could now understand the position of the town which figures so largely in the squadron-annals of the equatorial shore; it was set upon a hillock, whence the eye could catch the approaching sail of the slaver, and where the flag could be raised conspicuously in token of no cruiser being near. but the glory had departed from sánga-tánga (peel-white? strip- white?); not a trace of the town remained, the barracoons had disappeared, and all was innocent as upon the day of its creation. a deep silence reigned where the song of joy and the shrieks of torture had so often been answered by the voice of the forest, and eternal nature had ceased to be disturbed by the follies and crimes of man. sánga-tánga was burned down, after the fashion of these people, when mbango, whom europeans called "pass-all," king of the urungu, who extend up the right bank of the ogobe, passed away from the sublunary world. king pass-all had completed his education in portugal: a negro never attains his highest potential point of villany without a tour through europe; and thus he rose to be the greatest slave-dealer in this slave- dealing scrap of the coast. in early life he protected the spanish pirates who fled to cape lopez, after plundering the american brig "mexico:" they were at last forcibly captured by captain (the late admiral) trotter, r.n.; passed over to the united states, and finally hanged at boston, during the presidency of general jackson. towards the end of his life he became paralytic, like king pepple of bonny, and dangerous to the whites as well as to the blacks under his rule. the people, however, still speak highly of him, generosity being a gift which everywhere covers a multitude of sins. he was succeeded by one of his sons, who is favourably mentioned, but who soon followed him to the grave. i saw another, a boy, apparently a slave to a mpongwe on the coast, and the rest of the family is scattered far and wide. since pass-all's death the "peddlers in human flesh and blood" have gone farther south: men spoke of a great depot at the mpembe village on the banks of the nazareth river, where a certain ndábúliya is aided and abetted by two utangáni. now that "'long-sea" exportation has been completely suppressed, their only markets must be the two opposite islands. south of sánga-tánga, lay a thin line of deeper blue, fetish point, the eastern projection of cape lopez bay. from mbango's town it is easy to see the western headland, cape lopez, whose low outliers of sand and trees gain slowly but surely upon the waters of the atlantic. i deferred a visit until a more favourable time, and--that time never came. cape lopez is said to have considerable advantages for developing trade, but the climate appears adverse. a large catholic mission, described by barbot, was established here by the portuguese: as in the congo, nothing physical of it remains. but mr. wilson is rather hard when he asserts that all traces have disappeared-- they survive in superior 'cuteness of the native. little need be said about our return, which was merrier than the outward bound trip. wind, tide, and current were now in our favour, and we followed the chords, not the arcs, of the several bays. at . p.m. we gave a wide berth to the rollers off point nyonye and two hours afterwards we groped through the outer darkness into bwámánge, where the good azízeh and asúnye, who came to receive us, shouted with joy. on the next day another "gorilla palaver," when a large male was reported to have been shot without a shadow of truth, detained me: it was the last straw which broke the patient camel's back. after "dashing" to old king lángobómo one cloth, one bottle of absinthe, two heads of tobacco, and a clay pipe, we set out betimes for the fifteen miles' walk to mbátá. various obstacles delayed us on the way, and the shades of evening began to close in rapidly; night already reigned over the forest. progress under such circumstances requires the greatest care; as in the streets of damascus, one must ever look fixedly at the ground, under penalty of a shaking stumble over cross-bars of roots, or fallen branches hidden by grass and mud. and the worst of these wet walks is that, sooner or later, they bring on swollen feet, which the least scratch causes to ulcerate, and which may lame the traveller for weeks. they are often caused by walking and sitting in wet shoes and stockings; it is so troublesome to pull off and pull on again after wading and fording, repeated during every few hundred yards, that most men tramp through the brooks and suffer in consequence. constant care of the feet is necessary in african travel, and the ease with which they are hurt--sluggish circulation, poor food and insufficient stimulants being the causes--is one of its deplaisirs. the people wash and anoint these wounds with palm oil: a hot bath, with pepper-water, if there be no rum, gives more relief, and caustic must sometimes be used. we reached mbátá at . p.m., and all agreed that two hours of such forest-walking do more damage than five days along the sands. since my departure from the coast, french naval officers, travellers and traders, have not been idle. the marquis de compiègne, who returned to france in , suffering from ulcerated legs, had travelled up the fernão vaz, and its tributary the highly irregular ogobai, ogowaï, or ogowé (ogobe); yet, curious to remark, all his discoveries arc omitted by herr kiepert. his furthest point was kilometres east of "san quita" (sankwita), a village sixty-one kilometres north (??) of pointe fétiche, near cape lopez; but wars and receding waters prevented his reaching the confluence where the ivindo fork enters the north bank of the ogobe. he made observations amongst the "kamma" tribe, which differs from the bakele and other neighbours. m. guirold, commanding a cruiser, was also sent to the estuary of the rembo or fernão vaz, into which the mpungule (n'poulounay of m. du chaillu?), ascended only by m. aymès, discharges. the explorers found many shoals and shifting sands before entering the estuary; in the evening they stopped at the ogobe confluence, where a french seaman was employed in custom- house duties. m. de compiègne, after attending many palavers, was duly upset when returning to the ship. on the fernão vaz there are now ( ) five factories, each named after some french town: paris factory, however, had fallen to ruins, the traders having migrated miles higher up the kamma river. here a certain drunken kinglet, "rampano," breaks everything he finds in the house, and pays damages when he returns to his senses. on march st there was a violent quarrel between the women of two settlements, and the "reguli" embarked with all their host, to fight it out; rampano was the victor, and after the usual palaver the vanquished was compelled to pay a heavy fine. m. du chaillu's descriptions of the country, a park land dotted with tree-mottes, are confirmed; but the sport, excepting hippopotamus, was poor, and the negroes were found eating a white-faced monkey--mere cannibalism amongst the coast tribes. the fauna and flora of the ogobe are those of the gaboon, and the variety of beautiful parrots is especially remarked. on january , , m. de compiègne passed from the fernão vaz through the obango canal into the ogobe, which, bordered by fetish rocks, flows through vast forests; his object was to study the manners and customs of the kammas, a more important tribe than is generally supposed, far outnumbering the urungus of the coast. their country is large and contains many factories, the traders securing allies by marrying native women. the principal items of import are dry goods, guns, common spirits, and american tobacco; profits must be large, as what costs in france one franc eighty cents, here sells for ten francs' worth of goods. the exports are almost entirely comprised in gum mastic and ivory. at the factory of mr. watkins the traveller secured certain figures which he calls "idols"--they are by no means fitted for the drawing-room table. he also noticed the "peace of the household," a strip of manatus nerve, at times used by paterfamilias. mr. r. b. n. walker, who made sundry excursions between and , also wrote from elobe that he had left the french explorers, mm. de compiègne and marche, on the okanda river which m. du chaillu believes to be the northern fork of the ogobe. their letters (feb. , ) were dated from osse in the okanda country, where they had made arrangements with the kinglet for a journey to the "otjebos," probably the moshebo or moshobo cannibals of the "gorilla book." the rocks, shoals, and stony bottom of the ogobe reduced their rate of progress to three miles a day, and, after four wearisome stages, they reached a village of bákele. here they saw the slave-driving tribe "okota," whose appearance did not prepossess them and whose chief attempted unsuccessfully to stop the expedition. they did not leave before collecting specimens of the language. further eastward, going towards the country of the yalimbongo tribe, they found the okanda river, which they make the southern fork, the okono being the northern, descending from the mountains; here food was plentiful compared with okota-land. the active volcano reported by mr. r. b. n. walker, , was found to bear a lake upon the summit--which, in plutonic formations, would suggest an extinct crater. east of the yalimbongo they came upon the apingis, whom m. du chaillu, after two visits, also placed upon the southern fork of the ogobe. the tribe is described as small in stature, of mild habits, and fond of commerce; hence their plantations on the north or right bank of the river are plundered with impunity by the truculent "oshieba" (moshebo or moshobo?). further east the river, after being obstructed by rapids, broadens to a mile and becomes navigable-- they were probably above the "ghats." it is supposed to arise south in a lakelet called tem or n'dua. a bákele village was seen near ochunga, a large riverine island; and thence they passed into the country of the mountaineer okandas. they are described as fine men, but terrible sorcerers; their plantations of banana and maize are often plundered by the "oshieba," the latter being now recognized as a kindred tribe of the pahouin (fán). chapter vi. village life in pongo-land. the next day was perforce a halt. forteune and his wives did not appear till a.m., when it was dead low water. i had lent nimrod a double-barrelled gun during the march, and he was evidently anxious to found a claim upon the protracted usufruct. "dashes" also had to be settled, and loads made up. the two women to whose unvarying kindness all my comfort had been owing, were made happy with satin-stripe, cassis, and the inevitable nicotiana. in an unguarded moment my soft heart was betrayed into giving a bottle of absinthe to the large old person who claimed to be forteune's mamma. expecting nothing, had nothing been offered she would not have complained; the present acted upon her violently and deleteriously; she was like the cabman who makes mauvais sang because he has asked and received only twice his fare; briefly, next morning she was too surly to bid us adieu. when giving forteune his "dash," i was curious to hear how he could explain the report about the dead gorilla shot the night before last: the truth of the old saying, "a black man is never fast for an excuse," was at once illustrated; the beast had been badly wounded, but it had dragged itself off to die. and where was the blood? the rain had washed the blood away! nimrod seemed chagrined at the poor end of so much trouble, but there was something in his look and voice suggesting a suppressed thought--these people, like the english and the somal, show their innermost secrets in their faces. at last, i asked him if he was now willing to try the shekyani country. he answered flatly, "no!" and why? some bushmen had bewitched him; he knew the fellow, and would quickly make "bob come up his side:" already two whites had visited him with a view of shooting gorillas; both had failed; it was "shame palaver!" this might have been true, but it certainly was not the whole truth. i can hardly accept m. du chaillu's explanation, that the mpongwe, who attack the beasts with trade muskets and pebbles, will not venture into the anthropoid's haunts unless certain of their white employer's staunchness. what could that matter, when our nimrod had an excellent weapon in his hand and a strong party to back him? very likely forteune was tired with walking, and five dollars per shot made the game not worth the candle. again, perhaps the black diplomatist feared to overstock the market with njinas, or to offend some regular customer for the sake of an "interloper." in these african lands they waste over a monkey's skin or a bottle of rum as much intrigue as is devoted to a contested election in england. i then asked the guide if my staying longer would be of any use? he answered with a simple negative. whilst the utángáni remained the mbunji (spell) would still work, but it would at once be broken by our departure, and he would prove it by sending down the first-fruits. this appeared to me to be mere mpongwe "blague," but, curious to say, the sequel completely justified both assertions. he threw out a hint, however, about certain enemies and my "medicine," the arsenical soap; i need hardly say that it was refused. when the palaver ended and the tide served, a fierce tornado broke upon us, and the sky looked grisly in the critical direction, north-east. having no wish to recross the gaboon river during a storm blowing a head wind, i resolved to delay my departure till the morrow, and amused myself with drawing from the nude a picture of the village and village-life in pongo-land. the mpongwe settlements on the gaboon river are neatly built, but without any attempt at fortification; for the most part each contains one family, or rather a chief and his dependants. in the larger plantation "towns," the abodes form a single street, ranging from to , yards in length; sometimes, but rarely, there are cross streets; the direction is made to front the sea- breeze, and, if possible, to present a corner to storm-bearing eurus. an invariable feature, like the arcaded loggie of old venetian towns, is the námpolo, or palaver-house, which may be described as the club-room of the village. an open hangar, like the ikongolo or "cask-house" of the trading places, it is known by a fire always kept burning. the houses are cubes, or oblong squares, varying from to feet in length, according to the wealth and dignity of the owner; all are one-storied, and a few are raised on switch foundations. most of them have a verandah facing the street, and a "compound" or cleared space in the rear for cooking and other domestic purposes. the walls are built by planting double and parallel rows of posts, the material being either bamboo or the mid-rib of a wine-giving palm (raphia vinifera); to these uprights horizontal slats of cane are neatly lashed by means of the never-failing "tie-tie," bast-slips, runners, or llianas. for the more solid buildings thin "mpávo," or bark slabs, are fitted in between the double posts; when coolness is required, their place is taken by mats woven with the pinnated leaves of sundry palms. this is a favourite industry with the women, who make two kinds, one coarse, the other a neat and close article, of rattan-tint until it becomes smoke-stained: the material is so cheap and comfortable, that many of the missionaries prefer it for walls to brick or boarding. the windows are mere holes in the mats to admit light, and the doors are cut with a mpáno (adze) from a single tree trunk, which would be wilful waste if timber were ever wanting. the floor is sometimes sandy, but generally of hard and level tamped clay, to which the european would prefer boarding, and, as a rule, it is clean--no fear of pythogenie from here! the pent-shaped roof of rafters and thatch is water-tight except when the host of rats disturb it by their nocturnal gambols. rich men affect five or six rooms, of which the principal occupies the centre. the very poor must be contented with one; the majority have two. the "but" combines the functions of hall, dining-room, saloon and bachelor's sleeping quarters. the "ben" contains a broad bed for the married, a standing frame of split bamboo with mats for mattresses; it is usually mounted on props to defend it from the nchu'u or white ants, and each has its mosquito bar, an oblong square, large enough to cover the whole couch and to reach the ground; the material is either fine grass- cloth, from the ashira country, a light stuff called "mbongo," or calico and blue baft from which the stiffening has been washed out. it is far superior to the flimsy muslin affairs supplied in an anglo-indian outfit, or to the coarse matting used in yoruba. provided with this solid defence, which may be bought in any shop, one can indulge one's self by sleeping in the verandah without risk of ague or rheumatism. the "ben" always displays a pile of chests and boxes, which, though possibly empty, testify to the "respectability" of the household. in hotaloya's i remarked a leather hat-case; he owned to me that he had already invested in a silk tile, the sign of chieftainship, but that being a "boy" he must grow older before he could wear it. the inner room can be closed with a strong door and a padlock; as even the window-hole is not admitted, the burglar would at once be detected. except where goods are concerned, the mpongwe have little respect for privacy; the women, in the presence of their husbands, never failed to preside at my simple toilette, and the girls of the villages would sit upon the bedside where lay an utangání in almost the last stage of déshabillé. the furniture of course varies; a rich man near the river will have tables and chairs, sofas, looking-glasses, and as many clocks, especially "sam slicks," as love or money can procure. even the poorest affect a standing bedstead in the "ben," plank benches acting as couches in the "but," a sufficiency of mats, and pots for water and cooking. a free man never condescends to sit upon the ground; the low stool, cut out of a single block, and fancifully carved, is exactly that of the old egyptians preserved by the modern east africans; it dates from ages immemorial. the look of comparative civilization about these domiciles, doubtless the effect of the portuguese and the slave trade, distinguishes them from the barbarous circular huts of the kru-men, the rude clay walls of the gold coast, and the tattered, comfortless sheds of the fernandian "bube." they have not, however, that bandbox-like neatness which surprises the african traveller on the camerones river. the only domestic animals about these villages are dogs, poultry, and pigeons (fine blue rocks): i never saw in pongo-land the goats mentioned by m. du chaillu. the bush, however, supplies an abundance of "beef," and, as most south africans, they have a word, isángú (amongst the mpongwes), or ingwámbá (of the cape lopez people), to express that inordinate longing and yearning for the stimulus of meat diet, caused by the damp and depressing equatorial climate, of which dr. livingstone so pathetically complains. the settlements are sometimes provided with little plots of vegetables; usually, however, the plantations are distant, to preserve them from the depredations of bipeds and quadrupeds. they are guarded by bushmen, who live on the spot and, shortly before the rains all the owners flock to their farms, where, for a fortnight or so, they and their women do something like work. new grounds are preferred, because it is easier to clear them than to remove the tangled after-growth of ferns and guinea grass; moreover, they yield, of course, better crops. the plough has not yet reached pongo-land; the only tools are the erem (little axe for felling), the matchet (a rude cutlass for clearing), the hoe, and a succedaneum for the dibble. after the bush has been burned as manure, and the seed has been sown, no one will take the trouble of weeding, and half the surface is wild growth. maize (zea mays) has become common, and the people enjoy "bútás," or roasted ears. barbot says that the soil is unfit for corn and indian wheat; it is so for the former, certainly not for the latter. rice has extended little beyond the model farms on the north bank of the river; as everywhere upon the west african coast, it is coarser, more nutritious, and fuller flavoured than the indian. the cereals, however, are supplanted by plantains and manioc (cassava). the plantains are cooked in various ways, roast and boiled, mashed and broiled, in paste and in balls; when unripe they are held medicinal against dysentery. the manioc is of the white variety (fatropha aypim seu utilissima), and, as at lagos, the root may be called the country bread: i never saw the poisonous or black manioc (fatropha manihot), either in east or in west africa, and i heard of it only once in unyamwezi, central africa. yet it is mentioned by all old travellers, and the sweet harmless variety gives very poor "farinha," anglicè "wood meal." the vegetables are "mbongwe" (yams), koko or colocasia esculenta, occras (hibiscus esculentus), squashes (pumpkins), cucumbers, beans of several sorts, and the sweet potato, an esculent disliked by englishmen, but far more nutritious than the miserable "irish" tuber. the ground-nut or peanut (arachis hypogaea), the "pindar" of the united states, a word derived from loango, is eaten roasted, and, as a rule, the people have not learned to express its oil. proyart (pinkerton, xvi. ) gives, probably by misprint, "pinda, which we call pistachio." "bird- peppers," as the small red species is called, grow wild in every bush; they are wholesome, and the people use them extensively. tomatoes flourish almost spontaneously, and there is a bulbless native onion whose tops make excellent seasoning. sugar-cane will thrive in the swamps, coffee on the hill-slopes: i heard of, but never saw ginger. the common fruits are limes and oranges, mangoes, papaws, and pineapples, the gift of the new world, now run wild, and appreciated chiefly by apes. the forest, however, supplies a multitude of wild growths, which seem to distinguish this section of the coast, and which are eaten with relish by the people. amongst them are the sángo and nefu, with pleasant acid berries; the ntábá, described as a red grape, which will presently make wine; the olive-like azyigo (ozigo?); the filbert-like kula, the "koola-nut" of m. du chaillu ("second expedition," chap, viii.), a hard-shelled nux, not to be confounded with the soft-shelled kola (sterculia); and the aba, or wild mango (mango gabonensis), a pale yellow pome, small, and tasting painfully of turpentine. it is chiefly prized for its kernels. in february and march all repair to the bush for their mango-vendange, eat the fruit, and collect the stones: the insides, after being sun-dried, are roasted like coffee in a neptune, or in an earthern pot. when burnt chocolate colour, they are pounded to the consistency of thick honey, poured into a mould, a basket lined with banana leaves, and set for three days to dry in the sun: after this the cake, which in appearance resembles guava cheese, will keep through the year. for use the loaf is scraped, and a sufficiency is added to the half-boiled or stewed flesh, the two being then cooked together: it is equally prized in meat broths, or with fish, dry and fresh; and it is the favoured kitchen for rice and the insipid banana. "odika," the "ndika" of the bákele tribes, is universally used, like our "worcester," and it may be called the one sauce of gorilla-land, the local equivalent for curry, pepper-pot, or palm-oil chop; it can be eaten thick or thin, according to taste, but it must always be as hot as possible. the mould sells for half a dollar at the factories, and many are exported to adulterate chocolate and cocoa, which it resembles in smell and oily flavour. i regret to say that travellers have treated this national relish disrespectfully, as continentals do our "plomb- boudin:" mr. w. winwood reade has chaffed it, and another briton has compared it with "greaves." at "cockerapeak," or, to speak less unpoetically, when alectryon sings his hymn to the dawn, the working bees of the little hive must be up and stirring, whilst the master and mistress enjoy the beauty-sleep. "early to bed, and early to rise," is held only fit to make a man surly, and give him red eyes, by all wild peoples, who have little work, and who justly hold labour an evil less only than death. amongst the bedawin it is a sign of shaykh-dom not to retire before dawn, and i have often heard the somal "palavering" after midnight. as a rule the barbarian enjoys his night chat and smoke round the fire all the more because he drinks or dozes through the better part of the day. there is a physical reason for the preference. the absence of light stimulus, and the changes which follow sunset seem to develope in him a kind of night-fever as in the nervous temperament of europe. hence so many students choose the lamp in preference to the sun, and children mostly clamour when told at o'clock to go to bed. shortly after sunrise the young ones are bathed in the verandah. here also the mistress smooths her locks, rumpled by the night, "tittivates" her macaw-crest with the bodkin, and anoints her hair and skin with a tantinet of grease and palm oil. some, but by no means all, proceed for ablution to the stream-side, and the girls fetch water in heavy earthen jars, containing perhaps two gallons; they are strung, after the kru fashion, behind the back by a band passing across the forehead. when we meet them they gently say "mbolo!" (good morning), or "oresa" (are you well)? at this hour, however, all are not so civil, the seniors are often uncommonly cross and surly, and the mollia tempora fandi may not set in till after the first meal--i have seen something of the kind in england. the sex, impolitely said to have one fibre more in the heart and one cell less in the brain, often engages in a violent wordy war; the tornado of wrath will presently pass over, and leave clear weather for the day. in the evening, when the electric fluid again gathers heavily, there will be another storm. meanwhile, superintended by the mistress, all are occupied with the important duty of preparing the morning meal. it is surprising how skilful are these heaven-born cooks; the excellent dishes they make out of "half-nothing." i preferred the cuisine of forteune's wives to that of the plateau, and, after finding that money was current in the village, i never failed to secure their good offices. the mpongwe breakfast is eaten by the women in their respective verandahs, with their children and friends; the men also gather together, and prefer the open air. this feed would not only astonish those who talk about a "free breakfast-table," with its silly slops and bread-stuffs; it would satisfy a sharp-set highlander. in addition to yams and sweet potatoes, plantains, and perhaps rice, there will be cooked mangrove-oysters fresh from the tree, a fry, or an excellent bouillabaisse of fish; succulent palaver sauce, or palm-oil chop; poultry and meat. the domestic fowl is a favourite; but, curious to say, neither here nor in any part of tropical africa known to me have the people tamed the only gallinaceous bird which the black continent has contributed to civilization. the guinea fowl, like the african elephant, remains wild. we know it to be an old importation in europe, although there are traditions about its appearing in the fourteenth century, when moslems sold it to christians as the "jerusalem cock," and christians to moslems as the "bird of meccah." it must be the greek meleagris, so called, says Ælian, from the sisters who wept a brother untimely slain; hence the tears upon its plume, suggesting the german perl-huhn, and its frequent cries, which the brazilians, who are great in the language of birds, translate sto fraca, sto fraca, sto fraca (i'm weak). the hausa moslems make the guinea fowl cry, "kilkal! kilkal!" (grammar by the rev. f. j. schön, london, salisbury square, ). it is curious to compare the difference of ear with which nations hear the cries of animals, and form their onomatopoetic, or "bow-wow" imitations. for instance, the north americans express by "whip-poor-will" what the brazilians call "joão-corta-páo." the guinea fowl may have been the "afraa avis;"but that was a dear luxury amongst the romans, though the greek meleagris was cheap. the last crotchet about it is that of an african traveller, who holds it to be the peacock of solomon's navies, completely ignoring the absolute certainty which the south-indian word "tukkiim" carries with it. the mpongwe will not eat ape, on account of its likeness to themselves. but they greatly enjoy game; the porcupine, the ground-hog (an echymys), the white flesh of the bush pig (cricetomys), and the beef of the nyáre (bos brachyceros); this is the "buffalo" or "bush-cow" of the regions south of sierra leone, and the empacassa of the congo-portuguese, whose "empacasseirs" or native archers, rural police and auxiliaries "of the second line," have as "guerra preta" (black militia) won many a victory. their numbers in angola have amounted to , , and they aided in conquest like the indian sipahi (sepoy) and the tupi of the older brazil. now they wear the tánga or pagne, a waist cloth falling to the knee, and they are armed with trade muskets and cartridge-boxes fastened to broad belts. barbot calls the nyare a buffalo, and tells us that it was commonly shot at sandy point, where in his day elephants also abounded. captain boteler (ii. ) well describes a specimen, which was killed by dr. guland, r.n., as exactly resembling the common cow of england, excepting that its proportions are far more "elegant." this hearty breakfast is washed down with long drinks of palm wine, and followed by sundry pipes of tobacco; after which, happy souls! all enjoy a siesta, long and deep as that of andine mendoza; and they "kill time" as well as they can till evening. the men assemble in the club round the námpolo-fire, where they chat and smoke, drink and doze; those who are agriophagi or xylobian Æthiopians, briefly called hunters, spend their days much like the race which byron declared "merely born to hunt and vote, and raise the price of corn." the pongo venator is up with the sun, and, if not on horseback, at least he is on the traces of game; sometimes he returns home during the hours of heat, when he knows that the beasts seek the shady shelter of the deepest forests; and, after again enjoying the "pleasures of the chase," he disposes of a heavy dinner and ends the day, sleep weighing down his eyelids and his brains singing with liquor. what he did yesterday that he does to-day, and what he does to-day that he shall do to-morrow; his intellectual life is varied only by a visit to town, where he sells his choice skins, drinks a great deal too much rum, and makes the purchases, ammunition and so forth, which are necessary for the full enjoyment of home and country life. at times also he joins a party of friends and seeks some happier hunting ground farther from his campagne. meanwhile the women dawdle through the day, superintending their domestic work, look after their children's and their own toilette, tend the fire, attend to the cooking, and smoke consumedly. the idle sit with the men at the doors of their huts; those industriously disposed weave mats, and, whether lazy or not, they never allow their tongues and lungs a moment's rest. the slaves, male and female, draw water, cut fuel, or go to the distant plantations for yams and bananas; whilst the youngsters romp, play and tease the village idiot--there is one in almost every settlement. briefly, the day is spent in idleness, except, as has been said, for a short time preceding the rains. when the sun nears the western horizon, the hunter and the slaves return home, and the housewife, who has been enjoying the "coolth" squatting on her dwarf stool at her hut-door, and puffing the preparatory pipe,--girds her loins for the evening meal, and makes every one "look alive." when the last rays are shedding their rich red glow over the tall black trees which hem in the village, all torpidity disappears from it. the fires are trimmed, and the singing and harping, which were languid during the hot hours, begin with renewed vigour. the following is a specimen of a boating-song: (solo.) "come, my sweetheart!" ( chorus.) "haste, haste!" (solo) 'how many things gives the white man?' (chorus chants all that it wants.) (solo) 'what must be done for the white man?" (chorus improvises all his requirements) (solo) "how many dangers for the black girl?" (chorus) "dangers from the black and the white man!" the evening meal is eaten at p.m. with the setting of the sun, whose regular hours contrast pleasantly with his vagaries in the northern temperates. and hesperus brings wine as he did of old. drinking sets in seriously after dark, and is known by the violent merriment of the men, and the no less violent quarrelling and "flyting" of the sex which delights in the "harmony of tongues." all then retire to their huts, and with chat and song, and peals of uproarious laughter and abundant horseplay, such as throwing minor articles at one another's heads, smoke and drink till p.m. the scene is "dovercourt, all speakers and no hearers." the night is still as the grave. and the mewing of a cat, if there were one, would sound like a tiger's scream. the mornings and evenings in these plantation-villages would be delightful were it not for what the brazilians call immundicies. sandflies always swarm in places where underwood and tall grasses exclude the draughts, and the only remedy is clearing the land. thus at st. isabel or clarence, fernando po, where the land-wind or the sea-breeze ever blows, the vicious little wretches are hardly known; on the forested background of mountain they are troublesome as at nigerian nufe. the bite burns severely, and presently the skin rises in bosses, lasting for days with a severe itching, which, if unduly resented, may end in inflammatory ulcerations--i can easily understand a man being laid up by their attacks. the animalcules act differently upon different constitutions. while mosquitoes hardly take effect, sand flies have often blinded me for hours by biting the circumorbital parts. the numbers and minuteness of this insect make it formidable. the people flap their naked shoulders with cloths or bushy twigs; nigerian travellers have tried palm oil but with scant success, and spirits of wine applied to the skin somewhat alleviate the itching but has no prophylactic effect. sandflies do not venture into the dark huts, and a "smudge" keeps them aloof, but the disease is more tolerable than the remedy of inflaming the eyes with acrid smoke and of sitting in a close box, by courtesy termed a room, when the fine pure air makes one pine to be beyond walls. after long endurance in hopes of becoming inoculated with the virus, i was compelled to defend myself with thick gloves, stockings and a muslin veil made fast to the hat and tucked in under the shirt. after sunset the sandflies retire, and the mosquito sounds her hideous trump; as has been said, however, pongo-land knows how to receive her. chapter vii. return to the river. early on the last morning in march we roused the kru-men; they were eager as ourselves to leave the "bush," and there was no delay in loading and the mission-boat. forteune, azízeh, and asúnye were there to bid me god-speed, and hotaloya did not fail to supply a fine example of mpongwe irresolution. that "sweet youth" had begged hard during the last week that i would take him to fernando po; carpenters were wanted for her majesty's consulate, and he seemed to jump at the monthly pay of seven dollars--a large sum in these regions. on the night before departure he had asked me for half a sovereign to leave with his wives, and he made me agree to an arrangement that they should receive two dollars per mensem. in the morning i had alluded to the natural sorrow which his better semi-halves must feel, although the absence of groaning and weeping was very suspicious, and i had asked in a friendly way, "them woman he make bob too much?" "ye', sar," he replied with a full heart, "he cry too much." when the last batch had disappeared with the last box i walked up to him, and said, "now, andrews, you take hat, we go gaboon." hotaloya at once assumed the maudlin expression and insipid ricanement of the hindú charged with "sharm kí bát" (something shameful). "please, mas'r, i no can go--nanny po he be too far--i no look my fader (the villain had three), them boy he say i no look 'um again!" the wives had won the day, and words would have been vain. he promised hard to get leave from his papa and "grand-pap," and to join me after a last farewell at the plateau. his face gave the lie direct to his speech, and his little man�uvre for keeping the earnest-money failed ignobly. the swift brown stream carried us at full speed. "captain merrick" pointed out sundry short cuts, but my brain now refused to admit as truth a word coming from a mpongwe. we passed some bateaux pecheurs, saw sundry shoals of fish furrowing the water, and after two hours we were bumping on the rocks outlying mombe creek and nenga oga village. the passage of the estuary was now a pleasure, and though we grounded upon the shallows of "voileliay bay," the kru-men soon lifted the heavy boat; the wind was fair, the tide was ebbing, and the strong current was in our favour. we reached glass town before midday, and after five hours, covering some twenty-two direct geographical miles, i found myself with pleasure under the grateful shade of the factory. it need hardly be described, as it is the usual "bungalow" of the west african shore. twelve days had been expended upon miles, but i did not regret the loss. a beautiful bit of country had been added to my mental pinacothek, and i had satisfied my mind to a certain extent upon that quæstio, then vexata, the "gorilla book." even before my trip the ethnological part appeared to me trustworthy, and, if not original, at any rate borrowed from the best sources. my journey assured me, from the specimen narrowly scrutinized, that both country and people are on the whole correctly described. the dates, however, are all in confusion: in the preface to the second edition, "october, ," became "october, ," and we are told that the excursions were transposed for the simple purpose of taking the reader from north to south. as in the case of most african travels, when instruments are not used, the distances must be reduced: in chapter xii. the shekyani villages are placed sixty miles due east of sánga-tánga; whereas the map shows twenty. mr. w. wimvood reade declares that the apingi country, the ultima thule of the explorer, is distant from ngumbi "four foot-days' journey;" as mm. de compiègne and marche have shown, the tribe in question extends far and wide. others have asserted that seventy-five miles formed the maximum distance. but many of m. du chaillu's disputed distances have been proved tolerably correct by mm. serval and griffon du bellay, who were sent by the french government in to survey the ogobe. a second french expedition followed shortly afterwards, under the charge of mm. labigot and touchard; and finally that of , like all preceding it, failed to find any serious deviation from fact. the german exploring expedition (july , ) confirms the existence of m. du chaillu's dwarfs, the obongo tribe, scoffed at in england because they dwell close to a fierce people of patagonian proportions. the germans report that they are called "babongo," "vambuta," and more commonly "bari," or "bali;" they dwell fourteen days' march from the mouth of the luena, or river of chinxoxo. i have not seen it remarked that these pygmies are mentioned by andrew battel plinian at the end of the sixteenth century. "to the north-east of mani kesoch," he tells us, "are a kind of little people called matimbas, who are no bigger than boys twelve years old, but are very thick, and live only upon flesh, which they kill in the woods with bows and darts." of the aykas south of the welle river, discovered by dr. schweinfurth, i need hardly speak. it is not a little curious to find these confirmations of herodotean reports about dwarfish tribes in the far interior, the dokos and the wabilikimo, so long current at zanzibar island, and so long looked upon as mere fables. our departure from mbátá had broken the spell, and forteune did keep his word; i was compelled in simple justice to cry "peccavi." on the very evening of our arrival at glass town the youth kángá brought me a noble specimen of what he called a nchígo mpolo, sent by forteune's bushmen; an old male with brown eyes and dark pupils. when placed in an arm-chair, he ludicrously suggested a pot-bellied and patriarchal negro considerably the worse for liquor. from crown to sole he measured feet / inches, and from finger-tip to finger-tip feet inch. the girth of the head round ears and eyebrows was foot inches; of the chest, feet inches; above the hip joints, feet inches; of the arms below the shoulder, feet inches; and of the legs, feet inches. evidently these are very handsome proportions, considering what he was, and there was a suggestion of ear lobe which gave his countenance a peculiarly human look. he had not undergone the inhuman hebrew-abyssinian operation to which m. du chaillu's gorillas had been exposed, and the proportions rendered him exceedingly remarkable. that interesting anthropoid's career after death was one series of misfortunes, ending with being stuffed for the british museum. my factotum sat up half the night skinning, but it was his first coup d'essai. in a climate like the gaboon, especially during the rains, we should have turned the pelt "hairy side in," filled it with cotton to prevent shrinking, and, after painting on arsenic, have exposed it to the sun: better still, we should have placed it on a scaffolding, like a defunct congo-man, over a slow and smoky fire, and thus the fatty matter which abounds in the integuments would have been removed. the phalanges of the hands and feet, after being clean-scraped, were restored to their places, and wrapped with thin layers of arsenicated cotton, as is done to small animals, yet on the seventh day decomposition set in; it was found necessary to unsew the skin, and again to turn it inside out. the bones ought to have been removed, and not replaced till the coat was thoroughly dry. the skinned spoils were placed upon an ant-hill; a practice which recalls to mind the skeleton deer prepared by the emmets of the hartz forest, which taught oken that the skull is(?) expanded vertebræ. we did not know that half-starved dogs and "drivers" will not respect even arsenical soap. the consequence of exposing the skeleton upon an ant-hill, where it ought to have been neatly cleaned during a night, was that the "pariah" curs carried off sundry ribs, and the "parva magni formica laboris" took the trouble to devour the skin of a foot. worse still: the skull, the brain, and the delicate members had been headed up in a breaker of trade rum, which was not changed till the seventh day. it was directed to an eminent member of the old anthropological society, and the most interesting parts arrived, i believe, soft, pulpy, and utterly useless. the subject seems to have been too sore for mentioning --at least, i never heard of it again. the late dr. john edward gray, of the british museum, called this nchígo mpolo, from its bear-like masses of breast-pile, the "hairy chimpanzee" (troglodytes vellerosus). after my return home i paid it a visit, and could only think that the hirsute one was considerably "mutatus ab illo." the colour had changed, and the broad-chested, square-framed, pot-bellied, and portly old bully- boy of the woods had become a wretched pigeon-breasted, lean- flanked, shrunk-linibed, hungry-looking beggar. it is a lesson to fill out the skin, even with bran or straw, if there be nothing better--anything, in fact, is preferable to allowing the shrinkage which ends in this wretched caricature. during my stay at glass town i was fortunate enough to make the acquaintance of the rev. messrs. walker and preston, of the baraka mission. the head-quarter station of the american board of foreign (presbyterian) missions was established on the gaboon river in by the rev. j. leighton wilson, afterwards one of the secretaries to the society in new york. he had left the best of memories in "the river," and there were tales of his having manumitted in the southern united states a small fortune of slaves without a shade of compulsion. his volume on west africa, to which allusion has so often been made, contains a good bird's- eye of the inter-tropical coast, and might, with order, arrangement, and correction of a host of minor inaccuracies, become a standard work. i have already expressed my opinion, founded upon a sufficiently long experience, that the united states missionary is by far the best man for the western coast, and, indeed, for dangerous tropical countries generally. physically he is spare and hard, the nervous temperament being more strongly developed in him than in the bulbous and more bilious or sanguine european. he is better born, and blood never fails to tell. again, he generally adopts the profession from taste, not because il faut vivre. he is better bred; he knows the negro from his childhood, and his education is more practical, more generally useful than that of his rivals. moreover, i never yet heard him exclaim, "capting, them heggs is 'igh!" lastly he is more temperate and moderate in his diet: hitherto it has not been my fate to assist in carrying him to bed. perhaps the american missionary carries sobriety too far. in dangerous tropical regions, where there is little appetite and less nutritious diet, where exertion of mind and body easily exhaust vitality, and where "diffusible stimulants" must often take the place of solids, he dies first who drinks water. the second is the man who begins with an "eye-opener" of "brandy- pawnee," and who keeps up excitement by the same means through the day. the third is the hygienic sciolist, who drinks on principle poor "gladstone" and thin french wines, cheap and nasty; and the survivor is the man who enjoys a quantum suff. of humming scotch and burton ales, sherry, madeira, and port, with a modicum of cognac. this has been my plan in the tropics from the beginning, when it was suggested to me by the simplest exercise of the reasoning faculties. "a dozen of good port will soon set you up!" said the surgeon to me after fever. then why not drink port before the fever? i have said something upon this subject in "zanzibar city, island, and coast" (i. p. ), it will bear repetition. joseph dupuis justly remarks: "i am satisfied, from my own experience, that many fall victims from the adoption of a course of training improperly termed prudential; viz. a sudden change of diet from ship's fare to a scanty sustenance of vegetable matter (rejecting even a moderate proportion of wine), and seclusion in their apartments from the sun and atmosphere." an immense mass of nonsense, copied in one "authority" from another, was thrown before the public by books upon diet, until the "physiology of common life" (george henry lewes) discussed liebig's brilliant error in considering food chemically, and not physiologically. the rest assume his classification without reserve, and work from the axiom that heat-making, carbonaceous and non-nitrogenous foods (e.g. fat and sugars), necessary to support life in the arctic and polar regions, must be exchanged for the tissue-making, plastic or nitrogenous (vegetables), as we approach the equator. they are right as far as the southern temperates, their sole field of observation; they greatly err in all except the hot, dry parts of the tropics. why, a hindoo will drink at a sitting a tumbler of glí (clarified butter), and the european who would train for wrestling after the fashion of hindostan, as i attempted in my youth, on "native" sweetmeats and sugared milk, will be blind with "melancholia" in a week. the diet of the negro is the greasiest possible, witness his "palm- oil chop" and "palaver sauce;" his craving for meat, especially fat meat, is a feeling unknown to europe. and how simple the reason. damp heat demands almost as much carbon as damp or dry cold. return we to the baraka mission. the name is a corruption of "barracoon;" in the palmy days of the trade slave-pens occupied the ground now covered by the chapel, the schoolroom, and the dwelling-house, and extended over the site of the factory to the river-bank. the place is well chosen. immediately beyond the shore the land swells up to a little rounded hill, clean and grassy like that about sánga-tánga. the soil appears poor, and yet around the mission-house there are some fine wild figs, one a huge tree, although not a score of years old; the bamboo clump is magnificent, and the cocoas, oranges, and mangoes are surrounded by thick, fragrant, and luxuriant quickset hedges of well-trimmed lime. a few words concerning the banana of this coast, which we find so flourishing at baraka. an immense god-send to the gaboon, it is well known to be the most productive of all food, square yards of it giving annually nearly , kilogrammes of food far more nutritious than the potato. here it is the musa sapientum, the banana de soâ thomé, which has crossed over to the brazil, and which is there known by its sharper leaves and fruit, softer and shorter than the indigenous growth. the plant everywhere is most vigorous in constant moist heat, the atmosphere of a conservatory, and the ground must be low and wet, but not swampy. the best way of planting the sprouts is so to dispose them that four may form the corners of a square measuring twelve feet each side; the common style is some five feet apart. the raceme, which appears about the sixth to the tenth month, will take sixty days more to ripen; good stocks produce three and more bunches a year, each weighing from twenty to eighty pounds. the stem, after fruiting, should be cut down, in order to let the others enjoy light and air, and the oftener the plants are removed to fresh ground the better. the banana, when unripe, is white and insipid; it is then baked under ashes till it takes a golden colour, and, like a cereal, it can be eaten as bread. a little later it is boiled, and becomes a fair vegetable, tasting somewhat like chestnuts, and certainly better than carrots or turnips. lastly, when softer than a pear, it is a fruit eaten with milk or made into beignets. i have described the plantain-cider in "lake regions of central africa" (ii. ). the fruit contains sugar, gum, and acids (malic and gallic); the rind, which is easily detached when ripe, stains cloth with ruddy grey rusty colour, by its tannin, gallic, and acetic acids. the baraka mission has had several out-stations. one was at a ruined village of fán, which we shall presently pass on the right bank of the river. the second was at ikoi, a hamlet distant about fifteen (not twenty-five) miles, upon a creek of the same name, which enters the gaboon behind point ovindo, and almost opposite konig island. a third is at anenge-nenge, vulgò inenge-nenge,-- "nenge" in mpongwe, and anenge in bákele, meaning island,-- situated forty (not ) miles up the main stream; here a native teacher still resides. the baraka school now ( ) numbers thirty scholars, and there are twelve to fifteen communicants. the missionaries are our white "labourers;" but two of them, the revs. jacob best and a. bushnell, are absent in the united states for the benefit of their health. my first visit to the rev. william walker made me regret my precipitate trip to mbátá: he told me what i now knew, that it was the wrong line, and that i should have run two or three days up the rembwe, the first large influent on the southern bank of the gaboon. he had come out to the river in , and had spent twenty years of his life in africa, with occasional furloughs home. he greatly interested me by a work which he was preparing. the gaboon mission had begun its studies of the many native dialects by the usual preparatory process of writing grammars and vocabularies; after this they had published sundry fragmentary translations of the scriptures, and now they aimed at something higher. after spending years in building and decorating the porticoes of language, they were ambitious of raising the edifice to which it is only an approach; in other words, of explaining the scholarship of the tongue, the spirit of the speech. "language," says the lamented dr. o.e. vidal, then bishop designate of sierra leone,[fn# ] "is designed to give expression to thought. hence, by examining the particular class of composition"--and, i may add, the grammatical and syntactical niceties characterizing that composition--"to which any given dialect has been especially devoted, we may trace the direction in which the current of thought is wont to flow amongst the tribe or nations in which it is vernacular, and so investigate the principal psychical peculiarities, if such there be, of that tribe or nation." and again he remarks: "dr. krap was unable to find any word expressing the idea of gratitude in the language of all the suaheli (wásawahílí) tribes; a fact significant enough as to the total absence of the moral feeling denoted by that name." similarly the mpongwe cannot express our "honesty;" they must paraphrase it by "good man don't steal." in time they possibly may adopt the word bodily like pús (a cat), amog (mug), kapinde (carpenter), krus (a cross), and ilepot (pot). such a task is difficult as it is interesting, the main obstacle to success being the almost insuperable difficulty of throwing off european ideas and modes of thought, which life-long habit has made a second nature. take the instance borrowed from dr. krap, and noticed by a hundred writers, namely, the absence of a synonym for "gratitude" amongst the people of the nearer east. i have explained the truth of the case in my "pilgrimage," and it will bear explanation again. the wásawahíli are moslems, and the moslem view everywhere is that the donor's maker, not the donor, gives the gift. the arab therefore expresses his "thank you!" by "mamnún"--i am under an obligation (to your hand which has passed on the donation); he generally prefers, however, a short blessing, as "kassir khayr' ak" (may allah) "increase thy weal!" the persian's "may thy shadow never be less!" simply refers to the shade which you, the towering tree, extend over him, the humble shrub. another instance of deduction distorted by current european ideas, is where casalis ("etudes sur la langue séchuana," par eugène casalis, part ii. p. ), speaking of the sisuto proverbs, makes them display the "vestiges of that universal conscience to which the creator has committed the guidance of every intelligent creature." surely it is time to face the fact that conscience is a purely geographical and chronological accident. where, may we ask, can be that innate and universal monitor in the case of a people, the somal for instance, who rob like spartans, holding theft a virtue; who lie like trojans, without a vestige of appreciation for truth; and who hold the treacherous and cowardly murder of a sleeping guest to be the height of human honour? and what easier than to prove that there is no sin however infamous, no crime however abominable, which at some time or in some part of the world has been or is still held in the highest esteem? the utmost we can say is that conscience, the accident, flows directly from an essential. all races now known to the world have a something which they call right, and a something which they term wrong; the underlying instinctive idea being evidently that everything which benefits me is good, and all which harms me is evil. their good and their evil are not those of more advanced nations; still the idea is there, and progress or tradition works it out in a thousand different ways. my visits to mr. walker first gave me the idea of making the negro describe his own character in a collection of purely hamitic proverbs and idioms. it appeared to me that, if ever a book aspires to the title of "l'africain peint par lui-même," it must be one in which he is the medium to his own spirit, the interpreter to his own thoughts. hence "wit and wisdom from west africa" (london, tinsleys, ), which i still hold to be a step in the right direction, although critics, who possibly knew more of cornhill than of yoruba, assured me that it was "rather a heavy compilation." nor can i yet see how the light fantastic toe can show its agility in the sabots of african proverbs. chapter viii. up the gaboon river. detestable weather detained me long at the hospitable factory. tornadoes were of almost daily occurrence --not pleasant with barrels of gunpowder under a thatched roof; they were useful chiefly to the mpongwe servants of the establishment. these model thieves broke open, under cover of the storms, a strong iron safe in an inner room which had been carefully closed; they stole my mboko skin, and bottles were not safe from them even in our bedrooms. my next step was to ascend the "olo' mpongwe," or gaboon river, which bowdich ("sketch of gaboon") calls oroöngo, and its main point ohlombopolo. the object was to visit the fán, of whose cannibalism such curious tales had been told. it was not easy to find a conveyance. the factory greatly wanted a flat-bottom iron steamer, a stern-wheeler, with sliding keel, and furnaces fit for burning half-dried wood--a craft of fourteen tons, costing perhaps £ per ton, would be ample in point of size, and would save not a little money to the trader. i was at last fortunate in securing the "eliza," belonging to messrs. hatton and cookson. she was a fore-and-aft schooner of twenty tons, measuring feet inches over all and put up at bonny town by captain birkett. she had two masts, and oars in case of calms; her crew was of six hands, including one fernando, a congoese, who could actually box the compass. no outfit was this time necessary, beyond a letter to mr. tippet, who had charge of the highest establishments up stream. his business consisted chiefly of importing arms, ammunition, and beads of different sorts, especially the red porcelain, locally called loangos. on april , a little before noon, i set out, despite thunder and lightning, rain, sun, torrential showers, and the vehemently expressed distaste of my crew. the view of the right bank was no longer from afar; it differs in shape and material from the southern, but the distinction appears to me superficial, not extending to the interiors. off konig island we found nine fathoms of water, and wanted them during a bad storm from the south-east; it prevented my landing and inspecting the old dutch guns, which bowdich says are remains of the portuguese. both this and parrot island, lying some five miles south by west, are masses of cocoas, fringed with mangroves; a great contrast with the prairillon of the neighbouring point ovindo. at last, worn out by a four-knot current and a squall in our teeth, we anchored in four fathoms, about five miles south-east of konig. from this point we could easily see the wide gape of the rembwe, the south-eastern influent, or rather fork, of the gaboon, which rises in the south-western versant of some meridional chain, and which i was assured can be ascended in three tides. the people told me when too late of a great cavity or sink, which they called wonga-wonga; bowdich represents it to be an "uninhabited savannah of three days' extent, between empoöngwa and adjoomba (mayumba). i saw nothing of the glittering diamond mountains, lying eastward of wonga-wonga, concerning which the old traveller was compelled to admit that, "when there was no moon, a pale but distinct light was invariably reflected from a mountain in that quarter, and from no other." it has now died out--this superstition, which corresponds with the carbuncle of hoy and others of our scoto-scandinavian islands. resuming our cruize on the next day, we passed on the right a village of "bad bákele," which had been blown down by the french during the last year; in this little business the "king" and two lieges had been killed. the tribe is large and important, scattered over several degrees north and south of the equator, as is proved by their slaves being collected from distances of several weeks and even months. in mr. wilson numbered them at , . according to local experts they began to press down stream about , driven à tergo by their neighbours, the mpángwe (fán), even as they themselves are driving the mpongwes. but they are evidently the kaylee or kalay of bowdich (p. ), whose capital, "samashialee," was "the residence of the king, ohmbay." he places them in their present habitat, and makes them the worst of cannibals. whilst the "sheekans" (shekyani) buried their dead under the bed within the house, these detestable kaylees ate not only their prisoners, but their defunct friends, whose bodies were "bid for directly the breath was out of them;" indeed, fathers were frequently seen to devour their own children. bowdich evidently speaks from hearsay; but the brazil has preserved the old traditions of cannibalism amongst the gabões. the bákele appeared to me very like the coast tribes, only somewhat lighter-coloured and wilder in look, whilst they again are darker-skinned than their eastern neighbours from the inner highlands. their women are not so well dressed as the "ladies" of the mpongwe, the chignon is smaller, and there are fewer brass rings. the men, who still cling to the old habit of hunting, cultivate the soil, practise the ruder mechanical arts, and trade with the usual readiness and greed; they asked us a leaf of tobacco for an egg, and four leaves for a bunch of bananas. missionaries, who, like messrs. preston and best, resided amongst them for years, have observed that, though a mild and timid people, they are ever involved in quarrels with their neighbours. i can hardly understand how they "bear some resemblance to the dwarfish dokos of the eastern coast," seeing that the latter do not exist. the dikele grammar proves the language, which is most closely allied to the benga dialect, to be one of the great south african family, variously called kafir, because first studied amongst these people; ethiopic (very vague), and nilotic because its great fluvial basin is the zambezi, not the nile. as might be expected amongst isolated races, the tongue, though clearly related to that of the mpongwe and the mpangwe, has many salient points of difference; for instance, the liquid "r" is wholly wanting. according to mr. t. leighton wilson, perhaps one word in two is the same, or obviously from the same root; consequently verbal resemblances are by no means striking. the orthography of the two differs materially, and in this respect dikele more resembles the languages of the eastern coast than its western neighbour, at the same time less than the fiote or the congoese. it has a larger number of declensions, and its adjectives and pronouns are more flexible and complicated. on the other hand, it possesses few of the conjugations which form so conspicuous a feature in the tongues of the lower river, and, reversing the usage of the mpongwe, it makes very little use of the passive. running the gauntlet of cheer and chaff from the noisy inmates of the many bákele villages, and worried by mangrove-flies, we held our way up the muddy and rapidly narrowing stream, whose avenues of rhizophoras and palms acted as wind-sails; when the breeze failed the sensation was stifling. lyámbá (cannabis sativa) grew in patches upon the banks, now apparently wild, like that about lagos and badagry. not till evening did the tide serve, enabling us to send our papers for visa on board the guard-ship "l'oise," where a party of young frenchmen were preparing for la chasse. a little higher up stream are two islets, nenge mbwendi, so called from its owner, and nenge sika, or the isle of gold. the mpongwe all know this name for the precious metal, and the bakele appear to ignore it: curious to say, it is the fante and mandenga word, probably derived from the arabic sikkah, which gave rise to the italian zecca (mint) and zecchino. it may have been introduced by the laptots or lascar sailors of the senegal. m. du chaillu ("second expedition," chap. iii.) mentions "the island nengué shika" on the lower fernão vaz river; and bowdich turns the two into ompoongu and soombea. the third is anenga-nenga, not ninga- ninga, about one mile long from north to south, and well wooded with bush and palms; here the gaboon mission has a neat building on piles. the senior native employé was at glass town, and his junior, a youth about nineteen, stood à la napoléon in the doorway, evidently monarch of all he surveyed. i found there one of the ndiva, the old tribe of pongo-land, which by this time has probably died out. we anchored off wosuku, a village of some fifty houses, forming one main street, disposed north-east-- south-west, or nearly at right angles with the river. the entrance was guarded by a sentinel and gun, and the "king," imondo, lay right royally on his belly. a fine plantation of bananas divides the settlement, and the background is dense bush, in which they say "nyáre" and deer abound. the bákele supply sheep and fowls to the plateau, and their main industry consists in dressing plantain-fibre for thread and nets. we now reach the confluence of the nkonio or north-eastern, with the mbokwe, or eastern branch, which anastomose to form the gaboon; the latter, being apparently the larger of the two, preserves the title mpolo. both still require exploration; my friend m. braouezzec, lieutenant de vaisseau, who made charts of the lower bed, utterly failed to make the sources; and the rev. mr. preston, who lived seven months in the interior, could not ascend far. mr. w. winwood reade reached in may, , the rapids of the nkomo river, but sore feet prevented his climbing the mountain, which he estimates at , feet, or of tracing the stream to its fountain. mr. r.b.n. walker also ascended the nkomo for some thirty miles, and found it still a large bed with two fathoms of water in the cacimbo or "middle dries." in m. du chaillu's map the upper nkomo is a dotted line; according to all authorities, upon the higher and the lower river his direction is too far to the north-east. the good tippet declares that he once canoed three miles up the mbokwe, and then marched eastward for five days, covering a hundred miles--which is impossible. he found a line of detached hills, and an elevation where the dews were exceedingly cold; looking towards the utterly unknown orient, he could see nothing but a thick forest unbroken by streams. he heard from the country people traditions of a great lake, which may be that placed by tuckey in north latitude °- °. the best seasons for travel are said to be march and november, before and after the rains, which swell the water twelve feet. about anenge-nenge we could easily see the sub-ranges of the great eastern ghats, some twenty miles to the north-east. here the shallows and the banks projecting from different points made the channel dangerous. entering the mbokwe branch we were compelled to use sweeps, or the schooner would have been dashed against the sides; as we learned by the trees, the tides raise the surface two to three feet high. after the third hour we passed the "fán komba vina," or village of king vina. it stood in a pretty little bay, and the river, some feet broad, was fronted, as is often the case, by the "palaver tree," a glorious ceiba or bombax. all the people flocked out to enjoy the sight, and my unpractised eye could not distinguish them from bákele. above it, also on the right bank, is the now-deserted site where messrs. adams and preston nearly came to grief for bewitching the population with "bad book." five slow hours from anenge-nenge finally placed us, about sunset, at mayyán, or tippet town. the depôt lies a little above the confluence of the mbokwe and the londo, or south-eastern fork of the latter. a drunken pilot and a dark and moonless night, with the tide still running in, delayed us till i could hardly distinguish the sable human masses which gathered upon the styx- like stream to welcome their new matyem--merchant or white man. before landing, all the guns on board the steamer were double- loaded and discharged, at the instance of our host, who very properly insisted upon this act of african courtesy--"it would be shame not to fire salute." we were answered by the loudest howls, and by the town muskets, which must have carried the charges of old chambers. mr. tippet, an intelligent coloured man from the states, who has been living thirteen years on the gaboon, since the age of fourteen, and who acts as native trader to mr. r.b.n. walker, for ivory, ebony, rubber, and other produce, escorted me to his extensive establishment. at length i am amongst the man- eaters. chapter ix. a specimen day with the fán cannibals. at a.m. on the next day, after a night with the gnats and rats, i sallied forth in the thick "smokes," and cast a nearer look upon my cannibal hosts. and first of the tribal name. the mpongwe call their wild neighbours mpángwe; the europeans affect such corruptions as fánwe, panwe, the f and p being very similar, phaouin and paouen (pawen). they call themselves fán, meaning "man;" in the plural, bafan. the n is highly nasalized: the missionaries proposed to express it by "nh" which, however, wrongly conveys the idea of aspiration; and "fan," pronounced after the english fashion, would be unintelligible to them. the village contains some souls, and throughout the country the maximum would be about spears, or , of both sexes, whilst the minimum is a couple of dozen. it is pleasantly situated on the left bank of the mbokwe river, a streamlet here some feet broad, whose water rises feet inches under the tidal influence. the single street, about half a mile long, is formed by two parallel rows of huts, looking upon a cleared line of yellow clay, and provided with three larger sheds--the palaver houses. the fán houses resemble those of the mpongwe; in fact, the tribes, beginning at the camarones river, build in much the same style, but all are by no means so neat and clean as those of the seaboard. a thatch, whose projecting eaves form deep shady verandahs, surmounts walls of split bamboo, supported by raised platforms of tamped earth, windows being absent and chimneys unknown; the ceiling is painted like coal tar by oily soot, and two opposite doors make the home a passage through which no one hesitates to pass. the walls are garnished with weapons and nets, both skilfully made, and the furniture consists of cooking utensils and water-pots, mats for bedding, logs of wood for seats and pillows, and lumps of timber or dwarf stools, neatly cut out of a single block. their only night-light--that grand test of civilization--is the mpongwe torch, a yard of hard, black gum, mixed with and tightly bound up in dried banana leaves. according to some it is acacia; others declare it to be the "blood" of the bombax, which is also used for caulking. they gather it in the forest, especially during the dries, collect it in hollow bamboos, and prepare it by heating in the neptune, or brass pan. the odour is pleasant, but fragments of falling fire endanger the hut, and trimming must be repeated every ten minutes. the sexes are not separated; as throughout intertropical africa, the men are fond of idling at their clubs; and the women, who must fetch water and cook, clean the hut, and nurse the baby, are seldom allowed to waste time. they are naturally a more prolific race than those inhabiting the damp, unhealthy lowlands, and the number of the children contrasts pleasantly with the "bleak house" of the debauched mpongwe, who puts no question when his wife presents him with issue. in the cool of the morning fitevanga, king of mayyán, lectured me upon the short and simple annals of the fán. in the first stragglers who had crossed the sierra del crystal are said to have been seen upon the head waters of the gaboon. i cannot, however, but suspect that they are the "paämways" of whom bowdich ("sketch of gaboon," p. ) wrote in the beginning of the century, "all the natives on this route are said to be cannibals, the paämways not so voraciously as the others, because they cultivate a large breed of dogs for their eating." mr. w. winwood reade suspects them to be an offshoot of the great fulah race, and there is nothing in point of dialect to disprove what we must at present consider a pure conjecture. "the fulah pronouns have striking analogies with those of the yoruba, accra, ashantee, and timmanee, and even of the great kaffir class of dialects, which reaches from the equator to the cape," wrote the late learned e. norris, in his "introduction to the grammar of the fulah language" (london: harrison, ). according to the people of the upper river the fán were expelled by the bati or batti--not "bari" as it has been written-from their ancient seats; and they are still pushing them seawards. the bushmen are said to live seven to ten short marches (seventy to a hundred miles) to the east, and are described by mr. tippet, whom they have visited, as a fine, tall, slender, and light- skinned people, who dress like the fán, but without so much clothing, and who sharped the teeth of both sexes. dr. barth heard of the bati, and herr petermann's map describes them[fn# ] as "pagans, reported to be of a white colour, and of beautiful shape, to live in houses made of clay, to wear cloth of their own making, and to hold a country from which a mountain is visible to the south-west, and close to the sea." the range in question may be the long qua (kwa), which continues the camarones block to the north-east, and the batis may have passed south-westward from southern adamáwa. the fán were accompanied in their seaward movement by the osheba or 'sheba, the moshebo and moshobo of m. du chaillu's map. they are said to be a tribe of kindred blood and warlike tastes, speaking a remarkably guttural tongue, but intelligible to the mpángwe. they too were doubtless pressed forward by the inner bati, who are.also affected by the okáná, the yefá, and the sensobá. the latter are the innermost known to my negro informants, and their sheep and goats have found their way to the gaboon: they are doughty elephant-hunters, and they attack the njína, although they have no fire-arms. the mpangwe deride the savagery of these races, who have never heard of a man riding a horse or an ass, which the mpongwes call cavala and buro burro). the names of these three races, which are described as brave, warlike, and hospitable to strangers, will not be found on any map; indeed the regions east of the gaboon belong to the great white blot of inter-tropical africa, extending from north latitude degrees to south latitude degrees. major de ruvignes heard also of a tribe called lachaize (osheba?) which excels the fán in strength and courage as much as the latter do the coast tribes: a detachment of them had settled near one of the chief mpángwe towns, "mboma." some days after his arrival he saw several of these people, and describes them as giants, compared with the negro races to which his eye was accustomed. the general stature varied from six feet to six feet four inches; their complexion was a light café au lait; their hair was ornamented with cowries, strung so thickly as to suggest a skull-cup, whilst long streamers of elephants' tails, threaded with the cypraea and brass rings, hung down from the head behind the ears, covering the nape of the neck. all these, we may observe, are congo customs. in their manufacture of iron, dug by themselves, they resemble the cannibals. the fán have now lodged themselves amongst the less warlike, maritime, and sub-maritime tribes, as the (ashantis) asiante lately did in fante-land; now they visit the factories on the estuary, and wander as far as the ogobe. in course of time, they will infallibly "eat up" the bákele, as the latter are eating up the mpongwe and shekyani. they have their own names for neighbouring tribes: the mpongwe, according to bowdich, called the shekyani, and the inner tribes "boolas, a synonym of dunko in ashantee;" hence, probably, the "bulous" of mr. hutchinson (p. ), "a tribe on the guergay creek, who speak a different language from the mpongwes." the fán call the mpongwes, báyok; the bákele, ngon; the shekyani, besek; and the gaboon river, aboka. the sub-tribes of cannibals, living near my line of march, were named to me as follows:-- . the lálá (oshebas?), whose chief settlement, sánkwí, is up the mbokwe river; . their neighbours, the esánvímá; . the sánikiya, a bush tribe; . the sákulá, near mayyán; . the esobá, about fakanjok; . the esonzel of the ute, or autá village; . the okola, whose chief settlement is esámási; and . the ashemvon, with asya for a capital. from m. du chaillu's illustrations (pp. , ) i fully expected to see a large-limbed, black-skinned, and ferocious-looking race, with huge mustachios and plaited beards. a finely made, light- coloured people, of regular features and decidedly mild aspect, met my sight. the complexion is, as a rule, chocolate, the distinctive colour of the african mountaineer and of the inner tribes; there are dark men, as there would be in england, but the very black are of servile origin. few had any signs of skin-disease; i saw only one hand spotted with white, like the incipient morphetico (leper) of the brazil. many, if bleached, might pass for europeans, so "caucasian" are their features; few are negro in type as the mpongwe, and none are purely "nigger" like the blacks of maritime guinea and the lower congoese. and they bear the aspect of a people fresh from the bush, the backwoods; their teeth are pointed, and there is generally a look of grotesqueness and surprise. when i drank tea, they asked what was the good of putting sugar in tobacco water. the hair is not kinky, peppercorn-like, and crisply woolly, like that of the coast tribes; in men, as well as in women, it falls in a thick curtain, nearly to the shoulders, and it is finer than the usual elliptical fuzz. the variety of their perruquerie can be rivalled only by that of the dress and ornament. the males affect plaits, knobs, and horns, stiff twists and upright tufts, suddenly projecting some two inches from the scalp; and, that analogies with europe might not be wanting, one gentleman wore a queue, zopf, or pigtail, bound at the shoulders, not by a ribbon, but by the neck of a claret bottle. other heads are adorned with single feathers, or bunches and circles of plumes, especially the red tail-plumes of the parrot and the crimson coat of the touraco (corythrix), an african jay; these blood-coloured spoils are a sign of war. the brazilian traveller will be surprised to find the coronals of feathers, the kennitare (acangátara) of the tupí- guarani race, which one always associates with the new world. the skull-caps of plaited and blackened palm leaf, though common in the interior, are here rare; an imitation is produced by tressing the hair longitudinally from occiput to sinciput, making the head a system of ridges, divided by scalp-lines, and a fan-shaped tuft of scarlet-stained palm frond surmounts the poll. i noticed a fashion of crinal decoration quite new to me. a few hairs, either from the temples, the sides or the back of the head, are lengthened with tree-fibres, and threaded with red and white pound-beads, so called by europeans because the lb. fetches a dollar. these decorations fall upon the breast or back; the same is done to the thin beard, which sprouts tufty from both rami of the chin, as in the purely nervous temperament of europe; and doubtless the mustachios, if the latter were not mostly wanting, would be similarly treated. whatever absurdity in hair may be demanded by the trichotomists and philopogons of europe, i can at once supply it to any extent from africa--gratis. gentlemen remarkable by a raie, which as in the scotch terrier begins above the eyes and runs down the back, should be grateful to me for this sporting offer. nothing simpler than the fán toilette. thongs and plaits of goat, wild cat, or leopard skin gird the waist, and cloth, which is rare, is supplied by the spoils of the black monkey or some other "beef." the main part of the national costume, and certainly the most remarkable, is a fan of palm frond redolent of grease and ruddled with ochre, thrust through the waist belt; while new and stiff the upper half stands bolt upright and depends only when old. it suggests the "enduap" (rondache) of ostrich-plumes worn by the tupi-guarani barbarians of the brazil, the bunchy caudal appendages which made the missionaries compare them with pigeons. the fore part of the body is here decked with a similar fan, the outspread portion worn the wrong way, like that behind. the ornaments are seed-beads, green or white, and loangos (red porcelain). the "bunch" here contains to strings, and up country , worth one dollar; each will weigh from one to three, and a wealthy fán may carry fifteen to forty-five pounds. the seed-bead was till lately unknown; fifteen to twenty strings make the "bunch." there is not much tattooing amongst the men, except on the shoulders, whilst the women prefer the stomach; the gandin, however, disfigures himself with powdered cam-wood, mixed with butter-nut, grease, or palm oil--a custom evidently derived from the coast-tribes. each has his "ndese," garters and armlets of plaited palm fibre, and tightened by little cross-bars of brass; they are the "hibás" which the bedawin wear under their lower articulations as preservatives against cramp. lastly, a fetish horn hangs from the breast, and heavy copper rings encumber the wrists and ankles. though unskilful in managing canoes--an art to be learned, like riding and dancing, only in childhood--many villagers affect to walk about with a paddle, like the semi-aquatic kru-men. up country it is said they make rafts which are towed across the stream by ropes, when the swiftness of the current demands a ferry. the women are still afraid of the canoe. all adult males carry arms, and would be held womanish if they were seen unweaponed. these are generally battle-axes, spears cruelly and fantastically jagged, hooked and barbed, and curious leaf-shaped knives of archaic aspect; some of the latter have blades broader than they are long, a shape also preserved by the mpongwe. the sheaths of fibre or leather are elaborately decorated, and it is chic for the scabbard to fit so tight that the weapon cannot be drawn for five minutes; i have seen the same amongst the somal. there are some trade-muskets, but the "hot- mouthed weapon" has not become the national weapon of the fán. bows and arrows are unknown; the náyin or cross-bow peculiar to this people, and probably a native invention, not borrowed, as might be supposed, from europe, is carried only when hunting or fighting: a specimen was exhibited in london with the gorillas. the people are said sometimes to bend it with the foot or feet like the tupí guaranís, the jivaros, and other south americans. suffice it to remark of this weapon, with which, by the by, i never saw a decent shot made, that the détente is simple and ingenious, and that the "ebe" or dwarf bolt is always poisoned with the boiled root of a wild shrub. it is believed that a graze is fatal, and that the death is exceedingly painful: i doubt both assertions. most men also carry a pliable basket full of bamboo caltrops, thin splints, pointed and poisoned. placed upon the path of a bare-footed enemy, this rude contrivance, combined with the scratching of the thorns, and the gashing cuts of the grass, must somewhat discourage pursuit. the shields of elephant hide are large, square, and ponderous. the "terrible war-axe" is the usual poor little tomahawk, more like a toy than a tool. after a bathe in the muddy mbokwe, i returned to the village, and found it in a state of ferment. the fán, like all inner african tribes, with whom fighting is our fox-hunting, live in a chronic state of ten days' war, and can never hold themselves safe; this is the case especially where the slave trade has never been heard of. similarly the ghazwah ("razzia") of the bedawin is for plunder, not for captives. surprises are rare, because they will not march in the dark. battles are not bloody; after two or three warriors have fallen their corpses are dragged away to be devoured, their friends save themselves by flight, and the weaker side secures peace by paying sheep and goats. on this occasion the sister of a young "brave" had just now been killed and "chopped" by the king of sánkwí, a neighbouring settlement of oshebas, and the bereaved brother was urging his comrades with vociferous speeches to "up and arm." usually when a man wants "war," he rushes naked through his own village, cursing it as he goes. moreover, during the last war mayyán lost five men to three of the enemy; which is not fair, said the women, who appeared most eager for the fray. all the youths seized their weapons; the huge war-drums, the hollowed bole of a tree fringed with nyáre hide, was set up in the middle of the street; preparations for the week of singing and dancing which precedes a campaign were already in hand, and one war-man gave earnest of blood-shed by spearing a goat the property of mr. tippet. it being our interest that the peace should be kept till after my proposed trip into the interior, i repaired to the palaver-house and lent weight to the advice of my host, who urged the heroes to collect ivory, ebony, and rubber, and not to fight till his stores were filled. we concluded by carrying off the goat. after great excitement the warriors subsided to a calm; it was broken, however, two days afterwards by the murder of a villager, the suspected lover of a woman whose house was higher up the mbokwe river; he went to visit her, and was incontinently speared in the breast by the "injured husband." if he die and no fine be paid, there will be another "war." i made careful inquiry about anthropophagy amongst the fán, and my account must differ greatly from that of m. du chaillu. the reader, however, will remember that mayyán is held by a comparatively civilized race, who have probably learned to conceal a custom so distasteful to all their neighbours, white and black; in the remoter districts cannibalism may yet assume far more hideous proportions. since the fán have encouraged traders to settle amongst them, the interest as well as the terrors of the coast tribes, who would deter foreigners from direct dealings, has added new horrors to the tale; and yet nothing can exceed the reports of older travellers. during my peregrinations i did not see a single skull. the chiefs, stretched at full length, and wrapped in mats, are buried secretly, the object being to prevent some strong fetish medicine being made by enemies from various parts of the body. in some villages the head men of the same tribe are interred near one another; the commonalty are put singly and decently under ground, and only the slave (máká) is thrown as usual into the bush. mr. tippet, who had lived three years with this people, knew only three cases of cannibalism; and the rev. mr. walker agreed with other excellent authorities, that it is a rare incident even in the wildest parts--perhaps opportunity only is wanted. as will appear from the fán's bill of fare, anthropophagy can hardly be caused by necessity, and the way in which it is conducted shows that it is a quasi-religious rite practised upon foes slain in battle, evidently an equivalent of human sacrifice. if the whole body cannot be carried off, a limb or two is removed for the purpose of a roast. the corpse is carried to a hut built expressly on the outskirts of the settlement; it is eaten secretly by the warriors, women and children not being allowed to be present, or even to look upon man's flesh; and the cooking pots used for the banquet must all be broken. a joint of "black brother" is never seen in the villages: "smoked human flesh" does not hang from the rafters, and the leather knife-sheaths are of wild cow; tanned man's skin suggests only the tannerie de meudon, an advanced "institution." yet dr. schweinfurth's valuable travels on the western nile prove that public anthropophagy can co-exist with a considerable amount of comfort and, so to speak, civilization--witness the nyam-nyam and mombattu (mimbuttoo). the sick and the dead are uneaten by the fán, and the people shouted with laughter when i asked a certain question. the "unnatural" practice, which, by the by, has at different ages extended over the whole world, now continues to be most prevalent in places where, as in new zealand, animal food is wanting; and everywhere pork readily takes the place of "long pig." the damp and depressing atmosphere of equatorial africa renders the stimulus of flesh diet necessary. the isángú, or ingwánba, the craving felt after a short abstinence from animal food, does not spare the white traveller more than it does his dark guides; and, though the moral courage of the former may resist the "gastronomic practice" of breaking fast upon a fat young slave, one does not expect so much from the untutored appetite of the noble savage. on the eastern parts of the continent there are two cannibal tribes, the wadoe and the wabembe; and it is curious to find the former occupying the position assigned by ptolemy (iv. ) to his anthropophagi of the barbaricus sinus: according to their own account, however, the practice is modern. when weakened by the attacks of their wákámbá neighbours, they began to roast and eat slices from the bodies of the slain in presence of the foe. the latter, as often happens amongst barbarians, and even amongst civilized men, could dare to die, but were unable to face the horrors of becoming food after death: the great cortez knew this feeling when he made his soldiers pretend anthropophagy. many of the wadoe negroids are tall, well made, and light complexioned, though inhabiting the low and humid coast regions-- a proof, if any were wanted, that there is nothing unwholesome in man's flesh. some of our old accounts of shipwrecked seamen, driven to the dire necessity of eating one another, insinuate that the impious food causes raging insanity. the wabembe tribe, occupying a strip of land on the western shore of the tanganyika lake, are "menschenfresser," as they were rightly called by the authors of the "mombas mission map." these miserables have abandoned to wild growth a most prolific soil; too lazy and unenergetic to hunt or to fish, they devour all manner of carrion, grubs, insects, and even the corpses of their deceased friends. the midgán, or slave-caste of the semi-semitic somal, are sometimes reduced to the same extremity; but they are ever held, like the wendigo, or man-eaters, amongst the north american indians, impure and detestable. on the other hand, the tupi- guaranís of the brazil, a country abounding in game, fish, wild fruits, and vegetables, ate one another with a surprising relish. this subject is too extensive even to be outlined here: the reader is referred to the translation of hans stade: old travellers attribute the cannibalism of the brazilian races to "gulosity" rather than superstition; moreover, these barbarians had certain abominable practices, supposed to be known only to the most advanced races. anthropophagy without apparent cause was not unknown in southern africa. mr. layland found a tribe of "cave cannibals" amongst the mountains beyond thaba bosigo in the trans-gariep country.[fn# ] he remarks with some surprise, "horrible as all this may appear, there might be some excuse made for savages, driven by famine to extreme hunger, for capturing and devouring their enemies. but with these people it was totally different, for they were inhabiting a fine agricultural tract of country, which also abounded in game. notwithstanding this, they were not contented with hunting and feeding upon their enemies, but preyed much upon each other also, for many of their captures were made from amongst the people of their own tribe, and, even worse than this, in times of scarcity, many of their own wives and children became the victims of this horrible practice." anthropophagy, either as a necessity, a sentiment, or a superstition, is known to sundry, though by no means to all, the tribes dwelling between the nun (niger) and the congo rivers; how much farther south it extends i cannot at present say. on the lower niger, and its branch the brass river, the people hardly take the trouble to conceal it. on the bonny and new calabar, perhaps the most advanced of the so-called oil rivers, cannibalism, based upon a desire of revenge, and perhaps, its sentimental side, the object of imbibing the valour of an enemy slain in battle, has caused many scandals of late years. the practice, on the other hand, is execrated by the efiks of old calabar, who punish any attempts of the kind with extreme severity. during the slaves of creek-town attempted it, and were killed. at duke-town an ibo woman also cut up a man, sun- dried the flesh, and sold it for monkey's meat--she took sanctuary at the mission house. yet it is in full vigour amongst their ibo neighbours to the north-west, and the duallas of the camarones river also number it amongst their "country customs." the mpongwe, as has been said, will not eat a chimpanzee; the fán devour their dead enemies. the fán character has its ferocious side, or it would not be african: prisoners are tortured with all the horrible barbarity of that human wild beast which is happily being extirpated, the north american indian; and children may be seen greedily licking the blood from the ground. it is a curious ethnological study, this peculiar development of destructiveness in the african brain. cruelty seems to be with him a necessary of life, and all his highest enjoyments are connected with causing pain and inflicting death. his religious rites--a strong contrast to those of the modern hindoo--are ever causelessly bloody. take as an instance, the efik race, or people of old calabar, some , wretched remnants of a once-powerful tribe. for years they have had intercourse with europeans, who, though slavers, would certainly neither enjoy nor encourage these profitless horrors; yet no savages show more brutality in torture, more frenzied delight in bloodshed, than they do. a few of their pleasant practices are-- the administration of esere, or poison-bean; "egbo floggings" of the utmost severity, equalling the knout; substitution of an innocent pauper for a rich criminal; infanticide of twins; and vivisepulture. and it must be remembered that this tribe has had the benefit of a resident mission for the last generation. i can hardly believe this abnormal cruelty to be the mere result of uncivilization; it appears to me the effect of an arrested development, which leaves to the man all the ferocity of the carnivor, the unreflecting cruelty of the child. the dietary of these "wild men of the woods" would astonish the starveling sons of civilization. when will the poor man realize the fact that his comfort and happiness will result not from workhouses and almshouses, hospitals and private charities, but from that organized and efficient emigration, so long advocated by the seer carlyle? only the crassest ignorance and the listlessness born of misery and want prevent the able-bodied pauper, the frozen-out mechanic, or the weary and ill-clad, the over-worked and under-fed agricultural labourer, from quitting the scenes of his purgatory, and from finding, scattered over earth's surface, spots where he may enjoy a comparative paradise, heightened by the memory of privations endured in the wretched hole which he pleases to call his home. but nostalgia is a more common disease than men suppose, and it affects none more severely than those that are remarkable for their physical powers. a national system of emigration, to be perfect, must not be confined to solitary and individual hands, who, however numerous, are ever pining for the past. the future will organize the exodus of whole villages, which, like those of the hebrides in the last century, will bear with them to new worlds their lares and penates, their wives, families, and friends, who will lay out the church and the churchyard after the old fashion familiar to their youth, and who will not forget the palaver- house, vulgarly called pothouse or pub. few of these lestrigons lack fish, which they catch in weirs, fowl, flesh of dogs, goats, or sheep; cattle is a luxury yet unknown, but the woods supply an abundance of nyáre and other "bush-beef." they also have their special word for the meat- yearning. still in the semi-nomadic stage, they till the ground, and yet depend greatly upon the chase. they break their fast (kidiashe) at a.m., eat a mid-day meal (amos), and sup (gogáshe) at sunset, besides "snacks" all through the day when they can find material. they are good huntsmen, who fear neither the elephant (nyok), the hippopotamus (nyok á mádzim), frequent in the rivers of the interior, the crocodile, nor the gorilla (njí). it is generally asserted--and the unfortunate douville re- echoed the assertion--that the river-horse and the crocodile will not live together; the reason is, simply, that upon the seaboard, where these animals were first observed, the crocodile prefers the fresh water of the river, the hippopotamus the brackish water at its mouth. in the interior, of course, they dwell together in amity, because there is nothing for them to quarrel about. the banana, planted with a careless hand, supplies the staff of life, besides thatch, fuel, and fibre for nets and lines: when they want cereals, maize, holcus, and panicum will grow almost spontaneously. the various palm-trees give building materials, oil, wine, and other requisites too numerous to mention. the "five products of the cow" are ignored, as in the western hemisphere of yore: one of the most useful, however, is produced by the nje or njeve, a towering butyraceous tree, differing from that which bears the shea butternut. its produce is sun-dried, toasted over a fire, pounded and pressed in a bag between two boards, when it is ready for use. the bush, cut at the end, is fired before the beginning, of the rains, leaving the land ready for yams and sweet potatoes almost without using the hoe. in the middle dries, from june to september, the villagers sally forth en masse for a battue of elephants, whose spoils bring various luxuries from the coast. lately, before my arrival, they had turned out to gather the aba, or wild mango, for odika sauce; and during this season they will do nothing else. the fán plant their own tobacco, which is described as a low, spreading plant, and despise the imported weed; they neither snuff nor chew. all manufacture their own pipe-bowls, and they are not ignorant of the use of lyamba or hashish. they care little for sugar, contrary to the rule of africa in general, but they over-salt all their food; and they will suck the condiment as children do lollipops. their palm oil is very poor, as if they had only just learned the art of making it. after the daily siesta, which lasted till p. m., mr. tippet asked me to put in an appearance at a solemn dance which, led by the king's eldest daughter, was being performed in honour of the white visitor. a chair was placed in the verandah, the street being the ballroom. received with the usual salutation, "mboláne," to which the reply is "an," i proceeded to the external study of fán womanhood. whilst the men are tall and élancés, their partners are usually short and stout, and, "her stature tall, i hate a dumpy woman," is a matter of taste upon which most of us agree with his lordship. this peculiar breadth of face and person probably result from hard work and good fare, developing adipose tissue. i could not bring myself to admire gondebiza, the princess royal,-- what is grotesque in one sex becomes unsightly in the other. fat, thirty, and perhaps once fair, her charms had seen their prime, and the system of circles and circlets which composed her personnel had assumed a tremulous and gravitating tendency. she was habited in the height of fán fashion. her body was modestly invested in a thin pattern of tattoo, and a gauze-work of oil and camwood; the rest of the toilette was a dwarf pigeon-tail of fan- palm, like that of the men, and a manner of apron, white beads, and tree bark, greasy and reddened: the latter was tucked under and over the five lines of cowries, which acted as cestus to the portly middle, "big as a budget." the horns of hair, not unlike the rays of light in michael angelo's "moses," were covered with a cap of leaves, and they were balanced behind by a pigtail lashed with brass wire. her ornaments were sundry necklaces of various beads, large red and white, and small blue and pink porcelains; a leaf, probably by way of amulet, was bound to a string round the upper arm; and wrists and ankles were laden with heavy rings of brass and copper, the parure of the great in fán- land. the other ballerine were, of course, less brilliantly attired, but all had rings on their arms, legs, and ankles, fingers, and toes. a common decoration was a bunch of seven or eight long ringlets, not unlike the queues de rat, still affected by the old-fashioned englishwoman; these, however, as in the men, were prolonged to the bosom by strings of alternate red and white beads. others limited the decoration to two rats' tails depending from the temples, where phrenologists localize our "causality." many had faces of sufficient piquancy; the figures, though full, wanted firmness, and i noticed only one well-formed bosom. the men wore red feathers, but none carried arms. the form of saltation suggested mr. catlin's drawings. a circular procession of children, as well as adults, first promenaded round the princess, who danced with all her might in the centre, her countenance preserving the grand sérieux. the performers in this "ging-a-ring" then clapped hands with prolonged ejaculations of o-o-o-oh, stamped and shuffled forwards, moving the body from the hips downwards, whilst h. r. h. alone stood stationary and smileless as a french demoiselle of the last century, who came to the ball not to causer but to danser. at times, when king fitevanga condescended to show his agility, the uproar of applause became deafening. the orchestra consisted of two men sitting opposite each other,--one performed on a caisson, a log of hollowed wood, four feet high, skin-covered, and fancifully carved; the other on the national anjyá, a rude "marimba," the prototype of the pianoforte. it is made of seven or eight hard- wood slats, pinned with bamboo tacks to transverse banana trunks lying on the ground: like the grande caisse, it is played upon with sticks, plectra like tent-pegs. mr. w. winwood reade ("savage africa," chap, xiii.) says: "the instrument is also described by froebel as being used by the indians of central america, where, which is still more curious, it is known by the same name--'marimba.'" of course they borrowed the article and the name from the negroes: most tribes in africa have their own terms for this universal instrument, but it is everywhere recognized by the african who knows europeans as "marimba." thus owen tells us (p. ) "that at the mouth of the zambesi it is called 'tabbelah,'" evidently the arabic "tablah" another favourite instrument is a clapper, made of two bamboos some five feet long, and thick as capstan bars,--it is truly the castanet en grand. highly gratified by the honour, but somewhat overpowered by the presence and by that vile scourge the sandfly, i retired after the first review, leaving the song, the drum, and the dance to continue till midnight. accustomed to the frantic noises of african village-life in general, my ears here recognized an excess of bawl and shout, and subsequent experience did not efface the impression. but, in the savage and the barbarian, noise, like curiosity, is a healthy sign; the lowest tribes are moping and apathetic as sick children; they will hardly look at anything, however strange to them. the rest of my day and week was devoted to the study of this quaint people, and the following are the results. those who have dealings with the fán universally prefer them in point of honesty and manliness to the mpongwe and coast races; they have not had time to become thoroughly corrupt, to lose all the lesser without gaining anything of the greater virtues. they boast, like john tod, that they ne'er feared the french, and have scant respect for (white) persons; indeed, their independence sometimes takes the form of insolence. we were obliged to release by force the boy nyongo, and two of mr. tippet's women who had been put "in log"--anglicè, in the stocks. they were wanted as hostages during the coming war, and this rude contrivance was adopted to insure their presence. chastity is still known amongst the fán. the marriage tie has some significance, the women will not go astray except with the husband's leave, which is not often granted. the men wax wroth if their mothers be abused. it is an insult to call one of them a liar or a coward; the coast-tribes would merely smile at the soft impeachment; and assure you that none but fools--yourself included by implication--are anything else. their bravery is the bravery of the savage, whose first object in battle is to preserve his only good, his life: to the civilized man, therefore, they appear but moderately courageous. they are fond of intoxication, but are not yet broken to ardent spirits: i have seen a single glass of trade rum cause a man to roll upon the ground and convulsively bite the yellow clay like one in the agonies of the death-thirst. they would do wisely to decline intercourse with europeans; but this, of course, is impossible-- there is a manifest destiny for them as for their predecessors. the vile practice of the white or west coast is to supply savages with alcohol, arms, and ammunition; to live upon the lives of those they serve. the more honourable moslems of the eastern shores do not disgrace themselves by such greed of gain. the fán are cunning workers in iron, which is their wealth. their money is composed of ikíá, dwarf bars shaped like horse-fleams, a coinage familiar to old travellers in west africa, and of this spartan currency a bundle of ten represents sixpence. "white man's ikíá" would be silver, for which the more advanced mpongwe have corrupted the english to "solove." an idea exists on the lower river that our hardware is broken up for the purpose of being made into spear-heads and other weapons. such is not generally the case. the wamasai, the somal and the cape kafirs-- indeed, all the metal-working african barbarians--call our best sheffield blades "rotten iron." they despise a material that chips and snaps, and they prefer with ample cause their native produce, charcoal-smelted, and tempered by many successive heatings and hammerings, without quenching in water. nor will they readily part with it when worked. the usual trade medium is a metal rod; two of these are worth a franc if of brass, while three of copper represent two francs. there is a great demand for beads and salt, the latter especially throughout the interior. thus ended my "first impressions" amongst the fán cannibals. chapter x. to the mbíka (hill) ; the sources of the gaboon.----return to the plateau. not yet despairing of a shot at or of capturing a "poor relation," i persuaded mr. tippet to assemble the lieges and offer them double what was proposed at mbátá. no one, however, appeared sanguine of success, the anthropoid keeps his distance from the fán. a trip to the interior was suggested, first up the mbokwe, and finally arranged for the londo river. information about the country was, as usual, vague; one man made the stream head two days off, the other a few hours, and mr. tippet's mind fluctuated between fifty and one hundred miles. the party was easily assembled, and we set out at a.m. on april th. i and selim had the dignity of a "dingy" to ourselves: mr. tippet out of a little harem of twenty-five had chosen two wives and sundry abigails, his canoe, laden with some fifteen souls, was nearly flush with the water. the beauties were somewhat surly, they complained, like the sluggard, of too early waking and swore that they would do nothing in the way of work, industry being essentially servile anne coombe (ankombe, daughter of qua ben), was a short, stout, good humoured lass, "'lizer" (eliza), i regret to say, would not make the least exertion, and, when called, always turned her back. after dropping three miles down the mbokwe river, we entered the londo influent: some three miles further on it fines down from a width of eighty feet to a mere ditch, barred with trees, which stop navigation. we landed on the left bank and walked into the palaver-house of fakanjok or pakanjok, the village of a fán head man, called by mr. tippet "john matoko." it was old, dirty and tattered, showing signs of approaching removal. out of the crowd of men and women who nearly sat upon us, i had no difficulty in hiring eight porters, thereby increasing our party to twenty-five souls. these people carry on the shoulder, not as africans always should do, on the head: they even cross the fallen trunks which act as rickety bridges, with one side of the body thus heavier than the other. the bush-path began by wheeling westward, as though we were returning to anenge-nenge; thence it struck south-eastwards, a rhumb from which it rarely deviated. though we were approaching the sub-ranges of the sierra del crystal, the country was very like that about mbátá; streamlets flowing to the mbokwe, wet yellow soil forming slippery muds, unhealthy as unpleasant in the morning sunshine; old and new clearings and plantations, mostly of bananas, mere spots in the wide expanse of bush, and deserted or half-inhabited villages. shortly after noon we came to a battle-field, where the heroes of tippet-town had chanced to fall in with their foes of autá, a settlement distant eight or nine miles. both armies at once "tree'd" themselves behind trunks, and worked at long bowls, the "bushmen," having only one gun and two charges, lost four of their men, and the victors, who had no time to carry off the slain, contented themselves with an arm or two by way of gigot. probably the memory of this affair, which is still to be settled, unfavourably impressed my escort. after a total of some two hours (six miles) we arrived at a large "oláko" or breakwind, a half- face of leafy branches, and all insisted upon a long rest. i objected, and then "palaver came up." we were at last frankly told that the villages ahead were hostile, that we could not proceed further in this direction, and that the people of fakanjok had thought my only object was to sight from afar a golden prairie and a blue range beyond. the latter is known to the french as "tem," from a hillock crowned with a huge red- trunked tree of that name. opposition was useless, so we turned back some twenty minutes to a junction, and took the south-eastern instead of the eastern line. here the country was higher and drier, more hilly and gravelly, the aneroid showing some feet ( . ); it would be exceptionally healthy in any but the rainy season. before the afternoon had well set in, a camping ground had been chosen in the tall, thin forest, near the confluence of two dwarf streams, whose vitreous waters, flowing over fine sand and quartz pebbles, were no small recommendation. as the cooking proceeded, frowning brows relaxed, and huge fires put to flight ill temper and the sandfly. i had proposed lashing my hammock to one of the tree- stumps, which are here some ten feet tall, the people, who swing themselves for the purpose of felling, declare the upper wood to be softer than below. "public opinion," however, overruled me, and made it fast to two old trunks. the night was a succession of violent tornadoes, and during one of the most outrageous the upper half of a "triste lignum," falling alongside of and grazing my hammock, awoke me with its crash. next morning, when the rain had somewhat abated, i set out, by a path whose makers were probably the ape and the squirrel-hunter, in the direction of a rise, which the people called mbika --the hill. after a total of some two miles and a half, we found a clearing upon the summit, but, although i climbed up a tree, the bush was dense enough to conceal most of the surroundings. according to the fán, the nkomo rises on the seaward or western face of this mbíká, whilst the mbokwe, springing from its eastern counterslope, runs south-west of the massif and joins the former. the one-tree hill known as "tem" appeared a little to the north of west: to the north-east we could see a river-fork, but none knew its name. our return was enlivened by the inspection of an elephant-kraal, where a herd had been trapped, drugged, and shot during the last season. as the walls were very flimsy, i asked why the animals did not break loose; the answer was that the ngán (mganga or fetishman) ran a line of poison vine along its crest, and that the beasts, however wild, would not attempt to pass through it. the natives showed me the liana which they described, still lying on the poles of the broken corral. mr. preston, of the gaboon mission, who first noticed it, and mr. wilson, who gives an illustration of the scene (p. ), declares that the creeper is drawn around the herd when browsing; that as long as the animals are unmolested they will not dash through the magic circle, and that the fence of uprights is constructed outside it. the same tale is told of all the wild elephant-hunters in the interior, the báti the okáná, the yefá, and the sensobá. arrived at tippet-town, i gave my "dashes," chiefly brass and copper rods, bade an affectionate farewell, and then dropped down stream without further ceremony. i had been disappointed a second time in re gorilla, and nothing now remained but a retreat, which time rendered necessary. the down-stream voyage was an easy matter, and it need hardly be said far less unpleasant than the painful toil up. from the sanjika village on the gaboon, the "tem" hill was seen bearing due east (mag.) and the mbíká °. behind them were glimpses of blue highland, rising in lumpy and detached masses to the east; these are evidently sub-ranges of the western ghats, the sierra del crystal, which native travellers described to me as a serrated broken line of rocky and barren acicular mountains; tall, gravelly, waterless, and lying about three days' journey beyond the screen of wooded hill. it is probably sheltered to some extent from the damp sea-breeze, and thus to the east there would be a "lee-land," dry, healthy and elevated, which, corresponding with ugogo on the zanzibar- tanganyika line, would account for the light complexions of the people. early on the morning of thursday, april th, the "eliza" was lying off mr. r. b. n. walker's factory, and i was again received with customary hospitality by mr. hogg. these two short trips gave me a just measure of the comparative difficulties in travelling through eastern and western africa, and to a certain extent accounted for the huge vacuum which disfigures the latter, a few miles behind the seaboard. the road to unyamwezi, for instance, has been trodden for centuries; the people have become trained porters; they look forward annually to visiting the coast, and they are accustomed to the sight of strangers, arabs and others. if war or blood-feud chance to close one line, the general interests of the interior open another. but in this section of africa there is no way except from village to village, and a blood-feud may shut it for months. the people have not the habit of dealing with the foreigner, whom they look upon as a portent, a walking ghost, an ill-omened apparition. porterage is in embryo, no scale of payment exists; and no dread of cutting off a communication profitable to both importer and exporter prevents the greedy barbarian plundering the stranger. captain speke and i were fortunate in being the first whites who seriously attempted the lake region; our only obstacles were the european merchants at zanzibar; the murder of m. maizan, although a bad example to the people, had been so punished as to render an immediate repetition of the outrage improbable. i say immediate, for, shortly after our return, the unfortunate herr roscher was killed at the hisonguni village, near the rufuma river, without apparent reason. [fn# ] but m. du chaillu had a very different task, and as far as he went he did it well. his second expedition, in which an accidental death raised the country against him, was fortunately undertaken by a man in the prime of youth and strength; otherwise he must have succumbed to a nine hours' run, wounded withal. in east africa when one of lieutenant cameron's "pagazis" happened to kill a native, the white man was mulcted only in half his cloth. on the other hand, i see no reason why these untrodden lines should be pronounced impossible, as a writer in the "pall mall" has lately done, deterring the explorer from work which every day would cover new ground. the gaboon is by no means a bad point de départ, whence the resolute traveller, with perseverance (anglicè time), a knowledge of the coast language, and good luck might penetrate into the heart (proper) of africa, and abolish the white blot which still affronts us. his main difficulty would be the heavy outlay; "impecuniosity" to him would represent the scurvy and potted cat of the old arctic voyager. but if he can afford to travel regardless of delays and expense, and to place depots of cloth, beads, and other "country-money" at every hundred miles, mpongwe-land would be one of the gateways to the unknown regions of the dark continent. moreover, every year we hear some new account of travellers coming from the east. unfortunately men with £ , to £ , a year do not "plant the lance in africa," the old heroic days of the spanish and portuguese exploring hidalgos have yet to dawn anew. we must now look forward to subsidies from economical governments, and whilst the germans and italians, especially the former, are so liberally supported and adequately rewarded, englishmen, as in the case of the gallant lieutenant cameron, run the risk of being repudiated, left penniless in the depths of negro-land. chapter xi. mr., mrs., and master gorilla. the reader will kindly bear in mind, when perusing my notes upon the gorilla, that, as in the the case of the fán cannibalism described by the young french traveller, my knowledge of the anthropoid is confined to the maritime region; moreover, that it is hearsay, fate having prevented my nearer acquaintance with the "ape of contention." the discovery must be assigned to admiral hanno of carthage, who, about b. c. , first in the historical period slew the troglodytes, and carried home their spoils. the next traveller who described the great troglodytes of equatorial africa was the well-known andrew battel, of leigh, essex ( to ); and his description deserves quoting. "here (mayombo) are two kinds of monsters common to these woods. the largest of them is called pongo in their language, and the other engeco "(in the older editions "encêgo" evidently nchigo, whilst engeco may have given rise to our "jocko"). "the pongo is in all his proportions like a man, except the legs, which have no calves, but are of a gigantic size. their faces, hands, and ears are without hair; their bodies are covered, but not very thick, with hair of a dunnish colour. when they walk on the ground it is upright, with their hands on the nape of the neck. they sleep in trees, and make a covering over their heads to shelter them from the rain. they eat no flesh, but feed on nuts and other fruits; they cannot speak, nor have they any understanding beyond instinct. "when the people of the country travel through the woods, they make fires in the night, and in the morning, when they are gone, the pongos will come and sit round it till it goes out, for they do not possess sagacity enough to lay more wood on. they go in bodies, and kill many negroes who travel in the woods. when elephants happen to come and feed where they are, they will fall on them, and so beat them with their clubbed fists (sticks?) that they are forced to run away roaring. the grown pongos are never taken alive, owing to their strength, which is so great that ten men cannot hold one of them. the young pongos hang upon their mother's belly, with their hands clasped about her. many of the young ones are taken by means of shooting the mothers with poisoned arrows, and the young ones, hanging to their mothers, are easily taken." i have italicized the passages which show that the traditions still preserved on the coast, about the pongo and the chimpanzee, date from old. surely m. du chaillu does grave injustice to this good old briton, who was not a literary man, by declaring his stories to be mere travellers' tales, "untrue of any of the great apes of africa." battel had evidently not seen the animal, and with his negro informants he confounds the gorilla and the "bushman;" yet he possibly alludes to a species which has escaped m. du chaillu and other modern observers. mr. w. winwood reade ("savage africa," chap, xix.) has done good service by reprinting the letter of a bristol trader on the west coast of africa, first published by lord monboddo ("origin and progress of language," vol. i. p. , to ). here we find distinct mention of three anthropoid apes. the first is the "impungu" (or pongo?), which walks upright, and is from seven to nine feet high. the second is the "itsena," evidently the njína, njí, nguyla, or gorilla; and thirdly is the "chimpenza," our chimpanzee, a word corrupted from the congoese kampenzy, including the nchígo, the kulu-kamba, and other troglodytes. i have heard of this upright-walking mpongo at loango and other places on the west coast of africa, where the njína is familiarly spoken of, and it is not, methinks, impossible, that an ape even larger than the gorilla may yet be found. james barbot ("a voyage to congo river," churchill, vol. v. p. ,) tells us in that the "kingdom of angola, or dongo, produces many such extraordinary apes in the woods; they are called by the blacks quojas morrow, and by the indians orang- outang, that is satyrs, or woodmen. . . . this creature seems to be the very satyr of the ancients, written of by pliny and others, and is said to set upon women in the woods, and sometimes upon armed men." amongst these animals he evidently includes the chimpanzee, as may be seen by his reference to the royal exchange, london. in the philosophical abbé proyart, in his excellent "history of loango," tells us (vide the chapter upon animals) that "there are in the forests baboons four feet high; the negroes affirm that, when they are hard pushed, they come down from the trees with sticks in their hands to defend themselves against those who are hunting them, and that very often they chase their pursuers. the missionaries never witnessed this singularity." according to the people, gorillas five or six feet tall have been seen as lately as at "looboo wood," a well-known spot which we shall presently sight, about three miles inland from the centre of loango bay. and now the long intervals between travellers' accounts wax shorter. the well-known writer, bowdich, before quoted, published, in , his hearsay description of the "ingena," garnished with the usual native tales. i had the honour of receiving an account of his discovery from his widow, the late mrs. lee, who was held the "mother of african travellers," and whose energy and intelligence endured to the last,--if memory serves me, she referred to some paper upon the subject, written by herself about . towards the end of , the rev. mr. wilson, founder of the gaboon mission, and proto-grammarian of its language, obtained two skulls, which were followed by skeletons, fragmentary and perfect. he sent no. , measuring, when alive, ½ feet in height, and feet across the shoulders, to the "natural history society" of boston. he evidently has a right to boast that he was "the first to call the attention of naturalists to the 'njena.'" his colleague, dr. thomas savage, and professor jeffries wyman called the new animal by the old name of gorilla, suffixing it to the "troglodytes" which geoffrey de saint-hilaire, reviving linnaeus, had proposed in . in , dr. savage published in the "journal of natural history" (boston) the result of his careful inquiries about the "engé-ena" and the "enche-eko." in , this information was supplemented by dr. ford, also of the gaboon mission, with a "paper on the gorilla," published in the "transactions of the philadelphian academy of sciences." m. du chaillu first had the honour of slaying the gorilla in its native wilds. i saw his trophies in the united states in ; and the sensation which they subsequently created in london ( - ) is too recent to require notice. unfortunately the specimens were mutilated and imperfect. mr. r. b. n. walker, agent of messrs. hatton and cookson at the gaboon river, was the first to send home a young specimen bodily, stowed away in spirits; two boiled skeletons of large grey animals, whose skins i saw at the factory, and rum-preserved brains, intestines, and other interesting parts, which had vainly been desired by naturalists. mr. w. winwood reade spent five active months in the gorilla country in : major levison also visited the river, but their hunting was as unsuccessful as mine; whilst, in , major (now colonel) de ruvignes is reported to have been more fortunate. since that time gorillas have been killed by the french chasseur. the young troglodyte has often been captured. the usual mode is to fell the tree, and during the confusion to throw a cloth over its head; the hands are then pinioned behind, and a forked stick is fastened under the chin to prevent the child biting. i should prefer, for trapping old as well as young, the way in which bears are caught by the north american backwoodsman,--a hollowed log, with some fruit, plantains for instance, floating in a quant. suff. of sugar, well sugared and narcotized. concerning the temper of these little captives, there are heroic differences of opinion. mr. ford records the "implacable desperation" of a juvenile which was brought to the mission. it was taken very young, and kept four months, and many means were used to tame it; but it was so incorrigible, that it bit me an hour before it died." yet, in face of this and other evidence, mr. w. winwood reade, writing to the "athenaeum" (september , ), asserts that "the young gorilla in captivity is not savage." "joe gorilla," m. du chaillu's brat, was notoriously fierce and unmanageable. the rev. mr. walker, of baraka, had a specimen, which he describes as a very tractable pupil; and my excellent friend major noeliy white, better known as "governor white," of corisco island, brought to fernando po a baby njina, which in its ways and manners much resembled an old woman. mr. r. b. n. walker became the happy godfather of two youngsters, who were different in disposition as valentine and orson. one, which measured inches high, and died in , was so savage and morose, that it was always kept chained; the other, "seraphino," was of angelic nature, a general favourite at the factory: it survives, in a photograph taken by the french commandant of the comptoir, as it sat after breakfast on godpapa's lap. at first it was confined, but it soon became so tame and playful, that the cage was required only at night. it never bit, unless when teased, and its only fault was not being able to avoid the temptation of eating what disagreed with it--in fact, it was sub- human in some points, and very human in others. all died in direct consequence of dysentery, which even a milk diet could not prevent. perhaps the best way to send home so delicate an animal would be to keep it for a time in its native forest; to accustom it to boiled plantains, rice, and messes of grain; and to ship it during the fine season, having previously fitted up a cabin near the engine-room, where the mercury should never fall below °(fahr.). in order to escape nostalgia and melancholy, which are sure to be fatal, the emigrant should be valeted by a faithful and attached native. the habitat of the gorilla has been unduly limited to the left banks of the gaboon and fernao vaz rivers, and to the lands lying between north latitude °, and south latitude °,--in fact, to the immediate vicinity of the equator. the late count lavradio informed me that he had heard of it on the banks of the lower congo river (south latitude °), and the "soko," which dr. livingstone identifies with the gorilla, extends to the lualaba or upper congo, in the regions immediately west of the tanganyika lake. his friends have suggested that the "soko" might have been a chimpanzee, but the old traveller was, methinks, far above making the mistake. the yorubans at once recognize the picture; they call the anthropoid "nákí;" and they declare that, when it seizes a man, it tears the fingers asunder. so m. du chaillu (chapter vi.) mentions, in the mpongwe report, that the njina tears off the toe-nails and the finger-nails of his human captives. we should not believe so scandalous an assertion without detailed proof; it is hardly fair to make the innocent biped as needlessly cruel as man. it is well known to the natives of the old calabar river by the name of "onion." in , the brothers jules and ambroise poncet travelled with dr. peney to ab kúka, the last of their stations near the head of the luta nzige (albert nyanza) lake, and dr. peney "brought back the hand of the first gorilla which had been heard of" ("ocean highways," p. - -february, ). the german expedition ( ) reports chicambo to be a gorilla country; that the anthropoid is found one day's journey from the coast, and that the agent of that station has killed five with his own hand. mr. thompson of sherbro ("palm land," chap, xiii.) says of the chimpanzee: "some have been seen as tall as a man, from five to seven feet high, and very powerful." this is evidently the njína, the only known anthropoid that attains tall human stature; and from the rest of the passage,[fn# ] it is clear that he has confounded the chimpanzee with the nchigo-mpolo. the strip of gorilla-country visited by me was an elevated line of clayey and sandy soil, cut by sweet-water streams, and by mangrove-lined swamps, backed inland by thin forest. here the comparative absence of matted undergrowth makes the landscape sub-european, at least, by the side of the foul tropical jungle; it is exceptionally rich in the wild fruits required by the huge anthropoid. the clearings also supply bananas, pine-apple leaves, and sugar-cane, and there is an abundance of honey, in which, like the nchígo, the gorilla delights. the villages and the frequent plantations which it visits to plunder limit its reproduction near the sea, and make it exceedingly wary and keen of eye, if not of smell. even when roosting by night, it is readily frightened by a footstep; and the crash caused by the mighty bound from branch to branch makes the traveller think that a tree has fallen. the gorilla breeds about december, a cool and dry month: according to my bushmen, the period of gestation is between five and six months. the babe begins to walk some ten days after birth; "chops milk" for three months and, at the end of that time may reach eighteen inches in height. m. du chaillu makes his child, "joe gorilla," feet inches when under the third year: assuming the average height of the adult male at feet to feet inches, this measurement suggests that, according to the law of flourens, the life would exceed thirty years. i saw two fragmentary skins, thoroughly "pepper and salt;" and the natives assured me that the gorilla turns silver-white with age. it is still a disputed point whether the weight is supported by the knuckles of the forehand, like the chimpanzee, or whether the palm is the proper fulcrum. m. du chaillu says ("first expedition," chap, xx.), "the fingers are only lightly marked on the ground;" yet a few pages afterwards we are told, "the most usual mode of progression of the animal is on all-fours and resting on the knuckles." in the "second expedition" (chap, ii.) we read, "the tracks of the feet never showed the marks of toes, only the heels, and the track of the hands showed simply the impressions of the knuckles." the attack of the gorilla is that of the apes and the monkeys generally. the big-bellied satyr advances to the assault as it travels, shuffling on all-fours; "rocking" not traversing; bristling the crest, chattering, mowing and displaying the fearful teeth and tusks. like all the simiads, this troglodyte sways the body to and fro, and springs from side to side for the purpose of avoiding the weapon. at times quasimodo raises himself slightly upon the dwarfed "asthenogenic," and almost deformed hind limbs, which look those of a child terminating the body of a dan lambert: the same action may be seen in its congeners great and small. the wild huntsmen almost cried with laughter when they saw the sketches in the "gorilla book,"[fn# ] the mighty pugilist standing stiff and upright as the late mr. benjamin caunt, "beating the breast with huge fists till it sounded like an immense bass drum;" and preparing to deal a buffet worthy of friar tuck. they asked me if i thought mortal man would ever attempt to face such a thing as that? with respect to drumming with both forehands upon the chest, some asserted that such is the brute's practice when calling mrs. gorilla, or during the excitement of a scuffle; but the accounts of the bushmen differ greatly on this point. in a hand-to-hand struggle it puts forth one of the giant feet, sometimes the hinder, as "joe gorilla" was wont to do; and, having once got a hold with its prehensile toes, it bites and worries like any other ape, baboon, or monkey. from this grapple doubtless arose the old native legend about the gorilla drawing travellers up trees and "quietly choking them." it can have little vitality, as it is easily killed with a bit of stone propelled out of a trade musket by the vilest gunpowder, and the timid bushmen, when failing to shoot it unawares, do not fear to attack it openly. as a rule, the larger the simiad, the less sprightly it becomes; and those most approaching man are usually the tamest and the most melancholy--perhaps, their spirits are permanently affected by their narrow escape. the elderly male (for anthropoids, like anthropoi, wax fierce and surly with increasing years) will fight, but only from fear, when suddenly startled, or with rage when slightly wounded. moreover, there must be rogue-gorillas, like rogue-elephants, lions, hippopotami, rhinoceros, and even stags, vieux grognards, who, expelled house and home, and debarred by the promising young scions from the softening influence of feminine society, become, in their enforced widowerhood, the crustiest of old bachelors. at certain seasons they may charge in defence of the wife and family, but the practice is exceptional. mr. wilson saw a man who had lost the calf of his leg in an encounter, and one etia, a huntsman whose left hand had been severely crippled, informed mr. w. winwood reade, that "the gorilla seized his wrist with his hind foot, and dragged his hand into his mouth, as he would have done a bunch of plantains." no one, however, could give me an authentic instance of manslaughter by our big brother. the modifications with which we must read the picturesque pages of the "gorilla book" are chiefly the following. the gorilla is a poor devil ape, not a "hellish dream-creature, half man, half beast." he is not king of the african forest; he fears the njego or leopard and, as lions will not live in these wet, wooded, and gameless lands, he can hardly have expelled king leo. he does not choose the "darkest, gloomiest forests," but prefers the thin woods, where he finds wild fruits for himself and family. his tremendous roar does not shake the jungle: it is a hollow apish cry, a loudish huhh! huhh! huhh! explosive like the puff of a steam-engine, which, in rage becomes a sharp and snappish bark -- any hunter can imitate it. doubtless, in some exceptional cases, when an aged mixture of lablache and dan lambert delivers his voce di petto, the voice may be heard for some distance in the still african shades, but it will hardly compare with the howling monkeys of the brazil, which make the forest hideous. the eye is not a "light grey" but the brown common to all the tribe. the gorilla cannot stand straight upon his rear quarter when attacking or otherwise engaged without holding on to a trunk: he does not "run on his hind legs;" he is essentially a tree ape, as every stuffed specimen will prove. he never gives a tremendous blow with his immense open paw; doubtless, a native legend found in battel and bowdich; nor does he attack with the arms. however old and male he may be, he runs away with peculiar alacrity: though powerfully weaponed with tigerish teeth, with "bunches of muscular fibre," and with the limbs of goliah, the gorilla, on the seaboard at least, is essentially a coward; nor can we be surprised at his want of pluck, considering the troubles and circumstances under which he spends his harassed days. finally, whilst a hen will defend her chicks, mrs. gorilla will fly, leaving son or daughter in the hunter's hands. chapter xii. corisco--"home" to fernando po. on april nd, after some five weeks in the gaboon river, i found myself once more in her majesty's steam-ship "griffon," which had returned from the south coast, bound for corisco (gorilla island?) and fernando po. it was "going-away day," when proverbially the world looks prettier than usual, and we enjoyed the suggestive view of the beaded line which, seen from the sea, represents the sierra del crystal. the distance from le plateau to the isle of lightning was only thirty-five miles, from the nearest continent ten, and before the evening tornado broke from the south-east, here the normal direction, we were lying in the roads about two miles from the landing-place. the anchorage is known by bringing mbánya (little corisco), the smaller and southern outlier in a line between laval islet and the main island. the frequent coruscations gave a name to corisco, which the natives know as mange: it was called, says barbot, "'ilha do corisco,' from the portuguese, because of the violent horrid lightnings, and claps of thunder, the first discoverers there saw and heard there at the time of their discovery." there is still something to be done in investigating the cause of these electrical discharges. why should lofty fernando po and low-lying corisco suffer so much, when zanzibar island, similarly situated, suffers so rarely? again, why is damascus generally free from thunder-storms when brazilian sâo paul, whose site is of the same altitude and otherwise so like, can hardly keep the lightning out of doors? the immunity of zanzibar island can hardly be explained by the popular theory; neither it nor fernando po, which suffers greatly from thunder-storms, lies near the embouchure of a great river, where salt and fresh water may disturb electrical equilibrium. i shall say more upon this point when in the congo regions (chap. xii.). the position of great corisco (north latitude ° ' ") is at the mouth of a well-wooded bay, which barbot (iv. ) calls bay of angra, i.e. bight of bight. he terms the southern or munda stream rio de angrta, or angex, whilst the equally important muni (danger) becomes only "a little river" without name. the modern charts prefer corisco bay. it measures some forty miles from north to south by half that depth, and its position causes the rains, which are synchronous with those of the gaboon, to be much more copious and continuous. they last nine months out of twelve, and in march, , the fall was inches, the heaviest remembered it had filled the little island valleys, and made the paths lines of canal. next morning we were visited by the rev. mr. mackey, the senior of the eight white men who inhabit this piece of land--a proper site for robinson crusoe--where, as the yankee said of great britain, you can hardly stretch yourself without fear of falling overboard. he kindly undertook to be our guide over the interior, and we landed on the hard sand of the open western beach: here at times a tremendous surf must roll in. we struck into the bush, and bent towards the south-west of the islet, where stands the monarch of cliffs, feet high. the maximum length is three miles by about the same breadth, and the circumference, including the indentations, may be fifteen. the surface is rolling composed of humus and clay, corallines and shelly conglomerates based on tertiary limestone and perhaps sandstone; dwarf clearings alternate with tracts of bush grass, and with a bushy second growth, lacking large trees. the only important wild productions pointed out to us were cardamoms, the oil palm (elais guincensis), and an unknown species of butter-nut. the centre of the island was a mass of perennial pools, fed, they say, by springs as well as rains, one puddle, adorned with water lilies and full of dwarf leeches which relish man's life, extended about a hundred yards long. in fact, the general semblance of corisco was that of a filled up "atoll," a circular reef still growing to a habitable land. here only could i find on the west coast of africa a trace of the features which distinguished the gorilla island of , years ago. at south bay we came upon a grassy clearing larger than usual, near a bright stream; its pottery and charred wood showed the site of the spanish barracoon destroyed by the british in . during the last seven years the "patriarchal institution" has become extinct, and the old slavers who have at times touched at the island, have left it empty-handed. corisco had long been celebrated for cam-wood, a hard and ponderous growth, yielding a better red than brazil or braziletto, alias brazilete (brasilettia, de cand.) one of the eucæsalpinieæ, a congener of c. echinata, which produces the brazil-wood or pernambuco-wood of commerce. in , the hollander governor-general of minas sent some forty whites to cultivate "indian wheat and other sort of corn and plants of guinea." the design was to supply the dutch west indian company's ships with grain and vegetables, especially bananas, which grow admirably; i heard that there are fifteen varieties upon this dot of dry land. thus the crews would not waste time and money at cape lopez and the portuguese islands. the dutch colonists began by setting up a factory in a turf redoubt, armed with iron guns, "the better to secure themselves from any surprise or assault of the few natives, who are a sort of wild and mischievous blacks." the plantation was successful, but the bad climate and noxious gases from the newly turned ground, combined with over-exertion, soon killed some seventeen out of the forty; and the remainder, who also suffered from malignant distempers, razed their buildings and returned to the gold coast. when the crown of spain once more took possession of fernando po, it appointed a governor for corisco, but no establishment was maintained there. to its credit be it said, there was not much interference with the protestant mission; public preaching was forbidden pro formâ in , but no notice was taken of "passive resistance." the native villages, exactly resembling those of the gaboon, are all built near the strip of fine white sand which forms the shore, and upon the sweet water channels which cut deep into the limestones. they are infested with rats, against whose depredations the mango trees must be protected with tin ruffs; yet there are six kinds of reptilia upon the island, including the common black snake and cobras, from six to seven feet long: these animals, aided by the dogs, which also persecute the iguanas, have prevented rabbits breeding. in barbot's time ( ) there were only thirty or forty inhabitants, who held the north- eastern point about a league from the wooding and watering places. "that handful of blacks has much ado to live healthy, the air being very intemperate and unwholesome; they are governed by a chief, who is lord of the island, and they all live very poorly, but have plenty enough of cucumbers, which grow there in perfection, and many sorts of fowl." in the rev. mr. wilson reckons them at less than , , and in i was told that there were about , , of whom were bengas. in look, dress, and ornaments they resemble the mpongwe, but some of them have adopted the kru stripe, holding a blue nose to be a sign of freedom. they consider themselves superior to the "pongos," and they have exchanged their former fighting reputation for that of peaceful traders to the mainland and to the rivers muni and mundah. they live well, eating flesh or fish once a day, not on sundays only, the ambition of henri quatre: at times they trap fine green turtle in seines, but they do not turn these "delicate monsters." mr. wilson numbered the whole benga tribe at , , but mr. mackey reduced the figure to half. besides corisco they inhabit the two capes at the north and south of the bay. the language is used by other tribes holding the coast northward for a hundred miles or more, and probably by the inner people extending in a northerly direction from corisco bay: the same, with certain modifications, is also spoken at são bento, batanga, and perhaps as far north as the camarones river. on the other hand, the tribes occupying the eastern margin of corisco bay, such as the mbiko, dibwe, and belengi, cannot understand one another, and the tongues of the southward regions differ even more from the benga. yet all evidently belong to the great south african family. mr. mackey, who explored corisco island in , assures us that scarcely any of the older inhabitants were born there; they came from the continent north or north-east of the bay, gradually forcing their way down. the characteristic difference of the benga, the bákele, and the mpongwe dialects is as follows: "the mpongwes have a great partiality for the use of the passive voice, and avoid the active when the passive can be used. the bákele verb delights in the active voice, and will avoid the passive even by a considerable circumlocution. the benga takes an intermediate position in this respect, and uses the active and passive very much as we do in english." the corisco branch of the presbyterian board of foreign missions was established by the rev. james s. mackey in . it made as much progress as could be expected, and in it numbered scholars and communicants; the total of those baptized was , and had been suspended. the members applied themselves, as the list of their publications shows, with peculiar ardour to the language, and they did not neglect natural history and short explorations of the adjoining interior. they had sent home specimens of the six reptilia, the six snails and land shells, the seventy-five sea shells, and the fishes, all known by name, which they collected upon the island and in the bay. it is to be presumed that careful dredging will bring to light many more: the pools are said to produce a small black fish, local as the proteus anguineus of the styrian caves, to mention no other. i was curious to hear from mr. mackey some details about the muni river, where he travelled in company with m. du chaillu. it still keeps the troublous reputation for petty wars which made the old traders dignify it with the name of "danger." the nearest falls are about thirty miles from olobe island, and the most distant may be sixty-five. of course we had a laugh over the famous omamba or anaconda, whose breath can be felt against the face before it is seen. late in april th i returned the books kindly lent to me from the mission library, shook hands with my kind and hospitable entertainers at the mission house, mentally wishing them speedy deliverance from corisco, and embarked on board the "griffon." we quickly covered the "great water desert" of miles between the gorilla island and fernando po, and at noon on the next day i found myself once more "at home." [fn# ] paul b. du chaillu, chap. iii. "explorations and adventures in equatorial africa." london: murray, . [fn# ] rev. j. leighton wilson of the presbyterian mission, eighteen years in africa, "western africa," &c. new york. harpers, . [fn# ] barbot, book iv. chap. . [fn# ] this word is the muzungu of the zanzibar coast, and contracted to utángá and even tángá it is found useful in expressing foreign wares; utangáni's devil-fire, for instance, is a lucifer match. [fn# ] "abeokuta and the camaroons mountains," vol. ii. chap. i. london: tinsleys, . [fn# ] see "zanzibar city, island, and coast," vol. i. chap. v sect. . [fn# ] "observations on the fevers of the west african coast." new york: jenkins, . a more valuable work is the "medical topography, &c. of west africa," by the late w.f. daniell, m.d., . finally, mr. consul hutchinson offered valuable suggestions in his work on the niger expedition of - (longmans, , and republished in the "traveller's library"). [fn# ] m. du chaillu ends his chapter i. with an "illustration of a mpongwe woman," copied without acknowledgment from mr. wilson's "portrait of yanawaz, a gaboon princess." [fn# ] everywhere on the lower river "hard dollars" are highly valued. the spanish, formerly the favourite, and always worth s. d., command only a five-franc piece at le plateau; moreover, the "peseta," like the shilling, is taken as a franc. [fn# ] "the british jews," by the rev. john mills. london: houlston and stoneman, . [fn# ] for further details see "zanzibar city, island, and coast," vol. ii. chap. iv. [fn# ] see "zanzibar city, island, and coast," vol. ii. chap. v. [fn# ] see part ii. chap. xxii. "hans stade," translated by mr. albert tootal, annotated by myself, and published by the hakluyt society, . [fn# ] captain boteler (v. ii. p. ) gives a sketch of the "fetiche dance, cape lopez," and an admirable description of ndá, who is mounted on stilts with a white mask, followed by negroes with chalked faces. [fn# ] see "zanzibar, city, island, and coast," vol. i. chap. vii. [fn# ] i have discussed this subject in my "zanzibar," vol. i. chap. xi. [fn# ] m. du chaillu's description of the animal is excellent (p. ), and the people at once recognized the cut. [fn# ] i did not see the iboko, which m. du chaillu (chap, xvi.) calls the "boco;" but, from the native description, i determined it to be the tsetse. he names the sandfly (chap, xvi.) "igoo-gouai." his "ibolai" or "mangrove fly" is "owole" in the singular, and "iwole" in the plural. the wasp, which he terms "eloway," is known to the mpongwe people as "ewogoni." [fn# ] "introductory remarks to a vocabulary of the yoruba language." seeleys, fleet street, london. [fn# ] hutchinson's "ten years' wanderings, p. . [fn# ] "journal of the ethnological society," april, . [fn# ] "zanzibar city, island, and coast," vol. ii. chap. ii. [fn# ] see chap. ii. [fn# ] first edition, illustration vi. (p. ), and xliii. (p. ). end of volume of two trips to gorilla land. proofreaders europe, http://dp.rastko.net. this file was produced from images generously made available by the bibliotheque nationale de france (bnf/gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr. willy de la court [illustration: a mandingo chief, and his headman, in their costume, & other natives] observations upon the windward coast of africa, the religion, character, customs, &c. of the natives; with a system upon which they may be civilized, and a knowledge attained of the interior of this extraordinary quarter of the globe; and upon the natural and commercial resources of the country; made in the years and . by joseph corry. with an appendix, containing a letter to lord howick, on the most simple and effectual means of abolishing the slave trade. london: printed for g. and w. nicol, booksellers to his majesty, pall-mall; and james asperne, cornhill. by w. bulmer and co. cleveland row, st. james's . to the right honourable lord viscount castlereagh, one of his majesty's principal secretaries of state for foreign affairs. my lord, hightly flattered by your lordship's polite condescension, in permitting me to inscribe to you the following pages, i return your lordship my most unfeigned thanks. if they meet your lordship's approbation, and that of a discerning public; or if they tend in the most remote degree to excite more intelligent efforts and more active enterprise on behalf of the unenlightened african, or to augment the commerce of the united kingdom with a country, now in danger of falling into the hands of our enemies, i shall feel an ample reward for the risques and dangers to which i have been exposed in collecting these fragments; while the occasion gives me the opportunity of subscribing myself, with grateful acknowledgments, your lordship's most obedient, and devoted humble servant, joseph corry, preface. with becoming deference, i shall endeavour to illustrate in the following pages, the observations i have personally made upon the coast of africa, and to give the information i have obtained from an extended circle of chiefs, and native tribes, relative to its inhabitants, their religion, habits and customs, the natural productions and commercial resources, &c. and attempt to delineate the most eligible grounds upon which the condition of the african may be effectually improved, and our commercial relations be preserved with that important quarter of the globe. though deeply impressed with the importance of the subject, and my own incompetency, i obtrude myself upon public notice, governed by this reflection, that i am stimulated by an ardent zeal for the prosperity of my country, and am animated by a philanthropic solicitude for the effectual manumission of the african, from his enslaved customs, his superstitious idolatry, and for the enlargement of his intellectual powers. i shall guard against the sacrifice of truth to abstracted principles; and if in the most remote degree, i excite the interference of my countrymen in behalf of the african, extend our commerce, and enlarge the circle of civilized and christian society, i shall think that i have neither travelled, nor written in vain. africa is a country hitherto but little known; those in general who have visited it, have been either inadequate to research, or have been absorbed in the immediate attainment of gain; moreover the european traveller in that country has to contend with the combined influence of the native jealousies of its inhabitants, their hereditary barbarism, obstinate ferocity, and above all, an uncongenial climate. to surmount these difficulties, commerce is the most certain medium to inspire its chiefs and natives with confidence, and to obtain a facility of intercourse with the interior country. sanctioned by that pursuit, i have been favoured with information from a large circle of native chiefs, and tribes, relative to their customs, their habits, localities, predilections, and the existing state of society. the impressions, which ocular demonstration, and personal investigation occasion upon visiting this uncultivated country, are so different from those excited in any other district of the globe, and so powerful, that the mind is naturally led to meditation on the means of its improvement and on the mode by which it may be ameliorated, and the sources of commerce be essentially enlarged. europe, which merits the highest rank for philanthropy, has hitherto strangely neglected this country; nor have the attempts of individuals and benevolent societies been productive in endeavouring to diffuse the influence of civilization, and to desseminate the seeds of science throughout these extensive regions. trusting that my endeavours to befriend the natives of africa, and to extend the commerce of my country, will shield me from the severity of animadversion, and of criticism, i shall proceed in my relation. j. corry. _september st, _. contents. chapter i. remarks from the period of embarkation at st. helen's, till the arrival at sierra leone--sketches of the land seen in the passage--its bearings and distance--observations upon the bay and entrance of sierra leone river, &c. chapter ii. the author leaves bance island.--visits the colony of sierra leone.--delivers his introductory letter to the late governor day, from whom he experiences a most hospitable reception.--cursory remarks upon that colony, and upon the islands of banana.--his embarkation for the island of goree, &c. chapter iii. an excursion to the main land.--visit to king marraboo.--anecdotes of this chief.--another excursion, accompanied by mr. hamilton.--a shooting party, acccompanied by marraboo's son, alexander, and other chiefs.--reflections upon information obtained from them, and at goree, relative to this part of the coast.--embark in his majesty's sloop of war the eugenia, which convoyed mr. mungo park in the brig crescent, to the river gambia, on his late mission to the interior of africa.--observations on that subject.--arrive in porto praya bay, in the island of st. jago.--some remarks upon that island.--departure from thence to england, and safe arrival at portsmouth chapter iv. the author proceeds to london.--re-embarks for africa.--arrives at madeira.--observations on that island.--prosecution of the voyage, and arrival in the sierra leone river, &c. chapter v. observations upon the natural productions of the river sierra leone.--the author explores its branches, interior to bance island, the rochelle, and the port logo.--the manners and customs of the inhabitants.--their commerce.--the author's safe arrival at miffare chapter vi. return to bance island.--general observations on the commerce, religion, customs, and character of the natives upon the windward coast.--an account of the requisite merchandize for trade, the best mode of introducing natural commerce and civilization into africa, &c. chapter vii. the mode of trial by _ordeal_ and _red water_ in africa.--the wars of its inhabitants.--the state of barbarism and slavery considered.--the condition of the africans will not be improved by a late legislative act, without further interference.--salutary measures must be adopted towards the negroes in the colonies.--a system suggested to abolish slavery in africa, and the slave trade in general, and to enlarge the intellectual powers of its inhabitants.--the proper positions to effect an opening to the interior of africa, and to display to the world its manifold resources chapter viii. what the anthor conceives should be the system of establishment to make effectual the operations from cape verd to cape palmas.--reasons for subjecting the whole to one superior and controlling administration.--the situations, in his estimation, where principal depots may be established, and auxiliary factories may be placed, &c. &c. chapter ix. the author embarks in the ship minerva.--proceeds to the rio pongo.--disquisitions thereon.--further observations on the inhabitants, obtained from natives of various nations met with there.--the isles de loss.--returns to sierra leone, &c. chapter x. the author visits the isles de loss.--remarks on those islands.--touches at the river scarcies.--arrives at the colony of sierra leone.--embarks for the west indies--lands at the colony of demerary.--some observations on the productions of that colony, berbice, and essequibo, and on the importance of dutch guiana to the united kingdom in a political and commercial view chapter xi. conclusion appendix. no. i. letter to the right honourable lord viscount howick, his majesty's late principal secretary of state for foreign affairs, on the eve of his lordship introducing the late bill into parliament for the abolition of the slave trade; shewing at one view the most simple and ready mode of gradually and effectually abolishing the slave trade, and eradicating slavery no. ii. letter to the right honourable the lords commissioners of the admiralty, referred to in the foregoing letter to lord howick no. iii. of the purrah of the _termite_, _termes_, or _bug a bug_, as it is called by the natives upon the windward coast of africa of the camelion on the interment of the dead on the amusements, musical instruments, &c. of the africans concluding observations vocabulary of the languages of the principal nations of the windward coast of africa directions to the binder. mandingo chief and his head man, with other natives in their costume, to face the title page. sketch of the windward coast of africa to face page palma the colony of sierra leone and islands of banana island of goree porto praya, island of st. jago island of fogo, cape verd island of st. jago, and paps of cape verd bance island, river sierra leone in illustration of the above plates, it may be satisfactory to the reader to explain that the turban, in the frontispiece, distinguishes the _mandingo chief_; and that the cap, which adorns the _head man_, is embroidered by _themselves_ on scarlet cloth procured from europeans in trade, and is executed with great ingenuity. the narrow stripe of blue cloth suspended behind from the covering which adorns one of the figures in the back ground, distinguishes a female in the state of virginity. this distinguishing mark of _virgin purity_ is uniformly removed upon entering into the matrimonial state, and is called by the timmauees _tintanjey_. in the plate of bance island, river sierra leone, page , is a correct representation of the _pullam_ tree, described in page , as bearing a species of silk cotton, or ether down, and is much revered by the natives, who consider it in many instances as their _fetish_. * * * * * errata. page , line , for _gallunas_ read _galhinas_. , for _is derived from the african gris-gris_, read, _is the expression from which the african gris-gris is_ _derived_. , for _lugras_, read _lugars_. , for _bungra_, read _bangra_. [illustration: sketch of the windward coast of africa] observations upon the windward coast of africa. chapter i. _remarks from the period of my embarkation at st. helens, to my arrival at sierra leone--sketches of the land discovered in the passage--its bearings and distance--with observations upon the bay and entrance of sierra leone river, &c._ previous to my arrival and landing in the river sierra leone, on the th of april, , i shall notice my passage, and display the sketches i have taken of the land we fell in with, its bearings and distance, for the observation of the mariner, which from position and prominence to the atlantic, claim his most serious attention in running down the coast of africa to-windward.[ ] on the th march, , i sailed from st. helens in the ship thames, commanded by james welsh, in company with a fleet of ships bound to the east indies, under convoy of his majesty's ship indostan. we had a favourable run down channel; but, after making to the westward of scilly, a heavy gale of wind separated the thames from the convoy, which we never afterwards regained, and were therefore obliged, at all hazards, to proceed for our destination upon the coast of africa. nothing interesting occurred during a prosperous and quick passage, until the high land of sierra leone appeared in view on the evening of the th of april. we came to an anchor outside the capes, and weighed the next morning, steering our course for the river. the space between leopard's island, situated to the north, and cape sierra leone to the south, forms the entrance into the river sierra leone; being in latitude ° " n. and in ° " w. long. and is computed about seven geographical leagues distant. the river empties itself immediately into the ocean; and its level banks to the north are covered with impervious forests, while those to the south exhibit the romantic scenery of an extended chain of lofty mountains and hills, clothed and ornamented with foliage of the most luxuriant nature, exciting the highest admiration in those who are susceptible of the impressions which the sublime works of the creation never fail to inspire. upon entering the bay, the eye is attracted by an extensive river, circumscribed by the foregoing outline, and exhibiting upon its banks an assemblage of the productions of nature, vegetating in their native purity. this view is animated by the prospect of the colony of sierra leone, and the masts of vessels and craft which commerce, and a safe anchorage, encourage to assemble before it, and by numerous natives paddling with great dexterity in their canoes. [illustration: palma bearing s. by w. distant about leagues from a published aug by g & w nicol] as i shall have occasion to speak hereafter of the importance of this bay in a commercial and agricultural point of view, i shall not at present enter into farther details; but only suggest that i consider it as a position from whence active enterprize may perform its operations throughout an extensive district, and derive the most important advantages. at two. p.m. came to an anchor before the fort and settlement of bance island, which we saluted with seven guns. the river is navigable up to this island for ships, and small craft proceed a number of miles higher, on the branches of the port logo and rochell. it is obscured from the view by the island of tasso, until bearing round a point of that island called tasso point; the eye is then attracted by a regular fortification, and even an elegant range of buildings and store-houses, which, with great propriety, may be considered as one of the most desirable positions upon the windward coast of africa, to command the interior commerce of the countries bordering upon the river sierra leone and its branches, and that of the rivers to the northward, the scarcies and adjoining rivers, the rio pongo, with the isles de loss, rio grande, rio noonez, &c. and those which fall into the sea from cape sierra leone to cape palmas. tasso is an island adjoining, about a mile and a half distant, of some extent, and a remarkably fertile soil. it is attached to bance island; bearing cotton of a very good staple, and is capable of producing any tropical production. considerable labour and expense have been applied to introduce cultivation into this island, and to exemplify to the african the advantages derivable from his native soil, by the civil arts of life; while under a still more scientific superintendency, it would become a possession of very considerable consequence in an agricultural view. bance island is little more than a barren rock, of about three-quarters of a mile in extent. the entrance into the fort is through a folding door or gate, over which, throughout the night, a watch is constantly placed. the expectations excited by its external appearance were by no means lessened by a view of the interior of the fort, in which were assembled several traders, and chiefs, with their attendants. i was much the object of their curiosity and attention; and in their manner, all came up to me, to _give me service _, as expressed in the idiom of their language. this ceremony is simply performed by touching the fingers, accompanied in the timminy language by the usual obeisance of _currea _, or, how do you do? the reply to this is _ba_, which means good, i return you service. the grumittas, or free black people, are assembled outside the fort, in houses or huts built with mud, upon the general construction in africa, which usually is an oblong square, raised little more than eight feet; or a circle of the same height, over which is thrown a roof of bamboo, or other thatch, supported by posts about five or six feet asunder, forming a canopy, which shelters them from the rays of the sun, or the inclemency of the weather, and affords a shade under which they retire in the extreme heat of the day, where they repose in their hammocks, or rest upon their mats. this group of buildings or huts is denominated adam's town, from the black chief who presides over these labouring people. their numbers may be estimated at about . originally they were slaves to the proprietors of this island; but from a very humane and wise policy, they have been endowed with certain privileges, which rescue them from an absolute state of slavery, and prevents their being sold as slaves, unless they are convicted by the laws and customs of their country of some crime or delinquency. among these people are artizans in various branches, viz. smiths, carpenters, joiners, masons, &c. under the superintendance of europeans in their different trades, who for ingenuity and adroitness in their respective capacities, would deserve the approbation even of the connoisseur in these arts; while in many other instances they discover a genius of the most intelligent character, and a decency in their dress and manners distinguished from that among the surrounding tribes; which is the never failing consequence of the influence of the arts of civilized society over barbarous customs and habits. [footnote : perhaps it will be considered by the reader a singular phenomenon, that the upper region of _palma_ was covered with snow.] chapter ii. _the author leaves bance island--visits the colony of sierra leone--delivers his introductory letter to the late governor day, from whom he experiences a most hospitable reception--cursory remarks upon that colony and upon the islands of bannana--his embarkation for the island of goree, &c._ from the th to the td april, i remained at bance island, and having determined to embark for europe, where circumstances required me by the first conveyance, i visited the colony of sierra leone, then under the government of the late capt. william day, of the royal navy, to whom i had a recommendatory letter. his reception of me was in conformity with his general character, distinguished for urbanity and polite hospitality; and such were the impressions upon my mind, both from observation and report, of the skill and penetration he possessed to fulfil the arduous duties of his station, that they never will be effaced, and i shall ever retain the highest respect for his memory. he was then occupied in forming plans of defence in the colony; and had he lived, i am firmly persuaded, from subsequent observation and enquiry, that it would in a short period have opposed to an enemy a formidable resistance, and that it might have been speedily rescued from that anarchy and confusion which distracted councils, and want of unanimity had occasioned. the colony of sierra leone was established by the st of george iii. avowedly in opposition to the slave trade, and for the purpose of augmenting more natural commerce, and introducing civilization among the natives of africa. the grant is from the st of july, , and to continue for the space of years. during the late war with france, in september , it was nearly destroyed by a french squadron, consisting of one two-decker, several armed ships and brigs, in the whole about seven or eight sail; they appeared in the offing on the evening of the th, and in the morning of the th at day-light commenced their operations; the result of which was, that the colony was ravaged by the enemy, and many houses burnt and destroyed. this squadron was piloted into the river by two americans, one of whom was a captain neville. the pecuniary loss to the colony by this attack has been estimated at about , _l_. independant of buildings destroyed, valued at first cost, about , _l_. more. bance island experienced the same fate, and suffered in pecuniary loss upwards of , _l_. in addition to this calamity, the sierra leone company had to lament the inefficiency of its superintendants, their want of unanimity, and various other disasters and unforeseen difficulties which operated to augment the charge in their establishment, and diminish its funds; and with every deference to the benevolent undertakers, whose motives merit the highest approbation of every enlightened mind, i would observe, they have likewise to regret their misconception of the eligible grounds upon which so beneficent a plan is to be productive of operative influence; but as at a future stage of my narrative, i shall be enabled from more minute investigation to enter at large upon this interesting subject, i shall for the present dismiss it. on the th of april i embarked on board his majesty's sloop of war the lark, then upon the windward station; having looked into the river for governor day's dispatches, &c.; and i cannot omit this opportunity of expressing the obligations conferred upon me by captain langford, the commander, and his officers, which invariably continued during my being on board. at day-light we weighed, and were saluted by one of the forts with guns, which were returned; nothing of moment occurred during our passage, except being once overtaken with a tornado: this is a hurricane which prevails upon the windward coast of africa about this season of the year, preceding the rainy season; and it is impossible to convey by description an adequate idea of this explosion of the elements. it announces its approach by a small white cloud scarcely discernible, which with incredible velocity overspreads the atmosphere, and envelopes the affrighted mariner in a vortex of lightning, thunder, torrents of rain, &c. exhibiting nature in one universal uproar. it is necessary when this cloud appears at sea, to take in all sail instantaneously, and bear away right before the furious assailant, which soon expends its awful and tremendous violence, and nature is again hushed into peaceful tranquillity. to the southward of cape sierra leone, and in about degrees north latitude, lie the islands of bannana, in a direction from east to west. to the west of great bannana, lie the smaller islands, which are little more than barren rocks. the soil of the bannanas is very fertile, and the climate healthy, from their proximity to the sea, and the refreshing breezes which it bestows upon them. they take their name from a fruit so denominated; and are situated in the most eligible position for commerce, upon the windward coast; combining, from their fertility of soil and situation, great agricultural advantages, and peculiar salubrity of air. at present the sovereignty of these islands is contended for by two chiefs, of considerable intelligence and enterprise, named caulker and cleveland. caulker appears to be the legitimate sovereign; cleveland's forefathers having been established by caulker's as _trade men_, on their account; and by intermarriage with that family their claims are founded. james cleveland, who married king caulker's sister, first began the war by his grummettas, on the bannanas, attacking caulker's people on the plantains, the result of this violence was, that charles caulker was killed in battle; and his body mangled and cut into pieces, in the most savage and cruel manner. in , stephen caulker, the present chief, commenced war again, to revenge his brother's death; and the barbarous contest has continued ever since, marked with ferocious cruelty, and with various success to the respective claimants. soon after its renewal, james cleveland died, and was succeeded by his nephew, william, who has received his education in england, and is a chief of no inconsiderable acquirements and talent. stephen caulker has succeeded in obtaining from him the possession of the bannanas and plantains, and at present sways authority over them; still, however, exposed to the enterprising genius and intrigues of cleveland. [illustration: the colony of sierra leone a bearing s.w. by e. distant miles, and the bananas bearing s.w. by w distant leagues. published aug by g & w nicol] were it practicable to reconcile these contentions, and procure these valuable islands, they would form most eligible auxiliaries and depots to any establishment which government might form upon this part of the coast, and be of the utmost importance; or in the event of their being unattainable, factories might be established at kittim and boom, both under caulker's influence and protection. i have had frequent intercourse with this chief, and i found him of a very superior understanding, and acute intellect, to the generality of his countrymen; and if his jealousies could be allayed by the emollients of superior advantage, his intelligence and co-operation would much facilitate any operations in this quarter. on the th of april we arrived at goree roads, and came to an anchor nearly opposite to that part of the island of goree, called the point de nore, and opening cape emanuel, which is by much the most eligible position in the event of tornados, as a ship may always run in safety to sea, between the island and the main land. goree is a small island, or barren rock, little more than three quarters of a mile in length, and a few hundred yards in breadth. its native inhabitants are of colour, and a spurious progeny from the french; for whom they still retain a great predilection. the number of what are called principal inhabitants, does not exceed males, with their families, dependants, and slaves; which may in the aggregate amount to frequently between three and four thousand souls. their principal trade is in slaves, of whom they annually export about two thousand, with a small proportion of dead cargo, chiefly procured from gambia. religion, of any description, is little practised or understood among them; although it is evident that christianity has been introduced into the island, as there are traces of a catholic chapel and a monastery remaining. custom here, as in all the maritime countries of africa, is the governing principle of all their actions, added to an avaricious thirst for gain, and the indulgence of sensual gratification. the ceremony of marriage is too offensive for delicacy even to reflect upon, much less for me to narrate: it does not attach to the union any sacred obligation, the bond being broken at the moment of caprice in either party, or predilection in favour of any other object. as a preliminary to this disgusting ceremony, a "big dinner," in their phraseology, and a few presents to the lady, first obtaining her and her parents' consent, is all that is requisite. when the happy pair are united, the dependants and slaves of the parties, and their respective connexions, who are assembled round the buildings or huts, send forth a most savage yell of exclamation, accompanied by their barbarous music, gesticulations, and clapping of the hands, in unison with their song of triumph. this dance is continued with unabating vociferation during the night, and perhaps for a week, or greater length of time, bearing, however, due reference to the rank and consequence of the connubial pair. the following morning the bride issues forth, with solemn pace and slow, in grand procession, preceded by her most intimate female associate during her virgin state, reclining upon her shoulder with both hands; who, in consequence, is considered as the next matrimonial candidate. they are immediately surrounded by a concourse of attendants, accompanied by music, dancing, and other wild expressions of joy; and in a body proceed to visit her circle of acquaintance and friends, who are always expected to contribute some offering of congratulation. this ceremony is the concluding one on the part of the bride; while the dancing and music are continued by the attendants as long as they can procure any thing either to eat or drink. [illustration: island of goree published aug by g & w nicol] in a military point of view, in its present condition, the island of goree is far from being a place of strength; but in a commercial, it is of considerable importance; and, therefore, ought to claim the attention of government, if it attaches any consequence towards a commerce with the coast of africa. in a military character, its batteries and guns are in an extremely bad condition; and it is completely a position where a piccaroon privateer could check every supply from the continent, upon which it depends for fresh provisions and water, and might carry on hostile operations without the range of its batteries; which, by consequence, always exposes this garrison to contingencies and casual supply. in a commercial consideration, i view it as a possession of the greatest moment; from its contiguity to the french settlement of the senegal, and to a large portion of that valuable district, which they claim and influence; from whence accurate information may be obtained of their operations; and a check may issue, to maintain our ascendency to leeward; besides a rallying point for our outward bound ships, to ascertain the enemy's force upon the coast; the deviation from a direct course to leeward being very unimportant: moreover, it might be an eligible depot for the trade of that infinitely valuable river, the gambia, which, for variety of natural productions, is perhaps not to be excelled by any other in the world; only requiring the hand of industry and intelligence to fertilize and unfold. the garrison of goree has seldom more than effective men to defend it, of the royal african regiment, commanded by major lloyd;[ ] and this force is very fluctuating, from sickness and the diseases of the climate; in general, however, it is tolerably healthy, and its physical department is superintended by a gentleman (doctor heddle) of very considerable intelligence and ability in his profession. the hospitality of major lloyd, and the officers of his corps, to their countrymen, is distinguished by liberality; and during my stay in that island, which was upwards of three weeks, i have to acknowledge their polite attentions. i was the inmate of mr. hamilton, in the commissariat department, whose peculiar friendship and kind offices have made a most indelible impression upon my mind. the view from the roads, some of the buildings near the shore being of stone, and upon even an elegant and convenient construction, is calculated to raise expectation upon approaching it, which is considerably lessened[**transcriber's note: "lessoned" must be a typesetting error.] upon a nearer view; the streets being extremely narrow, and the huts of the natives huddled together without regularity or system. the inhabitants are governed in their local customs and capacities by a native mayor, and his advisers; but, of course, under the control of the commandant of the garrison; and this privilege is a mere matter of form and courtesy, which a lenient authority permits. [footnote : now lieutenant colonel lloyd.] chapter iii. _an excursion to the main land.--visit to king marraboo.--anecdotes of this chief.--another excursion, accompanied by mr. hamilton.--a shooting party, accompanied by marraboo's son, alexander, and other chiefs.--reflections upon information obtained from them, relative to this part of the coast, and at goree.--embark in his majesty's sloop of war, the eugenie, which convoyed mr. mungo park in the brig crescent, to the river gambia, on his late mission to the interior of africa.--observations on that subject.--arrive in porto praya bay, in the island of st. jago.--some remarks upon that island.--departure from thence to england, and safe arrival at portsmouth._ a few days after the arrival of the lark at the island of goree, accompanied by a party of the officers of that ship, i made an excursion upon the main land: we set out from the ship early in the morning, for decar, the capital of a chief or king, named marraboo: we arrived before he had moved abroad, and, after going through winding narrow paths or streets, we were conducted by one of his people to his palace, a wretched hovel, built with mud, and thatched with bamboo. in our way to this miserable habitation of royalty, a confused sound of voices issued forth from almost every hut we passed, which originated from their inhabitants vociferating their morning orisons to allah and mahomet; their religion being an heterogeneous system of mahomedanism, associated with superstitious idolatry, incantations, and charms. we found _marraboo's head men_ and priests assembled before his majesty's dwelling _to give him service_, and to offer him their morning's salutation. at length he made his appearance, followed by several of the officers of the palace, carrying skins of wild beasts, and mats, which upon enquiry, i found to have composed the royal bed, spread out upon a little hurdle, erected about a foot and a half high, interwoven with bamboo canes: my attention was much engaged with this novel sight; and i could not contemplate the venerable old man, surrounded by his chiefs, without conceiving i beheld one of the patriarchs of old, in their primaeval state. after his chiefs had paid their obeisance, i presumed, accompanied by my friends, to approach the royal presence; when he discovered us among the group, his countenance underwent an entire change, expressive of reserve and surprise, exclaiming, "what did i want with marraboo?" with great humility i replied, "i be englishman, come from king george's country, his brother, to give him service." he replied with quickness, "i be very glad to see you, what service have you brought?" i was aware of this tax upon my civility, and replied, that "i make him good service;" which in plain english was, that i shall make you a good present. he then conversed with more freedom relative to his country, government, localities, and religion; i suggested to him that "i understood he was a powerful king, and a great warrior, had many wives and children, that he ruled over much people, and a fine country, that i hear he get much head, that he far pass any of his enemies, and that i be very happy to look so great a king:" or, in other words, that i understood he was a great general, was very rich, was more wise than all his contemporary chiefs, and that it gave me much pleasure to pay my respects to so great a prince: but the former idiom of language is best adapted to convey meaning to the interpreters of the chiefs of africa, in whatever tongue it may be spoken; being that which they use in translation; and when they are addressed in this phraseology, they convey their ideas with more perspicuity and literal interpretation. but to return to the dialogue. marraboo.--"i be very glad to look you for that, i have much trouble all my life--great deal of war--my son some time since killed in battle." this was accompanied by such a melancholy expression of countenance, that could not fail to excite my compassion, i therefore avoided touching more on the subject of his wars; only observing, "that i hear he be too much for all his enemies, and that he build great wall that keep his town and people safe." marraboo.--"the king of darnel's people cannot pass that--they all be killed--they come there sometimes, but always go back again." my curiosity was excited to obtain the history of this _enchanted wall_, which on my approach to the town, i had discovered to be apparently little more than three or four feet high, and situated within the verge of their wells of fresh water, open at several places, and without any defence. upon enquiry, i found that marraboo had been early in life _fetish man_, or high priest, to damel, king of cayor, a very powerful chief bordering upon the senegal, and that he had artfully contrived to gain over to his interest a number of adherents, who, in process of time, became formidable, rebelled against their lawful sovereign, and took possession of that part of the country towards cape verd: to strengthen their position, marraboo caused a wall to be erected, commencing from the sea shore, and extending towards the cape; which, in the estimation of the natives, and in consequence of his sacerdotal office, incantations, and charms, was rendered invulnerable: the hypocritical priest well knew the natural disposition of his countrymen, and the effect his exorcisms would produce upon their minds; which operated so effectually, that when his army was beaten by the powerful damel, they uniformly retired behind their exorcised heap of stones, which in a moment stopt their enemy's career, and struck them with such dread, that they immediately retired to their country, leaving their impotent enemy in quiet possession of his usurped territory; whom otherwise they might have annihilated with the greatest facility. superstition is a delusion very prevalent in africa; and its powerful influence upon the human mind is forcibly illustrated by the foregoing instance. when i enquired of marraboo the nature of his belief in a supreme being, his observations were confused and perplexed, having no perspicuous conception of his attributes or perfections, but an indistinct combination of incomprehensibility; and to sum up the whole, he remarked, "that he pass all men, and was not born of woman." a few days after the abovementioned visit, i made another excursion to the main land, accompanied by mr. hamilton, and one of the principal inhabitants of goree, named martin. we landed at a small native town, called after the island, goree town. when we came on shore, we were immediately surrounded by natives, who surveyed us with great curiosity and attention. we had prepared ourselves with fowling-pieces and shooting equipage, with the view of penetrating into the interior country: in pursuance of our design, we dispatched a messenger to _decar_, with a request that we might be supplied with attendants and horses: our solicitation was promptly complied with; and alexander, marraboo's son, speedily made his appearance with two horses, attended by several chiefs and head men. our cavalcade made a most grotesque exhibition; mr. hamilton and myself being on horseback, followed by alexander and his attendants on foot, in their native accoutrements and shooting apparatus. my seat was not the most easy, neither was my horse very correct in his paces; the saddle being scarcely long enough to admit me, with a projection behind, intended as a security from falling backwards: the stirrups were formed of a thin plate of iron, about three or four inches broad, and so small, that i could scarcely squeeze my feet into them. in our progress we killed several birds, of a species unknown in europe, and of a most beautiful plumage; one of which, a little larger than the partridge in england, was armed with a sharp dart or weapon projecting from the pinion, as if designed by nature to operate as a guard against its enemies. our associates rendered us every friendly attention, and evinced great anxiety to contribute to our sport; and proved themselves skilful and expert marksmen. the country abounded with a multiplicity of trees and plants, which would no doubt have amply rewarded the researches of the botanist, and scientific investigator. the fatigue i had undergone, and the oppressive heat of the sun, so completely overpowered me, by the time of our return to goree town, that i felt myself attacked by a violent fever; in this situation i was attended with every tenderness and solicitude by the females; some bringing me a calabash of milk, others spreading me a mat to repose upon, and all uniting in kind offices: it is from them alone that man derives his highest happiness in this life; and in all situations to which he is exposed, they are the assuasive agents by whom his sorrows are soothed, his sufferings alleviated, and his griefs subdued; while compassion is their prominent characteristic, and sympathy a leading principle of their minds. the attention of these kind beings, and the affectionate offices of my friend, operating upon a naturally good constitution, soon enabled me to overcome the disease, and to return again to goree. during the remaining part of my stay there, i was vigilantly employed in procuring every information relative to this part of the coast, and through the intelligence of several of the native inhabitants and traders, i am enabled to submit the following remarks. to elucidate, with perspicuity, the deep impression i feel of the importance of this district of the windward coast, in obtaining a facility of intercourse with the interior, combining such a variety of local advantage, by which our ascendency may be preserved, and our commercial relations improved, is an undertaking, the difficulties of which i duly appreciate; and i am aware that i have to combat many prejudices and grounds of opposition to the system i conceive to be practicable, to develope the various stores of wealth with which africa abounds, and to improve the intellectual faculties of its native inhabitants. that a situation so highly valuable as the senegal, and its contiguous auxiliary, the island of goree, has been so overlooked, is certainly a subject of great surprise, and deep regret. while visionary and impracticable efforts have been resorted to penetrate into the interior of africa, we have strangely neglected the maritime situations, which abound with multifarious objects of commerce, and valuable productions, inviting our interference to extricate them from their dormant state; and the consideration apparently has been overlooked, that the barbarism of the natives on the frontiers must first be subdued by enlightened example, before the path of research can be opened to the interior. we have several recent occurrences to lament, where the most enterprising efforts have failed, through the inherent jealousies of the natives, and their ferocious character; and, therefore, it is expedient to commence experiments in the maritime countries, as the most eligible points from whence operative influence is to make its progress, civilization display itself among the inhabitants, and a facility of intercourse be attained with the interior. so long as this powerful barrier remains in its present condition, it will continue unexplored; and our intercourse with its more improved tribes must remain obscured, by the forcible opposition of the frontier; and these immense regions, with their abundant natural resources, continue unknown to the civilized world. the inhabitants of the sea coast are always more fierce and savage than those more remote and insular: all travellers and voyagers, who have visited mankind in their barbarous state, must substantiate this fact: and the history of nations and states clearly demonstrates, that the never-failing influence of commerce and agriculture united, has emanated from the frontiers, and progressively spread their blessings into the interior countries. view our own now envied greatness, and the condition in which our forefathers lived, absorbed in idolatry and ignorance, and it will unquestionably appear, that our exalted state of being has arisen from the introduction of the civilized arts of life, the commerce which our local situation has invited to our shores, and our agricultural industry. within the district now in contemplation, flows the river of _senegal_, with its valuable _gum trade_; the _gambia_, abounding with innumerable objects of commerce, such as indigo, and a great variety of plants for staining, of peculiar properties, timber, wax, ivory, &c.; _the rio grande, rio noonez, rio pongo,_ &c. all greatly productive, and their borders inhabited by the jolliffs, the foollahs, the susees, the mandingos, and other inferior nations, and communicating, as is now generally believed, with the river niger, which introduces us to the interior of this great continent; the whole presenting an animating prospect to the distinguished enterprise of our country. that these advantages should be neglected, is, as i have before said, subject of deep regret, and are the objects which i would entreat my countrymen to contemplate, as the most eligible to attain a knowledge of this important quarter of the globe, and to introduce civilization among its numerous inhabitants; by which means, our enemies will be excluded from that emolument and acquirement, which we supinely overlook and abandon to contingencies. the island of goree lies between the french settlement of the senegal and the river gambia, and therefore is a very appropriate local station to aid in forming a general system of operation from cape verd to cape palmas, subject to one administration and control. the administrative authority, i would recommend to be established in the river of sierra leone, as a central situation, from whence evolution is to proceed with requisite facility, and a ready intercourse be maintained throughout the whole of the windward coast; and as intermediate situations, i would propose the rivers gambia, rio noonez, rio pongo, and isles de loss, to the northward; and to the southward, the bannana islands, the galinhas, bassau, john's river, &c. to cape palmas; or such of them as would be found, upon investigation, best calculated to promote the resources of this extensive coast. the supreme jurisdiction in the river sierra leone, with auxiliaries established to influence the trade of the foregoing rivers, form the outlines of my plan, to be supported by an adequate military force, and organized upon principles which i have hereafter to explain in the course of my narrative. having an opportunity to sail for england, in his majesty's sloop of war the eugenie, commanded by charles webb, esq. as it was uncertain at what time the lark was to proceed, i availed myself of that officer's kind permission to embark, accompanied by surgeon thomas burrowes and his lady. the eugenie had been dispatched for england to convoy the crescent transport brig, with mr. mungo park on board, to the river gambia, upon his late mission to the interior of africa. captain webb did not conceive it prudent, nor indeed was it expedient, to proceed higher up the river than jillifree, and dispatched the crescent as far as kaya, about miles from the capes of the river, where mr. park landed with his associates, viz. his surgeon, botanist, draftsman, and about soldiers, commanded by an officer obtained from the royal african corps at goree, by the order of government. nothing could have been more injudicious than attempting this ardoous undertaking, with any force assuming a military appearance. the natives of africa are extremely jealous of white men, savage and ferocious in their manners, and in the utmost degree tenacious of any encroachment upon their country. this unhappy mistake may deprive the world of the researches of this intelligent and persevering traveller, who certainly merits the esteem of his country, and who, it is to be feared, may fall a victim to a misconceived plan, and mistaken procedure. [illustration: porto praya, island of st jago published aug by g & w nicol] although anxious to embark, yet i could not take my departure without sensibly feeling and expressing my sense of obligation for the many attentions i had to acknowledge from the officers of the garrison, and also to several of the native inhabitants, among whom were peppin, martin, st. john, and others; the latter, i am sorry to say, was in a bad state of health; i am much indebted to him for his judicious remarks, and very intelligent observations. this native received his education in france, and has acquired a very superior intelligence relative to the present condition of his country. accompanied by mr. hamilton, my hospitable and friendly host, and several of the officers of the lark, i embarked on board the eugenie, on the st of may, and arrived in porto praya bay on the d of june. the town of porto praya is situated upon a plain, forming a height from the sea, level with the fort, and is a most wretched place, with a very weak and vulnerable fortification. in the roads there is good anchorage for shipping, opposite to quail island, and for smaller vessels nearer the shore. it has a governmenthouse, a catholic chapel, a market place, and jail, built with stone; and is now the residence of the government of the island of st. jago, subject to the crown of portugul. formerly the governor's place of abode was at the town of st. jago, upon the opposite side of the island: his title is that of governor-general of the islands, comprehending mayo, fogo, &c. mayo is remarkable for its salt, which is cast on shore by the rollers or heavy seas, which at certain periods prevail, and run uncommonly high. the heat of the sun operating upon the saline particles, produces the salt, which the inhabitants collect in heaps for sale. we anchored at mayo for some hours, and a number of vessels were lying in the roads, chiefly americans, taking in this article; it is a very rocky and dangerous anchorage; we, however, found the traders were willing to undergo the risque, from the cheapness of the commodity they were in quest of. it is a most sorry place, with scarce a vestige of vegetation upon its surface, and its inhabitants apparently live in the greatest misery. they are governed by a black man, subject to the administration of st. jago. the military force of st. jago is by no means either formidable in numbers or discipline, and exhibits a most complete picture of despicable wretchedness. a black officer, of the name of vincent, conducted as to the governor, who received us with politeness, and gave us an invitation to dinner. the town and garrison were quite in a state of activity and bustle; an officer of high rank and long residence among them had just paid the debt of nature, and his body was laid in state in the chapel, in all his paraphernalia. the greater part of the monks from the monastery of st. jago were assembled upon the occasion, to sing requiems for his soul; and the scene was truly solemn and impressive. we met these ministers of religion at dinner, but how changed from that gravity of demeanor which distinguished them in their acts of external worship. the governor's excellent madeira was taken in the most genuine spirit of devotion, accompanied by fervent exclamations upon its excellent qualities. upon perceiving this holy fervency in the pious fraternity, we plied them closely, and frequently joined them in flowing bumpers, until their ardour began to sink into brutal stupidity, and the morning's hymns were changed into revelry and bacchanalian roar. [illustration: pogo, bearing n. by w. distance about leagues from b published aug by g & w nicol] [illustration: island of st. iago, distance miles. . paps of cape verde, bearing at c, _n.n.e._ and at d, _s.e._ by _s._ distance leagues. published aug by g & w nicol] this, however, was rather a tax upon the governor's hospitality, as it deprived him of his _ciesta_, a common practice with him, almost immediately after the cloth is withdrawn. when we came ashore the next morning, we were highly entertained with the anecdotes related to us of the pranks performed during the night by the convivial priests, many of whom were unable to fulfil the duties of the altar at the usual hour of prayer. the natives of st. jago, with those of the neighbouring islands, are mostly black, or of a mixed colour, very encroaching in their manners, and much addicted to knavery. the island is extremely rocky and uneven, but the vallies are fertile. the inhabitants raise cotton, and they have several sugar works; the quantity they raise of both, does not, however, much exceed their own consumption, but there is no doubt that it might be considerably augmented by industry, even for exportation; but the natives are indolent, and extremely listless in their habits. the only inducement in touching at this island is, to procure water and provisions: the former is good, and the latter consists in hogs, turkeys, ducks, poultry, &c. but frequently, after they have been visited by a fleet, a great scarcity prevails. the commodities the natives require as payment may be purchased at rag fair, being extremely partial to cast off wearing apparel of every description. the men are extremely slovenly in their dress; but the women are rather more correct and uniform, those of the better condition being habited in muslin, and their hair ornamented, and neatly plaited. they manufacture a narrow cloth of silk and cotton, which is in high estimation among them, and its exportation is prohibited, except to portugal. considerable ingenuity is displayed in this manufacture, which is performed in a loom, differing very little from that used by the ruder inhabitants of the coast of africa, and similar to the garter loom in england. they have horses and mules well adapted to their roads and rugged paths, which they ride most furiously, particularly the military, who advance at full speed to a stone wall, or the side of a house, merely to shew their dexterity in halting. after being detained here for several days in taking in stock and provisions, we again weighed with the crescent brig, and a sloop from gambia, bound to london, under our convoy, and after a tedious and very anxious passage, arrived at portsmouth on the th of august. we were detained under quarantine until the return of post from london, and proceeded on shore the following day. there is something in _natale solum_ which charms the soul after a period of absence, and operates so powerfully, as to fill it with indescribable sensations and delight. every object and scene appeals so forcibly to the senses, enraptures the eye, and so sweetly attunes the mind, as to place this feeling among even the extacies of our nature, and; the most refined we are capable of enjoying. it is this love of his country which stimulates man to the noblest deeds; and, leaving all other considerations, only obedient to its call, separates him from his most tender connections, and makes him risque his life in its defence. "where'er we roam, whatever realms to see, our hearts untravell'd fondly turn to thee; still to our country turn, with ceaseless pain, and drag, at each remove, a lengthening chain." goldsmith. chapter iv. _the author proceeds to london.--re-embarks for africa.--arrives at madeira.--observations on that island.--prosecution of the voyage, and arrival in the sierra leone river, &c._ our happy arrival was celebrated at the crown inn, where captain webb and his first lieutenant (younger) joined us; we dined together, and separated with mutual kind wishes. the next morning mr. burrowes and myself proceeded to london, and were once more rapidly conducted into its busy scene. without even time to greet my friends, i again left town for portsmouth, to commit myself to the watery element, and revisit the shores. i had so recently left; and on the d of september sailed, in the ship andersons, from st. helen's, under convoy of the arab post sloop of war, commanded by keith maxwell, esq. and the favorite sloop of war, by john davie, esq. we anchored in funchal roads, island of madeira, on saturday the lath of october, without experiencing any remarkable event. when approaching the island of madeira, it exhibits to the eye a strikingly beautiful and picturesque view. the uneven surface of the hills, covered with plantations of vines, and various kinds of herbage, with the exception of partial spots burnt up by the heat of the sun in the dry season, displays a singular perspective, which, with the beautiful appearance of the interspersed villas, churches, and monasteries, form an arrangement both exquisite and delightful. after being visited by the boat of health, our party proceeded on shore in the evening; and upon being made known to the house of messrs. murdoch, masterton, and co. were politely invited to breakfast the ensuing morning. at our appearance, in conformity with our appointment, we were introduced into the breakfast parlour by mr. wardrope, one of the acting partners, to his lady and sister, who received us with engaging civilities and attention. after our friendly meal, we perambulated the town of funchal, and attended chapel, which so far from being a house of devotion, presented to our contemplation a rendezvous for intrigue and the retirement of a conversazione. funchiale or funchal, takes its derivation from funcho, signifying in the portuguese language, fennel; it is situated at the bottom of a bay, and may be considered disproportionate to the island, in extent and appearance, as it is ill built, and the streets remarkably narrow and ill paved. the churches are decorated with ornaments, and pictures of images and saints, most wretchedly executed: i understand, however, that a much better taste is displayed in the convents, more especially that of the franciscans, in which is a small chapel, exhibiting the disgusting view of human skulls and thigh bones lining its walls. the thigh bones form a cross, and the skulls are placed in each of the four angles. nature has been very bountiful in her favours to madeira; its soil is rich and various, and its climate is salubrious and versatile; it abounds in natural productions, and only requires the fostering hand of the husbandman to produce every necessary, and almost luxury, of life. walnuts, chesnuts, and apples, flourish in the hills, almost spontaneously, and guanas, mangoes, and bananas, in wild exuberance. at the country residence of james gordon, esq. where we dined, and met with the most distinguished hospitality, i saw a most surprising instance of rapid growth; a shoot of the tree, called the limbriera royal, started up, perpendicularly from the trunk, to a height of nearly _thirty feet_, from the month of january to that of october: it is, however, to be observed, that the branches were lopped off, and it is supposed the juices of the trunk communicated to this stem. corn of a very good quality grows in this island, and might be produced in plenty, but the inhabitants, whose characteristic is idleness, neglect its culture, and thereby subject themselves to the necessity of relying upon foreign imports. their beef, mutton, and pork, are remarkably good, and they have game in the mountains. by order of the late governor, in , the population was taken from the confessional returns, and, as he was himself a bishop, it may be inferred that the number stated below, which i procured from official authority, is accurate, viz. number confessed, , and, calculating in for children under years of age, the first period of their confession, is equal to , -------- making in the aggregate the number of souls to be , -------- , of whom were computed to be inhabitants of the town of funchal. the government consists of a governor, appointed by the crown of portugal, the island being in its possession, styled governor of the islands, and: is perfectly arbitrary; funchal is his residence; he has a council under him consisting of members, whose president is the second judge for the time being. all officers are nominated by the crown, and the holders continue only for three years, at the end of which new nominations take place. the only article of trade is wine, of which they export about , pipes annually, and consume from to , pipes in the island, comprehending _small wine_, &c. being in the whole about , pipes. it is made by pressing out the juice from the grape in a wooden vessel, proportioned in size to the quantity they intend to make. the wine-pressers take off their jackets and stockings, get into the vessel, and with their elbows and feet press as much of the juice as is practicable by this operation; the stalks are then tied together and pressed, under a square piece of wood, by a lever with a stone fastened to the end of it; the wine is brought from the country in goat skins, by men and women on their heads. the roads are so steep and roughly paved, that neither carriages nor carts are in use, the substitute is a palanquin for the former, and for the latter a hollow log of wood, drawn by oxen, upon which the wine vessels or other loads are placed; they, however, have horses and mules very well adapted to their roads. the revenue to the crown of portugal is estimated from to , _l_. annually, clear of all expenses; but the balance of trade is greatly against them, all their specie being drawn to lisbon. the currency of the island is spanish, and consists of dollars, converted by their laws, into milreas of _s_. _d_. pistareens, value about is. bits, about _d_. and half bits, about _d_. it is disadvantageous to take up money at madeira upon bills, as they make payment in dollars, which they value at a milrea. sometimes they may, from particular circumstances, give a premium, but it is seldom equal to the discount. on the morning of the th i bad my grateful adieu to madeira, and the friendly roof of mr. wardrope and his united family, the abode of conjugal affection, friendship, and hospitable reception; and at p.m. went on board. we weighed anchor under the protection of the favorite, the arab continuing at her moorings. passing between the grand canary and close in with teneriffe, we arrived safe at the island of goree, on the th of november, without our commodore, under convoy of the favorite. the ship andersons having freight to deliver at that island, we continued there until the th, and again resumed our voyage; arriving, without accident; at bance island, which i have previously noticed, on the d of the same month. my residence was confined to this island, and in excursions through the neighbouring countries, until the th june, , during which period, and from a general intercourse with an extended circle of chiefs, natives, and traders, i have been enabled to decide upon the situation of this country, and to form a conclusive opinion of the condition and character of its inhabitants, and its commercial resources. from these sources of intelligence, and the example this island displayed, with observations upon the conduct and management of the sierra leone company, i first conceived the system that i shall hereafter delineate, upon which the african's condition may be effectually improved, and his hereditary slavery exterminated. [illustration: bance island, in the river sierra leone. _the property of john & alexander anderson esq. london._] the natives of africa resident upon the coast, are uniformly considered as more ferocious and barbarous in their customs and manners, less numerous in population, and more encroaching and deceitful, than those of the interior. while this formidable opposition exists, and the baneful influence of barbarous habits continues, it is in vain to look to remuneration by natural commerce, or to the establishment of civilization. the african's barbarity must be first here assailed, and the infinite resources upon the coasts and maritime rivers must be developed to his view, to pre-dispose him to refine his condition, and adopt the civilized habits of life; nor is there any site which i have met with upon the windward coast of africa, more calculated to promote this beneficent undertaking, than the island of bance, from its locality of situation, being central to windward and leeward operation, commanding an extensive circle of interior country, and being long established in the estimation of the natives of an extended district. but more of this subject in order. chapter v. _observations upon the natural productions of the river sierra leone.--the author explores its branches, interior to bance island, the rochelle, and the port logo.--the manners and customs of the inhabitants.--their commerce.--the author's safe arrival at miffaré._ the river of sierra leone abounds in fish, and the spermaceti whale has been occasionally found, the shark, the porpoise, eels, mackarel, mullet, snappers, yellow tails, cavillos, tenpounders, &c. with the _mannittee_, a singular mass of shapeless flesh, having much the taste of beef, which the natives greatly esteem, and consider the highest offering they can make. oysters are found in great abundance, attached to the interwoven twigs and branches of the mangrove tree, to which they closely cling; and of the zoophytes, there is the common sponge to be found upon the sandy beaches, on the boolum shore, and would, no doubt, bring a high price in england. the domestic animals of the adjoining countries are, cattle, sheep, goats, hogs, ducks, turkeys, and fowls, very inferior, however, to those in europe. the beasts of prey are, lions, leopards, hyaenas, wild hogs in abundance, squirrels, monkies, antelopes, &c. with the civet and zibeth cats, and a most extraordinary animal, which is found in the mountains of sierra leone and the adjacent countries, a species of the ourang outang, called by the natives, japanzee, or chimpanzee, but approaching nearer to the anatomy of the human frame than the former animal. some of them, when full grown, are nearly feet, and are covered with black hair, long on the back, but thin and short upon the belly and breast; the face is quite bare, and the hands and feet resemble those of man; its countenance is remarkably grave, similar to that of an old black man, but its ears are straight; it will imitate a human being in walking, sleeping, eating, and drinking, and is certainly a most singular production of nature. surgeon burrowes, whom i have before mentioned, had a perfect skeleton of this animal, which, he assured me, differed in nothing from the human, but in the spine, it being curved. this skeleton, i believe, now forms a part of the collection of surgeon-general keate. there are, of amphibious animals, green turtles, hawk's bills, and loggerheads, which grow to a great size, some of them weighing several hundred pounds, land turtles, fresh water turtles, alligators, extremely voracious, and from to feet in length; they will swallow a man, and at bance island negro boys have been frequently snatched up by them from the shore. there are also a variety of the lizard species, with the guava, and camelion. snakes abound; some of them haunt the houses in the night, and prowl about for poultry, of which they are fond; some have been found to measure above feet; and i have the skin of one in my possession, killed when young, above feet in length; it is that species which swallows its prey entire; several animals were found in their perfect state when the one i allude to was cut open. there is also an immense animal of this species, which i have heard the natives of this part of the coast describe, often exceeding feet in length, and of an enormous size; it is variegated with spots, and the head is covered with scales; the tongue is fleshy and forked, but its bite is not poisonous; it is to be found in the recesses of caves and thickets, from whence it suddenly darts upon its victim, whether man or beast: it frequently chooses a tree, from which it reconnoitres the passing objects, supporting itself by the tail, which it twists round the trunk or branches: when it seizes animals, especially those of the larger kind, such as lions, tigers, &c. it dexterously, and almost instantaneously twists itself round their bodies in several folds, and by its powerful muscular force, breaks the bones, and bruises it in all its parts; when this is done it covers the animal with a viscous cohesive saliva, by licking its body with its tongue, which facilitates the power of swallowing it entire; this process is tedious, and it gradually sucks in the body, which, if large, renders it incapable of moving for some time, until it digests; and this is the period which the hunters watch to destroy it: it makes a hissing noise like a serpent, and has recourse to a variety of expedients to conceal itself; it is called by the natives _tinnui_, and is what i apprehend naturalists term the species of _boa constrictor_: it is most commonly found in the sultry climates of africa, and i believe is also an inhabitant of asia and america. insects are extremely numerous, of a nondescript species, and exceedingly beautiful: the most singular are termites, destructive to houses and fences built of wood; ants, causing ruin to provisions; cockroaches and crickets, destroying leather, linen, and clothes; musquitos, sand-flies, centipedes, scorpions; and wild bees, which are very productive of honey. the vermis and large barnacles abound, which are so destructive to shipping without copper bottoms. esculent vegetables are various: rice, which forms the chief part of the african's sustenance. the rice-fields or _lugars_ are prepared during the dry season, and the seed is sown in the tornado season, requiring about four or five months growth to bring it to perfection. yams, a nutritious substance, known in the west indies. _cassada_ or _cassava_, a root, of a pleasant taste when roasted or boiled, and makes an excellent cake, superior in whiteness to flour. papaw, of a deep green in its growth, but yellqw when ripe, and is an excellent dish when boiled; its leaves are frequently used by the natives for soap; ropes are made of the bark. oranges and limes are in great abundance, and of superior quality, throughout the year; but lemons degenerate much in their growth, and in a few years are scarcely to be distinguished from the latter. guavas, pumpkins, or pumpions, squash water mellons, musk mellons, and cucumbers, grow in the greatest perfection. the pumpkins grow in wild exuberance throughout the year, and make a good pudding or pie. indian corn, or maize, may be reaped several times throughout the year, only requiring about three months growth. millet, with a multiplicity too tedious to enumerate. sugar canes are not very abundant, but are of a good quality, which, under careful management and industry, would, no doubt, yield productive returns. coffee trees, of different nondescript species, only requiring the same interference. dyes, of infinite variety and superior texture: yellow is procured from the butter and tallow tree, producing a juice resembling gamboge, but more cohesive, and of a darker colour; the wood of this tree is firm, and adapted to a variety of purposes; its fruit is about the size of a tennis ball, nearly oval, thick in the rind, and of a pleasant acid taste, containing several seeds about the size of a walnut, and yielding a viscous substance used by the natives in their food. red and black are procured from a variety of other trees and plants; and indigo growing in wild exuberance, particularly in the rivers more to the northward. cotton, in great varieties, requiring only cultivation to raise it to perfection and amount. the natives manufacture from it a narrow cloth, which is made from thread, spun in a manner similar to the distaff. a species of silk cotton, or ether down, is produced on a large tree, called the pullam tree. the quantity which the usual size bears may be computed at about cwt. in pods of to inches long, - / in circumference, and about - / inch in diameter, which, upon being exposed to the heat of the sun, is distended to an incredible bulk. it is much superior to down for the couch, and, from its elasticity, might be of great utility in the manufacture of hats. this tree is in great estimation among the africans, and is frequently regarded by them as their _fetish_. every town almost has a tree of this species towering over its huts, which its chief tells the traveller with exultation he or his father planted. tobacco is uncertain, but i entertain very little doubt that it might be raised upon the more luxuriant soils. pepper, more particularly near cape mount, of several sorts, maboobo, massaaba, massa, amquona, tosan, &c.; the three first are of a weaker flavour, and are oblong and angular in their seeds; but the last excels in pungency, and is the native malaguetta pepper of africa. the bread-fruit tree, is similar in appearance to the apple tree, and grows in the low sandy situations of the boolum shore, producing a fruit exceedingly nutritious, and larger than an apple. tamarinds in great variety and plenty: the velvet tamarind abounds in the bananas, also the white and brown; but the latter are most in esteem, and are very fine. okras, the fruit of a small tree, resembling the english mallows, which put into soup gives it a gelatine quality, highly alimental; the leaves make a good spinage. the palm tree, producing the oil so denominated, is one of the most useful trees to the african, yielding him meat, drink, and raiment. where it grows, it is an indication of a good soil. it is remarkably tall, without branches, having regular and gradual protuberances, from the bottom towards the top, ending in five or six clusters of nuts, shaded by large deciduous leaves. the nuts, which are about the size of a hazle nut, have a hard kernel, encompassed by a clammy unctuous substance, covered by a thin skin, and the oil is produced from them by being exposed to the sun, which, by its influence, opens the juices; subsequent to this exposure, the nuts are put into a boiler full of water, and a liquid, in the process of boiling, flows upon the top, which when skimmed off, soon hardens and turns rancid; the kernel of the nut, after this process, is taken out of the boiler, beat in a paloon, and put into clear water, the shell of the nut sinks, and its contents float upon the surface, which, when skimmed as before, is finally put into a pot, fried, and carefully poured off, producing another kind of oil, used as butter, and having in a great degree its quality. the wine is extracted from the tree by forming an incision at the bottom of every cluster of nuts, from each of which flows about a gallon of wine per day, for a week, when they are closed until the ensuing season. the liquid, when newly taken from the tree, resembles whey, and in that state has a sweetish agreeable taste, but it soon ferments and grows sour, changing to a strong vinegar of a disagreeable smell: in its fermented state it is most esteemed by the natives, and is productive of inebriety. a substance overtops the clusters about or inches in diameter, and or feet in height, in a full grown tree, from whence proceeds a stalk, about inches in length, which, on being boiled in water, makes an excellent vegetable resembling cabbage, or rather, in taste, the cauliflower; the leaves of the tree are converted by the natives into baskets, fishing nets, and cloth. medicinal plants. _colla_ is highly esteemed by the natives, and they attribute to it the virtues of peruvian bark; the portuguese, ascribe the same quality to it, and dispatch from their factories small vessels to collect all they can procure. _castor oil rhinum_.-the bush which produces the bud from which this oil and valuable medicine is extracted, grows in great exuberance upon the windward coast, and its vicinity. a species of bark is in great abundance also, and is said to be equal in virtue to the peruvian. the foregoing enumeration of natural productions, is the result of unscientific enquiry only; but unquestionably, industrious and professional research, would discover infinitely more to philosophic and commercial contemplation, and develope the arcana of nature, dormant here through ignorance and barbarism. on the th of may, i set out from bance island, with the view of exploring the two branches of the sierra leone river, the rochelle, and the port logo. after rowing a few hours i arrived at the factory of miffaré, formerly occupied by a mr. berauld, a frenchman, but now attached to bance island. mr. hodgkin, with his people, then in possession of the factory, accompanied me up the port logo branch the following morning, taking a number of towns in our way, and visiting the chiefs. the course of this branch of the river is extremely serpentine, and is navigable for light vessels to a little way from the town of port logo which is now the residence of alimami, a mandingo chief, who assumes the title of emperor. the banks are overgrown with the mangrove tree, interwoven together, so as to form an almost impenetrable thicket, excluding the air, which, with the extreme heat of the sun, and the noxious insects which are extracted by its rays from the swamps and woods, renders this navigation intolerably oppressive. the chief part of its trade is in slaves, camwood, and ivory, the latter, however, being small, although port logo commands a very extensive back country. when we came near the town of port logo, which is extremely difficult of approach at low water, we announced our visit by saluting in the manner of this country, which is what they call bush firing, or in other words is a continued irregular firing of musquetry. it was soon discovered who we were, and crowds of natives flocked down from the upper town, which is situated on the declivity of a hill, to give us service, or to pay their respects. our first visit was to _marriba_, one of alimami's head men, and a resident of what they consider the lower town. upon our arrival at marriba's house, we found him at his devotions in the palaver-house, a shed under which the natives daily assemble to pray, or discuss public affairs. he received us with every demonstration of regard, and immediately offered his services to conduct us to alimami. the old chief preceded us, with his long gold-headed cane, and our rear was brought up by a number of armed men, who had assembled to give us a favourable reception. our salute had pleased alimami, and being before known to him, he was determined to shew us every respect. the heat of the sun was almost intolerable, and before we arrived at the top of the hill where the imperial palace stood, i was nearly exhausted. the entrance to this large square of irregular mud buildings, is through a narrow passage or gate, forming an oblong square of mud, covered with thatch, and facing alimami's house: we were ushered through this by one of his head men, and proceeded in the order we set out to alimami, who was seated at the top of the square, surrounded by his chiefs, upon a mat spread upon a raised bank of mud, dressed in a turban, after the turkish fashion, and a loose manding, robe, or shirt. several pleaders were haranguing two of his judges, who were seated at a distance, in palaver, or council, to take cognizance of a dispute relative to some slaves; and although our arrival had excited the-curiosity of every inhabitant of the town, yet we passed the tribunal without interruption, their attention being absorbed on the subject of their sitting. the whole compass of the square was scarcely equal to contain their oratory, their voices being so extremely loud as to be heard distinctly, without the walls, accompanied by menacing attitudes. passing this declamatory assembly, we paid our obeisance to alimami, who was graciously pleased to receive us in the manner of his country, with great civilities, and immediately spread mats for us with his own hands, near himself. it was impossible, although accustomed to these people, to contemplate the surrounding objects without interest. i had previously been acquainted with this chief at bance island, where he was in a high degree restrained by european manners; but here, every thing was native and original. all came to give us service, which is performed as i have mentioned. a goat and a couple of fowls were next presented for our dinners, for which an offering more valuable was expected, and of course complied with. this mutual interchange of civilities being fulfilled, our attention was excited by the orators, who by this time were extremely clamorous; one of them, with an aspect the most furious, ran up to where i was seated, and addressing alimami, said, "that as proof his palaver be good, white man come to give him service while he address him on the subject of his demand;" attaching to that circumstance, the superstitious idea that he was right, and that i was his _fetish_ to establish that right. i then enquired of alimami the nature of the trial; he replied, "these men tell their story, i appoint two judges to hear them, who are to report to me what they say, and their opinions of the matter, but i hear all that already and they cannot tell me wrong: i then give judgment," or in other words more expressive of his meaning; these men make their complaint to my head men, or the judges i have appointed to hear it; it is their business to make me a true report, and give me their opinion on the merits of the case; and although i am not now supposed to hear it, yet i am so situated as to hear the whole, and can thereby check any corrupt practices in the judges. i had now leisure to examine the interior of alimami's residence; it consisted of a square of irregular buildings, thatched with bamboo, and covered with roofs, supported by pillars of wood, at about feet distance, projecting about the same number of feet beyond the skeleton of the fabric, and forming a kind of palisado, which serves as a shade for retirement from the heat of the sun, and under which, the inhabitants indulge in repose, or sit in familiar intercourse. during my conversation with alimami, his brother, a fat jolly fellow, was reposing himself upon his mat, reading his arabic prayer book, which, upon examination, i found executed in a neat character, and from his interpretation, was a record of fabulous anecdotes of his family, and containing confused extracts from the koran. the mandingos are professed mahomedans, whose influence is spreading with so much rapidity on this part of the coast, that several of the other tribes have submitted to their authority; so strong an impression has their superior attainments and book-knowledge imprinted on their minds. in no instance can their growing influence appear more conspicuous than in that of alimami being vested with authority over the port logo, of which he is not a native, and over a people originally infidels. formerly this tribe of mandingos were itinerant _fetish_ makers and priests, but now they are numerous to the northward of sierra leone, from whence a wide district receives their rulers and chieftains. after an audience of considerable length, alimami retired with several of his chiefs, and soon after i had a message that he wished to see me in another part of his dwelling. i had previously noticed to him that i intended shortly to embark for my country. when conducted to his presence, he very emphatically enquired "if what i tell him be true?" i replied "it was; but that i go to do him and his countrymen good; that he know this was the second time i look them, but never forget them." "we all know that," he replied, "but white man that come among us, never stay long time; you be good man, and we wish you live among us--how many moon you be gone from us?"--"about ten moon; how would you like to go with me, alimami?"--"i like that much, but black man not be head enough to do what white man does;" and putting his hand to his bosom, he took from it a piece of gold in the form of a heart; and said, "take that for me." to have refused it would have been an insult; i therefore accepted it; adding, "that i would tie it to fine riband, and wear it when i look my country, to let englishmen see what fine present he make me." he was quite pleased with the idea, and expressed his satisfaction with great fervency. soon after, i offered to take my leave, and was accompanied by him and his chiefs to the gate, where i bade him adieu, and passed through the town, paying my respects to its inhabitants, and among others, to the schoolmaster, whose venerable appearance, and superior intelligence, excited my respect and esteem. upon our return to marriba's house, we were happy to partake of a country mess of rice, boiled with fowls, palm oil, and other compounds. the chief could not be prevailed to eat with us, but attended us with great assiduity during our meal. the imperial guard accompanied us to our canoe, and we returned to miffaré without accident. the following morning we proceeded to the branch of the rochell, which we found more diversified and picturesque than the port logo, and its borders better inhabited. proceeding up this branch, and visiting the chiefs in our way, and the inhabitants of a number of villages, we arrived at billy manshu's town, a little chief of very considerable intelligence, and who treated us with great hospitality: here we slept. we arose early, and pursued our course up the branch, passing one of the most regular built towns i have observed in africa, now morrey samba's, but formerly morrey bunda's town. morrey bunda was originally a manding, and _fetish_ maker to smart, the chief who commands an extensive country on that side of the rochell branch towards the sherbro, and rose into notice and influence: he is now dead. the town is surrounded by a mud wall, and at the entrance, and upon each angle of the oblong square which encloses it, there are towers erected for the purposes of defence. the wall, with the towers, completely obscures the buildings which form the town, and serve as a guard against any depredations of enemies, while it shelters the inhabitants from the effects of their arrows or musquetry. morrey bunda has displayed in his plans of fortifications, considerable ingenuity, considering the circumstances he had to provide against, and the predatory nature of african wars, which are uniformly to surprise the inhabitants of a village or town while asleep, or in any other unguarded state, seldom or ever coming to a general engagement in the open country, but acting under the protection of some ambush, or other place of security, which, while it is calculated to conceal their numbers, serves as a retreat from their successful opponents. leaving morrey samba's we passed by a number of other villages, until we arrived at one of smart's trading towns, called mahera, situated upon an eminence, and commanding a most delightful prospect of the meandering course of the river, interspersed with islands, displaying a great diversity of appearance. smart has very wisely chosen this spot, as it is not only a charming situation, healthy, and delightful, but well situated to command a very extensive internal trade in camwood and ivory, besides being contiguous to the sherbro, from whence a great portion of the camwood is procured, and situated on the principal branch of the sierra leone. in addition to these local advantages, he has recently opened a path with the interior, communicating with the foolah country, which is entirely under his influence, and which he can open and shut at pleasure. it would be of incalculable advantage to any operation to secure the friendship of this chief: he possesses a very superior mind, and, from his connection with bance island, has acquired a knowledge of european ideas and manners seldom to be met with among any of the chiefs on this part of the coast. from the various opportunities i have had to consult smart on his general sentiments relative to his country, and the freedom of intercourse i have had with him, i am well persuaded that he would be a powerful and intelligent auxiliary in promoting the civilization of his country, upon a liberal principle, calculated to its condition, and having a tendency to eradicate its barbarism; but he is one, of many more upon this quarter of the coast, who have no reliance upon the attempts that have been made, and deplores, with regret, that through the want of a correct knowledge of the dispositions of his countrymen, an ignorance of the nature of the evil to be removed, and the invidious principles which constituted the establishments that have been formed to promote this beneficent undertaking, his country is still excluded from the light of truth, and the refined arts of civilized life. from mahera we proceeded to rochell, another of mr. smart's towns, more insular, where i expected to have met him, in conformity with an arrangement previously made, to visit him at his towns, and see, as he observed, his country fashion. upon our reaching this point of our expedition, we were saluted by a numerous assemblage of chiefs and natives, going to join my friend smart in one of his wars with his opposite neighbours and rivals, the cammarancies, inhabiting the country towards the port logo. the cause of quarrel was, that these people had seized upon the rafts and canoes which brought the camwood over the falls higher up the river, and had demolished several storehouses belonging to smart and his people, engaged in that trade. smart, with a part of his forces, had crossed the river only an hour before, and another division were embarking to join him at a place of rendezvous upon the enemy's territory, with the intention of cautiously approaching during the night to some of their towns, and surprising them before they had arisen from sleep. nothing could exceed the novelty of this sight; the chiefs and their followers were armed with their bows and arrows, and other rude implements of war, and completely in their native character; in addition to their native weapons, some had musquets, procured from europeans in trade, swords, and various other manufacture, supplied by traders, exhibiting an appearance, of which no idea can be formed, without a personal knowledge of this barbarous people. the chiefs, in particular, were covered with _gris-gris_ and _fetishes_, a mixture of feathers and other preposterous materials, calculated to obliterate any trace of human appearance, and possessing the virtue, as they conceived, of shielding them from danger. solemn _palaver_ is always held upon these occasions, and their _gris-gris_ makers, _fetish_ men, and priests, exorcise their absurd decorations, which, in their estimation, operate as guardian angels in the hour of difficulty and peril. having occasion to visit a gentleman resident at some distance, we left our canoes at rochell, and proceeded on foot. _cabba_, one of the chiefs, accompanied us with a guard, being apprehensive, as he observed, that "bad might happen us, as war live in the country." we passed through a remarkably fertile country, presenting an infinite variety of natural productions. our path was frequently lined with pine-apples, in all the luxuriance of nature; but amidst this animating landscape, we beheld deserted villages, ravaged by the ferocious hand of man; and all the traces of barbarous devastation. we fell in with several armed parties, with whom i conversed upon the subject of the war, which appeared to be of a predatory nature, and the consequence of insatiate avarice and barbarous habits. at length we arrived, much fatigued, at mr. green's (at massou), with whom we rested for the night, receiving every kindness and attention in his power to bestow. i am indebted to this gentleman for a variety of useful information relative to a wide extent of country. his education and acquirements are of the first class, and i could not view such a man, insulated from polished society, which he was qualified to adorn, and shut up in the wilds of africa, among barbarians, without a mixture of pain and surprise; nor did i depart from him without sympathy and regret, after he had confided to me his motives, and the outlines of his life, which were marked with eventful incidents, and extraordinary occurrences. it was my object to have proceeded from massou to rocond, the principal town of smart's residence, and from thence to penetrate to the falls of the river, which, from every information i received, exhibit a sublime scene; but, on account of the disturbed state of the country, and that chiefs absence, i was obliged to give up my intention, and return to rochell, from whence we rowed down the river to the town of our little hospitable chief, billy manshu; where we stayed the night. the following day we arrived safe at miffaré; and although smart had given orders at mahera to stop all canoes, we were suffered to pass; the chiefs observing, "that they knew we would not tell their enemies, when we came among them, what we saw them do." had we been strangers, it is more than probable we should have fallen victims to the fury of these barbarians, who, in the towns we passed, were excited to a savage fierceness, highly descriptive of the natural ferocity of the african character. at miffaré, formerly occupied by monsieur berauld, as previously noticed, who had lately paid the common debt of nature, and who was here buried by his own desire, i had the opportunity of ascertaining a singular custom prevalent in this country towards the dead, and which strongly elucidates the prevailing ideas of its inhabitants, relative to the immortality of the soul and a future state. after monsieur berauld's interment, his women, and the head people of the town, assembled round the grave occasionally, for a series of days, requiring every evening, from mr. hodgkin, a candle to light his grave, which they kept burning during the period of their mourning, under the idea that it would light him in the other world. in addition to this, a still more singular rite was performed on this occasion, by alimami, of the port logo, and a numerous assemblage of natives, who sacrificed a bull to the departed spirit of berauld, who was held in great estimation among them. from authority i cannot doubt, i am persuaded that when slaves have been redundant, human sacrifices have been offered to the manes of their favourite chiefs and princes. this horrid custom, which is even extended, in many of the districts of africa, to the productions of the earth, is a most serious subject to contemplate, and a feature of barbarism, pregnant with melancholy consequences to that class of beings, whom a late legislative act has abandoned to contingencies, and the uncontrolled power and avarice of other nations. chapter vi. _return to bance island.--general observations on the commerce, religion, customs, and character of the natives upon the windward coast.--an account of the requisite merchandize for trade, the best mode of introducing natural commerce and civilization into africa, &c._ the morning after my last arrival at miffaré i returned to bance island; before i leave it, it may not perhaps be considered as inexpedient at this stage of my narrative, to submit to my readers an account of the present state of commerce upon the windward coast of africa, the merchandize used therein, a general outline of the religion, customs, and character of its natives, and the system i conceive eligible, and consistent with the claims of humanity, by which their intellectual powers may be improved, and their enslaved state ameliorated; while our commercial ascendency may be preserved with this region of the earth, and our enemies excluded from those important advantages, which it only requires intelligence and enterprise to unfold. in accomplishing this important part of my duty i beg leave to state, that my reflections are the result of much deliberation upon the subject, derived from manifold sources of information, and that i am the zealous advocate of the radical abolition of the slavery of the human kind. the motives by which i am actuated are, a philanthropic feeling for my species, christian principles, humanity, and justice: however i may differ, in the means i shall propose, from many truly benevolent characters, yet i trust that they will do me the justice to consider that my intentions are congenial with theirs in the cause of humanity. i shall confine myself to a digested summary of actual observations on the trade, laws, customs, and manners of the people i have had occasion to visit; nor shall i attempt to enter into a minute detail on subjects already ably delineated to british merchants, and with which they are intimately conversant; but i shall treat of those branches of commerce which have been hitherto confined to local knowledge, and not generally known; submitting to the superior powers of the legislature, the incalculable advantages to be derived by their interference to promote the agricultural and commercial establishments upon the maritime districts of africa, as the only appropriate measure to attain a facility of intercourse with the interior, and to enlarge the circle of civilised society. if my endeavours tend to increase the commerce of my country, and eventually to emancipate the african, my design will be accomplished, and my fondest hopes will be gratified. in pursuance of my plan, i shall first detail the present number of slaves, and dead cargo, annually exported, upon an average, from the windward coast of africa, &c. from the information acquired from the traders of most intelligence in respective rivers, and from my own observation. | | | | | | | |amount | | | | | | | |sterling | names of places |a |b |c |d |e |f | £ |---------------------|-------|----|----|------|----|----|--------- |river gambia, and | | | | | | | |island of goree . . .| , | |-- |-- | |-- | , |rio noonez. . . . . .| | |-- |-- |-- |-- | , |rio pongo . . . . . .| , | | |-- |-- |-- | , |river sierra leone, | | | | | | | |adjacent rivers, | | | | | | | |and isles de loss, | , | | | |-- |-- | , |inclusive . . . . . .| | | | | | | |river sherbro . . . .| |-- | | |-- |-- | , |---- gallunas. . . .| , |-- | |-- |-- |-- | , |cape mount to | | | | | | | |cape palmas . . . . .| , | |-- |-- |-- | | , | |-------|----|----|------|----|----|-------- | | , | | | , | | | , a-slaves, b-ivory, c-camwood, d-rice, e-bees wax, f-malaguetta pepper estimating slaves at _l_. each; ivory, _l_.; camwood, _l_.; rice, _l_.; wax, _l_.; and malaguetta pepper, _l_. per ton, at first cost upon the coast of africa; the whole produces the sum of , _l_. sterling; to which may be added a three-fold export to leeward, which will make an aggregate amount of nearly _one million_ sterling. in addition to the foregoing exemplification, we have to contemplate the great multiplicity of natural productions, abounding in this extent of region, namely, indigo, numerous plants for staining, cotton in wild exuberance, cocoa, coffee, and aromatic plants, &c. &c. wild bees are so extremely numerous, that wax forms an important article of trade which might be considerably increased; substances proper for making soap are also to be found in great abundance, raw hides, more especially in the gambia, and the countries insular to the rio noonez and rio pongo; gold is procured from bambouk, and tobacco is found in every direction, which might be greatly increased by cultivation and an improved soil; cattle, poultry, guinea hens, different species of game, fish, with other animals; fruits, and a variety of vegetable productions, calculated to satisfy every luxurious want and desire. to these objects of commerce may be added, the now important article of sugar, which might be raised to a great amount, in various districts of africa, as the climate is propitious to the growth of the sugarcane, which, under proper cultivation, might be raised in great perfection. the lands upon the banks of the gambia, the rio noonez, the rio grande, the rio pongo, in the mandingo country, sierra leone, sherbro, &c. are universally allowed to be extremely fertile in many places, and abundant in vegetation and population. these countries produce various hard woods, well adapted to cabinet work and ship building, and are singular in their qualites and properties. the most remarkable are, st. the cevey, or kinney wood, which grows about the size of the oak, in england, and may be cut into planks of feet by inches. its texture is something of the ash grey and mahogany, variegated with stripes, fancifully disposed, and is therefore adapted to cabinet work; its qualities for ship building are peculiar, having the virtue of resisting the worm and vermis, so destructive to shipping in tropical climates, and corroding iron; it grows in great abundance. any quantity of this wood put into water sufficient to cover it, will, in a few hours, produce an unctuous substance floating on the top, resembling verdigrise, and of a poisonous quality. secondly, the dunjay wood, rather coarser in the grain, but harder in quality than the spanish bay mahogany. it possesses the same peculiarities as the cevey or kinney, in resisting the worm in salt water, and corroding iron. it may be procured in any quantity. and, thirdly, the melley wood, or _gris-gris_ tree, another species of mahogany, abundant in growth, having a more rare quality than the foregoing, resisting the worm in both salt and fresh water; it is extremely hard, and its juices so poisonous, in the premature state, as to cause instant death. the manifold and neglected productions of this extraordinary continent require only to be developed, and when the useful arts of europe are introduced here, ample recompense will attend the benevolent undertaking, natural history will be much enlarged, and mankind be greatly benefited. the claims of humanity, the distinguished part it has taken in an unnatural and much to be deplored commerce, loudly unite with a wise policy, in one impressive appeal to the feelings of the more refined inhabitants of europe, and to none more than those of englishmen. the goods adapted to african commerce are, _east india goods_--consisting of bafts, byrampauats, chilloes, romals, neganipauts, niccanees, red and blue chintz, guinea stuffs, bandanoes, sastracundies, &c. _manchester goods_.--cotton chilloes, cushtaes, neganipauts, photaes, romal handkerchiefs, silk handkerchiefs, &c. _linen britanias_, slops, spirits, tobacco, guns, swords, trade chests, cases, jars, powder, umbrellas, boats, canvas, cordage, pitch, tar, paints, oil, and brushes, empty kegs, kettles, pans, lead basons, earthenware, hardware, beads, coral, iron bars, lead bars, common caps, kilmarnock ditto, flints, pipes, leg and hand manilloes, snuff boxes, tobacco boxes, cargo hats, fine ditto, hair trunks, knives, looking glasses, scarlet cloth, locks, shot, glass ware, stone ware, provisions, bottled ale and porter, &c. &c. the foregoing general enumeration may serve to convey a just conception of the various manufactures requisite in the african trade, and the different branches to which it is allied, yeilding support to a numerous body of merchants, manufacturers, artizans, and many of the labouring class of the community. generally speaking, the africans are unacquainted with specie as a circulating medium of commerce, although they form to themselves an ideal standard, by which they estimate the value of the commodities in barter; this, however, fluctuates on various parts of the coast. from senegal to cape mesurado, the medium of calculation is termed a _bar_; from thence to the eastward of cape palmas, the computation is in _rounds_; and on the gold coast in _ackies_ of gold, equal to _l_. sterling, and of trade only half that value. at goree the bar, under the french, was , pieces of sous, and of ; but at present the bar is considered a dollar. the bar is by no means a precise value, but subject to much variation; the quantity and quality of the articles materially differing in many parts of the coast, and frequently on rivers of a near vicinity; for example, six heads of tobacco are equal in trade to a bar, as is a gallon of rum, or a fathom of chintz. a piece of cloth which, in one place, will only pass for bars, will in others fluctuate to ; hence the trader must form an average standard, to reduce his assortment to an equilibrium. the following are the barter prices now established throughout a considerable extent of the windward coast; but it is to be observed, they are subject to fluctuation from locality of situation and other circumstances. blue baft bars bonny chintz & stripe white baft byrampaut chilloe bijudapaut cushtae bonny blue romal niccanee sastracundie india cherridery taffety cottanee dozen britannias piece of bandanas barrel of powder fowling gun burding soldier's gun bars buccanier ditto dozen of cutlasses sword blade iron bar arangoes bunch of point beads bunch of mock coral red pecado lb. for seed beads, ditto battery ditto mandingo kettle dozen of hardware bason ton of salt fine hat tobacco, lb. to rum, per gallon prime ivory is procured at a bar per lb, and _escrevals_, or pieces under lb. bar for each - / lb. as the natives are unacquainted with arithmetic, their numerical calculations are carried on by counters of pebbles, gun-flints, or cowries. after the number of bars is decided upon, a counter, or pebble, &c. is put down, representing every bar of merchandize, until the whole is exhausted, when the palaver is finished; and, as they have very little idea of the value of time, they will use every artifice of delay and chicane to gain a bar. in matters of less consequence they reckon with their fingers, by bending the little finger of the right hand close to the palm, and the other fingers in succession, proceeding to the left hand, concluding the calculation by clapping both the hands together; and if it requires to be extended, the same process is repeated. among the foulahs in particular, commercial transactions are carried on with extreme tardiness; a _palaver_ is held over every thing they have for barter. the season in which they chiefly bring their trade to the coast is during the dry months, and they generally travel in caravans, under the control of a chief or head man. the head man of the party expects to be lodged and accommodated by the factor, and before they enter upon business, he expects the latter _to give him service_, or a present of kola, malaguetta pepper, tobacco, palm oil, and rice; if they eat of the kola, and the present is not returned, the head man begins the trade, by making a long speech, in which he magnifies the difficulties and dangers he has had to surmount, &c.; mutual interpreters report this harangue. the trade for rice is settled with little delay, but every tooth of ivory requires a new palaver, and they will dispute for a whole day for a bar with the most determined firmness. when the palaver and trade is gone through, they again expect a present, and if they are pleased with the factor, they march off singing his praises, which they communicate to all they meet on the road. the annual return from this commerce in colonial productions, has been from _two_ to _three millions sterling_; for although large remittances have been made in bills to the african merchants, yet these bills have been provided for in produce by the planters. politically considered, it will appear, that its regeneration might have been more appropriately the progressive work of time; and humanely viewed, it will also appear, from my subsequent remarks, that by those means alone the african can be freed from his shackles, and his condition efficaciously improved. but to proceed with the intention of this chapter, i shall next make some remarks on the religion, customs, and character of the natives of the windward coast. the natives on this part of the coast, and indeed throughout africa, are in general extremely superstitious; they believe in witchcraft, incantations, and charms, and in certain mahomedan doctrines, adopted from itinerant devotees and priests of that persuasion, who are numerous among them, and make a trade of selling charms. the baggoes, nellos, susees, timinees, &c. occasionally worship and offer sacrifices to the devil, and are equally confused in their conception of the supreme being, of whose attributes they entertain an assemblage of indistinct ideas, of which it is impossible to give any clear description. they will tell the traveller with great apathy, "they never saw him, and if he live he be too good to hurt them." their acts of devotion are the consequence of fear alone, and are apparently divested of any feelings of thankfulness or gratitude for the blessing they receive from the good spirit which they suppose to exist. the devil, or evil spirit, which they suppose to exist also, claims their attention from the injury they suppose him capable of inflicting, and is worshipped under a variety of forms; at one time in a grove, or under the shade of a large tree, consecrated to his worship, they place, for the gratification of his appetite; a _country mess_, a goat, or other offering of this nature, which they may conceive to be acceptable to his divinity, who, however, is often cozened out of the offering by some sacreligious and more corporeal substance, to whose nature and wants it is more congenial; at some periods great faith is attached to their _fetish_, as an antidote against evil; and at others the alligator, the snake, the guava, and a number of other living animals and inanimate substances are the objects of their worship. like other unenlightened nations, a variety of external beings supply the want of the principles of christianity; hence the counterfeit adoption and substitution of corporate qualities as objects of external homage and reverence. _fetish_, derived from the word _feitico_, denotes witchcraft among the majority of the maritime nations of africa: this superstition is even extended to some europeans after a long residence in that country, and is an expression of a compound meaning, forming an arrangement of various figures, which constitute the objects of adoration, whether intellectually conceived, or combined with corporeal substances; even the act of devotion itself; or the various charms, incantations, and buffoonery of the priests and fetish makers, who abound among them. in short, it is an incongruous composition of any thing dedicated to the purpose; one kind of fetish is formed of a piece of parchment containing an expression or sentence from the koran, which is associated with other substances, sewed up in a piece of leather, and worn upon several parts of their bodies. another kind is placed over the doors of their huts, composed of distorted images besmeared with palm oil, and stuck with feathers, some parts are tinged with blood, and the whole is bedaubed with other preposterous applications. _ghresh_, or _gresh_, is an expression in the arabic tongue, meaning to expel or drive away, and, as i apprehend, by the repetition of the word, is the expression from which the african _gris-gris_ is derived, consisting of exorcised feathers, cloth, &c., short sentences from the koran, written on parchment, and enclosed in small ornamented leathern cases, worn about their persons, under the idea that it will keep away evil spirits, and is a species of _fetish_. the mandingos, or book-men, are great _fetish_ makers, many of them being well versed in the arabic tongue, and writing it in a neat character. from the impression of their superior learning and address, their influence and numbers daily increase, many of them having become rulers and chiefs in places where they sojourned as strangers, the religion they profess in common with the foolahs, jolliffs, and other mahomedan tribes, is peculiarly adapted to the sensual effiminacy of the africans: the doctrines of mahomet contained in their book i have procured from a very intelligent chief in the rio pongo, and when i compare his account with others of his nation on this part of the coast, the foolahs, and the mahomedan tribes in the vicinity of the island of goree, i am persuaded the following is the portion of the islam faith believed by them. st. that god is above all, and not born of woman. d. that mahomet stands between god and man, to intercede for him; that he is superior to all beings born of woman, and is the favorite of god. and, d. that he has prepared for the meanest of his followers and believers _seventy-two bouris_, or black-eyed girls of superior beauty, who are to administer to all their pleasures, and participate with them in the enjoyment of the fountains and groves of paradise, and in the gratification of those appetites congenial to their nature and existence in this world. this nearly amounts to the entire belief of mahomet's doctrine, which is nothing but a compound of this eternal truth and necessary fiction; namely, "that there is only one god, and mahomet is the apostle of god:" from hence, in the idiom of the koran, the belief of god is inseparable from the apostolic character of mahomet. the fertile and politic imagination of this impostor admirably adapted his tenets to the prevailing and established customs; he tolerates polygamy, &c. and to add to the sanctity of his pernicious doctrines, he represents himself as having been visited by the angel gabriel, in the cave of hera, where he communicated to him the precepts of the koran, in the month of ramadan, which he enjoins as a fast; he interdicts wine, and inculcates the necessity of praying five times a day, facing the holy city, &c.; forming together a system of the most insidious character towards the establishment of pure christianity. in the performance of the duties of their belief, the mahomedan nations of africa, upon the coast, are exact and scrupulous, but they have no idea of the intellectual doctrines of the islam faith, or the happiness described by mahomet as enjoyed by superior saints in the beatitude of vision; they are as perplexed on this subject as they are in their conceptions of the divine nature, and discover a surprising contraction of mental powers, when considered as human beings endowed with reason. the nations, upon the windward coast, are in general little influenced by belief in their actions. forgiveness of injuries they conceive incompatible with the nature of man; and a spirit of retaliation is very prevalent and hereditary, descending in succession from father to son. they are extremely jealous of white men, designing, ferocious, and cowardly; but there are, notwithstanding, a great variety of localities existing among them, and it will be found that their climate and habits are closely assimilated. to the africans, the indispensible articles of life are reduced to a very narrow compass, and they are unacquainted with the insatiate wants of europeans. the heat of the climate renders cloathing an incumberance, and occasions a carelessness with regard to their dwellings: for the former, they require only a stripe of linen, and their _gris-gris_; while a building of mud, covered with an interwoven and thatched roof, forms the latter, which is reared with little labour, and, when circumstances require it, is abandoned without much regret. the food of the negro consists chiefly of rice, millet, &c. seasoned with palm oil, butter, or the juices of the cocoa-nut tree mixed with herbs of various kinds. they frequently regale themselves with other dishes, kous-kous, and country mess, to which they sometimes add fowls, fish, and flesh, heightened in the flavour by a variety of savory applications. a contracted system of agriculture, conducted by their women and slaves, in a very few days prepares the _lugars_, or cultivated fields; and the harvest is distributed by the elders of the community, according to the portion and wants of the society of the village, or is stored up to be portioned out as circumstances may require. water is the ordinary drink of the negroes; they, however, regale themselves with a wine extracted from the palm tree, as before described, which, in the luxury of indulgence, they frequently suck through a very small kind of cane, until inebriety and stupidity absorb them in a perfect state of apathy. they have also a very pleasant beverage, extracted from the cocoa nut and banana tree, besides several descriptions of beer, fermented from various roots and herbs. in the rio pongo, and adjacent countries, especially in the bashia branch of that river, the soosees extract a fermented and intoxicating liquor from a root growing in great abundance, which they call _gingingey_, something similar to the sweet potatoe in the west indies. the distillation is commenced by forming a pit in the earth, into which a large quantity of the root is put, and covered with fuel, which is set on fire, and kept burning until the roots are completely roasted: the roots are then put into paloons, and beat, exposed afterwards in mats to the sun, by which they acquire a taste similar to honey; and are afterwards put into hampers for distillation. this is performed by making a funnel of sticks in a conical form, interwoven together like basket-work; the funnel is filled with the material, and water poured upon it; the succulent moisture therefrom passes through a tube, and yields a liquid similar in colour to coffee, and of a violent purgative quality. it remains in this state about twenty-four hours, and is then incorporated with a quantity of the ashes of rice-straw, which excites a bubbling fermentation like boiling water, after which it becomes fit for use. in forty-eight hours it returns again to its purgative state, which interval is employed in drinking most copiously, until overtaken by insensibility and intoxication. the root, in its roasted state, is an excellent medicine for colds. indigo and cotton grow in wild exuberance almost every where, without culture, and the women collect such quantities as they consider requisite for their families, which they prepare and spin upon a distaff; the thread is woven, by an apparatus of great simplicity, into fillets, or pieces from six to nine inches broad, which are sewed together to any width, required for use. the indigo, in its indigenous state, and a variety of other plants, colour these cloths, an ell of which will serve as a dress for a negroe of the lower class. they manufacture cloths, of a very fanciful pattern, from various substances. i have some from the rind of the cocoa-nut, of great beauty, and a fine texture; also cloth, fine mats, baskets, hats, ornaments, quivers, arrows, &c. which all prove the taste and ingenuity of the natives. the negro is attached by love about his thirteenth year, and from sixteen to twenty he seeks the object of his affection. this choice generally continues in his confidence during life; and in proportion as he acquires wealth, he associates with her several concubines, who generally live cordially together. from this acquisition to his household, he is considered rich; and it is a common expression with the negro to say, "such a man be rich, he have much woman." when an object excites his desire, he consults his head woman, who, without any apparent suspicion of rivalry, gives her assent, and forwards his suit; but she is displeased when not consulted; and it is not uncommon that the object falls a victim to her jealousy. celibacy is a state almost unknown in africa; and when it does occur, it is considered as a degradation. the negroe's existence is almost a gratuitous gift of nature; his wants are supplied without laborious exertion, his desires are gratified without restraint, his soul remains in peaceful indolence and tranquillity, and his life glides on in voluptuous apathy and tranquil calm: he has few solicitudes or apprehensions, and he meets the stroke of fate with perfect resignation. in the countries which i have visited, and, as i understand from others, every principal village or town has its _bantaba_, or _palaver-house_, which i have before described. in this house, or under the shade of some venerable tree, all ranks occasionally assemble in groups, from sun-rising to sun-set, and pass the time in chit-chat, or in conversation on public affairs. their subjects are inexhaustible, and their tittle-tattle is carried on with surprising volubility, gaiety, and delight; their time thus occupied is so seducing, that they separate with great reluctance, sometimes passing the entire day in this, pratling, smoaking, and diversion: night, however, terminates these amusements: they assemble in the open air during the dry season, and under the palaver-houses in the wet, where they form themselves into dancing companies, generally during half the night, and not unfrequently the whole of it. their instruments of music are upon a very rude construction, consisting of a _tabila_, or drum, hollowed out from a piece of wood, and covered at each end with a bull's hide, producing a most barbarous noise, accompanied by a _baba_, or rattle, loud shouts, palaver, songs, and violent gesticulations, forming a system of confused uproar, unmusical, and ungraceful. their motions are irregular, sometimes in violent contortion, and at others voluptuous and slow. nothing can be done without a palaver; and at the change of every dance, he from whom the proposition originates, makes a solemn harangue over the musical instruments, which is generally descriptive of some warlike action or exploit, when they again give themselves up with rapture to the pleasures of the dance, the females in particular, whose actions and shew of luxuriant pleasure are highly offensive to delicacy, exhibiting all the gradations of lascivious attitude and indecency. at this period of unusual delight, they are applauded by the men with rapturous ardour; but suddenly a feeling of shame strikes the minds of the young creatures with a humiliating sense of their display, and amidst these plaudits they hastily retire to the matrons, who are spectators of the scene, and hide their blushes in their bosoms. so strongly implanted is this ingenuous and amiable modesty in youth, which is frequently laid aside when engaged in the vortex of pleasure, that it is one of the highest charms of beauty; and wretches only, degraded by debauchery and systematic vice, are capable of insulting this sentiment. a scrupulous regard to modesty and truth will not permit me to pursue the description of these amusements farther than observing, that they prepare them for a profound and tranquil sleep on their mats, from whence they arise at the dawn of day cheerful and easy. thus infancy and youth are singularly happy, and mothers attend their offspring with maternal feeling and delight; they are neither disturbed by painful commands or restraint; and it is a picture of perfect happiness to see these children of nature in sportive groups and infantine diversion. this happy infancy and gay youth is peculiarly calculated to organise a vigorous manhood, and a firm old age; and, i am persuaded, that these are the physical causes why the negro race are so muscular in body, and procreative of their species. in some countries innoculation is practised; but the small pox is not so common, or dreadful in its effects, in these countries as in europe. the greatest term of their lives may be computed at from sixty to seventy years, it seldom or ever happening that life is prolonged beyond that period in this part of africa. they retain their vigour, and enjoy a permanent and regular state of health until the last; and i have observed a venerable chief of advanced years having the possession of a dozen of young handsome wives, and the father of a young progeny, whose legitimacy was never disputed or suspected. in europe the last stage of man is a daily anticipation of dissolution; but in africa, declining years are only insensible approaches to the termination of a journey, the event of which he considers as the end of life, unconscious of the future, but as a fatality equally attached to all the creation. the picture i have endeavoured to delineate may serve to convey an idea to the mind of the moral and physical state of africa, which, undisturbed by ferocious barbarism, fierce hostilities, and horrid customs, convey a blissful and happy state of being; but, alas! we must now take another view, and contemplate these beings in the most degrading state, absorbed in superstitious idolatry, inhuman customs, and shut out from the civil arts of life, and the mild principles of christianity. their customs, their hostilities, slavery, and the mode i have conceived requisite to infranchise this unhappy race of men, i shall attempt to represent in the following chapter; and happy shall i feel if the description excites the attention and interference of more capacious minds on this subject, interesting to so large a portion of the human race, and to the claims of humanity. chapter vii. _the mode of trial by_ ordeal _and_ red water _in africa.--the wars of its inhabitants.--the state of barbarism and slavery considered.--the condition of the africans will not be improved by a late legislative act, without further interference.--salutary measures must be adopted towards the negroes in the colonies.--a system suggested to abolish slavery in africa, and the slave trade in general, and to enlarge the intellectual powers of its inhabitants.--the proper positions to effect an opening to the interior of africa, and to display to the world its manifold resources._ trial by _ordeal_ in africa is a punishment for petty thefts and delinquincies. trial by _red water_ is generally applied to crimes of greater magnitude. after the usual ceremonial of calling a palaver, the operation is performed by heating a piece of iron in the fire, the hand of the accused is dipped into a viscous preparation, and the iron is immediately drawn horizontally over the palm of the hand. if the judges (one of whom is always the executioner) have previously determined, in defiance of all the evidence, to prove the culprit guilty, the consequence is that the flesh is seared; but if they are predisposed to acquit him, the iron is dexterously applied so as to absorb the unctuous surface on the hand without affecting it, and a sentence of not guilty is pronounced. trial by _red water_ consists in making the accused drink a quantity of water, into which is infused the poisonous juice of the melley or _gris-gris_ tree; this is prepared by these _equitable_ judges, and applied upon the same fraudulent principles as in the trial by the _ordeal of fire_; it is, however, less resorted to. if the unhappy object of suspicion is affected in such a manner as they consider as a proof of guilt, his brains are knocked out upon the spot, or the body is so inflated by the pernicious liquid that it bursts. in either of these catastrophes all his family are sold for slaves. some survive these diabolical expedients of injustice, but the issue is uniformly slavery. when chiefs of influence, guilty of atrocity and fraud, become objects of accusation, the ingredient is of course qualified so as to remove its fatal tendency. hence justice seldom or ever in this country can punish powerful offenders, or shield the innocence of the weak and unprotected. the iniquity and oppression sanctioned by these trials, is a dreadful consequence of their avarice and inhumanity, for it is a fact that slaves are created thereby, and human sacrifices offered to that spirit, which they consider as their tutelar guardian: it is a subject which humanity should seriously contemplate in the relinquishment of the slave trade, whether, by the hasty adoption of that measure, before the intellectual powers of the people are improved by civilization, this barbarous evil may not be increased. when i closely enquired of the chiefs and natives relative to these savage customs, they uniformly admitted the fact, "that such live in their country," but with their characteristic dissimulation, always denied having perpetrated these horrid acts, and shifted the diabolical practice to some other nation or tribe, adding, "that only bad men do that thing." circumcision is practised among men, and a certain infliction on women, not, however, from religious motives, but to guard against the consequences of a disease not uncommon among them. the infliction upon women is the result of infidelity, or a sacrifice of chastity to loose gratification. as a preliminary, they retire to the _bunda_, or penitentiary, and are there secluded from all sexual intercourse. when the season of penitence is over, the operation is performed by the rude application of two stones, fashioned and sharpened for the purpose; this obliterates all delinquincy, and on their return to the world they are considered as restored to virgin purity. wars in africa originate from a variety of causes; in forming a correct estimate of these, it is necessary to consider its localities and situation. the inhabitants of this quarter of the earth, more particularly those of the district now under consideration, compose numerous tribes and nations, whose various views and interests excite jealousies and contentions, which, aided by the passions peculiar to a barbarous people, inevitably produce hostilities, and the effusion of human blood. what we have hitherto known of this country undoubtedly proves that wars are carried on with the most sanguinary violence: their prisoners, by the customs of the country, are consigned to massacre, slavery, and sacrifice,[ ] to gratify the avarice, vanity, and cruelty of their chiefs; one of these passions must be predominant, and therefore the question is, which of them is the least pregnant with evil? it cannot admit of a doubt that those who are victims to avarice meet a more mild and humane fate, in falling into the hands of europeans, than the unhappy portion who are sacrificed to vanity and cruelty; and it is equally true, that since the interior nations have been enabled to exchange their slaves for european merchandize, the number of victims to the latter passion has decreased. i am far from being the advocate of slavery, but i am stating a fact, and leave it to the reader to form his own conclusions. where confirmed habits and immemorial custom is to be supplanted, it is certainly requisite to be well acquainted with the nature and character of the natives, which i have not here introduced in an exaggerated shape, but infinitely within the bounds of their savage ferocity. from these sources alone have arisen the expedients attendant upon the slave trade; kidnapping and petty warfare form a very unimportant branch of the barbarism which governs the inhabitants of africa, and their enslaved condition. viewing this in the mass of moral evil which disgraces the character of man, it will be found that it is even disproportioned to the estimated population of africa, which, from the best authority, has been stated at upwards of millions; and to apply the consideration to our own situation, it will be found, that the number of executions and transportations from the united kingdom, in proportion to its population, is infinitely greater than the number of slaves exported from the shores of africa, to its numerous inhabitants. unquestionably the slave trade has extricated a number of human beings from death, whom the horrible sacrifices before described consigned to a barbarous exit, and has been a cause, though an immoral one when applied to britons, of extricating many victims, who otherwise would have been annually sacrificed: humanity has, therefore, some consolation in this polluted branch of our commerce, which in its nature is barbarous and inhuman. theories become extremely dangerous when they are impracticable, or misapplied, and are pernicious in their consequences from the fallacious measures they establish. in africa crimes are punished by forfeitures, slavery, or death; they are however rare; but accusations are often used to procure slaves, whether for domestic purposes, sale, or sacrifice to their customs. death, as a punishment, is seldom the penalty of condemnation; and if the culprit is rich, he can purchase his security. the alleged crime of witchcraft, or magic, is a common means by which the chiefs increase their accusations; and, consequently, the number of slaves. adultery, and other violations of social order, are punished by fine, but absolution is to be obtained by money. the crimes by which the chiefs obtain the condemnation and disposal of their subjects, are nearly all imaginary; for few exist which, under their laws, are considered as acts of turpitude. the abuse of authority, the action of violent passions, barbarous customs, ferocious habits, and insatiate avarice among the chiefs, augment the number of captives and victims, and the operation of these is much greater in the interior than in the maritime districts; but this leads me to the next part of my subject, namely, that a late legislative act will not, without farther interference, improve the condition of the african. by the hasty conclusion of that measure, the unhappy african is now abandoned to his fate; and we have surrendered him into the hands of other nations, less acquainted with his character and situation. former acts of parliament had adopted wise and humane measures to ameliorate the condition of slaves on board british vessls, so that their wants, and even their comforts, were administered with a liberal hand; and much more might have been done to augment these comforts. instead of now being the object of matured and wise regulations, the captive is exposed to the rapacity of our enemies, who will derive great advantages from our abandonment of the trade, and those who are incompetent, from the want of local knowledge, to ease his shackles, and sooth him in his state of bondage. the magnitude and nature of the disease, required a comprehensive system of policy to eradicate it; and although in its nature and tendency of great moral turpitude, alteratives were required calculated to its inveterate character and established habits. the condition of the african, the probable advantages he was to derive by our abandonment, and the circumstances of commerce, were all considerations of important consequence. even virtue itself must modify to its standard many considerations of moral evil, more particularly in a political point of view, that it may the more effectually establish its principles; nor can it, amidst the corruptions of society, exercise at all times its functions with due effect; neither has an instance occurred where its prudence and discretion was more imperiously called upon, than in that now under consideration. it had immemorial custom in africa to contend with, inveterate barbarism, and savage ferocity. this system had interwoven itself with our commercial existence so closely, as to require the most sagacious policy to eradicate it; at the same time it was the highest consideration for our magnanimity to interfere for that being whose thraldom and calamitous state had so long contributed to our wealth and commercial prosperity, before we abandoned him to contingencies. enough may have been said in the foregoing pages, to prove that something yet remains to be done to effect the manumission of the african, and preserve the important branches of commerce, which necessity has allied with the slave trade; and i entreat my readers to give this subject that dispassionate consideration which its merits require, and beg to assure them, that i obtrude my suggestions upon their notice with great submission and diffidence, trusting that what may appear in my system deficient, others more competent will embrace the subject, and excite the beneficence of my country in behalf of the african, promote civilization and christian society in his country, display its arcana of wealth to the world, and open a path to its commerce, free and unobscured. the colonization of the coast of africa, in my estimation, is impracticable, from its climate being uncongenial to the constitution of europeans, and from the system of slavery existing among its inhabitants, without the employment of natives in their present condition. the requisite authority to establish a system of labour, upon remunerative principles, and with industrious vigour, cannot otherwise be supported; and a misapprehension on this principle has been one of the great causes, as i conceive, of the failure of the sierra leone company in establishing their agricultural objects. they attempted, in prosecution of their humane project, an agricultural establishment on the boolam shore, opposite to their colony, where they had a choice of good lands: they proceeded upon the principles of their declaration, "that the military, personal, and commercial rights of blacks and whites shall be the same, and secured in the same manner," and in conformity with the act of parliament which incorporated them, more immediately that clause which relates to labour, namely, "not to employ any person or persons in a state of slavery in the service of the said company;" but they have totally failed; and in one of their reports, among other reasons, it is acknowledged, that for want of authority over the free natives whom they employed, their agricultural establishment on the boolam shore was unsuccessful. let not those worthy and truly respectable characters, whose humanity has induced them to risque an extensive property _unhappily expended without effect_, here consider that i mean to militate against their views, but rather may they acquiesce in the truth, and devise other expedients to promote their beneficent objects, and to _assimilate the natives_ of the country with their views. they have not only to lament a nonproductive profusion of their property, but an _alienation of the natives_, occasioned by a misconception of their character, by distracted councils, and the narrowed ideas of the agents they employed to prosecute their humane endeavours, but also by a desolate waste in their colony, without a regular feature of cultivation in its vicinity. at bance island, where slavery and agriculture were united under one superintendance in conformity with the established laws of the country, the mechanic arts among the natives have arrived at a greater degree of perfection than any situation i have visited upon the windward coast; and had the intellectual powers of their minds been more amply considered and cultivated, they would have exhibited an uncontrovertible example of the capacity and intelligence of the african. although, as i have previously noticed, a superintendance directed only to the mechanical arts, applied to the local necessities of the island, has had the most visible effects, yet, in proportion as their privileges have been extended, authority has become more inefficient, and their labour less unproductive in a pecuniary point of view, for want of a previous enlargement of their intellectual powers, and a progressive operation of freedom commensurate thereto. i can bestow no panegyric adequate to the sense i entertain of that active goodness which prompted the directors of the sierra leone company to the undertaking i have alluded to; but with all due deference i conceive that they have mistaken the practicable grounds, upon which the seeds of civilization, and the principles of christianity, can be effectively displayed to the african. the directors had to contend with a peculiar co-mixture of passions, licentious habits, and hereditary vice; to eradicate these, and to rescue the natives from their natural state, alluring and progressive measures were necessary, founded upon an accurate investigation of their characters and policy, and not by the fulminations of intemperate zealots, and theoretical speculators. the beneficent views of the sierra leone company have been unaccountably perverted, and have been the distorted instruments in prolonging, rather than extirpating, the barbarism of the african: it is therefore a subject of great regret to the benevolent supporters of this establishment, that an unprofitable expenditure of their property is the only existing perpetuity of their humane interference. will it be found that the company's agents have introduced the arts of civilization among any tribe or nation in africa, that they have made any progress in agriculture, although possessing a very extensive tract of fertile lands, or that they have converted them into any of the regular features of cultivation? have they explored or brought into action any of the attainable and lucrative branches of natural commerce, abounding in the region they inhabit, or do they employ a single ship in a regular trade with the mother country? will it be found that they have unfolded the doctrines of christianity, in their native purity and simplicity, to the unenlightened african, or converted, by their preaching and example, any tribe or nation among them?--the spacious waste is destitute of the appearance of domestic industry, or respectable character; it exhibits only a tissue of indolence, hypocritical grimace, petulant and assuming manners, and all the consequences of idleness and corrupted morals. to succeed in this beneficent undertaking, and to expunge the inveterate nature of the african, his prejudices, and inherent customs, progressive approaches upon his present condition are indispensibly requisite, under the attractive influence of agriculture, manufactures, commerce, and navigation. accidental events, concurring with political causes, frequently render the best concerted measures abortive, and retard their progress, but unquestionably the above-mentioned are the means by which the african may be manumitted, and his condition improved. the wisest laws operate but slowly upon a rude and fierce people, therefore the measures of reformation are not to be successfully performed by a coup-de-main, nor are the hereditary customs of africa to be erased by the inflammatory declamations of enthusiasm, but by a liberal policy and the ascendency of the polished arts of society. commerce, the chief means of assembling, and agriculture of assimilating, mankind, must first assume their fascinating and alluring attitudes to the african upon his native plains. too impetuous and indolent to observe the forms, or enter into the requisite details of business, he contemplates the effect, without investigating the cause; but, when he discovers his own comparative wretchedness, he will be roused from his innate indolence, his powers will be stimulated, and his emulation excited to attain a more exalted state. imperceptible and circumspect approach at innovation upon the laws, customs, and country of africa are indispensibly requisite, its chiefs and head men must be cajoled, their jealousies dextrously allayed, and their sordid avarice flattered by the prospect of superior gain. during the infancy of colonization, the employment of native labour must be tolerated, as is evident by the unsuccessful attempts of the sierra leone company, and may appear from what i have already urged. independent of political considerations, of much weight, the uncongeniality of the climate of africa to the constitution of the european colonist opposes an insurmountable barrier to the exercise of laborious avocations; therefore it is necessary to employ natives, in conformity with the usage of the country; and a recognition of property should exist in their persons; for it is obvious, from experiment, that authority cannot otherwise be established, or the necessary labour performed to produce an adequate return. while this invidious exigency obstructs the immediate manumission of the slave, it does not the less accelerate it, agreeable to the sound and humane policy adapted to his condition; but, on the contrary, is necessary to his complete emancipation; for he must first be taught the nature of the blessings of freedom, his intellectual faculties must be expanded, and the veil of barbarism gradually removed, to prepare him to participate in its enjoyment. the system of colonization which i, with all submission, submit to the legislature, and to my country, is this: st. to employ natives in whom a recognition of property shall exist, as unavoidable from the present condition of africa. d. to procure them from as wide an extent of the most powerful nations and tribes upon the sea coast, as is practicable, and from the slatees or slave merchants from the interior countries. d. that a requisite number of these should be fit for the present purposes of labour, and for an immediate initiation into the mechanic arts, as applicable to the local circumstances of the colony, and the useful purposes of life. th. that a proportionate number of males and females should form the complement, from the age of to years, and be placed in a seminary of instruction, under the inspection of the government of the colony, and under tutors approved of in england. th. that this establishment of a seminary of instruction in africa, under the administration of the colony, shall have for its bases the initiation of these children, as calculated to their sexes, into the rudiments of letters, religion, and science, and the progressive operation of education adapted to the useful purposes of life. th. that when thus prepared, the necessary avocations of domestic economy, agriculture, and mechanics, employ the next period of their existence, under the superintendence of the european colonist. th. when arrived at the period of mature years, and thus instructed, to become the object of legislative enquiry and investigation as to their attainments, character, fidelity, and mental improvement. th. that such as produce clear testimonials of capacity, knowledge, and acquirement, become immediately objects of manumission. th. that all proceedings in this process of education and emancipation, become matters of record in the colony, subject to such control and investigation as his majesty's government may, in its wisdom, appoint, from time to time, to guard against the corruption and prejudices of the legislative authority of the colony. th. that thus endowed, they are to be dismissed to their respective countries and nations, employed as agents in various capacities of civilized pursuit, and to promote the commercial and agricultural views of the colony, and disseminate their allurements among their tribe, which, under the direction of the unerring dispensations of divine providence, might, in process of time, diffuse civilization and christianity throughout the utmost region of africa, its inhabitants become members of civilized and christian society, and their country, in process of time, be extricated from its barbarism. it is for the legislature to devise a system adapted to the colonies, calculated to their local situations, and to remove the invidious distinction now subsisting between the african there, and in his native country; by these means the entire negro race may participate in the blessings of civilization and revealed religion, in every quarter where our extensive dominion and influence exist. by adopting the _first proposition_, a sufficient authority would be maintained to enforce the labour necessary to produce profit, and competent to excite emulation, which is a powerful passion in the character of the african; for in every effort he discovers a strong spirit of competition. through the medium of the d proposition, the natives of an extentive district would be collected under the instruction of the european colonist, and, in process of time, would become the happy instruments of initiating their, tribe or nation into the arts of civilization, and in promoting the commercial interests of the colony, which may eventually be diffused throughout africa. by the d expedient, an adequate portion of effective labourers would be obtained to commence vigorous operations. in consequence of the th, th, and th, a portion of children of both sexes would be procured at a moderate rate, in their unadulterated condition, who would be susceptible of any impressions, free from the control of their parents, and the contamination of their example, into whose tender minds might be instilled the principles of moral virtue, religious knowledge, and the civil arts of life. through the adoption of the th and th, the objects of humanity might be realized, and slavery, with the slave trade, make a natural exit from the shores and country of africa. by the th, the corrupted and interested endeavours of the colonists to retard the work of emancipation would be controlled; and, by the patronage of government, pecuniary resource and support be obtained, in aid of individual and corporate endeavours, the requisite population from the parent state acquired, and the indispensible authority established to secure success to any further attempts at colonization upon the coast of africa. and through the th expedient, an extended population would enjoy the advantages of instruction and example, and our ascendency and commerce be increased by a rapid process, which would predispose the natives to throw open the avenues of their country to our enterprize and research. thus may the long seclusion of the african from the light of truth and revealed religion be annihilated, his inveterate jealousies allayed, his nature regenerated, and his barbarism fall before the emanations of enlightened existence. in the interim, an unobscured path to the interior of his country will be opened, and our commerce therewith flow through a less polluted channel; while the negro, now the victim of barbarism in his native land, may be extricated from his thraldom, and received into the circle of civilized life, which he has hitherto been excluded from, and to which providence, without doubt, in its mysterious and incomprehensible administration of human affairs, has designed him to arrive at. [footnote : a portion of them being destined to domestic slavery, as victims to revenge, and as sacrifices to their barbarous customs.] chapter viii. _what the author conceives should be the system of establishment to make effectual the operations from cape verde to cape palmas.--reasons for subjecting the whole to one superior and controlling administration.--the situations, in his estimation, where principal depots may be established, and auxiliary factories placed, &c. &c._ what i have already said respecting the coast from cape verde to cape palmas, may be sufficient to convey a tolerably just and general idea of the religion, customs, and character of the inhabitants, the commercial resources with which it abounds, and the system to be pursued to unite commerce with the claims of humanity in one harmonious compact. i am persuaded there is no situation on the windward coast of africa more calculated, or more advantageously situated, than the river of sierra leone to influence and command an enlarged portion of the continent of africa. this part of africa, as ascertained by mr. park, communicates, by its rivers to the niger, and introduces us to the interior of this great continent; and, from other sources of information, foolahs, mandingos, &c. i am enabled to confirm the statement given in one of the reports of the sierra leone company, that from _teembo_, about miles interior to the entrance of the rio noonez, and the capital of the foolah king, a path of communication exists through the kingdoms of bellia, bourea, munda, segoo (where there are too strong grounds to believe that the enterprising spirit of mr. park ceased its researches in this world), soofundoo to genah, and from thence to tombuctoo, described as extremely rich and populous. the distance from teembo to tombuctoo the natives estimate at about four moons' journey, which at miles per day, calculating days to each moon, is equal to , miles. this distance in a country like africa, obscured by every impediment which forests, desarts, and intense climate can oppose to the traveller, is immense; and when it is considered that in addition to these, he has to contend with the barbarism of the inhabitants, it is a subject for serious deliberation, before the investigation of its natural history and commercial resources is undertaken. but it also displays an animating field of enterprise to obtain a free intercourse with this unbounded space, and if, at a future day, we should traverse it with freedom and safety, the whole of africa might thereby be enlightened, and its mysteries developed to the civilized world. i have therefore conceived the expediency of submitting all the enterprises and operations of the united kingdom to the influence of a supreme direction and government in the river of sierra leone. no doubt many contradictory opinions may prevail upon this subject, and upon the outline i have previously submitted on the most eligible plan of introducing civilization into africa; but the detail of all my motives and reasons would occupy too large a space; i shall therefore proceed to instance some local circumstances and political reasons why i make the proposition. from what i have said respecting the path which smart, of the rochell branch of the river sierra leone, has now under his authority, and can open and shut at pleasure, communicating with the extensive country of the foolahs, whose king (as the sierra leone agents are well aware of, but who was strangely and unaccountably neglected by them) is well disposed to aid, by prudent application, all advances towards the civilization of his country, it is evident that an immense commerce, extending northward to cape verde, and southward to cape palmas, on the coasts, and from the interior countries, might be maintained. by light vessels and schooners, drawing from to feet water, a continued activity might be kept up in the maritime situations and rivers, and a correspondence by land might be conducted by post natives, who travel from to miles per day, to all parts of the interior countries. from the island of goree a correspondence with the river gambia, and a watchful vigilance over the settlement of the french in the senegal would be maintained both by land and sea, which, with a well chosen position, central from cape sierra leone, to cape palmas, would combine a regular system of operation, concentrating in the river sierra leone. in addition to these three principal depots, it would be requisite to establish factories, and places of defence to the northward, on the rivers scarcies and kissey, at the isles de loss, the rivers dembia, rio pongo, rio grande, rio noonez, and gambia; and to leeward, on the rivers sherbro, galhinas, cape mount, junk river, john's river, bassau, &c. or in other commanding positions towards cape palmas. the expense of these auxiliary establishments and forts would be inconsiderable, compared with the objects they would attain, the chief requisite being regular and well supplied assortments of goods, and a wise system of organization adapted to circumstances. the navigation of these rivers, and habits of conciliation and friendship with the chiefs resident upon them, and towards the interior, it may here be perceived, are the only practicable measures, under the auspicious control of government, to retain our commerce with africa, to civilize its inhabitants, and explore its hidden wealth; and are the most favourable, also, towards our operations in the countries on this continent; while the various natives attached to this pursuit, would aid, by wise management, in influencing the inhabitants, where our researches and pursuits might carry us, and eventually conduct us to the centre of africa, from thence to the eastern shores of the mediterranean, and the banks of the nile. i trust it will here also appear that the means of acting, and the important advantages to be derived therefrom, are neither illusive nor impracticable. it is to be lamented, that, in undertakings of this kind, men of limited genius, of no experience in business, and incapable of acting with unanimity, have been too frequently employed; who are governed more by caprice than principle, and are consequently seldom able to reduce their ideas into practice, and allow their passions to predominate over the maxims of duty. delicacy in managing the humours and interests of men is the art requisite to successful operation. may it be remembered, that if civilization and our ascendency prevail in africa, and if the first essays we make to extend our relations with that country are successful, we attach to the civilized world one-fourth of the habitable globe, and its infinite resources. it therefore becomes a subject of great magnitude, to commence and form a system of operation, to collect the means of this immense extent, and the propriety of subjecting the whole to a similarity of views, and co-operation under one controlling administration. the precipitate abolition of the slave trade will reduce our affairs in africa, to a contracted and unproductive compass, in its present condition; therefore if we attach any consequence to this quarter of the globe, it will be expedient to endeavour to discover new scources [**note: sources] of commercial wealth and industry. coffee, cotton, the sugar cane, cacao, indigo, rice, tobacco, aromatic plants and trees, &c. first offer themselves to, our attention in wild exuberance. and these, in my humble opinion, are the only rational means to bring africa into a state of civilization, and to abolish slavery. i recommend one administration under the patronage of government, in the sierra leone river, to guard against a want of unity in the number of petty establishments that may otherwise exist on the coast, which from jealousies and interests varying in different directions, produce operations of a contradictory nature, and the first necessary step, is to be well acquainted with the character and dispositions, of the natives, and the localities of the maritime situations; for without combined enterprises, i venture to predict we are now excluded from the commerce of africa. i trust that my system will be examined in all its points, with dispassionate impartiality before it is rejected; and if others more competent to the task, devise more eligible means to promote the views of humanity and commerce, i shall feel happy to have agitated the subject, and rejoice at every means, to rescue so important a matter to the interests of mankind. the commandant of goree, i would propose as second in command, with delegated powers to control all the operations in the countries bordering on the senegal, and the river gambia; and an annual inspection directed by him, throughout this district. the intermediate countries from the rio noonez to cape mount would come immediately under the examination of the central and administrative government of sierra leone, and the third division under the authority of another command at a position chosen between cape mount, and cape palmas. the military protection of the establishments, as i have here recommended, would neither require great exertions, or numbers. goree certainly claims peculiar attention. its fortifications should be repaired, and the guns rendered more complete, and tanks for water should be in a perfect state to guard against the want of this necessary article from the main land, which, as before noticed, is liable to be cut off at any period by the enemy. the convenience, airy and healthy construction of the barracks and hospitals, claim the most minute attention and care. under skilful superintendance in these important departments, the health of the troops might be preserved, and objects of defence realized with a very inconsiderable military establishment. but as government must be well informed by its officers, both military and naval in these points, it would be indecorous in me to enlarge on the subject. lieut. colonel lloyd, from his long residence, and intimacy with a great portion of the windward coast, possesses ample information. and the naval officers, who from time to time have visited it, have, no doubt, furnished every document necessary to complete an effective naval protection. a regular system of defence, adapted to the jurisdiction of the sierra leone, and delegated establishment between cape mount and cape palmas, are also obviously requisite. the establishments that would be eligible for the purposes of defence, are confined to the three foregoing principal positions, and they have little to perform that is either difficult or embarrassing. it may not, however, be considered as going beyond the bounds of propriety to hint, that a great portion of the soldiers charged with defence, should be able engineers and gunners, and a few cavalry might be occasionally found useful. to complete the entire plan, and exclude our enemies from every point, from cape blanco to cape palmas, the possession of the french establishment at the isle of louis in the senegal, is an abject of serious contemplation, and no doubt might be attained with great facility by even a small force. the unhealthy consequences to a military force attached to this place might be greatly removed by superior convenience in the hospitals, barracks, and other departments of residence; and in a commercial point of view, its advantages are too well ascertained for me to obtrude any observations. the bricks necessary for building may be procured in the country, lime from oyster shells, &c. wood and other materials at a very inconsiderable expense; and as the usual mode of payment, is in bars of goods, instead of money, the nominal amount would thereby be greatly lessened. chapter ix. _the author embarks in the ship minerva.--proceeds to the rio pongo.--disquisitions thereon.--further observations on the inhabitants, obtained from natives of various nations met with there.--the isles de loss--returns to sierra leone, &c._ upon the th of june, , i embarked at bance island, on board the ship minerva of liverpool, bound upon a trading voyage to the rio pongo, and other rivers to the northward, and on thursday the th came to an anchor at the upper forks, in the rio pongo, being the point at which the branches of the _bungra, charleston, constintia,_ &c. empty themselves; higher up the river are the _sanga_ and _bashia_ branches, occupied by a chain of factories, and inhabited by various nations and tribes. the principal factories for trade are on the constintia, about miles up the river, mr. cummings's factory, at ventura; mr. john irvin's, at kessey; mr. benjamin curtis's, at boston; mr. frasier's, at bangra; mr. sammo's, at charleston; mr. david lawrence's, at gambia; mr. daniel botefeur's, at mary hill; mr. ormond's, mr. tillinghurst's, mr. gray's, in the bashia branch; with various others of inferior consideration. during my stay on this river, i visited the whole of these branches, and in addition to personal investigation, i obtained much information from the various conductors of these factories, and had a variety of opportunities of communicating with many of the natives from the interior countries, who are drawn hither by the extensive commerce of the rio pongo. in my excursions on this river, i was generally accompanied by captain william browne, of liverpool, who was part owner of the minerva, and had the sole management of the concerns of her voyage; and i am happy to give him this public testimony of the many obligations he conferred upon me, while on this part of the coast, which unceasingly continued until my arrival in england, by the way of the west indies. the countries bounded by the rio pongo and the gambia, are inhabited by the nilloes and various tribes, who carry on a considerable trade with that river, the rio noonez, and rio grande, and inland to the two latter, is the powerful nation of the foolahs, possessing an extensive country, about miles in breadth from north to south, and miles from east to west. teembo, the capital of the foolah king, is about miles inland from the entrance of the rio noonez. the paths for trade and communication with the interior, from this position, are at the king's pleasure, and he opens and shuts them by his mandate. the foolahs are tall, well-limbed, robust and courageous, grave in their deportment, are well acquainted with commerce, and travel over an astonishing space of the country. their religion is a mixture of mahomedanism, idolatry, and fetishism. one of their tenets, which inculcates the destruction of those they term infidels, is peculiarly friendly to slavery, and as the greater part of their neighbouring tribes are of that description, they are continually practising every violence, and, are frequently engaged in wars. when i suggested to a chief of very considerable intelligence, and one of the foolah king's head men, whom i met in the rio pongo, the enormity of their injustice to the surrounding tribes, and how displeasing it was to the god they prayed to, his reply was, "true, this be bad fashion to foolah, or mandingo man, but these people we make war against never pray to god, nor do we make war with those who give god almighty service." while this barbarism exists, and the slave trade is continued, humanity will have to, bewail the miserable condition of the african slave. for this, and various other reasons that might be urged, and considering the position and extensive influence of the foolah nation, their king claims a high consideration in a combined scheme of establishment upon the coast. so impressed was this chief, of the beneficial advantages to be derived from agriculture, that he tendered land, cattle, men, &c. to the agents of the sierra leone company, only requesting from them, in return, a delegated superintendance; but, strange to tell, this disposition was not cultivated nor improved; nor was the further offer of the king of laby, and his high priest, to place their sons under the protection of the company, to be sent to england and educated. a more important step could not have been taken to attain the object of the directors, than this of attaching the foolah nation to their interest. the women of this nation are handsome, and of a sprightly temper, and their countenances are more regular than those of the common negroes; the hair in both men and women is much longer, and not so woolly, but they have a most disgusting custom of forming it into ringlets, bedaubed with oil and grease, which gives them a very barbarous appearance. the foolah tongue, is different from that of the surrounding nations, and its accent is more harmonious. to the southward of the rio pongo, to sierra leone, lie the countries of the bagoes, soosees, mandingos, timminees, and boolams, all idolaters except the mandingos, who, like the foolahs, associate in their religion a mixture of fetishism and mahomedanism. the timminees are a more harmless race of men than any of the other _infidel_ nations, and their dispositions are more calculated to industrious avocations than their neighbours. i have already noticed the mandingos, but, as i consider this nation and the foolahs of the first consequence, from their power and influence over the other nations of this part of the coast, i shall add a few more observations upon them. from what i have before stated, it will appear that the mandingos are a numerous people in africa, gaining a daily influence and authority in the district now under consideration. besides the tribes of this people who inhabit the countries between the soosees and timminees, there are various others established in the country of bambouk, and on the borders of the gambia, but the great body occupy an extensive territory above the sources of that river. the empire of the mandingos is not, however, so considerable as that of the foolahs, but from their increasing influence over the western countries, from their docile and cunning dispositions, their knowledge in merchandize, and acquirements in book-knowledge, their power must, in process of time, be greatly increased; and it will be of the utmost moment to civilize them, in order to acquire an influence over the more barbarous states. notwithstanding the cunning and dissimulation which characterizes these people, they are generous, open, and hospitable, and their women are aimiable and engaging: they are more zealous mahomedans than the foolahs; their colour has a mixture of yellow, but their features are more regular than the other nations of africa which i have seen. the foolahs, the mandingos, and the joliffs, bordering on the senegal, are the most handsome negroes on this part of africa; the hair of the latter, however, is more crisped and woolly, their nose is round, and their lips are thick; this nation, in particular, is blacker than those approximating towards the line; nor are the negroes in the krew coast, and towards palmas, so black as the nation i now speak of; which may tend to prove, that the colour of the africans does not arise from a vertical sun, but from other physical causes yet unknown. there is a characteristic feature between the mahomedan nations of africa, particularly those from the shores of the mediterranean (whom i have seen in my travels in that quarter) which, with their almost universal profession of the mahomedan religion, sanctions the idea, that this part of the coast has been peopled from the eastern parts of the continent; but the visible difference in religion, complexion, and feature, of the nations towards cape palmas, give rise to other conjectures. an obvious difference may be observed among these numerous nations; their language and their customs are various, and are frequently without affinity or relation. from the shores of the mediterranean to this part of africa, the majority of the nations are mahomedans, but towards cape palmas they are gross idolaters, with a mixture mahomedanism and superstition; many of them erect temples, and dedicate groves to the devil. i have seen several of these, which exhibit no outward sign or object of worship, but consist of stumps of trees, in a circular form, covered with leaves, or a thatched roof, in the centre of which stands a square altar of mud, without any image of adoration. the reason assigned by them for their omission in this instance, is, "that they never look the devil or evil spirit, therefore they do not know how to make any thing like him." to the good spirit they neither make offering nor sacrifice, considering it as unnecessary to obtain his favours, from his disposition to do nothing but good, which of course he will administer to them. from every thing that i have observed, i conceive that idolatry, and fetish worship, is the predominant religion of africa, and that mahomedanism has been propagated by the moore and arab's. it may not here be unopportune to introduce the mandingo man's prayer, which i obtained from a very intelligent chief of that nation: viz. _mandingo arabic_. subbohanalahe rabila'ademy abodehé. subbohanala rabila allah. subbohana arabe. inye allamante, nafuse wa amutate sue wakefurella. teyatelillahé tebates allivatuelub lahey. sillamaleko ayo hanabehé, obara katolahe sullamalina ihannabé, lebadelahe saliheneé" the address to mahomet follows, viz. sahadala elahe idillaha mahomedo, arasoolo lahi man mahomedo aboodaho. _in their idiom of english._ god lives and, is not dust. god be master of all and is above his slaves. god knows his slave, and is not made of earth; but above all. (before the next sentence, subbohana arabe, &c. he bows twice.) suppose i die, i can look you to-morrow, and thank you, and be out of trouble, and free from the devil. (teyatelillahé, &c. accompanied by a motion of the fingers) i beg in my prayers again, god, i may die to day, i look to thank you again to-morrow, my people and family may then get into trouble, and i then pray to you. to mahomet. mahomet be man, born of woman, the prophet of god, and speak to him for man. in this system of prayer there is a mixture of fetishism, mahomedanism, and a strong analogy to the christian system; and it is no inconsiderable argument in favour of the mediation of the saviour, that in the worship of heathen nations a mediator is uniformly associated with the object of adoration. virgil in his aeneid, and other classic writers, illustrate a belief of the ancient heathens in the omniscience of the deity, and they clearly elucidate the importance they attached the mediatorial efficacy of offerings and sacrifice. the form of worship adapted to the foregoing prayer, is to squat down upon the ground, placing the palm of their hands flat thereon twice, touching the earth the same number of times with their foreheads; then rubbing their arms from the wrist to the elbow, with that which is contracted by this operation, when the hands are applied to the face, and the forefingers put into the ears. i have dwelt more minutely upon this people and their present condition compared with the foolahs, because i consider these nations have it much in their power to shut and open the paths of intercourse with the interior countries, therefore they become of importance, in the contemplation of any pursuits upon this district of africa. the mandingoes inhabiting galam, and the countries interior to the gambia, carry on the principal trade with those of bambouk, &c. where gold is procured. this precious metal is obtained from the surface of the earth, and from the banks of the falls of the rivers in the rainy season; it is first washed in a calabash; and when the water is poured off, the dust, and sometimes large grains remain. the natives have no idea of mining; but it appears from hence, that mines of this metal must exist, which are concealed thro' the want of the arts of civilized life. the mandingoes speak of these countries with a great air of mystery, and are extremely jealous, lest europeans should obtain any information relative to them: as they carry on almost exclusively, this branch of commerce. when i was in the bashia branch of the rio pongo, a meteor of an extraordinary kind appeared for two successive nights, directing its course from ne. to sw. which put the natives in a most dreadful state of consternation; the women fell into loud lamentations, the men beat their drums, and sent forth the most horrid yells; imagining, that this barbarous uproar would drive away the object of their fears. in eclipses of the sun and moon, they repeat their prayers and sacrifices, with the same clamour, under the notion that it will frighten away the monster which they suppose to obscure these planets from their view. these superstitious notions have the most powerful influence over the negro's mind, and it is impossible to dissuade or reason him out of them. from all i have stated, the great importance of these countries, to open an intercourse with the interior of africa, must appear. on the borders of the rio pongo, and other rivers, excellent lands, forming hill, and dale, are every where to be found, and well adapted to agricultural experiments. with the _consent of the chiefs_, these might be obtained at a small expense, and many of them with whom i have communicated, would gladly embrace a wise interference; but they all complain, "white man not know their fashion," intimating in very forcible language, that every caution should be used, at innovation upon their laws, customs, and manners. let example first excite their admiration, and their barbarism will bow before the arts of civilization, and slavery be gradually abolished. before i conclude this chapter, i shall make some observations upon the temperature of the western countries of africa, situated between cape verde and cape palmas, mention the principal diseases, and those which europeans are most exposed to on their first arrival in these countries, and give general precautions against the dangers of the climate, &c. the inexhaustible fecundity of africa holds out to europeans strong excitements to enterprise and research; but in the pursuit, the diseases which prevail in this country should be well understood; and it would be highly expedient, in any plans of colonization, to attach a medical staff, as the natives have no idea of the art of surgery, except what arises from the knowledge they have of the properties of herbs, and the superstitions attached to their fetishism. in annexing this extraordinary country to the civilized world, and exploring its stores of wealth, a burning climate, and the diseases peculiar thereto, unite with the barbarism of its inhabitants in opposition to the european; but by a strict observance of necessary rules, and avoiding all kinds of excess, the formidable influence of the sun may be resisted, and the pernicious effects of exhalations, which arise from a humid, marshy, and woody country, may in a great degree be obviated; and i am sorry to say, that for want of proper precaution and through ignorance, fatal consequences more frequently occur, than from the unhealthiness of the climate. the temperature from cape verde to cape palmas is extremely various from the vertical rays of the sun, the nature of the soil, and the face of the country. in the months from november to march, by fahrenheit's thermometer, it has been from ° in the morning, to ° at noon, in the shade; and nearly the same variation has been observed at the river of sierra leone; and in some places in the foolah country it has been from ° to ° from july to october, the mean temperature in the river gambia, by fahrenheit, has been from ° in the morning to ° at noon in the shade, and during the same months at sierra leone from about ° to °; but a variety of local circumstances may give a greater or less degree of heat: this however may serve to give a general idea of the temperature of these countries. the island of goree, for example, the island of bance, and the bay of sierra leone, are more healthy, enjoying the cooling sea breezes, more than situations in the rivers more interior. the banks of all the rivers in africa, which i have visited, are enclosed by impenetrable forests, marshes, and the closely combined mangrove tree, and it is but seldom that the land forms an uneven dry surface on their borders. instances however in the sierra leone, rio pongo, &c. occasionally occur, when the most picturesque scenery adorns the river. from may to august, hurricanes or _tornados_, before described, prevail upon the windward coast, and this phenomenon is to be met with from cape verde to cape palmas. the months from november to march are remarkable for the prevalence of east and north-east winds. when these winds, which are called _harmatans_, set in, they are accompanied with a heavy atmosphere, and are of a dry and destructive nature. every description of vegetation is blasted by their influence, and every object, animate and inanimate, feels their powerful effects; the skin is parched and dried, and every feature is shriveled and contracted. the most compact cabinet work will give way, the seams of flooring open, and the planks even bend. furniture of every sort is distorted; in short, nothing escapes their dreadful power. the nights at this period are cool and refreshing. the months of july, august, september, and october are rainy, from the equator to about the th degree of north latitude. towards the equinoxial they begin earlier, and make their progress to windward, but the difference throughout the whole of the north tropic fluctuates little more or less than or days. when the rains commence, the earth, before parched up and consolidated into an impenetrable crust, by the powerful influence of the sun and a long period of drought, is immediately covered with vermin and reptiles of all sorts, creating a moving map of putrefaction. the natives ascribe to these many of their diseases; but a further cause may be added, namely, the great change from heat to cold, and the variations at this season. the powerful influence of the sun, which at this period is almost vertical, quickly dissipates the clouds which obscure the sky, and produces an almost insupportable effect; but new clouds soon condense, and intercept the solar rays; a mitigating heat follows; the pores are compressed, and prespiration ceases. variations succeeding so rapidly, are attended with the most serious effects, and the most fatal consequences. and, lastly, the noxious exhalations arising from the inaccessible forests and marshy swamps which abound in africa, and from numerous animal and vegetable remains of the dry season, which cover the soil every where, are productive of putrid effluvia. these rains, or rather periodical torrents of water, which annually visit the tropics, invariably continue for about four months of the year, and during the other eight it rarely happens that one single drop falls; in some instances, however, periodical showers have happened in the dry season, but the effects of these are scarcely perceptible on vegetation; the consequence is, that the surface of the earth forms an impervious stratum or crust, which shuts up all exhalation. when the rains cease, and the heat of the sun absorbs the evaporations from the earth, which have been so long concealed during the dry season, a most offensive and disgusting effluvia is produced, which then fastens upon the human system, and begets diseases that in a short time shew their effects with dreadful violence; and no period is more to be guarded against than when the rains cease, for the intense heat completely impregnates the atmosphere with animalculae and corrupted matter. the principal complaints which attack europeans are, malignant nervous fevers, which prevail throughout the rainy season, but they are expelled by the winds which blow in the month of december; from hence these _harmatans_ are considered healthy, but i have heard various opinions among medical men on this subject. dr. ballard (now no more), whose long residence at bance island, and in africa, and whose intimate acquaintance with the diseases of these climates, peculiarly qualified him to decide upon the fact, was of opinion, most decidedly, that the _harmatan_ season was not the most healthy. when this malignant fever takes place in all its virulence, its consequences are the most disastrous; the symptoms are violent and without gradation, and the blood is heated to an increased degree beyond what is experienced in europe; the ninth day is generally decisive, and this is a crisis that requires the most vigilant attention and care over the patient. i speak this from personal experience. in consequence of the fatigues i underwent in the rio pongo, and other rivers, and having been for several days and nights exposed to an open sea, and to torrents of rain upon land, i was seized with this dreadful disorder, although i had enjoyed an uninterrupted state of good health before, and on my arrival at the colony of sierra leone was unable to support myself on shore; and had it not been for the kind attention and skilful prescriptions of dr. robson of that colony, with the friendly offices of captain brown, i should, in all probability, at this stage have finished my travels and existence together. dysenteries frequently follow this fever, which are of a very fatal tendency, and sometimes the flux is unattended by fever. this disease is not uncommon in persons otherwise healthy, but it is productive of great debility, which requires a careful regimen; if it continues to a protracted period, its consequences are often fatal. in my own case, a dysentery followed the fever, and reduced me to a mere skeleton. the dry belly-ache is another dangerous disease, accompanied by general languor, a decrease of appetite, a viscous expectoration, and fixed pain in the stomach. opium is considered an efficacious medicine in this disease, and is administered with great perseverance, accompanied by frequent fomentations. an infusion of ginger drank in the morning has frequently good effects. flannel assists excretion, and is found beneficial. _tetanos_ is also another disease peculiar to africa, and is a kind of spasm and convulsive contraction, for which opium is the usual remedy. the guinea worm is another disease among the natives, which is productive of tumours upon the body and limbs, productive of great pain, and is a contagious disease. this, however, is a subject without my province, and which has been ably treated upon by gentlemen, whose profession fully qualified them for the investigation. in addition to the many valuable treatises upon tropical diseases, from high authority, i would recommend dr. winterbottom's publication to the reader, as, embracing highly important local information upon the diseases of the windward coast. i have only touched on those which have more immediately come within my personal observation. too much care cannot be taken by europeans in drinking, and even washing in the waters of africa, which should always undergo a filtering preparation, and i am persuaded that great circumspection should be used in this respect: these and other precautions, with a generous, but regular system of living, would no doubt tend to diminish the fatal tendency of diseases in africa. without doubt, a series of professional observations and enquiry into the temperature and periodical variations of the climate of africa, and its diseases, would be attended with the most important advantages to the science of physic, and might ultimately prove of incalculable consequence in preserving the valuable lives of our brave soldiers and sailors, exposed to all the ravages of tropical climates. advantages that are well worth the attention of government, which would train up a body of physicians and surgeons, initiated into the mysteries of the diseases peculiar to those countries, which might tend to preserve a large portion of human beings of the utmost consequence and importance to the state; and it might form a part in the organization of colonial establishments, to attach thereto an institution of this nature. chapter x. _the author visits the isles de loss.--remarks on those islands.--touches at the river scarcies.--arrives at the colony of sierra leone.--embarks for the west indies--lands at the colony of demerory.--some observations on the productions of that colony, berbice, and essequibo, and on the importance of dutch guiana to the united kingdom, in a political and commercial view._ on the th of july, i rejoined the minerva at the palm trees, and on the th we weighed and passed the bar of the rio pongo, steering our course for the isles de loss; and on the th came to an anchor off factory island. the isles de loss, in the portuguese language meaning islands of idols, are so called from the idolatrous customs of the natives, and are seven in number; tammara, crawford's, factory, temba, white's, goat, and kid islands. tammara is the largest, but very difficult of approach, and has few inhabitants; crawford's has two factories for trade, belonging to gentlemen formerly in the service of the sierra leone company; and factory island has an american establishment, conducted by a mr. fisk, these are the principal (the others being little more than barren rocks), and they abound in vegetation and natural productions. squilly, or the sea onion, to which great medicinal qualities are ascribed, grows in great abundance in these islands, and might be procured in almost any quantity. dr. lewis, in the _materia medica_, or _edinburgh dispensary_, describes the peculiar qualities of this root. the positions of these islands are excellent for trade, but exposed to the predatory excursions of the enemy, who have frequently pillaged the factories established in crawford's island. on the th we again got under weigh, steering our course for the entrance into the river scarcies. the night was attended by tremendous peals of thunder, lightning, and torrents of rain: we continued off and on until the th, when we arrived outside mattacont island, bearing e. by s. and the isles de loss in sight. at p.m. i accompanied captain brown, with five hands, in the pinnace, with the intention of running into the scarcies river. we sailed with a fresh breeze in expectation of gaining the entrance by the approach of night; but we were obliged to anchor in the open sea, amidst the most awful peals of thunder, while the whole heaven displayed nothing but vivid flashes of lightning. amidst this tremendous scene, exposed to the mercy of the waves, with the prospect of being deluged by rain, we secured our little bark and ourselves, in the best manner our circumstances would admit, and committed ourselves to the all protecting care and disposal of providence. the mantle of night was soon spread around us, the scene was grand and solemn, and we were at length hushed to rest by the jar of elements, and the murmurs of the ocean. we awoke to contemplate an azure sky, and the all-bountiful mercy of the creator, in preserving us from such imminent danger, to pursue our destination through breakers, shoals, and sands. at day-light, with a breeze from the land, we weighed, and steered our course s.s.e. for the scarcies bar, but the wind shifting to the s.e. and the ebb tide running strong, we were nearly driven out of sight of land; we were therefore obliged again to anchor, and wait the change of tide. trusting to a sea breeze that had just set in, it being slack water, we again weighed: the serenity of the weather did not long continue, but soon increased to a brisk gale, accompanied by thunder, lightning and rain; we were driven with great impetuosity through the narrow channel between the bar and the shore, and from the shallowness of the water, the rollers continually broke over our heads, threatening our destruction every moment. providentially we surmounted these dangers, and at p.m. entered the river, which is interspersed with islands and picturesque objects, that could not be viewed without interest. i have been thus minute in describing this excursive voyage, that others, whose business may hereafter lead them to this river, may profit by the difficulties we experienced in this critical and dangerous passage. we were obliged to come to an anchorage in the river during the night, under a very violent rain, and the next day arrived at robart, the factory of mr. aspinwall. this gentleman, whom a previous acquaintance had induced me to visit, received us with great hospitality and kindness. from a residence of upwards of years on the coast, he possesses much intelligence and valuable information relative to this part of africa, and i am indebted to him not only on this, but on former occasions, for many interesting particulars. the factories of trade in this river are, mr. aspinwall, robart. boatswain, a black chief and trader, above robart. mr. lewis, rocoopa, attached to bance island. mr. gordon, thomas's island, ditto. with a variety of small factories attached to those of mr. aspinwall. on the th we took leave of mr. aspinwall, and embarked on board a schooner he had the kindness to furnish us with; and after a very tedious and tempestuous passage, arrived at sierra leone on the st, having had contrary winds to contend with; whereas with a favourable breeze, the passage is usually performed in a few hours. here i was attacked with the epidemic fever of africa, and experienced the medical assistance and friendship i have previously noticed. in an exceedingly exhausted state, but much recovered, i again embarked on board the minerva, where i had a second attack of the fever, accompanied by dysentery, which reduced me to the lowest state of existence; and after one of the most distressing and disagreeable voyages i ever experienced, we arrived in demerary roads after a passage of days, and, by the providence of the almighty, we escaped both disease and the enemy. a few hours after we came to an anchor i went on shore, and i verily believe that the passengers and spectators suspected they had received a visitation from the world of spirits. when i reached the house of mr. colin mccrea, captain brown's consignee, the unaffected and gentlemanlike reception i met with, both from him and his lady, with their subsequent kind conduct, can never be effaced from my memory. captain brown soon joined us, and in the most engaging terms we were invited to become inmates with mr. mccrea and his partner, which we availed ourselves of during our stay in demerary. a few days after, i became acquainted with mr. alexander mccrea, brother to my kind host, and as soon as my health would permit, visited him at his plantation, the hope, miles from stabroke, the capital of the colony of demerary. in this society, and from other quarters, i was favoured with various information upon the situation of the colonies in dutch guiana, and their importance in a political and commercial point of view. the colonial produce of demerary, essequibo, and berbice, chiefly consists in sugar, coffee, cotton, rum, and molasses; but the richness and fertility of the soil is capable of raising any tropical production; new sources being daily unfolded, of the immense wealth derivable from these colonies, and their great importance to great britain. the following example, extracted from the custom house reports, may elucidate this in a striking degree. in the june fleet of , consisting of sixty sail of various burthen and tonnage, there were exported, viz. , casks of sugar. casks coffee. barrels do. , barrels cotton. , puncheons rum. hhds. molasses. , , lbs. wt. coffee. calculating sugar at £ . per cask, and £ . per barrel; rum guilders, or £ . s. per puncheon; coffee s. per lb.; cotton £ . per bale of cwt; and molasses a guilder, or s. d. per gallon, the total amount will be upwards of £ , , . this immense export has since progressively increased, and colonists are only wanting to augment it to an inconceivable extent. how valuable then do these colonies become, and of what importance are they, in any negociation with the enemy. unquestionably under the fostering care and guidance of british jurisprudence, they would produce an accumulated export infinitely beyond the present computation, and be productive of increasing wealth to the merchant, and revenue to the country. the lands are still more fertile proceeding towards the interior, and being thinly inhabited, are attainable with great facility, and are extremely various in their productions. at this period these valuable possessions were nearly in a defenceless state, having a very inadequate and feeble military force to defend them, and being almost without naval protection; they had literally only an armed brig and schooner, built and set a float by the colony of demerary, to guard an extensive coast, and an immense property. in addition to the foregoing enumeration of commerce, indigo, pepper, cacoa, or chocolate nut, &c. may be raised to great amount. of the latter, an individual planter at berbice, from a nursery of , trees had , bearing ones in , which when gathered in, calculating lb. to each tree, will reimburse him in the sum of £ , . retrospectively viewed, it will appear that the colonies of dutch guiana are of the utmost importance to the revenue, and wealth of great britain. if any consequence is attached by government to the west indies, and it would be preposterous to infer that there is not, these become of great magnitude in the estimation of our colonial possessions, and if they are to revert to their former proprietors, it evidently should be for no mean equivalent; and it is but justice to say, that when i was in this part of the world, the apparent negligence in the protection and jurisdiction of these possessions, by the administration of the day, had so far alienated the minds of the inhabitants, that their reversion to the former government did not appear to be a subject which would excite their regret; although they were originally predisposed in favour of great britain. contemplating also dutch guiana in our present state of warfare, and viewing it, from its contiguity, as an alliance of magnitude to french guiana, the brazils, and the spanish settlements of south america, from whence, in the existing situation of europe, the insatiate ambition of our inveterate enemy derives an important sinew of finance, which nerves his arm in wielding the sword against the liberties and the existence of the united kingdom, they become infinitely enhanced, and are of still more momentous consideration. indisputably their possession would tend much to facilitate the british dominion in this lucrative portion of the globe, which might lead to a decisive termination of hostilities, and the permanent establishment of honourable tranquillity. on the morning of the th of october i took my grateful leave of my hospitable host and his family; and, accompanied by my trusty friend, fellow voyager and traveller, captain brown, i embarked at noon on board the ship admiral nelson, the command of which he had taken, accompanied by about sail of vessels under convoy of his majesty's sloop of war, the cygnet, commanded by------maude, esq. touching at tobago, where our fleet was augmented, we came to an anchor in the harbour of grenada, on the th of november, and remained there until the th. the history of this island, with that of the west indies in general, is so well known, that it would be delaying my readers unnecessarily, for me to obtrude my observations. one anecdote, however, which among a variety of experiments, i made to ascertain the sentiments of the negroes in the colonies, may prove, in a high degree, their sentiments upon their present condition. when i mentioned to them some spot, or some head man in their country within their recollection, with the utmost extacy they would say, "eh! you look that, massa?" i then assured them i had, and described the pullam, or palm tree, in their native town: the effect of this remembrance was instantaneous, and demonstrated by the most extravagant expressions of delight. conceiving that i had attained my object, and being persuaded that the transportation of these people was an oppressive transgression against their natural rights, i added, "i had fine ship, i go back to their country, and obtain leave from massa, to let them go look their country;" a sudden transition from extravagance to grave reflection followed; "i, massa, me like that very well, me like much to look my country; but suppose, massa, they make me slave, me no see my massa again; all the same to me where i be slave, but me like my massa best, and i no look my country with you." among every class with whom have conversed on this subject, i have uniformly received a similar answer, and it is a convincing proof that, by humane treatment, the condition of the slave is improved, not only by his transportation to the colonies, but in his own estimation. it may be interesting to notice, that at the island of grenada, i had an opportunity of correctly ascertaining the truth of a statement, i had heard from a medical gentleman of respectability at demerary, that, that ravager of the human species, the yellow fever, was first imported into this island from the island of bulam, in the rio grande, upon the coast of africa, by a ship called the hankey, which brought away the sickly colonists from that unfortunate expedition. on the th we arrived at tortola, and on the th sailed with the fleet under convoy of the la seine frigate, and landed at liverpool on the th of january, . chapter xi. _conclusion_. i have endeavoured in the foregoing pages, to introduce to my readers, the substance of my diary of observations upon the windward coast of africa. originally i only intended them for my own private satisfaction, and that of my intimate friends; but on my arrival in england, i found that the commerce of africa was then a particular subject in agitation, among a large portion of my fellow subjects, and the legislature of my country. under these circumstances, i conceived it my duty as a british commercial subject, and as a friend to humanity, to communicate my sentiments to the right honourable lord viscount howick, then one of his majesty's principal secretaries of state; which i did in the subjoined letter. (appendix no. i.) upon further reflection, and by the express wish of respectable individuals, i have been induced to obtrude my narrative and sentiments upon the notice of the public. i have avoided as much as possible to magnify my personal adventures, and dangers, nor have i had recourse to the flowing periods of description, preferring a simple narrative of facts formed upon grounds of personal observation. from thence, if my endeavours tend to awaken a spirit of enterprise, to enlarge the trade of the united kingdom, and to increase the export of its manufactures, or lead to more intelligent interference in behalf of the enslaved african, my design will be accomplished. to do justice to the natural history of africa, and to introduce to the public its various sources of commerce, would require a union of political interests, and vigorous execution, which none but government can apply with full effect. the principal outline which i have endeavoured to confine myself to, is a recital of such traits of the disposition and character of the natives, as seem requisite to be understood to form an accurate judgment of the present condition of africa. the advantages that may possibly result not only from moral, but political considerations, in forming upon sure principles, agricultural and mercantile establishments, calculated to instruct and civilize the negroes employed in the necessary avocations, will unfold the fertility of their soil which is now left to nature; and will also fulfil the expectations of a rational humanity, while it might rapidly expel slavery and the slatee trade, to the establishment of civilization, and more natural commerce. i have also endeavoured to demonstrate the eligibility of the position of the river sierra leone, from whence a controlling and administrative authority might employ the resources of the windward coast from cape verde to cape palmas, at the same time submitting solely to the wisdom of government, the propriety of annexing senegal to our possessions on the coast; which of course would tend to the total exclusion of france from this part of the world. i have besides dwelt upon such positions, as appear to me best calculated to establish factories of trade and agricultural operation; and upon the nations whose barbarism must first be subdued, in order to influence other tribes, and to obtain a free intercourse with the interior, and have pointed out those chiefs whose dispositions and influence, would greatly co-operate to facilitate this beneficent undertaking. the rivers i have dwelt upon, are surrounded with fertile lands and a numerous population, and may be navigated a considerable distance into the interior country; and by reducing all operations to one well adapted system, under the guidance of experience, moderation, and wisdom, i am firmly persuaded that success will be the result. what i have said relative to the present state of the natives of africa, may tend to demonstrate the nature of the opposition, which civilization has to guard against, and the barbarism it has to contend with. the condition of a free negro in africa is easy and contented, and the class of slaves attached to them, are satisfied with their fate. they only are to be lamented, who are procured from condemnation, either for real or imaginary crimes, or who are taken in war; and it is from this class that slaves are procured by other nations. it is a remarkable circumstance, that the major part of these unhappy creatures come from the interior, and that the maritime places which have had intercourse with europeans, afford only a small number of slaves; and i am persuaded, abominable as the slave trade may be considered, and disgraceful as it is, that it has saved many human beings from a premature and barbarous death. i am also firmly of opinion, that it is only by a _gradual abolition_, and a rational system to civilize the inhabitants of africa, that this detested traffic can be effectually abolished. a rational philosophy and humanity, should first have submitted to political necessity, and have commenced experiment upon practicable theories, while the sacred rights of property should have been regarded, and well considered. this opinion may perhaps subject me to the animadversion of many worthy individuals; but i beg to assure them, that i am as zealous an abolitionist as any among my fellow subjects, although i widely differ from many of them, as to the means of effecting a measure, that embraces so large a portion of the human race; and i should contradict the conviction of my own mind, were i to utter any other opinion. rectitude of intention, a lively interest in the condition of the african, and a deep impression of the importance of this country to great britain, in a commercial point of view, have actuated me in obtruding myself upon the public; and before i take my leave, i earnestly entreat a deliberate investigation of the imperfect system of operation, i have recommended in the foregoing pages. if i have not been sufficiently perspicuous, i trust the shafts of criticism will be enfeebled by the consideration, that a commercial education and pursuit cannot claim a title to literary acquirements; but if in any instance i meet the judgment of a discerning public, and my suggestions excite more competent endeavours, i shall feel the highest pleasure, and satisfaction. into the hands of an enlightened legislature, and a beneficent public, i commit the negro race; and may their endeavours be blest by providence! may they tend to enlarge the circle of civilized and christian society, and augment the commercial prosperity of the united kingdom! appendix. no. i. _to the right honourable lord viscount howick, his majesty's late principal secretary of state for foreign affairs; shewing at one view the most simple and ready mode of gradually and effectually abolishing the slave trade, and eradicating slavery, on the eve of his lordship introducing the late bill into parliament for the abolition of the slate trade_. _london, th february, ._ my lord, stimulated by an ardent zeal for the political and commercial interests of my country, and animated by the principles of humanity, i venture to approach your lordship upon a subject which, with every deference, i conceive to be of the most momentous consequence at the present conjuncture, namely, the existing state of africa, and the relative importance of its trade to the _united kingdom_. in my communications to your lordship, i shall adhere to that brevity which is consistent with perspicuity, and a recognition of the importance attached to your lordship's time and weighty engagements. if experimental knowledge, my lord, attaches any force to the observations i now submit to your lordship, i have to premise, that they are the result of recent personal investigation, and are a summary of remarks detailed in journals of a very excursive observation on the windward coast of africa, and a peculiar facility of intercourse with the chiefs and native tribes of a widely extended circle, from which i am returned, by the west indies, in the late fleet under the convoy of his majesty's frigate la seine, and merlin sloop of war. as a preliminary introduction, permit me to refer your lordship to the annexed copy of a letter, (appendix no. ii.) which i ventured to address to the right honourable the lords commissioners of the admiralty, dated st may, ultimo, in which is exemplified the present state of commerce from the island of goree to cape palmas. vide page . conclusive as this example may be of its magnitude, yet it is infinitely below its attainable increase. the want of naval protection, and the patronage of government, has greatly fettered it, and exposed the property engaged therein, to the incursions and destructive depredations of the enemy. connected with its present extent, the gambia, the rio pongo, the river sierra leone, and the rivers adjacent to cape palmas, abound with the greatest variety of the most lucrative and rare objects of commercial pursuit, namely, indigo, numerous plants for staining, pepper, cotton, and a multifarious enumeration of dormant productions, besides timber of various kinds, adapted to the building of ships destined to tropical climates, having the peculiar quality of resisting the worm, so ruinous to shipping, and corroding iron; it may be cut into planks of feet by inches, and may be procured in any quantity. a retrospective view therefore, my lord, displays a fruitful field to commercial enterprise, to the attention of civilized nations, to the naturalist, and to the metaphysician, requiring united interference only, to unfold and fertilize them; which in effect, would tend to enfranchise a kindred species, absorbed in barbarism, and preserve, uninterrupted, our commercial advantages with this extraordinary and important quarter of the globe. it is, certainly, my lord, a subject of the deepest regret to the philanthropist, that among the africans, a devoted race is consigned to the galling fetters of slavery by their inhuman customs, by their barbarous hostilities, and the commercial expedients of civilized states. much has been written and said, my lord, upon this interesting subject, from authority high in rank, in talents, and situation, but still it is involved in a perplexed labyrinth; the attainable sources of african commerce remain unexplored, and the inhabitants of its extensive regions are still entangled by the thraldom of barbarous customs, and superstitious infidelity. no efficient measures have been adopted, upon practicable grounds, to unite the views of humanity and commerce in one harmonious compact, compatible with the present condition of africa, its character, its customs, and its inveterate barbarism. benevolence has, unhappily, hitherto failed in its objects, through the opposition of a peculiar mixture of passions, of obstinate ferocity, and licentious and hereditary habits. to subdue the inveteracy of these evils, and to establish the manumission of the african, alluring and progressive alterations are necessary, compatible with his present condition, under the influence of agriculture and mechanics, adapted to the useful purposes of life, to commerce, and to navigation. previous to his enfranchisement, my lord, these must exhibit before him their facinations upon his native plains. too impetuous and indolent to observe the forms, or to enter into the necessary details of business, he views the effect without investigating the cause; but when he perceives the former, and contemplates his own comparative wretchedness, and contracted sphere of intellect, he will be roused from his innate indolence, his powers will be dilated, and his emulation stimulated to attain a more exalted state of being, while his barbarism will fall before the luminous displays of enlightened example. hence, to free the african, commercial and agricultural societies adapted to the present state of the country, appear to be the most practicable means, and the only sources of remunerative and effective influence: but as these measures necessarily require population from the parent state, aided by great pecuniary support, and intelligent superintendance; the patronage of the legislature is indispensibly requisite, to aid individual and corporate endeavours. in pursuance hereof, imperceptible and circumspect approach at innovation upon the laws, customs, and country of africa, are highly expedient; the chiefs and head men claim a primary consideration; their obstinate predilection in favour of long-existing usage must be cajoled, the inveteracy of their jealousies and superstitions be dexterously removed, and their sordid avarice flattered, by the judicious maxims of policy, and by the prospects of superior gain. the slave trade, therefore, being lucrative, and of immemorial existence, must, in the interim, pursue its present course, as a fatality attached to the condition of africa, and as a polluted alliance, which the dictates of policy and humanity impose, until a succedaneum is found in its stead. while this invidious exigency obstructs the immediate manumission of the slave, it does not the less accelerate it in conformity thereto, but on the contrary, is a necessary preliminary to his efficacious emancipation. before he is admitted into the political society of his master, and is allowed to be free, his intellectual faculties must be expanded by the example of polished society, and by the arts of civilization. maxims of policy, my lord, are often apparently little consonant with those of morality; and where an inveterate evil in society is to be eradicated, address and delicacy in managing the humours and interests of men, are arts requisite to success. this consideration is applicable to the present condition of the africans, and may perhaps justify a farther continuance of the _slave trade_, as compatible with its _radical abolition_. the reasonings adopted by a numerous assemblage of chiefs, convened in the retirement of the mountains of sierra leone, when _that_ company assumed a defensive attitude, most clearly prove this grievous necessity. in their idiom of our language they say, "white man now come among us with new face, talk palaver we do not understand, they bring new fashion, great guns, and soldiers into our country, but they make no trade, or bring any of the fine money of their country with them, therefore we must make war, and kill these white men." this, my lord, is an impressive epitome of the sentiments of the whole country, and hence the impolicy of illuminating their minds and abolishing slavery, in order to erect a system of reformation upon an invidious base in the estimation of the governing characters of the country. with every deference, my lord, to the wisdom and benevolence which framed the constitution of the sierra leone company, i would observe, that had they adopted the following measures, they would before now have been far advanced in their scheme of reformation. st. they should have employed their funds in the established commerce of the country. d. have purchased slaves from as _wide an extent_ of native tribes as was practicable; they should have employed them in that capacity, under the superintendence of the european colonist; have initiated them into the arts of agriculture and useful mechanics, manufactures, and navigation, and have instructed them in the rudiments of letters, religion, and science, &c. d. having arrived at this state of civilization and knowledge, their _graduated manumission_ should have proceeded in proportion to their fidelity and attainments. and, lastly, being thus qualified, they should have employed them as the agents to their tribe, to make known to them the arcana of wealth in their country, dormant through hereditary barbarism and superstitious idolatry, from the adoption of the first proposition, a facility of intercourse with the interior and native tribes would have been acquired, and also a knowledge of the genius, policy, customs, manners, and commercial resources of the neighbouring nations. by the d, the seeds of science would have been disseminated throughout an extended district, and a spirit of industry and enquiry would have been infused, which, by imperceptible degrees, under the guidance of providence, might eventually have been spread throughout the most remote regions of africa. by means of the d, the objects of humanity would have been realized. and by the progressive influence of the last, a system of civilization and commercial enterprize would have been diffused, and an equivalent, in process of time, been obtained, consistent with the cogency of existing circumstances, and the african's present state of being. by adopting this system, my lord, the maxims of sagacious policy, and the claims of humanity, upon practicable principles, may be united, and adapted to the present condition of africa, while our commerce therewith will be invigorated and encreased, and will flow without interruption through a less polluted channel; the seclusion of the african from the refined arts of society be annihilated, his jealousies allayed, his nature regenerated, his barbarism fall before the advantages of enlightened existence, and his enslaved customs make their natural exit, together with the slave trade, from his shores and his country. how animating is this contemplation, my lord, to the beneficence of enlightened nations, and how worthy of the magnanimity of a british government to effect! in the interim, my lord, new and accumulated sources of commerce, &c. will remunerate the parent state in a manner more congenial with the natural rights of mankind, while a monumental column will be erected to humanity, which will perpetuate its exalted benevolence, and excite the admiration of, and be an example to, the civilized world; but if africa is abandoned by great britain, it will be subject to the rapacity of other nations, who, _to my personal knowledge_, are _now_ directing their views towards its commerce in the contemplation of that abandonment, and who will, no doubt, seize it with avidity, as being highly lucrative and important; while the african's chains will still clink in the ears of the civilized world, his fetters be rivetted more closely, and his miserable fate be consigned to the uncertainty of human events. finally, permit me to assure your lordship, that i am wholly uninfluenced, and that i am, at this moment, ignorant of the present opinions of men in europe upon this interesting subject, as i have just arrived in england, and have been excluded for some time past from any other scene but that of personal observation in africa. i have considered the subject with deep interest, and finding the momentous question upon the eve of being agitated by the legislature, i have conceived it my duty, as a british commercial subject, to give every information to your lordship, within my personal knowledge, and have, therefore, obtruded my thoughts upon you; and if your lordship deems a more detailed and systematic view of my journals of any interest, i am ready to unfold them with the utmost alacrity. in the interim, i am, my lord, your lordship's most obedient humble servant, joseph corry. no. ii. _to the right honourable the lords commissioners of the admiralty,_ _referred to in the foregoing letter to lord howick._ _bance island, river sierra leone, coast of africa,_ _may st, ._ my lords, that consideration which has uniformly distinguished your lordships for the safe-guardianship of our commerce, and the property engaged in it, stimulates me to approach your lordships with some few observations on the present state of the african trade, and its dependencies. my object is, to submit to your lordships a statement of the british capital involved in that commerce, as exemplified by the present amount of export, diligently ascertained from the most authentic sources of intelligence, and to offer some brief remarks on its importance to the united kingdom, and the necessity of a more adequate naval protection. in the first place, permit me to solicit your lordships' attention to the estimate of annual export from the windward coast of africa. (vide page .) your lordships will perceive, that the amount of export _only_ is here under review; and i submit to your consideration the capital vested in the necessary shipping, also the property of british factors, resident on the coast, and factories belonging to merchants at home, which forms another article of great importance. during the present war, from the rio noonez to the river sierra leone, slaves, and more than the value of slaves in craft, have fallen into the hands of the enemy; which were forcibly seized upon the premises of factories, the property of british subjects, to the amount of , _l_. at the computation of each, valuing them upon an equitable average: moreover, about one hundred resident free people have been involved in this violence, of incalculable importance, and ground of indefinite claims from the natives. when your lordships contemplate these facts, and the annual emolument derived from this commerce by the government, and a numerous body of merchants, it may be presumed that its magnitude is of sufficient consequence to justify the expense of _adequate naval protection_. british subjects connected with, and resident on, the coast, are consequently become deeply interested, and are earnestly solicitous for an extension of your lordships' paternal care towards their possessions. the principal amount, as before shewn, necessarily in the progress of business, passes into currency through their hands, which, with the surplus property they have in their stores, their buildings, and people, creates a momentous risque, which is exposed to the predatory ravages of piccaroon privateers, and to the hostile squadrons and depredations of the enemy. with all due retrospective reference to your lordships' vigilance and watchful guardianship over our commerce, i take the liberty to remind your lordships, that only one sloop of war, the arab, (the favourite being taken) has been charged with the important office of defending an extent of coast of upwards of miles, against the sweeping hand of the enemy; an example of which has fatally occurred in the late destruction effected by commodore l'hermitte's squadron, to the very serious injury of many british merchants, and perhaps the ruin of many underwriters upon african risques. from the apparent approaches the legislature appears to make towards an abolition of the slave trade, the object of consideration for the defence of the coast of africa may have become of less comparative magnitude; but when upwards of one million in export from thence, and its enumerated appendages, are entangled, and at imminent hazard, an animated and impressive appeal is made your lordships for every practicable security, while it remains in existence; and to the legislative wisdom, for a remuneration commensurate thereto, in the event of its annihilation. trusting that your lordships will deign to recognize the importance of this subject, and will vouchsafe to pardon my temerity in assuming to suggest to your lordships' wisdom the expediency of establishing a more adequate and permanent naval force for the protection of the trade and coast of africa, i am, my lord, your lordship's most obedient devoted humble servant, joseph corry. no. iii. when the foregoing narrative and observations were prepared for the press, the original minutes from whence the following appendix is compiled, had not come to hand, as they remained with a part of my papers, which i have since received from the coast of africa. the substance of these miscellaneous fragments i shall divide into sections, descriptive of the different subjects to which they allude, and it may be found that they illustrate more fully many of the foregoing remarks upon the windward coast of africa. section i. _of the purrah_. among the singular customs of the inhabitants of africa, there exists in the vicinity of the sierra leone, and more particularly among the mixed tribes of the foolahs, soosees, boolams, &c. an institution of a religious and political nature. it is a confederation by a solemn oath, and binds its members to inviolable secrecy not to discover its mysteries, and to yield an implicit obedience to superiors, called by the natives the _purrah_. as it is dangerous to enquire from the natives, and consequently difficult to procure information on this subject, conjecture must supply the want of oral and ocular testimony; but what i have here advanced i had from an intelligent chief, who was a member of the society, who, i am nevertheless convinced, preserved his integrity, in communicating the following particulars, as i never could induce him to touch upon any part of the mysteries, which he acknowledged to exist, but spoke of them with the utmost reserve. the members of this secret tribunal are under the supreme control of a sovereign, whose superior, or _head man_, commands by his council, absolute submission and authority from the subordinate councils and members. to be admitted into the confederacy it is necessary to be thirty years of age; and to be a member of the grand _purrah_, fifty years; and the oldest member of the subordinate _purrahs_ form those of the sovereign _purrahs_. no candidate is admitted but at the recommendation and responsibility of members, who imprecate his death, if he betrays fear during his initiation into the ceremonies, or the sacred mysteries of the association; from which females are entirely excluded. some months elapse, in the preparation for admission, and the candidate passes through the severest trials, in which every dreadful expedient is employed to ascertain his firmness of mind, and courage. the candidate is conducted to a sacred wood, where a place is appointed for his habitation, from which he dares not absent himself; if he does, he is immediately surrounded and struck dead. his food is supplied by men masked, and he must observe an uniform silence. fires, during the night, surround these woods, to preserve them inviolate from the unhallowed steps of curiosity, into which if indiscretion tempts any one to enter, a miserable exit is the result. when the trials are all gone through, _initiation_ follows; the candidate is first sworn to secrecy, to execute implicitly the decrees of the _purrah_ of his order, and to be devoted to the commands of the _sovereign purrah_. during the process of initiation, the hallowed woods resound with dreadful howlings, shrieks, and other horrid noises, accompanied by conflagrations and flames. this secret and inquisitorial tribunal takes cognizance of crimes and delinquencies, more especially witchcraft and murder; and also operates as a mediator in wars, and dissentions among powerful tribes and chiefs. its interference is generally attended with effect, more particularly if accompanied by a threat of vengeance from the _purrah_; and a suspension of hostilities is scrupulously observed, until it is determined who is the aggressor; while this investigation takes place by the sovereign _purrah_, as many of the warriors are convoked, as they conceive necessary to enforce their judgment, which usually consigns the guilty to a pillage of some days. to execute the decree, they avail themselves of the night to depart from the place where the sovereign _purrah_ is assembled, previously disguising their persons with hideous objects, and dividing themselves into detachments, armed with torches and warlike weapons; they arrive at the village of the condemned, and proclaim with tremendous yells the decree of the sovereign _purrah_. the affrighted victims of superstition and injustice are either murdered or made captives, and no longer form a people among the tribes. the produce arising from this horrid and indiscriminate execution of the decrees of this tribunal is divided equally between the injured tribe, and the sovereign _purrah_; the latter share is again subdivided among the warriors employed in the execution of its diabolical decree, as a recompense for their zeal, obedience, and promptitude. the families of the tribes under the dominion of this infernal confederacy, when they become objects of suspicion or rivalry, are subjected to immediate pillage, and if they resist, are dragged into their secret recesses, where they are condemned, and consigned to oblivion. its supreme authority is more immediately confined to the sherbro; and the natives of the bay of sierra leone speak of it with reserve and dread: they consider the brotherhood as having intercourse with the _bad spirit_, or devil, and that they are sorcerers, and invulnerable to human power. of course the _purrah_ encourages these superstitious prejudices, which establish their authority and respect, as the members are numerous, and are known to each other by certain signs and expressions. the mandingos have also their sacred woods and mysteries, where, by their delusions and exorcisms, they prepare their children for circumcision. the soosees, inhabiting the borders of the rio pongo, have a species of _purrah_, which gives its members great consequence among them; but their ceremonies are kept also with inviolable secrecy, and they are bound by horrid oaths and incantations. these people seem to delight in disseminating improbable tales of their institution, and their invention appears to be exhausted in superstitious legends of its mysteries. the timmanees have an inquisitorial institution called _bunda_, noticed in page , to which women only are subjected. the season of penitence is superintended by an elderly woman, called _bunda_ woman; and fathers even consign their wives and daughters to her investigation when they become objects of suspicion. here is extracted from them an unreserved confession of every crime committed by themselves, or to which they are privy in others. upon their admission they are besmeared with white clay, which obliterates every trace of human appearance, and they are solemnly abjured to make an unequivocal confession; which if not complied with, they are threatened with death as the inevitable consequence. the general result is a discovery of fact and falsehood, in proportion as their fears of punishment are aroused, which the _bunda_ woman makes known to the people who assemble in the village or town where the _bunda_ is instituted. if she is satisfied with the confession, the individual is dismissed from the _bunda_, and, as is noticed in chapter vii. an act of oblivion is passed relative to her former conduct; but where the crime of witchcraft is included, slavery is uniformly the consequence: those accused as partners of her guilt are obliged to undergo the ordeal by _red water_, redeem themselves by slaves, or go into slavery themselves. when the _bunda_ woman is dissatisfied with the confessions, she makes the object sit down, and after rubbing poisonous leaves, procured for the purpose, between her hands, and infusing them in water, she makes her drink in proportion to its strength. it naturally occasions pain in the bowels, which is considered as an infallible evidence of guilt. incantations and charms are then resorted to by the _bunda_ woman, to ascertain what the concealed crime is, and after a _decent_ period employed in this buffoonery, the charges are brought in conformity with the imagination or malignity of this priestess of mystery and iniquity. during the continuance of this engine of avarice, oppression, and fraud in any town, the chiefs cause their great drum and other instruments of music to be continually in action, and every appearance of festive hilarity pervades among the inhabitants, accompanied by the song and the dance. contumacy, or a refusal to confess, is invariably followed by death. in short, the bewildered natives feel the effects, and dread the power of these extraordinary institutions; they know they exist, but their deliberations and mysteries are impenetrably concealed from them; and the objects of their vengeance are in total ignorance, until the annihilating stroke of death terminates their mortal career. it is impossible to contemplate the religious institutions, and superstitious customs of the western nations of africa, north of the equator, without closely assimilating them with those of ethiopia and egypt; and from hence to infer that a correspondence has existed between the eastern and western inhabitants of this great continent. section ii. _of the_ termite, termes, _or_ bug a bug, _as it is called by the natives upon the windward coast of africa._ among the insects mentioned in page , the _termite, termes_, or _bug a bug_, attracts peculiar notice. the following observations are derived from the investigations i occasionally made upon the island of tasso, attached to bance island, where they abound, and indeed in nearly all the western countries of africa. the oeconomy of nature, and the wisdom of providence, are wonderfully displayed in these little animals; for although they occasion the utmost devastation to buildings, utensils, and all kinds of household furniture and merchandize, and indeed every thing except metal and stone, yet they answer highly important purposes in demolishing the immense quantity of putrid substances, which load the earth in tropical climates. their astonishing peculiarities cannot fail to excite the notice of an attentive observer; the sagacity and ingenuity they display in their buildings, their industry, and the plunder and devastation they commit, is incredible to those who have not witnessed their communities and empires. they are divided into innumerable societies, and acknowledge a king and queen, the former of which i brought to europe, but the latter was by accident mislaid at sea. linnaeus denominates the african _bug a bug, termes_, and describes it as the plague of the indies. every community, as i have observed, has a king and queen, and the monarchy, if i may be allowed the expression, forms three distinct orders of insects, in three states of existence; of every species there are likewise three orders, which differ very essentially in the functions they have to perform, and are in appearance very different. in their primitive state, they are perfectly white; they have six little feet, three on each side, and a small head, in which i could perceive no eyes, after a minute investigation with a microscope. in this state they supply the community with provisions from subterraneous cavities, fabricate their pyramidical buildings, and may with great propriety be called labourers. in a few weeks they destroy the largest trunks of trees, carry away all descriptions of putrid substances, and particles of vegetable decay, which, in such a climate as africa, amply compensates for the ruin which they otherwise occasion. their buildings are contrived and finished with great ingenuity and solidity, to a magnitude infinitely beyond the erections of man, when a comparative dimension of size is considered. they are usually termed hills, and are generally in a conical form, from to feet in perpendicular height, and frequently upwards of feet square in the base. for a considerable period, vegetation is banished from the surface of their abode, but from the second to the third year, it becomes like the surrounding soil. the exterior forms a crust, which shelters the interior from the weather, and the community from the attacks of enemies. the interior is divided into almost innumerable chambers or apartments, with amazing regularity and contrivance; in the centre of which is the royal residence of the king and queen, composed of solid clay, closely compacted, and distinct from the external habitation, which accommodate their subjects. it appears that the royal erection is the first which occupies the attention of the labourers, as it is central in the foundation of the hill which composes the empire at large. this makes its first appearance above the surface of the earth in various turrets, in the form of a sugar loaf, from which they increase their number, widening them from the base; the middle one is the highest and largest, and they fill up the spaces as they proceed, until the whole is formed into one. this compact construction is admirably adapted to guard against external violence, and to preserve a genial warmth and moisture to cherish the hatching of the eggs, and the young. the queen is by far the largest, and has an unwieldy body, of enormous dimensions, when compared with her subjects; so also is the king, but inferior in size to the queen. the royal residence is a full constructed hill, surrounded by an innumerable number of others, differing in shape and dimensions, arched in various forms, circular, and elliptical, which communicate by passages, occupied by guards and attendants, and surrounded by nurseries and magazines. but when the community is in an infant state, these are contiguous to the royal residence; and in proportion as the size of the queen increases, her chamber is enlarged, and her attendants and apartments multiplied. the construction of the outward apartments which surround the central royal residence, that of the _common father_ and _mother_ of the community, form an intricate labyrinth of nurseries and magazines, separated by chambers and galleries, communicating with each other, and continuing towards the surface of the pyramid; and being arched, they support each other, and are uniformly larger towards the centre. the second order of _termes_ are like the first, blind and active, but they undergo a change of form, approaching to the perfect state; they are much larger, and increase from about a quarter of an inch in length to half an inch, and greater in bulk; and what is still more remarkable, the mouth is armed with sharp claws, and the head is disproportionably enlarged. they may properly be called the nurses and warriors of the kingdom; they urge their fellow subjects in the _first_ state to labour, they inspect the construction of the interior apartments, repel all attacks from enemies, and devour them with fury; and may be considered as the standing army of the state. in the third and last stage, they are winged; their bodies then measure about / ths of an inch in length, furnished with four brownish transparent wings, rather large; they have eyes also of a disproportionate size, visible to the observer. when they make their appearance in this state, it is indicative of the approach of the rainy season. at this period they procreate their species. they seldom wait before they take wing for a second or third shower; and should the rain happen in the night, the quantities of them which are found the next morning upon the surface of the earth, and on the waters, more particularly upon the latter, are astonishing. the term of existence at this stage is extremely short, and frequently on the following morning after they have taken flight, they are surprisingly weakened and decreased; at the utmost i do not think they live more than two days; and these insects, so industrious, courageous, and destructive in the two first periods of their existence, become the prey of innumerable enemies. indolent, and incapable of resisting the smallest insects, they are hunted by various species from place to place, and not one pair in millions get into a place of safety, to fulfil the laws of nature and propagation. their wings in a short time fall from them, and the ponds and brooks are covered with their carcases. the negroes in many places collect them in their calabashes, dry them, and fry them on a slow fire, which they consider as a delicious morsel. a few, however, escape the general dissolution, several pairs of them are found by those of the first genus, as they are continually moving over the surface of the earth, and are carried by them to found new kingdoms and communities. the royal mansion is then erected, as before described, their wings fall off, and they pass the remainder of their existence in indolence and luxury, and in the propagation of their species. their dimensions now undergo a monstrous change, more especially the queen; her abdomen augments by degrees, and increases to a prodigious size, when compared with her two first stages of existence; and the king, although greatly augmented, yet is diminutive compared to his enormous spouse, who sometimes exceeds three inches in length. she is in this state extremely prolific, and the matrix is almost perpetually yielding eggs, which are taken from her by her attendants, and are carried into the adjoining nurseries. the foregoing is a very imperfect delineation of this wonderful insect, which requires the minutest description by an experienced and scientific naturalist to illustrate clearly; and there are many secrets in the natural history of this little animal that would amply reward his investigation upon the different circumstances attending its existence. those that build in trees, or erect pyramids, have a strong resemblance to each other, and pass through the same stages to the winged state, but they are not of so large a size as the foregoing; and it is a very singular circumstance, that of all these different species, neither the labourers nor soldiers expose themselves to the open air, but travel in subterraneous vaults, unless when they are obstructed and impelled by necessity; and when their covered ways and habitations are destroyed, it is wonderful how quickly they will rebuild them. i have frequently destroyed them in the evening, and have found them re-erected on the following morning. when a pair, in the perfect state, is rescued from the general devastation which attends these little animals, they are by the two first species elected king and queen, and are inclosed in a chamber, as before described, around which a new empire is formed, and pyramids are erected. that species which builds in trees, frequently establish their abode in houses also, which in time they will entirely destroy, if not extirpated. the large kind, however, are more destructive, and more difficult to guard against, as their approaches are principally made under-ground, and below the foundation; they rise either in the floors, or under the posts, which in african buildings support the roof, and as they proceed, they form cavities towards the top, similar to the holes bored in the bottom of ships by the worms, which appear to answer the same purpose in water as the _termites_ do upon land. how convincing is this fact of the infinitely wise arrangements of the creator, who has united, in the whole system of creation, one uniform conformation of order and utility; for although the _vermis_, or worm, which is so pernicious to shipping in tropical climates, and the _termite_, possess so many destructive qualities, yet these very properties serve the most important purposes and designs. scarcely any thing perishable on land escapes the _termite_, or in water, the worm; and it is from thence evident, that these animals are designed by nature to rid both of incumbrances, which in tropical climates would be attended with putrefaction and disease. the first object which strikes the attention, and excites admiration, upon opening and investigating the hills of the _termites_, is, the conduct of the armed species, or soldiers; when a breach is made by a pick-axe, or hoe, they instantaneously sally forth in small parties round the breach, as if to oppose the enemy, or to examine the nature of the attack, and the numbers increase to an incredible degree as long as it continues; parties frequently return as if to give the alarm to the whole community, and then rush forth again with astonishing fury. at this period they are replete with rage, and make a noise which is very distinguishable, and is similar to the ticking of a watch; if any object now comes in contact with them, they seize it, and never quit their hold until they are literally torn in pieces. when the violence against their habitation ceases, they retire into their nests, as if nothing had happened, and the observer will instantaneously perceive the labourers at work, with a burthen of mortar in their mouths, which they stick upon the breach with wonderful facility and quickness; and although thousands and millions are employed, yet they never embarrass the proceedings of each other, but gradually fill up the chasm. while the labourers are thus employed, the greatest part of the soldiers retire, a few only being discernible, who evidently act as overseers, and at intervals of about a minute, make the vibrating noise before described, which is immediately answered by an universal hiss from the labourers, and at this signal they redouble their exertions with encreased activity. in minutely examining these hills, great obstacles present themselves to the observer; the apartments and nurseries which surround the royal habitation, and the whole internal fabric, are formed of moist brittle clay, and are so closely connected, that they can only be examined separately, for having a geometrical dependance upon each other, the demolition of one pulls down more; patience is therefore exhausted in the investigation, and it is impossible to proceed without interruption; for while the soldiers are employed in defending the breach, the labourers are engaged in barricading the different galleries and passages towards the royal chamber. in one apartment which i dug out from a hill, i was forcibly struck with their attachment and allegiance to their sovereigns; and as it is capacious enough to hold a great number of attendants, of which it has a constant supply, i had a fair opportunity offered for experiment, i secured it in a small box; and these faithful creatures never abandoned their charge; they were continually running about their king and queen, stopping at every circuit, as if to administer to them, and to receive their commands. upon exposing their different avenues and chambers for a night only, before the next morning, provided the king and queen are preserved, and their apartments remain, it will be found that they are all shut up with a thin covering of clay, and every interstice in the ruins, through which either cold or wet could communicate, filled up, which is continued with unremitting industry until the building is restored to its pristine state. besides these species, there are also the _marching termites_, of an encreased size, who make excursions in large bodies, and spread devastation in their way; but as my means of observation upon them was only accidental, it will be intruding an imperfect description to notice them at all; but if we form a conclusion from the immense number of _termites_ which everywhere abound in africa, we shall be tempted to believe that their procreation is endless and unceasing. when the papers came to hand which contained the substance of these remarks upon this extraordinary insect, i did not intend to annex them to the observations on the windward coast of africa, nor am i without some doubt as to the propriety of so doing; the observation of the learned _naturalist_ only can ascertain the economy of the _termite_, or _bug a bug_, and i have therefore to apologize for obtruding these imperfect and general remarks. section iii. _of the cameleon_. the cameleon is a native of the torrid zone, and is a genus of the lizard: the faculty of assuming the colour of every object it approaches is ascribed to it, and other singular properties; but there are many rare phoenomena not so well understood, such as its absorption and expulsion of air at pleasure, its property of living a considerable time without any kind of nourishment, and its extraordinary visual advantages, which are perhaps not to be found in any other of the wonderful works of the creation. i have made various experiments to ascertain these extraordinary properties in this little animal; and i brought home one in a preserved state. the first object which struck my attention, was the variation of colour; and i am persuaded that it does not assume these from the surrounding objects, but that they proceed from internal sensations of pain, or otherwise. from the moment that the liberty of my captive was infringed upon, or when interrupted in its pursuits, it became less sensible of external objects, the vivacity of its colour, and the plumpness of its form underwent a visible change. its natural colour is a beautiful green; and when in a state of liberty it is to be found in the grass, or lodged on the branches of some tree, ornamented with the gayest foilage; and it would appear that its liberty, and the privilege of living in the grass, are indispensible towards the preservation of its qualities. the colour of its skin, in a perfect state of health, is scarcely discernible from the trees and grass, in which it delights to conceal itself, and is not to be discovered at all without a very minute scrutiny. it remains immoveable for a length of time, and its motions are all cautious and slow, continuing to loll out its tongue, which is long and glutinous, in order to secure the little insects that are necessary to its nourishment; and i doubt not but it has an attractive influence over its prey, for i have observed them continually floating around the cameleon, when scarcely discernible in any other space. when the tongue is covered with a sufficient quantity it draws it in instantaneously, and by incessantly repeating the operation, all the insects within its reach are taken in the snare. that its health and existence depend upon being in the grass, i am persuaded, from the change occasioned by placing it in gravel or sand, when it immediately assumes a yellow tinge, its form is reduced considerably, and the air expelled, with which the body of this animal is inflated, so as visibly to reduce the size. if they are irritated in this situation, they expell the air so strong as even to be heard, gradually decreasing in size, and becoming more dull in colour, until at length they are almost black; but upon being carried into the grass, or placed on the branches of a tree, they quickly assume their wonted solidity and appearance. the victims of my observation i have frequently wrapped in cloth of various colours, and have left them for a considerable time, but when i visited them i did not find that they partook of any of the colours, but uniformly were of a tarnished yellow, or greyish black, the colours they always assume when in a state of suffering and distress, and i never could succeed in making them take any other when in a situation of constraint. the skin of the cameleon is of a very soft and delicate texture, and appears to the observer similar to a shagreen skin, elastic and pliable; and it may be owing to this extraordinary construction that it changes its colours and size with that facility which astonishes us; but what may be considered as a more wonderful faculty is, its expanding and contracting itself at pleasure, and, as it were, retaining the fluid in an uniform manner, when in health, but exhaling it when in a state of suffering, so as to reduce its dimensions to a more contracted size. its peculiar organization is such, that the atmospheric air which it inhales so generally throughout every part of its body, distends and projects even its eyes and extremities. i have frequently seen it after many days fasting become suddenly plump, and continue so for a fortnight, when immediately it became nothing but a skeleton of skin and bone. the tenuity of its body is at these seasons astonishing, the spine of its back becomes pointed, the flesh of its sides adhere to each other, and apparently form one united subsance, when it will, in a few hours, at pleasure, resume its rotund state; and this appears to me to be a most extraordinary circumstance in the construction of this animal, which invites the minutest research of the naturalist. to convince myself how far the assertion might be admitted, that the cameleon can exist upon air, i have placed them in a cage, so constructed, as to exclude any thing else, even the minutest insect; when i have visited my captives, they have opened their mouths and expelled the air towards me so as to be felt and heard. in the first stage of their privation and imprisonment, which has continued for more than a month, i have found them in continual motion around their prison, but afterwards their excursions became more circumscribed, and they have sunk to the bottom, when their powers of distension and contraction became languid and decreased, and were never again capable of performing their accustomed transformation. the one which i brought to england preserved in spirits, after undergoing upwards of two months of famine, when i carried it among the grass, or placed it in the thick foliage of a tree, in little more than a week regained its green colour, and power of expansion; but not contented with my experiment, and determined to ascertain it to the utmost, i redoubled my precautions to exclude every thing but air, and my devoted victim was doomed to another series of trial, and continued to exist upwards of a month, when it fell a sacrifice to my curiosity. the eyes of the cameleon may also be considered a remarkable singularity; they are covered with a thin membrane, which nature has given it to supply the want of eye-lids, and this membrane is sunk in the centre by a lengthened hole, which forms an orifice, bordered by a shining circle. this covering follows all the motions of the eye so perfectly, that they appear to be one and the same; and the aperture, or lengthened hole, is always central to the pupil, the eyes moving in every direction, independant of each other; one eye will be in motion while the other is fixed, one looking behind while the other is looking before, and another directed above while its companion is fixed on the earth, so that its eyes move in every possible direction, independant of each other, without moving the head, which is closely compacted with the shoulders. by these quick evolutions its personal safety is guarded, and it perceives with quickness the insects and flies, which it is always entrapping by its glutinous tongue. without doubt, this species of lizard possesses peculiarities well worthy the attention of naturalists, who only can define them; what i have said i have observed in my leisure moments, and must be considered as a very imperfect detail of its natural history. section iv. _of the interment of the dead._ the ceremony of burial upon the windward coast of africa is conducted with great singularity, solemnity, and extravagant circumstances of condolence. the body of the deceased is wrapped up in a cloth, closely sewed around it, and the head is covered with a white cap of cotton, which is the colour universally adopted in mourning. the relatives of the deceased bedaub themselves from head to foot with white clay, upon which they form the most disgusting figures, while scarcely a leg or an arm exhibits the same feature. i have even seen serpents and other frightful animals delineated with great accuracy on many parts of the body, which gives them a most hideous appearance during the season of mourning. when the corps has been washed, and put into a white cloth of cotton, of the manufacture of the country, the whole is inclosed in a mat, and laid out in state. the corps is placed over the grave upon four sticks across, and after one of the nearest relatives has collected all the finery with which the deceased was accustomed to decorate himself, and that also which remains among his family, he asks him, with expressions of sorrow, if he wants such and such an article for his comfort in the other world, in which he is accompanied by the remainder of his family and friends, who join in _making cry,_ or more property speaking, in dancing and rejoicing. the following night the dance and song is continued with demonstrations of mirth and glee, and are kept up every successive night during that moon; and if the deceased has been of consequence in his tribe, these extravagant acts of lamentation continue for months together. _on the amusements, musical instruments, &c. of the africans._ upon all occasions of mirth or sorrow, the dance is uniformly introduced, with monotonous songs, sometimes tender and agreeable, at other times savage and ferocious, but always accompanied by a slow movement; and it may with propriety be said, that all the nights in africa are spent in dancing; for after the setting of the sun, every village resounds with songs, and music; and i have often listened to them with attention and pleasure, during the tranquil evenings of the dry season. villages a league distant from each other frequently perform the same song, and alternately change it, for hours together. while this harmonic correspondence continues, and the inhabitants of the neighbouring villages chaunt their couplets, the youth of both sexes listen with the greatest attention and pleasure. among the several kinds of instruments of music which accompany the ceremonies of mourning or mirth among the africans, the drum is the principal. it is made from a hard thin wood, about three feet long, which is covered with a skin distended to the utmost. they strike it with the fingers of the right hand collected together, which serves to beat time in all their dances. among the foulahs and soosees they have a kind of flute, made of a hard reed, which produces sounds both unmusical and harsh: but all the africans of the windward district are the most barbarous musicians that can be conceived. they have also a kind of guitar, formed from the calabash, which they call _kilara_. some of these are of an enormous size, and the musician performs upon it by placing himself on the ground, and putting the _kilara_ between his thighs; he performs on it with both his hands, in a manner similar to the playing on the harp in this country. they have another instrument of a very complicated construction, about two feet deep, four feet long, and eighteen inches wide, which they call _balafau_. it is constructed by parallel intervals, covered with bits of hard polished wood, so as to give each a different tone, and are connected by cords of catgut fastened at each extremity of the instrument. the musician strikes these pieces of wood with knobbed sticks covered with skin, which produces a most detestable jargon of confused noise. jugglers and buffoons are very common, and are the constant attendants of the courts of negro kings and princes, upon whom they lavish the most extravagant eulogiums, and abject flattery. these jesters are also the panders of concupiscense; they are astrologers, musicians, and poets, and are well received every where, and live by public contribution. section v. _concluding observations._ it has already been observed that cotton and indigo are indigenous to the windward coast of africa. tobacco grows in every direction, likewise cocoa, coffee, and aromatic plants would no doubt succeed by cultivation. a trade in raw hides might be carried on to a great extent; and the articles of wax, gold, ivory, emery, dyes, &c. might be greatly increased. substances for making soap are to be found in great abundance; cattle, poultry, different kinds of game, fish, and various animals, fruits, and roots, abound, affording a great variety of the necessaries and luxuries of life: and european art and industry are only wanting to introduce the extensive culture of the sugar cane. the warmth and nature of the climate are peculiarly adapted to the maturing this plant, and there are many situations from cape verde to cape palmas, where this valuable production might undoubtedly be raised to great amount and perfection. in addition to the woods i have already named, there are many others for building, viz. _todso, worsmore,_ and a fine yellow wood, called _barzilla_, the _black_ and the _white mangrove_, boxwood of a superior quality, _conta_, a remarkable fine wood for building, and various kinds of mahogany, of a beautiful colour, and large dimensions. it has also been observed in the previous section, that one of the musical instruments used by the africans of the windward coast, named by them _kilara_, is formed from the calabash, a pumpkin which grows from the size of a goblet to that of a moderate sized tub, and serves every purpose almost of household utensils. they divide this pumpkin into two hemispheres, with the utmost accuracy, and it is excavated by pouring boiling water inside, to soften the pulp. the inside is cleaned with great neatness, and they execute upon the outside various designs and paintings, both fanciful and eccentric, such as birds, beasts, serpents, alligators, &c. in fine, the objects of commerce and enjoyment in this country are, comparatively speaking, inexhaustible; and this is a part of the world which england has hitherto strangely neglected, because its mysteries are unknown. it only requires the happy influence of civilization, agriculture, and natural commerce, to surprize and enrich those, who humanely and wisely interfere to procure these blessings to its inhabitants. the system of establishment to attain these important ends to our commerce, and to the bewildered african, should be skilfully planned, and wisely adapted to the _present condition_ of the country, for the _hasty conclusion of the abolition of the slave trade never can, in its present state, meet the views and objects of rational humanity_. is the united kingdom, at this crisis, when the enormous power of our adversary has shut the door of commerce against us in every direction where his influence and dictates command, to abandon africa, so abundant and versatile in its natural productions and resources, to contingencies, and to the grasp of other nations? forbid it, humanity, and forbid it, wise policy! let civil laws, religion, and morality, exercise their influence in behalf of the negro race, whom barbarism has subjected to our dominion, and let the beneficence and wisdom of government devise a system of agriculture and commercial operation, upon the maritime situations of africa, as the most effectual means to freedom of intercourse with its interior. the operations of impracticable theories and misguided zeal have accomplished an unqualified abolition of the slave trade, which i am persuaded will be highly injurious to the commercial and manufacturing interests of our country; and is a measure which humanity will have deeply to deplore, while in its tendency it is pernicious to the african, and auspicious to the views of france. without doubt the ability and energies of the _present administration_ will be directed to avert these calamities; and amidst the _important diliberations_ which now occupy their attention, the condition of africa, the wealth derivable from so important a quarter of the earth, and the relations involved with it, will not be overlooked by them. a vocabulary of the language of the principal nations of the windward coast of africa. |english |jolliff |soosee |timmanee |------------|-------------------|--------------------|---------------- |one |ben |kiring |pen |two |yar |faring |prung |three |niet |shooking |tisas |four |nianett |nari |pánlee |five |gurum |shooli |tomát |six |gurum ben |shinie |rókin |seven |gurum yar |shulifiring |dayring |eight |gurum niet |shulimashukúng |daysas |nine |gurum niant |shulimang |daynga |ten |fue |fooang |tofot |twenty |nill |mahwinia |tofot marung |thirty |fanever |tongashukúng |tofot masas |forty |nianett fue |tonganani |tofot manlu |fifty |guaum fue |tongashulang |tofot tomat |sixty |gurum ben fue |tongashini |tofot rokin |seventy |gurum yar fue |tongashulifiring |tofot dayring |eighty |gurum niet fue |tongashulimashakung |tofot daysas |ninety |gurum nianet fue |tongashulimanáne |tofot danygah |one hundred |temer |kimé |tofot tofot |i | |emtang |eto or munga |thou | |etang |moota or moonga |he | |atang |otto or ken |it | |atang |ree |we | |mackutang |sitta or shang |ye | |wotang |angsha |they | |etang |angna |god |tallah | | |the devil |ghiné | | |heaven |assaman | | |english |jolliff |soosee |mandingo |------------|--------------------|---------------|------------------ |the sun |burham safara |shuge |teelee |the moon |burham safara lion |kige |koro |gold |ourous | |sanoo |father |bail |taffe |fa |my father |samma bail | | |mother |de |inga |ba |my mother |samma de | | |man |gour | |mo or fato |woman |diguén | |mooséa |brother |rak gour |tarakunjia |ba ding kea |my brother |samma rak gour | | |sister |rak diguén |magine |ba ding mooséa |my sister |samma rak diguén | | |head |bop |hung hungji |roon |my head |samma bop | | |tongue |lamin |ning ningje |ning |mouth |guémin |dé |da |nose |bauane |nieue |nung |bread |bourou | |munko |water |dock | |gee |teeth |guené | | |bowels |bouthet | | |belly |birr | |kono |fingers |baram | |boalla ronding |arm |lokoó | |boalla same for hand. |hair |cayor | | |the beard |jekim |habe de habe |bora |white |toulha é |fihe |qui |black |jolof |foro |fing |good |bachna |fang |bettie |bad |bahout |niaake |jox |english |soosee |-------------------------------------|------------------------ |elephant |siti |camelion |kolungji |horse |shuoe |cow |ninkgegine |goat |shee |sheep |juké |leopard |shuko she |alligator |shonge |parrot |kalle |shark |sark |honey |kume |white ant, termite, &c. |bugabuge |(or bug a bug) | |the sea |baa |earth |bohe |knife |finé |shirt |doma |trowsers |wangtanji |brass pan |tang kue |house |bankhi |door |dé nadé |day |hi |night |qué |health |maié langfe |sickness |fura |pain |whondi, whona fe |love |whuli |hatred |niaahú |road |kirá |idle |kobi |hot |furi, furihe |cold |himbeli |what are you doing? |emung she ra falama? |tornado |tuliakbegle |which way are you going? |esigama mung kirara |to trade |sera shofe |make haste |arâ bafe mafurì |to kill |fuka fe |to quarrel |gerì shofe |to sing |shige sháfe |to beat the drum |fare mokafé |have you done? |ebanta gei? |are you afraid? |egahama? |he is not yet gone |a mú siga sending |stand still |tife ira hara |run |gee fé |leap, or jump |tubang fe |have you slept well? |eheo keefang? |do you understand soosee? |esusee whi mema? |i am hungry |kaame em shukuma |eat |dong |let us go |woem hasiga |will you go with me? |esigáma em fokhera |i have no money |náfuli muna embe |how much do you want? |e' wama ierekong |sit down |dokha |how do you do |e'mung keé? |very well |em melang hekeefang |give me some rice? |málungdundundifeemma |here |be |what is your name? |ehili mungkee? |i love you |efanghe emma |if you want rice i will give you some|ha ewama málunghong eminda fuma éma |let us go together. |meekufiring ha siga |english |jolliff |----------------------------|----------------------- |goat |phas |sheep |zedre |wolf |bouki |elephant |guìé |ox |nack |fish |guienn |horse |ghénapp |butter |dión |milk |sán |tiger |shaglé |iron |vina |millet |doughoul |quiver |smagalla |to dance |faik |to sing |ouhai |to-day |thei |to-morrow |elleck, or mek |yesterday |demb |a tree |garallun |to drink |nán |to eat |leck ou leckamm |she is remarkably handsome |sama rafitnalóll |good day |dhiarakio |good day sir |dhiarakio-samba |good night |fhanandiam |come here? |kahihfie |yes |ouaa |no |dhiett |how do you do? |dhya mésa? |very well |dhya medal |buy |ghuyendé |sell |ghuyal |take |diapol |i will |benguéna |i thank you |guérum nalá |a bar of iron |baravin |what did you say? |loung a houche |can you speak joliff? |dígenga jolliff |how much did that cost? |niatar ladiar? |give me |maniman |i love you from my heart |sépenata tié somo koll |english |temmanee |bullom |-----------------------|------------------------|---------------- |how do you do? |currea |lemmoó |i return you service, |bá |bá |or salute | | |are you well? |too pay |appay wa? |very well |tai ó tai |pay chin lin |what is your name? |gnay see mooa? |illil é móa? |give me a little rice |song mee pilla pittun |knamée opillay | | |otayk |yes |a |a |no |deh |be |is your father at home?|pa ka moo oyá roshaytee?|appa moway lore | | |ko killayée |he is |oéeree |way lorre |what do you want? |ko nyaymaee? |yeng yayma? |why do you do so? |ko sum kingyotteeay |yaywum layngalla |i beg your pardon |a marree moo |lum marra mó |english |temmanek |bullom |--------------------|--------------------|----------------------- |i love you |ee bóter moo |a marra mo |let me alone |tuoy mee |y'nfolmee |let me go |teer amee |y'mmelmee |sit down |yeera |y'nchal |i am hungry |durabang mee |nrik mi a me |shut the door |kanta kayraree |ingkunta fong fólootay |will you go with me?|yintoo kó pey a mee?|mo mee ko day ree |where are you going?|ray mó kóay. |lomo koa |here |unno |kakée or ha |forward |kihdee |ebol |backward |rarung |wayling |to-day |taynung |eenang |to-morrow |anéenang |beng |sometimes |olokko ollon |lokkó poom |and |ray |na |good bye |mang peearó |heepeeáró ** the foregoing vocabulary, and imperfect number of words, may serve to give some idea of a part of the languages on the windward coast of africa. from those accidents to which the traveller is continually exposed, i have unfortunately lost what i am persuaded was a very accurate vocabulary of the jolliff, foulah, maudingo, soosee, bullom, and temmanee tongues, which i had arranged under the correction of a very intelligent trader long resident upon the windward coast. owing to this misfortune i have been obliged to refer to scattered memoranda only, which i know to correspond correctly with the document i allude to. as the foulah and mandingo nations are of most consequence in attempts at civilization, i have to regret exceedingly that i have not been able to give the languages of those nations more at large. the online distributed proofreading canada team at http://www.pgdpcanada.net sanders of the river by edgar wallace author of "four just men," "the council of justice," "the duke in the suburbs," etc. ward, lock & co., limited london and melbourne popular novels by edgar wallace published by ward, lock & co., limited. _in various editions._ sanders of the river bones bosambo of the river bones in london the keepers of the king's peace the council of justice the duke in the suburbs the people of the river down under donovan private selby the admirable carfew the man who bought london the just men of cordova the secret house kate, plus ten lieutenant bones the adventures of heine jack o' judgment the daffodil mystery the nine bears the book of all power mr. justice maxell the books of bart the dark eyes of london chick sandi, the king-maker the three oak mystery the fellowship of the frog blue hand grey timothy a debt discharged those folk of bulboro the man who was nobody the green rust _made and printed in great britain by_ ward, lock & co., limited, london. contents. chapter page i.--the education of the king ii.--keepers of the stone iii.--bosambo of monrovia iv.--the drowsy one v.--the special commissioner vi.--the dancing stones vii.--the forest of happy dreams viii.--the akasavas ix.--the wood of devils x.--the loves of m'lino xi.--the witch-doctor xii.--the lonely one xiii.--the seer the last.--dogs of war sanders of the river. chapter i. the education of the king. mr. commissioner sanders had graduated to west central africa by such easy stages that he did not realise when his acquaintance with the back lands began. long before he was called upon by the british government to keep a watchful eye upon some quarter of a million cannibal folk, who ten years before had regarded white men as we regard the unicorn; he had met the basuto, the zulu, the fingo, the pondo, matabele, mashona, barotse, hottentot, and bechuana. then curiosity and interest took him westward and northward, and he met the angola folk, then northward to the congo, westward to the masai, and finally, by way of the pigmy people, he came to his own land. now, there is a subtle difference between all these races, a difference that only such men as sanders know. it is not necessarily a variety of colour, though some are brown and some yellow, and some--a very few--jet black. the difference is in character. by sanders' code you trusted all natives up to the same point, as you trust children, with a few notable exceptions. the zulu were men, the basuto were men, yet childlike in their grave faith. the black men who wore the fez were subtle, but trustworthy; but the browny men of the gold coast, who talked english, wore european clothing, and called one another "mr.," were sanders' pet abomination. living so long with children of a larger growth, it follows that he absorbed many of their childlike qualities. once, on furlough in london, a confidence trick was played on him, and only his natural honesty pulled him out of a ridiculous scrape. for, when the gold-brick man produced his dull metal ingot, all sanders' moral nerves stood endways, and he ran the confiding "bunco steerer" to the nearest station, charging him, to the astonishment of a sorely-puzzled policeman, with "i.g.b.," which means illicit gold buying. sanders did not doubt that the ingot was gold, but he was equally certain that the gold was not honestly come by. his surprise when he found that the "gold" was gold-leaf imposed upon the lead of commerce was pathetic. you may say of sanders that he was a statesman, which means that he had no exaggerated opinion of the value of individual human life. when he saw a dead leaf on the plant of civilisation, he plucked it off, or a weed growing with his "flowers" he pulled it up, not stopping to consider the weed's equal right to life. when a man, whether he was _capita_ or slave, by his bad example endangered the peace of his country, sanders fell upon him. in their unregenerate days, the isisi called him "ogani isisi," which means "the little butcher bird," and certainly in that time sanders was prompt to hang. he governed a people three hundred miles beyond the fringe of civilisation. hesitation to act, delay in awarding punishment, either of these two things would have been mistaken for weakness amongst a people who had neither power to reason, nor will to excuse, nor any large charity. in the land which curves along the borders of togo the people understand punishment to mean pain and death, and nothing else counts. there was a foolish commissioner who was a great humanitarian, and he went up to akasava--which is the name of this land--and tried moral suasion. it was a raiding palaver. some of the people of akasava had crossed the river to ochori and stolen women and goats, and i believe there was a man or two killed, but that is unimportant. the goats and the women were alive, and cried aloud for vengeance. they cried so loud that down at headquarters they were heard and mr. commissioner niceman--that was not his name, but it will serve--went up to see what all the noise was about. he found the ochori people very angry, but more frightened. "if," said their spokesman, "they will return our goats, they may keep the women, because the goats are very valuable." so mr. commissioner niceman had a long, long palaver that lasted days and days, with the chief of the akasava people and his councillors, and in the end moral suasion triumphed, and the people promised on a certain day, at a certain hour, when the moon was in such a quarter and the tide at such a height, the women should be returned and the goats also. so mr. niceman returned to headquarters, swelling with admiration for himself and wrote a long report about his genius and his administrative abilities, and his knowledge of the native, which was afterwards published in blue book (africa) - . it so happened that mr. niceman immediately afterwards went home to england on furlough, so that he did not hear the laments and woeful wailings of the ochori folk when they did not get their women or their goats. sanders, working round the isisi river, with ten houssas and an attack of malaria, got a helio message: "go akasava and settle that infernal woman palaver.--administration." so sanders girded up his loins, took grains of quinine, and leaving his good work--he was searching for m'beli, the witch-doctor, who had poisoned a friend--trekked across country for the akasava. in the course of time he came to the city and was met by the chief. "what about these women?" he asked. "we will have a palaver," said the chief. "i will summon my headmen and my councillors." "summon nothing," said sanders shortly. "send back the women and the goats you stole from the ochori." "master," said the chief, "at full moon, which is our custom, when the tide is so, and all signs of gods and devils are propitious, i will do as you bid." "chief," said sanders, tapping the ebony chest of the other with the thin end of his walking-stick, "moon and river, gods or devils, those women and the goats go back to the ochori folk by sunset, or i tie you to a tree and flog you till you bleed." "master," said the chief, "the women shall be returned." "and the goats," said sanders. "as to the goats," said the chief airily, "they are dead, having been killed for a feast." "you will bring them back to life," said sanders. "master, do you think i am a magician?" asked the chief of the akasava. "i think you are a liar," said sanders impartially, and there the palaver finished. that night goats and women returned to the ochori, and sanders prepared to depart. he took aside the chief, not desiring to put shame upon him or to weaken his authority. "chief," he said, "it is a long journey to akasava, and i am a man fulfilling many tasks. i desire that you do not cause me any further journey to this territory." "master," said the chief truthfully, "i never wish to see you again." sanders smiled aside, collected his ten houssas, and went back to the isisi river to continue his search for m'beli. it was not a nice search for many causes, and there was every reason to believe, too, that the king of isisi himself was the murderer's protector. confirmation of this view came one morning when sanders, encamped by the big river, was taking a breakfast of tinned milk and toast. there arrived hurriedly sato-koto, the brother of the king, in great distress of mind, for he was a fugitive from the king's wrath. he babbled forth all manner of news, in much of which sanders took no interest whatever. but what he said of the witch-doctor who lived in the king's shadow was very interesting indeed, and sanders sent a messenger to headquarters, and, as it transpired, headquarters despatched in the course of time mr. niceman--who by this time had returned from furlough--to morally "suade" the king of the isisi. from such evidence as we have been able to collect it is evident that the king was not in a melting mood. it is an indisputable fact that poor niceman's head, stuck on a pole before the king's hut, proclaimed the king's high spirits. h.m.s. _st. george_, h.m.s. _thrush_, h.m.s. _philomel_, h.m.s. _phoebe_ sailed from simonstown, and h.m.s. _dwarf_ came down from sierra leone _hec dum_, and in less than a month after the king killed his guest he wished he hadn't. headquarters sent sanders to clear up the political side of the mess. he was shown round what was left of the king's city by the flag-lieutenant of the _st. george_. "i am afraid," said that gentleman, apologetically, "i am afraid that you will have to dig out a new king; we've rather killed the old one." sanders nodded. "i shall not go into mourning," he said. there was no difficulty in finding candidates for the vacant post. sato-koto, the dead king's brother, expressed his willingness to assume the cares of office with commendable promptitude. "what do you say?" asked the admiral, commanding the expedition. "i say no, sir," said sanders, without hesitation. "the king has a son, a boy of nine; the kingship must be his. as for sato-koto, he shall be regent at pleasure." and so it was arranged, sato-koto sulkily assenting. they found the new king hidden in the woods with the women folk, and he tried to bolt, but sanders caught him and led him back to the city by the ear. "my boy," he said kindly, "how do people call you?" "peter, master," whimpered the wriggling lad; "in the fashion of the white people." "very well," said sanders, "you shall be king peter, and rule this country wisely and justly according to custom and the law. and you shall do hurt to none, and put shame on none nor shall you kill or raid or do any of the things that make life worth living, and if you break loose, may the lord help you!" thus was king peter appointed monarch of the isisi people, and sanders went back to head-quarters with the little army of bluejackets and houssas, for m'beli, the witch-doctor, had been slain at the taking of the city, and sanders' work was finished. the story of the taking of isisi village, and the crowning of the young king, was told in the london newspapers, and lost nothing in the telling. it was so described by the special correspondents, who accompanied the expedition, that many dear old ladies of bayswater wept, and many dear young ladies of mayfair said: "how sweet!" and the outcome of the many emotions which the description evoked was the sending out from england of miss clinton calbraith, who was an m.a., and unaccountably pretty. she came out to "mother" the orphan king, to be a mentor and a friend. she paid her own passage, but the books which she brought and the school paraphernalia that filled two large packing cases were subscribed for by the tender readers of _tiny toddlers_, a magazine for infants. sanders met her on the landing-stage, being curious to see what a white woman looked like. he put a hut at her disposal and sent the wife of his coast clerk to look after her. "and now, miss calbraith," he said, at dinner that night, "what do you expect to do with peter?" she tilted her pretty chin in the air reflectively. "we shall start with the most elementary of lessons--the merest kindergarten, and gradually work up. i shall teach him calisthenics, a little botany--mr. sanders, you're laughing." "no, i wasn't," he hastened to assure her; "i always make a face like that--er--in the evening. but tell me this--do you speak the language--swaheli, bomongo, fingi?" "that will be a difficulty," she said thoughtfully. "will you take my advice?" he asked. "why, yes." "well, learn the language." she nodded. "go home and learn it." she frowned. "it will take you about twenty-five years." "mr. sanders," she said, not without dignity, "you are pulling--you are making fun of me." "heaven forbid!" said sanders piously, "that i should do anything so wicked." the end of the story, so far as miss clinton calbraith was concerned, was that she went to isisi, stayed three days, and came back incoherent. "he is not a child!" she said wildly; "he is--a--a little devil!" "so i should say," said sanders philosophically. "a king? it is disgraceful! he lives in a mud hut and wears no clothes. if i'd known!" "a child of nature," said sanders blandly. "you didn't expect a sort of louis quinze, did you?" "i don't know what i expected," she said desperately; "but it was impossible to stay--quite impossible." "obviously," murmured sanders. "of course, i knew he would be black," she went on; "and i knew that--oh, it was too horrid!" "the fact of it is, my dear young lady," said sanders, "peter wasn't as picturesque as you imagined him; he wasn't the gentle child with pleading eyes; and he lives messy--is that it?" this was not the only attempt ever made to educate peter. months afterwards, when miss calbraith had gone home and was busily writing her famous book, "alone in africa: by an english gentlewoman," sanders heard of another educative raid. two members of an ethiopian mission came into isisi by the back way. the ethiopian mission is made up of christian black men, who, very properly, basing their creed upon holy writ, preach the gospel of equality. a black man is as good as a white man any day of the week, and infinitely better on sundays if he happens to be a member of the reformed ethiopian church. they came to isisi and achieved instant popularity, for the kind of talk they provided was very much to the liking of sato-koto and the king's councillors. sanders sent for the missioners. the first summons they refused to obey, but they came on the second occasion, because the message sanders sent was at once peremptory and ominous. they came to headquarters, two cultured american negroes of good address and refined conversation. they spoke english faultlessly, and were in every sense perfect gentlemen. "we cannot understand the character of your command," said one, "which savours somewhat of interference with the liberty of the subject." "you'll understand me better," said sanders, who knew his men, "when i tell you that i cannot allow you to preach sedition to my people." "sedition, mr. sanders!" said the negro in shocked tones. "that is a grave charge." sanders took a paper from a pigeon-hole in his desk; the interview took place in his office. "on such a date," he said, "you said this, and this, and that." in other words he accused them of overstepping the creed of equality and encroaching upon the borderland of political agitation. "lies!" said the elder of the two, without hesitation. "truth or lies," he said, "you go no more to isisi." "would you have the heathen remain in darkness?" asked the man, in reproach. "is the light we kindle too bright, master?" "no," said sanders, "but a bit too warm." so he committed the outrage of removing the ethiopians from the scene of their earnest labours, in consequence of which questions were asked in parliament. then the chief of the akasava people--an old friend--took a hand in the education of king peter. akasava adjoins that king's territory, and the chief came to give hints in military affairs. he came with drums a-beating, with presents of fish and bananas and salt. "you are a great king!" he said to the sleepy-eyed boy who sat on a stool of state, regarding him with open-mouthed interest. "when you walk the world shakes at your tread; the mighty river that goes flowing down to the big water parts asunder at your word, the trees of the forest shiver, and the beasts go slinking to cover when your mightiness goes abroad." "oh, ko, ko!" giggled the king, pleasantly tickled. "the white men fear you," continued the chief of the akasava; "they tremble and hide at your roar." sato-koto, standing at the king's elbow, was a practical man. "what seek ye, chief?" he asked, cutting short the compliments. so the chief told him of a land peopled by cowards, rich with the treasures of the earth, goats, and women. "why do you not take them yourself?" demanded the regent. "because i am a slave," said the chief; "the slave of sandi, who would beat me. but you, lord, are of the great; being king's headman, sandi would not beat you because of your greatness." there followed a palaver, which lasted two days. "i shall have to do something with peter," wrote sanders despairingly to the administrator; "the little beggar has gone on the war-path against those unfortunate ochori. i should be glad if you would send me a hundred men, a maxim, and a bundle of rattan canes; i'm afraid i must attend to peter's education myself." * * * * * "lord, did i not speak the truth?" said the akasava chief in triumph. "sandi has done nothing! behold, we have wasted the city of the ochori, and taken their treasure, and the white man is dumb because of your greatness! let us wait till the moon comes again, and i will show you another city." "you are a great man," bleated the king, "and some day you shall build your hut in the shadow of my palace." "on that day," said the chief, with splendid resignation, "i shall die of joy." when the moon had waxed and waned and come again, a pencilled silver hoop of light in the eastern sky, the isisi warriors gathered with spear and broad-bladed sword, with _ingola_ on their bodies, and clay in their hair. they danced a great dance by the light of a huge fire, and all the women stood round, clapping their hands rhythmically. in the midst of this there arrived a messenger in a canoe, who prostrated himself before the king, saying: "master, one day's march from here is sandi; he has with him five score of soldiers and the brass gun which says: 'ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!'" a silence reigned in court circles, which was broken by the voice of the akasava chief. "i think i will go home," he said. "i have a feeling of sickness; also, it is the season when my goats have their young." "do not be afraid," said sato-koto brutally. "the king's shadow is over you, and he is so mighty that the earth shakes at his tread, and the waters of the big river part at his footfall; also, the white men fear him." "nevertheless," said the chief, with some agitation, "i must go, for my youngest son is sickening with fever, and calls all the time for me." "stay!" said the regent, and there was no mistaking his tone. sanders did not come the next day, nor the next. he was moving leisurely, traversing a country where many misunderstandings existed that wanted clearing up. when he arrived, having sent a messenger ahead to carry the news of his arrival, he found the city peaceably engaged. the women were crushing corn, the men smoking, the little children playing and sprawling about the streets. he halted at the outskirts of the city, on a hillock that commanded the main street, and sent for the regent. "why must i send for you?" he asked. "why does the king remain in his city when i come? this is shame." "master," said sato-koto, "it is not fitting that a great king should so humble himself." sanders was neither amused nor angry. he was dealing with a rebellious people, and his own fine feelings were as nothing to the peace of the land. "it would seem that the king has had bad advisers," he reflected aloud, and sato-koto shuffled uneasily. "go, now, and tell the king to come--for i am his friend." the regent departed, but returned again alone. "lord, he will not come," he said sullenly. "then i will go to him," said sanders. king peter, sitting before his hut, greeted mr. commissioner with downcast eyes. sanders' soldiers, spread in a semi-circle before the hut, kept the rabble at bay. "king," said sanders--he carried in his hand a rattan cane of familiar shape, and as he spoke he whiffled it in the air, making a little humming noise--"stand up!" "wherefore?" said sato-koto. "that you shall see," said sanders. the king rose reluctantly, and sanders grabbed him by the scruff of his neck. swish! the cane caught him most undesirably, and he sprang into the air with a yell. swish, swish, swish! yelling and dancing, throwing out wild hands to ward off the punishment, king peter blubbered for mercy. "master!" sato-koto, his face distorted with rage, reached for his spear. "shoot that man if he interferes," said sanders, without releasing the king. the regent saw the levelled rifles and stepped back hastily. "now," said sanders, throwing down the cane, "now we will play a little game." "wow-wow--oh, ko!" sobbed his majesty. "i go back to the forest," said sanders. "by and by a messenger shall come to you, saying that the commissioner is on his way. do you understand?" "yi-hi!" sobbed the king. "then will you go out with your councillors and your old men and await my coming according to custom. is that clear?" "ye-es, master," whimpered the boy. "very good," said sanders, and withdrew his troops. in half an hour came a grave messenger to the king, and the court went out to the little hill to welcome the white man. this was the beginning of king peter's education, for thus was he taught obedience. sanders went into residence in the town of isisi, and held court. "sato-koto," he said on the second day, "do you know the village of ikan?" "yes, master; it is two days' journey into the bush." sanders nodded. "you will take your wives, your children, your servants, and your possessions to the village of ikan, there to stay until i give you leave to return. the palaver is finished." next came the chief of the akasava, very ill at ease. "lord, if any man says i did you wrong, he lies," said the chief. "then i am a liar!" said sanders. "for i say that you are an evil man, full of cunning." "if it should be," said the chief, "that you order me to go to my village as you have ordered sato-koto, i will go, since he who is my father is not pleased with me." "that i order," said sanders; "also, twenty strokes with a stick, for the good of your soul. furthermore, i would have you remember that down by tembeli on the great river there is a village where men labour in chains because they have been unfaithful to the government and have practised abominations." so the chief of the akasava people went out to punishment. there were other matters requiring adjustment, but they were of a minor character, and when these were all settled to the satisfaction of sanders, but by no means to the satisfaction of the subjects, the commissioner turned his attention to the further education of the king. "peter," he said, "to-morrow when the sun comes up i go back to my own village, leaving you without councillors." "master, how may i do without councillors, since i am a young boy?" asked the king, crestfallen and chastened. "by saying to yourself when a man calls for justice: 'if i were this man how should i desire the king's justice?'" the boy looked unhappy. "i am very young," he repeated; "and to-day there come many from outlying villages seeking redress against their enemies." "very good," said sanders. "to-day i will sit at the king's right hand and learn of his wisdom." the boy stood on one leg in his embarrassment, and eyed sanders askance. there is a hillock behind the town. a worn path leads up to it, and a-top is a thatched hut without sides. from this hillock you see the broad river with its sandy shoals, where the crocodiles sleep with open mouth; you see the rising ground toward akasava, hills that rise one on top of the other, covered with a tangle of vivid green. in this house sits the king in judgment, beckoning the litigants forward. sato-koto was wont to stand by the king, bartering justice. to-day sato-koto was preparing to depart and sanders sat by the king's side. there were indeed many litigants. there was a man who had bought a wife, giving no less than a thousand rods and two bags of salt for her. he had lived for three months with her, when she departed from his house. "because," said the man philosophically, "she had a lover. therefore, mighty sun of wisdom, i desire the return of my rods and my salt." "what say you?" said sanders. the king wriggled uncomfortably. "what says the father?" he said hesitatingly, and sanders nodded. "that is a wise question," he approved, and called the father, a voluble and an eager old man. "now, king," he said hurriedly, "i sold this woman, my daughter; how might i know her mind? surely i fulfil my contract when the woman goes to the man. how shall a father control when a husband fails?" sanders looked at the king again, and the boy drew a long breath. "it would seem, m'bleni, that the woman, your daughter, lived many years in your hut, and if you do not know her mind you are either a great fool or she is a cunning one. therefore, i judge that you sold this woman knowing her faults. yet the husband might accept some risk also. you shall take back your daughter and return rods and a bag of salt, and if it should be that your daughter marries again, you shall pay one-half of her dowry to this man." very, very slowly he gave judgment, hesitatingly, anxiously, glancing now and again to the white man for his approval. "that was good," said sanders, and called forward another pleader. "lord king," said the new plaintiff, "a man has put an evil curse on me and my family, so that they sicken." here was a little poser for the little judge, and he puzzled the matter out in silence, sanders offering no help. "how does he curse you?" at last asked the king. "with the curse of death," said the complainant in a hushed voice. "then you shall curse him also," said the king, "and it shall be a question of whose curse is the stronger." sanders grinned behind his hand, and the king, seeing the smile, smiled also. from here onward peter's progress was a rapid one, and there came to headquarters from time to time stories of a young king who was a solomon in judgment. so wise he was (who knew of the formula he applied to each case?), so beneficent, so peaceable, that the chief of the akasava, from whom was periodically due, took advantage of the gentle administration, and sent neither corn nor fish nor grain. he did this after a journey to far-away ikan, where he met the king's uncle, sato-koto, and agreed upon common action. since the crops were good, the king passed the first fault, but the second tribute became due, and neither akasava nor ikan sent, and the people of isisi, angry at the insolence, murmured, and the king sat down in the loneliness of his hut to think upon a course which was just and effective. * * * * * "i really am sorry to bother you," wrote sanders to the administrator again, "but i shall have to borrow your houssas for the isisi country. there has been a tribute palaver, and peter went down to ikan and wiped up his uncle; he filled in his spare time by giving the akasava the worst licking they have ever had. i thoroughly approve of all that peter has done, because i feel that he is actuated only by the keenest sense of justice and a desire to do the right thing at the right time--and it was time sato-koto was killed--though i shall have to reprimand peter for the sake of appearances. the akasava chief is in the bush, hiding." peter came back to his capital after his brief but strenuous campaign, leaving behind him two territories that were all the better for his visit, though somewhat sore. the young king brought together his old men, his witch-doctors, and other notabilities. "by all the laws of white men," he said, "i have done wrong to sandi, because he has told me i must not fight, and, behold, i have destroyed my uncle, who was a dog, and i have driven the chief of the akasava into the forest. but sandi told me also that i must do what was just, and that i have done according to my lights, for i have destroyed a man who put my people to shame. now, it seems to me that there is only one thing to do, and that is to go to sandi, telling the truth and asking him to judge." "lord king," said the oldest of his councillors, "what if sandi puts you to the chain-gang?" "that is with to-morrow," quoth the king, and gave orders for preparations to be made for departure. half-way to headquarters the two met; king peter going down and sanders coming up. and here befell the great incident. no word was spoken of peter's fault before sunset; but when blue smoke arose from the fires of houssa and warrior, and the little camp in the forest clearing was all a-chatter, sanders took the king's arm and led him along the forest path. peter told his tale and sanders listened. "and what of the chief of the akasava?" he asked. "master," said the king, "he fled to the forest cursing me, and with him went many bad men." sanders nodded again gravely. they talked of many things till the sun threw long shadows, and then they turned to retrace their footsteps. they were within half a mile of the camp and the faint noise of men laughing, and the faint scent of fires burning came to them, when the chief of the akasava stepped out from behind a tree and stood directly in their path. with him were some eight fighting men fully armed. "lord king," said the chief of the akasava, "i have been waiting for you." the king made neither movement nor reply, but sanders reached for his revolver. his hand closed on the butt, when something struck him and he went down like a log. "now we will kill the king of the isisi, and the white man also." the voice was the chief's, but sanders was not taking any particular interest in the conversation, because there was a hive of wild bees buzzing in his head, and a maze of pain; he felt sick. "if you kill me it is little matter," said the king's voice, "because there are many men who can take my place; but if you slay sandi, you slay the father of the people, and none can replace him." "he whipped you, little king," said the chief of the akasava mockingly. "i would throw him into the river," said a strange voice after a long interval; "thus shall no trace be found of him, and no man will lay his death to our door." "what of the king?" said another. then came a crackling of twigs and the voices of men. "they are searching," whispered a voice. "king, if you speak i will kill you now." "kill!" said the young king's even voice, and shouted, "oh, m'sabo! beteli! sandi is here!" that was all sandi heard. * * * * * two days later he sat up in bed and demanded information. there was a young doctor with him when he woke, who had providentially arrived from headquarters. "the king?" he hesitated. "well, they finished the king, but he saved your life. i suppose you know that?" sanders said "yes" without emotion. "a plucky little beggar," suggested the doctor. "very," said sanders. then: "did they catch the chief of the akasava?" "yes; he was so keen on finishing you that he delayed his bolting. the king threw himself on you and covered your body." "that will do." sanders' voice was harsh and his manner brusque at the best of times, but now his rudeness was brutal. "just go out of the hut, doctor--i want to sleep." he heard the doctor move, heard the rattle of the "chick" at the hut door, then he turned his face to the wall and wept. chapter ii. keepers of the stone. there is a people who live at ochori in the big african forest on the ikeli river, who are called in the native tongue "the keepers of the stone." there is a legend that years and years ago, _cala-cala_, there was a strange, flat stone, "inscribed with the marks of the devils" (so the grave native story-teller puts it), which was greatly worshipped and prized, partly for its magic powers, and partly because of the two ghosts who guarded it. it was a fetish of peculiar value to the mild people who lived in the big forest, but the akasava, who are neither mild nor reverential, and being, moreover, in need of gods, swooped down upon the ochori one red morning and came away with this wonderful stone and other movables. presumably, the "ghosts of brass" went also. it was a great business, securing the stone, for it was set in a grey slab in the solid rock, and many spear-heads were broken before it could be wrenched from its place. but in the end it was taken away, and for several years it was the boast of the akasava that they derived much benefit from this sacred possession. then of a sudden the stone disappeared, and with it all the good fortune of its owners. for the vanishing of the stone coincided with the arrival of british rule, and it was a bad thing for the akasava. there came in these far-off days (' ?) a ridiculous person in white with an escort of six soldiers. he brought a message of peace and good fellowship, and talked of a new king and a new law. the akasava listened in dazed wonderment, but when they recovered they cut off his head, also the heads of the escort. it seemed to be the only thing to do under the circumstances. then one morning the akasava people woke to find the city full of strange white folk, who had come swiftly up the river in steamboats. there were too many to quarrel with, so the people sat quiet, a little frightened and very curious, whilst two black soldiers strapped the hands and feet of the akasava chief prior to hanging him by the neck till he was dead. nor did the bad luck of the people end here; there came a lean year, when the manioc[ ] root was bad and full of death-water, when goats died, and crops were spoilt by an unexpected hurricane. there was always a remedy at hand for a setback of this kind. if you have not the thing you require, go and take it. so, following precedents innumerable, the akasava visited the ochori, taking away much grain, and leaving behind dead men and men who prayed for death. in the course of time the white men came with their steamboats, their little brass guns, and the identical block and tackle, which they fastened to the identical tree and utilised in the inevitable manner. "it appears," said the new chief--who was afterwards hanged for the killing of the king of the isisi--"that the white man's law is made to allow weak men to triumph at the expense of the strong. this seems foolish, but it will be well to humour them." his first act was to cut down the hanging-tree--it was too conspicuous and too significant. then he set himself to discover the cause of all the trouble which had come upon the akasava. the cause required little appreciation. the great stone had been stolen, as he well knew, and the remedy resolved itself into a question of discovering the thief. the wretched ochori were suspect. "if we go to them," said the chief of the akasava thoughtfully, "killing them very little, but rather burning them, so that they told where this godstone was hidden, perhaps the great ones would forgive us." "in my young days," said an aged councillor, "when evil men would not tell where stolen things were buried, we put hot embers in their hands and bound them tightly." "that is a good way," approved another old man, wagging his head applaudingly; "also to tie men in the path of the soldier-ants has been known to make them talkative." "yet we may not go up against the ochori for many reasons," said the chief; "the principal of which is that if the stone be with them we shall not overcome them owing to the two ghosts--though i do not remember that the ghosts were very potent in the days when the stone was with us," he added, not without hope. the little raid which followed and the search for the stone are told briefly in official records. the search was fruitless, and the akasava folk must needs content themselves with such picking as came to hand. of how mr. niceman, the deputy commissioner, and then sanders himself, came up, i have already told. that was long ago, as the natives say, _cala-cala_, and many things happened subsequently that put from the minds of the people all thought of the stone. in course of time the chief of the akasava died the death for various misdoings, and peace came to the land that fringes togo. * * * * * sanders has been surprised twice in his life. once was at ikeli, which in the native tongue means "little river." it is not a little river at all, but, on the contrary, a broad, strong, sullen stream that swirls and eddies and foams as it swings the corner of its tortuous course seaward. sanders sat on a deck-chair placed under the awning of his tiny steamer, and watched the river go rushing past. he was a contented man, for the land was quiet and the crops were good. nor was there any crime. there was sleeping sickness at bofabi, and beri-beri at akasava, and in the isisi country somebody had discovered a new god, and, by all accounts that came down river, they worshipped him night and day. he was not bothering about new gods, because gods of any kind were a beneficent asset. milini, the new king of the isisi, had sent him word: "master," said his mouthpiece, the messenger, "this new god lives in a box which is borne upon the shoulders of priests. it is so long and so wide, and there are four sockets in which the poles fit, and the god inside is a very strong one, and full of pride." "ko, ko!" said sanders, with polite interest, "tell the lord king, your master, that so long as this god obeys the law, he may live in the isisi country, paying no tax. but if he tells the young men to go fighting, i shall come with a much stronger god, who will eat your god up. the palaver is finished." sanders, with his feet stretched out on the rail of the boat, thought of the new god idly. when was it that the last had come? there was one in the n'gombi country years ago, a sad god who lived in a hut which no man dare approach; there was another god who came with thunder demanding sacrifice--human sacrifice. this was an exceptionally bad god, and had cost the british government six hundred thousand pounds, because there was fighting in the bush and a country unsettled. but, in the main, the gods were good, doing harm to none, for it is customary for new gods to make their appearance after the crops are gathered, and before the rainy season sets in. so sanders thought, sitting in the shade of a striped awning on the foredeck of the little _zaire_. the next day, before the sun came up, he turned the nose of the steamer up-stream, being curious as to the welfare of the shy ochori folk, who lived too near the akasava for comfort, and, moreover, needed nursing. very slow was the tiny steamer's progress, for the current was strong against her. after two days' travel sanders got into lukati, where young carter had a station. the deputy commissioner came down to the beach in his pyjamas, with a big pith helmet on the back of his head, and greeted his chief boisterously. "well?" said sanders; and carter told him all the news. there was a land palaver at ebibi; otabo, of bofabi, had died of the sickness; there were two leopards worrying the outlying villages, and---- "heard about the isisi god?" he asked suddenly; and sanders said that he had. "it's an old friend of yours," said carter. "my people tell me that this old god-box contains the stone of the ochori." "oh!" said sanders, with sudden interest. he breakfasted with his subordinate, inspected his little garrison of thirty, visited his farm, admired his sweet potatoes, and patronised his tomatoes. then he went back to the boat and wrote a short dispatch in the tiniest of handwriting on the flimsiest of paper slips. "in case!" said sanders. "bring me ," he said to his servant, and abiboo came back to him soon with a pigeon in his hand. "now, little bird," said sanders, carefully rolling his letter round the red leg of the tiny courier and fastening it with a rubber band, "you've got two hundred miles to fly before sunrise to-morrow--and 'ware hawks!" then he gathered the pigeon in his hand, walked with it to the stern of the boat, and threw it into the air. his crew of twelve men were sitting about their cooking-pot--that pot which everlastingly boils. "yoka!" he called, and his half-naked engineer came bounding down the slope. "steam," said sanders; "get your wood aboard; i am for isisi." * * * * * there was no doubt at all that this new god was an extremely powerful one. three hours from the city the _zaire_ came up to a long canoe with four men standing at their paddles singing dolefully. sanders remembered that he had passed a village where women, their bodies decked with green leaves, wailed by the river's edge. he slowed down till he came abreast of the canoe, and saw a dead man lying stark in the bottom. "where go you with this body?" he asked. "to isisi, lord," was the answer. "the middle river and the little islands are places for the dead," said sanders brusquely. "it is folly to take the dead to the living." "lord," said the man who spoke, "at isisi lives a god who breathes life; this man"--he pointed downwards--"is my brother, and he died very suddenly because of a leopard. so quickly he died that he could not tell us where he had hidden his rods and his salt. therefore we take him to isisi, that the new god may give him just enough life to make his relations comfortable." "the middle river," said sanders quietly, and pointed to such a lone island, all green with tangled vegetation, as might make a burying ground. "what is your name?" "master, my name is n'kema," said the man sullenly. "go, then, n'kema," he said, and kept the steamer slow ahead whilst he watched the canoe turn its blunt nose to the island and disembark its cargo. then he rang the engines full ahead, steered clear of a sandbank, and regained the fairway. he was genuinely concerned. the stone was something exceptional in fetishes, needing delicate handling. that the stone existed, he knew. there were legends innumerable about it; and an explorer had, in the early days, seen it through his glasses. also the "ghosts clad in brass" he had heard about--these fantastic and warlike shades who made peaceable men go out to battle--all except the ochori, who were never warlike, and whom no number of ghosts could incite to deeds of violence. you will have remarked that sanders took native people seriously, and that, i remark in passing, is the secret of good government. to him, ghosts were factors, and fetishes potent possibilities. a man who knew less would have been amused, but sanders was not amused, because he had a great responsibility. he arrived at the city of isisi in the afternoon, and observed, even at a distance, that something unusual was occurring. the crowd of women and children that the arrival of the commissioner usually attracted did not gather as he swung in from mid-stream and followed the water-path that leads to shoal. only the king and a handful of old men awaited him, and the king was nervous and in trouble. "lord," he blurted, "i am no king in this city because of the new god; the people are assembled on the far side of the hill, and there they sit night and day watching the god in the box." sanders bit his lip thoughtfully, and said nothing. "last night," said the king, "'the keepers of the stone' appeared walking through the village." he shivered, and the sweat stood in big beads on his forehead, for a ghost is a terrible thing. "all this talk of keepers of stones is folly," said sanders calmly; "they have been seen by your women and your unblooded boys." "lord, i saw them myself," said the king simply; and sanders was staggered, for the king was a sane man. "the devil you have!" said sanders in english; then, "what manner of ghost were these?" "lord," said the king, "they were white of face, like your greatness. they wore brass upon their heads and brass upon their breasts. their legs were bare, but upon the lower legs was brass again." "any kind of ghost is hard enough to believe," said sanders irritably, "but a brass ghost i will not have at any price." he spoke english again, as was his practice when he talked to himself, and the king stood silent, not understanding him. "what else?" said sanders. "they had swords," continued the chief, "such as the elephant-hunters of the n'gombi people carry. broad and short, and on their arms were shields." sanders was nonplussed. "and they cry 'war,'" said the chief. "this is the greatest shame of all, for my young men dance the death dance and streak their bodies with paint and talk boastfully." "go to your hut," said sanders; "presently i will come and join you." he thought and thought, smoking one black cigar after another, then he sent for abiboo, his servant. "abiboo," he said, "by my way of thinking, i have been a good master to you." "that is so, lord," said abiboo. "now i will trust you to go amongst my crew discovering their gods. if i ask them myself, they will lie to me out of politeness, inventing this god and that, thinking they please me." abiboo chose the meal hour, when the sun had gone out and the world was grey and the trees motionless. he came back with the information as sanders was drinking his second cup of coffee in the loneliness of the tiny deck-house. "master," he reported, "three men worship no god whatever, three more have especial family fetishes, and two are christians more or less, and the four houssas are with me in faith." "and you?" abiboo, the kano boy, smiled at sanders' assumption of innocence. "lord," he said, "i follow the prophet, believing only in the one god, beneficent and merciful." "that is good," said sanders. "now let the men load wood, and yoka shall have steam against moonrise, and all shall be ready for slipping." at ten o'clock by his watch he fell-in his four houssas, serving out to each a short carbine and a bandoleer. then the party went ashore. the king in his patience sat in his hut, and sanders found him. "you will stay here, milini," he commanded, "and no blame shall come to you for anything that may happen this night." "what will happen, master?" "who knows!" said sanders, philosophically. the streets were in pitch darkness, but abiboo, carrying a lantern, led the way. only occasionally did the party pass a tenanted hut. generally they saw by the dull glow of the log that smouldered in every habitation that it was empty. once a sick woman called to them in passing. it was near her time, she said, and there was none to help her in the supreme moment of her agony. "god help you, sister!" said sanders, ever in awe of the mysteries of birth. "i will send women to you. what is your name?" "they will not come," said the plaintive voice. "to-night the men go out to war, and the women wait for the great dance." "to-night?" "to-night, master--so the ghosts of brass decree." sanders made a clicking noise with his mouth. "that we shall see," he said, and went on. the party reached the outskirts of the city. before them, outlined against a bronze sky, was the dark bulk of a little hill, and this they skirted. the bronze became red, and rose, and dull bronze again, as the fires that gave it colour leapt or fell. turning the shoulder of the hill, sanders had a full view of the scene. between the edge of the forest and slope of the hill was a broad strip of level land. on the left was the river, on the right was swamp and forest again. in the very centre of the plain a huge fire burnt. before it, supported by its poles, on two high trestles, a square box. but the people! a huge circle, squatting on its haunches, motionless, silent; men, women, children, tiny babies, at their mothers' hips they stretched; a solid wheel of humanity, with the box and the fire as a hub. there was a lane through which a man might reach the box--a lane along which passed a procession of naked men, going and returning. these were they who replenished the fire, and sanders saw them dragging fuel for that purpose. keeping to the edge of the crowd, he worked his way to the opening. then he looked round at his men. "it is written," he said, in the curious arabic of the kano people, "that we shall carry away this false god. as to which of us shall live or die through this adventure, that is with allah, who knows all things." then he stepped boldly along the lane. he had changed his white ducks for a dark blue uniform suit, and he was not observed by the majority until he came with his houssas to the box. the heat from the fire was terrific, overpowering. close at hand he saw that the fierceness of the blaze had warped the rough-hewn boards of the box, and through the opening he saw in the light a slab of stone. "take up the box quickly," he commanded, and the houssas lifted the poles to their shoulders. until then the great assembly had sat in silent wonder, but as the soldiers lifted their burden, a yell of rage burst from five thousand throats, and men leapt to their feet. sanders stood before the fire, one hand raised, and silence fell, curiosity dominating resentment. "people of the isisi," said sanders, "let no man move until the god-stone has passed, for death comes quickly to those who cross the path of gods." he had an automatic pistol in each hand, and the particular deity he was thinking of at the moment was not the one in the box. the people hesitated, surging and swaying, as a mob will sway in its uncertainty. with quick steps the bearers carried their burden through the lane; they had almost passed unmolested when an old woman shuffled forward and clutched at sanders' arm. "lord, lord!" she quavered, "what will you do with our god?" "take him to the proper place," said sanders, "being by government appointed his keeper." "give me a sign," she croaked, and the people in her vicinity repeated, "a sign, master!" "this is a sign," said sanders, remembering the woman in labour. "by the god's favour there shall be born to ifabi, wife of adako, a male child." he heard the babble of talk; he heard his message repeated over the heads of the crowd; he saw a party of women go scurrying back to the village; then he gave the order to march. there were murmurings, and once he heard a deep-voiced man begin the war-chant, but nobody joined him. somebody--probably the same man--clashed his spear against his wicker shield, but his warlike example was not followed. sanders gained the village street. around him was such a press of people that he followed the swaying box with difficulty. the river was in sight; the moon, rising a dull, golden ball over the trees, laced the water with silver, and then there came a scream of rage. "he lies! he lies! ifabi, the wife of adako, has a female child." sanders turned swiftly like a dog at bay; his lips upcurled in a snarl, his white, regular teeth showing. "now," said sanders, speaking very quickly, "let any man raise his spear, and he dies." again they stood irresolute, and sanders, over his shoulder, gave an order. for a moment only the people hesitated; then, as the soldiers gripped the poles of the god-box, with one fierce yell they sprang forward. a voice screamed something; and, as if by magic, the tumult ceased, and the crowd darted backward and outward, falling over one another in their frantic desire to escape. sanders, his pistol still loaded, stood in open-mouthed astonishment at the stampede. save for his men he was alone; and then he saw. along the centre of the street two men were walking. they were clad alike in short crimson kilts that left their knees bare; great brass helmets topped their heads, and brass cuirasses covered their breasts. sanders watched them as they came nearer, then: "if this is not fever, it is madness," he muttered, for what he saw were two roman centurions, their heavy swords girt about their waists. he stood still, and they passed him, so close that he saw on the boss of one shield the rough-moulded letters:-- "augustus cae." "fever" said sanders emphatically, and followed the box to the ship. * * * * * when the steamer reached lukati, sanders was still in a condition of doubt, for his temperature was normal, and neither fever nor sun could be held accountable for the vision. added to which, his men had seen the same thing. he found the reinforcements his pigeon had brought, but they were unnecessary now. "it beats me," he confessed to carter, telling the story; "but we'll get out the stone; it might furnish an explanation. centurions--bah!" the stone, exposed in the light of day, was of greyish granite, such as sanders did not remember having seen before. "here are the 'devil marks,'" he said, as he turned it over. "possibly--whew!" no wonder he whistled, for closely set were a number of printed characters; and carter, blowing the dust, saw-- "marius et augustus cent . . . . . . . . . nero imperat . . . . . in deus . . . . . dulce." that night, with great labour, sanders, furbishing his rusty latin, and filling in gaps, made a translation: "marius and augustus, centurions of nero, csar and emperor, sleep sweetly with the gods." "we are they who came beyond the wild lands which hanno, the carthaginian, found . . . "marcus septimus went up into egypt, and with him decimus superbus, but by the will of csar, and the favour of the gods, we sailed to the black seas beyond. . . . . here we lived, our ships suffering wreck, being worshipped by the barbarians, teaching them warlike practices. . . . "you who come after . . . bear greetings to rome to cato hippocritus, who dwells by the gate . . ." sanders shook his head when he had finished reading, and said it was "rum." [footnote : there is a tremendous amount of free hydrocyanic acid (prussic acid) in manioc.] chapter iii. bosambo of monrovia. for many years have the ochori people formed a sort of grim comic relief to the tragedy of african colonisation. now it may well be that we shall laugh at the ochori no more. nor, in the small hours of the night, when conversation flags in the little circle about the fires in fishing camps, shall the sleepy-eyed be roused to merriment by stories of ochori meekness. all this has come about by favour of the liberian government, though at present the liberian government is not aware of the fact. with all due respect to the republic of liberia, i say that the monrovians are naturally liars and thieves. once upon a time, that dignity might be added to the state, a warship was acquired--if i remember aright it was presented by a disinterested shipowner. the government appointed three admirals, fourteen captains, and as many officers as the ship would hold, and they all wore gorgeous but ill-fitting uniforms. the government would have appointed a crew also, but for the fact that the ship was not big enough to hold any larger number of people than its officers totalled. this tiny man-of-war of the black republic went to sea once, the admirals and captains taking it in turn to stoke and steer--a very pleasing and novel sensation, this latter. coming back into the harbour, one of the admirals said-- "it is my turn to steer now," and took the wheel. the ship struck a rock at the entrance of the harbour and went down. the officers escaped easily enough, for your monrovian swims like a fish, but their uniforms were spoilt by the sea water. to the suggestion that salvage operations should be attempted to refloat the warship, the government very wisely said no, they thought not. "we know where she is," said the president--he was sitting on the edge of his desk at government house, eating sardines with his fingers--"and if we ever want her, it will be comforting to know she is so close to us." nothing more would have been done in the matter but for the fact that the british admiralty decided that the wreck was a danger to shipping, and issued orders forthwith for the place where it lay to be buoyed. the liberian government demurred on account of expense, but on pressure being applied (i suspect the captain of h.m.s. _dwarf_, who was a man with a bitter tongue) they agreed, and the bell-buoy was anchored to the submerged steamer. it made a nice rowdy, clanging noise, did that bell, and the people of monrovia felt they were getting their money's worth. but all monrovia is not made up of the freed american slaves who were settled there in . there are people who are described in a lordly fashion by the true monrovians as "indigenous natives," and the chief of these are the kroomen, who pay no taxes, defy the government, and at intervals tweak the official nose of the republic. the second day after the bell was in place, monrovia awoke to find a complete silence reigning in the bay, and that in spite of a heavy swell. the bell was still, and two ex-admirals, who were selling fish on the foreshore, borrowed a boat and rowed out to investigate. the explanation was simple--the bell had been stolen. "now!" said the president of the liberian republic in despair, "may beelzebub, who is the father and author of all sin, descend upon these thieving kroomen!" another bell was attached. the same night it was stolen. yet another bell was put to the buoy, and a boat-load of admirals kept watch. throughout the night they sat, rising and falling with the swell, and the monotonous "clang-jangle-clong" was music in their ears. all night it sounded, but in the early morning, at the dark hour before the sun comes up, it seemed that the bell, still tolling, grew fainter and fainter. "brothers," said an admiral, "we are drifting away from the bell." but the explanation was that the bell had drifted away from them, for, tired of half measures, the kroomen had come and taken the buoy, bell and all, and to this day there is no mark to show where a sometime man-of-war rots in the harbour of monrovia. the ingenious soul who planned and carried out this theft was one bosambo, who had three wives, one of whom, being by birth congolaise, and untrustworthy, informed the police, and with some ceremony bosambo was arrested and tried at the supreme court, where he was found guilty of "theft and high treason" and sentenced to ten years' penal servitude. they took bosambo back to prison, and bosambo interviewed the black gaoler. "my friend," he said, "i have a big ju-ju in the forest, and if you do not release me at once you and your wife shall die in great torment." "of your ju-ju i know nothing," said the gaoler philosophically, "but i receive two dollars a week for guarding prisoners, and if i let you escape i shall lose my job." "i know a place where there is much silver hidden," said bosambo with promptitude. "you and i will go to this place, and we shall be rich." "if you knew where there was silver, why did you steal bells, which are of brass and of no particular value?" asked his unimaginative guard. "i see that you have a heart of stone," said bosambo, and went away to the forest settlement to chop down trees for the good of the state. four months after this, sanders, chief commissioner for the isisi, ikeli, and akasava countries, received, _inter alia_, a communication of a stereotyped description-- to whom it may concern. wanted,--on a warrant issued by h.e. the president of liberia, bosambo krooboy, who escaped from the penal settlement near monrovia, after killing a guard. he is believed to be making for your country. a description followed. sanders put the document away with other such notices--they were not infrequent in their occurrence--and gave his mind to the eternal problem of the ochori. now, as ever, the ochori people were in sad trouble. there is no other tribe in the whole of africa that is as defenceless as the poor ochori. the fingoes, slaves as they are by name and tradition, were ferocious as the masai, compared with the ochori. sanders was a little impatient, and a deputation of three, who had journeyed down to headquarters to lay the grievances of the people before him, found him unsympathetic. he interviewed them on his verandah. "master, no man leaves us in peace," said one. "isisi folk, n'gombi people from far-away countries, they come to us demanding this and that, and we give, being afraid." "afraid of what?" asked sanders wearily. "we fear death and pain, also burning and the taking of our women," said the other. "who is chief of you?" asked sanders, wilfully ignorant. "i am chief lord," said an elderly man, clad in a leopard skin. "go back to your people, chief, if indeed chief you are, and not some old woman without shame; go back and bear with you a fetish--a most powerful fetish--which shall be, as me, watching your interest and protecting you. this fetish you shall plant on the edge of your village that faces the sun at noon. you shall mark the place where it shall be planted, and at midnight, with proper ceremony, and the sacrifice of a young goat, you shall set my fetish in its place. and after that whosoever ill-treats you or robs you shall do so at some risk." sanders said this very solemnly, and the men of the deputation were duly impressed. more impressed were they when, before starting on their homeward journey, sanders placed in their hands a stout pole, to the end of which was attached a flat board inscribed with certain marks. they carried their trophy six days' journey through the forest, then four days' journey by canoe along the little river, until they came to ochori. there, by the light of the moon, with the sacrifice of two goats (to make sure), the pole was planted so that the board inscribed with mystic characters would face the sun at noon. news travels fast in the back lands, and it came to the villages throughout the isisi and the akasava country that the ochori were particularly protected by white magic. protected they had always been, and many men had died at the white man's hand because the temptation to kill the ochori folk had proved irresistible. "i do not believe that sandi has done this thing," said the chief of the akasava. "let us go across the river and see with our own eyes, and if they have lied we shall beat them with sticks, though let no man kill, because of sandi and his cruelty." so across the water they went, and marched until they came within sight of the ochori city, and the ochori people, hearing that the akasava people were coming, ran away into the woods and hid, in accordance with their custom. the akasava advanced until they came to the pole stuck in the ground and the board with the devil marks. before this they stood in silence and in awe, and having made obeisance to it and sacrificed a chicken (which was the lawful property of the ochori) they turned back. after this came a party from isisi, and they must needs come through the akasava country. they brought presents with them and lodged with the akasava for one night. "what story is this of the ochori?" asked the isisi chief in command; so the chief of the akasava told him. "you may save yourself the journey, for we have seen it." "that," said the isisi chief, "i will believe when i have seen." "that is bad talk," said the akasava people, who were gathered at the palaver; "these dogs of isisi call us liars." nevertheless there was no bloodshed, and in the morning the isisi went on their way. the ochori saw them coming, and hid in the woods, but the precaution was unnecessary, for the isisi departed as they came. other folk made a pilgrimage to the ochori, n'gombi, bokeli, and the little people of the forest, who were so shy that they came by night, and the ochori people began to realise a sense of their importance. then bosambo, a krooman and an adventurer at large, appeared on the scene, having crossed eight hundred miles of wild land in the earnest hope that time would dull the memory of the liberian government and incidentally bring him to a land of milk and honey. now bosambo had in his life been many things. he had been steward on an elder dempster boat, he had been scholar at a mission school--he was the proud possessor of a bound copy of _the lives of the saints_, a reward of industry--and among his accomplishments was a knowledge of english. the hospitable ochori received him kindly, fed him with sweet manioc and sugar-cane, and told him about sandi's magic. after he had eaten, bosambo walked down to the post and read the inscription-- trespassers beware. he was not impressed, and strolled back again thinking deeply. "this magic," he said to the chief, "is good magic. i know, because i have white man's blood in my veins." in support of this statement he proceeded to libel a perfectly innocent british official at sierra leone. the ochori were profoundly moved. they poured forth the story of their persecutions, a story which began in remote ages, when tiganobeni, the great king, came down from the north and wasted the country as far south as the isisi. bosambo listened--it took two nights and the greater part of a day to tell the story, because the official story-teller of the ochori had only one method of telling--and when it was finished bosambo said to himself-- "this is the people i have long sought. i will stay here." aloud he asked: "how often does sandi come to you?" "once every year, master," said the chief, "on the twelfth moon, and a little after." "when came he last?" "when this present moon is at full, three moons since; he comes after the big rains." "then," said bosambo, again to himself, "for nine months i am safe." they built him a hut and planted for him a banana grove and gave him seed. then he demanded for wife the daughter of the chief, and although he offered nothing in payment the girl came to him. that a stranger lived in the chief village of the ochori was remarked by the other tribes, for news of this kind spreads, but since he was married, and into the chief's family at that, it was accepted that the man must be of the ochori folk, and such was the story that came to headquarters. then the chief of the ochori died. he died suddenly in some pain; but such deaths are common, and his son ruled in his place. then the son died after the briefest reign, and bosambo called the people together, the elders, the wise men, and the headmen of the country. "it appears," he said, "that the many gods of the ochori are displeased with you, and it has been revealed to me in a dream that i shall be chief of the ochori. therefore, o chiefs and wise men and headmen, bow before me, as is the custom, and i will make you a great people." it is characteristic of the ochori that no man said "nay" to him, even though in the assembly were three men who by custom might claim the chieftainship. sanders heard of the new chief and was puzzled. "etabo?" he repeated--this was how bosambo called himself--"i do not remember the man--yet if he can put backbone into the people i do not care who he is." backbone or cunning, or both, bosambo was certainly installed. "he has many strange practices," reported a native agent to sanders. "every day he assembles the men of the village and causes them to walk past a _pelebi_ (table) on which are many eggs. and it is his command that each man as he passes shall take an egg so swiftly that no eye may see him take it. and if the man bungle or break the egg, or be slow, this new chief puts shame upon him, whipping him." "it is a game," said sanders; but for the life of him he could not see what game it was. report after report reached him of the new chief's madness. sometimes he would take the unfortunate ochori out by night, teaching them such things as they had never known before. thus he instructed them in what manner they might seize upon a goat so that the goat could not cry. also how to crawl on their bellies inch by inch so that they made no sound or sign. all these things the ochori did, groaning aloud at the injustice and the labour of it. "i'm dashed if i can understand it!" said sanders, knitting his brows, when the last report came in. "with anybody but the ochori this would mean war. but the ochori!" notwithstanding his contempt for their fighting qualities, he kept his police houssas ready. but there was no war. instead, there came complaint from the akasava that "many leopards were in the woods." leopards will keep, thought sanders, and, anyway, the akasava were good enough hunters to settle that palaver without outside help. the next report was alarming. in two weeks these leopards had carried off three score of goats, twenty bags of salt, and much ivory. leopards eat goats; there might conceivably be fastidious leopards that cannot eat goats without salt; but a leopard does not take ivory tusks even to pick his teeth with. so sanders made haste to journey up the river, because little things were considerable in a country where people strain at gnats and swallow whole caravans. "lord, it is true," said the chief of the akasava, with some emotion, "these goats disappear night by night, though we watch them; also the salt and ivory, because that we did not watch." "but no leopard could take these things," said sanders irritably. "these are thieves." the chief's gesture was comprehensive. "who could thieve?" he said. "the n'gombi people live very far away; also the isisi. the ochori are fools, and, moreover, afraid." then sanders remembered the egg games, and the midnight manoeuvres of the ochori. "i will call on this new chief," he said; and crossed the river that day. sending a messenger to herald his coming, he waited two miles out of the city, and the councillors and wise men came out to him with offerings of fish and fruit. "where is your chief?" he asked. "lord, he is ill," they said gravely. "this day there came to him a feeling of sickness, and he fell down moaning. we have carried him to his hut." sanders nodded. "i will see him," he said grimly. they led him to the door of the chief's hut, and sanders went in. it was very dark, and in the darkest corner lay a prostrate man. sanders bent over him, touched his pulse lightly, felt gingerly for the swelling on the neck behind the ears for a sign of sleeping sickness. no symptom could he find; but on the bare shoulder, as his fingers passed over the man's flesh, he felt a scar of singular regularity; then he found another, and traced their direction. the convict brand of the monrovian government was familiar to him. "i thought so," said sanders, and gave the moaning man a vigorous kick. "come out into the light, bosambo of monrovia," he said; and bosambo rose obediently and followed the commissioner into the light. they stood looking at one another for several minutes; then sanders, speaking in the dialect of the pepper coast, said-- "i have a mind to hang you, bosambo." "that is as your excellency wishes," said bosambo. sanders said nothing, tapping his boot with his walking-stick and gazing thoughtfully downward. "having made thieves, could you make men of these people?" he said, after a while. "i think they could fight now, for they are puffed with pride because they have robbed the akasava," said bosambo. sanders bit the end of his stick like a man in doubt. "there shall be neither theft nor murder," he said. "no more chiefs or chiefs' sons shall die suddenly," he added significantly. "master, it shall be as you desire." "as for the goats you have stolen, them you may keep, and the teeth (ivory) and the salt also. for if you hand them back to akasava you will fill their stomachs with rage, and that would mean war." bosambo nodded slowly. "then you shall remain, for i see you are a clever man, and the ochori need such as you. but if----" "master, by the fat of my heart i will do as you wish," said bosambo; "for i have always desired to be a chief under the british." sanders was half-way back to headquarters before he missed his field-glasses, and wondered where he could have dropped them. at that identical moment bosambo was exhibiting the binoculars to his admiring people. "from this day forth," said bosambo, "there shall be no lifting of goats nor stealing of any kind. this much i told the great sandi, and as a sign of his love, behold, he gave me these things of magic that eat up space." "lord," said a councillor in awe, "did you know the great one?" "i have cause to know him," said bosambo modestly, "for i am his son." fortunately sanders knew nothing of this interesting disclosure. chapter iv. the drowsy one. there were occasions when sanders came up against the outer world, when he learnt, with something like bewilderment, that beyond the farthermost forests, beyond the lazy, swelling, blue sea, there were men and women who lived in houses and carefully tabooed such subjects as violent death and such horrid happenings as were daily features of his life. he had to treat with folk who, in the main, were illogical and who believed in spirits. when you deal in the abstract with government of races so influenced, a knowledge of constitutional law and economics is fairly valueless. there is one type of man that can rule native provinces wisely, and that type is best represented by sanders. there are other types, as, for instance: once upon a time a young man came from england with a reputation. he was sent by the colonial office to hold a district under sanders as deputy commissioner. he was a bachelor of law, had read science, and had acquired in a methodical fashion a working acquaintance with swaheli, bacteriology, and medicines. he was a very grave young man, and the first night of his arrival he kept sanders (furtively yawning) out of his bed whilst he demonstrated a system whereby the aboriginal could be converted--not converted spiritually, but from unproductive vagrancy to a condition of good citizenship. sanders said nothing beyond using the conventional expressions of polite interest, and despatched the young man and his tremendous baggage to an up-country station, with his official blessing. torrington--this was the grave young man's name--established himself at entoli, and started forth to instil into the heathen mind the elementary principles of applied mechanics. in other words he taught them, through the medium of swaheli--which they imperfectly understood--and a tin kettle, the lesson of steam. they understood the kettle part, but could not quite comprehend what meat he was cooking, and when he explained for the fortieth time that he was only cooking water, they glanced significantly one at the other and agreed that he was not quite right in his head. they did not tell him this much to his face, for cannibals have very good manners--though their table code leaves much to be desired. mr. torrington tried them with chemical experiments, showing them how sulphuric acid applied to sugar produced su^{ }, su^{ }, or words to that effect. he gained a reputation as a magician as a result, and in more huts than one he was regarded and worshipped as a great and clever devil--which in a sense he was. but the first time he came up against the spirit of the people, his science, his law, and his cut-and-dried theories went _phutt_! and that is where sanders came in--sanders who had forgotten all the chemistry he ever knew, and who, as a student of constitutional law, was the rankest of failures. it came about in this way. there was a young man in isisi who prophesied that on such a day, at such an hour, the river would rise and drown the people. when mr. torrington heard of this prophecy he was amused, and at first took no notice of it. but it occurred to him that here might be a splendid opportunity for revealing to the barbarian a little of that science with which he was so plentifully endowed. so he drew a large sectional plan, showing-- (_a_) the bed of the river; (_b_) the height of the banks; (_c_) the maximum rise of the river; (_d_) the height of the surrounding country; and demonstrated as plainly as possible the utter absurdity of the prophecy. yet the people were unconvinced, and were preparing to abandon the village when sanders arrived on the scene. he sent for the prophet, who was a young man of neurotic tendencies, and had a wooden prison cage built on the bank of the river, into which the youth was introduced. "you will stay here," said sanders, "and when the river rises you must prophesy that it will fall again, else assuredly you will be drowned." whereupon the people settled down again in their homes and waited for the river to drown the prophet and prove his words. but the river at this season of the year was steadily falling, and the prophet, like many another, was without honour in his own country. sanders went away; and, although somewhat discouraged, mr. torrington resumed his experiments. first of all, he took up sleeping sickness, and put in three months' futile work, impressing nobody save a gentleman of whom more must be written in a further chapter. then he dropped that study suddenly and went to another. he had ideas concerning vaccination, but the first baby he vaccinated died of croup, and torrington came flying down the river telling sanders a rambling story of a populace infuriated and demanding his blood. then torrington went home. "the country is now quiet," wrote sanders to the administrator, with sardonic humour. "there are numerous palavers pending, but none of any particular moment. the isisi people are unusually quiet, and bosambo, the monrovian, of whom i have written your excellency, makes a model chief for the ochori. no thefts have been traced to him for three months. i should be grateful if full information could be supplied to me concerning an expedition which at the moment is traversing this country under the style of the isisi exploitation syndicate." curiously enough, torrington had forgotten the fact that a member of this expedition had been one of the most interested students of his sleeping sickness clinics. the isisi exploitation syndicate, limited, was born between the entre and the sweet at the house of a gentleman whose christian name was isidore, and who lived in maida vale. at dinner one night with a dear friend--who called himself mcpherson every day of the year except on yum kippur, when he frankly admitted that he had been born isaacs--the question of good company titles came up, and mr. mcpherson said he had had the "isisi exploitation" in his mind for many years. with the aid of an atlas the isisi country was discovered. it was one of those atlases on which are inscribed the staple products of the lands, and across the isisi was writ fair "rubber," "kola-nut," "mahogany," and "tobacco." i would ask the reader to particularly remember "tobacco." "there's a chief i've had some correspondence with," said mr. mcpherson, chewing his cigar meditatively; "we could get a sort of concession from him. it would have to be done on the quiet, because the country is a british protectorate. now, if we could get a man who'd put up the stuff, and send him out to fix the concession, we'd have a company floated before you could say knife." judicious inquiry discovered the man in claude hyall cuthbert, a plutocratic young gentleman, who, on the strength of once having nearly shot a lion in uganda, was accepted by a large circle of acquaintances as an authority on africa. cuthbert, who dabbled in stocks and shares, was an acquisition to any syndicate, and on the understanding that part of his duty would be the obtaining of the concession, he gladly financed the syndicate to the extent of seven thousand pounds, four thousand of which messrs. isidore and mcpherson very kindly returned to him to cover the cost of his expedition. the other three thousand were earmarked for office expenses. as mr. mcpherson truly said: "whatever happens, we're on velvet, my boy," which was perfectly true. before cuthbert sailed, mcpherson offered him a little advice. "whatever you do," he said, "steer clear of that dam' commissioner sanders. he's one of those pryin', interferin'----" "i know the breed," said cuthbert wisely. "this is not my first visit to africa. did i ever tell you about the lion i shot in uganda?" a week later he sailed. * * * * * in course of time came a strange white man through sanders' domain. this white man, who was cuthbert, was following the green path to death--but this he did not know. he threw his face to the forest, as the natives say, and laughed, and the people of the village of o'tembi, standing before their wattle huts, watched him in silent wonder. it was a wide path between huge trees, and the green of the undergrowth was flecked with sunlight, and, indeed, the green path was beautiful to the eye, being not unlike a parkland avenue. n'beki, chief of this village of the o'tembi, a very good old man, went out to the path when the white man began his journey. "white man," he said solemnly, "this is the road to hell, where all manner of devils live. night brings remorse, and dawn brings self-hatred, which is worse than death." cuthbert, whose swaheli was faulty, and whose bomongo talk was nil, grinned impatiently as his coastboy translated unpicturesquely. "dam nigger done say, this be bad place, no good; he say bimeby you libe for die." "tell him to go to blazes!" said cuthbert noisily; "and, look here, flagstaff, ask him where the rubber is, see? tell him we know all about the forest, and ask him about the elephants, where their playground is?" cuthbert was broad-shouldered and heavily built, and under his broad sun-helmet his face was very hot and moist. "tell the white man," said the chief quietly, "there is no rubber within seven days' journey, and that we do not know ivory; elephants there were _cala cala_--but not now." "he's a liar!" was cuthbert's only comment. "get these beggars moving, flagstaff. hi, _alapa', avanti, trek_!" "these beggars," a straggling line of them, resumed their loads uncomplainingly. they were good carriers, as carriers go, and only two had died since the march began. cuthbert stood and watched them pass, using his stick dispassionately upon the laggards. then he turned to go. "ask him," he said finally, "why he calls this the road to what-d'ye-call-it?" the old man shook his head. "because of the devils," he said simply. "tell him he's a silly ass!" bellowed cuthbert and followed his carriers. this natural path the caravan took extended in almost a straight line through the forest. it was a strange path because of its very smoothness, and the only drawback lay in the fact that it seemed to be the breeding-place of flies--little black flies, as big as the house-fly of familiar shape, if anything a little bigger. they terrified the natives for many reasons, but principally because they stung. they did not terrify cuthbert, because he was dressed in tapai cloth; none the less, there were times when these black flies found joints in his armour and roused him to anger. this path extended ten miles and made pleasant travelling. then the explorer struck off into the forest, following another path, well beaten, but more difficult. by devious routes mr. cuthbert came into the heart of sanders' territories, and he was successful in this, that he avoided sanders. he had with him a caravan of sixty men and an interpreter, and in due course he reached his objective, which was the village of a great chief ruling a remarkable province--bosambo, of the ochori, no less; sometime krooman, steward of the elder dempster line, chief on sufferance, but none the less an interesting person. bosambo, you may be sure, came out to greet his visitor. "say to him," said cuthbert to his interpreter, "that i am proud to meet the great chief." "lord chief," said the interpreter in the vernacular, "this white man is a fool, and has much money." "so i see," said bosambo. "tell him," said cuthbert, with all the dignity of an ambassador, "that i have come to bring him wonderful presents." "the white man says," said the interpreter, "that if he is sure you are a good man he will give you presents. now," said the interpreter carefully, "as i am the only man who can speak for you, let us make arrangements. you shall give me one-third of all he offers. then will i persuade him to continue giving, since he is the father of mad people." "and you," said bosambo briefly, "are the father of liars." he made a sign to his guard, and they seized upon the unfortunate interpreter and led him forth. cuthbert, in a sweat of fear, pulled a revolver. "master," said bosambo loftily, "you no make um fuss. dis dam' nigger, he no good; he make you speak bad t'ings. i speak um english proper. you sit down, we talk um." so cuthbert sat down in the village of ochori, and for three days there was a great giving of presents, and signing of concessions. bosambo conceded the ochori country--that was a small thing. he granted forest rights of the isisi, he sold the akasava, he bartered away the lulungo territories and the "native products thereof"--i quote from the written document now preserved at the colonial office and bearing the scrawled signature of bosambo--and he added, as a lordly afterthought, the ikeli district. "what about river rights?" asked the delighted cuthbert. "what will you give um?" demanded bosambo cautiously. "forty english pounds?" suggested cuthbert. "i take um," said bosambo. it was a remarkably simple business; a more knowledgeable man than cuthbert would have been scared by the easiness of his success, but cuthbert was too satisfied with himself to be scared at anything. it is said that his leave-taking with bosambo was of an affecting character, that bosambo wept and embraced his benefactor's feet. be that as it may, his "concessions" in his pocket, cuthbert began his coastward journey, still avoiding sanders. he came to etebi and found a deputy-commissioner, who received him with open arms. here cuthbert stayed a week. mr. torrington at the time was tremendously busy with a scheme for stamping out sleeping sickness. until then, cuthbert was under the impression that it was a pleasant disease, the principal symptom of which was a painless coma. fascinated, he extended his stay to a fortnight, seeing many dreadful sights, for torrington had established a sort of amateur clinic, and a hundred cases a day came to him for treatment. "and it comes from the bite of a tsetse fly?" said cuthbert. "show me a tsetse." torrington obliged him, and when the other saw the little black insect he went white to the lips. "my god!" he whispered, "i've been bitten by that!" "it doesn't follow----" began torrington; but cuthbert was blundering and stumbling in wild fear to his carriers' camp. "get your loads!" he yelled. "out of this cursed country we get as quick as we can!" torrington, with philosophical calm, endeavoured to reassure him, but he was not to be appeased. he left etebi that night and camped in the forest. three days later he reached a mission station, where he complained of headaches and pains in the neck (he had not attended torrington's clinics in vain). the missionary, judging from the man's haggard appearance and general incoherence that he had an attack of malaria, advised him to rest for a few days; but cuthbert was all a-fret to reach the coast. twenty miles from the mission, cuthbert sent his carriers back, and said he would cover the last hundred miles of the journey alone. to this extraordinary proposition the natives agree--from that day cuthbert disappeared from the sight of man. * * * * * sanders was taking a short cut through the forest to avoid the interminable twists and bends of the river, when he came suddenly upon a village of death--four sad little huts, built hastily amidst a tangle of underwood. he called, but nobody answered him. he was too wary to enter any of the crazy habitations. he knew these little villages in the forest. it was the native custom to take the aged and the dying--especially those who died sleepily--to far-away places, beyond the reach of man, and leave them there with a week's food and a fire, to die in decent solitude. he called again, but only the forest answered him. the chattering, noisy forest, all a-crackle with the movements of hidden things. yet there was a fire burning which told of life. sanders resumed his journey, first causing a quantity of food to be laid in a conspicuous place for the man who made the fire. he was on his way to take evidence concerning the disappearance of cuthbert. it was the fourth journey of its kind he had attempted. there had been palavers innumerable. bosambo, chief of the ochori, had sorrowfully disgorged the presents he had received, and admitted his fault. "lord!" he confessed, "when i was with the white man on the coast i learnt the trick of writing--it is a cursed gift--else all this trouble would not have come about. for, desiring to show my people how great a man i was, i wrote a letter in the english fashion, and sent it by messenger to the coast and thence to friends in sierra leone, telling them of my fortune. thus the people in london came to know of the treasure of this land." sanders, in a few illuminative sentences, conveyed his impression of bosambo's genius. "you slave and son of a slave," he said, "whom i took from a prison to rule the ochori, why did you deceive this white man, selling him lands that were not yours?" "lord!" said bosambo simply, "there was nothing else i could sell." but there was no clue here as to cuthbert's whereabouts, nor at the mission station, nor amongst the carriers detained on suspicion. one man might have thrown light upon the situation, but torrington was at home fulfilling the post of assistant examiner in mechanics at south kensington (more in his element there) and filling in his spare time with lecturing on "the migration of the bantu races." so that the end of sanders' fourth quest was no more successful than the third, or the second, or the first, and he retraced his steps to headquarters, feeling somewhat depressed. he took the path he had previously traversed, and came upon the death camp late in the afternoon. the fire still burnt, but the food he had placed had disappeared. he hailed the hut in the native tongue, but no one answered him. he waited for a little while, and then gave orders for more food to be placed on the ground. "poor devil!" said sanders, and gave the order to march. he himself had taken half a dozen steps, when he stopped. at his feet something glittered in the fading light. he stooped and picked it up. it was an exploded cartridge. he examined it carefully, smelt it--it had been recently fired. then he found another. they were lee-metford, and bore the mark "' ," which meant that they were less than a year old. he was still standing with the little brass cylinders in his hand, when abiboo came to him. "master," said the houssa, "who ties monkeys to trees with ropes?" "is that a riddle?" asked sanders testily, for his mind was busy on this matter of cartridges. abiboo for answer beckoned him. fifty yards from the hut was a tree, at the foot of which, whimpering and chattering and in a condition of abject terror, were two small black monkeys tethered by ropes. they spat and grinned ferociously as sanders approached them. he looked from the cartridges to the monkeys and back to the cartridges again, then he began searching the grass. he found two more empty shells and a rusting lancet, such as may be found in the pocket-case of any explorer. then he walked back to the hut before which the fire burnt, and called softly-- "mr. cuthbert!" there was no answer, and sanders called again-- "mr. cuthbert!" from the interior of the hut came a groan. "leave me alone. i have come here to die!" said a muffled voice. "come out and be civil," said sanders coolly; "you can die afterwards." after a few moments' delay there issued from the door of the hut the wreck of a man, with long hair and a month-old beard, who stood sulkily before the commissioner. "might i ask," said sanders, "what your little game is?" the other shook his head wearily. he was a pitiable sight. his clothes were in tatters; he was unwashed and grimy. "sleeping sickness," he said wearily. "felt it coming on--seen what horrible thing it was--didn't want to be a burden. oh, my god! what a fool i've been to come to this filthy country!" "that's very likely," said sanders. "but who told you that you had sleeping sickness?" "know it--know it," said the listless man. "sit down," said sanders. the other obeyed, and sanders applied the superficial tests. "if you've got sleeping sickness," said sanders, after the examination, "i'm suffering from religious mania--man, you're crazy!" yet there was something in cuthbert's expression that was puzzling. he was dull, heavy, and stupid. his movements were slow and lethargic. sanders watched him as he pulled a black wooden pipe from his ragged pocket, and with painful slowness charged it from a skin pouch. "it's got me, i tell you," muttered cuthbert, and lit the pipe with a blazing twig from the fire. "i knew it (puff) as soon as that fellow torrington (puff) described the symptoms (puff);--felt dull and sleepy--got a couple of monkeys and injected my blood (puff)--_they_ went drowsy, too--sure sign----" "where did you get that tobacco from?" demanded sanders quickly. cuthbert took time to consider his answer. "fellow gave it me--chief fellow, bosambo. native tobacco, but not bad--he gave me a devil of a lot." "so i should say," said sanders, and reaching over took the pouch and put it in his pocket. * * * * * when sanders had seen mr. cuthbert safe on board a homeward-bound steamer, he took his twenty houssas to the ochori country to arrest bosambo, and expected bosambo would fly; but the imperturbable chief awaited his coming, and offered him the customary honours. "i admit i gave the white man the hemp," he said. "i myself smoke it, suffering no ill. how was i to know that it would make him sleep?" "why did you give it to him?" demanded sanders. bosambo looked the commissioner full in the face. "last moon you came, lord, asking why i gave him the isisi country and the rights of the little river, because these were not mine to give. now you come to me saying why did i give the white man native tobacco--lord, that was the only thing i gave him that was mine." chapter v. the special commissioner. the hon. george tackle had the good fortune to be the son of his father; otherwise i am free to confess he had no claim to distinction. but his father, being the proprietor of the _courier and echo_ (with which are incorporated i don't know how many dead and gone stars of the fleet street firmament), george had a "pull" which no amount of competitive merit could hope to contend with, and when the stories of atrocities in the district of lukati began to leak out and questions were asked in parliament, george opened his expensively-bound gazetteer, discovered that the district of lukati was in british territory, and instantly demanded that he should be sent out to investigate these crimes, which were a blot upon our boasted civilisation. his father agreed, having altogether a false appreciation of his son's genius, and suggested that george should go to the office and "get all the facts" regarding the atrocities. george, with a good-natured smile of amusement at the bare thought of anybody instructing him in a subject on which he was so thoroughly conversant, promised; but the _courier and echo_ office did not see him, and the librarian of the newspaper, who had prepared a really valuable dossier of newspaper cuttings, pamphlets, maps, and health hints for the young man's guidance, was dismayed to learn that the confident youth had sailed without any further instruction in the question than a man might secure from the hurried perusal of the scraps which from day to day appeared in the morning press. as a special correspondent, i adduce, with ill-suppressed triumph, the case of the hon. george tackle as an awful warning to all newspaper proprietors who allow their parental affections to overcome their good judgment. all that the hon. george knew was that at lukati there had been four well-authenticated cases of barbarous acts of cruelty against natives, and that the commissioner of the district was responsible for the whippings and the torture. he thought, did the hon. george, that this was all that it was necessary to know. but this is where he made his big mistake. up at lukati all sorts of things happened, as commissioner sanders knows, to his cost. once he visited the district and left it tranquil, and for carter, his deputy, whom he left behind, the natives built a most beautiful hut, planting gardens about, all off their own bat. one day, when carter had just finished writing an enthusiastic report on the industry of his people, and the whole-hearted way they were taking up and supporting the new rgime, the chief of the village, whom carter had facetiously named o'leary (his born name was indeed olari), came to him. carter at the moment was walking through the well-swept street of the village with his hands in his coat pockets and his big white helmet tipped on the back of his head because the sun was setting at his back. "father," said the chief olari, "i have brought these people to see you." he indicated with a wave of his hand six strange warriors carrying their shields and spears, who looked at him dispassionately. carter nodded. "they desire," said olari, "to see the wonderful little black fetish that my father carries in his pocket that they may tell their people of its powers." "tell your people," said carter good-humouredly, "that i have not got the fetish with me--if they will come to my hut i will show them its wonders." whereupon olari lifted his spear and struck at carter, and the six warriors sprang forward together. carter fought gamely, but he was unarmed. when sanders heard the news of his subordinate's death he did not faint or fall into a fit of insane cursing. he was sitting on his broad verandah at headquarters when the dusty messenger came. he rose with pursed lips and frowning eyes, fingering the letter--this came from tollemache, inspector of police at bokari--and paced the verandah. "poor chap, poor chap!" was all that he said. he sent no message to olari; he made no preparations for a punitive raid; he went on signing documents, inspecting houssas, attending dinner parties, as though carter had never lived or died. all these things the spies of olari reported, and the chief was thankful. lukati being two hundred miles from headquarters, through a savage and mountainous country, an expedition was no light undertaking, and the british government, rich as it is, cannot afford to spend a hundred thousand pounds to avenge the death of a subordinate official. of this fact sanders was well aware, so he employed his time in collecting and authenticating the names of carter's assassins. when he had completed them he went a journey seventy miles into the bush to the great witch-doctor kelebi, whose name was known throughout the coast country from dakka to the eastern borders of togoland. "here are the names of men who have put shame upon me," he said; "but principally olari, chief of the lukati people." "i will put a spell upon olari," said the witch-doctor; "a very bad spell, and upon these men. the charge will be six english pounds." sanders paid the money, and "dashed" two bottles of square-face and a piece of proper cloth. then he went back to headquarters. one night through the village of lukati ran a whisper, and the men muttered the news with fearful shivers and backward glances. "olari, the chief, is cursed!" olari heard the tidings from his women, and came out of his hut into the moonlight, raving horribly. the next day he sickened, and on the fifth day he was near to dead and suffering terrible pains, as also were six men who helped in the slaying of carter. that they did not die was no fault of the witch-doctor, who excused his failure on account of the great distance between himself and his subjects. as for sanders, he was satisfied, saying that even the pains were cheap at the price, and that it would give him great satisfaction to write "finis" to olari with his own hand. a week after this, abiboo, sanders' favourite servant, was taken ill. there was no evidence of fever or disease, only the man began to fade as it were. making inquiries, sanders discovered that abiboo had offended the witch-doctor kelebi, and that the doctor had sent him the death message. sanders took fifty houssas into the bush and interviewed the witch-doctor. "i have reason," he said, "for believing you to be a failure as a slayer of men." "master," said kelebi in extenuation, "my magic cannot cross mountains, otherwise olari and his friends would have died." "that is as it may be," said sanders. "i am now concerned with magic nearer at hand, and i must tell you that the day after abiboo dies i will hang you." "father," said kelebi emphatically, "under those circumstances abiboo shall live." sanders gave him a sovereign, and rode back to headquarters, to find his servant on the high road to recovery. i give you this fragment of sanders' history, because it will enable you to grasp the peculiar environment in which sanders spent the greater part of his life, and because you will appreciate all the better the irony of the situation created by the coming of the hon. george tackle. sanders was taking breakfast on the verandah of his house. from where he sat he commanded across the flaming beauties of his garden a view of a broad, rolling, oily sea, a golden blaze of light under the hot sun. there was a steamer lying three miles out (only in five fathoms of water at that), and sanders, through his glasses, recognised her as the elder dempster boat that brought the monthly mail. since there were no letters on his table, and the boat had been "in" for two hours, he gathered that there was no mail for him, and was thankful, for he had outlived the sentimental period of life when letters were pleasant possibilities. having no letters, he expected no callers, and the spectacle of the hon. george being carried in a hammock into his garden was astonishing. the hon. george carefully alighted, adjusted his white pith helmet, smoothed the creases from his immaculate ducks, and mounted the steps that led to the stoep. "how do?" said the visitor. "my name is tackle--george tackle." he smiled, as though to say more was an insult to his hearer's intelligence. sanders bowed, a little ceremoniously for him. he felt that his visitor expected this. "i'm out on a commission," the hon. george went on. "as you've doubtless heard, my governor is the proprietor of the _courier and echo_, and so he thought i'd better go out and see the thing for myself. i've no doubt the whole thing is exaggerated----" "hold hard," said sanders, a light dawning on him. "i gather that you are a sort of correspondent of a newspaper?" "exactly." "that you have come to inquire into----" "treatment of natives, and all that," said the hon. george easily. "and what is wrong with the treatment of the native?" asked sanders sweetly. the hon. gentleman made an indefinite gesture. "you know--things in newspapers--missionaries," he said rapidly, being somewhat embarrassed by the realisation that the man, if any, responsible for the outrages was standing before him. "i never read the newspapers," said sanders, "and----" "of course," interrupted the hon. george eagerly, "we can make it all right as far as you are concerned." "oh, thank you!" sanders' gratitude was a little overdone, but he held out his hand. "well, i wish you luck--let me know how you get on." the hon. george tackle was frankly nonplussed. "but excuse me," he said, "where--how----hang it all, where am i to put up?" "here?" "yes -- dash it, my kit is on shore! i thought----" "you thought i'd put you up?" "well, i did think----" "that i'd fall on your neck and welcome you?" "not exactly, but----" "well," said sanders, carefully folding his napkin, "i'm not so glad to see you as all that." "i suppose not," said the hon. george, bridling. "because you're a responsibility--i hate extra responsibility. you can pitch your tent just wherever you like--but i cannot offer you the hospitality you desire." "i shall report this matter to the administrator," said the hon. george ominously. "you may report it to my grandmother's maiden aunt," said sanders politely. half an hour later he saw the hon. george rejoin the ship that brought him to isisi bassam, and chuckled. george would go straight to the administrator, and would receive a reception beside which a sahara storm would be zephyrs of araby. at the same time sanders was a little puzzled, and not a little hurt. there never had been a question of atrocities in his district, and he was puzzled to account for the rumours that had brought the "commissioner" on his tour of investigation--could it be a distorted account of olari's punishment? "go quickly to the ship, taking a book to the lord who has just gone from here," was his command to a servant, and proceeded to scribble a note:-- "i am afraid," he wrote, "i was rather rude to you--not understanding what the devil you were driving at. an overwhelming curiosity directs me to invite you to share my bungalow until such time as you are ready to conduct your investigation." the hon. george read this with a self-satisfied smirk. "the way to treat these fellows," he said to the elder dempster captain, "is to show 'em you'll stand no nonsense. i thought he'd climb down." the elder dempster captain, who knew sanders by repute, smiled discreetly, but said nothing. once more the special correspondent's mountain of baggage was embarked in the surf boat, and the hon. george waved a farewell to his friends on the steamer. the elder dempster skipper, leaning over the side of his bridge, watched the surf boat rising and falling in the swell. "there goes a man who's looking for trouble," he said, "and i wouldn't take a half-share of the trouble he's going to find for five hundred of the best. is that blessed anchor up yet, mr. simmons? half ahead--set her due west, mr. what's-your-name." it was something of a triumph for the hon. george. there were ten uniformed policemen awaiting him on the smooth beach to handle his baggage, and sanders came down to his garden gate to meet him. "the fact of it is----" began sanders awkwardly; but the magnanimous george raised his hand. "let bygones," he said, "be bygones." sanders was unaccountably annoyed by this generous display. still more so was he when the correspondent refused to reopen the question of atrocities. "as your guest," said george solemnly, "i feel that it would be better for all concerned if i pursued an independent investigation. i shall endeavour as far as possible, to put myself in your place, to consider all extenuating circumstances----" "oh, have a gin-swizzle!" said sanders rudely and impatiently; "you make me tired." "look here," he said later, "i will only ask you two questions. where are these atrocities supposed to have taken place?" "in the district of lukati," said the hon. george. "olari," thought sanders. "who was the victim?" he asked. "there were several," said the correspondent, and produced his note-book. "you understand that i'd really much rather not discuss the matter with you, but, since you insist," he read, "efembi of wastambo." "oh!" said sanders, and his eyebrows rose "kabindo of machembi." "oh, lord!" said sanders. the hon. george read six other cases, and with every one a line was wiped from sanders' forehead. when the recital was finished the commissioner said slowly-- "i can make a statement to you which will save you a great deal of unnecessary trouble." "i would rather you didn't," said george, in his best judicial manner. "very good," said sanders; and went away whistling to order dinner. over the meal he put it to the correspondent: "there are a number of people on this station who are friends of mine. i won't disguise the fact from you--there is o'neill, in charge of the houssas; the doctor, kennedy, the chap in charge of the survey party; and half a dozen more. would you like to question them?" "they are friends of yours?" "yes, personal friends." "then," said the hon. george, gravely, "perhaps it would be better if i did not see them." "as you wish," said sanders. with an escort of four houssas, and fifty carriers recruited from the neighbouring villages, the hon. george departed into the interior, and sanders saw him off. "i cannot, of course, guarantee your life," he said, at parting, "and i must warn you that the government will not be responsible for any injury that comes to you." "i understand," said the hon. george knowingly, "but i am not to be deterred. i come from a stock----" "i dare say," sanders cut his genealogical reminiscences short; "but the last traveller who was 'chopped' in the bush was a d'arcy, and his people came over with the conqueror." the correspondent took the straight path to lukati, and at the end of the third day's march came to the village of mfabo, where lived the great witch-doctor, kelebi. george pitched his camp outside the village, and, accompanied by his four houssas, paid a call upon the chief, which was one of the first mistakes he made, for he should have sent for the chief to call upon him; and if he called upon anybody, he should have made his visit to the witch-doctor, who was a greater man than forty chiefs. in course of time, however, he found himself squatting on the ground outside the doctor's house, engaged, through the medium of the interpreter he had brought from sierra leone, in an animated conversation with the celebrated person. "tell him," said george to his interpreter, "that i am a great white chief whose heart bleeds for the native." "is he a good man?" asked george. the witch-doctor, with the recollection of sanders' threat, said "no!" "why?" asked the hon. george eagerly. "does he beat the people?" not only did he beat the people, explained the witch-doctor with relish, but there were times when he burnt them alive. "this is a serious charge," said george, wagging his head warningly; nevertheless he wrote with rapidity in his diary:-- "interviewed kelebi, respected native doctor, who states: "'i have lived all my life in this district, and have never known so cruel a man as sandi (sanders). i remember once he caused a man to be drowned, the man's name i forget; on another occasion he burned a worthy native alive for refusing to guide him and his houssas through the forest. i also remember the time when he put a village to the fire, causing the people great suffering. "'the people of the country groan under his oppressions, for from time to time he comes demanding money and crops, and if he does not receive all that he asks for he flogs the villagers until they cry aloud.'" (i rather suspect that there is truth in the latter statement, for sanders finds no little difficulty in collecting the hut-tax, which is the government's due.) george shook his head when he finished writing. "this," he said, "looks very bad." he shook hands with the witch-doctor, and that aged villain looked surprised, and asked a question in the native tongue. "you no be fit to dash him somet'ing," said the interpreter. "dash him?" "give 'um present--bottle gin." "certainly not," said george. "he may be satisfied with the knowledge that he is rendering a service to humanity; that he is helping the cause of a down-trodden people." the witch-doctor said something in reply, which the interpreter very wisely refrained from putting into english. * * * * * "how go the investigations?" asked the captain of houssas three weeks later. "as far as i can gather," said sanders, "our friend is collecting a death-roll by the side of which the records of the great plague will read like an advertisement of a health resort." "where is he now?" "he has got to lukati--and i am worried"; and sanders looked it. the houssa captain nodded, for all manner of reports had come down from lukati country. there had been good crops, and good crops mean idleness, and idleness means mischief. also there had been devil dances, and the mild people of the bokari district, which lies contiguous to lukati, had lost women. "i've got a free hand to nip rebellion in the bud," sanders reflected moodily; "and the chances point to rebellion----what do you say? shall we make a report and wait for reinforcements, or shall we chance our luck?" "it's your funeral," said the houssa captain, "and i hate to advise you. if things go wrong you'll get the kicks; but if it were mine i'd go, like a shot--naturally." "a hundred and forty men," mused sanders. "and two maxims," suggested the other. "we'll go," said sanders; and half an hour later a bugle blared through the houssas' lines, and sanders was writing a report to his chief in far-away lagos. the hon. george, it may be said, had no idea that he was anything but welcome in the village of lukati. olari the chief had greeted him pleasantly, and told him stories of sanders' brutality--stories which, as george wrote, "if true, must of necessity sound the death-knell of british integrity in our native possessions." exactly what that meant, i am not disposed to guess. george stayed a month as the guest of lukati. he had intended to stay at the most three days, but there was always a reason for postponing his departure. once the carriers deserted, once the roads were not safe, once olari asked him to remain that he might see his young men dance. george did not know that his escort of four houssas were feeling uneasy, because his interpreter--as big a fool as himself--could not interpret omens. george knew nothing of the significance of a dance in which no less than six witch-doctors took part, or the history of the tumble-down hut that stood in solitude at one end of the village. had he taken the trouble to search that hut, he would have found a table, a chair, and a truckle bed, and on the table a report, soiled with dust and rain, which began: "i have the honour to inform your excellency that the natives maintain their industrious and peaceable attitude." for in this hut in his lifetime lived carter, deputy commissioner; and the natives, with their superstitious regard for the dead, had moved nothing. it was approaching the end of the month, when the hon. george thought he detected in his host a certain scarcely-veiled insolence of tone, and in the behaviour of the villagers something more threatening. the dances were a nightly occurrence now, and the measured stamping of feet, the clash of spear against cane shield, and the never-ending growl of the song the dancers sang, kept him awake at nights. messengers came to olari daily from long distances, and once he was awakened in the middle of the night by screams. he jumped out of bed and pushed aside the fly of his tent to see half a dozen naked women dragged through the streets--the result of a raid upon the unoffending bokari. he dressed, in a sweat of indignation and fear, and went to the chief's hut, fortunately without his interpreter, for what olari said would have paralysed him. in the morning (after this entirely unsatisfactory interview) he paraded his four houssas and such of his carriers as he could find, and prepared to depart. "master," said olari, when the request was interpreted, "i would rather you stayed. the land is full of bad people, and i have still much to tell you of the devilishness of sandi. moreover," said the chief, "to-night there is to be a great dance in your honour," and he pointed to where three slaves were engaged in erecting a big post in the centre of the village street. "after this i will let you go," said olari, "for you are my father and my mother." the hon. george was hesitating, when, of a sudden, at each end of the street there appeared, as if by magic, twenty travel-stained houssas. they stood at attention for a moment, then opened outwards, and in the centre of each party gleamed the fat water-jacket of a maxim gun. the chief said nothing, only he looked first one way and then the other, and his brown face went a dirty grey. sanders strolled leisurely along toward the group. he was unshaven, his clothes were torn with bush-thorn, in his hand was a long-barrelled revolver. "olari," he said gently; and the chief stepped forward. "i think, olari," said sanders, "you have been chief too long." "master, my father was chief before me, and his father," said olari, his face twitching. "what of tagondo, my friend?" asked sanders, speaking of carter by his native name. "master, he died," said olari; "he died of the sickness _mongo_--the sickness itself." "surely," said sanders, nodding his head, "surely you also shall die of the same sickness." olari looked round for a way of escape. he saw the hon. george looking from one to the other in perplexity, and he flung himself at the correspondent's feet. "master!" he cried, "save me from this man who hates me!" george understood the gesture; his interpreter told him the rest; and, as a houssa servant reached out his hand to the chief, the son of the house of widnes, strong in the sense of his righteousness, struck it back. "look here, sanders," forgetting all his previous misgivings and fears concerning the chief, "i should say that you have punished this poor devil enough!" "take that man, sergeant," said sanders sharply; and the houssa gripped olari by the shoulder and flung him backward. "you shall answer for this!" roared the hon. george tackle, in impotent wrath. "what are you going to do with him? my god! no, no!--not without a trial!" he sprang forward, but the houssas caught him and restrained him. * * * * * "for what you have done," said the correspondent--this was a month after, and he was going aboard the homeward steamer--"you shall suffer!" "i only wish to point out to you," said sanders, "that if i had not arrived in the nick of time, you would have done all the suffering--they were going to sacrifice you on the night i arrived. didn't you see the post?" "that is a lie!" said the other. "i will make england ring with your infamy. the condition of your district is a blot on civilisation!" * * * * * "there is no doubt," said mr. justice keneally, summing up in the libel action, sanders v. _the courier and echo_ and another, "that the defendant tackle did write a number of very libellous and damaging statements, and, to my mind, the most appalling aspect of the case is that, commissioned as he was to investigate the condition of affairs in the district of lukati, he did not even trouble to find out where lukati was. as you have been told, gentlemen of the jury, there are no less than four lukatis in west africa, the one in togoland being the district in which it was intended the defendant should go. how he came to mistake lukati of british west africa for the lukati of german togoland, i do not know, but in order to bolster up his charges against a perfectly-innocent british official he brought forward a number of unsupported statements, each of which must be regarded as damaging to the plaintiff, but more damaging still to the newspaper that in its colossal ignorance published them." the jury awarded sanders nine thousand seven hundred and fifty pounds. chapter vi. the dancing stones. heroes should be tall and handsome, with flashing eyes; sanders was not so tall, was yellow of face, moreover had grey hair. heroes should also be of gentle address, full of soft phrases, for such tender women who come over their horizon; sanders was a dispassionate man who swore on the slightest provocation, and had no use for women any way. when you place a man upon a throne, even though that throne be a wooden stool worth in the mart fourpence more or less, you assume a responsibility which greatly outweighs all the satisfaction or personal gratification you may derive from your achievement. there is a grave in toledo, a slab of brass, over a great king-maker who lived long enough to realise his insignificance. the epitaph upon that brass tomb of his is eloquent of his sum knowledge of life and human effort. pulvis et nihil says the inscription, and powder and nothing is the ultimate destiny of all king-makers. sanders was a maker of kings in the early days. he helped break a few, so it was in obedience to the laws of compensation that he took his part in reconstructive work. he broke esindini, matabini, t'saki--to name three--and helped, in the very old days, and in another country, to break lobengula, the great bull. king-maker he was beyond question--you could see republicanism written legibly in the amused grin with which he made them--but the kings he made were little ones--that is the custom of the british-african rule, they break a big king and put many little kings in his place, because it is much safer. somewhere about north, and in longitude , is a land which is peculiar for the fact that it is british, french, german, and italian--according to which map of africa you judge it by. at the time of which i write it was neither, but it was ruled by mensikilimbili for the great king. he was the most powerful of monarchs, and, for the matter of that, the most cruel. his dominion stretched "from moonrise to sunset," said the natives, and he held undisputed sway. he had a court, and sat upon an ivory throne, and wore over the leopard skins of his rank a mantle woven of gold thread and scarlet thread, and he administered justice. he had three hundred wives and forty thousand fighting men, and his acquaintance with white men began and ended with the coming of a french mission, who presented him with a tall hat, a barrel organ, and one hundred thousand francs in gold. this was limbili, the great king of yitingi. the little kings of the southern lands spoke of him with bated breath; his name was uttered in a low voice, as of a god; he was the symbol of majesty and of might--the isisi people, themselves a nation of some importance, and boastful likewise, referred to themselves disparagingly when the kingdom of yitingi was mentioned. following the french mission, sanders went up as envoy to the limbilu, carrying presents of a kind and messages of good will. he was escorted into the territory by a great army and was lodged in the city of the king. after two days' waiting he was informed that his majesty would see him, and was led to the presence. the presence was an old man, a vicious old man, if sanders was any judge of character, who showed unmistakable signs of anger and contempt when the commissioner displayed his presents. "and what are these, white man?" said the king. "toys for my women, or presents for my little chiefs?" "these are for your greatness," said sanders quietly, "from a people who do not gauge friendship by the costliness of presents." the king gave a little sniff. "tell me, white man," he said; "in your travels have you ever seen so great a king as i?" "lord king," said sanders, frank to a fault. "i have seen greater." the king frowned, and the crowd about his sacred person muttered menacingly. "there you lie," said the king calmly; "for there never was a greater king than i." "let the white man say who is greater," croaked an aged councillor, and a murmur of approval arose. "lord," said sanders, looking into the eyes of the old man who sat on the throne, "i have seen lo ben."[ ] the king frowned again, and nodded. "of him i have heard," he said; "he was a great king and an eater-up of nations--who else?" "king," lied sanders, "also ketcewayo"; and something like a hush fell upon the court, for the name of ketcewayo was one that travelled north. "but of white kings," persisted the chief; "is there a white king in the world whose word when it goes forth causes men to tremble?" sanders grinned internally, knowing such a king, but answered that in all his life he had never met such a king. "and of armies," said the king, "have you ever seen an army such as mine?" and so through the category of his possessions he ran; and sanders, finding that the lie was to save himself a great deal of trouble, lied and acclaimed king limbili as the greatest king in all the world, commander of the most perfect army, ruler of a sublime kingdom. it may be said that the kingdom of yitingi owed its integrity to its faults, for, satisfied with the perfection of all his possessions, the great king confined his injustices, his cruelties, and his little wars within the boundaries of his state. also he sought relaxation therein. one day, just after the rains, when the world was cool and the air filled with the faint scent of african spring, sanders made a tour through the little provinces. these are those lands which lie away from the big rivers. countries curled up in odd corners, bisected sharply on the map by this or that international boundary line, or scattered on the fringe of the wild country vaguely inscribed by the chartographer as "under british influence." it was always an interesting journey--sanders made it once a year--for the way led up strange rivers and through unfamiliar scenes, past villages where other white men than sanders were never seen. after a month's travel the commissioner came to icheli, which lies on the border of the great king's domain, and with immense civility he was received by the elders and the chiefs. "lord, you have come at a good moment," said the chief solemnly, "to-night daihili dances." "and who is daihili?" asked sanders. they told him; later they brought for his inspection a self-conscious girl, a trifle pert, he thought, for a native. a slim girl, taller than the average woman, with a figure perfectly modelled, a face not unpleasant even from the european standpoint, graceful in carriage, her every movement harmonious. sanders, chewing the end of his cigar, took her in at one glance. "my girl, they tell me that you dance," he said. "that is so, master," she said; "i am the greatest dancer in all the world." "so far i cannot go," said the cautious commissioner; "but i do not doubt that your dancing is very wonderful." "lord," she said, with a gesture, "when i dance men go mad, losing their senses. to-night when the moon is high i will show you the dance of the three lovers." "to-night," said sanders briefly, "i shall be in bed--and, i trust, asleep." the girl frowned a little, was possibly piqued, being a woman of fifteen, and in no wise different to women elsewhere in the world. this sanders did not know, and i doubt whether the knowledge would have helped him much if he did. he heard the tom-tom beating, that night as he lay in bed, and the rhythmical clapping of hands, and fell asleep wondering what would be the end of a girl who danced so that men went mad. the child was the chief's daughter, and at parting sanders had a few words to say concerning her. "this daughter of yours is fifteen, and it would be better if she were married," he said. "lord, she has many lovers, but none rich enough to buy her," said the proud father, "because she is so great a dancer. chiefs and headmen from villages far distant come to see her." he looked round and lowered his voice. "it is said," he whispered, "that the great one himself has spoken of her. perhaps he will send for her, offering this and that. in such a case," said the chief hopefully, "i will barter and bargain, keeping him in suspense, and every day the price will rise----" "if the great one need her, let her go," said sanders, "lest instead of money presents he sends an army. i will have no war, or women palaver, which is worse than war, in my country--mark that, chief." "lord, your word is my desire," said the chief conventionally. sanders went back to his own people by easy stages. at isisi he was detained for over a week over a question of witch-craft; at belembi (in the isisi country) he stopped three days to settle a case of murder by fetish. he was delivering judgment, and abiboo, the sergeant of police, was selecting and testing his stoutest cane for the whipping which was to follow, when the chief of the icheli came flying down the river with three canoes, and sanders, who, from where he sat, commanded an uninterrupted view of the river, knew there was trouble--and guessed what that trouble was. "justice!" demanded the chief, his voice trembling with the rage and fear he had nursed, "justice against the old one, the stealer of girls, the destroyer of cities--may death go to him. iwa!----" the very day sanders had left, the messenger of the great king had come, and with him a hundred warriors, demanding the dancing girl. true to his pre-arranged scheme, the chief began the inevitable bargaining over terms. the presents offered were too small. the girl was worth a hundred thousand rods--nay, a thousand bags of salt. "you were mad," said sanders calmly; "no woman is worth a thousand bags of salt." "well, that might be," admitted the outraged father; "yet it would be folly to begin by naming a price too low. the bargaining went on through the night and all the next day, and in the end the envoy of the great king grew impatient. "let the woman be sent for," he said, and obedient to the summons came daihili, demure enough, yet with covert glances of encouragement to the unemotional ambassador, and with subtle exhibitions of her charms. "woman," said the messenger, "the greatest of kings desires you, will you come?" "lord," said the girl, "i wish for nothing better." with that, the hundred armed warriors in attendance at the palaver closed round the girl. "and so," said sanders, "you got nothing?" "lord, it is as you say," moaned the old chief. "it is evident," said sanders, "that an injustice has been done; for no man may take a woman unless he pay. i think," he added, with a flash of that mordant humour which occasionally illuminated his judgments, "that the man pays twice, once to the father, and all his life to his wife--but that is as may be." six weeks later, after consultation, sanders sent a messenger to the great king, demanding the price of the woman. what happened to the messenger i would rather not describe. that he was killed, is saying the least. just before he died, when the glaze of death must have been on his eyes, and his poor wrecked body settling to the rest of oblivion, he was carried to a place before the king's hut, and daihili danced the dance of the spirits. this much is now known. sanders did nothing; nor did the british government, but hurried notes were exchanged between ambassadors and ministers in paris, and that was the end of the incident. two icheli spies went up into the great king's country. one came back saying that the dancing girl was the favourite wife of the old king, and that her whims swayed the destinies of the nation. also he reported that because of this slim girl who danced, many men, councillors, and captains of war had died the death. the other spy did not come back. it may have been his discovery that induced the girl to send an army against the icheli, thinking perchance that her people were spying upon her. one day the city of icheli was surrounded by the soldiers of the great king, and neither man, woman nor child escaped. the news of the massacre did not come to sanders for a long time. the reason was simple there was none to carry the message, for the icheli are isolated folk. one day, however, an isisi hunting party, searching for elephants, came upon a place where there was a smell of burning and many skeletons--and thus sanders knew---- "we cannot," wrote monsieur leon marchassa, minister for colonial affairs, "accept responsibility for the misdoings of the king of the yitingi, and my government would regard with sympathetic interest any attempt that was made by his majesty's government to pacify this country." but the british government did nothing, because war is an expensive matter, and sanders grinned and cursed his employers genially. taking his life in his hands, he went up to the border of yitingi, with twenty policemen, and sent a messenger--a yitingi messenger--to the king. with the audacity which was not the least of his assets, he demanded that the king should come to him for a palaver. this adventure nearly proved abortive at the beginning, for just as the _zaire_ was steaming to the borders sanders unexpectedly came upon traces of a raiding expedition. there were unmistakable signs as to the author. "i have a mind to turn back and punish that cursed bosambo, chief of the ochori," he said to sergeant abiboo, "for having sworn by a variety of gods and devils that he would keep the peace; behold he has been raiding in foreign territory." "he will keep, master," said abiboo, "besides which, he is in the neighbourhood, for his fires are still warm." so sanders went on, and sent his message to the king. he kept steam in his little boat--he had chosen the only place where the river touches the yitingi border--and waited, quite prepared to make an ignominious, if judicious, bolt. to his astonishment, his spies brought word that the king was coming. he owed this condescension to the influence of the little dancing girl, for she, woman-like, had a memory for rebuffs, and had a score to settle with mr. commissioner sanders. the great king arrived, and across the meadow-like lands that fringe the river on both sides sanders watched the winding procession with mingled feelings. the king halted a hundred yards from the river, and his big scarlet umbrella was the centre of a black line of soldiers spreading out on either hand for three hundred yards. then a party detached itself and came towards the dead tree by the water side, whereon hung limply in the still air the ensign of england. "this," said sanders to himself, "is where i go dead one time." it is evidence of the seriousness of the situation, as it appealed to him, that he permitted himself to descend to coast english. "the king, the great one, awaits you, white man, offering you safety in his shadow," said the king's messenger; and sanders nodded. he walked leisurely toward the massed troops, and presently appeared before the old man squatting on a heap of skins and blinking like an ape in the sunlight. "lord king, live for ever," said sanders glibly, and as he raised his hand in salute he saw the girl regarding him from under knit brows. "what is your wish, white man?" said the old king; "what rich presents do you bring, that you call me many days' journey?" "lord, i bring no presents," said sanders boldly; "but a message from a king who is greater than you, whose soldiers outnumber the sands of the river, and whose lands extend from the east to the west, from the north to the south." "there is no such king," snarled the old man. "you lie, white man, and i will cut your tongue into little strips." "let him give his message, master," said the girl. "this is the message," said sanders. he stood easily, with his hands in the pockets of his white uniform jacket, and the king was nearer death than he knew. "my master says: 'because the great king of yitingi has eaten up the icheli folk: because he has crossed the borderland and brought suffering to my people, my heart is sore. yet, if the great king will pay a fine of one thousand head of cattle and will allow free access to his country for my soldiers and my commissioners, i will live in peace with him.'" the old man laughed, a wicked, cackling laugh. "oh, ko!" he chuckled; "a great king!" then the girl stepped forward. "sandi," she said, "once you put me to shame, for when i would have danced for you, you slept." "to you, daihili," said sanders steadily, "i say nothing; i make no palaver with women, for that is not the custom or the law. still less do i talk with dancing girls. my business is with limbili the king." the king was talking rapidly behind his hand to a man who bent over him, and sanders, his hands still in his jacket pockets, snapped down the safety catches of his automatic colts. all the time the girl spoke he was watching from the corners of his eyes the man who talked with the king. he saw him disappear in the crowd of soldiers who stood behind the squatting figures, and prepared for the worst. "since i may not dance for you," the girl was saying, "my lord the king would have you dance for me." "that is folly," said sanders: then he saw the line on either side wheel forward, and out came his pistols. "crack! crack!" the shot intended for the king missed him, and broke the leg of a soldier behind. it had been hopeless from the first; this sanders realised with some philosophy, as he lay stretched on the baked earth, trussed like a fowl, and exceedingly uncomfortable. at the first shot abiboo, obeying his instructions, would turn the bows of the steamer down stream; this was the only poor satisfaction he could derive from the situation. throughout that long day, with a pitiless sun beating down upon him, he lay in the midst of an armed guard, waiting for the death which must come in some dreadful form or other. he was undismayed, for this was the logical end of the business. toward the evening they gave him water, which was most acceptable. from the gossip of his guards he gathered that the evening had been chosen for his exit, but the manner of it he must guess. from where he lay he could see, by turning his head a little, the king's tent, and all the afternoon men were busily engaged in heaping flat stones upon the earth before the pavilion. they were of singular uniformity, and would appear to be specially hewn and dressed for some purpose. he asked his guard a question. "they are the dancing stones, white man," said the soldier, "they come from the mountain near the city." when darkness fell a huge fire was lit; it was whilst he was watching this that he heard of the _zaire's_ escape, and was thankful. he must have been dozing, exhausted in body and mind, when he was dragged to his feet, his bonds were slipped, and he was led before the king. then he saw what form his torture was to take. the flat stones were being taken from the fire with wooden pincers and laid to form a rough pavement before the tent. "white man," said the king, as rude hands pulled off the commissioner's boots, "the woman daihili would see you dance." "be assured, king," said sanders, between his teeth, "that some day you shall dance in hell in more pleasant company, having first danced at the end of a rope." "if you live through the dancing," said the king, "you will be sorry." a ring of soldiers with their spears pointing inward surrounded the pavement, those on the side of the tent crouching so that their bodies might not interrupt the great one's view. "dance," said the king; and sanders was thrown forward. the first stone he touched was only just warm, and on this he stood still till a spear-thrust sent him to the next. it was smoking hot, and he leapt up with a stifled cry. down he came to another, hotter still, and leapt again-- "throw water over him," said the amused king, when they dragged the fainting man off the stones, his clothes smouldering where he lay in an inert heap. "now dance," said the king again--when out of the darkness about the group leapt a quivering pencil of yellow light. ha-ha-ha-ha-a-a-a! abiboo's maxim-gun was in action at a range of fifty yards, and with him five hundred ochori men under that chief of chiefs, bosambo. for a moment the yitingi stood, and then, as with a wild yell which was three-parts fear, the ochori charged, the king's soldiers broke and fled. they carried sanders to the steamer quickly, for the yitingi would re-form, being famous night fighters. sanders, sitting on the deck of the steamer nursing his burnt feet and swearing gently, heard the scramble of the ochori as they got into their canoes, heard the grunting of his houssas hoisting the maxim on board, and fainted again. "master," said bosambo in the morning, "many moons ago you made charge against the ochori, saying they would not fight. that was true, but in those far-off days there was no chief bosambo. now, because of my teaching, and because i have put fire into their stomachs, they have defeated the soldiers of the great king." he posed magnificently, for on his shoulders was a mantle of gold thread woven with blue, which was not his the night before. "bosambo," said sanders, "though i have a score to settle with you for breaking the law by raiding, i am grateful that the desire for the properties of others brought you to this neighbourhood. where did you get that cloak?" he demanded. "i stole it," said bosambo frankly, "from the tent of the great king; also i brought with me one of the stones upon which my lord would not stand. i brought this, thinking that it would be evidence." sanders nodded, and bit his cigar with a little grimace. "on which my lord would not stand," was very prettily put. "let me see it," he said; and bosambo himself carried it to him. it had borne the heat well enough, but rough handling had chipped a corner; and sanders looked at this cracked corner long and earnestly. "here," he said, "is an argument that no properly constituted british government can overlook--i see limbili's finish." * * * * * the rainy season came round and the springtime, before sanders again stood in the presence of the great king. all around him was desolation and death. the plain was strewn with the bodies of men, and the big city was a smoking ruin. to the left, three regiments of houssas were encamped; to the right, two battalions of african rifles sat at "chop," and the snappy notes of their bugles came sharply through the still air. "i am an old man," mumbled the king; but the girl who crouched at his side said nothing. only her eyes never left the brick-red face of sanders. "old you are," he said, "yet not too old to die." "i am a great king," whined the other, "and it is not proper that a great king should hang." "yet if you live," said sanders, "many other great kings will say, 'we may commit these abominations, and because of our greatness we shall live.'" "and what of me, lord?" said the girl in a low voice. "you!" sanders looked at her. "ho, hi," he said, as though he had just remembered her. "you are the dancing girl? now we shall do nothing with you, daihili--because you are nothing." he saw her shrink as one under a lash. after the execution, the colonel of the houssas and sanders were talking together. "what i can't understand," said the colonel, "is why we suddenly decided upon this expedition. it has been necessary for years--but why this sudden activity?" sanders grinned mysteriously. "a wonderful people, the english," he said airily. "old man limbili steals british subjects, and i report it. 'very sad,' says england. he wipes out a nation. 'deplorable!' says england. he makes me dance on the original good-intention stones of hades. 'treat it as a joke,' says england; but when i point out that these stones assay one ounce ten penny-weights of refined gold, and that we've happed upon the richest reef in central africa, there's an army here in six months!" i personally think that sanders may have been a little unjust in his point of view. after all, wars cost money, and wars of vengeance are notoriously unprofitable. [footnote : lo bengola, the king of the matabele.] chapter vii. the forest of happy dreams. sanders was tied up at a "wooding," being on his way to collect taxes and administer justice to the folk who dwell on the lower isisi river. by the river-side the little steamer was moored. there was a tiny bay here, and the swift currents of the river were broken to a gentle flow; none the less, he inspected the shore-ends of the wire hawsers before he crossed the narrow plank that led to the deck of the _zaire_. the wood was stacked on the deck, ready for to-morrow's run. the new water-gauge had been put in by yoka, the engineer, as he had ordered; the engines had been cleaned; and sanders nodded approvingly. he stepped lightly over two or three sleeping forms curled up on the deck, and gained the shore. "now i think i'll turn in," he muttered, and looked at his watch. it was nine o'clock. he stood for a moment on the crest of the steep bank, and stared back across the river. the night was black, but he saw the outlines of the forest on the other side. he saw the jewelled sky, and the pale reflection of stars in the water. then he went to his tent, and leisurely got into his pyjamas. he jerked two tabloids from a tiny bottle, swallowed them, drank a glass of water, and thrust his head through the tent opening. "ho, sokani!" he called, speaking in the vernacular, "let the _lo-koli_ sound!" he went to bed. he heard the rustle of men moving, the gurgles of laughter as his subtle joke was repeated, for the cambul people have a keen sense of humour, and then the penetrating rattle of sticks on the native drum--a hollow tree-trunk. fiercely it beat--furiously, breathlessly, with now and then a deeper note as the drummer, using all his art, sent the message of sleep to the camp. in one wild crescendo, the _lo-koli_ ceased, and sanders turned with a sigh of content and closed his eyes--he sat up suddenly. he must have dozed; but he was wide awake now. he listened, then slipped out of bed, pulling on his mosquito boots. into the darkness of the night he stepped, and found n'kema, the engineer, waiting. "you heard, master?" said the native. "i heard," said sanders, with a puzzled face, "yet we are nowhere near a village." he listened. from the night came a hundred whispering noises, but above all these, unmistakable, the faint clatter of an answering drum. the white man frowned in his perplexity. "no village is nearer than the bongindanga," he muttered, "not even a fishing village; the woods are deserted----" the native held up a warning finger, and bent his head, listening. he was reading the message that the drum sent. sanders waited; he knew the wonderful fact of this native telegraph, how it sent news through the trackless wilds. he could not understand it, no european could; but he had respect for its mystery. "a white man is here," read the native; "he has the sickness." "a white man!" in the darkness sanders' eyebrows rose incredulously. "he is a foolish one," n'kema read; "he sits in the forest of happy thoughts, and will not move." sanders clicked his lips impatiently. "no white man would sit in the forest of happy thoughts," he said, half to himself, "unless he were mad." but the distant drum monotonously repeated the outrageous news. here, indeed, in the heart of the loveliest glade in all africa, encamped in the very centre of the green path of death, was a white man, a sick white man--in the forest of happy thoughts--a sick white man. so the drum went on and on, till sanders, rousing his own _lo-koli_ man, sent an answer crashing along the river, and began to dress hurriedly. in the forest lay a very sick man. he had chosen the site for the camp himself. it was in a clearing, near a little creek that wound between high elephant-grass to the river. mainward chose it, just before the sickness came, because it was pretty. this was altogether an inadequate reason; but mainward was a sentimentalist, and his life was a long record of choosing pretty camping places, irrespective of danger. "he was," said a newspaper, commenting on the crowning disaster which sent him a fugitive from justice to the wild lands of africa, "over-burdened with imagination." mainward was cursed with ill-timed confidence; this was one of the reasons he chose to linger in that deadly strip of land of the ituri, which is clumsily named by the natives "the lands-where-all-bad-thoughts-become-good-thoughts" and poetically adapted by explorers and daring traders as "the forest of happy dreams." over-confidence had generally been mainward's undoing--over-confidence in the ability of his horses to win races; over-confidence in his own ability to secure money to hide his defalcations--he was a director in the welshire county bank once--over-confidence in securing the love of a woman, who, when the crash came, looked at him blankly and said she was sorry, but she had no idea he felt towards her like that---- now mainward lifted his aching head from the pillow and cursed aloud at the din. he was endowed with the smattering of pigeon-english which a man may acquire from a three months' sojourn divided between sierra leone and grand bassam. "why for they make 'em cursed noise, eh?" he fretted. "you plenty fool-man, abiboo." "si, senor," agreed the kano boy, calmly. "stop it, d'ye hear? stop it!" raved the man on the tumbled bed; "this noise is driving me mad--tell them to stop the drum." the _lo-koli_ stopped of its own accord, for the listeners in the sick man's camp had heard the faint answer from sanders. "come here, abiboo--i want some milk; open a fresh tin; and tell the cook i want some soup, too." the servant left him muttering and tossing from side to side on the creaking camp bedstead. mainward had many strange things to think about. it was strange how they all clamoured for immediate attention; strange how they elbowed and fought one another in their noisy claims to his notice. of course, there was the bankruptcy and the discovery at the bank--it was very decent of that inspector fellow to clear out--and ethel, and the horses, and--and---- the valley of happy dreams! that would make a good story if mainward could write; only, unfortunately, he could not write. he could sign things, sign his name "three months after date pay to the order of----" he could sign other people's names; he groaned, and winced at the thought. but here was a forest where bad thoughts became good, and, god knows, his mind was ill-furnished. he wanted peace and sleep and happiness--he greatly desired happiness. now suppose "fairy lane" had won the wokingham stakes? it had not, of course (he winced again at the bad memory), but suppose it had? suppose he could have found a friend who would have lent him , , or even if ethel---- "master," said abiboo's voice, "dem puck-a-puck, him lib for come." "eh, what's that?" mainward turned almost savagely on the man. "puck-a-puck--you hear'um?" but the sick man could not hear the smack of the _zaire_'s stern wheel, as the little boat breasted the downward rush of the river--he was surprised to see that it was dawn, and grudgingly admitted to himself that he had slept. he closed his eyes again and had a strange dream. the principal figure was a small, tanned, clean-shaven man in a white helmet, who wore a dingy yellow overcoat over his pyjamas. "how are you feeling?" said the stranger. "rotten bad," growled mainward, "especially about ethel; don't you think it was pretty low down of her to lead me on to believe she was awfully fond of me, and then at the last minute to chuck me?" "shocking," said the strange, white man gravely, "but put her out of your mind just now; she isn't worth troubling about. what do you say to this?" he held up a small, greenish pellet between his forefinger and thumb, and mainward laughed weakly. "oh, rot!" he chuckled faintly. "you're one of those forest of happy dreams johnnies; what's that? a love philtre?" he was hysterically amused at the witticism. sanders nodded. "love or life, it's all one," he said, but apparently unamused. "swallow it!" mainward giggled and obeyed. "and now," said the stranger--this was six hours later--"the best thing you can do is to let my boys put you on my steamer and take you down river." mainward shook his head. he had awakened irritable and lamentably weak. "my dear chap, it's awfully kind of you to have come--by the way, i suppose you _are_ a doctor?" sanders shook his head. "on the contrary, i am the commissioner of this district," he said flippantly--"but you were saying----" "i want to stay here--it's devilish pretty." "devilish is the very adjective i should have used--my dear man, this is the plague spot of the congo; it's the home of every death-dealing fly and bug in africa." he waved his hand to the hidden vistas of fresh green glades, of gorgeous creepers shown in the light of the camp fires. "look at the grass," he said; "it's homeland grass--that's the seductive part of it; i nearly camped here myself. come, my friend, let me take you to my camp." mainward shook his head obstinately. "i'm obliged, but i'll stay here for a day or so. i want to try the supernatural effects of this pleasant place," he said with a weary smile. "i've got so many thoughts that need treatment." "look here," said sanders roughly, "you know jolly well how this forest got its name; it is called happy dreams because it's impregnated with fever, and with every disease from beri-beri to sleeping sickness. you don't wake from the dreams you dream here. man, i know this country, and you're a newcomer; you've trekked here because you wanted to get away from life and start all over again." "i beg your pardon." mainward's face flushed; and he spoke a little stiffly. "oh, i know all about you--didn't i tell you i was the commissioner? i was in england when things were going rocky with you, and i've read the rest in the papers i get from time to time. but all that is nothing to me. i'm here to help you start fair. if you had wanted to commit suicide, why come to africa to do it? be sensible and shift your camp; i'll send my steamer back for your men. will you come?" "no," said mainward sulkily. "i don't want to, i'm not keen; besides, i'm not fit to travel." here was an argument which sanders could not answer. he was none too sure upon that point himself, and he hesitated before he spoke again. "very well," he said at length, "suppose you stay another day to give you a chance to pull yourself together. i'll come along to-morrow with a tip-top invalid chair for you--is it a bet?" mainward held out his shaking hand, and the ghost of a smile puckered the corners of his eyes. "it's a bet," he said. he watched the commissioner walk through the camp, speaking to one man after another in a strange tongue. a singular, masterful man this, thought mainward. would he have mastered ethel? he watched the stranger with curious eyes, and noted how his own lazy devils of carriers jumped at his word. "good-night," said sanders' voice; and mainward looked up. "you must take another of these pellets, and to-morrow you'll be as fit as a donkey-engine. i've got to get back to my camp to-night, or i shall find half my stores stolen in the morning; but if you'd rather i stopped----" "no, no," replied the other hastily. he wanted to be alone. he had lots of matters to settle with himself. there was the question of ethel, for instance. "you won't forget to take the tabloid?" "no. i say, i'm awfully obliged to you for coming. you've been a good white citizen." sanders smiled. "don't talk nonsense!" he said good-humouredly. "this is all brotherly love. white to white, and kin to kin, don't you know? we're all alone here, and there isn't a man of our colour within five hundred miles. good-night, and please take the tabloid----" mainward lay listening to the noise of departure. he thought he heard a little bell tingle. that must be for the engines. then he heard the puck-a-puck of the wheel--so that was how the steamer got its name. abiboo came with some milk. "you take um medicine, master?" he inquired. "i take um," murmured mainward; but the green tabloid was underneath his pillow. then there began to steal over him a curious sensation of content. he did not analyse it down to its first cause. he had had sufficient introspective exercise for one day. it came to him as a pleasant shock to realise that he was happy. he opened his eyes and looked round. his bed was laid in the open, and he drew aside the curtains of his net to get a better view. a little man was walking briskly toward him along the velvet stretch of grass that sloped down from the glade, and mainward whistled. "atty," he gasped. "by all that's wonderful." atty, indeed, it was: the same wizened atty as of yore; but no longer pulling the long face to which mainward had been accustomed. the little man was in his white riding-breeches, his diminutive top-boots were splashed with mud, and on the crimson of his silk jacket there was evidence of a hard race. he touched his cap jerkily with his whip, and shifted the burden of the racing saddle he carried to the other arm. "why, atty," said mainward, with a smile, "what on earth are you doing here?" "it's a short way to the jockey's room, sir," said the little man. "i've just weighed in. i thought the fairy would do it, sir, and she did." mainward nodded wisely. "i knew she would, too," he said. "did she give you a smooth ride?" the jockey grinned again. "she never does that," he said. "but she ran gamely enough. coming up out of the dip, she hung a little, but i showed her the whip, and she came on as straight as a die. i thought once the stalk would beat us--i got shut in, but i pulled her round, and we were never in difficulties. i could have won by ten lengths," said atty. "you could have won by ten lengths," repeated mainward in wonder. "well, you've done me a good turn, atty. this win will get me out of one of the biggest holes that ever a reckless man tumbled into--i shall not forget you, atty." "i'm sure you won't, sir," said the little jockey gratefully; "if you'll excuse me now, sir----" mainward nodded and watched him, as he moved quickly through the trees. there were several people in the glade now, and mainward looked down ruefully at his soiled duck suit. "what an ass i was to come like this," he muttered in his annoyance. "i might have known that i should have met all these people." there was one he did not wish to see; and as soon as he sighted venn, with his shy eyes and his big nose, mainward endeavoured to slip back out of observation. but venn saw him, and came tumbling through the trees, with his big, flabby hand extended and his dull eyes aglow. "hullo, hullo!" he grinned, "been looking for you." mainward muttered some inconsequent reply. "rum place to find you, eh?" venn removed his shining silk hat and mopped his brow with an awesome silk handkerchief. "but look here, old feller--about that money?" "don't worry, my dear man," mainward interposed easily. "i shall pay you now." "that ain't what i mean," said the other impetuously; "a few hundred more or less does not count. but you wanted a big sum----" "and you told me you'd see me----" "i know, i know," venn put in hastily; "but that was before kaffirs started jumpin'. old feller, you can have it!" he said this with grotesque emphasis, standing with his legs wide apart, his hat perched on the back of his head, his plump hands dramatically outstretched: and mainward laughed outright. "sixteen thousand?" he asked. "or twenty," said the other impressively. "i want to show you----" somebody called him, and with a hurried apology he went blundering up the green slope, stopping and turning back to indulge in a little dumb show illustrative of his confidence in mainward and his willingness to oblige. mainward was laughing, a low, gurgling laugh of pure enjoyment. venn, of all people! venn, with his accursed questions and talk of securities. well! well! then his merriment ceases, and he winced again, and his heart beat faster and faster, and a curious weakness came over him---- how splendidly cool she looked. she walked in the clearing, a white, slim figure; he heard the swish of her skirt as she came through the long grass--white, with a green belt all encrusted with gold embroidery. he took in every detail hungrily--the dangling gold ornaments that hung from her belt, the lace collar at her throat, the---- she did not hurry to him, that was not her way. but in her eyes dawned a gradual tenderness--those dear eyes that dropped before his shyly. "ethel!" he whispered, and dared to take her hand. "aren't you wonderfully surprised?" she said. "ethel! here!" "i--i had to come." she would not look at him, but he saw the pink in her cheek and heard the faltering voice with a wild hope. "i behaved so badly, dear--so very badly." she hung her head. "dear! dear!" he muttered, and groped toward her like a blind man. she was in his arms, crushed against his breast, the perfume of her presence in his brain. "i had to come to you." her hot cheek was against his. "i love you so." "me--love me? do you mean it?" he was tremulous with happiness, and his voice broke--"dearest." her face was upturned to his, her lips so near; he felt her heart beating as furiously as his own. he kissed her--her lips, her eyes, her dear hair---- "o, god, i'm happy!" she sobbed, "so--so happy----" * * * * * sanders sprang ashore just as the sun was rising, and came thoughtfully through the undergrowth to the camp. abiboo, squatting by the curtained bed, did not rise. sanders walked to the bed, pulled aside the mosquito netting, and bent over the man who lay there. then he drew the curtains again, lit his pipe slowly, and looked down at abiboo. "when did he die?" he asked. "in the dark of the morning, master," said the man. sanders nodded slowly. "why did you not send for me?" for a moment the squatting figure made no reply, then he rose and stretched himself. "master," he said, speaking in arabic--which is a language which allows of nice distinctions--"this man was happy; he walked in the forest of happy thoughts; why should i call him back to a land where there was neither sunshine nor happiness, but only night and pain and sickness?" "you're a philosopher," said sanders irritably. "i am a follower of the prophet," said abiboo, the kano boy; "and all things are according to god's wisdom." chapter viii. the akasavas. you who do not understand how out of good evil may arise must take your spade to some virgin grassland, untouched by the hand of man from the beginning of time. here is soft, sweet grass, and never a sign of nettle, or rank, evil weed. it is as god made it. turn the soil with your spade, intent on improving his handiwork, and next season--weeds, nettles, lank creeping things, and coarse-leafed vegetation cover the ground. your spade has aroused to life the dormant seeds of evil, germinated the ugly waste life that all these long years has been sleeping out of sight--in twenty years, with careful cultivation, you may fight down the weeds and restore the grassland, but it takes a lot of doing. your intentions may have been the best in disturbing the primal sod; you may have had views of roses flourishing where grass was; the result is very much the same. i apply this parable to the story of a missionary and his work. the missionary was a good man, though of the wrong colour. he had large ideas on his duty to his fellows; he was inspired by the work of his cloth in another country; but, as sanders properly said, india is not africa. kenneth mcdolan came to mr. commissioner sanders with a letter of introduction from the new administration. sanders was at "chop" one blazing morning when his servant, who was also his sergeant, abiboo, brought a card to him. it was a nice card, rounded at the corners, and gilt-edged, and in the centre, in old english type, was the inscription-- rev. kenneth mcdolan. underneath was scribbled in pencil: "on a brief visit." sanders sniffed impatiently, for "reverend" meant "missionary," and "missionary" might mean anything. he looked at the card again and frowned in his perplexity. somehow the old english and the reverendness of the visiting card did not go well with the rounded corners and the gilt edge. "where is he?" he demanded. "master," said abiboo, "he is on the verandah. shall i kick him off?" abiboo said this very naturally and with simple directness, and sanders stared at him. "son of sin!" he said sternly, "is it thus you speak of god-men, and of white men at that?" "this man wears the clothes of a god-man," said abiboo serenely; "but he is a black man, therefore of no consequence." sanders pulled a pair of mosquito boots over his pyjamas and swore to himself. "white missionaries, yes," he said wrathfully, "but black missionaries i will not endure." the reverend kenneth was sitting in sanders' basket-chair, one leg flung negligently over one side of the chair to display a silk sock. his finger-tips were touching, and he was gazing with good-natured tolerance at the little green garden which was the commissioner's special delight. he was black, very black; but his manners were easy, and his bearing self-possessed. he nodded smilingly to sanders and extended a lazy hand. "ah, mr. commissioner," he said in faultless english, "i have heard a great deal about you." "get out of that chair," said sanders, who had no small talk worth mentioning, "and stand up when i come out to you! what do you want?" the reverend kenneth rose quickly, and accepted the situation with a rapidity which will be incomprehensible to any who do not know how thumbnail deep is the cultivation of the cultured savage. "i am on a brief visit," he said, a note of deference in his tone. "i am taking the small towns and villages along the coast, holding services, and i desire permission to speak to your people." this was not the speech he had prepared. he had come straight from england, where he had been something of a lion in bayswater society, and where, too, his theological attainments had won him regard and no small amount of fame in even a wider circle. "you may speak to my people," said sanders; "but you may not address the kano folk nor the houssas, because they are petrified in the faith of the prophet." regaining his self-possession, the missionary smiled. "to bring light into dark places----" he began. "cut it out," said sanders briefly; "the palaver is finished." he turned on his heel and re-entered the bungalow. then a thought struck him. "hi!" he shouted, and the retiring missionary turned back. "where did you pick up the 'kenneth mcdolan'?" he asked. the negro smiled again. "it is the patronymic bestowed upon me at sierra leone by a good christian white man, who brought me up and educated me as though i were his own son," he recited. sanders showed his teeth. "i have heard of such cases," he said unpleasantly. the next day the missionary announced his intention of proceeding up country. he came in to see sanders as though nothing had happened. perhaps he expected to find the commissioner a little ashamed of himself; but if this was so he was disappointed, for sanders was blatantly unrepentant. "you've got a letter from the administration," he said, "so i can't stop you." "there is work for me," said the missionary, "work of succour and relief. in india some four hundred thousand----" "this is not india," said sanders shortly; and with no other word the native preacher went his way. those who know the akasava people best know them for their laziness--save in matter of vendetta, or in the settlement of such blood feuds as come their way, or in the lifting of each other's goats, in all which matters they display an energy and an agility truly inexplicable. "he is an akasava man--he points with his foot," is a proverb of the upper river, and the origin of the saying goes back to a misty time when (as the legend goes) a stranger happened upon a man of the tribe lying in the forest. "friend," said the stranger, "i am lost. show me the way to the river"; and the akasava warrior, raising a leg from the ground, pointed with his toe to the path. though this legend lacks something in point of humour, it is regarded as the acme of mirth-provoking stories from bama to the lado country. it was six months after the reverend kenneth mcdolan had left for his station that there came to sanders at his headquarters a woeful deputation, arriving in two canoes in the middle of the night, and awaiting him when he came from his bath to the broad stoep of his house in the morning--a semi-circle of chastened and gloomy men, who squatted on the wooden stoep, regarding him with the utmost misery. "lord, we are of the akasava people," said the spokesman, "and we have come a long journey." "so i am aware," said sanders, with acrid dryness, "unless the akasava country has shifted its position in the night. what do you seek?" "master, we are starving," said the speaker, "for our crops have failed, and there is no fish in the river; therefore we have come to you, who are our father." now this was a most unusual request; for the central african native does not easily starve, and, moreover, there had come no news of crop failure from the upper river. "all this sounds like a lie," said sanders thoughtfully, "for how may a crop fail in the akasava country, yet be more than sufficient in isisi? moreover, fish do not leave their playground without cause, and if they do they may be followed." the spokesman shifted uneasily. "master, we have had much sickness," he said, "and whilst we cared for one another the planting season had passed; and, as for the fish, our young men were too full of sorrow for their dead to go long journeys." sanders stared. "therefore we have come from our chief asking you to save us, for we are starving." the man spoke with some confidence, and this was the most surprising thing of all. sanders was nonplussed, frankly confounded. for all the eccentric course his daily life took, there was a certain regularity even in its irregularity. but here was a new and unfamiliar situation. such things mean trouble, and he was about to probe this matter to its depth. "i have nothing to give you," he said, "save this advice--that you return swiftly to where you came from and carry my word to your chief. later i will come and make inquiries." the men were not satisfied, and an elder, wrinkled with age, and sooty-grey of head, spoke up. "it is said, master," he mumbled, through his toothless jaws, "that in other lands when men starve there come many white men bringing grain and comfort." "eh?" sanders' eyes narrowed. "wait," he said, and walked quickly through the open door of his bungalow. when he came out he carried a pliant whip of rhinoceros-hide, and the deputation, losing its serenity, fled precipitately. sanders watched the two canoes paddling frantically up stream, and the smile was without any considerable sign of amusement. that same night the _zaire_ left for the akasava country, carrying a letter to the reverend kenneth mcdolan, which was brief, but unmistakable in its tenor. "dear sir,"--it ran--"you will accompany the bearer to headquarters, together with your belongings. in the event of your refusing to comply with this request, i have instructed my sergeant to arrest you. yours faithfully, "h. sanders, _commissioner_." "and the reason i am sending you out of this country," said sanders, "is because you have put funny ideas into the heads of my people." "i assure you----" began the negro. "i don't want your assurance," said sanders, "you are not going to work an indian famine fund in central africa." "the people were starving----" sanders smiled. "i have sent word to them that i am coming to akasava," he said grimly, "and that i will take the first starved-looking man i see and beat him till he is sore." the next day the missionary went, to the intense relief, be it said, of the many white missionaries scattered up and down the river; for, strange as it may appear, a negro preacher who wears a black coat and silk socks is regarded with a certain amount of suspicion. true to his promise, sanders made his visit, but found none to thrash, for he came to a singularly well-fed community that had spent a whole week in digging out of the secret hiding-places the foodstuffs which, at the suggestion of a too zealous seeker after fame, it had concealed. "here," said sanders, wickedly, "endeth the first lesson." but he was far from happy. it is a remarkable fact that once you interfere with the smooth current of native life all manner of things happen. it cannot be truthfully said that the events that followed on the retirement from active life of the reverend kenneth mcdolan were immediately traceable to his ingenious attempt to engineer a famine in akasava. but he had sown a seed, the seed of an idea that somebody was responsible for their well-being--he had set up a beautiful idol of pauperism, a new and wonderful fetish. in the short time of his stay he had instilled into the heathen mind the dim, vague, and elusive idea of the brotherhood of man. this sanders discovered, when, returning from his visit of inspection, he met, drifting with the stream, a canoe in which lay a prone man, lazily setting his course with half-hearted paddle strokes. sanders, on the bridge of his tiny steamer, pulled the little string that controlled the steam whistle, for the canoe lay in his track. despite the warning, the man in the canoe made no effort to get out of his way, and since both were going with the current, it was only by putting the wheel over and scraping a sandbank that the steamer missed sinking the smaller craft. "bring that man on board!" fumed sanders, and when the canoe had been unceremoniously hauled to the _zaire's_ side by a boat-hook, and the occupant rudely pulled on board, sanders let himself go. "by your infernal laziness," he said, "i see that you are of the akasava people; yet that is no reason why you should take the middle of the channel to yourself." "lord, it is written in the books of your gods," said the man, "that the river is for us all, black and white, each being equal in the eyes of the white gods." sanders checked his lips impatiently. "when you and i are dead," he said, "we shall be equal, but since i am quick and you are quick, i shall give you ten strokes with a whip to correct the evil teaching that is within you." he made a convert. but the mischief was done. sanders knew the native mind much better than any man living, and he spent a certain period every day for the next month cursing the reverend kenneth mcdolan. so far, however, no irreparable mischief had been done, but sanders was not the kind of man to be caught napping. into the farthermost corners of his little kingdom his secret-service men were dispatched, and sanders sat down to await developments. at first the news was good; the spies sent back stories of peace, of normal happiness; then the reports became less satisfactory. the akasava country is unfortunately placed, for it is the very centre territory, the ideal position for the dissemination of foolish propaganda, as sanders had discovered before. the stories the spies sent or brought were of secret meetings, of envoys from tribe to tribe, envoys that stole out from villages by dead of night, of curious rites performed in the depth of the forest and other disturbing matters. then came a climax. tigili, the king of the n'gombi folk, made preparations for a secret journey. he sacrificed a goat and secured good omens; likewise three witch-doctors in solemn conclave gave a favourable prophecy. the chief slipped down the river one night with fourteen paddlers, a drummer, his chief headsman, and two of his wives, and reached the akasava city at sunset the next evening. here the chief of the akasava met him, and led him to his hut. "brother," said the akasava chief, not without a touch of pompousness, "i have covered my bow with the skin of a monkey." tigili nodded gravely. "my arrows are winged with the little clouds," he said in reply. in this cryptic fashion they spoke for the greater part of an hour, and derived much profit therefrom. in the shadow of the hut without lay a half-naked man, who seemed to sleep, his head upon his arm, his legs doubled up comfortably. one of the akasava guard saw him, and sought to arouse him with the butt of his spear, but he only stirred sleepily, and, thinking that he must be a man of tigili's retinue, they left him. when the king and the chief had finished their palaver, tigili rose from the floor of the hut and went back to his canoe, and the chief of the akasava stood on the bank of the river watching the craft as it went back the way it had come. the sleeper rose noiselessly and took another path to the river. just outside the town he had to cross a path of moonlit clearing, and a man challenged him. this man was an akasava warrior, and was armed, and the sleeper stood obedient to the summons. "who are you?" "i am a stranger," said the man. the warrior came nearer and looked in his face. "you are a spy of sandi," he said, and then the other closed with him. the warrior would have shouted, but a hand like steel was on his throat. the sentinel made a little sound like the noise a small river makes when it crosses a shallow bed of shingle, then his legs bent limply, and he went down. the sleeper bent down over him, wiped his knife on the bare shoulder of the dead man, and went on his way to the river. under the bush he found a canoe, untied the native rope that fastened it, and stepping in, he sent the tiny dug-out down the stream. * * * * * "and what do you make of all this?" asked sanders. he was standing on his broad stoep, and before him was the spy, a lithe young man, in the uniform of a sergeant of houssa police. "master, it is the secret society, and they go to make a great killing," said the sergeant. the commissioner paced the verandah with his head upon his breast, his hands clasped behind his back. these secret societies he knew well enough, though his territories had been free of them. he knew their mushroom growth; how they rose from nothingness with rituals and practices ready-made. he knew their influence up and down the liberian coast; he had some knowledge of the "silent ones" of nigeria, and had met the "white faces" in the kassai. and now the curse had come to his territory. it meant war, the upsetting of twenty years' work--the work of men who died and died joyfully, in the faith that they had brought peace to the land--it meant the undermining of all his authority. he turned to abiboo. "take the steamer," he said, "and go quickly to the ochori country, telling bosambo, the chief, that i will come to him--the palaver is finished." he knew he could depend upon bosambo if the worst came. in the days of waiting he sent a long message to the administration, which lived in ease a hundred miles down the coast. he had a land wire running along the seashore, and when it worked it was a great blessing. fortunately it was in good order now, but there had been times when wandering droves of elephants had pulled up the poles and twisted a mile or so of wire into a hopeless tangle. the reply to his message came quickly. "take extreme steps to wipe out society. if necessary arrest tigili. i will support you with four hundred men and a gunboat; prefer you should arrange the matter without fuss. "administration." sanders took a long walk by the sea to think out the situation and the solution. if the people were preparing for war, there would be simultaneous action, a general rising. he shook his head. four hundred men and a gunboat more or less would make no difference. there was a hope that one tribe would rise before the other; he could deal with the akasava; he could deal with the isisi plus the akasava; he was sure of the ochori--that was a comfort--but the others? he shook his head again. perhaps the inherent idleness of the akasava would keep them back. such a possibility was against their traditions. he must have come upon a solution suddenly, for he stopped dead in his walk, and stood still, thinking profoundly, with his head upon his breast. then he turned and walked quickly back to his bungalow. what date had been chosen for the rising we may never know for certain. what is known is that the akasava, the n'gombi, the isisi, and the boleki folk were preparing in secret for a time of killing, when there came the great news. sandi was dead. a canoe had overturned on the isisi river, and the swift current had swept the commissioner away, and though men ran up and down the bank no other sign of him was visible but a great white helmet that floated, turning slowly, out of sight. so a man of the akasava reported, having learnt it from a sergeant of houssas, and instantly the _lo-koli_ beat sharply, and the headmen of the villages came panting to the palaver house to meet the paramount chief of the akasava. "sandi is dead," said the chief solemnly. "he was our father and our mother and carried us in his arms; we loved him and did many disagreeable things for him because of our love. but now that he is dead, and there is none to say 'yea' or 'nay' to us, the time of which i have spoken to you secretly has come; therefore let us take up our arms and go out, first against the god-men who pray and bewitch us with the sprinkling of water, then against the chief of the ochori, who for many years have put shame upon us." "master," said a little chief from the fishing village which is near to the ochori border, "is it wise--our lord sandi having said there shall be no war?" "our lord sandi is dead," said the paramount chief wisely; "and being dead, it does not greatly concern us what he said; besides which," he said, as a thought struck him, "last night i had a dream and saw sandi; he was standing amidst great fires, and he said, 'go forth and bring me the head of the chief of the ochori.'" no further time was wasted. that night the men of twenty villages danced the dance of killing, and the great fire of the akasava burnt redly on the sandy beach to the embarrassment of a hippo family that lived in the high grasses near by. in the grey of the morning the akasava chief mustered six hundred spears and three score of canoes, and he delivered his oration: "first, we will destroy the mission men, for they are white, and it is not right that they should live and sandi be dead; then we will go against bosambo, the chief of the ochori. when rains came in the time of kidding, he who is a foreigner and of no human origin brought many evil persons with him and destroyed our fishing villages, and sandi said there should be no killing. now sandi is dead, and, i do not doubt, in hell, and there is none to hold our pride." round the bend of the river, ever so slowly, for she was breasting a strong and treacherous current, came the nose of the _zaire_. it is worthy of note that the little blue flag at her stern was not at half-mast. the exact significance of this was lost on the akasava. gingerly the little craft felt its way to the sandy strip of beach, a plank was thrust forth, and along it came, very dapper and white, his little ebony stick with the silver knob swinging between his fingers, mr. commissioner sanders, very much alive, and there were two bright maxim-guns on either side of the gangway that covered the beach. a nation, paralysed by fear and apprehension, watched the _debarquement_, the chief of the akasava being a little in advance of his painted warriors. on sanders' face was a look of innocent surprise. "chief," said he, "you do me great honour that you gather your young men to welcome me; nevertheless, i would rather see them working in their gardens." he walked along one row of fighting men, plentifully besmeared with cam-wood, and his was the leisurely step of some great personage inspecting a guard of honour. "i perceive," he went on, talking over his shoulder to the chief who, fascinated by the unexpected vision, followed him, "i perceive that each man has a killing spear, also a fighting shield of wicker work, and many have n'gombi swords." "lord, it is true," said the chief, recovering his wits, "for we go hunting elephant in the great forest." "also that some have the little bones of men fastened about their necks--that is not for the elephant." he said this meditatively, musingly, as he continued his inspection, and the chief was frankly embarrassed. "there is a rumour," he stammered, "it is said--there came a spy who told us--that the ochori were gathering for war, and we were afraid----" "strange," said sanders, half to himself, but speaking in the vernacular, "strange indeed is this story, for i have come straight from the ochori city, and there i saw nothing but men who ground corn and hunted peacefully; also their chief is ill, suffering from a fever." he shook his head in well-simulated bewilderment. "lord," said the poor chief of the akasava, "perhaps men have told us lies--such things have happened----" "that is true," said sanders gravely. "this is a country of lies; some say that i am dead; and, lo! the news has gone around that there is no law in the land, and men may kill and war at their good pleasure." "though i die at this minute," said the chief virtuously, "though the river turn to fire and consume my inmost stomach, though every tree become a tiger to devour me, i have not dreamt of war." sanders grinned internally. "spare your breath," he said gently. "you who go hunting elephants, for it is a long journey to the great forest, and there are many swamps to be crossed, many rivers to be swum. my heart is glad that i have come in time to bid you farewell." there was a most impressive silence, for this killing of elephants was a stray excuse of the chief's. the great forest is a journey of two months, one to get there and one to return, and is moreover through the most cursed country, and the akasava are not a people that love long journeys save with the current of the river. the silence was broken by the chief. "lord, we desire to put off our journey in your honour, for if we go, how shall we gather in palaver?" sanders shook his head. "let no man stop the hunter," quoth he. "go in peace, chief, and you shall secure many teeth."[ ] he saw a sudden light come to the chief's eyes, but continued, "i will send with you a sergeant of houssas, that he may carry back to me the story of your prowess"--the light died away again--"for there will be many liars who will say that you never reached the great forest, and i shall have evidence to confound them." still the chief hesitated, and the waiting ranks listened, eagerly shuffling forward, till they ceased to bear any semblance to an ordered army, and were as a mob. "lord," said the chief, "we will go to-morrow----" the smile was still on sanders' lips, but his face was set, and his eyes held a steely glitter that the chief of the akasava knew. "you go to-day, my man," said sanders, lowering his voice till he spoke in little more than a whisper, "else your warriors march under a new chief, and you swing on a tree." "lord, we go," said the man huskily, "though we are bad marchers and our feet are very tender." sanders, remembering the weariness of the akasava, found his face twitching. "with sore feet you may rest," he said significantly; "with sore backs you can neither march nor rest--go!" at dawn the next morning the n'gombi people came in twenty-five war canoes to join their akasava friends, and found the village tenanted by women and old men, and tigili, the king, in the shock of the discovery, surrendered quietly to the little party of houssas on the beach. "what comes to me, lord?" asked tigili, the king. sanders whistled thoughtfully. "i have some instructions about you somewhere," he said. [footnote : tusks.] chapter ix. the wood of devils. four days out of m'sakidanga, if native report be true, there is a trickling stream that meanders down from n'gombi country. native report says that this is navigable even in the dry season. the missionaries at bonginda ridicule this report; and arburt, the young chief of the station, with a gentle laugh in his blue eyes, listened one day to the report of elebi about a fabulous land at the end of this river, and was kindly incredulous. "if it be that ivory is stored in this place," he said in the vernacular, "or great wealth lies for the lifting, go to sandi, for this ivory belongs to the government. but do you, elebi, fix your heart more upon god's treasures in heaven, and your thoughts upon your unworthiness to merit a place in his kingdom, and let the ivory go." elebi was known to sanders as a native evangelist of the tornado type, a thunderous, voluble sub-minister of the service; he had, in his ecstatic moments, made many converts. but there were days of reaction, when elebi sulked in his mud hut, and reviewed christianity calmly. it was a service, this new religion. you could not work yourself to a frenzy in it, and then have done with the thing for a week. you must needs go on, on, never tiring, never departing from the straight path, exercising irksome self-restraint, leaving undone that which you would rather do. "religion is prison," grumbled elebi, after his interview, and shrugged his broad, black shoulders. in his hut he was in the habit of discarding his european coat for the loin cloth and the blanket, for elebi was a savage--an imitative savage--but still barbarian. once, preaching on the river of devils, he had worked himself up to such a pitch of enthusiastic fervour that he had smitten a scoffer, breaking his arm, and an outraged sanders had him arrested, whipped, and fined a thousand rods. hereafter elebi had figured in certain english missionary circles as a christian martyr, for he had lied magnificently, and his punishment had been represented as a form of savage persecution. but the ivory lay buried three days' march beyond the secret river; thus elebi brooded over the log that smouldered in his hut day and night. three days beyond the river, branching off at a place where there were two graves, the country was reputably full of devils, and elebi shuddered at the thought; but, being a missionary and a lay evangelist, and, moreover, the proud possessor of a copy of the epistle to the romans (laboriously rendered into the native tongue), he had little to fear. he had more to fear from a certain white devil at a far-away headquarters, who might be expected to range the lands of the secret river, when the rains had come and gone. it was supposed that elebi had one wife, conforming to the custom of the white man, but the girl who came into the hut with a steaming bowl of fish in her hands was not the wife that the missionaries recognised as such. "sikini," he said, "i am going a journey by canoe." "in the blessed service?" asked sikini, who had come under the influence of the man in his more elated periods. "the crackling of a fire is like a woman's tongue," quoted elebi; "and it is easier to keep the lid on a boiling pot than a secret in a woman's heart." elebi had the river proverbs at his finger-tips, and the girl laughed, for she was his favourite wife, and knew that in course of time the information would come to her. "sikini," said the man suddenly, "you know that i have kept you when the blood taker would have me put you away." (arburt had a microscope and spent his evenings searching the blood of his flock for signs of trynosomiasis.) "you know that for your sake i lied to him who is my father and my protector, saying: 'there shall be but one wife in my house, and that tombolo, the coast woman.'" the girl nodded, eyeing him stolidly. "therefore i tell you that i am going beyond the secret river, three days' march, leaving the canoe at a place where there are two graves." "what do you seek?" she asked. "there are many teeth in that country," he said; "dead ivory that the people brought with them from a distant country, and have hidden, fearing one who is a breaker of stones.[ ] i shall come back rich, and buy many wives who shall wait upon you and serve you, and then i will no longer be christian, but will worship the red fetish as my father did, and his father." "go," she said, nodding thoughtfully. he told her many things that he had not revealed to arburt--of how the ivory came, of the people who guarded it, of the means by which he intended to secure it. next morning before the mission _lo-koli_ sounded, he had slipped away in his canoe; and arburt, when the news came to him, sighed and called him a disappointing beggar--for arburt was human. sanders, who was also human, sent swift messengers to arrest elebi, for it is not a good thing that treasure-hunting natives should go wandering through a strange country, such excursions meaning war, and war meaning, to sanders at any rate, solemn official correspondence, which his soul loathed. who would follow the fortunes of elebi must paddle in his wake as far as okau, where the barina meets the lapoi, must take the left river path, past the silent pool of the white devil, must follow the winding stream till the elephants' playing ground be reached. here the forest has been destroyed for the sport of the great ones; the shore is strewn with tree trunks, carelessly uprooted and as carelessly tossed aside by the gambolling mammoth. the ground is innocent of herbage or bush; it is a flat wallow of mud, with the marks of pads where the elephant has passed. elebi drew his canoe up the bank, carefully lifted his cooking-pot, full of living fire, and emptied its contents, heaping thereon fresh twigs and scraps of dead wood. then he made himself a feast, and went to sleep. a wandering panther came snuffling and howling in the night, and elebi rose and replenished the fire. in the morning he sought for the creek that led to the secret river, and found it hidden by the hippo grass. elebi had many friends in the n'gombi country. they were gathered in the village of tambango--to the infinite embarrassment of the chief of that village--for elebi's friends laid hands upon whatsoever they desired, being strangers and well armed, and, moreover, outnumbering the men of the village three to one. one, o'sako, did the chief hold in greatest dread, for he said little, but stalked tragically through the untidy street of tambango, a bright, curved execution knife in the crook of his left arm. o'sako was tall and handsome. one broad shoulder gleamed in its nakedness, and his muscular arms were devoid of ornamentation. his thick hair was plastered with clay till it was like a european woman's, and his body was smeared with ingola dust. once only he condescended to address his host. "you shall find me three young men against the lord elebi's arrival, and they shall lead us to the land of the secret river." "but, master," pleaded the chief, "no man may go to the secret river, because of the devils." "three men," said o'sako softly; "three young men swift of foot, with eyes like the n'gombi, and mouths silent as the dead." "---- the devils," repeated the chief weakly, but o'sako stared straight ahead and strode on. when the sun blazed furiously on the rim of the world in a last expiring effort, and the broad river was a flood of fire, and long shadows ran through the clearings, elebi came to the village. he came unattended from the south, and he brought with him no evidence of his temporary sojourn in the camps of civilisation. save for his loin cloth, and his robe of panther skin thrown about his shoulders, he was naked. there was a palaver house at the end of the village, a thatched little wattle hut perched on a tiny hill, and the lord elebi gathered there his captains and the chief of the village. he made a speech. "_cala, cala_," he began--and it means "long ago," and is a famous opening to speeches--"before the white man came, and when the arabi came down from the northern countries to steal women and ivory, the people of the secret river buried their 'points' in a place of devils. their women they could not bury, so they lost them. now all the people of the secret river are dead. the arabi killed some, bula matadi killed others, but the sickness killed most of all. where their villages were the high grass has grown, and in their gardens only the weaver bird speaks. yet i know of this place, for there came to me a vision and a voice that said----" the rest of the speech from the european standpoint was pure blasphemy, because elebi had had the training of a lay preacher, and had an easy delivery. when he had finished, the chief of the village of tambangu spoke. it was a serious discourse on devils. there was no doubt at all that in the forest where the _cach_ was there was a veritable stronghold of devildom. some had bad faces and were as tall as the gum-trees--taller, for they used whole trees for clubs; some were small, so small that they travelled on the wings of bees, but all were very potent, very terrible, and most effective guardians of buried treasure. their greatest accomplishment lay in leading astray the traveller: men went into the forest in search of game or copal or rubber, and never came back, because there were a thousand ways in and no way out. elebi listened gravely. "devils of course there are," he said, "including the devil, the old one, who is the enemy of god. i have had much to do with the casting out of devils--in my holy capacity as a servant of the word. of the lesser devils i know nothing, though i do not doubt they live. therefore i think it would be better for all if we offered prayer." on his instruction the party knelt in full view of the village, and elebi prayed conventionally but with great earnestness that the powers of darkness should not prevail, but that the great work should go on triumphantly. after which, to make doubly sure, the party sacrificed two fowls before a squat _bete_ that stood before the chief's door, and a crazy witch-doctor anointed elebi with human fat. "we will go by way of ochori," said elebi, who was something of a strategist. "these ochori folk will give us food and guides, being a cowardly folk and very fearful." he took farewell of the old chief and continued his journey, with o'sako and his warriors behind him. so two days passed. an hour's distance from the city of the ochori he called a conference. "knowing the world," he said, "i am acquainted with the ochori, who are slaves: you shall behold their chief embrace my feet. since it is fitting that one, such as i, who know the ways of white men and their magic, should be received with honour; let us send forward a messenger to say that the lord elebi comes, and bid them kill so many goats against our coming." "that is good talk," said o'sako, his lieutenant, and a messenger was despatched. elebi with his caravan followed slowly. it is said that elebi's message came to bosambo of monrovia, chief of the ochori, when he was in the despondent mood peculiar to men of action who find life running too smoothly. it was bosambo's practice--and one of which his people stood in some awe--to reflect aloud in english in all moments of crisis, or on any occasion when it was undesirable that his thoughts should be conveyed abroad. he listened in silence, sitting before the door of his hut and smoking a short wooden pipe, whilst the messenger described the quality of the coming visitor, and the unparalleled honour which was to fall upon the ochori. said bosambo at the conclusion of the recital, "damn nigger." the messenger was puzzled by the strange tongue. "lord chief," he said, "my master is a great one, knowing the ways of white men." "i also know something of white men," said bosambo calmly, in the river dialect, "having many friends, including sandi, who married my brother's wife's sister, and is related to me. also," said bosambo daringly, "i have shaken hands with the great white king who dwells beyond the big water, and he has given me many presents." with this story the messenger went back to the slowly advancing caravan, and elebi was impressed and a little bewildered. "it is strange," he said, "no man has ever known an ochori chief who was aught but a dog and the son of a dog--let us see this bosambo. did you tell him to come out and meet me?" "no," replied the messenger frankly, "he was such a great one, and was so haughty because of sandi, who married his brother's wife's sister; and so proud that i did not dare tell him." there is a spot on the edge of the ochori city where at one time sanders had caused to be erected a warning sign, and here elebi found the chief waiting and was flattered. there was a long and earnest conference in the little palaver house of the city, and here elebi told as much of his story as was necessary, and bosambo believed as much as he could. "and what do you need of me and my people?" asked bosambo at length. "lord chief," said elebi, "i go a long journey, being fortified with the blessed spirit of which you know nothing, that being an especial mystery of the white men." "there is no mystery which i did not know," said bosambo loftily, "and if you speak of spirits, i will speak of certain saints, also of a virgin who is held in high respect by white men." "if you speak of the blessed paul----" began elebi, a little at sea. "not only of paul but peter, john, luke, matthew, antonio, and thomas," recited bosambo rapidly. he had not been a scholar at the catholic mission for nothing. elebi was nonplussed. "we will let these magic matters rest," said elebi wisely; "it is evident to me that you are a learned man. now i go to seek some wonderful treasures. all that i told you before was a lie. let us speak as brothers. i go to the wood of devils, where no man has been for many years. i beg you, therefore, to give me food and ten men for carriers." "food you can have but no men," said bosambo, "for i have pledged my word to sandi, who is, as you know, the husband of my brother's wife's sister, that no man of mine should leave this country." with this elebi had to be content, for a new spirit had come to the ochori since he had seen them last, and there was a defiance in the timid eyes of these slaves of other days which was disturbing. besides, they seemed well armed. in the morning the party set forth and bosambo, who took no risks, saw them started on their journey. he observed that part of the equipment of the little caravan were two big baskets filled to the brim with narrow strips of red cloth. "this is my magic," said elebi mysteriously, when he was questioned, "it is fitting that you should know its power." bosambo yawned in his face with great insolence. clear of ochori by one day's march, the party reached the first straggling advance guard of the big forest. a cloud of gum-trees formed the approach to the wood, and here the magic of elebi's basket of cloth strips became revealed. every few hundred yards the party stopped, and elebi tied one of the strips to a branch of a tree. "in this way," he communicated to his lieutenant, "we may be independent of gods, and fearless of devils, for if we cannot find the ivory we can at least find our way back again." (there had been such an experiment made by the missionaries in traversing the country between bonguidga and the big river, but there were no devils in that country.) in two days' marches they came upon a place of graves. there had been a village there, for isisi palms grew luxuriously, and pushing aside the grass they came upon a rotting roof. also there were millions of weaver birds in the nut-palms, and a choked banana grove. the graves, covered with broken cooking pots, elebi found, and was satisfied. in the forest, a league beyond the dead village, they came upon an old man, so old that you might have lifted him with a finger and thumb. "where do the young men go in their strength?" he mumbled childishly; "into the land of small devils? who shall guide them back to their women? none, for the devils will confuse them, opening new roads and closing the old. oh, ko ko!" he snivelled miserably. "father," said elebi, dangling strips of red flannel from his hand, "this is white man's magic, we come back by the way we go." then the old man fell into an insane fit of cursing, and threw at them a thousand deaths, and elebi's followers huddled back in frowning fear. "you have lived too long," said elebi gently, and passed his spear through the old man's neck. * * * * * they found the ivory two days' journey beyond the place of killing. it was buried under a mound, which was overgrown with rank vegetation, and there was by european calculation some , worth. "we will go back and find carriers," said elebi, "taking with us as many of the teeth as we can carry." two hours later the party began its return journey, following the path where at intervals of every half-mile a strip of scarlet flannelette hung from a twig. there were many paths they might have taken, paths that looked as though they had been made by the hand of man, and elebi was glad that he had blazed the way to safety. for eight hours the caravan moved swiftly, finding its direction with no difficulty; then the party halted for the night. elebi was awakened in the night by a man who was screaming, and he leapt up, stirring the fire to a blaze. "it is the brother of olambo of kinshassa, he has the sickness _mongo_," said an awe-stricken voice, and elebi called a council. "there are many ways by which white men deal with this sickness," he said wisely, "by giving certain powders and by sticking needles into arms, but to give medicine for the sickness when madness comes is useless--so i have heard the fathers at the station say, because madness only comes when the man is near death." "he was well last night," said a hushed voice. "there are many devils in the forest, let us ask him what he has seen." so a deputation went to the screaming, writhing figure that lay trussed and tied on the ground, and spoke with him. they found some difficulty in gaining an opening, for he jabbered and mouthed and laughed and yelled incessantly. "on the question of devils," at last elebi said. "devils," screeched the madman. "yi! i saw six devils with fire in their mouths--death to you, elebi! dog----" he said other things which were not clean. "if there were water here," mused elebi, "we might drown him; since there is only the forest and the earth, carry him away from the camp, and i will make him silent." so they carried the lunatic away, eight strong men swaying through the forest, and they came back, leaving elebi alone with his patient. the cries ceased suddenly and elebi returned, wiping his hands on his leopard skin. "let us sleep," said elebi, and lay down. before the dawn came up the party were on the move. they marched less than a mile from their camping ground and then faltered and stopped. "there is no sign, lord," the leader reported, and elebi called him a fool and went to investigate. but there was no red flannel, not a sign of it. they went on another mile without success. "we have taken the wrong path, let us return," said elebi, and the party retraced its steps to the camp they had abandoned. that day was spent in exploring the country for three miles on either side, but there was no welcome blaze to show the trail. "we are all n'gombi men," said elebi, "let us to-morrow go forward, keeping the sun at our back; the forest has no terrors for the n'gombi folk--yet i cannot understand why the white man's magic failed." "devils!" muttered his lieutenant sullenly. elebi eyed him thoughtfully. "devils sometimes desire sacrifices," he said with significance, "the wise goat does not bleat when the priest approaches the herd." in the morning a great discovery was made. a crumpled piece of flannel was found on the outskirts of the camp. it lay in the very centre of a path, and elebi shouted in his joy. again the caravan started on the path. a mile farther along another little red patch caught his eye, half a mile beyond, another. yet none of these were where he had placed them, and they all bore evidence of rude handling, which puzzled the lay brother sorely. sometimes the little rags would be missing altogether, but a search party would come upon one some distance off the track, and the march would go on. near sunset elebi halted suddenly and pondered. before him ran his long shadow; the sun was behind him when it ought to have been in front. "we are going in the wrong direction," he said, and the men dropped their loads and stared at him. "beyond any doubt," said elebi after a pause, "this is the work of devils--let us pray." he prayed aloud earnestly for twenty minutes, and darkness had fallen before he had finished. they camped that night on the spot where the last red guide was, and in the morning they returned the way they had come. there was plenty of provision, but water was hard to come by, and therein lay the danger. less than a mile they had gone before the red rags had vanished completely, and they wandered helplessly in a circle. "this is evidently a matter not for prayer, but for sacrifice," concluded elebi, so they slew one of the guides. three nights later, o'sako, the friend of elebi, crawled stealthily to the place where elebi was sleeping, and settled the dispute which had arisen during the day as to who was in command of the expedition. * * * * * "master," said bosambo of monrovia, "all that you ordered me to do, that i did." sanders sat before the chief's hut in his camp chair and nodded. "when your word came that i should find elebi--he being an enemy of the government and disobeying your word--i took fifty of my young men and followed on his tracks. at first the way was easy, because he had tied strips of cloth to the trees to guide him on the backward journey, but afterwards it was hard, for the _n'kema_ that live in the wood----" "monkeys?" sanders raised his eyebrows. "monkeys, master," bosambo nodded his head, "the little black monkeys of the forest who love bright colours--they had come down from their trees and torn away the cloths and taken them to their houses after the fashion of the monkey people. thus elebi lost himself and with him his men, for i found their bones, knowing the way of the forest." "what else did you find?" asked sanders. "nothing, master," said bosambo, looking him straight in the eye. "that is probably a lie!" said sanders. bosambo thought of the ivory buried beneath the floor of his hut and did not contradict him. [footnote : bula matidi, _i.e._, "stone breaker," is the native name for the congo government.] chapter x. the loves of m'lino. when a man loves one woman, whether she be alive or dead, a deep and fragrant memory or a very pleasant reality, he is apt to earn the appellation of "woman-hater," a hasty judgment which the loose-minded pass upon any man whose loves lack promiscuosity, and who does not diffuse his passions. sanders was described as a woman-hater by such men who knew him sufficiently little to analyse his character, but sanders was not a woman-hater in any sense of the word, for he bore no illwill toward woman kind, and certainly was innocent of any secret love. there was a young man named ludley who had been assistant to sanders for three months, at the end of which time sanders sent for him--he was stationed at isisi city. "i think you can go home," said sanders. the young man opened his eyes in astonishment. "why?" he said. sanders made no reply, but stared through the open doorway at the distant village. "why?" demanded the young man again. "i've heard things," said sanders shortly--he was rather uncomfortable, but did not show it. "things--like what?" sanders shifted uneasily in his chair. "oh--things," he said vaguely, and added: "you go home and marry that nice girl you used to rave about when you first came out." young ludley went red under his tan. "look here, chief!" he said, half angrily, half apologetically, "you're surely not going to take any notice--you know it's the sort of thing that's done in black countries--oh, damn it all, you're not going to act as censor over my morals, are you?" sanders looked at the youth coldly. "your morals aren't worth worrying about," he said truthfully. "you could be the most depraved devil in the world--which i'll admit you aren't--and i should not trouble to reform you. no. it's the morals of my cannibals that worry me. home you go, my son; get married, _crescit sub pondere virtus_--you'll find the translation in the foreign phrase department of any respectable dictionary. as to the sort of things that are done in black countries, they don't do them in our black countries--monkey tricks of that sort are good enough for the belgian congo, or for togoland, but they aren't good enough for this little strip of wilderness." ludley went home. he did not tell anybody the real reason why he had come home, because it would not have sounded nice. he was a fairly decent boy, as boys of his type go, and he said nothing worse about sanders than that he was a woman-hater. the scene that followed his departure shows how little the white mind differs from the black in its process of working. for, after seeing his assistant safely embarked on a homeward-bound boat, sanders went up the river to isisi, and there saw a woman who was called m'lino. the average black woman is ugly of face, but beautiful of figure, but m'lino was no ordinary woman, as you shall learn. the isisi people, who keep extraordinary records in their heads, the information being handed from father to son, say that m'lino came from an arabi family, and certainly if a delicately-chiselled nose, a refinement of lip, prove anything, they prove m'lino came from no pure bantu stock. she came to sanders when he sent for her, alert, suspicious, very much on her guard. before he could speak, she asked him a question. "lord, where is lijingii?" this was the nearest the native ever got to the pronunciation of ludley's name. "lijingii has gone across the black water," said sanders gently, "to his own people." "you sent him, lord," she said quickly, and sanders made no reply. "lord," she went on, and sanders wondered at the bitterness in her tone, "it is said that you hate women." "then a lie is told," said sanders. "i do not hate women; rather i greatly honour them, for they go down to the caves of hell when they bear children; also i regard them highly because they are otherwise brave and very loyal." she said nothing. her head was sunk till her chin rested on her bare, brown breast, but she looked at him from under her brows, and her eyes were filled with a strange luminosity. something like a panic awoke in sanders' heart--had the mischief been done? he cursed ludley, and breathed a fervent, if malevolent, prayer that his ship would go down with him. but her words reassured him. "i made lijingii love me," she said, "though he was a great lord, and i was a slave; i also would have gone down to hell, for some day i hoped i should bear him children, but now that can never be." "and thank the lord for it!" said sanders, under his breath. he would have given her some words of cheer, but she turned abruptly from him and walked away. sanders watched the graceful figure as it receded down the straggling street, and went back to his steamer. he was ten miles down the river before he remembered that the reproof he had framed for the girl had been undelivered. "that is very extraordinary," said sanders, with some annoyance, "i must be losing my memory." three months later young penson came out from england to take the place of the returned ludley. he was a fresh-faced youth, bubbling over with enthusiasm, and, what is more important, he had served a two-years' apprenticeship at sierra leone. "you are to go up to isisi," said sanders, "and i want to tell you that you've got to be jolly careful." "what's the racket?" demanded the youth eagerly. "are the beggars rising?" "so far as i know," said sanders, putting his feet up on the rail of the verandah, "they are not--it is not bloodshed, but love that you've got to guard against." and he told the story of m'lino, even though it was no creditable story to british administration. "you can trust me," said young penson, when he had finished. "i trust you all right," said sanders, "but i don't trust the woman--let me hear from you from time to time; if you don't write about her i shall get suspicious, and i'll come along in a very unpleasant mood." "you can trust me," said young penson again; for he was at the age when a man is very sure of himself. remarkable as it may read, from the moment he left to take up his new post until he returned to headquarters, in disgrace, a few months later, he wrote no word of the straight, slim girl, with her wonderful eyes. other communications came to hand, official reports, terse and to the point, but no mention of m'lino, and sanders began to worry. the stories came filtering through, extraordinary stories of people who had been punished unjustly, of savage floggings administered by order of the sub-commissioner, and sanders took boat and travelled up the river _hec dum_. he landed short of the town, and walked along the river bank. it was not an easy walk, because the country hereabouts is a riot of vegetation. then he came upon an african idyll--a young man, who sat playing on a squeaky violin, for the pleasure of m'lino, lying face downwards on the grass, her chin in her hands. "in the name of a thousand devils!" said sanders wrathfully; and the boy got up from the fallen tree on which he sat, and looked at him calmly, and with no apparent embarrassment. sanders looked down at the girl and pointed. "go back to the village, my woman," he said softly, for he was in a rage. "now, you magnificent specimen of a white man," he said, when the girl had gone--slowly and reluctantly--"what is this story i hear about your flogging o'sako?" the youth took his pipe from his pocket and lit it coolly. "he beat m'lino," he said, in the tone of one who offered full justification. "from which fact i gather that he is the unfortunate husband of that attractive nigger lady you were charming just now when i arrived?" "don't be beastly," said the other, scowling. "i know she's a native and all that sort of thing, but my people at home will get used to her colour----" "go on board my boat," said sanders quietly. "regard yourself as my prisoner." sanders brought him down to headquarters without troubling to investigate the flogging of o'sako, and no word passed concerning m'lino till they were back again at headquarters. "of course i shall send you home," said sanders. "i supposed you would," said the other listlessly. he had lost all his self-assurance on the journey down river, and was a very depressed young man indeed. "i must have been mad," he admitted, the day before the mail boat called _en route_ for england; "from the very first i loved her--good heavens, what an ass i am!" "you are," agreed sanders, and saw him off to the ship with a cheerful heart. "i will have no more sub-commissioners at isisi," he wrote acidly to the administration. "i find my work sufficiently entertaining without the additional amusement of having to act as chaperon to british officials." he made a special journey to isisi to straighten matters out, and m'lino came unbidden to see him. "lord, is he gone, too?" she asked. "when i want you, m'lino," said sanders, "i will send for you." "i loved him," she said, with more feeling than sanders thought was possible for a native to show. "you are an easy lover," said sanders. she nodded. "that is the way with some women," she said. "when i love, i love with terrible strength; when i hate, i hate for ever and ever--i hate you, master!" she said it very simply. "if you were a man," said the exasperated commissioner, "i would tie you up and whip you." "f--f--b!" said the girl contemptuously, and left him staring. to appreciate the position, you have to realise that sanders was lord of all this district; that he had the power of life and death, and no man dared question or disobey his word. had m'lino been a man, as he said, she would have suffered for her treason--there is no better word for her offence--but she was a woman, and a seriously gifted woman, and, moreover, sure of whatever powers she had. he did not see her again during the three days he was in the city, nor (this is the extraordinary circumstance) did he discuss her with the chief. he learned that she had become the favourite wife of o'sako; that she had many lovers and scorned her husband, but he sought no news of her. once he saw her walking towards him, and went out of his way to avoid her. it was horribly weak and he knew it, but he had no power to resist the impulse that came over him to give her a wide berth. following this visit, sanders was coming down stream at a leisurely pace, he himself at the steering wheel, and his eyes searching the treacherous river for sand banks. his mind was filled with the problem of m'lino, when suddenly in the bush that fringes the isisi river, something went "woof," and the air was filled with flying potlegs. one struck his cabin, and splintered a panel to shreds, many fell upon the water, one missed sergeant abiboo's head and sent his _tarbosh_ flying. sanders rang his engines astern, being curious to discover what induced the would-be assassin to fire a blunderbuss in his direction, and abiboo, bare-headed, went pattering forward and slipped the canvas cover from the gleaming little maxim. then four houssa soldiers jumped into the water and waded ashore, holding their rifles above their heads with the one hand and their ammunition in the other, and sanders stood by the rail of the boat, balancing a sporting lee-enfield in the crook of his arm. whoever fired the shot had chosen the place of killing very well. the bush was very thick, the approach to land lay through coarse grass that sprang from the swamp, vegetation ran rank, and a tangle of creeper formed a screen that would have been impenetrable to a white man. but the houssas had a way--they found the man with his smoking gun, waiting calmly. he was of the isisi people--a nation of philosophers--and he surrendered his weapon without embarrassment. "i think," he said to sergeant abiboo, as they hurried down the bank to the river-side, "this means death." "death and the torments of hell to follow," said abiboo, who was embittered by the loss of his _tarbosh_, which had cost him five francs in the french territory. sanders put up his rifle when he saw the prisoner. he held an informal court in the shattered deck cabin. "did you shoot at me?" he asked. "i did, master," said the man. "why?" "because," the prisoner replied, "you are a devil and exercise witchcraft." sanders was puzzled a little. "in what particular section of the devil department have i been busy?" he asked in the vernacular. the prisoner was gazing at him steadily. "master," he replied, "it is not my business to understand these things. it is said to me, 'kill'--and i kill." sanders wasted no more time in vain questions. the man was put in irons, the nose of the steamer turned again down stream, and the commissioner resumed his vigil. midway between b'fani and lakaloli he came to a tying-up place. here there were dead trees for the chopping, and he put his men to replenish his stock of fuel. he was annoyed, not because a man had attempted to take his life, nor even because his neat little cabin forward was a litter of splinters and broken glass where the potleg had struck, but because he nosed trouble where he thought all was peace and harmony. he had control of some sixteen distinct and separate nations, each isolated and separated from the other by custom and language. they were distinct, not as the french are from the italian, but as the slav is from the turk. in the good old times before the english came there were many wars, tribe against tribe, people against people. there were battles, murders, raidings, and wholesale crucifixions, but the british changed all that. there was peace in the land. sanders selected with care a long, thin cigar from his case, nibbled at the end and lit it. the prisoner sat on the steel deck of the _zaire_ near the men's quarters. he was chained by the leg-iron to a staple, and did not seem depressed to any extent. when sanders made his appearance, a camp stool in his hand, the commissioner seated himself, and began his inquisition. "how do they call you, my man?" "bofabi of isisi." "who told you to kill me?" "lord, i forget." "a man or a woman?" "lord, it may have been either." more than that sanders could not learn, and the subsequent examination at isisi taught sanders nothing, for, when confronted with m'lino, the man said that he did not know her. sanders went back to his base in a puzzled frame of mind, and bofabi of isisi was sent to the convict establishment at the river's mouth. there matters stood for three months, and all that sanders learnt of the girl was that she had a new lover whose name was tebeki, and who was chief of the akasava. there were three months of peace and calm, and then tebeki, coveting his neighbour's wife, took three hundred spears down into the isisi country, burnt the village that sheltered her, crucified her husband, and carried her back with him. in honour of this achievement tebeki gave a feast and a beer dance. there were great and shameless orgies that lasted five days, and the strip of forest that fringes the river between the isisi and the lower river became a little inferno. at the end of the five days tebeki sat down to consider his position. he was in the act of inventing justification for his crime, when sanders came on the scene. more ominous were the ten houssas and the maxim which accompanied the brown-faced little man. sanders walked to tebeki's hut and called him out, and tebeki, blear-eyed and shaky, stepped forth into the hot sunshine, blinking. "tebeki," said sanders, "what of o'sako and his village?" "master," said tebeki, slowly, "he put shame upon me----" "spare me your lies," said sanders coldly, and signed to the houssas. then he looked round for a suitable tree. there was one behind the hut--a great copal-gum. "in half an hour i shall hang you," said sanders, looking at his watch. tebeki said nothing; only his bare feet fidgeted in the dust. there came out of the hut a tall girl, who stood eyeing the group with curiosity; then she came forward, and laid her hand on tebeki's bare shoulder. "what will you do with my man?" she asked. "i am m'lino, the wife of o'sako." sanders was not horrified, he showed his teeth in a mirthless grin and looked at her. "you will find another man, m'lino," he said, "as readily as you found this one." then he turned away to give directions for the hanging. but the woman followed him, and boldly laid her hand on his arm. "master," she said, "if any was wronged by o'sako's death, was it not i, his wife? yet i say let tebeki go free, for i love him." "you may go to the devil," said sanders politely; "i am getting tired of you and your lovers." he hanged tebeki, expeditiously and with science, and the man died immediately, because sanders was very thorough in this sort of business. then he and the houssa corps marched away, and the death song of the woman sounded fainter and fainter as the forest enveloped him. he camped that night on the hill of trees, overlooking the sweeping bend of the river, and in the morning his orderly came to tell him that the wife of o'sako desired to see him. sanders cursed the wife of o'sako, but saw her. she opened her mission without preliminary. "because of the death i brought to o'sako, my husband, and tebeki, my lover, the people have cast me forth," she said. "every hand is against me, and if i stay in this country i shall die." "well?" said sanders. "so i will go with you, until you reach the sangar river, which leads to the congo. i have brothers there." "all this may be true," said sanders dispassionately; "on the other hand, i know that your heart is filled with hate because i have taken two men from you, and hanged a third. nevertheless, you shall come with us as far as the sangar river, but you shall not touch the 'chop' of my men, nor shall you speak with them." she nodded and left him, and sanders issued orders for her treatment. in the middle of the night abiboo, who, in addition to being sanders' servant, was a sergeant of the houssas, came to sanders' tent, and the commissioner jumped out of bed and mechanically reached for his express. "leopards?" he asked briefly. "master," said sergeant abiboo, "it is the woman m'lino--she is a witch." "sergeant," said the exasperated sanders, "if you wake me up in the middle of the night with that sort of talk, i will break your infernal head." "be that as it may, master," said the sergeant stolidly, "she is a witch, for she has talked with my men and done many wonderful things--such as causing them to behold their children and far-away scenes." "have i an escort of babies?" asked sanders despairingly. "i wish," he went on, with quiet savageness, "i had chosen kroomen or bushmen"--the sergeant winced--"or the mad people of the isisi river, before i took a half-company of the king's houssas." the sergeant gulped down the insult, saying nothing. "bring the woman to me," said sanders. he scrambled into his clothing, and lit his tent lantern. after a while he heard the pattering of bare feet, and the girl came into his tent, and regarded him quietly. "m'lino," said sanders, "i told you that you were not to speak with my men." "lord," she said, "they spoke with me first." "is this true?" the sergeant at the tent door nodded. "tembeli, the son of sekambano, spoke with her, thus disobeying orders, and the other men followed," he said. "bushmen by gad!" fumed sanders. "you will take tembeli, the son of sekambano, tie him to a tree, and give him twenty lashes." the sergeant saluted, produced a tawdry little notebook, all brass binding and gold edges, and made a laborious note. "as for you," said sanders to the woman, "you drop your damned bush-mesmerism, or i'll treat you in the same way--_alaki_?" "yes, lord," she said meekly, and departed. two houssas tied tembeli to a tree, and the sergeant gave him twenty-one with a pliable hippo-hide--the extra one being the sergeant's perquisite. in the morning the sergeant reported that tembeli had died in the night, and sanders worried horribly. "it isn't the flogging," he said; "he has had the _chicotte_ before." "it is the woman," said the sergeant wisely. "she is a witch; i foresaw this when she joined the column." they buried tembeli, the son of sekambano, and sanders wrote three reports of the circumstances of the death, each of which he tore up. then he marched on. that night the column halted near a village, and sanders sent the woman, under escort, to the chief, with orders to see her safely to the sangar river. in half an hour she returned, with the escort, and sergeant abiboo explained the circumstances. "the chief will not take her in, being afraid." "afraid?" sanders spluttered in his wrath; "afraid? what is he afraid of?" "her devilry," said the sergeant; "the _lo-koli_ has told him the story of tebeki, and he will not have her." sanders swore volubly for five minutes; then he went off to interview the chief of the village. the interview was short and to the point. sanders knew this native very well, and made no mistakes. "chief," he said at the end of the palaver, "two things i may do; one is to punish you for your disobedience, and the other is to go on my way." "master," said the other earnestly, "if you give my village to the fire, yet i would not take the woman m'lino." "so much i realise," said sanders; "therefore i will go on my way." he marched at dawn on the following day, the woman a little ahead of the column, and under his eye. halting for a "chop" and rest at mid-day, a man of the houssas came to him and said there was a dead man hanging from a tree in the wood. sanders went immediately with the man to the place of the hanging, for he was responsible for the peace of the district. "where?" he asked, and the man pointed to a straight gum-tree that stood by itself in a clearing. "where?" asked sanders again, for there was no evidence of tragedy. the man still pointed at the tree, and sanders frowned. "go forward and touch his foot," said the commissioner, and, after a little hesitation, the soldier walked slowly to the tree and put out his hand. but he touched nothing but air, as far as sanders could see. "you are mad," he said, and whistled for the sergeant. "what do you see there?" asked sanders, and the sergeant replied instantly: "beyond the hanging man----" "there is no hanging man," said sanders coolly--for he began to appreciate the need for calm reasoning--"nothing but a tree and some shadows." the houssa looked puzzled, and turned a grave face to his. "master, there is a man hanging," he said. "that is so," said sanders quietly; "we must investigate this matter." and he signed for the party to return to the camp. on the way he asked carelessly if the sergeant had spoken with the woman m'lino. "i saw her, but she did not speak, except with her eyes." sanders nodded. "tell me," he said, "where did you bury tembeli, the son of sekambano?" "master, we left him, in accordance with our custom, on the ground at the foot of a tree." sanders nodded again, for this is not the custom of the houssas. "we will go back on our tracks to the camping place where the woman came to us," he said. they marched until sundown, and whilst two men pitched his tent sanders strolled round the little camp. the men were sitting about their cooking-pots, but the woman m'lino sat apart, her elbows on her knees, her face between her hands. "m'lino," he said to her, halting suddenly before her, "how many men have you killed in your life?" she looked at him long and fixedly, and he returned the stare; then she dropped her eyes. "many men," she said. "so i think," said sanders. he was eating his dinner when abiboo came slowly toward him. "master, the man has died," he said. sanders looked at him narrowly. "which man?" "the man you chicotted with your own hand," said abiboo. now, the commissioner had neither chicotted a man, nor had he ordered punishment, but he replied in a matter-of-fact tone, "i will see him." on the edge of the camp there was a little group about a prostrate figure. the houssas fell apart with black looks as sanders came near, and there was some muttering. though sanders did not see it, m'lino looked strangely at ahmid, a houssa, who took up his rifle and went stealthily into the bush. the commissioner bent over the man who lay there, felt his breast, and detected no beat of heart. "get me my medicine chest," he said, but none obeyed him. "sergeant," he repeated, "bring my medicine chest!" abiboo saluted slowly, and, with every appearance of reluctance, went. he came back with the case of undressed skin, and sanders opened it, took out the ammonia bottle, and applied it to the man's nose. he made no sign. "we shall see," was all that sanders said when the experiment failed. he took a hypodermic syringe and filled the little tube with a solution of strychnine. this he jabbed unceremoniously into the patient's back. in a minute the corpse sat up, jerkily. "ha!" said sanders, cheerfully; "i am evidently a great magician!" he rose to his feet, dusted his knees, and beckoned the sergeant. "take four men and return to the place where you left tembeli. if the leopards have not taken him, you will meet him on the road, because by this time he will have waked up." he saw the party march off, then turned his attention to m'lino. "my woman," he said, "it is evident to me that you are a witch, although i have met your like before"--it was observed that the face of sanders was very white. "i cannot flog you, because you are a woman, but i can kill you." she laughed. their eyes met in a struggle for mastery, and so they stared at one another for a space of time which seemed to sanders a thousand years, but which was in all probability less than a minute. "it would be better if you killed yourself," she said. "i think so," said sanders dully, and fumbled for his revolver. it was half drawn, his thumb on the hammer, when a rifle banged in the bushes and the woman fell forward without a word. ahmid, the houssa, was ever a bad shot. * * * * * "i believe," said sanders, later, "that you took your rifle to kill me, being under the influence of m'lino, so i will make no bad report against you." "master," said the houssa simply, "i know nothing of the matter." "that i can well believe," said sanders, and gave the order to march. chapter xi. the witch-doctor. nothing surprised sanders except the ignorance of the average stay-at-home briton on all matters pertaining to the savage peoples of africa. queer things happened in the "black patch"--so the coast officials called sanders' territory--miraculous, mysterious things, but sanders was never surprised. he had dealings with folks who believed in ghosts and personal devils, and he sympathised with them, realising that it is very difficult to ascribe all the evils of life to human agencies. sanders was an unquiet man, or so his constituents thought him, and a little mad; this also was the native view. worst of all, there was no method in his madness. other commissioners might be depended upon to arrive after the rains, sending word ahead of their coming. this was a good way--the isisi, the ochori, and the n'gombi people, everlastingly at issue, were agreed upon this--because, with timely warning of the commissioner's approach, it was possible to thrust out of sight the ugly evidence of fault, to clean up and make tidy the muddle of folly. it was bad to step sheepishly forth from your hut into the clear light of the rising sun, with all the dbris of an overnight feast mutely testifying to your discredit, and face the cold, unwavering eyes of a little brown-faced man in immaculate white. the switch he carried in his hand would be smacking his leg suggestively, and there were always four houssa soldiers in blue and scarlet in the background, immobile, but alert, quick to obey. once sanders came to a n'gombi village at dawn, when by every known convention he should have been resting in his comfortable bungalow some three hundred miles down river. sanders came strolling through the village street just as the sun topped the trees and long shadows ran along the ground before the flood of lemon-coloured light. the village was silent and deserted, which was a bad sign, and spoke of overnight orgies. sanders walked on until he came to the big square near the palaver house, and there the black ruin of a dead fire smoked sullenly. sanders saw something that made him go raking amongst the embers. "pah!" said sanders, with a wry face. he sent back to the steamer for the full force of his houssa guard, then he walked into the chief's hut and kicked him till he woke. he came out blinking and shivering, though the morning was warm. "telemi, son of o'ari," said sanders, "tell me why i should not hang you--man-eater and beast." "lord," said the chief, "we chopped this man because he was an enemy, stealing into the village at night, and carrying away our goats and our dogs. besides which, we did not know that you were near by." "i can believe that," said sanders. a _lo-koli_ beat the villages to wakefulness, and before a silent assembly the headman of the n'gombi village was scientifically flogged. then sanders called the elders together and said a few words of cheer and comfort. "only hyenas and crocodiles eat their kind," he said, "also certain fishes." (there was a general shudder, for amongst the n'gombi to be likened to a fish is a deadly insult.) "cannibals i do not like, and they are hated by the king's government. therefore when it comes to my ears--and i have many spies--that you chop man, whether he be enemy or friend, i will come quickly and i will flog sorely; and if it should again happen i will bring with me a rope, and i will find me a tree, and there will be broken huts in this land." again they shuddered at the threat of the broken hut, for it is the custom of the n'gombi to break down the walls of a dead man's house to give his spirit free egress. sanders carried away with him the chief of the village, with leg-irons at his ankles, and in course of time the prisoner arrived at a little labour colony on the coast, where he worked for five years in company with other indiscreet headmen who were suffering servitude for divers offences. they called sanders in the upper river districts by a long and sonorous name, which may be euphemistically translated as "the man who has a faithless wife," the little joke of bosambo, chief of the ochori, and mightily subtle because sanders was wedded to his people. north and south, east and west, he prowled. he travelled by night and by day. sometimes his steamer would go threshing away up river, and be watched out of sight by the evil-doing little fishing-villages. "go you," said sarala, who was a little headman of the akasava, "go you three hours' journey in your canoe and watch the river for sandi's return. and at first sign of his steamer--which you may see if you climb the hill at the river's bend--come back and warn me, for i desire to follow certain customs of my father in which sandi has no pleasure." he spoke to two of his young men and they departed. that night by the light of a fire, to the accompaniment of dancing and drum-beating, the son of the headman brought his firstborn, ten hours old, squealing noisily, as if with knowledge of the doom ahead, and laid it at his father's feet. "people," said the little chief, "it is a wise saying of all, and has been a wise saying since time began, that the firstborn has a special virtue; so that if we sacrifice him to sundry gods and devils, good luck will follow us in all our doings." he said a word to the son, who took a broad-bladed spear and began turning the earth until he had dug a little grave. into this, alive, the child was laid, his little feet kicking feebly against the loose mould. "oh, gods and devils," invoked the old man, "we shed no blood, that this child may come to you unblemished." the son stirred a heap of loose earth with his foot, so that it fell over the baby's legs; then into the light of the fire stepped sanders, and the chief's son fell back. sanders was smoking a thin cigar, and he smoked for fully a minute without saying a word, and a minute was a very long time. then he stepped to the grave, stooped, and lifted the baby up awkwardly, for he was more used to handling men than babes, gave it a little shake to clear it of earth, and handed it to a woman. "take the child to its mother," he said, "and tell her to send it to me alive in the morning, otherwise she had best find a new husband." then he turned to the old chief and his son. "old man," he said, "how many years have you to live?" "master," said the old man, "that is for you to say." sanders scratched his chin reflectively, and the old man watched him with fear in his eyes. "you will go to bosambo, chief of the ochori, telling him i have sent you, and you shall till his garden, and carry his water until you die," said sanders. "i am so old that that will be soon," said the old man. "if you were younger it would be sooner," said sanders. "as for your son, we will wait until the morning." the houssas in the background marched the younger man to the camp sanders had formed down river--the boat that had passed had been intended to deceive a chief under suspicion--and in the morning, when the news came that the child was dead--whether from shock, or injury, or exposure, sanders did not trouble to inquire--the son of the chief was hanged. i tell these stories of sanders of the river, that you may grasp the type of man he was and learn something of the work he had to do. if he was quick to punish, he acted in accordance with the spirit of the people he governed, for they had no memory; and yesterday, with its faults, its errors and its teachings, was a very long time ago, and a man resents an unjust punishment for a crime he has forgotten. it is possible to make a bad mistake, but sanders never made one, though he was near to doing so once. sanders was explaining his point of view in regard to natives to professor sir george carsley, when that eminent scientist arrived unexpectedly at headquarters, having been sent out by the british government to study tropical disease at first hand. sir george was a man of some age, with a face of exceptional pallor and a beard that was snowy white. "there was a newspaper man who said i treated my people like dogs," said sanders slowly, for he was speaking in english, a language that was seldom called for. "i believe i do. that is to say, i treat them as if they were real good dogs, not to be petted one minute and kicked the next; not to be encouraged to lie on the drawing-room mat one day, and the next cuffed away from the dining-room hearthrug." sir george made no answer. he was a silent man, who had had some experience on the coast, and had lived for years in the solitude of a central african province, studying the habits of the malarial mosquito. sanders was never a great conversationalist, and the three days the professor spent at headquarters were deadly dull ones for the commissioner. on one subject alone did the professor grow talkative. "i want to study the witch-doctor," he said. "i think there is no appointment in the world that would give me a greater sense of power than my appointment by a native people to that post." sanders thought the scientist was joking, but the other returned to the subject again and again, gravely, earnestly, and persistently, and for his entertainment sanders recited all the stories he had ever heard of witch-doctors and their tribe. "but you don't expect to learn anything from these people?" said sanders, half in joke. "on the contrary," said the professor, seriously; "i anticipate making valuable scientific discoveries through my intercourse with them." "then you're a silly old ass," said sanders; but he said it to himself. the pale professor left him at the end of the fourth day, and beyond an official notification that he had established himself on the border, no further news came of the scientist for six months, until one evening came the news that the pale-faced old man had been drowned by the upsetting of a canoe. he had gone out on a solitary excursion, taking with him some scientific apparatus, and nothing more was heard of him until his birch-bark canoe was discovered, bottom up, floating on the river. no trace of sir george was found, and in the course of time sanders collected the dead man's belongings and forwarded them to england. there were two remarkable facts about this tragedy, the first being that sanders found no evidence either in papers or diaries, of the results of any scientific research work performed by the professor other than a small note-book. the second was, that in his little book the scientist had carefully recorded the stories sanders had told him of witch doctors. (sanders recognised at least one story which he had himself invented on the spur of the moment for the professor's entertainment.) six more or less peaceful months passed, and then began the series of events which make up the story of the devil man. it began on the little river. there was a woman of the isisi people who hated her husband, though he was very good to her, building her a hut and placing an older wife to wait upon her. he gave her many presents, including a great neck-ring of brass, weighing pounds, that made her the most envied woman on the isisi river. but her hatred for her husband was unquenched; and one morning she came out from her hut, looking dazed and frightened, and began in a quavering voice to sing the song of the dead, mechanically pouring little handfuls of dust on her head, and the villagers went in, to find the man stark and staring, with a twisted grin on his dead face and the pains of hell in his eyes. in the course of two days they burned the husband in the middle river; and as the canoe bearing the body swept out of sight round a bend of the river, the woman stepped into the water and laved the dust from her grimy body and stripped the green leaves of mourning from her waist. then she walked back to the village with a light step, for the man she hated best was dead and there was an end to it. four days later came sanders, a grim little man, with a thin, brown face and hair inclined to redness. "m'fasa," he said, standing at the door of her hut and looking down at her, as with a dogged simulation of indifference she pounded her grain, "they tell me your man has died." "lord, that is true," she said. "he died of a sudden sickness." "too sudden for my liking," said sanders, and disappeared into the dark interior of the hut. by and by sanders came back into the light and looked down on her. in his hand was a tiny glass phial, such as europeans know very well, but which was a remarkable find in a heathen village. "i have a fetish," he said, "and my fetish has told me that you poisoned your husband, m'fasa." "your fetish lies," she said, not looking up. "i will not argue that matter," said sanders wisely, for he had no proofs beyond his suspicions; and straightway he summoned to him the chief man of the village. there was a little wait, the woman pounding her corn slowly, with downcast eyes, pausing now and then to wipe the sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand, and sanders, his helmet on the back of his head, a half-smoked cheroot in his mouth, hands thrust deep into his duck-pockets and an annoyed frown on his face, looking at her. by and by came the chief tardily, having been delayed by the search for a soldier's scarlet coat, such as he wore on great occasions. "master, you sent for me," he said. sanders shifted his gaze. "on second thoughts," he said, "i do not need you." the chief went away with a whole thanksgiving service in his heart, for there had been certain secret doings on the river for which he expected reprimand. "m'fasa, you will go to my boat," said sanders, and the woman, putting down her mortar, rose and went obediently to the steamer. sanders followed slowly, having a great many matters to consider. if he denounced this woman to the elders of the village, she would be stoned to death; if he carried her to headquarters and tried her, there was no evidence on which a conviction might be secured. there was no place to which he could deport her, yet to leave her would be to open the way for further mischief. she awaited him on the deck of the _zaire_, a straight, shapely girl of eighteen, fearless, defiant. "m'fasa," said sanders, "why did you kill your husband?" "lord, i did not kill him; he died of the sickness," she said, as doggedly as before. sanders paced the narrow deck, his head on his breast, for this was a profound problem. then he looked up. "you may go," he said; and the woman, a little puzzled, walked along the plank that connected the boat with the shore, and disappeared into the bush. three weeks later his spies brought word that men were dying unaccountably on the upper river. none knew why they died, for a man would sit down strong and full of cheer to his evening meal, and lo! in the morning, when his people went to wake him, he would be beyond waking, being most unpleasantly dead. this happened in many villages on the little river. "it's getting monotonous," said sanders to the captain of the houssas. "there is some wholesale poisoning going on, and i am going up to find the gentleman who dispenses the dope." it so happened that the first case claiming investigation was at isisi city. it was a woman who had died, and this time sanders suspected the husband, a notorious evil-doer. "okali," he said, coming to the point, "why did you poison your wife?" "lord," said the man, "she died of the sickness. in the evening she was well, but at the dark hour before sun came she turned in her sleep saying 'ah! oh!' and straightway she died." sanders drew a long breath. "get a rope," he said to one of his men, and when the rope arrived abiboo scrambled up to the lower branch of a copal-gum and scientifically lashed a block and tackle. "okali," said sanders, "i am going to hang you for the murder of your wife, for i am a busy man and have no time to make inquiries; and if you are not guilty of her murder, yet there are many other abominable deeds you have been guilty of, therefore i am justified in hanging you." the man was grey with terror when they slipped the noose over his neck and strapped his hands behind him. "lord, she was a bad wife to me and had many lovers," he stammered. "i did not mean to kill her, but the devil man said that such medicine would make her forget her lovers----" "devil man! what devil man?" asked sanders quickly. "lord, there is a devil greatly respected in these parts, who wanders in the forest all the time and gives many curious medicines." "where is he to be found?" "lord, none know. he comes and goes, like a grey ghost, and he has a fetish more powerful than a thousand ordinary devils. master, i gave the woman, my wife, that which he gave to me, and she died. how might i know that she would die?" "_cheg'li_," said sanders shortly to the men at the rope-end, and _cheg'li_ in the dialect of the river means "pull." * * * * * "stop!" sanders was in a changeable mood, and a little irritable by reason of the fact that he knew himself to be fickle. "how came this drug to you? in powder, in liquid, or----" the man's lips were dry. he could do no more than shake his head helplessly. "release him," said sanders; and abiboo loosened the noose and unstrapped the man's hands. "if you have lied to me," said sanders, "you die at sunset. first let me hear more of this devil man, for i am anxious to make his acquaintance." he gave the man ten minutes to recover from the effects of his fear, then sent for him. "lord," said he, "i know nothing of the devil man save that he is the greatest witch-doctor in the world, and on nights when the moon is up and certain stars are in their places he comes like a ghost, and we are all afraid. then those of us who need him go forth into the forest, and he gives to us according to our desires." "how carried he the drug?" "lord, it was in a crystal rod, such as white men carry their medicines in. i will bring it to you." he went back to his hut and returned a few minutes later with a phial, the fellow to that which was already in sanders' possession. the commissioner took it and smelt at the opening. there was the faintest odour of almonds, and sanders whistled, for he recognised the after-scent of cyanide of potassium, which is not such a drug as untutored witch-doctors know, much less employ. * * * * * "i can only suggest," wrote sanders to headquarters, "that by some mischance the medicine chest of the late sir george carsley has come into the possession of a native 'doctor.' you will remember that the chest was with the professor when he was drowned. it has possibly been washed up and discovered.... in the meantime, i am making diligent inquiries as to the identity of the devil man, who seems to have leapt into fame so suddenly." there were sleepless nights ahead for sanders, nights of swift marchings and doublings, of quick runs up the river, of unexpected arrivals in villages, of lonely vigils in the forest and by strange pools. but he had no word of the devil man, though he learnt many things of interest. most potent of his magical possessions was a box, "so small," said one who had seen it, and indicated a six-inch square. in this box dwelt a small and malicious god who pinched and scratched (yet without leaving a mark), who could stick needles into the human body and never draw blood. "i give it up," said sanders in despair, and went back to his base to think matters out. he was sitting at dinner one night, when far away on the river the drum beat. it was not the regular _lo-koli_ roll, but a series of staccato tappings, and, stepping softly to the door, the commissioner listened. he had borrowed the houssa signalling staff from headquarters, and stationed them at intervals along the river. on a still night the tapping of a drum carries far, but the rattle of iron-wood sticks on a hollowed tree-trunk carries farthest of all. "clok-clok, clockitty-clock." it sounded like the far-away croaking of a bull-frog; but sanders picked out the letters: "devil man sacrifices to-morrow night in the forest of dreams." as he jotted down the message on the white sleeve of his jacket, abiboo came running up the path. "i have heard," said sanders briefly. "there is steam in the _pucapuc_?" "we are ready, master," said the man. sanders waited only to take a hanging revolver from the wall and throw his overcoat over his arm, for his travelling kit was already deposited on the _zaire_, and had been for three days. in the darkness the sharp nose of his little boat swung out to the stream, and ten minutes after the message came the boat was threshing a way against the swift river. all night long the steamer went on, tacking from bank to bank to avoid the shoals. dawn found her at a wooding, where her men, working at fever speed, piled logs on her deck until she had the appearance of a timber-boat. then off again, stopping only to secure news of the coming sacrifice from the spies who were scattered up and down the river. sanders reached the edge of the dream forest at midnight and tied up. he had ten houssa policemen with him, and at the head of these he stepped ashore into the blackness of the forest. one of the soldiers went ahead to find the path and keep it, and in single file the little force began its two-hour march. once they came upon two leopards fighting; once they stumbled over a buffalo sleeping in their path. twice they disturbed strange beasts that slunk into the shadows as they passed, and came snuffling after them, till sanders flashed a white beam from his electric lamp in their direction. eventually they came stealthily to the place of sacrifice. there were at least six hundred people squatting in a semi-circle before a rough altar built of logs. two huge fires blazed and crackled on either side of the altar; but sanders' eyes were for the devil man, who leant over the body of a young girl, apparently asleep, stretched upon the logs. once the devil man had worn the garb of civilisation; now he was clothed in rags. he stood in his grimy shirt-sleeves, his white beard wild and uncombed, his pale face tense, and a curious light in his eyes. in his hand was a bright scalpel, and he was speaking--and, curiously enough, in english. "this, gentlemen," said he, leaning easily against the rude altar, and speaking with the assurance of one who had delivered many such lectures, "is a bad case of trynosomiasis. you will observe the discoloration of skin, the opalescent pupils, and now that i have placed the patient under anaesthetics you will remark the misplacement of the cervical glands, which is an invariable symptom." he paused and looked benignly around. "i may say that i have lived for a great time amongst native people. i occupied the honourable position of witch-doctor in central africa----" he stopped and passed his hand across his brow, striving to recall something; then he picked up the thread of his discourse. all the time he spoke the half-naked assembly sat silent and awe-stricken, comprehending nothing save that the witch-doctor with the white face, who had come from nowhere and had done many wonderful things--his magic box proved to be a galvanic battery--was about to perform strange rites. "gentlemen," the old man went on, tapping the breast of his victim with the handle of his scalpel, "i shall make an incision----" sanders came from his place of concealment, and walked steadily towards the extemporised operating-table. "professor," he said gently, and the madman looked at him with a puzzled frown. "you are interrupting the clinic," he said testily; "i am demonstrating----" "i know, sir." sanders took his arm, and sir george carsley, a great scientist, consulting surgeon to st. mark's hospital, london, and the author of many books on tropical diseases, went with him like a child. * * * * * chapter xii. the lonely one. mr. commissioner sanders had lived so long with native people that he had absorbed not a little of their simplicity. more than this, he had acquired the uncanny power of knowing things which he would not and could not have known unless he were gifted with the prescience which is every aboriginal's birthright. he had sent three spies into the isisi country--which lies a long way from headquarters and is difficult of access--and after two months of waiting they came to him in a body, bearing good news. this irritated sanders to an unjustifiable degree. "master, i say to you that the isisi are quiet," protested one of the spies; "and there is no talk of war." "h'm!" said sanders, ungraciously. "and you?" he addressed the second spy. "lord," said the man, "i went into the forest, to the border of the land, and there is no talk of war. chiefs and headmen told me this." "truly you are a great spy," scoffed sanders; "and how came you to the chiefs and headmen? and how did they greet you? 'hail! secret spy of sandi'? huh!" he dismissed the men with a wave of his hand, and putting on his helmet went down to the houssa lines, where the blue-coated soldiers gambled in the shade of their neat white barracks. the houssa captain was making palatable medicine with the aid of a book of cigarette papers and a six-ounce bottle of quinine sulphide. sanders observed his shaking hand, and talked irritably. "there's trouble in the isisi," he said, "i can smell it. i don't know what it is--but there's devilry of sorts." "secret societies?" suggested the houssa. "secret grandmothers," snarled sanders. "how many men have you got?" "sixty, including the lame 'uns," said the houssa officer, and swallowed a paperful of quinine with a grimace. sanders tapped the toe of his boot with his thin ebony stick, and was thoughtful. "i may want 'em," he said. "i'm going to find out what's wrong with these isisi people." * * * * * by the little river that turns abruptly from the river of spirits, imgani, the lonely one, built a house. he built it in proper fashion, stealing the wood from a village five miles away. in this village there had been many deaths, owing to the sickness; and it is the custom on the upper river that whenever a person dies, the house wherein he died shall die also. no man takes shelter under the accursed roof whereunder the spirit sits brooding; the arms of the dead man are broken and scattered on his shallow grave, and the cooking-pots of his wives are there likewise. by and by, under the combined influences of wind and rain, the reed roof sags and sinks, the doorposts rot; elephant-grass, coarse and strong, shoots up between crevices in wall and roof; then come a heavier rain and a heavier wind, and the forest has wiped the foul spot clean. imgani, who said he was of the n'gombi people, and was afraid of no devils--at any rate, no isisi devil--stole doorposts and native rope fearlessly. he stole them by night, when the moon was behind the trees, and mocked the dead spirits, calling them by evil and tantalising names. yet he went cautiously to work; for whilst he did not hold spirits in account, he was wholesomely respectful of the live isisi, who would have put him to death had his sacrilege been detected, though, strangely enough, death was the thing he feared least. so he stole the accursed supports and accursed roof-props, and would have stolen the roofs as well, but for the fact that they were very old and full of spiders. all these things he came and took, carrying them five miles to the turn of the river, and there, at his leisure, he built a little house. in the daytime he slept, in the night he trapped beasts and caught fish, but he made no attempt to catch the big bats that come over from the middle island of the river, though these are very edible, and regarded as a delicacy. one day, just before the sun went down, he went into the forest on the track of zebra. he carried two big hunting-spears, such as the n'gombi make best; a wickerwork shield, and on his back, slung by a strip of hide, a bunch of dried fish he had caught in the river. a man of middle height was imgani, spare of build, but broad of shoulder. his skin shone healthily, and his step was light. as he walked, you saw the muscles of his back ripple and weave like the muscles of a well-trained thoroughbred. he was half an hour's journey within the forest, when he came upon a girl. she was carrying a bundle of manioc root on her head, and walked gracefully. when she saw imgani she stopped dead, and the fear of death and worse came in her eyes, for she knew him to be an outcast man, with no tribe and no people. such men are more dreadful than the ingali, who rears up from the grass and plunges his poison-fangs in your leg. they stood watching one another, the man leaning with both hands on the spears, his cheek against them; the girl trembled. "woman, where do you go?" said imgani. "master, i go to the village which is by the river, this being the path," she flurried. "what have you there?" "manioc, for bread," she whispered thickly. "you are a root-eater," said imgani, nodding his head. "master, let me go," she said, staring at him. imgani jerked his head. "i see you are afraid of me--yet i want nothing from you," he said. "i am imgani, which means the lonely one; and i have no desire for wives or women, being too high a man for such folly. you are safe, root-eater, for if i wished i would fill this forest with the daughters of chiefs, all very beautiful, all moaning for me." the girl's fear had disappeared, and she looked at him curiously. moreover, she recognised that there was truth in his claim of austerity. possibly she was a little piqued, for she said tartly enough, employing an isisi proverb: "only the goat bleats at the mouth of the leopard's cave--the isisi grow fat on strangers." he looked at her, his head cocked on one side. "they say in the lower country that the isisi sell men to the arabi," he said musingly. "that is bad talk; you may go." with another jerk of his head he dismissed her. she had gone some little distance when he called her back. "root-eater," he said, "if men ask you who i be, you shall say that i am imgani the lonely one, who is a prince amongst the princes; also that i have killed many men in my day--so many that i cannot count them. also say that from my house, which i have built by the river, to as far as a man can see in every way, is my kingdom, and let none stray therein, except to bring gifts in their hands, for i am very terrible and very jealous." "lord," said the girl, "i will say all this." and she went, half running, in the direction of the village, leaving imgani to continue on his way. now this village had many young men eager to please the girl, who carried manioc, for she was a chief's daughter, and she was, moreover, fourteen, a marriageable age. so when she came flying along the village street, half hysterical in her fear, crying, babbling, incoherent, there was not wanting sympathy nor knight valiant to wipe out the insult. six young men, with spears and short swords, danced before the chief and the chief's daughter (how important she felt, any woman of any race will tell you), and one of them, e'kebi, a man gifted with language, described from sunset to moonrise, which is roughly four hours, exactly what would happen to imgani when the men of the isisi fell upon him; how his eyes would shrivel as before a great and terrible fire, and his limbs wither up, and divers other physiological changes which need not be particularised. "that is good talk," said the chief; "yet, since sandi is our master and has spies everywhere, do not shed blood, for the smell of blood is carried farther than a man can see. and sandi is very devilish on this question of killing. moreover, this lonely one is a stranger, and if we catch him we may sell him to the arabi, who will give us cloth and gin for him." having heard all this, they sacrificed a young goat and marched. they came upon the house of imgani, but the lonely one was not there, for he was trapping beasts in the forest; so they burnt his house, uprooted his poor garden, and, being joined by many other isisi people, who had followed at a respectful distance, lest imgani's estimate of his own prowess were justified by results, they held high revel, until of a sudden the sun came up over the middle island, and all the little stars in the sky went out. imgani saw all this, leaning on his spears in the shadow of the forest, but was content to be a spectator. for, he reasoned, if he went out against them they would attempt to kill him or beat him with rods, and that his high spirit could not endure. he saw the flames lick away the house he had built with such labour. "they are foolish people," he mused, "for they burn their own, and perhaps the spirits of the dead will be displeased and give them boils." when all that was left of his habitation was a white heap of ash, a dark-red glow, and a hazy wisp of smoke, imgani turned his face to the forest. all day long he walked, halting only to eat the fish he carried, and at night time he came upon another isisi village, which was called o'fasi. he came through the village street with his shoulders squared, his head erect, swinging his spears famously. he looked neither to the left nor to the right; and the villagers, crowding to the doors of their huts, put their clenched knuckles to their mouths, and said: "o ho!" which means that they were impressed. so he stalked through the entire length of the village, and was making for the forest-path beyond, when a messenger came pattering after him. "lord," said the messenger, "the _capita_ of this village, who is responsible to the government for all people who pass, and especially for thieves who may have escaped from the village of irons, desires your presence, being sure that you are no thief, but a great one, and wishing to do honour to you." thus he recited, and being a peaceable man, who had been chosen for the part because he was related by marriage to the principal wife of the chief, he kept a cautious eye on the broad-headed spear, and determined the line of his flight. "go back to your master, slave," said imgani, "and say to him that i go to find a spot of sufficient loneliness, where i may sleep this night and occupy myself with high thoughts. when i have found such a place i will return. say, also, that i am a prince of my own people, and that my father has legions of such quantity that, if every fighting man of the legions were to take a handful of sand from the bottom of the river, the river would be bottomless; also say that i am named imgani, and that i love myself better than any man has loved himself since the moon went white that it might not look like the sun." he went on, leaving the messenger filled with thought. true to his promise, imgani returned. he came back to find that there was a palaver in progress, the subject of the palaver being the unfortunate relative by marriage to the chief's principal wife. "who," the chief was saying, "has put shame upon me, being as great a fool as his cousin, my wife." "master," said the poor relation humbly, "i entreated him to return; but he was a man of great pride, and, moreover, impatient to go." "your mother was a fool," said the chief; "her mother also was a fool, and your father, whoever he was, and no man knows, was a great fool." this interesting beginning to a crude address on hereditary folly was interrupted by the return of imgani, and as he came slowly up the little hillock the assembly took stock of him, from the square, steel razor stuck in the tight-fitting leopard-skin cap to the thin bangles of brass about his ankles. the chief, a portly man of no great courage, observed the spears, noting that the hafts were polished smooth by much handling. "lord," said he mildly, "i am chief of this village, appointed by the government, who gave me a medal to wear about my neck, bearing on one side the picture of a great man with a beard, and on the other side certain devil marks and writings of vast power. this was given to me that all people might know i was chief, but i have lost the medal. none the less, i am chief of this village, as this will show." he fumbled in the bosom of his cloth and brought out a bag of snake skin, and from this he extracted a very soiled paper. with tender care he unfolded it, and disclosed a sheet of official notepaper with a few scrawled words in the handwriting of mr. commissioner sanders. they ran: "to all sub-commissioners, police officers, and commanders of houssa ports: "arrest and detain the bearer if found in any other territory than the isisi." there was a history attached to this singular document. it had to do with an unauthorised raid upon certain ochori villages and a subsequent trial at headquarters, where a chief, all aquiver with apprehension, listened to a terse but knowledgable prophecy as to what fate awaited him if he put foot out of his restricted dominion. imgani took the paper in his hand and was interested. he turned it about, rubbed the writing lightly with his fingers to see whether it was permanent, and returned it to the chief. "that is very wonderful, though i do not fear magic, except an especial kind such as is practised by a certain witch-doctor of my father's," he said; "nor do i know any government which can govern me." after which he proceeded to tell them of his father, and of his legions and wives, and various other matters of equal interest. "i do not doubt that you will understand me," he said. "i am a lonely one, hating the company of men, who are as changeable as the snow upon the mountains. therefore, i have left my house with my wives, who were faithful as women go, and i have taken with me no legion, since they are my father's." the chief was puzzled. "why you are lonely, i cannot tell," he said; "but certainly you did right to leave your father's legions. this is a great matter, which needs a palaver of older men." and he ordered the _lo-koli_ to be sounded and the elders of the village to be assembled. they came, bringing their own carved stools, and sat about the thatched shelter, where the chief sat in his presidency. again imgani told his story; it was about fifty wives, and legions of warriors as countless as the sand of the river's beach; and the trustful isisi listened and believed. "and i need this," said imgani, in his peroration; "a little house built on the edge of the river, in such a place that no path passes me and no human being comes within sight of me, for i am very lonely by nature--and a great hater of men." imgani went to live in the clearing nature had made for him, and in a hut erected by his new-found friends. other hospitalities he refused. "i have no wish for wives," he stated, "being full of mighty plans to recover my kingdom from evil men who are my father's councillors." lonely he was in very truth, for none saw him except on very special occasions. it was his practice to go hunting by night and to sleep away the hot days. sometimes, when the red ball of the sun dropped down behind the trees on the western bank of the river, the villagers saw the straight, blue film of his smoke as he cooked his evening meal; sometimes a homeward-bound boatman saw him slipping silently through the thin edge of the forest on his way to a kill. they called him the silent one, and he enjoyed a little fame. more than this, he enjoyed the confidence of his hosts. the isisi country is within reach of the foreign river, down which strangely-shaped boats come by night empty, and return by night full of people who are chained neck to neck, and the officials of french west africa--which adjoins the isisi country--receive stories of raids and of burnings which they have not the facilities for investigating, for the isisi border is nearly six hundred miles from the french headquarters, and lies through a wilderness. imgani, in his hunting trips, saw things which might have filled him with amazement, but for the fact that he was a man who was not given to emotion. he saw little caravans that came stealing from the direction of the territory of france, with whimpering women and groaning men in bondage. he saw curious midnight shippings of human souls, and grew to know the white-robed arabs who handled the whip so deftly. one night as he stood watching all these things, el mahmud, that famous trader, espied him in the moonlight and saw that he was of a strange people. "what man are you?" he asked. "lord," said imgani, "i am of a strange people--the n'gombi." "that is a lie," said the slaver, "for you have not the face marks of the n'gombi; you are a half-bred arab," and he addressed him in arabic. imgani shook his head. "he does not understand," said the slaver to his lieutenant; "find out where this man's hut is; one night we will take him, for he is worth money." he spoke in arabic, and his subordinate nodded. when the slaver came again three men visited imgani's house, but he was hunting, and he was hunting every time the long boats came by night to o'fasi. * * * * * sanders did not go to o'fasi for six months, during which time, it should be emphasised, nothing happened which by any stretch of imagination could be held to justify any loss of prestige. he was due to make his half-yearly visit to the isisi. the crops had been good, the fish plentiful, the rains gentle, and there had been no sickness. all these facts you may bear in mind. one morning, when swirls of grey mist looped from tree to tree and the east was growing grey, imgani came back from the forest bearing on his shoulders all that was material of a small buck which he had snared in the night. when he saw a little fire before his hut and a man squatting chin on knee, he twirled those spears of his cheerfully and went on, for he was afraid of no man. "is the world so full of people that you come to disturb my loneliness?" he asked. "i have a thought that i shall kill you and fry your heart, for i do not like to see you sitting by a fire before my hut." he said all this with a ferocious mien, and the man before the fire shifted uneasily. "master, i expected this," he said, "for i see you are a proud man; but i come because of your pride, knowing your wisdom." imgani tossed the buck to one side and sat down, staring threateningly and laying the haft of his spears across his bare knee. then the other man craned his neck forward and spoke eagerly. the sun came up and flushed the world rosy; but still he sat talking with great force, imgani listening. "so, master," he concluded, "we will kill sandi when he comes to palaver. ifiba, m'bwka, and a cousin of my mother's, will put spears into him very quickly, and we shall be a great people." imgani nodded his head wisely. "that is true," he said, "people who kill white men must be greatly honoured, because all the other nations will say: 'behold, these are the people who kill white men!'" "and when he is dead," the messenger went on, "many young men will go to the boat that smokes and slay all who are with him." "that is wise also," said imgani; "when i kill white men i also kill their friends." he discussed his deeds to some length and with great detail. after the man had gone, imgani made a meal of fish and manioc, polished the steel blades of his spears with wet sand, dried them carefully with grass, and laid himself down in the shade of the hut to sleep. he was awake in the early part of the afternoon, and went plunging into the river, swimming far towards the middle stream with great, strong strokes. then he swam back to shore, let the sun dry him, and dressed himself in his leopard skin. he came to the village slowly, and found it agitated. more especially so was the chief, that wise _capita_, for news had arrived that sandi was coming in the night, and that even now his steamer was rounding the bend of the river. a plan had miscarried; sanders was two days ahead of time, and ifiba and m'bwka, his trusty men, were away on an expedition, and there was no time to substitute unseasoned assassins. the steamer drifted broadside to the shore, one stern wheel revolving lazily, and then they saw, imgani amongst the rest, that the decks were crowded with soldiers, impassive brown men in blue uniforms and fezes. a plank bumped down, and holding their rifles high the soldiers came pattering to the shore, and with them a white officer but not sandi. it was a brusque, white man. "who is the chief here?" he said crossly. "lord, i am that man," said the stout chief, all a-flutter. "take that man." a sergeant of houssas grasped the chief and deftly swung him round; a corporal of houssas snapped a pair of handcuffs on his wrists. "lord," he whined, "why this shame?" "because you are a great thief," said the houssa officer, "a provoker of war and a dealer in slaves." "if any man says that, it is a lie," said the chief, "for no government man has witnessed such abominations." imgani stepped forward. "chief," he said, "i have seen it." "you are a great liar," fumed the portly _capita_, trembling with rage, "and sandi, who is my friend, will not believe you." "i am sandi," said imgani, and smiled crookedly. chapter xiii. the seer. there are many things that happen in the very heart of africa that no man can explain; that is why those who know africa best hesitate to write stories about it. because a story about africa must be a mystery story, and your reader of fiction requires that his mystery shall be, in the end, x-rayed so that the bones of it are visible. you can no more explain many happenings which are the merest commonplaces in latitude n., longitude (say) w., than you can explain the miracle of faith, or the wonder of telepathy, as this story goes to show. in the dead of a night mr. commissioner sanders woke. his little steamer was tied up by a wooding--a wooding he had prepared for himself years before by lopping down trees and leaving them to rot. he was one day's steam either up or down the river from the nearest village, but he was only six hours' march from the amatombo folk, who live in the very heart of the forest, and employ arrows poisoned by tetanus. sanders sat up in bed and listened. a night bird chirped monotonously; he heard the "clug-clug" of water under the steamer's bows and the soft rustling of leaves as a gentle breeze swayed the young boughs of the trees that overhung the boat. very intently he listened, then reached down for his mosquito boots and his socks. he drew them on, found his flannel coat hanging behind the door of his tiny cabin, and opened the door softly. then he waited, standing, his head bent. in the darkness he grinned unpleasantly, and, thumbing back the leather strap that secured the flap of the holster which hung by his bunk he slipped out the colt-automatic, and noiselessly pulled back the steel envelope. he was a careful man, not easily flurried, and his every movement was methodical. he was cautious enough to push up the little safety-catch which prevents premature explosion, tidy enough to polish the black barrel on the soft sleeve of his coat, and he waited a long time before he stepped out into the hot darkness of the night. by and by he heard again the sound which had aroused him. it was the faint twitter of a weaver bird. now weaver birds go to sleep at nights like sensible people, and they live near villages, liking the society of human beings. certainly they do not advertise their presence so brazenly as did this bird, who twittered and twittered at intervals. sanders watched patiently. then suddenly, from close at hand, from the very deck on which he stood, came an answering call. sanders had his little cabin on the bridge of the steamer; he walked farther away from it. in the corner of the bridge he crouched down, his thumb on the safety-catch. he felt, rather than saw, a man come from the forest; he knew that there was one on board the steamer who met him. then creeping round the deck-house came two men. he could just discern the bulk of them as they moved forward till they found the door of the cabin and crept in. he heard a little noise, and grinned again, though he knew that their spear-heads were making sad havoc of his bedclothes. then there was a little pause, and he saw one come out by himself and look around. he turned to speak softly to the man inside. sanders rose noiselessly. the man in the doorway said "kah!" in a gurgling voice and went down limply, because sanders had kicked him scientifically in the stomach, which is a native's weak spot. the second man ran out, but fell with a crash over the commissioner's extended leg, and, falling, received the full weight of a heavy pistol barrel in the neighbourhood of his right ear. "yoka!" called sanders sharply, and there was a patter of feet aft, for your native is a light sleeper, "tie these men up. get steam, for we will go away from here; it is not a nice place." sanders, as i have tried to explain, was a man who knew the native; he thought like a native, and there were moments when he acted not unlike a barbarian. clear of the danger, he tied up to a little island in mid-stream just as the dawn spread greyly, and hustled his two prisoners ashore. "my men," said he, "you came to kill me in the dark hours." "lord, that is true," said one, "i came to kill, and this other man, who is my brother, told me when to come--yet it might have been another whom he called, for i am but one of many." sanders accepted the fact that a chain of cheerful assassins awaited his advent without any visible demonstration of annoyance. "now you will tell me," he said, "who gave the word for the killing, and why i must die." the man he addressed, a tall, straight youth of the amatombo people, wiped the sweat from his forehead with his manacled hands. "lord, though you chop me," he said, "i will not tell you, for i have a great ju-ju, and there are certain fetishes which would be displeased." sanders tried the other man with no greater success. this other was a labourer he had taken on at a village four days' journey down stream. "lord, if i die for my silence i will say nothing," he said. "very good," said sanders, and nodded his head to abiboo. "i shall stake you out," he added, "flat on the ground, your legs and arms outstretched, and i will light a little fire on your chests, and by and by you will tell me all i want to know." staked out they were, with fluffy little balls of dried creeper on each breast, and sanders took a lighted stick from the fire his servants had built. the men on the ground watched his every movement. they saw him blow the red stick to a flame and advance toward them, then one said-- "lord, i will speak." "so i thought," said sanders; "and speak truth, or i will make you uncomfortable." if you ask me whether sanders would have employed his lighted stick, i answer truthfully that i think it possible; perhaps sanders knew his men better than i know sanders. the two men, released from their unhappy position, talked frankly, and sanders was a busy man taking notes in english of the conversation which was mainly in bomongo. when his interrogation was completed, sanders gathered up his notes and had the men taken on board the steamer. two hours later the _zaire_ was moving at its fullest speed in the direction of a village of the akasava, which is called in the native tongue tukalala. there was a missionary to tukalala, a devoted young american methodist, who had elected to live in the fever belt amongst heathen men that he might bring their hearts to the knowledge of god. sanders had no special regard for missionaries; indeed, he had views on the brotherhood which did him no particular credit, but he had an affection for the young man who laboured so cheerfully with such unpromising material, and now he paced the little bridge of his steamer impatiently, for it was very necessary that he should reach tukalala before certain things happened. he came round a bend of the little river just as the sun was going down behind the trees on the western bank, and the white beach before the mission station showed clearly. he motioned with two fingers to the man at the wheel, and the little steamer swung almost broadside to the swift stream and headed for the bank, and the black water of the river humped up against his port bow as though it were a sluice gate. into the beach he steamed; "pucka-pucka-pucka-puck," sang the stern wheel noisily. where the missionary's house had stood was a chaos of blackened debris, and out of it rose lazy little wisps of smoke. he found the missionary dressed in white duck, greatly soiled, lying face downwards, and he found some difficulty in raising him, because he was pinned to the ground with a broad-bladed elephant spear which had been broken off flush with his shoulders. sanders turned him on his back, closed the patient's eyes, staring, it seemed, hungrily at the darkening sky as though at the last questioning god's wisdom. the commissioner took a gaudy bandana handkerchief from his pocket, and laid it on the dead man's face. "abiboo," he said softly to his sergeant, "dig me a great hole by that copal gum, for this man was a great chief amongst his people, and had communion with gods." "he was a christ man," said abiboo sagely, who was a devout follower of the prophet, "and in the sura of mary it is written: "'the sects have fallen to variance about jesus, but woe, because of the assembly of a great day to those who believe not!'" abiboo bore the title of haj because he had been to mecca and knew the koran better than most christians know the bible. sanders said nothing. he took a cigar from his pocket and lit it, casting his eyes around. no building stood. where the mission station with its trim garden had been, was desolation. he saw scraps of cloth in the fading light. these were other victims, he knew. in the mellow light of the moon he buried the missionary, saying the lord's prayer over him, and reciting as much of the burial service as he could remember. then he went back to the _zaire_ and set a guard. in the morning sanders turned the nose of the _zaire_ down stream, and at sunset came to the big river--he had been sailing a tributary--and where the two rivers meet is the city of the akasava. they brought the paramount chief of all the people to him, and there was a palaver on the little bridge with a lantern placed on the deck and one limp candle therein to give light to the assembly. "chief," said sanders, "there is a dead white man in your territory, and i will have the hearts of the men who killed him, or by the death i will have your head." he said this evenly, without passion, yet he swore by _ewa_, which means death and is a most tremendous oath. the chief, squatting on the deck, fidgeting with his hands, shivered. "lord," he said, in a cracked voice, "this is a business of which i know nothing; this thing has happened in my territory, but so far from my hand that i can neither punish nor reward." sanders was silent save for an unsympathetic sniff. "also, master," said the chief, "if the truth be told, this palaver is not of the akasava alone, for all along the big river men are rebellious, obeying a new ju-ju more mighty than any other." "i know little of ju-jus," said sanders shortly, "only i know that a white man has died and his spirit walks abroad and will not rest until i have slain men. whether it be you or another i do not care--the palaver is finished." the chief rose awkwardly, brought up his hand in salute, and went shuffling down the sloping plank to land. as for sanders, he sat thinking, smoking one cigar after another. he sat long into the night. once he called his servant to replace the candle in the lantern and bring him a cushion for his head. he sat there until the buzzing little village hushed to sleep, until there was no sound but the whispering of bat wings as they came and went from the middle island--for bats love islands, especially the big vampire bats. at two o'clock in the morning he looked at his watch, picked up the lantern, and walked aft. he picked a way over sleeping men until he came to that part of the deck where a houssa squatted with loaded carbine watching the two prisoners. he stirred them gently with his foot, and they sat up blinking at his light. "you must tell me some more," he said. "how came this bad ju-ju to your land?" the man he addressed looked up at him. "lord, how comes rain or wind?" he said. "it was a sudden thought amongst the people. there were certain rites and certain dances, and we chopped a man; then we all painted our faces with camwood, and the maidens said 'kill!'" sanders could be very patient. "i am as your father and your mother," he said. "i carry you in my arms; when the waters came up and destroyed your gardens i came with manioc and salt and saved you; when the sickness came i brought white men who scraped your arms and put magic in your blood; i have made peace, and your wives are safe from m'gombi and isisi folk, yet you are for killing me." the other nodded. "that is true talk, master--but such is the way of ju-jus. they are very high things, and do not remember." sanders was worried; this matter was out of his reach. "what said the ju-ju?" "lord, it said very clearly, speaking through the mouth of an old man, m'fabaka of begeli----" "m'fabaka of begeli?" repeated sanders softly, and noted the name for a speedy hanging. "this old man saw a vision, and in this vision, which he saw with great pain and foaming at the mouth and hot eyeballs, he saw white men slain by black men and their houses burnt." "when was this?" "when the moon was full"--six days ago, thought sanders--"and he saw a great king with many legions marching through the land making all white men fear him." he went on to give, as only a native memory can recall, the minutest detail of the king's march; how he slew white men and women and put their house to flames; how his legions went dancing before him. "and all this happened at the full of the moon," he finished; "therefore we, too, went out to slay, and, knowing that your highness would be coming as is your custom to give judgment at this season of the year, it was thought wise to kill you, also the christ-man." he told all this in a matter-of-fact tone, and sanders knew that he spoke the truth. another man would have been more affected by that portion of the narrative which touched him most nearly, but it was the king ("a great man, very large about the middle"), and his devastating legions who occupied the commissioner's thoughts. there was truth behind this, he did not doubt that. there was a rising somewhere that he had not heard of; very quickly he passed in mental review the kings of the adjoining territories and of his own lands. bosambo of monrovia, that usurper of the ochori chieftainship, sent him from time to time news of the outlying peoples. there was no war, north or south or east. "i will see this old man m'fabaka of begeli," he said. begeli is a village that lies on an in-running arm of the river, so narrow that it seems like a little river, so still that it is apparently a lake. forests of huge trees slope down on either bank, and the trees are laced one to the other with great snake-like tendrils, and skirted at foot with rank undergrowth. the _zaire_ came cautiously down this stretch of calm water, two maxim guns significantly displayed at the bridge. a tiny little steamer this _zaire_. she had the big blue of england drooping from the flagstaff high above the stern wheel--an ominous sign, for when sanders flew the commissioner's flag it meant trouble for somebody. he stood on the deck coatless, signalling with his raised fingers to the man at the wheel. "phew!" an arrow was shivering in the wooden deck-house. he pulled it out and examined its hammered steel point carefully, then he threw it overboard. "bang!" a puff of smoke from the veiling foliage--a bullet splintered the back of his deck-chair. he reached down and took up a rifle, noticed the drift of the smoke and took careful aim. "bang!" there was no sign to show where the bullet struck, and the only sound that came back was the echo and the shrill swish of it as it lashed its way through the green bushes. there was no more shooting. "puck-apuck-puck-apuck-puck," went the stern wheel slowly, and the bows of the _zaire_ clove the calm waters and left a fan of foam behind. before the village was in view six war canoes, paddling abreast, came out to meet the commissioner. he rang the engines to "stop," and as the noise of them died away he could hear in the still air the beating of drums; through his glasses he saw fantastically-painted bodies, also a head stuck upon a spear. there had been a trader named ogilvie in this part of the world, a mild, uncleanly man who sold cloth and bought wild rubber. "five hundred yards," said sanders, and sergeant abiboo, fiddling with the grip of the port maxim, gave the cartridge belt a little pull, swung the muzzle forward, and looked earnestly along the sights. at the same time the houssa corporal, who stood by the tripod of the starboard gun, sat down on the little saddle seat of it with his thumb on the control. there came a spurt of smoke from the middle canoe; the bullet fell short. "ogilvie, my man," soliloquised sanders, "if you are alive--which i am sure you are not--you will explain to me the presence of these schneiders." nearer came the canoes, the paddle plunging rhythmically, a low, fierce drone of song accompanying the movement. "four hundred yards," said sanders, and the men at the maxims readjusted the sights. "the two middle canoes," said sanders. "fire!" a second pause. "ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!" laughed the guns sardonically. sanders watched the havoc through his glasses. "the other canoes," he said briefly. "ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!" this gunner was a careful man, and fired spasmodically, desiring to see the effects of his shots. sanders saw men fall, saw one canoe sway and overturn, and the black heads of men in the water; he rang the steamer ahead full speed. somebody fired a shot from one of the uninjured canoes. the wind of the bullet fanned his face, he heard the smack of it as it struck the woodwork behind. there came another shot, and the boy at the wheel turned his head with a little grin to sanders. "lord," he mumbled in arabic, "this was ordained from the beginning." sanders slipped his arm about his shoulder and lowered him gently to the deck. "all things are with god," he said softly. "blessed be his name," whispered the dying boy. sanders caught the wheel as it spun and beckoned another steersman forward. the nose of the steamer had turned to the offending canoe. this was an unhappy circumstance for the men therein, for both guns now covered it, and they rattled together, and through the blue haze you saw the canoe emptied. that was the end of the fight. a warrior in the fifth boat held his spear horizontally above his head in token of surrender, and ten minutes later the chief of the rebels was on board. "master," he said calmly, as they led him to sanders' presence, "this is a bad palaver. how will you deal with me?" sanders looked at him steadily. "i will be merciful with you," he said, "for as soon as we come to the village i shall hang you." "so i thought," said the chief without moving a muscle; "and i have heard it said that you hang men very quickly so that they feel little pain." "that is my practice," said sanders of the river, and the chief nodded his head approvingly. "i would rather it were so," he said. it was to a sorrowful village that he came, for there were many women to wail their dead. sanders landed with his houssas and held a high palaver under the trees. "bring me the old man m'fabaka who sees visions," he said, and they brought him a man so old that he had nothing but bones to shape him. they carried him to the place of justice and set him down before the commissioner. "you are an evil man," said sanders, "and because your tongue has lied many men have died; to-day i hang your chief upon a tree, and with him certain others. if you stand before your people and say, 'such a story, and such a story was a lie and no other thing,' you may live your days; but, if you persist in your lying, by my god, and your god, you shall die!" it was a long time before the old man spoke, for he was very old and very frightened, and the fear of death, which is the ghost of some old men, was on him. "i spoke the truth," he quavered at last. "i spoke of what i saw and of what i knew--only that." sanders waited. "i saw the great king slay and burn; yesterday i saw him march his regiments to war, and there was a great shouting, and i saw smoke." he shook his head helplessly. "i saw these things. how can i say i saw nothing?" "what manner of king?" asked sanders. again there was a long interval of silence whilst the old man collected himself. "a great king," he said shakily, "as big as a bull about the middle, and he wore great, white feathers and the skin of a leopard." "you are mad," said sanders, and ended the palaver. * * * * * six days later sanders went back to headquarters, leaving behind him a chastened people. ill-news travels faster than steam can push a boat, and the little _zaire_, keeping to mid-stream with the blue flag flying, was an object of interest to many small villages, the people of which crowded down to their beaches and stood with folded arms, or with clenched knuckles at their lips to signify their perturbation, and shouted in monotonous chorus after the boat. "oh, sandi--father! how many evil ones have you slain to-day? oh, killer of devils--oh, hanger of trees!--we are full of virtues and do not fear." "ei-fo, kalaba? ei ko sandi! eiva fo elegi," etc. sanders went with the stream swiftly, for he wished to establish communication with his chief. somewhere in the country there was a revolt--that he knew. there was truth in all the old man had said before he died--for die he did of sheer panic and age. who was this king in revolt? not the king of the isisi, or of the m'gombi, nor of the people in the forelands beyond the ochori. the _zaire_ went swinging in to the government beach, and there was a captain of houssas to meet him. "land wire working?" said sanders as he stepped ashore. the houssa captain nodded. "what's the palaver?" he asked. "war of a kind," said sanders; "some king or other is on the rampage." and he told the story briefly. the houssa officer whistled. "by lord high keeper of the privy purse!" he swore mildly, "that's funny!" "you've a poisonous sense of humour!" sanders snapped. "hold hard," said the houssa, and caught his arm. "don't you know that lo benguela is in rebellion? the description fits him." sanders stopped. "of course," he said, and breathed a sigh of relief. "but," said the perplexed houssa officer, "matabeleland is three thousand miles away. rebellion started a week ago. how did these beggars know?" for answer sanders beckoned a naked man of the akasava people who was of his boat's crew, being a good chopper of wood. "i'fasi," he said, "tell me, what do they do in your country to-day?" the man grinned sheepishly, and stood on one leg in his embarrassment, for it was an honour to common men that sanders should address them by name. "lord, they go to hunt elephant," he said. "how many?" said sanders. "two villages," said the man, "for one village has sickness and cannot go." "how do you know this?" said sanders. "is not your country four days by river and three days by land?" the man looked uncomfortable. "it is as you say, master--yet i know," he said. sanders turned to the houssa with a smile. "there is quite a lot to be learnt in this country," he said. * * * * * a month later sanders received a cutting from the _cape times_. the part which interested him ran: " . . . the rumour generally credited by the matabele rebels that their adherents in the north had suffered a repulse lacks confirmation. the commissioner of barotseland denies the native story of a rebellious tribe, and states that as far as he knows the whole of his people have remained quiet. other northern commissioners state the same. there has been no sympathetic rising, though the natives are emphatic that in a 'far-away land,' which they cannot define, such a rebellion has occurred. the idea is, of course, absurd." sanders smiled again. chapter the last. dogs of war. chiefest of the restrictions placed upon the black man by his white protector is that which prevents him, when his angry passions rise, from taking his enemy by the throat and carving him with a broad, curved blade of native make. naturally, even the best behaved of the tribes chafe under this prohibition the british have made. you may be sure that the akasava memory is very short, and the punishment which attended their last misdoing is speedily forgotten in the opportunity and the temptation which must inevitably come as the years progress. thus, the akasava, learning of certain misdoings on the part of the ochori, found themselves in the novel possession of a genuine grievance, and prepared for war, first sending a message to "sandi," setting forth at some length the nature of the insult the ochori had offered them. fortunately, sanders was in the district, and came on the spot very quickly, holding palaver, and soothing an outraged nation as best he could. sanders was a tactful man, and tact does not necessarily imply soft-handedness. for there was a truculent soul who sat in the council and interpolated brusque questions. growing bolder as the commissioner answered suavely, he went, as a child or native will, across the border line which divides a good manner from a bad. sanders turned on him. "what base-born slave dog are you?" he asked; and whilst the man was carefully considering his answer, sanders kicked him down the slope of the hill on which the palaver house stood, and harmony was once more restored. very soon on the heels of this palaver came a bitter complaint from the isisi. it concerned fishing nets that had been ruthlessly destroyed by the lulungo folk, and this was a more difficult matter for sanders to settle. for one thing, all self-respecting people hate the lulungo, a dour, wicked, mischievous people, without shame or salt. but the isisi were pacified, and a messy war was averted. there were other and minor alarums--all these were in the days' work--but sanders worried about the lulungo, because of their general badness, and because of all his people, isisi, ikeli, akasava, and ochori, who hated the lulungo folk with a deep-rooted hatred. in his own heart, sanders knew that war could only be postponed, and so advised london, receiving in reply, from an agitated under-secretary in whitehall, the urgent request that the postponement should cover and extend beyond the conclusion of "the present financial year--for heaven's sake!" they had a proverb up in the lulungo district--three days' march beyond the akasava--and it is to this effect: "when a man hath a secret enemy and cannot find him, pull down his own hut and search among the dbris." this is a cumbersome translation. there is another proverb which says, "because of the enemy who lives in the shadow of your hut"; also another which says, "if you cannot find your enemy, kill your dearest friend." the tendency of all these proverbs is to show that the lulungo people took a gloomy view of life, and were naturally suspicious. sanders had a cook of the lulungo tribe, down at m'piti--which model city served as mr. commissioner's headquarters. he was a wanderer, and by way of being a cosmopolitan, having travelled as far north as dacca, and as far south as banana--and presumably up the congo to matadi. when he came to m'piti, applying for work, he was asked his name and replied in the "english" of the coast: "master, dey one call me sixpence all'time. i make 'um cook fine; you look 'um for better cook, you no find 'um--savvy." "and what," said sanders, in the lulungo dialect, "what mongrel talk do you call this?" "master, it is english," said the abashed native. "it is monkey talk," said sanders, cruelly; "the talk of krooboys and half-bred sailors who have no language. what are you called by your people?" "lataki, master," said the cook. "so shall you be called," said sanders. "further, you shall speak no language but your own, and your pay will be ten shillings a month." lataki made a good cook, and was a model citizen for exactly three months, at the end of which time sanders, returning unexpectedly from a hunting trip, found lataki asleep in his master's bed--lataki being very drunk, and two empty gin bottles by the bedside testifying mutely to his discredit. sanders called his police, and lataki was thrown into the lock-up to sober down, which he did in twenty-four hours. "i would have you understand," said sanders to the culprit the next day, "that i cannot allow my servants to get drunk; more especially i cannot allow my drunken servants to sleep off their potations on my bed." "lord, i am ashamed," said lataki cheerfully; "such things happen to a man who has seen much of the world." "you may say the same about the whipping you are about to receive," said sanders, and gave an order to the sergeant of police. lataki was no stoic and when, tied to a tree, ten strokes were laid upon his stout back by a bored houssa, he cried out very loudly against sanders, and against that civilisation of which sanders was the chosen instrument. after it was all over, and he had discovered that he was still alive, albeit sore, he confessed he had received little more than he deserved, and promised tearfully that the lesson should not be without result. sanders, who had nothing more to say in the matter, dismissed him to his duties. it was a week after this that the commissioner was dining in solitude on palm-oil chop--which is a delicious kind of coast curry--and chicken. he had begun his meal when he stopped suddenly, went to his office, and brought in a microscope. then he took a little of the "chop"--just as much as might go on the end of a pin--smeared it on a specimen glass, and focussed the instrument. what he saw interested him. he put away the microscope and sent for lataki; and lataki, in spotless white, came. "lataki," said sanders carelessly, "knowing the ways of white men, tell me how a master might do his servant honour?" the cook in the doorway hesitated. "there are many ways," he said, after a pause. "he might----" he stopped, not quite sure of his ground. "because you are a good servant, though possessed of faults," said sanders, "i wish to honour you; therefore i have chosen this way; you, who have slept in my bed unbidden, shall sit at my table with me at my command." the man hesitated, a little bewildered, then he shuffled forward and sat clumsily in the chair opposite his master. "i will wait upon you," said sanders, "according to the custom of your own people." he heaped two large spoonfuls of palm-oil chop upon the plate before the man. "eat," he said. but the man made no movement, sitting with his eyes upon the tablecloth. "eat," said sanders again, but still lataki sat motionless. then sanders rose, and went to the open doorway of his bungalow and blew a whistle. there was a patter of feet, and sergeant abiboo came with four houssas. "take this man," said sanders, "and put him in irons. to-morrow i will send him down country for judgment." he walked back to the table, when the men had gone with their prisoner, carefully removed the poisoned dish, and made a meal of eggs and bananas, into neither of which is it possible to introduce ground glass without running the risk of instant detection. ground glass--glass powdered so fine that it is like precipitated chalk to the touch--is a bad poison, because when it comes in contact with delicate membranes right down inside a man, it lacerates them and he dies, as the bad men of the coast know, and have known for hundreds of years. in the course of time lataki came before a judge who sat in a big thatched barn of a courthouse, and lataki brought three cousins, a brother, and a disinterested friend, to swear that sanders had put the glass in his own "chop" with malice aforethought. in spite of the unanimity of the evidence--the witnesses had no less than four rehearsals in a little hut the night before the trial--the prisoner was sentenced to fifteen years' penal servitude. here the matter would have ended, but for the lulungo people, who live far away in the north, and who chose to regard the imprisonment of their man as a _casus belli_. they were a suspicious people, a sullen, loveless, cruel people, and they were geographically favoured, for they lived on the edge of a territory which is indisputably french, and, moreover, unreachable. sanders sent flying messages to all the white people who lived within striking distance of the lulungo. there were six in all, made up of two missions, jesuit and baptist. they were most unsatisfactory people, as the following letters show: the first from the protestant: "losebi mission. "dear mr. commissioner,--my wife and i are very grateful to you for your warning, but god has called us to this place, and here we must stay, going about our master's business, until he, in his wisdom, ordains that we shall leave the scene of our labours." father holling wrote: "ebendo river. "dear sanders,--i think you are wrong about the lulungo people, several of whom i have seen recently. they are mighty civil, which is the only bad sign i have detected. i shall stay because i think i can fight off any attack they make. i have four martini-metford rifles, and three thousand rounds of ammunition, and this house, as you know, is built of stone. i hope you are wrong, but----" sanders took his steamboat, his maxim gun, and his houssa police, and went up the river, as far as the little stern-wheeler would carry him. at the end of every day's journey he would come to a place where the forest had been cleared, and where, stacked on the beach, was an orderly pile of wood. somewhere in the forest was a village whose contribution to the state this ever-replenished wood-pile was. night and day two sounding men with long rods, sitting at the steamer's bow, "stubbed" the water monotonously. shoal, sandbank, channel, shoal. sometimes, with a shuddering jar, the boat would slide along the flat surface of a hidden bank, and go flop into the deep water on the other side; sometimes, in the night, the boat would jump a bank to find itself in a little "lake" from which impassable ridges of hidden sand barred all egress. then the men would slip over the sides of the vessel and walk the sandy floor of the river, pushing the steamer into deep water. when sixty miles from the baptist mission, sanders got news from a friendly native: "lord, the lulungo came at early morning, taking away the missionary, his wife, and his daughter, to their city." sanders, yellow with fever, heavy-eyed from want of sleep, unshaven and grimy, wiped the perspiration from his head with the back of his hand. "take the steamer up the river," he said to abiboo. "i must sleep." he was awakened at four o'clock in the afternoon by the smashing of a water-bottle, which stood on a shelf by his bunk. it smashed for no apparent reason, and he was sprinkled with bits of glass and gouts of water. then he heard a rifle go "pang!" close at hand, and as he sprang up and opened the wire-woven door of his cabin, abiboo came to report. "there were two men firing from the bank," he said. "one i have shot." they were nearing the village now, and turning a sharp bend of the river they came in sight of it, and the little _zaire's_ siren yelled and squealed defiantly. sanders saw a crowd of men come down to the beach, saw the glitter of spears, and through his glasses the paint on the bodies of the men. then six canoes came racing out to meet the steamer. a corporal of houssas sat down nonchalantly on a little saddle-seat behind the brass maxim, and gripped its handles. "five hundred yards," said sanders, and the corporal adjusted the sight without perceptible hurry. the canoes came on at a hurricane speed, for the current was with them. the man behind the gun polished a dull place on the brass water-jacket with the blue sleeves of his coat, and looked up. sanders nodded. the canoes came nearer, one leading the rest in that race where hate nerved effort, and death was the prize. suddenly-- "ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!" laughed the little gun sardonically, and the leading canoe swung round broadside to the stream, because the men who steered it were dead, and half of the oarsmen also. "ha-ha-ha-h-a-a!" there was a wild scramble on the second canoe; it swayed, capsized, and the river was full of black heads, and the air resounded with shrill cries. as for the remainder of the flotilla it swung round and made for safety; the machine-gun corporal slipped in another belt of cartridges, and made good practice up to nine hundred yards, from which two canoes, frantically paddled, were comparatively safe. sanders put his tiny telegraph over to full speed ahead and followed. on the shore the lulungo made a stand, and missiles of many kinds struck the little steamer. but the maxim sprayed the village noisily, and soon there came a nervous man waving a palm leaf, and sanders ceased firing, and shouted through his megaphone that the messenger must swim aboard. "lord, we feel great shame," said the man. he stood in a wet place on the deck, and little rills of water dripped from him. "we did not know we fought sandi the lion, sandi the buffalo, before the stamp of whose mighty feet----" sanders cut him short. "there is a white man, a white woman, and a young girl in your city," he said. "bring them to the ship, and then i will sit in the palaver-house, and talk this matter over." the man shuffled uneasily. "master," he said, "the white man died of the sickness; the woman is ill also; as for the girl, i know nothing." sanders looked at him, his head on one side like an inquisitive bird. "bring me the white man, alive or dead," he said softly; "also the white woman, well or ill, and the girl." in an hour they brought the unfortunate missionary, having taken some time to make him look presentable. the wife of the missionary came in another canoe, four women holding her, because she was mad. "where is the girl?" asked sanders. he spoke very little above a whisper. the messenger made no answer. "the girl?" said sanders, and lashed him across the face with his thin stick. "master," muttered the man, with his head on his chest, "the chief has her." sanders took a turn up and down the deck, then he went to his cabin and came out with two revolvers belted to his hips. "i will go and see this chief," he said. "abiboo, do you run the boat's nose into the soft sand of the bank, covering the street with the maxim whilst i go ashore." he landed without opposition; neither gun banged nor spear flew as he walked swiftly up the broad street. the girl lay before the chiefs hut quite dead, very calm, very still. the hand to cut short her young life had been more merciful than sanders dared hope. he lifted the child in his arms, and carried her back to the ship. once he heard a slight noise behind him, but three rifles crashed from the ship, and he heard a thud and a whimper of pain. he brought the body on board, and laid it reverently on the little after-deck. then they told him that the woman had died, and he nodded his head slowly, saying it was better so. the _zaire_ backed out into mid-stream, and sanders stood watching the city wistfully. he wanted the chief of the lulungo badly; he wanted, in his cold rage, to stake him out in spread-eagle fashion, and kill him with slow fires. but the chief and his people were in the woods, and there were the french territories to fly to. in the evening he buried the missionary and his family on a little island, then drove downstream, black rage in his soul, and a sense of his impotence, for you cannot fight a nation with twenty houssa policemen. he came to a little "wooding" at dusk, and tied up for the night. in the morning he resumed his journey, and at noon he came, without a moment's warning, into the thick of a war fleet. there was no mistaking the character of the hundred canoes that came slowly up-stream four abreast, paddling with machine-like regularity. that line on the right were akasava men; you could tell that by the blunt noses of the dug-outs. on the left were the ochori; their canoes were streaked with red cornwood. in the centre, in lighter canoes of better make, he saw the white-barred faces of the isisi people. "in the name of heaven!" said sanders, with raised eyebrows. there was consternation enough in the fleet, and its irregular lines wavered and broke, but the _zaire_ went steaming into the midst of them. then sanders stopped his engines, and summoned the chiefs on board. "what shame is this?" said sanders. otako, of the isisi, king and elder chief, looked uncomfortably to ebeni of akasava, but it was bosambo, self-appointed ruler of the ochori, who spoke. "lord," he said, "who shall escape the never-sleeping eye of sandi? lo! we thought you many miles away, but like the owl----" "where do you go?" asked sanders. "lord, we will not deceive you," said bosambo. "these great chiefs are my brothers, because certain lulungo have come down upon our villages and done much harm, stealing and killing. therefore, because we have suffered equally, and are one in misfortune, we go up against the lulungo people, for we are human, and our hearts are sore." a grin, a wicked, mirthless grin, parted sanders' lips. "and you would burn and slay?" he asked. "master, such was the pleasure we had before us." "burning the city and slaying the chief, and scattering the people who hide in the forest?" "lord, though they hide in hell we will find them," said bosambo; "yet, if you, who are as a father to us all, say 'nay,' we will assemble our warriors and tell them it is forbidden." sanders thought of the three new graves on a little island. "go!" he said, pointing up the river. he stood on the deck of the _zaire_ and watched the last canoe as it rounded the bend, and listened to the drone of many voices, growing fainter and fainter, singing the song of the slayer, such as the isisi sing before action. the end. =transcriber's notes:= original hyphenation, spelling and grammar have been preserved as in the original page , '"chief, said sanders' changed to '"chief," said sanders' page , "cailbraith" changed to "calbraith" page , "was simple there" changed to "was simple--there" page , "peace with him" changed to "peace with him." page , "his lips impatiently" changed to "his lips impatiently." page , "before the other?" changed to "before the other;" page , "for it we cannot" changed to "for if we cannot" page , "the way we go" changed to "the way we go." page , "midstream" changed to "mid-stream" [ed. for consistency] page , "the matebele rebels" changed to "the matabele rebels" lost in the jungle. narrated for young people. by paul du chaillu, author of "discoveries in equatorial africa," "wild life under the equator," "journey to ashango land," "stories of the gorilla country," &c. _with numerous engravings._ _new york:_ harper & brothers, publishers, franklin square. . [illustration: shooting a leopard. [p. .] by paul du chaillu. the country of the dwarfs. illustrated. mo, cloth, $ . my apingi kingdom. illustrated. mo, cloth, $ . lost in the jungle. illustrated. mo, cloth, $ . wild life under the equator. illustrated. mo, cloth, $ . stories of the gorilla country. illustrated. mo, cloth, $ . explorations and adventures in equatorial africa. illustrated. new edition. vo, cloth, $ . a journey to ashango land, and further penetration into equatorial africa. new edition. illustrated. vo, cloth, $ . _published by harper & brothers, new york._ _sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the united states, on receipt of the price._ entered, according to act of congress, in the year , by harper & brothers, in the clerk's office of the district court of the united states for the southern district of new york. contents. chapter i. paul's letter to his young friends, in which he prepares them for being "lost in the jungle." chapter ii. a queer canoe.--on the rembo.--we reach the niembouai.--a deserted village.--gazelle attacked by a snake.--etia wounded by a gorilla. chapter iii. harpooning a manga.--a great prize.--our canoe capsized.--description of the manga.--return to camp. chapter iv. we go into the forest.--hunt for ebony-trees.--the fish-eagles.--capture of a young eagle.--impending fight with them.--fearful roars of gorillas.--gorillas breaking down trees. chapter v. lost.--querlaouen says we are bewitched.--monkeys and parrots.--a deserted village.--strange scene before an idol.--bringing in the wounded.--an invocation. chapter vi. a white gorilla.--meeting two gorillas.--the female runs away.--the man gorilla shows fight.--he is killed.--his immense hands and feet.--strange story of a leopard and a turtle. chapter vii. return to the ovenga river.--the monkeys and their friends the birds.--they live together.--watch by moonlight for game.--kill an oshengui. chapter viii. we are in a canoe.--outfit for hunting.--see a beautiful antelope.--kill it.--it is a new species.--river and forest swallows. chapter ix. we hear the cry of a young gorilla.--start to capture him.--fight with "his father."--we kill him.--kill the mother.--capture of the baby.--strange camp scene. chapter x. jack will have his own way.--he seizes my leg.--he tears my pantaloons.--he growls at me.--he refuses cooked food.--jack makes his bed.--jack sleeps with one eye open.--jack is intractable. chapter xi. start after land-crabs.--village of the crabs.--each crab knows his house.--great flight of crabs.--they bite hard.--feast on the slain.--a herd of hippopotami. chapter xii. strange spiders.--the house-spider.--how they capture their prey.--how they fight.--fight between a wasp and a spider.--the spider has its legs cut off, and is carried away.--burrow spider watching for its prey. chapter xiii. we continue our wanderings.--joined by etia.--we starve.--gambo and etia go in search of berries.--a herd of elephants.--the rogue elephant charges me.--he is killed.--he tumbles down near me.--story of redjioua. chapter xiv. a formidable bird.--the people are afraid of it.--a baby carried off by the guanionien.--a monkey also seized.--i discover a guanionien nest.--i watch for the eagles. chapter xv. the cascade of niama-biembai.--a native camp.--starting for the hunt.--a man attacked by a gorilla.--his gun broken.--the man dies.--his burial. chapter xvi. funeral of the gorilla's victim.--a man's head for the alumbi.--the snake and the guinea-fowl.--snake killed.--visit to the house of the alumbi.--determine to visit the sea-coast. chapter xvii. at washington once more.--delights of the sea-shore.--i have been made a makaga.--friends object to my return into the jungle.--quengueza taken sick.--gives a letter to his nephew.--taking leave. chapter xviii. departure.--arrival at goumbi.--the people ask for the king.--a death-panic in goumbi.--a doctor sent for.--death to the aniembas.--three women accused.--they are tried and killed. chapter xix. quengueza orders ilogo to be consulted about his illness.--what the people think of ilogo.--a nocturnal séance.--song to ilogo.--a female medium.--what ilogo said. chapter xx. departure from goumbi.--querlaouen's village.--find it deserted.--querlaouen dead.--he has been killed by an elephant.--arrive at obindji's town.--meeting with querlaouen's widow.--neither malaouen nor gambo at home. chapter xxi. leave for ashira land.--in a swamp.--cross the mountains.--a leopard after us.--reach the ashira country. chapter xxii. great mountains.--ashira land is beautiful.--the people are afraid.--reach akoonga's village.--king olenda sends messengers and presents.--i reach olenda's village. chapter xxiii. king olenda comes to receive me.--he is very old.--never saw a man so old before.--he beats his kendo.--he salutes me with his kombo.--kings alone can wear the kendo. chapter xxiv. they all come to see me.--they say i have an evil eye.--ashira villages.--olenda gives a great ball in my honor.--beer-houses.--goats coming out of a mountain alive. chapter xxv. ascension of the ofoubou-orèrè and andelè mountains.--the ashiras bleed their hands.--story of a fight between a gorilla and a leopard.--the gorilla and the elephant.--wild boars. chapter xxvi. propose to start for haunted mountains.--olenda says it can not be done.--at last i leave olenda village.--a tornado.--we are lost.--we fight a gorilla.--we kill a leopard.--return to olenda. chapter xxvii. departure for the apingi country.--the ovigui river.--dangerous bridge to cross.--how the bridge was built.--glad to escape drowning.--on the way.--reach the oloumy. chapter xxviii. a gorilla.--how he attacked me.--i kill him.--minsho tells a story of two gorillas fighting.--we meet king remandji.--i fall into an elephant-pit.--reach apingi land. chapter xxix. first day in apingi land.--i fire a gun.--the natives are frightened.--i give the king a waistcoat.--he wears it.--the sapadi people.--the music-box.--i must make a mountain of beads. chapter xxx. a large fleet of canoes.--we ascend the river.--the king paddles my canoe.--agobi's village.--we upset.--the king is furious.--okabi, the charmer.--i read the bible.--the people are afraid. chapter xxxi. a great crowd of strangers.--i am made a king.--i remain in my kingdom.--good-by to the young folks. illustrations. page shooting a leopard _frontispiece._ the royal canoe the manga the mpano felling ebony-trees bringing in the wounded watching birds and monkeys shooting the new antelope querlaouen and his idol caught by jack gorilla sleeping catching the ogombons bit by a spider death of the bull elephant guanionien carrying off a mondi gambo's friend killed by a gorilla bidding good-by to quengueza "chally, chally, do not let me die" the songs to ilogo giving beads to querlaouen's wife going to ashira land reception of the king of the ashiras the kendo drinking plantain beer attack on the wild boars an ashira idol crossing the ovigui river the elephant-trap the music-box okabi and the leopard my housekeeper lost in the jungle. chapter i. paul's letter to his young friends, in which he prepares them for being "lost in the jungle." my dear young folks,--in the first book which i wrote for you, we traveled together through the gorilla country, and saw not only the gigantic apes, but also the cannibal tribes which eat men. in the second book we continued our hunting, and met leopards, elephants, hippopotami, wild boars, great serpents, etc., etc. we were stung and chased by the fierce bashikouay ants, and plagued by flies. last spring, your friend paul, not satisfied with writing for young folks, took it into his head to lecture before them. when i mentioned the subject to my acquaintances, many of them laughed at the notion of my lecturing to you, and a few remarked, "this is another of your queer notions." i did not see it!!! i thought i would try. thousands of young folks came to your friend paul's lectures in boston, brooklyn, and new york; not only did my young friends come, but a great many old folks were also seen among them. the intelligent, eager faces of his young hearers, their sparkling eyes, spoke to him more eloquently than words could do, and told him that he had done well to go into the great jungle of equatorial africa, and that they liked to hear what he had done and what he had seen. when he asked the girls and boys of new york if he should write more books for them, the tremendous cheers and hurrahs they gave him in reply told him that he had better go to work. when, at the end of his third lecture, he made his appearance in the old clothes he had worn in africa, and said he would be happy to shake hands with his young hearers, the rush then made assured him that they were his friends. oh! how your hearty hand-shaking gladdened the heart of your friend paul; he felt so happy as your small hands passed in and out of his! before writing this new volume, i went to my good and esteemed friends, my publishers in franklin square, and asked them what they thought of a new book for young folks. "certainly," they said; "by all means, friend paul. write a new book, for stories of the gorilla country and wild life under the equator are in great demand." i immediately took hold of my old journals, removed the african dust from them, and went to work, and now we are going to be lost in the jungle. * * * * * there are countries and savages with which you have been made acquainted in the two preceding volumes of which you will hear no more. miengai, ngolai, and makinda are not to lead us through a country of cannibals. aboko will slay no more elephants with me. fasiko and niamkala are to be left in their own country, and to many a great chief we have said good-by forever. if we have left good friends and tribes of savage men, we will go into new countries and among other strange people. we shall have lots of adventures; we will slay more wild beasts, and will have, fierce encounters with them, and some pretty narrow escapes. we will have some very hard times when "lost in the jungle;" we will be hungry and starving for many a day; we will see how curiously certain tribes live, what they eat and drink, how they build, and what they worship; and, before the end of our wanderings, you will see your friend paul made king over a strange people! it makes him laugh even now when he thinks of it. i am sure we will not always like our life in the woods, but i hope, nevertheless, that you will not be sorry to have gone with me in the strange countries where i am now to lead you. let us get ready to start. let us prepare our rifles, guns, and revolvers, and take with us a large quantity of shoes, quinine, powder, bullets, shot, and lots of beads and other things to make presents to the kings and people we shall meet. oh dear, what loads! and every thing has to be carried on the backs of men! i shudder when i think of the trouble; but never mind; we shall get through our trials, sickness, and dangers safely. _en avant!_ that is to say, forward! chapter ii. a queer canoe.--on the rembo.--we reach the niembouai.--a deserted village.--gazelle attacked by a snake.--etia wounded by a gorilla. the sun is hot; it is midday. the flies are plaguing us; the boco, the nchouna, the ibolai are hard at work, and the question is, which of these three flies will bite us the hardest; they feel lively, for they like this kind of weather, and they swarm round our canoes. i wish you could have seen the magnificent canoes we had; they were made of single trunks of huge trees. we had left the village of goumbi, where my good friend quengueza, of whom i have spoken before, and the best friend i had in africa, reigned. our canoes were paddling against the current of the narrow and deep river rembo. you may well ask yourselves where is the place for which i am bound. if you had seen us you might have thought we were going to make war, for the canoes were full of men who were covered with all their war fetiches; their faces were painted, and they were loaded with implements of war. the drums beat furiously, and the paddlers, as we ascended, were singing war-songs, and at times they would sing praises in honor of their king, saying that quengueza was above all kings. quengueza and i were in the royal canoe, a superb piece of wood over sixty feet long, the prow being an imitation of an immense crocodile's head, whose jaws were wide open, showing its big, sharp, pointed teeth. this was emblematic, and meant that it would swallow all the enemies of the king. in our canoe there were more than sixty paddlers. at the stern was seated old quengueza, the queen, who held an umbrella over the head of his majesty, and myself, and seated back of us all was adouma, the king's nephew, who was armed with an immense paddle, by which he guided the canoe. [illustration: the royal canoe.] how warm it was! every few minutes i dipped my old panama hat, which was full of green leaves, into the water, and also my umbrella, for, i tell you, the sun seemed almost as hot as fire. the bodies of the poor paddlers were shining with the oil that exuded from their skin. if you had closely inspected our canoes you would have seen a great number of axes; also queer-looking harpoons, the use of which you might well be curious about. we were bound for a river or creek called the niembouai, and on what i may call an african picnic; that is to say, we were going to build a camp on the banks of that river, and then we were to hunt wild beasts of the forest, but, above all, we were to try to harpoon an enormous creature called by the natives _manga_, a huge thing living in fresh water, and which one might imagine to be a kind of _whale_. the distance from goumbi to niembouai was about fifteen miles. after three hours' paddling against a strong current we reached the niembouai river. as we entered this stream the strong current ceased; the water became sluggish, and seemed to expand into a kind of lake, covered in many places with a queer kind of long tufted reed. for miles round the country looked entirely desolate. now and then a flock of pelicans were seen swimming, and a long-legged crane was looking on the shore for fish. at the mouth of the niembouai, on a high hill, stood an abandoned bakalai village called akaka; the chief, whom i had known, was dead, and the people had fled for fear of the evil spirits. nothing was left of the village but a few plantain-trees; the walls of the huts had all tumbled down. how dreary all seemed for miles round akaka. the lands were overflowed, and, as i have said before, were covered with reeds. far off against the sky, toward the east-northeast, towered high mountain peaks, which i hoped to explore. they rose blue against the sky, and seemed, as i looked at them through my telescope, to be covered with vegetation to their very tops. these mountains were the home of wild men and still wilder beasts. i thought at once how nice it would be for me to plant the stars and stripes on the highest mountains there. as we advanced farther up the river the mountains were lost sight of, and still we paddled up the niembouai. canoe after canoe closed upon us, until at last the whole fleet of king quengueza were abreast of the royal canoe, when i fired a gun, which was responded to by a terrific yell from all the men. then quengueza, with a loud voice, gave the order to make for a spot to which he pointed, where we were to land and build our camp. soon afterward we reached the place, and found the land dry, covered with huge trees to protect us from the intense heat of the sun, from the heavy dews of night, and from slight showers. the men all scattered into the forest, some to cut long poles and short sticks for our beds; others went to collect palm-leaves to make a kind of matting to be used as roofing. the first thing to be done was for the people to make a nice olako for their king and myself. our shelter was hardly finished when a terrible rainstorm burst upon us, preceded by a most terrific tornado, for we were in the month of march. by sunset the storm was all over; it cooled the air deliciously, for the heat had been intense. at noon, under the shade of my umbrella while in the canoe, the thermometer showed ° fahrenheit. we had brought lots of food, and many women had accompanied us, who were to fish, and were also to cook for the people. the harpoons were well taken care of, for we fully expected to harpoon a few of the _mangas_. the manga canoes were to arrive during the night, for the canoes we had were not fit for the capture of such large game. in the evening old quengueza was seated by the side of a bright fire; the good old man seemed quite happy. he had brought with him a jug of palm wine, from which he took a drink from time to time, until he began to feel the effects of the beverage, and became somewhat jolly. his subjects were clustered in groups around several huge fires, which blazed so brightly that the whole forest seemed to be lighted by them. i put my two mats on my bed of leaves, hung my musquito nets as a protection against the swarms of musquitoes, then laid myself down under it with one of my guns at my side, placed my revolvers under my head, and bid good-night to quengueza. i did not intend to go right to sleep, but wished to listen to the talk of the people. the prospect of having plenty of meat to eat appeared to make them merry, and after each one had told his neighbor how much he could eat if he had it, and that he could eat more manga than any other man that he knew, the subject of food was exhausted. then came stories of adventures with savage beasts and with ghosts. we had in company many great men. the chief of them all was good old quengueza, formerly a great warrior. after the king came rapero ouendogo, azisha olenga, adouma, rakenga rikati kombe, and wombi--all men of courage and daring, belonging to the abouya, a clan of warriors and hunters. we had slaves also; among them many belonged to the king--slaves that loved him, and whose courage was as great as that of any man belonging to the tribe. among them was etia, the mighty and great slayer of gorillas and elephants. etia provided game for quengueza's table; he was one of the beloved slaves of the king, and he was also a great friend of mine. we were, indeed, old friends, for we had hunted a good deal together. on a sudden all merriment stopped, for ouendogo had shouted "let etia tell us some of his hunting adventures." this order was received with a tremendous cheer, and etia was placed in the centre. how eager were the eyes and looks of those who knew the story-telling gift of their friend etia, who began thus: "years ago, i remember it as well as if it were but yesterday, i was in a great forest at the foot of a high hill, through which a little stream was murmuring; the jungle was dense, so much so that i could hardly see a few steps ahead of me; i was walking carefully along, very carefully, for i was hunting after the gorilla, and i had already met with the footprints of a huge one. i looked on the right, on the left, and ahead of me, and i wished i had had four eyes, that is, two more eyes on the back of my head, for i was afraid that a great gorilla might spring upon me from behind." we all got so impatient to hear the story that we shouted all at once, "go on, etia, go on. what did you see in the bush? tell us quick." but etia was not to be hurried faster than he chose. after a short pause, he continued: "i do not know why, but a feeling of fear crept over me. i had a presentiment that something queer was going to happen. i stood still and looked all round me. "suddenly i spied a huge python coiled round a tree near to a little brook. the serpent was perfectly quiet. his huge body was coiled several times round the tree close to the ground, and there he was waiting for animals to come and drink. it was the dry season, and water was very scarce, and many animals came to that spring to drink. i can see, even to this day, its glittering eyes. its color was almost identical with that of the bark of the tree. i immediately lay down behind another tree, for i had come also in search of game, and i could do nothing better than wait for the beasts to come there and drink. "ere long i spied a ncheri 'gazelle' coming; she approached unsuspicious of any danger. just as she was in the act of drinking, the snake sprang upon the little beast and coiled himself round it. for a short time there was a desperate struggle; the folds of the snake became tighter and tighter round the body of the poor animal. i could see how slowly, but how surely the snake was squeezing its prey to death. a few smothered cries, and all was over; the animal was dead. then the snake left the tree and began to swallow the gazelle, commencing at the head. it crushed the animal more and more in its folds. i could hear the bones crack, and i could see the animal gradually disappearing down the throat of the snake." "why did you not, etia, kill the snake at once?" shouted one man, "and then you would have had the ncheri for your dinner?" "wait," replied etia. "after i had watched the snake for a short time, i took my cutlass and cut the big creature to pieces. that night i slept near the spot. i lighted a big fire, cooked a piece of the snake for my meal, and went to sleep. "the next morning i started early, and went off to hunt. i had not been long in the forest before i heard a noise; it was a gorilla. i immediately got my gun ready, and moved forward to meet him. i crept through the jungle flat on 'my belly,' and soon i could see the great beast tearing down the lower branches of a tree loaded with fruit. suddenly he stopped, and i shouted to him, 'kombo (male gorilla), come here! come here!' he turned round and gave a terrific yell or roar, his fierce, glaring eyes looked toward me, he raised his big long arms as if to lay hold of me, and then advanced. we were very near, for i had approached quite close before i shouted my defiance to him. "when he was almost touching me, i leveled my gun--that gun which my father, king quengueza, had given me--that gun for which i have made a fetich, and which never misses an animal--then i fired. the big beast tottered, and, as it fell, one of his big hands got hold of one of my legs; his big, thick, huge fingers, as he gave his death-gasp, contracted themselves; i gave a great cry of pain, and, seizing my battle-axe, i dealt a fearful stroke and broke its arm just above the joint. but his fingers and nails had gone deep into my flesh, which it lacerated and tore." etia pointed to his leg, and continued: "i have never gotten over it to this day, though it is so long ago that very few of you that are here to-night were born then. i began to bleed and bleed, and feared that the bone of my leg was broken. i left the body of the gorilla in the woods, but took its head with me, and that head i have still in my plantation; and at times," added etia, "its jaws open during the night, and it roars and says, 'etia, why have you killed me?' i am sure that gorilla had been a man before. that is the reason i am lame to this day. i succeeded in reaching my pindi (plantation), and my wife took care of me; but from that day i have hated gorillas, and i have vowed that i would kill as many of them as i could." the story of etia had the effect of awakening every one. they all shouted that etia is a great hunter, that etia had been bewitched before he started that time, and that if it had not been for etia having a powerful monda (fetich), he would have been killed by the gorilla. our story-telling was interrupted by the arrival of canoes, just built for the fishing of the manga. these canoes were unlike other canoes; they were flat-bottomed, as flat as a board; the sides were straight, and both ends were sharp-pointed, and, when loaded, with two men, did not draw in the water, i am sure, half an inch. they glided over the water, causing scarcely a ripple. there was no seat, and a man had to paddle standing up, the paddle being almost as long as a man. these canoes were about twenty-five feet long, and from eighteen to twenty inches broad. in them were several queer kinds of harpoons, which were to be used in capturing the mangas. chapter iii. harpooning a manga.--a great prize.--our canoe capsized.--description of the manga.--return to camp. the next morning, very early, if you had been on the banks of the niembouai, you would have seen me on one of those long flat-bottomed canoes which i have described to you, and in it you would likewise have seen two long manga harpoons. a man by the name of ratenou, who had the reputation of being one of the best manga harpooners, and of knowing where they were to be found, was with me. he was covered with fetiches, and had in a pot a large quantity of leaves of a certain shrub, which had been mashed with water and then dried. this mixture, when scattered on the water, is said to attract the manga. when we left the shore, being less of an expert than ratenou, and not being able to stand up so easily as he did, i seated myself at the bottom of the canoe. ratenou recommended me not to move at all, and while he paddled i could not even hear the dip of his paddle in the water, so gently did our boat glide along. we crossed the niembouai to the opposite shore, where we lay by among the reeds. by that time the twilight had just made its appearance, and you know the twilight is of short duration under the equator; indeed, there is hardly any at all. ratenou threw on the water, not far from where we lay in watch, some of the green stuff he had in the pot, and we had not waited long before i saw, coming along the surface of the water, a huge beast, which gave two or three puffs and then disappeared. my man watched intently, and in the mean time moved the canoe toward the spot. we came from behind, so that the animal could not see us, and, just as the manga came to the surface of the water once more, and gave three gentle puffs, ratenou sent the harpoon with tremendous force into his body. the huge creature, with a furious dash and jerk at the line, made for the bottom of the river. ratenou let the line slip, but held back as much as he dared, in order thus to increase the pain inflicted on the beast. the suspense and excitement were great. the animal dashed down to the bottom with impetuous haste, but the harpoon was fast in him, and held him. we watched the rope going out with the utmost anxiety. the harpoon has hardly struck the manga when our canoe goes with fearful rapidity. the native's rope proved too short; there was not enough of it to let it go. every moment i fully expected to upset, and did not relish the idea at all. finally the rope slackened; the manga was getting exhausted. at last no strain was observable; the beast was dead. without apparently much effort, the line was hauled in, and presently i saw the huge beast alongside the canoe. "let us upset the canoe," said ratenou. "what!" said i. "let us upset the canoe." the good fellow, who was not overloaded with clothes, thought that to be an easy task; but i did not look at the proposal quite in the same light; so i said, "ratenou, let us paddle the canoe to the shore, and i will get out." it was hardly said before it was done. i landed, and then the huge manga was tied to the canoe, the latter was capsized over its back, and then we turned it over again. this was a big prize, for there is no meat so much thought of among the savages as that of the manga. we immediately made for the camp, and were received with uproarious cheers. the canoe was upset once more, and the big freshwater monster was dragged ashore. it was hard work, for the huge beast must have weighed from fifteen to eighteen hundred pounds. [illustration: the manga.] what a queer-looking thing it was! the manga is a new species of manatee. its body is of a dark lead-color; the skin is very thick and smooth, and covered in all parts with single bristly hairs, from half an inch to an inch in length; but the hairs are at a distance from each other, so that the skin appears almost smooth. the eyes are small--very small; it has a queer-looking head, the upper and lower parts of the lips having very hard and bristly hair. the manga is unlike the whale in this, that it has two paddles, which are used as hands; and, when the flesh or skin is removed, the skeleton of the paddles looks very much like the bony frame of a hand. i have named this curious species after my most esteemed friend, professor owen, of london, _manatus oweni_. the skin of the manga, when dried, is of a most beautiful amber color; the nearer the middle of the back, the more beautiful and intense the yellow. the skin is there more than one inch in thickness. when fresh it has a milky color, but when it dries, and the water goes off, it turns yellow. that part of the back is carefully cut in strips by the natives, who make whips with it, just in the same way as they do with the hippopotamus hide, and these whips are used extensively on the backs of their wives. the large, broad tail, which is shown in the engraving, is used by them as a rudder, while their hands are used as paddles. these hands, unlike those of seals, have no claws or nails. this manga was eleven feet long, and the body looked quite huge. mangas feed entirely on grass and the leaves of trees, the branches of which fall into the water; they feed, also, on the grass found at the bottom of the rivers. in looking at such curious shaped things, i could not help thinking what queer animals were found on our globe. the doctor was greatly rejoiced at our success. then came the ceremony of cutting up the beast; but, before commencing, ratenou, the manga doctor, went through some ceremony round the carcase which he did not want any one to see. after a little he began to cut up the meat. it was very fat; on the stomach the fat must have been about two inches thick. the lean meat was white, with a reddish tinge, and looked very nice. it is delicious, something like pork, but finer grained and of sweeter flavor. it must be smoked for a few days in order to have it in perfection. we cut the body into pieces of about half a pound each, and put them on the oralas and smoked master manga. the fragrance filled our camp. the manga belongs to the small but singular group of animals classed as sirenia. i have often watched these manga feeding on the leaves of trees, the branches of which hung close to the water. the manga's head only shows above the water. when thus seen, the manga bears a curious resemblance to a human being. they never go ashore, and do not crawl even partly out of the water. they must sometimes weigh as much as two to three thousand pounds. chapter iv. we go into the forest.--hunt for ebony-trees.--the fish-eagles.--capture of a young eagle.--impending fight with them.--fearful roars of gorillas.--gorillas breaking down trees. several weeks have passed since we left the niembouai. i have been alone with my three great hunters, querlaouen, gambo, and malaouen. we are sworn friends; we have resolved to live in the woods and to wander through them. several times since we left our manga-fishing we have been "lost in the jungle." we have had some very hard times, but splendid hunting; and on the evening of that day of which i speak, we were quietly seated somewhere near the left bank of the river ovenga, by the side of a bright fire, and, at the same time my men enjoyed their smoke, we talked over the future prospects of our life in the forest. that evening i said, "boys, let us go into the forest and look for ebony-trees; i want to find them; i must take some of that wood with me when i go back to the land of 'the spirits.'" malouen, gambo, and querlaouen shouted at once, "let us go in search of the ebony-tree; let us choose a spot where we shall be able to find game." for i must tell you that good eating was one of the weak points of my three friends. the ebony-tree is scattered through the forest in clusters. it is one of the finest and most-graceful among the many lovely trees that adorn the african forest. its leaves are long, sharp-pointed, and of a dark green color. its bark is smooth, and also a dark green. the trunk rises straight as an arrow. queer to say, the ebony-tree, when old, becomes hollow, and even some of its branches are hollow. next to the bark is a white "sap-wood." generally that sap-wood is three or four inches thick; so, unless one knows the tree by the bark, the first few blows of an axe would not reveal to him the dark, black wood found inside. young ebony-trees of two feet diameter are often perfectly white; then, as the tree grows bigger, the black part is streaked with the white, and as the tree matures, the black predominates, and eventually takes the place of the white. the wood of the ebony-tree is very hard; the grain short and very brittle. [illustration] you can see that it is no slight work to cut down such big trees with the small axes we had, such as represented in the accompanying drawing. i show you, also, the drawing of a mpano, which is the instrument used in hollowing out the trunks of trees to make canoes. after wandering for some hours we found several ebony-trees. how beautiful they were, and how graceful was the shape of their sharp-pointed leaves! these trees were not very far from the river, or i should rather say from a creek which fell into the ovenga river, so that it would not be difficult to carry our ebony logs to the banks and there load them on canoes. we immediately went to work and built a nice camp. we had with us two boys, njali and nola, who had been sent with a canoe laden with provisions from one of querlaouen's plantations, and which his wife had forwarded to us. some bunches of plantains were of enormous size. there were two bunches of bananas for me, and sundry baskets of cassava and peanuts. there was also a little parcel of dried fish, which querlaouen's wife had sent specially to her friend chally. we set to work, and soon succeeded in felling two ebony-trees. we arranged to go hunting in the morning, and cut the wood into billets in the afternoon. as we were not in a hurry, and it was rather hard work, we determined to take our time. by the side of our camp we had a beautiful little stream, where we obtained our drinking water, and a little below that spot there was a charming place where we could take a bath. not far from our camp there was a creek called eliva mono (the mullet's creek), so named on account of the great number of mullets which at a certain season of the year come there to spawn. besides the mono, the creek contained great numbers of a fish called condo. large and tall trees grew on the banks of the creek. [illustration: felling ebony-trees.] this creek was at that time of the year a resort for the large fish-eagles. these birds could look down from the tops of the high trees, on which they perched, upon the water below, and watch for their finny prey. the waters of the creek were so quiet that half the time not a ripple could be seen on them. high up on some of the trees could be seen the nests belonging to these birds of prey. there were several eagles, and they belonged to two different species. one was called by the natives _coungou_, and was known all over the country, for it is found as far as the sea. its body was white, and of the size of a fowl, and it had black wings, the spread of which was very great, and the birds were armed with thick and strong talons. the females were of a gray color. another eagle was also found on the creek. it was a larger bird, of dark color, and called by the natives the compagnondo (_tephrodornis ocreatus_). the shrill cries of this bird could be heard at a great distance, sounding strangely in the midst of the great solitude. both these eagles feed on fish, and two of the coungous had their nest on the top of a very high tree, and in that nest there were young ones. the nest was built, like most of the fish-eagles' nests, with sticks of trees, and occupied a space of several feet in diameter. when once the nest is built it is occupied a good number of years in succession. it is generally placed between the forks of the branches, and can be seen at a great distance. each year the nest requires repairs, which both the male and female birds attend to. these coungous seemed very much attached to each other. after one of a pair had been shot, i would hear the solitary one calling for its mate, and it would remain day after day near the spot, and at last would either take another mate or fly off to another country. when a pair of coungous, male and female, were killed, then the next year another couple would take possession of their nest. i often watched the coungous' nest. they were always on the look-out for fish. now and then they would dive and seize a fine mullet, which they would carry up to their young and feed them. how quick they were in their motion! sometimes one would catch a fish so big and heavy that it seemed hardly strong enough to rise in the air with it. the natives say that sometimes the eagles are carried under the water when they have caught a fish too big for their strength, and from whose body they can not extricate their firmly-fixed talons before the fish dives to the bottom. when the old birds approached the nest with food the young ones became very noisy, evincing their impatience for the treat of fresh fish, with which the parents sometimes hovered over the nest as if desirous of tantalizing their appetite. one day i took it into my head to have the tree cut down, so that i could examine the nest. the old birds were greatly excited, for they saw that something was wrong. at last the tree fell with a great crash. i immediately made for the nest, and i can not tell you what a stench arose from it; it was fearful. remnants of decayed fish and many other kinds of offal made a smell which it was surprising the young eagles could endure. in the mean time the young ones had tumbled out of the nest, and while we were looking for them, and just after i had captured one, the parents came swooping down. goodness! i thought i was going to be attacked by them, for they hovered round, sometimes coming quite close to me; once or twice i thought my hat at least would be carried off. becoming worried, i raised my gun and fired, and killed the male; then the female got frightened and flew away. the young were covered with gray down. they must certainly possess very limited powers of smell, for i can not see how any living thing could exist in the midst of such odors. on one of my excursions up the creek i discovered another coungou nest, and, as it was not built in a very high tree, i determined to examine its economy. so, with pretty hard work, i climbed up another tree, from whence, with the aid of my field-telescope, i could watch all that went on in the nest, which contained two young eagles. during the first few days the old birds would feed their young by tearing the flesh of the fish with their beaks, while their talons held it fast. when the coungous are young, the male and female have the same gray plumage, which in the male turns white and black when old. one fine afternoon i left the camp all alone, gambo, malaouen, and querlaouen being fast asleep. before i knew it, i found myself far away, for i had been thinking of home and of friends, and, walking in a good hunting path, i had gone farther than i thought, and time had fled pleasantly. i carried on my shoulder a double-barrel, smooth-bore gun, intending to take a short walk in the woods. when i looked at my watch, it was o'clock! i had been gone three hours. just as i was ready to turn back, i thought i heard distant thunder. i listened attentively, and i perceived that the noise was not thunder, but the terrific roar of a gorilla at some distance. though it was getting late, i thought i would go in that direction; so i took out the small shot with which one of the barrels of my gun was loaded, and put in a heavy bullet instead. my revolvers were in the belt round my waist, and had been loaded that very morning. as i approached the spot where the beast was, the more awful sounded the roar, till at last the whole forest re-echoed with the din, and appeared to shake with the tremendous voice of the animal. it was awful; it was appalling to hear. what lungs the monster had, to enable him to emit so deep and awe-inspiring a noise. the other inhabitants of the forest seemed to be silent; the few birds that were in it had stopped their warbling. suddenly i heard a crash--two crashes. the animal was in the act of breaking the limbs of trees. then the noise of the breaking of trees ceased, and the roar of the monster recommenced. this time it was answered by a weaker roar. the echoes swelled and died away from hill to hill, and the whole forest was filled with the din. the man gorilla and his wife were talking together: they no doubt understood each other, but i could not hear any articulate sound. i stopped and examined my gun. just as i got ready to enter the jungle from the hunting-path to go after the male gorilla, the roaring ceased. i waited for its renewal, but the silence of the forest was no more to be disturbed that day. after waiting half an hour i hurried back toward the camp. i walked as fast as i could, for i was afraid that darkness would overtake me. six o'clock found me in the woods; the sun had just set, and the short twilight of the equator which followed the setting of the sun warned me to hurry faster than ever if i wanted to reach the camp. hark! i hear voices. what can these voices be, those of friends or enemies? i moved from the hunting-path and ascended an adjacent tree, but soon i heard voices that i recognized as those of malaouen and querlaouen shouting "moguizi, where are you? moguizi, where are you?" i responded "i am coming! i am coming!" and soon after they gave a tremendous hurrah; we had met. we soon reached the camp, and i rested my weary limbs by the side of a blazing fire and dried my clothes, which were quite wet, for i had crossed several little streams. chapter v. lost.--querlaouen says we are bewitched.--monkeys and parrots.--a deserted village.--strange scene before an idol.--bringing in the wounded.--an invocation. we soon after left the left bank of the ovenga and crossed over to the other side, but not before having carefully stored under shelter the billets of ebony-wood we had taken so much pains to cut, and which i wanted to take home with me. the country where we now were was very wild, and seemed entirely uninhabited. at any rate, we did not know of any people or village for miles round. after wandering for many, many days through the forest, we came suddenly on a path. immediately querlaouen, gambo, malaouen, and i held a great council, and, in order not to be heard in case some one might pass, we went back half a mile farther from the path in the forest. then we seated ourselves, and began to speak in a low voice. querlaouen spoke first, and said that he did not know the country, and could not tell what we had better do, except that every one should have his gun ready, and his powder and bullets handy, his eyes wide open, and his ears ready to catch even the sound of a falling leaf or the footsteps of a gazelle. gambo said querlaouen was right. then malouen rose and said: "for days we have been in these woods, and we have seen no living being, no path; we have fed on wild honey, on berries, nuts, and fruits, and to-day we have at last come upon a path. we know that the path has been made by some people or other. it is true we know that we are in the ashankolo mountains; that the tribe of bakalai, living there, are a fighting people; but," he said, "he thought it was better to go back and follow the path until we came to the place where the people lived." querlaouen got up and said: "we have been lost in this forest, and, though we look all round us, there is not a tree we recognize; the little streams we pass we know not. the ant-hills we have seen are not the same as those in our own country. the large stones are not of the shape of the stones we are accustomed to look upon. we must have been bewitched before we left the village." this suggestion of friend querlaouen was received by a cheer from my two other fellows, i being the only one that did not believe in what he said. "for," continued he, "this has never happened to us before. yes, somebody wants to bewitch us." while he thus talked, his gentle and amiable face assumed a fierce expression, and the other two said "yes, somebody wants to bewitch us; but he had better look out, for surely he will die." at last i said, "let us get back to the path, and follow it; perhaps we will meet some strange adventure." just as we rose to move on we heard the chatter of monkeys, and we made for the spot whence the sound proceeded, in the hope that we might kill one or two. carefully we went through the jungle, the prospect of killing a monkey filling our hearts with joy; for we could already, in anticipation, see a bright fire blazing, and some part of a monkey boiling in the little iron pot we carried with us; for myself, i imagined a nice piece roasting on a bright charcoal fire. at last we came to the foot of a very high tree, and, raising our heads, we could see several monkeys. the tree was so tremendously high that the monkeys hardly appeared larger than squirrels. how could our small shot reach the top of that tree, which was covered with red berries, upon which the monkeys were quietly feeding? although we could not reach them, they were not to be left in undisturbed possession, for a large flock of gray parrots, with red tails, flew round and round the tree, screeching angry defiance at the monkeys, who had at first been hidden by the thick leaves. the monkeys screamed back fierce menaces, running out on the slender branches in vain endeavor to catch their feathered opponents, who would fly off, only to return with still more angry cries. both parrots and monkeys being out of reach of our guns, we were obliged to leave them to settle the right of possession to the rich red fruit. how weary we were when we struck the path again! and, having first passed a field of plantain-trees, we at last arrived at a village. not a living creature was to be seen in it. not even a goat, a fowl, or a dog, although we found several fires smouldering, from which the smoke still ascended. we proceeded carefully, for we did not know what kind of people inhabited this village. but i said, "boys, let us go straight through the place." so we went on until we came to an ouandja (a building), where, in a dark corner of a room, stood a huge image of an idol. oh! how ugly it was. it represented a woman with a wide-open mouth, through which protruded a long, sharp-pointed iron tongue. at the foot of the idol we found the skulls of all kinds of animals, elephants, leopards, hyenas, monkeys, and squirrels--even of crocodiles; and skins of snakes, intermingled with bunches of dry, queer-looking leaves, the ashes of burnt bones, and the shells of huge land turtles. how horribly strange the big idol looked in the corner! it made me shudder. the village was deserted, darkness was coming on, and the question now was, what were we going to do? should we sleep in that forlorn-looking village or not? if we staid there the villagers might return when we were asleep. for some time we regarded each other in silence; then i said, "boys, i think we had better sleep in the forest, away from the path, but not far from the village." gambo, malouen, and querlaouen shouted with one voice, "that is so. let us sleep in the forest, for this village seems to us full of aniemba (witchcraft)." so we returned to the jungle, and collected large leaves to be used for roofing a hut which was quickly built with limbs from dead trees that lay scattered about, yielding also a plentiful supply of wood for a rousing fire. when every thing was ready, i pulled my matchbox from my bag and lighted our fire. night came, and all life seemed to go to rest. now and then i could hear the cry of some wild night animal, which had left his lair in search of prey, and was calling for its mate. before midnight we were aroused by the muttering of distant thunder; a tornado was coming. the trees began to shake violently, the wind became terrific; soon we heard the branches of trees breaking; then the trees themselves began to fall, and with such a crash as to alarm us greatly. suddenly, not far from our hut, one of the big giant trees of the forest came down with a fearful noise, and crushing in its mighty fall dozens of other trees, one of them adjoining our camp. we got up in the twinkle of an eye, frightened out of our wits, for we fancied the whole forest was going to tumble down. the monkeys chattered; a terrific roar from a gorilla resounded through the forest, mingling with the howls of hyenas. snakes, no doubt, were crawling about. immediately after the falling of the great tree near us we heard a novel and tremendous noise in the jungle, coming from a herd of elephants fleeing in dismay, and breaking down every thing in their path. "goodness gracious!" i shouted, in english, "what does all this mean? are we going to be buried alive in the forest?" the words were scarcely out of my mouth when there came a blinding flash of lightning, instantaneously followed by a peal of thunder like a volley from a hundred cannon, that seemed to shake the very earth to its foundation; and then the rain fell in torrents, and soon deluged the ground. happily, we knew what we were about when we built our fires, for we had started them on the top of large logs of wood, so arranged that it would have required more than a foot of water on the ground before it could reach the fires and extinguish them. then our leaves were so broad and nicely arranged that they entirely protected us from the storm, and our shelter was perfected by the branches of the great tree which, in falling, had apparently threatened our destruction. the terrible hubbub lasted some hours, the continued lightning and thunder preventing sleep; but toward o'clock in the morning the storm ceased, and all again became quiet; only the dripping of the water from the leaves could be heard; then we went to sleep, but not before having arranged our fires in such a manner that we could go to rest in comparative safety. in the early morning, before dawn, and while we were only half awake, i thought i heard the sound of a human voice. listen! we all listened attentively, and gambo laid down with his ears to the ground, and then he declared that he distinctly heard voices in the direction of the village. there was no doubt--the people had returned. "let us go," said i, "and find out what kind of neighbors these are. we have our guns and plenty of ammunition, so we need not fear them; but let us act with caution." this was agreed to. so, leaving our camp, we quietly crept near the village, until we gained a spot from whence we could see all that was going on. men with lighted torches were entering the village, and four of them bore what, to all appearances, was a dead body, which they deposited before the huge idol, now moved out into the open street. the gleam of the torches revealed to us that this prostrate body had been pierced by many spears, part of which still remained in it. [illustration: bringing in the wounded.] every man was armed to the teeth, but not a woman was visible. the scene was strange and wild. not a word was uttered after the body of the wounded man had been laid on the ground. how strange and wild the men looked by the lurid glare of their torches! their bodies were painted and covered with fetiches. just back of the huts stood the tall trees, whose branches moved to and fro in the wind. i could hear its whispers as it passed through the foliage of the trees. the stars were shining beautifully, and a few fleecy white clouds were floating above our heads. i wish you could have seen us as we lay flat on the ground. our eyes must have been bright indeed as we looked on the wild scene; and this i know, that our hearts were beating strongly as we lay close together. if, perchance, one of us had been seized with a fit of sneezing, or a fit of coughing, it might have been the end of us, for the savages would have been alarmed, and, believing us to be enemies, would at once have attacked us; so we had started on a rather risky business. i had never thought of it before; it was always so with me at that time. i thought of the danger after i was in it. soon another batch of men made their appearance, carrying another wounded man, who appeared almost dead, and they laid him by the side of the other, and then the women came in, carrying their babies and leading their children. there stood the huge idol looking grimly at the scene. how ugly it seemed, with its copper eyes and wide-open mouth, which showed two rows of sharp-pointed teeth! in one of its hands it held a sharp-pointed knife, and in the other it held a bearded spear. it had a necklace of leopards' teeth, and its hideous head was decorated with birds' feathers. one side of its face was painted yellow, the other white; the forehead was painted red, and a black stripe did duty for eyebrows. i could not make out whether it represented a male or a female. by its side stood the people, as silent as the idol itself. at last a man came in front of the idol, and at once, by the language he spoke in, we knew him to be a bakalai. "mbuiti," he said, addressing the idol, "we have been to the war, and now we have returned. there lie before thee two of our number; look at them. you see the spear-wounds that have gone into their bodies. they can not talk. when they were strong they went to the jungle and shot game, and when they had killed it they always brought some to give thee; many times they have brought to thee antelopes, wild boars, and other wild beasts. they have brought thee sugar-cane, ground-nuts, plantains, and bananas; they have given thee palm wine to drink. oh, mbuiti, do thou heal them!" and all the people shouted "do make them well." how queer their voices resounded in the forest! suddenly all the torches were extinguished, and the village was again in darkness. not a voice was heard; complete silence followed. they were evidently afraid of an attack, and retired quietly to their huts. i was very glad that we had managed to see all this without having been discovered; did not think it safe, however, to move away before giving the villagers time to fall asleep, and then we realized new causes for apprehension. it was not a very pleasant or safe thing to be out in this jungle in the early morning before it was light. we might tread on a snake, or lay hold of one folded among the lower branches of the trees on which we laid our hands; or a wandering leopard might be prowling round; and, as there certainly were gorillas in the neighborhood, we might come on a tree which a female gorilla with a baby had climbed into for the night, and then we should have the old fellow upon us showing fight. i confess i did not care to fight gorillas in the dark. again, a party of bashikouay might be encountered, when nothing would be left for us but flight. after our breakfast of nuts and berries, the question naturally arose, shall we go back to the strange village? "certainly not," at once said querlaouen; "we do not know what kind of bakalai they are." when my turn to speak came, i said, "boys, why not go and learn from these people the causes which led to their affray, and at the same time learn exactly in what part of the forest we are?" for about a minute we were all silent. my three savages were thinking about my proposal; then malaouen said, "chaillie, we had better not go. who knows? it may be that the wounded men we saw the people bringing into the village were found speared in the path, and, if so, we might be suspected of being the men who speared them. then," said he, "what a palaver we should get in! and there would be no other way for us to get out of our troubles except by fighting. you know that the bakalai here fight well." we all gave our assent to malaouen's wise talk, for i must tell you, boys, my three men had good common sense, and many a time have i listened to their counsels. "besides, we have a good deal of hunting to do," said malaouen, "and we had better attend to it." "yes," we all said, with one voice. "let us attend to our hunting. let us have a jolly good time in the woods, and kill as many gorillas, elephants, leopards, antelopes, wild boars, and other wild beasts as we can." it being settled we should not go back to the village, we all got up, looked at our guns carefully, and plunged into the woods once more. if you could have seen us, you would have said, what wild kind of chaps these four fellows are! indeed we did look wild. we did not mind it; our hearts were bound together, we were such great friends. i am sure many of you who read these pages would have been our friends also, if you had been there. chapter vi. a white gorilla.--meeting two gorillas.--the female runs away.--the man gorilla shows fight.--he is killed.--his immense hands and feet.--strange story of a leopard and a turtle. some time has elapsed since that strange night-scene i have described to you in the preceding chapter. we had gone, as you are aware, into the woods hunting for wild game. all i can say is, that i wish some of you had been with us. we had a glorious time! lots of fun, and cleared that part of the forest of the few wild beasts that were in it: one elephant, one gorilla, three antelopes, two wild boars were killed, besides smaller game, and some queer-looking birds. once or twice we had pretty narrow escapes. i wish you had been with us to enjoy the thunder and lightning. it would have given you an idea of the noise the thunder can make, and the brightness a flash of lightning can attain; how heavy the rain can fall; and a tornado would have shown you how strong the wind can blow. for the thunder we hear and the rains that fall at home can not give us any conception of what takes place in the mountainous and woody regions of equatorial africa. after all, there is some enjoyment in being "lost in the jungle" in the country in which i have taken you to travel with me. once more i am in sight of the ovenga. for some time the people inhabiting the banks of that river had whispered among themselves that a white gorilla had been seen. at first the story of a white gorilla was believed in by only a few, but at last the white gorilla's appearance was the talk of every body. gambo, querlaouen, and malaouen were firm believers in it. both men and women would come back to their villages and assure the people that they had had a glimpse of the creature. he looked so old he could hardly walk. his hair was perfectly white, and he was terribly wrinkled. he must have lived forever in the forest, and was, no doubt, the great-grandfather of hundreds of gorillas. his wife must have died long ago. he was a monster in size. then old men said they remembered, when they were boys, that a man disappeared from the village; perhaps he had been caught by that very gorilla. "how is it," said i to the people, "that i have never seen a white gorilla?" they would answer, "there are white-headed men, so there are white-haired gorillas. a white gorilla is not often to be seen, for when he becomes so old that he turns white, he lives quite alone, and in a part of the forest where people can not go, for the jungle is too thick there. he seems to be too knowing, and keeps out of the way of the hunting-path." "of course," they would add, "its skin remains black." day after day we went through the forest to see if we could get a glimpse of the white gorilla. we had been a whole week in quest of the white gorilla, never camping twice in the same spot; often malaouen and querlaouen declared that they would go and hunt alone, while gambo and i, with a boy we had with us, should choose our own course, always appointing a certain place near a hunting-path where we could all meet at sunset. on the last day of the week, we had been on the hunt for several hours, when we came upon tolerably fresh tracks of a gorilla; judging by the immense footprints he had left on the ground, he must be a monster--a tremendous big fellow. was he a white gorilla or not? these tracks we followed cautiously, and at last, in a densely-wooded and quite dark ravine, we came suddenly upon two gorillas, a male and a female. the old man gorilla was by the side of his wife, fondly regarding her. they had no baby. how dark and horrid their intensely black faces appeared! i watched them for a few minutes, for, thanks to the dense jungle in which we were concealed, i was not perceived at once. but, on a sudden, the female uttered a cry of alarm, and ran off before we could get a shot at her, being lost to sight in a moment. we were not in a hurry to fire at her. of course the male must be killed first; it is ten times safer to get him out of the way. the male had no idea of running off. as soon as the female disappeared, he gazed all round with his savage-looking eyes. he then rose slowly from his haunches, and at once faced us, uttering a roar of rage at our evidently untimely intrusion, coming as we had to disturb him and frighten his wife, when they were quietly seated side by side. gambo and i were accompanied by the boy, who carried our provisions and an extra gun, a double-barrel smooth bore. the boy fell to the rear of us, and we stood side by side and awaited the advance of the hideous monster. in the dim half-light of the ravine, his features working with rage; his gloomy, treacherous, mischievous gray eyes; his rapidly-agitated and frightful, satyr-like face, had a horrid look, enough to make one fancy him really a spirit of the damned, a very devil. how his hair moved up and down on the top of his head. he advanced upon us by starts, as it is their fashion--as i have told you in my other books--pausing to beat his fists upon his vast breast, which gave out a dull, hollow sound, like some great base-drum with a skin of oxhide. then, showing his enormous teeth at the same time, he made the forest ring with his short, tremendous, powerful bark, which he followed by a roar, the refrain of which is singularly like the loud muttering of thunder. the earth really shook under our feet--the noise was frightful. i have heard lions' roars, but certainly the lion's roar can not be compared with that of the gorilla. we stood our ground for at least three long minutes--at least it seemed so to me--the guns in our hands, before the great beast was near enough for a safe shot. during this time i could not help thinking that i had heard that a man had been killed only a few days before; and, as i looked at the gorilla in front of me, i thought that if i missed the beast, i would be killed also. so i said to myself, "be careful, friend paul, for if you miss the fellow, he won't miss you." i realized the horror of a poor fellow when, with empty gun, he stands before his remorseless enemy, who, not with a sudden spring like the leopard, but with a slow, vindictive look, comes to put him to death. at last he stood before us at a distance of six yards. once more he paused, and gambo and i raised our guns as he again began to roar and beat his chest, and just as he took another step forward, we fired, and down he tumbled, almost at our feet, upon his face--dead. but he was not the _white gorilla_. how glad i was. i saw at once that we had killed the very animal i wanted. his height was five feet nine inches, measured to the tip of the toes. his arms spread nine feet. his chest had a circumference of sixty-two inches. his arms were of most prodigious muscular strength. his hands, those terrible, claw-like weapons, almost like a man's, having the same shaped nails, and with one blow of which he can tear out the bowels of a man and break his ribs or arms, were of immense size. i could understand how terrible a blow could be struck with such a hand, moved by such an arm, all swollen into great bunches of muscular fibres. when i took hold of his hands, i shall not say _in_ mine, for his were so large that my hands looked like those of a baby by the side of his. how cold his hands were, how callous, how thick and black the nails, as black as his face and skin. what a huge foot he possessed! where is the giant that could show such prodigious feet? we disemboweled the monster on the spot. malouen and querlaouen, who had heard our guns, joined us, and we built a camp close by. my three fellows were very fond of gorilla's meat, and they had a great treat. the brain was carefully saved by them. in the evening gambo told us some stories, one of which, the last one, i will relate to you. it relates to the leopard, and goes to prove that this ferocious animal has no friend. the legend of coniambiÉ. coniambié was a king, who made an orambo (a trap) in which a ncheri (gazelle) was caught. after it had been caught, it cried and called for its companion; then a ngivo (another gazelle) was caught. the ngivo cried, and a wild boar came and was caught; then an antelope came, and was caught; afterward a bongo and a buffalo came, and all were caught, and all of them died in the trap. at that time coniambié was in the mountains. a leopard was caught also, but did not die. then came a turtle, who released the leopard from the trap. then the leopard wanted to kill the turtle which had saved him. the leopard got hold of the turtle to kill it, but the turtle, seeing this, drew her head, legs, and tail inside her shell, but not before she had managed to get into the hollow of an old tree, with the leopard after her in the hollow, and he could not get away. the tree is called ogana, and bears a berry on which monkeys are fond of feeding. so there came to the tree at this time, for the purpose of feeding, a miengai, or white-mustached monkey; a ndova, the white-nosed monkey; a nkago, the red-headed monkey; an oganagana, a blackish monkey; a mondi, which has very long black hair; a nchegai and a pondi, who all came to eat the berries. when the leopard heard the noise of the monkeys, he shouted, "monkeys, come and release me!" then they came and helped the leopard out of the hole. but the leopard, instead of being grateful, fought with the monkeys, and ate the nkago and the ndova. then the monkey called a mpondi said, "_mai! mai!_ that is so; that is so! you leopards are noted rogues. the leopard and the goat do not live together at the same place. we came to help you, and, as soon as you were helped, you began to kill us. _mai! mai!_ you are a rogue." moral. the reason why the leopard wanders solitary and alone is on account of his roguery; he is not to be trusted. there are men who can not be trusted any more than the leopard. we shouted with one voice, "that is so; there are men who can not be any more trusted than the leopard, for they are so treacherous and deceitful." then we canvassed the bad qualities of the leopard, and concluded that he had not a single friend in the forest. after this story was concluded we gave another look to our fires, and then went to sleep. this was the way, young folks, we spent many of our evenings when we were not too tired traveling in the great forest. chapter vii. return to the ovenga river.--the monkeys and their friends the birds.--they live together.--watch by moonlight for game.--kill an oshengui. after wandering through the forest for many days, we reached once more the banks of the river rembo ovenga, the waters of which had fallen twelve or fifteen feet, for we are in the dry season. the numerous aquatic birds and waders which come with the dry weather give the river a lively, pleasant appearance. the white sand which lines many parts of the shore is beautiful. the mornings are cool, and sometimes foggy. the dark green of the well-wooded banks had something grand about it. i, poor and lonely traveler, had a charming scene before me. the stream is still yellow, but far less so than in the rainy season. then the rains were driving down a turbulent tide laden with mud washed down from the mountains and valleys; now the waters roll on placidly, as though all was peace and civilization on their borders. new birds had come. the otters were plentiful, and fed on the fish that were thick in the stream. in that great jungle beasts had been scarce for some time, and we had a hard time to get food. but what a glorious time we had by ourselves in that forest! oh how i enjoyed rambling in that jungle, though toiling hard, and often hungry and sick! how glad i always was when i returned to the banks of the rembo ovenga! i loved that river, for i knew that its waters, as they glided down, would disappear in that very ocean whose waves bathed the shores of both the old and the new world. at times, when seated on its banks, i could not help it, i would think of friends absent, but dear to me. i remembered those i loved--i remembered the boys and girls who were slowly but surely growing men and women, but who were still young folks in my memory, though years were flying fast. the lad of the jungle had become a man also; his mustache had made its appearance, and had grown a good deal; his face had become older--probably he found it so when perchance he gazed in the looking-glass he carried with him. disease, anxiety, sleepless nights, and traveling under the burning sun had begun to do their work; but, in despite of all, my heart was still young, and i loved more than ever those friends i had left behind. i had come back to obindji to see if i could get some plantains or smoked cassada, and then intended to return to the woods in search of new animals and new insects. king obindji welcomed me, and was delighted to see malaouen, querlaouen, and gambo once more, and his wives got food ready for us. then we started again for the forest. i took with me lots of small shot of different sizes for birds, and once more we would get lost in the jungle, but from time to time we would come back to the uninhabited banks of the wild ovenga to look at our river. one day, wandering in the forest, i spied a queer-looking bird i had not seen before, and i immediately got ready to chase it. this bird was called by the natives the monkey-bird (_buceros albocrystatus_). [illustration: watching birds and monkeys.] as i was looking at that queer bird i spied a monkey, two monkeys, three monkeys, four, five, six, ten monkeys. these monkeys looked very small, and were called oshengui by the natives. then i saw more of the queer birds, and lo! i perceived they were all playing with these little monkeys--yes, playing with these oshenguis. strange indeed they looked, with their long-feathered tail, queer-looking body, and strange big beak. they followed those little monkeys as they leaped from branch to branch; sometimes i thought they would rest on the backs of the monkeys, but no, they would perch close to them, and then the monkey and the bird would look at each other. i never heard a note from the birds--they were as silent as the trees themselves. the oshengui would look at them and utter a kind of kee, kee, kee, and then they would move on, and the birds would follow. day after day i would meet those birds, and then i would look for the monkeys, and was sure to see them. no wonder they are called the monkey-bird. but then i never saw them follow any monkeys but the oshengui. i wondered why they followed them; i could not imagine the reason. i never saw them resting on the birds, but i noticed that these birds were fond of the fruits and berries the oshneguis feed upon. then the question arose, did the birds follow the monkeys, or the monkeys the birds? i came to the conclusion that the birds followed the monkeys, whom they could hear telling them, as it were, where they could get food without searching for it. i tried to discover where these birds made their nests, but never found one in the country of the rembo. now let us come to their companions, the monkeys. how small are these oshenguis! they are the smallest monkeys of that part of africa. their color was of a yellowish tinge; they had long, but not prehensile tails, for the monkeys with prehensile tails are found in america. it is a frolicsome and innocent little animal. strange to say, the common people, who eat all kinds of monkeys, would not eat that one--why, i could not tell. his cry is very plaintive and sad, and is not heard far off, like the cry of other monkeys. as sure as you live, when you meet them hopping about the branches overhead, you may say that water is not far off. they always sleep on trees whose branches overhang a water-course. they all sleep on the same tree. how queer they look, with their tails hanging down! to see the mother carrying her young, and the young clinging to the mother, is a sight worth seeing, for these baby monkeys do not look bigger than rats, and, when quite young, not much bigger than large mice. strange to say, though very young monkeys can not walk, from the very day they are born they seem to be able to cling with their hands to the breast of their mother; for young monkeys must help themselves, or they would drop to the ground. so we may say that the oshengui and the monkey-bird are almost inseparable friends, and we must let them wander in the great jungle in search of their food while we look for other birds and animals. there were also in the forest several varieties of tigercat, the name of which is very similar to that of the little monkeys, the oshengui, i have just spoken to you about. there are several species of these cats, but i am going to speak to you of the _genetta fieldiana_. you will say, "what a queer name!" not at all. i have told you that i often remembered him in africa, and i named this animal after my friend, mr. cyrus w. field. i described this animal in the proceedings of the boston natural history society. these oshenguis are perfect little plagues. they are very sly; they never sleep at night; they are then wandering in search of prey--of something to kill. they see better at night than in broad daylight. during the day they hide in some hollow tree, or in the midst of a cluster of thick, dead branches, which are so close together that you can not see what is inside. they will crawl in there and remain till night comes. the darker the night, the bolder their deeds; for on a dark night they will come into the villages, knowing that every body is generally asleep between two or three o'clock in the morning, manage to get into some poultry-house--i do not know how--and then pounce upon the poor chickens and strangle them. they will destroy the whole lot of them, suck their blood, and if they can, they will drag one away. if you have a parrot they will try to get at it. sometimes they will climb trees and get their prey among the birds. the green wild pigeons, the partridges, the wild ducks and cranes, sleeping on the banks of rivers, are good food for them, for they are very fond of the feathered tribe. one morning, on the banks of a creek not far from our camp, i saw the footprints of an oshengui on the sands. it had been there, i could see, the night before. i had two or three chickens, which i kept carefully. i wanted to see if i could not get a few eggs, for i had not for a long time tasted any, and i wondered if the oshengui would come and eat my chickens. poor chickens! they have to look sharp in that country, for they have many enemies among the snakes and the species of wild-cats of the forest, besides the hawks. the moon was declining, and rose about one o'clock in the morning, and shone just bright enough to enable me to see. so, towards one o'clock, i took one of my chickens and tied it to a stick on the bank of the little creek near our camp, and hid myself, not far off, on the edge of the forest. i took with me two guns, one loaded with bullets in case i should meet larger game i did not bargain for, and the other loaded with shot, which i intended for the oshengui, if it came. the light from the moon was dim, as i have said, but just enough for me to see. i hoped that the oshengui would come from the direction opposite to where i was. the poor fowl began to cackle, frightened at being in a strange place, and no doubt having an instinctive knowledge of insecurity. it cackled and cackled from time to time, and then would try to go to sleep, but could not; it seemed to comprehend impending danger. at last i saw something coming along the shore whose eyes were like two bright charcoal fires. it seemed so close to the ground that, if it had not been for the two fiery eyes, i should have thought it was a big snake. the legs were so short and so bent that the body touched the ground. i raised my gun very carefully, and waited. at last i could see the long muzzle of the oshengui. how sly the animal was! he came on like a thief, and so carefully looking right and left as he advanced, but never losing sight of the fowl. the nearer he came, the flatter his body lay on the ground, until it arrived near the fowl; then there was a pause; then a sudden spring upon the fowl--there was just one cry; the fowl was dead. having aimed carefully, i pulled the trigger--bang! and down rolled the oshengui on his back, with the fowl in his jaws. a tremendous shout rose from our camp. gambo, querlaouen, and malaouen came rushing toward me, and they all cried, "you will kill no more of our fowls now, oshengui!" with my prize hung above my head, i went to sleep, and the next day we made preparations to go up the river. chapter viii. we are in a canoe.--outfit for hunting.--see a beautiful antelope.--kill it.--it is a new species.--river and forest swallows. we are now ascending the river rembo ovenga. we are in a little canoe, that can be easily hidden in the jungle, and as we ascend the river we meet strange sights, and i can assure you we enjoy our journey. it is true that it is hot, but we can not help it. in the bow of the canoe is a little stick, to which is attached a nice little flag showing the stars and stripes. querlaouen is at the stern, and using his paddle as a rudder; malaouen is at the head, where he keeps a sharp look-out for wild beasts. i need not say that his gun is close at hand. gambo and i have our paddles, and we dip them gently--so gently that, if you had been on the banks of the river at night, you could not have heard us. near the prow is a smooth-bore gun, loaded with shot, in case we should see some big crane or wild ducks. by my side lies a double-barreled breech-loader, loaded with very large steel-pointed bullets, in case of need, for elephants, crocodiles, leopards, wild buffaloes, and gorillas; or, should we be attacked by the savages inhabiting the country, they were to be used against them. by the side of that gun was a heavy war-axe. malaouen had his gun by him; gambo likewise. our formidable double-barreled breech-loader, with steel-pointed bullets, would smash, i was sure, an elephant's ribs, if the opportunity occurred. we had an extra gun, in case one should get out of order. we had also two cutlasses. we thought we would dispense with a cooking-pot, for all our food was to be roasted on charcoal--that is to say, if we were able to kill any game. in a little box made of tin i had matches, a few flints, and a fire-steel, which were to be used in case the matches should become worthless. i had also a lancet, a little bottle of ammonia to be used in the event of either of us being bitten by a scorpion or some venomous serpent, some medicine, and a bottle of quinine. for food we had a few plantains and dried cassada. then we expected to find berries, nuts, and fruits, and wild honey. of course our imagination ran wild. the idea of gambo was that the forest would be full of wild game; antelopes were to be plentiful, and also wild boars. our outfit was of the light order. gambo, malaouen, and querlaouen wore next to nothing, and they had no change of clothes but a wild-cat skin. they could take it easy in the matter of clothing--shirts, neck-ties, pantaloons, waistcoats, and coats were superfluities which they can dispense with. my outfit was composed of the clothes i wore, and in my hunting-bag i had an extra pair of thick shoes, in case those i wore should give out, and a second pair of pantaloons. each of us had a flask full of powder, with a goodly number of bullets, and some small shot. at last we came to the spot where we wanted to land, and then hauled our canoe into the jungle, hiding it where we thought no one could see it. afterward we advanced a little into the forest, and then made our camp for the night. as usual, we made large, blazing fires, and, after they had been fairly started, we laid down on the green branches of the trees we had cut, and before i knew it my men were fast asleep. the deep snore of gambo told me that he was unconscious of what was going on around; he was soon followed by querlaouen and malaouen, and they snorted a trio which would have well frightened any wild beast which might come lurking round us. each of these men held their guns closely in their arms. i rose and looked at these three brave and daring savages, who now slumbered perfectly unconscious and helpless. i looked at them with a feeling of love, and thought that soon, like themselves, i would fall asleep, and be as unconscious of all that was round me. i thought of the wild country i was in, of the wild beasts by which i was surrounded, and i began to feel so little and so weak, i seated myself and prayed to the great god, he who had created the white man, and the black man, and all species of men, and the wild beasts of the forest, to keep me as he had done before. continuing our wanderings in the forest, the next morning i came alone to a beautiful little stream, and just as i was in the act of stooping to drink some of its water, which was as clear as crystal, i suddenly heard a slight noise not far off, which i believed must be made by antelopes or gazelles. looking carefully at my gun, i made for that part of the forest from whence came the sounds, trying to be as nimble and as noiseless as i could. i had not proceeded far when my eyes opened wide open, and i became terribly excited, for i saw an animal i had never seen before--an antelope. it was the most lovely and beautiful creature of the forest i had ever seen. i stopped. it seemed to me that i had not eyes big enough to admire it. oh, i thought, it is too beautiful to be fired at and killed. how brilliant was his colors! the body was of a bright yellow, as bright as an orange; then from its back came fourteen beautiful stripes, as white as snow; a chestnut patch between the horns and the eyes, below which was a white crescent, having in the middle a dark brown stripe. that beautiful creature was quietly resting on the trunk of a dead tree, while beyond, among the trees, were several others which i could not see so well. i was so excited i could not breathe, for of all the lovely beasts i had seen in the forest, this one was the most lovely; none could have compared with it in beauty. the skin of the leopard was nothing to it. i raised my gun almost in sorrow, but i felt that i must kill the beast, in order to bring its skin home; for i knew it was an animal that had never been seen before. just as i raised my gun, the beautiful creature rose up from the tree on which it had slept, as if to show me its beautiful form, and how graceful were its motions, before the fatal shot should put an end to its life. i wish you could have seen this antelope when alive, surrounded by the green of the forest, which contrasted singularly with its bright color, and made the animal appear as if it had come from an enchanted land, where the sun had given to its hair and skin its own golden color, as it sometimes gives it to the clouds when it is on the point of disappearing. [illustration: shooting the new antelope.] i put my finger on the trigger and fired; down came that beautiful creature from the tree, falling on its back, showing a stomach as white as milk. the others decamped without my being able to fire at them, on account of the fallen tree. as i came near to look at my great prize, i felt that i would like to put my arm round the nice neck of the animal, whose short groans betokened it was in the agonies of death, for i felt so sorry, and i wished i could see it alive again. then the blood poured from its mouth, and stained the ground on which it lay gasping for breath, which it could not get. after a few struggles all became silent; the poor antelope was dead, killed by the ruthless hand of man. i looked at it and looked at it, for i could not tire looking at such a beautiful beast. the men came, and we cut a heavy branch of a tree, to which we fastened it, and brought the poor dead antelope to the camp. when i brought the stuffed animal to a village, the people at once shouted with transports of the wildest astonishment, "bongo! bongo!" for such was the native name given to this antelope. i need not say how careful i was in preparing its skin, which to me was precious, and i brought the stuffed specimen back to new york in the year , and in it could have been seen among the large collection i had brought here.[a] [a] a description of it can be seen in the report of the boston natural history society for . the collection has left the country. since the day i had killed the bongo we had built another camp near another beautiful stream--the forest was full of them--and not far from two or three abandoned plantations. often i would go all alone and watch the birds. i loved especially to look at the swallows. one which i discovered was a beautiful species. it is all black, but with a bluish tinge. when the weather was clear, and there was no prospect of an approaching storm, they flew high in the air; but if the weather was threatening, they would almost touch the bushes. when they fly high in the air, the insects on which they feed, i suppose, are there; but when a storm is coming the insects no doubt know it, and come down to seek refuge from the rain under the leaves or blades of grass. these are the reasons by which i account for the swallows flying high in fine weather, and low when a storm is coming. how quickly these little black swallows did fly! none of them had ever seen our northern clime. they were birds of the equatorial regions of africa. the woods are their home, and the open spots where plantations or villages are built, and where the rivers flow, are the places where they love to fly in search of their food. there was another beautiful swallow, a river swallow, black in color, with a solitary white spot, which looked like silver, on its throat. what a beautiful little bird it is! its days were spent flying over the river. it would take a flight, and then rest on the branches or stumps of some dead trees which were imbedded in the stream, but the branches of which were just above the water. i could not help feeling sorry when killing these little birds, and, after i thought i had killed enough of them to enrich the museums, nothing would have tempted me to kill another. this lovely and dear little swallow has never seen the countries where the polar star is visible; the silence of the forest is its delight, and its pleasure is to skim over the waters of rivers which come from unexplored and unpenetrated mountains, where the name of the white man has never been heard. how i loved to look at these little birds, for i do love swallows! little wanderers they are. at home they are the heralds of spring. if they could speak, how many touching stories they would have to tell us of their wonderful escapes, and of their trials and dangers; what hardships they have to encounter when they migrate and travel over distant lands, when they cross over seas and over mountains; how many of them fall bravely before reaching the land they want to reach; what stormy and tempestuous weather they often meet in their journey, and how happy they must feel when they have come to the land of their migration. chapter ix. we hear the cry of a young gorilla.--start to capture him.--fight with "his father."--we kill him.--kill the mother.--capture of the baby.--strange camp scene. one very fine morning, just at the dawn of day, when the dew-drops were falling from leaf to leaf, and could hardly reach the ground; just as the birds were beginning to sing, the insects to hum, the bee to buzz, the butterflies to awake, i suddenly heard the cry of a young gorilla for his mother. malaouen and querlaouen were with me. they heard the cry as well as i did, and immediately gave a kind of _chuck_ for me to remain still. we listened attentively to ascertain the exact spot in the forest whence the noise proceeded. another cry from the young gorilla told us the precise direction, and we made for the place. the jungle was so thick that we had to be most careful in order to avoid arousing the suspicions of the gorilla. happily, we came to a little rivulet which seemed to flow from the direction in which we had heard the noise. so we waded into it and followed its course instead of a path. the water at times reached as high as our knees; it was cool and limpid, and the bed of the stream was gravelly. the noise made by the young gorilla had for some time ceased, and we wondered if he had gone. when, lo! i heard a heavy chuckle--it was the mother! we were not far off. we left the stream, passing through the jungle most carefully. at last we lay flat on our bellies, looking more like snakes than human beings. i had that morning painted my face and hands black, so i appeared of the same color as my men. we crawled to a spot where we remained quite still, for we could then hear the noise the mother gorilla made in taking the berries from the lower branches of the trees, or in tearing down some wild kind of cane. we were watching and peering through the jungle--my eyes were almost sore from the exertion. by-and-by we heard a noise in our rear. it was the male gorilla! what a terrific roar he gave as he saw us close by, and watching his wife. the whole forest resounded with it. goodness gracious! i thought we ought to have been more careful. we ought to have considered that perhaps the male gorilla was with his wife. but in less time than i take to write it we were facing the gorilla, who advanced toward us, his face convulsed with rage. just as he was close upon us we fired, and he fell forward on his face, uttering a most frightful groan. after a few movements and twitchings of the limbs, he was silent, for he was dead. in the mean time the mother and her young had gone off, leaving the "big fellow" to fight their battles. it was a good thing that the big gorilla came first, for he might have come after we had fired, and while we were trying to catch "his child," and then pounced upon us. "the female gorilla and her young have gone; but first," said malaouen, "let us hide ourselves close by and wait; perhaps she will come back; let us see if we can not find them." we hid ourselves on the lower branches of a tree, not far from the dead body of the big gorilla. we waited and waited--not a sound--nothing to show that the female gorilla was coming back to see if her mate was there. beginning to feel somewhat tired of waiting, i said, "boys, let us see if we can find the gorilla. you know, as well as i do, that female gorilla are timid--indeed, that most of them are great cowards. the 'men' gorilla fight, but the 'women' gorilla do not." "that is so," replied malaouen. "querlaouen, let us go after the female and try to capture her." so we descended the tree upon which we had hidden ourselves. we left the big gorilla dead on the ground, bidding him good-by, and telling him that we were coming again; malaouen adding in a queer way, "kombo" (that is the name they give to a male gorilla), "who told you to come and fight us? if you had not come, perhaps at this time you might have been by the side of your wife and child, instead of being asleep for all time to come. the forest is not going to hear your 'talk' any more, and you are not going to frighten any body." so we left the big fellow dead on the ground, and went immediately in search of the female gorilla and her young. in order not to lose our dead gorilla, as we advanced in the jungle, we broke, here and there, young branches of the trees, and from time to time collected leaves in our hands, which we dropped on the ground, and then, on our return, we would look after the boughs of the trees we had broken, and the leaves we had scattered, and thus find our way back to the gorilla. we traveled on through the jungle for a long time, and no gorilla. at last we were startled. we heard a roar. it was the female calling for her mate. it was the female that had escaped from us in the morning. she was calling for the "old man," who would not hear her any more, for, as you know, he was dead. she called and called, but there was no answer for her. carefully we went through the jungle, stepping gently on the dead leaves of the trees till we came near the female gorilla, which we saw just behind an old tree that had fallen on the ground. there she was, looking at her babe, giving now and then a kind of chuckle, her old, wrinkled black face looking so ugly. her gray eyes followed the young gorilla as he would move round; then she would pick a berry, giving another kind of chuckle for the baby to come and get it. after eating it he would climb on his mother, and she would pass her thick black hand over the little body. then he came down and seated himself between her legs, and gazed at her, his little black face looking so queer. then he moved off again, but only to return once more. as i was very intently watching, my gun slipped from the tree along which it rested, and fell on the ground. the gorilla heard it, gave a shriek, and, followed by her babe, was starting to run. the gun of querlaouen was too quick for her. bang! the poor mother fell in her gore, but the little fellow disappeared in the woods. we leaped over the tree, and did not even take a look at the poor dead gorilla, but rushed in pursuit of the young fellow, who was the prize we wanted the most. at last we saw him; a stream had stopped his flight. he could not get any farther, and was looking toward the other side. but he soon spied us, and took to a young sapling, and when he had reached the top he looked at us with glaring eyes, and--would you believe it?--howled again and again at us! there was no way to get at him, so malaouen took his axe, and down came the tree, with the gorilla on it, howling and shrieking. at the same instant querlaouen threw over his head a little net we carried with us for the purpose of capturing gorillas, and so we caught him. we hollaed and shouted also, so our shouts, mixed with the howls and shrieks of the gorilla, made a charming concert in the jungle. after giving vent to our joyous feelings by shouts, and had sobered down again, i wish you could have seen that gorilla kicking under its net. the question was how to take the fellow from under the net and get it home. i cried, "give me the axe; i see a branch close by which will make a splendid forked stick." the words were hardly uttered before the axe was in my hands, and in the wink of an eye i had hold of a stick about five feet long, with a pronged fork. malaouen had in the mean time cut a little stick to tie across it, and collected some creepers to be used as cords. i wish you could have heard his howls as querlaouen seized the little villain by the back of his head, while i put the forked stick on his neck, holding it fast to the ground while malaouen was tying the little stick, now and then taking his hands off for fear of a bite, the little rascal kicked up such a row. querlaouen, who had become free to act after i got the forked stick firm over his neck, had all he could do to hold the legs of the little fellow on the ground, who kicked up, hollaed, and shrieked; his muscles worked, and he tried to catch hold of us with his hands, but the forked stick was too much for him, and then we succeeded in tying his hands behind his back. i was sorry to hurt his poor neck, but the first thing the little rascal attempted as soon as i raised the stick from the ground was to start at us. but he could not even turn his head round. he had to walk off a prisoner, and his shouts and shrieks were of no avail. his father and mother had been killed, and he had no one to defend him from his enemies. how proud we felt of our prize! we returned by the way we had come, being guided by the broken boughs of young trees and the leaves we had thrown on the ground. as soon as we came to the female gorilla, and the little fellow saw his mother, he tried to rush toward her. i dropped the forked stick and let him go. he at once jumped on his mother, and began sucking her breasts, and then looked in her face, and appeared to feel quite sorrowful. when he saw she was dead, he gave a howl at us, as if to say, "you fellows have killed my mother!" it was utterly impossible for us to carry to our camp all our spoil, so we concluded to hang her to a branch of a tree, and come for her the next morning, which we did. then we continued our march, and toward sunset came to the large male we had killed in the morning. we were so tired that we did not wish to do any thing with the big gorilla that night. i felt i was too tired to take his skin off. the little fellow did not seem to care for his father; he looked at him well, and gave only a single plaintive cry. i could not help thinking of the poor old fellow. how many times he had slept at the foot of some big tree, and kept watch over his wife and baby! now he was dead, nothing but his huge body and his tremendous face showed the giant strength he once possessed; now a little insect was stronger than he was. what had he died for? he had died bravely defending his wife and baby from an enemy whom he knew had come to do them harm. he was right. may i and every man of us always have the same motive that big gorilla had! i could not help feeling sorry. here lay dead before me a wonderful beast, one of the most strange creatures of the forest god has created. his mate lay dead in another part of the forest, and their offspring was my prisoner. how strange his huge shadow looked as he hung by the neck to the limb of a tree near our camp, and how small our bodies looked by the side of his! that night i could not sleep. that big gorilla was always before my eyes. he seemed to grin at me; his long, powerful arm, his huge hands, appeared as if they were moving and trying to seize me. i could see his big black nails ready to go into my flesh; his mouth seemed ready to open and give one of those terrific roars which shake the whole forest. and then i would see his enormous canines come out from his sharp-cut lips, and how red his mouth was inside. there were his deep sunken eyes, wide open, looking at me, and, though dead, he had a scowl of defiance and intense ferocity on his face. it so happened that his face was turned toward the bed of leaves on which i lay, and he was hung not far from me. the young gorilla during the whole night moaned for his mother. he would look at the fires before him, then at us, and then give a howl, as if was saying, "what have i before me?" i decidedly frightened him more than malaouen and querlaouen could, for, in despite of the noise the young gorilla made, and of the shadow of the big gorilla, they had fallen sound asleep. but now and then they would awake, look at the fires, put on more wood to make a blaze, would perhaps smoke a pipe, and then go to sleep again. toward four o'clock in the morning querlaouen arose, took from his bag a little idol, and put it on the ground, muttering words i could not hear, all the time thinking i was sound asleep. then he took a piece of chalk of the alumbi, and rubbed it on his forehead between his two eyes; then he rubbed it in the hollow of his chest, and along both his arms; then he chewed a piece of a certain soft cane, which he spat on the idol; and then he talked to it. now and then he muttered my name. at last i understood that the ignorant but good fellow was begging his idol to take care of me. then, with his sharp-pointed knife, he cut his two hands slightly in many places, and took the blood that fell and rubbed his body with it, also the idol, and then laid down once more by the fires and took another sleep. gambo had left us to go after wild honey, but not before making us a solemn promise not to hunt gorilla, for i was afraid that some accident might happen to him. the next morning when he returned to our camp, and saw our big gorilla hanging to the tree, and heard that the mother of the young gorilla had been killed also, he cried, "why did i go after wild honey instead of remaining with you!" but he quietly seated himself, and after a while wanted a piece of gorilla for his breakfast, for we had to skin the beast, as i wanted his hide and skeleton. [illustration: querlaouen and his idol.] the next evening i saw the shelter of a nshiego-mbouvé (_troglodytes calvus_). i crept within shot of the shelter, lay down flat in the jungle--i am sure a snake or leopard could not have lain more quiet--and there i waited. my men had covered themselves with dry leaves and brush, scarce daring to breathe, lest the approaching animal should hear us. from the calls there were evidently two. it was getting dark in the forest, and i began to feel afraid that the animals had smelt us, when i saw a nshiego-mbouvé approach the tree where the shelter was. it ascended by a hand-over-hand movement, and with great rapidity. then it crept carefully under the shelter, seated itself in the crotch made by a projecting bough, its feet and haunches resting on this bough, then put one arm round the trunk of the tree for security. thus they rest all night, and this posture accounts for some singular abrasions of the hair on the side of this variety of chimpanzee, which could be seen on the specimens i brought home. no sooner was it seated than it began again to utter its call. it was a male, and was calling for its female. it was answered, when an unlucky motion of one of my men made a noise, and roused the suspicions of the ape in the tree. it looked round. it began preparations to descend and clear out. i fired, and it fell to the ground dead, with a tremendous crash. these nshiego-mbouvé are very shy, and far more difficult to approach than gorillas. how queer they look with their bald heads! the black skin on the top of the head is quite shiny. they must attain great age, and i have often wondered how long the gorilla, chimpanzee, kooloo-kamba, and nshiego-mbouvé live. i should not be surprised if they sometimes live to be a hundred years old. all the varieties of chimpanzees often inhabit the same woods as the gorilla, and they seem to live in harmony with each other. there is food enough for them all; besides, nuts and fruits are very plentiful. when they get old they feed on leaves, for a time comes when their teeth are quite decayed. in one very old nshiego-mbouvé i killed, nearly all of his teeth had dropped out, and he had but four or five left. chapter x. jack will have his own way.--he seizes my leg.--he tears my pantaloons.--he growls at me.--he refuses cooked food.--jack makes his bed.--jack sleeps with one eye open.--jack is intractable. now let us follow that young gorilla, whom i called jack. jack, to begin with, was the most untractable little beast one possibly could get hold of. jack was a little villain, a little rogue, very treacherous, and quite untamable. the kinder i was, the worse he seemed to be. we took him with us in the forest till we returned to our village, and then many of the women disappeared. jack was smart in his wickedness, and was quite as treacherous as any of the gorillas i had met before. he would not eat any cooked food, and every day i had to send into the forest for berries and nuts. i wish you could have seen his eyes glisten, you would have noticed how treacherous and gloomy they were. jack was cunning; he would look at me right straight in the face, and when he did that i learned that he meant mischief, and, if close at hand, meant an attack upon me. of course, once in the camp, the forked stick had been taken away, and a little chain tied round the neck of jack; the chain was about six feet long. then i had a long pole fastened in the ground, and the chain was tied to an iron ring which had been used as a bracelet on the upper arm of a native, by which means he could turn all round without entangling the chain. [illustration: caught by jack.] one day i had come to offer jack some tondo (berries) which friend malaouen had just collected for him (i wanted always to feed jack myself, to see if i could tame him), and i approached the little fellow to within the distance which i thought the utmost length of his chain would allow him to go. he looked at me straight in the face, and i waited for him to extend his arm to get the nice tondo i was offering him, when, quick as lightning, he threw his body on the ground on one arm and one leg, the chain drawn to its full length, and then, before i knew it, he seized my leg, and with his big toe got hold and fast of my _inexpressibles_, which were rather old, and a portion of them was soon in his possession. i thought in my fright that a piece of my leg had also been taken away, which i am glad to say was not the case. still holding the piece of my pantaloons, he retreated to his pole, then gave a howl and started at me again. this time i knew better--i was off. he held the piece of my pantaloons for a long time, it having passed from his big toe into his hand. jack looked at times almost cross-eyed, and was as ugly a fellow as any one could wish to see. he was not so strong as friend joe, the account of which you have read in "stories of the gorilla country," but he was a pretty strong chap, and i should not have liked to be shut up in a room alone with him. several times i had narrow escapes of a grip from his strong big toe. when evening came, jack would collect the dry leaves i had given him, and would go to sleep upon them, and sometimes he did look almost like a child. how strange that i never saw twin gorillas! the mother gorilla has only one baby gorilla at a time. my men and i have captured a good many of their young ones during the time i lived in the great forest of equatorial africa, but i never succeeded in taming one. some were more fierce or stubborn than others, but all refused food that was cooked; the berries, nuts, and fruits must come from the forest. though these little brutes were diminutive, and the merest babies in age, they were astonishingly strong, and, as you have yourselves seen in the different accounts i have given you, by no means good tempered. when any thing displeased them they would roar, and bellow, and look wickedly from out their cunning little eyes, and strike the ground with their feet. jack was not so ugly-looking a fellow as friend joe, neither was he as strong. like all the gorillas, his face and his skin were entirely black. his little eyes, deep and sunken, seemed to be gray; his nose was more prominent than in the chimpanzee, for gorillas have noses, and consequently he comes nearer in appearance than the chimpanzee to the african negro. he had, as we have, eyelashes, and the upper ones were the longest. his mouth was large, and the lips sharply cut. the gorilla has no lips like we have; the dark pigment covers them, and when his mouth is shut no red is seen outside. the ears are small in comparison with the face, and they are smaller than the ears of man. their ears are much smaller than those of the chimpanzee, and look very much like the ears of man; the chin is short and receding. the face is very wrinkled; the head is covered with hair much shorter than that on the body, and in the male gorilla the top of the head has a reddish crown of hair. you see how much the arm of the gorilla is like the arm of man--how short his legs are. the leg is about the same size from the knee to the ankle, the short thigh decreasing slightly. the leg of the gorilla has not the graceful curve found in man, it having no calf. i want you to examine the hands and feet of a young gorilla. you will be struck at once how short the hand is, and how much it looks like that of a man. the fingers are short, but how thick they are! the nails are very much like ours, and project slightly over the tips of the fingers. see how short the thumb is--how much shorter than the thumb of man; it is hardly half as thick as the forefinger. the thumb is of very little use to a gorilla. the palm of the hand is hard, naked, and callous; the back is hairy to the knuckles, and the short hair grows on the fingers, as in man. [illustration: gorilla sleeping.] the leg of the gorilla is very short. look at his foot. instead of a big toe he has a thumb, and you see, by the wrinkles and transverse indents, that the foot is used as a hand. the third toe is a little longer than the second, and the others follow in the same proportion; and, if you look at your own feet, you will see that the toes of the gorilla and those of man keep the same gradation of length, the middle one being the longest. look at the representation of a young gorilla as he sleeps. he certainly looks almost like a baby; but do not believe that he is so fast asleep that you need make a great deal of noise to awake him. no; these little fellows seem to go "to bed" with one eye open, and at the least noise you see their gray eye twinkle, and immediately they sit up, and look round to discover what is the matter, and at once are ready for a fight. as they awake they generally give a howl of defiance. chapter xi. start after land-crabs.--village of the crabs.--each crab knows his house.--great flight of crabs.--they bite hard.--feast on the slain.--a herd of hippopotami. we have come down to the river. we are off in our canoes to hunt for ogombon (land-crabs), each one of us being provided with a basket and a short cutlass, and are paddling for some spot not far from the banks of the river where the land-crabs are found in abundance. there are several canoes full of women, for catching crabs is the special business of the women, as hunting is the special work of the men. the land-crabs burrow in the ground. their holes are found in very large numbers in some parts of the country. the burrows form the subterranean homes of the crabs, into which they retire when alarmed--and the slightest noise does that. they remain in their burrows until hunger drives them out in search of food, or when they fancy danger is averted. we landed at last on a swampy bottom, the soil of which was very black. i immediately saw an innumerable quantity of crabs running in all directions--making for their burrows--alarmed at our approach and the sound of footsteps; and as they ran they displayed the two large claws with which they were ready to bite any one bold enough to seize them. the ground was covered with an incredible number of burrows. these land-crabs are curious creatures. they are found in various parts of the world, and equatorial africa has a fair share of them, in goodly variety. the natives have any number of wonderful tales to tell about the ogombons. there was a wild shout of joy among the people at having come to the right spot. the baskets were immediately opened, the short heavy sticks and cutlasses were got in readiness, and we scattered all over the thickly-wooded island, for it was an island where only mangrove grew. not far from the island i could see huge hippopotami playing in the river, but we had taken it into our heads to come down the river and make a great haul of these crustaceæ. there was, as i have said, a general skedaddle of crabs, for at the least noise they ran away, having a counterpart in the women, who ran to and fro with great shouts, which were soon taken up by the men, in their wild excitement after land-crabs. these crabs were of tremendous size, and were the real ogombons, the largest species found in the country, and the only ones the natives will eat. they were gray, almost of the color of the mud on which they walk. they were armed with tremendous claws, which warned us to be very careful in handling them, or we should get a good bite. this island was celebrated as the home of the ogombons, and the whole of that part on which we landed was entirely covered with their burrows, which were in many places so thick and so close together as to communicate with each other. in these retreats the crabs remain in darkness. they never venture far from home. how master land-crab knows his own habitation from those of his neighbor i can not tell, but now and then he would make a mistake and go into "somebody else's house," thus getting into the wrong box. at this time of the year the land-crabs were fat, but the shells were somewhat hard, but not so hard as later in the season, when the crab is left to himself, not being so good to eat. hence, in the season, land-crab parties start from every village for the spots where they are to be found. when the crabs are ready to cast off their shells, they shut themselves up in their burrow, which they have stocked with leaves, closing the entrance with mud, and they remain there until their new armor is on. after quitting its old armor a crab is very soft, but in course of time the new shell becomes hard, even harder than the preceding one. i was never able to ascertain the age a land-crab could attain. so we were racing in every direction after the land-crabs, which fled with the utmost speed for their burrows. now and then one would be caught. we had to be very light of foot when approaching them, for at the least noise they would go and hide in their dark abodes. of the two large claws, one was a tremendous thing, and it was amusing to watch the crabs walking leisurely round their holes, as if there was no foe in their neighborhood, but yet holding up one of the large claws as if they were ready for any thing that might come along. this claw nodded backward and forward in a very comical manner. [illustration: catching the ogombons.] i approached one very big fellow without his having perceived me, and, before he was aware, i laid my stick heavily on his back, and then seized him with my hand, to place him in the basket which hung at my side. i roared out with pain, for he had got hold of one of my fingers with its large claw, and shook it as if he would have torn it off. with my other hand i quickly seized the crab and twisted the claws from the body, which i thought would release me; but lo! although the body lay on the ground, the rascally claws gripped harder than ever. oh! oh! oh!!! i shouted--which cries brought two or three of the women to my assistance. the muscles of the claws had retained their contractile power after they were separated from the body. in the mean time the rascal had retired into his burrow, no doubt in a good deal of pain, but saying to himself, "what do i care; a new limb will soon come out!" for among the crustaceæ such is the case--a new limb soon springs out, and takes the place of the one lost; so i was left without my prize. the women again warned me to be very careful, instructing me how to catch crabs by seizing the big claw and severing it from the body; but, before doing this, the stick must be placed on the middle of the back, where the claws can not reach, as they can not move backward. i soon spied another crab, but he heard my footstep, and with the utmost speed made for his burrow. then i came suddenly upon another, just in front of me; he had not time to turn round; so, shoving my stick in front of him until it nearly touched his two big eyes, i put him into a furious rage. by-and-by he managed to seize the stick, which he shook, just as the other crab had done my finger. i was thankful that it was not my finger this time. the motion of the claw at the junction with the body was very queer. after some trouble, i managed to secure this fellow. then i went after another, which at once took to his burrow and disappeared; but i was determined to watch and wait for him. i noticed him every now and then peering slyly out, drawing in his head at the slightest noise; so i hid behind his burrow, and kept very still. at last he came out, walking slowly from his hole. i put my foot on his burrow, upon which he turned round, and ran one way and then another, and finally made for another burrow, where he met the possessor coming out from his "castle," when a general fight of claws ensued. the aggressor, being the stronger, succeeded in winning the battle and getting in, while the other, in his fright, plunged into a burrow the owner of which had probably been killed that morning. great slaughter of the crabs had already taken place, and so many heavy, fat fellows had been captured that we were sure of a great feast. it was well for us that it was so, for at last the ogombons got thoroughly frightened and remained in their burrows; not one was to be seen; so, after having captured some thousands of them, we got back into our canoes and ascended the river again. the ogombons are peculiar. i think they never go to the sea, but deposit their eggs on the shores of the island, for i never met them on the sea-coast. they feed on all kinds of refuse, on black mud, leaves, berries, etc., etc. the crabs found on the main land are not eaten, the natives believing that they sometimes visit their cemeteries. on the white sand of the sea-shore are found innumerable little crabs of the same color as the sand itself. besides the ogombons there are many other land-crabs, but they are much smaller, and are not eaten by the natives. many of these crabs are of the most gorgeous colors, some purple and red, others blue and red; they are exceedingly wild, and swift of foot. they live close to the sea, and may be seen on the shore in great numbers during the night. i wish i had had time to spare to study these crabs more thoroughly than i have done, but i have told you the little i know about them. as we returned we had to pass through the midst of the tremendous herd of hippopotami which i have mentioned. for years that herd had taken possession of an immense mud-bank lying between the island and the main land, or rather the tongue of land which separated the sea from the river fernand vaz. the hippopotami began to grunt, and plunged into the water, remaining there for some time, and then would come again to the surface, until gradually the navigation became dangerous, so much so that we had to be very careful, and paddle along the shore for fear of being upset by these huge creatures, who would surge from under the water in every direction, and we knew not where the next one would rise. two or three times one rose very near my canoe. i did not want to fire at them, for they would have sunk to the bottom, and would not have risen for two or three days after, and then probably they would have been found at the mouth of the river, or been driven into the sea by the current. by the kind of groan or hoarse grunt they gave, i made up my mind that they were becoming enraged at having been disturbed, so we paddled carefully on until i thought we were at last out of their reach. but we were to receive a good fright before we had done with them, for i saw a canoe just ahead of the one in which i was seated rocking and jerking about in an extraordinary manner, and the people in it shouting at the top of their voices, and there came up a huge hippopotamus, which gave a terrific grunt, immediately responded to by the other hippopotami we had left behind. we paddled hard in order to get out of the way, for the huge creature seemed to be maddened; and at last, with a thankful heart, i left all the hippopotami behind, and, after some severe paddling, we reached a safe place on the bank of the river, where a general and grand cooking of the crabs began. chapter xii. strange spiders.--the house-spider.--how they capture their prey.--how they fight.--fight between a wasp and a spider.--the spider has its legs cut off, and is carried away.--burrow spider watching for its prey. now i must pause a little in that great jungle, and recount to you some of the queer things which i have seen among the spiders--the burrowing spiders, the house-spiders, the wall-spiders, and the spiders which weave their big and far-spreading webs among the trees of the forest or the tall grass of the open fields. i hope you will feel as interested as i did when you learn how smart many of them are. there are a very great variety of spiders in the country i have explored. some are of queer shape. each species has its peculiar habits. i often wish i had devoted more of my time to the study of their habits, and to ascertaining the way in which they catch their prey; but what i have observed i will relate to you. i will speak to you first of the house-spiders, and what i saw of them. in many of the little huts where i lived, the walls of which were made of the bark of trees, there were always several house-spiders, which i took good care not to kill, for they were seemingly inoffensive, only they were great enemies to the cockroaches, insects, and flies. sometimes in the evening, when i laid down on my acoco (bed of sticks), by the light of a torch my eyes would rest upon the wall, and i would see emerging from some crack a queer-looking gray spider, and now and then cockroaches, which swarm in the african huts, or some other kind of insect, would come out on the walls. then the spider would slyly advance toward the insect, taking great care to approach it from behind, in order not to be seen by the unsuspecting victim, with which it is soon to engage in a deadly struggle, for the spider is brave and voracious, and is not to be easily frightened by the size of its antagonist. these house-spiders are of a dull gray, which color assists in concealing its approach. after leaving its lair and getting a good position, it remains perfectly rigid and motionless, often for half an hour, waiting for some unlucky cockroach to pass by. at last the cockroach rushes past. in an instant the spider, with great impetuosity, pounces upon him. then ensues a tug and a battle which is of great interest--a conflict for life on the part of the cockroach, a combat for food on the part of the spider, which for the time seems more voracious and ferocious than a tiger or leopard. the battle is often prolonged for more than half an hour. the great black african cockroach grows to a large size, and is a very strong and formidable opponent for the spider. the latter, after pouncing on its victim, fastens on its back, and, to prevent being borne off, clings with two of his hairy hind legs, which seem to have little hooks, to the floor or to the wall. all the cockroach's endeavors and frantic exertions are to escape. he tugs and jerks, and generally succeeds at first in dragging its enemy off for some distance. the desperate struggle goes on, the spider using all its power and strength. it manages again to get a hold with its feet. at last it succeeds in fastening its head on the body of the cockroach, and begins sucking away at the juices of the latter, which, at the pain of the first bite, makes the greatest efforts to escape, for it knows that the deadly struggle has begun. then there would be a tremendous fight. i sometimes thought the cockroach would escape, both being exhausted. then would come a pause. presently the struggle would recommence, the spider sucking away all the time, and the poor cockroach at last succumbing, whereupon his enemy drags off the body to some corner or hiding-place where it can be devoured at leisure. once in the daytime, a few days after seeing the fight i have been describing to you, i saw the same spider, for i knew its place of hiding, come out after an insect. it was creeping slowly toward its prey, when a wasp--one of those beautiful, long-legged, and slender wasps, with striped bodies, which are so common here--came to attack the spider. quickly she flew over the spider, her long legs hanging down and plying between the legs of the poor spider, who was now in as bad a plight as the cockroach was a few days before. in this latter case, cunning instead of strength was to be used. the wasp kept flying above the spider, moving her long legs with great rapidity between the legs of the spider, while her head was touching that of her opponent, and giving a bite from time to time. then the spider tried to run away, but could not, for the long legs of the wasp moved between his legs in a backward sort of a way, which prevented the spider from advancing. the wasp all the time was hovering above the spider with very quick motions, her legs moving so fast that i could not see all their movements. suddenly the wasp turned round, and put her head down close to the right front leg of the spider, to which it gave one or two bites, just where it is joined to the body, and the leg dropped down; then she worked away at the head for a few seconds, then again turned round and gave a bite or two to the leg next to the one that had just been cut, and this dropped down also. i had never seen any thing fly so fast. at last the poor spider seemed perfectly stunned; he could hardly move. i considered the fight over, and that the wasp was victor. another leg dropped down, and then another, all being cut just where they are attached to the body, till at last they were all cut down. when the last hind leg dropped, the wasp seized the body of the spider, and flew away outside of my little hut to devour it. i missed my spider very much afterwards, and the cockroaches had their own way for a few days without fear of being devoured, till another house-spider made its appearance. in one of my little huts there were other species of spider besides the one i have spoken to you about, whose little webs would be built in places where they would be most apt to entangle the flies. after these had been caught, the spider would immediately come out and suck their blood. however small the fly might be, the spider would come, and even when only a musquito had been taken, it would come, but it would give only one or two sucks, and then would go away. you will agree that there must be very little to suck out of a musquito that has not been feeding on a human being. in the tall grass which sometimes grows round the village, or in the large open spaces where trees have been cut down, there is found a tremendous big bright yellow and black spider, whose web spreads over a space of several feet, and so thick and strong is it that, when i have got entangled in one, i could certainly feel a slight impediment to my walk, or the moving of my arm. the threads of the web are yellow, the same color as one part of the spider. this spider belongs probably to the genus mygale. some of them grow to be of immense size; i have frequently seen them with a body as large as a sparrow's egg. happily, the bite of this spider is not dangerous, for one day, as i was pursuing a bird and was in the midst of a lot of grass, the blades of which stuck to my skin and cut me like a razor, and i was watching and pursuing the bird in order not to lose sight of it, i got entangled in one of these big webs--by far the biggest web built by any spider i have ever heard of. i looked round to see and get out of the spider's way, but before i was aware i got a bite which was almost as painful as the sting of a scorpion. in my fright i tumbled down. i had no ammonia with me, consequently i returned at once to the village, where i had some, but by the time i reached home i felt no ill effect, the pain having left me a few minutes after the bite. these big spiders are said by the natives to make these large, spreading webs in order to catch little birds, the blood of which they suck. i never saw a bird caught, nor even any remains of feathers in the web, but from the strength of the web i am certain that many little birds, if once caught, could not get out, and that this big spider is fully equal to mastering little birds, for its strength must be very great if it is as strong in proportion to its size as other spiders are. [illustration: bit by a spider.] at any rate, if birds are caught in their webs, it must be very seldom. but if their webs do not catch birds, they are tremendous traps for flies, wasps, beetles, and insects of all kinds; for i have never long watched one of them without seeing some living thing of one kind or another caught, and then immediately the big, long-legged spider would come swiftly and suck the blood of the victim; two or three suckings would finish up a common black fly. they are very voracious, and attack the prey with great vigor. they must like the powerful sun, for many of their webs are built in the open spaces where master sol has his own way. the rain can not incommode them as he does us. when one of these webs is finished it will remain perfect a long time; sometimes it will stand for months before the owner begins to make another. one day in the forest i spied not far from the ground, just by an old dead tree, a little bit of a long-legged spider waging a terrible conflict with a caterpillar, which, without exaggeration, must have been at least thirty or forty times larger than the body of the little, slender, and long-legged spider. i immediately took from my pocket my magnifying-glass, in order to see better; then saw, about four inches from the ground, spreading from under the dead branch of the tree, several threads of a web which hung down, embracing a space of four or five inches, and ending in one thread as it came near the caterpillar. that single thread was entangled in the hair of the caterpillar and round its neck, and the caterpillar hung by it. the end of his body scarcely touched the ground. then there was a desperate struggle. i suppose the caterpillar, before being caught, was down on the ground quietly eating some leaves, and the spider dropped down upon it like a wild beast would pounce upon its prey. i lay flat on the ground to look at the conflict. this time the long legs of the spider were of the same use to it as were those of the wasp in the other fight i have related. for a long while there was a great struggle, the caterpillar shaking and turning round and round as it hung by that single thread; often its body would twist into a circle, the end touching the head, when suddenly, at one of these twists, the spider, by some dexterous movements, spun one of its threads round the caterpillar, binding the tail to the head. the caterpillar, by a desperate effort, broke the thread, and freed the lower part of its body. the spider was so small that i had to use the magnifying-glass all the time in order to watch its movements. at first the attention of the spider was entirely engaged in securing its prey. when the caterpillar was struggling hard to disentangle itself, it would come down and spin thread after thread round the hairy body of its victim, and then unite them to the single thread. now and then, with its pincers, which appeared through the magnifying-glass to be very large in comparison with the size of the body, it would try to cut the large pincers of the caterpillar. the end of its long legs, as they came round the head and eyes of the caterpillar, seemed to annoy it terribly, to judge by the struggles of the worm. at last the spider succeeded in seizing the base of the right pincer of the caterpillar, and tried to cut it, but in vain. in less than fifteen seconds it returned to the task, and went at the left pincer, but with apparently no better success. then, after a while, its attacks were directed to a spot between the pincers. he kept at it and kept at it, apparently sucking the blood, till finally, after thirty-seven minutes of deadly conflict, the caterpillar, a mammoth in comparison with the size of the spider, hung dead. then the spider finished sucking the blood of its victim. while the spider was carrying on this deadly combat, it did not mind me when i touched its web with a little stick: it would just ascend the single thread by which it was suspended, and then, within a few seconds, would return to the fight. after the caterpillar had been killed, when i touched the web it would go up, and remain there for a long time--three or four minutes--before it came down. finally i took hold of the caterpillar; down came the spider, and with him part of his web. the spider ran along the ground for a few inches, then suddenly rolled itself into a ball and lay apparently dead, the legs being twisted round the body. it appeared to me that the spider thought a wasp was going to attack it, and thus protected itself. after a little while i came to look at the poor dead caterpillar, and saw a few ants hard at work carrying it off somewhere to be devoured. among the great many species of spiders there are some which are very curious. among the most remarkable are those which burrow holes in the ground and live in them. these ground-spiders are short, and have powerful fangs and legs. several species of spiders have short legs, and flat, oval bodies, surrounded by pointed spurs, looking, when taken from their webs, more like bugs than veritable spiders. the cave in which the burrow spiders live is but a few inches long, built in the shape of a tube, from the opening of which they watch for their prey. the interior of the burrow is like felt, and is so arranged that it forms a tunnel that prevents the earth from falling in. some of the burrow spiders are called trap-door spiders, on account of the curious way in which the entrance of their abode is guarded. a trap-door closes the entrance. this door is made of the same material as the interior of the tube, to which it is attached by a kind of hinge, by which it falls squarely upon it. this trap-door is made to protect the spider from its enemies, among which are wasps and many species of ants. these latter sometimes make short work of a spider. this door is a marvel; the outside is generally covered with earth similar in color to the ground by which it is surrounded, thus rendering it difficult to find the burrow. trap-door spiders are found in many parts of the world. but many species of spiders live in burrows that have no doors. some of these burrow spiders go out at night as well as in the daytime, but they hardly ever move far from their burrows. i have often seen them watching from the entrance of their caves for prey. how queer they look! they must have a wonderful sense of hearing, for at the least noise they run back inside of their burrows. they seem to know when the noise does not come from an enemy, but from some insect upon which they intend to prey. one day one of these burrow spiders was watching for its food, when suddenly it pounced upon a big caterpillar which had made its appearance, and, after a desperate struggle, the poor caterpillar was carried into the burrow, though still alive. after half an hour i carefully demolished the burrow, and found the spider at the bottom; the caterpillar was partly devoured, and i saw the remains of legs, wings, and heads of insects which had been captured and eaten up. i took the spider out; it seemed stupefied, and walked to and fro as if it did not know where to go. when once a spider has built its burrow it dwells in it for a long time. these burrows are built in such a manner that when it rains the water can not get in. have you ever thought, when looking at the web of a spider, what an admirable piece of work it is, and how this thread is manufactured? no lace is more beautifully worked. the thread is formed by a semi-liquid secretion, which comes out, at the will of the spider, through minute apertures, and which hardens into a thread by contact with the atmosphere. how strange that is! spiders must have a great amount of knowledge, and are, no doubt, good barometers, for when a storm is impending they never will build or mend a web. there is a good reason for their not being extravagant in the use of their silk, for, although they can use at their will the secretion from which the thread is made, it requires time to reproduce it; so when you see a spider spinning new webs, it is a sign of fine weather coming. if you look closely at the web of a spider, you will surely be surprised at their wonderful skill. first a net-work of strong threads is built; these are the main beams, and between them the net made of smaller thread is spun. these webs are exceedingly elastic, for they have to resist the power of the wind. when the web has been long built, and has become stretched, they will sometimes go and fetch a little piece of wood, which they hang by a thread, and haul it to a spot where they think it will steady their structure. the threads of spiders are produced from an organ called the "spinneret," which is placed at the extremity of the body. the spinnerets are arranged in pairs, and are four, six, or eight in number. the spider generally works at its web with its head down, lowering itself by its thread. the whole is worked by the sense of touch, the threads being guided by one of the hind legs. if you take the trouble to watch a spider working, you will see it work just as i have described. the semi-liquid secretion is forced out through very small apertures, which may be called miniature tubes; they look very much like very minute hairs. these tubes cover the spinnerets, which are externally like little rounded projections, but their shape is not always the same. the threads become quite strong, for after leaving the tubes they are united together, and hence are much stronger than if the thread was composed of a single strand. chapter xiii. we continue our wanderings.--joined by etia.--we starve.--gambo and etia go in search of berries.--a herd of elephants.--the rogue elephant charges me.--he is killed.--he tumbles down near me.--story of redjioua. now we have left the land-crabs and the spiders, let us continue our wanderings in the jungle. i am ransacking the forest to discover and understand all that is in it. we had a lot of fun at that time. i was in good health and spirits. i was perhaps a little reckless, and did not seem to care for any thing. when there was danger in an undertaking, i frequently did not think enough about it, but rather took delight in it, scorpions, centipedes, and venomous serpents being the exception, for i rather objected to them, and did not fancy meeting them in my hunt, or under my bed, nor, indeed, any where else. whenever i could, i killed them without mercy. i delighted to sleep under the trees, in the midst of the thickest part of the forest, and where savage beasts were plentiful. in that case i always kept a sharp look-out, and saw that our fires were kept blazing. friend etia had come to meet us, and was going to join us in the woods for a few days, and we were all glad to see him. one day, while we were hunting, we came to a spot where large quantities of fern were growing under the tall trees, and we saw that in the morning a large herd of elephants had been there, for their heavy footprints were strongly marked on the ground. immediately there was great rejoicing, for we knew that the elephants could not be far off. how eager were the faces of malaouen, querlaouen, and gambo. they looked at their guns as if to say, "i hope you will help me to kill an elephant." the guns i gave them were their great pets. gambo and etia had gone away through the jungle, and were to remain two days collecting berries and nuts, and then they were to come back to us. we were in a sorry plight--we were starving. we could not wait for them, for fear that, while waiting, the elephants would move off. what a pity! each of us might bag an elephant. by the way, should i say bag? when i was a boy i used to bag squirrel; that is to say, put them in my bag. it was about three o'clock when we came upon the tracks of the elephants. what a number of them must be together! "there must be at least twenty," whispered malaouen. "there must be at least thirty," said querlaouen. malaouen insisted there were only twenty. then i had my say, and i said i thought there were about twenty-five. we tracked them till five o'clock, and then concluded that we had better have our camp built where we were, rather than go too near to them. being the dry season, we were not afraid of rain or tornadoes, so we chose a place to lie down, under a gigantic tree, as there we would only require a fire in front of us, our backs being protected by the tree, and the leopards would have less chance at us, and we would not have to build so many fires. in the evening we furbished our guns, chose the steel-pointed bullets we used for elephants, and then went to sleep on the dry ground. during the night we were awakened by a tremendous crashing of trees all round us, and we saw elephants bounding in the forest like wild bulls, tearing every thing before them, and then disappearing through the darkness. they seemed perfectly mad. malaouen shouted, "chaillie! the bashikouays are coming; let us make a big fire." he had hardly said this when i heard the tremendous roar of a male gorilla, then the piercing shrieks of his female, followed by the cries of a young gorilla. we immediately scattered the fire-wood we had lighted. it was high time, for the bashikouay were coming. the insects began flying over our heads. happily, we were in the midst of a fortress of fire. in less than half an hour they had gone on their march, and the forest became as silent as the night itself. we had had a narrow escape. if it had not been for the timely warning of the elephants, we should have been obliged to clear out double-quick through that jungle in the middle of the night. it would have been no joke. "the bashikouay have driven away every thing before them. what will become of our elephants?" i said. "they may have gone a great distance, and it may take us five days to overtake them. i wish the bashikouay had gone somewhere else." we went to sleep again, and when we awoke it was broad daylight. the birds were singing, and the sun's rays peeped through the dark foliage. i was really annoyed, for i was sure the elephants had gone a long way off. we could not pursue them, i thought, for it would take so much time that etia and gambo might return and not find us. then malaouen said that the elephants had probably gone back among the ferns, and we had better try to find them there. he was not mistaken, for when we went back there we saw at once that their footsteps were in that direction. we traveled slowly in the dense jungle, now and then frightening a guinea-fowl. at other times we would see a snake running away before us, or we would meet a strange insect or a queer butterfly. malaouen, who this time walked ahead of me, suddenly turned round and made me a sign to stop, and then he came near me, his feet appearing not to touch the ground; i could not hear them. he whispered to me the word _njogoo_ (elephant). i started, i looked round, i could not see any, and i could not understand how malaouen could have seen them. his quick ear had heard the sound of the footsteps of one. we advanced carefully. at last i saw the elephants lying quietly on the ground. i counted twenty of the huge beasts, and among them i recognized a tremendous bull elephant. what a sight it was! on a sudden the elephants got up, and they all retreated slowly through the forest, with the exception of the old bull, who stood still. i think i still see him, with his long ears, his big tusks, his thick, wrinkled black skin, covered with scattered and short hair. malaouen and i lay flat on the ground, as flat as we possibly could. it was no child's play. we were to have a little business to transact with the bull, the fighting one of the herd. if we missed him he would charge us, and, what made it worse, we could not get a good shot at the huge and leviathan-like creature. presently malaouen crawled forward; i lay still. how he could crawl without making a noise i could not tell, but he did it, till at last he almost came under the elephant's body. the elephant was looking toward me, and malaouen had succeeded in approaching from behind. i was thinking that if malaouen did not kill the elephant where he stood, i would run the risk of being charged by him and trampled to death, unless i shot the beast dead upon the spot. i felt like shouting to malaouen to be careful, and not to miss his shot at the elephant. when his gun rose, it rose slowly but surely; then i heard a tremendous detonation, and down the elephant came in my direction, close upon me. i fired, and the monster fell just in front of where i was lying. three or four yards more, and he would have tumbled down upon me, and probably made a pancake of your friend. querlaouen came rushing to the rescue, but the great beast lay without motion. querlaouen had killed him. i had shot the elephant right between the two eyes, which is not a good spot, while querlaouen's bullet had gone right into his body through the lower part of the belly. we looked like ants by the side of that huge creature. we cut his tail off, and then returned to our old camp, which was not far distant, where we were to meet etia and gambo. in the afternoon they came in, and when we showed them the elephant's tail they looked at us with amazement, as if they did not believe their own eyes. then they shouted, "you are men! you are men!" they were loaded with wild nuts, and thus we were to have plenty of food! [illustration: death of the bull elephant.] in despite of my best endeavors to prevent it, there must be some heathen ceremonies to celebrate our victory over the elephant. the hind quarters were cut off, and, with a piece of the flesh, were set apart and carried into the forest for the spirit alombo to feed upon. then my men muttered some words that i could not understand, but i did not care, for we were very much like the man who, when traveling in india, received an elephant as a present, and did not know what to do with it. the next day, after taking as much elephant meat as we could, we moved away, for the flies were coming pretty thick; and besides, the bashikouay might return again, and the smell would not be of the pleasantest after a couple of days' sojourn by the body of the dead elephant. so we started for another part of the forest, and built our camp several miles farther to the north of the place where we had been. of course we chose a spot where there was a beautiful little stream, so that we had plenty of good water to drink. the next morning we were to go hunting, and we were glad to be all together again, it was so nice. we busied ourselves smoking our elephant meat, so that we might be sure of having food for a good many days, though we should not find any berries. we furbished our guns, and had a real nice day in getting ready for some grand hunting. nothing during the night disturbed us, and the next morning we all felt strong and refreshed. querlaouen and i went hunting together, while malaouen and gambo went off in another direction. we were really lost in that great jungle, and yet we appeared to think that the forest belonged to us. we were to come back toward sundown; no one was to camp out by himself. that was the law i made that day. the country was hilly, and under the tall trees the ground was covered with a dense jungle. that day nothing was seen, and toward night we were glad to rest our weary limbs by the huge pile of blazing fire, and then we went to sleep, hoping to be more fortunate the next time. our supper was composed of a few wild berries, but chiefly of elephant meat, my men enjoying the elephant marvelously. after our supper, and before we went to sleep, querlaouen got up and said, "now i am going to tell you a story." redjioua, a king.--akenda mbani. "long ago, long before our fathers lived, in a far country there lived a king called redjioua. that king had a daughter called arondo. arondo (sweetheart) was beautiful--more beautiful than all the girls of the country. redjioua said to the people, 'though a man would ask my daughter in marriage, and present me with a great many slaves, goats, and tusks of ivory, so that he might "soften" my heart to have her, he can not have her. i want only a man that shall agree that, when arondo will be ill, he must be ill also; that when arondo dies, he must die also the same day.' "years passed by; no one came to ask arondo in marriage, for all were afraid of the law the king had made, no one being willing to die when she died." i questioned querlaouen, "did arondo ever marry?" "wait a little while and you will hear," said friend querlaouen, as gently as he could. "there was a man in that country called akenda mbani (never goes twice to the same place)." many names among the tribes of equatorial africa have a meaning, and remember that akenda mbani's means "never goes twice to the same place." "akenda mbani came to the king and said to him, 'i come to marry arondo, your daughter, the one you have (_tená coni_) made a law concerning; so i have brought no ivory, or slaves, or goats. i come without the things, for i agree to die when arondo dies.' "so redjioua gave his beautiful daughter, the pride of his heart, the loveliest woman of his dominion, to akenda mbani. "akenda mbani was a great hunter, but, as his name implied, he never went twice to the same place in the forest to hunt. but his name did not prevent his moving about his own village. "after he had married arondo, he went hunting, and one day he killed two wild boars, after which exploit he returned to the village of his father-in-law, carrying one of the boars on his back. he went to redjioua and said, 'father, i have killed two wild boars; i bring you one.' the king said, 'thank you, my son; go and fetch the other.' then akenda mbani replied, 'when i was born, my father, in giving me my name of akenda mbani, gave me a coni (a law) never to go twice to the same place.' so the other wild boar was lost, as no one could tell where it was to be found in the forest. "then he went hunting again, and killed two antelopes. of course akenda mbani said he could not go and fetch the other." then gambo interrupted the story by saying, "the king knew very well that akenda mbani could not go twice to the same spot; why did he ask him to go?" "i can not say why," said querlaouen; "i tell you the story as it has come to us from our forefathers." "shortly afterward akenda mbani killed two beautiful _bongos_, and brought one back. then the people came and asked him to show them the way, so they might fetch the other. but akenda mbani said, 'you know that if we do not keep the coni our father gave us, we are sure to die. i do not wish to die for a bongo, so i can not go.' he thus went shooting month after month, but would never go back to the same spot. "one fine evening, as akenda mbani was seated in front of his house, the people came to him and said, 'a people called oroungous have come; they have come to trade, and also to buy ten slaves.' "akenda mbani turned to his wife and said, 'let us go and meet the oroungous, who are still in their canoe on the river-bank, and who have come to be my guests.' "then they went and met the oroungous. akenda mbani took a chest of goods, and put the chest on the head of his wife, and he himself took a sword, and they returned to their home, leaving the oroungous on the beach. "a moon (month) passed away since the oroungous had left, and the chest which the oroungous had brought, and which arondo carried to her house, had not been opened. one evening arondo said to her husband, 'let us go and see what is in the chest.' so they went and took the cover off, and inside they discovered the most beautiful things, that had come from the white man's country. the chest was quite full of beautiful cloths. arondo desired her husband to take two fathoms of one beautiful cloth, as she liked it. so akenda mbani cut off two fathoms. the chest was then closed again, and they left the place. "then akenda mbani seated himself on an _ebongo_ (stool), and arondo on the _acoco_ (bed), and she began to sew. she had only pierced the cloth four times with her needle when she exclaimed, 'husband! husband! i begin to have a headache!' akenda mbani replied,'take care, take care. do not be sick if you do not wish me to die;' and he looked her steadily in the face. arondo called again, 'akenda mbani! akenda mbani! my husband, do tie a string round my head, for i have a great deal of pain.' then arondo tied a string round her husband's head also, though he had no headache. "in a short time arondo began to cry again, for she suffered greatly, and her headache was getting worse and worse. akenda mbani was becoming frightened, for he did not want to die. "the news of arondo's illness spread all over the village, and soon reached the ears of king redjioua, her father. the whole people of the village came to see arondo, and many were around her when she was crying and calling on her father. the king said, 'do not cry, my daughter; you will not die, my child.' as soon as arondo heard this, she moaned, 'ah father! ah father! why did you say i will not die, for you know that if you _daga_ (mourn, lament, fear) death it is sure to come.' "she had hardly uttered these words when she died. the people mourned and wept, putting their hands over their heads. "redjioua said, 'as my daughter is dead, akenda mbani must die also.' akenda mbani answered, 'i will die, that i may be buried with arondo, my wife.' so akenda was killed. "the king ordered a slave to be buried alive with his daughter. there were also placed in her grave ten dishes, ten jars full of palm wine, ten baskets, ten tusks of ivory, and many other things, among which was the chest of the oroungous." there was a dead silence among us all, for we wanted to hear the end of the story. querlaouen stopped for breath, and then continued: "the place where the people are buried is called ndjimai, and here they laid the bodies of akenda mbani and of arondo, side by side in one grave, laying over them the spears of akenda mbani, his battle-axe, the bed upon which he and his wife had slept, his cutlasses, and his hunting-bag. then the people said, 'now let us cover the grave with sand,' which they did until a little mound was formed. "then agambouai (this name means the speaker of the village) said, 'king, there are leopards here.' as soon as redjioua heard this, he cried, 'do not build a mound over the grave of my child, for fear that leopards may see it, scratch up the earth, and eat the body of my beautiful daughter.' "they replied, 'let us take the things back and dig a deeper grave.' then they took away the things, and seated the bodies of arondo and akenda mbani on two seats. when they had finished their work, and thought the grave deep enough, they replaced all the things they had taken out. then they lifted the body of arondo and laid her gently in the grave. next they took hold of akenda mbani, and raised him gently to place him by the side of his wife; but he opened his eyes and mouth, and said, 'don't you know i never go twice to the same place? if any of you attempt to place me again in the tomb, i will kill him, for you know i never go twice to the same place.' "he then rose, and, accompanied by the people, returned to the village; and when redjioua saw him he said, 'how is it that akenda mbani has returned? i thought he had been killed and buried.' "up to the time of redjioua, when a husband or wife died, the survivor was killed; but akenda mbani broke the law by rising again from the grave. since then, no one is killed on account of the spouse dying." * * * * * from this legend, which has been handed down from generation to generation, i conclude that perhaps at a remote period it was compulsory for both husband and wife to die at the same time. after a hearty laugh at the lucky escape of akenda mbani, my men thanked their stars that they were not born at that time, and then we all went to sleep. chapter xiv. a formidable bird.--the people are afraid of it.--a baby carried off by the guanionien.--a monkey also seized.--i discover a guanionien nest.--i watch for the eagles. several weeks have passed away since the story of akenda mbani was told us, and we have since been wandering through the forest in the midst of the intricate hunting-paths which querlaouen knew so well. at night we would all meet and recount the adventures of the day, and eat the game which some of us had been fortunate enough to kill. in case we had killed no game, then we had our elephant meat to fall back upon. how silent the forest was! not a human being besides ourselves was to be seen. a leaf falling, a bird singing, a wild guinea-fowl calling for its mate, the footsteps of a gazelle, the chatter of a monkey, the hum of a bee, the rippling of the water of some beautiful little stream as it meandered through the forest, were the only noises that ever disturbed the stillness of this grand solitude. now and then we could hear the wind whispering strangely as it passed gently amid the branches of the tall trees hanging over our heads. we must have looked strange indeed as we wandered through that great forest, where god alone could see us. how strange every thing seemed to me! i was in another world, and novel objects every where met my eyes. one morning i hear a strange cry high up in the air. i look, and what do i see?--what do i see yonder up in the sky? an eagle. but what kind of an eagle? for it appears to me so much larger than any eagle i have ever met with before. and as i asked this, my men exclaimed, "it is a _guanionien_; the leopard of the air; the bird that feeds on gazelles, goats, and monkeys; the bird that is the most difficult of any to find and to kill." "yes," said querlaouen; "in my younger days i remember that my wife and myself were on our plantation, with some of our slaves, and one day we heard the cries of a baby, and saw a child carried up into the sky by one of these guanioniens. the baby had been laid on the ground, and the guanionien, whose eyes never miss any thing, and which had not been noticed soaring above our heads, pounced on its prey, and then laughed at us as he rose and flew to a distant part of the forest." then querlaouen showed me a fetich partly made of two huge claws of this bird. what tremendous things those talons were! how deep they could go into the flesh! then came wonderful stories of the very great strength of the bird. the people were afraid of them, and were compelled to be very careful of their babies. these grand eagles do not feed on fowls; they are too small game for them. monkeys are what they like best; they can watch them as they float over the top of the trees of the forest; but sometimes the monkeys get the better of them. "people had better not try to get hold of the guanionien's young if they want to keep their sight," said gambo; "for, as sure as we live, the old bird will pounce upon the man that touches its young." for a long time i had heard the people talking of the guanionien, but had never yet had a glimpse of one. now, looking up again, i saw several of them. how high they were! at times they would appear to be quite still in the air; at other times they would soar. they were so high that i do not see how they could possibly see the trees; every thing must have been in a haze to them; monkeys, of course, could not be seen. they were, no doubt, amusing themselves, and i wonder if they tried to see how near they could go to the sun. some at times flew so high that i lost sight of them. oh, how i longed to kill a guanionien; but i never was able to do it. once i examined one, but it was dead, and had been killed by spears as it had come down and seized a goat. the natives had kept it for me; but when i returned to the village it was quite spoiled and decomposed, the feathers having dropped out. several times i was on the point of killing one, but never was in time. my men went hunting that morning, while i remained alone in the camp, for i felt tired, and wanted to write up my journal, and to describe all the things i had seen or heard during the past few days. in the afternoon i thought i would ramble round. i took a double-barreled smooth-bore gun, and loaded one side with a bullet in case i should see large game; the other barrel i loaded with shot no. . then i carefully plunged into the woods till i reached the banks of a little stream, and there i heard the cry of the mondi (_colobus satanus_), which is one of the largest monkeys of these forests. from their shrill cries, i thought there must be at least half a dozen together. i was indeed glad that i had one barrel loaded with big shot. if the mondis were not too far off, i would be able to get a fair shot, and kill one. i advanced very cautiously until i got quite near to them. i could then see their big bodies, long tails, and long, jet-black, shining hair. what handsome beasts they were! what a nice-looking muff their skins would make! i thought. just as i was considering which of them i would fire at, i saw some big thing, like a large shadow, suddenly come down upon the tree. then i heard the flapping of heavy wings, and also the death-cry of a poor mondi. then i saw a huge bird, with a breast spotted somewhat like a leopard, raise itself slowly into the air, carrying the monkey in its powerful finger-like talons. the claws of one leg were fast in the upper part of the neck of the monkey; so deep were they in the flesh that they were completely buried, and a few drops of blood fell upon the leaves below. the other leg had its claws quite deep into the back of the monkey. the left leg was kept higher than the right, and i could see that the great strength of the bird was used at that time to keep the neck, and also the back of the victim, from moving. the bird rose higher and higher, the monkey's tail swayed to and fro, and then both disappeared. it was a guanionien. its prey was, no doubt, taken to some big tree where it could be devoured. the natives say that the first thing the guanionien does is to take out the eyes of the monkeys they catch. but there must be a fearful struggle, for these mondis are powerful beasts, and do not die at the eagle's will. there must be a great trial of strength; for if the monkey is not seized at an exact place on the neck, he can turn his head, and he then inflicts a fearful bite on the breast of the eagle, or on his neck or leg, which disables his most terrible enemy, and then both, falling, meet their death. i looked on without firing. the monkeys seemed paralyzed with fear when the eagle came down upon them, and did not move until after the bird of prey had taken one of their number, and then decamped. when i looked for them they had fled for parts unknown to me in the forest. i was looking so intently at the eagle and its prey that for a while i had forgotten the mondis. i do not wonder at it, for monkeys i could see often, but it is only once in a great while that such a scene as i witnessed could be seen by a man. it was grand; and i wondered not that the natives called the guanionien the leopard of the air. as i write these lines, though several years have passed away, i see still before me that big, powerful bird carrying its prey to some unknown part of the forest. long after the time i have been speaking to you about, i was hunting in the forest, when i came to a spot where i saw on the ground more than a hundred skulls of various animals, and of monkeys of all sizes, from those of baby monkeys to those of large mandrills; and there were two or three skulls of young chimpanzees. what a ghastly sight it was! some of these skulls seemed almost fresh; they were skulls of all the species of monkeys found in the forest. what could all this mean? i quickly perceived that these skulls were all scattered round a huge tree which rose higher than any of the trees surrounding it. raising my eyes toward the top, i saw a huge nest made of branches of trees. i looked and looked in vain. i could not even hear the cries of any young birds. they had gone; they must have left their nest, and i wondered if they would come back at night with the _old folks_; so i concluded that i would lie in wait. i waited in vain. the sun set, and no guanionien; darkness came, and no guanionien. then i took a box of matches from my hunting-bag, and set fire to a large pile of wood which i had made ready, and then i cooked a few plantains i had with me. i was all alone; i had taken no one with me. how quiet and silent every thing was around me that night! now and then i could hear the dew that had collected on the leaves above come down drop after drop. i could see a bright star through the thick foliage of the trees. i could hear the music of the musquitoes round me; for i think there is something musical about the buzzing of a musquito, though there is nothing pleasant about its bite. i could see now and then a beautiful and bright fire-fly, which seemed to be like a light flitting through the jungle from place to place, sometimes remaining still and giving a stream of light all round as it rested on some big leaves for a while, then moving farther on. now and then i could hear the mournful cry of the owl, and at times i fancied i could hear the footstep of wild beasts walking in the silence of night. i did not sleep at all that night; i did not wish to do so; and, as i was seated by the fire, i thought of the strange life i had led for some time past--how strange every thing was from what i had been accustomed to see at home. there was not a tree in the forest that we had in ours, and the face of a white man had not been seen by me for a very long time. the night passed slowly, but at last the cries of the partridges reminded me that daylight was not far off. when the twilight came, it was of very short duration; the birds began to sing, the insects to move about, the monkeys to chatter, but the hyena, the leopard, and other night-animals had retired long before the sunlight into their dens. then i got up and roasted a plantain, which i ate; forthwith i shouldered my gun and started back for the village by a hunting-path that i knew. coming to the banks of a stream, where the water was as pure and limpid as crystal, i seated myself by the charming rivulet, thinking i would refresh myself by taking a bath, when lo! what do i see? a large snake swimming in the water. its body was black, and its belly yellow, with black stripes. i immediately got up and fired at the disgusting creature, which i killed; and that water, which appeared to me a few minutes before so nice, was, to my eyes, no longer so. chapter xv. the cascade of niama-biembai.--a native camp.--starting for the hunt.--a man attacked by a gorilla.--his gun broken.--the man dies.--his burial. after wandering through the forest, at times coming back to the bakalai village for food, gambo suggested that we should go and see his father, who was an ashira chief, and who had built an olako in the forest not far from the bakalai village of ndjali-coudie. we traveled through the forest until we reached a beautiful cascade, called niama-biembai. how gracefully niama-biembai wanders through the hills, falling from rock to rock! its bed is gravelly, and its water clear and pure, like some northern brook. how i loved to look at niama-biembai, and, by the gentle noise its waters made in falling, to think of friends who were far away! just in sight of this charming cascade was the encampment of gambo's father, whom i had met before. we were received with great joy by the people. the evening of my arrival the olako was busy with preparations. meat was scarce--very scarce; _gouamba_ (hunger for meat) had seized the people, and the great hunters were getting ready for the hunt, and the people were joyful in the belief that plenty of game would be brought into the camp. in the evening the hunters spoke with hollow and sonorous voices, and called upon the spirits of their ancestors to protect them. they covered themselves with the chalk of the alumbi, and then bled their hands. then we seated ourselves round the fire, and the eleven hunters who were going with me began to tell their wonderful stories. the next morning we made for the hunting-paths. seven men were to go off in one direction for gazelles, and three others, among whom i was one, were to hunt for gorillas. malaouen and querlaouen went by themselves; gambo and another man accompanied me. before starting, igoumba, the chief of the olako, told us to be careful, for there were some bad and ferocious gorillas in the woods. after walking some distance, we finally made toward a dark valley, where gambo said we should find our prey. we were soon in one of the most dense jungles i ever met in africa. my poor pantaloons received several rents from the thorns; at last one of the legs was taken clean off, so i was left with one-leg pantaloons. we were at times in the midst of swamps, so this was one of the hardest days i had had for a long time. the gorilla chooses the darkest and gloomiest forest for his home, and is found on the outskirts of the clearings only when in search of plantains, bananas, sugar-cane, or pine-apples. often he chooses for his peculiar haunt a wood so dark that, even at midday, one can scarcely see ten yards. oh young folks! i wish you could have been with me in some part of that great jungle, then you could have seen for yourselves. our little party had separated. my friends malaouen and querlaouen said they were going to seek for elephants. gambo, his friend, and myself were to hunt for gorillas. gambo and i kept together; for really, if i had lost him, i should never have found my way back. all at once gambo's friend left us, saying that he was going to a spot where the _tondo_ (a fruit) was plentiful, and there might be gorillas there; so he went off. he had been gone but a short time when i heard a gun fired only a little way from us, and then i heard the tremendous roar of the gorilla, which sounded like distant thunder along the sky. the whole forest seemed filled with the din. oh how pale i must have looked! a cold shudder ran through me. when i looked at gambo, his face looked anxious. we gazed in each other's faces without saying a word, but instinctively we made for the spot where we had heard the roar of the gorilla and detonation of the gun. when i first heard the gun i thought the gorilla had been slain, and my heart was filled with joy; but the joy was of short duration, for the roar immediately followed, to tell us that the gorilla was not dead. then through the forest resounded once more the crack of a gun, and immediately afterward the most terrific roars of the beast. he roared three times, and then all became silent; no more roars were heard, no more guns were fired. this time gambo seized my arm in great agitation, and we hurried on, both filled with a dreadful and sickening alarm. we had not to go far before our worst fears were realized. we pressed through the jungle in search of our companion, and at last found him. the poor brave fellow, who had gone off alone, was lying on the ground in a pool of his own blood, and, i at first thought, quite dead. beside him lay his gun; the stock was broken, and the barrel bent almost double. in one place it was flattened, and it bore plainly the marks of the gorilla's teeth. yes; the huge monster, in his rage, had bitten the barrel of the gun, and his powerful teeth had gone fiercely into that piece of steel. what a face he must have made as he held the barrel of that gun between his tremendous teeth! how he must have gnashed them with rage! how the wrinkles on his old face must have shown out! it must have been one of the most horrid and frightful pictures that one could ever behold. lowering my body and putting my ear to his heart, i remained for a while pale and speechless. at last i discovered that his heart beat. oh how glad i was! i immediately tore to pieces the old shirt i wore--it was one of the last i possessed--and the remaining leg of my pantaloons, and began to dress his wounds. i never was much of a surgeon, so i felt somewhat awkward and nervous. then i poured into his mouth a little brandy, which i took from the small flask i always carried with me in case of need, which revived him a little, and he was able, with great difficulty, to speak. and then he told us that he was walking in the jungle just where the tondo grew, when he suddenly met, face to face, a huge male gorilla. as soon as the gorilla saw him he was literally convulsed with rage, and rushed at him. it was a very gloomy part of the wood, and there were a great many barriers between him and the gorilla. it was almost quite dark in that thicket, but he took good aim, and fired at the beast when he was about eight yards off. the ball, he thought, had wounded him in the side. the monster at once began beating his breast, giving three most impressive roars, which shook the earth, and, with the greatest rage, advanced upon him. to run away was impossible. he would have been caught by the muscular arm of the gorilla, and held in his powerful and giant hand, before he could have taken a dozen steps in the jungle. "so," said the poor fellow, "i stood my ground, and reloaded my gun as quickly as i could, for the gorilla was slowly but steadily advancing upon me. as i raised my gun to fire, the gorilla, which was quite close to me, stretched out his long and powerful arm, and dashed the gun from my grasp. it struck the ground with great violence and went off. then, in an instant, and with a terrible roar, the animal raised his arm and came at me with terrific force. i was felled to the ground by a heavy blow from his immense open paw." here the poor fellow tried to raise his arm to his abdomen, and continued: "he cut me in two; and while i lay bleeding on the ground, the monster seized my gun, and i thought he would dash my brains out with it. that is all i remember. i know that i am going to die." this huge gorilla thought the gun was his enemy, so he had seized it and dashed it on the ground, and then, not satisfied, had taken it up again and given it a tremendous bite--a bite which would have crushed the arm of a man more easily than we crush the bones of a young spring chicken. the great strength of the gorilla seems to lie in that big, long, and gigantic muscular arm of his, and in his immense hands--which we may call paws--with which he strikes, the hand always being almost wide open as it strikes. when we reached the spot the gorilla was gone, so gambo blew his antelope-horn, calling upon the other men to rejoin us. we then made, with branches of trees, a kind of bed, laying lots of leaves over it, upon which we carried the poor fellow back to the camp of the ashiras. i still remember the heart-rending, piercing wail i heard when i entered the camp; how his poor wife came rushing out to meet him, holding his hand and crying, "husband, do speak to me--do speak to me once more!" but he never spoke again, for at last his heart ceased to beat, and he was dead. he had been killed by a gorilla. how sorry i was. i felt truly unhappy. they entreated me to give the poor fellow medicine. they seemed persuaded that i could prevent his dying; but i was far from my head-quarters, where all my medicines were, and i had nothing to suit his case. the people declared, with one accord, that it was no true gorilla that had attacked him, but a man--a wicked man that had been turned into a gorilla. such a being no one could escape, for he can not be killed. the next morning i got up, and, taking my large bag, put into it provisions for three days, adding two or three pounds of powder, with forty or fifty large bullets. i took my best gun, and placed, as usual, my two revolvers in the belt fastened round my waist, then painted my hands and face with powdered charcoal, mixed with palm oil, so that i might appear black. i took querlaouen with me, telling him that i must kill that gorilla. querlaouen, at first, did not want to go, "for," said he, "we will never be able to kill that man gorilla." but querlaouen always obeyed me. [illustration: gambo's friend killed by a gorilla.] we proceeded at once into the thick of the jungle, making for the spot where the poor man had been mortally wounded. i felt very sorry when i saw the place where the man had been killed. a flush came over my face. "thou shalt be avenged!" i muttered. i looked at my gun with ferocious joy; i held it up, and fondled it, and i must have looked fierce, for poor querlaouen appeared terrified. "yes," said i to querlaouen, "i shall kill that very gorilla." i followed for a while the tracks of the beast by the marks of blood he had left on the trunks of the trees, but these became less and less noticeable as i removed from the scene of that sad catastrophe. finally i lost those bloody hand-prints; but then i followed closely, and with great care, other marks he had left in the jungle as he went along. at times i would entirely lose these signs of the huge monster, then i would find them again. i lost them finally, and i searched and searched, but they were not to be seen. i had evidently gone astray. i was so annoyed, so disheartened; for i had set my heart on killing that gorilla, and i was on the point of giving up the chase. querlaouen kept a few hundred yards from me, and he could see no traces of the gorilla. suddenly, and by sheer carelessness, i had stepped on a dead branch of a tree, and broke it. of course, the breaking of that dry limb made a noise. immediately i heard a tremendous rush in the jungle, and then saw an intensely black face peering through the leaves. the deep, gray, sunken eyes of the great beast seemed to emit fire when they got sight of me. then he scattered the jungle with his two hands, raised himself (for he was on all-fours) on his hind legs, gave from that huge chest one of his deep, terrific roars, which shook the whole adjacent forest, and rushed toward me, showing his immense teeth as he opened his mouth. i had never before seen a gorilla come so quickly to the attack as did this one. he walked in a waddling manner, his two arms extended toward me, his body bent in the same direction, and it seemed to me that at any moment i might see him tumble down on his face. this feeling was caused by his peculiar walk. i was calm, but it was the calm that precedes death--the feeling that in one minute more i might be a dead man. i am sure not a muscle moved in my face. i was steady, and said to myself, "paul b. du chaillu, you will never go home if you do not kill that creature on the spot, and before he has a chance to get hold of your poor body." as he approached nearer and nearer, i know that i was cool and determined, but felt that within a few seconds all might be over with me; for, if the diabolical creature once had me in his grasp, he would crush me to death. here he is, only five yards distant, but the jungle is so thick that if i fire my bullet may strike the limb of a tree. i wait. i feel that i am as pale as death. i have raised my gun to my shoulder, and follow the movements of the beast, all the time with it pointed at his head. now he is only four yards distant; i mean his body, for his arms are extended toward me, and are much nearer. i wait a little longer. he has made one step more toward me; he is within three yards and a half of me. in three or four seconds more he will be a dead gorilla or i a dead man. just as he opened his mouth to utter another of his frightful roars, and i could feel his breath on my face, i fired, and shot him right through the heart. he gave a leap, and fell, with a fearful groan, quite dead, his long, powerful arm almost reaching me as he lay extended on the ground, as if ready to clutch me; but it fell short by a few inches. i drew a heavy breath, for my respiration had become short through excitement. i had a narrow escape, for if the gorilla's hands in falling had reached me they would have lacerated me terribly. querlaouen was perfectly wild. while the gorilla was coming to the attack, he cried out with his powerful voice several times, and with all his might, "kombo, come here if you dare! come here!" he gave a tremendous shout as the gorilla fell, advanced toward the dead monster, fired right into his body, and then whirled round toward me. i thought he had become insane, he looked so wild. when we went up to the gorilla he was quite dead. his eyes were wide open, his lips shut, and his teeth clinched together. when i took hold of his hand a cold shiver ran through me, it was so big. the hand of goliath, the giant, could not have been any larger. when we returned to the camp, and told how we had slain the gorilla, there was immense rejoicing. soon after a number of men went with querlaouen to fetch the monster, and when it made its appearance in the village the people became intensely excited, and it was all i could do to prevent them from hacking the body to pieces. i am happy to say, however, that i was able to bring this big specimen to new york. chapter xvi. funeral of the gorilla's victim.--a man's head for the alumbi.--the snake and the guinea-fowl.--snake killed.--visit to the house of the alumbi.--determine to visit the sea-coast. now the people were to bury the man who had been killed by that big gorilla. his kindred arrived to get the body to carry it to his village. every man had his body and face painted in all sorts of colors. they also wore their fetiches, and looked like so many devils coming out of the woods. after traveling the whole day we came to a strange village on the top of a hill, at the foot of which there was a beautiful little stream, the water of which never dried during the season when there was no rain. as soon as we made our appearance the sounds of wailing and weeping filled the air. the body was taken to the house of the deceased, where his widows--for he had three wives--mourned, and wept, and cried so that i felt the greatest sympathy for them. at sunset silence reigned in the village. all the women had gone into their huts, while the men seated themselves on the ground or on their little stools. but suddenly a great wailing rent the air, and from every hut came lamentations--sounds that were heart-rending. then they sang songs, praising the departed one--songs such as i have described to you young folks in "stories of the gorilla country." at last, after two days, six stout men, covered with fetiches and painted in the most fantastic manner, came to take the body, to leave it in the woods under some big tree. as soon as they were ready the tam-tams began to beat, and songs of sorrow were chanted as they disappeared from the village. i followed the body, for i wished to see what they would do. after a while we got into the jungle, and soon came to a spot where the body was left. a fire was lighted by its side, no doubt with the idea of keeping him warm; then some boiled plantains, and a piece of cooked elephant and some smoked fish, were put in a dish of wicker-work and placed at his head. all the while the men kept muttering words i did not understand. the day after the funeral, toward sunset, while i was looking for birds in the forest, trying to obtain some new specimens which i might never have seen before, i fell in with the brother of the deceased, and saw that he was carrying something carefully packed--something which i could not make out. i asked him what it was. at first he replied, "nothing." then i said, "you must tell me." thinking that i was getting angry, he then answered, "moguizi, i will tell you what it is. it is _the head of my brother_ who was buried yesterday, and i have just been to get it." "the head of your brother!" i exclaimed; "and why have you cut off the head of your brother?" "because," he answered, in a low whisper, "my brother was a great hunter, a mighty warrior, and i want to put his head in the house of the alumbi. moguizi, do not tell any one that you have seen me with this head, for we never tell any one when we do this thing, though we all do it. after we have been in the village i will show you the house of the alumbi." so i let him go back to his village, and i went hunting for my birds. as i was returning to my home in the village, i stopped on the bank of the little stream, and there i perceived a very large snake enjoying a bath. as the water was quite clear, i could see him perfectly. i thought i would watch his movements rather than kill him. the back of this snake was black, and his belly striped yellow and black. it was of a very venomous kind, and one most dreaded by the natives. i could not help a cold shudder running through me as i looked at the reptile. by-and-by it came out of the water and remained still for a little while. then i saw a beautiful guinea-fowl coming toward the stream to drink. how beautiful the bird looked! i have before described it in "stories of the gorilla country." he came toward the water, and just as it stood on the brink of the little stream, ready to drink, i saw the huge snake crawling silently toward the bird. it crawled so gently that i could not even hear the noise its body made as it glided over the dead leaves that had fallen from the trees. it came nearer and nearer, and it certainly did not make the noise that it does when not in search of prey. the poor guinea-fowl, in the mean time, was unaware of the approach of its enemy, and how greatly its life was in danger. so it lowered its neck and dipped its bill into the water; once, twice, and the snake was getting nearer and nearer; thrice, and the snake was close at hand; and now the snake began to coil itself for a spring. then the bird took one drink more, and just as it turned its head back its eyes met those of the snake, which stood glaring at the bird. the poor guinea-fowl stood still, moving not a step, and it was not more than half a yard from the snake, when suddenly the monster sprang with a dart on the poor bird, and before i had time to wink, part of its shiny black body was round the fowl. how pitiful were the cries of the poor guinea-fowl! quick, quick, quick, and all was over. the snake's mouth distended, for he had begun to swallow the bird by the head. just then i fired in such a way as not to hit the snake, and in his fright he disgorged the bird and left him and the field, crawling out of the way as quick as possible. this time i could hear the noise of the leaves. indeed, it went off very fast, and i was just on the point of losing sight of it, when i managed to send a load of shot into its body, breaking the spine, as it was about half way across the stream. then i took a look at the dead guinea-fowl. toward the neck the feathers were very slimy from the snake-froth. the snake was now twisting about in all directions, but could neither advance nor retreat, for you know that, its spine being cut, it could not swim, and therefore soon died. i picked up my guinea-fowl, cut off the head of the snake, made a parcel of its body, and took the trophies of my day's sport into the village, where i gave a treat to some of my friends. soon after my return i went to see my friend oyagui, who told me in a most mysterious way to wait, and that he would show me the house of the _alumbi_ on the next day. the next morning i did not see oyagui, but toward sunset he came with the same mysterious air, and told me to come with him. then he led me to the rear of his hut, where there was a little dwarfish house, which we entered. there i saw three skulls of men resting on the ochre with which he rubbed his body. one cake was red, another yellow, and another white. there lay the skull of his father, of an uncle, and of a brother. as for the fresh head he had cut the day before, it was not to be seen. there were several fetiches hung above the skulls--fetiches which were famous, and had led his ancestors to victory, gave them success in the hunt, and had prevented them from being bewitched. one of these fetiches had two claws of the eagle called _guanionien_, and three scales of an animal called _ipi_, an ant-eater, the scales on which are very large and thick. this ipi i had thus far never been able to see, though i had heard of it. in the hut was also a plain iron chain, and in the fore-ground the remains of a burning fire. oyagui never spoke a word, and after looking round i left, and he closed the door, which was made of the bark of trees. the people of the village were comparatively strange, and regarded me with some fear. that day there was a new moon. in the evening all was silent; hardly a whisper could be heard. the men had painted their bodies, and there was no dancing or singing, so i retired to my hut, and was soon soundly sleeping. by this time i began to feel tired of my hard and exciting life, and thought of gradually returning toward the sea-coast. in the morning i had made up my mind to leave, and made preparations accordingly, and on the following day i bade these people good-by, and started on my return. chapter xvii. at washington once more.--delights of the sea-shore.--i have been made a makaga.--friends object to my return into the jungle.--quengueza taken sick.--gives a letter to his nephew.--taking leave. time passed away. in the mean time i had returned to washington, that beautiful little village i had built near the sea-shore on the banks of the fernand vaz river. i brought down the innumerable trophies of my wanderings while "lost in the jungle"--gorillas, chimpanzees, kooloo-kamba, and other animals; also reptiles. the birds could be counted by thousands, the other specimens by hundreds, all of which i carefully stored. every day i would cross the tongue of land separating the fernand vaz from the sea, and would go and look at the deep water of the ocean. my eyes would try to look far into the distance, in the hope of spying a sail. there was no vessel for me. i was still alone on that deserted coast of the gulf of guinea. i loved to steal away from washington, and seat myself all alone on the shore, and look at the big, long, rolling billows of the surf as they came dashing along, white with foam; the booming sound they gave in breaking was like music to me. it was so nice to have left that everlasting jungle; to see prairie land and the wide expanse of the atlantic; to look at the sun as it disappeared, apparently under the water. how grand the spectacle was! i loved to look at the gulls, to hear their shrill cries, for these cries were so unlike those of the birds of the great forest. there was also something very invigorating in that strong sea breeze that came from the south and southwest. beyond the breakers i could see now and then the fins of some huge sharks searching for their prey; sometimes they would hardly appear to move, at other times they swam very fast. the time had not yet come for me to return to new york. i must go back again into the great jungle; i must discover new mountains, new rivers, new tribes of people, new beasts, and new birds; i must have more fights with gorillas, more elephant-hunting. i would be so glad to see querlaouen, malaouen, and gambo. while i was in the interior, the commi people, in great council, had made me a _makaga_, which title only one man, and he generally the best hunter and bravest, may bear. the office of the makaga is to lead in all desperate frays. he is the avenger of blood. if any one has murdered one of his fellow-villagers, and the murderer's townspeople refuse to give him up (which almost always happens, for they think it a shame to surrender any one who has taken refuge with them), then it is the office of the makaga to take the great warriors of the tribe, to attack and destroy the village, and cut off the heads of as many people as he can. if any one is suspected of being a wizard, and runs away from his village, it is the business of the makaga to follow and capture him. in that case he is a kind of sheriff. in fact, he has to see that the laws are executed. it was only among the commi that i heard of a makaga. so you may conceive i did not care to be a makaga, and in a great meeting of the chiefs i declared i could not be. but they all shouted, "we want you, the great slayer of beasts, to be our makaga; we want you to stay with us all the time." i was getting well and strong again, for i had taken a long rest. i concluded i must go again into the jungle. my good friend ranpano said, "why do you wish to go back into the forest? if you go again to countries where not one black man has ever gone before, we shall never see you again. i have heard that the people want you; they only desire to kill you, for they want to get your skull; they want to make a fetich of your hair. they have many fetiches, but they want one from your hair and brain. we love you; you are our white man. what you tell us to do, we do. when you say it is wrong, we do not do it. we take care of your house, your goats, your fowls, your parrots, your monkeys, and your antelopes;" then shouted with a loud voice, "we love you!" to which all the people answered, "yes, we love him. he is our white man, and we have no other white man." then the king continued: "we know that writing talks; write to us, therefore, a letter to prove to your friends, if you do not come back, that we have not hurt you; so that when a vessel from the white-man country comes, we can show your letter to the white men." these poor people had an idea that every white man must know me like they knew me. finally, when they saw i was bound to go once more to the jungle, they gave me up, all exclaiming in accents of wonder, "ottangani angani (man of the white men), what is the matter with you that you have no fear? god gave you the heart of a leopard; you were born without fear!" just as i was making the final preparations for my departure, a great trial came upon me. quengueza, who had accompanied me to the coast, became dangerously ill. there were murmurs among the up-river people. i began to despair of his life. all the medicine i gave him seemed for a while to do him no good, and he became thinner and thinner every day, till at last he looked almost like a skeleton. how anxious i felt! was my great and beloved african friend to die? what would the people say? for i had brought him down from his country. they would surely say that i had killed their king. i could not make out what would be the end if so great a misfortune was to happen. the murmurs of the people, which had already began, caused me sad forebodings of the future. but there was still a bright spot. quengueza knew that, even if i could, i would not make him ill; he knew i loved him too well, and every day he would declare that whoever said that i had made him ill was a liar. and one morning i heard him protest that the man who would say that his friend chally had made him ill was a wizard. of course, after such talk, the people took good care to keep their tongues quiet. finally he got better and better, and became stronger. what a load of anxiety was removed from my mind! i felt that i must go now; the rainy season was coming on. quengueza was not strong enough; besides, he wanted to remain, for he had business to transact with some of the sea-shore chiefs after he was well enough to go about. so quengueza called one of his nephews of the name of rapero, and as these people do not write, he gave him "his mouth;" that is to say, he sent word to his brother, or, as i discovered after, to his nephew, who reigned in his stead in goumbi, to give me as many people as i wanted; and he ordered that his nephew adouma must be the chief of the party who were to accompany me in the ashira country, and to take me to olenda, the king of that people. my dear little commi boy macondai was to come with me, and he was the only one at the sea-side quengueza would allow to return. then, when all was ready for our departure, i went to bid good-by to my two best friends in africa, king ranpano and king quengueza. i have told you before how much i loved king quengueza, the great chief of the rembo river. in the presence of all the people, having his idol by his side, covered with the chalk of the alumbi, he took my two hands in his, the palms of our hands touching each other. then he invoked the spirits of his ancestor kombé ricati ratenou, and of his mother niavi, marking me on the forehead with the _mpeshou_ (ochre) of his mother niavi; then he invoked her spirit, for his sake, to protect me, his great friend. he invoked, also, the spirits of his ancestors who had done great deeds to follow me once more in the jungle where he and his people had never been, so that no one could hurt me. there was a dead silence when the old chief spoke. after pausing a while, he took a piece of wild cane, which he chewed; then put in his mouth a little piece of the _mpeshou_, and chewed the two together. he then spat the stuff he had chewed on me and round me, still holding my hands, upon which he breathed gently and said, "may the spirits of my ancestors, as the wind that i have blown upon you, follow you wherever you go." and then he shouted with a tremendous voice, "niavi, kombé ricati ratenou, be with my white man in the jungle where he goes!" [illustration: bidding good-by to quengueza.] chapter xviii. departure.--arrival at goumbi.--the people ask for the king.--a death panic in goumbi.--a doctor sent for.--death to the aniembas.--three women accused.--they are tried and killed. after receiving quengueza's blessing i jumped in our canoe, and soon the merry sound of the paddles was heard, and once more i ascended the river. the breeze was fresh, the tide was coming in, and every thing was in our favor. the sickness of quengueza had delayed me so much that it was now october. we were in the middle of the rainy season, and it was not very comfortable weather for traveling. my outfit was composed chiefly of powder, shot, bullets, beads, looking-glasses, bracelets of brass and copper, and a lot of trinkets for presents, and also some fine pieces of prints and silks, with a few shirts and coats, for the chiefs. i had also a clock and a musical box. when we reached goumbi, the head village of quengueza's dominions, we were pretty well tired out, for on our way we had encountered two very heavy rain-storms, preceded each by a tornado. the people, not seeing him with me, asked after their king, quengueza, crying out, "our king went with you, why have you not brought him back? when he went with you he was well, why has he been sick?" then one of the king's nephews gave me quengueza's house, and mombon, his head slave, came to receive my orders. old friend etia came also, and i was delighted to see him. toward sunset i heard a good deal of drumming, and songs being sung to abambou and mbuiri. i knew at once by these songs that somebody was very sick. it proved to be mpomo, one of the nephews of the king. mpomo was a great friend of mine; his wives and his people had always given me plenty of food, and if you have not heard of him before, it is because he was neither a hunter, a man of the jungle, nor a warrior. i was asked to go and see him. the people had spent the night before drumming by the side of the bed where he lay, to drive the abambou and the aniemba away; that is to say, the devil and witchcraft. on entering the hut, i was shocked at the appearance of my old friend. i could see, by his dim eyes, that he was soon to die, and as i took hold of his wrist and touched his pulse, i found it so weak that i was afraid he could scarcely live through the approaching night. as he saw me, he extended his hands toward me (for i had taught these people to shake hands), and said, in such a pitiful and low voice, "chally, save me, for i am dying!" in his hut and outside of it were hundreds of people, most of them moved to tears, for they were afraid that their friend, one of the leading men of the tribe, and one of the nephews of their king, was going to die. his wives were by his bedside, and watched him intently. i said to him, "mpomo, i am not god; i am unable to make a tree turn into a fish or an animal. i am a man, and my life is in the hands of god, as yours is. you must ask god, and not your fetiches, to make you well." unfortunately, they all thought i could make him well. his friends insisted that i should give him medicine. at last i gave him some. in that country i was afraid to give medicine to men who were very sick. this will seem strange to you, but you will not wonder at it when i tell you that these savages are very superstitious. if the sick person got well after i had given him the medicine, it was all right; but if he got worse, then i was blamed, for they said, "if he had not taken the medicine of the white man instead of our own, he would have got well." i warned them that i thought mpomo could not get well. i loved him as well as they did, and felt very sorry. but they all replied, with one voice, "mpomo will not die unless somebody has bewitched him." early the next morning, just before daybreak, the wailings and mournful songs of the natives rent the air. the whole village was in lamentation. poor mpomo had just died; he had gone to his long rest. he had died a poor heathen, believing in idols, witchcraft, fetiches, and in evil and good spirits. how mournful were their cries! "all is done with mpomo! we shall never see him again! he will never speak to us any more! we shall not see him paddle his canoe any more! he will walk no more in the village!" at the last moment, when a commi man is dying, his head wife comes and throws herself beside him on his bed, and surrounds his body with her arms, telling him that she loves him, and begging him not to die. as if the poor man wanted to die! i immediately went to mpomo's hut. i saw his poor wives in tears sitting upon the ground, throwing moistened ashes and dust over their bodies, shaving their hair, and tearing the clothes they wore into rags. now and then they took the lifeless body of poor mpomo in their arms; at other times they would kneel at his motionless feet, and implore him to open his eyes and look at them. as soon as the news of mpomo's death spread in the village, there was great excitement from one end of it to the other. fear was on every face; each man and woman thought death was soon to overtake them. each one dreaded his neighbor; fathers dreaded their sons and their wives; the sons their fathers and mothers; brothers and sisters were in fear of each other. a panic of the wildest kind had spread among the people of goumbi; neither men nor women were in their senses. they fancied themselves surrounded by the shadow of death, and they saw it ready to get hold of them and carry them away to that last sleep of which they were so afraid. the people talked of nothing but witchcraft, of wizards, and witches. they were sure that mpomo had been bewitched. two days elapsed before mpomo was buried, and then a large canoe came, and mpomo's relatives took the body down the river, where the cemetery of the abouya clan was situated. this cemetery was some fifty miles down the river, beyond quayombi. as the body was placed in the canoe, the people of the whole village mourned. the shrieks of his wives were heart-rending, and it was, who should show the greatest sorrow among the people; for every one was afraid of being accused of aniemba (sorcery); for if they did not appear very sorry, they would be sure to be suspected of being aniembas (sorcerers). immediately after the departure of the funeral procession, every man came out armed to the teeth, their faces betokening angry fear, all shouting and screaming, "there are people among us who kill other people. let us find them out. let us kill them. how is it--mpomo was well a few days ago, and now mpomo is dead?" a canoe was then immediately dispatched among the bakalai in order to get a celebrated doctor, who had the reputation of being able to discover wizards at once. the excitement of the savages became extreme. they wanted blood. they wanted to find victims. they wanted to kill somebody. old and young, men and women, were frantic with a desire for revenge on the sorcerers. the doctor came. the people surrounded him, shouting, "we have wizards among us. we have sent for you to find them. do find them out, for if you do not, our people will be dying all the time." then the mboundou was prepared. i have described it to you before, and how it is prepared. the doctor drank a big cup of it in one draught. oh how his body trembled; how his eyes afterward became bloodshot, his veins enlarged. how the people looked at him with bloodthirsty eyes, and with mouths wide open. every man and boy was armed, some with spears, some with swords, some with guns loaded to the muzzle, some with axes and huge knives, and on every face i could see a determination to wreak a bloody revenge on those who should be pointed out as the criminals. the whole people were possessed with an indescribable fury and horrid thirst for human blood. i shall never forget the sight. there i stood, alone in the midst of this infuriated populace, looking at those faces, so frightened, but, at the same time, so thirsty for blood. a cold shudder ran through me, for i knew not what would come next. i knew not but the whole village of goumbi might be deluged in blood. i am sure you would have felt as i did. for the first time my voice was without authority in goumbi. no one wanted to hear me when i said that nobody must be killed; that there were no such things as sorcerers. "chally, we are not the same people you are. our country is full of witchcraft. death to the wizards!" shouted they all, in tones which made the village shake. "death to the _aniembas_!" they, were all surrounding the doctor, as i have said before, when, at a motion from the stranger, the people became at once very still. not a whisper could be heard. how oppressed i felt as i looked on. this sudden silence lasted about one minute, when the loud, harsh voice of the doctor was heard. the people did not seem to be able to breathe, for no one knew if his name would be the one that should be called, and he be accused of the crime of witchcraft. "there is a very black woman--a young woman--who lives in a house having one door only, with a large bunch of lilies growing by the door. not far off is a tree to which the _ogouloungou_ birds come every day." scarcely had he ended when the crowd, roaring and screaming like so many beasts, rushed frantically for the place indicated, when, to my horror, i saw them enter the hut of my good friend okandaga, and seize the poor girl, who looked so frightened that i thought she had lost her reason. i shouted with all the power of my voice, "you are not going to kill the beautiful and good okandaga--the pride and beauty of the village? no," said i, "you are not to kill her." but my voice was drowned. they dragged her from her hut, and waved their deadly weapons over her head. they tore her off, shouting and cursing, and as the poor, good african girl passed in the hands of her murderers, i thought the big tree behind which i was looking might hide me from her view. but lo! she saw me, and with a terrible shriek she cried, extending her arms toward me, "chally, chally, do not let me die. do not let these people kill me. i am not a witch. i have not killed mpomo. chally, be a friend to me. you know how i have taken care of you--how i have given you food; how often i have given you water." i trembled all over. i shook like a reed. it was a moment of terrible agony to me. the blood rushed toward my head. i seized my gun and one of my revolvers which was in my belt. i had a mind to fire into the crowd--shoot people right and left--send dismay among them--rescue dear and kind okandaga, who was now poor and helpless--who had not a friend; put her in a canoe, and carry her down the river. but then, run away--where? i too would have murdered people. perhaps some of the nephews of my friend quengueza would be among those i should kill. then what should i say to quengueza? they were too frantic and crazed. the end would have been, i should have been murdered without saving the life of okandaga. how i cried that same evening. i remember it so well. i cried like a child. i would have given all i had to save okandaga's life. [illustration: "chally, chally, do not let me die."] "after all," said i to myself, "what am i?" they took her toward the banks of the rembo and bound her with cords. quengueza, as you know, was not in goumbi. how much i wished he had been. presently silence fell again upon the crowd. then the harsh and demon-like voice of the doctor once more rang over the town. it seemed to me like the hoarse croak of some death-foretelling raven. "there is an old woman not far from the king's place. she lives in a long and narrow house, and just in front of the house are plantain-trees which come from the sprouts which were planted by oganda, the king's eldest brother, who is now dead. there is also, back of her house, a lime-tree which is now covered with fruit. she has bewitched mpomo." again the crowd rushed off. this time they seized a princess, a niece of king quengueza, a noble-hearted and rather majestic old woman. as they crowded about her with flaming eyes and threats of death, she rose proudly from the ground, looked them in the face unflinchingly, and, motioning them to keep their hands off her, said, "i will drink the mboundou, for i am not a witch; and woe to my accusers if i do not die!" the crowd shouted and vociferated. then she too was escorted to the river, but was not bound. she submitted to all without a tear or a murmur for mercy; she was too proud. belonging directly to the families of the chiefs of the abouya tribes from times of which they had no record, she wanted to show that she was not afraid of death. pride was in her features, and she looked haughtily at her accusers, who left a strong guard, and then went back to the doctor. again, a third time, the dreadful silence fell upon the town, and the doctor's voice was heard. oh how i hated that voice! "there is a woman with six children--she lives on a plantation toward the rising sun--she too bewitched mpomo." again there was a furious shout, and the whole town seemed to shake under the uproar of voices clamoring for vengeance. a large squad of people rushed toward a plantation not far from the village. they returned soon after, appearing frantic, as if they were all crazy, and went toward the bank of the river, dragging with them one of king quengueza's slaves, a good woman who many and many a time had brought me baskets of ground-nuts, bunches of bananas, and plantains. her they took to where the two others were. then the doctor descended the street of the village. how fierce he looked! he wore round his waist a belt made from the skin of a leopard; on his neck he wore the horn of an antelope, filled with charmed powder, and hanging from it was a little bell. round his belt hung long feathers of the ogouloungou bird; on his wrists he wore bracelets made from the bones of snakes; while round his neck were several cords, to which were attached skins of wild animals, tails of monkeys, leopards' and monkeys' teeth, scales of pangolins, and curious-looking dry leaves mingled with land and river shells. his face was painted red, his eyebrows white, and all over his body were scattered white and yellow spots. his teeth were filed to a point, and altogether he looked horrid. i wish i could have shot that monster; but then they all think alike--they all believe in witchcraft. he approached the women, and the crowd surrounded them. silence again succeeded to that great uproar; the wind seemed to whisper through the boughs of the trees; the tranquil river glided down, whose waters were soon to be stained with blood. in a loud voice the doctor recited the crime of which the three women were accused. then, pointing to okandaga, he said that she had, a few weeks before, asked mpomo for some salt, he being her relative. "salt was scarce," said he, looking toward the frantic multitude, "and mpomo refused her; she said unpleasant words to him, for she was angry that he had refused her salt. then she vowed to bewitch him, and had succeeded, and by sorcery had taken his life." the people shouted, "oh, okandaga, that is the way you do--you kill people because they do not give you what you ask. you shall drink the mboundou! that sweet face of yours is that of a witch. ah! ah! ah! and we did not know it." the crime of quengueza's niece came next to be told. she had been jealous of mpomo for a long time because he had children and she had none. she envied him; therefore jealousy and envy took possession of her, and she bewitched him. the people screamed, "how could a woman be so wicked as to kill a man because he had children and she had none! we will give you mboundou to drink, and we will see if you are not a witch." quengueza's slave had asked mpomo for a looking-glass. he had refused her, and therefore she had killed him with sorcery also. as each accusation was recited the people broke out in curses. each one rivaled his neighbor in cursing the victims, fearful lest lukewarmness in the ceremony should expose him to a like fate. so okandaga's father, mother, brother, and sisters joined in the curses. the king's niece was cursed by her brothers and sons, and the poor slave by every body. it was a fearful scene to contemplate. then a passage was formed in the vast crowd, and the three women were led to the river, where a large canoe was in waiting. the executioners went in first, then the women, the doctor, and a number of people well armed with huge knives and axes. by this time the sweat ran down my face. i must have been deadly pale as i followed each motion of these people. then the tam-tams beat, and the proper persons prepared the mboundou. quabi, mpomo's eldest brother, who was to inherit all of mpomo's property, held the poisoned cup. at sight of it poor okandaga began again to cry, and quengueza's niece turned pale in the face, for even the negro face at such times attains a pallor which is quite perceptible. three other canoes, full of armed men, surrounded that in which the victims were. a mug full of mboundou was then handed to the old slave woman, next to the royal niece, and last to the young and kind okandaga. as they drank, the multitude shouted, "if they are witches, let the mboundou kill them; if they are innocent, let the mboundou go out!" it was the most exciting scene in my life. my arrival in the cannibal country was as nothing compared with this. though horror froze my blood, my eyes were riveted upon the spectacle. i could not help it. suddenly the slave fell down. she had not touched the boat's bottom before her head was hacked off by a dozen rude swords, the people shouting "kill her! kill her!" next came quengueza's niece. in an instant her head was off, and her blood was dyeing the waters of the river. during all this time my eyes had been riveted on poor okandaga. i hoped that she would not fall, but soon she too staggered, and struggled, and cried, vainly resisting the effects of the poison in her system. there was a dead silence--the executioners themselves were still--for okandaga was the belle of the village, and had more lovers than any body else; but, alas! she finally fell, and in an instant her head was hewn off. then all was confusion. in an incredibly short space of time the bodies were cut in pieces and thrown in the river. i became dizzy; my eyes wandered about; the perspiration fell down from my face in big drops; i could hardly breathe, and i thought i would fall insensible. one scene more like this, and i should have become mad. the image of poor okandaga was before me, begging me to save her. i retired to my hut, but it felt so hot inside that i could not stay. when all was over, the crowd dispersed without saying a word; the clamor ceased, and for the rest of the day the village was silent. in the evening my friend adouma, uncle of okandaga, came secretly to my house to tell me how sorry he was that okandaga had been killed. he said, "chailly, i was compelled to take part in the dreadful scene. i was obliged to curse okandaga, but what my mouth said my heart denied. if i had acted otherwise i should have been a dead man before now." i then spoke to adouma of the true god, and told him that nothing in the world lasted forever. men, women, and children died, just as he saw young and old trees die. often a young tree would die before an old one. hence young men and young women would frequently die before older ones. chapter xix. quengueza orders ilogo to be consulted about his illness.--what the people think of ilogo.--a nocturnal sÉance.--song to ilogo.--a female medium.--what ilogo said. what a strange village goumbi is! it is well that i am the friend of king quengueza. the people are so superstitious. we had hardly got over the affair of witchcraft when the people declared they must find some means of ascertaining the cause of the king's sufferings. quengueza had sent word himself that his people must try to find out from _ilogo_ why he was sick, and what he must do for his recovery. ilogo is believed by the people to be a spirit living in the moon--a mighty spirit, who looks down upon the inhabitants of the earth--a spirit to whom the black man can talk. "yes," they said, "ilogo's face can be seen; look at it." then they pointed out to me the spots on the moon which we can see with our naked eye. these spots were the indistinct features of the spirit. one fine evening, at full moon (for, to consult ilogo, the moon must be full, or nearly so), the women of the village assembled in front of the king's house. clustered close together, and seated on the ground, with their faces turned toward the moon, they sang songs. they were surrounded by the men of the village. i shall not soon forget that wild scene. the sky was clear and beautiful; the moon shone in its brightness, eclipsing by its light that of the stars, except those of the first magnitude; the air was calm and serene, and the shadows of the tall trees upon the earth appeared like queer phantoms. [illustration: the songs to ilogo.] the songs of the women were to and in praise of ilogo, the spirit that lived in ogouayli (the moon). presently a woman seated herself in the centre of the circle of singers and began a solo, gazing steadfastly at the moon, the people every now and then singing in chorus with her. she was to be inspired by the spirit ilogo to utter prophecies. at last she gave up singing, for she could not get into a trance. then another woman took her place, in the midst of the most vociferous singing that could be done by human lips. after a while the second woman gave place to a third--a little woman, wiry and nervous. she seated herself like the others, and looked steadily at the moon, crying out that she could see ilogo, and then the singing redoubled in fury. the excitement of the people had at that time become very great; the drums beat furiously, the drummers using all their strength, until covered with perspiration; the outsiders shouted madly, and seemed to be almost out of their senses, for their faces were wrinkled in nervous excitement, their eyes perfectly wild, and the contortions they made with their bodies indescribable. the excitement was now intense, and the noise horrible. the songs to ilogo were not for a moment discontinued, but the pitch of their voices was so great and so hoarse that the words at last seemed to come with difficulty. the medium, the women, and the men all sang with one accord: "ilogo, we ask thee, tell who has bewitched the king! ilogo, we ask thee, what shall we do to cure the king? the forests are thine, ilogo! the rivers are thine, ilogo! the moon is thine! o moon! o moon! o moon! thou art the home of ilogo! shall the king die? o ilogo! o ilogo! o moon! o moon!" these words were repeated over and over, the people getting more terribly excited as they went on. the woman who was the medium, and who had been singing violently, looked toward the moon, and began to tremble. her nerves twitched, her face was contorted, her muscles swelled, and at last her limbs straightened out. at this time the wildest of all wild excitement possessed the people. i myself looked on with intense curiosity. she fell on her back on the ground, insensible, her face turned up to the moon. she looked as if she had died in a fit. the song to ilogo continued with more noise than ever; but at last comparative quiet followed, compelled, i believe, by sheer exhaustion from excitement. but the people were all gazing intently on the woman's face. i shall not forget that scene by moonlight, nor the corpse-like face of that woman, so still and calm. how wild it all looked! the woman, who lay apparently dead before the savages, was expected at this time to see things in the world of ilogo--that is to say, the moon--to see the great spirit ilogo himself; and, as she lay insensible, she was supposed to be holding intercourse with him. then, after she had conversed with the great spirit ilogo, she would awake, and tell the people all she saw and all that ilogo had said to her. for my part, i thought she really was dead. i approached her, and touched her pulse. it was weak, but there was life. after about half an hour of insensibility she came to her senses, but she was much prostrated. she seated herself without rising, looking round as if stupefied. she remained quite silent for a while, and then began to speak. "i have seen ilogo, i have spoken to ilogo. ilogo has told me that quengueza, our king, shall not die; that quengueza is going to live a long time; that quengueza was not bewitched, and that a remedy prepared from such a plant (i forget the name) would cure him. then," she added, "i went to sleep, and when i awoke ilogo was gone, and now i find myself in the midst of you." the people then quietly separated, as by that time it was late, and all retired to their huts, i myself going to mine, thinking of the wild scene i had just witnessed, and feeling that, the longer i remained in that strange country, the more strange the customs of the people appeared to me. soon all became silent, and nothing but the barking of the watchful little native dogs broke the stillness of the night. the moon continued to shine over that village, the inhabitants of which had run so wild with superstition. chapter xx. departure from goumbi.--querlaouen's village.--find it deserted.--querlaouen dead.--he has been killed by an elephant.--arrive at obindji's town.--meeting with querlaouen's widow.--neither malaouen nor gambo at home. after a few days thus spent in goumbi, we had to get ready to be off. adouma made the preparations for our journey; canoes were lying on the banks of the river, waiting to carry the people quengueza had ordered to go with me. these were, for the most part, the king's slaves. plantains and cassava had been gathered for our journey. we were to ascend the river as far as obindji. one fine morning we started, several very large canoes being filled with men who were to escort me. adouma was in my canoe, holding a large paddle as a rudder. we were in a canoe which was chiefly loaded with my outfit and presents. we left goumbi silently, for the death of mpomo made singing out of order. the people were in mourning. some of the men who were to accompany me had most curious names, such as gooloo-gani, biembia, agambie-mo, jombai, monda, akondogo. the day became exceedingly hot and sultry, and toward evening we were overtaken by a terrible storm of wind and rain--a real tornado burst upon us. the next morning we were on our way for the upper river. i was glad i was about to see my old friend querlaouen once more. i was also to see my other friends, malaouen and gambo. i had nice presents for querlaouen, and pretty beads for his wife and children. among the presents for querlaouen was a handsome gun and a keg of powder for shooting elephants, leopards, gorilla, and all sorts of wild game. as we ascended the river i recognized the point on the other side of which was querlaouen's plantation. i ordered the men to sing, in order that querlaouen might thus hear of our arrival. the nearer we came to the point the louder became the beatings of my heart. to see old querlaouen, with whom i had had so many pleasant days; who had bravely shared all kinds of danger with me, including hunger and starvation; with whom i had slain gorilla--i was in a hurry to give to him and his wife their presents. to see such a friend was indeed to have a great treat. our canoes soon passed the point. i was looking eagerly, watching for somebody on the river bank. no one! perhaps our songs had not pierced through the woods. the wind was coming from an opposite direction. "sing louder," i exclaimed, for i fancied they did not sing loud enough. they looked at me as if they would have said, "what's the matter with chally, he looks so excited?" little did they know my feelings, and how my heart beat for querlaouen. they sang louder, till i could hear the echo of their voices among the hills that surrounded us. i looked, but no one was on the shore. querlaouen might have gone hunting, but surely his wife, or brother, or some of his children must be there. all was silent. i shouted with all my power, "querlaouen, your friend chally has come! your friend chally has come!" but the hills sent back the echo of my voice to me. i fired a gun, and the echo resounded from hill to hill, and no one came. i began to feel oppressed. a presentiment flashed over my mind. was querlaouen dead? at last i landed on the very shore where querlaouen lived. again i shouted, "querlaouen, where are you?" i called his wife. the silence of death was there. i advanced, but lo! when i reached the village, it was deserted. not a soul was seen. the jungle was the thickest where his little clearing had been. the houses had tumbled down. desolation was before me. the grass had grown to a man's height in the little street. what a pang of sorrow shot through my heart! i could not help it. i shouted, "querlaouen! my friend querlaouen, what has become of you? you are not dead, are you?" and i looked with profound sadness on the scene around. days that had passed came to my memory. i retraced my steps, disappointed, and with a foreboding heart. on the river bank, just as i was on the point of stepping into the canoe, a bakalai came out from the jungle. he had recognized me, and came to meet me. as soon as i saw him, i cried out, "where is friend querlaouen?" his answer seemed so long in coming--"dead!" "dead!" i exclaimed; "querlaouen dead!" and, i could not help it, two tears rolled down my cheeks. "querlaouen dead!" i repeated again. the recollection of that good and noble savage flashed upon me as fast as thought can flash, and once more and in a low voice i said, "dead! querlaouen dead!" when i became composed again, i asked, "how did he die?" "one day," said the bakalai man, "a few _moons_ ago--it was in the dry season--querlaouen took his gun and a slave along with him, and went out into the woods to hunt after an elephant which had the day before destroyed a whole plantation of plantain-trees, and had trampled down almost a whole patch of sugar-cane. his slave, who accompanied him, but had left him for a few minutes to look at one of the plantations close by, heard the report of querlaouen's gun. he waited for his return, but querlaouen did not come back. he waited so long that he began to feel anxious, and at last set out to seek him. he found him in the forest dead, and trampled into a shapeless mass by the beast, which he had wounded mortally, but which had strength enough to rush at and kill its enemy. not far from querlaouen lay the elephant, dead." how poor querlaouen, who was so prudent a hunter, could have been caught by the elephant, i could not learn. the man said it was an aniemba (witchcraft) that had killed querlaouen; that querlaouen's brother had bewitched him, and caused, by witchcraft, the elephant to trample upon him. the brother was killed by the mboundou which the people made him drink; for they said his brother made him go hunt that day, when he knew the elephant would kill him. that family, who really loved each other, and lived in peace and unity, was then divided asunder. the brother being killed, the women and children had gone to live with those to whom they belonged by the law of inheritance, and were thus scattered in several villages. with a heavy heart i entered my canoe, but not before giving a bunch of beads to the bakalai who had told me the story of the untimely death of poor querlaouen. we ascended the river silently, i thinking of the frailty of human life, and that perhaps a day might come when some elephant would trample upon me, or some ferocious leopard carry me away in his jaws, or some gorilla would, with one blow of his powerful hand, cut my body in two. perhaps fever might kill me. i might encounter an unfriendly tribe and be murdered. i raised a silent prayer to the great ruler of the universe to protect me, and said, "god, thou knowest that i am guided only by the love of discovering the wonders of thy creation, so that i may tell to my fellow-creatures all that i have seen. i am but a worm; there is no strength in me. what am i in this great forest?" oh how helpless i felt. the news of querlaouen's death had very much depressed my spirits, casting a heavy gloom over me. to this day i love to think of friend querlaouen, of his family, and of his children, and of the great hunts we have had together. we finally approached obindji's town, and soon were landed on the shore, where his little village was built with the bark of trees. i need not say what a welcome we received. but lo! what do i see? querlaouen's wife! she had come here on a visit. as is customary in that country for friends who have not seen each other for a long time, we embraced. the good woman was so glad to see me. she still wore the marks of her widowhood. her hair was shorn, she wore no ornament whatever, and did not even wash. she spent the evening with me, telling me all her troubles, and that, as soon as her season of widowhood was finished, she was to become the wife of querlaouen's youngest brother. "but," added she, "i will never love any one as i loved querlaouen." she was to live in the mountains of the ashankolo. this was probably the last time i was to see the wife of my good friend querlaouen, the bakalai hunter, and all the friendship i ever had for her husband was now hers; so i went quietly to one of my chests, and, taking a necklace of large beads, fixed it round her neck; then put my hand on the top of her head, and gave her a _bongo_ (a law), which was, that she must never part with these beads, and that, as years would roll by, she must say, "these beads came from chally, querlaouen's friend." the old woman was so much touched that she trembled, and tears stood in her eyes. after keeping the necklace for two or three minutes round her neck, she took it off, for a woman in mourning can not wear any ornaments. she said she would keep the beads till she died, and then they should be buried with her. i gave her some other presents, which she hid, "for," said she, "if the people knew i had such nice things, they might bewitch me in order to obtain them. chally, the country is full of aniemba." these last words she uttered in a very low voice. [illustration: giving beads to querlaouen's wife.] obindji told me that he had heard malaouen had gone on some trading expedition. i had, therefore, only to regret not being able to see him or gambo, who had returned to his own country. i missed them dreadfully, and i left word with obindji to tell them to come to the ashira country after me. i could not possibly remain, and all the entreaties of friend obindji could not make me stay. i must go to the ashira country. in the mean time, a new comer is to be one of the chiefs of the party. okendjo, an ashira man, with adouma, is going to lead us. adouma received very positive orders from the king to follow me to the ashira country. wherever i go, he must not return without me. with bakalai and goumbi people, amounting to thirty-two men all told, i left the morning after my arrival for the ashira land. okendjo was in his glory; he had conceived the brilliant idea of taking the first moguizi into his country. chapter xxi. leave for ashira land.--in a swamp.--cross the mountains.--a leopard after us.--reach the ashira country. early on that morning of my departure for the ashira land we were awakened by the voice of friend obindji, who was recommending okendjo to take great care of his "white man," and see that nothing should hurt him. we were soon under way, and, leaving the ovenga, ascended the ofoubou river for three miles and a half, when we unloaded our canoes. then we struck off due east. we had very great trouble in getting through the marshy lands which border the river, for they were overflowed to the very foot of the hills. this was about as hard a piece of traveling as i ever had in my life. the water was so yellow that i could not see to the bottom, which was slimy clay, covering the roots of trees. i hardly entered the swamp before down i seated myself in a manner i did not like at all. i barely saved my gun from going to the bottom. my foot had slipped on a root. then i went tottering along, getting hold of all the branches or trees i could reach, at the same time saying to myself that i did not see the use of such a country. i was in water from my knees to my waist; below my knees i was in mud. i felt warm enough, for at every step i would go deeper into the sticky mud, and it was difficult to get my feet out again. i took good care to have okendjo and two or three fellows go ahead of me. they had no clothes, and if they tumbled into the water i did not care; they were not long in drying off. finally we got through, and stood at the foot of a mountain ridge along which, we may say, lay the route leading to ashira land. here we gave three cheers, and with cheery hopes i started once more for a _terra incognita_. we are lost in the jungle. under the tall trees a dense jungle covers the ground; lianas hang gracefully from the limbs and trunks of trees. many of them are covered with flowers. now and then, huge blocks of quartz rocks are met with. we go along slowly, for we are tired. okendjo says that soon we shall reach the promised land, where goats, fowls, plantain, and palm wine are plentiful. mountain after mountain had to be ascended. oh, how hard we worked! how we panted after reaching the summit of a hill. how beautiful were the rivulets, they were so pure, so cool, so nice; their crystalline water rolled in every direction, tumbling over the rocks in foaming cascades, or purling along in a bed of white pebbles. oh how much they reminded me of the hill-streams and trout-brooks of home; for if the trees i saw had not the foliage of our trees at home, the stones were the same. the quartz was similar. nature there, at least, was alike. the rocks were of the same formation. i felt well and happy. i was on my way to discover new lands, new rivers, new mountains, and new beasts and birds. i was to see new tribes of men whom i had never seen before. [illustration: going to ashira land.] so i trotted along, okendjo, adouma, and i leading the way. by-and-by the country became still more rugged. the blocks of quartz we met were of larger size, and soon our path led us in the midst of huge masses of stones. how queer and small we looked as our caravan filed, one by one, between the ponderous blocks! we looked exactly like pigmies alongside of the huge boulders. quite near us were some large ebony-trees; how beautiful their foliage looked, contrasting with the blocks of quartz and granite, some of which were covered with mosses, and others perfectly bare. what could have brought these huge boulders on those mountains? i should not wonder if glaciers had accomplished it in ages that are past. the more rocky the soil, the better ebony-trees appeared to flourish. how hard the walking was! in many places the rains had washed away the soil from the immense and wide-spreading roots, which ran along the ground like huge serpents--indeed, many of them were just like big boa constrictors. my feet were so sore by walking on those roots, or rather by stepping from one to another, for i was obliged to wear thin-soled shoes, so that i might bend my feet to seize the roots. if i had worn thick shoes i should have tumbled down at the first jump. just before sunset we stopped, and i ordered the camp to be built, the fire-wood to be collected for the night. there were no large leaves to be found, so we all hoped that no rain or tornado would come that night. we all made beds of such leaves as were to be found; for myself, i put two mats on the top, and lighted, as usual, four fires round me to keep off the wild beasts. the bakalai built a camp for themselves, the ashira built another, and my own was between the two. i lay down, feeling very tired, and prayed to god to take care of me. for a pillow i used the belt which held my revolvers, and taking one of my guns in my arms, i went to sleep. toward one o'clock in the morning i was awakened by the loud roaring of a leopard which was prowling round our camp. he had smelled human flesh; probably he had tasted it before, but he dared not approach very close, for the fires were bright and the men awake. he was afraid of the bright light, and his howls testified how enraged he was. he was, no doubt, hungry, but his cowardice kept him back. i ordered some guns to be fired at random in the direction where we heard his growls. for a while the forest became silent, and the leopard went off. we thought we had frightened him; but, just as we were on the point of going to sleep once more, suddenly the roaring began again, and this time the beast had come nearer. he wanted, no doubt, to make his breakfast upon one of us; but his desires were not to be gratified. i felt mad, as i wanted to sleep, for the next day was to be one of hard traveling. if i had dared, i would have ventured into the forest after the beast; but the risk was too great, it was so dark. the leopard would have done, no doubt, as cats do, lain flat on the ground and waited for his prey, and pounced upon me as the smaller animal would do upon a mouse. so, as the roars of the beast continued, we concluded to keep awake, first putting more wood on our fires. the loads we had carried since leaving obindji had been very heavy, and the sore backs of the men began to show that they had hard work. i was loaded as well as any of them, with powder, shot, my own food, bullets for my gun and my revolvers, which i carried in my belt, an extra pair of pantaloons, shoes, etc., etc. resuming our journey next morning, i discovered that the fellows had either been eating lots of plantains, or perhaps slyly throwing away a quantity of them, in order to be relieved of the burden. i warned them that if we were short of food they would have to starve first. they replied, "there are plenty of nuts in the forest--there are plenty of berries in the forest; we can stand being a day without food!" toward the evening of that day we began to see signs of a change in the face of the country. now and then we would pass immense plantations of plantains, the trees loaded with fruit. we came at last to one which gorillas had visited and made short work of, having demolished lots of trees, which lay scattered right and left. elephants had also made sad havoc in some of the plantations. then we came across patches of sugar-cane. these plantations were scattered in the great forest, and grew in the midst of innumerable trunks and dead branches of trees that had been cut down. the soil became more clayey, and at last we emerged from the immense forest. i saw, spread out before me, a new country, the like of which i had not seen since i had been lost in the great equatorial jungle. it was ashira land. the prairies were dotted plentifully with villages, which looked in the distance like ant-hills. chapter xxii. great mountains.--ashira land is beautiful.--the people are afraid.--reach akoonga's village.--king olenda sends messengers and presents.--i reach olenda's village. what a beautiful country! how lovely the grass seemed to me! how sweet it was to see an open space! "where are we?" cried i to my okendjo men. they answered, in ashira land--otobi (prairie). it seemed to me that they should have replied in fairyland, as i had been so long shut up in the dark forest. i stood for a long time on a bluff just on the border of the forest. on the left, in the far distance, loomed up mountains higher than any i had yet seen. they looked very beautiful against the blue sky. these mountains were called nkoumou-nabouali. no one had ever been on their summit. on the right, in the distance also, were mountains, but not so lofty, called ofoubou-orèrè and andelè, and in front of my position were still other mountains called okoukoué. all over the prairies villages were scattered, and the hills and valleys were streaked with ribbon-like paths, while here and there my eye caught the silver sheen of a brook winding along through the undulating land. i could also see groves of banana and plantain trees, with their leaves so large and beautiful. there were likewise plantations of cassada and peanuts. the setting sun shone over the landscape, and the tall green grass reminded me of home, and my heart at once went over the sea. do not think that i was without feeling because i went to africa and left civilization--that i never thought of friends. there were girls and boys of whom i thought almost every day, and whom i loved dearly. "fire a gun," said okendjo; "fire, moguizi, so that my people may know you by the thunder you carry in your hand, and that okendjo brings them a moguizi." the good fellow was in a high state of excitement. adouma was nowhere. i loaded my guns with heavy charges, and fired, bang! bang! bang! immediately i could see the people running out of their villages; they seemed in the distance like pigmies; they shouted, and were, perhaps, just a little frightened as they ran to and fro. they had seen the smoke and heard the noise, and soon they saw me. okendjo had sent guides to tell the people not to be afraid; besides, my fame had gone before me, for many of the ashira had seen me. we did not long remain motionless, for it was almost dark, and we must hurry. soon every hill-top was covered with people, but as we passed by they ran away. okendjo walked ahead of me, shouting "ashira! i have brought to you a great and mighty spirit! he is good, and does no harm! ashira! i am okendjo." the crowd shouted in reply, "the ntangani has come! the moguizi has come to see our land--our land which he never saw before. moguizi, we will give you plenty to eat! moguizi, do us no harm! oh, moguizi!" then they sung songs, and the idols were brought out, so that they might see the moguizi that had come. the drums beat, but, as i have said, when i came near, the people ran away, leaving their idols behind to look at me. indeed, the ashira land was a strange country. we soon came to a village, the chief of which was okendjo's brother; his name was akoonga. he was at the gate of the village, and trembled with fear, but he had come to welcome me. "am i tipsy with plantain wine? do tell me, okendjo, if i see aright, or is it a hallucination of my mind? have i not before me the spirit who makes the guns, the beads, the brass rods, and the copper rings? "do i see aright when i see that his hair is long, and as black as that of the mondi? when i see that his legs are black, and that he has no toes (i had boots on)? that his face is of a color i never saw? do tell me--tell me quick, okendjo, am i drunk?" okendjo replied, "he is the spirit of whom you have heard so much, who came into the bakalai country. he comes from the spirit land to visit us." the people then shouted, "how queer the spirit looks!" my hair was long, very long, and excited their wonder. akoonga soon gave me a house. there the chief came, followed by ten of his wives, each bearing two bunches of plantains, which, with fear and trembling, they brought to my feet. then came four goats, twenty fowls, several baskets of ground-nuts, and many bunches of sugar-cane. the chief told okendjo to say to me that he was glad i was to spend the night in his village, and that i was the master of every thing in it. when night came okendjo walked from one end of the village to the other, and i heard him say to his people, "be silent; do not trouble the spirit; do not speak, lest you awake him, and he might awake in anger, and smite you, and make the people of our village die. neither our forefathers nor ourselves ever saw such a wonder as this." next morning immense crowds surrounded the village. they shouted and shouted, and, not to disappoint them, i walked through the street from time to time. olenda, the king or head chief of the ashiras, for whose place i was bound, sent presents of goats and plantains for the spirit by two messengers, and wanted to know if the arrival of the moguizi was true. the king also sent word that i should be carried; for why should the moguizi walk if he is tired? the messengers went and reported to their king that it was so--a good moguizi had come. then a great number of men were sent back to carry my baggage, and we left akoonga's village. the men shouted, and from time to time sung wild songs celebrating my arrival among them. after a walk of ten miles i reached the village of olenda. olenda was the great king of the ashira tribe. chapter xxiii. king olenda comes to receive me.--he is very old.--never saw a man so old before.--he beats his kendo.--he salutes me with his kombo.--kings alone can wear the kendo. olenda village was situated at the top of a high hill. the people, with the exception of a few, had fled. all were afraid to see the moguizi close by them. "how could king olenda run off, when his great friend quengueza sent him a moguizi?" shouted okendjo; "the people will return when they see olenda facing you." i was led to the onandja, and had scarcely seated myself on a native stool when i heard the sound of the kendo--the king was coming. the kendo was ringing, and no one can possess or ring a kendo but a king. so, at every step the king made the kendo rang, and at last olenda stood before me. [illustration: reception of the king of the asihras.] never in my life had i seen a man so old; never did i dream that a man could be so old, and i wondered not that his fame had spread far and wide on account of his age. he was a man with wool as white as snow, and his face was a mass of wrinkles. every rib could be seen, for the skin was like parchment. his body was bent almost double with age, and the legs and arms were like sticks, apparently not bigger than broom-handles. his cheeks were so hollow that the skin seemed to cling to the bones. he had painted with the chalk of the alumbi his haggard old face, red on one side and white on the other, in streaks, and, as he stood before me, i wondered as much at his appearance as he did at mine. he carried a long stick or cane to support himself. the like i had never seen. he seemed the apparition of some man who had lived in our world a couple of hundred years. when we had gazed at each other (he looking at me with deep little eyes for at least five minutes, and beating his kendo all the time with his palsied hand), he suddenly spoke and said, "i have no bowels; i am like the ovenga river--i can not be cut in two. i am also like the niembai and ovenga rivers, which unite together. thus my body is united, and nothing can divide it." this gibberish had some deep mystic significance. it was the regular and invariable salutation of the ashira kings, olenda's predecessors, time out of mind. each chief and important person has such a salutation, which they call _kombo_. i will explain olenda's kombo to you. if you had before you a map of the countries i have explored in equatorial africa, which are published in my larger works, you would see on it the river ovenga. olenda means, when he says that he can not be cut in two and is like the river ovenga, that his body can not be divided any more than the river ovenga can be cut in twain. the niembai and ovenga unite together and form one river, called rembo; so, if his body was cut in two, it could not be separated, for, as the two rivers unite and form one, so the two parts of his body would reunite again and form one. then he continued, beating his kendo from time to time, "you, the spirit, have come to see olenda; you, the spirit, have put your feet where none like you have ever been. you are welcome." here the old king's son, also a very old negro, with white wool on his head, handed over to the king two slaves, which his majesty formally presented to me, together with three goats, twenty bunches of plantains, twenty fowls, five baskets of ground-nuts, and several bunches of sugar-cane. "this," said he, "is to salute you. whatever else you want, tell me. i am the king of this country; i am older than any tree you see around you." i replied that slaves i did not want, but the food and other presents i would take. then more of the old man's children came, all old, and wrinkled, and white-headed men. they stood before me, regarding me with wonder and awe, while the people, of whom thousands were gathered from all the villages of the plain, had returned while their old king was speaking to me. they looked on in silence, and expressed their surprise in whispers. at last the old king turned to his people and said, "i have seen many things in my life--many wonderful things; but now i am ready to die, for i have received the moguizi spirit, from whom we receive all things. it will always be said in our nation, by those coming after us, that in the time of olenda the spirit first appeared and dwelt among us. you are welcome (turning to me). keep this spirit well (to his people); he will do us good." i was amazed; my eyes could not keep away from olenda. i knew not that men could become so old. then olenda began to beat his kendo again, invoking the spirits of his ancestors to be with him and his, and, with big body bent double, and supported by his cane, he returned to his hut, ejaculating "_ma-mo_, _ma-mo_, _ma-mo_!" the kendo is the symbol of royalty in most of the tribes of this part of the interior of africa. it is a rude bell of iron, furnished with a long handle, also of iron, and of the same piece, as shown in the engraving. the sound, which at home announces the vicinity of a herd of cows or sheep, in africa precedes the advent of the sovereign, who uses the kendo only when on visits of state or on business of importance. when not beating it they wear it on the shoulder. the bell may vary from six to eight inches in length, and the handle from twelve to fifteen inches. when they wear the kendo they fill it with a skin, generally of an oshengui, which contains monda, or charms, to keep away the aniemba. a nice little hut was given to me, and i was soon safely housed in it. one of the chickens given to me by olenda was killed, and a soup made with it. it was excellent, and did me good. chapter xxiv. they all come to see me.--they say i have an evil eye.--ashira villages.--olenda gives a great ball in my honor.--beer-houses.--goats coming out of a mountain alive. several days have elapsed since my arrival at olenda. from more than one hundred and fifty villages of the plain, the people streamed to olenda's town to see "the spirit." they came in the night, slept on the ground outside the town, and in the morning crowded about me, wondering at my hair, at my clothes, at my shoes; declaring that my feet were like elephant's feet, for they did not see the toes; and they would try to get a glance at my eyes. the moment i looked at them they ran off screaming, and especially the women and children. the africans had a great dread of my look. they believe in the _evil eye_, and often, when i would look steadily at them, my best friends, with a shudder, would beg me not to do it. so i may say that since my arrival the time has been devoted to seeing and being seen. and i assure you it was no joke to hear that uproarious crowd and their wild shouts--to have always in my sight a crowd of people yelling at every movement i made. i had a yankee clock, which was an object of constant wonder to them. they thought that there was a kind of spirit inside that made the noise, and that watched over me. its constant ticking, day and night, was noticed, and they had an idea that the noise could never stop. at night of course the sound is louder, and this frightened them, and not one dared to come close to my hut. every day olenda beats his kendo; every day he comes to get a look at me. this ashira prairie seemed to be shut in on all sides by mountains, which of course were covered with forest. fancy the forest a sea of trees, and the ashira land an island. pine-apples grew in great abundance, and thousands and thousands of them were clustered close together, and formed otôbi (prairies) by themselves. this plain is the finest and most delightful country i had thus far seen in the jungle. the undulations of the prairie, which is a kind of table-land surrounded on every side by high mountains, gave the landscape a charming variety. the surrounding mountains, the splendid peak of the nkoomoo nabouali on the north, said by the superstitious ashiras to be inhabited by satyrs like men; the andelè and ofoubou-orèrè to the south, and the ococoo to the east, are all covered with dense masses of foliage. in those forests are living tribes of wild men and wilder beasts, roaming at pleasure. i have arrived in a country where i could see grass, and see distinctly the moon, the stars, and the sun without first being obliged to cut the trees down. oh, you have no idea how nice it is to see an open space after you have been shut up in the forest for years. from olenda's village i made excursions all over the ashira country. the villages were so numerous i could not count them. there were from one hundred and fifty to two hundred of them. some were quite small, others were quite large; and what beautiful villages they were. i had not seen such pretty ones before. the houses were small, but the neatest i had met in the jungle. they are built generally in one long street, houses on each side. the streets are kept clean; and this was the first tribe i met where the ground at the back of the houses was also cleared off. in most villages there was, back of the houses, a street where great numbers of plantain-trees and some lime-trees, for they love lemons, were growing. the villages are surrounded by thousands of plantain-trees, and regular footpaths connected one village with another. ball after ball was given to me, and one evening olenda gave me a very fine, big one. more than fifty drums beat, besides there were musicians armed with short sticks, with which they pounded with all their might on pieces of board. the singing was extraordinary, and the ashira belles cut any amount of capers, one time raising their legs one way, then bending their bodies backward and forward, shaking their heads from one side to the other, kicking their heels together, the iron or brass bracelets or anklets adding to the harmony of _the musical instruments_ i have described to you. the singing was as wild as can be imagined. olenda's wives--for his majesty was blessed with several scores of them--danced with fury. they danced all night, and the next morning there was a general stampede to the beer or cider-house. i must tell you that the ashira are very fond of plantain wine. i followed, for i wanted to see a beer-house and a general ashira spree. after walking for half an hour we came to a cluster of trees, in the centre of which we found a brewery. a few women had charge of the premises--the wives of some of the ashira. what a sight presented itself to my view! there hung all round hundreds of large bunches of plantain in different stages of ripening, from the dark green to the bright yellow, hanging from the limbs of trees. there were also some red-skin plantains. [illustration: drinking plantain beer.] it was a large building, under a single roof, supported by numerous wooden pillars, and on these hung a great many bunches of plantain. in the middle of the building there were scores of large jars, manufactured in the country, some of which would hold ten or fifteen gallons. from the necks of some of them a quantity of rich white froth was running out. the beer in others was just ripe, and ready for drinking. there were also many large mugs, looking more like dishes, however, for the plantain juice to be poured into. very soon the men seated themselves, either on the stools that belonged to them or on mats, and the drinking began. mug after mug was swallowed by each man. i think no german could drink the same amount of liquid. they became, after a while, jolly and boisterous; they began, in fact, to get tipsy. do not believe they were drinking at random. each jug of wine belonged to several men, who had clubbed together; that is to say, each had given a certain amount of plantain to make the beer which the vessel contained. the plantain with which the beer or wine is made is a kind of banana, much larger and coarser, and used, as you have seen, as food; but it must be cooked, the natives cooking it when it is green. when ripe, it is yellow like the banana. the beer is made in the following manner: the plantain must be quite ripe; then it is cut in small pieces, which are put into the jar until it is half filled; then the jar is filled with water. after a few days it ferments; then the froth comes out, and the beer is ready for use. the bunches of plantain, which were hanging by hundreds, had their owners, and had been brought from the plantations by their wives, and were ripening in the shade. as the plantations yield fruit all the year round, the beer is never lacking among the ashiras. after they were sufficiently excited, they began to talk of their wonderful warlike exploits, and i do believe it was who should lie the most. the greater the lie, the louder the applause. i tasted the plantain beer, and found it somewhat sour; i did not like it at all. i spent the day in the beer-house, and, when we returned to the village, the men insisted on having another dance, and they kept hard at work at it all night, and went all to sleep the next morning. i was glad when every thing was over, for my head began to ache. i determined to visit the mountains from which the river ofoubou takes its name. king olenda was to take charge of my luggage, and i took only a few presents for the ashira chiefs i was to see, and who had come to see and invite me to visit their towns in the mountains. one of olenda's sons was chief of our party, and adouma, quengueza's nephew, led with him. we did not start before old king olenda had told all his people to take great care of the "spirit." we left the village in the midst of the wildest shouts, and then wended our way through the beautiful green grass. within a mile and a half south from olenda we came to the foot of mount nchondo, one of the highest points of the prairie. there we all stopped; why, i could not guess. when one of the ashiras said to me, pointing to the mountain, "you see that mountain, moguizi?" "yes," said i. "from that part of the mountain," continued oyagui, olenda's great-grandson, in the most serious manner, "goats come out. that is a great mountain; a spirit lives there. sometimes, when our people want a goat, they will go there, and a goat will come to them." i said, "that can not be." "yes," insisted oyagui, "i know plenty of people who get goats there." then we passed by numerous villages, skirting most of the hills at their base, and crowds of people every where cried out, "the moguizi is coming! the moguizi is coming!" all these villages were surrounded by groves of plantain and banana trees. after a journey of about ten miles, we came, at the foot of the cloud-capped mount andelè, to the village of mouendi, whose chief, mandji, came forth with great joy to meet me, for he was a great friend of adouma. he sang, as he came forward with his people, "it is good that the moguizi comes to see our town." to the rear of the village, on the slope of the mountain, the forest had been cleared, and the space occupied by plantations, where tobacco, peanuts, plantains, yams, and sugar-cane were grown to an extent which makes this a land of plenty where no man starves. bushes of wild cotton were seen now and then, but not in great numbers. i was glad that i had reached a country where i should not readily starve--plantains and goats were plentiful. as i stood and cast my eyes over the scene, the yellow waving grass, with now and then a dark green patch in low land between the hills, where water stood, and the cane-fields contrasting with the dark green of the forest, reminded me of rural scenes at home; but i looked in vain for cattle; none were to be seen. i had a great time at mouendi; mandji, its chief, was very kind to me. i had more goats and plantains given to me than my men and myself could eat. the goumbi people were in great glee; that was just the country for them, and, i may now say it, it was just the country for me also. i was in clover, i thought. chapter xxv. ascension of the ofoubou-orÈrÈ and andelÈ mountains.--the ashira bleed their hands.--story of a fight between a gorilla and a leopard.--the gorilla and the elephant.--wild boars. the day arrived when we were to ascend the ofoubou-orèrè and andelè mountains, which were the highest peaks of that range. mandji, who is really a nice chief, had given me the necessary people, and i longed to reach the summits of these woody regions. we intended to hunt there also while we looked around. every one prepared himself for several days' hard work, and finally, when every thing was ready, each being loaded with a good stock of provisions, we bade good-by to the villagers. the ashiras, before starting, covered themselves with fetiches, as usual, and drew blood from their hands by cutting small gashes on them, in order to insure good luck in the hunt. they were in great spirits, for the idol of the village had told the people that we should kill much game. the first night after we camped a tremendous tornado blew from the northeast, leaving us safely in our leafy shelter, however, and then the men began to tell stories of the gorilla. oyagui was the first to get up. he was a splendid story-teller; but, before he began, he swore that he was going to tell a true story, part of which he saw, and a part was seen by his brother, which was the same as if he himself had seen it. a smile stole over the faces of all present, for oyagui was known to tell tremendous big stories, and a great deal of faith was required before one could believe them. "one day," said he, "a gorilla was walking in the forest, when he met a ngègo (leopard). the gorilla stopped, and so did the leopard. the latter, being hungry, crouched for a spring at his foe, whereat the gorilla set up a hideous roar. undismayed by that terrific noise, the leopard made his leap, but was caught in mid air by the gorilla, who seized him by the tail, and whirled him round his head till the tail broke off and remained in his hand, and the animal escaped, leaving his brush in the big hands of the gorilla. how funny the leopard did look, as he ran off without his tail!" "you never saw that," exclaimed one of the party. "i did," said oyagui; "i did, as sure as i live. the leopard ran away to his companions, who, when they saw him, asked, 'what is the matter?' whereupon the unfortunate beast recounted his defeat." "how do you know," said another, "that the leopards asked the one without a tail 'what is the matter?' you can not understand leopard talk." "oh," said oyagui, undismayed, "they looked at each other, and i am sure they said what i have told you, or something of the kind, for immediately the chief ngègo began howling till all the leopards of the forest came, who, when they saw their brother thus injured, and without a tail, vowed vengeance, and set out to find the gorilla. this my brother saw," said oyagui, talking louder than ever, "and he followed the leopard, while i was watching the gorilla." "they had not long to hunt. when the gorilla saw them coming he broke down a tree, of which he made a club, and then swung it round and round his head, keeping the troop of leopards at bay. at last, however, the gorilla grew tired, his efforts began to slacken, and he whirled round his tree with less force. he stopped, and then the leopards rushed on him with one accord, and soon killed him. they sprang on his head, on his breast, on his arms, and on his legs." "you never saw this!" shouted all the ashiras together. "i have!" bawled oyagui, as loud as he could. then they all said, "oyagui, tell us another story." there was a pause and a short silence while we gave another start to the fires, for, at any rate, oyagui had succeeded in making us think of leopards in telling us his story. then oyagui began again. "a great gorilla was once walking in the forest with his wife and baby, when they came upon a huge elephant, who said, 'let me pass, gorilla; move off, for these woods belong to me!' "'oh, oh!' said the gorilla, 'how do the woods belong to thee? am i not the master here? am i not the man of the woods? do i not roam where i please?'" "oh!" once more exclaimed the ashiras, "this can not be, for you do not talk gorilla; you can not understand gorillas' or elephants' talk." "no," said oyagui, "i can not understand gorillas' or elephants' talk, but i can see what they mean, for i have a fetich which makes me comprehend the talking of the beasts." oyagui continued: "ordering his wife and baby to move aside, the gorilla broke down a large limb of a tree, and, brandishing it like a club, made for the elephant, whom he soon killed by furious blows. the body of the latter i found a few days afterward, with the club of the gorilla lying by his side. i got frightened when i saw the big elephant charging at the gorilla, and the gorilla charging at the elephant, and so i ran away; but i saw the club by the side of the big elephant." soon after the conclusion of this story we went to sleep, i believing, for one, that oyagui had most wonderful powers of imagination. i really do think that he believed all he said, for, as he told the stories, he got very excited, and his body shone with perspiration. the next morning, after a good night's rest, i got up very early, and proceeded a little way into the forest, before our ascent, to see if i could find some antelope or gazelle, or some other kind of game, wandering about in search of food, when i unexpectedly heard the grunt of wild boars. i was alone. i listened, and made sure that they were coming down the mountain. i knew that i must get shelter in order not to be seen, for i had discovered that they were coming just in my direction. a wild boar would not be a bad thing, i thought, especially if it was fat. were they yellow wild boars, or black ones? yellow or black, one would be welcome. looking around, i saw the remains of a tree that had fallen down from old age. the top of the stump was about three feet above the ground, and in it was a hollow, into which i could easily get, and there could not be seen, for the tree, in falling, broke off, carrying away part of the trunk. i looked inside to see if there were any snake, or scorpion, or centipede in it, but saw nothing. if i had tried, i could not have made a better hiding-place. so i stepped in, making a peep-hole to see through, and lay in wait. the grunting became louder. i could hear them uprooting the ground, and finally four big yellow wild boars were before me. i cocked my gun as the big fellow of the party approached, unaware of his danger, and fired, and down he came. his three companions made a leap of about ten yards--a tremendous leap it was. these wild boars can leap farther than an antelope. this was a _potamocherus albifrons_, a species which i have described to you in a former volume. [illustration: attack on the wild boars.] there was great joy when i returned to the camp and told the good news. they thought i had killed a monkey. we had part of it for our breakfast, and it was excellent, but not very fat, as this time of the year is not their fat season. one of my ashira men had at home a small idol, which had the reputation of being an excellent guardian of his vacant house, and to this idol he was to take a piece of smoked boar's flesh. i succeeded in purchasing the idol, a likeness of which i here give you. chapter xxvi. propose to start for haunted mountains.--olenda says it can not be done.--at last i leave olenda village.--a tornado.--we are lost.--we fight a gorilla.--we kill a leopard.--return to olenda. i soon after returned to olenda's village. one day i said to olenda, "olenda, have you ever been to the nkoumou-nabouali?" the wrinkled old chief looked at me through his small eyes for some time without saying a word, and then he replied, "moguizi, no living man has ever been to the top of those mountains." "what kind of people live in those mountains?" "no one lives there," said olenda, "except a race of people whom you may perhaps see, but, as soon as you approach their abodes, they vanish away, and no one can tell which way they have gone, for no one can see them when they disappear; their villages are made only with branches of trees." i remained silent a little while. then i said, "olenda, i want to go there; i want to go to the very top of the nkoumou-nabouali--to the very top," i added, pointing out to him the highest blue peak i could see from his village--"to the highest top, so that i may look at all the country round." i thought to myself what a glorious sight it would be, for, at a single glance, i should see hills, and plains, and rivers spread all around. my enthusiasm was very great when thinking of these things. i felt strong--so strong that i thought it would be nothing to go through that belt of immense forest and climb those high mountains. olenda gave a quiet laugh, which i still recollect, for it came from his hollow chest, and, if i had believed in witchcraft, i should have certainly thought olenda was a sorcerer. his people were afraid of him, for no one could understand how he could have lived so long; all the wives he had married when a young man had died long ago; there was not a living man or woman in the country who knew him when he was a young man. the mothers of these people he knew when they were babies. after he had given that laugh, which ended in a sarcastic smile, he looked me in the face and said, "you can not do it. no one has ever been there; there is a mighty spirit living in those woods which prevents people from passing. besides, there is nothing to eat; there are no wild beasts, no antelope, no wild boar. at the foot of the mountain there is a tremendous waterfall, which drowns the roar of the gorilla." "i must go," said i. so i talked to the ashiras, and finally i managed, by making presents and promising more on my return, to get guides enough among the ashira freemen to lead me through the impenetrable forests which lay between the prairie and the mountain top. then we prepared ourselves for the journey. i had two fine axes, which i filed and ground on soft stone in order to make them very sharp; also several _manchettes_, or cutlasses, to help us to cut our way through the jungle. i had several boxes of matches to light our fires, besides fire-steel and flints, in case our matches should get wet. i also took several wax candles, as it is much more easy to light the fires with them. likewise i took one heavy blanket, for i knew not what kind of weather we should have on the mountains; as for my men, the fires would be their blankets. the heavy portion of our luggage was several hundred bullets, about fifty pounds of shot with which to kill guinea-fowls and other birds, and about ten pounds of powder. for food we had smoke-dried plantains, which had been cooked first, and then dried on an orala by smoking them. we had also smoked cassada. this kind of food, prepared in this way, would keep much longer and be much lighter, so each man could carry a much greater quantity of it. we wanted plenty of food. it was the first time i had seen plantain prepared in that way. we started in the midst of the cheers of the ashira people, and, as we disappeared down the hill, i saw olenda looking after us with his body half bent, and for all the world like some being of another planet. we took a northerly direction till the afternoon, when we left the prairie, and entered at once into as fine a piece of bog land as any one could wish to be in. it was awful traveling; the ground was soft, and every step we made took us almost knee-deep into it. now and then i had to look at my compass to see that we were going in the right direction, for there was no path whatever; but the ashira said we would find one after passing the marshes; that it was a hunting-path, and that there we would meet game. the fellows were already thinking of meat. when night came on we stopped on a hill surrounded by bog; we were so tired that we had not the strength to build our shelters; besides, there were no large leaves to be seen. we lighted tremendous fires, but toward midnight i was awakened by the sound of distant thunder, which gradually grew louder and louder; then flashes of lightning glared through the forest, and then terrific claps of thunder rolled along the sky. the rain began to pour down with a fury that flooded the country in a short time; our beds of leaves were saturated, compelling us to get up. the rain kept pouring down with increasing violence. we had not built our fires sufficiently high, although we had used huge pieces of wood that ought to have been high enough from the ground to prevent the rain from putting them out. but they were getting dimmer and dimmer, and at last we were left in complete darkness. it was pitch dark, and we could not even see each other except when a flash of lightning would brighten the forest. we were in a pretty fix. i began to regret that we had not been more careful. leopards and other wild beasts might be prowling about, and get hold of some of us. what would the ashiras say if one of their number should be carried away by a wild beast? they would call me a bad spirit. we could not even talk, for the thunder was too loud, and drowned our voices; besides, the rain made a great noise as it fell in torrents upon the trees, and from their leaves to the ground. we were surrounded by tall trees, and i was afraid that some of them might be struck by the lightning, and their heavy broken limbs fall in the midst of us. in fact, it was as uncomfortable a night as any one could wish to spend in the jungle, for we knew not what would happen next. toward four o'clock in the morning the rain ceased, but then i was wet to the bones; of course, my ashiras would soon dry. we lighted our fires once more, having split in two some pieces of half-rotten logs which lay near by, and had perhaps lain there for more than a hundred years, the heart being soft and dry. this is the kind of wood we use to light our fires with when there has been a heavy rain, and the wood that has fallen from the trees is wet outside. in these immense forests, which have been resting in their gloomy solitude for ages, the growths of trees succeed one after the other. i have often wondered how africa looked before it was covered with this dense vegetation, and what kind of animals it had, for the fauna of that country must have changed like ours. i remembered that once the immense mastodon roamed through america. with these thoughts i went to sleep in clothes wet to the skin. i took a large dose of quinine, however, in order to prevent a chill, which probably might have ensued from such a severe night. the next morning i dried my wet clothes, and once more we went bravely into the great jungle, still taking by my compass a northerly direction through the dense and thorny forest. the hunting-path was almost a myth, for only now and then would we get a glimpse of it; but my ashira men seemed to know almost every large tree we passed. we advanced slowly, our manchettes helping to cut the undergrowth. the third day i lost my only shirt--at least it would not hold together; and one of the legs of my pantaloons was torn off once, and i had to mend it with the fibre of the bark of trees. i lost, besides, many patches of skin, and the sharp thorns tore my flesh. snakes we would see now and then. we had hardly entered the jungle that first morning before i heard the roar of the gorilla. this at once revived my drooping spirits, as also those of my men, who immediately began to see looming up before them large pieces of gorilla meat broiled or roasted on charcoal. a dead silence among ourselves followed the roar of the big monster. each ashira, as if by instinct, came close to me for protection. we had not far to go. i went off in an easterly direction with friend gambo, leaving all the ashiras together in fear of the gorilla. we had barely gone a quarter of a mile in the direction from whence the roar proceeded when we heard what was now a much louder roar, this time quite near. we stood quite still, for fear of alarming the beast, which was evidently approaching us unawares. at last we could see the bushes bend toward us. gambo and i looked at each other, and inspected our guns; they were all right. a feeling of safety crept over us of course, for a good gun, with a steady aim, is a friend in need, and this we thought each of us possessed. the fear of alarming the gorilla, however, proved needless. he had come where he had heard a noise, and when he saw us he at once struck the intervening bushes, rose to an erect position, made a few steps in a waddling sort of way, stopped, and seated himself; then beating his vast breast, which resounded like an old drum, he advanced straight upon us. his dark gray sunken eyes flashed with rage; his features worked convulsively; his intensely black face looked horrid. his huge canines, powerful sinewy hands, and immense arms told us that we must not expect mercy from the monster. at every few paces he stopped, and, opening his cavernous mouth, gave vent to his thunderous roars, which the forest gave back with multiplied echoes until it was full of the din. he was evidently not a bit alarmed, but quite ready for a fight. we stood perfectly still. he advanced till he stood beating his breast within about six yards of us, when i thought it time to put an end to the scene. my shot hit him in the breast, and he fell forward on his face, dead. the gorilla seems to die easy if shot in the right place. this one proved to be a middle-aged male, and a very fine specimen, but it was utterly impossible to preserve his skin in that great jungle. in a short time all the ashira joined us, and soon after the gorilla was cut to pieces, the hands and feet being thrown away, and the brain being religiously preserved for fetiches. there was plenty in the camp, for during the day i killed a nice little ncheri (gazelle), when i also had a feast. we were now fairly in the midst of high hills, sometimes going down, then going up; but, to save me, i could not tell exactly where we were going. occasionally we followed the tracks that elephants had made, but finally lost them. the elephants had evidently often changed their minds, and retraced their steps from whence they came. i could not tell exactly where the mountains of the nkonmou-nabouali were. the compass became of no use, for we never followed two minutes the same direction. at the rate we should have had to go through the forest, taking our course by the compass, we should have required perhaps a month or more, as we would have had to go on without making use of the clearings that we found now and then, or the tracks made by the wild beasts, or the little streams that came down from the hills. in fact, we would have had to make a road. the woods were very dense, game was scarce, and at last we had but one day's provisions left. the berries were not plentiful--indeed, for two or three days we did not eat to our heart's content for fear of running through our provisions too fast. i had with me only the suit of clothes i wore and a spare pair of pantaloons, for i was getting very poor, and my stock of garments left at olenda was small--indeed, it was so small that it was next to nothing. my poor rags could hardly be kept together. at times we had to pass through dense and very thorny jungles, where briers were as thick as grass on a prairie, and the holes in my clothes left so many bare spots that at every advance my scratched body bore witness of the hard time we had had, and of the difficulties we should encounter if i persisted in advancing into these mountains where there were no paths. it came into my head that the ashiras did not want to go; so i called our men together, and, after lighting a bright fire, we talked over "the situation," and then concluded that we had better return rather than risk certain death by starvation. we rested that night in the forest, and the next morning i gave the order to return, feeling quite disappointed at my non-success. we set out praying only that we might not starve. we still were in good spirits, and laughed over our misfortune, although hunger began to pinch us hard, and i can assure you it is not a very pleasant thing. we were looking for berries every where, and the ashiras for rat-holes and mice-nests, for mice and rats are great dainties among them; squirrels and monkeys, wild boars and antelopes, guinea-fowls, parrots, and even serpents, but nothing was to be seen. to make it worse, we lost our way. we had been careless in not breaking boughs of trees when we followed the elephant's tracks, and we got into the wrong track of other elephants. once lost in such a forest, the more you try to find your way the more you generally get bewildered. at last i took my compass, and we directed our steps, with its help, toward the south. on a sudden, a cry of joy came from the ashira. a bee's hive had been discovered by one of the men. he pointed us to a big tree. "look," said he, "just where the branches start from the trunk. don't you see bees round there? there is a big hole there, and the bees have their hive in it." as we saw the spot we all cried out, "yes, there is a bee-hive." immediately the tree was ascended, the bees smoked, not out, but in, for we wanted plenty of food; the combs were brought down, for the man who ascended the tree had provided himself with large leaves and native cords to put the honey in, which he did, tying several parcels round his neck. as soon as he came down i put my hands on my revolvers and said, "i would blow out the brains of any one who should touch the honey before i gave it to him." so every thing was put before me. i unfolded the large leaves, divided the honey in exactly equal portions for each of us, not forgetting to put in the mixture the dead smoked bees, the worms, the comb, the honey, and the dirt that was among it, for in that way we had more of it. it was delicious! perfectly splendid! dead bees, honey, wax, dirt, worms, went down as fast as we could possibly eat them, and when done, i declared, "i wish, boys, we had more of this honey." this suggestion of mine was responded to by a vigorous hurra, all shouting, rovano! rovano! "that is so, that is so." we got up after our meal, all feeling rather the better for it. i said to myself, as i rose and felt a good deal more elasticity in my legs, "after all, honey eaten in the way we have done is far more strengthening than fine honey, that is so clear and clean." it is wonderful, young folks, how a few days of starvation sharpens the appetite. you can not understand it till you have gone through the ordeal of hunger. in the afternoon, just after descending a hill, we came to a very thick part of the forest. we were all silent, for we wanted to kill game, when suddenly one of the men close to me made us a sign to stop and keep perfectly still, his face showing excitement and fear. i stopped and looked at him. without saying a word, he pointed me to a tree. i looked, and could see nothing; i was looking at the wrong tree. he came close to me, and whispered the word ngègo (leopard). i looked in the direction indicated. truly there was a magnificent leopard resting flat on the immense horizontal branch of a tree not more than fifteen or twenty feet from the ground. we had narrowly escaped, for we had to pass under that tree. the leopard had seen us, and was looking at us, as if to say, "why do you disturb me in my sleep?" for i suppose, as they move but seldom in the daytime, he intended to remain there for the day. his long tail wagged; he placed himself in a crouching position, ready to spring on some of us, hoping, i dare say, thus to secure his dinner. his glaring eyes seemed to look at me, and, just as i thought he was ready to spring, i fired between his two eyes, and the shot went right through his head, and down he fell with a heavy crash, giving a fearful groan. he tried to get up again, but another shot finished him, and then the tremendous war-shouts of the ashiras rang through the forest. i shot that leopard at a distance of not more than eight or ten yards.[b] [b] see frontispiece. the leopard was hardly on the ground before we rushed in with our knives. a heavy blow of the axe partly severed his head from his neck. we cut off his tail to take it back to town, and then took his claws off, to give them to olenda for a necklace. the leopard was cut in pieces, and we lighted a big fire, or, rather, several big fires. this leopard was fat--very fat, but smelt very strong--awfully so. the ribs looking the best, i thought i would try them and have some cutlets--real leopard cutlets. i flattened them and pounded them with the axe in order to make them tender. by that time the fire had burned up well, so i took from it a lot of bright burning charcoal, and put my cutlets on it. the cutlets soon afterward began to crisp; the fat dropped down on the charcoal, and a queer fragrance filled the atmosphere round. then i put on the cutlets a little salt i had with me, rubbed them with some cayenne pepper, and immediately after i began to go into them in earnest. the meat was strong, and had an odor of musk, which was very disagreeable. i found it so at the third cutlet, and when i had done i took some salt in my mouth, mixed with cayenne pepper, in order to see if i could not get rid of the taste; i could not. i wished then that the leopard had been some other animal. this hard work, starvation, and wet at nights, began to tell upon me. besides, i had made no discoveries, and i began to wish that i had listened to friend olenda. his sarcastic and hollow laugh came back to me. his prophetic words, "i tell you, moguizi, that no one ever ascended the nkoumou-nabouali," were remembered. i began to feel weaker and weaker, and when i awoke two days after killing the leopard, i rose with difficulty from my bed of leaves. we set forward without breakfast. i dared not send men in the forest for berries; we must be contented with those we should find on our route, for every hour was precious, and they might not find any, after all. so we walked on with empty stomachs, longing for a sight of the ashira country. i could not be mistaken; my compass was in good order; i had taken into account its variation. we were going south, if not right straight, at least in a general southern direction. on, and on, and on, through the gloomy jungle, no man saying a word to the other, and every man looking anxiously for the first sight of prairie-land, which, with my diseased brain, weakened by hunger, was to me like a fairy-land. at last, on the afternoon of a day which i have never forgotten, a sudden lighting of the forest gloom told us that an open country was near at hand. with a certain renewal of strength and hope we set off on a run, caring not how the jungle would tear us to pieces, till we reached a village at the very bounds of the bush. here the people were much alarmed at our appearance and our frantic actions. "food! food! food!" shouted the ashiras. that was all they could say. when they discovered that we did not mean mischief, they approached. the chief had seen me at olenda, and he made haste with his people to supply our necessities with all manner of food in their possession--plantains, pine-apples, cassada, yams, fowls, smoked fish. the chief gave me a royal present of a goat, which we killed in the wink of an eye. i ate so much that i feared i should be ill from putting too large a share into my so long empty stomach. we were so merry during that evening. i told the good old chief to come and see me at olenda, and that i would give him a nice present there. the next morning we reached olenda. the old chief, of whom i did not wonder people were afraid, came to meet me at the entrance of the village, for we had been firing guns to announce our arrival, and, as soon as he saw me, he said, in his deep, hollow, and piercing voice, "moguizi, no ashira has ever been or will ever go to the top of the nkoumou-nabouali!" my boy macondai was very glad to see me again, and came with tears of joy to welcome me. the people were all pleased to see us. a child, said to be a sorcerer, was bound with cords, and was to be killed the next day. after a great deal of talking to olenda, the boy was not to be killed. i was glad i had come in time to save his life. the weather by this time was getting oppressively hot in the prairie. my long black hair was hanging too heavily on my shoulders. i wore it very long in order to astonish the natives. every chief wanted me to give him a lock of my hair, and this they considered a very great present. they would immediately go to the alumbi house to lay it at the foot of the idol, but more generally it was worn as a fetich. i resolved to have my hair cut, as it was too long for comfort. i gave makondai a large pair of scissors i had with me. of course i did not expect him to cut my hair as a fifth avenue or fashionable hotel barber would do, the chief point being that he should cut it tolerably short. in the interior of africa i was not obliged to bother myself about the latest style. collars and neck-ties were unknown to me. when he had done he gathered up the hair and threw it in the street. i was surprised some time after to hear a noise of scuffling and fighting, accompanied by awful shouting. i came out of my hut to see what was the matter. they were busily engaged in securing my hair, that the wind had scattered all around, each man picking up as much as he could, and trying to prevent his neighbor from getting any, so that he might have more to himself. even old king olenda was in the scramble for a share. he could not trust his people. he was afraid he would not get any if he depended upon them, and when i saw him he had a lock which his head wife had found for him. i never saw such a scramble for hair before; they looked and looked after a scattered hair all day, and when they gave up the search i am sure not a hair could have been found on the ground. chapter xxvii. departure for the apingi country.--the ovigui river.--dangerous bridge to cross.--how the bridge was built.--glad to escape drowning.--on the way.--reach the oloumy. yonder, in a northeasterly direction, lies a country where live a strange people called apingi. the ashira, who now and then visit the country, say that a large river flows through it, and that the river, which is called ngouyai, runs also at the foot of the nkoumou-nabouali mountains. on the banks of that large stream many strange tribes of men live, of whom they have heard, but have never seen. our evenings were often spent in talking about that strange country. it was said there was an immense forest between it and ashira land, and that there were paths leading to it through the jungle, which was believed to be very dense. one morning i went to olenda and said to him, "king, i wish to go to the apingi country, and i want you to give me people to accompany me." the old man, with his little deep, sunken eyes, regarded me for a little while, for he seemed never tired of looking at me, then said, "moguizi, you shall go to the apingi country, and i will give you people who have been there to accompany you." and then he repeated his _kombo_, which i have given to you before, and returned to his hut. if olenda was not tired of looking at me, i must say that i was never tired of looking at him, for so old a person i had never seen in my life. i have often wondered if olenda was not the oldest person living in the world. i believe he was. when the king gave the order to get ready for my departure, great preparations were made. food was collected and cooked for my trip, quantities of ripe plantain were boiled and then smoked, and then, the food being ready, the people came who had been ordered by the king to accompany me. olenda gave me three of his sons, or, i should rather say, great-grandchildren. they were to be the leaders. adouma, quengueza's nephew, was the only stranger who was allowed to accompany me. this was a great favor, for the law was very strict in that land that no commi should be permitted to go farther than the ashira land. macondai was too small. i was afraid he would die from the hardships we should encounter in the jungle. olenda was to take care of him. the names of olenda's three great-grandchildren were minsho, iguy, and aiaguy. minsho, being the eldest, was to be the chief. it was a bad time of the year to start, for we were in the beginning of december. it rained every day, and tornadoes coming from that very apingi country blew over us toward the sea. all the rivers were rising. in the valleys there was a great deal of water, but the prairie looked very green and beautiful. for the last few days it had been raining almost without intermission, and we had to delay our departure on account of the swollen state of the rivers. but at last, on the th of december, , there was a great commotion in the village of olenda, for we were really about to start. olenda had come out, and was surrounded by his people. he had called our party, and admonished his great-grandsons to take care of his moguizi, for the moguizi was his friend, and had come to him, olenda. if olenda had not been living, he would never have come into the country. the whole people shouted with one voice, "that is so." then the old king proceeded formally to bless us, and to wish us good success, and that no harm should befall us on the road. on this occasion his majesty was painted with the chalk or ochre of the alumbi, and had daubed himself with the ochres of his most valiant ancestors, and with that of his mother. he invoked their spirits to be with us, and afterward took a piece of wild cane, bit off several pieces of the pith, and spat a little of the juice in the hand of each one of the party, at the same time blowing on their hands. then, in his sonorous and hollow voice, which hardly seemed human, he said, solemnly, "let all have good speed with you, and may your road be as smooth (pleasant) as the breath i blow on your hands." then minsho received the cane, of which he was to take great care, as, if it were lost, heavy misfortunes would happen to us, but as long as he kept it all would be well. minsho was to bring back the cane to olenda. immediately after this we started, taking a path leading toward the northeast. the prairie in the valleys was very swampy, the heavy rains having overflowed the lands, and we had to walk through considerable pools of standing water. in one of these swamps we had to wade up to our waists in muddy water, and several of the party slipped down and seated themselves in a manner they did not like, to the great merriment of the others, whose turn was to come next, and who, when laughing at their neighbors' misfortunes, fancied they could go through safely. as for myself, being short in stature, i had the water on several occasions higher than my waist. toward noon we approached the ovigui river, a mountain torrent which had now swollen into a river, and before reaching its natural banks we had to pass through a swamp in the forest for half an hour. the torrent had overflowed, and its waters were running swiftly down among the trees. i began to wonder how we were to cross the bridge. the ashiras had been speaking of that bridge, and, in fact, we had delayed our start two or three days because they said the waters were too high. at last we came to a spot where the ground was dry, and a little way farther i could see the swift waters of the ovigui gliding down with great speed through the forest. i saw at once that even an expert swimmer would be helpless here, and would be dashed to pieces against the fallen trees which jutted out in every direction. not being a very good swimmer, i did not enjoy the sight. there was one consolation, no crocodile could stand this current, and these pleasant "gentlemen" had therefore retired to parts unknown. i wanted all the time to get a glimpse of the bridge, but had not succeeded in doing so. i called minsho, who pointed out to me a queer structure which he called the bridge. it was nothing but a creeper stretched from one side to the other. then minsho told me that some years before the bed of the river was not where we stood, but some hundred yards over the other side. "this," he said, "is one of the tricks of the ovigui." i found that several other of these mountain streams have the same trick. of course minsho said that there was a muiri (a spirit) who took the river and changed its course, for nothing else could do it but a spirit. the deep channel of the ovigui seemed to me about thirty yards wide. now in this new bed stood certain trees which native ingenuity saw could be used as "piers" for a bridge. at this point in the stream there were two trees opposite each other, and about seven or eight yards distant from each shore. other trees on the banks were so cut as to fall upon these, which might have been called the piers. so a gap had been filled on each side. it now remained to unite the still open space in the centre, between the two "piers," and here came the tug. unable to transport heavy pieces of timber, they had thrown across this chasm a long, slender, bending limb, which they fastened securely to the "piers." of course no one could walk on this without assistance, so a couple of strong vines (lianas) had been strung across for balustrades. these were about three or four feet above the bridge, and about one foot higher up the stream. i could barely see the vine, and my heart failed me as i stood looking at this breakneck or drowning concern. to add to the pleasurable excitement, minsho told me that, on a bridge below, half a dozen people had been drowned the year before by tumbling into the river. "they were careless in crossing," added minsho, "or some person had bewitched them." the waters of the ovigui ran down so fast that looking at them for any length of time made my head dizzy. i was in a pretty fix. i could certainly not back out. i preferred to run the risk of being drowned rather than to show these ashira i was afraid, and to tell them that we had better go back. i think i should never have dared to look them in the face afterward. the whole country would have known that i had been afraid. the moguizi would have then been nowhere. a coward i should have been called by the savages. rather die, i thought, than to have such a reputation. [illustration: crossing the ovigui river.] i am sure all the boys who read this book would have had the same feelings, and that girls could never look at a boy who is not possessed of courage. the engraving before you will help to give a good idea of the bridge i have just described to you, and of our mode of crossing. the party had got ready, and put their loads as high on their backs as they could, and in such a manner that these loads should slip into the river if an accident were to happen. the crossing began, and i watched them carefully. they did not look straight across, but faced the current, which was tremendous. the water reached to their waists, and the current was so swift that their bodies could not remain erect, but were bent in two. they held on to the creeper and advanced slowly side-ways, never raising their feet from the bridge, for if they had done otherwise the current would have carried them off the structure. one of the men slipped when midway, but luckily recovered himself. he dropped his load, among the articles in which were two pairs of shoes; but he held on to the rope and finished the "journey" by crossing one arm over the other. it was a curious sight. we shouted, "hold on fast to the rope! hold on fast!" the noise and shouting we did was enough to make one deaf. another, carrying one of my guns, so narrowly escaped falling as to drop that, which was also swept off and lost. meantime i wondered if i should follow in the wake of my shoes and gun. at any rate, i was bound to show the ashira that i was not afraid to cross the bridge, even, as i have said, at the risk of being drowned. it would have been a pretty thing to have these people believe that i was susceptible of fear. the next thing would have been that i should have been plundered, then murdered. these fellows had a great advantage over me. their garments did not trouble them. at last all were across but minsho, adouma, and myself. i had stripped to my shirt and trowsers, and set out on my trial, followed by minsho, who had a vague idea that if i slipped he _might_ catch me. adouma went ahead. before reaching the bridge i had to wade in the muddy water. then i went upon it and marched slowly against the tide, never raising my feet, till at last i came to the tree. there the current was tremendous. i thought it would carry my legs off the bridge, which was now three feet under the water. i felt the water beating against my legs and waist. i advanced carefully, feeling my way and slipping my feet along without raising them. the current was so strong that my arms were extended to their utmost length, and the water, as it struck against my body, bent it. the water was really cold, but, despite of that, perspiration fell from my face, i was so excited. i managed to drag myself to the other side, holding fast to the creeper, having made up my mind never to let go as long as i should have strength to hold on. should my feet give way, i intended to do like the other man, and get over by crossing one arm over the other. at last, weak and pale with excitement, but outwardly calm, i reached the other side, vowing that i would never try such navigation again. i would rather have faced several gorillas, lions, elephants, and leopards, than cross the ovigui bridge. putting ourselves in walking order again, we plunged into the great forest, which was full of ebony, barwood, india-rubber, and other strange trees. about two miles from the ovigui we reached a little prairie, some miles long and a few hundred yards wide, which the natives called _odjiolo_. it seemed like a little island incased in that great sea of trees. what a nice little spot it would have been to build a camp under some of the tall, long-spread branches of trees which bordered it! but there was no time for camping. there were to be no stops during the daytime till we reached the apingi country. a few miles after leaving the odjiolo prairie we came to a steep hill called mount oconcou. as we ascended we had to lay hold of the branches in order to help ourselves in the ascent, and we had to stop several times in order to get our breath. we finally reached a plateau from which we could see nkoumou-nabouali mountains. then we surmounted the other hills, with intervening plains and valleys, all covered with dense forest, and at last found ourselves on the banks of a most beautiful little purling mountain brook, which skirted the base of our last hill. this nice little stream was called the aloumy or oloumy. here we lit our fires, built shelters, and camped for the night, all feeling perfectly tired out, and i, for one, thankful for the nice camp we had succeeded in building, for i needed a good night's rest. chapter xxviii. a gorilla.--how he attacked me.--i kill him.--minsho tells a story of two gorillas fighting.--we meet king remandji.--i fall into an elephant-pit.--reach apingi land. the next morning we felt much refreshed, and once more entered the forest, following a footpath which was sometimes good, but oftener very bad. the country became more rugged and mountainous. on every side we met beautiful little streams of water wending their way through the woods. very often we had to march in the bed of some purling brook, as the easiest way we could find. this second day was exceedingly trying to our feet, for we made our way the greatest part of the time through a dense and gloomy forest. several times we heard, at a great distance, the roar of the gorilla and the heavy footsteps of elephants. we heard also the cries of the nshiego-mbouvé, and now and then the shrill cry of a monkey. in the afternoon i was startled by the roar of a gorilla, and it was three quarters of an hour before we came near him. he was then close to the path we were following, and roared incessantly. i find that i can not get accustomed to the roar of the gorilla, notwithstanding the number i have hunted and shot; it is still an awful sound to me. the long reverberations coming from his powerful chest, the vindictive bark by which each roar is preceded when about to attack, the hollow monotone of the first explosion, the ugly, ferocious look which he gives to his enemies, all are awe-inspiring, and proclaim the great beast the monarch of the forest of equatorial africa. when we came near him, he, in turn, at once made toward us, uttering a succession of bark-like yells, denoting his rage, and reminding me of the inarticulate ravings of a maniac. balancing his huge body with his arm, the animal approached us, every few moments stopping to beat his breast, and throwing his head back to utter his tremendous roar. his fierce, gloomy eyes glared upon us, the short hair on the top of his head was rapidly agitated, and the wrinkled face was contorted with rage. it was like a very devil, and i do not wonder at the superstitious terror with which the natives regard the monster. his manner of approach gave me once more an opportunity of seeing with how much difficulty he maintains himself in an erect posture. his short legs are not able firmly to support the vast body. they totter beneath the great weight, and the walk is a sort of waddle, in which the long and prodigiously strong arms are used in a clumsy way to balance the body, and keep up the ill-sustained equilibrium. twice he sat down to roar. my gun had, of course, been loaded in the morning (i always took care to reload my guns each day), and could thus be depended upon, so i shouldered it, feeling easy. i waited till he was close enough, and then, as he once more stopped to roar, i delivered my fire, and brought him down on his face--dead. his huge body proclaimed his giant strength. there is enough humanity in the beast to make a dead one an awful sight, even to accustomed eyes, as mine were by this time. it was as though i had killed some monstrous creature which had something of the man in it. we could do nothing with the gorilla, so the ashiras took as much meat out of his body as they could conveniently carry. we cut his head off and carried it with us. it was a huge and horrible head. looking at his enormous canine teeth, i saw at once that the monster must have had a tremendous fight a year or two before, for one of them had been broken off in the socket of the jaw. what a grand sight it must be to see a gorilla fight! this reminded me of the stories i had sometimes heard from the natives regarding the fearful conflicts the male gorillas have among themselves for the possession of a wife. indeed, the fight that this one was engaged in must have been a severe one, for not only had one of his large teeth been broken, but one of his arms was shorter than the other, and had evidently been broken and united again, not, i am sure, by a surgeon-gorilla, for i do not believe they have any, but nature and time were the healing processes. there is a skeleton of a gorilla in the british museum, the arm of which had been broken, no doubt, in some conflict, but when the animal was killed the wound had healed, and the bones of the arm had united. minsho promised to tell us the story of a fight between two gorillas in the evening by the camp-fire. how tremendous that blow must have been, i thought, in order to break that powerful muscular and thick-set bony arm! the forest must have been filled with the loud yells of the monster as he fought desperately against his enemy. we continued our way after fording a stream about one hundred and twenty feet wide, called the louvendji, carrying our gorilla's head with us, and toward dusk built our camp. after we had seated ourselves by the fireside, and i had taken my own modest meal, minsho got up, after filling himself with gorilla meat, and said, "moguizi, i promised you, after you had killed this big gorilla this morning, that i would tell you a gorilla story. are you ready to hear it?" "i am ready to hear it," i said, and all the party shouted "all are ready to hear it." "long ago," said he, "before i was born, and in the time of my father--for the story i am going to tell you is from my father--there was a terrible gorilla fight in the woods. my father had been cutting down trees in the forest in order to make a plantation, and was returning home, when suddenly he heard, not far from him, the yells of gorillas, and he knew that the beasts were coming quickly toward him. "not far from where he stood there was a large hollow tree, into which he at once entered and hid himself, for he was afraid of the gorillas. he had with him only his axe, and of course could not dream of fighting the gorillas, especially as there were two of them. he had hardly entered his hiding-place before the gorillas made their appearance. my father trembled with fear lest they should discover where he was, but they were so enraged at each other that they did not busy themselves about what surrounded them." minsho was getting excited, and his eyes began to sparkle as he came to the fighting part of his story. there was a pause and a dead silence, for we wanted to hear about the fight of the two gorillas. minsho suddenly gave a tremendous yell in the ashira fashion. "now," said he, "open your ears, for you are going to hear what my father saw. "the two gorillas seized each other and rolled on the ground, yelling. one at last gave the other a bite, which made his enemy give an awful shriek of pain. they then got up, their faces covered with blood, their bodies lacerated, and, looking fiercely at one another with their deep-sunken eyes, each gave a yell of defiance, and both slowly advanced again; then the larger, which was probably the elder, stopped, both wanting rest in order to breathe, and then they pounced upon each other, screaming, yelling, bellowing, beating their chests, retreating, and advancing. at last they both stood on their hind legs a few rods from each other, their eyes seeming to flash fire, and advanced once more for a deadly fight, when the older and bigger one raised his hand and gave his antagonist a most fearful blow, which broke the other's arm. immediately the badly-wounded gorilla fled, leaving the old gorilla master of the field; but then the victor was also covered with blood. my father still trembled, for he was afraid of being discovered. after a time, when all was silent, he looked round, and saw that the victorious gorilla had also gone off." by this time minsho was covered with perspiration; he fancied, i suppose, that he had seen the fight himself. he concluded by saying, "i have no doubt the gorilla we killed this morning lost one of his big tusks in a great fight with another gorilla," in which opinion we all coincided. after this story we lay down on our beds of leaves, and, surrounded by blazing fires, all went to sleep, hoping to rest well, for we had a hard day's work before us on the morrow. in the morning the songs of birds awoke us from our sleep. after roasting a ripe plantain and eating it, i started once more, following a path by which we traveled all day. again no game was seen; we did not even meet the footsteps of an elephant; and a little before sunset we came to a bando or olako, built by the ashira and apingi people especially for the convenience of travelers. the bando was roofed with peculiar and very large leaves, here called the shayshayray and the quaygayray. here we concluded to stop for the night. not even the cry of an owl or of a hyena disturbed the stillness; no elephant's footstep came to awake us from our slumber; the howls of the leopard were not to be heard. several days had been thus spent in the jungle, but we were now compelled to hurry along, for we had no food. in the mean time we had a view of some small prairies, and in one of them had seen villages, which the ashiras said were those of the bakalai; but as minsho and the rest of the ashiras did not want to go near them, we reentered the forest. "the bakalai here," said minsho, who i could see was not gifted with any great amount of bravery, "always stop and fight people." so we managed to pass their villages unseen. minsho said we were approaching the country of the apingi. he was not mistaken. in the afternoon, while we were passing through dense woods, we heard people talking not far from us, and i came suddenly on a man who turned out to be remandji, king of the apingi. at the sight of me he and his company stood silent and amazed for a few minutes, when he began to dance about me in a most unroyal and crazy manner, shouting again and again, "the spirit has come to see me! the spirit has come to see my country!" he kept looking at me steadfastly, and for a while i thought his majesty had gone out of his mind. king remandji looked like a very fine old negro. the question that arose in my mind was, "how did the king happen to be in the woods?" his majesty had come to fish in a neighboring creek, for kings here are modest in their tastes, and was on his way to meet his wives, who had been sent on before him. he knew olenda's sons, and directed them to a certain spot, and said he would be back that evening and bring his wives with him. we parted with the king, rejoicing in the prospect of having fish and plantain for dinner. meantime we went on, and when the evening came we all began to feel somewhat anxious about our quarters. game was said to be plentiful in the forest, so i pushed a little out of the path, and, thinking i had seen something like a gazelle, i stepped forward toward it, when down into an elephant-trap i went, feeling quite astonished at finding myself at the bottom of it. it was a wonder my gun did not go off. this trap i had fallen into was about ten feet deep, eight feet long, and six feet wide. as soon as i recovered sufficiently to comprehend my position, i began to holla and shout for help. no one answered me. i shouted and shouted, but no reply came. i was in a pretty fix. "suppose," said i to myself, "that a huge snake, as it crawls about, should not see this hole, and tumble down on top of me." the very thought made me shout louder and louder. at times i would call, "ayagui! ayagui! minsho! minsho!" finally i fired a gun, and then another, and soon i heard the voices of my men shouting "moguizi, where are you? moguizi, where are you?" "here i am!" i cried. "where?" i heard minsho repeat. "close by--here, minsho, in a big elephant-pit; look out, lest you fall into it yourself." minsho by this time knew where i was, and called all the men. they immediately cut a creeper and let it down. i fired off my gun, and sent it up first, and then, holding fast to the creeper, i was lifted out of the pit, and very glad i was too, i assure you. the wonder to me was that i did not break my neck in getting into it. [illustration: the elephant trap.] finally we reached the place where remandji had directed minsho to go. we lighted our fires, and soon after remandji made his appearance. he looked again and again at me. his women were frightened, and did not show themselves. happily, his majesty brought some plantains and fish with him. i thought i had before known what musquitoes were, but i never saw the like of those we had in this spot. they certainly must have been a new kind, for their sting was like that of a bee, and very painful. hundreds of them were buzzing around each one of us. my eyes, hands, and legs were swollen. i had a musquito-net with me, but inside of it they would get, how i could not tell. several times i got out of the net, and when i thought i had shaken it well, and driven every one of them off, i would get under it again in the twinkle of an eye; but the musquitoes, which seemed perfectly famished, were like vultures, and would get in at the same time that i did. the ashiras declared that they had never before seen such a place for musquitoes. smoke and fire seemed to have no effect upon them. i never suffered such torture in my life. they beat all i had ever seen in the shape of musquitoes. the next morning i was so terribly bitten that i looked as if i had the measles or the chicken-pox. remandji, who had built his camp next to ours, came declaring that the people must have bewitched the place where we had slept, and off he took us to his village. after a three hours' march, we came at last, through a sudden opening in the forest, to a magnificent stream, the rembo apingi or ngouyai. i stood in amazement and delight, looking at the beautiful and large river i had just discovered, and the waters of which were gliding toward the big sea, when a tremendous cheer from the ashiras announced to the apingi, remandji's subjects, who had made their appearance on the opposite bank, that a spirit had come to visit them. the latter responded to the cheering, and presently a great number of exceedingly frail flat canoes and several rafts were pushed across, and soon reached our side of the river; they had come to ferry us over. the apingi people live only on the right bank of this noble river. i got into a very small canoe, which was managed with great skill by the apingi boatman. i did not see how he could keep his equilibrium in the frail-looking shell. the shouting on the apingi side was becoming louder and louder, and when i landed the excitement was intense. "look at the spirit!" shouted the multitude. "look at his feet! look at his hair! look at his nose!" etc., etc. they followed me till i was safely housed in one of the largest huts in the town, which was about twelve feet long and seven feet broad, with a piazza in front. when all my luggage was stored there was hardly room to move. i had indeed reached a strange country. presently remandji came to me, followed by all the old men of his town and several chiefs of the neighboring villages. twenty-four fowls were laid at my feet; bunches of plantains, with baskets of cassava. and remandji, turning toward the old men, said, "i have beheld what our fathers never saw--what you and i never saw before. i bid thee welcome, o spirit! i thank your father, king olenda," said he, turning to minsho, "for sending this spirit to me." then he added, "be glad, o spirit, and eat of the things we give thee." whereupon, to my great astonishment, a slave was handed over to me, bound, and remandji said, "kill him; he is tender and fat, and you must be hungry." i was not prepared for such a present. they thought i was a cannibal--an eater of human flesh--and there stood before me a fat negro, who during the night had been caught, for remandji had sent word to the people of my coming, and in his forethought determined that i must have a good meal on my arrival. then i shook my head, spat violently on the ground, which is a great way of showing disgust, the people all the time looking at me with perfect astonishment. i made minsho tell them that i abhorred people who ate human flesh, and that i, and those who were like me in the spirit-land, never did eat human flesh. just fancy! what a fine present! a nice fat negro, ready for cooking. it was like the presentation of a fat calf. remandji then said, "what becomes of all the people we sell, and that go down the river for you to take away? we hear you fatten them before they are killed. therefore i gave you this slave, that you might kill him and make glad your heart." a deep blush came over my face, i felt so ashamed. it was true, the white man had come into their country for hundreds of years and carried away their people. after my refusal of the fat negro, who was glad to get free, remandji's wives cooked the food for me which had before been presented. the king tasted of every thing that was laid before me, and drank of the water which was brought for me to drink. such is the custom, for the people are afraid of poison; and the wife always tastes of the food she presents to her husband before he eats it, and the water he is going to drink. the uproar in the village was something terrific. i thought i should be deafened, and that their wonder at seeing me would never cease. for a bed i had but a few sticks, but i was glad that night to lay upon them, and to have one of those little huts to shelter me from rain, for i had had a hard time, i can assure you, since i had left olenda's. before going to sleep i thanked the kind god who had watched over me and led me safely into the midst of tribes of men whom no white man had ever seen before. chapter xxix. first day in apingi land.--i fire a gun.--the natives are frightened.--i give the king a waistcoat.--he wears it.--the sapadi people.--the music-box.--i must make a mountain of beads. in the morning when i awoke i looked round my room. of course i did not have to look far, for the house was small; besides, it was filled with my baggage. several fetiches hung on the walls, and in a corner was the skull of an antelope fastened to the roof. there were no windows, the floor of pounded yellow clay, and just by the few sticks which formed my bed were the remains of an extinguished fire. it was daylight, for i could hear the birds singing. the sun had risen, for i could see the sunshine through the crevices of the walls, which were made of the bark of trees, and through these the light came in. i listened to hear voices in the village; but no, all was silent. i got up, intending to go to the river to wash my face, and opened the door, which had been made with the bottom of an old canoe. every hut in the village had its door, for there were famished leopards in the forest which often carried away people. i had hardly stepped out of the house when i saw before me a very large crowd of people, who gave a loud yell at my appearance. i instinctively put my hand on one of my revolvers and held my gun in readiness; then looked at these people, who had been surrounding my hut since daylight, without saying a word. their yells were pretty loud. i knew not what they meant at first. i looked at them, when most of the women and children, and some of the men, ran away, although i cried out to them not to be afraid. king remandji soon arrived to say good-morning to me, and, while he was by my side, i raised the double-barreled gun i had with me, which i had loaded with a very heavy charge of powder, and fired it off. the gun recoiled on my shoulder, and hurt me slightly. the people fled in dismay, and the noise of the detonation re-echoed through the forest. remandji regarded me with fear and trembling. i reassured him by a smile, and by putting on his head a most flaming red cap which i had got ready for him. how he admired the bright red! he shouted to his people to come back, which they all did. after washing my face in the river i returned to the village. it was a beautiful village. the houses were small, most of them being eight or ten feet long and six or eight feet wide. the walls were built with the bark of trees, and were about five feet high. the roofs were thatched either with large leaves or with the leaves of the palm, and at the top were about seven feet high. at the rear of the houses were large groves of plantain-trees. walking through the street, i came to the big idol, or mbuiti of the place, which stood under a ouandja (a covered roof), and there kept guard. that morning a few plantains, ground-nuts, sugar-cane, and a piece of a deer were before it. there was also a vessel with palm wine. after walking to the end of the village i came back to remandji, the people hollaing and shouting all the time, "the good spirit has come! the spirit has come!" i breakfasted outside of my hut, a few roasted plantains and a boiled fowl being my fare. how wild the shouts of these people were when they saw me eating! they were perfectly frantic. the fork was an object of the greatest wonder. they exclaimed, "the spirit does not eat with his hand; the spirit has a queer mouth; the spirit has teeth that are not filed sharp to a point; the spirit has a nose; how strange is the hair of the spirit!" the crowd was pouring in from all the surrounding villages, and the excitement was intense. they were afraid, but, in despite of their fear, they came to see the great spirit who had arrived in their country. after breakfast i called remandji, and led him into my hut, and also the two head men, or graybeards of his village. then i put on his majesty a flaming red waistcoat. i could not spare a coat, and i had no pantaloons to give him; luckily, they never want to wear the latter in this part of the world. he looked splendid with his waistcoat on. i also put round his neck a necklace of large blue and white beads, of the size of sparrow's eggs. i gave him, into the bargain, a looking-glass, and he was very much frightened when he saw his face in it, and he looked at me as if to say "what next?" to the two elders, or graybeards, i gave each a necklace of large beads, and put on the head of each a red cap. then we came out. as soon as the people saw them appear in such great style, they became very wild. i fired two guns, and remandji and the two graybeards told the people not to be afraid. immediately, guided by the same instinct, they all advanced toward us in a half-sitting posture, clapping their hands, and at the same time shouting "ah! ah! ah!" when they thought they were near enough, they stopped, looked at me with a queer expression, and then shouted, "you are a great spirit! you are a great spirit!" and then they suddenly got up, and ran away to the other end of the village. "really the apingi country is a strange land," said i to myself. in the afternoon several thousand strangers filled the village. they had come to look at me, but before sunset almost all of them had returned to their homes. they had come by water and by land, from the mountains and from the valleys. the story of the arrival of the spirit in remandji village had spread far and wide, and every one came to see if it was true, desiring to see for themselves. but how afraid they were when i looked at them! how fast they ran away, and how quickly they would come back, but always keeping at a respectful distance! in the evening there was a grand ball. the noise was horrible, the dancing was grand, the gesticulations and contortions were funny, the tam-tams sounded strangely, the singing was powerful, and i, of course, enjoyed the affair amazingly. i staid out all night to please them, and they were glad to see me look at them and laugh. after a few days i became the great friend of a good many. i gave them beads, especially the women. i handled their little babies, and never got angry, though sometimes their curiosity annoyed me very much indeed. remandji and i became great friends. he was a real nice king, and we spent hours together. i was obliged to use minsho as an interpreter, for i do not understand the apingi tongue very well. it seems to me like the language of the mbinga, a tribe which i have spoken of in "stories of the gorilla country." one day a great crowd came and asked me to take my shoes off. when i asked them why, they said they wanted to know if i had toes like they had. "you have ears like we have," said they, "and we want to see if you have cloven feet like an antelope. we want to see if your feet are like those of a people who live far away from here, of whom we have heard, and who are called _sapadi_. yes," they exclaimed, with one voice, "far away in the mountains there are sapadi; they do not have feet like other people; they have feet like antelopes; they have cloven feet." i told them that there were no such people. remandji immediately called one of his slaves, a man to whose country none of the apingi had ever been (the shimba country), and he declared positively, with a look of great truthfulness, that he had seen sapadi. another man also came forward and declared the same thing--they were people like the apingi, only their feet were like those of antelopes. to please them, i took off my boots. this was done in the midst of most vociferous cheers. they took my socks to be my skin. after my socks were taken off, and my naked feet burst upon their sight, the excitement became intense. the idol was brought out, the drums began to beat, and they sang songs to me, shouting and hollaing in the most approved african manner. remandji took one of my feet in his lap and touched it, declaring that it was softer than the skin of a leopard. when his people saw this they became frantic. "the great spirit has come! the great spirit has come!" they shouted; "the king holds one of his feet!" remandji rose, and, in a half-squatting position, danced and sang before me, the drums in the mean time beating furiously. the noise was deafening. they took me for a god. [illustration: the music-box.] when they had calmed down a little i went into my hut, wound up my large music-box, and, coming out, set it on an apingi stool in the midst of the crowd, who immediately retreated farther off. i then let the spring go, and at once the music began to play. a dead silence followed the tumult; the drums dropped down from between the drummers' legs; a leaf falling on the ground could have been heard; they were perfectly mute. remandji and the people looked at me in affright. i went away, but of course the music continued to go on. they looked from me to the box, and back again, and finally exclaimed, "lo! the devil speaks to him." i disappeared into the woods, and the music continued--the devil continued to speak. the town is filled once more with strangers from the countries round, who have come to see the spirit that is stopping with remandji. the forests are full of olakos in which these people sleep. the women appear hideously ugly; every one of them seems to have three or four children, and they are tattooed all over. on the bodies of many of them one could not find a spot as big as a pea that was free from this tattooing. they think that cutting their bodies in this way is beautifying. it is simply hideous. they file their teeth sharp to a point, which gives their faces a frightfully savage appearance; but, with all their ugliness, the apingi were kind-hearted, always treated me well, and loved me. i always tried to do what was right by them. one day they saw me writing my journal, and they said i was making print and cloth to give them. during the nights they all believed i did not sleep, but that i was at work making beads and all the things i gave them, whereupon ensued a great council of above thirty apingi chiefs, who, after due deliberation with remandji, who was at their head, came to me, surrounded by thousands of their people, and then their king delivered the following speech: "spirit, you are our king; you have come to our country to do us good." the people, with one accord, repeated what remandji had said--"you can do every thing." i wondered what was coming next. then, in a loud voice, he added, "proceed now to make for us a pile of beads, for we love the beads you make and give us. make a pile of them as high as the tallest tree in the village," and he pointed to a giant tree which could not have been less than two hundred feet in height, "so that our women and children may go and take as many beads as they wish. you must give us cloth, brass kettles, copper rods, guns, and powder." the people liked the speech of remandji, and shouted "yo! yo!" a sign of approval. he continued: "the people will come to see you after you have gone; and when we shall say to them, 'the spirit who came has gone,' they will say, 'it is a lie! it is a lie! no spirit ever came to visit remandji.' but when the whole country shall be filled with the things which we ask you to make, then, though they do not see you, they will say, 'truly a spirit has visited the land of the apingi, and lived in remandji's village.'" the faces of the crowd were beaming with satisfaction, for they approved of remandji's speech. then there was a dead silence again. i did not know what to say. i did not want to tell them i was a spirit, nor did i wish to tell them i was not one, for prestige is a great thing in a savage country. they felt grieved when i told them i brought them things, and did not make them. they did not believe me, and said, "thy spirit does not wish to do what we ask of it. why, spirit, will you not do what we ask you!" and then the whole crowd began to dance and sing before me, saying, "moguizi, do not be angry with us. moguizi, we love you. moguizi, you are good. moguizi, stay with us." on my continued refusal they scattered, and i went among them. chapter xxx. a large fleet of canoes.--we ascend the river.--the king paddles my canoe.--agobi's village.--we upset.--the king is furious.--okabi, the charmer.--i read the bible.--the people are afraid. remandji and i had been talking of traveling together, and i had told him that i wished to ascend the river. he promised to have a fleet of canoes prepared, and that his people would turn out _en masse_. he was as good as his word. the appointed day came. quite a little fleet had been brought together. but what canoes! my goodness! what a difference between them and the canoes of the commi country! they were very small--mere nut-shells. remandji proudly pointed to the fleet he had collected to take me up. while he was talking to me i was thinking seriously of the great probability of capsizing, and the prospect was not exactly cheering, for the current of the river was strong. though sometimes i have no objection to a ducking, i had strong objections to getting it in that manner, with all my clothes on. then the order for departure was given by the king. there was no help for it. i had asked canoes to go up. remandji had done the thing in great style. i could not back out. i was led in front of the royal canoe. half a dozen of these could have been easily put inside of one of quengueza's canoes. the royal canoe was not much better than any other canoe, though the largest one had been chosen for me. i made my preparations against accident--that is to say, ready in case we capsized. i tied my compass to a cord about my neck; then i tied my gun fast by a long rope to the canoe, which would float at any rate; and i had a small box of clothes, a shirt, and two pairs of shoes, which i tied also. i tied a handkerchief round my head, and put my watch inside on the top, so that it would not get wet. there was not a host of people to go in the royal canoe--remandji, a paddler, and myself--that was all. no more could get in with safety. there was not so much royalty and state as you see in the department of the navy. the admiral of the fleet i could not find. rafts are used extensively, but only for crossing the river or in going down the stream. each canoe has two or three men in it. how small they all were! quite flat on the bottom, and floating only a few inches above the water. they are very well designed for the swift current of the river, which runs, at this time of the year (december), at the rate of four miles an hour after a heavy rain. remandji was dressed in the flaming red waistcoat i had given him. the king paddled the canoe. as for me, i was perfectly satisfied to seat myself in the bottom, expecting all the time to upset, for steadiness was not part of our programme. i was quite uncomfortable, and as the canoe leaked, the part of my pantaloons upon which i was seated was a little more than damp; but no matter, it was cooling. but i could not help wishing the apingi canoes at the bottom of the river; this hard wish of mine, of course, to be fulfilled when i should not be in one of them. remandji shouted with all his might to the fleet of small canoes to keep out of our way, for surely if a canoe had knocked against ours we should have been in the water before we had time to give the fellows our blessing. we went gayly up the river, the royal canoe being ahead of all the others, remandji and his man paddling as hard as they could. the people of the villages we passed begged remandji to stop; but our fleet was bound for a village whose chief was called agobi, the father-in-law of remandji, and who had made friends with me. we at last reached his village. loud cheers from the villagers welcomed us. several canoes were upset at the landing by being knocked against each other; but the apingi swim like fish, and the suit of clothes they wore (their own skin) dried so quickly that a wetting was of very little moment to them. there was a grand apingi dance that night, and no sleep for me. after two days spent at agobi's village we began to ascend the river again, but the current was so swift that we hardly seemed to make any headway. there was a good deal of shouting, hollaing, and cursing in the apingi language before we fairly left the shore. the banks of this noble stream, down to the water's edge, were a mass of verdure. i began to congratulate myself that there would be no capsizing, and that i was not going to take a bath in the river. our canoe was, as i have said, ahead of all the others, when suddenly a canoe, which was crossing the river from the left bank, came close to us. we thought, however, that it would pass above our bow, but it was borne down by the current, and, before we could get out of the way, swept down upon us in spite of the shouts of remandji and his man. the canoe had only an old woman in it. bang! bang! and before i had time to say "look out," both canoes were capsized, and there we were in the river. remandji was perfectly frantic, cursing the old woman while he was swimming. she did not in the least mind what he said, but swam off down stream like a buoy, shouting continually, "where is my bunch of plantains? give me back my plantains!" for i must say that, if we were angry at her, and blamed her for the accident, she was equally angry at us for the same reason, each thinking it was the other's fault. the whole fleet was in great excitement, and remandji was in a fearful rage at the idea of any one upsetting his moguizi. i was still in the water, holding on to the canoe as hard as i could, looking after the old woman, who soon reached the shore, and, climbing out at a bend of the river, waited for her capsized canoe to float along, which having secured, she got in and paddled off, full of complaints at losing her plantains, and, of course, blaming us for it. remandji kept telling her all the time (i give you the literal translation, for the negroes do not mince words) to shut her mouth; but the more he told her to keep still, the more she talked. as for me, i at last succeeded in reaching the shore, remandji securing the canoe. nothing was lost, and my gun was safe; it was not loaded, for which i was thankful. it was a good thing that we had kept close to the banks of the river, for if we had capsized in the middle of the stream we should have gone a mile or two down the river before reaching the shore. i was not sorry when we got back to remandji's village, and his people were very glad to see us return. i do not know what these apingis will think about me next. remandji was a very intelligent fellow. as i am writing about him, i fancy i see his face and that i am talking to him. remandji was not a very tall negro. he was white-headed, with a mild expression of countenance, very kind to his people, and respected by all his tribe. if there was any quarrel among them, they would come to him to settle it. as you have seen, there was some fine hunting in his country. leopards were somewhat plentiful in the forest, and one day i said to the king, "remandji, i must go and hunt leopards, for i want their skins." he immediately asked, pointing to my coat, if i wanted a coat made of leopard's skin. i said no. then he left me, and a little while after came back with a man, and said, "it is of no use for you to go into the jungle, for we want to see you all the time. here is a man who has a big fetich, which enables him to kill all the leopards he wants without the fear of being killed by them." i burst out laughing. the man said, "laugh, o spirit; but you will see." the next morning, before starting, he came to show himself. when he made his appearance he began a most curious dance, talking sometimes very loud, at other times in a whisper, and making as many contortions as it is possible for a man to do. i could hardly recognize him. he did not look at all like the man of the day before. he was painted with ochre--half the body yellow, the other half red; one side of his face was red, the other white. on his head he had a covering made entirely of long feathers from the tails of strange birds. round his neck and shoulders hung an iron chain, each link being about one inch long, and oval. to this chain was suspended the skin of an animal which i had never seen, called ndesha, a species of large wild-cat found in the forest. it was spotted somewhat like the skin of a leopard, but the ground part was reddish. the only portion that could be seen was that part near the tail, which hung down. in this skin was tied a wonderful fetich, which no other man possessed, and by which he was able, as i have said, to slay the leopards. the name of the man was okabi. so i said, "okabi, show me this monda." he replied that no one could see that monda, for if they did they would try to make one like it. round his waist he wore a belt made of a leopard's skin, which had been cut from the head, along the spine, to the tail. they believe that no spear can go through such belts. they are very much prized, each warrior placing great value upon his personal safety. this leopard-charmer started quite alone, and i thought no more about him during the day. in the evening i was seated on one of those little round apingi stools, and remandji and i were talking about the back country. i felt very much interested in the account he gave me of it, as he spoke of a tribe of people i had never seen, when lo! what did i see? okabi, carrying on his back a dead leopard! i rubbed my eyes, thinking it was a mistake. no; it was okabi himself, and a dead leopard. how okabi got the leopard i could not imagine, but surely he had it, and there was no mistake about it. he placed the leopard at my feet, saying, "did i not tell you i had a fetich to kill leopards?" remandji also said, "did i not tell you i had a man who had a big fetich to kill leopards?" [illustration: okabi and the leopard.] "i believe," said i to remandji, "that when he promised to kill a leopard for me he had a trap set, and he knew that a leopard was in it. for," said i, "no man can make leopards come to him." "oh yes," said remandji, "there are men who have fetiches which have power to make game come to them." i coaxed okabi to show me his leopard fetich. he promised to do so the next day. he came, but i have very little doubt that he took something off from it he did not want me to see. he entered my hut and then untied the skin, and after he spread it out i saw the contents which made the fetich. there were ashes of different plants, little pieces of wood, the small head of a young squirrel, claws of the wonderful guanionien, feathers of birds, bones of animals i could not recognize, bones of birds, dried intestines of animals, some dried brain of young chimpanzee, a very rare land-shell, scales of fishes, a little bit of scrapings from the skull of one of his ancestors. these were the things that made the leopards come to him. "and if one of all these things you see," said he to me, "were missing, the fetich or monda would be good for nothing." time passed pleasantly in that fine country, and one day, as i was quietly reading my bible outside of my hut, a crowd assembled and watched me with wondering eyes. i told them that when i read this book it taught me that god was the great spirit who had made the stars, the moon, the rivers, the mountains, and all the wild beasts, and every thing that was in the world. then i read some verses aloud to them. i told them that god said people must not worship that which they had made with their own hands, but any thing they wanted they must ask of him. they must love him. he said people must not tell lies--must not kill. presently i let the leaves of the book slip through my hands to show them how many there were. as the leaves slipped quickly from between my hand they made a slight noise, when, to my great surprise, as soon as they heard it they fled. in an instant the whole crowd, remandji and all, had disappeared, with symptoms of the greatest terror. it was who should run the fastest. i called them back, but it was in vain. the louder i shouted, the faster they ran. the whole village was soon entirely deserted. i shouted, "remandji, come back--people, come back. i will do you no harm." by-and-by i saw remandji's face peeping from behind a plantain-tree. i called him, saying "that he and his people ought to be ashamed of themselves for leaving me alone in the village." at last they came back, when remandji said, "o spirit! we ran away, for the noise made by what you held in your hand (meaning the bible) was like that made by ococoo, and we knew not what was coming next. we did not know that you and ococoo could talk together." ococoo is one of the chief spirits of the apingi. i told them it was all nonsense, and took the book again, but they begged me to let it alone. in my frequent hunting-trips through the jungle, i found a great many palm-trees of the kind that yields the oil known as palm oil. i had never before seen such numbers of palms, all hanging full of ripe nuts. the apingi eat these nuts. their women come loaded every day with baskets full. they eat them roasted or boiled. the oil is used for the ladies' toilets, either as cold cream for the skin or pomade for the hair. this cold cream is rather peculiar. the oil is mixed with clay, and they rub their bodies with this _clean and delightful mixture_. as a pomade, they sometimes put more than half a pound of it on their hair. every few days they oil their heads, often mixing clay with the oil, and, as they never wash, and soap is unknown, the fragrance coming therefrom is not of the most odoriferous kind, and made me often wish that i had a cold, or could not smell. these ladies wear charming little ear ornaments in the shape of rings three or four inches in diameter, the wire being often of the size of a lady's little finger. of course the hole in the lobe of the ear is quite large. their faces are tattooed all over, and, to crown the whole of the description, they have, as has before been observed, a beautiful mouth, ornamented in front by two rows of teeth filed to a sharp point. they have a peculiar form of tattooed lines which is thought by them to be most beautiful. a broad stripe is drawn from the back of the neck along the shoulders, and across the breasts, meeting in an acute angle in the hollow of the chest. the flesh is raised at least two lines from the level of the skin. other stripes are drawn in curves along the back, and from the breast down on the abdomen. the legs and arms are tattooed all over, and their faces are literally cut to pieces. i never saw so much tattooing in any of the tribes i visited as among the apingi. they seemed to like it; and when i reproached them for spoiling their bodies in such a manner, they replied, "why, we think it is beautiful." and, pointing to my clothes, "why do you wear garments?" said they. "these tattooings are like your garments; we think they are very fine." trouble loomed in the distance for me. the people insisted that i must get married. remandji said that he must give me a housekeeper to keep my house and cook food for me. it was so; i must have a cook. the weather was hot and unpleasant, and it would be rather nice to have some one to attend to the kitchen. i smiled; it was a good idea. "yes," i said, "i want a housekeeper." remandji brought me a lot of women. i chose the ugliest, whose pretty good likeness you have below, and installed her as my housekeeper, cook, and maid-of-all-work. for two or three days all went well, when, one fine morning, a deputation of men and women from a neighboring village came to me, smiling and looking happy. they brought goats, fowls, and plantains; hailed me as their relative, and said that they came to ask for presents. [illustration: my housekeeper.] i confess that i lost my temper. i took a stick from my hut, the sight of which drove my would-be relatives and my housekeeper out of the village. they fled in the utmost consternation. "really," said i to myself, "these apingi are a strange people." remandji laughed heartily at the adventurers, saying to them, "i told you not to go to the spirit, as he would get angry at you." chapter xxxi. a great crowd of strangers.--i am made a king.--i remain in my kingdom.--good-by to the young folks. the village was crowded with strangers once more. all the chiefs of the tribe had arrived. what did it all mean? they had the wildest notions regarding me. i was the most wonderful of creatures--a mighty spirit. i could work wonders--turn wood into iron, leaves of trees into cloth, earth into beads, the waters of the rembo apingi into palm wine or plantain wine. i could make fire, the matches i lighted being proof of it. what had that immense crowd come for? they had met to make me their king. a kendo, the insignia of chieftainship here, had been procured from the shimba people, from whose country the kendo comes. the drums beat early this morning; it seemed as if a fête-day was coming, for every one appeared joyous. i was quite unprepared for the ceremony that was to take place, for i knew nothing about it; no one had breathed a word concerning it to me. when the hour arrived i was called out of my hut. wild shouts rang through the air as i made my appearance--"yo! yo! yo!" the chiefs of the tribe, headed by remandji, advanced toward me in line, each chief being armed with a spear, the heads of which they held pointed at me. in rear of the chiefs were hundreds of apingi warriors, also armed with spears. were they to spear me? they stopped, while the drummers beat their tam-tams furiously. then remandji, holding a kendo in his hand, came forward in the midst of the greatest excitement and wild shouts of "the moguizi is to be made our king! the moguizi is to be made our king!" when remandji stood about a yard from me a dead silence took place. the king advanced another step, and then with his right hand put the kendo on my left shoulder, saying, "you are the spirit whom we have never seen before. we are but poor people when we see you. you are one of those of whom we have heard, who came from nobody knows where, and whom we never expected to see. you are our king. we make you our king. stay with us always, for we love you!" whereupon shouts as wild as the country around came from the multitude. they shouted, "spirit, we do not want you to go away--we want you forever!" immense quantities of palm wine, contained in calabashes, were drank, and a general jollification took place in the orthodox fashion of a coronation. from that day, therefore, i may call myself du chaillu the first, king of the apingi. just fancy, i am an african king! of all the wild castles i ever built when i was a boy, i never dreamed that i should one day be made king over a wild tribe of negroes dwelling in the mountains of equatorial africa. i will remain in my kingdom for a while, and see every thing strange that there is in it. in the mean time, dear young folks, i bid you good-by, promising that, should you like to hear more of the country i have explored, i will, in another year, bring you back to the strange land where you and i have had so many adventures together. 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"harper's story books" can be obtained complete in twelve volumes, each one containing three stories, at the price of $ ; or in thirty-six thin volumes, each containing one story, at the price of $ . the volumes sold separately, the large ones at $ each, the others at cents each. volume i.--bruno; willie and the mortgage; the straitgate. " ii.--the little louvre; prank; emma. " iii.--virginia; timboo and joliba; timboo and fanny. " iv.--the harper establishment; franklin; the studio. " v.--the story of ancient history; the story of english history; the story of american history. " vi.--john true; elfred; the museum. " vii.--the engineer; rambles among the alps; the three gold dollars. " viii.--the gibraltar gallery; the alcove; dialogues. " ix.--the great elm; aunt margaret; vernon. " x.--carl and jocko; lapstone; orkney the peacemaker. " xi.--judge justin; minigo; jasper. " xii.--congo; viola; little paul. some of the story books are written particularly for girls, and some for boys; and the different volumes are adapted to various ages, so that the series forms a complete library of story books for children of the family and the sunday-school. journal of an african cruiser comprising sketches of the canaries, the cape de verds, liberia, madeira, sierra leone, and other places of interest on the west coast of africa. by horatio bridge an officer of the u. s. navy. edited by nathaniel hawthorne. london: wiley and putnam, , waterloo place [entered at stationers' hall.] preface. the following pages have afforded occupation for many hours, which might else have been wasted in idle amusements, or embittered by still idler regrets at the destiny which carried the writer to a region so little seductive as africa, and kept him there so long. he now offers them to the public, after some labor bestowed in correction and amendment, but retaining their original form, that of a daily journal, which better suited his lack of literary practice and constructive skill, and was in fitter keeping with the humble pretensions of the work, than a re-arrangement on artistic principles. at various points of the narrative, however, he has introduced observations or disquisitions from two or three common-place books, which he kept simultaneously with the journal; and thus, in a few instances, remarks are inserted as having been made early in the cruise, while, in reality, they were perhaps the ultimate result of his reflection and judgment upon the topics discussed. if, in any portion of the book, the author may hope to engage the attention of the public, it will probably be in those pages which treat of liberia. the value of his evidence, as to the condition and prospects of that colony, must depend, not upon any singular acuteness of observation or depth of reflection, but upon his freedom from partizan bias, and his consequent ability to perceive a certain degree of truth, and inclination to express it frankly. a northern man, but not unacquainted with the slave institutions of our own and other countries--neither an abolitionist nor a colonizationist--without prejudice, as without prepossession--he felt himself thus far qualified to examine the great enterprise which he beheld in progress. he enjoyed, moreover, the advantage of comparing liberia, as he now saw it, with a personal observation of its condition three years before, and could therefore mark its onward or retreating footsteps, and the better judge what was permanent, and what merely temporary or accidental. with these qualifications, he may at least hope to have spoken so much of truth as entirely to gratify neither the friends nor enemies of this interesting colony. the west coast of africa is a fresher field for the scribbling tourist, than most other parts of the world. few visit it, unless driven by stern necessity; and still fewer are disposed to struggle against the enervating influence of the climate, and keep up even so much of intellectual activity as may suffice to fill a diurnal page of journal or commonplace book. in his descriptions of the settlements of the various nations of europe, along that coast, and of the native tribes, and their trade and intercourse with the whites, the writer indulges the idea that he may add a trifle to the general information of the public. he puts forth his work, however, with no higher claims than as a collection of desultory sketches, in which he felt himself nowise bound to tell all that it might be desirable to know, but only to be accurate in what he does tell. on such terms, there is perhaps no very reprehensible audacity in undertaking the history of a voyage; and he smiles to find himself, so simply and with so little labor, acquiring a title to be enrolled among the authors of books! april , . list of contents chap. i. departure--mother carey's chickens--the gulf stream--rapid progress--the french admiral's cook--nautical musicians--the sick man--the burial at sea--arrival at the canaries--santa cruz--love and crime--island of grand canary--troglodytes near las palmas. chap. ii. nelson's defeat at santa cruz--the mantilla--arrival at porto grande--poverty of the inhabitants--portuguese exiles at the cape de verds--city of porto praya--author's submersion--green turtle--rainy season--anchor at cape mesurado. chap. iii. visit of governor roberts, &c.--arrival at cape palmas--american missionaries--prosperity of the catholic mission--king freeman, and his royal robe--customs of the kroo-people--condition of native women. chap. iv. return to monrovia--sail for porto praya--the union hotel--reminiscences of famine at the cape de verds--frolics of whalemen--visit to the island of antonio--a dance--fertility of the island--a yankee clockmaker--a mountain ride--city of poverson--point de sol--kindness of the women--the handsome commandant--a portuguese dinner. chap. v. arrival of the macedonian--return to the coast of africa--emigrants to liberia--tornadoes--maryland in liberia--nature of its government--perils of the bar--mr. russwurm--the grebo tribe--manner of disposing of their dead. chap. vi. settlement of sinoe--account of a murder by the natives--arrival at monrovia--appearance of the town--temperance--law-suits and pleadings--expedition up the st. paul's river--remarks on the cultivation of sugar--prospects of the coffee-culture in liberia--desultory observations on agriculture. chap. vii high character of governor roberts--suspected slaver--dinner on shore--facts and remarks relative to the slave-trade--british philanthropy--original cost of a slave--anchor at sinoe--peculiarities and distinctive characteristics of the fishmen and bushmen--the king of appollonia--religion and morality among the natives--influence of the women. chap. viii. palaver at sinoe--ejectment of a horde of fishmen--palaver at settra kroo--mrs. sawyer--objections to the marriage of missionaries--a centipede--arrival at cape palmas--rescue of the sassy-wood drinker--hostilities between the natives and colonists. chap. ix. palaver with king freeman--remarks on the influence of missionaries--palaver at rock-boukir--narrative of captain farwell's murder--scene of embarkation through the surf--sail for little berebee. chap. x. palaver at little berebee--death of the interpreter and king ben cracko and burning of the town--battle with the natives, and conflagration of several towns--turkey buzzards--a love-letter--moral reflections--treaty of grand berebee--prince jumbo and his father--native system of expresses--curiosity of the natives. chap. xi. madeira--aspect of the island--annual races--"hail columbia!"--ladies, cavaliers, and peasants--dissertation upon wines--the clerks of funchal--decay of the wine-trade--cultivation of pine-trees--a night in the streets--beautiful church--a sunday-evening party--currency of madeira. chap. xii. passage back to liberia--coffee plantations--dinner on shore--character of colonel hicks--shells and sentiment--visit to the council-chamber--the new-georgia representative--a slave-ship--expedition up the st. paul's--sugar manufactory--maumee's beautiful grand-daughter--the sleepy disease--the mangrove-tree. chap. xiii. the theatre--tribute to governor buchanan--arrival at settra kroo--jack purser--the mission school--cleanliness of the natives--uses of the palm-tree--native money--mrs. sawyer--influence of her character on the natives--characteristics of english merchant-captains--trade of england with the african coast. chap. xiv. american trade--mode of advertising, and of making sales--standard of commercial integrity--dealings with slave-traders--trade with the natives--king's "dash"--native commission-merchants--the gold trade--the ivory trade--the "round trade"--respectability of american merchant-captains--trade with the american squadron. chap. xv. jack purser's wife--fever on board--arrival at cape palmas--strange figure and equipage of a missionary--king george of grand bassam--intercourse with the natives--tahon--grand drewin--st. andrew's--picaninny lahoo--natives attacked by the french--visit to king peter--sketches of scenery and people at cape lahon. chap. xvi. visit from two english trading-captains--the invisible king of jack-a-jack--human sacrifices--french fortresses at grand bassam, at assinoe, and other points--objections to the locality of liberia--encroachments on the limits of that colony--arrival in axim--sketches of that settlement--dixcove--civilized natives--an alligator. chap. xvii. dutch settlement at el mina--appearance of the town--cape coast castle--burial-place of l. e. l.--an english dinner--festivity on shipboard--british, dutch, and danish accra--native wives of europeans--a royal princess--an armadillo--sail for st. thomas--aspect of the island. chap. xviii. excursion to st. anne de chaves--mode of drying coffee--black priests--madam domingo's hotel--catering for the mess--man swallowed by a shark--letters from home--fashionable equipage--arrival at the gaboon--king glass and louis philippe--mr. griswold--mr. and mrs. wilson--character of the gaboon people--symptoms of illness. chap. xix. recovery from fever--projected independence of liberia--remarks on climate and health--peril from breakers--african arts--departure for the cape de verds--man overboard. chap. xx. glimpses of the bottom of the sea--the gar-fish--the booby and the mullet--improvement of liberia--its prospects--higher social position of its inhabitants--intercourse between the white and colored. races--a night on shore--farewell to liberia--reminiscence of robinson crusoe. chap. xxi. sierra leone--sources of its population--appearance of the town and surrounding country--religious ceremonies of the mandingoes--treatment of liberated slaves--police of sierra leone--agencies for emigration to the west indies--colored refugees from the united states--unhealthiness of sierra leone--dr. fergusson--splendid church--melancholy fate of a queen's chaplain--currency--probable ruin of the colony. chap. xxii. failure of the american squadron to capture slave-vessels--causes of that failure--high character of the commodore and commanders--similar ill-success of the french squadron--success of the english, and why--results effected by the american squadron. journal of an african cruiser. chapter i. departure--mother carey's chickens--the gulf stream--rapid progress--the french admiral's cook--nautical musicians--the sick man--the burial at sea--arrival at the canaries--santa cruz--love and crime--island of grand canary--troglodytes near las palmas. _june_ , .--towed by the steamer hercules, we go down the harbor of new york, at o'clock a.m. it is the fourth time the ship has moved, since she was launched from the navy yard at portsmouth. her first experience of the ocean was a rough one; she was caught in a wintry gale from the north-east, dismasted, and towed back into portsmouth harbor, within three days after her departure. the second move brought us to new york; the third, from the navy yard into the north river; and the fourth will probably bring us to an anchorage off sandy hook. after a hard winter of four months, in new hampshire, we go to broil on the coast of africa, with ice enough in our blood to keep us comfortably cool for six months at least. at a.m. the steamer cast off, and we anchored inside of sandy hook; at meridian, hoisted the broad pennant of commodore perry, and saluted it with thirteen guns. at p.m. the ship gets under way, and with a good breeze, stands out to sea. our parting letters are confided to the pilot. that weather-beaten veteran gives you a cordial shake with his broad, hard hand, wishes you a prosperous cruise, and goes over the side. his life is full of greetings and farewells; the grasp of his hand assures the returning mariner that his weary voyage is over; and when the swift pilot boat hauls her wind, and leaves you to go on your course alone, you feel that the last connecting link with home is broken. on our ship's deck, there were perhaps some heart-aches, but no whimpering. few strain their eyes to catch parting glimpses of the receding highlands; it is only the green ones who do that. the old salt seeks more substantial solace in his dinner. it is matter of speculation, moreover, whether much of the misery of parting does not, with those unaccustomed to the sea, originate in the disturbed state of their stomachs. .--we are in the gulf-stream. the temperature of the water is ten degrees above that of the air. though the ship is deep, being filled with stores, and therefore sailing heavily, we are yet taken along eleven knots by the wind, and two or three more by the current. swiftly as we fly, however, we are not quite alone upon the waters. mother carey's chickens follow us continually, dipping into the white foam of our track, to seize the food which our keel turns up for them out of the ocean depths. mysterious is the way of this little wanderer over the sea. it is never seen on land; and naturalists have yet to discover where it reposes, and where it hatches its young; unless we adopt the idea of the poets, that it builds its nest upon the turbulent bosom of the deep. it is a sort of nautical sister of the fabled bird of paradise, which was footless, and never alighted out of the air. hundreds of miles from shore, in sunshine and in tempest, you may see the stormy petrel. among the unsolvable riddles which nature propounds to mankind, we may reckon the question, who is mother carey, and where does she rear her chickens? .--we are out of the gulf-stream, and the ship is now rolling somewhat less tumultuously than heretofore. for four days, we have been blest with almost too fair a wind. a strong breeze, right aft, has been taking us more than two hundred and forty miles a day on our course. but the incessant and uneasy motion of the ship deprives us of any steady comfort. in spite of all precautions, tables, chairs, and books, have tumbled about in utter confusion, and the monotony is enlivened by the breaking of bottles and crash of crockery. as some consolation, our log book shows that we have made more than half of a thousand miles, within the last forty-eight hours. land travelling, with all the advantages of railroads, can hardly compete with the continual diligence of a ship before a prosperous breeze. .--spoke an american brig from liverpool, bound for new york. though the boat was called away, and our letters were ready, it was all at once determined not to board her; and, after asking the captain to report us, we stood on our course again. the newspapers will tell our friends something of our whereabouts; or, at least, that on a certain day, we were encountered at a certain point upon the sea. .--wind still fair, and weather always fine. we have not tacked ship once since leaving sandy hook, and are almost ready to quarrel with the continual fair wind. there is nothing else to find fault with, except the performances of our french cook in the wardroom, who came on board just before we left new york, and made us believe that we had obtained a treasure. he told us that he had cooked for a french admiral. we swore him to secrecy on that point, lest the commodore should be disposed to engage the services of so distinguished an artist for his own table. but our self-congratulations were not of long continuance. the sugared omelet passed with slight remark. the beefsteak smothered in onions was merely prohibited in future. but when, on the second day, the potatoes were served with mashed lemon-peel, the general discontent burst forth; and we scolded till we laughed again at the dilemma in which we found ourselves. next to being without food, is the calamity of being subjected, in the middle of the atlantic, to the diabolical arts of the french admiral's cook. at sea, the arrangements of the table are of far more importance than on shore. there are so few incidents, that one's dinner becomes, what dr. johnson affirmed it always to be, the affair of which a man thinks oftenest in the course of the day. .--all day, the wind has been ahead, and very light. this evening, a dead calm is upon the sea; but the sky is cloudless, and the air pure and soft. all the well are enjoying the fine weather. the commodore and captain walk the poop-deck; the other officers, except the lieutenant and young gentlemen of the watch, are smoking on the forecastle, or promenading the quarter-deck. a dozen steady old salts are rolling along the gangways; and the men are clustered in knots between the guns, talking, laughing, or listening to the yarns of their comrades--an amusement to which sailors are as much addicted as the sultan in the arabian nights. but music is the order of the evening. though a band is not allowed to a ship of our class, there are always good musicians to be found among the reckless and jolly fellows composing a man-of-war's crew. a big landsman from utica, and a dare-devil topman from cape cod, are the leading vocalists; symmes, the ship's cook, plays an excellent violin; and the commodore's steward is not to be surpassed upon the tambourine. a little black fellow, whose sobriquet is othello, manages the castanets, and there is a tolerable flute played by one of the afterguard. the concerts usually commence with sentimental songs, such as "home, sweet home," and the canadian boat song: but the comic always carries off the palm; "jim along josey," "lucy long," "old dan tucker," and a hundred others of the same character, are listened to delightedly by the crowd of men and boys collected round the fore-hatch, and always ready to join in the choruses. thus a sound of mirth floats far and wide over the twilight sea, and would seem to indicate that all goes well among us. but the delicious atmosphere, and the amusements of the ship, bring not joy to all on board. there are sick men swinging uneasily in their hammocks; and one poor fellow, whose fever threatens to terminate fatally, tosses painfully in his cot. his messmates gently bathe his hot brow, and, watching every movement, nurse him as tenderly as a woman. strange, that the rude heart of a sailor should be found to possess such tenderness as we seldom ask or find, in those of our own sex, on land! there, we leave the gentler humanities of life to woman; here, we are compelled to imitate her characteristics, as well as our sterner nature will permit. .--the sick man died last night, and was buried to-day. his history was revealed to no one. where was his home, or whether he has left friends to mourn his death, are alike unknown. dying, he kept his own counsel, and was content to vanish out of life, even as a speck of foam melts back into the ocean. at a.m., for the first time, in a cruise likely to be fatal to many on board, the boatswain piped "all hands to bury the dead!" the sailor's corpse, covered with the union of his country's flag, was placed in the gangway. two hundred and fifty officers and men stood around, uncovered, and reverently listened to the beautiful and solemn burial service, as it was read by one of the officers. the body was committed to the deep, while the ship dashed onward, and had left the grave far behind, even before the last words of the service were uttered. the boatswain "piped down," and all returned to their duties sadly, and with thoughtful countenances. .--at a.m., the island of palma and the peak of teneriffe are in full sight, though the lofty summit of the mountain is one hundred miles distant. .--at a.m., anchored at santa cruz, capital of the island of teneriffe. the health-officer informed us that we must ride out a quarantine of eight days. a fine precaution, considering that we are direct from new york! after breakfast, i went to the mole, to see the consular agent, on duty. while waiting in our boat, we were stared at by thirty or forty loafers (a yankee phrase, but strictly applicable to these foreign vagabonds), of the most wretched kind. some were dressed in coarse shirts and trowsers, and some had only one of these habiliments. none interested me, except a dirty, swarthy boy, with most brilliant black eyes, who lay flat on his stomach, and gazed at us in silence. his elf-like glance sparkles brightly in my memory. one of the seamen in our boat spoke to the persons on shore in spanish. i inquired whether that were his mother-tongue, and learned that he was a native of mahon. on questioning him further, i ascertained that he was concerned in a tragedy of which i had often heard, while on the mediterranean station, two or three years ago. a beautiful girl of sixteen, of highly respectable family, fell in love with a young man, her inferior in social rank, though of reputable standing. the affair was kept secret between them. at length, the lover became jealous, and, one evening, called his mistress out of her father's house, and stabbed her five or six times. she died instantly, and her murderer fled. it was believed in mahon that he was drowned by falling overboard from the vessel in which he escaped. nevertheless, that murderer was the man with whom i was speaking in the boat, now bearing another name, and a common sailor of our ship. he told me his real name; and i heard, afterwards, that, when drunk, he had confessed the murder to one of his messmates. this incident illustrates what i have often thought, that the private history of a man-of-war's crew, if truly told, would be full of high romance, varied with stirring incident, and too often darkened with, deep and deadly crime. many go to sea with the old robinson crusoe spirit, seeking adventure for its own sake; many, to escape the punishment of guilt, which has made them outlaws of the land; some, to drown the memory of slighted love; while others flee from the wreck of their broken fortunes ashore, to hazard another shipwreck on the deep. the jacket of the common sailor often covers a figure that has walked broadway in a fashionable coat. an officer sometimes sees his old school-fellow and playmate taken to the gangway and flogged. many a blackguard on board has been bred in luxury; and many a good seaman has been a slaver and a pirate. it is well for the ship's company, that the sins of individuals do not, as in the days of jonas, stir up tempests that threaten the destruction of the whole. the island of grand canary is one of the most interesting of the group at which we have now arrived. the population of its capital, the city of las palmas, is variously estimated at from nine thousand inhabitants, to twice that number. the streets, however, have none of the bustle and animation that would enliven an american town, of similar size. around the city there is an aspect of great fertility; fields of corn and grain, palm-trees, and vineyards, occupy the valleys among the hills, and extend along the shores, twining a glad green wreath about the circuit of the island. the vines of canary produce a wine which, two or three centuries ago, was held in higher estimation than at present, and is supposed by some to have been the veritable "sack" that so continually moistened the throat of falstaff. the very name of canary is a cheerful one, associated as it is with the idea of bounteous vineyards, and of those little golden birds that make music all over the world. the high hills that surround the city of las palmas are composed of soft stone, the yielding quality of which has caused these cliffs to be converted to a very singular purpose. the poorer people, who can find no shelter above ground, burrow into the sides of the hill, and thus form caves for permanent habitation, where they dwell like swallows in a sand-bank. judging from the number of these excavations, the mouths of which appear on the hill-sides, there cannot be less than a thousand persons living in the manner here described. not only the destitute inhabitants of grand canary, but vagabonds from teneriffe and the other islands, creep thus into the heart of the rock; and children play about the entrances of the caverns as merrily as at a cottage-door: while, in the gloom of the interior, you catch a glimpse of household furniture, and women engaged in domestic avocations. it is like discovering a world within the world. chapter ii. nelson's defeat at santa cruz--the mantilla--arrival at porto grande--poverty of the inhabitants--portuguese exiles at the cape de verds--city of porto prayo--author's submersion--green turtle--rainy season--anchor at cape mesurado. _july_ .--ashore at santa cruz. the population of the city is reckoned at six or eight thousand. the streets are clean, and the houses built in the spanish fashion. camels are frequent in the streets. the landing at the mole is generally bad, as nelson found to his cost. it is easy to perceive that, even in ordinary times, the landing of a large party, though unopposed, must be a work of considerable difficulty. how much more arduous, then, was the enterprise of the great naval hero, who made his attack in darkness, and in the face of a well-manned battery, which swept away all who gained foot-hold on the shore! the latter obstacle might have been overcome by english valor, under nelson's guidance; but night, and the heavy surf, were the enemies that gave him his first and only defeat. the little fort, under whose guns he was carried by his step-son, after the loss of his arm, derived its chief interest, in my eyes, from that circumstance. the glory of the great admiral sheds a lustre even upon the spot where success deserted him. in the cathedral of santa cruz are to be seen two english flags, which were taken on that occasion, and are still pointed out with pride by the inhabitants. i saw them five years ago, when they hung from the walls, tattered and covered with dust; they are now enclosed in glass cases, to which the stranger's attention is eagerly directed by the boys who swarm around him. the defeat of nelson took place on the anniversary of the patron-saint of santa cruz; a coincidence which has added not a little to the saint's reputation. it was by no means his first warlike exploit; for he is said to have come to the assistance of the inhabitants, and routed the moors, when pressing the city hard, in the olden time. we wandered about the city until evening, and then walked in the plaza. here the ladies and gentlemen of the city promenade for an hour or two, occasionally seating themselves on the stone benches which skirt the square. like other spanish ladies, the lovely brunettes of santa cruz generally wear the mantilla, so much more becoming than the bonnet. there are just enough of bonnets worn by foreigners, and travelled spanish dames, to show what deformities they are, when contrasted with the graceful veil. this head-dress could only be used in a climate like that of teneriffe, where there are no extremes of heat or cold. it is a proverb that there is no winter and no summer here. so equable and moderate is the temperature, that, we were assured, a person might, without inconvenience, wear either thick or thin clothing, all the year round. with such a climate, and with a fertile soil, it would seem that this must be almost a paradise. there is a great obstruction, however, to the welfare of the inhabitants, in the want of water. it rains so seldom that the ground is almost burnt up, and many cattle actually perish from thirst. it is said that no less than thirty thousand persons have emigrated from the island, within three years. the productions of teneriffe, for export, are wine and barilla. of the first, the greater part is sent to england, russia and the united states. about thirty thousand pipes are made annually, of which two thirds are exported. little or no wine is produced on the southern slope of the island. the hills around santa cruz are little more than rugged peaks of naked rock. the scenery is wild and bold, but sterile; and scattered around are stupendous hills of lava, the products of former volcanic eruptions, but which have, for ages, been cold and wave-washed. .--arrived at porto grande, in the island of st. vincent's, one of the cape de verds. the harbor is completely landlocked by the island of st. antonio, which stretches across its mouth. still, there is, at times, a considerable swell. the appearance of the land is barren, desolate, and unpromising in the highest degree; and the town is in keeping with the scenery. eighty or ninety miserable hovels, constructed of small, loose stones, in the manner of our stone-fences, stand in rows, with some pretence of regularity. besides the governor and his aid, there are here five white men, or rather portuguese (for their claim to white blood is not apparent in their complexions), viz. the collector, the american consular agent, a shop-keeper, whose goods are all contained in a couple of trunks, and two private soldiers. we called to see the governor, and were politely received; he offered seats, and did the honors of the place with dignity and affability. his pay is one dollar per diem. he has five soldiers under his command, two of them portuguese, and three native negroes, one of whom has a crooked leg. the people here are wretchedly poor, subsisting chiefly by fishing, and by their precarious gains from ships which anchor in the port. the collector informed me that there had been sixty whale-ships in the harbor, within the past year. the profits accruing from thence, however, are very inadequate to the comfortable support of the inhabitants. the adults are mostly covered with rags, while many of the children are entirely naked; the cats and dogs (whose condition may be taken as no bad test of the degree of bodily comfort in the community) are lean and skeleton-like. as to religion, i saw nothing to remind me of it, except the ruins of an old church. there has been no priest since the death of one who was drowned, a few years ago, near bird island, a large rock, at the mouth of the harbor. at the time of this fatal mishap, the reverend father was on a drunken frolic, in company with some colored women. the cape de verd islands derive their name from the nearest point of the mainland of africa; they are under the dominion of portugal, and, notwithstanding their poverty, furnish a considerable revenue to that country, over and above the expenses of the colonial government. this revenue comes chiefly from the duties levied upon all imported articles, and from the orchilla trade, which is monopolized by the government at home, and produces , dollars per annum. another source of profit is found in the tithes for the support of the church, which, in some, if not all the islands, have been seized by the government (under a pledge for the maintenance of the clergy), and are farmed out annually. these islands supply the portuguese with a place of honorable exile for officers who may be suspected of heresy in politics, and hostility to existing institutions. they are advanced a step in rank, to repay them (and a poor requital it is) for the change from the delicious climate of portugal, and the gaieties of lisbon, to the dreary solitude, the arid soil, and burning and fever-laden air of the cape de verds. it is a melancholy thought, that many an active intellect--many a generous and aspiring spirit--may have been doomed to linger and perish here, chained, as it were, to the rocks, like prometheus, merely for having dreamed of kindling the fire of liberty in their native land. .--we have spent some days at porto praya, the capital of st. jago, the largest of the cape de verd islands; whence we sail to-day. a large part of the population is composed of negroes and mulattoes, whose appearance indicates that they are intemperate, dissolute, and vile. the portuguese residing here are generally but little better; as may be supposed from the fact, that most of those who were not banished from portugal, for political or other offences, came originally to engage in the slave-trade. going ashore to-day, we beached the boat, and a large negro, with a ragged red shirt, waded out and took me on his shoulders. there is no position so absurd, nor in which a man feels himself so utterly helpless, as when thus dependant on the strength and sure-footedness of a fellow-biped. as we left the boat, a heavy "roller" came in. the negro lost his footing, and i my balance, and down we plunged into the surf. my sable friend seemed to consider it a point of duty to hold stoutly by my legs, the inevitable tendency of which manoeuvre was to keep my head under water. having no taste for a watery death, under these peculiar circumstances, i freed myself by a vigorous kick, sprang to my feet, and seizing the negro by the "ambrosial curls," pushed his head in turn under the surf. but seeing the midshipmen and boat's crew laughing, noiselessly but heartily, at my expense, the ludicrousness of the whole affair struck me so forcibly that i joined in their mirth, and waded ashore as fast as possible. an abolitionist, perhaps, might draw a moral from the story, and say that all, who ride on the shoulders of the african race, deserve nothing better than a similar overthrow. sailed from porto praya. the bay of this port is a good one, except in south-east gales, when the anchorage is dangerous. the town, called villa de praya, contains about two thousand inhabitants of every shade, the dark greatly predominating. many vessels from europe and the united states, bound to india, brazil, or africa, find this a convenient place to procure water and fresh provisions, and bring, in return, much money into the city. there are three hundred troops here, nearly all black, and commanded by forty portuguese officers. the men are under severe discipline, are tolerably well dressed, and make a soldierly appearance. it is said that a st. jago soldier formerly wore only a cocked hat, being otherwise in a state of nature; but i cannot pretend to have seen any instance of this extreme scantiness of equipment. .--saw a large green turtle asleep on the surface of the water. one of our boats went alongside of him, and two men attempted to turn him over with boat-hooks. he struggled successfully, however, to keep himself "right side up," and, in a few moments, plunged beneath the surface. once upon his back, he would have been powerless and a prisoner, and we might have hoped for the advantage of his presence at our mess-table. .--at noon, the first rain came. it continued heavy and unremitting, for twenty-four hours, after which there was a glimpse of the blue sky. two startling thunder-claps burst over the ship, at about o'clock, a.m. last night, at , a heavy plunge carried away both our chain bobstays at once, and all hands were turned up in the rain, to secure the bowsprit. the sanitary regulations of the squadron, induced by the commencement of the rainy season, cause considerable mirth and some growling. one rule is, that every man shall protect himself with flannel next his person, and at night shall also wear a cloth-jacket and trowsers. stoves are placed on the berth-deck, to dry the atmosphere below. it is a curious fact, that, in march last, at portsmouth, n. h., with the thermometer at zero, we were deprived of stoves the moment the powder came on board; while now in the month of july, on the coast of africa, sweltering at eighty degrees of fahrenheit, the fires are lighted throughout the ship. .--continual rain for the last three days. all miserable, but getting used to it. .--a clear day, and comfortably cool. wind fair. .--made land, and saw an english brig of war. commander oakes, of the ferret, came on board. .--made cape mount. _august_ .--at , meridian, anchored at cape mesurado, off the town of monrovia. we find at anchor here the u. s. brig porpoise, and a french barque, as well as a small schooner, bearing the liberian flag. this consists of stripes and a cross, and may be regarded as emblematical of the american origin of the colony, and of the christian philanthropy to which it owes its existence. thirty or forty kroomen came alongside. three officers of the porpoise visited us. all are anxious to get back to the united states. they coincide, however, in saying that, with simple precautions, the health of this station is as good as that of any other. they have had only a single case of fever on board; and, in that instance, the patient was a man who ran away, and spent a night ashore. my old acquaintance, captain cooper, came on board, and is to be employed as pilot. chapter iii. visit of governor roberts, &c.--arrival at cape palmas--american missionaries--prosperity of the catholic mission--king freeman, and his royal robe--customs of the kroo-people--condition of native women. _august_ .--we were visited by governor roberts, doctor day, and general lewis, the latter being colonial secretary, and military chief of the settlement. they looked well, and welcomed me back to liberia with the cordiality of old friendship. the governor was received by the commodore, captain, and officers, and saluted with eleven guns. he and his suite dined in the cabin, and some of the officers of the porpoise in the ward-room. in the evening, we brought out all our forces for the amusement of our distinguished guests. first, the negro band sang "old dan tucker," "jim along josey," and other ditties of the same class, accompanied by violin and tambourine. then othello played monkey, and gave a series of recitations. the french cook sang with great spirit and skill. the entertainments of the evening, as the theatrical bills expressed it, concluded with ma normandie and other beautiful songs and airs well executed by the french cook, accompanied by symmes on the violin, and a landsman on the flute. .--sailed for cape palmas, in company with the porpoise. .--anchored at cape palmas. we were boarded by kroo-men, in eight or ten canoes. while the thermometer stood at or degrees, these naked boatmen were shivering, and seemed absolutely to suffer with cold; and such is the effect of the climate upon our own physical systems, that we find woollen garments comfortable at the same temperature. visited and lunched with governor rasswurm. called on mr. james, a colored missionary, now occupying the house of mr. wilson, who has lately removed to gaboon river. mr. james presented us with some ebony, and a few grebo books. he informed us that the fever had visited him more or less severely, as often as once in four weeks during seven years. this may truly be called a feverish life! he is about to remove to gaboon. the catholic mission seems to have driven the presbyterian from the ground. we called on mr. kelly, a catholic priest from baltimore, and the only white man of the mission at present in africa. preparations, however, have already been made for twenty more, principally french, whose arrival is expected within a year, and who will establish themselves at different points along the coast. mr. kelly is now finishing a very commodious house, on a scale of some magnitude, with piazzas around the whole. there is evidently no lack of money. the funds for the support of the catholic mission are derived principally through lyons, in france; and the enterprise is said to be under the patronage of the king. the abundant pecuniary means which the priests have at command, and the imposing and attractive ceremonies of their mode of worship--so well fitted to produce an effect on uncultivated natures, where appeals either to the intellect or the heart would be thrown away--are among the chief causes of their success. it is said, too, and perhaps with truth, that as many converts are made, among the natives, by presents, as by persuasion. but no small degree of the prosperity of the mission must be attributed to the superior shrewdness and ability of the persons engaged in it--to their skilful adaptation of their precepts and modes of instruction to the people with whom they have to deal, and to their employment of the maxims of worldly policy in aid of their religious views. these qualities and rules of conduct have characterized the catholic missionaries in all ages, in all parts of the world, and in their dealings with every variety of the human race; and their success has everywhere been commensurate with the superiority, in a merely temporal point of view, of the system on which they acted. before returning on board, we called on king freeman, who received us, seated on a chair which was placed in front of his house. his majesty's royal robe was no other than an old uniform frock, which i had given him three years ago. we accepted the chairs which he offered us, and held a palaver, while some twenty of his subjects stood respectfully around. he remembered my former visit to the colony, and appeared very glad to see me again. his town was nearly deserted, the people having gone out to gather rice. about the royal residence, and in the vicinity, i saw thirty or forty cattle, most of them young, and all remarkably small. it is said, and i believe it to be a fact, that cattle, and even fowls, when brought from the interior, take the coast-fever, and often perish with it. certain it is that they do not flourish. .--king freeman came on board, dressed in his uniform frock, with two epaulettes, a redcap, and checked trowsers. he received some powder and bread from the commodore, and some trifles from the ward-room. .--joe davis brought his son on board to "learn sense." in pursuit of this laudable object, the young man is to make a cruise with us. the father particularly requested that his son might be flogged, saying, "spose you lick him, you gib him sense!" on such a system, a man-of-war is certainly no bad school of improvement. .--a delightful day, clear sky, and cool breeze. we sailed from cape palmas yesterday, steering up the coast. i have been conversing with young ben johnson, one of our kroomen, on the conjugal and other customs of his countrymen. these constitute quite a curious object of research. the kroomen are indispensable in carrying on the commerce and maritime business of the african coast. when a kroo-boat comes alongside, you may buy the canoe, hire the men at a moment's warning, and retain them in your service for months. they expend no time nor trouble in providing their equipment, since it consists merely of a straw hat and a piece of white or colored cotton girded about their loins. in their canoes, they deposit these girdles in the crowns of their hats; nor is it unusual, when a shower threatens them on shore, to see them place this sole garment in the same convenient receptacle, and then make for shelter. when rowing a boat, or paddling a canoe, it is their custom to sing; and, as the music goes on, they seem to become invigorated, applying their strength cheerfully, and with limbs as unwearied as their voices. one of their number leads in recitative, and the whole company respond in the chorus. the subject of the song is a recital of the exploits of the men, their employments, their intended movements, the news of the coast, and the character of their employers. it is usual, in these extemporary strains, for the kroomen attached to a man-of-war to taunt, with good-humored satire, their friends who are more laboriously employed in merchant vessels, and not so well fed and paid. their object in leaving home, and entering into the service of navigators, is generally to obtain the means of purchasing wives, the number of whom constitutes a man's importance. the sons of "gentlemen" (for there is such a distinction of rank among them) never labor at home, but do not hesitate to go away, for a year or two, and earn something to take to their families. on the return of these wanderers--not like the prodigal son, but bringing wealth to their kindred--great rejoicings are instituted. a bullock is killed by the head of the family, guns are fired, and two or three days are spent in the performance of various plays and dances. the "boy" gives all his earnings to his father, and places himself again under the parental authority. the krooman of maturer age, on his return from an expedition of this kind, buys a wife, or perhaps more than one, and distributes the rest of his accumulated gains among his relatives. in a week, he has nothing left but his wives and his house. age is more respected by the africans than by any other people. even if the son be forty years old, he seldom seeks to emancipate himself from the paternal government. if a young man falls in love, he, in the first place, consults his father. the latter makes propositions to the damsel's father, who, if his daughter agree to the match, announces the terms of purchase. the price varies in different places, and is also influenced by other circumstances, such as the respectability and power of the family, and the beauty and behavior of the girl. the arrangements here described are often made when the girl is only five or six years of age, in which case she remains with her friends until womanhood, and then goes to the house of her bridegroom. meantime, her family receive the stipulated price, and are responsible for her good behavior. should she prove faithless, and run away, her purchase-money must be refunded by her friends, who, in their turn, have a claim upon the family of him who seduces or harbors her. if prompt satisfaction be not made (which, however, is generally the case), there will be a "big palaver," and a much heavier expense for damages and costs. if, after the commencement of married life, the husband is displeased with his wife's conduct, he complains to her father, who either takes her back, and repays the dowry, or more frequently advises that she be flogged. in the latter alternative, she is tied, starved, and severely beaten; a mode of conjugal discipline which generally produces the desired effect. should the wife be suspected of infidelity, the husband may charge her with it, and demand that she drink the poisonous decoction of sassy-wood, which is used as the test of guilt or innocence, in all cases that are considered too uncertain for human judgment. if her stomach free itself from the fatal draught by vomiting, she is declared innocent, and is taken back by her family without repayment of the dower. on the other hand, if the poison begin to take effect, she is pronounced guilty; an emetic is administered in the shape of common soap; and her husband may, at his option, either send her home, or cut off her nose and ears. there is one sad discrepancy in the moral system of these people, as regards the virtue of the women. no disgrace is imputed to the wife who admits the immoral advances of a white man, provided it be done with the knowledge and consent of her husband. the latter, in whose eyes the white man is one of a distinct and superior order of beings, usually considers himself honored by an affair of this nature, and makes it likewise a matter of profit. all proposals, in view of such a connection, must pass through the husband; nor, it is affirmed, is there any hazard of wounding his delicacy, or awakening his resentment, whatever be his rank and respectability. the violated wife returns to the domestic roof with undiminished honor, and confines herself as rigidly within the limits of her nuptial vow, as if this singular suspension of it had never taken place. in spite of the degradation indicated by the above customs, the kroo-women are rather superior to other native females, and seem to occupy a higher social position. the wife first married holds the purse, directs the household affairs, and rules the other women, who labor diligently for the benefit of their common husband and master. their toil constitutes his wealth. it is usual for a man to live two, three, or four days, with each of his wives in turn. as old age advances, he loses the control of his female household, most of the members of which run away, unless he is wise enough to dispose of them (as usage permits) to his more youthful relatives. as a krooman of sixty or seventy often has wives in their teens, it is not to be wondered at that they should occasionally show a disposition to rove. chapter iv. return to monrovia--sail for porto praya--the union hotel--reminiscences of famine at the cape de verds--frolics of whalemen--visit to the island of st. antonio--a dance--fertility of the island--a yankee clock-maker--a mountain ride--city of poverson--point de sol--kindness of the women--the handsome commandant--a portuguese dinner. _august_ .--passed near sinoe, a colonial settlement, but did not show our colors. an english merchant brig was at anchor. our pilot observed, that this settlement was not in a flourishing condition, because it received no great "_resistance_" from the colonization society. of course, he meant to say, "_assistance_;" but there was an unintentional philosophy in the remark. many plants thrive best in adversity. anchored at the river sesters, and sent a boat ashore. two canoes paddled alongside, and their head-men came on board. one was a beautifully formed man, and walked the deck with a picturesque dignity of aspect and motion. he had more the movement of an indian, than any negro i ever saw. two men were left in each boat, to keep her alongside, and wait the movements of their master. they kneel in the boat, and sit on their heels. when a biscuit is thrown to them, they put it on their thighs, and thence eat it at their leisure. .--ashore at monrovia. the buildings look dilapidated, and the wooden walls are in a state of decay. houses of stone are coming into vogue. there is a large stone court-house, intended likewise for a legislative hall. what most interested me, was an african pony, a beautiful animal, snow white, with a head as black as ebony. i also saw five men chained together, by the neck; three colonists and two natives, with an overseer superintending them. they had been splitting stone for government. a gun from the ship gave the signal for our return. going on board, we got under way, and sailed for porto praya. .--for four days, we have had much rain; and i have seldom visited the deck, except when duty called me. fortunately, governor roberts had lent me the report of the committee of parliament, on the western coast of africa, the perusal of which has afforded me both pleasant and profitable occupation. it is an excellent work, full of facts, from men who have spent years on the coast. .--wind still favorable. the day is sunny, and all are on deck to enjoy the air. damp clothes hang in the rigging to-day, and mouldy boots and shoes fill the boats. .--we find ourselves again off the harbor of porto praya. i landed in quest of news, and heard of the death of mr. legare, and the loss of the store-ship, at this port. all hands were saved, but with the sacrifice of several thousand dollars' worth of property, besides the vessel. on approaching the shore, three flags are observed to be flying in the town. one is the consular flag of our own nation; another is the banner of portugal; and the third, being blue, white, and blue, is apt to puzzle a stranger, until he reads union hotel, in letters a foot long. when last at porto praya, a few friends and myself took some slight refreshment at the hotel, and were charged so exorbitantly, that we forswore all visits to the house in future. to-day, the keeper stopt me in the street, and begged the favor of our patronage. on my representing the enormity of his former conduct, he declared that it was all a mistake; that he was the master of the hotel, and was unfortunately absent at the time. i was pleased with this effrontery, having paid the exorbitant charge into his own hands, not a month before. it is delightful, in these remote, desolate, and semi-barbarous regions, to meet with characteristics that remind us of a more polished and civilized land. the streets are hot and deserted, and the town more than ordinarily dull, as most of the inhabitants are out planting. the court has gone to buonavista, on account of the unhealthiness of porta praya, at this season of the year. a few dozen scrubby trees have been planted in the large square, but, though protected by palings and barrels, have not reached the height of two feet. in the centre stands a marble monument, possibly intended for a fountain, but wholly destitute of water. .--the boat went ashore again, and brought off the consul, and some stores. we then made sail, passing to the windward of all the islands, and reached our former anchorage at porto grande. .--there are one barque and three brigs, all american whalers, in the harbor of porto grande. they have been out from three to six months, and are here for water, bad though it be, and fresh provisions. their inducements to visit this port, are the goodness of the harbor, and the smallness of the port charges. no consular fee has been paid until now, when, an agent being appointed, each vessel pays him a perquisite of four dollars. this group of islands is chiefly interesting to americans, as being the resort of our whale-ships, to refit and obtain supplies, and of other vessels trading to the coast of africa. little was generally known of them, however, in america, until , when a long-continued drought parched up the fields, destroyed the crops, and reduced the whole population to the verge of death, by famine. not less than ten thousand did actually perish of hunger; and the remainder were saved only by the timely, prompt and bountiful supplies, sent out from every part of the united states. i well remember the thrill of compassion that pervaded the community at home, on hearing that multitudes were starving in the cape de verd islands. without pausing to inquire who they were, or whether entitled to our assistance, by any other than the all-powerful claim of wretchedness, the americans sent vessel after vessel, laden with food, which was gratuitously distributed to the poor. the supplies were liberal and unremitted, until the rains returned, and gave the usual crops to the cultivators. twelve years have passed since that dismal famine; but the memory of the aid extended by americans has not yet faded, nor seems likely to fade, from the minds of those who were succored in their need. i have heard men, who were then saved from starvation, speak strongly and feelingly on the subject, with quivering lip and faltering voice. women, likewise, with streaming eyes, to this day, invoke blessings on the foreign land that fed their children, when there was no other earthly help. england, though nearer, and in more intimate connection with these islands, sent not a mouthful of food; and portugal, the mother country, shipped only one or two small cargoes to be sold; while america fed the starving thousands, gratuitously, for months. our consul at porto praya, mr. gardner, after making a strong and successful appeal to the sympathies of his own countrymen, distributed his own stores to the inhabitants, until he was well-nigh beggared. he enjoys the only reward he sought, in the approval of his conscience, as well as the gratitude of the community; and america, too, may claim more true glory from this instance of general benevolence, pervading the country from one end to the other, than from any victory in our annals. .--ashore again. an ox for our ship was driven in from the mountains by three or four horsemen and as many dogs, who chased him till he took refuge in the water. a boat now put off, and soon overtaking the tired animal, he was tied securely. when towed ashore, one rope was fastened round his horns, and another to his fore-foot, each held by a negro, while a third took a strong gripe of his tail. in this manner, they led and drove him along, the fellow behind occasionally biting the beast's tail, to quicken his motions; until at length the poor creature was made fast to an anchor on the beach, there to await the butcher. there is here a miserable church, but no priest. passing the edifice to-day, i saw seven or eight women at their devotions. instead of kneeling, they were seated, with their chins resting on their knees, on the shady side of the church. .--the crews of the whale-ships, when ashore, occasionally give no little trouble to the colonial police. this evening, one of their sailors came up to us, quite intoxicated, and bleeding from a hurt in his head. he was bent upon vengeance for his wound, but puzzled how to get it; inasmuch as a female hand had done the mischief, by cutting his head open with a bottle. his chivalry would not allow him to strike a woman; nor could he find any man who would acknowledge himself her relative. in this dilemma, he was raving through the little village, accompanied by several of his brother whale-men, mostly drunk, and ready for a row. the portuguese officer on duty called out the guard, consisting of two negroes with fixed bayonets, and caused them to march back and forth in the street. fifty paces in the village would bring them to the country; when the detachment came to the right about, and retraced its steps. these two negroes formed precisely two-fifths of the regular military force at porto grande; but, besides this formidable host, there are some thirty officers and soldiers of the national guard, comprising all the negro population able to bear clubs. the women here have a peculiar mode of carrying children, when two or three years old. the child sits astride of the mother's left hip, clinging with hands and feet, and partially supported by her left arm. the little personage being in a state of total nudity, and of course very slippery, this is doubtless the most convenient method that could be adopted. the gait of the women is remarkably free and unembarrassed. with no constraint of stays or corsets, and often innocent of any covering, the shoulders have full play, and the arms swing more than i have ever seen those of men, in our own country. their robes are neither too abundant, nor too tight, to prevent the exhibition of a very martial stride. the scanty clothing worn here is owing partly, but not entirely, to the warmth of the climate. another cogent reason is the poverty of the inhabitants; so, at least, i infer from the continual petitions for clothes, and from remarks like the following, made to me by a mulatto woman:--"you very good man, you got plenty clothes, plenty shirt." _september_ .--the cornelia, of new bedford, came in and anchored. she has been out fifteen months, and has only barrels of oil. .--left the ship in the launch on an expedition to the neighboring island of st. antonio; being despatched by the commodore to procure information as to the facilities for anchoring ships, and obtaining water and refreshments. our boat was sloop-rigged, and carried three officers, a passenger, and ten men. at a.m. we "sheeted home," and stood out of the harbor with a fair breeze, and all canvass spread: but, within an hour, the wind freshened to a gale, and compelled us to take in everything but a close reefed mainsail. the sea being rough, and the weather squally, our boat took in more water than was either agreeable or safe, until we somewhat improved matters by constructing a temporary forecastle of tarpaulins. finding it impossible, however, to contend against wind and current, we bore up for an anchorage called santa cruz. this was formerly a notorious haunt for pirates; but no vestige of a settlement remains, save the ruins of an old stone house, which may probably have been the theatre of wild and bloody incidents, in by-gone years. the serrated hills are grey and barren, and the surrounding country shows no verdure. anchoring here, we waited several hours for the wind to moderate, and tried to get such sleep as might perchance be caught in an unsteady boat. by great diligence in working against wind and current, we succeeded in reaching genella at o'clock in the evening of the second day. our mulatto pilot, manuel quatrine, whistled shrilly through his fingers; and, after a brief delay, the response of a similar whistle reached our ears from shore. a conversation was sustained for some moments, by means of shouts to-and-fro in portuguese; a man then swam off to reconnoitre; and, on his return, the people launched a canoe and carried us ashore, weary enough of thirty-six hours' confinement in an open boat. we took up our quarters in the house of a decent negro, who seemed to be the head man of the village, and, after eating such a supper as the place could supply, sallied out to give the women an opportunity of preparing our beds. meanwhile, the pilot had not been idle. though a married man, and the father of six children, he was a gay lothario, and a great favorite with the sex; he could sing, dance, and touch the guitar with infinite spirit, and tolerable skill. being well known in the village, it is not surprising that the arrival of so accomplished a personage should have disturbed the slumbers of the inhabitants. at ten o'clock, a dance was arranged before the door of one of the huts. the dark-skinned maidens, requiring but little time to put on their ball-costume, came dropping in, until, before midnight, there were thirty or forty dancers on foot. the figures were compounded of the contra-dance and reel, with some remarkable touches of the mandingo balance. the music proceeded from one or two guitars, which, however, were drowned a great part of the time, by the singing of the girls and the clapping of each individual pair of hands in the whole party. a calabash of sour wine, munificently bestowed by a spectator, increased the fun, and it continued to wax higher and more furious, as the night wore away. our little pilot was, throughout, the leader of the frolic, and acquitted himself admirably. his nether garments having received serious detriment in the voyage, he borrowed a large heavy pea-jacket, to conceal the rents, and in this garb danced for hours with the best, in a sultry night. long before the festivity was over, my companions and myself stretched ourselves on a wide bag of straw, and fell asleep, lulled by the screaming of the dancers. the next morning we were early on foot, and looked around us with no small interest. the village is situated at the point where a valley opens upon the shore. the sides of this vale are steep, and, in many places, high, perpendicular, and rocky. every foot of earth is cultivated; and where the natural inclination of the hill is too great to admit of tillage, stone walls are built to sustain terraces, which rise one over another like giant steps to the mountain-tops. it was the beginning of harvest, and the little valley presented an appearance of great fertility. corn, bananas, figs, guavas, grapes, oranges, sugar-cane, cocoa-nuts, and many other fruits and vegetables, are raised in abundance. the annual vintage in this and a neighboring valley, appertaining to the same parish, amounts to about seventy-five pipes of wine. it is sour and unpalatable, not unlike hard-cider and water. when a cultivator first tries his wine, it is a custom of the island for him to send notice to all his acquaintances, who invariably come in great force, each bringing a piece of salt-fish to keep his thirst alive. not unfrequently, the whole produce of the season is exhausted by a single carouse. the people are all negroes and mulattoes. male and female, they are very expert swimmers, and are often in the habit of swimming out to sea, with a basket or notched stick to hold their fish; and thus they angle for hours, resting motionless on the waves, unless attacked by a shark. in this latter predicament, they turn upon their backs, and kick and splash until the sea-monster be frightened away. they appear to be a genial and pleasant-tempered race. as we walked through the village, they saluted us with "blessed be the name of the lord!" whether this expression (a customary courtesy of the islanders) were mere breath, or proceeded out of the depths of the heart, is not for us to judge; but, at all events, heard in so wild and romantic a place, it made a forcible impression on my mind. when we were ready to depart, all the villagers came to the beach, with whatever commodities they were disposed to offer for sale; a man carrying a squealing pig upon his shoulders; women with fruits and fowls; girls with heavy bunches of bananas or bundles of cassada on their heads; and boys, with perhaps a single egg. each had something, and all lingered on the shore until our boat was fairly off. five or six miles further, we landed at paolo, where reside several families who regard themselves as the aristocracy of st. antonio, on the score of being connected with señor martinez, the great man of these islands. their houses are neatly built, and the fields and gardens well cultivated. they received us hospitably, principally because one of our party was a connection of the family. i was delighted with an exhibition of feeling on the part of an old negro servant-woman. she came into the parlor, sat down at the feet of our companion, embraced his knees, and looked up in his face with a countenance full of joy, mingled with respect and confidence. we saw but two ladies at this settlement. one was a matron with nine children; the other a dark brunette, very graceful and pleasing, with the blackest eyes and whitest teeth in the world. she wore a shawl over the right shoulder and under the left arm, arranged in a truly fascinating manner. the poorer classes in the vicinity are nearly all colored, and mostly free. they work for eight or ten cents a day, living principally on fruit and vegetables, and are generally independent, because their few wants are limited to the supply. the richest persons live principally within themselves, and derive their meats, vegetables, fruits, wine, brandy, sugar, coffee, oil, and most other necessaries and luxuries, from their own plantations. one piece of furniture, however, to be seen in several of the houses, was evidently not the manufacture of the island, but an export of yankee-land. it was the wooden clock, in its shining mahogany case, adorned with bright red and yellow pictures of saints and the virgin, to suit the taste of good catholics. it might have been fancied that the renowned sam slick, having glutted all other markets with his wares, had made a voyage to st. antonio. nor did they lack a proper artist to keep the machine in order. we met here a person whom we at first mistook for a native, so identical were his manners and appearance with those of the inhabitants; until, in conversation, we found him to be a yankee, who had run away from a whale-ship, and established himself as a clock and watch-maker. after a good night's rest, another officer and myself left paolo, early, for a mountain ride. the little pilot led the way on a donkey; my friend followed on a mule, and i brought up the rear on horseback. we began to ascend, winding along the rocky path, one by one, there being no room to ride two abreast. the road had been cut with much labor, and, in some places, was hollowed out of the side of the cliff, thus forming a gallery of barely such height and width as to admit the passage of a single horseman, and with a low wall of loose stones between the path and the precipice. at other points, causeways of small stones and earth had been built up, perhaps twenty feet high, along the top of which ran the path. on looking at these places from some projecting point, it made us shudder to think that we had just passed, where the loosening of a single one of those small stones might have carried us down hundreds of feet, to certain destruction. the whole of the way was rude and barren. here and there a few shrubs grew in the crevices of the rocks, or wild flowers, of an aspect strange to our eyes, wasted their beauty in solitude; and the small orchilla weed spread itself moss-like over the face of the cliff. at one remarkable point, the path ran along the side of the precipice, about midway of its height. above, the rock rose frowningly, at least five hundred feet over our heads. below, it fell perpendicularly down to the beach. the roar of the sea did not reach us, at our dizzy height, and the heavy surf-waves, in which no boat could live, seemed to kiss the shore as gently as the ripple of a summer-lake. this was the most elevated point of the road, which thence began to descend; but the downward track was as steep and far more dangerous. at times, the animals actually slid down upon their haunches. in other places, they stept from stone to stone, down steep descents, where the riders were obliged to lie backwards flat upon the cruppers. over all these difficulties, our guide urged his donkey gaily and unconcernedly. as for myself, though i have seen plenty of rough riding, and am as ready as most men to follow, if not to lead, i thought it no shame to dismount more than once. the rolling of a stone, or the parting of stirrup, girth, or crupper, would have involved the safety of one's neck. nor did the very common sight of wooden crosses along the path, indicating sudden death by accident or crime, tend to lessen the sense of insecurity. the frequent casualties among these precipitous paths, together with the healthfulness of the climate, have made it a proverb, that it is a natural death, at st. antonio, to be dashed to pieces on the rocks. but such was not our fate. we at length reached the sea-shore, and rode for a mile along the beach to the city of poverson, before entering which metropolis, it was necessary to cross a space of level, sandy ground, about two hundred yards in extent. here the little pilot suddenly stuck his heels into the sides of his donkey, and dashed onward at a killing pace; while mule and horse followed hard upon his track, to the great admiration of ragamuffins, who had assembled to witness the entrée of the distinguished party. poverson is the capital of the island, and contains about two thousand inhabitants, who, with few exceptions, are people of color. the streets are crooked and narrow, and the houses mean. we called upon the military and civil governors, and, after accepting an invitation to dine with the former, left the place for a further expedition. passing over a shallow river, in which a number of women and girls were washing clothes, we ascended a hill so steep as to oblige us to dismount, and from the summit of which we had a fine view of the rich valley beneath. it is by far the most extensive tract of cultivated land that we have seen in the island, and is improved to its utmost capacity. we thence rode three miles over a path of the same description as before, and arrived at the village and port of point-de-sol. the land about this little town is utterly barren, and the inhabitants are dependent on poverson for food, with the exception of fish. a custom-house, a single store, a church, and some twenty houses of fishermen, comprise all the notable characteristics of the principal seaport of the island. it was a part of our duty to make an examination of the harbor, for which purpose we needed a boat. two were hauled up on the beach; but the smallest would have required the power of a dozen men to launch her;--whereas, the fishermen being absent in their vocation, our party of three, and a big boy at the store, comprised our whole available masculine strength. the aid of woman, however, is seldom sought in vain; nor did it fail us now. old and young, matron and maid, they all sallied forth to lend a hand, and, with such laughing and screaming as is apt to attend feminine efforts, enabled us to launch the boat. in spite of their patois of bad portuguese, we contrived to establish a mutual understanding. a fine, tall girl, with a complexion of deep olive, clear, large eyes, and teeth beautifully white and even, stood by my side; and, like the ancient mariner and his sister's son, we pulled together. she was strong, and, as byron says, "lovely in her strength." this difficulty surmounted, we rowed round the harbor, made our examination, and returned to the beach, where we again received the voluntary assistance of the women, in dragging the boat beyond the reach of the waves. we now adjourned to the store, in order to requite their kindness by a pecuniary offering. each of our fair friends received two large copper coins, together equal to nine cents, and were perfectly satisfied, as well they might be--for it was the price of a day's work. two or three individuals, moreover, "turned double corners," and were paid twice; and it is my private belief that the tall beauty received her two coppers three times over. after a lunch of fried plantains and eggs, we rode back to poverson. on the way, we met several persons of both sexes with burdens on their heads, and noticed that our guide frequently accosted them with a request for a pinch of snuff. with few exceptions, a horn or piece of bone was produced, containing a fine yellow snuff of home-manufacture, which, instead of being taken between the thumb and finger, was poured into the palm of the hand, and thence conveyed to the nose. arriving at the city, we proceeded at once to the house of the commandant, and in a little time were seated at dinner. our host was fitted by nature to adorn a far more brilliant position than that which he occupied, as the petty commander of a few colored soldiers, in a little island of the torrid zone. he was slightly made, but perfectly proportioned, with a face of rare beauty, and an expression at once noble and pleasing. his eyes were large, and full of a dark light; his black hair and moustache were trimmed with a care that showed him not insensible of his personal advantages; as did likewise his braided jacket, fitting so closely as to set off his fine figure to the best effect. his manners were in a high degree polished and graceful. one of the guests, whom he had invited to meet us, understood english; and the conversation was sustained in that language, and in spanish. the dinner was cooked and served in the portuguese style; it went off very pleasantly, and was quite as good as could be expected at the house of a bachelor, in a place so seldom visited by strangers. each of the portuguese gentlemen gave a sentiment, prefaced by a short complimentary speech; and our party, of course, reciprocated in little speeches of the same nature. the commandant did not fail to express the gratitude due from the people of the cape de verd islands to america, for assistance in the hour of need. time did not permit us to remain long at table, and we took leave, highly delighted with our entertainment. mounting again, we rode out of town more quietly than we had entered it. a sergeant was drilling some twenty negro soldiers in marching and wheeling. his orders were given in a quick, loud tone, and enforced by the occasional application of smart blows of a rattan to the shoulders of his men. suspecting that the blows fell thicker because we were witnesses of his discipline, it seemed a point of humanity to hasten forward; especially as the approach of night threatened to make our journey still more perilous than before. after riding about three miles, we met two well-dressed mulatto women on donkeys, accompanied by their cavaliers. of course, we allowed the ladies to pass between us and the rock; a matter of no slight courtesy in such a position, where there was a very uncomfortable hazard of being jostled headlong down the precipice. we escaped, however, and spurring onward through the gloom of night, passed unconsciously over several rough spots where we had dismounted in the morning. the last mile of our mountain-ride was lighted by the moon; and, as we descended the last hill, the guide gave a shrill whistle, to which the boat's crew responded with three cheers for our return. a good night's rest relieved us of our fatigue. the following morning, with a fair breeze and a six hours' sail, we reached our floating-home, and have ever since entertained the mess-table with the "yarn" of our adventures; until now the subject is beginning to be worn thread-bare. but, as the interior of the island of st. antonio is one of the few regions of the earth as yet uncelebrated by voyagers and tourists, i cannot find in my heart to spare the reader a single sentence of the foregoing narrative. chapter v. arrival of the macedonian--return to the coast of africa--emigrants to liberia--tornadoes--maryland in liberia--nature of its government--perils of the bar--mr. russwurm--the grebo tribe--manner of disposing of their dead. _september_ .--weighed anchor, and stood out to sea. at o'clock a.m., made the frigate macedonian. she saluted the broad pennant, and both ships bore up for porto grande, where we anchored, and read the news from home. .--the commodore left the ship, and hoisted his broad pennant on board the macedonian. .--sailed at o'clock p.m., for porto praya. .--anchored at porto praya, where we find the decatur, which arrived yesterday, after a passage of forty-five days from norfolk. .--sailed in the evening for the coast. _october_ .--off cape mount. .--ashore at monrovia. it being sunday, we attended the methodist church. mr. teage, editor of the liberia herald, preached an appropriate and well-written discourse, on occasion of admitting three men and a woman to church-membership. one of the males was a white, who had married a colored woman in america, and came out to the colony with mr. mcdonough's people, some time ago. his wife being dead, he has married another woman of color, and is determined to live and die here. .--dined with the governor. visited the house of a poor colonist, a woman with two children and no husband. she endeavors to support her family by washing. two or three, other women of the neighborhood dropped in. it is said that the proportion of female emigrants to males is as three and a half to one. unless it be expected that these women are to work in the fields, it is difficult to imagine how they are to earn a subsistence. a little chance washing and sewing, not enough to employ one in ten, is all they have to depend upon. the consequence is, that every person, of even moderate means of living, has two or three women to feed and clothe. they do not need their services, but cannot let them starve. this is one of the drawbacks upon colonization. even the able-bodied men are generally unfit for promoting the prosperity of the colony. a very large proportion of them are slaves, just liberated. accustomed to be ruled and taken care of by others, they are no better than mere children, as respects the conduct and economy of life. in america, their clothes, food, medicines, and all other necessaries, have been furnished without a thought on their own part; and when sent to liberia, with high notions of freedom and exemption from labor (ideas which with many are synonymous), they prove totally inadequate to sustain themselves. i perceive, in colonization reports, that the owners of slaves frequently offer to liberate them, on condition of their being sent to liberia; and that the society has contracted debts, and embarrassed itself in various ways, rather than let such offers pass. in my opinion, many of the slaves, thus offered, are of little value to the donors, and of even less to the cause of colonization. better to discriminate carefully in the selection of emigrants, than to send out such numbers of the least eligible class, to become burdens upon the industrious and intelligent, who might otherwise enjoy comfort and independence. many a colonist, at this moment, sacrifices his interest to his humanity, and feels himself kept back in life by the urgent claims of compassion. the society allows to new emigrants provisions for six months. after that period, if unable to take care of themselves, they must either starve, or be supported by the charitable. fifty young or middle-aged men, who had been accustomed to self-guidance in america, would do more to promote the prosperity of the colony, than five hundred such emigrants as are usually sent out. the thievish propensity of many of the poor and indolent colonists is much complained of by the industrious. on this account, more than any other, it is difficult to raise stock. the vice has been acquired in america, and is not forgotten in africa. .--a rainy morning. last night we were all roused from sleep by the sea coming into the starboard air-ports. we of the larboard side laughed at the misfortune of our comrades, and closed our own ports, without taking the precaution to screw them in. half an hour afterwards, a very heavy swell assailed us on the larboard, beat in all the loose ports, and deluged the rooms. i found myself suddenly awakened and cooled by a cataract of water pouring over me. out jumped the larboard sleepers, in dripping night-gear, and shouted lustily for lights, buckets, and swabs; while the starboard gentlemen laughed long and loud, in their turn. .--sailed for the leeward. .--beautiful weather. this afternoon all hands were called to shorten sail, in those earnest, startling tones, which are prompted by the sense of danger alone. every man sprang to his station with the instinctive readiness of disciplined seamen. the idlers were all on deck, and looked about for the cause. had a man fallen overboard? no! nor was there any particular appearance of a squall. but the earnest gaze of the commander and a passenger, towards the shore, drew all eyes in the same direction; and, behold! a smoke was seen rising from the land, which had been mistaken for the cloud that precedes the tornado. it is necessary to prepare for many blows that do not come. in the tornado-seasons (which may be estimated at four or five weeks, about the months of march and november), there are frequent appearances of squalls, sometimes as often as twice or thrice in twenty-four hours. the horizon grows black, with very much the aspect of a thunder-shower in america. generally, the violence of the wind does not equal the apprehensions always entertained. we could have carried royals through nineteen out of twenty of the tornadoes that assailed our ship; but the twentieth might have taken the sticks out of us. the harmless, as well as the heavy tornadoes, have the same black and threatening aspect. they usually blow from the land, although once, while at anchor, we experienced one from seaward. .--anchored at cape palmas. this colony is independent, of liberia proper, and is under the jurisdiction and patronage of the maryland state colonization society. its title is maryland in liberia. the local government is composed of an agent and an assistant agent, both to be appointed by the society at home, for two years; a secretary, to be appointed by the agent annually; and a vice-agent, two counsellors, a register, a sheriff, a treasurer, and a committee on new emigrants, to be chosen by the people. several minor officers are appointed by the agent, who is entrusted with great powers. the judiciary consists of the agent, and a competent number of justices of the peace, who are appointed by him, and two of whom, together with the agent, constitute the supreme court. a single justice has jurisdiction in small criminal cases, and in all civil cases where the claim does not exceed twenty dollars. male colored people, at twenty years of age, are entitled to vote, if they hold land in their own right, or pay a tax of one dollar. every emigrant must sign a pledge to support the constitution, and to refrain from the use of ardent spirits, except in case of sickness. by a provision of the constitution, emigration is never to be prohibited. our boat attempted to land at some rocks, just outside of the port, in order to avoid crossing the bar; but as the tide was low, and the surf troublesome, we found it impracticable. i hate a bar; there is no fair play about it. the long rollers come in from the sea, and, in consequence of the shallowness of the water, seem to pile themselves up so as inevitably to overwhelm you, unless you have skilful rowers, a good helmsman, and a lively boat. at one moment, your keel, perhaps, touches the sand; the next, you are lifted upon a wave and borne swiftly along for many yards, while the men lie on their oars, or only pull an occasional stroke, to keep the boat's head right. now they give way with a will, to escape a white-crested wave that comes trembling and roaring after them; and now again they cease rowing, or back water, awaiting a favorable moment to cross. should you get into a trough of the sea, you stand a very pretty chance to be swamped, and have your boat rolled over and over upon its crew; while, perchance, a hungry shark may help himself to a leg or arm. pulling across this ugly barrier, we landed at the only wharf of which the colony can boast. there is here a stone warehouse, but of no great size. in front of it lay a large log, some thirty feet long, on which twelve or fourteen full grown natives were roosting, precisely like turkeys on a pole. they are accustomed to sit for hours together in this position, resting upon their heels. a girl presented us with a note, informing all whom it might concern, that mrs. ---- would do our washing; but, as the ship's stay was to be short, we turned our attention to the cattle, of which a score or two were feeding in the vicinity. they are small, but, having been acclimated, are sleek and well-conditioned. as i have before observed, it is a well-established fact, that all four-footed emigrants are not less subject to the coast fever than bipeds. horses, cattle, and even fowls, whether imported or brought from the interior to the coast, speedily sicken, and often die. i dined with mr. russwurm, the colonial agent, a man of distinguished ability and of collegiate education. he gave me, some monkey-skins and other curiosities, and favored me with much information respecting the establishment. the mean temperature of the place is eighty degrees of fahrenheit, which is something less than that of monrovia, on account of its being more open to the sea. the colony comprises six hundred and fifty inhabitants, all of whom dwell within four miles of the cape. besides the settlement of harper, situated on the cape itself, there is that of mount tubman (named in honor of mr. t. of georgia), which lies beyond mount vaughan, and three and a half miles from cape palmas. there is no road to the interior of the country, except a native path. the agent, with a party of twenty, recently penetrated about seventy miles into the bush, passing through two tribes, and coming to a third, of large numbers and strength. the king of the latter tribe has a large town, where many manufactures are carried on, such as iron implements and wooden furniture of various kinds. he refused mr. russwurm an escort, alleging that there was war, but sent his son to the coast, to see the _black-white_ people and their improvements. a large native tribe, the grebo, dwells at cape palmas in the midst of the colonists. their conical huts, to the number of some hundreds, present the most interesting part of the scene. opposite the town, upon an uninhabited island at no great distance, the dead are exposed, clad in their best apparel, and furnished with food, cloth, crockery, and other articles. a canoe is placed over the body. this island of the dead is called by a name, which, in the plainest of english, signifies "go-to-hell;" a circumstance that seems to imply very gloomy anticipations as to the fate of their deceased brethren, on the part of these poor grebos. as a badge of mourning, they wear cloth of dark blue, instead of gayer colors. dark blue is universally, along the coast, the hue indicative of mourning. the fishmen, at cape palmas, as well as at most other places on the coast, refuse to sell fish to be eaten on board of vessels, believing that the remains of the dead fish will frighten away the living ones. .--sailed at o'clock a.m., with a good wind, and anchored at sinoe at p.m. chapter vi. settlement of sinoe--account of a murder by the natives--arrival at monrovia--appearance of the town--temperance--law-suits and pleadings--expedition up the st. paul's river--remarks on the cultivation of sugar--prospects of the coffee-culture in liberia--desultory observations on agriculture. _october_ .--at sinoe. mr. morris, the principal man of the settlement, came on board, in order to take passage with us to monrovia. he informs us that there are but seventy-two colonists here at present, but that nearly a hundred are daily expected. such an accession of strength is much needed for the natives in the vicinity are powerful, and not very friendly, and the colony is too weak to chastise them. our appearance has caused them some alarm. this is the place where the mate of an american vessel was harpooned, some months since, by the fishmen. we shall hold a palaver about it, when the commodore joins us. we left sinoe at o'clock, p.m. . mr. morris has been narrating the circumstances of the murder of the american mate, at sinoe, in reference to which we are to "set a palaver." "palaver," by-the-by, is probably a corruption of the portuguese word, "palabra." as used by the natives, it has many significations, among which is that of an open quarrel. to "set a palaver," is to bring it to a final issue, either by talking or fighting. the story of the murder is as follows. a fishman agreed to go down the coast with captain burke, who paid him his wages in advance; on receiving which, the fellow jumped overboard, and escaped. the captain then refused to pay the sums due to two members of the same tribe, unless the first should refund the money. finding the threat insufficient, he endeavored to entice these two natives on board his vessel, by promises of payment, but ineffectually. meanwhile, the mate going ashore with a colonist, his boat was detained by the natives, during the night, but given up the next morning, at the intercession of the inhabitants. the mate returned on board, in a violent rage, and sent a sailor to catch a fishman, on whom to take vengeance. but the man caught a tartar, and was himself taken ashore as prisoner. the mate and cook then went out in a boat, and were attacked by a war-canoe, the men in which harpooned the cook, and stripping the mate naked, threw him overboard. they beat the poor fellow off, as he attempted to seize hold of the canoe, and, after torturing him for some time, at length harpooned him in the back. captain burke, having but one man and two passengers left, made sail, and got away as fast as possible. .--arrived at monrovia, where we find the porpoise, with six native prisoners on board, who were taken at berebee, as being concerned in the murder of captain farwell and his crew, two years ago. to accomplish their capture, the porpoise was disguised as a barque, with only four or five men visible on deck, and these in scotch caps and red shirts, so as to resemble the crew of a merchant-vessel. the first canoe approached, and prince jumbo stepped boldly up the brig's side, but started back into his boat, the moment that he saw the guns and martial equipment on deck. the kroomen of the porpoise, however, jumped into the water and upset the canoe, making prisoners of the four natives whom it contained. six or eight miles further along the coast, the brig being under sail, another canoe came off with two natives, who were likewise secured. the kroomen begged to be allowed to kill the prisoners, as they were of a hostile tribe. .--leaving the ship in one of our boats, pulled by kroomen, we crossed the bar at the mouth of the mesurado, and in ten minutes afterwards, were alongside of the colonial wharf. half-a-dozen young natives and colonists issued from a small house to watch our landing; but their curiosity was less intrusive and annoying, than would have been that of the same number of new-york boys, at the landing of a foreign man-of-war's boat. on our part, we looked around us with the interest which even common-place objects possess for those, whose daily spectacle is nothing more varied than the sea and sky. even the most ordinary shore-scenery becomes captivating, after a week or two on shipboard. two colonists were sawing plank in the shade of the large stone store-house of the colony. ascending the hill, we passed the printing-office of the liberia herald, where two workmen were printing the colonial laws. the publication of the newspaper had been suspended for nearly three months, to enable them to accomplish work of more pressing importance. proceeding onward, we came to the governor's house, and were received with that gentleman's usual courtesy. the house is well furnished, and arranged for a hot climate; it is situated near the highest point of the principal street, and commands from its piazza a view of most of the edifices in monrovia town. the fort is on the highest ground in the village, one hundred feet above the sea; it is of stone, triangular in shape, and has a good deal the appearance of an american pound for cattle, but is substantial, and adequate for its intended purposes. from this point, the street descends in both directions. about fifty houses are in view. first, the government house, opposite to which stand the neat dwellings of judge benedict and doctor day. further on, you perceive the largest house in the village, erected by rev. mr. williams, of the methodist mission. on the right is a one-story brick house, and two or three wooden ones. a large stone edifice, intended for a court-house and legislative hall, has recently been completed. the street itself is wide enough for a spacious pasture, and affords abundance of luxuriant grass, through which run two or three well-trodden foot-paths. apart from the village, on the cape, we discerned the light-house, the base of which is about two hundred feet above the sea. we dined to-day at the new hotel. the dinner was ill-cooked (an unpardonable fault at monrovia, where good cooks, formerly in the service of our southern planters, might be supposed to abound), and not served up in proper style. but there was abundance to eat and drink. though the keeper of the house is a clergyman and a temperance-man, ale, porter, wine, and cherry-brandy, are to be had at fair prices. three years ago, a tavern was kept here in monrovia by a mr. cooper, whose handbill set forth, that "nothing was more repugnant to his feelings than to sell ardent spirits"--but added--"if gentlemen _will_ have them, the following is the price." of course, after such a salvo, mr. cooper pocketed the profits of his liquor-trade with a quiet conscience. he used to tell me that a little brandy was good for the "suggestion;" but i fear that he made, in his own person, too large a demand upon its suggestive properties; for his house is now untenanted and ruinous, and he himself has carried his tender conscience to another settlement. .--went ashore in the second cutter. the kroomen managed her so bunglingly, that, on striking the beach, she swung broadside to the sea. in this position, a wave rolled into her, half-filled the boat, and drenched us from head to foot. apprehending that she would roll over upon us, and break our limbs or backs, we jumped into the water, and waded ashore. while in the village, i visited the court house, to hear the trial of a cause involving an amount of eight hundred dollars. governor roberts acted as judge, and displayed a great deal of dignity in presiding, and much wisdom and good sense in his decision. this is the highest court of the colony. there are no regularly educated lawyers in liberia, devoting themselves exclusively to the profession; but the pleading seems to be done principally by the medical faculty. two doctors were of counsel in the case alluded to, and talked of coke, blackstone, and kent, as learnedly as if it had been the business of their lives to unravel legal mysteries. the pleadings were simple, and the arguments brief, for the judge kept them strictly to the point. an action for slander was afterwards tried, in which the damages were laid at one hundred dollars. one of the medico-jurisconsults opened the cause with an appeal to the feelings, and wrought his own sensibilities to such a pitch as to declare, that, though his client asked only for one hundred dollars, he considered the jury bound in conscience to give him two. the doctor afterwards told me that he had walked eighty miles to act as counsel in this court. a tailor argued stoutly for the defendant, but with little success; his client was fined twenty dollars. on our return, a companion and myself took passage for the ship in a native canoe. these little vessels are scooped out of a log, and are of even less size and capacity than the birch-canoes of our indians, and so light that two men, using each a single hand, may easily carry them from place to place. our weight caused the frail bark to sit so deep in the water, that, before reaching the ship, we underwent another drenching. three changes of linen in one day are altogether too expensive and troublesome. _november_ .--went up the st. paul's river on a pleasure excursion, with the governor, and several men of lesser note. we touched at the public farm, and found only a single man in charge. the sugar-cane was small in size, was ill-weeded, and, to my eye, did not appear flourishing. the land is apparently good and suitable, but labor is deficient, and my impressions were not favorable in regard to the manner of cultivation. the mill was exposed to the atmosphere, and the kettles were full of foul water. we landed likewise at new georgia, a settlement of recaptured africans. there was here a pretty good appearance, both of people and farms. we called also at caldwell, a rich tract of level land, of which a space of about two miles is cultivated by comfortable and happy-looking colonists. a very pleasant dinner was furnished by the governor at what was once a great slave station, and the proprietor of which is still hostile to the colonists, and to both english and americans, for breaking up the trade. we saw several alligators. one of them, about three feet in length, lay on a log, with his mouth wide open, catching flies. from the whole course of my observation, i cannot but feel satisfied that the colonists are better off here than in america. they are more independent, as healthy, and much happier. agriculture will doubtless be their chief employment, but, for years to come, the cultivation of sugar cane cannot be carried to any considerable extent. there are many calls upon the resources of the colonization society and the inhabitants, more pressing, and which promise a readier and greater return. a large capital should be invested in the business, in order to render it profitable. the want of a steam-mill, to grind the cane, has been severely felt. ignorance of the most appropriate soil, and of the most productive kind of cane, and the best methods of planting and grinding it, have likewise contributed to retard the cultivation of sugar. but the grand difficulty is the want of a ready capital, and the high price of labor. the present wages of labor are from sixty to seventy-five cents per day. the natives refuse to work among the canes, on account of the prickly nature of the leaves, and the irritating property of a gum that exudes from them. yet it may be doubted whether the colony will ever make sugar to any important extent, unless some method be found to apply native labor to that purpose. private enterprise is no more successful than the public efforts. a plantation has been commenced at millsburg, and prosecuted with great diligence, but with no auspicious results. sugar has been made, indeed, but at a cost of three times as much, per pound, as would have purchased it. hitherto, the plantations of coffee trees have not succeeded well. coffee, it is true, is sometimes exported from liberia; and doubtless the friends of colonization drink it with great gusto, as an earnest of the progress of their philanthropic work. the cup, however, will be less grateful to their taste, when they learn that nearly all this coffee is procured at the islands of st. thomas and st. prince's, in the bight of benin, and entered as the produce of liberia, _ad captandum_. the same game has been played in england, by entering their coffee as from sierra leone or gambia, to entitle it to the benefit of the lower duties on colonial produce. but the english custom-house officers are now aware of the deception, and the business is abandoned. the mode of forming a coffee-plantation is simply to go into the woods (where the tree abounds), select the wild coffee tree, and transport it into the prepared field. the indigenous coffee-tree of liberia produces fruit of a superior quality, larger and finer flavored, than that of the west indies. but the cultivation, i think, is conducted upon wrong principles. instead of having large plantations, with no other vegetables on the land, let every man intermingle a few coffee trees with the corn, cassada, and other vegetables in his garden or fields. these few trees, having the benefit of the hoeing and manuring bestowed on the other crops, will produce much more abundantly and with less trouble, than by separate culture. in fact, after setting out the trees, there will be no trouble, except that of gathering and preparing the berries for market. in this burning climate, the shade afforded by the tree will be beneficial to most vegetables. the want of success, hitherto, in the cultivation of coffee, has been attributed by some to the custom of transplanting the trees from the forest, instead of raising them from seed. the colonial secretary is now making trial of the latter method. he has several thousand young trees in his nursery, and will soon be able to test the comparative efficiency of the different systems. not improbably, the cultivation of seedlings may be found preferable to that of transplanted trees; but, in my opinion, the great obstacle to success has been the deficiency of care and proper manuring. in order to bear well, trees require to have the ground enriched, and kept free from weeds. failing this, the plant often dies, and never flourishes so well as in its native woods. the inhabitants of liberia have not the means of bestowing the requisite care upon the cultivation of coffee, on an extended scale; and i say boldly, that large plantations, in that region, cannot compete with those of brazil and the west indies, where the plantations are well-stocked, and cultivated by slave-labor. free labor in africa will not soon be so cheap as that of slaves in other countries. even in cuba, the planters can barely feed themselves and their slaves, by the culture of coffee. how, then, can it be made profitable in liberia, where labor commands so high a price, and is often impossible to be procured? as incidental, however, to other branches of agriculture, coffee may be advantageously raised. the best trees are those seen in gardens, where, from ten or twelve, more berries are gathered than from hundreds in a plantation. a single tree, in the garden of colonel hicks, is said to have produced sixteen pounds at a gathering; and i have seen several very fine trees in similar situations. fifty or a hundred trees, well selected, and properly distributed through the fields, would yield several hundred pounds of coffee, which, being gathered and dried by the women and children, would be gratuitous as regards the cost of labor. thus, the coffee culture, in liberia, must be considered far more eligible than that of sugar; inasmuch as the latter requires a large capital and extensive operations, while the former succeeds best on a very moderate scale. judge benedict has probably bestowed more attention on this business, than any other person in liberia. he is a man of excellent sense and information, and has the means to carry out his views, as well as the patriotism to exert himself for the advantage of the commonwealth. with these qualifications, he has employed five or six years in the experiment of raising coffee, and thus far, with little success, although his plantation comprises some thousands of growing trees. in the spring of , he made presents, to myself and other officers, of genuine liberian coffee, in small native bags, containing two or three pounds each. the judge is still giving away little bags of the same kind; but i do not yet learn that his crop is more than sufficient for his own use, and for distribution as specimens; certainly, it is not so abundant as to render the sale of it an object. as for the plantation itself, i must confess that it appeared to me more flourishing three years ago, than at present. most of the trees, on the spot originally planted, are dead, and the rest in a sickly condition; while the most thriving trees are to be seen on the lower and damper land adjacent, which, at my former visit, was covered with a dense forest. beyond a doubt, the coffee tree is as well adapted to this soil and climate as to those of cuba, and produces a larger and better flavored berry; but i repeat my opinion, that the liberian, hiring laborers at sixty cents a day, cannot compete with the west indian, who has his hundreds of slaves already paid for, and his trees growing in well-weeded land. the mere feeding, i might almost say, of a dozen laborers in liberia, will cost more than all the coffee they raise would re-imburse, at the cuba prices. the cultivation of rice is universal in africa. the natives never neglect it, for fear of famine. for an upland crop, the rice-lands are turned over and planted in march and april. in september and october, the rice is reaped, beaten out, and cleaned for market or storing. the lowland crop, on the contrary, is planted in september, october, and november, in marshy lands, and harvested in march and april. lands will not produce two successive crops without manuring and ploughing. about two bushels of seed are sown to the acre; and the crop, on the acre of upland, is about thirty bushels, and from forty to forty-five bushels on the lowlands. the rice is transported to market on the backs of natives, packed in bundles of about three feet long and nine inches in diameter. the wrappers are made of large leaves, bound together by cords of bark. the load is sustained by shoulder-straps, and by a band, passing round the forehead of the bearer. cassada is a kind of yam, and sends up a tall stalk, with light green leaves. it has a long root, looking like a piece of wood with the brown bark on; the interior is white and mealy, rather insipid, but nutritious, and invaluable as an article of food. it is raised from the seed, root, or stem; the latter being considered preferable. its yield is very great. in six months, it is fit to dig, and may be preserved fifteen or eighteen months in the ground, but ceases to be eatable in three or four days after being dug. tapioca is manufactured from this root. indian corn is planted in may and harvested in september; or, if planted in july, it ripens in november and december. sweet potatoes constitute one of the main reliances of the colonists; they are raised from seeds, roots or vines, but most successfully from the latter. the season of planting is in may, or june, and the crop ripens four months later. plantains and bananas are a valuable product; they are propagated from suckers, which yield a first crop in about a year. the top is cut down, and new stalks spring from the root. ground nuts are the same article peddled by the old women at our street-corners, under the name of pea-nuts; so called from the close resemblance of the bush to the tops of the sweet pea. this nut is used in england for making oil. the cocoa is a bulbous root of the size of a tea-cup, and has some similarity to the artichoke. pine-apples, small, but finely flavored, grow wild in the woods, and are abundant in their season. in concluding these very imperfect and miscellaneous observations on the agriculture and products of liberia, it may be remarked that the farmer's life and modes of labor are different from those of the same class, in other countries; inasmuch as there is here no spring, autumn, or winter. the year is a perpetual summer; therein, if in nothing else, resembling the climate of the original paradise, to which men of all colors look back as the birth-place of their species. the culture of the soil appears to be emphatically the proper occupation of the liberians. many persons have anticipated making money more easily by trade; but, being unaccustomed to commercial pursuits, and possessing but little capital, by far the greater number soon find themselves bankrupt, and burthened with debt. with these evidences of the inequality, on their part, of competition with vessels trading on the coast, and with the established traders of the colony, the inhabitants are now turning their attention more exclusively to agriculture. chapter vii. high character of governor roberts--suspected slaver--dinner on shore--facts and remarks relative to the slave trade--british philanthropy--original cost of a slave--anchor at sinoe--peculiarities and distinctive characteristics of the fishmen and bushmen--the king of appollonia--religion and morality among the natives--influence of the women. _november_ .--ashore, botanizing. in this region, where all the plants are strange, and many of them beautiful, it is easy work to form a collection. with a kroo-boy to carry my book, i cut leaves and flowers as they came to hand. .--governor roberts, general lewis, and doctor day, dined with us in the ward-room. the governor is certainly no ordinary person. in every situation, as judge, ruler, and private gentleman, he sustains himself creditably, and is always unexceptionable. his deportment is dignified, quiet, and sensible. he has been tried in war as well as in peace, has seen a good share of fighting, and has invariably been cool, brave, and successful. he is a native of virginia, and came from thence in . the friends of colonization can hardly adduce a stronger argument in favor of their enterprise, than that it has redeemed such a man as governor roberts from servitude, and afforded him the opportunity (which was all he needed) of displaying his high natural gifts, and applying them to the benefit of his race. to-night we had a kroo-dance on the forecastle. it was an uncouth and peculiar spectacle, characterized by singing, stamping, and clapping of hands, with a great display of agility. national dances might be taken as no bad standard of the comparative civilisation of different countries. a gracefully quiet dance is the latest flower of high refinement. .--two vessels descried standing in; and bets were five to one that they were the macedonian and decatur. it proved otherwise; they were a british gun-brig and french merchant-schooner. .--it has been raining for three days, almost incessantly. no macedonian yet. .--dined on shore. our captain and five officers, the master and surgeon of an english merchantman, and the captain of the french schooner, were of the party. it was a pleasant dinner. the conversation turned principally upon the trade and customs of the coast. the slave-trade was freely discussed; and the subject had a peculiar interest, under the circumstances, because this identical frenchman, at table with us, is suspected to have some connection with it. it is merely a surmise. the french captain speaks a little english; but, after dinner, as a matter of courtesy, we all adopted his native language. our friend colonel hicks, as usual, did most of the talking; he is as shrewd, agreeable, and instructive a companion, as may often be met with in any society. the dinner-conversation, above alluded to, suggests some remarks in reference to the slave-trade. there is great discrepancy in the various estimates as to the number of slaves annually exported from africa. some authorities rate it as high as half a million. captain bosanquet, r.n., estimates that fifteen thousand are annually sent to the west indies, and a greater number to arabia, all of which are from portuguese settlements. he affirms that the trade has increased very much between the years and , and particularly in the latter part of that period; an effect naturally consequent upon the great number of captures made by the english cruisers. a trader, for instance, contracting to introduce a given number of slaves into cuba, must purchase more on the coast to make up for those lost by capture. captain brodhead, another british officer, says that the number of slaves carried off is grossly exaggerated, and that the english papers told of thousands being shipped from a port, where he lay at anchor during the period indicated, and for fifty days before and afterwards; in all which time, not a slave vessel came in sight. doctor madden states, that, during his residence in cuba, the number of slaves annually imported was twenty-five thousand. sir thomas fowell buxton calls it one hundred and fifteen thousand! her majesty's commissioners say that the number is as well known as any other statistical point, and that it does not exceed fifteen thousand. the slave-trade rose to a great height in , owing principally to the high price of colonial produce. i was in cuba in that year, and witnessed the great activity that prevailed in buying negroes, and forming plantations, especially those of sugar. the prices have since fallen, and the slave-trade decreased, on the plain principle of political economy, that the demand regulates the supply. the english cruisers are doubtless very active in the pursuit of vessels engaged in this traffic. the approbation of government and the public (to say nothing of £ head-money for every slave recaptured, and the increased chance of promotion to vacancies caused by death) is a strong inducement to vigilance. but, however benevolent may be the motives that influence the action of great britain, in reference to the slave-trade, there is the grossest cruelty and injustice in carrying out her views. attempts are now being made to transport the rescued slaves in great numbers to the british west india islands, at the expense of government. it is boldly recommended, by men of high standing in england, to carry them all thither at once. the effect of such a measure, gloss it over as you may, would be to increase the black labor of the british islands, by just so much as is deducted from the number of slaves, intended for the spanish or brazilian possessions. "the sure cure for the slave-trade" says mr. laird, "is in our own hands. it lies in producing cheaper commodities by free labor, in our own colonies." and, to accomplish this desirable end, england will seize upon the liberated africans and land them in her west india islands, with the alternative of adding their toil to the amount of her colonial labor, or of perishing by starvation. how much better will their condition be, as apprentices in trinidad or jamaica, than as slaves in cuba? infinitely more wretched! english philanthropy cuts a very suspicious figure, when, not content with neglecting the welfare of those whom she undertakes to protect, she thus attempts to made them subservient to national aggrandizement. the fate of the rescued slaves is scarcely better than that of the crews of the captured slave-vessels. the latter are landed on the nearest point of the african coast, where death by starvation or fever almost certainly awaits them. i am desirous to put the best construction possible on the conduct as well of nations as of individuals, and never to entertain that cold scepticism which explains away all generosity and philanthropy on motives of selfish policy. but it is difficult to give unlimited faith to the ardent and disinterested desire professed by england, to put a period to the slave-trade. if sincere, why does she not, as she readily might, induce spain, portugal, and brazil, to declare the traffic piratical? and again, why is not her own strength so directed as to give the trade a death-blow at once? there are but two places between sierra leone and accra, a distance of one thousand miles, whence slaves are exported. one is gallinas; the other new sesters. the english keep a cruiser off each of these rivers. slavers run in, take their cargoes of human flesh and blood, and push off. if the cruiser can capture the vessels, the captors receive £ per head for the slaves on board, and the government has more "emigrants" for its west india possessions. now, were the cruisers to anchor at the mouths of these two rivers, the slavers would be prevented from putting to sea with their cargoes, and the trade at those places be inevitably stopped. but, in this case, where would be the head-money and the emigrants? it has been asserted that the colonists of liberia favor the slave-trade. this is not true. the only places where the traffic is carried on, north of the line, are in the neighborhood of the most powerful english settlements on the whole coast; while even british authority does not pretend that the vicinity of the american colonies is polluted by it. individuals among the colonists, unprincipled men, may, in a very few instances, from love of gain, have given assistance to slavers, by supplying goods or provisions at high prices. but this must have been done secretly, or the law would have taken hold of them. slavers, no doubt, have often watered at monrovia, but never when their character was known. on the other hand, the slave stations at st. paul's river, at bassa, and at junk, have undeniably been broken up by the presence of the colonists. even if destitute of sympathy for fellow-men of their own race and hue, and regardless of their deep stake in the preservation of their character, the evident fact is, that self-interest would prompt the inhabitants of liberia to oppose the slave-trade in their vicinity. wherever the slaver comes, he purchases large quantities of rice at extravagant rates, thus curtailing the supply to the colonist, and enhancing the price. moreover, the natives, always preferring the excitement of war to the labors of peace, neglect the culture of the earth, and have no camwood nor palm-oil to offer to the honest trader, who consequently finds neither buyers nor sellers among them. the truth is, the slave-traders can dispense with assistance from the liberian colonists. they procure goods, and everything necessary to their trade, at sierra leone, or from any english or american vessel on the coast. if the merchantmen find a good market for their cargoes, they are satisfied, whatever be the character of their customers. this is well understood and openly avowed here. the english have no right to taunt the americans, nor to claim higher integrity on their own part. they lend precisely the same indirect aid to the traffic that the americans do, and furnish everything except vessels, which likewise they would supply, if they could build them. it is the policy of the english ship-masters on the coast to represent the americans as engaged in the slave-trade; for if, by such accusations, they can induce british or american men-of-war to detain and examine the fair trader, they thus rid themselves of troublesome rivals. the natives are generally favorable to the slave-trade. it brings them many comforts and luxuries, which the legitimate trade does not supply. their argument is, that "if a man goes into the bush and buys camwood, he must pay another to bring it to the beach. but if he buy a slave, this latter commodity will not only walk, but bring a load of camwood on his back." all slaves exported are bushmen, many of whom are brought from two or three hundred miles in the interior. the fishmen and kroomen are the agents between the slave-traders and the interior tribes. they will not permit the latter to become acquainted with the white men, lest their own agency and its profits should cease. a slave, once sold, seldom returns to his home. if transported to a foreign country, his case is of course hopeless; and even if recaptured on the coast, his return is almost impossible. his home, probably, is far distant from the sea. it can only be reached by traversing the territories of four or five nations, any one of whom would seize the hapless stranger, and either consign him to slavery among themselves, or send him again to a market on the coast. hence, those recaptured by the english cruisers are either settled at sierra leone, or transported to some other of the colonies of great britain. the price paid to the native agents for a full grown male slave, is about one musket, twelve pieces of romauls, one cutlass, a demijohn of rum, a bar of iron, a keg of powder, and ten bars of leaf-tobacco, the whole amounting to the value of thirty to thirty-five dollars. a female is sold for about a quarter less; and boys of twelve or thirteen command only a musket and two pieces of romauls. slave-vessels go from havana with nothing but dollars and doubloons. other vessels go out with the above species of goods, and all others requisite for the trade. the slaver buys the goods on the coast, pays for them with specie, and lands them in payment for the slaves, money being but little used in traffic with the natives. .--the decatur arrived this evening, after a passage of thirty days from porto praya. she left the macedonian on the way, the winds being light, the current adverse, and the frigate sailing very badly. .--the macedonian arrived. coming off from town, to-day, i took a canoe with a couple of kroomen, who paddled down the river, till we arrived at a narrow part of the promontory. on touching the shallows, one of the kroomen took me on his back to the dry land. the two then picked up the canoe, carried her across the cape, perhaps a hundred yards, and launched her, with myself on board, through the heavy surf. .--sailed at daylight for sinoe, leaving the macedonian and decatur, an american ship and barque, an english brig, and two hamburg vessels, at anchor. .--anchored at sinoe at noon. .--ashore. visited fishtown, a well-built native village, containing probably four hundred inhabitants. it is within about two hundred yards of the colonial dwellings. the people are said to have committed many depredations upon the colonists; and there is an evident intention of driving them off. this is the tribe with which we are to hold a palaver. there are two grand divisions of native africans on the western coast, the fishmen and the bushmen; the latter being inhabitants of the interior; and the former comprising all the tribes along the sea-shore, who gain a subsistence by fishing, trading between the bushmen and foreign vessels, and laboring on shipboard. the kroomen, so often mentioned, are in some respects a distinct and separate people; although a large proportion, probably nine-tenths of those bearing that name, are identical with the fishmen. the latter are generally treacherous and deceitful; the kroomen are much more honest, but still are not to be trusted without reserve and discrimination. the government of these people, and of the natives generally, is nominally monarchical, but democratic in substance. the regal office appears to be hereditary in a family, but not to descend according to our ideas of lineal succession. the power of the king is greatly circumscribed by the privilege, which every individual in the tribe possesses, of calling a palaver. if a man deems himself injured, he demands a full discussion of his rights or wrongs, in presence of the rulers and the tribe. the head-men sit in judgment, and substantial justice is generally done. there are persons, celebrated for their power and copiousness of talking, who appear as counsel in behalf of the respective parties. the more distinguished of these advocates are sometimes sent for, from a distance of two or three hundred miles, to speak at a palaver; and, in such cases, they leave all other employment, and hurry to the scene of action. it would appear that, on other parts of the coast, or farther in the interior, the native kings possess more power and assume greater state, than those who have come under my notice. the king of appollonia, adjoining axim territory, is said to be very rich and powerful. if the report of his nearest civilized neighbor, the governor of axim, is to be credited, this potentate's house is furnished most sumptuously in the european style. gold cups, pitchers, and plates, are used at his table, with furniture of corresponding magnificence in all the departments of his household. he possesses vast treasures in bullion and gold dust. the governor of dixcove informed me, that, about four years ago, he accompanied an english expedition against appollonia, which is still claimed by england, although their fort there has been abandoned. on their approach, the king fled, and left them masters of the place. some of the english soldiers opened the sepulchre of the king last deceased, and took away an unknown amount of gold. afterwards, by order of the governor, the remainder was taken from the grave, amounting to several hundred dollars. together with the treasure, numerous articles had been buried, such as a knife, plate, and cup, swords, guns, cloth, goods of various kinds, and, in short, every thing that the dead king had required while alive. there were also four skeletons, two of each sex, buried beneath the royal coffin. it is said that sixty victims were sacrificed on occasion of the funeral, of whom only the most distinguished were allowed, even in death, to approach their master so nearly, and act as his immediate attendants in the world of spirits. the splendor of an african funeral, on the gold coast, is unparalleled. it is customary for persons of wealth to smear the corpses of their friends with oil, and then to powder them with gold-dust from head to foot, so as to produce the appearance of bronzed or golden statues. the present king of appollonia deposited six hundred ounces of gold (about ten thousand dollars) with the governor of cape coast castle, as security for his good behavior. his cellar is well supplied with rare wines, which he offers liberally to strangers who land at his residence. all these circumstances, and this barbaric magnificence, indicate a far different condition from that of the native kings in the vicinity of liberia, who live simply, like their subjects, on vegetables and fish, and one of whom was proud to array himself in a cast-off garment of my own. their wealth consists not in gold, plate, or bullion, but in crockery and earthenware. not only the kings, but all the rich natives, accumulate articles of this kind, until their dwellings resemble warehouses of crockery. perhaps fifty white wash-bowls, with as many pitchers, mugs, and plates, may be seen around the room; and when these utensils become so numerous as to excite the envy of the tribe, the owners are said to bury them in the earth. in the house of king glass (so named, i presume, from the transparency of his character), i noticed the first indications of a taste for the fine arts. seventy coarse colored engravings, glazed and framed, were suspended on the wall; and, what was most curious, nearly all of them were copies of the same print, a portrait of king william the fourth. it is to be desired that some missionary should give an account of the degree and kind of natural religion among the native tribes. their belief in the efficacy of sassy-wood to discover guilt or innocence, indicates a faith in an invisible equity. some of them, however, select the most ridiculous of animals, the monkey, as their visible symbol of the deity; or, as appears more probable, they stand in spiritual awe of him, from an idea that the souls of the dead are again embodied in this shape. under this impression, they pay a kind of worship to the monkey, and never kill him near a burial-place; and though, in other situations, they kill and eat him, they endeavor to propitiate his favor by respectful language, and the use of charms. other natives, in the neighborhood of gaboon, worship the shark, and throw slaves to him to be devoured. on the whole, their morality is superior to their religion--at least, as between members of the same tribe--although they scarcely seem to acknowledge moral obligations in respect to strangers. their landmarks, for instance, are held sacred among the individuals of a tribe. a father takes his son, and points out the "stake and stones" which mark the boundary between him and his neighbor. there needs no other registry. land passes from sire to son, and is sold and bought with as undisputed and secure a title as all our deeds and formalities can establish. but, between different tribes, wars frequently arise on disputed boundary questions, and in consequence of encroachments made by either party. "land-palavers" and "women-palavers" are the great causes of war. veracity seems to be the virtue most indiscriminately practised, as well towards the stranger as the brother. the natives are cautious as to the accuracy of the stories which they promulgate, and seldom make a stronger asseveration than "i tink he be true!" yet their consciences do not shrink from the use of falsehood and artifice, where these appear expedient. the natives are not insensible to the advantages of education. they are fond of having their children in the families of colonists, where they learn english, and the manners of civilized life, and get plenty to eat. probably the parents hope, in this way, to endow their offspring with some of the advantages which they suppose the white man to possess over the colored race. so sensible are they of their own inferiority, that if a person looks sternly in the face of a native, when about to be attacked by him, and calls out to him loudly, the chances are ten to one that the native runs away. this effect is analogous to that which the eye of man is said to exert on the fiercest of savage beasts. the same involuntary and sad acknowledgment of a lower order of being appears in their whole intercourse with the whites. yet such self-abasement is scarcely just; for the slave-traders, who constitute the specimens of civilized man with whom the natives have hitherto been most familiar, are by no means on a par with themselves, in a moral point of view. it is a pity to see such awful homage rendered to the mere intellect, apart from truth and goodness. it is a redeeming trait of the native character, so far as it goes, that women are not wholly without influence in the public councils. if, when a tribe is debating the expediency of going to war, the women come beneath the council-tree, and represent the evils that will result, their opinion will have great weight, and may probably turn the scale in favor of peace. on the other hand, if the women express a wish that they were men, in order that they might go to war, the warriors declare for it at once. it is to be feared, that there is an innate fierceness even in the gentler sex, which makes them as likely to give their voices for war as for peace. it is a feminine office and privilege, on the african coast, to torture prisoners taken in war, by sticking thorns in their flesh, and in various other modes, before they are put to death. the unfortunate captain farwell underwent three hours of torture, at the hands of the women and children. so, likewise, did the mate of captain burke's vessel, at sinoe. the natives are very cruel in their fights, and spare neither age nor sex; they kill the women and female children, lest they should be the mothers of future warriors, and the boys, lest they should fight hereafter. if they take prisoners, it is either to torture them to death, or to sell them as slaves. the fishmen have often evinced courage and obstinacy in war, as was the case in their assaults upon the liberian settlers, in the heroic age of the colony, when ashman and his associates displayed such warlike ability in defeating them. the bushmen are as cruel as the former, but appear to be more cowardly. i have heard the rev. mr. brown, himself an actor in the scene, relate the story of the fight at heddington, in which three colonists, assisted by two women, were attacked at daybreak by five hundred natives, many of whom were armed with muskets. zion harris and mr. demery were the marksmen, while the clergyman assumed the duty of loading the guns. the natives rushed onward in so dense a crowd, that almost every bullet and buckshot of the defenders hit its man. the besieged had but six muskets, one hundred cartridges, and a few charges of powder. their external fortifications consisted only of a slight picket-fence, which might have been thrown down in an instant. but, fortunately, when there were but three charges of powder left in the house, a shot killed gotorap, the chief of the assailants, at whose fall the whole army fled in dismay. one of the trophies of their defeat was the kettle which they had brought for the purpose of cooking the missionaries, and holding a cannibal feast. the battle-field is poetically termed the bed of honor: but the bravest man might be excused for shrinking from a burial in his enemy's stomach! poetry can make nothing of such a fate. rude and wretched as is the condition of the natives, it has been affirmed that many of the liberian colonists have mingled with them, and preferred their savage mode of life to the habits of civilisation. only one instance of the kind has come to my personal knowledge. we had on board, for two or three months, a party of kroomen, among whom was one, dressed like the rest, but speaking better english. being questioned, he said that he had learned english on board of merchant-vessels, where he had been employed for several years. we took this young man into the ward-room, where he worked for three months, associating chiefly with the kroomen on deck, speaking their language, and perfectly resembling them in his appearance and general habits. about the time of discharging him, we discovered that he was a native of north carolina, had resided many years in liberia, but, being idle and vicious, had finally given up the civilized for the savage state. his real name was elijah park; his assumed one, william henry. chapter viii. palaver at sinoe--ejectment of a horde of fishmen--palaver at settra kroo--mrs. sawyer--objections to the marriage of missionaries--a centipede--arrival at cape palmas--rescue of the sassy wood-drinker hostilities between the natives and colonists. _november_ .--at sinoe. the settlement here is in a poor condition. the inhabitants are apparently more ignorant and lazy than the colonists on any other part of the coast. yet they have a beautiful and fertile situation. .--the macedonian and decatur arrived. governor roberts, and other persons of authority and distinction among the colonists, were passengers, in order to be present at the intended palaver. .--at a.m., thirteen boats left the different ships, armed, and having about seventy-five marines on board, besides the sailors. entering the river, with flags flying and muskets glittering, the boats lay on their oars until all were in a line, and then pulled at once for the beach, as if about to charge a hostile battery. the manoeuvre was handsomely executed, and seemed to give great satisfaction to some thirty colonists and fifty naked natives, who were assembled on the beach. the officers and marines were landed, and formed in line, under the direction of lieutenant rich. the music then struck up, while the commodore and governor roberts slept ashore, and the whole detachment marched to the palaver-house, which, on this occasion, was the methodist church. the commodore seated himself behind a small table, which was covered with a napkin. the officers, with governor roberts and doctor day, occupied seats on his right, and the native chiefs, as they dropped in, found places on the left. if the latter fell short of us in outward pomp and martial array, they had certainly the advantage of rank, there being about twenty kings and headmen of the tribes among them. governor roberts opened the palaver in the commodore's name, informing the assembled chiefs, that he had come to talk to them about the slaughter of the mate and cook, belonging to captain burke's vessel. jim davis, who conducted the palaver on the part of the natives, professed to know nothing of the matter, the chiefs present being bushmen, whereas the party concerned were fishmen. after a little exhibition of diplomacy, davis retired, and prince tom came forward and submitted to an examination. his father is king of the tribe of fishmen, implicated in the killing of the two men. the prince denied any personal knowledge on the subject, but observed that the deed had been done in war, and that the tribe were not responsible. when asked where nippoo was (a chief known to have taken a leading part in the affray), he at first professed ignorance, but, on being hard pressed, offered to go and seek him. he was informed, however, that he could not be permitted to retire, but must produce nippoo on the spot, or be taken to america. the council went on. the depositions of three colonists were taken, and the facts in the case brought out. they were substantially in accordance with the narrative already given in this journal; and, upon full investigation, captain burke was decided to have been the aggressor. the proceedings of the fishmen had been fierce and savage, but were redeemed by a quality of wild justice, and exhibited them altogether in a better light than the white men. this affair being adjusted, the business of the palaver might be considered at an end, so far as the american squadron had any immediate connection with it. but there were points of importance to be settled, between the natives and the colonists. it was the interest of the latter, that the fishmen, residing in the neighborhood of the settlement, should be ejected from their land, which would certainly be a very desirable acquisition to the emigrants. it seems, that the land originally belonged to the sinoe tribe, whose head-quarters are four miles inland. several years ago, long before the arrival of the emigrants, this tribe gave permission to a horde of fishmen to occupy the site, but apparently without relinquishing their own property in the soil. feeble at first, the tenants wore a friendly demeanor towards their landlords, and made themselves useful, until, gradually acquiring strength, they became insolent, and assumed an attitude of independence. setting the interior tribe, of whom they held the land, at defiance, these fishmen put an interdict upon their trading with foreigners, except through their own agency. eight or ten years ago, however, the inland natives sold the land to the colonization society, subject to the incumbrance of the fishmen's occupancy, during good behavior; a condition which the colonists likewise pledged themselves to the fishmen to observe, unless the conduct of the latter should nullify it. for the last two or three years, the settlement at sinoe, being neglected by the mississippi society, under whose patronage it was established, has dwindled and grown weaker in numbers and spirit. the fishmen, with their characteristic audacity, have assumed a bolder aspect, and, besides committing many depredations on the property of the colonists, have murdered two or three of their number. the murderers, it is true, were delivered up by the tribe, and punished at the discretion of the monrovian authorities; but the colonists at sinoe felt themselves too feeble to redress their lighter wrongs, and therefore refrained from demanding satisfaction. about a month since, an addition of sixty new emigrants was made to the seventy, already established there. considering themselves now adequate to act on the offensive, they determined to drive off the fishmen. in this purpose they were confirmed by the monrovian government; and it was a part of the governor's business, at the palaver, to provide for its execution. governor roberts exhibited much sagacity and diplomatic shrewdness in accomplishing his object. it was obviously important to obtain the assistance of the bushmen, in expelling and keeping away the fishmen. they, however, were unwilling to take part in the matter, alleging their fears as an excuse; although it might probably be a stronger reason, that they could trade more advantageously with merchant-vessels, through the medium of the fishmen, than by the agency of the colonists. but the interposition of the american commodore, and the affair of the murder, afforded the governor the advantage of mixing up that question with the colonial one; so as to give the natives the impression that everything was done at the instance and under the authority of our armed force. this vantage-ground he skilfully made use of, yet not without its being perceived, by the native politicians, that the question of expelling the fishmen was essentially distinct from that of the murder of captain burke's seamen. davis the interpreter, and one of the headmen of the sinoe tribe, inquired why the commodore did not first talk his palaver, and then the governor in turn talk his. it did not suit his excellency's views to answer; and the question was evaded. by this ingenious policy, the bushmen were induced to promise their aid in ridding the settlement of its troublesome neighbors; while the fishmen, overawed by the presence of a force friendly to the colonists, submitted to their expulsion with a quietude that could not, under other circumstances, have been expected. doubtless, they had forfeited their claim to the land by non-observance of the conditions on which they held it; yet, in some points, the affair had remarkably the aspect of a forcible acquisition of territory by the colonists. no time was lost in carrying the decree of the palaver into execution. apprehending hostilities from the squadron, the fishmen had already removed most of their property, as well as their women and children, and had evacuated the town. governor roberts, mr. brown, doctor day, late government agent, together with a few colonists, repaired to the place and directed its demolition. this was partially effected by the natives, of whom some hundreds from the interior were present. they cut down and unroofed many of the dwellings; and the governor left directions to burn every house, if the fishmen should attempt to re-occupy the town. this wild horde, therefore, may be considered as permanently ejected from the ground which they held on so singular a tenure; and thus terminated an affair which throws a strong light on many of the characteristics of the natives, and likewise on the relations between them and the emigrants. _december_ .--we sailed, at two o'clock a.m., for settra kroo, fifteen miles down the coast. anchored at eleven a.m. a boat being sent ashore, brought news of the death of mr. sawyer, the missionary. he left a wife, now the only white person at the place. .--the boats landed at settra kroo, to settle a palaver. the matter in question was the violence offered by the natives to captain brown, master of an american vessel, in striking and attempting to kill him. they admitted the fact, begged pardon, and agreed to pay ten bullocks, four sheep, and some fowls, or the value thereof, to captain brown, and further to permit him to trade without payment of the usual "dash." this town is said to be very superior to any other native settlement on the coast; and the people are the best informed, most intelligent, and the finest in personal appearance, that we have met with. dined on shore. mrs. sawyer presided at the table, although her husband was buried only yesterday. it is impossible not to look with admiration at this lady, whose husband and only child have fallen victims to the climate, yet who believes it her duty to remain alone, upon a barbarous coast, in a position which perhaps no other woman ever voluntarily occupied. she is faithful to her trust, as the companion of him who fell at his post, and is doubtless happy in obedience to the unworldly motives that guide her determination. yet i cannot reconcile myself to the idea of a woman sharing the martyrdom, which seems a proper, and not an undesirable fate (so it come in the line of his duty) for a man. i doubt the expediency of sending missionary ladies to perish here. indeed, it may well be questioned whether a missionary ought, in any country, to be a married man. the care of a family must distract his attention and weaken his efficiency; and herein, it may be, consists one great advantage which the catholic missionary possesses over the protestant. he can penetrate into the interior; he can sleep in the hut, and eat the simple food of a native. but, if there be a wife and children, they must have houses and a thousand other comforts, which are not only expensive and difficult to obtain, but are clogs to keep the missionary down to one spot. i know how much the toil and suffering of man is alleviated, in these far-off regions, by the tenderness of woman. but the missionary is, by his profession, a devoted man; he seeks, in this life, not his own happiness, but the eternal good of others. compare him with the members of my own profession. we are sustained by no such lofty faith as must be supposed to animate him, yet we find it possible to spend years upon the barren deep, exposed to every variety of climate, and seeking peril wherever it may be found--and all without the aid of woman's ministrations. can a man, vowed to the service of a divine master, think it much to practise similar self-denial? .--this morning, while performing my ablutions with a large sponge, a centipede, four and a half inches long, crawled out of one of the orifices, and, ran over my hand. the venomous reptile was killed, without any harm being done. it had probably been hidden in one of a number of large land-shells, which i brought on board a day or two ago. his touch upon my hand was the most disagreeable sensation that i have yet experienced in africa. for a month past it has rained almost every night, but only three or four times during the day. the tornadoes have not troubled us, and the regular land and sea-breezes prevail. .--at p. m., anchored off cape palmas. the decatur had hardly clewed up her top-sails, when she was directed by signal to make sail again. shortly afterwards, a boat from the frigate brought us intelligence that there is trouble here between the natives and the colonists. the boats are ordered to be in readiness to go ashore to-morrow, in order to settle a palaver. the decatur has gone to caraway to protect the missionaries there. thus we are in a fair way to have plenty of work, palavering with the natives and protecting the colonists. not improbably, the latter have felt encouraged, by the presence of our squadron, to assume a higher tone towards the natives than heretofore. but we shall see. .--we landed, this morning, with nine armed boats, to examine into the difficulties above alluded to. the first duty that it fell to our lot to perform, was one of humanity. we had scarcely reached governor russwurm's house, when, observing a crowd of people about a mile off, on the beach, we learned that a man was undergoing the ordeal of drinking sassy-wood. the commodore, with most of the officers, hastened immediately to the rescue. on approaching the spot, we saw a woman with an infant on her back, walking to and fro, wailing bitterly, and throwing up her arms in agony. further on, we met four children, from eight to twelve years of age, crying loudly as they came towards us, and apparently imploring us to save their father. beyond them, and as near the crowd as she dared go, stood a young woman, supporting herself on a staff, with the tears streaming down her cheeks, while she gazed earnestly at the spot where her husband was suffering. although she took no notice of us, her low moans were more impressive than the vociferous agony of the former woman; and we could not but suppose that the man was peculiarly amiable in the domestic relations, since his impending fate awakened more grief in the hearts of _two_ wives, than, in civilized life, we generally see exhibited by one. meeting a colonist, with intelligence that the victim was nearly dead, we quickened our pace to a fast run. before we could reach the spot, however, the man had been put into a canoe, and paddled out into a lagoon by one of the party, while the remainder moved on to meet us. the commodore ordered two of the leaders to be seized and kept prisoners, until the drinker of sassy-wood should be given up. this had the desired effect; and, in half an hour, there came to the government house a hard-featured man of about fifty, escorted by a crowd, no small portion of which was composed of his own multifarious wives and children, all displaying symptoms of high satisfaction. he looked much exhausted, but was taken into the house and treated medically, with the desired success. when sufficiently recovered he will be sent to a neighboring town, where he must remain, until permitted by the customs of his people to return. he had been subjected to the ordeal, in order to test the truth or falsehood of an accusation brought against him, of having caused the death of a man of consequence, by incantations and necromantic arts. in such cases, a strong decoction of the sassy-wood bark is the universally acknowledged medium of coming at the truth. the natives believe that the tree has a supernatural quality, potent in destroying witches and driving out evil spirits; nor, although few escape, do the accused persons often object to quaffing the deadly draught. if it fail to operate fatally, it is generally by the connivance of those who administer it, in concocting the potion of such strength that the stomach shall reject it. should the suspected wizard escape the operation of the sassy-wood, it is customary to kill him by beating on the head with clubs and stones; his property is forfeited; and the party accusing him feast on the cattle of their victim. the man whom we rescued had taken a gallon of the decoction the previous evening, and about the same quantity just before we interrupted the ordeal. his wealth had probably excited the envy of his accusers. we had just returned to the government house and were about to seat ourselves at the dinner-table, when an alarm-gun was heard from mount tubman. a messenger soon arrived to say that the natives were attempting to force their way through the settlement, to the cape. the marines, together with all the officers who could be spared, were instantly on the march. the commodore and governor russwurm led the force, on horseback; the flag-lieutenant and myself being the only other officers fortunate enough to procure animals. mine was the queerest charger on which a knight ever rode to battle; a little donkey, scarcely high enough to keep my feet from the ground; so lazy that i could only force him into a trot by the continual prick of my sword; and so vicious that he threw me twice, in requital of my treatment. the rest of the detachment footed it four miles, on a sandy road, and under the scorching sun. on the way we overtook several armed colonists, hurrying to the point of danger. passing the foot of mount vaughan we reached mount tubman, and, ascending a steep, conical hill, found ourselves on a level space of a hundred yards in diameter, with a strong picket-fence surrounding it, and a solitary house in the centre. fifteen or sixteen armed men were on the watch, as conscious of the neighborhood of an enemy; the piazza was crowded with women and children; and from the interior of the house came the merry voices of above a score of little boys and girls, ignorant of danger, and enjoying a high frolic. apart, by the wall, sat a blind man, grasping his staff with a tremulous hand; and near him lay a sick woman, who had been brought in from a neighboring farm-house. all these individuals, old and young, had been driven hither for refuge by the alarm of war. not far off, we beheld tokens that an attack had been made, and sternly resisted by the little garrison of the stockade. on the side opposite the cape, a steep path rose towards the gate. some twenty yards down this passage lay a native, dead, with an ugly hole in his scull; and, in a narrow path to the right, was stretched another, who had met his death from a bullet-wound in the centre of his forehead. the ball had cut the ligature which bound his "greegree" of shells around his head, and the faithless charm lay on the ground beside him. already, the flies were beginning to cluster about the dead man's mouth. the attacking party, to which these slain individuals belonged, were of the barroky tribe. it is supposed that, knowing king freeman to be at variance with the colonists, and hearing the salute in honor of the commodore's landing, they mistook it for the commencement of hostilities, and came in to support the native party and gather spoil. as their repulse had evidently been decisive, we looked around us to enjoy the extensive and diversified view from the summit of the hill. casting our eyes along the road which we had just passed, the principal settlement was visible, consisting of two separate villages, intermingled with large native towns, the dwellings in which greatly outnumbered those of the colonists. on one side of the rude promontory ran a small river; on the other, the sea rolled its unquiet waves. at a short distance from the shore was seen the rocky islet, bearing the name of go-to-hell, where the natives bury their dead. northward, were the farms of those whom the recent hostile incursion had driven to this place of refuge. in various directions, several spurs of hills were visible, on one of which, glittering among the trees, appeared the white edifices of the mount vaughan episcopal mission. on our return, some of the party halted at the mission establishment; but i urged my little donkey onward, and, though this warlike episode had cost me a dinner, made my re-appearance at the governor's table in time for the dessert. chapter ix. palaver with king freeman--remarks on the influence of missionaries--palaver at rock boukir--narrative of captain farwell's murder--scene of embarkation through the surf--sail for little berebee. _december_ .--at cape palmas. we again landed, as on the preceding day, and met the redoubtable king freeman, and twenty-three other kings and headmen from the tribes in the vicinity. the palaver, like that at sinoe, was held in the methodist church; the commodore, the governor, and several officers and colonists, appearing on one side, and the natives on the other. there were several striking countenances among the four-and-twenty negro potentates, and some, even, that bore the marks of native greatness; as might well be the case, in a system of society where rank and authority are, in a great measure, the result of individual talent and force of character. one head man was very like henry clay, both in face and figure. it is remarkable, too, that one of the chiefs at sinoe not only had a strong personal resemblance to the same distinguished statesman--being, as it were, his image in ebony, or bronze--but, while not speaking, moved constantly about the palaver-house, as is mr. clay's habit in the senate-chamber. the interpreter, on the present occasion, yellow will by name, was dressed in a crimson mantle of silk damask, poncho-shaped, and trimmed with broad gold lace. the palaver being opened, the colonists complained that the chiefs had raised to double what it had been, or ought to be, the prices of rice and other products, for which the settlements were dependent upon the natives; also, that they would permit no merchant vessels to communicate with the colonial town. on representation of these grievances, the kings agreed to rescind the obnoxious regulations. this, however, did not satisfy the governor, who had hoped to induce king freeman to remove his town to another site, and allow the colonists more room. as matters at present stand, the king's capital city is within three hundred yards of governor russwurm's house, and entirely disunites the colonial settlements on the cape. in case of war, the communication between these two sections of the town of harper would be completely broken off. the governor, therefore, proposed that king freeman should sell his land on the cape, receiving a fair equivalent from the colony, and should transplant his town across the river, or elsewhere. but the king showed no inclination to comply; nor did the commodore, apparently, deem it his province to support governor russwurm, or take any part in the question. the point was accordingly given up; the governor merely requesting king freeman to "look his head," that is, consider--and let him know his determination. there was also a complaint made, on the part of the missionaries, that the natives had cut off their supplies, and had attempted to take away the native children, who had been given them to educate. i was subsequently informed, however, by the rev. mr. hazlehurst, that the missionaries had no difficulty with the natives, and did not wish their affairs to be identified with those of the colonists. the above representation, therefore, appears to have been unauthorized by the mission establishment. and here, without presuming to offer an opinion as respects their conduct at this particular juncture, i must be allowed to say, that the missionaries at liberia have shown themselves systematically disposed to claim a position entirely independent of the colonies. they are supported by wealthy and powerful societies at home; they have been accustomed to look upon their own race as superior to the colored people; they are individually conscious, no doubt, in many cases, of an intellectual standing above that of the persons prominent among the emigrants; and they are not always careful to conceal their sense of such general or particular superiority. it is certain, too, that the native africans regard the whites with much greater respect than those of their own color. hence, it is almost impossible but that jealousy of missionary influence should exist in the minds of the colonial authorities. the latter perceive, in the midst of their commonwealth, an alien power, exercised by persons not entitled to the privileges of citizenship, and to whom it was never intended to allow voice or action in public affairs. by such a state of things, the progress of christianity and civilisation must be rather retarded than advanced. there is reason, therefore, to doubt whether the labors of white missionaries, in the territory over which the colonists exercise jurisdiction, is, upon the whole, beneficial. if removed beyond those limits, and insulated among the natives, they may accomplish infinite good; but not while assuming an anomalous position of independence, and thwarting the great experiment which the founders of liberia had in view. one grand object of these colonies is, to test the disputed and doubtful point, whether the colored race be capable of sustaining themselves without the aid or presence of the whites. in order to a fair trial of the question, it seems essential that none but colored missionaries should be sent hither. the difficulties between the government and the methodist episcopal mission confirm these views. at a former period, that mission possessed power almost sufficient to subvert the colonial rule. let it not be supposed, that these remarks are offered in any spirit of hostility to missionaries. my intercourse with them in different parts of the world, has been of the most friendly nature. i owe much to their kindness, and can bear cheerful testimony to the laborious, self-devoting spirit in which they do their duty. at athens, i have seen them toiling unremittingly, for years, to educate the ignorant and degraded descendants of the ancient greeks, and was proud that my own country--in a hemisphere of which plato never dreamed--should have sent back to greece a holier wisdom than he diffused from thence. in the unhealthy isle of cyprus, i have beheld them perishing without a murmur, and their places filled with new votaries, stepping over the graves of the departed, and not less ready to spend and be spent in the cause of their divine master. i have witnessed the flight of whole families from the mountains of lebanon, where they had lingered until its cedars were prostrate beneath the storm of war, and only then came to shelter themselves under the flag of their country. everywhere, the spirit of the american missionaries has been honorable to their native land; nor, whatever be their human imperfections, is it too much to term them holy in their lives, and often martyrs in their deaths. and none more so than the very men of whom i now speak, in these sickly regions of africa, where i behold them sinking, more or less gradually, but with certainty, and destitute of almost every earthly comfort, into their graves. i criticise portions of their conduct, but reverence their purity of motive; and only regret, that, while divesting themselves of so much that is worldly, they do not retain either more wisdom of this world, or less aptness to apply a disturbing influence to worldly affairs. but it is time to return from this digression. matters being now in a good train at cape palmas, we go to use our pacific influence elsewhere. .--we sailed at daylight, and anchored this evening at rock boukir. .--in the morning, twelve armed boats were sent ashore from the three ships. we landed on an open beach, all in safety, but more or less drenched by the dangerous surf. one or two boats took in heavy seas, broached to, and rolled over and over in the gigantic surf-wave. on landing, we found a body of armed natives, perhaps fifty in number, drawn up in a line. their weapons were muskets, iron war-spears, long fish-spears of wood, and broad knives. they made no demonstrations of opposing us, but stood stoutly in their ranks, showing more independence of bearing and less fear, than any natives whom we have met with. they were evidently under military rule, and, as well as the remainder of the tribe, evinced a degree of boldness, amounting almost to insolence, which, it must be owned, would have made our party the more ready for a tustle, on any reasonable pretext. the town of rock boukir is enclosed by palisades, about eight feet high, with small gates on every side. it was not the purpose of the natives to admit us within their walls; but a rain made it desirable that the palaver should be held in a sheltered place, instead of on the beach, as had been originally intended. we therefore marched in, took possession of the place, and stationed sentinels at every gate. the town was entirely deserted; for the warriors had gone forth to fight, if a fight there was to be; and the women and children were sent for security into the "bush." in the central square stood the palaver house, beneath the shadow of a magnificent wide-spreading tree, which had perhaps mingled the murmur of its leaves with the eloquence of the native orators, for at least a century. here we posted ourselves, and awaited the king of rock boukir. the messengers announced, that he wished to bring his armed men within the walls, and occupy one side of the town, while our party held the other. as this proposition was not immediately acceded to, and as the king would not recede, it seemed doubtful whether there would be any palaver, after all. at length, however, the commodore ordered the removal of our sentinels from the gates, on one side of the town, and consented that the native warriors should come in. a further delay was accounted for, on the plea that the king was putting on his robes of state. finally, he entered the palaver house and seated himself; an old man of sinister aspect, meanly dressed, and having for his only weapon a short sword, with a curved blade, six inches wide. governor roberts now opened the palaver, by informing the king that his tribe were suspected of having participated in the plunder of the mary carver, and the murder of her captain and crew. i subjoin a brief narrative of this affair. two years since, the schooner mary carver, of salem, commanded by captain farwell of vassalboro', was anchored at half berebee, for the purpose of trading with the natives. her cargo was valued at twelve thousand dollars. captain farwell felt great confidence in the people of half berebee, although warned not to trust them too far, as they had the character of being fierce and treacherous. one day, being alone on shore, the natives knocked him down, bound him, and delivered him to the women and children, to be tortured by sticking thorns into his flesh. after three hours of this horrible agony, the men despatched him. as soon as the captain was secured, a large party was sent on board the vessel, to surprise and murder the mate and crew. in this they were perfectly successful; not a soul on board escaped. they then took part of the goods out, and ran the schooner ashore, where she was effectually plundered. within a space of twelve miles along the beach, there are five or six families of fishmen, ruled by different members of the cracko family, of which ben cracko of half berebee is the head. all these towns were implicated in the plot, and received a share of the plunder. a portuguese schooner had been taken, and her crew murdered, at the same place, a year before. the business had turned out so profitably, that other tribes on the coast began to envy the good fortune of the crackos, and declared that they likewise were going to "catch" a vessel. the object of our present palaver was to inquire into the alleged agency of the tribe at rock boukir in the above transaction. the king, speaking in his own language, strenuously denied the charge; at the same time touching his ears and drawing his tongue over his short curved broad-sword. by these symbols and hieroglyphics, i supposed him to mean, that he had merely heard of the affair, and that his sword was innocent of the blood imputed to him. it seems, however, that it is the native form of taking an oath, equivalent to our kissing the book. the king agreed to go to berebee, and assist in the grand palaver to be held there; complying with a proposal of the commodore, to take passage thither in the macedonian. matters being so far settled, the council was broken up, and the party re-embarked. several of the boats having been anchored outside of the surf, the officers and men were carried off to them in the native canoes. the scene on the beach was quite animated. hundreds of natives, having laid aside their weapons, crowded around to watch the proceedings. the women and children came from the woods in swarms, all talking, screaming, laughing, and running hither and thither. the canoes were constantly passing from the shore to the boats, carrying two persons at a time. our men, being unaccustomed to such rough water and unsteady conveyances, often capsized the canoes and were tumbled ashore by the surf, perhaps with the loss of hats, jackets, or weapons. here was visible the head of a marine, swimming to one of the boats, with his musket in his hand. another, unable to swim, was upheld by a krooman. here and there, an impatient individual plunged into the surf and struck out for his boat, rather than await the tedious process of embarkation. all reached the vessels in safety, but few with dry jackets. his majesty of rock boukir, too, went on board the frigate, according to agreement, and probably, by this mark of confidence, saved his capital from the flames. if all stories be true, he little deserves our clemency; and it is even said, that the different tribes held a grand palaver at this place, for the division of the spoil of the mary carver. we set sail immediately. .--anchored at half past five p.m., off little berebee. chapter x. palaver at little berebee--death of the interpreter and king ben cracko, and burning of the town--battle with the natives, and conflagration of several towns--turkey buzzards--a love-letter--moral reflections--treaty of grand berebee--prince jumbo and his father--native system of expresses--curiosity of the natives. _december_ .--at nine a.m., the boats of the squadron repaired to the flag-ship, where they were formed in line, and then pulled towards the shore abreast. the landing-place is tolerably good, but contracted. four or five boats might easily approach it together; but when most of the thirteen attempted it at once, so narrow was the space, that one or two of them filled. they were hauled up, however, and secured. our force, on being disembarked, was stationed in line, opposite the town of little berebee, and the wood in its immediate vicinity. many of the officers went up to the palaver house, a temporary shed erected for the occasion, about fifty yards from the town-gate. king ben cracko now making his appearance, with five or six headmen or kings of the neighboring tribes, the palaver began. the interpreter, on this occasion, was well known to have been, in his own person, a leading character in the act of piracy and murder, which it was the object of the palaver to investigate. he had therefore a difficult part to act; one that required great nerve, and such a talent of throwing a fair semblance over foul facts, as few men, civilized or savage, are likely to possess. with the consciousness of guilt upon him, causing him to startle at the first aspect of peril, it is singular that the man should have had the temerity to trust himself in so trying a position. his version of the mary carver affair was a very wretched piece of fiction. he declared that captain farwell had killed two natives, and that old king cracko, since deceased, had punished the captain by death, in the exercise of his legitimate authority. he denied that the tribe had participated in captain farwell's murder, or in those of the mate and crew, or in the robbery of the vessel; affirming that the schooner had gone ashore, and that everything was lost. all this was a tissue of falsehood; it being notorious that a large quantity of goods from the wreck, and portions of the vessel itself, were distributed among the towns along the coast. it was well known, moreover, that these people had boasted of having "caught" (to use their own phrase), an american vessel, and that the neighboring tribes had threatened to follow ben cracko's example. governor roberts, who conducted the examination on our part, expressed to the man his utter disbelief of the above statements. the commodore, likewise, stept hastily towards him, sternly warning him to utter no more falsehoods. the interpreter, perceiving that the impression was against him, and probably expecting to be instantly made prisoner, or put to death, now lost the audacity that had hitherto sustained him. at this moment, it is said, a gun was fired at our party, from the town; and, simultaneously with the report, the interpreter sprang away like a deer. there was a cry to stop him--two or three musket-bullets whistled after the fugitive as he ran--but he had nearly reached the town-gate, when his limbs, while strained to their utmost energy, suddenly failed beneath him. a rifle-shot had struck him in the vertebra of the neck, causing instantaneous death. meanwhile, king ben cracko had made a bolt to escape, but was seized by his long calico robe; which, however, gave way, leaving him literally naked in the midst of his enemies. a shot brought him to the ground; but he sprang to his feet, still struggling to escape. he next received two bayonet wounds, but fought like a wild beast, until two or three men flung themselves upon him, and held him down by main force. finding himself overpowered, he pretended to be dead, but was securely bound, and taken to the beach. a lion of the african deserts could not have shown a fiercer energy than this savage king; and those who gazed at him, as he lay motionless on the sand, confessed that they had never seen a frame of such masculine vigor as was here displayed. his wounds proved mortal. the melée had been as sudden as the explosion of gunpowder; it was wholly unexpected, but perhaps not to be wondered at, where two parties, with weapons in their hands, had met to discuss a question of robbery and murder. when the firing commenced, about two hundred natives were on the spot, or in the vicinity; they were now flying in all directions, some along the beach, a few into the sea itself, but by far the greatest number to the woods. many shots were fired, notwithstanding the commodore's orders to refrain. we were now directed to break down the palisades, and set fire to the town. a breach of twenty or thirty feet was soon made in the wall, by severing the withes that bound together the upright planks. before this could be effected, another party crept through the small holes, serving the purpose of gates, and penetrated to the centre of the town, where, assembling around the great council-tree, they gave three cheers. the houses were then set on fire, and, within fifteen minutes, presented one mass of conflagration. the palisades likewise caught the flames, and were consumed, leaving an open space of blackened and smoking ruins, where, half an hour before, the sun had shone upon a town. the natives did not remain idle spectators of the destruction of their houses. advancing to the edge of the woods, they discharged their muskets at us, loaded not with christian bullets, but with copper-slugs, probably manufactured out of the spikes of the mary carver. a marine was struck in the side by one of these missiles, which tumbled him over, but without inflicting a serious wound. a party from our ship penetrated the woods behind the town, where one of them fired at an object which he perceived moving in the underbrush. going up to the spot, it proved to be a very aged man, apparently on the verge of a century, much emaciated, and too feeble to crawl further in company with his flying towns-people. he was unharmed by the shot, but evidently expected instant death, and held up his hand in supplication. our party placed the poor old patriarch in a more sheltered spot, and left him there, after supplying him with food; an act of humanity which must have seemed to him very singular, if not absurd, in contrast with the mischief which we had wrought upon his home and people. meantime, the ships were disposed to have a share in the fight, and opened a cannonade upon the woods, shattering the great branches of the trees, and adding to the terror, if not to the loss, of the enemy. little berebee being now a heap of ashes, we re-embarked, taking with us an american flag, probably that of the mary carver, which had been found in the town. we also made prizes of several canoes, one of which was built for war, and capable of carrying forty men. the wounded king cracko, likewise, was taken on board the frigate, where, next morning, he breathed his last; thus expiating the outrage in which, two years before, he had been a principal actor. we afterwards understood that the natives suffered a loss of eight killed and two wounded. .--the season for palavers and diplomacy being now over, we landed at seven o'clock this morning, ten or twelve miles below berebee, in order to measure out a further retribution to the natives. on approaching the beach, we were fired upon from the bushes, but without damage, although the enemy were sheltered within twenty yards of the water's edge. the boat's crew first ashore, together with two or three marines, charged into the shrubbery and drove off the assailants. all being disembarked, the detachment was formed in line, and marched to the nearest town, which was immediately attacked. like the other native towns, it was protected by a wall of high palisades, planted firmly in the soil, and bound together by thongs of bamboo. cutting a passage through these, we entered the place, which contained perhaps a hundred houses, neatly built of wicker-work, and having their high conical roofs thatched with palmetto-leaves. such edifices were in the highest degree combustible, and being set on fire, it was worth while for a lover of the picturesque to watch the flames, as they ran up the conical roofs, and meeting at the apex, whirled themselves fiercely into the darkened air. while this was going on, the war-bells, drums, and war-horns of the natives were continually sounding; and flocks of vultures (perhaps a more accurate ornithologist might call them turkey-buzzards) appeared in the sky, wheeling slowly and heavily over our heads. these ravenous birds seemed to have a presentiment that there were deeds of valor to be done: nor was it quite a comfortable idea, that some of them, ere nightfall, might gratify their appetite at one's own personal expense. to confess the truth, however, they were probably attracted by the scent of some slaughtered bullocks; it being indifferent to a turkey-buzzard whether he prey on a cow or a christian. after destroying the first town, we marched about a mile and a half up the beach, to attack a second. on our advance, the marine drummer and fifer were ordered from the front of the column to the rear, as being a position of less danger. they of course obeyed; but the little drummer deeming it a reflection upon his courage, burst into tears, and actually blubbered aloud as he beat the _pas de charge_. it was a strange operation of manly spirit in a boyish stage of development. as we approached the second town, our boat-keepers, who watched the scene, distinctly saw a party of thirty or forty natives lying behind a palisade, with their guns pointed at our advanced guard. unconscious that the enemy were so near, we halted for an instant, about forty yards from the town, and then advanced at a run. this so disconcerted the defenders that they fled, after firing only a few shots, none of which took effect. in fact, the natives proved themselves but miserable marksmen. they can seldom hit an object in motion, although, if a man stand still, they sometimes manage to put a copper-slug into his body, by taking aim a long time. after firing, the savage runs a long distance before he ventures to load. had their skill or their hardihood been greater, we must have suffered severely; for the woods extended nearly to the water's edge, and exposed us, during the whole day, to the fire of a sheltered and invisible enemy. after the storm and conflagration of the second town, we took a brief rest, and then proceeded to capture and burn another, situated about a mile to the northward. this accomplished, we judged it to be dinner-time. indeed, we had done work enough to ensure an appetite; and history does not make mention, so far as i am aware, of such destruction of cities so expeditiously effected. having emptied our baskets, we advanced about three miles along the beach--still with the slugs of the enemy whistling in our ears--and gave to the devouring element another town. man is perhaps never happier than when his native destructiveness can be freely exercised, and with the benevolent complacency of performing a good action, instead of the remorse of perpetrating a bad one. it unites the charms of sin and virtue. thus, in all probability, few of us had ever spent a day of higher enjoyment than this, when we roamed about, with a musket in one hand and a torch in the other, devastating what had hitherto been the homes of a people. one of the sweetest spots that i have seen in africa, was a little hamlet of three houses, standing apart from the four large towns above-mentioned, and surrounded by an impervious hedge of thorn-bushes, with two palisaded entrances. forcing our way through one of these narrow portals, we beheld a grassy area of about fifty yards across, overshadowed by a tree of very dense foliage, which had its massive roots in the centre, and spread its great protecting branches over the whole enclosure. the three dwellings were of the same sort of basket-work as those already described, but particularly neat, and giving a pleasant impression of the domestic life of their inhabitants. this small, secluded hamlet had probably been the residence of one family, a patriarch, perhaps, with his descendants to the third or fourth generation--who, beneath that shadowy tree, must have enjoyed all the happiness of which uncultivated man is susceptible. nor would it be too great a stretch of liberality, to suppose that the green hedge of impervious thorns had kept out the vices of their race, and that the little area within was a sphere where all the virtues of the native african had been put in daily practice. these three dwellings, and the verdant wall around them, and the great tree that brooded over the whole, might unquestionably have been spared, with safety to our consciences. but when man takes upon himself the office of an avenger by the sword, he is not to be perplexed with such little scrupulosities, as whether one individual or family be less guilty than the rest. providence, it is to be presumed, will find some method of setting such matters right. in fine, when the negro patriarch's strong sable sons supported their decrepit sire homeward, with their wives, "black, but comely," bearing the glistening, satin-skinned babies on their backs, and their other little ebony responsibilities trudging in the rear, there must have been a dismal wail; for there was the ancestral tree, its foliage shrivelled with fire, stretching out its desolate arms over the ashes of the three wicker dwellings. the business of the day was over. besides short excursions, and charges into the bush, the men had marched and countermarched at least twelve miles upon the beach, with the surf sometimes rolling far beyond our track. some hundreds of slugs had been fired at us; and, on our part, we had blazed away at every native who had ventured to show his face; but the amount of casualties, after such a day of battle, reminds one of the bloodless victories and defeats of an italian army, during the middle ages. in a word, we had but two men wounded; and whether any of the enemy were killed or no, it is impossible to say. at all events, we slew a number of neat cattle, eight or nine of which were sent on board the ships, where they answered a much better purpose than as many human carcasses. the other spoil consisted of several canoes, together with numerous household utensils--which we shall bring home as trophies and curiosities. there was also a chain cable, and many other articles belonging to the mary carver, and a pocket-book, containing a letter addressed to captain robert mcfarland. the purport of the epistle is not a matter of public interest; but it was written in a lady's delicate hand, and was probably warm with affection; and little did the fair writer dream that her missive would find its way into an african hut, where it was probably regarded as a piece of witchcraft. thus ended the warfare of little berebee. the degree of retribution meted out had by no means exceeded what the original outrage demanded; and the mode of it was sanctioned by the customs of the african people. according to their unwritten laws, if individuals of a tribe commit a crime against another tribe or nation, the criminal must either be delivered up, or punished at home, or the tribe itself becomes responsible for their guilt. an example was of peremptory necessity; and the american vessels trading on the coast will long experience a good effect from this day's battle and destruction. the story will be remembered in the black man's traditions, and will have its due weight in many a palaver. nevertheless, though the burning of villages be a very pretty pastime, yet it leaves us in a moralizing mood, as most pleasures are apt to do; and one would fain hope that civilized man, in his controversies with the barbarian, will at length cease to descend to the barbarian level, and may adopt some other method of proving his superiority, than by his greater power to inflict suffering. for myself personally, the "good old way" suits me tolerably enough; but i am disinterestedly anxious that posterity should find a better. .--we sailed at day-light for grand berebee. nearing the point on which it is situated, the ships hoisted white flags at the fore, in token of amity. a message was sent on shore to the king, who came off in a large canoe, and set his hand to a treaty, promising to keep good faith with american vessels. he likewise made himself responsible for the good conduct of the other tribes in the vicinity. on board the macedonian, there were five prisoners, who had been taken two months ago, by the brig porpoise. one was the eldest son of this king, and the others belonged to his tribe. the meeting between the king and prince was very affecting, and fully proved that nature has not left these wild people destitute of warmth and tenderness of heart. they threw themselves into each other's arms, wept, laughed, and danced for joy. to the king, his son was like one risen from the dead; he had given him up for lost, supposing that the young man had been executed. the prisoners were each presented with a new frock and trowsers, besides tobacco, handkerchiefs, and other suitable gifts. the prince received a lieutenant's old uniform coat; and when they got into their canoe, it was amusing to see how awkwardly he paddled, in this outlandish trim. he made two or three attempts to get the coat off, but without success. one of his companions then offered his assistance; but as he took the prince by the collar, instead of the sleeve, it was found impracticable to rid him of the garment. the more he pulled, the less it would come off; and the last we saw of prince jumbo, he was holding up his skirts in one hand, and paddling with the other. there will be grand rejoicings to-night, on the return of the prisoners. all will be dancing and jollity; plays will be performed; the villages will re-echo with the report of fire-arms and the clamor of drums; and the whole population will hold a feast of bullocks. .--anchored at cape palmas. the natives here were alarmed at the return of the three ships; and many of them carried away their moveables into the woods. news of the destruction of the towns below had reached them several days since. they have a simple, but very effective system of expresses. when information of great interest is to be conveyed from tribe to tribe, one of their swiftest runners is despatched, who makes what speed he can, and, when tired, entrusts his message to another. thus it is speeded on, without a moment's delay. should the runner encounter a river in his course, he shouts his news across; it is caught up on the other side, and immediately sent forward. in this manner, intelligence finds its way along the coast with marvellous celerity. .--we sailed two days ago. yesterday, there came off from the shore, some six or eight miles, a couple of canoes, paddled by six men each, who exerted themselves to the utmost to overtake us. they had nothing to sell; and their only object seemed to be, to obtain the particulars of the fight and conflagration at little berebee, a hundred and fifty miles below. .--anchored at monrovia, and landed governor roberts, who, with dr. johnson, had been a passenger from cape palmas. .--sailed for porto praya, with the intention of visiting madeira, before returning to the coast. chapter xi. madeira--aspect of the island--annual races--"hail columbia!"--ladies, cavaliers, and peasants--dissertation upon wines--the clerks of funchal--decay of the wine-trade--cultivation of pine-trees--a night in the streets--beautiful church--a sunday-evening party--currency of madeira. _january_ , .--we made madeira yesterday, but, the weather being thick and squally, stood off and on until to-day. . our ship rides gently at her anchor. the loo rock rises fifty feet perpendicular from the water, at so short a distance, that we can hear the drum beat tattoo in the small, inaccessible castle, on its summit. this rock is the outpost of the city of funchal. the city stretches along the narrow strip of level ground, near the shore, with vine-clad hills rising steeply behind. on the slopes of these eminences are many large houses, surrounded with splendid gardens, and occupied by wealthy inhabitants, chiefly englishmen, who have retired upon their fortunes, or are still engaged in business. on a height to the left, stands a castle of considerable size, in good repair. high up among the hills, in bold relief, is seen the church of our lady of the mount, with its white walls and two towers. the hills are rugged, steep, and furrowed with deep ravines, along which, after the heavy rains of winter, the mountain torrents dash headlong to the sea. my remarks on madeira will be thrown together without the regularity of a daily journal; for our visit to the island proves so delightful, that it seems better worth the while to enjoy, than to describe it. the annual races are well attended. during their continuance, throngs of passengers, on foot, on horseback, and in palanquins, are continually proceeding to the course, a little more than a mile and a half from town. the road thither constantly ascends, until you find yourself several hundred feet above the sea, with an extensive prospect beneath and around. a tolerable space for the track is here afforded by an oblong plain, seven-eighths of a mile in length. near the judges' stand was a large collection of persons of all classes, ladies, dandies, peasants, and jockeys. here, too, were booths for the sale of eatables and drinkables, and a band of music to enliven the scene. these musicians saw fit to honor us in a very particular manner. they had all agreed to ship on board our vessel; and, with a view to please their new masters, when three or four of our officers rode into the course, they played "hail columbia." we took off our caps in acknowledgment, and thought it all very fine. directly afterwards, two other officers rode in, and were likewise saluted with "hail columbia!" anon, two or three of us dismounted and strolled about among the people, thinking nothing of the band, until we were reminded of their proximity by the old tune again. in short, every motion on our part, however innocent and unpretending, caused the hills of madeira to resound with the echoes of our national air. finding that our position assumed a cast of the ridiculous, we gave the leader to understand, that, if the tune were played again, the band's first experience of maritime life should be a flogging at the gangway. the hint was sufficient; not only did we hear no more of "hail columbia," but none of the musicians ever came near the ship. with few exceptions the running was wretched. one or two of the match-races (which were ten in number, all single heats, of a mile each) were well contested. the first was run by two ponies; a fat black one with a chubby boy on his back, and a red, which, as well as his rider, was in better racing condition. the black was beaten out of sight. the second race was by two other ponies, one of which took the lead, and evidently had the heels of his antagonist. suddenly, however, he bolted, and leaped the wall, leaving the track to be trotted over by the slower colt. two grey horses succeeded, and made pretty running; but their riders, instead of attending to business, joined hands, and rode a quarter of a mile in this amiable attitude. rather than antagonists, one would have taken them for twin brethren, like two other famous horsemen, castor and pollux. to the ladies this mode of racing appeared delightful; but the remarks of our party, consisting of several english and american officers and gentlemen, were anything but complimentary. the last quarter of this heat was well run, one of the horses winning apparently by a neck. the judge, however, a portuguese, decided that it was a dead heat. at one extremity of the course, the hill rises abruptly; and here were hundreds of persons of both sexes, in an excellent position to see the running, and to impart a pretty effect to the scene. a large number of peasantry were present, dressed in their peculiar costume, and taking great interest in the whole matter. both men and women wear a little blue cap lined with scarlet, so small that one wonders how it sticks on the head. in shape it is like an inverted funnel, running up to a sharp point. the women have short, full dresses, with capes of a dark blue, trimmed with a lighter blue, or of scarlet with blue trimming. these colors form a sectional distinction; the girls of the north side of the island wearing the scarlet capes, and those of the south side, the blue. in the intervals of the races, ladies and gentlemen cantered round the course, and some of them raced with their friends. three scottish ladies, with more youth than beauty, and dressed in their plaids, made themselves conspicuous by their bold riding, and quite carried off the palm of horsemanship from their cavaliers. a sketch of madeira would be incomplete indeed, without some mention of its wines. three years ago, when it was more a matter of personal interest, i visited this island, and gained considerable information on the subject. madeira then produced about thirty thousand pipes annually, one third of which was consumed on the island, one-third distilled into brandy, and the remainder exported. about one-third of the exportation went to the united states, and the balance to other parts of the world. the best wines are principally sent to our own country--that is to say, the best exported--for very little of the first-rate wine goes out of the island. the process of adulteration is as thoroughly understood and practised here, as anywhere else. the wine sent to the united states is a kind that has been heated, to give it an artificial age. the mode of operation is simply to pour the wine into large vats, and submit it for several days to a heat of about º. after this ordeal, the wine is not much improved by keeping. there are other modes of adulteration, into the mysteries of which i was not admitted. one fact, communicated to me by an eminent wine-merchant, may shake the faith of our connoisseurs as to the genuineness of their favorite beverage. it is, that, from a single pipe of "mother wine," ten pipes are manufactured by the help of inferior wine. this "mother wine" is that which has been selected for its excellence, and is seldom exported pure. the wines, when fresh from the vintage, are as various in their flavor as our cider. it is by taste and _smell_ that the various kinds are selected, after which the poorer wines are distilled into brandy, and the better are put in cases, and placed in store to ripen. the liquor is from time to time racked off, and otherwise managed until ready for exportation. it is _invariably_ "treated" with brandy. french brandy was formerly used, which being now prohibited, that of the island is substituted, although of an inferior quality. besides the "madeira wine," so famous among convivialists, there are others of higher price and superior estimation. there is the "sercial," distinguished by a kind of poppy taste. there is the malmsey, or "ladies' wine," and the "vina tinta," or madeira claret, as it is sometimes called. the latter is made of the black grapes, in a peculiar manner. after being pressed, the skins of the grapes are placed in a vat, where the juice is poured upon them and suffered to stand several days, until it has taken the hue required. the taste of this wine is between those of port and claret. there is a remarkable difference in the quality of the vintages of the north and south sides of the island; the former not being a third part so valuable as the latter. the poorer classes drink an inferior and acid wine. the vineyards are generally owned by rich proprietors, by whom they are farmed out to the laborer, who pays half the produce when the wine has been pressed; the government first taking its tenth. the grape-vines run along frame-work, raised four or five feet from the ground, so as to allow the cultivator room to weed the stalks beneath. the finest grapes are those which grow upon the sunny side of a wall. at the season of vintage, the grapes are placed in a kind of canoe, where they are first crushed by men's feet (all wines, even the richest and purest, having this original tincture of the human foot), and then pressed by a beam. perhaps the very finest wines in the world are to be found collected at the suppers given by the clerks, in the large mercantile houses of madeira. by an established custom, when one of their corps is about to leave the island, he gives an entertainment, to which every guest contributes a bottle or two of wine. it is a point of honor to produce the best; and as the clerks know, quite as well as their principals, where the best is to be found, and as the honor of their respective houses is to be sustained, it may well be imagined that all the _bon-vivants_ on earth, were they to meet at one table, could hardly produce such a variety of fine old madeira, as the clerks of funchal then sip and descant upon. in no place do mercantile clerks hold so respectable a position in society as here; owing to the tacit understanding between their principals and themselves, that, at some future day, they are to be admitted as partners in the houses. this is so general a rule, that the clerk seems to hold a social position scarcely inferior to that of the head of the establishment. they prove their claim to this high consideration, by the zeal with which they improve their minds and cultivate their manners, in order to fill creditably the places to which they confidently aspire. at my second visit to madeira, i find the wine trade at a very low ebb. the demand from america, owing to temperance, the tariff, and partly to an increased taste for spanish, french, and german wines, is extremely small. not a cargo has been shipped thither for three years. the construction given to the tariff, by the secretary of the treasury, will infuse new life into the trade. the hills around the city of funchal are covered with vineyards, as far up as the grape will grow; then come the fields of vegetables; and the plantations of pine for the supply of the city. the island took its name from the great quantity of wood which overshadowed it, at its first discovery. this being long ago exhausted, considerable attention is paid to the cultivation of the pine-tree, which produces the most profitable kind of wood. in twelve or thirteen years, it is fit for the market, and commands a handsome price. far up the mountains, we saw one plantation, in which fifty or sixty acres had been covered with pines, within a few years; some of the infant trees being only an inch high. thus in the course of a morning's ride, we ascend from the region of the laughing and luxuriant vine, into that of the stately and sombre pine; it is like being transported by enchantment from the genial clime of madeira into the rugged severity of a new england forest. in going up the mountain, the traveller encounters many peasants, both men and women, with bundles of weeds for horses, and sticks for fire-wood, which are carried upon the head. thus laden, they walk several miles, and perhaps sell their burthens for ten or twelve cents apiece. articles cannot easily be conveyed in any other manner, down the steep declivities of the hills. in the city, burthens are drawn by oxen, on little drags, which glide easily over the smooth, round pavements. the driver carries in his hand a long mop without a handle, or what a sailor would term a "wet swab." if any difficulty occur in drawing the load, this moist mop is thrown before the drag, which readily glides over it. the beggars of funchal are numerous and importunate, and many of them wretched enough, as, in one instance, i had occasion to witness. with a friend, i had quitted a ball at two o'clock in the morning. the porter of our hotel, not expecting us at so late an hour, had retired; and, as all the family slept in the back part of the house, we were unable to awaken them by our long and furious knocking. several englishmen occupied the front apartments, but scorned to give themselves any trouble about the matter, except to breathe a slumberous execration against the disturbers of their sleep. on the other hand, our anathemas were louder, and quite as bitter upon these inhospitable inmates. finally, after half an hour's vigorous but ineffectual assault upon the portal, we retreated in despair, and betook ourselves to walk the streets. the night was beautifully clear, but too cool for the enervated frame of an african voyager. we were tired with dancing, and occasionally sat down; but the door-steps were all of stone, and, though we buttoned our coats closely, it was impossible to remain long inactive. near morning, we approached the door of the cathedral, and were about to seat ourselves, when we perceived a person crouching on the spot, and apparently asleep. the slumber was not sound; for when we spoke, a young girl, a mere rose-bud of a woman, about fourteen years of age, arose and answered. she was very thinly clad; and, with her whole frame shivering, the poor thing assumed an airy and mirthful deportment, to attract us. it was grievous to imagine how many nights like this the unhappy girl was doomed to pass, and that all her nights were such, unless when vice and degradation procured her a temporary shelter. ever since that hour, when i picture the pleasant island of madeira, with its sunshine, and its vineyards, and its jovial inhabitants, the shadow of this miserable child glides through the scene. one of the most beautiful houses of worship i have ever seen, is the english church, just outside of the city of funchal. the edifice has no steeple or bells, these being prohibited by the treaty between portugal and great britain, which permits the english protestants to erect churches. you approach it through neat gravel walks, lined with the most brilliant flowers, and these in such magnificent profusion, that the building may be said to stand in the midst of a great flower-garden. the aspect is certainly more agreeable, if not more appropriate, than that of the tombstones and little hillocks which usually surround the sacred edifice; it is one method of rendering the way to heaven a path of flowers. on entering the church, we perceive a circular apartment, lighted by a dome of stained glass. the finish of the interior is perfectly neat, but simple. the organ is fine-toned, and was skilfully played. pleasant it was to see again a church full of well-dressed english--those saxon faces, nearest of kin to our own--and to hear once more the familiar service, after being so long shut out from consecrated walls! sunday is not observed with much strictness, in madeira. on the evening of that day, i called at a friend's house, where thirty or forty persons, all portuguese, were collected, without invitation. music, dancing, and cards, were introduced for the entertainment of the guests. the elder portion sat down to whist; and, in a corner of the large dancing room, one of the gentlemen established a faro-bank, which attracted most of the company to look on, or bet. so much more powerful were the cards than the ladies, that it was found difficult to enlist gentlemen for a single cotillion. after a while, dancing was abandoned, and cards ruled supreme. the married ladies made bets as freely as the gentlemen; and several younger ones, though more reserved, yet found courage to put down their small stakes. i observed one sweet girl of sixteen, standing over the table, and watching the game with intense interest. methought the game within her bosom was for a more serious stake than that upon the table, and better worth the observer's notice. who should win it?--her guardian angel? or the gambling fiend? alas, the latter! she bashfully drew a little purse from her bosom, and put her stake down with the rest. the currency of madeira is principally composed of the old-fashioned twenty cent pieces, called cruzados, which pass at the rate of five for a dollar. payments of thousands of dollars are made in this coin, which, not being profitable to remit, circulates from hand to hand. chapter xii. passage back to liberia--coffee plantations--dinner on shore--character of col. hicks--shells and sentiment--visit to the council chamber--the new georgia representative--a slave-ship--expedition up the st. paul's--sugar manufactory--maumee's beautiful grand-daughter--the sleepy disease--the mangrove-tree. _february_ .--we are on our return to liberia. the ship is destined to cruise along the whole coast, from cape mesurado to the river gaboon, touching at all important and interesting points. it will present the best opportunity yet enjoyed, to observe whatever things worthy of notice the country can present. hourly, as we approach the coast, we perceive the difference in temperature. it is a grateful change, that of winter to summer. last night was as mild as a summer evening at home. i remained on the forecastle till midnight, enjoying the moonlight, the soft air, and the cheerful song of a cricket, which had been, in some manner, brought on board at porto praya, a week ago. he seems to be the merriest of the crew, and now nightly pipes to the forecastle men. our ship slides along almost imperceptibly, yet gets over the sea wonderfully well. she is a noble ship, stiff, fast, and dry. her motion is very easy, and her performance, whether in strong or light breezes, is always excellent. her grating-deck has been taken off, as it made her a little top-heavy and uneasy, and detracted from her speed; and she is infinitely better for the change. _march_ .--anchored at monrovia, in less than eight days from porto praya, although the winds were light, most of the time. several of our kroomen, who left us, two months ago, completely dressed in sailor-rig, came on board with only a hat and a handkerchief, and forthwith proceeded to haul upon the ropes, as before. .--i have been walking through judge benedict's coffee-plantation, from the condition of which i find little encouragement to persons disposed to engage in the business. the trees are certainly not so thrifty, and are apparently less in number than they were three years ago. there is little or no weeding done; consequently, the plantation is overgrown with grass and bushes, and looks as if the forest might, at no distant day, reclaim its children. all the trees have been transplanted from the neighboring woods, and, it is said, do not flourish so well as those raised from seed, in nurseries. general lewis has several thousand coffee-plants growing from the seed, and, in two or three years, will have tested the comparative advantages of this plan. i dined ashore to-day. at the table were a dutchman, a dane, four american officers, and colonel hicks. all, except myself, were good talkers, and composed a delightful dinnerparty. colonel hicks, of whom i have before spoken in this journal, is one of the most shrewd, active and agreeable men in the colony. once a slave in kentucky, and afterwards in new-orleans, he is now a commission-merchant in monrovia, doing a business worth four or five thousand dollars per annum. writing an elegant hand, he uses this accomplishment to the best advantage by inditing letters, on all occasions, to those who can give him business. if a french vessel shows her flag in the harbor, the colonel's krooman takes a letter to the master, written in his native language. if an american man-of-war, he writes in english, offering his services, and naming some person as his intimate friend, who will probably be known on board. then he is so hospitable, and his house always so neat, and his table so good--his lady, moreover, is such a friendly, pleasant-tempered person, and so good-looking, into the bargain--that it is really a fortunate day for the stranger in liberia, when he makes the acquaintance of colonel and mrs. hicks. every day, after the business of the morning is concluded, the colonel dresses for dinner, which appears upon the table at three o'clock. he presides with genuine elegance and taste; his stories are good, and his quotations amusing. to be sure, he occasionally commits little mistakes, such, for instance, as speaking of america as his alma mater; but, on the whole, even without any allowance for a defective education, he appears wonderfully well. one circumstance is too indicative of strong sense, as well as good taste, not to be mentioned;--he is not ashamed of his color, but speaks of it without constraint, and without effort. most colored men avoid alluding to their hue, thus betraying a morbid sensibility upon the point, as if it were a disgraceful and afflicting dispensation. altogether the colonel and his lady make many friends, and are as apparently happy, and as truly respectable as any couple here or elsewhere. coming to the beach, we found no boat; and nearly half an hour passed before one arrived to take us on board. in the interim, i strolled along the shore, picking up the small shells, which the waves had thrown in abundance upon the sand. in the eye of a conchologist, they would have been of little value, as all of them were common, and none possessed more than a single valve. but the purple blush of the interior pleased me; and what is more, i was gathering these trifles for a lady whom i have never seen, yet whom i trust that i may venture to count among my friends. i know that she will be pleased with the poor offering and its giver; for each of these shells is linked with a thought that flew over the sea--from the sunset shore of africa to a fireside in new england--and returned thence to the wanderer, bringing grateful fancies, reminiscences, and hopes. it was a smiling half-hour. .--ashore, and in the council-chamber. it is a spacious apartment on the second floor of the stone building recently erected for the purposes of a legislative hall and court-house. the governor presided, sitting in a high backed rocking-chair; which, by the by, the natives call a "missionary horse." the colonial secretary acted as chief-clerk, and doctor prout, in gold-bowed spectacles, as his assistant. an ungainly lad, with big feet and striped hose, seemed to engross in his own person the offices of door-keeper, sergeant-at-arms, and page. the council proper consisted of ten members, who sat at separate desks, arranged semi-circularly in front of the governor. the spectators occupied rude benches in the rear of the members. the question before the council related to the building of a market-house in monrovia, at the expense of the commonwealth, as proposed in one of the sections of a bill to form a city government. this being a matter of some interest, each member expressed his views, but with such brevity that the whole debate occupied scarcely forty minutes, although several individuals spoke twice. this conciseness was less a virtue of choice than necessity, being attributable chiefly to the fact, that the presiding officer set his face against all vagaries of eloquence, and kept the speakers strictly to the point. if one wandered in the least, he was instantly called to order, and compelled to take his seat, upon the slightest deviation from the rules of the house. one of the members was a wilder specimen of humanity than even our legislative bodies at home have ever presented to an admiring world. he was a re-captured african, representing new georgia, an uncouth figure of a man, who spoke very broken english, with great earnestness, and much to the amusement of his brother counsellors and the audience generally. i regret my inability to preserve either the matter or the manner of so original an orator. here, as in the various other situations in which i have seen him placed, governor roberts acquitted himself as a dignified, manly, and sensible person. deriving his appointment from the society at home, he can act with more independence, in an official capacity, than if indebted to the voices of the members for his position. .--at sea again, on our way to gallenas. .--fell in with the english brig-of-war ferret. our captain went on board, and was told that she had been engaged with a large slaver, four days ago. previous to the action, the slave-ship went to gallenas, where the ferret's pinnace was at anchor. she ran alongside of the boat, with three guns out on a side, and her waist full of musketeers--a superiority of force in view of which the pinnace did not venture to attack her; and the ship took in nine hundred or a thousand slaves, and went off unmolested. at sea, she encountered the ferret, and was fired into repeatedly by that vessel, during the night, but succeeded in making her escape. the slaver was under portuguese colors, and is said to have been formerly the american ship crawford, now owned by spaniards, and bearing a spanish name. .--again came to an anchor at monrovia. .--just returned from an excursion up the st. paul's river. three officers, in company with dr. lugenbeel, left monrovia seasonably in the forenoon, in one of our boats, rowed--and well rowed too--by five kroomen. near the village, we passed from the mesurado river through stockton's creek, seven or eight miles, to the st. paul's. our first landing was at the public farm, where the manufacture of sugar was going on. twelve kroomen (whose power, in this country, is applied to as great a variety of purposes as those of steam and water in our own) were turning the mill by two long levers, walking round and round in one interminable circle, like the horse in an old-fashioned bark-mill. three or four boys fed the mill with cane, which about a score of colonists were employed in cutting and bringing in by small armsfull, from a field in the immediate vicinity. the overseer, mr. moore, and a few other persons, were occupied in boiling the cane-juice. mr. moore informed me that sixteen kroomen were employed on the premises, at three dollars per month, and twenty-five colonists at sixty-two and a half cents a day, besides their food. this year, they make about thirty barrels of sugar (which will cost at least twenty-five cents per pound), and two pipes of molasses. the cane, now in process of manufacture, is very small and unprofitable, all of the larger kind having been already ground. the sugar-house is a wretched building, with a thatched roof, and the sides roughly boarded like a cow-shed. there were four boilers in full bubble, and ten thousand bees in full buzz about the establishment; the insects bidding fair to hoard up more profit than the sugar-manufacturers. mr. moore had accompanied the niger expedition in the capacity of farmer, and resided nine or ten months on the model farm, without undergoing the prevalent sickness. while almost every white man perished, the colored colonists all survived. a large amount of property was left in the charge of mr. moore, and he returned with the expedition to england. as superintendent of the public farm, he now receives from the colonization society a salary of three hundred dollars. leaving the farm, we soon entered the st. paul's, a noble river, which comes rolling onward from the yet unexplored interior of the country. following its course a mile or more towards the sea, we arrived at maumee's town, a village of thirty or forty huts, where a considerable slave-trade was carried on, until broken up by the colonists under governor ashman. old maumee still resides here, and cherishes a bitter hatred against the liberians, and all americans and englishmen, as having caused the ruin of her profitable commerce. the old hag was not now at home, having obeyed the custom of the country by retiring to a more secluded spot, for the purpose of nursing a sick granddaughter. the persons who remained were quite uninteresting. the only noticeable group was composed of two women, one lying flat on her face, with her head in the other's lap. her hair being combed out as straight as the tenacity of its curls would allow, her friend was arranging it in that fine braid with which it is customary to cover the head. having procured a guide, we crossed the river, and, at the mouth of logan's creek, exchanged our boat for a large canoe, in which we followed the windings of the deep and narrow inlet for nearly two miles. this brought us to a village of six huts. without ceremony, we entered the dwelling of the old queen (who was busied about her household affairs), and looked around for her grand-daughter, to see whom was the principal object of our excursion. on my former visit to maumee's town, four or five months ago, this girl excited a great deal of admiration by her beauty and charming simplicity. she was then thirteen or fourteen years of age, a bright mulatto, with large and soft black eyes, and the most brilliantly white teeth in the world. her figure, though small, is perfectly symmetrical. she is the darling of the old queen, whose affections exhaust themselves upon her with all the passionate fire of her temperament--and the more unreservedly, because the girl's own mother is dead. we entered the hut, as i have said, without ceremony, and looked about us for the beautiful grand-daughter. but, on beholding the object of our search, a kind of remorse or dread came over us, such as often affects those who intrude upon the awfulness of slumber. the girl lay asleep in the adjoining apartment on a mat that was spread over the hard ground, and with no pillow beneath her cheek. one arm was by her side--the other above her head--and she slept so quietly, and drew such imperceptible breath, that i scarcely thought her alive. with some little difficulty she was roused, and awoke with a frightened cry--a strange and broken murmur--as if she were looking dimly out of her sleep, and knew not whether our figures were real, or only the phantasies of a dream. her eyes were wild and glassy, and she seemed to be in pain. while awake, there was a nervous twitching about her mouth and in her fingers; but, being again extended on the mat, and left to herself, these symptoms of disquietude passed away; and she almost immediately sank again into the deep and heavy sleep, in which we found her. as her eyes gradually closed their lids, the sunbeams, struggling through the small crevices between the reeds of the hut, glimmered down about her head. perhaps it was only the nervous motion of her fingers; but it seemed as if she were trying to catch the golden rays of the sun and make playthings of them--or else to draw them into her soul, and illuminate the slumber that looked so misty and dark to us. this poor, doomed girl had been suffering--no, not suffering, for, except when forcibly aroused, there appears to be no uneasiness--but she had been lingering two months in a disease peculiar to africa. it is called the "sleepy disease," and is considered incurable. the persons attacked by it are those who take little exercise, and live principally on vegetables, particularly cassady and rice. some ascribe it altogether to the cassady, which is supposed to be strongly narcotic. not improbably, the climate has much influence, the disease being most prevalent in low and marshy situations. irresistible drowsiness continually weighs down the patient, who can be kept awake only for the few moments needful to take a little food. when this lethargy has lasted three or four months, death comes--with a tread that the patient cannot hear, and makes the slumber but a little more sound. i found the aspect of maumee's beautiful grand-daughter inconceivably affecting. it was strange to behold her so quietly involved in sleep--from which it might be supposed she would awake so full of youthful life--and yet to know that this was no refreshing slumber, but a spell in which she was fading away from the eyes that loved her. whatever might chance, be it grief or joy, the effect would be the same. whoever should shake her by the arm--whether the accents of a friend fell feebly on her ear, or those of strangers, like ourselves, the only response would be that troubled cry, as of a spirit that hovered on the confines of both worlds, and could have sympathy with neither. and yet, withal, it seemed so easy to cry to her--"awake! enjoy your life! cast off this noon-tide slumber!" but only the peal of the last trumpet will summon her out of that mysterious sleep. on our return, we passed under the branches of the mangrove tree, and pulled some of the long fruit or seed. this singular seed is about fifteen or sixteen inches long, and in its greatest diameter not more than an inch. it is round, heavy, and pointed at both ends. when ripe, it detaches itself from a sort of acorn, to which the smaller end has been firmly joined, and falls with sufficient force to implant itself deeply in the mud. after a few days, it begins to shoot, and soon becomes a tall mangrove. this tree has many strings to its bow; for, while the seed is growing, as here described, the branches send down slender and cord-like shoots, perhaps thirty feet long, and less than an inch in thickness. these strike into the mud, and aid in giving sustenance to the tree. thus the mangrove presents the appearance of a large tree, supported by hundreds of lesser trunks, standing so thickly together as to be impassable for even small animals. therein it differs from the tree described by milton, to which it otherwise seems to bear an analogy:-- "in the ground the bended twigs take root, and daughters grow about the mother-tree, a pillar'd shade, high overarched, and echoing walks between!" returning to the ship, we found it lighted up, and the theatre about to open. the scenery has been much improved, since the last performance, and the actors are more perfect in their parts. chapter xiii. the theatre--tribute to governor buchanan--arrival at settra kroo--jack purser--the mission-school--cleanliness of the natives--uses of the palm-tree--native money--mrs. sawyer--influence of her character on the natives--characteristics of english merchant-captains--trade of england with the african coast. _march_ .--the scenery of the theatre having been damaged by the rain, the other night, it is spread out to dry, and will be re-painted. much interest is felt in the drama, and the exertions of the performers are rewarded with full houses nightly. some of the actors have evidently trodden other boards than these. among two hundred men, many of whom have led wild and dissipated lives on shore, it is easy to suppose that enough are familiar with the theatre in front of the curtain, and a few behind it. thus a tolerable company has been collected, needing only a few female recruits to render it perfect. the dresses and scenery were procured by general subscription, and are showy as well as appropriate; and many a manager might deem himself fortunate to engage the whole corps, with wardrobe and decorations included, for a summer campaign. on board ship, our buskined heroes are of more importance than booth, forrest, or macready ashore, as affording amusement to a set of fellows who would have precious little of it, without this resource. .--at p.m. up anchor for the leeward, and stand off with a good breeze. .--we have passed bassa cove, merely sending in some letters by a kroo-canoe, which boarded us. a considerable settlement of colonists is established here. many of their houses are visible along the shore, while two smaller villages, in the immediate vicinity, are concealed by the woods. the bar at this place has a bad reputation; several boats having been swamped in passing it. in , ten persons, including a midshipman and purser's clerk, were drowned here, by the capsizing of a boat belonging to the frigate potomac. at bassa cove, in , died thomas buchanan, governor of liberia; a man who has identified his name with the existence of the colony, by his successful exertions to promote its strength and respectability. no other person had done so much to impress the natives with awe and respect for the colonists, and to give liberia an independent position in the eyes of foreigners. a year before his death, it was my good fortune to be a shipmate of this great and excellent man; for great and excellent i do not hesitate to call him, although the remoteness of his sphere of action has left his name comparatively obscure. like all who came in contact with him, i was deeply impressed with his pure, high, determined, and chivalric character. in a grove, near the village, he selected a spot for his burial; and there rest the remains of a finished gentleman, an accomplished scholar, a fearless soldier, a wise legislator, an ardent philanthropist, and a sincere christian. so long as liberia shall have a history, governor buchanan will be remembered in it. honor to his ashes! .--sunday. no service to-day, in consequence of a heavy rain, which commenced at nine in the morning, and continued till one in the afternoon. in the evening, four or five miles from land, we were boarded by the mate of an english brig, at anchor off grand botton. he seemed a well-disposed, off-hand man, telling us, among other things, that he had run away from the u.s. schooner enterprise, in the pacific ocean, four years ago. this was rather a hazardous communication to make, on the deck of a national vessel; and it so happened that one of our lieutenants was in the enterprise, at the time referred to, and remembered the circumstance and the man. however, as he had put confidence in us, we did not molest him. .--anchored at settra kroo. .--ashore, and dined upon roasted oysters, in a native hut. a large, shrewd krooman, jack purser by name, seems to be the most important private individual here. he is the great tradesman of the place, and very accommodating in his mode of transacting business. we saw a specimen of his dealings with the natives. being told that we wanted wood, he sent intelligence through the town; and, directly, many women and girls flocked to his house, each with a bundle of wood upon her head, which she deposited near the door. after twenty or thirty loads had been brought, jack purser came forth with a bundle of tobacco under his arm, and threw the price of each load upon the wood, one, two, or three leaves of tobacco, according to its size. there was no haggling, as is invariably the case when a white man is the customer, but all assented to the decision of the trademan. jack purser is a man of fortune, if the number of his wives, twenty-nine, be a criterion. i saw a native doctor making his "greegree," or charm, for rain. there were two large mortars, with leaves, bark, and roots, in each, and a long vine extending from one to the other. into these mortars he poured water, until it ran over. .--dined on shore, at mrs. sawyer's. the repast consisted of bits of mutton in palm-butter, mutton roasted, rice, palm-cabbage, chicken, and papaw, with coffee, but no wine. there are thirty children in the mission-school, mostly boys, who show considerable aptitude for learning. it is an obstacle in the way of educating girls, that many of them are betrothed before entering school, and, just when their progress begins to be satisfactory, their husbands claim them and take them away. mr. wilson adopted the plan of taking the pair of betrothed ones; and, after pursuing their studies in unison (doubtless including the conjugation of the verb, to love), they left the school together. one of the scholars, a little fellow called robert soutter, took a strange fancy to me, and followed everywhere at my heels, expressing a strong wish to accompany me to big america. when we returned to the ship, he actually jumped into the boat, without saying a word, and came off, ready for the voyage. to be sure, there were few preparations requisite to rig him out. a handkerchief about his loins comprised all the earthly goods of robert soutter. the houses at settra kroo are often two stories high, with piazzas round the whole. the entrance to the upper story is by a ladder from without. like other native houses, they are built with bamboo, and thatched. there being a war with other portions of the kroo-people, the beachmen have been obliged to plant cassada in the town itself, instead of the neighboring fields. hence high fences are necessary to keep out the cattle; and these, being irregular, make it a kind of labyrinth for a stranger. the place is one of the best on the coast for watering ships, in the dry season. a large stream of sweet and clear water runs through a grove of palm-trees, to the sea. hither come all the women of the village, in the old scriptural fashion, with the water-jar, holding three or four gallons, on the head. the consumption of water by the natives is very great. whether it be part of their religious ritual, i know not--although cleanliness is in itself a religion--but the whole population wash themselves from head to foot, at least twice a day, in fresh water, when to be procured. these naked people, however, are as much averse as ourselves to being wet by the rain; and every man of consequence has his umbrella, to protect him both from sun and shower. palm-trees are more abundant here, than in any place which i have visited on the coast. no tree, as has been said a thousand times, is so useful as the palm. it gives a good shade, and is pleasing as an ornamental tree. the palm-nut is very palatable and nutritious for food, and likewise affords oil, the kernel as well as the pulpy substance being available for that purpose. palm-wine is the sap of the tree; and its top furnishes a most delicious dish, called palm-cabbage. the trunk supplies fire-wood, and timber for building fences. from the fibres of the wood is manufactured a strong cordage, and a kind of native cloth; and the leaves, besides being used for thatching houses, are converted into hats. if nature had given the inhabitants of africa nothing else, this one gift of the palm-tree would have included food, drink, clothing, and habitation, and the gratuitous boon of beauty, into the bargain. i have procured some of the country-money. it is more curious than convenient. the "manilly," worth a dollar and a half, would be a fearful currency to make large payments in, being composed of old brass kettles, melted up, and cast in a sand-mould. the weight is from two to four pounds; so that the circulation of this country may be said to rest upon a pretty solid metallic basis. the "buyapart," valued at twenty-five cents, is a piece of cloth four inches square, covered thickly over with the small shells called cowries, sewed on. the other currency consists principally in such goods as have an established value. brass kettles, cotton handkerchiefs, tobacco, guns, and kegs of powder, are legal tender. [footnote: specimens of the native money have been presented by the author to the national institute at washington.] .--mrs. sawyer was on board yesterday. it is not without regret that we part with this interesting, energetic, and truly christian woman. she is the only white person here, and lives alone among a tribe of savages, as safe, and perhaps more so, than in a civilized city. the occasional visits of vessels of war prevent any evil-minded person from molesting her; but she has little need of guardianship of this nature; for her own kind acts, and purity of character, will always ensure her the respect of the natives. mrs. s. told us, that, before her husband died, the war-king of the settra kroos had quarrelled with him, and was his enemy at the time of his death. not long afterwards, this war-king came to mrs. sawyer, and assured her of his protection and assistance to the utmost of his power, which is very great, as he commands all the fighting-men of the tribe. i know not that the power of feminine excellence has ever been more strikingly acknowledged, than by this act of an incensed and barbarous warrior. somewhat of her influence, as well as that of the missionaries generally, is probably owing to her color. many of the natives look with contempt on the colonists, and do not hesitate to tell them that they are merely liberated slaves. on the other hand, the colonists will never recognize the natives otherwise than as heathen. amalgamation is scarcely more difficult between the white and colored races in america, than it is in africa, between the "black-white" colonist and the unadulterated native. on our arrival here, we found an english brig, whose commander has been once on board of us. he has a large assortment of trade-goods of all sorts, and his vessel is fitted up with a view to comfort in living, as well as the convenience of trade. a native colored woman has her residence on board, as his washerwoman and stewardess, and likewise, if the captain be not belied, in a more intimate relation. to-day, also, came in another english brig, the master of which has a female companion, filling the same variety of offices as the former. many of the english trading vessels retain such persons on board, during the whole time they are on the coast. the masters, so far as we have had opportunity to observe, have generally been hard-drinking unscrupulous men. few of them hesitate to avow their readiness to furnish slavers with goods, equally with any other purchasers, if they can make their profit, and get their pay. there is great jealousy among the traders, and much underhand work to get the business from each other. they have native trade-men in their interest, all along the coast, watching their rivals, and preparing to take any advantage that may offer. profound secrecy is observed as to their movements and intentions. the crews of some vessels are seldom allowed to visit the shore, lest they should give information about the affairs of the master. not a few of the reports about american slavers spring from this jealousy of trade. the masters of english merchant-vessels, jealous of the americans, and desirous to engross the trade to themselves, report them to the british cruisers as suspicious vessels. the cruiser, if he give too ready credence to the calumny, will probably overhaul the american, and perhaps break up his voyage; he being, nevertheless, as honest as any trader on the coast. but the ends of the englishman are answered; he sells his cargo, and cares little about the diplomatic correspondence that may ensue, and the possible embroilment of the two nations. english vessels far outnumber all others on the coast. dr. madden, the commissioner to examine the condition of the british colonial settlements, reports the total imports into england from the west coast of africa, in , at £ , . in , the exports of british products to africa amounted to £ , , in the transportation of which, , tons of shipping were employed. the government and people of england are giving great attention to this coast, as an important theatre of trade. a committee of the house of commons, in , made extensive and minute inquiries into the subject, and published a great mass of interesting information. they recommended, that the crown should resume the jurisdiction of several forts, on the gold coast, which have been given up to a committee of merchants; and that there be new settlements established, and block-houses erected at various points. the english have lost the gum-trade, by the french subsidizing the king of the trazars, who holds the key to the gum-country; and the mahogany-trade has been destroyed by that of honduras, the wood from which is of a better quality. the experiment on the part of the english, of carrying african rice to compete with that of america, has likewise failed. the subject of american trade with the west of africa is so important, that it may be well to devote a separate chapter to some account of its nature, and the methods of carrying it on. chapter xiv. american trade--mode of advertising, and of making sales--standard of commercial integrity--dealings with slave-traders--trade with the natives--king's "dash"--native commission-merchants--the gold trade-the ivory trade--the "round trade"--respectability of american merchant-captains--trade with the american squadron. more vessels come to the coast of africa from salem than from any other port in the united states; although new york, boston, and providence, all have their regular traders. some of these trade chiefly to gambia or sierra leone; others to gallinas, monrovia and down the coast, touching at different points. others, again, go to the gaboon river, and the islands of princes and st. thomas; and some stretch still farther south, to benguela, and beyond. most american vessels bring provisions, such as flour, ship-bread, beef, pork, and hams, which are bought chiefly by the european or american colonists. the natives, however, are yearly acquiring a taste for them. the market being often overstocked, this part of the trade is precarious. other exports are furniture, boots and shoes, wooden clocks, and all articles of american manufacture, or such as are used among civilized men. all the vessels bring new england rum, leaf-tobacco, powder, guns, large brass pans, and cotton cloth. on these points, a great deal of correct information has been given by dr. hall, and may be found in some of the numbers of the african repository. the mode of trading has some peculiarities. on arriving at a civilized settlement, the captain sends his "list" ashore to some resident merchant. this list contains a schedule of his cargo, with the prices of each article annexed, and the kind of pay required. some take only cash. most vessels, however, take the productions of the country at a stipulated price; for instance, camwood at, say, sixty dollars per ton, palm-oil, at twenty-five to thirty-three cents per gallon, ivory, ground or peanuts, gold dust, and gum. at the cape de verd islands, salt, goat-skins, and hides, are the chief commodities received in exchange; at gambia, hides; at monrovia, cape palmas, and other settlements in liberia, camwood and palm-oil are the great staples. there is likewise some ivory, but not in large quantity. on the gold coast, the trade is in gold-dust and palm-oil; at the gaboon, in ivory and gold-dust,--and at benguela, in gum. the "list" being put up conspicuously in the merchant's store (such being the method of advertising in liberia, where the newspapers are not made use of, for this purpose), the traders, purchasers, and idlers, come to see what is for sale. the store becomes, for the time being, the public exchange of the settlement, where people assemble, not merely with commercial views, but to hear the intelligence from abroad, and to diffuse it thence throughout the country. in due time, the captain comes on shore with his samples, and individual purchasers bargain for what they want. the captain receives payment, whether in cash or commodities, and weighs the camwood, or measures the palm-oil, at the merchant's store. if credit be given, the merchant is responsible, and receives a perquisite of five per cent on all sales. the captain takes up his residence on shore, and sends for goods from his vessel, as they are wanted; while the mate and crew remain on board, to despatch and receive the cargo. every vessel has in its employ several kroomen, by whom all the boat-service is performed. when the demand for goods appears to have ceased, the captain either takes his unsold cargo away, or leaves a portion to be disposed of in his absence, and sets sail for another settlement. here the same process is gone through with, and so on, until the cargo is sold. the captain then turns back, touching at the several places where he has left goods, to receive the proceeds, and thence home to america, for a new cargo. regular traders have numerous orders to fill up, from persons resident on the coast; taking care, of course, to allow themselves a good profit for their trouble and freight. the trade with the colonists is easy and sufficiently plain; the only difficulty being the somewhat essential one of obtaining payment. colonial traders, in abundance, are eager to buy on credit; but, possessing little or no capital, they often fail to satisfy their obligations at the period assigned--if, indeed, they ever pay at all. commercial integrity is not here of so high an order as in older countries, where the great body of merchants have established a standard of rectitude, which individuals must not venture to transgress. another large branch of business is at places where the slave-trade is carried on; as at gallinas and wydah. here, provisions, guns, powder, cotton cloths, and other goods, suitable for the purchase or subsistence of slaves, are sold at good prices for cash, or bills of exchange. the bills of pedro blanco, the notorious slave-dealer at gallinas, on an eminent spanish house in new york, and another in london, are taken as readily as cash. a large number of the vessels engaged in the african trade, whether english or american, do a considerable part of their business either with the slavers, or with natives settled at the slave-marts, and who, from their connection with the trade, have plenty of money. some of the large english houses give orders to their captains and supercargoes not to traffic with men reputed to be slave-dealers; but, if a purchaser come with money in his hand, and offer liberal prices, it requires a tenderer conscience and sterner integrity than are usually met with, on the coast of africa, to resist the temptation. the merchant at home, possibly, is supposed to know nothing of all this. it is quite an interesting moral question, however, how far either old or new england can be pronounced free from the guilt and odium of the slave trade, while, with so little indirectness, they both share its profits and contribute essential aid to its prosecution. the method of trade with the natives is more tedious than that with the colonists, and differs entirely in its character. on anchoring at a trade-place, it is necessary, first of all, to pay the king his "dash," or present, varying in value from twenty dollars to seven or eight hundred. such sums as the latter are paid only by ships of eight hundred or a thousand tons,--and in the great rivers, as bonny or calebar. the "dash" may be considered as equivalent to the duties levied on foreign imports, in civilized countries; and doubtless, as in those cases, the trader remunerates himself by an enhanced price upon his merchandize. the king being "dashed" to his satisfaction, trade commences. the canoes bring off the articles which the natives have for sale; and the goods of the vessel are exhibited in return. at first, it is a slow process; either party offering little for the commodity of the other, and asking much for his own. but, in a few days, prices becoming established on both sides, business grows brisk, and flags only when one party has little more to exchange. native agents are employed by the stranger; some being kroomen attached to the vessel, and others trade-men, inhabiting the native towns. these men, in addition to their small regular pay, continually receive presents, which are necessary in order to excite their activity and zeal. there is still another mode of trading, resorted to by many masters of vessels. they entrust quantities of goods--varying in value from a trifling sum up to a thousand dollars, or even more--to native trade-men. with these, or part of them, the trade-man goes into the interior, makes trade with the bushmen, and brings the proceeds to his employer. these native agents are sometimes trusted with large amounts, for several months together, and not unfrequently give their principal great trouble in collecting his dues. their families, to be sure, are held responsible, and the king is bound to enforce payment. nevertheless, if so disposed, they can procrastinate, and finally cheat their creditor out of his debt; especially as the vessel cannot remain long upon the coast, awaiting the king's tardy methods of compulsion. on the gold coast, each vessel employs a native who is called its "gold-taker," and is skilful in detecting spurious metal. the gold-dust is brought for sale, wrapped up in numerous coverings, to avoid waste. it is tested by acids; or, more commonly, by rubbing the gold on the "black-stone," when the color of the mark, which it leaves upon the stone, decides the character of the metal. the gold, after its weight has been ascertained, is put by the captain into little barrels, holding perhaps half a pint, and with the top screwing tightly on. this "glittering dust" (to use the phrase which moralists are fond of applying to worldly pelf), commands from sixteen to eighteen dollars per ounce, in england and the united states. it is gathered from the sands which the rivers of africa wash down from the golden mountains; and, when offered for sale, small lumps of gold and rudely manufactured rings are sometimes found among the dust--ornaments that have perhaps been worn by sable monarchs, or their sultanas, in the interior of the country. in the ivory trade, small teeth (comprising all that weigh less than twenty pounds) are considered to be worth but half the price, per pound, that is paid for large teeth. from fifty cents to a dollar is the ordinary value of a pound of ivory. some large teeth sell for a hundred dollars, or even a hundred and fifty. the sale of such a gigantic tusk, as may well be supposed, is considered an affair of almost national importance, and the bargain can only be adjusted through the medium of a "big palaver." the trade in ivory is now on the decline; the demand in england and france not being so great as formerly, and america never having presented a good market for the article. palm-oil is brought from the interior, on the heads of the natives, in calabashes, containing two or three gallons each. in speaking of the interior, however, a comparatively short distance from the coast is to be understood. gold, where great value is concentrated into small bulk, and some ivory, may occasionally come from remote regions; but the vast inland tracts of the african continent have little to do, either directly or indirectly, with the commerce of the civilized world. in dealing with the natives, there was formerly a system much in vogue, but now going out of use, called the "round trade." the method was, to offer one of each article; for instance, one gun, one cutlass, one flint, one brass kettle, one needle, and so on, from the commodity of greatest value down to the least. in all traffic there is a desire on the part of the native to obtain as great a variety as his means will compass. if the native commodity on sale be valuable, the captain offers two or more of his guns, cutlasses, flints, brass kettles, and needles; if it be small, and of trifling value, he perhaps exhibits only a flint and a needle as an equivalent. the native of course tries to get the most valuable, and the purchaser to pay the least. if the former demand a piece of cloth, and if it be refused by the captain, the native then asks what he will "room" it with. the captain, it may be, proposes to substitute a needle; and, after much talk, the troublesome bargain is thus brought to a point. english vessels usually have supercargoes; the americans are seldom so provided. but the american captains, on the other hand, are respectable, intelligent, and trustworthy men, almost without exception. the exigencies of the trade require such men; and any defect, either of capacity or integrity, would soon be brought to light by the onerous duties and responsibilities imposed upon them. great latitude must be allowed them, or the voyage cannot be expected to turn out profitably. they perform the double duty of master and supercargo, and perhaps with the more success, as there can be no disunion or difference of judgment. these captains are likewise often part owners of vessel and cargo. since the african coast has been made the cruising ground of an american squadron, the merchantmen have brought out stores, with the expectation of disposing of them to the ships of war. some of these speculations have turned out very profitable; but now, when the government understands and has made provisions for the wants of the station, this market is not to be relied upon. to the officers, indeed, there is a chance, though by no means a certainty, of selling mess-stores. the prices charged by merchantmen correspond with the scarcity of the article, and are sometimes enormous. i have known nine dollars a barrel asked for irish, or rather yankee potatoes, and have paid my share for a small quantity, at that rate. to those who see this vegetable daily on their tables, it may seem strange that men should value a potatoe five times as highly as an orange. after eating yams and cassada, however, for months together, one learns how to appreciate a mealy potatoe, the absence of which cannot be compensated by the most delicious of tropical fruits. adam's fare in paradise might have been much improved, had eve known how to boil potatoes; nor, perhaps, would the fatal apple have been so tempting. chapter xv. jack purser's wife--fever on board--arrival at cape palmas--strange figure and equipage of a missionary--king george of grand bassam--intercourse with the natives--tahon--grand drewin--st. andrew's--picaninny lahoo--natives attacked by the french--visit of king peter--sketches of scenery and people at cape labon. _march_ .--got under way, at daylight, and stood down the coast. i recollect nothing else, at settra kroo, that requires description, unless it be the person and garb of a native lady of fashion. sitting with my friend jack purser, yesterday, a young woman came up, with a pipe in her mouth. a cloth around her loins, dyed with gay colors, composed her whole drapery, leaving her figure as fully exposed as the most classic sculptor could have wished. it is to be observed, however, that the sable hue is in itself a kind of veil, and takes away from that sense of nudity which would so oppress the eye, were a woman of our own race to present herself so scantily attired. the native lady in question was tall, finely shaped, and would have been not a little attractive, but for the white clay with which she had seen fit to smear her face and bosom. around her ankles were many rows of blue beads, which also encircled her leg below the knee, thus supplying the place of garters, although stockings were dispensed with. her smile was pleasant, and her disposition seemed agreeable; and, certainly, if the rest of jack purser's wives (for this was one of the nine-and-twenty) be so well-fitted to make him happy, the sum total of his conjugal felicity must be enormous! .--sunday. an oppressively hot day. there are three new cases of fever, making fourteen in all, besides sixteen or seventeen of other complaints. there is some apprehension that we are to have general sickness on board. _april_ .--off cape palmas. a canoe being sent ashore, returned with a letter from the rev. mr. hazlehurst, stating that two missionaries wish for a passage to the gaboon, and making so strong an appeal that the captain's sympathies could not resist it. so we run in and anchor. .--went ashore in the gig, and amused myself by reading the newspapers at the governor's, while the captain rode out to the mission establishment, at mount vaughan. during my stay, one of the new missionaries, a native of kentucky, came in from mount vaughan, and rode up to the government house, in country style. he was in a little wagon, drawn by eight natives, and sat bolt upright, with an umbrella over his head. the maligners of the priesthood, in all ages and countries, have accused them of wishing to ride on the necks of the people; but i never before saw so nearly literal an exemplification of the fact. in its metaphorical sense, indeed, i should be very far from casting such an imputation upon the zealous and single-minded missionary before me. he is a man of eminent figure, at least six feet and three inches high, with a tremendous nose, vast in its longitude and depth, but wonderfully thin across the edge. it was curious to meet, in africa, a person so strongly imbued with the peculiarities of his section of our native land; for his manner had the real western swing, and his dialect was more marked than is usual among educated men. with a native audience, however, this is a matter of no moment. we were told that the roman catholics are about to leave cape palmas, and establish branches of their mission at the different french stations on the coast, under the patronage of louis philippe. the presbyterians have all gone to the gaboon river. the episcopal mission pines at cape palmas, and will probably be removed. the discord between its members and the colonial government continues with unabated bitterness. mr. hazlehurst regrets that the missionaries were identified with the colonists, in our great palaver with the four-and-twenty kings and headmen, at cape palmas. he believes, that, in case of any outbreak of the natives, the missionaries on the out stations would fall the first victims. his sentiments, it must be admitted, are such as it behoves a minister of religion to entertain, in so far as he would repudiate military force as an agent for sustaining the cause of missions. we sailed at noon for the leeward without the missionaries, who declined taking passage, as it is doubtful whether the ship will proceed beyond cape coast castle. we have now fifteen cases of fever, most of them mild in character. the prospect of sickness will cut short our leeward cruise. .--off tahoo. the natives have come on board, with fowls, ivory, and monkey-skins, to "make trade." tobacco is the article chiefly sought for in exchange. a large canoe came off, with a small english flag displayed, and a native in regimentals standing erect; a most unusual and inconvenient posture to be maintained in a canoe. mounting the ship's side, he proved to be no less a man than king george of grand bassam. his majesty wore a military frock trimmed with yellow, two worsted epaulettes on his shoulders, and an english hussar-cap on his head, with the motto fulgor et honos. a cloth around his loins completed his heterogeneous equipment. in the canoe was a small bullock, tied by the feet, together with several ducks, chickens, kids, and plantains. the bullock and one duck were presented to the captain by way of "dash;" always the most expensive mode of procuring provisions, for, unless you dash the donor to at least an equal extent, he will certainly importune you for more. king george remarked that the other articles in the canoe belonged to the boys, and were for sale. they refused to sell them, however, until the king, after eating and drinking his fill in the cabin, went out, and engaged in the traffic at once. the liquor brought out his real character; and this royal personage scolded and haggled like a private trader, and a sharp one too. having sold his stock, and received much more than its value, his majesty thought it not beneath his station to beg, and thus obtain divers odd things for his wardrobe and larder. when he could get no more, he finally took his leave, carrying off the remains of the food which had been set before him, without so much as an apology. we have been running along that portion of the coast, where, three months ago, we burned the native towns. no attempt has yet been made to rebuild them, for fear of a second hostile visit from the ships; but the natives have indirectly applied to the commodore for permission to do so, and it will probably be granted, on their pledging themselves to good behavior. .--at anchor off grand berebee. all day, the ship has been thronged with natives. they are civil at first, but almost universally display a bad trait of character, by altering their manners for the worse, in proportion to the kindness shown them. as they acquire confidence, they become importunate, and almost impudent. every canoe brings something to sell. it is amusing to see these people paddling alongside with two or three chickens tied round their necks, and hanging down their backs, with an occasional flutter that shows them to be yet alive. some of the kings hold umbrellas over their heads; rather, one would suppose, as a mark of dignity, than from a tender regard to their complexions. these umbrellas were afterwards converted into bags, to hold the bread which they received. the weather has been cooler for two days, and the fever-patients are fast improving. .--this morning, our visitors of yesterday, and many more, came alongside, but only persons of distinction were admitted on board. nevertheless, they suffice to crowd the deck. a war-canoe, with a king in it, paddled round the ship twice, all the men working for dear life, by way, i suppose, of contrasting their naval force with our own. all our guests, of whatever rank, come to trade or to beg; and it is curious to see how essentially their estimation of money differs from our own. coin is almost unknown in the traffic of the coast, and it is only those who have been at sierra leone, or some of the colonial settlements, who are aware of its value. one "cut money," or quarter of a dollar, is the smallest coin of which most of the natives have any idea. this is invariably the price of a fowl, when money is offered; but a head of tobacco or a couple of fish-hooks would be preferred. empty bottles find a ready market. yesterday, i "dashed" three or four great characters with a bottle each; all choosing ale or porter bottles in preference to an octagonal-sided one, used by "j. wingrove and co." of london, in putting up their "celebrated raspberry vinegar." the chiefs must have consulted about it afterwards; for, this morning, no less than three kings and a governor, begged, as a great favor, that i would give them that particular bottle, and were sadly disappointed, on learning that it had been paid away for a monkey-skin. no other bottle would console them. after the traffic is over, the begging commences; and they prove themselves artful as well as persevering mendicants. sometimes they make an appeal to your social affections; "massa, i be your friend!" the rascal has never seen you before, and would cut your throat for a pound of tobacco. another seeks to excite your compassion: "my heart cry for a bottle of rum!" and no honest toper, who has felt what that cry is, can refuse his sympathy, even if he withhold the liquor. a third applicant addresses himself to your noble thirst for fame. "suppose you dash me, i take your name ashore, and make him live there!" and certainly a deathless name, at the price of an empty bottle or a head of tobacco, is a bargain that even a yankee would not scorn. .--we passed tahoo in the night, and are now running along a more beautiful country. the land is high and woody, unlike the flat and marshy tracts that skirt the shores to windward. these are the highlands of drewin. the ship has been full of grand drewin people, who come to look about them, to beg, and to dispose of fowls, ducks, cocoa-nuts, and small canoes. they are the most noisy set of fellows on the coast. . we left grand drewin, and anchored at st. andrew's, six miles distant. the inhabitants, being at war with those of grand drewin, do not come off to us, apprehending that their enemies are concealed behind the ship. these tribes have been at war more than a year, and have made two expeditions, resulting in the death of two men on one side and three on the other. the army of grand drewin, having slain three, boasts much of its superior valor. it must be owned, that the absurdity of war, as the ultimate appeal of nations, becomes rather strikingly manifest, by being witnessed on a scale so ridiculously minute. .--a message having been sent in to inform the king of our character, three or four canoes came off to us. the inhabitants have little to sell compared with those of grand drewin. indian corn, which does not flourish so well to windward, has been offered freely at both places, in the ear. i went ashore, in company with four other officers. the bar is difficult, and, in rough weather, must be dangerous. a broad bay opens on your sight, as soon as the narrow and rocky mouth of the river is passed. two large streams branch off, and lose themselves among the high trees upon their banks. a number of cocoa-nut trees, on the shore, made a thick shade for fifteen or twenty soldiers, who loitered about, or sat, or lay at length upon the ground, watching against the approach of the enemy. some held muskets in their hands; others had rested their weapons against the trunks of the trees. we were first conducted to the residence of king queah, who received us courteously, regaled us with palm-wine, and inflicted a duck upon us by way of "dash." the wine, in a capacious gourd, was brought out, and placed in the centre of the large open space, where we sat. the king, his headman, and his son, all drank first, in order to prove that the liquor was not poisonous; a ceremony which makes one strongly sensible of being among people, who have no very conscientious regard for human life. the mug was then refilled, and passed to us. on the walls of the house there were fresco-paintings, evidently by a native artist, rudely representing persons and birds. the most prominent figures were the king, seated in a chair, and seven wives standing in a row before him, most of them with pipes in their mouths. black, red, and white, were apparently the only colors that the painter's palette supplied. the groundwork was the natural color of the clay, which had been plastered upon the wall of wicker-work. there seem to be two crowned heads at this place, reminding one of the two classic kings of brentford; for, after leaving king queah, we were led to the house of another sovereign, styled king george. the frequent occurrence of this latter name, indicates the familiarity between the natives and the english. his majesty received us in state; that is to say, chairs were placed for the visitors, and the king, with a black hat on his head, looked dignified. i was so fortunate as to make a favorable impression on his principal wife, by means of an empty bottle and a head of tobacco, which she was pleased to accept at my hands in the most gracious manner. though probably fifty years of age, she had beautified herself, and concealed the touch of time by streaks of soot carefully laid on over her face and body. the houses of each family are enclosed within bamboo walls, sometimes to the number of eight or ten huts in one of these insulated hamlets. they are generally wretched hovels, and of the simplest construction, merely a thatched roof, like a permanent umbrella, with no lower walls, and no ends. altogether, the dwellings and their inhabitants looked miserable enough. the tribe has the reputation of being treacherous and cruel, and the aspect of the people is in accordance with their character. i purchased a man's cloth, of native manufacture. it is said to be made of the bark of a tree, pounded together so as to be strong and durable. i also procured a hank of fine white fibre of the pine-apple leaf. of this material the natives make strong and beautiful fishing-lines, and other cords. before being twisted it has the appearance of hemp. .--we anchored, last evening, at picaninny lahoo. only one canoe has come off to us. the natives are shy of all strange vessels, in consequence of a french man-of-war having fired upon one of the neighboring towns, a few days since. it seems that a french merchant-barque was wrecked here, by running ashore. the master saved his gold and personal property, and he and the crew were kindly treated; but the vessel and cargo were plundered, in accordance with the custom of the african coast, as well as of countries that boast more of their civilisation. nevertheless, the captain of the french man-of-war demanded restitution, and kept up a fire upon the town for several successive days. an english merchant-vessel, lying there at the time, protested against the cannonade, and threatened to report the french captain to lord stanley!--on the plea that his measures of hostility prevented the natives from engaging in trade. in fact, these masters of english merchant-vessels would probably consider the interruption of trade as the greatest of all offences against human rights. we boarded a brig of that nation to-day, and found her full of natives, with whom a very brisk business was going forward. some brought palm-oil, and others gold, which they exchanged principally for guns, cloth, and powder. we here saw the gold tested by the "blackstone;" a peculiar kind of mineral, black, with a slight tinge of blue. if, when the gold is rubbed upon this stone, it leaves a reddish mark, it is regarded as a satisfactory proof of its purity; otherwise, there is more or less alloy. the trader is obliged to depend upon the judgment and integrity of a native in his employ, who is skilful in trying gold. the average profit, acquired by the foreign traders in their dealings with the natives, is not less than a hundred per cent. on the principal articles, and much more on the smaller ones. no inconsiderable portion of this, however, is absorbed by the numerous "dashes;" in the first place, to the king, then to the head trade-men, the canoe-men, and all others whose agency can anywise influence the success of the business. the masters or supercargoes of english vessels receive, besides their regular pay of six pounds per month, a commission of five per cent. on all sales; they being responsible for any debts which they may allow the natives to contract. .--ashore at cape lahon, the scene of the recent hostilities between the french and the natives. we landed in large heavy canoes, flat-bottomed and square-sided. the town is built upon a narrow point of land between the sea and a lake, just at the outlet of two rivers. on the side next the sea, you discern only the bamboo walls of the town, and a few cocoa-nut trees, scattered along the sandy beach; but on the lake side, there is one of the loveliest views imaginable. the quiet lake and its wooded islands; the thousand of green cocoa-nut trees, laden with fruit, and shadowing all the shore; the rivers, broad and dark, stretching away on either hand, until lost among the depths of the forest, which doubtless extends into the mysterious heart of africa; the canoes, returning along these majestic streams with people who had fled; the hundreds of natives who reclined in the shade, or clustered around a fountain in the sand, or busied themselves with the canoes;--all contributed to form a picture which was very pleasant to our eyes, long wearied as we were with the sight of ocean and sky, and the dreary skirts of the sea-shore. it was an hour of true repose, while we lay in the shadow of the trees, and drank the cool milk of cocoa-nuts, which the native boys plucked and opened for us. i should have narrated, in the first place, our visit to king peter, who rules over this beautiful spot. he held his court under an awning of palm-leaves, in an area of more than a hundred feet square, around the sides of which were the little dwellings that, conjointly, composed his palace. the king received us with dignity and affability; and probably not less than two hundred of his subjects were collected in the area, to witness the interview; for it was to them a matter of national importance. they are exceedingly anxious to adjust their difficulties with the french, and hope to interest us as mediators. by their own history of the affair, which was laid before us at great length, they appear to have been only moderately to blame, and to have suffered a great deal of mischief. king quashee and nine men were killed, and fifty or sixty houses burnt, besides other damage. these people are a fine-looking race, well formed, and with very pleasing countenances. at our first arrival the women were all at the plantations, in the interior, whither they had fled when our ship came in sight, apprehending her to be french. towards evening, they returned to the village, and afforded us an opportunity to see and talk with them. they are the handsomest african dames with whom i have formed an acquaintance, and the most affable. it grieves me to add, that, like all their countrymen and countrywomen, they are importunate beggars, and seem greatly to prefer the fiery liquors of the white man to their own mild palm-wine and cocoa-nut milk. one of our party offered rum to the eight young wives of tom beggree, our trade-man; and every soul of them tossed off her goblet without a wry face, though it was undiluted, and thirty-three per cent. above proof. as at other places, each family resides in a separate enclosure, which is larger or smaller, according to the number of houses required. domestic harmony is in some degree provided for, by allotting a separate residence to each wife. there is a courtyard before most of the enclosures, after traversing which, you enter a spacious square, and perceive neatly built houses on all four of its sides. they are constructed of bamboo-cane placed upright, and united by cross-pieces of the same, strongly sewed together with thongs of some tough wood. some of the floors are not untastefully paved with small pebbles, intermingled with white shells. doors there are none, the entrance being through the windows, in order to keep out the pigs and sheep, which abound in the enclosures. the streets or passages through the town are about five feet wide, and are bordered on either side by the high bamboo wall of some private domain. the settlement extends more than a mile in length, and is the largest and best-built that i have yet had the good fortune to see on the coast of africa. chapter xvi. visit from two english trading-captains--the invisible king of jack-a-jack--human sacrifices--french fortresses at grand bassam, at assinee, and other points--objections to the locality of liberia--encroachments on the limits of that colony--arrival at axim--sketches of that settlement--dix cove--civilized natives--an alligator. _april_ .--under way from cape lahon at daylight. all the morning, there were light breezes and warm air; but a fine sea-breeze set in, in the afternoon, and brought us, at seven o'clock, to anchor at "grand jack," or "jack-a-jack." the distributors of names along this coast deserve no credit for their taste. the masters of two english merchantmen came on board and spent the evening. one of them was far gone with a consumption; the other was, in his own phrase, a "jolly cock," and seemed disposed to make himself amusing; in pursuance of which object he became very drunk, before taking his departure. englishmen, in this station of life, do not occupy the same social rank as with us, and, consequently, have seldom the correct and gentlemanly manners of our own ship-masters. the master of an english merchant-vessel would hardly be considered a fit guest for either the cabin or ward-room of a british man-of-war. these masters informed us that they had paid three hundred dollars each, for the king's "dash," at this place; in addition to which, every merchant-captain must pay eight dollars on landing, and if from bristol, twenty-four dollars. this distinction is in consequence of a bristol captain having shot a native, some years ago; and when the palaver was settled, the above amount of blood-money was imposed upon all ship-masters from the same place. our two visitors have now been here for months, and will remain for months longer, without once setting foot on shore; partly to avoid incurring the impost on landing, partly from caution against the natives, and partly to keep their business secret. the jealousy between the traders is very great. those from bristol, liverpool, and london, all are in active competition with each other, and with any foreigner who may come in their way; and their policy may truly be described as machiavelian, in its mystery, craft, and crookedness. the business requires at least as long an apprenticeship as the diplomacy of nations, and a new hand has but little chance among these sharp fellows. .--some canoes from the shore have been off to us. we learn from them, that there is to be a great annual festival today; on which occasion the king, who has been secluded from the sight of his subjects for eight years, will shine forth again, "like a re-appearing star." there is something very provocative to the imagination in this circumstance. what can have been the motive of such a seclusion? was it in the personal character of the king, and did he shut himself up to meditate on high matters, or to revel in physical indulgence? or, possibly, to live his own simple life, untrammelled by the irksome exterior of greatness? or was it merely a trick of kingcraft, in order to deify himself in the superstition of his people, by the awfulness of an invisible presence among them? be the secret what it may, it would be interesting to observe the face of the royal hermit, at the moment when the sunshine and the eyes of his subjects first fall upon it again. the inhabitants from many miles around have come to witness and participate in the ceremonies. there are to be grand dances, and all manner of festivity; and one of the english captains informed us that he had sold a thousand gallons of rum, within a fortnight, to be quaffed at this celebration. there is another circumstance that may give the festival a darker interest. it is customary, on such occasions, to sacrifice one or two slaves, who are generally culprits reserved for this anniversary. the natives on board deny that there will be any such sacrifice, but admit that a palaver will be held over a slave, who had attempted to escape. should it be so, the poor wretch will stand little chance for mercy at the hands of these barbarians, frenzied with rum, and naturally blood-thirsty. we are all anxious to go on shore, to see the ceremonies, and try to save the destined victim; or, if better may not be, to witness the thrilling spectacle of a human sacrifice, which, being partly a religious rite, is an affair of a higher order than one of our civilized executions. but our captain has heard of an english vessel ashore and in distress, a day's sail below, and is hastening to their assistance. while taking our departure, therefore, we can only turn our eyes towards the shore, where a large town is visible, clustered under the shelter of a cocoa-nut grove. .--at a.m., we are passing grand bassam, seven or eight miles from land. our track just touches the outer edge of the semicircular line of dirty foam, indicating the distance to which the influence of the river extends. within the verge, the water is discolored by recent contact with the earth; beyond it, ripples the uncontaminated, pure, blue ocean. one is the emblem of human life, muddied with base influences; the other, of eternity, which is only not transparent because of its depth. grand bassam is one of the many places on the coast, where the french have recently established forts, and raised their flag. three large houses are visible. the one in the centre seems to be the military residence and stronghold; the other two are long buildings, one story high, and are probably used as storehouses. a picket-fence surrounds the whole. at assinee, likewise, which is now in sight, there is another french fort, consisting of a block-house and two store-houses, encompassed by pickets. the french government are also fortifying other points along the coast, in the most systematic manner. the general plan is, a block-house in the centre, with long structures extending from each angle, two for barracks, and two for trading-houses; the whole enclosed within a stockade. they are imposing establishments, and constructed with an evident view to durability. it is said that all but french vessels are to be prohibited from trading within range of their guns, and that a man-of-war is to be stationed at each settlement. the captain of a bremen brig informed me, that the danes are about to sell their fort at accra to the french; he gave as his authority the single danish officer remaining at accra. it is perhaps to be regretted that the colonies of liberia were not originally planted in the fertile territory along which we have recently sailed, and which other nations are now pre-occupying. liberia does not appear to possess so rich a soil as most other parts of the coast; there is more sand, and more marsh, above than below cape palmas. but the country between cape palmas and axim is inhabited by cruel, warlike, and powerful tribes; and a colony would need more strength than liberia has ever yet possessed, to save it from destruction. from axim to accra, there is a chain of forts which have been held by different european nations, for centuries; nearly all the coast is claimed by these foreigners; while the interior is occupied by such powerful kingdoms as those of ashantee and dahomey. on these accounts, the tract now called liberia (extending about three hundred miles, from cape mesurado to cape palmas) was the most open for the purposes of colonization. even within the limits just named, however, both france and england have recently betrayed a purpose of effecting settlements. it is to be hoped that these nations will hereafter transfer their titles to liberia. their policy doubtless is, to hold the country for its exclusive trade, or until they can obtain advantageous terms of commercial intercourse with the colonists and natives. the attention of the society at home, as well as of the liberian government, is now fully awake to the importance of securing territory. they are aware, that, without vigorous and prompt measures to extinguish the native title to the country between monrovia and cape palmas, foreign nations will occupy the intermediate positions, and cause much embarrassment hereafter. .--at assinee. we boarded a french brig-of-war, the eglantine, last evening, and learned that the vessel, which ran ashore here, had gone to pieces; so that all our hurry was of no avail. sailed at a.m. for axim. .--last night, we had thunder, lightning, wind, and rain. there are showers and small tornadoes, almost every night, succeeded by clear and pleasant days. we are now in sight of cape-three-points, and the fort at axim. it is pleasant, after the monotonous aspect of the shore to windward, to see a coast with deep indentations and bold promontories. the fort at axim has a commanding appearance, and the country in the vicinity has a decidedly new-england look. .--ashore at axim, where we met with some features of novelty. the fort here is really an antique castle, having been built by the portuguese so long ago as , and taken from them by its present possessors, the dutch, in . it is of stone, built upon scientific principles, with embrasures for cannon and loop-holes for musketry. the walls are four feet thick, and capable of sustaining the assault of ten thousand natives. the fortress is three stories high, the basement story being widest, and each of the others diminishing in proportion, and surrounded by a terrace. the two lower departments are intended for the cannon and the mass of the defenders; while the governor occupies the upper as his permanent residence, and may there fortify himself impregnably, even if an enemy should possess the fort below--unless, indeed, they should blow him into the air. the country claimed by the dutch, extends about thirty miles along the coast, and twenty miles into the interior, with a population estimated at about ten thousand. they seem--particularly those who reside in the villages beneath the fortress--to be entirely under the control of their european masters, and to live comfortably, and be happy in their condition. the natives possess slaves; and there are also many "pawns," of a description seldom offered to the pawnbrokers in other parts of the world; namely, persons who have pledged the services of themselves and family to some creditor, until the debt be paid. it is a good and forcible illustration of the degradation which debt always implies, though it may not always be outwardly visible, as here at axim. the governor himself, who is a native of amsterdam, and apparently a mulatto, is one of those pawn-brokers who deal in human pledges. he is a merchant-soldier, bearing the military title of lieutenant, and doing business as a trader. the governor of el mina is his superior officer, and the fort at axim is garrisoned by twelve black soldiers from the former place. war has existed for several years between these dutch settlements and their powerful neighbor, the king of appollonia, who is daily expected to attack the fortress. in that event, the people in the neighboring villages would take refuge within the walls, and there await the result. the native houses are constructed in the usual manner, of small poles and bamboo, plastered over with clay, and thatched. they might be kept comfortable if kept in repair, but are mostly in a wretched state, although thronged with occupants. the proportion of women, as well as children, appears larger than in other places; and they wear a greater amplitude of apparel than those of their sex on the windward coast, covering their persons from the waist to the knee, and even lower. the most remarkable article of dress is one which i have vaguely understood to constitute a part of the equipment of my own fair countrywomen--in a word, the veritable bustle. among the belles of axim, there is a reason for the excrescence which does not exist elsewhere; for the little children ride astride of the maternal bustle, which thus becomes as useful, as it is unquestionably ornamental. fashion, however, has evidently more to do with the matter than convenience; for old wrinkled grandams wear these beautiful anomalies, and little girls of eight years old display protuberances that might excite the envy of a broadway belle. indeed, fashion may be said to have its perfect triumph and utmost refinement, in this article; it being a positive fact, that some of the axim girls wear merely the bustle, without so much as the shadow of a garment. its native name is "tarb koshe." axim is said to be perfectly healthy, there being no marshes in the vicinity. the soil is fertile and the growth luxuriant. there is a fine well of water, from which ships may be supplied abundantly and easily, though not cheaply. the landing place is protected by small islands and reefs, which break the force of the swell; so that boats may land with as much safety and as little difficulty as in a river. one of our boats, nevertheless, with fifteen or sixteen persons on board, ran on a rock and bilged, in attempting to go ashore. all were happily saved by canoes from the beach. there is a great abundance of pearl-shells to be found along the shore, not valuable, but pretty. the currency here is gold dust, which passes from hand to hand as freely as coin bearing the impress of a monarch or a republic. the governor's weights for gold are small beans; a brown one being equivalent to a dollar, and a red one to fifty cents. .--ashore; and spent most of the day in the fortress; one of the cool places of africa. situated on a high, rocky point of land, with the sea on three sides, every breeze that stirs, however lightly, is sure to be felt on the terraces of the castle of axim; and they bring coolness even at noontide, being tempered by the spray constantly rising from the waves that dash against the rocks below. there is great difficulty in procuring any supplies here, except wood and water, and those at a high rate--seven dollars per cord for the former, and one dollar for each hundred gallons of the latter; this, too, including only the filling of the casks, and rolling them a short distance on the beach. we found it impossible to purchase bullocks, sheep, or pigs, and but very little poultry. the governor explained, that several men-of-war had recently visited the settlement, and taken all the live stock that could be spared, and that the war with appollonia had cut off the large supply formerly drawn from that country. the natives at this place cannot furnish vessels with supplies, unless by the governor's express permission; which, it is said, he does not grant, except upon condition that they expend the proceeds in purchasing goods from him. one of our stewards bought a roasting-pig, on shore; and the fact coming to the ears of governor rhule, he notified the people that there would be a palaver after our departure, for the discovery of the offender. the fine for a transgression of this kind is two ounces of gold, or thirty-two dollars. let us imagine a village storekeeper, in our own country, possessing supreme control over all the traffic of his neighbors--and we shall have an idea of the relative position of the governor of axim and the natives. moreover, he is the general arbitrator, _ex officio_, and expects that all awards shall be paid in cash, and that the successful party spend the amount at his shop. we learned from governor rhule, that the dutch government, some years ago, had sent agents from el mina to comassee, the capital of ashantee, for the purchase of slaves, to be employed in the wars between the dutch east india settlements and the natives of that region. three thousand were thus purchased, at forty dollars each, and transported to batavia. perhaps no circumstance, possible to be conceived, could do more to strip war of its poetry, than such a fact; and yet it is in good keeping with the character of a shrewd, commercial, business-like people, endowed with more common sense than chivalry or sensibility. a british general, in order to carry on an expedition against a french colony, once entered into a similar speculation; but it was indignantly annulled by his government. in the present case, the exportation of slaves, to fight the battles of their masters, ceased only two or three years since, on the termination of the war. these servile soldiers continued in batavia, except a few wounded ones, who have been sent back to el mina, and now reside there on pensions. between axim and accra, both inclusive, there are six dutch forts now occupied and in repair, besides several which have been abandoned. i was told that the annual cost of these establishments, to the home-government, is not more than twenty thousand dollars; most of their expenses being defrayed by duties, port-charges and other revenue accruing on the spot. .--we left axim yesterday, and anchored, last night, off the british settlement at dixcove. this morning, while heaving up the anchor, a boat came off from the schooner edward burley of bevaley, requesting assistance, as her spars had been shivered by lightning. soon after, the commandant of the fort came on board, in a large and handsome canoe, paddled by ten or twelve natives. the passengers sit in the bows, using chairs or stools for seats, and protected from the surf and spray by the high sides of the canoe. we dined on shore with the governor, mr. swansey, at his new residence, in the cool and refreshing atmosphere of a high hill. the house is handsomely furnished in the english style. mr. swansey has resided ten years on the coast, and was one of the persons examined before the committee of parliament in reference to the state and affairs of this region. there is a circumstance that connects this gentleman, though but slightly, with poetic annals. being at cape coast castle at the time of mrs. mclean's death, he was one of the inquest that examined into that melancholy event. his account confirms the general impression, that her death was unpremeditated, and caused by an accidental over-dose of prussic-acid, which she was in the habit of taking for spasms. she was found alone, and nearly dead, behind the door of her apartment. alas, poor l.e.l.! it was certainly a strange and wild vicissitude of fate that made it the duty of this respectable african merchant, in company with men of similar fitness for the task, to "sit" upon the body--say, rather, on the heart--of a creature so delicate, impassioned, and imaginative. the native houses here are quite large; three or four being two stories high, with balconies, built of stone, in the spanish style. they are furnished with sofas, bedsteads, and pictures. one elderly native received us in a calico surtout, and gave us ale. another wore the native garb, with the long cloth folded around him and resting upon his shoulder, like a roman toga. he offered champagne, madeira, gin, brandy, ale, and cigars, and pressed us to partake, with a dignified and elegant hospitality. this was mr. brace. he had a clerk (of native blood, but dressed in cap, jacket, and pantaloons, in the english style), who spoke good english, and was very gentlemanly. it is interesting to meet the natives of africa at so advanced a stage of refinement, yet retaining somewhat of their original habits and character, which is of course entirely lost in the liberian colonists. .--spent the morning on shore, at the government-house, reading the english newspapers, and enjoying the coolness of the position and the society of the intelligent governor. i was interested in observing an alligator, inhabiting a fresh-water pond, on the edge of the town. a chicken being held out to him as a lure, he came out of the pond and snapped at it, making a loud, startling noise with his teeth. he had entirely emerged from his native element, and remained some fifteen minutes on land, during which time he snapped five or six times at the fowl, which was as often drawn away by a string. at length, seizing his prey, he plunged with it into the water, dived, swam across the pond, and rose to the surface on the other side, where he masticated his breakfast, at his leisure. three alligators inhabit this pond, and being regarded as "fetishes," or charmed and sacred creatures, are never injured by the natives. on their part, the amphibious monsters seem to cherish amicable feelings towards the human race, and allow children to bathe and sport in the pond, without injury or molestation. the reptile that i saw was seven or eight feet long, with formidable teeth and scales. instead of the cassada and rice of the windward coast, corn is here the principal food. after being pounded in their long mortars, it is ground fine, by hand, between two stones like those used by painters, and is mixed with palm-wine. .--having repaired the american schooner, and supplied her with one of our spare topmasts, we are ready to sail to-day. chapter xvii. dutch settlement at el mina--appearance of the town--cape coast castle--burial-place of l. e. l.--an english dinner--festivity on ship-board--british, dutch, and danish accra--native wives of europeans--a royal princess--an armadillo--sail for st. thomas--aspect of the island. _april_ .--at a.m., anchored off the dutch settlement of el mina. the governor's lieutenant boarded us in a large canoe, paddled by about a score of blacks. a salute was fired by our ship, and returned from the castle with a degree of splendor quite unexpected; for a portion of the native town, situated beneath the castle-walls, was set on fire by the wad of a cannon, and twenty or thirty houses burnt to the ground. on landing, we received a message, intimating that the governor would be glad to see us, and consequently called upon him. he is a man of about thirty, who came out in , as a clerk, and has risen to be governor, with the military rank of lieutenant-colonel. all the civil officers have military titles, and wear the corresponding uniforms, for effect upon the natives; but the dutch evince their shrewdness by placing practical men of business, rather than soldiers, at the head of their colonial establishments. the only officer of the regular army is a lieutenant, commanding the guard, of one hundred men. el mina--the mine--was built in , or thereabouts, by the portuguese, whose early navigators have left tokens of their enterprise all along this coast; although the achievements of those adventurous men do but illustrate the nation's present supineness and decay. the settlement was taken by the dutch about a century after its foundation. the main fortress is extensive, mounting ninety guns, and is capable of withstanding the assault of a large force of regular troops. on an eminence, above the town, is a second fort, apparently strong and in good repair; and two small batteries are placed in commanding situations. the houses in the town are built of stone, and thatched. the streets are narrow, crooked, and dirty, imparting to the place the air of intricate bewilderment of some of the old european cities. much of the trade is done in the streets, and entirely by women, who sit with their merchandize on the ground before them, and their gold-scales in their laps, waiting for customers. it would perhaps add to our manliness of character, if at least the minor departments of traffic were resigned to the weaker sex, among ourselves. crossing a small river, we came to another, and by far the best section, of the town. there are long, wide streets, two of which, meeting at an obtuse angle, form together an extent of nearly a mile. a double row of trees throw their shade over the central walk of this alameda. at intervals are seated groups of women-traders. the wares of some are deposited upon the ground, while pieces of cloth are displayed to advantage upon lines, stretching from tree to tree. before returning on board, we bespoke rings and chains of a native goldsmith. the fashions of africa are less evanescent than those of europe; and we may expect to see such ornaments as glittered on the bosom of the queen of sheba. _may_ .--sailed for cape coast castle with the evening breeze. .--at cape coast castle. the landing is effected in large canoes, which convey passengers close to the rocks, safely and without being drenched, although the surf dashes fifty feet in height. there is a peculiar enjoyment in being raised, by an irresistible power beneath you, upon the tops of the high rollers, and then dropped into the profound hollow of the waves, as if to visit the bottom of the ocean, at whatever depth it might be. we landed at the castle-gate, and were ushered into the castle itself, where the commander of the troops received us in his apartment. i took the first opportunity to steal away, to look at the burial-place of l.e.l., who died here, after a residence of only two months, and within a year after becoming the wife of governor mclean. a small, white marble tablet (inserted among the massive grey stones of the castle-wall, where it faces the area of the fort) bears the following inscription:-- hic jacet sepultum omne quod mortale fuit letitiae elisabethae mclean, quam, egregiâ ornatam indole, musis unicè amatam; omniumque amores secum trahentem, in ipso aetatis flore, mors immatura rapuit, die octobris xv., a.d. mdcccxxxviii, Ã�tat . * * * * * quod spectas viator marmor, vanum heu doloris monumentum, conjux moereng erexit. the first thought that struck me was the inappropriateness of the spot for a grave, and especially for the grave of a woman, and, most of all, a woman of poetic temperament. in the open area of the fort, at some distance from the castle-wall, the stone pavement had been removed in several spots, and replaced with plain tiles. here lie buried some of the many british officers who have fallen victims to the deadly atmosphere of this region; and among them rests l.e.l. her grave is distinguishable by the ten red tiles which cover it. daily, the tropic sunshine blazes down upon the spot. daily, at the hour of parade, the peal of military music resounds above her head, and the garrison marches and counter-marches through the area of the fortress, nor shuns to tread upon the ten red tiles, any more than upon the insensible stones of the pavement. it may be well for the fallen commander to be buried at his post, and sleep where the reveille and roll-call may be heard, and the tramp of his fellow-soldiers echo and re-echo over him. all this is in unison with his profession; the drum and trumpet are his perpetual requiem; the soldier's honorable tread leaves no indignity upon the dead warrior's dust. but who has a right to trample on a woman's breast? and what had l.e.l. to do with warlike parade? and wherefore was she buried beneath this scorching pavement, and not in the retired shadow of a garden, where seldom any footstep would come stealing through the grass, and pause before her tablet? there, her heart, while in one sense it decayed, would burst forth afresh from the sod in a profusion of spontaneous flowers, such as her living fancy lavished throughout the world. but now, no verdure nor blossom will ever grow upon her grave. if a man may ever indulge in sentiment, it is over the ashes of a woman whose poetry touched him in his early youth, while he yet cared anything about either sentiment or poetry. thus much, the reader will pardon. in reference to mrs. mclean, it may be added, that, subsequently to her unhappy death, different rumors were afloat as to its cause, some of them cruel to her own memory, others to the conduct of her husband. all these reports appear to have been equally and entirely unfounded. it is well established here, that her death was accidental. we dined at the castle to-day, and met the officers of a new english brig, the sea-lark, among whom i was happy to recognize lieutenant b----, an acquaintance at mahon, and a messmate of my friend c----. all these officers are gallant fellows; and the commencement of our acquaintance promises to place them and ourselves on the most cordial terms. the dinner, like other english dinners, was rather noisy, but rendered highly agreeable by the perfect good feeling that prevailed. at eight in the evening, we returned on board, though strongly urged to sleep on shore by the governor and all our other friends. such hospitality, though unquestionably sincere, and kindly meant, it was far better to decline than accept; for it was much the same as if death, in the hearty tone of good-fellowship, had pressed us to quaff another cup and spend the night under his roof. had we complied, it would probably have cost the lives of more than one of us. our captain took wisdom by the sad experience of the english brig, which had lost her purser and master by just such a festivity, prolonged to a late hour, and finished by the officers passing the night on shore. the fever of the climate punished their imprudence. all vessels, except those of our own navy, allow their officers to sleep on shore. they expect to be taken sick, but hope that the first attack of fever will season them. possibly, this is as wise a course as the british officers could adopt; for, unlike ourselves, they are compelled by duty to trust themselves in pestiferous situations, particularly in the ascent of rivers, where there is scarcely a chance of escaping the deadly influence of the atmosphere. they therefore confront the danger at once, and either fall beneath it, or triumph over it. .--governor mclean, and all the officers of the castle and brig, dined on board. the table was laid on the quarter-deck, and was the scene of much mirth and friendly sentiment. in the evening, the theatre was open, with highly respectable performances; after which came a supper; and the guests took their leave at midnight, apparently well-pleased. .--we sailed yesterday from cape coast castle, and anchored to-day at accra, abreast of the british and dutch forts. .--early this morning, we were surrounded with canoes, filled with articles for sale. the most remarkable were black monkey-skins. there are seven vessels at anchor here, including our own, and an english war-steamer. three of the seven, a barque, brig, and schooner, are from the united states. landing in a canoe, we were met on the beach by the governor and some of his gentlemen, and escorted to the castle. thence we went to the residence of mr. bannerman. he is the great man of accra, wealthy, liberally educated in england, and a gentleman, although with a deep tinge of african blood in his cheeks. but when native blood is associated with gentlemanly characteristics and liberal acquirements, it becomes, instead of a stigma of dishonor, an additional title to the respect of the world; since it implies that many obstacles have been overcome, in order to place the man where we find him. this, however, is a view not often taken by those who labor under the misfortune (for such it is, if they so consider it) of having african blood in their veins. .--a missionary, on his way to the gaboon, and two american merchant-captains, hunt and dayley, dined with us in the ward-room. the latter are respectable men. the missionary, mr. burchell, seems much depressed. he has had the fever at cape palmas, the effects of which still linger in his constitution; while his companion, the rev. mr. campbell, although but recently from america, has already finished his earthly labors, and gone to his reward. we left them only a month ago at cape palmas, in perfect health. .--my impressions of accra are more favorable than of any other place which i have yet seen in africa. british and dutch accra are contiguous. the forts of the two nations are within a mile of each other, situated on ground which, at a little distance, appears not unlike the "bluffs" on our western rivers; level upon the summit, with a precipitous descent, as if the land had "caved in" from the action of the water. the country round is level, and nearly free from woods as far as the rise of the hills, some ten miles distant. about three miles to the eastward, danish accra shows its neat town and well-kept fortress. i did not visit the place, but learn that it is fully equal to its neighbors. thus, within a circuit of three or four miles, the traveller may perform no inconsiderable portion of the grand tour, visiting the territory of three different countries of europe, and observing their military and civil institutions, their modes of business, their national characteristics, and all assimilated by a general modification, resulting from the climate and position in which they are placed. there seems to be an exchange of courtesy and social kindness among the three settlements. seven or eight europeans reside in the different forts; so that, together with the captains of merchant-vessels in the roads, there are tolerable resources of society. all the europeans have native wives, who dress in a modest, but peculiar style, of which the lady of mr. bannerman may give an example. she wore a close-fitting muslin chemisette, buttoned to the throat with gold buttons, a black silk tunic extending to the thigh, a colored cotton cloth, fastened round the waist and falling as low as the ankles, black silk stockings and prunella shoes. this lady is jet black, of pleasing countenance, and is a princess of royal blood. in the last great battle between the europeans on the coast and the powerful king of ashantee (the same who defeated and slew sir charles mccarthy), the native army was put to total rout by the aid of congreve rockets. the king's camp, with most of his women, fell into the hands of the victors. three of his daughters were appropriated by the english merchants, here and at cape coast, and became their faithful and probably happy wives. one of the three fell to the lot of mr. bannerman, and is the lady whom i have described. these women are entrusted with all the property of their husbands, and are sometimes left for months in sole charge, while the merchants visit england. the acting governor of the british fort, mr. topp, departs for that country to-morrow, leaving his native wife at the head of affairs. mr. bannerman is of scottish blood by paternal descent, but african by the mother's side, and english by education, and is a gentleman in manner and feeling. he is the principal merchant here, and transacts a large business with the natives, who come from two or three hundred miles in the interior, and constantly crowd his yard. there they sit, in almost perfect silence, receiving their goods, and making payment in gold-dust and ivory. towards us mr. bannerman showed himself most hospitable, yet in a perfectly unostentatious manner. accra is the land of plenty in africa. beef, mutton, turkeys and chickens abound; and its supply of european necessaries and luxuries is unequalled. .--we got under way, yesterday, for the "islands," a term well understood to mean those of st. thomas and prince's. mr. bushnell (one of the two missionaries who proposed to take passage with us from cape palmas, a month since) is now on board as a passenger to prince's island. the other, mr. campbell, is dead. he was of a wealthy and influential family in kentucky, and is said to have been a young man of extraordinary talent and promise. yesterday we fired seventeen minute-guns, in obedience to an order from the navy-department for the melancholy death of its chief, by the explosion of the princeton's gun. at twelve o'clock to-day, we fired thirteen minute guns, as a tribute of respect to the memory of commodore kennon, who fell a victim to the same disastrous accident. alone on the waters, months after the event, and five thousand miles from the scene of his fate, we gave a sailor's requiem to a brave and accomplished officer. .--calm and sunny. oh, how sunny!--and, alas, how calm! at accra, i received a present of an armadillo, or ant-eater, who is certainly a wonderful animal, and well worth studying, in the tedium of a calm between the tropics. the body proper is but about nine inches, but, when stretched at length, he covers an extent of two and a half feet, from head to tail, and is wholly fortified with an impenetrable armor of bony scales. on any occasion of alarm, it is his custom to thrust his long nose between his hind-legs and roll his body and tail compactly together, so as to appear like the half of a ball, presenting no vulnerable part to an enemy. in this condition he affords an excellent example of a self-involved philosopher, defending himself from the annoyance of the world by a stoical crustiness, and seeking all his enjoyment within his own centre. his muscular strength being great, and especially that of his fore-legs, it is very difficult to unroll him. an attempt being made to force his coil, he sticks his fore-claws into the scales of his head, and holds on with a death-like grip. at night, however, or when all is quiet, he vouchsafes to unbend himself, and waddles awkwardly about on his short legs, in pursuit of cockroaches, weevils and spiders. [footnote: the above-described ant-eater is properly the long-tailed manis, being an african species of the pangolin. his scaly armor will turn a musket-ball. this animal, with a few other natural and artificial curiosities from africa, has been deposited in the national collection, attached to the patent office at washington.] .--after many days of calm or light winds, a stiff and fair breeze, for twenty-four hours past, has been driving us rapidly on our course. we hope to see st. thomas to-morrow. .--land was discovered at daylight; but the wind had again failed us. it being sunday, divine service was performed, and well performed, by mr. bushnell. he has gained the respect and regard of all on board, by his amiable, guileless disposition, and unassuming piety. at noon the breeze freshened, and brought us within ten miles of the island, by the close of day. st. thomas is high, and possesses strong features. one landmark is so singular as to strike every beholder most forcibly. it is a rock, apparently not less than five hundred feet high, and shaped like a light-house, towering into the air, about a third of the distance from the southern extremity of the island. we are now within a few miles of the equator; and sundry jokes, not unfamiliar to the nautical joe miller, are passing through the ship, touching the appearance of "the line." .--a heavy tornado struck us last night. we were prepared for it, however, with nothing on the ship but the topsail, clewed down, and the fore-topmast-staysail. the last mentioned sail blew away, and the ship lay over with her guns in the water. in five minutes, nevertheless, we were going before the wind and away from shore. the appearance of the island is pleasant. a high volcanic peak, hills covered with wood, and spots of ground reminding us of the lawns or pasture-lands of our own country. on these tracts not a tree or a bush is visible for acres together; but whether the soil was left naked by nature, or rendered so by cultivation, is yet to be ascertained. a ruined chapel on the top of a hill, a large mansion, apparently unoccupied, on the shore, and a few huts among the cocoa-trees, are the only evidences that men have ever been here. several canoes have now come off to us, bringing fruit and shells. chapter xviii. excursion to st. anne de chaves--mode of drying coffee--black priests--madame domingo's hotel--catering for the mess--man swallowed by a shark--letters from home--fashionable equipage--arrival at the gaboon--king glass and louis philippe--mr. griswold--mr. and mrs. wilson--character of the gaboon people--symptoms of illness. _may_ .--i have just returned from an excursion to st. anne de chaves, the capital of st. thomas. leaving the ship, yesterday, at a.m., we landed, but did not find the horses which had been ordered from the city. deeming it unadvisable to wait, three of the party started on foot, and two in the "gig" (not the land-vehicle of that name), which was to proceed on the same destination. after walking three or four miles along the beach, we met two of the six horses expected. these served to mount a pair of us, while the third, with the guide and boys, proceeded on foot; it being arranged that we should travel in the old-fashioned mode of "ride and tie." most of the distance was across open land, without a tree or shrub, but overgrown with coarse, high grass. the whole appearance was that of a western prairie, but without the grandeur of its extent, or the flowers that attract the traveller, when wearied with the immensity of prospect. the soil, like that of the cocoa-nut groves, is a black, deep, fertile loam. in two hours, we arrived at st. anne de chaves. the town is spread out upon the circular shore of the bay, nearly half a mile in extent, and is defended by a stone fort, situated on the extreme point of the cape. there are three or four hundred houses, which, with few exceptions, are small, and constructed of wood. a long stone building is appropriated as the residence of the governor, and contains the public offices. the only remarkable edifices besides, are a large wooden church, looking very like a barn, and a smaller one of stone. the streets are unpaved, but kept remarkably clean, and not without an especial reason. the great, and almost only, article of commerce is coffee, which is kept in the houses, and dried daily in the streets. as soon as the sun is up, therefore, servants sweep the streets, as carefully as if it were a parlor-floor, and bring out large quantities of coffee, which they spread upon the ground to dry. at night, it is carried in. more than half the street, at the proper season, is covered with coffee yet in the husk. the exports of this article amount annually to about a million of pounds, producing from seventy to eighty thousand dollars. the only whites residing on the island, with one exception, are about sixty portuguese; the number of colored inhabitants is estimated at fifteen thousand. black priests are plenty in the streets, walking about in bombazine robes, with the crisp hair shaven from their crowns. the jesuits invariably followed hard upon the heels of the early portuguese adventurers, in their african discoveries; but i am not aware that their efforts to catholicise the natives have anywhere produced such permanent results, as in this island. to be sure, the religion of the inhabitants seems to amount to little more than the practice of a few external rites; for they have both the appearance and character of dishonesty and treachery, and are said to be addicted to all sorts of vice. so far as the black priests possess any influence, however, it is believed to be used conscientiously, and with excellent effect; nor, though provoked to smile at these queer specimens of the cloth, could i indulge the impulse without being self-convicted of narrowness and illiberally. st. augustine, and other fathers of the church, if i have heard aright, were of the same sable hue as the priests of st. anne de chaves. the currency of the island is wretched. coppers are the sole coin in use, in all domestic transactions, and pass at ten times their intrinsic value. they are said to be introduced mainly by the american merchantmen, who do most of the trade with the island. the foreign business is chiefly transacted by mr. lippitt, a hamburgh merchant, at whose house we were hospitably received. he set his best fare before us; and some of the party not only ate at his table, but slept beneath his roof. the others took lodgings at the house of madam domingo, a fat black lady, whose first husband, a merchant of considerable business, had left her a large mansion, several slaves, some children, and other desirable property. a young, dandy-looking negro succeeded to the vacant place in her house and heart, and now does the honors of the establishment. the largest room had a singular aspect of familiarity to our eyes; its walls being adorned with prints of american origin, among which were portraits of all the presidents of the united states, previous to general harrison. these, perhaps, were the gift of some merchant-captain to his hospitable landlady; or, more probably, they had been hung up in compliment to the national sensibilities of madam domingo's most frequent guests. tawdry mirrors and chandeliers completed the decoration of the apartment. a supper of coffee and hard-boiled eggs, beds harder than the eggs, and a bill equally difficult of digestion, comprise all that is further to be said of the fashionable hotel of st. anne de chaves. after a good breakfast with our hamburgh friend, we all embarked in the gig, and, spreading our canvass to the breeze, reached the ship in an hour and ten minutes. .--ashore with the caterer of the mess, marketing for sea-stores; a difficult task among a set of people who, though poor, care little about making a profit by selling what they have. many of them would not take money, requiring in payment some article of clothing, especially shirts, or, as the next grand desideratum, trowsers. by careful research among the small plantations we were able to pick up a few goats, pigs, and fowls, and came off with materials to keep the mess in good humor for at least ten days. none but sea-faring men can appreciate the great truth, that amiability is an affair of the stomach, and that the disposition depends upon the dinner. we found the soil very fertile. groves of cocoa-nuts cover many acres together. beneath the shade, coffee trees were in full bearing; and bananas, plantains, and corn, flourished luxuriantly. the people are all blacks, speak portuguese, and--a circumstance that affords the voyager an agreeable variety, after seeing so much nakedness--wear clothes. their habitations are scattered among the trees. it is usual to have one house for rainy weather, for sleeping, and for storage, and another as a kitchen, and for occupation during the day. the first is close, the other has merely corner-posts, supporting a roof sufficiently light to make a shade. part of the day was spent in picking up shells upon the shore. occasionally, i unhoused a "soldier-crab," who had taken up free quarters in some unoccupied cone, and became so delighted with its shelter as never to move without dragging it at his heels along the sand. .-- p.m., a horrid accident has just occurred. as the gig was coming alongside, under sail, the tiller broke, and the coxswain who was steering, fell overboard. he was a good swimmer, and struck out for the ship, not thirty yards distant, while the boat fell off rapidly to the leeward. in less than half a minute, a monstrous shark rose to the surface, seized the poor fellow by the body, and carried him instantly under. two hundred men were looking on, without the power to afford assistance. we beheld the water stained with crimson for many yards around--but the victim was seen no more! once only, a few seconds after his disappearance, the monster rose again to the surface, displaying a length of well nigh twenty feet, and then his immense tail above the water, as if in triumph and derision. it was like something preternatural; and terribly powerful he must have been, to take under so easily, and swallow, in a moment, one of the largest and most athletic men in the ship. poor ned martin! .--again visited the town, where we found an american brig, the vintage of salem, captain frye. she is from the south coast, homeward bound, with a cargo of gum copal. the captain had some letters for the squadron, which were now eleven months old. my own gave an account of the president's visit to boston, the bunker hill celebration, and other events of that antediluvian date. epistolary communication is, at the best, a kind of humbug. what was new and true, when written, has become trite and false, before it can be read. it assures of nothing--not even of the existence of the writer; for his hand may have grown cold, since the characters which it traced began their weary voyage in quest of us; and all of which we can be absolutely certain is, that many unexpected events have happened, and many expected ones have failed to happen, betwixt the sealing of the letter and the unfolding it again. until the ocean be converted into an electric telegraph, through which intelligence will thrill in an instant, there can be no real communication between the sailor and his far-off friends. and yet, after all, how pleasant it is to write letters!--how much pleasanter to receive them! i acknowledged the receipt of these musty epistles, by the same vessel that conveyed them to me. i have seen but one equipage in the capital of st. thomas, but that was a sufficiently remarkable one; a small, three-wheeled vehicle, like a velocipede, with a phaeton-top to it. drawn by two negroes, and pushed by three, it rolled briskly to the door of the church, and there deposited a plump and youthful dame, as black as ebony. from the deference shown her by the priests, i inferred that it was my good fortune to behold the leading belle of st. anne de chaves. after dining with mr. lippitt, we returned to the boats, and got safely on shipboard before dark. my impressions of st. thomas and its delightful climate are highly favorable. a visit to an island has generally more of interest and amusement than one to a spot on the continent, because the secluded position of the inhabitants imparts an originality and raciness to their modes of life. .--got under way yesterday morning for the gaboon. today the wind has been favorable, and we are now at anchor for the night, off the mouth of the river, five miles from land. .--at p.m., anchored within three miles of the missionary establishment. mr. bushnell took his leave, respected by us all, as a pious, unpretending, sensible, and amiable man. .--ashore. we found our friends well, and glad to see us. they are comfortably situated in large houses, made of bamboos, and thatched with the bamboo-leaves sewed together. these present an airy, cool, and light appearance, highly suitable to a tropical region, and yet are impervious to rain. we visited the house of king glass, where several of the chiefs assembled to talk a palaver. they are apprehensive of difficulties with the french, and wish the english and americans to interpose. according to their story, the commandant of a french fort, three miles distant, had attempted, a short time ago, to procure a cession of their territory. this they constantly refused, declaring their intention to keep the country open for trade with all nations, and allow exclusive advantages to none. after several trials, the commandant apparently relinquished his purpose. a french merchant-captain now appeared, who ingratiated himself into the favor of the simple king glass, invited him to a supper, and made his majesty and the head-man drunk. while in this condition, he procured the signatures of the king and two or three chiefs to a paper, which he declared to be merely a declaration of friendship towards the french, but which proved to be a cession of certain rights of jurisdiction. next morning, the french fired a salute of twenty-one guns in honor of the treaty between louis philippe and king glass, and sent presents which the natives refused to receive. they now apprehend a forcible seizure of their territory by the french, and desire our interposition, as calculated to prevent such a national calamity. our captain, however, declined to interfere, or to express any opinion in the premises, on the ground that it was not his province to judge of such matters abroad, unless the interests of americans were involved. the missionaries have perhaps some agency in this movement. they see the probability that the catholic priests will follow them to the gaboon, and subvert their influence with the natives. .--in the morning i visited mr. griswold's place, about two miles from baracca, the residence of mr. wilson. the former establishment was commenced only eight months ago; and already there are two buildings finished, and two more nearly so, all of bamboo. the ground is more fertile than that occupied by mr. wilson, and has been brought thus seasonably into a good state of cultivation. mr. griswold is a vermonter, a practical farmer, and an energetic man, and doubtless turns his agricultural experience to good account, great as is the difference between the bleak hills of new england, and this equatorial region. his lady, an interesting woman, is just recovering from fever. after an agreeable visit, we returned to the ship, accompanied by mr. and mrs. griswold, and there found mr. wilson and lady, and mr. james and his daughter. they all dined and spent the day on board. mr. wilson is well known in america by reputation, and is one of the most able and judicious among the three hundred missionaries, whom the american board sends forth throughout the world. here at gaboon, he preaches to the natives in their own language, which he represents as being very soft, and easy of acquirement. the people frequent divine services with great regularity, and are at least attentive listeners, if not edified by what they hear. mrs. wilson is a lady of remarkable zeal and energy. reared in luxury, in a southern city, she liberated her slaves, gave up a handsome fortune to the uses of missions, and devoted herself to the same great cause, in that region of the earth where her faith and fortitude were likely to be most severely tried. it is now six years since she came to africa; and she has never faltered for a moment. having had the good fortune, on a former cruise, to make the acquaintance of mrs. wilson, at cape palmas, i was happy to renew it here. i have seldom met with a person so well fitted to adorn society, and never with one in whose high motives of action and genuine piety i had more confidence. the natives at the gaboon, to whom these excellent people are sacrificing themselves, are said to present more favorable points of character than those in most other parts of africa. they are mild in their manners, friendly to europeans and americans, and disposed to imitate them in dress and customs. they own many slaves among themselves, but treat them with singular gentleness, and never sell them to foreigners. they are very indolent, and make no adequate improvement of their advantages for agriculture and trade. their country is excellent for grazing, and the cattle of the best kind; but they take so little forethought as to sell even the last cow, should a purchaser offer. consequently, there are hardly more than thirty cattle left in a tract of country capable, in its present state, of sustaining a thousand. king glass is an old man, much inclined to drink, yet more regular than any of his subjects in attendance at church. toko, a headman, is very shrewd and intelligent, and highly spoken of by mr. wilson, in reference to his moral qualities. will glass, nephew to the king, is blessed with a couple of dozen wives, and seldom moves without a train of five or six of them in attendance. he paid a visit to our ship in a full-dress english uniform, said to have cost three hundred dollars. on the other side of the river lives king will, a great man, and with the reputation of a polished gentleman. the slave-trade is carried on in this king's dominions; and, while i write, a spanish slaver lies at anchor off his town, waiting for her human cargo. _june_ .--got under way, and went down the river about three miles, when, the wind failing, we anchored. at p.m., we started again, and stood out to sea. mr. wilson accompanied us to the mouth of the river, and there left us, bearing back our hearty good wishes for his personal prosperity and that of the mission. .--at , meridian, we have made the run to the island of st. thomas, and are now about fifteen miles to the northward of it. .--the wind is still sufficiently fresh and fair to enable us to make seven knots westing; the great desideratum. four months we have been running away from our letters; and now we go to meet them. blow, breezes, blow, and waft us swiftly onward! .--a continuance of favorable winds. i am not well to-day. slight headache, and heaviness of feeling--no great matter--but these are ominous symptoms, on the coast of africa. .--one year since we left america; a year not without incident and interest. we are still on the first parallel of north latitude, and going nine. i am under the surgeon's hands, apprehending a fever, but hoping to throw it off. .--we have made two hundred and twenty miles within the last twenty-four hours; and still the breeze does not slacken. much better in health. bless the man who first invented doctors! chapter xix. recovery from fever--projected independence of liberia--remarks on climate and health--peril from breakers--african arts--departure for the cape de verds--man overboard. june .--a weary blank! since my last date, i have had the coast fever, caught by sleeping on shore, at st. anne de chaves, and am now just recovering my physical force. my sickness was accompanied with little bodily pain, but with great prostration of strength. able medical advice, and kind and judicious treatment, have brought me up a little; and, with the help of god, i may again call myself well, in a week or two more. but there is great danger of relapses, caution! we are now at monrovia, having made the passage from the river gaboon, hitherward, in seven days and fourteen hours, from anchorage to anchorage--an unprecedented run! the macedonian has been here, and is gone. .--still better this morning. the sky looks brighter than before; the woods seem greener, and cast a lovelier shade; the surf breaks more gracefully along the beach; and the natives, paddling their canoes around the ship, look more human--more like brethren. returning health gives a more beautiful aspect to all things. it is almost worth while to have been brought so low by sickness, for the sake of the freshness of body and spirit, the renewed youth, the tenderer susceptibility to all good impressions, which make my present consciousness so delightful. it is like being new-created, and placed in a new world. life, to the convalescent, looks as fair and promising as if he had never tried it, and been weary of it. .--still improving. the fine weather of yesterday and to-day invigorates and cheers me. lieutenant governor benedict and some friends are expected on board, by special invitation. we pay much attention to the persons in authority here; it being the policy of our government to befriend and countenance the colonies. i hear that a serious effort is now in progress, at this place, to declare liberia independent of the colonization society, and set up a republic. lieutenant governor benedict and mr. teage are said to be at the head of the movement. both are men of talent. mr. teage formerly edited the liberia herald, and preached in the baptist church, where his services were most emphatically gratuitous; for he not only ministered without a stipend, but supplied a place of worship--the sacred edifice being his own private property. he is certainly one of the ablest, if not the very ablest, writer and preacher in the colony. the project above-mentioned seems to me an unwise one; but benefits, which do not now appear, may possibly be obtained by sundering the relations between the settlement and the parent society. much is expected from england. that nation, however, can never feel a maternal interest in the colony, nor will do for it what the society has all along done, and continues to do. .--still stronger. i am now able to resume my place at the mess-table. but care is necessary to avoid a relapse. it is one of the worst features of this disease, that it appears to continue in the system for many months after the patient's recovery, and to renew its attacks upon the slightest exposure. most persons find it necessary to leave the coast, in order to the re-establishment of their health. i am not the only convalescent on board the ship. mr. ewal, a young danish supercargo, is here for a few days, to try the benefit of a change of air, and enjoy the attendance of a regular physician. he has been on shore above a month, sick of the fever, under the charge of dr. prout, a colored practitioner. our captain pitied his condition, invited him on board, and, with his uniform kindness, took him into the cabin, where, in only three days, he has already improved wonderfully. .--a sunny day, after three or four dull and rainy ones. my health is now so far restored, that i shall insert no more bulletins. i owe much to the care of our surgeon, who is very able and attentive, and has seen much yellow-fever practice, in the west indies. the assistant-surgeon is also an excellent and an untiring officer. my fever, like the other cases which have happened on board, was of a bilious kind. all foreigners make themselves liable to it, either in its milder or more aggravated forms, by sleeping even a single night on shore; but, according to dr. hall, a physician of great experience on the coast, health may be preserved for an indefinite period, by the simple precaution of sleeping always on ship-board, at a very moderate distance from land. this does not altogether coincide with my own observations. it is true, that during eight or ten months after the arrival of a ship upon the coast, the health of her crew will probably continue good, if they neither sleep on shore nor ascend the rivers. but, if exposed for a longer period to the enervating influences of the unceasing heat, and the frequent penetrating rains, it may reasonably be expected that any ship's company will be broken down, even though not a single death may occur. in our own ship, we have recently had many cases of fever, where the patients have neither slept on shore, nor been exposed to the peculiar malaria of rivers. doubtless, however, the fever of the country, where all due precautions have been used, will be much lighter on board, than on shore. but the patients will be liable to frequent relapses, and a complete recovery will be almost out of the question, without a change of climate. it is another objection to the long continuance of ships on this station, that all wounds or injuries, however slight, have a tendency to become obstinate and dangerous sores, which incapacitate these afflicted from performing any duty. besides the coast fever (which, dr. hall remarks, he has never known an emigrant completely to escape), there is an intermittent fever, against which no acclimation will protect the colonist, any more than against the bilious fever of america. the rev. mr. james, a colored missionary, told me, that, for seven years, he had been accustomed to suffer attacks of fever, once in every four or five weeks. the natives of this country are as healthy as any people under heaven. a benignant providence has adapted the climate, soil, and productions, of every part of the globe to the constitutions of those races of mankind which it has placed there. nor is africa an exception. in spite of her desolating wars, and the immense drain of her children through the slave trade which for centuries has checked the increase of population, she is still a populous country. the aboriginal natives, unless killed through superstition or cruelty, survive to an almost patriarchal longevity. the colored people of america, or any other part of the world, may be regarded as borrowed from africa, and inheriting a natural adaptation to her soil and climate. such emigrants, therefore, may be expected to suffer less than the whites, in the process of acclimation, and may, in due time, find their new residence more genial to their constitutions, than those which they have quitted. at all events, their children will probably flourish here, and attain a fulness of physical, and perhaps moral and intellectual perfection, which the colored race has fallen short of, in other regions. as the country becomes cleared and cultivated, the mortality of the emigrants decreases. it is asserted to be one-third less, at this period, than it was ten years ago. the statistics of cape palmas show the population to be on the increase, independently of immigration. dr. hall affirmed (but, i should imagine, with unusual latitude of expression) that, in the sickliest season ever known at cape palmas, the rate of mortality was lower than that of the free colored population in baltimore, in an ordinary year. in another generation, this may no doubt be said with perfect accuracy. .--last night, the porpoise came in, and anchored inside of us. as we lay unusually near the shore, and as the wind was rising, with a heavy swell, the brig found herself, this morning, in a dangerous position. she sent us a boat, to say that she was dragging her anchor, and to ask for a hawser. this was immediately supplied; but, before we could give her the end of it, she had drifted into the breakers. she hoisted her colors, union down, and was momentarily expected to strike. at this instant, a tremendous roller swamped one of our boats, and left the men swimming for their lives. the other boats went to their assistance, and providentially succeeded in rescuing them all. meantime, the brig made sail, and, by the help of our hawser, was able to keep her wind, and got out to sea, leaving both her anchors behind. soon after the porpoise was saved, we found ourselves likewise in equal peril. the breakers began to whiten about the ship. the wind was not violent, but the swell was terrible; and the long rollers filled the bay, breaking in forty feet of water, and covering the sea with foam. our anchors held tolerably well; but we dragged slowly, until, from seven fathoms, we had shoaled our water to four and a half. a council of the officers being called, it was determined to get under way. a hawser and stream-anchor being sent out, in order to bring the ship's head in the proper direction for making sail, the cables were slipped. it was a moment of intense interest; for, had the rollers or the wind inclined the ship from her proper course, we must inevitably have been lost; but she stood out beautifully, and soon left all peril astern. there were still three merchant-vessels at anchor; the american barque reaper, a bremen brig, and a hamburg schooner. while we had our own danger to encounter, we thought the less of our fellow-sufferers; but, after our escape, it was painful to think of leaving them in jeopardy. to the american barque (which lay inshore of us, with her colors union down) we sent a boat, with sixteen kroomen, by whose assistance she was saved. the bremen brig had her colors at half-mast, appealing to us for aid. she was nearer to the shore than the other vessels, and lay in the midst of the breakers, which frequently covered her from stem to stern. her escape seemed impossible; and her cargo, valued at thirty thousand dollars, would have been considered a dear purchase at a thirtieth of that sum. we gave her all the help in our power, and not without effect; but her salvation, under providence, was owing to a strong tide, which was setting out of the river, and counteracted the influence of wind and swell. finally, we had the satisfaction to see all the vessels, one after another, come off safe. during this scene, there was great commotion on shore, the people evidently expecting one or all of us to be lost. when the porpoise got off, the kroomen on the beach raised a great shout of joy. .--there is a very heavy sea this morning, with no prospect of its immediately subsiding. the kroomen say that it will last four days from its commencement. it must have been terrific in the bay, last night. all the vessels are in sight, keeping off till the swell abates. we have left two boats behind us, and two anchors, besides the stream-anchor. there has been nothing like this storm, since our arrival on the coast. _july_ .--again at anchor. as we shall soon have done with liberia, i must not forget to insert, among the motley records of this journal, some account of its ants. the immense number of these insects, which infest every part of the land, is a remarkable provision in the economy of africa, as well as of other tropical countries. though very destructive to houses, fences, and other articles of value, their ravages are far more than repaid by the benefits bestowed; for they act as scavengers in removing the great quantity of decaying vegetable matter, which would otherwise make the atmosphere intolerable. they perform their office both within doors and without. frequently, the "drivers," as they are called, enter houses in myriads, and, penetrating to the minutest recesses, destroy everything that their omnivorous appetite can render eatable. whatever has the principle of decay in it, is got rid of at once. all vermin meet their fate from these destroyers. food, clothing, necessaries, superfluities, mere trash, and valuable property, are alike in their regard, and equally acceptable to their digestive powers. they would devour this journal with as little compunction as so much blank paper--and a sermon as readily as the journal--nor would either meal lie heavy on their stomachs. they float on your coffee, and crawl about your plate, and accompany the victuals to your mouth. the ants have a queen, whom the colonists call bugga-bug. her subjects are divided into three classes; the laborers, who do nothing but work--the soldiers, who do nothing but fight--and the gentry, who neither work nor fight, but spend their lives in the pleasant duty of continuing their species. the habitations of these insects, as specimens of mechanical ingenuity, are far superior to the houses of the natives, and are really the finest works of architecture to be met with on the african coast. in height, these edifices vary from four to fifteen or twenty feet, and are sometimes ten or twelve feet in diameter at the base. they contain apartments for magazines, for nurseries, and for all other domestic, social, and public purposes, communicating with one another, and with the exterior, by innumerable galleries and passages. the clay, which forms the material of the buildings, is rendered very compact, by a glutinous matter, mixed with earth; and all the passages, many of which extend great distances under ground, are plastered with the same kind of stucco. captain tuckey, in his expedition to the river zaire, discovered ant-hills composed of similar materials to the above, but which, in shape, precisely resembled gigantic toad-stools, as high as a one-story house. in this part of africa, they have the form of a mound. at the present day, when the community-principle is attracting so much attention, it would seem to be seriously worth while for the fourierites to observe both the social economy and the modes of architecture of these african ants. providence may, if it see fit, make the instincts of the lower orders of creation a medium of divine revelations to the human race: and, at all events, the aforesaid fourierites might stumble upon hints, in an ant-hill, for the convenient arrangement of those edifices, which, if i mistake not, they have christened phalanxteries. .--at a.m., got under way for the cape de verds. .--calm in the morning, and predictions of a long passage. at noon, sprung up a ten-knot breeze; and are sanguine of making a short run. in the evening, at the tea-table, we were talking of the delights of saratoga, at this season, and contrasting the condition of the fortunate visitors to that fashionable resort, with that of the sallow, debilitated, discontented cruisers on the african station. in the midst of the conversation, the cry of "man overboard," brought us all on deck with a rush. there was not much sea, though we were going seven knots. the man kept his head well above water, and swam steadily toward the life-buoy, which floated at a short distance from him--his only hope--while the wide atlantic was yawning around him, eager for his destruction. we watched him anxiously, until he seized it, and then thought of sharks. we were too far at sea, however, for many of these monsters to be in attendance. in a few moments a boat picked up man and buoy, and the ship was on her course again. .--anchored at porto praya. the season of journalizing, to any good purpose, is over. scenes and objects in this region have been so often presented to my eyes, that they now fail to make the vivid impressions which could alone enable me (were that ever possible) to weave them into a lively narrative of my adventures. my entries therefore, for the rest of the cruise, are likely to be "few, and far between." chapter xx glimpses of the bottom of the sea--the gar-fish--the booby and the mullet--improvement of liberia--its prospects--higher social position of its inhabitants--intercourse between the white and colored races--a night on shore--farewell to liberia.--reminiscence of robinson crusoe. _september_ .--at porto grande. to-day, as for many previous days, the water has been beautifully clear. the massive anchor and the links of the chain-cable, which lay along the bottom, were distinctly visible upon the sand, full fifty feet below. hundreds of fish--the grouper, the red snapper, the noble baracouta, the mullet, and many others, unknown to northern seas--played round the ship, occasionally rising to seize some floating food, that perchance had been thrown overboard. with my waking eye, i beheld the bottom of the sea as plainly as clarence saw it in his dream; although, indeed, here were few of the splendid and terrible images that were revealed to him:-- "a thousand fearful wrecks; a thousand men that fishes gnawed upon; wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl, inestimable stones, unvalued jewels." nevertheless, it was a sight that seemed to admit me deeper into the liquid element than i had ever been before. now and then came the long, slender gar-fish, and, with his sword-like beak, struck some unhappy fish which tempted his voracity. i watched the manoeuvres of the destroyer and his victims, with no little interest. the fish (which, in the two instances particularly observed, was the mullet) came instantly to the surface, on being struck, and sprang far out of water. he swam on his side with a circular motion, keeping his head above the surface. from time to time he leaped into the air, spasmodically, and in a fit of painful agony; for it could not be from alarm, as the foe was nowhere visible. gradually, his strength failed, and his efforts became feebler, and still more feeble. the fates of the two mullets were different. one received a second blow from the inexorable gar-fish, which, for a moment, increased his agony and his exertions. he then lay motionless upon the surface, at rest from all trouble. the conqueror came a third time, seized his prey, and swam swiftly out of sight. the other mullet, which rose half an hour afterwards, swam closer to the ship than his predecessor, and received no second blow. while the poor fellow was yet in the death-struggle, came two great sable birds, with bills, wings, and legs, like those of the heron. flapping their dark wings in the air, they circled round, and repeatedly swooped almost upon the dying fish. but he was not doomed to be their victim. presently, with his brown back, white breast, and pink bill, came flapping along a booby, and, without a moment's hesitation, stooped upon the mullet, and appeared to swallow him in the twinkling of an eye. the fish was at least six inches in length, and the bird not twice as much. how so liberal a morsel could be so quickly disposed of, was a marvel to a dozen idlers, who had been curiously observing this game of life and death to one party, and a dinner to the other. certainly, the booby carried off the fish. borne down by the weight of his spoil, the feathered gormandizer alighted on the water--rested himself for a moment--rose again, and re-alighted--and in this manner, with many such intervals of repose, made his way to the shore. .--at p.m., sailed for the coast, in company with the truxton. .--anchored off cape mesurado. it is now fourteen months since our ship first visited monrovia. within that period there has been a very perceptible improvement in its condition. the houses are in better repair; the gardens under superior cultivation. there is an abundant supply of cattle, which have been purchased from the natives. more merchant-vessels now make this their port, bringing goods hither, and creating a market for the commodities, live stock, and vegetables, of the colonists. an increased amount of money is in circulation; and the inhabitants find that they can dispose of the products of their industry for something better than the cloth and tobacco, which they were formerly obliged to take in payment. the squadron of united states men-of-war, if it do no other good, will at least have an essential share in promoting the prosperity of liberia. after having seen much, and reflected upon the subject even to weariness, i write down my opinion, that liberia is firmly planted, and is destined to increase and prosper. this it will do, though all further support from the united states be discontinued. a large part of the present population, it is true, are ignorant, and incompetent to place a just estimate on freedom, or even to comprehend what freedom really is. but they are generally improving in this respect; and there is already a sufficient intermixture of intelligent, enterprising and sagacious men, to give the proper tone to the colony, and insure its ultimate success. the great hope, however, is in the generation that will follow these original emigrants. education is universally diffused among the children; and its advantages, now beginning to be very manifest, will, in a few years, place the destinies of this great enterprise in the hands of men born and bred in africa. then, and not till then, will the experiment of african colonization, and of the ability of the colonists for self-support and self-government, have been fairly tried. my belief is firm in a favorable result. meantime, it would be wiser in the colonization society, and its more zealous members, to moderate their tone, and speak less strongly as to the advantages held out by liberia. unquestionably, it is a better country than america, for the colored race. but they will find it very far from a paradise. men, who expect to become independent and respectable, can only achieve their object here on the same terms as everywhere else. they must cultivate their minds, be willing to exert themselves, and not look for a too easy or too rapid rise of fortune. one thing is certain. people of color have here their fair position in the comparative scale of mankind. the white man, who visits liberia, be he of what rank he may, and however imbued with the prejudice of hue, associates with the colonists on terms of equality. this would be impossible (speaking not of individuals, but of the general intercourse between the two races) in the united states. the colonist feels his advantage in this respect, and reckons it of greater weight in the balance than all the hardships to which he is obliged to submit, in an unwonted climate and a strange country. he is redeemed from ages of degradation, and rises to the erect stature of humanity. on this soil, sun-parched though it be, he gives the laws; and the white man must obey them. in this point of view--as restoring to him his long-lost birthright of equality--liberia may indeed be called the black man's paradise. it is difficult to lay too great stress on the above consideration. when the white man sets his foot on the shore of africa, he finds it necessary to throw off his former prejudices. for my own part, i have dined at the tables of many colored men in liberia, have entertained them on shipboard, worshipped with them at church; walked, rode, and associated with them, as equal with equal, if not as friend with friend. were i to meet those men in my own town, and among my own relatives, i would treat them kindly and hospitably, as they have treated me. my position would give me confidence to do so. but, in another city, where i might be known to few, should i follow the dictates of my head and heart, and there treat these colored men as brethren and equals, it would imply the exercise of greater moral courage than i have ever been conscious of possessing. this is sad; but it shows forcibly what the colored race have to struggle against in america, and how vast an advantage is gained by removing them to another soil. .--yesterday, governor roberts gave our officers a farewell dinner. we left the table early, made our adieus, and were on our way down the river half an hour before sunset. the pilot and some of our friends endeavored to dissuade us from attempting the passage of the bar, pronouncing the surf too dangerous. some kroomen also discouraged us, saying that the bar was "too saucy." with the fever behind us, and the wild breakers and sharks before, it was matter of doubt what course to pursue. anxiety to be on our way homeward settled the difficulty; and we left the wharf, to make, at least, a trial. a trial, and nothing more, it proved; for, as we neared the bar, it became evident that there would be great rashness in attempting to cross. the surf came in heavily, and with the noise of thunder, and the gigantic rollers broke into foam, across the whole width of the bar. darkness had fallen around us, with the sudden transition of a tropical climate. there was no open space visible amid the foam; and, while the men lay on their oars, we looked anxiously for the clear water, which marks the channel to the sea. many minutes were thus spent, looking with all our eyes. a council of war was held between the captain and myself, in which we discussed the probabilities of being swamped and eaten. having once fairly started, we did not like to turn back, especially as it would be necessary to go through the insipid ceremony of repeating our good-bye. then, too, the image of fever rose behind us. by the prohibition of the commodore, and the dictates of prudence, not an officer had slept on shore on any part of the mainland of the african coast, during the whole period of our cruise; and now, at the very last moment, to be compelled to incur the risk, was almost beyond patience. on the other hand, there was the foaming surf, and the ravenous sharks, in whose maws there was an imminent probability of our finding accommodation, should we venture onward. it is a fate proper enough for a sailor, but which he may be excused for avoiding as long as possible. our council ended, therefore, with a determination to turn back, and trust to the tender mercies of the fever. it was a splendid moonlight night; one of those nights on which the natives deem it impossible to catch fish, saying that the sky has too many eyes, and that the fish will shun the bait. the frogs kept up an incessant chorus, reminding me of the summer evening melodies of my native land, yet as distinct from those as are the human languages of the two countries. i have observed that the notes of frogs are different in different parts of the world. on the banks of the beautiful arno, it is like the squalling of a cat. here, it is an exact imitation of the complaining note of young turkeys. unweariedly, these minstrels made music in our ears, until dawn gleamed in the east, and ushered in a bright and glorious morning. the birds now took the place of the frogs in nature's orchestra, and cooed, peeped, chattered, screamed, whistled, and sang, according to their various tastes and abilities. the trees were very green, and the dew-drops wonderfully brilliant; and, amid the cheerful influence of sun-rise, it was difficult to believe that we had incurred any deadly mischief, by our night's rest on the shore of africa. at a later period, i add, that no bad result ensued, either to the captain, myself, or the eight seamen, who were detained ashore on the above occasion. this good fortune may be attributable to the care with which we guarded ourselves from the night-air and the damps; and besides, we left the coast immediately, and, after a brief visit to sierra leone, pursued our homeward course to america. on another occasion, a lieutenant, a surgeon, and six men, belonging to our squadron, were detained on shore at cape mount, all night, after being capsized and wet. what were their precautions, i am unable to say; but, all the officers and men were attacked by fever, more or less severely, and in one instance fatally. [footnote: while revising these sheets for the press, the writer hears of an example which may show the necessity of the health-regulations imposed on the american squadron. the u.s. ship preble ascended the river gambia to the english settlement of bathurst, a distance of fifteen miles, to protect the european residents against an apprehended attack of the natives. although the ship remained but one or two days, yet, in that brief space, about a hundred cases of fever occurred on board, proving fatal to the master, a midshipman, and seventeen of the crew.] and now we leave liberia behind us, with our best wishes for its prosperity, but with no very anxious desire to breathe its fever-laden atmosphere again. there is enough of interest on the african station; but life blazes quickly away, beneath the glare of that torrid sun; and one year of that climate is equivalent to half a dozen of a more temperate one, in its effect upon the constitution. the voyager returns, with his sallow visage, and emaciated form, and enervated powers, to find his contemporaries younger than himself--to realize that he has taken two or three strides for their one, towards the irrevocable bourne; and has abridged, by so much, the season in which life is worth having for what may be accomplished, or for any zest that may be found in it. before quitting the coast, i must not forget that our cruising-ground has a classical claim upon the imagination, as being the very same over which robinson crusoe made two or three of his voyages. that famous navigator sailed all along the african shore, between cape de verd and the equator, trading for ivory, for gold dust, and especially for slaves, with as little compunction as pedro blanco himself. it is remarkable that de foe, a man of most severe and delicate conscience, should have made his hero a slave-dealer, and should display a perfect insensibility to anything culpable in the traffic. morality has taken a great step in advance, since that day; or, at least, it has thrown a strong light on one spot, with perhaps a corresponding shadow on some other. the next age may shift the illumination, and show us sins as great as that of the slave-trade, but which now enter into the daily practice of men claiming to be just and wise. chapter xxi. sierra leone--sources of its population--appearance of the town and surrounding country--religious ceremonies of the mandingoes--treatment of liberated slaves--police of sierra leone--agencies for emigration to the west indies--colored refugees from the united states--unhealthiness of sierra leone--dr. fergusson--splendid church--melancholy fate of a queen's chaplain--currency--probable ruin of the colony. _october_ .--we arrived off the point of sierra leone, last night, and were piloted up to the town, this morning. this is one of the most important and interesting places on the coast of africa. it was founded in , chiefly through the benevolent agency of mr. granville sharp, as a place of refuge for a considerable number of colored persons, who had left their masters, and were destitute and unsheltered in the streets of london. five years later, the population of the colony was recruited by above a thousand slaves, who had fled from the united states to nova scotia, during the american revolution. again, in , there was an addition of more than five hundred maroons, or outlawed negroes, from jamaica. and finally, since , sierra leone has been the receptacle for the great numbers of native africans liberated from slave-ships, on their capture by british cruisers. pensioners, with their families, from the black regiments in the west indies, have likewise been settled here. the population is now estimated at about forty-five thousand; a much smaller amount, probably, than the aggregate of all the emigrants who have been brought hither. the colony has failed to prosper, but not through any lack of effort on the part of england. it is the point, of all others on the african coast, where british energy, capital, and life, have been most profusely expended. the aspect of the cape, as you approach it from the sea, is very favorable. you discern cultivated hills, the white mansions of the wealthy, and thatched cottages, neat and apparently comfortable, abodes of the poorer class. over a space of several miles, the country appears to be in a high state of improvement. one large village is laid out with the regularity of philadelphia, consisting of seven parallel streets, kept free from grass, with thatched huts on either side, around which are small plots of ground, full of bananas and plantain trees. the town itself is a scene of far greater activity than any other settlement on the west coast. great numbers of negroes, of various tribes and marks, are to be seen there. so mixed, indeed, is the colored population, that there is little sympathy or sense of fellowship among them. the mandingoes seem to be the most numerous, and are the most remarkable in personal appearance. almost without exception, they are very tall figures, and wear white robes, and high caps without visors. these mandingoes hold the faith of mahomet, and at the time of our arrival, were celebrating the feast of the ramazan. several hundreds of them paraded through the streets in a confused mass, occasionally stopping before some gentleman's house, and enacting sundry mummeries, in consideration of which they expected to receive a present. in front of a house where i happened to be, the whole body were ranged in order; and two of them, one armed with a gun, and the other with a bow and arrow, ran from end to end of the line, crouching down and pretending to be on the watch against an enemy. at intervals, their companions, or a portion of them, raised a cry, like those which one hears in the mosques of asia. the above seemed to compose nearly all the ceremony; and our liberality was in proportion to the entertainment, consisting merely of a handful of coppers, scattered broadcast among the multitude. when this magnificent guerdon was thus proffered to their acceptance, they forthwith forgot their mummery, and joined in a general scramble. the king, or chief, now stept forward, and protested energetically against this mode of distribution; it being customary to consign all the presents to him, to be disposed of according to his better judgment. however, the mob picked up the coppers, and showed themselves indifferently well contented. when cargoes of slaves are brought to sierra leone, they are placed in a receptacle called the queen's yard, where they remain until the constituted authorities have passed judgment on the ship. this seldom requires more than a week. the liberated slaves are then apprenticed for five, seven, or nine years; the government requiring one pound ten shillings sterling from the person who takes them. unless applicants come forward, these victims of british philanthropy are turned adrift, to be supported as they may, or, unless providence take all the better care of them, to starve. for the sick, however, there is admittance to the government hospital; and the countrymen of the new-comers, belonging to the same tribe, lend them such aid as is in their power. food, consisting principally of rice, cassadas, and plantains, or bananas, is extremely cheap; insomuch that a penny a day will supply a man with enough to eat. the market is plentifully supplied with meats, fowls, and vegetables, and likewise with other articles, which may be tidbits to an african stomach, but are not to be met with in our bills of fare. for instance, among other such delicacies, i saw several rats, each transfixed with a wooden skewer, and some large bats, looking as dry as if they had given up the ghost a month ago. supporting themselves on food of this kind, it is not to be wondered at, that the working-classes find it possible to live at a very low rate of labor. the liberated slaves receive from four to six pence, and the kroomen nine pence per diem; these wages constituting their sole support. as may be supposed, so heterogeneous and wild a population as that of sierra leone requires the supervision of a strict and energetic police. accordingly, the peace is preserved, and crimes prevented, by a whole army of constables, who, in a cheap uniform of blue cotton, with a white badge on the arm, and a short club as their baton of office, patrol the streets, day and night. their number cannot be less than two or three hundred. there is a desire, in some quarters, to destroy the colony of sierra leone; and one of the means for accomplishing this end is, of procuring the emigration of the colored colonists to the west indies. for this purpose there are three different agencies. one has over its door:--"british guiana emigration office;" another is for trinidad; and a third for jamaica. great promises are made to persons proposing to emigrate; such as a free passage to the west indies, wages of from seventy-five cents to a dollar per day, and permission to return when they choose. very few, however, of those who have been long resident here, can be induced to avail themselves of these offers, small as are the earnings of labor at sierra leone. they believe that the stipulations are not observed; that emigrants, on their arrival in the west indies, will be called upon to pay their passages, and that it will not be at their option to return. in short, they suspect emigration to be only a more plausible name for the slave-trade. the kroomen are the class most sought for as emigrants, although negroes of any tribe are greedily received. even the africans just re-captured are sent off, as the authorities are pleased to term it, "voluntarily." the last emigration, consisting of somewhat less than two hundred and fifty persons, included seventy-six slaves, almost that instant landed from a prize. a respectable merchant assured me, that these men were not permitted to communicate with their countrymen, but were hurried off to the vessel, without knowing whither they were bound. the acting governor, dr. fergusson, denied the truth of this, although he admitted that the seventy-six liberated slaves did emigrate to the west indies, very soon after landing from the prize. it is to be remarked, that the white inhabitants of sierra leone, as well as the colored people, entertain very unfavorable notions of this scheme of procuring laborers for the west indies. the best defence of it, perhaps, is, that neither blacks nor whites can flourish in this settlement, and that a transportation from its poor soil and sickly climate, to any other region, may probably be for the better. but, undeniably, the british government is less scrupulous as to the methods of carrying out its philanthropic projects, than most other nations in their schemes of self-aggrandizement. in freetown, which is the residence of all the europeans, are to be found what remains of the emigrants from nova scotia, and their descendants. the whole number transported hither at several periods, was about fifteen hundred. not more than seventy or eighty of these people, or their progeny, now survive upon the spot. our pilot is one of the number. he affirms, that his countrymen were promised fifty acres of land, each, in sierra leone, on condition of relinquishing the land already in their possession in nova scotia. with this understanding they emigrated to africa; but, in more than half a century which has since elapsed, the government has never found it convenient to fulfil its obligations. only two or three acres have been assigned to each individual. meantime, the body of emigrants has dwindled away, until the standard six feet of earth by two, the natural inheritance of every human being, has sufficed for almost all of them, as well as fifty, or five thousand acres could have done. these emigrants were the colonial slaves, who were taken or ran away from the united states, during the revolutionary war. considered physically and statistically, their movement was anything but an advantageous one. it would be matter of curious speculation to inquire into the relative proportions now alive, of slaves who remained upon our southern soil, and of these freed men, together with the amount of their posterity. not, of course, that it has been in any degree a fair experiment as to the result of emancipating and colonizing slaves. the trial of that experiment has been left to america; and it has been commenced in a manner that might induce england to mistrust her own beneficence, when she contrasts liberia with sierra leone. this settlement has been known as "the white man's grave;" and it is certainly a beautiful spot for a grave--as lovely as one of those ornamental cemeteries, now so fashionable, and on which so much of our taste is lavished; as if only the dead had leisure for the enjoyment of shrubbery and sculpture. sierra leone, however, is by no means the fatal spot that it once was. formerly, a governor was expected to die every year, although a few held the reins of power, and enjoyed the pomp and dignity of office, twice or even thrice that period. brave and excellent men have accepted the station, on this fearful tenure. among them was colonel denham, the adventurous traveller in africa. very great mortality likewise prevailed among the merchants, military and civil officers, and soldiers. this was partly owing to the recklessness of their mode of life. the rich were in the habit of giving champagne-breakfasts at noon, and heavy and luxurious suppers at night. the continual neighborhood and near prospect of death made them gaily desperate; so that they grew familiar with him, and regarded him almost as a boon companion. and, besides, in a sickly climate, each individual is confident of his own personal immunity against the disease which, he is ready to allow, may be fatal to those around him. i have noticed this absurd hallucination in others, and been conscious of it in myself. in battle it is the same--the bullet is expected to strike any and every breast, except one's own--and here, perhaps, is the great secret of courage. latterly, the europeans at sierra leone practise a more temperate life. another circumstance that has conduced to render the settlement less insalubrious, is the clearing of lands in the vicinity, and conversion of the rank jungle into cultivated fields. the good effect of this change will be readily appreciated by those who have noticed the improved health of our western settlers, as the forest falls before the axe; or who have seen the difference between the inhabitants of old and new lands, in any country. it is said, by the old residents here, that they do not find it very sickly, except once in seven years, when an epidemic rages, and carries off many settlers. this has happened regularly since , until the present year, when, in the proper order of things, the angel of death should have re-appeared. several persons provided for their safety by quitting the place; and others made their arrangement to retreat, on the first symptoms of danger. but the year, thus far, seems to have been distinguished by no peculiar mortality. life, in a climate like this, must generally be much more brief than in temperate regions, even if it do not yield at once to the violence of disease. yet there are circumstances of europeans attaining a good and green old age at sierra leone. mr. hornell, a scotch merchant of great wealth and probity--which latter virtue is rare enough, in this quarter, to deserve special mention--has resided here fifteen years, and twenty-seven years in the west indies. he lives regularly, but generously imbibing ale, and brandy-and-water, in moderate quantities, every day of his life. the governor, colonel george macdonald, is now absent in england. in the interim, the duties of the office are performed by dr. fergusson, a mulatto in color, but born in scotland, and married to a white lady, who now resides in that country. dr. fergusson was regularly educated at edinburgh, and is a medical officer of the british army; a man of noble and commanding figure, handsome and intellectual countenance, and finished manners. he is affable, as well as dignified, in his deportment, and fluent and interesting in conversation. to him, and five or six other men of color, whom i have met on the coast, i should refer, as proofs that individuals of the african race may, with due advantages, be cultivated and refined so as to compare with the best specimens of white gentlemen. there is a large church here, said to have cost seventy thousand pounds sterling; notwithstanding which vast expenditure, divine service has ceased to be performed. the last clergyman, a young man universally beloved and respected, lost his life, two or three years ago. he had gone with a party of friends, five in all, on board a homeward-bound vessel, which lay at a short distance from the shore. on their return the boat capsized and sunk. the five kroomen saved themselves, by swimming, until picked up by a canoe; the five whites were lost; and the young clergyman among them. the latter swam well, and was almost within reach of a canoe, when he threw up his hands, exclaiming, "god have mercy on me!"--and disappeared. a shark had undoubtedly seized him, at the moment when he believed himself safe. this gentleman held the office of queen's chaplain; and since his melancholy fate, no new appointment of that nature has been made. if credit be due to the statements reciprocally made by the colonists, in reference to one another, there is great need of teachers to inculcate the principles of religion, morality, and brotherly love; although the spiritual instruction heretofore bestowed (which has cost large sums to the pious in england) has been almost entirely thrown away. there are some missionaries here, who have directed their labors principally to the business of education. the tide runs so strongly, into and out of the river, that such accidents as that which befell the five europeans, above-mentioned, are of no unfrequent occurrence. when boats or canoes are upset, it is impossible for the passengers to swim against the current. we had an instance of the danger, while at anchor there. the captain was seated in his cabin, with the stern windows open, when he heard a native in a canoe, under the stern, say "man drown!" being asked what he meant, he reiterated the words, pointing towards the sea. just then, a cry was indistinctly heard. two of our boats were instantly despatched, and picked up three kroomen, whose canoe had sunk, leaving them to the mercy of the current, which was rapidly drifting them towards the ocean. the humane society of sierra leone bestows a reward for every person rescued from drowning. in this instance, of course, no claim was made upon their funds. the currency here differs from that of all the other settlements on the coast, except those belonging to great britain. the spanish and south american doubloons are valued at only sixty-four shillings sterling each, or fifteen dollars and thirty-six cents; while they are worth elsewhere, sixteen dollars. spanish and south american dollars pass at about one per cent. discount. the english sovereign is reckoned at four dollars eighty cents; and the french five-franc piece at ninety-two cents. the gold and silver coin of the united states is not current at sierra leone. bills on london, at thirty days sight, are worth from par to five per cent. premium, and may actually be sold in small sums (say, from £ to £ ) at fair rates. pilotage is five shillings sterling per foot; and the port-charges are so exorbitant as to prevent the entrance of many vessels, which would otherwise stop to try the market. of late years, the trade of sierra leone has suffered great diminution. money having been lost on all the timber exported, that business is at present nearly abandoned. another cause of decay is the withdrawal of the british squadron, which has now its principal rendezvous at ascension. more than all, as contributing to the decline of the colony, the home-government has discontinued the greater part of the assistance formerly rendered. the governor, colonial secretary, and chief justice, are believed to be all the civil officers who now draw their salaries from england. the military force consists of a captain, five or six subalterns, and probably two or three hundred soldiers. in consequence of the failure of support from the mother-country, the colony has imposed higher duties upon certain articles, in order to try the experiment of raising a revenue from their own resources. the most sagacious and best informed residents predict that the result aimed at will not follow, and that three or four years will suffice to render the colony of sierra leone bankrupt. chapter xxii. failure of the american squadron to capture slave-vessels--causes of that failure--high character of the commodore and commander--similar ill-success of the french squadron--success of the english, and why--results effected by the american squadron. it will not have escaped the reader's notice, that the foregoing journal of our cruise records not the capture of a single slave-vessel, either by our own ship or any other belonging to the american squadron. such is the fact, and such it must inevitably be, so long as the circumstances, which prevented our efficiency in that respect, shall continue to exist. the doctrines relative to the right of search, held by our government and cordially sanctioned by the people, declare that the cruisers of no foreign nation have a right to search, visit, or in any way detain an american vessel on the high seas. denying the privilege to others, we must of course allow the same inviolability to a foreign flag, as we assert for that of our own country. hence, our national ships can detain or examine none but american vessels, or those which they find sailing under the american flag. but no slave-vessel would display this flag. the laws of the united states declare the slave-trade, if exercised by any of its citizens, to be piracy, and punishable with death; the laws of spain, portugal and brazil, are believed to be different, or, at least, if they threaten the same penalty, are certain never to inflict it. consequently, all slaves will be careful to sail under the flag of one of these latter nations, and thus avoid the danger of losing life as well as property, in the event of capture. undoubtedly, many american vessels have been sold to foreigners, by unprincipled citizens of our country, with a belief or full understanding that they were to be employed in this nefarious trade. in some instances, such vessels have been sold, with stipulations in the contract, binding the seller to deliver them at slave-stations on the coast of africa; they have been sent out to those stations under american colors, and commanded by american captains; and there, being transferred to new masters, they have immediately taken on board their cargoes of human flesh. but how is an american cruiser to take hold of a vessel so circumstanced? on her departure from the united states, and until the transfer takes place, she is provided with regular papers, and probably sails for her destined port with a cargo which may be used in lawful, as well as unlawful trade. after the transfer, she appears under foreign colors, is furnished with foreign papers, commanded by a foreign master, and manned by a foreign crew. it is not to be presumed that this change of nationality will be effected in presence of one of our men-of-war. how then can such a vessel be taken or molested, so long as the present treaties and laws continue in force? it is well that the public should be prepared for an inefficiency which can hardly fail to continue; and, in justice to the american squadron, it should be imputed to the true cause, and not to any lack of energy or good-will on the part of the officers. whatever be their zeal (and hitherto they have been active and indefatigable), it is almost certain that their efforts will not be crowned with success, in the capture of a single prize. the commodore, under whose general direction we have acted, is a gentleman of the highest professional character, persevering, sagacious, and determined, and well known as such, both in and out of the service. the commanders of the different vessels were likewise men of elevated character, zealous in performing their duty, and honorably ambitious of distinction. if the incentive of gain be reckoned stronger than considerations of duty and honor, it was not wanting; for, besides half the value of the vessel, each liberated slave would have been worth twenty-five dollars to the captors--a handsome amount of prize-money, in a cargo of six or eight hundred. the french, like ourselves, having no reciprocal treaties with spain, portugal, and brazil, are equally unsuccessful in making prizes. eleven of their vessels of war were stationed on the coast, during the period of our cruise, but effected not a single capture. england, by virtue of her treaties with the three nations above mentioned, empowers her cruisers to take slave-vessels under either of their flags. hence the success of the english commanders; a success which is sometimes tauntingly held up, in contrast with what is most unjustly termed the sluggishness of our own squadron. still, the presence of american national vessels, on the coast of africa, has not been unattended with results that may partly compensate for the sacrifice of human life and health, which the climate renders inevitable. the trade of the united states has been protected. the natives have been taught, that the humblest american merchant-vessel sails under the shadow of a flag, which guarantees security to everything that it covers. the colonies of liberia have been made more respectable in the eyes of the barbarian nations that surround them. this latter advantage it is creditable to our country to bestow; for the united states demand from liberia no commercial exemptions, nor anything in return for the countenance which she lends to that growing commonwealth. never before, perhaps, did a colony exist, so entirely free from vexatious interference on the part of the mother-country, and so carefully fostered by the benevolence that planted it. slight as is the present political connection between the united states and liberia, the latest advices inform us that it is in contemplation to sever the silken thread. the colonization society, i understand, is discussing the expediency of relinquishing its further control over the government, and allowing the infant colony to take a place among independent nations. should this event come to pass, and liberia either find the protection of another maritime power, or prove adequate to protect herself, there will be one reason the less for sending a squadron of gallant ships to chase shadows in a deadly climate. the end. travels of richard and john lander, into the interior of africa, for the discovery of the course and termination of the niger; from unpublished documents in the possession of the late capt. john william barber fullerton, employed in the african service: with _a prefatory analysis of the previous travels_ of park, denham, clapperton, adams, lyon, ritchie, &c. into the hitherto unexplored countries of africa. by robert huish, esq. author of the "last voyage of capt. sir john ross, to the arctic regions," "memoirs of w. cobbett, esq." "private and political life of the late henry hunt, esq." &c. &c. &c. london: _(printed for the proprietors,)_ published by john saunders, , newgate street. . introduction. many are the acquisitions which geography has made since the boundaries of commerce have been extended, and the spirit of enterprise has carried our adventurous countrymen into countries which had never yet been indented by a european foot; and which, in the great map of the world, appeared as barren and uninhabitable places, destitute of all resources from which the traveller could derive a subsistence. it must, however, on the other hand, be admitted, that design has frequently had little to do in the discovery of those countries, however well it may have been conceived, and however great the perseverance may have been, which was exhibited in the pursuit. the discovery of america was, indeed, a splendid example of an enlightened conception, and an undaunted heroism, crowned with the most complete success; and the laudable and unabated ardour which this country, in despite of the most appalling obstacles, has persisted in solving the great geographical problem of the course and termination of the niger, may be placed second in rank to the discovery of america. as long as any fact is shut out from the knowledge of man, he who is in search of it will supply the deficiency by his own conclusions, which will be more or less removed from the object of his pursuit, according to the previous opinions which he may have formed, or to the credit which he may have placed on the reports of others. these remarks cannot be better illustrated, than in the case furnished by the joliba, the quorra, or niger, the termination of which river was utterly unknown until richard and john lander, braving difficulties which would have broken any other hearts than theirs, succeeded in navigating the river until its conflux with the ocean. since park's first discovery of the joliba, every point of the compass has been assumed for the ulterior course and termination of that river, and however wrong subsequent discovery has proved this speculative geography to have been, it is not to be regarded as useless. theories may be far short of the truth, but while they display the ingenuity and reasoning powers of their authors, they tend to keep alive that spirit of inquiry and thirst for knowledge which terminates in discovery. various accounts of this river had been gradually collected from different sources, which afforded grounds for fresh theories respecting its termination. that of reichard was the favourite, he supposing that it assumed a southwest course, and terminated in the gulph of guinea. it was observed at the time, that there was neither evidence on which such an opinion could be supported, nor any by which it could be refuted. discovery has proved him to be right in respect to its ultimate disposal; but at the same time, he participated in the general error regarding its course to wangara. these different opinions appeared in several publications, in which, as might be expected, much error was mixed up with the general correctness. that the river flowed into the sea at funda, was the principal and chief point that was gained; but the most extraordinary circumstance attending this discovery, was, that no one knew where funda was. the only exception to these was the theory of major denham, supported by sultan bello's information, who continued its easterly course below boossa, and ended it in lake tchad. such was the uncertain condition in which the course of the niger remained, when the happy idea occurred of sending the messrs. landers to follow its course below boossa. by this step the british government completed what it had begun, and accomplished in a few months the work of ages. contents chap. i. herodutus. early history of africa. interior of africa. malte brun. division of africa. early african discoveries. portuguese discoveries. madeira. island of arguin. bemoy. prester john. death of bemoy. elmina. ogane. john ii. lord of guinea. diego cam. his return to congo. catholic missionaries. acts of the missionaries. magical customs of the natives. expulsion of the portuguese. chap. ii. expeditions of the english. thompson. first expedition of jobson. african animals. jobson's arrival at tenda. bukar sano. second expedition of jobson. the horey. expedition of vermuyden. expedition of stibbs. falls of barraconda. natives of upper gambia. dangers from the elephants and sea horses. travels of jannequin. chap. iii. african association. expedition of ledyard. his death. expedition of lucas. major houghton. his death. chap v. [*] park's first journey. pisania. dr. laidley. jindy. mandingo negroes. kootacunda. woolli. konjour. membo jumbo. tallika. ganado. kuorkarany. fatteconda. almami. departure from fatteconda. joag. robbery of mr. park by the natives. demba sego. gungadi. tesee. tigitty sego. anecdote of an african wife. kooniakary. sambo sego. [footnote: chap. iv. was accidentally numbered chap. v.] chap. vi. king semba. sego jalla. salem daucari. route from soolo to feesurah. kemmoo. kaarta. koorabarri. funing kedy. ali, king of ludamar. sampaka. arrival at the camp of ali. conduct of the moors. robberies of ali. illness of mr. park. curiosity of the african ladies. whirlwinds of the desert. an african wedding. chap. vii. sufferings of mr. park. departure of ali. park's introduction to fatima. beauty of the moorish women. the great desert of jarra. demba taken by the moors. jarra. queira. escape of mr. park. his perilous situation. shrilla. wawra. dingyee. departure from doolinkeaboo. first view of the niger. amiable conduct of a bambara woman. mansong king of sego. sansanding. park's encounter with a lion. moorzan. silla. kea. superstition of the natives. madiboo. sibity. sansanding. conduct of mansong. yamina. balaba. taffara. sominoo. kollikorro. saphie writing. bambakoo. kooma. park robbed by the foulahs. reflections. chap. viii. sibidooloo. the mansa of wonda. mansia. generous conduct of a karfa. a negro school. treatment of the slaves. close of the rhamadam. departure of the coffle. the jallonka wilderness. coffle attacked by bees. fate of nealee. koba. jallonka banditti. malacotta. magnanimous conduct of damel. park's arrival in england. chap. ix. frederic horneman. ummesogeir. siwah. conduct of the siwahans. mourzouk. fezzan. death of horneman. nicholls. his death. chap. x. adams. soudenny. timbuctoo. king and queen of timbuctoo. la mar zarah. natives of timbuctoo. their customs. their religion. female physicians. amusements at timbuctoo. capture of slaves. penal code at timbuctoo. doubts respecting the niger. chap. xi. adams' departure from timbuctoo. tudenny. distress in the desert. vied d'leim. escape of adams. hilla gibla. adam's amour with isha. adams sold as a slave. hieta mouessa ali. recapture of adams. chap. xii. wadinoon. treatment of slaves. cruel treatment of adams. murder of dolbie. characteristics of european slaves. ransom of adams. return of adams to england. justification of adams. chap. xiii. sidi hamet. timbuctoo. women of timbuctoo. dress of the natives of timbuctoo. bimbinah. wassanah. reflections on national character. comparison between adams and sidi hamet. reflections on timbuctoo. close of adams' narrative. chap. xiv. population of west barbary. the errifi. the shilluh. anecdote of shilluh. character of the arabs. the moors. the marabouts. religion of the africans. chap. xv. second expedition of park. his departure. attacks on mr. park. his disheartening situation. conduct of mansong. death of mr. anderson. death of mr. park. manuscripts of park. chap. xvi. tuckey's expedition. his departure. disasters of the expedition. death of tuckey. expedition of captain gray. expedition of major laing. chap. xvii. expedition of captain lyon. benioleed. zemzem. bonjem. sockna. hoon. wadan. journey to mourzouk. zeighan. samnoo. wad el nimmel. chap. xviii. mourzouk. description of mourzouk. castle of mourzouk. construction of the houses of mourzouk. the fighi. african education. the burying places of mourzouk. dress of the women. filthy habits of the natives. their dances. dresses of the sultan's children. the sultan's son. revenue of the sultan of fezzan. personal characteristics of the natives. moral character of the fezzaners. music of the fezzaners. illness of captain lyon. his distressing situation. treachery of mukni. death of mr. ritchie. return of captain lyon. chap. xix. expedition of denham and clapperton. sockna. sand storm in the desert. mourzouk. interview with the sultan of mourzouk. boo khaloom. departure of major denham for tripoli. sails for england. entrance into sockna. superstition of boo khaloom. marriage at sockna. agutifa. tingazeer. zeghren. omhal henna. illness of clapperton and oudney. strength of the expedition. description of the arabs. chap. xx. expedition to the westward. tuaricks. kharaik. gorma. ancient inscriptions. oubari. roman buildings. route over the sand hills. wadey shiati. visit to the town. ghraat. visit to the sultan. tuarick woman. chap. xxi. departure from mourzouk. gabrone. medroosa. tegerhy. natives of tegerhy. skeletons of slaves. major denham and the skeletons. slaughter of the camels. anay sultan tibboo. kisbee. tiggema. dirkee. plundering arabs. bilma. female natives of bilma. boo khaloom, and captain lyon's book. surgical skill of the arabs. aghadem. tibboo couriers. beere kashitery. negro shampooing. gunda tibboos. mina tahr. arab plunderers. kofei. traita tibboos. huts of the tarifas. lake tchad. lari. death of a coluber. nyagami. tribe of monkeys. woodie. dress of the natives of woodie. buridha. strength of buridha. min ali tahr, and the royal family of england. chap. xxii. approach to kouka. description of the bornou troops. barca gana. sheik of kouka. presentation to the sheik. costume of the women of kanem and bornou. major denham and a young lion. the court of bornou. kouka. angornou. the bornouese. sports of the bornouese. expedition against the kerdies. mora, the capital of mandara. the sultan of mandara. malem chadily. expedition against the fellatas. defeat of the arabs. death of boo khaloom. perilous situation of major denham. song on boo khaloom. old birnie. gambarou. expedition against the mungas. chap. xxiii. sultan of loggun. the loggunese. mr. tyrwhit. the shouaa arabs. tahr, the chief of the la salas. the beddoomahs. katagum. sansan. death of dr. oudney. market of kano. pugilism in kano. marriages and funerals of the people of kano. the governor of hadyja. quana. females of quarra. treatment of the small pox. a fellata fugitive. chap. xxiv. the wells of kamoon. arrival at sockatoo. sultan bello. abolition of the slave trade. clapperton's visit to sultan bello. death of mr. park. obstacles to the journey to youri. books of park. final abandonment of the journey. ateeko, the brother of bello. purchase of major denham's baggage. the civet cat. the executioner of sockatoo. departure from sockatoo. account of sockatoo. trade of sockatoo. arrival in england. chap. xxv. lander's first expedition with clapperton. sultan bello's letter. widah. the sugar berry. beasts of prey. animals of dahomy. religion of dahomy. its government. officers of the court of dahomy. marriages at dahomy. carnival at abomey. sacrifice of victims at abomey. anecdote of the king of dahomy. badagry. introduction to the chief of eyeo. saboo. humba, death of captain pearce. dances at jannah. lander at an african almacks. duffoo. erawa. washoo. koosoo. akkibosa, medical treatment in eyeo. loko. tshow. entrance into katunga. theatrical entertainments at eyeo. method of salutation. chap. xxvi. situation of the city of eyeo. its markets. feasts of the youribanies. produce of youriba. etiquette at the court of katunga. african antelopes. sultan yarro. female cavalry. kiama. sultan. yarro's daughter. wawa. its productions and natives. the widow zuma. her costume and domestic marriage to clapperton. character of the inhabitants of wawa. departure from wawa. boussa. inquiries respecting park. place of park's death. expected recovery of park's journal. letter from the king of youri. conduct of the widow zuma. her dress and escort. mahommed el his camp. rejoicings at koolfu. its trade. the widow laddie, employment of time at koolfu. character of its people. akinjie. futika. baebaejie. chap. xxvii. military tactics of the fellatas. female warrior of zamfra. proceedings of bello. letter of sultan bello. death of clapperton. chap. xxviii. almena. cannibals of almena. natives of catica. the river coodoma. cuttup. the sultan of cuttup. lander and the wives of the sultan. the river rary. dunrora. lander taken back to cuttup. zaria. crosses the koodonia. arrival at badagry. attempt on the life of lander by poison. ransomed by captain laing. arrival in england. chap. xxix. african discoveries. expedition of richard and john lander. instructions of government. departure from portsmouth. badagry. visit to king adooley. his conduct. traits of lander's character. visit of the king's eldest son. intrigues of the mulattoes. division of badagry. visit to the king of portuguese town. customs of the natives. chap. xxx. evasive conduct of adooley. visit to adooley. visit from the chief of spanish town. rapacity of adooley. visit of general poser's headman. religious rites of the mahommedans. sports of the natives. the houssa mallams. surgical skill of richard lander. articles demanded by adooley. female of jenna. character of adooley. his filial affection. battle between the lagos and badagrians. trial by the cap. chap. xxxi. departure from badagry. progress up the river. arrival at wow regulations of the fetish at wow. the village of sagba. passage of a swamp. basha. soato. arrival at bidjie. bad faith of adooley. introduction to the chief of bidjie. departure from bidjie arrival of a messenger from jenna. laatoo. larro. the chief of larro. customs at larro. departure from larro. introduction at the court of jenna. the governor of jenna. pascoe and his wife. musicians of jenna. the badagry guides. african wars. women of jenna. fate of the governor's wives. conduct of the widow. abominable customs at jenna. mourning of the women. an african tornado. departure from jenna. arrival and departure from bidjie. the chief of chow. departure from chow. egga. arrival at jadoo. natives of jadoo. affection of the african mothers. engua. afoora. assinara. arrival at chouchou. tudibu. eco. dufo. chaadoo. arrival at row. chekki. coosoo. the butter tree. departure from coosoo. arrival at acboro. lazipa. cootoo. bohoo. visit to the head minister. mallo. jaguta. shea. esalay. desertion of esalay. atoopa. leoguadda. eetcho. market at eetcho. eetcholee. arrival at katunga. chap. xxxii. visit to mansolah. customs of the court of katunga. mansolah's visit to the landers. intended route of the landers. the master of the horse. decay of katunga. the markets of katunga. visit from ebo. intrigues of the wives of ebo. visit of houssa mallams. presents to the head men. their affluence. site of katunga. character of the natives. political constitution of alorie. exhibition of the presents. projected departure from katunga. wives of mansolah. last interview with mansolah. chap. xxxiii. departure from katunga. revolt of the carriers. arrival at rumbum. acra. visit of the natives. the governor of keeshee. visit of the mallams. singular application of an acba woman. departure from acba. return of the badagry guides. african banditti. village of moussa. progress to kiama. meeting of the kiama escort. arrival at benikenny. kiama. chap xxxiv. presents to the king of kiama. visit to the king. parentage of the widow zuma. visit from the mahommedan mallams. their honesty. the bebun salah. religious ceremonies of the mahommedans. anniversary of the bebun salah. races at kiama. approach of the king. his dress. the king's children. chap. xxxv. kakafungi. illness of john lander. distressing situation of the landers. departure from coobley. the midiki, or queen of boussa. mr. park's effects. disappointment respecting mr. park's papers. kagogie. arrival at yaoorie. deceitful conduct of the sultan. description of yaoorie. message to the king of boussa. departure from yaoorie. letter from the sultan of yaoorie. chap. xxxvi. arrival at guada. adventure with a crocodile. subterraneous course of the niger. the king consults the niger. arrival at wowow. interview with the king. negotiation for a canoe. the king and the salt cellar. arrival of the canoe from wowow. preparations for departure. departure from boossa. arrival at patashie. message from the king of wowow. visit to the king of wowow. return to patashie. arrival at lever. conduct of ducoo. canoes demanded by the chief of teah. treacherous conduct of the chief. departure from patashie. bajiebo. interview with the chief of leechee. majie. belee. the king of the park water. interview with the water king. progress down the niger. zagozhi. messengers arrive from rabba. chap. xxxvii. visit of the two arabs. message from mallam dendo. present of mr. park's tobe to the prince of rabba. perfidy of the king of nouflie. departure from zagozhi. noble speech of the prince of rabba. construction of the canoes. last audience of the king of the dark water. chap. xxxviii. danger from the hippopotami. dacannie. gungo. arrival at egga. annoyances at egga. departure from egga. arrival at kacunda. visit from the chief's brother. departure from kacunda. alarm of the natives. hostile motions of the natives. explanation of the chief. information obtained from the funda mallam. detention at damaggoo. first signs of european intercourse. departure from damaggoo. arrival at kirree. attacked by the natives. the landers taken to kirree. loss of their property. holding of a palaver. the kirree people. chap. xxxix. departure from kirree. superstition of the eboes. arrival at an eboe town. visit to the king of eboe. first interview with obie. the palaver. king boy. character of the kings of africa. decision of obie. embarrassments of the landers. conduct of the eboe people. revels of the natives. the little fat female visitor. her intoxication. chap. xl. exorbitant demand of king boy. visit of king obie. arrangement made with king boy. preparation for departure. hostile disposition of the natives. description of adizzetta. etiquette of king boy. offering to the fetish. progress down the river. uncomfortable situation of the landers. introduction to forday. progress to brass town. procession down the river. superstitious practices of the natives. description of brass, residence of the landers at brass. traffic of the natives. chap. xli. richard lander proceeds to the english brig. arrival in the second brass river. reception on board the brig. scandalous conduct of captain lake. disappointment of king boy. captain lake and the pilot. unfeeling behaviour of lake. richard lander's anxiety about his brother. return of john lander. john lander's stay at brass town. his narrative. chap. xlii. proceedings on board the brig. presents to king boy. perfidy of the pilot. hostile motions of the natives. brig. providential escape. nautical instructions. release of mr. spittle. perilous situation of the passage to fernando po. fernando po. colonization of fernando po. traffic with the natives. localities of fernando po. the kroomen. natives of fernando po. costume of the natives. their thieving propensities. punishment of the thieves. resources of the island. method of obtaining palm wine. island of anna bon. injurious effects of the climate. prospective commercial advantages. voyage to the calebar river. geographical and nautical directions. the tornadoes. superstitious custom of the natives. duke ephraim. visit to duke ephraim. the priests of duke town. mourning amongst the natives. attack of an alligator. the thomas taken by a pirate. departure from fernando po. death of the kroomen. arrival in england. advantages of the expedition. investigation of the niger. course of the niger. ptolemy's hypothesis of the niger. sources of the african rivers. benefit of lander's expedition. chap. xliii. richard lander's third expedition. fitting out of the expedition. vessels employed in the expedition. sailing of the expedition. arrival in the river nun. attack of the natives. impolitic conduct of lander. return of richard lander to fernando po. return of lander to attah. reconciliation of the damaggoo chiefs. abolition of the sacrifices of human beings. rabba. ascent of the river tchadda. prophecy of king jacket. lander wounded by the natives. approaching death of lander. death of richard lander. infamous conduct of liverpool merchants. causes of the attack. meeting of the inhabitants of truro. the travels of richard lander, into the interior of africa. chapter i. previously to entering upon the immediate subject of the origin and progress of the different voyages, which have been undertaken for exploring the interior of africa, it may be not only interesting, but highly instructive, to take a rapid survey of the great peninsula, as it appeared to the earlier travellers, and as it was found by the last of them, amongst whom may be included the individual, whose adventures in the present work, claim our chief attention. it is on record, that the coasts of africa have been navigated from as early a period, as six hundred years before christ, and, according to the earliest records of history, the circumnavigation of africa was accomplished by the phoenicians, in the service of pharaoh necho. on referring to herodotus, the earliest and most interesting of greek historians, and to whom we are indebted for the knowledge of many important facts relative to africa, in the earliest periods of its history, we find, in corroboration of the circumnavigation of africa by the phoenicians, "that taking their course from the red sea they entered into the southern ocean; on the approach of autumn, they landed in lybia, and planted some corn in the place, where they happened to find themselves; when this was ripe, and they had cut it down, they again departed. having thus consumed two years, they in the third passed the columns of hercules, and returned to egypt. their relation may obtain attention from others, but to me it seems incredible, for they affirmed that having sailed round africa, _they had the sun on their right hand._" it is worthy of remark, that the very circumstance, which led herodotus to attach discredit to the circumnavigation of africa by the phoenicians, on account of their having the sun to the right, is the very strongest presumption in favour of its truth. some historians have indeed endeavoured to prove, that the voyage was altogether beyond any means, which navigation at that early era could command; but in the learned exposition of rennell, a strong degree of probability is thrown upon the early tradition. at all events it may be considered, that the obscure knowledge, which we possessed of the peninsular figure of africa, appears to have been derived from the phoenicians. herodotus, however, was himself a traveller, in those early times, of no mean celebrity. despairing of obtaining accurate information of the then known part of the habitable world, he determined to have recourse to travelling, for the purpose of completing those surveys, which had been undertaken by his predecessors, and which had been left in a dubious and indefinite state. he resided for a considerable period in egypt, during which, he entered into a friendly communion with the native priests, from whom he obtained much accurate information, as well as a great deal that was false and exaggerated relative to the extensive region, which extends from the nile to the atlantic. according to his description it is much inferior in fertility to the cultivated parts of europe and asia, and suffering extremely from severe drought; yet he makes mention of a few spots, such as cinyps, and the high tract cyrene, which, undergoing the process of irrigation, may stand comparison with the richest portions of the globe. generally, however, in quitting the northern coast, which he terms significantly the forehead of africa, the country became more and more arid. hills of salt arose, out of which the natives constructed their houses, without any fear of their melting beneath a shower in a region where rain was unknown. the land became almost a desert, and was filled with such multitudes of wild beasts, as to be considered their proper inheritance, and scarcely disputed with them by the human race. farther to the south, the soil no longer afforded food even to these wild tenants; there was not a trunk of a tree, nor a drop of water--total silence and desolation reigned. this may be considered as the first picture on record of the northern part of africa; a country, which, even after the lapse of two thousand years, presents to the eye of science, as regards its interior recesses, a blank in geography, a physical and not less a moral problem; a dark and bewildering mystery. the spirit of enterprise has carried our mariners to the arctic seas, braving the most appalling dangers in the solution of a great geographical problem; by the same power, civilization has been carried into the primeval forests of the american continent, and cities have arisen in the very heart of the andes. the interior of africa, however, notwithstanding its navigable rivers, has been hitherto almost a sealed chapter in the history of the globe. the deserts, which extend from egypt to the atlantic, and which cover a great surface of the interior, have proved a barrier to the march of conquest, or civilization; and whatever science has gained, has been wrested by the utmost efforts of human perseverance and the continual sacrifice of human life. it must, however, be allowed that there are obstacles existing to the knowledge and the civilization of central africa, which cannot be overcome by the confederated power of human genius. extending miles in length, and nearly the same extent in breadth, it presents an area, according to malte brun, of , , square miles, unbroken by any estuary, or inland sea, and intersected by a few long or easily navigable rivers; all its known chains of mountains are of moderate height, rising in terraces, down which the waters find their way in cataracts, not through deep ravines and fertile valleys. owing to this configuration, its high table lands are without streams, a phenomenon unknown in any other part of the world; while, in the lower countries, the rivers, when swelled with the rains, spread into floods and periodical lakes, or lose themselves in marshes. according to this view of the probable structure of the unknown interior, it appears as one immense flat mountain, rising on all sides from the sea by terraces; an opinion favoured by the absence of those narrow pointed promontories, in which other continents terminate, and of those long chains of islands, which are, in fact, submarine prolongations of mountain chains extending across the main land. it is, however, not impossible, that in the centre of africa, there may be lofty table lands like those of quito, or valleys like that of cashmeer, where, as in those happy regions, spring holds a perpetual reign. in regard to the population, as well as its geographical character, africa naturally divides itself into two great portions, north and south of the mountains of kong and the jebel el komar, which give rise to the waters of the senegal, the niger and the nile. to the north of this line, africa is ruled, and partially occupied by foreign races, who have taken possession of all the fertile districts, and driven the aboriginal population into the mountains and deserts of the interior. it is consistent with general experience, that in proportion as civilization extends itself, the aboriginal race of the natives become either extinct, or are driven farther and farther into the interior, where they in time are lost and swept from the catalogue of the human race. south of this line, we find africa entirely peopled with the negro race, who alone seem capable of sustaining the fiery climate, by means of a redundant physical energy scarcely compatible with the full development of the intellectual powers of man. central africa is a region distinguished from all others, by its productions and climate, by the simplicity and yet barbarian magnificence of its states; by the mildness and yet diabolical ferocity of its inhabitants, and peculiarly by the darker nature of its superstitions, and its magical rites, which have struck with awe strangers in all ages, and which present something inexplicable and even appalling to enlightened europeans; the evil principle here seems to reign with less of limitation, and in recesses inaccessible to white men, still to enchant and delude the natives. the common and characteristic mark of their superstition, is the system of fetiches, by which an individual appropriates to himself some casual object as divine, and which, with respect to himself, by this process, becomes deified, and exercises a peculiar fatality over his fortune. the barbarism of africa, may be attributed in part its great fertility, which enables its inhabitants to live without are but chiefly to its imperviousness to strangers. every petty state is so surrounded with natural barriers, that it is isolated from the rest, and though it may be overrun and wasted, and part of its inhabitants carried into captivity, it has never been made to form a constituent part of one large consolidated empire and thus smaller states become dependent, without being incorporated. the whole region is still more inaccessible on a grand scale, than the petty states are in miniature; and while the rest of the earth has become common, from the frequency of visitors, africa still retains part of the mystery, which hung over the primitive and untrodden world. passing over the attempts of the very early travellers to become acquainted with the geographical portion of africa, in which much fiction, and little truth, were blended, we arrive at that period, when the spirit of discovery began to manifest itself amongst some of the european states. the darkness and lethargy, which characterised the middle ages, had cast their baneful influence over every project, which had discovery for its aim, and even the invaluable discovery of the mariner's compass, which took place at the commencement of the thirteenth century, and which opened to man the dominion of the sea, and put him in full possession of the earth had little immediate effect in emboldening navigators to venture into unfrequented seas. at a somewhat earlier period, it is true, the hanse towns and the italian republics began to cultivate manufactures and commerce, and to lay the foundation of a still higher prosperity, but they carried on chiefly an inland or coasting trade. the naval efforts, even of venice or genoa, had no further aim than to bring from alexandria, and the shores of the black sea, the commodities of india, which had been conveyed thither chiefly by caravans over land. satisfied with the wealth and power, to which they had been raised by this local and limited commerce, these celebrated republics made an attempt to open a more extended path over the ocean. their pilots, indeed, guided most of the vessels engaged in the early voyages of discovery, but they were employed, and the means furnished, by the great monarchs, whose ports were situated upon the shores of the atlantic. the first appearance of a bolder spirit, in which the human mind began to make a grand movement in every direction, in religion, science, freedom, and liberty, may be dated from about the end of the fifteenth century. the glory of leading the way in this new career, was reserved for portugal, then one of the smallest, and least powerful of the european kingdoms. when in , john i. sent forth a few vessels, to explore the western shores of africa, while he prepared a great armament to attack the moors of barbary, the art of navigation was still very imperfect, nor had the portuguese ever ventured to sail beyond cape non. but what most powerfully contributed to give impulse and direction to the national ardour, was the enlightened enthusiasm, with which prince henry of portugal, a younger son of john i., espoused the interests of science, and the prosecution of nautical discovery. in order to pursue his splendid projects without interruption, he fixed his residence at sagres, near cape st. vincent, where the prospect of the open atlantic continually invited his thoughts to their favourite theme. his first effort was upon a small scale. he fitted out a single ship, the command of which was entrusted to two gentlemen of his household, who volunteered their services, with instructions to use their utmost endeavours to double cape bojador, and thence to steer southward. according to the mode of navigation, which then prevailed, they held their course along the shore, and by following that direction, they must have encountered almost insuperable difficulties, in the attempt to pass the cape; their want of skill was, however, compensated by a fortunate accident. a sudden squall drove them out to sea, and when they expected every moment to perish, landed them on an unknown island, which, from their happy escape, they named porto santo. they returned to portugal with the good tidings, and were received with the applause due to fortunate adventurers. the following year, prince henry sent out three ships to take possession of the new island; a fixed spot on the horizon, towards the south, resembling a small black cloud, soon attracted the attention of the settlers, and the conjecture suggested itself that it might be land. steering towards it, they arrived at a considerable island, uninhabited, and covered with wood, which, on that account, they called madeira. by these voyages, the portuguese became accustomed to a bolder navigation, and at length, in , gilianez, one of prince henry's captains, by venturing out into the open sea, succeeded in doubling cape bojador, which, until then, had been regarded as impassable. this successful voyage, which the ignorance of the age placed on a level with the most famous exploits recorded in history, opened a new sphere to navigation, as it discovered the vast continent of africa, still washed by the atlantic ocean, and stretching towards the south. a rapid progress was then made along the shores of the sehara, and the portuguese navigators were not long in reaching the fertile regions watered by the senegal and the gambia. the early part of this progress was dreary in the extreme; they saw nothing before them but a wild expanse of lifeless earth and sky, naked rocks and burning sands, stretching immeasurably into the exterior, and affording no encouragement to any project of settlement. after, however, passing cape blanco, the coast began to improve in appearance, and when they saw the ivory and gold brought down from the interior, those regions began to excite the lust of conquest. this was, however, an undertaking beyond the means of any force which had as yet sailed from portugal. in , however, nuno tristan discovered the island of arguin, and as gonzalo da centra was in killed by a party of negroes, in attempting to ascend a small river, near the rio grande, the portuguese considered an insular position to be the most eligible for a settlement, and the island of arguin was accordingly fixed upon. this establishment had been scarcely formed, when an important event took place, which afforded a favourable opportunity and pretext for laying the foundation of the portuguese empire in africa. bemoy, a prince of the jaloofs, arrived at arguin, as a suppliant for foreign aid, in recovering his dominions from a more powerful competitor or usurper. he was received with open arms, and conveyed to lisbon, where he experienced a brilliant reception, his visit being celebrated by all the festal exhibitions peculiar to that age, bull-fights, puppet-shows, and even feats of dogs. on that occasion, bemoy made a display of the agility of his native attendants, who on foot, kept pace with the swift horses, mounting and alighting from these animals at full gallop after being instructed in the christian religion, he was baptized, and did homage to the king and the pope, for the crown, which was to be placed on his head; for this purpose a powerful armament under the command of pero vaz d'acunha, was sent out with him, to the banks of the senegal. the circumstance, which tended more particularly to inflame the pious zeal of the christian monarch, was the information, that to the east of timbuctoo there was a territory inhabited by a people who were neither moors nor pagans, but who, in many of their customs resembled the christians. it was immediately inferred, that this could be no other than the kingdom of the mysterious personage known in europe, under the uncouth appellation of prester john. this singular name seems first to have been introduced by travellers from eastern asia, where it had been applied to some nestorian bishop, who held there a species of sovereignty, and when rumours arrived of the christian king of abyssinia, he was concluded to be the real prester john. his dominions being reported to stretch far inland, and the breadth of the african continent being very imperfectly understood, the conclusion was formed, that a mission from the western coast might easily reach his capital. it does not fully appear, what were the precise expectations from an intercourse with this great personage, but it seems to have been thoroughly rooted in the minds of the portuguese, that they would be raised to a matchless height of glory and felicity, if they could by any means arrive at his court. the principal instruction given to all officers employed in the african service, was, that in every quarter, and by every means, they should endeavour to effect this discovery. they accordingly never failed to put the question to all the wanderers of the desert, and to every caravan that came from the interior, but in vain, the name had never been heard. the portuguese then besought the natives at all events, into whatever region they might travel, studiously to inquire if prester john was there, or if any one knew where he was to be found, and on the promise of a splendid reward, in case of success, this was readily undertaken. the conclusion of the adventure of bemoy, was extremely tragical. a quarrel having arisen between him and the commander of the expedition, the latter stabbed the african prince on board his own vessel. whether this violent deed was prompted by the heat of passion, or by well-grounded suspicions of the prince's fidelity, was never fully investigated, but the king learned the event with great regret, and in consequence, gave up his design of building a fort on the senegal. embassies were, however, sent to the most powerful of the neighbouring states, nor was any pause made in the indefatigable efforts to trace the abode of prester john. amongst the great personages, to whom an embassy was sent, are mentioned the kings of tongubutue, (timbuctoo,) and tucurol, a mandingo chief named mandimansa, and a king of the foulhas, with all of whom a friendly intercourse was established. all endeavours were, however, vain as to the primary object, but the portuguese thereby gained a more complete knowledge of this part of interior africa than was afterwards attained in europe till a very recent period. there is, however, one circumstance attending these discoveries of the portuguese, and the embassies, which they in consequence sent to the native princes, which deserves particular attention. there is very little doubt existing, but that the portuguese were acquainted with the town and territory of timbuctoo; and the question then presents itself, by what means did the portuguese succeed in penetrating to a kingdom, which, for centuries afterwards, baffled all the efforts of the most enterprising travellers to arrive within some hundred miles of it. the city of timbuctoo, for instance, was, for a considerable length of time, the point to which all the european travellers had directed their attention; but so vague and indefinite were the accounts of it, that the existence of timbuctoo as a town, began to be questioned altogether, or at least, that the extraordinary accounts, which had been given of it, had little or no foundation in truth. from the time of park to the present period, we have information of only three europeans reached timbuctoo, and considerable doubt still exists in regard to the truth of the narrative of one of them. it is true that the intelligence of the portuguese embassies, as respecting the particulars of them, and the manner in which they were conducted, has either perished, or still remains locked up in the archives of the lusitanian monarchy. but when we look into the expeditions, which have been projected of late years into the interior of africa, we cannot refrain from drawing the conclusion, that the character of the african people must have undergone a change considerably for the worse, or that our expeditions are not regulated on those principles so as to command success. the portuguese in the meantime continued to extend their discoveries in another quarter, for in , they reached the gold coast, when dazzled by the importance and splendour of the commodity, the commerce of which gave name to that region, they built the fort of elmina or the mine, making it the capital of their possessions on that part of the continent. pushing onward to benin, they received a curious account of an embassy said to be sent at the accesion of every new prince, to a court of a sovereign named ogane, who was said to reside seven or eight hundred miles in the interior. on the introduction of the ambassadors, a silk curtain concealed the person of his majesty from them, until the moment of their departure, when the royal foot was graciously put forth from under the veil, and reverence was done to it as a "holy thing." from this statement it appears that the pope of rome is not the only person, whose foot is treated as a "holy thing;" there is not, however, any information extant, that the portuguese ambassadors kissed the great toe of the african prince, and therefore the superiority of the pope in this instance is at once decided. the statement, however, of the portuguese ambassadors excited greatly the curiosity of the court on their return, and it was immediately surmised by them, that this mysterious potentate was more likely to be prester john, than any person whom they had yet heard of. it must, however, be remarked, that it was a subject of great doubt and discussion to determine who this ogane really was. although in possession of the extensive coast of africa, the portuguese had, as yet, no declared title to it, for that purpose, therefore, they appealed to religion or rather the superstition of the age. it was a maxim, which the bigots of the vatican had endeavoured strongly to inculcate, that whatever country was conquered from infidel nations, became the property of the victors. this title was, however, not completed until it was confirmed by a special grant obtained from the pope, and accordingly the reigning monarch of portugal, john ii., obtained the grant of all the lands from cape bojador to the indies inclusive. robertson, speaking of this grant, says, "extravagant as this donation, comprehending such a large portion of the habitable globe, would now appear even in catholic countries, no person in the fifteenth century doubted but that the pope, in the plenitude of his apostolic power, had a right to confer it." the grant was no sooner confirmed by the pope, than john hesitated not a moment to style himself lord of guinea, giving his commanders, at the same time, instructions that, instead of the wooden crosses, which it had hitherto been the custom to erect in token of conquest, pillars of stone should be raised twice the stature of a man, with proper inscriptions, and the whole surmounted by a crucifix inlaid with lead. the first, who sailed from elmina, for the purpose of planting these ensigns of dominion in regions yet undiscovered was diego cam, in . after passing cape st. catherine, he encountered a very strong current setting direct from the land, which was still at a considerable distance; on tasting the water, however, it was found to be fresh, from which the conjecture was drawn, that he was at the mouth of some great river, which ultimately turned out to be the fact. this river has since been celebrated under the name of the congo, or the zaire, lying in latitude ° south, and longitude ° east. on reaching the southern bank of the river, diego planted his first pillar, after which he ascended its borders, and opened a communication with the natives by means of signs. his first inquiry was respecting the residence of their sovereign, and, on receiving the information, that he resided at the distance of several days journey inland, he determined to send a number of his men with presents for the prince, the natives undertaking to be the guides, and pledging themselves, within a stipulated period, to conduct them back again. as the natives meantime passed and repassed on the most intimate footing, diego took the advantage of a moment, when several of the principal persons were on board his ship, weighed anchor and put to themselves as good and _bona fide_ christians, as any of the revered men, who had been sent out to instruct them. the early missionaries, however, committed the same fault, which has distinguished the labours of those of later periods, for they immediately began attack one of the most venerated institutions of the realm of congo which was polygamy; and to the aged monarch the privation of his wives appeared so intolerable, that he renounced the christian faith, and relapsed into all the impurities of paganism and polygamy. the heir apparent, however, saw nothing so very dreadful in the sacrifice of his wives, and braving the displeasure of his father, remained attached to the portuguese. the holy fathers managed their business on this occasion with that skill, for which the cowled tribe have ever been distinguished, and by the aid of the apostle st. james, and a numerous cavalry of angels, the old king died, and alphonso, the zealous convert, became entitled to reign. his brother, however, panso aquitimo, supported by the nobles and almost the whole nation, raised the standard of revolt, in support of polygamy and paganism. a civil war ensued, which is generally the attendant upon the proselytism of a people, and alphonso had only a handful of portuguese to oppose to the almost innumerable host of his countrymen; but the holy fathers again applied to their auxiliaries, and in consequence of apparitions in the clouds, at one time of st. james, and another of the virgin mary, alphonso always came off victorious, and as he thereby became firmly seated on the throne, the missionaries secured for themselves a safe and comfortable establishment at congo. the following account of the conduct of these missionaries, as it is given in the edinburgh cabinet library, cannot fail to afford a considerable degree of entertainment, at the same time, it is much to be deplored, that men engaged in so sacred a cause, "could play such fantastic tricks before high heaven," and disgrace the doctrine, which they meant to teach. being reinforced by successive bodies of their brethren, the missionaries spread over the neighbouring countries of lundi, pango, concobella and maopongo, many tracts of which were rich and populous, although the state of society was extremely rude. everywhere their career was nearly similar; the people gave them the most cordial reception, flocked in crowds to witness and to share in the pomp of their ceremonies; accepted with thankfulness their sacred gifts, and received by thousands the rite of baptism. they were not, however, on this account prepared to renounce their ancient habits and superstitions. the inquisition, that _chef d'ouvre_ of sacerdotal guilt, was speedily introduced into their domestic arrangements, and, as was naturally to be supposed, caused a sudden revulsion, on which account the missionaries thenceforth maintained only a precarious and even a perilous position. they were much reproached, it appears, for the rough and violent methods employed to effect their pious purposes, and although they treat the accusation as most unjust, some of the proceedings, of which they boast with the greatest satisfaction, tend not a little to countenance the charge. when, for example, they could not persuade the people to renounce their superstitions, they used a large staff, with which they threw down their idols and beat them to pieces; they even stole secretly into the temples, and set them on fire. a missionary at maopongo, having met one of the queens, and finding her mind inaccessible to all his instructions, determined to use sharper remedies, and seizing a whip, began to apply it lustily to her majesty's person: the effect he describes as most auspicious; every successful blow opened her eyes more and more to the truth, and she at last declared herself wholly unable to resist such forcible arguments in favour of the catholic doctrine. she, however, hastened to the king, with loud complaints respecting this mode of mental illumination; and the missionaries thenceforth lost all favour with that prince and the ladies of his court, being allowed to remain solely in dread of the portuguese. in only one other instance were they allowed to employ this mode of conversion. the smith, in consequence of the skill, strange in the eyes of a rude people, with which he manufactured various arms and implements, was supposed to possess a measure of superhuman power, and he had thus been encouraged to advance pretensions to the character of a divinity, which were very generally admitted. the missionaries appealed to the king, respecting this impious assumption, and that prince conceiving that it interfered with the respect due to himself, agreed to deliver into their hands the unfortunate smith, to be converted into a mortal in any manner they might judge efficacious. after a short and unsuccessful argument, they had recourse to the same potent instrument of conversion, as they had applied to the back of the queen. the son of vulcan, deserted in this extremity by all his votaries, still made a firm stand for his celestial dignity, till the blood began to stream from his back and shoulders, when he finally yielded, and renounced all pretensions to a divine origin. a more intimate acquaintance discovered other irregularities amongst the natives, against which a painful struggle was to be maintained. according to the custom of the country, and it were well if the same custom could be introduced into some particular parts of europe, the two parties, previously to marriage, lived together for some time, in order to make a trial of each other's tempers and inclinations, before entering into the final arrangement. to this system of probation, the natives were most obstinately attached, and the missionaries in vain denounced it, calling upon them at once either to marry or to separate. the young ladies were always the most anxious to have the full benefit of this experimental process; and the mothers, on being referred to, refused to incur any responsibility, and expose themselves to the reproaches of their daughters, by urging them to an abridgment of the trial, of which they might afterwards repent. the missionaries seem to have been most diligent in the task, as they called it, of "reducing strayed souls to matrimony." father benedict succeeded with no fewer than six hundred, but he found it such "laborious work," that he fell sick and died. another subject of deep regret, respecting the many superstitious practices still prevalent, even among those who exhibited some sort of christian profession, was, that sometimes the children, brought for baptism, were bound with magic cords, to which the mothers, as an additional security from evil, had fastened beads, relics, and figures of the agnus dei. it was a compound of paganism and christianity, which the priests turned away from with disgust; but still the mothers seemed more inclined to part with the beads, relics, and figures of the agnus dei, than their magic cords. the chiefs, in like manner, while they testified no repugnance to avail themselves of the protection promised from the wearing of crucifixes and images of the virgin, were unprepared to part with the enchanted rings and other pagan amulets with which they had been accustomed to form a panoply round their persons. in case of dangerous illness, sorcery had been always contemplated as the main or sole remedy, and those who rejected its use were reproached, as rather allowing their sick relations to die, than incur the expense of a conjuror. but the most general and pernicious application of magic was made in judicial proceedings: when a charge was advanced against any individual, no one ever thought of inquiring into the facts, or of collecting evidence--every case was decided by preternatural tests. the magicians prepared a beverage, which produced on the guilty person, according to the measure of his iniquity, spasm, fainting, or death, but left the innocent quite free from harm. it seems a sound conclusion of the missionaries, that the draught was modified according to the good or ill will of the magicians, or the liberality of the supposed culprit. the trial called bolungo, was indeed renounced by the king, but only to substitute another, in which the accused was made to bend over a large basin of water, when, if he fell in, it was concluded that he was guilty. at other times, a bar of red hot iron was passed along the leg, or the arm was thrust into scalding water, and if the natural effect followed, the person's head was immediately struck off. snail shells, applied to the temples, if they stuck, inferred guilt. when a dispute arose between man and man, the plan was, to place shells on the heads of both, and make them stoop, when he, from off whose head the shell first dropped, had a verdict found against him. while we wonder at the deplorable ignorance on which these practices were founded, we must not forget that "the judgments of god," as they were termed, employed by our ancestors, during the middle ages, were founded on the same unenlightened views, and were in some cases absolutely identical. other powers, of still higher name, held sway over the deluded minds of the people of congo. some ladies of rank went about beating a drum, with dishevelled hair, and pretended to work magical cures. there was also a race of mighty conjurors, called scingilli, who had the power of giving and withdrawing rain at pleasure; and they had a king called ganja chitorne, or god of the earth, to whom its first fruits were regularly offered. this person never died, but when tired of his sway on earth, he nominated a successor, and killed himself; a step, doubtless, prompted by the zeal of his followers, when they saw any danger of his reputation for immortality being compromised. this class argued strongly in favour of their vocation, as not only useful, but absolutely essential, since without it the earth would be deprived of those influences, by which alone it was enabled to minister to the wants of man. the people accordingly viewed, with the deepest alarm, any idea of giving offence to beings, whose wrath might be displayed in devoting the land to utter sterility. we cannot trace any record, stating the period or the manner in which the portuguese and their officious missionaries were expelled from congo; it is, however, supposed that they at length carried their religious innovations to such a length, as to draw down upon them the vengeance of the people, and that some bold and decisive steps were taken to liberate the country from its usurpers. it is, however, certain, that capt. tucky, in his late expedition, did not find a single trace of either the portuguese or their missionaries on the banks of the zaire. the traveller has ever found much greater difficulty in making discoveries in mahometan than in gentoo or pagan countries, and from this cause the great continent of africa is much less known to europeans than it was in ancient times. until the present age, and a very recent part of it, our knowledge of that immense portion of the globe extended but very little way from the coast, and its enterprises have made great advances to a knowledge of that interior before unexplored. the design of examining on land africa, to find out the manners, habits, and institutions of its men, the state of the country, its commercial capabilities in themselves, and relative to this country, formed the african association. from the liberal sentiments, knowledge, and comprehensive views of that society, were the courage and enterprise of adventurers stimulated to particular undertakings of discovery. chapter ii. we are now arrived at the period when england, aroused by the commercial advantages, which portugal was deriving from her african possessions, determined, in defiance of the pope of rome and "the lords of guinea," to participate in the treasures, and to form her own settlements on the african coast, although it must be admitted, that one of the motives by which the english merchants were actuated, was not founded on humanity or patriotism. the glorious and splendid results, which had arisen from the discovery of the east and west indies, caused the ocean to be generally viewed as the grand theatre where wealth and glory were to be gained. the cultivation of the west india islands by the labour of europeans, was found to be a task almost impracticable, and the attention was thence drawn to discover a source, from which manual labour could be obtained, adapted to the climate, and this resource was soon found in the black population of africa. it is not to be doubted, that many of our african settlements were formed for the purpose of procuring a supply of slaves, for the west india possessions, at the same time, the attention of others was excited by a far more innocent and brilliant prospect. it was in the beginning of the seventeenth century, that an unbounded spirit of enterprise appears to have been excited amongst the british merchants, by vague reports of an africa _el dorado_. the most flattering reports had reached europe, of the magnitude of the gold trade carried on at timbuctoo, and along the course of the niger; despatches were even received from morocco, representing its treasures, as surpassing those of mexico and peru, and in , a company was formed in london, for the express purpose of penetrating to the country of gold, and to timbuctoo. exaggeration stepped in to inflame the minds of the speculators, with the enormous wealth which awaited them in the interior of africa. the roofs of the houses were represented to be covered with plates of gold, that the bottoms of the rivers glistened with the precious metal, and the mountains had only to be excavated, to yield a profusion of the metallic treasure. from the northern part of africa, impediments of almost an insuperable nature presented themselves, to the attainment of these great advantages; immense deserts, as yet unexplored by human foot, and the knowledge of the existence of tribes of barbarous people on the borders of them, were in themselves sufficient to daunt the spirit of adventure in those quarters, and ultimately drew the attention to the discovery of another channel, by which the golden treasures of timbuctoo could be reached, without encountering the appalling dangers of the deserts, or the murderous intentions of the natives. the existence of the great river niger, had been established by the concurrent testimony of all navigators, but of its course or origin, not the slightest information had been received. the circumstance of its waters flowing from the eastward, gave rise to the conjecture, that they flowed through the interior of the continent, and emptied themselves either by the senegal or the gambia, into the atlantic. it was, therefore, considered probable, that by ascending the senegal or the gambia, which were supposed to be merely tributary streams of the niger, of which they formed the estuary, that timbuctoo and the country of gold might be reached; and so strongly was this opinion impressed upon the minds of the merchants, and other adventurers, that a journey to timbuctoo became the leading project of the day, and measures were accordingly taken to carry it into execution. the first person sent out by the company established for exploring the gambia, was richard thompson, a barbary merchant, a man of some talent and enterprise, who sailed from the thames in the catherine, of tons, with a cargo valued at nearly two thousand pounds sterling. the expedition of thompson was unfortunate in the extreme, but the accounts received of his adventures and death, have been differently recited. it is certain, that thompson ascended the gambia as far as tenda, a point much beyond what any european had before reached, and according to one account, he was here attacked by the portuguese, who succeeded in making a general massacre of the english. another account states, that he was killed in an affray with his own people, and thence has been styled the first martyr, or more properly the first victim in the cause of african discovery. the company, however, nothing daunted by the ill success of thompson, despatched another expedition on a larger scale, consisting of the sion of tons, and the st. john of , giving the command to richard jobson, to whom we are indebted for the first satisfactory account of the great river districts of western africa. jobson arrived in the gambia, in november, , and left his ship at cassau, a town situate on the banks of that river. here, however, his progress was impeded by the machinations of the portuguese, and so great was the dread of the few persons belonging to that nation, who remained at cassan after the massacre of thompson, that scarcely one could be found, who would take upon himself the office of a pilot to conduct his vessel higher up the river. in this extremity he had no other resource than to take to his boats, but, on ascending the river, he found his merchandise in comparatively little request, and repented that he had not laden his boats with salt. he soon afterwards met with brewer, who had accompanied thompson to tenda, and remained with the english factory established up the river. he also filled jobson with "golden hopes." wherever the english stopped, the negro kings, with their wives and daughters, came down to the river side to buy, or rather to beg for trinkets, and still more for brandy. they also showed themselves by no means ignorant of the art of stealing, but their thefts were, in some degree, obliged to be winked at, for fear of offending the royal personages, and drawing down upon themselves the secret vengeance of the uncivilized hordes. on christmas day tirambra, a negro prince, a great friend of the english, sent them a load of elephant's flesh, which was accepted with tokens of the greatest respect and gratitude, although the whole gift was secretly thrown away. after a navigation in boats of nearly thirty days, jobson reached the rapids of barraconda, the highest point to where the tide flows, and where he found himself involved in great difficulties. the ascent was to be made against a current running with the greatest rapidity; the great number of hidden rocks made it dangerous to pursue their course during the night, the same time, that in attempting to avoid the rocks, they struck upon sand banks and shallows, which often obliged the crew to strip and go into the water, for the purpose of clearing the boats from the sands. in the performance, however, of this task, the greatest danger was run from the vast number of crocodiles, that infested the river, and which, in several instances, seemed to be in waiting for any prey with which the boats could supply them. the river was also filled with "a world of sea-horses, whose paths, as they came on shore to feed, were beaten with tracts as large as a london highway." the land on either side of the river was covered with immense forests of unknown trees, which appeared to team with living things, feathered and quadruped, making a roar sometimes, which was sufficient to instil terror into the stoutest heart. amongst the latter, the baboons appeared to hold the sovereignty of the woods, and whenever the navigation of the river obliged the travellers to keep close in shore, where the banks were covered with trees; the baboons posted themselves on the branches, and kept up a regular attack upon the navigators, throwing at them the largest branches, which they could break from the trees, and apparently holding a palaver with each other, as to the best mode of prosecuting the attack against the lawless intruders into their territory. they appeared actually to be aware when a branch hit one of the navigators, for they immediately up a shout of triumph, screaming hideously, and "grinning ghastly a horrible smile," as if expressive of their victory. the voices of the crocodiles calling, as it were, to each other, resembling the sound "of a deep well," might be heard at the distance of a league, whilst the elephants were seen in huge hordes, raising their trunks in the air, and snorting defiance to all who dared approach them. the latter are objects of great fear to the natives, scarcely one of whom dare approach them, but they appeared to have an instinctive sense of the superiority of the english, for they no sooner made a movement against them, than they hurried away with the speed of the forest deer, and were soon lost in the depths of their native forests. three balls were lodged in one of the animals, but he made off with them; he was, however, soon after found dead by the negroes. the most formidable animals, however, were the lions, ounces, and leopards, which were seen at some distance, but the sailors could not obtain a shot at them. at one of their halting places, the baboons appeared like an army consisting of several thousands, some of the tallest placed in front, marshalled under the guidance of a leader, the smaller ones being in the middle, and the rear brought up by the larger ones. the sailors showed some disposition to enter into an acquaintance with the leader of the army, but the desire was by no means mutual, for nature has very kindly infused into the hearts of these creatures a strong distrust in the friendly advances of their brother bipeds, knowing them to be, in many of their actions, false, hollow, and deceitful, a proof of which, one of the leaders of the army received in a very striking and forcible manner, in the shape of a bullet, which passed directly through his body. the baboons were, however, determined that their treacherous friends should not obtain possession of the body of their murdered leader, for before the sailors could arrive at the spot where the deceased general lay, his indignant and patriotic companions had carried his body away. on following these creatures to their haunts in the recessess of the forest, places were found, where the branches had been so intertwined, and the ground beaten so smoothly, as to make it rather difficult to believe that the labour had not been accomplished by human hands. on the th of january, jobson arrived at tenda, and he immediately despatched a messenger to buckar sano, the chief merchant on the gambia, who soon after arrived with a stock of provisions, which he disposed of at reasonable prices. in return for the promptitude, with which buckar sano had replied to his message, jobson treated him with the greatest hospitality, placing before him the brandy bottle as the most important object of the entertainment. buckar sano seemed by no means unwilling to consider it in that character, for he paid so many visitations to it that he became so intoxicated, that he lay during the whole of the night dead drunk in the boat. buckar sano, however, showed by his subsequent conduct, that drunkenness was not a vice, to which he was naturally addicted, and that the strength of the spirit had crept upon him, before he was aware of the consequences that were likely to ensue. on any subsequent occasion, when the brandy bottle was tendered to him, he would take a glass, but on being pressed to repeat it, he would shake his head with apparent tokens of disgust; after the exchange of some presents, and many ridiculous ceremonies, buckar sano was proclaimed the white man's alchade, or mercantile agent. jobson had, however, some reason to doubt his good faith, from the accounts which he gave of a city four months journey in the interior, the roofs of the houses of which were covered with sheets of gold. it must, however, be considered, in exculpation of the supposed exaggerated accounts of buckar sano, that the europeans at that time possessed a very circumscribed knowledge of the extent of the interior of africa, and that a four months journey, to a particular city, would not be looked upon at the time as transgressing the bounds of truth. it is most probable that buckar sano alluded to timbuctoo, a place that has given rise to more extraordinary conjectures, and respecting which, more fabulous stories have been told than of babylon, or of carthage of ancient history. the circumstance of a vessel having arrived in the river for the purpose of traffic, caused a strong sensation throughout the country, and the natives flocked from all the neighbouring districts, anxious not only to obtain a sight of the white men, but to commence their commercial dealings. they erected their huts on the banks of the river, which in a short time resembled a village, and for the first time, the busy hum of trade was heard in the interior of africa. the natives, with whom jobson commenced his commercial dealings, appeared to possess some traces of civilization, nor were they deficient in many of the arts, which are known amongst the civilized nations, and which, even at that time, were with them but in their infancy. to these people, however, succeeded a different race of visitors, far more rude and uncivilized, whose bodies were covered with skins of wild animals, the tails hanging as from the beasts. the men of this race had never seen a white man before, and so great was their fear, when jobson presented himself amongst them, that they all ran away, and stationed themselves at some distance from the river. they were, however, soon tempted back again, at the sight of a few beads, and the most friendly relations were afterwards established between them. jobson found that in tenda, as elsewhere, salt was the article chiefly in demand, but he had unfortunately omitted to provide himself with any great quantity of that article. iron wares met with a ready sale, though these were supplied at a cheaper rate by a neighbouring people. the sword-blade of buckar sano, and the brass bracelets of his wife, appeared to jobson to be specimens of as good workmanship as could be seen in england. jobson, from very prudential motives, abstained from mentioning gold; but buckar sano, who knew perhaps what europeans most coveted, told him, that if he continued to trade with tenda, he could dispose of all his cargoes for gold. the negro merchant affirmed, that he had been four times at a town in which the houses were all covered with gold, and distant a journey of four moons. jobson was informed that six days journey from st. john's mart, the name which he gave to the factory at tenda, was a town called mombar, where there was much trade for gold. three stages farther was jaye, whence the gold came. some of the native merchants, finding that jobson had not any salt with him, refused to enter into any commercial dealings with him, and returned highly dissatisfied. for the commodities which he did dispose of, he obtained, in exchange, gold and ivory; he could have obtained hides in abundance, but they were too bulky a commodity to bear the expense of conveyance. jobson wisely adapted his carriage to the negro customs; he danced and sung with the natives, and entered with a proper spirit into all their entertainments. he remarks, that the water of the gambia above barraconda has such a strong scent of musk, from the multitude of crocodiles, that infest that part of the river, as to be unfit for use. the torpedo also abounds in the river about cassan, and at first caused not a little terror and amazement to the crew. amongst other acts of kindness, which buckar sano showed to the englishman, he offered to introduce him at the court of tenda. this, in a commercial point of view, was an advantage not to be overlooked, independently of the knowledge, which he would acquire of the internal geography of the country. on reaching the king's presence, an example was witnessed of the debasing homage, which is usually paid to negro princes, and of which some striking examples will be given in the journey of clapperton. the great and wealthy merchant, on appearing in the presence of the king, first fell on his knees, and then throwing off his shirt, extended himself naked and flat on the ground, whilst his attendants almost buried him beneath dust and mud; after grovelling like a beast for some time in this position, he suddenly started up, shook off the mud from him, in which operation he was assisted by two of his wives, who then assisted him in equipping himself in his best attire, with his bow and quiver, and all the other paraphernalia of a person of rank and consequence. he and his attendants, after having made a semblance of shooting at jobson, laid their bows at his feet, which was understood to be a token of homage. the king even assured the english captain, that the country, and every thing in it, were then placed at his disposal, "which bounty, observes jobson, could require no less than two or three bottles of my best brandy, although the english were not sixpence the better for the grant." the dry season had now commenced, and jobson observed that the waters of the river were gradually sinking lower and lower; but the city, the roofs of which were plates of gold, haunted the busy fancy of jobson, and he used every endeavour to ascend the river, in order that he might discover the sources from which the plates of gold were made. it was evident to him, that buckar sano had either practised an imposition upon him, or that he had grossly exaggerated the treasures of the wonderful city; but in regard to the former, he could not divine any motive by which buckar sano could be actuated in imposing upon him; and in regard to the latter, making every allowance for exaggeration, it might eventually transpire, that the country abounded with the precious metal, although perhaps not exactly in the extraordinary degree as reported by buckar sano. after encountering many difficulties, he was obliged to relinquish the farther ascent of the river, nor did he even reach the point where the previous discoveries of thompson terminated, which may be considered as the utmost boundary of the discoveries of that period; indeed many years elapsed before any travellers passed the limits at which thompson or jobson had arrived. the latter gives a strange report, which, however, was in some degree partially circulated before him, of a silent traffic being carried on in the interior between the moors and a negro nation, who would not allow themselves to be seen. "the reason," he adds, "why these negroes conceal themselves, is, that they have lips of an unnatural size, hanging down halfway over their breasts, and which they are obliged to rub with salt continually, to keep them from putrefaction." thus even the great salt trade of the interior of africa is not wholly untinged with fable. the stream became at last so shallow, that jobson could not ascend any farther, and he began his voyage downwards on the th february, intending to return at the season when the periodical rains filled the channel. he was, however, never able to execute this purpose, as he and the company became involved in a quarrel with the merchants, whom he visits with his highest displeasure, representing them as persons alive only to their own immediate interests, and utterly regardless of any of those honourable motives with which all commercial dealings ought to be characterised. jobson may be said to have been the first englishman, who enjoyed the opportunity of observing the manners and superstitions peculiar to the interior of africa, but that must be taken as only within the narrow limits to which the discoveries at that period extended. he found that the chiefs of the different nations were attended by bands of musicians, to whom he gives the appellation of juddies or fiddlers, and compares them to the irish rhymsters, or, as we should now compare them, to the italian improvisatori. by some other authors they are called jelle, or jillemen; the instruments on which they perform being rudely made of wood, having a sonorous sound, on account of its extreme hardness, and in some instances they exhibit the knowledge of the power of an extended string, by fastening a piece of the gut of an animal across a plane of wood, and beating on it with a stick. like the majority of the musicians of the ruder tribes, the excellence of their music depends on the noise which is made, and if it be so obstreperous, as almost to deafen the auditors, the greater is the pleasure which is shown. these wandering minstrels are frequently attended by the greegree men, or sorcerers, who, on account of the fantastic dress which they wear, form a most motley group; the greegree men, trying to outvie each other in the hideous and fantastic style of their dress, and the more frightful they make themselves appear, the greater they believe is the effect of their sorcery. the principal festivals are those of circumcision and of funeral. whenever former ceremony is performed, a vast concourse of people are attracted, from every part of the country, the operator being generally a greegree man, who pretends to determine the future fate of the individual, in the manner by which the operation is performed, but which is always declared to be highly prosperous, if a liberal present has been made. during the performance of the ceremony, the forests appear in a blaze, the most discordant shouts rending the air, intermixed with the sounds of their instruments, composing altogether a tumult, which is heard at the distance of many leagues. the dancing is described as of the most ludicrous kind, marked by those indecencies, which generally distinguish the amusements of the savage tribes. in these sports, the women are always the foremost in the violence of their gestures; the young ones selecting the objects of their affection, to bestow upon them some token of their attachment. the funeral of their chiefs is a ceremony of great solemnity, and in some of its forms has a strong resemblance to an irish wake. flowers of the most odorous scent are buried with the corpse, which is also supplied with a considerable quantity of gold, to assist him on his entrance into the other world, where it is believed, that the degree of happiness, is proportionate to the quantity of gold which the deceased has in his possession. it must, however, be mentioned, that the natives of this part of africa, appear to be wholly exempt from the stigma, which belongs to some of the other tribes of africa, in the human victims which are sacrificed at the funerals of their kings or chiefs, and which in some cases amount to three or four hundred. the funerals of the kings of tenda are conducted with a decorum highly creditable to the people, considering their uncivilised state; and the graves are frequently visited by the relatives of the deceased, to repair any injury, which they may have sustained from the violence of the rains, or the attacks of carnivorous animals. at all the festivals, a personage called horey, or which jobson calls the devil, acts a most conspicuous part, at the same time, that he generally carries on his operations in secret, impressing thereby on the minds of the natives, an idea of his invisibility. the horey generally takes his station in the adjoining woods, whence he sends forth the most tremendous sounds, supposed to have a very malignant influence on all those who happen to be within hearing. it is, however, a fortunate circumstance for the native, who is so unfortunate as to be within hearing of the horey's cries, that the method is known, of appeasing the vindictive spirit of the horey, which is, by placing a quantity of provisions, in the immediate vicinity of the place where his roaring is heard; and if on the following day the provisions have disappeared, which is sure to be the case, the natives are then satisfied that the horey has been appeased, which, however, lasts only for a short time, for as the appetite of the horey is certain to return, his cries are again heard, and the provisions are again deposited for his satisfaction. in regard to this horey or devil, rather a ludicrous story is told by jobson, who, being in company with a marabout, and hearing the horey in full cry in a neighbouring thicket, seized a loaded musket, declaring his resolution aloud, to discharge the contents without any further ceremony, at his infernal majesty. dreading the consequences, which might befal the whole nation, were the devil to be killed, the marabout implored jobson to desist from his murderous design; on a sudden, the hoarse roar of the horey was changed into a low and plaintive sound, expressive of an individual imploring mercy from his destroyer;--again jobson levelled his gun at the spot whence the sound issued, when on a sudden, his infernal majesty presented himself in the shape of a huge negro, bloated with fat, and who now lay on the ground, his devilish spirit quelled, and apparently in such an agony of fear, as to be unable to sue for the mercy of the avenging englishman, who stood laughing over him, at the idea of having so easily vanquished an african devil. the dissensions, which took place amongst the company, on the return of jobson, put an end for a time to all further discoveries. it was evident that these divisions in the company, arose from a spirit of jealousy amongst certain members of it, who had formed amongst themselves certain schemes of personal aggrandizement, and were therefore unwilling to despatch any one into those quarters, in which such abundant sources presented themselves, of amassing inexhaustible riches. the next attempt was made by vermuyden, an opulent merchant, on the gambia, about the year or , who equipped a boat abundantly stored with bacon, beef, biscuit, rice, strong waters, and other comfortable supplies, the weight of which, however, was so great, that on arriving at the flats and shallows, the vessel could not proceed on her voyage without the greatest danger. after navigating the shallows for some time, he arrived at a broad expanse of water, which he compared to windermere lake, and he now found himself on a sudden entangled in a great difficulty, owing to a number of streams flowing into this lake, and the consequent uncertainty which existed, of choosing that particular one, which might be considered the main branch or stream; and were he to ascend any other, he might find that all his labours had been spent in vain, as it might lead him to a quarter, at a great distance from those stations and towns, where the europeans had established their commercial settlements. "up the buffing stream," says vermuyden, "with sad labour we wrought," and when he had ascended further up the stream, the sailors were often obliged to strip themselves naked, and get into the water. this was found, however, to be a most dangerous experiment, for the crocodiles and river horses showed themselves in fearful numbers, and fully inclined to treat the intruders on their rightful domain, with the most marked hostility. vermuyden says, they were ill pleased, or unacquainted with any companions in these watery regions, and at all events, he was convinced that his men were not very proper companions for them. so daring were the river horses, that one of them struck a hole in the boat with his teeth, an accident which was rather of a serious nature, as there was no one on board possessing any skill in carpentry; and as one attack had been made, great apprehension was entertained that it might be renewed, and the consequences prove of the most fatal kind. they, however, fell upon the expedient of fixing a lantern at the stern of the vessel, which kept the monsters at a respectful distance; they showing great alarm at any light shining in the dark. on one occasion, when they landed for the purpose of searching for gold, they found the territory guarded by an incredible number of huge baboons, who seemed determined to enter into open conflict with them, and to set at defiance every attempt that was made to penetrate into the territory. if the sailors shouted to them; the baboons set up a loud scream, showing their white teeth, and making known the reception which the intruders would meet with, if they made any further advances. finding that neither their oratory nor their menaces had any effect upon the baboon army, a few guns were discharged at them, which seemed rather to astonish them, for it was something which they had never seen nor heard before; but as no immediate effect was visible amongst their army, they began to consider the firing as a sort of joke, and prepared to drive the invaders back to their boats. a volley, however, from the human assailants, by which three of the baboon army were laid prostrate, soon convinced the latter, that the firing was no joke, and after making some slight show of resistance, they carried away the dead, and retreated to the woods. the discovery of gold being the principal object of the adventure of vermuyden, he landed frequently in different places, and proceeded to wash the sand, and examine the rocks. vermuyden had acquired, in his native country, some slight knowledge of alchymy, and he carried out with him not only mercury, aqua regia, and large melting pots, but also a divining rod, which, however, as was most likely the case, was not found to exhibit any virtue. vermuyden, however, was not to be laughed out of his superstitious notions, although his companions took every opportunity of turning his expectations into ridicule, but he found a very plausible excuse for the impotency of his divining rod in the discovery, that its qualities had all been dried up by the heat of the climate, and that, under every circumstance, it was not an instrument adapted to the country in which it was to be carried into use. on one occasion, however, the virtue of the divining rod appeared suddenly to have returned, for his eyes were gladdened with the sight of a large mass of apparent gold; the delusion, however, soon vanished, for, on examination, it was found to be nothing more than common spar. according to his report, the metal is never met with in low fertile and wooded spots, but always in naked and barren hills, embedded in a reddish earth. at one place, after a labour of twenty days, he succeeded in extracting twelve pounds, and, at length, he asserts that he arrived at the mouth of the mine itself, and saw gold in such abundance, as surprised him with joy and admiration. it does not appear, however, that he returned from his expedition considerably improved in his fortune by the discovery of this mine, nor does he give any notice of the real position of it, by which we are led to conjecture, that the discovery of the mine was one of those fabrications, which the travellers of those times were apt to indulge in, for the purpose of gratifying their own vanity, and exciting the envy of their fellow countrymen. the spirit of african discovery began to revive in england about the year . at that time, the duke of chandos was governor of the african company, and being concerned at the declining state of their affairs, suggested the idea of retrieving them, by opening a path into the golden regions, which were still reported to exist in the central part of africa. the company were not long in finding a person competent to undertake the expedition, and, on the particular recommendation of the duke, the appointment was given to capt. bartholomew stibbs. being furnished with the requisite means for sailing up the gambia, stibbs sailed in september, , and, on the th of october, he arrived at james' island, the english settlement, situate about thirty miles from the mouth of the river, whence he despatched a messenger to mr. willy, the governor, who happened at that time to be visiting the factory at joar, more than a hundred miles distant, asking him to engage such vessels as were fit to navigate the upper streams of the gambia. to his great surprise and mortification, however, he received an answer from mr. willy, that no vessels of that kind were to be had, indeed, instead of using every exertion to promote the cause for which stibbs had been sent out by the company, willy appeared to throw every possible obstruction in his way, as if he were actuated by a mean and petty spirit of jealousy of the success, which was likely to await him. a few days, however, after the answer of willy had been received, a boat brought down his dead body, he having fallen a victim to the fever of the climate, which had previously affected his brain. willy was succeeded in the governorship by a person named orfeur, who showed no immediate objection to furnish the vessels and other articles necessary for the expedition of stibbs up the gambia, but matters went on so slowly, that the equipment was not completed until the middle of december, when the season was fast approaching, which was highly unfavourable for the accomplishment of the purpose, which stibbs had in view. he intended to proceed on his journey on the th of december, but a slight accident, which happened to one of his boats, prevented his departure on that day: from a superstitious idea that prevailed in the mind of stibbs, that success would not attend him, if he sailed on the day celebrated as the nativity of jesus christ, he deferred his journey to the th, when he departed with a crew consisting of nineteen white men, a complete black one, although a christian, and who was to serve as an interpreter; twenty-nine grumellas, or hired negroes, with three female cooks; taking afterwards on board a balafeu, or native musician, for the purpose of enlivening the spirits of the party, and driving away the crocodiles, who are superstitiously supposed to have a great dislike "to the concord of sweet sounds," although emanating from the rude instrument of an african musician. during the early part of the voyage every thing appeared to augur well for the success of the expedition; the party were in high spirits, and no accident of any moment had yet occurred to check the joviality, which prevailed amongst the crew. the natives were every where disposed to carry on trade, and, in some places, saphies or charms were hung on the banks of the river to induce the white men to come on shore. stibbs had endeavoured to conceal the object, of his journey, but he had formed his calculations upon an erroneous principle, for he found himself at last pointed out as the person who was come to bring down the gold. as they approached the falls of barraconda, the fears of the native crew began to manifest themselves, and, as is usual with minds immersed in ignorance and superstition, they commenced to foretell the most dreadful disasters, if their captain should attempt to proceed above the falls of barraconda; numerous stories were now told of the fearful accidents, which had happened to almost every person who had attempted to navigate the river above the falls; the upsetting of a single canoe, from unskilful management, was magnified into the loss of a hundred, and of course not a single individual escaped a watery grave. the natives expected that their terrible narratives would have a proper influence upon the mind of their captain, and that he would, in consequence, desist from prosecuting his journey beyond the falls, but when, contrary to their expectations, he expressed his determination to proceed to the utmost extent to which the river would be found to be navigable, the natives presented themselves in a body before him, and declared their firm determination not to proceed any further, for, to the apparent surprise of stibbs, they informed him that barraconda was the end of the world, and certainly no person but a fool, or a madman, would attempt to penetrate any further. instances, certainly, they confessed had been known of persons going beyond the end of the world, but then, as might be naturally expected, they never were seen any more, being either devoured by enormous beasts, or carried away into another world, by some horrid devils, who were always on the watch to catch the persons, who rejecting the advice, which they themselves were now giving, were so fool hardy as to throw themselves in their power. stibbs now found himself in rather an unpleasant predicament, the natives appeared resolute not to proceed beyond barraconda, and stibbs knew well that it would be highly imprudent in him to proceed without them. a palaver was held, and all the arguments which stibbs could bring forward, failed to produce the desired effect upon his alarmed crew. he, however, suddenly bethought himself, that he had an argument in his possession, of greater potency, than any that could be afforded by the most persuasive arguments, and taking a bottle of brandy from his chest, he gave to each man a glass of the spirit, when, on a sudden, a very extraordinary change appeared to take place in their opinions and sentiments. they might have been misled as to barraconda being the end of the world, and they did now remember some instances of persons returning, who had been beyond the falls, and as to the enormous animals, who were said to have devoured the voyagers; they now believed that no other animals were meant than crocodiles and river horses, which, although certainly formidable, were not by any means such dreadful objects as to prevent them prosecuting their voyage. thus, what the powers of oratory could not effect, nor the arguments of sound and deliberate reason accomplish, was achieved in a moment by the administration of a small quantity of spirituous liquid, giving bravery to the coward, and daring to the effeminate. they had now arrived at the dreaded boundary of the habitable world, but the falls were not found to be nearly so formidable as they had been represented; they bore rather the character of narrows than of falls, the channel being confined by rocky ledges and fragments, between which there was only one passage, where the canoes rubbed against the rocks on each side. contrary to the reports, which had been in general circulation, of the dispositions of the natives of the upper gambia, in which they were represented to be of a most ferocious and savage nature, they were found to be a harmless, kind, and good-humoured people, who, on every occasion, hastened to render every assistance in their power to the navigators, making them presents of fowls and provisions, and, in some instances, refusing to take any thing in return for the articles which they gave away. the most laborious part of the journey now presented itself, which consisted in the great exertions, which were necessary in order to pass the flats and quicksands, which seemed to multiply as they ascended the river, and which obliged the natives to strip and get into the water, to drag the boats over the shallows by main force. although the natives had now ascertained beyond all further doubt, that barraconda was not the end of the world, yet, one part of their story was fully verified, which was that relating to the enormous animals, with which these desolate regions were tenanted. to the present travellers, they appeared far more formidable than to their predecessors, for the very elephants that had fled precipitately before the crew of jobson, struck the greatest terror into the party of stibbs; for one of them showed such a determined disposition to exhibit the extent of his strength, that he turned suddenly upon the crew, and in a very short time put the whole of them to flight. so little did they show any symptoms of fear for the crew, that they were frequently seen crossing the river in bands, at a very short distance from the boats, throwing up the water with their trunks in every direction, and raising such an emotion in the water, as to make the boats rock about, to the great alarm of the crews, and particularly the natives, who now began to wish, that they had not been seduced by the potency of the spirituous liquid, to venture into a region, where death presented itself to them, in the strict embrace of an elephant's trunk, or bored to death by the teeth of the river horse. in regard to the latter animal, the danger which they incurred, was more imminent than with the elephants, but this did not arise from the greater ferocity or savageness of the animal, for the river horse moves in general in a sluggish and harmless manner; but in the shallow places of the river, the horses were seen walking at the bottom, and the space between them and the boat so small, that the keel often came into collision with the back of the animal, who, incensed at the affront offered to him, would be apt to strike a hole through the boat with his huge teeth, and thereby endanger its sinking. it was evident to the commander of the expedition, that the courage of his native crew was almost paralyzed, when they had to contend with any of these formidable creatures, although he had no reason to complain of their exertions, in dragging the boats over the flats and shallows, which appeared to abound in every part of the river. it now became manifest to stibbs, that he had chosen an unfavourable time of the year for his expedition; for, after having spent two months, he found himself on the nd february, only fifty-nine miles above barraconda, and at some distance from tenda, consequently he was not so successful as either thompson or jobson, notwithstanding his means were more efficient, and adapted to the purpose. stibbs, however, expressed himself greatly disappointed with the results of his expedition, and began to look upon the golden mines of africa, represented as they had been to be inexhaustible, as nothing more than the grossest falsifications, made to suit some private purpose, or to throw a certain degree of ridicule upon the plans and exertions of the african company. he had been informed of a mighty channel, which was to lead him into the remote interior of africa, but he had as yet only navigated a river, which in certain seasons is almost dry, and where the crews were obliged to assume the character of the amphibious; for at one time, they were obliged to be for hours in the water, dragging the boats over the shallows, and at another, they were on the land, dragging the boats over it, in order to surmount the ledges of rocks, which extended from shore to shore. at one time they were rowing over the backs of the river horses, and the next, they ran the risk of being thrown upon their own back, by the trunks of the elephants, or having them snapped in two between the jaws of the crocodiles. the source of the great river, which, according to the description then given of it, could not be any other than the niger, was, according to the opinion of stibbs, "nothing near so far in the country, as by the geographers has been represented." the river, which he had navigated, did not answer in any degree with the description which had been given of the niger. the name was not even known in the quarters through which he had passed; it did not flow from any lake, that he could hear of, or which was known to any of the natives, nor did it communicate with the senegal, or any other great river; and so far from it being a mighty stream in the interior, the report was given to him by the natives, that at about twelve days journey above barraconda, it dwindled into a rivulet, so small that the "fowls could walk over it." on the return of stibbs to the company's settlement at the month of the gambia, these reports were received with great reluctance, and the strongest doubts were thrown upon their authenticity. at that time, a person of the name of moore was the company's factor on the gambia; and in order to invalidate the statements of stibbs, he produced herodotus, leo, edrisi, and other high authorities, whilst on the other hand, stibbs declared, that he had never heard of such travellers before, and that he did not see why greater faith should be put in their reports, than in his. stibbs for some time supported the veracity of his statements, but moore and herodotus at length prevailed, and stibbs retired from the service in disgust. there were, however, many strongly inclined to attach implicit belief to the statements of stibbs, at all events, they had the direct tendency of preventing any other voyage being undertaken for some time, for exploring that part of the african continent. the first person who brought home any accounts of french africa, was jannequin, a young man of some rank, who, as he was walking along the quay at dieppe, saw a vessel bound for this unknown continent, and took a sudden fancy to embark and make the voyage. he was landed at a part of the sahara, near cane blanco. he was struck in an extraordinary degree with the desolate aspect of the region. in ascending the river, however, he was delighted with the brilliant verdure of the banks, the majestic beauty of the trees, and the thick impenetrable underwood. the natives received him hospitably, and he was much struck by their strength and courage, decidedly surpassing similar qualities in europeans. he saw a moorish chief, called the kamalingo, who, mounting on horseback, and brandishing three javelins and a cutlass, engaged a lion in single combat, and vanquished that mighty king of the desert. flat noses and thick lips, so remote from his own ideas of the beautiful, were considered on the senegal, as forming the perfection of the human visage; nay, he even fancies that they were produced by artificial means. of actual discovery, little transpired worthy of record in the travels of jannequin, and his enthusiasm became soon daunted by the perils which at every step beset him. chapter iii. nearly seventy years had elapsed, and the spirit of african discovery had remained dormant, whilst in the mean time the remotest quarters of the globe had been reached by british enterprise; the vast region of africa still remaining an unseemly blank in the map of the earth. to a great and maritime nation as england then was, and to the cause of the sciences in general, particularly that of geography, it was considered as highly discreditable, that no step should be taken to obtain a correct knowledge of the geographical situation of the interior of africa, from which continual reports arrived of the existence of great commercial cities, and the advantages which the arabs derived from their intercourse with them. for the purpose of promoting this great national undertaking, a small number of highly-spirited individuals formed themselves into what was termed the african association, a sum of money was subscribed, and individuals were sought for, who were qualified to undertake such arduous and dangerous enterprises. lord rawdon, afterwards the marquess of hastings, sir joseph banks, the bishop of llandaff, mr. beaufoy, and mr. stuart, were nominated managers. the first adventurer was mr. ledyard, who, from his earliest age, had been a traveller from one extremity of the earth to the other. he had circumnavigated the globe with capt. cook, had resided for several years amongst the american indians, and had travelled with the most scanty means from stockholm round the gulf of bothnia, and thence to the remotest parts of asiatic russia. on his return from his last journey, sir joseph banks was then just looking out for a person to explore the interior of africa, and ledyard was no sooner introduced to him, than he pronounced him to be the very man fitted for the undertaking. ledyard also declared that the scheme was in direct unison with his own wishes, and on being asked how soon he could depart, he answered, "tomorrow." some time, however, elapsed in making the necessary arrangements, and a passage was shortly afterwards obtained for him to alexandria, with the view of first proceeding southward from cairo to sennaar, and thence traversing the entire breadth of the african continent. he arrived at cairo on the th of august, . his descriptions of egypt are bold and original, but somewhat fanciful. he represented the delta as an unbounded plain of excellent land miserably cultivated; the villages as most wretched assemblages of poor mud huts, full of dust, fleas, flies, and all the curses of moses, and the people as below the rank of any savages he ever saw, wearing only a blue shirt and drawers, and tattooed as much as the south sea islanders. he recommends his correspondents, if they wish to see egyptian women, to look at any group of gypsies behind a hedge in essex. he describes the mohammedans as a trading, enterprising, superstitious, warlike set of vagabonds, who, wherever they are bent upon going, will and do go; but he complains that the condition of a frank is rendered most humiliating and distressing by the furious bigotry of the turks; to him it seemed inconceivable that such enmity should exist among men, and that beings of the same species should trick and act in a manner so opposite. by conversing with the jelabs, or slave merchants, he learned a good deal respecting the caravan routes and countries of the interior. every thing seemed ready for his departure, and he announced that his next communication would be from sennaar, but, on the contrary, the first tidings received were those of his death. some delays in the departure of the caravans, acting upon his impatient spirit, brought on a bilious complaint, to which he applied rash and violent remedies, and thus reduced himself to a state, from which the care of rosetti, the venetian consul, and the skill of the best physician of cairo sought in vain to deliver him. the society had, at the time they engaged ledyard, entered into terms with mr. lucas, a gentleman, who, being captured in his youth by a sallee rover, had been three years a slave at the court of morocco, and after his deliverance acted as vice-consul in that empire. having spent sixteen years there, he had acquired an intimate knowledge of africa and its languages. he was sent by way of tripoli, with instructions to accompany the caravan, which takes the most direct route into the interior. being provided with letters from the tripolitan ambassador, he obtained the bey's permission, and even promises of assistance for this expedition. at the same time he made an arrangement with two sheerefs or descendants of the prophet, whose persons are held sacred, to join a caravan with which they intended to travel. he proceeded with them to mesuraba, but the arabs there being in a state of rebellion, refused to furnish camels and guides, which, indeed, could scarcely be expected, as the bey had declined to grant them a safe conduct through his territories. mr. lucas was therefore obliged to return to tripoli, without being able to penetrate further into the continent. he learned, however, from imhammed, one of the sheerefs, who had been an extensive traveller, a variety of particulars respecting the interior regions. the society had, at the same time, made very particular inquiries of ben ali, a morocco caravan trader, who happened to be in london. from these two sources, mr. beaufoy was enabled to draw up a view of centra. africa, very imperfect, indeed, yet superior to any that had ever before appeared. according to the information thus obtained, bornou and kashna were the most powerful states in that part of the continent, and formed even empires, holding sway over a number of tributary kingdoms, a statement which proved at that time to be correct, though affairs have since greatly changed. the kashna caravan often crossed the niger, and went onwards to great kingdoms behind the gold coast, gongah or kong, asiente or ashantee, yarba or yarriba, through which clapperton afterwards travelled. several extensive routes across the desert were also delineated. in regard to the niger, the report of imhammed revived the error, which represented that river as flowing westward towards the atlantic. the reason on which this opinion was founded, will be evident, when we observe that it was in kashna, that ben ali considered himself as having crossed that river. his niger, therefore, was the quarrama, or river of zermie, which flows westward through kashna and sackatoo, and is only a tributary to the quorra or great river, which we call the niger. he describes the stream as very broad and rapid, probably from having seen it during the rainy season, when all the tropical rivers of any magnitude assume an imposing appearance. mr. lucas made no further attempt to penetrate into africa. the next expedition was made by a new agent, and from a different route. major houghton, who had resided for some years as consul at morocco, and afterwards in a military capacity at goree, undertook the attempt to reach the niger by the route of gambia, not, like jobson and stibbs, ascending its stream in boats, but travelling singly and by land. he seems to have been endowed with a gay, active, and sanguine spirit, fitted to carry him through the boldest undertaking, but without that cool and calculating temper necessary for him, who endeavours to make his way amid scenes of peril and treachery. he began his journey early in , and soon reached medina, the capital of woolli, where the venerable chief received him with extreme kindness, promised to furnish guides, and assured him he might go to timbuctoo with his staff in his hand. the only evil that befell him at medina, arose from a fire that broke out there, and spreading rapidly through buildings roofed with cane and matted grass, converted a town of a thousand houses, in an hour, into a heap of ashes. major houghton ran out with the rest of the people into the fields, saving only such articles as could be carried with him. he mentions, that by trading at fattatenda, a person may make per cent, and may live in plenty on ten pounds a year. quitting the gambia, he took the road through bambouk, and arrived at ferbanna on the faleme. here he was received with the most extraordinary kindness by the king, who gave him a guide and money to defray his expenses. a note was afterwards received from him, dated simbing, which contained merely these words: "major houghton's compliments to dr. laidley, is in good health on his way to timbuctoo; robbed of all his goods by fenda, bucar's son." this was the last communication from him, for soon after the negroes brought down to pisania, the melancholy tidings of his death, of which mr. park subsequently learned the particulars. some moors had persuaded the major to accompany them to tisheet, a place in the great desert, frequented on account of its salt mines. in alluring him thither, their object, as it appears from the result, was to rob him, for it was very much out of the direct route to timbuctoo. of this in a few days he became sensible, and insisted upon returning, but they would not permit him to leave their party, until they had stripped him of every article in his possession. he wandered about for some time through the desert, without food or shelter, till at length quite exhausted, he sat down under a tree and expired. mr. park was shown the very spot where his remains wore abandoned to the fowls of the air. a considerable degree of information respecting the country on the senegal, was procured by a person of the name of bruce, who had a large share in the administration of the affairs of the french african companies. in one of his numerous journeys, he ascended the senegal as far as gallam, and established a fort or factory at dramanet, a populous and commercial town. the inhabitants carried on a trade as far as timbuctoo, which they described as situated leagues in the interior. they imported from it gold and ivory, and slaves from bambarra, which was represented by them, as an extensive region between timbuctoo and cassan, barren but very populous. the kingdom of cassan was said to be formed into a sort of island, or rather peninsula, by the branches of the senegal. gold was so abundant there, that the metal often appeared on the surface of the ground. from these circumstances it may be concluded, that cassan was in some degree confounded with bambouk, which borders it on the south. it had long been the ambition of the french, to find access to this golden country, but the jealousy of the native merchants presented an obstacle, that could not be easily surmounted. chapter iv. there is no chapter iv as the following chapter was numbered chapter v by mistake. chapter v. the death of major houghton left the african association without a single individual employed in the particular service, for which the company was originally established. on a sudden, mr. mungo park, a native of scotland, offered himself to the society, and the committee having made such inquiries as they thought necessary, accepted him for the service. his instructions were very plain and concise. he was directed, on his arrival in africa, to pass on to the river niger, either by the way of bambouk, or by such other route as should be most convenient; that he should ascertain the cause, and if possible, the rise and termination of that river; that he should use his utmost exertion to visit the principal towns or cities in its neighbourhood, particularly timbuctoo and houssa, and that he should afterwards return to europe, by such route as, under the then existing circumstances of his situation, should appear to him most advisable. he sailed from portsmouth on the nd of may, , and on the th june, he saw the mountains over mogadore, on the coast of africa, and on the st, after a pleasant voyage, he anchored at jillifree, a town on the northern bank of the gambia, opposite to james' island, where the english had formerly a small fort. on the rd, he proceeded to vintain, a town situated about two miles up a creek, on the southern side of the river. here he continued till the th, when he continued his course up the river, which is deep and muddy. the banks are covered with impenetrable thickets of mangrove, and the whole of the adjacent country appears to be flat and swampy. the gambia abounds with fish, but none of them are known in europe. in six days after leaving vintain, he reached jonkakonda, a place of considerable trade, where the vessel was to take in part of her lading. the next morning the european traders came from their different factories, to receive their letters, and learn the nature and amount of the cargo; whilst the captain despatched a letter to dr. laidley, with the information of mr. park's arrival. dr. laidley came to jonkakonda the morning following, when he delivered to him mr. beaufoy's letter, when the doctor gave him a kind invitation to spend his time at his house at pisania, until an opportunity should offer of prosecuting his journey. this invitation was too acceptable to be refused. pisania is a small village in the king of yany's dominions, established by british subjects, as a factory for trade, and inhabited solely by them and their black servants. the white residents at the time of mr. park's arrival, consisted only of dr. laidley and two gentlemen of the name of ainsley, but their domestics were numerous. they enjoyed perfect security, and being highly respected by the natives at large, wanted no accommodation the country could supply, and the greatest part of the trade in slaves; ivory, and gold was in their hands. being settled in pisania, mr. park's first object was to learn the mandingo tongue, being the language in almost general use throughout this part of africa, without which he was convinced he never could acquire an extensive knowledge of the country or its inhabitants. in this pursuit he was greatly assisted by dr. laidley, who had made himself completely master of it. next to the language, his great object was to collect information concerning the countries he intended to visit. on this occasion he was referred to certain traders called slatees, who are black merchants of great consideration in this part of africa, who come from the interior countries, chiefly with enslaved negroes for sale; but he discovered that little dependence could be placed on the accounts they gave, as they contradicted each other in the most important particulars, and all seemed extremely unwilling he should prosecute his journey. in researches of this kind, and in observing the manners and customs of the natives, in a country so little known to the nations of europe, and furnished with so many striking objects of nature, mr. park's time passed not unpleasantly, and he began to flatter himself that he had escaped the fever, to which europeans, on their first arrival in hot climates, are generally subject. but on the st july, he imprudently exposed himself to the night dew, in observing an eclipse of the moon, with a view to determine the longitude of the place; the next day he found himself attacked with fever and delirium, and an illness followed, which confined him to the house the greater part of august. his recovery was very slow, but he embraced every short interval of convalescence to walk out and examine the productions of the country. in one of these excursions, having rambled farther than usual in a hot day, he brought on a return of his fever, and was again confined to his bed. the fever, however, was not so violent as before, and in the course of three weeks, when the weather permitted, he was able to renew his botanical excursions; and when it rained, he amused himself with drawing plants, &c. in his chamber. the care and attention of dr. laidley contributed greatly to alleviate his sufferings; his company beguiled the tedious hours during that gloomy season, when the rain falls in torrents, when suffocating heats oppress by day, and when the night is spent in listening to the croaking of frogs, the shrill cry of the jackal, and the deep howling of the hyena; a dismal concert, interrupted only by the roar of tremendous thunder. on the th of october the waters of the gambia were at their greatest height, being fifteen feet above the high water mark of the tide, after which they began to subside; at first slowly, but afterwards very rapidly, sometimes sinking more than a foot in twenty-four hours: by the beginning of november the river had sunk to its former level, and the tide ebbed and flowed as usual. when the river had subsided, and the atmosphere grew dry, mr. park recovered apace, and began to think of his departure; for this is reckoned the most proper season for travelling: the natives had completed their harvest, and provisions were everywhere cheap and plentiful. on the nd december , mr. park took his departure from the hospitable mansion of dr. laidley, being fortunately provided with a negro servant, who spoke both the english and mandingo tongues; his name was johnson: he was a native of that part of africa, and having in his youth been conveyed to jamaica as a slave, he had been made free, and taken to england by his master, where he had resided many years, and at length found his way back to his native country. he was also provided with a negro boy, named demba, a sprightly youth, who, besides mandingo, spoke the language of the serawoollies, an inland people; and to induce him to behave well, he was promised his freedom on his return, in case the tourist should report favourably of his fidelity and services. a free man, named madiboo, travelling to the kingdom of bambara, and two slatees, going to bondou, offered their services, as did likewise a negro, named tami, a native of kasson, who had been employed some years by dr. laidley as a blacksmith, and was returning to his native country with the savings of his labours. all these men travelled on foot, driving their asses before them. thus mr. park had no less than six attendants, all of whom had been taught to regard him with great respect, and to consider that their safe return hereafter to the countries on the gambia, would depend on his preservation. dr. laidley and the messrs. ainsley accompanied park the two first days. they reached jindy the same day, and rested at the house of a black woman, who had formerly been the mistress of mr. hewett, a white trader, and who, in consequence of that honour, was called _seniora_. in the evening they walked out, to see an adjoining village, belonging to a slatee, named jemaffoo mamadoo, the richest of all the gambia traders. they found him at home, and he thought so highly of the honour done him by this visit, that he presented them with a fine bullock, part of which was dressed for their evening's repast. the negroes do not go to supper till late, and in order to amuse themselves while the beef was preparing, a mandingo was desired to relate some diverting stories, in listening to which, and smoking tobacco, they spent three hours. these stories bear some resemblance to those in the arabian nights' entertainments, but in general are of a more ludicrous cast. about one o'clock in the afternoon of the rd of december, park took his leave of dr. laidley and messrs. ainsley, and rode slowly into the woods. he had now before him a boundless forest, and a country, the inhabitants of which were strangers to civilized life. he reflected that he had parted from the last european he might probably behold, and perhaps quitted for ever the comforts of christian society. these thoughts necessarily cast a gloom over his mind, and he rode musing along for about three miles, when he was awakened from his reverie by a number of people, who, running up, stopped the asses, giving him to understand, that he must either go with them to peckaba, to present himself to the king of woolli, or pay customs to them. he endeavoured to make them comprehend, that not travelling for traffic, he ought not to be subjected to a tax like merchants, but his reasoning was thrown away upon them. they said it was usual for travellers of all descriptions to make a present to the king of woolli, and without doing so, none could be permitted to proceed. as the party were numerous, he thought it prudent to comply with their demand, and presented them with four bars of tobacco. at sunset he reached a village near kootacunda. the next day entering woolli, he stopped to pay customs to an officer of the king. passing the night at a village called tabajang: at noon the following day park reached medina, the capital of the king of woolli's dominions. it is a large place, and contains at least a thousand houses. it is fortified in the common african manner by a high mud wall, and an outward fence of pointed stakes and prickly bushes, but the walls were neglected, and the outward fence had suffered considerably by being plucked up for fire-wood. mr. park obtained a lodging with one of the king's near relations, who warned him, at his introduction to the king, not to shake hands with him, that liberty not being allowed to strangers. with this salutary warning, park paid his respects to jatta, the king, and asked his permission to pass to bondou. he was the same old man, of whom major houghton speaks in such favourable terms. the sovereign was seated before the door of his hovel, surrounded by a number of men and women, who were singing and clapping their hands. park, saluting him respectfully, told him the object of his visit. the monarch not only permitted him to proceed on his journey, but declared he would offer prayers for his safe return. one of mr. park's attendants, to manifest his sense of the king's courtesy, roared out an arabic song, at every pause of which the king himself, and all present, striking their hands against their foreheads, exclaimed, with affecting solemnity, _amen, amen._ the king further assured him, that a guide should be ready on the following day, to conduct him to the frontier of bondou. having taken leave, he sent the king an order upon dr. laidley for three gallons of rum, and received in return a great store of provisions. december the th, early in the morning, on visiting jatta, he found his majesty sitting upon a bullock's hide, warming himself before a large fire, for the africans frequently feel cold when a european is oppressed with heat. jatta received his visitant very kindly, and earnestly entreated him to advance no farther into the interior, telling him that major houghton had been killed in his route. he said that travellers must not judge of the people of the eastern country by those of woolli. the latter were acquainted with white men, and respected them; whereas, in the east, the people had never seen one, and would certainly destroy the first they beheld. park, thanking the king for his affectionate concern, told him he was determined, notwithstanding all danger, to proceed. the king shook his head, but desisted from further persuasion, and ordered the guide to hold himself in readiness. on the guide making his appearance, park took his last farewell of the good old king, and in three hours reached konjour, a small village, where he and his party rested for the night. here he bought a fine sheep for some beads, and his attendants killed it, with all the ceremonies prescribed by their religion. part of it was dressed for supper, after which a dispute arose between one of the negroes and johnson, the interpreter, about the sheep's horns. the former claimed the horns as his perquisite, as he had performed the office of butcher, and johnson disputed the claim. to settle the matter, mr. park gave a horn to each of the litigants. leaving konjour, and sleeping at a village called malla, on the th he arrived at kolor, a considerable town, near the entrance into which he saw hanging upon a tree, a sort of masquerade habit, made of the bark of trees, which he was told belonged to mumbo jumbo. the account of this personage is thus narrated by mr. park: "this is a strange bugbear, common to all the mandingo towns, and much employed by the pagan natives in keeping their women in subjection, for as the kafirs are not restricted in the number of their wives, every one marries as many as he can maintain, and, as it frequently happens, that the ladies disagree among themselves, family quarrels rise sometimes to such a height, that the husband can no longer preserve peace in his household. in such cases, the interposition of mumbo jumbo is called in, and is always decisive." this strange minister of justice, who is supposed to be either the husband himself, or some person instructed by him, disguised in the dress before mentioned, and armed with his rod of public authority, announces his coming by loud and continual screams in the woods near the town. he begins the pantomime at the approach of night, and, as soon as it is dark, enters the town, and proceeds to the bentang, at which all the inhabitants immediately assemble. this exhibition is not much relished by the women, for as the person in disguise is unknown to them, every married female suspects the visit may be intended for herself, but they dare not refuse to appear, when they are summoned: and the ceremony commences with songs and dances, which continue till midnight, when mumbo fixes on the offender. the victim, being immediately seized, is stripped naked, tied to a post, and severely scourged with mumbo's rod, amidst the shouts and derisions of the assembly; and it is remarkable, that the rest of the women are loudest in their exclamations against their unhappy sister. daylight puts an end to this indecent and unmanly revel. on the th of december, park reached tambacunda, leaving which the next morning, he arrived in the evening at kooniakary, a town of nearly the same size and extent as kolor. on the th he came to koojar, the frontier town of woolli near bondou. king jatta's guide being now to return, park presented him with some amber, and having been informed that it was not possible at all times to procure water in the wilderness, he inquired for men, who would serve both as guides and water-bearers, and he procured three negroes, elephant hunters, for that service, paying them three bars each in advance. the inhabitants of koojar beheld the white man with surprise and veneration, and in the evening invited him to see a _neobering,_ or wrestling match, in the bentang. this is an exercise very common in all these countries. the spectators formed a ring round the wrestlers, who were strong, active young men, full of emulation, and accustomed to such contests. being stripped to a short pair of drawers, and having their skin anointed with oil or _shea_ water, the combatants approached, each on all fours, parrying for some time, till at length one of them sprang forward, and caught his antagonist by the knee. great dexterity and judgment were now displayed, but the combat was decided by strength. few europeans would have subdued the conqueror. the wrestlers were animated by the sound of a drum. after the wrestling, commenced a dance, in which many performers assisted, provided with little bells fastened to their legs and arms, and here also the drum assisted their movements. the drum likewise keeps order among the spectators, by imitating the sound of certain mandingo sentences; for example, when the sport is about to begin, the drummer strikes, which is understood to signify, _ali boe si,_ "sit all down," upon which the lookers-on immediately squat themselves on the ground, and when the combatants are to begin, he strikes, _amuta, amuta,_ "take hold, take hold." in the morning of the th, he found that one of the elephant hunters had absconded with the money he had received beforehand; and to prevent the other two from following his example, park made them instantly fill their calabashes with water, and they entered the wilderness that separates woolli from bondou. the attendants halted to prepare a saphie or charm, to ensure a safe journey. this was done by muttering a few sentences, and spitting upon a stone, thrown before them on the road. having repeated this operation three times, the negroes proceeded with assurance off safety. riding along, they came to a large tree, called by the natives _neema taba_. it was decorated with innumerable rags of cloth, which persons travelling across the wilderness had at different times tied to the branches, which was done, according to the opinion of mr. park, to inform the traveller that water was to be found near it; but the custom has been so sanctioned by time, that nobody now presumes to pass without hanging up something. park followed the example, and suspended a handsome piece of cloth on one of the boughs; and being informed that either a well or a pool of water was at no great distance, he ordered the negroes to unload the asses, that they might give them some corn, and regale themselves with the provisions, which they had brought, meanwhile he sent one of the elephant hunters to look for the well. a pool was found, but the water was thick and muddy, and the negro discovered near it the remains of fire and fragments of provisions, which showed that it had been lately visited, either by travellers or banditti. the attendants, apprehending the latter, and supposing that the robbers lurked at no great distance, mr. park proceeded to another watering place. he arrived there late in the, evening, fatigued with so long a day's journey; and kindling a large fire, laid down, more than a gunshot from any bush, the negroes agreeing to keep watch by turns, to prevent surprise. the negroes were indeed very apprehensive of banditti during the whole of the journey. as soon, therefore, as daylight appeared, they filled their soofros and calabashes at the pool, took their departure, and arrived at tallika, the first town in bondou, on the th december. mr. park says, that he cannot take leave of woolli without observing, that he was every where well received by the natives, and that the fatigues of the day were generally alleviated by a hearty welcome at night. tallika, the frontier town of bondou towards woolli, is inhabited chiefly by the mohammedan foulahs, who acquire no inconsiderable affluence by furnishing provisions to the coffles or caravans, and by the sale of ivory from hunting elephants. here an officer constantly resides, whose business it is to watch the arrival of the caravans, which are taxed according to the number of loaded asses. mr. park lodged with this officer, and was accompanied by him to fatteconda, the king's residence, for which he was paid five bars. they halted for the first night at ganado, where they partook of a good supper, and were further exhilarated by an itinerant musician, or singing man, who told a number of entertaining stories, and played some sweet airs, by blowing his breath upon a bow-string, and striking it at the same time with a stick. at daybreak mr. park's fellow-travellers, the serawoollies, took their leave, with many prayers for his safety. a mile from ganado they crossed a branch of the gambia, called neriko, and in the evening reached koorkarany, a mohammedan town, in which the blacksmith had some relations. koorkarany is surrounded by a high wall, and is provided with a mosque. here a number of arabic manuscripts were shown to mr. park, particularly a copy of the book called _al sharra_. leaving koorkarany, they were joined by a young man, who was travelling to fatteconda for salt, and as night set in, they reached dooggi, a small village about three miles from koorkarany. there they purchased a bullock for six small stones of amber. early in the morning of the th december, they departed from dooggi, joined by a party of foulahs and others, in the evening arrived at a village called buggil, and passed the night in a miserable hut, having no other bed than a bundle of corn stalks. the wells are here dug with great ingenuity, and are very deep. from buggil they travelled along a dry, stony height, covered with mimosas, and descended into a deep valley, in which, pursuing their course, they came to a large village, where they intended to lodge. many of the natives were dressed in a thin french gauze, which they called _byqui_; this being a dress calculated to show the shape of their persons, was very fashionable among the women. these females were extremely rude and troublesome; they took mr. park's cloak, cut the buttons from the boy's clothes, and were proceeding to other outrages, when he mounted his horse, and proceeded on his journey. in the evening they reached soobrudooka, and as the company were numerous, they purchased a sheep and corn wherewith to regale themselves, after which, they slept by their baggage. from soobrudooka they came to a large village on the banks of the faleme, which is here very rapid and rocky. the river abounds with a small fish, of the size of sprats, which are prepared for sale by pounding them in mortars, and exposing them to dry in the sun in large lumps. an old moorish shereeff, who came to bestow his blessing on mr. park, and beg some paper to write saphies upon, said that he had seen major houghton in the kingdom of kaarta, and that he died in the country of the moors. mr. park and some of his attendants gave him a few sheets of paper, on which to write his charms. proceeding northward along the banks of the river, they arrived at mayemow, the chief man of which town presented mr. park with a bullock, and he in return gave him some amber and beads. crossing the river, they entered fatteconda, the capital of bondou, and received an invitation from a slatee to lodge at his house, for as in africa there are no inns, strangers stand at the bentang, or market-place, till they are invited by some of the inhabitants. soon afterwards, mr. park was conducted to the king, who was desirous of seeing him immediately, if he was not too much fatigued for the interview. he took his interpreter with him, and followed the messenger till they were quite out of the town, when suspecting some trick, mr. park stopped and asked his guide, whither he was going?--upon this, he pointed to a man sitting under a tree at some little distance, and told him that the king frequently gave audience in that retired manner, in order to avoid a crowd of people. when he advanced, the king desired him to come and sit by him upon the mat, and after hearing his story, on which he made no observation, he inquired of mr. park, if he wished to purchase any slaves or gold. being answered in the negative, he seemed surprised, but desired him to visit him again in the evening, that he might be supplied with some provisions. this prince was called almami, and was a pagan. it was reported that he had caused major houghton to be plundered. his behaviour, therefore, at this interview, although distinguished by greater civility than was expected, caused mr. park some uneasiness, for as he was now entirely in his power, he thought it more politic to conciliate the good opinion of the monarch, by a few presents. accordingly, in the evening, mr. park took with him a canister of gunpowder, some amber, tobacco, and an umbrella; and as he considered that his bundles would inevitably be searched, he concealed some few articles in the roof of the hut where he lodged, putting on his new blue coat, in order to preserve it. mr. park on coming to the entrance of the court, as well as his guide and interpreter, according to custom, took off their sandals, and the former pronounced the king's name aloud, repeating it till he was answered from within. they found the monarch sitting upon a mat, and two attendants with him. mr. park told him his reasons for passing through his country, but his majesty did but seem half satisfied. he thought it impossible, he said, that any man in his senses would undertake so dangerous a journey, merely to look at the country and its inhabitants. when, however, mr. park had delivered his presents, his majesty seemed well pleased, and was particularly delighted with the umbrella, which he repeatedly furled and unfurled, to the great admiration of himself and his two attendants, who could not for some time comprehend the use of this wonderful machine. after this, mr. park was about to take his leave, when the king began a long preamble in favour of the whites, extolling their immense wealth and good dispositions. he next proceeded to an eulogium on mr. park's blue coat, of which the yellow buttons seemed particularly to please his fancy, and he concluded by entreating mr. park to present him with it, assuring him, as a matter of great consolation to him for the loss of it, that he would wear it on all public occasions, and inform every one who saw it, of the great liberality of mr. park towards him. the request of an african prince, in his own dominions, comes very little short of a command. mr. park, therefore, very quietly took off his coat, the only good one in his possession, and laid it at his feet. in return for his compliance, he presented mr. park with great plenty of provisions, and desired to see him again in the morning. mr. park accordingly attended, and found the king sitting on his bed. his majesty told him he was sick, and wished to have a little blood taken from him, but mr. park had no sooner tied up his arm, and displayed the lancet, than his courage failed, and he begged him to postpone the operation. he then observed, that his women were very desirous to see him, and requested that he would favour them with a visit. an attendant was ordered to conduct him, and he had no sooner entered the court appropriated to the ladies, than the whole seraglio surrounded him, some begging for physic, some for amber, and all of them trying that great african specific, blood-letting. they were ten or twelve in number, most of them young and handsome, and wearing on their heads ornaments of gold and beads of amber. they rallied him on the whiteness of his skin and the prominency of his nose. they insisted that both were artificial, the first they said, was produced when he was an infant, by dipping him in milk, and they insisted that his nose had been pinched every day, till it had acquired its present unsightly and unnatural conformation. on his part, without disputing his own deformity, he paid them many compliments on african beauty. he praised the glossy jet of their skins, and the lovely depression of their noses; but they said, that flattery, or as they emphatically termed it, _honey-mouth_, was not esteemed in bondou. the ladies, however, were evidently not displeased, for they presented him with a jar of honey and some fish. mr. park was desired to attend the king again, a little before sunset, on which occasion he presented to his majesty some beads and writing paper, as a small offering, in return for which the king gave him five drachms of gold. he seconded the act by one still greater, he suffered the baggage to pass without examination, and mr. park was allowed to depart when he pleased. accordingly, on the morning of the d, mr. park left fatteconda, and in a few hours arrived at a small village, the boundary between bondou and kajaaga. hearing it was dangerous for travellers, mr. park resolved to proceed by night, until they should reach a more hospitable part of the country, and directed their course through the woods. on this occasion, mr. park says, "the stillness of the air, the howling of the wild beasts, and the deep solitude of the forest, made the scene solemn and impressive. not a word was uttered by any of us, but in a whisper; all were attentive, and every one anxious to show his sagacity, by pointing out to me the wolves and hyenas, as they glided, like shadows, from one thicket to another." the following afternoon they arrived at joag, in the kingdom of kajaaga, where they took up their abode at the house of the chief man, here called the _dooty_. he was a rigid mohammedan, but distinguished for his hospitality. the town was supposed to contain about two thousand inhabitants; it was surrounded by a high wall, in which were a number of port-holes for musketry. every man's possession was likewise surrounded by a wall, the whole forming so many distinct citadels, and, amongst a people unacquainted with the use of artillery, the walls answer all the purposes of stronger fortifications. the same evening, madiboo, the bushreen from pisania, went to pay a visit to his father and mother, who dwelt at a neighbouring town, called dramanet. he was joined by the blacksmith; and as soon as it was dark, mr. park was invited to see the sports of the inhabitants. a great crowd surrounded a dancing party; the dances, however, consisted more in wanton gestures, than in muscular exertion or graceful attitudes. the women vied with each other in displaying the most voluptuous movements imaginable. on the th december, early in the morning, a number of horsemen entered the town, and came to the bentang on which mr. park had made his bed. one of them, thinking he was asleep, attempted to steal his musket; but finding that he could not effect his purpose undiscovered, he desisted. mr. park now perceived, by the countenance of the interpreter, johnson, that something bad was in agitation; he was also surprised to see madiboo, and the blacksmith so soon returned. on inquiring the reason, madiboo informed him, that as they were dancing at dramanet, ten horsemen belonging to batcheri, the king, with his second son at their head, had inquired if the white man had passed. the ten horsemen mentioned by madiboo arrived, and entering the bentang dismounted, and seated themselves with those who had come before, the whole being about twenty in number, forming a circle round him, and each man holding his musket in his hand. mr. park now remarked to his landlord, that as he did not understand the serawoolii tongue, he hoped whatever the men had to say, they would speak in mandingo. to this they agreed, and a man, loaded with a remarkable number of saphies, opened the business in a long oration, purporting that the white man had entered the king's town, without having first paid the duties, or giving any present to the king, and that according to the laws of the country, his people, cattle and baggage were forfeited, and he added, that they had received orders from the king, to conduct mr. park to mauna. it would have been equally vain and imprudent to have resisted or irritated such a body of men, he, therefore, affected to comply with their demands. the poor blacksmith, who was a native of kasson, mistook this feigned compliance for a real intention, and begged mr. park privately, that he would not entirely ruin him by going to mauna, adding, that as he had every reason to believe that a war would soon take place between kasson and kajaaga, he should not only lose his little property, the savings of four years' industry, but should certainly be detained and sold as a slave. mr. park told the king's son, he was ready to go with him upon condition, that the blacksmith, who was an inhabitant of a distant kingdom, and entirely unconnected with him, should be allowed to stay at joag until his return. to this they all objected, and insisted that as all had acted contrary to the laws, all were equally answerable for their transgressions. their landlord strenuously advised mr. park not to go to the king, who, he said, if he discovered any thing valuable in his possession, would seize it without ceremony. in consequence of this representation, mr. park was the more solicitous to conciliate matters with the king's officers, and acknowledged that he had indeed entered the king's frontiers, without knowing that he was to pay the duties beforehand, but was ready to pay them then; accordingly he tendered, as a present to the king, the drachms of gold, which he had received from the king of bondou; this they accepted, but insisted on examining his baggage. the bundles were opened, but the men were greatly disappointed in not finding much gold and amber: they made up the deficiency, however, by taking whatever things they fancied, and departed, having first robbed him of half his goods. these proceedings tended, in a great degree, to dispirit the attendants of mr. park. madiboo begged of him to return; johnson laughed at the thoughts of proceeding without money, and the blacksmith was afraid to be seen, or even to speak, lest any one should discover him to be a native of kasson. in this dejected state of mind, they passed the night by the side of a dim fire. in the course of the following day mr. park was informed, that a nephew of demba sego jalla, the mandingo king of kasson, was coming to visit him. the prince had been sent out on a mission to batcheri, king of kajaaga, to endeavour to settle some disputes between his uncle and the latter, in which, having been unsuccessful, he was on his return to kasson, to which place he offered to conduct mr. park, provided he would set out on the following morning. mr. park gratefully accepted this offer, and, with his attendants, was ready to set out by daylight on the th of december. the retinue of demba sego was numerous, the whole amounting, on the departure from joag, to thirty persons and six loaded asses. having proceeded for some hours, they came to a tree, for which johnson had made frequent inquiry, and here, having desired them to stop, he produced a white chicken he had purchased at joag for the purpose, and tied it by the leg to one of the branches; he then declared they might now proceed without fear, for their journey would be prosperous. this circumstance exhibits the power of superstition over the minds of the negroes, for although this man had resided seven years in england, he retained all the prejudices imbibed in his youth. he meant this ceremony, he told mr. park, as an offering to the spirits of the wood, who were a powerful race of beings, of a white colour, with long flowing hair. at noon the travellers stopped at gungadi, where was a mosque built of clay, with six turrets, on the pinnacles of which were placed six ostrich eggs. towards evening they arrived at samee a town on the banks of the senegal, which is here a beautiful but shallow river, its banks high, and covered with verdure. on the following day they proceeded to kajee, a large village, part of which is on the north, and part on the south side of the river. about sunset mr. park and demba sego embarked in the canoe, which the least motion was likely to overset, and demba sego thinking this a proper time to examine a tin box belonging to mr. park, that stood in the fore part of the canoe, by stretching out his hand for it, destroyed the equilibrium and overset the vessel. as they were not far advanced, they got back to the shore without much difficulty, and after wringing the water from their clothes, took a fresh departure, and were safely landed in kasson. demba sego now told mr. park, that they were in his uncle's dominions, and he hoped that he would consider the obligation he owed to him, and make him a suitable return by a handsome present. this proposition was rather unexpected by mr. park, who began to fear that he had not much improved his condition by crossing the water, but as it would have been folly to complain, he gave the prince seven bars of amber and some tobacco, with which he seemed well satisfied. in the evening of december the th, they arrived at demba sego's hut, and the next morning mr. park was introduced by the prince to his father, tigitty sego, brother to the king of kasson, chief of tesee. the old man viewed his visitor with great earnestness, having never beheld but one white man before, whom mr. park discovered to be major houghton. he appeared to disbelieve what mr. park asserted, in answer to his inquiries concerning the motives that induced him to explore the country, and told him that he must go to kooniakary to pay his respects to the king, but desired to see him again before he left tesee. tesee is a large unwalled town, fortified only by a sort of citadel, in which tiggity sego and his family reside. the present inhabitants, though possessing abundance of cattle and corn, eat without scruple rats, moles, squirrels, snakes, locusts, &c. the attendants of mr. park were one evening invited to a feast, where making a hearty meal of what they thought to be fish and kouskous, one of them found a piece of hard skin in the dish, which he brought away with him, to show mr. park what sort of fish they had been eating. on examining the skin, it was discovered they had been feasting on a large snake. another custom, which is rigidly adhered to, is, that no woman is allowed to eat an egg, and nothing will more affront a woman of tesee than to offer her an egg. the men, however, eat eggs without scruple. the following anecdote will show, that in some particulars the african and european women have a great resemblance to each other, and that conjugal infidelity is by no means confined to the latter. a young man, a kafir of considerable affluence, who had recently married a young and handsome wife, applied to a very devout bushreen or mussulman priest of his acquaintance, to procure him saphies for his protection during the approaching war. the bushreen complied with his request, and to render the saphies more efficacious, enjoined the young man to avoid any nuptial intercourse with his bride for the space of six weeks. the kafir obeyed, and without telling his wife the real cause, absented himself from her company. in the mean time it was whispered that the bushreen, who always performed his evening devotions at the door of the kafir's hut, was more intimate with the young wife, than was consistent with virtue, or the sanctity of his profession. the husband was unwilling to suspect the honour of his sanctified friend, whose outward show of religion, as is the case with the priests and parsons of the civilized part of the world, protected him from even the suspicion of so flagitious an act. some time, however, elapsed before any jealousy arose in the mind of the husband, but hearing the charge repeated, he interrogated his wife on the subject, who confessed that the holy man had seduced her. hereupon the kafir put her into confinement, and called a palaver on the bushreen's conduct, which mr. park was invited to attend. the fact was proved against the priest, and he was sentenced to be sold into slavery, or find two slaves for his redemption, according to the pleasure of the complainant. the injured husband, however, desired rather to have him publicly flogged, before tiggity sego's gate; this was agreed to, and the sentence immediately carried into execution. the culprit was tied by the hands to a strong stake, and the executioner with a long black rod round his head, for some time applied it with such dexterity to the bushreen's back, as to make him roar until the woods resounded. the multitude, by their looking and laughing, manifested how much they enjoyed the punishment of the old gallant, and it is remarkable, that the number of stripes was exactly the same as enjoined by the mosaic law, _forty, save one._ on the th of january, demba sego, who had borrowed mr. park's horse, for the purpose of making a small excursion into the country, returned and informed his father, that he should set out for kooniakary early the next day. the old man made many frivolous objections, and gave mr. park to understand, that he must not depart without paying him the duties to which he was entitled from all travellers; besides which, he expected some acknowledgment for his kindness towards him. accordingly, the following morning demba sego, with a number of people, came to mr. park, to see what goods he intended as a present to the old chief. mr. park offered them seven bars of amber, and five of tobacco, but demba, having surveyed these articles, very coolly told him they were not a present suitable to a man of tiggity sego's consequence, and if he did not make him a larger offering, he would carry all the baggage to his father, and let him choose for himself. without waiting for a reply, demba and his attendants immediately opened the bundles, and spread the different articles upon the floor; everything that pleased them they took without a scruple, and demba in particular seized the tin box, which had so much attracted his attention in crossing the river. upon collecting the remains of his little fortune, after these people had left him, mr. park found, that as at joag, he had been plundered of half, so he was here deprived of half the remainder. having been under some obligations to demba sego, mr. park did not reproach him for his rapacity, but determined at all events to quit tesee the following morning; in the mean while, to raise the drooping spirits of his attendants, he purchased a fat sheep, and had it dressed for dinner. early in the morning of january the th, mr. park and his company left tesee, and about midday came in sight of the hills in the vicinity of kooniakary. having slept at a small village, the next morning they crossed a narrow but deep stream, called krisko, a branch of the senegal. proceeding eastward, about two o'clock they came in sight of the native town of jambo, the blacksmith, from which he had been absent about four years. he was received with the greatest affection by his relations, but he declared that he would not quit mr. park during his stay at kooniakary, and they set out for that place in the morning of the th january. about the middle of the day, they arrived at soolo, a small village about three miles to the south of it, where mr. park went to visit a slatee, named salim daucari, who had entrusted him with effects to the value of five slaves, and had given mr. park an order for the whole of the debt. the slatee received his visitors with great kindness. it was, however, remarkable that the king of kasson was by some means apprised of the motions of mr. park, for he had not been many hours at soolo, when sambo sego, the second son of the king of kasson, came thither with a party of horse, to inquire what had prevented him from proceeding to kooniakary, and waiting upon the king, who he said was impatient to see him. salim daucari apologised for mr. park, and promised to accompany him to kooniakary. they accordingly departed from soolo at sunset, and in about an hour entered kooniakary, but as the king had gone to sleep, the interview was deferred till the next morning, and the travellers slept in the hut of sambo sego. chapter vi. on the ensuing morning mr. park went to have an audience of king demba sego jalla, but the crowd of people that were assembled to see him was so great, that he could scarcely gain admittance; he at length arrived in the presence of the monarch, whom he found sitting upon a mat in a large hut: he appeared to be about sixty years of age. he surveyed mr. park with great attention, and on being made acquainted with the object of his journey, the good old king was perfectly satisfied, and promised him every assistance in his power. he said that he had seen major houghton, and presented him with a white horse, but that after passing the kingdom of kaarta, he had lost his life among the moors, but in what manner he was utterly ignorant. the audience being ended, mr. park returned to his lodging, where he made up a small present for the king, who sent him in return a large white bullock. although the king was well disposed towards mr. park, the latter soon discovered that very great and unexpected obstacles were likely to impede his progress. a war was on the eve of breaking out between kasson and kajaaga; the kingdom of kaarta, through which his route lay, being involved in the issue, and was also threatened with hostilities by bambarra. taking these circumstances into consideration, the king advised mr. park to remain in the vicinity of kooniakary, till some decisive information could be obtained of the state of the belligerents, which was expected to be received in four or live days. mr. park readily submitted to this proposal, and returned to soolo, where he received from salim daucari, on dr. laidley's account, the value of three slaves, chiefly in gold dust. being anxious to proceed as soon as possible, mr. park begged daucari to use his interest with the king, to procure him a guide by the way of foolado, as it was reported that the war had commenced. daucari accordingly set out for kooniakary on the morning of the th, and the same evening returned with an answer from the king, stating that his majesty had made an agreement with the king of kaarta, to send all merchants and travellers through his dominions, but if mr. park wished to take the route of foolado, the king gave him permission to do so, though he could not consistently with his agreement send him a guide. in consequence of this answer, mr. park determined to wait till he could pass through kaarta without danger. in the interim, however, it was whispered abroad, that the white man had received abundance of gold from salim daucari, and on the morning of the rd, sambo sego paid mr. park a visit, attended by a party of horsemen, and insisted upon knowing the exact amount of the money which he had received, declaring at the same time, that one half of it must go to the king; that he himself must have a handsome present, as being the king's son, and his attendants, as being the king's relations. mr. park was preparing to submit to this arbitrary exaction, when salim daucari interposed, and at last prevailed upon sambo to accept sixteen bars of european merchandize, and some powder and ball, as a complete payment of every demand that could be made in the kingdom of kasson. mr. park resided at soolo for several days, occasionally visiting surrounding country, and he reports that the number of towns and villages, and the extensive cultivation around them, surpassed every thing he had yet seen in africa. the king of kasson having now obtained information, that the war had not yet commenced between bambarra and kaarta, and that mr. park might probably pass through the latter country before the bambarra army invaded it, sent two guides early on the morning of the rd of february, to conduct him to the frontiers. he accordingly took leave of salim daucari, and jambo the blacksmith, and about ten o'clock departed from soolo. in the afternoon of the th, they reached kimo, a large village, the residence of madi konko, governor of the hilly country of kasson, which is called soromma. at kimo, the guides, appointed by the king of kasson, left mr. park, and he waited at this place till the th, when he departed, with madi konko's son as a guide. on the th of february they travelled over a rough stony country, and, having passed a number of villages, arrived at lackarago, a small village standing upon the ridge of hills that separates kasson from kaarta. the following morning they left lackarago, and soon perceived, towards the south-east, the mountains of fooladoo. proceeding with great difficulty down a stony and abrupt precipice, they continued their way in a dry bed of a river, where the trees, meeting over head, made the place dark and cool. about ten o'clock they reached the sandy plains of kaarta, and at noon came to a watering place, where a few strings of beads purchased as much milk and corn meal as they could eat. provisions were here so plentiful, that the shepherds seldom asked any return for the refreshment a traveller required. at sunset the travellers reached feesurah, where they rested. mr. park and his attendants remained at feesurah, during the whole of the following day, for the purpose of learning more exactly the situation of affairs, before they ventured further. their landlord asked so exorbitant a sum for their lodging, that mr. park refused to submit to his demand, but his attendants, frightened at the reports of approaching war, would not proceed unless he was satisfied, and persuaded him to accompany them to kemmoo for their protection on the road. this mr. park accomplished by presenting his host with a blanket to which he had taken a liking. matters being thus amicably adjusted, our travellers again set out on the th, preceded by their landlord of feesurah on horseback. this man was one of those negroes who observe the ceremonial part of mahometanism, but retain all their pagan superstitions, and even drink strong liquors; they are called johars or jowers, and are very numerous in kaarta. when the travellers had got into a lonely wood, he made a sign for them to stop, and taking hold of a hollow niece of bamboo, that hung as an amulet round his neck, whistled very loudly three times. mr. park began to suspect it was a signal for some of his associates to attack the travellers, but the man assured him it was done to ascertain the successful event of their journey. he then dismounted, laid his spear across the road and having said several short prayers, again gave three loud whistles; after which he listened, as if expecting an answer, but receiving none, said they might proceed without fear, for no danger actually existed. on the morning of the th, they departed from karan kalla, and it being but a short day's journey to kemmoo, they travelled slower than usual, and amused themselves by collecting eatable fruits near the road side. thus engaged, mr. park had wandered a short distance from his people, when two negro horsemen, armed with muskets, came galloping from the thickets. on seeing them, he made a full stop; the horsemen did the same, and all three seemed equally surprised and confounded. as he approached them, their fears increased, and one casting upon him a look of horror, rode off at full speed; while the other, in a panic of fear, put his hand over his eyes, and continued muttering prayers, till his horse, apparently without his knowledge, slowly conveyed him after his companion. about a mile to the westward they fell in with mr. park's attendants, to whom they related a frightful story: their fears had dressed him in the flowing robes of a tremendous spirit, and one of them affirmed, that a blast of wind, cold as water, poured down upon him from the sky, while he beheld the dreadful apparition. about two o'clock, mr. park entered the capital of kaarta, which is situate in the midst of an open plain, the country for two miles round being cleared of wood. they immediately proceeded to the king's residence, and mr. park, being surrounded by the astonished multitude, did not attempt to dismount, but sent in the landlord of feesurah, and madi konko's son, to acquaint his majesty of his arrival. the king replied, that he would see the stranger in the evening, and ordered an attendant to procure him a lodging, and prevent annoyance from the crowd. mr. park was conducted into a large hut, in which he had scarcely seated himself, than the mob entered, it being found impossible to keep them out, and when one party had seen him, and asked a few questions, they retired, and another succeeded, party after party, during the greater part of the day. the king, whose name was koorabarri, now sent for mr. park, who followed the messenger through a number of courts, surrounded with high walls. mr. park was astonished at the number of the king's attendants: they were all seated, the men on the king's right hand, and the women and children on the left. the king was not distinguished from his subjects by any superiority of dress, being seated on a leopard's skin, spread upon a bank of earth, about two feet high. mr. park seated himself upon the ground before him, and relating the causes that induced him to pass through his country, solicited his protection. the king replied, that he could at present afford him but little assistance, all communication between kaarta and bambarra being cut off; and monsong, king of bambarra, with his army on his march to kaarta, there was little hope of reaching bambarra by the direct route, for coming from an enemy's country, he would certainly be plundered or taken for a spy. under these circumstances he did not wish him to remain at kaarta, but advised him to return to kasson till the war was at an end, when, if he survived the contest, he would bestow every attention on the traveller, but if he should fall, his sons would take him under their care. mr. park dreaded the thoughts of passing the rainy season in the interior of africa, and was averse to return to europe, without having made further discoveries, he therefore rejected the well-meant advice of the king, and requested his majesty to allow a man to accompany him as near the frontiers of kaarta as was consistent with safety. the king, finding he was resolved to proceed, told him that one route, though not wholly free from danger, still remained, which was first to go into the moorish kingdom of luda-mar, and thence by a circuitous route to jarra, the frontier town of ludamar. he then inquired of mr. park how he had been treated since he left the gambia, and jocularly asked him how many slaves he expected to take home with him on his return. he was, however interrupted by the arrival of a man mounted on a fine moorish horse covered with sweat and foam, who having something of importance to communicate, the king immediately took up his sandals, which is the signal for strangers to retire. mr. park accordingly took leave, but afterwards learned that this messenger was one of the scouts employed to watch the motions of the enemy, and had brought intelligence that the bambarra army was approaching kaarta. in the evening the king sent to the stranger a fine sheep, a very acceptable gift, as they had not broken their fast during the whole of the day. at this time, evening prayers were announced, by beating on drums, and blowing through hollowed elephants' teeth; the sound of which was melodious, and nearly resembled the human voice. on the following morning, mr. park sent his horse-pistols and holsters as a present to the king, and informed him that he wished to leave kemmoo as soon as he could procure a guide. in about an hour the king returned thanks for his present, and sent a party of horsemen to conduct him to jarra. on that night he slept at a village called marena, where, during the night, some thieves broke into the hut where the baggage was deposited, cut open one of mr. park's bundles, and stole a quantity of beads, part of his clothes, some amber and gold. the following day was far advanced before they recommenced their journey, and the excessive heat obliged them to travel but slowly. in the evening they arrived at the village of toorda, when all the king's people turned back with the exception of two, who remained to guide mr. park and his attendants to jarra. on the th of february they departed from toorda, and about two o'clock came to a considerable town called funing-kedy, where being informed that the road to jarra was much infested by the moors, and that a number of people were going to that town on the following day, mr. park resolved to stay and accompany them. accordingly in the afternoon of the th of february, accompanied by thirty people, he left funing-kedy, it being necessary to travel in the night to avoid the moorish banditti. at midnight they stopped near a small village, but the thermometer being so low as °, none of the negroes could sleep on account of the cold. they resumed their journey at daybreak, and in the morning passed simbing, the frontier village of ludamar. from this village major houghton wrote his last letter, with a pencil, to dr. laidley, having been deserted by his negro servants, who refused to follow him into the moorish country. this brave but unfortunate man, having surmounted many difficulties, had endeavoured to pass through the kingdom of ludamar, where mr. park learned the following particulars concerning his fate. on his arrival at jarra, he got acquainted with some moorish merchants, who were travelling to tisheel, a place celebrated for its salt pits in the great desert, for the purpose of purchasing salt. it is supposed that the moors deceived him, either in regard to the route he wished to pursue, or the state of the country between jarra and timbuctoo, and their intention probably was to rob and leave him in the desert. at the end of two days he suspected their treachery, and insisted on returning to jarra. finding him to persist in this determination, the moors robbed him of every thing he possessed, and went off with their camels; the major, being thus deserted, returned on foot to a watering place called tarra. he had been some days without food, and the unfeeling moors refusing to give him any, he sunk at last under his distresses. whether he actually perished of hunger, or was murdered by the savage mahometans, is not certainly known. his body was dragged into the woods, and mr. park was shown at a distance, the spot where his remains were left to perish. leaving simbing, the travellers arrived in safety at jarra, which is a large town situate at the bottom of rocky hills; the houses being built of clay and stones intermixed, the former answering the purpose of mortar. it forms part of the moorish kingdom of ludamar, but the majority of the inhabitants are negroes, who purchase a precarious protection from the moors, in order to avert their depredations. on mr. park's arrival at jarra, he obtained a lodging at the house of daman jumma, a gambia slatee, to whom he had an order from dr. laidley for a debt of the value of six slaves. daman readily acknowledged the debt, but said he was afraid he could not pay more than two slaves' value. he was, however, very useful to mr. park, by procuring his beads and amber to be exchanged for gold, which being more portable, was more easily concealed from the moors. the difficulties, which they had already encountered, and the savage deportment of the moors, had completely frightened mr. park's attendants, and they declared they would not proceed one step further to the eastward. in this situation, mr. park applied to daman, to obtain from ali, king of ludamar, a safe conduct into bambarra, and he hired one of daman's slaves to guide him thither, as soon as the passport should be obtained. a messenger was despatched to ali, then encamped near benown, and mr. park sent that prince, as a present, five garments of cotton cloth purchased from daman. on the th of february, one of ali's slaves arrived, as he said, to conduct mr. park as far as goomba, and demanded one garment of blue cotton cloth for his attendance. about this time the negro boy demba declared, that he would never desert his master, although he wished that he would turn back, to which he was strongly recommended by johnson, who had declared his reluctance to proceed. on the following day, mr. park delivered a copy of his papers to johnson, to convey them to gambia with all possible expedition, and he left in daman's possession various articles, which he considered not necessary to take with him. he then left jarra, accompanied by his faithful boy, the slave sent by king ali, and one of daman's slaves. without meeting with any occurrence of note, mr. park arrived on the st of march at a large town called deena, inhabited by a greater proportion of moors than of negroes. mr. park lodged in a hut belonging to one of the latter. the moors, however, assembled round it, and treated him with every sort of indignity, with a view to irritate him, and afford them a pretence for pillaging his baggage. finding, however, their attempts ineffectual, they at last declared that the property of a christian was lawful plunder to the followers of mahomet, and accordingly opened his bundles, and robbed him of every thing they chose. mr. park spent the nd of march, in endeavouring to prevail on his people to proceed with him, but so great was their dread of the moors, that they absolutely refused. accordingly, the next morning, about two o'clock, mr. park proceeded alone on his adventurous journey. he had not, however, got above half a mile from deena, when he heard some one calling after him, and on looking back, saw his faithful boy running after him. he was informed by the boy, that ali's man had set out for benown, but daman's negro was still at deena, but that if his master would stop a little, he could persuade the latter to join him. mr. park waited accordingly, and in about three hours the boy returned with the negro. in the afternoon, they reached a town called samamingkoos, inhabited chiefly by foulahs. on the th they arrived at a large town called sampaka, where, on hearing that a white man was come into the town, the people, who had been keeping holiday and dancing, left of this pastime, and walking in regular order two by two, with the music before them, came to mr. park. they played upon a flute, which they blowed obliquely over the end, and governed the holes on the sides with their fingers. their airs were plaintive and simple. mr. park stopped at sampaka for the sake of being accompanied by some of the inhabitants, who were going to goomba; but in order to avoid the crowd of people, whom curiosity had assembled round him, he visited in the evening a negro village called samee, where he was kindly received by the dooty, who killed two fine sheep, and invited his friends to the feast. on the following day his landlord insisted on his staying till the cool of the evening, when he would conduct him to the next village. mr. park was now within two days journey of goomba, and had no further apprehension of being molested by the moors. he therefore accepted the invitation, and passed the forenoon very agreeably with the poor negroes, the mildness of their manners forming a striking contrast to the savageness and ferocity of the moors. in the midst of their cheerfulness, a party of moors unexpectedly entered the hut. they came, they said, by ali's orders, to convey the white man to his camp at benown. they told mr. park, that if he did not make any resistance, he was not in any danger, but if he showed any reluctance, they had orders to bring him by force. mr. park was confounded and terrified; the moors, observing his consternation, repeated the assurance of his safety, and added, that they had come to gratify the curiosity of ali's wife, who was extremely desirous to see a christian, but that afterwards, they had no doubt that ali would make him a present, which would compensate for his trouble, and conduct him safely to bambarra. entreaty or refusal would have been equally unavailing. mr. park took leave of his landlord and company with great reluctance, and, attended by his negro boy (for daman's slave made his escape on seeing the moors), followed the messengers, and reached dalli in the evening, where they were strictly watched for the night. on the following day, mr. park and his boy were conducted by a circuitous path, through the woods to dangoli, where they slept. they continued their journey on the th, and without any particular occurrence arrived at deena, when mr. park went to pay his respects to one of ali's sons. he sat in a hut, with five or six companions, washing their hands, feet, and mouths. the prince handed mr. park a double-barrelled gun, and told him to dye the stock blue, and repair one of the locks. mr. park with great difficulty persuaded him that he knew nothing of gun-making, then, said he, you shall give me some knives and scissors immediately. the boy, who acted as interpreter, declaring mr. park had no such articles, he hastily snatched up a musket, and would have shot the boy dead upon the spot, had not the moors interfered, and made signs to the strangers to retreat. the boy attempted to make his escape in the night, but was prevented by the moors, who guarded both him, and his master, with the strictest attention. on the th, mr. park and his guards departed for benown, and reached the camp of ali a little before sunset. it was composed of a great number of dirty tents, scattered without order, amongst which appeared large herds of camels, cattle, and goats. mr. park had no sooner arrived, than he was surrounded by such a crowd, that he could scarcely move. one pulled his clothes, another took off his hat, a third examined his waistcoat buttons, and a fourth calling out, _la ilia el allah, mahomet ra sowl allald_ (there is but one god, and mahomet is his prophet), signifying, in a menacing tone, that he must repeat those words. at length, he was conducted to the king's tent, where a number of both sexes were waiting his arrival. ali appeared to be an old man of the arab cast, with a long white beard, and of a sullen and proud countenance. having gazed on the stranger, he inquired of the moors, if he could speak arabic, hearing that he could not, he appeared much surprised, but made no remarks. the ladies were more inquisitive; they asked many questions, inspected every part of mr. park's dress, unbuttoned his waistcoat to display the whiteness of his skin; they even counted his toes and fingers. in a short time, the priest announced evening prayers, but before the people departed, some boys had tied a wild hog to one of the tent strings. ali made signs to mr. park to kill it, and dress it for food to himself, he, however, did not think it prudent to eat any part of an animal so much detested by the moors, and accordingly replied, that he never ate the flesh of swine. they then untied the hog, in hopes that it would run immediately at him, the moors believing that a great enmity subsists between hogs and christians, but the animal no sooner regained his liberty, than he attacked every person he met, and at last took shelter under the king's couch. mr. park was then conducted to the tent of ali's chief slave, but was not permitted to enter, nor touch any of the furniture. a little boiled corn, with salt and water, was afterwards served him for supper, and he lay upon a mat spread upon the sand, surrounded by the curious multitude. the next day, mr. park was conducted by the king's order, to a hut constructed of corn stalks of a square form, and a flat roof, supported by forked sticks; but out of derision to the christian, ali had ordered the wild hog before mentioned to be tied to one of the sticks, and it proved a very disagreeable inmate, the boys amusing themselves by beating and irritating the animal. mr. park was also again tormented by the curiosity of the moors. he was obliged to take off his stockings to exhibit his feet, and even his jacket and waistcoat to show them the mode of his toilet. this exercise he was obliged to repeat the whole day. about eight o'clock in the evening, ali sent him some kouskous and salt and water, being the only victuals he had tasted since the morning. during the night, the moors kept a regular watch, and frequently looked into the hut to see if he was asleep. about two o'clock a moor entered the hut, probably with a view of stealing something, and groping about, laid his hand upon mr. park's shoulder. he immediately sprang up, and the moor in a hurry, fell upon the wild hog, which returned the attack by biting his arm. the cries of the moor alarmed his countrymen, who conjecturing their prisoner had made his escape, prepared for pursuit. ali did not sleep in his own tent, but came galloping upon a white horse from a tent at a considerable distance; the consciousness of his tyrannical and cruel behaviour had made him so suspicious, that even his own domestics knew not where he slept. the cause of the outcry being explained, the prisoner was allowed to sleep until morning without further disturbance. with the returning day, the boys, says mr. park, assembled to beat the hog, and the men and women to plague the christian. on this subject, mr. park expresses himself most feelingly, for he adds, "it is impossible for me to describe the behaviour of a people, who study mischief as a science, and exult in the miseries and misfortunes of their fellow-creatures. it is sufficient to observe, that the rudeness, ferocity, and fanaticism, which distinguish the moors from the rest of mankind, found here a proper subject whereon to exercise their propensities. i was a _stranger_, i was _unprotected_, and i was a _christian_, each of these circumstances is sufficient to drive every spark of humanity from the heart of a moor; but when all of them, as in my case, were combined in the same person, and a suspicion prevailed withal, that i was come as a spy into the country, the reader will easily imagine that, in such a situation, i had every thing to fear. anxious, however, to conciliate favour, i patiently bore every insult, but never did any period of my life pass so heavily; from sunrise to sunset was i obliged to suffer, with unruffled countenance, the insults of the rudest savages on earth." mr. park had now a new occupation thrust upon him, which was that of a _barber_. his first display of official skill in his new capacity, was in shaving the head of the young prince of ludamar, in the presence of the king, his father, but happening to make a slight incision, the king ordered him to resign the razor, and walk out of the tent. this was considered by mr. park as a very fortunate circumstance, as he had determined to make himself as useless and insignificant as possible, being the only means of recovering his liberty. on the th of march, four moors arrived from jarra, with johnson the interpreter, having seized him before he knew of mr. park's confinement, and brought with them the bundle of clothes left at daman jumma's house. johnson was led into all's tent and examined; the bundle was opened, and mr. park was sent for, to explain the use of the various contents. to mr. park's great satisfaction, however, johnson had committed his papers to the charge of one of daman's wives. the bundle was again tied up, and put into a large cowskin bag. in the evening ali sent to mr. park for the rest of his effects, to secure them, according to the report of the messengers, _as there were many thieves in the neighbourhood_. every thing was accordingly carried away, nor was he suffered to retain a single shirt. ali, however, disappointed at not finding a great quantity of gold and amber, the following morning sent the same people, to examine whether anything was concealed about his person. they searched his apparel, and took from him his gold, amber, watch and a pocket compass. he had fortunately in the night buried another compass in the sand, and this, with the clothes he had on, was all that was now left him by this rapacious and inhospitable savage. the pocket compass soon became an object of superstitious curiosity, and ali desired mr. park to inform him, why the small piece of iron always pointed to the great desert? mr. park was somewhat puzzled: to have pleaded ignorance, would have made ali suspect he wished to conceal the truth; he therefore replied, that his mother resided far beyond the land of sehara, and whilst she lived, the piece of iron would always point that way, and serve as a guide to conduct him to her, and that if she died, it would point to her grave. ali now looked at the compass with redoubled wonder, and turned it round and round repeatedly, but finding it always pointed the same way, he returned it to mr. park, declaring he thought there was magic in it, and he was afraid to keep so dangerous an instrument in his possession. on the morning of the th, a council was hold in ali's tent respecting mr. park, and its decision was differently related to him by different persons, but the most probable account he received from ali's son, a boy, who told him it was determined to put out his eyes, by the special advice of the priests, but the sentence was deferred until fatima, the queen, then absent, had seen the white man. mr. park, anxious to know his destiny, went to the king and begged permission to return to jarra. this was, however, flatly refused, as the queen had not yet seen him, and he must stay until she arrived, after which his horse would be restored, and he should be at liberty to return to ludamar. mr. park appeared pleased; and without any hope of at present making his escape, on account of the excessive heat, he resolved to wait patiently for the rainy season. overcome with melancholy, and having passed a restless night, in the morning he was attacked by a fever. he had wrapped himself up in a cloak to promote perspiration, and was asleep, when a party of moors entered the hut, and pulled away the cloak. he made signs that he was sick, and wished to sleep, but his distress afforded sport to these savages. "this studied and degrading insolence," says mr. park, "to which i was constantly exposed, was one of the bitterest ingredients in the cup of captivity, and often made life itself a burthen to me. in these distressing moments i have frequently envied the situation of the slave, who, amidst all his calamities, could still possess the enjoyment of his own thoughts, a happiness to which i had for some time, been a stranger. wearied out with such continual insults, and perhaps a little peevish from the fever, i trembled, lest my passion might unawares overleap the bounds of prudence, and spur me to some sudden act of resentment, when death must be the inevitable consequence." in this miserable situation he left the hut, and laid down amongst some shady trees, a small distance from the camp, but ali's son, with a number of horsemen galloping to the place, ordered him to follow them to the king. he begged them to allow him to remain where he was for a few hours, when one of them presented a pistol towards him, and snapped it twice; he cocked it a third time, and was striking the flint with a piece of steel, when mr. park begged him to desist, and returned with them to the camp. ali appeared much out of humour, and taking up a pistol fresh primed it, and turning towards mr. park with a menacing look, said something to him in arabic. mr. park desired his boy to ask what offence he had committed, and was informed, that having gone out of the camp without ali's permission, it was suspected he had some design to make his escape, but in future, if he were seen without the skirts of the camp, orders were given that he should be immediately shot. about this time all the women of the camp had their feet, and the ends of their fingers stained of a dark saffron colour, but whether for religion or ornament, mr. park could not discover. on the evening of the th, a party of these ladies visited him, _to ascertain by actual inspection, whether the rites of circumcision extended to christians_. mr. park was not a little surprised at this unexpected requisition, and to treat the business jocularly, he told them it was not customary in his country, to give ocular demonstration before _so many_ beautiful women, but if all would retire, one young lady excepted, to whom he pointed, he would satisfy her curiosity. the ladies enjoyed the joke, and went away laughing, the preferred damsel, although she did not avail herself of the offer, to show she was pleased with the _compliment_, sent him meal and milk. on the morning of the th, ali sent a slave to order mr. park to be in readiness to ride out with him in the afternoon, as he intended to show him to some of his women, and about four o'clock the king with six attendants came riding to the hut. but here a new difficulty occurred, the moors objected to mr. park's _nankeen breeches_, which they said were inelegant and indecent, as this was a visit to ladies, but ali ordered him to wrap his cloak around him. they visited four different ladies, by each of whom mr. park was presented with a bowl of milk and water. they were very inquisitive, and examined his hair and skin with great attention, but affected to consider him as an inferior being, and knit their brows, and appeared to shudder when they looked at the whiteness of his skin. all the seladies were remarkably corpulent, which the moors esteem as the highest mark of beauty. in the course of the excursion, the dress and appearance of mr. park afforded infinite mirth to the company, who galloped round him, exhibiting various feats of activity and horsemanship. the moors are very good horsemen, riding without fear, and their saddles being high before and behind, afford them a very secure seat, and should they fall, the country is so soft and sandy, that they are seldom hurt. the king always rode upon a milk-white horse, with its tail dyed red. he never walked, but to prayers, and two or three horses were always kept ready saddled near his tent. the moors set a high value upon their horses, as their fleetness enables them to plunder the negro countries. on the same afternoon, a whirlwind passed through the camp, with such violence, that it overturned three tents, and blew down one side of the hut in which mr. park was. these whirlwinds come from the great desert, and at that season of the year are so common, that mr. park has seen five or six of them at one time. they carry up quantities of sand to an amazing height, which resemble at a distance so many moving pillars of smoke. the scorching heat of the sun, upon a dry and sandy country, now made the air insufferably hot. ali having robbed mr. park of his thermometer, he had no means of forming a comparative judgment; but in the middle of the day, when the beams of the vertical sun are seconded by the scorching wind from the desert, the ground is frequently heated to such a degree, as not to be borne by the naked foot; even the negro slaves will not run from one tent to another without their sandals. at this time of the day, the moors are stretched at length in their tents, either asleep or unwilling to move, and mr. park has often felt the wind so hot, that he could not hold his hand in the current of air, which came through the crevices of his hut, without feeling sensible pain. during mr. park's stay, a child died in an adjoining tent. the mother and relations immediately began the death howl, in which they were joined by several female visitors. he had no opportunity of seeing the burial, which is performed secretly during night, near the tent. they plant a particular shrub over the grave, which no stranger is allowed to pluck, nor even touch. about the same time a moorish wedding was celebrated, the ceremony of which is thus described by mr. park. "in the evening the tabala or large drum was beaten to announce a wedding, which was held at one of the neighbouring tents. a great number of people of both sexes assembled, but without that mirth and hilarity which take place at a negro wedding; here there was neither singing nor dancing, nor any other amusement that i could perceive. a woman was beating the drum, and the other women joining at times like a chorus, by setting up a shrill scream, and at the same time moving their tongues from one side of the mouth to the other with great celerity. i was soon tired and had returned to my hut where i was sitting almost asleep, when an old woman entered with a wooden bowl in her hand, and signified that she had brought me a present from the bride. before i could recover from the surprise which this message created, the woman discharged the content of the bowl full in my face. finding that it was the same sort of _holy water_, with which, among the hottentots, a priest is said to sprinkle a new-married couple, i began to suspect that the old lady was actuated by mischief or malice, but she gave me seriously to understand, that it was a nuptial benediction from the bride's own person, and which, on such occasions, is always received by the young unmarried moors as a mark of distinguished favour. this being the ease, i wiped my face and sent my acknowledgments to the lady. the wedding drum continued to beat, and the women to sing, or rather to whistle during the whole of the night. about nine in the morning, the bride was brought in state from her mother's tent, attended by a number of women, who carried her tent, being a present from her husband, some bearing up the poles, others holding by the strings, and in this manner they marched, whistling as formerly, until they came to the place appointed for her residence, where they pitched the tent. the husband followed with a number of men leading four bullocks, which they tied to the tent strings, and having killed another, and distributed the beef among the people, the ceremony was concluded." chapter vii. mr. park had now been detained a whole month in ali's camp, during which each returning day brought him fresh distresses. in the evening alone, his oppressors left him to solitude and reflection. about midnight, a bowl of kouskous, with some salt and water, was brought for him and his two attendants, being the whole of their allowance for the following day, for it was at this time the mahometan lent, which, being kept with religious strictness by the moors, they thought proper to compel their christian captive to a similar abstinence. time, in some degree, reconciled him to his forlorn state: he now found that he could bear hunger and thirst better than he could have anticipated; and at length endeavoured to amuse himself by learning to write arabic. the people, who came to see him, soon made him acquainted with the characters. when he observed any one person, whose countenance he thought malignant, mr. park almost always asked him to write on the sand, or to decipher what he had written, and the pride of showing superior attainment generally induced him to comply with the request. mr. park's sufferings and attendant feelings decreased in intenseness from time and custom; his attempts, as the first paroxysms ceased, to find the means to amuse and shorten the tedious hours, is a fine picture, of human passions; and their variations, circumstances, and situations, which, before they were encountered, would appear intolerable, generate a resolution and firmness, which render them possible to be borne. providence, with its usual benevolence, willing the happiness of mankind, fortifies the heart to the assaults, which it has to undergo. on the th of april, ali proposed to go two days journey, to fetch his queen fatima. a fine bullock was therefore killed, and the flesh cut into thin slices, was dried in the sun; this, with two bags of dry kouskous, served for food on the road. the tyrant, fearing poison, never ate any thing not dressed under his immediate inspection. previously to his departure, the negroes of benown, according to a usual custom, showed their arms and paid their tribute of corn and cloth. two days after the departure of ali, a shereef arrived with merchandize from walet, the capital of the kingdom of biroo. he took up his abode in the same hut with mr. park, and appeared be a well-informed man, acquainted with the arabic and bambarra tongues; he had travelled through many kingdoms; he had visited houssa, and lived some years at timbuctoo. upon mr. park's inquiring the distance from walet to timbuctoo, the shereef, learning that he intended to travel to that city, said, _it would not do_, for christians were there considered as the _devil's children_, and enemies to the prophet. on the th, another shereef arrived, named sidi mahomed moora abdallah, and with these two men mr. park passed his time with less uneasiness than formerly, but as his supply of victuals was now left to slaves, over whom he had no control, he was worse supplied than during the past month. for two successive nights, they neglected to send the accustomed meal, and the boy, having begged a few handfuls of ground nuts, from a small negro town near the camp, readily shared them with his master. mr. park now found that when the pain of hunger has continued for some time, it is succeeded by languor and debility, when a draught of water, by keeping the stomach distended, will remove for a short time every sort of uneasiness. the two attendants, johnson and demba, lay stretched upon the sand in torpid slumber, and when the kouskous arrived, were with difficulty awakened. mr. park felt no inclination to sleep, but was affected with a deep convulsive respiration, like constant sighing, a dimness of sight, and a tendency to faint, when he attempted to sit up. these symptoms went off when he had received nourishment. on the th of april, intelligence arrived at benown, that the bambarra army was approaching the frontiers of ludamar. ali's son, with about twenty horsemen, arriving, ordered all the cattle to be driven away, the tents to be struck, and the people to depart. his orders were instantly obeyed; the baggage was carried upon bullocks, one or two women being commonly placed upon the top of each burden. the king's concubines rode upon camels, with a saddle of an easy construction, and a canopy to keep the sun from them. on the nd of may, they arrived at ali's camp, and mr. park waited immediately upon him; he seemed much pleased with his coming, and introduced him to fatima, his favourite princess, saying, "that was the christian." the queen had long black hair, and was remarkably corpulent; she appeared at first shocked at having a christian so near her, but when mr. park had, by means of a negro boy, satisfied her curiosity, she seemed more reconciled, and presented him with a bowl of milk. the heat and the scarcity of water were greater here than at benown. one night, mr. park, having solicited in vain for water at the camp, resolved to try his fortune at the wells, to which he was guided by the lowing of cattle. the moors were very busy in drawing water, and when mr. park requested permission to drink, they drove him away with outrageous abuse. he at last came to a well, where there were an old man and two boys, to whom he made the same request. the former immediately drew up a bucket of water, but recollecting mr. park was a christian, and fearing the bucket would be polluted by his lips, he dashed the water into the trough, and told him to assuage his thirst from it. the cows were already drinking at the trough, but mr, park resolved to come in for his share, and, accordingly, thrusting his head between two of the cows, he drank with great pleasure till the water was nearly exhausted. thus passed the month of may, ali still considered mr. park as his lawful prisoner, and fatima, though she allowed him a greater quantity of victuals than fell to his portion at benown, yet she made no efforts for his release. some circumstances, however, now occurred, which produced a change in his favour more suddenly than he expected. the fugitive kaartans, dreading the resentment of the sovereign, whom they had so basely deserted, offered to treat with ali for two hundred moorish horsemen to assist them in an effort to expel daisy from gedinggooma, for till daisy should be vanquished, they could neither return to their native town, nor live in security in the neighbouring kingdoms. ali, with a view to extort money from these people, despatched his son to jarra, and prepared himself to follow him. mr. park, believing that he might escape from jarra, if he could get there, immediately applied to fatima, prime counsellor of the monarch, and begged her to intercede with ali for leave to accompany him to jarra. the request was at length granted. his bundles were brought before the royal consort, and mr. park explained the use of the several moveables, for the amusement of the queen, and received a promise of speedy permission to depart. in regard to the moorish character, especially the female, which mr. park had frequent opportunities of studying during his captivity at benown; it appears that the education of the women is neglected altogether, they being evidently regarded merely as administering to sensual pleasure. the moors have singular ideas of feminine perfection. with them, gracefulness of figure, and an expressive countenance, are by no means requisite. beauty and corpulency are synonymous. a perfect moorish beauty is a load for a camel and a woman of moderate pretensions to beauty requires a slave on each side to support her. in consequence of this depraved taste for unwieldiness of bulk, the moorish ladies take great pains to acquire it early in life, and for this purpose, the young girls are compelled by their mothers to devour a great quantity of kouskous, and drink a large portion of camel's milk every morning. it is of no importance whether the girl has an appetite or not, the kouskous and milk must be swallowed, and obedience is frequently enforced by blows. the usual dress of the women is a broad piece of cotton cloth wrapped round the middle, which hangs down like a petticoat; to the upper part of this are sewed two square pieces, one before and the other behind, which are fastened together over the shoulders. the head dress is a bandage of cotton cloth, a part of which covers the face when they walk in the sun, but frequently, when they go abroad, they veil themselves from head to foot. their employment varies according to their situation. queen fatima passed her time in conversing with visitors, performing devotions, or admiring her charms in a looking-glass. other ladies of rank amuse themselves in similar idleness. the lower females attend to domestic duties. they are very vain and talkative, very capricious in their temper, and when angry vent their passion upon the female slaves, over whom they rule despotically. the men's dress differs but little from that of the negroes, except that they all wear the turban, universally made of white cotton cloth. those who have long beards display them with pride and satisfaction, as denoting an arab ancestry. "if any one circumstance," says mr. park, "excited amongst the moors favourable thoughts towards my own person, it was my beard, which was now grown to an enormous length, and was always beheld with approbation or envy. i believe, in my conscience, they thought it too good a beard for a christian." the great desert of jarra bounds ludamar on the north. this vast ocean of sand is almost destitute of inhabitants. a few miserable arabs wander from one well to another, their flocks subsisting upon a scanty vegetation in a few insulated spots. in other places, where the supply of water and pasturage is more abundant, small parties of moors have taken up their residence, where they live in independent poverty, secure from the government of barbary. the greater part of the desert, however, is seldom visited, except where the caravans pursue their laborious and dangerous route. in other parts, the disconsolate wanderer, wherever he turns, sees nothing around him but a vast indeterminable expanse of sand and sky; a gloomy and barren void, where the eye finds no particular object to rest upon, and the mind is filled with painful apprehensions of perishing with thirst. surrounded by this dreary solitude, the traveller sees the dead bodies of birds, that the violence of the wind has brought from happier regions; and as he ruminates on the fearful length of his remaining passage, listens with horror to the voice of the driving blast, the only sound that interrupts the awful repose of the desert. the antelope and the ostrich are the only wild animals of these regions of desolation, but on the skirts of the desert are found lions, panthers, elephants, and wild boars. of domestic animals the camel alone can endure the fatigue of crossing it: by the conformation of his stomach, he can carry a supply of water for ten or twelve days; his broad and yielding foot is well adapted for treading the sand; his flesh is preferred by the moors to any other, and the milk is pleasant and nourishing. on the evening of the th of may, mr. park's horse and accoutrements were sent to him by order of ali. he had already taken leave of queen fatima, who most graciously returned him part of his apparel, and early on the th, he departed from the camp of bubaker, accompanied by johnson and demba, and a number of moorish horsemen. early in the morning of the th of may, mr. park was ordered to get in readiness to depart, and ali's chief slave told the negro boy, that ali was to be his master in future; then turning to mr. park, he said, the boy and every thing but your horse go back to bubaker, but you may take the old fool (meaning johnson, the interpreter) with you to jarra. mr. park, shocked at the idea of losing the boy, represented to ali, that whatever imprudence he had himself been guilty of, in coming into ludamar, he thought he had been sufficiently punished by being so long detained, and then plundered of his property. this, however, gave him no uneasiness, compared to the present injury. the boy seized on was not a slave, and accused of no offence. his fidelity to his master had brought him into his present situation, and he, as his protector, could not see him enslaved without deprecating the cruelty and injustice of the act. ali, with a haughty and malignant smile, told his interpreter, that if mr. park did not depart that instant, he would send him back likewise. finding it was vain to expect redress, mr. park shook hands with his affectionate boy, who was not less affected than himself, and having blended his tears with those of the boy, assured him he would spare no pains to effect his release. poor demba was led off by three of ali's slaves towards the camp at bubaker. on the st of june, they departed for jarra, where mr. park took up his residence with his old friend, daman jamma, whom he informed of every thing that had befallen him. mr. park then requested daman to endeavour to ransom the boy, and promised him a bill upon dr. laidley for the value of two slaves as soon as demba arrived at jarra. daman undertook the business, but ali, considering the boy as mr. park's principal interpreter, and fearing he should be instrumental in conducting him to bambarra, deferred the matter day after day, but told daman, he himself should have him hereafter, if he would, at the price of a common slave. to this daman agreed whenever the boy was sent to jarra. on the th of june, ali returned to bubaker to celebrate a festival, and permitted mr. park to remain with daman until his return. finding that every attempt to recover his boy was ineffectual, he considered it an act of necessity to provide for his own safety before the rains should be fully set in, and accordingly resolved to escape and proceed alone to bambarra, as johnson, the interpreter, had refused further attendance. on the th of june, at daybreak, mr. park took his departure, and in the course of the day arrived at queira; where he had not been a long time, before he was surprised by the appearance of ali's chief slave and four moors. johnson having contrived to overhear their conversation, learned that they were sent to convey mr. park back to bubaker. in the evening two of the moors were observed privately to examine mr. park's horse, which they concluded was in too bad a condition for his rider's escape, and having inquired where he slept, they returned to their companions. mr. park, on being informed of their motions, determined to set off immediately for bambarra to avoid a second captivity. johnson applauded his resolution, but positively refused to accompany him, having agreed with daman to assist in conducting a caravan of slaves to gambia. in this emergency mr. park resolved to proceed by himself, and about midnight got his clothes in readiness, but he had not a single bead, nor any other article of value, wherewith to purchase victuals for himself or his horse. at daybreak, johnson, who had been listening to the moors all night, came to inform him they were asleep, on which, taking up his bundle, mr. park stepped gently over the negroes, who were sleeping in the open air, and having mounted his horse, bade johnson farewell, desiring him to take particular care of the papers, with which he had entrusted him, and to inform his friends on the gambia, that he had left him in good health proceeding to bambarra. mr. park advanced with great caution for about the space of a mile, when looking back he saw three moors on horseback, galloping at full speed and brandishing their double-barrelled guns. as it was impossible to escape, he turned and met them, when two caught hold of his bridle, and the third presenting his musket, said he must go back to ali. mr. park rode back with the moors, with apparent unconcern, when, in passing through some thick bushes, one of them desired him to untie his bundle and show them the contents, but finding nothing worth taking, one of them pulled his cloak from him, and wrapped it about himself. this was the most valuable article in mr. park's possession, as it defended him from the rains in the day, and from the mosquitoes at night, he therefore earnestly requested them to return it, but to no purpose. mr, park now perceived, that these men had only pursued him for the sake of plunder, and turned once more towards the east. to avoid being again overtaken, he struck into the woods, and soon found himself on the right road. joyful as he now was, when he concluded he was out of danger, he soon became sensible of his deplorable situation, without any means of procuring food, or prospect of finding water. oppressed with excessive thirst, he travelled on without having seen a human habitation. it was now become insufferable; his mouth was parched and inflamed, a sudden dimness frequently came over his eyes, and he began seriously to apprehend that he should perish for want of drink. a little before sunset, he climbed a high tree, from the topmost branches of which he took a melancholy survey of the barren wilderness. a dismal uniformity of shrubs and sand every-where presented itself, and the horizon was as level and uninterrupted as that of the sea. descending from the tree, mr. park found his horse devouring the stubble and brushwood with groat avidity. being too faint to attempt walking, and his horse too much fatigued to carry him, mr. park thought it was the last act of humanity he should ever be able to perform, to take off his bridle and let him shift for himself; in doing which he was suddenly affected with sickness and giddiness, and falling upon the sand, felt as if the hour of death was approaching. "here then," said he, "after a short but ineffectual struggle, terminate all my hopes of being useful in my day and generation; here must the short span of my life come to an end. i cast, as i believe, a last look on the surrounding scene, and whilst i reflected on the awful change that was about to take place, this world, with all its enjoyments, seemed to vanish from my recollection." nature, however, resumed her functions, and on recovering his senses, he found the bridle still in his hand, and the sun just setting. he now summoned all his resolution, and determined to make another effort to prolong his existence. with this view he put the bridle on his horse, and driving him before him went slowly along for about an hour, when he perceived some lightning from the north-east; to him a delightful sight, as it promised rain, the wind began to roar amongst the bushes, and he was nearly suffocated with sand and dust, when the wind ceased, and for more than an hour the rain fell plentifully. he spread out his clothes to collect it, and assuaged his thirst by wringing and sucking them. the night was extremely dark, and mr. park directed his way by the compass, which the lightning enabled him to observe. on a sudden he was surprised to see a light at a short distance, and leading his horse cautiously towards it, heard by the lowing of the cattle and the clamour of the herdsmen, that it was a watering place. being still thirsty, he attempted to search for the wells, but on approaching too near to one of the tents, he was perceived by a woman, who immediately gave an alarm; mr. park, however, eluded pursuit by immerging into the woods. he soon after heard the croaking of frogs, and following the sound arrived at some shallow muddy pools, where he and his horse quenched their thirst. the morning being calm, mr. park ascended a tree, and not only saw the smoke of the watering place which he had passed in the night, but also another pillar of smoke to the east, about twelve or fourteen miles distant. directing his course thither, he reached some cultivated ground, on which some negroes were at work, by whom he was informed that he was near a foulah village, belonging to ali, called shrilla. he had some doubts about entering it, but at last ventured, and riding up to the dooty's house was denied admittance, and even refused a handful of corn for his horse. leaving this inhospitable door, he rode slowly out of the town towards some low huts scattered in the suburbs. at the door of a hovel hut, an old woman with a benevolent countenance sat spinning cotton. mr. park made signs that he was hungry, on which she immediately laid down her distaff, invited him to the hut, and set before him a dish of kouskous, of which he made a comfortable meal. in return for her kindness mr. park gave her a pocket handkerchief, begging at the same time a little corn for his horse, which she readily brought. while the horse was feeding, the people began to assemble, and one of them whispered something to the old woman, which greatly excited her surprise. mr. park knew enough of the foulah language, to discover that some of the men wished to apprehend and carry him to ali, in hope of receiving a reward. he therefore tied up the corn, and to prevent suspicion that he had run away from the moors, took a northerly direction. when he found himself clear of his attendants, he plunged again into the woods, and slept under a large tree. he was awakened by three foulahs, who supposing him to be a moor, pointed to the sun, and said it was time to pray. coming to a path leading southwards, which he followed until midnight, he arrived at a small pool of rain water. resting here for the night, the mosquitoes and flies prevented him from sleeping, and the howling of the wild beasts in the vicinity kept his horse in continual terror. on the following morning, he came to a watering place belonging to the foulahs, one of the shepherds invited him to come into his tent, and partake of some dates. there was just room enough in this tent to sit upright, and the family and furniture were huddled together in the utmost confusion. when mr. park had crept into it upon his hands and knees, he found in it a woman and three children, who with the shepherd and himself completely occupied the floor. a dish of boiled corn and dates was produced, and the master of the family, according to the custom of the country, first tasted it himself, and then offered a part to his guest. whilst mr. park was eating, the children kept their eyes fixed upon him and no sooner had their father pronounced the word _mazarini_, than they began to cry; their mother crept cautiously towards the door, and springing out of the tent, was instantly followed by her children; so truly alarmed were they at the name of a christian. here mr. park procured some corn for his horse, in exchange for some brass buttons, and thanking the shepherd for his hospitality departed. at sunset he came into the road which led to bambarra, and in the evening arrived at wawra, a negro town belonging to kaarta. now secure from the moors, and greatly fatigued, mr. park meeting with a hearty welcome from the dooty, rested himself at this place. he slept soundly for two hours on a bullock's hide. numbers assembled to learn who the stranger was, and whence he came; some thought him an arab, others a moorish sultan, and they debated the matter with such warmth, that their noise at length awoke him. the dooty, however, who had been at gambia, at last interposed, and assured them that he was certainly a white man, but from his appearance a very poor one. in the afternoon, the dooty examined mr. park's bag, but finding nothing valuable, returned it and told him to depart in the morning. accordingly mr. park set out, accompanied by a negro, but they had not proceeded above a mile, when the ass upon which the negro rode, kicked him off, and he returned, leaving mr. park to travel by himself. about noon he arrived at a town, called dingyee, where he was hospitably entertained by an old foulah. when mr. park was about to depart on the following day, the foulah begged a lock of his hair, because "white men's hair made a saphie, that would give to the possessor all the knowledge of white men." mr. park instantly complied with his request, but his landlord's thirst for learning was such, that he had cropped one side of his head, and would have done the same with the other, had not mr. park signified his disapprobation, and told him that he wished to preserve some of this precious ware. after travelling several days, without meeting with any occurrence of particular note. mr. park arrived at doolinkeaboo, where the dooty, at his request, gave him a draught of water, which is usually given as an earnest of greater hospitality. mr. park promised himself here a good supper and a comfortable bed, but he had neither the one nor the other. the night was rainy and tempestuous, and the dooty limited his hospitality to the draught of water. the next morning, however, when the dooty was gone to the fields, his wife sent mr. park a handful of meal, which, mixed with water, served him for breakfast. he departed from doolinkeaboo in company with two negroes, who were going to sego. they stopped at a small village, where an acquaintance of one of the negroes invited them to a public entertainment. they distributed with great liberality a dish called _sinkatoo_, made of sour milk, meal, and beer. the women were admitted into the society, a circumstance which had never come under mr. park's observation before; every one drank as he pleased; they nodded to each other when about to drink, and on setting down the calabash, commonly said _berha_ (thank you.) both men and women were in a state of intoxication, but were far from being quarrelsome. mr. park and the two negroes then resumed their journey, and passed several large villages, where the former was constantly taken for a moor, and with his horse, which he drove before him, afforded much mirth to the bambarrans. "he has been at mecca," says one; "you may see that by his clothes." another asked him if his horse was sick? a third wished to purchase it, &c., and even the negroes at last seemed ashamed of his company. they lodged that night at a small village, where mr. park procured victuals for himself and corn for his horse, in exchange for a button, and was told that he should see the niger, which the negroes call joliba, or the great water, early on the following day. the thought of seeing the niger in the morning, and the buzzing of the mosquitoes, kept mr. park awake the whole of the night, he had saddled his horse, and was in readiness before daylight, but as the gates of the village were shut on account of the wild beasts, he was obliged to wait until the people were stirring. at length, having departed, they passed four large villages, and in a short time saw the smoke over sego. on approaching the town, mr. park was fortunate enough to overtake the fugitive kaartans, to whose kindness he had been so much indebted in his journey through bambarra. they readily agreed to introduce him to the king, and they rode together through some marshy ground, where, as he was anxiously looking round for the river, one of them exclaimed, "_geo affili_" see the water! and looking forwards, mr. park says, "i saw, with infinite pleasure, the great object of my mission, the long sought for majestic niger, glittering to the morning sun, as broad as the thames at westminster, and flowing _slowly to the eastward_. [*] i hastened to the brink, and having drank of the water, lifted up my fervent thanks in prayer to the great ruler of all things, for having thus far crowned my endeavours with success." [footnote: we cannot reconcile this statement of park with the subsequent discovery of lander, who established the fact, that the niger empties itself into the bight of benin. the niger, flowing to the eastward, could not possibly have the bight of benin for its estuary, nor is it laid down in any of the recent maps as having an easterly direction.] mr. park now proceeded towards sego, the capital of bambarra, which consists of four distinct towns; two on the northern bank of the niger, called sego korro and sego koo, and two on the southern bank, called sego soo korro and sego see korro. the king of bambarra always resides at the latter place. he employs a great many slaves to convey people over the river, and the fare paid by each individual, ten kowrie shells, furnishes a considerable revenue. when mr. park arrived at one of the places of embarkation, the people, who were waiting for a passage, looked at him with silent wonder, and he saw with concern many moors amongst them. he had continued on the bank more than two hours, without having an opportunity of crossing, during which time information was carried to mansong, the king, that a white man was coming to see him. mansong immediately sent over one of his chief men, who informed mr. park that the king could not possibly see him until he knew what had brought him to bambarra. he then pointed towards a distant village, and desired mr. park to take up his lodgings there, and in the morning he would give him further instructions. greatly discouraged at this reception, mr. park set off for the village, but found, to his further mortification, that no person would admit him into his house, and that he was regarded with general astonishment and fear. thus situated, he sat all day without victuals, under the shade of a tree. towards night, the wind arose, and as there was great appearance of a heavy rain, he thought of passing the night among the branches of the trees, to secure himself from wild beasts. about sunset a woman, returning from the labours of the field, stopped to observe him, and perceiving that he was weary and dejected, inquired into his situation, which he briefly explained to her; whereupon, with looks of great compassion, she took up his saddle and bridle, and told him to follow her. having conducted him into her hut, she lighted up a lamp, spread a mat on the floor, and told him he might remain there for the night. she then went out, and returned in a short time with a fine fish, which, having half broiled, she gave him for supper. after telling him that he might sleep without apprehension, she called to the female part of the family, who stood gazing in fixed astonishment, to resume their task of spinning cotton, in which they employed themselves the greater part of the night. they lightened their labours by songs, one of which at least was extempore, as their guest was the subject of it. it was sung by one of the young women, the rest joining in chorus. the air was sweet and plaintive, and the words, literally translated, were as follow:-- "the winds roared, and the rains fell; the poor white man, faint and weary, came and sat under our tree. he has no mother to bring him milk--no wife to grind his corn. chorus. let us pity the white man, no mother has he." &c. this circumstance was to mr. park, affecting in the highest degree. he was oppressed by such unexpected kindness, and the sleep fled from his eyes. in the morning he presented his compassionate landlady with two of the four buttons which remained on his waistcoat, the only recompense which he had in his power. mr. park remained in the village the whole of july the st, in conversation with the natives. towards evening he grew uneasy, to find that no message arrived from the king, the more so, when he learned from the villagers, that the moors and slatees, resident at sego, had given mansong very unfavourable accounts of him, that many consultations had been held concerning his reception and disposal; that he had many enemies, and must expect no favour. on the following day, a messenger arrived from the king, who inquired if mr. park had brought any present, and seemed much disappointed, on being told that he had been robbed of all his effects by the moors. when mr. park proposed to go to court, he said he must stop until the afternoon, when the king would send for him. it was the afternoon of the next day, however, before another messenger arrived from mansong, who told mr. park, it was the king's pleasure he should depart immediately from the environs of sego, but that mansong, wishing to relieve a white man in distress, had sent five thousand kowries [*] to him to continue his journey, and if it were his intention to proceed to jenne, he (the messenger) had orders to guide him to sansanding. mr. park concludes his account of this adventure in the following words:-- [footnote: kowries are little shells, which pass current as money, in many parts of the east indies as well as in africa. mr. park estimates about kowries equal to one shilling. one hundred of them would purchase a day's provision for himself and corn for his horse.] "i was at first puzzled to account for this behaviour of the king, but from the conversation i had with the guide, i had afterwards reason to believe, that mansong would willingly have admitted me into his presence at sego, but was apprehensive he might not be able to protect me against the blind and inveterate malice of the moorish inhabitants. his conduct, therefore, was at once prudent and liberal. the circumstances, under which i made my appearance at sego, were undoubtedly such as might create in the mind of the king a well-warranted suspicion, that i wished to conceal the true object of my journey. he argued, probably as my guide argued, who, when he was told that i was come from a great distance, and through many dangers, to behold the joliba (niger) river, naturally inquired if there were no rivers in my own country, and whether one river was not like another? notwithstanding this, and in spite of the jealous machinations of the moors, this benevolent prince thought it sufficient, that a white man was found in his dominions in a condition of extreme wretchedness, and that no other plea was necessary to entitle the sufferer to his bounty." being thus obliged to leave sego, mr. park was conducted the same evening to a village, about seven miles eastward, where he and his guide were well received, as mr. park had learned to speak the bambarra tongue without difficulty. the guide was very friendly and communicative, and spoke highly of the hospitality of his countrymen; but he informed mr. park, that if jenne was the place of his destination, he had undertaken a very dangerous enterprise, and that timbuctoo, the great object of his search, was altogether in possession of the moors, who would not allow any christians to reside in it. in the evening they passed a large town called kabba, situated in the midst of a beautiful and highly cultivated country, bearing a great resemblance to the centre of england. in the course of the following day, they arrived at sansanding, a large town, containing , inhabitants, much frequented by the moors, in their commercial dealings. mr. park desired his guide to conduct him to the house where they were to lodge, by the most private way possible they accordingly rode along between the town and the river, and the negroes, whom they met, took mr. park for a moor, but a moor, who was sitting by the river side, discovered the mistake, and, making a loud exclamation, brought together a number of his countrymen; and when mr. park arrived at the house of the dooty, he was surrounded by a number of people, speaking a variety of dialects. by the assistance of his guide, however, who acted as interpreter, mr. park at length understood that one of the moors pretended to have seen him at one place, and another at some other place; and a moorish woman absolutely swore, that she had kept his house three years at gallam on the river senegal. the moors now questioned mr. park about his religion, but finding he was not master of the arabic, they sent for two jews, in hopes that they might be able to converse with him. the moors now insisted that he should repeat the mahometan prayers, and when he told them that he could not speak arabic, one of them started up, and swore by the prophet, if mr. park refused to go to the mosque, he would assist in carrying him thither. finding the moors becoming exceedingly clamorous, the dooty interfered, and told them that he would not see the king's stranger ill treated while under his protection, but that in the morning he should be sent about his business. this somewhat appeased their clamour, but they compelled mr. park to ascend a high seat by the door of the mosque, that every one might see him, where he remained till sunset, when he was conducted to a neat little hut, with a small court before it; but the moors climbed in crowds over the mud walls, to see the white man perform his evening devotions, and eat eggs. the first demand was positively declined, but he professed his utmost readiness to comply with the second; the dooty immediately brought seven hens' eggs, but was much surprised that mr. park would not eat them raw, as it is a prevalent opinion in the interior of africa, that europeans subsist chiefly on this diet. his reluctance to partake of this fare exalted him in the eyes of his sage visitants; his host accordingly killed a sheep, and gave him a plentiful supper. mr. park's route now lay through woods, much infested with all kinds of wild animals. on one occasion, his guide suddenly wheeled his horse round, calling out (_warra billi billi_, a very largo lion.) mr. park's steed was ill fitted to convey him from the scene of danger, but seeing nothing, he supposed his guide to be mistaken, when the latter exclaimed, "god preserve me;" and mr. park then saw a very large red lion, with his head couched between his fore paws. his eyes were fixed, as by fascination, on this sovereign of the beasts, and he expected every moment the fatal spring; but the savage animal, either not pressed by hunger, or struck with some mysterious awe, remained immovable, and allowed the party to pass without molestation. real misery arose from a meaner cause, namely, the amazing swarms of mosquitoes, which ascended from the swamps and creeks, to whose attack, from the ragged state of his garments, he was exposed at every point, and so covered over with blisters, that he could not get any rest at night. an affecting crisis next arrived. his horse, the faithful and suffering companion of his journey, had been daily becoming weaker. at length, stumbling over some rough ground, he fell; all his master's efforts were insufficient to raise him, and no alternative remained, but to leave the poor animal, which mr. park did, after collecting some grass and laying it before him, not without, however, a sad presentiment, that, ere long, he also might have to lie down and perish with hunger and fatigue. proceeding along the banks of the river, he reached kea, a small fishing village. the dooty, a surly old man, received him very coolly, and when mr. park solicited his protection, replied with great indifference, that he should not enter his house. mr. park knew not now where to rest, but a fishing canoe at that moment coming down the river, the dooty waved to the fisherman to land, and desired him to take charge of the stranger as far as moorzan. when the canoe had proceeded about a mile down the river, the fisherman paddled to the bank, and having desired mr. park to jump out, tied the canoe to a stake; he then stripped off his clothes, and dived into the water, where he remained so long that mr. park thought he was drowned, when he suddenly raised up his head astern of the canoe, and called for a rope. with this rope he dived a second time, and then got into the canoe, and with the assistance of the boy, they brought up a large basket, ten feet in diameter, containing two fine fish, which the fisherman carried ashore, and hid in the grass. the basket was then returned into the river, and having proceeded a little further down, they took up another basket, in which was one fish. about four o'clock, they arrived at moorzan, where mr. park was conveyed across the river to silla, a large town. here he remained under a tree, surrounded by hundreds of people, till it was dark, when, with a great deal of entreaty, the dooty allowed him to enter his balloon to avoid the rain, but the place was very damp, and his fever returned. the reflections, which now occurred to him, with the determination those reflections produced, are here given in his own words. "worn down by sickness, exhausted with hunger and fatigue, half naked, and without any article of value, by which i might procure provisions, clothes, or lodging, i was now convinced, that the obstacles to my further progress were insurmountable. the tropical rains were already set in, the rice grounds and swamps were every where overflowed, and in a few days more, travelling of every kind, except by water, would be completely obstructed. the kowries, which remained of the king of bambarra's present, were not sufficient to enable me to hire a canoe for any great distance, and i had little hope of subsisting by charity, in a country where the moors have such influence. i saw inevitable destruction in attempting to proceed to the eastward. with this conviction on my mind, i hope it will be acknowledged, that i did right in going no further. i had made every effort to execute my mission in its fullest extent, which prudence could justify. had there been the most distant prospect of a successful termination, neither the unavoidable hardships of the journey, nor the dangers of a second captivity should have forced me to desist." mr. park now acquainted the dooty with his intention of returning to sego, proposing to travel along the southern side of the river, but the dooty informed him, that from the number of creeks and swamps on that side, it was impossible to travel by any other route than the northern bank, and even that route would soon be impassable from the overflowing of the river. however, by the dooty's recommendation, mr. park was conveyed to moorzan in a canoe, where he hired another canoe for thirty kowries, which conveyed him to kea, where, for forty kowries more, the dooty permitted him to sleep in the same hut with one of his slaves. this poor negro, perceiving he was sickly, and his clothes very ragged, humanely lent him a large cloth to cover him for the night. the following day mr. park set out for madiboo, in company with the dooty's brother, who promised to carry his saddle, which he had before left at kea. on their road they observed a great number of earthen jars, piled up on the bank of the river. as they approached towards them, the dooty's brother plucked up a large handful of herbage, which he threw upon them, making signs for mr. park to do the same, which he did. the negro then informed him, that those jars belonged to some supernatural power, and were found in their present situation about two years ago, and that every traveller, as he passed them, from respect to the invisible proprietor, threw some grass upon the heap to defend them from the rain. thus conversing, they travelled on in the most friendly manner, until they perceived the footsteps of a lion, when the negro insisted that mr. park should walk before. the latter refused, on which the negro, after a few high words, and menacing looks, threw down the saddle and left him. mr. park having given up all hope of obtaining a horse, took off the stirrups and girth, and threw the saddle into the river. the negro, however, when he saw the saddle in the water jumped in, and bringing it out by the help of his spear, ran away with it. mr. park now continued his course alone, and in the afternoon reached madiboo. his guide, who had got there before him, being afraid he should complain of his conduct, restored the saddle, and mr. park also found his horse alive. on the st of august, mr. park proceeded to nyamere, where he remained three days, on account of the continual rain. on the th, he again set out, but the country was so deluged, that he had to wade across creeks for miles together, knee-deep in water. he at length arrived at nyara, and on the subsequent day, with great difficulty reached a small village called nemaboo. mr. park being assured that in the course of a few days, the country would be overflowed, was anxious to engage a fellow traveller, when a moor and his wife who were going to sego, riding on bullocks, agreed to take him along with them; they were, however, unacquainted with the road, and were very bad travellers. instead of wading before the bullocks, to feel if the ground was solid the woman boldly entered the first swamp, seated upon the top of the load, but when she had proceeded about two hundred yards the bullock sunk into a hole, and threw both the load and herself amongst the reeds; she was nearly drowned before her husband went to her assistance. at sunset they reached sibity, but the dooty received mr. park very coolly, and when he solicited a guide to sansanding, told him his people were otherwise engaged. mr. park passed the night in a damp old hut, which he expected every moment would fall upon him; for when the walls of the huts are softened with the rain, they frequently become too weak to support the roof. mr park heard three huts fall in during the night, and the following morning, saw fourteen in like manner destroyed. the rain continued with great violence, and mr. park being refused provisions by the dooty, purchased some corn, which he divided with his horse. the dooty now compelled mr. park to leave sibity, and accordingly he set out for sansanding, with little hope of receiving better treatment, for he had discovered that it was universally believed, he had come to bambarra as a spy; and as mansong had not admitted him into his presence, the dooties of the different towns were at liberty to treat him as they pleased. he arrived at sansanding at sunset, where his reception was just what he expected. the dooty, who had been so kind to him formerly, privately informed him, that mansong had sent a canoe to jenne to bring him back, he therefore advised him to leave sansanding before day-break, and not to stop at any town near sego. mr. park accordingly took his departure from sansanding, and proceeded to kabba. several people were assembled at the gate, one of whom running towards him, took his horse by the bridle, and led him round the walls of the town, then pointing to the west, told him to go along, or it would fare worse with him. mr. park hesitating, a number of people came up, and urged him in the same manner, and he now suspected that some of the king's messengers, who were in search of him, were in the town, and that these negroes from humanity wished him to escape. he accordingly took the road for sego, and having passed a village, the dooty of which refused him admittance, proceeded to a smaller one, where the dooty permitted him to sleep in a large balloon. leaving his miserable residence by break of day, he arrived in the afternoon at a small village within half a mile of sego, where he endeavoured in vain to procure some provisions. he was again informed that mansong had sent people to apprehend him, and the dooty's son told him he had no time to lose, if he wished to escape. mr. park now fully saw the danger of his situation, and determined to avoid sego altogether, and taking the road to diggani, until he was out of sight of the village, struck to the westward through high grass and swampy ground. about noon he stopped under a tree, to consider what course to take, and at length determined to proceed along the niger, and endeavour to ascertain how far the river was navigable. about sunset he arrived at a village called sooboo, where, for two hundred kowries, he procured a lodging for the night. after passing the villages of samee and kaimoo, he arrived at a small town called song, the inhabitants of which would not permit him to enter the gate, but as lions were numerous in the adjoining woods, he resolved to stay near the town, and accordingly laid down under a tree by the gate. in the night, a lion kept prowling round the village, and once advanced so near mr. park, that he heard him rustling amongst the grass, and climbed the tree for safety. he had before attempted to enter the gate, and on being prevented, informed the people of his danger. about midnight the dooty, with some of the inhabitants, desired him to come in; they were convinced, they said, that he was not a moor, for no moor ever waited at the gate of a village, without cursing the inhabitants. mr. park now proceeded on his journey; the country began to rise into hills, and he saw the summits of high mountains to the westward. he had very disagreeable travelling, on account of the overflow of the river; and in crossing a swamp, his horse sunk suddenly into a deep pit, and was almost drowned. both the horse and his rider were so covered with mud, that in passing a village, the people compared them to two dirty elephants. mr, park stopped at a village near yamina, where he purchased some corn, and dried his paper and clothes. as yamina is much frequented by the moors, mr. park did not think it safe to lodge there; he therefore rode briskly through it, and the people, who looked at him with astonishment, had no time to ask questions. on the following day, mr. park passed a town called balaba, the prospect of the country was by no means inviting, for the high grass and bushes seemed completely to obstruct the road, and the niger having flooded the low lands, had the appearance of an extensive lake. on the following day, mr. park took the wrong road, and when he discovered his error, on coming to an eminence, he observed the niger considerably to the left. directing his course towards it, through long grass and bushes, he came to a small but rapid stream, which he took at first for a branch of the niger, but, on examination, was convinced it was a distinct river, which the road evidently crossed, as he saw the pathway on the opposite side. he sat down upon the bank, in hopes that some traveller might arrive, who could inform him of the situation of the ford; but none arriving, and there being a great appearance of rain, he determined to enter the river considerably above the pathway, in order to reach the other side before the stream swept him too far down. with this view he fastened his clothes upon the saddle, and was standing up to the neck in water, pulling his horse by the bridle to make him follow, when a man, who came accidentally to the place, called to him with great vehemence, to come out, or the alligators would destroy both him and his horse. mr. park obeyed, and the stranger who had never before seen a white man, seemed wonderfully surprised, exclaiming in a low voice, "god preserve me, who is this?" but when he found mr. park could speak the bambarra tongue, and was going the same way as himself, he promised to assist him in crossing the river, which was named the frina. he then called to some person, who answered from the other side, and a canoe with two boys came paddling from amongst the reeds. mr. park gave the boys fifty kowries to ferry himself and his horse to the opposite shore, and in the evening, arrived at taffara, a walled town, where he discovered that the language of the people was pure mandingo. on the th, mr. park stopped at a village called sominoo, where he obtained some coarse food, prepared from the husks of corn, called _boo_. on the same day he arrived at sooha, where the dooty refused either to sell or to give him any provisions. mr. park stopped a while to examine the countenance of this inhospitable man, and endeavoured to find out the cause of his visible discontent. the dooty ordered a slave to dig a hole, and while the slave was thus employed, the dooty kept muttering and talking to himself, repeatedly pronouncing the words "_dankatoo'_" (good for nothing), "_jankre lemen_," (a real plague). these expressions mr. park thought could not apply to any one but himself; and as the pit had much the appearance of a grave, thought it prudent to mount his horse, and was about to decamp, when the slave, who had gone into the village, brought the corpse of a boy by the leg and arm, and threw it into the pit with savage indifference. as he covered the body with earth, the dooty often repeated, "_naphula attiniata_," (money lost;) from which it appeared that the boy had been one of his slaves. about sunset mr. park came to kollikorro, a considerable town, and a great market for salt. here he lodged with a bambarran, who had travelled to many parts of africa, and who carried on a considerable trade. his knowledge of the world had not lessened his confidence in saphies and charms, for when he heard that his guest was a christian, he brought out his _walha_, or writing-board, and assured mr. park he would dress him a supper of rice, if he would write him a saphie, to protect him from wicked men. mr. park wrote the board full from top to bottom on both sides, and his landlord, to possess the full force of the charm, washed the writing off into a calabash with a little water, and having said a few prayers over it, drank this powerful draught, after which he licked the board quite dry. information being carried to the dooty that a saphie writer was in the town, he sent his son with half a sheet of writing paper, desiring mr. park to write him a _naphula saphie_, a charm to procure wealth. he brought, as a present, some meal and milk, and when the saphie was finished, and read to him with an audible voice, he promised to bring mr. park some milk in the morning for breakfast. the following day, mr. park proceeded on his journey, and in the afternoon arrived at marraboo, where he lodged in the house of a kaartan, who, from his hospitality to strangers, was called _jatee_, (the landlord,) his house being a sort of public inn for all travellers. those who had money were well lodged, for they always made him some return for his kindness; but those who had nothing to give were content to accept whatever he thought proper. mr. park, belonging to the latter class, took up his lodging in the same hut with seven poor fellows, who had come from kancaba in a canoe, but their landlord sent them some victuals. mr. park now altered his course from the river to the mountains, and in the evening arrived at a village, called frookaboo, from which place he proceeded on the following day to bambakoo. this town is not so large as marraboo, but the inhabitants are rich; for when the moors bring their salt through kaarta or barnbarra, they rest at this place; the negro merchants purchasing the salt by wholesale, and retailing it to great advantage. here mr. park lodged at the house of a serawoolli negro, and was visited by a number of moors, who treated him with great civility. a slave-merchant, who had resided many years on the gambia, gave mr. park an imperfect account of the distance to that river, but told him the road was impassable at that season of the year, and added, that it crossed the joliba at about half a day's journey westward of bammakoo; and as there were not any canoes large enough to receive his horse, he could not possibly get him over for some months to come. mr. park consulted with his landlord how to surmount this difficulty, who informed him that one road which was very rocky, and scarcely passable for horses, still remained, but if he procured a proper guide over the hills to a town called sibidooloo, he had no doubt but he might travel forwards through manding. being informed that a _jilli-kea_, or singing-man, was about to depart for sibidooloo, mr. park set out in company with him; but when they had proceeded up a rocky glen about two miles, the singing-man discovered that he had brought him the wrong road, as the horse-road lay on the other side of the hill. he then threw his drum upon his back, and mounted up the rocks, where, indeed, no horse could follow him, leaving mr. park to admire his agility, and trace out a road for himself. mr. park rode back to the level ground, and following a path, on which he observed the marks of horses' feet, came to some shepherds' huts, where he was informed that he was on the right road to sibidooloo. in the evening he arrived at a village called kooma, situated in a delightful valley. this village is the sole property of a mandingo merchant, who fled thither with his family during a former war. the harmless villagers surrounded mr. park, asked him a thousand questions about his country, brought corn and milk for himself, and grass for his horse, and appeared very anxious to serve him. on the th, he departed from kooma, in company with two shepherds, who were going towards sibidooloo; but as the horse travelled slowly, and with great difficulty, the shepherds kept walking on at a considerable distance, when on a sudden mr. park heard some people calling to each other, and presently a loud screaming, as from a person in great distress. he rode slowly to the place whence the noise proceeded, and in a little time perceived one of the shepherds lying among the long grass near the road. when mr. park came close to him, he whispered that a party of armed men had seized his companion, and shot two arrows at himself, as he was making his escape. mr. park now stopped to consider what course it was most proper for him to pursue, and looking round, saw, at a small distance, a man sitting on the stump of a tree, and six or seven more sitting among the grass, with muskets in their hands. he had now no hopes of escaping, and therefore rode on towards them, in hopes they were elephant hunters. on coming up to them, he inquired if they had caught any thing, when one of them ordered him to dismount, but appearing suddenly to recollect himself, made signs to him to proceed. he accordingly rode past, but was soon followed by the men, who ordered him to stop, and informed him, that the king of the foulahs had sent them to bring him his horse, and all that belonged to him, to fooladoo. mr. park turned round, and went with them, till they came to a dark part of the wood, when one of them said, "this place will do," and immediately snatched his hat from his head, another drew a knife, and cut off a metal button that remained upon his waistcoat, and put it into his pocket. they then searched mr. park's pockets, examined every part of his apparel, and at length stripped him quite naked. while they were examining the plunder, he begged them, with great earnestness, to return his pocket-compass; but when he pointed it out to them, as it lay on the ground, one of the banditti, thinking he meant to take it up, cocked his musket, and swore he would lay him dead on the spot, if he presumed to lay his hand upon it. after this, some went away with his horse, and the remainder, after some deliberation, returned him the worst of the two shirts and a pair of trousers; and on going away, one of them threw back his hat, in the crown of which he kept his memorandums. after they were gone, mr. park sat for some time, looking around him with amazement and terror. "whatever way i turned," says he, "nothing appeared but danger and difficulty. i saw myself in the midst of a vast wilderness, in the depth of the rainy season, naked and alone, surrounded by savage animals, and men still more savage. i was five hundred miles from the nearest european settlement. all these circumstances crowded at once to my recollection, and i confess that my spirits began to fail me. i considered my fate as certain, and that i had no alternative but to lie down and perish. the influence of religion, however, aided and supported me. i reflected that no human prudence or foresight could possibly have averted my present sufferings. i was indeed a stranger in a strange land, yet i was still under the protecting eye of that providence, who has condescended to call himself the stranger's friend. at this moment, painful as my reflections were, the extraordinary beauty of a small moss in fructification irresistibly caught my eye. i mention this, to show from what trifling circumstances the mind will sometimes derive consolation, for though the whole plant was not larger than the top of one of my fingers, i could not contemplate the delicate conformation of its roots, leaves, and capsules, without admiration. can that being, thought i, who planted, watered, and brought to perfection, in this obscure part of the world, a thing which appears of so small importance, look with unconcern upon the situation and sufferings of creatures formed after his own image? surely not. reflections like these would not allow me to despair. i started up, and disregarding both hunger and fatigue, travelled forwards, assured that relief was at hand, and i was not disappointed." in a short time mr. park came to a small village, where he overtook the two shepherds, who had come with him from koona. they were much surprised to see him, as they expected the foulahs had murdered him. departing from this village, they travelled over several rocky ridges, and at sunset arrived at the town of sibidooloo. chapter viii. sibidooloo is the frontier town of manding, and is situated in a fertile valley, surrounded with high rocky hills. the chief man is here called the mansa, which usually signifies king; but it appear that the government of manding is a sort of republic, as every town has a particular mansa, and the chief power of the state is lodged in an assembly of the whole body. mr. park related to the mansa the circumstance of the robbery, and his story was confirmed by the two shepherds. the mansa continued smoking his pipe while he heard the relation, when, tossing up the sleeve of his coat with an indignant air, "sit down," said he to mr. park, "you shall have every thing restored to you. i have sworn it." then turning to an attendant, "give the white man," said he, "a draught of water, and with the first light of the morning go over the hills, and inform the dooty of bammakoo that a poor white man, the king of bambarra's stranger, has been robbed by the king of fouladoo's people." he heartily thanked the mansa for his kindness, and accepted his invitation, but having waited two days without receiving any intelligence, and there being a great scarcity of provisions, he was unwilling to trespass further on the generosity of his host, and begged permission to depart. the mansa told him, he might go as far as a town called wonda, and remain there until he heard some account of his property. accordingly, departing from that place, he reached it on the th. the mansa of wonda was a mahometan and, as well as chief magistrate of the town, was a schoolmaster. mr. park lodged in the school, which was an open shed; the little raiment upon him could neither protect him from the sun by day, nor the dews and mosquitoes by night; his fever returned with great violence, and he could not procure any medicine wherewith to stop its progress. he remained at wonda nine days, endeavouring to conceal his distress from his landlord, for which purpose, he several times lay down the whole of the day, out of his sight, in a field of corn, yet he found that the mansa was apprised of his situation, for one morning as he feigned to be asleep by the fire, he heard the mansa complain to his wife, that they were likely to find him a very troublesome guest, as, in his present sickly state, they should be obliged, for the sake of their good name, to maintain him till he recovered or died. the scarcity of provisions was at this time severely felt by the poor people. mr. park, having observed every evening five or six women come to the mansa's house, and each receive a portion of corn, inquired of the mansa, whether he maintained these women from charity, or expected a return from the next harvest. "observe that boy," replied the mansa, pointing to a fine child about five years of age, "his mother has sold him to me for forty days' provisions for herself and the rest of the family. i have bought another boy in the same manner." mr. park was much afflicted with this melancholy circumstance, but he afterwards observed that the mother, when she had received her corn, would come and talk to her son with much cheerfulness, as if he had still been under her care. on the th of september, two people arrived from sibidooloo with mr. park's horse and clothes; the pocket-compass was, however, broken to pieces. the horse was now so much reduced, that he saw that it would be impracticable to travel any further with him; he therefore presented him to his landlord, and requested him to send the saddle and bridle to the mansa of sibidooloo, as an acknowledgment for his trouble and kindness. on the morning of september th, mr. park took leave of his hospitable landlord, who presented him with a spear, as a token of remembrance, and a leathern bag to contain his clothes. on the th, he reached nemacoo, where he could not procure any provisions, as the people appeared to be actually starving, but in the afternoon of the th, a negro trader, named modi lemina taura, brought him some victuals, promising to conduct him to his house at kennyetoo on the following day. in travelling to kennyetoo, mr. park hurt his ankle, and was unable to proceed. the trader, in consequence, invited him to stop with him a few days, and accordingly he remained there until the th. on the th, he proceeded to mansia, a considerable town, where small quantities of gold are collected. the mansa of this town gave him a little corn, but demanded something in return, and on mr. park's assuring him that he had not anything in his possession, replied, as if in jest, that his white skin should not defend him, if he told him any falsehoods. he then conducted him to the hut wherein he was to sleep, but took away his spear, saying it should be returned in the morning. this circumstance raised mr. park's suspicions, and he requested one of the inhabitants, who had a bow and quiver, to sleep in the hut with him. about midnight a man made several attempts to enter the hut, but was prevented by mr. park and the negro, and the latter, on looking out, perceived it was the mansa himself. in the morning, mr. park, fearing the mansa might devise some means to detain him, departed before he was awake, the negro having recovered the spear. on the arrival of mr. park at kamalia, a small town, he proceeded to the house of karfa taura, the brother of his hospitable landlord at kennyetoo. he was sitting in his balloon, surrounded by several slatees, to whom he was reading from an arabic book. he asked mr. park if he understood it, and being answered in the negative, desired one of the slatees to fetch the little curious book that was brought from the west country. mr. park was surprised and delighted to find this volume _"the book of common prayer"_ and karfa expressed great joy to hear he could read it, as some of the slatees, who had seen europeans upon the coast, were unwilling, from his distressed appearance, to admit that mr. park was a white man, but suspected that he was some arab in disguise. karfa, however, perceiving he could read this book, had no doubt concerning mr. park, and promised him every assistance in his power, at the same time informing him, that it was impossible to cross the jallonka wilderness for many months to come, as eight rapid rivers lay in the way. he added, that he himself intended to set out for gambia, with a caravan of slaves, as soon as the rivers were fordable, and the grass burnt, and invited mr. park to stay and accompany him, remarking that when a caravan could not travel through the country, it was idle for a single man to attempt it. mr. park admitted the rashness of the attempt, but assured him that he had no alternative, for not having any money, he must either beg his subsistence by travelling from place to place, or perish from want. karfa now looked at him with great earnestness, informing him that he had never before seen a white man, and inquired if he could eat the common victuals of the country. he added, that if he would remain with him till the rains were over, he would conduct him in safety to the gambia, and then he might make him what return he pleased. mr. park having agreed to give him the value of one prime slave, he ordered a hut to be swept for his accommodation. thus was mr. park delivered by the friendly care of this benevolent negro, from a situation truly deplorable, but his fever became daily more alarming. on the third day after his arrival, as he was going with karfa to visit some of his friends, he was so faint that he staggered and fell into a pit; karfa endeavoured to console him, and assured him that if he would not walk out into the wet, he would soon be well. mr. park followed his advice, and in general confined himself to his hut, but was still tormented with the fever for five ensuing weeks. his benevolent landlord came every day to inquire after his health. when the rains became less frequent, the fever left him, but in so debilitated a condition, that it was with great difficulty he could get to the shade of a tamarind tree, at a short distance, to enjoy the refreshing smell of the corn fields, and the delightful prospect of the country. at length he found himself recovering, towards which the benevolent manners of the negroes, and the perusal of karfa's little volume, greatly contributed. meanwhile many of the slatees who resided at kamalia, having spent all their money, and become in a great measure dependent on karfa's bounty, beheld mr. park with envy, and invented many ridiculous stories to lessen him in his host's esteem, but karfa paid no attention to them, and treated him with unabated kindness. as he was one day conversing with some slaves, which a serawoolli merchant had brought from sego, one of them begged him to give him some victuals, mr. park replied, he was a stranger and had none to give. "i gave _you_, some victuals" said the slave, "when _you_ were hungry. have you forgotten the man who brought you milk at karrankalla? but," added he with a sigh, "_the irons were not then on my legs_." mr. park immediately recollected him, procured for him some ground nuts, and learned that he had been taken by the bambarrans, the day after the battle at joka, and sent to sego, where he had been purchased by his present master, who was carrying him to kajaaga. in the middle of december, karfa, who proposed to complete his purchase of slaves, departed for kancaba, a large town on the banks of the niger, and a great slave market. it was his intention to return in a month, and during his absence left mr. park to the care of a good old bushreen, who was schoolmaster at kamalia. the name of this schoolmaster was fankooma, and although a mahometan, was not intolerant in his principles. he read much, and took great pleasure in professional efforts. his school contained seventeen boys, mostly of pagan parents, and two girls. the girls were taught by daylight, but the boys were instructed before the dawn and late in the evening; by being considered, while pupils, as the domestic slaves of the master, they were employed by him during the day in various avocations. emulation is encouraged by their tutor to stimulate his scholars. when the pupil has read through the koran, and learned a certain number of public prayers, he undergoes an examination by the bushreens, who, when satisfied with his learning and abilities, desire him to read the last page of the koran. this being done, the boy presses the paper to his forehead, and pronounces the word amen; upon which the bushreens rise, shake him by the hand, and bestow upon him the title of bushreen. the parents then redeem their son, by giving his master the value of a slave; but if they cannot afford it, the boy continues the slave of the schoolmaster, until he ransoms himself by his own industry. on the th january, karfa returned to kamalia, with thirteen prime slaves, whom he had purchased. he also brought a young girl for his fourth wife, whom he had married at kancaba. she was kindly received by her colleagues, who had swept and whitewashed one of the best huts for her accommodation. on the day after his arrival, karfa having observed that mr. park's clothes were become very ragged, presented him with a garment and trousers, the usual dress of the country. karfa's slaves were all prisoners of war, who had been taken by the bambarran army. some of them had been kept three years at sego in irons, whence they were sent with other captives up the niger to yamina, bammakoo and kancaba, where they were sold for gold dust. eleven of them confessed that they had been slaves from their birth, but the other two refused to give any account of themselves to mr. park, whom they at first regarded with looks of horror, and repeatedly asked _if his countrymen were cannibals_. they were very desirous to know what became of the slaves after they had crossed the salt water. mr. park told them that they were employed in cultivating the land, but they would not believe him: and one of them putting his hand upon the ground, said with great simplicity, "have you really got such ground as this to set your feet upon?" the slaves were constantly kept in irons, and strictly watched. to secure them, the right leg of one and the left of another were fastened by the same pair of fetters, by supporting which with a string, they could walk very slowly. every four slaves were also fastened together by a rope of twisted thongs; and during the night their hands were fettered, and sometimes a light iron chain was put round their necks. those who betrayed any symptoms of discontent, were secured by a thick billet of wood about three feet long, which was fastened to the ankle by a strong iron staple. all these fetters were put on as soon as the slaves arrived at kamalia, and were not taken off until the morning they set out for the gambia. in other respects, the slaves were not harshly treated. in the morning they were led to the shade of a tamarind tree, where they were encouraged to keep up their spirits by playing different games of chance, or singing. some bore their situation with great fortitude, but the majority would sit the whole of the day in sullen melancholy, with their eyes fixed on the ground. in the evening, their irons being examined, and their hand-fetters put on, they were conducted into two large huts, and guarded during the night. notwithstanding this strictness, however, one of karfa's slaves, about a week after his arrival, having procured a small knife, opened the rings of his fetters, cut the rope, and made his escape, and more might have got off, had not the slave, when he found himself at liberty, refused to stop to assist his companions in breaking the chain, which was round their necks. all the merchants and slaves who composed the coffle, were now assembled at kamalia and its vicinity; the day of departure for the gambia was frequently fixed, and afterwards postponed. some of the people had not prepared their provisions, others were visiting their friends, or collecting their debts; thus the departure was delayed until february was far advanced, when it was determined to wait _until the fast moon was over_. "loss of time," observes mr. park, "is of no great importance in the eyes of a negro. if he has any thing of consequence to perform, it is a matter of indifference to him whether he does it to-day or to-morrow, or a month or two hence; so long as he can spend the present moment with any degree of comfort, he gives himself very little concern for the future." the rhamadam was strictly observed by the bushreens, and at the close of it, they assembled at the misura to watch for the new moon, but as the evening was cloudy, they were for some time disappointed, and several had returned home resolving to fast another day, when suddenly the object of their wishes appeared from behind a cloud, and was welcomed by clapping of hands, beating of drums, firing muskets, and other demonstrations of joy. this moon being accounted extremely lucky, karfa gave orders that the people of the coffle should immediately prepare for their journey, and the slatees having held a consultation on the th of april, fixed on the th as the day of departure. this resolution freed mr. park from much uneasiness, as he was apprehensive, from the departure having been so long deferred, that the rainy season would again commence before it took place, and although his landlord behaved with great kindness, his situation was very disagreeable. the slatees were unfriendly to him, and three trading moors, who had arrived at kamalia during the absence of karfa, to dispose of salt procured on credit, had plotted mischief against him from the day of their arrival; his welfare thus depended merely upon the good opinion of an individual, who was daily hearing tales to his prejudice. he was somewhat reconciled by time to their manner of living, but longed for the blessings of civilized society. on the morning of april th, the coffle assembled and commenced its journey. when joined by several persons at maraboo and bola, it consisted of seventy-three persons, thirty-five of whom were slaves for sale. the free men were fourteen in number, but several had wives and domestic slaves, and the schoolmaster, who was going to his native country woradoo, had eight of his scholars. several of the inhabitants of kamalia accompanied the coffle a short way on its progress, taking leave of their relations and friends. on reaching a rising ground, from which they had a prospect of the town, the people of the coffle were desired to sit down facing the west, and the town's people facing kamalia. the schoolmaster and two principal slatees, then placed themselves between the two parties, and repeated a long and solemn prayer, after this they walked round the coffle three times, pressing the ground with the end of their spears, and muttering a charm. all the people of the coffle then sprang up and set forwards, without formally bidding their friends farewell. the slaves had all heavy loads upon their heads, and many of them having been long in irons, the sudden exertion of walking quick, caused spasmodic contractions of their legs, and they had scarcely proceeded a mile, when two of them were obliged to be taken from the rope, and suffered to walk more slowly. the coffle after halting two hours at maraboo, proceeded to bola, thence to worumbang, the frontier village of manding, towards jallonkadoo. here they procured plenty of provisions, as they intended shortly to enter the jallonka wilderness, but having on the st travelled a little way through the woods, they determined to take the road to kinytakooro, a town in jallonkadoo, and this being a long day's journey distant, they halted to take some refreshment. every person, says mr, park, opened his provision bag, and brought a handful or two of meal to the place where karfa and the slatees were sitting. when every one had brought his quota, and whole was properly arranged in small gourd shells, the schoolmaster offered up a short prayer, the substance of which was, that god and the holy prophets might preserve them from robberies and all bad people, that their provisions might never fail them, nor their limbs become fatigued. this ceremony being ended, every one partook of the meal, and drank a little water, after which they set forward, rather running than walking, until they came to the river kokoro. this river is a branch of the senegal, its banks are very high, and from various appearances it was evident, that the water had risen above twenty feet perpendicular during the rainy season, but it was then only a small stream sufficient to turn a mill, and abounding in fish. the coffle proceeded with great expedition until evening, when they arrived at kinytakooro, a considerable town, nearly square, situated in the midst of an extensive and fertile plain. in this day's journey, a woman and a girl, two slaves belonging to a slatee of bola, could not keep up with the coffle from fatigue. they were dragged along until about four in the afternoon, when being both affected with vomiting, it was discovered that _they had eaten clay_. whether this practice, which is frequent amongst the slaves, proceeds from a vitiated appetite, or an intention to destroy themselves, is uncertain. three people remaining to take care of them, the slaves were suffered to lie down in the woods until they were somewhat recovered, but they did not reach the town until past midnight, and were then so exhausted that their master determined to return with them to bola. kinytakooro being the first town beyond the limits of manding, great ceremony was observed in entering it. the coffle approached it in the following procession: first went the singing men, followed by the other free men, then the slaves, fastened as usual by a rope round their necks, four to a rope, and a man with a spear between each party, after them the domestic slaves, and in the rear the free women. when they came within a hundred yards of the gate, the singing men began a loud song, extolling the hospitality of the inhabitants towards strangers, and their friendship in particular to the mandingos. arriving at the bentang, the people assembled to hear their _dentegi_ (history,) which was publicly recited by two of the singing men. they began with the events of that day, and enumerated every circumstance which had befallen the coffle in a backward series, to their departure from kamalia. when they had ended, the chief men of the town gave them a small present, and every person of the coffle, both free and enslaved, was entertained and lodged by the inhabitants. on the nd of april, the coffle proceeded to a village seven miles westward. the inhabitants of this village, expecting an attack from the foulahs of fooladoo, were constructing small huts among the rocks, on the side of a high hill. the situation was nearly impregnable, high precipices surrounded it on every side but the eastern, where was left a path broad enough for one person to ascend. on the brow of the hill were collected heaps of large stones, to be thrown down upon the enemy, if an attack on the post was attempted. the coffle entered the jallonka wilderness on the rd. they passed the ruins of two small towns, burnt by the foulahs, and the fire had been so intense as to vitrify the walls of several huts, which at a distance appeared as if coloured with red varnish. the coffle crossed the river wonda, where fish were seen in great abundance. karfa now placed the guides and young men in the front, the women and slaves in the centre, and the free men in the rear, and in this order they proceeded through a woody beautiful country, abounding with partridges, guinea fowls, and deer. at sunset they arrived at a stream called comeissang. to diminish the inflammation of his skin, produced by the friction of his dress from walking, and long exposure to the heat of the sun, mr. park took the benefit of bathing in the river. they had now travelled about thirty miles, and were greatly fatigued, but no person complained. karfa ordered one of his slaves to prepare for mr. park a bed made of branches of trees, and when they had supped upon kouskous moistened with boiling water, they all laid down, but were frequently disturbed by the howling of the wild beasts, and the biting of small brown ants. the next morning, most of the free people drank some _noening_, a sort of gruel, which was also given to the slaves that appeared least able to travel, but a female slave of karfa's who was called nealee, refused to partake of this refreshment, and was very sullen. the coffle proceeded over a wild and rocky country, and nealee, soon overcome by fatigue, lagged behind, complaining dreadfully of pains in her legs, on which her load was given to another slave, and she was directed to keep in front. the coffle rested near a small rivulet, and a hive of bees being discovered in a hollow tree, some negroes went in quest of the honey, when an enormous swarm flew out, and attacked the people of the coffle. mr. park, who first took the alarm, alone escaped with impunity. the negroes at length again collected together at some distance from the place where they were dispersed, but nealee was missing, and many of the bundles were left behind. to recover these, they set fire to the grass eastward of the hive, and as the wind drove the fire furiously along, they pushed through the smoke, until they came to the bundles. they also found poor nealee lying by the rivulet, she had crept to the stream, hoping to defend herself from the bees by throwing water over her body, but she was stung dreadfully. the stings were picked out, and her wounds washed and anointed, but she refused to proceed further. the slatees by the whip forced her to proceed about four or five hours longer, when, attempting to run away, she fell down with extreme weakness. again was the whip applied, but ineffectually; the unfortunate slave was unable to rise. after attempting to place her upon an ass, on which she could not sit erect, a litter of bamboo canes was made, upon which she was tied with slips of bark, and carried on the heads of two slaves for the remainder of the day. the coffle halted at the foot of a high hill, called gankaran-kooro. the travellers had only eaten one handful of meal each during the day's journey, exposed to the ardour of a tropical sun. the slaves were much fatigued, and showed great discontent; several _snapt their fingers_, a certain mark of desperation. they were all immediately put in irons, and those who had shown signs of despondency were kept apart. in the morning, however, they were greatly recovered, except poor nealee, who could neither walk nor stand, she was accordingly placed upon an ass, her hands being fastened together under the neck, and her feet under the belly, to secure her situation. the beast, however, was unruly, and nealee was soon thrown off, and one of her legs was much bruised. as it was found impossible to carry her forward, the general cry of the coffle was, "_kang tegi! kang tegi!_" (cut her throat! cut her throat!) mr. park proceeded forwards with the foremost of the coffle, to avoid seeing this operation performed, but soon after he learned that karfa and the schoolmaster would not agree to have her killed, but had left her on the road. her fate diffused melancholy throughout the whole coffle, notwithstanding the outcry before mentioned, and the schoolmaster fasted the whole day in consequence of it. the coffle soon after crossed the furkoomah, a river the same size as the wonda, and travelled so expeditiously, that mr. park with difficulty kept up with it. on the th april, the coffle ascended a rocky hill, called bokikooro, and in the afternoon, entering a valley, forded the bold, a smooth and clear river. about a mile westward of this river, discovering the marks of horses' feet, they were afraid that a party of plunderers were in the neighbourhood; and to avoid discovery and pursuit, the coffle travelled in a dispersed manner through the high grass and bushes. the following day, hoping to reach a town before night, they passed expeditiously through extensive thickets of bamboos. at a stream called nuncolo, each person ate a handful of meal, moistened with water, in compliance with some superstitious custom. in the afternoon, they arrived at sooseta, a jallonka village, in the district of kullo, a tract of country lying along the banks of the black river; and the first human habitation they had met with in a journey of five days, over more than a hundred miles. with much difficulty they procured huts to sleep in, but could not obtain any provisions, as there had been a scarcity before the crops were gathered in, during which all the inhabitants of kullo had subsisted upon the yellow powder of the _nitta_, a species of the mimosa, and the seeds of the bamboo, which, when properly prepared, tastes nearly similar to rice. as the provisions of the coffle were not exhausted, kouskous was dressed for supper, and several villagers were invited to partake; meanwhile one of the schoolmaster's boys, who had fallen asleep under the bentang, was carried off during the night; but the thief, finding that his master's residence was only three days' journey distant, thinking he could not be retained with security, after stripping him, suffered him to return. they now crossed the black river by a bridge of a curious construction. several tall trees are fastened together by the tops, which float on the water, while the roots rest on the rocks on each side of the river; these are covered with dry bamboos, and the whole forms a passage, sloping from each end towards the middle, so as to resemble an inverted arch. in the rainy season the bridge is carried away, but the natives constantly rebuilt it, and on that account exact a small tribute from every passenger. being informed that, two hundred jalonkas had assembled to intercept and plunder the coffle, they altered their course, and about midnight arrived at a town called koba. they now discovered that a free man and three slaves were missing; upon which it was concluded that the slaves had murdered the free man, and made their escape, and six people were sent back to the last village to endeavour to procure information. meanwhile the people of the coffle were ordered to conceal themselves in a cotton field, and no person to speak but in a whisper. towards morning, the men returned, but without the object of their pursuit. the coffle then entered the town, and purchased a quantity of ground nuts, which were roasted for breakfast; and, being provided with huts, determined to rest there for the day. they were agreeably surprised by the arrival of their companions. one of the slaves had hurt his foot, and as the night was dark, they had lost sight of the coffle, when the free man, who was aware of his danger, insisted on putting the slaves in irons, and as they were refractory, threatened to stab them one by one with his spear; they at last submitted, and in the morning followed the coffle to koba. in the course of the day, the intelligence concerning the jalonka plunderers was confirmed, on which karfa, continuing at koba until the th, hired some persons for protectors, and they proceeded to a village called tinkingtang. on the following day, the slaves being greatly fatigued, the coffle only proceeded nine miles, where provisions were procured by the interest of the schoolmaster, who sent a messenger forward to malacotta, his native town, to acquaint his friends with his arrival, and desire them to provide provisions for the entertainment of the coffle for two or three days. they halted at another village further on until the return of the messenger from malacotta. about two the messenger returned, accompanied by the schoolmaster's elder brother. "the interview," says mr. park, "between the two brothers, who had not seen each other for nine years, was very natural and affecting. they fell upon each other's neck, and it was some time before either of them could speak. at length, when the schoolmaster had a little recovered himself, he took his brother by the hand, and turning round, 'this is the man,' said he, pointing to karfa, 'who has been my father in manding. i would have pointed him out sooner to you, but my heart was too full.'" the coffle then proceeded to malacotta, where they were well entertained for three days, being each day presented with a bullock from the schoolmaster. malacotta is an unwalled town; the huts are made of unsplit canes twisted into wicker work, and plastered over with mud. the inhabitants are active and industrious; they make good soap by boiling ground nuts in water, and adding a lye of wood ashes. they also manufacture excellent iron, which they exchange in bondou for salt. a party of traders brought intelligence to this town of a war between the king of foota torra and the king of the jaloffs, which soon became a favourite subject of conversation in this part of africa. its circumstances were as follow:--almami abdulkader, king of foota torra, inflamed with a zeal for propagating the religion of the prophet, sent an ambassador to damel, king of the jaloffs, accompanied by two principal bushreens, each bearing a long pole, to the end of which was fixed a large knife. when admitted into the presence of damel, the ambassador ordered the bushreens to present the emblems of his mission, which he thus explained:--"with this knife," said he, "abdulkader will condescend to shave the head of damel, if damel will embrace the mahometan faith; and with the other knife, abdulkader will cut the throat of damel, if darnel refuses to embrace it. take your choice." the king of the jaloffs having told the ambassador he chose neither of his propositions, civilly dismissed him. abdulkader soon after invaded damel's dominions with a powerful army. as he approached, the towns and villages were abandoned, the wells filled up, and their effects carried off by the inhabitants. he advanced three days into the country of the jaloffs, without opposition; but his army had suffered so greatly for want of water, that many of his men had died by the way. this compelled him to march to a watering-place in the woods, where his men, having quenched their thirst, and being overcome with fatigue, lay down among the bushes to sleep. thus situated, they were attacked by the forces of damel in the night, and completely routed. king abdulkader himself, with a great number of his followers, being taken prisoners. the behaviour of the king of the jaloffs on this occasion we shall relate in mr. park's own words. "when his royal prisoner was brought before him in irons, and thrown upon the ground, the magnanimous damel, instead of setting his foot upon his neck, and stabbing him with his spear, according to custom in such cases, addressed him as follows:--'abdulkader, answer me this question. if the chance of war had placed me in your situation, and you in mine, how would you have treated me?'--'i would have thrust my spear into your heart,' returned abdulkader, with great firmness, 'and i know that a similar fate awaits me.'--'not so,' said damel; 'my spear is indeed red with the blood of your subjects killed in battle, and i could now give it a deeper stain, by dipping it in your own; but this would not build up my towns, nor bring to life the thousands, who fell in the woods; i will not, therefore, kill you in cold blood, but i will retain you as my slave, until i perceive that your presence in your own kingdom will be no longer dangerous to your neighbours, and then i will consider of the proper way of disposing of you.' abdulkader was accordingly retained, and worked as a slave for three months, at the end of which period, damel listened to the solicitations of the inhabitants of foota torra. and restored to them their king." the coffle resumed their journey on the th may, and having crossed a branch of the senegal, proceeded to a walled town, called bentingala, where they rested two days. in one day more, they reached dindikoo, a town at the bottom of a high ridge of hills, which gives the name of konkodoo to this part of the country; at dindikoo was a negro of the sort called in the spanish west indies, albinos, or white negroes. his hair and skin were of a dull white colour, cadaverous and unsightly, and considered as the effect of disease. after a tedious day's journey, the coffle arrived at satadoo, on the evening of the th. many inhabitants had quitted this town, on account of the plundering incursions of the foulahs of foota jalla, who frequently carried off people from the corn fields and wells near the town. the coffle crossed the faleme river on the th, and at night halted at a village called medina, the sole property of a mandingo merchant, who had adopted many european customs. his victuals were served up in pewter dishes, and his houses were formed in the mode of the english houses on the gambia. the next morning they departed, in company with another coffle of slaves, belonging to some serawoolli traders, and in the evening arrived at baniserile, after a very hard day's journey. mr. park was invited by one of the slatees, a native of this place, to go home to his house. he had been absent three years, and was met by his friends with many expressions of joy. when he had seated himself upon a mat near the threshold of his door, a young woman, his intended bride, brought some water in a calabash, and, kneeling before him, requested him to wash his hands. this being done, the young woman drank the water; an action here esteemed as the greatest proof that can be given of fidelity and affection. mr. park now arrived on the shores of the gambia, and on the th june reached pisania, where he was received as one risen from the dead; for all the traders from the interior had believed and reported, that, like major houghton, he was murdered by the moors of ludamar. karfa, his benefactor, received double the stipulated price, and was overpowered with gratitude; but when he saw the commodious furniture, the skilful manufactures, the superiority in all the arts of life, displayed by the europeans, compared with the attainments of his countrymen, he was deeply mortified, and exclaimed "black men are nothing," expressing, at the same time his surprise, that park could find any motive for coming to so miserable a land as africa. mr. park had some difficulty in reaching home. he was obliged to embark on the th june, in a vessel bound to america, and was afterwards driven by stress of weather, into the island of antigua, whence he sailed on the th november, and on the nd december landed at falmouth. he arrived in london before dawn on the morning of christmas day, and in the garden of the british museum accidentally met his brother-in-law, mr. dickson. two years having elapsed since any tidings had reached england, he had been given up for lost, so that his friends and the public were equally astonished and delighted by his appearance. the report of his unexpected return, after making such splendid discoveries, kindled throughout the nation a higher enthusiasm than had perhaps been excited by the result of any former mission of the same nature. the niger had been seen flowing _eastward_, into the interior of africa, and hence a still deeper interest and mystery were suspended over the future course and termination of this great central stream. kingdoms had been discovered, more flourishing and more populous than any formerly known on that continent; but other kingdoms, still greater and wealthier, were reported to exist in regions, which mr. park had vainly attempted to reach. the lustre of his achievements had diffused among the public in general an ardour for discovery, which was formerly confined to a few enlightened individuals; it was, however, evident that the efforts of no private association could penetrate the depths of this vast continent, and overcome the obstacles presented by its distance, its deserts, and its barbarism. chapter ix. it was now thought advisable to trace, without interruption the interesting career of mr. park, from its commencement to its close. the enthusiasm for discovery was, however, not confined solely to england; for the return of park had no sooner reached germany, than frederick horneman, a student of the university of gottingen, communicated to blumenbach, the celebrated professor of natural history, his ardent desire to explore the interior of africa under the auspices of the british african association. the professor transmitted to the association a strong recommendation of horneman, as a young man, active, athletic, temperate, knowing sickness only by name, and of respectable literary and scientific attainments. sir joseph banks immediately wrote, "if mr. horneman be really the character you describe, he is the very person whom we are in search of." on receiving this encouragement, horneman immediately applied his mind to the study of natural history and the arabic language, and in other respects sought to capacitate himself for supporting the character of an arab or a mahometan, under which he flattered himself that he should escape the effects of that ferocious bigotry, which had opposed so fatal a bar to the progress of his predecessors. in may , horneman repaired to london, where his appointment was sanctioned by the association, and having obtained a passport from the directory, who then governed france, he visited paris, and was introduced to some influential members of the national institute. he reached egypt in september, spent ten days at alexandria, and set out for cairo, to wait the departure of the kashna caravan. the interval was employed in acquiring the language of the mograben arabs, a tribe bordering on egypt. while he was at cairo, intelligence was received of the landing of buonaparte in that country, when the just indignation of the natives vented itself upon all europeans, and, amongst others, on horneman, who was arrested and confined in the castle. he was relieved upon the victorious entry of the french commander, who immediately set him at liberty, and very liberally offered him money, and every other supply which might contribute to the success of his mission. it was not before the th september , that horneman could meet with a caravan proceeding to the westward, when he joined the one destined for fezzan. the travellers soon passed the cultivated lands of egypt, and entered on an expanse of sandy waste, such as the bottom of the ocean might exhibit, if the waters were to retire. this desert was covered with the fragments, as it were, of a petrified forest; large trunks, branches, twigs, and even pieces of bark, being scattered over it. sometimes these stony remains were brought in as mistake for fuel. when the caravan halted for the night, each individual dug a hole in the sand, gathered a few sticks, and prepared his victuals after the african fashion of kouskous, soups, or puddings. horneman, according to his european habits, at first employed the services of another, but finding himself thus exposed to contempt or suspicion, he soon followed the example of the rest, and became his own cook. there are, as usual, oases in this immense waste. ten days brought the caravan to ummesogeir, a village situated upon a rock, with inhabitants, who, separated by deserts, from the rest of the world, passed a peaceful and hospitable life, subsisting on dates, the chief produce of their arid and sterile soil. another day's journey brought them to siwah, a much more extensive oasis, the rocky border of which is estimated by horneman to be fifty miles in circumference. it yields, with little culture, various descriptions of grain and vegetables; but its wealth consists chiefly in large gardens of dates, baskets of which fruit form here the standard of value. the government is vested in a very turbulent aristocracy, of about thirty chiefs, who meet in council in the vicinity of the town wall, and in the contests which frequently arise, make violent and sudden appeals to arms. the chief question in respect to siwah is, whether it does or does not comprise the site of the celebrated shrine of jupiter ammon, that object of awful veneration to the nations of antiquity, and which alexander himself, the greatest of its heroes, underwent excessive toil and peril to visit and to associate with his name. this territory does in fact contain springs, and a small edifice, with walls six feet thick, partly painted and adorned with hieroglyphics. there are also antique tombs in the neighbouring mountains, but as the subsequent discoveries of belzoni and edmonstone have proved that all these features exist in other oases, scattered in different directions along the desert borders of egypt, some uncertainty must perhaps for ever rest on this curious question. the route now passed through a region still indeed barren, yet not presenting such a monotonous plain of sand as intervenes between egypt and siwah. it was bordered by precipitous limestone rocks, often completely filled with shells and marine remains. the caravan, while proceeding along these wild tracts, were alarmed by a tremendous braying of asses, and, on looking back, saw several hundred of the people of siwah, armed and in full pursuit, mounted on these useful animals. the scouts, however, soon brought an assurance that they came with intentions perfectly peaceable, having merely understood that in the caravan there were two christians from cairo, and on their being allowed to kill them, the others would be permitted to proceed without molestation. all horneman's address and firmness were required in this fearful crisis. he opposed the most resolute denial to the assertions of the siwahans, he opened the koran, and displayed the facility with which he could read its pages. he even challenged his adversaries to answer him on points of mahommedan faith. his companions in the caravan, who took a pride in defending one of their members, insisted that he had cleared himself thoroughly from the imputation of being an infidel, and as they were joined by several of the siwahans, the whole body finally renounced their bloody purpose, and returned home. the travellers next passed through angila, a town so ancient as to be mentioned by herodotus, but now small, dirty, and supported solely by the passage of the inland trade. they then entered the black harutsch, a long range of dreary mountains, the _mons ater_ of the ancients, through the successive defiles of which they found only a narrow track enclosed by rugged steeps, and obstructed by loose stones. every valley too and ravine into which they looked, appeared still more wild and desolate than the road itself. a scene of a more gay and animated description succeeded, when they entered the district of limestone mountains, called the white harutsch. the rocks and stones here appeared as if glazed, and abounded in shells and other marine petrifactions, which on being broken had a vitrified appearance. after a painful route of sixteen days through this solitary region, the travellers were cheered by seeing before them the great oasis, or small kingdom of fezzan. both at temissa, the first frontier town, and at zuila, the ancient capital, which is still inhabited by many rich merchants, they were received with rapturous demonstrations of joy. the arrival of a caravan is the chief event which diversifies the existence of the fezzaners, and diffuses through the country animation and wealth. at mourzouk, the modern capital, the reception was more solemn and pompous. the sultan himself awaited their arrival on a small eminence, seated in an arm chair, ornamented with cloth of various colours, and forming a species of throne. each pilgrim, on approaching the royal seat, put off his sandals, kissed the sovereign's hand, and took his station behind, where the whole assembly joined in a chant of pious gratitude. fezzan, according to horneman, has a length of , and a breadth of miles, and is much the largest of all the oases, which enliven the immense desert of northern africa. it relieves, however, in only an imperfect degree, the parched appearance of the surrounding region. it is not irrigated by a river, nor even a streamlet of any dimensions; the grain produced is insufficient for its small population, supposed to amount to , or , inhabitants, and few animals are reared except the ass, the goat, and the camel. dates, as in all this species of territory, form the chief article of land produce, but fezzan derives its chief importance from being the centre of that immense traffic, which gives activity and wealth to interior africa. mourzouk, in the dry season, forms a rendezvous for the caravans proceeding from egypt, morocco and tripoli, to the great countries watered by the western river. yet the trade is carried on less by the inhabitants themselves, than by the tibboos, tuaricks, and other wandering tribes of the desert, concerning whom horneman collected some information, but less ample than lyon and denham afterwards obtained from personal observation. of timbuctoo, he did not obtain much information, morocco being the chief quarter whence caravans proceed to that celebrated seat of african commerce. in regard, however, to the eastern part of soudan, he received intelligence more accurate than had hitherto reached europe. houssa was for the first time understood to be, not a single country or city, but a region comprehending many kingdoms, the people of which are said to be the handsomest, most industrious, and most intelligent in that part of africa, being particularly distinguished for their manufacture of fine cloths. amongst the states mentioned, were kashna, kano, daura, solan, noro, nyffe, cabi, zanfara and guber. most or all of these were tributary to bornou, described as decidedly the most powerful kingdom in central africa, and which really was so regarded before the rise of the fellatah empire caused in this respect, a remarkable change. the niger, according to the unanimous belief in the northern provinces, was said to flow from timbuctoo eastward through houssa, and holding the same direction till it joined or rather became the bahr-elabiad, the main stream of the egyptian nile. prevalent as this opinion is amongst the arabs, late discoveries have proved it to be decidedly erroneous; the river or rivers which water houssa, being wholly distinct from that great stream which flows through bambarra and timbuctoo. horneman, after remaining some time at mourzouk, had resolved to join a caravan about to proceed southwards into the interior, when observing that the cavalcade consisted almost wholly of black traders, any connexion or intercourse with whom was likely to afford him little favour in the eyes of the moors, he was induced to forego this purpose; more especially as there was the greatest reason to apprehend obstruction in passing through the country of the turiacks, then at war with fezzan. he was informed besides, that caravans from bornou occasionally terminated their journey at mourzouk, again returning south; by which under more propitious circumstances he hoped to accomplish his object. these considerations determined him to postpone his departure, resolving in the mean while, with the view of forwarding his despatches to the association, to visit tripoli, where, however, he did not arrive till the th august, , having been detained a considerable time by sickness. after remaining in this city about three months he returned to mourzouk, nor was it till the th april, , that he departed thence for the southward, in company with two shereefs, who had given him assurances of friendship and protection. his letters were filled with the most sanguine hopes of success. but the lapse of two years without any tidings, threw a damp on the cheering expectations then raised in the association and the public. in september , a fezzan merchant informed mr. nissen, the danish consul of tripoli, that yussuph, as horneman had chosen to designate himself, was seen alive and well on his way to gondasch, with the intention of proceeding to the coast, and of returning to europe. another moorish merchant afterwards informed mr. m'donogh, british consul at tripoli, that yussuph was in safety at kashna, in june , and was there highly respected as a mussulman, marabout or saint. major denham afterwards learned that he had penetrated across africa as far as nyffe, on the niger, where he fell a victim, not to any hostility on the part of the natives, but to disease and the climate. a young man was even met with, who professed to be his son, though there were some doubt as to the grounds of his claim to that character. the association, when their expectations from horneman had failed, began to look round for other adventurers, and there were still a number of active and daring spirits ready to brave the dangers of this undertaking. mr. nicholls, in , repaired to calabar, in the gulf of benin, with the view of penetrating into the interior by this route, which appeared shorter than any other, but without any presentiment that the termination of the niger was to be found in that quarter. he was well received by the chiefs on that coast, but could not gain much information respecting that river, being informed that most of the slaves came from the west, and that the navigation of the calabar stream, at no great distance was interrupted by an immense waterfall, beyond which the surface of the country became very elevated. unfortunately, of all the sickly climates of africa, this is perhaps the most pestilential, and mr. nicholls, before commencing his journey, fell a victim to the epidemic fever. another german named roentgen, recommended also by blumenbach, undertook to penetrate into the interior of africa by way of morocco. he was described as possessing an unblemished character, ardent zeal in the cause, with great strength both of mind and body. like horneman, he made himself master of arabic, and proposed to pass for a mahommedan. having in arrived at mogadore, he hired two guides, and set out to join the soudan caravan. his career, however, was short indeed, for soon after his body was found at a little distance from the place whence he started. no information could ever be obtained as to the particulars of his death, but it was too probably conjectured that his guides murdered him for the sake of his property. chapter x. we are now entering upon the narrative of a series of the most extraordinary adventures which ever befel the african travellers, in the person of an illiterate and obscure seaman, of the name of robert adams, who was wrecked on the western coast of africa, in the american ship charles, bound to the isle of mayo, and who may be said to have been the first traveller who ever reached the far-famed city of timbuctoo. the place where the charles was wrecked was called elgazie, and the captain and the whole of the crew were immediately taken prisoners by the moors. on their landing, the moors stripped the whole of them naked, and concealed their clothes under ground; being thus exposed to a scorching sun, their skins became dreadfully blistered, and at night they were obliged to dig holes in the sand to sleep in, for the sake of coolness. about a week after landing, the captain of the ship was put to death by the moors, for which the extraordinary reason was given, that he was extremely dirty, and would not go down to the sea to wash himself, when the moors made signs for him to do so. after they had remained about ten or twelve days, until the ship and its materials had quite disappeared, the moors made preparations to depart, and divided the prisoners amongst them. robert adams and two others of the crew were left in the possession of about twenty moors, who quitted the sea coast, having four camels, three of which they loaded with water, and the other with fish and baggage. at the end of about thirty days, during which they did not see a human being, they arrived at a place, the name of which adams did not hear, where they found about thirty or forty tents, and a pool of water surrounded by a few shrubs, which was the only water they had met with since quitting the coast. in the first week of their arrival, adams and his companions being greatly fatigued, were not required to do any work, but at the end of that time, they were put to tend some goats and sheep, which were the first they had seen. about this time, john stevens arrived, under charge of a moor, and was sent to work in company with adams. stevens was a portuguese, about eighteen years of age. at this place they remained about a month. it was now proposed by the moors to adams and stevens, to accompany them on an expedition to soudenny to procure slaves. it was with great difficulty they could be made to understand this proposal, but the moors made themselves intelligible by pointing to some negro boys, who were employed in taking care of sheep and goats. being in the power of the moors, they had no option, and having therefore signified their consent, the party consisting of about eighteen moors, and the two whites, set out for soudenny. soudenny is a small negro village, having grass and shrubs growing about it, and a small brook of water. for a week or thereabouts, after arriving in the neighbourhood of this place, the party concealed themselves amongst the hills and bushes, lying in wait for the inhabitants, when they seized upon a woman with a child in her arms, and two children (boys), whom they found walking in the evening near the town. during the next four or five days, the party remained concealed, when one evening, as they were all lying on the ground, a large party of negroes, consisting of forty or fifty made their appearance, armed with daggers, and bows and arrows, who surrounded and took them all prisoners, without the least resistance being attempted, and carried them into the town; tying the hands of some, and driving the whole party before them. during the night above one hundred negroes kept watch over them. the next day they were taken before the governor or chief person, named muhamoud, a remarkably ugly negro, who ordered that they should all be imprisoned. the place of confinement was a mere mud wall, about six feet high, from whence they might readily have escaped, though strongly guarded, if the moors had been enterprising, but they were a cowardly set. here they were kept three or four days, for the purpose, as it afterwards appeared, of being sent forward to timbuctoo, which adams concluded to be the residence of the king of the country. at soudenny, the houses have only a ground floor, and are without furniture or utensils, except wooden bowls, and mats made of grass. they never make fires in their houses. after remaining about four days at soudenny, the prisoners were sent to timbuctoo, under an escort of about sixty armed men, having about eighteen camels and dromedaries. during the first ten days they proceeded eastward, at the rate of about fifteen to twenty miles a day, the prisoners and most of the negroes walking, the officers riding, two upon each camel or dromedary. as the prisoners were all impressed with the belief that they were going to execution, several of the moors attempted to escape, and in consequence, after a short consultation, fourteen were put to death by being beheaded, at a small village at which they then arrived, and as a terror to the rest, the head of one of them was hung round the neck of a camel for three days, until it became so putrid, that they were obliged to remove it. at this village, the natives wore gold rings in their ears, sometimes two rings in each ear. they had a hole through the cartilage of the nose, wide enough to admit a thick quill, in which adams saw some of the natives wear a large ring of an oval shape, that hung down to the mouth. they waited, only one day at this place, and then proceeded towards timbuctoo. shaping their course to the northward of east, and quickening their pace to the rate of twenty miles a day, they completed their journey in fifteen days. upon their arrival at timbuctoo, the whole party were immediately taken before the king, who ordered the moors into prison, but treated adams and the portuguese boy as curiosities; taking them to his house, they remained there during their residence at timbuctoo. for some time after their arrival, the queen and her female attendants used to sit and look at adams and his companions for hours together. she treated them with great kindness, and at the first interview offered them some bread baked under ashes. the king and queen, the former of whom was named woollo, the latter fatima, were very old grey-headed people. fatima was like the majority of african beauties, extremely fat. her dress was of blue nankeen, edged with gold lace round the bosom and on the shoulder, and having a belt or stripe of the same material, half-way down the dress, which came only a few inches down the knees. the dress of the other females of timbuctoo, though less ornamented than that of the queen, was in the same sort of fashion, so that as they wore no close under garments, they might, when sitting on the ground, as far as decency was concerned, as well have had no covering at all. the queen's head dress consisted of a blue nankeen turban, but this was worn only upon occasions of ceremony, or when she walked out. besides the turban, she had her hair stuck full of bone ornaments of a square shape, about the size of dice, extremely white; she had large gold hoop ear-rings, and many necklaces, some of them of gold, the others made of beads of various colours. she wore no shoes, and in consequence, her feet appeared to be as hard and dry "as the hoofs of an ass." the king's house or palace, which is built of clay and grass, not whitewashed, consists of eight or ten small rooms on the ground floor, and is surrounded by a wall of the same materials, against part of which the house is built. the space within the wall is about half an acre. whenever a trader arrives, he is required to bring his merchandize into this space, for the inspection of the king, for the purpose of duties being charged upon it. the king's attendants, who are with him during the whole of the day, generally consist of about thirty persons, several of whom are armed with daggers, and bows and arrows. adams did not know if the king had any family. for a considerable time after the arrival of adams and his companion, the people used to come in crowds to stare at them, and he afterwards understood that many persons came several days journey on purpose. the moors remained closely confined in prison, but adams and the portuguese boy had permission to visit them. at the end of about six months, a company of trading moors arrived with tobacco, who after some weeks ransomed the whole party. timbuctoo is situated on a level plain [*], having a river about two hundred yards from the town, on the south-east side, named la mar zarah. the town appeared to adams to cover as much ground as lisbon. he was unable to give any account of number of its inhabitants, estimated by caillié to amount to , or , . the houses are not built in streets, nor with any regularity, its population therefore, compared with that of european towns, is by no means in proportion to its size. it has no wall nor any thing resembling fortification. the houses are square, built of sticks, clay, and grass, with flat roofs of the same materials. the rooms are all on the ground-floor, and are without any of furniture, except earthen jars, wooden bowls, and mats made grass, upon which the people sleep. he did not observe a houses, or any other buildings, constructed of stone. the palace of the king he described as having walls of clay, or clay and sand, rammed into a wooden case or frame, and placed in layers, one above another, until they attained the height required, the roof being composed of poles or rafters laid horizontally, and covered with a cement or plaster, made of clay or sand. [footnote: this account of timbuctoo, as given by adams, by no means corresponds with that which was subsequently given by caillié. the latter makes it situated on a very elevated site, in the vicinity of mountains; in fact the whole account of that celebrated city, as given by caillié, is very defective.] the river la mar zarah is about three quarters of a mile wide at timbuctoo, and appeared in this place to have but little current, flowing to the south-west. about two miles from the town to the southward, it runs between two high mountains, apparently as high as the mountains which adams saw in barbary; here the river is about half a mile wide. the water of la mar zarah is rather brackish, but is commonly drunk by the natives, there not being, according to the report of adams, any wells at timbuctoo. it must be remarked in this place, that at the time when adams related the narrative of his residence in africa, and particularly in the city of timbuctoo, a very considerable degree of distrust was attached to it; and in order to put the veracity of adams to a decisive test, the publication of his adventures was delayed until the arrival of mr. dupuis, then the british vice-consul at mogadore, to whose interference adams acknowledged himself indebted for his ransom, and who, on account of his long residence in africa, and his intimate acquaintance with the manners and customs of the natives, was fully competent to the detection of any imposition which it might be the intention of adams to practise upon those, who undertook the publication of his adventures. from this severe ordeal adams came out fully clear of any intention to impose, and the principal points of his narrative were corroborated by the knowledge and experience of mr. dupuis. thus that gentleman, in allusion to the description which adams gave of la mar zarah, mentions that the spanish geographer marmol, who describes himself to have spent twenty years of warfare and slavery in africa, about the middle of the sixteenth century, mentions the river la-ha-mar as a branch of the niger, having muddy and unpalatable waters. by the same authority, the niger itself is called yea, or issa, at timbuctoo, a name which d'anville has adopted in his map of africa. the vessels used by the natives are small canoes for fishing, the largest of which are about ten feet long, capable of carrying three men; they are built of fig-trees hollowed out, and caulked with grass, and are worked with paddles about six feet long. the natives of timbuctoo are a stout healthy race, and are seldom sick, although they expose themselves by lying out in the sun at mid-day, when the heat is almost insupportable to a white man. it is the universal practice of both sexes to grease themselves all over with butter produced from goat's milk, which makes the skin smooth, and gives it a shining appearance. this is usually renewed every day: when neglected, the skin becomes rough, greyish, and extremely ugly. they usually sleep under cover at night, but sometimes, in the hottest weather, they will lie exposed to the night air, with little or no covering, notwithstanding that the fog, which rises from the river, descends like dew, and, in fact, at that season supplies the want of rain. all the males of timbuctoo have an incision on their faces from the top of the forehead down to the nose, from which proceed other lateral incisions over the eyebrows, into all of which is inserted a blue dye, produced from a kind of ore, which is found in the neighbouring mountains. the women have also incisions on their faces, but in a different fashion; the lines being from two to five in number, cut on each cheek bone, from the temple straight down; they are also stained with blue. these incisions being made on the faces of both sexes when they are about twelve months old, the dyeing material, which is inserted in them, becomes scarcely visible as they grow up. with the exception of the king and queen, and their immediate companions, who had a change of dress about once a week, the people are in general very dirty, sometimes not washing themselves for twelve or fourteen days together. besides the queen, who, as has been already stated, wore a profusion of ivory and bone ornaments in her hair, some of a square shape, and others about as thick as a shilling, but rather smaller, strings of which she also wore about her wrists and ankles; many of the women were decorated in a similar manner, and they seemed to consider hardly any favour too great to be conferred on the person who would make them a present of these precious ornaments. gold ear-rings were much worn, some of the women had also rings on their fingers, but these appeared to adams to be of brass; and as many of the latter had letters upon them, he concluded, both from this circumstance and from their workmanship, that they were not made by the negroes, but obtained from the moorish traders. the ceremony of marriage amongst the upper ranks at timbuctoo is, for the bride to go in the day-time to the king's house, and to remain there until after sunset, when the man who is to be her husband goes to fetch her away. this is usually followed by a feast the same night, and a dance. adams did not observe what ceremonies were used in the marriages of the lower classes. as it is common to have several concubines besides a wife, the women are continually quarrelling and fighting; there is, however, a marked difference in the degree of respect with which they are treated by the husband, the wife always having a decided pre-eminence. the negroes, however, appeared to adams to be jealous and severe with all their women, frequently beating them apparently for very little cause. the women appear to suffer very little from child-birth, and they will be seen walking about as usual the day after such an event. it is their practice to grease a child all over soon after its birth, and to expose it for about an hour to the sun. the infants at first are of a reddish colour, but become black in three or four days. illicit intercourse appeared to be but little regarded amongst the lower orders, and chastity among the women in general seemed to be preserved only so far as their situations or circumstances rendered it necessary for their personal safety or convenience. in the higher ranks, if a woman prove with child, the man is punished with slavery, unless he will take the woman for his wife, and maintain her. adams knew an instance of a young man, who, having refused to marry a woman by whom he had a child, was on that account condemned to slavery. he afterwards repented, but was not then permitted to retract his refusal, and was sent away to be sold. it does not appear that they have any public religion, as they have not any house of worship; no priest, and, as far as adams could discover, never meet together to pray. he had seen some of the negroes, who were circumcised; but he concluded that they had been in possession of the moors, or had been resident at sudenny. on this subject mr. dupuis says, "i cannot speak with any confidence of the religion of the negroes of timbuctoo; i have, however, certainly heard, and entertain little doubt, that many of the inhabitants are mahommedans; it is also generally believed in barbary, that there are mosques at timbuctoo; but, on the other hand, i am confident that the king is neither an arab nor a moor, especially as the traders, from whom i have collected these accounts, have been either the one or the other; and i might consequently presume, that, if they did give me erroneous information on any points, it would at least not be to the prejudice, both of their national self-conceit, and of the credit and honour of their religion." the only ceremony which adams saw, that appeared like the act of prayer, was on the occasion of the death of any of the inhabitants, when the relatives assembled and sat round the corpse. the burial is not attended with any ceremony whatever; the deceased are buried in the clothes in which they die, at a small distance to the south-west of the town. their only physicians are old women, who cure diseases and wounds by the application of simples. adams had a wen on the back of his right hand, the size of a large egg, which one of the women cured in about a month, by rubbing it and applying a plaster of herbs. they cure the tooth-ache by the application of a liquid prepared from roots, which frequently causes not only the defective tooth to fall out, but one or two of the others. on referring to the notes of mr. dupuis on the subject of the cures performed by the negro women, we read, "i may take this opportunity of observing that he (adams) recounted, at mogadore, several stories of the supernatural powers or charms possessed by some of the negroes, and which practised both, defensively to protect their own persons from harm, and offensively against their enemies. of these details i do not remember more than the following circumstance, which, i think, he told me happened in his presence:-- "a negro slave, the property of a desert arab, having been threatened by his master with severe punishment, for some offence, defied his power to hurt him, in consequence of a charm by which he was protected. upon this the arab seized a gun, which he loaded with a ball, and fired at only a few paces distant from the negro's breast; but the negro, instead of being injured by the shot, stooped to the ground and picked up the ball, which had fallen inoffensive at his feet." it seems strange that adams should have omitted their extraordinary stories in his narrative; for he frequently expressed to mr. dupuis a firm belief, that the negroes were capable of injuring their enemies by witchcraft; and he once pointed out to him a slave at mogadore, of whom on that account he stood particularly in awe. he doubtless imbibed this belief, and learned the other absurd stories, which he related, from the arabs, some of whom profess to be acquainted with the art themselves, and all of whom are, it is believed, firmly persuaded of its existence, and of the peculiar proficiency of the negroes in it. it is perhaps not unreasonable to suppose, that having found his miraculous stories, and his belief in witchcraft discredited and laughed at, both at mogadore and cadiz, adams should have at length grown ashamed of repeating them, and even outlived his superstitious credulity. this solitary instance of suppression may rather be considered as a proof of his good sense, and as the exercise of a very allowable discretion, than as evidence of an artfulness, of which not a trace had been detected in any other part of his conduct. dancing is the principal and favourite amusement of the natives of timbuctoo; it takes place about once a week in the town, when a hundred dancers or more assemble, men, women, and children, but the greater number are men. whilst they are engaged in the dance, they sing extremely loud to the music of the tambourine, fife, and bandera, [*] so that the noise they make, may be heard all over the town; they dance in a circle, and when this amusement continues till the night, generally round a fire. their usual time of beginning is about two hours before sunset, and the dance not unfrequently lasts all night. the men have the most of the exercise in these sports while daylight lasts, the women continuing nearly in one spot, and the men dancing to and from them. during this time, the dance is conducted with some decency, but when night approaches, and the women take a more active part in the amusement, their thin and short dresses, and the agility of their actions are little calculated to admit of the preservation of any decorum. the following was the nature of the dance; six or seven men joining hands, surrounded one in the centre of the ring, who was dressed in a ludicrous manner, wearing a large black wig stuck full of kowries. this man at intervals repeated verses, which, from the astonishment and admiration expressed at them by those in the ring, appeared to be extempore. two performers played on the outside of the ring, one on a large drum, the other on the bandera. the singer in the ring was not interrupted during his recitations, but at the end of every verse, the instruments struck up, and the whole party joined in loud chorus, dancing round the man in the circle, stooping to the ground, and throwing up their legs alternately. towards the end of the dance, the man in the middle of the ring was released from his enclosure, and danced alone, occasionally reciting verses, whilst the other dancers begged money from the by-standers. [footnote: the bandera is made of several cocoa-nut shells, tied together with thongs of goat-skin, and covered with the same material; a hole at the top of the instrument is covered with strings of leather, or tendons, drawn tightly across it, on which the performer plays with the fingers, in the manner of a guitar.] it has been already stated, that adams could not form any idea of the population of timbuctoo, but on one occasion he saw as many as two-thousand assembled at one place. this happened when a party of five hundred men were going out to make war on bambarra [*]. the day after their departure, they were followed by a great number of slaves, dromedaries, and heiries laden with previsions. such of these people as afterwards returned, came back in parties of forty or fifty; many of them did not return at all whilst adams remained at timbuctoo; but he never heard that any of them had been killed. [footnote: this statement, which is in opposition to the usual opinion, that timbuctoo is a dependency of bambarra, receives some corroboration from a passage in isaaco's journal (p. .), where a prince of timbuctoo is accused by the king of sego, of having, either personally, or by his people, plundered two bambarra caravans, and taken both merchandise and slaves.] about once a month, a party of a hundred or more armed men marched out in a similar manner, to procure slaves. these armed parties were all on foot, except the officers; they were usually absent from one week to a month, and at times brought in considerable numbers. the slaves were generally a different race of people from those of timbuctoo, and differently clothed, their dress being for the most part of coarse white linen or cotton. he once saw amongst them a woman, who had her teeth filed round, it was supposed, by way of ornament, and as they were very long, they resembled crow quills. the greatest number of slaves that adams recollects to have seen brought in at one time, were about twenty, and these, he was informed, were from a place called bambarra, lying to the southward and westward of timbuctoo, which he understood to be the country, whither the aforesaid parties generally went out in quest of them. the negro slaves brought to barbary from timbuctoo appear to be of various nations, many of them distinguished by the make of their persons and features, as well as by their language. mr. dupuis recollects an unusually tall stout negress at mogadore, whose master assured him that she belonged to a populous nation of cannibals. he does not know whether the fact was sufficiently authenticated, but it is certain that the woman herself declared it, adding some revolting accounts of her own feasts on human flesh. adams never saw any individual put to death at timbuctoo, the punishment for heavy offences being generally slavery; for slighter misdemeanours, the offenders are punished with beating with a stick; but in no case is this punishment very severe, seldom exceeding two dozen blows, with a stick of the thickness of a small walking-cane. the infrequency of the punishment of death in a community, which counts human life amongst its most valuable objects of trade, is not, however, very surprising; and considerable influence must be conceded to the operation of self-interest, as well as to the feelings of humanity, in accounting for this merciful feature, if it be indeed merciful, in the criminal code of the negroes of soudan. during the whole of the residence of adams at timbuctoo, he never saw any other moors than those whom he accompanied thither, and the ten by whom they were ransomed; and he understood from the moors themselves, that they were not allowed to go in large bodies to timbuctoo. this statement bears on the face of it a certain degree of improbability; but it loses that character when it is considered that timbuctoo, although it is become, in consequence of its frontier situation, the port, as it were, of the caravans from the north, which could not return across the desert the same season, if they were to penetrate deeper into soudan, is yet, with respect to the trade itself, probably only the point whence it diverges to houssa, tuarick, &c. on the east, and to walet, jinnie, and sego, on the west and south, and not the mart where the merchandise of the caravans is sold in detail. such moors, therefore, as did not return to barbary with the returning caravan, but remained in soudan until the following season, might be expected to follow their trade to the larger marts of the interior, and to return to timbuctoo only to meet the next winter's caravans. adams arriving at timbuctoo in february, and departing in june, might therefore miss both the caravans themselves and the traders, who remained behind in soudan; and, on the same principle, park might find moors carrying on an active trade in the summer at sansanding, and yet there might not be one at timbuctoo. adams never proceeded to the southward of timbuctoo, further than about two miles from the town, to the mountains before spoken of; he never saw the river joliba or niger, though he had heard mention made of it. he was told at tudenny, that the river lay between that place and bambarra. this apparently unimportant passage, affords on examination a strong presumption in favour of the truth and simplicity of this part of adams' narrative. in the course of his examinations, almost every new inquirer questioned him respecting the joliba or niger, and he could not fail to observe, that because he had been at timbuctoo, he was expected, as a matter of course, either to have seen, or at least frequently to have heard of that celebrated river. adams, however, fairly admitted that he knew nothing about it, and notwithstanding the surprise of many of his examiners, he could not be brought to acknowledge that he had heard the name even once mentioned at timbuctoo. all that he recollected was, that a river joliba had been spoken of at tudenny, where it was described as lying in the direction of bambarra. they who recollect major rennell's remarks respecting the niger, in his geographical illustrations, will not be much surprised that adams should not hear of the joliba, from the natives of timbuctoo. at that point of its course, the river is doubtless known by another name, and if the joliba were spoken of at all, it would probably be accompanied, as adams states, with some mention of bambarra, which may be presumed to be the last country eastward, in which the niger retains its mandingo name. chapter xi. the ten moors who had arrived with the five camels laden with tobacco, had been three weeks at timbuctoo, before adams learnt that the ransom of himself, the boy, and the moors, his former companions, had been agreed upon. at the end of the first week, he was given to understand, that himself and the boy would be released, but that the moors would be condemned to die; it appeared however afterwards, that in consideration of all the tobacco being given for the moors, except about fifty pounds weight, which was expended for a man slave, the king had agreed to release all the prisoners. two days after their release, the whole party consisting of the ten moorish traders, fourteen moorish prisoners, two white men and one slave quitted timbuctoo, having only the five camels, which belonged to the traders; those which were seized when adams and his party were made prisoners, not having been restored. as they had no means left of purchasing any other article, the only food they took with them was a little guinea corn flour. on quitting the town they proceeded in an easterly course, inclining to the north, going along the border of the river, of which they sometimes lost sight for two days together. except the two mountains before spoken of to the southward, between which the river runs, there are none in the immediate neighbourhood of timbuctoo, but at a little distance there are some small ones. they had travelled eastward about ten days, at the rate of about fifteen or eighteen miles a day, when they saw the river for the last time; it then appeared rather narrower than at timbuctoo. they then loaded the camels with water, and striking off in a northerly direction, travelled twelve or thirteen days at about the same pace. at the end of this time they arrived at a place called tudenny, or taudenny, a large village inhabited by moors and negroes, in which there are four wells of very excellent water. in this place there are large ponds or beds of salt, which both the moors and negroes come in great numbers to purchase; in the neighbourhood the ground is cultivated in the same manner as at timbuctoo. from the number of moors, many, if not all of whom, were residents, it appeared that the restriction respecting them, which was in force at timbuctoo, did not extend to tudenny. the moors here are perfectly black, the only personal distinction between them and the negroes being, that the moors had long black hair, and had no scars on their faces. the negroes are in general marked in the same manner as those of timbuctoo. here the party stayed fourteen days to give the ransomed moors, whose long confinement had made them weak, time to recruit their strength; and having sold one of the camels for two sacks of dates and a small ass, and loaded the four remaining camels with water, the dates and the flour, they set out to cross the desert, taking a north-west direction. they commenced their journey from tudenny about four o'clock in the morning, and having travelled the first day about twenty miles, they unloaded the camels, and laid down by the side of them to sleep. the next day they entered the desert, over which they continued to travel in the same direction nine and twenty days, without meeting a single human being. the whole way was a sandy plain like the sea, without either tree, shrub or grass. after travelling in this manner about fourteen days, at the rate of sixteen or eighteen miles a day, the people began to grow very weak; their stock of water began to run short, and their provisions were nearly exhausted. the ass died of fatigue, and its carcass was immediately cut up and laden on the camel, where it dried in the sun, and served for food, and had it not been for this supply, some of the party must have died of hunger. being asked if ass's flesh was good eating, adams replied, "it was as good to my taste then, as a goose would be now." in six days afterwards, during which their pace was slackened to not more than twelve miles a day, they arrived at a place, where it was expected water would be found; but to their great disappointment, owing to the dryness of the season, the hollow place, of about thirty yards in circumference, was found quite dry. all their stock of water at this time consisted of four goat-skins, and those not full, holding from one to two gallons each; and it was known to the moors, that they had then ten days further to travel before they could obtain a supply. in this distressing dilemma it was resolved to mix the remaining water with camels' urine. the allowance of this mixture to each camel was only about a quart for the whole ten days; each man was allowed not more than about half a pint a day. the moors, who had been in confinement at timbuctoo, becoming every day weaker, three of them in the four following days lay down, unable to proceed. they were then placed upon the camels, but continual exposure to the excessive heat of the sun, and the uneasy motion of the animals, soon rendered them unable to support themselves; and towards the end of the second day, they made another attempt to pursue their journey on foot, but could not. the following morning at day-break, they were found dead on the sand, in the place where they had lain down at night, and were left behind, without being buried. the next day, another of them lay down, and, like his late unfortunate companions, was left to perish; but on the following day, one of the moors determined to remain behind, in the hope that he, who had dropped the day before, might still come up, and be able to follow the party; some provisions were left with him. at this time it was expected, what proved to be the fact, that they were within a day's march of their town, but neither of the men ever after made his appearance, and adams has no doubt that they perished. vled duleim, the name of the place at which they now arrived, was a village of tents, inhabited entirely by moors, who, from their dress, manners, and general appearance, seemed to be of the same tribe as those of the encampment to which adams was conveyed from el gazie. they had numerous flocks of sheep and goats, and two watering places, near one of which their tents were pitched, but the other lay nearly five miles off. vled, or woled d'leim, is the douar of a tribe of arabs inhabiting the eastern parts of the desert, from the latitude of about twenty degrees north to the tropic. they are a tribe of great extent and power, inhabiting detached fertile spots of land, where they find water and pasturage for their flocks, but are very ignorant of the commonest principles of agriculture. they are an extremely fine race of men, their complexion very dark, almost as black as that of the negroes. they have straight hair, which they wear in large quantities, aqueline noses, and large eyes. their behaviour is haughty and insolent, speaking with fluency and energy, and appearing to have great powers of rhetoric. their arms are javelins and swords. the first fortnight after the arrival of the party was devoted to their recovery from the fatigues of the journey; but as soon as their strength was re-established, adams and his companion were employed in taking care of goats and sheep. having now begun to acquire a knowledge of the moorish tongue, they frequently urged their masters to take them to suerra, which the latter promised they would do, provided they continued attentive to their duty. things, however, remained in this state for ten or eleven days, during which time they were continually occupied in tending the flocks of the moors. they suffered severely from exposure to the scorching sun, in a state almost of utter nakedness, and the miseries of their situation were aggravated by despair of ever being released from slavery. the only food allowed to them was barley-flour and camels' and goats' milk; of the latter, however, they had abundance. sometimes they were treated with a few dates, which were a great rarity, there being neither date-trees, nor trees of any other kind, in the whole of the country round. but as the flocks of goats and sheep consisted of a great number, from one hundred and fifty to two hundred, and as they were at a distance from the town, adams and his companion sometimes ventured to kill a kid for their own eating, and to prevent discovery of the fire used in cooking it, they dug a cave, in which a fire was made, covering the ashes with grass and sand. at length, adams, after much reflection on the miserable state in which he had been so long kept, and was likely to pass the remainder of his life, determined to remonstrate upon the subject. his master, whose name was hamet laubed, frankly replied to him, that as he had not been successful in procuring slaves, it was now his intention to keep him, and not, as he had before led him to expect, to take him to suerra or mogadore. upon hearing this, adams resolved not to attend any longer to the duty of watching the goats and sheep; and in consequence, the following day, several of the young goats were found to have been killed by the foxes. this led to an inquiry, whether adams or the boy was in fault, when it appearing that the missing goats were a part of adams' flock, his master proceeded to beat him with a thick stick; he, however, resisted, and took away the stick, upon which a dozen moors, principally women, attacked him, and gave him a severe beating. as, notwithstanding what had occurred, adams persisted in his determination not to resume his task of tending the goats and sheep, his master was advised to put him to death, but this he was not inclined to do, observing to his advisers, that he should thereby sustain a loss, and that if adams would not work, it would be better to sell him. in the mean time, he remained idle in the tent for three days, when he was asked by his master's wife if he would go to the distant well, to fetch a couple of skins of water, it being of a better quality; to which he signified his consent, and went off the next morning on a camel, with two skins to fetch the water. on his arrival at the other well, instead of procuring water, he determined to make his escape; and understanding that the course to a place called wadinoon lay in a direction to the northward of west, he passed the well, and pushing on in a northerly course, travelled the whole of that day, when the camel, which had been used to rest at night, and had not been well broken in, would not proceed any further, and in spite of all the efforts adams could make, it lay down with fatigue, having gone upwards of twenty miles without stopping. finding there was not any remedy, adams took off the rope, with which his clothes were fastened round his body, and as the camel lay with his fore knee bent, he tied the rope round it in a way to prevent its rising, and then laid down by the side of it. this rope, which adams had brought from timbuctoo, was made of grass, collected on the banks of the river. the next morning, at daylight, he mounted again, and pushed on till about nine o'clock, when he perceived some smoke in advance of him, which he approached. there was a small hillock between him and this place, ascending which, he discovered about forty or fifty tents pitched, and on looking back, he saw two camels coming towards him, with a rider on each. not knowing whether these were in pursuit of him, or strangers going to the place in view, but being greatly alarmed, he made the best of his way forward. on drawing near to the town, a number of women came out, and he observed about a hundred moors standing in a row, in the act of prayer, having their faces towards the east, and at times kneeling down, and leaning their heads to the ground. on the women discovering adams, they expressed great surprise at seeing a white man. he inquired of them the name of the place, and they told him it was hilla gibla. soon afterwards the two camels, before spoken of, arriving, the rider of one of them proved to be the owner of the camel on which adams had escaped, and the other his master. at this time adams was sitting under a tent, speaking to the governor, whose name was mahomet, telling him his story; they were soon joined by his two pursuers, accompanied by a crowd of people. upon his master claiming him, adams protested that he would not go back; that his master had frequently promised to take him to suerra, but had broken his promises, and that he had made up his mind either to obtain his liberty or die. upon hearing both sides, the governor determined in favour of adams, and gave his master to understand, that if he was willing to exchange him for a bushel of dates and a camel, he should have them; but if not, he should have nothing. as adams' master did not approve of these conditions, a violent altercation arose, but at length, finding the governor determined, and that better terms were not to be had, he accepted the first offer, and adams became the slave of mahomet. the natives of hilla gibla or el kabla, appeared to be better clothed, and a less savage race than those of woled d'leim, between whom there appeared to be great enmity. the governor, therefore, readily interfered in favour of adams, and at one time threatened to take away the camel, and to put mahomet laubed to death. another consideration by which the governor was probably influenced, was a knowledge of the value of a christian slave, as an object of ransom, of which mahomet laubed seemed to be wholly ignorant. on entering the service of his new master, adams was sent to tend camels, and had been so employed about a fortnight, when this duty was exchanged for that of taking care of goats. mahomet had two wives, who dwelt in separate tents, one of them an old woman, the other a young one; the goats which adams was appointed to take care of, were the property of the elder one. some days after he had been so employed, the younger wife, whose name was isha, or aisha, proposed to him that he should also take charge of her goats, for which she would remunerate him, and as there was no more trouble in tending two flocks than one, he readily consented. having had charge of the two flocks for several days, without receiving the promised additional reward, he at length remonstrated, and after some negotiation on the subject of his claim, the matter was compromised by the young woman's desiring him, when he returned from tending the goats at night, to go to rest in her tent. it was the custom of mahomet, to sleep two nights with the elder woman, and one with the other, and this was one of the nights devoted to the former. adams accordingly kept the appointment, and about nine o'clock aisha came and gave him supper, and he remained in her tent all night. this was an arrangement which was afterwards continued on those nights, which she did not pass with her husband. things continued in this state for about six months, and as his work was light, and he experienced nothing but kind treatment, his time passed pleasantly enough. one night his master's son coming into the tent, discovered adams with his mother-in-law, and informed his father, when a great disturbance took place; but upon the husband charging his wife with her misconduct, she protested that adams had laid down in her tent without her knowledge or consent, and as she cried bitterly, the old man appeared to be convinced that she was not to blame. the old lady, however, declared her belief that the young one was guilty, and expressed her conviction that she should be able to detect her at some future time. for some days after, adams kept away from the lady, but at the end of that time, the former affair appearing to be forgotten, he resumed his visits. one night, the old woman lifted up the corner of the tent, and discovered adams with aisha, and having reported it to her husband, he came with a thick stick, threatening to put him to death. adams being alarmed, made his escape, and the affair having made a great deal of noise, an acquaintance proposed to adams to conceal him in his tent, and to endeavour to buy him off the governor. some laughed at the adventure; others, and they by far the greater part, treated the matter as an offence of the most atrocious nature, adams being "a christian, who never prayed." as his acquaintance promised, in the event of becoming a purchaser, to take him to wadinoon, adams adopted his advice, and concealed himself in his tent. for several days, the old governor rejected every overture, but at last he agreed to part with adams for fifty dollars worth of goods, consisting of blankets and dates, and thus he became the property of boerick, a trader, whose usual residence was at el kabla. the frail one ran away to her mother. the next day boerick set out with a party of six men and four camels, for a place called, according to the phraseology of adams, villa de bousbach, but the real name of which was woled aboussebah, which they reached after travelling nine days at the rate of about eighteen miles a day, directing their course to the north-east. on their route they saw neither houses nor trees, but the ground was covered with grass and shrubs. at this place they found about forty or fifty tents, inhabited by the moors, and remained five or six days; when there, a moor, named abdallah houssa, a friend of boerick, arrived from a place called hieta mouessa ali, who informed him that it was usual for the british consul at mogadore, to send to wadinoon, where this man resided, to purchase the christians who were prisoners in that country, and that as he was about to proceed thither, he was willing to take charge of adams, to sell him for account of boerick; at the same time, he informed adams that there were other christians at wadinoon. this being agreed to by boerick, his friend set out in a few days after for hieta mouessa ali, taking adams with him. instead, however, of going to that place, which lay due north, they proceeded north-north-west, and as they had a camel each, and travelled very fast, the path being good, they went at the rate of twenty-five miles a day, and in six days reached a place called villa adrialla, [*] where there were about twenty tents. this place appeared to be inhabited entirely by traders, who had at least five hundred camels, a great number of goats and sheep, and a few horses. the cattle were tended by negro slaves. here they remained about three weeks, until abdallah had finished his business, and then set out for hieta mouessa ali, where they arrived in three days. adams believed that the reason of their travelling so fast during the last stage was, that abdallah was afraid of being robbed, of which he seemed to have no apprehension after he had arrived at villa adrialla, and therefore they travelled from that place to hieta mouessa ali, at the rate of only about sixteen or eighteen miles a day; their course being due north-west. [footnote: it is the opinion of mr. dupuis, that this place should be written _woled adrialla_, but he has no knowledge of it.] hieta mouessa ali was the largest place which adams saw, in which there were no houses, there being not less than a hundred tents. there was here a small brook issuing from a mountain, being the only one he had seen except that at soudenny; but the vegetation was not more abundant than at other places. they remained here about a month, during which adams was as usual employed in tending camels. as the time hung very heavy on his hands, and he saw no preparation for their departure for wadinoon, and his anxiety to reach that place had been very much excited, by the intelligence that there were other christians there, he took every opportunity of making inquiry respecting the course and distance; and being at length of opinion that he might find his way thither, he one evening determined to desert, and accordingly he set out foot alone, with a small supply of dried goats' flesh, relying upon getting a further supply at the villages, which he understood were on the road. he had travelled the whole of that night, and until about noon the next day, without stopping, when he was overtaken by a party of three or four men on camels, who had been sent in pursuit of him. it seems they expected that adams had been persuaded to leave hieta mouessa ali, by some persons who wished to take him to wadinoon for sale, and they were therefore greatly pleased to find him on foot and alone. instead of ill treating him as he apprehended they would do, they merely conducted him back to hieta mouessa ali, from whence in three or four days afterwards abdallah and a small party departed, taking him with them. they travelled five days in a north-west direction at about sixteen miles a day, and at the end of the fifth day, reached wadinoon. having seen no habitations on their route, except a few scattered tents within a day's journey of that town. the inhabitants of wadinoon are descended from the tribe woled aboussebah, and owe their independence to its support, for the arabs of aboussebah being most numerous on the northern confines of the desert, present a barrier to the extension of the emperor of morocco's dominion in that direction. they have frequent wars with their southern and eastern neighbours, though without any important results; the sterility of the soil throughout the whole of the region of sand, affording little temptation to its inhabitants to dispossess each other of their territorial possessions. chapter xii. wadinoon or wednoon, was the first place at which adams had seen houses after he quitted tudenny. it is a small town, consisting of about forty houses and some tents. the former are built chiefly of clay, intermixed with stone in some parts, and several of them have a story above the ground-floor. the soil in the neighbourhood of the town was better cultivated than any he had yet seen in africa, and appeared to produce plenty of corn and tobacco. there were also date and fig trees in the vicinity, as well as a few grapes, apples, pears, and pomegranates. prickly pears flourished in great abundance. the christians whom adams had heard of, whilst residing at hieta mouessa ali, and whom he found at wadinoon, proved to be, to his great satisfaction, his old companions, stephen dolbie the mate, and james davison and thomas williams, two of the seamen of the charles. they informed him, that they had been in that town upwards of twelve months, and that they were the property of the sons of the governor. soon after the arrival of adams at wadinoon, abdallah offered him for sale to the governor or sheik, called amedallah salem, who consented to take him upon trial; but after remaining a week at the governor's house, adams was returned to his old master, as the parties could not agree upon the price. he was at length, however, sold to belcassam abdallah for seventy dollars in trade, payable in blankets, gunpowder, and dates. the only other white resident at wadinoon was a frenchman, who informed adams that he had been wrecked about twelve years before on the neighbouring coast, and that the whole of the crew, except himself, had been redeemed. this man had turned mahommedan, and was named absalom; he had a wife and child and three slaves, and gained a good living by the manufacture of gunpowder. he lived in the same house as the person who had been his master, and who, upon his renouncing his religion, gave him his liberty. among the negro slaves at wadinoon was a woman, who said she came from a place called kanno, (cano?) a long way across the desert, and that she had seen in her own country white men, as white as "bather," meaning the wall, and in a large boat, with two high sticks in it, with cloth upon them, and that they rowed this boat in a manner different from the custom of the negroes, who use paddles; in stating this, she made the motion of rowing with oars, so as to leave no doubt that she had seen a vessel in the european fashion, manned by white people. the work in which adams was employed at wadinoon, was building walls, cutting down shrubs to make fences, or working on the corn lands, or on the plantations of tobacco, of which a great quantity is grown in the neighbourhood. it was in the month of august that he arrived there, as he was told by the frenchman before spoken of; the grain had been gathered, but the tobacco was then getting in, at which he was required to assist. his labour at this place was extremely severe. on the moorish sabbath, which was also their market-day, the christian slaves were not required to labour, unless on extraordinary occasions, when there was any particular work to do, which could not be delayed. in these intervals of repose, they had opportunity of meeting and conversing together, and adams had the melancholy consolation of finding that the lot of his companions had been even more severe than his own. it appeared that, on their arrival, the frenchman before mentioned, from some unexplained motive, had advised them to refuse to work, and the consequence was, that they had been cruelly beaten and punished, and had been made to work and live hard, their only scanty food being barley flour and indian corn flour. however, on extraordinary occasions, and as a great indulgence, they sometimes obtained a few dates. in this wretched manner adams and his fellow-captives lived until the june following, when a circumstance occurred, which had nearly cost the former his life. his master's son, hameda bel cossim, having one sabbath-day ordered adams to take the horse and go to plough, the latter refused to obey him, urging that it was not the custom of any slaves to work on the sabbath-day, and that he was entitled to the same indulgence as the rest. upon which hameda went into the house and fetched a cutlass, and then demanded of adams, whether he would go to plough or not. upon his replying that he would not, hameda struck him on the forehead with the cutlass, and gave him a severe wound over the right eye, and immediately knocked him down with his fist. this was no sooner done, than adams was set upon by a number of moors, who beat him with sticks in so violent a manner, that the blood came out of his mouth, two of his double teeth were knocked out, and he was almost killed; it was his opinion that they would have entirely killed him, had it not been for the interference of boadick, the sheik's son, who reproached them for their cruelty, declaring that they had no right to compel adams to work on a market-day. the next day hameda's mother, named moghtari, came to him, and asked him how he dared to lift his hand against a moor? to which adams, driven to desperation by the ill treatment he had received, replied, that he would even take his life, if it were in his power. moghtari then said, that unless he would kiss hameda's hands and feet, he should be put in irons, which he peremptorily refused to do. soon after. hameda's father came to adams, and told him, that unless he did kiss his son's feet and hands, he must be put in irons. adams then stated to him, that he could not submit to do so; that it was contrary to his religion to kiss the hands and feet of any person; that in his own country he had never been required to do it; and that, whatever might be the consequence, he would not do it. finding he would not submit, the old man ordered that he should be put in irons, and accordingly they fastened his feet together with iron chains, and did the same by his hands. after he had remained in this state about ten days, moghtari came to him again, urging him to do as required, and declaring that, if he did not, he should never see the christian country again. adams, however, persevered in turning a deaf ear to her entreaties and threats. some time afterwards, finding that confinement was destructive of his health, hameda came to him, and took the irons from his hands. the following three weeks, he remained with the irons on his legs, during which time, repeated and pressing entreaties, and the most dreadful threats were used to induce him to submit; but all to no purpose. he was also frequently advised by the mate and the other christians, who used to be sent to him, for the purpose of persuading him to submit, as he must otherwise inevitably lose his life. at length, finding that neither threats nor entreaties would avail, and adams having remained in irons from june to the beginning of august, and his sufferings having reduced him almost to a skeleton, his master was advised to sell him; for, if longer confined, he would certainly die, and thereby prove a total loss. influenced by this consideration, his master at last determined to release him from his confinement; but, although very weak, the moment he was liberated, he was set to gathering in the corn. about a week afterwards, dolbie, the mate, fell sick. adams had called to see him, when dolbie's master, named brahim, a son of the sheik, ordered him to get up and go to work, and upon dolbie declaring that he was unable, brahim beat him with a stick, to compel him to go; but as he still did not obey, brahim threatened that he would kill him; and upon dolbie's replying, that he had better do so at once than kill him by inches, brahim stabbed him in the side with his dagger, and he died in a few minutes. as soon as he was dead, he was taken by some slaves a short distance from the town, where a hole was dug, into which he was thrown without ceremony. as the grave was not deep, and as it frequently happened that corpses after burial were dug out of the ground by the foxes, adams and his two surviving companions went the next day and covered the grave with stones. as the moors were constantly urging them to become mahommedans, and they were unceasingly treated with the greatest brutality, the fortitude of williams and davison being exhausted, they at last unhappily consented to renounce their religion, and were circumcised; by this means they obtained their liberty, after which they were presented with a horse, a musket, and a blanket each, and permitted to marry; no christian being allowed, at any place inhabited by moors, to take a wife, or to cohabit with a moorish woman. as adams was now the only remaining christian at wadinoon, he became in a more especial manner an object of the derision and persecution of the moors, who were constantly upbraiding and reviling him, and telling him that his soul would be lost, unless he became a mahommedan, insomuch that his life was becoming intolerable. mr. dupuis, speaking of the conduct which adams received from the moors, says, "i can easily believe adams' statement of the brutal treatment he experienced at wadinoon. it is consistent with the accounts i have always heard of the people of that country, who i believe to be more bigoted and cruel than even the remoter inhabitants of the desert. in the frequent instances which have come under my observation, the general effect of the treatment of the arabs on the minds of the christian captives, has been most deplorable. on the first arrival of these unfortunate men at mogadore, if they have been any considerable time in slavery, they appear lost to reason and feeling, their spirits broken, and their whole faculties sunk in a species of stupor, which i am unable adequately to describe. habited like the meanest arabs of the desert, they appear degraded even below the negro slave. the succession of hardships, which they endure, from the caprice and tyranny of their purchasers, without any protecting law to which they can appeal for alleviation or redress, seems to destroy every spring of exertion or hope in their minds; they appear indifferent to every thing around them; abject, servile, and brutified." "adams alone was, in some respects, an exception from this description. i do not recollect any ransomed christian slave, who discovered a greater elasticity of spirit, or who sooner recovered from the indifference and stupor here described." it is to be remarked, that the christian captives are invariably worse treated than the idolatrous or pagan slaves, whom the arabs, either by theft or purchase, bring from the interior of africa, and that religious bigotry is the chief cause of this distinction. the zealous disciples of mahomet consider the negroes merely as ignorant, unconverted beings, upon whom, by the act of enslaving them, they are conferring a benefit, by placing them within reach of instruction in "the true belief;" and the negroes, having no hopes of ransom, and being often enslaved when children, are in general, soon converted to the mahommedan faith. the christians, on the contrary, are looked upon as hardened infidels, and as deliberate despisers of the prophet's call; and as they in general steadfastly reject the mahommedan creed, and at least never embrace it, whilst they have hopes of ransom; the moslim, consistently with the spirit of many passages in the koran, views them with the bitterest hatred, and treats them with every insult and cruelty which a merciless bigotry can suggest. it is not to be understood that the christian slaves, though generally ill treated and inhumanly worked by their arab owners, are persecuted by them ostensibly on account of their religion. they, on the contrary, often encourage the christians to resist the importunities of those who wish to convert them; for, by embracing islamism, the christian slave obtains his freedom, and however ardent may be the zeal of the arab to make proselytes, it seldom blinds him to the calculations of self-interest. three days after williams and davison had renounced their religion, a letter was received from mr. dupuis, addressed to the christian prisoners at wadinoon, under cover to the governor, in which the consul, after exhorting them most earnestly not to give up their religion, whatever might befal them, assured them that within a month, he should be able to procure their liberty. davison heard the letter read, apparently without emotion, but williams became so agitated that he let it drop out of his hands, and burst into a flood of tears. from this time, adams experienced no particular ill treatment, but he was required to work as usual. about a month more elapsed, when the man who brought the letter, and who was a servant of the british consul, disguised as a trader, made known to adams that he had succeeded in procuring his release, and the next day they set out together for mogadore. on quitting wadinoon, they proceeded in a northerly direction, travelling on mules at the rate of thirty miles a day, and in fifteen days arrived at mogadore. here adams remained eight months with mr. dupuis. america and england being then at war, it was found difficult to procure for adams a conveyance to his native country; he therefore obtained a passage on board a vessel bound to cadiz, where he remained about fourteen months as servant or groom, in the service of mr. hall, an english merchant there. peace having been in the mean time restored, adams was informed by the american consul, that he had now an opportunity of returning to his native country with a cartel, or transport of american seamen, which was on the point of sailing from gibraltar. he accordingly proceeded thither, but arrived two days after the vessel had sailed. soon afterwards he engaged himself on board a welsh brig, lying at gibraltar, in which he sailed to bilboa, whence the brig took a cargo of wool to bristol, and after discharging it there, was proceeding in ballast to liverpool; but having been driven into holyhead by contrary winds, adams there fell sick, and was put on shore. from this place he begged his way up to london, where he arrived completely destitute. he had slept two or three nights in the open streets, when he was accidentally met by a gentleman, who had seen him in mr. hall's service at cadiz, and was acquainted with his history, by whom he was directed to the office of the african association, through whose means his adventures were made known to the public. adams may be said to have been the first christian, who ever reached the far-famed city of timbuctoo, and it must be admitted that many attempts were made to throw a positive degree of discredit upon his narrative, and to consider it more the work of deep contrivance than of actual experience. it is certain that many difficulties present themselves in the narrative of adams, which cannot be reconciled with the discoveries subsequently made, but that cannot be argued as a reason for invalidating the whole of his narrative; especially when it is so amply and circumstantially confirmed by the inquiries which were set on foot by mr. dupuis, at the instigation of the african association, and the result of which was, a complete confirmation of all the circumstances, which adams chapter xiii. it is perhaps not the least of the many extraordinary circumstances attending the city of timbuctoo, that no two travellers agree in their account of it; and for this reason it is most difficult to decide, to whom the greatest credibility should be awarded, or, on the other hand, whether some of them, who pretend to have resided within its walls, ever visited it at all. the contradictions of the respective travellers are in many instances so gross, that it is scarcely possible to believe that the description, which they are then giving can apply to one and the same place, and therefore we are entitled to draw the inference, that some of them are practising on our credulity, and are making us the dupes of their imagination, rather than the subjects of their experience. the expectations of moorish magnificence were raised to a very high pitch, by some of the inflated accounts of the wealth and splendour of the great city of central africa; but these expectations were considerably abated by the description given of timbuctoo by adams and sidi hamet, a moorish merchant, who describes that city in the following terms:-- "timbuctoo is a very large city, five times as great as swearah (suera or mogadore). it is built in a level plain surrounded on all sides with hills, except on the south, where the plain continues to the bank of the same river, which is wide and deep, and runs to the east. we were obliged to go to it to water our camels, and there we saw many boats, made of great trees, some with negroes paddling in them across the river. the city is strongly walled in with stone laid in clay, like the towns and houses in suse, only a great deal thicker." the latter account is at total variance with both adams and caillie, who describe timbuctoo as a city having no walls, nor any thing resembling fortifications. "the house of the king is very large and high, like the largest house in mogadore, but built of the same materials as the walls. there are a great many more houses in the city, built of stone, _with shops on one side_, where they sell salt, the staple article, knives, blue cloth, haicks, and an abundance of other things, with many gold ornaments. the inhabitants are blacks, and the chief is a very large, grey-headed, old black man, who is called shegar, which means sultan or king. the principal part of the houses are made with large reeds, as thick as a man's arm, which stand upon their ends, and are covered with small reeds first, and then with the leaves of the date tree; they are round, and the tops come to a point, like a heap of stones. neither the shegar nor his people are moslem; but there is a town divided off from the principal one, in one corner by a strong partition wall, with one gate to it, which leads from the main town, like the jews' town or _millah_ in mogadore. all the moors or arabs, who have liberty to come into timbuctoo, are obliged to sleep in that part of it every night, or to go out of the city entirely. no stranger is allowed to enter that millah, without leaving his knife with the gate-keeper; but when he comes out in the morning, it is restored to him. the people who live in that part are all moslem. the negroes, bad arabs, and moors are all mixed together, and intermarry, as if they were all of one colour; they have no property of consequence, except a few asses; their gate is shut and fastened every night at dark, and very strongly guarded both by night and by day. the shegar or king is always guarded by one hundred men on mules, armed with good guns, and one hundred men on foot, with guns and long knives. he would not go into the millah, and we saw him only four or five times in the two moons we staid at timbuctoo, waiting for the caravan; but it had perished in the desert, neither did the yearly caravan arrive from tunis and tripoli, for it also had been destroyed." "the city of timbuctoo is very rich, as well as very large; it has four gates to it; all of them are opened in the day time, but very strongly guarded and shut at night. the negro women are very fat and handsome, and wear large round gold rings in their noses, and flat ones in their ears, and gold chains and amber beads about their necks, with images and white fish bones, bent round, and the ends fastened together, hanging down between their breasts; they have bracelets on their wrists and on their ankles, and go barefooted. i had bought a small snuff-box, filled with snuff, at morocco, and showed it to the women in the principal street of timbuctoo, which is very wide. there were a great number about me in a few minutes, and they insisted on buying my snuff and box; one made me an offer, and another made me another, until one, who wore richer ornaments than the rest, told me, in broken arabic, that she would take off all she had about her, and give them to me for the box and its contents. i agreed to accept them, and she pulled off her nose-rings and ear-rings, all her neck-chains, with their ornaments, and the bracelets from her wrists and ankles, and gave them to me in exchange for it. these ornaments would weigh more than a pound, and were made of solid gold at timbuctoo. i kept them through the whole of the journey afterwards, and carried them to my wife, who now wears a part of them." "timbuctoo carries on a great trade with all the caravans that come from morocco, and the shores of the mediterranean sea. from algiers, tunis, tripoli, &c. are brought all kinds of cloth, iron, salt, muskets, powder and lead swords or scimitars, tobacco, opium, spices and perfumes, amber beads, and other trinkets, with a few more articles. they carry back, in return, elephants' teeth, gold dust and wrought gold, gum-senegal, ostrich feathers, very curiously worked turbans, and slaves; a great many of the latter, and many other articles of less importance. the slaves are brought in from the south-west, all strongly ironed, and are sold very cheap, so that a good stout man may be bought for a haick, which costs in the empire of morocco about two dollars." "the caravans stop and encamp about two miles from the city, in a deep valley, and the negroes do not molest them. they bring their merchandize near the walls of the city, where the inhabitants purchase all their goods on exchange for the before-mentioned articles; not more than fifty men from any one caravan being allowed to enter the city at a time, and they must go out before others are permitted to enter. this city carries on a great trade with wassanah, a city far to the south-east, in all the articles that are brought to it by caravans, and gets returns in slaves, elephants' teeth, gold, &c. the principal male inhabitants are clothed with blue cloth shirts, that reach from their shoulders down to their knees, and are very wide, and girt about their loins with a red and brown cotton sash or girdle. they also hang about their bodies, pieces of different coloured cloth and silk handkerchiefs. the king is dressed in a white robe of a similar fashion, but covered with white and yellow gold and silver plates, that glitter in the sun. he has also many other shining ornaments of shells and stones hanging about him, he wears a pair of breeches like the moors and barbary jews, and has a kind of white turban on his head, pointing up, and strung with different kinds of ornaments. his feet are covered with red morocco shoes. he has no other weapon about him than a large white staff or sceptre, with a golden lion on the head of it, which he carries in his hand. his countenance is mild, and he seems to govern his subjects more like a father than a king. all but the king go bareheaded. the poor have only a single piece of blue or other cloth about them. the inhabitants are very numerous; i think six times as many as in swearah, besides arabs and other mahommedans in their millah or separate town, which must contain nearly as many people as there are altogether in swearah. [*] the women are clothed in a light shirt, or under-dress, and over it a green, red or blue covering, from the bosom to below the knees, the whole of them girt about their waists with a red girdle. they stain their cheeks and foreheads red or yellow on some occasions; and the married women wear a kind of hood on their heads, made of blue cloth or silk, and cotton handkerchiefs of different kinds and colours, and go barefooted." [footnote: swearah or mogadore is stated to contain above , souls, that is , moors and , jews. this calculation would make timbuctoo to contain , inhabitants. a statement which deserves little credit.] "the king and people of timbuctoo do not fear and worship god like the moslem, but like the people of soudan, they only pray once in twenty-four hours, when they see the moon, and when she is not seen, they do not pray at all. they cannot read nor write, but are honest. they circumcise their children, like the arabs. they have not any mosques, but dance every night, as the moors and arabs pray." "if however european expectation had been raised to an extraordinary height respecting the size, riches, and importance of timbuctoo, it was likely to be still more luxuriantly feasted with the description of another town of central africa, in comparison of which timbuctoo must appear as a city of a second rate, and which sidi hamet describes as being of the magnitude, that it took him a day to walk round it." "according to the statement of sidi hamet, he travelled with about two hundred moslem, to a large city called wassanah, a place he had never before heard of, nor which is to be found in any of the modern maps of africa. for the first six days, they travelled over a plain within sight of the joliba, in a direction a little to the south of east, till they came to a small town called bimbinah, where the river turned more to the south-east, by a high mountain to the east. they now left the river, and pursued a direction more to the southward, through a hilly and woody country for fifteen days, and then came to the river again. the route wound with the river for three days in a south-easterly direction, and then they had to climb over a very high ridge of mountains, thickly covered with very lofty trees, which took up six days; from the summit, a large chain of high mountains was seen to the westward. on descending from this ridge, they came immediately to the river's bank, where it was very narrow and full of rocks. for the next twelve days, they kept on in a direction generally south-east, but winding, with the river almost every day in sight, and crossed many small streams flowing into it. high mountains were plainly seen on the western side. they then came to a ferry, and beyond that travelled for fifteen days more, mostly in sight of the river, till at length after fifty-seven days travelling, not reckoning the halts, they reached wassanah." "this city stands near the bank of the joliba, which runs past it nearly south, between high mountains on both sides, _and is so wide that they could hardly distinguish a man on the other side_. the walls are very large, built of great stones much thicker and stronger than those of timbuctoo, with four gates. it took a day to walk round them. _the city has twice as many inhabitants as timbuctoo;_ [*] the principal people are well dressed, but all are negroes and kafirs. they have boats made of great trees hollowed out, which will hold from fifteen to twenty negroes, and in these they descend the river for three moons to the great water, and traffic with pale people who live in great boats, and have guns as big as their bodies." this great water is supposed to be the atlantic, and as the distance of three moons must not be less than two thousand five hundred miles, it has been supposed that the niger must communicate with the congo. if so it must be, doubtless, by intermediate rivers; the whole account, however, is pregnant with suspicion, nor has any part of it been verified by any subsequent traveller. [footnote: according to sidi hamet, wassanah must contain nearly half a million of inhabitants. the circumstance also of the joliba or niger being there so bra that a man could scarcely be seen on the other side, throws great discredit over the whole statement of the moorish merchant.] it is singular, that a great variety of opinion has existed, respecting the exact state of government to which the city of timbuctoo was subject. it is well known, that the vernacular histories, both traditionary and written, of the wars of the moorish empire, agree in stating, that from the middle of the seventeenth century, timbuctoo was occupied by the troops of the emperors of morocco, in whose name a considerable annual tribute was levied upon the inhabitants; but that the negroes, in the early part of the last century, taking advantage of one of those periods of civil dissension bloodshed, which generally follow the demise of any of the rulers of barbary, did at length shake off the yoke of their northern masters, to which the latter were never afterwards able again to reduce them. nevertheless, although the emperors of morocco might be unable at the immense distance, which separate them from soudan, to resume an authority, which had once escaped i hands, it is reasonable to suppose that the nearer tribes of arabs would not neglect the opportunity thus afforded them, of returning to their old habits of spoliation, and of exercising their arrogant superiority over their negro neighbours; and that this frontier state would thus become the theatre of continual contests, terminating alternately, in the temporary occupation of timbuctoo by the arabs, and in their re-expulsion by negroes. in order to elucidate the state of things, which we have here supposed, we need not go further than to the history of europe in our own days. how often during the successful ravages of buonaparte, that great arab chieftain of christendom, might we not have drawn from the experience of madrid, or berlin, or vienna, or moscow, the aptest illustration of these conjectures respecting timbuctoo? and an african traveller, if so improbable a personage may be imagined, who should have visited europe in these conjunctures, might very naturally have reported to his countrymen at home, that russia, germany and spain were but provinces of france, and that the common sovereign of all these countries resided sometimes in the escurial, and sometimes in the kremlin. we have seen this state of things existing in ludamar, to the west of timbuctoo, where a negro population is subjected to the tyranny of the arab chieftain ali, between whom and his southern neighbours of bambarra and kaarta we find a continual struggle of aggression and self-defence; and the well-known character of the arabs would lead us to expect a similar state of things along the whole frontier of the negro population. in the pauses of such a warfare, we should expect to find no intermission of the animosity or precautions of the antagonist parties. the arab victorious would be ferocious and intolerant, even beyond his usual violence, and the koran or the halter would probably be the alternatives, which he would offer to his negro guest; whilst the milder nature of the negro would be content with such measures of precaution and self-defence, as might appear sufficient to secure him from the return of the enemy, whom he had expelled, without excluding the peaceful trader; and, under the re-established power of the latter, we might expect to find at timbuctoo precisely the same state of things as adams describes to have existed in . the reserve, with which we have seen grounds for receiving the testimony of the natives of africa, may reasonably accompany us in our further comparative examination of their accounts and those of adams, respecting the population and external appearance of the city of timbuctoo. we cannot give such latitude to our credulity as to confide in the statements of sidi hamet; nor do we place much reliance on the account of caillie, who was the last european who may be said to have entered its walls. notwithstanding, therefore, the alleged splendour of its court, the polish of its inhabitants, its civilized institutions, and other symptoms of refinement, which some modern accounts or speculations, founded on native reports, have taught us to look for, we are disposed to receive the humbler descriptions of adams, as approaching with much greater probability to the truth. let us, however, not be understood as rating too highly the value of a sailor's reports. they must of necessity be defective in a variety of ways. many of the subjects upon which adams was questioned, were evidently beyond the competency of such an individual fully to comprehend or satisfactorily to describe; and we must be content to reserve our final estimates of the morals, religion, civil polity, and learning, if the term may be allowed us, of the negroes of timbuctoo, until we obtain more conclusive information than could possibly have been derived from so illiterate a man as adams. a sufficiency, however, may be gathered from his story, to prepare us for a disappointment of the extravagant expectations, which have been indulged respecting this boasted city. and here we may remark, that the relative rank of timbuctoo amongst the cities of central africa, and its present importance with reference to european objects, appear to us to be considerably overrated. the description of leo, in the sixteenth century, may indeed lend a colour to the brilliant anticipations in which some sanguine minds have indulged on the same subjects in the nineteenth; but with reference to the commercial pursuits of europeans, it seems to have been forgotten, that the very circumstance which has been the foundation of the importance of timbuctoo to the traders of barbary, and consequently of a great portion of its fame amongst us, its frontier situation on the verge of the desert, at the extreme northern limits of the negro population, will of necessity have a contrary operation now, since a shorter and securer channel for european enterprise into the central regions of africa has been opened by the intrepidity and perseverance of park, from the south-western shores of the atlantic. independently of this consideration, there is great reason to believe that timbuctoo has in reality declined of late from the wealth and consequence which it appears formerly to have enjoyed. the existence of such a state of things, as we have described, in the preceding pages, the oppositions of the moors, the resistance of the negroes, the frequent change of masters, and the insecurity of property consequent upon these intestine struggles, would all lead directly and inevitably to this result. that they have led to it, may be collected from other sources than adams. even park, to whom so brilliant a description of the city was given by some of his informants, was told by others that it was surpassed in opulence and size by houssa, walet, and probably by jinnie. several instances also occur in both his missions, which prove that a considerable trade from barbary is carried on direct from the desert to sego and the neighbouring countries, without ever touching at timbuctoo; and this most powerful of the states of africa, in the sixteenth century, according to leo, is now, in the nineteenth, to all appearance, a mere tributary dependency of a kingdom, which does not appear to have been known to leo even by name. such a decline of the power and commercial importance of timbuctoo would naturally be accompanied by a corresponding decay of the city itself; and we cannot suppose that adams' description of its external appearance will be rejected, on account of its improbability, by those, who recollect that leo describes the habitations of the natives, _in his time,_ almost in the very words of the narrative _now_ [*], and that the flourishing cities of sego and sansanding appear, from park's account, to be built of mud, precisely in the same manner as adams describes the houses of timbuctoo. [footnote: one of the numerous discordances between the different translations of leo, occurs in the passage here alluded to. the meaning of the italian version is simply this, that "the dwellings of the people of timbuctoo are cabins or huts, constructed with stakes, covered with chalk or clay, and thatched with straw, _'le cui case sono capanne fatte di pali coperte di creta co i cortivi di paglia.'_ but the expression in the latin translation, which is closely followed by the old english translator, pery, implies a state of previous splendour and decay, 'cojus domus omnes in tuguriola, stramineis tectis, _sunt mutatæ.'_"] but whatever may be the degree of adams' coincidence with other authorities, in his descriptions of the population and local circumstances of timbuctoo, there is at least one asserted fact in this part of his narrative, which appears to be exclusively his own; the existence, we mean, of a considerable navigable river close to the city. to the truth of which, the credit of adams is completely pledged. on many other subjects it is _possible_ that his narrative might be considerably at variance with the truth, by a mere defect of memory or observation, and without justifying any imputation on his veracity, but it is evident that no such latitude can be allowed him in respect to the la mar zarah, which, if not in substance true, must be knowingly and wilfully false. we shall conclude our remarks on adams' narrative, by noticing only two important circumstances, respectively propitious and adverse to the progress of discovery and civilization, which is decidedly confirmed by the account of adams, viz. the mild and tractable natures of the pagan negroes of soudan, and their friendly deportment towards strangers, on the one hand; and, on the other, the extended and baneful range of that original feature of african society --slavery. chapter xiv. previously to entering into any further detail of the different expeditions for exploring the interior of africa, it may be greatly conducive to the better understanding of the subsequent narratives, when treating of the distinct races of people by which the countries are inhabited, to give a concise statement of the population of that part of africa, which is known by the appellation of west barbary, and which may be said to be divided into three great classes, exclusive of the jews, viz. berrebbers, arabs, and moors. the two former of these are, in every respect, distinct races of people, and are each again subdivided into various tribes or communities; the third are chiefly composed of the other two classes, or of their descendants, occasionally mixed with the european or negro races. the indiscriminate use of the names arab and moor, in speaking apparently of the same people, frequently leads the reader into an error as to the real class to which the individual belongs, and thus the national character of the two classes becomes unjustly confounded, whilst at the same time an erroneous opinion is formed of the relative virtues and vices of the different people, with whom the traveller is brought into collision. in the class of the berrebbers, we include all those, who appear to be descendants of the original inhabitants of the country before the arabian conquest, and who speak several languages, or dialects of the same language, totally different from the arabic. the sub-divisions of this class are:-- st, the _errifi,_ who inhabit the extensive mountainous province of that name on the shores of the mediterranean; nd, _the berrebbers of the interior,_ who commence on the southern confines of the errifi, and extend to the vicinity of fez and mequinez, occupying all the mountains and high lands in the neighbourhood of those cities; rd, _the berrebbers of middle atlas;_ and, th, _the shilluh of suse and haha,_ who extend from mogadore southward to the extreme boundaries of the dominions of the cid heshem, and from the sea coast to the eastern limits of the mountains of asia. the errifi are a strong and athletic race of people, hardy and enterprising, their features are generally good, and might in many cases be considered handsome, were it not for the malignant and ferocious expression, which marks them, in common with the berrebber tribes in general, but which is particularly striking in the eye of an errifi. they also possess that marked feature of the berrebber tribes, a scantiness of beard; many of the race, particularly in the south, having only a few straggling hairs on the upper lip, and a small tuft on the chin. they are incessantly bent on robbery and plundering, in which they employ either open violence or cunning and treachery, as the occasion requires, and they are restrained by no checks either of religion, morals, or humanity. however, to impute to them in particular, as distinct from other inhabitants of barbary, the crimes of theft, treachery, and murder, would certainly be doing them great injustice, but we believe we may truly describe them as more ferocious and faithless than any other tribe of berrebbers. the berrebbers of the districts of fez, mequinez, and the mountains of middle atlas, strongly resemble the errifi in person, but are said to be not quite so savage in disposition. they are a warlike people, extremely tenacious of the independence, which their mountainous country gives them opportunities of asserting, omit no occasion of shaking off the control of government, and are frequently engaged in open hostilities with their neighbours the arabs, or the emperor's black troops. they are, as we are informed, the only tribes in barbary, who use the bayonet. the districts which they inhabit are peculiarly interesting and romantic, being a succession of hills and valleys, well watered and wooded, and producing abundance of grain and pasturage. the shilluh or berrebbers of the south of barbary, differ in several respects from their brethren in the north. they are rather diminutive in person, and besides the want of beard already noticed, have in general an effeminate tone of voice. they are, however, active and enterprising. they possess rather more of the social qualities than the other tribes; appear to be susceptible of strong attachments and friendships, and are given to hospitality. they are remarkable for their attachment to their petty chieftains; and the engagements and friendships of the latter are held so sacred, that no instance is on record of any depredation being committed on travellers furnished with their protection, which it is usual to purchase with a present, or on any of the valuable caravans, which are continually passing to and fro through their territory, between barbary and soudan: the predominant feature of their character is, however, self interest, and although in their dealings amongst strangers, or in the towns, they assume a great appearance of fairness or sincerity, yet they are not scrupulous when they have the power in their own hands, and like the other berrebbers, they are occasionally guilty of the most atrocious acts of treachery and murder, not merely against christians, for that is almost a matter of course with all the people of their nation, but even against mahommedan travellers, who have the imprudence to pass through their country, without having previously secured the protection of one of their chiefs. as the shilluh have been said to be sincere and faithful in their friendships, so they are on the other hand, perfectly implacable in their enmities, and insatiable in their revenge. the following anecdote will exemplify in some degree these traits of their character. a shilluh having murdered one of his countrymen in a quarrel, fled to the arabs from the vengeance of the relations of his antagonist, but not thinking himself secure even there, he joined a party of pilgrims and went to mecca. from this expiatory journey he returned at the end of eight or nine years to barbary, and proceeded to his native district, he there sought, under the sanctified name of el haje, the pilgrim, a title of reverence amongst the mahommedans, to effect a reconciliation with the friends of the deceased. they, however, upon hearing of his return, attempted to seize him, but owing to the fleetness of his horse, he escaped and fled to mogadore, having been severely wounded by a musket ball in his flight. his pursuers followed him thither, but the governor of mogadore hearing the circumstances of the case, strongly interested himself in behalf of the fugitive, and endeavoured, but in vain, to effect a reconciliation. the man was imprisoned, and his persecutors then hastened to morocco to seek justice of the emperor. that prince, it is said, endeavoured to save the prisoner; and to add weight to his recommendation, offered a pecuniary compensation in lieu of the offender's life, which the parties, although persons of mean condition, rejected. they returned triumphant to mogadore, with the emperor's order for the delivery of the prisoner into their hands; and having taken him out of prison, they immediately conveyed him before the walls of the town, where one of the party, loading his musket before the face of their victim, placed the muzzle to his breast, and shot him through the body; but as the man did not immediately fall, he drew his dagger, and, by repeated stabbing, put an end to his existence. the calm intrepidity with which this unfortunate shilluh stood to meet his fate, could not be witnessed without the highest admiration; and however much we must detest the blood-thirstiness of his executioners, we must still acknowledge, that there is something closely allied to nobleness of sentiment in the inflexible perseverance, with which they pursued the murderer of their friend to punishment. like the arabs, the berrebbers are divided into numerous petty tribes or clans, each tribe or family distinguishing itself by the name of its patriarch or founder. the authority of the chiefs is usually founded upon their descent from some sanctified ancestor; or upon the peculiar eminence of the individual himself in mahommedan zeal, or some other religious qualification. with the exception already noticed, that the berrebbers of the north are of a more robust and stouter make than the shilluh, a strong family-likeness runs through all their tribes. their customs, dispositions, and national character, are nearly the same; they are all equally tenacious of their independence, which their local positions enable them to assume, and are all animated with the same inveterate and hereditary hatred against their common enemy, the arab. they invariably reside in houses or hovels built of stone and timber, which are generally situated on some commanding eminence, and are fortified and loop-holed for self-defence. their usual mode of warfare is, to surprise their enemy, rather than overcome him by an open attack; they are reckoned the best marksmen, and possess the best fire-arms in barbary, which render them a very destructive enemy wherever the country affords shelter and concealment; but although they are always an over-match for the arabs, when attacked on their own rugged territory, they are obliged on the other hand, to relinquish the plains to the arab cavalry, against which the berrebbers are unable to stand on open ground. the arabs, who now form so considerable a portion of the population of barbary, and whose race in the sheriffe line has given emperors to morocco ever since the conquest, occupy all the level country of the empire, and many of the tribes penetrating into the desert, have extended themselves even to the confines of soudan. in person, they are generally tall and robust, with fine features, and intelligent countenances. their hair is black and straight, their eyes large, black and piercing, their noses gently arched; their beards full and bushy, and they have invariably good teeth. the colour of those who reside in barbary, is a deep, but bright brunette, essentially unlike the sallow tinge of the mulatto. the arabs of the desert are more or less swarthy, according to their proximity to the negro states, until, in some tribes they are found entirely black, but without the woolly hair, wide nostril, and thick lip, which peculiarly belong to the african negro. the arabs are universally cultivators of the earth, or breeders of cattle, depending on agricultural pursuits alone for subsistence. to use a common proverb of their own, "the earth is the arab's portion." they are divided into small tribes or families, each separate tribe having a particular patriarch or head, by whose name they distinguish themselves, and each occupying its own separate portion of territory. they are scarcely ever engaged in external commerce; they dislike the restraints and despise the security of residence in towns, and dwell invariably in tents made of a stuff woven from goats' hair and the fibrous root of the palmeta. in some of the provinces, their residences form large circular encampments, consisting of from twenty to a hundred tents, where they are governed by a sheik or magistrate of their own body. this officer is again subordinate to a bashaw or governor, appointed by the emperor, who resides in some neighbouring town. in these encampments there is always a tent set apart for religious worship, and appropriated to the use of the weary or benighted traveller, who is supplied with food and refreshment at the expense of the community. the character of the arab, in a general view, is decidedly more noble and magnanimous than that of the berrebber. his vices are of a more daring, and if the expression may be used, of a more generous cast. he accomplishes his designs rather by open violence than by treachery; he has less duplicity and concealment than the berrebber, and to the people of his own nation or religion, he is much more hospitable and benevolent. beyond this, it is impossible to say any thing in his favour. but it is in those periods of civil discord, which have been so frequent in barbary, that the arab character completely develops itself. on these occasions, they will be seen linked together in small tribes, the firm friends of each other, but the sworn enemies of all the world besides. while these dreadful tempests last, the arabs carry devastation and destruction wherever they go, sparing neither age nor sex, and even ripping open the dead bodies of their victims, to discover whether they have not swallowed their riches for the purpose of concealment. their barbarity towards christians ought not to be tried by the same rules as the rest of their conduct, for although it has no bounds but those which self-interest may prescribe, it must almost be considered as a part of their religion; so deep is the detestation which i they are taught to feel for "the unclean and idolatrous infidel." a christian, therefore, who falls into the hands of the arabs, has no reason to expect any mercy. if it be his lot to be possessed by the arabs of the desert, his value as a slave will probably save his life, but if he happens to be wrecked on the coasts of the emperor's dominions, where europeans are not allowed to be retained in slavery, his fate would in most cases be immediate death, before the government could have time to interfere for his protection. the next great division of the people of western barbary, are the inhabitants of the cities and towns, who may be collectively classed under the general denomination of moors, although this name is only known to them through the language of europeans. they depend chiefly on trade and manufactures for subsistence, and confine their pursuits in general to occupations in the towns. occasionally, however, but very rarely, they may be found to join agricultural operations with the arabs. the moors may be divided into the four following classes:-- st. the tribes descended from _arab_ families. nd. those of _berrebber_ descent. rd. the _bukharie._ th. the _andalusie._ the _arab_ families are the brethren of the conquerors of the country, and they form the largest portion of the population of the southern towns, especially of those, which border on arab districts. the _berrebber_ families are in like manner more or less numerous in the towns, according to the proximity of the latter to the berrebber districts. the _bukharie,_ or black tribe, are the descendants of the negroes, brought by the emperor mulai ismael, from soudan. they have been endowed with gifts of land, and otherwise encouraged by the subsequent emperors, and the tribe, although inconsiderable in point of numbers, has been raised to importance in the state, by the circumstance of its forming the standing army of the emperor, and of its being employed invariably as the instruments of government. their chief residence is in the city of mequinez, about the emperor's person. they are also found, but in smaller numbers, in the different towns of the empire. the _andalusie,_ who form the fourth class of moors, are the reputed descendants of the arab conquerors of spain, the remnant of whom, on being expelled from that kingdom, appear to have retained the name of its nearest province. these people form a large class of the population of the towns in the north of barbary, particularly of tetuan, mequinez, fez, and rhabatt or sallee. they are scarcely, if at all found residing to the south of the river azamoor, being confined chiefly to that province of barbary known by the name of el gharb. these may be considered the component parts of that mixed population, which now inhabit the towns of barbary, and which are known to europeans by the name of moors. in feature and appearance the greater part of them may be traced to the arab, or berrebber tribes, from which they are respectively derived, for marriages between individuals of different tribes are generally considered discreditable. such, marriages, however, do occasionally take place, either in consequence of domestic troubles, or irregularity of conduct in the parties, and they are of course attended with a corresponding mixture of feature. intermarriages of the other tribes with the bukharie are almost universally reprobated, and are attributed, when they occur, to interested motives on the part of the tribe which sanctions them, or to the overbearing influence and power possessed by the bukharie. these matches entail on their offspring the negro feature, and a mulatto-like complexion, but darker. in all cases of intermarriage between different tribes or classes, the woman is considered to pass over to the tribe of her husband. besides the moors, the population of the towns is considerably increased by the negro slaves, who are in general prolific, and whose numbers are continually increasing by fresh arrivals from the countries of soudan. there are but few of the african travellers, who, in their descriptions of the different characters, which may be said to constitute the various branches of african society, do not frequently make mention of a class of men known by the name of marabouts, who may be regarded as the diviners or astrologers of the ancients, and of whose manners and imposition a slight sketch may not be thought in this place inexpedient nor useless. in order to belong to the privileged class of the marabouts, it is requisite to have only one wife, to drink no wine nor spirits, and to know how to read the koran, no matter however ill the task may be performed. in a country where incontinence and intemperance are so prevalent, and literature is so entirely unknown, it is not surprising that these men should easily gain credit with the public, but this credit is much augmented if the marabout be skilled in such tricks as are calculated to impose upon the vulgar. the least crafty amongst them will continue shaking their heads and arms so violently during several hours, that they frequently fall down in a swoon; others remain perfectly motionless, in attitudes the most whimsical and painful, and many of these impostors have the talent of captivating the confidence and good opinion of the multitude, by pretending to perform miracles in the public streets. this trade descends from father to son; and is so lucrative, that the most fertile parts of the country swarm with these knavish hypocrites. when they die, the neighbouring tribes erect a sort of mausoleum to their memory, consisting of a square tower, surmounted by a cupola of the most fantastical architecture. to these tombs, called likewise marabouts, the devout repair in crowds, and are accosted by the deceased through the organs of his surviving representatives, who dwell within the walls of the tower, and artfully contrive to increase the holy reputation of their predecessor, as well as their own profits. the walls of their tombs are covered with votive tablets and offerings to the deceased, consisting of fire-arms, saddles, bridles, stirrups and baskets of fruit, which no profane hand is allowed to touch, because the departed saint may choose to appropriate the contents to his own use, and by emptying the basket, acquire fresh claims to the veneration of the credulous. some of these jugglers generally accompany the armies, when they take the field, feeding the commanders with promises of victory, making the camp the scene of their mummeries and impostures, and dealing in amulets, containing mystic words, written in characters, which none but the marabout who disposes of them can decipher. according to the price of these amulets, they have respectively the power of shielding the wearer from a poniard, a musket shot and cannon ball, and there is scarcely a man in the army, who does not wear one or more of them round his neck, as well as hang them round that of his horse or camel. miraculous indeed is said to be the efficacy of their written characters in cases of sickness, but the presence of the marabout himself is necessary, in order that the writing may suit the nature of the disorder. when the disease is dangerous, the writing is administered internally, for which purpose they scrawl some words in large characters, with thick streaks of ink round the inside of a cup, dissolve the ink with broth, and with many devout ceremonies pour the liquor down the sick man's throat. these impostors have always free access to the beys and other high dignitaries of the state; and with regard to the former, in public audiences they never kiss his hand, but his shoulder, a token of distinction and confidence granted only to relations and persons of importance. in their religion, the africans labour under the disadvantage of being left to unassisted reason, and that too very little enlightened. man has, perhaps, an instinctive sentiment, that his own fate and that of the universe are ruled by some supreme and invisible power, yet he sees this only through the medium of his wishes and imagination. he seeks for some object of veneration and means of protection, which may assume an outward and tangible shape. thus the african reposes his faith in the doctrine of charms, which presents a substance stamped with a supernatural character, capable of being attached to himself individually, and of affording a feeling of security amid the many evils that environ him. in all the moorish borders where writing is known, it forms the basis of _fetisherie,_ and its productions enclosed in golden or ornamented cases, are hung round the person as guardian influences. absurd, however, as are the observances of the negro, he is a stranger to the bigotry of his moslem neighbours. he neither persecutes nor brands as impious those whose religious views differ from his own. there is only one point, on which his faith assumes a savage character, and displays darker than inquisitorial horrors. the despot, the object of boundless homage on earth, seeks to transport all his pomp and the crowd of his attendants to his place in the future world. his death must be celebrated by the corresponding sacrifice of a numerous band of slaves, of wives and of courtiers; their blood must moisten his grave, and the sword of the rude warrior once drawn, does not readily stop; a general massacre often takes place, and the capitals of these barbarian chiefs are seen to stream with blood. chapter xv. it is impossible not to view the unquenchable zeal and intrepidity, which park evinced on his first journey, without feeling for the individual the highest sentiments of admiration and respect. in addition to those high qualifications, we witnessed an admirable prudence in his intercourse with the natives, and a temper not to be ruffled by the most trying provocations; a union of qualities often thought incompatible, and which in our days we fear we cannot expect to see again directed to the same pursuits. it may be further stated, that to our own feelings, scarcely an individual of the age can be named, who has sunk under circumstances of deeper interest than this lamented traveller; whether we consider the loss, which geographical science has suffered in his death, or whether we confine our views to the blasted hopes of the individual, snatched away from his hard-earned, but unfinished triumph, and leaving to others that splendid consummation, which he so ardently sought to achieve. true it is, that the future discoverer of the termination of the niger, must erect the structure of his fame on the wide foundation, with which his great predecessor had already occupied the ground; but although the edifice will owe its very existence to the labours of park, yet another name than his is now recorded on the finished pile; hos ego--feci, tulit alter honores. the african association, although enthusiastically attached to every subject connected with the interior of africa, soon found that, unless the government would take up the subject as a national affair, no great hope existed of arriving at the great objects of their research; it was therefore proposed by sir joseph banks, that a memorial should be presented to his majesty george iii, praying him to institute those measures, by which the discoveries that park had made in the interior of africa could be prosecuted, and which might ultimately lead to the solution of those geographical problems, to which the attention of the scientific men of the country were then directed. in the mean time mr. park had married the daughter of a mr. anderson, with whom he had served his apprenticeship as a surgeon, and having entered with some success in the practice of his profession, in the town of peebles, it was supposed, that content with the laurels so dearly earned, he had renounced a life of peril and adventure. but none of these ties could detain him, when the invitation was given to renew and complete his splendid career. the invitation was formally sent to him by government, in october , to undertake an expedition on a larger scale, into the interior of africa. his mind had been brooding on the subject with enthusiastic ardour. he had held much intercourse with mr. maxwell, a gentleman who had long commanded a vessel in the african trade, by whom he was persuaded that the congo, which since its discovery by the portuguese, had been almost lost sight of by the europeans, would prove to be the channel by which the niger, after watering all the regions of interior africa, enters the atlantic. the scientific world were very much disposed to adopt park's views on this subject, and accordingly the whole plan of the expedition was adjusted with an avowed reference to them. the agitation of the public mind, by the change of ministry, and the war with france, delayed further proceedings till , when mr. park was desired by lord camden, the colonial secretary, to form his arrangements, with an assurance of being supplied with every means necessary for their accomplishment. the course which he now suggested, was, that he should no longer travel as a single and unprotected wanderer; his experience decided him against such a mode of proceeding. he proposed to take with him a small party, who being well armed and disciplined, might face almost any force which the natives could oppose to them. he determined with this force to proceed direct to sego, to build there two boats forty feet long, and thence to sail downwards to the estuary of the congo. instructions were accordingly sent out to goree, that he should be furnished liberally with men, and every thing else of which he might stand in need. mr. park sailed from portsmouth, in the crescent transport, on the th january . about the th of march, he arrived at the cape verd islands, and on the th reached goree. there he provided himself with an officer and thirty-five soldiers, and with a large stock of asses from the islands, where the breed of these animals is excellent, and which appeared well fitted for traversing the rugged hills of the high country, whence issue the sources of the senegal and niger. he took with him also two sailors and four artificers, who had been sent from england. a month however elapsed, before all these measures could be completed, and it was then evident that the rainy season could not be far distant, a period, in which travelling is very difficult and trying to european constitutions. it is clear, therefore, that it would have been prudent to remain at goree or pisania, till that season had passed; but in mr. park's enthusiastic state of mind, it would have been extremely painful to linger so long on the eve of his grand and favorite undertaking. he hoped, and it seemed possible, that before the middle of june, when the rains usually began, he might reach the niger, which could then be navigated without any serious toil or exposure. he departed, therefore, with his little band from pisania, on the th may, and proceeded through medina, along the banks of the gambia. with so strong a party, he was no longer dependent on the protection of the petty kings and mansas, but the africans seeing him so well provided, thought he had now no claim on their hospitality; on the contrary, they seized every opportunity to obtain some of the valuable articles which they saw in his possession. thefts were practised in the most audacious manner; the kings drove a hard bargain for presents; at one place, the women, with immense labour had emptied all the wells, that they might derive an advantage from selling the water. submitting quietly to these little annoyances, mr. park proceeded along the gambia till he saw it flowing from the south, between the hills of foota jalla and a high mountain called mueianta. turning his face almost due west, he passed the streams of the ba lee, the ba ting, and the ba woollima, the three principal tributaries of the senegal. his change of direction led him through a tract much more pleasing, than that passed in his dreary return through the jallonka wilderness. the villages, built in delightful mountain glens, and looking from their elevated precipices over a great extent of wooded plain, appeared romantic beyond any thing he had ever seen. the rocks near sullo, assumed every possible diversity of form, towering like ruined castles, spires and pyramids. one mass of granite so strongly resembled the remains of a gothic abbey, with its niches: and ruined staircase, that it required some time to satisfy him of its being composed wholly of natural stone. the crossing of the river, now considerably swelled, was attended with many difficulties, and in one of them isaaco, the guide, was nearly devoured by a crocodile. it was near satadoo, soon after passing the faleme, that the party experienced the first tornado, which marking the commencement of the rainy season, proved for them the "beginning of sorrows." in these tornadoes, violent storms of thunder and lightning are followed by deluges of rain, which cover the ground three feet deep, and have a peculiarly malignant influence on european constitutions. in three days twelve men were on the sick-list; the natives, as they saw the strength of the expedition decline, became more bold and frequent in their predatory attacks. at gambia attempts were made to overpower by main force the whole party, and seize all they possessed; but, by merely presenting their muskets, the assault was repelled without bloodshed. at mania korro the whole population hung on their rear for a considerable time, headed by thirty of the king's sons; and some degree of delicacy was felt as to the mode of dealing with these august thieves, so long as their proceedings were not quite intolerable. one of them came up and engaged mr. park in conversation, while another ran off with his fowling-piece, and on his attempting to pursue him, the first took the opportunity of seizing his great coat. orders were now given to fire on all depredators, royal or plebeian; and after a few shots had been discharged without producing any fatal effects, the thieves hid themselves amongst the rocks, and were merely seen peeping through the crevices. the expedition continued to melt away beneath the deadly influence of an african climate. everyday added to the list of the sick or dead, or of those who declared themselves unable to proceed. near bangassi, four men lay down at once. it was even with difficulty that mr. park dragged forward his brother-in-law, mr. anderson, while he himself felt very sick and faint. his spirits were about to sink entirely, when, coming to an eminence, he obtained a distant view of the mountains, the southern base of which he knew to be watered by the niger. then indeed he forgot his fever, and thought only of climbing the blue hills, which delighted his eyes. before he could arrive at that desired point, three weeks elapsed, during which he experienced the greatest difficulty and suffering. at length, he reached the summit of the ridge, which divides the senegal from the niger, and coming to the brow of the hill, saw again this majestic river rolling its immense stream along the plain. his situation and prospects were, however, gloomy indeed, when compared with those, with which he had left the banks of the gambia. of thirty-eight men, whom he then had with him, there survived only seven, all suffering from severe sickness, and some nearly at the last extremity. still his mind was full of the most sanguine hopes, especially when, on the nd august, he found himself floating on the waters of the niger, and advancing towards the ultimate object of his ambition. he hired canoes to convey his party to maraboo, and the river here, a mile in breadth, was so full and so deep, that its current carried him easily over the rapids, but with a velocity, which was even in a certain degree painful. at maraboo, he sent forward isaaco, the interpreter, to mansong, with part of the presents, and to treat with that monarch for protection, as well as for permission to build a boat. this envoy was absent several days, during which great anxiety was felt, heightened by several unfavourable rumours, amongst which was, that the king had killed the envoy with his own hand, and announced his purpose to do the same to every white man, who should come within his reach. these fears were, however, dispelled by the appearance of the royal singing-man, who brought a message of welcome, with an invitation to repair to sego, and deliver in person the remaining presents intended for the monarch. at samee, the party met isaaco, who reported that there was something very odd in his reception by mansong. that prince assured him, in general, that the expedition would be allowed to pass down the niger; but whenever the latter came to particulars, and proposed an interview with mr. park, the king began to draw squares and triangles with his finger on the sand, and in this geometrical operation his mind seemed wholly absorbed. isaaco suspected that he laboured under some superstitious dread of white men, and sought by these figures to defend himself against their magic influence. it was finally arranged, that the presents should be delivered, not to mansong in person, but to modibinne, his prime minister, who was to come to samee for that purpose. he accordingly appeared, and began by inquiring, in the king's name, an explanation why park had come to bambarra, with so great a train, from so distant a country, allowing him a day to prepare his reply. next morning, the traveller gave an answer in form, representing his mission as chiefly commercial, and holding forth the advantages, which bambarra might reap by receiving european goods directly from the coast, instead of circuitously, as now, through morocco, the desert, timbuctoo, and jenne, having a profit levied on them at every transfer. modibinne expressed satisfaction both with the reasons and the presents, and on his return next day, offered, on the part of mansong, the option of building a boat either at samee, sego, sansanding, or jenne. park chose sansanding, thus enabling the king to avoid an interview with the europeans, of which he seemed to entertain so mysterious a dread. the voyage down the river was distressing; for although the fatigue of travelling was avoided, the heat was so intense, that it was thought sufficient to have roasted a sirloin, and the sick had thus no chance of recovery. sansanding was found a prosperous and flourishing town, with a crowded market well arranged. the principal articles, which were cloth of houssa or jenne, antimony, beads, and indigo, were each arranged in stalls, shaded by mats from the heat of the sun. there was a separate market for salt, the main staple of their trade. the whole presented a scene of commercial order and activity totally unlooked for in the interior of africa. mansong had promised to furnish two boats, but they were late in arriving, and proved very defective. in order to raise money, it was necessary to sell a considerable quantity of goods; nor was it without much trouble, that the two skiffs were finally converted into the schooner joliba, forty feet long, six broad, and drawing only one foot of water, being the fittest form for navigating the niger downward to the ocean. during mr. park's stay at sansanding, he had the misfortune to lose his brother-in-law, mr. anderson, to whom his attachment was so strong as to make him say, "no event which took place during the journey ever threw the smallest gloom over my mind, till i laid mr. anderson in the grave. i then felt myself as if left a second time, lonely and friendless amidst the wilds of africa." although the party were now reduced to five europeans, one of whom was deranged, and although the most gloomy anticipations could not fail to arise in the mind of mr. park, his firmness was in no degree shaken. he announced to lord camden his fixed purpose to discover the termination of the niger, or to perish in the attempt, adding, "though all the europeans, who are with me should die, and though i were myself half dead, i would still persevere." to mrs. park he announced the same determination, combined with an undoubting confidence of success, and the commencement of his voyage down the niger, through the vast unknown regions of interior africa, he called, "turning his face towards england." it was on the th november , that park set sail on his last and fatal voyage. a long interval elapsed without any tidings, which, considering the great distance, and the many causes of delay, did not at first excite alarm amongst his friends. as the following year, however, passed on, rumours of an unpleasant nature began to prevail. alarmed by these, and feeling a deep interest in his fate, governor maxwell, of sierra leone, engaged isaaco, the guide, who had been sent to the gambia with despatches from the niger, to undertake a fresh journey to inquire after him. at sansanding he was so far fortunate as to meet amadi fatouma, who had been engaged to succeed himself as interpreter. from him he received a journal, purporting to contain the narrative of the voyage down the river, and of its final issue. the party, it would appear, had purchased three slaves, who, with the five europeans and fatouma, increased their number to nine. they passed silla and jenne in a friendly manner; but at rakbara (kabra) and timbuctoo, they were attacked by several armed parties, who were repelled only by a smart and destructive fire. no particulars are given of any of these important places; nor of kaffo gotoijege and others, which the discoverers are represented as having afterwards passed. at length they came to the village, more properly the city of yaour, where amadi fatouma left the party, his services having been engaged only to that point, he had, however, scarcely taken his leave, when he was summoned before the king, who bitterly complained that the white men, though they brought many valuable commodities with them, had passed without giving him any presents. he therefore ordered that fatouma should be thrown into irons, and a body of troops sent in pursuit of the english. these men reached boussa, and took possession of a pass, where rocks, hemming in the river, allowed only a narrow channel for vessels to descend. when park arrived, he found the passage thus obstructed, but attempted nevertheless to push his way through. the people began to attack him, throwing lances, pikes, arrows, and stones. he defended himself for a long time, when two of his slaves at the stern of the canoe were killed. the crew threw every thing they had into the river, and kept firing; but being overpowered by numbers and fatigue, unable to keep up the canoe against the current, and seeing no probability of escaping, mr. park took hold of one of the white men, and jumped into the water. martyn did the same, and they were all drowned in the stream in attempting to escape. the only slave that remained in the boat, seeing the natives persist in throwing weapons into it without ceasing, stood up and said to them, "stop throwing now; you see nothing in the canoe, and nobody but myself; therefore cease. take me and the canoe; but don't kill me." they took possession of both, and carried them to the king. these sad tidings, conveyed in course to england, were not for a long time received with general belief. the statement, being sifted with care, was thought to contain inconsistencies, as well as such a degree of improbability as left some room for hope; but year after year elapsed, and this hope died away. denham and clapperton received accounts from various quarters, which very nearly coincided with those of amadi fatouma. clapperton, in his last journey, even saw the spot where he perished, which, allowing for some exaggeration, did not ill correspond with the description just given; and further, he received notice that park's manuscripts were in the possession of the king of yaour, or youri, who offered to deliver them up, on condition that the captain would pay him a visit, which he, unfortunately, was never able to perform. chapter xvi. the fate of park, notwithstanding the deep regret which it excited in england and in europe, presented nothing which could destroy the hope of future success. the chief cause of failure could be easily traced to the precipitation into which he had been betrayed by a too ardent enthusiasm. nothing had ever been discovered adverse to the hypothesis that identified the niger with the congo, which still retained a strong hold on the public mind. the views of government and of the nation on this subject were entirely in unison. it was therefore determined, that an expedition on a grand scale should be fitted out, divided into two portions; one to descend the niger, and the other to ascend the congo; which two parties, it was fondly hoped, would effect a triumphant meeting in the middle of the great stream that they were sent to explore. the public loudly applauded this resolution; and never perhaps did an armament, expected to achieve the most splendid victories, excite deeper interest than this, which seemed destined to triumph over the darkness that had so long enveloped the vast interior of africa. the expedition to the congo was entrusted to captain tuckey, an officer of merit and varied services, who had published several works connected with geography and navigation. besides a crew of about fifty, including marines and mechanics; he was accompanied by mr. smith, an eminent botanist, who likewise possessed some knowledge of geology; mr. cranck, a self-taught, but able zoologist; mr. tudor, a good comparative-anatomist; mr. lock-hart, a gardener from kew; and mr. galwey, an intelligent person, who volunteered to join the party. they sailed from deptford on the th february , and reached malemba on the th june, where they met with a cordial reception from the mafook, or king's merchant, in the belief that they were come to make up a cargo of slaves. the chiefs, on being reluctantly convinced of the contrary, burst into the most furious invectives against the crowned heads of europe, particularly the king of england, whom they denominated the "devil," imputing chiefly to him the stop put to this odious, but lucrative traffic. a few days brought the english into the channel of the congo, which, to their great surprise, instead of exhibiting the immense size they had been taught to expect, scarcely appeared a river of the second class. the stream it is true, was then at the lowest, but the depth being still more than fathoms, made it impossible to estimate the mass of water which its channel might convey to the ocean. the banks were swampy, overgrown with mangrove trees, and the deep silence and repose of these extensive forests made a solemn impression upon the mind. at embomma, the emporium of the congo, much interest was excited by the discovery, that a negro officiating as cook's mate, was a prince of the blood. [*] he was welcomed with rapture by his father, and with a general rejoicing by the whole village. the young savage was soon arrayed in full african pomp, having on an embroidered coat, very much tarnished, a silk sash, and a black glazed hat, surmounted by an enormous feather. captain tuckey was introduced to the _cheeno,_ or hereditary chief, who, with his huge gilt buttons, stockings of pink sarcenet, red half-boots, and high-crowned embroidered hat, reminded him of punch in a puppet show. it was vain attempting to convey to this sage prince, any idea of the objects of the expedition. the terms which express science, and an enlightened curiosity, did not excite in his mind a single idea, and he rang continual changes on the questions:--are you come to trade? and are you come to make war? being unable to conjecture any other motive. at length having received a solemn declaration, that there was no intention to make war, he sealed peace by the acceptance of a large present of brandy. [footnote: this is by no means an uncommon case in the ships trading to africa, for we were once honoured by an introduction to one of these princes, who came to england in capt. fullerton's ship, in the humble capacity of a cabin boy. we could not exactly ascertain whether he considered any part of england, as belonging to the territory of his father, but he seemed very much disposed to consider our house as his home, for having once gained a footing in it, it was a very difficult matter to make him comprehend, when it was high time for him to take his departure. he once honoured us with a visit at nine o'clock in the morning, and at eleven at night, he was seated upon the same chair that he had taken possession of in the morning, during which time he had consumed ten basins of pea-soup, with a proportionate quantity of other substantials.] after sailing between ridges of high rocky hills, the expedition came to the yellala, or great cataract, and here they met with a second disappointment. instead of another niagara, which general report had led them to expect, they saw only a comparative brook bubbling over its stony bed. the fall appears to be occasioned merely by masses of granite, fragments of which have fallen down and blocked up the stream. yet this obstruction rendered it quite impossible for the boats to pass, nor could they be carried across the precipices and deep ravines, by which the country was intersected. the discoverers were, therefore, obliged to proceed by land through this difficult region, which, without a guide on whom they could rely, was attended with overwhelming toil. cooloo inga, and mavoonda, the principal villages, were separated by wide intervals, which placed the travellers under the necessity of often sleeping in the open air. at length the country improved and became more level; the river widened, and the obstacles to its navigation gradually disappeared. but just as the voyage began to assume a prosperous aspect, indications of its fatal termination began to show themselves. the health of the party was rapidly giving way under the effects of fatigue, as well as the malignant influence of a damp and burning atmosphere. tudor, crouch and galwey, were successively obliged to return to the ship. captain tuckey, after struggling for some time against the increasing pressure of disease and exhaustion, as well as the accumulating difficulties of the expedition, saw the necessity of putting a stop to its further progress. mr. smith at first expressed deep disappointment at this resolution, but soon became so ill that he could scarcely be conveyed to the vessel. on reaching it, a sad scene awaited the survivors; crouch, tudor and galwey, were no more; they had successively sunk under the weight of disease. mr. smith soon shared their fate, and captain tuckey himself, on the th october, added one more to the number of deaths, without having suffered the usual attack of fever. he had been exhausted by constant depression and mental anxiety. from this unfortunate expedition, however, some information was obtained respecting a part of africa, not visited for several centuries. no trace indeed was seen of the great kingdoms, or of the cities and armies described by the portuguese missionaries, so that though the interior may very probably be more populous than the banks of the river, there must in these pious narratives be much exaggeration; indeed it is not unworthy of remark, that all the accounts of the early missionaries, into whatever part of the world they undertook to intrude themselves, can only be looked upon as a tissue of falsehood, and hyperbolical misrepresentation. the largest towns, or rather villages, did not contain above one hundred houses, with five hundred or six hundred inhabitants. they were governed by chenoos, with a power nearly absolute, and having mafooks under them, who were chiefly employed in the collection of revenue. the people were merry, idle, good-humoured, hospitable, and liberal, with rather an innocent and agreeable expression of countenance. the greatest blemish in their character appeared in the treatment of the female sex, on whom they devolved all the laborious duties of life, even more exclusively than is usual among negro tribes, holding their virtues also in such slender esteem, that the greatest chiefs unblushingly made it an object of traffic. upon this head, however, they have evidently learned much evil from their intercourse with europeans. the character of the vegetation, and the general aspect of nature, are pretty nearly the same on the congo, as on the other african rivers. meantime the other part of the expedition, under major peddie, whose destination it was to descend the niger, arrived at the mouth of the senegal. instead of the beaten track along the banks of that river or of the gambia, he preferred the route through the country of the foulahs, which, though nearer, was more difficult and less explored. on the th november , he sailed from the senegal, and on the th december, the party, consisting of one hundred men, and two hundred animals, landed at kakundy, on the rio nunez; but before they could begin their march, major peddie was attacked with fever, and died. captain campbell, on whom the command devolved, proceeded on the line proposed till he arrived at a small river, called the ponietta, on the frontier of the foulah territory. by this time many of the beasts of burden had sunk, and great difficulty was found in obtaining a sufficient supply of provisions. the king of the foulahs, on being asked permission to pass through his territory, seemed alarmed at hearing of so large a body of foreigners about to enter his country. he contrived, under various pretexts, to detain them on the frontier four months, during which their stock of food and clothing gradually diminished, while they were suffering all the evils that arise from a sickly climate and a scanty supply of necessaries. at length, their situation became such as to place them under the absolute necessity of returning. all their animals being dead, it was necessary to hire the natives to carry their baggage, an expedient which gave occasion to frequent pillage. they reached kakundy with the loss only of mr. kum-doer, the naturalist; but captain campbell, overcome by sickness and exertion, died two days after, on the th of june . the command was then transferred to lieutenant stokoe, a spirited young naval officer, who had joined the expedition as a volunteer. he had formed a new scheme for proceeding into the interior; but unhappily he also sunk under the climate and the fatigues of the, journey. a sentence of death seemed pronounced against all, who should attempt to penetrate the african continent, and yet were still some, daring spirits, who did not shrink from the undertaking. captain gray, of the royal african corps, who had accompanied the last-mentioned expedition, under major peddie and captain campbell, undertook, in , to perform a journey by park's old route along the gambia. he reached, without any obstacle, boolibani, the capital of bondou, where he remained from the th june to the nd may ; but, owing to the jealousy of the monarch, he was not permitted to proceed any further. with some difficulty he reached gallam, where he met staff-surgeon dockard, who had gone forward to sego, to ask permission to proceed through bambarra, a request which had also been evaded. the whole party then returned to senegal. in , major laing was sent on a mission from sierra leone, through the timannee, kooranko, and soolima countries, with the view of forming some commercial arrangements. on this journey he found reason to believe, that the source of the niger lay much further to the south than was supposed by park. at falabo he was assured that it might have been reached in three days, had not the kissi nation, in whose territory it was situated, been at war with the soolimanas, with whom major laing then resided. he was inclined to fix the source of this great river a very little above the ninth degree of latitude. chapter xvii. the british government was in the mean time indefatigable in their endeavours to find out the channels for exploring the interior of africa. the pashaw of tripoli, although he had usurped the throne by violent means, showed a disposition to improve his country, by admitting the arts and learning of europe, while the judicious conduct of consul warrington inclined him to cultivate the friendship of britain. through his tributary kingdom of fezzan, he held close and constant communication with bornou, and the other leading states of central africa, and he readily undertook to promote the views of any english expedition in that direction. the usual means were supplied by the government, and the ordinary inducements held forth by the association. in consequence of these amicable dispositions evinced by the bashaw of tripoli towards the british government, it was resolved to appoint a vice-consul to reside at mourzouk, the capital of fezzan; and the late mr. ritchie, then private secretary to sir charles stuart, the british ambassador at paris, was selected for the undertaking. he was joined at tripoli by captain g. f. lyon, who had volunteered his services as his companion; and to this enterprising and more fortunate traveller, who has braved alike the rigours of an arctic winter, and the scorching heats of central africa, we are indebted for the narrative of the expedition. on the th march , the coffle, (_kafila_, _kefla_,) consisting of about two hundred men, and the same number of camels, commenced its march from tripoli for the interior. they were accompanied by mohammed el mukni, the sultan of fezzan, from whose protection and friendship the greatest advantages were anticipated. by the express advice of the bashaw, the english travellers assumed the moorish costume, with the character of moslem. mr. ritchie's name was converted into yusuf al ritchie; captain lyon called himself said ben abdallah; and belford, a ship-wright, who had entered into their service, took the name of ali. in the coffle were several parties of liberated blacks, all joyful at the idea of once more returning to their native land, though the means of their support were very slender, and many of them, with their young children, had to walk a distance of two thousand miles before they could reach their own country. the route lay for the first two days over a sandy irregular desert, and then entered the mountains of terkoona, situated to the south-east of tripoli, and which seems to be a continuation of the gharian or wahryan range. several little streams flow from the sides of the hills, abounding with game, particularly snipes and partridges. on the sixth day, passing over a stony desert, they reached benioleed, an arab town, with about two thousand inhabitants. it consists of several straggling mud villages, on the sides of a fertile ravine, several miles in length, and bounded by rocks of difficult access. the centre is laid out in gardens, planted with date and olive trees, and producing also corn, vegetables, and pulse. the valley is subject to inundation during the winter rains, but in summer requires to be watered with great labour, by means of wells of extraordinary depth. it is inhabited by the orfella tribe, subsisting chiefly by agriculture, and the rearing of cattle, aided only in a trifling degree by a manufacture of nitre; they are accounted hardy and industrious, but at the same time dishonest and cruel. benioleed castle stands in latitude ° ' " n., longitude ° ' " e. the houses are built of rough stones, on each side of the wady, none are above eight feet in height, receiving their light only through the doors, and their appearance is that of a heap of ruins. the wells are from to feet in depth, the water excellent. during the rains, the valley frequently became flooded by the torrents, and the water has been known to rise so nigh as to hide from view the tallest olive trees in the low grounds. men and animals are often drowned in the night, before they have time to escape. the torrents from the hill-sides rushing down with such impetuosity, that in an hour or two, the whole country is inundated. on leaving benioleed, it was necessary to take a supply of water for three days. the country presented an alternation of stony desert, and plains not incapable of cultivation, but having at this season no water. on the fifth day ( th april), they crossed wady zemzem, which runs into the gulf of syrtis, and passing over a plain strewed in some parts with cockle-shells, reached the well of bonjem, which is the northern boundary of fezzan. on the th april, the camels being loaded with four days' water, the caravan left bonjem, and proceeded over a barren desert called klia. at the end of three hours and a half, they passed a remarkable mound of limestone and sand, resembling, until a very near approach, a white turret. it is called by the natives the bowl of bazeen, the latter word signifying an arab dish, somewhat resembling a hasty pudding. the halt was made at the end of ten hours, in a sandy _wady_, called boo-naja, twenty-two miles south-southeast of bonjem. the next day, the road led through a defile, called hormut em-halla (the pass of the army); then passing a range of table-mountains, running north-east and south-west, called elood, it crossed a stony and very uneven plain, encircled with mountains, to the pass of hormut tazzet. having cleared the pass, the road opened upon a plain called el grazat arab hoon, where the caravan encamped, after a march of twelve hours and a half. here one of the camels died; three others were unable to come up, and all of the camels in the coffle were much distressed, not having for several days tasted any kind of food. two hours and a half further, they came to a solitary tree, which is reckoned a day's journey from water. slaves, in coming from the water, are not allowed to drink until they reach the tree, which is one of the longest stages from fezzan. at the end of nearly eleven hours, the route led through a pass called hormut taad abar, and after wading through a _wady_, closely hemmed in by mountains, opened into a small circular plain, in which was found a well of brackish, stinking water. in hot seasons, the well is dry, and even at this time it was very low; but the horses sucked up with avidity the mud that was thrown out of it. still there was not any fodder for the camels, till, about the middle of the next day's march, they reached a small wady, in which there were some low bushes. a strong sand-wind from the southward now rendered the march extremely harassing. the sand flew about in such quantities, that the travellers were unable to prepare any food, and they could not even see thirty yards before them. in the evening they encamped amid a plantation of palms, near two wells of tolerably fresh water, at a short distance from sockna. of this town, which is about half-way between tripoli and mourzouk, captain lyon gives the following description:-- sockna stands on an immense plain of gravel, bounded to the south by the soudah mountains, at about fifteen miles; by the mountains of wadam, about thirty miles to the eastward; a distant range to the west, and those already mentioned on the north. the town is walled, and may contain two thousand persons. there are small projections from the walls, having loop-holes for musketry. it has seven gates, only one of which will admit a loaded camel. the streets are very narrow, and the houses are built of mud and small stones mixed, many of them having a story above the ground-floor. a small court is open in the centre, and the doors, which open from this area, give the only light which the rooms receive. the water of sockna is almost all brackish or bitter. there are , date trees in the immediate neighbourhood of the town, which pay duty; also an equal number, not yet come into bearing, which are exempt. these dates grow in a belt of sand, at about two or three miles distant from the town, and are of a quality far superior to any produced in the north of africa. owing to their excellence, they are sold at a very high price at tripoli. the adjoining country is entirely destitute of shrubs, or any kind of food for camels, which are therefore sent to graze about five miles off; while in the town, all animals are fed on dates. sheep are brought here from benioleed, and are, in consequence of coming from such a distance, very dear. in the gardens about three miles from the town, barley, maize, and _gussob ohourra_ are cultivated, as well as a few onions, turnips, and peppers. the number of flies here are immense, and all the people carry little flappers, made of bunches of wild bulls' hair tied to a short stick, in order to keep those pests at a distance. the dates all being deposited in store-houses in the town, may account in some degree for the multitude of these insects, which in a few minutes fill every dish or bowl containing any liquid. the costume is here the same as that of the bedouins, consisting generally of a shirt and barracan, a red cap, and sandals. a few, whose circumstances allow of it, dress in the costume of tripoli. the neat appearance of the men in general is very striking, compared with that of the arabs about the coast. the women are considered exceedingly handsome, indeed one or two were really so, and as fair as europeans, but they are noted for their profligacy and love of intrigue. the first day of spring is at sockna a day of general rejoicing. it is then the custom, to dress out little tents or bowers on the tops of the houses, decorating them with carpets, _jereeds_, shawls, and sashes. a gaudy handkerchief on a pole, as a standard, completes the work, which is loudly cheered by the little children, who eat, drink, and play during the day in these covered places, welcoming the spring by songs, and crying continually, "o welcome spring, with pleasure bring us plenty." the women give entertainment in their houses, and the day is quite a holiday. from the top of the houses in which captain lyon lodged, these little bowers had a very pretty effect, every roof in the town being ornamented with one. four ears of corn were this day seen perfectly ripe, which was very early for the season. the gardens here are excellent, compared with the others in fezzan. ten miles east by south from sockna is the town of hoon. it is smaller than sockna, but is built and walled in the same manner. it has three gates, three mosques, and a large building, which is dignified with the name of a castle, but it does not appear to have even a loop-hole for musketry. the palm groves and gardens come up close to the walls of the town, and completely conceal it. the soil is sand, but is fertilized by being constantly refreshed by little channels, from wells of brackish water. the inhabitants, who are of the tribe fateima, bear a good character. the town of wadan is between twelve and thirteen miles east by north of hoon. it appeared much inferior to either of the other two in point of neatness, comfort, and convenience; although its aspect is much more pleasing; it is built on a conical hill, on the top of which are some enclosed houses, called the castle. here is a well of great depth, cut through the solid rock, evidently not the work of the arabs. the tombs and mosques, both here and at hoon, were ornamented with numbers of ostrich eggs. the inhabitants of wadan are sheerefs, who are the pretended descendants of the prophet, and form the bulk of the resident population, and arabs of the tribe _moajer_, who spend the greater part of the year with their flocks in the syrtis. a few miles eastward of the town, there is a chain of mountains, which, as well as the town itself, derives its name from a species of buffalo called _wadan_, immense herds of which are found there. the wadan is of the size of an ass, having a very large head and horns, a short reddish hide, and large bunches of hair hanging from each shoulder, to the length of eighteen inches or two feet; they are very fierce. there are two other specimens found here, the _bogra el weish_, evidently the _bekker el wash_ of shaw, a red buffalo, slow in its motions, having large horns, and of the size of a cow; and the white buffalo, of a lighter and more active make, very shy and swift, and not easily procured. the wadan seems best to answer to the oryx. there are great numbers of ostriches in these mountains, by hunting of which, many of the natives subsist. at all the three towns, sockna, hoon, and wadan, it is the practice to keep tame ostriches in a stable, and in two years to take three cullings of the feathers. captain lyon supposes that all the fine _white_ ostrich feathers sent to europe are from tame birds, the wild ones being in general so ragged and torn, that not above half a dozen perfect ones can be found. the black, being shorter and more flexible, are generally good. all the arabs agree in stating, that the ostrich does not leave its eggs to be hatched by the heat of the sun. the parent bird forms a rough nest, in which she covers from fourteen to eighteen eggs, and regularly sits on them, in the same manner as the common fowl does on her chickens, the male occasionally relieving the female.[footnote] it is during the breeding season that the greatest numbers are procured, the arabs shooting the old ones on their nests. [footnote: there is one peculiarity attending the ostrich, which is, that although the female lays from about twenty-five to thirty eggs, yet she only sits upon about fifteen, throwing the remainder outside the nest, where they remain until the young ones are hatched, and these eggs form the first food of the young birds.--editor.] on the d april, captain lyon and his companions left sockna, in company with sultan mukni, for mourzouk, which they entered upon the th may. the whole way is an almost uninterrupted succession of stony plains and gloomy wadys, with no water but that of wells, generally muddy, brackish, or bitter, and at fearful intervals. on the first evening, the place of encampment was a small plain, with no other vegetation than a few prickly _talk_ bushes, encircled by high mountains of basalt, which gave it the appearance of a volcanic crater. here, at a well of tolerably good water, called gatfa, the camels were loaded with water for five days. the next day, the horse and foot men passed over a very steep mountain called nufdai, by a most difficult path of large irregular masses of basalt; the camels were four hours in winding round the foot of this mountain, which was crossed in one hour. from the wady at its foot, called zgar, the route ascended to a flat covered with broken basalt, called dahr t'moumen (the believer's back): it then led through several gloomy wadys, till, having cleared the mountainous part of the soudah (jebel assoud), it issued in the plain called el maitba soudah, from its being covered in like manner with small pieces of basalt. three quarters of an hour further, they reached el maitba barda, a plain covered with a very small white gravel, without the slightest trace of basalt. "we did not see any where," says captain lyon, "the least appearance of vegetation, but we observed many skeletons of animals, which had died of fatigue in the desert, and occasionally the grave of some human being. all their bodies were so dried by the extreme heat of the sun, that putrifaction did not appear to have taken place after death. in recently dead animals, i could not perceive the slightest offensive smell; and in those long dead, the skin, with the hair on it, remained unbroken and perfect, although so brittle as to break with a slight blow. the sand-winds never cause these carcases to change their places, as in a short time, a slight mound is formed round them, and they become stationary." afterwards, passing between low, table-topped hills, called el gaaf, the coffle encamped on the third evening in a desert, called sbir ben afeen, where the plain presented on all sides so perfect a horizon, that an astronomical observation might have been taken as well as at sea. from the excessive dryness of the air, the blankets and barracans emitted electric sparks, and distinctly crackled on being rubbed. the horses' tails, also, in beating off the flies, had the same effect. the fourth day, the route passed over sand lulls to a sandy irregular plain, very difficult and dangerous. here the wind, being southerly, brought with it such smothering showers of burning sand, that they frequently lost the track, being unable to distinguish objects at the distance of only a few yards. the next day's march, the fifth from sockna, over a rocky country, led to the walled village of zeighan, or zeghren, situated in the midst of a large forest of palms, in latitude ° ' n. eight miles further, on basaltic hillocks, is another village, somewhat larger, and more neatly walled, called samnoo. the houses are very neatly built, and the rooms are washed with a yellow mud, which has a pretty effect. three tolerably built white-washed minarets, the first that had been seen since leaving tripoli, rose to some height above the houses, and have a pleasing appearance. palm trees encircle the town, and the gardens are considered good. this town, as well as zeighan, is famed for the number and sanctity of its marabouts. a stage of twenty miles, over a barren plain of gravel, leads to another, but inconsiderable town, called timen-hint. on the next day but one, they reached sebha, a mud-walled town, picturesquely situated on rising ground, surrounded with its palm groves, in the midst of a dreary, desert plain; it has a high, square, white-washed minaret to its principal mosque. at this place, captain lyon remarked a change of colour in the population, the people being mulattoes. two marches more led to ghroodwa, a miserable collection of mud huts, containing about fifty people, who appeared a ragged drunken set, as the immense number of tapped palms testified. from the ruins of some large mud edifices, this place seems once to have been of more importance. the palms, which extend for ten or fifteen miles, east and west, are the property of the sultan, and appeared in worse condition than any they had seen. on leaving this place, the route again entered on a barren, stony plain, and in five hours and a half passed a small wady, called wad el nimmel (the valley of ants), from the number of ants, of a beautiful pink colour, that are found there. a few scattered palms, and some ill-built ruined huts occurring at intervals, and betokening the greatest wretchedness, alone relieved the dreariness of the remainder of the journey. chapter xviii. the entry into mourzouk, the capital of sultan mukni, was attended with the usual ceremonial. on drawing near to the palm groves and gardens, which encompass the city, a large body of horse and foot was seen approaching with silken flags. when the horsemen had advanced within five hundred yards of the party, they set off at full speed, and, on coming up, threw themselves from their horses, and ran to kiss the sultan's hand. on drawing nearer to the town, the cavalcade was met by the dancers, drummers, and pipers. two men, bearing fans of ostrich feathers, stationed themselves on each side of the sultan, beating off the flies. thus preceded by the led horses and silken flags, they made their entry, the horsemen continuing to skirmish till they reached the gate. the soldiers then raced up every broad street, shouting and firing, whilst the women uttered their shrill cry, and on passing a large open space, a salute was fired from two six-pounders. the scene was altogether highly interesting. mourzouk is a walled town, containing about , inhabitants, who are blacks, and who do not, like the arabs, change their residence. the walls are of mud, having round buttresses, with loopholes for musketry, rudely built, but sufficiently strong to guard against attack; they are about fifteen feet in height, and at the bottom eight feet in thickness, tapering, as all the walls in this country do, towards the top. the town has seven gates, four of which are built up, in order to prevent the people escaping when they are required to pay their duties. a man is appointed by the sultan to attend each of these gates, day and night, lest any slaves or merchandise should be smuggled into the town. the people, in building the walls and houses, fabricate a good substitute for stones, which are not to be found in those parts, by forming clay into balls, which they dry in the sun, and use with mud as mortar; the walls are thus made very strong, and as rain is unknown, durable also. the houses, with very few exceptions, are of one story, and those of the poorer sort, receive all their light from the doors. they are so low as to require stooping nearly double to enter them; but the large houses have a capacious outer door, which is sufficiently well contrived, considering the bad quality of the wood, that composes them. thick palm planks, of four or five inches in breadth, for the size and manner of cutting a tree will not afford more, have a square hole punched through them at the top and bottom, by which they are firmly wedged together with thick palm sticks; wet thongs of camels' hide are then tied tightly over them, which, on drying, draw the planks more strongly and securely together. there are not any hinges to the doors, but they turn on a pivot, formed on the last plank near the wall, which is always the largest on that account. the locks and keys are very large and heavy, and of curious construction. the houses are generally built in little narrow streets, but there are many open places, entirely void of buildings, and covered with sand, on which the camels of the traders rest. many palms grow in the town, and some houses have small square enclosures, in which are cultivated a few red peppers and onions. the street of entrance is a broad space, of at least a hundred yards, leading to the wall that surrounds the castle, and is extremely pretty. here the horsemen have full scope to display their abilities, when they skirmish before the sultan. the castle itself is an immense mud building, rising to the height of eighty or ninety feet, with little battlements on the walls, and at a distance really looks warlike. like all the other buildings, it has no pretensions to regularity. the lower walls are fifty or sixty feet in thickness, the upper taper off to about four or five feet. in consequence of the immense mass of wall, the apartments are very small, and few in number. the rooms occupied by the sultan are of the best quality, that is to say, comparatively, for the walls are tolerably smooth and white-washed, and have ornamental daubs of red paint in blotches, by way of effect. his couch is spread on the ground, and his visitors squat down on the sandy floor, at a respectful distance. captain lyon and his party were always honoured by having a corner of the carpet offered to them. the best and most airy part of the castle is occupied by the women, who have small rooms round a large court, in which they take exercise, grind corn, cook, and perform other domestic offices. the number of great ladies, called _kibere,_ seldom exceed six. this dignified title is generally given to the mothers of the sultan's children, or to those, who having been once great favorites, are appointed governesses to the rest; there are, altogether about fifty women, all black and very comely, and from what stolen glances we could obtain, they appeared extremely well dressed. they are guarded by five eunuchs, who keep up their authority by occasionally beating them. the sultan has three sons and two daughters, who live with him in this cage, the doors of which are locked at night, and the keys brought to him, so that he remains free from any fear of attack. the castle is entered by a long winding passage in the wall, quite dark and very steep. at the door is a large shed, looking on a square place capable of containing three or four hundred men, closely huddled together. under this shed is a great chair of state, once finely gilt and ornamented, with a patchwork quilt thrown over it, and behind it are the remains of two large looking-glasses. in this chair the sultan receives homage every friday, before he ascends the castle, after returning from the mosque. this place is the mejlees, and was the scene of all the cruelties practised by mukni, when he first took possession of the country. the habitation in which captain lyon and his party were lodged, was a very good one, and as all the houses are built upon nearly the same plan, the following description will give an idea of all the rest. a large door, sufficiently high to admit a camel, opened into a broad passage or _skeefa,_ on one side of which was a tolerable stable for five horses, and close to it, a small room for the slaves, whose duty it might be to attend the house. a door opposite to that of the stable opened into the _kowdi,_ a large square room, the roof of which at the height of eighteen feet, was supported by four palm trees as pillars. in the centre of the roof was a large open space, about twelve feet by nine, from this, the house and rooms receive light, not to mention dust and excessive heat in the afternoon. at the end of the room facing the door, a large seat of mud was raised about eighteen inches high, and twelve feet in length. heaps of this description, though higher, are found at the doors of most houses, and are covered with loungers in the cool of the morning and evening. the large room was fifty feet by thirty-nine. from the sides, doors opened into smaller ones, which might be used as sleeping or store rooms, but were generally preferred for their coolness. their only light was received from the door. ascending a few steps, there was a kind of gallery over the side rooms, and in it were two small apartments, but so very hot as to be almost useless. from the large room was a passage leading to a yard, having also small houses attached to it in the same manner, and a well of comparatively good water. the floors were of sand, and the walls of mud roughly plastered, and showing every where the marks of the only trowel used in the country--the fingers of the right hand. there are no windows to any of the houses, but some rooms have a small hole in the ceiling, or high up the wall. near the house was the principal mosque, to which the sultan and the christian party went every friday, as a matter of course, and every other day they found it necessary to appear there once or twice. it is a low building, having a shed projecting over the door, which, being raised on a platform, is entered by a few steps. a small turret, intended to be square and perpendicular, is erected for the mouadden to call to prayers. one of the great lounges is on the seat in front of the mosque, and every morning and evening they are full of idle people, who converse on the state of the markets, and on their own private affairs, or in a fearful whisper canvass the sultan's conduct. in mourzouk there are sixteen mosques, which are covered in, but some of them are very small. each has an imaum, but the kadi is their head, of which dignity he seems not a little proud. this man had never, been beyond the boundaries of fezzan, and could form no idea of any thing superior to mud houses and palms; he always fancied the europeans to be great romancers, when they told him of their country, and described it as being in the midst of the sea. they had many opportunities of observing the fighi and their scholars sitting on the sand. the children are taught their letters by having them written on a flat board, of a hard wood, brought from bornou and soudan, and repeating them after their master. when quite perfect in their alphabet, they are allowed to trace over the letters already made, they then learn to copy sentences, and to write small words dictated to them. the master often repeats verses from the koran, in a loud voice, which the boys learn by saying them after him, and when they begin to read a little, he sings aloud, and all the scholars follow him from their books, as fast as they can. practice at length renders them perfect, and in three or four years their education is considered complete. thus it is, that many who can read the koran with great rapidity, cannot peruse a line of any other book. arithmetic is wholly put of the question. on breaking up for the day, the master and all the scholars recite a prayer. the school-hours are by no means regular, being only when the fighi has nothing else to do. morning early, or late in the evening, are the general times for study. the punishments are beating with a stick on the hands or feet and whipping, which is not unfrequently practised. their pens are reeds--their rubber sand. while learning their tasks, and perhaps each boy has a different one, they all read aloud, so that the harmony of even a dozen boys may be easily imagined. in the time of the native sultans, it was the custom, on a fixed day, annually, for the boys who had completed their education, to assemble on horseback, in as fine clothes as their friends could procure for them, on the sands to the westward of the town. on an eminence stood the fighi, bearing in his hand a little flag rolled on a staff; the boys were stationed at some distance, and on his unfurling the flag and planting it in the ground, all started at full speed. he who first arrived and seized it, was presented by the sultan with a fine suit of clothes, and some money, and rode through the town at the head of the others. these races ceased with the arrival of mukni, and parents now complain that their sons have no inducement to study. all the houses are infested with multitudes of small ants, which destroyed all the animals which the party had preserved, and even penetrated into their boxes. their bite was very painful, and they were fond of coming into the blankets. one singularity is worthy of remark in fezzan, which is, that fleas are unknown there, and those of the inhabitants, who have not been on the sea-coast, cannot imagine what they are like. bugs are very numerous, and it is extraordinary that they are called by the same name as with us. there is a species of them which is found in the sands, where the coffles are in the habit of stopping; they bite very sharply, and fix in numbers round the coronet of a horse; the animals thus tormented, often become so outrageous as to break their tethers. there are several pools of stagnant salt water in the town, which it is conceived in a great measure promote the advance of the summer fever and agues. the burying places are outside the walls, and are of considerable extent. in lieu of stones, small mud embankments are formed round the graves, which are ornamented with shreds of cloth tied to small sticks, with broken pots, and sometimes ostrich eggs. one of the burying places is for slaves, who are laid very little below the surface, and in some places the sand has been so carried away by the wind, as to expose their skeletons to view. owing to the want of wood, no coffins are used. the bodies are merely wrapped in a mat, or linen cloth, and covered with palm branches, over which the earth is thrown. when the branches decay, the earth falls in, and the graves are easily known by being concave, instead of convex. the place where the former sultans were buried, is a plain near the town; their graves are only distinguished from those of other people, by having a larger proportion of broken pots scattered about them. it is a custom for the relations of the deceased to visit, and occasionally to recite a prayer over the grave, or to repeat a verse of the koran. children never pass within sight of the tombs of their parents, without stopping to pay this grateful tribute of respect to their memory. animals are never buried, but thrown on mounds outside the walls, and there left. the excessive heat soon dries up all their moisture, and prevents their becoming offensive; the hair remains on them, so that they appear like preserved skins. the men of mourzouk of the better sort, dress nearly like the people of tripoli. the lower orders wear a large shirt of white or blue cotton, with long loose sleeves, trousers of the same, and sandals of camel's hide. the shirts being long, many wear no other covering. when leaving their houses, and walking to the market or gardens, a _jereed_ or _aba_ is thrown round them, and a red cap, or a neatly quilted cotton white one, completes the dress. on fridays, they perhaps add a turban, and appear in yellow slippers. in the gardens, men and women wear large broad-brimmed straw hats, to defend their eyes from the sun, and sandals made from the leaves and fibres of the palm trees. very young children go entirely naked, those who are older have a shirt, many are quite bare-headed, and in that state exposed all day to the sun and flies. the men have but little beard, which they keep closely clipped. the dress of the women here, differs materially from that of the moorish females, and their appearance and smell are far from agreeable. they plait their hair in thick bobbins, which hang over their foreheads, nearly as low down as the eye-brows, and are there joined at the bottom, as far round to each side as the temples. the hair is so profusely covered with oil, that it drops down over the face and clothes. this is dried up, by sprinkling it with plenty of a preparation made of a plant resembling wild lavender, cloves, and one or two more species pounded into powder, and called atria; it forms a brown dirty-looking paste, and combined with perspiration and the flying sand, becomes in a few days far from savoury. the back hair is less disgusting, as it is plaited into a long tress on each side, and is brought to hang over the shoulders; from these tresses, ornaments of silver or of coral are suspended. black wool is frequently worked in with their black locks, to make them appear longer. in the centre of the forehead, an ornament of coral or beads is placed, hanging down to the depth of an inch or two. a woollen handkerchief is fastened on the back of the head; it falls over behind, and is tied by a leathern strap under the chin. each ear is perforated for as many rings as the woman possesses, some wearing even six on one side. the largest, which is about five inches in diameter, hanging lowest, supported by a string from the head. round the neck, a tight flat collar of beads, arranged in fancy patterns, is worn with coral necklaces, and sometimes a broad gold plate immediately in front. a large blue shirt is generally worn, the collar and breast ornamented with needle-work. the women also wear white shirts, and striped silk ones called shami, which are brought from egypt; a jereed and red slippers complete their dress. they generally have their wrappers of a darker colour than those of the men. some of the better class of women wear trousers, not fuller in the leg than those worn in europe; they are very prettily embroidered with silk at the bottom of the leg, and form a handsome contrast to the black skin of the wearer. cornelians or agates, roughly shaped in the form of hearts, are much worn as necklaces, and they have a variety of rings for the thumbs and fingers. a band of silk cord hanging round the body from one shoulder, is generally filled with pendent leather or cloth bags, containing charms. round the wrists and above the elbows, armlets of silver, gold, glass, horn or ivory are worn, according to the ability of the wearer to purchase them, and on the ankles they have silver, brass, copper or iron shackles. a pair of silver ones were seen, which weighed one hundred and twenty-eight ounces, but these ponderous ornaments produce a callous lump on the leg, and entirely deform the ankle. the poorest people have only the jereed and sandals. both men and women have a singular custom of stuffing their nostrils with a twisted leaf of onions or clover, which has a very disgusting appearance. the men, not using oil, are much cleaner than the women, but the whole race of them, high and low, apparently clean, are otherwise stocked with vermin, and they make no secret of it. the sultan has been frequently observed, when detecting an interloper, to moisten his thumb to prevent its escape, and then demolish it with great composure and dignity. some of the neighbours, whom captain lyon visited, while reposing on their carpets, would send for a slave to hunt for these tormentors on their shirts, and it is a great recommendation to a female slave on sale to say that she is well skilled in this art, and in that of shampooing. the natives have a variety of dances, of which two or three are peculiar to the country. the parties assemble on the sands in the dusk of the evening, when a number of young men and women range themselves side by side, and dance to the sound of drums, to which they keep good time. the men have a rude kind of iron cymbal in each hand, which opens and shuts; this they beat in the manner of castanets, both sexes singing at the same time in chorus. the movements consist in stepping forward, the whole line at once, at a particular turn of the tune, as if to catch something with their two hands, which they hold out; they balance themselves a short time on the advanced foot, and then step back, turning half round, first to one side and then to the other, the whole line then moves slowly in a circle round the musicians, who form the centre, and who all join in the dance. there is nothing improper nor immodest in this exhibition, but on the contrary, from its slowness and the regularity of its movements, it is extremely pleasing and elegant. another dance is performed by women only, who form a circle round the drummers, and occasionally sing a lively chorus; one advances, and with her arms extended, foots it to and from the drummers, two or three times, until a change of tune, when she runs quickly backwards and falls flat down, the women behind are ready to receive her, and by a jerk of their arms throw her again upright, on which she once more turns round and resumes her place, leaving the one next in succession to her, to go through the same movements, all of which are performed in the most just time; the whole party occasionally enlivening the music, by their skill and extraordinary shout of joy. the dancing in the houses is not so pleasing as that in public, and as for decency, it is quite out of the question. the male slaves have many dances, in which great activity and exertion are requisite. one consists in dancing in a circle, each man armed with a stick, they all move, first half and then quite round, striking as they turn, the sticks of those on each side of them, and then jumping off the ground as high as they can. another is performed by boys, and they have no drum, but keep chorus by singing in a particular manner, _la ilia il alia,_ (there is no god, but god.) the sultan had frequently requested mr. ritchie to visit his children, and some of his negresses when they were indisposed, and he had in consequence frequently attended them, but being himself confined by illness, captain lyon was allowed to prescribe for them, and had therefore frequent opportunities of observing the interior of his family, which would not otherwise have been afforded him. he was much struck with the appearance of his daughters, one of three, the other of one year and a half old, who were dressed in the highest style of barbarian magnificence, and were absolutely laden with gold. from their necks were suspended large ornaments of the manufacture of timbuctoo; and they had massive gold armlets and anklets of two inches in breadth, and half an inch in thickness, which, from their immense weight had produced callous rings round the legs and arms of the poor infants. they wore silk shirts composed of ribbons sewed together, in stripes of various colours, which hung down over silk trousers. an embroidered waistcoat and cap completed this overwhelming costume. their nails, the tips of their fingers, the palms of their hands and soles of their feet were dyed dark-brown with henna. captain lyon viewed with amazement and pity the dress of these poor little girls, borne down as they were with finery; but that of the youngest boy, a stupid looking child of four years old, was even more preposterous than that of his sisters. in addition to the ornaments worn by them, he was loaded with a number of charms, enclosed in gold cases, slung round his body, while in his cap were numerous jewels, heavily set in gold, in the form of open hands, to keep off _the evil eye._ these talismans were sewn on the front of his cap, which they entirely covered. his clothes were highly embroidered, and consisted of three waistcoats, a shirt of white silk, the women only wearing coloured ones, and loose cloth, silk, or muslin trousers. the costume of the sultan's court or hangers-on, is strictly tripoline, and as fine as lace or presents of cast off-clothes can make them. it is the custom with mukni, in imitation of the bashaw, to bestow occasionally on his principal people some article of dress. those presents are made with much affected dignity, by throwing the garment to the person intended to be honoured, and saying, "wear that," the dress is immediately put on in his presence, and the receiver kneels and kisses his hand in token of gratitude. captain lyon once saw the old kadi, who was very corpulent, receive as a gift a kaftan, which was so small for him, that when he had squeezed himself into it, he was unable to move his arms, and was in that condition obliged to walk home. each of the sultan's sons has a large troop of slaves, who attend him wherever he goes; they are generally about the same age as their master, and are his playmates, though they are obliged to receive from him many hearty cuffs, without daring to complain. the suite of the youngest boy in particular, formed a very amusing groupe, few of them exceeding five years of age. one bears his master's _bornouse,_ another holds one shoe, walking next to the boy who carries its fellow. some are in fine cast-off clothes, with tarnished embroidery, whilst others are quite or nearly naked, without even a cap on their heads, and the procession is closed by a boy, tottering under the weight of his master's state gun, which is never allowed to be fired off. in mourzouk, the luxuries of life are very limited, the people principally subsisting on dates. many do not, for months together, taste corn; when obtained, they make it into a paste called _asooda,_ which is a softer kind of _bazeen._ fowls have now almost disappeared in the country, owing to the sultan having appropriated all he could find for the consumption of his own family. the sheep and goats are driven from the mountains near benioleed, a distance of four hundred miles; they pass over one desert, which, at their rate of travelling, occupies five days, without food or water. numbers therefore die, which in course raises the price of the survivors, they are valued at three or four dollars each, when they arrive, being quite skeletons, and are as high as ten and twelve, when fatted. bread is badly made, and is baked in ovens formed of clay in holes in the earth, and heated by burning wood; the loaves, or rather flat cakes are struck into the side, and are thus baked by the heat which rises from the embers. butter is brought in goat-skins from the syrtis, and is very dear. tobacco is very generally chewed by the women, as well as by the men. they use it with the _trona_ (soda). smoking is the amusement of a great man, rather than of the lower class, the mild tobacco being very dear, and pipes not easily procured. the revenues of the sultan of fezzan arise from slaves, merchandise, and dates. for every slave, great or small, he receives, on their entering his kingdom, two spanish dollars; in some years the number of slaves amount to , ; for a camel's load of oil or butter, seven dollars; for a load of beads, copper, or hardware, four dollars; and of clothing, three dollars. all arabs, who buy dates pay a dollar duty on each load, equal at times to the price of the article, before they are allowed to remove it. above , loads are sold to them annually. date trees, except those of the kadi and mamlukes, are taxed at the rate of one dollar for every two hundred; by this duty, in the neighbourhood of mourzouk, or more properly in the few immediately neighbouring villages, the sultan receives yearly , dollars. of all sheep or goats, he is entitled to a fifth. on the sale of every slave, he has, in addition to the head-money, a dollar and a half, which, at the rate of , , gives another , dollars. the captured slaves are sold by auction, at which the sultan's brokers attend, bidding high only for the finest. the owner bids against them until he has an offer equal to what he considers as the value of the slave; he has then three-fourths of the money paid to him, while one-fourth is paid by the purchaser to the sultan. should the owner not wish to part with his slaves, he buys them in, and the sum which he last names, is considered as the price, from which he has to pay the sultan's share. the trees, which are his private property, produce about , camel loads of dates, each load pounds weight, and which may be estimated at , dollars. every garden pays a _tenth_ of the corn produced. the gardens are very small, and are watered, with great labour, from brackish wells. rain is unknown, and dews never fall. in these alone corn is raised, as well as other esculents. pomegranates and fig-trees are sometimes planted in the water-channels. presents of slaves are frequently made, and fines levied. each town pays a certain sum, which is small; but as the towns are numerous, it may be averaged to produce , dollars. add to this his annual excursions for slaves, sometimes bringing , or , , of which one-fourth are his, as well as the same proportion of camels. he alone can sell horses, which he buys for five or six dollars, when half starved, from the arabs, who come to trade, and cannot maintain them, and makes a great profit by obtaining slaves in exchange for them. all his people are fed by the public, and he has no money to pay, except to the bashaw, which is about , dollars per annum. there are various other ways, in which he extorts money. if a man dies childless, the sultan inherits great part of his property; and if he thinks it necessary to kill a man, he becomes his entire heir. in mourzouk, about a tenth part of the population are slaves, though many of them have been brought away from their native country so young as hardly to be considered in that light. with respect to the household slaves, little or no difference is to be perceived between them and freemen, and they are often entrusted with the affairs of their master. these domestic slaves are rarely sold, and on the death of any of the family to which they belong, one or more of them receive their liberty; when, being accustomed to the country, and not having any recollection of their own, they marry, settle, and are consequently considered as naturalised. it was the custom, when the people were more opulent, to liberate a male or female on the feast of bairam, after the fast of rhamadan. this practice is not entirely obsolete, but nearly so. in mourzouk there are some white families, who are called mamlukes, being descended from renegades, whom the bashaw had presented to the former sultan. these families and their descendants are considered noble, and, however poor and low their situation may be, are not a little vain of their title. the general appearance of the men of fezzan is plain, and their complexion black. the women are of the same colour, and ugly in the extreme. neither sex are remarkable for figure, weight, strength, vigour, or activity. they have a very peculiar cast of countenance, which distinguishes them from other blacks; their cheek-bones are higher and more prominent, their faces flatter, and their noses less depressed, and more peaked at the tip than those of the negroes. their eyes are generally small, and their mouths of an immense width; but their teeth are frequently good; their hair is woolly, though not completely frizzled. they are a cheerful people, fond of dancing and music, and obliging to each other. the men almost all read and write a little, but in every thing else they are very dull and heavy; their affections are cold and selfish, and a kind of general indifference to the common incidents of life, mark all their actions. they are neither prone to sudden anger, nor at all revengeful. in mourzouk the men drink a great quantity of _lackbi,_ or a drink called _busa,_ which is prepared from the dates, and is very intoxicating. the men are good-humoured drunkards, and when friends assemble in the evening, the ordinary amusement is mere drinking; but sometimes a _kadanka_ (singing girl) is sent for. the arabs practise hospitality generally; but among the fezzaners that virtue does not exist, they are, however, very attentive and obsequious to those in whose power they are, or who can repay them tenfold for their pretended disinterestedness. their religion enjoins, that, should a stranger enter while they are at their meals, he must be invited to partake, but they generally contrive to evade this injunction by eating with closed doors. the lower classes are from necessity very industrious, women as well as men, as they draw water, work in the gardens, drive the asses, make mats, baskets, &c. in addition to their other domestic duties. people of the better class, or, more properly, those who can afford to procure slaves to work for them, are, on the contrary, very idle and lethargic; they do nothing but lounge or loll about, inquiring what their neighbours have had for dinner, gossip about slaves, dates, &c., or boast of some cunning cheat, which they have practised on a tibboo or tuarick, who, though very knowing fellows, are, comparatively with the fezzaners, fair in their dealings. their moral character is on a par with that of the tripolines, though, if any thing, they are rather less insincere. falsehood is not considered odious, unless when detected; and when employed in trading, they affirm that it is allowed by the koran, for the good of merchants. however this may be, captain lyon asserts, that he never could find any one able to point out the passage authorizing these commercial falsehoods. the lower classes work neatly in leather; they weave a few coarse barracans, and make iron-work in a solid, though clumsy manner. one or two work in gold and silver with much skill, considering the badness of their tools, and every man is capable of acting as a carpenter or mason; the wood being that of the date tree, and the houses being built of mud, very little elegance or skill is necessary. much deference is paid to the artists in leather or metals, who are called, _par excellence, sta,_ or master, as leather-master, iron-master, &c. from the constant communication with bornou and soudan, the languages of both these countries are generally spoken, and many of their words are introduced into the arabic. the family slaves and their children by their masters, constantly speak the language of the country, whence they originally come. their writing is in the mogrebyn character, which is used, as is supposed by captain lyon, universally in western africa, and differs much from that of the east. the pronunciation is also very different, the kaf being pronounced as a g, and only marked with one nunnation, and f is pointed below; they have no idea of arithmetic, but reckon every thing by dots on the sand, ten in a line; many can hardly tell how much two and two amount to. they expressed great surprise at the europeans being able to add numbers together without fingering. though very fond of poetry, they are incapable of composing it. the arabs, however, invent a few little songs, which the natives have much pleasure in learning, and the women sing some of the negro airs very prettily, while grinding their corn. the songs of the kadankas (singing girls), who answer to the egyptian almehs, is soudanic. their musical instrument is called rhababe, or erhab. it is an excavated hemisphere, made from the shell of a gourd lime, and covered with leather; to this a long handle is fixed, on which is stretched a string of horse hairs, longitudinally closed, and compact as one cord, about the thickness of a quill. this is played upon with a bow. captain lyon says, the women really produced a very pleasing, though a wild melody; their songs were pretty and plaintive, and generally in the soudan language, which is very musical. what is rather singular, he heard the same song sung by the same woman that horneman mentions, and she recollected having seen that traveller at the castle. the lower classes and the slaves, who, in point of colour and appearance, are the same, labour together. the freeman has, however, only one inducement to work, which is hunger; he has no notion of laying by any thing for the advantage of his family, or as a reserve for himself in his old age; but if by any chance he obtains money, he remains idle until it is expended, and then returns unwillingly to work. the females here are allowed greater liberty than those of tripoli, and are more kindly treated. though so much better used than those of barbary, their life is still a state of slavery. a man never ventures to speak of his women; is reproached, if he spends much time in their company, never eats with them; but is waited upon at his meals, and fanned by them while he sleeps. yet these poor beings, never having known the sweets of liberty, are, in spite of their humiliation, comparatively happy. the authority of parents over their children is very great; some fathers of the better class do not allow their sons even to eat or sit down in their presence, until they become men; the poorer orders are less strict. there are no written records of events amongst the fezzaners, and their traditions are so disfigured, and so strangely mingled with religious and superstitious falsehoods, that no confidence can be placed in them. yet the natives themselves look with particular respect on a man capable of talking of the people of the olden time. several scriptural traditions are selected and believed. the psalms of david, the pentateuch, the books of solomon, and many extracts from the inspired writers, are universally known, and most reverentially considered. the new testament, translated into the arabic, which captain lyon took with him, was eagerly read, and no exception was made to it, but that of our saviour being designated as the son of god. st. paul, or baulus, bears all the blame of mahomet's name not being inserted in it, as they believe that his coming was foretold by christ, but that paul erased it; he is therefore called a kaffir, and his name is not used with much reverence. captain lyon had not been more than ten days at mourzouk, before he was attacked with severe dysentery, which confined him to his bed during twenty-two days, and reduced him to the last extremity. his unadorned narrative conveys an affecting account of the sufferings to which the party were exposed from the insalubrity of the climate; the inadequate arrangements which had been made for their comfort, or even subsistence, and the sordid and treacherous conduct of the sultan. "our little party," he says, "was at this time miserably poor; for we had money only sufficient for the purchase of corn to keep us alive, and never tasted meat, unless fortunate enough to kill a pigeon in the gardens. my illness was the first break up in our little community, and from that time, it rarely happened that one or two of us were not confined to our beds. the extreme saltness of the water, the poor quality of our food, together with the excessive heat and dryness of the climate, long retarded my recovery, and when it did take place, it was looked on as a miracle by those who had seen me in my worst state, and who thought it impossible for me to survive. i was no sooner convalescent than mr. ritchie fell ill, and was confined to his bed with an attack of bilious fever, accompanied with delirium, and great pain in his back and kidneys, for which he required frequent cupping. when a little recovered, he got up for two days, but his disorder soon returned with redoubled and alarming violence. he rejected every thing but water, and, excepting about three hours in the afternoon, remained either constantly asleep or in a delirious state. even had he been capable of taking food, we had not the power of purchasing any which could nourish or refresh him. our money was now all expended, and the sultan's treacherous plans to distress us, which daily became too apparent, were so well arranged, that we could not find any one to buy our goods. for six entire weeks we were without animal food, subsisting on a very scanty portion of corn and dates. our horses were mere skeletons, added to which, belford became totally deaf, and so emaciated as to be unable to walk. my situation was now such as to create the most gloomy apprehensions. my naturally sanguine mind, however, and above all, my firm reliance on that power which had so mercifully protected me on so many trying occasions, prevented my giving way to despondency; and belford beginning soon to rally a little, we united, and took turns in nursing and attending on our poor companion. at this time, having no servant, we performed for mr. ritchie the most menial offices. two young men, brothers, whom we had treated with great kindness, and whom we had engaged to attend on us, so far from commiserating our forlorn condition, forsook us in our distress, and even carried off our little store of rice and cuscoussou; laughing at our complaints, and well knowing that our poverty prevented the redress which we should otherwise have sought and obtained." rhamadan, the mahommedan lent, was announced on the nd june. the strictest fast was immediately commenced, lasting from before day, about three a.m., till sunset, seven p.m. in order to support their assumed character as moslem; they were now obliged, during the sixteen hours, to eat only by stealth, their friend mukni having surrounded them with spies. mr. ritchie only, being confined to his bed by illness, was privileged to take food or drink. the excessive heat, which now raged, added to their sufferings. during the month of june, the thermometer, at five o'clock a.m., stood at from ° to °, but at two o'clock p.m., it rose to °, °, °, and at length, on the th and th, to ° and ° of fahrenheit. in the early part of july, the heat somewhat abated; the thermometer, at two p.m., ranging between ° and °. towards the close of the month, it again rose to °, in august to ° and °, in september it ranged between ° and °, with little difference in the temperature of the mornings; and in october, the average was about °. the minimum, in december, was ° at five a.m., and ° in the afternoon. the close of the rhamadan, on the d july, was attended, in the city, with the most extravagant demonstrations of rejoicing. everybody was in motion, screaming, dancing, firing guns, eating and drinking. poor mr. ritchie, after having been confined to his bed for fifty-eight days, was now able to sit up a little, and by the th august had tolerably recovered. about the same time, belford was again attacked with giddiness and deafness, and fell into a very weak state. their rate of living was now reduced to a quart of corn _per diem,_ with occasionally a few dates, divided amongst four persons. no one would purchase their merchandize, owing, as it became apparent to mukni's treacherous orders. mr. ritchie, for reasons not explained, did not think it right to draw for money on the treasury, and they were reduced to the last extremity, when the sultan graciously condescended to advance them eight dollars, and at this time a neighbour repaid them ten dollars, which they had lent soon after their arrival. they were now able to treat themselves with a little meat. about the th september, mr. ritchie, who had never recovered his spirits, but had latterly shunned the society even of his companions, again relapsed, and was confined to his bed, and belford, though better in health, was entirely deaf; their condition became every day more destitute. they had hired a woman to cook for them at a dollar a month. she was required to come only once a day, to bake their bread or make their cuscoussou; and it often happened, that when she had stolen half the allowance to which they had restricted themselves, they were obliged to fast till the morrow. they were saved, when on the very brink of starvation, by a supply of seven dollars, the munificent reward conferred upon belford by the sultan, for constructing a rude kind of carriage for him. soon afterwards, they sold a horse for seventy dollars. this seasonable supply was carefully economized; but it had become much reduced when captain lyon and belford both fell ill again. the former rose from his bed, after being confined to it for a week, a skeleton. under this exigency they met with a remarkable instance of disinterested friendship on the part of a native, yusuf el lizari, who, as well as his brother, had previously shown them much kindness. "one night," says captain lyon, "as we were all sitting pensively on our mat, our friend yusuf came in, and, addressing mr. ritchie, said, 'yusuf, you, and said are my friends. mukni has hopes you may die, that he may secure to himself all your goods. you seem very melancholy; do you want money?' mr. ritchie having acknowledged that he did, yusuf rejoined, 'i have none myself, but i will borrow some for you.' twenty dollars being the sum named, our kind friend went out, and soon returned with thirty, an act of generosity so unlocked for, that we were incapable of thanking him as he deserved. this seasonable supply enabled us to buy some good food, and to make some amends for our late privations. our health soon improved, and mr. ritchie's spirits began to brighten." but this interval of hope was soon darkened. on the th of november, poor ritchie was again attacked by illness, and after lying for three or four days in a state of torpor, without taking any refreshment, he again became delirious, and on the th expired. the two survivors of this ill-fated party were themselves reduce to the lowest state of debility, and the only prospect before them, was that of probably following, in a few days, their lamented companion. "and now, for the first time in all our distresses," says captain lyon, "my hopes did indeed fail me. belford, as well as he was able, hastened to form a rough coffin out of their chests, while the washers of the dead came to perform their melancholy office. the protestant burial service was read over the body, in secret, during the night, and on the next day, the remains were committed to the grave. at the grave, it was deemed necessary to keep up the farce of mahommadism, by publicly reciting the first chapter of the koran, which the most serious christian would consider as a beautiful and applicable form on such an occasion." within an hour after the funeral, a courier arrived from tripoli, announcing that a further allowance of £ , had been made by the british government towards the expenses of the expedition. had this welcome intelligence reached them a little sooner, many of their distresses would have been prevented. the efforts and mental exertions which the survivors of the party had undergone, proved, however, too much for their strength, and, for ten days, both were again confined to their beds. during this time, they were most humanely attended by yusuf and haji mahmoud, and by a little girl, who was their principal nurse. at length, captain lyon sufficiently recovered his health, to undertake, during the months of december and january, two excursions to the east and south of mourzouk, preparatory to his return to england. on the th of february, he finally left mourzouk; and on the th march, exactly one year from the day on which the party left tripoli, the captain and belford, his surviving companion, re-entered that capital. chapter xix. death had hitherto been the lot of the african adventurers, but nothing could shake the determination of the british government, to obtain, by some means or other, a competent degree of information respecting the unknown countries of africa. the great favour enjoyed at the court of tripoli, was still regarded as an advantageous circumstance. it was chiefly due to the prudence and ability of mr. warrington, without whose advice scarcely any thing of importance was transacted. the bashaw was therefore disposed to renew his protection to whatever mission britain might send; nor could the support of any sovereign have been more efficient, for the influence of this petty prince, and the terror of his name, were almost unbounded in the greatest kingdoms of central africa. one weapon, the gun, in the hands of his troops, gives him all this superiority; for the remoter nations, from the nile to the atlantic, scarcely know any other arms besides the spear, the bow, and the javelin. a musket among those tribes is an object of almost supernatural dread; individuals have been seen kneeling down before it, speaking to it in whispers, and addressing to it earnest supplications. with troops thus armed, the bashaw of tripoli is esteemed, in northern africa, the most potent monarch on earth; and it is a matter of surprise amongst the natives, that he has not ere now compelled all europe to embrace the mahommedan faith. he could, therefore, assure the english, that for any but physical obstacles, they might travel in safety from tripoli to bornou, as from edinburgh to london. under the confidence inspired by these circumstances, government prepared another expedition, and without difficulty procured a fresh band of adventurers, who undertook to brave all its perils. major denham, lieutenant clapperton, of the navy, and dr. oudney, a naval surgeon, possessing a considerable knowledge of natural history, were appointed to the service. without delay they proceeded to tripoli, where they arrived on the th november, . they were immediately introduced to the bashaw, whom they found sitting cross-legged on a carpet, attended by armed negroes. after treating them to sherbet and coffee, he invited them to a hawking party, where he appeared mounted on a milk-white arabian steed, superbly caparisoned, having a saddle of crimson velvet, richly studded with gold nails and with embroidered trappings. the hunt began on the borders of the desert, where parties of six or eight arabs dashed forward quick as lightning, fired suddenly, and rushed back with loud cries. the skill, with which they manoeuvred their steeds, whirling the long muskets over their heads, as they rode at full gallop, appeared quite surprising. on the th march, the party left tripoli for benioleed. here the consul and his son, who had accompanied them from tripoli, took their leave, with many hearty good wishes for their success and prosperity. on the day previously to their approach to sockna, the uniformity of the journey was somewhat enlivened, by meeting with a kafila, or coffle of slaves from fezzan, in which were about seventy negresses, much better looking and more healthy than any they had seen near the sea coast. they were marching in parties of fifteen or twenty, and on inquiring of one of these parties from whence they came, the poor things divided themselves with the greatest simplicity, and answered, "soudan, berghami and kanem," pointing out the different parcels from each country as they spoke. those from soudan had the most regular features, and an expression of countenance particularly pleasing. passing a small wadey and plantation of date trees, they had soon a view of sockna, and were met on the plain on which it stands, by the governor and principal inhabitants, accompanied by some hundreds of the country people, who all crowded round their horses, kissing their hands, and welcoming them with every appearance of sincerity and satisfaction, and in this way they entered the town; the words _inglesi, inglesi,_ were repeated by a hundred voices. this was to them highly satisfactory, as they were the first english travellers in africa, who had resisted the persuasion that a disguise was necessary, and who had determined to travel in their real character as britons and christians, and to wear on all occasions their english dresses; nor had they at any future period occasion to regret that they had done so. there was here neither jealousy nor distrust of them as christians, on the contrary, major denham was perfectly satisfied that their reception would have been less friendly, had they assumed a character that would have been at the best but ill supported. in trying to make themselves appear as mussulmans, they would have been set down as real impostors. of the inhabitants of sockna, we have already given a full account in the foregoing travels of captain lyon, nor does the history given by major denham differ in any of the essential points. of the affability of the females, the travellers had however many proofs, and whilst only two of them were walking through the town one morning, with a little army of ragged boys following them, two of rather the better order quickly dispersed them, and invited the english to enter a house, saying that a _mara zene,_ a beautiful woman, wished to see them. they put themselves under their guidance, and entering a better sort of dwelling house, were quickly surrounded by half a dozen ladies, most of them aged, but who asked them a thousand questions, and when satisfied that their visitors were not dangerous people, called several younger ones, who appeared to be but waiting for permission to show themselves. the dresses of the visitors were then minutely examined; the yellow buttons on their waistcoats, and their watches created the greatest astonishment. major denham wore a pair of loose white trousers, into the pockets of which he accidentally put his hands, which raised the curiosity of the ladies to a wonderful degree; the major's hands were pulled out, and those of three or four of the ladies thrust in, in their stead; these were replaced by others, all demanding their use so violently and loudly, that he had considerable difficulty in extricating himself, and was glad to make his escape. the remaining half of their journey to mourzouk was pretty nearly the same kind of surface as they had passed before, but in some places worse. sometimes two, and once three days, they were without finding a supply of water, which was generally muddy, bitter, or brackish. nor is this the worst which sometimes befals the traveller; the overpowering effect of a sudden sand-wind, when nearly at the close of the desert, often destroys a whole kafila, already weakened by fatigue, and the spot was pointed out to them strewed with bones and dried carcasses, where the year before, fifty sheep, two camels, and two men perished from thirst and fatigue, when within eight hours march of the well, for which they were then anxiously looking. indeed the sand storm they had the misfortune to encounter in crossing the desert, gave them a pretty correct idea of the dreaded effects of these hurricanes. the wind raised the fine sand, with which the extensive desert was covered, so as to fill the atmosphere, and render the immense space before them impenetrable to the eye beyond a few yards. the sun and clouds were entirely obscured, and a suffocating and oppressive weight accompanied the flakes and masses of sand, which it might be said they had to penetrate at every step. at times they completely lost sight of the camels, though only a few yards before them. the horses hung their tongues out of their mouths, and refused to face the torrents of sand. a sheep that accompanied the kafila, the last of their stock, lay down in the road, and they were obliged to kill him and throw the carcass on a camel; a parching thirst oppressed them, which nothing alleviated. they had made but little way by three o'clock in the afternoon, when the wind got round to the eastward, and imparted to them a little refreshment. with this change they moved on until about five, when they halted, protected a little by three several ranges of irregular hills, some conical, and some table-topped. as they had but little wood, their fare was confined to tea, and they hoped to find relieve from their fatigues by a sound sleep. that, however, was denied them; the tent had been imprudently pitched, and was exposed to the east wind, which blew a hurricane during the night: the tent was blown down, and the whole detachment were employed a full hour in getting it up again; their bedding and everything within it was during that time completely buried, by the constant driving of the sand. major denham was obliged three times during the night, to get up for the purpose of strengthening the pegs, and when he awoke in the morning, two hillocks of sand were formed on each side of his head, some inches high. on the th april, they arrived at a village in the midst of a vast multitude of palm trees, just one day's journey short of mourzouk. as it was to be the last day's march, they were all in good spirits at the prospect of rest, and had they made their arrangements with judgment, every thing would have gone on well. they had, however, neglected sending _an axant courier,_ to advise the sultan of their arrival, a practice which ought particularly to have been attended to, and consequently their reception was not what it ought to have been. they arrived at d'leem, a small plantation of date trees, at noon, and finding no water in the well, were obliged to proceed, and it was three in the afternoon before they arrived at the wells near mourzouk. here they were obliged to wait till the camels came up, in order that they might advance in form. they might, however, have saved themselves the trouble. no one came out to meet them, except some naked boys, and a mixture of tibboos, tuaricks, and fezzanese, who gazed at them with astonishment, and no very pleasant aspect. they determined on not entering the town, in a manner so little flattering to those whom they represented, and retiring to a rising ground, a little distance from the gates of the town, waited the return of a _chaoush,_ who had been despatched to announce their arrival. after half an hour's delay, the shiek el blad, the governor of the town came out, and in the sultan's name requested they would accompany him to the house, which had been prepared for them, and he added, to their great surprise, the english consul is there already. the fact was, a very ill-looking jew servant of major denham's, mounted on a white mule, with a pair of small canteens under him, had preceded the camels and entered the town by himself. he was received with great respect by all the inhabitants, conducted through the streets to the house which was destined to receive the party, and from the circumstance of the canteens being all covered with small brass shining nails, a very high idea, of his consequence was formed. he very sensibly received ail their attentions in silence, and drank the cool water and milk which were handed to him, and they always had the laugh against them afterwards, for having shown so much civility to an israelite, a race which are heartily despised. "we thought the english," said they, "were better looking than jews--death to their race! but the god made us all, though not all handsome like mussulmans, so who could tell?" as they were all this time exposed to a burning sun, they were well inclined to compromise a little of their dignity, and determined on entering the town, which they did by the principal gate. their interview with the sultan of mourzouk was anything but encouraging; he told them that there was no intention, as they had been led to expect, of any expedition to proceed to the southward for some time to come; that an army could only move in the spring of the year; that the arrangements for moving a body of men through a country, where every necessary must be carried on camels, both for men and horses, were go numerous, that before the following spring it was scarcely possible to complete them, that two camels were required for every man and horse, and one for every two men on foot. and as to their proceeding to bornou, it would be necessary had the bashaw instructed him to forward them, that they should be accompanied by an escort of two hundred men. he said, he would read to them the bashaw's letter, and they should see the extent to which he could forward their wishes. the letter was then handed to his fighi, or secretary, and they found that they were entrusted to the protection of the sultan of fezzan, who was to charge himself with their safety, and to ensure their being treated with respect and attention by all his subjects. that they were to reside at sebha or mourzouk, or wherever they chose in the kingdom of fezzan, and to await his return from tripoli. with this their audience ended, and they returned to their habitation. it is quite impossible to express the disheartening feelings, with which they left the castle. the heat was intense; the thermometer standing at ° in the coolest spot in the house during the of the day; and the nights were scarcely less oppressive; the flies were in such myriads, that darkness was the only refuge from their annoyance. they received visits from all the principal people of mourzouk, the day after their arrival, and remarking a very tall turiack, with a pair of expressive, large, benevolent looking eyes, above the black mask, with which they always cover the lower part of their face, hovering about the door, major denham made signs to him to come near, and inquired after hateeta, the chief, of whom captain lyon had spoken so highly, and for whom at his request, he was the bearer of a sword. to the great surprise of major denham, striking his breast, he exclaimed, "i am hateeta, are you a countryman of said? (captain lyon's travelling name,) how is he? i have often longed to hear of him." major denham found that hateeta had been but once in mourzouk, since the departure of captain lyon, and was to remain only a few days. on the following morning, he came to the house, and the sword was presented to him. it would be difficult to describe his delight, he drew the sword and returned it repeatedly, pressed it to his breast, exclaimed, allah! allah! took the hand of major denham, and pressing it, said, _katar heyrick yassur yassur,_ (thank you very, very much,) nearly all the arabic he could speak. it was shortly reported all over the town, that hateeta had received a present from said, worth one hundred dollars. they had been several times visited, and their hopes and spirits raised by a person called boo bucker, boo khaloom. he said that it was in the sultan's power to send them on to bornou, if he pleased, he even hinted that a bribe for himself might induce him to do so; this, however, was found not to be the case. boo khaloom was represented to them, and truly, as a merchant of very considerable riches and affluence in the interior. he was on the eve of starting for tripoli, with really superb presents for the bashaw. he had five hundred slaves, the handsomest that could be procured, besides other things. he stated in secret, that his principal object in going to tripoli, was to obtain the removal of the sultan of fezzan, and he wished that they should make application to the bashaw, for him to accompany them further into the interior; they were not, however, to hint that the proposition had come from him. boo khaloom said, that he should be instantly joined by upwards of one hundred merchants, who waited for his going, and no further escort would be necessary; that he should merely remain a few weeks in tripoli, and on his return they should instantly move on. boo khaloom left mourzouk for tripoli with his slaves and presents, loading upwards of thirty camels, apparently reconciled to, and upon good terms with the sultan. it was, however, very well known, that sultan mustapha had set every engine at work to have boo khaloom's head taken off, on his arrival at tripoli, and that the other was willing to sacrifice all that he was worth to displace and ruin mustapha in the bashaw's favour. it was not until the th, that the sultan, after attending the mosque, started for tripoli; all his camels and suite had marched in divisions for three days previously; in slaves he had alone more than , . he was attended by about ten horsemen, his particular favourites, and four flags were carried before him, through the town. the inhabitants complained dreadfully of his avarice, and declared that he had not left a dollar, or an animal worth one, in all fezzan. nothing was now to be done but to make their arrangements for a favourable start the following spring. by the sultan's departure, every necessary for their proceeding was withdrawn from the spot where they were. not a camel was to be procured, and every dollar, that he could by any means force from his subjects, was forwarded to tripoli. to that place, therefore, were they to look for supplies of every kind, and it was unanimously decided, that the departure of major denham for tripoli should follow that of the sultan or as soon as possible. in pursuance of this determination to represent to the bashaw of tripoli, how necessary it was that something more than promises should be given them for their sterling money, on monday, the th may, major denham left mourzouk, with only his own negro servant, three camels, and two arabs, and after a most dreary journey of twenty days, over the same uninteresting country which he had already traversed, the more dreary for want of his former companions, he arrived at tripoli on the th june, where he was received by the consul, with his usual hospitality and kindness, and he assigned him apartments in the consulate. major denham requested an immediate audience of the bashaw, which, in consequence of the rhamadan, was not granted him until the following evening. the consul, captain smyth of the navy, and major denham, attended. the latter represented, in the strongest terms, how greatly they were disappointed at the unexpected and ruinous delay, which they had experienced at mourzouk, and requested a specific time being fixed for their proceeding to bornou, stating also, that were the answer not satisfactory, he should proceed forthwith to england, and represent to the government how grievously they had been deceived. the i bashaw denied having intentionally broken his word, and solemnly declared that the will of god, in visiting the sultan of fezzan with sickness, had alone prevented their being now on the road to bornou. not receiving the full satisfaction which was expected, major denham lost no time in setting sail for england, to lodge a complaint with his own court. this news was painfully felt by the bashaw, who sent vessel after vessel, one of which at last overtook major denham, while performing quarantine at marseilles, and announced to him, that arrangements were actually made with boo khaloom, for escorting him to the capital of bornou. major denham immediately re-embarked, and a seven days' passage brought him once more to the shores of barbary. boo khaloom and part of the escort were already at the entrance of the desert; and on the th september, they re-entered the pass of melghri in the tarhona mountains. hope and confidence had now taken possession of the mind of major denham, in the place of anxiety and disappointment; there was now an air of assurance and success in all their arrangements, and, with this conviction, major denham felt his health and spirits increase. but little beyond the casualties attendant on desert travelling, occurred previously to their arriving again at sockna, which took place on the nd october. major denham found that the great failing of his friend, boo khaloom, was pomp and show; and feeling that he was on this occasion the representative of the bashaw, he was evidently unwilling that any sultan of fezzan should exceed him in magnificence. on entering sockna, his six principal followers, handsomely attired in turbans and fine barracans, and mounted on his best horses, kept near his person, whilst the others at a little distance, formed the flanks. major denham rode on his right hand, dressed in his british uniform, with loose turkish trousers, a red turban, red boots, with a white bornouse over all, as a shade from the sun, and this, though not strictly according to orders, was by no means an unbecoming dress. boo khaloom was mounted on a beautiful white tunisian horse, a present from the bashaw, the peak and rear of the saddle covered with gold, and his housings were of scarlet cloth, with a border of gold six inches broad. his dress consisted of red boots, richly embroidered with gold, yellow silk trousers, a crimson velvet caftan with gold buttons, a silk benise of sky blue, and a silk sidria underneath. a transparent white silk barraca was thrown lightly over this, and on his shoulder hung a scarlet bornouse with wide gold lace, a present also from the bashaw, which had cost at least four hundred dollars, and a cashmere shawl turban crowned the whole. in this splendid array they moved on, until, as they approached the gates of the town, the dancing and singing men and women met them, and amidst these, the shouts and firing of the men, who skirmished before them, and the loo! loo! of the women, they entered sockna. they found that houses were provided for them in the town, but the kafila bivouacked outside the gates. it had always been their intention to halt at sockna for three or four days, and here they expected to be joined by a party of megarha arabs, whom their sheik, abdi smud ben erhoma, had left them for the purpose of collecting together. hoon and wadan were also to furnish them with another quota. the house of major denham consisted of a court yard eighteen feet square, and a small dark room, leading out of it by two steps. the court, however, was the greater part of the day shaded, and here on a carpet, the major received his visitors. the arabs, as they arrived, were all sent to him by boo khaloom, and their presentation has a form in it, not much in character with their accustomed rudeness: they all come armed with their long guns, and the same girdle which confines their barracan, contains also two long pistols; the chief enters, and salutes, dropping on one knee, and touching the stranger's right hand with his, which he carries afterwards to his lips; he then says, "here are my men, who are come to say health to you." on receiving permission, they approached major denham one by one, saluting in the same manner as their chief, who continued to remain at his side; they then sat down, forming a sort of semi-circle round the major, with their guns upright between their knees, and after a little time, on the sheik's making a signal, they all quitted the presence. boo khaloom at this time became so alarmingly ill, that their departure was of necessity postponed. he requested major denham to prescribe for him. all the fighis' (writers,) and marabouts in sockna, were employed on this occasion by the friends of boo khaloom; and one night the tassels of his cap were literally loaded with their charms. boo khaloom assured major denham, when alone, that he had no faith in such things, and smiled when he said his friends would think ill of him, were he to refuse; his faith was, however, stronger than he chose to acknowledge; for entering one morning unexpectedly, the major found him with a dove, that had just been killed and cut open, lying on his head, which, as he assured him, was, because a very great marabout had come from wadan on purpose to perform the operation. major denham was nevertheless still more surprised to find him seated on a carpet, in the centre of the little court yard of his house, in the middle of the day, with five of his hordes round him, which had been brought from the tents by his order. the major was convinced, that this was some superstitious idea of the mystic influence which his horses were supposed to have upon his fate, and on expressing his surprise, he made him sit down and told him the following story. "sidi mohammed, praise be to his name!" said he, "was once applied to by a poor man, whose speculations in trade always turned out disadvantageously; his children died, and nothing flourished with him. mohammed told him, that horses were nearly connected with his fate, and that he must buy horses before he would be fortunate. 'if i cannot afford to keep myself,' said the man, 'how can i feed horses?'--'no matter,' said the prophet; alive or dead, no good fortune will come upon your house until you have them.' the poor man went and purchased the head of a dead horse, which was all his means enabled him to do, and this he placed over his house, little dreaming of the good fortune, which by this means he was to enjoy. before the first day passed, to his extreme surprise and joy, he saw a bird, with a chain attached to its neck, entangled with the horse's head; and, on mounting to the housetop to extricate the bird, he found it one of the greatest beauty, and that the chain was of diamonds. he was not long in discovering the bird had escaped from the window of the favourite of a certain sultan, who, on its being restored, gave the poor man the chain as his reward, and by means of which he became rich and happy. now," said boo khaloom, "i dreamt of this story last night, and that i was the poor man." during their stay at sockna, the marriage of the son of one of the richest inhabitants, haji mohammed-el-hair-trigge, was celebrated in the true arab style. there is something so rudely chivalric in their ceremonies, so very superior to the dull monotony of a tripolitan wedding, where from one to five hundred guests, all males assemble, covered with gold lace, and look at one another from the evening of one day until daylight the next, that we cannot refrain from transcribing it. the morning of the marriage-day, (for the ceremony is always performed in the evening, that is, the final ceremony, for they are generally betrothed, and the fatah read a year before,) is ushered in by the music of the town or tribe, consisting of a bagpipe and two small drums, serenading the bride first, and then the bridegroom, who generally walks through the streets, very finely dressed, with all the town at his heels; during which all the women assemble at the bride's house, dressed in their finest clothes, and place themselves at the different holes in the walls, which serve as windows, and look into the court-yard. when they are so placed, and the bride is in front of one of the windows, with her face entirely covered with her barracan, the bridal clothes, consisting of silk shifts, shawls, silk trousers, and fine barracans, to show her riches, are hung from the top of the house, quite reaching to the ground. the young arab chiefs are permitted to pay their respects; they are preceded from the skiffa, or entrance, by their music, and a dancing woman or two advance with great form, and with slow steps, to the centre of the court, under the bride's window; here the ladies salute their visitors with "loo! loo! loo!" which they return by laying their right hand on their breasts, as they are conducted quite round the circle. ample time is afforded them to survey the surrounding beauties, and there are but few who on those occasions are so cruel as to keep the veil quite closed. such an assemblage of bright black eyes, large ear-rings, and white teeth, are but rarely seen in any country. after having made the circuit, the largess is given, and exposed to view by the chief _danseuse,_ and according to its amount, is the donor hailed and greeted by the spectators. previously to their departure, all visitors discharge their pistols, and then again the ladies salute with the loo! loo! so far from being displeased at major denham asking permission to pay his respects, it was considered as a favour conferred, and the bridegroom, although he could not himself be admitted, attended him to and from the house of his mistress. this ceremony being ended, a little before sunset, the bride prepares to leave her father's house; a camel is sent for her, with a jaafa or sedan chair of basket work on its back, covered with skins of animals, shawls from soudan, cairo, and timbuctoo; she steps into this, and so places herself as to see what is going forward, and yet to lie entirely hidden from the view of others. she is now conducted outside the town, where all the horsemen and footmen, who have arms are assembled. the escort of the travellers on this occasion added to the effect, as they were all by boo khaloom's order in the field, consisting of sixty mounted arabs, and when they all charged and fired at the foot of the bride's camel, major denham says, he really felt for the virgin's situation, but it was thought a great honour, and that, he supposes, consoled her for the fright. they commenced by skirmishing by twos and fours, and charging in sections at full speed, always firing close under the bride's jaafa; in this manner they proceeded three times round the town, the scene occasionally relieved by a little interlude of the bridegroom; approaching the camel, which was surrounded by the negresses, who instantly commenced a cry, and drove him away, to the great amusement of the bystanders, exclaiming, _"burra! burra!"_ (be off! be off!) _mazal shouia,_ (a little yet.) with discharges of musketry, and the train of horsemen, &c., she is then conveyed to the bridegroom's house, upon which it is necessary for her to appear greatly surprised, and refuse to dismount; the women scream, and the men shout, and she is at length persuaded to enter, when after receiving a bit of sugar in her mouth, from the bridegroom's hand, and placing another bit in his, with her own fair fingers, the ceremony is finished, and they are declared man and wife. they had now to pass the gibel assoud, or black mountains; the northernmost part of this basaltic chain commences on leaving sockna. they halted at melaghi the place of meeting; immediately at the foot of the mountain is the well of agutifa, and from hence probably the most imposing view of these heights will be seen. to the south, the mountain path of niffdah presents its black, overhanging peaks, the deep chasm round which, the path winds, bearing a most cavern-like appearance; a little to the west, the camel path, called el nishka, appears scarcely less difficult and precipitous; the more southern crags close in the landscape, while the foreground is occupied by the dingy and barren wadey of agutifa, with the well immediately overhung by red ridges of limestone and clay; the whole presenting a picture of barrenness not to be perfectly described either by poet or painter. the first four days of their journey after leaving agutifa, were all dreariness and misery. this was the third time that they had passed these deserts, but no familiarity with the scenery at all relieves the sense of wretchedness which the dread barrenness of the place inspires. they marched from dawn until dark, for the sake of getting over them as soon as possible, and as scarcely sufficient fuel was to be found to boil a little water, a mass of cold tumuta was usually their supper. on leaving tingazeer they had the blessing of a rainy day, for such it was to all, but particularly to the poor negroes who accompanied the kafila; although boo khaloom always gave something to drink from his skins once a day, an unusual kindness; yet, marching as they were for twelve and fourteen hours, a single draught was scarcely sufficient to satisfy nature. in consequence of the rain, they found water fresh and pure during almost every day's march, and arrived at zeghren with the loss of only one camel. on the last day, previously to arriving at the well, omhul abeed, a skeleton of a man, with some flesh still hanging about him, lay close to the road, but it was passed by the whole kafila with scarcely a remark. after these dreary wastes, it was no small pleasure to rest a day at zeghren, the native town of a considerable merchant, who accompanied the kafila. when they first left sockna for mourzouk, abdi zeleel had before taken major denham to his house, and presented him to his mother and sister, and he now insisted upon his taking up his quarters there altogether. almost the first person who presented herself, was his friend the merchant's sister, he had almost said, the fair omhal henna, (the mother of peace.) we shall allow major denham to relate this african amour in his own words:-- "she had a wooden bowl of haleb (fresh milk) in her hand, the greatest rarity she could offer, and holding out the milk, with some confusion, towards me, with both her hands, the hood, which should have concealed her beautiful features, had fallen back. as my taking my milk from her, would have prevented the amicable salutation we both seemed prepared for, and which consisted of four or five gentle pressures of the hand, with as many _aish harleks,_ and _tiels,_ and _ham-dulillahs,_ she placed the bowl upon the ground, while the ceremonies of greeting, which take up a much longer time in an african village, than in an english drawing room, were by mutual consent most cordially performed. i really could not help looking at her with astonishment, and i heartily wish i had the power of conveying an idea of her portrait. it was the jemma (friday,) the sabbath, and she was covered, for i cannot call it dressed, with only a blue linen barracan, which passed under one arm, and was fastened on the top of the opposite shoulder, with a silver pin, the remaining part thrown round the body behind, and brought over her head as a sort of hood, which, as i have before remarked, had fallen off, and my having taken her hand, when she set down the milk, had prevented its being replaced. this accident displayed her jet black hair, in numberless plaits, all round her expressive face and neck, and her large sparkling eyes and little mouth, filled with the whitest teeth imaginable. she had various figures burnt on her chin, with gunpowder; her complexion was a deep brown, and round her neck were eight or ten necklaces, of coral and different coloured beads. so interesting a person i had not seen in the country, and on my remaining some moments with my eyes fixed on her, she recommenced the salutation. how is your health? &c., and smiling, asked with great naivete, whether i had not learned, during the last two months, a little more arabic? i assured her that i had. looking round to see if any body heard her, and having brought the hood over her face, she said, 'i first heard of your coming last night, and desired the slave to mention it to my brother. i have always looked for your coming, and at night, _because at night i have sometimes seen you._ you were the first man whose hand i ever touched, but they all said it did not signify with you, an insara (a christian.) god turn your heart! but my brother says you will never become moslem--won't you, to please abdi zeleel's sister? my mother says, god would never have allowed you to come, but for your conversion.' by this time again the hood had fallen back, and i had again taken her hand, when the unexpected appearance of abdi zeleel, accompanied by the governor of the town, who came to visit me, was a most unwelcome interruption. omhal henna quickly escaped; she had overstepped the line, and i saw her no more." on wednesday the th october, they made their entree into mourzouk, with all the parade and show that they could muster. by boo khaloom's presents to the bashaw, but chiefly on account of his having undertaken to conduct the travellers to bornou, he had not only gained the bashaw's favour, but had left tripoli with strong proofs of his master's consideration. the inhabitants came out to meet them, and they entered the gates amidst the shouts of the people, preceded by singing and dancing women. and the arabs who formed their escort, made such repeated charges, upon their jaded and tired animals, that major denham expected some of them would "fall to rise no more." no living creatures can be treated worse than an arab's wife and his horse, and if plurality could be transferred from the marriage bed to the stable, both wives and horses would be much benefited by the change. major denham could not quite resist a sensation of disappointment, that no friends came out to meet him, but as the sun was insufferably powerful, and as he had received a message by boo khaloom's brother, from dr. oudney, that he was unwell, and that lieutenant clapperton had the ague, he did not much expect to see them. he was, however, by no means prepared to see either of them so much reduced as they were. he found that both his companions and hillman, had been confined to their beds with _hemma,_ (fever and ague,) had been delirious, and the doctor and hillman only a little recovered. clapperton was still on his bed, which for fifteen days he had not quitted. doctor oudney was suffering also from a severe complaint in his chest, arising from a cold caught during his excursion to ghraat, and nothing could be more disheartening than their appearance. the opinion of every body, arabs, tripolines, and ritchie, and lyon, their predecessors, were all unanimous as to the insalubrity of the air. every one belonging to the present expedition had been seriously disordered, and amongst the inhabitants themselves, any thing like a healthy-looking person was a rarity. notwithstanding boo khaloom made every exertion in his power to get away from mourzouk, as early as possible, yet, from the numerous arrangements, which it was necessary for him to make, for the provisioning of so many persons, during a journey through a country possessing no resources, it was the th november before those arrangements were complete. dr. oudney and mr. clapperton, from a most praiseworthy impatience to proceed on their journey, and at the same time thinking their health might be benefited by the change of air, preceded him to gatrone by ten days. major denham remained behind to urge boo khaloom, and expedite his departure, as it was considered, by those means, that any wish might be obviated, which he might have to delay, on account of his private affairs, even for a day. their caution was, however, needless, no man could be more anxious to obey the orders he had received, and forward their views than himself; indeed so peremptory had been the commands of the bashaw, in consequence of the representation of our consul general, when complaining of former procrastinations, that boo khaloom's personal safety depended on his expedition, and of this he was well aware. the following is a correct account of the strength of the party, as it proceeded from mourzouk. major denham had succeeded in engaging, on his return to tripoli, as an attendant to accompany him to bornou, a native of the island of st. vincent, whose real name was adolphus sympkins, but who, in consequence of his having run away from home, and as a merchant traversed hall the world over, had acquired the name of columbus. he had been several years in the service of the bashaw, spoke three european languages, and perfect arabic. [*] they had besides, three free negroes, who had been hired in tripoli as private servants. jacob, a gibraltar jew, who was a sort of store-keeper, four men to look after the camels, and these, with mr. hillman and the remainder of the europeans, made up the number of their household to thirteen persons. they were also accompanied by several merchants from mesurata, tripoli, sockna, and mourzouk, who gladly embraced the protection of their escort, to proceed to the interior with their merchandize. [footnote: this person afterwards accompanied captain clapperton on his second journey.] the arabs in the service of the bashaw of tripoli, by whom they were to be escorted to bornou, and on whose good conduct their success almost wholly depended, were now nearly all assembled, and had been chosen from amongst the most convenient tribes. they gained considerably in the good opinion of the travellers, each day as they became better acquainted with them; they were not only a great and most necessary protection to them, breaking the ground, as they were, for any europeans who might follow their steps, but enlivened them greatly on their dreary desert way, by their infinite wit and sagacity, as well as by their poetry, extempore and traditional. there were several amongst the party, who shone as orators in verse, to use the idiom of their own expressive language, particularly one of the tribe of boo saiff marabooteens, or gifted persons, who would sing for an hour together, faithfully describing the whole of their journey for the preceding fortnight, relating the most trifling occurrence that had happened, even to the name of the well, and the colour and taste of the water, with astonishing rapidity and humour, and in very tolerable poetry, while some of his traditional ballads were beautiful. the arabs are generally thin, meagre figures, though possessing expressive and sometimes handsome features; great violence of gesture and muscular action; irritable and fiery, they are unlike the dwellers in towns and cities; noisy and loud, their common conversational intercourse appears to be a continual strife and quarrel. they are, however, brave, eloquent, and deeply sensible of shame. major denham once knew an arab of the lower class refuse his food for days together, because in a skirmish his gun had missed fire; to use his own words, _"gulbi wahr,_ (my heart aches,) _bin-dikti kadip hashimtui gedam el naz._ (my gun lied, and shamed me before the people.)" much has been said of their want of cleanliness; they may, however, be pronounced to be much more cleanly than the lower orders of people in any european country. circumcision, and the shaving the hair from the head, and every other part of the body; the frequent ablutions, which their religion compels them to perform; all tend to enforce practices of cleanliness. vermin, from the climate of their country, they, as well as every other person, must be annoyed with; and although the lower ranks have not the means of frequently changing their covering, for it can be scarcely called apparel, yet they endeavour to free themselves as much as possible from the persecuting vermin. their mode of dress has undergone no change for centuries back, and the words of fenelon will at this day apply with equal truth to their present appearance. "leurs habits sont aisés a faire, car en ce doux climat on ne porte qu'une piece d'étoffe fine et légère, qui n'est point taillée et que chacun met à long plis autour de son corps pour la modestie; lui donnant la forme qu'il veut." chapter xx. during the time that major denham had been occupied with transacting his business with the bashaw of tripoli, dr. oudney and lieutenant clapperton had determined to make an excursion to the westward of mourzouk, for the purpose of ascertaining the course of the rivers, and the local curiosities of the country. accordingly on the th june , dr. oudney, lieutenant clapperton, and mr. hillman, departed from mourzouk, accompanied by hadje ali, brother of ben bucher, ben khalloom, mahommed neapolitan mamelouk, and mahomet, son of their neighbour hadje mahmud. it was their intention to have proceeded direct to ghraat, and laboured hard to accomplish their object; obstacle after obstacle was, however, thrown in their way by some individuals in mourzouk. several came begging them not to go, as the road was dangerous, and the people not all under the bashaw's control. they at length hired camels from a targee, hadge said, but only to accompany them as far as the wadey ghrurby. this course was over sands skirted with date trees, the ground strewed with fragments of calcareous crust, with a vitreous surface from exposure to the weather. about mid-day, after an exhausting journey from oppressive heat, they arrived at el hummum, a straggling village, the houses of which were mostly constructed of palm leaves. they remained until the sun was well down and then proceeded on their course. the country had the same character. at eight they arrived at tessouwa. the greater number of inhabitants were turiacks. they had a warlike appearance, a physiognomy and costume different from the fezzaners. more than a dozen muffled-up faces were seated near their tents, with every one's spear stuck forcibly in the ground before him. this struck them forcibly, from being very different from that which they had been accustomed to see. the arab is always armed in his journey, with his long gun and pistols, but there is something more imposing in the spear, dagger, and broad straight sword. their course now lay over an extensive high plain, with a long range of hills, running nearly east and west. they entered them by a pass, in which were numerous recesses, evidently leading to more extensive wadeys. this pass led to another, the finest they had yet seen, and the only part approaching to the sublime, which they had beheld in fezzan. it was rugged and narrow; its sides high, and overhanging in some places near the end of the pass, the wady ghrarby opens, with groves of date palms, and high sandy hills. the change was sudden and striking, and instead of taking away, added to the effect of the pass they were descending. having travelled up the valley for about four miles, they halted at a small town, called kharaik, having passed two in their course. the number of date trees in the eastern and western division of the valley, is said to be , . the first division, or wadey shirgi, extends from near siba to within a few miles of thirtiba, the other from the termination of shirgi to aubari. in the evening, they saw some of the preparatory steps for a marriage. the woman belonged to kharaik, and the man to the next town. a band of musicians, accompanied by all the women of the village, with every now and then a volley of musketry, formed the chief part of the procession. one woman carried a basket on her head, for the purpose of collecting gomah to form a feast, and pay the musicians. they came from the village of the bridegroom, which was about a mile distant. the sheik of this town, whose name was ali, was a good-natured tibboo, exceedingly poor, but very attentive, and always in good humour. the place was so poor that they had sometimes to wait half a day before they could get a couple of fowls, or a feed of dates or barley for their horses. they were in hourly expectation of the arrival of camels from the friends of hateeta, for the purpose of conveying them to ghraat; no camels, however, arrived, and they were obliged to remain, much against their inclination. on hateeta conversing with dr. oudney, on the difficulty they experienced in getting away from mourzouk, on account of the obstacles thrown in the way by the people, he said, that the dread, which they had of the turiacks, was unfounded, and that they should soon be convinced of it. he further added, that he could by his influence alone conduct them in perfect safety to timbuctoo, and would answer with his head. he was indignant at the feelings, which the people of mourzouk had against the turiacks, who, he said, pride themselves on having but one word, and performing whatever they promise. the promised camels not having arrived, they hired two of mahomet el buin, and with these they proceeded on to gorma, which they found to be a larger town than any in the wadey, but both walls and houses have the marks of time. the sheik, mustapha ben ussuf, soon visited them. he was an old man, a fezzaner. his ancestors were natives of the place, and his features might be considered as characteristic of the natives of fezzan. they had many accounts of inscriptions being in this place, which the people could not read. they were conducted by sheik mustapha to examine a building, different, as he stated, from any in the country. when they arrived, they found to their satisfaction, it was a structure which had been erected by the romans. there were no inscriptions to be found, although they carefully turned up a number of the stones strewed about, but a few figures and letters rudely hewn out, and evidently of recent date. they imagined they could trace some resemblance to the letters of europe, and conjectured that they had been hewn out by some european traveller at no very distant period. their thoughts naturally went back to horneman, but again they had no intelligence of his having been there, "in short," as dr. oudney says, "to confess the truth, we did not know what to make of them, till we afterwards made the discovery of the targee writing." this building is about twelve feet high, and eight broad. it is built of sandstone well finished, and dug from the neighbouring hills. its interior is solid, and of small stones, cemented by mortar. it stands about three miles from gorma, and a quarter of a mile from the foot of the mountain. it is either a tomb or an altar; those well acquainted with roman architecture will easily determine which. the finding a structure of these people proves, without doubt, their intercourse here. it is probable they had no extensive establishment, otherwise they would have seen more remains as they went along; they passed by, and saw to the westward, the remains of ancient gorma. it appeared to occupy a space more extensive than the present town. they were not able to learn from the old sheik, whether any antique coins were ever found, or any building similar to this in the vicinity. was this the tract of the romans merely into the interior, or did they come to the valley for dates? hateeta arrived during the night of the th june; their departure was, however, delayed on account of his illness. on the following morning, they struck their tents by daylight, and commenced their journey. they sent their horses home, that is, to mourzouk, by their servant, adam, and set out on foot. they intended mounting the camels, but the loads were so ill arranged that they dared not venture. their course lay through groves of date trees, growing in the salt plains. these extended about four miles, and two miles further west, was a small arab town. they halted about an hour under the shade of the date trees, waiting for the coming up of the camels. they then mounted, and in the afternoon entered the date groves of oubari, where they halted. hateeta joined them in the evening. they had numerous tuarick visitors, some residents of the town, and others belonging to a kafila about to depart for the tuarick country. they are an independent-looking race. they examine with care every thing they see, and are not scrupulous in asking for different articles, such as tobacco, powder, and flints. the camel men not coming forward with their camels, the party took the advantage of their detention to visit the neighbouring hills. one part appeared at a distance as an artificial excavation, which, however, disappeared as they approached, and they found it to be a smooth surface, with a portion so removed as to give rise to the delusion. in ascending this by the track of a mountain torrent, they fell in with numerous inscriptions, in characters similar to those on the roman building. some were evidently done centuries ago, others very recently. to the southward there was another portion of the same range. when they got to the top, they were perspiring copiously, and had to take care that the perspiration was not checked too suddenly, as a strong cool breeze was blowing on the top. many places were cleared away for prayer, in the same manner as they had observed in places on all the roads, on which they had travelled. the form in general is an oblong square, with a small recess in one of the longer sides, looking to the rising sun, or it is semicircular, with a similar recess. on the top of a steep precipice, "god save the king" was sung with great energy and taste by hillman. the new moon was seen on this evening, to the great joy of all the followers of mahomet. muskets and pistols were discharged, and all the musicians began their labours. this sport was continued until night. a party of musicians came out to visit them, but several of them were so drunk that they could scarcely walk. the fast was kept by all with a bad grace, and scarcely one was to be seen who had not a long visage. it was even laughable to see some young men going about the streets, with long walking-sticks, leaning forward like men bent with age. as soon as the maraboot calls, not a person was to be seen in the streets; all commence, as soon as he pronounces "allah akber!" all pretend to keep it, and if they do not, they take care that no one shall know it; but from the wry faces and pharasaical shows, the rigidity may be called in question. none of the european party kept the fast, except for a day now and then; for all travellers, after the first day, are allowed exemption, but they have to make it up at some other time. they were greatly amused with stories of the great powers of eating of the tuaricks. they were told that two men have consumed three sheep at one meal, another eating a kail of bruised dates, and a corresponding quantity of milk, and another eating about a hundred loaves, about the size of an english penny loaf. they had many inquiries respecting the english females; for a notion prevailed, that they always bore more than one child at a time, and that they went longer than nine calendar months. on being told that they were the same in that respect as other women, they appeared pleased. they were also asked, how the women were kept; if they were locked up as the moorish women, or allowed to go freely abroad. the tuarick women are allowed great liberties that way, and are not a little pleased at having such an advantage. the customs and manners of europe, which they related to their friends, were so similar to some of theirs, that an old targee exclaimed, in a forcible manner, "that he was sure they had the same origin as us." the tuarick women have full round faces, black curling hair, and, from a negro mixture, inclined to be crispy; eyebrows a little arched, eyes black and large, nose plain and well formed. the dress a barracan, neatly wrapped round, with a cover of dark blue cloth for the head, sometimes coming over the lower part of the face, as in the men. they are not very fond of beads, but often have shells suspended to the ears as ear-drops. being obliged to postpone their departure for ten days, in consequence of the indisposition of hateeta, dr. oudney determined in the mean time to visit wady shiati, whilst mr. hillman was sent back to mourzouk, to send down supplies, and to take charge of the property. they arranged about the fare for their camels, and made every preparation for their immediate departure. before, however, they could set out, a guide for the sands was necessary; and for that purpose they engaged an old targee, who professed to know every part of the track. they travelled by moonlight, over a sandy soil, with numerous tufts of grass, and mound hillocks covered with shrubs, the surface in many places hard and crusty, from saline incrustations. the old men told them, that the mounds of earth were formed by water, as the wadey, at the times of great rains, was covered with water. at daylight they resumed their journey, and a little after sunrise entered among the sand-hills, which were here two or three hundred feet high. the ascent and descent of these proved very fatiguing to both their camels and themselves. the precipitous sides obliged them often to make a circuitous route, and rendered it necessary to form with their hands a track, by which the camels might ascend. beyond this boundary there was an extensive sandy plain, with here and there tufts of grass. in the afternoon, their track was on the same plain; and near sunset they began ascending high sand-hills, one appearing as if heaped upon the other. the guide ran before, to endeavour to find out the easiest track, with all the agility of a boy. the presence of nothing but deep sandy valleys and high sand-hills strikes the mind most forcibly. there is something of the sublime mixed with the melancholy; who can contemplate without admiration masses of loose sand, fully four hundred feet high, ready to be tossed about by every breeze, and not shudder with horror at the idea of the unfortunate traveller being entombed in a moment by one of those fatal blasts, which sometimes occur. they halted for the night on the top of one of these sand-hills. for three or four days their course still lay among the sand-hills; their guide, whom they now styled mahomet ben kami, or son of the sand, was almost always on before, endeavouring to find out the best way. they could detect in the sand numerous footmarks of the jackal and the fox, and here and there a solitary antelope. in some of the wadeys there were a great many fragments of the ostrich egg. about mid-day, they halted in a valley, and remained under the shade of some date trees for a few hours. the heat was oppressive, and their travelling was difficult they next came to an extensive level plain, which was some refreshment, for they were completely tired of ascending and descending sand-hills. the servants strayed, proceeding on a track, which was pointed out to them as the right one, and, before they were aware of their error, they went so far that they were not able to send after them. they, as well as themselves, thought the town was near, and they went forwards, with the intention of getting in before the remainder of the party could come up. they felt exceedingly uneasy respecting them, as they might so easily lose themselves in such intricate travelling. they halted in low spirits, and, after a little refreshment, went to sleep with heavy hearts. during the night, some strong breezes sprang up, by which their trunks and bed-clothes were all covered with sand in the morning. they heard nothing of their servants, and consoled themselves that they had perhaps found some place of shelter or rest. they commenced their journey early, and in a short time the hills of wadey shiati were seen stretching east and west, and the date-palms in several groves; but some high sand-hills were seen between them. they wished their old guide to take them a more direct course, but notwithstanding their desire, and even threats, he persevered in having his way; and, to do the old man justice, they afterwards found it would almost have been impossible for the camels to have gone the way they wished. after passing the base of some high sand-hills, they came to a strong pass, of gentle descent, covered with loose fragments of quartz rock, a yellowish feldspar, and iron ore, very similar to the rocks in the sebah district. from this place the town opened to their view, erected on a hill about three hundred feet high, standing in the middle of the valley, and has the appearance, at a distance, of a hill studded over with basaltic columns. they had no idea that the town was built on the hill, and consequently that the deception was produced by it. the majority of the inhabitants soon visited them, and all appeared pleased at their arrival. the kadi of the two neighbouring towns paid them many compliments, and pressed them much to spend a few days in his towns. they could not take advantage of this offer, which was no doubt of a selfish nature, for dr. oudney had not conversed long with him, before he began to beg a shirt. the doctor told him that his could be of no use to him, as it was very different from those of the country. on being told that, he asked for a dollar to buy one, which dr. oudney took care to refuse, saying that he only gave presents of money to the poor. the people made numerous urgent demands for medicines, and in a very short time, their large tent was surrounded with sick, the female part forming the majority. some beautiful faces and forms were clothed in rags; the plaited hair and necks of these even were loaded with ornaments. the females were rather under the middle stature, strongly built, and possess considerable vivacity, and liveliness. the complexion of those not much exposed to the sun was of a dirty white. dr. oudney was also applied to in a new capacity, that of a charm-writer. a man came and offered him two fowls, if he would give him a charm for a disease of the stomach; he was, however, obliged to decline the office of charm-writer, and confine himself to the cure of diseases by medicine. a buxom widow applied for a medicine to obtain her a husband, but the doctor told her he had no such medicine along with him. the same worthy personage took lieutenant clapperton for an old man, on account of his light-coloured beard and mustachios; but although this afforded some amusement to the party, clapperton felt some chagrin at it, for he had prided himself on the strength and bushiness of his beard, and was not a little hurt that light colour should be taken as a mark of old age. none of them had ever seen a light-coloured beard before, and all the old men dye their grey beards with henna, which gives them a colour approaching to that of lieutenant clapperton. they now proceeded to visit the interior of the town. the houses were built of mud, and erected on the sides of the hill, appearing as if one were pulled on the other. the passages or streets between them are narrow, and in two or three instances, some excavations were made through the rocks. the ascent was steep in some places, and they had to pass through the mosque before they arrived at the highest portion. from this they had a line view of wadey shiati in every direction, running nearly east and west; in the former direction it was well inhabited as far as oml' abeed, which is the westernmost town. many houses were in ruins, and many more were approaching to that state, still it was called the new town, although its appearance little entitles it to that appellation; but the ancient inhabitants lived in excavations in the rocks, the remains of which are very distinct. at the bottom of the hill, they entered several, not much decayed by time. at a hundred yards, however, from the base of the hill, and now used as a burying-ground, there is a subterranean house, of large dimensions, and probably the residence of the great personage. dr. oudney and clapperton entered this excavation, and found three extensive galleries, which communicated only by small openings, on passing through which, they had to stoop considerably. the galleries were, however, high, and of considerable length, about one hundred and fifty feet, and each had several small recesses, like sleeping rooms. the whole had neatness about it, and showed a taste in the excavation. there are no traces of similar abodes in fezzan. the people are so afraid, and so superstitious, that scarcely one of the town had ever entered it. they were astonished when the europeans entered it without ceremony, and two, encouraged by their example, brought them a light, by which they were enabled to look into the different recesses. on the th july, they started, with a beautiful moonlight, over a sandy plain, with a great many small hillocks. they stopped at dalhoon, a well nearly filled up with sand, and containing water so brackish that they were unable to drink it. they started again, and got in amongst the sand-hills. their new guide proved neither such an active man, nor so experienced a pilot, as their old tuarick, as they had several times to retrace their steps. after visiting several places of no particular note, they arrived at ghraat, and were soon visited by a number of hateeta's relations, one of whom was his sister; some were much affected, and wept at the sufferings that had detained him so long from them. a number of his male relations soon came, and many of the inhabitants of the town. the ladies were a free and lively set. they were not a little pleased with the grave manner in which their visitors uttered the various complimentary expressions. hateeta was not well pleased with something he had heard, but he told them not to be afraid, as he had numerous relations. they informed him that fear never entered their breasts, and begged him not to be uneasy on their account. early on the following morning, numerous visitors paid their respects to hateeta, and were introduced in due form to the europeans, who felt the length of time spent in salutations quite fatiguing, and so absurd in their eyes, that they could scarcely at times retain their gravity. the visitors were mostly residents of the city, and all were decorated in their best. there were also a sedateness and gravity in the appearance of all, which the dress tended greatly to augment. in the afternoon, they visited the sultan. mats had been spread in the castle in a small anti-chamber. the old man was seated, but rose up to receive them, and welcomed them to his city. he apologized for not waiting on them, but said he was sick, and had been very little out for some time. he had guinea-worm, and cataract was forming in his eyes. he was dressed in a nearly worn-out robe, and trousers of the same colour, and round his head was wrapped an old piece of yellow coarse cloth for a turban. notwithstanding the meanness of the dress, there was something pleasing and prepossessing in his countenance, and such as made them quite as much at home, as if in their tents. they presented him with a sword, with which he was highly pleased. hateeta wished it had been a bornouse; but they had none with them which they considered sufficiently good. they were led away by the title sultan, having no idea that the tuaricks were so vain; for they used to fill them with high notions of the wealth and greatness of the people of ghraat. on the whole, their interview was highly pleasing, and every one seemed much pleased with their visitors. the old sultan showed them every kindness, and they had every reason to believe him sincere in his wishes. after their visit, they called at the house of lameens, son of the kadi. he was a young man of excellent character, and universally respected. his father was then in ghadames, arranging, with some of the other principal inhabitants, the affairs of the community. he had left directions with his son, to show the strangers every attention. his house was neatly fitted up, and carpets spread on a high bed, on which the visitors seated themselves. several of the people who were in the castle came along with them, and by the assistance of those, who could speak arabic, they were able to keep up a tolerably good conversation. on inquiring about the tuarick letters, they found the same sounds given them as they had before heard from others. they were here at the fountain-head, but were disappointed at not being able to find a book in the tuarick language; they were informed, that there was not one extant. in the evening hateeta's kinswomen returned. they were greatly amused, and laughed heartily at their visitors blundering out a few tuarick words. it may be well supposed they were very unfit companions for the ladies, as they spoke no other language than their own, and the strangers knew very little of it. still, however, they got on very well, and were mutually pleased. dr. oudney could scarcely refrain laughing several times, at the grave manner which clapperton assumed. he had been tutored by hateeta, and fully acted up to his instructions; no tuarick could have done it better. their friend hateeta was anxious that they should shine, if not make an impression on the hearts of the ladies, and therefore read a number of lectures to clapperton, as to the manner in which he should deport himself. he was directed not to laugh nor sing, but to look as grave as possible, which hateeta said would be sure to please the grave tuaricks. the liveliness of the women, their freeness with the men, and the marked attention the latter paid them, formed a striking contrast with other mahommedan states. they now proceeded to take a circuit of the town, and during their walk they fell in with a number of females, who had come out to see them. all were free and lively, and riot at all deferred by the presence of the men. several of them had fine features, but only one or two could be called beautiful. many of the natives came out of their houses as they passed along, and cordially welcomed them to their town. it was done with so much sincerity and good heartedness, that they could not but be pleased and highly flattered. in the evening they heard a numerous band of females, singing at a distance, which was continued till near midnight. the women were principally those of the country. this custom is very common among the people, and is one of the principal amusements in the mountain recesses. hateeta said they go out when their work is finished, in the evening, and remain till near midnight, singing and telling stories; return home, take supper, and go to bed. chapter xxi. dr. oudney and his companions now determined to return to mourzouk, where they arrived in november, and on the th of the same month, they again departed, accompanied by nearly all those of the town, who could muster horses; the camels had moved early in the day, and at zerzow, they found the tents pitched. from zerzow to traghan there is a good high road, with frequent incrustations of salt. a marabout of great sanctity, is the principal person in traghan, as his father was before him. after being crammed as it were by the hospitality of this marabout, they left traghan for maefen, an assemblage of date huts, with but one house. the road to this place lies over a mixture of sand and salt, having a curious and uncommon appearance. the path, by which all the animals move for some miles, is a narrow space, or strip, worn smooth, bearing a resemblance both in appearance and hardness to ice. quitting maefen, they quickly entered on a desert plain, and after a dreary fourteen hours march for camels, they arrived at mestoota, a maten or resting place, where the camels found some little grazing, from a plant called ahgul. starting at sunrise, they had another fatiguing day, over the same kind of desert, without seeing one living thing that did not belong to the kafila, not a bird, nor even an insect; the sand is beautifully fine, round, and red. it is difficult to give the most distant idea of the stillness and beauty of a night scene, on a desert of this description. the distance between the resting places is not sufficiently great, for the dread of want of water to be alarmingly felt, and the track, though a sandy one, is well known to the guides. the burning heat of the day is succeeded by cool and refreshing breezes, and the sky ever illumined by large and brilliant stars, or an unclouded moon. by removing the loose and pearl-like sand, to the depth of a few inches, the effects of the sunbeams of the day are not perceptible, and a most soft and refreshing couch is easily formed. the ripple of the driving sand resembles that of a slow and murmuring stream, and after escaping from the myriads of fleas, which day and night persecute you, in the date-bound valley in which mourzouk stands, the luxury of an evening of this description is an indescribable relief. added to the solemn stillness, so peculiarly striking and impressive, there is an extraordinary echo in all deserts, arising probably from the closeness and solidity of a sandy soil, which does not absorb the sound. they now arrived at gabrone. the arabs watch for a sight of the high date trees, which surround this town, as sailors look for land, and after discovering these land marks, they shape their course accordingly. here major denham joined his companions, whom he found in a state of health but ill calculated for undertaking a long and tedious journey. during the stay of the major at mourzouk, he had suffered from a severe attack of fever, which had kept him for ten days in his bed, and although considerably debilitated, yet he was strong in comparison with his associates. dr. oudney was suffering much from his cough, and still complaining of his chest. mr. clapperton's ague had not left him, and hillman had been twice attacked so violently, as to be given over by the doctor. they all, however, looked forward anxiously to proceeding on their journey, and fancied that change of scene and warmer weather, would bring them all round. gabrone is not unpleasantly situated; it is surrounded by sandhills and mounds of earth, covered with a small tree, called _athali._ the person of the greatest importance at gabrone, is one hagi el raschid, a large proprietor, and a marabout. he was a man of very clear understanding and amiable manners, and as he uses the superstition of the people as the means of making them happy, and turning them from vicious pursuits, we become, as it were, almost reconciled to an impostor. they departed from gabrone at o'clock, a.m. the marabout accompanied boo khaloom outside the town, and having drawn, not a magic circle, but a parallelogram on the sand, with his wand, he wrote in it certain words of great import, from the koran; the crowd looked on him in silent astonishment, while he assumed a manner both graceful and imposing, so as to make it impossible for any one to feel at all inclined to ridicule his motions. when he had finished repeating the fatah aloud, he invited the party singly to ride through the spot he had consecrated, and having obeyed him, they silently proceeded on their journey, without repeating even an idea. they passed a small nest of huts in the road, prettily situated, called el bahhi, from whence the women of the place followed them with songs for several miles. having halted at medroosa, they moved on the next morning, and leaving an arab castle to the south-east, and some table-top hills, they arrived at kasrowa by three in the afternoon. on the th december, they were to arrive at tegerhy. the arabs commenced skirmishing as soon as they came within sight of it, and kept it up in front of the town for half an hour after their arrival. they were to halt here for a day or two, for the purpose of taking in the remainder of their dates and provisions, and never was halt more acceptable. almost the whole of the party were afflicted with illness; the servants were all so ill, that one of the negro women made them a mess of kouscasou, with some preserved fat, which had been prepared in mourzouk, it was a sorry meal, for the fat was rancid, and although tired and not very strong, major denham could not refuse an invitation about nine at night, after he had laid down to sleep, to eat camels' heart with boo khaloom; it was woefully hard and tough, and the major suffered the next morning from indulging too much at the feast. the tibboos and arabs kept them awake half the night with their singing and dancing, in consequence of the bousafer or feast, on entering the tibboo country. boo khaloom gave two camels, and the major and his party gave one. the sick seemed to gain a little strength; they had succeeded in purchasing a sheep, and a little soup seemed to revive them much, but they feared that hillman and one of the servants must be left behind. however distressing such an event would have been, it was impossible for men, who could not sit upright on a mule, to commence a journey of fifteen days over a desert, during which travellers are obliged to march from sunrise until dark. the morning of the th december was beautifully mild. after breakfast, all seemed revived, but it was with great pain that major denham observed the exceeding weakness of dr. oudney and hillman; he fancied that he already saw in them, two more victims to the noxious climate of central africa. almost every town in africa has its charm or wonder, and tegerhy is not without one. there is a well just outside the castle gates, the water of which, they were told most gravely, always rose when a kafila was coming near the town; that the inhabitants always prepared what they had to sell, on seeing this water increase in bulk, for it never deceived them. in proof of this assertion, they pointed out to major denham, how much higher the water had been previously to their arrival, than it was at the moment, when they were standing on the brink. this major denham could have explained, by the number of camels that had drunk at it, but he saw it was better policy to believe what every body allowed to be true, even boo khaloom exclaimed, "allah! god is great, powerful, and wise. how wonderful! oh!" over the inner gate of the castle, there is a large hole through to the gateway underneath, and they tell a story, of a woman dropping from thence a stone on the head of some leader, who had gained the outer wall, giving him by that means the death of abimelech in sacred history. the natives of tegerhy are quite black, but have not the negro face; the men are slim, very plain, with high cheek bones, the negro nose, large mouth, teeth much stained by the quantity of tobacco, and _trona_ or carbonate of soda, which they eat, and even snuff, when given to them, goes directly into their mouths. the young girls are most of them pretty, but less so than those of gabrone. the men always carry two daggers, one about eighteen inches, and the other six inches; the latter of which is attached to a ring, and worn on the arm or wrist. a tibboo once told major denham, pointing to the long one, "this is my gun, and this" showing the smaller of the two, "is my pistol." on the th they left tegerhy and proceeded on the desert. after travelling six miles they arrived at a well called omah, where their tents were pitched, and here they halted three days. near these wells, numbers of human skeletons, or parts of them, lay scattered on the sands. hillman, who had suffered dreadfully since leaving tegerhy, was greatly shocked at these whitened skulls, and unhallowed remains, so much so as to stand in need of all the encouragement which major denham could administer to him. on the th they continued their course over a stony plain, without the least appearance of vegetation. about sunset, they halted near a well, within half a mile of meshroo. round this spot were lying more than a hundred skeletons, some of them with the skin still remaining attached to the bones, not even a little sand thrown over them. the arabs laughed heartily at the expression which major denham evinced, and said, "they were only blacks, _nam boo!_ (d--n their fathers,)" and began knocking about the limbs with the butt end of their firelocks, saying, "this was a woman: this was a youngster," and such like unfeeling expressions. the greater part of the unhappy people, of whom these were the remains, had formed the spoils of the sultan of fezzan the year before. major denham was assured, that they had left bornou, with not above a quarter's allowance for each; and that more died from want than fatigue; they were marched off with chains round their necks and legs; the most robust only arrived in fezzan in a very debilitated state, and were there fattened for the tripoli slave market. their camels did not come up until it was quite dark, and they bivouacked in the midst of these unearthed remains of the victims of persecution and avarice, after a long day's journey of twenty-six miles, in the course of which, one of the party counted one hundred and seven of these skeletons. their road now lay over a long plain with a slight ridge. a fine naga (she camel), lay down on the road, as it was supposed from fatigue. the arabs crowded round and commenced unloading her, when, upon inquiry, it was found that she was suddenly taken in labour; about five minutes completed the operation; a very fine little animal was literally dragged into light. it was then thrown across another camel, and the mother, after being reloaded, followed quietly after her offspring. one of the skeletons which they passed this day, had a very fresh appearance, the beard was still hanging to the skin of the face, and the features were still discernible. a merchant, travelling with the kafila, suddenly exclaimed, "that was my slave i left behind four months ago, near this spot." "make haste! take him to the _fsug_ (market)," said an arab wag, "for fear any body else should claim him." on the th december, they arrived at the hormut el wahr, which were the highest hills they had seen since leaving fezzan; the highest peak being from five to six hundred feet. they had a bold black appearance, and were a relief to the eye, after the long level they had quitted. they blundered and stumbled on until ten at night, when they found the resting place, after a toilsome and most distressing day. this was the eighth day since the camels had tasted water; they were weak and sore-footed, from the stony nature of the passes in these hills of elwahr. they had now a stony plain, with low hills of sand and gravel, till they reached el garha, and here they rested for the night. several of the camels during this day were drunk--their eyes heavy, and wanting their usual animation; their gait staggering, and every now and then falling, as a man in a state of intoxication. this arose from eating dates after drinking water; these probably pass into a spirituous fermentation in the stomach. on the nd of december, they moved before daylight, and halted at the maten called el hammar, close under a bluff head, which had been in view since quitting their encampment in the morning. strict orders were given this day for the camels to keep close up, and for the arabs not to straggle, the tibboo arabs having been seen on the look out. during the last two days, they had passed, on an average, from sixty to ninety skeletons each day, but the numbers that lay about the wells at el hammar were countless; those of two young women, whose perfect and regular teeth bespoke them young, were particularly shocking; their arms still remained clasped round each other as they had expired, although the flesh had long since perished by being exposed to the burning rays of the sun, and the blackened bones only left; the nails of the fingers, and some of the sinews of the hand also remained, and part of the tongue of one of them still appeared through the teeth. they had now passed six days of desert, without the slightest appearance of vegetation, and a little branch of the snag, _(caparis sodada,)_ was brought as a comfort and curiosity. on the following, day, they had alternately plains of sand and loose gravel, and had a distant view of some hills to the westward. while major denham was dozing on his horse about noon, overcome by the heat of the sun, which, at that time of the day, shone with great power, he was suddenly awakened by a crashing under his feet, which startled him excessively. he found that his steed had, without any sensation of shame or alarm, stepped upon the perfect skeletons of two human beings, cracking their brittle bones under his feet, and by one trip of his foot, separating a skull from the trunk, which rolled on like a ball before him. this event imparted a sensation to him, which it took him a long time to remove. his horse was for many days afterwards not looked upon with the same regard as formerly. one of their nagas had this day her accouchement on the road, and they all looked forward to the milk, which the arabs assured them she had in abundance, and envied them not a little their morning draughts, which they were already quaffing in imagination. however, one of the many slips between the cup and the lip was to befall them. the poor naga suddenly fell, and as suddenly died. the exclamations of the arabs were dreadful. "the evil eye! the evil eye!" they all exclaimed; "she was sure to die, i knew it. well! if she had been mine, i would rather have lost a child, or three slaves. god be praised! god is great, powerful, and wise; those looks of the people are always fatal." on the st january , they arrived at the wadey ikbar. the arabs here caught a hyena, and brought it to major denham; he, nor any other of the party, had any other wish than to have merely a look at it. they then tied it, to a tree, and shot at it, until the poor animal was literally knocked to pieces. this was the most refreshing spot they had seen for many days; there were dome trees laden with fruit, though not ripe, which lay in clusters, and grass in abundance. they could have stayed here a week, says major denham, with pleasure; so reviving is the least appearance of cultivation, or rather a sprinkling of nature's beauty, after the parching wilds of the long and dreary desert they had passed. looking back with great regret at leaving the few green branches in ikbar, with nothing before them but the dark hills and sandy desert, they ascended slightly from the wadey, and leaving the hills of ikbar, proceeded towards a prominent head in a low range to the east of their course, called tummer as kumma, meaning "you'll soon drink water;" and about two miles in advance, they halted just under a ridge of the same hills, after making twenty-four miles. four camels were knocked up during this day's march: on such occasions, the arabs wait in savage impatience in the rear, with their knives in their hands, ready, on the signal of the owner, to plunge them into the poor animal, and bear off a portion of the flesh for their evening meal. they were obliged to kill two of them on the spot; the other two, it was hoped, would come up in the night. major denham attended the slaughter of one, and despatch being the order of the day, a knife is struck into the camel's heart, while his head is turned to the east, and he dies almost in an instant; but before that instant expires, a dozen knives are thrust into different parts of the carcass, in order to carry off the choicest parts of the flesh. the heart, considered as the greatest delicacy, is torn out, the skin stripped from the breast and haunches, part of the meat cut, or rather torn from the bones, and thrust into bags, which they carry for the purpose, and the remainder of the carcass is left for the crows, vultures, and hyenas, while the arabs quickly follow the kafila. on the th, they arrived at anay, a town which consists of a few huts built on the top of a mass of stone, round the base of which are also habitations, but the riches of the people are always kept above. the tuaricks annually, and sometimes oftener, pay them a most destructive visit, carrying off cattle and every thing they can lay their hands upon. the people, on those occasions, take refuge at the top of the rock, ascending by a rude ladder, which is drawn up after them; and as the sides of their citadel are always precipitous, they defend themselves with their missiles, and by rolling down stones on the assailants. the sultan tibboo, whose territory extends from this place to bilma, was at this time visiting a town to the south-west of anay, called kisbee, and he requested boo khaloom to halt there one day, promising to proceed with him to bilma. they accordingly reached kisbee on the evening of the th, where the camels got some pickings of dry grass. kisbee is a great place of rendezvous for all kafilas and merchants, and it is here that the sultan always takes his tribute for permission to pass through his country. the sultan himself had neither much majesty nor cleanliness of appearance; he came to boo khaloom's tent, accompanied by six or seven tibboos, some of them really hideous. they take a quantity of snuff, both in their mouths and noses; their teeth were of a deep yellow; the nose resembles nothing so much as a round lump of flesh stuck on the face, and the nostrils are so large, that their fingers go up as far as they can reach, in order to ensure the snuff an admission into the head. the watch, compass, and musical snuff-box of one of the party created but little astonishment; they looked at their own faces in the bright covers, and were most stupidly inattentive to what would have excited the wonder of almost any imagination, however savage. here was "the _os sublime,_" but the "_spiritus intus,_" the "_mens divinior,_" were scarcely discoverable. boo khaloom gave the sultan a fine scarlet bornouse, which seemed a little to animate his stupid features. in the evening, they had a dance by tibboo men, performed in front of their tents. it is graceful and slow, but not so well adapted to the male as the female. it was succeeded by one performed by some free slaves from soudan, who were living with the tibboos, enjoying, as they said, their liberty. it appeared to be most violent exertion; one man is placed in the middle of a circle, which he endeavours to break, and each one whom he approaches, throws him off, while he adds to the impetus by a leap, and ascends several feet from the ground; when one has completed the round, another lakes his place. whilst they were on the road, a violent disturbance arose amongst the arabs, one of them having shot a ball through the shirt of another of the magarha tribe; the sheik of the magarha took up the quarrel, and the man saved himself from being punished, by hanging to the stirrup-leather of major denham's saddle. the arab sheik made use of some expressions, in defending his man, which displeased boo khaloom, who instantly knocked him off his horse, and his slaves soundly bastinadoed him. tiggema, near which they halted, is one of the highest points in the range, and hangs over the mud houses of the town; this point stands at the south extremity of the recess, which the hills here form, and is about four hundred feet high; the sides are nearly perpendicular, and it is detached from the other hills by a chasm. on the approach of the tuaricks, the whole population flock to the top of these heights, with all their property, and make the best defence they can. the interior of some of the houses is neat and tidy; the men are generally travelling merchants, or rather pedlars, and probably do not pass more than four months in the year with their families, for the tibboos rarely go beyond bornou to the south, or mourzouk to the north; they appeared light-hearted, and happy as people constantly in dread of such visitors as the tuaricks can be, who spare neither age nor sex. they proceeded from tiggema nearly in a south-west direction, leaving the hills; and while resting under the shade of acacia trees, which were here very abundant, they had the agreeable, and to them very novel sight, of a drove of oxen; the bare idea of once more being in a country that afforded beef and pasture, was consoling in the extreme; and the luxurious thought of fresh milk, wholesome food, and plenty, were highly exhilarating to the whole of the party. in the afternoon, they came to a halt at dirkee, a good deal of powder was here expended in honour of the sultan, who again met them on their approach: his new scarlet bornouse was thrown over a filthy check shirt, and his turban and cap, though once white, were rapidly approaching to the colour of the head which they covered; when, however, on the following morning, his majesty condescended to ask one of the party for a little soap, these little negligences in his outward appearance were more easily accounted for. they had rather a numerous assembly of females, who danced for some hours before the tents. some of their movements were very elegant, and not unlike the greek dances, as they are represented. they were regaled by the sultan with cheese and ground nuts from soudan; the former of a pleasant flavour, but so hard that they were obliged to moisten it with water previously to eating. during the time that they halted at dirkee, the women brought them dates, fancifully strung on rushes, in the shape of hearts, with much ingenuity, and a few pots of honey and fat. they halted at dirkee rather more than two days. so many of boo khaloom's camels had fallen on the road, that, notwithstanding the very peaceable professions which the travelling party held forth, a marauding party was sent out to plunder some maherhies, and bring them in; an excursion that was sanctioned by the sultan, who gave them instructions as to the route they were to take. the former deeds of the arabs are, however, still in the memory of the tibboos, and they had therefore increased the distance between their huts and the high road, by a timely striking of their tents. nine camels, of the maherhy species, were brought in, but not without a skirmish; and a fresh party were despatched, which did not return that night. all the party were ordered to remain loaded, and no one was allowed to quit the circle in which the tents were pitched. on the following day, the arabs, who had been out foraging, returned with thirteen camels, which they had much difficulty in bringing to the halting place, as the tibboos had followed them several miles. patrols were placed during the whole of the night, who, to awaken the sleepers for the purpose of assuring them they were awake themselves, were constantly exclaiming, _balek ho!_ the watchword of the arabs. they had this day the enjoyment of a dish of venison, one of the arabs having succeeded in shooting two gazelles, many of which had crossed their path for the last three days. on finding a young one, only a few days old, the wily arab instantly laid down on the grass, imitating the cry of the young one, and as the mother came bounding towards the spot, he shot her in the throat. on the th, they reached bilma, the capital of the tibboos, and the residence of their sultan, who having always managed to get before and receive them, advanced a mile from the town attended by some fifty of his men-at-arms, and double the number of the sex, styled in europe, the fair. the men had most of them bows and arrows, and all carried spears; they approached boo khaloom, shaking the spears in the air over their heads, and after this salutation, the whole party moved on towards the town, the females dancing, and throwing themselves about with screams and songs quite original, at least to the european portion of the party. they were of a superior class to those of the minor towns; some having extremely pleasing features, while the pearly whiteness of their regular teeth, was beautifully contrasted with the glossy black of their skin, and the triangular flaps of plaited hair, which hung down on each side of their faces, streaming with oil, with the addition of the coral in the nose, and large amber necklaces, gave them a very-seducing appearance. some of them carried a _sheish,_ a fan made of soft grass or hair, for the purpose of keeping off the flies; others a branch of a tree, and some, fans of ostrich feathers, or a branch of the date palm. all had something in their hands, which they waved over their heads as they advanced. one wrapper of soudan, tied on the top of the left shoulder, leaving the right breast bare, formed their covering, while a smaller one was thrown over the head, which hung down to their shoulders, or was thrown back at pleasure; notwithstanding the apparent scantiness of their habiliments, nothing could be farther from indelicate than was their appearance or deportment. on arriving at bilma, they halted under the shade of a large tulloh tree, whilst the tents were pitching, and the women danced with great taste, and, as major denham was assured by the sultan's nephew, with great skill also. as they approached each other, accompanied by the slow beat of an instrument formed out of a calabash, covered with goat's skin, for a long time their movements were confined to the head, hands, and body, which they throw from one side to the other, flourish in the air, and bend without moving their feet; suddenly, however, the music becomes quicker and louder, when they start into the most violent gestures, rolling their heads round, gnashing their teeth, and shaking their hands at each other, leaping up, and on each side, until one or both are so exhausted that they fall to the ground, another pair then take their place. major denham now, for the first time, produced captain lyon's book, in boo khaloom's tent, and on turning over the prints of the natives, he swore, and exclaimed, and insisted upon it, that he knew every face. this was such a one's slave--that was his own--he was right,--he knew it. praised be god for the talents he gave the english: they were _shater; walla shater,_ (very clever.) of a landscape, however, it was found, that he had not the least idea, nor could he be made at all to understand the intention of the print of the sand-wind in the desert; he would look at it upside down, and when it was twice reversed for him, he exclaimed, _why! why!_ (it is all the same.) a camel, or a human figure, was all he could be made to understand, and at these he was all agitation and delight. _gieb! gieb!_ (wonderful! wonderful!) the eyes first took his attention, then the other features; at the sight of the sword, he cried out, _allah! allah!_ and on discovering the guns, instantly exclaimed, "where is the powder?" this want of perception as was imagined in so intelligent a man, excited at first the surprise of major denham, but perhaps, just the same would a european have felt, under similar circumstances. were a european to attain manhood without ever casting his eye upon the representation of a landscape on paper, would he immediately feel the particular beauties of it, the perspective and the distant objects of it? it is from our opportunities of contemplating works of art, even in the common walks of life, as well as to cultivation of mind, and associations of the finer feelings, by an intercourse with the enlightened and accomplished, that we derive our quick perception in matters of this kind, rather than from nature. on leaving bilma their road lay over loose hills of sand, in which the camels sunk nearly knee-deep. in passing these desert wilds, where hills disappear in a single night by the drifting of the sand, and where all traces of the passage of even a large kafila sometimes vanish in a few hours, the tibboos have certain points in the dark sandstone ridges, which from time to time raise their heads in the midst of this dry ocean of sand, and form the only variety, and by them they steer their course. from one of these land-marks they waded through sand formed into hills from twenty to sixty feet in height, with nearly perpendicular sides, the camels blundering and falling with their heavy loads. the greatest care is taken by the drivers in descending these banks; the arabs hang with all their weight on the animal's tail, by which means they steady him in his descent. without this precaution the camel generally falls forward, and of course all he carries goes over his head. in the evening they bivouacked under a head called zow, (the difficult,) where they found several wells. on the following day, the sand-hills were less than on the preceding one. but the animals still sank so deep that it was a tedious day, for all the four camels of boo khaloom gave in; two were killed by the arabs, and two were left to the chance of coming up before the following morning. tremendously dreary are these marches, as far as the eye can reach, billows of sand bound the prospect. on seeing the solitary foot passenger of the kafila, with his water flask in his hand, and the bag of zumeeta on his head, sink at a distance beneath the slope of one of these, as he plods his way along, hoping to gain a few paces in his long day's work, by not following the track of the camels, one trembles for his safety; the obstacle passed which concealed him from the view, the eye is strained towards the spot, in order to be assured that he has not been hurried quickly in the treacherous overwhelming sand. an unfortunate merchant of tripoli, mahomet n' diff, who had suffered much on the road from an enlarged spleen, was here advised to undergo the operation of burning with a red hot iron, the sovereign arab remedy for almost every disorder; he gave his consent, and previously to their proceeding, he was laid on his back, and while five or six arabs held him on the sand, the rude operators burnt him on the left side under the ribs in three places, nearly the size of a sixpence each. the iron was again placed in the fire, and while heating, the thumbs of about a dozen arabs were thrust into different parts of the poor man's side, to know if the pressure pained him, until his flesh was so bruised, that he declared all gave him pain: four more marks with the iron were now made near the former ones, upon which he was turned on his face, and three larger made within two inches of the back-bone. it might have been supposed that the operation was now at an end, but an old arab, who had been feeling his throat for some time, declared that a hot iron and a large burn were absolutely necessary just above the collar bone on the same side. the poor man submitted with wonderful patience to all this mangling, and after drinking a draught of water moved on with the camels. more than twenty camels were lost this day, on account of their straying out of the path. after travelling several days over the desert, encountering great distress and many privations, they arrived at an extensive wadey called agbadem. here there were several wells of excellent water, forage, and numbers of the tree called suag, the red berries of which are nearly as good as cranberries. they here broke in upon the retreats of about a hundred gazelles, who were enjoying the fertility of the valley. it was, however, not without great difficulty, from their extreme shyness, that one was shot, which afforded an ample and salutary meal to the distressed travellers. aghadem is a great rendezvous, and the dread of all small kafilas and travellers. it is frequented by freebooters of all descriptions. on the th january, the thermometer, in the shade of major denham's tent, was degrees at half-past two. the animals were all enjoying the blessings of plenty in the ravines, which run through the range of low black hills, extending nearly north and south, quite across the valley. the camels, in particular, feasted on the small branches of the suag, of which they are fond to excess. the tracks of the hyena had been numerous for the last three days, and one night they approached in droves quite close to the encampment. the evening of the th being beautifully serene, the telescope of major denham afforded great delight to boo khaloom; the brother of the kadi at mourzouk, mohamed abedeen, and several others, for more than an hour. major denham usually passed some time every evening in boo khaloom's tent, and had promised them a sight of the moon _greeb_ (near) for some time. an old hadje, who obtained a sight by the assistance of the major, for he could not fix the glass on the object, after an exclamation of wonder, looked him fully in the face, spoke not a word, but walked off as last as he could, repeating some words from the koran. this conduct the major was pleased to see, brought down the ridicule of the others, who were gratified beyond measure, and asked a hundred questions. the night was beautifully serene and clear, and the three splendid constellations, orion, canis major, and taurus, presented a coup d'oeil at once impressive and sublime. on the th january, the camels moved off soon after eight, and they took shelter from the sun, under the shade of some clumps, covered with high grass, near the wells, in order that the horses might drink at the moment of their departure. they had three or four long days to the next water, and the camels were too much fatigued to carry more than one day's food for the horses. while they were in this situation, two arabs, who had gone on with the camels, came galloping back, to say that they had encountered two tibboo couriers, on their way from bornou to mourzouk. they soon made their appearance, mounted on maherhies, only nine days from kouka. they brought news, that the sheik el kanemy, who now governed bornou, had just returned from a successful expedition against the sultan of bergharmi; that he had attacked and routed a powerful tribe of arabs, called la sala; and that the sultan, on hearing this, had fled, as before, to the south side of the great river, amongst the kirdies. they proceeded on their route, which was along a continued desert, and at sunset halted on the sand, without either wood or water, after twenty-four miles. the courier from bornou to mourzouk assured them, that he should not be more than thirty days on the road from where they left him. the tibboos are the only people who will undertake this most arduous service, and the chances are so much against both returning in safety, that one is never sent alone. the two men whom they had encountered were mounted on two superb maherhies, and proceeding at the rate of about six miles an hour. a bag of zumeeta (some parched corn), and one or two skins for water, with a small brass basin, and a wooden bowl, out of which they ate and drank, were all their comforts. a little meat, cut in strips, and dried in the sun, called _gedeed,_ is sometimes added to the store, which they eat raw; for they rarely light a fire for the purpose of cooking; although the want of this comfort during the nights, on approaching fezzan, where the cold winds are sometimes biting after the day's heat, is often fatal to such travellers. a bag is suspended under the tail of the maherhy, by which means the dung is preserved, and this serves as fuel on halting in the night. without a kafila, and a sufficient number of camels to carry such indispensables as wood and water, it is indeed a perilous journey. on the th, they appeared gradually to approach something resembling vegetation. they had rising lands and clumps of fine grass the whole of the way, and the country was not unlike some of the heaths in england. a herd of more than a hundred gazelles crossed them towards the evening, and the footmarks of the ostrich, and some of its feathers, were discovered by the arabs. the spot where they halted was called geogo balwy. early on the following morning, they made beere-kashifery, and soon afterwards mina tahr, (the black bird,) the sheik of the gunda tibboos, attended by three of his followers, approached the camp. beere-kashifery lay within his territories, and no kafilas pass without paying tribute, which, as he is absolute, sometimes amounts to half what they possess. in the present case, the visit was one of respect. boo khaloom received him in his tent, and clothed him in a scarlet bornouse of coarse cloth, and a tawdry silk caftan, which was considered as a superb present. the tibboos are smart active fellows, mounted on small horses of great swiftness; their saddles are of wood, small and light, open along the bone of the back; the pieces of wood, of which they are composed, are lashed together with thongs of hide; the stuffing is camels' hair, wound and plaited so as to be a perfect guard; the girths and stirrup-leathers are also of plaited thongs, and the stirrups themselves of iron, very small and light; into these, four toes only are thrust, the great toe being left to take its chance. they mount quickly, in half the time an arab does, by the assistance of a spear, which they place in the ground, at the same time the left foot is planted in the stirrup, and thus they spring into the saddle. their camels had not finished drinking until the sun was full six fathoms high, as the arabs term it; and as the expedition was in want of fresh meat, and indeed of every thing, mina tahr proposed that they should go to a well nearer his people, which, he assured them, was never yet shown to an arab. on the th january, therefore, they moved on, accompanied by the tibboos; and after travelling about ten miles, they came to the well of duggesheinga. this was a retired spot, undiscoverable from the ordinary route of travellers, being completely hidden from it by rising sand-hills. here the tibboos left them, promising to return early on the following day, with sheep, an ox, honey, and fat. this was joyful news to persons who had not tasted fresh animal food for fourteen or fifteen days, with the exception of a little camel's flesh. on the following day, the wind and drifting sand were so violent, that they were obliged to keep their tents during the whole of it. major denham found a loose shirt only the most convenient covering, as the sand could be shaken off as soon as it made a lodgement, which with other articles of dress, could not be done, and the irritation it caused, produced a soreness almost intolerable. a little oil or fat, from the hand of a negress, all of whom are early taught the art of shampooing to perfection, rubbed well round the neck, loins, and back, is the best cure, and the greatest comfort in cases of this kind; and although, from his christian belief, he was deprived of the luxury of possessing half a dozen of these shampooing beauties, yet, by marrying his negro, barca, to one of the freed women slaves, as he had done at sockna, he became, to a certain degree, also the master of zerega, whose education in the castle had been of a superior kind, and she was of the greatest use to the major on these occasions of fatigue or sickness. it is an undoubted fact, and in no case probably better exemplified than in this, that man naturally longs for attentions and support from female hands, of whatever colour or country, so soon as debility or sickness comes upon him. towards the evening, when the wind became hushed, and the sky re-assumed its bright and truly celestial blue, the tibboo sheik, and about thirty of his people, male and female, returned; but their supplies were very scanty for a kafila of nearly three hundred persons. the sweet milk turned out to be nothing but sour camel's milk, full of dirt and sand; and the fat was in small quantities, and very rancid. they, however, purchased a lean sheep for two dollars, which was indeed a treat. some of the girls who brought the milk were really pretty, as contrasted with the extreme ugliness of the men. they were different from those of bilma, were more of a copper colour, with high foreheads, and a sinking between the eyes. they have fine teeth, and are smaller and more delicately formed than the tibboos who inhabit the towns. it is quite surprising with what terror these children of the desert view the arabs, and the idea they have of their invincibility, while they are smart, active fellows themselves, and both ride and move better and quicker; but the guns! the guns! are their dread; and five or six of them will go round a tree, where an arab has laid down his gun for a minute, stepping on tiptoe, as if afraid of disturbing it, talking to each other in a whisper, as if the gun could understand their exclamations, and, it may be presumed, praying to it not to do them an injury, as fervently as ever man friday did robinson crusoe's musket. none of the gunda tibboos were above the middle size, well made, with sharp, intelligent, copper-coloured faces, large prominent eyes, flat noses, large mouth, and teeth regular, but stained a deep red, from the immoderate use of tobacco; the forehead is high, and the turban, which is a deep indigo colour, is worn high on the head, and brought under the chin, and across the face, so as to cover all the lower part, from the nose downwards; they have sometimes fifteen or twenty charms, in red, green, or black leather cases, attached to the folds of their turbans. the majority of them have scars on different parts of their faces; these generally denote their rank, and are considered as an ornament. their sheik had one under each eye, with one more on each side of his forehead, in shape resembling a half-moon. like the arabs of the north, their chieftainship is hereditary, provided the heir be worthy, any act of cowardice disqualifies, and the command devolves upon the next successor. their guide a sheik, mina tahr ben soogo lammo, was the seventh in regular succession. this tribe is called nafra sunda, and are always near beere-kashifery. the watch of major denham pleased him wonderfully at first but after a little time, it was found that looking at himself in the bright part of the inside of the case, gave him the greatest satisfaction; they are vainer than the vainest. mina tahr was now habited in the finest clothes that had ever been brought to beere-kashifery, and what to him could be so agreeable as contemplating the reflection of his own person so decked out? major denham, therefore, could not help giving him a small looking-glass, and he took his station in one corner of the major's tent, for hours, surveying himself with a satisfaction that burst from his lips in frequent exclamations of joy, and which he also occasionally testified by sundry high jumps and springs into the air. after regaining the road, they moved till noon, when their horses were watered at a well called kanimani, or the sheep's well, where some really sweet milk was brought to them, in immensely large basket bottles, some holding two gallons and more. they had drank and acknowledged its goodness, and how grateful it was to their weak stomachs, before they found out that it was camel's milk. no traveller in africa should imagine that _this_ he could not bear, or _that_ could not be endured. it is most wonderful how a man's taste conforms itself to his necessities. six months ago camel's milk would have acted upon them as an emetic, now they thought it a most refreshing and grateful cordial. the face of the country now improved in appearance every mile, and on this day they passed along, what seemed to them a most joyous valley, smiling in flowery grasses, tulloh trees, and kossom. about mid-day, they halted in a luxurious shade, the ground covered with creeping vines of the colycinth, in full blossom, which, with the red flower of the kossom, that drooped over their heads, made their resting place a little arcadia. they killed to-day one of the largest serpents they had seen: it is called _liffa_ by the arabs, and its bite is said to be mortal, unless the part is instantly cut out. it is a mistaken idea that all the serpent tribe are called liffa; this species alone bears the name; it has two horns, and is of a light brown colour. major denham's old choush ghreneim had a distorted foot, which was but of little use to him except on horseback, from the bite of one of those poisonous reptiles, notwithstanding the part infected was cut out; he was for thirteen months confined to his hut, and never expected to recover. arabs are always on the look out for plunder, "'tis my vocation, hal," none were ashamed to acknowledge it, but they were on this occasion to act as an escort, to oppose banditti, and not play the part of one. nevertheless, they were greatly dissatisfied at having come so far, and _done_ so little; they formed small parties for reconnoitering on each side of the road, and were open-mouthed for any thing that might offer. one fellow on foot had traced the marks of a flock of sheep, to a small village of tents to the east of their course, and now gave notice of the discovery he had made, but that the people had seen him, and he believed struck their tents. major denham felt that he should be a check upon them in their plunderings, and he, boo khaloom, and about a dozen horsemen, with each a footman behind him, instantly started for their retreat, which lay over the hills to the east. on arriving at the spot, in a valley of considerable beauty, where these flocks and tents had been observed, they found the place quite deserted. the poor affrighted shepherds had moved off with their all, knowing too well what would be their treatment from the naz abiad (white people), as they call the arabs. their caution, however, was made the excuse for plundering them, and a pursuit was instantly determined upon. "what! not stay to sell their sheep--the rogues, we'll take them without payment." they scoured two valleys, without discovering the fugitives, and major denham began to hope that the tibboos had eluded their pursuers, when after crossing a deep ravine, and ascending the succeeding ridge, they came directly on two hundred head of cattle, and about twenty persons, men, women, and children, with ten camels, laden with their tents and other necessaries, all moving off. the extra arabs instantly slipped from behind their leaders, and with a shout rushed down the hill; part headed the cattle to prevent their escape, and the most rapid plunder immediately commenced. the camels were instantly brought to the ground, and every part of their load rifled; the poor girls and women lifted up their hands to major denham, stripped as they were to the skin, but he could do nothing more for them beyond saving their lives. a sheik and a marabout assured major denham, it was quite lawful to plunder those, who left their tents instead of supplying travellers. boo khaloom now came up and was petitioned. major denham saw that he was ashamed of the paltry booty which his followers had obtained, as well as moved by the tears of the sufferers. the major seized the favourable moment, and advised that the arabs should give every thing back, and have a few sheep and an ox for a bousafer (feast), he accordingly gave the orders, and the arabs from under their barracans, threw down the wrappers they had torn off the bodies of the tibboo women, and the major was glad in his heart, when taking ten sheep and a fat bullock, they left these poor creatures to their fate, as had more arabs arrived, they would most certainly have stripped them of every thing. on the st, boo khaloom had thought it right to send on a tibboo, with the news of their approach to the sheik el kanemy who, they understood, resided at kouka, and one was despatched with a camel, and a man of mina tahr. on their arrival at kofei, the tibboo only, who had been despatched, was found alone and naked, some tibboo arabs of a tribe called wandela, had met them near the well, on the preceding evening, and robbed him even to his cap, and taking from him the letters, saying they cared not for the sheik or boo khaloom, tied him to a tree and there left him. in this state he was found by major denham's party, and mr. clapperton coming up soon afterwards, gave him from his biscuit bag, wherewithal to break his fast, after being twenty-four hours without eating. eighteen men had stripped him, he said, and taken off the camel and mina tahr's man, who, they also said, should be ransomed, or have his throat cut. mina tahr represented these people as the worst on the road, in every sense of the word. "they have no flocks," said he, "and have not more than three hundred camels, although their numbers are one thousand and more; they live by plunder, and have no connexion with any other people. no considerable body of men can follow them; their tents are in the heart of the desert, and there are no wells for four days in the line of their retreat. geddy ben agah is their chief, and i alone would give fifty camels for his head: these are the people, who often attack and murder travellers and small kafilas, and the gundowy, who respect strangers, have the credit of it." the men of traita, with their chief eskou ben cogla, came in the evening to welcome them; the well kofei belongs to them, and greatly enraged they appeared to be at the conduct of the wandelas. this chief returned to boo khaloom his letters, which he said, the chief of the wandelas had sent him that morning, begging that he would meet the kafila at the well, and deliver them to boo khaloom; had he known then what had taken place, "the slave," he said, "should have been stabbed at his father's grave, before he would have delivered them." boo khaloom was greatly enraged, and major denham was almost afraid, that he would have revenged himself on the traita chiefs. however the tibboo courier was again clothed and mounted, and once more started for bornou. their course during the early part of the following day, was due south, and through a country more thickly planted by the all tasteful hand of bounteous nature. boo khaloom, major denham, and about six arabs had ridden on in front; it was said they had lost the track, and should miss the well; the day had been oppressively hot--the major's companions were sick and fatigued, and they dreaded the want of water. a fine dust, arising from a light clayey and sandy soil, had also increased their sufferings; the exclamations of the arab who first discovered the wells, were indeed music to their ears, and after satisfying his own thirst, with that of his weary animals, major denham laid himself down by one of the distant wells, far from his companions, and these moments of tranquillity, the freshness of the air, with the melody of the hundred songsters that were perched amongst the creeping plants, whose flowers threw an aromatic odour all around, were a relief scarcely to be described. ere long, however, the noisy kafila, and the clouds of dust, which accompanied it, disturbed him from the delightful reverie into which he had fallen. previously to their arrival at lari, they came upon two encampments of the traita tibboos, calling themselves the sheik's people; their huts were not numerous, but very regularly built in a square, with a space left in the north and south faces of the quadrangle, for the use of the cattle. the huts were entirely of mats, which excluding the sun, yet admitted both the light and the air. these habitations for fine weather are preferable to the bete shars or tents of the arabs of the north. the interior was singularly neat; clean wooden bowls, with each a cover of basketwork, for holding their milk, were hung against the wall. in the centre of the enclosure were about one hundred and fifty head of cattle, feeding from cradles; these were chiefly milch cows with calves, and sheep. the tibboos received them kindly at first, but presumed rather too much on sheik kaneny's protection, which they claim or throw off, it is said, accordingly as it suits their purpose. the modest request of a man with two hundred armed arabs, for a little milk, was refused, and ready as the arabs are to throw down the gauntlet, a slight expression of displeasure from their leader, was followed by such a rapid attack on the tibboos, that before major denham could mount, half the stock was driven off, and the sheik well bastinadoed. boo khaloom was, however, too kind to injure them, and after driving their cattle for about a mile, he allowed them to return, with a caution to be more accommodating for the future. accustomed as these people are to plunder one another, they expect no better usage from any one, who visits them, provided they are strong enough, and _vice versa._ they are perfect spartans in the art of thieving, both male and female. an old woman, who was sitting at the door of one of the huts, sent a very pretty girl to major denham, as he was standing by his horse, whose massy amber necklace, greased head, and coral nose-studs and ear-rings, announced a person of no common order, to see what she could pick up; and after gaining possession of his handkerchief and some needles, while he turned his head, in an instant thrust her hand into the pocket of the saddle cloth, as she said, to find some beads, for she knew he had plenty. another and much larger nest of the traitas, lay to the east of their course, a little further on, with numerous flocks and herds. about two in the afternoon, they arrived at lari, ten miles distant from mittimee. on ascending the rising ground on which the town stands, the distressing sight presented itself of all the female, and most of the male inhabitants with their families, flying across the plain in all directions, alarmed at the strength of the kafila. beyond, however, was an object full of interest to them, and the sight of which conveyed to their minds a sensation so gratifying and inspiring, that it would be difficult for language to convey an idea of its force and pleasure. the great lake tchad, glowing with the golden rays of the sun in its strength, appeared to be within a mile of the spot on which they stood. the hearts of the whole party bounded within them at the prospect, for they believed this lake to be the key to the great object of their search: and they could not refrain from silently imploring heaven's continued protection, which had enabled them to proceed so far in health and strength, even to the accomplishment of their task. it was long before boo khuloom's best endeavours could restore confidence; the inhabitants had been plundered by the tuaricks only the year before, and four hundred of their people butchered, and but a few days before, a party of the same nation had again pillaged them, though partially. when at length these people were satisfied that no harm was intended them, the women came in numbers with baskets of gussub, gafooly, fowls and honey, which were purchased by small pieces of coral and amber of the coarsest kinds, and coloured beads. one merchant bought a fine lamb for two bits of amber, worth about two pence each in europe; two needles purchased a fowl, and a handful of salt, four or five good-sized fish from the lake. lari is inhabited by the people of kanem, who are known by the name of kanimboo; the women are good looking, laughing negresses, and all but naked; but this they were now used to, and it excited no emotions of surprise. most of them had a square of silver or tin hanging at the back of the head, suspended from the hair, which was brought down in narrow plaits, quite round the neck. the town of lari stands on an eminence, and may probably contain two thousand inhabitants. the huts are built of the rush which grows by the side of the lake, have conical tops, and look very like well-thatched stacks of corn in england. they have neat enclosures round them, made with fences of the same reed, and passages leading to them like labyrinths. in the enclosure are a goat or two, poultry, and sometimes a cow. the women were almost always spinning cotton, which grows well, though not abundantly, near the town and the lake. the interior of the huts is neat, they are completely circular, with no admission for air or light, except at the door, which has a mat, hung up by way of safeguard. major denham entered one of the best appearance, although the owner gave him no smiles of encouragement, and followed close at his heels, with a spear and dagger in his hand. in one corner stood the bed, a couch of rushes lashed together, and supported by six poles, fixed strongly in the ground. this was covered by the skins of the tiger-cat and wild bull. round the sides were hung the wooden bowls, used for water and milk; his tall shield rested against the wall. the hut had a division of mat-work, one half being allotted to the female part of the family. the owner, however, continued to look at his unexpected visitor with so much suspicion, and seemed so little pleased with his visit, notwithstanding all the endeavours of major denham to assure him, he was his friend, that he hurried from the inhospitable door, and resumed his walk through the town. on quitting lari, they immediately plunged into a thickly-planted forest of acacias, with high underwood, and at the distance of only a few hundred yards from the town, they came upon large heaps of elephants' dung, forming hillocks three or four feet in height, and marks of their footsteps; the tracks of these animals increased as they proceeded. part of the day their road lay along the banks of the tchad, and the elephants' footmarks of an immense size, and only a few hours old, were in abundance. whole trees were broken down, where they had fed; and where they had reposed their ponderous bodies, young trees, shrubs, and underwood, had been crushed beneath their weight. they also killed an enormous snake, a species of coluber; it was a most disgusting, horrible animal, but not, however, venomous. it measured eighteen feet from the mouth to the tail, it was shot by five balls and was still moving off, when two arabs, with each a sword, nearly severed the head from the body. on opening the belly, several pounds of fat were found, and carefully taken off by the two native guides, by whom they were accompanied. this they pronounced a sovereign remedy for sick and diseased cattle, and much prized amongst them. scarcely a mile further, a drove of wild red cattle, which were first taken for deer, were seen bounding to the westward. they were what the arabs called, _bugra hammar wahash_ (red cow wild.) they appeared to partake of the bullock and buffalo, with a tuft or lump on the shoulder. they bivouacked near a small parcel of huts, called nyagami, in a beautiful spot, so thick of wood, that they could scarcely find a clear place for their encampment. while the tents were fixing, an alarm was given of wild boars; one of the party followed the scent, and on his return, said he had seen a lion, and near him seven gazelles. no information could be obtained from the natives of lions ever being seen in the neighbourhood; numerous other animals appeared to abound, and that confirmed the opinion. they moved for woodie on the th february, accompanied by two arabs of boo saif. major denham left the kafila, and proceeded a little to the westward, making a parallel movement with the camels. birds of the most beautiful plumage were perched on every tree, and several monkeys chattered at them so impudently, that separating one from the rest, they chased him for nearly half an hour; he did not run very fast, nor straight forward, but was constantly doubling and turning, with his head over his shoulder, to see who was close to him. he was a handsome fellow, of a light brown colour, and black about the muzzle. about noon they came to a village of huts, called barrah, and although only three in number, the natives flew in all directions. on their approaching the town, they beckoned to them, and got off their horses, for the purpose of giving them confidence, and sat down under the shade of a large tamarind tree. an old negro, who spoke a little arabic, was the first who ventured to approach; seeing that he was not ill-treated, the others soon followed his example. major denham begged a little sour milk, a most refreshing beverage after a hot ride, but none was to be found, until they were assured that it should be paid for, and at the sight of the dollar they all jumped and skipped like so many monkeys. major denham now began to eat some biscuit which he had in his saddle cloth, which created much astonishment, and the first to whom he offered some, refused to eat it. one, rather bolder than the rest, put a small piece in his mouth, and pronounced it good, with such extravagant gestures, that the visitors all became clamorous. the major refused for a long time the man, who had been suspicious at first, to the great amusement of the rest, who seemed to relish the joke amazingly. the little nest of thatched huts in which they lived, was most beautifully situated on a rising spot, in the midst of a rich and luxuriant though not thick forest, about three miles to the northeast of woodie. one of the old men accompanied them, while his son carried a sheep, which the major had purchased at woodie, for which service he was rewarded by two coral beads and a little snuff. close to the town of woodie, they found the tents. the party had made about fourteen miles, without leaving the banks of the lake at any great distance. two elephants were seen swimming in the lake this day, and one, belonging to a drove at a distance, absolutely remained just before the kafila. hillman had gone on in front on his mule, suffering sadly from weakness and fatigue, and had laid himself down in what appeared a delightful shade, to await the arrival of the camels, not expecting to see an elephant. he was actually reposing within a dozen yards of a very large one, without being aware of it; and on an arab striking the animal with a spear, he roared out, and moved off. poor hillman's alarm was extreme. the courier had been sent off a second time, after being re-clothed and remounted, to receive the sheik's orders, and they were not to proceed beyond woodie until his pleasure was known. so jealous and suspicious are these negro princes of the encroachments of the arabs, that divers were the speculations as to whether the sheik would or would not allow the arabs to proceed with the party nearer his capital. a weekly fsug, or market, was held about a mile from the town, and the women, flocking from the neighbouring negro villages, mounted on bullocks, who have a thong of hide passed through the cartilage of the nose when young, and are managed with great ease, had a curious appearance. a skin is spread on the animal's back, upon which, after hanging the different articles they take for sale, they mount themselves. milk, sour and sweet, a little honey, lowls, gussub, and gafooly, are amongst their wares; fat and _meloheea_ (ochra), a green herb, which, with the bazeen, all negroes eat voraciously, and indeed christians too, as was afterwards experienced. the men brought oxen, sheep, goats, and slaves; the latter were few in number, and in miserable condition. woodie is a capital, or, as they say, blad kebir, and is governed by a sheik, who is a eunuch, and a man of considerable importance; they appear to have all the necessaries of life in abundance, and are the most indolent people which the travellers ever met with. the women spin a little cotton, and weave it into a coarse cloth of about six inches width. the men either lie idling in their huts during the whole of the day, or in the shade of a building formed by four supporters and a thatched roof, which stands in an open space amongst the huts; this is also the court of justice and the house of prayer. the men are considerably above the common stature, and of an athletic make, but have an expression of features particularly dull and heavy. the town stands about one mile west of the tchad, four short days' march from bornou. the women, like the tibboos, have a square piece of blue or white cloth tied over one shoulder, which forms their whole covering; their hair is, however, curiously and laboriously trained, and it was observed, that no one of tender years had any thing like a perfect head of hair. from childhood the head is shaved, leaving only the top covered; the hair from hence falls down quite round, from the forehead to the pole of the neck, and is there formed into one solid plait, which in front lying quite flat just over the eyes, and, behind, being turned up with a little curl, has just the appearance of an old-fashioned coachman's wig in england; some of them are, however, very pretty. on the morning of the th february, major denham went to the eastward, in order to see the extent of the forest, and also, if possible, to get a sight of the herd of upwards of one hundred and fifty elephants, which some of the arabs had seen the day before, while their camels were feeding. he was not disappointed, for he found them about six miles from the town, on the grounds annually overflowed by the waters of the lake, where the coarse grass is twice the height of a man; they seemed to cover the face of the country, and far exceeded the number which was reported. when the waters flow over these their pasturages, they are forced by hunger to approach the towns, and spread devastation throughout their march; whole plantations, the hopes of the inhabitants for the next year, are sometimes destroyed in a single night. when quite fatigued, major denham determined on making for some huts, and begged a little milk, sweet or sour. no knowing landlady of a country ever scanned the character of her customer more than did this untaught, though cunning negro, who was found there. he first denied that he had any, notwithstanding the bowls were scarcely ten paces behind him, and then asked, what they had got to pay for it? major denham had in reality nothing with him; and after offering his pocket handkerchief, which was returned to him, as not worth any thing, he was about to depart, though ten long miles from the tents, thirsty as he was, when the arab pointed to a needle, which was sticking in the major's jacket; for this and a white bead, which the arab produced, they had a bowl of fine milk and a basket of nuts, which refreshed them much. on their way to the tents, they saw a flock of at least five hundred pelicans, but could not get near enough to fire at them. on the th, two of the sheik's officers arrived, with letters and a present of goroo nuts of soudan; they have a pleasant bitter taste, and are much esteemed by all the tripoli people. these letters pressed boo khaloom to continue his march towards kouka, with all his people, a very great proof of his confidence in the peaceable disposition of their chief. in the evening of the same day, they reached a town called burwha. it is walled, and it was the first negro one they had seen. it may be called in that country a place of some strength, in proof of which, the inhabitants have always defied the tuarick marauders, who never entered the town. the walls may be about thirteen or fourteen feet high, and have a dry ditch which runs quite round them. the town probably covers an extent equal to three square miles, and contains five or six thousand inhabitants. there is a covered way, from which the defenders lance their spears at the besiegers, and instantly conceal themselves. there are but two gates, which are nearly east and west; and these being the most vulnerable part for an enemy to attack, are defended by mounds of earth thrown up on each side, and carried out at least twenty yards in front of the gate, and have nearly perpendicular faces. these advanced posts are always thickly manned, and they conceive them to be a great defence to their walls; they cannot, however, calculate upon their being abandoned, as an enemy once in possession of them, would so completely command the town, that from thence every part of it may be seen. nevertheless, burwha is a strong place, considering the means of attack which the arabs have. major denham rode nearly the whole of this day with min ali tahar, the gundowy tibbo sheik, who was accompanying them to bornou; he had some little difference with the sheik, of whom he was perfectly independent, and boo khaloom, ever politic, undertook to make up the misunderstanding; thereby not only showing his influence, but securing in a manner the future friendship of tahar, whose district was always considered the most dangerous part of the tibboo country, on the road to mourzouk. tahar was a sharp, intelligent fellow, spoke a little arabic, and had often asked major denham many questions about his country, and his sultan or king, but on this day he was more inquisitive than usual. "rais khaleel," said he, "what would your sultan do to min ali, if he was to go to england? would he kill me, or would he keep me there a prisoner? i should like to be there for about a month." "certainly neither the one nor the other," replied major denham; "he would be much more inclined to make you a handsome present, and send you back again." "oh!" exclaimed min ali, "i should take him something; but what could i give him? nothing but the skins of a dozen ostriches, some elephants' teeth, and a lion's skin." "the value of the present," said major denham, "could be of no importance to my sultan; he would look at the intention. do you, however, befriend his people; remember the inglezi that you have seen; and should any more ever find their way to your tents, give them milk and sheep, and put them in the road they are going. promise me to do this, and i can almost promise you, that my sultan shall send you a sword, such a one as hateeta had on my return, without your going to england, or giving him any thing." "is he such a man?" exclaimed min ali. "barak allah! what is his name?" "george," replied major denham. "george," repeated min ali. "health to george; much of it! _salem ali; george yassur._ tell him, min ali tahar wishes him all health and happiness; that he is a tibboo, who can command a thousand spears, and fears no man. is he liberal? is his heart large? _gulba kablr,_ does he give presents to his people?" "very much so indeed," replied major denham; "some of his people think him too generous." "by the head of my father!" _"raas el booe!_" exclaimed min ali, they are wrong; the sultan of a great people should have a large heart, or he is unworthy of them. who will succeed him when he dies?" "his brother," answered major denham. "what is his name?" asked min ali. "frederick," replied the major. "barak allah!" cried min ali; "i hope he will be like george, _matlook_ (liberal). _salem ali frederick!_ how many wives have they?" "no englishman," replied major denham, "has more than one." "a gieb! a gieb! wonderful! wonderful!" exclaimed min ali; why, they should have a hundred." "no, no," said major denham, "we think that a sin." "wallah! really!" (literally, by god!) cried min ali; "why, i have four now, and i have had more than sixty. she, however, whom i like best, always says, one would be more lawful; she may be right; you say she is. you are a great people; i see you are a great people, and know every thing. i, a tibboo, am little better than a gazelle." chapter xxii. the th of february was a momentous day to the europeans, as well as to their conductors. notwithstanding all the difficulties that had presented themselves at the various stages of their journey, they were at last within a few short miles of their destination; they were about to become acquainted with a people, who had never seen, or scarcely heard of a european, and to tread on ground, the knowledge and true situation of which had hitherto been wholly unknown. these ideas of course excited no common sensations, and could scarcely be unaccompanied by strong hopes of their labours being beneficial to the race amongst whom they were shortly to mix; of their laying the first stone of a work, which might lead to their civilization, if not their emancipation from all their prejudices and ignorance, at the same time open a field of commerce to their own country, which might increase its wealth and prosperity. the accounts, which they had received of the state of this country, had been so contradictory, that no opinion could be formed as to the real condition, or the number of its inhabitants. they had been told that the sheik's soldiers were a few ragged negroes, armed with spears, who lived upon the plunder of the black kaffir countries, by which he was surrounded, and which he was enabled to subdue by the assistance of a few arabs, who were in his service; and again they had been assured that his forces were not only numerous, but to a certain degree well trained. the degree of credit which might be attached to these reports, was nearly balanced in the scales of probability, and they advanced towards the town of kouka, in a most interesting state of uncertainty, whether they should find its chief at the head of thousands, or be received by him under a tree, surrounded by a few naked slaves. these doubts, however, were quickly removed; major denham had ridden on a short distance in front of boo khaloom, with his train of arabs all mounted, and dressed out in their best apparel, and from the thickness of the leaves soon lost sight of them, fancying that the road could not be mistaken. he rode still onwards, and on approaching a spot less thickly planted, was not a little surprised to see in front of him a body of several thousand cavalry, drawn up in a line, and extending right and left as far as he could see; checking his horse, he awaited the arrival of his party, under the shade of a wide-spreading acacia. the bornou troops remained quite steady without noise or confusion, and a few horsemen, who were moving about in front giving directions, were the only persons out of the ranks. on the arabs appearing in sight, a shout or yell was given by the sheik's people, which rent the air; a blast was blown from their rude instruments of music equally loud, and they moved on to meet boo khaloom and his arabs. there was an appearance of tact and management in their movements, which astonished every one; three separate small bodies from the centre and each flank, kept charging rapidly towards them, to within a few feet of their horses' heads, without checking the speed of their own, until the movement of their halt, while the whole body moved onwards. these parties, shaking their spears over their heads, exclaimed, _barca! barca! alla hiakkum, cha, alla cheraga;_ blessing! blessing! sons of your country! sons of your country. while all this was going on, they closed in their left and right flanks, and surrounded the little body of arab warriors so completely, as to give the compliment of welcoming them, very much the appearance of a declaration of their contempt of their weakness. they were all now so closely pressed as to be nearly smothered, and in some danger from the crowding of the horses, and clashing of the spears; moving on was impossible, and they therefore came to a full stop. boo khaloom was much enraged, but it was all to no purpose; he was only answered by shrieks of welcome, and the spears most unpleasantly rattled over their heads, expressive of the same feeling. this annoyance, however, was not of long duration. barca gana, the sheik's first general, a negro of noble aspect, clothed in a figured silk tobe, and mounted on a beautiful mandara horse, made his appearance, and after a little delay, the rear was cleared of those, who had pressed in upon the europeans and arabs, and they moved on, although very slowly, from the frequent impediments thrown in their way by these wild equestrians. the sheik's negroes as they were called, meaning the black chiefs and favourites, all raised to that rank by some deed of bravery, were habited in coats of mail composed of iron chain, which covered them from the throat to the knees, dividing behind, and coming on each side of the horse. their horses heads were also defended by plates of iron, brass, and silver, just leaving sufficient room for the eyes of the animal. at length, on arriving at the gate of the town, the europeans, boo khaloom, and about a dozen of his followers, were alone allowed to enter the gates, and they proceeded along a wide street, completely lined with spearmen on foot, with cavalry in front of them to the door of the sheik's residence. here the horsemen were formed up three deep, and they came to a stand; some of the chief attendants came out, and after a great many barcas! barcas! retired, when others performed the same ceremony. they were now again left sitting on their horses in the sun. boo khaloom began to lose all patience, and swore by the bashaw's head, that he would return to the tents, if he was not immediately admitted, he got, however, no satisfaction but a motion of the hand from one of the chiefs, meaning "wait patiently;" and major denham whispered to him the necessity of obeying, as they were hemmed in on all sides, and to retire without permission would have been as difficult as to advance. barca gana now appeared, and made a sign that boo khaloom should dismount; the europeans were about to follow his example, when an intimation that boo khaloom was alone to be admitted, fixed them again to their saddles. another half hour at least elapsed, without any news from the interior of the building, when the gates opened, and the four englishmen only were called for, and they advanced to the skiffa (entrance). here they were stopped most unceremoniously by the black guards in waiting, and were allowed one by one only to ascend a staircase; at the top of which they were again brought to a stand by crossed spears, and the open flat hand of a negro laid upon their breast. boo khaloom came from the inner chamber, and asked, "if we were prepared to salute the sheik, as we did the bashaw." they replied, "certainly;" which was merely an inclination of the head, and laying the right hand on the heart. he advised their laying their hands also on their heads--but they replied the thing was impossible. they had but one manner of salutation for any body, except their own sovereign. another parley now took place, but in a minute or two he returned, and they were ushered into the presence of the sheik of spears. they found him in a small dark room, sitting on a carpet, plainly dressed in a blue tobe of soudan, and a shawl turban. two negroes were on each side of him, armed with pistols, and on his carpet lay a brace of those instruments. fire arms were hanging in different parts of the room, presents from the bashaw and mustapha l'achmar, the sultan of fezzan, which are here considered as invaluable. his personal appearance was prepossessing, apparently not more than forty-five or forty-six, with an expressive countenance and benevolent smile. they delivered their letter from the bashaw, and after he had read it, he inquired, "what was our object in coming?" they answered, "to see the country merely, and to give an account of its inhabitants, produce, and appearance; as our sultan was desirous of knowing every part of the globe." his reply was, "that we were welcome, and whatever he could show us would give him pleasure; that he had ordered huts to be built for us in the town, and that we might then go, accompanied by one of his people, to see them, and that when we were recovered from the fatigue of our long journey, he would be happy to see us." with this, they took their leave. their huts were little round mud buildings, placed within a wall, at no great distance from the residence of the sheik. the enclosure was quadrangular, and had several divisions, formed by partitions of straw mats, where nests of huts were built, and occupied by the stranger merchants, who accompanied the kafila. one of these divisions was assigned to the europeans, and they crept into the shade of their earthly dwellings, not a little fatigued with their entrée and presentation. their huts were immediately so crowded with visitors, that they had not a moment's peace, and the heat was insufferable. boo khaloom had delivered his presents from the bashaw, and brought the europeans a message of compliment, together with an intimation, that their presents would be received on the following day. about noon, a summons was received for them to attend the sheik, and they proceeded to the palace, preceded by their negroes, bearing the articles destined for the sheik by their government, consisting of a double-barrelled gun, with a box, and all the apparatus complete, a pair of excellent pistols, in a case; two pieces of superfine broad-cloth, red and blue, to which were added a set of china and two bundles of spices. the ceremony of getting into the presence was ridiculous enough, although nothing could be more plain and devoid of pretension than the appearance of the sheik himself. they entered through passages lined with attendants, the front men sitting on their hams; and when they advanced too quickly, they were suddenly arrested by these fellows, who caught forcibly hold of them by their legs, and had not the crowd prevented their falling, they would most infallibly have become prostrate before arriving in the presence. previously to entering into the open court in which they were received; their papouches, or slippers, were whipped off by those active, though sedentary gentlemen of the chamber, and they were seated on some clean sand, on each side of a raised bench of earth, covered with a carpet, on which the sheik was reclining. they laid the gun and the pistols together before him, and explained to him the locks, turnscrews, and steel shot cases, holding two charges each, with all of which he seemed exceedingly well pleased; the powder-flask, and the manner in which the charge is divided from the body of the powder, did not escape his observation. the other articles were taken off by the slaves, as soon as they were laid before him. again they were questioned as to the object of their visit. the sheik, however, showed evident satisfaction at their assurance that the king of england had heard of bornou and himself, and immediately turning to his kaganawha (counsellors), said, "this is in consequence of our defeating the begharmis." upon which the chief who had most distinguished himself in these memorable battles, ragah turby, (the gatherer of horses,) seating himself in front of them, demanded, "did he ever hear of me?" the immediate reply of _"certainly,"_ did wonders for the european cause. exclamations were general, and "ah! then your king must be a great man," was re-echoed from every side. they had not any thing offered them by way of refreshment, and took their leave. it may be here observed, that besides occasional presents of bullocks, camel loads of wheat and rice, leathern skins of butter, jars of honey, and honey in the comb, five or six wooden bowls were sent them morning and evening, containing rice with meat, paste made of barley flour, savoury but very greasy, and on their first arrival, as many had been sent of sweets, mostly composed of curd and honey. in england a brace of trout might be considered as a handsome present to a traveller sojourning in the neighbourhood of a stream, but at bornou things are managed differently. a camel load of bream and a sort of mullet were thrown before their huts on the second morning after their arrival, and for fear that should not be sufficient, in the evening another was sent. the costume of the women, who attended the fsug, or market, was various; those of kanem and bornou were most numerous, and the former was as becoming as the latter had a contrary appearance. the variety in costume amongst the ladies consists entirely in the head ornaments; the only difference in the scanty covering which is bestowed on the other parts of the person, lies in the choice of the wearer, who either ties the piece of linen, blue or white, under the arms and across the breasts, or fastens it rather fantastically on one shoulder, leaving one breast naked. the kanamboo women have small plaits of hair hanging down all round the head, quite to the poll of the neck, with a roll of leather, or string of little brass beads in front, hanging down from the centre on each side of the face, which has by no means an unbecoming appearance; they have sometimes strings of silver rings instead of the brass, and a large round silver ornament in front of their foreheads. the female slaves from musgow, a large kingdom to the south-east of mandara, are particularly disagreeable in their appearance, although considered as very trustworthy, and capable of great labour; their hair is rolled up in three large plaits, which extend from the forehead to the back of the neck, like the bornowy; one larger in the centre, and two smaller on each side; they have silver studs in their nose, and one large one just under the lower lip, of the size of a shilling, which goes quite through into the mouth; to make room for this ornament, a tooth or two are sometimes displaced. amongst the articles offered to major denham in the market, was a young lion and a monkey; the latter appeared really the more dangerous of the two, and from being a degree or two lighter in complexion than his master, he seemed to have taken a decided aversion to the european. the lion walked about with great unconcern, confined merely by a small rope round his neck, held by the negro who had caught him when he was not two months old, and having had him for a period of three months, now wished to part with him; he was about the size of a donkey colt, with very large limbs, and the people seemed to go very close to him without much alarm, notwithstanding he struck with his foot the leg of one man who stood in his way, and made the blood flow copiously. they opened the ring which was formed round the noble animal, as major denham approached, and coming within two or three yards of him, he fixed his eye upon him, in a way that excited sensations, which it was impossible to describe, and from which the major was awakened, by a fellow calling him to come nearer, at the same time laying his hand on the animal's back; a moment's recollection convinced him, that there could be no more danger nearer, than where he was, and he stepped boldly up beside the negro, and he believed he should have laid his hand on the lion the next moment, but the beast, after looking carelessly at him, brushed past his legs, broke the ring, overturning several who stood before him, and bounded off to another part, where there were fewer people. it remained that major denham should be introduced to the sultan, in his royal residence at birnie, where all the real state and pomp of the kingdom, with none of its real power were concentrated. on the nd march, the english accompanied boo khaloom to that city, and on their arrival, the following day was fixed for the interview. fashion even in the most refined european courts, does not always follow the absolute guidance of taste or reason, and her magic power is often displayed in converting deformities into beauties, but there is certainly no court, of which the taste is so absurd, grotesque, and monstrous, as that to which major denham was now introduced. an enormous protruding belly, and a huge misshapen head, are the two features, without which it is vain to aspire to the rank of a courtier, or fine gentleman. the form, valued perhaps as the type of abundance and luxury, is esteemed so essential, that where nature has not bestowed, and the most excessive feeding and cramming cannot supply it, wadding is employed, and a false belly produced, which in riding appears to hang over the saddle. turbans are also wrapped round the head, in fold after fold, till it appears swelled on one side to the most unnatural dimensions, and only one half of the face remains visible. the fictitious bulk of the lords of bornou is still further augmented by drawing round them, even in this burning climate, ten or twelve successive robes of cotton or silk, while the whole is covered with numberless charms enclosed in green leathern cases. yet under all these incumbrances, they do sometimes mount and take the field, but the idea of such unwieldy hogsheads being of any avail in the day of battle, appeared altogether ridiculous, and it proved accordingly, that on such high occasions, they merely exhibited themselves as ornaments, without making even a show of encountering the enemy. with about three hundred of this puissant chivalry before and around him, the sultan was himself seated in a sort of cage of cane or wood near the door of his garden, on a seat, which at the distance appeared to be covered with silk or satin, and through the railing looked upon the assembly before him, who formed a kind of semicircle, extending from his seat to nearly where the english were waiting. the courtiers having taken their seats in due form, the embassy was allowed to approach within about pistol shot of the spot where the sultan was sitting, and desired to sit down, when the ugliest black that can be imagined, his chief eunuch, the only person who approached the sultan's seat, asked for the presents. boo khaloom's were produced in a large shawl, and were carried unopened to the presence. the glimpse which the english obtained of the sultan, was but a faint one, through the lattice work of his pavilion, sufficient, however, to show that his turban was larger than any of his subjects, and that his face from the nose downwards was completely covered. a little to the left, and nearly in front of the sultan, was an extempore declaimer, shouting forth praises of his master, with his pedigree; near him was one who bore the long wooden frumfrum, on which ever and anon he blew a blast loud and unmusical. nothing could be more ridiculous than the appearance of these people, squatting under the weight and magnitude of their bellies, while the thin legs that appeared underneath, but ill accorded with the bulk of the other parts. this was all that was ever seen of the sultan of bornou. the party then set out for kouka, passing on their way through angornou, the largest city in the kingdom, containing at least thirty thousand inhabitants. during his residence at kouka and angornou, major denham frequently attended the markets, where besides the proper bornouese, he saw the shouass, an arab tribe, who are the chief breeders of cattle; the kanemboos from the north, with their hair neatly and tastefully plaited, and the musgow, a southern clan of the most savage aspect. a loose robe or shirt of the cotton cloth of the country, often finely and beautifully dyed, was the universal dress, and high rank was indicated by six or seven of these, worn one above another. ornament was studied chiefly in plaiting the hair, in attaching to it strings of brass or silver beads, in inserting large pieces of amber or coral into the nose, the ear, and the lip, and when to these was added a face, streaming with oil, the bornouese belle was fully equipped for conquest. thus adorned, the wife or daughter of a rich shouaa might be seen entering the market in full style, bestriding an ox, which she managed dexterously, by a leathern thong passed through the nose, and whose unwieldy bulk she even contrived to torture into something like capering and curvetting. angornou is the chief market, and the crowd there is sometimes immense, amounting to eighty or one hundred thousand individuals. all the produce of the country is bought and sold in open market, for shops and warehouses do not enter into the system of african traffic. bornou taken altogether forms an extensive plain, stretching two hundred miles along the western shore of lake tchad, and nearly the same distance inland. this sea periodically changes its bed in a singular manner. during the rains, when its tributary rivers pour in thrice the usual quantity of water, it inundates an extensive tract, from which it retires in the dry season. this space, then overgrown with dense underwood, and with grass double the height of a man, contains a motley assemblage of wild beasts--lions, panthers, hyenas, elephants, and serpents of extraordinary form and bulk. these monsters, while undisturbed in this mighty den, remain tranquil, or war only with each other, but when the lake swells, and its waters rush in, they of necessity seek refuge among the abodes of men, to whom they prove the most dreadful scourge. not only the cattle but the slaves attending the grain, often fall victims; they even rush in large bodies into the towns. the fields beyond the reach of this annual inundation are very fertile, and land may be had in any quantity, by him who has slaves to cultivate it. this service is performed by females from musgow, who, aiding their native ugliness, by the insertion of a large piece of silver into the upper lip, which throws it entirely out of shape, are estimated according to the quantity of hard work which they can execute. the processes of agriculture are extremely simple. their only fine manufacture is that of tobes, or vestments of cotton skilfully woven and beautifully dyed, but still not equal to those of soudan. the bornouese are complete negroes both in form and feature; they are ugly, simple, and good natured, but destitute of all intellectual culture. only a few of the great fighis or doctors, of whom the sheik was one, can read the koran. "a great writer" is held in still higher estimation than with us, but his compositions consist only of words written on scraps of paper, to be enclosed in cases, and worn as amulets. they are then supposed to defend their possessor against every danger, to act as charms to destroy his enemies, and to be the main instrument in the cure of all diseases. for this last purpose they are assisted only by a few simple applications, yet the bornou practice is said to be very successful, either through the power of imagination, or owing to the excellence of their constitutions. in the absence of all refined pleasure, various rude sports are pursued with eagerness, and almost with fury. the most favourite is wrestling, which the chiefs do not practise in person, but train their slaves to it as our jockeys do game cocks, taking the same pride in their prowess and victory. nations are often pitched against each other; the musgowy and the bughami being the most powerful. many of them are extremely handsome, and of gigantic size, and hence their contests are truly terrific. their masters loudly cheer them on, offering high premiums for victory, and sometimes threatening instant death in case of defeat. they place their trust not in science, but in main strength and rapid movements. occasionally, the wrestler, eluding his adversary's vigilance, seizes him by the thigh, lifts him into the air, and dashes him against the ground. when the match is decided, the victor is greeted with loud plaudits by the spectators, some of whom even testify their admiration by throwing to him presents of fine cloth. he then kneels before his master, who not unfrequently bestows upon him a robe worth thirty or forty dollars, taken perhaps from his own person. death or maiming is no unfrequent result of these encounters. the ladies even of rank engage in another very odd species of contest. placing themselves back to back, they cause certain parts to strike together with the most violent collision, when she who maintains her equilibrium, while the other lies stretched upon the ground, is proclaimed victor with loud cheers. in this conflict the girdle of beads worn by the more opulent females, very frequently bursts, when these ornaments are seen flying about in every direction. to these recreations is added gaming, always the rage of uncultivated minds. their favourite game is one rudely played with beans, by means of holes made in the sand. boo khaloom having despatched his affairs in bornou, wished to turn his journey to some farther account, and proposed an expedition into the more wealthy and commercial region of houssa or soudan, but the eager wishes of his follower pointed to a different object. they called upon him to lead them into the mountains of mandara, in the south, to attack a village of the kerdies or unbelievers, and carry off the people as slaves to fezzan. he long stood out against this nefarious proposal, but the sheik who also had his own views, took part against him; even his own brother joined the malcontents, and at length there appeared no other mode in which he could return with equal credit and profit. influenced by these inducements, he suffered his better judgement to be overpowered, and determined to conduct his troops upon this perilous and guilty excursion. major denham allowed his zeal for discovery to overcome other considerations, and contrived, notwithstanding the prohibition of the sheik, to be one of the party. they were accompanied by barca gana, the principal general, a negro of huge strength and great courage, along with other warriors, and a large troop of bournouse cavalry. these last are a fine military body in point of external appearance. their persons are covered with iron plate and mail, and they manage with surprising dexterity their little active steeds, which are also supplied with defensive armour. they have one fault only, but it is a serious one, they cannot stand the shock of an enemy. while the contest continues doubtful, they hover round as spectators, ready, should the tide turn against them, to spur on their coursers to a rapid flight; but if they see their friends victorious, and the enemy turning their backs, they come forward and display no small vigour in pursuit and plunder. the road to mandara formed a continual ascent through a fertile country, which contained some populous towns. the path being quite overgrown with thick and prickly underwood, twelve pioneers went forward with long poles, opening a track, pushing back the branches, and giving warning to beware of holes. these operations they accompanied with loud praises of barca gana, calling out, "who is in battle like the rolling of thunder? barca gana. in battle, who spreads terror around him like the buffalo in his rage? barca gana." even the chiefs on this expedition carried no provisions, except a paste of rice, flour, and honey, with which they contented themselves, unless when sheep could be procured; in which case, half the animal, roasted over a frame-work of wood, was placed on the table, and the sharpest dagger present was employed in cutting it into large pieces, to be eaten without bread or salt. at length they approached mora, the capital of mandara. this was another kingdom, which the energy of its present sultan had rescued from the yoke of the fellata empire; and the strong position of its capital, enclosed by lofty ridges of hills, had enabled it to defy repeated attacks. it consists of a fine plain, bordered on the south by an immense and almost interminable range of mountains. the eminences directly in front were not quite so lofty as the hills of cumberland, but bold, rocky, and precipitous, and distant summits appeared towering much higher, and shooting up a line of sharp pinnacles, resembling the needles of mont blanc. it was reported that two months were required to cross their greatest breadth, and reach the other side, where they rose ten times higher, and were called large _moon_ mountains. they there overlooked the plain of adamowa, through which a great river, that has erroneously been supposed to be the quorra or niger, was said to flow from the westward. the hills immediately in view were thickly clustered with villages perched on their sides, and even on their tops, and were distinctly seen from the plain of mandara. they were occupied by half-savage tribes, whom the ferocious bigotry of the nations in the low country branded as pagans, and whom they claimed a right to plunder, seize, and drive in crowds for sale to the markets of fezzan and bornou. the fires, which were visible, in the different nests of these unfortunate beings, threw a glare upon the bold rocks and blunt promontories of granite by which they were surrounded, and produced a picturesque and somewhat awful appearance. a baleful joy beamed on the visage of the arabs, as they eyed these abodes of their future victims, whom they already fancied themselves driving in bands across the desert. "a kerdy village to plunder!" was all their cry, and boo khaloom doubted not that he would be able to gratify their wishes. their common fear of the fellatas had united the sultan of mandara in close alliance with the sheik, to whom he had lately married his daughter; and the nuptials had been celebrated by a great slave-hunt amongst the mountains, when, after a dreadful struggle, three thousand captives, by their tears and bondage, furnished out the materials of a magnificent marriage festival. the expedition obtained a reception quite as favourable as had been expected. in approaching the capital, they were met by the sultan, with five hundred mandara horse, who, charging full speed, wheeled round them with the same threatening movements which had been exhibited at bornou. the horses were of a superior breed, most skilfully managed, and covered with cloths of various colours, as well as with skins of the leopard and tiger-cat. this cavalry, of course, made a most brilliant appearance; but major denham did not yet know that their valour was exactly on a level with that of their bornou allies. the party were then escorted to the capital, amid the music of long pipes, like clarionets, and of two immense trumpets. they were introduced next day. the mode of approaching the royal residence is to gallop up to the gate with a furious speed, which often causes fatal accidents, and on this occasion a man was ridden down and killed on the spot. the sultan was found in a dark-blue tent, sitting on a mud bench, surrounded by about two hundred attendants, handsomely arrayed in silk and cotton robes. he was an intelligent little man, about fifty years old, with a beard dyed sky-blue. courteous salutations were exchanged, during which he steadily eyed major denham, concerning whom he at last inquired, and the traveller was advantageously introduced, as belonging to a powerful distant nation, allies of the bashaw of tripoli. at last, however, came the fatal question,--"is he moslem?" _"la! la!"_ (no, no.) "what: has the great bashaw caffre friends?" every eye was instantly averted; the sun of major denham's favour was set, and he was never again allowed to enter the palace. the bigotry of this court seems to have surpassed even the usual bitterness of the african tribes, and our traveller had to undergo a regular persecution, carried on especially by malem chadily, the leading fighi of the court. as major denham was showing to the admiring chiefs, the mode of writing with a pencil, and effacing it with indian rubber; malem wrote some words of the koran with such force, that their traces could not be wholly removed. he then exclaimed with triumph, "they are the words of god delivered to his prophet. i defy you to erase them." the major was then called upon to acknowledge this great miracle, and as his countenance still expressed incredulity, he was viewed with looks of such mingled contempt and indignation, as induced him to retire. malem, however, again assailed him with the assurance that this was only one of the many miracles which he could show, as wrought by the koran, imploring him to turn, and paradise would be his, otherwise nothing could save him from eternal fire. "oh!" said he, "while sitting in the third heaven, i shall see you in the midst of the flames, crying out to your friend barca gana and myself for a drop of water, but the gulf will be between us." his tears then flowed profusely. major denham, taking the general aside, entreated to be relieved from this incessant persecution, but gana assured him that the fighi was a great and holy man, to whom he ought to listen. he then held out not only paradise, but honours, slaves, and wives of the first families, as gifts to be lavished on him by the sheik, if he would renounce his unbelief. major denham asked the commander what would be thought of himself, if he should go to england and turn christian. "god forbid," exclaimed he, "but how can you compare our faiths? mine would lead you to paradise, while yours would bring me to hell. not a word more." nothing appears to have annoyed the stranger more than to be told, that he was of the same faith with the kerdies or savages, little distinction being made between any who denied the koran. after a long discussion of this question, he thought the validity of his reasoning would be admitted, when he could point to a party of those wretches devouring a dead horse, and appealed to boo khaloom if he had ever seen the english do the same; but to this, which after all was not a very deep theological argument, the arab replied, "i know they eat the flesh of swine, and god knows, that is worse." "grant me patience," exclaimed the major to himself, "this is almost too much to bear and to remain silent." the unfortunate kerdies, from the moment they saw arab tents in the valley of mandara, knew the dreadful calamity which awaited them. to avert it and to propitiate the sultan, numerous parlies came down with presents of honey, asses, and slaves. finally appeared the musgow, a more distant and savage race, mounted on small fiery steeds, covered only with the skin of a goat or leopard, and with necklaces made of the teeth of their enemies. they threw themselves at the feet of the sultan, casting sand on their heads, and uttering the most piteous cries. the monarch apparently moved by these gifts and entreaties, began to intimate to boo khaloom his hopes, that these savages might by gentle means be reclaimed, and led to the true faith. these hopes were held by the latter in the utmost derision, and he privately assured major denham, that nothing would more annoy the devout mussulmans, than to see them fulfilled, whereby he must have forfeited all right to drive these unhappy creatures in crowds, to the markets of soudan and bornou. in fact, both the sultan and the sheik had a much deeper aim. every effort was used to induce boo khaloom to engage in the attack of some strong fellata posts, by which the country was hemmed in, and as the two monarchs viewed the arabs with extreme jealousy, it was strongly suspected that their defeat would not have been regarded as a public calamity. the royal councils were secret and profound, and it was not known what influences worked upon boo khaloom. on this occasion, however, he was mastered by his evil genius, and consented to the proposed attack, but as he came out and ordered his troops to prepare for marching, his countenance bore such marks of trouble, that major denham asked, if all went well, to which he hurriedly answered, "please god." the arabs, however, who at all events expected plunder, proceeded with alacrity. the expedition set out on the following morning, and after passing through a beautiful plain, began to penetrate the mighty chain of mountains, which form the southern border of the kingdom. alpine heights rising around them in rugged magnificence, and gigantic grandeur, presented scenery which our traveller had never seen surpassed. the passes of hairey and of horza, amid a superb amphitheatre of hills, closely shut in by overhanging cliffs, more than two thousand feet high, were truly striking. here for the first time in africa, did nature appear to the english to rival in the production of vegetable life. the trees were covered with luxuriant and bright green foliage, and their trunks were hidden by a crowd of parasitical plants, whose aromatic blossoms perfumed the air. there was also an abundance of animal life of a less agreeable description. three scorpions were killed in the tent, and a fierce but beautiful panther, more than eight feet long, just as he had gorged himself by sucking the blood of a newly-killed negro, was attacked and speared. the sultan and barca gana were attended by a considerable body of bornou and mandara cavalry, whose brilliant armour, martial aspect, and skilful horsemanship, gave confidence to the european officer, who had not seen them put to the proof. it was the third day, when the expedition came in view of the fellata town of dirkulla. the arabs, supported by barca gana, and about one hundred spearmen marched instantly to the attack, and carried first that place, and then a smaller town beyond it, killing all who had not time to escape. the enemy, however, then entrenched themselves in a third and stronger position, called musfeia, enclosed by high hills, and fortified in front by numerous swamps and palisades. this was likewise attacked and all its defences forced. the guns of the arabs spread terror, while barca gana threw eight spears with his own hand, every one of which took effect. it was thought, that had the two bodies of cavalry, made even a show of advancing, the victory would have been at once decided, but major denham was much surprised to see those puissant warriors, keeping carefully under cover, behind a hill, on the opposite side of the stream, where not an arrow could reach them. the fellatas seeing that their antagonists were only a handful, rallied on the top of the hills, were joined by new troops, and turned round. their women behind cheered them on, continually supplied fresh arrows, and rolled down fragments of rock on the assailants. these arrows were tipped with poison, and wherever they pierced the body, in a few hours became black, blood gushed from every orifice, and the victim expired in agony. the condition of the arabs soon became alarming, scarcely a man was left unhurt, and their horses were dying under them. boo khaloom and his charger were both wounded with poisoned arrows. as soon as the fellatas saw the arabs waver, they dashed in with their horse, at the sight of which all the heroic squadrons of bornou and mandara put spurs to their steeds, the sultan at their head, and the whole became one mass of confused and tumultuous flight. major denham saw too late the peril into which he had inconsiderately plunged. his horse, wounded in to the shoulder, could scarcely support his weight, but the cries of the pursuing fellatas urged him forward. at last the animal fell twice, and the second time threw him against a tree, then, frightened by the noise behind, started up and ran off. the fellatas were instantly up, when four of his companions were stabbed beside him, uttering the most frightful cries. he himself fully expected the same fate, but happily his clothes formed a valuable booty, through which the savages were loath to run their spears. after inflicting some slight wounds, therefore, they stripped him to the skin, and forthwith began to quarrel about the plunder. while they were thus busied, he contrived to slip away, and though hotly pursued, and nearly overtaken, succeeded in reaching a mountain stream, gliding at the bottom of a deep and precipitous ravine. here he had snatched the young branches issuing from the stump of a large over-hanging tree, in order to let himself down into the water, when beneath his hand, a large _siffa,_ the most dangerous serpent in this country, rose from its coil, as in the very act of darting upon him. struck with horror, major denham lost all recollection, and fell headlong into the water, but the shock revived him, and with three strokes of his arm, he reached the opposite bank, and felt himself for the moment in safety. running forward, he was delighted to see his friends barca gana and boo khaloom, but amidst the cheers with which they were endeavouring to rally their troops, and the cries of those who were falling under the fellata spears, he could not for some time make himself heard. then maramy, a negro appointed by the sheik to attend upon him, rode up and took him on his own horse. boo khaloom ordered a bornouse to be thrown over the major--very seasonably, for the burning sun had began to blister his naked body. suddenly, however, maramy called out, "see! see! boo khaloom is dead," and that spirited chief, overpowered by the wound of a poisoned arrow, dropped from his horse and spoke no more. the others now only thought of pressing their flight, and soon reached a stream, where they refreshed themselves by copious draughts, and a halt was made to collect the stragglers. major denham here fell into a swoon, during which, as he afterwards learned, maramy complained that the jaded horse could scarcely carry the stranger forward, when barca gana said, "by the head of the prophet! believers enough have breathed their last to-day, why should we concern ourselves about a christian's death." malem chadily, however, so bitter as a theological opponent, showed now the influence of a milder spirit, and said, "no, god has preserved him; let us not abandon him;" and maramy declared, his heart told him what to do. they therefore moved on slowly till about midnight, when they passed the mandara frontier, in a state of severe suffering, but the major met with much kindness from a dethroned prince, mai meagamy, who seeing his wounds festering under the rough woollen cloak, which formed his only covering, took off his own trousers and gave them to him. the arabs lost forty-five of their number, besides their chief; the survivors were in a miserable plight, most of them wounded, some mortally, and all deprived of their camels, and the rest of their property. renouncing their pride, they were obliged to supplicate from barca gana a handful of corn to keep them from starving. the sultan of mandara, in whose cause they had suffered, treated them with the utmost contumely, which, perhaps, they might deserve, but certainly not from him. deep sorrow was afterwards felt in fezzan, when they arrived in this deplorable condition, and reported the fall of their chief, who was there almost idolized. a national song was composed on the occasion, which the following extract will show to be marked by great depth of feeling, and not devoid of poetical beauty:-- "oh trust not to the gun and the sword: the spear of the unbeliever prevails! "boo khaloom, the good and the brave, has fallen! fallen has he in his might! who shall now be safe? even as the moon amongst the little stars, so was boo khaloom amongst men! where shall fezzan now look for her protector? men hang their heads in sorrow, while women wring their hands, rending the air with their cries! as a shepherd is to his flock, so was boo khaloom to fezzan. "give him songs! give him music! what words can equal his praise! his heart was as large as the desert! his coffers were like the rich overflowings from the udder of the she camel, comforting and nourishing those around him. "even as the flowers without rain perish in the field, so will the fezzaners droop; for boo khaloom returns no more. "his body lies in the land of the heathen! the poisoned arrow of the unbeliever prevails! "oh trust not to the gun and the sword! the spear of the heathen conquers! boo khaloom, the good and the brave, has fallen! who shall now be safe?" the sheik of bornou was considerably mortified by the result of this expedition, and the miserable figure made by his troops, though he sought to throw the chief blame on the mandara part of the armament. he now invited the major to accompany an expedition against the mungas, a rebel tribe on his outer border, on which occasion he was to employ his native band of kanemboo spearmen, who, he trusted, would redeem the military reputation of the monarchy. major denham was always ready to go wherever he had a chance of seeing the manners and scenery of africa. the sheik took the field, attended by his armour-bearer, his drummer, fantastically dressed in a straw hat with ostrich feathers, and followed by-three wives, whose heads and persons were wrapped up in brown silk robes, and each led by a eunuch. he was preceded by five green and red flags, on each of which were extracts from the koran, written in letters of gold. etiquette even required that the sultan should follow with his unwieldy pomp, having a harem, and attendance much more numerous; while frumfrums, or wooden trumpets, were continually sounding before him. this monarch is too distinguished to fight in person; but his guards, the swollen and overloaded figures formerly described, enveloped in multiplied folds, and groaning beneath the weight of ponderous amulets, produced themselves as warriors, though manifestly unfit to face any real danger. the route lay along the banks of the river yeou, called also gambarou, through a country naturally fertile and delightful, but presenting a dismal picture of the desolation occasioned by african warfare. the expedition passed through upwards of thirty towns, completely destroyed by the fellatas in their last inroad, and of which all the inhabitants had been either killed or carried into slavery. these fine plains were now overgrown with forests and thickets, in which grew tamarind and other trees, producing delicate fruits, while large bands of monkeys, called by the arabs "enchanted men," filled the woods with their cries. here, too, was found old birnie, the ancient but now desolate capital, evidently much larger than any of the present cities, covering five or six miles with its ruins. they passed also gambarou, formerly the favourite residence of the sultans, where the remains of a palace and two mosques gave an idea of civilization superior to any thing that had yet been seen in interior africa. there were left in this country only small detached villages, the inhabitants of which remained fixed to them by local attachment, in spite of constant predatory inroads of the tuaricks, who carried off their friends, their children, and cattle. they have recourse to one mode of defence, which consists in digging a number of _blaquas,_ or large pits; these they cover with a false surface of sods and grass, into which the tuarick with his horse plunges before he is aware, and is received at the bottom upon sharp-pointed stakes, which often kill both on the spot. unluckily, harmless travellers are equally liable to fall into these living graves. major denham was petrified with horror, to find how near he had approached to several of them; indeed one of his servants stepped upon the deceitful covering, and was saved only by an almost miraculous spring. it seems wonderful that the sheik should not have endeavoured to restore some kind of security to this portion of his subjects, and to re-people those fine but deserted regions. the troops that had been seen hastening in parties to the scene of action were mustered at kobshary, a town which the mungas had nearly destroyed. the sheik made a review of his favourite forces, the kanemboo spearmen, nine thousand strong. they were really a very savage and military-looking host, entirely naked, except a girdle of goat-skin, with the hair hanging down, and a piece of cloth wrapped round the head. they carried large wooden shields, shaped like a gothic window, with which they warded off the arrows of the enemy, while they pressed forward to attack with their own spears. unlike almost all other barbarous armies, they kept a regular night-watch, passing the cry every half-hour along the line, and, at any alarm, raising a united yell, which was truly frightful. at the review they passed in tribes before the sheik, to whom they showed the most enthusiastic attachment, kneeling on the ground, and kissing his feet. the mungas again were described as terrible antagonists, hardened by conflicts with the tuaricks, fighting on foot with poisoned arrows, longer and more deadly than those of the fellatas. the sultan, however, contemplated other means of securing success, placing his main reliance on his powers as a mohammedan doctor and writer. three successive nights were spent in inscribing upon little scraps of paper figures or words, destined to exercise a magical influence upon the rebel host, and their effect was heightened by the display of sky-rockets, supplied by major denham. tidings of his being thus employed were conveyed to the camp, when the mungas, stout and fierce warriors, who never shrunk from an enemy, yielded to the power of superstition, and felt all their strength withered. it seemed to them that their arrows were blunted, their quivers broken, their hearts struck with sickness and fear, in short, that to oppose a sheik of the koran, who could accomplish such wonders, was alike vain and impious. they came in by hundreds, bowing themselves to the ground, and casting sand on their heads, in token of the most abject submission. at length, malem fanamy, the leader of the rebellion, saw that resistance was hopeless. after vain overtures of conditional submission, he appeared in person, mounted on a white horse, with one thousand followers. he was clothed in rags, and having fallen prostrate, was about to pour sand on his head, when the sultan, instead of permitting this humiliation, caused eight robes of fine cotton cloth, one after another, to be thrown over him, and his head to be wrapped in egyptian turbans till it was swelled to six times its natural size, and no longer resembled any thing human. by such signal honours the sheik gained the hearts of those whom his pen had subdued, and this wise policy enabled him not only to overcome the resistance of this formidable tribe, but to convert them into supporters and bulwarks of his power. chapter xxiii. major denham, who always sought, with laudable zeal, to penetrate into every corner of africa, now found his way in another direction. he had heard much of the shary, a great river flowing into lake tchad, on whose banks the kingdom of loggun was situated. after several delays, he set out on the d january , in company with mr. toole, a spirited young volunteer, who, journeying by way of tripoli and mourzouk, had thence crossed the desert to join him. the travellers passed angornou and angola, and arrived at showy, where they saw the river, which really proved to be a magnificent stream, fully half a mile broad, and flowing at the rate of two or three miles an hour. they descended it through a succession of noble reaches, bordered with fine woods and a profusion of variously tinted and aromatic plants. at length, it opened into the wide expanse of the tchad, after viewing which, they again ascended, and reached the capital of loggun, beneath whose high walls the river was seen flowing in majestic beauty. major denham entered, and found a handsome city, with a street as wide as pall-mall, and bordered by large dwellings, having spacious areas in front. having proceeded to the palace, for the purpose of visiting the sovereign, he was led through several dark rooms into a wide and crowded court, at one end of which a lattice opened, and showed a pile of silk robes, stretched on a carpet, amid which two eyes became gradually visible; this was the sultan. on his appearance, there arose a tumult of horns and frumfrums, while all the attendants threw themselves prostrate, casting sand on their heads. in a voice, which the court fashion of loggun required to be scarcely audible, the monarch inquired major denham's object in coming to this country, observing that, if it was to purchase handsome female slaves, he need go no further, since he himself had hundreds, who could be afforded at a very easy rate. this overture was rejected on other grounds than the price; yet, notwithstanding so decided a proof of barbarism, the loggunese were found to be a people more advanced in the arts of peace than any hitherto seen in africa. by a studied neutrality they avoided involving themselves in the dreadful wars, which had desolated the neighbouring countries; manufacturing industry was honoured, and the cloths woven here were superior to those of bornou, being finely dyed with indigo, and beautifully glazed. there was even a current coin, made of iron, somewhat in the form of a horse-shoe, and rude as this was, none of their neighbours possessed any thing similar. the ladies were handsome, intelligent, and of a lively air and carriage; but, besides pushing their frankness to excess, their general demeanour was by no means scrupulous. they used, in particular, the utmost diligence in stealing from major denham's person every thing that could be reached, even searching the pockets of his trousers, and when detected, only laughed, and called to each other, how sharp he was. but the darkest feature of savage life was disclosed, when the sultan and his son each sent to solicit poison "that would not lie," to be used against each other. the latter even accompanied the request with a bribe of three lovely black damsels, and ridiculed the horror which was expressed at the proposal. the loggunese live in a country abounding in grain and cattle, and diversified with forests of lofty acacias, and many beautiful shrubs. its chief scourge consists in the millions of tormenting insects, which fill the atmosphere, making it scarcely possible to go into the open air at mid-day, without being thrown into a fever, indeed, children have been killed by their stings. the natives build one house within another to protect themselves against this scourge, while some kindle a large fire of wet straw, and sit in the smoke; but this remedy seems worse than the evil it is meant to obviate. major denham was much distressed on this journey by the death of his companion, mr. toole; and he could no longer delay his return, when he learnt that the begharmis, with a large army, were crossing the shary to attack bornou. soon after his arrival at kouka, the sheik led out his troops, which he mustered on the plain of angola, and was there furiously attacked by five thousand begharmis, led by two hundred chiefs. the begharmi cavalry are stout, fierce-looking men, and both riders and horses still more thoroughly cased in mail than those of bornou; but their courage, when brought to the proof, is nearly on a level. the sheik encountered them with his kanemboo spearmen and a small band of musketeers, when, after a short conflict, the whole of this mighty host was thrown into the most disorderly flight; even the bornou cavalry joined in the pursuit. seven sons of the sultan, and almost all the chiefs fell; two hundred of their favourite wives were taken, many of whom were of exquisite beauty. mr. tyrwhit, a gentleman sent out by government to strengthen the party, arrived on the th may, and on the nd delivered to the sheik a number of presents, which were received with the highest satisfaction. in company with this gentleman, major denham, eager to explore africa, still further took advantage of another expedition, undertaken against a tribe of shouaa arabs, distinguished by the name of la sala, a race of amphibious shepherds, who inhabit certain islands along the south-eastern shores of the tchad. these spots afford rich pasture; while the water is so shallow, that, by knowing the channels, the natives can ride without difficulty from one island to the other. barca gana led one thousand men on this expedition, and was joined by four hundred of a shouaa tribe, called dugganahs, enemies to the la salas. these allies presented human nature under a more pleasing aspect than it had yet been seen in any part of central africa. they despise the negro nations, and all who live in houses, and still more in cities, while they themselves reside in tents of skin, in circular camps, which they move periodically from place to place. they live in simple plenty on the produce of their flocks and herds, celebrate their joys and sorrows in extemporary poetry, and seem to be united by the strongest ties of domestic affection. tahr, their chief, having closely examined our traveller, as to the motives of his journey, said, "and have you been three years from your home? are not your eyes dimmed with straining to the north, where all your thoughts must ever be? if my eyes do not see the wife and children of my heart for ten days, they are flowing with tears, when they should be closed in sleep." on taking leave, tahr's parting wish was, "may you die at your own tents, and in the arms of your wife and family." this chief might have sitten for the picture of a patriarch; his fine, serious, expressive countenance, large features, and long bushy beard, afforded a favourable specimen of his tribe. the united forces now marched to the shores of the lake, and began to reconnoitre the islands on which the shouaas, with their cattle and cavalry, were stationed; but the experienced eye of barca gana soon discerned, that the channel, though shallow, was full of holes, and had a muddy deceitful appearance. he proposed therefore to delay the attack, till a resolute band of kanemboo spearmen should arrive and lead the way. the lowing, however, of the numerous herds, and the bleating of the flocks on the green islands, which lay before them, excited in the troops a degree of hunger, as well as of military ardour, that was quite irrepressible. they called out, "what! be so near them, and not eat them?--no, no, let us on; this night, these flocks and women shall be ours." barca gana suffered himself to be hurried away, and plunged in amongst the foremost. soon, however, the troops began to sink into the holes, or stick in the mud; their guns and powder were wetted, and became useless; while the enemy, who knew every step, and could ride through the water as quickly as on land, at once charged the invaders in front, and sent round a detachment to take them in the rear. the assault was accordingly soon changed into a disgraceful flight, in which those who had been the loudest in urging to this rash onset set the example. barca gana, who had boasted himself invulnerable, was deeply wounded through his coat of mail and four cotton tobes, and with difficulty rescued by his chiefs from five la sala horsemen, who had vowed his death. the army returned to their quarters in disappointment and dismay, and with a severe loss. during the whole night, the dugganah women were heard bewailing their husbands, who had fallen, in dirges composed for the occasion, and with plaintive notes, which could not be listened to without the deepest sympathy. major denham was deterred by this disaster from making any further attempt to penetrate to the eastern shores of the tchad. the beddoomahs are another tribe who inhabit extensive and rugged islands, in the interior of the lake, amid its deep waters, which they navigate with nearly a thousand large boats. they neither cultivate the ground, nor rear flocks and herds, while their manners appeared to major denham, the rudest and most savage observed even among africans--the musgows always excepted. they have adopted as a religious creed, that god having withheld from them corn and cattle, which the nations around enjoy, has given in their stead strength and courage, to be employed in taking these good things from all in whose possession they may be found. to this belief they act up in the most devout manner, spreading terror and desolation over all the shores of this inland sea, no part of which, even in the immediate vicinity of the great capitals, is for a moment secure from their ravages. the most powerful and warlike of the bornou sovereigns, finding among their subjects neither the requisite skill nor experience in navigation, make no attempt to cope with the biddoomahs on these watery domains, and thus give up the lake to their undisputed sway. while major denham was thus traversing in every direction bornou, and the surrounding countries, lieutenant clapperton and dr. oudney were proceeding through houssa, by a route less varied and hazardous indeed, but disclosing forms both of nature and society fully as interesting. they departed from kouka on the th december , and passing the site of old birnie, found the banks of the yeou fertile, and diversified with towns and villages. on entering katagum, the most easterly fellata province, they observed a superior style of culture; two crops of wheat being raised in one season by irrigation, and the grain stored in covered sheds, elevated from the ground on posts. the country to the south was covered with extensive swamps and mountains, tenanted by rude and pagan tribes, who furnish to the faithful an inexhaustible supply of slaves. the practice of travelling with a caravan was found very advantageous, from the help it afforded, as well as from the good reports spread by the merchants, respecting their european companions. in bornou, these last had been viewed with almost unmingled horror, and for having eaten their bread under the extremest necessity, a man had his testimony rejected in a court of justice. some young bornouese ladies, who accosted major denham, having ventured to say a word in his favour, an attendant matron exclaimed, "be silent, he is an uncircumcised kafir--neither washes nor prays, eats pork, and will go to hell." upon which the others screamed, and ran off. but in houssa, this horror was not so great, and was mingled with the belief, that they possessed supernatural powers. not only did the sick come in crowds expecting to be cured, but the ladies solicited amulets to restore their beauty, to preserve the affections of their lovers, and even to destroy a hated rival. the son of the governor of kano, having called upon clapperton, stated it was the conviction of the whole city and his own, that the english had the power of converting men into asses, goats, and monkeys, and likewise that by reading in his book, he could at any time commute a handful of earth into gold. the traveller having declared to him the difficulty he often found in procuring both asses and gold, induced him with trembling hands to taste a cup of tea, when he became more composed, and made a sort of recantation of his errors. as the caravan proceeded they met many other travellers, and found sitting along the road, numerous females selling potatoes, beans, bits of roasted meat, and water with an infusion of gussub-grains; and when they stopped at any place for the night, the people crowded in such numbers as to form a little fair. clapperton attracted the notice of many of the fellata ladies, who, after examining him closely, declared, that had he only been less white, his external appearance might have merited approbation. the travellers passed through sansan, a great market place, divided into three distinct towns, and katagum, the strongly fortified capital of the province, containing about eight thousand inhabitants. thence they proceeded to murmur, where the severe illness under which dr. oudney had long laboured, came to a crisis. though now in the last stage of consumption, he insisted on continuing his journey and with the aid of his servant had been supported to his camel, when clapperton, seeing the ghastliness of death on his countenance, insisted on replacing him in his tent, where, soon after, without a groan, he breathed his last. his companion caused him to be buried with the honours of the country. the body was washed, wrapped in turban shawls, and a wall of clay built round the grave, to protect it from wild beasts; two sheep were also killed and distributed amongst the poor. katungwa, the first town of houssa proper, and the next on the route, is situated in a country well enclosed, and under high cultivation. to the south is an extensive range of rocky hills, amid which is the town of zangeia, with its buildings picturesquely scattered over masses of rocks. clapperton passed also girkwa, near a river of the same name, which appears to come from these hills, and to fall into the yeou. two days after, he entered kano, the ghana of edrisi, and which is now, as it was six hundred years ago, the chief commercial city of houssa, and of all central africa. yet it disappointed our traveller on his first entry, and for a quarter of a mile scarcely appeared a city at all. even in its more crowded quarters, the houses rose generally in clusters, separated by stagnant pools. the inhabited part on the whole, did not comprise more than a fourth of the space enclosed by the walls, the rest consisted of fields, gardens, and swamps; however, as the whole circuit is fifteen miles, there is space for a population moderately estimated, to be between thirty or forty thousand. the market is held on a neck of land, between two swamps, by which, during the rains, it is entirely overflowed, but in the dry season it is covered with sheds of bamboo, arranged into regular streets. different quarters are allowed for the several kinds of goods; some for cattle, others for vegetables, while fruits of various descriptions, so much neglected in bornou, are here displayed in profusion. the fine cotton fabrics of the country are sold either in webs, or in what are called tobes and turkadees, with rich silken strips or borders ready to be added. amongst the favourite articles are goora or kolla nuts, which are called african coffee, being supposed to give a peculiar relish to the water drunk after them; and crude antimony, with the black tint of which every eyebrow in houssa must be dyed. the arabs also dispose here of sundry commodities that have become obsolete in the north; the cast-off dresses of the mamelukes and other great men, and old sword-blades from malta. but the busiest scene is the slave market, composed of two long ranges of sheds, one for males and another for females. these poor creatures are seated in rows, decked out for exhibition. the buyer scrutinizes them as nicely as a purchaser with us does a horse, inspecting the tongue, teeth, eyes, and limbs; making them cough and perform various movements, to ascertain if there be any thing unsound, and in case of a blemish appearing, or even without assigning a reason, he may return them within three days. as soon as the slaves are sold, the exposer gets back their finery, to be employed in ornamenting others. most of the captives purchased at kano, are conveyed across the desert, during which their masters endeavour to keep up their spirits, by an assurance, that on passing its boundary, they will be set free and dressed in red, which they account the gayest of colours. supplies, however, often fail in this dreary journey, a want first felt by the slaves, many of whom perish with hunger and fatigue. clapperton heard the doleful tale of a mother, who had seen her child dashed to the ground, while she herself was compelled by the lash to drag on an exhausted frame. yet, when at all tolerably treated, they are very gay, an observation generally made in regard to slaves, but this gaiety, arising only from the absence of thought, probably conceals much secret wretchedness. the regulations of the market of kano seem to be good, and strictly enforced. a sheik superintends the police, and is said even to fix the prices. the _dylalas_ or brokers, are men of somewhat high character; packages of goods are often sold unopened bearing merely their mark. if the purchaser afterwards finds any defect, he returns it to the agent, who must grant compensation. the medium of exchange is not cloth as in bornou, nor iron as in loggun, but cowries or little shells, brought from the roast, twenty of which are worth a halfpenny, and four hundred and eighty make a shilling, so that in paying a pound sterling, one has to count over nine thousand six hundred cowries. amid so many strangers, there is ample room for the trade of the _restaurateur,_ which is carried on by a female seated on the ground, with a mat on her knees, on which are spread vegetables, gussub water, and bits of roasted meat about the size of a penny; these she retails to her customers squatted around her. the killing of a bullock forms a sort of festival at kano; its horns are dyed red with henna, drums are beaten, and a crowd collected, who, if they approve of the appearance and condition of the animal, readily become purchasers. boxing in houssa, like wrestling in bornou, forms a favourite exercise, and the grand national spectacle. clapperton, having heard much of the _fancy_ of kano, intimated his willingness to pay for a performance, which was forthwith arranged. the whole body of butchers attended, and acted as masters of the ceremonies; while, as soon as the tidings spread, girls left their pitchers at the wells; the market people threw down their baskets, and an immense crowd were assembled. the ring being formed, and drums beaten, the performers first came forward singly, plying their muscles, like a musician tuning his instrument, and each calling out to the bystanders--"i am a hyena." "i am a lion." "i can kill all that oppose me." after about twenty had shown off in this manner, they came forward in pairs, wearing only a leathern girdle, and with their hands muffled in numerous folds of country cloth. it was first ascertained that they were not mutual friends; after which they closed with the utmost fury, aiming their blows at the most mortal parts, as the pit of the stomach, beneath the ribs, or under the ear; they even endeavoured to scoop out the eyes; so that in spite of every precaution, the match often terminated in the death of one of the combatants. whenever clapperton saw the affair verging to such an issue, he gave orders to stop, and after seeing six parties exhibit, he paid the hire, and broke up the meeting. the negroes here are excessively polite and ceremonious, especially to those advanced in years. they salute one another by laying the hand on the breast, making a bow, and inquiring, _kona lafia? ki ka ky kee--fo fo da rana:_ how do you do? i hope you are well. how have you passed the heat of the day? the last question corresponds in their climate to the circumstantiality, with what our country folks inquire about a good night's rest. the unmarried girls, whether slaves or free, and likewise the young unmarried men, wear a long apron of blue and white check, with a notched edging of red woollen cloth. it is tied with two broad bands, ornamented in the same way, and hanging down behind to the very ankles. this is peculiar to soudan, and forms the only distinction in dress from the people of bornou. their marriages are not distinguished by any great form or ceremony. when a bride is first conducted to the house of the bridegroom, she is attended by a great number of friends and slaves, bearing presents of melted fat, honey, wheat, turkadees, and tobes as her dower. she whines all the way, _"wey kina! wey kina! wey lo!"_ o my head! my head! oh! dear me. notwithstanding this lamentation, the husband has commonly known his wife some time before marriage. preparatory to the ceremony of reading the fatah, both bridegroom and bride remain shut up for some days, and have their hands and feet dyed for three days successively, with henna. the bride herself visits the bridegroom, and applies the henna plasters with her own hands. every one is buried under the floor of his own house, without monument or memorial, and among the commonalty the house continues occupied as usual, but among the great there is more refinement, and it is ever after abandoned. the corpse being washed, the first chapter of the koran is read over it, and the interment takes place the same day. the bodies of slaves are dragged out of town, and left a prey to vultures and wild beasts. in kano they do not even take the trouble to convey them beyond the walls, but throw the corpse into the morass, or nearest pool of water. major denham was now informed that the sultan had sent a messenger express, with orders to have him conducted to his capital, and to supply him with every thing necessary for his journey. he now begged him to state what he stood in need of. the major assured him that the king of england, his master, had liberally provided for all his wants, but that he felt profoundly grateful for the kind offer of the sultan, and had only to crave from him the favour of being attended by one of his people as a guide. he instantly called a fair-complexioned fellata, and asked the major if he liked him; the answer was given in the affirmative, and major denham took his leave. he afterwards went by invitation, to visit the governor of hadyja, who was here on his return from sockatoo, and lived in the house of the wanbey. he found this governor of hadyja, a black man, about fifty years of age, sitting amongst his own people, at the upper end of the room, which is usually a little raised, and is reserved in this country for the master of the house, or visitors of high rank. he was well acquainted with the major's travelling name, for the moment he entered, he said laughing, "how do you do, abdallah? will you come and see me at hadyja on your return?" "god be willing," answered the major, with due moslem solemnity. "you are a christian, abdallah?" asked the governor. "i am," replied the major. "and what are you come to see?" inquired the governor. "the country," replied the major, "its manners and customs." "what do you think of it?" asked the governor. "it is a fine country," said the major, "but very sickly." at this the governor smiled, and again asked, "would you christians allow us to come and see your country?" "certainly," said the major, "and every civility and kindness would be shown to you." "would you force us to become christians?" asked the governor. "by no means," answered the major, "we never meddle with a man's religion." "what!" he exclaimed, "and do you ever pray?" "sometimes," said the major. "our religion commands us to pray always, but we pray in secret, and not in public, except on sundays." one of his attendants here abruptly asked, what a christian was "why, a kafir," rejoined the governor. "where is your jew servant?" he asked, "you ought to let us see him." "excuse me," said the major, "he is averse from it, and i never allow my servants to be molested for their religious opinions." "well, abdallah," said the governor, "thou art a man of understanding, and must come and see me at hadyja." the major then retired, and the arabs afterwards told him, that he was a perfect savage, and sometimes put a merchant to death for the sake of his goods, but this account, if true, is less to be wondered at, from the notorious villainy of some of them. from kano, lieutenant clapperton set out, under the guidance of mohammed jollie, leader of a caravan intended for sockatoo, capital of the sultan of the fellatas. the country was perhaps the finest in africa, being under high cultivation, diversified with groves of noble trees, and traversed in a picturesque manner by ridges of granite. the manners of the people, too, were pleasing and pastoral. at many clear springs, gushing from the rocks, young women were drawing water. as an excuse for engaging in talk, our traveller asked several times for the means of quenching his thirst. bending gracefully on one knee, and displaying, at the same time, teeth of pearly whiteness and eyes of the blackest lustre, they presented a gourd, and appeared highly delighted, when he thanked them for their civility, remarking to one another, "did you hear the white man thank me?" but the scene was changed on reaching the borders of the provinces of goobar and zamfra, which were in a state of rebellion against sockatoo. the utmost alarm at that moment prevailed; men and women, with their bullocks, asses, and camels, all struggled to be foremost, every one crying out, "woe to the wretch that falls behind; he will be sure to meet an unhappy end, even at the hands of the goobarites!" there was danger of being even thrown down and trampled to death by the bullocks, which were furiously rushing backward and forward; however, through the unremitting care of the escort, clapperton made his way safely, though not without much fatigue and annoyance, along this perilous frontier. the country was now highly cultivated. the road was crowded with passengers and loaded bullocks, going to the market of zimrie, which town was passed a little to the southward about noon, when the country became more wooded. in the evening, a halt was made at a town called quarra, where clapperton waited upon the governor, who was an aged fellata. here clapperton was unluckily taken for a fighi, or teacher, and was pestered at all hours of the clay to write out prayers by the people. his servants hit upon a scheme to get rid of their importunities, by acquainting them, that, if he did such things, they must be paid the perquisites usually given to the servants of other fighis. clapperton's washerwoman positively insisted on being paid with a charm in writing, that would entice people to buy earthen-ware of her, and no persuasion of his could either induce her to accept of money for her service, or make her believe that the request was beyond human power. in the cool of the afternoon, he was visited by three of the governor's wives, who, after examining his skin with much attention, remarked, compassionately, it was a thousand pities he was not black, for then he would have been tolerably good looking. he asked one of them, a buxom young girl of fifteen, if she would accept of him for a husband, provided he could obtain the permission of her master, the governor. she immediately began to whimper, and on urging her to explain the cause, she frankly avowed, _she did not know what to do with his white legs._ he gave to each of them a snuff-box, and, in addition, a string of white beads to the coy maiden. they were attended by an old woman and two little female slaves, and, during their stay, made very merry; but he feared much that their gaiety soon fled on returning to the close custody of their old gaoler. clapperton now tried every thing in his power to induce his guide to proceed, without waiting for the escort; but el wordee and the shreef, who were the most pusillanimous rascals he ever met with, effectually dissuaded him from it. he was much amused with a conversation he overheard between the blind shreef and his servant, respecting himself and his intended journey. "that abdallah," says the servant, "is a very bad man; he has no more sense than an ass, and is now going to lead us all to the devil, if we will accompany him. i hope, master, you are not such a fool." "yes," ejaculated the shreef, "it was a black day when i joined that kafir; but if i don't go with him; i shall never see the sultan; and when i return to kano without any thing, the people will laugh at me for my pains." "why did you not talk to him," said the servant, "about the dangers of the road?" "d--n his father!" replied the shreef; "i have talked to him, but these infidels have no prudence." clapperton now called out, "a thousand thanks to you, my lord shreef." "may the blessings of god be upon you!" exclaimed the shreef. "oh! rais abdallah, you are a beautiful man. i will go with you wherever you go. i was only speaking in jest to this dog." "my lord shreef," said clapperton, "i was aware of it from the first; it is of no importance, but, if the escort does not arrive to-morrow, i may merely mention to you, i shall certainly proceed, without further delay, to kashna." this clapperton said by way of alarming the shreef, who liked his present quarters too well, from the number of pious females, who sought edification from the lips of so true a descendant of the prophet; besides the chance such visits afforded of transmitting to their offspring the honour of so holy a descent. the small-pox was at this time raging in the country to an alarming degree. the treatment of the disease is as follows:--when the disease makes its appearance, they anoint the whole body with honey, and the patient lies down on the floor, previously strewed with warm sand, some of which is also sprinkled upon him. if the patient be very ill, he is bathed in cold water early every morning, and is afterwards anointed with honey, and replaced in the warm sand. this is their only mode of treatment; but numbers died every day of this loathsome disease, which had now been raging for six months. clapperton had now his baggage packed up for his journey to kashna, to the great terror of el wordee, the shreef, and all his servants, who earnestly begged him to remain only a day longer. a party of horse and foot arrived from zirmee the same night. it was the retinue of a fellata captain, who was bringing back a young wife from her father's, where she had made her escape. the fair fugitive bestrode a very handsome palfrey, amid a groupe of female attendants on foot. clapperton was introduced to her on the following morning, when she politely joined her husband in requesting clapperton to delay his journey another day, in which case, they kindly proposed they should travel together. of course, it was impossible to refuse so agreeable an invitation, to which clapperton seemed to yield with all possible courtesy. indeed he had no serious intention of setting out that day. the figure of the lady was small, but finely formed, and her complexion of a clear copper colour, while, unlike most beautiful women, she was mild and unobtrusive in her manners. her husband, too, whom she had deserted, was one of the finest looking men clapperton ever saw, and had also the reputation of being one of the bravest of his nation. a humpbacked lad, in the service of the gadado, or vizier of bello, who, on his way from sockatoo, had his hand dreadfully wounded by the people of goober, was in the habit of coming every evening to clapperton's servants to have the wound dressed. on conversing with clapperton himself, he told him that he had formerly been on an expedition under abdecachman, a fallata chief. they started from the town of labogee, or nyffee, and, crossing the quarra, travelled south fourteen days along the banks of the river, until they were within four days journey of the sea, where, according to his literal expression, "the river was one, and the sea was one," but at what precise point the river actually entered the sea, he had no distinct notion. chapter xxiv. early in the morning of the th march, clapperton commenced his journey, in company with the fellata chief. el wordee and the shreef were evidently in much trepidation, as they did not consider their present party sufficiently strong, in case of attack; but they had not proceeded far on their route, when they were agreeably surprised by meeting the escort, which they expected. it consisted of one hundred and fifty horsemen, with drums and trumpets. their leader, with his attendants, advanced to clapperton in full gallop, and bade him welcome to the country in the name of his master, the sultan, who, he said, was rejoiced to hear he was so near, and had sent him to conduct the travellers to his capital. they continued to travel with the utmost speed, but the people soon began to fag, and the lady of the fellata chief, who rode not far from clapperton, began to complain of fatigue. in the evening they halted at the wells of kamoon, all extremely fatigued, and on the following morning, they discovered that all their camels had strayed away in quest of food; they were, however, recovered by the exertions of the escort, to the commander of which clapperton made a handsome present, consisting of some european articles, and to his officers a present of minor value. on the following day, clapperton left the wells of kamoon, followed by his escort and a numerous retinue, and a loud flourish of horns and trumpets. of course, this extraordinary respect was paid to him as the servant of the king of england, as he was styled in the sheik of bornou's letter. to impress them still farther with his official importance, clapperton arrayed himself in his lieutenant's coat, trimmed with gold lace, white trousers, and silk stockings, and to complete his finery, he wore turkish slippers and a turban. although his limbs pained him extremely, in consequence of their recent forced march, he constrained himself to assume the utmost serenity of countenance, in order to meet, with befitting dignity, the honours they lavished on him as the humble representative of his country. from the top of the second hill after leaving kamoon, they at length saw sockatoo. a messenger from the sultan met them here to bid the travellers welcome, and to acquaint them that the sultan was at a neighbouring town, on his return from a ghrazzie or expedition, but intended to be in sockatoo in the evening. at noon they arrived at sockatoo, where a great number of people were assembled to look at the european traveller, and he entered the city amid the hearty welcomes of young and old. he was immediately conducted to the house of the gadado or vizier, where apartments were provided for him and his servants. the gadado, an elderly man named simnon bona lima, arrived near midnight, and came instantly to see him. he was excessively polite, but would on no account drink tea with clapperton, as he said, he was a stranger in their land, and had not yet eaten of his bread. he told clapperton that the sultan wished to see him in the morning, and repeatedly assured him of experiencing the most cordial reception. he spoke arabic extremely well, which he said he learned solely from the koran. after breakfast on the following morning, the sultan sent for clapperton, his residence being at no great distance. in front of it there is a large quadrangle, into which several of the principal streets of the city lead. they passed through three coozees, as guardhouses, without the least detention, and were immediately ushered into the presence of bello, the second sultan of the fellatas. he was seated on a small carpet, between two pillars supporting the roof of a thatched house, not unlike one of our cottages. the walls and pillars were painted blue and white, in the moorish taste and on the back wall was sketched a fire screen, ornamented with a coarse painting of a flower-pot. an arm-chair with an iron lamp standing on it, was placed on each side of the screen. the sultan bade clapperton many hearty welcomes, and asked him if he were not much tired with his journey from burderewa. clapperton told him it was the most severe travelling he had experienced between tripoli and sockatoo, and thanked him for the guard, the conduct of which he did not fail to commend in the strongest terms. the sultan asked him a great many questions about europe, and our religious distinctions. he was acquainted with the names of some of the more ancient sects, and asked whether we were nestorians or socinians. to extricate himself from the embarrassment occasioned by this question, clapperton bluntly replied, we were called protestants. "what are protestants?" said he. clapperton attempted to explain to him, as well as he was able, that having protested more than two centuries and a half ago, against the superstition, absurdities, and abuses practised in those days, we had ever since professed to follow simply what was written "in the book of our lord jesus," as they call the new testament, and thence received the name of protestants. he continued to ask several other theological questions, until clapperton was obliged to confess himself not sufficiently versed in religious subtleties, to resolve these knotty points, having always left that task to others more learned than himself. the sultan was a noble-looking man, forty-four years of age, although much younger in appearance, five feet ten inches high, portly in person, with a short curling black beard, a small mouth, a fine forehead, a grecian nose, and large black eyes. he was dressed in a light blue cotton tobe, with a white muslin turban, the shawl of which he wore over the nose and mouth, in the tuarick fashion. in the afternoon clapperton repeated his visit, accompanied by the gadado, mahomed el wordee, and mahomed gomsoo, the principal arab of the city, to whom he had a letter of introduction from hat salah, at kano. the sultan was sitting in the same apartment in which he received him in the morning, and clapperton laid before him the presents, in the name of his majesty the king of england. amongst these presents, the compass and spy glass excited the greatest interest, and the sultan seemed highly gratified when clapperton pointed out, that by means of the former he could at any time find out the east, to address himself in his daily prayers. he said "every thing is wonderful, but you are the greatest curiosity of all," and then added, "what can i give that is most acceptable to the king of england?" clapperton replied, "the most acceptable service you can render to the king of england, is to cooperate with his majesty, in putting a stop to the slave trade on the coast, as the king of england sends every year large ships to cruise there, for the sole purpose of seizing all vessels engaged in this trade, whose crews are thrown into prison, and of liberating the unfortunate slaves, on whom lands and houses are conferred, at one of our settlements in africa." "what!" said the sultan, "have you no slaves in england." "no," replied clapperton, "whenever a slave sets his foot on england, he is from that moment free." "what do you do then for servants?" asked the sultan. "we hire them for a stated period," replied clapperton, "and give them regular wages; nor is any person in england allowed to strike another, and the very soldiers are fed, clothed, and paid by government." "god is great!" exclaimed the sultan, "you are a beautiful people." clapperton now presented the sheik of bornou's letter. on perusing it, the sultan assured clapperton that he should see all that was to be seen within his dominions, as well as in youri and nyffee, both of which clapperton informed him, he was most anxious to visit. this interview terminated very satisfactory to clapperton, as through the influence and power of the sultan, he hoped to be able to accomplish his design of penetrating further into the country, but the sequel will show, that the knowledge which clapperton had as yet entertained of the african character, was very limited and superficial. in describing the events which took place during the residence of clapperton at sockatoo, we shall be obliged in several instances to be very circumstantial, as they have all a reference proximate or remote to the affairs which took place, when he visited the place at a future period, in company with richard lander, in whose papers some highly interesting information is contained, respecting the conduct of the sultan and the natives, both prior and subsequent to the death of clapperton, and from which in some degree resulted the death of that amiable and highly spirited officer. on the morning of the th march, clapperton was sent for by the sultan, and desired to bring with him "the looking glass of the sun," the name which they gave to the sextant. he was on this occasion conducted further into the interior of his residence, than on his two former visits. clapperton first exhibited a planisphere of the heavenly bodies. the sultan knew all the signs of the zodiac, some of the constellations, and many of the stars by their arabic names. the looking glass of the sun was then brought forward, and occasioned much surprise. clapperton had to explain all its appendages. the inverting telescope was an object of intense astonishment, and clapperton had to stand at some little distance, to let the sultan look at him through it, for his people were all afraid of placing themselves within its magical influence. he had next to show him how to take an observation of the sun. the case of the artificial horizon, of which clapperton had lost the key, was sometimes very difficult to open, as happened on this occasion, and he asked one of the people near him for a knife to press up the lid. the person handed him one much too small, and he quite inadvertently asked for a dagger for the same purpose. the sultan was instantly thrown into a fright; he seized his sword, and half drawing it from the scabbard, placed it before him, trembling all the time like an aspen leaf. clapperton did not deem it prudent to take the least notice of this alarm, although it was himself who had in reality the greatest cause of fear. on receiving the dagger, clapperton calmly opened the case, and returned the weapon to its owner with apparent unconcern. when the artificial horizon was arranged, the sultan and all his attendants had a peep at the sun, and the breach of etiquette which clapperton had committed, seemed to be entirely forgotten. in the evening the sultan sent him two sheep, a camel load of wheat and rice, and some of the finest figs which clapperton had ever tasted in africa. on the following day, clapperton returned the visit of mahomed gomsoo, the chief of the arabs, of whose excessive greediness he had been warned at kano, but at the same time recommended to make him a handsome present, and to endeavour by all means to keep him in good humour, on account of his great influence. on receiving the presents, gomsoo promised to give clapperton a letter to the sultan of youri, who was his particular friend, and with whom he had lived many years. from this person clapperton obtained the following information respecting the death of mr. park, and which confirmed the previous reports which had been obtained respecting him. gomsoo said he was at youri when the english came down in a boat from timbuctoo, and were lost, which circumstance he related in the following manner:--they had arrived off a town called boosa, and having sent a gun and some other articles as presents to the sultan of youri, they sent to purchase a supply of onions in the market. the sultan apprised them of his intention to pay them a visit, and offered to send people to guide them through the ledges of rock, which run quite across the channel of the river a little below the town, where the banks rise into high hills on both sides. instead of waiting for the sultan, they set off at night, and by daybreak next morning, a horseman arrived at youri, to inform the sultan that the boat had struck upon the rocks. the people on both sides of the river then began to assail them with arrows, upon which they threw overboard all their effects, and _two white men,_ arm and arm, jumped into the water, two slaves only remaining in the boat, with some books and papers, and several guns. one of the books was covered with wax-cloth, and still remained in the hands of the sultan of youri. gomsoo also told clapperton, and his account was confirmed by others, that the sultan of youri was a native of sockna, in the regency of tripoli, and prided himself extremely on his birth, but that he was such a drunkard, whenever any person of consequence came to visit him, that nothing proved so acceptable a present as a bottle of rum. on clapperton's return home from gomsoo's, he found a message had been left for him to wait upon the sultan, which he complied with immediately after breakfast. he received him in an inner apartment, attended only by a few slaves. after asking clapperton how he did, and several other chit chat questions, he was not a little surprised, without a single question being put to him on the subject, to hear, that if he wished to go to nyffee, there were two roads leading to it, the one direct, but beset by enemies; the other safer, but more circuitous; that by either route he would be detained during the rains, in a country at present in a state of rebellion, and therefore that he ought to think seriously of these difficulties. clapperton assured the sultan that he had already taken the matter into consideration, and that he was neither afraid of the dangers of the roads nor of the rains. "think of it with prudence," the sultan replied, and they parted. from the tone and manner in which the sultan pronounced the latter sentence, clapperton felt a foreboding that his intended visit to youri and nyffee was at an end. he could not help suspecting the intrigues of the arabs to be the cause, as they knew well, if the native africans were once acquainted with english commerce by the way of the sea, their own lucrative inland trade would from that moment cease. he was much perplexed during the whole of the day, to know how to act, and went after sunset to consult mahomed gomsoo. clapperton met him at the door of his house, on his way to the sultan, and stopped him to mention what had passed, and how unaccountably strange it appeared to him, that the sultan, after having repeatedly assured him of being at liberty to visit every part of his dominions, should now, for the first time, seem inclined to withdraw that permission, adding, that before he came to sockna, he never heard of a king making a promise one day and breaking it the next. all this, he knew, would find its way to the sultan. gomsoo told clapperton that he was quite mistaken; for that the sultan, the gadado, and all the principal people, entertained the highest opinion of him, and wished for nothing so much as to cultivate the friendship of the english nation. but, said clapperton, on leaving him, it is necessary for me to visit those places, or else how can the english get here? as clapperton anticipated, gomsoo repeated to the sultan every word he had said, for he was no sooner at home, than he was sent for by the sultan, whom he found seated with gomsoo and two others. he was received with great kindness, and gomsoo said he had made the sultan acquainted with their conversation. clapperton thanked him, and expressed his earnest hope, that he had neither done nor said any thing to offend him. the sultan assured him that his conduct had always met with his approbation, and although he was freely disposed to show him all the country, still he wished to do so with safety to him. an army, he added, was at this moment ravaging the country, through which he had to pass, and until he heard from it, it would be unsafe to go, he expected, however, further information in three or four days. he drew on the sand the course of the river quarra, which he informed clapperton entered the sea at fundah. by his account the river ran parallel to the sea coast for several days' journey, being in some places only a few hours, in others a day's journey distant from it. after questioning clapperton on some points connected with the english trade, the sultan said, "i will give the king of england a place on the coast to build a town, only i wish a road to be cut to rakah, if vessels should not be able to navigate the river." clapperton asked him, if the country which he had promised, belonged to him. "yes," said he, "god has given me all the lands of the infidels." this was an answer that admitted of no contradiction. the sultan informed clapperton, that some timbers of park's boat, fastened together with nails, remained a long time on the rocks of the river, and that a double-barrelled gun, taken in the boat, was once in his possession, but it had lately burst. his cousin, abderachman, however, had a small printed book, taken out of the boat; but he was now absent on an expedition to nyffee. the other books were in the hands of the sultan of youri, who was tributary to him. clapperton told the sultan, if he could procure these articles for the king of england, they would prove a most acceptable present, and he promised to make every exertion in his power. the direct road to youri is only five days' journey; but on account of the rebellious state of the country, it was necessary to take a circuitous route of twelve days. numbers of the principal people of sockatoo came to clapperton, to advise him to give up the idea of going, all alleging that the rains had already commenced it youri, and that the road was in the hands of their enemies. they repeated the same tales to the servants who were to accompany him, and threw them all into a panic at the prospect of so dangerous a journey. clapperton discovered also, that the arabs were tampering with his servants, and some of them absolutely refused to go, from some information that was given to them, that, if they met with no disasters on the route to youri, the sultan there would assuredly sell them, and that they would never be allowed to return. the journey to youri now appeared to engross the whole of clapperton's attention, and the sultan sent for him, to consult with him about the guide, who was to accompany him to that place. one man had already refused, and he had to tempt another with a promise of forty thousand kowries unknown to the sultan, who kindly took much pains to impress upon clapperton the necessity of his return within twenty-six days, on account of the capricious character of the people of the place. clapperton now began to see that no chance existed of his prosecuting his journey to youri; but it must be admitted, that some of the suspicions which he entertained were groundless, for the state of the country was afterwards found to be, if possible, worse than had been described; and the ravages of the fellatas so terrible, that any one coming from amongst them was likely to experience a very disagreeable reception. indeed it may be suspected, that the sultan must have been a good deal embarrassed by the simplicity with which his guest listened to his pompous boasting as to the extent of his empire, and by the earnestness with which he entreated him to name one of his seaports, where the english might land, when it was certain that he had not a town which was not some hundred miles distant from the coast. to prevent the disclosure of this fact, which must have taken place, had clapperton proceeded in that direction, might be an additional motive for refusing his sanction. in short, it was finally announced to clapperton, that no escort could be found to accompany him on so rash an enterprise, and that he could return to england only by retracing his steps. one morning, clapperton was surprised at a visit from ateeko, the brother of the sultan, to whom he had sent a present of a scarlet jacket, breeches, and bornouse. when he was seated, and the usual compliments were over, clapperton apologized, on the score of ill health, for not having already paid him a visit. he now told him he had a few things belonging to the englishman who was at musfeia with the late boo khaloom, but as no person knew what they were, he would gladly sell them to him, ordering his servant, at the same time, to produce a bundle he held under his arm. the servant took from the bundle a shirt, two pair of trousers, and two pieces of parchment used for sketching by major denham. the only other articles, ateeko said, were a trunk, a broken sextant, and a watch; the latter had been destroyed, as he alleged, in their ignorant eagerness to examine its structure. he then invited clapperton to visit him on the following morning, when they might fix the price of what he wished to buy, to which clapperton assented; but on reconsidering the matter, he thought it prudent first to consult the gadado, particularly as the sultan had gone on an expedition, and was not expected to return for five days. clapperton began to fear lest a bad construction might be put upon his visit to this mean prince, who, on the death of his father, bello the first, had aspired to the throne, and even had himself proclaimed sultan in sockatoo; from the mere circumstance of his brother bello, the present sultan, having expressed the intention, during his father's lifetime, of resigning the splendour of royalty for the tranquillity of a holy and learned life. ateeko had even the audacity to enter his brother's house, preceded by drums and trumpets; and when bello inquired the cause of the tumult, he received the first intimation of his brother's perfidy in the answer, "the sultan ateeko is come." bello, nowise disconcerted, immediately ordered the usurper into his presence, when ateeko pleaded, in vindication of his conduct, his brother's proposed disinclination to reign; to which the sultan only deigned to reply, "go and take off these trappings, or i will take off your head." ateeko, with characteristic abjectness of spirit, began to wring his hands, as if washing them in water, and called god and the prophet to witness that his motives were innocent and upright, since which time he has remained in the utmost obscurity. according, however, to another authority, bello confined him to the house for twelve months, and then a reconciliation took place between them. we are apt to speak of the sovereigns of barbarous and uncivilized nations as deficient in those virtues for which civilized sovereigns are or ought to be distinguished; but we suspect that few of the latter would have acted towards the usurper of his throne with the same magnanimity as was displayed by the fellata sovereign. on visiting the gadado, he told clapperton by no means to go to ateeko whilst the sultan was absent, as his visit at this juncture might be regarded with a very jealous eye by the people, who would not hesitate to charge him with a plot to place ateeko on the throne, by the assistance of england. the gadado undisguisedly expressed his contempt at ateeko's conduct, and assured him that it was entirely without the sanction of the sultan. on the return of the sultan from the army, permission was given to clapperton to purchase from ateeko the sorry remains of major denham's baggage; accompanied, therefore, by el wordee, he went to the prince's house, and after waiting for some time in the porch of a square tower, they were introduced into an inner coozee, hung round with blue and yellow silk, in sharp-pointed festoons, not unlike gothic arches. ateeko soon made his appearance, and after a few compliments, they proceeded to business. he brought out a damaged leathern trunk, with two or three shirts, and other articles of dress, much the worse for wear, and the sextant and parchment already mentioned. the former was completely demolished, the whole of the glasses being taken out, or, where they could not unscrew them, broken off the frame, which remained a mere skeleton. ateeko seemed to fancy that the sextant was gold, in which clapperton soon undeceived him; and selecting it, with the parchment and one or two flannel waistcoats and towels, likely to be useful to major denham, he offered the prince five thousand kowries, at which he appeared much surprised and mortified. el wordee whispered into clapperton's ear, "remember he is a prince, and not a merchant." but clapperton said, loud enough for his highness to hear, "remember, that when a prince turns merchant, he must expect no more than another man; and as that is the value of the articles, it is a matter of indifference to me whether i buy them or not." ateeko frequently repeated his belief of the sextant being gold; but at length the bargain seemed to be concluded, and clapperton requested the prince to send a slave to his house with the articles he had picked out, to whom also he would pay the money. the slave, however, was recalled before he got half-way, and his suspicious master took back the sextant-frame, in dread of being overreached by the purchaser in its value, which clapperton did not fail to deduct from the price agreed on. the prince stated, that he kept two hundred civet cats, two of which he showed clapperton. these animals were extremely savage, and were confined in separate wooden cages. they were about four feet long from the nose to the tip of the tail, and, with the exception of a greater length of body and a longer tail, they very much resembled diminutive hyenas. they are fed with pounded guinea corn and dried fish made into balls. the civet is scraped off with a kind of muscle shell every other morning, the animal being forced into a corner of the cage, and its head held down with a stick during the operation. the prince offered to sell any number of them which clapperton might wish to have; but he did not look upon them as very desirable travelling companions. ateeko was a little spare man, with a full face, of monkey-like expression. he spoke in a slow and subdued tone of voice, and the fellatas acknowledge him to be extremely brave, but at the same time avaricious and cruel. "were he sultan," say they, "heads would fly about in soudan." one evening, on paying the gadado a visit, clapperton found him alone, reading an arabic book, one of a small collection he possessed. "abdallah," said he, "i had a dream last night, and am perusing this book to find out what it meant. do you believe in such things?" "no, my lord gadado. i consider books of dreams to be full of idle conceits. god gives a man wisdom to guide his conduct, while dreams are occasioned by the accidental circumstances of sleeping with the head low, excess of food, or uneasiness of mind." "abdallah," he replied, smiling, "this book tells me differently." he then mentioned, that, in a few days, the sultan was going on another expedition, and wished him to join it; but that he preferred remaining, in order to have a mosque, which was then building, finished before the rhamadan, lest the workmen should idle away their time in his absence. previously to the sultan's departure, he sent clapperton a present of two large baskets of wheat, who now began to think seriously of retracing his steps to kano. he was sitting in the shade before his door, with sidi sheik, the sultan's fighi, when an ill-looking wretch, with a fiend-like grin on his countenance, came and placed himself directly before clapperton, who immediately asked sidi sheik who he was. he immediately answered, "the executioner." clapperton instantly ordered his servants to turn him out. "be patient," said sidi sheik, laying his hand upon that of clapperton; "he visits the first people in sockatoo, and they never allow him to go away without giving him a few goora nuts, or money to buy them." in compliance with this hint, clapperton requested forty kowries to be given to the fellow, with strict orders never again to cross his threshold. sidi sheik now related a professional anecdote of clapperton's uninvited visitor. being brother of the executioner of yacoba, of which place he was a native, he applied to the governor for his brother's situation, boasting of superior adroitness in the family vocation. the governor coolly remarked, "we will try; go and fetch your brother's head." he instantly went in quest of his brother, and finding him seated at the door of his house, without noise or warning, he struck off his head with a sword at one blow; then carrying the bleeding head to the governor, and claiming the reward of such transcendent atrocity, he was appointed to the vacant office. the sultan being afterwards in want of an expert headsman, sent for him to sockatoo, where, a short time after his arrival, he had to officiate at the execution of two thousand tuaricks, who, in conjunction with the rebels at goober, had attempted to plunder the country, but were all made prisoners. it may be added, that the capital punishments inflicted in soudan are beheading, impaling, and crucifixion; the first being reserved for mahometans, and the other two practised on pagans. clapperton was told, that wretches on the cross generally linger three days before death puts an end to their sufferings. clapperton was for some time delayed in completing his arrangements for his departure from sockatoo, on account of the fast of the rhamadan, which the fellatas keep with extreme rigour. the chief people never leave their houses, except in the evening to prayer; and the women frequently pour cold water over their backs and necks. under the idea, that the greater the thirst they appear to endure, the better entitled they become to paradise; though clapperton was inclined to believe that they made a parade of these privations, in a great measure, to obtain the reputation of extraordinary sanctity. on the nd may, clapperton sent for the steward of the gadado's household, and all the female slaves, who had daily performed the duty of bringing him provisions from the time of his arrival. these provisions were about a gallon of new milk every morning, in a large bowl, for himself, and two gallons of sour milk and siccory for his servants at noon, in return for which he always gave fifty kowries; at three o'clock three roast fowls, with doura or nutta sauce, for which he sent fifty kowries; again after sunset two bowls of bozeen were brought by two female slaves, to whom he gave one hundred kowries; and about two quarts of new milk afterwards, for which he gave fifty kowries more. as an acknowledgment for their attention during his residence in sockatoo, he now presented the steward of the household with ten thousand kowries, and the slaves with two thousand each. the poor creatures were extremely grateful for his bounty, and many of them even shed tears. in the afternoon he waited upon the sultan, who told him that he had appointed the same escort which he had before, under the command of the gadado's brother, to conduct him through the provinces of goober and zamfra, and that an officer of the gadado, after the escort left him, should accompany him to zirmee, kashna, kano, and katagun; the governor of which would receive orders to furnish him with a strong escort through the bedite territory, and to deliver him safely into the hands of the sheik of bornou. he also mentioned that the letter for the king of england would be ready the next day. on the following day, clapperton was visited by all the principal people of sockatoo, to bid him farewell, and in the evening he went to take his leave of the sultan. he was, however, at the mosque, and he had to wait about two hours before he came out. clapperton followed him at a little distance to the door of his residence, where an old female slave took clapperton by the hand and led him through a number of dark passages, in which, at the bidding of his conductress, he had often to stoop, or at times to tread with great caution, as they approached flights of steps, whilst a faint glimmering light twinkled from a distant room. he could not imagine where the old woman was conducting him, who, on her part, was highly diverted at his importunate inquiries. after much turning and winding, he was at last brought into the presence of bello, who was sitting alone, and immediately delivered into his hands a letter for the king of england. he had previously sent to clapperton to know what were his majesty's name, style, and title. he again expressed with much earnestness of manner, his anxiety to enter into permanent relations of trade and friendship with england, and reminded clapperton to apprise him by letter, at what time the english expedition would be upon the coast. after repeating the fatah, and praying for his safe arrival in england, and speedy return to sockatoo, he affectionately bade him farewell. clapperton went next to take his leave of his good old friend the gadado, for whom he felt the same regard, as if he had been one of his oldest friends in england, and he was certain it was equally sincere on his side. the poor old man prayed very devoutly for his safety, and gave strict charge to his brother, who was to accompany clapperton, to take especial care of him in their journey through the disturbed provinces. the town of sockatoo lies in latitude ° ' " north, and longitude ° ' east, and is situated near the junction of an inconsiderable stream, with the same river which flows past zirmee, and which taking its rise between kashna and kano, is said to fall into the quarra four days' journey to the west. the name in their language signifies, a halting place, the city being built by the fellatas, after the conquest of goober and zamfra, as near as clapperton could learn about the year . it occupies a long ridge, which slopes gently towards the north, and appeared to clapperton the most populous town he had visited in the interior of africa, for unlike most other towns in houssa, where the houses are thinly scattered, it is laid out in regular well-built streets. the houses approach close to the walls, which were built by the present sultan in , after the death of his father; the old walls being too confined for the increasing population. this wall is between twenty and thirty feet high, and has twelve gates, which are regularly closed at sunset. there are two large mosques, including the new one which was then building by the gadado, besides several other places for prayer. there is a spacious market-place in the centre of the city, and another large square in front of the sultan's residence. the inhabitants are principally fellatas, possessing numerous slaves. such of the latter as are not employed in domestic duties, reside in houses by themselves, where they follow various trades; the master of course reaping the profit. their usual employments are weaving, house-building, shoemaking, and iron work, many bring firewood to the market for sale. those employed in raising grain and tending cattle, of which the fellatas have immense herds, reside in villages without the city. it is customary for private individuals to emancipate a number of slaves every year, according to their means, during the great feast after the rhamadan. the enfranchised seldom return to their native country, but continue to reside near their old masters, still acknowledging them as their superiors, but presenting them yearly with a portion of their earnings. the trade at sockatoo is at present inconsiderable, owing to the disturbed state of the surrounding country. the necessaries of life are very cheap, butchers' meat is in great plenty and very good. the exports are principally civet, and blue check tobes called sharie, which are manufactured by the slaves from nyffee, of whom the men are considered the most expert weavers in soudan, and the women the best spinners. the common imports are goora nuts, brought from the borders of ashantee, and coarse calico and woollen cloth in small quantities, with brass and pewter dishes, and some few spices from nyffee. the arabs from tripoli and ghadamis bring unwrought silk, attar of roses, spices and beads; slaves are both exported and imported. a great quantity of guinea coin is taken every year by the tuaricks, in exchange for salt. the market is extremely well supplied, and is held daily from sunrise to sunset. after encountering several difficulties, and experiencing some very hair-breadth escapes, clapperton arrived at zirmee the capital of zamfra, a kind of outlawed city, the inhabitants of which are esteemed the greatest rogues in houssa, and where all the runaway slaves find protection. he passed also through kashna or cassina, the metropolis of a kingdom, which, till the rise of the fellata power, ruled over all africa from bornou to the niger. in its present subject and fallen state, the inhabited part does not cover a tenth of the wide circuit enclosed by its walls, yet a considerable trade is still carried on with the tuaricks, or with caravans coming across the desert by the route of ghadamis and suat. here clapperton met with much kindness from hadgi ahmet, a powerful and wealthy arab chief, who even took him into his seraglio, and desired him, out of fifty black damsels to make his choice, a complaisance, nothing resembling which had ever before been shown by a mussulman. the arab was so importunate, and appeared so determined that clapperton should have one of his ladies, that to satisfy him, he at length selected the oldest of the groupe, who made him an excellent nurse in his illness. lieutenant clapperton rejoined major denham at kouka, whence they set out, and crossed the desert in the latter part of . they reached tripoli in january , and soon after embarked for leghorn, but being detained by contrary winds and quarantine regulations, did not reach london until the following june. chapter xxv. having now completed our preparatory analysis of the principal travels for the exploration of the interior of africa, we proceed to enter upon those in which richard lander was remotely or closely connected, as the coadjutor or the principal, and to whose perseverance and undaunted courage, we are indebted for some of the most important information respecting the interior of africa, particularly in the solution of the great geographical problem of the termination of the niger. at the time when lander was ransomed by captain laing, of the maria of london, belonging to messrs. forster and smith, the papers, which he had with him respecting the travels which he had performed, as the servant of captain clapperton, who had been promoted on his return from his first expedition, were not very voluminous. in our personal intercourse with him, however, he unreservedly dictated to us many interesting particulars respecting his travels, whilst in the service of captain clapperton, which are not to be found in his published narrative, and particularly of the occurrences which took place at whidah, in the kingdom of dahomey, on their passage through that territory, in fulfilment of the object of their mission to sultan bello of sockatoo. although the second expedition of clapperton is ostensibly published under his name, yet it is generally known, that but for the information given by lander on his return, after the death of captain clapperton, very little would have transpired relative to any discoveries which had been made, or towards an elucidation of those geographical and statistical objects, for which the expedition was undertaken. we are therefore more disposed to award the merit where it is most particularly due, for although in accordance with the received notion, that whatever was accomplished in the second expedition, is to be attributed to clapperton, yet, from our private resources, we are enabled not only to supply many deficiencies in the published accounts of clapperton's second expedition, gathered from the oral communication of lander himself, but also to give a description of many interesting scenes, which throw a distinct light upon the character of the natives, their progress towards civilisation, and the extent of their commercial relations. it may be remembered that when clapperton took his leave of the sultan at sockatoo, he delivered into his hands a letter for the king of england, in consequence of several conversations that had passed between him and clapperton, touching the establishment of some commercial relations between england and the central kingdoms of africa. in that letter the sultan proposed three things:--the establishment of a friendly intercourse between the two nations by means of a consul, who was to reside at the _seaport_ of raka; the delivery of certain presents described, at the port of fundah, supposed to be somewhere near whidah, and the prohibition of the exportation of slaves, by any of the houssa merchants, to atagher, dahomy, or ashantee. no doubt whatever rested on the mind of lander, that clapperton was in some respects made the dupe of the pride, pomposity, and deception of the african sultan. it may be remembered that the sultan offered him land on the sea coast, on which to form a settlement, when it was subsequently discovered, that he was not in possession of an inch of territory within several hundred miles of the sea; the _seaport_ of raka was nearly similar to sancho panza's island barrataria, it was not to be found in any existing map, and it will be seen in the sequel, that the people resident on the sea coast knew as little of sultan bello of sockatoo, as he knew of them, although, according to his own report, the greater part of the sea coast belonged to him. on the arrival of clapperton in england, lord bathurst, then secretary of state for the colonies, conceived the proposals contained in the sultan's letter, to afford a fair opportunity for endeavouring to carry into effect objects of such considerable importance, and clapperton immediately volunteered his services for the occasion. he had arranged with sultan bello, that his messengers should about a certain time be at whidah, to conduct the presents and the bearers to sockatoo. clapperton was allowed to take with him on this novel and hazardous enterprise two associates, one of whom was captain pearce of the navy, an excellent draughtsman, and the other dr. morrison, a surgeon in the navy, well versed in various branches of natural history; and at his particular request, a fellow countryman of the name of dickson, who had served as a surgeon in the west indies, was added to the list; richard lander accompanying captain clapperton in the capacity of a servant. the travellers embarked on board his majesty's ship brazen, on the th august , and arrived off whidah on the th of the following november. mr. dickson landed at whidah, for reasons which do not appear in the narrative of clapperton's expedition, but which have been fully stated to us by lander, to whom we are indebted for the information which we now lay before our readers of the kingdom of dahomy, its natives, customs, natural productions, and commercial advantages. mr. dickson, accompanied with a portuguese of the name of de sousa, proceeded from whidah to dahomy, where the latter had resided for some time. here he was well received, and sent forward with a suitable escort to a place called shar, seventeen days' journey from dahomy, where he also arrived in safety, and thence proceeded with another escort towards youri, but has not since been heard of. it was in consequence of the inquiries that were set on foot relative to mr. dickson, that lander obtained the following highly interesting information relative to a part of africa, which was at one time, the emporium of the slave trade on the sea-coast, but the interior of which was but very little known. whidah was once an independent kingdom, but in the year was conquered by guadja trudo, the king of dahomy. grigwee, the present capital, lies a few miles up from the sea coast, and may contain about twenty thousand inhabitants. dahomy, including the subjugated districts, extends at least a hundred and fifty miles into the interior, the principal town of which is abomey, lying in about ° east longitude. dahomy produces in perfection all the immense variety of fine fruits found within the torrid zone, and amongst others one of a most singular quality. it is not unlike a ripe coffee berry, and does not at first appear to have a superior degree of sweetness, but it leaves in the mouth so much of that impression, that a glass of vinegar tastes like sweet wine, and the sourest lemon like a sweet orange; sugar is quite an unnecessary article in tea or coffee; in fact, the most nauseous drug seems sweet to whomever chews this fruit, and its effect is not worn away until after several meals. it is generally called the miraculous berry, and whoever eats of it in the morning, must be content at least for that day to forego the flavour of every kind of food, whether animal or vegetable, for all will be alike saccharine to the palate, and the most ridiculous effect is often produced by playing tricks upon those, who are not aware of its peculiar property. lander himself was one of the dupes, and he relates, that the first time he partook of one of these berries, he thought himself under the influence of witchcraft--the fowl of which he partook at dinner seemed to him as if it had been soaked in a solution of sugar--the lime juice appeared to him as if it were mixed with some saccharine matter--his biscuit tasted like a bun--and although he was convinced that he had not put any sugar into his grog, it seemed to him as if it had been sweetened by the first maker of punch in his native country. the beasts of prey are numerous and dangerous, and often commit great havoc amongst the sheep, and other live stock, notwithstanding every precaution to put them in a place of security at night. the tigers and leopards are not contented with what they actually carry off, but they leave nothing alive which comes within the reach of their talons. during the residence of lander in the country, a good mode of astonishing a tiger was practised with success. a loaded musket was firmly fixed in a horizontal position, about the height of his head, to a couple of stakes driven into the ground, and the piece being cocked, a string from the trigger, first leading a little towards the butt, and then turning through a small ring forwards, was attached to a shoulder of mutton, stuck on the muzzle of the musket, the act of dragging off which, drew the trigger, and the piece loaded with two balls, discharged itself into the plunderer's mouth, killing him on the spot. elephants are common in dahomy, but are not tamed and used by the natives, as in india, for the purposes of war or burthen, being merely taken for the sake of their ivory and their flesh, which is, on particular occasions, eaten. an animal of the hyena tribe, called by the natives tweetwee, is likewise extremely troublesome; herds of these join together, and scrape up the earth of newly-made graves, in order to get at the bodies, which are not buried here in coffins. these resurrection men, as lander termed them, make, during the night, a most dismal howling, and often change their note to one very much resembling the shriek of a woman in some situation of danger or distress. snakes of the boa species are here found of a most enormous size, many being from thirty to thirty-six feet in length, and of proportional girth. they attack alike wild and domestic beasts, and often human kind. they kill their prey by encircling it in their folds, and squeezing it to death, and afterwards swallow it entire; this they are enabled to do by a faculty of very extraordinary expansion in their muscles, without at the same time impairing the muscular action or power. the bulk of the animals which these serpents are capable of gorging would stagger belief, were the fact not so fully attested as to place it beyond doubt. the state of torpor in which they are sometimes found in the woods, after a _stuffing_ meal of this kind, affords the negroes an opportunity of killing them. lander informed us, that there is not in nature a more appalling sight than one of these monsters in full motion. it has a chilling and overpowering effect on the human frame, and it seems to inspire with the same horror every other animal, even the strongest and most ferocious; for all are equally certain of becoming victims, should the snake once fasten itself upon them. the religion of this country is paganism. they believe in two beings, equal in power; the one doing good, the other evil; and they pray to the demon to allow them to remain unmolested by the magicians, who are constantly endeavouring to injure them. in whidah, for some unaccountable reason, they worship their divinity under the form of a particular species of snake called daboa, which is not sufficiently large to be terrible to man, and is otherwise tameable and inoffensive. these daboas arc taken care of in the most pious manner, and well fed on rats, mice, or birds, in their fetish houses or temples, where the people attend to pay their adoration, and where those also who are sick or lame apply for assistance. the tiger is also an object of religious regard in dahomy proper; but they deem it the safest mode of worship to perform their acts of devotion to his skin only after death, which is stuffed for that purpose. the people of whidah occasionally imagine themselves inspired by the divinity, or, as they term it, are seized by the fetish; and in such cases, it becomes necessary, from the frantic manner in which they run about, to secure and place them under the charge of the fetisheers, or priests, until this fit of inspiration be over, and they become themselves again. the political management of whidah is entrusted to a viceroy, who is called the yavougah, or captain of the white men. this officer, at the time of lander's visit to the country, was a man of majestic stature, and possessed an uncommon share of dignity, mingled with complacency of manner. his dress was generally a large hat, somewhat resembling that of a spanish grandee, tastefully decorated, and a piece of damask silk, usually red, thrown over one shoulder, like a scotch plaid, with a pair of drawers; but his arms and legs were bare, except the bracelets of silver, which encircled the arm above the elbow, with manillas of the same sort, and rows of coral round the wrist. when he had any message to deliver from the king, or other public affairs to transact with the europeans, it was done with much ceremony and state; his guards, musicians, and umbrella-bearers, and a numerous retinue, always attending him. the most polished courtier of europe could not have deported himself more gracefully on public occasions than this man, or have carried on a conference with greater ease and affability. he was master, besides his own, of the english, french, and portuguese languages, having resided from his birth chiefly in the vicinity of the european forts, and in his younger days had been much connected with them, officially as a linguist. although, therefore, he understood perfectly what was said to him by the europeans, who accompanied lander, yet it was etiquette for the viceroy to be spoken to through an interpreter, and it was often amusing to see the bungling efforts of the latter in the performance of a task, which the yavougah himself so much better understood, and which he good humouredly, and in an under tone, assisted him to complete. after the business of ceremony was finished, he laid aside all formality, and conversed in a familiar manner upon general subjects, the whole party joining convivially in a collation, or repast, which was always served up on such occasions. the government of dahomy is, in the fullest sense of the word, despotism. it is a monarchy the most unlimited and uncontrolled on the face of the earth, there being no law but the king's will, who may chop off as many heads as he pleases, when he is "i' the vein," and dispose of his subjects' property as he thinks fit, without being accountable to any human tribunal for his conduct. he has from three to four thousand wives, a proportion of whom, trained to arms, under female officers, constitute his body-guards. as may naturally be supposed, but a few of these wives engage his particular attention. the successor to the throne is not announced during the king's lifetime; but the moment his decease is known, the proclamation is made with all possible despatch by the proper officers; for all is murder, anarchy, and confusion in the palace until it takes place; the wives of the late king not only breaking the furniture and ornaments, but killing each other, in order to have the honour of attending their husband to the grave. the choice usually falls on the eldest son of the late sovereign's greatest favourite, provided there exists no particular reason for setting him aside. there seem to be no rank nor privileges annexed to any branches of the royal family; the king, in his own person, absorbing the undivided respect of the people. those of his relations whom his majesty may deign to patronise, will, of course, be more noticed by their fellow-slaves; but are all alike the slaves of the king. his palace at abomey is walled round, and consists, according to the report of lander and others, who had an opportunity of visiting its interior, of numerous courts connected with each other, occupying, in the whole, a space full as large as st. james' park. the first minister is called the _tamegan,_ and he is the only man in the country whose head the king cannot cut off at pleasure. by some ancient regulation, he who attains this rank has that very essential part of his person secured to him, perhaps that he may honestly speak his mind to the king, without fear of consequences. the second, or mahou, is the master of the ceremonies, whose office it is to receive and introduce all strangers, whether black or white, and also to take care of them during their stay at court, and to see that they are well fed and lodged, with all their attendants. the third officer in the state is the yavougah of whidah; and the fourth is the jahou, or master of the horse, who is likewise the chief executioner, and has the duty of superintending the numerous decapitations, which occur in various ways. there are entertained about the court a number of king's messengers, called half-heads, because one side of their head is always shaved, whilst the hair on the other is allowed to grow to its full length. they are men, who have distinguished themselves in battle, and wear, as the badge of their office, strings of the teeth of those enemies they have actually killed with their own hands, slung round their necks, like the collar of an order. these extraordinary-looking couriers, when sent on any mission, are never permitted to walk, but run at full speed, and are relieved at certain distances on the road by relays of others, who push on in the same manner, on receiving their orders, which they transfer from one to the other with the greatest exactness. the general officers in the dahomian army are distinguished by large umbrellas, and when any of that class are killed in action, they say figuratively, that, on such an occasion, we lost so many umbrellas. in delivering what is termed the king's word, the messenger, as well as all those around him, fall prostrate on the ground, and cover their heads with dust, or with mud, if it rains; so that they often display very hideous figures, with their black bodies and the wool of their heads thus bedaubed with red puddle. the ministers of state, in communicating with the king, approach within a certain distance of him, crawling on their hands and knees, at last they prostrate themselves, kiss the ground, cover their heads with dust, then make their speech, and receive his reply. his majesty usually sits on public occasions, as he is represented in our engraving, under a rich canopy, on a finely carved stool or throne, surrounded by his women, some with whisks driving away the flies, one with a handkerchief to wipe his mouth, and another on her knees, holding a gold cup to spit in, as he smokes. their marriages, like those of most barbarous nations, are settled by the bridegroom paying a certain sum for the woman, which is calculated at the rate of one or more slaves, or moveable property in shells, cloth, or other articles, to the amount of the specified number of slaves. polygamy is allowed to any extent, and it is generally carried as far as the means of the gentlemen will admit, as, after a short period, or honeymoon, the women are employee in the fields and plantations, and usually are no better situated than the common servants of their husbands. adultery is punished by slavery, or the value of a slave, by the offender, and the lady likewise subjects herself to be sold, but it is remarked that this measure is seldom resorted to, and it sometimes happens that a handsome wife is repeatedly turned to advantage by her husband, in alluring the unwary into heavy damages. the state of women is upon the whole very abject in dahomy. wives approach their husbands with every mark of the humblest submission. in presenting him even with a calabash containing his food, after she has cooked it, she kneels and offers it with an averted look, it being deemed too bold to stare him full in the face. by their constantly practising genuflexion upon the bare ground, their knees become in time almost as hard as their heels. a mutinous wife or a vixen, sometimes the treasure and delight of an englishman; the enlivener of his fireside, and his safeguard from ennui, is a phenomenon utterly unknown in dahomy--that noble spirit, which animates the happier dames in lands of liberty, being here, alas! extinguished and destroyed. in most nations a numerous progeny is considered a blessing, as being likely to prop the declining years of their parents, but in dahomy, children are taken from their mothers at an early age, and distributed in villages remote from the places of their nativity, where they remain with but little chance of being ever seen, or at least recognized by their parents afterwards. the motive for this is, that there may be no family connexion nor combinations; no associations that might prove injurious to the king's unlimited power. hence each individual is detached and unconnected, and having no relative for whom he is interested, is solicitous only for his own safety, which he consults by the most abject submission. paternal affection, and filial love, therefore, can scarcely be said to exist. mothers, instead of cherishing, endeavour to suppress those attachments for their offspring, which they know will be violated, as soon as their children are able to undergo the fatigue of being removed from them. at a particular period of the year, generally in april or may, a grand annual festival is held, which may with much propriety be termed a _carnival._ on this occasion the chief magistrates or caboceers of the different towns and districts, the governors of the english, french, and portuguese settlements, are expected to attend at the capital, with their respective retinues; and the captains of ships, and factors trading at whidah, usually take this opportunity of paying their respects to the king. a great part of the population, in fact; repair to abomey, which resembles some great fair, from the number of booths and tents erected in it for various purposes. it is at this time also that the revenue is collected; all the people either bringing or sending their respective quotas to the royal treasury. white men are received there with every mark of respect, and even saluted by the discharge of cannon. there appears to be an extraordinary mixture of ferocity and politeness in the character of these people; though terrible and remorseless to their enemies, nothing can exceed their urbanity and kindness to strangers. should any white person be taken ill at abomey, the king sends the mayhou, or some other great officer, to make daily inquiries about the state of his malady, and desiring to know in what way he can assist or promote his recovery. notwithstanding, the king exacts from his own subjects the most humiliating and abject prostrations, on approaching his person, yet he admits europeans to his presence without the least scruple, requiring only from them those marks of respect which they may think fit to perform, in the style of salutation they have been accustomed to in their own countries. they are allowed to be seated in his company, and he personally pays them great attention. cooks are procured, who understand the mode of preparing european dishes; even table cloths, with knives and forks, although never used by themselves, are furnished, and in short every thing which can contribute to their comfort, is provided with eastern hospitality. they are likewise entertained with feasts, music, public dances, processions of the king's women, and the exhibition of sports and games. but amidst this general enjoyment of festivity and mirth, deeds are done from which the civilized mind recoils with horror, and which it cannot contemplate without feeling an ardent desire, to see mankind raised from that state of savage ignorance and superstition, which leads to acts so monstrous and unnatural. in order to _water_ with their blood the graves of the king's ancestors, and to supply them with servants of various descriptions in the other world, a number of human victims are annually sacrificed in solemn form, and this carnival is the period at which these shocking rites are publicly performed. scaffolds are erected outside the palace wall, and a large space fenced in round them. on these the king, with the white strangers who think proper to attend, are seated, and the ministers of state are also present in the space beneath. into this field of blood the victims are brought in succession, with their arms pinioned, and a fetisheer, laying his hand on the devoted head, pronounces a few mystical words, when another man, standing behind, with a large scymitar severs the sufferer's head from his body, generally at a single blow, and each repetition of this savage act is proclaimed by loud shouts of applause from the surrounding multitude, who affect to be highly delighted with the power and magnificence of their sovereign. his bards, or laureats, join also at this time in bawling out his strong names, (their term for titles of honour,) and sing songs in his praise. these scenes are likewise enlivened by a number of people engaged in a savage dance round the scaffolds; should the foot of one of these performers slip, it is considered an ill omen; the unfortunate figurante is taken out of the ring, and his head instantly struck off, whilst the dance continues without interruption, as if nothing unusual had occurred. the people thus sacrificed are generally prisoners of war, whom the king often puts aside for this purpose, several months previously to the celebration of his horrid festival; should there be any lack of these, the number is made up from the most convenient of his own subjects. the number of these victims sometimes amount to several hundred, but about seventy are the average number. their bodies are either thrown out into the fields, to be devoured by vultures and wild beasts, or hung by the heels in a mutilated state upon the surrounding trees, a practice exceedingly offensive in so hot a climate. the heads are piled up in a heap for the time, and afterwards disposed of in decorating the walls of the royal _simbonies,_ or palaces, some of which are two miles in circumference, and often require a renewal and repair of these ornaments. an anecdote is related of king adahoouza, who, on a successful attack upon badagry, having a great number of victims to sacrifice, ordered their heads to be applied to the above purpose. the person to whom the management of this business was committed, having neglected to make a proper calculation of his materials, had proceeded too far with his work, when he found that there would not be a sufficient number of skulls to adorn the whole palace; he therefore requested permission to begin the work, as the lawyers would say, _de novo,_ in order that he might, by placing them farther apart, complete the design in a regular manner; but the king would by no means give his consent to this proposal, observing that he would soon find a sufficient number of badagry heads to render the plan perfectly uniform, and learning that a hundred and twenty seven were required to complete this extraordinary embellishment, he ordered that number of captives to be brought forth and slaughtered in cold blood. on visiting the bed-chamber of bossa ahadee, the passage leading to it was found to be paved with human skulls. they were those of his more distinguished adversaries, captured at different times, and placed in that situation that he might nightly enjoy the savage gratification of trampling on the heads of his enemies. the top of the little wall, which surrounded this detached apartment, was adorned likewise with their jaw-bones. in some more civilized minds there is an instinctive dread on viewing the remains of a human being; but it cannot be laid to the charge of these savages, that the fear of ghosts and hobgoblins forms any part of their character. the immolation of victims is, however, not confined to this particular period; for at any time, should it be necessary to send an account to his forefathers of any remarkable event, the king despatches a courier to the shades, by delivering his message to whomsoever may happen to be near him, and then ordering his head to be chopped off immediately; and it has not unfrequently happened, that as something new has occurred to the king's mind, another messenger, as mr. canning very justly observed of the postscript of a letter, has instantly followed on the same errand, perhaps in itself of the most trivial kind. it is considered a high honour where his majesty personally condescends to become the executioner in these feats of decapitation, an office in which the king, at the time of the visit of lander to abomey, considered himself as a most expert proficient. the europeans were present on one occasion, when a poor fellow, whose fear of death outweighing the sense of the honour conferred on him, on being desired by the king to carry some message to his father, who was in the shades below, humbly declared on his knees that he was ignorant of the way, on which the tyrant vociferated, "i'll show you the way," and with one blow made his head fly many yards from his body, highly indignant that there should have been the least expression of reluctance. the performance of the annual sacrifice is considered a duty so sacred, that no allurement in the way of gain, no additional price which the white traders can offer for slaves, will induce the king to spare even a single victim of the established number; and he is equally inexorable with respect to the chiefs of his enemies, who are never, on any account, permitted to live if they fall into his hands. in illustration of the above, the following narrative is highly characteristic, and serves at once to a clear exposition of the savage and relentless feelings of the uncivilized negro. in a warlike excursion towards the mahee or ashantee borders, an enemy's town was surprised, and a great number of the inhabitants were either killed or made prisoners; but especial care was taken that the head of the prince of that district should be sent to abomey, and that every branch of his family should, if possible, be exterminated, for it was one which had often given the dahomian forces a great deal of trouble. a merciless massacre, therefore, of these individuals took place, in obedience to strict injunctions to that effect; and it was believed that not one of the breed was left alive. a youth, however, about seventeen years of age, one of the sons of the obnoxious prince, had managed to conceal his real quality, and not being pointed out, succeeded in passing among the crowd of prisoners to the dahomian capital, where, after selecting that portion thought necessary for the ensuing sacrifices, the captors sent the remainder to grigwee, to be sold at the factories. this young man happened to be purchased by mr. m'leod, and he lived thenceforth in the fort, as a sort of general rendezvous, or trunk, as it is called, for those belonging to that department. in a short time after this transaction, it some how transpired at abomey that there yet lived the remnant of the enemy's family, and in order to trace him out, the king fell upon a scheme, which strongly displays that species of cunning and artifice so often observed among savages. some of his half-heads, who may very appropriately be termed his mortal messengers, in contradistinction to the immortals sent to the shades, arrived at the fort, and, with the coke, a stern and hardhearted villain, who, in the absence of the yavougah, was the next caboceer, demanded admittance in the king's name, prostrating themselves as usual, and covering their heads with dust. on entering, they proceeded immediately to that quarter where the slaves were, and repeated the ceremony of kissing the ground before they spoke the _king's word,_ that is to say, delivered his message. the coke then made a long harangue, the purport of which was to signify the king's regret that animosity should have so long existed between him and the chief of that country which he had just despoiled, and to express his sorrow for the fate of a family, which had suffered from his displeasure, through false accounts and misrepresentations. for this reason, he was now most anxious to make every reparation in his power to a son yet remaining of that prince, and would readily re-establish him in the rank and possessions of his father, could he only find him out. completely duped by this wile, the unsuspecting lad exultingly exclaimed, "i am the son of the prince!"--"then," replied the coke, with a hellish joy at having succeeded in his object, "you are just the person we want." upon which these half-heads seized him, and began to bind his hands. finding by this time the real state of the case, which at first it was impossible to comprehend, mr. m'leod strongly protested against their seizing a slave whom he had regularly purchased, and complained loudly of the insult offered to the company's fort; but all in vain. he then earnestly entreated them to offer the king his own price, or selection of goods, and to beg as a favour from mr. m'leod, that he might be spared, strongly urging the plea also, that, when once embarked, he would be as free from every apprehension, respecting him, as if he had killed him. the coke coolly replied, that mr. m'leod need not give himself any further trouble to make any proposals, for he dared not repeat one of them to the king; and, after an ineffectual struggle, mr. m'leod was at last compelled to witness, with the most painful emotion, this ill-fated youth dragged off in a state of the gloomiest despair, a despair rendered more dismal from the fallacious glimpse of returning happiness, by which he had been so cruelly entrapped. the party not being able to obtain the slightest information respecting mr. dickson, retraced their steps, and rejoined captain clapperton in the river benin, where they met with an english merchant, of the name of houston, who advised them by no means to think of proceeding by that river, a circuitous track, and covered with pestilential swamps; and more particularly as the king bore a particular hatred to the english for their exertions in putting an end to the slave-trade, nor did he, mr. houston, know how far, or in what direction, that river might lead them. he recommended badagry as the most convenient point on the coast to start from, and he offered to accompany them across the mountains to katunga, the capital of youriba. his offer was accepted, and lander's journal commences with their starting from badagry, on the th december. they were also attended by a houssa black, of the name of pascoe, who had been sent from one of the king's ships to accompany the late enterprizing traveller belzoni, as interpreter, in his last and fatal journey. it appears, that during their stay at whidah, every inquiry was made after bello and his messengers, but without the slightest success, and equally so as to funda and raka, names never heard of on that part of the coast. it is now known that these places are nearly two hundred miles inland, and that raka is not even on the banks of any river, and that neither of them was then under the dominion of bello. badagry, the capital of a small territory, is situated at the mouth of the lagos river, in latitude ° ', and is much frequented by the portuguese slave-merchants, who have five factories there. canoes being obtained, the party proceeded slowly up a branch of this river, as far as the mouth of the gazie creek, which comes from the north-west, running through part of the kingdom of dahomy, having its rise in the country called keeto. they ascended this creek for about a mile and a half, and then landed on the western bank, at a place called bawie, where a market is held for the people of badagry and the adjacent towns. the very first night, they were guilty of a fatal imprudence. the banks of both these streams are low and covered with reeds; the soil a red clay mixed with sand; and the surrounding country is covered with forests of high trees and jungle. not a hum of a single mosquito was to be heard. every circumstance combined to create an atmosphere fatal to animal life, and the consequence of the unaccountable disregard of all precaution on the part of the travellers was too soon apparent. the seeds of those diseases were here sown, in the very first night of their journey, which speedily proved fatal to two of the party, and had nearly carried off the whole. how an old naval surgeon and two experienced naval officers could commit such an imprudence, in such a climate, is to us most surprising, when most dreadful consequences are well known to have almost invariably resulted from such a practice in tropical climates, on the th of december, they again slept in the open air, in the market-place of dagmoo, a large town, where they might have had as many houses as they wanted. this reckless indifference to the preservation of their health can only be accounted for on the principle, that on an expedition attended by so many difficulties and privations, it was deemed justifiable to attempt to inure the constitution to the noxious influences of the climate, and to look down with contempt upon any act which had the least tendency to effeminacy, or a scrupulous attention to personal comfort. the constitution of clapperton was well known to have been of an iron nature; it had already withstood the pestilential climate of some parts of soudan, in his previous travels, and, with that impression upon his mind, he regarded, perhaps, with indifference, or more likely with inattention, any effect which might arise from the marshy and swampy country through which the party travelled in the commencement of their journey. the disastrous sequel will, however, soon manifest itself. one morning, captain clapperton walked forward with mr. houston to the town of puka, the first place in the youriba territory, where they were civilly received, and they were visited by one of the eyeo war-chiefs, who came in state. he was mounted on a small horse, as were two of his attendants; the rest of the cavalcade were on foot. his dress was most grotesque, consisting of a ragged red coat, with yellow facings, and a military cap and feather, apparently portuguese. he came curvetting and leaping his horse, until within the distance of a hundred yards, when he dismounted, and, approaching the travellers, seated himself down on the ground. captain clapperton, by the hand of lander, sent him his umbrella, as a token that he wished him well, on the receipt of which the drums were beaten, and hands were clapped and fingers cracked at a great rate. it must be observed, that the latter motion is the method of salutation practised by the natives of dahomy and eyeo. the chief now came up to them, capering and dancing the whole of the way, and shook them by the hand, a few of his attendants accompanying him. lander informed us that he was not on this occasion honoured by the salute of the eyeo chief, and he attributed it to the nigh notion which the chief entertained of his own dignity and importance, and that it would be in him an act of great condescension to notice an individual who was evidently but a subordinate, and an attendant upon his superior. he, however, did not hesitate to steal a handkerchief belonging to lander, which perhaps he considered to be also an act of condescension in him. like other great men, who sometimes speak a great deal, without much meaning or sense being discoverable in their oration, the eyeo chief began his speech by saying that he was very glad that he now saw a white man, and he doubted not that white man was equally glad to see him, and then, pointing to the various parts of his dress, he said, "this cloth is not made in my country; this cap is of white man's velvet; these trousers are of white man's nankeen; this is a white man's shawl; we get all good things from white man, and we must therefore be glad when white man come to visit our country." although not cheered at the conclusion of his speech, like other great speakers, yet, on the other hand, like them in general, he appeared to be very well satisfied with himself; and captain clapperton, by his demeanour, fully gave him to understand that he fully approved of the sentiments which flowed from his lips, and that they were perfectly worthy of a chief of the eyeo nation. the two men, who appeared next in authority to himself, were stout good-looking men, natives of bornou; they were dressed in the fashion of that country, with blue velvet caps on their heads. being mahometans, they could not be prevailed on to drink spirits, but the captain and his men drank two drams. they paid a visit to the caboceer, or chief man of the town, whom they found seated in the midst of his elders and women. he was an ancient, tall, stupid-looking man, dressed in a long silk tobe, or long shirt; on his head was a cap, made of small glass beads of various colours, surrounded with tassels of small gold-coloured beads, and three large coral ones in front. the cap was the best part of the man, for it was very neat; in his hand he held a fly-flapper, the handle of which was covered with beads. after a number of compliments, they were presented with goroo nuts and water. they told him of their intention to proceed to eyeo; that they were servants of the king of england; and that they wanted carriers for themselves and baggage. the baggage, however, had not come up from the coast, and captain pearce had to return to the beach and see after it. they remained here for the night, and the old caboceer, their host, sent them a present of a sheep, a basket of yams, and some firewood. but when, the next morning, application was made to him for carriers, not a single man could be obtained. after a great deal of palavering, the eyeo captain loaded his own people. they could not procure any bearers for the hammocks, but they nevertheless set off, having only one horse, which captain clapperton and mr. houston agreed to ride alternately. the former, however, who had almost crippled himself the preceding day, with a pair of new boots, and could only wear slippers, became so galled by riding without a saddle, that he was soon reduced to walk bare-foot, and whenever he crossed an ant path, his feet felt as if on fire, these insects drawing blood from them and his ankles. after a most toilsome and distressing march, part of which wound through thick and dark woods, the morning proved raw, cold and hazy; the travellers had nothing to eat, and when at noon they reached the town of humba, captain clapperton had a slight fit of ague. on the following day, bearers were with some difficulty procured, and he was carried forward in a hammock. at bedgie, which they reached on the th, dr. morrison became very unwell with symptoms of fever. this place stands on the banks of a river about a quarter of a mile in width, full of low swampy islands and floating reeds. on the th, captain pearce and richard lander were taken ill. they had by this, time reached laboo, a town situated on a rising ground, where the country begins to undulate in hill and dale. its distance from the coast is not specified, but it can hardly be so much as fifty miles, as lagos can be reached in one day by a messenger, yet the journey had occupied the travellers no fewer than seven days. the delay seems partly to have been occasioned by the heavy baggage and stores, and by the difficulty of obtaining bearers. the eyeo people, as they were afterwards told, are unaccustomed to carry hammocks, and they ought to have proceeded on horseback, in fact, lander did not hesitate to express himself in rather severe terms, in regard to the manner in which the early part of the expedition was conducted; for, had the plan been adopted of making use of horses for the conveyance of the baggage, and not have allowed themselves to be delayed by the difficulty of procuring human assistance; had the whole party pressed forward to laboo, and there attempted to recruit their strength, it is highly probable that they would have altogether escaped the poisonous effects of the miasmata. the country thus far appears to have been an almost perfect level; in some places swampy, for the most part covered with dense forests, but partially cultivated, and very populous. towns and villages were numerous, and everywhere on the road they were met by numbers of people, chiefly women, bearing loads of produce on their heads, always cheerful and obliging, and delighted to see white men. at humba, the inhabitants kept up singing and dancing all night, in the true negro style, round the house allotted to the white men. their songs were in chorus, and, as lander expressed himself, "not unlike some church-music that i have heard." on leaving laboo, they were attended for some distance by the caboceer of the town, at the head of the whole population, the women singing in chorus, and holding up both hands as they passed, while groupes of people were seen kneeling down, and apparently wishing them a good journey. the road now lay over an undulating country, through plantations of millet, yams, and maize, and at three hours from laboo, led to jannah, which was once a walled town, but the gate and fosse are all that remain of the fortifications. it is situated on a gentle declivity, commanding an extensive prospect to the westward; to the eastward the view is interrupted by thick woods. the inhabitants may amount to from eight hundred to a thousand souls. the account which lander gave us of the natives of this district was highly favourable. he had only to complain of the eternal loquacity of the women, by which he was exceedingly annoyed; in addition to which, they appeared sometimes to be highly offended because, as he was ignorant of their language, he very often committed the most extraordinary blunders, in the answers which he gave by signs, and which were wholly opposite to what they had every reason to expect, from the significant language which they made use of. the women here are, however, not much better treated than in more central africa; not only the domestic duties are performed by them, but in all matters of industry the labour appears to be imposed upon them, whilst their husbands or owners are loitering away their time, telling unaccountable stories to each other, or sleeping under the shade of some of the beautiful trees which adorn this part of the country. very differently is it constituted with the canine species; for here the dog is treated with respect, and made the companion of man; here he has collars round his neck, of various colours, and ornamented with kowries; he sits by his master, and follows him in all his journeys and visits. the great man is never without one; and it appeared to lander that a boy was appointed to take care of him. in no other country in africa is this faithful animal treated with common humanity. the general character of the people of eyeo appears to be good and amiable, and, as a proof of their honesty, to which all the travellers bore ample testimony, they had now travelled sixty miles in eight days, with a numerous and heavy baggage, and about ten different relays of carriers, without losing so much as the value of a shilling, public or private; a circumstance evincing not only somewhat more than common honesty in the inhabitants, but a degree of subordination and regular government, which could not have been supposed to exist among a people hitherto considered as barbarous. it appears, however, that the eyeo captain, adamooli, had not quite so high an opinion of their spontaneous honesty; for he told the travellers, at puka, to keep a good look-out after their things, as the people there were great thieves. in some branches of the arts they possess an extraordinary skill. they are great carvers; their doors, drums, and every thing of wood being carved. in the weaving of cloth and linen they also evinced considerable skill. eight or ten looms were seen at work in one house; in fact it was a regular manufactory. captain clapperton visited several cloth manufactories, and three dye-houses, with upwards of twenty vats in each, all in full work. the indigo is of excellent quality, and the cloth of a good texture; some of it very fine. the women are the dyers, the boys the weavers, the men, in general, lookers on. the loom and shuttles are on the same principle as the common english loom, but the warp is only four inches wide. they also manufacture earthen-ware, but prefer that of europe, which they obtain from badagry. in walking through the town, the strangers were followed by an immense crowd, but met with not a word nor a look of disrespect. the men took off their caps as they passed, and the women remained kneeling. the market was well supplied with raw cotton, cloths, oranges, limes, plantains, bananas, onions, pepper, and gums for soup, boiled yams, and acassous, a paste made of maize and wrapped in leaves. a country finely cleared, and diversified with hill and dale, extends from jannah to tshow, distant two short stages. the route then again entered upon a thickly-wooded tract, with only patches of corn land, and the roads were dreadfully bad, being partially flooded by heavy rains. captain clapperton here caught a fresh cold, and all the patients became worse. dr. morrison, after being carried in a hammock as far as tshow, finding himself grow no better, was left behind, under the charge of mr. houston, who was to see him safe back to the coast. he, however, expired at jannah on the th. on the same day, at a town called engwa, captain pearce breathed his last. on this occasion, captain clapperton says, "the death of captain pearce has caused me much concern; for, independently of his amiable qualities as a friend and companion, he was eminently fitted by his talents, perseverance, and fortitude, to be of singular service to the expedition, and on these accounts i deplore his loss, as the greatest i could have sustained, both as regards my private feelings and the public service." on the following morning, the remains of this lamented officer were interred, in the presence of all the principal people of the town. the grave was staked round by the inhabitants, and a shed built over it. an inscription was carved on a board, and placed at the head of the grave by lander, captain clapperton being unable to sit up, or to assist in any manner in the mournful ceremony. thus did captain clapperton see himself bereft of his comrades, and left to pursue his journey in very painful and distressing circumstances, with only richard lander as his servant, who stood by him in all his fortunes, and pascoe, not a very trusty african, whom he had hired at badagry. two days after the interment of captain pearce, mr. houston joined captain clapperton from jannah, bearing the intelligence of the death of dr. morrison. these unfortunate officers had been conveyed thus far, about seventy miles, in hammocks, by the people of the country, every where experiencing the kindest attention, lodged in the best houses, and supplied with every thing that the country afforded. the fear, however, that continually preyed upon the mind of lander was excessive; for the general appearance of captain clapperton indicated that he would soon join his comrades in the grave; he was able occasionally to ride on horseback, and sometimes to walk, but he was greatly debilitated, and subject to a high degree of fever. by anticipation, lander saw himself a solitary wanderer in the interior of africa, bereft of all those resources with which clapperton was liberally supplied, and his only hope of deliverance resting on his being able to accomplish his return to badagry, literally as a christian mendicant. lander describes the country between badagry and jannah, the frontier town of the kingdom of youriba, as abounding in population, well cultivated with plantations of indian corn, different kinds of millet, yams, plantains, wherever the surface was open and free from the noxious influence of dense and unwholesome forests. the old caboceer of jannah was, according to the report of lander, a merry, jocose kind of companion. on one occasion, when he was surrounded by a whole crowd of the natives, and was informed that the english had only one wife, they all broke out into a loud laugh, in which the women in particular joined immoderately. the vanity of this old negro almost exceeded belief; during the ceremony of the reception of captain clapperton and mr. houston, he changed his dress three different times, each time, as he thought, increasing the splendour of his appearance. the whole court in which they were received, although very large, was filled, crowded, and crammed with people, except a place in front, where the august strangers sat, into which his highness led captain clapperton and mr. houston, in each hand, followed by lander, who, ever and anon, first to the right, and then to the left, felt a twitch at the tail of his coat, and on looking to ascertain the cause, found it to have proceeded from the _fair_ hands of a bewitching negress, who, casting upon him a look of irresistible fascination, accompanied by a smile from a pair of huge pouting lips, between which appeared a row of teeth, for which one of the toothless grannies at almack's would have given half her dowry, seemed to be anxious of trying the experiment of how far the heart of an englishman was susceptible of the tender passion, especially when excited by objects of such superlative beauty. it may be supposed that neither clapperton nor houston had as yet taken any lessons in the art and mystery of african dancing, and as to waltzing, neither of them felt any great inclination to be encircled in the arms of a negress, who, although she might be young and graceful in her attitudes, had a scent about her of stinking rancid oil, which was not very agreeable to the olfactory nerves of the delicate europeans. however, it was the etiquette of the court,--and every court, from the cape of good hope to the country of boothia, that is, if a court were ever held in the latter place,--is cursed with the ridiculous forms of ceremony and etiquette; it must be repeated, that at the court which his highness the caboceer of jannah, in the plenitude of his official importance, held at that place, it was a rule of etiquette, that every stranger, of whatever rank or nation, should choose for himself a partner, wherewith to dance an african fandango or bolero; and it may be easily supposed that, when the europeans looked around them, and saw the african beauties squatting on their haunches, or reclining, in graceful negligence, on banks of mud, a great difficulty existed as to whom they should select to be their partners in the african quadrille. we have ourselves been in a ball-room where the beating of the female heart was almost audible, when the object of its secret attachment approached to lead out the youthful beauty to the dancing circle; and although it cannot be supposed, that, on so short an acquaintance, the heart of any beautiful negress palpitated at the approach of captain clapperton, mr. houston, or the more timid and bashful lander, yet it was evident that the negresses, who were selected as their partners, testified their unqualified delight at the honour conferred upon them by a grin, which in a civilized country would be called a smile, but which happened to be of that extent, as if nature had furnished them with a mouth extending from ear to ear, similar to the opening of the jaws of a dogger codfish. the taglionis and elsters of the court were present; and although a latitude of a few degrees to the northward of the line is not exactly suitable for pirouetting and tourbillons, which, in a negress in a state of almost complete nudity, could not fail to attract the doting eyes even of the bishop of london, or of sir andrew agnew, particularly on the sabbath; yet, on this occasion, the beauties of the court attempted to outvie each other in the gracefulness of their attitudes, and the extraordinary height of their salutations. there is very little doubt but that the _tout ensemble_ would have formed an excellent subject for a cruickshanks, and particularly to take a sketch of the old black caboceer, sailing majestically around in his damask robe, with a train-bearer behind him, and every now and then turning up his old withered face, first to one of his visitors, and then to the other; then whisking round on one foot, and treading without ceremony on the shoeless foot of his perspiring partner, then marching slow, with solemn gait, like the autocrat of all the russias in a polonnaise, then, not exactly leading gracefully down the middle, but twining the hands of his visitors in his, which had very much the appearance of a piebald affair, showing at the same time an extraordinary inflation of pride, that a white man should dance with him. but the fate of lander was the most to be commiserated; for although it might be the etiquette of his country, that master and servant should not be quadrilling at the same time, yet as no such distinction existed in the court of the old caboceer of jannah, as far as the sentiments of the female beauties were concerned, poor lander led the very devil of a life of it. he certainly, as it would have been highly unbecoming in him, did not solicit the hand of any of the expectant beauties, and therefore, giving him all due credit for his extreme bashfulness and insuperable modesty, they were determined to solicit his; he was first twirled round by one beauty, then by another; at one moment he found himself in a state of juxta position with the old caboceer; at another, his animated partner was nearly driving him into a state of positive collision with his own master; in fact he was, like tom at almack's, putting the whole of the dancers into confusion, from his ignorance of the intricacies of the african dance, and his total inability to compete with his partner in her gymnastic evolutions. one of the most graceful movements, according to the opinion of the natives, consists in a particular part of the body, situated, as the metaphysicians would term it, _a posteriori,_ coming into contact with a similar part of the body of the partner, with as much violence as the physical strength of the female dancer can effect; and if on any of these occasions the equilibrium should be lost, and the weaker individual laid prostrate upon the ground, the laugh then sounds throughout the whole assembly, and the beauty is highly extolled, who by her prowess could have so well effected the prostration of her partner. now it is very possible, that when a person knows of an evil coming over him, he will be so upon his guard as to prevent any disastrous consequences arising from it; but lander not being aware that any accident could befall him from any movement of the lady who had selected him, much against his will, as her partner, was footing it away very composedly and becomingly, when a tremendous blow was inflicted on a certain part of the hinder portion of his body, which being as irresistible as if it had come from a battering-ram of the romans, laid him prostrate on the floor, to the infinite delight of all the fashionables of the court, particularly the female part, who testified their joy by the utterance of the loudest laughs and clapping their hands in an extacy of mirth. in fact, the travellers entered into all the humours of the day, and thus, as captain clapperton expressed himself, "cheered we our old friend, and he was cheered." the country between tshow and engwa, where the ground has been cleared, is described by lander as excessively beautiful, diversified by hills and dales, a small stream running through each valley. all the towns, however, are situated in the bosom of an inaccessible wood. the approach is generally through an avenue, defended by three stockades, with narrow wicker gates, and only one entrance. beyond engwa, the state of the atmosphere becomes much improved, the country being clear and gradually rising, and on the high grounds, large blocks of grey granite cropped out, indicated their approach to a range of primitive mountains. the plains were covered with the female cocoa nut, and with long high grass. walled towns occur at the end of short stages, each containing from five to ten thousand inhabitants. those at which the travellers halted were called afoura, assula, assonda, and chocho. at afoura, the granite formation began to show itself. assula is surrounded with a wall and a ditch, and contains about six thousand inhabitants. at these places, the travellers were abundantly supplied with provisions, and regaled with dancing and singing the whole night, by the apparently happy natives. on leaving the town of chocho, the road wound through beautiful valleys, planted in many places with cotton, corn, yams, and bananas and on the tops and hollows of the hills were perched the houses and villages of the proprietors of these plantations. at this very time, however, "a slaving war," was being carried on at only a few hours ride from the route taken by the travellers; such is the withering curse that hangs over the fairest regions of this devoted country. the next stage from bendekka to duffoo, lay through mountain scenery of a still wilder character. rugged and gigantic blocks of grey granite rose to the height of between six and seven hundred feet above the valleys, which now contracted to defiles scarcely a hundred yards in breadth, then widened to half a mile, and in one part the route crossed a wide table land. the soil is rich, but shallow, except along the fine streams of water which run through the valleys, where large tall trees were growing. the sides of the mountains are bare, but stunted trees and shrubs fill all the crevices. the valleys are well cultivated with cotton, corn, and yams. this cluster of hills is said to rise in the province of borgoo, behind ashantee, and to run through jaboo to benin, in a direction from w.n.w. to e.s.e. the width of the range is about eighty miles. from a summit overlooking the town of duffoo, a grand and beautiful view was obtained of mountains, precipices, and valleys in every direction. the top of the hill was covered with women grinding corn. this mount might be almost called a large corn mill. here and in every other place, the king of eyeo's wives were found trading for his majesty, and like women of the common class, carrying large loads on their heads from town to town. the town of daffoo is said to contain a population of , souls. on leaving it the road wound between two hills, descending over rugged rocks, beneath impending masses of granite, which seemed ready to start from their base, to the destruction of all below. it continued to ascend and descend as far as the town of woza, which stands on the edge of a table-land, gently descending, well cultivated, and watered by several streams. the stage terminated at another fortified town called chradoo, containing upwards of seven thousand inhabitants. on leaving this town on the following morning, they were attended by the worthy caboceer, and an immense train of men, women, and children; the women singing in chorus, whilst drums, horns, and gongs, formed a barbarous and discordant accompaniment to their agreeable voices. a difficult and dangerous road over broken rocks, and through rugged passes, where the natives were perched in groups to see the travellers pass, led in five hours to the large and populous town of erawa. here they were received with drums, the people as usual curious beyond measure, but very kind. the next day a mountain pass led through a thickly populous tract, to a town called washoo, beyond which place they entered a second range of mountains, more elevated and of a more savage character, than any they had hitherto passed; they appeared as if some great convulsion of nature had thrown the immense masses of granite in wild and terrific confusion. the road through this mountain pass, according to the information of lander, was grand and imposing, sometimes rising almost perpendicularly, then descending in the midst of rocks into deep dells; then winding beautifully round the side of a steep hill, the rocks above overhanging them in fearful uncertainty. in every cleft of the hills, wherever there appeared the least soil, were cottages, surrounded with small plantations of millet, yams, and plantains, giving a beautiful variety to the rude scenery. the road continued rising, hill above hill, for at least two miles, until their arrival at the large and populous town of chaki, situated on the top of the very highest hill. on every hand, on the hills, on the rocks, and crowding on the road, the inhabitants were assembled in thousands, the women welcoming them with holding up their hands, and chanting choral songs, and the men with the usual salutations, and every demonstration of joy. the caboceer was seated on the outside of his house, surrounded by his ladies, his singing men, and singing women, his drums, fifes, and gong-gongs. he was a good-looking man, about fifty years of age, with a pleasing countenance. his house was all ready for the reception of the strangers, and he immediately procured for them a large supply of goats, sheep, and yams, pressing them strongly to stay a day or two with them. he appeared to consider them as messengers of peace, come with blessings to his king and country. indeed a belief was very prevalent, and seems to have gone before them all the way, that they were charged with a commission to make peace wherever there was war, and to do good to every country through which they passed. the caboceer of this town indeed told them so, and said he hoped that they would be enabled to settle the war with the nyffee people and the fellatas, and the rebellion of the houssa slaves, who had risen against the king of yariba. when lander shook hands with him, he passed his hand over the heads of his chiefs, as confirming on them a white man's blessing. he was more inquisitive and more communicative than any one whom they had yet seen. he sat until nearly midnight, talking and inquiring about england. on asking, if he would send one of his sons to see england, he rose up with alacrity, and said, he would go himself. he inquired how many wives an englishman had. on being told only one, he seemed much astonished, and laughed greatly, as did all his people. "what does he do," said he, "when one of his wives has a child? our caboceer has two thousand!!" on leaving chaka, the caboceer escorted them several miles, attended by upwards of two hundred of his wives, _one_ of whom was young and handsome. the country was now extremely beautiful, clear of wood, and partly cultivated; and a number of fellata villages were passed, the inhabitants of which live here as they do in most other parts of soudan, a quiet and inoffensive pastoral life, unmolested by the black natives, and not interfering with their customs. the next stage led to koosoo, the largest town they had yet seen, surrounded with a double wall, and containing at least twenty thousand people. this place appears to stand at the northwestern termination of the granite range, the outer wall extending from some rugged hills on the s.e., to a great distance in the plain. here the same favourable impression respecting the whites was found to prevail as at chaki. the walls were crowded with people, and the caboceer, with his wives and head men, came forth to welcome the strangers. he was glad, he said, to see white men coming to his country, and going to see his king, adding that he never expected to see this day, and that now all the wars and bad palavers would be settled. he presented to them yams, eggs, a goat, a sheep, a fine fat turkey, and milk, and a large pig was sent by the caboceer of a neighbouring town. the country was described as being on every side full of large towns. its aspect continued through the next stage very beautiful, and well cultivated. the route lay in a parallel line with the hills as far as the town of yaboo, and then entered a fine plain, studded with fellata villages, extending to ensookosoo. at sadooli, half an hour further, the range of hills was seen bearing from e. by s. to s. the well cultivated country continued as far as aggidiba, but a considerable change then took place in its general aspect. the road led through a wood of low, stunted, scrubby trees, on a soil of gravel and sand, and the destructive ravages of the fellatas now became apparent, in the half deserted towns and ruined villages. akkibosa, the next town, was large, and surrounded inside the walls with an impenetrable wood. it was here that lander again had the melancholy prospect of seeing himself a lonely wanderer in the wilds of africa, for captain clapperton became worse than he had been since leaving badagry. the pain in his side was relieved by rubbing the part with a piece of cord, after some mallegeta pepper chewed had been applied to it. but the caboceer of adja gave our traveller some medicine, which was far more efficacious. it tasted like lime juice and pepper, and produced nausea to such a degree, that clapperton was unable to stand for half an hour after; he then suddenly got well, both as to the pain in his side, and a severe diarrhoea, which had troubled him for some time. the worthy caboceer, who had shown himself such an adept in practical pathology, was of the same opinion with others of his species, that a preventive is better than a remedy; but were this principle to be acted upon by the medical caboceers of the metropolis of england, we should not see them driving in their carriages from a.m. to p.m. to convince a set of dupes, that a few latinized words and hieroglyphics scrawled on a scrap of paper, which is to produce for them a nauseous compound of aperient drugs, are to save them from the jaws of death. captain clapperton was in reality ill, and therefore the application of the prescription of the scientific caboceer of adja, was perhaps advisable, on the ground that if it did not cure it would kill, but the case was differently situated with lander, for although his health had sustained some severe shocks, yet it was good in comparison to that of his master; but the prudent caboceer considered that although he was not then actually ill, yet the possibility, and even the probability existed that he might become so, and therefore it was determined that the same medicine should be administered to lander, as had been done to his master. lander, however, protested that he did not stand in need of so potent a medicine, on the other hand, the caboceer protested that he was a great fool to entertain any such an opinion, and following the practice of the celebrated dr. sangrado, lander was obliged to undergo the purgatory of the caboceer's medicine, and he was ready to admit that he did not feel himself the worse for it after its effects had subsided. the town of adja is remarkable for an avenue of trees, with a creeping briar-like plant ascending to the very tops, and hanging down so as to form an impenetrable defence against every thing but a snake, and it is impossible to burn it. leaving their medical friend, the caboceer of adja, they proceeded to loko, which is also a considerable walled town; and on proceeding about four miles further, they came to a groupe of three towns, one walled and two without walls, all bearing the name of soloo. the approach to the town of tshow was through a beautiful valley, planted with large shady trees and bananas, having green plots and sheets of water running through the centre, where the dingy beauties of tshow were washing their well-formed limbs, while the sheep and goats were grazing around on their verdant banks. this state of repose is stated, however, to be frequently disturbed by inroads from the neighbouring kingdom of borgho, the natives of which are described as thieves and plunderers, and as the travellers were now close on its borders, they thought it necessary to brush up their arms. in the evening, however, a caboceer arrived with a large escort of horse and foot from katunga, the capital of youriba, and having shaken hands with the travellers, immediately rubbed his whole body, that the blessing of their touch might be spread all over him. the escort was so numerous, that they ate up all the provisions of the town. every corner was filled with them, and they kept drumming, blowing, dancing, and singing during the whole of the night. on leaving this place, the road through which they passed was wide, though woody, and covered by men on horseback and bowmen on foot; the horsemen, armed with two or three long spears, hurrying on as fast as they could get the travellers to proceed; horns and country drums blowing and beating before and behind; some of the horsemen dressed in the most grotesque manner; others covered all over with charms. the bowmen had also their natty little hats and feathers, with the jebus, or leathern pouch, hanging by their side. these men always appeared to captain clapperton to be the best troops in this country and that of soudan, on account of their lightness and activity. the horsemen, however, are but ill mounted, the animals are small and badly dressed; their saddles so ill secured, and the rider sits so clumsily in his seat, that any englishman who ever rode a horse with an english saddle, would upset one of them the first charge with a long stick. the party were also attended by a great number of traders. after passing over a granite ridge, commanding a beautiful view of fine wooded valleys to the eastward, the road again crossed the moussa, running to the quorra, which is only three days distant. from the brow of a hill the great capital of eyeo opened to the view, on the opposite side of a vast plain bordered by a ridge of granite hills, and surrounded by a brilliant belt of verdure. the approach to katunga is thus described by clapperton: "between us and it lay a finely cultivated valley, extending as far as the eye could reach to the westward, our view to the eastward intercepted by a high rock, broken into large blocks, with a singular top, the city lying below us, surrounded and studded with green, shady trees, forming a belt round the base of a rocky mountain of granite, about three miles in length, presenting as beautiful a view as i ever saw." they entered the city by the north gate, accompanied by a band of music, and followed by an immense multitude of men, women, and children. after proceeding about five miles through the city, they reached the residence of the king, who received them seated under a verandah; the insignia of his state being two red and blue cloth umbrellas, supported by large poles held by slaves. he was dressed in a white tobe over another of blue; round his neck was a collar of large beads of blue stone, and on his head the imitation of a european crown in pasteboard, covered with blue cotton. the king's people had some difficulty in clearing the way for the strangers through the crowd, and sticks and whips were freely used, though generally in a good-natured manner. when they had at last got as far as the umbrellas, the space was all clear. the chiefs were observed to be holding a parley with the king, which clapperton conjectured to relate to his being desired to perform the usual ceremony of prostration. on this, captain clapperton told them, that the only ceremony he would submit to was that of an english salute; that he would take off his hat, make a bow, and shake hands with his majesty, if he pleased. the ceremony of prostration is required from all. the chiefs, who come to pay their court, cover themselves with dust, and then fall flat on their bellies, having first practised the ceremony, in order to be perfect, before a large fat eunuch. it is also the court etiquette to appear in a loose cloth, tied under one arm; no tobes, no beads, no coral, nor grandeur of any kind, must appear, but on the king alone. in many points of the ceremonial, in the umbrellas, the prostrations, the sticks and whips so good-naturedly inflicted on the crowd, and the extraordinary politeness practised by these people to each other, we have a singular approximation to the customs of the celestial empire. the theatrical entertainments, too, which are acted before the king, are quite as amusing, and almost as refined, as any which his celestial majesty can command to be exhibited before a foreign ambassador. the king of youriba made a point of the travellers staying to witness one of these theatrical entertainments. it was exhibited in the king's park, in a square place, surrounded by clumps of trees. the first performance was that of a number of men dancing and tumbling about in sacks, having their heads fantastically decorated with strips of rags, damask silk, and cotton of variegated colours, and they performed to admiration. the second exhibition was hunting the boa snake by the men in the sacks. the huge snake, it seems, went through the motions of this kind of reptile in a very natural manner, though it appeared to be rather full in the belly, opening and shutting its mouth in the most natural manner imaginable. a running fight ensued, which lasted some time, till at length the chief of the bagmen contrived to scotch its tail with a tremendous sword, when he gasped, twisted up, and seemed in great torture, endeavouring to bite his assailants, who hoisted him on their shoulders, and bore him off in triumph. the festivities of the day concluded with the exhibition of the _white devil,_ which had the appearance of a human figure in white wax, looking miserably thin, and as if starved with cold, taking snuff, rubbing its hands, treacling the ground as if tender-footed, and evidently meant to burlesque and ridicule a white man, while his sable majesty frequently appealed to clapperton, whether it was not well performed. after this, the king's women sang in chorus, and were accompanied by the whole crowd. the method of salutation is very singular. the king, for instance, on saluting captain clapperton, lifted up his hands three times, repeating, "ako! ako!" (how do you do?) the women behind him standing up and cheering them, and the men on the outside joined. it was impossible to count the number of his ladies, they were so densely packed, and so very numerous. in a private visit subsequently paid to the travellers, the king assured them that they were truly welcome; that he had frequently heard of white men; but that neither himself nor his father, nor any of his ancestors, had ever seen one. he was glad that white men had come at this time, and now, he trusted, his country would be put right, his enemies brought to submission, and he would be enabled to build up his father's house, which the war had destroyed. chapter xxvi. the city of eyeo, in houssa language, katunga, the capital of youriba, is situated in latitude ° ' n., longitude ° e. it is built on the sloping side and round the base of a small range of granite hills, which, as it were, forms the citadel of the town. they are formed of stupendous blocks of grey granite of the softest kind, some of which are seen hanging from the summits in the most frightful manner, while others, resting on very small bases, appear as if the least touch would send them down into the valley beneath. the soil on which the town is built is formed of clay and gravel, mixed with sand, which has obviously been produced from the crumbling granite. the appearance of these hills is that of a mass of rocks left bare by the tide. a belt of thick wood runs round the walls, which are built of clay, and about twenty feet high, and surrounded by a dry ditch. there are ten gates in the walls, which are about fifteen miles in circumference, of an oval shape, about four miles in diameter one way, and six miles the other; the south end leaning against the rocky hills, and forming an inaccessible barrier in that quarter. the king's houses, and those of his women, occupy about a square mile, and are on the south side of the hills, having two large parks, one in front and another facing the north; they are all built of clay, and have thatched roofs, similar to those nearer the coast. the posts supporting the verandahs and the doors of the king's or caboceer's houses are generally carved in has relief, with figures representing the boa killing an antelope or a hog, or with processions of warriors attended by drummers. the latter are by no means meanly executed, conveying the expression and attitude of the principal man in the groupe with a lofty air, and the drummer well pleased with his own music, or rather deafening noise. there are seven different markets, which are held every evening, being generally opened about three or four o'clock. the chief articles exposed for sale are yams, corn, calavances, plantains and bananas, vegetable butter, seeds of the colocynth, which form a great article of food, sweetmeats, goats, sheep, and lambs, also cloth of the manufacture of the country, and their various instruments of agriculture. the price of a small goat is from , to , kowries; , kowries being equal to a spanish dollar; a large sheep, , to , ; a cow, from , to , ; a horse, , to , ; a prime human being, as a slave, , to , , about half the price of a horse! the kingdom of youriba extends from puka, within five miles of the coast to about the parallel of ° n., being bounded by dahomy on the north-west, ketto and the maha countries on the north, borgoo on the north-east, the quorra to the east, accoura, a province of benin, to the south-east, and jaboo to the south-west. these are the positions of the neighbouring countries, as given by lander, although it is difficult to reconcile them with the map; borgoo seems rather to be north-east, dahomy west and southwest, jaboo and benin south-east. if badagry be included in youriba, the southern boundary will be the bight of benin. dahomy, alladah, maha, and badagry were claimed as tributaries; and the king of benin was referred to as an ally. the government is an hereditary despotism, every subject being the slave of the king; but its administration appears to have been for a long period mild and humane. when the king was asked, whether the customs of youriba involved the same human sacrifices as those of dahomy, his majesty shook his head, shrugged up his shoulders, and exclaimed, "no, no! no king of youriba could sacrifice human beings." he added, but probably without sufficient grounds for the vaunt, that, if he so commanded, the king of dahomy must also desist from the practice; that he must obey him. it is, however, stated, on the authority of lander, that when a king of youriba dies, the caboceer of jannah, three other head caboceers, four women, and a great many favourite slaves and women, are obliged to swallow poison, given by fetish men in a parrot's egg; should this not take effect, the person is provided with a rope to hang himself in his own house. no public sacrifices are used, at least no human sacrifices, and no one was allowed to die at the death of the last king, as he did not die a natural death, having been murdered by one of his own sons, though the religion of the people of youriba, as far as it could be comprehended by the travellers, consisted in the worship of one god, to whom they also sacrifice horses, cows, goats, sheep, and fowls. at the yearly feast, all these animals are sacrificed at the fetish-house, in which a little of the blood is spilled on the ground. the whole of them are then cooked, and the king and all the people, men and women attending, partake of the meat, drinking copiously of pitto (the country ale). it is stated, moreover, that it depends on the will of the fetish-man, or priest, whether a human being or a cow or other animal is to be sacrificed. if a human being, it is always a criminal, and only one. the usual spot where the feast takes place is a large open field before the king's houses, under wide-spreading trees, where there are two or three fetish houses. the usual mode of burying the dead in this country is, to dig a deep narrow hole, in which the corpse is deposited in a sitting posture, the elbows between the knees. a poor person is interred without any ceremony; in honour of a rich man, guns are fired, and rum is drunk over his grave, and afterwards in the house by his friends and retainers. at the celebration of a marriage, pitto is circulated freely amongst the guests. wives are bought, and according to the circumstances of the bridegroom, so is the price. the first question asked by every caboceer and great man was, how many wives the king of england, had, being prepared, it should seem, to measure his greatness by that standard; but when they were told that he had only one, (and, if they had felt disposed, they might have extended their information, by telling the inquirers that she was too much for him,) they gave themselves up to a long and ungovernable fit of laughter, followed by expressions of pity and wonder how he could possibly exist in that destitute condition. the king of youriba's boast was, that his wives, linked hand-in-hand, would reach entirely across the kingdom. queens, however, in africa, are applied to various uses, although in some countries at some distance to the northward, it is a difficult question to solve, whether they be of any use at all, except for the purpose of entailing an extraordinary expense upon the people, who have to labour hard for the support of the royal appendage, which is generally imported from a neighbouring country, where pride, pauperism, and pomposity are particularly conspicuous. it would be well for an admirer of queenship to take a trip to eyeo, to see to what uses queens can be applied; for there they are formed into a body-guard, and their majesties were observed, in every part of the kingdom, acting as porters, and bearing on their heads enormous burdens, in which they again differ from the queens of the more northern countries, where, fortunately for the natives of it, they never _bear_ at all. the queens of eyeo are, to all intents and purposes, slaves, and so are also other queens; but then they are slaves to foolish and ridiculous customs, to stiff starched etiquette, and to ceremonies degrading to a rational being. the eyeos, like other nations purely negro, are wholly unacquainted with letters, or any form of writing; these are known only to the arabs or fellatahs, who penetrate thither in small numbers; yet they have a great deal of popular poetry. every great man has bands of singers of both sexes, who constantly attend him, and loudly celebrate his achievements in extemporary poems. the convivial meetings of the people, even their labours and journeys, are cheered by songs composed for the occasion, and chanted often with considerable taste. the military force of the kingdom consists of the caboceers and their immediate retainers, which upon an average may be about one hundred and fifty each, a force formidable enough when called out upon any predatory excursion, but which would seem to be inadequate to the defence of the territory, against the encroachments or inroads of the fellatahs, and other more warlike tribes. it was supposed by captain clapperton that the army may be as numerous as that of any of the kingdoms of africa. no conjecture was offered as to the total population, but nearly fifty towns occurred in the line of route, each containing from six to seven thousand, and some fifteen to twenty thousand souls, and from the crowds on the roads, the population must be very considerable. the youribanies struck the travellers as having less of the characteristic features of the negro, than any other african race which they had seen. their lips are less thick, and their noses more inclined to the aquiline shape than negroes in general. the men are well made, and have an independent carriage. the women are almost invariably of a more ordinary appearance than the men, owing to their being more exposed to the sun, and to the drudgery they are obliged to undergo, all the labours of the land devolving upon them. the cotton plant and indigo are cultivated to a considerable extent, and they manufacture the wool of their sheep into good cloth, which is bartered with the people of the coast for rum, tobacco, european cloth, and other articles. the medium of exchange throughout the interior is the kowry shell, the estimated value of which has been already given. slaves, however, form the chief article of commerce with the coast. a prime slave at jannah is worth, sterling money, from three to four pounds, according to the value set on the articles of barter. domestic slaves are never sold, except for misconduct. his majesty was much astonished at learning that there are no slaves in england. upon the whole, the youribanies appeared to be a gentle and a kind people, affectionate to their wives and children, and to one another, and under a mild, although a despotic government. among the domestic animals of this country, there are horses of a very small breed, but these are scarce. the horned cattle are also small near the coast, but on approaching the capital, they are seen as large as those in england; many of them have humps on their shoulders, like those of abyssinia. they have also sheep, both of the common species, and of the african kind; hogs, muscovy ducks, fowls, pigeons, and a few turkeys. "the people of youriba," says lander, "are not very delicate in the choice of their food; they eat frogs, monkeys, dogs, cats, rats, mice, and various other kinds of vermin. a fat dog will always fetch a better price than a goat. locusts and black ants, just as they are able to take wing, are a great luxury. caterpillars are also held in very high estimation, they are stewed and eaten with yams and _tuah._ ants and locusts are fried in butter." this statement of lander, as far as regards the dog, is somewhat at variance with the compliment paid to the youribanies, for their treatment of that faithful animal. the hyena and the leopard are said to be very common, and the lion is found in some parts, but monkeys were the only wild animals seen by the travellers. although clapperton and lander remained at katunga from january rd to march th, and the mysterious quorra was not more than thirty miles distant to the eastward, he was not able to prevail upon the king to allow him to visit it, but was always put off with some frivolous excuse, and in these excuses, the old gentleman appears to have been as cunning and as cautious as a chinese mandarin; observing at one time that the road was not safe; at another, that the fellatas had possession of the country, and what would the king of england say if any thing should happen to his guest. the greatest difficulty was experienced in getting away from katunga, for his majesty could not or would not comprehend why he should be in any hurry to depart, and by way of an inducement, but which secretly might have a very opposite effect to that which was intended, clapperton and lander were both offered any wife they chose to select from his stock, and if one were not sufficient, five or six might be selected; for himself he had plenty, although he could not exactly tell their number, but if clapperton would stop, the experiment should be tried, of how far they would reach hand to hand; even this gracious offer appeared to have no influence upon the obstinate disposition of clapperton, he was determined to leave katunga and reach bornou before the rains set in, but the king was equally determined that he should not carry his project into execution, for, like all the other african princes, he seemed disposed to make a monopoly of the strangers who entered his territory. his majesty hinted that one journey was well and fully employed in seeing the kingdom of youriba, and paying the required homage to its potent monarch. it is curious how etiquette forms a part of every court, from a latitude of ° north, to one almost immediately under the equator, and it must be admitted that if a school of instruction were established at the former one, wherein the debutants might perfect themselves in their various gestures and attitudes, we should not behold such a number of awkward louts, and johnny raw's, as exhibit themselves at the levee room of the king of the guelphs. in the capital of eyeo, it is the custom of the court, for the monarch to hold a levee twice a day, at six in the morning, and two in the afternoon; rather hot work for the courtiers, perspiring in a temperature of about °. the son of a highland clansman, or of an irish bogtrotter, is ushered into the presence of his sovereign with very little preliminary instruction; not so however with the more refined and polished court of katunga. there, before the legitimate or illegitimate sons of royalty and nobility, or even of the plebeians are introduced to the king, they are required to wait upon the chief eunuch, a kind of african lord chamberlain, and before whom they are required to practise their prostrations and genuflexions, so as not to commit themselves in the presence of their august monarch. the finished courtier at the court of the guelphs, is known by the grace with which he seizes the hand of royalty, to imprint upon it a slobbering kiss; and the caboceer at the court of katunga, is known by the grace with which he covers himself with dust, and the intensity of his homage is estimated according to the quantity of the article which he throws over himself. it must have been a delectable treat for the europeans to have been present at one of these academies of court etiquette, where the old and young were practising their prostrations before the ugly antiquated eunuch, and who hesitated not to give his pupils a kick, when any of them evinced an extraordinary awkwardness in their attitudes. during the whole of the time that the prostrations were practising, the attendants were dancing in a circle, with now and then the interlude of a minuet by one of the performers, in the course of which he would frequently throw a somerset, as expert as old grimaldi, and all this under a burning tropical sun. these caboceers were dressed in robes of leopard skin, hung round with tassels and chains, and in a short time afterwards about twenty of them, in all their dirt and debasement, stretched at full length before the king, stripped to the waist, and vying with each other, which should have the most dust, and kiss the ground with the greatest fervour. when any one speaks to the king, it must be addressed to him through the eunuch, who is prostrated by the side of his master. on the th march, the travellers resumed their journey into the interior, and retracing their steps to tshow, reached at noon the next day, the town of algi, which was just rising from its ruins after the fellata, inroad of the preceding year. all the intermediate villages had shared the same fate. algi, according to the information received, no longer belonged to youriba, but to the sultan of kiama. it comprised three small villages, and before it was burnt down had been of considerable size. these marauders have a singular mode of setting fire to walled towns, by fastening combustibles to the tails of pigeons, which, on being loosed, fly to the tops of the thatched houses, while the assailants keep up a sharp fire of arrows, to prevent the inhabitants from extinguishing the flames. on the th, the travellers once more crossed the moussa, which formerly divided the kingdoms of youriba and borgoo. it was now dry in a great many places, with a very rocky bed; when full, it is about thirty yards in breadth, and flows with a very strong current. on the other side, the road to kiama lay through a flat country, thickly wooded with fine trees, and inhabited by large antelopes. these creatures are the most lively, graceful, and beautifully proportioned of the brute creation. wherever known, they have attracted the attention and admiration of mankind from the earliest ages, and the beauty of their dark and lustrous eyes affords a frequent theme to the poetical imaginings of the eastern poets. the antelopes seen by lander are by the dutch called springbok, and inhabit the great plains of central africa, and assemble in vast flocks during their migratory movements. these migrations, which are said to take place in their most numerous form only at the intervals of several years, appear to come from the north-east, and in masses of many thousands, devouring, like locusts, every green herb. the lion has been seen to migrate, and walk in the midst of the compressed phalanx, with only as much space between him and his victims as the fears of those immediately round could procure by pressing outwards. the foremost of these vast columns are fat, and the rear exceedingly lean, while the direction continues one way; but with the change of the monsoon, when they return towards the north, the rear become the leaders, fattening in their turn, and leaving the others to starve, and to be devoured by the numerous rapacious animals, who follow their march. at all times, when impelled by fear, either of the hunter or beasts of prey darting amongst the flocks, but principally when the herds are assembled in countless multitudes, so that an alarm cannot spread rapidly and open the means of flight, they are pressed against each other, and their anxiety to escape compels them to bound up in the air, showing at the same time the white spot on the croup, dilated by the effort, and closing again in their descent, and producing that beautiful effect from which they have obtained the name of the springer or springbok. early on the th, the travellers were met by an escort from the chief of kiama, the capital of a district of the same name, and containing thirty thousand inhabitants. kiama, wawa, niki, and boussa are provinces composing the kingdom of borgoo, all subject, in a certain sense, to the sovereign of boussa; but the different cities plunder and make war on each other, without the slightest regard to the supreme authority. the people of kiama and of borgoo in general have the reputation of being the greatest thieves and robbers in all africa, a character which nothing in their actual conduct appeared to confirm. the escort were mounted on beautiful horses, and forming as fine and wild a looking troop as the travellers had ever seen. by sultan yarro himself the travellers were well received. he was found seated at the porch of his door, dressed in a white tobe, with a red moorish cap on his head, attended by a mob of people, all lying prostrate, and talking to him in that posture. he shook hands with captain clapperton, and after telling him who he was, and where he wished to go, he said, "very well; i have assigned a house for you; you had better go and rest from the fatigues of your journey; a proper supply of provisions shall be sent you." the travellers took their leave, and repaired to the house prepared for them, which consisted of three large huts inside a square; they had not been long there, when a present arrived from yarro, consisting of milk, eggs, bananas, fried cheese, curds, and foofoo. the latter is the common food of both rich and poor in youriba, and is of two kinds, white and black. the former is merely a paste made of boiled yams, formed into balls of about one pound each. the black is a more elaborate preparation from the flour of yams. in the evening, yarro paid the travellers a visit. he came mounted on a beautiful red roan, attended by a number of armed men on horseback and on foot, and six young female slaves, naked as they were born, except a fillet of narrow white cloth tied round their heads, about six inches of the ends flying out behind, each carrying a light spear in the right hand. he was dressed in a red silk damask tobe, and booted. he dismounted and came into the house, attended by the six girls, who laid down their spears, and put a blue cloth round their waists, before they entered the door. after a short conference, in which he promised the travellers all the assistance they solicited, sultan yarro mounted his horse; the young spear-women resumed their spears, laying aside the encumbrance of their aprons, and away they went, the most extraordinary cavalcade, which the travellers had ever witnessed. their light form, the vivacity of their eyes, and the ease with which they appeared to fly over the ground, made these female pages appear something more than mortal, as they flew alongside of his horse, when he was galloping, and making his horse curvet and bound. a man with an immense bundle of spears remained behind, at a little distance, apparently to serve as a magazine for the girls to be supplied from, when their master had expended those they carried in their hands. here, as in other large towns, there were music and dancing the whole of the night. men's wives and maidens all join in the song and dance, mahommedans as well as pagans; female chastity was very little regarded. kiama is a straggling, ill-built town, of circular thatched huts, built, as well as the town-wall, of clay. it stands in latitude ° ' " n., longitude ° ' ", and is one of the towns through which the houssa and bornou caravan passes in its way to gonga, on the borders of ashantee. both the city and provinces are, as frequently happens in africa, called after the chief yarro, whose name signifies the boy. the inhabitants are pagans of an easy faith, never praying but when they are sick or in want of something, and cursing their object of worship as fancy serves. the houssa slaves among them are mahommedans, and are allowed to worship in their own way. it is enough to call a man a native of borgoo, to designate him as a thief and a murderer. sultan yarro was a most accommodating personage, he sent his principal queen to visit captain clapperton, but she had lost both her youth and her charms. yarro then inquired of captain clapperton, if he would take his daughter for a wife; to which clapperton answered in the affirmative, thanking the sultan at the same time for his most gracious present. on this, the old woman went out, and clapperton followed with the king's head-man, abubecker, to the house of the daughter, which consisted of several coozies, separate from those of the father, and was shown into a very clean one; a mat was spread, he sat down, and the lady coming in and kneeling down, clapperton asked her, if she would live in his house, or if he should come and live with her; she answered, whatever way he wished, "very well," replied clapperton, "as you have the best house, i will come and live with you." the bargain was concluded, and the daughter of the sultan was, _pro tempore,_ the wife of the gallant captain. on the th, the travellers took their leave of sultan yarro and his capital, and the fourth day reached wawa, another territorial capital, built in the form of a square, and containing from eighteen to twenty thousand inhabitants. it is surrounded with a good high clay wall and dry ditch, and is one of the neatest, most compact, and best walled towns that had yet been seen. the streets are spacious and dry; the houses are of the coozie form, consisting of circular huts connected by a wall, opening into an interior area. the governor's house is surrounded with a clay wall, about thirty feet high, having large coozies, shady trees, and square towers inside. unlike their neighbours of kiama, they bear a good character for honesty, though not for sobriety or chastity, virtues wholly unknown at wawa; but they are merry, good natured, and hospitable. they profess to be descended from the people of nyffee and houssa, but their language is a dialect of the youribanee; their religion is a mongrel mahommedism grafted upon paganism. their women are much better looking than those of youriba, and the men are well made, but have a debauched look; in fact, lander says, he never was in a place where drunkenness was so general. they appeared to have plenty of the necessaries of life, and a great many luxuries. their fruits are limes, plantains, bananas, and several wild fruits; their vegetables, yams and _calalow,_ a plant, the leaves of which are used in soup as cabbage; and their grain are dhourra and maize. fish they procure in great quantities from the quorra and its tributaries, chiefly a sort of cat-fish. oxen are in great plenty, principally in the hands of the fellatas, also sheep and goats, poultry, honey, and wax. ivory and ostrich feathers, they said, were to be procured in great plenty, but there was no market for them. it was at this place that clapperton had nearly, though innocently, got into a scrape with the old governor by coquetting with a young and buxom widow, and, in fact, lander himself experienced some difficulty in withstanding the amorous attack of this african beauty; for she acted upon the principle, that, as she could not succeed with the master, there was no obstacle existing that she knew of, to prevent her directing the battery of her fine black sparkling eyes against the servant. "i had a visit," says clapperton, "amongst the number, from the daughter of an arab, who was very fair, called herself a white woman, was a rich widow, and wanted a white husband. she was said to be the richest person in wawa, having the best house in the town, and a thousand slaves." she showed a particular regard for richard lander, who was younger and better-looking than clapperton; but she had passed her twentieth year, was fat, and a perfect turkish beauty, just like a huge walking water-butt. all her arts were, however, unavailing on the heart of lander; she could not induce him to visit her at her house, although he had the permission of his master. this gay widow appeared by no means disposed to waste any time by making regular approaches, like those by which widow wadman undermined the outworks, and then the citadel of the unsuspecting uncle toby, but she was determined at once to carry the object of her attack by storm. the widow zuma attempted in the first place to ingratiate herself with the europeans, by sending them hot provisions every day in abundance, during their stay at wawa. she calculated very justly, that gratitude is the parent of love, and therefore imagined that as the europeans could not be otherwise than grateful to her, for the delicacies, with which she so liberally supplied them, it would soon follow as a natural consequence, that their hearts would overflow with love; at all events it was not to be supposed, that both master and man could remain callous to the potency of her corporeal charms. finding, however, that the hearts of the europeans were much like the rocks of her native land, perfectly impenetrable, she had recourse to another stratagem, which is generally attended with success. in the enlightened and civilized country of europe, or at least in that part of it called england, it is by no means an obsolete custom, for an individual, who wishes to ingratiate himself with the object of his affections, to bestow a valuable present on the waiting woman or abigail, who is a great deal about her person, and the eulogiums which she then passes upon the absent lover, are great and exuberant in proportion to the extent of the bribe. a female, whoever she may be, whether a middlesex virgin, or a wawa widow, delights not only to have some one to whom she can speak of the object of her attachment, but who will be continually speaking to her of him, and as it appears that the female character is very nearly the same in the interior of africa, as in the latitude of london, it is by no means a matter of surprise, that the amorous widow enlisted pascoe, the black servant of clapperton, in her cause, by offering him in the way of a bribe, a handsome female slave as a wife, if he would manage to bring about an interview at her own house, between either clapperton or lander, expressing herself at the same time not to be very particular as to which of the two this interview was obtained with. clapperton it appears had greater confidence in himself than lander could boast of, and the former considering himself proof against all the arts and fascinations of the widow, and wishing at the same time to see the interior arrangement of her house, he determined to pay her a visit. he found her house large, and full of male and female slaves, the males lying about the outer huts, the females more in the interior. in the centre of the huts was a square one, of large dimensions, surrounded by a verandah, with screens of matting all round, except in one place, where there was hung a tanned bullock's hide; to this spot he was led up, and on its being drawn on one side, he saw the lady sitting cross-legged on a small turkey carpet, like one of our hearth-rugs, a large leathern cushion under her left knee; her goora pot, which was an old-fashioned pewter mug, by her side, and a calabash of water to wash her mouth out, as she alternately kept eating goora and chewing tobacco snuff, the custom with all ranks, male and female, who can procure them; on her right side lay a whip. at a little distance, squatted on the ground, sat a dwarfish, humpbacked female slave, with a wide mouth, but good eyes. she had no clothing on, with the exception of a profusion of strings of beads and coral round her neck and waist. this dwarfish personage served the purpose of a bell in our country, and what, it may be supposed, would in old times have been called a page. the lady herself was dressed in a white coarse muslin turban, her neck profusely decorated with necklaces of coral and gold chains, amongst which was one of rubies and gold beads; her eyebrows and eyelashes were blackened, her hair dyed with indigo, and her hands and feet with henna; around her body she had a fine striped silk and cotton country cloth, which came as high as her tremendous bosom, and reached as low as her ankles; in her right hand she held a fan made of stained grass, and of a square form. she desired clapperton to sit down on the carpet beside her, an invitation which he accepted, and in an alluring manner she began to fan him, at the same time sending humpback to bring out her finery for him to look at, which consisted of four gold bracelets, two large paper dressing-cases with looking-glasses, and several strings of coral, silver rings, and bracelets, with a number of other trifling articles. after a number of compliments, and giving her favoured visitor an account of all her wealth, he was led through one apartment into another, cool, clean, and ornamented with pewter dishes and bright brass pans. she now entered into the history of her private life, commencing with bewailing the death of her husband, who had now been dead ten years, during all of which time she had mourned after him excessively. she had one son, the issue of her marriage, but he was much darker than herself. with a frankness perfectly commendable in an african widow, and wholly at variance with the hypocritical and counterfeit bashfulness of the english one, the widow zuma at once exposed the situation of her heart, by declaring that she sincerely loved white men, and as her visitor belonged to that species, he saw himself at once the object of her affections, and the envy of all the aspiring young bachelors of the town, who had been for some time directing a vigorous attack against the widow's heart. the denouement of an english court-ship is frequently distinguished by an elopement; but although it was the last of clapperton's thoughts to run away with such an unwieldy mass of human flesh, yet she very delicately proposed to him, that she would send for a malem, or man of learning, who should read the fetah to them, or, in other words, that no time whatever should be lost in endowing the widow zuma with all claim, right, title, and privilege to be introduced at the court of wawa, or any other court in africa, or even at that time at the virtuous and formal court of queen charlotte of england, as the spouse of captain clapperton, of the royal navy of great britain. clapperton was now convinced that the widow was beginning to carry the joke a little too far, for she assured him, that she should commence immediately to pack up all her property, and accompany him to his native country, assuring him, at the same time, that she felt within herself every requisite qualification to make him a good, _active,_ and affectionate wife. clapperton, however, was by no means disposed to enter so suddenly into a matrimonial speculation, and he began to look rather serious at the offer which was so unexpectedly, but so lovingly made to him. this being observed by the widow, she sent for her looking-glass, and after having taken a full examination of herself, in every position which the glass would allow her, she offered it to clapperton, observing, that certainly she was a little older than he was, but that circumstance, in her opinion, should not operate as a bar to their matrimonial union. this was rather too much for clapperton to endure, and, taking the first opportunity, he made his retreat with all possible expedition, determining never to come to such close quarters again with the amorous widow. on his arrival at his residence, clapperton could not refrain from laughing at his adventure with the african widow, and informed lander, that he had now an opportunity of establishing himself for life; for although he had rejected the matrimonial advances of the widow, there was little doubt, that, rather than not obtain a husband, she would not hesitate to make the offer of her hand to any other white man, who might present himself. lander, however, was still more averse from matrimony than his master, at least with the african beauty; and although a frequent invitation was sent to him, yet he very politely declined the acceptance of it, and therefore, as far as the europeans were concerned, the widow remained without a husband. lander gives us no very flattering account of the character of the inhabitants. in the town of wawa, which is supposed to contain , inhabitants, he does not believe the virtue of chastity to exist. even the widow zuma let out her female slaves for hire, like the rest of the people of the town. drinking is the prevailing vice amongst all classes, nor is it confined to the male sex, for clapperton was for three or four days pestered by the governor's daughter, who used to come several times during the day, painted and bedizened in the highest style of wawa fashion, but she was always half tipsy. this lady, like the widow, had also a design upon the hearts of the europeans. on some of these occasions, she expressed her extreme readiness to prolong her visit during the whole of the night, but clapperton informed her, that at night he was employed in prayer, and looking at the stars, an occupation which she could not comprehend; and further he told her, that he never drank any thing stronger than _wa-in-zafir,_ a name which they give to tea, literally, however, being hot water. not being able to soften the obdurate heart of clapperton, nor to wean him from the unsociable habit of looking at the stars at night, she always left him with a flood of tears. in this part of borgoo, as well as in the neighbourhood of algi, and in all the countries between them and the sea, that lander passed through, he met with tribes of fellatas, nearly white, who are not moslem, but pagan. "they are certainly," he says, "the same people, as they speak the same language, and have the same features and colour, except those who have crossed with the negro. they are as fair as the lower class of portuguese or spaniards, lead a pastoral life, shifting from place to place as they find grass for their horned cattle, and live in temporary huts of reeds or long grass." from wawa there are two roads leading to the fellata country, one by youri, the other through nyffee. the former was reported to be unsafe, the sultan of the country being out, fighting the fellatas. the latter crosses the quorra at comie, and runs direct to koolfu, in nyffee. it was necessary, however, for clapperton to proceed in the first instance to boussa, to visit its sultan, to whom all this part of borgoo is nominally subject. they were also particularly anxious to see the spot where park and his companions perished, and, if possible, to recover their papers. leaving wawa at daybreak on the th march, the travellers passed over a woody country, and at length entered a range of low rocky hills, composed of pudding stone. at the end of an opening in the range was a beautiful sugar loaf mountain, overlooking all the rest, and bearing from the village half a mile e. s. e. the name of mount george was given to it by clapperton. the valleys were cultivated with yams, corn, and maize; and on the same day the travellers arrived at ingum, the first village belonging to boussa, situated on the north-eastern side of the hills. at four hours from ingum, they halted at a village of the cumbrie or cambric, an aboriginal race of kaffirs, inhabiting the woods on both sides of the river. about an hour further, they arrived at the ferry over the menai, where it falls into another branch of the quorra, and in about a quarter of an hour's ride from the opposite bank, they entered the western gate of boussa. the walls, which appeared very extensive, were undergoing repair. bands of male and female slaves, singing in chorus, accompanied by a band of drums and flutes, were passing to and from the river, to mix the clay they were building with. every great man had his own part of the wall to build, like the jews when they built the walls of jerusalem, every one opposite to his own house. the city of boussa is situated on an island formed by the quorra, in latitude ° ' n. longitude ° ' e. it stands nearest the westernmost branch of the menai, which is about twenty yards in breadth, and runs with a slow and sluggish current. the place pointed out to lander as the spot where park perished, is in the eastern channel. a low flat island about a quarter of a mile in breadth, lies between the town of boussa and the fatal spot, which is in a line from the sultan's house with a double trunked tree, with white bark, standing singly on the low flat island. the bank, at the time of lander's visit, was only ten feet above the level of the stream, which here breaks over a great slate rock, extending quite across to the eastern shore, which rises into gentle hills of grey slate, thinly scattered with trees. the following statement of the circumstances attending the lamented fate of mr. park, was given to the travellers by an eyewitness, and together with all the information which they could collect, tallies with the story, disbelieved at the time, which isaaco brought back from amadi fatooma. the informant stated "that when the boat came down the river, it happened unfortunately just at the time that the fellatas had risen in arms, and were ravaging goober and zamfra; that the sultan of boussa, on hearing that the persons in the boat were white men, and that it was different from any that had ever been seen before, as she had a house at one end, called his people together from the neighbouring towns, attacked and killed them, not doubting they were the advanced guard of the fellata army, then ravaging soudan, under the command of malem danfodio, the father of sultan bello. that one of the white men was a tall man, with long hair; that they fought for three days before they were all killed, that the people in the neighbourhood were very much alarmed, and great numbers fled to nyffee, and other countries, thinking that the fellatas were certainly coming amongst them; that the number of persons in the boat were only four, two white men and two black; that they found great treasure in the boat, but that the people had all died, who ate of the meat that was found on board." this meat according to another native informant, was believed on that account to be human flesh, for they knew, it was added, that we white men eat human flesh. lander afterwards received the following additional information from a mallam or priest, whom he met with at wawa, and who tendered it spontaneously. "the sultan of youri advised your countrymen to proceed the remainder of the way on land, as the passage by water was rendered dangerous by numerous sunken rocks in the niger, and a cruel race of people inhabiting the towns on its banks." they refused, however, to accede to this, observing that they were bound to proceed down the niger to the salt water. the old mallam further observed, that as soon as the sultan of youri heard of their death, he was much affected, but it was out of his power to punish the people, who had driven them into the water. a pestilence reached boussa at the time, swept off the king and most of the habitants, particularly those who were concerned in the transaction. the remainder fancying it was a judgment of the white man's god, placed everything belonging to the christians in a hut, and set it on fire. it is not a little remarkable, that it is now a common saying, all through the interior of africa, "do not hurt a christian, for if you do, you will die like the people of boussa." on clapperton waiting on the sultan of boussa, he was as usual very kindly received; his first inquiry was concerning some white men, who were lost in the river, some twenty years ago, near this place. the sultan appeared rather uneasy at these inquiries, and it was observed that he stammered in his speech. he assured both clapperton and lander, that he had not any thing in his possession belonging to the white men, and that he was a little boy when the event happened. clapperton told him that he wanted nothing but the books and papers, and to learn from him a correct account of the manner of their death; and, with the sultan's permission, he would go and visit the place where they were lost. to this request, the sultan gave a decided refusal, alleging that it was a very bad place. clapperton, however, having heard that part of the boat remained, inquired if such were really the case; to which the sultan replied, that there was no truth whatever in the report; that she did remain on the rocks for some time after, but had gone to pieces and floated down the river long ago. clapperton told the sultan, that, if he would give him the books and papers, it would be the greatest favour he could possibly confer on him. the sultan again assured him, that nothing remained with him; every thing of books or papers having gone into the hands of the learned men; but that, if any were in existence, he would procure them, and give them to him. clapperton then asked him, if he would allow him to inquire of the old people in the town the particulars of the affair, as some of them must have witnessed the transaction. the sultan appeared very uneasy, and as he did not return any answer, clapperton did not press him further at that time upon the subject. some unpleasant suspicions floating on the mind of clapperton, he took the first opportunity of returning to the subject, and on again inquiring about the papers of his unfortunate countryman, the sultan said, that the late iman, a fellata, had had possession of all the books and papers, and that he had fled from boussa some time since. this, therefore, was a death-blow to all future inquiries in that quarter, and the whole of the information concerning the affair of the boat, her crew, and cargo, was indefinite and unsatisfactory. every one, in fact, appeared uneasy when any information was required; and they always stifled any further inquiry by vaguely answering, that it happened before their remembrance, or they had forgotten it, or they had not seen it. they, however, pointed out the place where the boat struck and the unfortunate crew perished. even this, however, was done with caution, and as if by stealth, although in every thing unconnected with that affair, they were most ready to give the travellers whatever information they required, and in no part of africa were they treated with greater hospitality and kindness. the place where the vessel was sunk is in the eastern channel, where the river breaks over a grey slate rock extending quite across it. a little lower down, the river had a fall of three or four feet. here, and still further down, the whole united streams of the quorra were not above three-fourths the breadth of the thames at somerset-house. on returning to the ferry, clapperton found a messenger from the king of youri, who had sent him a present of a camel. the messenger stated, that the king, before he left youri, had shown him two books, very large and printed, that had belonged to the white men, who were lost in the boat at boussa; that he had been offered one hundred and seventy mitgalls of gold for them, by a merchant from bornou, who had been sent by a christian on purpose for them. clapperton advised him to tell the king that he ought to have sold them, for that he would not give five mitgalls for them; but that, if he would send them, he would give him an additional present, and that he would be doing an acceptable thing to the king of england by sending them, and that he would not act like a king, if he did not. clapperton gave the messenger, for his master, one of the mock gold chains, a common sword, and ten yards of silk, adding that he would give him a handsome gun and some more silk, if he would send the books. on asking the messenger, if there were any books like his journal, which he showed him, he said there was one, but that his master had given it to an arab merchant ten years ago; the merchant, however, was killed by the fellatas, on his way to kano, and what had become of that book afterwards, he did not know. upon this, clapperton sent a person with a letter to youri. mohammed, the fezzaner, whom he had hired at tabra, and whom he had sent to the chief of youri for the books and papers of the late mungo park, returned, bringing him a letter from that person, which contained the following account of the death of that unfortunate traveller. that not the least injury was done to him at youri, or by the people of that country; that the people of boussa had killed them, and taken all their riches; that the books in his possession were given him by the iman of boussa; that they were lying on the top of the goods in the boat when she was taken; that not a soul was left alive belonging to the boat; that the bodies of two black men were found in the boat, chained together; that the white men jumped overboard; that the boat was made of two canoes joined fast together, with an awning or roof behind; that he, the sultan, had a gun, double barrelled, and a sword, and two books, that had belonged to those in the boat; that he would give the books whenever clapperton went himself to youri for them, but not until then. this is, however, not exactly what the sultan says, in his letter, of which the following is a translation:-- "this is issued from the prince or lord of yaoury to abdallah, the english captain--salutation and esteem. hence your messenger has arrived, and brought us your letter, and we understand what you write; you inquire about a thing that has no trace with us. the prince or lord of boossy is older (or greater) than us, because he is our grandfather. why did you not inquire of him about what you wish for? you were at boossy, and did not inquire of the inhabitants what was the cause of the destruction of the ship and your friends, nor what happened between them of evil; but you do now inquire of one who is far off, and knows nothing of the cause of their (the christians') destruction. "as to the book, which is in our hand, it is true, and we did not give it to your messenger; but we will deliver it to you, if you come and show us a letter from your lord. you shall then see and have it, if god be pleased; and much esteem and salam be to you, and prayer and peace unto the last of the apostles! "mahommed" this may be considered as the conclusion of the information which was obtained respecting the fate of park; although clapperton expresses it to be his opinion, but founded on very slender grounds, that the journal of park is yet to be recovered. on leaving boussa, clapperton retraced his steps to the cumbrie villages, and then turned to the south-south-west to another of their villages, named songa, situated on the banks of the quorra. about two hours above songa, there is a formidable cataract, "where," lander observes, "if park had passed boussa in safety, he would have been in danger of perishing, unheard and unseen." an hour and a half below songa, the quorra rushes with great force through a natural gap, such it seems to be, between porphyritic rocks rising on each side of the channel. between songa and this place, the river is full of rocky islets and rapids, and these occur occasionally all the way down to wonjerque, or the king's ferry at the village of comie, where it is all in one stream, about a quarter of a mile in width, and ten or twelve feet deep in the middle. this is the great ferry of all the caravans to and from nyffee, houssa, and is only a few hours from wawa. on reaching this ferry, clapperton was told, that, so far from his baggage having been sent on to koolfu, it had been stopped at wawa, by order of the governor; but this extraordinary proceeding was in some degree accounted for, as it appeared that although neither clapperton nor lander would have any thing to do with the corpulent widow zuma, she was determined not to let them off so easily, and, to their great surprise, the travellers heard that she was at a neighbouring village, from which she sent them a present of some boiled rice and a fowl, giving them, at the same time, a pressing invitation to come and stop at her house. the governor's son informed clapperton, that his baggage would not be allowed to leave wawa till the widow zuma was sent back. "what the d---l have i to do with the widow?" asked clapperton.--"you have," he replied; "and you must come back with me and take her." clapperton, however, refused, in the most positive terms, to have any thing to do with or to say to her. at this moment lander returned from boussa, whither he had followed his master, to acquaint him with the detention of his baggage; all of which was owing to the widow having left wawa about half an hour after he did, with drums beating before her, and a train after her, first calling at his lodgings, before she waited on the governor. it was also ascertained that she had given old pascoe a female slave for a wife, without having previously asked the governor's permission. the widow had also intimated her intention to follow the travellers to kano, whence she would return to make war on the governor, as she had done once before. "this," said clapperton, "let me into their politics with a vengeance; it would indeed have been a fine end to my journey, if i had deposed old mahommed, and set up for myself, with a walking tun-butt for a queen." clapperton, however, determined to go back to wawa, to release his baggage; and scarcely had he got there, when the arrival of the buxom widow was announced, her appearance and escort being as grand as she could make it, hoping thereby to make an impression upon the flinty hearts of the europeans. the following is the description of her dress and escort:-- preceding her marched a drummer, beating the instrument with all his power, his cap being profusely decked with ostrich feathers. a bowman walked on foot, at the head of her horse, a long train following, consisting of tall, strong men, armed with spears, bows, and swords. she rode on a fine horse, whose trappings were of the first order for this semi-civilized country; the head of the horse was ornamented with brass-plates, the neck with brass bells, and charms sewed in various coloured leather, such as red, green, and yellow; a scarlet breast-piece, with a brass plate in the centre; scarlet saddle-cloth, trimmed with lace. she was dressed in red silk trousers and morocco boots; on her head a white turban, and over her shoulders a mantle of silk and gold. for the purpose of properly balancing her ponderous frame on the horse, she rode in the style of the men, a-straddle; and perhaps a more unwieldy mass never pressed upon the loins of an animal; had she, however, been somewhat younger, and less corpulent, there might have been some temptation to head her party, for she certainly had been a very handsome woman, and such as would have been thought a beauty in any country in europe. the widow was summoned before the governor; went on her knees, and, after a lecture on disobedience and vanity, was dismissed; but on turning her back, she shook the dust off her feet with great indignation and contempt; "and," says clapperton, "i went home, determined never to be caught in such a foolish affair in future." the travellers, having secured their baggage, returned to the ferry, and crossed the quorra. they were now on the high-road to koolfu, the emporium of nyffee. in the course of the first two stages, they came to two villages full of blacksmiths' shops, with several forges in each. they got their iron ore from the hills, which they smelt, where they dig it. in every village they saw a fetish house in good repair, adorned with painted figures of human beings, as also the boa, the alligator, and the tortoise. the country is well cultivated with corn, yams, and cotton; but the ant-hills were the highest the travellers had ever seen, being from fifteen to twenty feet high, and resembling so many gothic cathedrals in miniature. in the afternoon of the third day, they crossed a stream called the may yarrow, opposite the town of tabra, by a long narrow wooden bridge of rough branches covered with earth, the first that they had seen in africa; it will not, however, bear a man and horse, nor can two horses pass at once. tabra, which is divided by the river into two quarters, was at this time the residence of the queen-mother of nyffee, who was governor _ad interim_ during the absence of her son. it may contain from eighteen to twenty thousand inhabitants, who, with a few exceptions, are pagans, and they all, men and women, have the reputation of being great drunkards. there are only a few blacksmiths here, but a great number of weavers. the houssa caravans pass close to the north side of the town, but seldom enter it. before the civil war began, the benin people came here to trade. the war, which was still raging, originated in a dispute for the succession, between mohammed el majia, the son of the queen-mother, who was a moslem, and edrisi, who was represented to be a pagan. the former was supported by the fellatas, whom the people of nyffee cannot endure; the other had the best right and the people on his side, but there was little doubt of his being obliged to succumb. clapperton, accompanied by lander, repaired to the camp, to pay his respects to el majia. he was found mounted on a good bay horse, the saddle ornamented with pieces of silver and brass; the breastplate with large silver plates hanging down from it, like what is represented in the prints of roman and eastern emperors on horseback. he was a tall man, with a stupid expression of countenance, a large mouth, and snagged teeth, which showed horribly, when he attempted a smile. his dress consisted of a black velvet cap, with flaps over the ears, and trimmed with red silk; a blue and white striped tobe, and ragged red boots, part leather and part cloth; in his hand he bore a black staff with a silver head, and a coast-made umbrella and sword were carried by his slaves. altogether his appearance was far from being either kingly or soldier-like, and he displayed the most mean degree of rapacity. he was the ruin of his country by his unnatural ambition, and by calling in the fellatas, who would remove him out of the way the moment he is of no more use to them. even then, he dared not move without their permission. it was reported, and generally believed, that he put to death his brother and two of his sons. through him the greater part of the industrious population of nyffee had either been killed, sold as slaves, or had fled from their native country. lander considered that it would have been an act of charity to have removed him altogether. the _sanson,_ or camp, was a large collection of bee-hive-shaped huts, arranged in streets, and thatched with straw. but for the number of horses feeding, and some picketed near the huts, the men being all seen armed, and the drums beating, it might have been taken for a populous and peaceful village. here were to be seen weavers, tailors, women spinning cotton, others reeling it off; some selling _foofoo_ and _accassons,_ others crying yams and paste; little markets at every green tree; holy men counting their beads, and dissolute slaves drinking _wabum,_ palm wine. the king, when the travellers went to take leave of him, was found in his hut, surrounded by fellatas, one of whom was reading the koran aloud for the benefit of the whole, the meaning of which not one of them understood, not even the reader. it is by no means an uncommon occurrence, both in bornou and houssa, for a man to be able to read the koran fluently, who does not understand a word in it but _allah,_ and who is unable to read any other book. on the nd of may the travellers left tabra, and journeying along the banks of the may yarrow, crossed a stream running into it from the north, and soon after entered the great market town of koolfu. captain clapperton, it would appear, was doomed to be brought into contact with the rich widows of the country, for in this town he took up his abode with the widow laddie, huge, fat, and deaf, but reputed to be very rich. she was a general dealer, selling salt, natron, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera; but she was more particularly famous for her _booza_ and _wabum._ the former is made from a mixture of dourra, honey, chili-pepper, the root of a coarse grass on which the cattle feed, and a proportion of water; these are allowed to ferment in large earthen jars, placed near a slow fire for four or five days, when the booza is drawn off into other jars, and is fit to drink. it is very fiery and intoxicating, but is drunk freely both by moslem and pagans. every night, a large outer hut belonging to the widow, was filled with the topers of koolfu, who kept it up generally till dawn, with music and drink. the former consisted of the erhab or arab guitar, the drum, the nyffee harp, and the voice. their songs were mostly extempore, and alluded to the company present. on the night of the travellers' arrival, the new moon was seen, which put an end to the fast of rhamadan. it was welcomed both by moslems and kaffirs with a cry of joy, and the next day, the town exhibited a scene of general festivity. every one was dressed in his best, paying and receiving visits, giving and receiving presents, parading the streets with horns, guitars, and flutes, whilst groupes of men and women were seen seated under the shade at their doors, or under trees, drinking _wabum_ or _booza._ the women were dressed and painted to the height of nyffee fashion, and the young and the modest on this day would come up and salute the men, as if old acquaintance, and bid them joy on the day; with the wool on their heads dressed, plaited, and dyed with indigo; their eyebrows painted with indigo, the eyelashes with khol, the lips stained yellow, the teeth red, and their feet and hands stained with henna; their finest and gayest clothes on; all their finest beads on their necks; their arms and legs adorned with bracelets of glass, brass, and silver; their fingers with rings of brass, pewter, silver, and copper; some had spanish dollars soldered on the back of the rings; they too drank of the booza and wabum as freely as the men, joining in their songs, whether good or bad. in the afternoon parties of men were seen dancing, free men and slaves, all were alike; not a clouded brow was to be seen in koolfu. but at nine in the evening, the scene was changed from joy and gladness to terror and dismay: a tornado had just begun, and the hum of voices, and the din of the people putting their things under cover from the approaching storm, had ceased at once. all was silent as death, except the thunder and the wind. the cloudy sky appeared as if on fire, each cloud rolling onwards as a sea of flame, and only surpassed in grandeur and brightness by the forked lightning, which constantly seemed to ascend and descend from what was then evidently the town of bali on fire, only a short distance outside the walls of koolfu. when this was extinguished a new scene began, if possible, worse than the first. the wind had increased to a hurricane. houses were blown down; roofs of houses going along with the wind like chaff, the shady trees in the town bending and breaking; and in the intervals between the roaring of the thunder, nothing was heard but the war cry of the men and the screams of women and children, as no one knew but that an enemy was at hand, and that they should every instant share in the fate of bali. at last the rain fell, the fire at bali had ceased by the town being wholly burnt down, and all was quiet and silent, as if the angel of extermination had brandished his sword over the devoted country. koolfu or koolfie stands on the northern bank of the may garrow, and contains from twelve to fifteen thousand inhabitants, including slaves. it is built in the form of an oblong square, surrounded with a clay wall, about twenty feet high, with four gates. there are a great number of dyers, tailors, blacksmiths, and weavers, but all these, together with the rest of the townsfolk, are engaged in traffic. there are besides the daily market, general markets every monday and saturday, which are resorted to by traders from all quarters: youriba, borgoo, soccatoo, houssa, nyffee, and benin. the caravans from bornou and houssa, which halt at koolfu a considerable time, bring horses, natron, unwrought silk, silk cord, beads, maltese swords from bengazi, remounted at kano; clothes made up in the moorish fashion, italian looking glasses, such as sell for one penny and upwards at malta, tobes undyed, made in bornou, khol for the eyelids, a small quantity of attar of roses, much adulterated, gums from mecca, silks from egypt, moorish caps, and slaves. the latter who are intended for sale, are confined in the house mostly in irons, and are seldom allowed to go out of it, except to the well or river every morning to wash. they are strictly guarded on a journey, and chained neck to neck, or else tied neck to neck by a long rope of raw hide, and carry loads on their heads, consisting of their master's goods or household stuff; these loads are generally from fifty to sixty pounds weight. a stranger may remain a long time in a town without seeing any of the slaves, except by accident or by making a particular inquiry. although professedly moslem, religion had not yet moulded the society of the koolfuans into the usual gloomy monotony, nor had it succeeded in secluding or subjecting the female sex, who on the contrary, were the most active agents in every mercantile transaction. in the widow laddie's house, no fewer than twenty-one of these female merchants were lodged at the same time that clapperton and lander took up their abode with her, and it may be easily supposed, that the europeans led a most pleasant life of it. an african hut is by no means at any time an abode which an european would covet, but in addition to the suffocating heat, the mosquitoes, and many other nameless inconveniences, to be congregated with twenty or thirty females, not carrying about them the most delicious odour in the world, and making the welkin ring again with their discordant screams, there denominated singing, is a consummation by no means devoutly to be wished. in addition to other nuisances, the organ of amativeness, as the phrenologists would have it, was strongly developed in some of the skulls of the ladies, and displayed themselves in their actions towards the europeans, who not being disposed to return their amorous advances, often made a precipitate retreat out of the hut, not being aware at the time that by avoiding sylla, they ran a great risk of failing into charybdis. the widow laddie, although huge, fat, and deaf, was by no means of a cold, phlegmatic or saturnine disposition--many a wistful look she cast towards lander, but he either would not or could not comprehend their meaning, and to punish him for his stupidity, she took care that he should not comprehend any of the significant glances, which were cast towards him by the more juvenile portion of the community. to protect him from this danger, the kind widow attended him whithersoever he went, to the great annoyance of lander, who, in order to escape from such a living torment, betook himself to a more distant part of the town, or explored its vicinity, although very little presented itself to attract his immediate attention. the following is the manner in which the good people of koolfu fill up the twenty-four hours. at daylight, the whole household rise. the women begin to clean the house, the men to wash from head to foot; the women and children are then washed in water, in which has been boiled the leaf of a bush called _bambarnia._ when this is done, breakfast of cocoa is served out, every one having their separate dish, the women and children eating together. after breakfast, the women and children rub themselves over with the pounded red wood and a little grease, which lightens the darkness of the black skin. a score or patch of the red powder is put on some place, where it will show to the best advantage. the eyes are blacked with khol. the mistress and the better-looking females stain their teeth, and the inside of the lips, of a yellow colour, with goora, the flower of the tobacco plant, and the bark of a root; the outer parts of the lips, hair, and eyebrows are stained with _shunt,_ or prepared indigo. then the women, who attend the market, prepare their wares for sale, and when ready, set off, ten or twelve in a party, and following each at a stated distance. many of these trains are seen, and their step is, so regular, that if they had been drilled by a sergeant of the foot-guards in england, they could not perform their motions with greater exactitude. the elderly women prepare, clean, and spin cotton at home, and cook the victuals; the younger females are generally sent round the town, selling the small rice balls, fried beans, &c., and bringing back a supply of water for the day. the master of the house generally takes a walk to the market, or sits in the shade at the door of his hut, hearing the news, or speaking of the price of natron or other goods. the weavers are daily employed at their trade; some are sent to cut wood, and bring it to market; others to bring grass for the horses that may belong to the house, or to take to the market to sell. a number of people at the commencement of the rainy season, are employed in clearing the ground for sowing the maize and millet, some are sent on distant journeys to buy and sell for their master or mistress, and they very rarely betray their trust. about noon, they return home, when all have a mess of the pudding called _tvaki,_ or boiled beans. about two or three in the afternoon, they return to their different employments, on which they remain until near sunset, when they count their gains to their master or mistress, who receives it, and puts it carefully away in their strong room. they then have a meal of pudding, and a little fat or stew. the mistress of the house, when she goes to rest, has her feet put into a cold poultice of the pounded henna leaves. the young then go to dance and play, if it be moonlight, and the old to lounge and converse in the open square of the house, or in the outer _coozie,_ where they remain until the cool of the night, or till the approach of morning drives them into shelter. the majority of the inhabitants of koolfu are professedly mahommedans; the rest are pagans, who once a year, in common with the other people of nyffee, repair to a high hill in one of the southern provinces, on which they sacrifice a black bull, a black sheep, and a black dog. on their fetish houses are sculptured, as in youriba, the lizard, the crocodile, the tortoise, and the boa, with sometimes human figures. their language is a dialect of the youribanee, but the houssa is that of the market. they are civil, but the truth is not in them; and to be detected in a lie is not the smallest disgrace; it only causes a laugh. the men drink very hard, even the mahommedans and the women are not particularly celebrated for their chastity, although they succeeded in cheating both clapperton and lander; they were not, however, robbed of a single article, and they were uniformly treated with perfect respect. the people seem, indeed, by no means devoid of kindness of disposition. when the town of bali was burned down, every person sent next day what they could spare of their goods, to assist the unfortunate inhabitants. in civilized england, when a fire takes place, thieving and robbery are the order of the day, but during the conflagration at bali, not an article was stolen. to their domestic slaves, they behave with the greatest humanity, looking upon them almost as children of the family. the males are often freed, and the females given in marriage to free men, or to other domestic slaves. the food of the slave and the free is nearly the same. the greatest man or woman in the country is not ashamed, at times, to let the slaves eat of the same dish; but a woman is never allowed to eat with a man. with a people, who have neither established law nor government, it is surprising that they are so good and moral as they are; it is true, they will cheat if they can, but amongst the civilized nations, who have both laws and government, cheating is by no means a rare occurrence, and by those too, who are the loudest in the professions of their honesty and integrity. the country round koolfu is a level plain, well cultivated, and studded with little walled towns and villages along the banks of the may yarrow, and of a little river running into it from the north. between the walled towns of bullabulla and rajadawa, the route passed through plantations of grain, indigo, and cotton; the soil clay mixed with sand, with here and there large blocks of sandstone, containing nodules of iron and veins of iron-stone. at five days from koolfu, the route entered at the town of wazo, or wazawo, the district of koteng koro, formerly included in kashna; and for another five days' journey through a rich and beautiful valley, and over woody hills, the travellers reached womba, a large walled town, where the caravans both from the east and the west generally halt a day or two, and where, as at wazo, a toll is levied on merchandise. the town stands on a rising ground, at the eastern head of a valley watered by a small stream, having three bare rocky hills of granite to the north, east, and south. the inhabitants may amount to between ten and twelve thousand souls. the travellers were here objects of much kindness; the principal people of the place sent presents, and the lower ranks sought to obtain a sight of them by mounting the trees which overlooked their residence. the koran does not seem to have much embarrassed these people; their only mode of studying it was to have the characters written with a black substance on a piece of board, then to wash them off and drink the water; and when asked what spiritual benefit could be derived from the mere swallowing of dirty water, they indignantly retorted, "what! do you call the name of god dirty water?" this mode of imbibing sacred truth is indeed extensively pursued throughout the interior of the african continent. on the second day from womba, the travellers passed through another large and populous town, called akinjie, where also kafilas pay toll; beyond which, the route lay for two days over a very hilly country, for the most part covered with wood, and but little cultivated, till they approached guari. this town, the capital of a district of the same name, formerly included in kashna, is built partly on a hill, and partly in a narrow valley, through which runs a muddy stream, that is dry in summer; this stream, the source of which is only a day's journey distant, divides in one part the states of kotong kora and guari, and falls into the kodonia in nyffee. the district of guari was conquered by the fellatas, in a short time after their rising, together with the rest of houssa. on the death of old bello, the father of the then reigning sovereign, these districts, with the greater part of kashna, joined in the towia, or confederacy, against the fellatas. the chief of zamfra was the first to shake the spear of rebellion, and he was soon joined by the natives of goober, and the northern parts of kashna, by guari and kotong kora, and at length by the states of youri, cubbi, doura, and the southern part of zeg zeg. the strength of youri is said to lie in the bravery of its inhabitants, and the number of horse they can bring into the field, amounting to a thousand. clapperton was, however, disposed to place their real strength in the hilly and woody nature of their country. futika, the frontier town of zeg zeg, was reached on the second day from guari; and at zaria, where the travellers arrived on the fourth, they found themselves in a city almost wholly peopled by fellatas, who have mosques with minarets, and live in flat-roofed houses. the population is said to exceed that of kano, and must contain above fifty thousand inhabitants. a great number of the inhabitants are from foota ronda and foota torra, the foulahs and fellatas being, in fact, the same people. the people from the west professed to be well acquainted with both the english and the french, and they rattled over the names of the towns between sierra leone and the senegal and timbuctoo. they were armed with french fusees, preferring the guns of the french and the powder of the english. the old city of zaria was taken by the fellatas, within a month after they had made themselves masters of the provinces of goober and zamfra, about thirty years ago. it took a siege of two days, when it was evacuated by the sultan and the greater part of the inhabitants, who took refuge in hills south and west, where they still maintain their independence, though subject to the continual attacks of the fellatas. the old city is now known only by its ruined walls, surrounding some high mounds, which were in the centre of the enclosed area. the new city, built by the fellatas, to the south-east of the old, consists of a number of little villages and detached houses, scattered over an extensive area, surrounded with high clay walls. near the centre of the wall stands the principal mosque, built of clay, with a minaret nearly fifty feet high. on entering one of the western gates, instead of finding houses, the travellers could but just see the tops of some of them over the growing grain, at about a quarter of a mile distance; all was walled fields full of dhourra, with here and there a horse tethered in the open space. the province of zeg zeg is the most extensive in the kingdom of houssa, and both kashna and kano were at one time tributary to its sovereigns. the name of the country appears to be also given to the capital, and is possibly derived from it. it must, however, be observed that lander mentions zaria only by the name of zeg zeg. prior to the fellata conquest, islamism is said to have been unknown in zeg zeg, and the southern part is still in the possession of various pagan tribes, whose country is called boushir or boushi, that is, the infidel country, and is said to extend to the ocean. the country in the vicinity of the capital, zaria, is clear of wood, and is all either in pasture or under cultivation. its appearance at this season resembled some of the finest counties in england at the latter end of april. it was beautifully variegated with hill and dale, like the most romantic parts of england; was covered with luxuriant crops and rich pastures, and produced the best rice grown in any part of that continent. rows of tall trees, resembling gigantic avenues of poplar, extended from hill to hill. zaria, like many other african cities, might be considered as a district of country surrounded with walls. after passing several towns at the distance of short stages, the travellers, on the fourth day from zaria, entered, at the town of dunchow, the province of kano. a highly cultivated and populous country extends from this place to baebaejie, the next stage. this town stands in an extensive plain, stretching towards the north till lost in the horizon. the two mounts inside the walls of kano are just distinguishable above the horizontal line, bearing north-east by north. the hills of nora are seen about ten miles east; to the south are the mountains of surem, distant about twenty-five miles, while to the westward appear the tops of the hills of aushin, in zeg zeg, over which the route had passed. small towns and villages are scattered over the plain, and herds of fine white cattle were seen grazing on the fallow ground. the inhabitants of baebaejie, amounting to about twenty or twenty-five thousand, are chiefly refugees from bornou and waday, and their descendants, all engaged in trade. they appeared cleanly, civil, and industrious. a broad and good road thronged with passengers and loaded animals, led in another day's journey to kano. chapter xxvii. the travellers found the city of kano in a state of dreadful agitation. there was war on every side. hostilities had been declared between the king of bornou and the fellatas; the provinces of zamfra and goober were in open insurrection; the tuaricks threatened an inroad; in short, there was not a quarter to which the merchants durst send a caravan. kano being nearly mid-way between bornou and sockatoo, clapperton left his baggage there, to be conveyed to the former place on his return, and set out for the capital of the sultan bello, bearing only the presents destined for that prince. on his way he found numerous bands mustering to form an army for the attack of coonia, the rebel metropolis of ghoober. the appearance of these troops was very striking, as they passed along the borders of some beautiful little lakes, formed by the river zirmie. the appearance of the country at this season was very beautiful; all the acacia trees were in blossom, some with white flowers, others with yellow, forming a contrast with the small dusky leaves, like gold and silver tassels on a cloak of dark green velvet. some of the troops were bathing; others watering their horses, bullocks, camels, and asses; the lake gondamee as smooth as glass, and flowing around the roots of the trees. the sun, in its approach to the horizon, threw the shadows of the flowering acacias along its surface, like sheets of burnished gold and silver. the smoking fires on its banks, the sounding of horns, the beating of their gongs and drums, the blowing of their brass and tin trumpets; the rude huts of grass or branches of trees, rising as if by magic, everywhere the calls on the names mahomed, abdo, mustafa, &c., with the neighing of horses, and the braying of asses, gave animation to the beautiful scenery of the lake, and its sloping, green, and woody banks. the only regulation that appears in these rude feudal armies is, that they take up their ground according to the situation of the provinces, east, west, north, or south; but all are otherwise huddled together, without the least regularity. the sultan was himself encamped with the forces from sockatoo, whither the travellers repaired to join him, and they arrived just in time to be eye-witnesses of a specimen of the military tactics and conduct of these much-dreaded fellatas. this curious scene is thus described:-- after the mid-day prayers, all except the eunuchs, camel-drivers, and such other servants as were of use only to prevent theft, whether mounted or on foot, marched towards the object of attack, and soon arrived before the walls of the city. clapperton accompanied them, and took up his station close to the gadado. the march had been the most disorderly that could be imagined; horse and foot intermingling in the greatest confusion, all rushing to get forward; sometimes the followers of one chief tumbling amongst those of another, when swords were half unsheathed, but all ended in making a face, or putting on a threatening aspect. they soon arrived before coonia, the town not being above half a mile in diameter, nearly circular, and built on the banks of one of the branches of the liver, or lakes. each chief, as he came, took his station, which, it was supposed, had been previously assigned to him. the number of fighting men brought before the town could not be less than fifty or sixty thousand, horse and foot, of which the latter amounted to more than nine-tenths. for the depth of two hundred yards, all round the walls, was a dense circle of men and horses. the horse kept out of bow-shot, while the foot went up as they felt courage or inclination, and kept up a straggling fire with about thirty muskets and the shooting of arrows. in front of the sultan, the zeg zeg troops had one french fusee; the kano forces had forty-one muskets. these fellows, whenever they fired their muskets, ran out of bow-shot to load; all of them were slaves; not a single fellata had a musket. the enemy kept up a slow and sure fight, seldom throwing away their arrows, until they saw an opportunity of letting fly with effect. now and then a single horseman would gallop up to the ditch, and brandish his spear, the rider taking care to cover himself with his large leathern shield, and return as fast as he went, generally calling out lustily, when he got amongst his own party, "shields to the walls! you people of the gadado, (or atego, &c.) why do you not hasten to the wall?" to which some voices would call out, "oh, you have a good large shield to cover you." the cry of "shields to the wall!" was constantly heard from the several chiefs to their troops; but they disregarded the call, and neither chiefs nor vassals moved from the spot. at length the men in quilted armour went up "per order." they certainly cut not a bad figure at a distance, as their helmets were ornamented with black and white ostrich feathers, and the sides of the helmets with pieces of tin, which glittered in the sun; their long quilted cloaks of gaudy colours reaching over part of their horses' tails, and hanging over the flanks. on the neck, even the horses' armour was notched or vandyked, to look like a mane; on his forehead, and over his nose, was a brass or tin plate, also a semicircular piece on each side. the rider was armed with a large spear, and he had to be assisted to mount his horse, as his quilted cloak was too heavy; it required two men to lift him on. there were six of them belonged to each governor, and six to the sultan. it was at first supposed, that the foot would take advantage of going under cover of these unwieldy machines; but no, they went alone, as fast as the poor horses could bear them, which was but a slow pace. they had one musket in coonia, and it did wonderful execution; for it brought down the van of the quilted men, who fell from his horse like a sack of corn thrown from a horse's back at a miller's door, but both horse and man were brought off by two or three footmen. he got two balls through his breast; one went through his body and both sides of the tobe; the other went through and lodged in the quilted armour opposite the shoulders. the cry of "allahu akber!" (god is great), the cry of the fellatas, was resounded through the whole army every quarter of an hour; but neither this nor "shields to the walls!" nor "why do not the gadado's people go up?" had any effect, except to produce a scuffle amongst themselves, when the chiefs would have to ride up and part their followers, who, instead of fighting against the enemy, were more likely to fight with one another. at sunset, the besiegers drew off, and the harmless campaign terminated in a desertion on the part of the zirmee troops, followed by a general retreat. the flags of the fellatas are white, like the french, and their staff is a palm branch. they are not borne by men of honour, but by their slaves. the sultan had six borne before him; each of the governors had two. they also dress in white tobes and trousers, as an emblem of their purity in faith and intention. the most useful personage in the army, and as brave as any of them, was an old female slave of the sultan's, a native of zamfra, five of whose former governors, she said, she had nursed. she was of a dark copper colour, in dress and countenance very much like a female esquimaux. she was mounted on a long-backed bright bay horse, with a scraggy tail, crop-eared, and the mane, as if the rats had eaten part of it, nor was it very high in condition. she rode a-straddle, had on a conical straw dish-cover for a hat, or to shade her face from the sun; a short, dirty, white bed-gown, a pair of dirty white loose and wide trousers, a pair of houssa boots, which are wide, and come over the knee, fastened with a string round the waist. she had also a whip and spurs. at her saddle-bow hung about half a dozen gourds filled with water, and a brass basin to drink out of, and with this she supplied the wounded and the thirsty. the army being disbanded, clapperton obtained permission of the sultan to proceed to sockatoo, where he found every thing ready for his reception, in the house, which he had occupied on his former visit. the traveller, however, found an entire change in the feelings of kindness and cordiality towards himself, which had been so remarkably displayed in the previous journey. jealousy had began to fester in the breasts of the african princes. they dreaded some ambitious design in these repeated expeditions sent out by england, without any conceivable motive; for that men should undertake such long journeys, out of mere curiosity, they could never imagine. the sultan bello had accordingly received a letter from the court of bornou, warning him that by this very mode of sending embassies and presents, which the english were now following towards the states of central africa, they had made themselves masters of india, and trampled on all its native princes. the writer therefore gave it as his opinion, that the european travellers should immediately be put to death. an alarm indeed had been spread through sockatoo, that the english were coming to invade houssa. the sultan irritated doubtless at the shameful result of his grand expedition against coonia, felt also another and more pressing fear. war had just broken out between himself and the king of bornou. clapperton was on his way to visit that prince, and had left six muskets at kano, supposed to be intended as presents to him; and six muskets in central africa, where the whole fellata empire could scarcely muster forty, were almost enough to turn the scale between those two great military powers. under the impulse of these feelings, bello proceeded to steps not exactly consistent with the character of a prince and a man of honour. he demanded a sight of the letter which clapperton was conveying to the king of bornou, and when this was, of course, refused, he seized it by violence. lander was induced by false pretences to bring the baggage from kano to sockatoo, when forcible possession was taken of the muskets. clapperton loudly exclaimed against these proceedings, declaring them to amount to the basest robbery, to a breach of all faith, and to be the worst actions, of which any man could be guilty. this was rather strong language to be used to a sovereign, especially to one, who could at any moment have cut off his head, and the prime ministers of the sultan dropped some unpleasant hints, as if matters might come to that issue, though in point of fact, the government did not proceed to any personal outrage. on the contrary, bello discovered an honourable anxiety to explain his conduct, and to soothe the irritated feelings of the traveller. he even wrote to him the following letter, which it must be confessed, places the character of bello in a very favourable light. "in the name of god, and praise be to god, &c. &c. to abdallah clapperton, salutation and esteem. you are now our guest, and a guest is always welcomed by us; you are the messenger of a king, and a king's messenger is always honoured by us. you come to us under our honour as an ambassador, and an ambassador is always protected by us. there is no harm in the king's ministers sending you to the sheik kanemi, of bornou, nor do we see any harm in your coming, when thus sent. but when you formerly came to us from bornou, peace was then between us and the sheik; whereas there is now war between him and ourselves; we cannot perceive any blame in our preventing warlike stores being sent to him. we continue to maintain our faith with you, and are ready to attend to all your wishes, because we consider you as a trusty friend, and one who enjoys a high degree of esteem with us. do not encroach upon us, we will not encroach upon you; we have rights to maintain, and you have also rights to be respected. and salam be to you." (signed as usual.) it is difficult to conceive, why so reasonable and friendly a letter should have failed to subdue the irritation of the traveller; this cannot be accounted for only by his ill health, or by supposing that he was not exactly conversant with its contents. it appears, however, that the conduct of bello had such an effect upon the spirits of clapperton, that lander reports, he never saw him smile afterwards. the strong constitution of clapperton, had till this period enabled him to resist all the baneful influence of an african climate. he had recovered, though perhaps not completely, from the effects of the rash exposure which had proved fatal to his two companions, but subsequently when overcome with heat and fatigue he had lain down on a damp spot in the open air, he was soon after seized with dysentery, which continued to assume more alarming symptoms. unable to rise from his bed, and deserted by all his african friends, who saw him no longer a favourite at court, he was watched with tender care by his faithful servant lander, who devoted his whole time to attendance on his sick master. at length he called him to his bed-side, and said, "richard, i shall shortly be no more; i feel myself dying." almost choked with grief, lander replied, "god forbid, my dear master--you will live many years yet." clapperton replied, "don't be so much affected, my dear boy, i entreat you, it is the will of the almighty, it cannot be helped. i should have wished to live to have been of further use to my country--and more, i should like to have died in my native land--but it is my duty to submit." he then gave particular directions as to the disposal of his papers, and of all that remained of his property, to which the strictest attention was promised. "he then," says lander, "took my hand within his, and looking me full in the face, while a tear stood glistening in his eye, said in a low but deeply affecting tone, 'my dear richard, if you had not been with me, i should have died long ago. i can only thank you with my latest breath for your kindness and attachment to me, and if i could have lived to return with you, you should have been placed beyond the reach of want, but god will reward you.'" he survived some days, and appeared even to rally a little, but one morning, lander was alarmed by a peculiar rattling sound in his throat, and hastening to the bed-side found him sitting up, and staring wildly around; some indistinct words quivered on his lips, he strove but ineffectually to give them utterance, and expired without a struggle or a sigh. bello seems to have repented in some degree of his harsh conduct, especially after the news arrived of a great victory gained by his troops over the sultan of bornou. he allowed lander to perform the funeral obsequies with every mark of respect, agreeably to the sultan's own directions at jungavie, a small village on a rising ground, about five miles to the s. e. of sockatoo. lander performed the last sad office of reading the english service over the remains of his generous and intrepid master; a house was erected over his grave; "and he was left alone in his glory." chapter xxviii. lander may now be said to be in the interior of africa, a solitary wanderer, dependent entirely on his own resources, at the same time that he received from sultan bello, all the requisite means to enable him to return to his native country, allowing him to choose his own road, though advising him to prefer that which led through the great desert, but lander having already had many dealings with the arabs, preferred the track through the negro countries. on arriving at kano, on his return route, lander formed a spirited and highly laudable design, which proved him to be possessed of a mind much superior to his station, and this was nothing less than an attempt to resolve the great question, respecting the termination of the niger, which he hoped to effect by proceeding to funda, and thence to benin by water. striking off to the eastward of the route, on which, in company with his late master, he had reached kano, he passed several walled towns, all inhabited by natives of houssa, tributary to the fellatas, and early on the third day from bebajie, (as he spells it,) arrived at the foot of a high craggy mountain, called almena, from a ruined town said to have been built by a queen of the fantee nation, some five hundred years ago. mahomet, lander's servant, who had travelled far and near, and knew all the traditions of the country, gave the following story:--about five hundred years ago, a queen of the fantee nation having quarrelled with her husband about a golden stool, in other words, we presume about the throne, probably after her husband's death, fled from her dominions with a great number of her subjects, and built a large town at the foot of this mountain, which she called almena, from which it took its name. the town, according lander, was surrounded with a stone wall, as the ruins plainly attest. the m. s. account of tukroor evidently alludes to the same personage. the first who ruled over them, that is the seven provinces of houssa, was, as it is stated, amenah, daughter of the prince of zag zag, (zeg zeg?) she conquered them by the force of her sword, and subjected them, including kashna and kano, to be her tributaries. she fought and took possession of the country of bowsher, till she reached the coast of the ocean on the right hand, and west side. she died at atagara. the gigantic blocks of granite forming the mountain almena, fearfully piled on each other, and seeming ready to fall, are described as resembling the rocks near the logan stone in cornwall, but on a scale infinitely larger. to the eastward, a range of high hills was seen stretching from north to south, as far as the eye could reach, and lander was informed that they extended to the salt water. they were said to be inhabited by a savage race of people called yamyams, that is cannibals, who had formerly carried on an extensive traffic with the houssa men, bringing elephants' teeth, and taking in exchange red cloth, beads, &c., but five years before, they had murdered a whole kafila of merchants, and afterwards eaten them, since which time, the houssa people had been reasonably shy of dealing with them. sultan bello informed lander that he had ocular proof of the fact, that these same people are in the practice of eating human flesh. the sultan said, that on the governor of jacoba telling him of these people, he could scarcely believe it, but on a tuarick being hanged for theft, he saw five of these people eat a part, with which he was so disgusted, that he sent them back to jacoba soon after. he said, that whenever a person complained of sickness amongst these men, even though only a slight headache, he is killed instantly, for fear he should be lost by death, as they will not eat a person that has died by sickness; that the person falling sick is requested by some other family, and repaid when they had a sick relation; that universally, when they went to war, the dead and wounded were always eaten; that the hearts were claimed by the head men, and that on asking them, why they ate human flesh, they said, it was better than any other, that they had no want or food, and that excepting this bad custom, they were very cleanly, and otherwise not bad people, except that they were kaffirs. as far as the route of lander had hitherto extended, all the streams that were crossed had a north-westerly course, and on the fifth day, he reached a large river running in the same direction called accra. on the following day proceeding s. w., he arrived at nammalack, built immediately under a mountain, which, rising almost perpendicularly, forms a natural wall on the north-eastern side. it is thickly wooded and abounds with thousands of hyenas, tiger cats, jackals, and monkeys, who monopolize all the animal food in the neighbourhood, the poor inhabitants not being able to keep a single bullock, sheep, or goat. for four hours beyond this town, lander's route continued along the foot of this range of mountains, in a continued direction of s. w., it then turned eastward through an opening in the range, and after crossing one large and three small rivers, led to fillindushie, the frontier town of catica. lander speaks of the catica or bowchee people as the same. this district must, therefore, belong to the bowchee country, which forms part of zeg zeg, according to the m. s. account of tackroor, apparently on the boushy, that is infidel or kirdy country, bordering on yacoba. the inhabitants of catica are described as a fine handsome people, with features not at all resembling those of the negro race, and very similar to the european, but below the negroes in civilization, without any clothing, filthy in person, disgusting in manners, and destitute of natural affection; the parent selling his child with no more remorse or repugnance than he would his chicken, yet at the same time, by way of contrast, artless and good humoured. their appearance is extremely barbarous and repulsive. they rub red clay softened with oil over their heads and bodies, and invariably wear a large semicircular piece of blue glass in the upper and lower lip, with ear-pendants of red wood. they make fetishes like the natives of yariba. turning again to the s. w., the route now led over a fine and rich country, to a large river rolling to the n. w., called coodoma (kadoma,) which empties itself into the quorra, near funda. lander reached the north-eastern bank on the tenth day, and on the morrow after three hours travelling reached cuttup. having heard on his route many different reports of the wealth, population and celebrated market of this place, he was surprised to find it to consist of nearly five hundred villages, almost joining each other, occupying a vast and beautiful plain, adorned with the finest trees. amongst these, the plantain, the palm, and the cocoa-nut tree, were seen flourishing in great abundance, and the aspect of the country strikingly resembled some parts of yariba. a considerable traffic is carried on here in slaves and bullocks, which are alike exposed in the daily market. the bullocks are bred by the fellatas, who reside there for no other purpose. the sultan of cuttup being a very great man, that is, in his own estimation, lander made him a suitable present of four yards of blue damask, the same quantity of scarlet, a print of george iv., one of the late duke of york, which, we have reason to suppose, was held in higher estimation than his whole-length colossal figure on the top of the pedestal in this country, which has the superlative honour of calling him one of the most meritorious, most puissant, and most honourable of the royal blood. lander also made the sultan a present of _other trifling articles,_ in return for which he received a sheep, the humps, or we should call it the rumps, of two bullocks, and stewed rice sufficient for fifty men, not being able at the time to form an accurate opinion of the extent of lander's gourmandizing appetite, or most probably, as is generally the case in countries situated farther to the northward, judging of the appetite of others by his own. during the four days that lander remained in these hospitable quarters, he was never in want of provisions, nor do we see how it was possible that he should be, when he had two rumps of beef, from which he could at any time cut a steak, which the most finished epicurean of dolly's would not turn up his nose at, and stewed rice, as an entremet, sufficient for the gastronomic powers of fifty men. when it is also considered, that the sultan invariably receives as a tax the hump of every bullock that is slaughtered, weighing from twelve to fifteen pounds, and the choicest part of the animal, it is somewhat surprising that the country does not abound with _hump_-backed tyrants, similar to the notorious richard of england; at all events, lander had to congratulate himself that the humps, or rumps, were sent to him daily by the king's wives, we will suppose, out of the pure spirit of charity and benevolence, on the same principle, perhaps, that the widow zuma invited lander to take up his abode in her house. it was very proper that lander should make a return to the sultan's wives for their rumps of beef, and, therefore, he presented them with one or two gilt buttons from his jacket, and they, imagining them to be pure gold, fastened them to their ears. little, however, did the birmingham manufacturer suppose, when he issued these buttons from his warehouse, that they were destined one day to glitter as pendants in the ears of the wives of the sultan of cuttup, in the heart of africa; truly may it be said with shakespeare, "to what vile uses may we come at last!" it is very possible, from some cause not worthy here of investigation, that one of the wives of the sultan had contrived to obtain a higher place in the estimation of lander, than any of her other compeers; but, as a proof that great events from trivial causes flow, it happened that lander set the whole court of cuttup in a hubbub and confusion by a very simple act, to which no premeditated sin could be attached, and this act was no other, than presenting one of the wives of the sultan secretly, clandestinely, and covertly, with a most valuable article, in the shape of a large darning needle, which he carried about with him, for the purpose of repairing any sudden detriment, that might happen to any part of his habiliments. a female, whether european or african, generally takes a pride in displaying the presents that have been made her; and the favoured wife of the sultan no sooner displayed the present which she had received, than the spirit of jealousy and envy burst forth in the breast of all the remaining wives. it was a fire not easily to be quenched; it pervaded every part of the residence of the sultan; it penetrated into every hut, where one of the wives resided; discord, quarrels, and battles became the order of the day, and lander was obliged to make a precipitate retreat from a place, where he had incautiously and innocently raised such a rebellion. on relating this anecdote to us, lander declared, that, with a good supply of needles in his possession, he would not despair of obtaining every necessary article and accommodation throughout the whole of central africa. on leaving cuttup, lander proceeded south-south-west, over a hilly country, and on the following day, crossed the rary, a large river flowing to the south-east. the next day, part of the route lay over steep and craggy precipices, some of them of the most awful height. from the summit of this pass, he obtained a very beautiful and extensive prospect, which would indicate the elevation to be indeed very considerable. eight days' journey might plainly be seen before him. about half a day's journey to the east, stood a lofty hill, at the foot of which lay the large city of jacoba. in the evening, he reached dunrora, a town containing about four thousand inhabitants. lander had now reached the latitude of funda, which, according to his information, lies about twelve days due west of dunrora, and after seventeen perilous days' travelling from kano, he seemed to be on the point of solving the great geographical problem respecting the termination of the supposed niger, when, just as he was leaving dunrora, four armed messengers from the sultan of zeg zeg rode up to him, bearing orders for his immediate return to the capital. remonstrance was in vain; and, with a bad grace and a heavy heart, poor lander complied with the mandate. he was led back to cuttup by the same route that he had taken, and here, much against the inclination of his guards, he remained four days, suffering under an attack of dysentery. on his arrival at zaria, he was introduced to the king; and having delivered his presents, that prince boasted of having conferred on him the greatest possible favour, since the people of funda, being now at war with sultan bello, would certainly have murdered any one, who had visited and carried gifts to that monarch. from this reasoning, sound or otherwise, lander had no appeal, and was obliged to make his way back by his former path. the subsequent part of his route was, however, rather more to the westward of his former track. the koodoonia, where he crossed it, was much deeper, as well as broader, and much more rapid. on lander refusing to cross the river till it had become more shallow, his guards left him in great wrath, threatening to report his conduct to their master, and they did not return for a fortnight, during which time, lander remained at a bowchee village, an hour distant, very ill, having nothing to eat but boiled corn, not much relishing _roasted dog._ the inhabitants, who came by hundreds every day to visit him, were destitute of any clothing, but behaved in a modest and becoming manner. the men did not appear to have any occupation or employment whatever. the women were generally engaged, the greater part of the day, in manufacturing oil from a black seed and the guinea nut. not deeming it safe, according to the advice of the sultan of zeg zeg, to pursue his homeward way by the route of funda, he chose the youriba road; and, after serious delays, he reached badagry on the st november ; but here he was nearly losing his life, owing to the vindictive jealousy of the portuguese slave-merchants, who denounced him to the king as a spy sent by the english government. the consequence was, that it was resolved by the chief men to subject him to the ordeal of drinking a fetish. "if you come to do bad," they said, "it will kill you; but if not, it cannot hurt you." there was no alternative or escape. poor lander swallowed the contents of the bowl, and then walked hastily out of the hut through the armed men who surrounded it, to his own lodgings, where he lost no time in getting rid of the fetish drink by a powerful emetic. he afterwards learned, that it almost always proved fatal. when the king and his chiefs found, after five days, that lander survived, they changed their minds, and became extremely kind, concluding that he was under the special protection of god. the portuguese, however, he had reason to believe, would have taken the first opportunity to assassinate him. his life at this place was in continual danger, until, fortunately, captain laing, of the brig maria of london, of which fullerton was the chief mate, and afterwards commander, hearing that there was a white man about sixty miles up the country, who was in a most deplorable condition, and suspecting that he might be one of the travellers sent out on the expedition to explore the interior of africa, despatched a messenger with instructions to bring him away. the parties who held him were, however, not disposed to part with him without a ransom, the amount of which was fixed at nearly £ , which was paid by captain laing in broadcloths, gunpowder, and other articles, and which was subsequently refunded by the african society. lander arrived in england on the th april , on which occasion we were introduced to him by the late captain fullerton, from whose papers the following history of lander's second journey is compiled. chapter xxix. the journeys of denham and clapperton made a great accession to our knowledge of interior africa, they having completed a diagonal section from tripoli to the gulf of benin; they explored numerous kingdoms, either altogether unknown, or indicated only by the most imperfect rumour. new mountains, lakes, and rivers had been discovered and delineated, yet the course of the niger remained wrapt in mystery nearly as deep as ever. its stream had been traced very little lower than boussa, which park had reached, and where his career was brought to so fatal a termination. the unhappy issue of clapperton's last attempt chilled for a time the zeal for african discovery; but that high spirit of adventure which animates britons was soon found acting powerfully in a quarter, where there was least reason to expect it. partaking of the character which animated his master, lander endeavoured, on his return towards the coast, to follow a direction, which, but for unforeseen circumstances, would have led to the solution of the great problem. after reaching england, he still cherished the same spirit; in our frequent conversations with him, he expressed it to be his decided opinion, that the termination of the niger would be found between the fifth and tenth degree of north latitude, and his subsequent discoveries proved his opinion to be correct. undeterred by the recollection of so much peril and hardship, he tendered his services to the government to make one effort more, in order to reach the mouth of this mysterious river; his offer was accepted, but on terms which make it abundantly evident that the enterprise was not undertaken from any mercenary impulse. the manner in which he had acquitted himself of his trust, amidst the difficulties with which he had to contend after the death of clapperton, bespoke him as being worthy to be sent out on such a mission, when scientific observations were not expected, and the result has proved the justness of the opinion, that was entertained of him. descended from cornish parents, having been born at truro, and not gifted with any extraordinary talent, it was not his fortune to boast either the honour of high birth, or even to possess the advantages of a common-place education. his leading quality was a determined spirit of perseverance, which no obstacles could intimidate or subdue. in society, particularly in the company of those distinguished for their talents or literary attainments, his reserve and bashfulness were insuperable, and it was not until a degree of intimacy was established by frequent association, that he could be brought to communicate the sentiments of his mind, or to impress a belief upon the company, that he was possessed of any superior qualifications. his younger brother, john lander, who, influenced by a laudable desire to assist in the solution of the geographical problem, was of a very different turn of mind. he was brought up to the profession of a printer, and, as a compositor, had frequent opportunities of enriching his mind with various branches of knowledge, and in time became himself the author of several essays in prose and verse, by no means discreditable to his talents. being naturally gifted with an exuberant imagination, his descriptions partake of the inflated and bombastic; but we have reason to know, that the information which he gives is deduced from authentic sources, without the usual exaggeration proverbially belonging to travellers. the following were the instructions given by government to richard lander:-- "downing-street, st december . "sir, "i am directed by secretary sir george murray to acquaint you, that he has deemed it expedient to accept the offer, which you have made, to proceed to africa, accompanied by your brother, for the purpose of ascertaining the course of the great river, which was crossed by the late captain clapperton on his journey to sockatoo; and a passage having been accordingly engaged for you and your brother, on board of the alert, merchant vessel, which is proceeding to cape coast castle, on the western coast of africa, i am to desire that you will embark immediately on board that vessel. "in the event of your falling in with any of his majesty's ships of war on the coast of africa, previously to your arrival at cape coast castle, you will prevail on the master to use every endeavour to speak with such ship of war, and to deliver to the officer commanding her, the letter of which you are the bearer, and which is to require him to convey yourself and your brother to badagry, to present you to the king, and to give you such assistance as may be required to enable you to set out on your journey. "you should incur as little delay as possible at badagry, in order that, by reaching the hilly country, you may be more secure from those fevers, which are known to be prevalent on the low lands of the sea-coast. you are to proceed by the same road as on a previous occasion, as far as katunga, unless you shall be able to find, on the northern side of the mountains, a road which will lead to funda, on the quorra or niger; in which case, you are to proceed direct to funda. if, however, it should be necessary to go as far as katunga, you are to use your endeavours to prevail on the chief of that country to assist you on your way to the quorra, and with the means of tracing down, either by land or water, the course of that river as far as funda. "on your arrival at this place, you are to be very particular in your observations, so as to enable you to give a correct statement. " st, whether any, and what rivers fall into the quorra at or near that place; or whether the whole or any part of the quorra turns to the eastward. " nd, whether there is at funda, or in the neighbourhood, any lake or collection of waters or large swamps; in which case, you are to go round such lake or swamp, and be very particular in examining whether any river flows _into_ or _out_ of it, and in what direction it takes its course. " rd, if you should find that at funda, the quorra continues to flow to the southward, you are to follow it to the sea, where, in this case, it may be presumed to empty its waters; but if it should be found to turn off to the eastward, in which case it will most probably fall into the lake tchad, you are to follow its course in that direction, as far as you conceive you can venture to do, with due regard to your personal safety, to bornou; in which case it will be for you to determine, whether it may not be advisable to return home by the way of fezzan and tripoli: if, however, after proceeding in an easterly course for some distance, the river should be found to turn off towards the south, you are to follow it, as before, down to the sea. in short, after having once gained the banks of the quorra, either from katunga or lower down, you are to follow its course, if possible, to its termination, wherever that may be. "should you be of opinion that the sultan of youri can safely be communicated with, you are at liberty to send your brother with a present to that chief, to ask, in the king's name, for certain books or papers, which he is supposed to have, that belonged to the late mr. park; but you are not necessarily yourself to wait for your brother's return, but to proceed in the execution of the main object of your mission, to ascertain the course and termination of the niger. "you are to take every opportunity of sending down to the coast a brief extract of your proceedings and observations, furnishing the bearer with a note, setting forth the reward he is to have for his trouble, and requesting any english person to whom it is presented to pay that reward, on the faith that it will be repaid him by the british government. "for the performance of this service, you are furnished with all the articles which you have required for your personal convenience during your journey, together with a sum of two hundred dollars in coin; and in case, upon your arrival at badagry, you should find it absolutely necessary to provide yourself with a further supply of dollars, you will be at liberty to draw upon this department for any sum not exceeding three hundred dollars. "during the ensuing year, the sum of one hundred pounds will be paid to your wife in quarterly payments; and upon your return, a gratuity of one hundred pounds will be paid to yourself. "all the papers and observations, which you shall bring back with you, are to be delivered by you at this office; and you will be entitled to receive any pecuniary consideration which may be obtained from the publication of the account of your journey. "i am, sir, &c. &c. (signed) "r. w. hay." "to mr. richard lander." in pursuance of these instructions, richard lander and his brother embarked at portsmouth, on the th january , in the brig alert, for cape coast castle, where they arrived on the nd of the following month, after a boisterous and unpleasant passage. here they were fortunate enough to engage old pascoe and his wife, with jowdie, who had been employed on the last expedition, with ibrahim and mina, two bornou men, who were well acquainted with english manners, and could converse in the houssa language. these individuals promised to be very useful on the expedition, more especially old pascoe, whose merits as an interpreter were unquestionable. after remaining at cape coast castle eight days, they accompanied mr. m'lean, the president of the council at that place, on a visit to mr. hutchinson, commandant at anamaboo, about nine miles distant from cape coast. mr. hutchinson lived in his castle, like an english baron in the feudal times, untinctured, however, by barbarism or ignorance; for the polished, refinements of life have insinuated themselves into his dwelling, though it is entirely surrounded by savages, and though the charming sound of a lady's voice is seldom or never heard in his lonely hall. his silken banner, his turreted castle, his devoted vassals, his hospitality, and even his very solitariness, all conspired to recall to the mind the manners and way of life of an old english baron, in one of the most interesting periods of our history, whilst the highly chivalrous and romantic spirit of the gentleman alluded to, was strictly in unison with the impression. mr. hutchinson had resided a number of years on the coast, and was one of the few individuals, who had visited the capital of ashantee, in which he resided eight months, and obtained a better acquaintance with the manners, customs, and pursuits of that warlike, enterprising, and original nation, than any other european whatever. in the ashantee war he took a very active part, and rendered important and valuable services to the cause he so warmly espoused. they resided at the fort till the th march, and then sailed in the alert for accra, where they expected to find a vessel to take them to badagry, in the bight of benin, agreeably to their instructions. in two days they arrived opposite the british fort at accra, and, after staying there a week, they embarked on board the clinker, lieutenant matson, commander; and having sailed direct for badagry, they dropped anchor in the roadstead in the front of that town on the th. from the commander of the clinker they received a young man of colour, named antonio, son to the chief of bonny, who eagerly embraced the opportunity of proceeding with them into the interior, being impressed with the notion that he should be enabled to reach his home and country by means of the great river, or niger. in the earlier part of the afternoon of the nd march, they sailed towards the beach in one of the brig's boats, and having been taken into a canoe that was waiting at the edge of the breakers to receive them, they were plied over a tremendous surf, and flung with violence on the burning sands. wet and uncomfortable as this accident had rendered them, having no change of linen at hand, they walked to a small creek about the distance of a quarter of a mile from the sea shore, where they were taken into a native canoe, and conveyed safely through an extremely narrow channel, overhung with luxuriant vegetation, into the badagry river, which is a branch of the lagos. it is a beautiful body of water, resembling a lake in miniature; its surface is smooth and transparent as glass, and its picturesque banks are shaded by trees of a lively verdure. they were soon landed on the opposite side, when their road lay over a magnificent plain, on which deer, antelopes, and buffaloes were often observed to feed. numbers of men, women, and children followed them to the town of badagry, making the most terrific noises at their heels, but whether these were symptoms of satisfaction or displeasure, admiration or ridicule, they could not at first understand. they were soon, however, satisfied that the latter feeling was predominant, and indeed their clothing was sufficient to excite the laughter of any people, for it certainly was not african, nor had it any pretensions to be characterized as european. in the first place, the covering of the head consisted of a straw hat, larger than an umbrella, a scarlet mahommedan tobe or tunic and belt, with boots, and full turkish trousers. so unusual a dress might well cause the people to laugh heartily; they were all evidently highly amused, but the more modest of the females, unwilling to give them any uneasiness, turned aside to conceal the titter, from which they were utterly unable to refrain. on their way they observed various groups of people seated under the spreading branches of superb trees, vending provisions and country cloth, and on their approach, many of them arose and bowed, whilst others fell on their knees before them in token of respect. they reached the dwelling, which had been prepared for them about three o'clock in the afternoon, but as the day was too far advanced to visit the chief or king, they sent a messenger to inform him of their intention of paying him their respects on the following morning. towards evening, richard lander his brother being too fatigued to accompany him, took a saunter in the immediate vicinity of his residence, when he found, that in one respect, the streets of badagry, if they might be so called, and the streets of london, bore a very great resemblance. it might be the mere effect of female curiosity, to ascertain what kind of a man's visage could possibly be concealed under such a preposterous hat, or it might be for any other purpose, which his penetration could not discover, but certain it was, that ever and anon a black visage, with white and pearly teeth, and an expressive grin of the countenance, somewhat similar to that of the monkey in a state of excited pleasure, protruded itself under the canopy of straw, which protected his head, but he, who had withstood the amorous advances of the widow zuma, or of the fat and deaf widow laddie, could not be supposed to yield to the fascinations and allurements of a badagry houri. richard therefore returned to his dwelling, fully satisfied with himself, but by no means having satisfied the ladies of badagry, that an european was a man of love or gallantry. at nine o'clock on the morning of the rd march, agreeably to the promise which they had made on the preceding day, they visited the chief at his residence, which was somewhat more than half a mile from their own. on their entrance, the potent chief of badagry was sitting on a couple of boxes, which, for aught lander knew, might at one time have belonged to a hong merchant at canton; the boxes were placed in a small bamboo apartment, on the sides of which were suspended a great number of muskets and swords, with a few paltry umbrellas, and a couple of horses' tails, which are used for the purpose of brushing away flies and other insects. king adooley looked up in the faces of his visitors without making any observation, it perhaps not being the etiquette of kings in that part of the world, to make any observation at all on subjects before them, nor did he even condescend to rise from his seat to congratulate them on their arrival. he appeared in deep reflection, and thoughtfully rested his elbow on an old wooden table, pillowing his head on his hand. one of the most venerable and ancient of his subjects was squatted at the feet of his master, smoking from a pipe of extraordinary length; whilst lantern, his eldest son and heir apparent, was kneeling at his side, the badagry etiquette not allowing the youth to sit in the presence of his father. everything bore an air of gloom and sadness, totally different from what they had been led to expect. they shook hands, but the royal pressure was so very faint, that it was scarcely perceptible, yet, notwithstanding this apparent coldness, they seated themselves one on each side, without ceremony or embarrassment. it was evident that neither lander nor his brother knew how to deport themselves in the presence of a king, a thing which the former had never seen in his life but at the courts of africa, and they, god knows, were not calculated to give him an exalted idea of royalty; but when it had been ascertained, that it was contrary to etiquette at the court of badagry, for even the heir apparent to assume any other attitude in the royal presence than that of kneeling, it might have occurred to the european travellers, that seating themselves without permission, in the presence of so august a personage as the king of badagry, might be the forerunner of their heads being severed from their body, which, as it has been detailed in a preceding part of this work, is in that part of the country, a ceremony very easily and speedily despatched. it was, however, necessary that some conversation should take place between the king and his visitors, and therefore the latter began in the true old english fashion, to inquire about the state of his health, not forgetting to inform him at the same time, that they found the weather uncommonly hot, which could not well have been otherwise, considering that they were at that moment not much more than ° to the northward of the equator. in regard to the state of his health, he answered them only with a languid smile, and relapsed into his former thoughtlessness. not being able to break in upon the taciturnity of the monarch, they had recourse to a method which seldom fails of "unknitting the brow of care," and that was by a display to the best advantage, of the presents, which they had brought for him from england. badagry is not the only kingdom in which, if a present be made to the king, the sole return that is received for it, is the honour of having been allowed to offer it, and this experience was acquired by our travellers, for the king certainly accepted the presents, but without the slightest demonstration of pleasure or satisfaction; the king scarcely deigned to look at the presents, and they were carried away by the attendants, with real or seeming indifference. to be permitted to kiss the hand of the sable monarch could not rationally be expected, as an honour conferred upon them for the presents, which they had delivered, but it was mortifying to them not to receive a word of acknowledgement, not even the tithe of a gracious smile; they accordingly said not a word, but they had seen enough to convince them that all was not right. a reserve, the cause whereof they could not define, and a coldness towards them, for which they could in no wise account, marked the conduct of the once spirited and good-natured chief of badagry, and prepared them to anticipate various difficulties in the prosecution of their plans, which they were persuaded would require much art and influence to surmount. the brow of the monarch relaxed for a moment, and an attempt was made on the part of richard lander to enter into conversation with him, but on a sudden the king rose from his boxes, and left them to converse with themselves. after waiting a considerable time, and the king not returning, a messenger was despatched to acquaint him, that the patience of his visitors was nearly exhausted, and they would feel obliged by his immediate return, in order to put an end to their conference or palaver, as it is emphatically styled, as speedily as possible. on the receipt of this message, the king hastened back, and entered the apartment with a melancholy countenance, which was partially concealed behind large volumes of smoke, from a tobacco pipe, which he was using. he seated himself between them as before, and gave them to understand in a very low tone of voice, that he was but just recovering from a severe illness, and from the effect of a series of misfortunes, which had rendered him almost brokenhearted. his celebrated generals bombanee and poser, and all his most able warriors had either been slain in battle, or fallen by other violent means. the former in particular, whose loss he more especially lamented, had been captured by the lagos people, who were his most inveterate enemies. when this unfortunate man was taken prisoner, his right hand was immediately nailed to his head, and the other lopped off like a twig. in this manner he was paraded through the town, and exposed to the view of the people, whose curiosity being satiated, bombanee's head was at length severed from his shoulders, and being dried in the sun and beaten to dust, was sent in triumph to the chief of badagry. to add to his calamities, adooley's house, which contained an immense quantity of gunpowder, had been blown up by accident, and destroyed all his property, consisting of a variety of presents, most of them very valuable, that had been made him by captain clapperton, by european merchants, and traders in slaves. the chief and his women escaped with difficulty from the conflagration; but as it was the custom to keep the muskets and other firearms constantly loaded, their contents were discharged into the bodies and legs of those individuals, who had flocked to the spot on the first alarm. the flames spread with astonishing rapidity, notwithstanding every exertion, and ended in the destruction of a great part of the town. this accounted in some measure for the sad and grievous expression so strongly depicted on the chiefs countenance; but still another and more powerful reason had doubtless influenced him on this occasion. on returning to their residence, a number of principal men, as they style themselves, were introduced to compliment them on coming to their country, although their true and only motive for visiting their quarters was the expectation of obtaining rum, which is the great object of attraction to all of them. they had been annoyed during the greater part of this day by a tribe of ragged beggars, whose importunity was really disgusting. the men were in general old, flat-headed, and pot-bellied. the women skinny and flap-eared. to these garrulous ladies and gentlemen they were obliged to talk and laugh, shake hands, crack fingers, bend their bodies, bow their heads, and place their hands with great solemnity on their heads and breasts. they had not indeed a moment's relaxation from this excessive fatigue, and had job, amongst his other trials, been exposed to the horrors of an interminable african palaver, his patience would most certainly have forsaken him. lander was of opinion that he never would be a general favourite with this ever-grinning and loquacious people. if he laughed, and he was obliged to laugh, it was done against his inclination, and consequently with a very bad grace. at this time, lander, speaking of himself, says, "for the first five years of my life, i have been told, that i was never even seen to smile, and since that period, heaven knows my merriment has been confined to particular and extraordinary occasions only. how then is it possible, that i can be grinning and playing the fool from morning to night, positively without any just incentive to do so, and sweltering at the same time under a sun that causes my body to burn with intense heat, giving it the appearance of shrivelled parchment. fortunately these savages--for savages they most certainly are in the fullest extent of the word--cannot distinguish between real and fictitious joy; and although i was vexed at heart, and wished them, all at the bottom of the red sea, or somewhere else, i have every reason to believe that my forced attempts to please the natives have so far been successful, and that i have obtained the reputation, which i certainly do not deserve, of being one of the pleasantest and best-tempered persons in the world." this candid exposition, which lander gives of his own character is fully borne out by our own personal observation. on no occasion do we remember that we ever saw a smile sit upon his countenance, and as to a laugh, it appeared to be an act which he dreaded to commit. he seemed always to be brooding over some great and commanding idea, which absorbed the whole of his mind, and which he felt a consciousness within him, that he had not the ability to carry into execution, at the same time that he feared to let a word escape him, which could give a clue to the subject, which was then working within him. in this respect, he was not well fitted for a traveller in a country where, if his nature would not allow him, it became a matter of policy, if not of necessity, to appear high-hearted and gay, and frequently to join in the amusements of the people amongst whom he might be residing. lander himself was not ignorant of the arab adage, "beware of the man who never laughs;" and, therefore, as he was likely to be thrown amongst those very people, he ought to have practised himself in the art of laughing, so as not to rouse their suspicions, which, it is well known, if once roused, are not again easily allayed. to return to the narrative, one of the fetishmen sent them a present of a duck, almost as large as an english goose; but as the fellow expected ten times its value in return, it was no great proof of the benevolence of his disposition. they were now obliged to station armed men around their house, for the purpose of protecting their goods from the rapacity of a multitude of thieves that infested this place, and who displayed the greatest cunning imaginable to ingratiate themselves with the travellers. on the following morning, they awoke unrefreshed at daybreak; the noise of children crying, the firing of guns, and the discordant sound of drums and horns, preventing them from enjoying the sweetness of repose, so infinitely desirable, after a long day spent in a routine or tiresome ceremony and etiquette. on the th march, one of the chief messengers, who was a houssa mallam, or priest, presented himself at the door of their house, followed by a large and handsome spotted sheep from his native country, whose neck was adorned with little bells, which made a pretty jingling noise. they were much prepossessed in this man's favour by the calmness and serenity of his countenance, and the modesty, or rather timidity of his manners. he was dressed in the houssa costume, cap, tobe, trousers, and sandals. he wore four large silver rings on his thumb, and his left wrist was ornamented with a solid silver bracelet: this was the only individual, who had as yet visited them purely from disinterested motives, as all the others made a practice to beg whenever they favoured them with their company. the chief's eldest son was with them during the greater part of this day. the manners of this young man were reserved, but respectful. he was a great admirer of the english, and had obtained a smattering of their language. although his appearance was extremely boyish, he had already three wives, and was the father of two children. his front teeth were filed to a point, after the manner of the logos people; but, notwithstanding this disadvantage, his features bore less marks of ferocity than they had observed in the countenance of any one of his countrymen, while his general deportment was infinitely more pleasing and humble than theirs. when asked whether, if it were in his power to do so, he would injure the travellers, or any european, who might hereafter visit badagry, he made no reply, but silently approached their seat, and falling on his knees at their feet, he pressed richard lander with eagerness to his soft naked bosom, and affectionately kissed his hand. no language or expression could have been half so eloquent. they were now preparing to proceed on their journey, when they learned with surprise and sorrow, that a part of the populace had expressed themselves decidedly hostile to their projects, and that the leaders were continually with adooley, using all their influence, and exercising all their cunning, in order to awaken his slumbering jealousy. they endeavoured to persuade him to demand, before he granted them leave to pass through his country, a sum of money, which, they were aware, was not in the power of the travellers to pay; and therefore it was imagined they would be compelled to abandon the undertaking. the first intimation they received of the effect of these insinuations on the mind of the chief, was brought to them by a person, who pronounced himself to be "on their side." this man assured them, with an ominous visage, that adooley had declared, in the hearing of all the people, that the coat which richard lander had given him was intended for a boy, and not a man; it was therefore unworthy his acceptance as a king, and he considered that by the gift, they meant to insult him. the coat alluded to by adooley was certainly extremely old-fashioned, and belonged to a surgeon in the navy about twenty years ago, notwithstanding which, it was almost as good as new, and was made showy by the addition of a pair of tarnished gold epaulets. it was, however, clear to lander, that as this very same coat had been, only two days before, received with great satisfaction, that some enemy of theirs had been striving to render the chief discontented and mistrustful. to counteract the efforts of the malicious, they judged it prudent to sound the dispositions of those, who they were inclined to believe, from the fondness which they evinced for their rum, that they were favourable to their intentions and devoted to their interests. at this time, there were two mulattoes residing in the town, one of whom, by name hooper, acted as interpreter to adooley, and shared a good deal of his confidence. he was born at cape coast castle, in , and was for many years a soldier in the african corps. his father was an englishman, and he boasted of being a british subject. he was excessively vain of his origin, yet he was the most confirmed drunkard alive, always getting intoxicated before breakfast, and remaining in a soaking state all day long. this did not, however, make him regardless of his own interest, to which, on the contrary, he was ever alive, and indeed sacrificed every other feeling. the other mulatto could read and write english tolerably well, having received his education at sierra leone; he was a slave to adooley, and was almost as great a drunkard as hooper. these drunken political advisers of the chief they had little difficulty in bribing over to their interests; they had likewise been tampering with several native chiefs, apparently with equal success. unfortunately every one here styled himself a great and powerful man, and hooper himself calls a host of ragged scoundrels "noblemen and gentlemen," each of whom he advised lander to conciliate with presents, and especially spirituous liquors, in order to do away any evil impression they might secretly have received, and obtain their suffrages, though it should be at the expense of half the goods in their possession. there is hardly any knowing who is monarch here, or even what form of government prevails; independently of the king of kings himself, the redoubtable adooley, four fellows assume the title of royalty, namely, the kings of spanish-town, of portuguese-town, of english-town, and of french-town, badagry being divided into four districts, bearing the names of the european nations just mentioned. toward the evening, they received an invitation from the former of these chieftains, who by all accounts was originally the sole governor of the country, until his authority was wrested from him by a more powerful hand. he was then living in retirement, and subsisted by purchasing slaves, and selling them to portuguese and spanish traders. they found in him a meek and venerable old man, of respectable appearance. he was surrounded by a number of men and boys, his household slaves, who were all armed with pistols, daggers, muskets, cutlasses, swords, &c., the manufacture of various european countries. in the first place, he assured them, that nothing could give him more pleasure than to welcome them to badagry, and he very much wondered that they had not visited him before. if they had a present to give him, he said, he would thank them; but if they had not, still he would thank them. a table was then brought out into the court before the house, on which decanters and glasses, with a burning liquor obtained from the portuguese, were placed. in one corner of the yard was a little hut, not more than two feet in height, wherein had been placed a fetish figure, to preserve the chief from any danger or mischief, which their presence might otherwise have entailed upon him. a portion of the spirit was poured into one of the glasses, and from it emptied into each of the others, and then drunk by the attendant that had fetched it from the house. this is an old custom, introduced no doubt to prevent masters from being poisoned by the treachery of their slaves. as soon as the decanters had been emptied of their contents, other ardent spirits were introduced, but as richard lander imagined that fetish water had been mingled with it, they simply took a tea-spoonful into their mouths, and privately ejected it on the ground. the old chief promised to return their visit on the morrow, and lifting up his hands and eyes to heaven, like a child in the attitude of prayer, he invoked the almighty to preserve and bless them; they then saluted him in the usual manner, and returned well pleased to their own habitation. chapter xxx. they were now most anxious to proceed on their journey, out the chief, adooley, evaded their solicitations to depart, under the most frivolous and absurd pretences. he asserted that his principal reason for detaining them against their inclinations, was the apprehension he entertained for their safety, the road not being considered in a good state. under this impression, he despatched a messenger to jenna, to ascertain if the affairs of that country warranted him sending them thither. the old king of jenna, who, it will be recollected, behaved so kindly to captain clapperton, was dead; his successor had been appointed, but he had not at that time arrived from katunga. that being the case, there would not be any one at jenna to receive them. meantime, the rainy season was fast approaching, as was sufficiently announced by repeated showers and occasional tornadoes. they were also the more anxious to leave this abominable place, as they were informed that a sacrifice of no less than three hundred human beings, of both sexes and all ages, was shortly to take place, such as has been described in the second journey of clapperton. they often heard the cries of many of these poor wretches, and the heart sickened with horror at the bare contemplation of such a scene as awaited them, should they remain much longer at badagry. early on the morning of the th march, the house of the travellers was filled with visitors, and from that time to the evening they resigned themselves to a species of punishment, which cannot be characterized by any other terms than an earthly purgatory. after cracking fingers a hundred times, and grinning as often, they were informed, that the chief's messenger had returned from jenna, but for some reason, which lander could not define, the man was almost immediately sent back again, and they were told that they could not quit badagry until he again made his appearance. it is the custom in this place, that when a man cannot pay his respects in person to another, he sends a servant with a sword or cane, in the same manner as a gentleman delivers his card in england. they this day received a number of compliments in this fashion, and it is almost superfluous to say that a cane or a sword was at all times a more welcome and agreeable visitor than its owner would have been. they had scarcely finished their morning repast, when hooper introduced himself for his accustomed glass of spirits, to prevent him, according to his own account, from getting sick. he took the opportunity of informing them, that it would be absolutely necessary to visit the _noblemen_, who had declared themselves _on their side_. as they strove to court popularity and conciliate the vagabonds by every means in their power, they approved of hooper's counsel, and went in the first place, to the house of the late _general_ poser, which was at that time under the superintendence of his head man. him they found squatting indolently on a mat, and several old people were holding a conversation with him. as the death of poser was not generally known to the people, it being concealed from them, for fear of exciting a commotion in the town, he having been universally loved and respected they were not permitted even to mention his name, and the steward set them the example, by prudently confining his conversation to the necessity of making him a present proportionate to his expectations, and the dignity of his situation. muskets and other warlike instruments were suspended from the sides of the apartment, and its ceiling was decorated with fetishes and arab texts in profusion. gin and water were produced, and partaken of with avidity by all present, more especially by the two mulattoes that had attended them, which being done, the head man wished the great spirit to prosper them in all their undertakings, and told them not to forget his present by any means. they shortly afterwards took their leave, and quitted the apartment with feelings of considerable satisfaction, for its confined air was so impure, that a longer stay, to say the least of it, would have been highly unpleasant. as it was, they had consumed so much time in poser's house, that they found it necessary to alter their intention of visiting the other chiefs, and therefore resolved to pay their respects to adooley, whom they had not seen for two days. accordingly, they repaired immediately to his residence, and were welcomed to it with a much better grace, than on any previous occasion. the chief was eating an undrest onion, and seated on an old table, dangling his legs underneath, with a vacant thoughtlessness of manner, which their abrupt intrusion somewhat dissipated. he informed them of his intention to send them on their journey on the day after to-morrow, when he expected that the people of jenna would be in a suitable condition to receive them. he was full of good nature, and promised to make richard lander a present of a horse, which he had brought with him from sockatoo on the former expedition, adding, that he would sell another to john lander. so far, their visit was attended with satisfaction, but it was rather destroyed by adooley informing them that it was his particular wish to examine the goods, which they intended to take with them into _the bush,_ as the enclosed country is called, in order that he might satisfy himself that there were no objectionable articles amongst them. having expressed their thanks to adooley for his well-timed present, and agreed to the examination of their baggage, they all partook of a little spirit and water, which soon made them the best friends in the universe. during this palaver, the chief's sister and two of his wives were ogling at the travellers, and giggling with all the playfulness of the most finished coquette, until the approach of the chief of the english-town and the remainder of the travellers' party put a sudden stop to their entertainment, on which they presently left the apartment. these men came to settle a domestic quarrel, which was soon decided by the chief, who, after receiving the usual salutation of dropping on the knees with the face to the earth, chatted and laughed immoderately; this was considered by the travellers as a happy omen. in that country, very little ceremony is observed by the meanest of the people towards their sovereign, they converse with him with as little reserve, as if he were no better than themselves, while he pays as much attention to their complaints, as to those of the principal people of the country. an african king is therefore of some use, but there are kings in other parts of the world, of whose use it would be a very difficult matter to find any traces, and who know as much of the complaints or grievances of their subjects, as of the nucleus of the earth. nor was king adooley supposed to be entirely destitute of the virtues of hospitality, for it was observed that the remainder of his onion was divided equally amongst the chiefs, who had come to visit him, and was received by them with marks of the highest satisfaction. in the afternoon, a herald proclaimed the approach to the habitation of the venerable chief of spanish-town, with a long suite of thirty followers. the old man's dress was very simple, consisting only of a cap and turban, with a large piece of manchester cotton flung over his right shoulder, and held under his left arm. this is infinitely more graceful and becoming in the natives, than the most showy european apparel, in any variety of which, indeed, they generally look highly ridiculous. after they had made the chief and all his attendants nearly tipsy, the former began to be very talkative and amusing, continuing to chat without interruption for a considerable time, not omitting to whisper occasionally to the interpreter, by no means to forget, after his departure, to remind the travellers of the present they had promised him, it being considered the height of rudeness to mention any thing of the kind aloud in his presence. the rum had operated so cheerily upon his followers in the yard, that fat and lean, old and young, all commenced dancing, and continued performing the most laughable antics, till they were no longer able to stand. it amused the travellers infinitely to observe these creatures, with their old solemn placid-looking chief at their head, staggering out at the door way; they were in truth, but too happy to get rid of them at so cheap a rate. hooper shortly afterwards came with a petition from twelve _gentlemen_ of english-town, for the sum of a hundred and twenty dollars to be divided amongst them, and having no resource, they were compelled to submit to the demand of these rapacious scoundrels. late in the evening, they received the threatened visit from adooley, who came to examine the contents of the boxes. he was borne in a hammock by two men, and was dressed in an english linen shirt, a spanish cloak or mantle, with a cap, turban and sandals; his attendants were three half-dressed little boys, who, one by one, placed themselves at their master's feet, as they were in the regular habit of doing; one of them carried a long sword, another a pistol, and a third a kind of knapsack, filled with tobacco. the chief was presented with brandy, equal in strength to spirits of wine, and he swallowed a large quantity of it with exquisite pleasure. the boys were permitted to drink a portion of the liquor every time that it was poured into a glass for adooley, but, though it was so very strong, it produced no grimace, nor the slightest distortion of countenance in these little fellows. the fondness of the natives, or rather their passion for spirituous liquors is astonishing, and they are valued entirely in proportion to the intoxicating effects they occasion. adooley smoked nearly all the while he remained in lander's house. as each box was opened, however, he would take the pipe slowly from his mouth, as if perfectly heedless of what was going forward, and from the couch on which he was reclining, he regarded with intense curiosity each article, as it was held out to his observation. every thing that in his opinion demanded a closer examination, or more properly speaking, every thing he took a fancy to, was put into his hands at his own request, but as it would be grossly impolite to return it after it had been soiled by his fingers, with the utmost _nonchalance,_ the chief delivered it over to the care of his recumbent pages, who carefully secured it between their legs. adooley's good taste could not of course be questioned, and it did not much surprise, though it grieved the landers, to observe a large portion of almost every article in the boxes speedily passing through his hands into those of his juvenile minions. nothing seemed unworthy of his acceptance, from a piece of fine scarlet cloth to a child's farthing whistle; indeed he appeared to be particularly pleased with the latter article, for he no sooner made it sound, than he put on a horrible grin of delight, and requested a couple of the instruments, that he might amuse himself with them in his leisure moments. although he had received guns, ammunition, and a variety of goods, to the amount of nearly three hundred ounces of gold, reckoning each ounce to be worth two pounds sterling, yet he was so far from being satisfied, that he was continually grumbling forth his discontent. gratitude, however, was unknown to him, as well as to his subjects. the more that was given them, the more pressing were their importunities for other favours; the very food that he ate, and the clothes that he wore, were begged in so fawning a tone and manner, as to create disgust and contempt at the first interview. it was nearly midnight, before adooley rose from his seat to depart, when he very ceremoniously took his leave, with broad cloth and cottons, pipes, snuff-boxes, and knives, paper, ink, whistles, &c., and even some of the books of the travellers, not a line of which he could comprehend; so avaricious was this king of badagry. they rose early on the morning of the th, for the purpose of arranging some trifling matters and taking their breakfast in quietness and comfort; but they had scarcely sitten down, when their half-naked grinning acquaintance entered to pay them the compliments of the day. notwithstanding their chagrin, so ludicrous were the perpetual bowing and scraping of these their friends, in imitation of europeans, that they could not forbear laughing in good earnest. their rum, which had been kindly supplied them by lieutenant matson, they were happy to find was nearly all consumed, and the number of their general visitors had diminished in exact proportion to the decrease of the spirit, so that they were now beginning to feel the enjoyment of an hour or two's quiet in the course of the day, which was a luxury they could hardly have anticipated. the chief sent his son to them, requesting a few needles and some small shot; they could ill spare the latter, but it would have been impolitic to have refused his urgent solicitations, whatever might have been their tendency. the horses promised by adooley were now sent for them to examine. they appeared strong and in good condition, and if they played them no wicked pranks in "the bush," no doubt they would be found eminently serviceable. in the evening, poser's headman, who, it was understood, was one of the chiefs first captains, returned their visit of the preceding day, followed by a multitude of friends and retainers. he had been determined, it was believed, before he left home, to be in an ill humour with the travellers, and perhaps he had treated himself with an extra dram upon the occasion. this great bully introduced himself into their dwelling; his huge round face, inflamed with scorn, anger, and "potations deep." he drank with more avidity than his countrymen, but the liquor produced no good impression upon him, serving rather to increase his dissatisfaction and choler. he asked for every thing which he saw, and when they had gratified him to the best of their power, he began to be very abusive and noisy. he said he was convinced that they had come into the country with no good intentions, and accused them of deceit and insincerity in their professions, or, in plainer terms, that they had been guilty of a direct falsehood, in stating that they had no other motive for undertaking the journey than to recover the papers of mr. park at youri. he was assured that they were afraid to tell the true reasons for leaving their own country. they withstood his invectives with tolerable composure, and the disgraceful old fellow left them in a pet, about half an hour after his arrival. john lander, we find, on referring to this part of their journey says, "it is really a discouraging reflection, that, notwithstanding the sacrifices we have made of all private feeling and personal comfort, for the purpose of conciliating the good opinion of the people here; the constant fatigue and inconvenience to which we have been subjected; the little arts we have practised; the forced laughter; the unnatural grin: the never-ending shaking of hands, &c. &c., besides the dismal noises and unsavoury smells to which our organs have been exposed, still, after all, some scoundrels are to be found hardened against us by hatred and prejudice, and so ungrateful for all our gifts and attentions, as to take a delight in poisoning the minds of the people against us, by publicly asserting that we are english spies, and make use of other inventions equally false and malicious. pitiable, indeed, must be the lot of that man, who is obliged to drag on a year of existence in so miserable a place as this. nevertheless we are in health and spirits, and perhaps feel a secret pride in being able to subdue our rising dissatisfaction, and in overcoming difficulties, which at a first glance seemed to be insurmountable. by the blessing of heaven, we shall proceed prosperously in our undertaking; for in the divine goodness do we alone repose all our confidence and hopes of success. we may say that pleasure and enjoyment have accompanied us hither. the clearness of the sky is pleasant, and its brilliancy, the softness of the moon, the twinkling brightness of the stars, and the silence of night, the warbling and the flight of birds, the hum of insects, and the varied and luxuriant aspect of beautiful nature, are all charming to us; and what on earth can be more soothing and delightful than the thoughts of home and kindred, and anticipations of a holier and more glorious existence; these are true pleasures, of which the barbarians cannot deprive us." so writes john lander, in the enthusiasm of his imagination; but unfortunately the reality did not come up to the picture which his fancy had drawn; for although the softness of the moon, and the silence of night, and the brightness of the stars, might be all very pleasant objects, even under an equatorial sun, yet the following account of some of the disagreeables, when taken in contrast, rather tends to overbalance the sum of the agreeables. thus we find, that on the day subsequent to that on which john lander had written his rhapsody on the agreeables of badagry, the noise and jargon of their guests pursued them even in their sleep, and their dreams were disturbed by fancied palavers, which were more unpleasant and vexatious, if possible, in their effects than real ones. early on the morning of the th, they were roused from one of these painful slumbers to listen to the dismal yell of the hyenas, the shrill crowing of cocks, the hum of night flies and mosquitoes, and the hoarse croaking of frogs, together with the chirping of myriads of crickets and other insects, which resounded through the air, as though it had been pierced with a thousand whistles. the _silence_ of night, under these circumstances, could not have been very pleasant to them, and it scarcely amounts to a question, whether the warbling of the birds could afford any great delight, if the hyenas and the mosquitoes, and the frogs and the crickets considered themselves privileged to make up the chorus. the sun had scarcely risen, when two mahommedans arrived at their house, with an invitation for them to accompany them to the spot selected for the performance of their religious rites and observances. this being a novelty, they embraced the proposal with pleasure, and followed the men to the distance of about a mile from their house. here they observed a number of mahommedans sitting in detached groups, actively employed in the duties of lustration and ablution. it was a bare space of ground, edged with trees, and covered with sand. the mussulmans were obliged to bring water with them in calabashes. seated in a convenient situation, under the spreading branches of a myrtle tree, the two travellers could observe, without being seen, all the actions of the mussulmans. a number of boys, however, soon intruded themselves upon their privacy; and, in truth, they were more amused by the artlessness and playfulness of their manners, than with all the grave and stupid mummery of the mahommedan worshippers. groups of people were continually arriving at the spot, and these were welcomed by an occasional flourish of music from a native clarionet, &c. they were clad in all their finery, their apparel being as gaudy as it was various. the coup d'oeil presented by no means an uninteresting spectacle. loose tobes, with caps and turbans striped and plain, red, blue, and black, were not unpleasantly contrasted with the original native costume of figured cotton, thrown loosely over the shoulders, and immense rush hats. manchester cottons, of the most glaring patterns, were conspicuous amongst the crowd; but these were cast in the shade by scarfs of green silk, ornamented with leaves and flowers of gold, and aprons covered with silver spangles. very young children appeared bending under the weight of clothes and ornaments, whilst boys of maturer years carried a variety of offensive weapons. the turkish scimitar, the french sabre, the portuguese dagger confined in a silver case, all gleamed brightly, and heavy cutlasses, with rude native knives, were likewise exhibited, half-devoured by cankering rust. clumsy muskets and fowling-pieces, as well as arab pistole, were also handled with delight by the joyful mussulmans. in number the religionists were about a hundred and fifty. not long after the arrival of the two brothers, they formed themselves into six lines, and having laid aside many of their superfluous ornaments, and a portion of their clothing, they put on the most sedate countenance, and commenced their devotional exercises in a spirit of seriousness and apparent fervour, worthy of a better place and a more amiable creed. in the exterior forms of their religion, at least, the mussulmans are here complete adepts, as this spectacle was well calculated to convince the two europeans, and the little which they had hitherto seen of them, led them to form a very favourable opinion of their general temperance and sobriety. the ceremony was no sooner concluded, than muskets, carbines, and pistols were discharged on all sides. the clarionet again struck up a note of joy, and was supported by long arab drums, strings of bells, and a solitary kettle-drum. the musicians, like the ancient minstrels of europe, were encouraged by trifling presents from the more charitable of the multitude. all seemed cheerful and happy, and, on leaving the landers, several out of compliment, it was supposed, discharged their pieces at their heels, and were evidently delighted with themselves, with the two english, and the whole world. in the path, the landers met a fellow approaching the scene of innocent dissipation, clothed most fantastically in a flannel dress and riding on the back, on what they were informed was a wooden horse. he was surrounded by natives of all ages, who were laughing most extravagantly at the unnatural capering of the thing, and admiring the ingenuity of the contrivance. the figure itself was entirely concealed with cloths, which rendered it impossible to discover by what agency it was moved. its head was covered with red cloth, and a pair of sheep's ears answered the purpose for which they were intended tolerably well. yet, on the whole, though it was easy to perceive that a horse was intended to be represented by it, the figure was executed clumsily enough. as soon as this party had joined the individuals assembled near the place of worship, a startling shriek of laughter testified the tumultuous joy of the wondering multitude. the sun shone out resplendently on the happy groups of fancifully dressed persons, whose showy, various-coloured garments, and sooty skin, contrasted with the picturesque and lovely appearance of the scenery, produced an unspeakably charming effect. the foliage exhibited every variety and tint of green, from the sombre shade of the melancholy yew, to the lively verdure of the poplar and young oak. "for myself," says john lander, "i was delighted with the agreeable ramble, and imagined that i could distinguish from the notes of the songsters of the grove, the swelling strains of the english skylark and thrush, with the more gentle warbling of the finch and linnet. it was indeed a brilliant morning, teeming with life and beauty, and recalled to my memory a thousand affecting associations of sanguine boyhood, when i was thoughtless and happy. the barbarians around me were all cheerful and full of joy. i have heard that like sorrow, joy is contagious, and i believe that it is, for it inspired me with a similar gentle feeling." "the th march in this place, is what may-day is in many country places in england, and it strongly reminded us of it. but here unfortunately there are no white faces to enliven us, and a want of the lovely complexion of our beautiful countrywomen, tinged with 'its celestial red,' is severely felt; and so is the total absence here of that golden chain of kindness, which links them to the ruder associates of their festive enjoyments. by and by, doubtless, familiarity with black faces will reconcile me to them, but at present i am compelled to own, that i cannot help feeling a considerable share of aversion towards their jetty complexions, in common i believe with most strangers that visit this place." owing to the holiday, which is equally prized and enjoyed by mahommedan and pagan, their visitors on this day have been almost exclusively confined to a party of houssa mallams, who entered their dwelling in the forenoon, perfumed all over with musk, more for the purpose of gratifying their vanity by displaying their finery before them, than of paying the travellers the compliment of the day, which was avowedly the sole object of their intrusion. one or two of them were masticating the goora nut, and others had their lips, teeth, and finger nails stained red. each of the mallams was attended by a well-dressed little boy of agreeable countenance, who acted as page to his master, and was his _protegé_. neither of the men would eat or drink with those who they came to visit, yet whilst they were in their company, they seemed cheerful and good humoured, and were communicative and highly intelligent. in answer to the questions put to them, they; were informed that two rivers enter the quorra, or great river of funda, one of which is called the _coodonie,_ and the other the _tshadda,_ (from the lake tshad); that a schooner might sail from bornou to fundah, on the latter river, without difficulty; that funda is only twenty-four hours pull from benin, and twenty-nine days' journey from bornou. at the close of a long and to the travellers rather an interesting conversation, their visitors expressed themselves highly gratified with their reception, and left the hut to repair to their own habitations. these men, though slaves to adooley, are very respectable, and are never called upon by their master, except when required to go to war, supporting themselves by trading for slaves, which they sell to europeans. they wore decent _nouffie_ tobes, (_qu nyffee,_) arab red caps, and houssa sandals. the mallams, both in their manners and conversation, are infinitely superior to the ungentle, and malignant natives of badagry. march th fell on a sunday, and luckily for the travellers, the inhabitants of the place considered it as a holiday, and their singing, dancing, and savage jollity possessed greater charms for them than an empty rum cask, though backed by two white faces. with a trifling exception or so, they were in consequence unmolested by their visitors of the everlasting grin and unwearied tongue during the day. this happy circumstance afforded them an opportunity, and ample leisure for spending the sabbath in a manner most agreeable to their feelings; by devoting the greater part of it to the impressive duties of their divine religion, in humbling themselves before the mercy seat of the great author of their being, and imploring him to be their refuge and guardian, to shield them from every danger, and to render their undertakings hopeful and prosperous. as yet no crime of any peculiar atrocity had been committed, to impress the travellers with an unfavourable opinion of the moral character of the people amongst whom they were then residing, but on this evening of the sabbath, a fantee was robbed of his effects, and stabbed by an assassin below the ribs, so that his life was despaired of. the most unlucky part, however, of this tragical affair to richard lander, was, that the natives, from some cause, which he could not divine, had imbibed the conceit that he was skilled in surgery. in vain, he protested that he knew nothing of the anatomy of the human frame--there were many present, who knew far better than he did himself, and therefore, _nolens volens,_ he was obliged to visit the patient. it was certainly the first time that richard lander had been called in to exercise his surgical skill, and it must be admitted that in one sense, he was well adapted for the character of a bone-setter, or other offices for which the gentlemen of the lancet are notorious. this trait in his character consisted in a gravity of countenance well befitting the individual, who presents himself to his anxious patient, to pronounce the great question of life and death, and the greater the ignorance of the individual, the deeper and more solemn is the countenance, which he assumes. if richard lander had been in the least inclined to a risible disposition, perhaps no occasion was more likely to call it into action, than when he saw himself followed by two or three hundred savages, under an imputation of possessing the power of curing an individual, who had been stabbed nearly to the heart, when at the same time, he knew as much of the art of stopping an haemorrhage, as he did of the art of delivering one of the queens of badagry of an heir to "the golden stool." fortunately, however, for the new debutant in the medical profession, the victim of the assassin had died a few minutes before the english doctor arrived, and right glad he was, for had he found his patient alive, and he had afterwards died, no doubt whatever rested on his mind, that his death would be attributed to the want of skill on the part of his medical attendant, who, by way of reward for his interference, would have run no small risk of being buried in the same grave as the individual, whose life he had sacrificed to his ignorance and want of skill. from this dilemma he was fortunately relieved, but he had scarcely returned to his habitation, than he was called upon to attend a fetish, or a religious rite, that was to be performed over the remains of a native, who had been found dead, but who was in perfect health a few hours before. this kind of coroner's inquest appeared most strange to the travellers, when it was well known to them that the king of badagry, so far from following the example of other kings, who are so extremely anxious about the life of their subjects, often amuses himself with chopping off two or three hundred heads of his subjects, in order that the path to his apartments may be paved with their skulls; and should there not be quite a sufficient number to complete the job, the deficiency is made up with the same indifference, as a schoolboy strikes off the heads of the poppies in the corn fields. the ceremony observed at this fetish, had a great resemblance to an irish wake; and could the mourners have been able to obtain the requisite supply of spirits, there is very little doubt that there would not have been a mourner present, who would not have exhibited himself in the state of the most beastly intoxication. the lament of the relatives of the deceased was doleful in the highest degree, and no sounds could be more dismally mournful than those shrieked forth by them on this occasion. the sabbath was nearly over, when a summons was received from adooley, to repair to his residence, in order finally to settle the business relative to their journey into the interior, but they refused to have any disputes with him on the sabbath, and therefore promised to wait on him the following morning. accordingly after breakfast, they redeemed their pledge, by paying him the promised visit. adooley received them with his accustomed politeness and gracious smile. he prefaced his wish by saying, that he wished to inform them of his intention, to detain them at badagry a day or two longer, the "path" not being considered in a fit state for; travelling, rather than his reputation should suffer by leading them into danger, which would undoubtedly be the case, if he had not adopted his present resolution. yet, he continued, they might depend upon his word as a king, that they should be at liberty to depart on the following thursday at the latest. now the landers well knew that the country was never in a more peaceable or quiet state than at the moment he was speaking, and they were consequently mortified beyond measure, at the perpetual evasions and contradictions of this chief. they also regretted that the dry season was drawing fast to a close, and that then they would be obliged to travel in the rainy months. having made this declaration, adooley requested them to write on paper in his presence, for a few things, which he wished to procure from cape coast castle, or from england, as a return for the protection he had promised them. amongst other articles enumerated were _four_ regimental coats, such as are worn by the king of england, being for his own immediate wear, and forty less splendid than the king of england's, for his captains; two long brass guns, to run on swivels; _fifty_ muskets; _twenty_ barrels of gunpowder; four handsome swords, and forty cutlasses; to which were added, two puncheons of rum; a carpenter's chest of tools, with oils, paint and brushes; the king himself boasting that he was a blacksmith, carpenter, painter, and indeed every trade but a tailor. independently of these trifles, as he termed them, he wished to obtain half a dozen rockets, and a rocket gun, with a soldier from cape coast capable of undertaking the management of it; and lastly, he modestly ordered two puncheons of kowries to be sent him, for the purpose of defraying in part the expences, he had incurred in repelling the attacks of the men of porto novo, atta, juncullee; the tribes inhabiting those places having made war upon him, for allowing captain clapperton's last mission to proceed into the interior without their consent. they now asked jocosely, whether adooley would be satisfied with these various articles, when, having considered for a few moments, and conversed aloud to a few of his chiefs, who were in the apartment at the time, he replied that he had forgotten to mention his want of a large umbrella, _four_ casks of grape shot, and a barrel of flints, which having also inserted in the list, the letter was finally folded and sealed. it was then delivered into the hands of adooley, who said that he should send it by accra, one of his head men, to cape coast castle, and that the man would wait there till all the articles should be procured for him. if that be the case, the landers imagined that accra would have a very long time to wait. the interpreter of the landers, old hooper, having been suspected by the chief to be in their interest, a young man, named tookwee, who understood a little english, was sent for, and commanded to remain during the whole conference, in order to detect any error that hooper might make, and to see that every thing enumerated by the chief, should be written in the list of articles. during this long and serious conversation, the landers were highly amused with a singular kind of concert, which was formed by three little bells, which were fastened to the tails of the same number of cats by a long string, and made a jingling noise, whenever the animals thought proper to play off any of their antics. as an accompaniment to this singular kind of music, they were favoured with the strains of an organ, which instrument was turned by a little boy, placed purposely in a corner of the apartment. in the afternoon, a young jenna woman came to visit them, accompanied by a female friend from houssa. her hair was traced with such extraordinary neatness, that john lander expressed a wish to examine it more minutely. the girl had never beheld such a thing as a white man before, and permission was granted with a great deal of coyness, mixed up perhaps with a small portion of fear, which was apparent as she was slowly untying her turban. no sooner, however, was the curiosity of the travellers gratified, than a demand of two hundred kowries was insisted on by her companion, that, it was alleged, being the price paid in the interior by the male sex to scrutinize a lady's hair. they were obliged to conform to the usual custom, at which the women expressed themselves highly delighted. the hair, which had excited the admiration of the travellers, was made up in the shape of a hussar's helmet, and very ingeniously traced on the top. irregular figures were likewise braided on each side of the head, and a band of worked thread, dyed in indigo, encircled it below the natural hair, which seemed, by its tightness and closeness, to have been glued fast to the skin. this young jenna woman was by far the most interesting, both in face and form, of any they had seen since their landing; and her prettiness was rendered more engaging by her retiring modesty and perfect artlessness of manner, which, whether observed in black or white, are sure to command the esteem and reverence of the other sex. her eyelids were stained with a bluish-black powder, which is the same kind of substance, it is supposed, as that described in a note in mr. beckford's vatheck. her person was excessively clean, and her apparel flowing, neat, and graceful. before taking leave, the girl's unworthy companion informed john lander, that her _protegée_ was married, but that as her husband was left behind at jenna, she would prevail on her to visit the travellers in the evening after sunset. of course they expressed their abhorrence of the proposal, and were really grieved to reflect, that, with so much meekness, innocence, modesty, and beauty, their timid friend should be exposed to the wiles of a crafty and wicked woman. on this occasion, john lander says, "we have longed to discover a solitary virtue lingering amongst the natives of this place, but as yet our search has been ineffectual." as a contrast to the youthful individual just described, an old withered woman entered their residence in the evening, and began professing the most unbounded affection for both the travellers. she had drank so much rum that she could scarcely stand. she first began to pay her attentions to john lander, who, being the more sprightly of the two, she thought was the most likely to accede to her wishes; she happened, however, to be the owner of a most forbidding countenance, and four of her front teeth had disappeared from her upper jaw, which caused a singular and disagreeable indention of the upper lip. the travellers were disgusted with the appearance and hateful familiarity of this ancient hag, who had thus paid so ill a compliment to their vanity, and subsequently they forced her out of the yard without any ceremony. the travellers now ascertained that the king would not allow them to go to jenna by the nearest beaten path, on the plea, that, as sacred fetish land would lie in their way, they would die the moment in which they trod upon it. the pleasant news was now received, that the king of jenna had arrived at that town from katunga. his messenger reached badagry on the th march, and immediately paid a visit to the landers, accompanied by a friend. they regaled him with a glass of rum, according to their general custom, the first mouthful of which he squirted from his own into the mouth of his associate, and _vice versa._ this was the first time they had witnessed this dirty and disgusting practice. adooley again sent for the travellers, he having recollected some articles, which were necessary to complete the cargo, which the king of england was to send him. to their great surprise, however, the first article that he demanded was nothing less than a gun-boat, with a hundred men from england, as a kind of body-guard; for his own private and immediate use, however, he demanded a few common tobacco-pipes. it was a very easy matter to give a bill for the gun-boat and the hundred men, neither of which, they well knew, would be duly honoured; for, before they could come back protested to king adooley, the drawers of it knew they would be far beyond his power; and they had received such specimens of the extreme nobleness and generosity of his character, that they determined never to throw themselves in his power again. in regard, however, to the tobacco-pipes, they dared not part with them on any account, because, considering the long journey, they had before them, they were convinced they had nothing to spare; indeed it was their opinion, that the presents would be all exhausted long before the journey was completed, and this was in a great measure to be imputed to the rapacity of adooley, when he examined their boxes. with the same facility that they could have written the order for the gun-boat and the hundred men, they now wrote a paper for forty ounces of gold, worth there about two pounds an ounce, to be distributed amongst the chief of the english-town and the rest of their partisans. adooley had now summed up the measure of his demands; the travellers were most agreeably surprised by an assurance from him, that they should quit badagry on the morrow, with the newly-arrived jenna messenger. they accordingly adjusted all their little matters to the apparent satisfaction of all parties, nor could they help wishing, for the sake of their credit, that they might never meet such needy and importunate friends as pestered them during their residence at badagry. in regard to king adooley, we have been furnished with some most interesting particulars respecting him, and some of his actions certainly exhibit a nobleness of character seldom to be found in the savage. his conduct towards the landers was distinguished by the greatest rapacity and duplicity, whilst in his intercourse with his own immediate connexions, his actions cannot be surpassed by any of the great heroes of antiquity. he evinced in early youth an active and ingenious disposition, and an extraordinary fondness for mechanical employments and pursuits. this bias of adooley soon attracted the attention and notice of his father, and this revered parent did all that his slender means afforded of cherishing it, and of encouraging him to persevere in his industrious habits. whilst yet a boy, adooley was a tolerable carpenter, smith, painter, and gunner. he soon won the admiration of his father, who displayed greater partiality and affection for him, than for either of his other children, and on his death nominated this favorite son his successor, to the exclusion of his first-born, which is against the laws of the country, the eldest son being invariably understood as the legitimate heir. for some time, however, after his decease, no notice was taken of the dying request of the lagos chieftain; his eldest son ruled in his stead, notwithstanding his last injunction, and adooley for a few years wisely submitted to his brother without murmuring or complaint. the young men at length quarrelled, and adooley calling to remembrance the words and wishes of his father, rose up against the chief, whom he denounced an usurper, and vehemently called upon his friends to join him in disputing his authority, and endeavour to divest him of his power and consequence. all the slaves of his deceased parent, amongst whom were a great number of houssa mallams; all who bore any personal dislike to the ruling chief, or were discontented with his form of government; those who preferred adooley, and the discontented of all ranks, formed themselves into a strong body, and resolved to support the pretensions of their favourite. the brothers agreed to decide the quarrel by the sword, and having come to a general engagement, the partizans of the younger were completely routed, and fled with their leader before the victorious arms of the opposing party. fearing the result of this contest, adooley, with a spirit of filial piety, which is not rare amongst savages, and is truly noble, dug out of the earth, wherein it had been deposited, the skull of his father, and took it along with him in his flight, in order that it might not be dishonoured in his absence, for he loved his father with extraordinary tenderness, and cherished his memory as dearly as his own life. the headless body of the venerable chief, like those of his ancestors, had been sent to benin, in order that its bones might adorn the sacred temple at that place, agreeably to an ancient and respected custom, which has ever been religiously conformed to, and tenaciously held by the lagos people. but adooley displayed at the same time another beautiful trait of piety and filial tenderness. at the period of his defeat, he had an aged and infirm mother living, and her he determined to take with him, let the consequences be what they might. with his accustomed foresight, he had previously made a kind of cage or box, in case there should be a necessity for removing her. his father's skull having been disinterred and secured, he implored his mother to take immediate advantage of this cage, as the only means of escaping with life. she willingly acceded to her son's request, and was borne off on the shoulders of four slaves, to a village not far distant from lagos, accompanied by adooley and his fugitive train, where they imagined themselves secure from further molestation. in this opinion, however, they were deceived, for the more fortunate chief, suspicious of his brother's intentions, and dreading his influence, would not suffer him to remain long in peace, but drove him out soon after, and hunted him from place to place like a wild beast. in this manner, retreating from his brother, he at last reached the flourishing town of badagry, and being quite wearied with his exertions and fatigues, and disheartened by his misfortunes, he set down his beloved mother on the grass, and began to weep by her side. the principal people of the town were well acquainted with his circumstances, and admiring the nobleness of his sentiments, they not only pitied him, but resolved to protect and befriend him to the last. for this purpose they presently invited him to attend a council, which they had hastily formed. when in the midst of them, perceiving tears falling fast down his cheeks, they asked him why he wept so? "foolish boy," said they, "wipe away those tears, for they are unworthy of you, and show yourself a man and a prince. from this moment we adopt you our chief, you shall lead us on to war, and we will fight against your brother, and either prevail over him or perish. here your mother may dwell in safety, and here shall your father's skull be reverenced as it ought to be. come then, lay aside your fears, and lead us on against your enemies." these enemies were in the bush, and hovering near badagry, when adooley and his generous friends sallied out against them. the fighting or rather skirmishing lasted many days, and many people, it is said, were slain on both sides. but the advantage was decidedly in favour of the badagrians, whose superior knowledge of the district and secret paths of the wood, was of considerable service to them, enabling them to lie in ambush, and attack their enemies by surprise. the lagos people at length gave up the unequal contest in despair, and returned to their own country. adooley was thus left in quiet possession of an important and influential town, which declared itself independent of lagos for ever. since then various unsuccessful attempts have been made to compel the badagrians to return to their allegiance. the latter, however, have bravely defended their rights, and in consequence their independency has been acknowledged by the neighbouring tribes. in the year , the warlike chief of lagos died, and adooley considering it to be a favourable opportunity for his re-assertion of his claims to the vacant "stool," as it is called, determined to do so, and assembled his faithful badagrians for the purpose of making an attack on his native town. he imagined that as his brother was dead, he should experience little opposition from his countrymen; but he soon discovered that he had formed an erroneous opinion, for almost at his very outset, he met with a stout resistance. his brother had left an infant son, and him the people declared to be his legitimate heir, and unanimously resolved to support him. the sanguine invaders were repulsed, and entirely defeated, notwithstanding their tried bravery and utter contempt of danger; and were forced to return home in confusion without having accomplished any thing. in this unfortunate expedition bombanee and all the principal warriors were slain. a similar attempt has been made on lagos more than once, and with a similar result. on the arrival of the landers at badagry, adooley was but just recovering from the effects of these various mortifications and other disasters; and singular enough, he had the artfulness, as has been previously noticed, of laying the whole blame of them to his having permitted the last african mission to pass through his territories, contrary to the wishes of his neighbours, and those, who were interested in the matter. justice is not unfrequently administered at badagry by means of a large wooden cap, having three corners, which is placed on the head of the culprit at the period of his examination. this fantastic piece of mechanism, no doubt by the structure of internal springs, may be made to move and shake without any visible agent, on the same principle as the enchanted turk, or any other figure in our puppet shows. it is believed that the native priests are alone in the secret. when the cap is observed to shake whilst on the head of a suspected person, he is condemned without any further evidence being required; but should it remain without any perceptible motion, his innocence is apparent and he is forthwith acquitted. the frame of this wonderful cap makes a great fuss in the town, and as many wonderful stories are told of it here, as were related in england, a century or two ago, of the famous brazen head of roger bacon. a respectable man, the chief of french-town, was tried by the ordeal of the cap a short time since, for having, it was alleged, accepted a bribe of the lagos chieftain to destroy adooley by poison. the fatal cap was no sooner put upon his head than it was observed to move slightly and then to become more violently agitated. the criminal felt its motion, and was terrified to such a degree that he fell down in a swoon. on awakening, he confessed his guilt, and implored forgiveness, which was granted him by adooley, because, it was said, of his sorrow and contrition, but really, no doubt, of his birth and connexions. during the stay of the landers at badagry, the thermometer of fahrenheit ranged between ° and ° in their hut, but being oftener stationary nearer the latter, than the former. chapter xxxi. it was on tuesday, the st march, that the landers bade adieu to the chief of badagry, and during the whole of that day they were employed packing up their things preparatory to their departure. they repaired to the banks of the river at sunset, expecting to find a canoe, which adooley had promised should be sent there for their use; but having waited above two hours, and finding it had not arrived, they placed their goods in two smaller canoes, which were lying on the beach. these soon proved to be leaky, and as no other resource was at hand, they were fain to wait as patiently as they could for the canoe promised them. every thing betrayed the lukewarmness and indifference of the chief, who had received so much from them, and who expected so much more, but they had answered his purpose, and therefore he took no further notice of them. in two more hours, hooper made his appearance in adooley's war canoe, which he had prevailed on him to lend them. this was placed directly between the two others, and their contents speedily transferred into it. it was between ten and eleven o'clock at night that they were fairly launched out into the body of the river. the canoe was above forty feet in length; it was propelled through the water by poles instead of paddles, and moved slowly and silently along. it was a clear and lovely night; the moon shone gloriously as a silver shield, and reflecting the starry firmament on the unruffled surface of the water, the real concave of heaven with its reflection seemed to form a perfect world. the scenery on the borders of the river appeared wild and striking, though not magnificent. in the delicious moonshine it was far from uninteresting: the banks were low and partially covered with stunted trees, but a slave factory and, a fetish hut were the only buildings which were observed on them. they could not help admiring at some distance ahead of their canoe, when the windings of the river would permit, a noble and solitary palm tree with its lofty branches bending over the water's edge; to them it was not unlike a majestical plume of feathers nodding over the head of a beautiful lady. proceeding about ten miles in a westerly direction, they suddenly turned up a branch joining the river from the northward, passing on the left the village of bawie, at which captain clapperton landed. they saw several small islands covered with rank grass, interspersed in different parts of the river. they were inhabited by myriads of frogs, whose noise was more hoarse and stunning than ever proceeded from any rookery in christendom. as they went up the river the canoe men spoke to their priests, who were invisible to them, in a most sepulchral tone of voice, and were answered in the same unearthly and doleful manner. these sounds formed their nocturnal serenade. notwithstanding the novelty of their situation and the interest they took in the objects, which surrounded them, they were so overcome with fatigue, that they wrapped a flannel around them, and fell fast asleep. the hard and uncomfortable couch, on which they had reposed the preceding night, made their bodies quite sore, and occasioned them to awake at a very early hour in the morning. at six o'clock a.m. they found themselves still upon the river, and their canoe gliding imperceptibly along. from half a mile in width, and in many places much more, the river had narrowed to about twenty paces; marine plants nearly covered its surface, and marsh miasmata, loaded with other vapours of the most noxious quality, ascended from its borders like a thick cloud. its smell was peculiarly offensive. in about an hour afterwards, they arrived at the extremity of the river, into which flowed a stream of clear water. here the canoe was dragged over a morass into a deep but narrow rivulet, so narrow indeed that it was barely possible for the canoe to float, without being entangled in the branches of a number of trees, which were shooting up out of the water. shortly after, they found it to widen a little; the marine plants and shrubs disappeared altogether, and the boughs of beautiful trees, which hung over the banks, overshadowed them in their stead, forming an arch-like canopy, impervious to the rays of the sun. the river and the lesser stream abound with alligators and hippopotami, the wild ducks and a variety of other aquatic birds resorting to them in considerable numbers. in regard to the alligator, a singular fraud is committed by the natives of the coast, who collect the alligators' eggs in great numbers, and being in their size and make exactly resembling the eggs of the domestic fowl, they intermix them, and sell them at the markets as the genuine eggs of the fowls; thus many an epicure in that part of the world, who luxuriates over his egg at breakfast, fancying that it has been laid by some good wholesome hen, finds, to his mortification, that he has been masticating the egg of so obnoxious an animal as the alligator. the trees and branches of the shrubs were inhabited by a colony of monkeys and parrots, making the most abominable chattering and noise, especially the former, who seemed to consider the travellers as direct intruders upon their legitimate domain, and who were to be deterred from any further progress by their menaces and hostile deportment. after passing rather an unpleasant, and in many instances an insalubrious night, the travellers landed, about half-past eight in the morning, in the sight of a great multitude, that had assembled to gaze at them. passing through a place, where a large fair or market is held, and where many thousands of people had congregated for the purpose of trade, they entered an extensive and romantic town, called wow, which is situated in a valley. the majority of the inhabitants had never before had an opportunity of seeing white men, so that their curiosity, as may be supposed, was excessive. two of the principal persons came out to meet them, preceded by men bearing large silk umbrellas, and another playing a horn, which produced such terrible sounds, that they were glad to take refuge, as soon as they could, in the chief's house. the apartment, into which they were introduced was furnished with a roof precisely like that of a common english barn inverted. in the middle of it, which reached to within a few inches of the floor, a large square hole had been made to admit air and water to a shrub that was growing directly under it. the most remarkable, if not the only ornament in the room, were a number of human jaw bones, hung upon the side of the wall, like a string of onions. after a form and ceremonious introduction, they were liberally regaled with water from a calabash, which is a compliment the natives pay all strangers, and then they were shown into a very small apartment. here richard lander endeavoured to procure a little sleep having remained awake during the whole of the preceding night; but they were so annoyed by perpetual interruptions and intrusions, the firing of muskets, the garrulity of women, the unceasing squall of children, the drunken petition of men and boys, and a laugh, impossible to describe, but approximating more to the nature of a horse-laugh than any other, that it was found impossible to sleep for ten minutes together. the market of this place is supplied abundantly with indian corn, palm oil, &c., together with _trona,_ and other articles brought hither from the borders of the great desert, through the medium of the wandering arabs. according to the regulations of the fetish, neither a white man nor a horse is permitted to sleep at wow during the night season: as to the regulations respecting the horses, they knew not what had become of them; they were, according to the orders of adooley, to have preceded them to this place, but they had not then arrived. with respect to themselves, they found it necessary, in conformity to the orders of the fetish, to walk to a neighbouring village, and there to spend the night. their course to wow, through this creek, was north-by-east; and badagry, by the route they came, was about thirty miles distant. a violent thunder-storm, which on the coast is called a tornado, visited them this afternoon, and confined them to the "worst hut's worse room" till it had subsided, and the weather become finer. at three p.m. they sallied forth, and were presently saluted by hootings, groanings, and hallooings from a multitude of people of all ages, from a child to its grandmother, and they followed closely at their heels, as they went along, filling the air with their laughter and raillery. a merry-andrew at a country town in england, during the whitsuntide holidays, never excited so great a stir as did the departure of the travellers from the town of wow. but it is "a fool's day," and, no doubt, some allowance ought to be made for that. they had not proceeded more than a dozen paces from the outskirts of the town, when they were visited by a pelting shower, which wetted them to the skin in a moment. a gutter or hollow, misnamed a pathway, was soon overflowed, and they had to wade in it up to their knees in water, and through a most melancholy-looking forest, before they entered a village. it was called _sagba,_ and was about eight miles from wow. they were dripping wet on their arrival, and the weather still continuing unpleasant, it was some time before any one made his appearance to invite them into a hut. at length the chief came out to welcome them to his village, and immediately introduced them into a long, narrow apartment, wherein they were to take up their quarters for the night. it was built of clay, and furnished with two apertures, to admit light and air into the room. one end was occupied by a number of noisy goats, whilst the travellers took possession of the other. pascoe and his wife lay on mats at their feet, and a native toby philpot, with his ruddy cheek and jug of ale, belonging to the chief, separated them from the goats. the remainder of the suite of the travellers had nowhere whatever to sleep. the walls of their apartment were ornamented with strings of dry, rattling, human bones, written charms, or fetishes, sheep skins, and bows and arrows. they did not repose nearly so comfortably as could have been desired, owing to the swarms of mosquitoes and black ants, which treated them very despitefully till the morning. between six and seven on the morning of the nd april, they continued their route through woods and large open patches of ground, and at about eleven in the forenoon, they arrived at the borders of a deep glen, more wild, romantic, and picturesque than can be conceived. it was enclosed and overhung on all sides by trees of amazing height and dimensions, which hid it in deep shadow. fancy might picture a spot so silent and solemn as this, as the abode of genii and fairies, every thing conducing to render it grand, melancholy, and venerable, and the glen wanted only a dilapidated castle, a rock with a cave in it, or something of the kind, to render it the most interesting place in the universe. there was, however, one sight more beautiful than all the rest, and that was the incredible number of butterflies fluttering about like a swarm of bees, and they had no doubt chosen this glen as a place of refuge against the fury of the elements. they were variegated by the most brilliant tints and colourings imaginable: the wings of some of them were of a shining green, edged and sprinkled with gold; others were of a sky-blue and silver, others of purple and gold a lightfully blending into each other, and the wings of some were like dark silk velvet, trimmed and braided with lace. the appearance of the travelling party was romantic in the extreme, as they winded down the paths of the glen; with their grotesque clothing and arms, bundles, and fierce black countenances, they might have been mistaken for a strange band of ruffians of the most fearful character. besides their own immediate party, they had hired twenty men of adooley, to carry the luggage, as there are not any beasts of burthen in the country, the natives carrying all their burthens upon their heads, and some of them of greater weight than are seen carried by the irishwomen from the london markets. being all assembled at the bottom of the glen, they found that a long and dangerous bog or swamp filled with putrid water, and the decayed remains of vegetable substances intersected their path, and must necessarily be crossed. boughs of trees had been thrown into the swamp by some good-natured people to assist travellers in the attempt, so that their men, furnishing themselves with long poles which they used as walking sticks, with much difficulty and exertion, succeeded in getting over, and fewer accidents occurred to them, than could have been supposed possible, from the nature of the swamp. john lander was taken on the back of a large and powerful man of amazing strength. his brawny shoulders supported him, without any apparent fatigue on his part, and he carried him through bog and water, and even branches of tress, no bigger than a man's leg, rendered slippery with mud, in safety to the opposite side. although he walked as fast and with as much ease as his companions, he did not set him down for twenty minutes; the swamp being, as nearly as they could guess, a full quarter of a mile in length. they then walked to a small village called basha, whence, without stopping, they continued their journey, and about four in the afternoon, passed through another village somewhat larger than the former, which is called soato. here they found themselves so much exhausted with over fatigue and want of food, that they were compelled to sit down and rest awhile. the people, however, were a very uncourteous and clownish race, and teazed them so much with their rudeness and begging propensities, that they were glad to prosecute their journey to save themselves from any further importunities. having passed two other swamps, in the same manner as they had done before, they were completely tired, and could go no further, for they had been walking during the whole of the day in an intricate miserable path, sometimes exposed to the sun, and sometimes threading their way through a tangled wood. some of the people were sent to the next town, to fetch the horses promised by adooley, during the absence of whom, the two landers reposed themselves under a grove of trees, which was in the neighbourhood of a body of stagnant water, in which women were bathing, who cast long side glances at the two white men, who were observing all their motions. it was a low, marshy, and unwholesome spot; and although a village was not many miles ahead, yet they were unable to walk to it. under these circumstances, they had no other alternative than to rest there for the night, and they had made fires of dried wood and fallen leaves, and had prepared to repose for the night under a canopy of trees, and were in fact actually stretched at full length on the turf for that purpose, when they were agreeably surprised by the arrival of four of their men from the village with hammocks, for although sleeping in the open air, with heaven for their canopy, in a dark wood, may be all very romantic and pretty in description, yet in reality nothing could be more disagreeable, for the crawling of ants, black worms, &c., over their faces was sufficient to dispel every delightful fancy, which might have been engendered in the brain. these hammocks were highly acceptable, and they were lifted into them with very grateful feelings. it was also exceedingly pleasant, after a long day's journey on foot, to be carried along so easily, and to see the parrots and other birds, with a number of grinning, chattering monkeys, capering from the lofty branches of the trees, and making the woods resound with their hideous screams. after a charming journey of eight or ten miles, they entered the large and populous town of bidjie, where the landers first crossed clapperton's route, and where captain pearse and dr. morrison fell sick on the last expedition. about a quarter of a mile from the town they were met by a fellow with a cow's horn, who, chiming in with a trumpeter, who had accompanied them from wow, produced a harmony surpassing all that they had as yet heard. two men followed the bidjie musician with umbrellas of variegated silk, and, thus honoured and escorted, they were set down, amidst a crowd of people, in the centre of the town. as usual, the natives testified the wild delight they felt at the visit of the white men, by clapping of hands and loud shouts of laughter. in a short time, the noise of three or four drums was heard, which was an announcement that the chief was prepared to receive them, on which the multitude quitted them simultaneously, and rushed to the spot where he was sitting, and to which, they were also desired to proceed. the chief shook hands with them in great good humour; and they remarked with pleasure, or they fancied they did, that not only his laugh, but that of the people, was a more social and civilized kind of sound, than what of late they had been accustomed to hear. nevertheless, when john lander shook hands with the chief's son, which act was not very diverting in itself, the bystanders set up so general a roar of laughter, that the town rang with the noise; and when lander ventured further to place his hand on his head, they were yet more amazingly pleased, and actually "shrieked like mandrakes torn out of the earth." as soon as the ceremony of introduction was over, and the admiration of the people was confined within rational bounds, they wished the chief a pleasant night's rest, and were conducted into a comfortable airy hut, which had a verandah in front. the chief shortly afterwards sent them a goat for supper. they were now in momentary expectation of hearing some account of their horses from badagry, and indeed they waited the whole of the day at bidjie for that purpose, and in order that the men with the luggage might have time to overtake them, for they had been hindered by the swamps and quagmires, which they themselves found so much difficulty in crossing. just about sun-set, however, two fellows arrived from badagry with the mortifying intelligence, that their horses would not remain on the water in canoes, but having upset one of them, and kicked out the bottom of another, had swam ashore and been led back to badagry. they were fully convinced that this story was made up for the occasion, and thus by the bad faith of adooley they were deprived of their horses. they had put themselves in a fever by walking a journey of two days in one, and were likely to walk the remainder of the way to jenna in the glare and heat of the sun, for they had no umbrellas to screen themselves from his rays. richard lander paid eighty dollars for one of the horses, but adooley forgot to return the coin, and likewise kept for his own use a couple of saddles which were purchased at accra. late in the evening the expected carriers arrived with the luggage, some of which had been wetted and damaged in the marshes. they were now informed that horses would be sent them on the following day from jenna. during the greater part of the afternoon, richard lander amused himself in teaching the simple hearted chief to play on a child's penny jews-harp, many of which they had brought with them as presents; but his proficiency, owing to a wonderfully capacious mouth, and teeth of extraordinary size, was not near so flattering as could have been wished. his people, however, who had assembled in extraordinary numbers, were of a different opinion, and when they heard their chief draw the first sound from the little instrument, "shouts of applause ran rattling to the skies." a traveller in england, who enjoys the goodness of the roads, does not often murmur at the demands which are made upon his purse by the turnpike-keepers, but in africa the frequency of the turnpikes on the road from badagry to bidjie, was a matter of some surprise to the landers. human beings carrying burthens are the only persons who pay the turnpikes, for as to a horse or a carriage passing through them, it would be a scene of the greatest wonder. the landers, however, enjoyed the same privilege as the royal family of england, for being under the protection of the government, they as well as all their suite and baggage passed toll free. on sunday, april th, they arose at sunrise to make the necessary arrangements for leaving bidjie, which was no easy task, and shortly after they sent to signify their intention to the chief. he expressed a desire to see them as soon as they could conveniently come, accordingly after breakfast, they repaired to his habitation, which was contiguous to their own. after being conducted through a number of yards and huts, inhabited only by goats and sheep, which were tethered to posts, and a number of tame pigeons, they perceived the object of their visit squatting on a leopard's skin, under a decent looking verandah. he was surrounded by his drummers, and other distinguished persons, who made room for the travellers as they drew near. but the chief arose as soon as he saw them, and beckoning them to follow him, they were ushered through a labyrinth of low huts, and still lower doors, till at last they entered the innermost apartment of the whole suite, and here they were requested to sit down and drink rum. the doors they had seen were covered with figures of men, which exactly resembled certain rude attempts at portraying the human body, which may still be observed in several old chapels and churches in the west of england. the chief informed them that they were at liberty to quit bidjie, as soon as the heat of the sun should have somewhat abated, but previously to their departure he promised to return their visit. on leaving the place he followed them, though without their knowledge; but finding that they walked faster than he did, and that he could not keep pace with them, being a very bulky man, he hastily despatched a messenger to inform them that kings in africa, whatever they may do elsewhere, always walk with a slow and measured step, and that the strides of the travellers being long and vulgar, he would thank them to lessen their speed, and stop awhile to enable him to come up with them, which was of course agreed to by the travellers with great good will. a few minutes afterwards he reached their house, dressed in a tobe of green silk damask, very rich and showy, and a skull cap made of purple and crimson velvet. with the exception of strings of white beads, which encircled his arms, he used no personal ornaments. he remained chattering with them for a long time. many of the women of bidjie have the flesh on their foreheads risen in the shape of marbles, and their cheeks are similarly cut up deformed. the lobes of their ears are likewise pierced, and the holes made surprisingly large, for the insertion of pieces of and ivory into them, which is a prevailing fashion with all ranks. the church service was read this morning agreeably to their general custom. the natives, of whose society they were never able to rid themselves, seemed to attach great awe and reverence to their form of worship, for they had made them understand what if they were going about, which induced them to pay a high degree of silent attention to the ceremony, and set at rest for the time, that peculiar continuous laugh by which they are distinguished from their neighbours. in the afternoon, or as the natives express it, when the sun had lost its strength, they departed from the town of bidjie, accompanied by its good natured, happy governor, and in a very few minutes afterwards reached the banks of a rivulet called yow. butterflies were here more numerous than could be imagined, millions of them fluttered around them, and literally hid from their sight every thing but their own variegated and beautiful wings. here on the banks of the yow they took a last farewell of the affectionate old chief, who implored the "great god," to bless them, and as the canoes in which they had embarked moved from the spot, a loud long laugh, with clapping of hands from the lower classes, evinced the satisfaction they felt at having seen the white men, and their hearty wishes for their welfare. the yow is an extremely narrow rivulet, not more than a few feet in breadth, and flows in a serpentine direction through a flat country, covered with rushes, and tall, rank grass. crocodiles are said to resort here in great numbers, indeed the low bark or growl of these rapacious animals was heard distinctly, and in some instances quite close to them; after they had been pushed along against the stream by poles for five or six miles, between four and five o'clock in the afternoon they landed at a narrow creek, which ran a little way into a thick and gloomy forest. they had not proceeded more than two hundred yards on the pathway, when they were met by a messenger from jenna, who informed them that the owners of all the horses in the town, had ridden out to welcome their chief, and escort him to his residence, so that they should be obliged to walk the remainder of the way. a few minutes, however, only had elapsed before they descried a horse approaching them in the path, this was a goodly sight to them, who were already becoming wearied and sore with the exertions they had made during the day, for they did not reflect a moment that the animal might not after all be for their use. however, they soon met, and the rider immediately declared that he had left jenna purposely on their account. the head of the horse was loaded with charms and fetishes, enveloped in pieces of red and blue cloth. his saddle was of houssa manufacture, and uncommonly neat; in the interior such an article is only used by the principal people, and his bridle also was of curious workmanship. the horseman had an extravagant idea of his own consequence, and seemed to be a prodigious boaster. he wore abundance of clothing, most of which was superfluous, but it made him excessively vain. he informed the travellers that he had been despatched by the king of jenna, to meet them in the path, and to escort them to the capital; but understanding that adooley had supplied them with horses, he did not conceive it necessary to send others. the messenger, however, dismounted and offered them his horse, and the landers agreed that they should ride him in turns. they therefore immediately proceeded, and traversed a rich and various country, abounding plentifully with wood and water. a fine red sand covered the pathway, which they found to be in much better condition than any they had before seen. sometimes it winded through an open, level tract of fine grazing land, and then it again diverged through forests so thick and deep, that the light of the moon was unable to penetrate the gloom, and they were frequently left in comparatively midnight darkness. it is scarcely possible to give an adequate description of the magnificence, solemnity, and desolate repose of the awful solitudes through which they passed on this evening. they were, however, at times enlightened by the appearance of glow worms, which were so luminous that they could almost see to read by their golden splendour, and sometimes by the moonbeams, which trembled upon the leaves and branches of the trees. a fragrance also was exhaled from the forest, more odiferous than the perfume of violets or primroses, and they might almost fancy, when threading their way through scenery, which cannot be surpassed for beauty in any part of the world, that they were approaching those eternal shades, where, in ancient time, the souls of good men were supposed to wander. the woods rang with the song of the nightbirds, and the hum of the insects, which continued to salute them with little intermission till about ten o'clock at night, when they entered laatoo, a large and pleasant town. here they were informed that no house would be offered them, the fetish priest having declared that the moment a white man should enter the dwellings of the inhabitants, they would be seized by their enemies and enslaved. they arrived thirsty and exhausted, but for a long time could not procure even a drop of water. their tent had been left on the road for want of carriers, and they had made up their minds to rest under a tree, when about two hours afterwards it was fortunately brought into the town. they fixed it immediately, and having succeeded in procuring some wood from the inhospitable inhabitants, they kindled a fire in front of it, and whilst their attendants laid themselves in groups outside, the landers attempted to sleep within their tent, but it was in vain, so tormented were they with the mosquitoes and the ants. before sunrise, on the morning of the th of april, they were all on the alert, and struck their tent at a very early hour, they then sent the carriers onwards with the luggage and hastily left the town, without bidding adieu either to the chief or any of his people, on account of their inhospitality, and in an hour's time reached the extensive and important town of larro. on dismounting, they were first led to a large cleanly swept square, wherein was preserved the fetish of the place, which is the model of a canoe, having three wooden figures with paddles in it. after waiting in the shade for an hour, surrounded by an immense multitude of people of all ages, the chief's approach was announced by a general rush from their quarters, to the other end of the square, where he was walking. they went towards him in order to pay him the accustomed salutation of shaking hands, &c., but one of his followers fancying that john lander kept his master's hand clasped in his, longer than the occasion warranted, looked fiercely in his face, and snatched away his hand eagerly and roughly, without, however, uttering a word. "i could have pulled the fellow's ears with the greatest goodwill, in the world," says john lander, "had not the fear of secret revenge deterred me. as it was, i smothered my rising choler, and with my brother quietly followed the chief, to his principal hut, under whose verandah we were served with goora nuts in a huge pewter platter." presently the chief squatted himself down on a handsome rush mat, of native manufacture, and they were desired to sit by him, on an elegant turkey carpet, which had been laid there for the purpose. he was rather fancifully dressed; and wore two tobes, the one nearest the skin being of black silk velvet, and the other of crimson velvet, lined with sarsenet; his boots were of yellow leather, neatly worked, and his wrists were loaded with bracelets of silver and copper. the countenance of the chief betrayed much seriousness and solidity, and the diverting laugh of his countrymen was suspended by a sober cheerfulness. many of his wives sat behind him in rows, some of whom were of a bright copper colour, indeed a great number of the inhabitants of larro have fairer complexions than mulattoes. the yard of the hut was crammed full of curious and inquisitive people, who stood with open mouths during the audience. the chief wished to imprint strongly on their minds his own dignity and power; he said he was greater than the governor of jenna, inasmuch as the latter was a slave to the king of katunga, but himself was a free man. he would give them permission to depart to-morrow, he continued, and in the mean time would supply them with provisions. the chief was as good as his word, for shortly after they had quitted the hut they received a goat and some game, and he returned their visit in the cool of the evening. it appeared that it was not his general practice to drink spirituous liquors in presence of his people, as it may be against the law to do so, for having carefully excluded all prying eyes from their dwelling, and ordered a mat to be hung over the door-way, he even then turned his face to the wall, whenever he attempted to swallow the brandy that was offered to him. he remained with them rather better than an hour. on the presentation of the chief to them, a religious ceremony was performed, which was not observed in any other part of the country. a chapter from the koran was repeated to him by a mahommedan priest, to which both he and his people seemed to pay great attention. public schools are established in the town of larro, for the avowed purpose of teaching the rising generation the rudiments of the mahommedan religion. a singular custom prevails in the town, of compelling children at the breast to swallow a quantity of cold water from a calabash. an infant was nearly choked on this morning by the injection of more than a pint of water down its throat. whether the mothers follow this custom for the purpose of curing the children of any imaginary complaints, or, as is more probable, in the hope of rendering them less eager for their natural food, was not exactly to be ascertained. the inhabitants possess horses, asses, and mules, though not in any considerable numbers, they have, however, great abundance of sheep and goats, which are bred in the town; and their yards and huts are the common place of resort for those animals, indeed they may be said to grow up and live with the children of their owners. the landers amused themselves during the greater part of the day, in looking at the gambols of some very handsome goats, which had strayed into their abode, but the sheep were not near so tame or frolicsome, repelling all the advances towards a more familiar acquaintance, by timidity and ill nature. shrimps and fish, which are caught in the streams in the vicinity of the town, are daily exposed for sale, and the inhabitants appear to be in possession of a greater share of the necessaries and comforts of life, than their neighbours of the sea coast. they this day observed the country to be sensibly rising, and agriculture appeared to be conducted on a regular system, which was an evident proof of the active and industrious habits of the people. the gloomy fastnesses and wildnesses of nature, such as they passed on the first day or two of their journey from badagry, were less common as they advanced, and open glades with plantations of bananas, fields of yams and indian corn, all neatly fenced, met their view from the path of yesterday as well as on the present day. the inhabitants of larro also exhibit greater cleanliness of person and tidiness of apparel than the tribes nearer the sea-shore. those pests also, the unfortunate beggars, entirely disappeared, for the inhabitants of larro appeared to possess too much pride to beg. it was at larro that the two brothers began to feel the relaxing influence of the climate, but still their hearts were good, and they hoped, by the blessing of heaven, that their progress through the country might not be impeded by sickness. on tuesday, april th, the sun had scarcely risen above the horizon, and the mists of the morning yet hung upon the hills, than they quitted the town of larro, and pursued their journey on horseback. three horsemen from jenna followed them on the path, and they were enlivened by the wild jingling of their animals' bells, till they got within a mile of that town, where they alighted at a kind of turnpike, and fired a salute of two muskets. here they were met by a number of fellows with horns, who blew on them with the accustomed energy of the natives; these men preceded them over a bridge, which was thrown across a moat that surrounds jenna into the centre of the town, where they again alighted, and waited the chief's pleasure in an open shed. they had not been seated many seconds before an immense crowd of people pressed in upon them on every side, subjecting them to the accustomed inconvenience of want of air, strong unwholesome smells, and a confused hubbub, that defies description. never were the people more eager to behold a white man; the little ones formed themselves into a ring close to the shed, then followed those of maturer age, after them came a still older class, and the last circle consisted of people as tall as steeples; most of whom held infants in their arms. altogether a large amphitheatre was formed of black woolly heads, and white teeth set in jetty faces, and although the landers felt rather amazed at their innocent curiosity, and were obliged to wait a considerable time for the new chief, they could not help being highly diverted with the spectacle around them; at length, to their great relief and joy, intelligence was brought that the chief was ready to receive them. it appears that the principles of etiquette at the royal courts, whether of europe or of africa, are not definitively settled, for that which at the court of a william the fourth, would be considered as the extreme of rudeness and disrespect, is at the african courts construed into the most decisive testimony of good breeding and politeness. it may be difficult to determine to which the preference ought to be given, but as etiquette is an essential in all courts, no matter how far it departs from common sense and reason, we do not see why, as amongst the many fooleries which are enacted at courts, the african system should not be introduced. it happens, however, that the etiquette of the european and african are decidedly dissimilar: to make an individual wait is certainly considered in the former, as a breach of good manners, whereas in the latter, the longer a person is made to wait before the introduction takes place, the greater is the honour done him, and the higher is the rank of that person supposed to be, who exacts that ungracious duty. they discovered the chief, or rather governor, sitting on a piece of leather, under a large verandah at one end of a commodious square yard. he was clad in the prevailing finery of crimson velvet tobe and cap, both edged with gold lace. at his right hand sat his wives and women, and the brothers were desired to place themselves on his loft. the women sang the praises of their master in a loud unpleasant voice, in which they were assisted by the music, equally inharmonious, of drums, fifes, clarionets, and horns. on their wishing the chief all the happiness in the world, all the people who had flocked into the yard after them, and every one near the chief, prostrated themselves on the ground, and clapped their hands. goora nuts were now presented to them in water, and a profusion of compliments passed on both sides; but the dignity of the newly-made governor seemed to sit rather awkwardly upon him for he was as shy and bashful as a maiden, and really appeared agitated, and afraid of his white-faced visitants. strange as it may appear, the patience of the most patient people in the world was completely exhausted, as might be seen by the desertion of the premises before the travellers quitted them, notwithstanding the few words that had passed between them and the chief. the ceremony being over, they bade adieu to the chief, and having visited the grave of dr. morrison on their way, they repaired to a hut which had been got ready for their reception. the former governor of jenna, who it will be recollected treated the gentlemen composing the last mission so handsomely, died about fifteen months before the arrival of the landers, and the king of youriba chose one of the meanest of his slaves as his successor. this appears, however, to be an invariable rule with the sovereigns of that country, of which jenna is a province; for they fear as its distance from the capital is very great, that a person of higher rank, if possessed of talents and spirit, could easily influence the natives to throw off the yoke, and declare themselves independent of youriba. the then governor was a houssa man, and was raised to the dignity he then held, in all probability, on account of his childish simplicity, and artlessness, for a person with a countenance more indicative of innocence, and perhaps stupidity also, they never recollected to have seen. the qualities of his heart were, however, said to be excellent, and his manners were mild and amiable. he had been twelve months in coming from katunga to jenna; being under the necessity of stopping at every town between that place and the capital, to receive the applause and congratulations of the inhabitants, and to join in their festivities and amusements. the showers were now becoming heavier, and fell more frequently than heretofore, indeed the rainy season may be said fairly to have commenced, the thermometer, on the th of april, fell suddenly from ° to ", and remained stationary there for the whole of the day. on the th april they carried a present to the governor, which he received with every mark of satisfaction and gratitude; but he declared with sorrow that he should be obliged to send some of it to the king of katunga, who would not allow him to wear red cloth, till he had been a longer time established in his new situation. it is related in captain clapperton's journal, that one of old pascoe's wives eloped from him in katunga, whilst he was asleep, taking with her the trinkets mr. belzoni had given him, and said that she was never afterwards heard of. this woman had the effrontery to introduce herself into the house of the landers with an infant, whereof she asserted with warmth that pascoe was the father, and that she was determined to leave it upon his hands. she had prevailed upon a number of houssa women to accompany her, that they might endeavour to induce her quondam husband, who was a countryman of theirs, to receive the child, and make up the breach between them; but the infant not being more than nine or at most twelve months old, and three or four years having elapsed since the elopement took place, they were convinced that, independently of the age and infirmities of pascoe, it could not by any rule or law be his. accordingly, notwithstanding the uproar occasioned by the women's tongues, which, whether in africa or elsewhere, is a very serious matter, the mother with her spurious offspring, and the ladies who came to aid and abet her imposition, were turned out of the yard without any ceremony, to the great relief of pascoe, and his present wife, who felt rather uncomfortable, whilst the palaver was carrying on. the fetish priest of the town came dancing into the hut, shortly after the ladies had retired, looking exceedingly wild, and roaring as if possessed by an evil spirit. they paid little attention to the fellow's fooleries, who, not liking his reception, left the hut, after he had received the accustomed fee of a few kowries. the person and dress of the man, together with his whimsical ornaments, were admirably adapted to impose on the credulity and superstition of the inhabitants; although many people of the town, influenced perhaps by the spreading doctrines of mahomet, spoke their minds pretty freely, calling him a scoundrel and a devil. there was something peculiar in this priest's countenance, which could not be defined. on his shoulders he bore a large club, carved at one end with the figure of a man's head. a vast number of strings of kowries were suspended on this weapon, which were intermixed with shells, broken combs, small pieces of wood with rude imitations of men's faces cut on them, large sea-shells, bits of iron and brass, nut shells, &c. &c. perhaps, the number of kosries on his person did not fall far short of twenty thousand, and the weight of his various ornaments almost pressed him to the ground. after this fellow had left their apartment, three or four others came to torment them with drums, whistles, and horns, and began and ended the evening's serenade to their own infinite delight and satisfaction. the native drum answers the purpose of a tambourine, and bagpipe as well, and is of peculiar formation. its top is encircled with little brass bells, and is played upon with one hand, whilst the fingers of the other were employed at the same time in tapping on its surface. the instrument itself was held under the left arm, but instead of an outer wooden case, strings alone were used from end to end, which being pressed against the musician's side, sounds somewhat similar to those of a scotch bagpipe, but very inferior, are produced. the drummers, with their companions of the horns and whistles, subsist entirely on the charity of the public, who require their services on all occasions of general merriment and jollity. on the morning of the th of april, the two messengers who arrived at badagry whilst the landers were there, and stated that they had been employed for the purpose by the governor of jenna, were discovered to be impostors, and put in irons accordingly. but as the poor fellows had really been of essential service to them, inasmuch as by their representations, they had prevailed upon adooley to give them leave to proceed on their journey much sooner than they themselves could have done; they thought proper to intercede, in their behalf, and although they were to have been sold for their deception, they were set at liberty. the person also who had met them with a horse after crossing the river yow near bidjie, proceeded thither on his own account, without the knowledge or consent of the governor, but as he was a fellata and a respectable man, little was said or done about that matter. the only motive, which could have influenced these three men in their projects of assisting the travellers, had been without doubt in the expectation of receiving a trifling remuneration, and of this, notwithstanding an injunction to the contrary from the governor, they did not disappoint them, their services were well timed and very acceptable, and amply deserved the reward of a few needles and scissors. the travellers were this morning witnesses to a specimen of native tumbling and dancing, with the usual accompaniments of vocal and instrumental music; by far the most diverting part of the entertainment was the dancing, but even this did not at all answer the expectations they had formed of it. the dancers were liberally supplied with country beer, and like most amusements of the kind, this one ended in wrangling and intoxication. the fellows who accompanied them as guides from badagry, and who, in their native place would sell their birthright for a glass of rum, had now washed themselves, and thrown aside their rags, appearing in all public places in borrowed finery. they now never left their habitations without adooley's sword, which they had with them, and a host of followers. on this morning, they attended the celebration of the games in showy apparel, with silk umbrellas held over their heads; and amongst other articles of dress, the principal of them wore an immense drab-coloured quaker's hat of the coarsest quality. so great were their ostentation and pride, that they would scarcely deign to speak to a poor man. it was now they learned with great regret, that all the horses of the late governor of jenna, had been interred according to custom with the corpse of their master, and they consequently began to be apprehensive that they should be obliged to walk the whole of the way to katunga, as the present ruler was not the owner of a single beast of burthen. this piece of ill news was carefully withheld from the travellers, until the presents had been all duly delivered to the governor and his head men; but in this instance, the latter alone were to blame. matters being thus unpleasantly situated, they sent a messenger to the chief of larro, informing him of the circumstance, and entreating him to redeem his promise of lending them a horse and mule; and another messenger was sent to adooley, requesting him to despatch immediately, at least one of their horses from badagry, for they had found it impossible to proceed without them. it was not supposed that he would pay any attention to the request; and yet on the other hand, it was scarcely to be imagined that he would carry his chicanery so far, because he must fear that the variety of orders they had given him, to receive valuable presents from england, would never be honoured by their countrymen, if he refused to fulfil his engagements with them. since the demise of the late governor, it was calculated that jenna had lost more than five hundred of its population, chiefly by wars, intestine broils, &c. and all for want of a ruler. it must not, however, be imagined, that because the people of this country are almost perpetually engaged in conflicts with their neighbours, the slaughter of human beings is therefore very great. they pursue war, as it is called, partly as an amusement, or "to keep their hands in it," and partly to benefit themselves by the capture of slaves. as they were sailing down the coast, they were informed that the natives of la hoo, and jack-a-jack, had been warring for three years previously, and were still at variance, but during that long period only one single decrepit old woman, who found it no easy matter to run as fast as her countrymen, was left behind, and became the solitary victim of a hundred engagements. much after the same fashion are the bloodless wars of jenna. success depends much more on the cunning and address of the parties, than on any extraordinary display of intrepidity, and living not dead subjects are sought after, so that it is their interest to avoid hard blows, and enrich themselves by the sale of their prisoners. perhaps the extraordinary decrease in the population of jenna, has arisen principally from the desertion of slaves, who embrace the opportunity, whilst their masters are from home, engaged in predatory excursions, of running away; and thus the latter often become losers instead of gainers by their unnatural passion for stealing their fellow creatures. the individuals captured are sent to the coast, and the chiefs of those unsettled and barbarous tribes that inhabit it, are appointed agents to regulate the sale of them, for which they receive half the profits. late in the evening, the young fellata already mentioned, paid them a visit, and offered his horse for sale. he was a mahommedan priest, and was accompanied by a countryman of the same persuasion, but neither of the holy men appeared in their dealing to understand the meaning of truth or justice. an agreement was made and thirty dollars paid. the merchant implored them not to tell his father, who was the real owner of the horse, that he had sold him for less money than he had received, and in this request, he was seconded by his more venerable friend, because he said he wanted a small sum for his private use, which he knew his parent would refuse him. the words were hardly out of their mouths, before the two mussulmans publicly went through their ablutions in front of the house, where, turning their faces to the east, they seemed to pray very devoutly to the founder of their faith. when this was concluded, they sang an arabic hymn with great solemnity, and the whole had a wonderful and immediate effect on the feelings of many of their followers in the yard, who, mistaking loudness of voice for fervour, and hypocritical seriousness for piety, made the two worshippers a present of money. the fellatas are generally supposed to be spies from soccatoo, but although this is a very prevalent opinion, no measures whatever have yet been taken either to watch their motions, or question them as to their intentions. the women of jenna employ themselves generally either in spinning cotton, or preparing indian corn for food. much of the former material grows in the vicinity of the town, but the cultivation of the plant is not carried on with that spirit which it deserves. silk, which is brought over land from tripoli, the inhabitants sometimes interweave in their cotton garments, but such being very expensive, are only worn by the higher class of people. they have abundance of sheep, bullocks, pigs, goats, and poultry, but they prefer vegetable food to animal; their diet, indeed, is what we should term poor and watery, consisting chiefly of preparations of the yam and indian corn, notwithstanding which a stronger or more athletic race of people is nowhere to be met with. burdens with them, as with the natives of many parts of the continent, are invariably carried on the head, which, it is more than likely, occasions that dignified uprightness of form, and stateliness of walk, so often spoken of by those acquainted with the pleasing peculiarities, of the african female. the weight of a feather is borne on the head in preference to its being carried in the hand; and it not infrequently requires the united strength of three men to lift a calabash of goods from the ground to the shoulder of one, and then, and not till then, does the amazing strength of the african appear. the greater part of the inhabitants of jenna have the hair of their head and their eyebrows shaven. but the governor's ministers and servants wear their hair in the shape of a horse shoe as a mark of distinction. it is confined to the crown of the head by large daubs of indigo, and none of the people presuming to imitate it, it answers the purpose of a livery. the early part of the morning of april th, was obscured by a mist or haze, which was as thick, and at least as unwholesome, as a london fog in november, but between nine and ten o'clock it dispersed; and the sun shone out with uncommon lustre. the hut which they occupied was in a large square yard, and was the property of the late governor's wife, whose story is rather romantic. each of its sides was formed by huts, which had all at one time been inhabited, but a fire having broken out in one of them by some accident, the greater part perished. a few huts were only then standing, together with black, naked walls, and stakes, which supported the verandahs, the latter reduced to charcoal. the tenantable buildings were inhabited by the female slaves of the owner of the square, and the travellers and their suite. it is the custom in this place, when a governor dies, for two of his favourite wives to quit the world on the same day, in order that he may have a little, pleasant, social company in a future state; but the late governor's devoted wives had neither ambition nor inclination to follow their venerable husband to the grave, not having had or got, according to their opinion, enough of the good things of this world; they therefore went, and hid themselves before the funeral ceremonies were performed, and had remained concealed ever since with the remainder of their women. on this, day, however, one of these unfortunates, the individual to whom the house belonged, which the travellers resided, was discovered in her hiding place at the present governor's, and the alternative of a poisoned chalice, or to have her head broken by the club of a fetish priest, was offered her. she chose the former mode of dying, as being the less terrible of the two; and she, on this morning, came to their yard, to spend her last hours in the society of her faithful slaves, by whom she was addressed by the endearing name of mother. poor creatures! as soon as they learnt her misfortune, they dropped their spinning; the grinding of corn was also relinquished; their sheep, goats, and poultry were suffered to roam at large without restraint, and they abandoned themselves to the most excessive and poignant grief; but now, on the arrival of their mistress, their affliction seemed to know no bounds. there is not to be found in the world perhaps, an object more truly sorrowful, than a lonely defenceless woman in tears; and on such an occasion as this, it may very easily be conceived that the distress was more peculiarly cutting. a heart that could not be touched at a scene of this nature, must be unfeeling indeed. females were arriving the whole day, to condole with the old lady, and to weep with her, so that the travellers neither heard nor saw any thing but sobbing and crying from morning to the setting of the sun. the principal males in the town likewise came to pay their last respects to their mistress, as well as her grave-digger, who prostrated himself on the ground before her. notwithstanding the representations and remonstrances of the priest, and the prayers of the venerable victim to her gods, for fortitude to undergo the dreadful ordeal, her resolution forsook her more than once. she entered the yard twice to expire in the arms of her women, and twice did she lay aside the fatal draught, in order to take another walk, and gaze once more on the splendour of the sun and the glory of the heavens, for she could not bear the idea of losing sight of them forever. she was for some time restless and uneasy, and would gladly have run away from death, if she durst; for that imaginary being appeared to her in a more terrible light, than our pictures represent him with his shadowy form and fatal dart. die she must, and she knew it; nevertheless she tenaciously clung to life till the very last moment. in the mean time her grave was preparing, and preparations were making for a wake at her funeral. she was to be buried in one of her own huts, the moment after the spirit had quitted the body, which was to be ascertained by striking the ground near which it might be lying at the time, when, if no motion or struggle ensued, the old woman was to be considered as dead. the poison used by the natives on these occasions, destroys life, it is reported, in fifteen minutes. the reason of the travellers not meeting with a better reception when they slept at laatoo, was the want of a chief to that town, the last having followed the old governor of jenna, to the eternal shades, for he was his slave. widows are burnt in india, just as they are poisoned or _clubbed_ at jenna, but in the former country no male victims are destroyed on such occasions. the original of the abominable custom at jenna, of immolating the favourite wives, is understood to have arisen from the dread on the part of the chiefs of the country in olden times, that their principal wives, who alone were in possession of their confidence, and knew where their money was concealed, might secretly attempt their life, in order at once to establish their own freedom, and become possessed of the property; that, so far from entertaining any motive to destroy her husband, a woman might on the contrary have a strong inducement to cherish him as long as possible, the existence of the wife was made to depend entirely on that of her lord, and this custom has been handed down from father to son even to the present time. but why men also, who can have no interest to gain on the death of their prince, should be obliged to conform to the same rite, is not to be so easily accounted for. the individual, who was governor of jenna at the time of the visit of the landers, must of necessity go down to the grave on the first intelligence of the demise of the king of youriba, and as that monarch was a very aged man, the situation of the former was not the most enviable in the world. previously to her swallowing the poison, the favourite wife of a deceased chief or ruler destroys privately all the wealth, or rather money of her former partner, in order that it may not fall into the hands of her successor. the same custom is observed at badagry also, and although the king's son may be of age at the period of his father's death, he inherits his authority and influence only. he is left to his own sagacity and exertions to procure wealth, which can seldom be obtained without rapine, enslavement, and bloodshed. whenever a town is deprived of its chief, the inhabitants acknowledge no law; anarchy, troubles, and confusion immediately prevail, and until a successor is appointed, all labour is at an end. the stronger oppress the weak, and perpetrate every species of crime, without being amenable to any tribunal for their actions. private property is no longer respected, and thus, before a person arrives to curb its licentiousness, a town is not unfrequently reduced from a flourishing state of prosperity and of happiness to all the horrors of desolation. considerable surprise was now excited at the delay of the messenger, who was sent to badagry for the horses, on which they placed so much value, for he had not yet returned, although he promised to be back in four days from the time of his departure. as he had exceeded the time by a whole day, and being a native of badagry, the travellers had given up all hopes of again seeing either him or the horse, or even the message sword they had lent him as a token that he had been sent by them. positive assurances were given them that leave would be granted to depart from jenna on the following week, but as they had only one horse, they would be obliged to take it in turns to ride, or procure a hammock, which it would be a difficult thing to get, and attended with considerable expense. in the mean time, the devoted old queen dowager engrossed the chief part of their attention, although her doom was inevitably fixed, yet her cheerfulness appeared rather to increase, and she seemed determined to spin out her thread of life to its utmost limit; spies were now set over her, and she was not permitted to go out of the yard. on monday the th of april, the travellers had the customary visit to their yard of a long line of women, who came every morning with rueful countenances and streaming eyes to lament the approaching death of the old widow. they wept, they beat their breast and tore their hair; they moaned, and exhibited all manner of violent affliction at the expected deprivation. perhaps their sorrow was sincere, perhaps it was feigned; at all events their lamentations were ungovernable and outrageous; the first woman in the line begins the cry, and is instantly followed by the other voices; the opening notes of the lamentation were rather low and mournful, the last wild and piercing. the principal people of the place finding the old lady still obstinately bent on deferring her exit, sent a messenger to her native village, to make known to her relatives, that should she make her escape, they would take all of them into slavery, and burn their town to ashes, in conformity to an established and very ancient law. they therefore strongly advised the relatives of the old woman for their own sakes, and for the sake of the public, to use all their endeavours to prevail upon her to meet her fate honourably and with fortitude. a deputation was expected from the village on the morrow, when no doubt, after a good deal of crying and condoling, and talking and persuading, the matter will eventually be decided against the old lady. it was well understood that she had bribed a few of the most opulent and influential inhabitants of jenna with large sums of money, to induce them to overlook her dereliction from the path of duty, and by their representations that she had obtained the tacit consent of the king of katunga to live out the full term of her natural life. but the people for many miles round, horror-struck at such impiety and contempt for ancient customs, rose to enforce the laws of her country against her. on tuesday april th, the town of jenna was visited by one of those terrific thunder storms, which are so prevalent in those latitudes. the thatched hut in which the landers resided, afforded but an insecure and uncertain asylum against its fury. part of the roof was swept away, and the rain admitted freely upon their beds, whence the most awful lightning flashes could be seen, making "darkness visible." it appeared as if the genius of the storm were driving through the murky clouds in his chariot of fire to awaken the slumbering creation, and make them feel and acknowledge his power. it was, indeed, a grand lesson to human pride, to contemplate the terrors of a tornado through the trembling walls and roof of a gloomy dilapidated hut in the interior of africa. it is scenes like these, which make the traveller think of his home, his friends, and his fireside enjoyments, and by comparison, estimate the blessings which are his portion in his native land. in civilized countries, when men are visited by an awful calamity of this kind, the distinctions of rank are levelled, and numbers flock together, for the purpose of keeping each other in countenance, and strengthening each other's nerves; but here all was naked, gloomy, desolate. they passed the night, as may be supposed, in a very uncomfortable state. the roof of their dwelling had long been infested with a multitude of rats and mice; and these vermin being dislodged from their haunts, by the violence of the wind and rain, sought immediate shelter between their bed-clothes; and to this very serious inconvenience was added another still greater, viz. the company of lizards, ants, mosquitoes, besides worms and centipedes, and other crawling, creeping, and noxious things, which the tempest seemed to renovate with life and motion. after a long, long night, the morning at length appeared, and the terrors of the storm were forgotten. not long after sunrise, two fresh legions of women entered their yard, to mourn with their old mistress, and the shrieks and lamentations of these visitors, were more violent than any of their predecessors. it made them shudder to hear their cries. the piercing cries, that assailed the ears of telemachus, at his entrance into the infernal regions, were not more dolorous or fearful. their eyes were red with weeping; their hands were clasped on the crown of the head; their hair was in frightful disorder, and two channels of tears were plainly seen flowing down over the naked bosom of each of the women. in this manner they passed before the threshold of the hut in two close lines, and were observed to bend the knee to the venerable matron, without uttering a word. they then rose and departed, and their cries could be heard long after they were out of sight. matters were now arranged for their departure, and after breakfast they went to pay their last respects to the governor. of course they were obliged to wait a tiresome length of time outside his residence, before admittance was obtained; but when the doors were opened, the band that were in attendance inside, played a native tune as a token of welcome. a greater number of drummers were observed than on any former occasion. some of their instruments were something in the shape of a cone, and profusely ornamented with plates and figures of brass. on one of these was represented the busts of two men, with a tortoise in the act of eating out of the mouth of one of them. the tortoise had a cock by its side, and two dogs standing as guardians of the whole. these figures were ail ingeniously carved in solid brass. both ends of the larger drums were played on with the palms of the hand; hundreds of little brass bells were suspended round the edges for ornament rather than use; for being without clappers, they could not produce any sound. the common native drum is beaten on one of its ends only, and with a stick shaped like a bow. after a little conversation, the chief and his principal people shook the landers affectionately by the hand, and wished them every blessing; and as soon as they got outside the yard, they mounted their horses and rode out of the town. the chief of larro had broken his promise, but they were fortunate enough to meet with and purchase another horse that morning, so that they cared little about it. their pathway led through a champaign country, partially wooded; and after a pleasant ride of three quarters of an hour, they entered the small village of bidjie. here their carriers dropped their loads, nor could they be induced to resume them by the most pressing solicitations. nor would the villagers, as their duty required, take them up; but when they were begged to do so, they laughed at them, so that they were compelled to remain at bidjie until the following day. this was very provoking, but such was the tiresome mode of travelling through this country. no consideration can induce the natives to shake off their habitual indolence, not if a voice from heaven were to be heard, would they do it. pleasure and sloth are with them synonymous terms, and they are scarcely alive to any other gratification. in the mean time, the chief, who appeared to be a very good sort of man, although he had little authority over his people, sent them a fatted goat; and being in good health, and having very encouraging prospects held out to them as to their future progress, they were determined to forget their little troubles and vexations, and spend the evening as cheerfully as they could. hawks and vultures are exceedingly numerous both at jenna and this place, the former are bold and disgusting birds, but the latter are so hungry and rapacious that they pounce fearlessly in the midst of the natives when at their meals. whilst the landers were at supper, one of them darted at a piece of meat, which one of their men held between his fingers, and snatched it from him whilst he was conveying it to his mouth. at an early hour of wednesday the th april, to the infinite surprise and pleasure of the landers, the man from badagry made his appearance with one of their horses and an english saddle. the latter was as acceptable to them as the horse, for on the preceding day, for want of a saddle, they were obliged to substitute a piece of cloth, and the back of the animal being as sharp as a knife, it was no very pleasant thing to ride him; walking would have been the far less irksome exercise of the two. pascoe, whose sagacity and experience proved of infinite service to them, was lamed in his endeavours to walk as fast as the rest of the party, and as he had the misfortune of having one leg shorter than the other he became the general butt and laughing stock of his more robust companions. this day, however, they mounted him on the extra horse, on the back of which he retorted their revilings, and the whole of them became as envious of his dignity, as they were before facetious at his expense. they took their departure from bidjie while the morning was yet cool and pleasant, and arrived at chow before eleven o'clock in the forenoon. the natives have an unaccountable fancy that white men are fond of poultry to an excess, insomuch that whenever they entered a town or village, all the fowls were immediately seized and confined in a place of security until their departure. several strangers accompanied them from town to town, for the purpose of evading the duty which is exacted at the turnpike gates, by stating themselves to be of the number of their attendants. women also placed themselves under the protection of their men from cape coast castle, in order that they might enjoy a similar advantage; in return for this favour, they showed a great willingness to do for them many little kind offices, and they were found particularly useful in making fires, preparing food, &c. for the whole of the party. their journey throughout the whole of this day was extremely pleasant. at one time the path ran in a serpentine direction through plains covered with green turf, at another it led them amidst large groves of stately trees, from whose branches a variety of playful chattering monkeys diverted them by their mischievous tricks, and the grey parrot, with its discordant, shrill scream, and other beautiful birds, "warbled their native wood notes wild." the chief of chow, who received and entertained captain clapperton, had been dead some time, and was succeeded by a humble, good natured, and active individual, who treated the white men more like demi-gods than human beings. at the time of their arrival, he was engaged in superintending the slaves at his corn and yam plantations, but he hastened to them the moment he was informed of the circumstance. he possessed a number of horses, one of which was the smallest and most beautiful animal they ever beheld. in the evening, the chief visited them again with a present of provisions, and a few goora nuts. richard lander took the opportunity of playing on a bugle horn in his presence, by which he was violently agitated, under the supposition that the instrument was nothing less than a snake. for the first time since their landing they observed the loom in active operation; the manufacture of cotton cloth is, however, carried on exclusively by women, the men appearing too slothful and indolent to undertake any labour, which might subject them to fatigue. on the following day the path wound through a country charmingly diversified by hill and dale, woods and open glades, and watered by streams flowing over beds of fine white sand. a horseman from katunga met them about ten o'clock in the morning, whose dress and accoutrements were highly grotesque. he neither stopped nor spoke, but couched his lance as he gallopped past them. it was supposed that he was the bearer of a message to the chief of jenna, from the king of katunga, and that it had some reference to themselves, but whether it was an act of caution or of compliment could not be ascertained. they met a number of people of both sexes in the path, who were returning from egga to chow, and several naked boys on their way to the coast, under the care of guardians. these were slaves, and would be most likely sold at badagry. some of the woman bore burdens on their heads, that would have tired a mule and broken the neck of a covent garden irish woman, and children not more than five or six years old trudged after them with loads that would have given a full grown person in europe the brain fever. they departed from chow before sunrise; a surprising dew had fallen during the night and distilled from the leaves and branches in large drops. they passed during the forenoon, over three or four swampy places, covered with reeds, rushes, and rank grass, which were inhabited by myriads of frogs of prodigious size. on crossing the streams, they were invariably saluted by a loud and unaccountable hissing, as if from a multitude of serpents. they could not account for this extraordinary noise in any other way, than by supposing it to have proceeded from some species of insects, whose retreats they had invaded. with very trifling manual labour, the path, which was little better than a mere gutter formed by repeated rains, might be converted into a good and commodious road; and were a tree simply thrown over them, the streams and morasses might be crossed with ease and safely. but the natives appeared to have no idea whatever of such improvements, and would rather be entangled in thick underwood, and wade through pools of mud and water, than give themselves any trouble about repairing the road. but the native, however, says to himself, and not unjustly, _cui bono?_ neither in england or in africa are individuals to be found, who will undertake a work of difficulty and fatigue gratuitously, merely for the benefit and accommodation of others; characters of that description are very rarely to be found, and perhaps the interior of africa is the last place in the world where we should look for them. an englishman might find it to be his interest to repair the roads on which he is frequently obliged to travel; but what benefit can accrue to the uncivilized african, and particularly the slave, who has not a blade of grass under the canopy of heaven, which he can call his own, to trouble himself about the repair of a road, on which he might never have occasion to travel, and which, with the great uncertainty which is always hanging over his future condition in life, he may never fee again. trees not unfrequently fall across the pathway, but instead of removing them, the people form a large circuit round them, even a small ant hill is an object too mighty to be meddled with, and it is left in the centre of the narrow road, to be jumped over, or to be travelled round, according to the option of the traveller. several women, with little wooden figures of children on their heads, passed them in the course of the morning; they were mothers, who, having lost a child, carry these rude imitations of them about their persons for an indefinite time, as a symbol of mourning. not one of them could be induced to part with one of these little affectionate memorials. they entered egga, which is a very large town, in the early part of the afternoon. on their arrival, they were introduced into the house occupied by captain clapperton on his last journey, in the yard of which, repose the remains of an englishman, named dawson, who died here of a fever when that officer passed through the country. both the hut and yard were soon tilled with people, and were in a state of filth, which baffles all description. they could not by any means rid themselves of sheep, goats, and fowls, with their train; in spite of all their attempts to remove them, they were determined to be their companions, and this grievance, added to the tongues of a hundred visitors, made their situation all but intolerable. egga is the principal market town in this part of africa, and is attended by buyers and sellers for many miles round. women here are the chief, if not the only traders, most of them are of graceful and prepossessing exterior, and they all practise those petty tricks and artifices in their dealings, with which the market women of more civilized countries are not unacquainted. this day, april th, was one of the hottest they ever remember to have felt. they found the path in much better condition, than that on which they had previously travelled, and it lay almost entirely through plantations of yams, calavances and pumpkins, and three or four different varieties of corn, which a number of labourers were employed in weeding, &c. the hoe is the only implement of husbandry in use, and indeed they can well dispense with every other, because the soil, during the rainy months, is so soft and light, that but very little manual exertion in working it is required. population is abundant, labourers may be hired to any number; and it may be affirmed that he introduction of the plough would scarcely be a blessing, but on the contrary, it would furnish fresh encouragement to the general sin of indolence. having crossed at noon a small but agreeable river flowing from east to west, in which several females were bathing and washing clothes, they shortly afterwards entered the capacious and populous town of jedoo. here they were informed that the chief had been in the grave more than a twelvemonth; and that no one having yet been nominated to succeed him, every thing continued in a state of confusion and misrule. they were conducted, after having waited a little, into a large yard belonging to the late governor, and in a short time received a visit from his brother, in company with all the elders of the place; their conversation was, however, very unpleasant, and their whole behaviour much cooler than was agreeable, the more so as such a reception had been entirely unexpected. the yard in which they resided, was perfectly circular, and walled with huts, all tenanted by the late chiefs widows, who employ their time and earn their livelihood by spinning and weaving. not less than a hundred of the king of katunga's ladies were lodging in the yard with them. they had all passed the bloom of life, and had lately arrived with loads of trona and country cloth, which they barter for salt, and various articles of european manufacture, particularly beads; with these they return home, and expose them for sale in the market, and afterwards the profits are taken to their husbands. these royal ladies are distinguished from their countrywomen only by a peculiar species of cloth, which is wrapped round their goods, and which no one dared to imitate on pain of perpetual slavery. this severe punishment is often inflicted, for, as the king's wives pay no tribute or turnpike dues whatever, and must besides be entertained by the chiefs of every town through which they pass, strong inducements are offered for others to attempt to deceive, by using the forbidden cloth, and hence examples are necessary. as a contrast to the afflicted females of jenna, the wives of the king of katunga all fell to crying for joy this evening, on recognizing a few old acquaintance in the yard, who soon joined them in the melancholy music. it was highly ridiculous to see them, for after the first burst had subsided, they began to chat with a garrulity far beyond that of the most talkative of their european sisters. the conversation lasted more than an hour, till at last it resolved itself into a violent quarrel, which lasted during the remainder of the day. it was now ten o'clock, and the women were still sitting in groups round the several wood fires. the travellers themselves only occupied a small verandah, which was simply the projection of the roof of a thatched hut. their horses were fastened to wooden stakes in the centre of the yard; their men were lying round them, warming themselves at their own fires. sheep, beautiful sheep with tinkling bells hung round their necks, were chewing the cud in peace and happiness. but notwithstanding it was the hour of repose, the tongues of the female travellers were making a clatter which all the women of billingsgate could not rival, and together with the squalling of brats innumerable, completely spoiled the emotions, which the wild and pleasing scene around them would otherwise have awakened in their breasts. the sheep here are regarded with as much partiality, and treated much in the same manner as ladies lap dogs are in england. great care is taken to keep them clean and in good condition; they are washed every morning in soap and water; and so greatly are they attached to their masters or mistresses, that they are constantly at their meals, following them in doors and out, from town to town, and in all their peregrinations. goats, sheep, swine and poultry are in great plenty here, and in the possession of every one, notwithstanding which they are always excessively dear, because the people take a pride in displaying the number and quality of their domesticated animals. the inhabitants of jeado are in general very decently dressed in cotton dresses of their own manufacture. in their persons, they are much more agreeable, than those who reside near the sea. european goods are brought hither from dahomey and badagry, but more especially from lagos, and are daily exposed for sale in the markets of jadoo and egga. several chiefs on the road, questioned the travellers to account to them for the portuguese not purchasing so many slaves as formerly, and they made very sad complaints of the stagnation of that branch of traffic. it would perhaps have been as much as their heads were worth, to have told them the true reason. hippopotami abound in the rivers in the vicinity of the town, when young, the flesh and skin of these animals are sold as food, and whips and other articles are made of the skins of the old ones. at the usual hour of the following day, april th, they quitted jadoo, and in the middle of the day arrived at a clean, pretty little village, called pooya. the appearance of the country between these places is extremely fine, resembling a magnificent orchard. on their way they met several hundreds of people of both sexes and all ages, with a great number of bullocks, sheep, and goats, together with fowls and pigeons, which were carried on the head in neat wicker baskets. several of the travellers were loaded with country cloth, and indigo in large round balls. they were all slaves, and were proceeding to the coast from the interior, to sell the goods and animals under their charge. one old woman had the misfortune to let a large calabash of palm oil fall from her head: on arriving at the spot, they found a party of females, her companions in slavery, wringing their hands and crying. the affliction of the old woman was bitter indeed, as she dreaded the punishment which awaited her on her return to the house of her master. john lander compassionated her distress, and gave her a large clasp knife, which would more than recompense her for the loss of the oil, on which the women wiped away their tears, and fell down on the dust before them, exhibiting countenances more gladsome and animated than could be conceived. the mortality of children must be immense indeed here, for almost every woman they met with on the road, had one or more of those little wooden images, already mentioned. wherever the mothers stopped to take refreshment, a small part of their food was invariably presented to the lips of these inanimate memorials. the daughters of civilization may boast of the refinement of their feelings, but under what circumstances did they ever exhibit a stronger instance of maternal affection than these rude, untutored mothers of interior africa evinced to our travellers. the english mother will frequently deposit her child in the grave, and a few days afterwards will be seen joining in all the pleasures and vanities of the world. whirled about in a vortex of dissipation, the mother of civilization bears no memorial about her of the infant that is in its grave; but the uncivilized african carries about with her the image of her child, and, in the full force of her maternal affection, feeds not herself until in her imagination she has fed the being who once was dear to her. there was something beautifully affectionate in the mother offering the food to the images of her children, and had a whole volume been written in display of the african female character, a more forcible illustration could not have been given of it. although pooya is considered by the natives to be a day's journey from jadoo, they only halted to pay their respects to the chief, and then continued their journey over gentle hills, and through valleys watered by streams and rivulets, so as to reach engua in the afternoon. the soil between the two towns is mostly dry and sterile, and large masses of ironstone, which looked as if they had undergone the action of fire, presented themselves almost at every step. the day was oppressively hot, and as they had been exposed to the sun for a great number of hours, when they reached engua, their skin was scorched and highly inflamed, which proved very painful to them. richard lander was comparatively inured to the climate, but his brother now begun to feel it severely, he was sore, tired, and feverish, and longed to be down in a hut, but they were obliged to remain under a tree for three hours, before they could be favoured with that opportunity, because the chief of that town was engaged in making a fetish, for the purpose of counteracting any evil intentions that the white men might entertain towards him. all their people were fatigued and exhausted on the road, complaining much of the heat, and one of them was brought to them in the evening in a high fever. engua is the town where the lamented captain pearce breathed his last, and here also captain clapperton felt quite disheartened, and almost despaired of penetrating further into the interior of the country. the chief sent them only a little indian corn and water, and obstinately refused to sell them either a goat, sheep, or any other animal, although there were many thousands in the town. their reception at engua was so truly inhospitable, that they arose at a much earlier hour than they generally did, and proceeded on their way by starlight. in place of the ironstone which they had observed on the preceding day, the country was now partially covered with large and unshapely masses of granite. mountains and elevated hills were observed to the right of them, the sides of which were thickly wooded, and their summits reaching above the clouds. at nine o'clock, they passed through a neat and cleanly village named chakka, which had lately lost its chief, and an hour afterwards crossed a small river called akeeney, which was full of sharp and rugged rocks, and is reported to fall into the lagos. they were carried over on men's shoulders without much difficulty, but the horses were a long time in getting across. hence the path winded up a high and steep hill, which they ascended, and entered the town of afoora about mid-day. the governor gave them a hearty welcome, and said it made him so extremely happy to see them, which was also expressed by the joy and animation of his countenance. the best hut in the town, which was the most airy and commodious of any they had seen, was presently got ready for them, and shortly after they had taken possession of it, they received a quantity of excellent provisions from the chief. this was the first day of his government; his father, the late chief, had been dead some time, but from motives of delicacy he refused to take upon himself his authority until this morning. in honour of the event, a large company of women were dancing, rejoicing, and making merry all the evening, outside their hut. it appeared as rather a strange circumstance to richard lander, that the chief or governor of almost every town through which they had passed since leaving badagry, who was alive and well on his return to the coast three years ago, had been either slain in war or had died from natural causes. scarcely one of them was alive on his present expedition. on april th, an easy pleasant ride of three hours brought them to the first walled town they had seen, which was called assinara. the wall was of clay and so diminutive, that a person might easily jump over it; a dry ditch about eighteen inches deep, and three or four feet in width also surrounds the town. over this a single plank is thrown, which answers the purpose of a draw-bridge, and is the only means the inhabitants have of getting in and out of the place. assinara had also lately lost its chief in some battle, and all business was transacted by a benevolent elderly man, who volunteered his services till a successor should be appointed. from him the landers received the warmest reception, and the most hospitable treatment. the climate now began to have a most debilitating effect upon john lander, and from a state of robust health and vigour, he was now reduced to so great a degree of lassitude and weakness, that he could scarcely stand a minute at a time. every former pleasure seemed to have lost its charm with him. he was on this day attacked with fever, and his condition would have been hopeless indeed, had his brother not been near to relieve him. he complained of excessive thirst. ten grains of calomel were administered to him, and afterwards a strong dose of salts. on the following day, april th, he was much better and free from fever, but too weak to travel, their stay, therefore, at assinara was unavoidably protracted. the acting governor visited them with a very long face, and entreated the landers to discover a certain wizard, whom he imagined to be concealed somewhere in the town. by the influence of this sorcerer, a number of people, it was said, pined away and died, and women with child were more especially the object of his malevolence. these victims dropped down suddenly, without the slightest warning, and the deaths had lately been so numerous, that the old man himself was grievously alarmed, and begged a charm to preserve him and his family. on the rd, john lander finding himself considerably invigorated and refreshed by a day's rest at assinara, and sufficiently recovered to pursue their journey, all hands were in readiness to start at an early hour. the morning was cool and pleasant, and they travelled onwards in excellent spirits. without meeting any thing particular in the path, or perceiving any object sufficiently interesting or novel to demand attention, they entered the town of accadoo in the forenoon, having had an agreeable ride of a few hours duration only. at this time john lander seemed to be free from any kind of complaint whatever, and enjoyed an unusual cheerfulness and buoyancy of spirits, which led his brother to form the most flattering anticipations. in the course of a few minutes, however, his body was overspread with a burning heat, and he suffered under another attack of fever, more violent than any of the former. he resorted to the most powerful remedies, he could think of at the time. his brother bled him, and applied a strong blister to the region of the stomach, where the disorder seemed to be seated. it was swollen and oppressed with pain, and he felt as if some huge substance lay upon his chest. his mouth being dry and clogged, and his thirst burning and unquenchable, he drank so much water that his body was greatly swollen. towards evening, his ideas became confused and he grew delirious. he afterwards described to his brother the horrible phantoms that disturbed him whilst in this state, and the delicious emotion that ran through his whole frame, when the dreadful vision had passed away. tears gushed from his eyes, a profuse perspiration, which had been so long checked, gave him immediate relief, and from that moment his health began to improve. during this illness of john lander, the natives made a most hideous noise by singing and drumming on the celebration of their fetish. richard went out with the hope of inducing them to be quiet, but they only laughed at him, and annoyed them the more; having no compassion whatever for the sufferings of a white man, and if they can mortify him by any means, they consider it a praiseworthy deed. this day at noon, the sun stood at degrees of fahrenheit. early on saturday the th, a hammock was prepared for john lander, he being too weak to ride on horseback; and shortly wards they quitted the town of accadoo, in much better spirits, than circumstances had led them to expect. the hammock-men found their burden rather troublesome, nevertheless they travelled at a pretty quick pace, and between eight and nine o'clock, halted at a pleasant and comfortable village called etudy. the chief sent them a fowl and four hundred kowries; but they stopped only to take a slight refreshment, and to pay their respects. they then proceeded through large plantations of cotton, indigo, indian corn, and yams, and over stony fields, till between ten and eleven, when they entered the town of chouchou. they were almost immediately introduced to the chief, and from him into a ruinous hut, in a more filthy state than can be imagined. no pigstye was ever half so bad. its late occupier had incurred the displeasure and hatred of the chief, because he happened to be very rich, and rather than pay a heavy fine, he ran away and joined his former enemies, and this partly accounted for the destitution and wretchedness around them. since leaving jenna they met an incredible number of persons visited with the loss of one eye. they assigned no other reason for their misfortune, than the heat and glare of the rays of the sun. during the whole of this night it rained most heavily; but their hut, although of the very worst description, had a pretty good thatched roof, and sheltered them better than they could have expected. there are seasons and periods in our life-time, in which we feel a happy complacency of temper and an inward satisfaction, cheerfulness, and joy, for which we cannot very well account, but which constrain us to be at peace with ourselves and our neighbours, and in love with all the works of god. in this truly enviable frame of mind, richard lander says he awoke on this morning, to proceed onwards on horseback. it was a morning, which was fairly entitled to the epithet of incense breathing; for the variety of sweet-smelling perfumes, which exhaled after the rain, from forest flowers and flowering shrubs, was delicious and almost overpowering. the scenery which gratified their eyes on this day, was more interesting and lovely, than any they had heretofore beheld. the path circled round a magnificent, cultivated valley, hemmed in on almost every side with mountains of granite of the most grotesque and irregular shapes, the summits of which were covered with stunted trees, and the hollows in their slopes occupied by clusters of huts, whose inmates had fled thither as a place of security against the ravages of the _warmen_ who infest the plains. a number of strange birds resorted to this valley, many of whose notes were rich, full, and melodious, while others were harsh and disagreeable, but, generally speaking, the plumage was various, splendid, and beautiful. the modest partridge appeared in company with the magnificent balearic crane, with his regal crest, and delicate humming birds hopped from twig to twig, with others of an unknown species; some of them were of a dark, shining green; some had red silky wings and purple bodies; some were variegated with stripes of crimson and gold, and these chirped and warbled from among the thick foliage of the trees. in the contemplation of such beautiful objects as these, all so playful and so happy, or the more sublime ones of dark waving forests, plains of vast extent, or stupendous mountains, that gave the mind the most sensible emotions of delight and grandeur, leading it insensibly "to look from nature up to nature's god." speaking on these subjects, lander very feelingly expresses himself, "for myself," he says, "i am passionately fond of them, and have regretted a thousand times, that my ignorance incapacitated me from giving a proper representation of them, or describing the simplest flower that adorns the plains, or the smallest insect that sparkles in the air. this consideration gives me at times many unhappy reflections, although my defective education arose from circumstances over which my boyhood had no control." having passed through the immense valley already mentioned, they had not travelled far before they arrived and halted at a large village called tudibu; here they rested a while, and then continuing their journey for two hours over even ground between high hills, they rode into the town of gwen-dekki, in which they purposed passing the night. the chief was either very poor or very ill natured, for the only thing he sent them was a little boiled yam, with a mess of unpalatable gravy, which he would not have given, if he had not expected ten times its value in return. divine service, it being sunday, was performed in the course of the day, and this was a duty, which to persons in their situation, was found inconceivably pleasant. it rendered them happy and resigned in the midst or their afflictions and privations; reposing their confidence in the all-protecting arm of that beneficent being, who is the author and disposer of their destinies, and in whom alone, thus widely separated as they were from home, and kindred and civilization, the solitary wanderer can place his trust. on the morning of monday the th april, a thick mist obscured the horizon, and hid in deep shade the mountains and the hills; every object indeed was invisible, with the exception of the pathway and the trees growing on each side, which they could hardly distinguish as they passed along. it continued hazy for two hours after leaving gwen-dekki, when the mist dispersed and the atmosphere became clear. preparatory to ascending a steep granite hill, they halted to refresh their horses under the branches of a high spreading tree, near a town called eco. here they were visited by several of the inhabitants, who, as soon as they were informed of their arrival, came flocking to the spot. they formed themselves into a line to pay their respects, and entreated them to wait a little for the arrival of their chief, who was momentarily expected. but after staying as long as they conveniently could, and no chief appearing, they mounted their beasts and began the toilsome ascent. on attaining the summit of the hill, the _coup d'oeil_ was magnificent indeed, and the fog having been dispersed by the sun, the eye was enabled to range over an extensive horizon, bounded by hills and mountains of wonderful shapes. some of them bore a very striking resemblance to the table mountain at the cape of good hope, and another was not unlike the lion's head and rump of the same place. their course was north-east, and those two mountains bore due west from them. there was no continued range of hills, but numbers of single unconnected ones, with extensive valleys between them. in some places, several were piled behind each, and those most distant from them appeared like dark indistinct clouds. nothing could surpass the singularity, and it may be added the sublimity of the whole view from the top of the granite hill which they had ascended, and they contemplated it silence for a few seconds, with emotions of astonishment and rapture. descending the hill, they continued their journey over a noble plain, watered with springs and rivulets, and in the afternoon entered dufo, a most extensive and populous town. the inhabitants appeared to be industrious and very opulent, as far as regarded the number and variety of their domestic animals, having abundance of sheep, goats, swine, pigeons, and poultry, amongst the latter of which were observed for the first time, turkeys and guinea-fowl. they had likewise horses and bullocks. the chief did not make his appearance for a long time, but as soon as he had introduced himself, he desired them to follow him into a cleanly swept square, where was the house which he intended them to occupy. presently after his departure, he sent them a quantity of yams, a basket of ripe bananas, and a calabash of eggs, which they soon discovered to be good for nothing, although sand had been mixed with them, that they might feel heavier than they really were. they were on this evening visited by four burgoo traders, who informed them that they had crossed the niger at inguazhilligie, not more than fourteen days ago, and that although the rains had commenced, the river had as yet received no great addition to its waters. the travellers were early on horseback, on the morning of the th, and preceded by the carriers of their luggage, they rode out of the town of dufo. the country, indeed, appeared inferior, as to the boldness and beauty of its scenery, to that which they had traversed on the preceding day but still it possessed features of no common interest. another table mountain was observed to the left of their path in the course of the morning, as well as another lion's head and rump. ponderous masses of granite rock overhung the road way; they were almost black, and seemed to have been washed by the rains of a thousand years; in many of them were deep and gloomy caverns, which, were they in cornwall instead of in central africa, they would be selected by some novel-monger, as the scene of some dark and mysterious murder, or as the habitation of a gang of banditti, or perhaps of the ghost of some damsel, who might have deliberately knocked her brains out against some rocky protuberance, on account of a faithless lover. they were followed a long while by hundreds of the natives, and who annoyed them so much by their noises and curiosity, that they were compelled to resort to violent measures to drive them away; but this was a line of conduct rarely adopted towards them, and never without extreme reluctance. they were at length frightened away, and they saw them no more. about eight miles from dufo, they arrived at a large straggling village, called elokba, where they halted a little, as the path had been so stony, rugged, and irregular, that a few minutes rest was absolutely necessary to recruit themselves. from this place the road became excellent, not at all inferior to a drive round a nobleman's park in england, and continued to be good till they came in sight of a capacious walled town, called chaadoo, which they entered about mid-day. outside the walls is a small fellata village, the huts of which are constructed in the circular or _coozie_ form. its inhabitants employ themselves solely in the breeding of cattle, an occupation to which they are passionately addicted. they are simple in their manners, and extremely neat in their dress and appearance. not long after their arrival, three or four young fellata shepherdesses from the village came to pay their respects to the travellers, who felt much pleased with their society, for they were extremely well-behaved and intelligent; they remained, however, a very short time, their customary avocation not permitting a longer stay. the hair of these females was braided in a style peculiarly tasteful and becoming, and the contour of their oval faces was far from disagreeable. their manners also were innocent and playful; the imaginary shepherdesses of our pastorals were not more modest, artless, and engaging in description, than these were in reality; they left behind them an impression very favourable, both as regards their morals, _naiveté_, and rustic simplicity. on the road from dufo, richard lander unthinkingly shot a crane, which fell in an adjoining field. the report of his gun brought out a number of natives from "the bush," who being in continual dread of an attack from "the war men of the path," imagined it to be a signal of one of these marauders. they were all armed like their countrymen with bows and arrows, and with a threatening aspect would have lodged a few shafts in the person of richard lander, had it not been for the timely interference of one of their jenna messengers, who fortunately happened to be with him at the time, and who gave an immediate and satisfactory explanation. the head of the party then sought for and picked up the bird, but richard took it from him, after he had rewarded him liberally for his trouble. the man, however, was neither satisfied nor pleased, but roughly demanded the bird as his own, because it had fallen on his land. as there were no game laws here, richard lander would not admit his claim, and was retiring, when the fellow begged with much importunity that the head and legs of the animal, at least, might be given him to make a fetish of. this was likewise objected to, at which the man was out of all patience, and went off foaming with passion. in the evening, the crane was dressed for supper, and a similar request was made by a eunuch from katunga, who being a good-natured fellow, his wish was readily complied with. the chief of chaadoo, however, presently sent a messenger to request the said precious head and legs, and to him they were finally committed by the disappointed eunuch, who could hardly forbear weeping on the occasion; these relics are considered extremely valuable as a charm. the chief sent them a goat, a quantity of bananas, a dish of pounded or rather mashed yam with gravy, and a large basket of _caffas_. these are a kind of pudding, made into little round balls from bruised indian corn, which is first boiled to the consistence of thick paste. from being made entirely of coarse flour and water, they have an insipid taste when new, but when kept for a day or two, they become sour, and in this state are eaten by the natives. there are several deep wells in the town, but most of them are dried up, so that water is exceedingly scarce, and it is sold in the market-place to the inhabitants. they were daily accosted on the road with such salutations as these, "i hope you go on well on the path," "success to the king's work," "god bless you white men," "a blessing on your return, &c." they remained the whole of the th at chaadoo, in order to give the carriers with the luggage, time to come up with them, having been unavoidably detained by the roughness and unevenness of the road from dufo to elokba. the katunga eunuch already mentioned, was sent by the king of that place to receive the customary tribute of the governors of various towns on the road between katunga and jenna. this man was treated with much respect both by the governor of chaadoo and his people, who prostrated themselves to the eunuch, before addressing him. being in want of money, they sent some needles this morning to the market to sell. it is a custom in youriba, that after a buyer has agreed to pay a certain sum for an article, he retracts his expression, and affirms that he only promised to give about half the sum demanded. this occasioned violent altercations between the landers' people and the natives, but it is an established custom, from which there is no appeal. the mother of the governor was buried this afternoon, at a neighbouring village, and the funeral was attended by all his wives or women as mourners. they were dressed in their holiday attire and looked tolerably smart. the mourners exhibited no signs of grief whatever, on the contrary, they were as lively as a wedding party; attended by a drummer, they passed through their yard on their return to the governor's house, which was only a few steps distant, and they kept up singing and dancing during the whole of the day, to the noise of the drum. the inhabitants of the town have immense numbers of sheep, goats, pigs, and poultry, but bullocks are in the possession of fellatas alone. it was believed, that the natives have not a single animal of that description. like many other places, the market was not held here till the heat and toil of the day are over, and buyers seldom resort to it, till eight o'clock in the evening. on the morning of the th april, it commencing raining at a very early hour, and continued with uncommon violence, till between ten and eleven o'clock, when it suddenly ceased, and they quitted chaadoo. before their departure, however, the credulous governor, who in common with his people, imagine that white men possess an influence over the elements, paid them a visit with a calabash of honey as a present, to thank them he said, for the rain that had fallen, of which the country was greatly in want, and invoked blessings on them. the kindness of this good old man was remarkable; he never seemed weary of obliging them, regretted his inability to do more, and solicited them very pressingly to remain with him another day. they traversed a mountainous country intersected with streams of excellent water, and at noon entered a small, but pleasant picturesque village, which was ornamented with noble and shady trees. here they waited a very short time, and continuing their route, arrived towards evening at a capacious walled town, called _row_, wherein they passed the night. in many places, the wall, if it be deserving the name, was no more than twelve or fourteen inches from the ground, and the moat was of similar dimensions. the yard to which they were conducted, shortly after their arrival, was within three or four others, and so intricate were the passages leading to it, that after a stranger gets in, he would be sadly puzzled to find his way out again without a guide. nevertheless, this was no security against interruption, for the yard was speedily invaded by five or six hundred individuals, who had been induced to visit them from curiosity. as usual, they annoyed the travellers for a long time to the best of their ability, till they completely wearied them out by their importunity and forwardness. they then hung sheets round the door-way of their dwelling, and laid down on their mats; and then only, the natives began to disperse, and left them at their ease. the governor of the town was a morose, surly, and ill-natured man. he sent them only a few bananas, and a calabash of eggs, which were all stale and unfit to be eaten, so that some of their people were obliged to go supperless to bed. the governor ascribed the badness of his fare to extreme poverty, yet his vanity exacted from their jenna messengers the most abject method of salutation, with which they were acquainted. these men walked backwards from him several yards, to throw dirt on their heads, and with the dust and filth still clinging to their hair, they were compelled to address the chief with their faces to the ground. the apartment of the travellers unfortunately communicated with his, and the restless tongues of his numerous wives prevented either of the landers from dosing their eyes long after sunset. in the centre of their yard grew a tree, round which several stakes were driven into the ground. this tree was a fetish tree, and the stakes also fetish, and therefore a strong injunction was issued not to tie the horses to either of them. calabashes, common articles of earthenware, and even feathers, egg-shells, and the bones of animals; indeed any kind of inanimate substance is made fetish by the credulous, stupid natives, and like the horse-shoe, which is still nailed to the door of the more superstitious of english peasantry, these fetishes are supposed to preserve them from ghosts and evil spirits. it is sacrilege to touch them, and to ridicule them, would be dangerous. it was between seven and eight o'clock of the th april, before carriers could be procured, and every thing got in readiness for their departure. the sun was excessively hot, and the sky brilliantly clear. they crossed two or three rivulets of cool delicious water, as they had done on the preceding day, and then passed through an insignificant village, whose chief sent them a calabash of bruised corn, mixed with water, to drink. at noon, they arrived at the foot of a very elevated hill, and perceived a town perched on its summit, and knew it to be the same to which they had been directed. they dismounted, and after a laborious ascent, which occupied them three quarters of an hour, at length reached the top. stones and blocks of granite interrupted their path, so that it became a very difficult matter to force the horses along before them; they fell repeatedly, but without materially injuring themselves. the name of the town was chekki; their arrival was rather unexpected, and therefore the governor was not prepared to receive them, and they sat down under a tree, until they were tired of waiting. at length, a man came to conduct them to his residence, which was but a little way from the tree, under which they were reposing, when a tumultuous rush was made by the inhabitants to precede them into the yard, and notwithstanding the presence of their chief, they so surrounded the travelling party as to prevent a particle of fresh air from reaching them. the governor received them with bluntness, but not unkindly, though without much demonstration of good-will. while in his yard, he regaled them with water, and afterwards sent them a large calabash of _foorah_ sweetened with honey to their lodgings, which did not taste unlike thick gruel or _burgoo_, as it is termed in scotland. it is made of a corn called goorah, is very palatable, and is in general use with the natives of these parts. a quantity of bananas from the chief soon followed the foorah, and something more substantial than either, was promised them. it was observed to be a general practice here, as well as in every other town through which the landers passed, for children until the age of seven years to go naked, with perhaps a string of kowries tied round the loins, and clumsy bracelets, either of brass or tin enclosing the wrist. grown-up people, however, dress somewhat neatly, if not gracefully; the men wear a cap, tobe and trousers, mostly blue, and the women wear a large loose cotton cloth, which is thrown over the left shoulder, and comes down mantling below the knee. the right arm and feet alone are bare. people of both sexes are infinitely more grave and serious in their manners, than those nearer the coast, nor was the loud vacant laugh so prevalent, as at the commencement of their journey. they quitted chekki on the st of may, and rode on pleasantly until, at the expiration of four hours, they arrived at coosoo, a large and important town. a fellata hamlet stands near it, the inhabitants of which, subsist by following pastoral occupations alone. they are much esteemed by the youribans, who behave to them without suspicion or reserve. shortly after their arrival, a man stole a sword from one of the attendants on the travellers; he was pursued to the chief, and asserted that he had found it; as he laid the weapon at his feet. the sword was restored to them by the governor, but without the slightest allusion being made to the means by which he obtained it. a company or _goffle_ of merchants from hano, were at this time in the town, who had travelled thus far on their way to gonga, which is the selga of cape coast castle and accra. their merchandise consists chiefly of elephants' teeth, trona, rock salt, and country cloths. this, the landers were told, is a new route, the road formerly taken being considered unsafe, on account of private broils and disturbances amongst the natives. the goffle consisted of more than four hundred men; but a company of merchants that passed through the town ten days previously, amounted to twice that number. other merchants were also in the town, and were to leave on the morrow on their way to yaoorie, to which place they were destined. the palm tree became scarce as they advanced into the country, and, consequently, the oil obtained hereabouts, is only in very small quantities. but nature, ever bountiful, supplies its place with the mi-cadania or butter tree, which yields abundance of a kind of vegetable marrow, pleasant to the taste, and highly esteemed by the natives. it is used for lights and other domestic purposes. the tree from which it is obtained, is not much unlike our oak in appearance, and the nut it produces is enveloped in an agreeable pulpy substance. the kernel of this nut is about the size of our chestnut. it is exposed in the sun to dry, after which it is pounded very fine and boiled in water. the oily particles which it contains, soon float on the surface; when cool, they are skimmed off, and then made into little cakes for use, without any further preparation. two individuals appeared before the chief this day, in consequence of an accusation of theft that had been made against them. the method adopted of proving the guilt or innocence of the parties, was, by compelling them to swallow the fetish water. in the evening, the travellers received a fat goat, a basket of caffas, a calabash of bananas, a vast quantity of yams, and a bowl of milk from the governor. he appeared to be a sober, kind, and benevolent old man, and generally beloved by his people. to the landers, he was particularly attentive and obliging. he informed them, that the common path to katunga was unsafe, in consequence of a serious quarrel between the inhabitants of coosoo, and those of a neighbouring town. "therefore," said he, "i entreat you to remain here until to-morrow, in order that i may make arrangements to send you by a different road." this intelligence was not very agreeable to the landers, but they were convinced of its importance, and therefore thankfully accepted the chiefs offer. the market which was held this evening in the town, had a most imposing and brilliant appearance, from the immense of lamps used by the trades-people. their visitors, who continued with them until late in the evening, were innumerable, and the noise of the women's tongues was as loud and disagreeable as ever. for some time nothing could quiet them: threats and entreaties were disregarded or laughed at, till at last, they were compelled to resort to the childish expedient of spurting water in their faces from a large syringe. on seeing and feeling the effects of this fearful instrument, they became alarmed and ran away. on the following day, may nd, a fetish priest came to see them, and was about to treat them with the usual harangue of his profession, but they contrived to put a stop to it, by bribing him with a few needles. nothing particular was observed in this fellow's ornaments or dress, but his person presented a strange and singular appearance. the colour of his skin was like that of whitish brown paper; his eyebrows and eyelashes were of a silvery whiteness, and his eyes of a bright blue, notwithstanding which, the negro features were strongly and distinctly marked on his countenance. the man's parents were both natives, and quite black, and it was found impossible to ascertain the reason of this extraordinary deviation from the common laws of nature. they received an abundance of kindness from the good old chief of this place, and his endeavours to make them comfortable were imitated by many of the more respectable inhabitants. the path recommended by the friendly chief of coosoo, lay due east from the town, and they pursued their journey on it, on the morning of the rd of may. robbers were stated to be lurking about, and therefore they conceived it prudent, if not absolutely necessary, to take every precaution for the safety of the mission, they, therefore, loaded their own guns and pistols, and armed all their men with swords and muskets. their jenna messengers being unacquainted with the new route, the governor of coosoo had furnished them with two armed foot guides, whose weapons were bows and arrows, besides a horseman, armed at all points, to bring up the rear of the party. with all these warlike preparations and equipments, a few harmless women, who were terrified at the appearance of the travellers, were the only individuals whom they met with on the path during a ride of two hours, which brought them to a town called acboro. the town itself was very small, but its dilapidated walls, which enclose an immense extent of ground, would lead the observer to suppose, that it was formerly of much greater magnitude. within the walls, were three granite hills, two on one side, and the other on the opposite side of the town. all their bases were of solid stone, but their summits consisted of loose blocks, from the interstices of which, trees and stunted vegetation shot forth. besides these hills, immense masses of granite rock were seen piled upon each other in different parts. on the whole, acboro was one of the wildest and most venerable looking places that the human mind could conceive; the habitations of the people alone, lessening that romantic and pleasing effect, which a first sight of it produces. shortly after their arrival, the governor sent them a sucking pig and some other presents, and seemed highly pleased that circumstances had thrown them in his way. "white men do nothing but good," said he, "and i will pray that god may bless you, and send more of your countrymen to youriba." instead of the people running and scrambling to see them, the good-natured ruler of this place excluded the mass of them from visiting their yard, and came very civilly to ask their permission for a few of his friends to look at them. john lander was too weak and indisposed to gratify their curiosity by rising from his couch, so his brother went out to exhibit his person, and suffered himself to be examined rather minutely, which must have had a very ludicrous effect, to see the european undergoing an examination by a posse of black inquisitors, just as if he had been a horse or a bullock at smithfield. they, however, separated tolerably well pleased with each other. on may the th, three men, inhabitants of acboro, were captured by a gang of restless, marauding scoundrels, who are denominated here, as elsewhere, "war-men of the path," but who are, in reality, nothing more nor less, than highway robbers. they subsist solely by pillage and rapine, and waylaying their countrymen. the late governor of acboro was deposed and driven from the town by his own people, for his indifference to their interest, and the wanton cruelty, with which he treated them and their children. at different times he seized several individuals of both sexes, and sold them as slaves, without assigning any cause for the act. this drew on him the vengeance of the friends and relatives of the sufferers, who prevailed on the town's people to arise with them and punish the aggressor. the latter soon found that his party were too weak to withstand the attacks of the exasperated populace, and he fled to a remote village, where he was residing at the time of the arrival of the landers. the inhabitants of acboro immediately elected a more humane and benevolent governor in his stead. they rose this morning at an early hour, and john lander finding himself sufficiently recovered to ride on horseback, they bade farewell to the governor of acboro, and quitted the town by sunrise, taking care to use the same precaution against robbers as on the preceding day. in an hour and three quarters, they entered an open and delightful village called lazipa. an assemblage of fellata huts stood near it, by which their beautiful cattle were grazing. many of the bullocks were as white as snow, others were spotted like a leopard's skin, and others again were dotted with red and black on a white ground. a fellata girl presented them with a bowl of new milk, which was very agreeable and refreshing, and after drinking it, they bade adieu to the fellatas and their cattle for ever. they had not travelled a great way from lazipa, before they had to cross a large morass, on the borders of which a very large and handsome species of water-lily flourished in great perfection. they crossed this morass without difficulty or trouble, and with the same facility also two small streams, which intersected the road. at nine a.m., they arrived at cootoo, which like lazipa is an open village, but the former is by far the most extensive of the two. a person, who may have travelled from penzance in cornwall to the land's end, and observed the nature of the soil, and the blocks of granite which are scattered over its surface, will have a very good idea of the country between acboro and cootoo, only that in the latter, it is much more woody. after leaving cootoo, however, the aspect of the surrounding scenery speedily changed, and became infinitely more pleasing. the soil was more rich and deeper; patches of verdure and cultivated land were more frequent, the latter being neatly fenced; fine handsome trees, with their spreading branches and thick foliage, embellished the country in every direction, and extended to the eastern horizon. it might have been supposed that these trees had been carefully planted by the hand of man, for they grew at equal distances from each other, and none seemed to interfere with the order, beauty, and regularity of its neighbour. the soil between them was covered with a soft green turf, which rendered the whole view remarkably pleasant. it was over this delightful landscape that they travelled; the morning was cooled by a refreshing south-east wind, and the travellers, which is not often the case, were both on good terms with themselves, and gratified by everything around them. at length, they came in sight of numerous herds of fine cattle, attended by little boys, and shortly afterwards, they arrived at a clean and neat fellata village, the inhabitants of which were employed in feeding calves, and other occupations connected with an african farm. they then crossed a small stream, and entered a town of prodigious extent, called bòhoo, which was fortified with a triple wall and moats. without being exposed to the customary tiresome formalities, they were immediately conducted to the residence of the governor. the usual conversation passed between them, and after they had returned to their hut, a bullock was sent them, with yams, bananas, and a huge calabash of new milk, which did not contain less than six gallons, and the travellers sat down to enjoy themselves in perfect good humour. in the afternoon, a message was delivered to them, signifying that the governor's head minister would be very glad to see them, and would thank them to visit him in the course of the day. john lander, however, having experienced a relapse, his sufferings were such as to prevent him leaving the hut, and his brother was, therefore, obliged to go alone. after a pleasant walk of about two miles, he arrived at the habitation of the minister, by whom he was very kindly received. the compliments of the day only were exchanged between them, and the numerous wives, and large family of the master of the house, who are on these occasions generally exhibited to a stranger, having amply gratified their curiosity by an examination of his person, the interview terminated and he presently returned to his abode, after promising to visit the minister again on the following day. bòhoo lies north-east of acboro, and is built on the slope of a very gentle and fertile hill, at whose base flows a stream of milk-white water, and behind which is the fellata hamlet already mentioned. its immense triple wall is little short of twenty miles in circuit; but besides huts and gardens, it encloses a vast number of acres of excellent meadow land, in which bullocks, sheep, and goats feed indiscriminately. by the hasty view obtained of it, the town in some degree resembled kano, but there is no large swamp like that which intersects the latter city. bòhoo was formerly the metropolis of youriba, but about half a century ago, the reigning prince preferring the plain at katunga, the seat of government was transferred there, since which bòhoo has materially declined in wealth, population, and consequence, although it is still considered a place of great importance, and the second town in the kingdom. it is bounded on all sides by hills of gradual ascent, which are prettily wooded, and commands an extensive horizon. the land in the vicinity of the town presents a most inviting appearance, by no means inferior to any part of england in the most favourable season of the year. it appears to be duly appreciated by the fellatas, so great a number of whom reside with their flocks in different parts, that the minister candidly declared he could not give any information of their amount. these foreigners sell their milk, butter, and cheese in the market at a reasonable rate. the latter is made into little cakes about an inch square, and when fried in butter is very palatable. it is of the consistence and appearance of the white of an egg, boiled hard. agreeably to the promise which richard lander made to the chief, he left his brother to the care of old pascoe and his wife, and hastened to pay his respects to the chief's head man or minister. it appears that this man was placed in his present situation by the king of katunga, as a kind of spy on the actions of the governor, who can do nothing of a public nature, without in the first place consulting him, and obtaining his consent to the measure. yet he conducted himself so well in his disagreeable office, that he won the good will, not only of the governor of the town, but also its inhabitants. a kind of rivalry existed between the minister and his master, but then it was a rivalry in good and not in bad actions. hearing that the governor had sent the travellers a bullock, and something besides, he presented richard lander with a similar one, and a large calabash of _pitto_ (country beer,) which lander distributed amongst those who had accompanied him. a bottle of honey completed the list of presents, and they were forthwith forwarded to their habitation, but richard lander remained a considerable time afterwards with the chief. he was filled with amazement at the formation and ticking of lander's watch, which he gazed on and listened to with transport. the spurs which he wore, also excited his eager curiosity, and he examined them with the greatest attention. he hoped, he said, that god would bless them both, and that they had his best wishes for their safety. he remarked further, that white men worshipped the great god alone, and so did black men also, and that every blessing of life was derived from that source. on the return of richard, he found his brother extremely ill, he had been so faint and sick during his absence, that his recovery seemed doubtful, but in a few hours afterwards he became better. in the afternoon they sent to the governor and the minister, who had behaved so handsomely to them, three yards of fine red cloth, a common looking-glass, tobacco pipe, a pair of scissors, snuffbox, and a large clasp knife. the tobacco pipe was much admired, but the red cloth was the most valued; with the whole, however, they were both perfectly well pleased, and were extravagant in their expressions of gratitude. one of the bullocks was slaughtered this morning, and about two thirds of it distributed by the governor and his chief man to the poor in the town; the remainder of the carcass was divided equally amongst the attendants of the travellers, who appeared by no means anxious to leave the place, while their present, unusually good fare, was to be had. john lander was now so far recovered as to excite a hope that they might be able to proceed on their journey, on the following day. his recovery was, however, considerably retarded by the continual noises to which he was subject. perhaps, of all evils that can afflict a sick person, noises of any kind are the greatest. in africa, whether a person be ill or well, it is exactly the same, nothing like peace or quiet is any where to be found; independently of the continual fluttering of pigeons, which roosted close to their ears, the bleating of sheep and goats, and the barking of numerous half-starved dogs, they were still more seriously annoyed by the incessant clatter of women's tongues, which pursued them every where, and which it was believed nothing less than sickness or death on their part could eventually silence. the shrillness of their voices drowns the bleating of the sheep, and the yellings of the canine race; and notwithstanding all the exertions of richard lander, seconded by those of their attendants, their noise in this town considerably retarded the recovery of his brother. a person in england might be inclined to think lightly of this matter, but it is indeed a grievance, which can ill be borne by an invalid languishing under a wasting disease, and who has equally as much need of rest and silence as of medicine. besides those grievances, the shouts of the people outside the yard, and the perpetual squalling of children within it, the buzzing of beetles and drones, the continual attacks of mosquitoes and innumerable flies, form a host of irritating evils, to which a sick person is exposed, and to which he is obliged patiently to submit, until by a relief from his disorder, he is obliged to stand upon his legs, and once more take his own part. but even then noises assail his ear, and he does not enjoy the happiness of perfect silence unless he enters a grove or forest. they were this morning, visited by a party of fellatas of both sexes. they differed but little either in colour or feature from the original natives of the soil. in dress and ornaments, however, there was a slight distinction between them. they displayed more taste in their apparel, and wore a greater number of ornaments round the neck and wrists; they paid also great attention to their hair, which the women plait with astonishing ingenuity. like that of the young woman, whom they met at jenna, their heads exactly resembled a dragoon's helmet. their hair was much longer of course than that of the negro, which enables the fallatas to weave it on both sides of the head into a kind of _queue_, which passing over each cheek is tied under the chin. another company of fellatas came to them in the evening, for they had never beheld a white man, and curiosity had led them to their habitation. they brought with them a present of a little thick milk, of which they begged the travellers' acceptance, and then went away highly gratified with the interview. the behaviour of the whole of them was extremely reserved and respectful; nothing in the persons of the travellers excited their merriment, on the contrary, they seemed silently to admire their dress and complexion, and having examined them well at a distance, seemed grateful for the treat. in the mean time, the kindness and generosity of the governor of bòhoo continued unabated; instead of diminishing, it seemed to strengthen; he literally inundated them with milk, and he was equally lavish with other things. it gave them unmixed pleasure to meet with so much native politeness and attention from a quarter, where they the least expected it, and at a time also, when it was the most required. after they had retired to rest, a fellata woman came to their dwelling, bringing with her a number of eggs of the guinea-hen, and a large bowl of milk fresh from the cow, as a return for a few needles they had given her in the afternoon. this circumstance is mentioned merely to show the difference between the fellatas and the youribeans, in point of gratitude for favours which they may have received. the latter are very seldom grateful, and never acknowledge gratitude as a virtue. the indifference, unconcern, and even contempt, which they often evinced on receiving the presents which the landers made them, was a proof of this, and with a very few exceptions, they never observed a youribean to be sincerely thankful for any thing. on the following morning, john lander was able to sit on horseback, and as they were on the point of taking their departure, the governor came out to bid them farewell, and presented them with two thousand kowries to assist them on their journey. two hours after leaving bòhoo, they passed through an agreeable, thinly inhabited village called mallo, and in somewhat less than an hour after, arrived at jaguta, a large and compact town, fortified by a neater and more substantially built wall than any they had yet seen. jaguta lies e. s. e. of bòhoo, from which it is distant, as nearly as the landers could guess, from twelve to thirteen miles. in the course of the journey, they met a party of nouffie traders from coulfo, with asses carrying trona for the gonja market. among them, were two women, very neatly clad in their native costume, with clean white tobes outside their other apparel, resembling as nearly as possible the _chemise_ of european ladies. these asses were the first beasts they had observed employed in carrying burdens, for hitherto, people of both sexes and of all ages, especially women and female children, had performed those laborious duties. the governor of jaguta came to apologize in the evening, for not having attended them the greater part of the day, on the plea that he had been engaged in the country with his people, in making a fetish for the prosperity of the king of katunga. the return of the governor and his procession to the town, was announced by a flourish of drums, fifes, &c., with the usual accompaniments of singing and dancing. the musicians performed before him, for some time, in a yard contiguous to that where the landers resided, and their ears were stunned for the remainder of the night, by a combination of the most barbarous sounds in the world. they were here daily assured that the path was rendered exceedingly dangerous by banditti, and the governor of jaguta endeavoured with a good deal of earnestness, to persuade them that their goods would not be respected by them. it will, however, scarcely be believed, that this universal dread originates from a few borgoo desperadoes, who, although only armed with powder and a few broken muskets, can put a whole legion of the timid natives to flight. the inhabitants of the town kept firing the whole of the evening, to deter their formidable foe from scaling the wall and taking possession of their town. on the night of saturday may th, they were visited by thunder storms, from which, however, they did not receive any great annoyance. the natives as usual imputed the seasonable weather to their agency alone, and in consequence, their arrival at many places was hailed with transport, as the most fortunate thing that could have happened. extraordinary preparations were made by the governor of jaguta, to ensure the safety of the travellers on the dreaded pathway; and a horseman armed with sword and spear, in company with four foot soldiers, who were equipped with bows, and several huge quivers full of arrows, were in readiness to offer them their protection. the horseman preceded the party, and played off a variety of antics to the great amusement of the landers. he seemed not a little satisfied with himself; he flourished his naked sword over his head; brandished his spear; made his horse curvet and bound, and gallop alternately; and his dress being extremely grotesque, besides being old and torn, gave him an appearance not unlike that of a bundle of rags flying through the air. but with all this display of heroism and activity, the man would have fled with terror from his own shadow by moonlight, and it was really regretted by the travellers, that a few defenceless women were the only individuals that crossed their path to put his courage to the test, the formidable "war men" not being at that time in that part of the country. their journey this day was vexatiously short, not having exceeded four miles, for it was utterly beyond the power of either of the landers to persuade the superstitious natives, who conform only to their fetish in these matters, that the robbers would be afraid even to think of attacking white men. they halted at a small town called shea, which was defended by a wall. it appeared to possess a numerous population, if any opinion could be formed from the vast number of individuals that gathered round them, immediately on their entrance through the gateway. a stranger, however, cannot give anything like a correct estimate of the population of any inhabited place, in this part of africa, for as he can only judge of it by the number of court-yards a town or village may contain; and as the one court yard there may be residing at least a hundred people, and in the one adjacent to it, perhaps not more than six or seven, the difficulty will be immediately perceived. generally speaking, the description of one town in youriba, would answer for the whole. cleanliness and order and establish the superiority of one place over another, which may likewise have the advantages of a rich soil, a neighbourhood, and be ornamented with fine spreading and shady trees; but the form of the houses and squares is every-where the same; irregular and badly built clay walls, ragged looking thatched roofs, and floors of mud polished with cow-dung, form the habitations of the chief part of the natives of youriba, compared topmost of which, a common english barn is a palace. the only difference between the residence of a chief and those of his subjects, lies in the number and not in the superiority of his court yards, and these are for the most part tenanted by women and slaves, together with flocks of sheep and goats, and abundance of pigs and poultry, mixed together indiscriminately. shea lies four miles e. by s. of jaguta. the governor of the town presented them with a pig, and a quantity of country beer, and they also received little presents of provisions from a few of the people. may the th was on a sunday, and they were invited to witness an exhibition of tumbling; it was with great reluctance that the invitation was accepted, not only on account of the sanctity of the day, but for the delay which it would occasion them. they, however, considered it politic to lay aside their religious scruples, and they attended the exhibition mounted on their horses. as soon as it was over, they were escorted out of the town by beat of drum, preceded by an armed horseman, and an unarmed drummer, and continued their journey, followed by a multitude of the inhabitants. they passed through a very large walled town called esalay, about six miles from shea, but its wall was dilapidated, and the habitations of the people in ruins, and almost all deserted. this town, which was not long since well inhabited, has been reduced to its present desolate and miserable state, by the protection which its ruler granted to an infamous robber, whose continued assaults on defenceless travellers, and his cruelty to them, at length attracted the notice of the king of katunga. but previously to this, the inhabitants of another town not far off, many of whom had at different times suffered from his bold attacks, called in a number of borgoo men, who bore no better reputation for honesty than the robber himself, and resolved to attempt the capture of the ruffian in his strong hold, without any other assistance. their efforts, however, were unavailing; the governor, entrenched in his walled town, and supported by his people, sheltered the miscreant and compelled his enemies to raise the siege. about this time a messenger arrived at esalay from the king of katunga, with commands for the governor to deliver up the robber to punishment, but instead of obeying them, he privately warned the man of his danger, who took immediate advantage of it, and made his escape to nouffie. the governor was suspected of aiding the escape of the robber, and a second messenger soon after arrived from katunga, with orders for the guilty chief either to pay a fine to the king, of , kowries, or put a period to his existence by taking poison. neither of these commands suiting the inclination of the governor of esalay, he appointed a deputy, and privately fled to the neighbouring town of shea, there to await the final determination of his enraged sovereign. the landers saw this man at shea, dressed in a fancifully made tobe, on which a great number of arab characters were stitched. he walked about at perfect liberty, and did not seem to take his condition much to heart. the inhabitants of esalay, however, finding that their ruler had deserted them, that they were threatened by the king of katunga, and that the borgoo men emboldened by the encouragement they received from that monarch, were also lurking about the neighbourhood, and ready to do them any mischief, took the alarm, and imitating the example of their chief, most of them deserted their huts, and scattered themselves amongst the different towns and villages in the neighbourhood. very few people now resided at esalay; and this town, lately so populous and flourishing, was on the visit of the landers little better than a heap of ruins. after passing through esalay, they crossed a large morass and three rivers, which intersected the roadway. the croaking from a multitude of frogs which they contained, in addition to the noise of their drum, produced so animating an effect on their carriers, that they ran along with their burdens doubly as quick as they did before. they then arrived at an open village called okissaba, where they halted for two hours under the shadow of a large tree, to allow some of their men who had been loitering behind to rejoin them, after which the whole party again set forward, and did not stop until they arrived at the large and handsome walled town. atoopa, through which captain clapperton passed in the last expedition. during their ride, they observed a range of wooded hills, running from n.n.e. to s.s.w., and passed through a wilderness of stunted trees, which was relieved at intervals by patches of cultivated land, but there was not so much cultivation as might be expected to be found near the capital of youriba. the armed guides were no longer considered necessary, and, therefore, on the th may, they set out only with their badagry and jenna messengers and interpreters. on leaving atoopa, they, crossed a river, which flowed by the foot of that town, where their travellers overtook them, and they travelled on together. the country through which the path lay, was uncommonly fine; it was partially cultivated, abounding in wood and water, and appeared by the number of villages which are scattered over its surface, to be very populous. as they rode along, a place was pointed out to them, where a murder had been committed about seven years ago, upon the person of a young man. he fell a victim to a party of borgoo scoundrels, for refusing to give up his companion to them, a young girl, to whom he was shortly to be married. they, at first endeavoured to obtain her from him by fair means, but he obstinately refused to accede to their request, and contrived to keep the marauders at bay, till the young woman had made her escape, when he also ran for his life. he was closely pursued by them, and pierced by the number of arrows which they shot at him; he at length fell down and died in the path, after having ran more than a mile from the place where the first arrow had struck him. by the care with which this story is treasured up in their memory, and the earnestness and horror with which it is related, the landers were inclined to believe, that although there is so great a fuss about the borgoo robbers, and so manifest a dread of them, that a minder on the high-way is of very rare occurrence. when this crime was perpetrated, the whole nation seemed to be terror-struck, and the people rose up in arms, as if a public enemy were devastating their country, and slaughtering its inhabitants without mercy. this is the only instance they ever heard of a young man entertaining a strong attachment for a female. marriage is celebrated by the natives as unconcernedly as possible. a man thinks as little of taking a wife as of cutting an ear of corn; affection is altogether out of the question. a village in ruins, and a small town called nama, where they halted for a short time, were the only inhabited places they passed through during the day, till their entrance into the town of leoguadda, which was surrounded by a double wall, and in which they passed the night. the governor happened to be in his garden on their arrival, so that they were completely wearied with waiting for him, but as he did not make his appearance, they themselves found a convenient and comfortable hut; and though they were assailed by a volley of abuse from the mouths of half a dozen women, they succeeded in sending them away, and they remained in tranquil possession of their quarters. in the centre of their yard was a circular enclosure without a roof, within which was an alligator that had been confined there for seven years. this voracious animal was fed with rats only, of which he generally devoured five a day. one of the inhabitants perceiving that john lander was rather inquisitive, volunteered to go to a river in the vicinity of the town, and to return in a few minutes with as many young crocodiles as he might wish for; but as he had no opportunity of conveying animals of that description through the country, he declined the man's offer. the inhabitants of leoguadda, having probably no vegetable poison, make use of the venom of snakes on the tips of their arrows. the heads of those serpents, from which they extract this deadly substance, are exposed on the sticks, which are thrust into the inside of the thatch of their dwellings as a kind of trophy. leoguadda is almost surrounded by rugged hills, formed by loose blocks of granite; these added to a number of tall trees, always green and growing within the walls, render the town inconceivably pleasant and romantic. immense tracts of land are cultivated in the vicinity of the town with corn, yams, &c., and abundance of swine, poultry, goats, and sheep are bred by its inhabitants. formerly, also herds of cattle were to be seen in the meadows, but they belonged to fellatas, who, they were told, fled from leoguadda some time since, to join their countrymen at alorie. they left leoguadda early in the morning of th may, and about the middle of the forenoon reached a walled town of some extent called eetcho. this place is of importance on account of a large weekly market which is held in it. eetcho had recently been more than half consumed by fire, and would not, it was supposed, regain its former condition for some time. like most large trading-towns, it is in as unsettled and filthy a state as can be conceived. this day's journey was highly agreeable, the path lay through a beautiful country, varied in many places by hills of coarse granite, which were formed by blocks heaped on each other. trees and shrubs of a beautiful green grew from their interstices, and almost hid the masses of stone from the view. the governor of eetcho welcomed them to his town very civilly; yet his kindness was not of any great extent, and although in all probability, he was as opulent as most chiefs on the road, yet he did not follow their example in giving them provisions, but left them to procure what they wanted for themselves, in the best manner they were able. it is the general custom here, when any stranger of consequence approaches katunga, to send a messenger before him, for the purpose of informing the king of the circumstances; and as they were considered to be personages of consequence, one of their jenna guides was deputed to set out on the morrow, and in the mean time they were to remain at eetcho until a guard of soldiers should be sent to escort them to katunga. they, however, having no inclination for the honour, as it would expose them to a thousand little inconveniences, determined to avoid them all by leaving the place by moonlight. an extraordinary instance of mortality is here mentioned by richard lander, who says, "that not less than one hundred and sixty governors of towns and villages, between this place and the seacoast, all belonging to youriba, have died from natural causes, or have been slain in war, since i was last here, and that of the inhabited places through which we have passed, not more than half a dozen chiefs are alive at this moment, who received and entertained me on my return to badagry three years ago." on the night of the th, they were visited by a tornado, and in the morning it rained so heavily, that even if they had not been obliged to remain in eetcho that day, it would have been next impossible to have pursued their journey. the celebrated market of this place may be said to commence about mid-day, at which time, thousands of buyers and sellers were assembled in a large open space in the heart of the town, presenting the most busy, bustling scene imaginable. to say nothing of the hum and clatter of such a multitude of barbarians, the incessant exertions of a horrid band of native musicians rendered their own voices inaudible. people from katunga and other towns of less importance, flocked into eetcho to attend the market held on this day, which they were informed was not so well attended as on former occasions; the rain that had fallen, and the alleged danger which besets the path, having prevented many thousands from leaving their own abodes. country cloth, indigo, provision, &c., were offered for sale, but they observed nothing in the market worthy of notice. orders were given by the governor that the town should be well guarded during the night, for fear of its being attacked whilst the travellers were in it, and it was given out that any one found loitering outside the walls after sunset, would be seized without ceremony, and his effects taken from him. a very ungallant custom prevails at eetcho, which is, that every woman, who attends the market for the purpose of selling any article, is obliged to pay a tax of ten kowries to the governor, whilst any individual of the other sex is allowed to enter the town, and vend commodities publicly without paying any duty whatever. on thursday may th, they arose at a very early hour to undertake the journey to katunga, which was rather long, and they hoped not only to reach that city before the heat became oppressive, but also to avoid, if possible the escort, which they had every reason to suppose the king would send out to meet them. notwithstanding, however, their most strenuous exertions, it was six o'clock before they were all ready to depart. the air was cooler than they had felt it since landing from the clinker, the thermometer being as low as ° in the shade. the natives appeared to feel this _severity_ of the weather most keenly, for although they huddled themselves up in their warmest cotton dresses, they were yet shivering with cold. hundreds of people, and it would perhaps not be overrating the number to say thousands, preceded and followed them on the pathway; and as they winded through thick forests, along narrow roads, their blue and white clothing contrasted with the deep green of the ancient trees, produced an eminently pleasing effect. after a hasty ride of two hours, they came in sight of the town of eetcholee, outside of which were numerous trees, and underneath their widely spreading branches, were observed various groups of people seated on the turf taking refreshment. they joined the happy party, partook of a little corn and water, which was their usual travelling fare, and then renewed their journey in good spirits. they had not, however, proceeded a great way, when the escort, about which they had been so uneasy, was descried at a distance, and as they approached at a rapid pace, they joined the party in a very few minutes. there was no great reason after all, for their modesty to be offended either at the splendour or numbers of their retinue, for happily it consisted only of a few ragged individuals on foot, and eight on horseback; with the latter was a single drummer, but the former could boast of having in their train, men with whistles, drums and trumpets. richard lander sounded his bugle, at which the natives were astonished and pleased; but a black trumpeter jealous of the performance, challenged a contest for the superiority of the respective instruments, which terminated in an entire defeat of the african, who was hooted and laughed at by his companions for his presumption, and gave up the trial in despair. amongst the instruments used on this occasion, was a piece of iron, in shape exactly resembling the bottom of a parlour fire shovel. it was played on by a thick piece of wood and produced sounds infinitely less harmonious than "marrow-bones and cleavers." the leader of the escort was a strange looking, powerful fellow, and might very well serve the writer of a romance as the hero of his tale, in the character of keeper of an enchanted castle, when fierce, scowling looks, terrific frowns, and a peculiarly wild expression of countenance are intended to be _naturally_ described, for the man's stature was gigantic; his eyes large, keen, piercing, and ever in motion, his broad nose squatted over both cheeks; his lips immensely large, exposing a fine set of teeth; the beard was thick, black and gristly, and covering all the lower part of his face, reached to his bosom; the famous blue beard was nothing to him; and in gazing on his features, the observer might almost be inclined to believe, that all the most iniquitous and depraved passions of human nature were centered in his heart. yet, with so unlovely and forbidding an appearance, this man was in reality as innocent and docile as a lamb. he wore on his head a small rush hat, in shape like a common earthenware pan inverted, or like the hats, which are worn by the lower class of the chinese. his breast was enveloped in a coarse piece of blue cloth; from his left shoulder hung a large quiver of arrows, and in his right hand he held a bow, which he brandished like a lance; a short pair of trousers covered his thighs, and leathern boots, fantastically made, incased his feet and legs. his skin was of jetty blackness, his forehead high, but his tremendous beard, which was slightly tinged with grey, contributed, perhaps, more than any thing else, to impart that wildness and fierceness to his looks, which at first inspired the travellers with a kind of dread of their leader. thus escorted they travelled onwards, and after a hasty ride of six hours from eetcho, they beheld from a little eminence, those black naked hills of granite, at whose base lay the metropolis of youriba. about an hour afterwards, they entered the gates of that extensive city. as being consistent with etiquette, they halted under a tree just inside the walls, till the king and the eunuchs were informed of their arrival, which having been done after a wearisome delay, they rode to the residence of the chief eunuch ebo, who, next to the king, was the most influential man in the place. they found this personage a great fat, round, oily man, airing himself under the verandah of his dwelling. other eunuchs of similar appearance were sitting on the ground with him, and joining him in welcoming both of the travellers, but particularly richard, to katunga, with every appearance of sincerity, heartiness, and good-will. an uninteresting conversation now took place, which lasted for some time, after which, they walked altogether to the king's house, which was at the distance of half a mile from that place. chapter xxxii. information of the approach of the travellers had been previously sent to the monarch, but they were obliged to wait with much patience for a considerable period, until he had put on his robes of state. in the mean time to amuse his august visitors, the head drummer and his assistants, with the most benevolent intention, commenced a concert of the most bewitching melody; and long drums, kettle drums, and horns were played with little intermission, till mansolah, the king, made his appearance, and the travellers were desired to draw nearer to pay their respects to his majesty. they performed this ceremony after the english manner, much to the entertainment and diversion of the king, who endeavoured to imitate them, but it was easy to see that he was but a novice in the european mode of salutation--bowing and shaking hands; nor did he, like some other monarchs, stretch forth his hand to be kissed, which, to a man possessing a particle of spirit, must be degrading and humiliating. there is no doubt that it was owing to the rusticity and awkwardness of their address, not having been brought up amongst the fooleries and absurdities of a court, that mansolah's risible faculties were so strongly excited, but he laughed so long and heartily, and his wives, and eunuchs, and subjects of all sorts joined with him with such good will, and such power of lungs, that at length the travellers were obliged to laugh too, and were constrained to unite their voices to the general burst of kindly feeling, although, if they had been asked the cause of such jollity and obstreperous mirth, they would have been at a loss for an answer. mansolah's headpiece was something like a bishop's mitre, profusely ornamented with strings of coral, one of which answered the purpose of a ribbon, for it was tied under the chin, to prevent the cap from being blown off. his tobe was of green silk, crimson silk damask, and green silk velvet, which were all sewn together, like pieces of patchwork. he wore english cotton stockings, and neat leathern sandals of native workmanship. a large piece of superfine light blue cloth, given the chief by captain clapperton, was used as a carpet. the eunuchs, and other individuals who were present at the interview, prostrated themselves before their prince, agreeably to the custom of the country, and rubbed their heads with earth two separate times, retreating at some distance to perform this humiliating and degrading ceremony, and then drawing near the royal person, to lie again with their faces in the dust. they also saluted the ground near which he was sitting, by kissing it fervently and repeatedly, and by placing each cheek upon it. then, and not till then, with their heads, and faces, and lips, and breasts, stained with the red damp soil, which still clung to them, they were allowed to seat themselves near their monarch, and to join in the conversation. two or three of the inferior eunuchs, not satisfied with this servile prostration, began to sport and roll themselves on the ground, but this could not be effected without immense labour, and difficulty, and panting, and puffing, and straining; for like that paragon of knighthood sir john falstaff, they could not be compared to any thing so appropriately as huge hummocks of flesh. there they lay wallowing in the mire, like immense turtles floundering in the sea, till ebo desired them to rise. a very considerable number of bald-headed old men were observed among the individuals present, their hair or rather wool, having been most likely rubbed off by repeated applications of earth, sand, gravel, filth, or whatever else might be at hand, when the prince happened to make his appearance. the conference being brought to a close, a kid, a calabash of caffas, and two thousand kowries were presented to the landers, and cheered by a flourish of music, they laughed in concert as a mark of politeness, and shook hands with the king, and walked away to their own dwelling, which had been repaired, and thoroughly cleansed for their use. the latter operation was particularly necessary, as previously to their inhabiting it, it had been occupied by a multitude of domestic animals, sheep, pigs, goats, fowls, guinea fowls, bullocks, in fine, it had been a kind of stable, where ebo, the principal eunuch, kept his stock of animals. here, however, they were glad to lie down to repose their aching limbs, although the stench arising from some parts of the hut was almost insupportable. in the evening, the king returned their visit, and immediately took a fancy to john lander's bugle horn, which was very readily given him. he appeared to be greatly pleased with the present, turning about and inspecting every part of it, with the greatest curiosity. it appeared to him, however, to be immaterial as to which end the mouth was to be applied, for he put the lower part of the instrument to his mouth, and drawing up his breath to its full extent, sent such a puff of wind into it, as would have been sufficient for a diapason pipe of an organ; not hearing, however, the accustomed sound, he delivered the instrument to john lander, who brought out of it the shrillest note which he could, which set the king and his eunuchs into a violent laugh, and he expressed his delight to the donors of so valuable a present, assuring them that it made his heart glad to see them, and hoped that they would make themselves quite comfortable whilst they remained at katunga. they now shook hands, made a bow, not one that would have been deemed a very elegant one amongst the courtiers of st. james', and the sovereign departed, followed by a suite of wives, eunuchs, and other attendants. ebo inquired if there were any thing further that they wished to be done to their residence, to render their stay as agreeable as possible. their yard adjoined that of ebo, with which it communicated by a door way, without a door, so that it enabled the travellers to have frequent opportunities of seeing his numerous _unhappy wives_, and a number of little boys and girls, who were his personal attendants. the circumstance of a eunuch keeping a whole retinue of wives, appeared to the landers rather an extraordinary one, for he appeared to treat them with all the jealousy of a turkish pacha towards his mistresses in his seraglio. of their fidelity or continency, however, could be said, whenever an opportunity presented itself; but do not require to travel as far as africa for the experience, when an opportunity of that kind is wanted, it is not long before it is obtained. the eunuch sent them a very fat sheep, as a further token of his good will. on friday may th, richard lander accompanied by ebo, and the other unwieldy eunuchs, took a present to the king, which was pretty well received; mansolah, it was supposed out of compliment, remarked that if they had not brought with them the value of a single kowrie, they should have been favourably received at katunga, and well entertained at his own expense. they had, previously to presenting themselves before the king, consulted their friend ebo, on the subject of their journey to the niger, and he strongly advised them by no means even to hint at such an intention to the king, whose suspicions, he assured them, would immediately take the alarm, so that instead of being forwarded on their way thither, they would either be detained in the town for an indefinite time, or sent back again to the coast. they therefore conceived it prudent to give him the following statement only:--"that the king of england, anxious to procure the restoration of certain papers which belonged to a countryman of theirs, who perished at boosa about twenty years ago, which papers were supposed to be in the possession of the sultan of yaoorie, they had been despatched hither by their sovereign, in the hope that the king of katunga would forward them to the latter state, for the purpose of obtaining them from the sultan of yaoorie, and taking them back with them to england." mansolah, with the natural indifference of the uncultivated mind, displayed neither eager curiosity as to their object in coming to his country, nor surprise when they had informed him of it, but very promptly observed, that in two days time, he would send a messenger to kiama, wouwou, boossa, and yaoorie, for the purpose of acquainting the rulers of those provinces of their intention to pay them a visit, and that on the return of the messenger, they should have his permission to depart. this was promised after richard lander's repeated solicitations and importunities, that they should not be detained here longer than necessary, as in a very short time, the violent rains would render the roads to those countries impassable, and, in consequence, they would not be able to travel till the return of the dry season. their speedy departure was also a matter of importance to them on account of their health, which they found to be far better when they were travelling, than when cooped up in a close unwholesome hut, where ventilation appeared to be the object the least attended to, or considered of no importance at all. they were expressly and repeatedly informed that the monarch of this empire was brother to the king of benin; but notwithstanding this near relationship of the two sovereigns, not the slightest intercourse or communication is maintained between yarriba and that power, and the reason ascribed for it is, that the distance between the two countries is too great. it must, however, be remarked, that friends and acquaintance are often called brothers in yarriba; and to make a distinction in the above instance, they assert that mansolah and the king of benin were of one father and one mother. they made some inquiries of ebo on this subject, but he soon silenced their remarks by observing, that they were too inquisitive, or to use his own words, "that they talked too much." it was the intention of the landers, after leaving yaoorie to proceed direct to guarie, the prince of which country would no doubt send them to funda, whence it would be their endeavour to discover the termination of the niger, agreeably to their written instructions. instead of the jarring noise of women's tongues, which had hitherto annoyed and followed them at every stage of their journey from badagry, they at length enjoyed as much of composure and tranquillity, as they could well desire; for the wives of ebo residing at some distance from the part of the yard which they occupied, the shrill sound of their voices was pleasant, contrasted with the former loud, discordant, and perpetual din which rang in their ears from morning to night. their male visitors were, likewise, few and select, and did not remain with them any very considerable time together. an order was issued by the king, that if any impertinent individual troubled them at any time with his company, when it was not desired, ebo was at liberty to behead him, and no one according to the strict injunction of mattsolah, should tax the eunuch with injustice or cruelty in the performance of his duties. this royal proclamation as it may be termed, had the desired effect, for it was regarded with greater exactness and punctuality than some royal proclamations are in europe, the people having a great dread of ebo, who, independently of the high office which he held of chief eunuch, somewhat similar to the office of lord chamberlain at the court of st. james', was also the occupant of the delightful office of public executioner, an occupation which, in that despotic country, was frequently called into practice. the king of katunga, like other kings, has also his master of the horse, who at the time of lander's visit was an elderly person, possessing no small degree of influence over his royal master. the european and the african master of the horse, however, in some respects bore a great similarity to each other, although contrary to the opinion of the metaphysicians, the same cause produced a different effect. the european master of the horse has a great number of useless horses under his nominal care, and yet has nothing to do; the african master of the horse has also nothing to do, for the very best of all reasons, that he has no horses to take care of, the whole african stud consisting of one or two half-starved, ragged ponies, which would disgrace a costermonger's cart in the streets of london. katunga, however, is not the only place in which the sun shines, where the office is made for the man, and not the man for the office; but as they have no pension list in katunga, nor any retired allowances, nor any chiltern hundreds, to enable them to vacate their offices, they are immediately sent about their business when age, sickness, or other infirmity disables them from performing the duties of their office. the age of the master of the horse of the king of katunga was about seventy, but he contrived, similar to the plan adopted in some other countries, of keeping to himself all the emoluments of his office, and getting a deputy to perform the labour; thus for a mess of indian corn, the stud of the king of katunga could be very ably looked after by some half-starved native, whilst the holder of the office was comfortably reposing himself amongst his twenty or thirty wives. this important personage had been hitherto overlooked by the landers, that is, they had not as yet made him any present; in order, however, to let them know that there was such a being in existence, he sent them a sheep as a present, on the principle of the english adage, of throwing a sprat to catch a mackerel. a present from an african master of the horse is not a disinterested gift; he had seen the presents delivered to the king, and he ardently longed for a slip of the red cloth wherewith to decorate his person, and set off the jetty blackness of his skin. the pride of an african dignitary will not allow him to beg, and therefore he conjectured that on the receipt of his present of the sheep, common courtesy would instruct the landers to return the compliment, by a present of some european article of corresponding value. nor was the master of the horse wrong in his conjectures, for a present was sent him, and to his great delight a strip of red cloth was included in it. the unfortunate master of the horse, however, discovered, that although he filled the high office of master of the horse, he was not master of himself, nor was he master of that, which he believed did in reality belong to him, for his master and king no sooner heard that he had received a present of a piece of red cloth, than his majesty discovered that it was a colour, which royalty alone was entitled to wear. the master of the horse had scarcely exhibited his valuable present to his admiring wives, all of whom begged for a bit wherewith to enhance the charms of their unwieldy persons, than a messenger from the king arrived, bearing the afflicting intelligence to the master of the horse, to deliver up for the use of his majesty, a certain piece of red cloth presented to him by the europeans then in the town, or submit to have his head cut off by the dexterity of his chief eunuch. the master of the horse judged it better to lose the cloth than his head, and with a very ill grace, and muttering some expressions partaking strongly of the enormous crime of high treason, the cloth was delivered up, and the master of the horse returned to his wives to condole with them on the heavy loss which they had sustained. speaking of the town of katunga, lander says, "all seems quiet and peaceable in this large dull city, and one cannot help feeling rather melancholy, in wandering through streets almost deserted, and over a vast extent of fertile land, on which there is no human habitation, and scarcely a living thing to animate or cheer the prevailing solemnity." the walls of the town have been suffered to fall into decay, and are now no better than a heap of dust and ruins, and such unconcern and apathy pervade the minds of the monarch and his ministry, that the wandering and ambitious fellata has penetrated into the very heart of the country, made himself master of two of its most important and flourishing towns, with little, if any opposition, and is gradually, but very perceptibly gaining on the lukewarm natives of the soil, and sapping the foundations of the throne of yarriba. the people, surely, cannot be aware of their own danger, or they never would be unconcerned spectators of the events, which are rapidly tending to root out their religion, customs, and institutions, and totally annihilate them as a nation. but since they have neither foresight, nor wisdom, nor resolution to put themselves in a posture of defence, and make at least a show of resistance, when danger real or imaginary menaces them; since neither the love of country, which stimulates all nations to heroic achievements in defence of their just and natural rights, and all that is truly dear to them in the world; and since neither affection for their defenceless wives and unprotected offspring, nor love of self can awaken a single spark of courage or patriotism in their bosoms, can scare away that demon sloth from among them, or induce them to make a solitary exertion to save themselves and posterity from a foreign yoke; why then, they are surely unworthy to be called a people; they deserve to be deprived of their effects, children, and personal liberty, to have their habitual sloth and listlessness converted into labour and usefulness, in tilling, improving, and beautifying for strangers, that soil, which they have neither spirit nor inclination to cultivate for themselves. a market is held daily in different parts of katunga, but there are two days in the week, in which it is much larger and more numerously attended than on any of the other days. one is styled the queen's market, but in the evening, when it is held in another place, it is called the king's market. to make a market profitable, the sellers and buyers should be equal, for where either predominate, the advantage cannot be mutual; if the buyers exceed the sellers, the articles sold will rise in price, and on the other hand, if the sellers exceed the buyers, a depreciation in the price will take place. the latter case was observed to prevail in the markets of katunga, and which was in a degree a direct proof that the supply surpassed the population. the articles chiefly exposed for sale were, several different kinds of corn, beans, peas, and vegetables, in great abundance and variety; the butter extracted from the mi-cadama tree, country cotton cloths, red clay, ground or guinea nuts, salt, indigo, and different kinds of pepper; snuff and tobacco, trona, knives, barbs, hooks, and needles, the latter of the rudest native manufacture. there were also finger rings of tin and lead, and iron bracelets and armlets, old shells, old bones, and other venerable things, which the members of the society of antiquaries would estimate as articles of real _vertu_; a great variety of beads both of native and european manufacture, among the former of which was recognised the famous agra bead, which at cape coast castle, accra, and other places, is sold for its weight in gold, and which has been in vain attempted to be imitated by the italians and our own countrymen. one most remarkable thing was offered for sale, and that was a common blue english plate, the price of which was, however, too high for the individuals who frequented the market, although many there were, who cast a longing eye on so valuable a piece of property. some of the people were disposed to look upon it as a fetish, and the seller was by no means disinclined to invest it with that character, as he then knew, he could demand for it whatever price he pleased. the owner of it, however, from the exorbitant price which he put upon the piece of english crockery, carried it home with him, and dearly did he repent that he did not accept of the highest offer that was made him, for on its reaching the ears of his majesty, the king considered that he had as good a right to the english plate, especially as it was a fetish, as he had to the scarlet cloth of his master of the horse, and therefore the owner of it had his option, to deliver it up for the use of royalty, as an appendage to the crown of katunga, or to lose his own appendage of a head under the sword of that skilful anatomist, ebo. the owner of the plate adopted the same line of policy as the master of the horse, and the english plate became a part of the hereditary property of the kings of katunga. some of the articles in the market were not of the most tempting nature, at least to a european appetite; for instead of the dainties of an english market, consisting of hares, rabbits, fowls, &c., the natives of katunga feasted their looks upon an immense number of rats, mice, and lizards, some ready dressed for the immediate satisfaction of the appetite, with the skins on, and some undressed to be taken home, for the glasses and the kitcheners of katunga to try their culinary skill upon. little balls of beef and mutton were also to be had, weighing about two ounces, but the stomach must not have been of the squeamish kind, which could relish them. on the return of the landers from the market, where they were more gazed upon than any of the articles submitted for sale, they received a visit from their friend ebo, who was the bearer of the unwelcome intelligence, that a body of fellatas from soccatoo had arrived at the moussa, a river which divides yarriba from borgoo, and that they had attacked a town on its borders, through which their route would lie. therefore, continued ebo, the yaoorie messenger will of necessity be compelled to wait here till authentic intelligence be received of the truth or falsehood of the rumour, before he sets out on his mission to kiama. there was little doubt, ebo said, but the truth or falsity of the statement would be ascertained in about three days, and the messenger then would be immediately despatched on his errand. this intelligence bore in the eyes of the landers the character of a complete fiction, but for what purpose it was so got up, they could not divine. the king could gain little or nothing by their protracted stay in his capital; he had received his presents, and therefore it was conjectured, that it might be the etiquette of the court of katunga, not only for the king to receive some presents from strangers on their arrival, and especially from travellers of the character and importance which the landers gave themselves out to be, as the accredited ambassadors of the king of england, but also that the departure was to be preceded by certain presents, as a kind of passport or purchase of his leave to travel through his dominions. it appeared also most strange to the landers, that the very day after their arrival, the fellatas should so opportunely seize upon a town, through which they were to pass, and that the information of the inroad of so dreaded an enemy should not have reached katunga at an earlier period, when intelligence of no moment whatever flies through the country with the swiftness of an arrow from the bow. there was also another strong inducement, which operated upon the mind of the landers, to expedite their departure, and that was, that from some circumstances which had occurred, it was not beyond the range of probability, that the head of john lander, if not of his brother also, might be severed by the skill of ebo, the executioner. love is certainly a most wondrous power, whether it shows itself in the bosom of the fair english girl, or in that of the sooty african; nor is it confined to times and places, to condition or to climate; for it grows and flourishes in the wigwam of the american, the coozie of the african, and the proud edifices of the europeans. it, however, sometimes happens, that although one party may be in love, the other is as frigid, as if he were part and parcel of an iceberg, and so was it situated with john lander. it has been already stated, that the communication between the yard which the landers occupied, and that which was tenanted by the wives of ebo, was uninterrupted, and of course in the absence of their husband, there was no impediment to any of them whispering their tale of love into the ears of the juvenile travellers, whenever they thought they were in a disposition to hear it. some of the wives indeed, instead of being the nourishers and fosterers of love, were the veriest antidotes to it, that perhaps human nature could produce; on the other hand, there were some in the fullness and freshness of youth, who had just been selected or rather purchased by ebo, as very proper persons to soothe and comfort him in his declining years. one of them in particular, had, by certain signs and gestures, given john lander to understand, that although they might vary very much in colour, yet that a kind of sympathy might exist between their hearts, which would lead to a mutual communication of happiness, so much desired at so great a distance from his native land. john, however, either did not or would not understand the language, which the sable beauty spoke; still her conduct was not unnoticed by several other ladies of the seraglio, and particularly by the shrivelled and the wizened, who hesitated not to convey the intelligence to ebo, who immediately paid a visit to the travellers, out of pure compliment and good-will, as he said, at the same time expressing his fears that the curiosity of his women might be troublesome to them, and as it was by no means his wish, nor that of his lord and sovereign, the king, that they should be subjected to any species of annoyance, he had given directions for the door-way to be instantly blocked up with mortar, which would effectually prevent any further unpleasant intrusion on the part of the women. the landers could evidently see the lurking motive for this extreme attention of ebo, to promote their comfort, nor were they in reality displeased at it, for the society of the women was certainly at times very unpleasant and irksome, and as some of them evinced a strong disposition for intriguing, it was considered fortunate that the communication was closed, as the friendship and good-will of ebo were particularly necessary to them, not only to secure their good treatment during their stay at katunga, but also to expedite their departure from it. ebo had scarcely taken his departure, and they were rejoicing at the probability of not being again intruded upon, particularly as it was the sabbath day, when, to their great annoyance, they were favoured with the company of several houssa mallams, who, notwithstanding the irksome restraint to which they are subjected by the jealousy of the king and his people, are content to remain so far from their native country, and reside amongst strangers and pagans as long as they live. whether the priests have taken this step purely from religious motives, or, which is the more likely reason of the two, that they have exiled themselves from their home and families for the mere purpose of being enriched at the expense of the credulity and ignorance of the inhabitants, were questions, which could not at the time be solved. at all events, the institutions of these missionaries are effectually concealed under a cloak of piety and devotion; and thus they are tolerated by the common consent of the monarch and his subjects. the practice of making presents is, in general, in the african cities, not confined to the sovereign and his immediate ministers, but it extends to every grade, in the least degree connected with the court. thus the landers supposed that when they had made their presents to the king and his chief eunuchs, no further demand would be made upon them in the way of presents; in this, however, they found themselves mistaken, for they now discovered that there were certain gentlemen, styled head men, who are the confidential advisers of the king, and lead his armies to battle. it was, however, necessary previously to sending the presents to the head men, to submit them to the inspection of the king, in order that nothing might be given them, which had not his approbation and consent. this was accordingly done, and the donors took particular care not to include any red cloth amongst their presents. it was rather laughable to see the presents undergoing the examination of mansolah. amongst them were three large clasp knives, one for each of the head men, but his majesty very unceremoniously delivered one of them, without speaking a word, into the hands of ebo, who as unceremoniously put it into his belt, to be hereafter deposited amongst other valuables belonging to the sovereignty. this occasioned richard lander to return to his hut for another knife, for he easily foresaw that were he to make any distinction in the value or the number of the articles to the head men, it might be the cause of exciting jealousy and ill blood, and be greatly detrimental to his own interests, for as they were the advisers of the king, they were sure to make that one their enemy, who might look upon his present as less valuable, than those presented to their companions. towards evening, richard lander rode to the residence of the head men, by each of whom he was received in the most friendly manner. the presents were laid before them, and accepted with a profusion of thanks. one of them attempted to make a speech, but if he acquitted himself no better when giving his advice to his sovereign, than he did in the expression of his thanks, he could not be said to be a great acquisition to the councils of his king. the huts of the head men were larger and more carefully built, and their yards more commodious than even those of the king; all were kept in excellent order, clean and neat. these ministers of the crown, like the ministers of other countries, had contrived to appropriate to themselves the good things of the country, for they were in far more affluent circumstances than any of their neighbours; they had a wife for almost every week in the year, and large flocks of sheep and goats, in which the wealth of the natives principally consists. a goat, and two large pots of country beer, were laid at the feet of richard lander, and after expressing his acknowledgements, he returned home. the landers were of opinion, that it would require a long residence in this country, and a perfect acquaintance with its language to enable a foreigner to form a correct judgment of its laws, manners, customs, and institutions, as well as its religion and form of government. so innumerable are the mistakes, which the smattering of ignorant native interpreters never fails to occasion, that they despaired of obtaining any accurate information on any of those heads. perhaps few despots sully their dignity, by condescending to consult the inclination of their subjects, in personally communicating to them their most private as well as public concerns. yet the sovereign of youriba appeared to be so obliging, as to make this a common practice. in return, however, the people are expected and compelled to satisfy the curiosity of their prince, by adopting a similar line of conduct towards him; and all the presents which they receive from strangers, however trifling they may be, are in every instance taken to his residence for inspection. every thing, indeed, which relates to their personal interests, and all their domestic concerns, he listens to with the most patriarchal gravity. thus, the presents of the landers to the king, were exhibited two or three times. the presents to ebo, and also to the head men, were also shown to the people, having been first submitted to the inspection of the king. the common people were all anxious to know, whether, amongst the other things they had received, any coral had been given to the king or his ministers; and their curiosity was immediately gratified without hesitation or remark. if a stranger from a remote part of the empire, wishes to visit katunga, in order to pay his respects to the sovereign, the chief or governor of every town through which he may happen to pass, is obliged to furnish him with any number of carriers he may require; and in this manner his goods are conveyed from village to village, until he arrives at the capital. a similar indulgence is likewise extended to any governor who may have the like object in view. the most laughable mistakes were frequently made here, by one of the badagrian messengers, who acted also as an interpreter, as regards the gender and relationship of individuals, such as father for mother, son for daughter, boy for girl, and _vice versa_. he informed richard lander that a _brother_ of his, who was the friend of ebo, and resided with him, begged his permission to come and see them; of course they expected to see a gentleman of some consequence enter their yard, but to their surprise, the brother proved to be an old shrivelled woman, neither more nor less than one of the eunuch's wives. katunga by no means answered the expectations which the landers had been led to form of it, either as regards its prosperity, or the number of its inhabitants. the vast plain also on which it stands, although exceedingly fine, yields in verdure and fertility, and simple beauty of appearance to the delightful country surrounding the less celebrated city of bohoo. its market is tolerably well supplied with provisions, which are, however, exceedingly dear, in so much so that with the exception of disgusting insects, reptiles, and vermin, the lower classes of people are almost unacquainted with the taste of animal food. owing to the short time that the landers had been in the country, which had been chiefly employed in travelling from town to town, the manners of the people had not sufficiently unfolded themelves their observation, so that they were unable to speak of them with confidence, yet the few opportunities, which they had of studying their characters and disposition, induced them to believe, that they were a simple, honest, inoffensive, but a weak, timid, and cowardly race. they seemed to have no social tenderness, very few of those amiable private virtues, which could win their affection, and none of those public qualities that claim respect or command admiration. the love of country is not strong enough in their bosoms to invite them to defend it against the irregular incursions of a despicable foe; and of the active energy, noble sentiments, and contempt of danger, which distinguish the north american tribes, and other savages, no traces are to be found amongst this slothful people; regardless of the past, as reckless of the future, the present alone influences their actions. in this respect they approached nearer to the nature of the brute creation, than perhaps any other people on the face of the globe. though the bare mention of an enemy makes the pusillanimous mansolah, and his unwarlike subjects tremble in every limb, they take no measures to prevent whole bands of strangers from locating in the finest provinces of the empire, much less do they think of expelling them after they have made those provinces their own. to this unpardonable indifference to the public interest, and neglect of all the rules of prudence and common sense, is owing the progress, which the fellatas made in gaining over to themselves a powerful party, consisting of individuals from various nations in the interior, who had emigrated to this country, and the great and uniform success which has attended all their ambitious projects. at the time of the visit of the landers, they were effectually in the heart of the kingdom, they had entrenched themselves in strong walled towns, and had recently forced from mansolah a declaration of their independence, whilst this negligent and imbecile monarch beheld them gnawing away the very sinews of his strength, without making the slightest exertion to apply a remedy for the evil, or prevent their future aggrandizement. independently of raka, which is peopled wholly by fellatas, who have strengthened it amazingly, and rendered it exceedingly populous, another town of prodigious size, had lately sprung into being, which already surpassed katunga in wealth, population, and extent. it was at first resorted to by a party of fellatas, who named it alorie, and encouraged all the slaves in the country to fly from the oppression of their masters, and join their standard. they reminded the slaves of the constraint tinder which they laboured; and tempted them by an offer of freedom and protection, and other promises of the most extravagant nature, to declare themselves independent of yarriba. accordingly, the discontented; many miles round, eagerly flocked to alorie in considerable numbers, where they were well received. this occurrence took place about forty years ago, since which, other fellatas have joined their countrymen from sockatoo and rabba; and notwithstanding the wars, if mutual kidnapping deserves the name, in which they have been engaged, in the support and maintenance of their cause, alorie is become by far the largest and most flourishing city in yarriba, not even excepting the capital itself. it was said to be two days journey, that is, forty or fifty miles in circumference, and to be fortified by a strong clay wall, with moats. the inhabitants had vast herds and flocks, and upwards of three thousand horses, which last will appear a very considerable number, when it is considered that katunga does not contain more than as many hundreds. the population of alorie has never been estimated, but it must be immense. it has lately been declared independent of yarriba, and its inhabitants are permitted to trade with the natives of the country, on condition that no more fellatas be suffered to enter its walls. it is governed by twelve rulers, each of a different nation, and all of equal power; the fellata chief not having more influence or greater sway than the other. raka is but one day's journey north-east of katunga, and alorie three days journey to the south-west. the party of fellatas, which were reported to have taken possession of a yarriba town, on the banks of the moussa, were said to have abandoned it, and to have joined their countrymen at raka. this intelligence was brought to katunga by market people, no one having been sent by the king to ascertain the number of the adventurers, or the object of their visit. the king of katunga, since the arrival of the travellers in his capital, had been very niggardly in his presents, as coming from a monarch of a large and mighty kingdom. nor in other respects was the conduct of mansolah, such as to impart to them much pleasure, nor could they in any wise account for it, than by supposing that their own present had fallen short of his expectations, and thereby failed to awaken those good-natured qualities, which were displayed at sight of the infinitely more valuable, as well as showy one of captain clapperton. but whatever might have been the reason, certain it is that mansolah and his subjects had seen quite enough of white men, and that the rapturous exultation which glowed in the cheeks of the first european that visited this country, on being gazed at, admired, caressed, and almost worshipped as a god; joined to the delightful consciousness of his own immeasurable superiority, will in the present, at least, never be experienced by any other. "alas!" says richard lander, "what a misfortune; the eager curiosity of the natives has been glutted by satiety, a european is shamefully considered no more than a man, and hereafter, he will no doubt be treated entirely as such; so that on coming to this city, he must make up his mind to sigh a bitter farewell to goats' flesh and mutton, and familiarize his palate to greater delicacies, such a lizards, rats, and locusts, caterpillars, and other dainties, which the natives roast, grill, bake, and boil, and which he may wash down, if he pleases, with draughts of milk white water, the only beverage it will be in his power to obtain." on the morning of wednesday the th of may, richard lander was desired by a messenger to visit the king at his residence, and on his arrival there, he found a great number of people assembled. the object of this summons was explained by ebo, who said that lander had been sent for, that the present which he, the eunuch had received, should be shown to the people without any reservation whatever. it was accordingly spread out on the floor, together with the presents made to the king. even a bit of english brown soap, which had been given to ebo a short time before, was exhibited along with the other things; for so great a degree of jealousy exists among the eunuchs and others, arising from the apprehension that one might have received more than another; that ebo himself, powerful as he is, would dread the effects of it on his own person, should he have been found to have concealed a single thing. they all in fact endeavour to disarm censure by an appearance of openness and sincerity. on the night of thursday the th, to their infinite surprise and pleasure, ebo entered their yard in a great hurry, with the pleasant information, that the king, as nothing more was to be got from them, had consented to their departure on the following morning; and that it was his wish they would get their things in readiness by that time. so confident were they that they would be unable to start from katunga, for a month to come at the earliest, that they had not only sowed cress and onion seed the day after their arrival, which were already springing up, but they had actually made up their minds to abide there during the continuance of the rains. but now they were in hope of reaching yaoorie in twelve or fourteen days, in which city they intended to remain for a short time, before proceeding further into the interior. the only drawback to their pleasure, was the misfortune of having all their horses sick, which might seriously inconvenience them in their progress. the old route to kiama was considered so dangerous, that it was understood they were to be sent back to atoopa, which was two long days' journey from katunga, and they were to proceed in a safer path. although they now required but five men besides their own to carry the luggage, the king scrupled and hesitated to supply them with them, and the youngest of their jenna messengers was nominated to fill the place of one of them. they were told that it was on account of the vast number of people that have emigrated from katunga to raka and alorie, that a sufficient number of carriers could not be procured for them; but in so large a place as katunga, where two thirds of the population are slaves, their reason seemed quite ridiculous, and they suspected the real one to be the same original sin, viz. the humble character of their present. the king, however, promised to take his farewell of them on the following morning, and they being in good health, they hoped soon to accomplish the object of their undertaking, and return in safety to old england. on the following day, instead of the visit from the king, which they were told on the preceding day he was to honor them with, they were requested to repair to his residence. accordingly, having first saddled their horses, and packed up their luggage between six and seven o'clock a.m., the two brothers walked to the royal residence. on their arrival they were introduced without any ceremony into a private yard, wherein the king had been patiently waiting their coming for some time previously. he was rather plainly dressed in the costume of the country, namely a tobe, trousers, and sandals, with a cap very much resembling in shape those, which were worn by elderly ladies in the time of queen elizabeth, and which are still retained by some in the more remote parts of england. on his right the eunuchs were reposing their huge limbs on the ground, with several of the elders of the people, and his left was graced by a circle of his young wives, behind whom sat the widows of more than one of his predecessors, many of whom appeared aged. a performer on the whistle was the only musician present. so that during a very long interview, a little whistling now and then was the only amusement which the prince could afford them. a good deal of discussion ensued, and much serious whispering between the monarch and his wives, in the course of which both parties quitted the yard two or three times to hold a secret conference; followed by the eunuchs with their hands clasped on their breast. mansolah at length scraped together two thousand kowries, about three shillings and sixpence sterling, which he presented to the four men that had accompanied the travellers from badagry and jenna as guides, messengers, &c., to enable them to purchase provisions on their journey homeward. this sum had been collected from amongst the king's wives, each having contributed a portion, because their lord and master did not happen to be in a liberal mood. poor souls! they possess scarcely the shadow of royalty, much less the substance; the exterior forms of respect which they receive from the male portion of the people alone distinguishing them from their less illustrious countrywomen. they are compelled to work in order to provide themselves with food and clothing, and besides which, part of the earnings is applied to the king's use. to effect these objects, they are necessitated to make long and painful journeys to distant parts of the empire, for the purpose of trading. they have, however, the privilege of travelling from town to town, without being subjected to the usual duty, and can command the use of the governor's house wherever they go. the boasted industry of ancient queens and princesses in more classic regions, sinks into nothing when compared to the laborious life, which is led by the female branch of the royal family at yarriba. mansolah, after some time beckoned to them to draw near him, for they were sitting at some distance on a bundle of sticks, and with a benevolent smile playing upon his wrinkled features, he slowly and with great solemnity placed a goora nut in the right hand of each of them, and then asked their names. richard and john, they replied, "richard-_ee_ and john-_ee_," said the king, for he was unable to pronounce their christian names without affixing a vowel to the end of them, "you may now sit down again." they did so, and remained in that posture until they were both completely wearied, when they desired ebo to ask the king's permission for them to go home to breakfast, which was granted without reluctance. then, having shaken hands with the good old man, and wishing a long and happy reign, they bade him farewell for the last time, bowed to the ladies, and returned with all haste to their hut. chapter xxxiii. every thing was now ready for their departure from katunga, but some considerable time elapsed before the carriers were ready to take up their loads, and much murmuring was occasioned by their size and weight. they then left the city, and returned to eetcho by the way they had come. one of their horses became so weak on the road, that he was unable to carry his rider, old pascoe, so that they were obliged to drive him along before them, which was a tiresome and unpleasant occupation. the journey from katunga was long, and owing to the ruggedness of the path, was very fatiguing, and as they were much in advance of the remainder of the party, they halted at eetcholee, until they joined them. here they let their horses graze, partook of some beer and other refreshment, and sat down on the turf to enjoy themselves, for the day had been sultry, and the heat oppressive, and their whole party were nearly exhausted. on saturday may nd, an unexpected obstacle presented itself to the prosecution of their journey, as the katunga carriers all complained of pains in their limbs, and on reaching leoguadda, which lies midway between eetcho and atoopa, they placed their burdens on the ground, and to a man, stoutly refused to take them any further until the following day. their own men also, who were still more heavily laden than the katunga men, had suffered so much from the long and irksome journey of yesterday, particularly jowdie, who was the strongest and most athletic of them all, that they greatly feared that all of them would have been taken seriously ill on the road. they, therefore, lightened their burdens, and distributed a portion of what they had taken out of them into the boxes, &c., of their already overladen katunga associates, without, however, permitting the latter to know any thing of the circumstance. among the carriers was a very little man, called gazherie, (small man,) on account of his diminutive stature; he was notwithstanding very muscular, and possessed uncommon strength, activity, and vigour of body, and bore a package containing their tent, &c., which though very heavy, was yet by far the lightest load of the whole. conceiving that corporeal strength, rather than bulk or height, should in this case be taken into the account, a bag of shot weighing lbs, was extracted from jowdie's burden, and clandestinely added to his. the little man trudged along merrily, without dreaming of the fraud that had been practised on him, till they arrived within a short distance of leoguadda, when imagining that one end of the tent felt much heavier than the other, he was induced to take it from his head, and presently discovered the cheat, for the bag having been thrust simply inside the covering, it could be seen without unlacing the package. he was much enraged at being thus deceived, and called his companions around him to witness the fact, and said he was resolved to proceed no further than leoguadda. he then succeeded in persuading them to follow his example, and thus a kind of combination was instantly formed against the travellers. as was usual with them on entering a village, they rested a little while under a shady tree in leoguadda, and here they were presently surrounded by the murmuring carriers, with the little man at their head. they were furious at first, and gave them to understand that they would go no further, and were determined, let the consequence be what it might, to remain in the town all night. leoguadda contained no accommodations whatever for them, and a storm seemed now to be gathering over their heads. atoopa was the town in which the king of katunga had advised them to spend the night; they therefore resolved to go on to that town, and strenuously endeavoured by gentle means to bring over the carriers to their views, but, these failing, they resorted to their own mode of argument, namely, fierce looks, violent action, vociferous bawling, and expressive gesture, which intimidated so much, that they snatched up their burdens, without saying a word, and ran away with alacrity and good humour. these carriers were to accompany them as far as the frontier town of the kingdom. it was market day at atoopa, and at a distance of some miles from the town, the hum of human voices could be distinctly heard. just after their arrival, a man of note, who was a public singer and dancer, stood before the door of their hut to entertain them with a specimen of his abilities, and he entered with so much warmth and agility into the spirit of his profession, that his whimsical performance really afforded them much diversion. the musician had two assistant drummers in his train, whose instruments were far from being unmusical, and likewise several other men, whose part was to keep time by clapping with their hands. the dancing was excellent of its kind, and resembled more the european style, than any they had before seen in the country. the singing was equally good, the voices of the men being clear and agreeable; they sang the responses, and likewise accompanied the chanting of their master with their voices; in fact, they performed their part of the entertainment to admiration. a _fatakie_, a smaller number than a coffle of merchants, left atoopa on the preceding day for kiama, and it was most likely that they would overtake them at the next town. on sunday morning, though their horses were in a very weak condition, and all looked extremely sorrowful, yet they quitted atoopa at an early hour and in good spirits, and journeying in a westerly direction, in two hours time they entered a lively little walled town, called rumbum. here they dismounted, and took a slight refreshment of parched corn and water, on the trunk of a fallen tree. rumbum is a great thoroughfare for fatakies of merchants, trading from houssa, borgoo, and other countries to gonga; and consequently a vast quantity of land is cultivated in its vicinity with corn and yams, to supply them with provisions. on quitting this town, their course altered to n.w., and continued so till their arrival at the large and important town of keeshee, which is on the frontier of the kingdom, and distant from atoopa only about twelve miles. it is surrounded by a double strong clay wall, and is an excellent situation as a place of security from the attacks of the enemy. before entering this place, and at the distance of a mile from it, they passed through a clean, extensive, and highly-flourishing fellata village, called acba, which, like most other places in yarriba inhabited by fellatas, was well stocked with sheep and cattle. the governor of keeshee having died only ten days previously to their arrival, they were well received by his successor, who was an elderly and respectable-looking man. shortly after their arrival, he sent them a present of a fine young bullock, a quantity of yams, and more than a gallon of excellent strong beer. in the centre of the town is a high stony hill, almost covered with trees of stinted growth, to which, in case of an invasion by the enemy, the inhabitants fly for refuge. as soon as they have reached its summit, it is borne, they say, by a supernatural power above the clouds, where it remains till the danger is over. some years have elapsed since this miracle last took place, yet the story is told with a serious belief of its truth, and with the most amusing gravity. about a quarter of a mile to the north-east of this marvellous hill, rises another, which very much resembles it in shape and appearance, but the latter is rather larger and higher, and overlooks the country for many miles round. a number of emigrants from different countries reside in this place; there are not a few from borgoo, nouffie, houssa and bornoo, and two or three tuaricks from the borders of the great desert. to the west of the town is a picturesque hill of a gentle ascent, on which are several small hamlets; these hamlets have a rural and eminently beautiful appearance. in no town through which they had hitherto travelled, had they seen so many fine tall men, and good-looking women, as at this place; yet several individuals of both sexes were to be met with, who had lost the sight of one eye, and others who had unseemly wens on their throats, as large as cocoa nuts. they saw a cripple to-day for the first time, and a female dwarf, whose height scarcely exceeded thirty inches, and whose appearance bespoke her to be between thirty and forty years of age. her head was disproportionately large to the size of her body; her features, like her voice, were harsh, masculine, and unpleasant in the extreme. it would have been ridiculous to be afraid of such a diminutive thing, but there was an expression in her countenance so peculiarly repulsive, unwomanly, and hideous, that on approaching their hut, they felt a very unusual and disagreeable sensation steal over them. the descriptions of an elf or a black dwarf in the arabian nights entertainments, or modern romances, would serve well to portray the form and lineaments of this singular little being. it was market day, and richard lander took a walk in the evening to the place where the market was held, but the crowd that gathered round him was so great, as to compel him to return home much sooner, than he had intended. if he happened to stand still even for a moment, the people pressed by thousands to get close to him, and if he attempted to go on, they tumbled over one another to get out of his way, overturning standings and calabashes, throwing down their owners, and scattering their property about in all directions. the blacksmiths in particular, welcomed him by clashing their iron tools against each other, and the drummers rejoiced by thumping violently upon one end of their instruments. a few women and children ran from him in a fright, but the majority less timid, approached as near as they could, to catch a glimpse of the first white man they had ever seen. his appearance seemed to interest them amazingly, for they tittered and wished him well, and turned about to titter again. on returning, the crowd became more dense than ever, and drove all before them like a torrent, dogs, goats, sheep, and poultry were borne along against their will, which terrified them so much, that nothing could be heard but noises of the most lamentable description; children screamed, dogs yelled, sheep and goats bleated most piteously, and fowls cackled, and fluttered from among the crowd. never was such a hubbub made before in the interior of africa, by the appearance of a white man, and happy indeed was that white man to shelter himself from all this uproar in his own yard, whither the multitude dared not follow him. the widows of the deceased chief of keeshee, daily set apart a portion of the twenty-four hours to cry for their bereavement, and pray to their gods. on this evening, they began in the same sad, mournful tone, which is commonly heard on similar occasions all over the country. richard lander asked their interpreter, why the women grieved so bitterly, he answered quickly, "what matter! they laugh directly." so it was supposed, that they cried from habit, rather than from feeling, and that they can shed tears and be merry in the same breath, whenever they please. about seven o'clock this evening, they heard a public crier, proclaiming with a loud voice, that should any one be discovered straggling about the streets after that hour, he would be seized and put to death. many houses in the town had lately been set on fire by incendiaries, and this most likely gave rise to the above precautionary measure. they were compelled to remain the whole of the following day, on account of the inability of the governor to procure them carriers for their luggage, the number of people who visited them to-day was so great, and their company so irksome, that they were perplexed for some time how to get rid of them without offence. one party in particular was so unpleasant, and they so seriously incommoded them, that they had recourse to the unusual expedient of smoking them off, by kindling a fire at the door of their hut, before which they were sitting. it succeeded agreeably to their wishes. a company of women and girls from the fellata village of acba, impelled by a curiosity so natural to their sex, came likewise to see them in the afternoon, but their society, instead of being disagreeable, as the company of all their other visitors proved to be, was hailed by them with pleasure. for these females were so modest and so retiring, and evinced so much native delicacy in their whole behaviour, that they excited in the breast of the travellers the highest respect: their personal attractions were no less winning; they had fine sparkling jetty eyes, with eyelashes as dark and glossy as the ravens' plume; their features were agreeable, although their complexions were tawny; their general form was elegant; their hands small and delicate, and the peculiar cleanliness of their persons, and neatness of dress added to these, rendered their society altogether as desirable as that of their neighbours was disagreeable. the fellatas inhabiting acba were all born and bred in that town, their ancestors settled in the country at so remote a period, that although some inquiries were made respecting it, all their questions were unavailing, and in fact, not even a tradition has been preserved on the subject. these "children of the soil," lead a harmless, tranquil, and sober life, which they never suffer passing events to disturb; they have no ambition to join their more restless and enterprising countrymen, who have made themselves masters of alorie and raka, nor even to meddle in the private or public concerns of their near neighbours of keeshee. indeed, they have kept themselves apart and distinct from all; they have retained the language of their fathers, and the simplicity of their manners, and their existence glides serenely and happily away, in the enjoyment of domestic pleasures and social tenderness, which are not always found in civilized society, and which are unknown among their roving countrymen. they are on the best possible terms with their neighbours like the fellatas at bohoo and by them are held in great respect. the governor of keeshee was a borgoo man, and boasted of being the friend of yarro, chief of kiama, but as the old man told them many wonderful stories of the number of towns under his sway, his amazing great influence, and the entire subjection in which his own people were kept by his own good government, all of which was listened to with patience; they were inclined to believe that the pretensions of the governor were as hollow as they were improbable. as to his government, he gave them a specimen of it, by bawling to a group of children that had followed their steps into the yard, ordering them to go about their business. but every one in this country displayed the same kind of ridiculous vanity, and in the majority of towns which they visited, it was the first great care of their chiefs, to impress on their minds an idea of their vast importance, which in many instances was contradicted by their ragged tobes and squalid appearance. yet, if their own accounts were to be credited, their affluence and power were unbounded. all truth is sacrificed to this feeling of vanity and vain glory; and considering that in most cases they hold truth in great reverence, they render themselves truly ridiculous by their absurd practice of boasting; every circumstance around them tending to contradict it. in the case of the landers, however, these toasters had to deal with strangers, and with white men, and perhaps it may be considered as natural, amongst simple barbarians, to court admiration and applause, even if no other means were employed than falsehood and exaggeration. after a deal of talking, tending to no particular subject, from which any useful information could be obtained, the governor of keeshee begged the favour of a little rum and medicine to heal his foot, which was inclined to swell and give him pain; and another request which he made was, that they would repair a gun, which had been deprived of its stock by fire. he then sung them a doleful ditty, not in praise of female beauty, as is the practice with the songsters of england, but it was in praise of elephants and their teeth, in which he was assisted by his cane bearer, and afterwards took his leave. they received little presents of goora nuts, salt, honey, mi-cadamia, butter, &c., from several inhabitants of the place. some mallams and others, who wished to accompany the landers to kiama, whither they were going for the purposes of trade, persuaded the easy-minded governor on the preceding night, to defer getting their carriers until the following day, because, forsooth, they were not themselves wholly prepared to travel on that day. they were, therefore, obliged to wait the further pleasure of these influential merchants. thus balked in their expectations, after their luggage had all been packed up for starting, richard lander attempted to amuse himself early in the morning, by scrambling to the top of the high and steep hill, which stood in the middle of the town. in his progress, he disturbed a tiger-cat from his retreat amongst the rocks, but he was rewarded for his labour by an extensive and agreeable prospect from the summit of the mountain, which he found to consist of large blocks of white marble. the town with its double wall, perforated with holes for the bowmen to shoot through, lay at his feet, and several little rural villages studded the country on every side. the governor of keshee was so old and infirm, that it was evident he had not many years to live. a lotion was given him for his swollen foot, which greatly elated a few of his attendants, and their animated looks and gestures bespoke hearts overflowing with gratitude, so much so indeed, that it was remarked as a circumstance of very rare occurrence. the cause of these grateful feelings was, however, soon explained to them, for early in the morning, they were visited by a young man, who had particularly distinguished himself in his expressions of gratitude, but who now put on such a rueful countenance, and spoke in a tone so low and melancholy, that his whole appearance was completely altered, insomuch that it was supposed some great calamity had befallen him. the cause of it was soon explained, by his informing them that he would be doomed to die, with two companions, as soon as their governor's dissolution should take place; and as the old man had already one foot in the grave, the sadness of the poor fellow was not to be wondered at. when this same individual and his associates observed richard lander giving the lotion to their master on the preceding day, they imagined it would prolong his existence, and consequently lengthen their own, and hence arose that burst of feeling which had attracted their attention. the people here imagined that the landers could do anything, but more especially that they were acquainted with, and could cure all the complaints and disorders to which man is liable. during the day, the governor solicited from richard lander a charm to protect his house from fire, and to enable him to amass riches, while one of his elderly wives made a doleful complaint of having been likely to become a mother for the last thirty years, and begged piteously for medicine to promote and assist her accouchement. it was easy enough to satisfy the old man; but it was conceived that the hypochondriacal complaint of his wife, was too dangerous to be meddled with by unprofessional hands. poor woman! she was much to be pitied, for the odd delusion under which she had been labouring for some time, had given her considerable uneasiness, so that life itself became a burden to her. all that richard lander, her medical adviser, could do for her, was to soothe her mind, by telling her that her distemper was very common, and not at all dangerous; and he promised her that on their return to keeshee, should nothing transpire in her favour in the mean time, he would endeavour to remove the cause of her complaint. this comforted the aged matron exceedingly, and in the fulness of her heart, she burst into tears of joy, dropped on her knees to express her acknowledgments, and pressed them to accept a couple of goora nuts. their engaging female friends, the fellatas, paid them a second visit this morning, with bowls of milk and foorah; and in the evening, a few of their male companions also came, and remained with them a considerable time. both sexes displayed the same timid reserve in their presence, and deported themselves in the same respectful manner as they did on the preceding day. it appeared that the fellatas inhabiting acba, though very numerous, are but one family, for the landers were informed, that their ancestor separated himself from his friends, relatives, and acquaintances, and exiling himself for ever from his native country, he travelled hither with his wives and children, his flocks and herds. the sons and daughters of his descendants intermarry only among their own kindred, and they are betrothed to each other in infancy and childhood. the little that they saw of the fellatas in yarriba, soon convinced them that in all things they were much, very much superior to the loveless and unsocial proprietors of the soil. their countenances bespoke more intelligence, and their manners displayed less roughness and barbarism. the domestic virtues of the fellatas are also more affectionate and endearing, and their family regulations more chaste and binding. on wednesday the th may, they rose before sunset, and having little to do in the way of preparation for setting out, they took a hasty breakfast, and afterwards went to pay their respects to the governor, and thank him for his hospitality and kindness to them. the parting with the interesting female natives, shall be related in lander's own words. "on returning to our lodgings, we had the pleasure of receiving the morning salutation of our fair friends, the fellatas, on bended knee. resolved to have another and a last chat with the white strangers, these females had come for the purpose of offering us two calabashes of new milk. this, and former little acts of kindness, which we have received from these dark-eyed maidens, have effectually won our regard, because we know they were disinterestedly given, and the few minutes which we have had the happiness of spending in their company, and that of their countrymen, have redeemed many hours of listlessness and melancholy, which absence from our native country, and thoughts of home and friends but too often excite in our breasts. it was not, therefore, without a feeling of sorrow that we bade them adieu. for my own part, when they blessed me in the name of allah and their prophet, and implored blessings on my head, and when i gazed upon the faces of the simple-hearted and innocent females, who had so piously and fervently invoked the benediction, with the consciousness of beholding them no more in this life, my heart was touched with sorrow, for of all reflections, this is certainly the most melancholy and dispiriting." "ye, who have known what 'tis to dote upon a few dear objects, will in sadness feel such partings break the heart they fondly hoped to heal." there was far less feeling and tenderness, though more words and much greater noise in taking their farewell of the two old messengers that had accompanied them from badagry, and who, with their jenna guides, were to return home on the following day. they had behaved throughout the whole of the journey to the entire satisfaction of the landers, and because they had been their companions on a long and painful journey, and because their faces had become familiarized to them, that they left them behind with sincere regret. although they left keeshee between six and seven in the morning, they were obliged to seat themselves on a green turf in the outskirts of the town, and wait there till a quarter after nine before the carriers with the luggage made their appearance. here they were joined by a borgoo fatakie, and their ears were saluted with the hoarse, dull sounds of their drum, which was played by a ragged young yarribean, long after they were on their journey. a company of merchants travelling through the country has always a drummer in their pay, who walks at the head of the party, and performs on his instrument continually, be the journey ever so long, for the purpose of animating the slaves to quicken their steps. their route lay through a vast and lonely forest, infested by a band of robbers and in which there is not a single human habitation. john lander went unarmed before the fatakie, and travelled alone, whilst richard remained behind to defend the carriers, in case of necessity. he had already ridden some distance in advance of them, when about twenty very suspicious-looking fellows, armed with lances, bows, and arrows, suddenly made their appearance from behind the trees, where they had concealed themselves, and stood in the middle of the path, before the men with the luggage, who were so terrified that they were prepared to drop their burdens and run away. his gun being loaded, richard lander levelled it at them, and had nearly discharged it at their leader, which intimidated them all so much, that they retreated again into the heart of the forest. when the people of yarriba observe any one approaching them on the road, whose appearance inspires them with apprehension as to the honesty of their intentions, they fling off their loads without waiting the result of the meeting, and take to their heels without venturing to look behind them. the robbers, therefore, when they saw the fatakie, no doubt expected to obtain an easy booty, not anticipating to find a white man amongst them, nor thinking that their carriers would have made a stand. they journeyed fifteen miles through this dreaded forest, which occupied them five hours and three quarters, owing to the weakness of their horses, and want of water, but above all to the oppressive heat of the weather, from which they all suffered more or less. they then arrived at the moussa, which is a rivulet, separating the kingdom of yarriba from borgoo. having satisfied their thirst and bathed, they crossed the stream, and entered a little village on the northern bank, where they halted for the day. when travelling in the bush, several men in the train of a fatakie wear a large iron ring on the thumb and middle finger; to the latter a piece of plate iron is attached, with which they make signals to each other, and the fatakie, when apart, by clinking the rings. this method of communication is very significant, and it is understood as well, and is as promptly answered or obeyed, as the boatswain's whistle on board a ship. the collision of the rings produces a harsh, grating noise, loud enough to be heard at a considerable distance. the mere crossing of a little stream, which a person might almost have jumped over, introduced them into a country very different from yarriba, which was inhabited by a different people, speaking a different language, professing a different religion, and whose manners, customs, amusements, and pursuits were altogether different. the village in which they halted was called moussa, after the river, and is distant from keeshee, in a northerly direction, as nearly as they could guess, about sixteen miles. the landers occupied a large round hut, called by the natives of that country _catamba_, in the houssa language _sowley_, and in the bornou _coozie_. in the centre of it is the trunk of a large tree, which supports the roof; it has two apertures for doors, which are opposite each other, and directly over them, suspended from the wall, are a couple of charms, written in the arabic character on bits of paper, which are to preserve the premises from being destroyed by fire. it was now eleven o'clock at night; their attendants were reposing on mats and skins in various parts of the hut. bows and arrows and quivers ornamented with cows' tails, together with muskets, pistols, swords, lances, and other weapons, were either hanging on the wall or resting against it. the scene was wild and singular, and quite bordering on, if not really romantic. outside the hut it was still more striking: there, though it rained and thundered, the remainder of the fatakie, consisting of men, women, and children, were sitting on the ground in groups, or sleeping near several large fires, which were burning almost close to the hut, whilst others were lying under the shelter of large spreading trees in its immediate vicinity. the only apparel which they wear, was drawn over their half-naked persons, their weapons were at their sides, and their horses were grazing near them. most of the people retired to rest without food, yet they slept soundly, and appeared quite happy and comfortable after their day's exertion and fatigue. one of the men fainted on the road from exhaustion, and remained very feverish and unwell. at day break on the following day, the travellers pursued their course, and as lander expresses himself, there wore a sweetness in the mountain air, and a freshness in the morning, which they experienced with considerable pleasure, on ascending the hills, which bordered the northern side of the pretty little moussa. when wild beasts tired with their nightly prowling, seek retirement and repose in the lonely depths of these primeval forests, and when birds perched in the branches of the trees over their heads, warbled forth their morning song, it is the time, that makes up for the languid, wearisome hours in the heat of the day, when nothing could amuse or interest them. it is in the earlier part of the morning too, or in the cool of the evening, that nature can be leisurely contemplated and admired in the simple loveliness of a verdant plain, a sequestered grotto, or a rippling brook, or in the wilder and more mysterious features of her beauty in the height of a craggy precipice, the silence and gloom of vast shady woods, or when those woods are gracefully bending to the passing gale. an hour's ride brought them near to the site of a town, which was formerly peopled only by robbers. it was, however destroyed some years ago, and its inhabitants either slain or dispersed, by order of the spirited ruler of kiama, since which time the road has been less dreaded by travellers. their path lay through a rich country covered with luxuriant grasses and fine trees, but very little underwood could be seen. it abounded with deer and antelopes, and other wild animals of a more ferocious nature; such as the lion, the leopard, the elephant, the wild ass, &c., but the solitary lowing of the buffalo was the only sound that was distinguished in the forest, although they had not the pleasure of meeting even with that animal. at eleven o'clock, they entered a very small, cleanly-looking village, where they halted for the day. unfortunately the governor with most of his people were at work in the fields at some distance, so that they could not get any thing to eat till rather late in the evening. it appeared that these poor villagers were forced to supply the soldiers of their sovereign with provisions, gratis, whenever business led them so far that way from the capital; and that in order to avoid the rapacity of these men, they built for themselves another hamlet in the woods, far out of the way of the path, whither they carry their goats, &c. and the corn of which they may not be in immediate want. on their arrival they were introduced into a small grass hut, which the smoke had changed into the most glossy black, which could possibly be seen; the interior of the roof was also ingeniously decorated with large festoons of cobwebs and dust, which must have been allowed to accumulate for a number of years. its fetish was a dried grasshopper, which was preserved in a little calabash, but upon the supposition that this was insufficient to protect it from all the danger to which huts in that country are constantly exposed, auxiliary charms of blood and feathers are likewise stuck inside of the wall. at sun-set, not having any thing to eat, richard lander went out with his gun into the woods, and was fortunate enough to shoot a few doves, and pascoe, who went in a different direction, shot a guinea hen, which made them an excellent supper. hunger had driven back their keeshee carriers, who were to have accompanied them to kiama, and therefore they were obliged to send a messenger to yarro for men to supply their place. late in the evening, the governor of the village returned from his labour in the fields, and presented them with corn and honey. on the forenoon of friday the th, the musical jingling of little bells announced the approach of a body of horsemen, who in less than a minute galloped up to their hut, and saluted them one after another with a martial air, by brandishing their spears, to their great discomfiture, within a few feet of their faces. to display their horsemanship more effectually, they caused their spirited steeds to prance and rear in their presence, and when they imagined they were convinced of their abilities, they dismounted to prostrate themselves before them, and acquainted them of the welfare of their prince. the carriers who had arrived from kiama, had preceded them on the road, and the whole of the men then sat down to partake of a little refreshment. it was twelve o'clock exactly when they set out on their journey, and the day being so far advanced, they wished to make all the haste possible, but the weather was extremely warm, and their horses were hardly strong enough to carry their riders, so that they were obliged after all to travel very slowly. at five o'clock in the afternoon, they reached the ruins of a small town. the path was through the same forest as they had travelled through on the preceding day, but this part of it was less thickly wooded. at one place they remarked two immensely large trees, springing up almost close together, their mighty trunks and branches were twisted, and firmly clasped round each other, like giants in the act of embracing, and presented an appearance highly novel and singular. ant hills were numerous on the road; and a few paces from it, they observed, as they rode along, little cone-shaped mud buildings, erected by the natives for the purpose of smelting iron ore, which is found in abundance in different parts of the country. at sunset they arrived at a village called benikenny, which means in the language of the people, (a cunning man;) and they found there three women waiting their arrival, with corn and milk from the king of kiama: this was very acceptable, for they had been without food for thirteen hours. they rested at benikenny a little while, and fully expected to have slept there, for the afternoon had been excessively warm, and they were all much fatigued. it appears, however, that their armed escort were not in the same way of thinking as themselves, and they encouraged them to proceed to another village, which they said was at no great distance. they, therefore, quitted benikenny, yet no village could be seen, and then the escort confessed that they had deceived them, in order that they might arrive at kiama before night. the sun had gone down on their quitting the halting place, but the moon and stars supplied them with a cooler and more agreeable light, and they journeyed on through the forest more slowly than before. in spite of their fatigue, they could not help admiring the serenity and beauty of the evening, nor be insensible to the delicious fragrance shed around from trees and shrubs. the appearance of their warlike and romantic escort, was also highly amusing. they were clad in the fashion of the east, and sought their way between the trees on their right and left; but sometimes they fell in their rear, and then again dashed suddenly by them with astonishing swiftness, looking as wild as the scenery through which their chargers bounded. the effect was rendered more imposing by the reflection of the moon-beams from their polished spears, and the pieces of silver which were affixed to their caps; while the luminous firefly appeared in the air like rising and falling particles of flame. john lander's horse was unable from weakness and exhaustion to carry him further than benikenny, so that he was obliged to walk the remainder of the journey to kiama, which was full six miles. about eight o'clock, kiama appeared before them, and in a few minutes they entered the city, and rode directly to the king's house. he came out to receive them, after having waited outside a very short time, and welcomed them with much satisfaction and good will. he was an elderly man, almost toothless, and had a beard as white as wool. nothing remarkable was observed in his dress or appearance. his first question was respecting the health of their sovereign, and his second and last respecting their own welfare. he seemed to be exceedingly well pleased at seeing richard lander again. they then took their leave, and were conducted by one of his slaves to a hut, or rather an assemblage of huts, adjoining his own residence. the huts, however, were not entirely to their satisfaction, for many of them had only one aperture in each, which was scarcely three feet square, so that they could not get into them excepting on their hands and knees. they were, besides, so very warm and close, that they found great difficulty in breathing, and in consequence they preferred a hut which was cooler and better ventilated, though it had the inconvenience of a thoroughfare. no sooner were they securely housed, than half a dozen of the king's wives introduced themselves with huge calabashes of sour milk, fried pancakes, and beef stewed in rice, the first they had yet seen. variously coloured mats, of excellent workmanship, were afterwards brought for their use, and with thankful hearts and comfortable feelings, they laid themselves down to rest. chapter xxxiv. fatigued with the journey of the preceding day, the travellers lay on their mats rather later than usual, and before they had risen, the king's messengers and others entered their hut to give them the salutations of the morning. richard lander returned yarro's compliment, by calling to see him at his own house, while his brother remained at home to take care of the goods. the natives of the country having a very indifferent reputation for honesty, compelled them to keep a watchful eye over all their actions. a number of mallams from houssa paid them a visit about the middle of the day, but a body of more ignorant mahommedans, it was supposed, could no where be found, for not one of them, even to their chief, who had a youthful appearance, understood a word of arabic. just before sunset, john lander selected a present, consisting of the following articles for the king: viz. six yards of red cloth, a quantity of printed cottons, a pair of silver bracelets, a looking-glass, two pair of scissors, a knife, two combs, and a tobacco pipe. the goods having been properly secured, they repaired with this present to the king, who received it with much apparent satisfaction. yarro professed the mahommedan faith, yet it was easy to perceive the very slender acquaintance he had obtained of the precepts of the koran, by the confidence which he placed in the religion of his fathers, in placing fetishes to guard the entrance of his houses, and adorn their half-naked walls. in one of these huts, they observed a stool of very curious workmanship. the form of it was nearly square; the two principal figures were each supported by four little wooden figures of men, and another of large dimensions, seated on a clumsy representation of a hippopotamus, was placed between them. these images were subsequently presented to the landers by yarro; and they learnt that the natives, before undertaking any water excursion, applied for protection to the hippopotami, and other dangerous objects of the river, to the principal figure, which was mounted on one of those creatures. this important personage was attended by his musicians, and guarded by soldiers, some armed with muskets, and others with bows and arrows, who formed the legs of the stool. in the inner apartment they discovered yarro sitting alone, on buffalo hides, and they were desired to place themselves near him. the walls of this apartment were adorned with very good prints of george iv., the duke of york, lord nelson, the duke of wellington on horseback, together with an officer of the light dragoons, in company with a smartly dressed and happy looking english lady. opposite to them were hung horse accoutrements, and on each side were dirty scraps of paper, containing select sentences from the koran. on the floor lay muskets, several handsomely ornamented lances, and other weapons, all confusedly heaped together, by the side of a large granite stone used for pounding pepper. these were the most striking objects they observed in the king's hut, adjoining which were others, through whose diminutive doors, the wives of yarro were straining their eyes to catch a glimpse of the white men. when lander spoke of proceeding to yaoorie by way of wowow and boussa, the king objected to their visiting, the former state, under any condition whatever; alleging that three of the slaves who carried the goods for captain clapperton, had never returned to him again, but had remained at wowow, where they were protected by the governor mahommed, and that if he should send others with them to that place, they might do the same thing. he, therefore, promised to send them to boosa in four days by another road. independently of the above considerations, the king was highly incensed against the ruler of wowow for his harsh treatment of the widow zuma, who was his friend and relative, and who had lately fled to boosa for the purpose of claiming the protection of the king of that country. it was reported that yarro's father, the late king of kiama, during his life time had enjoyed the friendship of an arab from the desert, which was returned with equal warmth and sincerity. a similarity of dispositions and pursuits produced a mutual interchange of kind actions; their friendship became so great that the king was never happy except when in the arab's company, and as a proof of his esteem and confidence, he gave him his favourite daughter in marriage. the fruit of this alliance was the restless widow zuma, and hence her relationship to the then reigning monarch of kiama. the friendship of his father and the arab lasted until the death of the latter. the king, however, was inconsolable for his loss, and looked round him in vain for some one to supply the place of his friend, but the ardour of his affection was too strong, and held by the hope of following his friend to another world, he committed suicide. this was the most affecting instance of genuine friendship, and indeed the only one, that came to the hearing of the travellers since they had been in the country. yarro was much attached to the widow zuma, and she would have fled to kiama, instead of going to boosa, if her intentions had not been suspected, and her actions narrowly watched by the ruler of wowow. unwilling as the landers always were to infringe upon the observance of the sabbath, they were nevertheless compelled on sunday, may th, to submit to the mortification of cleaning and polishing a sword and pistol, which were sent them for that purpose by the king, against the approaching mahommedan festival. yarro shortly afterwards sent them a turkey, and one of his women presented them with a roasted badger, a quantity of yams, &c. for the use of one of their people. on this evening, the wives of the king unanimously bestowed a severe reprimand on their royal husband for neglecting to offer them a portion of a bottle of rum, which was given to him on the preceding day. the ladies scolded so lustily, that the noise was heard outside the wall surrounding their huts, which led them to make the discovery. to appease the indignation of the irascible ladies, and to reconcile them to the loss of so great a dainty as a glass of rum, they were presented with a few beads, and some other trifles, but still it was evident that these fancy articles bore no comparison in the eyes of the ladies with the exquisite relish of the spirituous liquid. it was generally supposed that the ruler of wowow would make war on this state, as soon as he should be made acquainted with the fact of the landers being at borgoo, without having paid him a visit. although it was within the dominions of the king of boossa, who was acknowledged to be the greatest of the sovereigns of borgoo, wowow was reported to have lately received a body of nouffie horse soldiers, consisting of eight hundred men, which rendered its chief more powerful than either of his neighbours. these soldiers were the remnant of the army of ederisa, (the edrisi of clapperton) who was the rightful heir to the throne of nouffie; they deserted him in his misfortunes, and sought a refuge in wowow from the fury of their successful countrymen, leaving their leader to his fate. shortly after the return of richard lander to england from his expedition with captain clapperton, it was reported that magia, who was a younger son of the late king of nouffie, was reinforced by the soldiers from soccatoo; that he took immediate advantage of the panic into which this intelligence had thrown his brother, by attacking and routing his army, and expelling both him, and them from their native country. ederisa was for some time after a wanderer, but at length he was said to have found an asylum with one of the chiefs of a state near the kingdom of benin where he continued to reside in tranquillity and retirement. they received visits almost every hour of the day from a number of mahommedan mallams residing at kiama, as well as from those merchants, who formed part of the fatakie that accompanied them through the forest from keeshee. the former sent two boys to pray for them, in the expectation, it was supposed, of obtaining something more substantial than thanks, for the good that might result to them from their charitable remembrance of the frailty of their nature. the boys dropped on their knees, and recited the lesson that they had been taught, without committing a single blunder. a few needles were, however, the only recompense it was thought proper to make them, so that it was not likely their masters would desire any more prayers to be offered up at the shrine of their prophet, for christians so illiberal and irreligious. of all the vices of which these mahommedan priests were guilty, and by all accounts they were not a few, slander and defamation appeared to be by far the most general. never did they hear a mallam speak of his neighbours in terms of common respect. according to his account they were all the vilest creatures under the sun, not one escaping the lash of his censure. "avoid that man," said a complaisant and comfortable looking old mahommedan, pointing to one of his companions, as he quitted the hut, after having just blessed him in the name of allah, "for believe me, he will take every opportunity of deceiving you, and if you go so far as to trust him with any of your property, he will cheat you of every kowrie." the venerable speaker had a number of gilt buttons, nearly new, in his possession, which they had given him to sell, for they were frequently obliged to make such shifts for a meal, and when his invective was finished, he arose to take his leave, but the self-righteous priest had neglected, in the hurry of discourse, to secure a few buttons which he had purloined, for as he stood up they dropped from the folds of his garment on the floor. the man's confusion was immediately apparent, but they did not wish to punish him further by increasing his shame, and they suffered him to go about his business, in the belief that the circumstance had wholly escaped their observation. gilt buttons fetch a high price at kiama, from two to three hundred kowries each, and as they had a great number of them, it was likely that from henceforth they would be of infinite service to them. women use buttons to ornament their fingers, necks, and wrists, and they imagine that the brightest of them are made of gold. a messenger arrived this day at the king's house with the information, that doncasson, the ex-king of houssa, had recently taken no less than twelve towns in that empire from the fellatas, in which he had been greatly assisted by the sheik of bornou. the fellatas have a tradition, that when danfodio, bello's father, and the first king of soccatoo, was a simple shepherd, he made a vow to the great author of evil, that if he would assist him in the subjugating the kingdom of houssa, he would be his slave for ever after. the request of danfodio, it is reported, was complied with on his own conditions, but for no longer than thirty years, after which the aborigines of the country were to regain their liberty, and re-establish their ancient laws and institutions. the term was now nearly expired, and the fellatas began already, said the houssa men, to tremble with apprehensions at the prospect of this tradition being realized. june st, was the eve of the bebun sàlah, or great prayer day, and which is generally employed by the mussulmans in kiama, in making preparations for a festival which was to commence on the following day, and to be continued till the evening of the ensuing day. every one in the town, who is in possession of the means, is obliged to slaughter either a bullock or a sheep on the anniversary of this day, and those who are not in possession of money sufficient to procure a whole bullock or sheep, are compelled to purchase a portion of the latter, at least, for the purpose of showing respect and reverence for the "bebun sàlah." the mahommedans make a practice on this occasion of slaughtering the sheep, which may have been their companion in their peregrinations during the past year, and as soon as the holidays are over, they procure another to supply its place, and at the return of the festival, to undergo a similar fate. the company of one of these animals is preferred by the natives to that of a dog. on the following morning a company of eight or ten drummers awoke them by the dismal noise of their drums, and by the exclamation of "_turawa au, azhie_," signifying, "white men, we wish you fortune," which was repeated in a high shrill tone every minute. during the night, kiama was visited by a thunder storm, which continued with dreadful violence for many hours, and the torrents of rain which fell, threatened to overwhelm them in their huts. before they were aware of it, the water had rushed in at the door, and had completely soaked their mats and bedclothes, setting every light article in the room afloat. after much trouble they succeeded in draining it off, and prevented its further ingress, when they lit a large fire in the centre of the hut, and laid themselves down by the side of it to sleep. towards morning it also rained heavily again, and to all appearances the wet season had at length fairly set in. under those circumstances, it would be found almost next to impossible to travel much further, and if they were fortunate to reach yaoorie, they would be obliged to remain there some time, till the roads should have become sufficiently hard and dry for their future progress. their chief hope was, that the rains might not be so incessant at their commencement, so as to render the path to yaoorie impassable. on wednesday june nd, the threatening appearance of the weather prevented the mahommedans from repairing to the spot, which they had selected for the purposes of devotion, so early in the morning as they, could have wished, but the clouds having dispersed, they had all assembled there between the hours of nine and ten. the worshippers arranged themselves in six lines or rows, the women forming the last, and sat down on as many ridges of earth, which had apparently been thrown up for the purpose. the chief mallam no sooner began a prayer, than the talking and noise of the multitude ceased, and the deepest attention seemed to be paid by every one, though the substance of what he said could only be guessed at, because it was in arabic, which none of them understood a word of. the ceremony much resembled that which was performed at badagry; and the forms, which are generally practised, it is supposed, on all public religious meetings in mahommedan countries, such as ablution, prostration, &c., were observed on this occasion. the king, however, did not rise, as he should have done, when the worshippers stood up, but satisfied himself with uttering the name of allah, and by simple prostration only. when the usual form of prayer had been gone through, the chief mallam placed himself on a hillock, and for about five minutes read to the people a few loose pages of the koran, which he held in his hand. while thus engaged, two priests of inferior order knelt beside him to hold the hem of his tobe, and a third, in the same position, held the skirts from behind. after he had finished reading, the priest descended from the hillock, and with the help of his assistants, slaughtered a sheep which had been bound and brought to him for sacrifice. the blood of the animal was caught in a calabash, and the king and the more devoted of his subjects washed their hands in it, and sprinkled some of it on the ground. the conclusion of the ceremony was announced by the discharge of a few old muskets, and with drums beating and fifes playing, the people returned to their respective homes. the majority of them were smartly dressed in all the finery they could procure. about a hundred of the men rode on horseback, with lances and other weapons in their hands, which, with the gay trappings of the horses, gave them a respectable appearance. in the afternoon, all the inhabitants of the town, and many from the little villages in the neighbourhood, assembled to witness the horse racing, which always takes place on the anniversary of the belun sàlah, and to which every one had been looking forward with the greatest impatience. previously to its commencement, the king with his principal attendants rode slowly on round the town, more for the purpose of receiving the admiration and plaudits of his people, than to observe where distress more particularly prevailed, which was his avowed intention. in this respect we do not see that the african kings are a jot worse than the europeans; it is true, indeed, that the african monarch has in some measure the advantage over the european, for we have never heard that any european king, particularly an english one, ever even conceived the idea of parading the town in which he might reside, for the purpose of finding and relieving the distressed, but when he does condescend to show himself amongst the people, to whom he is indebted for the victuals which he eats, it is for the purpose of attending some state mummery, or seeing a number of human beings standing in a row, with the weapons of murder in their hands, but which, when called into action to gratify the senseless ambition of the said king, is called privileged homicide. an inspection of these human machines is called a review; were some kings to institute a review of their own actions, it would be better for themselves, and better for the people, to whom a blind and stupid fortune has given him as their log. the kings of africa, like other kings, attach a great importance to a great noise, called a salute, and, therefore, a hint was given to the landers to bring their pistols with them to the race course, that they might salute the king as he rode by them; a salute is the same thing, whether it be from a pop-gun or a two and thirty pounder, for all salutes generally end in smoke, which shows their folly and insignificance. the landers felt a strong inclination to witness the amusements of the day, and they arrived at the course rather sooner than was necessary, which, however, afforded them a fairer opportunity of observing the various groups of people, which were flocking to the scene of amusement. the race course was bounded on the north by low granite hills, on the south by a forest, and on the east and west by tall shady trees; amongst which, were habitations of the people. under the shadow of these magnificent trees, the spectators were assembled, and testified their happiness by their noisy mirth and animated gestures. when the landers arrived, the king had not yet made his appearance on the course, but his absence was fully compensated by the pleasure they derived from watching the anxious and animated countenances of the multitude, and in passing their opinions on the taste of the women in the choice and adjustment of their fanciful and many coloured dresses. the wives and younger children of the chief, sat near them in a group by themselves, and were distinguished from their companions by their superior dress. manchester cloths of an inferior quality, but of the most showy patterns, and dresses made of common english bed-furniture, were fastened round the waist of several sooty maidens, who, for the sake of fluttering a short hour in the gaze of their countrymen, had sacrificed in clothes the earnings of a twelve months labour. all the women had ornamented their necks with strings of beads, and their wrists with bracelets of various patterns, some made of glass beads, some of brass, and others of copper, and some again of a mixture of both metals; their ankles were also adorned with different sorts of rings, of neat workmanship. the distant sound of drums gave notice of the king's approach, and every eye was immediately directed to the quarter whence he was expected. the cavalcade shortly appeared, and four horsemen first drew up in front of the chiefs house, which was near the centre of the course, and close to the spot where his wives and children, and themselves were sitting. several men bearing on their heads an immense number of arrows in large quivers of leopard's skin, came next, followed by two persons, who, by their extraordinary antics and gestures, were concluded to be buffoons. these two last were employed in throwing sticks into the air as they went on, and adroitly catching them in falling, besides performing many whimsical and ridiculous feats. behind them, and immediately preceding the king, a group of little boys nearly naked, came dancing merrily along, flourishing cows' tails over their heads in all directions. the king rode onwards, followed by a number of fine-looking men, on handsome steeds, and the motley cavalcade all drew up in front of his house, where they awaited his further orders without dismounting. this the landers thought was the proper time to give the first salute, so they accordingly fired three rounds, and their example was immediately followed by two soldiers with muskets, which were made at least a century and a half ago, nevertheless, they yielded fire, smoke, noise, and a stink, which are in general the component parts of all royal salutes. preparations in the mean time had been going on for the race, and the horses with their riders made their appearance. the men were dressed in caps, and loose tobes and trousers of every colour; boots of red morocco leather, and turbans of white and blue cotton. their horses were gaily caparisoned; strings of little brass bells covered their heads; their breasts were ornamented with bright red cloth and tassels of silk and cotton, a large guilted pad of neatly embroidered patchwork was placed under the saddle of each; and little charms, inclosed in red and yellow cloth were attached to the bridle with bits of tinsel. the arab saddle and stirrup were in common use, and the whole group presented an imposing appearance. the signal for starting was made, and the impatient animals sprung forward, and set off at a full gallop. the riders brandished their spears, the little boys flourished their cow's tail; the buffoons performed their antics, muskets were discharged, and the chief himself, mounted on the finest horse on the ground, watched the progress of the race, while tears of delight were starting from his eyes. the sun shone gloriously on the tobes of green, white, yellow, blue, and crimson, as they fluttered in the breeze; and with the fanciful caps, the glittering spears, the jingling of the horses' bells, the animated looks and warlike bearing of their riders, presented one of the most extraordinary and pleasing sights that they had ever witnessed. the race was well contested, and terminated only by the horses being fatigued and out of breath; but though every one was emulous to outstrip his companion, honour and fame were the only reward of the competitors. the king maintained his seat on horseback during these amusements, without even once dismounting to converse with his wives and children, who were sitting on the ground on each side of him. his dress was showy rather than rich, consisting of a red cap, enveloped in the large folds of a white muslin turban; two under tobes of blue and scarlet cloth, and an outer one of white muslin; red trousers, and boots of scarlet and yellow leather. his horse seemed distressed by the weight of his rider, and the various ornaments and trappings with which his head, breast, and body were bedecked. the chief's eldest and youngest sons were near his women and other children, mounted on two noble-looking horses. the eldest of these youths was about eleven years of age. the youngest being not more than three, was held on the back of his animal by a male attendant, as he was unable to sit upright on the saddle without this assistance. the child's dress was ill suited to his age. he wore on his head a light cap of manchester cotton, but it overhung the upper part of his face, and together with its ends, which flapped over each cheek, hid nearly the whole of his countenance from view; his tobe and trousers were made exactly in the same fashion as those of a man, and two large belts of blue cotton, which crossed each other, confined the tobe to his body. the little legs of the child were swallowed up in clumsy yellow boots, big enough for his father, and though he was rather pretty, his whimsical dress gave him altogether so odd an appearance, that he might have been taken for any thing but what he really was. a few of the women on the ground by the side of the king wore large white dresses, which covered their persons like a winding sheet. young virgins, according to custom, appeared in a state of nudity; many of them had wild flowers stuck behind their ears, and strings of beads, &c., round their loins; but want of clothing did not seem to damp their pleasure in the entertainment, for they entered with as much zest as any of their companions. of the different coloured tobes worn by the men, none looked so well as those of a deep crimson colour on some of the horsemen; but the clear white tobes of the mahommedan priests, of whom not less than a hundred were present on the occasion, were extremely neat and becoming. the sport terminated without the slightest accident, and the king dismounting was a signal for the people to disperse. chapter xxxv. the travellers left kiama on saturday june th, and arrived at kakafungi, the halting place, shortly after ten o'clock in the morning. the distance from kiama was about ten miles. it was a straggling, but extensive and populous town, and was delightfully situated on an even piece of ground. the inhabitants were so clean and well behaved, and their dwellings so neat and comfortable, that before the landers had spoken many words to one of them, they were prepossessed in their favour. nor was this opinion in any degree lessened, when after they had been introduced into a commodious and excellent hut, they received the congratulations of the principal people. they came to them in a body, followed by boys and girls carrying a present of two kids, with milk and an abundance of pounded corn, and remained with them the greater part of the day. john lander was here taken seriously ill, and his fever was so severe that he was obliged to lie on his mat till the carriers were ready to depart, which took place at two p.m., their path lying through a perfect wilderness, and presenting a greater degree of barrenness, than any thing which they had hitherto met with. the length of the journey, the insufferable heat of the sun, combined with the speed with which they were obliged to travel, greatly increased the malady of john lander. he was occasionally obliged to dismount, and lie on the ground for relief, being lifted off and replaced on his horse by their attendants. the two landers were far behind the rest of the party, on account of the inability of john lander to keep pace, and they discharged a pistol every now and then as a signal to the carriers of their approach. as each report echoed through the forest, it was answered by the increased howlings of wild animals, till at length, they gladly saw the gleam of a large fire, and arrived at the encampment, which had been prepared for them. here they took possession for the night, of a few deserted huts, which were falling to decay. the rest which john lander had obtained during the night, appeared to have revived him, and he seemed in better spirits, with an abatement of his fever. they accordingly proceeded on their journey, and after bathing, crossed the oly in a canoe, which they found tied to a tree. during the whole of the day, they travelled under a burning sun, and in the evening pitched their tent near a small stream. john lander was very ill, his fever having returned with increased violence. a storm gathered over their heads a few minutes after the tent had been fixed, and presently burst with increased violence. while it lasted, they were occupied with the thoughts of their forlorn condition. the deafening noise of the thunder, as it echoed among the hills, the overpowering glare of the lightning, the torrents of rain, and the violence of the wind were truly awful. the whole of their party were collected in the tent for shelter from the storm, and in spite of the water which ran through it, contrived to sleep till morning. they were obliged to lie the whole of the night in their wet clothes, the effects of which were visible in john lander in the morning. his brother endeavoured, in vain, to rally him, but he was scarcely able to stand. the tent was packed up in its wet state, and the carriers hastened onwards as fast as they could, for the provisions were consumed, and they were anxious to get to their journey's end without delay. as they advanced, john lander became worse, till at length, he was completely overcome, and to prevent falling off his horse, he dismounted and was laid down. there was not a tree near them, which could shelter them from the sun, so with the assistance of his people, richard obtained a few branches, and formed a sort of bower, their horses' pads answering the purpose of a bed. during the remainder of the day, john became worse, and the medicine chest had been sent with the other things. in this dilemma, with no food at hand, the condition of the travellers was most deplorable. richard with the view of obtaining some refreshment for his brother, went into the wood and shot the only bird he saw, which was not much bigger than the sparrow. with this, he returned, made a fire, and prepared a little soup in a half-pint cup, which for want of salt, was rather unsavoury, nevertheless it was of service to his brother; the flesh of the bird, richard divided between himself and his man, both of them being weak for want of food. they now contrived to make a more substantial habitation for the invalid, of some stout branches of trees, and thatched it with long grass; they also lighted large fires round it to keep off the wild beasts, but sleep was out of the question, for they were attacked by myriads of mosquitoes, and buzzing flies, attracted by the glare of the fires. a prowling tiger was the only savage animal that approached near enough to be seen during the night. on the following morning, a considerable improvement having taken place in john lander's health, they set forward in good spirits, and shortly after sunset arrived in the vicinity of coobly, without experiencing so much fatigue as had been anticipated. having waited on the governor, as a matter of courtesy, they were detained but a few moments, and then repaired to the hut assigned to them, where john was soon after seized with the return of the fever, more severe than the former. the governor sent them a bowl of rice, one of milk, two calabashes of butter, and a fine fat bullock. the situation of richard lander was now distressing in the extreme, his brother became hourly worse, and every moment was expected to be his last. during the few intervals he had from delirium, he seemed to be aware of his danger, and entered into arrangements respecting his family concerns. at this moment richard's feelings were of too painful a nature to be described. the unhappy fate of his late master, clapperton, came forcibly to his mind. he had followed him into the country, where he perished; he had attended him in his parting moments; he had performed for him the last mournful office which our nature requires, and the thought that he should have to go through the same sad ceremony for his brother, overwhelmed him with grief. two messengers now arrived from boossa with a quantity of onions as a present from the queen. they were commanded by the king to await their departure from coobly, and escort them to the city of boossa, which was said to be about two days journey from coobly. the illness of john lander, to the great joy of his brother, now took a favourable turn, and he became more tranquil and freer from pain, and preparations were now made for their departure from coobly. for some hours before their departure, richard was greatly annoyed by an old woman, who applied to him for medicine that would produce her an entire new set of teeth, or, she, "if i can only be supplied with two large and strong ones, i shall be satisfied with them." the woman at last became rather impertinent, when richard recommended her two iron ones from the blacksmith, which so much displeased her, that she went away in a pet. the governor supplied them every day with abundance of rice and milk, in fact, nothing could surpass his benevolence and general good humour. they quitted coobly on the th june, and on the following morning entered a snug pretty little town called zalee, lying in a rich and romantic valley, formed by a gap in a triple range of elevated hills, which ran from east to west. the governor sent them a goat, a fowl, a calabash of rice, and a quantity of corn for the horses. zalee contained about a thousand inhabitants. their course from zalee was in a south-easterly direction, and shortly after leaving the town, they came to a fine extensive plain, on which stood a few venerable and magnificent trees. numerous herds of antelopes were feeding, which on hearing the report of their guns, bounded over the plain in all directions. from this place they beheld the city of boossa, which lay directly before them at the distance of two or three miles, and appeared to be formed of straggling clusters of huts. to their great astonishment, however, on a nearer approach, boossa was found to be standing on the _main land_, and not on an island in the niger, as described by captain clapperton. nothing could be discovered, which could warrant the assertion as laid down by that traveller. at ten o'clock they entered the city by the western gateway, and discharged their pieces as the signal of their arrival. after waiting a few minutes, they were introduced to the king, whom they found in an interior apartment of his residence, in company with the _midilie_, the title bestowed on his principal wife or queen. they welcomed the travellers to boossa, with every appearance of cordiality. they told them very gravely, and with rueful countenances, that they had both been weeping in the morning for the death of captain clapperton, whose untimely end they would never cease to lament. it is true, they might have been so engaged, but as on their entrance, no outward signs of tears appeared, they rather mistrusted the information which had been imparted to them. on the day subsequently to their arrival, they were visited by the noted widow zuma, who presented herself to them without the slightest pretensions to finery of any kind, either in her dress or ornaments, for she was clad in very humble apparel of country cloth. she related to them with great good humour, her quarrels with her prince, the ruler of wowow, and her consequent flight from that city to escape his resentment. it appeared that in order to effect this, she was actually obliged to climb over the city wall in the night, and travel on foot to boossa, which was a very long journey, and to a woman of her size, must have been an arduous task. she alleged that she had done nothing whatever to merit the displeasure of the wowow chief, notwithstanding which, he had robbed her of all her household furniture and a number of her slaves. but from another quarter, they learnt that one of her sons had committed a theft in the city, for which he would have suffered death, if he had not made his escape with his mother, who, it was said, had instigated him to the deed. the widow complained sadly of poverty and the hardness of the times; she had fought with the youribeans against alorie, but instead of receiving a recompense for her bravery; she had lost half of her slaves in an engagement, which so disgusted her with the military profession, that she immediately abandoned it and returned home. yet in spite of all her losses and misfortunes, she had gained so much in corpulency, that it was with the utmost difficulty she could squeeze herself into the doorway of their hut, although it was by no means small. the widow zuma was a very good-looking person of matronly appearance, and her skin of a light copper colour. after the widow had left them, richard carried the presents which had been selected for the king and queen. each appeared delighted with them, and the former more especially was extravagant in his expressions of admiration and thankfulness. a pair of silver bracelets, a tobacco pipe, and a looking-glass, seemed to rivet the attention of the king, who could not take his eyes off them for a full half hour, so much was he pleased with them. the landers now visited the far famed niger or quorra, which flowed by the city about a mile from their residence, and were greatly disappointed at the appearance of this celebrated river. in its widest part it was not more than a stone's throw across. the rock on which richard lander sat, overlooked the spot where mr. park and his associates met their untimely fate; he could not help meditating on that circumstance, and on the number of valuable lives that had been sacrificed in attempting to explore that river, and he secretly implored the almighty, that he might be the humble means of setting at rest for ever the great question of its source and termination. the queen of a country is generally the standard of fashion, and therefore some idea may be formed of the fashions of boossa, by the following description of the dress in which the midikie or queen of boossa paid a visit to the landers. her majesty was clad in a common check shirt of nooffie manufacture, a plain piece of blue cotton was fastened round her head, wholly concealing the hair, a larger piece of the same kind was thrown over her left shoulder, and a third tied round her waist, reached so far as the middle of the leg. her feet were bare, as were likewise her arms up to the elbow; a brass ring ornamented each great toe, and eight silver bracelets each wrist, the least of them weighing little less than a quarter of a pound. besides these ornaments, the queen wore a necklace of coral and bits of gold, and small pieces of pipe coral were stuck in the lobe of each ear. it was the opinion of lander that it would have been bad policy on his part, to have stated the true reason of his visiting this country, knowing the jealousy of most of the people with regard to the niger; and, therefore, in answer to the king's inquiries, he was obliged to deceive him with the assertion, that his object was to go to bornou, by way of yaoorie, requesting at the same time, a safe conveyance through his territories. this answer satisfied the king, and he promised them every assistance in his power. in the course of conversation the king observed that he had in his possession a tobe, which belonged to a white man, who came from the north many years ago, and from whom it had been purchased by the king's father. the landers expressed a great curiosity to see this tobe, and in a very short time after the departure of the king, it was sent to them as a present. contrary to their expectations, they found it to be made of rich crimson damask, and very heavy from the immense quantity of gold embroidery with which it was covered. as the time, when the late king is said to have purchased this tobe, corresponds very nearly to the supposed period of mr. park's death, and as they never heard of any other white man having come from the north so far south as boossa, they were inclined to believe it part of the spoil obtained from the canoe of that ill-fated traveller. whether mr. park wore the tobe himself, which was scarcely possible on account of its weight, or whether he intended it as a present to a native chief, they were at a loss to determine. the king himself had never worn the tobe, nor did his predecessor, from a superstitious feeling; besides, observed the king, "it might excite the cupidity of the neighbouring powers." king george the third of england was a button-maker, and therefore no wonder need be excited at the information which was sent to the landers from the king of boossa, announcing to them that his majesty was a tailor, and that he would thank them much for some thread and a few needles for his own private use; the king also took it into his head that as he was a tailor, the landers must be gunsmiths, and therefore he sent them his muskets to repair, but it being sunday when the guns were sent, they declined the job until the following day. eager as they were to obtain even the slightest information relative to the unhappy fate of mr. park and his companions, as well as to ascertain if any of their books or papers were then in existence at that place, still they had almost made up their minds to refrain from asking him any questions on the subject, because they were apprehensive that it might be displeasing to the king, and involve them in many perplexities. finding the king, however, to be an affable, obliging, and good-natured personage, they were emboldened to send pascoe to him with a message expressive of the interest they felt on the subject, in common with all their countrymen, and saying, that if any books or papers which belonged to mr. park were yet in his possession, he would do them a great service by delivering them into their hands, or at least granting them permission to see them. to this, the king returned for answer, that when mr. park was lost on the niger, he, the king, was a very little boy, and that he knew not what had become of his effects; that the deplorable event had occurred in the reign of the late king's predecessor, who died shortly after, and that all traces of the white men had been lost with him. this answer disappointed the hopes of the landers, for to them it appeared final and decisive. but in the evening their hopes were again excited by a hint from their host, who was the king's drummer, and one of the principal men in the country; he assured them, that there was at least one book saved from mr. park's canoe, which was then in the possession of a very poor man in the service of his master, to whom it had been entrusted by the late king during his last illness. he said moreover, that if but _one_ application were made to the king on any subject whatever, very little was thought of it, but if a second were made, the matter would be considered of sufficient importance to demand his whole attention; such being the custom of the country. the drummer therefore recommended them to persevere in their inquiries, for he had no doubt that something to their satisfaction would be elicited. at his own request, they sent him to the king immediately, desiring him to repeat their former statement, and to assure the king, that should he be successful in recovering the book they wanted, their monarch would reward him handsomely. the king desired the drummer to inform them, that he would use every exertion, and examine the man, who was reported to have the white man's book in his possession. on the following day, the king came to see them, followed by a man with a book under his arm, which was said to have been picked up in the niger after the loss of their countrymen. it was enveloped in a large cotton cloth, and their hearts beat high with expectation, as the man was slowly unfolding it, for by its size they guessed it to be mr. park's journal, but their disappointment and chagrin were great, when on opening the book, they discovered it to be an old nautical publication of the last century. the title page was missing, but its contents were chiefly tables of logarithms. it was a thick royal quarto, which led them to conjecture that it was a journal. between the leaves they found a few loose papers of very little consequence indeed; one of them contained two or three observations on the height of the water in the gambia; one was a tailor's bill on a mr. anderson, and another was addressed to mr. mungo park, and contained an invitation to dine. the following is a copy of it: "mr. and mrs. watson would be happy to have the pleasure of mr. park's company at dinner on tuesday next, at half past five o'clock. an answer is requested. strand, th nov. ." the king, as well as the owner of the book, looked as greatly mortified as they themselves did, when they were told that the one produced, was not that of which they were in quest, because the reward promised would not of course be obtained. as soon as their curiosity had been fully satisfied, the papers were carefully collected and placed again between the leaves, and the book as carefully folded in its envelope as before, and taken away by its owner, who valued it as much as a household god. thus all their hopes of obtaining mr. park's journal or papers in the city of boossa were entirely defeated. at an early hour of wednesday june rd, the king and queen paid the travellers a farewell visit, when the former particularly cautioned them against poison. they then expressed their acknowledgements to both the royal personages for all their favours and an hour or two after they had taken their departure, the landers rode out of the city, accompanied by two horsemen as an escort, and a foot messenger to the sultan of yaoorie. they journied along the banks of the niger at an easy pace, and two hours afterwards entered a pleasant little walled town called where they were desired to halt until the following day the governor of kagogie had been made acquainted with their intention, no less than three days before their arrival, yet no canoe had been got ready for their use, and when they expected to embark, "the king of the canoe," as the person who has the care of it, is ridiculously styled, informed them with the utmost unconcern, that it was out of repair, and that it would not be fit for their reception for some hours at least. in the course of the afternoon they repaired to the side of the river, for the purpose of endeavouring to encourage and hurry the workmen in their labour about the canoe. promises and threats were employed to effect this object, but the men would neither be coaxed nor intimidated--they would not overwork themselves, they said, for all the riches in their possession, so that they were obliged to leave them and exercise their patience. the branch of the niger which flows by kagogie, is about a mile in width, but it is rendered so shallow by large sand banks, that except in one very narrow place, a child might wade across it without difficulty. about mid-day the workmen having finished the canoe, the luggage was presently put into it, and between twelve and one they embarked with their people, and were launched out into the river. the direction of this branch was nearly east and west, and they proceeded some distance down the stream for the purpose of getting into the main branch of the niger, where there was deeper water. having encountered a dreadful storm, which threatened to swamp the canoe, and which obliged them ultimately to take refuge on land, for the purpose of sheltering themselves from the violence of the tornado, they came to a place, where, a short distance from the water's edge, the country was thickly studded with clusters of huts, which altogether are called the village of sooloo. they took up their quarters in a large hut, which was nearest the landing place. they were treated with much hospitality by the natives, who did all in their power to render their short stay as agreeable as possible. the old chief of the village accompanied them to the water's edge, when they quitted their hut for the purpose of embarking, and enjoined "the king of the canoe," to be particularly careful of his charge. "careful," answered the man, "to be sure i will, do i not know that white men are more precious than a boat load of eggs, and require as much care to be taken of them." the landers entreated the same man a short time afterwards, to be more active and diligent in the management of his canoe, for he was rather inclined to be lazy, and suffered every canoe to go before their own, but he replied gravely, "kings do not travel so fast as common men, i must convey you along as slowly as possible." about eleven a.m. on the following day, they landed at the foot of a small village, on the east bank of the river, where the horses and men had arrived before them. they rested under a large tree an hour or two, awaiting the arrival of the carriers from the city of yaoorie, who had been sent for on the preceding day, by one of the boossa messengers that had charge of their horses. these men arrived at the village, between one and two o'clock in the afternoon, and they immediately mounted and rode onwards. on attaining the summit of a steep hill, they rode over a very narrow pathway so much overhung by an impenetrable thorny shrub, that there was no room for more than one man to walk. this led them to the wall of yaoorie, and they entered the city through an amazingly strong passage, in which was an immense iron door, covered with plates of iron, rudely fastened to the woodwork. they were almost exhausted with fatigue on their arrival, insomuch that they excused themselves from visiting and paying their respects to the sultan, and they were conducted to a convenient habitation, which had been prepared for them. they soon obtained an introduction to the prince, whom they had been so desirous to visit. after passing through a low dark avenue, and being kept long standing in a yard, they were conducted into another area, resembling that of a farm establishment. here they discovered the sultan sitting alone in the centre of the square, on a plain piece of carpeting, with a pillow on each side of him, and a neat brass pan in front. his appearance was not only mean, but absolutely squalid and dirty. he was a big-headed, corpulent, jolly-looking man, well stricken in years, and though there was something harsh and forbidding in his countenance, yet he was generally smiling during the conference. he showed considerable dissatisfaction, because neither clapperton nor lander had paid their court to him on their previous journey, and still more on being informed that their means of making a present had been reduced very low by the rapacity of the chiefs already visited. in regard to park's papers, he merely replied, with an affected laugh, "how do you think that i could have the books of a person that was lost at boossa?" afterwards being pressed upon the subject, he despatched an arab to inform them, that he declared to god in the most solemn manner, that he had never had in his possession, nor seen any books or papers of the white travellers that perished at boossa. thus it appeared, that his overture upon that subject to clapperton, by which the landers had been so unguardedly lured, was a mere pretext to induce them to visit him, and bestow a portion of the valuable articles with which they were understood to be provided. his whole conduct was in perfect unison with this first specimen of it. he did not, indeed, absolutely rob them, but there was no artifice so petty that he did not employ it, in order to obtain the few commodities which still remained in their possession. wishing to purchase some things, he induced the landers to send them, desiring that they should affix their own price; he then said they asked too much, on which pretext he delayed, and in a great measure evaded paying for them at all. the travellers, in their ill-judged confidence in his friendship, requested him to furnish a boat, in which they might descend the niger. he replied, they might have one for a hundred dollars, but being unable to command that sum they were finally obliged to apply to their friend, the king of boossa, whom they had so unreasonably distrusted, and who cheerfully undertook to supply their wants. the city of yaoorie is of prodigious extent, and is supposed to be as populous as any other in the whole continent, or at least that part of it which is visited by the trading arabs. its wall is high and very excellent, though made of clay alone, and may be between twenty and thirty miles in circuit, and it has eight vast entrance gates or doors, which were well fortified after the manner of the country. the residence of the sultan, as well as the houses of many of the principal inhabitants of the city, are two stories in height, having thick and clumsy stairs of clay, leading to the upper apartments, which are rather lofty, and, together with rooms on the ground floor, have door-ways sufficiently large to enable a person to enter without putting himself to the inconvenience of stooping. the principal part of the houses is built in the circular or coozie fashion, but the inhabitants have a few square ones, and the sultan's are of no regular form whatever. it may be considered somewhat singular, that the majority of the natives of western and central, and it may be said, also of northern africa, moisten the floors of their huts, and the inside of their walls with a solution of cow dung and water, two or three times a day, or as often as they can find the materials. though disagreeable to the smell of an european, this keeps the interior of a dwelling as cool as it is dark. the landers were anxious to expedite their departure, but the sultan sent word to inform them that he would be occupied _three days_ in writing to the king of england, and he would, therefore, thank them to remain in yaoorie till the expiration of that period. on the following day, however, the sultan told them in plain and decisive terms, that he could not send them either by way of koolfu or guarie, because the fellatas were in both of those places, and their fate then would soon be decided. he wished, however, to be expressly understood, that it was from no disinclination on his part to send them to either of those places, but that his great regard for them would not permit him to lead them into danger. now the landers knew very well that the fellatas had not the superiority either in koolfu or guarie; the natives of the latter place, in particular, having long since cut off the heads of all the fellatas that could be found in their country, and from that time they had enjoyed the most perfect independence. the sultan of yaoorie further said, that the best thing he could do, was to send them back again to boossa, and from thence he was certain they might have liberty to go anywhere. the moment they found this to be his intention, they returned to their house, and having formed their resolution, they instantly despatched one of their men with a message to the king of boossa, to the following effect: "that finding their presents insufficient to defray their expenses on the road to guarie and bornou, they were under the necessity of returning to the salt water to obtain more. that the chief of badagry, who is governor of that part of the coast, at which they had landed, had treated them so very ill, while they were with him, that he would detain them in his town for the remainder of their lives, if they were to return by the way they had come, and by so doing, that they should be unable to avoid falling into his power. besides which, the journey thither was so long that they should experience the same, or even greater inconvenience than if they were to proceed to bornou through catsheenah. under these circumstances, they were extremely desirous of travelling to the salt water by a shorter and safer route, and would therefore prefer going by fundah, as the easiest and likeliest means of accomplishing that end. but as they had heard that the road to that kingdom by land was infested with fellatas, who live by plunder and violence, they should feel infinitely obliged to him (the king of boossa,) if he could either sell or lend them a canoe to proceed thither by water, and if so, that they would remunerate him to the utmost of their ability." they awaited the return of their messenger with considerable anxiety, and if an unfavourable answer were returned, they were resolved, instead of proceeding to boossa, to push on to guarie, and thence to funda, as they originally intended, whatever might be the consequence. after the usual lapse of time, the boossa messenger returned, and to their unspeakable joy, informed them that the king had consented to procure for them a canoe, to proceed to funda, provided the road by land could not be depended on. he, however, candidly stated his inability to protect their persons from insult and danger beyond his own territories, and that they must solicit the good will of the prince of wowow, and the other rulers on the banks of the niger, and further, that their own men alone must manage the canoe, because no one at boossa would be willing, for various reasons, to accompany them on the journey. they were, therefore, in a fair way of accomplishing the object of the expedition. the sultan of yaoorie, however, put off their departure from day to day, and from week to week, under a variety of nonsensical excuses, and they were persuaded that it was his intention to detain them, until he had drained them of every thing that was valuable. on monday the th of july, however, to their surprise and pleasure, a messenger from the king of boossa arrived, to ascertain the reason of such unwarrantable conduct on the part of the sultan, and to request their immediate release. one of the inducements urged by this monarch for their longer stay with him, was rather whimsical. he had made them a present of a quantity of worthless feathers, which he had caused to be plucked from the body of a live ostrich, and because he entertained an opinion that if others were added to them, they would altogether form a very acceptable present to the king of england, he informed them that it would be necessary they should wait till such time as the ostrich should regain its plumage, in order for that part of its body, which had not been previously plucked, to undergo a similar operation, for the weather, he asserted, was much too cold for the bird to lose all its feathers at one and the same time, and further to encourage their growth, he would order that two thousand kowries worth of butter, (about twelve pounds weight,) should be diligently rubbed into the skin of the animal. this was, however, an arch trick on the part of the sultan, for he was indebted to the landers in a considerable sum for some buttons, which he had purchased of them, and this butter affair was intended as a kind of set-off, as the sultan said he did not approve of paying for the butter out of his own pocket. on the st august, the sultan sent a messenger to inform them that they were at liberty to pay their respects, and take their farewell of him previously to their departure from the city, which they were assured should take place on the following day, without any further procrastination or delay. they were glad to obey the summons, for such they considered it, and on their arrival at his residence, they were introduced into a large, gloomy, uncomfortable apartment; a number of swallows' nests were attached to the ceiling of the room, and their twittering owners, which were flying about in all directions, fed their young without interruption, and added not a little to the filthiness of the unswept and unclean apartment. the conversation during the interview was as uninteresting and spiritless, as their conversations with other native rulers had always been. the sultan, however, could not pay his debt, but by way of another set-off he offered them a female slave, which was just as much use to them as the ostrich feathers, however, the sultan was resolved to pay them in that species of coin, and therefore they took the lady, and old pascoe immediately adopted her as his wife. on monday the nd, all was hurry, bustle, and confusion, in getting their things ready for their departure, and after the beasts had been laden, and the people had their burdens on their head, they had to wait for the sultan's long expected letter to the king of england. a mallam was at length perceived hurrying towards them with it, and after him came the venerable arab chief, to honour them with his company a little way on their journey. this crafty old man was not their friend, for he had used them deceitfully, and misrepresented them and their goods to his master, and they enjoyed an innocent kind of revenge, in administering to him, after repeated applications, a powerful dose of medicine, which though harmless in its effects, had yet been very troublesome to him. indeed it was not till they had "jalaped" the sultan, his sister, and all the royal family, that they were permitted to take their farewell of yaoorie. the following is the letter of the sultan of yaoorie, as it was translated into english by a. o. salame: "praise be to god, and blessings and salutations be unto that (prophet), since whom there has been no other prophet. "to our friend in god, and his apostle (mahommed), the prince of the english christians; salutation and mercy, and blessings of god, be unto you, from your friend, the sultan of yaouri, whose name is mahommed ebsheer. perfect salutation be unto you, (and) may god cause your mornings and evenings to be most happy, with multiplied salutations (from us). "after our salutation unto you (some) ostrich feathers will reach you, (as a present,) from the bounty and blessings of god (we have in our country), and we, together with you, thank god (for what he has bestowed). and salutation be unto your hired people, (your suite) and peace be unto our people, who praise god. (signed,) from the prince of yaouri." of this letter, mr. salame says, that it is the worst of the african papers which he had seen, both as to its ungrammatical and unintelligible character. indeed, his yaourick majesty seemed to be sadly in need of words to make himself intelligible. it must be remarked, that the words between parentheses are not in the original, but supplied by the translator for the purpose of reducing the letter to some kind of meaning. chapter xxxvi. owing to the reputed badness of the path, that by which the landers had entered yaoorie, was rejected for a more northerly one, leading in almost a direct line to the river cubbie. about mid-day they arrived at the walls of a pretty considerable town, called guàda, and halted near a small creek of a river flowing from cubbie, and entering the niger a little lower down. here, as soon as they had taken a slight refreshment, they sent their beasts across the niger to proceed by land to boossa, and embarked in two canoes, which were each paddled by four men. on entering the niger, they found it running from two to three miles an hour, and they proceeded down the river till the sun had set; and the moon was shining beautifully on the water, as they drew near to a small cumbrie village on the borders of the river, where they landed and pitched their tent. the inhabitants of many of the numerous walled towns and open villages on the banks of the niger, and also of the islands, were found to be for the most part cumbrie people, a poor, despised, and abused, but industrious and hard-working race. inheriting from their ancestors a peaceful, timid, passionless, incurious disposition, they fall an easy prey to all who choose to molest them; they bow their necks to the yoke of slavery without a murmur, and think it a matter of course; and perhaps no people in the world are to be found who are less susceptible of intense feeling, and the finer emotions of the human mind, on being stolen away from their favourite amusements and pursuits, and from the bosom of their wives and families, than these cumbrie people, who are held in general disesteem. thousands of them reside in the kingdom of yaoorie, and its province of engarski, and most of the slaves in the capital have been taken from them. as they proceeded down the niger by a different channel from that by which they had ascended it to yaoorie, they had fresh opportunities of remarking the more striking features on its banks. the river, as might naturally be expected, was much swollen, and its current more impetuous, than when they passed upon their voyage to yaoorie. in the earlier part of the evening they landed at a small cumbrie village, and their canoes were pulled upon a sandy beach for the night in security. at seven o'clock on the following morning, they were once more upon the niger, and about noon they observed a herd of fellata cows grazing on the banks of the river, and a very short distance from them, they saw an immense crocodile floating on the surface like a long canoe, for which it was at first mistaken, and watching an opportunity to seize one of the cows, and destroy it by dragging it into the river. as soon as the terrific reptile was perceived by the canoemen, they paddled as softly as possible towards him, intending to wait at a short distance till the crocodile should have accomplished his object, when they agreed to pull rapidly towards the shore, and reap the fruit of the reptile's amazing strength, by scaring him off from his prey, or destroying him with harpoons, for the skin of the crocodile is not in this country considered impenetrable. their intentions were, however, frustrated by the sudden disappearance of the crocodile, which dived the moment he perceived the canoe so near him, making a loud plashing noise, and agitating the water in a remarkable manner in his descent. they waited some time, in hopes he would rise again, but they were not again gratified with the sight of the monster. a short time afterwards, they landed at warree, which is the most celebrated market town in the dependency of engarski, and consists, of several clusters of huts, encircled by a dwarf clay wall. the market was attended by many thousands of people from different parts of the country. vast numbers of canoes, filled with people and goods, were passing from one side of the niger to the other, and the countenances of both buyers and sellers betrayed a very anxious and business-like expression. as soon as the curiosity of the landers was fully satisfied, they crossed over to the boossa side of the river, and landed at a small walled town called garnicassa, which was inhabited by the cumbrie people, and situated about five miles north of boossa. at no great distance from this place, and within sight of it, all the branches of the niger meet, and form a beautiful and magnificent sheet of water, at least seven or eight miles in breadth, and it excited the surprise of the landers, to know what became of so extraordinary a body of water, for at boossa, the river is no more than a stone's throw across, and its depth is in proportion to its narrowness, but about an hour's walk from thence, it again becomes a noble river, and maintains its width, it was reported, even to funda. this singular fact favours the opinion, that a large portion of the waters of the niger is conveyed by subterraneous passages from the town of garnicassa to a few miles below boossa. the travellers pursued their journey along the banks of the niger, although the path was filled with water, and broken up by the force of the rains. after an hour's ride they drew near to the walls of boossa, and soon arrived at the drummer's house, which had been their former residence. here they found the midiki on her knees to receive and welcome them back again to boossa in the name of the king, but they were not permitted to enter and take possession of their old apartments, for the queen conducted them to other huts, which formed part of the cluster inhabited by the fellatas. in the evening they were visited by the king, who said, he had been apprehensive that they required a little repose and quietness after their journey, and therefore he did not like to intrude on them before. they were not long domiciliated in their new dwelling, before they were informed that the drummer's wife had excited the envy of the queen, by wearing round her neck a smart gilt button, which had been given to her, and that was the only reason why they were not allowed to occupy their former lodgings in her house. yet to be even with her _fair_ rival, the queen had extracted from her little sheep-skin box, wherein they had been confined for a quarter of a century, a small number of round and flat golden ornaments, with which she adorned her sable bosom, and thereby totally eclipsed the transitory splendour of the button belonging to the drummer's wife. in a conversation with the king, he intimated to them that it would be necessary for them to visit wowow, previously to their going to funda, because the prince of that state had already made war on kiama on their account, and captured a few of the people. the king, himself, repeated to them the promise which he had made to their messenger, that he would furnish them with a canoe sufficiently large to contain the whole of their people and themselves; but still some doubts arose in their minds, and should a canoe be denied them, after all that the monarch had said, it was their determination to take a canoe of their own accord, and steal away from boossa by night. the king expressed his fears that the personal safety of the travellers would be endangered by the fellatas, who resided on each side of the river; but pascoe answered his majesty by telling him, that the english were the gods of the waters, and no evil could befal them in boats, even though all africa, or the whole world should fight against them. "i will, however," said the king, in reply, "go down and ask the _becken ronah_ (dark or black water, which the niger is every where emphatically styled) whether it will be prudent and safe for the white men to embark on it or not, and i will be sure to acquaint you and them of my success, be it good or bad." the following day the king intended to question the niger, and the great hope of the landers was, that the river would return a favourable answer. the landers were not ignorant that a present to an african king will generally effect wonders, it will even make the niger return a favourable answer to an inquiry which, but for the present, would have been adverse. they therefore acted politically, and sent the king as a present, one of those beautiful silver medals which were cast during the american war, to which, was attached a large and valuable chain of the same metal; assuring the sable king at the same time, that he might now consider himself as the king of england's most particular friend, and that he could not make a more suitable return, than by assisting them them in their plan of journeying to the salt water by way of the niger. the present had the desired effect, for on the following day the king came to them with great joy, and informed them that he had been down to the niger with his mallam, and that the result of his visit was highly favourable to their wishes as well as to his own, the river having promised to conduct them in safety its termination. the landers during their stay at boossa, had to depend in great measure upon their own resources for their maintenance, their chief food consisting of guinea fowls and partridges, for their stock of articles, wherewith they could barter for provisions, was nearly exhausted. the market was already overstocked with buttons, needles were unsaleable; all their bits of coloured cloth were disposed of, and indeed almost every thing that _would_ sell, reserving to themselves a few articles of some value as presents to the different chiefs along the banks of the niger. amongst other trifles disposed of, were several tin cases, which contained worthless and unpalatable portable soups, &c. these were labelled with slips of tin, which though rather dull and dirty, nevertheless attracted the admiration of many, and they were highly diverted to see one man in particular walking at large, and strutting about with "concentrated gravy," stuck on his head in no less than four places. he appeared quite proud of these ornaments, and was simpering with pleasure wherever he went. the travellers left boossa on the th august, and directed their course for wowow, and having travelled a few miles, they crossed in a canoe a branch of the niger, forming a pretty little river, and running nearly west, and is said to encompass the whole of wowow. after a journey of about twelve miles, they entered the city of wowow through the western entrance, and by desire, they galloped swiftly towards the king's residence, and fired off a couple of pistols as a signal of their arrival. the customs of this monarch were the most singular that had been yet observed in africa. he came out to welcome the travellers, but it was contrary to etiquette for him to speak, or to enter into any kind of conversation, nor is any foreigner permitted to speak, whatever might be his rank, unless in presence of the representative of the chief from whom he last came. in the wall on each side of the entrance of the town was a large niche, in one of which the king stood fixed and motionless, with his hands clasped under his tobe, and supported on his bosom; and round a pole, which had been placed erect in the other niche, a naked youth had entwined his legs, remaining in breathless anxiety to be a spectator of the approaching interview. while the king remained in the above position, without moving a single muscle, and which lasted till the boossa messenger made his appearance, a singing woman drew near the person of her sovereign, and began to exercise her vocation in a tone of voice that displayed any thing but sweetness or melody, and so loud and shrill as to frighten away the birds from the trees near the spot. the boossa messenger, who had been so anxiously expected, at length arrived, and the spell, which had bound every one to the spot was dissolved in a moment; they were then conducted to the king, and formally introduced to him, but the grave eccentric old man shook hands with them, without taking them from the tobe in which they had been enveloped, or even condescending to look in their faces, for he never made it a practice to raise his head above a certain height, fearing that he should discover the person to whom he might be conversing gazing full in his countenance, to which he had a very strange, but unconquerable antipathy; the interview lasted but a moment, and they were hastily conducted to the house which was occupied by the late captain clapperton. on the following morning, richard lander carried the presents to the king. the monarch appeared well pleased and cheerful, and expressed himself perfectly satisfied, though in a few minutes afterwards he despatched a messenger to inquire if they had not brought any coral beads with them from england. in compliance with the request which richard lander made to him, the king informed him, that he would sell them a canoe with the greatest pleasure. he was convinced, he said, that they would return in safety to their country by way of the niger, which did not contain a single rock from inguazhilligee to funda. it was the earnest, and oft repeated desire of the chief of wowow, while they resided in the town, that they should return from boossa, and spend the approaching holidays with him, to which they thought proper to accede, indeed the old man had behaved so well to them, that they did not like to make an ungrateful return. but his sister, the midiki, was jealous of her brother, because they had given him so good a character, and she said, she was apprehensive he might obtain from them more than she was willing he should have, and, therefore, she not only set her husband's mind against the measure, but she slandered and defamed his character most shamefully. this despicable vice of slander is universal in africa, the people all speak ill of each other, from the monarch to the slave. they now found that they should be compelled to remain in boossa, till the period arrived for their final departure from the country. the expected messenger arrived from wowow, with full power to treat with the midiki for the purchase of the canoe, and although the landers were the parties most concerned in the business, they were not allowed to say anything about it. the bargain was, however, soon concluded; they were to give both their horses for the canoe, and if the king of wowow should fancy the animals to be more than equivalent to the value of the boat, he promised to send them the balance in money (kowries). this was infinitely better than they could have managed the business themselves, indeed they could not have contrived matters half so well, for they had previously made a present of the youngest of the horses to the king of boossa, but most likely, owing to pascoe's misrepresentation, or rather his misinterpretation, the monarch was not made sensible of the circumstance. the canoe was to be sent to them in a day or two, when they determined to prepare her for the water without delay. on wednesday, august th, they despatched one of their men, named ibrahim, to coulfo, with their ass and a number of needles to sell. the king also sent a messenger with him, who was commissioned to visit all the towns and villages on the nouffie side of the river, as far as the fellata town of rabba, and to request their chiefs and governors, in the name of the king of boossa, to suffer them to pass down the river without injury or molestation. the following is a singular trait in the african character. not having any good salt, they sent pascoe's wife to the king to request the favour of a little unadulterated salt, because there were such a great quantity of ashes, and other spurious ingredients, mixed up with that which is publicly sold in the markets, that they never could eat it with pleasure. both the king and queen embraced the opportunity of admiring the shape and beauty of the salt box, and spoke in rapturous terms of the lustre of its appearance, and the ingenuity of its contrivance. "allah! how wonderful," said they, "even the most trifling articles belonging to the white men, are fit for the use of the mightiest kings. alas! allah has given them all the glory and riches of the world, and its knowledge, and left none whatever for black men." the king was affected! he thrust the vessel into the pocket of his tobe, smoothed it down with his hand, looked melancholy, and said, "how nicely it fits! what a beautiful thing! how convenient it would be in travelling." he then took it out again, turned it round and round, opened and shut it repeatedly, and then bestowing on it a last commendation, as outrageously as any of the former, it was returned filled with genuine salt. who could not understand the meaning of all this? now this handsome salt cellar was of latten, and was formerly a common round tinder box, and because they had nothing better for the purpose, they deprived it of the candlestick on its cover a short time before, and converted it to its present use. the tin, moreover, had been burnt off from many parts of it, and pascoe's wife not being an admirer of cleanliness, it had lost much of its original brightness. the king's encomiums were nothing more than an indirect and ingenious solicitation of the article for his own use; which was further apparent by desiring the woman to relate to the landers, no part of the conversation that had passed between them: or in other words, that she should tell them every syllable. they could not help admiring the delicacy of the king, and sent back the tinder box to him immediately. the bearer was rewarded handsomely for his trouble, and they received as many thanks, as when he accepted the silver medal and chain which they had presented to him. it is by such means as this, that the chiefs and rulers of this country, ashamed of making a direct application for any thing in the possession of the travellers, to which they may have taken a fancy, endeavour to obtain it. if, however, the hint does not succeed in making a visible impression, less delicate measures are presently resorted to, and when every other expedient fails, they cast aside the reserve and bashfulness which had influenced them at first, and express their meaning in language which cannot be misunderstood. in this respect, the chiefs and governors are all alike, from badagry to the metropolis of yaoorie. on the st, a messenger with a canoe arrived from the king of wowow, but it was so very small, that it was wholly inadequate for their purpose. this was a most provoking circumstance, because a larger canoe was to be procured, which could not be done without a considerable loss of time. in fact, between the chief of wowow and his sister, the midiki, the travellers were completely taken in. the horses given in exchange to the prince of wowow for this sorry canoe, were large, handsome, and superior animals, worth in england at least sixty pounds, and the article they got in exchange for them was not worth so many pence. they heard that boats of a considerable size were kept at a small town on the banks of the niger called lever, and thither they resolved to proceed as soon as the boossa messenger should have returned from rabba, and get a canoe prepared with as much expedition as possible. the landers were now weary of their protracted stay at boossa, and urged the king to hasten their departure, and after many scruples and much hesitation, he at length appointed the second day of the moon, that being, according to his opinion, the happiest and luckiest of all days. he could not, however, forbear expressing his deep regret at their determination to leave boossa before the return of his messenger from nouffie, as it might be detrimental to their own personal interests, and his own reputation also might suffer, if any thing should befal them on the river, but he had already given his word for their departure, and from that promise he would not swerve. on the same afternoon they wished to pay their respects to the king, previously to their departure, which they understood was to take place on the following morning; but to their surprise, he asserted that the moon would not be discernible that evening, and, therefore, that the following monday would be the day of their departure. the moon, however, _did_ shine fairly in sight of all the people; nevertheless, they made no further remark to the prince on the subject, thinking it might confuse and irritate him. every thing was now got ready for starting. as it was not their intention to call at many inhabited places on the banks of the niger, they provided themselves with a great quantity of provisions, which consisted chiefly of three large bags of corn, and one of beans. they had likewise a couple of fowls and two sheep, so that they were of opinion, they should have food enough for all hands for three weeks or a month at least. to add to their stock, the king and midiki between them, gave them a considerable quantity of rice, honey, corn, and onions, and two large pots of vegetable butter, weighing not less than a hundred pounds. to their now unspeakable joy, the long expected and wished for messenger arrived from rabba, accompanied by two messengers from the king of nouffie, who were to be their guides as far as rabba, after passing which city, all the nouffie territory to the southward, was under the government of ederesa and his partisans. "the magia," said the boossa ambassador, "was delighted with the intelligence, that white men were to honour his dominions with their presence, and as a proof of his friendly disposition towards you, and his interest in your welfare, he has not only sent his son as your companion and guide, but he has likewise despatched a messenger to every town on the banks of the niger, either considerable or unimportant, even as far as funda, which is beyond the limits of the empire, and he is commissioned to acquaint their inhabitants of the fact of your intention of proceeding down the river, and to desire them to assist you with their encouragement and support, as far as it lies in their power to do." after some little consideration, the landers knew not whether they ought to feel pleasure or regret, thankfulness or indifference, at the arrival of these men, and the occasion which brought them thither; at the time, they could only foresee that they would be a heavy burden on their funds, and as it happened, that they had the utmost difficulty in the world to support themselves, it would cause them additional trouble, expense, and uneasiness, to provide them with the bare necessaries of life. the king, however, had but one feeling on the subject, and that was unbounded delight; he capered round his hut with transport, when he saw their guides, and heard the message which they had to deliver, and after a burst of joy, he began to cry like a child, his heart was so full. "now," said he, when he had become more composed, "whatever may happen to the white men, my neighbours cannot but acknowledge that i have taken every care of them, treated them as became a king, and done my best to promote their happiness and interests. they will not be able," continued the monarch with exultation, "they dare not have the effrontery to cast at me a reproach, like that which they bestowed on my ancestor; i can now safely entrust the white men to the care, protection, and hospitality of a neighbouring monarch, who, i am convinced, if not for my sake, at least for his own, will receive and entertain them with every mark of distinction and kindness, and feel that towards them i have done my duty, and let my neighbours see to it, that they do theirs." on monday, the th september, all were on the _qui vine_ at a very early hour, ransacking their lumber, packing it up, and turning it out into the yard, whence it was conveyed to the water side. about breakfast time, the king and queen arrived at their hut, to pay them a farewell visit, and bestow upon them their last blessing. they brought with them two pots of honey, and a large quantity of goora nuts, strongly recommending them to present the latter to the rabba chieftain, for that nothing which they might have in their possession, could so effectually conciliate his favour, procure them his friendship, and command his confidence. it was nine o'clock in the morning when they arrived at the river side, where they found two canoes lying to receive their goods, which were quickly loaded. they had, however, been but a short time on the water, when they discovered that the smaller canoe, in which were six individuals and a number of sheep belonging to the nouffie messengers, was over-laden, and in danger of sinking, and that both were very leaky, insomuch that it required three men to be constantly employed in baling out the water to keep them afloat. to lighten the smaller canoe, they took a man from her into their own, and afterwards they proceeded more safely, and with less apprehension, yet they were obliged to put into a small island, called malalie, to get it repaired, for they were afraid to proceed any further with the small canoe, on account of the rocks, and the velocity of the current. according to their estimation, the current was here running at the rate of five or six miles in an hour, and the bed of the river was full of rocks, some of which were only a few inches below the surface of the water, which occasioned it to make a loud rushing noise, and forewarn the canoe man of his danger. they now passed the boundaries of boossa, on the eastern side of the river, and entered the dominions of the king of nouffie. towards evening they came to inguazhilligee, having passed just before, a very large and pleasant, but straggling town, called congie. inguazhilligee is the first town on the wowow ground, all above, on the western bank of the niger, belonging to boossa. journeying along for a quarter of an hour without stopping at any place, they put into a market town, on a large and beautiful island, called patashie, just in time to save themselves from a heavy shower. here they were obliged to remain until the return of the messenger, whom they landed in the middle of the day, and sent to wowow, for the purpose of informing the king of their departure from boossa, and their intention to reside at patashie till it might please him to send the large canoe, which they had purchased of him. they were now out of the protection of the friendly monarch of boossa, who would have nothing further to do with them. patashie is a large, rich island, unspeakably beautiful, and is embellished with various groves of palm and other noble trees. it is tributary to wowow, though it is inhabited solely by nouffie people, who are considered honest, active, laborious, and wealthy. the hut in which they resided, exhibited a scene of revelry and mirth more becoming a native inn than a private dwelling. the chief of the island, accompanied by the four messengers from boossa and nouffie, and several of his own people, all dressed "in their holiday best," paid them a visit in the earlier part of the morning, and out of compliment, it was supposed, remained with them till the evening, with the exception of a short absence in the middle of the day, during all which time they were employed in swallowing palm wine, which is procured in the island in great plenty, and in telling nonsensical stories. the landers were heartily glad when they said it was time to depart, and having shaken hands with the ardour of drunkards, they took their leave, staggered out of the hut, and all went laughing away. they were about to close their hut for the night, when a messenger arrived from the king of wowow, with news not at all to their liking. he informed them that they were anxiously expected in that city from boossa at the time of the holidays, and because they did not come agreeably to their promise, the prince could not conceal his chagrin, and was exceedingly angry, not only with the king of boossa, who was the cause of their absence, but also with themselves. the messenger informed them that his sovereign had most certainly procured for them a canoe, which was laid up at lever, but that if they wished, or rather if they were determined to have their horses back again, the king would send them in compliance to their wishes, "for who," said he, with much emphasis, "would presume to assert that the monarch of wowow would keep the property of others? it would not be paying him that respect," he continued, which his rank and situation demanded, were the white men to leave his dominions and the country altogether, without first coming to pay him their respects, and he would therefore entreat them to pay a visit to wowow for that purpose, or if both of them could not leave patashie, he requested that richard lander would come and bid him adieu, because he had not done so when his illness compelled him to leave his city. the monarchs of boossa and wowow seemed to entertain very different opinions regarding the journey of the landers. the former insisting on the necessity of their proceeding down the niger on the eastern or nouffie side, and the latter making use of strong language to persuade them that the yarriba side of the river would be the most convenient, the most agreeable, and the safest; and if they would make up their minds not to attend to the king of boossa's advice, he would send a messenger with them, who should protect them even to the sea. this difference of opinion, they were apprehensive would involve them in a thousand perplexities, yet they could only be guided by circumstances. at boossa, they experienced the greatest difficulty and trouble in procuring the bare necessaries of life, but in the flourishing patashie, provisions were sent to them from the chiefs of the two islands in such abundance, that half of them were thrown to the dogs. the natives of all ages displayed the greatest anxiety to see the white men, and large crowds assembled every day, and waited from morning to night patiently till they had gained the object of their visit. however, they were all as timid as hares, and if the landers happened to look fixedly in their faces for a moment, most of them, more especially the females and the junior classes of both sexes, started back with terror, as if they had seen a serpent in the grass; and when the landers attempted to walk near any of them, they ran screaming away, as though they had been pursued by a lion, or were in danger of falling into the jaws of a crocodile, so horrified were these poor people at the bare sight of a white man, and so frightful did their imaginations picture him to be. on friday, september th, richard lander landed for the purpose of proceeding to wowow, and took possession of a house on the banks of the river, which had been prepared for him. the king of wowow's messenger accompanied him, and having got everything ready as soon as he could, he commenced his journey to the city. on his arrival at wowow, he was too much fatigued to pay his respects to the sovereign, but on the following day, he had prepared himself for the visit to the king's house, but to his great surprise the eccentric old man excused himself from being seen on that day, on the plea that he had taken a ride in the morning to see his gardens, and the exercise had so much tired him, that he felt no inclination whatever to receive his visitors till the following day. it was, therefore, not until the th, that he granted lander an audience, and he then said with the greatest indifference, "i have not yet been able to procure you the canoe which i promised to get, but i have no doubt that the ruler of patashie will have it in his power to supply you with one to your satisfaction, for which purpose i will send an express to that island without delay, whom i will furnish with the necessary instructions to effect an immediate purchase." finding that nothing definitive could be arranged relative to the canoe, lander prepared to take his departure, but previously to his setting out, he requested the monarch to show him his collection of charms, which were written on sheets of paper, glued or pasted together. amongst them he discovered a small edition of watts' hymns on one of the blank leaves of which was written, _alexander anderson, royal military hospital, gosport_, . from the wowow chieftain, as well as from his good old brother, and their quondam abba, richard and his attendants received the most liberal hospitality, and on his taking his leave of them, they wished him farewell in the most cordial and affectionate manner. on the return of richard lander to patashie, preparations were instantly made for their departure, but after all their luggage had been packed up in readiness, information was brought them from the chief, that they could not start until to-morrow, because the niger would receive a great influx of water during the night, which would be considerably in their favour. to raise any objection to this arrangement was considered as wholly useless, and therefore they quietly awaited the coming of the following day. between eight and nine in the morning, horses were brought from the chief and his nephew to take the landers to the water side, where their luggage had been previously conveyed. here they had to wait a considerable time till the canoes were brought from another part of the island, there being but one got ready at the time of their arrival. on the arrival of the canoes, and all their things had been removed into them from the beach, they were desired to ride to a landing place further down the island, because of the rocks, which were reported to intercept the stream at a little distance from the place whereon they stood, and to be very dangerous for canoes that were heavily laden. the venerable governor of patashie, to whom they were under so many obligations, preceded them on the footpath, walking with a staff, and they reached the appointed place of embarkation exactly at the same moment as the canoes. after thanking all the friends that had accompanied them, they jumped on board, and pushed off from the shore, cheered by the natives that were present. the current bore them rapidly along, and having passed down in front of one or two towns on the banks of the river, they came in sight of lever, which was the place of their destination, it being about twenty miles from patashie. their surprise was, however, great indeed, when instead of the proper person whom they expected would have received them, they were welcomed on shore by a man called ducoo, who represented himself as the agent and confidential friend of the prince of rabba, but their surprise was not a little increased on learning that a party of forty or fifty armed fellata soldiers were also in the town. ducoo treated them with the courtly politeness of a frenchman, and was equally lavish in his compliments and offers of service; he walked with them to the chief of the town, to whom he took the liberty of introducing them, almost before he knew himself who or what they were; went himself and procured excellent lodgings for them, returned and sat down in their company to tell them some droll stories, and impart to them in confidence some very disagreeable news; then hastily arose, went out, and came back again with a sheep and other provisions, which he had obtained by compulsion from the chief, and finally remained with them till long after the moon had risen, when he left them to their repose. the landers now began to discover that they had been egregiously imposed upon, for in the first place they found, after all, that lever did not belong to the king of wowow, though it stands on his dominions, nor had that monarch a single subject here, or a single canoe, so that they were as far as ever they were from getting one, and with the loss of their horses to boot. they now found to their cost that they had been cajoled and out-manoeuvred by those fellows of boossa and its adjoining state, whom they falsely conceived to be their dearest and best black friends. they had played with them as if they were great dolls; they had been driven about like shuttlecocks; they had been to them first a gazing stock, and afterwards were their laughing stock, and, perhaps, not unlikely their mockery; they had been their admiration, their buffoons, their wonder and their scorn, a by-word and a jest. else why this double dealing, this deceit, this chicanery, these hollow professions? "why," as richard lander says, "did they entrap us in this manner? why have they led us about as though we had been blind, only to place us in the very lap of what they imagine to be danger? for can it be possible that the monarchs of wowow and boossa were ignorant of the state of things here, which is in their own immediate neighbourhood, and which have continued the same essentially for these three years? surely," concludes lander, "they have knowingly deceived us." the landers were now placed in a most unpleasant predicament; they could not possibly obtain a canoe according to the promise of the king of wowow, and to take those which had been lent them by the chief of patashie, appeared such a breach of confidence, that they could not prevail upon themselves to commit it, but the necessity of the case pleaded strongly in their favour. they had not the means of purchasing the canoes of the chief of patashie, as the king of wowow had adroitly managed to exhaust them of nearly all their resources; but when they began to talk of prosecuting their journey in the canoes belonging to the chief of patashie, the canoe men stoutly resisted their right: fortunately, however, for them, their busy, restless friend ducoo interfered on their behalf, and soon silenced their remarks, by threatening to cut off the head of him who should presume from that time to set foot in either of the canoes; and in order to give his menace the greater weight, he stationed two of his men to guard the forbidden boats till the sun went down, with drawn swords, and during the greater part of the night, another of his men paraded up and down the banks of the river near the spot as a watch, and this man kept up a noise by continually playing on a drum. the four messengers, who had accompanied them from wowow and boossa, had hitherto been a great encumbrance upon the landers, as their maintenance was by no means inconsiderable, at the same time, they were themselves in some measure dependent upon the native chiefs for their support. they were, therefore, heartily rejoiced to get rid of them, and having been paid their stipulated wages, they left the town in company to proceed to wowow. the question of the canoes was, however, by no means settled, for the landers were on a sudden surprised by the arrival of a small party of men, who arrived in a canoe, from the chief of the island of teàh, with a message to them, purporting that the canoes which they had, to the infinite surprise of the chief, detained at lever, did not belong as was supposed, to his friend, the chief of patashie, but were his own property, and as he did not acknowledge the authority of wowow, but had ever been subject to the king of nouffie, he considered that they could have no right whatever to the canoes in question, and, therefore, he entreated them to return the canoes by the hands of his messengers. the chief of teàh asserted, that he had lent them, because he was willing to oblige the white men and his own neighbour, but he did not conceive it possible that they could make so ungrateful and unkind a return for his hospitality, and the respect and attention which it had been his pride and pleasure to show them. for their own parts, they could not forbear acknowledging the truth and justice of the observations of the teàh chieftain, and blaming themselves for the step they had taken. they said further, that whatever might be the consequence, they had not the slightest objection to restore the canoes to their rightful owner; and provided the men from teàh could obtain the consent of ducoo, the priest, to take them away, they were at liberty to do so whenever they might think proper. but this, they were by no means disposed to do, for they both feared and hated ducoo, and, therefore, they bribed the nouffie messenger with a large sum of money to assist them in their project, and purposed taking away both canoes in the night time by stealth. these intentions were, however, frustrated by the watchful vigilence of ducoo, who had mistrusted them long before they were made known to the landers, and when he had actually detected their plans, he ordered the canoes to be pulled up on shore, two hundred yards at least from the water's edge, and observed with vehemence, "that after what he had done, should they again be launched into the water and taken away, he would instantly tie a rope round the necks of the chief of the town, and the nouffie messenger that had accepted the bribe, and in that humiliating state, they should be driven like beasts to their sovereign, the magia." on friday the rd october, they were desired to get their things packed up, for that they would be allowed to proceed on their journey on the following morning. in pursuance of that arrangement, they had got all their luggage in readiness, and only waited the coming of the chief to take their departure, when to their great regret, one of his messengers entered their hut to apprise them, that they would be unable to depart until to-morrow, his master having been dissuaded from his original purpose by the officious, bustling priest, their friend and enemy. they submitted to their disappointment as patiently and silently as they could, and in the evening they obtained a solemn promise, that whatever might be the consequence, no one should divert him from the resolution he had formed of detaining them longer than that day, and that early on the following morning they should certainly depart. their surprise and displeasure may, however, be guessed, when after their goods had been removed from the hut into the yard, they were informed, that they would be compelled to remain in the town yet another day, notwithstanding all that the chief had told them on the day preceding. their patience was now completely exhausted, and they were in great anger, for it was disheartening to be always deceived and trifled with by such scoundrels. repairing, therefore, to a hut, in which they knew the chief passed the greater part of his time, they discovered him sitting on the ground in company with the artful ducoo and the nouffie messenger, and engaged in a very high dispute with both of them. their unexpected and abrupt intrusion, in a moment cut short their wrangling, and they spoke with much emphasis of the shameful manner in which they had been treated, and expressed their determination of leaving lever in a few hours, in defiance of them and all their power. with the most insolent effrontery in the world, ducoo smiled at them, and replied, that they were entirely in his power--that they should do as _he_ liked, and quit the town whenever he thought proper. such language as this they thought rather too bold, and they pretended to be in a violent passion, and quickly undeceived him on that point, threatening that if either he or any of his men, should presume to interfere with them in their intention; or proceedings or attempt to hinder them from getting away from the town, they would feel no more hesitation nor reluctance in shooting him, than if he had been a partridge or a guinea hen. the priest, who had never before seen any thing in them but mildness, was intimidated at the determined and resolute behaviour they had found it necessary to adopt; in a moment he was crest-fallen, and from being one of the most boisterous and consequential fellows in the world, became quite passive: yet his presence of mind did not forsake him, he stammered out a kind of apology, attempted to soothe them by soft language and submission, in which he found little difficulty, and did all in his power to effect a reconciliation. having settled this business, the landers went out, and assembling their men, attempted to draw their canoe to the river side, but the ground was even, and the boat so long and heavy, that notwithstanding all their exertions, they could move her only a few inches towards the river. the people were ashamed of themselves to see them labouring so hard, and to so little purpose, and ducoo likewise, observing them, was convinced that they were in earnest, therefore, whispering a few words in the ear of the chief, they both came down to the spot, where they were toiling at the canoe, followed by a number of men; these, with the priest at their head, took the work out of their hands, and in less than two minutes the boat was floating on the water. their luggage was then conveyed into the two canoes, and shortly afterwards they were supplied with three men to paddle them, with the assistance of their own. here they took their farewell of the chief and the priest, the latter begging them very anxiously to speak well of him to his sovereign at rabba. it was not till after they were all in the canoes, and ready to push off, that those on shore discovered them to be overladen, and recommended them to hire one of immense size, which was lying alongside. without stopping to make them any reply, or listen to any further nonsense, they desired their own men to push the boats out into the middle of the current, which was done very promptly, and the town of lever, with its chief and inhabitants, was speedily out of sight and soon forgotten. about one o'clock they landed at a considerable large and spacious town, called bajiebo, inhabited by nouffie people, although, it is situated on the yarriba, or western side of the river. for dirt, bustle, and nastiness of all kinds, this place exceeded anything they had ever seen before. for two hours after their arrival they were obliged to wait in a close diminutive hut, till a more convenient and becoming habitation could be procured for their reception, and the pleasure of the chief with regard to them should be known. they were much incommoded by visitors, who scarcely allowed them to move or breathe, which, joined to the heat of the weather and the insufferable stench, rendered their situation truly comfortless and distressing. they were at length removed from this horrible hole, and conducted to a hut in the heart of the town, in which wood fires had been burning the whole of the day, so that the wall was almost as warm as the sides of a heated oven, insomuch that it could scarcely be endured. yet, to render it more unpleasant still, a large closely woven mat was placed before the door way, in order to prevent a thousand eyes from staring in upon them, and which excluded every breath of air. their feelings during the whole of the night, were more distressing than could be conceived; they were almost suffocated with the closeness and intense heat of the room, and dreamt that they were being baked alive in an oven. bajiebo is a flourishing and important trading town, although not walled, and one of the largest and most populous that they had yet seen. the huts are erected so close to each other, and with so little regard to comfort, and a free circulation of air, that there is scarcely a foot path in the town wide enough for more than one man to walk on at a time, and not having the advantage of shady trees, the heat of the town was excessive and distressing. the power of the fellatas was here evidently very great. one of their number was styled chief, and had more authority and influence than the native ruler. they were obliged to make a present to each of these individuals, and other high and mighty personages were likewise desirous of obtaining a similar favour at their hands, but they made light of their conversation, and would not understand their enigmas. before sunrise on the th october, their luggage was removed to the beach, and between six and seven o'clock they were once more upon the water. in the course of an hour after leaving bajiebo, they passed by two towns of considerable extent, and in about an hour afterwards they arrived at an extensive town called lechee, inhabited by noufanchie, and said to be a place of considerable rank and consequence. here they landed by express desire, and finding an empty grass hut near the spot, they entered and took possession of it, till such time as the chief should be made acquainted with their arrival. here also their canoe men left them and returned to bajiebo, where they had hired them. they were not suffered to wait long, but in a few minutes received an invitation from the chief to come and see him; and having walked through a good part of the town, they at length approached his residence, and were introduced without ceremony or hindrance, into a large and lofty hut, where they discovered the chief sitting on a platform of mud, in great state, with about forty natives and fellatas in earnest conversation on each side of him. he received them with great civility, and many demonstrations of gladness, and desired them to draw near his person, that he might have a better opportunity of looking at and talking to them. he appeared, however, unwilling for them to quit lechee till the following day, and pressed them strongly to remain with him for the day, which, however, not all his solicitations nor importunities could induce them to accede to. after some trifling conversation, and a long and pithy harangue from a fellata, they took their leave of him and his people, and instantly made their way back to the water side, where they waited in the grass hut for the appearance of the canoe men, with whom the chief had promised to supply them. after a considerable delay, a man for each canoe could only be procured, so that two of their own people were obliged to supply the place of others, as well as they could. having got into their canoes, they pushed off from the shore, and proceeded at a good rate down the stream, along the side of a considerable island, which was within gunshot of the town, and after passing a large open village of respectable appearance, which was on the western bank, they put in at a small town, a few miles below, also on the yarriba side of the river, where they were constrained to go in quest of other canoe men, because those from lechee, though they had been with them only forty minutes, and had certainly not laboured very hard, had refused to proceed with them any further, nor could all their enticements induce them to forego the resolution which they had taken. the landers were detained in their canoes for an hour and a half, exposed to a scorching sun, in order to obtain fresh canoe men. they at last proceeded on their journey, and in the evening arrived at a fishing town on a small island, which was called madjie, and belonged to the noufanchie. here they were received with cheerfulness by the chief, who accommodated them with a roomy hut, sent them a quantity of dressed provisions, and otherwise treated them in the most hospitable manner. at nine in the following morning, they landed near a small town to procure a fresh supply of canoe men, and having obtained them, they journeyed along the eastern side of the river, and in a few hours afterwards, they perceived the smoke of the far-famed rabba ascending many miles before them. they stopped for a short time at a low, flat, swampy island called belee, and visited a mean, dirty-looking town, where they were in a short time introduced to the chief, who, according to the report of their messenger, was a great, rich, and important personage. he informed them, that mohammed, the magia's son, who had left them at patashie, had returned from his father, in pursuance of his agreement, but instead of remaining at rabba, as they had expected, he had come over to belee, and had been waiting three days on the island in expectation of their arrival. the governor further informed them, that they would be obliged to remain at belee, till the return of mohammed to the island, for he had news of importance to communicate to them. "to-morrow," he said, "you will leave hence, and proceed to another island, which is further down the river, wherein it is arranged that you shall abide till your affairs be finally adjusted." there was some mystery about this information, which was unexpected by the landers, and not very gratifying to them. it was the evening before mohammed returned to belee, and he presented himself before them in a dripping state, with an excuse, that he had been upset in a canoe two or three times. after the first salutation was over, he informed them of his visit to his father, and its result. the magia had desired him to assure them of his best wishes in their welfare, and his determination to protect, support, and encourage them, as far as he was able. mohammed then drew their attention to a young man, who had entered the hut with him, but whom they had not before observed, and introduced him as a messenger sent to them by the fellata prince of rabba. this man said, that his master, named mallam dendo, had commissioned him to acquaint them, that he heartily concurred with the king of nouffie in the favourable opinions and sentiments which the latter entertained for them. with respect to their visiting rabba, which he understood they were very much disinclined to do, he should not urge them, and rather imagined that they would be more comfortable and enjoy greater tranquillity, on an inland on the opposite side of the river, where he would recommend them to stop. the fellata messenger concluded by observing, that they would be visited on the morrow by _the king of the dark water_, who would escort them to the island in question, of which he was the governor. as early as five o'clock on the following morning, their canoes were loaded, and having breakfasted on a slice of yam, they were fully prepared to quit the island. but as it was not deemed either politic or proper to go away till the arrival of the great _king of the dark water_, who was hourly expected, and who might be inclined to construe their departure into contempt, they consented to await his coming. rather, however, than remain in a close black hut, full of men, whose garments were generally covered with vermin, and rarely if ever cleaned, and who made it a common practice to sit on the mat where the two landers slept, rather than undergo such a nuisance, they stepped into their canoes, and having pushed off from the land, they waited the arrival of the king of the dark water under the branches of a large tree, at a little distance from the town. between nine and ten, they heard a number of men singing, and keeping time to the motion of many paddles, and in a very few minutes, a canoe, which was paddled by a few men only, came in sight, and they knew by this that the water king was approaching. it was instantly followed by another, and much larger one, propelled by above twenty very fine young men, whose voices they had been listening to just before, and who were still continuing their song. the king of the dark water was with them. as the canoe drew nearer, they were not only surprised at its extraordinary length and uncommon neatness, but likewise at the unusual display of pomp and show which were observable in her. in the centre a mat awning was erected, which was variously decorated, and on the front of it hung a large piece of scarlet cloth, ornamented with bits of gold lace stitched on different parts of it. in the bow of the canoe were three or four little boys of equal size, who were clad with neatness and propriety; and in the stern sat a number of comely looking musicians, consisting of several drummers and a trumpeter, whilst the young men, who had the management of the boat, were not inferior to their companions either in decency of apparel or respectability of appearance. as soon as their canoe arrived at the landing place, the water king came out from beneath the awning, and followed by the musicians and a suite of attendants, walked to the hut, in which all public matters were transacted, and whither in a few minutes the landers were desired to repair. the chief of the island, with his elders and the more respectable of the people were seated, on their entrance, on each side of their important visitor, and the two landers, as a mark of distinction, were invited to place themselves in front of him. when the usual compliments had passed on both sides, he informed them, with much solemnity, of his rank and title, he then alluded to the cause of his coming, which he said, was to do them honour, and repeated what had been previously told them by the king's son. this being done, he presented them with a pot of excellent honey, and two thousand cowries in money, with a large quantity of goora nuts, and which are held in such high esteem that the opulent and powerful alone have the means of procuring them. having nothing further to say or do, they shook hands with his sable majesty, whose name was suliken rouah, expressed their acknowledgement for his handsome present, and returned to their boats. it was exactly mid-day when suliken rouah re-embarked in his princely canoe, and quitted the island of belee. determined for once to make an attempt at a more respectable appearance, for heretofore it had been extremely mean and homely, they hastily constructed an awning of their sheets. it was the first time they had made use of such a thing, though they were without umbrellas, and till then had nothing but slight straw hats to protect their heads from the sun. above the awning, they elevated a slender staff, on the top of which they fastened the national colours, the union flag, which was kindly given them by a gentleman on the coast, who was commandant of anamaboo. when unfurled and waving in the wind, it looked extremely pretty, and it made their hearts glow with pride and enthusiasm as they looked on this solitary little banner. they thought it would also be of service to them, if they made as gay an appearance as the king and his followers, and accordingly richard lander put on an old naval uniform coat, which he had with him for state occasions, and john lander dressed himself in as grotesque and gaudy a manner as their resources would afford. their eight attendants also put on new white mahommedan tobes, so that their canoe, with its white awning, surmounted by the union flag, their canoe men in new dresses, and themselves appearing as officers, contributed not a little to the effect of the whole scene. the august king of the dark water, with his retinue in twenty canoes, condescendingly gave them the precedence, and theirs was the first that moved off from land, and led the way down the river towards rabba. for a little while, they continued to take the lead, but the chief soon went before them for two reasons, first, that he might have an opportunity of looking at them, and secondly, that they might have a fairer chance of seeing him in all his state, for which purpose, he had placed himself outside his awning, on an elevated and conspicuous seat. however, he only wished to get a few yards before them, for his canoe men soon lifted their paddles out of the water, and the boat fell back to its former situation. the musicians in the large canoe performed merrily on their instruments, and about twenty persons now sung at intervals in recitative, keeping excellent time with their paddles. a brisk wind sprung up the river full in their faces, relieving them from the extreme heat of the weather, which was remarkably fine; the scene before them was very animating, and the whole of them were in high glee and spirits. other canoes joined them, and never did the british flag lead so extraordinary a squadron. the king of the dark water might have been mistaken for a river god, and his wives, now and then showing their pretty black faces from under the awning, cast many an arch look at them with their sparkling, jetty eyes. it was not long before their reverie was interrupted by a great noise from the adjacent land, and on turning, they perceived the banks of an island, called zagozhi, which was lined with numbers of people, admiring their flag, and watching them very earnestly, by which they guessed that this was the place of their destination. the island was so uncommonly low that the houses and trees appeared as if they were standing in the water, as indeed many of them actually were. theirs being the first canoe, before they landed on the island, they waited for the king to precede them, and the moment he set his foot on shore, they fired a salute of four muskets and three pistols. the king of the dark water was rather alarmed at this, and demanded whether they were going to make war on him, but he was soon relieved from his fear, by being told that it was an honour that they had been in the habit of paying to all the princes, whom they had met in their travels; which he no sooner understood, than he expressed himself much gratified by their attention. the king himself went in quest of a dwelling house, and conducted them to one of the best which the island afforded; it was, however, miserably bad, for as the town was built on a marsh, every hut in it had the disadvantage, during the whole of the rainy season, of soft damp floors, and uncomfortable roofs. their own hut had positively pools of water springing up out of the ground. the walls of the hut were built of mud from the river, strengthened and supported by wooden pillars, and ribs of the same materials; however, these do not prevent them from cracking in a hundred different places, and large chinks, admitting wind and rain, may be observed in the walls of every hut. they have all a very dirty and wretched appearance, although their inmates, generally speaking, were understood to be clean, opulent, and respectable. having conducted them to the hut, the chief of the island shook hands with them very heartily, and assured them they should want for nothing. he soon provided them with doors of bamboo for their hut, and a number of mats to spread on the floor, which made it tolerably comfortable. in the evening, four large calabashes of stewed rice with fowls, and no less than ten gallons of _petto_ or country beer were sent them. about seven in the evening, messengers arrived from rabba, to inform them that they should come early in the morning for the presents intended for their chief. they said that the king would not put them to the trouble of going to see him, as the town was full of arabs, whose begging propensities would be very inconvenient to them. the landers were much pleased with this intelligence, knowing very well the character of the arabs, and they sent back word, that they would be still more obliged to him, if he would dispense with their going to the sansan, or camp, at a short distance from the town, to visit the king of nouffie. rabba stands in an opposite direction to zagozhi, and appears at the distance of about two miles, to be an immensely large, populous, and flourishing town. it is built on the slope of a gentle hill, and on a spot almost entirely bare of trees; the niger here flowed in a direction to the south of east. chapter xxxvii. according to their announcement on the preceding day, the messengers from the chiefs arrived, bringing with them two fine sheep and a great quantity of rice, and it appeared that they would be required to give presents to nine people, before they should be able to get away from the place. having prepared the presents, the messengers were collected, and richard lander laid before each of them those that were intended for their masters, and in order to make them some reward, and secure their good will, he gave something to each of them, and dismissed them. on the following morning they were visited by two young men, arabs, from rabba, one of whom was very eager to claim acquaintance with richard lander, and to bring to his memory certain scenes which had taken place on his former journey to houssa. having in some degree recovered from his surprise at his salutation, on looking at him more attentively, he recognized in him the very same individual, that had been employed by captain clapperton, whom he had abused and cheated, and who was subsequently engaged by lander himself as a guide from kano. he was the same person also, who decamped with captain pearce's sword, and a large sum of money in kowries. the fellow, however, on being taxed with his dishonesty, made very light of his offence, and with the utmost effrontery begged every thing that he saw, so that the landers lost their temper with the scoundrel, and turned him out of the hut in disgust. he, however, could not believe that they were in earnest with him, "oh, it must be all sport," said he, but at last they threatened to shoot him, if ho did not go about his business, and being apprehensive that they would put their threats into execution, he ran off as fast as he could. the market at rabba is very celebrated, and considered by traders as one of the largest and best in the whole country, of which it may be styled the emporium. on one market day, between one and two hundred men, women, and children were exposed for sale in ranks and lines, like the oxen at smithfield. these poor creatures had for the most part been captured in war. the price of a strong healthy lad was about forty thousand kowries, (£ sterling,) a girl fetches about fifty thousand, and perhaps more, if she be at all interesting. the value of men and women varies according to their age, and abilities. the situation of the travellers now assumed a critical aspect, for early one morning, mallam dendo, the old king of rabba sent for pascoe in a great hurry, with a message that he was waiting impatiently his arrival at rabba, having something of the utmost consequence to communicate. as may be easily conjectured, the landers were rather surprised at this unexpected summons, and waited pascoe's return with much anxiety, for they had no doubt whatever, that themselves were principally concerned in it. when, however, he _did_ come back, and entered the hut, he looked very wistfully, and informed them with considerable agitation both of voice and manner, that mallam dendo had expressed to him the greatest dissatisfaction at the things which he had received from them as presents, declaring them to be perfectly worthless, and with the exception of the looking-glass, "fit only for a child," that he well knew they could have sent him something more useful and of greater value, if they had thought proper; but that if they persisted in their refusal to do so, he should demand of them their guns, pistols, and powder, before he would consent or permit them to leave zagozhi. this news made them very uneasy and unhappy, and they sat down in gloom and thoughtfulness without uttering a word, for they believed this to be a death-blow to all their hones. to part with the only defensive weapons in their possession, they felt determined not to do, for they knew if they were to be deprived of them, they should be entirely in the power of a set of fellows remarkable neither for generosity nor nobleness of principle, without the means of helping themselves, and they resolved never to part with their guns, unless compelled to do so by the most urgent necessity. having reflected deliberately on their situation, they felt convinced that something on their part must be done by way of conciliation, if they had any intention of quitting the country, and of prosecuting their enterprise. on a sudden, they thought of mr. park's tobe, which was given to them by the king of boossa, and they hoped that in consequence of the splendour of its appearance, and its intrinsic value, it might prove an acceptable present to the covetous prince, and be the means of effecting a perfect reconciliation between them. they therefore immediately despatched ibrahim with it to rabba, although their hearts misgave them at the time, that it would, after all, be thought lightly of, as an excuse for further extortions. in this, however, they were agreeably disappointed, for in less than two hours after his departure, ibrahim returned from his errand with a quick step and cheerful looks, and informed them that the tobe was accepted by the prince with rapturous admiration. by this present they had made him their friend for ever. "ask the white men," said he, "what they would desire, and if rabba can supply them with it, tell them they shall always have it. well," he continued, "i must purchase this tobe, i will not accept it as a gift; that would be against my principles, and besides, it would be wrong for me to be guilty of such injustice. now i shall be something like a king," he added, turning the tobe inside and out; "let no man know of it, my neighbours will behold me with envy, and as for my own people, i will surprise them some morning by putting it on when they are going to war: it will dazzle their eyes. how great will be their astonishment?" in this manner the king of the fellatas talked to ibrahim. on the following day, pascoe was sent to rabba, well tutored by his masters, and in consequence of the offer made by the king to make them any compensation for the handsome tobe, pascoe informed him, that the first wish of the white men was to obtain a large canoe, and to pursue their journey on the niger as fast as possible. he promised to settle the business of the canoe, and sent some presents to the landers, which at the time were very acceptable. they had, however, scarcely got over the dilemma with the king of rabba, than a messenger arrived to that monarch from the king of nouffie, who had despatched him privately to mallam dendo, with an intimation to him, that if it met with his approbation, he (the magia) would order the white men to be detained at zagozhi, until they would consent to make him a present of a certain number of dollars, or something equivalent to them in value; that he disbelieved the story of their poverty altogether, and would therefore search their luggage, in order to discover whether their assertion were true or false, that they had no greater presents to make. so much dissimulation, meanness, and rapacity, which this trait in his character exhibited, they had little reason to expect from the king of nouffie, after expressing for them so warmly and repeatedly as he had done, protestations of the most cordial, candid, and lasting friendship. they could not forbear feeling very indignant at this foul breach of the laws of hospitality and good faith, which previously to this act, they had experienced in every part of the country. perhaps it was well that they had presented the prince of rabba with mr. park's tobe, for he treated the message and its bearer with contempt, and answered energetically, "tell the magia, your sovereign, that i would rebuke him for this expression of his sentiments, and that i detest his base insinuations; that i will never consent to his wishes, and that i reject his proposal with disdain. what! shall the white men, who have come from such distant lands to visit our country, who have spent their substance amongst us, and made us presents before we had leisure to do any good for them, shall they be treated so inhumanly? never! they have worn their shoes from their feet, and their clothes from their persons, by the length and tediousness of their journeys; they have thrown themselves into our hands, to claim our protection and partake of our hospitality; shall we treat them as robbers, and cast them from us like dogs? surely not. what would our neighbours, what would our friends--our foes say to this? what could be a greater reproach than the infamy, which would attach itself to our characters, and to our name, should we treat these poor, unprotected, wandering strangers, and white men too, in the manner your monarch, the king of nouffie proposes? after they have been received and entertained with so much hospitality and honour in yarriba, at wowow, and at boossa, shall it be said that rabba treated them badly? that she shut her doors upon them and plundered them? no, never! i have already given my word to protect them, and i will not forfeit that sacred pledge for all the guns and swords in the world." such was the answer of a man whom we call a savage--it was worthy of a prince and a christian. it was now high time that their journey should be completed, for their goods were very nearly exhausted, and so far from being in a condition to make further presents, their means were scarcely adequate to procure the bare necessaries of life. their stock of cloth, looking-glasses, snuff-boxes, knives, scissors, razors, and tobacco pipes, had been already given away, and they had only needles and a few silver bracelets left, to present to the chiefs whom they might reasonably expect to fall in with on their voyage down the niger. the population of zagozhi cannot well be estimated on account of its lowness, and the prevailing flatness of the country round, on which neither a hillock nor eminence of any kind can be discerned. however, it must be immense, and the landers considered it to be one of the most extensive and thickly inhabited towns, as well as one of the most important trading places in the whole kingdom of nouffie, not excepting even coulfoo. having at length received permission to quit zagozhi on the following day, to pursue their journey down the niger, they made the necessary preparations for their departure. they were in hope of obtaining a canoe capable of holding the whole of their party, as it would be a much more satisfactory arrangement for them, and more convenient than two small ones. the chief of the island promised to send a messenger with them as far as egga, which was the last town down the river belonging to the nouffie territory. the chief was, however, unwilling to part with a canoe under any consideration, yet as a token of his friendship and regard, he offered to spare them one for twenty thousand kowries, in addition to their own canoe, which they had brought from patashie. a messenger from the prince of rabba arrived just after this proposal had been made to them, with full powers to treat with the "king of the dark water" for the canoe. in a short time, he returned from his errand, with the pleasing intelligence of his having succeeded in obtaining the long-talked-of canoe, and which was to be in readiness to receive them on board at an early hour on the following morning. on friday, october th, they rose at an early hour, to pack up their clothes, and to get their luggage ready for embarkation. but when this was all done, they met with a sudden and unforeseen embarrassment, for the sable king of the dark water laughed at the idea of giving them a canoe on the faith of receiving payment from the prince of the fellatas, and at first, he even refused to deliver up their own canoe, which they had brought from patashie, and which they had kept with so much anxiety and trouble. at length, however, he consented to restore to them all their property, and the whole of the articles were accordingly moved into the canoes. when all this was done, and they were quite ready to start, the old chief came down to the water side to bid them farewell, according to his avowed purpose, but in reality to offer them a commodious canoe in exchange for their own, if they would consent to give him ten thousand kowries in addition to them. they had fortunately realized a sufficient number of kowries from the sale of needles at rabba, and while richard lander was shifting the things from their own canoe into another, john lander walked back with the old chief to his residence, where he found all the people of the house gathered round the trunk of a large tree, which was burning in the hut. here he paid the chief ten thousand kowries for the canoe, which having done, he rejoined his brother at the water side. the canoes made here are of a particular description, very much resembling what are called punts in england, but are perfectly straight and flat bottomed. they are generally formed out of one log of wood, and are of an immense size; that which the landers purchased, was about fifteen feet in length and four in breadth, but they are sometimes made nearly as large again. to this offer the landers most willingly acceded, and as soon as all the goods were transferred into the purchased canoe, they found, after all, that it was not nearly large enough for their purpose, independently of its being extremely leaky, and patched up in a thousand places; they had been prevented from perceiving the canoe's defect before, by the excitement of preparation, and the hurry of departure. they now saw that they had been cheated by the artful king of the dark water, but rather than enter into an interminable dispute on the subject, which might involve them in further difficulties, they held their peace and put up with the imposition without a murmur; after, getting all their luggage into her, they waited for the arrival of a messenger, who was to have accompanied them a little way on their journey, but as he did not come, they resolved to depart without him, so bidding farewell to the king of the dark water, and hundreds of spectators who were gazing at them, they fired two muskets, and launching out into the river, they were soon out of sight of zagozhi. chapter xxxviii. they paddled along the banks at a distance of not less than thirty miles, every inch of which they had attentively examined, but not a bit of dry land could anywhere be discovered, which was firm enough to bear their weight. therefore, they resigned themselves to circumstances, and all of them having been refreshed with a little cold rice and honey, and water from the stream, they permitted the canoe to drive down with the current, for their men were too much fatigued with the labours of the day to work any longer. but here a fresh evil arose, which they were unprepared to meet. an incredible number of hippopotami arose very near them, and came plashing and snorting and plunging all round the canoe, and placed them in imminent danger. thinking to frighten them off, they fired a shot or two at them, but the noise only called up from the water, and out of the fens, about as many more of their unwieldy companions, and they were more closely beset than before. their people, who had never in all their lives been exposed in a canoe to such huge and formidable beasts, trembled with fear and apprehension, and absolutely wept aloud; their terror was not a little increased by the dreadful peals of thunder, which rattled over their heads, and by the awful darkness which prevailed, broken at intervals by flashes of lightning, whose powerful glare was truly awful. however, the hippopotami did them no kind of mischief whatever; no doubt at first when they interrupted them, they were only sporting and wallowing in the river for their own amusement, but had they upset the canoe, the travellers would have paid dearly for it. having travelled, according to their own computation, a distance little short of a hundred miles, they stopped at a small insignificant fishing village called _dacannie_, where they were very glad to land. the niger here presented a very magnificent appearance; and was reckoned to be nearly eight miles in breadth. whilst they were at breakfast, under the shelter of a tree, the promised messenger from zagozhi arrived, and introduced himself to them. he said that he had followed their track during the night, and had heard the report of their guns, but though he strove to come up with them, yet he had not been able. it was between nine and ten in the morning, that the guide desired them to proceed onwards, promising to follow them in a few minutes. with this arrangement they cheerfully complied, and instantly pushed off the shore, for of all persons, a messenger is the most unpleasant companion; he is fond of procrastination, sullen when rebuked, and stops at every paltry village wherein he fancies that he can levy his contributions without the fear of interruption. the messenger, whom they had left at dacannie, soon overtook them, and kept company with them till they drew near to two cities of prodigious extent, one on each side of the river, and directly opposite each other. to that lying on the right, the guide expressed his intention of going, and endeavoured to entice the landers with many promises to accompany him there, but they refused, for they had formed a resolution to husband their resources to the utmost of their ability, and consequently to land at little hamlets only, where they might do just as they pleased, without being amenable for their actions to those powerful beings, who are styled "the mighty" of the earth. they now took leave of the zagozhi messenger, who promised to follow them as before, and in an hour afterwards they put into a small village, situated on an island called gungo, the natives of which appeared to be a mild, inoffensive, quiet, and good-natured people. about sunset, the inhabitants of the whole island, amounting to about a hundred men, women, and children, dressed in very decent apparel, and headed by their chief, a venerable old man, paid them a visit. the chief was dressed in the mahommedan costume, and he arranged his people, and made them sit down round the hut which the landers occupied, in the most orderly manner. the men evinced no alarm, but the women and pretty little plump-faced children were much frightened at their white faces, and seemed not a little glad to get away. before they retired, they distributed about two hundred needles among them, and they went away highly pleased with their present. at zagozhi, they had been strongly recommended to put into a large and important trading town called _egga_, which was reported to be three days journey down the river from thence, and they had been promised a guide or messenger to accompany them thither, but they had neither heard nor seen any thing of him since the preceding day. from motives of prudence, however, they thought proper to make inquiries concerning the egga, of which they had been told, lest by any means, they should pass it without seeing it. about mid-day they touched at a large village to inquire whereabouts egga lay, and they were informed that they had not a long way to go. they journeyed onwards for about an hour, when they perceived a large, handsome town, behind a deep morass. it was the long-sought-for egga, and they instantly proceeded up a creek to the landing place. the town was upwards of two miles in length, they halted a few minutes before landing, no one having conveyed intelligence of their arrival to the chief. a young fellata was the first who invited them on shore, and they despatched pascoe to the chief to tell him who they were, and what they wanted. he quickly returned, saying that the old chief was ready to receive them, and they immediately proceeded to his residence. in a few minutes, they arrived at the zollahe or entrance hut, in which they found the old man ready to receive them. they discovered him squatting on a cow's hide, spread on the ground, smoking from a pipe of about three yards long, and surrounded by a number of fellatas, and several old mallams. they were welcomed in the most friendly and cordial manner, and as a mark of peculiar distinction, they were invited to seat themselves near the person of the chief. he looked at them with surprise from head to foot, and told them that they were strange-looking people, and well worth seeing. having satisfied his curiosity, he sent for all his old wives, that they might do the same; but as they did not altogether relish so much quizzing, they requested to be shown to a hut. a house, "fit for a king," to use his own expression, was speedily got ready for their reception, and as soon as he had learnt with surprise, that they subsisted on the same kind of food as himself, they were led to their dwelling, and before evening received a bowl of tuah and gravy from his wives. they were soon pestered with the visits of the mallams and the chief's wives, the latter of whom brought them presents of goora nuts as a sort of introduction to see them. as soon as the news of their arrival spread through the town, the people flocked by hundreds to their hut, for the purpose of satisfying their curiosity with a sight of the white people. the mallams and the king's wives had given them trouble enough, but the whole population of egga was too much for them, so that they were literally obliged to blockade the doorways, and station three of their people at each to keep them away. the landers were extremely anxious to expedite their departure from egga, for although the old chief was extremely kind and hospitable, yet the annoyance from the natives was more than could be borne; for they never could have a moment of rest, their windows and doorways being blocked up by visitors, so that they were literally prevented from inhaling the fresh air, but were like prisoners in a cage to be examined and quizzed by every one, who thought they could pass their jokes with impunity. having expressed their intention of continuing their journey, the elders of the town remonstrated with them, that it would be highly dangerous to go by themselves, and endeavoured to persuade them to alter the arrangement for their own sakes. they promised to procure them a convoy of traders, if they would consent to wait three days longer, which was to leave egga at the end of that time to attend a famous market called bocqua. when they sent word to the chief that they intended departing on the following day, he begged of them to remain a few days longer, declaring the banks of the river to be inhabited by people, who were little better than savages, and plundered every one that came near them. he was then asked, if he would send a messenger with them, but he refused, saying, that the fellata power and his own extended no further down the river; that egga was the last town of nouffie, and that none of his people traded below it. "if that be the case," said richard lander, "it will be as safe for us to go to-morrow as any other day," and with this determination he left him. he then proceeded to give directions for his people to prepare themselves for starting, when to the great astonishment of himself and his brother, pascoe and the mulatto ibrahim were the only two who agreed to go, the rest of them refusing to a man. richard said all he could to them to change their determination; he talked to them half an hour, telling them they were cowards, and that his life and that of his brother were as good as theirs, but he could not make the slightest impression upon them, and therefore told them to go out of his sight, and that they would do without them. partly, however, by threats, and partly by bribes, the men agreed to accompany them, although the impression could not be effaced from their minds, that they were going where they should be murdered, or at least sold as slaves. at length every thing being in readiness, they bade farewell to the old chief, and several of the principal inhabitants came hurrying down to the waterside to take their leave, to give them their blessing, and to wish them a successful voyage. the men at first paddled sluggishly, and the canoe went slowly through the water, for which reason they were two hours before they reached the middle of the river. a few miles from the town, they saw with emotions of pleasure a seagull, which flew over their heads, which to them was a most gratifying sight, for it reminded them forcibly of the object which they had in view, and they fondly allowed it to confirm their hopes, that they were drawing very near their journey's end. for many miles they could see nothing but large, open, well-built villages on both banks of the river, but more especially on the eastern, yet they touched at none of these goodly places, but continued their journey till the sun began to decline, when they stopped at a small hamlet on an island, with the intention of sleeping there, cut the inhabitants mistrusted their intentions, and were alarmed at their appearance; they would not even grant them an accommodation for the night, although they assured them, that the most homely, the most shattered hut would answer their purpose; fearing, however, that they might enforce their request, they did all they could to induce them to proceed onwards a little further, when they would arrive at a city of considerable importance called kacunda, where plenty of provisions could be obtained, and where the inhabitants would pay the greatest attention to them. kacunda is situated on the western bank of the river, and at a little distance, it has an advantageous and uncommonly fine appearance. the only access to the town was by winding channels, that interspersed an unwholesome swamp, nearly two miles in breadth. it was evening when they arrived there, and the people at first were alarmed at their appearance, but they were soon welcomed on shore by an old mahommedan priest, who speedily introduced them into an excellent and commodious hut, once the residence of a prince, but then the domicile of a schoolmaster. kacunda, properly speaking, consists of three or four villages, all of them considerably large, but unconnected, though situated within a very short distance of each other. it is the capital of a state or kingdom of the same name, which is quite independent of nouffie, or any other foreign power. the only dress that the natives wear, is a piece of cotton cloth round the loins. the women wear small ear-rings of silver, but use no paint, nor do they bedaub their persons with any sort of pigment. on the morning subsequently to their arrival, a large double bank canoe arrived at kacunda, and they shortly found that the king's brother had come in her to pay them a visit. he was saluted on landing with a discharge from five old rusty muskets. a messenger was immediately despatched to the landers, announcing that he was ready to see them. their meeting was very cordial, and they shook hands heartily with him, and explained to him their business. he brought a goat as a present, and in return richard lander presented him with a pair of silver bracelets, but he did not appear to be much interested about them, or indeed to care at all for them, but looking round their room, he perceived several little things to which he took a fancy, and which being of no value whatever to them, were readily presented to him. they had now become great friends, and he commenced giving them a dreadful account of the natives down the river, and advised them by no means to go amongst them, but return by the way they had come. he said to them with much emphasis, "if you go down the river, you will surely fall into their hands and be murdered." "go we must," said richard lander, "if we live or die by it, and that also on the morrow." he was then asked if he would send a messenger with them, for that he might ensure their safety, coming from so powerful a person as the chief of kacunda. but he replied directly, "no, if i were to do such a thing, the people at the next town would assuredly cut off his head;" but, he added, "if you will not be persuaded by me to turn back, and save your lives, at least you must not leave this by day light, but stop until the sun goes down, and then you may go on your journey, you will then pass the most dangerous town in the middle of the night, and perhaps save yourselves." he was asked, if the people of whom he spoke had muskets, or large canoes. to which he replied, "yes, in great numbers, they are very large and powerful, and no canoe can pass down the river in the day time, without being taken by them and plundered; and even at night, the canoes from here are obliged to go in large numbers, and keep close company with each other to make a formidable appearance in case of their being seen by them." the landers had no reason whatever to doubt this information, and being aware how little they could do, if they should be attacked by these formidable fellows, they determined on going at night, according to the custom of the natives, and proposed starting at four o'clock on the evening of the morrow. the chief's brother was apprised of their intentions, at which he seemed quite astonished, and they doubted not that this determined conduct, which they had every where shown, and apparent defiance of all danger, in making light of the dreadful stories, which were related to them, had great influence on the minds of the people, and no doubt inspired them with a belief that they were supernatural beings, gifted with more than ordinary qualifications. having communicated their intentions to their friend, and given him all the little trifling things he wished for, he departed with the present for his brother the chief. on the following day, he again paid them a visit, urging them by every argument which he could think of, to defer their departure for their own sakes for two or three days, in order that canoes might be got ready to accompany them on their voyage, and he endeavoured again to impress upon their minds the danger, which they should inevitably incur, if they were determined to go alone. they, however, paid little attention to his remarks, further than that they consented to wait till the afternoon, for a man to accompany them in the capacity of messenger, to the so much talked of bocqua market, where, it was asserted, they should be perfectly safe, and beyond which place the people were represented as being less rapacious, so that little fear was to be entertained from them. as the afternoon approached, they inquired in vain for the promised guide, and when they found that the chief, or rather his brother, felt no disposition whatever to redeem his pledge, they made immediate preparations to leave the town, to the manifest disappointment of the latter, who made a very dolorous lament, and did all in his power, except employing actual force, to induce them to change their resolution. they now ordered pascoe and their people to commence loading the canoe, but the poor fellows were all in tears and trembled with fear; one of them in particular, a native of bonny, said, that he did not care for himself, as his own life was of little consequence, all he feared was, that his masters would be murdered, and as he had been with them ever since they had left the sea, it would be as bad as dying himself, to see them killed. in pursuance of their plans, on the same afternoon, they bade adieu to the inhabitants of kacunda, and every thing having been conveyed to the canoe, they embarked and pushed off the shore, in the sight of a multitude of people. they worked their way with incredible difficulty through the morass, before they were able to get into the body of the stream, and being now fairly off they prepared themselves for the worst. "now," said richard lander, "my boys," as their canoe glided down with the stream, "let us all stick together; i hope that we have none amongst us, who will flinch, come what may." they had proceeded some distance down the river, when seeing a convenient place for landing, the men being languid and weary with hunger and exhaustion, they halted on the right bank of the river, which they imagined was most suitable for their purpose. the angry and scowling appearance of the firmament forewarned them of a shower, or something worse, which induced them hastily to erect an awning of mats under a palm tree's shade. the spot for a hundred yards was cleared of grass, underwood, and vegetation of all kinds: and very shortly afterwards, as three of their men were straggling about in the bush, searching for firewood, a village suddenly opened before them; this did not excite their astonishment, and they entered one of the huts which was nearest them, to procure a little fire. however, it happened only to contain women, but these were terrified beyond measure at the sudden and abrupt entrance of strange-looking men, whose language they did not know, and whose business they could not understand, and they all ran out in a fright into the woods, to warn their male relatives of them, who were labouring at their usual occupations of husbandry. mean time, their men had very composedly taken some burning embers from the fire, and returned to their masters, with the brief allusion to the circumstance of having discovered a village. this at the time was thought lightly of, but they rejoiced that they had seen the village, and immediately sent pascoe, ibrahim and jowdie, in company to obtain some fire, and to purchase some yams. in about ten minutes after, they returned in haste, telling them that they had been to the village, and asked for some fire, but that the people did not understand them, and instead of attending to their wishes, they looked terrified, and had suddenly disappeared. in consequence of their threatening attitudes, pascoe and his party had left the village, and hastened back to their masters. totally unconscious of danger, the landers were reclining on their mats, for they too, like their people, were wearied with toil, and overcome with drowsiness, when in about twenty minutes after their men had returned, one of them shouted with a loud voice, "war is coming, o war is coming!" and ran towards them with a scream of terror, telling them, that the natives were hastening to attack them. they started up at this unusual exclamation, and looking about them, they beheld a large party of men, almost naked, running in a very irregular manner, and with uncouth gestures, towards their little encampment. they were all variously armed with muskets, bows and arrows, knives, cutlasses, barbs, long spears, and other instruments of destruction; and as they gazed upon this band of wild men, with their ferocious looks and hostile appearance, which was not a little heightened on observing the weapons in their hands, they felt a very uneasy kind of sensation, and wished themselves safe out of their hands. their party was at this time much scattered, but fortunately they could see them coming to them at some distance, and they had time to collect their men. they resolved, however, to prevent bloodshed, if possible; their numbers were too few to leave them a chance of escaping by any other way. the natives were approaching fast, and had nearly arrived close to the palm tree. not a moment was to be lost. they desired pascoe and all their men to follow behind them at a short distance, with the loaded muskets and pistols; and they enjoined them strictly not to fire, unless they were first fired at. one of the natives, who proved to be the chief, was perceived to be a little in advance of his companions, and throwing down their pistols, which they had snatched up in the first moment of surprise, the two landers walked very composedly and unarmed towards him. as they approached him, they made all the signs and motions they could with their arms, to deter him and his people from firing on them. his quiver was dangling at his side, his bow was bent, and an arrow, which was pointed at their breasts, already trembled on the string, when they were within a few yards of his person. this was a highly critical moment--the next might be their last. but the hand of providence averted the blow, for just as the chief was about to pull the fatal cord, a man that was nearest him rushed forward and stayed his arm. at that instant the landers stood before him, and immediately held forth their hands; all of them trembling like aspen leaves; the chief looked up full in their faces, kneeling on the ground; light seemed to flash from his dark rolling eyes; his body was convulsed all over, as though he was enduring the utmost torture, and with a timorous, yet indefinable expression of countenance, in which all the passions of human nature were strangely blended, he drooped his head, eagerly grasped their proffered hands, and burst into tears. this was a sign of friendship, harmony followed, and war and bloodshed were thought of no more. peace and friendship now reigned amongst them, and the first thing that they did was, to lift the old chief from the ground, and convey him to their encampment. the behaviour of their men afforded them no little amusement, now that the danger was past. pascoe was firm to his post, and stood still with his musket pointed at the chief's breast during the whole of the time. he was a brave fellow, and he said to his masters, as they passed him to their encampment with the old man, "if the _black_ rascals had fired at either of you, i would have brought the old chief down like a guinea fowl." as for their two _brave_ fellows, sam and antonio, they took to their heels, and scampered off as fast as they could, directly they saw the natives approaching them over the long grass, nor did they make their appearance again, until the chief and all his people were sitting round them. all the armed villagers had now gathered round their leader, and anxiously watched his looks and gestures. the result of the meeting delighted them, every eye sparkled with pleasure; they uttered a shout of joy; they thrust their bloodless arrows into their quivers; they ran about as though they were possessed of evil spirits; they twanged their bowstrings, fired off their muskets; shook their spears; clattered their quivers; danced, put their bodies into all manner of ridiculous positions; laughed, cried, and sung in rapid succession; they were like a troop of maniacs. never was a spectacle more wild and terrific. when this sally of passion to which they had worked themselves, had subsided into calmer and more reasonable behaviour, the landers presented each of the war-men with a number of needles, as a farther token of their friendly intentions. the chief sat himself down on the turf, with one of the landers on each side of him, while the men were leaning on their weapons on his right and left. at first, no one could understand what the landers said, but shortly after an old man made his appearance, who understood the houssa language. him the chief employed as an interpreter, and every one listened with anxiety to the following explanation given by the chief. "a few minutes after you first landed, one of my people came to me, and said that a number of strange people had arrived at the market place. i sent him back again to get as near to you as he could, to hear what you intended doing. he soon after returned to me, and said that you spoke in a language which he could not understand. not doubting that it was your intention to attack my village at night, and carry off my people, i desired them to get ready to fight. we were all prepared and eager to kill you, and came down breathing vengeance and slaughter, supposing that you were my enemies, and had landed from the opposite side of the river. but when you came to meet us unarmed, and we saw your white faces, we were all so frightened that we could not pull our bows, nor move hand or foot; and when you drew near me, and extended your hands towards me, i felt my heart faint within me, and believed that you were _children of heaven_, and had dropped from the skies." such was the effect that the landers had produced on him, and under this impression, he knew not what he did. "and now," said he, "white men, all i want is your forgiveness." "that you shall have most heartily," said the landers, as they shook hands with the old chief; and having taken care to assure him that they had not come from so good a place as he had imagined, they congratulated themselves, as well as him, that this affair had ended so happily. for their own parts, they had reason to feel the most unspeakable pleasure at its favourable termination, and they offered up internally to their merciful creator, a prayer of thanksgiving and praise for his providential interference in their behalf. it was indeed a narrow escape, and it was happy for them that their white faces and calm behaviour produced the effect it did on these people; in another minute their bodies would have been as full of arrows as a porcupine's is full of quills. they now ascertained that the place where they now were, was the famous bocqua market place, of which they had heard so much talk, and that the opposite bank of the river belonged to the funda country. their interpreter was an old funda mallam, who understood the houssa language perfectly, and was come to bocqua to attend the market, which was held every nine days. the old mallam was asked the distance from bocqua to the sea, and he told them about ten days journey. the landers then pointed out the hills on the opposite side of the river, and asked him, where they led to. "the sea," was his answer. "and where do they lead to?" they inquired, pointing to those on the same bank of the river as themselves. he answered, "they run along way in the country we do not know." their next concern was about the safety of the river navigation, and they anxiously inquired his opinion of it lower down, and whether there were any rocks or dangerous places. as to the river navigation, he satisfied them by saying, that he knew of no dangers, nor had he ever heard of any, but the people on the banks, he said, were very bad. they asked him, if he thought the chief would send a messenger with them, if they were to request him, even one day's journey from this place. without the least hesitation, he answered: "no; the people of this country can go no further down the river; if they do, and are caught, they will lose their heads." every town that he knew of on the banks of the river, was at war with its neighbour, and all the rest likewise. they then asked him how far bornou was from funda. to which, he replied, "fifteen days journey." here their conversation was interrupted by the old chief, who wished to return to the village, and the mallam was obliged to accompany him. they likewise learnt from other persons, that directly opposite, on the eastern bank, was the common path to the city of funda, which, as they had been told at fof, was situated three days journey up the tshadda from the niger; that the large river which they had observed on their course, was the celebrated shar, shary, or sharry of travellers, or which is more proper than either, the tshadda, as it is universally called throughout the country. they were also informed that the smaller stream which they passed on the th, flowing from the same direction, was the _coodania_. on wednesday the th october, they made preparations for starting, and after experiencing rather hostile treatment from the natives, they arrived at a village called abbazacca, where they saw an english iron bar, and feasted their eyes on the graceful cocoa-nut tree, which they had not seen so long. it was the intention of the chief of abbazacca to send a man with them as messenger, to a large town, of which he said that his brother was governor, but on maturer reflection, he determined to accompany them himself, expecting to obtain an adequate reward. in consequence of the lightness of his canoe, and its superiority to the old one, which they had got at zagozhi, the chief passed them with the utmost facility, and touched at various towns and villages, to inform their inhabitants of the fact of the christians journeying down the river, and that they had come from a country he had never heard of. in the course of the day they came abreast of a village of pretty considerable extent, intending to pass it by on the other side; they had, however, no sooner made their appearance, than they were lustily hailed by a little squinting fellow, who kept crying out as loud as is lungs would permit him: "holloa! you englishmen, you come here!" they felt no inclination to obey the summons, being rather anxious to get to the town mentioned to them by the chief of abbazacca; and as the current swept them along past the village, they took no notice of the little man, and they had already sailed beyond the landing place, when they were overtaken by about a dozen canoes, and the people in them desiring them to turn back, for that they had forgotten to pay their respects to the king. the name of the village was damaggoo. being in no condition to force themselves from the men, who had interrupted them with so little ceremony, they pulled with all their strength against the current, and after an hour's exertion landed amidst the cheers and huzzas of a multitude of people. the first person they observed at the landing place, was their little friend in the red jacket, whom they found out afterwards was a messenger from the chief of bonny. whilst a hut was preparing for them, they were conducted over a bog to a large fetish tree, at the root of which they were made to sit down, till the arrival of the chief, who made his appearance in a few minutes, bringing with him a goat and other provisions as a present. he put a great many questions respecting themselves and their country, the places they had come from, their distance up the river, and also concerning the river itself, and was astonished at their answers. they were now conducted through filthy streets of mud to a very diminutive hut, which they found excessively warm, owing to the small quantity of light and air, which were admitted into it only through a narrow aperture, opening into a gloomy and dismal passage. the appearance of the inside was better than that of the outside, being rudely plastered with clay, and surrounded with indifferently carved fetish figures, either painted or chalked a red colour. as signs of european intercourse, with which the landers, as it might be reasonably supposed, were highly delighted, they received from the chief as a present some fofo, a quantity of stewed goat, sufficient for thirty persons, and _a small case bottle of rum_, a luxury which they had not enjoyed since they left kiama; the latter was a treat that they did not expect, although it was of the most inferior kind. early on the morning of the th, the chief paid them a visit, accompanied by a nouffie mallam; he gave them a pressing invitation to come and see him, which was readily accepted, and on proceeding to the residence, they passed through a variety of low huts, which led to the one in which he was sitting. he accosted them with cheerfulness, and placed mats for them to sit upon, and rum was produced to make them comfortable withal. he wished to know in what way they had got through the country, for he had learnt that they had come a long journey; and after having related to them some of their adventures, he appeared quite astonished, and promised as far as he was able to imitate those good men in the treatment of his guests. when antonio, their interpreter, explained to them that they were ambassadors from the great king of white men, he seemed highly delighted, and said, "something must be done for you to-morrow;" and left them to conjecture for a short time what that something would be, but they soon learnt that he intended to make rejoicings with all his people, that they would fire off their muskets, and pass a night in dancing and revelry. he requested them to wait eight days longer, when he expected his people back from the bocqua market. "i think," he added, "that the chief of bocqua's messenger and our people will be a sufficient protection." the landers readily assented to his proposal, and told him that as all their presents were expended, they would send him some from the sea coast, if he would allow a person to accompany them thither, on whom he could depend to bring them back to him. he expressed himself much gratified with this offer, and said that his own son should accompany them, and that although his people had never been lower down the river than to a place called kirree, about a day's journey from hence, he had no doubt that they should reach the sea in safety. he then promised with solemnity, that he would consent to their departure in the time that he had specified, and having shaken hands, they parted. the landers, however, found that the old chief was not so punctual to his word as they had a right to expect, for he was every day consulting his fetish and his mallams, and they were all unanimous in their opinion, that the departure of the white men should be delayed for a short time. this to them was a most vexatious proceeding. their determination of departing was not, however, to be shaken, although the entrails of some fowls which the chief consulted, declared that the time of their departure was very inauspicious. according to the chief's own arrangement, the people of the landers were to embark in the leaky canoe, with the heaviest of the luggage, and themselves were to travel in one of the chief's canoes, and to take along with them whatever was of most consequence. to this regulation they could not raise any plausible objection, because their old canoe had been partially repaired. a little after four in the afternoon of the th november, their luggage was conveyed to the river side, and they proceeded to load the canoes. long before five, every thing on their parts had been got in readiness for quitting the town, and they sat in the canoe till after sunset, waiting the arrival of the boatmen, who did not seem at all disposed to hurry themselves in making their appearance. they began at length to be wearied with anxiety, and impatient to be stirring. hundreds of people had been gazing on them for a long while, many of whom had taken the pains to come, from different parts of the town in boats for that purpose and the curiosity of all having been amply indulged, they were moving off in all directions, so that the landers were almost deserted. at length when their uneasiness was at its height, they saw the chief advancing towards them with a train of followers. the mallam and all his principal people were with him, bringing numerous jars of palm wine. a mat was spread near the water-side, whereon the chief sat himself, and the landers were instantly desired to place themselves one on each side of his person. the palm wine, and some rum were then produced, and as they were about to take a long farewell of their hospitable host, they drank of his offering, rather than give offence by a refusal. they drank and chatted away until half-past six in the evening, when they sent pascoe on before them in their own old canoe, telling him that they should overtake him. it was, however, nearly dark before they were allowed to depart, and as they lay at a short distance from the bank, all the fetish people walked knee deep into the river, and muttered a long prayer, after which they splashed the water towards their canoe with each foot, and then they proceeded on their voyage. on the following day, they observed a large market close to the banks of the river, which they were informed was kirree. a great number of canoes were lying near the bank, and in a short time afterwards, they saw about fifty canoes before them coming up the river. as they approached each other, the landers observed the british union flag in several, while others, which were white, had figures on them of a man's leg, chain, tables, and all kinds of such devices. the people in them, who were very numerous, were dressed in european clothing, with the exception of trousers. the landers felt quite overjoyed by the sight of these people, more particularly when they saw the english flag and european apparel amongst them, and they congratulated themselves that they were from the sea coast. but all their fond anticipations vanished in a moment as the first canoe met them. a great stout fellow, of a most forbidding countenance beckoned richard lander to come to him, but seeing him and all his people so well armed, lander was not much inclined to trust himself amongst them, and therefore paid no attention to the call. the next moment, he heard the sound of a drum, and in an instant several of the men mounted a platform and levelled their muskets at them. there was nothing to be done now but to obey; as for running away it was out of the question, their square loaded canoe was incapable of it, and to fight with fifty war canoes, for such they really were, containing each above forty people, most of whom were as well armed as themselves, would have been throwing away their own and their canoe men's lives very foolishly. by this time the canoes were side by side, and with astonishing rapidity the luggage of the landers found its way into those of their opponents. this mode of proceeding was not relished by them at all, and richard lander's gun being loaded with two balls and four slugs, he took deliberate aim at the leader, and he would have paid for his temerity with his life in one moment more, had not three of his people sprung on lander, and forced the gun from his hands. his jacket and shoes were now plundered from him, and observing some other fellows at the same time taking away pascoe's wife, lander lost all command over himself, and was determined to sell his life as dearly as he could. he encouraged his men to arm themselves with their paddles, and defend themselves to the last. he instantly seized hold of pascoe's wife, and with the assistance of another of his men dragged her from the fellow's grasp. pascoe at the same time levelled a blow at his head with one of their iron-wood paddles, that sent him reeling backwards, and they saw him no more. their canoe having been so completely relieved of their cargo, which had consisted only of their luggage, they had plenty of room on her for battle, and being each of them provided with a paddle, they determined, as they had got clear of their adversary, to cut down the first fellow who should dare to board them. this, however, was not attempted, and as none of the other canoes had attempted to interfere, lander was in hopes of finding some friends amongst them, but at all events, he was determined to follow the people who had plundered them, to the market, whither they seemed to be going. they accordingly pulled after them as fast as they could, and they were following the canoe that had attacked them, with the utmost expedition, when they were hailed by some people from a large canoe, which was afterwards found to belong to the new calabar river. one of the people, who was apparently a person of consequence, called out lustily, "holloa, white men, you french, you english?" "yes, english," lander answered immediately. "come here in my canoe," he said, and their two canoes approached each other rapidly. lander got into the canoe, and put three of his men into his own, to assist in pulling her to the market. the people of the canoe treated him with much kindness, and the chief gave him a glass of rum. on looking round him, lander now observed his brother coming towards him, in the damaggoo canoe, and the same villain, who had plundered his canoe was also the first to pursue that of his brother. the canoe in which richard was, as well as the war canoes, hastened to a small sand island in the river, at a short distance from the market, and john lander arrived soon afterwards. in a short time the damaggoo people made their appearance, and also the chief of bonny's messenger, having, like themselves, lost every thing they had of their own property, as well as of their masters. the canoes belonging to the landers had been lying at the island, but now the canoes were all formed into a line and paddled into the market-place before alluded to, called kirree, and here they were informed that a palaver would be held to take the whole affair into consideration; and accordingly, a multitude of men landed from the canoes, to hold, as it may be termed, a council of war. the landers were not suffered to go on shore, but constrained to remain in the canoes, without a covering for the head, and exposed to the heat of a burning sun. a person in a muhommedan dress, who they learnt afterwards was a native of a place near funda, came to them and endeavoured to cheer them, by saying that their hearts must not be sore, that at the palaver which would be held, they had plenty of friends to speak for them. in the mean time about twenty canoes full of damaggoo people had arrived from the various towns near that place. these persons having heard how the landers had been treated, also became their friends, so that they now began to think there was a chance of their escaping, and this intelligence put them into better spirits. a stir was now made in the market, and a search commenced through all the canoes for their goods, some of which were found, although the greater part of them were at the bottom of the river. those were landed and placed in the middle of the market-place. the landers were now invited by the mallams to land, and told to look at their goods, and see if they were all there. to the great satisfaction of richard lander, he immediately recognized the box containing their books, and one of his brother's journals. the medicine chest was by its side, but both were filled with water. a large carpet bag containing all their wearing apparel was lying cut open, and deprived of its contents, with the exception of a shirt, a pair of trousers, and a waistcoat. many valuable articles which it contained were gone. the whole of richard lander's journal, with the exception of a note book, with remarks from rabba to kirree, was lost. four guns, one of which had been the property of the late mr. park, four cutlasses, and two pistols were gone. all their buttons, kowries, and needles, which were necessary for them to purchase provisions with, all were missing, and said to have been sunk in the river. they were now desired to seat themselves, which as soon as they had done, a circle gathered round them and began questioning them, but at that moment the sound of screams and the clashing of arms reached the spot, and the multitude catching fire at the noise, drew their swords, and leaving the landers to themselves, they ran away to the place whence it proceeded. the origin of all this, was a desire for more plunder on the part of the eboe people. seeing the few things of the white men in the marketplace, they made a rush to the place to recover them. the natives, who were kirree people, stood ready for them, armed with swords, daggers, and guns; and the savage eboes finding themselves foiled in the attempt, retreated to their canoes, without risking an attack, although the landers fully expected to have been spectators of a furious and bloody battle. this after all, was a fortunate circumstance, inasmuch as the two brothers, having unconsciously jumped into the same canoe found themselves in each other's company, and were thus afforded, for a short time at least, the pleasure of conversing without interruption. the palaver not having yet concluded, they had full leisure to contemplate the scene around them. they had moored a little way from the banks of the river; in front of them was the marketplace, which was crammed with market people, from all parts of the neighbouring country of different tribes: a great multitude of wild men, of ferocious aspect and savage uncouth manners. to these belonged the choice either of giving them life and liberty, or dooming them to slavery or death. in the latter determination, their minds might be swayed by suspicion or caprice, or influenced by hatred. in the former, they might be guided by the hopes of gain, or biassed by the fear of punishment; for many of them had come from the sea-coast; and such an adventure as theirs could not long remain concealed from the knowledge of their countrymen. there happened to be amongst the savages, a few well-dressed mahommedan priests, who had come late to the market from the northward. these were decidedly the friends of the landers. many times they blessed them with uplifted hands and compassionate countenances, exclaiming, "allah sullikee," _god is king_. nor did they confine themselves to simple expressions of pity or concern; but as they subsequently learnt, they joined the assembly and spoke in their favour with warmth and energy, taxing those who had assaulted them, with cowardice, cruelty, and wrong: and proposing to have them beheaded on the spot, as a just punishment for their crime. this was bold language, but it produced a salutary effect on the minds of the hearers. in the afternoon, the landers were ordered to return to the small island whence they had come, and the setting of the sun being the signal for the council to dissolve, they were again sent for to the market. the people had been engaged in deliberation and discussion during the whole of the day; and with throbbing hearts they received their resolution, in nearly the following words:-- "that the king of the country being absent, they had taken upon themselves to consider the occurrence, which had taken place in the morning, and to give judgment accordingly. those of their things which had been saved from the water, should be restored to them; and the person, who first commenced the attack on the white men, should lose his head, as a just retribution for his offence, having acted without the chief's permission: that with regard to themselves, they must be considered as prisoners, and consent to be conducted on the following morning to obie, king of the eboe country, before whom they were to undergo an examination, and whose will and pleasure concerning their persons would then be explained." they received this intelligence with feelings of rapture, and with bursting hearts they offered up thanks to their divine creator, for his signal preservation of them throughout this disastrous day. the kirree people are a savage-looking race; they are amazingly strong and athletic, and are also well proportioned. their only clothing is the skin either of a leopard or tiger fastened round their waist. their hair is plaited, and plastered with red clay in abundance; and their face is full of incisions in every part of it; these are cut into the flesh, so as to produce deep furrows, each incision being about a quarter of an inch long and dyed with indigo. it was scarcely possible to make out a feature of their face, and never were individuals more disfigured. the eboe women have handsome features; and the landers could not help thinking it a pity, that such savage-looking fellows as the men should be blessed with so handsome a race of females. chapter xxxix. at sunrise on the th november, their canoe was taken from before kirree market-place, to the little sand bank or island in the middle of the river, where they waited till nine o'clock for the coming of two war canoes, which it was resolved should convoy them to the eboe country, which they understood was situated three days journey down the niger. at seven in the morning they bade adieu to kirree, the scene of all their sorrows, accompanied by six large war canoes, and again took their station with the damaggoo people. independently of their convoy, they had a sumpter canoe in company, belonging to the eboe people, from which the others were supplied with dressed provisions. for their part, they had neither money nor needles, nor indeed any thing to purchase a meal; and knowing this to be the case, their sable guardians neglected to take into consideration the state of their stomachs. however, they felt no very strong inclination to join them in their repast, though on one occasion they were invited to do so; for they felt an invincible disgust to it, from the filthy manner in which it had been prepared. yams were first boiled, and then skinned, and mashed into a paste, with the addition of a little water, by hands that were far from being clean. as this part of the business requires great personal exertion, the man on whom it devolved perspired very copiously, and the consequences may easily be guessed at. in eating they use their fingers only, and every one dips his hand into the same dish. it was ten at night, when they came abreast of a small town, where they stopped. it was long since they had tasted food, and they had suffered from hunger the whole day, without being able to obtain any thing. soon after they had stopped for the night, their guards gave each of them a piece of roasted yam, and their poor famished people had also the good fortune to get some too, being the first they had had since leaving damaggoo. the roasted yam, washed down with a little water, was to them as joyful a meal, as if they had been treated with the most sumptuous fare, and they laid themselves down in the canoe to sleep in content. long before sunrise on the th november, though it was excessively dark, the canoes were put in motion; for as the eboe country was said to be at no great distance, the eboe people who were with them, were desirous of arriving there as early in the day as possible. it proved to be a dull hazy morning, but at o'clock the fog had become so dense, that no object, however large, could be distinguished at a greater distance than a few yards. this created considerable confusion, and the men fearing, as they expressed it, to lose themselves, tied one canoe to another, thus forming double canoes, and all proceeded together in close company. the landers wished to be more particular in their observations of this interesting part of their journey, but were constrained to forego that gratification, on account of the superstitious prejudices of the natives, who were so infatuated as to imagine, that the landers had not only occasioned the fog, but that if they did not sit or lie down in the canoe, for they had been standing, it would inevitably cause the destruction of the whole party, and the reason they assigned, was, that the river had never beheld a white man before; and, therefore, they dreaded the consequences of their rashness and presumption in regarding its waters so attentively. this and similar nonsense was delivered with such determination and earnestness, that they reluctantly laid down, and allowed themselves to be covered with mats, in order to quiet their apprehensions; for they did not forget that they were prisoners, and that a perseverance in standing up, would have exposed them to the mortification of being put down by force. on the dispersion of the fog, the landers were again permitted to look at the river, and shortly afterwards one of the eboe men in their canoe, exclaimed, "there is my country;" pointing to a clump of very high trees, which was yet at some distance before them, and after passing a low fertile island, they quickly came to it. here they observed a few fishing canoes, but their owners appeared suspicious and fearful, and would not come near them, though their national flag, which was a british union, sewed on a large piece of plain white cotton, with scollops of blue, was streaming from a long staff on the bow. the town, they were told, was yet a good way down the river. in a short time, however, they came to an extensive morass, intersected by little channels in every direction, and by one of these, they got into clear water, and in front of the eboe town. here they found hundreds of canoes, some of them even larger than any they had previously met with. when they had come alongside the canoes, two or three huge brawny fellows, in broken english, asked how they did, in a tone which stentor might have envied; and the shaking of hands with their powerful friends was really a punishment, on account of the violent squeezes which they were compelled to suffer. the chief of these men called himself _gun_, though _blunderbuss_ or _thunder_ would have been as appropriate a name; and without solicitation, he informed them, that though he was not a great man, yet he was a little military king; that his brother's name was king _boy_, and his father's king _forday_, who, with king _jacket_, governed all the brass country. but what was infinitely more interesting to them, than this ridiculous list of kings, was the information he gave them, that besides a spanish schooner, an english vessel, called the thomas of liverpool, was also lying in the first brass river, which _mr. gun_ said was frequented by liverpool traders for palm oil. full of joy at this intelligence, they passed on to a little artificial creek, where they were desired to wait till the king's pleasure respecting them should be known. they were afterwards drawn in a canoe over ooze and mud to a house, where, if the countenance of their host had been at all in unison with the agreeableness of his dwelling, they imagined that they could live at ease in it, for a few days at least. the harshness, however, of this man's manners, corresponded with his sulky, ill-natured face, and deprived them of a good deal of pleasure, which they would have enjoyed, in reposing at full length on dry, soft mats, after having been cramped up for three days in a small canoe, with slaves and goats, and exposed to the dews by night and the sun by day. an hour or two of rest invigorated and refreshed them extremely, and they then received a message from the king, that he was waiting to see and converse with them. having little to adjust in regard to their dress, they rose up, and followed the messenger. passing near the outskirts of the town, the messenger conducted them, by paths little frequented, to the outward yard of the palace, before the door of which was placed the statue of a woman in a sitting posture, and made of clay, of course, very rude and very ugly. having crossed the yard, in which they saw nothing remarkable, they entered by a wooden door into another, which was far superior. from this enclosure they were led into a third, which, like the former, had its porticoes. opposite the entrance was a low clay platform, about three feet from the ground, which was overlaid with mats of various colours, a large piece of coarse red cloth covering the whole, and at each of its corners they observed a little squat figure, also of clay, but whether they were intended to be males or females, it was impossible to conjecture. here they were desired to place themselves among a crowd of half-dressed, armed men, who were huddled together on the left of the platform, some sitting, and others standing, and awaiting the coming of the prince. their friend, gun, was with them, and he immediately claimed priority of acquaintance with them. he chatted with amazing volubility, and in less than two minutes, he was on the most familiar footing, slapping them with no small force just above the knee, to give weight to his observations, and to rivet their attentions to his remarks. then, while they spoke, he would rest his heavy arms on their shoulders, and laugh aloud at every word they said, look very knowingly, and occasionally apply the palm of his hand to their backs with the most _feeling_ energy, as a token of encouragement and approbation. they wished him to answer questions which concerned them nearly, but the only satisfaction they received, was contained in the expression "o yes, to be sure," and this was repeated so often, with an emphasis so peculiar, and with a grin so irresistibly ludicrous, that in spite of their disappointment, they were vastly entertained with him. in this manner was the time beguiled, till they heard a door suddenly opened on their right, and the dreaded obie, king of the eboe country, stood before them. there was, however, nothing dreadful in his appearance, for he was a sprightly young man, with a mild open countenance, and an eye which indicated quickness, intelligence, and good nature, rather than the ferocity which they were told he possessed in an eminent degree. he received them with a smile of welcome, and shook hands with infinite cordiality, often complimenting them with the word, "yes," to which his knowledge of the english was confined, and which no doubt he had been tutored to pronounce for the occasion. their story was related to the king in full by the bonny messenger, who had accompanied them from damaggoo, whose speech, which nearly as they could guess lasted two whole hours, was delivered in an admirable manner, and produced a visible effect on all present. as soon as it was over, they were invited by obie to take some refreshment; being in truth extremely hungry at the time, they thankfully accepted the offer, and fish and yams, swimming in oil, were forthwith brought them on english plates, the king retiring in the meanwhile from motives of delicacy. when obie returned, a general conversation ensued, and he was engaged in talking promiscuously to those around him till evening, when the "great palaver," as it was called, was formally prorogued until the morrow, and presently after the chief bade them good night, and retired. on the following morning, they were visited by a number of the inhabitants, who broke through every restraint to gratify their desire of seeing them. this was what they naturally expected, yet after all, they were much better behaved and less impatient, than they had any reason to apprehend, and they departed with little importunity, considering that they had not been in the habit of bending to the will of prisoners and slaves, for such were the landers in reality. about noon they were informed that their attendance was required at the king's house, obie being fully prepared, it was said, to resume the hearing of their case, and examine the deposition of the bonny messenger and the damaggoo people. on entering the principal yard or court, in which they were introduced to the king on the preceding day, a common english chair, covered with inferior red cloth, was placed for the use of the king. he soon afterwards entered, his fat, round cheeks were swelling with good humour, real or assumed, as he shook hands with a sprightly air, when he instantly seated himself to receive the prostrations and addresses of his subjects and others. the business of the day was entered into with spirit, and a violent altercation arose between the brass and bonny people, and although not much was communicated to the landers, of the conversation that passed between them, yet a sufficiency was imparted to them to let them know, that they would never leave the country without a high ransom. bonny was the real place of their destination, and they had with them a messenger from the present and a son to the late ruler of that state, (king pepper,) whilst on the other hand, they knew nothing of brass, never having heard the name of such a river in their lives before. the brass people affirm that the bonny creek, which is a small branch of the niger, was dried up, and that the main river, which runs to brass, belongs to king jacket, who permitted no foreigners whatever to pass up and down the niger, without exacting the accustomed fees or duties. the brass people, therefore, would have a very plausible reason for taking them entirely out of the hands of obie and the damaggoo people. in the evening, antonio and five other bonny people came to their hut with tears in their eyes. on asking them, what was the matter, "the chief," they said, "is determined to sell you to the brass people, but we will fight for you, and die rather than see you sold." "how many of you bonny people are there?" richard lander asked. "only six," was the reply. "and can you fight with two hundred brass people?" lander asked. "we can kill some of them," they answered, "and your people can assist." lander then asked antonio the reason why he did not interpret what was going forward to-day at the king's house. he said, that he was afraid it would have made their hearts sore--that it was "a bad palaver." "we have all been to the chief," he added, "crying to him, and telling him that black man cannot sell white man, but he will not listen to us, he said, he would sell you to the brass people." the landers felt much hurt at their situation, for they did not expect that it would be so bad as it turned out to be, but they made up their minds to prepare themselves for the worst, for it was impossible to foresee the lengths to which the savages would go. on the following day, richard lander was taken very ill with the fever, and was consequently unable to attend the summons to the king's house, he therefore sent his brother in his stead, who gave the following account:-- "on my arriving there this morning, to my infinite surprise i found king boy (gun's eldest brother,) with a number of his attendants already assembled. he was dressed in a style far superior to any of his countrymen, and wore a jacket and waistcoat over a neat shirt of striped cotton, to which was annexed a silk pocket handkerchief, which extended below the knees. trousers are not permitted to be worn, either by natives or strangers, of the same hue as themselves, the kings alone being an exception to the rule. strings of coral and other beads encircled his neck, and a pretty little crucifix of seed beads hung on his bosom. this latter ornament, which has probably been given him by a slave captain, had by no means an unbecoming appearance. king boy introduced himself to me with the air of a person who bestows a favour, rather than soliciting acquaintance, and indeed his vanity in other respects was highly amusing. he would not suffer any one to sit between him and the platform, but squatted himself down nearest the king's seat, which, as a mark of honour, had been previously assigned to us; and with a volubility scarcely imaginable, he commenced a long narrative of his greatness, power, and dignity, in which he excelled all his neighbours, and to this i was constrained to listen with assumed composure and attention for a considerable time. to convince me of his veracity, he produced a pocket book, containing a great number of recommendatory notes, or 'characters,' as a domestic would call them, written in the english, french, spanish, and portuguese languages, and which had been given him by the various european traders, who had visited the brass river. this practice of giving written characters, which has for some time been adopted by europeans, is both praiseworthy and useful, and it has become almost universal on the western coast; because it is not to be supposed that the natives themselves can understand these documents, and strangers are made acquainted with their good or bad qualities by them, and taught to discriminate the honest from the unfaithful and malicious. boy's letters mentioned certain dealings, which their authors had had with him, and they likewise bore testimony to his own character, and the manners of his countrymen. amongst others is one from a 'james dow, master of the brig susan, from liverpool,' and dated: '_brass first river_, sept. ,' which runs as follows: "captain dow states, that he never met with a set of greater scoundrels than the natives in general, and the pilots in particular." these he anathematised as d----d rascals, who had endeavoured to steer his vessel among the breakers at the mouth of the river, that they might share the plunder of its wreck. king jacket, who claims the sovereignty of the river, is declared to be a more confirmed knave, if possible, than they, and to have cheated him of a good deal of property. the writer describes king forday as a man rather advanced in years, less fraudulent but more dilatory. king boy, his son, alone deserved his confidence, for he had not abused it, and possessed more honour and integrity than either of his countrymen. "these are the rulers of the brass river, and pretty fellows they are, truly. mr. dow further observes, that the river is extremely unhealthy, and that his first and second mates, three coopers, and five seamen, had already died of fever, and that he himself had had several narrow escapes from the same disorder. he concludes, by cautioning traders against the treachery of the natives generally, and gives them certain directions concerning 'the dreadful bar,' at the mouth of the river, on which he had nearly perished. "this business had been no sooner settled, than obie entered the yard, attended as usual, but clad indifferently in loose silks. after the customary salutations, boy directed the monarch to appeal to me, that he might be satisfied in what estimation he was held by white men. of course i said a variety of fine things in his favour, which were received with a very good grace indeed; but that a piece of paper simply, which could neither speak, hear, nor understand, should impart such information, was a source of astonishment and wonder to obie and his train, who testified their emotion in no other manner than by looks of silly amazement, and repeated bursts of laughter. "the king then said with a serious countenance, that there was no necessity for further discussion respecting the white men, his mind was already made up on the subject, and for the first time, he briefly explained himself to this effect: that circumstances having thrown us in the way of his subjects, by the laws and usages of the country, he was not only entitled to our own persons, but had an equal right to those of our attendants; that he should take no further advantage of his good fortune, than by exchanging us for as much english goods as would amount in value to twenty slaves. in order to have this matter fairly arranged and settled, he should, of his own accord, prevent our leaving the town, till such time as our countrymen at bonny or brass should pay for our ransom, having understood from ourselves that the english at either of those rivers, would afford us whatever assistance we might require, with cheerfulness and alacrity. concerning the goods of which we had been robbed at kirree, he assured us he would use his utmost exertions to get them restored. he lamented that circumstance more than any one, but he denied that a single subject of his had any thing to do with it, and attributed the whole of that unfortunate affair, to the rashness and brutality of a certain people, that inhabited a country nearly opposite to his own, whose monarch was his particular friend, therefore, he apprehended little difficulty in seeing justice done us; 'but then,' said he, 'it is necessary that you should wait here for an indefinite time, till a council of that nation be held, when the plunderers will be examined, and your claims established. the damaggoo people, that have come with you, have like yourselves suffered much loss; for my own part, i shall make them a present of a slave or two as a compensation, and they have my permission to go along with you for the present, which i understand you have promised their monarch, but you must not expect them to be your guides to the sea, for their responsibility ends here.' "when all this was interpreted to me by antonio, i was thunderstruck. it was in vain that i assured obie that there was not the slightest necessity for our detention in the town; that our countrymen would redeem us the moment they should see us, but not before; and equally unavailing were my solicitations for him to alter this arrangement and suffer us to depart; but the tears of his subjects, and the representations of the men at brass, had made too deep an impression upon his mind to be so easily eradicated. we found it too late either to implore or remonstrate. "this final decision of the king is a bitter stroke to us, for we fondly indulged the hope of a more favourable issue, from the deliberations of the savage council, at whose dissolution we expected to be sent to the sea coast, without being perplexed with further embarrassments. we have now to wait the return of a messenger from thence, who has not yet been sent on his errand, and he is to bring back with him the value of twenty slaves, ere we obtain our freedom. heaven only knows whether the masters of english vessels at bonny or brass, have the ability or feel the disposition to ransom us. we only know that if disposed of at all, we shall be sold for infinitely more than we are worth. "as may naturally be supposed, i returned home much depressed and afflicted, to inform my brother of the result of the palaver, and he was as greatly surprised and afflicted as myself at the intelligence. but though we are full of trouble and uneasiness at our gloomy situation, yet we do not repine at the divine dispensations of that almighty providence, which has comforted us in the hours of adversity, and relieved us in times of pain and danger, and snatched us from the jaws of death." on the following morning, richard lander was rather convalescent, and in truth they both wondered much that their health, generally speaking, had been so good, when they reflected for a moment on the hardships and privations, which they had lately undergone, the perplexities in which they had been entangled, and the difficulties with which they had had to contend. during the few days that they had spent in this place, they had been sadly in want of provisions, and their people, who for the first day bore their privation in silence, have since then been loud in their complaints. the constant fear which they entertained of being taken away and sold, now, however, changed that lively feeling of discontent into sullen-ness and despondency. what made the matter still worse was the fact, that having lost their needles and kowries at kirree, they had not the means of purchasing any thing, although the kowrie shell was not current where they then were. obie was in the habit of sending them a fowl, or a yam or two every morning, but as they were ten in number, it made but a slender meal, and it was barely sufficient to keep them from actual starvation. to stop, if possible, the sullen murmurings of their people, they were now reduced to the painful necessity of begging, but they might as well have addressed their petitions to the stones and trees, and thereby have spared themselves the mortification of a refusal. they never experienced a more stinging sense of their own humbleness and imbecility than on such occasions, and never had they greater need of patience and lowliness of spirit. in most african towns and villages, they had been regarded as demi-gods, and treated in consequence with universal kindness, civility, and veneration; but here, alas! what a contrast, they were classed with the most degraded and despicable of mankind, and were become slaves in a land of ignorance and barbarism, whose savage natives treated them with brutality and contempt. it would be hard to guess whence these unkindly feelings originated, but they felt that they had not deserved them, yet the consciousness of their own insignificance sadly militated against every idea of self-love or self-importance, and taught them a plain and useful moral lesson. although they made the most charitable allowances for the eboe people, they were, notwithstanding, obliged to consider them the most inhospitable tribe, as well as the most covetous and uncivil, that they were acquainted with. their monarch, and a respectable married female, who had passed the meridian of her days, were the only individuals, amongst several thousands, that showed them anything like civility or kindness, and the latter alone acted, as they were convinced, solely from disinterested motives. all ranks of people here are passionately fond of palm wine, and drank of it to excess, whenever they had an opportunity, which often occurred, as great quantities of it are produced in the town and its neighbourhood. it was a very general and favourite custom with them, as soon as the sun had set, to hold large meetings and form parties in the open air, or under the branches of trees, to talk over the events of the day, and make merry with this exciting beverage. these assemblies are kept up until after midnight, and as the revellers generally contrive to get inebriated very soon after they sit down to drink, the greater part of the evening is devoted to wrangling and fighting, instead of convivial intercourse, and occasionally the most fearful noises that it is possible for the mind to conceive. bloodshed, and even murder, it is said, not unfrequently terminate these boisterous and savage entertainments. a meeting of this description was held outside the yard of their residence every evening, and the noise which they made was really terrifying, more especially when the women and young people joined in the affray, for a quarrel of some sort was sure to ensue. their cries, groans, and shrieks of agony were dreadful, and would lead a stranger to suppose, that these dismal and piercing sounds proceeded from individuals about to be butchered, or that they were extorted by the last pangs of anguish and suffering. the landers trembled with alarm for the first night or two, imagining from these loud and doleful cries, that a work of bloodshed and slaughter was in progress. they found it useless to endeavour to sleep till the impression of the first wild cry that was uttered, and the last faint scream had worn away. but by degrees they became in some measure more reconciled to them, from the frequency of their occurrence, or rather they felt less apprehension than formerly, as to their origin; understanding with surprise that they were only the effects of a simple quarrel, and excite from the inhabitants no more than a casual remark, although it is said that in fits of ungovernable passion, the most heinous crimes are consummated in these frantic revels. their matronly female acquaintance, though excessively fat, was of diminutive stature, and by her cheerful pleasantry she beguiled in some degree the wearisomeness of the long evening hours, and banished that _ennui_, which the disagreeableness of their situation had partially induced, simply by her endeavours to do so. for not content with paying them formal visits in the day time, she came into their yard every night, instead of joining the orgies of her acquaintance, accompanied by two or three friends of congenial natures, with the very benevolent intention of pitying their misfortunes, and dissipating their melancholy. two or three slaves followed their mistress into the yard, carrying a few bottles of their favourite palm wine, and perhaps with a plate of bananas also, that the evening might be passed more agreeably. their sleeping quarters were in a recess, which was elevated three or four feet from the ground, and supported by wooden columns. it was without a door, or indeed anything answering the same purpose, so that they enjoyed the refreshing coolness of the evening air, with the disadvantage of being gazed at by whoever had the curiosity to enter their premises. they generally laid down shortly after sunset, and presently their fat, jolly little friend, duck-like, comes waddling into their yard, with her companions and slaves, to offer them the evening salutations, and enter into the usual familiar discourse. this was commonly preceded by a large potation of palm wine, which was always relished with a loud and peculiar smack, expressive of the pleasure and satisfaction afforded by so copious a draught, and betokening also much internal warmth and comfort. the officious slaves having spread mats for the purpose, directly in front of their recess, their lady visitor and her associates, together with their ill-natured host, who had by this time joined the party, squatted themselves down in a circle, and under the inspiration of the fermented juice, maintained a pretty animated conversation, till the wine was all expended and sleep weighed their eyelids down. for themselves they had little of any thing to say, because the landers were pretty nearly as ignorant of their language, as they were of theirs, and interpretation is unfavourable to the contagion of social felicity. nevertheless, it was highly diverting to watch the influence of the palm wine on their looks, language, and ideas. the flushed countenance is invisible in a black lady, but then she has the liquid and unsettled eye, the proneness to talk with irresistible garrulity, the gentle simper, or the bursting laugh at any trifle, or at nothing at all; and to wind up the list of symptoms, she has that complaisant idea of her own good points, and superior qualifications, which elicit her own approbation, without exciting the applauses of her associates, and which distinguishes the inexperienced male reveller in every part of the globe. all these were observable in their talkative little friend, as well as in her companions. it was also a relief to contemplate from their resting place, the peace and harmony of the little party before them, so entirely different from the boisterous one without; because it gave them a comfortable sense of their own security, which they should not certainly have entertained, had they been left to their own reflections, and when, after a good deal of turning and restlessness they at length fell into a disagreeable and unrefreshing dose, and were attacked by that hideous phantom, nightmare, which was often the case; starting up in fright from the assassin's knife, which they could scarcely persuade themselves to be unreal; it was pleasant to fix their eyes upon their comical little visitor, with her round shining face, and her jolly companions; all apprehension of mischief immediately vanished, and a truly pleasing effect was produced upon their minds and spirits. the breaking up of the party on the outside, was a signal for their friends also to depart. when rising from her mat, the mistress, after shaking hands, wished them good night in a thick tremulous tone, and waddled out of their yard in a direction, which hogarth denominates the line of beauty, she returned home to her husband, who was a valetudinarian. thus passed their evenings, and thus much of their solitary eboe friend. chapter xl. in addition to the value of twenty slaves, which the king of eboe demanded from them, they now heard that king boy required the value of fifteen casks of palm oil, which is equal to fifteen slaves, for himself, and as payment for the trouble he and his people will have in conducting them to the english vessel. he said, that he must take three canoes and one hundred and fifty people, and, therefore, it was impossible that he could do with less. the chief then said, that if they did not consent to give king boy a _book_ for all this money, he should send them into the interior of the country to be sold, and that they never should see the sea again. it was now seen that they had no alternative, and they considered it most prudent to give him the bill, not intending, however, on their arrival at the sea, to give him more than twenty common trade guns, to pay this chief and all other expenses. king boy was to give obie five pieces of cloth and one gun as part payment; the remainder was to be paid on his return, after having delivered them up to the brig. the landers and all their people were now in high spirits, at the prospect of leaving this place and obtaining their freedom, for they had so much faith in the character of the english, that they entertained not the slightest doubt that the captain of the brig would most willingly pay the ransom money. towards evening, obie in his showy coral dress came barefooted to their hut, for the purpose of inspecting their books and examining the contents of their medicine chest. his approach was announced to them by the jingling of the little bells which his feet. he appeared greatly pleased with every thing they said, and looked aghast when informed of the powerful properties of some of the medicines, which ended in a fit of laughter. he expressed a strong desire to have a little, especially of the purgatives, and there being no objection on the part of the landers, they supplied him with a good strong dose of jalap, which had the same affect as it had had upon the sultan of yaoorie and family. obie was evidently fearful of their books, having been informed that could "tell all things," and appeared to shrink with horror at which was offered him, shaking his head, saying, that he must not accept it, for that it was good only for white men, "whose god was not his god." the visit was of very short duration, on the following day, they found king boy in the inner yard of the king's house, and from his significant physiognomy, they conjectured that he had something of consequence to communicate. obie received them with his accustomed politeness and jocularity, but instantly directed his attention and discourse to king boy, who maintained an earnest and pretty animated conversation with him for some time. the bonny people were in attendance and weeping. as the landers were frequently pointed out and named, they had no doubt whatever that it was chiefly concerning themselves, which opinion was soon after confirmed. as if the parties had some secret to discuss, which they did not wish either their attendants or those of the landers to overhear, they retired to the middle court, where having conversed for a time by themselves, they returned with anxious looks to resume their conversation. this was repeated twice, after which, as it was subsequently understood, obie briefly related in a loud voice the result of this extraordinary conference, and all present, except the men of bonny, shouted simultaneously the monosyllable "yah," as a token of their approbation. in the mean time, from anxiety to be made acquainted with what had transpired respecting themselves, they felt rather impatient and uneasy, the answer of king boy to their repeated interrogations having been only "plenty of bars," the meaning whereof they were grievously puzzled to define. but shortly after the termination of the palaver, how transported were they to hear the last mentioned individual explain himself in broken english to this effect: "in the conversation, which i have just had with obie, i have been induced to offer him the goods, which he demands for your ransom, on the faith that they be hereafter repaid me by the master of the brig thomas, which is now lying in the first brass, river, and that the value of fifteen bars or slaves be added thereto in european goods, and likewise a cask of rum, as a remuneration for the hazard and trouble which i shall inevitably incur in transporting you to brass. if you consent to these resolutions, and on these only will i consent to redeem you, you will forthwith give me a bill on captain lake, for the receipt of articles to the value of thirty-five bars, after which you will be at liberty to leave this place, and to go along with me, whenever you may think proper, agreeably to the understanding at present existing between obie and myself." this was delightful news indeed, and they thanked king boy over and over again for his generosity and nobleness, for they were too much elated at the time to reflect on the exorbitant demands which had been imposed upon them. without hesitation they gave him a bill on mr. lake; indeed there was not anything which they would not have done, rather than lose the opportunity of getting down to the sea, which seemed so providentially held out to them. obie perceived by the great and sudden change in their countenances, the joy which filled their breasts, and having asked them whether they were not pleased with his arrangements, in the fullness of their hearts, he exacted from them a promise, that on returning to england, they would inform their countrymen that he was a good man, and that they would pay him a visit whenever they should come again into the country. when king boy came for his _book_, it was given to him, and he wished to send it down to the brig, to know if it was good. this was no more than what was to be expected, so he was informed, the book would be of no use, unless they were sent along with it, and that the captain would not pay it, before he had taken them on board, on which he put the bill into his pocket-book. they then bade him farewell, and he took leave of them in a kind and cordial manner. fearing that something might yet occur to detain them, and ultimately to change the king's resolution altogether, they were most eager to get out of the reach of him and his people as quickly as possible. therefore they lost not a moment in hastening to their lodgings, and having sent their people on board boy's canoe, they hurried after them immediately, and embarked at three in the afternoon, and thus terminated four of the most wretched days of their existence. they were unable to take along with them their own old leaky and shattered canoe, as it would detain them very much, from being so heavy to move along. the damaggoo people accompanied them in their own canoe, and every thing was arranged for their departure at an early hour on the following day. the brass canoe, which was now become their dwelling, was extremely large, and heavily laden. it was paddled by forty men and boys, in addition to whom there might be about twenty individuals, or more, including a few slaves and themselves, so that the number of human beings amounted altogether to sixty. like obie's war canoes, it was furnished with a cannon, which was lashed to the bow, a vast number of cutlasses, and a quantity of grape and other shot, besides powder, flints, &c. it contained a number of large boxes or chests, which were filled with spirituous liquors, cotton, silk goods, earthenware, and other articles of european and other foreign manufactures; besides abundance of provisions for present consumption, and two thousand yams for the master of a spanish slaver, which was then lying in brass river. in this canoe three men might sit abreast of each other, and from the number of people which it contained, and the immense quantity of articles of various descriptions, some idea of its size may be formed. it was cut out of a solid trunk of a tree, and drew four feet and a half of water, being more than fifty feet in length. it was, however, so deeply laden, that not above two inches of the canoe were to be seen above the water's edge. with its present burden, it would have been impossible for her to sail on any river less smooth than the niger, and even as it is, when it comes to be paddled, some danger exists of its being swamped. it was really laughable to reflect that the canoe was supplied with two speaking trumpets, which, considering the stentorian lungs of the men of brass, were entirely superfluous, and that she was commanded by regularly appointed officers, with sounding titles, in imitation of european vessels, such as captain, mate, boatswain, coxswain, &c. besides a cook and his minions. these distinctions are encouraged by king boy, whose vanity and consequence even in the most trifling concerns, were irresistibly diverting. the landers determined to sleep in the canoe that night, notwithstanding the want of room would render it an intolerable grievance. previously to embarking, they had taken a little boiled yam with palm oil at obie's house, and they remained two hours lying on the bank. at seven in the evening they settled themselves for the night, but found that they were exceedingly cramped up for want of room, occasioned by the yams being stowed badly. during the night a great tumult arose between the natives and the men of brass, which might have had a serious and fatal termination, if the latter had not taken timely precaution to convey their canoe from the beach into the middle of the stream, whither the natives could not follow them. the former had flocked down to the water's edge in considerable numbers, armed with muskets, spears, and other offensive weapons, and kept up a dreadful noise, like the howling of wolves, till long after midnight; when the uproar died away king boy slept on shore with his wife adizzetta, who was obie's favourite daughter, and on her account they waited till between seven and eight o'clock in the morning, when she made her appearance with her husband, who, they understood, had embraced the present opportunity of making an excursion with her to his native country, to vary her life a little by a change of air and scene, and to introduce her to his other wives and relatives residing at brass. she had besides expressed a desire to see white men's ships, and it was partly to gratify her curiosity in this particular that she was going with them. on stepping into the canoe, with a spirit of gallantry, boy handed her to the best seat, which was a box, close to which he himself sat, and which the landers, from motives of delicacy, had relinquished in her favour. her face was towards the bow, whilst the two landers sat directly _vis-a-vis_ on a heap of yams, but they were so close to the opposite party that their legs came in continual contact, which threatened to produce much inconvenience and confusion. they were still further detained by removing various heavy articles into another canoe, which was lying alongside, because the canoe in which they were was pronounced too deeply laden to be safe, but after all she did not appear to be lightened very considerably. this being all accomplished, at half-past seven they pushed off the eboe shore, and for a little while, with forty paddles dashing up the silvery foam at the same moment, they glided through the water with the speed of a dolphin. to the landers it was altogether a scene of considerable gratification. "the eyes of man," says richard lander, "are so placed in his head, that it has been frequently observed, whether sitting or standing, he can behold earth and sky at the same moment without inconvenience, which is an advantage, i believe, that no other animal possesses in an equal degree, if it does at all. as i was reflecting on this circumstance i happened to cast my eyes towards the horizon, to convince myself of its reality, when i found the tall, masculine figure of obie's favourite daughter intercepted it entirely from my view. being thus balked for a moment in my intentions, i was instantly diverted from them, and i deemed the opportunity favourable for studying the physiognomy and person of king boy's 'ladye love.' adizzetta may be between twenty and thirty years of age,[footnote: there is a discrepancy in the account given by lander respecting obie and adizzetta, which we cannot reconcile. obie is represented to be a sprightly _young_ man, and yet his favourite daughter adizzetta is married, and between and year of age. obie then could not be a _young_ man.] or perhaps younger, for she takes snuff, and females arrive at womanhood in warm countries much sooner than in cold ones. her person is tall, stout, and well proportioned, though it has not dignity sufficient to be commanding; her countenance is round and open, but dull and almost inexpressive; mildness of manners, evenness of temper, and inactivity of body also, might notwithstanding, i think be clearly defined in it; on the whole she has a perfect virginity of face, which betrays not the smallest symptoms of feeling. her forehead is smooth and shining as polished ebony, but it is rather too low to be noble; her eyes full, large, and beautiful, though languid; her cheeks of a dutch-like breadth and fullness; her nose finely compressed, but not quite so distinguished a feature as the negro nose in general; there is a degree of prettiness about her mouth, the lips not being disagreeably large, which is further embellished by a set of elegant teeth, perfectly even and regular, and white as the teeth of a greyhound; her chin--but i am unable to describe a chin; i only know that it agrees well with the other features of her face. "adizzetta seldom laughs, but smiles and simpers most engagingly, whenever she is more than ordinarily pleased, and she seems not to be unconscious of the powerful influence which these smiles have over the mind of her husband. her dress and personal charms may be described in a few words; the former consisting simply of a piece of figured silk, encircling the waist, and extending as far as the knees; her woolly hair, which is tastefully braided, is enclosed in a net, and ends in a peak at the top; the net is adorned, but not profusely, with coral beads, strings of which hang from the crown to the forehead. she wears necklaces of the same costly bead; copper rings encircle her fingers and great toes; bracelets of ivory her wrists, and enormous rings, also, of the elephant's tusks decorate her legs, near the ankle, by which she is almost disabled from walking, on account of their ponderous weight and immense size. i had almost finished the scrutiny of her person, when adizzetta, observing me regarding her with more than common attention, at length caught my eye, and turned away her head, with a triumphant kind of smile, as much as to say, aye, white man, you may well admire and adore my person; i perceive you are struck with my beauty, and no wonder neither: yet i immediately checked the ill-natured construction, which i had put on her looks, and accused myself of injustice. for though, said i to myself, adizzetta, poor simple savage, may be as fond of admiration as her white sisters in more civilized lands, yet her thoughts, for aught i know, might have been very remote from vanity or self-love. however, that she smiled i am quite certain, and very prettily too, for i saw a circling dimple, radiating upon her full, round cheek, which terminated in a momentary gleam of animation, and illuminate her dark languishing eye, like a flash of light; and what could all this mean i had forgotten to say that the person of obie's daughter is tattooed in various parts, but the incisions or rather lacerations are irregular and unseemly. her bosom in particular bears evident marks of the cutting and gashing, which it had received when adizzetta was a child, for the wounds having badly healed, the skin over them is risen a full half inch above the natural surface. by the side of each eye, near the temple vein, a representation of the point of an arrow is alone formed with tolerable accuracy. they look a though indigo had been inserted into the flesh with a needle, and by this peculiarity, with which every female face is impressed, the eboe women are distinguished from their neighbours and surrounding tribes. "before breakfast, adizzetta was employed above an hour in cleaning and polishing her teeth, by rubbing them with the fibrous roots of a certain shrub or tree, which are much esteemed, and generally used for the purpose in her own country, as well as in the more interior parts. a great part of the day is consumed by many thousands of individuals in this amusing occupation, and to this cause, the brilliant whiteness of their teeth, for which africans, generally speaking, are remarkable, may be attributed." such is lander's description of an african beauty, and that beauty a queen. about ten in the morning, a mess of fish, boiled with yams and plantains, was produced for breakfast. as king boy was fearful that the presence of the landers might incommode the lady, they were desired to move farther back, that she might eat with additional confidence and comfort, for alas! they were not placed on an equality with adizzetta and her kingly spouse. when they had breakfasted and swallowed a calabash of water from the stream, the landers were served with a plateful, and afterwards the boat's crew and the slaves were likewise regaled with yams and wafer. in the evening, another refreshment, similar to this, was served round to all, and these are the only meals which the men of brass have during the twenty-four hours. before eating, boy himself made it a practice of offering a small portion of his food to the spirits of the river, that his voyage might be rendered propitious by conciliating their good will. previously also to his drinking a glass of rum or spirits, he poured a few drops of it into the water, invoking the protection of these fanciful beings, by muttering several expressions between his teeth, the tenor of which, of course, they did not understand. this religious observance, they were told, was invariably performed, whenever the brass people have occasion to leave their country by water, or return to it by the same means; it is called a meat and drink offering, and is celebrated at every meal. a custom very similar to this prevails at yarriba, at badagry, cape coast castle, and along the western coast generally; the natives of those places never take a glass of spirits without spilling a quantity of it on the ground as "a fetish." in the morning, they observed a branch of the river running off in a westerly direction, the course of the main body being southwest. they stopped awhile at various little villages during the day, to purchase yams, bananas, and cocoa-nuts, and the curiosity of their poor inhabitants at their appearance was intense. they were chiefly fishermen or husbandmen, and notwithstanding the uncouth and remarkable dress of the landers, they behaved to them without rudeness and even with civility, so that their inquisitiveness was not disagreeable. speaking trumpets, it was imagined, were quite a novelty with the men at brass, by the extraordinary rapture which they displayed for their music, which certainly was anything but melodious. it has been already stated that two of these instruments were in the canoe, for the convenience of issuing orders, and during the whole of the day, they were not ten minutes together from the mouths of the officers, so great was the desire of all of them to breathe through them, and which adds considerably to the deafening noises made by their constant quarrelling with each other. this was a great annoyance to the landers, but they were constrained to submit to it in silence; besides, it was entirely superfluous, for the voices of the people were of themselves loud and powerful enough for all the common purposes of life; and when they have a mind to strain their brazen lungs, no speaking trumpet that has ever been made, be it ever so large, could match the quantity of horrid sound which they made; it would, in fact, drown the roaring of the sea. in addition to the officers and attendants in the canoe formerly mentioned, they had one drummer, the king's steward, and his lady's maid, and two persons to bale out water, besides three captains, to give the necessary directions for the safety of the canoe. the noise made by these people on their starting, in bawling to their fetish through the trumpets, was beyond all description. their object was to secure them a safe journey, and most certainly, if noise could do so, they were pretty certain of it. the villages that they passed in the course of the day, were very numerous, and not distant more than two or three miles from each other, on the banks of the river. they were surrounded by more cultivated land than they had seen for the previous fortnight; the crops consisting of yams, bananas, plantains, indian corn, &c. &c., not having seen so much since they left kacunda. the villages had a pleasing appearance from the river. the houses seemed to be built of a light-coloured clay, and being thatched with palm branches, they very much resembled our own cottages. they were of a square form, with two windows on each side of the door, but have no upper rooms. in many places they observed that the river had overflowed its banks, and was running between the trees and thick underwood. in the widest part, it did not seem more than a mile and a half across, in fact, its width, contrary to the usual course of rivers, when approaching the sea, was sensibly diminishing, and was dwindling away into an ordinary stream. "perhaps," says richard lander, "there cannot be a greater comfort under the sun, than sound and invigorating sleep to the weary, nor in our opinion, a greater grievance than the loss of it; because wakefulness at those hours, which nature has destined for repose, is, in nine cases out of ten, sure to be the harbinger of peevishness, discontent, and ill humour, and not unfrequently induces languor, lassitude, and disease. no two individuals in the world have greater reason to complain of disturbed slumbers or nightly watching, than ourselves. heretofore, this has been occasioned chiefly by exposure to damps, rains, and dews, mosquito attacks, frightful and piercing noises, and over-fatigue, or apprehension or anxiety of mind. but now, in the absence of most of these causes, we are cramped, painfully cramped for want of room, insomuch, that when we feel drowsy, we find it impossible to place ourselves in a recumbent posture, without having the heavy legs of mr. and mrs. boy, with their prodigious ornaments of ivory, placed either on our faces or on our breasts. from such a situation it requires almost the strength of a rhinoceros to be freed; it is most excessively teasing. last night we were particularly unfortunate in this respect, and a second attack of fever, which came on me in the evening, rendered my condition lamentable indeed, and truly piteous. it would be ridiculous to suppose, that one can enjoy the refreshment of sleep, how much soever it my be required, when two or more uncovered legs and feet, huge, black, and rough, are traversing one's face and body, stopping up the passages of respiration, and pressing so heavily upon them at times, as to threaten suffocation. i could not long endure so serious an inconvenience, but preferred last night sitting up in the canoe. my brother was indisposed, and in fact unable to follow my example, and therefores i endeavoured, if possible, to render his situation more tolerable. with this object in view, i pinched the feet of our snoring companions, mr. and mrs. boy, repeatedly, till the pain caused them to awake, and remove their brawny feet from his face, and this enabled him to draw backwards a few inches, and place his head into a narrow recess, which is formed by two boxes. however, this did not allow him liberty to turn it either way, and thus jammed, with no command whatever over his suffering limbs, he passed the hours without sleep, and arose this morning with bruised bones and sore limbs, complaining bitterly of the wretched moments, which the legs of mr. and mrs. boy had caused him, with their ivory rings and heaps of yams." they now arrived at a convenient place for stopping awhile, to give their canoe men rest from their labour, and at day break they launched out again into the river, and paddled down the stream. at seven in the morning, boy and his wife having landed to trade, the landers took advantage of their absence and slept soundly for two hours, without the risk of being disturbed by the brawny legs of either the gentleman or lady. they continued their course down the river until two hours after midnight, when they stopped near a small village on the east side of the river. they made fast to the shore, and the people settled themselves in the canoe to sleep. having sat up the whole of the previous night, for the best of all reasons, because they could find no room to lie down, in consequence of the crowded state of the canoe, and feeling themselves quite unequal to do the same, the landers took their mats and went on shore, determined if possible, to sleep on the ground. overcome by fatigue, the fear of being attacked by alligators, or any thing else, they selected a dry place and laid themselves down on their mats. they had nearly dropped asleep, when they were roused by several severe stings, and found themselves covered with black ants. they had got up their trousers, and were tormenting them dreadfully. at first they knew not which way to get rid of them. their men, pascoe, sam, and jowdie, seeing the condition they were in, landed from the canoe, and made large fires in the form of a ring, and they laid down in the midst of them and slept till daylight. the sting of a black ant is quite as painful as that of a wasp. towards the evening of the following day, they departed from the main river, and took their course up a small branch towards brass town, running in a direction about southeast from that which they had just left. they had not proceeded far on this course, when to their great satisfaction, they found themselves influenced by the tide. they had previously observed an appearance of foam on the water, which might have been carried up by the flood tide from the mouth of the river, but they now felt certain of being within its influence. they were constantly annoyed by the canoe running aground on a bank, or sticking fast in the underwood, which delayed their progress considerably, and the men were obliged to get out to lighten and lift the canoe off them. their tract was through a narrow creek, arched over by mangroves, so as to form a complete avenue, which in many places was so thick as to be totally impenetrable by the light above. a heavy shower of rain came on and wetted them thoroughly, and after this was over, the dripping from the trees, which overhung the canoe, kept them in constant rain nearly the whole of the night. the smell from decayed vegetable substances was sickly and exceedingly disagreeable. through these dismal and gloomy passages, they travelled during the whole of the night of the th november without stopping, unless for a few minutes at a time, to disengage themselves from the pendant shoots of the mangrove and spreading brambles, in which they occasionally became entangled. these luxuriant natives of the soil are so intricately woven, that it would be next to impossible to eradicate them. their roots and branches are the receptacles of ooze, mud, and filth of all kinds, exhaling a peculiar offensive odour, which no doubt possesses highly deleterious qualities. the reason adduced for not resting during the night, was the apprehension entertained by king boy, of being unable to overtake his father and brothers, they having left the eboe country the day before them. a certain spot had been previously fixed upon by the parties for the meeting, and they arrived there about nine o'clock a.m., and found those individuals in three large canoes, with their attendants, waiting their arrival. here they stopped, and made their canoes fast to the trees, to take refreshment, such as it was, and half an hour's rest; and here they were introduced to the renowned king forday, who according to his own account is monarch of the whole country. in one of the canoes sat old king forday, in company with several fetish priests; the second canoe belonged to king boy, and the third was mr. gun's. these canoes had come thus far for the purpose of escorting them into their country. king forday was a complaisant venerable-looking old man, but was rather shabbily dressed, partly in the european and partly in the native style. like most savages, his fondness for spirituous liquors was extreme, and he took large potations of rum in their presence, though it produced no visible effect upon his manner or conversation. in the jollity of the moment, he attempted to sing, but his weak piping voice did not seem to second his inclination, and the sound died away from very feebleness. his subjects, however, amounting to nearly two hundred individuals, testified their approbation of the effort by a tremendous "yah!" shouted simultaneously by every voice, which sounded like the roar of a lion. during the time that they had been at breakfast, the tide ebbed, and left their canoes lying on the mud. breakfast being over, the fetish priests commenced their avocations, by marking the person of king boy from head to foot with chalk, in lines, circles, and a variety of fantastic figures, which so completely metamorphosed him, as to render his identity rather questionable, at the distance of only a few yards. his usual dress had been thrown aside, and he was allowed to wear nothing but a narrow silk handkerchief tied round his waist; on his head a little close cap was placed, made of grass, and ornamented with large feathers. these they found to be the wing feathers of a black and white buzzard, which is the fetish bird of brass town. two huge spears were also chalked and put into his hands, and thus equipped his appearance was wild and grotesque in the extreme. the same operation was performed on the rest of the party, and the fetish priests were chalked in the same manner. the people belonging to the landers were merely marked on the forehead, and the landers themselves, perhaps from being already white, although their faces were not a little tanned, were exempted from the ceremony. they were now ordered into king forday's canoe, to sit down with him. the old man asked them immediately in tolerably good english, to take a glass of rum with him; and having observed them wondering at the strange appearance of king boy, and the rest of the party, gave them to understand that in consequence of no man having come down the river as they had done, the fetish ceremony was performed to prevent any thing happening to them. they also understood from him, that a certain rite would be performed to _dju-dju_, the fetish or domestic god of brass town, in honour of their coming. the tide was now fast returning, and preparations were made for proceeding to brass town. for this purpose the canoes were all arranged in a line, that of king boy taking the lead; the landers and king forday in the next, followed by king boy's brother; mr. gun and the damaggoo people in others, and in this order they proceeded up the river. gun was styled the _little military king_ of brass town, from being entrusted with the care of all the arms and ammunition, and on this occasion, he gave them frequent opportunities of witnessing his importance and activity, by suddenly passing a short distance from the rest of the canoes, and firing off the cannon in the bow of his own, and then dropping behind again. the whole procession formed one of the most extraordinary sights that can be imagined. the canoes were following each other up the river in tolerable order, each of them displaying three flags. in the first was king boy, standing erect and conspicuous, his head dress of feathers waving with the movements of his body, which had been chalked in various fantastic figures, rendered more distinct by its natural colour. his hands were resting on the barbs of two immense spears, which at intervals he darted violently into the bottom of his canoe, as if he were in the act of killing some formidable wild animal under his feet. in the bows of all the other canoes, fetish priests were dancing, and performing various extraordinary antics, their persons as well as those of the people in them, being chalked over in the same manner as that of king boy; and to crown the whole, mr. gun, the little military gentleman, was most actively employed, his canoe, now darting before, and now dropping behind the rest, adding not a little to the imposing effect of the whole scene, by the repeated discharges of his cannon. in this manner they continued on till about noon, when they entered a little bay, and saw before them on the south side of it, two distinct groups of buildings, one of which was king forday's own, and the other king jacket's town. the cannons in all the canoes were now fired off, and the whole of the people were quickly on the look-out, to witness their approach. the firing having ceased, the greatest stillness prevailed, and the canoes moved forward very slowly between the two towns to a small island, a little to the east of jacket's town. this island is the abode of _dju-dju_, or grand fetish priest, and his wives, no one else being permitted to reside there. as they passed forday's town, a salute of seven guns was fired off at a small battery near the water. the canoes stopped near the fetish hut on the island, which was a low insignificant building of clay. the priest, who was chalked over nearly in the same manner as boy, drew near to the water's edge, and with a peculiar air asked some questions, which appeared to be answered to his satisfaction. boy then landed, and preceded by the tall figure of the priest, entered the religious hut. soon after this, the priest came to the water-side, and looking at the landers with much earnestness, broke an egg, and poured some liquid into the water, after which he returned again to the hut. the brass men then rushed on a sudden into the water, and returned in the same hasty manner, which to the landers appeared equally as mysterious as the rest of the ceremony. after remaining at the island about an hour, during which time boy was in the hut with the priest, he rejoined them, and they proceeded to forday's town, and took up their residence at boy's house. in the extraordinary ceremony which they had just witnessed, it was evident that they were the persons principally concerned, but whether it terminated in their favour or against them; whether the answers of the _dju-dju_ were propitious or otherwise, they were only able to ascertain by the behaviour of the brass people towards them. it was with the strongest emotions of joy that they saw a white man on shore, whilst they were in the canoe, waiting the conclusion of the ceremony. it was a cheering and goodly sight to recognize the features of an european, in the midst of a crowd of savages. this individual paid them a visit in the evening; his behaviour was perfectly affable, courteous, and obliging, and in the course of a conversation which they had with him, he informed them that he was the master of the spanish schooner, which was then lying in the brass river for slaves. six of her crew, who were ill of the fever, and who were still indisposed, likewise resided in the town. of all the wretched, filthy, and contemptible places in this world of ours, none can present to the eye of a stranger so miserable an appearance, or can offer such disgusting and loathsome sights as this abominable brass town. dogs, goats, and other animals were running about the dirty streets half starved, whose hungry looks could only be exceeded by the famishing appearance of the men, women, and children, which bespoke the penury and wretchedness to which they were reduced, while the sons of many of them were covered with odious boils, and their huts were falling to the ground from neglect and decay. brass, properly speaking, consists of two towns of nearly equal size, containing about a thousand inhabitants each, and built on the borders of a kind of basin, which is formed by a number of rivulets, entering it from the niger through forests of mangrove bushes. one of them was under the domination of a noted scoundrel, called king jacket, to whom a former allusion has been made, and the other was governed by a rival chief, named king forday. these towns are situated directly opposite each other, and within the distance of eighty yards, and are built on a marshy ground, which occasions the huts to be always wet. another place, called pilot's town by europeans, from the number of pilots that reside in it, is situated nearly at the mouth of the first brass river, which the landers understood to be the "_nun_" river of the europeans, and at the distance of sixty or seventy miles from hence. this town acknowledges the authority of both kings, having been originally peopled by settlers from each of their towns. at the ebb of the tide, the basin is left perfectly dry, with the exception of small gutters, and presents a smooth and almost unvaried surface of black mud, which emits an intolerable odour, owing to the decomposition of vegetable substances, and the quantity of filth and nastiness which is thrown into the basin by the inhabitants of both towns. notwithstanding this nuisance, both children and grown-up persons may be seen sporting in the mud, whenever the tide goes out, all naked, and amusing themselves in the same manner, as if they were on shore. the brass people grow neither yams, nor bananas, nor grain of any kind, cultivating only the plantain as an article of food, which, with the addition of a little fish, forms their principal diet. yams, however, are frequently imported from eboe, and other countries by the chief people, who resell great quantities of them to the shipping that may happen to be in the river. they are enabled to do this by the very considerable profits which accrue to them from their trading transactions with people residing further inland, and from the palm oil which they themselves manufacture, and which they dispose of to the liverpool traders. the soil in the vicinity of brass is, for the most part, poor and marshy, though it is covered with a rank, luxuriant and impenetrable vegetation. even in the hands of an active, industrious race, it would offer almost insuperable obstacles to general cultivation; but, with its present possessory, the mangrove itself can never be extirpated, and the country will, it is likely enough, maintain its present appearance till the end of time. the dwelling in which the landers resided, belonged to king boy, and stood on the extreme edge of the basin, and was constructed not long since, by a carpenter, who came up the river for the purpose from calabar, of which place he was a native: he received seven slaves for his labour. this man must evidently have seen european dwellings, as there was decidedly an attempt to imitate them. it was of an oblong form, containing four apartments, which were all on the ground-floor, lined with wood, and furnished with tolerably-made doors and cupboards. this wood bore decided marks of its having once formed part of a vessel, and was most likely the remains of one which, according to report, was wrecked not long ago on the bar of the river. the house had recently been converted into a kind of seraglio by king boy, because ho had, to use his own expression, "plenty of wives," who required looking after. it also answered the purpose of a store-house for european goods, tobacco, and spirituous liquors. its rafters were of bamboo, and its thatch of palm leaves. the apartment which the landers occupied, had a window overlooking the basin, outside of which was a veranda, occupied at the time by pascoe and his wives. the whole of its furniture consisted of an old oaken table, but it was supplied with seats, made of clay, which were raised about three feet from the ground. these, together with the floor, which was of mud, were so soft and wet as to enable a person to thrust his hand into any part of them without any difficulty whatever. in one corner, communicating with the other apartments, was a door destitute of a lock, and kept always ajar, except at night, when it was closed. one of the sides of the room was decorated with an old french print, representing the virgin mary, with a great number of chubby-faced angels ministering to her, at whose feet was a prayer on "our lady's good deliverance." the whole group was designed and executed badly. when the tide is at its height, the water flows up to the doors and windows of the house, which may perhaps account for its dampness; it is, however, held in very high estimation by its owner, and was called an english house. in general the houses are built of a kind of yellow clay, and the windows are all furnished with shutters. there were several huts opposite the town, where the people make salt, after the rains are over; the water at present was brackish from the effect of the rains, but according to the information given by boy, in the course of two months it will be quite salt, when they will again commence making it. it is an article of trade, and appears to be taken in large quantities to the eboe market, where it is exchanged for yams, the kowrie shell not being circulated lower down the river than bocqua. the principal employment of the people consists in making salt, fishing, boiling oil, and trading to the eboe country, for not a particle of cultivated land was to be seen. the people live exclusively on yams and palm oil, with sometimes a small quantity of fish. they bring poultry from the eboe country, but rear very little themselves, and what they do rear is very carefully preserved, and sold to the ships that frequent the river. a little palm oil would have been a great luxury to the landers, but king boy would not give them any. their allowance consisted of half a small yam each day, but on the evening after their arrival, his majesty being out of the way, two of his wives brought them half a glass of rum each, and four yams; this was a great treat to them, but a considerable risk to the ladies, for had boy discovered the theft, it is more than likely that he would have had them flogged and sold. wet and uncomfortable as was their dwelling, yet it was infinitely more desirable and convenient than their confined quarters in the canoe, for here they had the pleasure of reposing at full length, which was a luxury they could not have purchased on the water at any price. the spanish captain paid them another visit, and left the town in the afternoon, on his return to his vessel. he informed them that slaves were very scarce, and obtained with difficulty and expense. richard lander was now invited to visit king forday, and he accordingly complied with the summons. his house was situated about a hundred yards distant from that of king boy, and on entering it, he found him sitting, half drunk, with about a dozen of his wives, and a number of dogs in a small filthy room. lander was desired to sit down by his side, and to drink a glass of rum. he was then given to understand, as well as his majesty was able, that it was customary for every white man who came down the river to pay him four bars. lander expressed his ignorance and surprise at this demand, but was soon silenced by his saying, "that is my demand, and i shall not allow you to leave this town until you give me a _book_ for that amount." seeing that he had nothing to do but to comply with his demand, lander gave him a bill on lake the commander of the english vessel, after which he said, "to-morrow you may go to the brig; take one servant with yon, but your mate, (meaning his brother,) must remain here with your seven people, until my son, king boy, shall bring the goods for himself and me, after this they shall be sent on board without delay." in order that he might make a decent appearance before his countrymen on the following day, richard lander was obliged to sit the whole of the afternoon with an old cloth wrapped round him, until his clothes were washed and dried. this was the most miserable and starving place which they had yet visited: since their arrival, mr. gun had sent them two meals, consisting of a little pounded yam, and fish stewed in palm oil, and for this he had the impudence to demand two muskets in payment. these fellows, like the rest on the coast, were a set of imposing rascals, little better than downright savages; lander was informed that they had absolutely starved three white men, shortly before his arrival, who had been wrecked in a slaving vessel, when crossing the bar. chapter xli. richard lander had determined that one of his men should accompany him down the river, and at ten o'clock, having taken leave of his brother and the rest of the party, they embarked in king boy's canoe, with a light heart and an anxious mind: although distant about sixty miles from the mouth of the river, his journey appeared to him already completed, and all his troubles and difficulties, he considered at an end. already, in fond anticipation, he was on board the brig, and had found a welcome reception from her commander had related to him all the hardships and dangers they had undergone, and had been listened to with commiseration; already had he assured himself of his doing all he could to enable him to fulfil his engagements with these people, and thought themselves happy in finding a vessel belonging to their own country in the river at the time of their arrival. these meditations and a train of others about home and friends, to which they naturally led, occupied his mind as the canoe passed through the narrow creeks, sometimes winding under avenues of mangrove trees, and at others expanding into small lakes occasioned by the overflowing of the river. the captain of the canoe, a tall sturdy fellow, was standing up, directing its course, occasionally hallooing as they came to a turn in the creek, to the fetish, and where an echo was returned half a glass of rum and a piece of yam and fish were thrown into the water. lander had seen this done before, and on asking boy the reason why he was throwing away the provisions thus, he asked, "did you not hear the fetish?" the captain of the canoe replied, "yes." "that is for the fetish," said boy, "if we do not feed him, and do good for him, he will kill us, or make us poor and sick." lander could not help smiling at the ignorance of the poor creatures, but such is their firm belief. they had pursued their course in this manner, which had been principally to the west, till about three in the afternoon, when they came to a branch of the river about two hundred yards wide, and seeing a small village at a short distance before them, they stopped there for the purpose of obtaining some dried fish. having supplied their wants and proceeded on, about an hour afterwards they again stopped, that their people might take some refreshment. boy very kindly presented lander with a large piece of yam, reserving to himself all the fish they had got at the village, and after making a hearty meal off them, he fell asleep. while he was snoring by lander's side, the remainder of the fish attracted his notice, and not feeling half satisfied with the yam which had been given him, he felt an irresistible inclination to taste them. conscience acquitted him on the score of hunger, and hinted that such an opportunity should not be lost, and accordingly, he very quickly demolished two small ones. although entirely raw, they were delicious, and he never remembered having enjoyed anything with a better relish in all his life. there was scarcely a spot of dry land to be seen anywhere, all was covered with water and mangrove trees. after remaining about half an hour, they again proceeded, and at seven in the evening arrived in the second brass river, which was a large branch of the quorra. they kept their course down it about due south, and half an hour afterwards, lander heard the welcome sound of the surf on the beach. they still continued onwards, and at a quarter before eight in the evening, they made their canoe fast to a tree for the night, on the west bank of the river. on the following morning, lander found his clothes as thoroughly wet from the effects of the dew, as if he had been lying in the river all night instead of the canoe. at five in the morning, they let go the rope from the tree, and took their course in a westerly direction up a creek. at seven they arrived in the main branch of the quorra, which is called the river nun, or the first brass river, having entered it opposite to a large branch, which, from the information given by king boy, ran to benin. the direction of the river nun was here nearly north and south, and they kept on their course down the stream. about a quarter an hour after they had entered the river nun, they discerned at a distance from them, two vessels lying at anchor. the emotions of delight which the sight of them occasioned were beyond the power of lander to describe. the nearest was a schooner, a spanish slave vessel, whose captain they had seen at brass town. their canoe was quickly by her side, and lander went on board. the captain received him very kindly, and invited him to take some spirits and water with him. he complained sadly of the sickly state of the crew, asserting that the river was extremely unhealthy, and that he had only been in it six weeks, in which time he had lost as many men. the remainder of his crew, consisting of thirty persons, were in such a reduced state, that they were scarcely able to move, and were lying about his decks, more resembling skeletons man living persons. lander could do no good with the spaniard, so he took his leave of him, and returned into the canoe. they now directed their course to the english brig, which was lying about three hundred yards lower down the river. having reached her, with feelings of delight, mingled with doubt, lander went on board. here he found every thing in as sad a condition, as he had in the schooner, four of the crew had just died of fever, four more which completed the whole, were lying sick in their hammocks, and the captain himself appeared to be in the very last stage of illness. he had recovered from a severe attack of fever, and having suffered a relapse in consequence of having exposed himself too soon, which had been nearly fatal to him, lander now stated to him who he was, explained his situation to him as fully as he could, and had his instructions read to him by one of his own people, that he might see there was no intention to impose upon him. lander then requested that he would redeem them by paying what had been demanded by king boy, and assured him, that whatever he might give to him on their account would certainly be repaid him by the british government. to the utter surprise, however, of lander, he flatly refused to give a single thing, ill and weak as he was, made use of the most offensive and the most shameful oaths, which he ever heard. petrified amazement, and horror-struck at such conduct, lander shrunk from him with terror. he could scarcely believe what he had heard, till his ears were assailed by a repetition of the same oaths. disappointed beyond measure, by such brutal conduct from one of his own countrymen, he could not have believed it possible, his feelings completely overpowered him, and he was ready to sink with grief and shame. he was now undetermined how to act, or what course to pursue. never in his life did he feel such humiliation as at this moment. in his way through the country he had been treated well; he had been in the habit of making such presents as had been expected from them, and above all, they had maintained their character amongst the natives, by keeping their promises. this was now no longer in his power, as his means were all expended, and when as a last, and as he had imagined, a certain resource, he had promised the price of his ransom should be paid by the first of his countrymen that he might meet with, on the best of all securities, to be thus refused and dishonoured by him, would, he knew, degrade them sadly in the opinion of the natives, if it did not lessen them in their own. as there were no hopes that the captain of this vessel would pay any thing for them, he went on board the canoe again, and told king boy, that he must take him to bonny, as a number of english ships were there. "no, no," said he, "dis captain no pay, bonny captain no pay. i won't take you any further." as this would not do, lander again had recourse to the captain, and implored him to do something for him, telling him that if he would only let him have ten muskets, boy might be content with them, when he found that he could get nothing else. the only reply lander received was; "i have told you already i will not let you have even a flint, so bother me no more." "but i have a brother and eight people at brass town," said lander to him, "and if you do not intend to pay king boy, at least persuade him to bring them here, or else he will poison or starve my brother, before i can get any assistance from a man of war, and sell all my people." the only answer given was; "if you can get them on board, i will take them away, but as i have told you before, you do not get a flint from me." lander then endeavoured to persuade boy to go back for his people, and that he should be paid some time or other. "yes," said the captain, "make haste and bring them." boy very naturally required some of his goods before he went, and it was with no small difficulty, that lander prevailed on him afterwards to go without them. the captain of the brig now inquired what men lander had, and on his telling him he had two seamen, and three others, who might be useful to him in working his vessel, his tone and manner began to soften. he fully agreed with lander, that they might be useful in getting the brig out of the river, as half of his crew were dead, and the other half sick, so lander took courage and asked him for a piece of beef to send to his brother, and a small quantity of rum, which he readily gave. lander knew that his brother as well as himself, much needed a change of linen, but he could not venture to ask such a thing from the captain with much hopes of success, so the cook of the brig, appearing to be a respectable sort of a man, an application was made to him, and he produced instantly three white shirts. king boy was now ready to depart, not a little discontented, and lander sent his own man in the canoe, with the few things which he had been able to obtain, and a note for his brother. the latter was desired to give antonio an order on any english captain that he might find at bonny, for his wages, and also one for the damaggoo people, that they might receive the small present he had promised to their good old chief, who had treated them so well. at two in the afternoon, king boy took his departure, promising to return with john lander and his people in three days, but grumbling much at not having been paid his goods. lander endeavoured to make himself as comfortable as he could in the vessel, and thinking that the captain might change his behaviour towards him, when he got better, he determined to have as little to say to him till then as possible. on the following day, captain lake appeared to be much better, and lander ventured to ask him for a change of linen, of which he was in great want. this request was immediately complied with, and he enjoyed a luxury which he had not experienced a long time. in the course of the morning, lander conversed with him about his travels in the country, and related the whole of the particulars of the manner in which they had been attacked and plundered at kirree. he then explained to him how king boy had saved them from slavery in the eboe country, and how much they felt indebted to him for it. he endeavoured particularly to impress this on his mind, as he still hoped to bring him round to pay what he had promised. having laid all before him as fully as he was able, and pointed out to him the bad opinion which boy would have of them, and the injurious tendency towards englishmen in general, that would result from not keeping their word with him, which it was in his power to enable them to do, he ventured to ask him to give him ten muskets for his bill on government. he listened apparently with great attention to his story, but lander no sooner advanced his wants, than with a furious oath, he repeated his refusal, and finding him as determined as ever he had been, he mentioned it no more. he moreover told him in the most unkind and petulant manner, "if your brother and people are not here in three days, i go without them." this, it was believed, he would not do, as the men would be of service to him, but boy had given his promise, that they should be at the vessel in that time. in the middle of the day, the pilot who had brought the vessel into the river, came on board and demanded payment for it, which gave lander an opportunity of seeing more of the disposition of mr. lake. the pilot had no sooner made his business known, than lake flew into a violent passion, cursing and abusing him in the most disgusting language he could use; he refused to pay him any thing whatever, and ordered him to go out of the ship immediately. whether lake was right or wrong in this, lander knew not, but he was shocked at his expressions, and the pilot reluctantly went away, threatening that he would sink his vessel, if he offered to leave the river without paying him his due. he was rather surprised to hear such language from the pilot, and doubted his meaning, until he found that he had a battery of seven brass guns at the town on the eastern side of the river, near its entrance, which, if well managed, might soon produce that effect. this town, as before observed, is named pilot's town, being the established residence of those who conduct vessels over the bar. on the following day, lander inquired of capt. lake, whether, when they left the river, he would take them to fernando po. this, however, he again refused, saying that the island had been given up; that there was not a single white man on it, and that no assistance could be got there, but that if all the people should arrive by the morning of the rd, he would land them at bimbia, a small island in the river cameroons, whither he was going to complete his cargo, and at this island he said that lander would find a white man, who kept a store for captain smith. lander was quite satisfied with this arrangement, feeling assured that he should get every thing he might want from him. lander's chief concern was now about his brother, and he much feared that the vessel would sail without him, for there was no dependence on the captain, so little did he care for them, or the object for which they had visited the country. lander took an opportunity of begging him, in the event of his brother and the men not arriving by the rd, to wait a little longer for them, asserting at the same time, that if he went away without them, they would be assuredly starved or sold as slaves, before he could return to them with assistance. he might just as well have addressed himself to the wind--"i can't help it, i shall wait no longer," was the only reply he made, in a surly, hasty tone, which was a convincing proof that all attempts to reason with him would be fruitless. in the afternoon, the chief mate and three kroomen were sent away by his direction to sound the bar of the river, to know whether there was sufficient depth of water for the vessel to pass over it. the pilot, who had been dismissed so peremptorily on the preceding day, was determined to have his revenge, and being naturally on the look out, had observed the movements of the boat; so favourable an opportunity was not to be lost, and accordingly watching her, he despatched an armed canoe, and intercepted her return at the mouth of the river. the mate of the brig and one of the kroomen were quickly made prisoners and conveyed to pilot's town, and the boat with the remainder sent back with a message to the captain, that they would not be given up until the pilotage should be paid. lake must have felt somewhat annoyed at this, but whether he did or not, he treated it with the greatest indifference, saying that he did not care, he would go to sea without his mate or the kroomen either, and that he was determined not to pay the pilotage. on the nd of december, the anxiety of lander for his brother's safety made him extremely unhappy, and during the whole of the day he was on the look out for him; lake, observing the distress he was in, told him not to trouble himself any more about him, adding, that he was sure he was dead, and that he need not expect to see him again. "if he had been alive," said lake, "he would have been here by this time, to-morrow morning i shall leave the river." such inhuman and unfeeling conduct from this man only tended to increase lander's dislike for him, and without paying him any attention, he kept looking out for his party. so great was his anxiety that he was on the look out long after dusk, nor could he sleep during the whole of the night. the rd arrived, the day fixed for the departure, but to the great joy of lander, and the mortification of lake, the sea breeze was so strong that it raised a considerable surf on the bar, and prevented them from getting out. this was a most anxious time for lander, and the whole of the day his eyes were riveted to the part of the river where he knew his brother must come. the whole day passed in tedious watching, and the night was far spent without any tidings of him. about midnight he saw several large canoes making their way over to the west bank of the river, in one of which he imagined that he could distinguish his brother. he observed them soon after landing, and saw by the fires which they made, that they had encamped under some mangrove trees. all his fears and apprehensions vanished in an instant, and he was overjoyed with the thoughts of meeting his brother in the morning. the captain of the brig having observed them, suddenly exclaimed, "now we shall have a little fighting to-morrow, go you and load seventeen muskets, and put five buck shot into each. i will take care that the cannon shall be loaded to the muzzle with balls and flints, and if there is any row, i will give them such a scouring as they never had." he then directed lander to place the muskets and cutlasses out of sight, near the stern of the vessel, and said to him, "the instant that your people come on board, call them aft, and let them stand by the arms. tell them, if there is any row to arm themselves directly, and drive all the brass people overboard." this was summary work with a vengeance, and every thing betokened that lake was in earnest. lander saw clearly that he was resolved on adopting severe measures, and he appeared to possess all the determination necessary to carry them through. lander could not help feeling otherwise than distressed and ashamed of leaving the brass people in this manner, but he had no alternative, there was no one to whom he could apply for assistance in his present situation, except the captain of the vessel, and to him he had applied in vain. his entreaties were thrown away on him, and even the certainty of an ample recompense by the british government, which had been held out to him, had been treated with contempt. he, therefore, had no hopes from that quarter. boy had refused to take them to bonny, asserting that if he could not be paid here, he should not be paid there, and to go back to brass town would be deliberately returning to starvation. his last resource, therefore, was to put the best face on the business which he could, and as no other plan was left him, to get away by fair means or foul, and let the blame fall where it was incurred. early on the following morning, lander was on the look out for his brother, and soon observed him and the people get into the canoe. they were no sooner embarked than they all landed again, which could be accounted for in no other way, than by supposing that it was the intention of boy to keep them on shore, until he had received the goods. he was, however, not long in this state of anxiety, for about seven o'clock, they embarked and were brought on board. the following is the account which john lander gave, of the events which fell under his notice at brass town, and his proceedings during the time that he was separated from his brother. wednesday, november th. "this morning, my brother, attended by one of our men, quitted this town with king boy and suite, leaving the remainder of the party and myself behind, as hostages for the fulfilment of the conditions, which we entered into with him in the eboe country. for myself, though greatly chagrined at this unforeseen arrangement, i could not from my heart, altogether condemn the framer of it; for it is quite natural to suppose that a savage should distrust the promises of europeans, when he himself is at all times guilty of breach of faith and trust, not only in his trading transactions with foreigners, but likewise in familiar intercourse with his own people. forday is the cause of it, and he displays all the artifice, chicanery, and low cunning of a crafty and corrupt mind. therefore, after a moment's reflection, i was not much surprised at the step which king boy has taken, nor can i be very angry with him, and i am resolved to await with composure his return, and consequently my release from this miserable place, though i have begun to consider with seriousness, what will become of us, in the event of lake's refusal to honour the bill which we have sent him. besides, i am rather uneasy on our people's account, for during these two or three days past, they have had scarcely any thing to eat, and we are now left entirely destitute, nor do i know where to obtain relief. the damaggoo people are with us likewise, and they are interested in my brother's return, equally as much as myself. instead of being our guides and protectors, these poor creatures have shared in our calamity; their little all has either been lost or stolen, or else expended in provisions, and like us, they are reduced to great distress and wretchedness. they will remain here, in order to receive the few things which we have promised them and their chief, but should lake object to part with his goods, we shall give them a note to the master of any english vessel at bonny, whither they are destined to go, requesting him to pay the poor strangers their demands. "after a good deal of solicitation and importunity, we received this morning four small yams from the wives of king boy, who informed us that the same number of yams will be given us daily. our people having nothing else to eat, made a kind of broth with this vegetable; at first it was, of course, a most insipid mess, but with the addition of a little salt, it is rendered more palatable. we sent to king forday in the afternoon, for a few plantains, or any thing that could be eaten, but the gloomy old savage shook his head, folded his arms, and refused. "nothing could exceed my regret and consternation on the perusal of the letter which i received from my brother, and somehow, i almost dreaded to meet with king boy. well knowing how much it would influence his behaviour towards us, we had been careful to represent to that individual, the thanks and cheering which he would receive from our countrymen, the moment he should take us on board the english brig, that he would be favoured and caressed beyond measure, and receive plenty of beef, bread, and rum. his face used to shine with delight on anticipating so luxurious a treat, and he had uniformly been in a better humour, after listening to these promises of ours, than any thing else could have made him. the contrast between his actual reception on board lake's ship, to that which his own fancy and our repeated assurances had taught him to expect, was too dreadful to think on even for a moment, and for this reason, as much as any other, i looked forward with something of apprehension and anxiety to an interview with this savage, because i knew, that after the cutting disappointment which he had experienced, he would be under the influence of strongly excited feelings, and stormy passions, over which he exercises no control. i was convinced too, that the whole weight of his resentment, and the fury of his rage, would fall upon me, for i am completely in his power. "the interesting moment at length arrived. we heard king boy quarrelling with his women, and afterwards walking through their apartments towards ours, muttering as he went along. he entered it, and stood still; i was reposing, as i usually do for the greater part of the day, upon a mat which is placed on the seat of wet clay, but on perceiving him, i lifted my head without arising, and reclined it on my hand. he looked fixedly upon me, and i returned his glance with the same unshrinking steadfastness. but his dark eye was flashing with anger, whilst his upturned lip, which exposed his white teeth, quivered with passion. no face in the world could convey more forcibly to the mind the feeling of contempt and bitter scorn, than the distorted one before me. it was dreadfully expressive, drawing up the left angle of his mouth in a parallel with his eyes, he broke silence, with a sneering, long-drawn 'eh!' and almost choked with rage, he cursed me; and in a tone and manner, which it is infinitely out of my power to describe, he spoke to the following effect: 'you are thief, man; english captain, no will! you assured me, when i took you from the eboe country, that he would be overjoyed to see me, and give me plenty of beef and rum; i received from him neither the one nor the other. eh! english captain, no will! i gave a quantity of goods to free you from the slavery of obie; i took you into my own canoe; you were hungry, and i gave you yam and fish; you were almost naked, i was sorry to see you so, because you were white men and strangers, and i gave each of you a red cap and a silk handkerchief; but you are no good, you are thief, man. eh! english captain, no will; he no will. you also told me your countrymen would do this (taking off his cap, and flourishing it in circles over his head,) and cry hurra! hurra! on receiving me on board their vessel; you promised my wife a necklace, and my father, four bars. but eh! english captain, no will! he tell me he no will: yes, i will satisfy your hunger with plenty more of my fish and yams, and your thirst i will quench with rum and palm wine. eh! you thief man, you are no good, english captain, no will!' he then stamped on the ground, and gnashing at me with his teeth like a dog, he cursed me again and again. "it is true i did not feel perfectly easy at this severe rebuke, and under such taunting reproaches; but i refrained from giving utterance to a single thought till after he had concluded his abuse and anathematizing. had a spirited person been in my situation, he might have knocked him down, and might have had his head taken off for his pains, but as for me, all such kind of spirit is gone out of me entirely. besides we had, though unintentionally, deceived king boy, and i also bore in mind the kindness which he had done us, in ransoming us from a state of slavery. most of what he had asserted was most unquestionably true, and in some measure, i was deserving his severest reprehension and displeasure. "the fury of boy having been somewhat appeased by my silence and submission, as well as by his own extraordinary and violent agitation, i ventured mildly to assure him, on the strength of my brother's letter, that his suspicions were entirely groundless, that mr. lake had certainly a _will_ or inclination to enter into arrangements with him for the payment of his just demands, and that when he should convey our people and myself to the thomas, every thing would be settled to his complete satisfaction. he half believed, half mistrusted my words, and shortly afterwards quitted the apartment, threatening, however, that we should not leave brass till it suited his own pleasure and convenience. "it is really a most humiliating reflection, that we are reduced to the most contemptible subterfuges of deceit and falsehood, in order to carry a point which might have been easily gained by straightforward integrity. but the conduct of lake has left us no alternative, and whatever my opinion of that individual may be, he surely must be destitute of all those manly characteristics of a british seaman, as well as of the more generous feelings of our common nature, to be guilty, on a sick bed, of an action which might, for aught he knew or cared, produce the most serious consequences to his unfortunate countrymen in a savage land, by exposing them to the wretchedness of want, and the miseries of slavery, to mockery, ill-usage, contempt, and scorn, and even to death itself. "november th. king boy has not visited us to-day, though we have received the customary allowance of four yams from his women. in addition to which, adizzetta made us a present of half a dozen this morning, as an acknowledgment for the benefit she had derived from a dose of laudanum, which i gave her last night, for the purpose of removing pain from the lower regions of the stomach, a complaint by which she says she is occasionally visited. "this morning, november st, i dismissed the poor damaggoo people, with a note to either of the english vessels lying in the bonny river, requesting him to give the bearer three barrels of gunpowder, and a few muskets, on the faith of being paid for the same by the british government. they left brass in their own canoe, quite dejected and out of heart, and antonio, the young man who volunteered to accompany us from his majesty's brig, clinker, at badagry, went along with them, on his return to his country, from which he has been absent two or three years. "the following day, one or two crafty little urchins, who are slaves to king boy, brought us a few plantains as a gift. they had been engaged in pilfering tobacco leaves from an adjoining apartment, to which our people were witnesses, and the juvenile depredators, fearing the consequences of a disclosure, bribed them to secrecy in the manner already mentioned. boy's women have also been guilty, during the temporary absence of their lord and master, of stealing a quantity of rum from the store room, and distributing it amongst their friends and acquaintance, and they have resorted to the same plan as the boys, to prevent the exposure, which they dreaded. one of them, who acts as a duenna, is the favourite and confidante of boy, and she wears a bunch of keys round her neck in token of her authority. she has likewise the care of all her master's effects, and as a further mark of distinction, she is allowed the privilege of using a walking-stick with a knob at the end, which is her constant companion. this woman is exceedingly good-natured, and indulges our men with a glass or two of rum every day. "last evening, king boy stripped to the skin, and having his body most hideously marked, ran about the town like a maniac with a spear in his hand, calling loudly on _dju dju_, and uttering a wild, frantic cry at every corner. it appears that one of his father's wives had been strongly suspected of adulterous intercourse with a free man residing in the town, and that this strange means was adopted, in pursuance of an ancient custom, to apprize the inhabitants publicly of the circumstance, and implore the counsel and assistance of the god at the examination of the parties. this morning the male aggressor was found dead, having swallowed poison, it is believed, to avoid a worse kind of death, and the priest declaring his opinion of the guilt of the surviving party, she was immediately sentenced to be drowned. this afternoon, the ill-fated woman was tied hand and foot, and conveyed in a canoe to the main body of the river, into which she was thrown without hesitation, a weight of some kind having been fastened to her feet for the purpose of sinking her. she met her death with incredible firmness and resolution. the superstitious people believe, that had the deceased been innocent of the crime laid to her charge, their god would have saved her life, even after she had been flung into the river; but because she had perished, her guilt was unquestionably attested. the mother of the deceased is not allowed to display any signs of sorrow or sadness at the untimely death of her daughter, for were she to do so, the same dreadful punishment would be inflicted upon her, 'for,' say the brass people, 'if the parent should mourn or weep over the fate of a child guilty of so heinous a crime, we should pronounce her instantly to be as criminal as her daughter, and to have tolerated her offence. but if, on the contrary, she betrays no maternal tenderness, nor bewail her bereavement in tears and groans, we should then conclude her to be entirely ignorant of the whole transaction; she would then give a tacit acknowledgment to the justice of the sentence, and rejoice to be rid of an object that would only entail disgrace on her as long as she lived. "our people are become heartily tired of their situation, and impatient to be gone; they were regaled with an extra quantity of rum last evening, by their female friend, the duenna; when their grievances appearing to them in a more grievous light than ever, they had the courage to go in a body to king boy, to demand an explanation of his intentions towards them. they told him, indignantly, either to convey them to the english brig, or sell them for slaves to the spaniards, 'for,' say they, 'we would rather lose our liberty, than be kept here to die of hunger.' boy returned them an equivocating answer, but treated them much less roughly than i had reason to anticipate. afterwards, i went myself to the same individual, and with a similar motive, but for some time i had no opportunity of conversing with him. it is a kind of holiday here, and most of the brass people, with their chiefs, are merry with intoxication. as well as i can understand, during the earlier part of the day they were engaged in a solemn, religious observance, and since then king forday has publicly abdicated in favour of boy, who is his eldest son. i discovered those individuals in a court annexed to the habitation of the former, surrounded by a great number of individuals with bottles, glasses, and decanters at their feet; they were all in a state of drunkenness, more or less; and all had their faces and bodies chalked over in rude and various characters. forday, alone, sat in a chair, boy was at his side, and the others, amongst whom was our friend gun and a drummer, were sitting around on blocks of wood, and on the trunk of a fallen tree. the chairman delivered a long oration, but he was too tipsy, and perhaps too full of days to speak with grace, animation, or power; therefore his eloquence was not very persuasive, and his nodding hearers, overcome with drowsiness, listened to him with scarcely any attention. they smiled, however, and laughed occasionally, but i could not find why they did so; i don't think they themselves could tell. the old chief wore an english superfine beaver hat, and an old jacket, that once belonged to a private soldier, but the latter was so small that he was able only to thrust an arm into one of the sleeves, the other part of the jacket being thrown upon his left shoulder. these, with the addition of a cotton handkerchief, which was tied round his waist, were his only apparel. by far the most showy and conspicuous object in the yard, was an immense umbrella, made of figured cotton of different patterns, with a deep fringe of coloured worsted, which was stuck into the ground. but even this was tattered and torn, and dirty withal, having been in forday's possession for many years, and it is only used on public and sacred occasions. i had been sitting amongst the revellers till the speaker had finished his harangue, when i embraced the opportunity, as they were about to separate, of entreating king boy to hasten our departure for the vessel. he was highly excited and elated with liquor, and being in excellent temper, he promised to take us to-morrow. "it required little time on the following day, to take leave of a few friends we have at brass, and we quitted the town not only without regret, but with emotions of peculiar pleasure. king boy, with three of his women, and his suite in a large canoe, and our people and myself in a smaller one. adizzetta would gladly have accompanied her husband to the english vessel, for her desire to see it was naturally excessive; but she was forbidden by old forday, who expressed some squeamishness about the matter, or rather he was jealous that on her return to her father's house in the eboe country, she would give too high and favourable an opinion of it to her friends, which might in the end produce consequences highly prejudicial to his interests. "we stopped awhile at a little fishing village, at no great distance from brass, where we procured a few fish, and abundance of young cocoa nuts, the milk of which was sweet and refreshing. continuing our journey on streams and rivulets intricately winding through mangroves and brambles, we entered the main body of the river in time to see the sun setting behind a glorious sky, directly before us. we were evidently near the sea, because the water was perfectly salt, and we scented also the cool and bracing sea breeze, with feelings of satisfaction and rapture. however, the wind became too stormy for our fragile canoe; the waves leaped into it over the bow, and several times we were in danger of being swamped. our companion was far before us, and out of sight, so that, for the moment, there was no probability of receiving assistance, or of lightening the canoe, but, happily, in a little while we did not require it, for the violence of the wind abating with the disappearance of the sun, we were enabled to continue on our way without apprehension. about nine o'clock in the evening, we overtook the large canoe and the crews, both having partaken of a slight refreshment of fish and plantain together, we passed the _second brass river_, which was to the left of us, in company. here it might have been somewhat more than half a mile in breadth, and though it was dangerously rough for a canoe, with great precaution we reached the opposite side in safety. from thence, we could perceive in the distance, the long wished for atlantic, with the moonbeams reposing in peaceful beauty on its surface, and could also hear the sea breaking, and roaring over the sandy bar, which stretches across the mouth of the river. the solemn voice of ocean never sounded more melodiously in my ear, than it did at this moment. o it was enchanting as the harp of david! passing along by the left bank, we presently entered the first brass river, which is the _nun_ of europeans, where at midnight we could faintly distinguish the masts and rigging of the english brig in the dusky light, which appeared like a dark and fagged cloud above the horizon. to me, however, no sight could be more charming. it was beautiful as the gates of paradise, and my heart fluttered with unspeakable delight, as we landed in silence on the beach opposite the brig, near a few straggling huts, to wait impatiently the dawn of to-morrow. "the morning of the th was a happy one, for it restored me to the society of my brother, and of my countrymen. the baneful effects of the climate are strongly impressed upon the countenances of the latter, who, instead of their natural healthy hue, have a pale, dejected, and sickly appearance, which is quite distressing to witness. however, the crew of the spanish schooner look infinitely more wretched; they have little else but their original forms remaining; they crawl about like beings under a curse they are mere shadows or phantoms of men, looking round for their burying place. no spectacle can be more humiliating to man's pride than this; nothing can give him a more degrading sense of his own nothingness. it is very much to be wondered at why europeans, and englishmen in particular, persevere in sending their fellow creatures to this aceldama, or golgotha, as the african coast is sometimes not inappropriately called; they might as well bury them at once at home, and it is pleasanter far to die there; but interest, and the lust of gain, like aaron's rod, seem to swallow up every other consideration." chapter xlii during the time that the canoe was coming from the shore to the vessel, richard lander had stationed himself by the cannon; it was the only one on board, but it had been loaded as lake had directed, and pointed to the gangway of the brig, where the brass people were obliged to come. the muskets were all ready, lying concealed, where lake had directed them to be placed, and he repeated the same orders that he had given on the preceding day, respecting the part that the landers' people were to take in the business. lake received john lander very civilly, but immediately expressed his determination to dismiss boy without giving him a single article, and to make the best of his way out of the river. a short time after the arrival of john lander, a canoe arrived at the beach, with mr. spittle, the mate of the brig, as prisoner, who, immediately sent a note off to the captain, informing him that the price of his liberation was the sum demanded for the pilotage of the vessel over the bar of the river. he said further, that he was strictly guarded, but that, notwithstanding this, he did not despair of making his escape, if lake could wait a little for him. the vessel had been brought into the river about three months before, but lake would never pay the pilotage, and all he did was to send mr. spittle a little bread and beef. the amount demanded was about fifty pounds worth of goods, which it was quite out of the question that lake would ever pay. meanwhile king boy, full of gloomy forebodings, had been lingering about the deck. he had evidently foresight enough to suspect what was to take place, and he appeared troubled and uneasy, and bewildered in thought. the poor fellow was quite an altered person; his habitual haughtiness had entirely forsaken him, and given place to a cringing and humble demeanor. a plate of meat was presented to him, of which he ate sparingly, and showed clearly that he was thinking more of his promised goods, than his appetite, and a quantity of rum that was given to him was drunk carelessly, and without affording any apparent satisfaction. knowing how things were likely to terminate, the landers endeavoured to get boy into a good humour, by telling him that he should certainly have his goods some time or other; but it was all to no purpose; the attempt was a complete failure; the present was the only time in his mind. the landers really pitied him, and were grieved to think that their promises could not be fulfilled. how gladly would they have made any personal sacrifice, rather than thus break their word; for although they had been half starved in his hands, yet they felt themselves indebted to him for having taken them from the eboe people, and bringing them to the vessel. richard lander rummaged over the few things which had been left them from their disaster at kirree, and found to his surprise, five silver bracelets wrapped up in a piece of flannel. he was not aware of having these things, but he immediately offered them to him, along with a native sword, which being a very great curiosity, they had brought with them from yarriba, with the intention of taking it to england. boy accepted of them, and john lander then offered him his watch, for which he had a great regard, as it was the gift of one of his earliest and best friends. this was refused with disdain, for boy knew not its value, and calling one of his men to look at what, he said, the landers wished to impose on him in lieu of his bars, both of them, with a significant groan, turned away from the landers with scorn and indignation, nor would they speak to them or even look at them again. the mortification of the landers was nearly now complete, but they were helpless, and the fault was not with them. boy now ventured to approach captain lake, on the quarter deck, and with an anxious petitioning countenance, asked for the goods, which had been promised him. prepared for the desperate game he was about to play, it was the object of lake to gain as much time as possible, that he might get his vessel under way, before he came to an open rupture. therefore, he pretended to be busy in writing, and desired boy to wait a moment. becoming impatient with delay, boy repeated his demand a second and a third time: "give me my bars." "i no will," said lake, in a voice of thunder, which could hardly have been expected from a frame so emaciated as his. "i no will, i tell you; i won't give you a--flint. give me my mate, you black rascal, or i will bring a thousand men of war here in a day or two; they shall come and burn down your towns, and kill every one of you; bring me my mate." terrified by the demeanor of lake, and the threats and oaths he made use of, poor king boy suddenly retreated, and seeing men going aloft to loosen the sails, apprehensive of being carried off to sea, he quickly disappeared from the deck of the brig, and was soon observed making his way on shore in his canoe, with the rest of his people; this was the last they saw of him. in a few minutes from the time boy had left the vessel, the mate, mr. spittle, was sent off in a canoe, so terrified were the brass people that a man of war would come, and put lake's threats into execution. at ten in the morning the vessel was got under way, and they dropped down the river. at noon the breeze died away, and they were obliged to let go an anchor to prevent their drifting on the western breakers, at the mouth of the river. a few minutes more would have been fatal to them, and the vessel was fortunately stopped, although the depth of water where she lay, was only five fathoms. the rollers, as the large high waves are called, which come into the river over the bar, were so high, that they sometimes passed nearly over the bow of the vessel, and caused her to ride very uneasily by her anchor. they had been obliged to anchor immediately abreast of the pilot's town, and expected every moment that they should be fired at from the battery. time was of the greatest importance to them; they had made boy their enemy, and expected before they could get out of the river, he would summon his people and make an attack upon them, whilst their whole party amounted only to twenty men, two thirds of whom were africans. the pilot also, whom lake had offended so much, was known to be a bold and treacherous ruffian. he was the same person, who steered the brig susan among the breakers, by which that vessel narrowly escaped destruction, with the loss of her windlass, and an anchor and cable. the fellow had done this, merely with the hope of obtaining a part of the wreck, as it drifted on shore. another vessel, a liverpool oil trader, was actually lost on the bar, by the treachery of the same individual, who having effected his purpose, by placing her in a situation, from which she could not escape, jumped overboard and swam to the canoe, which was at a short distance. the treatment of the survivors of this wreck is shocking to relate; they were actually stripped of their clothes, and allowed to die of hunger. it would be an endless task to enumerate all the misdeeds, that are laid to this fellow's charge, which have no doubt lost nothing by report, but after making all reasonable allowances for exaggeration, his character appears in a most revolting light, and the fact of his running these vessels on the bar, proves him to be a desperate and consummate villain. this same fellow is infinitely more artful and intelligent than any of his countrymen, and is one of the handsomest black men that the landers had seen. not long after they had dropped the anchor, they observed the pilot, with the help of the glass, walking on the beach, and watching them occasionally. a multitude of half-naked, suspicious-looking fellows, were likewise straggling along the shore, while others were seen emerging from a grove of cocoa trees, and the thick bushes near it. these men were all armed, chiefly with muskets, and they subsequently assembled in detached groups to the number of several hundreds, and appeared to be consulting about attacking the vessel. nothing less than this, and to be fired at from the battery, was now expected by them, and there was no doubt that the strength and loftiness of the brig only deterred them from so doing. the same people were hovering on the beach till very late in the evening, when they dispersed; many of them could be seen even at midnight, so that they were obliged to keep a good look-out till the morning. during the night, the vessel rode very uneasily, in consequence of the long heavy waves which set in from the bar; these are technically called by sailors _ground swell_, being different from the waves which are raised while the wind blows; the latter generally break at the top, while the former are quite smooth, and roll with great impetuosity in constant succession, forming a deep furrow between them, which, with the force of the wave, is very dangerous to vessels at anchor. their motions were still closely watched by the natives. about eleven they got under way, but were obliged to anchor again in the afternoon, as the water was not deep enough for the vessel to pass over the bar. the mate sounded the bar again, and placed a buoy as a mark for the vessel to pass over in the deepest water. on the following morning, the wind favouring them, they made another attempt at getting out of the river. they had already made some progress, when the wind again died away, and the current setting them rapidly over to the eastern breakers, they were obliged to let go an anchor to save them from destruction. they could see nothing of the buoy, and no doubt was entertained that it was washed away by the current. their anchorage was in three and a half fathom water, and the ground swell, which then set in, heaved the vessel up and down in such a frightful manner, that they expected every moment to see the chain cable break. as soon as they dropped their anchor, the tide rushed past the vessel at the rate of eight miles an hour. after the ebb tide had ceased running, the swell gradually subsided, and the vessel rode easily. the mate was again sent to sound the bar, and in about three hours afterwards, returned with the information that two fathoms and three quarters was the deepest water he could find. the bar extended across the mouth of the river in the form of a crescent, leaving a very narrow and shallow entrance for vessels in the middle, which was generally concealed by the surf and foam of the adjacent breakers. when the wind is light and the tide high, and the surface of the water smooth, excepting in a few places, the bar is then most dangerous. they observed several fires made by the natives on the beach, which were supposed to be signals for them to return. they passed a restless and most unpleasant night. the captain and the people were much alarmed for the safety of the brig. the heavy ground swell, which set in, increased by the strength of the tide, caused her to pitch and labour so hard, that a man was placed to watch the cable, and give notice the moment it _complained_, a technical expression, which meant, the moment it gave signs of breaking. daylight had scarcely dawned, when the pall of the windlass broke. the purpose of this was to prevent the windlass from turning round on its axis against any strain to which it might be subjected, and consequently it was no sooner broken, than the windlass flew round with incredible velocity, having nothing to resist the strain of the cable, which was passed round it. the chain cable ran out so swiftly, that in half a minute the windlass was broken to atoms. the two landers with their people rendered all the assistance in their power to prevent the ship from drifting. they succeeded in fastening the cable to ring bolts in the deck, until they got sufficient of it clear to go round the capstan, which they had no sooner effected, than the ring bolts were fairly drawn out of the deck by the strain on the cable. about eight in the evening, a terrific wave, called by sailors a _sea_, struck the vessel with tremendous force, and broke the chain cable. "the cable is gone," shouted a voice, and the next instant the captain cried out in a firm, collected tone, "cut away the kedge," which was promptly obeyed, and the vessel was again stopped from drifting among the breakers. the man who had been stationed to look out on the cable, came running aft on deck, as soon as he had given notice of the danger, calling out that all was over. "good god!" was the passionate exclamation of every one, and a slight confusion ensued. but the captain was prepared for the worst, he gave his orders with firmness, and behaved with promptness and intrepidity. "we were riding by the kedge, a small anchor, which, however, was the only one left us, and on which the safety of the brig now depended. the breakers were close under our stern, and this was not expected to hold ten minutes; it was a forlorn hope, every eye was fixed on the raging surf, and our hearts thrilled with agitation, expecting every moment that the vessel would be dashed in pieces. a few long and awful minutes were passed in this state, which left an indelible impression on our minds. never," continues richard lander, "shall i forget the chief mate saying to me, 'now, sir, every one for himself, a few minutes will be the last with us.' the tumultuous sea was raging in mountainous waves close by us, their foam dashing against the sides of the brig, which was only prevented from being carried among them by a weak anchor and cable. the natives, from whom they could expect no favour, were busy on shore making large fires, and other signals, for us to desert the brig and land at certain places, expecting, no doubt, every moment to see her a prey to the waves, and those who escaped their fury, to fall into their hands. wretched resource! the sea would have been far more merciful than they." such was their perilous situation, when a fine sea breeze set in, which literally saved them from destruction. the sails were loosened to relieve the anchor from the strain of the vessel, and she rode out the ebb tide without drifting. at ten a.m. the tide had nearly ceased running out, and the fury of the sea rather abated, but it was quite impossible that the brig could ride out another ebb tide where she lay, with the kedge anchor alone to hold her; the only chance left them, therefore, was to get to sea, and the captain determined on crossing the bar, although there appeared to be little chance of success. at half-past ten a.m. he manned the boat with two of lander's men, and two kroomen belonging to the brig, and sent them to tow while the anchor was got on board. this had no sooner been done than the wind fell light, and instead of drifting over to the western breakers as on the two preceding days, the brig was now set towards those on the eastern side, and again they had a narrow escape. with the assistance of the boat and good management, they at length passed clear over the bar on the edge of the breakers, in a depth of quarter less three fathoms, and made sail to the eastward. their troubles were now at an end; by the protection of a merciful providence, they had escaped dangers, the very thoughts of which had filled them with horror, and with a grateful heart and tears of joy for all his mercies, they offered up a silent prayer of thanks for their deliverance. the bar extends about four or five miles from the mouth of the river, in a southerly direction, but is by no means known. this river is by far the best place on the whole coast, at which small vessels may procure oil, as it is the shortest distance from the eboe country, where the best palm oil is to be had in any quantity. the eboe oil is pronounced to be superior to that of any other part of the country, which is brought to the coast. the river is not much frequented, owing probably to its being unknown, and the difficulty of crossing the bar; for not more than five english vessels have been known to come to it, two of which are stated to have been lost, and a third to have struck on the bar, but being a new strong vessel, she beat over into deep water. the landers recommend any master going to the river for palm oil, to provide himself with two good strong six-oared boats for towing, and a double complement of kroomen. the expense of ten or twelve kroomen would be trifling, as they only require a few yams and a little palm oil to eat, and they are always ready to perform any laborious work which may be required of them. if masters of vessels coming to the river would send a boat before to sound, and have two good six-oared boats towing, it is supposed there would be no danger of any being lost, as has been the case with some, from being weakly manned. vessels are got under way with a fine breeze, and when they arrive in the most dangerous part, it dies away, and if there be no boats ready for towing, nothing can save them from destruction. vessels going out of the river are usually recommended to keep as near as possible to the western breakers, but this plan is supposed to be very dangerous, unless there be sufficient wind to keep command of them. when a vessel leaves her anchorage in the river, she will be set by the current over to the western breakers, and when half way to the bar, will be set over to the eastern, as the landers were. the river would be the safest in the month of december or january, as the rains in the interior would then be over, and all the extra water will have been discharged, which it has received in the extent of country through which it has run. when no english vessels are in the river, the people of bonny come and purchase the palm oil from the brass people, probably for the purpose of supplying the ships in their river, as well as for their own uses. on the morning of november th, they discovered a strange vessel on their starboard beam, which directly made sail in chase of them. after firing a gun to make them stop, or to bring them to, as the sailors expressed themselves, she sent a boat on board of the brig, and we found her to be the black joke, tender to the british commodore's ship. the landers reported themselves to the lieutenant commanding her, under the hope of her taking them on board of his vessel and landing them at accra, from whence they thought it would be easy to find their way by one of his majesty's ships to ascension or st. helena, from either of which places an opportunity would offer for them to get home without delay. the orders, however, of the lieutenant were to run down the coast as far as the congo, and he recommended them to go to fernando po, where they would find every assistance, and a vessel about to sail soon for england. having obtained from them the intelligence that the spanish slaver was lying in the nun river ready to sail, he immediately altered his course for that river, for the purpose of capturing her. captain lake agreed to land them in his boat at fernando po, as he passed the island on his way to the river camaroons, and they again made sail to the westward. they were two days in making their passage to fernando po, and on the morning of december st, to their great satisfaction, they discovered the island. they were glad to get out of the thomas, for the unfeeling commander, notwithstanding that lander's men had rendered him every service in getting his brig out of the river, and had done every thing required of them, afterwards employed every means he could think of to annoy them, and to make them uncomfortable, while they were with him. at night, while the people were sleeping, he would make his men draw water, and throw it over them, for mere amusement. there are many commanders as bad as he is on the coast, who seem to vie with each other in acts of cruelty and oppression. the captain of the palm oil brig elizabeth, now in the calebar river, actually whitewashed his crew from head to foot, while they were sick with fever, and unable to protect themselves; his cook suffered so much in the operation, that the lime totally deprived him of the sight of one of his eyes, and rendered the other of little service to him. in the afternoon they were happily landed at clarence cove, in the island of fernando po, where they were most kindly received by mr. becroft, the acting superintendent. this worthy gentleman readily supplied them with changes of linen, and every thing they stood in need of, besides doing all he could to make them comfortable. the kindness and hospitality they received from him and dr. crichton in particular, made a grateful impression on the hearts of the landers. accustomed as they had been during the last month, to the monotonous sameness of a low flat country, the banks of the river covered with mangroves overhanging the water, and in many parts, in consequence of its extraordinary height, apparently growing out of it; the lofty summit of fernando po, and the still loftier mountains of the camaroons, on the distant mainland, presented a sublime and magnificent appearance. the highest mountain of the camaroons, is a striking feature on this part of the coast, being more than thirteen thousand feet high. the land in its vicinity is low and flat, which renders the appearance of this mountain still more imposing, as it towers majestically over the surrounding country in solitary grandeur. it divides the embouchures of the spacious rivers old calebar and del rey on the west, from the equally important one of the cameroons on the east. the island of fernando is detached about twenty miles from the coast, and appeared to them, when they first saw it, in two lofty peaks connected by a high ridge of land. the northern peak is higher than the other, which is situated in the southern part of the island, and rises gradually from the sea to the height of ten thousand seven hundred feet. in clear weather the island can be seen at the distance of more than a hundred miles; but this is not always the case, as the summit is most frequently concealed by clouds and fogs, which are common at certain seasons of the year. as they approached the island in fine weather, and with a moderate wind, they had ample time to observe it. the shore is formed mostly of a dark coloured rock, and covered with trees which reach down to the water's edge. the whole of the lower part of the island is covered with fine forest trees of various descriptions, extending about three fourths up the sides of the mountain, where they became thinly scattered, stinted in their growth, and interspersed with low bushes and a brown dry grass. in various parts, patches of cultivated ground may be seen along with the huts of the natives, presenting, with the luxuriant foliage of the trees, a mass of verdure in the most flourishing condition. nature has here done her utmost; the whole appearance of the island is of the most beautiful description, and fully justifies its title to the name of _ilha formosa_, signifying, "beautiful island," which it first received. as they approached it still nearer, the stupendous precipices, and wide fissures near the summit of the principal mountain, became more distinct, by the contrast between their dark recesses and the lights on the projecting rocks, until by the proximity of the observers to the shore, the whole became concealed behind the lesser height next to the sea. until the year , the island lay forsaken and neglected in its primitive condition, neither the portuguese nor spaniards having thought it worth their consideration. at length, the attention of the british government was directed to it, in consequence of its favourable position for putting a stop to the slave trade in that quarter of africa. situated within a few hours sail of the coast, in the immediate vicinity of those rivers, commencing with the camaroons on the east, and extending along the whole of the gold coast, where the principal outlets of this unlawful traffic are found, fernando po presented advantages, which were sufficient to authorize a settlement being formed on it, and captain w. owen sailed from england for that purpose, in his majesty's ship eden, with the appointment of governor, and with commander harrison under his orders. captain owen had been previously employed on an extensive and difficult survey of the coasts of africa, both in the atlantic and indian oceans, in which the shores of this island were included, and therefore, having visited it before, he was no stranger either to its nature and resources, or to the climate in which it is situated. previously to the arrival of captain owen, the island had been occasionally visited by some of the ships on the african station, for the purpose of obtaining supplies of vegetables and water, and perhaps now and then a liverpool trader would be seen there waiting for palm oil, or recovering the health of her crew from fevers obtained in the rivers on the coast. as the natives reside some distance in the interior, the arrival of a ship of war at the island, was announced to them by the discharge of a cannon on board, which was sufficient to bring them to the sea side, with whatever vegetables, poultry, and other articles they might wish to sell. the articles mostly demanded by them in return, were pieces of iron-hoop, knives, and nails. at first, a piece of iron-hoop about six inches long, would purchase a pair of fowls or four yams, so great was the value which the natives attached to iron. the business of forming a new settlement, is a species of service that requires the exercise of certain qualities of the mind, which it is not the good fortune of every one to possess. in addition to the pernicious effects of the climate on european constitutions, there were people on the island, who, although they might be unable to offer any serious impediment to the progress of the settlement, it was necessary to conciliate than treat them with hostility, and for this, no one could have been better calculated than captain owen. whatever may have induced him to relinquish the appointment of governor, no measures for gaining the friendship of the natives, and thereby securing their good will towards the colony, could have been better than those which he adopted, and the chiefs even now frequently mention his name. the part selected as the site of the proposed settlement, was on the northern side of the island on the borders of a small cove, formed by a narrow neck of land projecting out from the shore on the eastern side of it. this was named "point william," and the cove, together with the whole establishment was called "clarence," after his most gracious majesty, who was then lord high admiral of great britain. point adelaide with two small islets off it, connected by a sand bank, forms the western boundary of the cove, and is distant about half a mile from point william. goderich bay lies to the east, and cockburn cove to the west of clarence cove. under the able direction of captain owen, the various buildings were planned, while the operation of clearing the ground was going forward. a flag staff, which formerly stood on the extremity of point william, was removed to the governor's house; and a large commodious building, with a few solitary palm trees near it, is the first object which attracts attention. this building was assigned as the hospital, and was judiciously situated here, as it was the most exposed to the sea breeze, and stood completely isolated from the rest of the settlement, both which precautions were of no small importance in the climate of fernando po. a small, round-topped building at a short distance from the hospital, with a few huts near it, and surrounded by stakes, was formerly the magazine, and near it was another large building, used as the marine barracks. the officers' quarters, and those of the african corps, were next in succession, and announced their military character by a piece of artillery mounted close to them, and pointed towards the cove. the governor's house, a large, spacious building, stands eminently conspicuous, on the precipice of the shore beneath, which is the landing place. from hence, a fatiguing walk leads immediately to it, up an ascent of about one hundred feet. a battery of seven guns were landed for this purpose from his majesty's ship, esk, which were placed in a very commanding situation in front of the governor's house. the house of the mixed commission for the adjudication of captured slave vessels, stands in an unfinished state, at a short distance from the governor's. various other buildings occupy point william, which are diversified by a few trees, that give it a pleasing and picturesque appearance from the sea. this remark is generally made by those who first visit clarence cove, and all are pleased on first seeing it. in addition to the buildings just enumerated, mr. lloyd has a tolerably good house, and the surgeon of the colony, who is a naval officer, has also one assigned for his residence. the kroomen and free negroes, who amount to about two thousand in number, have a collection of small, neat huts, at a short distance from government house, which are constructed of wood, and thatched with palm leaves. they are very careful of them, and have a small garden in the front as well as behind, in which they cultivate indian corn, bananas, peppers, &c. these huts form two small streets, but they are daily receiving additions from new comers. the work of clearing the ground is constantly going forward and is performed by the free negroes, the african troops, and the kroomen. the principal disease amongst these people, which arises from accidents in cutting down the trees, is ulcerated legs, and sixteen of them were in the hospital from this cause alone. the kroomen are a particular race of people, differing entirely from the other african tribes. they inhabit a country called sotta krou, on the coast near cape palmas; their principal employment being of a maritime nature. their language, as well as their general character, is also different from that of their neighbours. a certain number of these men are always employed on board of the ships of war on the african coast, for the purpose of performing those duties where considerable fatigue and exposure to the sun are experienced. in consequence of their roving employment, they are to be found on all parts of the coast, and are sufficiently acquainted with it to serve as pilots. it is customary with them to establish themselves on various parts of the coast for this purpose, and to leave the elders of their tribes in their own country, unless their presence should be required by any war that might take place. they are said to return to their country after an absence of several years, when they have amassed by their industry, sufficient to maintain themselves, and some among them are intelligent and active, but they are not always to be trusted, although they are a very superior class of people, in comparison with other african tribes. besides a watering place at a short distance to the right of the governor's house, two small streams, hay brook and horton brook, run into goderich bay, affording plenty of excellent water, and capable of admitting boats. the watering place, above-mentioned, is generally frequented, from the convenience with which the water is obtained, being connected to the sea side by a wooden aqueduct, under which boats may lie and fill their casks very easily without removing them. when the landers arrived, clarence establishment consisted of the superintendent, or acting governor, mr. becroft, who was generally known by the title of captain; captain beattie, the commander of the portia, colonial schooner; mr. crichton, a naval surgeon; lieutenant stockwell, with a party of five or six marines; a mulatto ensign of the royal african corps, with two black companions from sierra leone, and some carpenters and sail-makers, besides a mulatto, who filled the office of clerk or secretary to mr. becroft; an english merchant of the name of lloyd, in the employment of mr. smith, whose residence has been already mentioned. no place, in point of convenience, could have been better selected for a settlement, than that on which clarence is situated. the bay affords safe anchorage for shipping, from the furious tornadoes, which are common in this part of the world, and is sufficiently capacious to shelter as many vessels as are likely to visit the island; it abounds with fish, and is free from sunken rocks, and the shore is steep and easy of access to boats. there is another bay, called george's bay, on the western side of the island, but it has the disadvantage of being open to that quarter, and consequently affords no safety to shipping. the proximity of clarence cove to the coast of africa, is also another important point in favour of the object for which the establishment was formed. the natives of fernando po are the filthiest race of people in the whole world. they are different in their manners and appearance from their neighbours on the coast, to whom the landers had of late been so much accustomed, and possess no single trait of character similar to them, except that of pilfering. in point of civilization, to which the natives of brass town have not the most distant pretensions, these people have even still less; their language is totally different, and they have no resemblance whatever to them. this in itself affords a tolerable proof of the little intercourse they have had with the world, for while the other islands of the gulf are plentifully stocked with the same race of people as those of the coast, fernando po which is so much nearer to it, is inhabited by a totally different class. they are, generally speaking, a stout, athletic, and well-made race of people, and peculiarly harmless and peaceably inclined in their dispositions, although each individual is generally armed with a spear about eight feet in length, made of a hard wood, and barbed at one end. they appeared also to be a healthy race of people, for although here and there one or two might be less favoured by nature in their persons, no signs of the diseases so common among the natives of africa were to be seen amongst them. they have already been described as a filthy race, but no words can convey an idea of their disgusting nature. they have long hair, which it is difficult to distinguish, from being matted together with red clay and palm oil. the clay and oil are so profusely laid on; that it forms an impenetrable shield for the head, and the long tresses, which descend to their shoulders, are generally in a moist condition. although this covering is a complete safeguard to all inconvenience from without, they still further adorn their heads with a kind of cap, made of dry grass, ornamented round the border with the feathers of fowls, or any other bird, carefully stuck into it apart from each other. some are so vain as to affix the horns of a ram in front of this cap, which gives them a most strange and ludicrous appearance. finally, the cap with all its ornaments of feathers, horns, shells, &c. is secured in its place with a piece of stick, which answers the purpose by being forced through it on one side and out on the opposite, after passing underneath the hair. sometimes this elegant pin, as it may be called, is formed of the leg bone of some small animal, and is pointed at one end for the purpose of penetrating more easily. the expression of their countenance, scared and marked as it is, and surmounted by the cap already described, is wild and barbarous. they smear their faces entirely over with red clay, mixed with palm oil, sometimes a kind of grey dust is used instead of the clay, and this preparation being equally distributed over their whole persons, renders their presence scarcely tolerable. it is difficult to find out the colour of their skin under the filthy covering of oil and clay by which it is concealed, but it is believed not to be so dark as the african negro, and more resembling a copper colour. the natives make use of no other dress than the cap, which they wear on their heads, but a few leaves, or a bunch of dried grass, are usually secured round the middle by the people of both sexes, while the younger, naturally unconscious of indecency, go entirely naked. the vertebrae of snakes, the bones of fowls and birds, as well as sheep, broken shells, small beads, and pieces of cocoa nut shell are put in requisition by the natives, for the ornament of their persons. a profusion of these strung together hang round the waist, which it seems to be the principal care to decorate in this manner, while their necks are scarcely less favoured with a proportion of these articles. strings of them are also fastened round the arms and legs, but not in such quantities as round the waist. the pieces of hoop they have obtained from the ships which have visited the island, are formed into rude knives, or polished, and worn on the arm, in a kind of band made of straw, and are much valued. in their first intercourse with europeans, the natives were very shy, and displayed much fear, but this gradually wore off, and they now venture boldly on board for the purpose of obtaining knives, hatchets, or any thing they can get. they have a few canoes of small dimensions, capable of containing ten or twelve people, but are not very expert in the management of them, although they are so far advanced as to make use of a mast and sail, which latter is constructed of a sort of mat. they seem to be little addicted to the water, and none were seen amongst them; who could swim. in their fishing excursions, the natives are generally very successful, and those who pursue this mode of obtaining their livelihood, are compelled to adhere to it, and allowed to have nothing to do with cultivating the land. they exchange their fish for yams, and thus the wants of the fishermen and the cultivators are both supplied. on the first visit of ships to this island, very considerable aversion was shown by the natives to any of their people attempting to go to their huts, or even to their endeavouring to penetrate into the woods, although only a short distance from the shore, from a fear perhaps of their plantations being plundered. their huts, which are of the rudest construction imaginable, may be distinctly seen amongst the trees in small groups, surrounding a clear space of ground, in which they cultivate the yam, and are formed of a few stakes driven firmly into the ground, thatched over with the palm leaf, the sides being completed with a sort of wicker work. they are about ten or twelve feet long, and half that in breadth, and not more than four or five feet in height. their only furniture consists of some long flat pieces of wood, raised a few inches from the ground, and slightly hollowed out, to answer the purpose of sleeping in. numerous instances have occurred, of the thieving propensities of the natives, and it required, at first, a considerable degree of vigilance to prevent them from being successful, but it is due to the chiefs to say, that since the establishment of clarence, they have invariably taken an active part in putting a stop to it. whatever may have been their habits previously to the formation of the settlement, they seem to be little improved by their intercourse with the settlers. their principal chief has received the formidable appellation of cut-throat from captain owen, a name, by which he will be known as long as he lives. this fellow is a most determined savage, and seems to have lost none of his natural propensities by communicating with the settlers. he has received innumerable presents from the english, of clothes, and a variety of things, which are all thrown away upon him, and he goes about as usual, wearing his little hat, with feathers stuck in it, and the long grass about his waist, disdaining such useless coverings as he imagines them. this is not to be wondered at, for accustomed as he has been all his life time, to the unrestrained freedom of his whole person, it would be rather a matter of surprise to see him make use of them, particularly in the climate of fernando po, where one almost wishes to follow the example of the natives, excepting in the use of their clay and palm oil. no doubt cut-throat thinks this quite a sufficient covering. the natives pay frequent visits to the colony, and, however they may deal out justice amongst themselves, are by no means backward in seeing it administered among the free negroes and kroomen of clarence. it frequently happens, that in the scarcity of live stock, some of the former, unable to restrain their desire for more substantial food, and tired of their indian corn, venture to help themselves to what the natives will not bring them; parties of these people are accordingly formed, who find their way to the huts of the natives in the interior, and steal their yams, goats, and sheep, or whatever they meet with. these depredations are sure to bring the unfortunate owners to the colony with complaints of their losses, which are laid before the governor. the negroes are then mustered before them, and the native who has been plundered, is allowed, if he can do so, to point out the thief. if he should be successful, which is frequently the case, he is allowed to witness the punishment, which the offender is sentenced to receive, and generally gets some recompense for his loss. on the sunday after the arrival of the landers at clarence, a party of four kroomen set off into the interior, with the full determination of plunder, let the consequences be what it might. they had not gone far before they met with a goat belonging to a native, which they immediately shot, and returned with it carefully concealed, that they might not be discovered. their precautions, however, were of little avail, for the owner of the animal accompanied by a party of his friends, made his appearance at clarence the next morning, and preferred his complaint in strong terms against the luckless kroomen, whom, it appeared, he knew perfectly well. the kroomen were accordingly mustered, and the very four, who had gone on this unfortunate expedition, were pointed out with exultation by the natives. the law took its course, the kroomen each received one hundred and fifty lashes from the african drummer, usually employed on these occasions, while the natives stood by, to see that the punishment was duly performed. this they did to admiration, by counting the number of lashes each received; and having witnessed the last punished, with eyes sparkling with brutal satisfaction at the tortures of the unfortunate sufferers, they went away quite satisfied. the place where this disagreeable operation is performed, is in the barrack yard, on point william, between the officers' house and the hospital. the culprit is tied up to a kind of strong gallows, erected for the purpose. two stout pieces of timber, about seven or eight feet high, are driven perpendicularly into the ground, about four feet apart from each other, a piece is secured firmly across them at the top, and another at a short distance from the ground. the hands of the man who is to be punished, are tied at each end of the upright pieces, and his legs are secured to the same on each side below, in which position he is exposed to the merciless scourge of the drummer, which is a common cat-o-nine-tails. it is painful even to think of such scenes as these, and when they take place at the mere whim and caprice of the hardened slave merchant, such a picture is revolting in the extreme. here, however, severe as it may appear, it must be looked upon in a different point of view. the punishment is great, but with the certainty of receiving it, if discovered, the negro will run the risk of incurring it, by what may be termed the breach of the first law of civilized society. in addition to the tendency it has to keep the free blacks in control, such a proceeding convinces the natives of the island, that their depredations are not sanctioned by the colony. were some punishment not instituted to curb the restless, pilfering propensities of these people, no order could be maintained; they would return to a worse condition, than that which they were in at first, and the colony would no longer be secure; for the natives of the island, finding their homes invaded, and their property carried off, unable to obtain redress, would soon take the law into their own hands, and would either murder the colonists, or drive them from the island. therefore, although a severe one, it is a salutary measure, and it has no doubt done much towards keeping the natives themselves honest. what punishment is adopted by the natives, the landers were not able to ascertain. the chiefs appear to possess considerable authority over them, and it is not improbable that the custom of the settlement is imitated in some shape or other. the only weapon used by the natives, excepting the knife before mentioned, is a spear, of about eight feet in length, made of iron wood, and barbed at one end. the nature of the wood is so hard, as not to require the protection of iron at the end, and they did not see any pointed with it. they are very plentiful amongst the natives, who do not appear to attach any particular value to them. the landers during their stay had no opportunity of witnessing their expertness with them, but they are said to use them for killing monkeys and other animals. the resources of the island, in point of provisions are exhausted, or the natives are determined to reserve what are left for their own purposes. on the first formation of the establishment, they gladly brought to market all they had to dispose of, in the same manner as they had done to any vessel that chanced to visit the island. these consisted of a few goats, sheep, and fowls, of a very poor quality, and plenty of yams, which were all readily exchanged for pieces of iron hoop, of about six inches long. a piece of hoop of this length would purchase a goat, three or four fowls, or a large bundle of yams, weighing about twenty pounds. as their stock became exhausted, so the iron hoops became less valuable; more were demanded, until the natives could no longer supply the settlement, and had enough to do to provide for themselves, when they discontinued their supplies, and the settlement, not yet able to provide for itself, is dependent on supplies from the calebar, and other rivers near it. bullocks are stated by the natives, to be plentiful on the hills in the interior, but the landers did not hear of any having been seen by the people of clarence, and they are generally obtained from the calebar river. deer are also said to be on the island, abundance of wild fowl, and a great number of monkeys, some black and others of a brown colour. parrots are also innumerable, and the natives are particularly partial to them and monkeys for food. turtle have been caught in the bay, as well as fish, but these supplies are uncertain, and, therefore, not to be depended upon. the island is entirely mountainous, and contains a fine rich soil, capable of producing any thing required of it. several small mountain streams fall into the sea, the largest of which are the two, named hay and horton brooks, before mentioned. the principal vegetable cultivated by the natives is the yam, with which they are particularly successful. the best yams of the island are said to be those of george's bay, which are very large, and of an uncommonly fine flavour. the supply of these at clarence is now very limited, and not to be depended on always, which may be probably to a difference in the season for growing them. this deficiency has been in some measure remedied by the construction of a government garden, from which some men of war have received supplies, but these are not sufficient to supply the wants of the colony, and recourse is had for them to the calebar river. palm wine at the colony, as well as on the coast, is the common and favourite drink of the natives. it is easily procured in any quantity, and is used in either an unfermented state, when just fresh from the tree, or after it has been kept some days. it seems peculiarly intended by a bountiful providence for the untutored and destitute indian, who is unable to supply himself with those beverages which are the result of art. the palm tree affords him a pleasant drink, a valuable oil, a fruit from the nut, and besides food, it furnishes him with a material to construct his hut, and is always ready for any immediate purpose. the juice, which is called "wine," is obtained by making a hole in the trunk of the tree, and inserting a piece of the leaf into it, so as to form a spout; the liquid flows through this, and is received in a calabash placed beneath it, which probably holds two or three gallons, and will be thus filled in the course of a day. it shortly assumes a milky appearance, and is either used in this state, or preserved till it acquires rather a bitter flavour. the produce of the palm tree, fish, and yams, form the principal food of the natives; they devour monkeys when they can get them. this method of obtaining the juice of the palm tree is exactly similar to that which is adopted by the indians of north america, with respect to the maple tree. a hole is made in the same manner in the trunk of the tree, and a piece of birch bark inserted into it as a spout, which, from its peculiar nature, answers the purpose remarkably well. the juice of the maple instead of being preserved is converted into sugar by evaporation. there are various sorts of timber at fernando po, amongst which the african oak is very plentiful, and particularly so in george's bay, where it grows close to the sea side; satin wood, ebony, lignum vitæ, yellow cam wood, and several sorts of mahogany, besides other wood of a very hard nature, grow in profusion all over the island, and may probably hereafter become valuable. the landers had the good fortune to arrive at the island during the season of fine weather, but they had not enjoyed much of the sea breeze, which about noon, sometimes set in from the north west quarter, the harmattan is said to be experienced here, although it extends not to the other islands of the gulf. this wind, which passes over the sands of africa, would be almost insupportable, were it not for the sea breezes. while the harmattan lasts, the dryness in the atmosphere produces an unpleasant feeling, although it is said not to be injurious to health. the atmosphere is filled with a fine light sand, which prevents objects from being distinctly seen; the sun loses its brilliancy, and everything appears parched and suffering from a want of moisture. the effect of the harmattan after the rainy season is said to be most beneficial in drying up the vapours with which the atmosphere is loaded, and it has been observed, that on the return of this wind at the end of the rainy season, the recovery of invalids commences. the harmattan has also the effect of drying up the skin of the natives in a very extraordinary manner. after an exposure to it, the skin peals off in white scales from their whole body, which assumes an appearance as if it were covered over with white dust. the islands in the gulf of guinea, with the exception of fernando po, have each a capital town of some consequence, and although they produce sufficient supplies for ships that visit them, and carry on a small trade, it is much to be doubted, whether they are not more indebted for their importance to the slave trade than any other source. with respect to prince's island and st. thomas, they are known to be the receptacles for slaves from the coast, from whence they are re-embarked and conveyed away as opportunities offer; and the natives of the small island of anna bon, appear to be living in constant fear of the same, from the effects of their former treatment by the spaniards. the natives of anna bon, have a tradition that they once belonged to the portuguese, and exhibit proofs of their having been formerly initiated in the ceremonies of the roman catholic religion. they are said to be particularly careful, when any stranger visits their settlement, to let them see their church, which is appropriately situated for this purpose immediately opposite the landing place. at present, by all accounts, they are living in a state of natural simplicity and ignorance of the world. some idea may be formed of the condition of their minds, by a story that is currently related of them, in which the effects of their former tuition are apparent. the king once gravely told a visitor, with an idea of impressing him with his importance, that a short time previously to his arrival, he had held a conference with the supreme being, from whom he had learnt the cause of a recent sickness which had visited them, and also that he had approved of his being the king of the island. other stories, equally nonsensical, are told of them, such as might be expected from people in this half-informed condition. but the old king's word was sufficient for his subjects, and this assurance was quite enough to satisfy the harmless, inoffensive creatures, that he was their legitimate king. although anna bon is a healthy island in comparison with any other in the gulf of guinea; it is too far removed from the coast to be of use in putting down the slave trade, unless it were made a rendezvous for half a dozen steam vessels, which would do more than any other class of vessels towards effecting this object. favourable as the situation of clarence is for the purpose for which it is intended, it is much to be regretted that it is so unhealthy for europeans. during the stay of the landers on the island, four deaths occurred; these persons were the sail maker, one of the carpenters of the colony, a seaman of the portia, a colonial schooner, and one of the crew of the susan, an english brig that they found there, on their arrival. the susan was in the calebar, waiting for a cargo, when her crew were attacked with fever, which quickly carried off her captain, mates, and left only one person alive. the vessel thus reduced, was without her crew to bring her out of the river, much less to complete her cargo, and she might have remained there till the last had died, but for the watchful attention of mr. becroft, who brought her to clarence with a party of men, and after putting a new mast into her, and doing all in his power to set the vessel in order, supplied her with provisions and fresh people, and sent her to sea. the landers were offered a passage in her to england, but declined accepting it in consequence of the condition in which she had been. she was afterwards obliged to stop at cape coast, in consequence of the fever having broken out afresh on board of her. the most melancholy account of the effects of the climate here, which came within the knowledge of the landers, was in the family of lieutenant stockwell, the officer commanding the party of marines, whose name has been already mentioned. this gentleman had brought his wife and a large family with him from the island of ascension, who were residing with his brother officer in a building called the waterfall house, which had been erected by captain owen. mr. stockwell successively lost five of his children, and five servants, the latter of whom successively died, as they came into his service. his brother officer also died, making eleven in number, and mr. stockwell and his wife narrowly escaped with their lives. the house was in consequence deserted by them, and since been occupied by the black people. the fever, which attacks europeans at this island, is said to be similar to the yellow fever in the west indies. the symptoms are the same, from the commencement to the end of the disease, and it is equally as summary in its effects. george's bay, is said to be far healthier than clarence, and being on the western side of the island, receives the full benefit of the sea breeze, while at clarence, the wind is later, and is interrupted by land to the westward of it. in addition to this, the sea breeze passes over a long and disagreeable swamp in its progress to clarence, which no doubt charges it with all kinds of noxious vapours. george's bay, besides having the benefit of a pure sea breeze, has a good deal of clear land about it, and equally as good a soil as clarence. it is more than probable, as the landers had now ascertained, that a water communication may be carried on with so extensive a part of the interior of africa, that a considerable trade will be opened with the country through which they had passed. the natives only require to know what is wanted from them, and to be shown what they will have in return, and much produce that is now lost from neglect, will be turned to a considerable account. the countries situated on the banks of the niger, will become frequented from all the adjacent parts, and this magnificent stream will assume an appearance, it has never yet displayed. the first effects of a trade being opened, will be to do away with the monopoly near the mouth of the river, which has hitherto been held by the chiefs of the lower countries. steam boats will penetrate up the river even as far as lever, at the time of year in which the landers came down, and will defy the efforts of these monopolists to arrest their progress. the steam engine, the greatest invention of the human mind, will be a fit means of conveying civilization amongst the uninformed africans, who, incapable of comprehending such a thing, will view its arrival amongst them with astonishment and terror, and will gradually learn to appreciate the benefits they will derive, and to hail its arrival with joy. in this case, fernando po will become of still greater consequence, and will no doubt be a depot of considerable importance. it was, however, the opinion of richard lander, that much expense would be saved, and above all, many valuable lives, if it were possible to adopt george's bay, as the place for the principal establishment. of the different parts of the coast, accra is the most healthy, and were it nearer, lander would recommend it for such a purpose, the soil being good and clear of underwood for many miles round. but the distance at which it lies from the mouth of the river is too great for such a purpose. on the rd december, mr. becroft, the superintendent, invited richard lander to accompany him in the portia, to the calebar river, whither he was going to procure stock for the use of the colony. the place from which this is obtained, is called ephraim town, where it appears to be very plentiful. being tired of fernando po, lander accepted his invitation, in order to pass away the time that they would still have to wait before they could get away, notwithstanding all their anxiety to reach home with the news of their discovery. john lander, being very ill, was unable to accompany them. richard, therefore, left him at clarence, and embarked with mr. becroft in the evening. they departed from clarence with a fine breeze, but found it necessary in going out, to be particularly careful of being drifted by the tide, either on point william, or on the adelaide islets at each extremity of the cove, as the tide always sets either towards the one or the other. in leaving the cove, it is best to keep, as near as possible, midway between the two extremes, and not to approach either the one or the other, nearer than can be possibly avoided. the currents in the gulf of guinea are stated to be very variable, although they are most generally from the westward, obeying the direction of the sea breeze. the harmattan generally produces a very strong westerly current in direct opposition to this, and the want of knowing it, has frequently proved fatal to vessels; the masters of which, imagining that they were under the influence of an easterly current, have been actually drifted many miles to the westward in the course of a single night, and have found themselves on shore the next morning; the violence of the current from the westward when the sea breezes are strong, is so great, that it is scarcely possible to believe, that a day or two of the harmattan would overcome it, but the effect of this is so powerful, that it is well known, to those, who have frequented the gulf, that the current produced by the harmattan, will even continue against the westerly winds, after they may have again set in. a remarkable instance is related of the velocity of the currents in the gulf, to the southward of fernando po. in the month of june, a vessel performed the passage between prince's island and st. thomas in twenty hours, which generally occupies from eight to ten days. the distance is about ninety three miles, and the vessel must have averaged from four to six miles per hour. the harmattan is said not to extend to the southward of fernando po, but this has not yet been fully ascertained. the passage through the gulf from fernando po to sierra leone, is generally extremely long and tedious, owing to the prevalence of calms and the different currents. it is usually made either by running to the southward and getting into the southeast trade, or by keeping in shore, as far as cape palmas, so as to benefit by the landwinds. the former method is generally recommended by the merchantmen as being safer and quicker, for a vessel adopting the latter, is more under the dangerous influence of the currents, besides being obliged to keep close to the shore; it is also adopted by the merchantmen in their homeward voyage. sometimes vessels by taking a mean between these two methods, get between two different winds, by which means they lose the benefit of both, and are delayed by calms and rains. this part, according to accurate information, is at the distance of sixty miles from the land, so that vessels should pass either far without or else within that distance on leaving fernando po. in this part of the gulf of guinea, between fernando po and the calebar river, the rainy season is stated to commence in the month of july, and to be at the worst in august and september, accompanied by tornadoes of the most terrific description. the rains continue during november, and cease in the month of december, but the coast is said to be seldom many days together without a tornado. during the other months of the year, dry, hot weather is experienced, excepting about may, when slight rains take place. these rains are looked upon as the winter of the natives, and are considered by them equally as cold in their effects, as our winters in england are by ourselves. they are equally alive to the change of the seasons as in northern countries, and prepare themselves against the cold weather during the rains, comparatively with as much care, as we do against our winter's frost. the chief peculiarity of this climate, which distinguishes it from all others within the tropics, consists in the furious storms of wind and rain, accompanied by the most terrific thunder and lightning it is possible to imagine. these storms are known by the name of tornadoes, and one would be almost inclined to think that the ancient's belief of the torrid zone being of a fiery nature, and too hot for mankind to live in, originated in the exaggerated reports of them, which might have gradually found their way into the part of the world then known, and from which they were not very far distant. the landers witnessed three of these tornadoes, but they were trifling in their effects, compared with those which take place in the rainy season. they are described as being most violent, but happily of short duration; nothing can withstand the fury of the wind while they last, but they give sufficient indications of their approach, to enable the experienced mariner, who is ever on the watch for the changes in the weather, to reduce his sail on the ship, and put her head in that position, in which she is best able to withstand its effects, by running before the wind. this awful period lasts generally about a quarter of an hour, when the wind subsides rather suddenly, while the rain falls incessantly; shortly afterwards, the wind shifts round by the south to its old quarter, the west, until another tornado comes to disturb it. there are several peculiarities attending the tornadoes, which are rather remarkable. it has been remarked by experienced navigators, that they are much influenced by the different phases of the moon, that they generally commence with the full or new moon, at which time they are the most violent, and that they even come on at the time that the moon sets. the influence of the moon on the weather in other countries is doubted, but this is an extraordinary fact, relating to the tornadoes, which has been proved by experience. on saturday december th, after a pleasing passage, richard lander, in company with mr. becroft, anchored off ephraim town, in the calebar river. the distance from fernando po to the north of the calebar river, is about sixty miles, and ephraim town is distant about fifty miles, on the eastern bank. on their way up the river, the attention of richard lander was attracted by something of a very extraordinary appearance, hanging over the water from the branch of a tree. his curiosity was excited by it, and he was at a loss to conjecture what it was. he did not remain long in suspense, for they soon passed sufficiently near it to enable him to discover, that it was the body of one of the natives suspended by the middle, with the feet and hands just touching the water. so barbarous a sight quickly reminded him, that he was again amongst the poor deluded wretches on the coast, although he had not seen any thing so bad on his way down to the brig thomas, in the river nun. the natives of this place are pagans, in the most depraved condition, and know nothing of mahommedanism, nor any other creed. they believe in a good spirit, who they imagine dwells in the water, and sacrifices of human beings, such as that which has just been mentioned, are frequently made to him, with the idea of gaining his favour and protection. the object selected for this purpose is generally some unfortunate old slave, who may be worn out and incapable of further service, or unfit for the market, and he is there left to suffer death, either from the effects of the sun, or from the fangs of some hungry alligator or shark, which may chance to find the body. the circumstance of the hands and feet being just allowed to be immersed in the water, is considered by these deluded people as necessary, and they are thereby rendered an easier prey. it is usual with ships on their first arrival in the river, to be visited by duke ephraim, the chief of the town; a personage who is well known to the numerous liverpool traders, that frequent the river. the reason of this visit is, that the duke may receive his present, which consists generally of cloth, muskets, rum, or any articles of that description, and he always goes on board in great state, in his canoe, for this purpose, previously to which, no one is allowed to leave the ship. this regulation, which is a method of securing the port dues, affects those only, who come to the river for the purpose of trade, and as the portia was a government vessel, they were not included in the number of those, who had the port dues to pay. as soon as they had anchored, richard lander accompanied mr. becroft on shore, and proceeded with him to the duke's residence, for the purpose of paying their respects to him. a walk of about ten minutes brought them to his house, and they found him in the palaver square which belongs to it, busily engaged in writing, and surrounded by a great number of his principal people. it was something unusual to find a native chief thus employed, but the large dealings which duke ephraim appears to have with the liverpool merchants, accounts in some measure for this accomplishment, and the smattering of english which he has obtained. his only pretensions to dress, consisted in a smart, gold laced hat, which he wore, and a handsome piece of silk tied round his loins. his chief officers, who were next to him, also wore gold laced hats, while those next in rank wore silver lace, and the lower class contented themselves without either. they arrived at council time, but mr. becroft being immediately recognized by the duke, he received them very cordially, and made them sit down. duke ephraim bears the character of being always very civil and attentive to the english, and of making himself very active in supplying their wants of live stock. he has formed a favourable opinion of them, from the fine things they bring him, but his discernment goes beyond these; for the circumstance of slave vessels having being captured and taken out of the river, by the boats of the english ships of war on the station, has impressed him with admiration of their boldness and courage, and given him a very exalted opinion of their power. vessels of war formerly came up the river in search of slaves, and he has always received their commanders with much kindness, and assisted them all in his power; a trait in his character, which is rather extraordinary, when their object is considered, as he is the principal agent by whom supplies of slaves are furnished from the interior. none, however, are allowed to come up now, in consequence of the deaths that have occurred. after a short time, they were desired to go up stairs into his best room, and they accordingly ascended about thirty or forty wooden steps, and entered a spacious apartment, when the sight that presented itself was of the most extraordinary description. the room, which was about thirty feet in length, by about twenty in breadth, was literally crammed full of all kinds of european furniture, covered with cobwebs and dust about half an inch thick. elegant tables and chairs, sofas of a magnificent description, splendid looking-glasses, and prints of the principal public characters of england, as well as views of sea and land engagements, set in handsome gilt frames, beautifully cut glass decanters, and glasses, glass chandeliers, and a number of other things, too numerous to mention, were all mixed together in the utmost confusion. a handsome organ attracted the notice of lander, and a large, solid brass arm-chair, which from an inscription upon it, appeared to be the present of sir john tobin of liverpool. the inscription, or rather raised characters upon it were, "presented by sir john tobin of liverpool, to his friend duke ephraim," and vain enough is the chief of his present. he exhibits this chair with the rest of his presents to the people, or any stranger who may happen to visit him, and allows them to feast their eyes, as he imagines, on the goodly sight, but such are his care and pride of them, that he will not allow them to be touched by any one, and his attendants are not permitted to approach them, even for the purpose of cleaning off the dust which has accumulated since their first arrival. the whole of this miscellaneous assemblage of goods, are presents which have been made to the duke by merchants of liverpool, as well as french, spanish, and portuguese traders, and are the accumulation of a considerable length of time. duke town, or ephraim town, as it is known by both of these appellations, is situated on rather elevated ground, on the left or east bank of the river, and is of considerable size, extending principally along it. from the appearance of it, it may be concluded that its inhabitants amount to at least six thousand people. the houses are generally built of clay, like those of the eboe people. the breadth of the river opposite to it, is not quite so wide as the thames at waterloo bridge, and the opposite bank is not so high as that on which the town stands. the houses are built in an irregular manner, leaving very little room for the road between them, which at that time was exceedingly wet and dirty. the duke's house is situate in the middle of the town, and like the rest is built of clay. it consists of several squares, round each of which is a verandah, similar to the houses in yarriba. the centre square is occupied by the duke and his wives, the others being the abode of his servants and attendants, which altogether amount to a considerable number. immediately opposite to the first square, which forms the entrance to his residence, stands a small tree, profusely decorated with human skulls and bones. this tree is considered by the people as fetish or sacred, and is supposed to possess the virtue of preventing the evil spirit from entering the duke's residence. near the tree stands the house, which is inhabited by their priests, a class of beings, certainly in the most savage condition of nature that it is possible to imagine. the fetish priests of brass town, chalked themselves from head to foot, besides dressing after a fashion of their own, but these fellows outdo them far, and make themselves the most hideous and disgusting objects possible. whether it may be with the idea of personifying the evil spirit of whom they are so afraid, lander could not learn, but they go about the town with a human skull fastened over their face, so that they can see through the eye-holes; this is surmounted by a pair of bullock's horns; their body is covered with net, made of stained grass, and to complete the whole, and give them an appearance as ridiculous behind as they are hideous before, a bullock's tail protrudes through the dress, and hangs down to the ground, rendering them altogether the most uncouth looking beings imaginable. sometimes a cocked hat is substituted for the horns, and the skull of a dog or monkey used, which renders their appearance, if possible, still more grotesque. thus equipped, they are ready to perform the mysteries of their profession, which lander had not sufficient opportunity to inquire into, but which are quite enough to enslave the minds of the people. they seem to believe in a good and evil spirit; that the good spirit dwells in the river, which accounts for their sacrifices being made on it, and that the evil spirit dwells in a tree, which being full of human skulls, keeps him away from them. on the morning of the th, the duke's principal man came on board the portia to receive payment for some bullocks, which mr. becroft had purchased. there was something in his appearance which attracted the attention of lander, and he fancied that he seemed to be much dirtier than any that had been seen on the preceding day. on a nearer inspection, his head, and the whole of his body were found to be covered with ashes, and a very dirty piece of sackcloth fastened round his loins; besides this he appeared to be suffering great distress of mind, and presented a most wretched and woeful appearance. lander asked him the cause of his grief, and why he had covered himself with ashes in such a manner, when he gave the following relation of the cause of all his distress. it appeared that he had possessed six wives, one of whom was gifted with a larger share of personal charms than the rest, the consequence of which was, that she received more attention from him and was loved more than any of the others. this partiality naturally excited the jealousy of the other ladies, and mortified by his neglect of them, they were determined on revenge, and was resolved to get rid of their favoured rival by mixing poison with her food. they had just succeeded in effecting their purpose, which had caused the poor fellow much distress, and he had not recovered the effects of his loss on the morning on which he came onboard the portia. his tale was simple and unvarnished, and while he was relating it to lander, the tears were trickling down his face. lander never before saw a black man feel so much for the loss of a wife as he did. this remarkable custom of mourning in sackcloth and ashes, appears to be peculiar to these people, and it was ascertained that they do not cease to cover their bodies with them as long as their sorrow lasts. they do the same on the death of a relation, and it is the only instance of the kind that lander met with in the part of the country through which he had travelled. great uproar and confusion prevailed the whole of this day throughout the town occasioned by an adventure of the doctor with the duke's most favourite wife, which is likely to end tragically to the parties concerned. this person, who is the doctor of the town, it appears was the bosom friend of the duke, in whom the latter had the greatest confidence, and allowed him to visit his wives _professionally_ as often as he thought proper. the gentleman's visit had lately become so frequent as to excite suspicion and a look out was accordingly kept on all his movements. the poor doctor was soon caught in the snare; the motive of his visit was found to be of an illegal nature, and the enraged duke has ordered both to be bound hand and foot and thrown into the river on the following day. lander found seven french vessels lying in the river, one spanish, and two english. one of the latter, named the caledonia, a ship of five hundred tons burden, was the property of sir john tobin, of liverpool, which, with the other, the brig elizabeth were taking in a cargo of palm oil. the river calebar is very serpentine, and there is scarcely any other tree but the mangrove to be seen on its banks. the right bank is intersected by numerous creeks, well known to the natives, who frequent them in their canoes; they communicate with all the rivers that fall into the gulf of guinea, between this river and that on which benin is situated. the natives go as far as benin in their canoes, but there is no communication by water with the camaroons river, which seems to be totally distinct from the calebar. the canoes of the natives are the same sort as those of the eboe people. the river is full of crocodiles which are generally about twelve or fourteen feet long, and are very daring in their search of prey. a short time previous to their arrival two deaths had been occasioned by them. sir john tobin has a large store close to the river side, in which palm oil is kept for shipment on board the liverpool vessels, and one evening an unfortunate native boy, tired with his day's work, fell asleep on the shore. in the course of the night an alligator attacked him, and was awakened by finding himself in the jaws of the monster; his struggles and cries were all in vain; the powerful creature lacerated him in a dreadful manner, and tore off one of his legs, with which he retreated into the water, and the remains of the unfortunate boy were found the next morning shockingly disfigured and weltering in blood, the death of the other was occasioned by his losing an arm in a similar manner. provisions are generally dear at duke town. bullocks fetch twenty dollars each, and those not of a very good quality. goats and sheep are valued at three dollars, ducks at half a dollar each, and fowls at half a dollar a pair. yams are cultivated by the natives very successfully, and are considered the best flavoured and finest of the country. there are no cleared portions of ground on the banks of the river, and their cultivation of the yam and other vegetables is at a distance in the woods. since lander's first return to fernando po from the calebar river, he accompanied mr. becroft twice to duke town in the portia. in this interval the carnarvon, an english vessel had arrived with government stores from england for the establishment, and as she was going to rio janeiro for a cargo to take back, and there seemed to be no prospect at present of their getting away from fernando po by any other means, the landers requested mr. becroft to conclude an agreement for their passage to that place, from whence they hoped to be more successful in finding their way to england. about a week previously, the brig thomas, in which they came from the river nun, touched at the island on her way home from the camaroons, her commander, lake, supposing that they would take a passage with him. they had now been upon the island seven weeks, and they would have preferred staying seven more, rather than put themselves into his power again. they had experienced quite enough of his care and kindness, and therefore declined his offer of taking them. after waiting three days at the island, he sailed about six o'clock in the afternoon, and had not got more than a mile from the anchorage, when a large vessel with long, raking masts, suddenly appeared from behind a part of the island, and was seen in pursuit of him. they observed the vessel to fire several guns at him, which at length made him take in all sail and wait. no doubt was entertained that this vessel was a pirate, and their suspicions were confirmed the next day by seeing the two vessels lying becalmed close to each other. there were no signs of them on the following day, and they saw nothing more of the thomas. nor, indeed, was this vessel ever heard of again, in fact, the landers considered it a most providential escape, that they did not take their passage in her. no doubt rested on the minds of the people of the settlement that the stranger vessel was a pirate, and that when his people had murdered the crew of the thomas, with their captain, or had compelled them to walk the plank, as they usually do, that they sunk her after taking everything out of her which they wanted. "walking the plank," is literally walking into the sea. a plank is placed across the side of the ship, so that one end projects some distance over it while the other remains inside. the person condemned by these ruffians to this mode of death, which is generally chosen to avoid one of a more dreadful nature, is placed on the inner end of the plank, and compelled to walk along it till he reaches the outer end, which immediately yields to his weight, and he falls into the sea, never to rise again. to make shorter work of it, he is sometimes loaded with a large shot, which quickly carries him down. these fellows have another method of disposing of any unfortunate vessel that may fall into their hands; after having got rid of the captain and crew as above, they fill her with slaves, and send her across the atlantic, should the vessel be met with by any ship of war, she escapes examination, as her appearance when in the hands of her own commander was known, and therefore no suspicion is excited. everything being prepared for their departure they embarked on board the carnarvon,--garth, commander, for rio janeiro. the landers speak in terms of high commendation of the conduct observed towards them, during their stay at fernando, by mr. becroft, mr. crichton, and mr. beatty. everything was supplied them which the place could afford, and it was always a source of gratification to them to reflect on the time that they passed in their society. having taken leave of their friends, they embarked and bade adieu to the island of fernando po. mr. stockwell, the officer of marines, accompanied them on board, having taken his passage like themselves to return to england. their crew consisted of seven european seamen, two free negroes and one krooman, besides the commander of the vessel and two mates. so great, however, was the mortality amongst them, that before a week had elapsed, the two landers with the three black men were all that were left to work the vessel, and one of them only knew how to steer. richard lander was obliged to take the helm until twelve at night, and every morning after four, having only a few minutes allowed him to take a hasty meal, and in addition to their troubles, the vessel was so completely over-run with rats, that it was quite impossible to stay below with any comfort, and as for sleeping there, it was wholly out of the question. on the evening of the th march, the krooman fell into the sea. this poor fellow, whose name was yellow will, called loudly to them for help, and although the vessel was not sailing at a great rate, he missed every thing that was thrown overboard to save him. to have altered the ship's course would have endangered the masts and sails, and their small boat was so leaky that it would not swim. they had therefore no alternative, but were obliged to abandon him to his fate with the most painful feelings, and they heard his cries nearly an hour afterwards. [footnote] there is nothing more distressing than an accident of this nature. to see an unfortunate man grasping in vain at any thing which is thrown to him, as the ship passes by him, to see him struggling against his fate as he rises on the distant wave, which frequently conceals him from view, and to be unable to render him the least assistance, whilst his cries die away in the breeze, raise sensations which it is impossible to describe. this man in the condition in which they then were, particularly, was a great loss to them, and was the best amongst the black people. [footnote: we have given this as it is stated in lander's narrative, but there is something highly improbable in the circumstance of the cries of a man, who could not swim, being heard for an hour after his immersion in the sea, and yet that during that time no effectual means could be devised for his deliverance.] on the morning of the th, the weather was very hazy, which prevented them seeing the land, although they knew it to be at no great distance from them. they were becalmed during the whole of the day, but found by the decrease of the depth, that they were drifting close on towards the shore. at five in the afternoon, the ship was about a quarter of a mile from the land, discovered by three large hills of a sugar loaf appearance being close to them. finding by pieces of cork and other things that they threw into the water, that they were drifting fast on the breakers, which they could distinctly hear, they made an attempt to get the long boat out to save themselves, as they expected the ship would be very soon wrecked, but they found that they could not muster sufficient strength to lift her over the side. at this critical moment, a breeze of wind from off the land saved them from destruction, and enabled them to get the vessel under command. on the th march they arrived at rio janeiro, and on the following day paid their respects to admiral baker, the commander in chief on the south american station, and made known to him their situation and anxiety to return to england. the admiral received them in that kind and hospitable manner, which is the peculiar characteristic of a british seaman. he invited them to his table with his officers, and ordered them a passage in the william harris, a government transport, which was to sail for england in a day or two. accordingly on the th they sailed for england, and on the th june arrived at portsmouth, after a tedious voyage, and gladly landed with hearts full of gratitude for all their deliverance. one of the first steps which government adopted on the arrival of richard lander, was to issue an order to the authorities at cape coast castle, to pay to king boy the whole of his demand for the ransom of the landers, and thereby re-establishing that faith and good opinion with the natives of the country, touching the honour and integrity of the english character. this journey by individuals who make no pretensions to science, has not afforded materials for the illustration of any of its branches, but previously to the loss of the instruments, the range of the thermometer is recorded. at badagry, on the coast, where the heat was most oppressive, it was between ° and °, oftener stationary near the latter than the former point. at jenna it fell suddenly one day from ° to °, and remained stationary for some hours. at assinara at noon, on the rd april it attained the height of °. near katunga it fell upon one occasion to ° in the shade, the air being then cooler than they had felt it since landing. at kiama the extremes were ° and °, the mean °. at youri, the range was the same. on their voyage from youri to boussa, on the nd august, it varied from ° to °. at boussa it varied from ° to °, but most commonly between ° and °. at patashie, generally between ° and °, once °. lever ° to °. bajiebo ° to °. on the passage down the river below that place, on the th october, ° to °. belee ° to °. such has been the issue of this important voyage, by which the grand problem that perplexed europe during so many ages, and on which, for a period of nearly forty years, so many efforts and sacrifices had been expended in vain, was completely solved. british enterprise completed, as it had begun this great discovery. park in his first journey reached the banks of the niger, and saw it rolling its waters towards the interior of the continent. in the second he embarked at bammakoo, and by sailing downwards to boussa, proved its continuous progress for upwards of a thousand miles. the present voyage has exhibited it following a farther course, which with its windings must amount to about eight hundred miles, and finally emptying itself into the atlantic. this celebrated stream is now divested of that mysterious character, which surrounded it with a species of supernatural interest. rising in a chain of high mountains, flowing through extensive plains, receiving large tributaries, and terminating in the ocean, it exhibits exactly the ordinary phenomena of a great river. but by this discovery we see opened to our view a train of most important consequences. the niger affords a channel of communication with the most fertile, most industrious, and most improved regions of interior africa. its navigation is very easy and safe, unless at intervals between boussa and youri, and between patashie and lever, and even there it becomes practicable during the _malca_ or flood, produced by the periodical rains. british vessels may, therefore, by this stream and its tributaries ascend to rabba, boussa, youri, soccatoo, timbuctoo, sego, and probably to other cities as great, but yet unknown. they may navigate the yet unexplored tchadda, a river, which at its junction, is nearly as large as the niger itself, and no doubt waters extensive and fertile regions. it was even stated to the landers by different individuals, that by this medium, vessels might reach the lake tchadda, and thereby communicate with the kingdom of bornou. but this statement appears erroneous, for though the tchadda be evidently the same with the shary, which runs by adomowa and durrora, yet flowing into the niger, it must be a quite different stream from the shary, which flows _into_ the tchad, and in a country so mountainous, there is little likelihood of any connecting branches. the decided superiority of the interior of africa to the coast, renders this event highly important. steam, so peculiarly adapted to river navigation, affords an instrument by which the various obstacles may be overcome, and vessels may be enabled to penetrate into the very heart of the african continent. on the return of the landers, the question was mooted by the geographical society of london, whether the quorra or _niger_, as discovered by lander, was the same river as the _kigir_ of the ancients. upon the whole subject it would have been sufficient to refer to d'anville and rennell, who favour the affirmative of the question, and on the opposite side to m. wakkenaer, who of all later writers has examined it with the greatest diligence, had not recent discoveries furnished us with better grounds for forming a conclusive opinion, than even the latest of these authors possessed. maritime surveys have now completed a correct outline of northern africa. major laing, by ascertaining the source of the quorra to be not more than sixteen hundred feet above the sea, proved that it could not flow to the nile. denham and clapperton demonstrated that it did not discharge itself into the lake of bornou, and at length its real termination in a delta, at the head of the great gulf of the western coast of africa, has rewarded the enlightened perseverance of the british government, and the courage and enterprise of its servants. the value to science of this discovery, and the great merit of those, whose successive exertions have prepared and completed it, is the more striking, when we consider that the hydrography of an unknown country is the most important step to a correct knowledge of its geography, and that in barbarous africa, nothing short of the ocular inquiries of educated men, is sufficient to procure the requisite facts, and yet it is not a little extraordinary, that the termination of the quorra or niger has been discovered by two men, who, in point of scientific knowledge, education, or literary acquirements, stand the lowest in the scale of the african travellers. it is, however, curious to observe how even the best collectors of oral information in that country, have failed in arriving at the truth, as to the origin, cause, and termination of the rivers. edrisi, abulfida, leo africanus,[footnote] delile, and bruce, all come to the determination that the quorra flowed from east to west. burckhardt, whose oral inquiries on bornou, have proved generally correct, concluded that the shary flowed from n.e. to s.w., and lyon, though particularly successful in his information on the countries not visited by him, was induced to confound the shary of bornou with the tchadda or yen, and like sultan bello, to carry the quorra, after passing youri and funda, into the lake tchadda, and thence into egypt. the most intelligent natives are confused, when questioned on the subject of rivers, while the majority, unable to understand the object or utility of such enquiries, can neither inform the traveller whether two streams are different rivers or part of the same; where any river rises, or whither it flows, and appear often to believe that all the lakes and streams of africa, are parts of one and the same water. it is not surprising, therefore, that ancients as well as moderns have obtained the knowledge of a large river flowing to the east, should have supposed that it was a branch of the nile of egypt, or that when the existence of a great lake, in the direction of the known portion of its stream, became known, the opinion should have followed, that the river terminated in that lake, or that it was discharged through the lake into the nile. such, consequently have been the prevalent notions in all ages, even amongst the most intelligent foreigners, as well as the higher class of natives, from herodotus, etearchus, and juba, to ibn, batuta, and bello of soccatoo. [footnote: it is supposed by w. martin leake, esq. vice president of the geographical society, that leo africanus actually reached timbuctoo. the narrative of adams places the matter at rest, that leo never did reach that famous city. mr. leake says, that leo was very young at the time, and, therefore that his memory probably failed him, when he came to describe the city, which was many years after his return.] considering these circumstances, it will hardly be contended that the late discovery of the landers, has made any alteration in the nature of the question, as to the identity of the quorra and nigir; the sudden bend of the river to the southward, through a country, which has been equally unknown to the ancients and moderns, having always left the best informed of them in ignorance of any part of the river, except that of which the course was northerly or easterly. if then, there be sufficient reason for the belief, that these latter portions were known to the, ancients, we have only to suppose them to have had some such imperfect knowledge of the interior of north africa, as we ourselves had attained previously to the expedition of denham and clapperton, to justify the application of the name nigir to the whole course of the river. although we find ptolemy to be misinformed on several points concerning central africa, yet there still remains enough in his data, on interior libya and northern ethiopia, to show a real geographical approximation, very distant indeed from the accuracy at which science is always aiming, but quite sufficient to resolve the question as to the identity of the nigir, in which an approximation is all that can be expected or required. having been totally ignorant of the countries through which that river flows in a southerly direction, ptolemy naturally mistook it for a river of the interior; he knew the middle ethiopia to be a country watered by lakes, formed by streams rising in mountains to the southward; he was superior to the vulgar error of supposing that all the waters to the westward of the nile flowed into that river, and he knew consequently that the rivers and lakes in the middle region, had no communication with the sea. it is but lately that we ourselves have arrived at a certainty on this important fact. we now know enough of the level of the lake tchad, to be assured that no water from that recipient can possibly reach the nile. this wonderful river, of which the lowest branch is geographical miles from the mediterranean, (measuring the distance along its course, in broken lines of g.m. direct,) has no tributary from the westward below the bahr adda of browne, which is more than miles from the sea, similarly measured. it is scarcely possible, therefore, that the latter point can be less, taking the cataracts into consideration than feet above the sea, whereas the following considerations lead to the belief that the tchadda is not more than feet in height. we learn from the information of clapperton, confirmed and amplified by that of lander, that there exists a ridge, which about kano and kashna, extends forth the yeu to the lake tchadda on one side, and on the other the river of soccatoo, which joins the quorra at a distance from the sea of about miles, measured in the manner above mentioned. a similar process of measurement gives a length of miles to the whole course of the quorra, the sources of which, according to major laing, are about feet above the sea; the stream, therefore, has an average fall of something less than a foot in a mile in lines of geographical miles. this would give to the confluence of the river of soccatoo with the quorra, a height of less than feet above the sea, but as that confluence occurs above the most rapid part of the main stream, feet seem to be very nearly the height. as a knowledge of the origin and course of rivers, conducts in every country to that of the relative altitude and directions of its highlands, the late discoveries on the waters of africa have thrown great light on its orography. the sources of the largest, or rather longest of its rivers, namely, the white or true nile, now appears to be in a point nearly equidistant from the indian and atlantic oceans in one direction, and from the mediterranean and the cape of good hope on the other. these central summits, it is fair to suppose, are at least as high as the snowy peak samen, in abyssinia, which is the culminating point towards the sources of the minor branch or blue nile, and that they are covered, therefore, with perpetual snow. from hence flow the white nile, the djyr, the bahr culla, the congo, and several rivers of the coast of zanguebar. as a part of these great african alps was described to denham as lying beyond the mountain of mendefy, the latter would seem to be an advanced northerly summit of them. the range is probably united to the eastward with the mountains of abyssinia, and to the westward, terminates abruptly in some lofty peaks on the eastern side of the delta of the quorra, but not till after it has sent forth a lower prolongation, which crosses the course of the quorra nearly at right angles, and terminates at the end of miles, at the sources of the quorra, gambia, and senegal. a minor counterfort advances from the central range to the northwestward, commencing about the peak of mendefy, and vanishing at the end of about miles in the desert of the tuaricks. it gives rise to the two sharys, which flow in opposite directions to the quorra and the lake tchadda, and further north to the streams which flow to the same two recipients from about kano and kashna. though the knowledge of interior africa now possessed by the civilized world, is the progressive acquisition of many enterprising men, to all of whom we are profoundly indebted, it cannot be denied that the last great discovery has done more than any other to place the great outline of african geography on a basis of certainty. when to this is added the consideration that it opens a maritime communication into the centre of the continent, it may be described as the greatest geographical discovery that has been made since that of new holland. thrice during the last thirty years, it has been on the eve of accomplishment; first when horneman had arrived from fezzan and nyfflé, secondly when park had navigated the quorra as far as boussa, and lastly when tuckey, supplied with all possible means for prosecuting researches by water, was unfortunately expedited to the congo, instead of being sent to explore the mouths of the niger. chapter xliii. a maritime communication with the interior of africa having been now opened, by the discovery of the termination of the niger in the bight of benin, it was considered, that some great commercial advantages might be derived by fitting out an expedition on a large scale, and as lander on his return home had reported, that the niger was navigable for vessels of a light burden for a considerable distance into the country, it was resolved to fit out two steam vessels, well armed and amply supplied with all stores both in a commercial point of view, and for attack and defence when arriving amongst the natives in the interior. it was an enterprise every way worthy of the british character, and one likely to be productive of future consequences, the importance of which it would be difficult to overrate either in a commercial or in a moral and political point of view. sir john tobin of liverpool was one of its great promoters, and the immediate object of the expedition was to ascend the niger, to establish a trade with the natives, and to enlarge our geographical knowledge of the country. when we look at the dense population of africa described in the preceding parts of this work, it is obvious that in them might be found an extensive market for the manufactured goods and wares of england; for the cottons of manchester, glasgow, &c., and for many other products of our skill and industry. in return for these, the rich commodities of gold, ivory, hippopotami teeth, and the more common articles of wood, peltry, gums, &c. &c. may be imported, and if encouragement be given, indigo and other valuable things would be largely cultivated to barter with europe. and still nobler aims were before us, the ending of the traffic in human beings, and the gradual illumination and civilization of africa. although in unison with the enlightened spirit of the times, this expedition may be considered as simply a mercantile speculation, yet at the same time it purposed to combine objects of greater and more general interest. the sum of £ was presented by sir john tobin, and other individuals concerned in the expedition. government had nothing to do with the outfit of the expedition, but it was to be accompanied by lieutenant william allen, of the royal navy, but without rank or command, as a passenger, with instructions to make surveys and observations, for which his scientific attainments well qualified him. richard lander was appointed to the command of the expedition, leaving his brother john as his _locum tenens_ in the customhouse of liverpool until his return. the expedition, considering the object which it had in view was of a formidable kind, two steam vessels were equipped for the purpose, the larger was computed to be tons burden, and propelled by a fifty horse engine. her sides were pierced and mounted with ten six pounders. forward, a very formidable display was made by a twenty-four pound swivel gun, whilst a long swivel eighteen pound carronade astern seemed to threaten destruction to every foe. in addition to these precautions against the spanish pirates who infest the coast, and of which lander was himself an eye witness in the capture of the brig thomas, and also against such of the native tribes, who might prove hostile to the expedition, she was completely surrounded by a _chevaux de frise_, and amply provided with small arms and boarding pikes for forty persons, of which number the crew were to consist. this steamer was named after the river she was intended to ascend, namely the quorra, which is the arabic for "shining river." her draft of water was easy, and in her ascent would not be more than two feet six inches, which was very small, considering that no sacrifice had been made of those operations, which constitute the _beau ideal_ of a steamer, which the quorra certainly was. the construction of the paddles was such, that should favourable winds occur, they could be removed in such a manner, that she could use sails instead of steam, and receive no impediment to her progress by their immersion in the water. she was schooner rigged and rather lofty. the quorra was intended to ascend the principal stream, and the lesser vessel, which was built entirely of wrought iron, and of a draught of only inches, was intended to explore all the tributary streams, and to visit timbuctoo, warree, soccatoo, &c. &c. this latter vessel was only tons burden, and called the alburkha, which is the arabic for "blessing." the brig columbine, which was to accompany them as far as the river nun, was principally laden with fuel and other articles for the use of the two steamers. she was not to ascend the river, but to anchor in a convenient place as a kind of store-house for the steamers. it was expected that a sufficiency of wood would be found on the banks of the river to generate steam, when the supply of coal was exhausted, or not easily to be procured. the whole squadron was under the command of captain harris of the royal navy, whose experience on the coast during a period of six years entitled him to the confidence of the promoters of the expedition. macgregor laud, esquire, of liverpool, as supercargo, and mr. briggs, of liverpool, surgeon, accompanied the expedition. to the latter gentlemen was confided the botanical department, and also that of natural history, being fully competent to investigate the very important branches connected with those sciences, either for philosophical or commercial results. the columbine brig was tons, commanded by captain miller, being laden with coals for the steamers, and a variety of articles for presents, trade, or barter, and a few passengers. the alburkha steamer was commanded by captain hill, and was admitted to be a model of a vessel, although with the exception of the decks, being entirely built of iron. she had a crew of fourteen men. lander carried with him a number of copies of an address, prepared by mr. salamé, and intended to explain the objects of their visit to the native chiefs and kings. they were printed on all kinds of coloured paper and being adorned with pictures of the two steam boats, were likely enough to be regarded not merely as ambassadorial letters, but as beautiful specimens of the fine arts by the sovereigns to whom they were to be presented. by the ample provision that was made, it would almost seem that every difficulty was anticipated, and certainly no individual was better fitted than lander to direct the outfit of the expedition, he having been twice in the country, and had acquired a perfect knowledge of the articles most in request by the natives, and particularly those kinds which would be the most acceptable to the native chiefs. every thing that could be procured for the success, safety, comfort, and happiness of the adventurous travellers was supplied in the most bountiful manner, nor should it be omitted to state that an abundance of trinkets, &c. &c. was shipped for the purpose of conciliating the good will of the natives. no correct estimate could be formed of the length of the absence of the expedition, it might, however, be naturally inferred that it would not be great, as the steamers would present a facility hitherto unknown in exploring the african rivers, and that the progress thus obtained would in no way be impeded by the caprice of any of the african chiefs in obtaining leave to proceed, or paying a compulsory tribute &c. for such a favour. a glance at the quorra would almost convince any one that her implements of destruction were such as to defy the whole condensed bow and arrow force of africa, and it was generally hoped, as the expedition was of a trading description, conducted at the entire expense of a body of liverpool merchants, that the speculations would be attended with profitable results, and finally with great advantages to open a trade between this country and the whole of western africa. the expedition sailed from liverpool in the month of july, , and put into milford, there to wait for orders, and also for richard lander who was expected to join them over land. they were also to obtain at milford clean bills of health. on tuesday the th june the columbine brig and the alburkha were towed out to sea by the quorra, which vessel returned to milford to wait the arrival of lander, and then to sail immediately for porto praga on the african coast, the place of rendezvous. from the unfortunate issue of the expedition we are excluded from the general information, which would otherwise have been obtained, had lander survived to communicate the result of his researches on his return to england. we know that he was bound in honour not to send public intelligence, except to the owners of the vessels employed, and therefore all the information that can be gleaned, is from his private letters to his friends and relatives, and that even would be necessarily confined to the news of his personal situation. the expedition was expected to enter the niger in six or seven weeks, and to return to england in about nine months. on sunday the th october, the expedition reached cape coast castle in seventy-two days after sailing from milford haven, after having touched at the isle de los, sierra leone and other points for a supply of fuel for the two steamers. some cases of fever had taken place, but as yet no death had occurred. at cape coast, the governor maclean and the officers of the garrison treated their visitors with the utmost kindness and hospitality. here lander fortunately secured the services of his old tried servant pascoe, as well as jowdie, and two natives of the eboe country, who were likely to be of great service to the expedition, one of them being the son of a chief, and both intelligent, with a slight knowledge of the english language. the alburkha, of which vessel some fears were entertained, was found to work admirably, exceeding the expectations of her commander and the other officers attached to the expedition. they sailed from cape coast castle about the middle of october, for the river nun, and proceeded direct from that river to the river niger. at the meeting of the geographical society of london in the month of june , the following letter was read, addressed to r. w. ray, esquire, from richard lander, dated---- niger expedition, river nun, october , . i have the honour to inform you that the expedition under my command arrived here on the th instant, all well. i found on my arrival here that the captain of the liverpool brig susan, had paid king boy. i hope you will be pleased to honour the bill. i have made king boy a handsome present from the ordnance stores you were good enough to supply me with, and he accompanies me to the eboe country to settle the palaver with king obie. king boy and king forday were very glad to see me again, and say i am no man but a devil. i sail this evening and, expect to reach the eboe country in four days, and feel quite confident of success. i find mr. alien sent out by the admiralty a very agreeable companion. (signed,) richard lander. from the account of the seaman who was the bearer of it from richard lander to his brother in liverpool, some further information was obtained, that _all_ the vessels of the expedition had reached the eboe country previously to the sailors leaving the nun river. the seaman stated that the steamers stemmed the current bravely, and ascended the niger with apparent ease. the following extract of a letter from sierra leone, dated may , contains some interesting intelligence respecting the expedition: the boats of his majesty's ship curlew had boarded the columbine about the th april, the master of which vessel had died a few weeks previously. the doctor on board the columbine had received letters from mr. lander dated from king obie's palace at eboe, about three weeks after they had sailed from the entrance of the river nun. king obie had treated them with much kindness, and had made lander a present of some canoes, with people to pilot them up the river. a few days before their arrival at eboe, the steamers sent their boats ashore to cut wood. they were fired upon by the inhabitants of a village, and obliged to return. the next morning a large number of men were sent armed, these were immediately fired upon by the natives. the quorra then sent a signal rocket into the town, and continued firing her long gun at intervals for an hour and a half. the natives still continuing to fire, the crews of both the steamers landed and drove them out of the town or village, and then burned it to the ground. three of the natives were found killed, and one was dying, one or two of the english were slightly wounded. the news of this engagement reached eboe before the steamer, and mr. lander is of opinion, it will have a salutary effect on the natives up the river, and be the means of preventing any further resistance. nine men are said to have died before they left the nun, and two or three afterwards. there was also an american merchant brig, the agenoria, lying in the nun. she had been fitted out by a company of merchants of new providence to explore the niger. she had with her two small schooners, which were to proceed up the river, while she remained at the entrance. nearly all the white men belonging to these vessels had died, and the remainder appeared in the most wretched state, and they had abandoned all intention of attempting to proceed up the river with the schooners, it being considered impossible to do so with any sailing vessel. the brig intended to procure a cargo of palm oil, and proceed to the united states. the agenoria was fitted out secretly by the company, and had cleared out for a whaling voyage. no doubt whatever exists, and the sequel fully confirms the opinion, that the conduct observed by the crews of the steamers in attacking and destroying the town of the natives was highly impolitic and uncalled for. it is true the natives had commenced the attack, and we have only to refer to the accounts transmitted to us, of various travellers on penetrating into the country of a savage people, and especially a people of the depraved nature of the africans, with whom lander had to deal, that they are generally the first to resort to force, not so much with the hope of victory, as with the desire of plunder. in the generality of cases, however, it is to be found that the hostility on the part of the natives was more easy to be quelled by a show of forbearance and an inclination to enter into terms of amity with them, than by an open desire to meet force by force. lander was by no means ignorant of the african character, he came not amongst them as a perfect stranger, and in all his former transactions with the natives, he had invariably found that he ultimately obtained their good will by a show of forbearance and lenity, more than by a determined spirit of resistance and reprisal. in no instance was this principle more completely verified than in the travels of major denham, in which in several instances, had he not maintained a complete control over his temper, on the insults and affronts offered to him by the natives, the consequences, would doubtless have been fatal to him, and although the natives were, in the case of lander, undoubtedly the aggressors, yet had a temper of conciliation been manifested towards them, that spirit of hatred and of vengeance would not have been awakened in their breasts, which led to a most fatal catastrophe, and to the death of one of the most enterprising travellers, who ever attempted to explore the interior of africa. for some reason not properly explained, richard lander, returned to fernando po on the st may from the quorra steam boat, which he had left afloat in deep water, near the river tchadda. from her he descended the niger in a native canoe, and arrived on board the brig columbine, which was lying in the nun river, having been days on his passage. during this period he stopped to sleep every night at a native village on the banks of the niger. at fernando po, mr. lander was evidently very ill, though he was rapidly recovering from an attack of the dysentery, with which he had been afflicted for some months. his object in returning alone to fernando po, was to procure medicines, as well as tea and other condiments, for the use of the invalids on board the steam boats. the reports of the grievous mortality which had prevailed on board the steamers were confirmed by the arrival of lander; the number of deaths on board the vessels had indeed been frightfully great; no fewer than twenty-five had perished before mr. lander undertook his journey to the coast, including most of the officers and engineers. the following may be considered as the principal circumstances which led to this lamentable result. the vessels were unfortunately detained at a place called attah, until mr. lander, accompanied by one or two of his associates, went to see the king. they were very hospitably received by his sable majesty, who was equipped in silk velvet, and attended by about three hundred well-dressed youths, all of them eunuchs, and forming a kind of body guard to their prince. this delay was followed by another still more vexatious. the larger steam boat, was forced by the strength of the current on a sand bank, where she was fixed for several weeks; till lifted into deep water by the swelling of the river. here she was examined, and found to have sustained no damage, but owing to this unseasonable accident, as well as the detention at attah, and above all, to the deplorable loss of life, which had ensued on board the vessels, the party had not in their power to cultivate their mercantile speculations either to the extent or so successfully as they wished, or as their friends anticipated. still, however, when mr. lander left the quorra, they might be said to have only begun to trade with the natives, and as there was unquestionably an abundance of ivory in the country, there was reason to hope that the adventure would be yet as prosperous in this point of view as its spirited and enterprising proprietors could reasonably desire. the great mortality which took place amongst the crews of the vessels, was mainly attributed to the injudicious conduct of captain harris, who, instead of pushing on direct for the niger, spent a great deal of time, as he coasted along, in examining inlets, &c., which exposed the crew to the fatal fever, which committed such ravages amongst them. captain harris himself fell a victim to his want of judgement, and lander, laird, lieutenant alien, and the captain of the alburkha, were the only persons in office, who survived, and but fourteen whites besides were left alive. the provisions were found to be uncommonly cheap and plentiful. a bullock weighing two cwt. cost eight shillings. fowls one penny each, and other things in proportion, so that the victualling of thirty men was not more than eighteen pence a day, including yams and rice. on the th may, lander left fernando po in a native canoe as before, in order to rejoin his companions, who were no doubt anxiously awaiting his return. richard lander returned to attah on the st july, in high health and spirits, and immediately made preparations for ascending the river in the alburkha, accompanied by lieutenant allen, and a medical man. his voyage from the coast in a canoe, occupied him thirty-two days. from attah, he wrote to his brother john, of which the following is an interesting extract: "you know, that when we were here together, abucco, chief of damaggoo, had been at variance with his brother for several years. on arriving at the former place from the coast, i was sorry to find the brothers, with their respective subjects, still engaged in that petty, but obstinate and ferocious warfare, which had distinguished the quarrel at its commencement. determined, if possible, to effect a reconciliation between them, i prevailed on our old friend abucco to accompany me to attah, promising to introduce him to his brother, and pledging my life for his safety. the meeting took place on the nd november, and a highly interesting one it was, i assure you. one party, preceded by jowdie, and a few drummers, were introduced into a large square enclosure. the chief seated on a kind of throne, was surrounded by all his mallams, and a multitude of attendants. his wives were seated under a verandah, from which were suspended several handsome turkey carpets, which served them for a screen. abucco instantly drew back, as he approached the throne, but, taking him by the hand, i led, or rather pulled him towards his brother. at this moment, his confidence seemed to have forsaken him entirely; his head hung down on his breast, and i could feel him tremble violently. whilst i was displaying my presents to the chief of attah, i perceived him several times bestow a hasty and displeased look on his brother, who had disengaged himself from my hand, and was sitting on the ground. though seven years had elapsed since their last meeting, neither of the rulers uttered a word. the curiosity of the chief of attah, having in some measure been gratified, i immediately introduced his brother to his notice, by paying him a high compliment, which abucco had certainly deserved. i then expressed the regret i felt in witnessing the bad effects of the misunderstanding, which had existed amongst them for so many years; insisted on the necessity of brothers living in harmony, and said i was determined not to quit the spot, until i had established a perfect reconciliation between them. the chief was extremely disconcerted, but he made no reply, i then desired abucco to rise, and leading him to his brother, i took the right hand of each, and pressing both hands together, made them shake hands heartily, observing; you are now friends, and may god keep you so. the brothers were deeply affected, and neither of them could utter a syllable, for several seconds afterwards. every countenance beamed with delight at the happy termination of the interview, and the multitude gave vent to their feelings, in a loud, long, and general shout. for my part, i need not say, i cannot tell the heartfelt gratification, i felt at that moment. but this is not the most important good, that i have been the humble means of effecting at this place. from time immemorable it has been a custom with the rulers of attah, to sacrifice human beings on rejoicing days, and on all public occasions. at the interview, which i have just described to you, two poor creatures were brought before us to be slain, in order that their blood might be sprinkled about the yard. i shuddered at the proposal, and begged with earnestness, that nothing of the kind might be done, i assured the chief he would one day have to give an account to god, of every life he might wantonly destroy; and also made him sensible, that though after death, his body would moulder into dust, his soul would live for ever, and that it would be happy or miserable, in proportion to the good or bad actions he had performed, or might yet perform in this world. the chief was evidently much affected at my words, and desired his followers to unbind the intended victims, and remove them from the yard. he then made a solemn promise, to put an end to the custom of sacrificing human beings. as soon as this declaration was made known to the mallams, and the crowd of attendants in the yard, they all held up their hands in token of approbation, and shouted for joy. it is now seven or eight months since this promise was made, and i am happy to say, it has been religiously kept." as further lights continued to be thrown upon the course of the niger, that geographical problem of many years, and as its importance in a commercial point of view, opening a way into the interior of africa, becomes more appreciable, our attention was naturally drawn to every circumstance connected with its exploration. thus the expeditions of mungo park excited a strong sensation, and have left a mournful recollection on the public mind, and thus the equally adventurous, and noble, and more successful enterprises of the brothers, landers, and especially of richard, whose narrative of his third voyage we are now relating, have fixed the admiration of their country. this feeling was probably greatly enhanced, as the prospect of utility is certainly much enlarged by the remarkable coincidence of these gallant efforts, with the application of the navigating powers of steam. there might have been generations of landers, with lives devoted to the cause, the sole reward of which would have been the discovery of a river's source and termination, but now there was combined with that end, the cheering hope of extending civilization, of strangling the hydra, slavery, in its cradle, and of diffusing comfort and happiness over a wide quarter of the globe. assuredly it is a glorious thing to be signally and prosperously engaged in laying the foundation for a consummation so devoutly to be wished. lander had not made great progress in the interior, before he found that he was deficient in some particular kinds of goods, which were required for the markets in the interior, and he, therefore, descended the river in a canoe, and embarked on board the curlew ship of war, to convey him to cape coast castle, where he expected to meet with the articles which he required. having succeeded in effecting his purchases, he returned to the mouth of the nun, thence to _reascend the niger for the third time_, and endeavour to penetrate as far up the river as boussa. it is, however, highly interesting to know, that previously to his last return to the coast, lander and lieutenant alien, had fortunately reached rabba, a large fellata town, in the iron steam boat, and for the period of thirteen or fourteen days had maintained a friendly intercourse, and carried on an advantageous trade with its inhabitants. the depth of the water at that place was between two and three fathoms, and as far as could be seen beyond it, the niger was free from rocks and other obstructions, and assumed a majestic and very encouraging appearance. for the reason already mentioned, lander was obliged to return to the coast, though it was supposed that he hastily quitted rabba on account of some unfavourable rumours which had reached him, to the effect that the people wished to inveigle our countrymen on shore, in order to seize their persons and destroy their boat. this is, however, an improbable supposition, for as far as could be ascertained, the general bearing of the inhabitants towards the english was any thing but hostile. this important town was inhabited by fellatas and negroes, and fully realized the expectations that had been formed of it, as regards its extent, its wealth, and its population. a few tuaricks from the borders of the desert, and other arabs were observed by our countrymen in the streets of rabba. another important feature of this expedition is, the circumstance that the travellers ascended the river tchadda, as high as one hundred and fifty miles from its junction with the niger. at that point, and at some distance below and above it, the river was found to be intersected with islands, and comparatively shallow, alternately becoming broad and narrow in proportion as its channel was free from, or obstructed by these islands. no traces of inhabitants appeared on the banks of this very interesting river, and lander and his valuable coadjutor were compelled to return to the niger for want of provisions. all the natives in this part of the country agreed in the assertion, that the tchadda communicates with lake tchad, the inland sea of africa. they do not hazard this as a mere conjecture, but state it with confidence, as a well-known and undisputed fact. this being the case, though it be at variance with the opinion entertained of it by many of our scientific countrymen, the concurrent testimony of the natives, who, after all, are better acquainted with the geography of their own country, is entitled to respect. it should also be remembered, that the tchadda has not received its name, any more than its gigantic namesake, from europeans, but from the natives themselves, who have never bestowed on it any other appellation. on a small island, near attah, lander erected a kind of mud fort, which would answer the purpose of a depot for british goods. this place has been named english island, and it possesses peculiar facilities for trading purposes in that part of the country. the king of attah, who seemed to have formed an attachment to lander, presented him with four small but very beautiful horses, which he succeeded in conveying to fernando po. poor old pascoe the black, who buried belzoni, and whose name occurs so frequently in clapperton's journal, and the narrative of the landers, as a faithful and brave servant, died at attah. for some time, no information which could be relied upon reached this country, relative to the progress of the expedition, although some sinister reports were afloat relative to the fatal termination of it. at length, however, all suspense was extinguished by the arrival of an individual belonging to the expedition, who gave the following account of the melancholy manner in which richard lander met his death, and which was subsequently corroborated by mr. moore, a medical gentleman attached to the expedition, and who was himself an eyewitness of the whole murderous scene. the particulars of the mournful event of lander's death are thus given: "richard lander and his associates entered the brass river, and began ascending it in excellent spirits. with them were two or three negro musicians, who, when the labours of the day were over, cheered their countrymen with their instruments, at the sound of which they danced and sang in company, while the few englishmen be longing to the party, amused themselves with angling on the banks of the stream, in which, though not very expert, they were tolerably successful. in this pleasing manner, stemming a strong current by day, and resting from their toil at night, richard lander and his little band, totally unapprehensive of danger, and unprepared to overcome or meet it, proceeded slowly up the niger. at some distance from its mouth, and on his way thither, they met king jacket, a relative of king boy, and one of the heartless and sullen chiefs, who rule over a large tract of marshy country on the banks of the brass river. this individual was hailed by our travellers, and a present of tobacco and rum was offered to him, he accepted it with a murmur of dissatisfaction, and his eyes sparkled with malignity, as he said in his own language, 'white man will never reach eboe this time.' this sentence was immediately interpreted to lander by a native of the country, a boy, who afterwards bled to death from a wound in the knee, but lander made light of the matter, and attributed jacket's prophecy, for so it proved, to the petulance and malice of his disposition. soon, however, he discovered his error, but it was too late to correct it, or evade the danger which threatened him. on ascending as far inland as sixty or seventy miles, the english approached an island, and their progress in the larger canoe was effectually obstructed by the shallowness of the stream. amongst the trees and underwood that grew on this island, and on both banks of the river in its vicinity, large ambuscades of the natives had previously been formed, and shortly after the principal canoe had grounded, its unfortunate crew, busily employed to heave it into deep water, were saluted with irregular but heavy and continued discharges of musketry. so great was lander's confidence in the sincerity and good will of the natives, that he could not at first believe that the destructive fire, by which he was literally surrounded, was any thing more than a mode of salutation they had adopted in honour of his arrival. but the kroomen who had leaped into the boat, and who fell wounded by his side, soon convinced him of his mistake, and plainly discovered to him the fearful nature of the peril into which he had fallen so unexpectedly, and the difficulty he would experience in extricating himself from it. encouraging his comrades with his voice and gestures, lander prepared to defend himself to the last, and a loud and simultaneous shout from his little party assured him that they shared his feelings, and would follow his example. meanwhile, several of the savages having come out of their concealment, were brought down by the shots of the english, but lander whilst stopping to pick up a cartridge from the bottom of the canoe, was struck near the hip by a musket ball. the shock made him stagger, but he did not fall, and he continued cheering on his men. soon finding, however, his ammunition expended, himself seriously wounded, the courage of his kroomen beginning to droop, and the firing of his assailants, instead of diminishing become more general than ever, he resolved to attempt getting into the smaller canoe, afloat at a short distance, as the only remaining chance of preserving a single life. for this purpose, abandoning their property, the survivors threw themselves into the stream, and with much difficulty, for the strength of the current was incredibly strong, most of them succeeded in accomplishing their object. no sooner was this observed by the men in ambush, than they started up and rushed out with wild and hideous yells; canoes that had been hidden behind the luxuriant foliage which overhung the river, were in an instant pushed out into the middle of the stream, and pursued the fugitives with surprising velocity; whilst numbers of people, with savage antics and furious gesticulations, ran and danced along the beach, uttering loud and startling cries. the kroomen maintained on this occasion, the good reputation which their countrymen have deservedly acquired; their lives depended on their energy and skill, and they impelled their slender bark through the water with unrivalled swiftness. the pursuit was kept up for four hours, and poor lander, without ammunition or any defensive weapon whatever, was exposed to the straggling fire, as well as the insulting mockery of his pursuers. one incident, which occurred in the flight, deserves to be recorded. a white man named t----, completely overpowered by his fears, refused to fire on the savages, who were within a paddle's length of him, but stood up in the canoe, with a loaded musket in his hand, beseeching them by his gestures to take him prisoner, rather than deprive him of his life. while in the act of making this dastardly appeal, a musket ball from the enemy entered his mouth, and killed him on the spot. the others behaved with the greatest coolness and intrepidity. the fugitives gained on their pursuers, and when they found the chase discontinued altogether, lander stood up for the last time in the canoe, and being seconded by his remaining associates, he waved his hat, and gave a last cheer in sight of his adversaries. he then became sick and faint from loss of blood, and sank back exhausted in the arms of those who were nearest to him. rallying shortly afterwards, the nature of his wound was communicated to him by mr. moore, a young surgeon from england, who had accompanied him up the river, and whose conduct throughout this disastrous affray was most admirable. the ball could not be extracted, and lander felt convinced his career would soon be terminated. when the state of excitement to which his feelings had been wrought, gave place to the languor which generally succeeds powerful excitement of any kind, the invalid's wound pained him exceedingly, and for several hours afterwards, he endured with calmness the most intense suffering. from that time he could neither sit up, nor turn on his couch, nor hold a pen, but while he was proceeding down the river in a manner so melancholy, and so very different from the mode in which he was ascending it only the day before, he could not help indulging in various reflections, and he talked much of his wife and children, his friends, his distant home, and his blighted expectations. it was a period of darkness, and distress, and sorrow to him, but his natural cheerfulness soon regained its ascendancy over his mind, and freely forgiving all his enemies, he resigned himself into the hands of his maker, and derived considerable benefit from the consolations of religion. he arrived with his surviving companions at fernando po on the th january. it was there found that the ball had entered his hip, and worked its way down to the thick of the thigh. he died on the nd february. his clothes and papers were all lost. "various conjectures have been urged as to the probable cause of this cold-blooded and heartless attack on lander and his party. some persons imagine that the natives had been stimulated to the perpetration of this disgraceful deed by the portuguese and south american slave dealers, who have considerable influence in the country, and whose interests would unquestionably decline by the introduction into the interior of british subjects and british manufactures. it is, however, generally supposed that the hostility of the natives may be in some degree traced to the shameful and scandalous conduct of some of the liverpool merchants, who had used their private influence to poison the minds of the natives by attributing particular motives to the travellers, which were at variance with the interests of the country, and subversive of the authority of the chiefs. nor is this scarcely a matter of doubt, when we peruse the following extract from a letter addressed by john lander to the editor of the literary gazette. "i cannot close this letter, without apprising you of a fact, which will appear incredible to you. can you believe me when i assert, on the most unquestionable authority, that there are merchants here (the letter was dated from liverpool) so heartless and inhuman as to instruct the masters of their vessels who trade to the african coast _to refuse any assistance to the expedition of which it may stand in need; to reject all letters that may be sent from the parties connected with it, and, in fine, to hold no communication whatever with the steamers or the brig_, does it not startle you, that jealousy and selfishness can go so far? believe me, i blush at the reflection of a crime so hideous and un-english like as this?" in a postscript, john lander says, "the fact of the merchants' instructions to the masters of their vessels may be safely depended on. nothing can be more true. they have gone even farther than i have ventured to hint. _they have taken measures to prejudice the minds of the natives against the expedition_." thus is human life, thus are the interests of science sacrificed on the shrine of a sordid love of gain and pelf. it is true that the merit of the fitting out of the expedition belongs to the enterprising spirit and the liberality of a few liverpool merchants, but greatly indeed is that merit eclipsed, in a general point of view, when it is considered, that in the same town could be found a set of individuals, who, for the purpose of enabling them to carry on an illegal and infamous traffic, could be the instruments of circumventing the life of an individual, who was nobly employed in the extension of geographical science, and who was perhaps actually laying the foundation of the civilization of the countries through which he might pass, and extending the commercial relations of his country. an indelible stain will it be upon the merchants of liverpool, who could so far forget that they were englishmen, as to make a horde of barbarous savages their instruments for the destruction of an expedition by which the general interests of the human race might be promoted, our commercial relations extended, and ultimately, the blessings of christianity diffused over the dark and unenlightened children of africa. as a palliative to the statement of john lander, and as some relief to the dark picture which we have just exhibited, it must be confessed, that when the circumstances are taken into consideration, which have already been detailed, when lander first visited the eboe country, his conduct was not exactly regulated by prudence or policy, in proceeding towards a country, not in the simple guise and unostentatious manner of the solitary traveller, but attended by a force sufficient to excite the fears and jealousy of the native chiefs, and to instil into their suspicious minds the belief, that the travellers, whom they had formerly seen in their country, had returned, equipped with the means of subjugating the country, and reducing the chiefs themselves, perhaps to a state of slavery. the very vessels in which they presented themselves, were sufficient to strike terror and alarm into the minds of the superstitious natives. they knew not by what character to describe them; to their ignorant and untutored understandings, they appeared to be impelled by some power of witchcraft, for which they could not in the least account; to behold a large vessel impelled even against the stream with no inconsiderable velocity, and no power manifested by which that speed could be obtained, set their minds a wondering, and obtained for lander the character of the devil. as the devil, therefore, had arrived in their country, it became an act of the most imperious duty to force him to abandon it, by any means which could suggest themselves, and no one certainly could be more effectual than to put themselves in ambuscade, and take the first opportunity of killing him at once. it must also be taken into consideration, that the report of the destruction of the town and the murder of some of the natives by the crew of the alburkha, had spread itself all along the banks of the river, and had spread consternation and alarm amongst the natives, who apprehended that the same fate might befal themselves. another opinion was entertained, that the brass people, perceiving that their lucrative carrying trade between the coast and the inland countries would be annihilated, if they suffered the english to trade with the natives of the interior in their own vessels, formed a coalition with the people of bonny, whose interests would likewise be affected by the new order of things, and that these men, aided by the savage inhabitants of the country residing in the vicinity of the spot, where the ruthless and cowardly assault was made, met together and resolved on the destruction of the unoffending englishmen. from what cause soever it originated, this much is certain, that the attack had been premeditated, that the arrangements of the assassins had been made in a methodical and skilful manner, and that brass and bonny canoes were engaged in the assault. those who have had the best means of knowing the character and disposition of the brass people, and their neighbours of bonny, whose treacherous manoeuvering can only be equalled by their insatiable rapacity, consider the last as by far the most probable hypothesis, and believe that king boy, notwithstanding his affectation of sympathy for the sufferers, and his apparent distress on beholding his friend and benefactor mortally wounded, was nevertheless at the bottom of the plot, and had exerted his influence to bring that plot to maturity, in conjunction with the malignant wretch, who foretold the eventful catastrophe. boy having with alacrity joined the party on all former occasions, when they ascended the river, and having obstinately refused to accompany them on this, strengthens the supposition that he was well aware of the formidable danger, which awaited them, but in which it is plain he had no ambition to participate. the fate of lander, on whom the eyes of all england were directed as the individual most likely to extend the benefits of civilization to the benighted africans, and to open fresh sources of wealth to his enterprising countrymen, excited in all breasts the most unfeigned regret; to the honour of the inhabitants of truro, the native place of the landers, it must be recorded that the intelligence of the premature death of richard lander, no sooner reached that town, than a meeting of his fellow townsmen took place, which was held at the council hall, at which humphry willyams, esquire, presided. after expressing their extreme regret, the assembly resolved: "to express its sincere sympathy with the sorrowing family, and its sense of the loss which science, commerce, and civilization had sustained by the death of this enterprising traveller. further that the sum of £ having been raised for the purpose of presenting pieces of plate to messrs. richard and john lander, and the altered circumstances of the case having induced the survivor generously to decline any participation in the fund so raised, and to request that the same might be appropriated to some other memorial of the respect and esteem of his native town, for his lamented brother; it was their opinion that if an adequate amount be obtained, a column should be erected in their native town, to commemorate the intrepidity of the two brothers, and that an appeal be made to the county to co-operate in their object." about ten days after, a second meeting took place, when the following address was printed, and unanimously adopted: to the inhabitants of cornwall. "the lamentable fate of the african traveller, richard lander, calls for some marked expression of public sympathy and respect, and more especially does it behove cornishmen to show their esteem and sorrow for their adventurous countryman. whether to testify this natural sentiment, or to declare our admiration at the energy of mind, which raised the departed and his enterprising brother from humble station to such enviable pre-eminence, or to evince that deep interest, which every philanthropist and christian must feel, in all that concerns the civilization of africa, we are assured there can be but one opinion as to the propriety of raising some lasting memorial of the travellers. the effects likely to result from their discoveries, followed up by such indomitable resolution as characterized richard lander, may be inferred from the melancholy circumstance that this courageous man has in all probability fallen a victim to the suspicion of those concerned in the atrocious slave trade. but the grand object has been accomplished, though great the cost: the path now opened for mercantile enterprise, will make plain the way, for civilization, freedom, and religion. park, denham, ritchie, clapperton and lander, have led the forlorn hope, against the seemingly impregnable fastnesses of african barbarism, and though each has perished, the cause of humanity has been advanced. at once, therefore, to celebrate the progress of discovery, and to record individual merit, it is proposed to erect a column in some conspicuous part of truro, the birth place of the landers, which, while it commemorates the fate of one brother, will render a just tribute to both, and to this end it is intended to apply the amount already obtained for a testimonial of respect of another description, which sum, however, being inadequate, the committee appeals to the liberality of the county, confident that contributions will be immediately forthcoming to render the memorial worthy of the occasion." notwithstanding this forcible appeal to the compatriots of landers it was some time before a sufficiency could be collected for the erection of the monument; success, however, at last attended the exertions of the committee, and the monument was erected; and although no blazoned escutcheon is engraved upon it, nor pompous epitaph declares the virtues of the departed, yet to the ages yet unborn it will rouse the spirit of compatriot pride, when the traveller views the memorial, and with exultation he will exclaim, richard lander was my countryman. in investigating the advantages which may be supposed to flow to the country by the discoveries of the landers, we fear that they have been much over-rated, for great and almost insuperable obstacles have to be surmounted, before the savages of africa can be brought to relinquish their usual habits, or in any manner to forego those advantages which the traffic in human flesh so bountifully presents to them. the chiefs, who rule over the uncivilized hordes, who are located on the banks of the quorra, are all engaged in a kind of commercial relation with the europeans, by whom it is found necessary to conciliate them, by sometimes, the most obsequious conduct, degrading to a man of civilization, when shown towards an ignorant, tyrannical, and despotic tyrant. any attempt to force a channel of commerce, beyond the territories of these savage chiefs, without having first, either by presents or other means, obtained their co-operation, is too visionary a scheme for even the most enterprising adventurer to dare to undertake. king jacket and king boy, with the king of eboe, may be said to be in the command of the estuary of the niger, and, therefore, any attempt to establish a channel of commerce without allowing them to participate in the profits, or to be permitted to exact a duty on all goods passing by water through their territory, must necessarily prove abortive. the jealousy of their character would be aroused, they would see in the traffic of the european a gradual decline of their own emoluments, and by degrees a total exclusion from those branches of commerce, from which they had hitherto derived the greatest profit. that the commerce of the interior of africa offers the most tempting advantages to the enterprising british merchant cannot be doubted, for the two articles alone of indigo and ivory would repay the speculator with a profit of nearly per cent. this circumstance was sufficient to arouse the commercial spirit of the merchants of glasgow, who, on the return of the landers with the information of the discovery of the termination of the niger, proceeded immediately to form a company, having a capital of £ , , for establishing a commercial intercourse with the chiefs of the interior of africa, forgetting at the time, that before they could reach the territories of those chiefs, they had in the persons of king boy, king jacket, and king forday, and the king of the eboe country, a gauntlet to run through, and a kind of quadruple alliance to extinguish, without which all their efforts would be in vain. the death of lander put an end to this speculation, as it was then clearly seen that unless the actual constitution of the countries situate on the banks of the quorra, could be placed under a different authority, and the people brought to a state of positive submission, it were futile to expect any solid or permanent advantages from any commercial relations they might form. the insalubrity of the climate, so very injurious to a european constitution, was also a great drawback to the prosecution of those commercial advantages, which the discovery of the termination of the niger offered to this country; it was literally sending men to die a premature death to embark them on board of an african trader, and we have the authority of the late captain fullerton for stating, that he scarcely ever knew an individual who, although he might escape the pestilential fevers of the country for the second, and even the third or fourth time, that did not eventually die. notwithstanding, however, the latter serious drawback to the prosecution of our geographical knowledge of the interior of africa, there are yet to be found amongst us some hardy, gallant spirits, who, fearless of every danger, and willing to undergo every privation which the human constitution can endure, are still anxious to expose themselves to such appalling perils, for the promotion of science and the general welfare of the human race. amongst those individuals, a young gentleman of the name of coulthurst has rendered himself conspicuous. he was the only surviving son of c. coulthurst, esquire, of sandirvay, near norwich, and was thirty-five years of age at the time of his death. he was educated at eton, studied afterwards at brazen nose college, oxford, and then went to barbadoes, but from his infancy his heart was set on african enterprise. his family are still in possession of some of his eton school books, in which maps of africa, with his supposed travels into the interior, are delineated; and at barbadoes he used to take long walks in the heat of the day, in order to season himself for the further exposure, which he never ceased to contemplate. his eager desires also took a poetical form, and a soliloquy of mungo park, and other pieces of a similar description, of considerable merit, were written by him at different times. the stimulus that at length decided him, however, was the success of the landers. he feared that if he delayed longer, another expedition would be fitted out on a grand scale, and leave nothing which an individual could attempt. it was in december , that messrs. coulthurst and tyrwhitt were introduced to the council of the geographical society, as being about to proceed at their own expense to the mouth of the quorra, with the view of endeavouring to penetrate thence eastward to the bahr-abiad; and although their preparations were not on such a scale as to warrant any very sanguine hopes of success, yet it was felt to be a duty on the part of the society to patronize so spirited an undertaking. they were accordingly placed in communication with colonel leake, and other members of the late african association, whose advice it was thought could not fail to be of service to them. they were also introduced to captain owen and to mr. lander, the value of whose experience in planning their operations was obvious. and the expedition being brought under the notice of his majesty's government, the loan of a chronometer was obtained for it, with strong letters of introduction and recommendation to the officers commanding the naval and military forces of the crown along the african coast. the party sailed from the downs on the st january , and arrived at bathurst st. mary's on the gambia on the th of the same month. both travellers were somewhat indisposed during the voyage, and the sun after their arrival so seriously affected mr. tyrwhitt, that he here yielded to the repeated representations of his companion and others, and returned home. the following is an extract of a letter received from mr. coulthurst, dated bathurst, st february , and the style is clearly indicative of the superior qualifications of his mind: "after a conference and palaver with some of the native chiefs, amongst whose grotesque forms and equipments you would have laughed to have seen me perched this morning, sipping palm wine; i have made up my mind to take the southern bank of this river, through fooladoo to sego. a messenger from the almana of bondou, who has undertaken to bring the gum trade here from the senegal, is now at bathurst, and the merchants are willing to assist in making up a coffila, which will enable us i trust to prosecute our journey in safety. though i shall not thus reach the main object of funda so directly as if i had had the good fortune to overtake the pluto, it would be scarcely possible for me to do this now before the rainy season; and though i shall be a few weeks later in reaching my destination, i shall have the satisfaction of tracing the _whole_ river, and giving the position of all the remarkable places, which neither caillie nor lander were able to do. there is now no earthly chance of the observations made by park seeing the light, for mr. ainslie showed me yesterday his last letter from sansanding, which i perused with much interest. you are aware that nothing but the unfortunate occurrence of the fellatas' conquests with the period of his expedition, and his being mistaken for one of their parties, occasioned its unhappy result; and by striking across the mountains, which we shall do at baranco, about four hundred miles up, we shall have only twenty-four days' land journey to the mighty niger, where he has scarcely command of water enough to float a canoe. "the climate here is so very superior to that in the bights of benin and biafra, that after barbadoes, where shade is unknown, it really seems comparatively cold; i took a stroll of half a dozen miles to-day before breakfast, which i could not have done, without feeling languid afterwards, in the west indies, but tyrwhitt never could have borne the breathing oven of the gold coast. everything reminds me here of the near neighbourhood of the desert; the toke and turban very general, every man, not a christian, a musselman, and what seems strange to european eyes, persons in the coarsest checks with gold ornaments to the value of hundreds of dollars. "the beautiful harnessed antelope, which it is really a sin to shoot, is common in the bush, and milk, honey, and rice, are to be had in most of the negro villages, this being quite the dairy country of africa. but then there are mosquitoes, that madden the best-tempered folk, and holy men with their eyes on the koran, ready to dirk you for the slightest subject of difference, and it is curious to see the strangest characters of this sort well received and admitted to a familiarity at government house, because they have much interest in the country, and it is politic just now to speak them fair." having concluded his arrangements for proceeding through the enyong and eboe countries, he intended to proceed up the calebar river, and thence over land to funda. he arrived without any particular accident in the eboe country, but the king of that people refused to let him pass, and he was, therefore, obliged to return to calebar, and thence it was his intention to take a passage on board the agnes for fernando po. the refusal of the king of the eboe country, did not proceed from any distrust or jealousy on his part, but a most sanguinary war was raging in the interior, and he, therefore, considered the life of the traveller to be in danger. he had not been exposed to any very severe fatigue, but his disappointment was great, and he laboured under considerable debility and depression of spirits. he died without much suffering on the second day after embarking on board the agnes. thus perished another victim in the cause of african discovery, but still there are hearts to be found, who are willing in the cause of science to brave every peril, for the purpose of enlarging our knowledge of the interior of the african continent, and opening fresh sources to the skill and industry of our merchants. the rev. mr. wolf is now on his journey to timbuctoo, and lieutenant wilkinson is following up the discoveries of lander; of them we may say with the poet:-- "fortuna audaces juvat." finis. produced from scanned images of public domain material from the google print project.) for jacinta [illustration: "don't you know that it is rather a serious thing to delay a spanish mail-boat?"--page ] for jacinta by harold bindloss author of "alton of somasco," "the cattle-baron's daughter," "the dust of conflict," "winston of the prairie," etc. [illustration] frederick a. stokes company new york publishers copyright, by frederick a. stokes company all rights reserved published january, contents chapter page i. jacinta brown ii. an overheated journal iii. on the veranda iv. a big contract v. the tomato finca vi. austin's point of view vii. at the bull fight viii. jefferson feels the strain ix. austin makes a venture x. jacinta is not content xi. the land of the shadow xii. nocturnal visitors xiii. toil xiv. jefferson's remonstrance xv. starting the pump xvi. elusive gum xvii. austin goes down river xviii. jacinta becomes indignant xix. condemned unheard xx. jacinta makes no excuse xxi. the pictures xxii. funnel-paint's proposition xxiii. funnel-paint moves again xxiv. austin finds a clue xxv. hove off xxvi. jefferson finds the gum xxvii. austin's toast xxviii. in command xxix. austin is missing xxx. jacinta capitulates for jacinta chapter i jacinta brown it was about seven o'clock in the evening when sobrecargo austin boarded the little mail-boat _estremedura_ as she lay rolling at anchor on the long, moon-lit heave that worked into the roadstead of santa cruz, palma. sobrecargo means much the same thing as purser, and austin was an englishman, though the _estremedura_ was to all intents and purposes a spanish steamer. she traded round the islands of the canary archipelago with mules and camels, tomatoes, bananas, onions, and seasick english tourists, as fortune favoured her. now, as the heavily sealed document austin carried in his pocket declared, she was to sail for las palmas, grand canary, with the cuban mail, by the gracious permission of the young king of spain. he had trouble on getting on board of her, for there were a good many bullocks swimming about her side waiting until the red-capped crew should heave them on board beneath the derrick-boom by means of a rope twisted round their horns. it probably hurt the bullocks, and now and then one succumbed to a broken neck during the operation; but the castilian, who can face his losses placidly, is not, as a rule, particularly merciful to his beast. there were also stray sheep, goats, and donkeys, as well as olive-faced peasants with blankets strapped about their shoulders, wandering about the after portion of the main deck, which was supposed to be reserved for the second-class passengers, when austin stopped a moment by the covered hatch. a big electric light hung from the spar-deck beams above his head, and he looked about him with a little ironical smile. he was a young man of average stature, and there was nothing especially distinguished in his appearance, though he had good grey eyes, and a pleasant bronzed face. he was somewhat lightly made, though he looked wiry, and held himself well, and there was a certain languidness in his smile which seemed to suggest that he was not addicted to troubling greatly about anything. because the scotchman who ran the _estremedura_'s engines had sold his white uniform jacket with the resplendent buttons a day or two before, he was just then attired somewhat incongruously in a white cap with the very large and imposing badge of the spanish mail service clasped into the front of it, a brown alpaca jacket, white duck trousers, and pipe-clayed shoes. the latter two items were, however, by no means immaculate, since he had, as a special favour to the mate, brought off certain sheep and goats in his despatch-boat, as well as a camel tied astern of it. spaniards and englishmen do not invariably agree, but they lived like brothers on board the _estremedura_, which, however, had its disadvantages. austin objected in particular to the community of property. that evening the steamer hummed with life, and the clatter of polyglot tongues. parsee dealers in silver-thread embroideries, german commercial travellers, madeiran portuguese, canario hillmen, and peninsular spaniards, moved amidst the straying livestock, while a little group of anglo-saxons naturally sat apart upon the hatch. there were, as is usual when englishmen foregather in a country where wine is cheap, empty bottles scattered about. the engineer from the sister ship and an athletic tourist, stripped, at least as far as was permissible, were wrestling in cumberland fashion on the hatch, with much delicate man�uvring of their feet and futile clutches at each other's waists. macallister, who, when he felt inclined, superintended the _estremedura_'s machinery, alternately encouraged them sardonically and solaced himself with one of the bottles. he was a big, gaunt man, and just then extremely dirty, and when he saw austin he looked up with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes. "i have been waiting for ye anxiously," he said. "ye may now have the pleasure of lending me five dollars." "i'm afraid not!" said austin decisively. "for one thing, i haven't got them. i very seldom have--as you ought to know." macallister made a little gesture of resignation. "well," he said, "ye have always your clothes, and if ye had known us better ye would not have brought so many of them on board the _estremedura_. i'm half expecting yon jackson o' las palmas, who gave us two dollars for the last white suit, to come round for some more o' them when we get in." austin tried the door of his room close by, and was consoled to find it locked, as he had left it. "they cost me five, and i naturally never saw a peseta of the money. i suppose you kept the correo buttons?" "i did not," said macallister, unabashed. "ye may observe miguel, the quartermaster, walking round in them. it was no a bad bargain--a basket o' big grapes an' a watermelon." austin bore it patiently. there was, in fact, nothing to be gained by protesting, and he knew that it was useless to expostulate with macallister when he spoke his own tongue, which was not an invariable custom with him. then the engineer turned and glanced at the wrestlers, who were still stamping up and down the hatch with feet spread well apart, compassionately. "they've been at it the whole o' a half hour, an' no a fall to cheer a body yet. one would think it was dancing they were," he said. "it wasn't to see that i wasted a tumblerful o' anisow on them." now, anisado is a preparation of spirit and extract of anise seed, which is esteemed in that country, and austin looked hard at his comrade, because he had a jar of it, intended for a spanish friend, in his room. he was a trifle uneasy, since a lock is not an insuperable obstacle to an engineer. the latter, however, changed the subject. "it's a kind o' pity about your clothes," he said. "miss jacinta brown is going across with us to-night, an' she was enquiring kindly after ye." austin had a good deal of composure, and he often needed it, but the shrewd scottish eyes saw the momentary pleasure in his face. then, because he did not appreciate macallister's badinage on that subject, he went into his room and bolted the door behind him before he switched on the light and examined the anisado jar. it seemed quite full when he shook it, and the seal was intact, but on looking closer he saw that the impression on the latter was not what it had been when he left it. he was aware that a certain proportion of sea-water may be added to rum without the average consumer noticing any great difference, but he had suspicions that a blend of brine and anise was not likely to be appreciated by its recipient, and he was for a moment or two consumed with righteous indignation. this, however, passed, for he realised that his expostulations would be heard with laughter. it was all a part of the happy-go-lucky life he led, and nobody concerns himself unduly about anything under the flag of spain. the castilian, as a rule, bears his troubles patiently, which is, perhaps, just as well, since he rarely sees them coming or makes any attempt to get out of the way of them. austin accordingly busied himself with his papers, and it was an hour later when he went on deck. the _estremedura_ had gone to sea by then, and the lights of the little spanish town blinked above the broad fringe of surf astern. high above her the great black cordillera cut hard and sharp against the luminous blueness of the night, and the long heave of the atlantic flashed, white-topped, beneath the moon ahead. she swung over it with slanted spars and swaying funnel, while the keen trade-breeze sang in her rigging, and now and then a flying-fish ricocheted, gleaming, from sea-top to sea-top beneath her side. she was very well kept above decks, a trim, yacht-like vessel, and for a while austin leaned over her quarter-rails, smoking a cigarette, and wondering when miss jacinta brown would come up on deck. there was a very deaf englishman, who insisted on conversing with him in stentorian tones in the saloon, and he had no desire for his company. in the meanwhile, it was pleasant to lounge there and watch the moonlight gleam upon the tumbling seas. there were, he admitted, a good many compensations in the life he led. the warmth and colour of the south appealed to him, and, though they are not particularly numerous, there are men like him who retain a somewhat chastened affection for the sea they earn their bread upon. it is true that he earned very little more than that on board the _estremedura_, and he had once had his aspirations like other men, as well as a prospect of realising them; but when financial disaster overtook the family firm nobody seemed anxious to secure the services of a young man without specialised training, who had artistic and somewhat expensive tastes, which was, perhaps, not altogether astonishing. that was how austin eventually came on board the _estremedura_, and stayed there, though there were odd hours when he took himself to task for doing so. still, he did not exactly know where he could go if he left her, and the indifference of the latins was already infecting him. men in spain believe that the future is quite able to take care of itself. by and by, however, a slim, white-clad figure appeared in the entrance to the saloon companion, and he moved in that direction with evident alacrity. as one result of being the _estremedura_'s sobrecargo, he was acquainted with everybody of importance in the archipelago, and among them all there was nobody who figured more prominently than miss jacinta brown. she was english on both sides, though she had lived in those islands most of her twenty-five years, and understood the spaniards, probably better than they understood themselves, for they are rather an impulsive than an introspective people. she also understood her countrymen, and ruled over them, as well as spanish artillery officers and commandantes. it was not very evident how she did it, for there were a good many spanish women, at least, almost as pretty, and of much better birth than she, and she apparently received no great assistance from her father, for pancho brown was a merchant of an unusually solid and unimaginative description. the wives of the english visitors, however, did not, as a rule, like jacinta. they said she was forward, and it was a pity she had no mother; but when any of them received an invitation from her it was immediately proclaimed all over the hotel. she smiled at austin graciously, and allowed him to place her a deck chair beneath a big lifeboat, where it was out of the wind, after which he procured himself another, and sat down and looked at her. jacinta did not seem to mind it, and most men would probably have found it difficult to keep their eyes off her. she was little, shapely, and very dainty, though she could, as austin knew, on occasion be essentially dignified. she had brown hair and eyes, with a little scintillating gleam in them, and her face was slightly tinted with the warm andalusian olive, though there was only english blood in her. she was dressed in white, as usual, with a simplicity that suggested perfect taste, while, as he watched her, austin wondered again exactly where her compelling attractiveness lay. he had met women with more delicate complexions, finer features, softer voices, and more imposing carriage; that is, women who possessed one or two of these advantages, but he had not as yet met any one to be compared to jacinta, as he expressed it, in the aggregate. then it seemed that she read his thoughts, which was, as he had noticed, a habit of hers. "yes, the dress is a new one. i am rather pleased with it, too," she said. austin laughed. "if i hadn't had the pleasure of making your acquaintance some time ago, you would have astonished me. as it is----" "never mind," said jacinta. "after all, there is no great credit in telling people of your kind what they are thinking, though i can't help it now and then. you were wondering what anybody saw in me." now austin was too wise to fancy for a moment that jacinta was fishing for compliments. she knew her own value too well to appreciate them unless they were particularly artistic, and he surmised that she had merely desired to amuse herself by his embarrassment. "if i was, it was very unwise of me," he said. "you are jacinta--and one has to be content with that. you can't be analysed." "and you?" "i am the _estremedura_'s sobrecargo, which is, perhaps, a significant admission." jacinta nodded comprehension. "i think it is," she said. "still, since you considered yourself warranted in approving of my dress, what are you doing in that jacket on a mail run?" "as usual, there is a reason. when i was across at arucas my comrades laid hands upon my garments, and disposed of them at a bargain. they had naturally squandered the money by the time i came back. i am now longing for a few words with the man who, i understand, is coming down to purchase some more at an equally alarming sacrifice." jacinta laughed, but she also looked at him with a little gleam in her eyes. "don't you think it's rather a pity you--are--the _estremedura_'s sobrecargo?" "well," said austin, reflectively, "i won't pretend to misunderstand you, but the trouble is that i don't quite see what else i could be. i cannot dig, and i'm not sure that it would be very pleasant to go round borrowing odd dollars from my friends, even if they were disposed to lend them to me, which is scarcely probable. most of them would, naturally, tell me to look at them, and see what i might have been if i'd had their diligence and probity. besides, i have time to paint little pictures which rash tourists buy occasionally, and the life one leads here has its compensations." the _estremedura_'s whistle hooted just then, and as jacinta looked round a lordly four-masted ship, carrying everything to her royals, swept up out of the night. she was driving down the trade-breeze a good twelve knots an hour, and the foam flew up in cascades as her bows went down, swirled in a broad, snowy smother along the slender streak of rushing hull. above it four tapered spires of sailcloth swung back against the moonlight at every stately roll, and she showed as an exquisite cameo cut in ebony on a ground of silver and blue. still, it was not the colour that formed the strength of that picture, but the suggestion of effort and irresistible force that was stamped on it. she drove by majestically, showing a breadth of wet plates that flashed in a leeward roll, and jacinta's eyes rested on the bent figure high on the lifted poop grappling with her wheel. "ah!" she said. "i suppose it's sometimes brutal, but that is man's work, isn't it?" austin laughed again, though there was a faint warmth in his cheek. "of course, i see the inference," he said. "still, it really isn't necessary for everybody to hold a big vessel's wheel, and i would a good deal sooner you said something nice to me. nobody likes to be told the truth about themselves, you know, and i understand now why folks threw big stones at the goat-skinned prophets long ago." "well," said jacinta, "we will talk of somebody else. i wonder if you know that jefferson has been left a fortune, or, at least, part of one?" "i didn't. still, i'm glad to hear it. i like the man. in fact, he's the straightest one i've come across in his occupation, which, by the way, is, perhaps, somewhat of an admission, considering that he's an american." "i like most americans. for one thing, they're usually in earnest." "and you like spaniards, who certainly aren't." "we will waive the question. it's rather a coincidence that jefferson should have fallen in love about the same time." "do i know the lady, who is, presumably, in earnest, too? i don't like women who have a purpose openly, though that does not apply to you. you have usually a good many, but nobody knows anything about them until you have accomplished them." jacinta ignored the compliment. "i don't think you know her, but she is a friend of mine. i went to school with her for two years in england." "then, of course, she's nice." "that," said jacinta, "is naturally a matter of opinion. she is, however, not in the least like me." "in that case it's difficult to see how she can be nice at all." jacinta smiled somewhat sardonically. "well," she said, "muriel is bigger than i am, and more solid--in every way--as well as quiet and precise. being the daughter of the clergyman of a forlorn little place in england, she has, of course, had advantages which have been denied to me. there are people who have to undertake their own training, or do without any, you know. she very seldom says anything she does not mean, and always knows exactly what she is going to do." "i'm not sure that sounds particularly attractive." jacinta lifted her head and looked at him. "still, she is worth--oh, ever so much more--than a good many such frivolous people as you or i. you will see her yourself to-morrow. she is coming across with us to las palmas, and, of course, if you would like to please me----" "that goes without saying. to-morrow we will endeavour to turn this ship upside down. it usually has to be done when we have the honour of carrying a lady from any part of provincial england." "i really don't want very much," and jacinta smiled, at him. "just the big forward room for her, and the seat next me at the top of your table. the nicest things have a way of getting there. then she is fond of fruit--and if you could get any of the very big moscatel, and some of that membrillo jelly. a few bunches of roses would look nice at our end of the table, too." "well," said austin, with a little whimsical gesture of resignation, "there is, as you know, a spanish commandante and his wife in that forward room, but i suppose we shall have to turn them out. the other things will naturally follow, but i'm afraid major-domo antonio will call us dreadful names to-morrow." jacinta rose. "you are as nice as i expected you would be," she said. "now it is getting chilly, and i have a letter to write." she smiled at him and went forward, walking, though she was english, with a curious buoyant gracefulness as spanish women do, while austin sat still and considered the position. he was quite aware that he would have trouble with the spanish commandante as well as his major-domo on the morrow, but that was, after all, of no great importance. when jacinta wanted anything she usually obtained it, and it was not a little to be counted among her friends, since she frequently contrived to do a good deal for them. there were men as well as women in those islands who owed more than they were aware of to jacinta brown. austin sighed as he remembered it, for he was a penniless sobrecargo, and she, in those islands, at least, a lady of station. it must be sufficient for him to do what little he could to please her, and he had, in fact, once or twice done a good deal. he took life easily, but there was in him a vein of chivalry, which for the most part, however, found somewhat whimsical expression. then he recollected that he had still certain documents to attend to, and going down again locked himself into his room. chapter ii an overheated journal the _estremedura_ lay rolling gently off the quaint old spanish city of santa cruz, teneriffe, most of the following day. it was, indeed, late in the afternoon when she went to sea, and while the jumble of white walls and red-tiled roofs faded astern austin sat in a deck-chair under a lifeboat, while jacinta, mrs. hatherly, and miss muriel gascoyne, to whom he had been duly presented, occupied a seat close by. he was not particularly charmed with the latter's company, and decided that she was certainly as unlike jacinta as she very well could be. miss gascoyne was a clear-complexioned, blue-eyed young englishwoman, solidly put together, and endued with a certain attractiveness; but she was quiet, and had a disconcerting way of looking at him in a fashion which vaguely suggested disapproval. there was also what he felt to be a slightly irritating air of authority about her, which seemed to suggest that she recognised the responsibility of her station, as one who was looked up to in a remote corner of rural england. mrs. hatherly, her aunt, was a little, withered old lady, with ruddy cheeks and the stamp of vigorous health upon her, though she had apparently been ordered south for the winter. she became visibly interested when jacinta contrived to mention that austin was in charge of the _estremedura_'s medicine chest. "it really isn't my fault, and i don't do more harm with it than i can help," he said. "then you have a knowledge of medicine?" asked the red-cheeked lady. "no," said austin, "not in the least. i had to get a sixpenny book from england to tell me the difference between a scruple and a drachm, and i'm not sure about some of the measures yet. you see, i entered the profession quite by accident. the manual in the drug chest was, naturally, in english, as it was sent on board a spanish ship, and the skipper, who couldn't read it, passed it on to me. my first case was a great success, unfortunately. we were loading pine, and one of the men contrived to get a splinter into the inner side of his eyelid. i suppose it was a weakness, but i really couldn't watch him going about in agony." "is the desire to relieve a fellow creature's suffering a weakness?" asked miss gascoyne. austin appeared to reflect. "i almost think it is when the chances are tolerably even that you're going to blind him. still, i got the thing out, and that man never quite knew the risks he ran. the next week another of them dropped a hogshead on to his foot, and smashed it badly--they don't wear boots, you know. he seemed quite convinced that i could cure him, and, as the risk was his, i undertook the thing. you can see him on the forecastle yonder, and he isn't limping. after that my fame went abroad, and they send their cripples off to me at several of the desolate places we call at. i always give them something, but whatever quantity of water the manual recommends i put in twice as much." miss gascoyne looked at him curiously. she had not met a young man of this type before, and was not sure that she approved of him. she also fancied that he was a trifle egotistical, which he certainly was not, and it never occurred to her that he was merely rambling on for her entertainment because he felt it his duty. "don't you think that one should always have faith in one's prescriptions and act upon it?" said her aunt. "i endeavour to do so when i dose the village people who come to me." austin laughed. "well," he said, "you see, i haven't any, and, perhaps if i had, it would be a little rough on others. still, as a matter of fact, they do get better--that is, most of them." miss gascoyne looked startled. "is it right to abuse the ignorant people's credulity like that?" she said, and stopped a trifle awkwardly, while a little twinkle crept into jacinta's eyes. "mr. austin hasn't really killed anybody yet," she said. "you haven't told us what you think of teneriffe, muriel." miss gascoyne turned her face astern, and there was appreciation, and something deeper than that, in her blue eyes, which had seen very little of the glory of this world as yet. high overhead the great black wall of the cañadas cut, a tremendous ebony rampart, against the luminous blue, and beyond it the peak's white cone gleamed ethereally above its wrappings of fleecy mist. beneath, the atlantic lay a sheet of glimmering turquoise in the lee of the island, and outside of that there was a blinding blaze of sunlight on the white-topped sea. "it is beautiful--wonderfully beautiful," she said, with a little tremble in her voice. "isn't it sad that such a country should be steeped in superstition?" austin felt the last observation jar upon him, for he knew that the inhabitants of that land would, in respect of sobriety and morality, compare very favourably with those of several more enlightened places he was acquainted with at home, and that was going far enough for him. still, he could defer to another's convictions when they were evidently sincere, and it seemed to him that jacinta's warning glance was a trifle unnecessary. there was, however, an interruption just then, for a steward appeared with a laden tray at the door of the captain's room. "doesn't don erminio take his comida in the saloon?" asked jacinta. "no," said austin. "not when we have english ladies on board. he's a different man, you know, and some of them will insist on talking spanish to him. it's a little trying to have to admit you don't understand your own language." "vaya!" said a deep voice beyond the open door. "eso no me gusta," and while the steward backed out in haste, a couple of plates went flying over the rail. "don erminio," said jacinta, "evidently doesn't approve of his dinner." miss gascoyne appeared astonished, and looked at austin gravely. "does he often lose his temper in that fashion?" she asked. "isn't it very childish to throw--good food into the sea?" "the captain is, when you come to know him, really a very good-natured man," said austin. then he stopped, and stood up suddenly as two figures came towards them along the deck, and another from the opposite direction. "it's monsignor--i wonder what macallister wants with him." a little, portly priest moved forward with a smile of good-humoured pride, and an ecclesiastic of a very different stamp walked at his side. the latter was a great man, indeed, a very great man, though he had once toiled in comparative obscurity. even miss gascoyne had apparently heard of him. "if one could venture, i should like to speak to him," she said. neither jacinta nor austin seemed to hear her. they were both watching macallister, and he, at least, clearly intended to accost the clerics. he was now dressed immaculately in blue uniform, and in that condition he was a big, handsome man, but he was also a north british calvinist, so far as he had any religious views at all, and accordingly not one who could reasonably be expected to do homage to a dignitary of rome. still, the little fleshy priest was a friend of his, and when the latter presented him he bent one knee a trifle and gravely took off his uniform cap. the ecclesiastic raised two fingers and spoke in latin. macallister smiled at him reassuringly. "that isn't exactly what i meant, but it can't do me any harm coming from a man like you, while if it does me any good i daresay i need it. you see, i'm one of the goats," he said. the great man glanced at his companion, who translated as literally as he could, though he also explained that the señor macallister not infrequently made things easier for some of the peasants who travelled third class on board the _estremedura_. then a whimsical but very kindly twinkle crept into the great man's eyes, and he laid a beautiful, olive-tinted hand on the shoulder of the mechanic who had graciously approved of him. "if he is kind to these poor hill men he is a friend of mine. the charity it covers many--differences," he said. then, as they came aft together, austin also took off his cap, and touched miss gascoyne's arm as he turned to the cleric. the girl rose gravely, with a tinge of heightened colour in her face and a little inclination, and, though nobody remembered exactly what was said, unless it was the eminent cleric, who was, as usual with his kind, a polished man of the world as well, he moved on with the girl on one side of him and macallister talking volubly in a most barbarous jargon on the other. mrs. hatherly and the little priest took their places behind them, and austin gathered that as a special favour macallister was going to show them all his engines. jacinta leaned back in her seat and laughed musically. "macallister," she said, "is always unique, and he will probably finish the entertainment by offering monsignor a glass of whiskey. it is to be hoped he doesn't apostrophise his firemen with his usual fluency. still, do you know, i am rather pleased with you? you have made muriel happy." "if i have pleased you it is rather more to the purpose," said austin, reflectively. "i have, however, noticed that when you express your approbation there is usually something else to be done." jacinta smiled. "it is very little, after all, but perhaps i had better explain. muriel met jefferson, who had been to london to see somebody, on board the _dahomey_, and--i'm telling you this in confidence--there are reasons for believing the usual thing happened. she is really good, you know, while jefferson is a somewhat serious man himself, as well as an american. they treat women rather well in his country--in fact, they seem to idealise them now and then. besides, i understand it was remarkably fine weather." "yes," said austin, who glanced suggestively across the sunlit heave towards the dim, blue heights of grand canary, "it is, one would believe, quite easy to fall in love with any one pretty and clever during fine weather at sea. that is, of course, on sufficient provocation. there are also, i think, englishmen with some capacity for idealisation--but hadn't you better go on?" jacinta pursed her lips as she looked at him with an assumption of severity, but she proceeded. "now, i had arranged for mrs. hatherly and muriel to spend the winter in grand canary, but she has heard of a doctor in one of the hotels at madeira, and is bent on going there. there is, of course, nothing the matter with her; but if she approves of the doctor in question it is very probable that she will stay in that hotel until the spring. still, she is changeable, and if she doesn't go at once it is possible that she will not go at all. the madeira boat leaves las palmas about half an hour after we get there, and i don't want mrs. hatherly and muriel to catch her. muriel doesn't want to, either." austin shook his head. "don't you know that it is rather a serious thing to delay a spanish mailboat?" he said. "still, i suppose you have decided that it must be done?" "i think so," said jacinta sweetly. "i also fancy you and macallister could manage it between you. you have my permission to tell him anything you think necessary." she rose and left him, with this, and austin, who was not altogether pleased with his commission, waited until after the four o'clock comida, when, flinging himself down on a settee in the engineer's room, cigar in hand, he put the case to macallister, who grinned. the latter, as a rule, appeared to find his native idiom more expressive in the evening. "i'm no saying jacinta's no fascinating, an' i've seen ye looking at her like a laddie eyeing a butterscotch," he said. "still, it can no be done. neither o' our reputations would stand it, for one thing." "we have nothing to do with the madeira boat, and the lopez boat for cuba doesn't sail until an hour after her," said austin. "besides, jacinta wants it done." macallister looked thoughtful. "weel," he said, "that is a reason. jacinta thinks a good deal of me, an' if i was no married already i would show ye how to make up to her. i would not sit down, a long way off, an' look at her. she's no liking ye any the better for that way of it." "hadn't you better leave that out?" said austin stiffly. "i'm the _estremedura_'s sobrecargo, which is quite sufficient. can't you have a burst tube or something of the kind?" "a burst tube is apt to result in somebody getting scalded, an' stepping into boiling water is sore on a primera maquinista's feet. ye'll just have to make excuses to jacinta, i'm thinking." austin, who knew he could do nothing without macallister's co-operation, was wondering what persuasion he could use, when he was joined by an unexpected ally. a big, aggressive englishman in tourist apparel approached the mess-room door and signed to him. "you were not in your room," he said, as though this was a grievance. austin looked at him quietly. "i'm afraid i really haven't the faculty of being in two places at once. is there anything i can do for you?" "there is. i particularly want to catch the liverpool boat _via_ madeira to-night, and the time you get in cuts it rather fine. it occurred to me that you might be able to hurry her up a little." "i'm sorry that's out of the question," said austin, languidly. "you see, i'm not expected to interfere with this steamer's engines." he was wondering how he could best favour the englishman with a delicate left-handed compliment, when macallister, who was once more very dirty, and wore only a dungaree jacket over his singlet, broke in: "i would," he said, "like to see him try." "may i ask who you are?" said the passenger, who regarded him superciliously. "ye may," and there was a portentious gleam in macallister's eyes. "i'm only her chief engineer." "ah!" said the other, who did not consider it advisable to mention that he had supposed him to be a fireman. "well, there are, i believe, means of obtaining a favour from a chief engineer. you naturally don't get many pickings in this kind of boat." austin laughed softly, for he knew his man. it is now and then permissible to bestow an honorarium upon a chief engineer over a deal in coals, but it requires to be done tactfully, and when the stranger suggestively thrust his hand into his pocket, macallister hove his six feet of length upright, and looked down on him, with a big hand clenched and blazing eyes. "out o' this before i shake some manners intil ye, ye fifteen-pound-the-round-trip scum!" he said. the stranger backed away from him, and then bolted incontinently as macallister made for the door. austin laughed softly when he heard him falling over things in the dark alleyway, and macallister sat down fuming. "a bit doosoor on the coal trade is one thing, but yon was--insultin'," he said, and then looked up with a sudden grin. "i'll fix the waster. can ye no smell a crank-pin burning?" "i can't," said austin. "still, under the circumstances, i'm quite willing to take your word for it." he went up on deck. it was dark now, but the moon was shining, and he was not surprised to see a sooty fireman clambering in haste up the bridge ladder. then the throb of the propeller slackened, and when the _estremedura_ lay rolling wildly athwart the long, moonlit heave, an uproar broke out in the engine room below. the castilian is excitable, and apt to lose his head when orders which he cannot understand are hurled at him, while macallister, when especially diligent, did not trust to words alone, but used lumps of coal and heavy steel spanners. he was just then apparently chasing his greasers and firemen up and down the engine room. there was a rush of apprehensive passengers towards the open skylights, from which steam as well as bad language ascended, and austin, who went with them, found jacinta by his side. "i suppose it's nothing dangerous?" she said. austin laughed. "if it were macallister would not be making so much noise. in fact, i don't think you need worry at all. when miss jacinta brown expresses her wishes, things are not infrequently apt to happen." jacinta smiled at him. "i have," she said, "one or two faithful servants. shall we move a little nearer and see what he is doing?" "i'm afraid the conversation of one of them is not likely to be of a kind that miss gascoyne, for example, would approve of." "pshaw!" said jacinta, and followed when austin made way for her to one of the skylights' lifted frames. the _estremedura_ was rolling wickedly, and very scantily attired men were scrambling, apparently without any definite purpose, beneath the reeling lights which flashed upon the idle machinery. they, however, seemed to be in bodily fear of macallister, who held a spouting hose, while a foamy, soapy lather splashed up from the crank-pit on the big, shining connecting-rod. austin could see him dimly through a cloud of steam, though he could think of no reason why any of the latter should be drifting about the engine room. there were several english passengers about the skylights, and the one with the aggressive manner was explaining his views to the rest. "the man is either drunk or totally incapable. he is doing nothing but shout," he said. "you will notice that he spends half the time washing the connecting-rods, which, as everybody knows, cannot get hot. if we miss the madeira boat i shall certainly call upon the company's manager." perhaps he spoke too loudly, or it may have been an accident, though austin, who saw macallister flounder on the slippery floor-plates as the steamer rolled, did not think it was. in any case, he drew jacinta back, and a moment later a jet from the spouting hose struck with a great splashing upon the glass. the aggressive passenger, who was looking down just then, got most of it in his face, and he staggered back, dripping, and gasping with anger. when he once more became vociferous, austin led jacinta away. "i'm afraid we will not catch that boat, but i really don't think you ought to hear mack's retort," he said. it was not quite half an hour later when the _estremedura_ moved on again, and macallister informed austin that he could not allow two journals to become overheated in the same voyage. it would, he said, be too much of a coincidence, and some of his subordinates did know a little about machinery. they had accordingly some few minutes yet in hand when they swung round the high isleta cinder heap into sight of las palmas. it gleamed above the surf fringe, a cluster of twinkling lights at the black hills' feet, and there were other lights, higher up, on ships' forestays, behind the dusky line of mole. in between, the long atlantic heave flashed beneath the moon, and there was scarcely two miles of it left. austin, standing forward with a pair of night-glasses, and jacinta beside him, watched the lights close on one another dejectedly. "we'll be in inside ten minutes, and i think the madeira boat has still her anchor down," he said. "i had to give the quartermaster orders to have our lancha ready, and he'll take any passengers straight across to her." "i believe you did what you could," said jacinta. "still, you see----" "oh, yes," said austin. "you like success?" jacinta looked at him with a little enigmatical smile. "when any of my friends are concerned, i believe i do." austin went aft, and a little while later found macallister standing by the poop, which was piled with banana baskets, among which seasick canary peasants lay. the big crane on the end of the mole was now on the _estremedura_'s quarter, and they were sliding into the mouth of the harbour. close ahead, with white steam drifting about her forecastle, lay the madeira boat. "they're heaving up," said the engineer. "jacinta will no' be pleased with ye, i'm thinking." "there's only one thing left," said austin. "one of us must fall in." macallister grinned. "then i know which it will be. it was not me who swam across the harbour last trip. but wait a moment. there's a dozen or two spaniards among the baskets, an' i'm thinking nobody would miss one of them." austin, who knew what his comrade was capable of, seized hold of him, but macallister shook his grasp off and disappeared among the baskets. then there was a splash in the shadow beneath the ship, a shout, and a clamour broke out from the crowded deck. a gong clanged below, the captain shouted confused orders from his bridge, and the _estremedura_ slid forward, with engines stopped, past a british warship with her boats at the booms. then in the midst of the confusion, austin, who was leaning on the rail, wondering what had really happened, felt himself gripped by the waist. they had slid into the shadow of the isleta, which lay black upon the water just there. "noo's your chance," said a voice he knew. "it's a hero she'll think ye. in ye go to the rescue!" austin, who was by no means certain that there was a man in the water at all, had no intention of going if he could help it, but, as it happened, he had no option. the _estremedura_ rolled just then, he felt himself lifted, and went out, head foremost, over the rail. the steamer had gone on and left him when he rose to the surface, but there was nobody either swimming or shouting in the water behind him. he knew it would be a minute or two yet before they got the big passenger lancha over, but the _estremedura_'s propeller was thrashing astern, and when she came back towards him he seized the boat-warp already lowered along her side. nobody appeared to notice him, for one of the british warship's boats was then approaching. she flashed by as he crawled in through the opened gangway, and a man stood up in her. "spanish mail ahoy!" he cried. "anybody speaking english aboard of you? if so, tell your skipper to go ahead. we have got the banana basket he dropped over. he can send for it to-morrow." austin slipped, unnoticed, into his room, but he laughed as he heard the roar of a whistle, and saw a long, black hull ringed with lights slide by. it was the madeira boat, steaming down the harbour. chapter iii on the veranda it was a clear, moonlight night when pancho brown, mrs. hatherly, and erminio oliviera, the _estremedura_'s captain, sat in big cane chairs on the veranda of the hotel catalina, las palmas. the catalina is long and low, and fronted with a broad veranda, a rather more sightly building than tourist hotels usually are, and its row of windows blazed that night. they were, most of them, wide open, and the seductive strains of a soft spanish waltz drifted out with the rhythmic patter of feet and swish of light draperies, for the winter visitors had organised a concert and informal dance. a similar entertainment was apparently going on in the aggressively english metropole, which cut, a huge, square block of building, against the shining sea a little further up the straight white road, while the artillery band was playing in the alameda of the town, a mile or two away. the deep murmur of the atlantic surf broke through the music in a drowsy undertone. pancho brown was essentially english, a little, portly gentleman with a heavy, good-humoured face. he was precise in dress, a little slow in speech, and nobody at first sight would have supposed him to be brilliant, commercially or otherwise. still, he had made money, which is, perhaps, the most eloquent testimony to anybody's business ability. he was then meditatively contemplating his daughter, who was strolling in the garden with a young english officer from the big white warship in the harbour. a broad blaze of silver stretched back across the sea towards the hazy blueness in the east beyond which lay africa, and it was almost as light as day. mrs. hatherly followed his gaze. "an only daughter must be a responsibility now and then," she said. "i have never had one of my own, but for the last few months my niece has been living with me, and i have had my moments of anxiety." pancho brown, who fancied she was leading up to something, smiled in a fashion which suggested good-humoured indifference, though he was quite aware that his daughter was then talking very confidentially to the young naval officer. "i am afraid i do not deserve your sympathy," he said. "jacinta's mother died when she was eight years old, but ever since she came home from school in england jacinta has taken care of me. in fact, i almost think it is jacinta who feels the responsibility. i am getting a little old, and now and then my business enterprises worry me." "and does that young girl know anything about them?" "jacinta," said brown, "knows a good deal about everything, and it really doesn't seem to do her any harm. in fact, i sometimes feel that she knows considerably more than i do. i make mistakes now and then, but if jacinta ever does i am not aware of them." "still, a girl with miss brown's appearance--and advantages--must naturally attract a good deal of attention, and, of course, one has----" brown smiled at her indulgently. "when jacinta chooses her husband i shall, no doubt, approve of him. i am not sure," he added, with an air of reflection, "that it would make any great difference if i didn't." "you are to be envied," said his companion, with a little sigh. "i feel the responsibility circumstances have placed on me is unpleasantly heavy, and i am almost sorry i missed the madeira boat two or three weeks ago. if we had gone in her we should not, of course, have been in las palmas now." "it is almost as evident that i should have been left forlorn to-night," said brown, with cumbrous gallantry. mrs. hatherly appeared to reflect. "it is a curious thing that miss brown assured me we should not catch the steamer that night, though we had apparently half an hour to spare; but in one respect it was perhaps fortunate, after all. if we had gone to madeira i should not have consulted dr. lane, who seems to understand my case so thoroughly; but, on the other hand, we should have seen no more of mr. jefferson." "it is not such a long way to madeira, and there is a steamer every week or so. from what i know of mr. jefferson, i think it is possible he would have gone there, too." "you are well acquainted with him?" brown glanced at her with a faint twinkle in his eyes. "i know a little about everybody in these islands, madam. mr. jefferson is considered a straight man, and i may mention that he meets with jacinta's approval. i almost think i could vouch for his character. i wonder," and he smiled genially, "if it would be as much to the purpose if i said that he had just been left eight thousand pounds?" "eight thousand pounds is not very much," and mrs. hatherly turned to him as if for guidance. "mr. jefferson called on me this afternoon, and it would be almost three weeks before i could get a letter from muriel's father, who trusted her to me. of course, a good deal would depend upon what i said about him; but, after all, muriel has not a penny of her own." "the sum in question is apt to go a long way when the man who has it is an american, and i really think you could leave him and miss gascoyne to settle the affair between them." brown stopped a moment, and then added, as if by an afterthought: "it is, of course, quite possible that they have done so already; and, in any case, i am not sure, my dear madam, that jefferson would be very greatly discouraged by your opposition. he is--as has been said--an american." the little, red-cheeked lady made a gesture of resignation, but just then captain oliviera, who spoke a little english, and appeared to feel himself neglected, broke in: "you come here for your healt, señora?" he said. "bueno! my sobrecargo go by the step, and he is savvy much the medsin. me, he cure, frecuentemente, by the morning. ola, i call him!" "otra vez," said brown, restrainingly, and mrs. hatherly favoured the captain, who was big and lean and bronzed, with a glance of interested scrutiny. "you are an invalid, too?" she said. "one would scarcely fancy it. in fact, you seem very robust to me. what do you suffer from?" brown made this a trifle plainer, and don erminio smiled. he had no great sense of fitness, and was slightly reckless in his conversation. "mi t'roat, and the head of me--by the morning," he said, and made a curious gurgling to give point to the explanation. "el sobrecargo he laugh and say, 'aha, mi captain, you want a peek-a-up again.' it is of mucho effecto. i go call him. he make some for you." "peek-a-up!" said mrs. hatherly, and brown laid his hand restrainingly upon the gallant skipper's arm. "it is a preparation they find beneficial at sea, though i do not think it would suit your case," he said, and oliviera roused himself to a further effort. "good man, mi sobrecargo. much education. also friend of me. i say him often: 'carramba! in spain is no dollar. why you stay here?' aha, señor austin savvy. by and by he marry a rich english señorita." it occurred to mrs. hatherly that brown's face lost a trifle of its usual placidity as his eyes rested on his daughter, who was, however, still apparently talking to the naval officer. the catalina did not possess a particularly attractive garden then, but there were a few dusty palms in it, and any one strolling in their shadow that moonlight night could see the filmy mists drifting athwart the great black cordillera, and the wisp of lights that twinkled above the hissing surf along the sweep of bay until they ended in a cluster where the white-walled city rose above the tossing spray. there were several pairs of young men and women who apparently found the prospect attractive, but brown did not notice austin among them. he and mrs. hatherly sat in the shadow, but oliviera was in the moonlight, which was probably how it happened that a man who appeared in the lighted doorway close by turned towards him, evidently without noticing the others. "that you, don erminio? then come right along," he said. "i've got to give somebody a good time, and you have so much human nature it's easy pleasing you. get up on your hind feet, and have some champagne--enough to make your throat bad for a month, if you feel like it." oliviera rose with alacrity. "aha!" he said. "i come." he wasted no time in doing it, though he reluctantly spared a moment to make his companions a little grave inclination, for don erminio was, after all, a castilian, and when he had gone the two who were left looked at one another. the joyous satisfaction in the voice and attitude of the man at the door had its significance for both of them. mrs. hatherly looked troubled, but there was a faint twinkle in her companion's eyes. "i wonder if mr. jefferson often gives his friends invitations of that kind?" she said. brown smiled reassuringly. "i almost think i could answer for his general abstemiousness. still, there are occasions upon which even the most sedate of us are apt to relax a little, and wish to share our satisfaction with our friends." "then," said mrs. hatherly, with evident anxiety, "you fancy----" "i should almost fancy this is one of the occasions in question." the little, red-cheeked lady rose with a sigh. "i have tried to do my duty," she said. "now, i think i must find muriel, if you will excuse me." she left him, and when brown also sauntered into the hotel the veranda remained empty until jacinta came up the broad stairway just as it happened that austin came out of the door. she was attired diaphanously in pale-tinted draperies, and seemed to austin, almost ethereal as she stopped a moment at the head of the stairway with the moonlight upon her. he was, however, quite aware that material things had their value to jacinta brown, and that few young women had a more useful stock of worldly wisdom. in another moment she saw him, and made him a little sign with her fan. he drew forward a chair, and then leaned against the balustrade, looking down on her, for it was evident that jacinta had something to say to him. "as i haven't seen you since that night on board the _estremedura_, i naturally haven't had an opportunity of complimenting you," she said. "may i ask upon what?" and austin looked a trifle uneasy. "your discretion. it would, perhaps, have been a little cold for a moonlight swim, and one's clothing would also be apt to suffer. after all, there was, of course, no reason why it should afford you any pleasure to display your gallantry." austin's face flushed. "there have been other occasions when it would have pleased me to twist macallister's neck," he said. "no doubt you overheard what he said to me?" "i did," said jacinta, who looked at him quietly over her fan. "it is a little astonishing that neither of you noticed me. still, of course, your attitude was, at least, sensible. what i do not understand is why you saw fit to change it a minute or two later. i had, i may mention, left the poop then." "i'm not sure i understand." jacinta laughed musically. "now," she said, "i really believe you do." "well," said austin, with a doubtful smile, "if you think i went overboard of my own will to win your approbation, you are mistaken. i did not go at all. i was, in fact, thrown in. macallister is, as you know, a somewhat persistent person." "ah!" said jacinta. "that explains a good deal. well, i feel almost tempted to be grateful to him for doing it, though you were, of course, sensible. there was really no reason why you should wish me to credit you with courage and humanity--especially when you didn't possess them." austin hoped she did not see that he winced, for although he had borne a good deal of her badinage, he felt his face grow hot. he was quite aware that this girl was not for him, and he had, he believed, succeeded in preventing himself falling in love with her. it seemed quite fitting that she should regard him as one of her servants, and since he could look for nothing more, he was content with that. he had, however, a spice of temper, and sometimes she drove him a trifle too hard. "still," he said, "if i ever did anything really worth while, i think i should insist upon your recognising it, though it is scarcely likely that i shall have the opportunity." "no," said jacinta, reflectively, "i scarcely think it is; but, after all, i have a little to thank you for. you see, you did delay the _estremedura_. i suppose you have not seen mr. jefferson during the last half hour?" "no," said austin, with a little start of interest. "has he----" "he has. muriel, at least, has evidently arrived at an understanding with him. i am not sure they saw me, but i came across them a little while ago--and they looked supremely happy." there was satisfaction in her voice, but it was with a mildly ironical and yet faintly wistful expression she gazed at the shining sea. it somewhat astonished austin, though there was so much about jacinta that was incomprehensible to him. "well," he said, "i'm glad; but i should scarcely have fancied miss gascoyne would have attracted jefferson. after all, one would hardly consider her a young woman who had very much in her. indeed, i have wondered why you were so fond of her." jacinta smiled curiously as she looked at him. "she is wonderful to jefferson. there is no grace or goodness that she is not endued with in his estimation." "but if she doesn't possess them?" "then," said jacinta, decisively, "because he believes she does, she will acquire them. there are women like that, you know, and i am not sure that sensible people like you and i don't lose the best of life occasionally. if a man believes a girl of muriel's kind angelic she is very apt to unfold shining wings, though nobody else ever fancied that she had anything of the kind about her." "ah!" said austin, who was a little stirred, though he would not admit it. "no doubt you know. a good many men must have thought that of you." jacinta laughed again. "no, my friend," she said. "i have met men who thought me amusing, and two or three who thought me clever--but that is a very different thing--while it is possible that the others remembered i was pancho brown's daughter. so, you see, my wings have not unfolded. in fact, i sometimes think they are in danger of shrivelling away." there was nothing that austin could say, for he was the _estremedura_'s sobrecargo, and had never forgotten that pancho brown was reputed to be making several thousand a year. still, he found silence difficult, and changed the subject. "well," he said, "you haven't told me yet why you are so fond of miss gascoyne." "she--is--good, and, after all, goodness really does appeal to some of us. besides, when i went to an english school, a stranger, more spanish than english in thought and sentiment, and most of the others held aloof from me, she saw i was lonely, and came and made friends with me. i was glad to cling to her then, and you see i haven't forgotten it." there was a tone in the girl's voice which sent a little thrill through the man. it was very clear that jacinta did not forget a kindness, and he had once or twice already had glimpses of her deeper nature. while he stood silent, and, as it happened, in the shadow, miss gascoyne came out of the door and approached jacinta with the moonlight on her face. austin was almost startled as he glanced at her. when he had last seen muriel gascoyne he had considered her a comely english girl without imagination or sensibility. she had, in fact, appeared to him narrow in her views, totally unemotional, and more than a little dull, certainly not the kind of young woman to inspire or reciprocate passionate admiration in any discerning man. now, as she came towards him with her eyes shining and the soft colour in her face, which was very gentle, she seemed transfigured and almost radiant. she stooped and kissed jacinta impulsively. "i am so happy, my dear," she said. "we owe ever so much to you." austin had the grace to wish himself somewhere else, though he did not see how he could get away, but jacinta, with her usual boldness, turned in his direction. "well," she said, "i almost think you owe mr. austin a little, too. if he hadn't stopped the _estremedura_ you would probably have been in madeira now." again muriel gascoyne astonished austin, for though it was evident she had not been aware of his presence, she showed no embarrassment, and smiled at him with a simplicity which, though he had not expected it from her, had in it the essence of all womanly dignity. "yes," she said, "i realise that. mr. austin, harry has been looking for you everywhere." austin made her a little grave inclination, and then, because she seemed to expect it, shook hands with her. "i am glad that the man you have promised to marry is one of my friends," he said. "there is not a better one in these islands." he did not remember what miss gascoyne said, and perhaps it was not of any particular consequence, but when she left them it happened that he and jacinta did not look at one another. there was, in fact, an almost embarrassing silence, and through it they heard the rhythmic swing of a soft spanish waltz, and the deep-toned murmur of the sea. then jacinta laughed. "i wonder what you are thinking?" she said. austin smiled, somewhat drily. "i was endeavouring to remember that there are a good many things the _estremedura_'s sobrecargo must dispense with. it is exceedingly unlikely that anybody will ever leave me eight thousand pounds." "i fancy there are a good many of us who would like to have a good deal more than we will probably ever get," said jacinta. "it can only be a very few who ever hear the celestial music at all, and to them it comes but once in their life." austin looked at her quietly. "a little while ago i should not have considered miss gascoyne capable of hearing it; but now, and because i know the man she has promised to marry, i almost think she will, at least occasionally, be able to catch an echo of it. it must be difficult to hear that orchestra once and forget it." jacinta turned to him with a curious little smile in her eyes. "you and i are, of course, sensible people, and fancies of that kind have nothing to do with us. in the meanwhile, it is really necessary that i should appear in one or two of the dances." austin made a little gesture that might have expressed anything, and she rose and left him standing on the veranda. chapter iv a big contract it was the day after the dance at the catalina, and austin was running into las palmas harbour in a powerful steam launch which had been lent him to convey certain documents to a spanish steamer. the trade-breeze had veered a little further east that day, as it sometimes did, and the full drift of the long atlantic sea came rolling inshore. the launch was wet with spray, which flew up in clouds as she lurched over the white-topped combers that burst in a chaotic spouting on a black volcanic reef not far away from her. it also happened that the coaling company's new tug had broken down a few minutes earlier, and when the launch drove past the long mole the first thing austin saw was a forty-ton coal lighter, loaded to the water's edge, drifting towards the reef. there was a boat astern of her, out of which a couple of spanish peons seemed to be flinging the water, preparatory to abandoning the lighter to her fate, but austin could see very little of the latter. the sea washed clean across her, and she showed no more than a strip of sluicing side amidst the spray. what became of her was no business of his, but when the whistle of a big grain tramp rolling across the mouth of the harbour, and apparently waiting for her coal, roared out a warning, it occurred to austin that the spaniards in the boat might have considerable difficulty in pulling her clear of the reef against the sea. accordingly, he unloosed the launch's whistle, and while it screeched dolefully, put his helm over and ran down upon the lighter. she was wallowing sideways towards the reef when he rounded up close alongside and saw, somewhat to his astonishment, that there was a man still on board. he was very black, though the spray was dripping from his face, and the seas that swept over the lighter's deck wet him to the knees. austin shouted to him: "i'll run round to leeward, jefferson, so you can jump!" he said. the wet man swung an arm up. "stand by to take our rope. i'm not going to jump." austin considered. he was by no means sure that the launch had power enough to tow the lighter clear, and the long white seething on the jagged lava astern of her suggested what would happen if she failed to do it. "come on board. i haven't steam to pull her off," he said. jefferson made an impatient gesture. "if you want me, you have got to try." austin wasted no more time. it was evidently valuable then, and he knew his man. he signed to the spanish fireman to back the launch astern, and clutched the rope jefferson flung him as she drove across the lighter's bows. "i can tow her just as well with you on board here," he roared. "i guess you can," and a sea wet jefferson to the waist as he floundered aft towards the lighter's stern. "still, you're going to find it awkward to steer her, too." this was plain enough, and austin decided that if jefferson meant to stay on board it was his affair, while he was far from sure that he would gain anything by attempting to dissuade him, even had there been time available. as it was, he realised that the lighter would probably go ashore while they discussed the question, and he signed to the spanish fireman, who started the little engine full speed ahead, and then opened the furnace door. there was a gush of flame from the funnel, and the tow-rope tightened with a bang that jerked the launch's stern under. then, while she was held down by the wallowing lighter a big, white-topped sea burst across her forward, and for a few seconds austin, drenched and battered by the flying spray, could see nothing at all. when it blew astern he made out jefferson standing knee deep in water at the lighter's helm, though there was very little else visible through the rush of white-streaked brine. austin shouted to the fireman, who once more opened the furnace door, for that cold douche had suddenly made a different man of him. he did, for the most part, very little on board the _estremedura_, and took life as easily as he could, but there was another side of his nature which, though it had been little stirred as yet, came uppermost then, as it did occasionally when he brought his despatches off at night in an open roadstead through the trade-wind surf. it was also known to the _estremedura_'s skipper that he had once swum off to the steamer from the roaring beach at orotava when no fishermen in the little port would launch a barquillo out. thus he felt himself in entire sympathy with jefferson as every big comber hove the launch up and the spray lashed his tingling skin, while for five anxious minutes the issue hung in the balance. launch and lighter went astern with the heavier seas, and barely recovered the lost ground in the smooths when a roller failed to break quite so fiercely as its predecessors. then the spanish fireman either raised more steam, or the heavy weight of coal astern at last acquired momentum, for they commenced to forge ahead, the launch plunging and rolling, with red flame at her funnel, and the smoke and spray and sparks blowing aft on austin, who stood, dripping to the skin, at the tiller. ahead, the long seas that hove themselves up steeply in shoal water came foaming down on him, but there was a little grim smile in his eyes, and he felt his blood tingle as he watched them. when he glanced over his shoulder, which it was not advisable to do unguardedly, he could see jefferson swung up above him on the lighter's lifted stern, and the long white smoother that ran seething up the reef. it, however, fell further behind them, until he could put the helm over and run the lighter into smoother water behind the mole, when jefferson flung up his arm again. "swing her alongside the grain boat, and then hold on a minute. i'll come ashore with you," he said. austin stopped the launch and cast the tow-rope off, and the lighter, driving forward, slid in under the big grain tramp's side. a few minutes later jefferson appeared at her gangway, and when austin ran in jumped on board. he was a tall man, and was just then very wet, and as black as any coal heaver. this, however, rather added to the suggestion of forcefulness that usually characterised him. "that fellow has been waiting several hours for his coal, and as i couldn't get a man worth anything on to the crane, i ran the thing myself," he said. "the way the wind was it blew the grit all over me, and i'm coming across for a wash with you. i'm 'most afraid to walk through the port as i am just now." he laughed happily, and austin fancied that he understood him, since he felt that if he had held miss gascoyne's promise he would not have liked to run any risk of meeting her in the state in which jefferson was just then. as it happened, it did not occur to either of them that they had done anything unusual, which had, perhaps, its significance. austin took him on board the _estremedura_, and when he had removed most of the coal-dust from his person they sat down with a bottle of thin wine before them in the sobrecargo's room. jefferson was lean in face and person, though he was largely made, and had dark eyes that could smile and yet retain a certain intentness and gravity. his voice had a little ring in it, and, big as he was, he was seldom altogether still. when he filled his glass his long fingers tightened on it curiously. "i owe you a little for pulling us off just now, but that's by no means all," he said. "miss gascoyne told me how you stopped the boat that night three weeks ago. now----" austin laughed. "we'll take it item by item. when you get started you're just a little overwhelming. in the first place, what are you coaling grain tramps for when somebody has left you a fortune?" "it's not quite that," said jefferson. "forty thousand dollars. they're busy at the coal wharf, and wanted me to stay on until the month was up, any way." "i don't think you owe them very much," said austin. "in fact, i'm not sure that if i'd been you i'd have saved that coal for them; but we'll get on. i want to congratulate you on another thing, and i really think you are a lucky man." the smile sank out of jefferson's eyes. "i'm quite sure of it," he said gravely. "i get wondering sometimes how she ever came to listen to such a man as i am, who isn't fit to look at her." austin made a little gesture of sympathy. this was not what he would have said himself, but he was an insular englishman, and the reticence which usually characterises the species is less highly thought of across the atlantic. the average american is more or less addicted to saying just what he means, which is, after all, usually a convenience to everybody. before he could speak jefferson went on: "i've been wanting to thank you for stopping that steamer," he said. "it's the best turn anybody ever did me, and i'm not going to forget it. now----" "if you're pleased, i am," said austin, who did not care for protestations of gratitude, a trifle hastily. "any way, you have got her, and though it's not my business, the question is what you're going to do. eight thousand pounds isn't very much, after all, and english girls are apt to want a good deal, you know." jefferson laughed. "forty thousand dollars is quite a nice little sum to start with; but i've got to double it before i'm married." "there are people who would spend most of their life doing it," said austin, reflectively. "how long do you propose to allow yourself?" "six months," and there was a snap in jefferson's voice and eyes. "if i haven't got eighty thousand dollars in that time i'm going to have no use for them." "when you come to think of it, that isn't very long to make forty thousand dollars in," said austin. he said nothing further, for he had met other americans in his time, and knew the cheerful optimism that not infrequently characterises them. jefferson looked at him steadily with the little glow still in his eyes. "you stopped the _estremedura_, and, in one respect, you're not quite the same as most englishmen. they're hide-bound. it takes a month to find out what they're thinking, and then, quite often, it isn't worth while. any way, i'm going to talk. i feel i've got to. wouldn't you consider miss gascoyne was worth taking a big risk for?" "yes," said austin, remembering what he had seen in the girl's face. "i should almost think she was." "you would almost think!" and jefferson gazed at him a moment in astonishment. "well, i guess you were made that way, and you can't help it. now, i'm open to tell anybody who cares to listen that that girl was a revelation to me. she's good all through, there's not a thought in her that isn't clean and wholesome. after all, that's what a man wants to fall back upon. then she's dainty, clever, and refined, with sweetness and graciousness just oozing out of her. it's all round her like an atmosphere." austin was slightly amused, though he would not for his life have shown it. it occurred to him that an excess of the qualities his companion admired in miss gascoyne might prove monotonous, especially if they were, as in her case, a little too obtrusive. he also fancied that this was the first time anybody had called her clever. still, jefferson's supreme belief in the woman he loved appealed to him in spite of its somewhat too vehement expression, and he reflected that there was probably some truth in jacinta's observation that the woman whose lover credited her with all the graces might, at least, acquire some of them. it seemed that a simple and somewhat narrow-minded english girl, without imagination, such as miss gascoyne was in reality, might still hear what jacinta called the celestial music, and, listening, become transformed. after all, it was not mere passion which vibrated in jefferson's voice and had shone in muriel gascoyne's eyes, and austin vaguely realised that the faith that can believe in the apparently impossible and the charity that sees no shortcomings are not altogether of this earth. then he brushed these thoughts aside and turned to his companion with a little smile. "how did you ever come to be here, jefferson?" he asked, irrelevantly. "it's rather a long way from the land of progress and liberty." jefferson laughed in a somewhat curious fashion. "well," he said, "others have asked me, but i'll tell you, and i've told miss gascoyne. i had a good education, and i'm thankful for it now. there is money in the family, but it was born in most of us to go to sea. i went because i had to, and it made trouble. the man who had the money had plotted out quite a different course for me. still, i did well enough until the night the _sachem_--there are several of them, but i guess you know the one i mean--went down. i was mate, but it wasn't in my watch the dutchman struck her." "ah!" said austin softly, "that explains a good deal! it wasn't exactly a pleasant story." he eat looking at his companion with grave sympathy as the details of a certain grim tragedy in which the brutally handled crew had turned upon their persecutors when the ship was sinking under them came back to him. knowing tolerably well what usually happens when official enquiry follows upon a disaster at sea, he had a suspicion that the truth had never become altogether apparent, though the affair had made a sensation two or three years earlier. still, while jefferson had not mentioned his part in it, he had already exonerated him. "it was so unpleasant that i couldn't find a shipping company on our side who had any use for the _sachem_'s mate," he said, and his voice sank a little. "of course, it never all came out, but there were more than two of the men who went down that night who weren't drowned. well, what could you expect of a man with a pistol when the one friend he had in that floating hell dropped at his feet with his head adzed open. that left me and nolan aft. he was a brute--a murdering, pitiless devil; but there were he and i with our backs to the jigger-mast, and a few of the rest left who meant that we should never get into the quarter-boat." austin was a trifle startled. "you told miss gascoyne that?" he said. "how did she take it?" jefferson made a curious little gesture. "of course," he said simply. "i had to. she believed in me; but do you think i'm going to tell--you--how it hurt her?" it was borne in upon austin that, after all, he understood very little about women. a few days earlier it would have seemed impossible to him that a girl with muriel gascoyne's straitened views should ever have linked her life with one who had played a leading part in that revolting tragedy. now, however, it was evident that there was very little she would not do for the man who loved her. "i'm sorry! you'll excuse it," he said. "still, that scarcely explains how you came to las palmas." "i came as deck-hand on board a barque bringing tomato boxes over. they were busy at the coaling wharf just then, and i got put on. you know the rest of it. i was left forty thousand dollars." "you haven't told me yet how you're going to turn them into eighty thousand." "i'm coming to it. you know we coaled the _cumbria_ before she went out to west africa. a nearly new , -ton tramp she was, light draught at that, or she'd never have gone where she did. you could put her down at £ , sterling. she went up into the half-charted creeks behind the shoals and islands south of senegal, and was lost there. among other things, it was a new gum she went for. it appears the niggers find gums worth up to £ the hundredweight in the bush behind that country. a frenchman chartered her, but he's dead now, as is almost everybody connected with the _cumbria_. they've fevers that will wipe you out in a week or two yonder--more fever, in fact, than anywhere else in africa. well, as everybody knows, they got oil and sundries and a little gum, and went down with fever while they crawled about those creeks loading her. she got hard in the mud up one of them, and half of the boys were buried before they pulled her out at all, and then she hit something that started a plate or two in her. they couldn't keep the water down, and they rammed her into a mangrove forest to save her. more of them died there, and the salvage expedition lost three or four men before they turned up their contract." "that," said austin, "is what might be termed the official version." jefferson nodded. "what everybody doesn't know is that the skipper played the frenchman a crooked game," he said. "there was more gum put into her than was ever shown in her papers; while they had got at the trade gin before she went ashore. in fact, i have a notion that it wasn't very unlike the _sachem_ affair. i can't quite figure how they came to start those plates in the soft mud of a mangrove creek. any way, the carpenter, who died there, was a countryman of mine. you may remember i did a few things for him, and the man was grateful. well, the result is i know there's a good deal more than £ , sterling in the _cumbria_." austin surmised that this was possible. it was not, he knew, seafarers of unexceptional character who usually ventured into the still little known creeks of western africa, which the coast mailboats' skippers left alone. he was also aware that more or less responsible white men are apt to go a trifle off their balance and give their passions free rein when under the influence of cheap spirits in that land of pestilence. "well?" he said. "i've bought her, as she lies, for £ , ." austin gasped. "you will probably die off in two or three weeks after you put your foot in her." "i'm not quite sure. i was at panama, and never had a touch of fever. any way, i'm going, and if you'll stand in with me, i'll put you down a quarter-share for a dollar." it was in one respect a generous offer, but austin shook his head. "no," he said decisively. "have you forgotten that miss gascoyne expects you to marry her?" jefferson's eyes glowed. "i'm remembering it all the time. that's why i'm going. would you take a refined and cultured girl and drag her through all the hard places men of my kind make money in up and down the world? has she to give up everything and come down to me? no, sir! it seems to me, the man who wants to marry a girl of that kind has got to do something to show he knows her value before he gets her, and it would be way better for both of us that she should be sorry for me dead than that i should live to drag her down." it seemed to austin that there was a good deal to be said for this point of view, and it also occurred to him that there was in this latter-day american, who had still the grime of the coaling wharf upon him, something of the spirit which had sent the knight-errant out in the days of chivalry. still, he naturally did not say so, for he was, after all, what jefferson called a hide-bound englishman. "well," he said, "you're taking a big risk, but perhaps you are right." jefferson rose with the abruptness which usually characterised his movements. "you're not coming?" "no. i haven't your inducement, and i'm afraid the contract's too big for me." "you have a week to consider it in," said jefferson, who opened the door. "in the meanwhile there's another fellow ready for his coal, and i'm going along." chapter v the tomato finca three weeks had passed since his interview with austin before jefferson was ready to sail, and he spent most of the time in strenuous activity. he had cabled to england for a big centrifugal pump and a second-hand locomotive-type boiler, while, when they arrived, macallister said that five hundred pounds would not tempt him to raise full steam on the latter. he also purchased a broken-down launch, and, though she was cheap, the cost of her and the pump, with other necessaries, made a considerable hole in his remaining £ , . it was for this reason he undertook to make the needful repairs himself, with the help of a steamer's donkey-man who had somehow got left behind, while austin and macallister spent most of the week during which the _estremedura_ lay at las palmas in the workshop he had extemporised. he appeared to know a little about machinery, and could, at least, handle hack-saw and file in a fashion which moved macallister to approbation, while austin noticed that the latter's sardonic smile became less frequent as he and the american worked together. jefferson was grimly in earnest, and it was evident that his thoroughness, which overlooked nothing, compelled the engineer's admiration. it also occurred to austin that, while there are many ways in which a lover may prove his devotion, few other men would probably have cared for the one jefferson had undertaken. he was not a very knightly figure when he emerged, smeared with rust and scale, from the second-hand boiler, or crawled about the launch's engines with blackened face and hands; but austin, who remembered it was for muriel gascoyne he had staked all his little capital in that desperate venture, forebore to smile. he knew rather better than jefferson did that it was a very forlorn hope indeed the latter was venturing on. one cannot heave a stranded steamer off without strenuous physical exertion, and the white man who attempts the latter in a good many parts of western africa incontinently dies. at last all was ready, and one night jefferson steamed off to the african liner from las palmas mole, taking with him the steamboat donkey-man and another english seafarer, who were at the time disgracefully drunk, as well as six spaniards from the coasting schooners. he said that when he reached the _cumbria_ he would hire niggers, who would be quite as reliable, and considerably cheaper. as it happened, the _estremedura_ was going to sea that night, bound for the eastern islands, and mrs. hatherly, who was never seasick, and had heard that the climate of one of them where it scarcely ever rained was good for rheumatic affections, had determined to visit it in her. jacinta, for no very apparent reason, decided to go with her, and it accordingly came about that most of her few acquaintances were with muriel gascoyne when she said good-bye to jefferson at the head of the mole. she kissed him unblushingly, and then, when the launch panted away across the harbour, turned, a little pale in face, but with a firm step, towards the _estremedura_, and an hour later stood with jacinta on the saloon deck, watching the liner's black hull slide down the harbour. then as the steamer lurched out past the mole, with a blast of her whistle throbbing across the dusky heave, muriel shivered a little. "i don't know whether we shall ever meet here again, but i think i could bear that now, and it really couldn't be so very hard, after all," she said. "it would have been horrible if he had gone and had not told me." jacinta looked thoughtful, as in fact she was. she was of a more complex, and, in some respects, more refined nature than her companion, while her knowledge of the world was almost startlingly extensive; but wisdom carries one no further than simplicity when one approaches the barriers that divide man's little life from the hereafter. indeed, there is warrant for believing that when at last they are rolled away, it is not the wise who will see with clearest vision. "i am not--quite--sure i understand," she said. there was a trace of moisture on muriel gascoyne's cheek, but she held herself erect, and she was tall and large of frame, as well as a reposeful young woman. though she probably did not know it, there was a suggestion of steadfast unchangeableness in her unconscious pose. "now," she said, very simply, "he belongs to me and i to him. if he dies out there--and i know that is possible--it can only be a question of waiting." jacinta was a little astonished. she felt that there had been a great and almost incomprehensible change in muriel gascoyne since she fell very simply and naturally in love with jefferson. it was also very evident that she was not consoling herself with empty phrases, or repeating commendable sentiments just because they appealed to her fancy, as some women will. she seemed to be stating what she felt and knew. "ah!" said jacinta, "you knew he might die there, and you could let him go?" muriel smiled. "my dear, i could not have stopped him, and now he is gone i think i am in one way glad that it was so. i do not want money--i have always had very little--but, feeling as he did, it was best that he should go. he would not have blamed me afterwards--of that i am certain--but i think i know what he would have felt if hardship came, and i wanted to spare it him." then, with a faint smile, which seemed to show that she recognised the anti-climax, she became prosaic again. "one has to think of such things. eight thousand pounds will not go so very far, you know." jacinta left her presently, and, as it happened, came upon austin soon after the _estremedura_ steamed out to sea. he was leaning on the forward rails while the little, yacht-like vessel--she was only some tons or so--swung over the long, smooth-backed undulations with slanted spars and funnel. there was an azure vault above them, strewn with the lights of heaven, and a sea of deeper blue which heaved oilily below, for, that night, at least, the trade breeze was almost still. "the liner will be clear of the land by now," she said. "i suppose you are glad you did not go with jefferson? you never told me that he had asked you to!" austin, who ignored the last remark, laughed in a somewhat curious fashion. "well," he said, reflectively, "in one respect jefferson is, perhaps, to be envied. he is, at least, attempting a big thing, and if he gets wiped out over it, which i think is quite likely, he will be beyond further trouble, and miss gascoyne will be proud of him. in fact, it is she i should be sorry for. she seems really fond of him." "is that, under the circumstances, very astonishing?" "jefferson is really a very good fellow," said austin, with a smile. "in fact, whatever it may be worth, he has my sincere approbation." jacinta made a little gesture of impatience. "pshaw!" she said. "you know exactly what i mean. i wonder if there is one among all the men i have ever met who would--under any circumstances--do as much for me?" she glanced at him for a moment in a fashion which sent a thrill through him; but austin seldom forgot that he was the _estremedura_'s purser. he had also a horror of cheap protestations, and he avoided the question. "you could scarcely expect--me--to know," he said. "suppose there was such a man, what would you do for him?" there was just a trace of heightened colour in jacinta's face. "i think, if it was necessary, and he could make me believe in him as muriel believes in jefferson, i would die for him." austin said nothing for a space, and looked eastwards towards africa, across the long, smooth heave of sea, while he listened to the throbbing of the screw and the swash of the water beneath the steamer's side. he was quite aware that while jacinta, on rare occasions, favoured her more intimate masculine friends with a glimpse of her inner nature, she never permitted them to presume upon the fact. he had, he felt, made some little progress in her confidence and favour, but it was quite clear that it would be inadvisable to venture further without a sign from her. jacinta was able to make her servants and admirers understand exactly what line of conduct it was convenient they should assume. if they failed to do so, she got rid of them. "whatever is mrs. hatherly going to fuerteventura for?" he asked. "dry weather," said jacinta, with a little smile. austin laughed. "one would fancy that las palmas was dry and dusty enough for most people. i suppose you told her there is nowhere she can stay? they haven't a hotel of any kind in the island." "that," said jacinta, sweetly, "will be your business. you are a friend of don fernando, and he has really a comfortable house. still, i expect three days of it will be quite enough for mrs. hatherly. you can pick us up, you know, when you come back from lanzarote." austin made a little whimsical gesture of resignation. "there is, presumably, no use in my saying anything. after all, she will be company for confidencia." "who is, by the way, a friend of yours, too." "i have artistic tastes, as you know. confidencia is--barring one or two--the prettiest girl in these islands." he moved away, but he turned at the top of the ladder, and jacinta smiled. "it is almost a pity a taste of that kind does not invariably accompany an artistic talent," she said. austin went down to his little room, which was almost as hot as an oven, and strove to occupy himself with his papers. the attempt, however, was not a success, for his thoughts would follow jefferson, who was on his way to africa with a big centrifugal pump, a ricketty steam launch, and a second-hand boiler of the locomotive type. in view of his ulterior purpose, there was, it seemed to austin, something ludicrously incongruous about this equipment, though he realised that the gaunt american possessed in full degree the useful practical point of view in which he himself fell short. jefferson was, in some respects, primitive, but that was, after all, probably fortunate for him. he knew what he desired, and set about the obtaining of it by the first means available. then he dismissed the subject, and climbing into his bunk went to sleep. next morning he took jacinta, mrs. hatherly, and muriel gascoyne ashore, and afterwards went on with the _estremedura_ to the adjoining island. it was three days later, and the steamer had come back again, when he and her captain rode with the three ladies towards the coast, after a visit to the black volcanic hills. mrs. hatherly and muriel sat in a crate-like affair upon the back of a camel, with distress in their faces, for there is probably no more unpleasant form of locomotion to anyone not used to it than camel-riding. the beast possesses a gait peculiarly its own, and at every lurch of its shoulders the two women jolted violently in the crate. the camel, however, proceeded unconcerned, with long neck moving backwards and forwards like a piston-rod. the rest rode horses, and a gun and several ensanguined rabbits lay across the captain's saddle. he rode like a castilian, and not a sailor, and jacinta had noticed already that austin was equally at home in the saddle. the fact had, naturally, its significance for her. it was then about two o'clock in the afternoon, and very hot, though the fresh trade breeze blew long wisps of dust away from under the horses' feet. nobody could have called that part of fuerteventura a beautiful country, but it had its interest to two of the party, who had never seen anything quite like it before. behind them rose low hills, black with streams of lava, red with calcined rock, and every stone on them was outlined in harsh colouring in that crystalline atmosphere. in front lay a desolation of ashes and scoriæ, with tracts of yellow sand, blown there presumably from africa, which swirled in little spirals before the breeze. it was chequered with clumps of euphorbia and thorn, but they, too, matched the prevailing tones of grey and brown and chrome, and there was not in all the waste a speck of green. further still in front of them the sea flamed like a mirror, and a vault of dazzling blue hung over all. they wound down into a hollow, through which, as one could see by the tortuous belt of stones, a little water now and then flowed, and dismounted in the scanty shadow of a ruined wall. it had been built high and solid of blocks of lava centuries ago, perhaps by the first of the spanish, or by dusky invaders from morocco. as it was not quite so hot there, austin and the captain made preparations for a meal when a bare-legged peon led the beasts away. then the captain frowned darkly at the prospect. "ah, mala gente. que el infierno los come!" he said, with blazing eyes, and swung a brown hand up, as though appealing to stones and sky before he indulged in another burst of eloquence. "what is he saying?" asked muriel gascoyne. "he seems very angry." austin smiled. "i scarcely think it would be altogether advisable to enquire, but it is not very astonishing if he is angry," he said. "don erminio is not, as a rule, a success as a business man, and this is a farm he once invested all his savings in. i am particularly sorry to say that i did much the same." miss gascoyne appeared astonished, which was, perhaps, not altogether unnatural, as she gazed at the wilderness in front of her. there were, she could now see, signs that somebody had made a desultory attempt at building a wall which was nearly buried again. a few odd heaps of lava blocks had also been piled up here and there, but the hollow was strewn with dust and ashes, and looked as though nothing had ever grown there since that island was hurled, incandescent, out of the sea. it was very difficult to discover the least evidence of fertility. "ah!" said jacinta, "so this is the famous finca de la empreza financial?" oliviera overheard her, and once more made a gesture with arms flung wide. "mira!" he said. "the cemetery where i bury the hopes of me. o much tomate, mucho profit. i buy more finca and the cow for me. aha! there is also other time i make the commercial venture. i buy two mulo. very good mulo. i charge mucho dollar for the steamboat cargo cart. comes the locomotura weet the concrete block down las palmas mole. the mole is narrow, the block is big, the man drives the locomotura behind it, he not can look. vaya, my two mulo, and the cart, she is in the sea. that is also ruin me. i say, 'vaya. in fifty year she is oll the same,' but when i see the finca de tomate i have the temper. alors, weet permission, me vais chasser the conejo." "the unfortunate man!" said jacinta, when he strode away in search of a rabbit. "still, the last of it wasn't quite unexceptional castilian." austin laughed. "don erminio speaks french almost as well as he does english. in fact, he's a linguist in his way. still, i'm not sorry he didn't insist upon me going shooting with him. it's risky, and i would sooner he'd borrowed somebody else's gun." they made a tolerable lunch, for the _estremedura_'s cook knew his business, and, though it very seldom rains there, some of the finest grapes to be found anywhere grow in the neighbouring island of lanzarote. then mrs. hatherly apparently went to sleep with her back against the wall, while muriel sat silent in the shadow, close beside her. perhaps the camel ride had shaken her, and perhaps she was thinking of jefferson, for she was gazing east towards africa, across the flaming sea. jacinta, as usual, appeared delightfully fresh and cool, as she sat with her long white dress tucked about her on a block of lava, while austin lay, contented, not far from her feet. "you never told me you had a share in the finca," she said. "well," said austin, "i certainly had. i also made a speech at the inaugural dinner, and don erminio almost wept with pride while i did it. i had, though he did not mention it, a share in his mule cart, too, and once or twice bought a schooner load of onions to ship to havana at his suggestion. you see, i had then a notion that it was my duty to make a little money. somehow, the onions never got to cuba, and our other ventures ended--like the finca." "then you have given up all idea of making money now?" "it really didn't seem much use continuing, and, after all, a little money wouldn't be very much good to me. a chance of making twenty thousand pounds might, perhaps, rouse me to temporary activity." "ah," said jacinta, looking at him with thoughtful eyes, "you want too much, my friend. you are not likely to make it by painting little pictures on board the _estremedura_." a faint trace of darker colour showed through the bronze in austin's cheek. "yes," he said, "that is exactly what is the matter with me. still, as i shall never get it, i am tolerably content with what i have. fortunately, i am fond of it--i mean the sea." "of course," said jacinta, with a curious little sparkle in her eyes, "contentment is commendable, though there is something that appeals to one's fancy in the thought of a man struggling against everything to acquire the unattainable." "so long as it is unattainable, what would be the good? besides, i am almost afraid i am not that kind of man." jacinta said nothing further, and half an hour slipped by, until a trail of smoke with a smear of something beneath it, crept up out of the glittering sea. "the _andalusia_," said austin. "she takes up our western run here under the new time-table. i hope she's bringing no english folks from las palmas to worry us." as it happened, there was a man on board the _andalusia_ who was to bring one of the party increased anxiety and distress of mind, but they did not know that then, and in the meanwhile the peon with the horses and don erminio came back again. he brought no rabbits, but he had succeeded in badly scratching one of the damascene barrels of austin's gun. "the conejo he no can eat the stone, and here there is nothing else," he explained. "otra vez--the other time, comes here a señor engleesman, and we have the gun, but there is no conejo. me i say, 'mira. conejo into his hole he go!' bueno! the engleesman he put the white rat into that hole, and wait, oh, he wait mucho tiempo. me, away i go. i come back, the engleesman has bag the captain of puerto." then he turned with a dramatic gesture to the camel, which stretched out its little head towards his leg. "bur-r-r. hijo de diablo. aughr-r-r. focha camello! me, i also spick the avar-r-ack. the condemn camello he comprehend." the long-necked beast at least knelt down as though it did, and mrs. hatherly climbed into the crate with a somewhat apprehensive glance at the gallant captain. chapter vi austin's point of view mrs. hatherly decided during the ride to the beach that she had seen quite enough of that island in the three days she had spent there, and she had already gone off to the _estremedura_ with muriel and jacinta when austin stood smoking on the little mole. long undulations of translucent brine seethed close past his feet to break with a drowsy roar upon the lava reefs, and the _estremedura_ lay rolling wildly a quarter of a mile away. a cluster of barefooted men were with difficulty loading her big lancha beneath the mole with the barley-straw the row of camels, kneeling in the one straggling street behind him, had brought down. the men were evidently tired, for they had toiled waist-deep in the surf since early morning, and austin decided to spare them the journey for his despatch gig. accordingly, when the lancha was loaded high with the warm yellow bales he clambered up on them and bade the crew get under way. the long sweeps dipped, and the craft went stern first towards the reef for a moment or two before she crawled out to sea, looking very like a cornstack set adrift as she lurched over the shining swell. austin lay upon the straw, smoking tranquilly, for everybody leaves a good deal to chance in spain, and now and then flung a little castilian badinage at the gasping men who pulled the big sweeps below. as it happened, they could not see him because the straw rose behind them in a yellow wall. they were cheerful, inconsequent fishermen, who would have done a good deal for him, and not altogether because of the bottle of caña he occasionally gave them. they had traversed half the distance, when, opening up a point, they met a steeper heave, and when the dripping bows went up after the plunge there was a movement of the barley-straw. austin felt for a better hold, but two or three bales fetched away as he did so, and in another moment he plunged down headforemost into the sea. when he came up he found a straw bale floating close beside him, and held on by it while he looked about him. the lancha was apparently going on, and it was evident that although the men must have heard the straw fall, they were not aware that he had gone with it. there was, he surmised, no room for the lost bales, and the men could not have heaved them up on top of the load. it therefore appeared probable that they purposed unloading the lancha before they came back for them, and he decided to climb up on the bale. he found it unexpectedly difficult, for when he had almost dragged himself up the bale rolled over and dropped him in again; while, when he tried to wriggle up the front of it, it stood upright and then fell upon him. after several attempts he gave it up, and set out for the steamer with little pieces of barley-straw and spiky ears sticking all over him. he could swim tolerably well, and swung along comfortably enough over the smooth-backed swell, for his light clothing did not greatly cumber him. still, he did not desire that any one beyond the _estremedura_'s crew should witness his arrival. he was, accordingly, by no means pleased to see jacinta and miss gascoyne stroll out from the deck-house as he drew in under the _estremedura_'s side, especially as there were no apparent means of getting on board quietly. the lancha had vanished round the stern, the ladder was triced up, and the open cargo gangway several feet above the brine. the steamer also hove up another four or five feet of streaming plates every time she rolled. still, it was evident that he could not stay where he was on the chance of the ladies not noticing him indefinitely, and as he swam on again miss gascoyne broke into a startled scream. "oh!" she said, "there's somebody drowning!" the cry brought macallister to the gangway, and he was very grimy in engine-room disarray. austin, in the water, saw the wicked twinkle in his eyes, and was not pleased to hear jacinta laugh musically. "i really don't think he is in any danger," she said. austin set his lips, and swam for the gangway as the _estremedura_ rolled down. his flung up hand came within a foot of the opening, and then he sank back a fathom or more below it as the _estremedura_ hove that side of her out of the water. when he swung up again macallister was standing above him with a portentiously sharp boat hook, while two or three grinning seamen clustered round. the girls were also leaning out from the saloon-deck rails. "will ye no keep still while i hook ye!" said the engineer. "if you stick that confounded thing into my clothes i'll endeavour to make you sorry," said austin savagely. macallister made a sweep at him, and austin went down, while one of the seamen, leaning down, grabbed him by the shoulder, when he rose. "let go!" he sputtered furiously. "give me your hand instead!" he evidently forgot that the seaman, who held on, was not an englishman, and next moment he was hove high above the water. then there was a ripping and tearing, and while the seaman reeled back with a long strip of alpaca in his hand, austin splashed into the water. he came up in time to see macallister smiling in jacinta's direction reassuringly. "there's no need to be afraid," he said. "though i'm no sure he's worth it, i'll save him for ye." now, jacinta was usually quite capable of making any man who offended her feel sorry for himself, but the sight of austin's savage red face as he gazed at macallister, with the torn jacket flapping about him in the water and the barley-straw sticking all over him, was too much for her, and she broke into a peal of laughter. in another moment macallister contrived to get his boat hook into the slack of austin's garments, and when two seamen seized the haft they hove him out, wrong side uppermost, and incoherent with wrath. when they dropped him, a tattered, dripping heap, on the deck, miss gascoyne leaned her face upon her hands, and laughed almost hysterically, until jacinta touched her shoulder. "mr. austin evidently believes he has a good deal to thank his comrade for. i think you had better come away," she said. austin put himself to some trouble in endeavouring to make macallister understand what he thought of him, when they had gone, but the engineer only grinned. "well," he said, "i'll forgive ye. if i had looked like ye do with two ladies watching me, i might have been a bit short in temper myself, but come away to your room. the _andalusia_'s boat came across a while ago, and there's business waiting ye." austin went with him, but stopped a moment when he approached his room. the door was open, as usual, and a stranger, in grey tourist tweed, upon whom englishman and clergyman was stamped unmistakably, sat inside the room. austin felt that he knew who the man must be. "does he know miss gascoyne is on board?" he asked. "no," said macallister. "the boat came round under our quarter, and we landed him through the lower gangway. he said he'd stay here and wait for ye. he's no sociable, anyway. i've offered him cigars and anisow, besides some of my special whisky, but he did not seem willing to talk to me." austin fancied he could understand it. macallister, who had discarded his jacket, was very grimy, and his unbuttoned uniform vest failed to conceal the grease stains on his shirt. then he remembered that his own jacket was torn to rags, and he was very wet; but macallister raised his voice: "here's mr. austin, sir," he said. the clergyman, who said nothing, gazed at him, and austin, who realised that his appearance was against him, understood his astonishment. he also fancied that the stranger was one with whom appearances usually counted a good deal. "if you will wait a minute or two while i change my clothes, i will be at your service, sir," he said. "as you may observe, i have been in the sea." "swum off to the steamer," said macallister, with a wicked smile. "it saves washing. he comes off yon way now and then." austin said nothing, but stepped into the room, and, gathering up an armful of clothing, departed, leaving a pool of water behind him. the clergyman, it was evident, did not know what to make of either of them. a few minutes later austin, who came back and closed the door, sat down opposite him. "my name is gascoyne," said the stranger, handing him an open note. "mr. brown of las palmas, who gave me this introduction, assured me that i could speak to you confidentially, and that you would be able to tell me where my daughter and mrs. hatherly are staying." austin glanced at him with misgivings. he was a little man, with pale blue eyes, and hair just streaked with grey. his face was white and fleshy, without animation or any suggestion of ability in it, but there had been something in the tone which seemed to indicate that he had, at least, been accustomed to petty authority. austin at once set him down as a man of essentially conventional views, who was deferred to in some remote english parish; in fact, just the man he would have expected muriel gascoyne's father to be; that is, before she had revealed her inner self. it was a type he was by no means fond of, and he was quite aware that circumstances were scarcely likely to prepossess a man of that description in his favour. still, austin was a friend of jefferson's, and meant to do what he could for him. "i know where miss gascoyne is, but you suggested that you had something to ask me, and i shall be busy by and by," he said. gascoyne appeared anxious, but evidently very uncertain whether it would be advisable to take him into his confidence. "i understand that you are a friend of mr. jefferson's?" he said. "i am. i may add that i am glad to admit it, and i almost fancy i know what you mean to ask me." gascoyne, who appeared grateful for this lead, looked at him steadily. "perhaps i had better be quite frank. indeed, mr. brown, who informed me that you could tell more about jefferson than any one in the islands, recommended it," he said. "i am, mr. austin, a clergyman who has never been outside his own country before, and i think it is advisable that i should tell you this, because there may be points upon which our views will not coincide. it was not easy for me to get away now, but the future of my motherless daughter is a matter of the greatest concern to me, and i understand that mr. jefferson is in africa. i want you to tell me candidly--as a gentleman--what kind of man he is." austin felt a little better disposed towards gascoyne after this. his anxiety concerning his daughter was evident, and he had, at least, not adopted quite the attitude austin had expected. but as austin was not by any means brilliant himself, he felt the difficulty of making gascoyne understand the character of such a man as jefferson, while his task was complicated by the fact that he recognised his responsibility to both of them. gascoyne had put him on his honour, and he could not paint jefferson as he was not. in the meanwhile he greatly wished to think. "i wonder if i might offer you a glass of wine, sir, or perhaps you smoke?" he said. "no, thanks," said gascoyne, with uncompromising decision. "i am aware that many of my brethren indulge in these luxuries. i do not." "well," said austin, "if you will tell me what you have already heard about jefferson it might make the way a little plainer." "i have been told that he is an american seafarer, it seems of the usual careless type. seafarers are, perhaps, liable to special temptations, and it is generally understood that the lives most of them lead are not altogether----" austin smiled a little when gascoyne stopped abruptly. "i'm afraid that must be admitted, sir. i can, however, assure you that jefferson is an abstemious man--americans are, as a rule, you see--and, though there are occasions when his conversation might not commend itself to you, he has had an excellent education. since we are to be perfectly candid, has it ever occurred to you that it was scarcely likely a dissolute sailor would meet with miss gascoyne's approbation?" gascoyne flushed a trifle. "it did not--though, of course, it should have. still, he told her that he was mate of the _sachem_, which was a painful shock to me. i, of course, remember the revolting story." he stopped a moment, and his voice was a trifle strained when he went on again. "i left england, mr. austin, within three days of getting my daughter's letter, and have ever since been in a state of distressing uncertainty. mr. jefferson is in africa--i cannot even write him. i do not know where my duty lies." had the man's intense anxiety been less evident, austin would have been almost amused. the reverend gascoyne appeared to believe that his affairs were of paramount importance to everybody, as, perhaps, they were in the little rural parish he came from; but there was something in his somewhat egotistical simplicity that appealed to the younger man. "one has to face unpleasant facts now and then, sir," he said. "there are times when homicide is warranted at sea, and man's primitive passions are very apt to show themselves naked in the face of imminent peril. it is in one respect unfortunate that you have probably never seen anything of the kind, but one could not expect too much from a man whose comrade's head had just been shorn open by a drink-frenzied mutineer. can you imagine the little handful of officers, driven aft away from the boats while the ship settled under them, standing still to be cut down with adze and axe? you must remember, too, that they were seafarers and americans who had few of the advantages you and your friends enjoy in england." he could not help the last piece of irony, but gascoyne, who did not seem to notice it, groaned. "to think of a man who appears to hold my daughter's confidence being concerned in such an affair at all is horribly unpleasant to me." "i have no doubt it was almost as distressing to jefferson at the time. still, as you have probably never gone in fear of your life for weeks together, you may not be capable of understanding what he felt, and we had perhaps better get on a little further." gascoyne seemed to pull himself together. "mr. jefferson has, i understand, no means beyond a certain legacy. it is not, after all, a large one." "if he is alive in six months i feel almost sure he will have twice as much, which would mean an income of close upon £ a year from sound english stock, and that, one would fancy, would not be considered abject poverty in a good many english rural parishes." gascoyne sighed. "that is true--it is certainly true. you said--if he were alive?" "as he is now on his way to one of the most deadly belts of swamp and jungle in western africa, i think i was warranted. knowing him as i do, it is, i fancy, certain that if he does not come back with £ , in six months he will be dead." "ah," said gascoyne, with what was suspiciously like a sigh of relief. "one understands that it is a particularly unhealthy climate. still, when one considers that all is arranged for the best----" austin, who could not help it, smiled sardonically, though he felt he had an almost hopeless task. it appeared impossible that gascoyne should ever understand the character of a man like jefferson. but he meant to do what he could. "it is naturally easier to believe that when circumstances coincide with our wishes, sir," he said. "now, i do not exactly charge you with wishing jefferson dead, though your face shows that you would not be sorry. i am, of course, another careless seafarer, a friend of his, and i can understand that what you have seen of me has not prepossessed you in my favour. still, if i can, i am going to show you jefferson as he is. to begin with, he believes, as you do, that miss gascoyne is far above him--and in this he is altogether wrong. miss gascoyne is doubtless a good woman, but jefferson is that harder thing to be, a good man. his point of view is not yours, it is, perhaps, a wider one; but he has, what concerns you most directly now, a vague, reverential respect for all that is best in womanhood, which, i think, is sufficient to place miss gascoyne under a heavy responsibility." he stopped a moment, looking steadily at gascoyne, who appeared blankly astonished. "because it was evident to him that a woman of miss gascoyne's conventional upbringing must suffer if brought into contact with the unpleasant realities of the outside world, he has staked his life willingly--not recklessly--on the winning of enough to place her beyond the reach of adversity. he realised that it was, at least, even chances he never came back from africa; but it seemed to him better that she should be proud of him dead than have to pity him and herself living. i know this, because he told me he would never drag the woman who loved him down. he fell in love with her without reflection, instinctively--or, perhaps, because it was arranged so--i do not understand these things. as surely--conventionalities don't always count--she fell in love with him, and then he had to grapple with the position. your daughter could not live, as some women do, unshocked and cheerfully among rude and primitive peoples whose morality is not your morality, in the wilder regions of the earth. it was also evident that she could not live sumptuously in england on the interest of £ , . you see what he made of it. if he died, miss gascoyne would be free. if he lived, she could avoid all that would be unpleasant. isn't that sufficient? could there be anything base or mean in a nature capable of devotion of that description?" gascoyne sat silent almost a minute. then he said very quietly: "i have to thank you, mr. austin--the more so because i admit i was a little prejudiced against you. perhaps men living as i do acquire too narrow a view. i am glad you told me. and now where is my daughter and mrs. hatherly?" "wait another minute! jefferson is, as you will recognise, a man of exceptional courage, but he is also a man of excellent education, and, so far as that goes, of attractive presence; such a one, in fact, as i think a girl of miss gascoyne's station is by no means certain to come across again in england. now, if i have said anything to offend you, it has not been with that object, and you will excuse it. your daughter and mrs. hatherly are on board this ship. it seemed better that you should hear me out before i told you." "ah," said gascoyne. "well, i think you were right, and again i am much obliged to you. will you take me to mrs. hatherly?" austin did so, and coming back flung himself down on the settee in macallister's room. "give me a drink--a long one. i don't know that i ever talked so much at once in my life, and i only hope i didn't make a consummate ass of myself," he said. "it's no that difficult," said macallister, reflectively, as he took out a syphon and a bottle of wine. "ye made excuses for yourself and jefferson?" austin laughed. "no," he said. "i made none for jefferson. i think i rubbed a few not particularly pleasant impressions into the other man. i felt i had to. it was, of course, a piece of abominable presumption." macallister leaned against the bulkhead and regarded him with a sardonic grin. "i would have liked to have heard ye," he said. chapter vii at the bull fight austin was writing in the saloon, which was a little cooler than his room, at about eight o'clock that night, while jacinta and mrs. hatherly made ineffectual attempts to read in the ladies' cabin, for the _estremedura_ was on her way south again, with the trade-wind combers tumbling after her. she rolled with a long, rhythmic swing, and now and then shook and trembled with the jar of her lifted propeller. muriel gascoyne was accordingly alone with her father on the deck above. she sat in a canvas chair, while gascoyne leaned upon the rails in front of her. there was a full moon overhead, and a fantastic panorama of fire-blackened hills, wastes of ash and lava, whirling clouds of sand, black rocks lapped by spouting surf, and bays of deepest indigo, unrolled itself upon one hand. it is, however, probable that neither of the pair saw much of it, for their thoughts were not concerned with the volcanic desolation. "it is a pity i did not come a few weeks earlier," said gascoyne with a sigh. muriel's eyes were a trifle hazy, but her voice was even. "if you had come then, and insisted upon it, i might have given him up," she said. "that means it is irrevocable now? i want you to make quite sure, my dear. this man does not belong to our world. even his thoughts must be different from ours. you cannot know anything of his past life--i scarcely think he could explain it to you. he would regard nothing from the same standpoint as we do." "still, it cannot have been a bad one. i can't tell you why i am sure of that, but i know." gascoyne made a little, hopeless gesture. "muriel," he said, a trifle hoarsely, "it is a terrible risk--and if you marry him you must inevitably drift away from me. you are all i have, and i am getting old and lonely, but that is not of the greatest moment. it would be horrible to think of you drifting away from all you have been taught to believe in and hold sacred." it was a strong appeal, perhaps the strongest he could have made, for the girl had been without breadth of view when she left home, and the boundaries of her outlook had coincided with those of the little rural parish. still, in some strange fashion she had gained enlightenment, and she was resolute, though her blue eyes slowly brimmed with moisture. it was true that he would be very lonely. "ah," she said, and it was a significant sign that she questioned the comprehension of the man whom she had regarded as almost infallible a few weeks earlier, "how can i make you understand? there are, perhaps, many worlds, and we know there are many kinds of men. they must think differently, but does that matter so very much, after all? there is the same humanity in all of us." "undoubtedly! in turks, idolaters, and unbelievers. humanity in itself is fallen and evil." muriel smiled. "father," she said, "you don't believe that there is no good in all those who have not been taught to believe as we do." gascoyne did not answer her, though it is possible that there were circumstances under which he would have returned a very slightly qualified affirmative. "there is a perilous optimism abroad," he said. "still," said muriel, unconscious of the irony of her deprecatory answer, "mr. jefferson is neither a turk nor an idolater. he is only an american sailor." gascoyne sighed dejectedly, for there was, it seemed, nothing left for him to appeal to. the girl's beliefs had gone. the simple, iron-fast rules of life she had once acknowledged were now apparently discredited; but even in his concern he was vaguely sensible that an indefinite something which he did not recognise as the charity that love teaches was growing up in place of them. still, he felt its presence as he watched her, and knew that it could not be altogether born of evil. "my dear," he said, "how shall i implore you to consider?" muriel smiled out of hazy eyes. "it is too late. he has my promise, and i belong to him. nothing that you could say would change that now. he has gone out--to africa--believing in me, and i know that he may never come back again." gascoyne appeared a trifle startled, and remembered a curious remark that austin had made to the effect that there was a heavy responsibility upon his daughter. he could not altogether understand why this should be, but he almost fancied that she recognised it now. there was also a finality and decision in the girl's tone which was new to him. "i think you know how hard it was for me to get away, but it seemed necessary. i came out to implore you to give this stranger up," he said. the girl rose, and stood looking at him gravely, with one hand on the chair arm to steady herself as the steamer rolled, and the moonlight upon her face. it was almost reposeful in its resolution. "father," she said, "you must try to understand. perhaps i did wrong when i gave him my promise without consulting you, but it is given, and irrevocable. he has gone out to africa--and may die there--believing in me. i don't think i could make you realise how he believes in me, but, though, of course, he is wrong, i grow frightened now and then, and almost hope he may never see me as i really am. that is why i--daren't--fail him. if there was no other reason i must keep faith with him." "then," said gascoyne, very slowly, "i must, at least, try to resign myself--and perhaps, my apprehensions may turn out to be not quite warranted, after all. i was horribly afraid a little while ago, but this man seems to have the faculty of inspiring confidence in those who know him. they cannot all be mistaken, and the man who is purser on this steamer seems to believe in him firmly. his views are peculiar, but there was sense in what he said, and he made me think a little less hardly of mr. jefferson." muriel only smiled. she realised what this admission, insufficient and grudging as it was, must have cost her father, and--for she had regarded everything from his point of view until a few weeks ago--she could sympathise with him. still, she was glad when she saw jacinta and mrs. hatherly coming towards them along the deck. it was an hour later when jacinta met austin at the head of the ladder, and stopped him with a sign. "i have had a long talk with mr. gascoyne, and found him a little less disturbed in mind than i had expected," she said. "i want to know what you said to him." "well," said austin, reflectively, "i really can't remember, and if i could it wouldn't be worth while. of course, i knew what i wanted to say, but i'm almost afraid i made as great a mess of it as i usually do." "still, i think miss gascoyne is grateful to you." "that," said austin, "affords me very little satisfaction, after all. you see, i didn't exactly do it to please miss gascoyne." "then i wonder what motive really influenced you?" austin pursed his lips, as if thinking hard. "i don't quite know. for one thing, very orthodox people of the reverend gascoyne's description occasionally have an irritating effect upon me. i feel impelled to readjust their point of view, or, at least to allow them an opportunity of recognising the advantages of mine, which, however, isn't necessarily the correct one. i hope this explanation contents you." jacinta smiled. "i think i shall remember it," she said. "i believe i generally do when anybody does a thing to please me. still, miss gascoyne's gratitude will not hurt you." then she swept away, and left him standing meditatively at the head of the ladder. he saw no more of her that night, and he was busy when the _estremedura_ steamed into las palmas early next morning, while it was nearly three weeks later when he met her again at a corrida de toros in the bull ring at santa cruz, teneriffe, which was, perhaps, the last place where one would have expected to find an english lady. the spacious amphitheatre was open to the sky, and all its tiers of stone benches packed with excited humanity, for half the inhabitants of the island had apparently gathered to enjoy the sanguinary spectacle. black is the colour affected by men who can afford it on a spanish holiday, but the white cotton the bare-legged hillmen wore, and the pink and chrome of their wives' and daughters' dresses, flecked with luminous colour the sombre ranks of the close-packed multitude. blazing sunlight beat down upon them, for it is only the richer citizens who sit in the shadow, and the topmost row was projected, a filagree of black and motley, against the hard glaring blue. below, the arena shone dazzlingly yellow, and the smell of blood and fresh sawdust came up from it through the many-toned murmur of the crowd. when this sank a little one could hear the deep boom of the atlantic swell crumbling on the lava beach. the revolting picador scene was over. two or three worn-out and blindfolded horses had been gored or trampled to death, and one picador's arm had been broken. the tawny, long-horned bull, which had shown unusual courage, stood panting in the middle of the arena, with a crimson smear on one shoulder where a lance had scored it deep, and while the bugles rang, the vast assembly waited for the banderillero scene in high good humour. just then a little party descended one of the avenues on the shady side, and austin, who had a note from pancho brown in his pocket, with some difficulty made his way to meet them. he was quite aware that brown was probably the only englishman in those islands who would have been able to reserve desirable places at a corrida de toros. jacinta, who accompanied him, was attended by his spanish housekeeper and two sunburnt english naval officers, but she made room for austin on one side of her, and appeared in no way displeased by his indifferently veiled approbation. miss brown had been dressed by a castilian modeste, mostly in black lace, that day, and her clustering brown hair was ornamented by a little mantilla of the same material. it was not a dress which would have suited every englishwoman, especially of substantial type, but jacinta was slight, and delicately round, and altogether sylph-like. "you venture to approve of this get-up?" she said. "the tourists were a little horrified at the hotel." austin, who wore white duck, noticed that she smiled at the governor, who sat above them amidst his glittering staff, and that almost sufficed to spoil his satisfaction, though it was only one of the many little things that emphasised the difference between them. still, he contrived to laugh. "i expect they were envious. it's bewilderingly effective, and i am a bit of an artist, as you know," he said. "i was wondering whether you would have the courage to come." "jacinta," said pancho brown, "has courage enough for anything. still, she came because i asked her. i make my living out of these people, and, perhaps, a little more. it was policy." jacinta laughed. "well," she said, "i rather like it, and i have been before. of course, i mean after they have killed the horses and smashed the picadores. that part is not only cruel, but ineffective. it's not inspiriting to see a man padded with leather sit quite still to be knocked over. they should either wipe it out or give them stuffed horses. by the way, you don't know my companions." the two naval officers acknowledged the introduction with characteristic brevity. their eyes were fixed on the arena, and the scene was probably worth their attention, for there are parts of a bull fight which cannot be termed revolting, at least, by those who have actually witnessed them. a lithe, well-favoured man, picturesquely attired, skipped into the ring, holding a crimson cape in one hand, and a couple of little decorated darts in the other. it was his business to strike them into the neck or shoulder of the bull, but nowhere else, while their points were calculated to do no more than exasperate it. the beast watched him savagely, pawing up the sand, and the chances appeared somewhat against the man, since to reach its neck he must approach his silk-covered breast within an inch or two of the gleaming horns, one of which was suspiciously reddened. austin could not quite see how he did it, for his motions were bewilderingly rapid, but he saw the wave of the gaudy cloak and heard its crisp rustle that was lost in the roar. then the man was running round the ring for his life, and the bull thundering along with lowered head and a dart bristling in its neck, a yard or two behind him. he had no time to swing himself over the barricade, as hard pressed banderilleros now and then did, for the deadly horns were almost in the small of his back. it was a frantic test of speed, highly trained human agility and endurance against the strength of the beast, and there was dead silence while they went round the arena once, the man running desperately, with tense, set face, while austin fancied he could hear his gasping breath through the roar of the hoofs. then, with a splendid bound, he drew a yard ahead, and another man with a green cape hurled himself through the opening. somehow he escaped destruction, and the bull slid onward with hoofs ploughing up the sand, and the gaudy silk fluttering about its head. there was a roar of plaudits that could have been heard miles away at sea, and while from tiers of benches the hats came sailing down, the bull, which shook the cape off, tore the coloured rags to fragments. "that fellow has good nerves," said one of the navy men. "i don't see anything very brutal in it, after all. they both start level, and take their chances, you know." jacinta looked at austin over her fan, and there was a faint flush in as much of her face as he could see, as well as a little gleam in her eyes. "i'm afraid it--is--a little barbarous," she said. "everybody says so. still, wasn't that banderillero splendid! you see, i have put on castilian notions with my clothes. of course, as an englishwoman, i could never venture here." austin was a little annoyed to feel that he was smiling sardonically. "well," he said, "i should almost have fancied that you were too super-refined and ethereal to admire that kind of thing, but i really believe you do." jacinta waved her fan. "do not be deceived, my friend. there is a good deal of the primitive in us all, and it shows up now and then." then she laughed. "i wonder how they all get their right hats back again." austin could not tell her, for it was a thing he could never understand; but while the attendants were still flinging the black sombreros into the air another banderillero approached the bull. he planted one dart and then dashed across the ring, but either his nerve failed him, or he could not trust his speed, for he grasped the top of the barricade and swung himself over. in another moment the bull struck it with a crash, and then stood still, half stunned, apparently endeavouring to make out where the man had gone. there was a storm of hisses and opprobrious cries. "that banderillero," said jacinta, sweetly, "should have been driven out of the ring. he ought never to have undertaken a thing that was too big for him." "isn't that a little hard upon the man?" said austin. "he probably didn't know it was too big until he had undertaken it." "that's sensible, miss brown," said one of the navy men. "when he found he couldn't run as fast as the bull could what was he to do?" "what did a certain gunboat's men do when they found themselves quite unexpectedly in front of the african headman's battery?" the navy man flushed a little, for he was young. "oh," he said, "that was different. they set their lips and went in, though i don't suppose any of them liked it. still, you see, that was what they were there to do." "exactly!" and jacinta laughed a little, though there was still a gleam in her eyes, and it was austin she looked at. "they did the obvious, as well as the most artistic thing. it fortunately happens that they're often very much the same." "i'm not quite sure i understand you," said the young officer. "people who want me to have to talk plain. still, i suppose one has always a certain sympathy for the fellow who gets himself killed decently." then, for a time, they became absorbed in the play of the banderilleros, who, flashing here and there, with cloaks of red, and gold, and green, passed the bull from one to another up and down the trampled arena. now, one of them escaped annihilation by a hairsbreadth, while the thundering vivas went up to the glaring sky, and a comrade turned the tormented beast again. now, a silk-clad athlete swept through the two-foot gap between deadly horns and flying man, and the bull swung round with a bellow to pursue him, or stood still, temporarily blinded with the gaudy cloak about its horns. it was a fascinating exhibition of human nerve and skill, and austin saw that jacinta watched it with slightly parted lips and a gleam in her eyes, until at last the bugles rang, and most of the men withdrew, leaving the bull alone in the middle of the arena, with the foam flakes dripping from its muzzle and its brawny neck bristling with the little darts. then there was a general movement and a great hum of voices rose from the close-packed benches. jacinta waved her fan, and touched austin's arm as she looked about her. "surely that is macallister. but whatever is he doing there?" she said. austin looked up across the long rows of faces, and saw his comrade sitting, spick and span in the blue spanish mail uniform, among the brilliant officers of the governor's staff. macallister was a big man, with a commanding appearance, when he had for the time being done with the engine room, and austin, who knew that he could make friends with anybody, was not astonished to notice that he seemed very much at home. "it is rather more than i know," he said. "still, i should fancy he was telling them something amusing in execrable castilian, by the way they are laughing. i believe macallister could get anywhere he wanted. he has, as a matter of fact, dragged me into somewhat astonishing places." "i shouldn't wonder," said one of the navy men. "george, isn't that big fellow in the uniform yonder the one we saw the other night at the opera?" "it is," said his comrade, with a little soft laugh, as though he remembered something that had afforded him considerable pleasure. jacinta touched austin with her fan. "i presume you know what he is referring to?" "well," said austin, "what i do know is this. mack and i went to see the italian company the other night, and because he, of course, knew everybody about the place, we went behind the scenes. he, unfortunately, became interested in the stage machinery, and when he had made spirited attempts to pull some of it to pieces, i and the improvisatore beguiled him to a chair in the wings. we gave him a cigar to keep him quiet, as well as the libretto, which he could not read, and, as he seemed somewhat sleepy, i was thankful to leave him there. i didn't care about that opera. he never told me what happened after." the young officer laughed again. "i daresay i can enlighten you. in the middle of the last act one of the wings collapsed, and everybody saw a big englishman, who had apparently just kicked it over, sitting, half asleep, in a folding chair. he didn't appear to have any legitimate connection with the drama, but he brought the house down when he got up in a hurry and fell over his chair." then the shrill call of the bugles rang through the great building, and a tall man, with a scarred face, gorgeously dressed, walked into the arena, holding a three-cornered hat and a long, straight sword. he stood still a moment, an imposing and curiously graceful figure, with bright blade lowered, while a tumultuous shout of "mæstro!" filled the building; and then, taking a cloak from an attendant, approached the bull. it was freely smeared with blood, and as it stood, bellowing, and pawing the sand in murderous rage, it was evident that the mæstro's task was not a particularly pleasant one. there was only one way in which he could kill the bull, and that was to pass his sword over the horns and down into the brawny chest, near the base of the neck. should he strike elsewhere it was probable that the vast assembly would descend and trample on him, for this was a duel to the death between man and beast, in which the latter was secured what seemed an even chance by punctilious etiquette. the spaniard displays a good deal of sympathy with a gallant bull. the beast seemed to understand that this man was different from the banderilleros who had previously tormented it, and backed away from him until he smote it lightly on the nostrils. then it swept forward in a savage rush but though the man's movements were so quick that one scarcely noticed them, he was not quite where he had been a moment earlier, when the bull thundered past him. still, one horn had ripped a strip of silk from him. he followed the beast, and struck it with his hand, and for five or six frenzied minutes the vast audience roared. this man never ran. he stepped backwards, or twisted, always with grave gracefulness, in the nick of time, until at last the bull stood still, as though stupefied with rage or uncertain how to attack its elusive persecutor. then, as the man walked up to it very quietly and unconcernedly, it seemed to hump itself together for a furious bound and rush with lowered head, and there was no sound in the great building until the bright steel flashed. man's breast and gleaming horns seemed to meet, but apparently in the same second the gorgeously clad figure had stepped aside, and in the next the bull plunged forward and came down upon its knees. there was another roar, and once more from all the close-packed benches came the rain of hats, cigars, and bundles of cigarettes. "ah," said jacinta, with a little gasp, "i think i have seen enough. there will be another bull and more picadores now. i never could stand that part of it. besides, i have done my duty, and patronised the show." they made their way out while the audience waited for another bull, and certain leather-swathed picadores rode in on decrepit, blindfolded horses, brought there to be killed; and it was an hour later when, as they stood beneath the oleanders in a fonda garden looking down upon the white-walled town, jacinta mentioned the affair again. "of course, it is a little cruel; but, after all, it appeals to rather more than the lower passions and lust of slaughter, don't you think?" she said. "i never saw anything to equal that mæstro's play in my life," said one of the young officers. "it was cool daring in the superlative degree." "i fancy," said austin, "you want us to make excuses for your being there." jacinta laughed. "not exactly! i am rather proud of being a law to myself--and others--you know. now, i really think that the qualities the mæstro possessed appealed to me, though i naturally mean some and not all of them. i am, after all, as i admitted, a little primitive in some respects." "you mean that you like a man to be daring?" asked the other officer. "of course!" and once more it was austin jacinta looked at. "still, i don't necessarily mean that everybody should go bull-fighting. there are other things more worth while." "even than sailing round the canaries and painting little pictures?" said austin. jacinta glanced at him with a curious smile. "well," she said, "since you ask me, i almost think there are." then she stopped a moment, and stood looking out from among the oleanders towards the glittering heave of the atlantic across the white-walled town. once more a faint gleam crept into her eyes. "i wonder," she added, "what jefferson is doing--out yonder in africa." chapter viii jefferson feels the strain the afternoon was wearing through, but it was still almost insufferably hot when jefferson stood with his hand upon the valve of the _cumbria_'s forward winch. she lay with her bows wedged into the mangrove forest, which crawled on high-arched roots over leagues of bubbling mire to the edge of one of the foulest creeks in western africa. it flowed, thick and yeasty, beneath the steamer's hove-up side, for she lay with a list to starboard athwart the stream. there was a bend close by, and her original crew had apparently either failed to swing her round it, which is an accident that sometimes happens in that country, or driven her ashore to save her sinking. her iron deck was unpleasantly hot, and the negroes who crossed it between hatch and surfboat hopped. they, of course, wore no boots, and, indeed, very little of anything at all beyond a strip of cotton round their waists. there was not a breath of wind astir, and the saturated atmosphere, which was heavy with the emanations of the swamps, seemed to seal the perspiration in the burning skin. jefferson felt the veins on his forehead swollen to the bursting point when he stopped the winch and looked about him while the spaniards slipped a sling over a palm-oil puncheon in the hold below. he could see nothing but a strip of dazzling water, and the dingy, white-stemmed mangroves which stretched away farther than the eye could follow, and sighed as he glanced back at the _cumbria_. she lay with deck unpleasantly slanted and one bilge in the mire, a rusty, two-masted steamer, with the blistered paint peeling off her, and the burnt awnings hanging from their spars. he did not expect much water in that creek until the wet season, and in the meanwhile it was necessary to heave the coal and cargo out of her and send it down stream to a neighbouring beach. it was very slow work with the handful of men he had, and those few weeks had set their mark on jefferson. he had never been a fleshy man, and long days of feverish toil under a burning sun and in the steamy heat of the flooded holds had worn him to skin and bone. his duck garments hung with a significant slackness about his gaunt frame, and they were rent in places, as well as blackened and smeared with oil. his face was grim and hollow, but there was a fierce steadfastness in his eyes, which seemed filled with curious brilliancy. "are you going to sleep down there? can't you send up another cask?" he said. a voice came up from the dusky hatch, out of which there flowed a hot, sour smell of palm oil and putrefying water. "the next tier's jammed up under the orlop beams," it said. "we might get on a little if we could break a puncheon out." jefferson laid his hands upon the combing of the hatch and swung himself over. it was a drop of several yards, and he came down upon the slippery round of a big puncheon, and reeling across the barrels, fell backwards against an angle-iron. he was, however, up again in a moment, and stood blinking about him with eyes dazzled by the change from the almost intolerable brightness above. blurred figures were standing more than ankle deep in water on the slanted rows of puncheons, and jefferson, who could not see them very well, blinked again when an englishman, stripped to the waist, moved towards him. the latter was dripping with yellow oil and perspiration. "it's this one," he said, and kicked a puncheon viciously. "the derrick-crabs have pulled the tops of the staves off her. they're soaked an' soft with oil. the water underneath's jamming them up, an' you'll see how the tier's keyed down by the orlop-beams." jefferson wrenched the iron bar he held away from him and turned to the rest. "there's a patch of the head clear. two or three of you get a handspike on to it," he said. "no, shove it lower down. mas abajo. now, heave all together. vamos. toda fuerza!" they were barefooted canary spaniards, of an astonishing ignorance, but excellent sailormen, and they understood him. lean, muscular bodies strained and bent, the dew of effort dripped from them; and, as he heaved with lips set, the hollows grew deeper in jefferson's grim face. no one spoke; there was only a deep, stertorous gasping, until the puncheon moved a little, and jefferson, stooping, drove his bar a trifle lower. then, while he strained every muscle and sinew in strenuous effort, the great, slimy barrel rose again, tilted, and rolled out on its fellows. for a moment it left a space of oily black water where it had been, and then the puncheons closed in with a crash again. jefferson flung the bar down and straightened himself. "now," he said wearily, "you can get ahead." he crawled up the ladder with a curious languidness, and while one of the englishmen apostrophised the puncheons the spaniards went back to their task. the castilian is not supposed to be remarkable for diligence, but there is, at least among the lower ranks of men in whom the iberian blood flows, a capacity for patient toil and uncomplaining endurance which, while not always very apparent, nevertheless shows itself unmistakably under pressure of circumstances. these were simple men, who had never been encouraged to think for themselves, and were, therefore, like other spaniards of their degree, perhaps, incapable of undertaking anything on their own initiative, but they could do a great deal under the right leader, and they had him in jefferson. one of the englishmen, however, was not quite satisfied. he had been in the tropics before, and did not like the curious flush in jefferson's face or the way the swollen veins showed on his forehead, so he climbed the ladder after him and leaned upon the winch-drum looking at him meditatively. the man was very ragged as well as very dirty, and altogether disreputable, so far as appearance went, while it is probable that in several respects his character left a good deal to be desired. "here's your hat. it's wet, but that's no harm," he said. "you forgot it. hadn't you better put it on quick?" jefferson, who recognised the wisdom of this, did so. "that's all right! well, what--are--you stopping for?" he said. the other man still regarded him contemplatively. "i know my place--but things isn't quite the same aboard this 'ooker as they would be on a big, two-funnel liner. you couldn't expect it. that's why i come up just now to speak to you. you're not feelin' well to-day?" "it's not worth worrying about. i guess nobody but a nigger ever does feel well in this country." the other man shook his head. "you go slow. i've seen it comin' on," he said. "you oughtn't to 'a' had your hat off a minute. you see, if you drop out, how's bill an' me to get the bonus you promised us?" jefferson laughed, though he found, somewhat to his concern, that he could not see the man very well. "i'm going to hold up until i knock the bottom of this contract out," he said, good-humouredly. "i can't do it if i stop and talk to you. get a move on. light out of this!" the man went back. he had done what he felt was his duty, though he had not expected that it would be of very much use, and jefferson started the winch. it hammered and rattled, and the barrels came up, slimy and dripping, with patches of whitewash still clinging to them. the glare of it dazzled jefferson until he could scarcely see them as they swung beneath the derrick-boom, but he managed to drop them into the surfboat alongside and pile the rest on deck, when she slid down the creek with a row of negroes paddling on either side. the steamer had struck the forest at the time of highest water, and it was necessary to take everything out of her if she was to be floated during the coming rainy season. he toiled on for another hour, with a racking pain in his head, and the canarios toiled in the stifling hold below, until there was a jar and a rattle, and a big puncheon that should have gone into the surfboat came down with a crash amidst them, and, bursting, splashed them with yellow oil. then the man who had remonstrated with jefferson went up the ladder in haste. the winch had stopped, and jefferson lay across it, amidst a coil of slack wire, with a suffused face. the man, who stooped over him, shouted, and the rest who came up helped to carry him to his room beneath the bridge. the floor was slanted so that one could scarcely stand on it, and as the berth took the same list, they laid him where the side of it met the bulkhead. he lay there, speechless, with half-closed eyes, and water and palm oil soaking from him. "now," said the man who had given jefferson good advice, "you'll get these spaniards out of this, bill. then you'll go on breaking the puncheons out. wall-eye, here, can run the winch for you, but you can come back in half an hour when i've found out what's wrong with the skipper." bill seemed to recognise that his comrade had risen to the occasion. "well," he said, "i s'pose there's no use in me sayin' anything. all i want to know is, how you're going to do it?" "see that?" and the other man pointed to a chest beneath the settee. "it's full of medicines, an' there's a book about them. good ole board of trade!" "how d'you know those medicines arn't all gorn?" asked bill. "they arn't. i've been in. there's a bottle of sweet paregoricky stuff i came round for a swigg of when mr. jefferson wasn't there now and then. it warms you up kind of comfortin'." bill went away with the spaniards, and, in place of improving the occasion by looking for liquor, as he might, perhaps, have been expected to do, went on with his task. the english sailorman does not always express himself delicately, but he is, now, at least, very far from being the dissolute, unintelligent ruffian he is sometimes supposed to be. there is no doubt of this, for shipowners know their business, and while there is no lack of teutons and cheerful, sober scandinavians, a certain proportion of english seamen still go to sea in english ships. the man who sat in jefferson's room could, at least, understand the treatise in the medicine chest, although it was one approved by the board of trade, which august body has apparently no great fondness for lucid explanations. he was, however, still pouring over it when his comrade thrust his head into the doorway again, and it is possible that jefferson had not suffered greatly from the fact that he had not as yet quite decided on any course of treatment. "well," said the newcomer, "i s'pose you know what he--has--got?" "come in, an' sit down there," said the other. "it's fever, for one thing--i've seen it coming on--an' sunstroke for another. what i'm stuck at is if i'm to treat them both together." bill looked reflective. "i think i'd take them one at a time. get the sunstroke out of him, an' then go for the fever. how d' you start on it, tom?" "undo his clothes. that's easy. the buttons is mostly off them, an' he has hardly any on. then you put cold water on his head." "that's not easy, anyway! where the blazes are you going to get cold water from?" it was somewhat of a paradox, for while there is plenty of water in western africa, none of it is cold. tom, however, was once more equal to the occasion. "we could get a big spanner from the engine room, an' put it on his head," he said. "there's plenty of them. s'pose you go an' bring one. any way, we'll swill him with the coldest water we can get." they laid a soaked singlet upon his head with a couple of iron spanners under it, and then sat down to watch the effect. somewhat to their astonishment, it did not appear to do him any appreciable good. darkness closed down as they waited, and it seemed to grow hotter than ever, while the thick white steam rose from the swamps. tom stood up and lighted the lamp. "the fever's easier," he said. "i've had it. you give him the mixture--it's down in the book--though i don't know what the meaning of all these sign things is. that starts him perspiring, an' then it's thick blankets. we used to give them green-lime water in the mailboats." "where's the green limes?" said bill. "any way, i'd give the sunstroke a decent chance first. perhaps he'll come out of it himself. i don't know that it wouldn't be better if he did." jefferson came out of his limp unconsciousness into a raving delirium that night, and they rolled him in two blankets, while bill, being left on watch, wisely threw away the draught his comrade had concocted. jefferson was also very little more sensible during the next few days, and, though the work went on, before the week was over the two lonely englishmen found they had another difficulty to grapple with. the sun was almost overhead, and the iron deck, insufferably hot, when the surfboat negroes, who had just finished their meal, came forward together, eight or nine big, naked men, with animal faces and splendid muscles. nobody knew where they came from, but when two or three of them appeared in a canoe, jefferson had managed to make them understand that he was willing to pay them for their services, and they forthwith went away, and came back with several comrades and a man of shorter stature who had apparently worked on a steamboat or at a white man's factory. they had worked tolerably well while jefferson was about to watch them, but they had now apparently decided on another mode of behaviour, for the attitude of their leader was unmistakably truculent. the man called bill, sitting on the fore hatch, turned at the patter of naked feet, and looked at him. "well," he said sharply, "what the ---- are you wanting?" "two bokus them green gin," said the negro. "two lil' piece of cloff every boy." tom laughed ironically. "there isn't any green gin bokus in the ship, for one thing. you'll get your cloth-piece when the work is done. that's all i've got to say to you. get out of this!" the negro made a little forceful gesture. "you no cappy." "well," said bill, drily, "he figures he's a bloomin' admiral in the meanwhile, and that's good enough for you. go home again, and don't worry me." "two cloff-piece," said the negro. "two cloff-piece every boy. you no lib for get them, we come down too much boy an' take them 'teamboat from you." the white men looked at one another, and it was evident that they were uncertain how far the negro might be able to make good his threat. there was, as it happened, very little to prevent him doing it, and stockaded factories, as well as stranded steamboats, have been looted in western africa. still, they remembered that they had the prestige of their colour to maintain. "oh, get out one time!" said tom. the negro turned upon him. "you no cappy. you low, white 'teamboat bushman. too much boy he lib for come down one night an' cut you big fat t'roat." bill, who was big and brawny, rose with an air of sorrowful resignation. "this ---- nonsense has got to be stopped," he said, and walked tranquilly towards the negro. "you wouldn't listen to reason, black-funnel-paint." then, before the latter quite realised what had happened to him, a grimy fist descended upon his jaw, and as he staggered backwards somebody seized his shoulders and whirled him round. in another moment bill kicked with all his might, and the negro went out headlong through the open gangway into the creek alongside. in the meanwhile the spaniards came tumbling from the hatch, and, though they were quiet men, they carried long canary knives. the sight of them was enough for the negroes, and they followed their leader, plunging from the gangway or over the rail. their canoes still lay beneath the quarter, and though tom hurled a few big lumps of coal on them as they got under way, they were flying up the creek in another minute, with paddles flashing. then bill explained the affair to the canarios as well as he could, and afterward drew his comrade back into the shadow of the deck-house to hold a council. both of them felt somewhat lonely as they blinked at the desolation of dingy mangroves which hemmed them in. there was, so far as they knew, not a white man in that part of africa, and the intentions of the negroes were apparently by no means amicable. "funnel-paint may come back an' bring his friends," said tom. "i don't know what's to stop him if he wants to. there's not a gun in the ship except mr. jefferson's pistol, an' those canary fellows' knives, an' we can't worry mr. jefferson about the thing when he's too sick to understand. if i'd only begun on him for fever he might have been better." "i'm thankful," said bill, "as he isn't dead. it wouldn't be very astonishing, but that don't matter." "you'd think it mattered a good deal if you was mr. jefferson. if i wasn't that anxious about him i'd let you try your hand an' see how easy it is worrying out that book. as it is, one of us is enough." "i'm thinking," said bill sourly, "as it's a ---- sight too much!" tom glared at him a moment, for one of the effects that climate has upon a white man's nerves is to keep him in a state of prickly irritation; but he was more anxious than he cared to confess, too anxious, indeed, to force a quarrel. "well," he said, "i'll ask you what you mean another time. just now, we've got to do a little for mr. jefferson and a little for ourselves. eight pound a month, all found, and a fifty-pound bonus when he gets her off, isn't to be picked up everywhere, and, of course, there's no telling when you an' me may get the fever. now, then, we want a boss who isn't sick, an' more men, as well as a doctor." "of course. how're you goin' to get 'em?" "not here. they don't grow in the swamps. somebody's got to go for them, an' las palmas is the best place. you could find a west-coast mailboat goin' home if you went down the creek in the launch. they've a man or two sick in the engine room most trips, an' they'd be glad to take you firin'. now, before mr. jefferson got that sunstroke he showed me two envelopes. if he was to peg out sudden i was to see the men in las palmas got them, and they'd tell me what to do. men do peg out at any time in this country. well, you look for a liner an' take those letters. if it's a good boat she'll only be four or five days steaming up the trades. mr. jefferson deserves a chance for his life." "what's wrong with takin' him, too; or all of us goin', for that matter?" asked his companion. "eight pounds a month, an' a bonus! besides, mr. jefferson put all his money into getting this ship off. if he comes round an' finds it thrown away he's not going to be grateful to either of us." bill sat silent, evidently thinking hard for a minute or two. "well," he said, "there's sense in the thing, an' i'll try it. you'll be all right with those canariers. they're nice quiet men, an' if you make 'em say it over lots of times you can generally understand 'em. wall-eye can bring the launch back. i'll get out of this when we've steam up." it was two hours later when he and one of the canarios who had worked on board the coaling company's tug departed, and the rest, clustering along the _cumbria_'s rail, watched them wistfully as the little clanking craft slid down the creek. they would very much have liked to have gone in her, and might have done so had not jefferson had the forethought to promise them a small share of the profit when the work was done, and fed them well. there are also men who inspire confidence in those they lead, and sailormen capable of carrying out a bargain. thus there were no open expressions of regret or misgivings when the last of the launch's smoke-trail melted above the mangroves, though tom looked very grave as he clawed the shoulder of an olive-faced canario seaman who did not understand him. "if that man goes on the loose with what he gets for firin', an' forgets all about those letters, it won't be nice for us," he said. "in the meanwhile, we've just got to buck up and lighten the blame old scrap-iron tank between us." he called her a few other names while the spaniard watched him, smiling, and, having so relieved himself, went softly into the skipper's room, where jefferson lay, a worn-out shadow of a man, wrapped in very dirty blankets, and babbling incoherently. chapter ix austin makes a venture it was late one hot night when austin first met captain farquhar of the s.s. _carsegarry_ in a calle of santa cruz, and the worthy shipmaster, being then in a somewhat unpleasant position, was sincerely pleased to see him. the _carsegarry_ had reached las palmas with three thousand tons of steam coal some ten days earlier, and, because there are disadvantages attached to living on board a vessel that is discharging coal, farquhar had taken up his abode at the metropole. he had, as usual, made friends with almost everybody in the hotel during the first few days, which said a good deal for his capabilities, considering that most of them were englishmen; and then, finding their society pall on him, went across to santa cruz in search of adventure and more congenial company. as it happened, he found the latter in the person of another englishman with similar tastes; and one or two of their frolics are remembered in that island yet. on the night farquhar came across austin they had amused themselves not altogether wisely in a certain café, from which its proprietor begged them to depart when they had broken one citizen's guitar and damaged another's clothes. then, as it was getting late, they adjourned to the mole, where the englishman had arranged that a boat at his command should meet them, and convey farquhar, who was going back to las palmas next day, on board the _estremedura_. the boat was not forthcoming, and the englishman's temper deteriorated while they waited half an hour for it, until when at last the splash of oars came out of the soft darkness he was not only in a very unpleasant humour, but determined upon showing his companion that he was not a man with whom a spanish crew could take liberties. there was also a pile of limestone on the mole, and when a shadowy launch slid into the blackness beneath it he hurled down the biggest lumps he could find, as well as a torrent of castilian vituperation. then, however, instead of the excuses he had expected, there were wrathful cries, and the englishman gasped when he saw dim, white-clad figures clambering in portentous haste up the adjacent steps. "we'll have to get out of this--quick!" he said. "i've made a little mistake. it's somebody else's boat." they set about it without waste of time, but there was a good deal of merchandise lying about the mole, and the englishman, who fell over some of it, lay still until a peon came across him peacefully asleep behind a barrel next morning. farquhar, however, ran on, snatching up a handspike as he went, with odd lumps of limestone hurtling behind him; and as he and his pursuers made a good deal of noise as they sped across the plaza at the head of the mole, the citizens still left in the cafés turned out to enjoy the spectacle. english seafarers are tolerated in that city, but it is, perhaps, their own fault that they are not regarded with any particular favour, and when farquhar turned at bay in a doorway and proceeded to defy all the subjects of spain, nobody was anxious to stand between him and the barelegged sailors, who had nasty knives. it might, in fact, have gone hard with him had not two civiles, with big revolvers strapped about them, arrived. they heard the crowd's explanations with official unconcern, and then, though it was, perhaps, their duty to place farquhar in safe custody in the cuartel, decided on sending for austin, who was known to be staying that night in a neighbouring hotel. he had befriended english skippers already under somewhat similar circumstances, and the civiles, who knew their business, were quite aware that nobody would thank them for forcing the affair upon the attention of the english consul. austin came, and saw farquhar gazing angrily at the civiles and still gripping his bar, while the crowd stood round and made insulting remarks about him in castilian. he at once grasped the position, and made a sign of concurrence when one of the civiles spoke to him. "you take him to his steamer," said the officer. "one of us will come round in the morning when he understands." austin turned to farquhar. "give the man that bar," he said. "come along, and i'll send you off to your steamer." "i'm going to have satisfaction out of some of them first," and farquhar made an indignant gesture of protest. "then i'll knock up the consul. i'll show them if a crowd of garlic-eating pigs can run after me." "if you stop here you'll probably get it, in the shape of a knife between your ribs," said austin, who seized his arm. "a wise man doesn't drag in the consul when he wants to keep his berth." he forced farquhar, who still protested vigorously, along, and, because the civiles marched behind, conveyed him to the mole, where a boat was procured to take them off to the _estremedura_. farquhar had cooled down a little by the time they reached her, and appeared grateful when austin put him into his berth. "perhaps you did save me some trouble, and i'll not forget you," he said. "take you round all the nice people in las palmas and tell them you're a friend of mine." "i'm not sure it would be very much of a recommendation," said austin, drily. farquhar laughed. "that's where you're mistaken. when i've been a week in a place i'm friends with everybody worth knowing." "if to-night's affair is anything to go by, it's a little difficult to understand how you manage it," said austin. "it's quite easy to be looked up to, and still have your fun," and farquhar lowered his voice confidentially. "when folks think a good deal of you in one place you have only to go somewhere else when you feel the fit coming on." the _estremedura_ sailed for las palmas next morning, and on arriving there austin was somewhat astonished to discover that farquhar had, in fact, acquired the good-will of a good many people of consequence in that city. he was a genial, frolic-loving man, and austin, who became sensible of a liking for him, spent a good deal of his leisure on board the _carsegarry_, while, when the _estremedura_ came back there, he also consented to advise farquhar about the getting up of a dance to which everybody was invited. it was a testimony to the latter's capacity for making friends that a good many of them came, and among the rest were pancho brown, his daughter, muriel gascoyne, and mrs. hatherly, as well as the commander of a spanish warship, and several officers of artillery. the night was soft and still, and clear moonlight shone down upon the sea. the trade breeze had fallen away, and only a little cool air came down from the black isleta hill, while fleecy mists drifted ethereally athwart the jagged peaks of the great cordillera. an orchestra of guitars and mandolins discoursed spanish music from the poop, and there was room for bolero and casucha on the big after-hatch, while, when the waltzers had swung round it, the _carsegarry_'s engineer made shift to play the english lancers on his fiddle. everybody seemed content, and the genial farquhar diffused high spirits and good humour. austin had swung through a waltz with jacinta, though the guitars were still twinging softly when they climbed the ladder to the bridge-deck, where canvas chairs were laid out. it was a curious waltz, tinged with the melancholy there is in most spanish music, but the crash of a gun broke through it, and while the roar of a whistle drowned the drowsy murmur of the surf, the long black hull of an african mailboat slid into the harbour ringed with lights. then there followed the rattle of cable, and austin fancied that the sight of the steamer had, for no very apparent reason, its effect upon his companion. she had been cordial during the evening, but there was a faint suggestion of hardness in her face as she turned to him. "i am especially fond of that waltz," she said. "you may have noticed there's a trace of what one might call the bizarre in it. no doubt, it's eastern. they got it from the moors." "it only struck me as very pretty," said austin, who surmised by her expression that jacinta was preparing the way for what she meant to say. "i'm afraid i'm not much of a musician." "you, at least, dance rather well. there are not many englishmen who really do, which is, perhaps, no great disadvantage, after all." austin laughed, though he was a trifle perplexed. "well," he said, "though you don't overwhelm me with compliments, as a rule, you have told me that i could dance before. now, however, one could almost fancy that the fact didn't meet with your approval." jacinta looked at him reflectively over her fan. "i scarcely supposed you would understand, and one does not always feel in the mood to undertake a logical exposition of their views. still, here's muriel, and she, at least, generally seems to know just what she means. suppose you ask her what she thinks of dancing." austin did so, and miss gascoyne, who was crossing the deck-bridge with farquhar, stopped beside them. "i don't think there is any harm in dancing, in itself--in fact, i have just been waltzing with captain farquhar," she said. "of course, the disadvantage attached to amusements of any kind is that they may distract one's attention from more serious things. don't you think so, captain farquhar?" farquhar caught austin's eye, and grinned wickedly, but miss gascoyne, who failed to notice this, glanced towards the steamer which had just come in. "that must be the african boat, but i suppose there is no use expecting any news?" she said quietly, though there was a faint suggestive tremour in her voice. she passed on with farquhar, and jacinta glanced at austin with a little enquiring smile. "if i had a sister who persisted in talking in that aggravatingly edifying fashion, i should feel tempted to shake her," he said. "still, one could forgive her a good deal if only for the way she looked at the west-coast boat. it suggested that she has as much humanity in her as there is in the rest of us, after all." "still, don't you think there was a little reason in what she said?" "of course. that is, no doubt, why one objects to it. well, since it's difficult to keep the personal equation out, i suppose dancing and sailing about these islands on board the _estremedura_ is rather a wasteful life. painting little pictures probably comes to much the same thing, too, though there are people who seem to take art seriously." jacinta looked at him steadily. "when one has really an artistic talent it is different," she said. austin, who hoped she did not notice that he winced, sat silent a space, gazing out across the glittering sea, and it was not altogether a coincidence that his eyes were turned eastwards towards africa, where jefferson was toiling in the fever swamps. he wondered if jacinta knew his thoughts had also turned in that direction somewhat frequently of late. "well," he said, "i suppose it is. some of those pictures must be pretty, or the tourists wouldn't buy them, but that doesn't go very far, after all." he stopped a moment, and then went on with a little wry smile. "no doubt some patients require drastic treatment, and there are cases where it is necessary to use the knife." jacinta rose, and, dropping her fan to her side, gravely met his gaze. "if it wasn't, it would probably not be tried," she said. "one could fancy that it was, now and then, a little painful to the surgeon." austin walked with her to the ladder, and stopped a moment at the head of it. "well," he said, "one has to remember that all men are not built on the same model, and, what is more to the purpose, they haven't all the same opportunities. no doubt the latter fact is fortunate for some of them, since they would probably make a deplorable mess of things if they undertook a big enterprise." "ah!" said jacinta, who remembered it afterwards, "one never knows when the opportunities may present themselves." she went down the ladder, and it was about an hour later when a boat slid alongside, and a man came up, asking for austin. the latter, who sat on the bridge-deck amidst a group of farquhar's guests, looked at him curiously when he handed him an envelope. his garments had evidently not been made for him, and there were stains of grease and soot on his coarse serge jacket, while the coal dust had not been wholly washed from his face. it was not difficult to recognise him as a steamer's fireman. "you're mr. austin?" he said. austin admitted that he was, and after a glance at the letter turned round and saw that muriel gascoyne, who sat close by, was watching him with a curious intentness. then he once more fixed his attention on the paper in his hand. "s.s. _cumbria_" was written at the top of it, and there followed a description of the creek, and how the steamer lay, as well as the cargo in her holds. then he read: "i'm beginning to understand why those wrecker fellows let up on the contract, though they hadn't the stake i have in the game. there are times when i get wondering whether i can last it out, for it seems to me that white men who work in the sun all day are apt to drop out suddenly in this country. i make you and mr. pancho brown my executors in case of anything of that kind happening to me. if you come across anybody willing to take the _cumbria_ over as a business proposition, do what you can, on the understanding that one-third of the profit goes to miss gascoyne, the rest as executors' and wreckers' remuneration. i don't know how far this statement meets your law, but i feel i can trust you, any way. in case either party is not willing to take the thing up, the other may act alone." austin turned to the fireman. "you have another letter for mr. brown?" "yes, sir," said the man. "mr. jefferson----" austin, who heard a rustle of feminine draperies and what seemed to be a little gasp of surprise or alarm, made the man a sign. "come into the skipper's room. i've two or three things to ask you," he said. "miss brown, will you please hand that letter to your father?" they disappeared into the room beneath the bridge, and it was some time before they came out again. then austin sent the man down the ladder with a steward to take him to brown, and leaned against the rail. jacinta, muriel, and mrs. hatherly were still sitting there, but the rest had gone. he told them briefly all he had heard about jefferson, and then descended the ladder in search of brown. the latter met him with the letter in his hand, and they found a seat in the shadow of the _carsegarry_'s rail. nobody seemed to notice them, though the fluttering dresses of the women brushed them as they swung in the waltz. "you have read it," said austin. "what do you think?" pancho brown tapped the letter with the gold-rimmed glasses he held in his hand. "as a business proposition i would not look at it. the risks are too great," he said. "it struck me like that, too. still, that's not quite the question. you see, the man isn't dead." "i almost think he is by this time," said brown, reflectively. "now, he did not seem quite sure when he wrote those letters that there was really any gum in her. at least, he hadn't found it, and i understand that circumstances had made him a little suspicious about the _cumbria_'s skipper, who we know is dead. taking oil at present value, in view of what we would have to pay for a salvage expedition and chartering, there is, it seems to me, nothing in the thing." "i'm not quite sure of that; but you are still presuming jefferson dead." brown turned and looked at him. "the first thing we have to do is to find out. somebody will have to go across, and, of course, he must be a reliable man. i should be disposed to go so far as to meet the necessary expenses, not as a business venture, but because jacinta would give me no peace if i didn't." "there would be no difficulty about the man." brown turned to him sharply. "you?" "yes. if jefferson is dead i should probably also undertake to do what i can to meet his wishes as executor." brown sat silent a space, and then tapped the letter with his glasses again. "in that case i might go as far as to find, say, £ . it should, at least, be sufficient to prove if there is any odd chance of getting the _cumbria_ off." "i think i shall do that with £ , but i should prefer that you did not provide it. that is, unless you decide to go into the thing on a business footing, and take your share of the results, as laid down by jefferson." brown seemed to be looking hard at him, but they sat in shadow, and austin was glad of it. "ah!" he said quietly, though there was a significance in his tone. "well, somebody must certainly go across, and if you fail elsewhere you can always fall back on me for--a loan. when are you going?" "by the first boat that calls anywhere near the creek." he rose and turned away, but pancho brown sat still, with a curious expression in his face. if any of the dancers had noticed him, it would probably have occurred to them that he was thinking hard. pancho brown was a quiet man, but he often noticed a good deal more than his daughter gave him credit for. still, when at length he rose and joined farquhar there was nothing in his appearance which suggested that he was either anxious or displeased. in the meanwhile austin came upon mrs. hatherly, who was wandering up and down the deck, and she drew him beneath a lifeboat. "miss gascoyne is, no doubt, distressed? i am sorry for her," he said. the little lady held his arm in a tightening grasp. "of course," she said, and there was a tremour in her voice. "still, after all, that does not concern us most just now. somebody must go, and see what can be done for mr. jefferson." "yes," said austin. "i am going." "then--and i am sure you will excuse me--it will cost a good deal, and you cannot be a rich man, or----" "i should not have been on board the _estremedura_? you are quite correct, madam." mrs. hatherly made a little deprecatory gesture. "i am not exactly poor; in fact, i have more money than i shall live to spend, and i always meant to leave it to muriel. it seems to me that it would be wiser to spend some of it on her now. you will let me give you what you want, mr. austin?" austin stood silent a moment, with a flush in his face, and then gravely met her gaze. "i almost think i could let you lend me forty pounds. with that i shall have enough in the meanwhile. you will not think me ungracious if i say that just now i am especially sorry i have not more money of my own?" the little lady smiled at him. "oh, i understand. that is what made me almost afraid. it cannot be nice to borrow from a woman. still, i think you could, if it was necessary, do even harder things." "i shall probably have to," said austin, a trifle drily. "i don't mind admitting that what you have suggested is a great relief to me." "you would naturally sooner let me lend it you than mr. brown?" "why should you suppose that?" and the flush crept back into austin's face. mrs. hatherly smiled again. "ah," she said, "i am an old woman, and have my fancies, but they are right now and then. i will send you a cheque to-morrow, and, mr. austin, i should like you to think of me as one of your friends. do you know that i told muriel half an hour ago you would go?" austin made her a little grave inclination, though there was a smile in his eyes. "i am not sure that any of my other friends has so much confidence in me, madam," he said. "after all, it is another responsibility, and i shall have to do what i can." the little lady smiled at him as she turned away. "well," she said quietly, "i think that will be a good deal." it was ten minutes later when austin met jacinta, and she stopped him with a sign. "you are going to mr. jefferson?" she said. "yes," said austin, with a trace of dryness. "i believe so. after all, he is a friend of mine." jacinta watched him closely, and her pale, olive-tinting was a trifle warmer in tone than usual. his self-control was excellent, to the little smile, but she could make a shrewd guess as to what it cost him. "soon?" she asked. "in two or three days. that is, if the compania don't get the spaniards to lay hands on me. by the way, you may as well know now that i had to get mrs. hatherly to lend me part, at least, of the necessary money." jacinta flushed visibly. "you will not be vindictive, though, of course, i have now and then been hard on you." "i shouldn't venture to blame you. as we admitted, there are occasions on which one has to resort to drastic remedies." jacinta stopped him with a gesture. "please--you won't," she said. "of course, i deserve it, but you will try to forgive me. you can afford to--now." she stood still a moment in the moonlight, an ethereal, white-clad figure, with a suggestion of uncertainly and apprehension in her face which very few people had ever seen there before, and then turned abruptly, with a little smile of relief, as miss gascoyne came towards them. "he's going out, muriel. you will thank him--i don't seem able to," she said. muriel came forward with outstretched hands, and in another moment austin, to his visible embarrassment, felt her warm grasp. "oh," she said, "mrs. hatherly knew you meant to. i feel quite sure i can trust you to bring him back to me." austin managed to disengage his hands, and smiled a little, though it was jacinta he looked at. "i think," he said, "i have a sufficient inducement for doing what i can. still, you will excuse me. there are one or two points i want to talk over with captain farquhar." he turned away, and twenty minutes later jacinta, standing on the bridge-deck, alone, watched his boat slide away into the blaze of moonlight that stretched suggestively towards africa. chapter x jacinta is not content darkness was closing down on the faintly shining sea, and the dull murmur of the surf grew louder as the trade-breeze died away, when jacinta and muriel gascoyne sat in the stern of a white gig which two barefooted canarios pulled across las palmas harbour on the evening on which austin was to sail. in front of them the spray still tossed in filmy clouds about the head of the long, dusky mole, and the lonely isleta hill cut black as ebony against a cold green transparency, while skeins of lights twinkled into brilliancy round the sweep of bay. jacinta, however, saw nothing of this. she was watching the _estremedura_'s dark hull rise higher above the line of mole, and listening to one of the boatmen who accompanied the rhythmic splash of oars with a little melodious song. she long afterwards remembered its plaintive cadence and the words of it well. "las aves marinas vuelen encima la mar," he sang, and then while the measured thud and splash grew a trifle faster, "no pueden escapar las penas del amor." he did not seem to know the rest of it, and when she had heard the stanza several times jacinta, who saw muriel's eyes fixed upon her enquiringly, made a little half-impatient gesture. "it's the usual sentimental rubbish, though he sings passably well. 'even the sea birds cannot escape the pains of love,'" she said. "absurd, isn't it? like most of the men one comes across nowadays, they probably spend all their time in search of something to eat. still, i suppose--you--would sympathise with the man whose perverted imagination led him to write that song." muriel looked at her with a hint of reproach in her big blue eyes, which were very reposeful. "i don't think i ever quite understood you, and i don't now, but i once went to see an english gullery," she said. "there were rows of nests packed so close that one could scarcely pick a way between, with little, half-feathered things in most of them. they all had their mouths open." jacinta laughed musically. "of course," she said. "you are delightful. but never mind me. go on a little further." "it was the big gulls i was thinking of," said muriel gravely. "they didn't fly away, but hung just above us in a great white cloud, wheeling, screaming, and now and then making little swoops at our heads. it didn't seem to matter what happened to them, but any one could see they were in an agony of terror lest we should tread upon some of the little, half-feathered nestlings. i came away as soon as the others would let me. it seemed a cruelty to frighten them." "it seems to me," said jacinta, "that you are anticipating, or confusing things considerably, but i'll try not to offend you by making that a little plainer, though, i should almost like to. i'm in quite a prickly humour to-night." she sat silent a moment or two, while a trace of colour crept in her companion's face, looking out towards the eastern haze, as she had done of late somewhat frequently. "yes," she said, reflectively, "i feel that it would be a relief to make you upset and angry. you are so aggravatingly sure of everything, and serene. of course, that is, perhaps, only natural, after all. you have, in one respect, got just what you wanted, and have sense enough to be content with it." muriel turned and looked at her with a trace of bewilderment, for there was an unusual hardness in jacinta's tone. "wouldn't everybody be content in such a case?" she asked. "oh, dear no!" and jacinta laughed. "i, for one, would begin to look for flaws in the thing, whatever it was, and wonder if it wouldn't be wiser to change it for something else. in fact, i don't mind telling you i feel like that to-night. you see, for a year at least, i have been trying to bring a certain thing about, and--now i have succeeded--i wish i hadn't. of course, you won't understand me, and i don't mean you to; but you may as well remember that it's a somewhat perilous thing to keep on giving people good advice. some day they will probably act upon it." "but that ought to please one." jacinta glanced once more into the soft darkness that crept up from the east with a little shiver. "well," she said sharply, "in my case it certainly doesn't." they were alongside the _estremedura_ in another minute, but the seaman they found on deck did not know where austin was, and led them down to macallister's room. it was beneath the spar-deck, and very hot, for the dynamo was not running that night, and a big oil lamp lighted it. it was also full of tobacco smoke, and--for the port was open--the rumble of the long swell tumbling against the mole came throbbing into it. a big man in very shabby serge, with a hard face, sat opposite the engineer, until the latter, seeing the two women, laid a hand upon his shoulder. "out ye get!" he said, and his guest was projected suddenly into the dimly-lighted space about the after-hatch. then he smiled upon the newcomers affably. "come away in," he said. "was it me or mr. austin ye came to see?" "on this occasion it was mr. austin," said jacinta, who found a place opposite him, beside muriel, on a settee. "of course, that was because he is going away. isn't he here?" "he is not," and macallister beamed at her. "in one way, it's not that much of a pity. there's twice the light-heartedness in me that there is in mr. austin." "i can quite believe it. still, light-heartedness of one kind is now and then a little inconvenient. where has he gone?" "to the town. i don't expect him until he calls for his man--the one i've just hove out--when the west-coast mailboat comes in. she won't stop more than half an hour, but there's no sign of her yet." jacinta sighed whimsically, perhaps to hide what she felt. "then i'm afraid we shall not see him, which is a pity, because i've been thinking over the nice things i meant to say to him, and now they're all wasted," she said. "you will tell him that we came to say good-bye to him, won't you, and that i'm just a little vexed he never called to tell us anything about his expedition." macallister grinned sardonically, and though jacinta was usually a very self-possessed young woman, she appeared to find his gaze a trifle disconcerting. "well," he said, "i know all about it. he has sold everything he had, and he borrowed £ . one way or another he has another £ of his own." jacinta looked up sharply. "he has no more than that?" "it's not likely," and macallister watched her with a faint twinkle in his eyes. "i do not know why he would not have the £ mr. brown offered him. maybe ye do." there was a just perceptible trace of colour in jacinta's cheek. "i hardly see how you could expect me to when i never heard of it until this moment," she said. "would £ be enough for mr. austin?" "i'm thinking it would. no for everybody under the same circumstances, but enough for him. there are folks in these islands who have only seen the outside of mr. austin, which, ye may observe, is in one sense quite a natural thing." he stopped a moment, and smiled upon her genially. "it's not his fault that he's no quite so well favoured as i am. what would ye expect of an englishman? still, there are men aboard here who have seen what's underneath--i mean the other side of him--at nights when he brought the dispatch off through the surf, and once--though that was not his business--when i was sick, an' they let water down in the starboard boiler." "still," said jacinta, "he would naturally have to have so many things." "he has four good men, a little box o' drugs, and a case o' dynamite. farquhar's going on to australia with mining stores, and he gave it him." it seemed absurdly insufficient, and jacinta struggled with an almost hysterical inclination to laugh. it was, she realised, a very big thing austin had undertaken, and his equipment consisted of a case of dynamite and a box of drugs, which, on his own confession, he knew very little about. still, she saw that macallister, who, she fancied, ought to know, rated manhood far higher than material. it was muriel who broke the silence. "but they will want a doctor," she said, with a little tremour in her voice. macallister shook his head. "ye would not get one to go there for £ , and he would be no use if he did," he said. "ye will remember that malaria fever does not stay on one long. it goes away when it has shaken the strength out o' ye--and now and then comes back again--while by the time austin gets there mr. jefferson will be----" he stopped with some abruptness, but though she shivered, muriel looked at him with steady eyes. "ah!" she said, "you mean he will either be better, or that no doctor could cure him then?" macallister made her a little inclination, and it was done with a grave deference that jacinta had scarcely expected from him. "just that," he said. "i'm thinking ye are one of the women a man can tell the truth to. it is a pity there are not more o' them. it is no a healthy country mr. austin is going to, but i have been five years on the coast o' it, and ye see me here." "i wonder," said jacinta, "whether you, who know all about ships and engines, did not feel tempted to go with mr. austin?" the engineer smiled curiously. "tempted!" he said. "it was like trying to be teetotal with a whisky bottle in the rack above one's bunk; but i am a married man, with a wife who has a weakness for buying dining-room suites." "dining-room suites! what have they to do with it?" "just everything," and macallister sighed. "she will only have the biggest ones the doors will let in, and she has furnished a good many dining-rooms altogether. ye will mind that we lived here and there and everywhere, while she's back in england now. ye would not meet a better woman, but on £ a month ye cannot buy unlimited red-velvet chairs and sideboards with looking-glasses at the back o' them." jacinta laughed as she rose. "you will tell mr. austin we are sorry we did not see him." "i will," and macallister stood up, too. "perhaps ye mean it this time, and i'm a little sorry for him myself. there are men who get sent off with bands and speeches and dinners to do a smaller thing, but mr. austin he just slips away with his box o' dynamite and his few sailormen." he stopped and looked hard at her a moment before he turned to muriel. "still, we'll have the big drum out when he brings mr. jefferson and the _cumbria_ back again, and if there's anything that can be broken left whole in this ship that night it will be no fault o' mine." they went out and left him, but jacinta stopped when they came upon the man he had ejected from his room, sitting on the companion stairway and smoking a very objectionable pipe. she also held a little purse concealed beneath her hand. "you are going back with mr. austin to the _cumbria_?" she said. the man stood up. "in course," he said. "it's eight pound a month, all found, an' a bonus." "ah!" said jacinta. "i suppose there is nothing else?" the man appeared to ruminate over this, until a light broke in on him. "well," he said, "mr. jefferson does the straight thing, an' he fed us well. that is, as well as he could, considering everything." jacinta smiled at muriel. "you will notice the answer. he is a man!" then she held out a strip of crinkly paper. "that will make you almost a month to the good, and if you do everything you can to make things easier for the man who wants to get the _cumbria_ off, there will probably be another waiting for you when you come back again." the man, who took the crinkly paper, gazed at it in astonishment, and then made a little sign of comprehension. "thank you kindly, miss, but which one am i to look after special? you see, there's two of them." jacinta was apparently not quite herself that night, for the swift colour flickered into her face, and stayed there a moment. "both," she said decisively. "still, you are never to tell anybody about that note." the man once more gazed at her with such evident bewilderment that muriel broke into a little half-audible laugh. then he grinned suddenly, and touched his battered cap. "well, we'll make it--both," he said. they went up the companion, and left him apparently chuckling, but jacinta appeared far from pleased when she got into the waiting boat. "that was to have gone to england for a hat and one or two things i really can't do without--though i shall probably have to now," she said. "oh, aren't they stupid sometimes--i felt i could have shaken him." in the meanwhile the man in the fireman's serge went back to macallister's room. "give me an envelope--quick!" he said. macallister got him one, and he slipped a strip of paper inside before he addressed it and tossed it across the table. "you'll post that. there's a castle boat home to-morrow, and i'd sooner trust you with it than myself," he said, with a little sigh, which, however, once more changed to a chuckle. "if there's money inside it ye're wise," said macallister drily. "still, what are ye grinning in yon fashion for?" "i was thinking it's just as well i've only--one--old woman. it would make a big hole in eight pounds a month--an' a bonus--if i had any more of 'em. but you get that letter posted before i want it back." "wanting," said macallister, reflectively, "is no always getting. maybe, it's now and then fortunate it is so, after all." it was two hours later, and jacinta stood on the flat roof of pancho brown's house looking down upon the close-packed spanish town, when the crash of a mail gun rose from the harbour and was lost in the drowsy murmur of the surf. then the other noises in the hot streets below her went on again, but jacinta scarcely heard the hum of voices and the patter of feet as she watched a blinking light slide out from among the others in the harbour. it rose higher and swung a little as it crept past the mole, then a cluster of lower lights lengthened into a row of yellow specks, and she could make out the west-coast liner's dusky hull that moved out with slanting spars faster into the faintly shining sea. jacinta closed one hand as she leaned upon the parapet and watched it, until she turned with a little start at the sound of footsteps. she was, one could have fancied, not particularly pleased to see muriel gascoyne then. "we were wondering what had become of you, and mrs. hatherly is waiting to go home," said the latter. then she turned and caught a glimpse of the moving lights that were closing in on one another and growing dim again. "that must be the african boat?" "it is. she is taking out six careless sailormen whose lives are, perhaps, after all, of some value to them." muriel looked at her, and wished she could see her face. "every one of them may be of some value to somebody else." "i suppose so," and jacinta laughed curiously. "you obvious people are now and then to be envied, muriel." "if there is anything you would like to tell me----" and muriel laid a hand upon her arm with a gesture of sympathy. "there isn't. we all have our discontented fits, and mine is, no doubt, more than usually unreasonable since everything has turned out as i wanted it." then she rose and turned towards the stairway with a little laugh which muriel fancied had a hint of pride in it. "i really don't think i would have had anything done differently, after all, and now i must not keep mrs. hatherly waiting." chapter xi the land of the shadow it was towards the end of the afternoon when the skipper of the west-coast mailboat, peering through his glasses, made out two palms that rose apparently straight out of the sea. he watched them for some minutes, and then took their bearing carefully upon the compass, before he rang for half speed and called austin to the bridge. "that's your island, and we'll run in until i get under six fathoms," he said. "after that it will have to be the surfboat, and i fancy you will be very wet when you get ashore." it seemed to austin that this was more than probable, for although there was not an air of wind to wrinkle it, a long heave came up in vast, slow undulations out of the southern horizon, and the little mailboat swung over them with sharply slanted spars and funnel. she stopped once for a few moments while the deep-sea lead plunged from her forecastle, and then, with propeller throbbing slowly, crept on again. she had come out of her course already under the terms of the bargain austin had made with the las palmas agent, for some of those steamers have the option of stopping for odd boatloads of cargo and passengers wherever they can be found along the surf-swept beaches, and since no offer he could make would have tempted her skipper to venture further in among the shoals, austin had fixed upon that island as the nearest point of access to the _cumbria_. he did not, however, know how he was to reach her when he got there. in the meanwhile they were slowly raising the land, or the nearest approach to it to be found in that part of africa, which consists of mire and mangroves intersected everywhere by lanes of water. it lay ahead, a grey smear streaked with drifting mist against which the palms that had now grown into a cluster rose dim and indistinct, and a thin white line stretched between themselves and it. the skipper appeared to watch the latter anxiously. "there's considerable surf running in on the beach, and i'm a little uneasy about my boat," he said. "i suppose it wouldn't suit you to go on with us, and look for a better place to get ashore to-morrow?" "no," said austin, decisively. "i'm far enough from where i'm going already, and one would scarcely fancy that there are many facilities for getting about in this country." the skipper made a little gesture of resignation. "that's a fact," he said. "well, i can't go back on the agent, but if the boat turns you and the boys out before you get there you can't blame me." austin laughed. he had got many a wet jacket, and had once or twice had to swim for it, in the surf of the canary beaches, though he was quite aware that there are very few places where the sea runs in and breaks as it does on the hammered coast of western africa. indeed, as he watched the blur of steamy mangroves grow clearer, and the filmy spouting increase in whiteness, he could have fancied that nature, in placing that barrier of tumbling foam along its shore, had meant it as a warning that the white man was not wanted there. the air was hot and heavy, the sky a dingy grey, the sea a dim, slatey green, and there came off across the steep heave a dull booming like the sound of distant thunder. it was not an encouraging prospect, and austin knew from what he had heard about the country that he was not likely to be more favourably impressed with it upon closer acquaintance. he also felt that if there was not quite so much at stake he could very willingly leave the salving of the _cumbria_ to jefferson and take the next steamer back again. he could fix upon no sufficient reason for his being there at all, since the very uncertain profits on a quarter share in the venture did not account for it. in one respect, also, jacinta's favourable opinion could scarcely be of any practical value to him, since she would naturally marry a man of means by and by, and forget all about him. still, she had, dropping now and then a barbed word which rankled in his memory, striven to stir him to endeavour; and now he was watching the spray drive across a beach of western africa, while he wondered what the result of it all would be, and whether he or the men he had brought with him would escape the fever. so far as he was concerned, it did not seem to greatly matter. he had taken life easily, but he realised that it had very little to offer him, and it was, perhaps, fortunate that he did so, since it is, as a rule, broken men and those who have nothing to fall back upon who accomplish what is most worth doing in the lands that lie beneath the shadow. in any case, it was clear that he had broken down the last bridge behind him when the mailboat stopped and lay rolling more wildly than ever athwart the long swell. a big surfboat sank down her side amidst a clatter of blocks and complaining of davit-falls, down which a cluster of almost naked black men slid on board. it was not an easy matter to descend after them. the steamer rolled one way, the boat another, while the latter swung up one moment almost level with her rail and swooped down beneath a fathom of streaming side the next. austin, bill, the fireman, and the canarios, however, accomplished it, and there was a waving of hats among the cluster of passengers who watched them above. then the negroes, perched six or seven on either side, took up the paddles, and austin was sensible of a momentary sinking of his heart as the boat slid out from the rolling steamer. she was a part of the civilisation he had been accustomed to, and when a sonorous blast of her whistle came throbbing after him in farewell he sighed. he would, however, at least not look behind, and sitting in the stern-sheets, out of the paddlers' way, he tossed the canarios a bundle of maize-husk cigarettes, and passed one to bill, the fireman, who glanced at it scornfully. then he made himself as comfortable as he could upon the box of dynamite while he lighted another, for that compound of nitro-glycerine is supposed to require a detonator, and nobody is very particular who has lived in spain. the black men wanted cigarettes, too, but austin did not hand them any. the island was still a good way off, and it seemed to him advisable that they should devote their attention to their paddling. they did it, swaying rhythmically, with toes in a loop of fibre, and naked black bodies that straightened suddenly and bent again, while some kept up a measured hissing and the rest broke into a little doleful song. a brawny man, with a blue stripe down his forehead, stood upright grasping the sculling oar astern, and the boat swung along smoothly, with big, dim slopes of water rolling up astern of her. they, however, grew steeper as she drew in with the shore, and the easy dip and swing became a succession of fierce rushes, during which she drove onwards, lifted high, with the foam seething to her gunwale, and then swooped suddenly into the hollow. when she did so austin, glancing aft, could see a great slope of water that grew steeper and steeper as it came speeding after her. then the slopes became ridges that frothed above and roared, and the paddles whirled faster, while the big muscles bunched beneath the helmsman's skin, and the veins began to stand out on his sable forehead. the boat no longer sailed inshore. she sped like a toboggan on an icy slide, though it seemed to austin that the comparison was faulty, because she went fastest uphill, while when he rose upright for a moment he could see no shore at all. there was only a succession of parallel white ridges in front of them and a filmy cloud of spray. the afternoon was also wearing through, and the vapours from the steaming swamps obscured the dingy heavens. it was even less consoling to glance astern, for the surf that sweeps the fever coast was evidently rather worse than usual that day, as it is now and then for no very apparent reason. the ridges had become walls, with great frothing crests and sides that were smeared with spumy lines. they had the vast, slow lift and fall of the ocean behind them, and were running up a smoothly slanted plane of shoals. the black men paddled faster, and they no longer sang. they hissed and shrieked and whistled, while the thud of their paddles rose in a strenuous rhythm like the tapping of a great drum, and the craft careered at furious speed beneath them, driven by the sea. the foam stood feet above her now when she sped along, very like an arrow, and boiled in over her high, pointed stern every now and then. there was a foot of brine inside her that swilled to and fro, and every man was dripping, while the roar of the tumbling rollers had grown bewildering. they appeared to be crumbling upon hammered sand not very far away. how the negroes meant to beach her, austin did not know, and he was content that it was their business and not his. the canarios were evidently uneasy, for, sailormen as they were, they had never run through surf like this; but they were also of iberian extraction, and, when discussion is clearly useless, and the last crisis must be faced, the spaniard is, at least, as capable of calm resignation as most other men. in any case, there is certainly no better boat-boy than the west african kroo, and austin left the affair to the helmsman, when there was a sudden horrifying crash that threw three or four of the paddlers down together. it was evident that they had touched bottom, but, fortunately for them, the swirl of the shore-running sea dragged them off again, and they went up, not more than half swamped, sideways, with the foam seething into her, on the next roller. then the spouting chaos about them seemed to suddenly melt away, and austin, wiping the water from his eyes, saw that they were sliding round a sandy beach into a little bay. in another few minutes they were out on the sand, though they toiled for the next half hour helping the negroes to tilt the great boat and run her in again when they had emptied the water out of her. it was done at last, and austin felt almost sorry, while he was once more sensible of vague but unpleasant misgivings when the negroes drove her lurching out into the spray. night was not very far away, and he had no notion of where he was to sleep, or what he was to eat, for that matter, since the provisions the steward had given him were, for the most part, saturated. a little muddy creek oozed down amidst the mangroves across the bay, and there were a few huts, apparently made of rammed soil, beside it, as well as a canoe. the light was going when they reached them, and bill, who went into the nearest, came out suddenly. "there's a dead nigger inside," he said. austin looked at him with a little smile. he had reasons for surmising that the man's nerves were good, but his voice had an uncertain tone in it, and his eyes were anxious. "well," he said, "i suppose one must expect to come across a dead nigger now and then in this country." bill glanced furtively over his shoulder towards the hut, as though he desired to be rather farther away from it. "that one wasn't nice to look at," he said. "what did they leave him there for when there's a creek just outside the door, and where are the rest of them? i'd like to know what he died of. it might be catchin'." austin was once more sensible of a little thrill of apprehension as he looked about him and considered the question. on the one side a tuft of palms dominated the narrow strip of sand, but the little ridge of high land behind it was covered with apparently impenetrable jungle. elsewhere the dingy mangroves rose from black depths of mire on slimy roots and pale stems that glimmered, blanched, amidst the drifting steam that clung about them. night was close at hand, and, though there was no sign of the land breeze yet, the air was thick and heavy with a hot, sour smell. the clamour of the surf made the deep silence more apparent, for there was no sound of life about the clustered huts. austin knew that the black man is frequently stricken by the pestilence, and as he stood there on the little strip of desolate beach he felt his courage melting away from him. the canarios he also saw were standing close together and murmuring excitedly, while every now and then one of them would glance askance at the huts. "if there was any niggers but dead ones in the place they'd have been out by now," said bill. "the _cumbria_ should lie about north from here up the biggest creek," said austin. "if we borrowed the canoe yonder you could find your way to her?" "i'd try that, or anything, so long as it was to get out of this." he glanced towards the hut again, and austin, who could not quite explain it, then or afterwards, became sensible that if he waited much longer he would say or do something that would not be seemly in one who was there as leader. he felt that had he been alone he would probably have turned and run. "well," he said, as quietly as he could contrive, "we will run the canoe down. i believe some of the things they get are infectious now and then." he had no need to repeat the order. the canarios jumped at the word, and in another few minutes they had launched the canoe and were paddling her out of the creek clumsily, as men unaccustomed to the oar might do. it opened into a wider one, through which the heave of the sea pulsed languidly, until they crawled round a point and the streamy mangroves closed in on them. then suddenly the thick, hot darkness fell. they moored the canoe to a slimy stem, and lay down in her, packed like herrings; but in spite of the mosquitoes austin slept a little of the night. he was glad when all the swamps steamed again as the dawn broke suddenly upon them; and when they had eaten they took up the paddles. the mists thinned and melted, the sun that sucked the damp from their dew-soaked clothing scorched their skin, and the glare from the yellow water became intolerable. still, it was evident that it would not be advisable to waste any time, and through the long hot hours the canoe crept on. now she slid into steamy shadow among the mangrove islets, skirting belts of mire, and now crept, a slender strip of hull, packed with wearied and perspiring humanity, across broad reaches of flaming water that moved on inland under her, streaked with smears of yellow foam. it was evident to austin that the flood tide ran longer than usual there, as it sometimes does about an island, or the guinea stream had backed it up along the shore. the stream, however, did not only set up the creek, but slid through the forest, where the trees rose on arched roots above the water; and here and there they had to paddle hard to avoid being drawn into branch-roofed tunnels that smelt like open sewers. the refuse of leagues of forest seemed to lie rotting there. by afternoon austin's hands were bleeding, and one of his knees was raw where he pressed it as a point of resistance to paddle from on the craft's bottom; but he took his place when his turn came, though his eyes were dazzled, and the headache that had crept upon him was growing insufferable. he was now distinctly anxious as to when they would reach the _cumbria_, for, though bill said she lay up a big muddy creek north of the island, he appeared by no means sure that was the one, and austin felt he could not logically blame him. creeks, it was evident, were bewilderingly plentiful in that country, and there were no distinctive features in the scenery. dingy, white-stemmed mangroves, fermenting mire, and yellow water, were all the same, and as they crept on past bend and island there was no sign of change. the shadows lay black upon the water when they stopped again, all of them horribly cramped, and aching in every limb; but when they had sat portentiously silent, with the craft moored to a mangrove root, for half an hour or so, bill stood up in the bow. "did you hear anything, mr. austin?" he asked. austin fancied that he did, though for a moment or two he was not sure that it was not the ticking of his watch, for the sound, which was very faint, had a beat in it. then it grew a little louder, and he felt a curious thrill of satisfaction. "engines!" he said sharply. "it's the launch." she swung out, apparently from the mangroves, in another few minutes, and came on towards them, clanking and wheezing horribly, with the yellow foam piled about her, but austin felt that he had never seen anything more welcome than that strip of mire-daubed hull with the plume of smoke streaming away from it. then she stopped close alongside them, and austin shook hands with tom as he climbed on board. "did you come across any niggers, sir?" asked the latter. "no," said austin. "how's mr. jefferson?" "comin' round," said tom, with a grin. "i've worked most of the fever--an' the sunstroke--out of him. it was a big load off me when, as i took him his mixture one morning, he looks up at me. 'who the devil are you poisoning?' says he, quite sensible, an' like himself again." "you were coming down to look for us?" "we were--an' uncommonly glad to see you. the blame niggers is getting aggravating. came down, two canoe loads of 'em, a night or two ago, an' only sheered off when we tumbled one o' them over with a big lump o' coal. wall-eye dropped it on to the man in the bow of her from the bridge, an' so far as we could make out it doubled him up considerable." wall-eye was apparently the squinting spaniard who acted as fireman, and when he saw tom glance at him he stood up, with a grimy hand clenched, and unloosed a flood of castilian invective. austin, who smiled as he watched him, felt that while most of what he said could not be effectively rendered into cold anglo-saxon, it was probably more or less warranted. in the meanwhile the launch was coming round with backed propeller, and in another moment or two she was clanking away into the darkness that descended suddenly, towards the _cumbria_. chapter xii nocturnal visitors jefferson was standing at the open door of the house beneath the _cumbria_'s bridge when austin first caught sight of him, as he groped his way forward along the slanted deck. the black, impenetrable obscurity that descends upon the tropic swamps when the air is full of vapour, hung over the stranded steamer, and the man's gaunt figure cut with harsh sharpness against the stream of light. the thin duck he wore clung about him, soaked with perspiration and the all-pervading damp, emphasising the attenuated spareness of his frame, and austin could almost have fancied it was a draped skeleton he was gazing at. still, he was a trifle reassured when he felt the firm grasp of a hot, bony hand. "so you have come?" said the american. "it's good to get a grip of you. i guessed you would." he drew austin into the deck-house, and they sat down opposite each other, and said nothing for almost a minute, though there was a little smile in jefferson's face as he leaned back against the bulkhead. his hair, which had grown long since he left las palmas, hung low and wet upon his forehead, and the big cheek bones showed through the tight-stretched skin, which was blanched, though there was a faint yellow tinge in it which relieved its dead whiteness. this had its significance, for the coast fever has not infrequently an unpleasant after effect upon the white man's constitution. "it isn't quite a sanatorium," he said, as though he guessed his comrade's thoughts. "port royal, santos, panama--i know them all--aren't a patch on these swamps. still, we needn't worry now you have come." austin smiled as he looked at him. "to be correct, i'm not quite sure that i did," he said, reflectively. "i mean, it wasn't exactly because i wished to." "ah!" said jefferson, as comprehension dawned on him. "then the quarter share--that offer stands good--didn't bring you? well, i was wondering if she would make you go." austin was a trifle astonished, for, though he had a somewhat hardly acquired acquaintance with human nature, it had never occurred to him that the patronage jacinta extended to her masculine friends naturally attracted some attention, or that in this particular case the onlookers might most clearly grasp the points of the game. "i can't quite see why she should have wanted me to," he said. there was another brief silence, during which the men looked at one another. this was not a subject either of them had meant to talk about. indeed, it was one which, under different circumstances, they would have kept carefully clear of, but both realised that conventional niceties did not count for much just then: they were merely men who had henceforth to face the grim realities of existence with the shadow of death upon them, and they knew that the primitive humanity in them would become apparent as the veneer wore through. "still," said jefferson, "i can think of one reason. there was a time when muriel was good to her, and jacinta can't forget it. she's not that kind. the first day i met her i felt that she was taking stock of me, and i knew i'd passed muster when she made you stop the _estremedura_. perhaps, it wasn't very much in itself, but i was thankful. i've done a few tough things in my time, but i know i'd never have got muriel if that girl had been against me. still, it wasn't altogether because of muriel she sent you." austin showed his astonishment this time, and jefferson smiled. "you can't quite figure how i came to understand a thing of that kind? well, some of you smart folks have made the same mistake before. you don't seem to remember when you waste ten minutes working a traverse round what you could say in one, that however you dress it up, human nature's much the same. now you're astonished at me. i'm talking. sometimes i feel i have to. you want to know just why she really sent you?" "to be frank, i have asked myself the question, and couldn't be quite sure it was altogether because she wanted me to get this unfortunate steamboat off." "it wasn't. you're getting as near to it as one could expect of an englishman. it hurts some of you to let anybody know what you really think. well, i'll try to make my notion clear to you. there was a lady in france who threw her glove among the lions long ago, but the man who went down for it was of no great account after all. he hadn't sense enough to see the point of the thing." "there were apparently folks who sympathised with him," said austin, with a reflective air. "i'm not sure the man could reasonably have been expected to go at all, since the lady in question evidently only wished to show everybody how far he would venture to please her." "now it seems to me quite likely that she meant to do a good deal more. the man may have been content to fool his time away making pretty speeches to the court ladies and walking round dressed in silk while the rest of them rode out in steel. can't you fancy that she wanted him to find out that he had the grit of the boldest of them, and could do something worth while, too? she probably knew he had, or she would never have sent him." a little colour crept into austin's face, but he laughed. "one could, no doubt, imagine a good many other reasons, and most of them would probably be as wide of the mark. any way, they don't concern us. if the thing ever happened, it was a very long while ago. we know better now." "well, i guess you can't help it," and there was a twinkle in jefferson's eyes. "your shell's quite a good fit, and you don't like to come out of it, though i almost thought you were going to a moment or two ago." "i don't like to be pulled out. one feels that it isn't decent. the shell's the best of some of us," said austin. "then we'll come down to business. you brought the giant powder?" "a case of it, with fuses and detonators," and austin's relief at the change of subject was evident. "are you contemplating blowing her up?" "no, sir. she's worth too much. it is, however, quite likely that we'll make a hole in the mangrove forest and shake up the bottom of this creek. that is, when we're ready. there's a good deal to be put through first." "have you found the gum?" "i haven't looked. she's full to the orlops, and we haven't started in to pump her out. didn't seem much use in trying while she had so much weight in her, and we'll want all the coal we've got. when we have hove most of it and the oil out i'll start the big centrifugal. you see, she hasn't a donkey on deck. that's why, though it cost me a good deal, i bought the locomotive boiler. you folks have a library of shipping acts, but you don't show much sense when you let anything under , tons go to sea with her pumps run from the main engines. when you most want steam for pumping it's when your fires are drowning out." it was once more evident to austin that jefferson knew his business, and had foreseen most of the difficulties he would have to grapple with. still, he fancied, by his face, that he had not quite anticipated all. "where are you putting the oil you take out of her?" he asked. "on a strip of sand up a creek. that's one of the few things that are worrying me. we'll have to get it on board as soon as we float her off when the rain comes, or the creek will get it ahead of us. the next point is that it will be a little rough on the men who have to watch it after working all day long." "to watch it! who is likely to meddle with it here?" "niggers," said jefferson drily. "they cleaned most everything they could come at off the boat before i got to her, but they couldn't break out cargo with the water in her, and didn't know enough to get at the provisions in the lazaret. still, while these particular swamps don't seem to belong to anybody, there's trade everywhere, and oil's a marketable commodity." "where's the frenchman who chartered the _cumbria_?" "dead. i've been up to his place in the launch. i found it caved in, and trees growing up in it already. nature straightens things up quite smartly in this country. any way, i'll show you round to-morrow; and, in the meanwhile, it's about time that spaniard brought you some supper." "it seems to me that everybody who had anything to do with this unfortunate vessel invariably died." jefferson smiled a trifle grimly. "that's a fact," he said. then one of the canarios brought in a simple meal, and when they had eaten and talked for another hour, austin stretched himself out on the settee and jefferson climbed into his slanted bunk. they left the light burning and the door wide open, and both of them lay down dressed as they were; but while jefferson seemed to fall into a somewhat restless doze, austin found that sleep fled the further from him the more he courted it that night. it was very hot, for one thing, and stranded steamer and mangrove forest alike seemed filled with mysterious noises that stirred his imagination and disturbed his rest. it was only by a strenuous effort he lay still for a couple of hours, and then, rising softly, with a little sigh, went out into the night. the darkness closed about him, black and impenetrable, when he stepped out of the stream of light before the deck-house door, and the feeble flame of the match he struck to light his pipe as he leaned upon the rail only made it more apparent. he could see nothing whatever when the match went out, but the oily gurgle of the creek beneath him suggested the height of the steamer's hove-up side. she lay, so jefferson had told him, with her inshore bilge deep in the mire, and two big derrick-booms slung from the wire hawser that ran from her stern to the mangroves along what should have been the bank, as a precaution against any nocturnal call by negroes in canoes. her outshore side, which he looked down from, was, he surmised by the slant of deck, between ten and fifteen feet above the creek. it was a little cooler there, and the sounds were less disquieting than they had been in the room. he could localise and identify some of them now--the splash of falling moisture, the trickle of the stream, and the soft fanning of unseen wings as one of the great bats which abound in that country stooped towards the light. still, behind these were mysterious splashings among the mangroves and wallowings in the creek, while the thick, hot darkness seemed to pulse with life. he could almost fancy he heard the breathing of unseen things, and it did not seem strange to him that the dusky inhabitants of that country should believe in malevolent deities. indeed, as he leaned upon the rail, with its darkness enfolding him, he was troubled by a sense of his own insignificance and a longing to escape from that abode of fear and shadow. other men, including those who had come out with a salvage expedition, had found the floating of the _cumbria_ too big a thing for them, and he already understood that there are parts of the tropics where the white man is apt to find his courage melt away from him as well as his bodily vigour. then he commenced to wonder dispassionately why jacinta had sent him, or if he had, after all, been warranted in considering that she had done so. she had, though he admitted it unwillingly, at least, not bidden him go, but she had certainly done what she could to make him understand that he was wasting his life on board the _estremedura_. it would have been a consolation to feel that he was obeying her command and doing her a definite service, if it was only to bring jefferson home to muriel gascoyne; but she had not laid one upon him, and even jefferson seemed to understand that her purpose went further. he was less pleased with the fancy that jacinta had undertaken what she apparently considered his reformation. he had been, in some respects, content as he was, for while there was no other woman he had the same regard for, he had forced himself to recognise that it was quite out of the question that she should ever entertain more than kindliness for him. austin could be practical, and remembered that young women with her advantages, as a rule, looked higher than a steamboat purser, while even if jefferson succeeded in his venture, and he went home with four or five thousand pounds, which appeared just then distinctly unlikely, jacinta was the only daughter of a man whose income was supposed to amount to as much a year. austin sighed a little as he decided that he did not really know why he had come. in the meanwhile he was there, and there was nothing to be gained by being sorry, especially as he could not even console himself with the fancy that jacinta was grieving over him. she was probably, as usual, far too busy by that time with somebody else's affairs. he was also averse from permitting himself to feel any glow of self-congratulation over the fancy that he was doing a chivalrous thing. in fact, he saw it with realistic clearness of vision as one that was wholly nonsensical, and it did not occur to him that the essence of all that was best in the old knightly days might be surviving still, and, indeed, live on, indestructible, even in the hearts of practical, undemonstrative englishmen, as well as garlic-scented spaniards, and seafaring americans. still, when he had yielded himself instinctively to jacinta's will he had vaguely realised that, after all, the bonds of service are now and then more profitable to a man than dominion. in the meanwhile the damp soaked through his clothing, and his physical nature shrank from the hot steaminess and the sour odours of putrefaction. it was unpleasant to stand there in that thick darkness, and even a little hard upon the nerves, but he had had enough of the deck-house, and he could not sleep, which is by no means an unusual difficulty with white men in the tropics. it was a relief when at last a sound that grew louder fixed his attention, and resolved itself into a measured thudding. here were evidently canoes coming down the creek, but austin was a little uncertain what to do. he had no wish to rouse the worn-out men, who probably needed all the sleep they could get, if this was a usual occurrence; but it did not appear advisable that there should be nobody but himself on deck in case the canoes ran alongside. he was considering what he should do when jefferson, who held a glinting object in his hand, appeared in the door of the deck-house. then there was a patter of feet on a ladder below, and another dim figure materialised out of the darkness. "that ---- funnel-paint come back again," said the half-seen man. jefferson laughed unpleasantly. "he's getting monotonous, but he's taking steep chances this time." the beat of paddles slackened a little, there was a murmur of voices beneath the steamer's side, and jefferson leaned out, looking down into the impenetrable blackness beneath him. a scraping sound came out of it, and apparently moved along, while, when the half-seen man thrust a big block of coal upon him, austin turned and strode softly after jefferson, who walked forward beside the rail. "better let him have it now, sir," said the other man. "she's quite low on the other quarter, and if they try swimming round her stern the booms won't stop them." then there was a vivid streak in the darkness, and a detonation that was twice repeated, while austin, who hurled his lump of coal down with all his strength, caught a whiff of acrid smoke. there was also a splash below, and a confused clamour that was lost in the hasty thud of paddles as the invisible canoes got away. then, while the canarios came floundering across the deck, a single voice rose up. "bimeby we done lib for cut you t'roat!" it said. "oh, go to the devil!" said jefferson, and the big revolver flashed again. there was no answer, and the splash of paddles slowly died away. it was evident that the affair was over, and austin fancied that nobody was much the worse. jefferson sauntered towards him snapping the spent shells out of his pistol. "funnel-paint is getting on my nerves. i'll have to drop half a stick of giant powder on him next time he comes," he said. "he didn't make much of a show," said austin. "you think he meant to come on board?" "if there had been nobody round he would have done so, but how far he'd have gone then is another question. he probably knows that nigger stockades are apt to get blown up when a white man disappears, and it's quite likely his nerve would have failed him. any way, he's hanging out at a village up the creek, and we'll probably go round to-morrow with some giant powder and make a protest. in the meanwhile, i don't know any reason why you shouldn't go to sleep again." austin went back with him to the house beneath the bridge, and, though it was not perceptibly cooler, found sleep come to him. his vague apprehensions had vanished in the face of a definite peril. chapter xiii toil a faint light was creeping into the skipper's room when austin awakened, and, seeing his comrade's berth unoccupied, went out on deck. the swamps were wrapped in woolly vapour, and a column of dingy smoke went up straight and unwavering from the funnel of the locomotive boiler. the hot land breeze had died away, and it would be some time yet before that from the sea set in. in the meanwhile it was almost cool, and very still; so still, in fact, that austin was startled when a flock of parrots, invisible in the mist, swept past, screaming, overhead. then the sounds of man's activity suddenly commenced, for there was a clatter forward where the spaniards flung the loose covers from the hatch, and a harsh rattle of chain mingled with the soft patter of their naked feet. in another few moments a sharp, musical clinking broke out, and austin saw tom, who had served as a steamer's donkey-man, straighten his bent back when a rush of white vapour whirled with a strident hissing about the locomotive boiler, which now drove the winch. he grinned at austin, and glanced at the misty creek, far down which a faint screaming was dying away. "those parrots must be ---- silly things," he said. "what d' they want to live here for when they can fly?" austin, who decided that there was some reason in the query, strolled round the house, and came upon jefferson sitting with his back to it and the box of dynamite on the deck in front of him. he looked gaunter and more haggard than ever in the daylight, but he was busy pinching down a copper cap upon a strip of snaky fuse, which he proceeded to carefully embed in a roll of semi-plastic material that looked very like a candle made of yellow wax. "what are you doing?" asked austin. "nipping on a couple of detonators," said jefferson. "stand clear of the one on the deck. they're lined with mercury fulminate, and you want to take your shoes off when you come near that. giant powder's innocent by comparison. i mean to try a stick or two of this consignment." "what are you going to try it on?" asked austin, who stepped back a pace or two expeditiously. jefferson looked up with a little grim smile. "on the house of the headman of the village where funnel-paint lives," he said. "if we can get in a good morning's work, we'll go up and remonstrate with him this afternoon. you might take that stick of powder and fuse and wrap it up in something." austin picked up the yellow roll, and then held it as far as he conveniently could from him, while jefferson laughed. "i guess you needn't worry. you could pound it with a hammer, or put it in the fire, and it wouldn't show fight--that is, ninety-nine times out of the hundred," he said. "still, there might be considerable trouble on the other one. the sure way to stir it up is to pat a shred of it with a piece of wood, though the man who tries it is scarcely likely to see what it does." austin got rid of the dynamite as speedily as he could, and when he came back one of the spaniards was laying out breakfast on the deck. it was not a sumptuous meal, consisting, as it did, of coffee, a can of meat that austin fancied was tainted, ship's bread, which is biscuit, and a pale fluid that had presumably been butter; but he did not feel hungry, and jefferson ate little. in the meanwhile a blaze of light beat through the mists which melted under it, and flaming yellow creek and dingy mangroves sprang suddenly into being as by the unrolling of a transformation scene. their pale stems dripped slime, and just there their foliage was blotched and spotted as with smears of flour. it gave them a diseased appearance, and austin, who felt he loathed the sight of them already, remembered that where the mangrove grows the white man not infrequently dies. he was almost glad when breakfast was over and jefferson rose. "i want to be quite clear," he said. "you're going to see this thing out with me on a quarter share?" "i am," said austin. "anyway, i'll do what i can, though i'm afraid i haven't given the question of the share much consideration." jefferson looked at him intently. "well," he said, "i've worried a good deal about my three-quarters. that's what i came for, and if we float her off you'll get yours, just as sure as you'll earn it--hard. it's a big thing you're going into, and you'll find it calling on all the grit that's in you. we're on results here, and, now you understand that, we'll start in." he went to the forward winch, and austin, obeying his directions, descended to the hold with a vague recognition of the fact that there was a change in jefferson. as coaling clerk in grand canary, austin had found him a quiet and somewhat reserved man, who conducted himself in everything, at least, as conventionally as most of his english friends in that island. now it was as though he had sloughed off the veneer so that the primitive man beneath it appeared, which is a thing that not infrequently happens in such places as the swamps he was toiling in. his voice, even, was different. it was harsh, with a suggestion of command; and the fierce, resolute nature of the man became revealed in it and the penetrating glance of his steady eyes. austin, however, discovered that he had very little time to think of jefferson. the spaniards were on results, too, and when the chain sling came rattling down the strenuous toil began. the hold was dim and shadowy, as well as insufferably hot, and filled with nauseating smells. the tiers of barrels slanted so that one could scarcely stand on them, but when somebody gave austin a handspike he took his place with the rest, and set about prizing loose the puncheons so that they could get a sling round them or the hoisting-crabs on the stave-ends. now and then the crabs slipped, or tore through the oil-soaked wood when the great barrel swung up into the sunlight, and it came crashing down; while each time they made an opening, the rest slipped down, grinding upon each other, and squeezed it up again. those on the lower side were water-borne, but the others were only held in place by those beneath them on the incline, and the men could not keep the untouched tiers intact as they would have done had the _cumbria_ been floating level. for the first half hour, austin, who had never undertaken manual toil before, felt that his task was beyond the strength of such a man as he. one can no more acquire facility in labour without some training than he can in an art or craft, and again and again his untaught muscles failed to obey the prompting of his will. then the heavy puncheon generally rolled back and bruised him, or the slipping handspike left its mark upon his skin. it was probably fortunate that the canarios were cheerful, deft-handed sailormen, courteous, too, and considerate in their own fashion, for that half hour was, in some respects, a bitter one. during it the man of taste and leisure had his comparative uselessness impressed upon him, for, while he gasped, and the dew of effort dripped from him, it was not alone the slackness of his soft muscles that became apparent, but his inferiority in quickness, and the intrepidity which on occasion risks crushed foot and hand or a broken limb. the men who surpassed him were also benighted aliens, but he remembered afterwards that there was not one among them who flung a jibe at him. then it became a trifle easier. his nerves steadied, and the fits of gasping became less frequent as he warmed to the work. it was, as jefferson had mentioned, a big thing they had undertaken, a thing worth doing, even apart from what they might gain by it, and it occurred to him that somebody must toil brutally before anything of that kind in brought to its accomplishment. by and by the strain and stress of it, the swift flitting of half-naked figures, the upward lurch of the dripping puncheons, and the clanging of the winch commenced to fire his blood. there was, after all, a good deal of the primitive in him, and he had the capacity for finding delight in bodily toil which still lurks here and there in a cultured englishman, and presently he flung his oil-stained jacket away. then, in a momentary pause, his shirt was discarded, too, and he knotted his suspenders about his waist. when he fell in between the grinding puncheons one of them removed most of the light singlet from him, and he clambered out with a berserker fit upon him. he had found his manhood, and vaguely recognised that the curse laid on man in eden might be a privilege. something had awakened in him he had not felt before, though he had run the _estremedura_'s lancha through the spouting surf, and had never been accounted a laggard in the strenuous english games. the chain slings came down faster and faster, while the hammerings of the winch rang insistently through their rattle. at any cost to the men below it must not be kept waiting. the blaze of brightness beneath the hatch became dazzling, and austin felt his shoulders scorched as he passed through it. the iron deck above them shed down an intolerable heat, and still the olive-faced canarios swayed, and splashed, and heaved amidst the barrels. now and then a man said "car-rai!" or in incongruous juxtaposition, "ave maria!" ejaculating it in gasps, but there was a puncheon ready when the sling came clashing down, and jefferson's voice rang encouragingly through the din. "oh, hump yourselves! send her up!" he said. "vamos! adelante! dern your skins! more bareel!" bill grinned at austin in one momentary stoppage. "the boss is himself again," he said. "he's shoving her along. we've got to make the time for our little trip this afternoon. oh, howling--is that how you slew a puncheon? you'll manslaughter one of us next time. cut her as she rolls." austin gasped with astonishment as well as relief when the winch stopped at last. the first half hour had appeared interminable, the other hours had fled, for he saw by the distance the glare of light had moved across the hold that the sun was overhead. then he essayed to straighten himself, and when he had with some difficulty accomplished it went up the ladder with the rest. when he went out on deck jefferson was sitting upon the drum of the winch, and smiled curiously as he scrutinised him. austin, whose torn singlet fell away from him clitted with yellow oil, was almost naked to the waist, as well as very wet from the knees downwards. one of his canvas shoes had burst, and his hands were bleeding. he stood still, dazzled by the change of light, and blinked at his comrade. "well," said jefferson, reflectively, "i have seen men who looked smarter, but i guess you'll do. in fact, i'm beginning to feel sure of you." "thanks!" said austin. "i suppose in one respect that's a compliment. still, i almost think, or, at least, i did when i first went down there, that if i'd known what was in front of me i'd have stayed in grand canary." jefferson nodded with a curious little smile. "i wonder," he said, reflectively, "if you ever felt like that before?" austin considered a moment. "i'm not going to make any admissions. you probably have?" he said. "quite often," and jefferson laughed. "it's a thing that happens to most of us now and then. there are times when the contract looks very big and the man feels very small. in fact, it's sometimes hard to look straight at it and not back down. still, in the case of this one, it has to be done." "i suppose so!" said austin, and then turned round. "well, what is it, bill?" "here's your shirt an' jacket," said the man. "if you don't want your skin to come off, you'd better put them on." austin, who thanked him, did so, and then fumbled in the pocket for a cigarette. the one he found was torn and crushed, but he contrived to light it, and flung himself down in the shadow of the rail. jefferson, who watched him, grinned. "you're getting your grip," he said. "not long ago you'd have slung that thing into the creek. the man left the sir out, too. perhaps you noticed it?" "i did. still, no doubt, after watching my efforts in the hold, he felt himself warranted. i didn't expect to find things quite the same here as they are at the catalina." jefferson laughed softly. "they're not. this is a blame risky co-operative venture, and when i made it so i put down a big stake on human nature. we're all on results, and partners in the thing. there's no respect in this ship. i don't want it. why should any man touch his hat to me? oh, i know we use the fist and handspike on american ships--when it's necessary--and i skipped round the _sachem_'s deck-house once with the cold steel an inch or two behind me; but that's not the point at all. i want a hundred cents' worth for my dollar from every man, and i'm going to get it, but i'm boss because i can drive a winch and break out cargo better than any of the rest of them. at least, that's one big reason." austin would have grinned at this not very long ago. jefferson expressed himself crudely, but austin was disposed to be less critical after that morning's labour, and was commencing to realise that his comrade had, in fact, placed a heavy stake upon the reliability of seafaring humanity. a taint of suspicious distrust or petty treachery would, he felt, be sufficient to ruin the venture, for there was one pistol in the ship to enforce authority, and a dozen men, who might defy it, with wicked knives. it was also evident that the full dollars' worth would be demanded from every one of them. still, austin smiled. "i scarcely think that's the american skipper's usual point of view, though, of course, it's a commendable one," he said. "after all, one has to admit that there is, perhaps, some foundation for the equality notion in a democratic country, but from what i know of yours, while you seem willing to act upon it in regard to scandinavians, teutons, poles, and englishmen, you make indians and niggers an exception." "exactly! they were made different, and they stop outside. i was crowding her a little this morning to save time, because i mean to remonstrate with one of them this afternoon. this ship's mine; i bought her with good money, and there may be a balance out that's to be settled with blood as well. am i to sit down while the black scum take her from me?" "i really think that the longer one looks at this contract the bigger it gets," said austin, reflectively. jefferson glanced at the dingy forest, flaming creek, and the _cumbria_'s slanted deck with a little glow in his eyes. "well," he said, "that's what gets hold of me. to worry a big contract through, is--life--to some kinds of men." "perhaps it is, but it was easier painting little pictures. still, you see, when you marry miss gascoyne you'll have to go round with your shirt, and, perhaps, a frock coat on, and let up on this kind of thing. in fact, what you are doing isn't at all what the folks she is acquainted with would expect from a man with £ , in england." jefferson laughed, though there was a certain grimness in his face. "well," he said, "there is a good deal to be done everywhere, and different ways of playing the game. a frock coat wouldn't stop a man making a show at one of them, although at first he mightn't find it comfortable. life's much the same thing everywhere when you mean to take part in it and hustle. any way, i've talked enough, and wall-eye's coming along with the comida." they ate the meal in silence. austin was glad to rest, and sitting drowsily content in the shadow, he began to realise the boundless optimism and something of the adaptability of his companion. jefferson had made an excellent coaling clerk at las palmas, though he knew nothing about the business, which demands a good deal of discretion, when he came there. he had also passed muster with mrs. hatherly and muriel gascoyne as what they no doubt called a gentleman, which was a manifestly harder thing, and here in africa he was a ragged and fever-worn leader of primitive men, but clearly a successful one. it seemed to austin that if he eventually aspired to become a local influence in any part of sheltered england he would also in all probability show up equally well. chapter xiv jefferson's remonstrance they were not long over the meal, and when austin thrust his plate aside, jefferson, who had waited at least five minutes for him, rose with a little twinkle, which seemed to express whimsical resignation, in his eyes. "and now there's something i'd rather leave alone to be done," he said. "the launch is ready, and we'll go up and remonstrate with those niggers. it's a little rough upon a man who is fond of a quiet life." "one would scarcely have fancied that quietness had any great attraction for you," said austin. "still, you probably know what pleases you better than i do." jefferson laughed. "there are folks who seem to like being kicked, but it's a sensation that doesn't appeal to everybody." "you have a case of dynamite, too. now, i had once an air-gun sent me, a good many years ago, and i remember how i burned to go out and destroy the neighbours' cats with it." the american's face grew a trifle grim, and he looked at him with half-closed eyes. "well," he said, "i suppose that feeling's there, but in a sense you're wrong. it isn't the only one. we put up a big bluff in coming here at all, and it's nerve, and nothing else, that will have to keep us where we are. there are no police or patrolmen in this country to fall back upon, and you have to face the cold truth, which is this: if one of those niggers clinched with you or me, he would mop the deck with us in about two minutes. it's not a nice thing to admit, but there it is." austin looked thoughtful, as, indeed, he was, for jefferson, who, it seemed, could look an unpleasant fact in the face, had gone straight to the bottom of the question, as he usually did. the white man's domination, it had to be admitted, largely depended upon his command of machine guns and magazine rifles, but they had none of these on board the _cumbria_. they were no match for the negro as a muscular animal, and there was only left them what jefferson called bluff, which apparently consisted of equal parts of hardihood and arrogance. still, there are respects in which it is difficult to distinguish between it and genuine courage, and it was certainly apt to prove futile in that land without the latter. austin realised that since there was nothing else available, they must do what they could with it, though this was far from pleasing him. he had a dislike for anything which savoured of assertive impudence. they went up the creek in the little, clanking launch, eight limp and perspiring white men, with knives and iron bars, under a scorching sun that burned through their oil-stained garments. they slid through strips of shadow where the belts of mire they skirted bubbled with the emanations the heat sucked up from them, and slid across lake-like reaches where the yellow water was dazzling to look upon. all the time, endless ranks of mangroves crawled past them, and there was no sound but the presumptuous clanking of the engine to break the deep silence of the watery forest. the whole land seemed comatose with heat, and all that had its being in it probably was so, for it is at night that nature awakens in the swamps of the fever belt. man alone was stirring, and the puny noise of his activity jarred for a few moments on the great stillness and then sank into it again. austin sat huddled in the launch's stern-sheets with his senses dulled by the heat and glare, though the desolation of mire and mangroves reacted on him. he knew, as he sometimes admitted, a little about a good many things which were of no use to him, and he remembered then that the vast quadrilateral of northern africa west of egypt had absorbed several civilisations long before the portuguese saw its southern shores. they had vanished, and left no mark on it, and it was plain that in the great swamp belt, at least, the black man still lived very much as he had done when the first mangroves crept out into the sea. it is a primitive country, where man knows only the law of the jungle, and jefferson, who grasped that fact, was apparently ready to act upon it in the usual primitive fashion. there was, at first, no sign of life when the launch came into sight of a little village hemmed in by the swamps. it had its attractiveness in that country, for the clustering huts stood, half buried in foliage, beneath towering cottonwoods, with a glaring strip of sand in front of them. there were bananas, and, as jefferson recognised, lime trees in between. still, by the time they approached the beach men came floundering hastily out of the huts, and austin was not greatly consoled by the sight of them. they were big men, and wore very little to conceal their splendid muscles. some of them also carried long canoe paddles, and one or two had wicked, corkscrew-headed spears. austin wondered, a little uneasily, whether they only speared fish with them, and looked round to see what effect their appearance had upon his companions. it was apparently not a great one. jefferson was quietly grim; tom, the donkey-man, scornfully cheerful; while there was a little portentous glint in the canarios' eyes. austin fancied he was the only one who had the slightest doubt that anything their leader did would not be altogether warranted. this, however, was comprehensible, for he was aware that while the american's attitude towards the coloured people is, perhaps, not altogether what it should be, the western pioneer never quite equalled the iberian in his plan of subjugation. the spaniard, at least, did not send out indian agents, or dole out rations of very inferior beef. they landed without molestation, and straightened themselves to make what show they could, though there was nothing very imposing about any of the party. the climate had melted the stiffness out of them, and their garments, which were stained with oil, and rent by working cargo, clung about their limbs soaked with perspiration. they looked, austin fancied, more like shipwrecked seamen than anything else. in fact, he felt almost ashamed of himself, and that it was the negroes' own fault if they did not unceremoniously fling them back into the creek. still, he realised that they were men who probably held their lives in their hands, and had what appeared to be a singularly difficult task in front of them. they were there to make it clear to the headman that it would be wise of him to leave them alone, and austin was quite willing to supplement jeffersons' efforts in this, though he was by no means sure how it was to be accomplished. the negroes, so far as he could see, were regarding them with a kind of derisive toleration. in the meanwhile they were moving forward between patches of bananas, and under a few glossy limes, while groups of dusky men kept pace with them behind, until they reached a broad strip of sand with a big cottonwood tree in the midst of it. there was a hut of rammed soil that appeared more pretentious than the rest in front of them, and a man stood waiting in the door of it. jefferson stopped in the shadow when he saw him. "i'm going to sit down where it's cool," he said. "any way, if that is their headman, i'd sooner he came out to us." he sat down, with his back to the tree, while the rest clustered round him, a lean, dominant figure, in spite of his haggard face and the state of his attire, and it seemed to austin that there was a suggestion of arrogant forcefulness in his attitude. the headman stood quietly in his doorway, looking at him, while the negroes drew in a little closer. they now seemed uncertain what to make of these audacious strangers, and waited, glancing towards their leader, though there were, austin fancied, forty or fifty of them. "is there anybody here, who speaks english?" asked jefferson. it appeared that there was, for all along that coast there is a constant demand for labour in the white men's factories, and a man who wore a piece of cloth hung from his shoulder instead of the waist-rag, stood forward at a sign from the headman. the latter had little cunning eyes set in a heavy, fleshy face, and he, too, wore a piece of cloth, a sheet of white cotton, which flowed about his tub-like body in graceful lines. negroes, like other people, fatten when they seize authority and live in idleness upon the result of others' toil, for even the swamp belt heathen who asks very little from life must now and then work or starve. there are no charitable institutions to fall back upon in that country, where the indigent is apt to be belaboured by his neighbours' paddles. then the headman, who did not leave his hut, conferred with the interpreter, until the latter turned to jefferson, whom he had, it seemed, already pitched upon as leader. "them headman he done say--what the debbil you lib for here for?" he announced. "we have come for funnel-paint," said jefferson. it was evident that the negro did not understand whom he meant, but when jefferson, assisted by the donkey-man, supplied him with a very unflattering description of the delinquent, comprehension seemed to dawn on him, and he once more conferred with his master. "him no one of we boy," he said. "him dam bad 'teamboat bushman, sah. lib for here two three day. now lib for go away." austin, who understood that the term bushman was not used in a complimentary sense in those swamps, smiled as he noticed that seafaring men were evidently also regarded there with no great favour, and glanced at jefferson inquiringly. "he's probably lying," said the latter. "i've trailed funnel-paint here, and there's nowhere else he could live. i've been round to see. any way, he had a crowd of this rascal's boys with him when he came down to worry me. we'll let him have that to figure on." it cost him some trouble to make his meaning clear to the negro, while when the latter in turn explained it to the headman, austin noticed a retrograde movement among several of those about them. they seemed desirous of getting a little further away from the domineering white man. "i want those boys," said jefferson, indicating the negroes who had edged away. "then i want some gum or ivory, or anything of that kind your headman has, as a token he'll send me down funnel-paint as soon as he can catch him. he hasn't caught on to half of it. help me out, austin." austin did what he could, and at last it became evident that the interpreter grasped their meaning. this time there was, however, a change in the attitude of the negro, which had hitherto appeared to be a trifle conciliatory. "none of my boys have been near your steamer. go away before we drive you out," was, at least, the gist of what he said. jefferson made a little contemptuous gesture, and pointed to one of the negroes. "tell him i want those boys, and it would be wise of him to turn them up before the shadow crawls up to where that man is. if he doesn't, i'll let a duppy, ju-ju, or whatever he calls his fetish devils, loose on him. he has about fifteen minutes to think the thing over in." even with the help of the donkey-man they were some time in making this comprehensible, and austin glanced at his comrade when the headman's answer came. it was a curt and uncompromising _non possumus_, and jefferson sighed. "of course," he said, "i saw it would come to this from the beginning, and in one way i'm not sorry. i don't know what i'd have done with funnel-paint or his friends if i had got them, except that somehow i'd 'most have scared them out of their lives. still, it seemed only decent to give the headman a chance for himself. now it will suit us considerably better to scare him and the others all together. i'll wipe that house of his out of existence inside twenty minutes." austin glanced at the house. it was larger than the others, and comparatively well built, and, he fancied, probably of as much value to its owner as a white man's mansion would be to him. this was clearly not a time to be supersensitive, but he felt a trace of compunction. "i don't know that i'd go quite so far myself," he said. "after all, we're not sure that the headman is responsible." "then," said jefferson, drily, "we'll make him, and you listen to me. we may have to do quite a few things that aren't pretty, and we have no use for sentimentality. we're just a handful of white men, with everything to grapple with, and we'll be left alone to do it while these devils are afraid of us, and not a moment longer. the fever may wipe half of us out at any time, and we have got to make our protest now." "it's the giant-powder i'm sticking at. no doubt it's a little absurd of me--but i don't like it." jefferson laughed a trifle scornfully. "there's a good deal of what we call buncome in most of you. you don't like things that don't--look--pretty, pistols among them. well, am i to be trampled on whenever it happens that the other man is bigger than i?" "the law is supposed to obviate that difficulty in a civilised community." "the man who gets the verdict is usually the one with the biggest political pull or the most money, in the one i belong to, but that's not quite the point just now. if you have a notion that the game's all in our hands, look at them yonder." austin did so, and decided that, after all, jefferson might be right. the negroes had clustered together, and there were more of them now, while all of them had spears or big canoe paddles. it was tolerably evident that any sign of vacillation would bring them down upon the handful of white men whose prestige alone had hitherto secured them from molestation. if they failed to maintain it, and had to depend upon their physical prowess, the result appeared as certain as it would be unpleasant. the affair had resolved itself into a case of what jefferson termed bluff, a test of coolness and nerve, and austin glanced a trifle anxiously at the spaniards. they were, he fancied, a little uneasy, but it was clear that they had confidence in their leader, and they sat still, though he could see one or two of them fingering the wicked canary knives. their courage was, however, not of the kind that stands the tension of uncertainty well, and he commenced to long that the shadow would reach the trampled spot where the man jefferson pointed to had stood. in the meanwhile it was creeping slowly across the hot white sand, and he felt his heart beat as he watched it and the negroes, who commenced to murmur and move uneasily. the white man's immobility had its effect on them, and it seemed that jefferson had done wisely in confiding in the latter's ability to bear the longer strain. still, austin was not sure that the impatience of the spaniards might not spoil everything after all. as regarded himself, he began to feel a curious and almost dispassionate interest in the affair which almost prevented him considering his personal part in it. he also noticed the intensity of the sunlight, and the blueness of the shadows among the trees, as well as the mirror-like flashing of the creek. it was, he fancied, the artistic temperament asserting itself. then he felt a little quiver run through him when jefferson stood up. "we have to get it done," he said. "keep those canarios close behind me." they moved forward in a little phalanx, carrying staves and iron bars, though austin knew that a word would bring out the twinkling steel; and, somewhat to his astonishment, the negroes fell back before them, and as they approached it the headman scuttled out of his house. jefferson stopped outside it and taking a stick of yellow substance from his pocket, inserted it in a cranny he raked out in the wall. then he lighted the strip of fuse and touched austin's shoulder. "get those fellows back to the creek, but they're not to run," he said. "the action of one stick of giant-powder is usually tolerably local, but i don't want any of the niggers hoisted, either. where's that interpreter? steady, we'll bring them down on us like a swarm of bees if they see us lighting out before they understand the thing." there was, austin fancied, not much time to waste; but he managed to impress the fact upon the canarios that their haste must not be too evident, and to make the negro understand that it was perilous to approach the house. then he overtook the spaniards, and they moved back in a body towards the launch, and stopped close by the beach. the negroes also stood still, and all alike watched the little sputtering trail of smoke creep up the side of the house. it showed blue in the sunlight, though there was a pale sparkling in the midst of it. then a streak of light sprang out suddenly, and expanded into a blaze of radiance. after it came the detonation, and a rolling cloud of thin vapour, out of which there hurtled powdered soil and blocks of hard-rammed mud. the vapour thinned and melted, and austin saw that there was no longer any front to the headman's house, while, as he watched it, most of the rest fell in. he looked round to see what effect it had on the negroes, but could not make out one of them. they had, it seemed, gone silently and in haste. then he heard jefferson sigh as with relief. "well," he said, "that's one thing done, and i'm glad we have come out of it with a whole skin. we'll light out before somebody shows them that we're only human, and spoils the thing." they went on board the launch, but austin felt curiously limp as she clanked away down stream. the strain of the last half hour had told on him, though he had not felt it to the full at the time. it was two hours' steaming before they swept past the _cumbria_, and a man on her forecastle waved an arm to indicate that all was right on board her; but austin would not have had the time any shorter. he felt it was just as well that village lay some distance from them. they went on to the strip of sand where jefferson had stored the coal and oil, and when they reached it he stood up suddenly with an imprecation. "four puncheons gone! funnel-paint has come out ahead of me, after all," he said. "well, there's no use in worrying now, when he has got away with them; but i'm going to stop down here to-night in case he comes back again." then he swung the launch round with backed propeller, and in another few minutes they were steaming back up stream towards the _cumbria_. a tent of some kind must be extemporised, for it is not wise of a white man to spend the night unprotected in the fever swamps. chapter xv starting the pump the bush was dim with steamy shade when austin and jefferson plodded along a little path behind the beach where the oil was stored. it was with difficulty they made their way, for the soil was firmer there, and a dense undergrowth sprang up among the big cottonwoods which replaced the mangroves. they were draped with creepers, and here and there an orchid flung its fantastic blossoms about a rotting limb, while the path twisted in and out among them and through tangled thickets. it was then the hottest part of the afternoon, and save for the soft fall of the men's footsteps everything was still. the atmosphere was very like that of a turkish bath, and as austin stumbled along the perspiration dripped from him. he had toiled strenuously from early dawn until darkness closed down, of late, and though he had, as yet, escaped the fever, every joint in his body ached, and he was limp and dejected with the heat and weariness. his only respite from labour had been the few hours spent on watch beside the landed oil when his turn came, and he had now come down with two of the spaniards to relieve jefferson, who was going back to the _cumbria_. the latter glanced towards a ray of brightness that beat into the dim green shadow, and here and there flung a patch of brilliancy athwart the great columnar trunks. "i've been wondering where this trail goes, and it seems to me there's an opening close in front of us," he said. "we'll rest when we get there, and i don't know that i'll be sorry. you have to choose between stewing and roasting in this country, and, when it lets my skin stay on me, i almost think the latter's easier." austin felt inclined to agree with him, for they had blundered through the shadowy bush for half an hour, and its hot, saturated atmosphere made exertion almost impossible. still, he said nothing, and in a few more minutes they came out upon a glaring strip of sand beside another creek. jefferson stopped a moment, with a little gesture of astonishment, in the shadow of a palm. "what in the name of wonder have they been turning that sand over for?" he said. austin walked out of the shadow, blinking in the dazzling brightness the creek flung back, and saw that the sand had certainly been disturbed every here and there. it seemed to him that somebody had been digging holes in it and then had carefully filled them up. "there isn't a nigger village nearer than the one where funnel-paint lives, or i could have fancied they'd had an epidemic and been burying their friends," he said. jefferson shook his head. "they wouldn't worry to bring them here," he said. "still, somebody has been digging since the last wet season, for it seems to me that when the rain comes the creek flows over here." it occurred to austin that one or two, at least, of the excavations had been filled in not long ago, but his comrade made no comment when he suggested it, and they went back together to the shadow of the palm, where jefferson, sitting down thoughtfully, filled a blackened pipe. it was several minutes before he broke the silence. "there is," he said, at length, "a good deal i can't get the hang of about the whole affair; but if i knew just how they came to start the plates that let the water in, i'd have something to figure on. you can't very well knock holes in an iron steamer's bottom on soft, slimy mud, and i don't know where they could have found a rock here if they wanted to." "ah!" said austin. "then you think they might have wanted to find one?" jefferson again sat silent for almost a minute, and then slowly shook his head. "i don't know--i've nothing to go upon," he said. "she's not even an old, played-out boat. still, it seems to me that a heavily freighted steamer, hung up by her nose on the bank, might easily have started some of her plates when the waters of the creek subsided. then she'd settle deeper--it's nice soft mud." "but that would be--after--she went ashore." "yes," said jefferson dryly. "that's the point of it." austin looked thoughtful. it had also occurred to him that there was a good deal it was difficult to understand about the stranding of the _cumbria_, though that, after all, did not appear to concern them greatly just then. "what puzzles me is why the salvage men let go," he said. "you see, they're accustomed to this kind of thing, and have money behind them." jefferson looked at him with a little smile, and austin saw that he guessed his thoughts. jefferson was as gaunt as ever, a fever-worn skeleton of a man, dressed, for the most part, in oil-stained rags, while austin was quite aware that, so far as outward appearances went, there was very little that was prepossessing about himself. his big felt hat hung over his forehead, sodden with grease, and shapeless; his hands were hard and scarred, his nails were broken, and the rent singlet hung open almost to his waist. all this seemed to emphasise their feebleness, and the fact that there was no money behind them, at least. "well," said jefferson, "that's quite easy. those salvage men are specialists, and expect a good deal for the time they put in. now they took some oil out of her, but there is reason for believing they were not sure they'd get the _cumbria_ off at all, and it would cost a good deal to charter a light-draught steamer to come up here. they tried towing it down to a schooner, and lost a good deal of it on the shoals. then they towed the schooner in, and had to wait for a smooth surf before they could get her out, with no more than sixty tons at that. the game wasn't worth while, and the men were going down with fever." "but the gum?" "there wasn't a great deal down in the cargo sheets, and, any way, until they'd hove the oil out they couldn't come at it." "you are still sure about the gum yourself?" jefferson laughed softly. "i think i am. i don't quite know where it is, but the skipper got it--a good deal of it." "still, the steamer would be worth a persistent effort. there was no doubt about her being there." "no," said jefferson, with a little gesture of comprehension. "now i know just what you mean. you're wondering, since those men couldn't heave her off, what's the use of us trying. well, specialists make their mistakes now and then, just like other men, and they took it for granted that things were normal when they were there. from what i've seen of the sand strips and the marks on the mangrove trunks, i don't think they were. you see, there's a good deal we don't know about the tides yet, and the guinea stream doesn't always run quite the same along this coast; while, when there's less than usual of the southwest winds that help it along, it's quite likely to mean two or three feet less water in these creeks. then you can have a wet season that's a little drier than the other ones, and it's fresh water here--the tide just backs it up." "then you're counting on the present season being a normal one?" "yes," said jefferson quietly. "i've staked all i have on it--and a good deal more than that. if it isn't, i might as well have pitched my forty thousand dollars into the sea." he stopped a moment, and then laid a little grey object in austin's palm. "what d'you make of that?" austin started as he looked at it. "a pistol bullet!" "exactly," said jefferson. "it has been through the barrel, too; you can see the score of the rifling. i picked it up along the trail, but i don't know how long it lay there, or who fired it. still, the niggers don't carry pistols. well, it's about time i was getting back on board if we're to start the pump to-night." austin glanced at him sharply, and noticed that there was a suggestion of tension in his voice, though his face was quiet. it was evident that a good deal would depend upon the result of the first few hours' pumping, for unless it lowered the water there would be little probability of their floating the steamer. neither of them, however, said anything further, and when they went back to the beach where the oil was, jefferson steamed away in the launch, and austin, who was left with two canarios, lay down in the shadow of a strip of tarpaulin. the spaniards, tired with their morning's labour, went to sleep; and austin, who filled his pipe several times, found the hours pass very slowly. there was nothing to hold his attention--only glaring sand, dingy, dim green mangroves, and tiers of puncheons with patches of whitewash clinging to them. it flung back an intolerable brightness that hurt his aching eyes, and he became sensible of a feverish impatience as he lay watching the shadows lengthen. his thoughts were with jefferson, who was, no doubt, now getting steam on the locomotive boiler and coupling up the big pump. unless the latter did what they expected of it, the toil they had undergone, and jefferson's eight thousand pounds, would have been thrown away. that was very evident, but austin wondered a little at himself as his impatience grew upon him, until it was only by an effort he held himself still. it was not the quarter share jefferson offered him which had brought him there, for he realised that even with five thousand pounds he would still be, to all intents and purposes, a poor man, and his life on board the _estremedura_ had, in most respects, been one that suited him. he had, in fact, not greatly cared whether the _cumbria_ could be floated or not, when he came out, but since then jefferson's optimism, or something that was born of the toil they had undertaken, had laid hold of him, and now he was almost as anxious as his comrade that their efforts should result in success. in fact, he was feverishly anxious, and felt that if it would gain them anything he would willingly stake his life on the venture. then he smiled as he remembered that he had, without quite realising it, done so already. still, the long, hot afternoon dragged away, and when the sun dipped, and black darkness closed down upon the creek, the launch came clanking up to the beach. she brought two canarios as well as bill, the fireman, and austin's voice was eager as he greeted the latter. "have you got the pump going yet?" he asked. "no," said bill. "tom and mr. jefferson was packing something when i came away. he'd given her a spin, and found the engine blowing at a gland." austin asked him nothing further, but drove the launch at top speed through the blackness that shrouded the misty creek, and walked straight to where jefferson was standing when he reached the _cumbria_. the red glow from the open fire-door of the locomotive boiler fell upon him, and there were signs of tension in his face, while the red trickle from a hand he had apparently injured smeared his torn jacket. steam was roaring from a valve beside him, and austin could scarcely hear him when he turned to the donkey-man. "shut the fire-door. she'll go now," he said. "i'll let her shake down for a minute or two, and then we'll give her everything." he walked forward towards where the light of a lamp fell upon the casing of the pump, which looked like a huge iron drum considerably flattened in. then he touched a valve, and the machine became animate with a low pulsatory wheezing, while something commenced to hum and rattle inside it. the sound swelled into a fierce rhythmic whirring, the great iron case vibrated, and austin could feel the rails he leaned on tremble. jefferson turned and looked at him with a little smile, while he laid a hand, as it were, affectionately upon the pump. "yes," he said, "i've made her go, and she's going to earn me eighty thousand dollars. she's drawing air just now. heave your hat down, and see if she'll take it along." austin, who became sensible that a little draught was shaking his duck trousers, did as jefferson suggested, and the big felt hat rolled and flopped in a ludicrous fashion along the deck. then it seemed to spring forward into the blackness, and groping after it, he found it glued to the iron grid which was screwed to the end of a big pipe. it was with some little difficulty he tore it loose. then he saw jefferson swing up one hand. "easy, while she's getting her first drink; then, if she's spouting full, you can let her hum," he said, and turned to austin. "now, come down with me." they went down together into the musty hold, and when somebody lowered the big hose after them, jefferson, standing upon the ladder, seized the rope, and looked up at the canarios clustering round the hatch above. "where's that rake you made?" he said. it was handed him, and austin glanced down at the water, which glistened oilily under the light of a suspended lamp. it was thick with floating grease and strewn with fragments of rotten bags. "get hold and keep her clear!" said jefferson, who thrust the rake upon him, and then waited a moment before he lowered the hose, while austin, glancing round a moment, could see the faces of the men above them. they were intent, and almost as expectant as his comrade's. then the big pipe sank with a soft splash, and shook out its loose half-coil, as if alive, while it swelled. it grew hard and rigid, and the dim, oily water swirled and seethed about the end of it. in another moment there was a rush of floating objects towards it from the shadows. strips of bagging, handspikes, clots of oil, and dunnage wood, came thicker and thicker, and jefferson raised his voice. "let her hum!" he said. the pipe palpitated as it further straightened itself, and now a hole opened in the oily water, and half-seen things came up with a rush from the depths of the flooded hold. hundreds of little black kernels whirled and sank in the swing of the eddy, which grew wider as a deep, resonant hum descended from the deck above. it seemed to austin that everything in the hold was coming to the top, but as he watched the bewildering succession of odds and ends that spun amidst the froth, jefferson's voice rose harshly. "it's water she's wanting! keep her clear!" he said. austin contrived to do it for a while, though now and then the whirling rush of bags and wood almost tore the rake away from him. he was kept busy for half an hour, while jefferson stood leaning out from the ladder, and steadily watching the water. then the american swung himself down, with his knife in his hand, and scratched the iron at its level. "we'll know in another hour or two whether we're pumping out the _cumbria_ or pumping in the creek," he said. "if it's the latter, i've got to let up on the contract. i can't undertake to dry out this part of africa." then he signed to one of the canarios. "come down. ven aca, savvy, and take this rake." they went up together, but as they passed along the deck jefferson stopped once more to lay his hand upon the pump. it was running with a dull, rumbling roar, and the deck trembled about it. "she's doing good work," he said. "now we'll have comida. i daren't go back there for another hour." they went into the deck-house, where the spaniard who acted as steward was waiting them, but in passing, jefferson made a sign to tom, who stood in the glow from the fire-door, with a shovel in his hand. "all she's worth!" he said. they ate as a matter of duty, and because they needed all the strength the climate had left them, but neither had much appetite, and austin knew that jefferson was listening as eagerly as he was himself to the deep, vibrating hum that came throbbing through the open door. it was a relief to both of them to hear, the persistent jingling of a cup that stood unevenly in its saucer. the pump was running well, but there remained the momentous question, was it lowering the water? and when the meal was over, austin glanced at jefferson as he pushed his plate aside. "shall i go down and look?" he asked. "no," said jefferson hoarsely. "any way, if you do, don't come back and worry me. she's full up, fore and after holds and engine room--and there are things i don't stand very well. we'll give her two hours, and then, if she's doing anything worth while, the scratch i made will be dry." austin nodded sympathetically. "under the circumstances," he said, "two hours is a long while." jefferson smiled, a curious, wry smile. "it's hard--the toughest thing one can do--just to keep still; but if i climbed up and down that ladder for two hours i'd probably break out, and heave somebody into the creek. there are things you have to get over once for all--and do it quick." "i suppose there are," said austin. "still, it's the first time i've made the acquaintance of any of them, and i shouldn't have fancied one could get a thrill of this kind out of a centrifugal pump. there is, however, of course, a good deal at stake." "eighty thousand dollars," said jefferson, "and all the rest of my life. you don't usually get such chances as the _cumbria_ is giving us twice." austin found that he, at least, could not keep still, however he tried, and he went out and paced up and down the slanted deck, where he fell over things, though he now and then endeavored to talk rationally to tom the donkey-man. he did not find the attempt a success, but he saw that he was not the only one who felt the tension, for the canarios, in place of resting, were clustered round the hatch, and apparently staring down the opening. jefferson was still in the deck-house each time he passed, a gaunt, grim-faced object, with a lean hand clenched on an unlighted pipe, and at last austin sat down on the deck beside the pump. he liked to feel the throb of it, but he remembered the half hour he spent there a long while afterwards. then jefferson came out of the deck-house, walking slowly, though austin fancied it cost him an effort, and they climbed down the ladder together. the man with the rake stood on the opposite one across the hatch, and austin felt his heart beat painfully as he raised the lantern he held and jefferson stooped down. he straightened himself slowly, though the blood was in his face. "dry!" he said hoarsely. "she's lowering it. it's a sure thing, austin. if the fever doesn't get us we'll see this contract out." then he turned, and they went up and back to the deck-house, while an exultant clamour broke out from the canarios; but jefferson's lean hand quivered a little when he laid it on the table as he sat down. "if she has started any plates, they're not started much," he said. "now, talk about anything you like, so long as it isn't the _cumbria_. i've got to slacken down to-night." chapter xvi elusive gum it was in the small hours when austin wakened, and, listening a moment, stretched his aching limbs with a little sigh of content. the odds and ends on the table beside him were rattling merrily, and a deep pulsatory humming rang stridently through the silence of the swamps. the pump was running well, for he could hear the steady splash of water falling into the creek, and once more a little thrill of exultation ran through him. he was not in most respects a fanciful man, for in him the artistic temperament was held in due subjection by a knowledge of the world and shrewd practical sense. still, there were times when he vaguely recognised that there might, after all, be a reality behind the fancies he now and then indulged in with a smile, and that night it seemed to him that the big centrifugal pump was chanting a song of triumph. he had tasted toil, and what toil really is only those know who have borne it in the steamy heat of the tropics, which saps the white man's vigour; while he had discovered what, artist as he was, he had not learned before: that, by way of compensation, man may attain a certain elusive spirituality by the stern subjugation of his body, even when it is accomplished by brutal manual labour. as the _estremedura_'s sobrecargo he had watched the struggle for existence between man and man with good-humoured toleration of its petty wiles and trickeries, but now it was the cleaner and more primitive struggle between man and matter he was called upon to take his part in with the faith in the destiny of his species which is capable of moving mountains, and not infrequently does so with hydraulic hose and blasting charges, as well as a few odd thousand tons of iron and water in a stranded steamer. lying still a while, he heard the great pump hurling out its announcement of man's domination to swamp and forest, and then went peacefully to sleep. he was astir with the dawn next morning, but when they went down the ladder into the hold he knew that the change in him had reached a further stage. whether the water had sunk or not, he was going to see that fight out, and go back triumphant, or leave his bones in africa. it was not alone to vindicate himself in jacinta's eyes, for that, though it counted, too, seemed of less moment now; he was there to justify his existence, to prove himself a man, which many who have won honours in this world have, after all, never really done. as a sign of it, he was wholly practical when, hanging down from the ladder, he laid the fingers of one hand upon the scratch jefferson had made on the iron. then he held up the hand. "wet to the knuckles only," he said. "last night the water was on the thumb." they went up, and jefferson looked at him keenly when they stood on deck; in fact, as he had done when austin first clambered, half naked, out of the hatch. "yes," he said quietly, "she is heaving it out, and you have done more than start in. you mean staying with it now?" austin laughed. "i'm not sure how you know it, but i really think i do." "no?" said jefferson, with a twinkle in his eyes. "when it's in your voice, and stamped upon the rest of you. well, i think we're going to float her, though it's perhaps not quite a sure thing yet. we seem to have bluffed off funnel-paint, but the trouble is, you can't bluff the fever. in the meanwhile, we'll see if she's draining any out of the engine room." they went in, and stood on the top platform, looking down on the water, which, so far as they could discern, stood at much the same level as it had done. jefferson gazed at it with an air of reflection. "if the bulkhead's strained and started so the water could get in, i don't quite see why it shouldn't run out into the hold again, but there's evidently no suction that way," he said. "you see how that tool-case lid is floating. there's another point that strikes me. those started plates don't seem to be letting very much water in." "as you have already pointed out, there is a good deal it's a little difficult to understand about the whole thing." "well," said jefferson gravely, "it doesn't matter in the meanwhile, and we'll probably find out by and by. the first thing we have to do is to lay hands on that gum, and until the water's lower we can't start in. the boys can lay off to-day. well, what are you wanting, bill?" "two of the canariers down!" said the fireman, who appeared in the doorway. "they was looking groggy yesterday, an' one o' them's talking silly now. i think it's fever." austin looked at jefferson, whose face grew a trifle grim. "ah," he said, "it's beginning. well, i had expected we'd have that to grapple with before very long. we'll go along and look at them." they went, and found one of the men raving in the forecastle, while austin, who did what he could for him and his comrade, which was very little, afterwards spent a day of blissful idleness stretched at full length on the settee in the skipper's room, with a damp-stained treatise on navigation. he had never imagined that he could peruse a work of that kind with interest, but it served its purpose, for he felt he must have something to fix his attention on. in the meanwhile the big pump hummed on, as it did for another day and night, until on the third morning jefferson stopped it and turned steam on the winch again. "you have got to keep your eyes open as well as hustle, boys," he said, as he stood with his hand on the lever. "there'll be forty dollars, spanish, for whoever finds the first bag of gum." austin made this clear to them, and they went down the ladder, but two men who had gone with them before were not there that day. the water had sunk, and tiers of rotting bags lay, half afloat, in it, giving out a sickening smell of fermentation. they were filled with little black nuts, the oleaginous kernels of the palm fruit from which the layer of oil had been scraped off, and these were evidently worth little in their damaged condition. austin, however, had very little time to notice them in, for the winch above him rattled, and the day of feverish toil began. the bags burst when they dragged them into piles and laid them upon the sling, while when the winch swung them up, a rain of kernels and slimy water came pattering and splashing down. putrefying kernels floated up into every hole they made, and now and then a man sank waist deep among the crumbling bags. still, there was no stoppage or slackening of effort. forty dollars is a large sum to a seaman of the canaries, who can bring up a family on one peseta, which is rather less than ninepence, a day, while the bonus contingent on getting the _cumbria_ off would set up most of them for life. they remembered it that day as they floundered and waded about the stifling hold, for the work of the big pump had renewed their ardour. still, the task before them was one most men would have shrunk from. the heat below decks was suffocating, the smell of the steaming, fermenting mass of slime and oil and kernels nauseating. the water it swam in was putrescent, and the weight to be hauled out of it and sent up into the sunlight apparently enough to keep them busy for months ahead, though they had, as everybody knew, very little time to move it in. it was to be a grim struggle between man and inert material, for unless the _cumbria_ was hove off when the rains came, it seemed very probable that she would stay there until she fell to pieces. they set about it in silence, which, in the case of spaniards, was a significant thing; but nobody had any breath to spare, and austin gasped distressfully as he toiled, almost naked, in their midst. his hair was filled with grease, clots of oil smeared his shoulders, and the bags that burst as he lifted them abraded his dripping skin. still, they went up, opening as they swung out of the dusky hold, and the winch rattled on, while there could be no rest for any man while sling succeeded sling. he was half blinded by perspiration, the wounds on his raw hands had opened again, and there were now red patches on his uncovered breast and arms. his muscles had, however, grown accustomed to the strain since the first arduous day, and he did a man's part, as their comrade, with the rest. there were no distinctions down in the stifling hold. it was a community of effort for the one result, and again austin wondered at the forethought of the fever-wasted man above who drove the hammering winch. jefferson was, beyond all question, boss; but with singular clearness of vision, or, perhaps, that higher, half-conscious faculty of doing the right thing, that characterises the leader of men, he had recognised that what he called bluff was of no service here, and had gone straight to the strength there is in simple human nature. there was, those untaught sailormen knew, no labour he was not ready to bear his part in, and no command was flung at them for a show of authority. jefferson spent his strength and dollars freely, and while he asked no more than a hundred cents' worth for the latter, he got it with interest, a hundredfold. it grew hotter and hotter, and there were curiously mingled ejaculations of latin prayer and imprecations that had somehow lost their sting. the man with calumniated ancestry took it as a jest, and amidst the roar of running chain and fierce rattle of the winch the work went on. the rains were coming, there was very much to be done, and human courage braced itself to the task. hard hands were torn and bleeding, veins showed gorged on dusky foreheads, muscles rose and bunched themselves under the olive skin, and englishman and iberian gave freely all that was in them, the sweat of the hard-driven body and tension of controlling will. they were alone in the land of the shadow, with a deadly climate against them, but the conflict they were engaged in has been waged before by spaniards and englishmen in half the wilder lands. then the winch stopped suddenly, and jefferson came backwards down the ladder. he alighted knee deep in water among the rotten bags, and all his observations were not recordable. he had put off conventionality, and was once more the reckless sailor and the optimistic american, so he spoke of the lower regions, and called the men who had stowed the _cumbria_'s cargo condemned loafers in barbarous castilian and good american, while the olive-faced canarios gasped and grinned at him. "the man who packed those bags there should be hung," he said. "we can't break the bulk out until we've shifted most of them. then i'll send you down the sling-tub, and we'll heave the stuff to ----! it's sixty dollars now for the man who finds the gum." "no sign of it yet," said austin. "they'd never have stowed it among the bulk kernels. they're worth something. hadn't you better make sure of them?" jefferson laughed grimly. "they're worth--how do i know? call it £ a ton when they're not rotten. it's the gum we came for, and i'm going to find it if i tear the ballast tanks and limbeys out of her. clear that bag bulkhead, and then stand by for the sling-tub. we'll heave every blue-flamed kernel over." the tub came down by and by, in fact, two of them, and those who had no shovels bailed up the slimy kernels with their hats and hands; but each time the chain swung through the hatch the tub below was full. it was two o'clock when they desisted, and some of them were waist deep in water then, while soon after they came up the big hose splashed in again. there were steampipe collars to unbolt and pack, and bolt again, before that was done; while when austin came upon jefferson, he held up one hand from which the scalded skin was peeling. "i can run the ---- winch if i drive her with my mouth and foot," he said. "get the comida into you, and then back into the hold again. we're going to make her hum." austin glanced suggestively towards the men, who stood with backs still bent with weariness, about the entrance to the forecastle. "i suppose so," he said. "still, the question is, can they stand it long?" jefferson laughed harshly. "they'll have to. we have the blazing sun against us, and the evening fever-mist; in fact, 'most everything that man has to grapple with, and the worst of all is time. still, they can't break us. we have got to beat them--the river, the climate, and all the man-killing meanness nature has in western africa." he stopped a moment, and, standing very straight, a haggard, grim-faced scarecrow, flung up his scalded hands towards the brassy heavens in a wide, appealing gesture. "when you come to the bottom of things, that's what we were made for. there's something in us that is stronger than them all." austin said nothing, though once more a little thrill ran through him as he slipped away quietly in search of his comida. what they were doing had, he felt, been sung in epics long ago, and jefferson had, it seemed, blundered upon the under-running theme. it was the recognition of the primal ban again, the ban that had a blessing for man to triumph in, and by it win dominion over the material world and all there is therein. he and his comrade were men whose creed was crudely simple, though it was also, on points they did not often mention, severe; but they bore the bonds of service, which are never worn without compensation, willingly, and the tense effort of will and limb had clarified and strengthened the vague faith in them until they were ready to attempt the impossible. still, austin had little time for his comida. the men in the forecastle were very sick indeed, and he packed them in foul blankets, and dosed them with green-lime water, boiling hot to start the perspiration, which was, he recognised, likely to accomplish more than his prescriptions. there were limes in funnel-paint's village, and they had not scrupled to requisition them. one of the men lay still, moaning faintly through blackened lips, and the other, raving, called incoherently on saints and angels. it seemed to austin, standing in that reeking den, that there was small chance for his patients unless they heard him. two of those whose names he caught had once, he remembered, been, at least, fresh-water sailormen, and half unconsciously he also appealed to them. one creed appeared much the same as another in that dark land, and something in him cried out instinctively to the great serene influences beyond the shadow. when he had finished his work of mercy the spaniards were stripping the covers off the after hatch, and he had scarcely a minute for a mouthful before he joined them to heave the kernels up by hand. they went up, basket after basket, and splashed into the creek, but there was no sign of a gum bag or package anywhere among them. bill, who hove them out through the open gangway, once turned to grin at austin, who stood next the hatch. "i've never been a millionaire, an' it's ---- unlikely that i'll ever be one, either; but i know what it must feel like now," he said. "here are you an' me slingin' away stuff that's worth twelve pounds a ton, an' one o' them goes a long way with a man like me." austin said nothing. he had no breath to spare, but he thrust a brimming basket upon the fireman, and that did just as well. they toiled throughout that afternoon, under a broiling sun, but when the black darkness came again they had still found no gum. then, as they ate together, austin looked at jefferson. "you are sure the gum was really put into her?" he said. "it was," said jefferson, with a little grim smile. "whether it's there now, or not, is another thing. we'll know when she's empty, and if we haven't found it then, we'll consider. not a pound reached grand canary, and it's quite certain that the fellows who went--somewhere else--took none of it with them." chapter xvii austin goes down river a week had passed without their finding any gum, when one evening austin stood beside jefferson in the _cumbria_'s forecastle. it felt as hot as an oven, though the damp fell in big drops from the iron beams and trickled down the vessel's unceiled skin, while a smoky lamp supplied it with insufficient illumination. the faint light showed the hazily outlined forms of the men sitting limp and apathetic, now the long day's toil was over, in the acrid smoke of canary tobacco, and forced up clearly the drawn face of one who lay beneath it, gazing at austin with a glitter in his uncomprehending eyes. behind him other figures occupied a part of the shelf-like row of bunks, but they were mere shapeless bundles of greasy blankets and foul clothing, with only a shock of damp hair or a claw-like hand projecting from them here and there to show that they were human. jefferson said nothing, but his face was a trifle grim, and he straightened himself wearily when one of the spaniards rose and moved into the light. "señor," he said, with a little deprecatory gesture, "for ourselves we others do not complain, but these men are very sick, and the medicines of the señor austin do not make them better. one of them is my cousin, another my wife's brother; and there are those in las palmas and galdar who depend on them. in a week, or, perhaps, a day or two, they die. something must be done." there was a faint approving murmur from the rest of the men. they had worked well, but the excitement of the search for the gum was wearing off, and the strain had commenced to tell. jefferson smiled wryly as he glanced at austin. "hadn't you better ask him what can be done?" he said. the spaniard flung his arms up when austin translated this. "who knows?" he said. "i am only an ignorant sailorman, and cannot tell; but when we came here the señor austin promised us that we should have all that was reasonable. it is not fitting that men should die and nothing be done to save them." "i scarcely think it is," said austin. "still, how to set about the thing is more than i know. it must be talked over. we may, perhaps, tell you more to-morrow." he touched jefferson's shoulder, and they went out of the forecastle and towards the skipper's room silently. when they sat down jefferson looked hard at him. "well?" he said. "two of them are your men." austin made a little sign of comprehension. "i don't remember what i promised them. i had trouble to get them, but i certainly told them the place wasn't a healthy one. that, however, doesn't convey a very sufficient impression to anybody who hasn't been here." "no," and jefferson smiled grimly, "i don't quite think it does. the point is that you feel yourself responsible to them, though i don't see why you should. a man has to take his chances when he makes a bargain of the kind they did." austin stretched himself on the settee wearily, and lighted a cigarette. he had been feeling unpleasantly limp of late, and his head and back ached that night. "it's a little difficult to define what a bargain really is," he said. "still, it seems to me that to make it a just one the contracting parties should clearly understand, one what he is selling, and the other what he is buying. in the case in question i knew what i was getting, but i'm far from sure the canarios quite realised what they might have to part with." "that is not the business view." "i am willing to admit it. i, however, can't help fancying that there is a certain responsibility attached to buying up men's lives for a few dollars when they're under the impression that it's their labour they're selling. in fact, it's one that is a little too big for me." jefferson sat silent for almost a minute, looking at austin, who met his gaze steadily, with his eyes half closed. "well," he said, "it isn't the usual view, but there's something to be said for it. what d'you mean to do?" "put the sick men on board the launch and run them out to sea on the chance of picking up a west-coast liner, or--and it might suit just as well--one of the new opposition boats. from what i gathered at las palmas, the men who run them are, for the most part, rather a hard-up crowd, and you're usually more likely to get a kindness done you by that kind of people. we have nothing to pay their passage with, you see." "you might get one oil puncheon into the launch. still, you have to remember that men who go down with fever along shore often die, instead of coming round, when they get out to sea." austin smiled. "one would fancy that men who stay along shore when they have fever, as these fellows have it, die invariably." once more jefferson sat silent a while, gazing at his comrade thoughtfully. "well," he said, with a little gesture, "i leave the thing to you. after all, it's quite likely that one's dollars aren't worth what you lay out to get them, now and then, but that's certainly not the question. the boat's not making the water i expected, but we haven't found the gum, and engine room and after hold are still almost full. the boiler, as you know, has two or three tubes blowing, and we have nothing to stop them with. that means she's wasting half her steam, and as we have to keep a full head for the pump and winch, the coal's just melting. by the time we heave her off there will be very little left, and i've no fancy for going to sea short of fuel and being picked up as salvage. it's a point that has been worrying me lately." "there is coal to be had at sierra leone." "and there are a british consul and government authorities. you're loaded down to the water's edge with shipping acts, and the _cumbria_'s still upon your register. do you suppose they are going to let her out again, as she is, if we once go in there?" austin fancied it was scarcely likely. the requirements of the paternal board of trade are, in fact, so onerous that english owners not infrequently register their ships under another flag; while it occurred to him that consul and surveyor would have a fit of indignant horror if they saw how the enactments were complied with on board the _cumbria_. "no, sir," said jefferson. "she's going straight across to las palmas when she leaves this creek. that's spanish, and a few dollars go a long way in spain. besides, it's not quite certain that we'll leave the creeks at all this season." austin straightened himself suddenly. "what do you mean?" "only that i'm not going home without the gum." there was a little silence, and during it austin endeavoured to adopt an attitude of resignation. it was his belief that the _cumbria_ would be floated, or the project given up, when the rains came, that had animated him through the toil he had undertaken. another month or two would, he had expected, see the task accomplished; but now it might, it seemed, continue indefinitely, and he shrank from the thought of a longer sojourn in the land of shadow. then, with a little effort, he slowly raised his head. "to be candid, that is a good deal more than i counted on when i made the bargain," he said. "still, i can't well go back on it now. there is coal to be had in dakar, too, but it would cost a good deal to bring even a schooner load here, though we could, per contra, load up oil in her. have you the money?" jefferson drummed with his fingers upon the table. "that's the trouble. i have a little left, but i'm not quite sure i could get it into my hands without the mailing to and fro of signed papers." "some of the west-coast mailboats call at dakar. i might get the coal and a schooner on a bond there. of course, the people would want a heavy profit under the circumstances." "three or four times as much as they were entitled to, any way," and a little glint crept into jefferson's eyes. "now, it's quite usual for the man who does the work to be glad of the odd scraps the man with the money flings him for his pains, but it's going to be different with this contract. i haven't the least notion of working here to make the other fellow rich. if we buy the coal it will be at the market value, cash down. the trouble is, i don't quite know where i'm going to get it." "well," said austin, slowly, "a means of raising it has occurred to me. you see, as seems to have been the case with you, there is money in the family, and ethically i really think a little of it belongs to me. it is not--for several reasons--a pleasant thing to ask for it. in fact, i fancied once i'd have starved before i did so, but it couldn't be harder than what we have been doing here. one could cable to las palmas, and a credit might be arranged by wire with one of the banking agencies there." "your people would let you have the money?" austin laughed, a trifle harshly. "not exactly out of good-will, but, if i worded that cable cleverly, they might do it to keep me here. i don't know how it is in your country, but in ours they're seldom very proud of the poor relation. in fact, some of them would do a good deal to prevent his turning up to worry them. i think there are occasions when a man is almost warranted in levying contributions of the kind." jefferson's eyes twinkled. "you are a curious, inconsequent kind of man. you worry over those spaniards who have no call on you, and then you propose to bluff your own people out of their money." "if i had been one who always acted logically i should certainly not have been here. as it is, i'll start to-morrow, and wire my kind relations that, failing a draft for two hundred pounds, i'm coming home in rags by the first steamer. i almost think they'll send the money." jefferson stretched out a lean hand suddenly, and laid it on his comrade's arm. "it's going to hurt you, but you can't get anything worth while without that. you can send them back their money when we get her off; but if you let anything stop you now you'll feel mean and sorry all your life." "yes," said austin, "i fancy i should. it's rather a pity, but one can't always be particular. in the meanwhile, i'll see tom about the launch." he went out, and, coming back half an hour later, threw himself down on the settee, and was fast asleep when jefferson, who had been busy about the pump, came in and stood a moment looking down on him. austin's face was worn, and thinner than it had been when he reached the _cumbria_; the damp stood beaded on it, and his hair lay wet and lank upon his pallid forehead. "i guess the raising of that money is going to be about the hardest thing you ever did, but you'll do it," said jefferson. "i've got the kind of man i want for a partner." austin, who did not hear him, slept on peacefully, and steamed away down river early next morning; while it was late on the second night, and the launch was out at sea, when he sat, very wearily, with his hand upon her helm, looking out across the long, smooth undulations. a half-moon hung low to the westward, and they came up, heaving in long succession from under it, ebony black in the hollows, and flecked with blinks of silver light upon their backs. austin only saw the latter, for he was looking into the dusky blueness of the east, though it was only by an effort he kept himself awake. during the last few days a feeling of limp dejection had been creeping over him. the launch was steaming slowly, with only a little drowsy gurgle about her propeller as she swung and dipped to the swell, though she rolled uneasily with the weight of the big oil puncheon high up in her. bill, the fireman, was crouched, half asleep, beside the clanking engine, and two very sick men lay forward beneath a ragged tarpaulin. though the surf had been smoother than usual, austin did not know how he had brought them all out across the bar. there were many stars in the heavens, and by and by, as he blinked at the soft darkness with aching eyes, he saw one that seemed unusually low down and moved a little. then, shaking himself to attention, he made out a dim glimmer of green, and became sensible of a faint throbbing that crept softly out of the silence. he leaned forward and touched the fireman. "open her out," he said. "that's a steamboat coming, and it looks as if she would go by well to the south." bill pulled at a lever, the engine clanked faster, and the launch commenced to rail more sharply as she lurched over the long undulations with an increasing gurgle beneath her side. the sea was oily smooth, and she rolled southwards fast; but the steamer's lights were rising high, and the pounding of engines grew louder in a sharp crescendo, until they could hear the black water frothing under iron bows. then the launch's whistle broke into a shrill scream. there was no answer, and austin turned to the fireman again. "shake her up! there will not be another boat for a week!" he said. bill pulled the lever over a little further, and stirred the furnace, and the clanking grew louder, while the launch rolled more violently. when she swung up, austin saw a strip of dusky hull that swayed and heaved in front of them, and then was suddenly lost to view again. "she's not one of the mailboats, anyway. they'd be lighted, saloon deck and poop," he said. "it almost looks as if she would get away from us." bill opened the whistle full, and left it screaming while he sprang up on the side deck, a black figure holding high a strip of blazing waste. its red glare streaked the water, and the burning oil dripped from it in a sparkling rain, while austin felt his heart beat when the man flung it down with an imprecation. then a deep, vibratory blast came trembling across the glimmering water, and he saw the piled-up foam fall away beneath the big iron bows. "they've seen us," he said. "she's standing by." five minutes later the launch lay lurching beneath the steamer's high, black side, while a man leaned out from her slanted bridge above, looking down into her. "what d'you want?" he said. "i'm not going in for cargo unless it's worth while. we're tolerably full this trip." "a passage," said austin. "there are myself and two sick men. we're going to grand canary." "what's the oil for?" "to cover the ticket." the skipper appeared to be gazing down at him in astonishment. "sixteen pounds' worth, at the most, for three men to grand canary! you have good nerves," he said. "i can't go any further, and you see they're very sick." the skipper was understood to say that his ship was not a several adjectived hospital, but austin only smiled, for he was acquainted with that kind of man, and aware that he was, at least, as likely to do him a kindness as an elaborately got up mailboat's skipper. "well," he said, "if you won't have us, i'll take them back and bury them. it's tolerably sure to come to that. two of us will not eat much, any way, and we'll be quite content to sleep on deck." there was no answer for a moment, and then, as the bridge came slanting down, the man who leaned out from it laughed. "it's a puncheon of oil to nothing, and i've been hard up myself," he said. "the next thing is, how the devil are you going to get them up? we've stowed away our ladder." "then it'll have to be a sling. i'll steady them up when she rises, and some of your crowd can hand them in." it was done with difficulty, for the steamer rolled with a disconcerting swing, and then austin grasped bill's hand before he went up the rope. a gong clanged sharply, the launch slid astern, and several seamen carried the two bundles of foul blankets away. while austin watched them vacantly a hand fell upon his shoulder, and propelled him into a room beneath the bridge. then he heard a harsh voice: "there isn't any factory i'm acquainted with hereabouts. where d'you get that oil from?" it said. austin sat down on the settee and blinked at the burly, hard-faced man in front of him. "i don't know if you'll be astonished, but we really came by it legitimately," he said. "in fact, we got it out of a stranded steamer--one we're endeavouring to heave off, you see." the skipper smiled as comprehension suddenly dawned on him. "then you're one of the ---- fools who bought the _cumbria_?" "i am. still, i'm not sure that your opinion of us is quite warranted yet. if it isn't, you'll get more than the one puncheon for taking us across. in the meanwhile, i'm a little anxious about those men." "they're all right. pills will see to them. we have one. he probably killed somebody by accident, or did something of that kind, or he wouldn't be here. directors had a notion we might pick up a few passengers. they, however, prefer the liners." austin laughed, and the skipper's eyes slowly twinkled. "the fact is, i don't blame them," he said. "any way, you will lie down here until they get you a room in the poop ready." he went out, and an hour or two later austin was roused by a touch from a fitful sleep. a young man who stooped over him was regarding him intently. "put that in your mouth?" he said. austin slipped the little glass tube between his lips, and the doctor nodded when he passed it back to him. "yes," he said, "you have a very promising case of fever coming on. get up and lean on me; the sooner we pack you between the blankets the better." austin rose unsteadily, and found that he had some difficulty in walking when they went out upon the slanting deck. he was quite sure of that, but everything else that he did, or was done to him, during the next few days, was wrapped in obscurity. still, he had a hazy notion of the doctor and another man half dragging him into a little room. chapter xviii jacinta becomes indignant it was fifteen days after he boarded the steamer when austin reached las palmas in a condition which, at least, prevented him chafing at the delay as he otherwise would have done. on the second day something went wrong with the high-pressure engine, and the little, deep-loaded vessel lay rolling idly athwart the swell, while her engineers dismantled and re-erected it. then the trouble they had already had with the condenser became more acute, so that they would scarcely keep a vacuum, and it also happened that the trade-breeze she had to steam against blew unusually fresh that season. austin, however, was not aware of this at the time. he lay rambling incoherently for several days, and when at last his senses came back to him, found himself too weak and listless to trouble about anything. he gained strength rapidly, for the swamp fever does not, as a rule, keep its victim prostrate long. it either kills him without loss of time, or allows him to escape for a season; but its effect is frequently mental as well as physical, and austin's listlessness remained. he had borne a heavy strain, and when he went ashore at las palmas the inevitable reaction was intensified by the black dejection the fever had left behind. it seemed to him that he and jefferson were only wasting their efforts, and though he still meant to go on with them, he expected no result, since he now felt that there was not the slightest probability of their ever getting the _cumbria_ off. it was a somewhat unusual mood for a young englishman to find himself in, though by no means an incomprehensible one in case of a man badly shaken by the malaria fever, while one of austin's shortcomings was, or so, at least, jacinta brown considered, a too complaisant adaptation of himself to circumstances. she held the belief that when the latter were unpropitious, a determined attempt to alter them was much more commendable, and not infrequently successful. in any case, austin found pancho brown was away buying tomatoes when he called at his office, and the spanish clerk also informed him that miss brown and mrs. hatherly had left las palmas for a while. he fancied they had gone to madeira, but was not certain, and austin, who left him a message for brown and a letter jefferson had charged him with to be forwarded to miss gascoyne, went on to the telegraph office more dejected than ever. jacinta had, usually, a bracing effect upon those she came into contact with, and austin, who felt he needed a mental stimulant, realised now that one of the things that had sustained him was the expectation of hearing her express her approval of what he had done. he had not looked for anything more, but it seemed that he must also dispense with this consolation. he delivered one of the canarios, who was apparently recovering, to his friends, and saw the other bestowed in the hospital, and then, finding that he could not loiter about las palmas waiting an answer to his cable, which he did not expect for several days, decided to go across to teneriffe with the _estremedura_. there was no difficulty about this, though funds were scanty, for the spanish manager told him he could make himself at home on board her as long as he liked, if he would instruct the new sobrecargo in his duties, as he, it appeared, had some difficulty in understanding them. on the night they went to sea he lay upon the settee in the engineers' mess-room, with macallister sitting opposite him, and a basket of white grapes and a garafon of red wine on the table between them. port and door were wide open, and the trade-breeze swept through the room, fresh, and delightfully cool. austin had also an unusually good cigar in his hand, and stretched himself on the settee with a little sigh of content when he had recounted what they had done on board the _cumbria_. "i don't know if we'll ever get her off, and the astonishing thing is, that since i had the fever i don't seem to care," he said. "in the meanwhile, it's a relief to get away from her. in fact, i feel i would like to lie here and take it easy for at least a year." macallister nodded comprehendingly. austin's face was blanched and hollow, and he was very thin, while the stamp of weariness and lassitude was plain on him. still, as he glanced in his direction a little sparkle crept into the engineer's eyes. "so jefferson made the pump go, and ran the forehold dry!" he said. "when ye come to think of it, yon is an ingenious man." austin laughed. "he is also, in some respects, an astonishing one. he was perfectly at home among the smart people at the catalina, and i fancy he would have been equally so in the bowery, whose inhabitants, one understands, very much resemble in their manners those of your glasgow closes or edinburgh wynds. in fact, i've wondered, now and then, if miss gascoyne quite realises who she is going to marry. there are several sides to jefferson's character, and she has, so far, only seen one of them." "well," said macallister, reflectively, "i'm thinking she will never see the rest. there are men, though they're no exactly plentiful, who can hide them, and it's scarcely likely that jefferson will rive a steamboat out of the african swamps again." "once is quite enough in a lifetime, but it's when the work is done, and he has to quiet down, i foresee trouble for jefferson. i'm not sure miss gascoyne's english friends would altogether appreciate him." again macallister nodded. "still," he said, "what yon man does not know he will learn. i would back him to do anything now he has made that boiler steam. then ye will mind it's no the clever women who are the easiest to live with when ye have married them, and there's a good deal to be said for girls like miss gascoyne, who do not see too much. it is convenient that a wife should be content with her husband, and not be wanting to change him into somebody else, which is a thing i would not stand at any price myself." austin grinned, for it was known that macallister had, at least now and then, found it advisable to entertain his friends on board the _estremedura_ by stealth. the engineer however, did not appear to notice his smile. "ye will go back when ye get the money?" he said. "of course. i have to see the thing out now, though i don't quite understand how i ever came to trouble myself about it in the first place." this time it was macallister who grinned. "i have been in this world a weary while, and would ye pull the wool over my eyes? ye are aware that the notion was driven into ye." austin was astonished, and a trifle annoyed, as he remembered a certain very similar conversation he had had with jefferson. it was disconcerting to find that macallister was as conversant with his affairs as his partner had shown himself to be, especially as they had both apparently drawn the same inference. "i wonder what made you say that?" he asked, with lifted brows. macallister laughed. "well," he said drily, "i'm thinking miss brown knows, as well as i do, that ye would not have gone of your own accord." "why should miss brown have the slightest wish that i should go to africa?" "if ye do not know, how could ye expect me to? still, it should be plain to ye that it was not for your health." austin raised himself a trifle, and looked at his comrade steadily. "the drift of your remarks is tolerably clear. any way, because i would sooner you made no more of them, it might be as well to point out that no girl who cared twopence about a man would send him to the swamps where the _cumbria_ is lying." "maybe she would not. there are things i do not know, but ye will mind that jacinta brown is not made on quite the same model as miss gascoyne. she sees a good deal, and if she was not content with her husband she would up and alter him. i'm thinking it would not matter if it hurt the pair o' them." "the difficulty is that she hasn't got one." macallister laughed softly. "it's one that can be got over, though jacinta's particular. it's not everybody who would suit her. ye are still wondering why ye went to africa?" "no," said austin, with a trace of grimness. "i don't think it's worth while. mind, i'm not admitting that i didn't go because the notion pleased me, and if miss brown wished me to, it was certainly because of muriel gascoyne." "maybe," said macallister, with a little incredulous smile. he rose, and, moving towards the doorway, turned again. "she might tell ye herself to-morrow. she's now in santa cruz." he went out, apparently chuckling over something, and austin thoughtfully smoked out his cigar. to be a friend of jacinta brown's was, as he had realised already, a somewhat serious thing. it implied that one must adopt her point of view, and, what was more difficult, to some extent, at least, sink his own individuality. macallister and jefferson were, he fancied, perhaps right upon one point, and that was that jacinta had decided that a little strenuous action might be beneficial in his case; but if this was so, austin was not sure that he was grateful to her. he was willing to do anything that would afford her pleasure, that was, so long as he could feel she would gain anything tangible, if it was only the satisfaction of seeing muriel gascoyne made happy through his endeavours. in fact, what he wished was to do her a definite service, but the notion of being reformed, as it were, against his wishes, when he was not sure that he needed it, did not please him. this was carrying a friendly interest considerably too far, and it was quite certain, he thought, that he could expect nothing more from her. he almost wished that he had never seen her, which was a desire he had hovered on the brink of before; but while he considered the matter the trade-breeze was sighing through the port, and the engines throbbed on drowsily, while from outside came the hiss and gurgle of parted seas. austin heard it all, until the sounds grew fainter, and he went to sleep. it also happened that while he slept and dreamed of her, jacinta sat with muriel gascoyne in the garden of a certain hotel on the hillside above santa cruz, teneriffe. the house had been built long ago, evidently for a spanish gentleman of means and taste, and its latest proprietor had sufficient sense to attempt no improvement on its old-world beauty. it stood on a terrace of the hillside, quiet, quaint, and cool, with its ancient, bronze-railed balconies, red-tiled roof, and pink-washed walls, but its garden of palms and oleanders was its greatest charm. on the night in question a full moon hung over the cañadas' splintered rampart, and its soft radiance fell upon the white-walled city and smote a track of glittering silver across the vast plain of sea. the smell of oleanders and heliotrope was heavy in the air, and a cluster of blossoms swayed above jacinta's shoulder. she was just then looking up at a spanish officer in dark green uniform, who stood close by, with sword girt tight to his thigh. he had a dark, forceful face, with the stamp of distinction on it, but he received no encouragement, though he glanced at the vacant place on the stone bench suggestively. "no," said jacinta. "i do not think i shall go to-morrow, so you need not call for me. i have scrambled through the mercedes wood several times already, and we came here to be quiet. that is why we are sitting outside to-night. there are two or three tiresome people in the house who will insist upon talking." it is seldom necessary to furnish a spaniard, who is usually skilled in innuendo, with a second hint, and the officer took his departure gracefully. when he vanished, with jingling sword, into the shadow of the palms, muriel looked at her companion. "you meant me to stay?" she said. "of course," said jacinta. "still, i didn't mean you to let him see that i did, and i really did not kick you very hard. any way, it doesn't matter. the great thing is that he is gone." "you were anxious that he should go?" "yes," said jacinta. "i feel relieved now. he is, in some respects, a very silly man. in fact, he has been wanting to marry me for ever so long." "why?" said muriel, and stopped abruptly. "of course, i mean that he is a spaniard, you know." jacinta laughed, and apparently indicated herself by a little wave of her fan. she was once more attired in an evening dress that appeared to consist largely of black lace, and looked curiously dainty and sylph-like in the diaphanous drapery. the moonlight was also on her face. "the reason," she said, "ought to be sufficiently plain. he is, as you point out, certainly spanish, but there really are a few estimable gentlemen of that nationality. this one was governor or commandante in some part of cuba, and i believe he got comparatively rich there. they usually do. still, he's a little fond of the casino, and is reported to be unlucky, while, in spite of my obvious disadvantages, i am the daughter of pancho brown." she stopped with another laugh that had a faintly suggestive ring in it. "there are times when i wish i was somebody else who hadn't a penny!" "but it can't be nice to be poor," said muriel, looking at her with a trace of bewilderment in her big blue eyes. "it is probably distinctly unpleasant. still, it would be consoling to feel that your money could neither encourage nor prevent anybody you liked falling in love with you, and it would, in one sense, be nice to know that the man you graciously approved of would have to get whatever you wanted for you. you ought to understand that." there was a trace of pride in muriel's smile. "of course; but, after all, there are not many men who can do almost anything, like--harry jefferson. some of the very nicest ones seem quite unable to make money." "i really don't think there are," and jacinta's tone was, for no very apparent reason, slightly different now. "the nicest ones are, as you suggest, usually lazy. it's sad, but true. still, you see, if ever i married, my husband would have to shake off his slothfulness and do something worth while." "but he mightn't want to." "of course," said jacinta, drily. "he probably wouldn't. still, he would have to. i should make him." "ah," said muriel. "do you know that you are just a little hard, and i think when one is too hard one is generally sorry afterwards. now, i don't understand it all, but you once told me you had got something you wished for done, and were sorry you had. i fancied you were even sorrier than you wished me to know." jacinta sat silent a moment or two, with a curious expression in her face, as she looked out across the clustered roofs towards the sparkling sea. it was a custom she had fallen into lately, and it was always towards the east she gazed. then she smiled. "well," she said, "perhaps i was, but it was certainly very silly of me." neither of them spoke again for a while, and by and by a man came out of the house bearing an envelope upon a tray. jacinta tore it open, and muriel saw the blood surge to her face as she spread out the telegraphic message. then the swift colour faded, and there was only a little angry glint in her eyes. "it's from my father, and good news for you," she said. "tell muriel austin was here. salvage operations difficult, but he left jefferson, who expects to be successful, well. forwarding letter." "ah!" said muriel, with a little gasp, "you don't know what a relief that is to me. but you seem almost angry." jacinta laughed a trifle harshly. "i almost think i am. it isn't exactly pleasant to find one's self mistaken, and i had expected something better from mr. austin. the difficulties he mentions were evidently too much for him. you were quite right, my dear. there are not many men like jefferson." now muriel gascoyne had no very keen perceptions, and was, moreover, wrapped up in her own and jefferson's affairs, or she might have seen that anger was not all that jacinta was feeling. as it was, overcome by the relief the message had brought her, she quite failed to notice the pain in her companion's face or the quivering of her hands. in a minute or two jacinta, who waited until she fancied she could do so without it appearing significant, rose and left her. she, however, stopped on the terrace, and once more looked down on the glittering sea, with one hand closed at her side. then, as though remembering something, she turned hastily. "i could never have believed you were a coward--and you went out for me!" she said, and moved towards the hotel with a little air of resolution, as one who had made a painful decision. chapter xix condemned unheard a full moon hung over the white city, and the drowsy murmur of the surf broke fitfully through the music of the artillery band when austin sat listlessly on a bench in the plaza of santa cruz. it was about eight o'clock in the evening, and the plaza was crowded, as usual at that hour. peon and officer, merchant and clerk, paced slowly up and down, enjoying the cool of the evening with their wives and daughters, or sat in clusters outside the lighted cafés. the band was an excellent one, the crowd gravely good-humoured, and picturesquely attired, for white linen, pale-tinted draperies, sombre cloth, and green uniform formed patches of kaleidoscopic colouring as the stream of humanity flowed by under the glaring lamplight and the soft radiance of the moon. austin had sat there often before he went to africa, listening to the music and watching the spectacle; but neither had any charm for him that night. the laughter sounded hollow, the waltz the band was playing had lost its swing, and the streams of light from the cafés hurt his eyes and irritated him. the deep murmur of the sea alone was faintly soothing, and remembering how often he had thought of that cool plaza, with its lights and music, in the steamy blackness of the swamps, he wondered vaguely what had happened to him. the zest and sparkle seemed to have gone out of life, and he did not attribute it to the fact that the melancholia of the swamp belt was still upon him. he crossed the plaza, and sitting outside one of the cafés he had frequented, asked for wine. it was brought him, chilled with snow from the great peak's summit, but the greeting of the man who kept the café seemed for once devoid of cordiality, and the wine sour and thin. still, the spaniard stood a minute or two by his chair, and, as it happened, jacinta passed just then with a dark-faced spanish officer. he wore an exceedingly tight-fitting uniform, but he had a figure that carried it well, and an unmistakable air of distinction. jacinta was also smiling at him, though she turned, and seemed to indicate somebody in the vicinity with a little gesture. as she did so her eyes rested for a moment upon austin, who became for the first time unpleasantly conscious of his haggard face and hard, scarred hands. there was, he realised, nothing in the least distinguished about him. then it was with a faint sense of dismay he saw that jacinta did not mean to recognise him, for she laughed as she turned to her companion, and he heard the soft rustle of her light draperies as they went on again. "that is the colonel sarramento?" he said, as carelessly as he could, though there was a faint flush in his hollow face. "it is," said his companion. "colonel in the military service, though he has held other offices in cuba. a man of ability, señor, and now it is said that he will marry the english merchant's daughter. why not? the señorita brown is more spanish than english, and she is certainly rich." "i don't know of any reason," said austin listlessly, and the man turned away. he had no wish to waste his time upon an englishman who apparently did not appreciate his conversation. austin sat still a little while, indignation struggling with his languor, for he was almost certain that jacinta had seen him. he had never flattered himself that she would regard him as anything more than a friend who was occasionally useful, but he thought she might, at least, have expressed her appreciation of his latest efforts, and he was also a trifle puzzled. jacinta, as a rule, would stop and speak to any of the barefooted peons she was acquainted with, and he had never known her to slight an acquaintance without a reason. it seemed only due to her to make quite sure she had intentionally passed him without recognition. he rose and strolled round the plaza until he met her again face to face where a stream of garish light fell upon them both. she allowed her eyes to rest upon him steadily, but it was the look she would have bestowed on a stranger, and in another moment she had turned to the officer at her side. then a bevy of laughing tourists passed between and separated them. after that austin strolled round the plaza several times in a far from amiable temper. he was stirred at last, and easy-going as he usually was, there was in him a certain vein of combativeness which had been shaken into activity in africa. it was, he admitted, certainly jacinta's privilege to ignore him; but there were occasions on which conventionalities might be disregarded, and he determined that she should, at least, make him acquainted with her purpose in doing so. he did not mean to question it, but to hear it was, he felt, no more than his due. it was some time before he came upon her again, talking to a spanish lady, who, seeing him approaching with a suggestion of resolution in his attitude, had sufficient sense to withdraw a pace or two and sign to another companion. jacinta apparently recognised that he was not to be put off this time, for she indicated the vacant chairs not far away with a little wave of her fan, and when he drew one out for her sat down and looked at him. "you are persistent," she said. "i am not sure that it was altogether commendable taste." austin laughed a trifle bitterly, for the pessimistic dejection the fever leaves does not, as a rule, tend to amiability, and its victim, while willing to admit that there is nothing worth worrying over, is apt to make a very human display of temper on very small provocation. "one should not expect too much from a steamboat sobrecargo," he said. "it is scarcely fair to compare him--for example--with a distinguished spanish officer." "i do not think you are improving matters," said jacinta. "well," said austin drily, "i have, you see, just come from a land where life is rather a grim affair, and one has no time to study its little amenities. i am, in fact, quite willing to admit that i have left my usual suavity behind me. still, i don't think that should count. you contrived to impress me with the fact that you preferred something more vigorously brusque before i went out." jacinta met his gaze directly with a little ominous sparkle in her eyes and straightening brows. she had laid down her fan, and there was a cold disdain in her face the man could not understand. it was unfortunate he did not know how pancho brown had worded his message, for it contained no intimation that he was going back to africa. "it's a pity you didn't stay there," she said. austin started a little. he did not see what she could mean, and the speech appeared a trifle inhuman. "it would please me to think you haven't any clear notion what those swamps are like," he said. "one is, unfortunately, apt to stay there altogether." "which is a contingency you naturally wished to avoid? i congratulated you upon your prudence once before. still, you, at least, seemed quite acquainted with the characteristics of the fever belt of western africa when you went out. your friends the mailboats' officers must have told you. that being so, why did you go?" "a persistent dropping will, it is said, in time wear away considerably harder material than i am composed of. words are also, one could fancy, even more efficacious than water in that respect." a trace of colour crept into jacinta's face, and her brows grew straighter. the lines of her slight form became more rigid, and she was distinctly imperious in her anger. "oh, i understand!" she said. "well, i admit that i was the cause of your going, and now you have come to reproach me for sending you. well, i will try to bear it, and if i do show any anger it will not be at what you say, but at the fact that one who i to some extent believed in should consider himself warranted in saying anything at all. no doubt, you will not recognise the distinction, but in the meanwhile you haven't quite answered my question. you were a free agent, after all, and i could use no compulsion. why did you go?" austin's temper had grown no better during the interview, which was unfortunate for him, because an angry man is usually at a disadvantage in the presence of a woman whose indignation with him is largely tempered by a chilling disdain. "that," he said, reflectively, "is a point upon which i cannot be quite certain, though the whole thing was, naturally, in most respects a piece of egregious folly. still, your good opinion had its value to me, especially as it was very evident that i could never expect anything more. a little brutal candour is, i think, admissible now and then." the colour had faded out of jacinta's face, but the sparkle was a trifle plainer in her eyes. "so you recognised that! under the circumstances, it was wise of you, though how far you were warranted in telling me is a question we needn't go into now. it is a pity you ever went at all." "in one sense i almost think it is," said austin, gazing at her bewilderedly. "still, there is a good deal i can't understand. i am in the dark, you see." "then i suppose i must try to make it clear to you. i am an essentially practical person, and any ardour you possess has hitherto been qualified by a very commendable discretion; but we are not very old, after all, and there is, fortunately, something in most of us which is occasionally stronger than the petty prudence we guide ourselves by. now and then, as you gracefully suggest, it leads us into folly, which we have, perhaps, really no great reason to be sorry for. well, for a little while you shook off the practical and apparently aspired after the ideal. you went out to africa because you fancied it would please me, and it did. one may admit that a thing of that kind appeals to a woman's vanity. still, of course, one could scarcely expect you to adhere to such a purpose. we have grown too wise to indulge in unprofitable sentimentality, and our knights errant do not come back upon their shields. they are practical gentlemen, who appreciate the comfort of a whole skin." "i'm afraid you're confusing historical periods, and the times have certainly changed. they now use an empty gun case in western africa, i believe, and if they can't get that, any old blanket or piece of canvas that happens to be available." "it should be a comfort to know that you need never anticipate anything so unpleasant." this time the colour suffused austin's pallid face. it was clear that she was taunting him with cowardice in leaving jefferson, and her contempt appeared so wholly unreasonable that he would make no attempt to vindicate himself. it did not appear likely to be successful in any case, and the pessimistic bitterness the fever leaves was still upon him. "well," he said quietly, "i had looked for a slightly different reception; but it presumably isn't dignified to complain, especially when it's evident it wouldn't do any good, while i scarcely think there is anything to be gained by extending our conversation. you see, i am, naturally, aware that my character is a somewhat indifferent one already. you will, no doubt, excuse me?" jacinta made him a little inclination over her lifted fan. "if you will tell the señora anasona yonder that i am waiting, i should be much obliged," she said. it was five minutes later when austin was admitted to the cable office as a favour, and handed a despatch from a las palmas banking agency. "your draft will be honoured to the extent of £ ," it ran. he smiled grimly as he thrust it into his pocket, and, wandering round the plaza again, came upon muriel gascoyne and mrs. hatherly sitting in two of the chairs laid out in front of a hotel. he felt tempted to slip by, but remembered that he had a duty to jefferson. mrs. hatherly shook hands with him, and though he fancied there was a restraint in her cordiality, muriel turned to him impulsively. "tell me everything," she said. "the letter has not arrived." "there is a good deal of it," said austin, with a smile. "then don't waste time." austin roused himself with an effort. her tense interest and her simplicity, which, it seemed to him, had in it so much that was admirable, appealed to him, and he determined that she, at least, should know what jefferson had done for her. the artistic temperament had also its influence on him, and he made her and her companion see the steaming swamps and feel the stress and strain of effort in the stifling hold, while it was his pleasure that jefferson should stalk, a lean, dominant figure, through all the varied scenes. he felt, when he concluded, that he had drawn those sombre pictures well, and it would be jefferson's fault if he did not henceforward pose before the girl's fancy as a knightly hero of romance. there were, naturally, difficulties to be overcome, for he recognised that she must be forced to comprehend that chivalric purposes must, nowadays, be wrought out by most prosaic means, and that the clash of the encounter occasionally leaves its mark upon a man. still, he saw that he had succeeded when the simple pride shone through the moisture that gathered in the girl's big blue eyes, and he was moved to sympathy when she rose with a little gasp. "i must tell jacinta. i don't feel quite able to thank you, mr. austin; but you will understand," she said. she left them, and mrs. hatherly turned and looked at austin very graciously. "so you are going back?" she said. "of course," said austin. "there is a spanish boat to las palmas to-morrow, and nothing to keep me now i have got the money. i don't mind admitting that the asking for it was harder than anything i did in africa." the little lady nodded, with a very kindly light in her eyes. "yes," she said, "i can understand that, but in one sense i am not exactly pleased. why didn't you come to me?" "it sounds very ungracious, madam, but i am already in your debt, and one is naturally shy about asking favours of that kind from women. i almost think there are special reasons why it should be so in my case." "that, presumably, means somebody has used you badly? still, it really isn't wise to generalise too freely, and you were once good enough to promise that you would consider me as a friend of yours." "i could scarcely have fancied you were particularly friendly a little while ago." the little lady smiled again. "i offer you my sincere apologies, mr. austin. and now a question. did you tell jacinta what you have told us?" "i certainly did not. to be candid, i hadn't the slightest encouragement. miss brown made it quite clear to me that she hadn't a trace of interest in any of my doings. in fact, she was kind enough to suggest it was rather a pity i escaped the fever, and hadn't come back upon my shield." "for which she will probably be distinctly annoyed with herself by and by. i presume you must catch the spanish steamer, mr. austin?" "of course. after all, i shall be glad to get back. people are not so very exacting in africa, you see." mrs. hatherly nodded, though there was a twinkle in her eyes. "well," she said, "we will talk of something else in the meanwhile. i am alone just now, and you cannot decently leave me." they discussed a good many things, and it seemed to austin that his companion meant to keep him there, and was anxious to gain time. still, he could see no reason for it, and failed to understand her remark about jacinta, and he sat still with an effort until muriel came back again. she appeared a trifle vexed about something. "i don't know what has happened to jacinta, but she wasn't in the least sympathetic," she said. "she wouldn't even listen when i wanted to talk about harry and the _cumbria_." "where is she now?" asked mrs. hatherly. "with the señora anasona. they are going back to laguna directly, though she had, as you know, practically promised to stay with us to-night. the señora, it seems, wants to drive her across to her finca at orotava to-morrow. it is very provoking." mrs. hatherly changed the subject, and it was a minute or two later when she turned to austin again. "i suppose it is really necessary that you should cross to las palmas to-morrow," she said casually. "couldn't you get there in the _estremedura_ before the west-coast boat sailed?" "there are several things i have to do which can't well be arranged here." "you would insist on getting them all done, even if you knew it would cost you something?" "i really think i should. you see, jefferson and the others are practically depending on me, and i daren't omit anything i want, whatever trouble it might cause me, although, as a matter of fact, i don't anticipate any, and it will be rather a relief to get away." "ah!" said mrs. hatherly. "well, i suppose that is only what one would expect from you. muriel, will you tell jacinta that she has not shown me the lace she mentioned, and as i think i'll get the woman at laguna to make me some, i want to see it before she goes away. i shall have to keep you another few minutes, mr. austin." muriel disappeared into the crowd, and it was a little time before she came back again. "jacinta has just driven off with the señora," she said. "i can't quite understand why she didn't come to say good-bye." austin smiled drily. "i think i could guess her reason." mrs. hatherly rose and held out her hand. "if you can come and see us to-morrow, please do so," she said. "if not, you will remember now that whatever happens i am one of your friends." "i shall be glad to do so, madam," and austin made her a little inclination. "good friends are scarce, and there are apparently not many people who believe in me." chapter xx jacinta makes no excuse it was in the heat of the afternoon mrs. hatherly and muriel drove into old-world laguna, which stands high upon the hill slopes above santa cruz. it was built four hundred years ago, and remains but little changed, for its early prosperity ebbed away with the trade in the once famous vintages of canary, so that it stood until a few years ago with the grass in its streets, a place of drowsy stillness, picturesque in its decay, cool, and by no means over clean. beneath it the hillside drops, dusty and sun-scorched, to the sea; but on the plateau behind it are fields of tall sugar-cane, walnuts, eucalyptus, and vines, beyond which again the shoulders of the great peak are seamed by straggling pines. still, when mrs. hatherly drove into it, laguna was once more awakening, for the british tourist had arrived, with his wife and daughters, in blue veils and inartistic raiment that roused the peasants' wonder, besides cameras, and baggage by the carriage load; and when the tourist comes, quietness and the dignified simplicity of olden spain melt before him. the señora anasona, with whom jacinta was then residing, however, belonged to the ancient order, and she had also placed herself and all her possessions at mrs. hatherly's disposal. the latter had already discovered that to be a friend of jacinta's counted for a good deal in those islands. it secured one consideration in unexpected places, and opened doors at which the tweed-clad tourists' wives might knock in vain. the castilian is somewhat behind the times, and, perhaps because he is seldom troubled with much of it, attaches rather less importance than some other people do to the possession of money. muriel, however, was not certain why her aunt had undertaken that hot and dusty drive, although she had informed her that if there was a comfortable hotel in laguna she might stay there a day or two, because she was not sure that santa cruz suited her, and she had been troubled with certain premonitory twinges in one shoulder. in any case, she faced the scorching sun uncomplainingly, and arriving at last before an iron-bound door in a blank white wall, was led through an ill-kept garden, where flowers rioted, a chaos of blazing colour, at their will, into a big, cool house, which seemed filled with slumbrous quietness. she was received by a very reposeful lady of middle age in inconveniently tight-fitting black silk, with the powder thick upon her pallid face. the señora anasona was, as is usual with spanish women who have passed their third decade, somnolent in expression, and portly; but though they could only muster a very little indifferent french between them, she promptly set her guests at ease. "this poor house and all there is in it are yours," she said. "the friends of the señorita jacinta are also mine. since you have known this for some time, why have you stayed away so long?" it was the usual conventional formula in spain, but there was a certain stately graciousness in her gesture which mrs. hatherly had never seen quite equalled before. the latter attempted an appropriate reply in french, and then inquired for jacinta, whereupon her hostess smiled. "she is in the patio, and, perhaps, asleep," she said. "if not, it is likely that she will come in. i do not know. one does what one pleases always in this house of mine, and here one usually sleeps by the afternoon. what would you? it is a custom of the country, and there is nothing else to do. one can dream of the times when it was different with us and spain." "one could fancy in this island that those days have not altogether passed away, or, at least, that they had left something behind," said mrs. hatherly. "one sees it in even your peons' courtesy, and the modesty of the women." "you did not feel that in las palmas?" "no," said mrs. hatherly. "i don't think i did." the señora laughed. "las palmas is not spanish now, my friend. they have coal wharves and harbour works, and heap up the pesetas there. there are, however, things we others would not exchange for silver. this house, for example. an englishman would buy it and make it an hotel." "of course, you would not sell it him?" the señora shook her head. "it is not mine," she said. "it belongs to the anasonas who are dead. one of them built it four hundred years ago, and one of them has lived here always, until my husband, colonel of cazadores, died in cuba. now i live alone, and remember, until by and by my nephew comes here after me. the past is all we have in spain, but one feels that, after all, it may be worth more than the present--when one goes to las palmas." then a maid brought in a basket of grapes and a little wine, and it was some time later when the señora turned to muriel. "it seems that jacinta is not coming in," she said. "perhaps she would sooner see you alone in the patio. i do not know. jacinta does not care about the conventions. she does what pleases her, and it is also very often the right thing. one descends from the veranda outside that window." muriel smiled as she went out, for she was acquainted with jacinta's habits, and was beginning to comprehend the customs of the land she lived in, where time is not considered, and it is always drowsy afternoon. then, though she was not an imaginative person, she trod softly as she went down the steps to the patio, for the influence of the place laid hold on her. the little white town lay silent under the cloudless heavens, and had there been any movement of busy life there, which very seldom happened, the high white walls of the garden would have shut out the sound. the house was also built round the patio in a hollow square, and interposed a double barrier between the outer world and that space of flowers. over it hung bronze-railed balconies, and quaint verandas with old carved pillars and rich trellises smothered in purple bougainvilla, while there were oleanders and heavy scented heliotrope in the little square below. a fountain twinkled in the midst of it, and fat goldfish from palma swam slowly round its marble basin; but all was old, artistic, ill cared for, and steeped in a silence which seemed filled with the reminiscences of bygone years. even jacinta, who lay in a big cane chair near the fountain, appeared in keeping with the atmosphere of the place, for she was dressed in gauzy castilian black, which added a suggestion of old-fashioned stateliness to her somewhat slender figure, and an ebony fan of a kind not made nowadays lay across an open book she had apparently been reading. she looked up with a little smile when she saw muriel, and languidly pointed to the canvas lounge beside her. "it's comfortable, and i think it's strong," she said. "any way, the señora regularly goes to sleep in it. i brought the lounges with me, because they don't have such things in spain. i shall probably leave them here, and if they break down with the señora it is quite certain nobody will ever think of mending them. one folds one's hands and says that it doesn't matter at laguna. you will begin to understand it if you stay here." muriel laughed. "it's often a little hard to tell what you mean," she said. "you have been reading?" "mr. prescott's history of the spanish occupation of mexico--you will, no doubt, be astonished at that?" "i am. still, i have read it, too." jacinta smiled as she unfolded her fan. "i have my moments of relaxation, and can be sentimental now and then. sentiment, you see, is in the atmosphere here. one feels mediæval, as if all the old things of the olden days had come back again, miracles, and crowned virgins that fell from the clouds, valour and knightliness, and man's faith in woman. no doubt there were more, but i don't remember them. they have, of course, gone out of fashion long ago." she spoke lightly, but there was a trace of bitterness in her voice that muriel noticed. "one doesn't find that atmosphere in the book. the men who went with cortez were cruel as well as brutal." "they certainly seem to have been so, which is one reason why they interest me. you see, the spaniards seized these islands a little before they discovered cuba, and i wanted to find out what the men who built these beautiful homes here were really like when they had work on hand. as one would have fancied, the grave, ceremonious don who posed as a most punctilious gentleman at home became a very different kind of person when he went to mexico. the original adam showed up there. it's a useful lesson to any one silly enough to idealise the man she is going to marry." muriel flushed a little. "i think i know what you mean. mr. austin tried to convey the same impression when he told me what they were doing on board the _cumbria_. still, he went a good deal further than you do. he made me understand that, though there are things that could only be done rudely and almost brutally, it was often only what was ideal in the men who did them that sent them to the work at all." "yes," said jacinta drily. "i fancy he would do it rather well. mr. austin is not much of an artist, and would never be a great one; but he has the capacity of understanding, or, perhaps, i should say imagining things. still, the pity is that he usually stops there. he doesn't want to do them, and though he once very rashly tried, he was not long in discovering that the work was a good deal too hard for him. i really think you should be glad there is a trace of primitive--we'll be candid, and call it brutality--in harry jefferson." again the colour showed in muriel's face. "it isn't," she said. "it's only natural forcefulness; but we needn't go into that. i wonder why you are so angry with mr. austin?" "angry?" and jacinta raised her brows. "oh, dear no! still, there are points on which he did not quite come up to my expectations, and after the admonitions i have wasted on him i feel a little annoyed with him." "still, isn't that a trifle unreasonable? what could he have done that he hasn't done? he was ill and worn out, but he wouldn't even stay a day after he got the money." "what money?" and there was a sharp insistency in jacinta's tone. "the money to buy the coal with. they found they hadn't enough, you know." "i don't." "well," said muriel, "it is really your own fault. you wouldn't let me tell you about it in the plaza. mr. austin had to borrow the money from his english relatives, though i think it hurt him horribly to ask them. when he found they would send it he had to catch the first african steamer." jacinta straightened herself suddenly, and gazed at muriel with astonishment and dismay in her face. "so he meant to go back all the time?" she said. "of course," said muriel, and jacinta, sitting back again, sat very still, though her companion noticed that one hand had closed tightly on her fan. "when was he to go?" she asked, with a curious quietness. "in a day or two. he is in las palmas now." then there was a curious silence for almost a minute, and jacinta, who could not rouse herself to break it, was glad to see that muriel had evidently not remembered that her only information about austin's doings was that contained in her father's message. there was no sound but the soft splashing of the fountain, and jacinta found the stillness becoming intolerable. it was a relief when muriel, who felt that her company was not appreciated, rose. "perhaps the señora will expect me to go back," she said. "are you coming?" "i am not," said jacinta. "i have no doubt your aunt will come out to see me presently." muriel looked a little puzzled. "you will not mind my going?" "of course not," and jacinta laughed somewhat curiously. "i have, as you see, a work on mexico to keep me company." muriel left her, and she lay still in the chair listening to the fountain and gazing straight in front of her, until mrs. hatherly came down the veranda stairs alone half an hour later. she sat down and looked at jacinta steadily. "i suppose you know why i have come to laguna to-day?" she said. "yes," said jacinta quietly. "still, i hadn't the faintest notion a little while ago. i shall try to bear anything you may think fit to say to me. mr. austin, i understand, is a friend of yours." the little lady smiled, for she saw that jacinta was clever enough to make no excuses, and she appreciated her candour as well as her good sense. "well," she said, "i want you to tell me why you sent him to africa." "for one thing, because muriel was once very kind to me. mr. jefferson was down with fever, and i fancied that, in any case, he could do a good deal more with a comrade there. still, that was not all. there were other reasons." "naturally. it is gratifying to discover how far a man's devotion will carry him." a little flash crept into jacinta's eyes, but it faded again. "i suppose i deserve that, but you are wrong. it wasn't to soothe my vanity." "no?" and there was a suggestion of incredulity in mrs. hatherly's smile. "still, one may be excused for pointing out that it really looks very like it." jacinta made a little movement with her fan. "you can't think worse of me than i do of myself; but i scarcely fancy i did wrong in sending him. he was wasting his life here, and i thought i knew what there was in him. i wanted to rouse it--to waken him. you see, i am talking very frankly." "in that case it must have cost you something to send him to africa?" the colour showed plainly in jacinta's face. "i think that is another question. one, too, which you could scarcely expect me to answer you." "i'm afraid it was not very delicate," and mrs. hatherly's eyes grew gentler. "still, didn't you feel that you were presumptuous?" "of course; but i have always done what pleased me, and made others do it, too. it usually turned out well, you know. i have, however, come to grief this time, and it would almost be a relief if somebody would shake me." mrs. hatherly smiled. "i fancy the feeling will do you good. still, if you were right in sending mr. austin out, it is just a little incomprehensible." "then you don't know how i treated him?" "no," said mrs. hatherly. "at least, not exactly. he only admitted that you did not seem very pleased to see him. still, i am an old woman, and that naturally conveyed a good deal to me. perhaps you do deserve shaking, but i want to be kind." jacinta turned to her with the colour in her cheeks and a haziness in her eyes. "i taunted him with being a coward and finding the work too hard for him. the man was ill and jaded, but i had no mercy on him. he said nothing; he never told me he was going back. how was i to know? the night my father's message came i felt i could have struck him. if i had done so, he would probably not have felt it half so much as the bitterness i heaped upon him." "ah!" said mrs. hatherly. "it was, perhaps, natural under the circumstances, but there is a good deal that you are responsible for." "what do you mean by under the circumstances?" mrs. hatherly smiled. "i have not the slightest doubt that you quite understand, my dear. the question, however, is how you are going to set it right?" jacinta shivered a little. the colour had already ebbed from her face, which was a trifle more pallid than usual. "it is a thing i may never be able to do," she said. "that is what makes it so hard. you see, a good many men go out to africa, and so few come back again. if it hadn't been for that i don't think i should have admitted what i have done, but i feel i must have somebody's comprehension--if i can't expect sympathy." "you have mine, my dear," and mrs. hatherly laid a beautiful thin hand gently upon her arm. "besides, i think mr. austin will understand how it came about when he goes back to africa." jacinta straightened herself slowly. "well," she said, "that may happen, and in any case i know that i sent him, and he was glad to go." she met the little lady's sympathetic gaze steadily. "still, that is so very little, after all." mrs. hatherly smiled reassuringly. "my dear," she said, "i think you do not quite understand all that man is yet. in spite of the climate he and his comrade are going to be successful." then she turned, and jacinta rose, for the señora anasona and muriel were coming down the stairway. chapter xxi the pictures austin had been gone a fortnight when jacinta and muriel gascoyne sat under the lee of the _estremedura_'s deck-house one morning, on their way to las palmas. above them the mastheads swung languidly athwart a cloudless sweep of blue, and the sea frothed in white incandescence about the lurching hull below as the little yacht-like steamer reeled eastwards with a rainbow in the spray that whirled about her bows. astern of her the peak's white cone gleamed above its wrappings of fleecy mist, and ahead on the far horizon grand canary swam a purple cloud. jacinta was dressed ornately in the latest english mode, and it seemed to muriel that she had put on conventional frivolity along with her attire. indeed, muriel had noticed a change in her companion during the last few days, one that was marked by outbreaks of flippancy and somewhat ironical humour. an english naval officer leaned upon the back of her chair, and a tourist of the same nationality stood balancing himself against the rolling with his hand on the rail that ran along the deck-house. the latter was looking down at macallister, who sat upon the deck with a little box in front of him. "i brought up the two or three sketches ye were asking for, mr. coulstin," he said. "the saloon's full of jabbering spaniards, and the messroom's over hot." the tourist screwed the glass he wore more tightly into his eye. "if they're equal to the one i saw in the n. w. a. store i may be open to make a purchase," he said. "i think you told me you were acquainted with the artist, miss brown?" "i believe i did," said jacinta, who was conscious that macallister was watching her languidly. "you will, however, no doubt be able to judge his pictures for yourself." coulston made a little humourous gesture. "i am not a painter, and i could scarcely venture to call myself a connoisseur. still, i buy a picture or two occasionally, and the one i mentioned rather took my fancy. a sketch or two of that kind would make a pleasant memento." "one would fancy that a good photograph would be more reliable, as well as cheaper," said the naval officer. coulston reproachfully shook his head. "i'm afraid we differ there," he said. "leaving out the question of colour, a photograph is necessarily an artificial thing. it wants life and atmosphere, and you can never put that into a picture by a mechanical process. only a man can feel, and transmute his impressions into material. accuracy of detail is, after all, by comparison, a secondary consideration, but perhaps i had better pull up before my hobby makes a bolt of it." "i have heard of people riding a hobby uncomfortably hard," said jacinta reflectively. "that, i think, is, to be accurate, seldom what happens. if a man has a genuine hobby, it never needs spurring. it is, in fact, unpleasantly apt to run away with him on the smallest provocation. are steamboat men addicted to making sketches, mr. macallister?" "no," said macallister, grinning. "at least its not the usual thing, but i once sailed with another of them who did. he was second engineer, and would draw the chief one day. it was very like him, so like that it cost the man his job, and a wife as well. says he, 'how could ye expect me to idealise a man with a mouth like yon?'" "but how did that affect his wife?" asked the officer. macallister grinned more broadly, but it was jacinta he looked at. "ye see," he said, "he had not got one then. he was second engineer, and would have gone chief in a new boat if he'd stayed with that company. the young woman was ambitious, and she told him she would not marry him until he was promoted, on principle. he was a long while over it after he lost that berth, and then--also on principle--he would not marry her." jacinta laughed, though muriel fancied she had seen a momentary hardening of her face. "she probably deserved it, though one can't help concluding that she wouldn't feel it much," she said. "that is one of the advantages of being a practical person; but hadn't you better get the drawings out?" macallister took out a sketch in water-colour and held it up. it showed a strip of a steamer's deck, with the softened sunlight beating down through an awning upon a man in skipper's uniform who lay, cigar in hand, in a hammock that swung beneath the spars. he was, to judge from his expression, languidly contented with everything, and there was a big glass of amber-coloured liquid on the little table beside him, and a tier of bottles laid out upon the deck. beneath it ran the legend, "for men must work." "that," said jacinta, "is, at least, what they tell their wives." the tourist gazed at the drawing, and then turned to her. he was, as she had discovered already, a painfully didactic person. "the conceit," he said, "is a somewhat happy one, though the sketch is, it seems to me, a little weak in technique. as we admitted, one difference between a photograph and a painting is that the artist records his own sensations in the latter, and stamps it with, at least, a trace of his individuality. in that respect the sketch is, i fancy, characteristic. the artist, one could imagine, was in full sympathy with his subject--the far niente--but i am, no doubt, getting prosy." for no very apparent reason a little flush of colour crept into jacinta's face, and macallister, who saw it, chuckled as he took out another sketch. "well," he said, reflectively, "i never met a man who could do nothing more gracefully than mr. austin, but i'll let ye see the rest of them, since they're in my charge to sell. mr. austin, who wants the money, took a sudden notion he'd go to africa, and, if they've had a quick run, he's now humping palm oil puncheons in a stranded steamer's hold. i'm thinking it will be a big change for him." the naval officer laughed softly. "from what i know of the tropics i fancy you are right. in fact, it's rather difficult to imagine the man i met at the bull fight doing that kind of thing at all. salvage work is necessarily hard under any circumstances, and anywhere, but the last place i would care to attempt it in is western africa. what sent--him--there?" "ye must not ask me," and a little twinkle, for which jacinta longed to shake him, crept into macallister's eyes. "now, there are clever folks who will look at a man, or maybe talk to him awhile, and then label him, thinking they know just what to expect of him. it does him no great harm, and it pleases them, until one day he does something that astonishes them in spite of his label. then they're apt to get angry with him. a man, ye see, is, after all, not that unlike an engine. ye cannot tell what may be going on in the inside of him, and when the result's distressing it's most often the fault of injudicious handling." jacinta, to whom he apparently directed his observations, contrived to regard him with a little smile, and he proceeded to extricate another sketch, a canvas this time. "this one is different," he said. coulston, who apparently concurred with him, gazed at the picture with a trace of astonishment. it showed a big cargo lancha lurching out, deep-loaded, through a fringe of tumbling surf with four men straining at the ponderous oars. the wet rags they wore clung about their limbs, and there was weariness in their grim, brown faces. bent backs and set lips had their significance, and the sketch was stamped with the suggestion of endurance and endeavour. yet, as those who saw it felt, there was triumph in it, too, for while the rollers came seething in to hurl her back the lancha was clawing off the shore. "it's good!" said the navy man. "it's unusually good. those fellows are played out, and they know if they slacken down for a moment she'll roll over with them or go up on the beach. the sea's running in against her--one finds out by trying it how hard it is to pull off against a surf--but they're driving her out. presumably, that's what you call the motive of the thing." the tourist nodded appreciatively. "yes," he said. "in spite of certain faults in drawing, it's well worked out. what puzzles me is how the man who did the other one came to feel it as he evidently did. one could fancy he had had a revelation, and that in some respects he was a different man when he painted this. i'll offer you five guineas for it, mr. macallister." "then," said macallister, promptly, "ye can have it. eight guineas for the two, if ye would like the other one. there are two or three more of them here ye might care to look at." he stopped a moment, and added, as if in explanation: "i'm anxious to do what i can for mr. austin. many's the time i've stole his wine and sold his clothes." he undid a package, and, first of all, took out a photograph of a young girl with a comely english face, which jacinta glanced at somewhat sharply. then she became intent when there followed several rudimentary pencil and pastel sketches of herself, until macallister handed coulston a picture. he turned from it to jacinta, and looked at her with a steadiness a young woman less accustomed to masculine criticism would probably have found disconcerting. she lay smiling at him in the canvas lounge, very pretty and very dainty, with conventional indifference expressed even in her pose. she was, he fancied, a woman who knew her world thoroughly, and had the greater influence therein because she seldom asked too much from it. then he glanced again at her portrait almost incredulously, for it showed the little shapely head held well erect, the red lips straightened and firmly closed, and the glow of a strenuous purpose in the eyes. stooping, he laid the picture on her knees with a little smile. jacinta laughed softly. "yes," she said, "of course, i know what you mean. i am essentially modern and frivolous, and not in the least like that. still, you see, all of us have our serious moments now and then, although it is probably fortunate they don't last long." "ah," said coulston, wilfully neglecting his opportunity, "i almost fancy a light breaks in on me. one could entitle this inspiration, and it is, you know, possible to transmit it occasionally. i wonder whether it would make the idea clearer if we placed the three pictures together. mr. macallister will permit me?" he set up the first sketch of the steamboat skipper against the lifeboat skids, and gazed at it critically. "assuming that a picture contains something of its painter's ego, you will observe how the idea of petty indulgence and his appreciation of sensual comfort is impressed on one," he said. "now we will set up the other sketch of the sailormen. there you see restraint, tense effort, abnegation--and victory--in one sense a spiritual triumph over the body. it is an interesting question how the man who painted both could have been brought to grasp what lieutenant onslow calls the motive of the last one; but if we might venture to place another picture between." jacinta raised her head sharply, and there was an ominous sparkle in her eyes. "no," she said, with quiet incisiveness, "i would sooner you didn't. there are certainly men whose hobby, now and then, runs away with them. macallister, will you put that portrait back again?" she handed it him face downwards, for the others had not seen it, and lieutenant onslow turned to the tourist. "i don't quite understand, but i fancy miss brown doesn't approve of vivisection any more than i do," he said. "it really isn't decent to turn anybody inside out." "i wonder," said coulston, ignoring him, "if you would mind my offering to buy the three?" he was looking steadily at her, but jacinta contrived for a moment to catch macallister's eye. so swift was the flashed glance that the tourist did not notice it, but jacinta could convey a good deal with a look, and the engineer was a man of considerable intelligence. "that one is not for sale," he said. "no," said onslow, who held up a strip of pasteboard and a sheet of brown paper, "i scarcely think it is. in fact, you don't appear to have noticed that there's a seal on this part of it, and instructions that this particular packet is not to be opened." it seemed to muriel that a trace of colour once more crept into jacinta's face, but macallister surveyed the wrappings the officer handed him with a grin. "it is not that difficult to slice a seal off and stick it back again," he said. "it's also a thing mr. austin should have remembered. many a garafon of wine has he seen opened." "so you know that trick!" onslow laughed. "i'm inclined to think it's one that has now and then been practised upon our mess." just then mrs. hatherly appeared on deck, and the group broke up. muriel joined her aunt, macallister, accompanied by the tourist, went down the ladder with the box of sketches under his arm, while jacinta and lieutenant onslow were left alone. the latter stood with his hand on the lifeboat skids, looking down on her gravely. he was a well-favoured young man, with an honest, sun-bronzed face. "i am," he said, "as you know, going out to take over command of a west-coast gunboat in a day or two, and it is more than probable that i shall not have an opportunity like this again. you see, nasmyth and i have had a very good time in these islands, and we feel that we owe it largely to you. in fact, it's perfectly clear to us that things would have been very different if you hadn't taken us under your gracious protection. i just want to say that we recognise it, and feel grateful." "well," said jacinta, reflectively, "i am rather glad you do. gratitude that is worth anything carries a certain sense of obligation with it." "of course!" and onslow smiled. "only give me the chance of doing anything i can for you." "do you know whereabouts on the west-coast the delgado island lies?" "i can readily find out." jacinta glanced at him sharply, and had no doubt concerning the eagerness in his face. if there was anything he could do to please her it would certainly be done. "there is a stranded steamer somewhere up a creek behind that island, and i think the men who are trying to salve her have a good many difficulties to contend with. among other things, i fancy the niggers are worrying them." "ah!" said onslow. "our ships are not, as a rule, permitted to take any part in commercial ventures, but there are, of course, exceptions to everything. according to my instructions, i am also to avoid all unpleasantness with the seaboard niggers unless they have been provoking the authorities. still, i would like to ask if any of the men on board that steamer is a friend of yours?" "one of them is miss gascoyne's affianced lover, and she is a very old friend indeed. however, since you are apparently unable----" onslow checked her with a little smile. "i'm not sure you are really willing to let me off, and if you were, i shouldn't be pleased, while i scarcely think you have answered my question very frankly, either. that, however, doesn't matter. it is permissible for the commander of a coast patrol gunboat to send a pinnace in to survey a little known creek or channel, and her crew would, of course, be guided by circumstances if they came upon a stranded steamer." "i presume you would not care to earn muriel's undying gratitude by being a trifle more definite?" "no," said onslow, with twinkling eyes. "i esteem miss gascoyne's good opinion, but i really couldn't go any further to win yours. as i pointed out, one would be guided by circumstances; but men on board stranded steamers have been supplied with drugs and provisions, as well as lent naval artificers to advise them as to repairs. i have even heard of a gunboat's launch carrying out their hawsers and anchors." jacinta rose with a little smile. "i think one could leave it with confidence to your discretion, and since it seems very likely that you will come across that steamer, i should be pleased to have your views as to the selection of a few comforts and provisions." onslow favoured her with them, and, as it happened, met macallister when at last he went down the ladder. "ye are going out to africa, too?" said the latter, with a grin. "she has been giving ye sailing instructions?" onslow looked at him grimly. "well," he said, "what the devil has that to do with you?" "oh, nothing. just nothing at all. still, because i see ye are willing, i would have ye know that there are--two--men from grand canary on board yon steamer already." onslow smiled a trifle drily. "my dear man, i'm not altogether an ass," he said. in the meanwhile muriel strolled back towards jacinta, and glanced at her with a suggestion of astonishment in her face as she sat down. "you are different from what you were a little while ago," she said. jacinta laughed. "i daresay i am. i had, as a matter of fact, sunk into a state of pessimistic apathy, which naturally found expression in ill-humoured pleasantries lately, but i have been getting to work again. it has rather a bracing effect, you see. in the meanwhile, it might be advisable for you to make yourself as nice as possible to lieutenant onslow, who is now coming up on deck again. go and ask him to show you a flying fish, or something." muriel went, for she had discovered that there was usually a sufficient reason for most of what jacinta did, and the latter lay still in her chair. "there is," she said, "still a fly in the amber. i wonder what he wanted with that photograph, though, after all, he didn't think it worth while carrying to africa." chapter xxii funnel-paint's proposition deep stillness hung over the dingy mangroves, and there was not a breath of air astir, while austin, who lay among the palm oil puncheons beside the creek, was oppressed by a sense of suffocation. a few yards away two spaniards lay, apparently asleep, huddled, shapeless heaps of ragged clothing, beneath a strip of tarpaulin raised on poles, and it was then, though there was no sun visible, a little past the hottest part of the afternoon. a yellow vapour that seemed suffused with heat had obscured the heavens for a week or more, and the swamps lay sweltering beneath it waiting for the rain. austin longed for it ardently, for there was an almost unendurable tension in the atmosphere. he had shaken off the fever, but he was worn and dazed by toil, for the strain was not without its effect upon him, and he had become subject to curious tricks of fancy. he had brought the coal from dakar, and it now lay piled upon a down river beach; but he had obtained only two or three men, and the steamy heat of the swamp belt had melted the sustaining energy out of the _cumbria_'s company. individually, he felt that it was a hopeless struggle they were making. they had untrammelled nature against them, and, he could almost fancy, the malevolent spirits of the bush the negroes believed in. a man, he admitted, could believe in anything in that country, and he had of late been troubled by a feeling that something sinister and threatening was hovering near him. he was unpleasantly conscious of it then, which was partly why he lay raised on his elbow, with his eyes fixed on the bush that shut in the narrow strip of land. it rose before him, laced with tangled creepers, mysterious, and shadowy, and it seemed to him that somebody or something was watching him from its dim recesses. he had been conscious of the same sensation when he plodded with a spanish seaman along the narrow trail to the dug up beach, an hour earlier, but it was stronger now, and instinctively he slipped his hand into a pocket where the pistol he had bought in grand canary lay. then he laughed in a listless fashion, for they had seen no more of the negroes since the blowing up of the headman's house, and he felt that he had not them to fear. there was, in fact, no tangible cause for apprehension at all. presently something seemed to materialise amidst the shadows where the creepers streamed from a cottonwood in dense festoons, and, lying still, with fingers closing on the pistol, he could almost fancy he made out a dim human form. there was, at least, one black patch among the leaves that suggested greasy naked skin. it vanished again, however, and austin, who felt his heart beating, abused the intolerable glare the sand flung up that dazzled his vision, and then stiffened himself in tenser watchfulness as for a moment he made out a pair of rolling eyes. the creepers rustled, a twig snapped, and he was about to call out, when one of the canarios raised himself a trifle. "ave maria!" he said, with drowsy hoarseness, and, though the words are frequently used to express astonishment in his country, it was evident that he meant them as a pious appeal. in any case, the creepers became suddenly still again, and austin, who rose a trifle stiffly, found nothing when he pushed his way through the midst of them. there was no sound in the steamy bush, not a leaf seemed bruised or bent, and he went back again, with the perspiration dripping from him. nevertheless, he was annoyed to notice that the canario was watching him curiously. "nothing!" he said, with a dramatic gesture. "nothing that one can see." "what do you mean?" asked austin sharply. the canario flung out an arm again. "who knows! though one cannot see it, it comes now and then. there are evil things in this land of the devil, and the saints are very far away. this is no place for them." austin sat down again and took out his pipe. he felt that there was nothing to be gained by continuing the discussion, for of late he had become almost superstitiously apprehensive himself. he lay watching the bush for another hour, and then, though it was the last thing he had intended, went to sleep. he had borne a heavy strain, and his will was weakening. it was dark when he was awakened by a splash of paddles as the _cumbria_'s surfboat crept up the creek with the relief watch, and another hour had passed when they made the craft fast alongside the gangway and climbed wearily on board the steamer. there was no sound or light on board her, for half the crew were sick, and the pump had stopped. she lay, a black mass, amidst the sliding mist, and he stumbled over the kernel bags upon her slanted deck as he groped his way to his room in the poop. it was seldom he or jefferson slept soundly now, and as they only awakened each other, austin had moved to a room aft. he lighted the oil lamp and flung himself, dressed as he was, into his berth, but found he could not sleep, though he could not remember how long he lay awake listening. he could hear mysterious splashings in the forest and the low gurgle of the creek, while now and then a timber creaked, or a drop of moisture fell from the iron beams with a splash that startled him. at last, when his eyes were growing heavy, there was a different and very faint sound on deck, and as he raised himself the door that stood a little open swung back gently. the lamp was still burning, for he found the light comforting, as white men are occasionally apt to do in that country, and it was with a little gasp of relief he felt for the pistol beneath his pillow as funnel-paint came in. he was almost naked, and the water ran from him, but the strip of cloth about his loins was bound by a leather belt, with a sheath hung to it such as seamen wear, and the knife from the latter gleamed in his wet hand. he, however, dropped it upon the deck, and squatted on the water-ledge that rose a foot beneath the door. austin watched him quietly, for he was, at least, not afraid of funnel-paint. "what the devil do you want?" he said. "halluf them gum," said the negro, with a wicked grin. "how are we to give it you when we haven't found a bag of it?" the negro grinned again. "s'pose i done tell you where him lib?" "if you knew why didn't you get it for yourself?" funnel-paint shook his head. "them book i got savvy--i no savvy make him tell me," he said. "you dash me halluf them gum you get them book." austin lay silent, resting on one elbow, for a moment or two. he knew that book means anything which is written on in that country, and it occurred to him that if the gum had been hidden ashore, it was very probable that the man who buried it had made a rough sketch or other record of the spot. the document, it was conceivable, might have come into the negro's possession. still, he was suspicious. "there's another boy who speaks english in the headman's village," he said. "him only dam bushman--no savvy book, no savvy anyt'ing. him them headman's boy. headman he want everyt'ing." "ah!" said austin, who was more dubious about his visitor's good faith than ever, since it was clear that it was his intention to trick his confederate out of his share of the plunder. "i suppose, since you swam off, you haven't the book about you?" the negro let one eyelid droop a little. "you t'ink black man one dam fool?" "no," said austin, reflectively, "if you understand me, i should rather call you an infernal rogue. any way, you lib for get out one time, and come back to-morrow. i'll palaver with them other white man by then, savvy?" funnel-paint unobtrusively laid a wet prehensile toe upon the haft of the knife, but austin, who was careful not to betray the fact, noticed it. "them other white man he do go dash me anyt'ing," he said decisively. "i savvy him. s'pose you done tell him you no go catch them book?" "then how do you fancy i'm going to give you half the gum without his knowing?" funnel-paint grinned unpleasantly. "bimeby them white cappy man he die," he said, as though he were sure of it. "white man sick too much in dis country. i savvy." austin contrived to hold in check the indignant wrath he felt. a man's life, he was quite aware, was worth very little in those swamps; and, because he placed some small value on the one that belonged to him, it was evidently advisable to proceed circumspectly. funnel-paint was, he recognised, a diplomatist in his way, and had said very little, though that was sufficient to show austin what his proposition meant. it was, at least, clear that he was to ask no questions if anything unexpected happened to jefferson, and in reward of this he would be permitted to carry off half the gum. it appeared that funnel-paint was sure of its existence, or he would never have ventured to creep on board at night at all, and austin decided that since he certainly could not be trusted, the boldest course was best. the rage he felt also prompted him to it, and he lay still, considering, with a hand beneath the pillow, and a flush in his face, while the negro squatted, huge and motionless, on the door-ledge, watching him with a little cunning smile. it seemed to austin that it would simplify matters considerably if he could secure funnel-paint's person, though he could not quite see how it was to be done, especially since it was evident that the negro would be no use to them dead. in the meanwhile there was deep stillness without, intensified by the oily gurgle of the creek, until austin fancied he heard another faint and stealthy sound on deck. funnel-paint did not appear to notice it, which was, it seemed to austin, significant, for he sat still, though with a scarcely perceptible motion he drew the knife a little nearer to him with his toe. austin decided that the proposition he had made was, after all, probably a blind, and the friends he had expected were now arriving. "keep still!" he said abruptly, whipping out the pistol. the negro started, and would apparently have fallen backwards in his alarm had he not seized the edge of the cushion on the settee in a wet hand. then he gazed at austin as though in bewilderment or consternation. "bushman lib!" he said. he glanced towards the open ring of the port, and for a second austin turned his eyes in the same direction, but that was long enough, for the big cushion of the settee fell upon his head, and he rolled over under it. it was a moment or two before he had flung it from him and sprung out of his berth, and then there was no sign of funnel-paint, though he could hear a rush of feet and the sound of a scuffle on deck. they were also booted feet, and austin ran out into the black darkness beneath the poop. he could see nothing for a moment, but he heard a hoarse ejaculation that was followed by a splash in the creek. then a shadowy figure grew out of the blackness, and he dropped the pistol to his side at the sound of an english voice. "all right, mr. austin?" it said. "i am," said austin. "is that you, bill?" the half-seen man assured him that it was, and then followed him back into the lighted room, where he sat down and held up a hand from which a red trickle dripped down his arm. "the dam brute's got away," he said. "p'r'aps you could fix this up for me." austin lugged a little chest out from under the settee, and glanced at the injured hand. "nothing serious, though i have no doubt it stings," he said. "you were in one sense lucky in getting it there. how did you happen to come along?" "it was my watch," said bill. "i had just come down from the bridge-deck when i thought i heard talking, and that brought me here as quietly as i could. if i'd had the sense to take my boots off i'd have had him. i gripped him by the rail, but he shoved the knife into my hand and slung himself over." austin bound his hand up, and then looked at him thoughtfully. "i don't think there's anything to be gained by letting the others know," he said. "any way, i'd consider it a favour if you said nothing about the thing until i've talked it over with mr. jefferson." bill grinned comprehendingly. "i'll tell tom, but nobody else. we have our own little row with the vermin, and the next time i get my grip on him there'll be an end of him!" he went out, and by and by austin contrived to go to sleep, while it was next day, and they sat in the dripping engine room, from which the water was sinking, when he told jefferson what had passed. the latter listened thoughtfully, and then broke into a little hollow laugh. "it seems to me that you missed your chance," he said. "funnel-paint knows a good deal--i have guessed that for some time--but he has found out he can't get at the gum without one of us helping him, at last. that is probably why he has left us alone so long. he wasn't sure whether there was any of it on board the ship, and was, naturally, willing that we should decide that point for him." "what would he gain by that?" asked austin. "the gum!" and jefferson laughed again, but not pleasantly. "he's an inconsequent devil, but he seems to have scraped up a little sense as he went on with the game. you see, white men are apt to die off suddenly in this country, and i scarcely think that anybody who could make trouble knows we're here. any way, there's no unusual need for worry. it only means double watches." "still, one could fancy you had a good deal on your mind." "i have. we have stripped this ship all but the engine room to the ballast tanks--there was, you may remember, a manhole lid lifted on the forward one, which may account for some of the water getting in--and the five hundred dollars i raised the offer to hasn't produced a pound of gum. half the men are down now, and we can't send them all away, while even if we wanted to they're most of them unwilling to go. they're as keen on their share--and it's quite a big one--as i am. then we'll have the rains on us in a week or two." austin sat silent awhile. he knew that the feverish search for the treasure had stirred the cupidity of the latins until they were as determined on finding it as their leader. nothing else was thought of, the sick men raved of it, and, in any case, those who had held out so long and staunchly had their percentage on the value of the steamer's hull and cargo to gain. it meant comparative affluence to the barefooted sailormen. that, however, was only one side of the question, after all, for while their willingness was evident, their physical capacity for work was lessening every day. "the rains will flood every beach," he said. "if we don't find the gum before they come, what then?" "if it's necessary, we'll stay here until the water falls again. that is, at least, some of us will." austin rose up slowly with a little sign of comprehension. two men had been buried while he was away, and he did not think that many of them would be left there to see the waters fall. chapter xxiii funnel-paint moves again a week had slipped by since the negro's visit, and austin and jefferson were sitting late in the skipper's room. there had been no change in the weather, and it was then, if possible, hotter than ever. the muggy land breeze had died away, and a thick woolly mist shut the stranded steamer in. door and ports were open wide, but the oil lamp that hung beneath the beams burned unwaveringly, and the ray of light that streamed out from the doorway made the blackness outside more apparent. the big pump was running behind the deck-house, and its deep vibratory humming rang startlingly through a stillness so intense that it seemed unnatural, as it hurled the water out of the engine room. austin sat huddled in a corner, attired only in duck trousers, and torn singlet which came no lower than his elbows, and, for want of buttons, fell open at his neck. he had an unusually clean skin, and his sun-scorched lower arms and scarred hands, with the battered knuckles and broken nails, emphasised by contrast the clear whiteness of his half-covered chest. that night it was beaded with perspiration, for which he was sincerely thankful, since there are times in the tropics when the healing moisture fails to find its way through the fevered skin, and its afflicted owner burns in torment. jefferson sat on the little table, a blackened pipe in his hand, and the listless pose of both suggested that the last trace of energy had been sapped out of them. at last austin laughed, hollowly and dejectedly. "i don't know why we're sitting here saying nothing when we have to begin again at five o'clock to-morrow, but i don't feel like sleep," he said. "in fact, i scarcely think i've slept for more than a couple of hours at a time since i came back again. i suppose i ought to be in the forecastle now--four or five of them seemed very sick when i last looked in--but there's an abominable tension in the air that makes any exertion out of the question." jefferson nodded. "you can't do anything for them, and there's nobody we could spare to send with them down river," he said. "they've got to take their chances with the rest of us now, and it seems to me one might figure them out as three or four to one if the rains don't come. still, if you don't want to do anything, why can't you keep still?" "i don't know," and austin, who had been rolling a damp cigar in his fingers, flung it down. "if that pump stopped i should probably make an exhibition of myself. the hum and thump it makes has a soothing effect on me. it's suggestive. even here man has something to say. i don't know whether you understand me." jefferson looked at him curiously. "i guess i do. i'd mix myself a good strong pick-me-up if i were you. you have had something on your mind the last day or two." "i have," said austin. "i'm afraid of that infernal funnel-paint, i think. i can't help a fancy that we haven't done with him yet; and, though the connection isn't very apparent, the fact that the first thing we came across after landing when i came out was a dead nigger, insists on obtruding itself on my recollection. bill told me he was singularly unpleasant to look at." jefferson contrived to laugh. "you take that pick-me-up, and in the meanwhile let up on your reminiscences. things of that kind aren't cheerful--and i'm worried by one or two of them myself." austin, who stooped and picked up the cigar, settled himself afresh on the settee after lighting it, and half an hour dragged by. neither of them felt the least sign of drowsiness yet, and the jingle of the odds and ends in the rack, and tremble of the stout teak house, was, as he had said, vaguely reassuring. the big pump was pounding on in spite of the climate, and neither heat nor fever had any effect on steam. then he looked up sharply, and jefferson straightened himself, for a faint sound of footsteps came out of the darkness. they were slow and dragging, as though somebody was groping his way warily towards the light. "on deck!" said the american. "what d'you want? are you there, wall-eye? que hay?" there was no answer, but the shuffling steps drew nearer, slowly and falteringly, as though whatever made them was but indifferently capable of motion. there was also something unpleasantly suggestive about them, and austin now sat very straight, while he saw that jefferson's lips were pressed together. there was no apparent reason why they should shrink from what was coming, but austin, at least, felt his nerves tingling. he was overwrought, and white men are apt to become fanciful when they work too hard in the fever swamps. it is a land where one realises the presence of influences beyond the definition of human reason, and he afterwards admitted that he was afraid. "mil diablos!" said jefferson. "ven aca! what are you after, outside there?" there was still no answer, though a clatter of booted feet now rose from the iron deck. it drowned the other footfalls, and austin found that clang of nailed shoes curiously reassuring. then a figure that swayed from side to side emerged from the blackness and stood mowing in the stream of light. "good lord!" said jefferson, with horror in his voice. "slam that door to. keep it out!" austin rose with a sense of sudden sickness, but the figure had moved again, and now stood with one foot inside the room and a horrible hand on the door-jamb, leering at them. it had the shape of a man, but the resemblance ended there, for there was no sign of human intelligence in the awful face. the thing had no eyebrows, the hair had almost gone, and nose and cheeks were formless with corruption, while naked chest and arms were smeared with festering scars. austin stood still, shivering, with one hand clenched hard on the table, until jefferson snatched a glinting object from his bunk. "good lord!" he said again. "it's coming in!" the figure seemed to brace itself for another move forwards, and austin saw jefferson straighten himself slowly with a big pistol in his hand. he did not remember what his comrade said, but the negro seemed to recoil instinctively before his fierce ejaculation, and, lurching backwards, faded into a formless shadow in the gloom again. then jefferson's hand fell upon austin's shoulder. "shake yourself! there's something to be done," he said. "they have a light forward, and we can't have--that thing--groping among them in the forecastle." they went out, and as they did so a sudden glare of light sprang up. tom, the donkey-man, had lighted the air-blast lamp he used when anything had to be done to pump or boiler at night, and its smoky radiance showed that jefferson's shouts had roused the spaniards. they were clustered, half dressed, about the head of the ladder which led to the bridge deck, with consternation in their shadowy faces, glancing at one another as though afraid to move a step further. tom leaned against the rail, holding up the lamp, and the thing that had the shape of a man sat gibbering on a coil of hawser in the midst of the bridge deck. the eyes of all who stood there were fixed upon it, but nobody seemed anxious to come any nearer. jefferson, standing very straight, opened the breech of his pistol, ran a finger across the back of the chamber, and then closed it with a little snap which, though the pump was humming, sounded startlingly distinct. his lips were tightly set, and his face was very grim. the loathsome figure on the rope mowed and grinned at him. "i suppose the thing was human--once," he said. "still, we can't have it here. these complaints are contagious, one understands, but i wish it hadn't happened. he's too like a man." he dropped the pistol to his side, as though his nerve had momentarily failed him, and austin, who suddenly grasped his purpose, sprang forward as he raised it again. "hold on!" he said. "do you realise what it is you propose to do?" jefferson turned to him slowly, and there was a curious stillness among those who watched them. austin was glad of the hum of the big pump and the pounding of the engine, for he felt that silence would have made the tension unendurable. then jefferson smiled, a little wry smile. "i know," he said, a trifle hoarsely, "it isn't nice to think of, but it's no more than happens to a superfluous kitten--and it's necessary. heaven knows what the poor devil suffered before he came to this, and we don't want to. he's animate carrion without reason or sensibility now. it was only the light brought him here when funnel-paint somehow sent him within sight of us." austin saw that this was true. there was no glimmer of human intelligence in the creature's wandering gaze, but he still bore the shape of a man, and that counted for a good deal, after all. "jefferson," he said, "it can't be done!" his comrade looked at him with half-closed eyes. "would you wish to live if you looked like that, or do you want the rest of us to find out what he went through? i'm responsible for those men yonder--and it's only antedating the thing a month or two. the life is almost rotted out of him. stand clear! we must get it over!" it was evident that the spaniards understood what he meant to do, and a murmur of concurrence rose from them, for they knew a little about the more loathsome forms of skin diseases. men who might have escaped from the sepulchre walk abroad in the hot southern countries, where restraint is unknown and salt fish is a staple food, but, though they have often themselves to blame, the innocent also suffer in western africa, and none of those who stood by, tense and strung up, had ever seen a man who looked quite as this one did. then, as jefferson raised his pistol, austin seized him by the shoulder and shook him in a sudden outbreak of fury. "you're right," he said, "but you shall not do it! you hear me? put the ---- thing down!" then there was a sudden clamour, and as the canarios ran forward jefferson struggled vainly. austin never knew where his strength came from, but in another moment the pistol slipped from his comrade's hand, and, reeling backwards, he struck the deck-house. austin stood in front of him, with hands clenched, and the veins swollen high on his forehead, panting hard. "it has come to this," he said. "if you move a step, i'll heave you over the rail! i've strength enough to break your back to-night!" jefferson straightened himself slowly, and waved back the others who were clustering round. then he smiled, and made a little gesture of resignation. "i believe you have, but that's not quite the point," he said. "it's the only thing you have ever asked me, and, if nothing else will satisfy you, you shall have him. you don't suppose it isn't a relief to me? the question is, what you're going to do with him? you see, he can't stay here." that, at least, was evident, and for a moment or two austin gazed about him stupidly as he grappled with the difficulty. the stricken man still squatted, unconcerned, upon the hawser, mowing and grimacing, while he clawed at the hemp in a fashion that suggested the antics of a pleased animal, with swollen hands. the rest stood still, well apart from him, with expectancy overcoming the repulsion they felt. then tom, the donkey-man, who was nearest the rail, held up his flaring lamp. "there's the canoe he come in still alongside aft," he said. austin gasped with relief. "heave down a bunch of the red bananas we got up the creek," he said. "he'll know they are good to eat." it was done, and jefferson smiled again grimly. "that," he said, "is easy. still, have you figured how he is to be gotten into the canoe? you are hardly going to make him understand what he is to do." "there's only one way. he must be put into it. under the circumstances, it's only fitting that i should undertake the thing." "no!" and jefferson's voice rang sharply. "not you! offer any of the rest of them fifty dollars!" austin smiled. "to take a risk i'm responsible for? i think not. i went sufficiently far when i brought some of them here. besides, it's comforting to remember you mayn't be right about the thing being contagious, after all." jefferson looked at him hard a moment, with the fingers of one hand closed, and then made a little sign. "well," he said, "if you feel it that way, there's probably nothing to be gained by protesting. there are disadvantages in being leader." austin turned and touched the negro with his foot, while he pointed to the ladder. "get up! you lib for canoe one time!" he said. the negro mowed and gibbered meaninglessly, and austin, stooping, grasped his shoulder, which was clean. with an effort he dragged him to his feet, and, while the rest fell back from them, drove the man towards the head of the ladder. then one of them slipped, and there was a cry of horror from the rest as the negro clutched the white man, and they rolled down the ladder into the darkness below together. tom ran towards the rail with his lamp, and as jefferson leaned out from them he saw austin shake off the negro's engirdling grasp. "get up!" he said hoarsely, and stirred him with his foot again. the man rose half upright, stumbled, and, straightening himself, moved towards the open gangway with a lurch. then he vanished suddenly and there was a crash below. austin leaned out through the opening, and his voice rose harsh and strained: "come down, one of you, and cut this warp! the devil's hanging on!" he said. wall-eye, the canario, sprang down with his knife, and when austin climbed back to the bridge deck the men clustering along the rails saw a canoe with a shadowy object lying in the stern of her slide through the blaze of radiance cast by the blast-lamp and vanish into the blackness outside it. then tom put out the light, and a hoarse murmur of relief rose out of the darkness. a minute or two later austin stood, a trifle grey in face, in the doorway of the skipper's room, and stepped back suddenly when jefferson approached him. "keep off!" he said. "give me the permanganate out of the side drawer. i left it there. miguel, bring me the clothes you washed out of my room in the poop, and fill me a bucket." the last was in castilian, and one of the canarios went scrambling down the ladder, while when he came back with an armful of duck clothing jefferson held out a jar to his comrade. "no!" said austin sharply. "put it down!" jefferson did as he was bidden, and austin, who stripped the thin garments from him and flung them over the rail, shook the permanganate into the bucket, and then, standing stark naked, when it had dissolved, sluiced himself all over with the pink solution. it was ten minutes later when he stepped into the room, dripping, with a wet rag about his waist, and shook his head when jefferson handed him a towel. "i think not," he said. "if there's any efficacy in the thing, i may as well let it dry in. after all, it's consoling to remember that it mayn't be necessary." jefferson's fingers quivered as he leaned upon the table. "no. of course not!" he said, and added, inconsequently: "i don't think i'm unduly sensitive, but a very little thing would turn me deadly sick." austin struggled into his duck trousers, and jefferson, whose face was also a little more pallid than usual, glanced at him again. "you have a beautiful skin," he said. "it's most like a woman's. there's good clean blood in you." "it's one of my few good points," and austin's smile suggested comprehension. "i haven't been particularly indulgent in any direction, considering my opportunities, and i'm rather glad of it now. one could fancy that the man who seldom let one slip would be unusually apt to get the promised wages in this country." he dragged his singlet over his arms, and a little twinkle slowly crept into jefferson's eyes. "well," he said, "you carry your character with you. how long has the restraining influence been at work on you?" "you are a little outside the mark," and a faint flush showed in austin's hollow cheeks. "i am, as you know, not a believer in the unnecessary mortification of the flesh, but there's a trace of the artistic temperament, if that's the right name for it, in me, and it's rather apt to make one finickingly dainty." jefferson smiled drily. "that doesn't go quite far enough. i've seen men of your kind wallow harder than the rest. still, whatever kept you from it, you can be thankful now." austin went on with his dressing, and then took a little medical treatise out of a drawer. he spent some time turning over it before he looked up. "there's nothing that quite fits the thing here, and from what the west-coast mailboat men told me, craw-craw must be different," he said. "in the meanwhile, it wouldn't do any harm to soak myself in black coffee." he was about to go out when jefferson stopped him. "this is a thing that is better buried, but there's something to be said. from my point of view, and it's that of the average sensible man, i was right; but yours goes higher, and in one way i am glad of it. i just want to tell you i'm satisfied with my partner!" austin smiled at him. "we'll both be guilty of some sentimental nonsense we may be sorry for afterwards if we continue in that strain, my friend. still, there's one thing to consider. although i couldn't help it, what i did was, of course, absurd, if you look at it practically, and things of that kind have their results occasionally." jefferson seemed to shiver, and then clenched a hard, scarred fist. "we won't think of it. your blood's clean," he said. "but if, after all, trouble comes--i'll get even with that damned funnel-paint if i spend my life in africa trailing him, and have to kill him with my naked hands!" chapter xxiv austin finds a clue the grey light was growing clearer, and the mangroves taking shape among the fleecy mist, when austin stood looking down upon the creek in the heavy, windless morning. there was no brightness in the dingy sky, which hung low above the mastheads, but the water gleamed curiously, and no longer lapped along the steamer's rusty plates. it lay still beneath her hove-up bilge, giving up a hot, sour smell, and jefferson, who came out of the skipper's room, touched austin as he gazed at it. "the stream should have been setting down by now. something's backing up the ebb," he said. "a shift of wind along the shore, most likely. the rain's coming!" austin glanced up at the lowering heavens, but there was no change in their uniform greyness, and no drift of cloud. the smoke of the locomotive boiler went straight up, and the mist hung motionless among the trees ashore. still, there was something oppressive and portentous in the stillness, and his skin was tingling. "if it doesn't come soon we'll not have a man left," he said. "it isn't in flesh and blood to stand this much longer." "then," said jefferson drily, "the sooner we get to work the better. there's a good deal to do, and you're not going to feel it quite so much once you get hold of the spanner." the pump had just stopped, and tom came towards them, rubbing his greasy hands with a cotton rag, as they moved in the direction of the engine room. the lower part of it was dripping when they went down, and a foot or two of water still lay upon the floor-plates where they met the depressed side, but it was evident that another hour's work of the big pump would leave the place almost dry. austin sat down on a tool-locker lid, with jefferson standing beside him, but tom floundered away towards the stoke-hold, and they could hear him splashing in the water. when he reappeared with a blinking lamp he crawled up the slippery ladder as though working out a clue, while it was several minutes before he came back and leaned against a column opposite jefferson with the look of a man who had not found quite what he had expected. "sea-cocks shut!" he said. "ballast tank full-way cock is screwed up, too. of course, they could have closed that with the overhead screw-gear. you'll remember that manhole cover was off the forward section." jefferson glanced at austin, though it was tom he spoke to. "did you expect to find them open?" "well," said the donkey-man, "to be quite straight, i did." "i wonder why?" tom glanced at him with a little suggestive grin. "she has two plates started, but with the boiler blowing away half her steam we haven't very hard work to run all that came in that way down, and her bilge pump would have kept her clear. what i want to know is, what all that water was doing in her?" "ah," said jefferson, "you must ask another. i guess nobody's going to find the full answer to that conundrum. there are only two or three men who could have told us, and we're not going to have an opportunity of worrying them about it, unless we get the fever, too." "well," said tom, "the mill's looking good, but it's about time we made a start on her and got the cylinder covers off and hove the pistons up. it's quite likely we'll want to spring new rings on them. there should be some of the spanners in that locker, mr. austin." austin rose and lifted the lid, while tom held the lamp, but the first thing he saw was a sodden book. he drew it out, dripping, and opened it; but while a good many of the pulpy pages had fallen out, there were enough left to show that it was one of the little tables of strengths and weight of materials an engineer often carries about with him. there was a rather wide margin round the tabulated figures, and as he vacantly pulled out one of the wet pages he noticed a little close pencil writing upon a part of it. "hold that light nearer, tom. here's something that looks interesting," he said. "'buried jackson this morning--memo hand his share over to mary nichol.'" he signed tom to move the light again. "there follows an obliterated address, and the words, 'scarcely think she'll ever get it. my left arm's almost rotten now.'" he stopped again a moment, and his face had grown hard when he went on: "you see, the thing--is--contagious, and that devil funnel-paint, or somebody, has played the same trick before. i wonder if the man who wrote this looked quite as bad as the nigger did." "hold on!" said jefferson sharply. "i guess none of us have any use for that kind of talking, and you swilled yourself with permanganate, any way." "the result will probably be the same, whether one thinks of it or not. you will, however, notice that the man's name was jackson, and the woman's mary nicol." it was evident that this was a forced attempt to break away from the subject, and though tom grinned, it was in a sickly fashion. "that's no how astonishing. she was the last," he said. "hadn't you better turn over, and see if there's any more of it?" austin contrived to lift another of the pulpy pages, and once more the close writing appeared, but it was difficult to make out, and their faces were close together when tom lowered the lamp. they showed curiously grave, as well as hollow, in the smoky light, for there was reason for believing that the man who had made those notes was dead, and it was clear that the horrible thing which had stricken him might also come upon them. "the last of the bags buried this afternoon," austin read. "watson took a new bearing. w. half n. to the cottonwood, with twist of creek in line. forty paces--he made it thirty-nine. graham says one packet left in the old place where the niggers got scent of it, and the quills on the second islet; memo, it makes £ to me." he dropped the book, and tom came near letting go the lamp, while for a moment or two afterwards they stared at one another. austin was quivering a little, but jefferson made a restraining gesture as he laid a hand upon his shoulder. "steady! i guess we've got the clue," he said. "there are two islets two or three leagues back down the creek. you passed them coming up. still, what do they put up in quills?" "gold-dust! the niggers bring it down from the western soudan, and i believe they're ostrich quills. one of the trader fellows told me a good deal about them over a dinner at the metropole. a bushman had once stuck him with a lot of brass filings. are you going down to look for them?" jefferson, it was evident from his face, laid a strong restraint upon himself. "no," he said, with curious quietness. "funnel-paint knows nothing about these islets yet, or he wouldn't have come to you, and it's my first business to heave this steamer off. to do it we'll want her engines, and there's a heavy job in front of us before we start them. the rains won't wait for any man." he broke off, for a glare of blue light fell through the open frames above and flooded the engine room. it flickered on rusty columns and dripping, discoloured steel, and vanished, leaving grey shadow behind it, amidst which the smoky lamplight showed feeble and pale. then there was a crash that left them dazed and deafened, and in another moment was followed by a dull crescendo roar, while a splashing trickle ran down into the engine room. the glass frames quivered under the deluge, and one could almost have fancied that the heavens had opened. jefferson whirled round and gripped the donkey-man's arm, shaking him as he stood blinking about him in a bewildered fashion. "if you tell any of the rest what you have heard, i'll fling you into the creek! and now up with you, and bring every man who is fit to work. there's no time to lose," he said. tom made for the ladder, and austin, who went with him, carrying the book, was drenched before he reached the skipper's room. the air was filled with falling water that came down in rods, and blotted out the mangroves a dozen yards away. steam rose from the sluicing deck, the creek boiled beneath the deluge, but there was no longer any trace of the insufferable tension, and he stood a moment or two relaxing under the rush of lukewarm water that beat his thin clothing flat against his skin. then he splashed forward to the forecastle, where tom had little difficulty in rousing the men. they crawled out, gaunt and haggard, in filthy rags, some of them apparently scarcely fit to stand, for the rain had come, and every inch the water rose would bring them so much nearer home. there was no need to urge them when they floundered into the engine room, and hour after hour they strained and sweated on big spanner and chain-tackle willingly, while the big cylinder-heads and pistons were hauled up to the beams. the one thought which animated them was that the engines would be wanted soon. it mattered little that platform-grating and slippery floor-plates slanted sharply under them, and each ponderous mass they loosened must be held in with guy and preventer lest it should swing wildly into vertical equilibrium. that was only one more difficulty, and they had already beaten down so many. so day after day they worked on sloping platforms, slipping with naked feet, and only grinned when tom flung foul epithets, and now and then a hammer, at one of them. much of what he said was incomprehensible, and, in any case, he was lord supreme of the machinery; and bill, whose speech was also vitriolic, acted as his working deputy. the latter had served as greaser in another steamer, and for the time being even jefferson deferred to him. they stripped her until the big cylinders stood naked on their columns, and the engine room resembled the erecting shop of a foundry, and then the work grew harder when the reassembling began. since the skeleton engines slanted, nothing would hang or lower as they wanted it, and they toiled with wedge and lever in semi-darkness by the blinking gleam of lamps, while the rain that shut the light out roared upon the shut-down frames above. it was very hot down in the engine room, and when a small forge was lighted to expand joints they could not spring apart, and to burn off saponified grease, men with less at stake would probably have fancied themselves suffocated. still, each massive piece was cleaned and polished, keyed home, or bolted fast, and, when the hardest work was over, the slope of the platforms lessened little by little as the _cumbria_ rose upright. it was evident to all of them that the water was rising in the creek. in a month her deck was almost leveled, but the muddy flood that gurgled about her still lay beneath her corroded water line, and jefferson seized the opportunity of laying out an anchor to heave on before the stream ran too strong. the launch's boiler had given out, and they lashed her to the surfboat, with the hatch covers as a bracing between, but they spent an afternoon over it before jefferson was satisfied, and the thick, steamy night was closing in when they warped the double craft under the _cumbria_'s forecastle. it rose above them blackly, with a blaze of flickering radiance over it where the blast-lamp hurled a shaft of fire upwards into the rain. floundering figures cut against the uncertain brilliancy, voices came down muffled through the deluge, and there was a creaking and groaning as the ponderous stream anchor swung out overhead. austin stood, half naked, on the platform between launch and surfboat, with the water sluicing from him, and though he had toiled since early dawn, he was sensible only of a feverish impatience, and no weariness at all. he had had enough of the dark land, and what they were about to do was to ensure a start on the journey that would take them out of it. it grew rapidly darker, the long hull faded, and the flare of the lamp alone cut, a sheet of orange and saffron, against the blackness above them. jefferson's voice fell through it sharply. "stand by!" he said. "we'll ease her down!" there was a fresh groaning and creaking. something big and shadowy that racked the complaining chain descended towards them, and then there was a scuffle and a shout on the deck above. austin heard the rattle of running chain and a hoarse cry. "jump on it!" jefferson's voice ran out, fierce with alarm. "nip the slack around the bollard. hang on! oh, hang on, until he gets a turn!" feet shuffled about the light, there was stertorous gasping, another cry, and a scream, and again jefferson's voice broke through the confused sounds: "stand from under--for your life!" it said. the warning was unnecessary, for the canarios were already crouching forward in the surfboats bottom, and as austin sprang in among them there was a whirr and a crash. the craft swayed beneath him; he could feel her dipping in the flood, but she rose with a staggering lurch, slanted slightly, and held down by something huge and heavy. "are you still on top there?" jefferson asked. "we seem to be," said austin. "something's gone, but it's too dark to see. how d'you come to let her go with a run?" "wall-eye let her surge too soon," said jefferson. "he was getting an extra turn on, and nipped his hand in. she has 'most wrung it off him. handspike your anchor where you can tilt her clear before we slack cable." they contrived to do it somehow, with the flare that was lowered from the cat-davit dropping blazing oil about them, and then coiled down a length of the ponderous cable. one of the twin craft was tilted to the water's edge now, and still the massive iron links came clanking down. then, as the last fell with a crash, jefferson leaned out over the rails above. "bend the wire on below the break. you'll want a clear link for the shackle when we couple her up," he said. "hang on to your anchor until you're in the mangroves on the other bank. we want to heave towards deep water out in the stream." more barefooted men came swinging down the hanging wire, and they slid away into the blackness, bumping against the steamer's plates. the twin craft were top-heavy, and lurched in the grip of the stream. it was a minute or two before they had cleared the _cumbria_, and by then they were almost under her quarter; while when they had crept away from her a fathom or two all of them knew there was a task in front of them that would severely tax all their strength. they had the uncoiling wire rope to drag them back into line, the stream swept them down a fathom for every one they made ahead, and, as ill luck would have it, bore upon the launch's pressed down side so that they could hear the water gurgling into her in ever faster swirl. still, they had to reach the opposite bank, or be hauled back to commence the task again, and, gasping and panting, they heaved on the wet rope that led into the rain ahead. most of them were used to work of that kind, but during the first five minutes austin felt his arms grow weary and nerveless, and the veins distend on his forehead, while a curious singing commenced in his ears. he choked with every fresh grasp he laid upon the rope, and a canario behind him gasped out breathless snatches of castilian obscenity. still, in spite of all they could do, the blaze of red light leaping in the rain showed that they were making nothing, and now and then the rope ran out again through their clinging hands. there was no sign of the mangroves on the opposite bank, while the tilt of the platform grew steeper, and it was evident that the launch was filling under them. then, little by little, the wire rope that ran out into the darkness astern commenced to curve--they could hear the swirl of the stream across it--and after another five minutes' tense effort they swung into a slacker flow or reflex eddy. there was, however, no slackening of the strain, and it was not until a dim, black wall rose up above them that austin loosed his grasp upon the rope, and, floundering and stumbling in the rain and darkness, they strove to clear the anchor. it went over with a mighty splash, the platform rose with a jerk under them; then, as they backed clear, there was a rattle of cable, and they seized the wire. the lashed craft swung like a pendulum athwart the stream, the rattling winch hauled them back fathom by fathom to the _cumbria_, while, when he had crawled on board her, austin dropped limply, and a trifle grey in face, on to the settee in the skipper's room. "well," he said, "that's done, though i think a little more of it would have made an end of me. it is rather an astonishing thing, but while i felt fiercely anxious to get that anchor out before we started, it hardly seems worth the trouble now." "we couldn't heave her off without it," said jefferson. "that means going home--eventually." "i suppose it does," said austin, with a little mirthless smile. "still, i haven't any home, you see, and i'm not sure that a lazar hospital of some kind isn't what is awaiting me. you will remember the encouraging words that fellow left--'my arm's almost rotten now.'" jefferson slowly clenched one scarred hand. "that's a thing we are neither of us strong enough to think about. it's a little too horrible--it couldn't happen!" "it's scarcely likely in your case, at least. he didn't put his arm round you, and i had nothing worth mentioning on that night. men do die rotten, and i fancied once or twice i felt a suggestive tingling in my skin." jefferson seemed to be holding himself in hand with a struggle, but austin smiled. "well," he said, "if it comes at all, it will get the right one. i'm not going home to be married. in fact, i was told that it would be rather a graceful thing to come back upon my shield, though i don't know that i would like to do so looking as that nigger did. in the meanwhile, i had, perhaps, better see to wall-eye's hand." he went out into the darkness, and jefferson stood still, with his lips set tight, leaning on the table. he was, in some respects, a hard man, and his sojourn in africa had not roused his gentler qualities, but just then he felt an unpleasant physical nausea creeping over him again. chapter xxv hove off the rain came down in sheets, and the mangrove roots were hidden by the yellow flood, when jefferson stood, dripping, on the _cumbria_'s bridge. her iron deck was level, the stumpy pole masts ran upright into the drifting mist, and a column of black smoke floated sluggishly from her rusty funnel. dingy vapour also rose from the slender one of the locomotive boiler, and cables--hemp and wire and chain--stretched between the mangroves and the steamer's bow and stern. jefferson, leaning heavily on the bridge rails, considered them each in turn. he shivered a little, though the rain was warm, and his wet face looked unusually gaunt and worn; but his eyes were intent and steady, for at last all was ready for the supreme effort of heaving the _cumbria_ off. he looked down when austin stopped at the foot of the ladder. his face and hands were black, and the thin singlet, which was all he wore above his duck trousers, seemed glued to him. "hadn't you better keep inside the wheelhouse until we start the mill?" he said. jefferson smiled drily. "do you think you could? what are you wandering up and down the deck for?" "i'm not. i've been firing the locomotive boiler, and spent the last twenty minutes in the forecastle. it isn't as dry as it should be there." he spoke lightly, though there was a suggestion of tension in his voice, and it was evident that both of them were anxious. indeed, jefferson fancied that his comrade found it difficult to stand still at all. "well?" he said. "there are a third of them i daren't turn out, and two or three of the others who are down with tom look a good deal shakier than i care about. still, you see, i couldn't keep them in. they've had about enough of this country, and i don't blame them. you can figure on about half of us as reasonably effective, but what everybody wants to know is, when we are to begin." "when you can give me eighty pounds of steam. then we'll shake her up for an hour or two with reversed propeller, and heave on everything when you get up to the hundred. still, although we have blown a good deal of the mud out forward, i expect she'll want another fifty before she'll move." austin glanced at the gap in the forest beneath the bows, across which the shattered mangroves were strewn. he and jefferson had gone over all this before, but since he had stopped by the ladder they must talk of something, for silence would have been intolerable just then. "i'll go down and stir them up, though i'm not sure that they need it," he said. he disappeared round the deck-house, and now there was nobody to see him, jefferson paced feverishly up and down the bridge, until wall-eye, the steward, came pattering barefoot along the deck, with his arm in a sling. jefferson stopped him with a sign. "slip into mr. austin's room, and bring me the thermometer he keeps in the little case," he said. "as usual, no comprenny? casetta de cuero, very chiquitita." the man went away, and when he came back jefferson, who went into the wheelhouse, sucked the little clinical thermometer gravely for a minute or two. then he frowned as he looked at it. "ninety-nine, point something. i guess it's coming on again," he said. "well, one can go on working when it's a good deal more than that, especially when he has to." he came out, and, leaning down, dropped the case into the hands of the man below. "put it back, and don't let mr. austin know," he said. "señor austin no savvy, you comprenny?" wall-eye grinned as he went away. he could, of course, hold his tongue, but the little case was sodden already, and it could not have got so wet as that in austin's room. in the meanwhile austin had gone down to the stoke-hold. the place was dimly lighted, and insufferably hot, for, with the _cumbria_ stationary, no more air came down the ventilator shafts than the fires would draw, and they were burning sulkily. in fact, it was only by strenuous labour that steam could be raised at all. here and there the pale flicker of an oil lamp emphasised the gloom, though there were three half-moon patches of brightness in each of the two boilers, until a fierce red glow beat out as tom, the donkey-man, flung open a furnace door. then austin gained some impression of his surroundings. the bent figures of half naked men with shovels were forced out of the shadows. another man, dripping with perspiration, pushed a clattering truck, and several more lay, apparently inert, upon the floor-plates, with water thick with coal grime trickling from them. only two of them were professional firemen, and all were weakened by the climate or shaken by the fever, while as the red light touched them, austin could see how worn they were, and the suggestive hollows in their uncovered skin. there are also things which it is unfit that a white man should do, and firing in a calm in the tropics is one of them. austin, however, had little time to look about him in, for tom thrust an iron bar into one of the spaniards's hands. "stand by with the bucket, you. now, out with the clinker!" he said. it is probable that the last man addressed did not understand what was said, but he knew how to clean a fire, and stood, half crouching, before the furnace, with face averted, while he plied the bar. there was a rattling beneath the grate-bars and an overpowering wave of heat, in the midst of which the man stood bowed, with thin garments scorching and his hair frizzling visibly. austin could hear his gasping breath, and became possessed by a sense of futile indignation. toil of that kind was, he felt, more than could be expected of anything made in the image of a man. then the canario let the bar fall clanging, and seized another, while the heat grew more intense when he raked out the ash and glowing clinker from the flaming tunnel. austin shrank back with a hand upon his eyes and singlet singeing, and his voice broke through tom's cry of "damp her down!" "por misericordia," he said, "echadle agua!" somebody swung a bucket, and a cloud of steam whirled up; but the man who had cleaned the fire let his scraper fall, and lurching with a half strangled cry, went down amidst the vapour. he lay with scorched chest and arms on the floor-plates, making little stertorous noises, until tom, who tore the bucket from his comrade's hands, flung the rest of its contents over him. "drag him away!" he said, and turned to austin. "he's the second one, but he'll come round by and by. did you come down to look on or give us a hand?" he flung open another door, and austin took a shovel from a weary man. he had studied the art of firing up on deck, where it was considerably cooler, before the locomotive boiler, but he discovered that the work now demanded from him was an entirely different matter. the heat was overpowering, the bed of glowing fuel long, and it was only by the uttermost swing of shoulders and wrench of back and loins that he could effectively distribute his shovelful. he felt his lowered face scorching, and the sweat of effort dripped from him, but he toiled on in berserker fury while tom encouraged him. "spread it!" he said. "next lot well down to the back end. you needn't be afraid to move yourself. keep her thin!" austin wondered whether he had any eyebrows left when that furnace was filled, but it was done at last, and then there was coal to be trimmed from the bunkers. the dust that whirled about the shovels blackened and choked him, but he worked on savagely. every man was needed, with half the spaniards sick, and he felt that if this was the cost of success it was not fitting that he should shirk his part in it. social distinctions counted for nothing there; the barriers of creed and nationality had also melted. they were all privates in that forlorn hope, with death as the penalty of failure, and while they could not be more, none of them that day dared be less, than men. he never remembered all he did. there was a constant clanging of shovels, whirring of coal trucks, and slamming of iron doors that opened to let out fiery heat and radiance and take the flying fuel in. men came and went like phantoms, gasping, panting, groaning now and then, and the voice of their leader rose stridently at intervals. he was a man of low degree, and his commands were not characterised by any particular delicacy, but he was the man they needed, and when he emphasised his instructions with a grimy hand, and now and then the flat of the shovel, nobody resented it. during one brief interlude he found breath for a deprecatory word or two with austin. "if she was doing her eight or ten knots it wouldn't be as hard as this," he said. "then the ventilators would cool her down. the fires won't burn themselves now--you have got to make them; but you'll find her steam sweet and easy when she's going up the trades head to breeze." "i wonder," said austin grimly, "how many of us will be left when she gets there." then bill, who had been busy at the locomotive boiler, came down the ladder with a message, and he and tom vanished into the engine room, while austin, who greatly desired to go with them, put a restraint upon himself. for some minutes he felt his heart beat as he listened to a premonitory wheezing and panting, and then his blood seemed to tingle as this merged into the steady rumble of engines. the faint quiver of the floor-plates sent a thrill through him, and he drew in a great breath of relief when beam and angle commenced to tremble. the rumbling grew steadily louder, the whirl of the reversed propeller shook the ship, and it was evident that the engines were running well. after that, however, the work became harder still, for the big cylinders must be fed, and it was with a sensation of thankfulness that he had not broken down beneath the strain austin dragged himself up the ladder when a message was brought him that he was wanted to drive the after winch. it was raining heavily, but he found it a relief to feel the deluge beat upon his beaded face and scorched skin, though he could scarcely see the mangroves to which the wire that ran from the winch drum led. it was shackled to a big bridle, a loop of twisted steel that wound in and out among a rood or two of the stoutest trees. the winch was also powerful, and it remained to be seen whether it would heave the _cumbria_ out of her miry bed, or pull that portion of the watery forest up bodily. a great cable that slanted back towards him rose out of the water forward in a curve, and he could dimly see jefferson's lean figure outlined against the drifting mist high up on the bridge. on the forecastle beyond it more shadowy men stood still, and austin wondered whether their hearts beat as his did while they waited. the man beside him stooped ready, with body bent in a rigid curve, and bare, stiffened arms, clenching the wire that led to the winch-drum. there was a minute's waiting, and then jefferson, moving along the bridge, flung up a hand. "heave!" he said. austin felt his pulses quicken and a curious sense of exultation as he unscrewed the valve, for it seemed to him that flesh and blood had borne the strain too long, and now they had steel and steam to fight for them. the deck beneath him quivered as the screw whirled faster, and he could see the poop shaking visibly. then the winch wheezed and pounded, and there was a groaning forward as the rattle of the windlass joined in. wire and hemp and studded chain rose ripping from the river, creaked and groaned and strained, but when they had drawn each curve out they could get no inch of slack in. austin clenched his fingers on the valve-wheel, but his eyes were fixed on the lonely figure pacing feverishly up and down the bridge, and just then he felt all the bitterness of defeat. the rattle forward died away, and though the winch still whirred and hammered, none of the wire rope ran over the drum into the crouching spaniard's hands. the tension lasted for some minutes, and then jefferson's voice came down harshly through the rain. "let up!" he said. "get down, half of you, and see if you can help them with the firing. we'll try her again when you have raised more steam." there was, by contrast, a curious silence when the roar of steam died away, and the thudding of the big engines below decks sank to a lower pitch. the men who could be spared went down in a body, and toiled for another hour in a frenzy. the fierce latin blood was up; they knew it was the last round, and they would not be beaten now. the throbbing blast which rushed skywards from the blow-off valve when they came up again showed what they had done, and austin walked aft, singed and blackened, to his winch, with his heart in his mouth. it must be now or never, for it was clear to him that the men were making their last effort, and the boilers would not bear another pound of steam. the windlass was groaning horribly when he opened the valve, and the whole ship trembled with the whirring of the screw. he saw the drums spin round futilely for a moment or two, and then the spaniard, who crouched behind one of them, howled, as a foot of the uncoiling wire came back to his hands. simultaneously, the groaning of the windlass changed to a clanking rattle, and no sound had ever seemed half so musical to austin. the ship shook beneath him, and creaked in all her frame, while the hammering and rattling swelled into a frantic din as she commenced to move. he felt as though he were choking, and his sight momentarily failed him; but as yet the battle was not quite won, and closing blackened fingers on the valve-wheel, he watched the rope come home with dazzled eyes. it ran in faster and faster; he could hear the great stud-cable splashing and grinding as it came in, too, and for five breathless minutes he held himself to his task, feeling the _cumbria_ creep down stream, stern foremost, under him. then her pace grew faster, and the clanging of his winch seemed to deafen him, until at last a shrill-pitched voice fell through the din. "bastante!" it said. "she's clear now! 'vast heaving!" then the tension slackened as the long, rusty hull swung out into midstream, and flesh and blood were left shaken, and, as yet, unable to recover from the suddenly lifted strain in the silence, as winch and engines stopped. tom, the donkey-man, was chanting some incoherent ribaldry forward; here and there a canario howled or flung up dripping arms; while the one beside austin sat down upon the hatch and rocked himself to and fro as he called upon the queen of heaven. only jefferson stood very still, a tall, lean figure, on the bridge, with his torn and drenched clothing sticking to him, and austin leaned heavily upon his winch. he did not wish to move, and was not sure he could have done so had he wanted to. the _cumbria_ was clear afloat, and they had won; but there was nothing he could say or do which would sufficiently celebrate that triumph. jefferson gave them five minutes to recover their balance, and then his voice came down again. the windlass clanked its hardest, wire hawsers splashed, and the _cumbria_ had swung across to the opposite forest when the big anchor rose to her bows. in the meanwhile the surfboat had been busy, too; and when the winch whirred again they slid away, stern foremost, with propeller churning slowly, against the muddy stream. it was twenty minutes later when, with a roar of running cable, the anchor plunged once more, and she brought up abreast of the creek where the coal and oil were stored. jefferson came down from his bridge and sat down on the table in the skipper's room when austin flung himself on to the settee, with the water trickling from him. "well," he said, "we have floated her, but there's still a good deal to be done. there are the coal and oil to get on board, and then we have to find the gum." austin looked up at him with a little smile. "that's rather a prosaic epilogue when one comes to think of it," he said. "then you can paint a picture of it when you get home, if you fancy it worth while," said jefferson drily. "i don't think it would be," and austin smiled again. "after all, a picture either goes beyond or falls a long way short of the real thing, and the subject's rather too big for me. man's domination symbolised by a staggering scarecrow with a fireman's shovel." jefferson dropped his hand on his shoulder, and gripped it hard. "well," he said, "you can drive a winch and sling a palm oil puncheon like a sailorman. i guess that's 'most as useful as the other thing, any way." "ah!" said austin, "you're skirting rather a big question, but we are practical now. are you going to dig the gum up before you heave in cargo?" "i'm not. it seems to me it's safer where it is in the meanwhile, so long as funnel-paint doesn't know where to look for it. if you'll give me a dose of quinine i'd be obliged to you." austin glanced at him sharply. "have you any special reason for asking for it?" "i've been in the rain quite a long while now, and it's a good deal wiser to head off a fever than wriggle out of its clutches once it gets a good grip on you. one gets cautious in this country." austin said nothing further, for he was by this time well acquainted with his comrade's characteristics, but he was not quite contented with the latter's reason when he lugged out the medicine chest. chapter xxvi jefferson finds the gum a half-moon shone in a rift between the massed banks of cloud when austin stood looking down into the trench four of the spaniards were digging. it ran partly across the islet, which was small and sandy, intersecting another excavation that had a palm at one end of it, while a half-rotten cottonwood, from which orchids sprang, stood in line with the trench the men were toiling in. they were shovelling strenuously, and the thud of the sand they flung out jarred on the silence, for the night was very still. austin could hear the creek lapping on the beach, and the deep humming of the _cumbria_'s pump, softened by the distance. she lay, with a light or two blinking fitfully on board her, half a mile away, ready at last for sea. then he glanced at jefferson, who stood close beside him, shivering a little, though the night was hot, as he leaned upon a shovel. "we have been at it, at least, a couple of hours," austin said suggestively. jefferson laughed. "and we'll be here this time to-morrow unless we find the case. there's only one on this islet, that fellow said, and, as i tried to point out, the men who buried it probably wanted to get the thing done quickly. they'd have run a line from the two trees, and either dumped the case at the intersection or a few paces outside it on a given bearing. if we don't strike it in a few minutes we'll work a traverse." ten minutes passed, and then one of the canarios cried out excitedly as he struck something with his shovel. austin saw his comrade's hands quiver on the shovel-haft in the moonlight, but that was all, and next moment two of the spaniards fell on hands and knees in the sand. they flung it up in showers with their fingers, while austin, by an effort, stood very still, for he felt that he might do things he would be sorry for afterwards if he let himself go. the latins were panting in their eagerness, and wallowing rather like beasts than men amidst the flying sand. then one of them, who dragged something out, hove it up and flung it at austin's feet with a gasp of consternation. "ah, maldito! es muy chiquitita!" he said. austin set his lips as he glanced at his comrade, whose face grew suddenly hard. "yes," he said, with portentous quietness. "it is remarkably small, and by the way he hove it up there can't be very much in it." they stood still a moment, looking down at the little wooden case, while the spaniards clustered round them, with eyes that gleamed in the moonlight, breathing unevenly. then jefferson said: "light that blast-lamp, and we'll open it." austin's fingers trembled, and he wasted several matches before the sheet of flame sprang up. then he fell furiously upon the case with a hammer and splintered the lid. he plunged his hand in and took out a quill, which he twisted until it burst, and spilled a little heap of gleaming grains in his palm. "it's gold," he said. "empty the lot!" said jefferson, and his voice was hoarse. "your hat is big enough. it will all go into it." there was a low murmur from the spaniards when austin obeyed him, and he handed the wide-brimmed hat to jefferson. "would you make it four pounds?" asked the latter. "i certainly would not." jefferson laughed harshly. "then it's probably worth some £ ," he said. "it's rather a grim joke, considering what has no doubt been done for the sake of it." he laid the hat down, and one of the spaniards, glancing at the little pile of quills, broke into a torrent of horrible maledictions, while austin, who said nothing, gazed at his comrade until the latter made a curious little gesture. "there is still the gum," he said. austin smiled sardonically. "if you can still believe in it you are an optimist of the finest water. any way, we'll go and look for it. it will be a relief to get done with the thing." they waded to the surfboat, which lay close by on the beach, and slid down stream to an adjacent island, where they had no difficulty in finding the tree the man who made the note in the engineers' tables had alluded to. the moon had, however, sunk behind a cloud, and they toiled by the light of the blast-lamp for half an hour, until once more one of the canarios struck something with his shovel. they dragged it out with difficulty, and found it to be a heavy, half-rotten bag, with something that appeared to be a package of plaited fibre inside it. other bags followed, and hope was growing strong in them again when they had disclosed at least a score. jefferson looked at austin with a little smile in his eyes. "there's a couple of hundred pounds, any way, in each of those bags, and if the man who told me was right, that stuff is worth anything over £ the ton," he said. "so far as we have prospected, this strip of sand is full of them. it's going to be more profitable than gold-mining. we'll get this lot into the surfboat first. put that lamp out." austin did so, and they staggered through a foot or two of water with the bags on their backs. some of them burst as they carried them, but the fibre packages remained intact, and the big boat was almost loaded when austin, who was breathless, seated himself for a moment on her gunwale. he could see by the silvery gleam on the cloud bank's edge that the moon was coming through again, and he was glad of the fact, for he had stumbled and once fallen heavily under his burden when floundering through the strip of thorny brushwood which fringed the beach. still, he agreed with jefferson that it was not advisable to use the big blast-light any longer than was absolutely necessary, for they both had an unpleasant suspicion that they had not done yet with funnel-paint. it was, indeed, for that reason they had made the search at night and used the surfboat, which could be paddled almost silently, instead of the launch, though tom had repaired her boiler, and she was then lying alongside the _cumbria_, with steam up, ready. the black hull of the latter was faintly visible, and as he glanced at it he fancied that a puff of white steam sprang up where he supposed the locomotive boiler to be. a moment later a thin, shrill scream rang through the stillness, and one of the spaniards, startled by the sound, fell heavily against the boat with the bag he was carrying. austin made a sign to jefferson, who was staggering across the beach with a bag upon his back. "they're whistling," he said. "i fancy i can hear the launch coming." there was another hoarser scream, and when it died away a low thudding sound crept out of the darkness. austin swept his gaze upriver, but could only see the shadowy mangroves, for the moon had not come through yet. "funnel-paint!" said jefferson, breathlessly. "there are four more bags in sight. we'll get her afloat before we go for them." they did it up to their waists in water, and it cost them an effort, for the big boat was heavy now; and then, though the spaniards glanced longingly at the _cumbria_'s blinking lights, jefferson insisted upon their carrying down the bags. when that was done, nobody lost any time in getting on board; and, grasping the paddles, they drove her out into the stream. "paddle!" said jefferson grimly. "i guess it's for your lives!" it is probable that the spaniards did not understand him, but they did what they could, for while the clank of the launch's engines grew louder the sound of paddles was also rapidly drawing nearer. there were, however, very few of them, and the boat was big, so that austin gasped with relief when at last the little steamer swept round her stern. "stand by for the line!" said tom, who sprang up on her deck. "they can't be far off. it's ten minutes, any way, since we first heard their paddles." the tow-line was caught, and tightened with a jerk, and the surfboat went upstream with the yellow water frothing about her, while austin could hear the rhythmic thud of paddles through the clank of hard-pressed engines. jefferson said nothing, but stood rigidly still, with hands clenched on the big steering oar, until they drove alongside the _cumbria_. "up with you, tom, and see they whip those bags in!" he said. "i want the case you'll find under the settee in my room, too. you'll sing out for two or three men who can be relied on, austin." "what are you going to do?" asked austin. jefferson laughed unpleasantly. "head the devils off from the island, any way, and, if it's necessary, obliterate some of funnel-paint's friends. it's fortunate the launch has twice the speed of any canoe." he clambered on board the launch, and when a few more men came scrambling down, swung her out before they could decide whether it would be wiser to climb back again. after that, he left the helm to austin, and moving towards the engine, opened the valve wide. "head her for the islet. if they have had anybody watching us in a canoe, they'll go there first," he said. austin made a sign of comprehension, but said nothing until his comrade, sitting down, opened the case he had asked for. then he became possessed by unpleasant apprehensions as he saw jefferson take out several rolls of giant-powder with fuses attached to them. they looked exactly like candles now, only the wicks were black, and unusually long. sitting still, very grim in face, he tied one or two together, and then nipped a piece or two off the fuses with his knife. "i guess it would be as well to make sure," he said. "of what?" asked austin. "that they'll go off when i want them," and jefferson laughed a little grating laugh. "i've had them ready for some while, and took a good deal of trouble timing the fuses. now, the effect of giant-powder's usually local, and i figure one could throw these things far enough for us to keep outside the striking radius. they'd go better with a little compression, but there's a big detonator inside them which should stir them up without it. if these two sticks fell upon a nigger they wouldn't blow him up. they'd dissolve him right into gases, and it's quite probable there wouldn't be any trace of him left." austin asked no more questions. worn as he was by tense effort and the climate, kept awake as he had been to watch when he might have slept at night, and troubled by vague apprehensions that the loathsome plague might be working in his blood, he was ready, and, perhaps, rather more than that, to turn upon the man who had made their heavy burden more oppressive still. indeed, it would have been a relief to him to feel the jump of a rifle barrel in his hand, but from jefferson's scheme he shrank almost aghast. to run amuck, with flashing pistol or smashing firebar, among the canoes, would have appeared to him a natural thing, but the calculating quietness of his comrade, who sat so unconcernedly, making sure that the rolls of plastic material should not fail, struck him as wholly abnormal, and a trifle horrible. pistol shot, machete slash, and spear thrust, were things that one might face; but it seemed beyond toleration that another man should unloose the tremendous potentialities pent up in those yellow rolls upon flesh and blood. he was, however, quite aware that there was nothing to be gained by protesting, and while jefferson went on with his grim preparations he turned his gaze upriver towards the approaching canoes. he could see them clearly, black bars that slid with glinting paddles athwart a track of silvery radiance, for the half-moon had sailed out from behind the cloud. they were coming on in a phalanx, five or six of them, and the splash and thud of the paddles rose in a rhythmic din. he swung the launch's bows a trifle down stream, to run in between them and the island. then he turned again, and saw bill, the fireman, watching jefferson. the light of the engine lantern was on his face, and it showed wry and repulsive with its little venomous grin. forward, the spaniards were clustered together, and they were, by their movements, apparently loosening their wicked knives; but they showed no sign of consternation, and austin became sensible of a change in his mood. it seemed to him that he and they had grown accustomed to fear, and felt it less in the land of shadow. if they were to be wiped out by a spear thrust, or jefferson's giant-powder, which seemed equally likely, nothing that he could do would avert it; but by degrees he became possessed by a quiet vindictive anger against the man who had forced this quarrel on them when their task was almost done. there were, he fancied, fifty or sixty men in the canoes, and he felt a little thrill of grim satisfaction as he reflected that if he and his comrades went under they would not go alone. in fact, he could almost sympathise with jefferson. in the meanwhile the canoes were drawing level with them as they approached the islet. he could see the wet paddles glinting, and the naked bodies swing, while presently jefferson, who made bill a little sign to stop the engine, stood up on the deck. the case of giant-powder lay open at his feet, and bill laid a glowing iron on the cylinder covering. the men in the canoes ceased paddling, and while the craft slid slowly nearer each other there was for a moment or two an impressive silence, through which austin fancied he could hear a faint rhythmic throbbing. then jefferson, who cut one of the rolls of giant-powder through, flung up his hand. "where you lib for, funnel-paint?" he shouted. "them beach," said the negro, and his voice reached them clearly. "we done come for them gum. you lib for 'teamboat before we cut you t'roat!" "then i'm going to put the biggest kind of ju-ju onto you," said jefferson. "you savvy how i blow up them headman's house? if you don't want to be blown up like it, lib for up river one time, and be ---- to you!" there was probably only one man among them who partly understood him, but his gesture was fierce and commanding, and the confused splashing of paddles suggested that some, at least, of the negroes were impressed. two of the canoes moved backwards against the stream, and while funnel-paint cried out in his own tongue, jefferson stooped. "touch that on the iron, bill," he said. in another moment he stood very straight again with a dim object that sparkled in his hand, and then hurled it at the island. it fell amidst the brushwood, out of which there sprang a sheet of flame that was followed by a detonation and a great upheaval of flying sand. then the paddles splashed confusedly, and in another minute or two the canoes were a hundred yards away. after that there was silence, broken only by the voice of funnel-paint, who seemed to be flinging reproaches at his friends, and a faint, dull throbbing which austin fancied was a trifle plainer than before. then jefferson laughed as he took up another stick of giant-powder. "that seems to have scared them, but if they come back again they'll get the next one in the middle of them," he said. "listen!" said austin, holding up his hand. "can't you hear engines?" jefferson swung round sharply, and the scream of a whistle came shrilly across the water from the _cumbria_ just then. it was answered by another of a deeper tone, and a blaze of blue light sprang up, apparently out of the creek. it showed a black shape that wallowed through a mass of piled up foam. "a launch!" said jefferson. "a fast one!" "no," said austin. "a pinnace. a gunboat's pinnace. ah! the canoes are going." there was a sudden thudding of paddles, and the canoes melted into the darkness as the moon sailed behind a cloud again; but the whirr and thump of engines drew nearer, and jefferson reached down for the lantern. "well," he said, "a good deal depends upon what country she belongs to, and it's quite likely we're going to have trouble. still, we have got to face it now." he waved the lantern, and while the whirr of engines slackened a voice came out of the darkness. "launch ahoy! is that the _cumbria_ yonder?" it said in excellent english. austin took the lantern from jefferson with a soft laugh. "i'll take charge now--you see, i'm acquainted with my countrymen's little peculiarities," he said, and raised his voice a trifle. "it is. if you don't mind steaming that far, we should consider it a pleasure to do anything we can for you." "if you have no great objections, i'll come on board now," said the other man. "starboard a little! start her slow!" there was a whirring of engines, a little, very trim pinnace crept up alongside, and a young man in immaculate white uniform stepped on the launch's deck. "ah!" he said, "mr. austin! i've had the pleasure of meeting you before. what has become of the niggers?" "which niggers?" asked jefferson, carelessly. the young officer looked at him with a little dry smile, and it was evident that his eyes were keen, for he made a sign to bill, who was about to secrete the giant-powder. "i am," he said, "under the impression that you know a good deal more about them than i do. we have rather good glasses, and i certainly made out four or five canoes. may i ask what that stuff is yonder?" "it is what, i believe, is called in america giant-powder," said austin. "we found it useful in blowing the mangroves up." "quite so," said the officer. "in fact, we heard the detonation. still, i daresay there are several things we should like to ask each other about, and you suggested going across to your steamer." "i did," said austin. "we should be glad of your company for to-night, at least, though i'm afraid we can't offer you much to eat. this is my partner, jefferson--lieutenant onslow." chapter xxvii austin's toast an hour had passed since their first meeting, when austin, jefferson, and two navy men sat round a little table that had been laid out upon the _cumbria_'s bridge deck. it was slightly cooler there than it was below, besides which the mess-rooms reeked with damp and mildew. a lamp hung from one of the awning spars above them, and its light fell upon the men's faces and the remnants of the very frugal meal. the handful of bluejackets who came up in her had apparently gone to sleep beneath an awning on the flooring of the pinnace, which lay alongside, but a sharp clinking rose from the lighted engine room, where a couple of naval artificers were busy with tom, the donkey-man. the gunboat's surgeon, who had been round the forecastle, was talking to austin, while her commander lay opposite jefferson, immaculately neat, in a canvas chair. "our tale," he said, "is a very simple one. as we didn't seem to be wanted anywhere just now, we moored ship snugly in the bight behind the island, and decided to get a little painting done. she was getting rusty along the water-line, and one can't get at it well when she's washing through a swell, you know. under the circumstances, i seized the opportunity to do a little rough surveying. we are expected to pick up any information that may be of use to the admiralty hydrographers." jefferson lay very limply in his chair, but his eyes twinkled appreciatively. "well," he said, "i guess that would look all right in the log, but any one who had seen you start surveying would wonder why you brought those cases of provisions as well as engine oil and packing, and two or three ingots of bearing metal. we were uncommonly glad to get them and see the artificers, though i'm not sure your admiralty would approve of the way you're squandering its stores." onslow laughed. "we are not forbidden to offer assistance to any one in want of it, and the provisions, at least, do not belong to our parsimonious lords. in fact, they were handed me at las palmas by a friend of yours, on the off chance of our falling in with you. of course, i could not exactly promise that you would get them, though i had reasons for believing the thing was possible." jefferson filled a wineglass, and thrust the bottle across the table. "i think i know the lady's name," he said. "this is the first wine i've drunk since i came to africa, and it will probably be the last until i get out of it again. to-morrow it's going forward to the sick men in the forecastle. the lady who sent it is not going to mind my passing the kindness on." "i venture to think she would approve," and onslow glanced at austin. "in fact, i couldn't quite help a fancy she intended it as a peace-offering. miss brown is, as you are probably aware, capable of conveying an impression without saying anything very definite, and the one i received from her was that she felt she had been a trifle hard on somebody. i should, of course, not have presumed to mention it had it not been borne in on me that it was not intended i should keep that impression entirely to myself. if i have been mistaken i must apologise to her and both of you." jefferson stood up with the wineglass in his hand, and the others rose with him. "this," he said, "is a little out of my usual line, but it's her wine we're drinking, and i can't quite let the occasion pass. 'to her serene excellency, the cleverest woman in the canaries, who hasn't forgotten us!'" austin stood opposite him, a ragged, climate-worn skeleton, with a little flush in his haggard face, and he looked at the gunboat's commander. "my comrade hasn't gone quite far enough," he said. "the queen, who can do no wrong!" then the glasses were emptied, and there was a moment's silence when they sat down. three of them were, after all, somewhat reserved englishmen, who had, for once, allowed their thoughts to become apparent; and commander onslow, who felt that he had, perhaps, exceeded his somewhat delicate commission, was distinctly displeased with himself. he had had a certain conversation with mrs. hatherly, who had been rather frank with him, before he left the canaries, and the attitude of the ragged adventurer who had proclaimed his unwavering devotion to the woman who had sent him there appealed to him, so much so, in fact, that it made him uncomfortable. it was, he felt, advisable to change the subject. "considering everything, it was, perhaps, as well we turned up when we did. you see, those niggers don't belong to us," he said. "i was, i may admit, rather thankful when they disappeared, since it might have made a good deal of trouble if we had taken a hand in. now you understand that, you may be willing to tell me what you purposed doing with the giant-powder." jefferson laughed grimly. "if you had come five minutes later i'd have blown half of them to the devil. we, at least, can't afford to be particular." "you had, presumably, a reason? i wonder if you have any objections to telling us the rest of it in confidence?" jefferson, who lighted a cigar, told him the story, and onslow lay back in his chair, listening with grave attention, while the surgeon leaned forward with elbows on the table. at last onslow shook his head. "it's interesting, exceedingly," he said. "still, i don't think i'd recommend you to tell it in quite that shape to everybody. it would probably make trouble, and you mightn't find anybody very willing to believe you. things of that kind don't happen now--at least, they're not supposed to--and i fancy it would prove a good deal more convenient just to mention the simple facts. you bought the steamer stranded, and, with considerable difficulty, got her off." "we had practically decided on doing no more than that already," said austin. "still, i wonder if, now you have heard the story, one could ask your views?" onslow smiled drily. "i haven't any, and if i were you, i wouldn't worry about anything beyond the financial aspect of the affair. nobody is likely to thank you, and the only men who could tell you what happened are dead, you know." austin saw that jefferson also recognised that the advice was good, and, changing the subject, he spoke to the surgeon. the latter looked thoughtful. "i can't tell you what that man was afflicted with," he said. "there are several african diseases we are not acquainted with, and a good many of their troubles are supposed to be contagious. of course, you could apply to the college of tropical diseases they've lately started in liverpool, if you are really interested." "i am," said austin. "in fact, i'm very much so, indeed. you see, i had practically nothing on, and he got his festering arms round me." the surgeon looked at him gravely. "i scarcely think you need worry, but if you have to do any rough work i would endeavour to avoid any lacerated bruises, and, as far as possible, keep your skin unbroken." "it's a little difficult on board this steamer. there are several raw patches on my arms now." the surgeon promised to attend to them, but just then onslow turned to jefferson. "have you opened up any of the gum yet?" he asked. jefferson said he had not, and was rather anxious to do so, whereupon onslow and the surgeon offered to accompany him, and they went down the ladder together to where the bags still lay upon the forward hatch. "i shouldn't wonder if you were right about its value," said the surgeon, when jefferson held up the lantern one of the spaniards had handed him. "we took a senegal frenchman down the coast last trip, and he had rather a craze upon the subject. there is, i understood from him, a particular gum the niggers find somewhere between here and the head of the niger, for which one could get almost what he liked to ask from the makers of special high-class varnishes. in fact, the man said that one of them who had been trying it told him that it must be used in certain processes whatever its cost might be. the only trouble was that it appeared very difficult to get hold of, except in the smallest quantities; but perhaps your frenchman had got on the track of it." austin tore one of the bags, which were very rotten, across, and then slit the fibre package beneath it. the surgeon, who stooped beside him, was the first to thrust his hand into the opening. "the nodules seem very uniform in size," he said, and then stood up suddenly, with astonishment in his face. "i'm almost afraid that somebody has been beforehand with you." "what do you mean?" asked austin, still tearing at the package. the surgeon turned and gazed hard at jefferson. "this is certainly not gum. it looks very like an ordinary palm kernel." he held up a little, round, black object, and jefferson's face grew grim, while he clenched one hand. then he wrenched the knife from austin and fell on his knees, ripping at the fibre package savagely. it opened beneath the steel, and when its contents poured out on deck he rose with a little bitter laugh. there was no doubt whatever. they were palm kernels. a curious silence followed, during which jefferson leaned against the rail, looking down upon the bags with expressionless eyes, until he made a little gesture. "well," he said, very quietly, "it seems we have had our trouble for nothing. you may as well open the rest of them." austin was not sure how he contrived to do it. he felt suddenly limp and feeble, but holding himself in hand by an effort, he slit the remaining bags, and flooded the deck with kernels. there was nothing else, and the kernels appeared half rotten. "this must be a little rough on you," said onslow, with a trace of awkwardness. "i understand you expected to find more of the stuff yonder." "i did," said jefferson. "funnel-paint can have it now. we have had about enough of this country, and if your artificers fancy we could trust that starboard boiler, we'll set about raising steam to take her out first thing in the morning." onslow made a little gesture of sympathy. "i almost think it is the wisest thing you can do," he said. "in the meanwhile, it is getting late, and we have a long trip in front of us to-morrow. i have no doubt you don't feel much like entertaining anybody just now." he and the surgeon withdrew to the rooms prepared for them, and when austin, who went with them, came back, he stood a moment by the doorway of the one beneath the bridge which jefferson now occupied alone. the latter looked up at him with half-closed eyes. "we have the oil and the ship--and that will have to be enough," he said, and then straightened himself with a fierce gesture. "get out, and sleep--if you feel like it. the thing has shaken me, and i'm not sure i'm very well." austin went away, but it was almost daylight before sleep came to him, and he had only been on deck an hour when their guests departed in the morning. jefferson, who bade them good-bye at the gangway, stood leaning on the rail while the pinnace steamed away, and then walked, with curious heaviness, towards his room. he crawled into his bunk when he reached it, and lay there, while austin looked down on him with concern. "i've had the fever on me for quite a while, and at last it has gripped me hard," he said. "i'll probably be raving in an hour or two. get steam up as soon as you're able, and take her out of the devilish country." austin was very busy between his comrade's room, forecastle, and stoke-hold during the rest of that day, and he had very little time for rest at night, but though half the men were sick, and his own limbs were aching portentously, it was with a little thrill of exultation he climbed to the bridge early on the following morning. the windlass was rattling on the forecastle, wall-eye stood by the winch astern, and the surfboat was sliding towards the mangroves, where a big wire hawser was made fast, in the rain. austin was not a professional sailor, but he could handle surfboat and steam launch, and in the good days had sailed his yacht along the coast at home. he also had confidence in the grizzled, olive-faced spaniard who stood gravely behind him, gripping the steering-wheel. the anchor came home to the bows at last, somehow the fever-worn men on the forecastle hove it in; the after winch hammered when he made a sign, and the long, rusty hull moved backwards towards the forest as her head swung slowly round. there was a splash of dripping wire, and he swung up an arm with a cry of "largo!" then the winch rattled furiously, a gong clanged below, and a wild, exultant shouting went up when the _cumbria_'s engines commenced to throb. the gaunt, hollow-faced men who stood, dripping, in the rain, had borne everything but cold, and now they were going home. austin felt his eyes grow hazy for a moment as he leaned upon the rails, and then, with a little shake of his shoulders, he fixed his gaze steadily upon the mangroves that came sliding back to him ahead. he had, he felt, a task that would demand all his attention in front of him. they slid down stream unchecked until the afternoon, and the _cumbria_ steered handily, which, since there were awkward bends to swing round, was fortunate for all of them; but austin had misgivings when at last they approached one that appeared sharper than the rest, for he could only see the close ranks of dingy mangroves in front of him as he gazed into the rain and mist. the creek was too narrow to swing the steamer to an anchor, and it was evident that if she was to get around the bend at all he most go at it hard, for the yellow stream was running fast with them, and unless she steamed faster the vessel would not steer. he signed to the helmsman, who edged her in near one bank to gain a little room; and then set his lips tight as he clenched his telegraph and rang for full speed ahead. it was consoling to remember that tom was below, for a good donkey-man is, as a rule, more to be trusted than a junior engineer. ahead, the oily current was sliding through the mangroves as well as among them, covering all their high-arched roots, and he knew that there were a good many feet of water there, for the creek was full, and he had heard of steamers going full tilt into the watery forest at such times. still he breathed unevenly as he watched the dingy trees slide past one another, for the bend was opening very slowly, and there was a long tongue of mangroves close in front of him. the bridge planks were trembling beneath him now, and he could hear the thud-thud of the hard-driven screw; but the stream seemed to be running very fast at the bend, and, glancing round, he saw something very like fear in the face of the man who held the wheel. when he looked ahead again the long tongue of mangroves seemed flying towards him. he strode to the end of the bridge and glanced down at the lift of rusty side. there was a good deal of it above the water, for the _cumbria_ was loaded easily, and she was also, he was very glad to remember, light of draught. he could not check her with an anchor under foot. she would only swing to it, and that would land her among the mangroves broadside on. if he backed his propeller he would as surely go ashore, and his face grew very grim as he made the helmsman a little sign. since he must strike the forest, he would strike it fair, as hard as the engines could drive her, bows on; and he thrust down the telegraph once more for the last pound of steam. the throb of plank and rail grew sharper, the trees seemed rushing at the forecastle, the helmsman gazed forward with drawn face over his moving wheel, and a shouting broke out on deck. austin, however, did not move at all, save when he raised a hand to the helmsman. once more, easy-going artist as he was, the berserker fit was upon him, and it was with a light only one or two of his friends had ever seen there in his eyes he hurled her full speed at the forest. she struck it, with a crash that flung two or three of the spaniards staggering, and it crumpled up before her. mangrove boughs came streaming down on her grinding forecastle, torn limbs clutched at rail and stanchion, and were smashed by them. mire was whirled aloft by the thudding screw, and austin, gripping his telegraph, laughed a harsh laugh as he saw that she was going through. how thick that belt of trees was, or what water flowed among their roots, he did not know, but he remembered that he had found no bottom among them in other places with a boathook, now and then. in another few moments the white-stemmed trunks fell aside again, and they drove out once more into clear and swiftly-flowing water. then the spaniards howled together, and austin, twining his hand in the lanyard, unloosed the whistle, and hurled back a great vibratory blast at the beaten forest. it was, he admitted afterward, a somewhat feeble thing, but he said he felt the occasion demanded something then. after that they had no great difficulty, and by nightfall they drove her out with sluicing decks over the smoking bar, dipping the bleached and rotten ensign to the little white gunboat that lay rolling behind the island. then austin felt a great weight lifted off him as he flung himself into a canvas chair upon his bridge. there was now only open sea in front of them, and he had seen that the big pump could keep the water down. he felt that he could contrive by some means to make las palmas. chapter xxviii in command austin was quite aware that he had his work cut out when he was left in command of the _cumbria_, with half her crew sick, and her skipper raving deliriously. he knew very little about medicine, and certainly no more about what he termed the astronomical side of navigation, and after several attempts decided that it was beyond his ability to take an accurate solar observation. there were, however, other, though not very reliable, means of approximately ascertaining the ship's position which he was acquainted with, and he nerved himself afresh for a grapple with what most men would, under the circumstances, have considered insuperable difficulties. he had two spaniards who could be trusted to keep the steamer more or less on the course he gave them, while the _cumbria_ steerd handily, which is more than all steamers do. there was a large-scale chart, considerably mildewed, but still legible, in the skipper's room, as well as a pilot guide to the west african coast, while the patent log that towed astern to record the distance run appeared to be working accurately. he could thus, it was evident, depend in some degree upon what is termed dead reckoning, which is comparatively reliable in the case of short distances run in the vicinity of a high, well lighted coast. the one the _cumbria_ steamed along was, however, not lighted at all, and most of it scarcely rose a foot above sea-level, while when he had ruled the line she was presumed to be travelling on across the chart, and pricked off the distance the patent log told him she had run, there remained the question how far the tide and the guinea stream had deflected it, and whether the steering and her compasses could be trusted. it was also rather an important question; and when he had, on several occasions, peered for an hour at a time through jefferson's glasses in search of a cape or island which the chart indicated should be met with, and saw only a hazy line of beach, or a dingy smear on the horizon which might be mangroves, or, quite as likely, a trail of mist, the probability of his ever reaching the canaries seemed very remote indeed. there would, he fancied, be no great difficulty in obtaining a mate and two or three seamen from one of the steamers he came across, but in that case the strangers would expect half the value of the _cumbria_'s hull and cargo, and very likely make their claim to it good. he was also aware that more experienced skippers than he was had put their ships ashore upon that coast. but what troubled him most was the fact that if he lost sight of it, or found no point that he could identify, he would have nothing to start from when he must boldly head her out across the open ocean. she had rolled along at six to eight knots, with the big pump going, for several days, when a trail of smoke crept out of the western horizon. austin watched it anxiously, and when at last a strip of black hull and a yellow funnel grew into shape beneath it, summoned the donkey-man, and with his assistance, which was not especially reliable, worried over the signal code painted on the flag rack in the wheel-house when he had stopped the engines. it was almost obliterated, and most of the flags themselves were missing; but between them they picked out sundry strips of mildewed bunting and sent them up to the masthead. the little west-coast mailboat was close alongside now, and flags also commenced to flutter up between her masts, while her whistle screamed in long and short blasts. austin, anxious as he was, laughed a little. "that is apparently the morse code, and it's unfortunate that neither of us understands it," he said. "i presume it means that they can make nothing of our flags, and one could hardly blame them. any way, we have got to stop her." tom grinned as he pulled an armful of tattered ensigns out of a locker. "this one should do the trick," he said. "i'd start the whistle." austin drew the lanyard, and when the ensign blew out on the hot air union down, the mailboat stopped, and, considering that they were steamboat men, her crew had a white gig over in a very creditable time. she came flying towards the _cumbria_ with four negroes at the oars, and when she slid alongside a young mate in trim white uniform came up a rope. "you might have slung me the ladder down," he said, gazing about him in blank astonishment. "paint is evidently scarce where you come from. i've seen smarter craft in a wrecker's yard. still, i can't stop here talking. what do you want?" "a doctor, for one thing," said austin, to gain time. "we have half the crew down in the forecastle." the mate walked to the rails and shouted to his boat-boys, while, when the gig slid away, he pointed up at the drooping flags as he turned to austin. "i suppose it's artistic, the colouring, i mean," he said. "still, it's a trifle difficult to make out by either code." austin laughed. "come into my room and have a drink. there are one or two things i want to ask you." five minutes later he spread a mildewed chart on the table as they sat with a bottle of jacinta's wine before them. "now," he said, "if you will tell me exactly where we are, i'd be much obliged to you." "you don't know?" and the mate looked at him curiously. "since you can't undertake any salvage operations with the mails on board, i don't mind admitting that i'm far from sure. you see, we have only one navigator, and if you were forward just now you would hear him raving. i've got to take her somehow--on dead reckoning--to the canaries." the mate opened his mouth and gasped. "well," he said simply, "may i be ----!" "i suppose that's natural, but it isn't much use to me. i've been creeping along the coast, so far, but it's evident that if i stick to it i won't reach las palmas. i want a definite point from which to make a start for the ocean run." the mate pulled a pin out of the chart, and, measuring with the dividers, stuck it in again. "you're not quite so much out as i expected you would be," he said. "it's a straight run to the isleta, grand canary. whether you'll ever get there with the compass and the patent log is another matter, though, of course, if you go on long enough, you'll fetch some part of america. i don't want to be unduly inquisitive, but you will have lost, at least, an hour of our time before i put pills on board again, and i really think there is a little you should tell me." austin briefly outlined his adventures, and when he had finished the mate brought his fist down with a bang on the table. "well," he said, "you have evidently excellent nerves of your own, and i'm not quite so sure as i was that you'll never get her home. i don't mind admitting now that at first i thought you were crazy. it's evident that your compass and patent log are all right, but you'll have to get your latitude and longitude, at least, occasionally, and i'll bend on some signals any skipper you come across would understand. if he's particularly good-natured he might chalk it on a board." he stopped a moment with a little sardonic smile. "as a matter of fact, it's not quite so unusual a question as you might suppose." austin thanked him profusely, and felt a good deal easier when he and the mailboat's doctor, who arrived presently and gave him good advice, went away. then, with a blast of her whistle, the _cumbria_ steamed on to the west again, and it was three or four days later, and she was plunging along with dripping forecastle at a little over six knots against the trades, when austin had trouble with jefferson. he was asleep in his room, aft, and, awakening suddenly, wondered for a moment or two what was wrong, until it dawned on him that it was the unusual quietness which had roused him. then he sprang from his berth and hastened out on deck, for it was evident that the engines had stopped. there was clear moonlight overhead, and the ship was rolling heavily, while as he looked forward a clamour broke out beneath the bridge, where grimy men came scrambling up from the stoke-hole gratings. it was light enough for him to see their blackened faces and their excited gestures. other men were, he fancied, from the pattering on the iron deck, also moving in that direction from the forecastle; but what most astonished him was the sight of a gaunt white figure pacing up and down the bridge. while he gazed at it, wall-eye came running towards him breathlessly. "the señor jefferson has stopped the ship!" he said. "he has a pistol, and maccario, who is shut up in the wheel-house, shouts us that he will go back to africa again!" austin, who knew a little about malarial fever by this time, ran forward, and met tom at the foot of the bridge ladder. the latter laid a grimy finger on his forehead significantly. "right off his dot! i don't know what's to be done," he said. "it would be easier if he hadn't that pistol." a gong clanged beneath them while they considered it, and tom shook his head. "he has been ringing all over the telegraph, from full speed to hard astern," he said. "i don't know if he'd give you the pistol, but when i got half way up the ladder he said he'd put a bullet into me. any way, if you went up and talked to him while i crawled up quiet by the other ladder, i might get him by the foot or slip in behind him." austin was by no means anxious to face the pistol, but it was evident that something must be done, and he went up the ladder as unconcernedly as he could. when he reached the head of it jefferson beat upon the wheel-house window with his fist. "what's her head to the westwards for?" he said. "port, hard over! can't you hear inside there?" the steering engine rattled, and it was evident that the helmsman was badly afraid, but in another moment jefferson had swung away from the wheel-house, and was wrenching at the telegraph again. "what's the matter with these engines?" he said. "i want her backed while i swing her under a ported helm. i'll plug somebody certain if this is a mutiny." he opened the big revolver, and closed it with a suggestive click, while it cost austin an effort to walk quietly along the bridge. jefferson's eyes were glittering, his hair hung down on his face, which was grey and drawn, dark with perspiration, and his hands and limbs were quivering. his voice, however, although a trifle hoarser, was very like his usual one, so much so, in fact, that austin found it difficult to believe the man's mind was unhinged by fever. he whirled round when he heard austin, without a trace of recognition in his eyes. "now," he said, "why can't i get what i want done?" "you're very sick," said austin quietly. "hadn't you better go back to bed?" jefferson laughed. "yes," he said, "i guess i am, or these brutes wouldn't try to take advantage of me. still, in another minute you're going to see me make a hole in somebody!" he leaned heavily on the bridge rails, with the pistol glinting in his hand, and austin endeavoured to answer him soothingly. "what do you want to go back to africa for?" he said. "there wouldn't be any difficulty about it if it was necessary." "funnel-paint's there. they brought me away when i was sick, or i'd have killed him." he made a little gesture, and dropped his hoarse voice. "you see, i had a partner who stood by me through everything, and funnel-paint sent down a ---- rotting nigger!" "your partner's all right," said austin, who saw that jefferson was as far from recognising him as ever. "i've excellent reasons for being sure of it." jefferson leaned towards him confidentially, with one hand on the rails. "it hasn't come out, but it's bound to get him. the nigger had his arms round him. then he'll have to hide in a dark hole where nobody can see him, while the flesh rots off him, until he dies." austin could not help a shiver. he knew the thing might happen, and he realised now that it had also been in jefferson's mind. still, it was, in the meanwhile, his business to get the pistol from the latter, and then put him in his berth, by force, if necessary. "the difficulty is that you can't kill a man twice," he said. "i seem to have a notion that you hove a stick of dynamite into funnel-paint's canoe." "i could have done, and i meant to, but my partner was with me. i had to humour him. that man stood by me." austin stood still, looking at him, a little bewildered by it all. the mailboat doctors and some of the traders he had met at las palmas had more than once related curious examples of the mental aberration which now and then results from malarial fever. still, jefferson, whom he had left scarcely fit to raise his head in his bunk, was now apparently almost sensible; and, what was more astonishing, able, at least, to walk about. then, when he wondered how he was to get his comrade down from the bridge, the latter turned to him with a sudden change of mood. "you're keeping me talking while they play some trick on me," he said. "all right! in another moment you'll be sorry." the pistol went up, and austin set his lips while a little shiver of dismay ran through him. the ladder he had come up by was some distance away, the wheel-house, at least, as far, and he stood clear in the moonlight, realising that the first move he made would probably lead to jefferson squeezing the trigger. then, with sudden bitterness, he remembered what, it seemed, was in his blood, and felt astonished that he should be troubled by physical fear. it would be a swifter and cleaner end if his comrade killed him there. that consideration, however, only appealed to his reason, and the reflection came that jefferson would probably never shake off the recollection of what he had done; and, knowing it was safest, he braced himself to stand motionless, while the perspiration dripped from him, steadily eyeing the fever-crazed man. "if you will let me tell you why we are steaming west it would save a good deal of trouble," he said, as soothingly as he could, though his voice shook. "you see, you were too sick to understand, and you're not very well yet." jefferson, somewhat to his astonishment, seemed willing to listen, but he was, unfortunately, far from the side of the bridge below which austin surmised that tom was crouching. he risked a glance round, but the helmsman evidently dare not leave the wheel-house, for which austin could not blame him, and the spaniards stood clustered together gazing up at them from below. austin decided that if he signed or called to them jefferson would use the pistol, though he fancied that one of them was trying to make him understand something. then suddenly a shadowy form glided out from behind the wheel-house, where jefferson could not see it. there was a rush of feet, and a spring, and jefferson went down heavily with another man, who wound his arms round him. they rolled against the bridge rails, and a breathless voice called to austin. "get hold of the pistol!" it said. austin wrenched it from his comrade; men came scrambling up the ladder, and in another moment or two they had jefferson helpless, and set about carrying him to his room. when they laid him in his berth his strength seemed to suddenly melt away, and he lay limp and still, only babbling incoherently. austin ventured to give him a sedative, and then, leaving wall-eye to watch him, went out on deck. tom, who was waiting for him, made a little deprecatory gesture. "i'm sorry, mr. austin, but he never came near my side of the bridge," he said. "if i had got up he'd have dropped me with the pistol, and that wouldn't have done much good to anybody." "of course not," said austin. "i was uncommonly thankful when bill got hold of him. send him along to my room, and then start your engines." in another two or three minutes the _cumbria_ was steaming west again, and bill, the fireman, stood, somewhat sheepishly, in the doorway of austin's room. "i owe you a good deal, and when the time comes i'll endeavour to remember it," said the latter. "still, i don't want mr. jefferson ever to know anything about the thing. you did it cleverly." bill grinned. "well," he said, "i'm quite glad i did. i felt i had to do something for my five pounds, any way." it dawned upon austin that once or twice, when he had somewhat risky work to do, bill had been near him. "what five pounds?" he asked. "the five pounds she shoved into my hand one night on board the _estremedura_--no--the fact is, i'm feeling a little shaky, and i don't quite know what i'm saying. the getting hold of mr. jefferson has upset me. when you think of it, it's only natural." "then it has come on very suddenly," said austin. "you seemed all right a moment or two ago. am i to understand that somebody gave you five pounds to look after me?" it was evident to bill that there was nothing to be gained by further reticence, and he edged out of the doorway, grinning more broadly than ever. "well," he said, "i guess she meant you, though she said it was both of you. still, you won't tell her, or i sha'n't get any more." he had vanished before austin could ask another question, but the matter was quite clear to the latter, and his face grew hot while a little thrill of satisfaction ran through him as he recognised that jacinta had felt it worth while to do what she could to ensure his safety. then he remembered something else, and his face grew hard as he pulled off his jacket and glanced at his bare arm. he had torn and abraded it heaving in oil and coal, and the gunboat's surgeon had warned him that it was advisable to keep his skin unbroken. there were several half-hardened scars upon it now, and another had been torn away when he fell against the rail in a heavy lurch a day or two earlier. he had worn no jacket at the time. he had since noticed a curious tingling sensation in that part of his arm, and, holding it nearer the lamp, he saw that the flesh was inflamed about the wound. there was no doubt about the fact. when he pressed it with his thumb all the lower arm was sore, and he let it fall limply to his side, and sat down with a little groan. the horrible thing he shrank from had, it seemed, come upon him. he sat very still for half an hour, grappling with a numbing sense of dismay, and then, with a little shake of his shoulders, went back to the bridge, for he had still a duty to his comrades. chapter xxix austin is missing it was a fine morning, and the signal, "steamer approaching from the south," was flying from the staff high up on the isleta hill, when pancho brown's boat lay heaving on the smooth swell at the entrance to las palmas harbour. mrs. hatherly, jacinta, and muriel sat in the stern-sheets, and beyond them two barefooted canarios were resting on their oars, while two or three miles away a smear of smoke that half hid a streak of dusky hull moved towards them across the shining sea. brown was watching it attentively with a pair of marine glasses in his hand. "you have brought me off several times for nothing, but i almost think our friends have turned up at last," he said. "of course, from lieutenant onslow's cable she should have been here several days ago, but it's very likely the engines would give them trouble. any way, we'll know in ten minutes or so. there's the _sanidad_ going off." a launch crept out from the mole, and behind her in the harbour boats were being got afloat. coaling clerks, tobacco and wine merchants, and a miscellaneous crowd of petty dealers, were waiting to step on board, but two, at least, of pancho brown's party had no eyes for them. they were watching the incoming steamer rise higher out of the shining sea, and wondering if she was the one they had for the last few days looked for with tense anxiety. they had onslow's cable from sierra leone, and the skipper of a big tramp which had come in for coals reported that a small british steamer had asked him for the latitude and longitude a week before. nothing, however, had since been heard of her, and jacinta had found the last three or four days as trying as muriel did. the latter had, however, borne the suspense bravely, and displayed a sublime confidence in her lover which jacinta, for no very obvious reason, found almost exasperating at times. "can't we go out a little?" she said at last. brown made a sign to the canarios, who dipped the oars, and as they slid past the _carsegarry_, which lay with steam blowing off, and a water barge alongside, captain farquhar leaned over her rails. he had come in for coal on his way to liverpool the previous day, and had spent part of the night with brown. "i really think that is the _cumbria_," he said. "any way, she's much the kind of boat jefferson described to me, and so far as i can make out they have a big boiler on deck. i suppose you are going off to her?" brown said they were, and farquhar glanced at the boat hesitatingly. "i'd very much like to come with you, but i can't leave just now," he said. "still, we won't have filled our tanks up for an hour or two, and you might tell mr. austin that i certainly expect him to pull across and see me. in fact, although we have steam up, i'll wait until he does." brown made a sign of comprehension, and the boat slid away, while when she stopped again outside the harbour the eyes of all on board her were fixed upon the steamer. she had also stopped, and lay rolling wildly, with the yellow flag at her foremast-head and the _sanidad_ launch alongside her; but in another minute or two the flag came fluttering down, and she moved on again towards the harbour. brown signed to the oarsmen to turn the boat's head. "there's no doubt that she's the _cumbria_, and they can't have had anything very bad on board," he said. in another five minutes the _cumbria_ crept up with them, rolling wickedly, with the big pump thudding on her deck, and a stream of water spouting from her side. rags of awnings fluttered about her, her funnel was white with salt crust, for the trade-wind blows strong at that season, and the blistered paint had peeled from her corroded sides. her story was written upon her so that even the girls could read, and both felt that no plainer testimony was needed to the courage of the men who had brought her home. then they saw them, jefferson leaning out, gaunt and blanched in face, from the bridge rails, and austin standing amidst a group of haggard men on the forecastle. jacinta's heart was beating a good deal faster than usual, and she saw the sudden tears rise to her companion's eyes; but as the long, rusty hull forged past them austin made no sign. he stood looking straight in front of him, until he turned to the men about him who were busy with the anchor. "he can't have seen us," said muriel, with astonishment in her tone, and then touched brown's arm. "tell them to row their hardest, please." the canarios bent their backs and the boat swept forward, for the steamer had already passed ahead of them. jacinta sat unusually still, watching her, sensible at once of a vague dismay and a thrill of pride. she had understanding as well as imagination, and the sight of that rusty vessel and the worn faces of the men upon her deck had stirred her curiously. it was, she felt, a notable thing they had done, and she was, she knew, responsible for the part one of them had played in it. he had come home with credit, a man who had done something worth while, and had doubtless learned his strength. she could not fancy him frittering his life away after that; but still she was perplexed, and a trifle anxious, for it seemed that he must have seen them, and he had made no sign. she had, on her part, twice passed him without recognition in the plaza at santa cruz, and her heart smote her as she remembered it; but he was not a vindictive man, and must by that time have realised the misapprehension she had been under concerning him. for that, at least, she would ask his forgiveness in another few minutes, and her face burned as she wondered what he would say to her. then she saw the white wash of the _cumbria_'s propeller as it whirled astern, and there was a roar of running chain, while two or three minutes later they were making their way up the lowered ladder amidst a crowd of petty dealers when jefferson came across the deck, driving the latter aside. jacinta saw that it cost muriel an effort to hide her consternation at his appearance, but in another moment she was smiling at him with shining eyes, and the haggard man's arms were about her. that the deck was crowded with spaniards did not seem in the least to matter to either of them. jacinta, who would not have done as much, felt a little thrill of sympathy, and, it was significant, looked round for austin. there was, however, no sign of him. then jefferson, still holding muriel's arm, drew them out of the press, and there was a general offering of congratulations and grasping of hands. "i am," he said, "uncommonly glad to be back again, though i'm not sure we'd have ever got here except for austin. i have only been on my feet the last day or two, and he did everything." "where is he?" said muriel, seeing that jacinta would not ask. "across at the _carsegarry_. at least, he told me he was going when he recognised her." "without coming to shake hands with us?" said muriel, who flashed a covert glance at jacinta. "i understand from one of these fellows that farquhar is just going to sea, and it's very probable that austin heard it, too. i have no doubt he'll be back again in five minutes." "you will come ashore with us, and we will expect you and mr. austin to make my house your home in the meanwhile," said brown. "i shall be very glad," said jefferson. "you will, however, have to excuse me for an hour or two. i have our consul to see, and a good many things to do before i can call my time my own. i wonder if you could get me a tartana?" "mine is waiting at the mole," said brown. it was an hour later when they took their places in the vehicle, but though brown bade the driver wait a minute or two, there was no appearance of austin. just then the _carsegarry_ crept down the harbour, and with a sonorous blast of her whistle steamed out to sea. "there is no boat coming. he must have landed on the other mole, and, perhaps, met somebody he couldn't get away from," said brown. "i'll leave word that we are expecting him, and no doubt he'll turn up soon after we get home." they drove away, and that afternoon sat together in brown's cool patio. the noise of the bustling city was deadened by the tall white walls, over which there shone a square of cloudless blue, and the scent of flowers was heavy in the shadowy space below. jefferson lay, attired becomingly once more, in a big cane chair, with a little smile of content in his hollow face, and a pile of fruit, and a flask of wine, on the table in front of him. the others sat about him, and a fountain splashed behind them in the shadow. "a very little of this will make me well," he said. "in fact, it is already a trifle difficult to believe that i could scarcely lift myself in my berth a few days ago. i think it was the sight of gomera that cured me. you see, i was a little doubtful about austin finding the canaries, and when they came to tell me they could see the peak, wall-eye, who was watching me, ran out." "what was he watching you for?" asked muriel. "to see i didn't get up. i had my chance then, and i crawled out of my berth. i believe i fell over several things before i got out on deck, and then i knew we were all right at last. there was the peak--high up in the sky in front of us, with gomera a blue smudge low down at its feet. we ran in under the lee, and, because they were played out, and tom had trouble with his engines, stayed there three days." he stopped a moment, with a little laugh. "i think austin was 'most astonished as i was to find he'd brought her home. he'd been running four or five days on dead reckoning, and wasn't much more than a hundred miles out." "i wonder where he is," said brown. jefferson looked a trifle perplexed, and it was evident that others of the party had asked themselves the same question, for there was a moment's silence until muriel spoke. "if he doesn't come soon i shall feel very vexed with him; but we want to hear how you got the steamer off," she said. jefferson commenced his tale diffidently, but, because austin had worked in the sombre background--more effectively than he could do already--the rest listened with full comprehension. his unvarnished narrative was, however, striking enough, and, save for the splashing of the fountain, and his low voice, there was a suggestive silence in the patio, until he stopped abruptly when he came to the scene in which austin pleaded for the negro. "the man wasn't fit to look at," he said. "but why did mr. austin go near him?" asked muriel, with a little shiver. "to save his life," said jefferson, awkwardly. "you see, we couldn't have him there--and he really wasn't a man then. the thing he had we believed contagious, and somebody had to put him into his canoe." muriel gazed at him with an expression of perplexity, and it was clear that she did not quite understand what had taken place on the night in question, which was, however, not astonishing. brown appeared a trifle uncomfortable, and jefferson was sincerely thankful when jacinta broke in. "of course," she said. "he couldn't have stayed there. mr. austin put him into his canoe?" she stopped for a moment, and her voice seemed to change a trifle. "did he find it necessary to touch him?" "he did. in fact, the nigger got hold of him. one of them slipped on the bridge deck ladder and they rolled down it together." again there was silence, and all of them looked at jefferson, who saw the question in jacinta's eyes. "no," he said. "nothing came of it, though for a week or so i was horribly afraid. it isn't men like austin who take that kind of thing, and it's possible it mayn't have been infectious, after all." muriel heard jacinta softly draw in her breath, as though she had been under a strain which had suddenly relaxed. then a little colour crept into her face and a sparkle into her eyes. "yes," said jefferson, though nobody had spoken, "it was a daring thing. more, in fact, than i would have done. my partner has the cleanest kind of real hard sand in him." he turned to muriel with a little deprecatory gesture. "i had more at stake than he had--and i was afraid that night." jacinta sat still a while, a trifle flushed in face, for the scene jefferson had very vaguely pictured had stirred her to the depths. the man whom she had sent forth had done more than she would ever have asked of him, and the gallantry of the action brought a dimness to her eyes. then she remembered that it was not done recklessly, for he had, it seemed, decided calmly, which must have made it inexpressibly harder. there were, she could imagine, circumstances in which a man might more or less willingly risk his life, but the risk austin had taken was horrible, and he stood to gain nothing when he quietly recognised the responsibility he had taken upon himself. it was with an overwhelming sense of confusion she remembered the jibes she had flung at him concerning his discretion, and yet under it there was still the sense of pride. after all, it was to please her he had gone to africa. "well," said jefferson quietly, "you are pleased with him?" jacinta met his gaze unwaveringly, and her voice had a little thrill in it. "does it matter in the least whether i am pleased or not?" she said. "still, since you ask, i scarcely think i have heard of anything that would surpass what he did that night." jefferson made her a little inclination. "i am," he said gravely, "not sure that i have, either." he went on with his story, but jacinta scarcely listened to it, for she was wondering why austin had not come, and waiting expectantly for the time when she could, in self-abasement, endeavour to wipe what she had said from his memory. still, he did not come, and it was half an hour later when a barefooted boatman was shown into the patio. he had an envelope in his hand, and turned to brown. "the englishman who was in the _estremedura_ gave me this on board the _carsegarry_," he said. "i am sorry i could not bring it before, but several steamers i had to go to came in, and then it was some time before i found out that the señor jefferson had gone home with you." when he went away brown handed jefferson the note, while the latter, who opened it, straightened himself suddenly and seemed to be struggling with some emotion. then he passed it to jacinta. "you have good nerves, miss brown," he said. "if i had known it would come to this, i think i would have left the _cumbria_ there." jacinta took the letter in a steady hand, but her face grew a trifle blanched as she read. "i am going home with farquhar," the message ran. "i could hardly go in a passenger boat, and he is fixing me up a room by myself. i didn't care to tell you when you were just shaking off the fever, but one of my arms feels very much as that engineer said his did. i am going to see if one of the big specialists or the tropical disease men can do anything for me." jacinta sat quite still a minute, and then slowly rose. "it is horrible, but i suppose even a purpose of the kind he had does not exempt one from the consequences," she said. "there are things to attend to. you will excuse me just now." they looked at one another when she left them, and then brown turned to jefferson. "i wonder if you have any objections to showing me that note?" he said. "it doesn't seem to be here," said muriel. "what can she have done with it?" "don't worry about looking," said jefferson sharply. "i can remember it. it has, in fact, shaken a good deal of the stiffness out of me." muriel gasped with consternation when he told them, and by and by the group broke up, while it was a somewhat silent party that assembled for comida an hour later. jacinta, it was evident, had very little appetite, though she contrived to join in the somewhat pointless conversation, and it was not until late that night brown came upon her alone on the flat roof. she was leaning on the parapet, and looking out across the sea, but her eyes were turned northwards now, and she did not hear him until he gently laid a hand upon her shoulder. then she turned and looked at him with despair in her face. she had not expected him, or he would not have seen it, though there was clear moonlight above them. brown sat down on the parapet, and, taking off his gold-rimmed glasses, held them in his hand. "i think i understand, my dear, and i have something to say," he said. jacinta made no disclaimer. for one thing, she saw it would have been useless, and she had no strength left in her then. "is it worth while?" she asked. "would anything that you could say change what has happened?" "no," said brown, reflectively, "i scarcely think it would. still, i would like to mention that we really don't know the thing is incurable. in fact, it may be a malady which is readily susceptible to the proper treatment, and he has done wisely in going to england." a little gleam of hope crept into jacinta's eyes. "i had hardly dared to think of that," she said. "well," said brown, "i really fancy the thing may not be as serious as you and mr. jefferson, perhaps naturally, seem to fear. now, as you know, i was going to england about the new fruit contracts in a week or two, and there is no particular reason why i shouldn't go the day after to-morrow. i should make it my business to see mr. austin has the best advice which can be got from the specialists in that country. only, my dear, i want to ask a very plain question. supposing he is cured--what then?" "i'm afraid you must shape the question differently," and a trace of colour crept into the whiteness of jacinta's face. "then i will tell you what i know. you sent that man to africa, and he went because he was in love with you. he is also a man i have a considerable liking for--and you are my only child. i am getting old, and would like to see you safely settled before i go. there are," and he made a little gesture, "occasions on which one must speak plainly." jacinta's face was crimson at last, but she in no way attempted to question the correctness of the announcement he had made. "mr. austin, at least, never told me what you seem to be so sure about--and it is scarcely likely that he will ever do so now," she said. brown smiled a little, and tapped the palm of his hand with his glasses. "my dear," he said, "i think you know better. of course, you would never have admitted so much as you have done if i had not had you at a disadvantage to-night. well, the first thing is to see what can be done to cure him. only, if he comes back, you will, i suppose, know your mind?" he looked at her steadily, and, when jacinta lowered her eyes, laid his hand gently on her arm again. "i sail by the yellow-funnel boat the day after to-morrow," he said. chapter xxx jacinta capitulates the _carsegarry_ was not a fast vessel. like most of the ocean tramp species, she had been built to carry the largest possible cargo on a very moderate consumption of coal, and speed was a secondary consideration. she had also been in the warmer seas for some time, with the result that every plate beneath her water-line was foul, and as she fell in with strong northwest breezes, she was an unusually long while on the way to liverpool. austin was thus not astonished to find a letter from jefferson, written four or five days after he left las palmas, waiting him at farquhar's brokers, which made it evident that his comrade had got to work again. he smiled a trifle grimly as he read it, for he fancied that its optimistic tone had cost jefferson--who alluded to his apprehensions about his arm very briefly--an effort, for the fact that he was asked to cable as soon as he had seen a doctor appeared significant. the rest of the letter concerned financial affairs. "we have had a rough preliminary survey, and the result is distinctly encouraging," he read. "after making a few temporary repairs i expect to bring her on to liverpool, and there is every reason to believe we can dispose of her for a good round sum. i could have got £ , , ex-cargo, as she lies here. palm oil, it also appears, is scarce and dear, at up to £ the ton, from which it seems to me that your share should approximate £ , . i have to mention that brown is on his way to liverpool and wants you to communicate with him at the address enclosed." this was satisfactory as far as it went. the only trouble was that austin was very uncertain whether he would live to spend what he had so hardly earned. his arm had become exceedingly painful during the voyage, and after a consultation with the ship broker he telephoned an eminent specialist. "i will expect you at two o'clock," the doctor said. "if it appears advisable, we can, of course, avail ourselves, as you suggest, of any views the tropical disease men may favour us with. in the meanwhile, i will arrange for a gentleman who has made considerable progress in similar researches to meet you." austin went out of the broker's office with three hours to spare, and wandered aimlessly about the city in a state of tense suspense. he felt that he could not sit still, and in any case he was dubious as to whether he was warranted in going back to the hotel. indeed, he wondered whether he had any right to be at large at all, and after a while hung about the wharves, where there was less chance of any one coming into perilous contact with him. he had never spent such a morning in his life, and decided that what he had done and borne in africa was not worth mention by comparison. still, the hours dragged by, and at last he set out for the specialists' surgery without daring to wonder what the result would be, and found two gentlemen awaiting him there. one of them, who had grey hair and very keen eyes, motioned him to a chair. "now," he said, "before we proceed to an examination it might be better if you told us concisely what happened to you in africa." austin, who sat down, did so, and wondered a little that he was able to speak coherently and quietly, for every nerve in him seemed tingling with tense anxiety. then the man with the grey hair asked him a few terse questions about the negro's appearance, and when he had described it as well as he could remember, glanced at his companion. "do you recognise the symptoms?" he said. "no," said the other man, who was younger. "there are one or two complaints not unusual in that country which appear to somewhat resemble it, but they are seldom so virulent. i would like to talk to mr. austin about it later, but in the meanwhile----" "exactly," and the specialist made a little gesture. "mr. austin is, no doubt, anxious to hear our opinion. if you will permit me----" he drew the jacket gently over austin's swollen arm, and the latter, who held it out, bare to the shoulder, felt the perspiration start from him as he watched the doctors bend over the limb. they said nothing for a space of seconds, and austin fancied he would remember that time while he lived. then, to his astonishment, the grey-haired man glanced at his companion with a little smile. "i fancy this case has lost its special interest to you?" he said. the other man nodded. "it has," he said. "our views evidently coincide." "i would venture to point out that any decision you may have arrived at is, naturally, of considerable importance to me," said austin, a trifle sharply. the specialist smiled again. "i expect you will be pleased to hear that it is not a peculiarly african disease you are suffering from. it is, in fact, no more than a by no means infrequent form of blood poisoning." austin gasped, and felt his heart beat furiously from relief, and the specialist waited a moment or two before he went on. "it is evident that you had several lacerations on your lower arm--made by corroded iron, or something of the kind." "i tore the skin rather frequently working cargo, and when the scars had partly healed opened up rather a nasty wound by falling on the steamer's rail." "exactly. the result is not astonishing in the case of a man weakened by fever who has attempted to work harder than is advisable in a country like the one you mention. in the meanwhile, this arm is going to give you trouble, and i should recommend you to go into the private ward of the ---- hospital. i will telephone them if that would suit you?" austin said he placed himself in the doctor's hands, and half an hour later was being driven to the hospital, where the other man, who was apparently anxious to know more about the negro, asked permission to visit him. he also came in due time, but, so far as austin could ascertain, never quite decided what the negro was suffering from, though he admitted that there were african troubles of the kind which were infectious. in the meanwhile, austin realised how much he needed rest, and how heavy the strain he had borne had been. he did not even want to read, and was languidly content to sit still and think of nothing, until one day, when it was evident that his arm was healing, a nurse came in to announce a visitor. "if it's that doctor man, you can tell him i can't remember anything more about the nigger, and don't mean to try," he said. the nurse laughed. "it isn't," she said. "it's a little gentleman with gold-rimmed spectacles." austin started. "ah!" he said. "will you please tell them to send him in?" in a few more minutes brown came in, and, sitting down, shook his head reproachfully. "you have really given your friends a good deal of anxiety, and i was almost afraid i would have to go back without learning what had become of you," he said. "still, though i know the thing isn't, fortunately, what you thought it was, the first question is, how are you?" "recovering," said austin, with a smile. "i understand that my arm will be all right again very shortly. it was a very usual trouble. as you seem to recognise, i let my imagination run away with me." "i am very pleased to hear it. why didn't you cable?" "i understood that you had left las palmas, and jefferson was on the point of doing so. i could scarcely suppose there was any one else who cared enough about what happened to me to make it necessary." brown looked at him with a curious little smile which austin found disconcerting. "there are mrs. hatherly and muriel. i almost think jacinta would have liked to know that you and jefferson were under a misapprehension, too. still, that is, perhaps, not very important, after all. i suppose jefferson told you that he expects to get a good deal for the _cumbria_ and her cargo?" "i was pleased to hear that my share might amount to £ , ." brown took off his glasses and held them in one hand, which, as austin knew, was a trick of his when he had anything on his mind. "i am going to take a liberty," he said. "have you decided yet what you will do with it?" "no. that was one of the points i meant to wait a little before grappling with." "well," said brown, reflectively, "there is something i could suggest, but i would like to ask another question." he stopped a moment, and tapped the palm of one hand with his glasses. "why did you go out to africa?" "wouldn't the chance of winning £ , , which was what jefferson estimated my share would be, appear a sufficient reason?" "no," said brown drily. "not to me. when he first made you the offer you wouldn't go." "i went, however, when i heard that he was sick. it was then a very natural thing. that ought to satisfy you." "i scarcely think it does." "then, if i had any other reasons, though i am not exactly admitting it, they concern myself alone." brown made a little gesture. "well," he said, "i don't suppose it matters in the meanwhile. you have once or twice asked my advice, and now you have some £ , , and, i understand, don't know how to lay it out to the best advantage." "exactly. i don't feel the least desire to undertake the heaving off of any more steamers." brown leaned forward, and tapped his hand with the glasses. "an enterprising man could do a good deal with £ , . it would, for example, buy him, we'll call it, a third share in a certain rather profitable fruit and wine business in las palmas. that is, of course, on the understanding that he devoted his whole time and energy to it." austin gazed at him in blank astonishment for a moment or two, and then a red flush crept into his face. "i fancy a third share in the business you are evidently alluding to would be worth a good deal more than that," he said. "probably," said brown, with a trace of dryness. "that is, i might get more for it, but i have no intention of offering it to everybody. i would like to ask your careful attention for a minute or two, mr. austin." he stopped a moment, and his tone had changed when he proceeded. "there is nothing to be gained by hiding the fact that i am getting old, and i begin to feel that i would like to take my life a little more easily," he said. "indeed, i want somebody i could have confidence in to do the hardest work for me. i made the business--and i am a little proud of it. it would not please me to let go of it altogether--and, as a matter of fact, i have been warned that if i retired to england, the climate would probably shorten my life for me. you are, perhaps, aware that i came out to the canaries originally because my constitution is not an excellent one." he stopped again, and added, with a certain significance: "i have, however, been told that my ailments are not likely to prove hereditary. well, as i mentioned, i do not want to give the business up entirely, and it would be a matter of grief to me to see it go to pieces in the hands of an incompetent manager. that is why i have made you the offer." austin met his gaze steadily, though the flush was still in his face. "i scarcely think anybody would call me an enterprising business man, that is, at least, from the conventional english point of view." brown chuckled softly. "i believe you know as well as i do that a man of that kind would not be of the least use in spain. they would drive him crazy, and he would probably have insulted half his clients past forgiveness before he had been a month among them. now, you understand the spaniards, and, what is as much to the purpose, they seem to like you." austin sat still, looking at him, and at last he saw that brown's reserve was breaking down. his hands seemed to be trembling a little, and there were other signs of anxiety about him. "i don't know why you have made me that offer, sir," he said. "there must be plenty of men more fitted to be the recipient of it." "it is, at least, wholly unconditional," and brown made a little gesture that curiously became him. "i may say that i had already satisfied myself about you, or i should never have made it." "then," said austin, a trifle hoarsely, "i can only thank you--and endeavour to give you no cause for being sorry afterwards that you fixed on me." they had a little more to say, but the nurse appeared during the course of it and informed brown that the surgeon was coming to dress austin's arm. "just a minute," said the latter. "will you be kind enough to pass me that pad and pencil?" she gave it to him, and he scribbled hastily, and then tore off the sheet and handed it to brown. "i wonder if that message meets with your approval, sir?" he said. brown put on his glasses, and smiled as he read: "miss brown, casa-brown, las palmas. ran away without a cause. almost well. may i come back as your father's partner?" brown chuckled softly, though there was a curious and somewhat unusual gentleness in his eyes. "it has my full approbation, though, considering the cable company's charges, isn't it a trifle loquacious?" "does that matter?" asked austin. brown laughed, and grasped the hand he held out. "no," he said, "i don't suppose it does. after all, these things only happen once in the average lifetime. well, i must evidently go now, but i will come back to see what jacinta says to-morrow." he went out, and that night austin got jacinta's answer. "come!" was all it said, but austin was well content, and, though he was not a very sentimental man, went to sleep with the message beneath his pillow. it was, however, rather more than three weeks later when, as a yellow-funnelled mailboat slid into las palmas harbour, austin, leaning down from her rail, saw jacinta and mrs. hatherly in one of the crowding boats below. the little lady discreetly remained where she was, and when jacinta came up the ladder austin met her at the head of it. she flashed a swift glance into his face, and then for a moment turned hers aside. "ah!" she said, "you have forgotten what i said to you, and you are really well again?" austin laughed, a quiet, exultant laugh. "i was never particularly ill, but you know all that, and we have ever so much more pleasant things to talk about," he said. "in the meanwhile, i fancy we are blocking up the gangway." holding the hand she had given him, he drew her behind the deck-house masterfully, and looked down on her with a little smile. "i almost think you are pleased to see me back," he said. "ah!" said jacinta, "if you only knew what the past few weeks have cost me." austin, laying both hands on her shoulders, stooped and kissed her twice. "that was worth going to africa for, and if jefferson had only bought the _cumbria_ sooner i would have ventured to do as much ever so long ago." there was apparently nobody else on that side of the deck-house, and jacinta, who did not shake his grasp off, looked up at him with shining eyes. "you are quite sure of that?" she said. "the wish to do so was almost irresistible the first time i saw you. it has been growing stronger ever since." jacinta laughed softly, though the crimson was in her cheeks. "still, you would have mastered it. you were always discreet, you know, and that was why at last i--who have hitherto told all my friends what they ought to do--had to let some one else make it clear how much i wanted you. now, you are going to think very little of me after that?" "my dear," said austin, "you know there was only one thing which could have kept me away from you." "as if that mattered," and jacinta laughed scornfully. "now, stoop a little, though, perhaps, i shouldn't tell you, and if you hadn't gone to africa, of course, i shouldn't have done it. i knew when you went away how badly i wanted you--and i would have done anything to bring you back, however much it cost me." a couple of seamen carrying baggage appeared from behind the deck-house just then, which naturally cut short their confidences, and austin made his way with jacinta's hand upon his arm towards the boat. he was a trifle bewildered, as well as exultant, for this was quite a new jacinta, one, in fact, he had never encountered before. she gave him another proof of it when he made an observation that afforded her the opening as they were rowed across the harbour. "no," she said, quite disregarding mrs. hatherly, "i am not going to give you any advice or instructions now you belong to me. after managing everybody else's affairs successfully for ever so long i made a deplorable mess of my own, you see." "then what am i to do when we have difficulties to contend with?" said austin. "we may have a few now and then." "you," said jacinta sweetly, "will have to get over them. i know you can do that now, and i am just going to watch you and be pleased with everything. isn't that the correct attitude, mrs. hatherly?" the little lady beamed upon them both. "it is rather an old-fashioned one, my dear," she said. "still, i am far from sure that it doesn't work out as well as the one occasionally adopted by young women now." the end. transcriber's note: the following typographical errors present in the original edition have been corrected. in chapter ii, ="don erminio," said jacinto, "evidently doesn't approve of his dinner."= was changed to ="don erminio," said jacinta, "evidently doesn't approve of his dinner."=, =a bit doosoor on the coal trade is one thing, but you was--insultin'= was changed to =a bit doosoor on the coal trade is one thing, but yon was--insultin'=, =as he steamer rolled= was changed to =as the steamer rolled=, and =our launcha ready= was changed to =our lancha ready=. in chapter iii, =erminio oliviera, the _estremeduro's_ captain= was changed to =erminio oliviera, the _estremedura's_ captain=, and =if jacinto ever does= was changed to =if jacinta ever does=. in chapter iv, =it also occured to him= was changed to =it also occurred to him=. in chapter v, =a schoner load of onions= was changed to =a schooner load of onions=, and a missing quotation mark was added after =painting little pictures on board the _estremedura_.= in chapter vi, =as he drew in under the estremedura's side= was changed to =as he drew in under the _estremedura's_ side=, and =isn't that sufficient.= was changed to =isn't that sufficient?= in chapter vii, =his silk-covered beast= was changed to =his silk-covered breast=, =escaped anihilation= was changed to =escaped annihilation=, and =didn't apear to have any legitimate connection= was changed to =didn't appear to have any legitimate connection=. in chapter viii, =the negroes who crosesd it= was changed to =the negroes who crossed it=, and =somebody seized his soulders= was changed to =somebody seized his shoulders=. in chapter ix, =drifted etherially athwart= was changed to =drifted ethereally athwart=. in chapter x, =acompanied the rhythmic splash of oars= was changed to =accompanied the rhythmic splash of oars=. in chapter xi, =the blurr of steamy mangroves= was changed to =the blur of steamy mangroves=, =swoopd down beneath= was changed to =swooped down beneath=, and ="who the devil are you poisoning?"= was changed to ='who the devil are you poisoning?'=. in chapter xiii, a missing period was added after =winch commenced to fire his blood=. in chapter xv, a quotation mark was deleted before =those salvage men are specialists=. in chapter xvi, a quotation mark was added after =last night the water was on the thumb.= in chapter xvii, a missing quotation mark was added after ="well,= and before =he said, "it isn't the usual view=, and a missing quotation mark was added after =the trouble is, i don't quite know where i'm going to get it.=. in chapter xix, =admissable now and then= was changed to =admissible now and then=, =he recognised thath she must be forced= was changed to =he recognised that she must be forced=, =the girls' big blue eyes= was changed to =the girl's big blue eyes=, and a missing quotation mark was added before =couldn't you get there in the _estremedura_=. in chapter xx, a missing quotation mark was added after ="well,= and before =said muriel, "it is really your own fault=, a quotation mark was deleted before =eight guineas for the two=, and a period was changed to a question mark after =the delgado island lies=. in chapter xxi, =that, i think, is, to be acurate= was changed to =that, i think, is, to be accurate=. in chapter xxii, =one of the canorios raised himself a trifle= was changed to =one of the canorios raised himself a trifle=, and a quotation mark was deleted after =not afraid of funnel-paint=. in chapter xxiii, a quotation mark was added after =makes any exertion out of the question=, a quotation mark was deleted before =offer any of the rest of them=, and =clenched a hard, scared fist= was changed to =clenched a hard, scarred fist=. in chapter xxiv, =even jefferson deferrd to him= was changed to =even jefferson deferrd to him=, =as the cumbria rose upright= was changed to =as the _cumbria_ rose upright=, =in a month her deck was almost leved= was changed to =in a month her deck was almost leveled=, =you will remember the encouraging words that fellow left--"my arm's almost rotten now."= was changed to =you will remember the encouraging words that fellow left--'my arm's almost rotten now.'"=, and =slowly clenched one scared hand= was changed to =slowly clenched one scarred hand=. in chapter xxv, =he keeps in the litle case= was changed to =he keeps in the little case=, =beam and angle comenced to tremble= was changed to =beam and angle commenced to tremble=, and =wire and hemp and studded chain rosed= was changed to =wire and hemp and studded chain rose=. in chapter xxvi, a missing question mark was added after =put that lamp out.=, =keep outside the straking radius= was changed to =keep outside the striking radius=, =austim became sensible of a change in his mood= was changed to =austin became sensible of a change in his mood=, and =a faint rythmic throbbing= was changed to =a faint rhythmic throbbing=. in chapter xxvii, quotation marks were added after =keep your skin unbroken.= and =you may as well open the rest of them.= in chapter xxviii, =the _cumbria_ steerd handily= was changed to =the _cumbria_ steered handily=, and =the distance run appeared to be working acurately= was changed to =the distance run appeared to be working accurately=. in chapter xxx, =an dinformed brown that the surgeon= was changed to =and informed brown that the surgeon=. transcriber's notes: printer's errors have been corrected. italics are indicated using _underscore_ characters. bold characters are indicated using =equal= characters. the 'oe' ligature is represented with 'oe'. footnotes have been located at the end of each chapter. consult the transcriber's notes at the end of this text for details. [illustration: sirimba players, congo.] west african studies by mary h. kingsley author of "travels in west africa" _with illustrations and maps_ london macmillan and co., limited new york: the macmillan company _all rights reserved_ richard clay and sons, limited london and bungay. to my brother mr. c.g. kingsley and to my friend who is dead this book is dedicated preface to the reader i pray you who may come across this book to distinguish carefully between the part of it written by others and that written by me. anything concerning west africa written by m. le comte c. de cardi or mr. john harford, of bristol, does not require apology and explanation; while anything written by me on this, or any subject, does. m. le comte de cardi possesses an unrivalled knowledge of the natives of the niger delta, gained, as all west coasters know, by personal experience, and gained in a way whereby he had to test the truth of his ideas about these natives, not against things said concerning them in books, but against the facts themselves, for years; and depending on the accuracy of his knowledge was not a theory, but his own life and property. i have always wished that men having this kind of first-hand, well-tested knowledge regarding west africa could be induced to publish it for the benefit of students, and for the foundation of a true knowledge concerning the natives of west africa in the minds of the general public, feeling assured that if we had this class of knowledge available, the student of ethnology would be saved from many fantastic theories, and the general public enabled to bring its influence to bear in the cause of justice, instead of in the cause of fads. i need say nothing more regarding appendix i.; it is a mine of knowledge concerning a highly developed set of natives of the true negro stem, particularly valuable because, during recent years, we have been singularly badly off for information on the true negro. it would not be too much to say that, with the exception of the important series of works by the late sir a. b. ellis, and a few others, so few that you can count them on the fingers of one hand, and dr. freeman's _ashanti and jaman_, published this year, we have practically had no reliable information on these, the most important of the races of africa, since the eighteenth century. the general public have been dependent on the work of great east and central african geographical explorers, like dr. livingstone, mr. h. m. stanley, dr. gregory, mr. scott elliott, and sir h. h. johnston, men whose work we cannot value too highly, and whom we cannot sufficiently admire; but who, nevertheless, were not when describing africans describing negroes, but that great mixture of races existing in central and east africa whose main ingredient is bantu. to argue from what you know about bantus when you are dealing with negroes is about as safe and sound as to argue from what you may know about eastern europeans when you are dealing with western europeans. nevertheless, this fallacious method has been followed in the domain of ethnology and politics with, as might be expected, bad results. i am, therefore, very proud at being permitted by m. le comte de cardi to publish his statements on true negroes; and i need not say i have in no way altered them, and that he is in no way responsible for any errors that there may be in the portions of this book written by me. mr. john harford, the man who first[ ] opened up that still little-known qua ibo river, another region of negroes, also requires no apology. i am confident that the quite unconscious picture of a west coast trader's life given by him in appendix ii. will do much to remove the fantastic notions held concerning west coast traders and the manner of life they lead out there; and i am convinced that if the english public had more of this sort of material it would recognise, as i, from a fairly extensive knowledge of west coast traders, have been forced to recognise, that they are the class of white men out there who can be trusted to manage west africa. i most sincerely wish that the whole of this book had been written by such men as the authors of appendices i. and ii. we are seriously in want of reliable information on west african affairs. it is a sort of information you can only get from resident white men, those who live in close touch with the natives, and who are forced to know the truth about them in order to live and prosper, and from scientific trained observers. the transient traveller, passing rapidly through such a region as west africa, is not so valuable an informant as he may be in other regions of the earth, where his observations can be checked by those of acknowledged authorities, and supplemented by the literature of the natives to whom he refers. for on west africa, outside ellis's region, there is no authority newer than the eighteenth century, and the natives have no written literature. you must, therefore, go down to _urstuff_ and rely only on expert observers, whose lives and property depend on their observing well, or whose science trains them to observe carefully. now of course i regard myself as one of the second class of these observers: did i not do so i would not dare speak about west africa at all, especially in such company; but whatever i am or whatever i do, requires explanation, apology, and thanks. you may remember that after my return from a second sojourn in west africa, when i had been to work at fetish and fresh-water fishes, i published a word-swamp of a book about the size of norie's _navigation_. mr. george macmillan lured me into so doing by stating that if i gave my own version of the affair i should remove misconceptions; and if i did not it was useless to object to such things as paragraphs in american papers to the effect that "miss kingsley, having crossed the continent of africa, ascended the niger to victoria, and then climbed the peak of cameroon; she is shortly to return to england, when she will deliver a series of lectures on french art, which she has had great opportunities of studying." well, thanks to mr. macmillan's kindness, i did publish a sort of interim report, called _travels in west africa_. it did not work out in the way he prophesied. it has led to my being referred to as "an intrepid explorer," a thing there is not the making of in me, who am ever the prey of frights, worries, and alarms; and its main effect, as far as i am personally concerned, has been to plunge me further still in debt for kindness from my fellow creatures, who, though capable of doing all i have done and more capable of writing about it in really good english, have tolerated that book and frequently me also, with half-a-dozen colds in my head and a dingy temper. chief among all these creditors of mine i must name mrs. j. r. green, mrs. george macmillan, and miss lucy toulmin smith; but don't imagine that they or any other of my creditors approve of any single solitary opinion i express, or the way in which i express it. it is merely that i have the power of bringing out in my fellow-creatures, white or black, their virtues, in a way honourable to them and fortunate for me. i must here also acknowledge the great debt of gratitude i owe to mr. john holt, of liverpool. a part of my work lies in the affairs of the so-called bubies of fernando po, and no one knows so much about fernando po as mr. holt. he has also been of the greatest help to me in other ethnological questions, and has permitted me to go through his collections of african things most generously. it is, however, idle for me to attempt to chronicle my debt to mr. holt, for in every part of my work i owe him much. i do not wish you to think he is responsible for any of it, but his counsels have ever been on the side of moderation and generosity in adverse criticism. i honestly confess i believe i am by nature the very mildest of critics; but mr. holt and others think otherwise; and so, although i have not altered my opinions, i have restrained from publishing several developments of them, in deference to superior knowledge. i am also under a debt of gratitude to professor tylor. he also is not involved in my opinions, but he kindly permits me to tell him things that i can only "tell tylor"; and now and again, as you will see in the fetish question, he comes down on me with a refreshing firmness; in fact, i feel that any attempt at fantastic explanations of west african culture will not receive any encouragement from him; and it is a great comfort to a mere drudge like myself to know there is some one who cares for facts, without theories draping them. i will merely add that to all my own west coast friends i remain indebted; and that if you ever come across any one who says i owe them much, you may take it as a rule that i do, though in all my written stuff i have most carefully ticketed its source. i now turn to the explanation and apology for this book, briefly. apology for its literary style i do not make. i am not a literary man, only a student of west africa. i am not proud of my imperfections in english. i would write better if i could, but i cannot. i find when i try to write like other people that i do not say what seems to me true, and thereby lose all right to say anything; and i am more convinced, the more i know of west africa--my education is continuous and unbroken by holidays,--that it is a difficult thing to write about, particularly when you are a student hampered on all sides by masses of inchoate material, unaided by a set of great authors to whose opinions you can refer, and addressing a public that is not interested in the things that interest you so keenly and that you regard as so deeply important. in my previous book i most carefully confined myself to facts and arranged those facts on as thin a line of connecting opinion as possible. i was anxious to see what manner of opinion they would give rise to in the minds of the educated experts up here; not from a mere feminine curiosity, but from a distrust in my own ability to construct theories. on the whole this method has worked well. ethnologists of different theories have been enabled to use such facts as they saw fit; but one of the greatest of ethnologists has grumbled at me, not for not giving a theory, but for omitting to show the inter-relationship of certain groups of facts, an inter-relationship his acuteness enabled him to know existed. therefore i here give the key to a good deal of this inter-relationship by dividing the different classes of fetishism into four schools. in order to do this i have now to place before you a good deal of material that was either crowded out of the other work or considered by me to require further investigation and comparison. as for the new statements i make, i have been enabled to give them this from the constant information and answers to questions i receive from west africa. for the rest of the fetish i remain a mere photographic plate. regarding the other sections of this book, they are to me all subsidiary in importance to the fetish, but they belong to it. they refer to its environment, without a knowledge of which you cannot know the thing. what mr. macmillan has ticketed as introductory--i could not find a name for it at all--has a certain bearing on west african affairs, as showing the life on a west coast boat. i may remark it is a section crowded out of my previous book; so, though you may not be glad to see it here, you must be glad it was not there. the fishing chapter was also cast out of _travels in west africa_. critics whom i respect said it was wrong of me not to have explained how i came by my fishes. this made me fear that they thought i had stolen them, so i published the article promptly in the _national review_, and, by the kindness of its editor, mr. maxse, i reprint it. it is the only reprint in this book. the chapter on law contains all the material i have been so far able to arrange on this important study. the material on criminal law i must keep until i can go out again to west africa, and read further in the minds of men in the african forest belt region; for in them, in that region, is the original text. the connection between religion and law i have not reprinted here, it being available, thanks to the courtesy of the hibbert trustees, in the _national review_, september, . i have left my stiffest bit of explanation and apology till the last, namely, that relating to the crown colony system, which is the thing that makes me beg you to disassociate from me every friend i have, and deal with me alone. i am alone responsible for it, the only thing for which i may be regarded as sharing the responsibility with others being the statistics from government sources. it has been the most difficult thing i have ever had to do. i would have given my right hand to have done it well, for i know what it means if things go on as they are. alas! i am hampered with my bad method of expression. i cannot show you anything clearly and neatly. i have to show you a series of pictures of things, and hope you will get from those pictures the impression which is the truth. i dare not set myself up to tell you the truth. i only say, look at it; and to the best of my ability faithfully give you, not an artist's picture, but a photograph, an overladen with detail, colourless version; all the time wishing to heaven there was some one else doing it who could do it better, and then i know you would understand, and all would be well. i know there are people who tax me with a brutality in statement, i feel unjustly; and it makes me wonder what they would say if they had to speak about west africa. it is a repetition of the difficulty a friend of mine and myself had over a steam launch called the dragon fly, whose internal health was chronically poor, and subject to bad attacks. well, one afternoon, he and i had to take her out to the home-going steamer, and she had suffered that afternoon in the engines, and when she suffered anywhere she let you know it. we did what we could for her, in the interests of humanity and ourselves; we gave her lots of oil, and fed her with delicately-chopped wood; but all to but little avail. so both our tempers being strained when we got to the steamer, we told her what the other one of us had been saying about the dragon fly. the purser of the steamer thereon said "that people who said things like those about a poor inanimate steam launch were fools with a flaming hot future, and lost souls entirely." we realised that our observations had been imperfect; and so, being ever desirous of improving ourselves, we offered to put the purser on shore in the dragon fly. we knew she was feeling still much the same, and we wanted to know what he would say when jets of superheated steam played on him. he came, and they did; and when they did, you know, he said things i cannot repeat. nevertheless, things of the nature of our own remarks, but so much finer of the kind, that we regarded him with awe when he was returning thanks to the "poor inanimate steam launch"; but it was when it came to his going ashore, gladly to leave us and her, that we found out what that man could say; and we morally fainted at his remarks made on discovering that he had been sitting in a pool of smutty oil, which she had insidiously treated him to, in order to take some of the stuffing out of him about the superior snowwhiteness of his trousers. well, that purser went off the scene in a blue flame; and i said to my companion, "sir! we cannot say things like that." "right you are, miss kingsley," he said sadly; "you and i are only fit for sunday school entertainments." it is thus with me about this crown colony affair. i know i have not risen to the height other people--my superiors, like the purser--would rise to, if they knew it; but at the same time, i may seem to those who do not know it, who only know the good intentions of england, and who regard systems as inanimate things, to be speaking harshly. i would not have mentioned this affair at all, did i not clearly see that our present method of dealing with tropical possessions under the crown colony system was dangerous financially, and brought with it suffering to the native races and disgrace to english gentlemen, who are bound to obey and carry out the orders given them by the system. plotinus very properly said that the proper thing to do was to superimpose the idea upon the actual. i am not one of those who will ever tell you things are impossible, but i am particularly hopeful in this matter. england has an excellent idea regarding her duty to native races in west africa. she has an excellent actual in the west african native to superimpose her idea upon. all that is wanted is the proper method; and this method i assure you that science, true knowledge, that which spinoza termed the inward aid of god, can give you. i am not science, but only one of her brick-makers, and i beg you to turn to her. remember you have tried to do without her in african matters for years, and on the road to civilisation and advance there you have travelled on a cabbage leaf. i have now only the pleasant duty of remarking that in this book i have said nothing regarding missionary questions. i do not think it will ever be necessary for me to mention those questions again except to nonconformist missionaries. i say this advisedly, because, though i have not one word to retract of what i have said, the saying of it has demonstrated to me the fearless honesty and the perfect chivalry in controversy of the nonconformist missions in england. as they are the most extensively interested in west africa, if on my next stay out in west africa i find anything i regard as rather wrong in missionary affairs i intend to have it out within doors; for i know that the nonconformists will be clear-headed, and fight fair, and stick to the point. mary h. kingsley. footnotes: [ ] mr. mceachen first traded there in a hulk, but, after about two years, withdrew in . no trade was done in this river by white men until mr. harford went in, since then it has continued. contents page chapter i introductory chapter ii sierra leone and its surroundings chapter iii african characteristics chapter iv fishing in west africa chapter v fetish chapter vi schools of fetish chapter vii fetish and witchcraft chapter viii african medicine chapter ix the witch doctor chapter x early trade in west africa chapter xi french discovery of west africa chapter xii commerce in west africa chapter xiii the crown colony system chapter xiv the crown colony system in west africa chapter xv more of the crown colony system chapter xvi the clash of cultures chapter xvii an alternative plan chapter xviii african property appendix i. a short description of the natives of the niger coast protectorate, with some account of their customs, religion, trade, etc. by m. le comte c. n. de cardi ii. a voyage to the african oil rivers twenty-five years ago. by john harford iii. trade goods used in the early trade with africa as given by barbot and other writers of the seventeenth century. by m. h. kingsley. index list of illustrations sirimba players, congo _frontispiece_. santa cruz, teneriffe _to face page_ for palm wine " secret society leaving the sacred grove " jengu devil dance of king william's slaves, sette camma, november , [a] " batanga canoes " falls on the tongue river " loanda canoe with mat sails. " st. paul do loanda " round a kacongo camp fire " fantee natives of the gold coast " yoruba " a calabar chief " natives of gaboon " fjort natives of kacongo and loango " oil river natives " st. paul do loanda " cliffs at loanda " dondo angola " trading stores " st. paul do loanda " in an angola market " a man of south angola " a housa " house property in kacongo " bubies of fernando po " ja ja, king of opobo " ja ja making ju ju " footnotes: [a] by permission of r. b. n. walker, esq. west african studies chapter i introductory regarding a voyage on a west coast boat, with some observations on the natural history of mariners never before published; to which is added some description of the habits and nature of the ant and other insects, to the end that the new-comer be informed concerning these things before he lands in afrik. there are some people who will tell you that the labour problem is the most difficult affair that africa presents to the student; others give the first place to the influence of civilisation on native races, or to the interaction of the interests of the various white powers on that continent, or to the successful sanitation of the said continent, or some other high-sounding thing; but i, who have an acquaintance with all these matters, and think them well enough, as intellectual exercises, yet look upon them as slight compared to the problem of the west coast boat. now life on board a west coast steamer is an important factor in west african affairs, and its influence is far reaching. it is, indeed, akin to what the press is in england, in that it forms an immense amount of public opinion. it is on board the steamer that men from one part of west africa meet men from another part of west africa--parts of west africa are different. these men talk things over together without explaining them, and the consequence is confusion in idea and the darkening of counsel from the ideas so formed being handed over to people at home who practically know no part of the west coast whatsoever. i had an example of this the other day, when a lady said to me in an aggrieved tone, after i had been saying a few words on swamps, "oh, miss kingsley, but i thought it was wrong to talk about swamps nowadays, and that africa was really quite dry. i have a cousin who has been to accra and he says," &c. that's the way the formation of an erroneous opinion on west africa gets started. many a time have i with a scientific interest watched those erroneous opinions coming out of the egg on a west coast boat. say, for example, a gold coaster meets on the boat a river-man. river-man in course of conversation, states how, "hearing a fillaloo in the yard one night i got up and found the watchman going to sleep on the top of the ladder had just lost a leg by means of one crocodile, while another crocodile was kicking up a deuce of a row climbing up the crane." gold coaster says, "tell that to the marines." river-man says, "perfect fact, sir, my place swarms with crocodiles. why, once, when i was," &c., &c. anyhow it ends in a row. the gold coaster says, "sir, i have been years" (or or some impressive number of years) "on the west coast of africa, sir, and i have never seen a crocodile." river-man makes remarks on the existence of a toxic state wherein a man can't see the holes in a ladder, for he knows he's seen hundreds of crocodiles. i know gold coasters say in a trying way when any terrific account of anything comes before them, "oh, that was down in the rivers," and one knows what they mean. but don't you go away with the idea that a gold coaster cannot turn out a very decent tale; indeed, considering the paucity of their material, they often display the artistic spirit to a most noteworthy degree, but the net result of the conversation on a west african steamboat is error. parts of it, like the curate's egg, are quite excellent, but unless you have an acquaintance with the various regions of the coast to which your various informants refer, you cannot know which is which. take the above case and analyse it, and you will find it is almost all, on both sides, quite true. i won't go bail for the crocodile up the crane, but for the watchman's leg and the watchman being asleep on the top of the ladder i will, for watchmen will sleep anywhere; and once when i was, &c., i myself saw certainly not less than crocodiles at one time, let alone smelling them, for they do swarm in places and stink always. but on the other hand the gold coaster might have remained , , or any other number of centuries instead of years, in a teetotal state, and yet have never seen a crocodile. it may seem a reckless thing to say, but i believe that the great percentage of steamboat talk is true; only you must remember that it is not stuff that you can in any way use or rely on unless you know yourself the district from which the information comes, and it must, like all information--like all specimens of any kind--be very carefully ticketed, then and there, as to its giver and its district. in this it is again like the english press, wherein you may see a statement one day that everything is quite satisfactory, say in uganda, and in the next issue that there has been a massacre or some unpleasantness. the two statements have in them the connecting thread of truth, that truth that, according to fichte, is in all things. the first shows that it is the desire in the official mind that everything should be quite satisfactory to every one; the second, that practically this blessed state has not yet arrived--that is all. i need not, however, further dwell on this complex phase, and will turn to the high educational value of the west african steamboat to the young coaster, holding that on the conditions under which the coaster makes his first voyage out to west africa largely depends whether or no he takes to the coast. strange as it is to me, who love west africa, there are people who have really been there who have not even liked it in the least. these people, i fancy, have not been properly brought up in a suitable academy as i was. doubtless a p. & o. is a good preparatory school for india, or a union, or castle liner for the cape, or an empereza nacioñal simply superb for a portuguese west coast possession, but for the bights, especially for the terrible bight of benin, "where for one that comes out there are forty stay in," i have no hesitation in recommending the west coast cargo boat. not one of the best ships in the fleet, mind you; they are well enough to come home in, and so on, but you must go on a steamer that has her saloon aft on your first trip out or you will never understand west africa. it was on such a steamer that i made my first voyage out in ' , when, acting under the advice of most eminent men, before whose names european science trembles, i resolved that the best place to study early religion and law, and collect fishes, was the west coast of africa. on reaching liverpool, where i knew no one and of which i knew nothing in ' , i found the boat i was to go by was a veteran of the fleet. she had her saloon aft, and i am bound to say her appearance was anything but reassuring to the uninitiated and alarmed young coaster, depressed by the direful prophecies of deserted friends concerning all things west african. dirt and greed were that vessel's most obvious attributes. the dirt rapidly disappeared, and by the time she reached the end of her trip out, at loanda, she was as neat as a new pin, for during the voyage every inch of paint work was scraped and re-painted, from the red below her plimsoll mark to the uttermost top of her black funnel. but on the day when first we met these things were yet to be. as for her greed, her owners had evidently then done all they could to satisfy her. she was heavily laden, her holds more full than many a better ship's; but no, she was not content, she did not even pretend to be, and shamelessly whistled and squarked for more. so, evidently just to gratify her, they sent her a lighter laden with kegs of gunpowder, and she grunted contentedly as she saw it come alongside. but she was not really entirely content even then, or satisfied. i don't suppose, between ourselves, any south west coast boat ever is, and during the whole time i was on her, devoted to her as i rapidly became, i saw only too clearly that the one thing she really cared for was cargo. it was the criterion by which she measured the importance, nay the very excuse for existence, of a port. if she is ever sold to other owners and sent up the mediterranean, she will anathematise malta and scorn naples. "what! no palm oil!" she'll say; "no rubber? call yourself a port!" and tie her whistle string to a stanchion until the authorities bring off her papers and let her clear away. every one on board her she infected with a commercial spirit. i am not by nature a commercial man myself, yet under her influence i found myself selling paraffin oil in cases in the bights: and even to missionaries and government officials travelling on her in between ports, she suggested the advisability of having out churches, houses, &c., in sections carefully marked with her name. as we ran down the irish channel and into the bay of biscay, the weather was what the mariners termed "a bit fresh." our craft was evidently a wet ship, either because she was nervous and femininely flurried when she saw a large wave coming, or, as i am myself inclined to believe, because of her insatiable mania for shipping cargo. anyhow, she habitually sat down in the rise of those waves, whereby, from whatever motive, she managed to ship a good deal of the atlantic ocean in various sized sections. her saloon, as aforesaid, was aft, and i observed it was the duty, in order to keep it dry, of any one near the main door who might notice a ton or so of the fourth element coming aboard, to seize up three cocoa-fibre mats, shut three cabin doors and yell "bill!" after doing this they were seemingly at full liberty to retire into the saloon and dam the atlantic ocean, and remark, "it's a dog's life at sea." i never noticed "bill" come in answer to this performance, so i was getting to regard "bill" as an invocation to a weather ju ju; but this was hasty, for one night in the bay i was roused by a new noise, and on going into the saloon to see what it was, found the stewardess similarly engaged; mutually we discovered, in the dim light--she wasn't the boat to go and throw away money on electric--that it was the piano adrift off its daïs, and we steered for it. very cleverly we fielded _en route_ a palm in pot complete, but shipped some beer and worcester sauce bottles that came at us from the rack over the table, whereby we got a bit messy and sticky about the hair and a trifle cut; nevertheless, undaunted we held our course and seized the instrument, instinctively shouting "bill," and "bill" came, in the form of a sandy-haired steward, amiable in nature and striking in costume. after the first three or four days, a calm despair regarding the fate of my various lost belongings and myself having come on me, and the weather having moderated, i began to make observations on what manner of men my fellow-passengers were. i found only two species of the genus coaster, the government official and the trading agent, were represented; so far we had no missionaries. i decided to observe those species we had quietly, having heard awful accounts of them before leaving england, but to reserve final judgment on them until they had quite recovered from sea-sickness and had had a night ashore. some of the agents soon revived sufficiently to give copious information on the dangers and mortality of west africa to those on board who were going down coast for the first time, and the captain and doctor chipped in ever and anon with a particularly convincing tale of horror in support of their statements. this used to be the sort of thing. one of the agents would look at the captain during a meal-time, and say, "you remember j., captain?" "knew him well," says the captain; "why i brought him out his last time, poor chap!" then follows full details of the pegging-out of j., and his funeral, &c. then a government official who had been out before, would kindly turn to a colleague out for the first time, and say, "brought any dress clothes with you?" the unfortunate new comer, scenting an allusion to a more cheerful phase of coast life, gladly answers in the affirmative. "that's right," says the interlocutor; "you want them to wear at funerals. do you know," he remarks, turning to another old coaster, "my dress trousers did not get mouldy once last wet season." "get along," says his friend, "you can't hang a thing up twenty-four hours without its being fit to graze a cow on." "do you get anything else but fever down there?" asks a new comer, nervously. "haven't time as a general rule, but i have known some fellows get kraw kraw." "and the portuguese itch, abscesses, ulcers, the guinea worm and the smallpox," observe the chorus calmly. "well," says the first answerer, kindly but regretfully, as if it pained him to admit this wealth of disease was denied his particular locality; "they are mostly on the south-west coast." and then a gentleman says parasites are, as far as he knows, everywhere on the coast, and some of them several yards long. "do you remember poor c.?" says he to the captain, who gives his usual answer, "knew him well. ah! poor chap, there was quite a quantity of him eaten away, inside and out, with parasites, and a quieter, better living man than c. there never was." "never," says the chorus, sweeping away the hope that by taking care you may keep clear of such things--the new coaster's great hope. "where do you call--?" says a young victim consigned to that port. some say it is on the south-west, but opinions differ, still the victim is left assured that it is just about the best place on the seaboard of the continent for a man to go to who wants to make himself into a sort of complete hospital course for a set of medical students. this instruction of the young in the charms of coast life is the faithfully discharged mission of the old coasters on steamboats, especially, as aforesaid, at meal times. desperate victims sometimes determine to keep the conversation off fever, but to no avail. it is in the air you breath, mentally and physically; one will mention a lively and amusing work, some one cuts in and observes "poor d. was found dead in bed at c. with that book alongside him." with all subjects it is the same. keep clear of it in conversation, for even a half hour, you cannot. far better is it for the young coaster not to try, but just to collect all the anecdotes and information you can referring to it, and then lie low for a new coaster of your own to tell them to, and when your own turn comes, as come it will if you haunt the west coast long enough, to peg out and be poor so and so yourself. for goodness sake die somewhere where they haven't got the cemetery on a hill, because going up a hill in shirt collars, &c., will cause your mourners to peg out too, at least this is the lesson i was taught in that excellent west coast school. when, however, there is no new coaster to instruct on hand, or he is tired for ten minutes of doing it, the old coaster discourses with his fellow old coasters on trade products and insects. every attention should be given to him on these points. on trade products i will discourse elsewhere; but insects it is well that the new comer should know about before he sets foot on africa. on some west coast boats excellent training is afforded by the supply of cockroaches on board, and there is nothing like getting used to cockroaches early when your life is going to be spent on the coast--but i need not detain you with them now, merely remarking that they have none of the modest reticence of the european variety. they are very companionable, seeking rather than shunning human society, nestling in the bunk with you if the weather is the least chilly, and i fancy not averse to light; it is true they come out most at night, but then they distinctly like a bright light, and you can watch them in a tight packed circle round the lamp with their heads towards it, twirling their antennæ at it with evident satisfaction; in fact it's the lively nights those cockroaches have that keep them abed during the day. they are sometimes of great magnitude; i have been assured by observers of them in factories ashore and on moored hulks that they can stand on their hind legs and drink out of a quart jug, but the most common steamer kind is smaller, as far as my own observations go. but what i do object to in them is, that they fly and feed on your hair and nails and disturb your sleep by so doing; and you mayn't smash them--they make an awful mess if you do. as for insect powder, well, i'd like to see the insect powder that would disturb the digestion of a west african insect. but it's against the insects ashore that you have to be specially warned. during my first few weeks of africa i took a general natural historical interest in them with enthusiasm as of natural history; it soon became a mere sporting one, though equally enthusiastic at first. afterwards a nearly complete indifference set in, unless some wretch aroused a vengeful spirit in me by stinging or biting. i should say, looking back calmly upon the matter, that per cent. of west african insects sting, per cent. bite, and the rest are either permanently or temporarily parasitic on the human race. and undoubtedly one of the many worst things you can do in west africa is to take any notice of an insect. if you see a thing that looks like a cross between a flying lobster and the figure of abraxas on a gnostic gem, do not pay it the least attention, never mind where it is; just keep quiet and hope it will go away--for that's your best chance; you have none in a stand-up fight with a good thorough-going african insect. well do i remember, at cabinda, the way insects used to come in round the hanging lamp at dinner time. mosquitoes were pretty bad there, not so bad as in some other places, but sufficient, and after them hawking came a cloud of dragon-flies, swishing in front of every one's face, which was worrying till you got used to it. ever and anon a big beetle, with a terrific boom on, would sweep in, go two or three times round the room and then flop into the soup plate, out of that, shake himself like a retriever and bang into some one's face, then flop on the floor. orders were then calmly but firmly given to the steward boys to "catch 'em;" down on the floor went the boys, and an exciting hunt took place which sometimes ended in a capture of the offender, but always seemed to irritate a previously quiet insect population who forthwith declared war on the human species, and fastened on to the nearest leg. it is best, as i have said, to leave insects alone. of course you cannot ignore driver ants, they won't go away, but the same principle reversed is best for them, namely, your going away yourself. one way and another we talked a good deal of insects as well as fever on the----, but she herself was fairly free from these until she got a chance of shipping; then, of course, she did her best--with the flea line at canary, mixed assortment at sierra leone, scorpions and centipedes in the timber ports, heavy cargo of the beetle and mangrove-fly line, with mosquitoes for dunnage, in the oil rivers; it was not till she reached congo--but of that anon. we duly reached canary. this port i had been to the previous year on a castle liner, having, in those remote and dark ages, been taught to believe that liverpool boats were to be avoided; i was, so far, in a state of mere transition of opinion from this view to the one i at present hold, namely, that liverpool west african boats are quite the most perfect things in their way, and, at any rate, good enough for me. i need not discourse on the grand canary; there are many better descriptions of that lovely island, and likewise of its sister, teneriffe, than i could give you. i could, indeed give you an account of these islands, particularly "when a west coast boat is in from south," that would show another side of the island life; but i forbear, because it would, perhaps, cause you to think ill of the west coaster unjustly; for the west coaster, when he lands on the island of the grand canary, homeward bound, and realises he has a good reasonable chance to see his home and england again, is not in a normal state, and prone to fall under the influence of excitement, and display emotions that he would not dream of either on the west coast itself or in england. indeed, it is not too much to say that on the canary islands a good deal of the erroneous prejudice against west africa is formed; but this is not the place to go into details on the subject. it was not until we left canary that my fellow passengers on the ---- realised that i was going to "the coast." they had most civilly bidden me good-bye when they were ashore on the morning of our arrival at las palmas; and they were surprised at my presence on board at dinner, as attentive to their conversation as ever. they explained that they had regarded me at first as a lady missionary, until my failure, during a sunday service in the bay of biscay, to rescue it from the dire confusion into which it had been thrown by an esteemed and able officer and a dutiful but inexperienced purser caused them to regard me as only a very early visitor to canary. now they required explanation. i said i was interested in natural history. "botany," they said, "they had known some men who had come out from kew, but they were all dead now." [illustration: santa cruz, teneriffe. [_to face page _] i denied a connection with kew, and in order to give an air of definiteness to my intentions, remembering i had been instructed that "one of the worst things you can do in west africa is to be indefinite," i said i was interested in the south antarctic drift--i was in those days. they promptly fell into the pit of error that this was a gold mine speculation, and said they had "never heard of such a mine." i attempted to extricate them from this idea, and succeeded, except with a deaf gentleman who kept on sweeping into the conversation with yarns and opinions on gold mines in west africa and the awful mortality among people who attended to such things, which naturally led to a prolonged discussion ending in a general resolution that people who had anything to do with gold mines generally died rather quicker even than men from kew. indeed, it took me days to get myself explained, and when it was accomplished i found i had nearly got myself regarded as a lunatic to go to west africa for such reasons. but fortunately for me, and for many others who have ventured into this kingdom, the west african merchants are good-hearted, hospitable english gentlemen, who seem to feel it their duty that no harm they can prevent should happen to any one; and my first friends, among them my fellow passengers on the----, failing in inducing me to return from sierra leone, which they strongly advised, did their best to save me by means of education. the things they thought i "really ought to know" would make wild reading if published in extenso. led by the kindest and most helpful of captains, they poured in information, and i acquired a taste for "facts"--any sort of facts about anything--a taste when applied to west african facts, that i fancy ranks with that for collecting venomous serpents; but to my listening to everything that was told me by my first instructors, and believing in it, undoubtedly i have often owed my life, and countless times have been enabled to steer neatly through shoaly circumstances ashore. our captain was not a man who would deliberately alarm a new comer, or shock any one, particularly a lady; indeed, he deliberately attempted to avoid so doing. he held it wrong to dwell on the dark side of coast life, he said, "because youngsters going out were frequently so frightened on board the boats that they died as soon as they got on shore of the first cold they got in the head, thinking it was yellow jack"; so he always started conversation at meal times with anecdotes of his early years on an ancestral ranch in america. one great charm about "facts" is that you never know but what they may come in useful; so i eagerly got up a quantity of very strange information on the conduct of the american cow. he would then wander away among the china seas or the indian ocean, and i could pass an examination on the social habits of captains of sailing vessels that ran to bombay in old days. sometimes the discourse visited the south american ports, and i took on information that will come in very handy should i ever find myself wandering about the streets of callao after dark, searching for a tavern. but the turn that serious conversation always drifted into was the one that interested me most, that relating to the coast. particularly interesting were those tales of the old times and the men who first established the palm oil trade. they were, many of them, men who had been engaged in the slave trade, and on the suppression thereof they turned their attention to palm oil, to which end their knowledge of the locality and of the native chiefs and their commercial methods was of the greatest help. their ideas were possibly not those at present in fashion, but the courage and enterprise those men displayed under the most depressing and deadly conditions made me proud of being a woman of the nation that turned out the "palm oil ruffians"--drake, hawkins, the two roberts, frobisher, and hudson--it is as good as being born a foreign gentleman. there was one of these old coasters of the palm oil ruffian type who especially interested me. he is dead now. for the matter of that he died at a mature age the year i was born, and i am in hopes of collecting facts sufficient to enable me to publish his complete biography. he lived up a creek, threw boots at leopards, and "had really swell spittoons, you know, shaped like puncheons, and bound with brass." i am sure it is unnecessary for me to mention his name. two of the old coasters never spoke unless they had something useful and improving to say. they were scotch; indeed, most of us were that trip, and i often used to wonder if the south atlantic ocean were broad enough for the accent of the "a," or whether strange sounds would ever worry and alarm central america and the brazils. for general social purposes these silent ones used coughs, and the one whose seat was always next to mine at table kept me in a state of much anxiety, for i used to turn round, after having been riveted to the captain's conversation for minutes, and find him holding some dish for me to help myself from; he never took the least notice of my apologies, and i felt he had made up his mind that, if i did it again, he should take me by the scruff of my neck some night and drop me overboard. he was an alarmingly powerfully built man, and i quite understood the local african tribe wishing to have him for a specimen. some short time before he had left for home last trip, they had attempted to acquire his head for their local ju ju house, from mixed æsthetic and religious reasons. in a way, it was creditable of them, i suppose, for it would have caused them grave domestic inconvenience to have removed thereby at one fell swoop, their complete set of tradesmen; and as a fellow collector of specimens i am bound to admit the soundness of their methods of collecting! wishing for this gentleman's head they shot him in the legs. i have never gone in for collecting specimens of hominidae but still a recital of the incident did not fire me with a desire to repeat their performance; indeed, so discouraged was i by their failure that i hesitated about asking him for his skeleton when he had quite done with it, though it was gall and wormwood to think of a really fine thing like that falling into the hands of another collector. the run from canary to sierra leone takes about a week. that part of it which lies in the track of the n.e. trade winds, _i.e._, from canary to cape verde, makes you believe mr. kipling when he sang-- "there are many ways to take of the eagle and the snake, and the way of a man with a maid; but the sweetest way for me is a ship upon the sea on the track of the north-east trade." was displaying, gracefully, a sensible choice of things; but you only feel this outward bound to the west coast. when you come up from the coast, fever stricken, homeward bound, you think otherwise. i do not mean to say that owing to a disintegrating moral effect of west africa you wish to pursue the other ways mentioned in the stanza, but you do wish the powers above would send that wind to the powers below and get it warmed. alas! it is in this trade wind zone that most men die, coming up from the coast sick with fever, and it is to the blame of the trade wind that you see obituary notices--"of fever after leaving sierra leone." nevertheless, outward bound the thing is delightful, and dreadfully you feel its loss when you have run through it as you close in to the african land by cape verde. at any rate i did; and i began to believe every bad thing i had ever heard of west africa, and straightway said to myself, what every man has said to himself who has gone there since hanno of carthage, "why was i such a fool as to come to such an awful place?" it is the first meeting with the hot breath of the bights that tries one; it is the breath of death himself to many. you feel when first you meet it you have done with all else; not alone is it hot, but it smells--smells like nothing else. it does not smell all it can then; by and by, down in the rivers, you get its perfection, but off cape verde you have to ask yourself, "can i live in this or no?" and you have to leave it, like all other such questions, to allah, and go on. we passed close in to cape verde, which consists of rounded hills having steep bases to the sea. from these bases runs out a low, long strip of sandy soil, which is the true cape. beyond, under water, runs out the dangerous almadia reef, on which were still, in ' , to be seen the remains of the _port douglas_, who was wrecked there on her way to australia in ' . her passengers were got ashore and most kindly treated by the french officers of senegal; and finally, to the great joy and relief of their rescuers the said passengers were fetched away by an english vessel, and taken to what england said was their destination and home, australia, but what france regarded as merely a stage on their journey to hell, to which port they had plainly been consigned. it was just south of cape verde that i met my first tornado. the weather had been wet in violent showers all the morning and afternoon. our old coasters took but little notice of it, resigning themselves to saturation without a struggle, previous experience having taught them it was the best thing to do, dryness being an unattainable state during the wet season, and "worrying one's self about anything one of the worst things you can do in west africa." so they sat on deck calmly smoking, their new flannel suits, which were donned after leaving the trade winds, shrinking, and their colours running on to the other deck, uncriticised even by the first officer. he was charging about shouting directions and generally making that afternoon such a wild, hurrying fuss about "getting in awnings," "tricing up all loose gear," such as deck chairs, and so on, to permanent parts of the----, that, as nothing beyond showers had happened, and there was no wind, i began to feel most anxious about his mental state. but i soon saw that this activity was the working of a practical prophetic spirit in the man, and these alarms and excursions of his arose from a knowledge of what that low arch of black cloud coming off the land meant. we were surrounded by a wild, strange sky. indeed, there seemed to be two skies, one upper, and one lower; for parts of it were showing evidences of terrific activity, others of a sublime, utterly indifferent calm. at one part of our horizon were great columns of black cloud, expanding and coalescing at their capitals. these were mounted on a background of most exquisite pale green. away to leeward was a gigantic black cloud-mountain, across whose vast face were bands and wreaths of delicate white and silver clouds, and from whose grim depths every few seconds flashed palpitating, fitful, livid lightnings. striding towards us came across the sea the tornado, lashing it into spray mist with the tremendous artillery of its rain, and shaking the air with its own thunder-growls. away to windward leisurely boomed and grumbled a third thunderstorm, apparently not addressing the tornado but the cloud-mountain, while in between these phenomena wandered strange, wild winds, made out of lost souls frightened and wailing to be let back into hell, or taken care of somehow by some one. this sort of thing naturally excited the sea, and all together excited the----, who, not being built so much for the open and deep sea as for the shoal bars of west african rivers, made the most of it. in a few seconds the wind of the tornado struck us, screaming through the rigging, eager for awnings or any loose gear, but foiled of its prey by the first officer, who stood triumphantly on a heap of them, like a defiant hen guarding her chickens. some one really ought to write a monograph on the natural history of mariners. they are valuable beings, and their habits are exceedingly interesting. i myself, being already engaged in the study of other organisms, cannot undertake the work; however, i place my observations at the disposal of any fellow naturalist who may have more time, and certainly will have more ability. the sailor officer (_nauta pelagius vel officinalis_) is metamorphic. the stage at which the specimen you may be observing has arrived is easily determined by the band of galoon round his coat cuff; in the english form the number of gold stripes increasing in direct ratio with rank. the galoon markings of the foreign species are frequently merely decorative, and in many foreign varieties only conditioned by the extent of surface available to display them and the ability of the individual to acquire the galoon wherewith to decorate himself. the english third officer, you will find, has one stripe, the second two, the first three, and the _imago_, or captain, four, the upper one having a triumphant twist at the top. you may observe, perhaps, about the ship sub-varieties, having a red velvet, or a white or blue velvet band on the coat cuff; these are respectively the doctor, purser, and chief engineer; but with these sub-varieties i will not deal now, they are not essentially marine organisms, but akin to the amphibia. the metamorphosis is as clearly marked in the individual as in the physical characteristics. a third officer is a hard-working individual who has to do any thing that the other officers do not feel inclined to, and therefore rarely has time to wash. he in course of time becomes second officer, and the slave of the hatch. during this period of his metamorphosis he feels no compunction whatever in hauling out and dumping on the deck burst bacon barrels or leaking lime casks, actions which, when he reaches the next stage of development, he will regard as undistinguishable in a moral point of view from a compound commission of the seven deadly sins. for the deck, be it known, is to the first officer the most important thing in the cosmogony, and there is probably nothing he would not sacrifice to its complexion. one that i had the pleasure of knowing once lamented to me that he was not allowed by his then owners to spread a layer of ripe pineapples upon his precious idol, and let them be well trampled in and then lie a few hours, for this he assured me gave a most satisfactory bloom to a deck's complexion. yet when this same man becomes a captain and grows another stripe round his cuffs, he no longer takes an active part in the ship's household affairs, that is his first officer's business, the ship's husband's affair; and should he have an inefficient first the captain expects men and nations to sympathise with him, just as a lady expects to be sympathised with over a bad housemaid. there are, however, two habits which are constant to all the species through each stage of transformation from roustabout to captain. one is a love of painting. i have never known an officer or captain who could pass a paint-pot, with the brush sticking temptingly out, without emotion. while, as for jack, the happiest hours he knows seemingly are those he spends sitting on a slung plank over the side of his ocean home, with his bare feet dangling a few feet above the water as tempting bait for sharks, and the tropical sun blazing down on him and reflected back at him from the iron ship's side and from the oily ocean beneath. then he carols forth his amorous lay, and shouts, "bill, pass that paint-pot" in his jolliest tones. it is very rarely that a black seaman is treated to a paint-pot; all they are allowed to do is to knock off the old stuff, which they do in the nerveless way the african does most handicraft. the greatest dissipation of the black hands department consists in being allowed to knock the old stuff off the steam-pipe covers, donkey, and funnel. this is a delicious occupation, because, firstly, you can usually sit while doing it, and secondly, you can make a deafening din and sing to it. the other habit and the more widely known is the animistic view your seaman takes of nature. every article that is to a landsman an article and nothing more, is to him an individual with a will and mind of his own. i myself believe there is something in it. i feel sure that a certain hawser on board the ---- had a weird influence on the minds of all men who associated with it. it was used at liverpool coming out of dock, but owing to the absence of harbours on the coast it was not required again until it tied our ocean liner up to a tree stump at boma, on the congo. nevertheless it didn't suit that hawser's views to be down below in the run and see nothing of life. it insisted on remaining on deck, and the officers gave in to it and said "well, perhaps it was better so, it would rot if it went down below," so some days it abode on the quarter-deck, some days on the main, and now and again it would condescend to lie on the fo'castle, head in the sun. it had too its varying moods of tidiness, now neat and dandy coiled, now dishevelled and slummocky after association with the kru boys. it is almost unnecessary to remark that the relationship between the first officer and the chief engineer is rarely amicable. i certainly did once hear a first officer pray especially for a chief engineer all to himself under his breath at a sunday service; but i do not feel certain that this was a display of true affection. i am bound to admit that "the engineer is messy," which is magnanimous of me, because i had almost always a row of some kind on with the first officer, owing to other people upsetting my ink on his deck, whereas i have never fallen out with an engineer--on the contrary, two chief engineers are amongst the most valued friends i possess. the worst of it is that no amount of experience will drive it into the head of the first officer that the engineer will want coal--particularly and exactly when the ship has just been thoroughly scrubbed and painted to go into port. i have not been at sea so long as many officers, yet i know that you might as well try and get a confirmed dipsomaniac past a grog shop as the engineer past, say the canary coaling company; indeed he seems to smell the dakar coal, and hankers after it when passing it miles out to sea. then, again, if the engineer is allowed to have a coal deposit in the forehold it is a fresh blow and grief to the first officer to find he likes to take them as mrs. gamp did her stimulant, when she "feels dispoged," whether the deck has just been washed down or no. the cook, although he always has a blood feud on with the engineer concerning coals for the galley fire, which should endear him to the first officer, is morally a greater trial to the first than he is to his other victims. you see the cook has a grease tub, and what that means to the deck in a high sea is too painful to describe. so i leave the first officer with his pathetic and powerful appeals to the immortal gods to be told why it is his fate to be condemned to this "dog's life on a floating hanwell lunatic asylum," commending him to the sympathetic consideration of all good housewives, for only they can understand what that dear good man goes through. after we passed cape verde we ran into the west african wet season rain sheet. there ought to be some other word than rain for that sort of thing. we have to stiffen this poor substantive up with adjectives, even for use with our own thunderstorms, and as is the morning dew to our heaviest thunder "torrential downpour of rain," so is that to the rain of the wet season in west africa. for weeks it came down on us that voyage in one swishing, rushing cataract of water. the interspaces between the pipes of water--for it did not go into details with drops--were filled with gray mist, and as this rain struck the sea it kicked up such a water dust that you saw not the surface of the sea round you, but only a mist sea gliding by. it seemed as though we had left the clear cut world and entered into a mist universe. sky, air, and sea were all the same, as our vessel swept on in one plane, just because she capriciously preferred it. many days we could not see twenty yards from the ship. once or twice another vessel would come out of the mist ahead, slogging past us into the mist behind, visible in our little water world for a few minutes only as a misty thing, and then we leisurely tramped on alone "o'er the viewless, hueless deep," with our horizon alongside. if you cleared your mind of all prejudice the thing was really not uncomfortable, and it seemed restful to the mind. as i used to be sitting on deck every one who came across me would say, "wet, isn't it? well, you see this is the wet season on the coast"--or, "damp, isn't it? well, you see this is the wet season on the coast"--and then they went away, and, i believe slept for hours exhausted by their educational efforts. after this they would come on deck and sit in their respective chairs, smoking, save that irrepressible deaf gentleman, who spent his time squirrel like between vivid activity and complete quiescence. you might pass the smoking room door and observe the soles of his shoes sticking out off the end of the settee with an air of perfect restful calm hovering over them, as if the owner were hibernating for the next six months. within two minutes after this an uproar on the poop would inform the experienced ear that he was up and about again, and had found some one asleep on a chair and attacked him. it was during one of these days, furnishing reminiscences of noah's flood, that conversation turned suddenly on driver ants. one of the silent men, who had been sitting for an hour or so, with a countenance indicative of a contemplative acceptance of the penitential psalms, roused by one of the deaf man's rows, observed, "paraffin is good for driver ants." "oh," said the deaf gentleman as he sat suddenly down on my ink-pot, which, for my convenience, was on a chair, "you wait till you get them up your legs, or sit down among them, as i saw smith, when he was tired clearing bush. they took the tire out of him, he live for scratch one time. smith was a pocket circus. you should have seen him get clear of his divided skirt. oh lor! what price paraffin?" the conversation on the driver ant now became general. as far as i remember, mr. burnand, who in _happy thoughts_ and _my health_, gave much information, curious and interesting, on earwigs and wasps, omitted this interesting insect. so, perhaps, a _précis_ of the information i obtained may be interesting. i learnt that the only thing to do when you have got them on you is to adopt the course of action pursued by brer fox on that occasion when he was left to himself enough to go and buy ointment from brer rabbit, namely, make "a burst for the creek," water being the quickest thing to make them leave go. unfortunately, the first time i had occasion to apply this short and easy method with the ant was when i was strolling about by bell-town with a white gentleman and his wife, and we strolled into drivers. there were only two water-barrels in the vicinity, and my companions, being more active than myself, occupied them. while in west africa you should always keep an eye lifting for drivers. you can start doing it as soon as you land, which will postpone the catastrophe, not avoid it; for the song of the west coaster to his enemy is truly, "some day, some day, some day i shall meet you; love, i know not when nor how." perhaps, therefore, this being so, and watchfulness a strain when done deliberately, and worrying one of the worst things you can do in west africa, it may be just as well for you to let things slide down the time-stream until fate sends a column of the wretches up your legs. this experience will remain "indelibly limned on the tablets of your mind when a yesterday has faded from its page," or, as the modern school of psychologists would have it, "the affair will be brought to the notice of your sublimated consciousness, and that part of your mind will watch for drivers without worrying you, and an automatic habit will be induced that will cause you never to let more than one eye roam spell-bound over the beauties of the african landscape; the other will keep fixed, turned to the soil at your feet." the driver is of the species _ponera_, and is generally referred to the species _anomma arcens_. the females and workers of these ants are provided with stings as well as well-developed jaws. they work both for all they are worth, driving the latter into your flesh, enthusiastically up to the hilt; they then remain therein, keeping up irritation when you have hastily torn their owner off in response to a sensation that is like that of red hot pinchers. the full-grown worker is about half an inch long, and without ocelli even. yet one of the most remarkable among his many crimes is that he will always first attack the eyes of any victim. these creatures seem to have no settled home; no man has seen the beginning or end, as far as i know, of one of their long trains. as you are watching the ground you see a ribbon of glistening black, one portion of it lost in one clump of vegetation, the other in another, and on looking closer you see that it is an _acies instituta_ of driver ants. if you stir the column up with a stick they make a peculiar fizzing noise, and open out in all directions in search of the enemy, which you take care they don't find. these ants are sometimes also called "visiting ants," from their habit of calling in quantities at inconvenient hours on humanity. they are fond of marching at night, and drop in on your house usually after you have gone to bed. i fancy, however, they are about in the daytime as well, even in the brightest weather; but it is certain that it is in dull, wet weather, and after dusk, that you come across them most on paths and open spaces. at other times and hours they make their way among the tangled ground vegetation. their migrations are infinite, and they create some of the most brilliant sensations that occur in west africa, replacing to the english exile there his lost burst water pipes of winter, and such like things, while they enforce healthy and brisk exercise upon the african. i will not enter into particulars about the customary white man's method of receiving a visit of drivers, those methods being alike ineffective and accompanied by dreadful language. barricading the house with a rim of red hot ashes, or a river of burning paraffin, merely adds to the inconvenience and endangers the establishment. the native method with the driver ant is different: one minute there will be peace in the simple african home, the heavy-scented hot night air broken only by the rhythmic snores and automatic side slaps of the family, accompanied outside by a chorus of cicadas and bull frogs. enter the driver--the next moment that night is thick with hurrying black forms, little and big, for the family, accompanied by rats, cockroaches, snakes, scorpions, centipedes, and huge spiders animated by the one desire to get out of the visitors' way, fall helter skelter into the street, where they are joined by the rest of the inhabitants of the village, for the ants when they once start on a village usually make a regular house-to-house visitation. i mixed myself up once in a delightful knockabout farce near kabinda, and possibly made the biggest fool of myself i ever did. i was in a little village, and out of a hut came the owner and his family and all the household parasites pell mell, leaving the drivers in possession; but the mother and father of the family, when they recovered from this unwonted burst of activity, showed such a lively concern, and such unmistakable signs of anguish at having left something behind them in the hut, that i thought it must be the baby. although not a family man myself, the idea of that innocent infant perishing in such an appalling manner roused me to action, and i joined the frenzied group, crying, "where him live?" "in him far corner for floor!" shrieked the distracted parents, and into that hut i charged. too true! there in the corner lay the poor little thing, a mere inert black mass, with hundreds of cruel drivers already swarming upon it. to seize it and give it to the distracted mother was, as the reporter would say, "the work of an instant." she gave a cry of joy and dropped it instantly into a water barrel, where her husband held it down with a hoe, chuckling contentedly. shiver not, my friend, at the callousness of the ethiopian; that there thing wasn't an infant--it was a ham! these ants clear a house completely of all its owner's afflictions in the way of vermin, killing and eating all they can get hold of. they will also make short work of any meat they come across, but don't care about flour or biscuits. like their patron mephistopheles, however, they do not care for carrion, nor do they destroy furniture or stuffs. indeed they are typically west african, namely, good and bad mixed. in a few hours they leave the house again on their march through the ewigkeit, which they enliven with criminal proceedings. yet in spite of the advantage they confer on humanity, i believe if the matter were put to the human vote, africa would decide to do without the driver ant. mankind has never been sufficiently grateful to its charwomen, like these insect equivalents, who do their tidying up at supremely inconvenient times. i remember an incident at one place in the lower congo where i had been informed that "cork fever" was epidemic in a severe form among the white population. i was returning to quarters from a beetle hunt, in pouring rain; it was as it often is, "the wet season," &c., when i saw a european gentleman about twenty yards from his comfortable-looking house seated on a chair, clad in a white cotton suit, umbrellaless, and with the water running off him as if he was in a douche bath. i had never seen a case of cork fever, but i had heard such marvellous and quaint tales of its symptoms that i thought--well, perhaps, anyhow, i would not open up conversation. to my remorse he said, as i passed him, "drivers." inwardly apologising, i outwardly commiserated him, and we discoursed. it was on this occasion that i saw a mantis, who is by way of being a very pretty pirate on his own account, surrounded by a mob of the blind hurrying drivers who, i may remark, always attack like red indians in open order. that mantis perfectly well knew his danger, but was as cool as a cucumber, keeping quite quiet and lifting his legs out of the way of the blind enemies around him. but the chances of keeping six legs going clear, for long, among such brutes without any of them happening on one, were small, even though he only kept three on the ground at one time. so, being a devotee of personal courage, i rescued him--whereupon he bit me for my pains. why didn't he fly? how can you fly, i should like to know, unless you have a jumping off place? drivers are indeed dreadful. i was at one place where there had been a white gentleman and a birthday party in the evening; he stumbled on his way home and went to sleep by the path side, and in the morning there was only a white gentleman's skeleton and clothes. however, i will dwell no more on them now. wretches that they are, they have even in spirit pursued me to england, causing a critic to observe that _brevi spatio interjecto_ is my only latin, whereas the matter is this. i was once in distinguished society in west africa that included other ladies. we had a distinguished native gentleman, who had had an european education, come to tea with us. the conversation turned on drivers, for one of the ladies had the previous evening had her house invaded by them at midnight. she snatched up a blanket, wrapped herself round with it, unfortunately allowed one corner thereof to trail, whereby it swept up drivers, and awful scenes followed. then our visitor gave us many reminiscences of his own, winding up with one wherein he observed "_brevi spatio interjecto_, ladies; off came my breeches." after this we ladies all naturally used this phrase to describe rapid action. there is another ant, which is commonly called the red driver, but it is quite distinct from the above-mentioned black species. it is an unwholesome-looking, watery-red thing with long legs, and it abides among trees and bushes. an easy way of obtaining specimens of this ant is to go under a mango or other fruit tree and throw your cap at the fruit. you promptly get as many of these insects as the most ardent naturalist could desire, its bite being every bit as bad as that of the black driver. these red ones build nests with the leaves of the tree they reside on. the leaves are stuck together with what looks like spiders' webs. i have seen these nests the size of an apple, and sent a large one to the british museum, but i have been told of many larger nests than i have seen. these ants, unfortunately for me who share the taste, are particularly devoted to the fruit of the rubber vine, and also to that of a poisonous small-leaved creeping plant that bears the most disproportionately-sized spiny, viscid, yellow fruit. it is very difficult to come across specimens of either of these fruits that have not been eaten away by the red driver. it is a very fascinating thing to see the strange devices employed by many kinds of young seedlings and saplings to keep off these evidently unpopular tenants. they chiefly consist in having a sheath of exceedingly slippery surface round the lower part of the stem, which the ants slide off when they attempt to climb. i used to spend hours watching these affairs. you would see an ant dash for one of these protected stems as if he were a city man and his morning train on the point of starting from the top of the plant stem. he would get up half an inch or so because of the dust round the bottom helping him a bit, then, getting no holding-ground, off he would slip, and falling on his back, desperately kick himself right side up, and go at it again as if he had heard the bell go, only to meet with a similar rebuff. the plants are most forbearing teachers, and their behaviour in every way a credit to them. i hope that they may in time have a moral and educational effect on this overrated insect, enabling him to realise how wrong it is for him to force himself where he is not welcome; but a few more thousand years, i fear, will elapse before the ant is anything but a chuckleheaded, obstinate wretch. nothing nowadays but his happening to fall off with his head in the direction of some other vegetable frees the slippery plant from his attempts. to this other something off he rushes, and if it happens to be a plant that does not mind him up he goes, and i have no doubt congratulates himself on having carried out his original intentions, understanding the world, not being the man to put up with nonsense and all that sort of thing, whereas it is the plant that manages him. some plants don't mind ants knocking about among the grown-up leaves, but will not have them with the infants, and so cover their young stuff with a fur or down wherewith the ant can do nothing. others, again, keep him and feed him with sweetstuff so that he should keep off other enemies from its fruit, &c. but i have not space to sing in full the high intelligence of west african vegetation, and i am no botanist; yet one cannot avoid being struck by it, it is so manifold and masterly. before closing these observations i must just mention that tiny, sandy-coloured abomination _myriaica molesta_. in south west africa it swarms, giving a quaint touch to domestic arrangements. no reckless putting down of basin, tin, or jam-pot there, least of all of the sugar-basin, unless the said sugar-basin is one of those commonly used in those parts, of rough, violet-coloured glass, with a similar lid. since i left south west africa i have read some interesting observations of sir john lubbock's on the dislike of ants to violet colour. i wonder if the portuguese of angola observed it long ago and adopted violet glass for basins, or was it merely accidental and empirical. i suspect the latter, or they would use violet glass for other articles. as it is, everything eatable in a house there is completely insulated in water--moats of water with a dash of vinegar in it--to guard it from the ants from below; to guard from the ants from above, the same breed and not a bit better. eatables are kept in swinging safes at the end of coir rope recently tarred. but when, in spite of these precautions, or from the neglect of them, you find, say your sugar, a brown, busy mass, just stand it in the full glare of the sun. sun is a thing no ant likes, i believe, and it is particularly distasteful to ants with pale complexions; and so you can see them tear themselves away from their beloved sugar and clear off into a hyde park meeting smitten by a thunderstorm. this kind of ant, or a nearly allied species, is found in houses in england, where it is supposed they have been imported from the brazils or west indies in . possibly the brazils got it from south west africa, with which they have had a trade since the sixteenth century, most of the brazil slaves coming out of congo. it is unlikely that the importation was the other way about; for exotic things, whether plants or animals, do not catch on in western africa as they do in australia. in the former land everything of the kind requires constant care to keep it going at all, and protect it from the terrific local circumstances. it is no use saying to animal or vegetable, "there is room for all in africa"--for africa, that is africa properly so called--equatorial west africa, is full up with its own stuff now, crowded and fighting an internecine battle with the most marvellous adaptations to its environment. chapter ii sierra leone and its surroundings concerning the perils that beset the navigator in the baixos of st. ann, with some description of the country between the sierra leone and cape palmas and the reasons wherefrom it came to be called the pepper, grain, or meleguetta coast. it was late evening-time when the ---- reached that part of the south atlantic ocean where previous experience and dead reckoning led our captain to believe that sierra leone existed. the weather was too thick to see ten yards from the ship, so he, remembering certain captains who, under similar circumstances, failing to pick up the light on cape sierra leone, had picked up the carpenter rock with their keels instead, let go his anchor, and kept us rolling about outside until the morning came. slipperty slop, crash! slipperty slop, crash! went all loose gear on board all the night long; and those of the passengers who went in for that sort of thing were ill from the change of motion. the mist, our world, went gently into grey, and then black, growing into a dense darkness filled with palpable, woolly, wet air, thicker far than it had been before. this, my instructors informed me, was caused by the admixture of the "solid malaria coming off the land." however, morning came at last, and even i was on deck as it dawned, and was rewarded for my unwonted activity by a vision of beautiful, definite earth-form dramatically unveiled. no longer was the ---- our only material world. the mist lifted itself gently off, as it seemed, out of the ocean, and then separated before the morning breeze; one great mass rolling away before us upwards, over the land, where portions of it caught amongst the forests of the mountains and stayed there all day, while another mass went leisurely away to the low bullam shore, from whence it came again after sunset to join the mountain and the ocean mists as they drew down and in from the sea, helping them to wrap up freetown, sierra leone and its lovely harbour for the night. it was with a thrill of joy that i looked on freetown harbour for the first time in my life. i knew the place so well. yes; there were all the bays, kru, english and pirate; and the mountains, whose thunder rumbling caused pedro do centra to call the place sierra leona when he discovered it in . and had not my old friend, charles johnson, writing in , given me all manner of information about it during those delicious hours rescued from school books and dedicated to a most contentious study of _a general history of robberies and murders of the most notorious pyrates_? that those bays away now on my right hand "were safe and convenient for cleaning and watering;" and so on and there rose up before my eyes a vision of the society ashore here in that lived "very friendly with the natives--being thirty englishmen in all; men who in some part of their lives had been either privateering, buccaneering, or pirating, and still retain and have the riots and humours common to that sort of life." hard by, too, was bence island, where, according to johnson, "there lives an old fellow named _crackers_ (his true name he thinks fit to conceal), and who was formerly a noted buccaneer; he keeps the best house in the place, has two or three guns before his door with which he salutes his friends the pyrates when they put in, and lives a jovial life with them all the while they are there." alas! no use to me was the careful list old johnson had given me of the residents. they were all dead now, and i could not go ashore and hunt up "peter brown" or "john jones," who had "one long boat and an irish young man." social things were changed in freetown, sierra leone; but only socially, for the old description of it is, as far as scenery goes, correct to-day, barring the town. whether or no everything has changed for the better is not my business to discuss here, nor will i detain you with any description of the town, as i have already published one after several visits, with a better knowledge than i had on my first call there. on one of my subsequent visits i fell in with sierra leone receiving a shock. we were sitting, after a warm and interesting morning spent going about the town talking trade, in the low long pleasant room belonging to the coaling company whose windows looked out over an eventful warehouse yard; for therein abode a large dog-faced baboon, who shied stones and sticks at boys and any one who displeased him, pretty nearly as well as a flintshire man. also in the yard were a large consignment of kola nuts packed as usual in native-made baskets, called bilys, lined inside with the large leaves of a ficus and our host was explaining to my mariner companions their crimes towards this cargo while they defended themselves with spirit. it seemed that this precious product if not kept on deck made a point of heating and then going mildewed; while, if you did keep it on deck, either the first officer's minions went fooling about it with the hose, which made it swell up and burst and ruined it, or left it in unmitigated sun, which shrivelled it--and so on. this led, naturally, to a general conversation on cargo between the mariners and the merchants, during which some dreadful things were said about the way matches arrived, in west africa and other things, shipped at shipper's own risk, let alone the way trade suffered by stowing hams next the boilers. of course the other side was a complete denial of these accusations, but the affair was too vital for any of us to attend to a notorious member of the party who kept bothering us "to get up and look at something queer over king tom." now it was market day in freetown; and market day there has got more noise to the square inch in it than most things. you feel when you first meet it that if it were increased a little more it would pass beyond the grasp of human ear, like the screech of that whistle they show off at the royal society's conversazione. however, on this occasion the market place sent up an entire compound yell, still audible, and we rose as one man as the portly housekeeper, followed by the small, but able steward, burst into the room, announcing in excited tones, "oh! the town be took by locusts! the town be took by locusts!" (_d.c. fortissimo_). and we attended to the incident; ousting the reporter of "the queer thing over king tom" from the window, and ignoring his "i told you so," because he hadn't. this was the first cloud of locusts that had come right into the town in the memory of the oldest inhabitant, though they occasionally raid the country away to the north. i am informed that when the chiefs of the western soudan do not give sufficient gifts to the man who is locust king and has charge of them--keeping them in holes in the desert of sahara--he lets them out in revenge. certainly that year he let them out with a vengeance, for when i was next time down coast in the oil rivers i was presented with specimens that had been caught in old calabar and kept as big curios. this freetown swarm came up over the wooded hills to the south-west in a brown cloud of singular structure, denser in some parts than others, continually changing its points of greatest density, like one of thompson's diagrams of the ultimate structure of gases, for you could see the component atoms as they swept by. they were swirling round and round upwards-downwards like the eddying snowflakes in a winter's storm, and the whole air rustled with the beat of the locusts' wings. they hailed against the steep iron roofs of the store-houses, slid down it, many falling feet through the air before they recovered the use of their wings--the gutters were soon full of them--the ducks in the yard below were gobbling and squabbling over the layer now covering the ground, and the baboon chattered as he seized handfuls and pulled them to pieces. everybody took them with excitement, save the jack crows, who on their arrival were sitting sleeping on the roof ridge. they were horribly bored and bothered by the affair. twice they flopped down and tried them. there they were lying about in gutters with a tempting garbagey look, but evidently the jack crows found them absolutely mawkish; so they went back to the roof ridge in a fuming rage, because the locusts battered against them and prevented them from sleeping. we left sierra leone on the ---- late in the afternoon, and ran out again into the same misty wet weather. the next morning the balance of our passengers were neither up early, nor lively when they were up; but to my surprise after what i had heard, no one had the much-prognosticated attack of fever. all day long we steamed onwards, passing the banana isles and sherboro island and the sound usually called sherboro river.[ ] we being a south-west coast boat, did not call at the trading settlements here, but kept on past cape st. ann for the kru coast. all day long the rain came down as if thousands of energetic--well, let us say--angels were hurriedly baling the waters above the firmament out into the ocean. everything on board was reeking wet. you could sweep the moisture off the cabin panelling with your hand, and our clothes were clammy and musty, and the towels too damp on their own account to dry you. why none of us started specialising branchiae i do not know, but feel that would have been the proper sort of breathing apparatus for such an atmosphere. the passengers were all at the tail end of their spirits, for sierra leone is the definite beginning of the coast to the out-goer. you are down there when you leave it outward bound; it is indeed, the complement of canary. those going up out of west africa begin to get excited at sierra leone; those going down into west africa, particularly when it is the wet season, begin to get depressed. it did not, however, operate in this manner on me. i had survived sierra leone, i had enjoyed it; why, therefore, not survive other places, and enjoy them? moreover, my scientific training, combined with close study of the proper method of carrying on the local conversation, had by now enabled me to understand its true spirit,--never contradict, and, if you can, help it onward. when going on deck about o'clock that evening, i was alarmed to see our gallant captain in red velvet slippers. a few minutes later the chief officer burst on my affrighted gaze in red velvet slippers too. on my way hurriedly to the saloon i encountered the third officer similarly shod. when i recovered from these successive shocks, i carried out my mission of alarming the rest of the passengers, who were in the saloon enjoying themselves peacefully, and reported what i had seen. the old coasters, even including the silent ones, agreed with me that we were as good as lost so far as this world went; and the deaf gentleman went hurriedly on deck, we think "to take the sun,"--it was a way he had at any time of day, because "he had been studying about how to fix points for the government--and wished to keep himself in practice." my fellow new-comers were perplexed; and one of them, a man who always made a point of resisting education, and who thought nothing of calling some of our instructor's best information "tommy rot!" said, "i don't see what can happen; we're right out at sea, and it's as calm as a millpond." "don't you, my young friend? don't you?" sadly said an old coaster. "well, i'll just tell you there's precious little that can't happen, for we're among the shoals of st. ann." the new-comers went on deck "just to look round;" and as there was nothing to be seen but a superb specimen of damp darkness, they returned to the saloon, one of them bearing an old chart sheet which he had borrowed from the authorities. now that chart was not reassuring; the thing looked like an exhibition pattern of a prize shot gun, with the quantity of rocks marked down on it. "look here," said an anxious inquirer; "why are some of these rocks named after the company's ships?" "think," said the calm old coaster. "oh, i say! hang it all, you don't mean to say they've been wrecked here? anyhow, if they have they got off all right. how is it the 'yoruba rock' and the 'gambia rock?' the 'yoruba' and the 'gambia' are running now." "those," explains the old coaster kindly, "were the old 'yoruba' and 'gambia.' the 'bonny' that runs now isn't the old 'bonny.' it's the way with most of them, isn't it?" he says, turning to a fellow old coaster. "naturally," says his friend. "but this is the old original, you know, and it's just about time she wrote up her name on one of these tombstones." "you don't save ships," he continues, for the instruction of the new-comers, attentive enough now; "that go on the kru coast, and if you get ashore you don't save the things you stand up in--the natives strip you." "cannibals!" i suggest. "oh, of course they are cannibals; they are all cannibals, are natives down here when they get the chance. but, that does not matter; you see what i object to is being brought on board the next steamer that happens to call crowded with all sorts of people you know, and with a lady missionary or so among them, just with nothing on one but a flyaway native cloth. you remember d----?" "well," says his friend. strengthened by this support, he takes his turn at instructing the young critic, saying soothingly, "there, don't you worry; have a good dinner." (it was just being laid.) "for if you do get ashore the food is something beastly. but, after all, what with the sharks and the surf and the cannibals, you know the chances are a thousand to one that the worst will come to the worst and you live to miss your trousers." after dinner we new-comers went on deck to keep an eye on providence, and i was called on to explain how the alarm had been given me by the footgear of the officers. i said, like all great discoveries, "it was founded on observation made in a scientific spirit." i had noticed that whenever a particularly difficult bit of navigation had to be done on our boat, red velvet slippers were always worn, as for instance, when running through the heavy weather we had met south of the bay, on going in at puerto de la luz, and on rounding the almadia reefs, and on entering freetown harbour in fog. but never before had i seen more than one officer wearing them at a time, while tonight they were blazing like danger signals at the shore ends of all three. my opinion as to the importance of these articles to navigation became further strengthened by subsequent observations in the bights of biafra and benin. we picked up rivers in them, always wore them when crossing bars, and did these things on the whole successfully. but once i was on a vessel that was rash enough to go into a difficult river--rio del rey--without their aid. that vessel got stuck fast on a bank, and, as likely as not, would be sticking there now with her crew and passengers mere mosquito-eaten skeletons, had not our first officer rushed to his cabin, put on red velvet slippers and gone out in a boat, energetically sounding around with a hand lead. whereupon we got off, for clearly it was not by his sounding; it never amounted to more than two fathoms, while we required a good three-and-a-half. yet that first officer, a truthful man, always, said nobody did a stroke of work on board that vessel bar himself; so i must leave the reader to escape if he can from believing it was the red velvet slippers that saved us, merely remarking that these invaluable nautical instruments were to be purchased at hamburg, and were possibly only met with on boats that run to hamburg and used by veterans of that fleet. if you will look on the map, not mine, but one visible to the naked eye, you will see that the coast from sierra leone to cape palmas is the lower bend of the hump of africa and the turning point into the bights of benin, biafra and panavia. its appearance gives the voyager his first sample of those stupendous sweeps of monotonous landscapes so characteristic of africa. from sherboro river to cape mount, viewed from the sea, every mile looks as like the next as peas in a pod, and should a cruel fate condemn you to live ashore here in a factory you get so used to the eternal sameness that you automatically believe that nothing else but this sort of world, past, present, or future, can ever have existed: and that cities and mountains are but the memories of dreams. a more horrible life than a life in such a region for a man who never takes to it, it is impossible to conceive; for a man who does take to it, it is a kind of dream life, i am judging from the few men i have met who have been stationed here in the few isolated little factories that are established. some of them look like haunted men, who, when they are among white men again, cling to their society: others are lazy, dreamy men, rather bored by it. the kind of country that produces this effect must be exceedingly simple in make: it is not the mere isolation from fellow white men that does it--for example, the handful of men who are on the ogowé do not get like this though many of them are equally lone men, yet they are bright and lively enough. anyhow, exceedingly simple in make as is this region of africa from sherboro to cape mount, it consists of four different things in four long lines--lines that go away into eternity for as far as eye can see. there is the band of yellow sand on which your little factory is built. this band is walled to landwards by a wall of dark forest, mounted against the sky to seaward by a wall of white surf; beyond that there is the horizon-bounded ocean. neither the forest wall nor surf wall changes enough to give any lively variety; they just run up and down a gamut of the same set of variations. in the light of brightest noon the forest wall stands dark against the dull blue sky, in the depth of the darkest night you can see it stand darker still, against the stars; on moonlight nights and on tornado nights, when you see the forest wall by the lightning light, it looks as if it had been done over with a coat of tar. the surf wall is equally consistent, it may be bad, or good as surf, but it's generally the former, which merely means it is a higher, broader wall, and more noisy, but it's the same sort of wall making the same sort of noise all the time. it is always white; in the sunlight, snowy white, suffused with a white mist wherein are little broken, quivering bits of rainbows. in the moonlight, it gleams with a whiteness there is in nothing else on earth. if you can imagine a non-transparent diamond wall, i think you will get some near idea to it, and even on the darkest of dark nights you can still see the surf wall clearly enough, for it shows like the ghost of its daylight self, seeming to have in it a light of its own, and you love or hate it. night and day and season changes pass over these things, like reflections in a mirror, without altering the mirror frame; but nothing comes that ever stills for one-half second the thunder of the surf-wall or makes it darker, or makes the forest-wall brighter than the rest of your world. mind you, it is intensely beautiful, intensely soothing, intensely interesting if you can read it and you like it, but life for a man who cannot and does not is a living death. but if you are seafaring there is no chance for a brooding melancholy to seize on you hereabouts, for you soon run along this bit of coast and see the sudden, beautiful headland of cape mount, which springs aloft in several rounded hills a thousand and odd feet above the sea and looking like an island. after passing it, the land rapidly sinks again to the old level, for a stretch of another miles or so when cape mesurado,[ ] rising about feet, seems from seaward to be another island. the capital of the liberian republic, monrovia, is situated on the southern side of the river mesurado, and right under the high land of the cape, but it is not visible from the roadstead, and then again comes the low coast, unrolling its ribbon of sandy beach, walled as before with forest wall and surf, but with the difference that between the sand beach and the forest are long stretches of lagooned waters. evil looking, mud-fringed things, when i once saw them at the end of a hard, dry season, but when the wet season's rains come they are transformed into beautiful lakes; communicating with each other and overflowing by shallow channels which they cut here and there through the sand-beach ramparts into the sea. the identification of places from aboard ship along such a coast as this is very difficult. even good sized rivers doubling on themselves sneak out between sand banks, and make no obvious break in surf or forest wall. the old sailing direction that gave as a landmark the "tree with two crows on it" is as helpful as any one could get of many places here, and when either the smoke season or the wet season is on of course you cannot get as good as that. but don't imagine that unless the navigator wants to call on business, he can "just put up his heels and blissfully think o' nowt," for this bit of the west coast of africa is one of the most trying in the world to work. monotonous as it is ashore, it is exciting enough out to sea in the way of the rocks and shoals, and an added danger exists at the beginning and end of the wet, and the beginning of the dry, in the shape of tornadoes.[ ] these are sudden storms coming up usually with terrific violence; customarily from the s.e. and e., but sometimes towards the end of the season straight from s. more slave ships than enough have been lost along this bit of coast in their time, let alone decent bristol guineamen into the bargain, owing to "a delusion that occasionally seized inexperienced commanders that it was well to heave-to for a tornado, whereas a sailing ship's best chance lay in her heels." it was a good chance too, for owing to the short duration of this breed of hurricane and their terrific rain, there accompanies them no heavy sea, the tornado-rain ironing the ocean down; so if, according to one of my eighteenth century friends, you see that well-known tornado-cloud arch coming, and you are on a guineaman, for your sins, "a dray of a vessel with an epping forest of sea growth on her keel, and two-thirds of the crew down with fever or dead of it, as likely they will be after a spell on this coast," the sooner you get her ready to run the better, and with as little on her as you can do with. if, however, there be a white cloud inside the cloud-arch you must strip her quick and clean, for that tornado is going to be the worst tornado you were ever in. nevertheless, tornadoes are nothing to the rocks round here. at the worst, there are but two tornadoes a day, always at tide turn, only at certain seasons of the year, and you can always see them coming; but it is not that way with the rocks. there is at least one to each quarter hour in the entire twenty-four. they are there all the year round, and more than one time in forty you can't see them coming. in case you think i am overstating the case, i beg to lay before you the statement concerning rocks given me by an old captain, who was used to these seas and never lost a ship. i had said something flippant about rocks, and he said, "i'll write them down for you, missy." this is just his statement for the chief rocks between junk river and baffu; not a day's steamer run. "two and three quarters miles and six cables n.w. by w. from junk river there is 'hooper's patch,' irregular in shape, about a mile long and carrying in some places only - / fathoms of water. there is another bad patch about a mile and a-half from hooper's, so if you have to go dodging your way into marshall, a liberian settlement, great caution and good luck is useful. in waterhouse bay there's a cluster of pinnacle rocks all under water, with a will-o'-the wisp kind of buoy, that may be there or not to advertise them. one rock at tobokanni has the civility to show its head above water, and a chum of his, that lies about a mile w. by s. from tobokanni point, has the seas constantly breaking on it. the coast there is practically reefed for the next eight miles, with a boat channel near the shore. but there is a gap in this reef at young sesters, through which, if you handle her neatly, you can run a ship in. in some places this reef of rock is three-quarters of a mile out to sea. trade town is the next place where you may now call for cargo. its particular rock lies a mile out and shows well with the sea breaking on it. after trade town the rocks are more scattered, and the bit of coast by kurrau river rises in cliffs to feet high. the sand at their base is strewn with fallen blocks on which the surf breaks with great force, sending the spray up in columns; and until you come to sestos river the rocks are innumerable, but not far out to sea, so you can keep outside them unless you want to run in to the little factory at tembo. just beyond sestos river, three-quarters of a mile s.s.w. of fen river, there are those fen rocks on which the sea breaks, but between these and the manna rocks, which are a little more than a mile from shore n.w. by n. from sestos river, there are any quantity of rocks marked and not marked on the chart. these manna rocks are a jolly bad lot, black, and only a few breaking, and there is a shoal bank to the s.e. of these for half a mile, then for the next four miles, there are not more than hull openers to the acre. most of them are not down on the chart, so there's plenty of opportunity now about for you to do a little african discovery until you come to sestos reef, off a point of the same name, projecting half a mile to westwards with a lot of foul ground round it. spence rock which breaks, is w. two-thirds s., distant - / miles from sestos point; within miles of it is the rock which _the corisco_ discovered in . it is not down on the chart yet, all these set of rocks round sestos are sharp too, so the lead gives you no warning, and you are safer right-away from them. then there's a very nasty one called diabolitos, i expect those old portuguese found it out, it's got a lot of little ones which extend miles and more to seaward. there is another devil rock off bruni, called by the natives ba ya. it stands feet above sea-level, and has a towering crown of trees on it. it is a bad one is this, for in thick weather, as it is a mile off shore and isolated, it is easily mistaken, and so acts as a sort of decoy for the lot of sunken devil rocks which are round it. further along towards baffu there are four more rocks a mile out, and forest ground on the way." i just give you this bit of information as an example, because i happen to have this rough rock list of it; but a little to the east the rocks and dangers of the kru coast are quite as bad, both in quantity and quality, indeed, more so, for there is more need for vessels to call. i often think of this bit of coast when i see people unacquainted with the little local peculiarities of dear west africa looking at a map thereof and wondering why such and such a bay is not utilised as a harbour, or such and such a river not navigated, or this, that and the other bit of coast so little known of and traded with. such undeveloped regions have generally excellent local reasons, reasons that cast no blame on white man's enterprise or black man's savagery. they are rock-reefed coast or barred rivers, and therefore not worth the expense to the trader of working them, and you must always remember that unless the trader opens up bits of west africa no one else will. it may seem strange to the landsman that the navigator should hug such a coast as the shoals (the _bainos_ as the old portuguese have it) of st. ann--but they do. if you ask a modern steamboat captain he will usually tell you it is to save time, a statement that the majority of the passengers on a west coast boat will receive with open derision and contempt, holding him to be a spendthrift thereof; but i myself fancy that hugging this coast is a vestigial idea. in the old sailing-ship days, if you ran out to sea far from these shoals you lost your wind, and maybe it would take you five mortal weeks to go from sierra leone to cape mount or _wash congo_, as the natives called it in the th century. off the kru coast, both west coast and south-west coast steamers and men-o'-war on this station, call to ship or unship krumen. the character of the rocks, of which i have spoken,--their being submerged for the most part, and pinnacles--increases the danger considerably, for a ship may tear a wound in herself that will make short work of her, yet unless she remains impaled on the rock, making, as it were, a buoy of herself, that rock might not be found again for years. this sort of thing has happened many times, and the surveying vessels, who have been instructed to localise the danger and get it down on the chart, have failed to do so in spite of their most elaborate efforts; whereby the more uncharitable of the surveying officers are led in their wrath to hold that the mercantile marine officers who reported that rock and gave its bearings did so under the influence of drink, while the more charitable and scientifically inclined have suggested that elevation and subsidence are energetically and continually at work along the bight of benin, hoisting up shoals to within a few feet of the surface in some places and withdrawing them in others to a greater depth. the people ashore here are commonly spoken of as liberians and kruboys. the liberians are colonists in the country, having acquired settlements on this coast by purchase from the chiefs of the native tribes. the idea of restoring the africans carried off by the slave trade to africa occurred to america before it did to england, for it was warmly advocated by the rev. samuel hoskins, of newport, rhode island, in , but it was before america commenced to act on it, and the first emigrants embarked from new york for liberia in . on the other hand, though england did not get the idea until , she took action at once, buying from king tom, through the st george's bay company, the land at sierra leone between the rochelle and kitu river. this was done on the recommendation of mr. smeatham. the same year was shipped off to this new colony the first consignment of free negro servants and whites; out of those arrived and survived their first fortnight, and set themselves to build a town called granville, after mr. granville sharpe, whose exertions had resulted in lord mansfield's epoch-making decision in the case of somerset _v._ mr. j. g. stewart, his master, _i.e._, that no slave could be held on english soil. the liberians were differently situated from their neighbours at sierra leone in many ways; in some of these they have been given a better chance than the africans sent to sierra leone--in other ways not so good a chance. neither of the colonies has been completely successful. i hold the opinion that if those american and english philanthropists could not have managed the affair better than they did, they had better have confined their attention to talking, a thing they were naturally great on, and left the so-called restoration of the african to his native soil alone. for they made a direful mess of the affair from a practical standpoint, and thereby inflicted an enormous amount of suffering and a terrible mortality on the africans they shipped from england, canada, and america; the tradition whereof still clings to the colonies of liberia and sierra leone, and gravely hinders their development by the emigration of educated, or at any rate civilised, africans now living in the west indies and the southern states of america. i am aware that there are many who advocate the return to africa of the africans who were exported from the west coast during the slavery days. but i cannot regard this as a good or even necessary policy, for two reasons. one is that those africans were not wanted in west africa. the local supply of african is sufficient to develop the country in every way. there are in west africa now, africans thoroughly well educated, as far as european education goes, and who are quite conversant with the nature of their own country and with the language of their fellow-countrymen. there are also any quantity of africans there who, though not well educated, are yet past-masters in the particular culture which west africa has produced on its inhabitants. the second reason is that the descendants of the exported africans have seemingly lost their power of resistance to the malarial west coast climate. this a most interesting subject, which some scientific gentleman ought to attend to, for there is a sufficient quantity of evidence ready for his investigation. the mortality among the africans sent to sierra leone and liberia has been excessive, and so also has been that amongst the west indians who went to congo belge, while the original intention of the united presbyterian mission to calabar had to be abandoned from the same cause. in fact it looks as if the second and third generation of deported africans had no greater power of resistance to west africa than the pure white races; and, such being the case, it seems to me a pity they should go there. they would do better to bring their energies to bear on developing the tropical regions of america and leave the undisturbed stock of africa to develop its own. however, we will not go into that now. i beg to refer you to bishop ingram's _sierra leone after a hundred years_, for the history of england's philanthropic efforts. i may some day, perhaps, in the remote future, write myself a book on america's effort, but i cannot write it now, because i have in my possession only printed matter--a wilderness of opinion and a mass of abuse on liberia as it is. no sane student of west africa would proceed to form an opinion on any part of it with such stuff and without a careful personal study of the thing as it is. the natives of this part of the west coast, the aboriginal ones, as mrs. gault would call them, are a different matter. you can go and live in west africa without seeing a crocodile or a hippopotamus or a mountain, but no white man can go there without seeing and experiencing a kruboy, and kruboys are one of the main tribes here. kruboys are, indeed, the backbone of white effort in west africa, and i think i may say there is but one man of all of us who have visited west africa who has not paid a tribute to the kruboy's sterling qualities. alas! that one was one of england's greatest men. why he painted that untrue picture of them i do not know. i know that on this account the magnificent work he did is discredited by all west coasters. "if he said that of kruboys," say the old coasters, "how can he have known or understood anything?" it is a painful subject, and my opinion on kruboys is entirely with the old coasters, who know them with an experience of years, not with the experience of any man, however eminent, who only had the chance of seeing them for a few weeks, and whose information was so clearly drawn from vitiated sources. all i can say in defence of my great fellow countryman is that he came to west africa from the very worst school a man can for understanding the kruboy, or any true negro, namely, from the bantu african tribes, and that he only fell into the error many other great countrymen of mine have since fallen into, whereby there is war and misunderstanding and disaffection between our government and the true negro to-day, and nothing, as far as one can see, but a grievous waste of life and gold ahead. the kruboy is indeed a sore question to all old coasters. they have devoted themselves to us english, and they have suffered, laboured, fought, been massacred, and so on with us for generation after generation. many a time krumen have come to me when we have been together in foreign possessions and said, "help us, we are englishmen." they have never asked in vain of me or any englishman in west africa, but recognition of their services by our government at home is--well, about as much recognition as most men get from it who do good work in west africa. for such men are a mere handful whom imperialism can neglect with impunity, and, even if it has for the moment to excuse itself for so doing, it need only call us "traders." i say us, because i am vain of having been, since my return, classed among the liverpool traders by a distinguished officer. this part of western africa from sierra leone to cape palmas was known to the geographers amongst the classics as _leuce �thiopia_: to their successors as the grain or pepper or meleguetta coast. i will discourse later of the inhabitants, the kru, from an ethnological standpoint, because they are too interesting and important to be got in here. the true limits of the grain coast are from the river sestros to growy, two leagues east of cape palmas according to barbot, and its name came from the fact that it was hereabouts that the portuguese, on their early expeditions in the th century, first came across grains of paradise, a circumstance that much excited those navigators at the time and encouraged them to pursue their expeditions to this region, for grains of paradise were in those days much valued and had been long known in european markets. these euphoniously-named spices are the seeds of divers amomums, or in lay language, cardamum--_amomum meleguetta_ (roscoe) or as pereira has it, _amomum granum paradisi_. their more decorative appellation "grains of paradise" is of italian origin, the italians having known and valued this spice, bought it, and sold it to the rest of europe at awful prices long before the portuguese, under henry the navigator, visited the west african coast. the italians had bought the spice from the tawny moors, who brought it, with other products of west africa across the desert to the mediterranean port monte barca by tripoli. the reason why this african cardamum received either the name of grains of paradise or of meleguetta pepper is, like most african things, wrapt in mystery to a certain extent. some authorities hold they got the first name on their own merits. others that the italian merchants gave it them to improve prices. others that the italians gave it them honestly enough on account of their being nice, and no one knowing where on earth exactly they came from, said, therefore, why not say paradise? it is certain, however, that before the portuguese went down into the unknown seas and found the pepper coast that the italians knew those peppers came from the country of melli, but as they did not know where that was, beyond that it was somewhere in africa, this did not take away the sense of romance from the spice. as for their name meleguetta, an equal divergence of opinion reigns. i myself think the proper word is meneguetta. the old french name was maneguilia, and the name they are still called by at cape palmas in the native tongue is emanequetta. the french claim to have brought peppers and ivory from the river sestros as early as , and the river sestros was on the seaboard of the kingdom of mene, but the termination quetta is most probably a corruption of the portuguese name for pepper. but, on the other hand, the native name for them among the sestros people is waizanzag. and therefore, the whole name may well be european, and just as well called meleguetta as meneguetta, because the kingdom of mene was a fief of the empire of melli when the portuguese first called at sestros. the other possible derivation is that which says mele is a corruption of the italian name for turkey millet, _melanga_, a thing the grains rather resemble. another very plausible derivation is that the whole word is portuguese in origin, but a corruption of _mala gens_, the portuguese having found the people they first bought them of a bad lot, and so named the pepper in memory thereof. this however is interestingly erroneous and an early example of the danger of armchairism when dealing with west africa. for the coast of the _malegens_ was not the coast the portuguese first got the pepper from, but it was that coast just to the east of the meleguetta, where all they got was killing and general unpleasantness round by the rio san andrew, drewin way, which coast is now included in the ivory. the grains themselves are by no means confined to the grain coast, but are the fruit of a plant common in all west african districts, particularly so on cameroon mountain, where just above the , feet level on the east and southeast face you come into a belt of them, and horrid walking ground they make. i have met with them also in great profusion in the sierra del crystal; but there is considerable difference in the kinds. the grain of paradise of commerce is, like that of the east indian cardamom, enclosed in a fibrous capsule, and the numerous grains in it are surrounded by a pulp having a most pleasant, astringent, aromatic taste. this is pleasant eating, particularly if you do not manage to chew up with it any of the grains, for they are amazingly hot in the mouth, and cause one to wonder why paradise instead of hades was reported as their "country of origin." the natives are very fond of chewing the capsule and the inner bark of the stem of the plant. they are, for the matter of that, fond of chewing anything, but the practice in this case seems to me more repaying than when carried on with kola or ordinary twigs. two kinds of meleguetta pepper come up from guinea. that from accra is the larger, plumper, and tougher skinned, and commands the higher price. the capsule, which is about inches long by inch in breadth, is more oval than that of the other kind, and the grains in it are round and bluntly angular, bright brown outside, but when broken open showing a white inside. the other kind, the ordinary guinea grain of commerce, comes from sierra leone and liberia. they are devoid of the projecting tuft on the umbilicus. the capsule is like that of the accra grain. when dry, it is wrinkled, and if soaked does not display the longitudinal frill of the javan _amomum maximum_, which it is sometimes used to adulterate. this common capsule is only about - / inches long and / an inch in diameter, but the grain when broken open is also white like the accra one. there are, however, any quantity on cameroons of the winged javan variety, but these have so far not been exported. the plants that produce the grains are zingiberaceous, cane-like in appearance, only having broader, blunter leaves than the bamboo. the flower is very pretty, in some kinds a violet pink, but in the most common a violet purple, and they are worn as marks of submission by people in the oil rivers suing for peace. these flowers, which grow close to the ground, seeming to belong more to the root of the plant than the stem, or, more properly speaking, looking as if they had nothing to do with the graceful great soft canes round them, but were a crop of lovely crocus-like flowers on their own account, are followed by crimson-skinned pods enclosing the black and brown seeds wrapped in juicy pulp, quite unlike the appearance they present when dried or withered. there is only a small trade done in guinea grains now, george iii. (cap. ) having declared that no brewer or dealer in wine shall be found in possession of grains of paradise without paying a fine of £ , and that if any druggist shall sell them to a brewer that druggist shall pay a fine of £ for each such offence. the reason of this enactment was the idea that the grains were poisonous, and that the brewers in using them to give fire to their liquors were destroying their consumers, his majesty's lieges. as far as poison goes this idea was wrong, for meleguetta pepper or grains of paradise are quite harmless though hot. perhaps, however, some consignment may have reached europe with poisonous seeds in it. i once saw four entirely different sorts of seeds in a single sample. that is the worst of our ethiopian friends, they adulterate every mortal thing that passes through their hands. i will do them the justice to say they usually do so with the intellectually comprehensible end in view of gaining an equivalent pecuniary advantage by it. still it is commercially unsound of them; for example for years they sent up the seeds of the _kickia africana_ as an adulteration for _strophantus_, whereas they would have made more by finding out that the _kickia_ was a great rubber-producing tree. they will often take as much trouble to put in foreign matter as to get more legitimate raw material. i really fancy if any one were to open up a trade in kru coast rocks, adulteration would be found in the third shipment. it is their way, and legislation is useless. all that is necessary is that the traders who buy of them should know their business and not make infants of themselves by regarding the african as one or expecting the government to dry nurse them. in private life the native uses and values these guinea grains highly, using them sometimes internally sometimes externally, pounding them up into a paste with which they beplaster their bodies for various aches and pains. for headache, not the sequelæ of trade gin, but of malaria, the forehead and temples are plastered with a stiff paste made of guinea grain, hard oil, chalk, or some such suitable medium, and it is a most efficacious treatment for this fearfully common complaint in west africa. but the careful ethnologist must not mix this medicinal plaster up with the sort of prayerful plaster worn by the west africans at time for ju ju, and go and mistake a person who is merely attending to his body for one who is attending to his soul. footnotes: [ ] this word is probably a corruption of the old name for this district, cerberos. [ ] the derivation of this name given by barbot is from _misericordia_. "as some pretend on occasion of a portuguese ship cast away near the little river druro, the men of that ship were assaulted by the negroes, which made the portuguese cry for quarter, using the word _misericordia_, from which by corruption mesurado." [ ] tornado is possibly a corruption from the portuguese _trovado_, a thunderstorm; or from _tornado_, signifying returned; but most likely it comes from the spanish _torneado_, signifying thunder. chapter iii african characteristics containing some account of the divers noises of western afrik and an account of the country east of cape palmas, and other things; to which is added an account of the manner of shipping timber; of the old bristol trade; and, mercifully for the reader, a leaving off. when we got our complement of krumen on board, we proceeded down coast with the intention of calling off accra. i will spare you the description of the scenes which accompany the taking on of kruboys; they have frequently been described, for they always alarm the new-comer--they are the first bit of real africa he sees if bound for the gold coast or beyond. sierra leone, charming, as it is, has a sort of christy minstrel air about it for which he is prepared, but the kruboy as he comes on board looks quite the boys' book of africa sort of thing; though, needless to remark, as innocent as a lamb, bar a tendency to acquire portable property. nevertheless, kruboys coming on board for your first time alarm you; at any rate they did me, and they also introduced me to african noise, which like the insects is another most excellent thing, that you should get broken into early. woe! to the man in africa who cannot stand perpetual uproar. few things surprised me more than the rarity of silence and the intensity of it when you did get it. there is only that time which comes between . a.m. and . p.m., in which you can look for anything like the usual quiet of an english village. we will give man the first place in the orchestra, he deserves it. i fancy the main body of the lower classes of africa think externally instead of internally. you will hear them when they are engaged together on some job--each man issuing the fullest directions and prophecies concerning it, in shouts; no one taking the least notice of his neighbours. if the head man really wants them to do something definite he fetches those within his reach an introductory whack; and even when you are sitting alone in the forest you will hear a man or woman coming down the narrow bush path chattering away with such energy and expression that you can hardly believe your eyes when you learn from them that he has no companion. [illustration: for palm wine. [_to face page ._] some of this talking is, i fancy, an equivalent to our writing. i know many english people who, if they want to gather a clear conception of an affair write it down; the african not having writing, first talks it out. and again more of it is conversation with spirit guardians and familiar spirits, and also with those of their dead relatives and friends, and i have often seen a man, sitting at a bush fire or in a village palaver house, turn round and say, "you remember that, mother?" to the ghost that to him was there. i remember mentioning this very touching habit of theirs, as it seemed to me, in order to console a sick and irritable friend whose cabin was close to a gangway then in possession of a very lively lot of sierra leone kruboys, and he said, "oh, i daresay they do, miss kingsley; but i'll be hanged if hell is such a damned way off west africa that they need shout so loud." the calm of the hot noontide fades towards evening time, and the noise of things in general revives and increases. then do the natives call in instrumental aid of diverse and to my ear pleasant kinds. great is the value of the tom-tom, whether it be of pure native origin or constructed from an old devos patent paraffin oil tin. then there is the kitty-katty, so called from its strange scratching-vibrating sound, which you hear down south, and on fernando po, of the excruciating mouth harp, and so on, all accompanied by the voice. if it be play night, you become the auditor to an orchestra as strange and varied as that which played before shadrach, meshech, and abednego. i know i am no musician, so i own to loving african music, bar that fernandian harp! like benedick, i can say, "give me a horn for my money when all is done," unless it be a tom-tom. the african horn, usually made of a tooth of ivory, and blown from a hole in the side, is an instrument i unfortunately cannot play on. i have not the lung capacity. it requires of you to breathe in at one breath a whole s.w. gale of wind and then to empty it into the horn, which responds with a preliminary root-too-toot before it goes off into its noble dirge bellow. it is a fine instrument and should be introduced into european orchestras, for it is full of colour. but i think that even the horn, and certainly all other instruments, savage and civilised, should bow their heads in homage to the tom-tom, for, as a method of getting at the inner soul of humanity where are they compared with that noble instrument! you doubt it. well go and hear a military tattoo or any performance on kettle drums up here and i feel you will reconsider the affair; but even then, remember you have not heard all the african tom-tom can tell you. i don't say it's an instrument suited for serenading your lady-love with, but that is a thing i don't require of an instrument. all else the tom-tom can do, and do well. it can talk as well as the human tongue. it can make you want to dance or fight for no private reason, as nothing else can, and be you black or white it calls up in you all your neolithic man. many african instruments are, however, sweet and gentle, and as mild as sucking doves, notably the xylophonic family. these marimbas, to use their most common name, are all over africa from senegal to zambesi. their form varies with various tribes--the west african varieties almost universally have wooden keys instead of iron ones like the east african. personally, i like the west african best; there is something exquisite in the sweet, clear, water-like notes produced from the strips of soft wood of graduated length that make the west african keyboard. all these instruments have the sound magnified and enriched by a hollow wooden chamber under their keyboard. in calabar this chamber is one small shallow box, ornamented, as most wooden things are in calabar, with poker work--but in among the fan, under the keyboard were a set of calabashes, and in the calabashes one hole apiece and that hole covered carefully with the skin of a large spider. while down in angola you met the xylophone in the imposing form you can see in the frontispiece to this volume. of the orchid fibre-stringed harp, i have spoken elsewhere, and there remains but one more truly great instrument that i need mention. i have had a trial at playing every african instrument i have come across, under native teachers, and they have assured me that, with application, i should succeed in becoming a rather decent performer on the harp and xylophone, and had the makings of a genius for the tom-tom, but my greatest and most rapid triumph was achieved on this other instrument. i picked up the hang of the thing in about five minutes, and then, being vain, when i returned to white society i naturally desired to show off my accomplishment, but met with no encouragement whatsoever--indeed my friends said gently, but firmly, that if i did it again they should leave, not the settlement merely, but the continent, and devote their remaining years to sweeping crossings in their native northern towns--they said they would rather do this than hear that instrument played again by any one. this instrument is made from an old powder keg, with both ends removed; a piece of raw hide is tied tightly round it over what one might call a bung-hole, while a piece of wood with a lump of rubber or fastening is passed through this hole. the performer then wets his hand, inserts it into the instrument, and lightly grasps the stick and works it up and down for all he is worth; the knob beats the drum skin with a beautiful boom, and the stick gives an exquisite screech as it passes through the hole in the skin which the performer enhances with an occasional howl or wail of his own, according to his taste or feeling. there are other varieties of this instrument, some with one end of the cylinder covered over and the knob of the stick beating the inside, but in all its forms it is impressive. next in point of strength to the human vocal and instrumental performers come frogs. the small green one, whose note is like that of the cricket's magnified, is a part-singer, but the big bull frog, whose tones are all his own, sings in handel festival sized choruses. i don't much mind either of these, but the one i hate is a solo frog who seems eternally engaged at night in winding up a waterbury watch. many a night have i stocked thick with calamity on that frog's account; many a night have i landed myself in hailing distance of amen corner from having gone out of hut, or house, with my mind too full of the intention of flattening him out with a slipper, to think of driver ants, leopards, or snakes. frog hunting is one of the worst things you can do in west africa. next to frogs come the crickets with their chorus of "she did, she didn't," and the cicadas, but they knock off earlier than frogs, and when the frogs have done for the night there is quiet for the few hours of cool, until it gets too cool and the chill that comes before the dawn wakes up the birds, and they wake you with their long, mellow, exquisitely beautiful whistles. the aforesaid are everyday noises in west africa, and you soon get used to them or die of them; but there are myriads of others that you hear when in the bush. the grunting sigh of relief of the hippos, the strange groaning, whining bark of the crocodiles, the thin cry of the bats, the cough of the leopards, and that unearthly yell that sometimes comes out of the forest in the depths of dark nights. yes, my naturalist friends, it's all very well to say it is only a love-lorn, innocent little marmoset-kind of thing that makes it. i know, poor dear, softly, softly, and he wouldn't do it. anyhow, you just wait until you hear it in a shaky little native hut, or when you are spending the night, having been fool enough to lose yourself, with your back against a tree quite alone and that yell comes at you with its agony of anguish and appeal out of that dense black world of forest which the moon, be she never so strong, cannot enlighten, and which looks all the darker for the contrast of the glistening silver mist that shows here and there in the clearings, or over lagoon, or river, wavering twining, rising and falling; so full of strange motion and beauty, yet, somehow, as sinister in its way as the rest of your surroundings, and so deadly silent. i think if you hear that yell cutting through this sort of thing like a knife and sinking despairingly into the surrounding silence, you will agree with me that it seems to favour duppy, and that, perchance, the strange red patch of ground you passed at the foot of the cotton tree before night came down on you, was where the yell came from, for it is red and damp and your native friends have told you it is so because of the blood whipped off a sasa-bonsum and his victims as he goes down through it to his under-world home. seen from the sea, the ivory coast is a relief to the eye after the dead level of the grain coast, but the attention of the mariner to rocks has no practical surcease; and there is that submarine horror for sailing ships, the bottomless pit. they used to have great tragedies with it in olden times, and you can still, if you like, for that matter; but the french having a station miles to the east of it at grand bassam would nowadays prevent your experiencing the action of this phenomenon thoroughly, and getting not only wrecked but killed by the natives ashore, though they are a lively lot still. now although this is not a manual of devotion, i must say a few words on the bottomless pit. all along the west coast of africa there is a great shelving bank, submarine, formed by the deposit of the great mud-laden rivers and the earth-wash of the heavy rains. the slope of what the scientific term the great west african bank is, on the whole, very regular, except opposite piccaninny bassam, where it is cut right through by a great chasm, presumably the result of volcanic action. this chasm commences about miles from land and is shaped like a v, with the narrow end shorewards. nine miles out it is three miles wider and , feet deep, at three miles out the sides are opposite each other and there is little more than a mile between them, and the depth is , feet; at one mile from the beach the chasm is only a quarter of a mile wide and the depth feet--close up beside the beach the depth is feet. the floor of this chasm is covered with grey mud, and some five miles out the surveying vessels got fragments of coral rock. [illustration: secret society leaving the sacred grove] [illustration: jengu devil dance of king william's slaves, sette camma, nov. , . [_to face page ._] the sides of this submarine valley seem almost vertical cliffs, and herein lies its danger for the sailing ship. the master thereof, in the smoke or fog season (december-february), may not exactly know to a mile or so where he is, and being unable to make out piccaninny bassam, which is only a small native village on the sand ridge between the surf and the lagoon, he lets go his anchor on the edge of the cliffs of this bottomless pit. then the set of the tide and the onshore breeze cause it to drag a little, and over it goes down into the abyss, and ashore he is bound to go. in old days he and his ship's crew formed a welcome change in the limited dietary of the exultant native. mr. barbot, who knew them well, feelingly remarks, "it is from the bloody tempers of these brutes that the portuguese gave them the name of malagens for they eat human flesh," and he cites how "recently they have massacred a great number of portuguese, dutch and english, who came for provisions and water, not thinking of any treachery, and not many years since, (that is to say, in ) an english ship lost three of its men; a hollander fourteen; and, in , a portuguese, nine, of whom nothing was ever heard since." from cape palmas until you are past the mouth of the taka river (st. andrew) the coast is low. then comes the cape of the little strand (caboda prazuba), now called, i think, price's point. to the east of this you will see ranges of dwarf red cliffs rising above the beach and gradually increasing in height until they attain their greatest in the face of mount bedford, where the cliff is feet high. the portuguese called these barreira vermelhas; the french, kalazis rouges; and the dutch, roode kliftin, all meaning red cliffs. the sand at their feet is strewn with boulders, and the whole country round here looks fascinating and interesting. i regret never having had an opportunity of seeing whether those cliffs had fossils on them, for they seem to me so like those beloved red cliffs of mine in kacongo which have. the investigation, however, of such makes of africa is messy. those kacongo cliffs were of a sort of red clay that took on a greasy slipperiness when they were wet, which they frequently were on account of the little springs of water that came through their faces. when pottering about them, after having had my suspicions lulled by twenty or thirty yards of crumbly dryness, i would ever and anon come across a water spring, and down i used to go--and lose nothing by it, going home in the evening time in what the local natives would have regarded as deep mourning for a large family--red clay being their sign thereof. the fossils i found in them were horizontally deposed layers of clam shells with regular intervals, or bands, of red clay, four or five feet across; between the layers some of the shell layers were or more feet above the present beach level. identical deposits of shell i also found far inland in ka congo, but that has nothing to do with the ivory coast. inland, near drewin, on the ivory coast, you can see from the sea curious shaped low hills; the definite range of these near drewin is called the highland of drewin; after this place they occur frequently close to the shore, usually isolated but now and again two or three together, like those called by sailors the sisters. i am much interested in these peculiar-shaped hills that you see on the ivory and gold coast, and again, far away down south, rising out of the ouronuogou swamp, and have endeavoured to find out if any theories have been suggested as to their formation, but in vain. they look like great bubbles, and run from to , feet. the red cliffs end at mount bedford and the estuary of the fresco river, and after passing this the coast is low until you reach what is now called the district of lahu, a native sounding name, but really a corruption from its old french name la-hoe or hou. you would not think, when looking at this bit of coast from the sea, that the strip of substantial brown sand beach is but a sort of viaduct, behind which lies a chain of stagnant lagoons. in the wet season, these stretches of dead water cut off the sand beach from the forest for as much as miles and more. beyond mount la-hou on this sand strip there are many native villages--each village a crowded clump of huts, surrounded by a grove of coco palm trees, each tree belonging definitely to some native family or individual, and having its owner's particular mark on it, and each grove of palm trees slanting uniformly at a stiff angle, which gives you no cause to ask which is the prevailing wind here, for they tell you bright and clear, as they lean n.e., that the s.w. wind brought them up to do so. groves of coco palms are no favourites of mine. i don't like them. the trees are nice enough to look on, and nice enough to use in the divers ways you can use a coco-nut palm; but the noise of the breeze in their crowns keeps up a perpetual rattle with their hard leaves that sounds like heavy rain day and night, so that you feel you ought to live under an umbrella, and your mind gets worried about it when you are not looking after it with your common sense. then the natives are such a nuisance with coco-nuts. for a truly terrific kniff give me even in west africa a sand beach with coco-nut palms and natives. you never get coco-nut palms without natives, because they won't grow out of sight of human habitation. i am told also that one coco will not grow alone; it must have another coco as well as human neighbours, so these things, of course, end in a grove. it's like keeping cats with no one to drown the kittens. well, the way the smell comes about in this affair is thus. the natives bury the coco-nuts in the sand, so as to get the fibre off them. they have buried nuts in that sand for ages before you arrive, and the nuts have rotted, and crabs have come to see what was going on, a thing crabs will do, and they have settled down here and died in their generations, and rotted too. the sandflies and all manner of creeping things have found that sort of district suits them, and have joined in, and the natives, who are great hands at fishing, have flung all the fish offal there, and there is usually a lagoon behind this sort of thing which contributes its particular aroma, and so between them the smell is a good one, even for west africa. the ancient geographers called this coast ajanginal �thiope, and the dutch and french used to reckon it from growe, where the melaguetta coast ends. just east of cape palmas, to the rio do sweiro da costa, where they counted the gold coast to begin, the portuguese divided the coast thus. the ivory, or, as the dutchmen called it, the tand kust, from gowe to rio st. andrew; the malaguetta from st. andrew to the rio lagos;[ ] and the quaqua from the rio lagos to rio de sweiro da costa, which is just to the east of what is now called assini. it is undoubtedly one of the most interesting and nowadays least known bits of the coast of the bight of benin; but, taken altogether, with my small knowledge of it, i do not feel justified in recommending the ivory coast as either a sphere for emigration or a pleasure resort. nevertheless, it is a very rich district naturally, and one of the most amusing features of west african trade you can see on a steamboat is to watch the shipping of timber therefrom. this region of the bight of benin is one of enormous timber wealth, and the development of this of late years has been great, adding the name of timber ports to the many other names this particular bit of west africa bears, the timber ports being the main ports of the french ivory coast, and the english port of axim on the gold coast. the best way to watch the working of this industry is to stay on board the steamer; if by chance you go on shore when this shipping of mahogany is going on you may be expected to help, or get out of the way, which is hot work, or difficult. the last time i was in africa we on the---- shipped enormous bulks of timber. these logs run on an average to feet long and to feet in diameter. they are towed from the beach to the vessel behind the surf boats, seven and eight at a time, tied together by a rope running through rings called dogs, which are driven into the end of each log, and when alongside, the rope from the donkey engine crane is dropped overboard, and passed round the log by the negroes swimming about in the water regardless of sharks and as agile as fish. then, with much uproar and advice, the huge logs are slowly heaved on board, and either deposited on the deck or forthwith swung over the hatch and lowered down. it is almost needless to remark that, with the usual foresight of men, the hatch is of a size unsuited to the log, and therefore, as it hangs suspended, a chorus of counsel surges up from below and from all sides. the officer in command on this particular hatch presently shouts "lower away," waving his hand gracefully from the wrist as though he were practising for piano playing, but really to guide shoo fly, who is driving the donkey engine. the tremendous log hovers over the hatch, and then gradually, "softly, softly," as shoo fly would say, disappears into the bowels of the ship, until a heterogeneous yell in english and kru warns the trained intelligence that it is low enough, or more probably too low. "heave a link!" shouts the officer, and shoo fly and the donkey engine heaveth. then the official hand waves, and the crane swings round with a whiddle, whiddle, and there is a moment's pause, the rope strains, and groans, and waits, and as soon as the most important and valuable people on board, such as the captain, the doctor, and myself, are within its reach to give advice, and look down the hatch to see what is going on, that rope likes to break and comes clawing at us a mass of bent and broken wire, and as we scatter, the great log goes with a crash into the hold. fortunately, the particular log i remember as indulging in this catastrophe did not go through the ship's bottom, as i confidently expected it had at the time, nor was any one killed, such a batch of miraculous escapes occurring for the benefit of the officer and men below as can only be reasonably accounted for by their having expected this sort of thing to happen. quaint are the ways of mariners at times. that time they took on quantities of great logs at the main gangway, well knowing that they would have to go down the hatch aft, and that this would entail hauling them along the narrow alley ways. this process was effected by rigging the steam winches aft, then two sharp hooks connected together by a chain at the end of the wire hawser were fixed into the head of the log, and the word passed "haul away," water being thrown on the deck to make the logs slip easier over it, and billets of wood put underneath the log with the same intention, and the added hope of saving the deck from being torn by the rough hewn, hard monster. now there are two superstitions rife regarding this affair. the first is, that if you hitch the hooks lightly into each side of the log's head and then haul hard, the weight of the log will cause the hooks to get firmly and safely embedded in it. the second is, that the said weight will infallibly keep the billets under it in due position. nothing short of getting himself completely and permanently killed shakes the mariner's faith in these notions. what often happens is this. when the strain is at its highest the hooks slip out of the wood, and try and scalp any one that's handy, and now and again they succeed. there was a man helping that day at axim whom the doctor said had only last voyage fell a victim to the hooks; they slipped out of the head of the log and played round his own, laying it open to the bone at the back, cutting him over the ears and across the forehead, and if that man had not had a phenomenally thick skull he must have died. but no, there he was on this voyage as busy as ever with the timber, close to those hooks, and evidently with his superstitious trust in the invariable embedding of hooks in timber unabated one fraction. sometimes the performance is varied by the hauling rope itself parting and going up the alley way like a boa constrictor in a fit, whisking up black passengers and boxes full of screaming parrots in its path from places they had placed themselves, or been placed in, well out of its legitimate line of march. but the day it succeeds in clawing hold of and upsetting the cook's grease tub, which lives in the alley-way, that is the day of horror for the first officer and the inauguration of a period of ardent holystoning for his minions. should, however, the broken rope fail to find, as the fox-hunters would say, in the alley-way, it flings itself in a passionate embrace round the person of the donkey engine aft, and gives severe trouble there. the mariners, with an admirable faith and patience, untwine it, talking seriously to it meanwhile, and then fix it up again, may be with more care, and the shout, "heave away!"--goes forth again; the rope groans and creaks, the hooks go in well on either side of the log, and off it moves once more with a graceful, dignified glide towards its destination. the bo'sun and chips with their eyes on the man at the winch, and let us hope their thoughts employed in the penitential contemplation of their past sins, so as to be ready for the consequences likely to arise for them if the rope parts again, do not observe the little white note--underbill--as a german would call it, which is getting nearer and nearer the end of the log, which has stuck to the deck. in a few moments the log is off it, and down on chips' toes, who returns thanks with great spontaneity, in language more powerful then select. the bo'sun yells, "avast heaving, there!" and several other things, while his assistant kruboys, chattering like a rookery when an old lady's pet parrot has just joined it, get crowbars and raise up the timber, and the carpenter is a free man again, and the little white billet reinstated. "haul away," roars the bo'sun, "abadeo na nu de um oro de kri kri," join in the hoarse-voiced kruboys, "ji na oi," answers the excited shoo fly, and off goes that log again. the particular log whose goings on i am chronicling slewed round at this juncture with the force of a roman battering ram, drove in the panel of my particular cabin, causing all sorts of bottles and things inside to cast themselves on the floor and smash, whereby i, going in after dark, got cut. but no matter, that log, one of the classic sized logs, was in the end safely got up the alley-way and duly stowed among its companions. for let west africa send what it may, be it never so large or so difficult, be he never so ill-provided with tackle to deal with it, the west coast mariner will have that thing on board, and ship it--all honour to his determination and ability. the varieties of timber chiefly exported from the west african timber ports are _oldfieldia africana_, of splendid size and texture, commonly called mahogany, but really teak, bar and camwood and ebony. bar and cam are dye-woods, and, before the anilines came in these woods were in great request; invaluable they were for giving the dull rich red to bandana handkerchiefs and the warm brown tints to tweed stuffs. camwood was once popular with cabinet makers and wood-turners here, but of late years it has only come into this market in roots or twisty bits--all the better these for dyeing, but not for working up, and so it has fallen out of demand among cabinet makers in spite of its beautiful grain and fine colour, a pinky yellow when fresh cut, deepening rapidly on exposure to the air into a rich, dark red brown. amongst old spanish furniture you will find things made from camwood that are a joy to the eye. there has been some confusion as to whether bar and camwood are identical--merely a matter of age in the same tree or no--but i have seen the natives cutting both these timbers, and they are quite different trees in the look of them, as any one would expect from seeing a billet of bar and one of cam; the former is a light porous wood and orange colour when fresh cut, while billets of bar and only to of cam go to the ton. there are many signs of increasing enterprise in the west african timber trade, but so far this form of wealth has barely been touched, so vast are the west african forests and so varied the trees therein. at present it, like most west african industries, is fearfully handicapped by the deadly climate, the inferiority and expensiveness of labour, and the difficulties of transport. at present it is useless to fell a tree, be it ever so fine, if it is growing at any distance from a river down which you can float it to the sea beach, for it would be impossible to drag it far through the liane-tangled west african forest. indeed, it is no end of a job to drag a decent-sized log even two hundred yards or so to a river. the way it is done is this. when felling the tree you arrange that its head shall fall away from the river, then trim off the rough stuff and hew the heavy end to a rough point, so that when the boys are pully-hauling down the slope--you must have a slope--to the bank, it may not only be able to pierce the opposing undergrowth spearwise more easily than if its end were flat or jagged, but also by the fact of its own weight it may help their exertions. i have seen one or two grand scenes on the ogowé with trees felled on steep mountain sides, wherein you had only got to arrange these circumstances, start your log on its downward course to the river, get out of the fair way of it, and leave the rest to gravity, which carried things through in grand style, with a crashing rush and a glorious splash into the river. you had, of course, to take care you had a clear bank and not one fringed with dead-trees, into which your mighty spear would embed itself and also to have a canoe load of energetic people to get hold of the log and keep it out of the current of that lively ogowé river, or it would go off to kama country express. but this work on timber was far easier than that on the gold or ivory coasts, whence most timber comes to europe, and where the make of the country does not give you so fully the assistance of steep gradients. after what i have told you about the behaviour of these great baulks on board ship you will not imagine that the log behaves well during its journey on land. indeed, my belief in the immorality of inanimate nature has been much strengthened by observing the conduct of african timber. nor am i alone in judging it harshly, for an american missionary once said to me, "ah! it will be a grand day for africa when we have driven out all the heathen devils; they are everywhere, not only in graven images, but just universally scattered around." the remark was made on the occasion of a floor that had been laid down by a mission carpenter coming up on its own account, as native timber floors laid down by native carpenters customarily come, though the native carpenter lays norway boards well enough. when, after much toil and tribulation and uproar, the log has been got down to the river and floated, iron rings are driven into it, and it is branded with its owner's mark. then the owner does not worry himself much about it for a month or so, but lets it float its way down and soak, and generally lazy about until he gets together sufficient of its kind to make a shipment. one of the many strange and curious things they told me of on the west coast was that old idea that hydrophobia is introduced into europe by means of these logs. there is, they say, on the west coast of africa a peculiarly venomous scorpion that makes its home on the logs while they are floating in the river, three-parts submerged on account of weight, and the other part most delightfully damp and cool to the scorpion's mind. when the logs get shipped frequently the scorpion gets shipped too, and subsequently comes out in the hold and bites the resident rats. so far i accept this statement fully, for i have seen more than enough rats and scorpions in the hold, and the west coast scorpions are particularly venomous, but feeling that in these days it is the duty of every one to keep their belief for religious purposes, i cannot go on and in a whole souled way believe that the dogs of liverpool, havre, hamburg, and marseilles worry the said rats when they arrive in dock, and, getting bitten by them, breed rabies. nevertheless, i do not interrupt and say, "stuff," because if you do this to the old coaster he only offers to fight you, or see you shrivelled, or bet you half-a-crown, or in some other time-honoured way demonstrate the truth of his assertion, and he will, moreover, go on and say there is more hydrophobia in the aforesaid towns than elsewhere, and as the chances are you have not got hydrophobia statistics with you, you are lost. besides, it's very unkind and unnecessary to make a west coaster go and say or do things which will only make things harder for him in the time "to come," and anyhow if you are of a cautious, nervous disposition you had better search your bunk for scorpions, before turning in, when you are on a vessel that has got timber on board, and the chances are that your labours will be rewarded by discovering specimens of this interesting animal. scorpions and centipedes are inferior in worrying power to driver ants, but they are a feature in coast life, particularly in places--cameroons, for example. if you see a man who seems to you to have a morbid caution in the method of dealing with his hat or folded dinner napkin, judge him not harshly, for the chances are he is from cameroon, where there are scorpions--scorpions of great magnitude and tough constitutions, as was demonstrated by a little affair up here that occurred in a family i know. the inhabitants of the french ivory coast are an exceedingly industrious and enterprising set of people in commercial matters, and the export and import trade is computed by a recent french authority at ten million francs per annum. no official computation, however, of the trade of a coast district is correct, for reasons i will not enter into now. the native coinage equivalent here is the manilla--a bracelet in a state of sinking into a more conventional token. these manillas are made of an alloy of copper and pewter, manufactured mainly at birmingham and nantes, the individual value being from to centimes. changes for the worse as far as english trade is concerned have passed over the trade of the ivory coast recently, but the way, even in my time, trade was carried on was thus. the native traders deal with the captains of the english sailing vessels and the french factories, buying palm oil and kernels from the bush people with merchandise, and selling it to the native or foreign shippers. they get paid in manillas, which they can, when they wish, get changed again into merchandise either at the factory or on the trading ship. the manilla is, therefore, a kind of bank for the black trader, a something he can put his wealth into when he wants to store it for a time. they have a singular system of commercial correspondence between the villages on the beach and the villages on the other side of the great lagoon that separates it from the mainland. each village on the shore has its particular village on the other side of the lagoon, thus alindja badon is the interior commercial centre for grand jack on the beach, abia for anamaquoa, or half jack, and so on. anamaquoa is only separated from its sister village by a little lagoon that is fordable, but the other towns have to communicate by means of canoes. grand bassam, assini, and half jack are the most important places on the ivory coast. the main portion of the first-named town is out of sight from seaboard, being some five miles up the costa river, and all you can see on the beach are two large but lonesome-looking factories. half jack, jack a jack, or anamaquoa--there is nothing like having plenty of names for one place in west africa, because it leads people at home who don't know the joke to think there is more of you than there naturally is--gives its name to the bit of coast from cape palmas to grand bassam, this coast being called the half jack, or quite as often the bristol coast, and for many years it was the main point of call for the guineamen, old-fashioned sailing vessels which worked the bristol trade in the bights. this trade was established during the last century by mr. henry king, of bristol, for supplying labour to the west indies, and was further developed by his two sons, richard, who hated men-o'-war like a quaker, and william who loved science, both very worthy gentlemen. after their time up till when i was first on the coast, this firm carried on trade both on the bristol coast and down in cameroon, which in old days bore the name of little bristol-in-hell, but now the trade is in other hands. according to captain binger, there are now about sailing ships still working the ivory coast trade, two of them the property of an energetic american captain, but the greater part belonging to bristol. their voyage out from bristol varies from to days, according as you get through the horse latitudes--so-called from the number of horses that used to die in this region of calms when the sailing vessels bringing them across from south america lay week out and week in short alike of wind and water. in old days, when the bristol ship got to the coast she would call at the first village on it. then the native chiefs and head men would come on board and haggle with the captain as to the quantity of goods he would let them have on trust, they covenanting to bring in exchange for them in a given time a certain number of slaves or so much produce. this arrangement being made, off sailed the guineaman to his next village, where a similar game took place all the way down coast to grand bassam. when she had paid out the trust goods to the last village, she would stand out to sea and work back to her first village of call on the bristol coast to pick up the promised produce, this arrangement giving the native traders time to collect it. in nine cases out of ten, however, it was not ready for her, so on she went to the next. by this time the guineaman would present the spectacle of a farmhouse that had gone mad, grown masts, and run away to sea; for the decks were protected from the burning sun by a well-built thatch roof, and she lounged along heavy with the rank sea growth of these seas. sometimes she would be unroofed by a tornado, sometimes seized by a pirate parasitic on the guinea trade, but barring these interruptions to business she called regularly on her creditors, from some getting the promised payment, from others part of it, from others again only the renewal of the promise, and then when she had again reached her last point of call put out to sea once more and worked back again to the first creditor village. in those days she kept at this weary round until she got in all her debts, a process that often took her four or five years, and cost the lives of half her crew from fever, and then her consorts drafted a man or so on board her and kept her going until she was full enough of pepper, gold, gum, ivory, and native gods to sail for bristol. there, when the guineaman came in, were grand doings for the small boys, what with parrots, oranges, bananas, &c., but sad times for most of those whose relatives and friends had left bristol on her. in much the same way, and with much the same risks, the bristol coast trade goes on now, only there is little of it left, owing to the french system of suppressing trade. palm oil is the modern equivalent to slaves, and just as in old days the former were transhipped from the coasting guineamen to the transatlantic slavers, so now the palm oil is shipped off on to the homeward bound african steamers, while, as for the joys and sorrows, century-change affects them not. so long as western africa remains the deadliest region on earth there will be joy over those who come up out of it; heartache and anxiety over those who are down there fighting as men fought of old for those things worth the fighting, god, glory and gold; and grief over those who are dead among all of us at home who are ill-advised enough to really care for men who have the pluck to go there. during the smoke season when dense fogs hang over the bight of benin, the bristol ships get very considerably sworn at by the steamers. they have letters for them, and they want oil off them; between ourselves, they want oil off every created thing, and the bristol boat is not easy to find. so the steamer goes dodging and fumbling about after her, swearing softly about wasting coal all the time, and more harshly still when he finds he has picked up the wrong guineaman, only modified if she has stuff to send home, stuff which he conjures the bristol captain by the love he bears him to keep, and ship by him when he is on his way home from windward ports, or to let him have forthwith. sometimes the bristolman will signal to a passing steamer for a doctor. the doctors of the african and british african boats are much thought of all down the coast, and are only second in importance to the doctor on board a telegraph ship, who, being a rare specimen, is regarded as, _ipso facto_, more gifted, so that people will save up their ailments for the telegraph ship's medical man, which is not a bad practice, as it leads commonly to their getting over those ailments one way or the other by the time the telegraph ship arrives. it is reported that one day one of the bristolmen ran up an urgent signal to a passing mail steamer for a doctor, and the captain thereof ran up a signal of assent, and the doctor went below to get his medicines ready. meanwhile, instead of displaying a patient gratitude, the bristolman signalled "repeat signal." "give it 'em again," said the steamboat captain, "those bristolmen ain't got no board schools." still the bristolman kept bothering, running up her original signal, and in due course off went the doctor to her in the gig. when he returned his captain asked him, saying, "pills, are they all mad on board that vessel or merely drunk as usual?" "well," says the doctor, "that's curious, for it's the very same question captain n. has asked me about you. he is very anxious about your mental health, and wants to know why you keep on signalling 'haul to, or i will fire into you,'" and the story goes that an investigation of the code and the steamer's signal supported the bristolman's reading, and the subject was dropped in steam circles. although the bristolmen do not carry doctors, they are provided with grand medicine chests, the supply of medicines in west africa being frequently in the inverse ratio with the ability to administer them advantageously. inside the lid of these medicine chests is a printed paper of instructions, each drug having a number before its name, and a hint as to the proper dose after it. thus, we will say, for example, was jalap; , calomel; , croton oil; and , quinine. once upon a time there was a bristol captain, as good a man as need be and with a fine head on him for figures. some of his crew were smitten with fever when he was out of number , so he argues that and are all the world over, but being short of , it being a popular drug, he further argues and make as well, and the dose of being so much he makes that dose up out of jalap and croton oil. some of the patients survived; at least, a man i met claimed to have done so. his report is not altogether reproducible in full, but, on the whole, the results of the treatment went more towards demonstrating the danger of importing raw abstract truths into everyday affairs than to encouraging one to repeat the experiment of arithmetical therapeutics. footnotes: [ ] no connection with the colony of lagos. chapter iv fishing in west africa. there is one distinctive charm about fishing--its fascinations will stand any climate. you may sit crouching on ice over a hole inside the arctic circle, or on a windsor chair by the side of the river lea in the so-called temperate zone, or you may squat in a canoe on an equatorial river, with the surrounding atmosphere per cent. mosquito, and if you are fishing you will enjoy yourself; and what is more important than this enjoyment, is that you will not embitter your present, nor endanger your future, by going home in a bad temper, whether you have caught anything or not, provided always that you are a true fisherman. this is not the case with other sports; i have been assured by experienced men that it "makes one feel awfully bad" when, after carrying for hours a very heavy elephant gun, for example, through a tangled forest you have got a wretched bad chance of a shot at an elephant; and as for football, cricket, &c., well, i need hardly speak of the unchristian feelings they engender in the mind towards umpires and successful opponents. [illustration: batanga canoes. _to face page ._] being, as above demonstrated, a humble, but enthusiastic, devotee of fishing--i dare not say, as my great predecessor dame juliana berners says, "with an angle," because my conscience tells me i am a born poacher,--i need hardly remark that when i heard, from a reliable authority at gaboon, that there were lakes in the centre of the island of corisco, and that these fresh-water lakes were fished annually by representative ladies from the villages on this island, and that their annual fishing was just about due, i decided that i must go there forthwith. now, although corisco is not more than twenty miles out to sea from the continent, it is not a particularly easy place to get at nowadays, no vessels ever calling there; so i got, through the kindness of dr. nassau, a little schooner and a black crew, and, forgetting my solemn resolve, formed from the fruits of previous experiences, never to go on to an atlantic island again, off i sailed. i will not go into the adventures of that voyage here. my reputation as a navigator was great before i left gaboon. i had a record of having once driven my bowsprit through a conservatory, and once taken all the paint off one side of a smallpox hospital, to say nothing of repeatedly having made attempts to climb trees in boats i commanded, but when i returned, i had surpassed these things by having successfully got my main-mast jammed up a tap, and i had done sufficient work in discovering new sandbanks, rock shoals, &c., in corisco bay, and round cape esterias, to necessitate, or call for, a new edition of _the west african pilot_. corisco island is about three miles long by - / wide: its latitude ° n., long. ° - / e. mr. winwood reade was about the last traveller to give a description of corisco, and a very interesting description it is. he was there in the early sixties, and was evidently too fully engaged with a drunken captain and a mad malay cook to go inland. in his days small trading vessels used to call at corisco for cargo, but they do so no longer, all the trade in the bay now being carried on at messrs. holt's factory on little eloby island (an island nearer in shore), and on the mainland at coco beach, belonging to messrs. hatton and cookson. in winwood reade's days, too, there was a settlement of the american presbyterian society on corisco, with a staff of white men. this has been abandoned to a native minister, because the society found that facts did not support their theory that the island would be more healthy than the mainland, the mortality being quite as great as at any continental station, so they moved on to the continent to be nearer their work. the only white people that are now on corisco are two spanish priests and three nuns; but of these good people i saw little or nothing, as my headquarters were with the presbyterian native minister, mr. ibea, and there was war between him and the priests. the natives are benga, a coast tribe now rapidly dying out. they were once a great tribe, and in the old days, when the slavers and the whalers haunted corisco bay, these benga were much in demand as crew men, in spite of the reputation they bore for ferocity. nowadays the grown men get their living by going as travelling agents for the white merchants into the hinterland behind corisco bay, amongst the very dangerous and savage tribes there, and when one of them has made enough money by this trading, he comes back to corisco, and rests, and luxuriates in the ample bosom of his family until he has spent his money--then he gets trust from the white trader, and goes to the bush again, pretty frequently meeting there the sad fate of the pitcher that went too often to the well, and getting killed by the hinterlanders. on arriving at corisco island, i "soothed with a gift, and greeted with a smile" the dusky inhabitants. "have you got any tobacco?" said they. "i have," i responded, and a friendly feeling at once arose. i then explained that i wanted to join the fishing party. they were quite willing, and said the ladies were just finishing planting their farms before the tornado season came on, and that they would make the peculiar, necessary baskets at once. they did not do so at once in the english sense of the term, but we all know there is no time south of °, and so i waited patiently, walking about the island. corisco is locally celebrated for its beauty. winwood reade says: "it is a little world in miniature, with its miniature forests, miniature prairies, miniature mountains, miniature rivers, and miniature precipices on the sea-shore." in consequence partly of these things, and partly of the inhabitants' rooted idea that the proper way to any place on the island is round by the sea-shore, the paths of corisco are as strange as several other things are in latitude , and, like the other things, they require understanding to get on with. they start from the beach with the avowed intention of just going round the next headland because the tide happens to be in too much for you to go along by the beach; but, once started, their presiding genii might sing to the wayfarer mr. kipling's "the lord knows where we shall go, dear lass, and the deuce knows what we shall see." you go up a path off the beach gladly, because you have been wading in fine white sand over your ankles, and in banks of rotten and rotting seaweed, on which centipedes, and other catamumpuses, crawl in profusion, not to mention sand-flies, &c., and the path makes a plunge inland, as much as to say, "come and see our noted scenery," and having led you through a miniature swamp, a miniature forest, and a miniature prairie, "it's a pity," says the path, "not to call at so-and-so's village now we are so near it," and off it goes to the village through a patch of grass or plantation. it wanders through the scattered village calling at houses, for some time, and then says, "bless me, i had nearly forgotten what i came out for; we must hurry back to that beach," and off it goes through more scenery, landing you ultimately about fifty yards off the place where you first joined it, in consequence of the south atlantic waves flying in foam and fury against a miniature precipice--the first thing they have met that dared stay their lordly course since they left cape horn or the ice walls of the antarctic. at last the fishing baskets were ready, and we set off for the lakes by a path that plunged into a little ravine, crossed a dried swamp, went up a hill, and on to an open prairie, in the course of about twenty minutes. passing over this prairie, and through a wood, we came to another prairie, like most things in corisco just then (august), dried up, for it was the height of the dry season. on this prairie we waited for some of the representative ladies from other villages to come up; for without their presence our fishing would not have been legal. when you wait in west africa it eats into your lifetime to a considerable extent, and we spent half-an-hour or so standing howling, in prolonged, intoned howls, for the absent ladies, notably grievously for on-gou-ta, and when they came not, we threw ourselves down on the soft, fine, golden-brown grass, in the sun, and all, with the exception of myself, went asleep. after about two and a half hours i was aroused from the contemplation of the domestic habits of some beetles, by hearing a crackle, crackle, interspersed with sounds like small pistols going off, and looking round saw a fog of blue-brown smoke surmounting a rapidly-advancing wall of red fire. i rose, and spread the news among my companions, who were sleeping, with thumps and kicks. shouting at a sleeping african is labour lost. and then i made a bee-line for the nearest green forest wall of the prairie, followed by my companions. yet, in spite of some very creditable sprint performances on their part, three members of the band got scorched. fortunately, however, our activity landed us close to the lakes, so the scorched ones spent the rest of the afternoon sitting in mud-holes, comforting themselves with the balmy black slime. the other ladies turned up soon after this, and said that the fire had arisen from some man having set fire to a corner of the prairie some days previously, to make a farm; he had thought the fire was out round his patch, whereas it was not, but smouldering in the tussocks of grass, and the wind had sprung up that afternoon from a quarter that fanned it up. i said, "people should be very careful of fire," and the scorched ladies profoundly agreed with me, and said things i will not repeat here, regarding "that fool man" and his female ancestors. the lakes are pools of varying extent and depth, in the bed-rock[ ] of the island, and the fact that they are surrounded by thick forests on every side, and that the dry season is the cool season on the equator, prevents them from drying up. most of these lakes are encircled by a rim of rock, from which you jump down into knee-deep black slime, and then, if you are a representative lady, you waddle, and squeal, and grunt, and skylark generally on your way to the water in the middle. if it is a large lake you are working, you and your companions drive in two rows of stakes, cutting each other more or less at right angles, more or less in the middle of the lake, so as to divide it up into convenient portions. then some ladies with their specially shaped baskets form a line, with their backs to the bank, and their faces to the water-space, in the enclosure, holding the baskets with one rim under water. the others go into the water, and splash with hands, and feet, and sticks, and, needless to say, yell hard all the time. the naturally alarmed fish fly from them, intent on getting into the mud, and are deftly scooped up by the peck by the ladies in their baskets. in little lakes the staking is not necessary, but the rest of the proceedings are the same. some of the smaller lakes are too deep to be thus fished at all, being, i expect, clefts in the rock, such as you see in other parts of the island, sometimes or feet deep. the usual result of the day's fishing is from twelve to fifteen bushels of a common mud-fish,[ ] which is very good eating. the spoils are divided among the representative ladies, and they take them back to their respective villages and distribute them. then ensues, that same evening, a tremendous fish supper, and the fish left over are smoked and carefully kept as a delicacy, to make sauce with, &c., until the next year's fishing day comes round. the waters of west africa, salt, brackish, and fresh abound with fish, and many kinds are, if properly cooked, excellent eating. for culinary purposes you may divide the fish into sea-fish, lagoon-fish and river-fish; the first division, the sea-fish, are excellent eating, and are in enormous quantities, particularly along the windward coast on the great west african bank. south of this, at the mouths of the oil rivers, they fall off, from a culinary standpoint, though scientifically they increase in charm, as you find hereabouts fishes of extremely early types, whose relations have an interesting series of monuments in the shape of fossils, in the sandstone; but if primeval man had to live on them when they were alive together, i am sorry for him, for he might just as well have eaten mud, and better, for then he would not have run the risk of getting choked with bones. on the south-west coast the culinary value goes up again; there are found quantities of excellent deep-sea fish, and round the mouths of the rivers, shoals of bream and grey mullet. the lagoon-fish are not particularly good, being as a rule supremely muddy and bony; they have their uses, however, for i am informed that they indicate to lagos when it may expect an epidemic; to this end they die, in an adjacent lagoon, and float about upon its surface, wrong side up, until decomposition does its work. their method of prophecy is a sound one, for it demonstrates (_a_) that the lagoon drinking water is worse than usual; (_b_) if it is not already fatal they will make it so. the river-fish of the gold coast are better than those of the mud-sewers of the niger delta, because the gold coast rivers are brisk sporting streams, with the exception of the volta, and at a short distance inland they come down over rocky rapids with a stiff current. the fish of the upper waters of the delta rivers are better than those down in the mangrove-swamp region; and in the south-west coast rivers, with which i am personally well acquainted, the up-river fish are excellent in quality, on account of the swift current. i will however leave culinary considerations, because cooking is a subject upon which i am liable to become diffuse, and we will turn to the consideration of the sporting side of fishing. now, there is one thing you will always hear the gold coaster (white variety) grumbling about, "there is no sport." he has only got himself to blame. let him try and introduce the polynesian practice of swimming about in the surf, without his clothes, and with a suitable large, sharp knife, slaying sharks--there's no end of sharks on the gold coast, and no end of surf. the rivermen have the same complaint, and i may recommend that they should try spearing sting-rays, things that run sometimes to six feet across the wings, and every inch of them wicked, particularly the tail. there is quite enough danger in either sport to satisfy a sir samuel baker; for myself, being a nervous, quiet, rational individual, a large cat-fish in a small canoe supplies sufficient excitement. the other day i went out for a day's fishing on an african river. i and two black men, in a canoe, in company with a round net, three stout fishing-lines, three paddles, dr. günther's _study of fishes_, some bait in an old morton's boiled-mutton tin, a little manioc, stinking awfully (as is its wont), a broken calabash baler, a lot of dirty water to sit in, and happy and contented minds. i catalogue these things because they are either essential to, or inseparable from, a good day's sport in west africa. yes, even _i_, ask my vict----friends down there, i feel sure they will tell you that they never had such experiences before my arrival. i fear they will go on and say, "never again!" and that it was all my fault, which it was not. when things go well they ascribe it, and their survival, to providence or their own precautions; when things are merely usual in horror, it's my fault, which is a rank inversion of the truth, for it is only when circumstances get beyond my control, and providence takes charge, that accidents happen. i will demonstrate this by continuing my narrative. we paddled away, far up a mangrove creek, and then went up against the black mud-bank, with its great network of grey-white roots, surmounted by the closely-interlaced black-green foliage. absolute silence reigned, as it can only reign in africa in a mangrove swamp. the water-laden air wrapped round us like a warm, wet blanket. the big mangrove flies came silently to feed on us and leave their progeny behind them in the wounds to do likewise. the stink of the mud, strong enough to break a window, mingled fraternally with that of the sour manioc. i was reading, the negroes, always quiet enough when fishing, were silently carrying on that great african native industry--scratching themselves--so, with our lines over side, life slid away like a dreamless sleep, until the middle man hooked a cat-fish. it came on board with an awful grunt, right in the middle of us; flop, swish, scurry and yell followed; i tucked the study of fishes in general under my arm and attended to this individual specimen, shouting "lef em, lef em; hev em for water one time, you sons of unsanctified house lizards,"[ ] and such like valuable advice and admonition. the man in the more remote end of the canoe made an awful swipe at the ft.-long, grunting, flopping, yellow-grey, slimy, thing, but never reached it owing to the paddle meeting in mid-air with the flying leg of the man in front of him, drawing blood profusely. i really fancy, about this time, that, barring the cat-fish and myself, the occupants of the canoe were standing on their heads, with a view of removing their lower limbs from the terrible pectoral and dorsal fins, with which our prey made such lively play. "_brevi spatio interjecto_," as cæsar says, in the middle of a bad battle, over went the canoe, while the cat-fish went off home with the line and hook. one black man went to the bank, whither, with a blind prescience of our fate, i had flung, a second before, the most valuable occupant of the canoe, _the study of fishes_. i went personally to investigate fluvial deposit _in situ_. when i returned to the surface--accompanied by great swirls of mud and great bubbles of the gases of decomposition i had liberated on my visit to the bottom of the river--i observed the canoe floating bottom upwards, accompanied by morton's tin, the calabash, and the paddles, while on the bank one black man was engaged in hauling the other one out by the legs; fortunately this one's individual god had seen to it that his toes should become entangled in the net, and this floated, and so indicated to his companion where he was, when he had dived into the mud and got fairly embedded. now it's my belief that the most difficult thing in the world is to turn over a round-bottomed canoe that is wrong side up, when you are in the water with the said canoe. the next most difficult thing is to get into the canoe, after accomplishing triumph number one, and had it not been for my black friends that afternoon, i should not have done these things successfully, and there would be by now another haunted creek in west africa, with a mud and blood bespattered ghost trying for ever to turn over the ghost of a little canoe. however, all ended happily. we collected all our possessions, except the result of the day's fishing--the cat-fish--but we had had as much of him as we wanted, and so, adding a thankful mind to our contented ones, went home. none of us gave a verbatim report of the incident. i held my tongue for fear of not being allowed out fishing again, and i heard my men giving a fine account of a fearful fight, with accompanying prodigies of valour, that we had had with a witch crocodile. i fancy that must have been just their way of putting it, because it is not good form to be frightened by cat-fish on the west coast, and i cannot for the life of me remember even having seen a witch crocodile that afternoon. i must, however, own that native methods of fishing are usually safe, though i fail to see what i had to do in producing the above accident. the usual method of dealing with a cat-fish is to bang him on the head with a club, and then break the spiny fins off, for they make nasty wounds that are difficult to heal, and very painful. the native fishing-craft is the dug-out canoe in its various local forms. the accra canoe is a very safe and firm canoe for work of any sort except heavy cargo, and it is particularly good for surf; it is, however, slower than many other kinds. the canoe that you can get the greatest pace out of is undoubtedly the adooma, which is narrow and flat-bottomed, and simply flies over the water. the paddles used vary also with locality, and their form is a mere matter of local fashion, for they all do their work well. there is the leaf-shaped kru paddle, the trident-shaped accra, the long-lozenged niger, and the long-handled, small-headed igalwa paddle; and with each of these forms the native, to the manner born, will send his canoe flying along with that unbroken sweep i consider the most luxurious and perfect form of motion on earth. it is when it comes to sailing that the african is inferior. he does not sail half as much as he might, but still pretty frequently. the materials of which the sails are made vary immensely in different places, and the most beautiful are those at loanda, which are made of small grass mats, with fringes, sewn together, and are of a warm, rich sand-colour. next in beauty comes the branch of a palm, or other tree, stuck in the bows, and least in beauty is the fisherman's own damaged waist-cloth. i remember it used to seem very strange to me at first, to see my companion in a canoe take off his clothing and make a sail with it, on a wind springing up behind us. the very strangest sail i ever sailed under was a black man's blue trousers, they were tied waist upwards to a cross-stick, the legs neatly crossed, and secured to the thwarts of the canoe. you cannot well tack, or carry out any neat sailing evolutions with any of the african sails, particularly with the last-named form. the shape of the african sail is almost always in appearance a triangle, and fastened to a cross-stick which is secured to an upright one. it is not the form, however, that prevents it from being handy, but the way it is put up, almost always without sheets, for river and lake work, and it is tied together with tie tie--bush rope. if you should personally be managing one, and trouble threatens, take my advice, and take the mast out one time, and deal with that tie tie palaver at your leisure. never mind what people say about this method not being seaman-like--you survive. [illustration: falls on the tongue river.] [illustration: loanda canoe with mat sails. [_to face page ._] the mat sails used for sea-work are spread by a bamboo sprit. there is a single mast, to the head of which the sail is either hoisted by means of a small line run through the mast, or, more frequently, made fast with a seizing. such a sail is worked by means of a sheet and a brace on the sprit, usually by one man, whose companion steers by a paddle over the stern; sometimes, however, one man performs both duties. now and again you will find the luff of the sail bowlined out with another stick. this is most common round sierra leone. the appliances for catching fish are, firstly, fish traps, sometimes made of hollow logs of trees, with one end left open and the other closed. one of these is just dropped alongside the bank, left for a week or so, until a fish family makes a home in it, and then it is removed with a jerk. then there are fish-baskets made from split palm-stems tied together with tie tie; they are circular and conical, resembling our lobster pots and eel baskets, and they are usually baited with lumps of kank soaked in palm-oil. then there are drag nets made of pineapple fibre, one edge weighted with stones tied in bunches at intervals; as a rule these run ten to twenty-five feet long, but in some places they are much longer. the longest i ever saw was when out fishing in the lovely harbour of san paul de loanda. this was over thirty feet and was weighted with bunches of clam shells, and made of european yarn, as indeed most nets are when this is procurable by the natives, and it was worked by three canoes which were being poled about, as is usual in loanda harbour. then there is the universal hook and line, the hook either of european make or the simple bent pin of our youth. but my favourite method, and the one by which i got most of my fish up rivers or in creeks is the stockade trap. these are constructed by driving in stakes close together, leaving one opening, not in the middle of the stockade, but towards the up river end. in tidal waters these stockades are visited daily, at nearly low tide, for the high tide carries the fish in behind the stockade, and leaves them there on falling. up river, above tide water, the stockades are left for several days, in order to allow the fish to congregate. then the opening is closed up, the fisher-women go inside and throw out the water and collect the fish. there is another kind of stockade that gives great sport. during the wet season the terrific rush of water tears off bits of bank in such rivers as the congo, and ogowé, where, owing to the continual fierce current of fresh water the brackish tide waters do not come far up the river, so that the banks are not shielded by a great network of mangrove roots. in the ogowé a good many of the banks are composed of a stout clay, and so the pieces torn off hang together, and often go sailing out to sea, on the current, waving their bushes, and even trees, gallantly in the broad atlantic, out of sight of land. bits of the congo free state are great at seafaring too, and owing to the terrific stream of the great zaire, which spreads a belt of fresh water over the surface of the ocean miles from land, ships fall in with these floating islands, with their trees still flourishing. the ogowé is not so big as the congo, but it is a very respectable stream even for the great continent of rivers, and it pours into the atlantic, in the wet season, about , , cubic feet of fresh water per second, on which float some of these islands. but by no means every island gets out to sea, many of them get into slack water round corners in the delta region of the ogowé and remain there, collecting all sorts of _débris_ that comes down on the flood water, getting matted more and more firm by the floating grass, every joint of which grows on the smallest opportunity. in many places these floating islands are of considerable size; one i heard of was large enough to induce a friend of mine to start a coffee plantation on it; unfortunately the wretched thing came to pieces when he had cut down its trees and turned the soil up. and one i saw in the karkola river, was a weird affair. it was in the river opposite our camp, and very slowly, but perceptibly it went round and round in an orbit, although it was about half an acre in extent. a good many of these bits of banks do not attain to the honour of becoming islands, but get on to sand-banks in their early youth, near a native town, to the joy of the inhabitants, who forthwith go off to them, and drive round them a stockade of stakes firmly anchoring them. thousands of fishes then congregate round the little island inside the stockade, for the rich feeding in among the roots and grass, and the affair is left a certain time. then the entrance to the stockade is firmly closed up, and the natives go inside and bale out the water, and catch the fish in baskets, tearing the island to pieces, with shouts and squeals of exultation. it's messy, but it is amusing, and you get tremendous catches. [illustration: st. paul do loanda. [_to face page ._] a very large percentage of fish traps are dedicated to the capture of shrimp and craw-fish, which the natives value highly when smoked, using them to make a sauce for their kank; among these is the shrimp-basket. these baskets are tied on sticks laid out in parallel lines of considerable extent. they run about three inches in diameter, and their length varies with the place that is being worked. the stakes are driven into the mud, and to each stake is tied a basket with a line of tie tie, the basket acting as a hat to the stake when the tide is ebbing; as the tide comes in, it lowers the basket into the current and carries into its open end large quantities of shrimps, which get entangled and packed by the force of the current into the tapering end of the basket, which is sometimes eight or ten feet from the mouth. you can always tell where there is a line of these baskets by seeing the line of attendant sea-gulls all solemnly arranged with their heads to win'ard, sea-gull fashion. another device employed in small streams for the capture of either craw-fish or small fish is a line of calabashes, or earthen pots with narrow mouths; these are tied on to a line, i won't say with tie tie, because i have said that irritating word so often, but still you understand they are; this line is tied to a tree with more, and carried across the stream, sufficiently slack to submerge the pots, and then to a tree on the other bank, where it is secured with the same material. a fetish charm is then secured to it that will see to it, that any one who interferes with the trap, save the rightful owner, will "swell up and burst," then the trap is left for the night, the catch being collected in the morning. single pots, well baited with bits of fish and with a suitable stone in to keep them steady, are frequently used alongside the bank. these are left for a day or more, and then the owner with great care, crawls along the edge of the bank and claps on a lid and secures the prey. [illustration: round a kacongo camp fire. [_to face page ._] hand nets of many kinds are used. the most frequent form is the round net, weighted all round its outer edge. this is used by one man, and is thrown with great deftness and grace, in shallow waters. i suppose one may hardly call the long wreaths of palm and palm branches, used by the loango and kacongo coast native for fishing the surf with, nets, but they are most effective. when the calemma (the surf) is not too bad, two or more men will carry this long thick wreath out into it, and then drop it and drag it towards the shore. the fish fly in front of it on to the beach, where they fall victims to the awaiting ladies, with their baskets. another very quaint set of devices is employed by the kruboys whenever they go to catch their beloved land and shore crabs. i remember once thinking i had providentially lighted on a beautiful bit of ju-ju; the whole stretch of mud beach had little lights dotted over it on the ground. i investigated. they were crab-traps. "bottle of beer," "the prince of wales," "jane ann," and "pancake" had become--by means we will not go into here--possessed of bits of candle, and had cut them up and put in front of them pieces of wood in an ingenious way. the crab, a creature whose intelligence is not sufficiently appreciated, fired with a scientific curiosity, went to see what the light was made of, and then could not escape, or perhaps did not try to escape, but stood spell-bound at the beauty of the light; anyhow, they fell victims to their spirit of inquiry. i have also seen drop-traps put for crabs round their holes. in this case the sense of the beauty of light in the crab is not relied on, and once in he is shut in, and cannot go home and communicate the result of his investigations to his family. yet, in spite of all these advantages and appliances above cited, i grieve to say the west african, all along the coast, decends to the unsportsmanlike trick of poisoning. certain herbs are bruised and thrown into the water, chiefly into lagoons and river-pools. the method is effective, but i should doubt whether it is wholesome. these herbs cause the fish to rise to the surface stupefied, when they are scooped up with a calabash. other herbs cause the fish to lie at the bottom, also stupefied, and the water in the pool is thrown out, and they are collected. more as a pastime than a sport i must class the shooting of the peculiar hopping mud-fish by the small boys with bows and arrows, but this is the only way you can secure them as they go about star-gazing with their eyes on the tops of their heads, instead of attending to baited hooks, and their hearing (or whatever it is) is so keen that they bury themselves in the mud-banks too rapidly for you to net them. spearing is another very common method of fishing. it is carried on at night, a bright light being stuck in the bow of the canoe, while the spearer crouching, screens his eyes from the glare with a plantain leaf, and drops his long-hafted spear into the fish as they come up to look at the light. it is usually the big bream that are caught in this way out in the sea, and the carp up in fresh water. the manners and customs of many west african fishes are quaint. i have never yet seen that fish the natives often tell me about that is as big as a man, only thicker, and which walks about on its fins at night, in the forest, so i cannot vouch for it; nor for that other fish that hates the crocodile, and follows her up and destroys her eggs, and now and again dedicates itself to its hate, and goes down her throat, and then spreads out its spiny fins and kills her. the fish i know personally are interesting in quieter ways. as for instance the strange electrical fish, which sometimes have sufficient power to kill a duck and which are much given to congregating in sunken boats, causing much trouble when the boat has to be floated again, because the natives won't go near them, to bail her out. then there is that deeply trying creature the ning ning fish, who, when you are in some rivers in fresh water and want to have a quiet night's rest, just as you have tucked in your mosquito bar carefully and successfully, comes alongside and serenades you, until you have to get up and throw things at it with a prophetic feeling, amply supported by subsequent experience, that hordes of mosquitos are busily ensconcing themselves inside your mosquito bar. what makes the ning ning--it is called after its idiotic song--so maddening is that it never seems to be where you have thrown the things at it. you could swear it was close to the bow of the canoe when you shied that empty soda-water bottle or that ball of your precious indiarubber at it, but instantly comes "ning, ning, ning" from the stern of the canoe. it is a ventriloquist or goes about in shoals, i do not know which, for the latter and easier explanation seems debarred by their not singing in chorus; the performance is undoubtedly a solo; any one experienced in this fish soon finds out that it is not driven away or destroyed by an artillery of missiles, but merely lies low until its victim has got under his mosquito curtain, and resettled his mosquito palaver,--and then back it comes with its "ning ning." a similar affliction is the salt-water drum-fish, with its "bum-bum." loanda harbour abounds with these, and so does chiloango. in the bright moonlight nights i have looked overside and seen these fish in a wreath round the canoe, with their silly noses against the side, "bum-bumming" away; whether they admire the canoe, or whether they want it to come on and fight it out, i do not know, because my knowledge of the different kinds of fishes and of their internal affairs is derived from dr. günther's great work, and that contains no section on ichthyological psychology. the west african natives have, i may say, a great deal of very curious information on the thoughts of fishes, but, much as i liked those good people, i make it a hard and fast rule to hold on to my common-sense and keep my belief for religious purposes when it comes to these deductions from natural phenomena--not that i display this mental attitude externally, for there is always in their worst and wildest fetish notions an underlying element of truth. the fetish of fish is too wide a subject to enter on here, it acts well because it gives a close season to river and lagoon fish; the natives round lake ayzingo, for example, saying that if the first fishes that come up into the lake in the great dry season are killed, the rest of the shoal turn back, so on the arrival of this vanguard they are treated most carefully, talked to with "a sweet mouth," and given things. the fishes that form these shoals are _hemichromis fasciatus_ and _chromis ogowensis_. i know no more charming way of spending an afternoon than to leisurely paddle alone to the edge of the ogowé sand bank in the dry season, and then lie and watch the ways of the water-world below. if you keep quiet, the fishes take no notice of you, and go on with their ordinary avocations, under your eyes, hunting, and feeding, and playing, and fighting, happily and cheerily until one of the dreaded raptorial fishes appears upon the scene, and then there is a general scurry. dreadful warriors are the little fishes that haunt sand banks (_alestis kingsleyæ_) and very bold, for when you put your hand down in the water, with some crumbs, they first make two or three attempts to frighten it, by sidling up at it and butting, but on finding there's no fight in the thing, they swagger into the palm of your hand and take what is to be got with an air of conquest; but before the supply is exhausted, there always arises a row among themselves, and the gallant bulls, some two inches long, will spin round and butt each other for a second or so, and then spin round again, and flap each other with their tails, their little red-edged fins and gill-covers growing crimson with fury. i never made out how you counted points in these fights, because no one ever seemed a scale the worse after even the most desperate duels. most of the west coast tribes are inveterate fishermen. the gold coast native regards fishing as a low pursuit, more particularly oyster-fishing, or i should say oyster-gathering, for they are collected chiefly from the lower branches of the mangrove-trees; this occupation is, indeed, regarded as being only fit for women, and among all tribes the villages who turn their entire attention to fishing are regarded as low down in the social scale. this may arise from fetish reasons, but the idea certainly gains support from the conduct of the individual fisherman. do not imagine brother anglers, that i am hinting that the gentle art is bad for the moral nature of people like you and me, but i fear it is bad for the african. you see, the african, like most of us, can resist anything but temptation--he will resist attempts to reform him, attempts to make him tell the truth, attempts to clothe, and keep him tidy, &c., and he will resist these powerfully; but give him real temptation and he succumbs, without the european preliminary struggle. he has by nature a kleptic bias, and you see being out at night fishing, he has chances--temptations, of succumbing to this--and so you see a man who has left his home at evening with only the intention of spearing fish, in his mind, goes home in the morning pretty often with his missionary's ducks, his neighbours' plantains, and a few odd trifles from the trader's beaches, in his canoe, and the outer world says "dem fisherman, all time, all same for one, with tief man."[ ] the accras, who are employed right down the whole west coast, thanks to the valuable education given them by the basel mission as cooks, carpenters, and coopers, cannot resist fishing, let their other avocations be what they may. a friend of mine the other day had a new accra cook. the man cooked well, and my friend vaunted himself, and was content for the first week. at the beginning of the second week the cooking was still good, but somehow or other, there was just the suspicion of a smell of fish about the house. the next day the suspicion merged into certainty. the third day the smell was insupportable, and the atmosphere unfit to support human life, but obviously healthy for flies. the cook was summoned, and asked by her britannic majesty's representative "where that smell came from?" he said he "could not smell it, and he did not know." fourth day, thorough investigation of the premises revealed the fact that in the back-yard there was a large clothes-horse which had been sent out by my friend's wife to air his clothes; this was literally converted into a screen by strings of fish in the process of drying, _i.e._, decomposing in the sun. the affair was eliminated from the domestic circle and cast into the ocean by seasoned natives; and awful torture in this world and the next promised to the cook if he should ever again embark in the fish trade. the smell gradually faded from the house, but the poor cook, bereaved of his beloved pursuit, burst out all over in boils, and took to religious mania and drink, and so had to be sent back to accra, where i hope he lives happily, surrounded by his beloved objects. footnotes: [ ] specimens of rock identified by the geological survey, london, as cretaceous, and said by other geologists up here to be possibly jurassic. [ ] _clarias laviaps._ [ ] translation: "leave it alone! leave it alone! throw it into the water at once! what did you catch it for?" [ ] translation: "all fishermen are thieves." chapter v. fetish. wherein the student of fetish determines to make things quite clear this time, with results that any sage knowing the subject and the student would have safely prophesied; to which is added some remarks concerning the position of ancestor worship in west africa. the final object of all human desire is a knowledge of the nature of god. the human methods, or religions, employed to gain this object are divisible into three main classes, inspired-- _firstly_, the submission to and acceptance of a direct divine message. _secondly_, the attempt by human intellectual power to separate the conception of god from material phenomena, and regard him as a thing apart and unconditioned. _thirdly_, the attempt to understand him as manifest in natural phenomena. i personally am constrained to follow this last and humblest method, and accept as its exposition spinoza's statement of it, "since without god nothing can exist or be conceived, it is evident that all natural phenomena involve and express the conception of god, as far as their essence and perfection extends. so we have a greater and more perfect knowledge of god in proportion to our knowledge of natural phenomena. conversely (since the knowledge of an effect through a cause is the same thing as the knowledge of a particular property of a cause), the greater our knowledge of natural phenomena the more perfect is our knowledge of the essence of god which is the cause of all things."[ ] but i have a deep respect for all other forms of religion and for all men who truly believe, for in them clearly there is this one great desire of the knowledge of the nature of god, and "_ein guter mensch in seinem dunkeln drange ist sich des rechten weges wohl bewuszt._" nevertheless the most tolerant human mind is subject to a feeling of irritation over the methods whereby a fellow-creature strives to attain his end, particularly if those methods are a sort of heresy to his own, and therefore it is a most unpleasant thing for any religious-minded person to speak of a religion unless he either profoundly believes or disbelieves in it. for, if he does the one, he has the pleasure of praise; if he does the other, he has the pleasure of war, but the thing in between these is a thing that gives neither pleasure; it is like quarrelling with one's own beloved relations. thus it is with fetish and me. i cannot say i either disbelieve or believe in it, for, on the one hand, i clearly see it is a religion of the third class; but, on the other, i know that fetish is a religion that is regarded by my fellow white men as the embodiment of all that is lowest and vilest in man--not altogether without cause. before speaking further on it, however, i must say what i mean by fetish, for "the word of late has got ill sorted." i mean by fetish the religion of the natives of the western coast of africa, where they have not been influenced either by christianity or mohammedanism. i sincerely wish there were another name than fetish which we could use for it, but the natives have different names for their own religion in different districts, and i do not know what other general name i could suggest, for i am sure that the other name sometimes used in place of fetish, namely juju, is, for all the fine wild sound of it, only a modification of the french word for toy or doll, _joujou_. the french claim to have visited west africa in the fourteenth century, prior to the portuguese, and whether this claim can be sustained on historic evidence or no, it is certain that the french have been on the coast in considerable numbers since the fifteenth century, and no doubt have long called the little objects they saw the natives valuing so strangely _joujou_, just as i have heard many a frenchman do down there in my time. therefore, believing juju to mean doll or toy, i do not think it is so true a word as fetish; and, after all, west africa has a prior right to the use of this word fetish, for it has grown up out of the word _feitiço_ used by the portuguese navigators who rediscovered west africa with all its wealth and worries for modern europe. these worthy voyagers, noticing the veneration paid by africans to certain objects, trees, fish, idols, and so on, very fairly compared these objects with the amulets, talismans, charms, and little images of saints they themselves used, and called those things similarly used by the africans _feitiço_, a word derived from the latin _factitius_, in the sense magically artful. modern french and english writers have adopted this word from the portuguese; but it is a modern word in its present use. it is not in johnson, and the term _fétichisme_ was introduced by de brosses in his remarkable book, _du culte des dieux fetiches_, ; but doubtless, as professor tylor points out, it has obtained a great currency from comte's use of it to denote a general theory of primitive religion. professor tylor, most unfortunately for us who are interested in west african religion, confines the use of the word to one department of his theory of animism only--namely to the doctrine of spirits embodied in, or attached to, or conveying influence through certain material objects.[ ] i do not in the least deny professor tylor's right to use the word fetish[ ] in that restricted sense in his general study of comparative religion. i merely wish to mention that you cannot use it in this restricted sense, but want the whole of his grand theory of animism wherewith to describe the religion of the west africans. for although there is in that religion a heavy percentage of embodied spirits, there is also a heavier percentage of unembodied spirits--spirits that have no embodiment in matter and spirits that only occasionally embody themselves in matter. take, for example, the gods of the ewe and tshi.[ ] there is amongst them tando, the native high god of ashantee. he appears to his priesthood as a giant, tawny skinned, lank haired, and wearing the ashantee robe. but when visiting the laity, on whom he is exceedingly hard, he comes in pestilence and tempest, or, for more individual village visitations, as a small and miserable boy, desolate and crying for help and kindness, which, when given to him, tando repays by killing off his benefactors and their fellow-villagers with a certain disease. this trick, i may remark, is not confined to tando, for several other west african gods use it when sacrifices to them are in arrears; and i am certain it is more at the back of outcast children being neglected than is either sheer indifference to suffering or cruelty. because, fearing the disease, your native will be far more likely to remember he is in debt to the god and go and pay an instalment, than to take in that child whom he thinks is the god who has come to punish. but you have only to look through ellis's important works, the "tshi-speaking, ewe-speaking, and yoruba-speaking peoples of the west coast of africa," to find many instances of the gods of fetish who do not require a material object to manifest themselves in. and i, while in west africa, have often been struck by incidents that have made this point clear to me. when i have been out with native companions after nightfall, they pretty nearly always saw an apparition of some sort, frequently apparitions of different sorts, in our path ahead. then came a pause, and after they had seen the apparition vanish, on we went--not cheerily, however, until we were well past the place where it had been seen. this place they closely examined, and decided whether it was an abambo, or manu, or whatever name these spirit classes had in their local language, or whether it was something worse that had been there, such as a sasabonsum or ombuiri. they knew which it was from the physical condition of the spot. either there was nothing there but ordinary path stuff; or there was white ash, or there was a log or rock, or tree branch, and the reason for the different emotion with which they regarded this latter was very simple, for it had been an inferior class spirit, one that their charms and howled incantations could guard them against. when there was ash, it had been a witch destroyed by the medicine they had thrown at it, or a medium class spirit they could get protection from "in town." but if "he left no ash" the rest of our march was a gloomy one; it was a bad business, and unless the fetish authorities in town chose to explain that it was merely a demand for so much white calico, or a goat, &c., some one of our party would certainly get ill. well do i remember our greatest terror when out at night on a forest path. i believe him to have been a sasabonsum, but he was very widely distributed--that is to say we dreaded him on the forest paths round mungo mah lobeh; we confidently expected to meet him round calabar; and, to my disgust, for he was a hindrance, when i thought i had got away from his distribution zone, down in the ogowé region, coming home one night with a fan hunter from fula to kangwe, i saw some one coming down the path towards us, and my friend threw himself into the dense bush beside the path so as to give the figure a wide berth. it was the old symptom. you see what we object to in this spirit is that one side of him is rotting and putrifying, the other sound and healthy, and it all depends on which side of him you touch whether you see the dawn again or no. such being the case, and african bush paths being narrow, this spirit helps to make evening walks unpopular, for there are places in every bush path where, if you meet him, you must brush against him--places where the wet season's rains have made the path a narrow ditch, with clay incurved walls above your head--places where the path turns sharply round a corner--places where it runs between rock walls. such being the case, the risk of rubbing against his rotting side is held to be so great that it is best avoided by staying at home in the village with your wives and families, and playing the tom-tom or the orchid-fibre-stringed harp, or, if you are a bachelor, sitting in the village club-house listening to the old ones talking like retired colonels. yet however this may be, i should hesitate to call this half-rotten individual "a material object." sometimes we had merry laughs after these meetings, for he was only so-and-so from the village--it was not him. sometimes we had cold chills down the back, for we lost sight of him; under our eyes he went and he left no ash. take again mbuiri of the mpongwe, who comes in the form usually of a man; or nkala, who comes as a crab; or the great nzambi of the fjort--they leave no ash--and so on. this subject of apparition-forms is a very interesting one, and requires more investigation. for such gods as nzambi mpungu do not appear to human beings on earth at all, except in tempest and pestilence. the great gods next in order leave no ash. the witch, if he or she be destroyed, does leave ash, and the ordinary middle and lower class spirits leave the thing they have been in, so unaltered by their use of it that no one but a witch doctor can tell whether or no it has been possessed by a spirit. you see therefore fetish is in a way complex and cannot be got into "worship of a material object." there is no worship in west africa of a material not so possessed, for material objects are regarded as in themselves so low down in the scale of things that nothing of the human grade would dream of worshipping them. moreover, apart from these apparitions, i do not think you can accurately use the word fetish in its restricted sense to include the visions seen by witch-doctors, or incantations made of words possessing power in themselves, and yet these things are part and parcel of fetish. in fact, not being a comparative ethnologist, but a student of west african religion, i wish to goodness those comparative ethnologists would get another word of their own, instead of using our own old west coast one. it is, however, far easier to state what fetish is not, than to state what it is. although a darwinian to the core, i doubt if evolution in a neat and tidy perpendicular line, with fetish at the bottom and christianity at the top, represents the true state of things. it seems to me--i have no authority to fortify my position with, so it is only me--that things are otherwise in this matter. that there are lines of development in religious ideas, and that no form of religious idea is a thing restricted to one race, i will grant; but if you will make a scientific use of your imagination, most carefully on the lines laid down for that exercise by professor tyndall, i think you would see that the higher form of the fetish idea is brahmanism; and that the highest possible form it could attain to is shown by two passages in the works of absolutely white people to have already been reached,--first in that passage from a poem by an author, whose name i have never known, though i have known the lines these five-and-twenty years-- "god of the granite and the rose, soul of the lily and the bee, the mighty tide of being flows in countless channels, lord, from thee. it springs to life in grass and flowers, through every range of being runs, and from creation's mighty towers, its glory flames in stars and suns"-- and secondly in this statement by spinoza--"by the help of god, i mean the fixed and unchangeable order of nature, or chain of natural events, for i have said before and shown elsewhere that the universal laws of nature, according to which all things exist and are determined, are only another name for the eternal decrees of god, which always involves eternal truth and necessity, so that to say everything happens according to natural laws, and to say everything is ordained by the decree and ordinance of god, is to say the same thing. now, since the power in nature is identical with the power of god, by which alone all things happen and are determined, it follows that whatsoever man as a part of nature provides himself with to aid and preserve his existence, or whatsoever nature affords him without his help, is given him solely by the divine power acting either through human nature or through external circumstances. so whatever human nature can furnish itself with by its own efforts to preserve its existence may be fitly termed the inward aid of god, whereas whatever else accrues to man's profit from outward causes may be called the external aid of god."[ ] now both these utterances are magnificent fetish, and because i accept them as true, i have said i neither believe nor disbelieve in fetish. i could quote many more passages from acknowledged philosophers, particularly from goethe. if you want, for example, to understand the position of man in nature according to fetish, there is, as far as i know, no clearer statement of it made than is made by goethe in his superb _prometheus_. by all means read it, for you cannot know how things really stand until you do. this was brought home to me very keenly when i was first out in west africa. i had made friends with a distinguished witch doctor, or, more correctly speaking, he had made friends with me. i was then living in a deserted house the main charm of which was that it was the house that mr. h. m. stanley had lived in while he was waiting for a boat home after his first crossing africa. this charm had not kept the house tidy, and it was a beetlesome place by day, while after nightfall, if you wanted to see some of the best insect society in africa, and have regular walpurgis all round, you had only got to light a lamp; but these things were advantageous to an insect collector like myself, therefore i lodge no complaint against the firm of traders to whom that house belongs. well, my friend the witch doctor used to call on me, and i apologetically confess i first thought his interest in me arose from material objects. i wronged that man in thought, as i have many others, for one night, about p.m., i heard a pawing at the shutters--my african friends don't knock. i got up and opened the door, and there he was. i made some observations, which i regret now, about tobacco at that time of night, and he said, "no. you be big man, suppose pusson sick?" i acknowledged the soft impeachment. "pusson sick too much; pusson live for die. you fit for come?" "fit," said i. "suppose you come, you no fit to talk?" said he. "no fit," said i, with a shrewd notion it was one of my portuguese friends who was ill and who did not want a blazing blister on, a thing that was inevitable if you called in the local regular white medical man, so, picking up a medicine-case, i went out into the darkness with my darker friend. after getting outside the closed ground he led the way towards the forest, and i thought it was some one sick at the roman catholic mission. on we went down the path that might go there; but when we got to where you turn off for it, he took no heed, but kept on, and then away up over a low hill and down into deeper forest still, i steering by his white cloth. but africa is an alarming place to walk about in at night, both for a witch doctor who believes in all his local forest devils, and a lady who believes in all the local material ones, so we both got a good deal chipped and frayed and frightened one way and another; but nothing worse happened than our walking up against a python, which had thoughtfully festooned himself across the path, out of the way of ground ants, to sleep off a heavy meal. my eminent friend, in the inky darkness and his hurry to reach his patient, failed to see this, and went fair up against it. i, being close behind, did ditto. then my leader ducked under the excited festoon and went down the path at headlong speed, with me after him, alike terrified at losing sight of his guiding cloth and at the python, whom we heard going away into the bush with that peculiar-sounding crackle a big snake gives when he is badly hurried. finally we reached a small bush village, and on the ground before one of the huts was the patient extended, surrounded by unavailing, wailing women. he was suffering from a disease common in west africa, but amenable to treatment by european drugs, which i gave to the medical man, who gave them to his patient with proper incantations and a few little things of his own that apparently did not hinder their action. as soon as the patient had got relief, my friend saw me home, and when we got in, i said, why did you do this, that and the other, as is usual with me, and he sat down, looked far away, and talked for an hour, softly, wordily and gently; and the gist of what that man talked was goethe's _prometheus_. i recognised it after half an hour, and when he had done, said, "you got that stuff from a white man." "no, sir," he said, "that no be white man fash, that be country fash, white man no fit to savee our fash." "aren't they, my friend?" i said; and we parted for the night, i the wiser for it, he the richer. now, i pray you, do not think i am saying that there is a "wisdom religion" in fetish, or anything like that, or that fetish priests are spinozas and goethes--far from it. all that it seems to me to be is a perfectly natural view of nature, and one that, if you take it up with no higher form of mind in you than a shrewd, logical one alone, will, if you carry it out, lead you necessarily to paint a white chalk rim round one eye, eat your captive, use woka incantations for diseases, and dance and howl all night repeatedly, to the awe of your fellow-believers, and the scandal of mohammedan gentlemen who have a revealed religion. moreover, the mind-form which gets hold of this truth that is in all things, makes a great difference in the form in which the religion works out. for instance, to a superficial observer, it would hardly seem possible that a persian and a mahdist were followers of the same religion, or that a spaniard and an english broad churchman were so. and yet it seems to me that it is only this class of difference that exists between the african, the brahmanist, and the shintoist. another and more fundamental point to be considered is the influence of physical environment on religions, particularly these nature religions. the semitic mind, which had never been kept quite in its proper place by natural difficulties, gave to man in the scheme of creation a pre-eminence that deeply influences europeans, who have likewise not been kept in their place owing to the environments of the temperate zone. on the other hand, the african race has had about the worst set of conditions possible to bring out the higher powers of man. he has been surrounded by a set of terrific natural phenomena, combined with a good food supply and a warm and equable climate. these things are not enough in themselves to account for his low-culture condition, but they are factors that must be considered. then, undoubtedly, the nature of the african's mind is one of the most important points. it may seem a paradox to say of people who are always seeing visions that they are not visionaries; but they are not. the more you know the african, the more you study his laws and institutions, the more you must recognise that the main characteristic of his intellect is logical, and you see how in all things he uses this absolutely sound but narrow thought-form. he is not a dreamer nor a doubter; everything is real, very real, horribly real to him. it is impossible for me to describe it clearly, but the quality of the african mind is strangely uniform. this may seem strange to those who read accounts of wild and awful ceremonials, or of the african's terror at white man's things; but i believe you will find all people experienced in dealing with uncultured africans will tell you that this alarm and brief wave of curiosity is merely external, for the african knows the moment he has time to think it over, what that white man's thing really is, namely, either a white man's juju or a devil. it is this power of being able logically to account for everything that is, i believe, at the back of the tremendous permanency of fetish in africa, and the cause of many of the relapses into it by africans converted to other religions; it is also the explanation of the fact that white men who live in districts where death and danger are everyday affairs, under a grim pall of boredom, are liable to believe in fetish, though ashamed of so doing. for the african, whose mind has been soaked in fetish during his early most impressionable years, the voice of fetish is almost irresistible when affliction comes on him. sudden dangers or terror he can face with his new religion, because he is not quick at thinking. but give him time to think when under the hand of adversity, and the old explanation that answered it all comes back. i know no more distressing thing than to see an african convert brought face to face with that awful thing we are used to, the problem of an omnipotent god and a suffering world. this does not worry the african convert until it hits him personally in grief and misery. when it does, and he turns and calls upon the god he has been taught will listen, pity and answer, his use of what the scoffers at the converted african call "catch phrases" is horribly heartrending to me, for i know how real, terribly real, the whole thing is to him, and i therefore see the temptation to return to those old gods--gods from whom he never expected pity, presided over by a god that does not care. all that he had to do with them was not to irritate them, to propitiate them, to buy their services when wanted, and, above all, to dodge and avoid them, while he fought it out and managed devils at large. risky work, but a man is as good as a devil any day if he only takes proper care; and even if any devil should get him unaware--kill him bodily--he has the satisfaction of knowing he will have the power to make it warm for that devil when they meet on the other side. there is something alluring in this, i think, to any make of human mind, but particularly so to the logical, intensely human one possessed by the west african. therefore, when wearied and worn out by confronting things that he cannot reconcile, and disappointed by unanswered prayers, he turns back to his old belief entirely, or modifies the religion he has been taught until it fits in with fetish, and is gradually absorbed by it. it is often asked whether christianity or mohammedanism is to possess africa--as if the choice of fate lay between these two things alone. i do not think it is so, at least it is not wise for a mere student to ignore the other thing in the affair, fetish, which is as it were a sea wherein all things suffer a sea change. for remember it is not christianity alone that becomes tinged with fetish, or gets engulfed and dominated by it. islam, when it strikes the true heart of africa, the great forest belt region, fares little better though it is more recent than christianity, and though it is preached by men who know the make of the african mind. islam is in its blüth-period now in all the open parts, even on the desert regions of africa from its mediterranean shore to below the equator, but so far it has beaten up against the forest belt like a sea on a sand beach. it has crossed the forest belt by the lakes, it has penetrated it in channels, but in those channels the waters of islam are, recent as their inroad there is, brackish. therefore i make no pretence at prophesying which of these great revealed religions will ultimately possess africa; but it is an interesting point to notice what has been the reason of the great power of immediate appeal to the african which they both possess. the african has a great over-god, and below him lesser spirits, including man; but the african has not in west africa, nor so far as i have been able to ascertain elsewhere in the whole continent, a god-man, a thing that directly connects man with the great over-god. this thing appeals to the african when it is presented to him by christianity and islam. it is, i am quite aware, not doctrinally true to say that islam offers him a god-man, nevertheless in mohammed practically it does so, and that too in a more easily believable form--by easily i do not mean that it is necessarily true. moreover it minimises the danger of death in a more definite way, more in keeping with his own desires, and it is more reconcilable with his conscience in the treatment of life as he has to live it. most of the higher class africans are traders. islam gives an easier, clearer line of rectitude to a trader than its great rival in africa--under african conditions. there are many who will question whether conscience is a sufficiently large factor in an african mind for us to think of taking it into account, but whether you call it conscience, or religious bent, or fear, the factor is a large one. an african cannot say, as so many europeans evidently easily can, "oh, that is all right from a religious point of view, but one must be practical, you know"; and it is this factor that makes me respect the african deeply and sympathise with him, for i have this same unmanageable hindersome thing in my own mind, which you can call anything you like; i myself call it honour. now conscience when conditioned by christianity is an exceedingly difficult thing for a trader to manage satisfactorily to himself. a mass of compromises have to be made with the world, and a man who is always making compromises gets either sick of them or sick of the thing that keeps on nagging at him about them, or he becomes merely gaseous-minded all round. there are some few in all races of men who can think comfortably "that conscience, like a restive horse, will stumble if you check his course, but ride him with an easy rein, and rub him down with worldly gain, he'll carry you through thick and thin, safe, although dirty, 'till you win," but such men are in africa a very small minority, and so it falls out that most men engaged in trade revert to fetish, or become lax as church members, or embrace islam. i think, if you will consider the case, you will see that the workability of islam is one of the chief reasons of its success in africa. it is, from many african points of view, a most inconvenient religion, with its rahmadhizan, bound every now and again to come in the height of the dry season; its restrictions on alcoholic drinks and gambling; but, on the whole it is satisfying to the african conscience. moreover, like christianity, it lifts man into a position of paramount importance in creation. he is the thing god made the rest for. i have often heard africans say, "it does a man good to know god loves him; it makes him proud too much." well, at any rate it is pleasanter than fetish, where man, in company with a host of spirits, is fighting for his own hand, in an arena before the gods, eternally. we will now turn to the consideration of the status of the human soul in pure fetish, that is to say in fetish that is common to all the different schools of west african fetishism. what strikes a european when studying it is the lack of gaps between things. to the african there is perhaps no gap between the conception of spirit and matter, animate or inanimate. it is all an affair of grade--not of essential difference in essence. at the head of existence are those beings who can work without using matter, either as a constant associate or as an occasional tool--do it all themselves, as an african would say. beneath this grade there are many grades of spirits, who occasionally or habitually, as in the case of the human grade, are associated with matter, and at the lower end of the scale is what we call matter, but which i believe the west african regards as the same sort of stuff as the rest, only very low--so low that practically it doesn't matter; but it is spirits, the things that cause all motion, all difficulties, dangers and calamities, that do matter and must be thought about, for they are _real_ things whether "they live for thing" or no. the african and myself are also in a fine fog about form, but i will spare you that point, for where that thing comes from, often so quickly and silently, and goes, often so quickly and silently, too, under our eyes, everlastingly, that thing on which we all so much depend at every moment of our lives, that thing we are quite as conscious of as light and darkness, heat or cold, yet which makes a thing no heavier in one shape than in another,--is altogether too large a subject to touch on now. yet, remember it is a most important part of practical fetish, for on it depends divination and heaps of such like matters, that are parts of both the witch doctor and the fetish priest's daily work. one of the fundamental doctrines of fetish is that the connection of a certain spirit with a certain mass of matter, a material object, is not permanent; the african will point out to you a lightning-stricken tree and tell you that its spirit has been killed; he will tell you when the cooking pot has gone to bits that it has lost its spirit; if his weapon fails it is because some one has stolen or made sick its spirit by means of witchcraft. in every action of his daily life he shows you how he lives with a great, powerful spirit world around him. you will see him before starting out to hunt or fight rubbing medicine into his weapons to strengthen the spirits within them, talking to them the while; telling them what care he has taken of them, reminding them of the gifts he has given them, though those gifts were hard for him to give, and begging them in the hour of his dire necessity not to fail him. you will see him bending over the face of a river talking to its spirit with proper incantations, asking it when it meets a man who is an enemy of his to upset his canoe or drown him, or asking it to carry down with it some curse to the village below which has angered him, and in a thousand other ways he shows you what he believes if you will watch him patiently. it is a very important point in the study of pure fetish to gain a clear conception of this arrangement of things in grades. as far as i have gone i think i may say fourteen classes of spirits exist in fetish. dr. nassau of gaboon thinks that the spirits commonly affecting human affairs can be classified fairly completely into six classes.[ ] regarding the fetish view of the state and condition of the human soul there are certain ideas that i think i may safely say are common to the various cults of fetish, both negro and bantu, in western africa. firstly, the class of spirits that are human souls always remain human souls. they do not become deified, nor do they sink in grade. i am aware that here i am on dangerous ground so i am speaking carefully.[ ] an eminent authority, when criticising my statements,[ ] dwelt upon their heterodoxy on this point, saying however, "we may throw out the conjecture that in remote and obscure west africa men do not reach the necessary pitch of renown for mighty deeds or sanctity that qualifies them in larger countries for elevation after death to high places among recognised divinities." this conjecture i quite accept as an explanation of the non-deification of human beings in west africa, and i think, taken in conjunction with the grade conception, it fairly explains why west africa has not what undoubtedly other regions of the world have in their religions, deified ancestors. after having had my attention drawn to the strangeness of this non-deification of ancestors, i did my best to work the subject out in order to see if by any chance i had badly observed it. i consulted the accounts of west african religions given by labat, bosman, bastian and ellis, and to my great pleasure found that the three first said nothing against my statements, and that sir a. b. ellis had himself said the same thing in his _ewe speaking people_. moreover, i sent a circular written on this point to people in west africa whom i knew had opportunities of knowing the facts as at present existing,--the answers were unanimous with ellis and myself. nevertheless, mind, you will find something that looks like worship of ancestors in west africa. only it is no more worship, properly so called, than our own deference to our living, elderly, and influential relations. in almost all western african districts (it naturally does not show clearly in those where reincarnation is believed to be the common and immediate lot of all human spirits) is a class of spirits called "the well disposed ones," and this class is clearly differentiated from "them," the generic name used for non-human spirits. these "well disposed ones" are ancestors, and they do what they can to benefit their particular village or family, acting in conjunction with the village or family fetish, who is not a human spirit, nor an ancestor. but the things given to ancestors are gifts, not in the proper sense of the word sacrifices, for the well disposed ones are not gods even of the rank of a sasabonsum or an ombuiri. in an extremely interesting answer to my inquiries that i received from mr. j. h. batty, of cape coast, who had kindly submitted my questions to a native gentleman well versed in affairs, the statement regarding ancestors is, "the people believe that the spirits of their departed relations exercise a guardian care over them, and they will frequently stand over the graves of their deceased friends and invoke their spirits to protect them and their children from harm. it is imagined that the spirit lingers about the house some time after death. if the children are ill the illness is ascribed to the spirit of the deceased mother having embraced them. elderly women are often heard to offer up a kind of prayer to the spirit of a departed parent, begging it either to go to its rest, or to protect the family by keeping off evil spirits, instead of injuring the children or other members of the family by its touch. the ghosts of departed enemies are considered by the people as bad spirits, who have power to injure them." in connection with this fear of the ancestor's ghost hurting members of its own family, particularly children, i may remark it has several times been carefully explained to me that this "touching" comes not from malevolence, but from loneliness and the desire to have their company. a sentimental but inconvenient desire that the living human cannot give in to perpetually, though big men will accede to their ancestor's desire for society by killing off people who may serve or cheer him. this desire for companionship is of course immensely greater in the spirit that is not definitely settled in the society of spiritdom, and it is therefore more dangerous to its own belongings, in fact to all living society, while it is hanging about the other side of the grave, but this side of hades. thus i well remember a delicious row that arose primarily out of trade matters, but which caused one family to yell at another family divers remarks, ending up with the accusation, "you good-for-nothing illegitimate offspring of house lizards, you don't bury your ditto ditto dead relations, but leave them knocking about anyhow, a curse to calabar." naturally therefore the spirit of a dead enemy is feared because it would touch for the purpose of getting spirit slaves; therefore it follows that powerful ancestors are valued when they are on the other side, for they can keep off the dead enemies. a great chief's spirit is a thoroughly useful thing for a village to keep going, and in good order, for it conquered those who are among the dead with it, and can keep them under, keep them from aiding their people in the fights between its living relations and itself and them, with its slave spirit army. i ought to say that it is customary for the living to send the dead out ahead of the army, to bear the brunt in the first attack. ancestor-esteem you will find at its highest pitch in west africa under the school of fetish that rules the tshi and ewe peoples. ellis gives you a full description of it for ashanti and dahomey.[ ] the next district going down coast is the yoruba one; but yoruba has been so long under the influence of mahometanism that its fetish, judging from ellis's statement in his _yoruba speaking people_, is deeply tinged with it. i have no personal acquaintance with yorubaland, but have no hesitation for myself in accepting his statements from the accuracy i have found them, by personal experience with tshi and ewe people, to possess. below yoruba comes a district, the oil rivers, where, alas, ellis did not penetrate, and where no ethnologist, unless you will graciously extend the term to me, has ever cautiously worked. in this district you have a school where reincarnation is strongly believed in, a different school of fetish to that of tshi and ewe, a class of human ghosts called the well-disposed ones. and these are ancestors undoubtedly. they do not show up clearly in those districts where reincarnation is believed to be the common lot of all human souls. nevertheless, they are clear enough even there, as i will presently attempt to explain. these ancestor spirits have things given to them for their consolation and support, and in return they do what they can to benefit and guard their own villages and families. nevertheless, the things given to the well-disposed ones are not as things sacrificed to gods. nor are the well-disposed ones gods, even of the grade of a sasabonsum or an ombuiri. it is a low down thing to dig up your father--i.e., open his grave and take away the things in it that have been given him. it will get you cut by respectable people, and rude people when there is a market-place row on will mention it freely; but it won't bring on a devastating outbreak of small-pox in the whole district. footnotes: [ ] of the divine law, _tractatus theologico politicus_, spinoza. [ ] _primitive culture_, e. b. tylor, p. . [ ] professor tylor kindly allowed me to place this statement before him, and he says that as the word fetish, with the sense of the use of bones, claws, stones, and such objects as receptacles of spiritual influences, has had nearly two centuries of established usage, it would not be easy to set it aside, and he advises me to use the term west african religion, or in some way make my meaning clear without expecting to upset the established nomenclature of comparative ethnology. [ ] this word is pronounced by the natives and by people knowing them, cheuwe, as ellis undoubtedly knew, but presumably he spelt it tshi to please the authorities. [ ] _the vocation of the hebrews_, spinoza. [ ] see _travels in west africa_, by m. h. kingsley. macmillan & co. . [ ] for further details see _travels in west africa_, p. . [ ] "origins and interpretations of primitive religions." _edinburgh review_, july, , p. . [ ] _the tshi speaking, ewe speaking and yoruba speaking people of west africa._--a. b. ellis. chapter vi schools of fetish wherein the student, thinking things may be made clearer if it be perceived that there are divers schools of fetish, discourses on the schools of west african religious thought. as i have had occasion to refer to schools of fetish, and as that is a term of my own, i must explain why i use it, and what i mean by it, in so far as i am able. when travelling from district to district you cannot fail to be struck by the difference in character of the native religion you are studying. my own range on the west coast is from sierra leone to loanda; and here and there in places such as the oil rivers, the ogowe, and the lower congo, i have gone inland into the heart of what i knew to be particularly rich districts for an ethnologist. i make no pretence to a thorough knowledge of african fetish in all its schools, but i feel sure no wandering student of the subject in western africa can avoid recognising the existence of at least four distinct forms of development of the fetish idea. they have, every one of them, the underlying idea i have attempted to sketch as pure fetish when speaking of the position of the human soul; and yet they differ. and i believe much of the confusion which is supposed to exist in african religious ideas is a confusion only existing in the minds of cabinet ethnologists from a want of recognition of the fact of the existence of these schools. [illustration: fantee natives of the gold coast. [_to face page ._] for example, suppose you take a few facts from ellis and a few from bastian and mix, and call the mixture west african religion, you do much the same sort of thing as if you took bits from mr. spurgeon's works, and from those of some eminent jesuit and of a sound greek churchman, and mixed them and labelled it european religion. the bits would be all right in themselves, but the mixture would be a quaint affair. as far as my present knowledge of the matter goes, i should state that there were four main schools of west african fetish: ( ) the tshi and ewe school, ellis' school; ( ) the calabar school; ( ) the mpongwe school; ( ) nkissism or the fjort school. subdivisions of these schools can easily be made, but i only make the divisions on the different main objects of worship, or more properly speaking, the thing each school especially endeavours to secure for man. the tshi and ewe school is mainly concerned with the preservation of life; the calabar school with attempting to enable the soul successfully to pass through death; the mpongwe school with the attainment of material prosperity; while the school of nkissi is mainly concerned with the worship of the mystery of the power of earth--nkissi-nsi. you will find these divers things worshipped, or, rather, i would say cultivated, in all the schools of fetish, but in certain schools certain ideas are predominant. look at srahmantin of the tshi people, and at nzambi of the fjort. both these ladies know where the animals go to drink, what they say to each other, where their towns are, and what not; also they both know what the forest says to the wind and the rain, and all the forests' own small talk in the bargain, and, therefore, also the inner nature of all these things; and both, like other ladies, i have heard prefer gentlemen's society. women they have a tendency to be hard on, but either srahmantin or nzambi think nothing of taking up a man's time, making him neglect his business or his family affairs, or both together, by keeping him in the bush for a month or so at a time, teaching him things about medicines, and finally sending him back into town in so addlepated a condition that for months he hardly knows who he exactly is. when he comes round, however, if he has any sense, he sets up in business as a medical man; sometimes, however, he just remains merely crackey. such a man was my esteemed kefalla. but look how different under different schools is the position of srahmantin and nzambi. srahmantin is only propitiated by doctors and hunters; by all respectable, busy, family men forced to go through forests, she is simply dreaded, while nzambi, the great princess, entirely dominates the whole school of nkissism. from what cause or what series of causes the predominance of these different things has come, i do not know, unless it be from different natural environment and different race. it is certainly not a mere tribal affair, for there are many different tribes under each school. for example, i do not think you need make more than a subdivision between the tshi, the ga or ogi and the ewe peoples' fetish, nor more than a subdivision between those of the eboes and the ibbibios, or those of the fjort and mussurongoes; but we want more information before it would be quite safe to dogmatise. it is impossible in the present state of our knowledge to give exact geographical limits of the different schools of fetish, and i therefore only sketch their geographical distribution in western africa, from sierra leone to loanda, hoping thereby to incite further research. sierra leone and its adjacent districts have not been studied by an ethnologist. we have only scattered information regarding the religion there; and unfortunately the observations we have on it mainly bear on the operations of the secret societies, which in these regions have attained to much power, and are usually though erroneously grouped under the name of poorah. poorah, like all secret societies, is intensely interesting, for it is the manifestation of the law form of fetish; but secret societies are pure fetish, and common to all districts. all that we can gather from the scattered observations on the rest of the fetish in this region is that it is allied to the fetish school of the tshi-speaking people. next to this unobserved district, we come to the well-observed districts of the tshi, ewe, and yoruba-speaking people--ellis's region. it may seem unwise for me to attempt to group these three together and call them one school, because from this one district we have two distinct cults of fetish in the west indies, voudou and obeah (tchanga and wanga). voudou itself is divided into two sects, the white and the red--the first, a comparatively harmless one, requiring only the sacrifice of, at the most, a white cock or a white goat, whereas the red cult only uses the human sacrifice--the goat without horns. obeah, on the other hand, kills only by poison--does not show the blood at all. and there is another important difference between voudou and obeah, and that is that voudou requires for the celebration of its rites a priestess and a priest. obeah can be worked by either alone, and is not tied to the presence of the snake. both these cults have sprung from slaves imported from ellis's district, obeah from slaves bought at koromantin mainly, and voudou from those bought at dahomey. nevertheless, it seems to me these good people have differentiated their religion in the west indies considerably; for example, in obeah the spider (_anansi_) has a position given it equal to that of the snake in voudou. now the spider is all very well in west africa; round him there has grown a series of most amusing stories, always to be told through the nose, and while you crawl about; but to put him on a plane with the snake in dahomey is absurd; his equivalent there is the turtle, also a focus for many tales, only more improper tales, and not half so amusing. the true importance and status of the snake in dahomey is a thing hard to fix. personally i believe it to be merely a case of especial development of a local ju-ju. we all know what the snake signifies, and instances of its attaining a local eminence occur elsewhere. at creek town, in calabar, and brass river it is more than respected. it is an accidental result of some bit of history we have lost, like the worship of the crocodile at dixcove and in the lower congo. whereas it is clear that the general respect, amounting to seeming worship, of the leopard is another affair altogether, for the leopard is the great thing in all west african forests, and forests and surf are the great things in western africa--the lines of perpetual danger to the life of man. [illustration: yoruba. [_to face page ._] but there is a remarkable point that you cannot fail to notice in the fetish of these three divisions of true negro fetish studied by ellis, namely, that what is one god in yoruba you get as several gods exercising one particular function in dahomey, as hundreds of gods on the gold coast. moreover, all these gods in all these districts have regular priests and priestesses in dozens, while below yoruba regular priests and priestesses are rare. there the officials of the law societies abound, and there are fetish men, but these are different people to the priests of bohorwissi and tando. i do not know yoruba land personally, but have had many opportunities of inquiring regarding its fetish from educated and uneducated natives of that country whom i have met down coast as traders and artisans. therefore, having found nothing to militate against ellis's statements, i accept them for yoruba as for dahomey and the gold coast; and my great regret is that his careful researches did not extend down into the district below yoruba--the district i class under the calabar school--more particularly so because the districts he worked at are all districts where there has been a great and long-continued infusion of both european and mohammedan forms of thought, owing to the four-hundred-year-old european intercourse on the seaboard, and the even older and greater mohammedan influence from the western soudan; whereas below these districts you come to a region of pure negro fetish that has undergone but little infusion of alien thought. whether or no to place benin with yoruba or with calabar is a problem. there is, no doubt, a very close connection between it and yoruba. there is also no doubt that benin was in touch, even as late as the seventeenth century, with some kingdom of the higher culture away in the interior. it may have been abyssinia, or it may have been one of the cultured states that the chaos produced by the mohammedan invasion of the soudan destroyed. in our present state of knowledge we can only conjecture, i venture to think, idly, until we know more. the only thing that is certain is that benin was influenced as is shown by its art development. benin practically broke up long before ashantee or dahomey, for, as proyart[ ] remarks, "many small kingdoms or native states which at the present day share africa among them were originally provinces dependent on other kingdoms, the particular governors of which usurped the sovereignty." benin's north-western provinces seem to have done this, possibly with the assistance of the mohammedanised people who came down to the seaboard seeking the advantages of white trade; and benin became isolated in its forest swamps, cut off from the stimulating influence of successful wars, and out of touch with the expanding influence of commerce, and devoted its attention too much to fetish matters to be healthy for itself or any one who fell in with it. it is an interesting point in this connection to observe that we do not find in the accounts given by the earlier voyagers to benin city anything like the enormous sacrifice of human life described by visitors to it of our own time. other districts round calabar, bonny, opobo, and so on, have human sacrifice as well, but they show no signs of being under benin in trade matters, in which benin used to be very strict when it had the chance. in fact, whatever respect they had for benin was a sentimental one, such as the king of kongo has, and does not take the practical form of paying taxes. the extent of the direct influence of benin away into the forest belt to the east and south i do not think at any time was great. benin was respected because it was regarded as possessing a big fetish and great riches. in recent years it was regarded by people discontented with white men as their great hope, from its power to resist these being greater than their own. nevertheless, the adjacent kingdom of owarie (warri), even in the sixteenth century, was an independent kingdom. so different was its fetish from that of benin that warri had not then, and has not to this day, human sacrifice in its religious observances, only judicial and funeral killings. considering how very easily africans superficially adopt the religious ideas of alien people with whom they have commercial intercourse, we must presume that the people who imported the art of working in metals into benin also imported some of their religion. the relics of religion, alien to fetish, that show in benin fetish are undoubtedly christian. whether these relics are entirely those of the portuguese roman catholic missions, or are not also relics of some earlier christian intercourse with western soudan christianised states existing prior to the mohammedan invasion of northern africa, is again a matter on which we require more information. but just as i believe some of the metal articles found in benin to be things made in birmingham, some to be old portuguese, some to be native castings, copies of things imported from that unknown inland state, and some to be the original inland state articles themselves, so do i believe the relics of christianity in the fetish to be varied in origin, all alike suffering absorption by the native fetish. there is no doubt that up to the last twenty years the three great fetish kings in western africa were those of ashantee, dahomey, and benin. each of these kings was alike believed by the whole of the people to have great fetish power in his own locality. in the time of which we have no historical record--prior to the visits of the first white voyagers in the fifteenth century--there is traditional record of the king of benin fighting with his cousin of dahomey. possibly dahomey beat him badly; anyhow something went seriously wrong with benin as a territorial kingdom, before its discovery by modern europe. i now turn to the fetish of the oil rivers which i have called the calabar school. the predominance of the belief there in reincarnation seems to me sufficient to separate it from the gold coast and dahomey fetish. funeral customs, important in all negro fetish, become in the calabar school exceedingly so. a certain amount of care anywhere is necessary to successfully establish the human soul after death, for the human soul strongly objects to leaving material pleasures and associations and going to, at best, an uninteresting under-world; but when you have not only got to send the soul down, but to bring it back into the human form again, and not any human form at that, but one of its own social status and family, the thing becomes more complicated still; and to do it so engrosses human attention, and so absorbs human wealth, that you do not find under the calabar school a multitude of priest-served gods as you do in dahomey and on the gold coast. mind you, so far as i could make out while in the calabar districts myself, the equivalents of those same gods, were quite believed in; but they were neglected in a way that would have caused them in dahomey, where they have been taught to fancy themselves to wreck the place. not only is care taken to send a soul down, but means are taken to see whether or no it has duly returned; for keeping a valuable soul, like that of a great fetish proficient who could manage outside spirits, or that of a good trader, is a matter of vital importance to the prosperity of the houses, so when such a soul has left the house in consequence of some sad accident or another, or some vile witchcraft, the babies that arrive to the house are closely watched. assortments of articles belonging to deceased members of the house are presented to it, and then, according to the one it picks out, it is decided who that baby really is--see, uncle so-and-so knows his own pipe, &c.--and i have often heard a mother reproaching a child for some fault say, "oh, we made a big mistake when we thought you were so-and-so." i must say i think the absence of the idea of the deification of ancestors in west africa shows up particularly strongly in the calabar school, for herein you see so clearly that the dead do not pass into a higher, happier state--that the soul separate from the body is only a part of that thing we call a human being, and in west africa the whole is greater than a part, even in this matter. [illustration: a calabar chief. [_to face page ._] the pathos of the thing, when you have grasped the underlying idea, is so deep that the strangeness of it passes away, and you almost forget to hate the horrors of the slaughter that hang round oil river funeral customs, or, at any rate, you understand the tenacity you meet with here of the right to carry out killing at funerals, a greater tenacity than confronted us in gold coast or dahomey regions, because a different idea is involved in the affair. on the gold coast, for example, you can substitute wealth for the actual human victim, because with wealth the dead soul could, after all, make itself comfortable in srahmandazi, but not so in the rivers. without slaves, wives, and funds, how can the dead soul you care for speak with the weight of testimony of men as to its resting place or position? rolls of velvet or satin, and piles of manillas or doubloons alone cannot speak; besides, they may have been stolen stuff, and the soul you care for may be put down by the authorities as a mere thieving slave, a sort of mere american gold bug trying to pass himself off as a duke--or a descendant of general washington--which would lead to that soul being disgraced and sent back in a vile form. think how you yourself, if in comfortable circumstances, belonging to a family possessing wealth and power, would like father, mother, sister, or brother of yours who by this change of death had just left these things, to go down through death, and come back into life in a squalid slum! we meet in this school, however, with a serious problem--namely, what does become of dead chiefs? it is a point i will not dogmatise on, but it certainly looks as if the calabar under-world was a most aristocratic spot, peopled entirely by important chiefs and the retinues sent down with them--by no means having the fine mixed society of srahmandazi. the oil river deceased chief is clearly kept as a sort of pensioner. the chief who succeeds him in his headship of the house is given to "making his father" annually. it is not necessarily his real father that he makes, but his predecessor in the headmanship--a slave succeeding to a free man would "make his father" to the dead free man, and so on. this function undoubtedly consists in sending his predecessor a big subsidy for his support, and consolation in the shape of slaves and goods. i may as well own i have long had a dark suspicion regarding this matter--a suspicion as to where those goods went. their proper destination, of course, should be the under-world. thither undoubtedly on the gold coast they would go; but when sent in the rivers i do not think they go so far. in fact, to make a clean breast of it, i do not believe big chiefs are properly buried in the oil rivers at all. i think they are, for political purposes, kept hanging about outside life, but not inside death, by their diplomatic successors. i feel emboldened to say this by what my friend, major leonard, vice-consul of the niger coast protectorate, recently told me. when he was appointed vice-consul, and was introducing himself to his chiefs in this capacity, one chief he visited went aside to a deserted house, opened the door, and talked to somebody inside; there was not any one in material form inside, only the spirit of his deceased predecessor, and all the things left just as they were when he died; the live chief was telling the dead chief that the new consul was come, &c. the reason, that is the excuse, for this seemingly unprincipled conduct in not properly burying the chief, so that he may be reincarnated to a complete human form, lies in the fact that he would be a political nuisance to his successor if he came back promptly; therefore he is kept waiting. from first-class native informants i have had fragments of accounts of making-father ceremonies. particularly interesting have been their accounts of what the live chief says to the dead one. much of it, of course, is, for diplomatic reasons, not known outside official circles. but the general tone of these communications is well known to be of a nature to discourage the dead chief from returning, and to reconcile him to his existing state. things are not what they were here. the price of oil is down, women are ten times more frivolous, slaves ten times more trying, white consul men abound, also their guns are more deadly than of old, this new consul looks worse than the last, there is nothing but war and worry for a chief nowadays. the whole country is going to the dogs financially and domestically, in fact, and you are much better off where you are. then come petitions for such help as the ghost chief and his ghost retinue can give. this, i think, explains why chiefs' funeral customs in the rivers differ in kind, not merely in grade, from those of big trade boys or other important people, and also accounts for their repetition at intervals. big trade boys, and the slaves and women sent down with them, return to a full human form more or less promptly; mere low grade slaves, slaves that cannot pull a canoe, _i.e._, provide a war canoe for the service of the house out of their own private estate, are not buried at all--they are thrown away, unless they have a mother who will bury them. they will come back again all right as slaves, but then that is all they are fit for. then we have left very interesting sections of the community to consider from a funeral rite point of view--namely, those in human form who are not, strictly speaking, human beings, and those who, though human, have committed adultery with spirits--women who bear twins or who die in child-birth. these sinners, i may briefly remark, are neither buried nor just thrown away; they are, as far as possible, destroyed. but with the former class the matter is slightly different. children, for example, that arrive with ready cut teeth, will in a strict family be killed or thrown away in the bush to die as they please; but the feeling against them is not really keen. they may, if the mother chooses to be bothered with them, be reared; but the interesting point is that any property they may acquire during life has no legal heir whatsoever. it must be dissipated, thrown away. this shows clearly that such individuals are not human, and, moreover, they are not buried nor destroyed at death; they are just thrown away. there is no particular harm in them as there is in the sin-stained twins. the only class in west africa i have found that are like these spirit humans is that strange class, the minstrels. i wish i knew more about these people. were it not that mr. f. swanzy possesses material evidence of their existence, in the shape of the most superb song-net, i should hesitate to mention them at all. some of my french friends, however, tell me they have seen them in senegal, and i venture to think that region must be their headquarters. i have seen one in accra, one in sierra leone, two on board steamers, and one in buana town, cameroon. briefly, these are minstrels who frequent market towns, and for a fee sing stories. each minstrel has a song-net--a strongly made net of a fishing net sort. on to this net are tied all manner and sorts of things, pythons' back bones, tobacco pipes, bits of china, feathers, bits of hide, birds' heads, reptiles' heads, bones, &c., &c., and to every one of these objects hangs a tale. you see your minstrel's net, you select an object and say how much that song. he names an exorbitant price; you haggle; no good. he won't be reasonable, say over the python bone, so you price the tobacco pipe--more haggle; finally you settle on some object and its price, and sit down on your heels and listen with rapt attention to the song, or, rather, chant. you usually have another. you sort of dissipate in novels, in fact. i do not say it's quiet reading, because unprincipled people will come headlong and listen when you have got your minstrel started, without paying their subscription. hence a row, unless you are, like me, indifferent to other people having a little pleasure. these song-nets, i may remark, are not of a regulation size. i have never seen on the west coast anything like so superb a collection of stories as mr. swanzy has tied on that song-net of his--woe is me! without the translating minstrel, a cycle of dead songs that must have belonged to a west african shakespeare. the most impressive song-net that i saw was the one at buana. its owner i called homer on the spot, because his works were a terrific two. tied on to his small net were a human hand and a human jaw bone. they were his only songs. i heard them both regardless of expense. i did not understand them, because i did not know his language; but they were fascinating things, and the human hand one had a passage in it which caused the singer to crawl on his hands and knees, round and round, stealthily looking this side and that, giving the peculiar leopard questing cough, and making the leopard mark on the earth with his doubled-up fist. ah! that was something like a song! it would have roused a rock to enthusiasm; a civilised audience would have smothered its singer with bouquets. i--well, the headman with me had to interfere and counsel moderation in heads of tobacco. but what i meant to say about these singers was only this. they are not buried as other people are; they are put into trees when they are dead--may be because they are "all same for one" with those singers the birds. i do not know, i only hope homer is still extant, and that some more intelligent hearer than i will meet with him. [illustration: natives of gaboon. [_to face page ._] the southern boundary of the calabar school of fetish lies in narrower regions than the boundary between it and ellis's school in the north. i venture to think that this may in a measure arise from there being in the southern region the additional element of difference of race. for immediately below calabar in the cameroon territory the true negro meets the bantu. in cameroon in the tribes of the dualla stem we have a people speaking a bantu language, and having a bantu culture, yet nevertheless having a great infusion of pure negro blood, and largely under the dominion of the true negro thought form. i own that of all the schools of fetish that i know, the calabar school is the one that fascinates me most. i like it better than ellis's school, wherein the fate of the soul after death is a life in a shadow land, with shadows for friends, lovers, and kinsfolk, with the shadows of joys for pleasures, the shadows of quarrels for hate--a thing that at its best is inferior to the wretchedest full-life on earth. yet this settled shadow-land of srahmandazi or gboohiadse is a better thing than the homeless drifting state of the soul in the school below calabar--namely, the school i have ventured to term the mpongwe school. to the brief consideration of this school we will now turn. in between the strongly-marked calabar school and the strongly-marked school of nkissism of loango kacongo, and bas congo there exists a school plainly differing from both. this region is interesting for many reasons, chief amongst which is that it is the sea-board region of the great african forest belt. tribe after tribe come down into it, flourish awhile, and die, uninfluenced by mohammedan or european culture. the mohammedans in africa as aforesaid have never mastered the western region of the forest belt; and the europeans have never, in this region between cameroon and loango, established themselves in force. it is undoubtedly the wildest bit of west africa. the dominant tribes here have, for as far back as we can get evidence--some short four hundred years--been tribes of the mpongwe stem--the so-called noble tribes. to-day they are dying--going off the face of the earth, leaving behind them nothing to bear testimony in this world to their great ability, save the most marvellously beautiful language, the greek of africa, as dr. nassau calls it, and the impress of their more elaborate thought-form on the minds of the bush tribes that come into contact with them. their last pupils are the great bafangh, now supplanting them in the regions of the bight of panavia. from their influence i think the school of fetish of this region is perhaps best called the mpongwe school, though i do not altogether like the term, because i believe the mpongwe stem to be in origin pure negro, and the fetish school they have elaborated and co-ordinated is bantu in thought-form, just as the language they have raised to so high a pitch of existence is in itself a bantu language. yet the mpongwe are rulers of both these things, and they will thereby leave imprinted on the minds of their supplanters in the land the mark of their intelligence. i have said the predominant idea in this mpongwe school is the securing of material prosperity. that is to say this is the part of pure fetish that receives more attention than other parts of pure fetish in this school; but it attains to no such definite predominance as funeral rites do in the calabar school, or the preservation of life in ellis's school. one might, however, quite fairly call the mpongwe school the trade-charm school, great as trade charms are in all west african fetish. this lack of a predominance sufficient to dwarf other parts of pure fetish makes the mpongwe school particularly interesting and valuable to a student; it is a magnificent school to study your pure fetish in, as none of it is here thrown by a predominant factor into the background of thought, and left in a neglected state. it is of this school that you will find dr. nassau's classification of spirits, and all the other observations of his that i have quoted of things absolutely believed in by the natives, and also all the mpongwe, benga, igalwa, ncomi, and fetish i have attempted to describe.[ ] it has no gods with proper priests. human beings are here just doing their best to hold their own with the spirit world, getting spirits under their control as far as possible, and dealing with the rest of them diplomatically. this state i venture to think is fetish in a very early form, a form through which the now elaborate true negro fetish must have passed before reaching its present co-ordinated state. how long ago it was when the true negro was in this stage i will not venture to conjecture. sir henry maine, of whom i am a very humble follower, says, "nothing moves that is not greek." this is a hard saying to accept, but the truth of it grows on you when you are studying things such as these, and you are forced to acknowledge that they at any rate have a slow rate of development--sometimes indeed it seems that there is a mere wave motion of thought among all men rising here and there when in the hands of superior tribes, like the mpongwe for example, to a wave crest destined on their extinction to fall again. now and again as a storm on the sea, the impulse of a revealed religion sweeps down on to this ocean of nature philosophy, elevates it or confuses it according to the initial profundity of it. if you have ever seen the difference between a deep sea storm and an esturial storm, you will know what i mean. yet this has nothing to do with the truth or falsity of the fetish thought-form, but merely has a bearing on the quality of the minds that deal with it, as it must on all minds not under the influence of a revealed religion; and i now turn, in conclusion of this brief consideration of the schools of fetish in west africa, to the next school to the mpongwe, namely, the school of nkissism. i need not go into details concerning it here; you have them at your command in the two great works of bastian, _an expedition under loango küste und besuch in san salvador_, and in mr. r. e. dennett's _folk lore of the fjorts_, published by the liberality of the folk lore society, and also his former book, _seven years among the fjorts_.[ ] [illustration: fjort natives of kacongo and loango. [_to face page ._] the predominant feature in this school is undoubtedly the extra recognition given to the mystery of the power of the earth, nkissi 'nsi. here you find the earth goddess nzambi the paramount feature in the fetish; from her the fetish priests have their knowledge of the proper way to manage and communicate with lower earth spirits, round her circle almost all the legends, in her lies the ultimate human hope of help and protection. nzambi is too large a subject for us to enter into here. she is the great mother, but she is not absolute in power. she is not one of the forms of the great unheeding over-lord of gods, like nyankupong, or abassi-boom; the equivalent to him, is her husband nzambi mpungu, among the followers of nkissism; but the predominance given in this school to the great princess nzambi has had two effects that must be borne in mind in studying the region from loango to the south bank of congo. firstly, it apparently led to nzambi being confused by the natives with the holy virgin, when they were under the tuition of the roman catholic missionaries during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; hence nzambi's cult requires to be studied with the greatest care at the present day. secondly, partly in consequence of the native predominance given to her, and partly in the predominance she has gained from the aforesaid confusion, women have a very singular position, a superior one to that which they have in other schools; this you will see by reading the stories collected by mr. dennett. i will speak no further now concerning these schools of fetish, for nkissism is the most southern of the west african schools, its domain extending over the whole of the regions once forming the kingdom of kongo down to angola. below angola, on the west coast, you come to the fringing zone of the kalahi desert, and to those interesting people the bushmen, of whose religion i am unable, with any personal experience, to speak. below them you strike south africa. south africa is south africa; west africa is west africa. of the former i know nothing, of the latter alas! only a tenth part of what i should wish to know, so i return to pure fetish and to its bearing on witchcraft. footnotes: [ ] _history of loango_, by the abbé proyart, . pinkerton, vol. xvi., p. . [ ] _travels in west africa._ fetish chapters. [ ] sampson low and co. chapter vii fetish and witchcraft wherein the student having by now got rather involved in things in general, is constrained to discourse on witchcraft and its position in west african religious thought, concluding with the conviction that fetish is quite clear though the student has not succeeded in making it so. now, here we come to a very interesting question: what is witchcraft in itself? conversing freely with the devil, says christendom, firmly; and taking the devil to mean the spirit of evil, i am bound to think christendom is in a way scientifically quite right, though the accepted scientific definition of witchcraft at present is otherwise, and holds witchcraft to be conversing with natural science, which of course i cannot accept as the devil. thus i cannot reconcile the two definitions should they mean the same thing; and so i am here really in the position of being at one in opinion with the roman catholic missionaries of the fifteenth century, who, as soon as they laid eyes on my friend the witch-doctor, recognised him and his goings on as a mass of witchcraft, and went for the whole affair in an exceeding game way. but let us take the accepted view, that first propounded by sir alfred lyall; and i humbly beg it to be clearly understood i am only speaking of the bearing of that view on fetish in west africa. i was of course fully aware of the accepted view of the innate antagonism between religion and witchcraft when i published in a deliberately scattered form some of my observations on fetish, being no more desirous of giving a mental lead to white men than to black, but only wistful to find out what they thought of things as they are. the consequence of this action of mine has been, i fear, on the whole a rather more muddled feeling in the white mind regarding fetish than ever heretofore existed; a feeling that, if what i said was true, (and in this matter of fetish information no one has gainsaid the truth of it), west african religion was more perplexing than it seemed to be when regarded as a mere degraded brutal superstition or childish foolishness. however, one distinguished critic has tackled my fetish, and gallantly: the writer in the _edinburgh review_. with his remarks on our heresy regarding the deification of ancestors i have above attempted to deal, owning he is quite right--we do not believe in deified ancestors. i now pass on to his other important criticism, and again own he is quite right, and that "witchcraft and religious rites in west africa are originally indistinguishable."[ ] this is evidently a serious affair for west africa and me, so i must deal with it carefully, and first quote my critic's words following immediately those just cited. "if this is correct there can be no doubt that such a confusion of the two ideas that in their later forms not only stand widely apart, but are always irreconcilably hostile, denotes the very lowest stage of aboriginal superstition wherever it prevails, for it has been held that, although the line between abject fetishism and witchcraft may be difficult to trace in the elementary stages, yet from the beginning a true distinction can invariably be recognised. according to this theory, the witch is more nearly allied with rudimentary science than with priestcraft, for he relies not upon prayer, worship, or propitiation of divinities, but upon his own secret knowledge and experience of the effect producible by certain tricks and mysterious devices upon the unseen powers, over whom he has obtained a sort of command. instead of serving like a priest these powers, he is enabled by his art to make them serve him, and it is for this reason that his practices very soon become denounced and detested by the priesthood." now there are many interesting points to be considered in west africa bearing on the above statement of sir alfred lyall's theory of the nature of witchcraft,--points which i fancy, if carefully considered, would force upon us the strange conclusion that, accepting this theory as a general statement of the nature of witchcraft, there was no witchcraft whatever in west africa, nothing having "a true distinction" in the native mind from religion. you may say there is no religion and it's all witchcraft, but this is a superficial view to take; you see the orthodox christian view of witchcraft contains in it an element not present in the west african affair; the christian regards the witch with hatred as one knowing good, yet choosing evil. the west african has not this choice in his mind; he has to deal with spirits who are not, any of them, up to much in the way of virtue viewed from a human standpoint. i don't say they are all what are called up here devils; a good many of them are what you might call reasonable, respectable, easy-going sort of people; some are downright bad; in fact, i don't think it would be going too far to say that they are all downright bad if they get their tempers up or take a dislike to a man; there is not one of them beneficent to the human race at large. nzambi is the nearest approach to a beneficent deity i have come across, and i feel she owes much of this to the confusion she profits by, and the holy virgin suffers from, in the regions under nkissism; but nzambi herself is far from morally perfect and very difficult tempered at times. you need not rely on me in this matter; take the important statement of dr. nassau: "observe, these were distinctly prayers, appeals for mercy, agonising protests; but there was no praise, no love, no thanks, no confession of sin."[ ] he was speaking regarding utterances made down there in the face of great afflictions and sorrow; and there was no praise, because there was no love, i fancy; no thanks because what good was done to the human being was a mere boughten thing he had paid for. no confession of sin, because the fetish believer does not hold he lives in a state of sin, but that it is a thing he can commit now and again if he is fool enough. sin to him not being what it is to us, a vile treason against a loving father, but a very ill-advised act against powerful, nasty-tempered spirits. herein you see lies one difference between the christian and the fetish view,--a fundamental one, that must be borne in mind. then in the above-quoted passage you will observe that the dislike to witchcraft is traced in a measure to the action of priesthoods. this hatred is undoubted. but witchcraft is as much hated in districts in west africa where there are no organised priesthoods as in districts where there are--in the regions under the calabar and mpongwe schools, for example, where the father of the house is the true priest to the family, where what looks like a priesthood, but which is a law god-cult only--the secret society--is the dominant social thing. now this law god-cult affair, purroh, oru, egbo, ukukiwe, etc., etc., call it what you please, it's all the same thing, is not the organisation that makes war on witchcraft in west africa. it deals with it now and then, if it is brought under its official notice; but it is not necessary that this should be done; summary methods are used with witches. it just appeals at once to ordeal, any one can claim it. you can claim it, and administer it yourself to yourself, if you are the accused party and in a hurry. a. says to you, "you're a witch." "i'm not," you ejaculate. i take the bean; down it goes; you're sick or dead long before the elaborate mechanism of the law society has heard of the affair. of course, if you want to make a big palaver and run yourself and your accuser into a lot of expense you can call in the society; but you needn't. from this and divers things like it i do not think the hatred of witchcraft in west africa at large has anything originally to do with the priesthood. you will say, but there is the hatred of witchcraft in west africa. you have only to shout "_ifot_" at a man or woman in calabar, or "_ndo tchi_" in fjort-land, and the whole population, so good-tempered the moment before, is turned bloodthirsty. witches are torn to bits, destroyed in every savage way, when the ordeal has conclusively proved their guilt--mind you, never before. granted; but i believe this to be just a surging up of that form of terror called hate. i am old enough to remember the dynamite scares up here, and the jack the ripper incidents; then it was only necessary for some one to call out, "dynamiter" or "jack the ripper" at a fellow-citizen, and up surged our own people, all same for one with those africans, only our people, not being so law-governed, would have shredded the accused without ordeal, had we not possessed that great factor in the formation of public virtue, the police, who intervened, carried away the accused to the ordeal--the police court--where the affair was gone into with judicial calm. honestly, i don't believe there is the slightest mystic revulsion against witchcraft in west africa; public feeling is always at bursting-point on witches, their goings-on are a constant danger to every peaceful citizen's life, family, property, and so on, and when the general public thinks it's got hold of one of the vermin it goes off with a bang; but it does not think for one moment that the witch is _per se_ in himself a thing apart; he is just a bad man too much, who has gone and taken up with spirits for illegitimate purposes. the mere keeping of a familiar power, which under christendom is held so vile a thing, is not so held in west africa. everyone does it; there is not a man, woman, or child who has not several attached spirits for help and preservation from danger and disease. it is keeping a spirit for bad purposes only that is hateful. it is one thing to have dynamite in the hand of the government or a mining company for reasonable reasons, quite another to have it in the hands of enemies to society; and such an enemy is a witch who trains the spirits over which he has got control to destroy his fellow human beings' lives and properties. the calling in of ordeal to try the witch before destroying him has many interesting points. the african, be it granted, is tremendously under the dominion of law, and it is the law that such trials should take place before execution; but there is also involved in it another curious fact, and that is that the spirit of the ordeal is held to be able to manage and suppress the bad spirits trained by the witch to destruction. human beings alone can collar the witch and destroy him in an exemplary manner, but spiritual aid is required to collar the witch's devil, or it would get adrift and carry on after its owner's death. regarding ordeal affairs i will speak when dealing with legal procedure. such being the west african view of witchcraft, i venture to think there are in this world divers reasons for hating witchcraft. there is the fetish one, that he is an enemy to society; there is the priesthood one, that he is a sort of quack or rival practitioner--under this head of priesthood aversion for witchcraft i think we may class the witchcraft that is merely a hovering about of the old religion which the priesthood of an imported religion are anxious to stamp out; and there is that aversion to witchcraft one might call the protestant aversion, which arises from the feeling that it is a direct sin against god himself. this latter feeling has been the cause of as violent a persecution of witches, witness the action of king james i. and that of the quakers in america, as any west african has ever presented to the world. throughout all these things the fact remains, that whether black, white, or yellow, the witch is a bad man, a murderer in the eyes of allah as well as those of humanity. that all witches act by means of poison alone would be too hasty a thing to say, because i think we need hardly doubt that the african is almost as liable to die from a poisonous idea put into his mind as a poisonous herb put into his food; indeed, i do not know that in west africa we need confine ourselves to saying natives alone do this, for white men sink and die under an idea that breaks their spirit. all the vital powers are required there to resist the depressing climate. if they are weakened seriously in any way, death is liable to ensue. the profound belief in the power of a witch causes a man who knows, say, that either a nail has been driven into an nkiss down on the south-west coast, or the fangaree drum beaten on him up in the sierra leone region, to collapse under the terror of it, and i own i can see no moral difference between the guilt of the man or woman who does these things with the intent to slay a fellow-citizen and that of one who puts bush into his chop--both mean to kill and do kill, but both methods are good west african witchcraft. the latter may seem to be an incipient form of natural science, but it seems to me--i say it humbly--that the west african incipient scientist is not the local witch, but that highly respectable gentleman or lady, the village apothecary, the _nganga bilongo_ or the _abiabok_. the means of killing in vogue in west african witchcraft without the direct employment of poison are highly interesting, but i think it would serve no good purpose for me to give even the few i know in detail. there is one interesting point in this connection. i have said that in order to make a charm efficacious against a particular person you must have preferably some of his blood in your possession, or, failing that, some hair or nail clipping; failing these, some articles belonging intimately to him--a piece of his loin-cloth, or, under the school of nkissi, a bit of his iron. this i believe to hold good for all true fetish charms; but we have in the bight of benin charms which are under the influence of a certain amount of mohammedan ideas--for example, the deadly charms of the kufong society. this class of charm does not require absolutely a bit of something nearly connected with the victim, but nevertheless it cannot act at a great distance, or without the element of personal connection. take the fangaree charm, for example, to be found among the mendi people, and all the neighbouring peoples who are liable to go in for kufong. fangaree is the name of a small drum that is beaten by a hammer made of bamboo. the uses of this drum are wide and various, but it also gives its name to the charm, because the charm, like the drum, is beaten with a similar stick. the charm stuff itself is made of a dead man's bone, of different herbs smoked over a fire and powdered the same day, ants'-hill earth, and charcoal. this precious mixture is made into a parcel; that parcel is placed on a frame made of bamboo sticks. on the top of the charm a small live animal--an insect, i am informed, will do--is secured by a string passing over it, and the charm is fixed with wooden forks into the ground on either side. this affair is placed by the murderer close to a path the victim will pass along, and the murderer sits over it, waiting for him to come. when he comes, he is allowed to pass just by, and then his enemy breaks a dry bamboo stick; the noise causes the victim to turn and look in the direction of the noise--_i.e._ on to the charm--and then the murderer hits the live animal on it, calling his victim's name, and the charm is on him. if the animal is struck on the head, the victim's head is affected, and he has violent fits until "he dies from breaking his neck" in one of them; if the animal is struck to tailwards, the victim gets extremely ill, but in this latter case he can buy off the charm and be cured by a fangaree man. a similar arrangement is in working order under some south-west coast murder societies i am acquainted with. the interesting point, however, is the necessity of establishing the personal connection between the victim and the charm by means of making him look on the charm and calling his name. without his looking it's no good. hence it comes that it is held unwise to look behind when you hear a noise o'night in the bush; indeed, no cautious person, with sense in his head and strength in his legs, would dream of doing this unless caught off guard. in connection also with this turning the face being necessary to the working of the fangaree charm, there is another charm that is worked under kufong, according to several natives from its region--the hinterland of sierra leone, liberia, and ivory coast--with whom i have associated when we have both been far from our respective homes away in south-west africa. it is a charm i have never met with as indigenous in the south-west or oil rivers fetish, and i think it has a heavier trace of mohammedan influence in it than the fangaree charm. the way it works is this. a man wants to kill you without showing blood. only leopard society men do that, and your enemy, we will presume, is not a leopard. so he throws his face on you by a process i need not enter into. you hardly know anything is wrong at first; by-and-by you notice that every scene that you look on, night or day, has got that face in it, not a filmy vision of a thing, but quite material in appearance, only it's in abnormal places for a face to be, and it is a face only. it may be on the wall, or amongst the roof poles, or away in a corner of the hut floor; outdoors it is the same--the face is first always, there just where you can see it. some of my informants hold that it keeps coming closer to you as time goes on; but others say no; it keeps at one distance all the time. this, however, is a minor point; it is its being there that gets to matter. it is in amongst the bushes at the side of the path, or in the water of the river, or at the end of your canoe, or in the oil in the pots, or in the manchester cottons in the factory shop. wherever you look, there it is. in a way it's unobtrusive, it does not spread itself out, or make a noise, or change, yet, sooner or later, in every place, you cannot miss seeing it. at first you think, by changing your environment--going outdoors, coming in, going on a journey, mixing with your fellow-men, or avoiding them--you can get rid of the thing; but you find, when you look round,--a thing you are certain to do when the charm has got its grip,--for sure that face is there as usual. now this sort of thing tells on the toughest in time, and you get sick of life when it has always got that face mixed up in it, so sick that you try the other thing--death. this is an ill-advised course, but you do not know in time that, when you kill yourself, you will find that on the other side, in the other thing, you will see nothing but that face, that unchanging silent face you are so sick of. the kufong man who has thrown his face at you knows, and when he hears of your suicide he laughs. naturally you cannot know, because you are not a kufong man, or the charm could not be put on you. what you "can do in this here most awful go," as mr. squeers would say, i am unfortunately not able to tell you. i made many inquiries from men who know "the face," who had had it happen on people in their families, and so on, but in answer to my inquiries as to why the afflicted did not buy it off, what charms there were against it, and so forth, i was always told it was a big charm, that the man who put it on lost something of himself by so doing, so it was never put on except in cases of great hatred that would stick at nothing and would kill; also that it was of no real use for the victim to kill his charmer, though that individual, knowing the pleasure so doing would afford his victim, takes good care to go on a journey, and to keep out of the way until the charm has worked out in suicide. there is a certain amount of common sense in this proceeding which is undoubtedly true african, but there is a sort of imaginative touch which makes me suspect mohammedan infusion; anyhow, i leave you to judge for yourself whether, presupposing you accept the possibility of a man doing such a thing to you or to any one you love, you think he can be safely ignored, or whether he is not an enemy to society who had better be found out and killed--killed in a showy way. personally i favour the latter course. there is but one other point in witchcraft in west africa that i need now detain you with, and that is why a person killed by witchcraft suffers more than one who dies of old age, for herein lies another reason for this hatred of witchcraft. every human soul in west africa throughout all the fetish schools is held to have a certain proper time of incarnation in a human body, whether it be one incarnation or endless series of incarnations; anything that cuts that incarnation period short inconveniences the soul, to say the least of it. under ellis's school, and i believe throughout all the others, the soul that lives its life in a body fully through is held happy; it is supposed to have learnt its full lesson from life, and to know the way down to the shadow-land home and all sorts of things. hence also comes the respect for the aged, common throughout all west africa. they are the knowing ones. such an one was the late chief long john of bonny. now if this process of development is checked by witchcraft and the soul is prematurely driven from the body, it does not know all that it should, and its condition is therefore miserable. it is, as it were, sent blind, or deaf, or lame into the spirit-land. this is a thing not only dreaded by individuals for themselves, but hated for those they love; hence the doer of it is a hated thing. you must remember that when you get keen hatred you must allow for keen affection, it is not human to have one without the other. that the africans are affectionate i am fully convinced. this affection does not lie precisely on the same lines as those of europeans, i allow. it is not with them so deeply linked with sex; but the love between mother and child, man and man, brother and sister, woman and woman, is deep, true, and pure, and it must be taken into account in observing their institutions and ideas, particularly as to this witchcraft where it shows violently and externally in hatred only to the superficial observer. i well remember gossiping with a black friend in a plantation in the calabar district on witchcraft, and he took up a stick and struck a plant of green maize, breaking the stem of it, saying, "there, like that is the soul of a man who is witched, it will not ripen now." we will now turn to the consideration of that class whose business in life is mainly to guard the community from witchcraft and from miscellaneous evil spirits acting on their own initiative, the fetish men of west africa, namely, those men and women who devote their lives to the cult of west african religion. such people you find in every west african district; but their position differs under different schools, and it is in connection with them that we must recognise the differences in the various schools, remembering that the form of fetish makes the form of fetish man, not the fetish man the form of fetish. he may, as it were, embroider it, complicate it, mystify it, as is the nature of all specialists in all professions, but primarily he is under it, at any rate in west africa, where you find the fetish man in every district, but in every district in a different form. for example, look at him under the ellis school. where there are well-defined gods, there your fetish man is quite the priest, devoting himself to the cult of one god publicly, probably doing a little general practice into the bargain with other minor spirits. to the laity he of course advertises the god he serves as the most reliably important one in the neighbourhood; but it has come under my notice, and you will find under ellis's, that if the priest of a god gets personally unwell and finds his own deity ineffective, he will apply for aid to a professional brother who serves another god. below ellis's school, in the calabar school, your fetish man is somewhat different; the gods are not so definite or esteemed, and the fetish man is becoming a member of a set of men who deal with gods in a lump, and have the general management of minor spirits. below this school, in the mpongwe, the fetish man is even less specialised as regards one god; he is here a manager of spirits at large, with the assistance of a strong spirit with whom he has opened up communication. below this school, in that of nkissi, the fetish man becomes more truly priest-like--he is the nganga of an nkiss; but nevertheless his position is a different one to that of the priest in ellis's school; here he is in a better position than in the mpongwe school, but in an inferior one to that in ellis's, where he is not the lone servitor or manager for a god, but a member of a powerful confraternity. you must bear in mind, of course, that the fetish man is always, from a lay standpoint, a highly important person; but professionally, i cannot but think, a priest say of tando in ashantee or of shango in dahomey, is of a higher grade than a nganga to an nkiss, certainly far higher than a fetish man under the mpongwe school, where every house father and every village chief does a lot of his own fetish without professional assistance. of course chiefs and house fathers do a certain amount in all districts--in fact, in west africa every man and woman does a certain amount of fetish for himself; but where, as in ellis's school, you get a regular set of priests and plenty of them, the religion falls into their hands to a greater extent. i feel that the study of the position of fetish-men is deserving of great attention. i implore the student who may take it up to keep the fetish man for practical purposes distinct from the gentleman who represents the law god-cult--the secret tribal society. if you persist in mixing them, you will have in practical politics as fine a mess as if you mixed up your own bench of bishops with the woolsack. i beg to contribute to the store of knowledge on this point sundry remarks sent me on most excellent native authority from the gold coast:-- "the inhabitants of cape coast must congratulate themselves that they enjoy the protection of seventy-seven fetishes. every town (and this town) has one fetish house or temple, often built in a square or oblong form of mud or swish, and thatched over, or constructed of sticks or poles placed in a circular form and thatched. in these temples several images are generally placed. every fetish-man or priest, moreover, has his private fetishes in his own house, one of a bird, stones encased by string, large lumps of cinder from an iron furnace, calabashes, and bundles of sticks tied together with string. all these are stained with red ochre and rubbed over with eggs. they are placed on a square platform and shrouded from the vulgar gaze. "the fetishes are regarded as spiritual intelligent beings who make the remarkable objects of nature their residence or enter occasionally into the images and other artificial representations which have been duly consecrated by certain ceremonies. it is the belief of this people that the fetishes not unfrequently render themselves visible to mortals. thus the great fetish of the rock on which cape coast castle stands is said to come forth at night in human form, but of superhuman size, and to proceed through the town dressed in white to chase away evil spirits. "in all the countries along the coast (gold) the regular fetish day is tuesday. the fishermen would expect that, were they to go out on that day, it would spoil their fishing. "the priest's office may in some cases be hereditary, but it is not uniformly so, for the children of fetish-men sometimes refuse to devote themselves to the pursuits of their parents and engage in other occupations. any one may enter the office after suitable training, and parents who desire that their children may be instructed in its mysteries place them with a fetish-man, who receives a premium for each. the order of fetish-men is further augmented by persons who declare that the fetish has suddenly seized on them. a series of convulsive and unnatural bodily distortions establish their claim. application is made to the fetish for counsel and aid in every domestic and public emergency. when persons find occasion to consult a private fetish-man, they take a present of gold-dust and rum and proceed to his house. he receives the presents, and either puts a little of the rum on the head of every image or pours a small quantity on the ground before the platform as an offering to the whole pantheon; then, taking a brass pan with water in it, he sits down with the pan between him and the fetishes, and his inquirers also seat themselves to await the result. having made these preparatory arrangements, looking earnestly into the water, he begins to snap his fingers, and addressing the fetish, extols his power, telling him that the people have arrived to consult him, and requesting him to come and give the desired answer. after a time the fetish-man is wrought up into a state of fury. he shakes violently and foams at the mouth; this is to intimate that the fetish was come home and that he himself is no longer the speaker, but the fetish, who uses his mouth and speaks by him. he now growls like a tiger and asks the people if they have brought rum, requiring them at the same time to present it to him. he drinks, and then inquires for what purpose they have sent for him. if a relative is ill, they reply that such a member of their family is sick and they have tried all the means they could devise to restore him, but without success, and they, knowing he is a great fetish, have come to ask his aid, and beg him to teach them what they should do. he then speaks kindly to them, expresses a hope that he shall be able to help them, and says, "i go to see." it is imagined that the fetish then quits the priest, and, after a silence of a few minutes, he is supposed to return, and gives his response to the inquirers. "in cases of great difficulty the oracle at abrah is the last resort of the fantees. this notable oracle is always consulted at night. they find a large fire made upon the ground, and the presents they have brought they place in the hands of the priests who are in attendance. they are then directed to elevate their presents above their heads and to fix their eyes steadfastly upon the ground, for should they look up, the fetish, it is said, would inflict blindness on them for their sacrilegious gaze. after a time the oracle gives a response in a shrill, small voice intended to convey the idea that it proceeds from an unearthly source, and the inquirers, having obtained the end of their visit, then depart. "in cases of bodily affliction the fetish orders medical preparations for the patient. if the malady of the patient does not appear to yield to such applications, the fetish is again consulted, and in some cases, as a further expedient, the priest takes a fowl and ties it to a stick, by which operation it is barbarously squeezed to death. the stick is then placed in the path leading to the house for the purpose of deterring evil spirits from approaching it. when the patient is a rich man, several sheep are sacrificed, and he is fetished until the last moment arrives amidst the howls of a number of old fetish women, who continue to besmear with eggs and other medicine the walls and doorposts of his house and everything that is around him until he has ceased to breathe." not only does the african depart from life under the care of fetish-men--and, as my valued correspondent ungallantly remarks, "old fetish-women"--but he is met, as it were, by them on his arrival. my correspondent says "as soon as the child is born the fetish-man binds certain fetish preparations round his limbs, using at the same time a form of incantation or prayer. this is done to fortify the infant against all kinds of evil. on the eighth day after the birth, the father of the child, accompanied by a number of friends, proceeds to the house of the mother. if he be a rich man, he takes with him a gallon of ardent spirits to be used on the festive occasion. on arriving at the house, the friends form a circle round the father, who delivers a kind of address in which he acknowledges the kindness of the gods for giving him the child, and calls upon those present also to thank the fetishes on his account; then, taking the child in his arms, he squirts upon it a little spirit from his mouth, pronouncing the name by which it is to be called. a second name which the child usually takes is that of the day of the week on which it is born. the following are the names of the days in the fanti language, varied in their orthography according to the sex of the child:-- male. female. sunday quisi akosua. monday kujot ajua. tuesday quabina abmaba. wednesday quaku ekua. thursday quahu aba. friday kufi efua. saturday qamina ama. those ceremonials called on the coast "customs" are the things that show off the fetish-man at the best in more senses of the word than one. we will take the yam custom. the intentions of these yam customs are twofold--firstly they are a thanksgiving to the fetishes for allowing their people to live to see the new yams, and for the new yams, but they are also institutions to prevent the general public eating the new yam before it's ready. the idea is, and no doubt rightly, that unripe yams are unwholesome, and the law is that no new yams must be eaten until the yam custom is made. the fetish-men settle when the yams are in a fit state to pass into circulation, and then make the custom. it generally occurs at the end of august, but is sometimes kept back until the beginning of september. in fantee all the inhabitants of the towns assemble under the shade of the grove adjoining the fetish hut, and a sheep and a number of fowls are killed, part of their flesh is mixed with boiled yams and palm-oil, and a portion of this mixture is placed on the heads of the images, and the remainder is thrown about before the fetish hut as a peace-offering to the deities. at winnebah, on the gold coast, there is an interesting modification in the yam custom. the principal fetish of that place, it is believed, will not be satisfied with a sheep, but he must have a deer brought alive to his temple, and there sacrificed. accordingly on the appointed day every year when the custom is to be celebrated, almost all the inhabitants except the aged and infirm go into the adjoining country--an open park-like country, studded with clumps of trees. the women and children look on, give good advice, and shriek when necessary, while the men beat the bush with sticks, beat tom-toms, and halloo with all their might. while thus engaged, my correspondent remarks in his staid way, "sometimes a leopard starts forth, but it is usually so frightened with the noise and confusion that it scampers off in one direction as fast as the people run from it in another. when a deer is driven out, the chase begins, the people try to run it down, flinging sticks at its legs. at last it is secured and carried exultingly to the town with shoutings and drummings. on entering the town they are met by the aged people carrying staves, and, having gone in procession round the town, they proceed to the fetish house, where the animal is sacrificed, and partly offered to the fetish, partly eaten by the priests." these yam customs are at their fullest in the benin bights, but you get a custom made for the new yam in all the districts lower down. these customs have long been credited with being stained by human sacrifices. not altogether unjustly. you can always read human sacrifice for goats and fowls when you are considering a district inhabited by true negroes, and the occasion is an important one, because in west africa a human sacrifice is the most persuasive one to the fetishes. it is just with them as with a chief--if you want to get some favour from him you must give him a present. a fowl or a goat or a basket of vegetables, or anything like that is quite enough for most favours, but if you want a big thing, and want it badly, you had better give him a slave, because the slave is alike more intrinsically valuable and also more useful. so far as i know, all human beings sacrificed pass into the service of the fetish they are sacrificed to. they are not merely killed that he may enjoy their blood, but that he may have their assistance. fetishes have much to do, and an extra pair of hands is to them always acceptable. as for the importance of these harvest customs to the general system of fetish, i think in west africa it is small. the goings on, the licentiousness and general jollification that accompany them, upsetting law and order for days, give them a fallacious look of importance; but i think far more really near the heart of the fetish thought-form is the lonely man who steals at night into the forest to gain from sasabonsom a charm, and the woman who, on her way back from market, throws down before the fetish houses she passes a scrap of her purchases; compared to the cult of the law-god, well, yam customs are dirty water price, palaver, and insignificant politically. i have dealt here with fetish as far as the position of the human being is concerned, because this phase may make it more comprehensible to my fellow white men who regard the human being as the main thing in the created universe, but i must beg you to remember that this idea of the importance of the human race is not held by the african. the individual is supremely important to himself, and he values his friends and relations and so on, but abstract affection for humanity at large or belief in the sanctity of the lives of people with whom he is unrelated and unacquainted, the african barely possesses. he is only capable of feeling this abstract affection when under the influence of one of the great revealed religions which place the human being higher in the scale of creation. this comes from no cruelty of mind _per se_, but is the result of the hardness of the fight he has to fight against the world; and possessing this view of the equal, if not greater importance of many of the things he sees round him, the african conceives these things also have their fetish--a fetish on the same ground idea, but varying from human fetish. the politics of mungo mah lobeh, the mountain, with the rest of nature, he believes to exist. the alemba rapid has its affairs clearly, but the private matters of these very great people are things the human being had better keep out of; and it is advisable for him to turn his attention to making terms with them and go into their presence with his petition when their own affairs are prosperous, when their tempers are not as it were up over some private ultra-human affair of their own. i well remember the opinions expressed by my companions regarding the folly--mine, of course--of obtruding ourselves on mungo when that noble mountain was vexed too much, and the opinion expressed by an efik friend in a tornado that came down on us. well, there you have this difference. i instinctively say "us." she did not think we were objects of interest to the tornado or the forest it was scourging. she took it they had a sort of family row on, and we might get hit with the bits, therefore it was highly unfortunate that we were present at the meeting. again, it is the same with the surf. the boat-boys see it's in a nasty temper, they keep out of it, it may be better to-morrow, then it will tolerate them, for it has no real palaver with them individually. of course you can go and upset the temper of big nature spirits, but when you are not there they have their own affairs. hence it comes that we have in fetish a religion in which its believers do not hold that devotion to religion constitutes virtue. the ordinary citizen is held to be most virtuous who is least mixed up in religious affairs. he can attain virtue, the love and honour of his fellow-men, by being a good husband and father, an honest man in trade, a just man in the palaver-house, and he must, for the protection of his interests, that is to say, not only his individual well-being, but the well-being of those dependent on him, go in to a certain extent for religious practices. he must associate with spirits because spirits are in all things and everywhere and over everything; and the good citizen deals with the other spirits as he deals with that class of spirits we call human beings; he does not cheat the big ones of their dues; he spills a portion of his rum to them; he gives them their white calicoes; he treats his slave spirits honourably, and he uses his slave spirits for no bad purpose, and if any great grief falls on him he calls on the great over-lord of gods, mentioning these things. but men are not all private citizens; there are men whose destiny puts them in high places--men who are not only house fathers but who are tribe fathers. they, to protect and further the interests of those under them, must venture greatly and further, and deal with more powerful spirits, as it were, their social equals in spiritdom. these good chiefs in their higher grade dealings preserve the same clean-handed conduct. and besides these there are those men, the fetish men, who devote their lives to combating evil actions through witches and miscellaneous spirits who prey on mankind. these men have to make themselves important to important spirits. it is risky work for them, for spirits are a risky set to deal with. up here in london, when i have to deal with a spirit as manifest in the form of an opinion, or any big mind-form incarnate in one man, or in thousands, i often think of an african friend of mine who had troubles, and i think sympathetically, for his brother explained the affair to me. he was an educated man. "you see," he said, "my brother's got a strong ju ju, but it's a damned rocky ju ju to get on with." footnotes: [ ] july, , p. . [ ] _travels in west africa._ (macmillan, , p. .) chapter viii african medicine mainly from the point of view of the native apothecary, to which is added some account of the sleep disease and the malignant melancholy. there is, as is in all things west african, a great deal of fetish ceremonial mixed up with west african medical methods. underlying them throughout there is the fetish form of thought; but it is erroneous to believe that all west african native doctors are witch doctors, because they are not. one of my efik friends, for example, would no more think of calling in a witch doctor for a simple case of rheumatism than you would think of calling in a curate or a barrister; he would just call in the equivalent to our general practitioner, the abiabok. if he grew worse instead of better, he would then call in his equivalent to our consulting physician, the witch doctor, the abiadiong. but if he started being ill with something exhibiting cerebral symptoms he would have in the witch doctor at once. this arises from the ground principle of all west african physic. everything works by spirit on spirit, therefore the spirit of the medicine works on the spirit of the disease. certain diseases are combatable by certain spirits in certain herbs. other diseases are caused by spirits not amenable to herb-dwelling spirits; they must be tackled by spirits of a more powerful grade. the witch doctor who belongs to the school of nkissism will become more profound on this matter still, and will tell you all herbs, indeed everything that comes out of the earth, have in them some of the power of the earth, nkissi nisi; but the general view is the less concrete one--that it is a matter of only certain herbs having power. this i have been told over and over again in various west coast tongues by various west african physicians, and in it lies the key to their treatment of disease--a key without which many of their methods are incomprehensible, but which shows up most clearly in the methods of the witch doctor himself. in the practice of the general practitioner, or, more properly speaking, the apothecary, it is merely a theory, just as a village chemist here may prescribe blue pill without worrying himself about its therapeutic action from a scientific point of view. before i pass on to the great witch doctor, the physician, i must detain you with a brief account of the neglected-by-traveller-because-less-showy african village apothecary, a really worthy person, who exists in every west african district i know of; often, as in the calabar and bonny region, a doctor whose practice extends over a fair-sized district, wherein he travels from village to village. if he comes across a case, he sits down and does his best with it, may be for a fortnight or a month at a time, and when he has finished with it and got his fee, off he goes again. big towns, of course, have a resident apothecary, but i never came across a town that had two apothecaries. it may be professional etiquette, but, though i never like to think evil of the profession whatever colour its complexion may be, it may somehow be connected with a knowledge of the properties of herbs, for i observed when at corisco that an apothecary from the mainland who was over there for a visit shrank from dining with the local medico. these apothecaries are, as aforesaid, learned in the properties of herbs, and they are the surgeons, in so far as surgery is ventured on. a witch doctor would not dream of performing an operation. amongst these apothecaries there are lady doctors, who, though a bit dangerous in pharmacy, yet, as they do not venture on surgery, are, on the whole, safer than their _confrères_, for african surgery is heroic. many of the apothecaries' medical methods are fairly sound, however. the dualla practitioner is truly great on poultices for extracting foreign substances from wounds, such as bits of old iron cooking pot, a very frequent foreign substance for a man to get into him in west africa, owing to pots being broken up and used as bullets. almost incredible stories are told by black men and white in cameroons concerning the efficiency of these poultices; one i heard from a very reliable white authority there of a man who had been shot with bits of iron pot in the thigh. the white doctor extracted several pieces, and declared he had got them all out; but the man went on suffering and could not walk, so finally a country doctor was called in, and he applied his poultice. in a few minutes he removed it, and on its face lay two pieces of iron pot. the white doctor said they had been in the poultice all the time, but he did not carry public opinion with him, for the patient recovered rapidly. the negroes do not seem to me to go in for baths in medical treatment quite so much as the bantu; they hold more with making many little incisions in the skin round a swollen joint, then encasing it with clay and keeping a carefully tended fire going under it. but the bantu is given greatly to baths, accompanied by massage, particularly in the treatment of that great west african affliction, rheumatism. the mpongwe make a bath for the treatment of this disease by digging a suitably sized hole in the ground and putting into it seven herbs--whereof i know the native names only, not the scientific--and in addition in go cardamoms and peppers. boiling water is then plentifully poured over these, and the patient is laid on and covered with the parboiled green stuff. next a framework of twigs is placed over him, and he is hastily clayed up to keep the steam in, only his head remaining above ground. in this bath he is sometimes kept a few hours, sometimes a day and a half. he is liable to give the traveller who may happen suddenly on him while under treatment the idea that he is an atrocity; but he is not; and when he is taken out of the bath-poultice he is rubbed and kneaded all over, plenty more hot water being used in the process, this indeed being the palladium of west coast physic. the fjort tribe do not bury their rheumatic patients until they are dead and all their debts paid, but they employ the vapour bath. my friend, mr. r. e. dennet, who has for the past eighteen years lived amongst the fjort, and knows them as no other white man does, and knows also my insatiable thirst for any form of west african information, has kindly sent me some details of fjort medical methods, which i give in his own words--"the fjort have names for many diseases; aches are generally described as _tanta ki tanta_; they say the head suffers _ntu tanta ki tanta_, the chest suffers _mtima tanta ki tanta_, and so on. rheumatism that keeps to the joints of the bones and cripples the sufferer is called _ngoyo_, while ordinary rheumatism is called _macongo_. they generally try to cure this disease by giving the sufferers vapour baths. they put the leaves of the _nvuka_ into a pot of boiling water, and place the pot between the legs of the patient, who is made to sit up. they then cover up the patient and the pot with coverings. "they try to relieve the local pain by spluttering the affected part with chalk, pepper, and logwood, and the leaves of certain plants that have the power of blistering. "small-pox they try to cure by smearing the body of the patient over with the pulped leaves of the mzeuzil. palm oil is also used. these patients are taken to the woods, where a hut is built for them, or not, according to the wealth and desire of their relations. if poor they are often allowed to die of starvation. a kind of long thin worm that creeps about under the eyelid is called _loyia_, and is skilfully extracted by many of the natives by means of a needle or piece of wood cut to a sharp point. "blind boils they call _fvuma_, and they cure them by splintering over them the pulped root _nchechi_, mixed with red and white earth. leprosy they call _boisi_, ague _chiosi_, matter from the ear _mafina_, rupture _sangafulla_. but diseases of the lungs, heart, liver, and spleen seem to puzzle the native leeches and many natives die from these terrible ills. cupping and bleeding, which they do with the hollow horns of the goat and the sharpened horn of a kid, are the remedies usually resorted to. "all persons are supposed to have the power to give their enemies these different sicknesses. amulets, frontlets, bracelets, and waistbands charged with medicines are also used as either charms or cures. "a woman who was stung by a scorpion went nearly mad, and, rushing into the river, tried to drown herself. i tried my best to calm her and cure her by the application of a few simple remedies, but she kept us awake all night, and we had to hold her down nearly the whole time. i called in a native surgeon to see if he could do anything, and he spluttered some medicine over her, and, placing himself opposite to her, shouted at her and the evil spirit that was in her. she became calmer, and the surgeon left us. as i was afraid of a relapse, i sent the woman to be cured in a town close by. the princess of the town picked out the sting of the scorpion with a needle, and gave the woman some herbs, which acted as a strong purge, and cured her. as the nganga bilongo (apothecary) is busy curing the patient, he generally has a white fowl tied to a string fastened to a peg in the ground close to him. i have described this in _seven years among the fjort_." i think this communication of mr. dennett's is of much interest, and i hastily beg to remark that, if you have not got a devoted friend to hold you down all night, call in an apothecary in the morning time, and then hand you over to a princess--things that are not always handy even in west africa when you have been stung by a scorpion--things that, on the other hand, are always handy in west africa--carbonate of soda applied promptly to the affected part will save you from wanting to drown yourself and much other inconvenience. the sting should be extracted regardless of the shedding of blood, carbonate of soda in hot water washed over the place, and then a poultice faced with carbonate of soda put on. although i do not say these west african doctors possess any specific for rheumatism, it is an undoubted fact that the south-west coast tribes, with their poultices and vapour baths, are very successful in treating it, more so than the true negroes, with their clay plaster and baking method. rheumatism is a disease the africans seem especially liable to, whatever may be the local climate, whether it be that of the reeking niger delta, or the dry delightful climate of cabinda; moreover, my friends who go whaling tell me the bermuda negroes also suffer from rheumatism severely, and are "a perfect cuss," wanting to come and sit in the blood and blubber of fresh-killed whales. small-pox is a vile scourge to africa. the common treatment is to smear the body of the patient with the pulped leaves of the mzeuzil palm and with palm oil; but i cannot say the method is successful, save in preventing pitting, which it certainly does. the mortality from this disease, particularly among the south-west coast tribes, is simply appalling. but it is extremely difficult to make the bush african realise that it is infectious, for he regards it as a curse from a great nature spirit, sent in consequence of some sin, such as a man marrying within the restricted degree, or something of that kind. mr. dennett mentions small-pox patients being sent into the bush with more or less accommodation provided. mr. du chaillu gave mr. fraser the idea that the bakele tribe habitually drove their small-pox sick into the bush and neglected them, which certainly, from my knowledge of the tribe, i must say is not their constant habit by any means. i venture to think that this rough attempt at isolation among the fjort is a remnant of the influence of the great portuguese domination of the kingdom of congo in the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries, when the roman catholic missionaries got hold of the fjort as no other west african has since been got hold of. nevertheless the keeping of the sick in huts you will find in almost all districts in places--_i.e._ round the house of a great doctor. my friend miss mary slessor, of okÿon, has the bush round her compound fairly studded with little temporary huts, each with a patient in. you see, distinguished doctors everywhere are a little uppish, and so their patients have to come to them. such doctors are usually specialists, noted for a cure of some particular disease, and often patients will come to such a man from towns and villages a week's journey or more away, and then build their little shantie near his residence, and remain there while undergoing the cure. there is a prevalent coast notion that white men do not catch small-pox from black, but i do not think this is, at any rate, completely true. i was informed when in loanda that during an epidemic of it amongst the natives, every white man had had a more or less severe touch, and i have known of cases of white men having small-pox in other west coast places, small-pox they must either have caught from natives or have made themselves, which is improbable. i fancy it is a matter connected with the vaccination state of the white, although there seem to be some diseases prevalent among natives from which whites are immune--the yaws, for example. less terrible in its ravages than small-pox, because it is far more limited in the number of its victims, is leprosy; still you will always find a case or so in a district. you will find the victims outcasts from society, not from a sense of its being an infectious disease, but because it is confounded with another disease, held to be a curse from an aggrieved nature spirit. there was at okÿon when i was there a leper who lived in a regular house of his own, not a temporary hospital hut, but a house with a plantation. he led a lonely life, having no wife or family or slave; he was himself a slave, but not called on for service--it was just a lonely life. people would drop in on him and chat, and so on, but he did not live in town. there was also another one there, who had his own people round him, and to whom people would send their slaves, because he was regarded as a good doctor; but he also had his house in the bush, and not in town. undoubtedly the diseases that play the greatest continuous havoc with black life in west africa are small-pox, divers forms of pneumonia, heart-disease, and tetanus, the latter being largely responsible for the terrible mortality among children; but the two west african native diseases most interesting to the european on account of their strangeness, are the malignant melancholy and the sleep sickness, and strangely enough both these diseases seem to have their head centre in one region--the lower congo. they occur elsewhere, but in this region they are constantly present, and now and again seem to take an epidemic form. regarding the first-named, i am still collecting information, for i cannot tell whether the malignant melancholy of the lower congo is one and the same with the hystero-hypochondria, the home-sickness of the true negro. in the lower congo i was informed that this malignant melancholy had the native name signifying throwing backwards, from its being the habit of the afflicted to throw themselves backwards into water when they attempted a drowning form of suicide.[ ] they do not, however, confine themselves to attempts to drown themselves only, but are equally given to hanging, the constant thing about all their attempts being a lack of enthusiasm about getting the thing definitely done: the patient seems to potter at it, not much caring whether he does successfully hang or drown himself or no, but just keeps on, as if he could not help doing it. this has probably given rise to the native method of treating this disease--namely, holding a meeting of the patient's responsible relations, who point out elaborately to him the advantages of life over death, and enquire of him his reasons for hankering after the latter. if in spite of these representations he persists in a course of habitual suicide, he is knocked on the head and thrown into the river; for it is a nuisance to have a person about who is continually hanging himself to the house ridge pole and pulling the roof half off, or requiring a course of sensational rescues from drowning. the sleep disease[ ] is also a strange thing. when i first arrived in africa in there had just been a dreadful epidemic of it in the kakongo and lower congo region, and i saw a good many cases, and became much interested in it, and have ever since been trying to gather further information regarding it. dr. patrick manson in his important paper[ ] states that it has never been known to affect any one who has not at one time or another been resident within this area, and observes on its distribution that "it seems probable that as our knowledge of africa extends, this disease will be found endemic here and there throughout the basins of the senegal, the niger, the congo, and their affluents. we have no information of its existence in the districts drained by the nile and the zambesi, nor anywhere on the eastern side of the continent." as far as my own knowledge goes the centres of this disease are the senegal and the congo. i never saw a case in the oil rivers, nor could i hear of any, though i made every inquiry; the cases i heard of from lagos and the oil rivers were among people who had been down as labourers, &c., to the congo. what is the reason of this i do not know, but certainly the people of the lower congo are much given to all kinds of diseases, far more so than those inhabiting the dense forest regions of congo français, or the much-abused mangrove swamps of the niger delta. dr. manson says, "the sleeping sickness has been attributed to such things as sunstroke, beriberi, malaria, poison, peculiar foods, such as raw bitter manioc, and diseased grain; it is evident, however, that none of these things explains all the facts." in regard to this i may say i have often heard it ascribed to the manioc when in kakongo, the idea being that when manioc was soaked in water surcharged with the poisonous extract, it had a bad effect. certainly in kakongo this was frequently the case in many districts where water was comparatively scarce. the pools used for soaking the root in stank, and the prepared root stank, in the peculiar way it can, something like sour paste, with a dash of acetic acid, and thereby the villages stank and the market-places ditto, in a way that could be of no use to any one except a person anxious to find his homestead in the dark; but dr. manson's suggestion is far more likely to be the correct one. against it i can only urge that in some districts where i am informed by my medical friends that _filaria perstans_ is very prevalent, such as calabar, the niger, and the ogowe, sleeping sickness is not prevalent. dr. manson says "the fact that the disease can be acquired only in a comparatively limited area, suggests that the cause is similarly limited; and the fact that the disease may develop years after the endemic area has been quitted, suggests that the cause is of such a nature that it may be carried away from the endemic area and remain latent, as regards its disease-producing qualities for a considerable period; even for years." he then goes on to say, "_filaria perstans_, so far as is known, is limited in its geographical distribution to western equatorial africa--that is to say, it can be acquired there only--and it may continue in active life for many years after its human host has left the country in which alone it can be acquired. we also know that similar entozoa in their wanderings in the tissues by accident of location, or by disease, or injury of their organs, not infrequently give rise to grave lesions in their hosts. i therefore suggest that possibly _filiaria perstans_ may in some way be responsible for the sleeping sickness. i know that this parasite is extremely common in certain sleeping sickness districts, and moreover, i have found it in the blood of a considerable number of cases of this disease--in six out of ten--including that described by mackenzie. there are many difficulties in the way of establishing this hypothesis, but there is a sufficient inherent probability about it to make it well worth following up." the most important statement that i have been able to get regarding it so far, has been one sent me by mr. r. e. dennett; who says "the sleeping sickness though prevalent throughout kakongo and loango is most common in the north of loango and the south of kakongo, that is north of the river quillou and among the mussorongo. "what the cause of the sickness is, it is hard to say, but it is one of those scourges which is ever with us. the natives say any one may get it, that it is not hereditary, and only infectious in certain stages. they avoid the _dejecta_ of affected persons, but they do not force the native to live in the bush as they do a person affected by small-pox. "pains in the head chiefly just above the nose are first experienced, and should these continue for a month or so it is to be expected that the disease is _madotchila_, or the first stage of the sleeping sickness. "in the word _madotchila_ we have the idea of a state of being poisoned or bewitched. at this stage the sickness is curable, but as the sick man will never admit that he has the sickness and will suffer excruciating pain rather than complain, and as it is criminal to suggest to the invalid or others that he is suffering from the dreadful disease, it often happens that it gets great hold of the afflicted and from time to time he falls down overcome by drowsiness. "then he swells up and has the appearance of one suffering from dropsy, and this stage of the disease is called _malazi_, literally meaning thousands (_kulazi_ = one thousand, the verb _koula_ to become great and _zi_ the productive fly.) "this appears to be the acute stage of the disease and death often occurs within eight days from the beginning of the swelling. "then comes the stage _ntolotolo_, meaning sleep or mock death. "the next stage is called _tchela nxela nbela_, that is the knife cutting stage, referring to the operation of bleeding as part of the cure; and the last stage of the disease is called _nlemba ngombo_. _lemba_ means to cease. the rites of _lemba_ are those which refer to the marriage of a woman who swears to die with her husband or rather to cease to live at the same time as he does. _ngombo_ is the name of the native grass cloth in which, before the _nlele_ or cotton cloth of the white man appeared, the dead were wrapped previous to burial. thus in the name _nlemba ngombo_ we have the meaning of marriage to the deathly winding sheet or shroud. "i remember how poor sanda (a favourite servant of mr. dennett's, a mussorong boy) was taken sick with pains in his head which i at first mistook for simple headache. as he was of great service to me i kept him in the factory instead of sending him to town (the custom with invalids in kakongo is that they should go to their town to be doctored). i purged him and gave him strong and continued doses of quinine and he got better; but from time to time he suffered from recurring headache and drowsiness, and on one occasion when i was vexed at finding him asleep and suspecting him of dissipation, was going to punish him, i was informed by another servant that the poor fellow was suffering from the sleeping sickness. i at once sent him to town with sufficient goods to pay his doctor's bill, and his relations did all in their power to have him properly cured, taking him many miles to visit certain ngangas famed for the cure of this fell disease. "he came back to me well and happy. the next year however, the malady returned, and he went to town and gradually wasted away. they told me that sores upon one of his arms had caused him to lose a hand, which he lived to see buried before him. sanda was of royal blood, so his body was taken across from the north bank to san antonio or sonio, on the south bank of the congo, and there he was buried with his fathers. "another sad case was that of a woman who lived in the factory. "as a child, it appeared afterwards, she had suffered from the disease, and had been cured by the good french doctor then resident in landana (dr. lucan). i knew nothing of this at the time, and put her sickness down to drink, but got a doctor to see her. he could not make out what was the matter, but thought it might possibly be some nervous disease; altogether we were completely puzzled. "on one occasion during my absence she nearly tortured one of her children to death by stabbing her with a needle. on my return, and when i heard what she had done, i was very angry with her, and turned her out of the factory, and shortly afterwards the poor creature died in the swelling state of the disease. "joaõ (a more or less civilised native) tells me that one of his wives was cured of this sleeping sickness. she was living with him in a white man's factory when she had it, and on one occasion fell upon a demijohn and cut her back open rather seriously--the white man cured her so far as the wound was concerned. a native doctor, a nganga or kakamucka, later on cured the sleeping sickness. he first gave her an emetic, then each day he gave her a kind of turkish bath; that is, having boiled certain herbs in water, he placed her within the boiling decoction under a covering of cloth, making her perspire freely. towards nightfall he poured some medicine up her nostrils and into her eyes, so that in the morning when she awoke, her eyes and nose were full of matter; at the same time he cupped and bled her in the locality of the pain in the head. what the medicines were i cannot say, neither will the nganga tell any one save the man he means shall succeed him in his office. "the native doctors appear to know when the disease has become incurable and the life of the patient is merely a question of a few days, for once while i was at chemongoanleo, on the lower congo i heard the village carpenter hammering nails into planks, and asked my servant what they were doing. 'building buite's coffin,' he said. 'what, is he dead?' said i. 'no, but he must die soon,' he answered. this statement was confirmed by the relations of buite who came to me for rum as my share towards his funeral expenses. imagine my feelings when shortly after this buite, swollen out of all likeness to his former self, crawled along to the shop and asked me for a gallon of rum to help him pay his doctor's bill. "a doctor of the congo free state began to take an interest in the sickness and asked me to persuade some one suffering from the disease to come and place himself under his care, promising that he would have a place apart made for him at the station, so that he could study the sickness and try to cure the poor fellow. after a good deal of trouble i got him a patient willing to remain with him, but owing to some red tape difficulty as to the supply of food for the sick man this doctor's good intentions came to nought. a portuguese doctor here also gave his serious attention to the sleeping sickness, and it was reported that he had found a cure for it in some part of a fresh billy-goat. this good man wanted a special hospital to be built for him and a subsidy so that he might devote himself to the task he had undertaken. his government, however, although its hospitals are far in advance of those of its neighbours on the coast, could not see its way to erect such a place." all i need add to this is that i was informed that the disease when it had once definitely set in ran its fatal course in a year, but that when it came as an epidemic it was more rapidly fatal, sometimes only a matter of a few weeks, and it was this more acute form that was accompanied by wild delirium. another native informant told me when it was bad it usually lasted only from twenty to forty days. monteiro says the sleep disease was unknown south of the congo until it suddenly attacked the town of musserra, where he was told by the natives as many as died of it in a few months. this was in , and curious to say it did not spread to the neighbouring towns. monteiro induced the natives to remove from the old town and the mortality decreased till the disease died out. "there was nothing in the old town to account for this sudden singular epidemic. it was beautifully clean and well-built on high dry ground, surrounded by mandioca plantations, the last place to all appearance to expect such a curious outbreak."[ ] monteiro also observes that "there is no cure known for it," but he is speaking for angola, and i think this strengthens his statement that it is a comparatively recent importation there. for certainly there are cures, if not known, at any rate believed in, for the sleeping sickness in its own home kakongo and loango. there is a great difference in the diseases, flora and fauna, of the north and south banks of the congo--whether owing to the difficulty of crossing the terrifically rapid and powerful stream of the great river i do not know. still there was--more in former times than now--much intercourse between the natives of the two banks when the portuguese discovered the congo in . the town called now san antonio was the throne town of the kingdom of kongo, and had nominally as provinces the two districts kakongo and loango, these provinces that are now the head centres of the sleep disease. yet in the early accounts given of kongo by the catholic missionaries, who lived in kongo among the natives, i have so far found no mention of the sleep disease. it is impossible to believe that merolla, for example, could have avoided mentioning it if he had seen or heard of it. merolla's style of giving information was, like my own, diffuse. certainly we must remember that these catholic missionaries were not much in loango and kakongo as those provinces had broken almost entirely away from the kongo throne prior to the portuguese arrival, so perhaps all we can safely say is that in the - th centuries there was no sleep disease in the districts on the south bank of the congo, and it was not anything like so notoriously bad in the districts on the north bank. before quitting the apothecary part of this affair, i may just remark that if you, being white, of a nervous disposition, and merely in possession of an ordinary amount of medical knowledge, find yourself called in to doctor an african friend or acquaintance, you must be careful about hot poultices. i should say, _never_ prescribe hot poultices. an esteemed medical friend, since dead, told me that when he first commenced practice in west africa he said to a civilised native who was looking after his brother--the patient--"give him a linseed poultice made like this"--demonstration--"and mind he has it hot." the man came back shortly afterwards to say his brother had been very sick, but was no better, though every bit of the stuff had been swallowed so hot it had burnt his mouth. but swallowing the poultice is a minor danger to its exhibition. even if you yourself see it put on outside, carefully, exactly where that poultice ought to be, the moment your back is turned the patient feeling hot gets into the most awful draught he can find, or into cold water, and the consequences are inflammation of the lungs and death, and you get the credit of it. the natives themselves you will find are very clever at doctoring in their own way, by no means entirely depending on magic and spells; and you will also find they have a strong predilection for blisters, cupping and bleeding, hot water and emetics; in all their ailments and on the whole it suits them very well. therefore i pray you add your medical knowledge and your special drugs to theirs and for outside applications stick to blisters in place of hot poultices. footnotes: [ ] an experienced medical man from west africa informs me that he considers the africans very liable to hysterical disease, and he attributes the throwing backwards to the patient's desire not to spoil his or her face, a thing ladies are especially careful of, and says that turning a lady face downwards on the sand is as efficacious in breaking up the hysterical fit as throwing water over their clothes is with us. [ ] negro lethargy; maladie du sommeil; enfermedad del sueno; nelavane (oulof); dadane (sereres); toruahebue (mendi); ntolo (fjort). [ ] _system of medicine._ volume ii. edited by dr. clifford allbutt. macmillan & co., . [ ] _angola and the river congo._ macmillan. vol. i., p. . chapter ix the witch doctor african medicine mainly from the point of view of the witch doctor. we will now leave the village apothecary and his methods, and turn to the witch doctor, the consulting physician. he of course knows all about the therapeutic action of low-grade spirits, such as dwell in herbs and so on; but he knows more--namely the actions of higher spirits on the human soul, and the disorders of the human soul into the bargain. the dogma that rules his practice is that in all cases of disease in which no blood is showing, the patient is suffering from something wrong in the soul. in order to lay this dogma fairly before you, i should here discourse on the nature of spirits unallied to the human soul--non-human spirits--and the nature of the human spirit itself; but as on the one hand, i cannot be hasty on such an important group of subjects, and, on the other, i cannot expect you to be anything else in such a matter, i forbear, and merely beg to remark that the african does not believe in anything being soulless, he regards even matter itself as a form of soul, low, because not lively, a thing other spirit forms use as they please--practically as the cloth of the spirit that uses it. this conception is, as far as i know, constant in both negro and bantu. i will therefore here deal only with what the african regards as merely one class of spirits--an important class truly, but above it there are at least two more important classes, while beneath it in grade there are, i think, about eleven, and equal to it, but differing in nature, several classes--i don't exactly know how many. this class of spirits is the human soul--the _kla_ of the true negro, the _manu_ of the bantu. these human souls are also of different grades, for one sort is believed to be existent before birth, as well as during life and after death, while other classes are not. there is more interesting stuff here, but i am determined to stick to my main point now--the medical. well, the number of souls possessed by each individual we call a human being is usually held to be four--( ) the soul that survives, ( ) the soul that lives in an animal away wild in the bush, ( ) the shadow cast by the body, ( ) the soul that acts in dreams. i believe that the more profound black thinkers hold that these last-named souls are only functions of the true soul, but from the witch doctor's point of view there are four, and he acts on this opinion when doctoring the diseases that afflict these souls of a man. the dream-soul is the cause of woes unnumbered to our african friend, and the thing that most frequently converts him into that desirable state, from a witch doctor's point of view of a patient. it is this way. the dream-soul is, to put it very mildly, a silly flighty thing. off it goes when its owner is taking a nap, and gets so taken up with sky-larking, fighting, or gossiping with other dream-souls that sometimes it does not come home to its owner when he is waking up. so, if any one has to wake a man up great care must always be taken that it is done softly--softly, namely gradually and quietly, so as to give the dream-soul time to come home. for if either of the four souls of a man have their intercommunication broken, the human being possessing them gets very ill. we will take an example. a man has been suddenly roused by some cause or other before that dream-soul has had time to get into quarters. that human being feels very ill, and sends for the witch doctor. the medical man diagnoses the case as one of absence of dream-soul, instantly claps a cloth over the mouth and nose, and gets his assistant to hold it there until the patient gets hard on suffocated; but no matter, it's the proper course of treatment to pursue. the witch doctor himself gets ready as rapidly as possible another dream-soul, which if he is a careful medical man, he has brought with him in a basket. then the patient is laid on his back and the cloths removed from the mouth and nose, and the witch doctor holds over them his hands containing the fresh soul, blowing hard at it so as to get it well into the patient. if this is successfully accomplished, the patient recovers. occasionally, however, this fresh soul slips through the medical man's fingers, and before you can say "knife" is on top of some -feet-high or more silk cotton tree, where it chirrups gaily and distinctly. this is a great nuisance. the patient has to be promptly covered up again. if the doctor has an assistant with him, that unfortunate individual has to go up the tree and catch the dream-soul. if he has no assistant, he has to send his power up the tree after the truant; doctors who are in full practice have generally passed the time of life when climbing up trees personally is agreeable. when, however, the thing has been re-captured and a second attempt to insert it is about to be made, it is held advisable to get the patient's friends and relatives to stand round him in a ring and howl lustily, while your assistant also howling lustily, but in a professional manner, beats a drum. this prevents the soul from bolting again, and tends to frighten it into the patient. in some obstinate cases of loss of dream-soul, however, the most experienced medical man will fail to get the fresh soul inserted. it clings to his fingers, it whisks back into the basket or into his hair or clothes, and it chirrups dismally, and the patient becomes convulsed. this is a grave symptom, but the diagnosis is quite clear. the patient has got a _sisa_ in him, so there is no room for the fresh soul. now, a _sisa_ is a dreadful bad thing for a man to have in him, and an expensive thing to get out. it is the surviving soul of a person who has not been properly buried--not had his devil made, in fact. and as every human surviving soul has a certain allotted time of existence in a human body before it can learn the dark and difficult way down to srahmandazi, if by mischance the body gets killed off before the time is up, that soul, unless properly buried and sent on the way to srahmandazi, or any other hades, under expert instruction given as to the path for the dead, becomes a _sisa_, and has to hang about for the remaining years of its term of bodily life. these _ensisa_ are held to be so wretchedly uncomfortable in this state that their tempers become perfect wrecks, and they grow utterly malignant, continually trying to get into a human body, so as to finish their term more comfortably. now, a _sisa's_ chief chance of getting into a body is in whipping in when there is a hole in a man's soul chamber, from the absence of his own dream-soul. if a _sisa_ were a quiet, respectable soul that would settle down, it would not matter much, for the dream-soul it supplants is not of much account. but a _sisa_ is not. at the best, it would only live out its remaining term, and then go off the moment that term was up, and most likely kill the souls it had been sheltering with by bolting at an inconvenient moment. this was the verdict given on the death of a man i knew who, from what you would call faintness, fell down in a swamp and was suffocated. inconvenient as this is, the far greater danger you are exposed to by having a _sisa_ in you lies in the chances being to that it is stained with blood, for, without being hard on these unfortunate unburied souls, i may remark that respectable souls usually get respectably buried, and so don't become _ensisa_. this blood which is upon it the devils that are around smell and go for, as is the nature of devils; and these devils whip in after the _sisa_ soul into his host in squads, and the man with such a set inside him is naturally very ill--convulsions, delirium, high temperature, &c., and the indications to your true witch doctor are that that _sisa_ must be extracted before a new dream-soul can be inserted and the man recover. but getting out a _sisa_ is a most trying operation. not only does it necessitate a witch doctor sending in his power to fetch it _vi et armis_, it also places the medical man in a position of grave responsibility regarding its disposal when secured. the methods he employs to meet this may be regarded as akin to those of antiseptic surgery. all the people in the village, particularly babies and old people--people whose souls are delicate--must be kept awake during the operation, and have a piece of cloth over the nose and mouth, and every one must howl so as to scare the _sisa_ off them, if by mischance it should escape from the witch doctor. an efficient practitioner, i may remark, thinks it a great disgrace to allow a _sisa_ to escape from him; and such an accident would be a grave blow to his practice, for people would not care to call in a man who was liable to have this occur. however, our present medical man having got the _sisa_ out, he has still to deal with the question of its disposal before he can do anything more. the assistant blows a new dream soul into the patient, and his women see to him; but the witch doctor just holds on to the _sisa_ like a bulldog. sometimes the disposal of the _sisa_ has been decided on prior to its extraction. if the patient's family are sufficiently well off, they agree to pay the doctor enough to enable him to teach the _sisa_ the way to hades. indeed, this is the course respectable medical men always insist on although it is expensive to the patient's family. but there are, i regret to say, a good many unprincipled witch doctors about who will undertake a case cheap. they will carry off with them the extracted _sisa_ for a small fee, then shortly afterwards a baby in the village goes off in tetanic convulsions. no one takes much notice of that, because it's a way babies have. soon another baby is born in the same family--polygamy being prevalent, the event may occur after a short interval--well, after giving the usual anxiety and expense, that baby goes off in convulsions. suspicion is aroused. presently yet another baby appears in the family, keeps all right for a week may be, and then also goes off in convulsions. suspicions are confirmed. the worm--the father, i mean--turns, and he takes the body of that third baby and smashes one of its leg bones before it is thrown away into the bush; for he knows he has got a wanderer soul--namely, a _sisa_, which some unprincipled practitioner has sent into his family. he just breaks the leg so as to warn the soul he is not a man to be trifled with, and will not have his family kept in a state of perpetual uproar and expense. it sometimes happens, however, in spite of this that, when his fourth baby arrives, that too goes off in convulsions. thoroughly roused now, paterfamilias sternly takes a chopper and chops that infant's remains up extremely small, and it is scattered broadcast. then he holds he has eliminated that _sisa_ from his family finally. i am informed, however, that the fourth baby to arrive in a family afflicted by a _sisa_ does not usually go off in convulsions, but that fairly frequently it is born lame, which shows that it is that wanderer soul back with its damaged leg. it is not treated unkindly but not taken much care of, and so rarely lives many years--from the fetish point of view, of course, only those years remaining of its term of bodily life out of which some witchcraft of man or some vengeance of a god cheated it. if i mention the facts that when a man wakes up in the morning feeling very stiff and with "that tired feeling" you see mentioned in advertisements in the newspapers, he holds that it arises from his own dream-soul having been out fighting and got itself bruised; and that if he wakes up in a fright, he will jump up and fire off his gun, holding that a pack of rag tag devils have been chasing his soul home and wishing to scare them off, i think i may leave the complaints of the dream-soul connected with physic and pass on to those connected with surgery. now, devoted as i am to my west african friends, i am bound in the interests of truth to say that many of them are sadly unprincipled. there are many witches, not witch doctors, remember, who make it a constant practice to set traps for dream-souls. witches you will find from sierra leone to cameroons, but they are extra prevalent on the gold coast and in calabar. these traps are usually pots containing something attractive to the soul, and in this bait are concealed knives or fish-hooks--fish-hooks when the witch wants to catch the soul to keep, knives when the desire is just to injure it. in the case of the lacerated dream-soul, when it returns to its owner, it makes him feel very unwell; but the symptoms are quite different from those arising from loss of dream-soul or from a _sisa_. the reason for catching dream-souls with hooks is usually a low mercenary one. you see, many patients insist on having their own dream-soul put back into them--they don't want a substitute from the doctor's store--so of course the soul has to be bought from the witch who has got it. sometimes, however, the witch is the hireling of some one intent on injuring a particular person and keen on capturing the soul for this purpose, though too frightened to kill his enemy outright. so the soul is not only caught and kept, but tortured, hung up over the canoe fire and so on, and thus, even if the patient has another dream-soul put in, so long as his original soul is in the hands of a torturer, he is uncomfortable. on one occasion, for example, i heard one of the kru boys who were with me making more row in his sleep, more resounding slaps and snores and grunts than even a normal kru boy does, and, resolving in my mind that what that young man really required was one of my pet pills, i went to see him. i found him asleep under a thick blanket and with a handkerchief tied over his face. it was a hot night, and the man and his blanket were as wet with sweat as if they had been dragged through a river. i suggested to head-man that the handkerchief muzzle should come off, and was informed by him that for several nights previously the man had dreamt of that savoury dish, crawfish seasoned with red pepper. he had become anxious, and consulted the head-man, who decided that undoubtedly some witch was setting a trap for his dream-soul with this bait, with intent, &c. care was now being taken to, as it were, keep the dream-soul at home. i of course did not interfere and the patient completely recovered. we will now pass on to diseases arising from disorders in the other three souls of a man. the immortal or surviving soul is liable to a disease that its body suffered from during its previous time on earth, born again with it. such diseases are quite incurable, and i only personally know of them in the calabar and niger delta, where reincarnation is strongly believed in. then come the diseases that arise from injury to the shadow-soul. it strikes one as strange at first to see men who have been walking, say, through forest or grass land on a blazing hot morning quite happily, on arrival at a piece of clear ground or a village square, most carefully go round it, not across, and you will soon notice that they only do this at noontime, and learn that they fear losing their shadow. i asked some bakwiri i once came across who were particularly careful in this matter why they were not anxious about losing their shadows when night came down and they disappeared in the surrounding darkness, and was told that that was all right, because at night all shadows lay down in the shadow of the great god, and so got stronger. had i not seen how strong and long a shadow, be it of man or tree or of the great mountain itself, was in the early morning time? ah me! i said, the proverb is true that says the turtle can teach the spider. i never thought of that. murders are sometimes committed by secretly driving a nail or knife into a man's shadow, and so on; but if the murderer be caught red-handed at it, he or she would be forthwith killed, for all diseases arising from the shadow-soul are incurable. no man's shadow is like that of his own brother, says the proverb. now we come to that very grave class of diseases which arise from disorders of the bush-soul. these diseases are not all incurable, nevertheless they are very intractable and expensive to cure. this bush-soul is, as i have said, resident in some wild animal in the forest. it may be in only an earth pig, or it may be in a leopard, and, quite providentially for the medical profession no layman can see his own soul--it is not as if it were connected with all earth pigs, or all leopards, as the case may be, but it is in one particular earth pig or leopard or other animal--so recourse must be had to medical aid when anything goes wrong with it. it is usually in the temper that the bush-soul suffers. it is liable to get a sort of aggrieved neglected feeling, and want things given it. when you wander about the wild gloomy forests of the calabar region, you will now and again come across, far away from all human habitation or plantation, tiny huts, under whose shelter lies some offering or its remains. those are offerings administered by direction of a witch doctor to appease a bush-soul. for not only can a witch doctor see what particular animal a man's bush-soul is in, but he can also see whereabouts in the forest that animal is. still, these bush-souls are not easily appeased. the worst of it is that a man may be himself a quiet steady man, careful of his diet and devoted to a whole skin, and yet his bush-soul be a reckless blade, scorning danger, and thereby getting itself shot by some hunter or killed in a trap or pit; and if his bush-soul dies, the man it is connected with dies. therefore if the hunter who has killed it can be found out--a thing a witch doctor cannot do unless he happens by chance to have had his professional eye on that bush-soul at the time of the catastrophe; because, as it were, at death the bush-soul ceases to exist--that hunter has to pay compensation to the family of the deceased. on the other hand, if the man belonging to the bush-soul dies, the bush-soul animal has to die too. it rushes to and fro in the forest--"can no longer find a good place." if it sees a fire, it rushes into that; if it sees a lot of hunters, it rushes among them--anyhow, it gets itself killed off. we will now turn our attention to that other great division of diseases--namely such as are caused only and directly by human agency. those i have already detained you too long over are caused by spirits acting on their own account, for even in the case of the trapped dream-souls they are held themselves to have shown contributory negligence in getting hooked or cut in traps. the others arise from what is called witchcraft. you will often hear it said that the general idea among savage races is that death always arises from witchcraft; but i think, from what i have said regarding diseases arising from bush-souls' bad tempers, from contracting a _sisa_, from losing the shadow at high noon, and from, it may be, other causes i have not spoken of, that this generalisation is for west africa too sweeping. but undoubtedly sixty per cent of the deaths are believed to arise from witchcraft. i would put the percentage higher, were it not for the terrible mortality from tetanus among children, which sometimes is and sometimes is not put down to witchcraft, and the mortality from smallpox and the sleep disease down south in loango and kakongo, those diseases not being in any case that i have had personal acquaintance with imputed to witchcraft at all. indeed i venture to think that any disease that takes an epidemic form is regarded as a scourge sent by some great outraged nature spirit, not a mere human dabbler in devils. i have dealt with witchcraft itself elsewhere, therefore now i only speak regarding it medically; and i think, roughly speaking, not absolutely, mind you, that the witching something _out_ of a man is the most common iniquity of witchcraft from cape juby to cameroons, the region of the true negro stock; while from cameroons to benguella--the limit of my knowledge to the south on the western side of the continent--the most common iniquity of witchcraft is witching something into him. as in the diseases arising from the loss of the dream-soul i have briefly dealt with the witching something out, i now turn to the witching something in. i well remember, in , being then new to and easily alarmed by the west coast, going into a village in kakongo one afternoon and seeing several unpleasant-looking objects stuck on poles. investigation showed they were the lungs, livers, or spleens of human beings; and local information stated that they were the powers of witches--witches that had been killed and, on examination, found to have inside them these things, dangerous to the state and society at large. wherefrom it was the custom to stick up on poles these things as warnings to the general public not to harbour in their individual interiors things to use against their fellow-creatures. they mutely but firmly said, "see! if you turn witch, your inside will be stuck on a pole." i may remark that in many districts of the south-west coast and middle congo it is customary when a person dies in an unexplainable way, namely without shedding blood, to hold a post-mortem. in some cases the post-mortem discloses the path of the witch through the victim--usually, i am informed, the injected witch feeds on the victim's lungs--in other cases the post-mortem discloses the witch power itself, demonstrating that the deceased was a keeper of witch power, or, as we should say, a witch. once when i was at batanga a woman dropped down on the beach and died. the usual post-mortem was held, and local feeling ran high. "she no complain, she no say nothing, and then she go die one time." the post-mortem disclosed what i think you would term a ruptured aneurism of the aorta, but the local verdict was "she done witch herself"--namely that she was a witch, who had been eaten by her own power, therefore there were great rejoicings over her death. this dire catastrophe is, however, liable to overtake legitimate medical men. all reasonable people in every clime allow a certain latitude to doctors. they are supposed to know things other people need not, and to do things, like dissections and such, that other people should not, and no one thinks any the worse of them. this is the case with the african physician, whom we roughly call the witch doctor, but whose full title is the combatant of the evils worked by witches and devils on human souls and human property. this medical man has, from the exigencies of his profession, to keep in his own inside a power, and a good strong one at that, which he can employ in his practice by sending it into patients to fetch out other witch powers, _sisas_, or any miscellaneous kind of devil that may have got into them. his position is totally different from that of the layman. he is known to possess a witch power, and the knowledge of how to employ it; but instead of this making him an object of aversion to his fellow-men, it secures for him esteem and honour, and the more terrifically powerful his power is known to be, the more respect he gains; for suppose you were taken ill by a real bad devil, you would prefer a medical man whose power was at least up to that devil's fighting weight. nevertheless his having to keep the dangerous devil in his own inside exposes the witch doctor to grave personal danger, for if, from a particularly healthy season, or some notorious quack coming into his district, his practice falls off, and his power is thereby not kept fed, that unfortunate man is liable to be attacked by it. this was given me as the cause of the death of a great doctor in the chiloango district, and i heard the same thing from the ncomi district, so it is clear that many eminent men are cut off in the midst of their professional career in this way. as for what this power is like in its corporal form, i can only say that it is evidently various. one witch doctor i know just to the north of loango always made it a practice to give his patients a brisk emetic as soon as he was called in, and he always found young crocodiles in the consequences. i remember seeing him in one case secure six lively young crocodiles that had apparently been very recently hatched. these were witch powers. again, i was informed of a witch who was killed near the bungo river having had found inside him a thing like a lizard, but with wings like a bat. the most peculiar form of witch power i have heard of as being found inside a patient was on the ogowe from two native friends, both of them very intelligent, reliable men, one of them a bible reader. they said that about two years previously a relation of theirs had been badly witched. a doctor had been called in, who administered an emetic, and there appeared upon the scene a strange little animal that grew with visible rapidity. an hour after its coming to light it crawled and got out of the basin, and finally it flew away. it had bat's wings and a body and tail like a lizard. this catawampus, my informant held, had been witched into the man when it was "small, small"--namely, very small. it might, they thought, have been given to their relation in some food or drink by an enemy, but for sure, if it had not been disturbed by that emetic, it would have grown up inside the man and have eaten its way out through his vitals. from the whole of the above statements i think i have shown you that if as a witch doctor you are called in to a patient who is ill, but who is not showing blood anywhere, your diagnosis will be that he has got some sort or another of devil the matter with him, and that the first indication is to find out who put that devil in, because, in the majority of cases, until you know this you can't get it out; the second is to get it out; the third is to prevent its getting adrift, and into some one else. i have only briefly sketched the ideas and methods of witch doctors in west africa, in so far as treatment is concerned. the infinite variety of methods employed in detecting who has been the witch in a given case; the infinite variety of incantations and so on, i have no space to dwell on here, and will conclude by giving you a general sketch of the career of a witch doctor. we will start with the medical student stage. now, every west african tribe has a secret society--two, in fact, one for men and one for women. every free man has to pass through the secret society of his tribe. if during this education the elders of this society discover that a boy is what is called in calabar an _ebumtup_--a person who can see spirits--the elders of the society advise that he should be brought up to the medical profession. their advice is generally taken, and the boy is apprenticed as it were to a witch doctor, who requires a good fee with him. this done, he proceeds with his studies, learns the difference between the dream-soul basket and the one _sisas_ are kept in--a mistake between the two would be on a par with mistaking oxalic acid for epsom salts. he is then taught how to howl in a professional way, and, by watching his professor, picks up his bedside manner. if he can acquire a showy way of having imitation epileptic fits, so much the better. in fact, as a medical student, you have to learn pretty well as much there as here. you must know the dispositions, the financial position, little scandals, &c., of the inhabitants of the whole district, for these things are of undoubted use in divination and the finding of witches, and in addition you must be able skilfully to dispense charms, and know what babies say before their own mothers can. then some day your professor and instructor dies, his own professional power eats him, or he tackles a disease-causing spirit that is one too many for him, and on you descend his paraphernalia and his practice. it is usual for a witch doctor to acquire for his power a member of one of the higher grade spirit classes--he does not acquire a human soul--and his successor usually, i think, takes the same spirit, or, at any rate, a member of the same class. this does not altogether limit you as a successor to a certain line of practice, but, as no one spirit can do all things, it tends to make you a specialist. i know a district where, if any one wanted a canoe charm, they went to one medical man; if a charm to keep thieves off their plantation, to another. this brings us to the practice itself, and it may be divided into two divisions. first, prophylactic methods, namely, making charms to protect your patient's wives, children, goats, plantations, canoes, &c. from damage, houses from fire, &c., &c., and to protect the patient himself from wild animals and all danger by land or water. this is a very paying part, but full of anxiety. for example, put yourself in the place of a mpangwe medical friend of mine. you have with much trouble got a really valuable spirit to come into a paste made of blood and divers things, and having made it into a sausage form, and done it round with fibre wonderfully neatly, you have painted it red outside to please the spirits--because spirits like red, they think it's blood. well, in a week or so the man you administered it to comes back and says "that thing's no good." his paddle has broken more often than before he had the thing. the amount of rocks, and floating trees, to say nothing of snags, is, he should say, about double the normal, whereby he has lost a whole canoe load of european goods, and, in short, he doesn't think much of you as a charm maker. then he expectorates and sulks offensively. you take the charm, and tell him it was a perfectly good one when you gave it him, and you never had any complaints before, but you will see what has gone wrong with it. investigation shows you that the spirit is either dead or absent. in the first case it has been killed by a stronger spirit of its own class; in the second, lured away by bribery. now this clearly points to your patient's having a dangerous and powerful enemy, and you point it out to him and advise him to have a fresh and more powerful charm--necessarily more expensive--with as little delay as possible. he grumbles, but, realising the danger, pays up, and you make him another. the old one can be thrown away, like an empty pill-box. the other part of your practice--the clinical--consists in combating those witches who are always up to something--sucking blood of young children, putting fearful wild fowl into people to eat up their most valued viscera, or stealing souls o' nights, blighting crops, &c. therefore you see the witch doctor's life is not an idle one; he has not merely to humbug the public and pocket the fees--or i should say "bag," pockets being rare in this region--but he works very hard, and has his anxieties just like a white medical man. the souls that get away from him are a great worry. the death of every patient is a danger to a certain extent, because the patient's soul will be vicious to him until it is buried. but i must say i profoundly admire our west african witch doctors for their theory of _sisas_ as an explanation of their not always being able to insert a new soul into a patient, for by this theory they save themselves somewhat, and do not entail on themselves the treatment their brother medicos have to go through on the nass river in british columbia. according to mr. fraser, in that benighted nass river district those native american doctors hold it possible that a doctor may swallow a patient's soul by mistake. this is their theory to account for the strange phenomenon of a patient getting worse instead of better when a doctor has been called in, and so the unfortunate doctor who has had this accident occur is made to stand over his patient while another medical man thrusts his fingers in his throat, another kneads him in the abdomen, and a third medical brother slaps him on the back. all the doctors present have to go through the same ordeal, and if the missing soul does not turn up, the party of doctors go to the head doctor's house to see if by chance he has got it in his box. all the things are taken out of the box, and if the soul is not there, the head doctor, the president of the college of physicians, the sir somebody something of the district, is held by his heels with his learned head in a hole in the floor, while the other doctors wash his hair. the water used is then taken and poured over the patient's head. i told this story to all the african witch doctors i knew. i fear, that being hazy in geography, they think it is the practice of the english medical profession; but, anyhow every one of them regarded the doctors of the nass river as a set of superstitious savages, and imbeciles at that. of course a medical man had to see to souls, but to go about in squads, administer rough emetics to themselves, instead of to the patients, and as for that head washing--well, people can be fool too much! none of them showed the slightest signs of adopting the british columbia method, none of them showed even any signs of adopting my suggestion that they should go and teach those benighted brothers of theirs the theory of _insisa_. if you ask me frankly whether i think these african witch doctors believe in themselves, i think i must say, yes; or perhaps it would be safer to say they believe in the theory they work by, for of that there can be very little doubt. i do not fancy they ever claim invincible power over disease; they do their best according to their lights. it would be difficult to see why they should doubt their own methods, because, remember, all their patients do not die; the majority recover. i am not putting this recovery down to their soul-treatment method, but to the village apothecary, who has usually been doctoring the patient with drugs before the so-called witch doctor is called in. of course the apothecary does not get the credit of the cure in this case, but i fancy he deserves it. another point to be remembered is that the africans on the west coast, at any rate, are far more liable than white men to many strange nervous disorders, especially to delirium, which often occurs in a comparatively slight illness. why i do not pretend to understand; but i think in these nervous cases the bedside manners of a witch doctor--though strongly resembling that of the physician who attended the immortal why why's mother--may yet be really useful. as to the evil these witch doctors do in the matter of getting people killed for bewitching it is difficult to speak justly. i fancy that, on the whole, they do more good than harm, for remember witchcraft in these districts is no parlour game; in the eyes of allah as well as man it is murder, for most of it is poison. most witchcraft charms i know of among people who have not been in contact with mohammedanism have always had that element of mixing something with the food or drink--even in that common, true negro form of killing by witchcraft, putting medicine in the path, there is a poisoned spike as well as charm stuff. there can be no doubt that the witch doctor's methods of finding out who has poisoned a person are effective, and that the knowledge in the public mind of this detective power keeps down poisoning to a great extent. of the safeguards against unjust accusation i will speak when treating of law. as to their using hypnotism, i suppose they do use something of the sort at times. west indians, with whom i was always anxious to talk on the differences and agreements between vodou and obeah and their parent west african religion, certainly, in their description of what they called wanga--and translated as glamour--seemed to point to this; but for myself, save in the case of blood coming before, one case of which i witnessed, i have seen nothing beyond an enormously elaborated common sense. i dare not call it sound, because it is based on and developed out of animism, and of that and our white elaborated view i am not the judge, remembering you go the one way, i the other--which is the best, god knows. chapter x early trade in west africa concerning the accounts given by classic writers of west africa, and of the method of barter called the silent trade. it is a generally received opinion that there are too many books in the world already. i cannot, however, subscribe to any institution that proposes to alter this state of affairs, because i find no consensus of opinion as to which are the superfluous books; i have my own opinion on the point, but i feel i had better keep it to myself, for i find the very books i dislike--almost invariably in one-volume form, as this one is, though of a more connected nature than this is likely to be--are the well-beloved of thousands of my fellow human beings; and so i will restrict my enthusiasms in the matter of books to the cause of attempting to incite writers to give us more. if any one wants personally to oblige me he will forthwith write a masterly history of the inter-relationships--religious, commercial, and cultural--of the other races of the earth with the african, and he can put in as an appendix a sketch of the war conquest of africa by the white races. i do not ask for a separate volume on this, because there will be so many on the others; moreover, it is such a kaleidoscopic affair, and its influence alike on both european, asiatic, and african seems to me neither great nor good. for the past fifteen years i have been reading up africa; and the effect of the study of this literature may best be summarised in mr. kipling's observation, "for to admire an' for to see, for to be'old this world so wide, it's never been no good to me, but i can't drop it if i tried." wherein it has failed to be of good, i hastily remark, is that after all this fifteen years' reading, i found i had to go down into the most unfashionable part of africa myself, to try to find out whatever the thing was really like, and also to discover which of my authors had been doing the heaviest amount of lying. it seemed clear to the meanest intelligence that this form of the darkening of counsel was fearfully prevalent among them, because of the way they disagreed about things among themselves. of course i have so far only partially succeeded in both these matters; for, regarding the first, personal experience taught me that things differed with district; regarding the second, that all the people who have been to africa and have written books on it have, off and on, told the truth, and that what seemed to the public who have not been there to be the most erroneous statements have been true in substance and in fact, and that those statements they have accepted immediately as true on account of their either flattering their vanity or comfortably explaining the reasons of the failure of their endeavours, have the most falsehood in them. there is another point i must mention regarding this material for that much wanted colossal work on the history of african relationships with the rest of the world--which i do not intend to write, but want written for me--and that is the superiority both in quality and quantity of the portion which relates to the early history of the west coast. yet very little attention has been given in our own times to this. i might say no attention, were it not for sir a. b. ellis, that very noble man and gallant soldier, who did so much good work for england both with sword and pen. just for the sake of the work being worth doing, not in the hope of reward; for twenty years' service and the publication of a series of books of great interest and importance taught him that west africa was under a ban that it was beyond his power to remove; nevertheless he went on with his work unfaltering, if not uncomplaining, and died, in , a young man, practically killed by the warim incident--the true history of which has yet to be written. for the credit of my country, i must say that just before death he was knighted. i do not quote colonel ellis's works extensively, because, for one thing, it is the duty of people to read them first-hand, and as they are perfectly accessible there is no excuse for their not doing so; and, for another thing, i am in touch with the majority of the works from which he gathered his information regarding the early history, and with the natives from whom he gathered his ethnological information. there are certain points, i grant, on which i am unable to agree with him, such as the opinion he formed from his personal prejudices against the traders in west africa; but in the main, regarding the regions with which he was personally acquainted and on which he wrote--the bight of benin regions--i am only too glad that there is colonel ellis for me to agree with. the fascination of west africa's historical record is very great, bristling as it does with the deeds of brave men, bad and good, black and white. what my german friends would call the blüth-period of this history is decidedly that period which was inaugurated by the great prince henry the navigator; and no man who has ever read, as every man should read, mr. major's book on prince henry, can fail to want to know more still, and what happened down in those re-discovered bights of benin and biafra after this blüth-period closed. this can be done, mainly thanks to a dutchman named bosman, who was agent for the great dutch house of the gold coast for many years circa , and who wrote home to his uncle a series of letters of a most exemplary nature reeking with information on native matters and local politics, and suffused with a tender fear of shocking his aunt, which did not, however, seem in his opinion to justify him in suppressing important ethnological facts. regarding the ethnological information we have of the gold coast natives, the most important works are those by the late sir a. b. ellis. his books are almost models of what books should be that are written by people studying native customs in their native land. we have also the results of scientific observers in the works of buckhardt and bastian, besides a mass of scattered information in the works of travellers, bosman, barbot, labat, mathews, bowditch, cruickshank, winwood reade, h. m. stanley, burton, captain canot, captain binger, and others, and quite recently a valuable contribution to our knowledge in mr. sarbar's _fanti customary laws_.[ ] i think that every student of the african form of thought should master these works thoroughly, and i fully grant their great importance; but, nevertheless, i am quite unable to agree with mr. jevons (_introduction to the history of religion_, p. ) when he says, regarding fetishism, that "it is certainly amongst the inhabitants of the gold and slave coasts that the subject can best be studied." these two coasts are, i grant, the best place for a student who is resident in europe, and therefore dependent on the accounts given by others of the things he is dealing with, to draw his information from, because of the accuracy and extent of the information he can get from ellis's work; but, apart from ellis the value of these regions to an ethnologist is but small, and for an ethnologist who will go out to west africa and study his material for himself, the whole of the coast regions of the benin bight are but of tenth-rate importance, because of the great and long-continued infusion of both mohammedan and european forms of thought into the original native thought-form that has taken place in these regions. this subject i will refer to later, and i will return now to the history, confining myself to the earlier portions of it, and to that which bears on the early development of trade. i sincerely wish i could go into full details regarding the whole history of the locality here, because i know my only chance of being allowed to do so is on paper, and it would be a great relief to my mind; but i forbear, experience having taught me that the subject, to put it mildly, is not of general interest. for example, person after person have i tried to illuminate and educate in the matter of our relationships with the ashantees; always, alas, in vain. before i have got half through they "hear a voice i cannot hear that's calling them away;" or remember something "that must be done at once;" or, worst of all, go off straightway to sleep, after once or twice feebly enquiring, "where is that place?" of course i am glad that my little knowledge has been the comfort it has to several people. once, when i was homeward-bound along the gold coast, three gentlemen came on board very ill from fever, and homeward-bound, too. their worst symptom was agonising insomnia. "not a wink," they assured my friend the irish purser, had they had "for a couple of months." "we'll soon put that right for you on board this boat," he said, in his characteristically kind and helpful manner. to my great surprise, that same afternoon he deliberately tackled me on the subject of the real reason that induced osai kwofi kari kari to cross the prah in january, . i was charmed at this unwonted display of interest in the subject, and hoped also to gain further information on it from those recently shipped gold coasters in the smoking-room. i was getting on fairly well with it; and my friend the purser, instead of having "some manifests to write out," as was usual with him, nobly battled with the intricacies of the subject for a good half hour and more; and then, just when i was in the middle of some topographical elucidation, accompanied by questions, up that purser rose, yawned and stretched himself, and hailed the doctor, who happened to be passing by. "what do you think of that, doctor?" he said, pointing to the settee. "do them a power of good," says his compatriot the medico. turning round, i saw the three victims of insomnia grouped together; the middle man had his head pillowed on the oilclothed top of the table, and reclining, more or less gracefully, against him on either side were his two companions, their half-smoked pipes fallen from their limp fingers--all profoundly, unquestionably asleep. "oh, yes! of course, i was delighted," but not flattered; and, warned by this incident, i will here only say that should any one be really interested in the eventful history of the long struggle between the english, portuguese, french, dutch, and brandenburgers, with each other and with the natives, for the possession of the country where the black man's gold came from, they will find a good deal about it in the works already cited; and should any medical man--the remedy is perhaps a little too powerful to be trusted in the hands of the laity--require it for the treatment of insomnia as above indicated, i recommend that part of it which bears on the ashantee question in small but regular doses. our earliest authorities mentioning africa with the knowledge in them that it is surrounded by the ocean, save at suez, are theopompus and herodotus. unfortunately all theopompus's works are lost to us, voluminous though they were, his history alone being a matter of fifty-eight volumes, while before he took up history he had won for himself a great reputation as an orator, during the reigns of philip and alexander the great. he is perpetually referred to, however, though not always praised, by other great classical writers, cicero, pliny, the two dionysiuses and others, and was evidently regarded as a great authority; one particular fragment of his works that refers to africa is preserved by �lian, and consists of a conversation between silenus and midas, king of phrygia. silenus says that europe, asia, and africa are surrounded by the sea, but that beyond the known world there is an island of immense extent containing large animals and men of twice our stature. this island mr. major thinks, and doubtless rightly, is connected with the tradition of our old friend--you know what i mean, as captain marryat's boatswain says--the atlantis of plato. this affair i will no further mention or hint at, but hastily pass on to that other early authority, herodotus, who was born years before christ, and whose works, thanks be, have survived. he says: "the phoenician navigators under command of pharaoh-necho, king of egypt, setting sail from the red sea, made their way to the southern sea; when autumn approached they drew their vessels to land, sowed a crop, waited until it was ripe for harvest, reaped it, and put again to sea." having spent two years in this manner, in the third year they reached the pillars of hercules, (jebu zatout, and gibraltar), and returned to egypt, "reporting," says herodotus, "what does not find belief in me, but may perhaps in some other persons, for they said in sailing round africa they had the sun to the right (to the north) of them. in this way was libya first known."[ ] much has been written regarding the accuracy of these phoenician accounts; for, as frequently happens, their mention of a thing that seemed at first to brand their account as a lie remains to brand it as the truth--and although i have no doubt those phoenician gentlemen heartily wished they had said nothing about having seen the sun to the north, yet it was best for them in the end, as it demonstrates to us that they had, at any rate, been south of the equator; and we owe to herodotus here, as in many other places in his works, a debt of gratitude for honestly putting down what he did not believe himself; he also has suffered from this habit of accuracy, becoming himself regarded by the superficial people of this world as a credulous old romancer, which he never was. good man, he only liked fair play. "here," he says as it were, "is a thing i am told. it's a bit too large for my belief hatch, but if you can get it down yours, you're free and welcome to ship it." herodotus, however, accepts the fact that africa was surrounded by water, save at its connection with the great land mass of the earth (europe and asia) by the isthmus of suez. several other attempts to circumnavigate africa were made prior to herodotus's writings. one that we have mention of[ ] was made by a persian nobleman named sataspes, whom xerxes had, for a then capital offence, condemned to impalement. this man's mother persuaded xerxes that if she were allowed to deal with her son she would impose on him a more terrible punishment even than this, namely, that he should be condemned to sail round libya. there is no doubt this good lady thought thereby to save her son; but, as events turned out, xerxes, by accepting her suggestion, did not cheat justice by granting this as an alternative to immediate execution. however, off sataspes sailed with a ship and crew from egypt, out through the pillars of hercules, and doubling the cape of libya, then named solois, he steered south, and, says herodotus, "traversed a vast extent of sea for many months, and finding he had still more to pass he turned round and returned to egypt and then back to xerxes, who had him then impaled, because, for one thing he had not sailed round libya, and for another, xerxes held he lied about those regions of it that he had visited; for sataspes said he had seen a nation of little men who wore garments made of palm leaves, who, whenever his crew drew their ships ashore, left their cities and flew into the mountains, though he did them no injury, only taking some cattle from them; and the reason he gave for his not sailing round libya was that his ships could go no further." sataspes's end was sad, but one cannot feel that he was a loss to the class of romancers of travel. another and a more determined navigator was eudoxus of cyzicus (b.c. ). the scanty record we have of his exploration is of great interest. while he was making a stay in alexandria, he met an indian who was the sole survivor of a crew wrecked on the red sea coast. he is the indian who persuaded ptolemy euergetes to fit out an expedition to sail to india, and off they went and succeeded in it greatly, but on their return the king seized the cargo; so therefore, as a private enterprise, the thing was a failure. however, eudoxus was a man of great determination, and on the death of ptolemy vii. in the reign of his successor, he set out on another expedition to india. on his return voyage he was driven down the african coast, and found there on the shore amongst other wreckage the prow of a vessel with the figure of a horse carved on it. this relic he took with him as a curiosity, and on his successful return to alexandria exhibited it there in the market place, and during its exhibition it was recognised by some pirates from cadiz (gades) who happened to be in that city, and they testified that the small vessels which were employed in the fisheries along the west african coast as far as the river lixius (wadi al knos) always had the figure of a horse on their prows, and on this account were called "horses." the fact of this wreck of a vessel belonging to western europe being found on the east coast of africa joined with the knowledge that these vessels did not pass through the mediterranean sea, gave eudoxus the idea that the vessel he had the figure head of must have come round africa from the west coast, and he then proceeded to cadiz and equipped three vessels, one large and two of smaller size, and started out to do the same thing, bar wrecking. he sailed down the known west coast without trouble, but when he came to passing on into the unknown seas, he had trouble with the crews, and was compelled to beach his vessels. after doing this he succeeded in persuading his crews to proceed, but it was then found impossible to float the largest vessel, so she was abandoned, and the expedition proceeded in the smaller and in a ship constructed from the wreck of the larger on which the cargo was shipped with the expedition. eudoxus reached apparently senegambia, and then another mutiny broke out, and he had to return to barbary. but undaunted he then fitted out another expedition, consisting of two smaller vessels, and once again sailed to the south to circumnavigate africa. nothing since has been heard of eudoxus of cyzicus surnamed the brave.[ ] on his second voyage he fell in with natives who, he says, spoke the same language that he had previously heard on the eastern coast of africa. if he was right in this, some authors hold he must have gone down the west coast, at least as far as cameroons, because there you nowadays first strike the language, which does stretch across the continent, namely, the bantu, and we have no reason to suppose that the bantu border line was ever further north on this coast than it is at present; indeed, the indications are, i think, the other way; but as far as the language goes, it seems to me that eudoxus could have heard the same language as on the east african coast far higher up than cameroons, namely, on the moroccoan coast, for in those days, prior to the great arab invasion, most likely the language of the berber races had possession of northern africa from east coast to west. however, there is another statement of his which i think points to eudoxus having gone far south, namely, that the reason of his turning back was an inability to get provisions, for this catastrophe is not likely to have overtaken so brave a man as he was until he reached the great mangrove swamps of the niger. the litoral of the sahara was in those days, we may presume, from the accounts we have far later from leo africanus and arab writers, more luxuriant and heavily populated than it is at present. of these voyages, however, we have such scant record that we need not dwell on them further, and so we will return to about b.c., and consider the wonderful voyage made by hanno of carthage, of which we have more detailed knowledge; although there still remains a certain amount of doubt as to who exactly hanno was, mainly on account of hanno apparently having been to carthage what jones is to north wales--the name of a number of individuals with a habit of doing everything and frequently distinguishing themselves greatly. the carthaginians were to the classic world much what the english are to the modern, a great colonising, commercial people--warlike when wanted. they planted colonies in north africa and elsewhere, and had commercial relationship with all the then known nations of the world, including a trans-sahara trade with the people living to the south of the great desert. we shall never know to the full where those carthaginians went, from the paucity of record; but we have record of the voyage of this hanno in a _periplus_ originally written in the punic language and then translated into greek.[ ] hanno, it seems, was a chief magistrate at carthage, and pliny says his voyage was undertaken when carthage was in a most flourishing condition.[ ] from the _periplus_ we learn that the expedition to the west coast consisted of sixty ships of fifty oars each, and , persons of both sexes, ample provisions and everything necessary for so great an undertaking. the object of this expedition was to explore, to found colonies, and to increase commerce. the expedition, after passing the pillars of hercules, sailed two days along the coast and founded their first colony, which they called thymatirum. just south of this place, on a promontory called soloeis, they built a temple to neptune. a short distance further on they found a beautiful lake, the edges of which were bordered with large reeds, the country abounding in elephants and other game; a day's sail from this place, they founded five small cities near the sea called respectively cariconticos, gytte, acra, millitea, and arambys. the next most important part of their voyage was their discovery of the great river lixius, on the banks of which they found a pastoral people they called the lixitae. these seem to have been a mild people; but there were in the neighbourhood tribes of a ferocious character, and they were also told there were trogloditae dwelling in the mountains, where the lixius took its rise, who were fleeter than horses. unfortunately we are not told how long the carthaginians took in reaching this river lixius; but if the carthaginians had been keeping close in shore they would not have met with a river that looked great until they reached the mouth of the ouro ( ° ' n. lat), which is four miles wide, but only an estuary; but as the carthaginians do not seem to have gone up it, they may not have noticed its imperfections, and so, pursuing that dangerous method of judging a west african river from its mouth, regarded it as a great river. however this may have been, they took with them as guides and interpreters some of the lixitae, and continued their voyage for three days, when they came to a large bay, an island in it containing a circle of five stadia, and proceeded to found another colony on that island, calling it cerne, where they judged they were as far from the pillars of hercules as these were from carthage. so it is held now that cerne is the same as the french trading station arguin (about miles north of senegal river), on to whose shoals the wreck of the french frigate _la méduse_ drifted in , the tragedy of which is familiar to us all from géricault's great painting. hanno next called at a place where there was a great lake, which they entered by sailing up a river called by them cheretes. in this they found three islands, all larger than the island of cerne. one day's sail then brought them to the extremity of the lake overhung by mountains, which were inhabited by savages clad in wild beasts' skins, who prevented their landing by pelting them with stones. the next point in their voyage was a large and broad river, infested with crocodiles and river horses; and from this place they made their way back to cerne, where they rested and repaired and then set forth again, sailing south along the african shores for twelve successive days. the language of the natives of these regions the lixitae did not understand, and the carthaginians could not hold any communication with them for another reason, that they always fled from them; towards the last day they approached some large mountains covered with trees. they went on two days further, when they came to a large opening in the sea, on land on either side of which was a plain whereon they saw fires in every direction. at this place[ ] they refilled their water barrels, and continued their voyage five days further, when they reached a large bay which their interpreters said was called the western horn. in this bay they found a large island, in the centre of which was a salt lake with a small island in it. when they went ashore in the day time they saw no inhabitants, but at night time they heard in every direction a confused noise of pipes, cymbals, drums and song, which alarmed the crew, while the diviners they had with them, equivalent to our naval chaplains, strongly advised hanno to leave that place as speedily as possible. hanno, however, being less alarmed than his companions, pushed on south, and they soon found themselves abreast of a country blazing with fires, streams of which seemed to be pouring from the mountain tops down into the sea. "we sailed quickly thence," says hanno, "being much terrified." proceeding four days further they found that things did not improve in appearance from their point of view, for the whole country seemed ablaze at night, a country full of fire, and at one point the fire seemed to fly up to the very stars. hanno says their interpreters told them that this great fire was the chariot of the gods. three days more sailing south brought them to another bay, called the southern horn. in this bay they found a large island, in which again there was a lake with another island in it, having inhabitants who were savage, and whose bodies were covered with hair. these people the interpreters called the gorillae--some were captured and taken aboard, but so savage and unmanageable did they prove that they were killed and the skins preserved. as most of the inhabitants of the islands of the gorillae seemed to be females, and as these ladies had made such a gallant fight of it with their carthaginian captors, hanno kept their skins to hang up in the temple of juno on his return home, evidently intending to be complimentary both to the goddess and the gorillae; but it is to be feared neither of them took it as it was meant, for hanno had no luck from the gods after this, having to turn back from shortness of provisions, and finally ending his career by, some say, being killed, and others say exiled from carthage on account of his having a lion so tame that it would carry baggage for him; punic public opinion held that this demonstrated him to be a man dangerous to the state. the gorillae seem to have worked out their vengeance on white men by making it more than any man's character for truth is worth to see one of them--except stuffed in a museum, with a label on. how far hanno really went down south is not known with any certainty. m. gosselin held he only reached the river nun, on the moroccoan coast. major rennell fixed his furthest point somewhere north of sierra leone, and held the island of the gorillae to be identical with the island of sherboro'. bougainville believed that he at any rate went well into the bight of benin, while others think he went at any rate as far as gaboon. i cannot myself see why he should not have done so, considering the winds and tides of the locality and the time taken; indeed, i should be quite willing to believe he went down to congo, and that in the most terrific of the fires he witnessed an eruption of the volcanic peak of cameroon, a volcano not yet extinct. indeed the name given to this high fire "that almost reached the stars" by his interpreters--the chariot of the gods--is not so very unlike the name the cameroon peak bears to this day, mungo mah lobeh, the throne or place of thunder, and this native name is also capable of being translated into "the place of the gods" or spirits. the thing i do not believe in the affair is that the lixitae interpreters ever called it or any other place "a chariot"; for as hanno was the first white man they had seen, and they had no chariots of their own, it is unlikely they could have known anything of chariots; and i think this chariot of the gods must have been an error of hanno's in translating his interpreter's remarks. it is perfectly excusable in him if it is so, because to understand what an interpreter means who does not know your language, and whose own language you are not an adept in, and who is translating from a language regarding which you are both alike ignorant, is a process fraught with difficulty. i have tried it, so speak feelingly. it is true it is not an impossibility, as those unversed in african may hastily conjecture, because at least one-third of an african language consists in gesture, and this gesture part is fairly common to all tribes i have met, so that by means of it you can get on with daily life; but it breaks down badly when you come to the names of places. i myself once went on a long march to a place that subsequent knowledge informed me was "i don't know" in my director's native tongue. still, if he did not know, i did not know, and so it was all the same. i got there all right, therefore it did not matter to me; but i was haunted during my stay in it by a confused feeling that perhaps i was flying in the face of science by being somewhere else--being in two places at the same time. i really, however, cannot help thinking hanno must have got past the niger delta; for there is nothing to frighten any one, as far as the look of things go, until you go south from calabar, and find yourself facing that magnificent great cameroon and fernando po; and hanno's people were scared as they were never scared before. yet, again, there are those fires, which were in the main doubtless what that very wise and not half-appreciated missionary, the late rev. j. leighton wilson, says they were, namely, fires made by the native burning down the high grass at the end of a dry season to make his farms. now hanno could have seen any quantity of these along parts of the shores of the bight of benin, but is not likely to have seen them to any alarming extent on the biafran bight, because the shores thereof are deeply fringed with mangrove swamps, and the native does not start making farms in them. hanno might have seen what looked like the smoke of innumerable fires on the sides of cameroon mountain and fernando po. i myself have seen the whole mighty forest there smoking as if beneath it smouldered the infernal regions themselves; but it is only columns and wafts of mist, and so gives no blaze at night; if you want to see a real land of flame with, over it, a pall of cloud reflecting back its crimson light in a really terrifying way, you must go south of cameroon, south of congo français, south, until you reach the region of the great congo itself; and there--on the grass-covered hills and plains of the lower congo lands--you will see a land of fire at the end of the dry season, terrific enough to awe any man. of course, if hanno passed the congo and went down as far as the fringing sands of the kalahari desert, he would certainly not have been able to get stores; but also down there he would not have met with an island on which there were gorillas; for even if we grant that there was sufficient dense forest south of the congo in his days for gorillas to have inhabited, and allow that in old days gorillas were south of the congo, which they are not now, still, there is no island near the coast. so i am afraid we cannot quite settle hanno's furthest point, and must content ourselves by saying he was a brave man, a good sailor, and a credit therefore to his country and the human race. after hanno's time i cannot find any record of a regular set of trading expeditions down the west coast by the carthaginians. from scattered observations it is certain the commerce of the carthaginians with the barbary coast and the bight of benin was long carried on; but it does not seem to have been carried on along the coast of the bight of biafra; and the voyage in b.c. may be cited in support of this, showing that the voyage as far south as eudoxus went was then considered as marvellous and new. still, on the other hand, it must be remembered that, prior to our own day, the navigator had no great inducement to tell the rest of the world exactly where he had been; indeed, the navigator whose main interest is commerce is, to this day, not keen on so doing. he would rather keep little geographical facts--such as short cuts by creeks, and places where either gold, or quicksilver, and buried ivory, is plentiful--to himself, than go explaining about these things for the sake of getting an unrepaying honour. one sees this so much in studying the next period of this history--the early portuguese and early french discoveries; you will find that one of these nations knew about a place years before the other came along, and discovered it, and claimed it as its own--with disputes as a natural consequence. there has, however, been one very interesting point in the dealing of the nations of higher culture with the africans, and that is the way their commerce with them has had periods of abeyance. the egyptians have left us record of having been extensively in touch with the interior of africa, _via_ the nile valley,--then came a pause. then came the carthaginian commerce,--then a pause. then the portuguese, french, english, dutch, and dane trading enterprise, say, roughly from to ,--then a falling off of this enterprise; revived during the slave-trade days, falling off again on its suppression, and reviving in our own days. i suppose i ought to say greatly, but--well, we will discuss that later. these pauses have always been caused by the nations of higher culture getting too busy with wars at home to trouble themselves about the african, all the more so because the produce of africa has filtered slowly, whether it was fetched by white man or no, into their markets through the hands of the energetic north african tribes and the arabs. whenever the white man has settled down with his home affairs, and has had time to spare, he has always gone and looked up the african again, "discovered him," and he has always found him in the same state of culture that the pioneers of the previous blüth-period found him in. hanno does not find down the west coast another carthage--he finds bush fires, and hears the tom-tom and the horn and the shouts. he finds people slightly clad and savage. then read aluise da ca da mostro and the rest of prince henry's adventures; well, you might--save that the old traveller is more interesting--almost be reading a book published yesterday. the only radical change made for large quantities of africans by means of white intercourse was made by exporting them to america. how this is going to turn out we do not yet know; and whether or no, after the present period of white exploitation of africa, there may not come another pause from our becoming too interested in some big fight of our own to keep up our interest in the african, we cannot tell; so i will pass on to a very interesting point in a method of trade mentioned by the early authorities--the silent trade. herodotus gives us the first description of it,[ ] saying that the carthaginians state that beyond the pillars of hercules there is a region of libya, and men who inhabit it. when they arrive among these people and have unloaded their merchandise they set it in order on the shore, go on board their ships and make a great smoke, and the inhabitants seeing the smoke come down to the sea shore, deposit gold in exchange for the merchandise, and withdraw to some distance. the carthaginians then going ashore examine the goods, and if the quantity seems sufficient for the merchandise they take it and sail away; but if it is not sufficient they go on board again and wait; the natives then approach and deposit more gold until they have satisfied them: neither party ever wrongs the other, for they do not touch the gold before it is made adequate to the value of the merchandise, nor do the natives touch the merchandise before the carthaginians have taken the gold. the next description of this silent trade i have been able to find is that given by aluise da ca da mostro, a venetian gentleman who, allured by the accounts of the riches of west africa given by prince henry the navigator, abandoned trading with the low countries, entered the prince's service, and went down the coast in . when in the district of cape blanco, at a place called by him hoden, he was told that six days' journey from this place there was a place called tagazza, signifying a chest of gold; there large quantities of rock salt were dug from the earth every year and carried on camels by the arabs and the azanaghi, who were tawny moors,[ ] in separate companies to timbuk, and from thence to the empire of melli, which belonged to the negroes; having arrived there they disposed of their salt in the course of eight days, at the rate of two and three hundred mitigals the load (a mitigal = a ducat), according to the quantity thereof, after which they returned home with the gold they had been paid in. these merchants reckoned it forty days' journey on horseback from tagazza to "timbuk" as mostro, while from timbuk to melli it is thirty days' journey. ca da mostro then inquired to what use the salt taken to melli was put; and they said that the merchants used a certain quantity of it themselves, for on account of their country lying near the line, where the days and nights are of equal length, at certain seasons of the year the heats were excessive, and putrefied the blood unless salt was taken; their method of taking it was to dissolve a piece in a porringer of water daily and drink it. when the remainder of the salt reached melli, carried thither on camels, each camel load was broken up into pieces of a suitable size for one man to carry. a large number of what ca da mostro calls footmen--whom we nowadays call porters--were assembled at melli to be ready to carry the salt from thence further away still into the heart of africa. i have dwelt on this salt's wanderings because we have here a very definite description of a trade route, and the importance of understanding these trade routes is very great. we do not learn, however, exactly where the salt goes to beyond melli; but melli seems to have been, as timbuctoo was, and to a certain extent still is, a trade focus; and from melli evidently the salt went in many directions, and it is interesting to note ca da mostro's observations on the salt porters, who he says carry in each hand a long forked stick, which when they are tired they fix into the ground and rest their loads on; so to-day may you see the west african porters doing, save that it is only the porters who have to pass over woodless plateaux on their journeys that carry two sticks. [illustration: oil river natives. [_to face page ._] speaking however further on the course of this salt trade ca da mostro says that some of the merchants of melli go with it until they come to a certain water, whether fresh or salt his informant could not say; but he holds it most likely was fresh, or there would be no need of carrying salt there; and it is the opinion of the few people who have of late years interested themselves in the matter that this great water is the niger joliba. but be this as it may, when those merchants from melli arrive on the banks of this great water they place their shares of salt in heaps in a row, every one setting a mark on his own. this done, the merchants retire half a day's journey; then "the negroes, who will not be seen or spoken with, and who seem to be the inhabitants of some islands, come in large boats," and having viewed the salt lay a sum of gold on every heap and then retire. when they are all gone the negro merchants who own the salt return, and if the quantity of gold pleases them they take it and leave the salt; if not, they leave both and withdraw themselves again. the silent people then return, and the heaps from which they find the gold has been removed they carry away, and either advance more gold to the other heaps or take their gold from them and leave the salt. in this manner, says ca da mostro, from very ancient times these negroes have traded without either speaking to or seeing each other, until a few years before, when he was at cape blanco among the azanaghi, who supply the negroes of melli with their salt as aforesaid, and who evidently get from them gossip as well as gold. they told him that their fellow merchants among the black moors had told them that they had had serious trouble in consequence of the then emperor of melli, a man who took more general interest in affairs than was common in emperors of melli, having been fired with a desire to know why these customers of his traders did not like being seen; he had commanded the salt merchants when they next went to traffic with the silent people to capture some of them for him by digging pits near the salt heaps, concealing themselves therein and then rushing out and seizing some of the strange people when they came to look at the salt heaps. the merchants did not at all relish the royal commission, for they knew, as any born trader would, that it must be extremely bad for trade to rush out and seize customers by the scruff of their necks while they were in the midst of their shopping. however, much as the command added to their commercial anxieties, the thing had to be done, or there was no doubt the emperor would relieve them both of all commercial anxieties and their heads at one and the same time. so they carried out the royal command, and captured four of their silent customers. three they immediately liberated, thinking that to keep so many would only increase the bad blood, and one specimen would be sufficient to satisfy the imperial curiosity. unfortunately however the unfortunate captive they retained would neither speak nor eat, and in a few days died; and so the salt merchants of melli returned home in very low spirits, feeling assured that their emperor would be actively displeased with them for failing to satisfy his curiosity, and that the silent customers would be too alarmed and angered with them for their unprovoked attack to deal with them again. subsequent events proved them to be correct in both surmises: his majesty was highly disgusted at not having been able to see one of these people; and naturally, for the description given to him of those they had captured was at least highly interesting. the merchants said they were a span taller than themselves and well shaped, but that they made a terrible figure because their under lip was thicker than a man's fist and hung down on their breasts; also that it was very red, and something like blood dropped from it and from their gums. the upper lip was no larger than that of other people, and owing to this there were exposed to view both gums and teeth, which were of great size, particularly the teeth in the corners of the mouth. their eyes were of great size and blackness. as for the customers, for three years went the merchants of melli to the banks of the great water and arranged their salt heaps and looked on them for gold dust in vain: but the fourth year it was there; and the merchants of melli believed that their customers' lips had begun to putrefy through the excessive heat and the want of salt, so that being unable to bear so grievous a distemper they were compelled to return to their trade. things were then established on a fairly reasonable basis; the merchants did not again attempt to see their customers, and they knew from their experience with their captive that they were by nature dumb; for had there been speech in him, would he not have spoken under the treatment to which he was subjected? and as for the emperor of melli he said right out he did not care whether those blacks could speak or no, so long as he had but the profit of their gold. this gold, i may remark, that was collected at melli was divided into three parts: the first was sent by the melli caravans to kokhia on the caravan route to syria and cairo; the other two parts went from melli to timbuctoo, where it was again divided up, some of it going to toet,[ ] and from thence along the coast to tunis, in barbary. some of it went to hoden, not far from cape blanco, and from there to oran and hona; thence it went to fez, morocco, azila-azasi, and moosa, towns outside the straits of gibraltar, whence it went into europe, through the hands of italians, and other christians, who exchanged their merchandise for the wares of the barbary moors; and the remainder of the gold went down to the west african coast to the portuguese at arguin. this description of the gold route is by ca da mostro, and is the first description of west african trade route i have found. but i must tear myself from the fascination of gold and its trade routes and return to that silent trade. the next person after ca da mostro to mention it is captain richard jobson, who in - made a voyage especially to discover "the golden trade," of what he calls tombâk, which is our last author's timbuk, by way of the gambia, then held by many to be a mouth of the niger. jobson's inquiries regarding this "golden trade" informed him that the great demand for salt in the gambia trade arose from the desire for it among the arabiks of barbary; that the natives themselves only consumed a small percentage of this import, trading away the main to those arabiks in the hinterland, who in their turn traded it for gold to tombak, where the demand for it was great, because that city, although possessing all manner of other riches and commodities, lacked salt, so that the arabiks did a good trade therein. jobson was also informed that the arabiks had, as well as the market for salt at timbuctoo, a market for it with a strange people who would not be seen, and who lived not far from yaze; that the salt was carried to them, and in exchange they gave gold. asking a native merchant, who was engaged in this trade, why they would not be seen, he made a sign to his lips, but would say no more. jobson, however, learnt from other sources that the reason these negroes buy salt from the tawny moors is because of the thickness of their lips, which hang down upon their breasts, and, being raw, would putrefy if they did not take salt, a thing their country does not afford, so that they must traffic for it with the moors. the manner they employ, according to jobson, is this: the moors on a fixed day bring their goods to a place assigned, where there are certain houses appointed for them; herein they deposit their commodities, and, laying their salt and other goods in parcels or heaps separately, depart for a whole day, during which time their customers come, and to each parcel of goods lay down a proportion of gold as they value it, and leave both together. the merchants then return, and as they like the bargain take the gold and leave their wares, or if they think the price offered too little, they divide the merchandise into two parts, leaving near the gold as much as they are inclined to give for it, and then again depart. at their next return the bargain is finished, for they either find more gold added or the whole taken away, and the goods left on their hands. a further confirmation of the existence of this method of trading we find in that most interesting voyage of claude jannequin, sieur de rochfort, . he says, "in this cursed country"--he always speaks of west africa like that--"there is no provision but fish dried in the sun, and maize and tobacco." the natives will only trade by the french laying down on the ground what they would give for the provisions, and then going away, on which the natives came and took the commodities and left the fish in exchange. the regions he visited were those of cape blanco. to this day you will find a form of this silent trade still going on in guinea. i have often seen on market roads in many districts, but always well away from europeanised settlements, a little space cleared by the wayside, and neatly laid with plantain leaves, whereon were very tidily arranged various little articles for sale--a few kola nuts, leaves of tobacco, cakes of salt, a few heads of maize, or a pile of yams or sweet potatoes. against each class of articles so many cowrie shells or beans are placed, and, always hanging from a branch above, or sedately sitting in the middle of the shop, a little fetish. the number of cowrie shells or beans indicate the price of the individual articles in the various heaps, and the little fetish is there to see that any one who does not place in the stead of the articles removed their proper price, or who meddles with the till, shall swell up and burst. there is no doubt it is a very easy method of carrying on commerce. in what the silent trade may have originated it is hard to say; but one thing is certain, that the dread and fear of the negroes did not result from the evil effects of the slave trade, as so many of their terrors are said to have done, for we have seen notice of it long before this slave trade arose. nevertheless, there can be but little doubt that it arose from a sense of personal insecurity, and has fetish in it, the natives holding it safer to leave so dangerous a thing as trafficking with unknown beings--white things that were most likely spirits, with the smell of death on them--in the hands of their gods. in the cases of it that i have seen no doubt it was done mostly for convenience, one person being thereby enabled to have several shops open at but little working expense; but i have seen it employed as a method of trading between tribes at war with each other.[ ] we must dismiss, i fear, bashfulness regarding lips as being a real cause; but i will not dismiss the bleeding lips as a mere traveller's tale, because i have seen quite enough to make me understand what those people who told of bleeding thick lips meant; several, not all of my african friends, are a bit thick about the lower lip, and when they have been passing over waterless sun-dried plateaux or bits of desert they are anything but decorative. the lips get swollen and black, and ca da mostro does not go too far in his description of what he was told regarding them. footnotes: [ ] clowes and sons, . [ ] _melpomene_, iv. . [ ] _melpomene_, iv. . [ ] see ellis's _history of the gold coast_, also tozer's _history of ancient geography_, beazley's _dawn of modern geography_, and _strabo_, b.c. , book xvii, edited by theodore jansonius ab almelooven, amsterdam, . [ ] there is doubt as to whether this _periplus_ is the entire one with which the classic writers were conversant. [ ] "et hanno carthaginis potentia florente circumvectus a gabibus ad finem arabiae navigationem eam prodidit scripto"; (and hanno, when carthage flourished, sailed round from cadiz to the remotest parts of arabia, and left an account of his voyage in writing) plinius, lib. ii. cap. lxvii. p.m. . see also lib. v. cap. i. p.m. , and pomponius mela, lib. iii. cap. ix. p. , edit. isaici vossii. there is an english version of the _periplus_, edited by falconer, london, ; and an oxford edition of it, and some other works, by dr. hudson, . also there is a work on hanno's _periplus_ based on ms. in the meyer museum at liverpool by simonides, not the iambic poet, who wrote a ridiculous satire against women, quoted by �lian; nor yet simonides who was one of the greatest of the ancient poets, and flourished in the seventy-fifth olympia; but a modern gentleman connected with america, whose work i am sufficient scholar neither to use nor to criticise. [ ] major identifies this place with cape verde, pointing out that the inability of the lixitae interpreters to understand the language accords with the fact that at the senegal commences the country of the blacks; "the immense opening" he regards as the gambia. [ ] _melpomene_, iv. . [ ] the writers of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries commonly divide up the natives of africa into-- , moors; , tawny moors; , black moors, a term that lingers to this day in our word blackeymoor; , negroes. [ ] ato, according to the version given in grynæus. [ ] mr. ling roth kindly informs me of further instances of this silent trading to be found in _lander's journal_, lond., , iii. - , and forbes's _wanderings of a naturalist_, lond. , where it is cited for the kubus of sumatra. he says it also occurs among the veddahs, and that there is in no case any fetish control. chapter xi french discovery of west africa concerning the controversy that is between the french and the portuguese as to which of them first visited west africa, with special reference to the fort at elmina. we will now turn our attention to the other pioneers of our present west african trade, and commence with the french, for we cannot disassociate our own endeavours in this region from those of france, portugal, holland, and the brandenburgers; nor are we the earliest discoverers here. when we english heard the west african coast was a region worth trading with, those great brick-makers for the architects of england's majesty, the traders, went for it and traded, and have made that trading pay as no other nation has been able to do. however, from the first we got called hard names--pirates, ruffians, interlopers, and such like--in fact, every bad name the other nations could spare from the war of abuse they chronically waged against each other. the french claim to have traded with west africa prior to the discoveries made there by the emissaries of prince henry the navigator.[ ] when on my last voyage out i was in french territory, i own the discovery of this claim of my french friends came down on me as a shock, because on my previous voyage out i had been in portuguese possessions, and had spent many a pleasant hour listening to the recital of the deeds of diego caõ and lopez do gonsalves, and others of that noble brand of man, the fifteenth-century portugee. i heard then nothing of french discoverers, and also had it well knocked out of my mind that the english had discovered anything of importance in west africa save the niger outfalls, and i had a furious war to keep this honour for my fellow countrymen. then when i got into french territory not one word did i hear of diego caõ or lopez; and so as a distraction from the consideration of the private characters of people still living, i started discoursing on what i considered a safer and more interesting subject, and began to recount how i had had the honour of being personally mixed up in the monument to diego caõ at the mouth of the congo, and what fine fellows--i got no farther than that, when, to my horror, i heard my heroes called microbes, followed by torrents of navigators' names, all french, and all unknown to me. being out for information i never grumble when i get it, let it be what it may. so i asked my french friends to write down clearly on paper the names of those navigators, and promised as soon as i left the forests of the equator, and reached the book forests of europe, i would try and find out more about them. i have; and i own that i owe profound apologies to those truly great frenchmen for not having made their acquaintance sooner; nevertheless i still fail to see why my honoured portuguese, diego and lopez, should have been called microbes, and i have no regrets about my fights for the honour of the niger for my own countrymen, nor for my constant attempts to take the conceit out of my french and portuguese friends, as a set-off for "the conceit about england" they were always trying to take out of me, by holding forth on what those carthaginians had done on the west coast before france or portugal were so much as dreamt of. the portuguese discoveries you can easily read of in major's great book on prince henry; and as this book is fully accepted as correct by the highest portuguese authorities, it is safer to do so than to attempt to hunt your portuguese hero for yourself, because of the quantity of names each of them possesses, and the airy indifference as to what part of that name their national chroniclers use in speaking of them. i have tried it, and have several times been in danger of going to my grave with the idea that i was investigating the exploits of two separate gentlemen, whereas i was only dealing with two parts of one gentleman's name; nevertheless, it is a thing worth learning portuguese for. and, in addition to major's book, we have now, thanks to the hakluyt society, that superb thing, the chronicle of the discovery and conquest of guinea, by gomez eanes de zurara--a work completed in . this work is one on which we are largely dependent for the details of the early portuguese discoveries, because gomez eanes spent the later part of his life in tidying up the torre do tombo--namely, the national archives, of which he was keeper--and his idea of tidying up included the lady-like method of destroying old papers. it makes one cold now to think of the things de zurara may have destroyed; but he evidently regarded himself, as does the nineteenth century spring-cleaner, as a human benefactor; and, strange to say, his contemporaries quite took his view; indeed, this job was done at the request of the cortes, and with the royal sanction. there is also an outstanding accusation of forgery against zurara, but that is a minor offence, and is one we need only take into consideration when contemplating the question as to whether a man capable of destroying early manuscripts and forgery might not be also capable of leaving out of his chronicle, in honour of the navigator, any mention of there being frenchmen on the coast, when he sent out his emissaries to discover what might lay hidden from the eye of man down in the southern seas. i do not, however, think de zurara left out this thing intentionally, but that he had no knowledge of it if it did exist, for no man could have written as he wrote, unless he had a heart too great for such a meanness. certain it is prince henry never knew, for these are the five reasons given by zurara, in the grave, noble splendour of his manner, why the prince undertook the discoveries with which his name will be for ever associated. i give the passage almost in full because of its beauty. "and you should note well that the noble spirit of this prince (henry the navigator) by a sort of natural constraint was ever urging him both to begin and carry out very great deeds; for which reason after the taking of ceuta, he always kept ships well armed against the infidel, both for war and because he also had a wish to know the land that lay beyond the isles of canary and that cape called bojador, for that up to his time neither by writings nor by the memory of man was known with any certainty the nature of the land beyond that cape. some said indeed saint brandan had passed that way, and there was another tale of two galleys rounding the cape which never returned ... and because the said lord infant wished to know the truth of this--since it seemed to him if he, or some other lord, did not endeavour to gain that knowledge, no mariners or merchants would ever dare to attempt it, (for the reason that none of them ever trouble themselves to sail to a place where there is not a sure and certain hope of profit,) and seeing also that no other prince took any pains in this matter, he sent out his own ships against those parts, to have manifest certainty of them all, and to this he was stirred up by his zeal for the service of god, and of king dom duarto, his lord and brother, who then reigned; and this was the first reason of his action." "the second reason was that if there chanced to be in those lands a population of christians or some havens into which it would be possible to sail without peril, many kinds of merchandise might be brought to this nation which would find a ready market, and reasonably so because no other people of these parts traded with them, nor yet people of any other that were known; and also the products of this nation might be taken there, which traffic would bring great profit to our countrymen." "the third reason was that as it was said that the power of the moors in that land of africa was very much greater than was commonly supposed, and that there were no christians among them nor any other race of men, and because every wise man is obliged by natural prudence to wish for a knowledge of the power of his enemy; therefore the said lord infant exerted himself to cause them to be fully discovered to make it known determinedly how far the power of those infidels extended." "the fourth reason was because during the one and thirty years he had warred against the moors he had never found a christian king nor a lord outside this land, who for the love of jesus christ would aid him in the said war; therefore he sought to know if there were in those parts any christian princes in whom the charity and the love of christ was so ingrained that they would aid him against those enemies of the faith." "the fifth reason was the great desire to make increase of the faith of our lord jesus christ, and to bring to him all the souls that should be saved." according to the portuguese, gil eannes was the first emissary of prince henry who succeeded in passing cape bojador. this feat he accomplished in ; but on this his first voyage out he contented himself with passing the cape: a thing which previous expeditions of prince henry had failed to do, and which, so far apparently as prince henry knew, had not been done before, for it was regarded as a tremendous achievement. the next year prince henry's cupbearer, affonso gonsalves baladaya, set out accompanied by gil eannes in a caravel; and the coast to the south of bojador was visited; their furthest expedition was to a shallow bay called by them angra des ruives.[ ] they then returned to portugal, and the next year again went down the coast as far as a galley-shaped rock. this place they called pedro de galli, from its appearance; its present name is pedra de galla. their chief achievement was the discovery of the rio do oura. it is not an important river in itself, but only one of those deceptive estuaries common on the west coast. but it was the first west african place the portuguese got gold dust at, hence its name. the amount of gold was apparently not considerable, and the chief cargo that expedition took home was sea wolves' skins; they reported quantities of seals or sea wolves as they called them here, and this report was the cause of the next portuguese expedition; for the portuguese in those days seem to have always been anxious for sea wolves' oil and skins; and whether this be a survival or no, it seems to me curious that the ladies of lisbon are to this day very keen on sealskin jackets, which their climate can hardly call for imperatively. but, however this may be, it is certain that we have no account of the portuguese having passed south of the next important cape south of bojador, namely, blanco, before . the terrible tragedy of tangiers and political troubles hindered their explorations from to ,[ ] and the french claim to have been down the west coast trading not only before this date, but before prince henry sent a single expedition out at all, namely, as early as . the french story is that there was a deed of association of the merchants of dieppe and rouen of the date . this deed was to arrange for the carrying on to greater proportions of their already existing trade with west africa. the original of this deed was burnt, according to labat, at dieppe, in the conflagration of .[ ] how long before this association was formed that trade had been carried on, it is a little difficult to make out, i find, from the usual hindrance to the historical study of west africa, namely, lack of documentary evidence and a profusion of recriminatory lying. this association was under the patronage of the dukes of normandy, then kings of england; and its ultimate decay is partly attributed to the political difficulties these patrons became involved in. the french authorities say the association was an exceedingly flourishing affair; and it is stated that under its auspices factories were established at sierra leone, and that a fort was built at la mina del ore, or del mina, the place now known as elmina, as early as . now it is round the subject of this fort that most controversy wages, for this french statement does not at all agree with the portuguese account of the fort. the latter claim to have discovered the coast--called by them la mina, by us the gold--in , with an expedition commanded by joão de santarim and pedro de escobara. the portuguese, finding this part of the coast rich in gold, and knowing the grabbing habits of other nations where this was concerned, determined to secure this trade for themselves in a sound practical way, although they were already guarded by a papal bull. the expedition that discovered la mina was the last one made during the reign of affonso v.; but his son, who succeeded him as joão ii., rapidly set about acting on the information it brought home. this king indeed took an intelligent interest in the guinea trade, and was well versed in it; for a part of his revenues before he came to the throne had been derived from it and its fisheries. joão ii. energetically pushed on the enterprise founded by his father affonso v., who had in rented the trade of the guinea coast to fernam gomez for five years at equizodas a year,[ ] on the condition that leagues of new coast should be discovered annually, starting from sierra leone, the then furthest known part, and reserving the ivory trade to the crown. the expedition sent out by king joão, commanded by the celebrated diego de azambuja, took with it, in ten caravels and two smaller craft, ready fashioned stones and bricks, and materials for building, with the intention of building a fort as near as might be to a place called sama, where the previous expedition had reported gold dust to be had from the natives. this fort was to be a means of keeping up a constant trade with the natives, instead of depending only on the visits of ships to the coast. azambuja selected the place we know now as elmina as a suitable site for this fort. having obtained a concession of the land from the king casamanca, on representing to him what an advantage it would be to him to have such a strong place wherein he and his people could seek security against their enemies, and which would act as a constant market place for his trade, and a storehouse for the portuguese goods, azambuja lost no time in building the fort with his ready-fashioned materials, and not only the fort, but a church as well. both were dedicated to san gorge da mina, and a daily mass was instituted to be said therein for the repose of the soul of the great prince henry the navigator, whose body had been laid to rest in november, . indeed, one cannot but be struck with the wealth of portuguese information that we possess, regarding the building of the castle at elmina and by the good taste shown by the portuguese throughout; for, besides establishing this mass--a mass that should be said in all catholic churches on the west african coast to this day in memory of the great man whose enterprise first opened up that great, though terrible region, to the civilised world--king joão granted many franchises and privileges to people who would go and live at san gorge da mina, and aid in expanding the trade and civilisation of the surrounding region, which is as it should be; for people who go and live in west africa for the benefit of their country deserve all these things, and money down as well. having done these, the king evidently thought he deserved some honour himself, which he certainly did, so he called himself lord of guinea, and commanded that all subsequent discoverers should take possession of the places they discovered in a more substantial way than heretofore; for it had been their custom merely to erect wooden crosses or to carve on trees the motto of prince henry, _talent de bien faire_. the monuments king joão commanded should be erected in place of these transient emblems he designed himself; they were to be square pillars of stone six feet high, with his arms upon them, and two inscriptions on opposite sides, in latin and portuguese respectively, containing the exact date when the discovery of the place was made; by his order the cross that was to be on each was to be of iron and cramped into the pedestal. major says the cross was to surmount the structure; but my portuguese friends tell me it was to be in the pedestal, and also that the remains of these old monuments are still to be seen in their possessions; so we must presume that the outfit for an exploring expedition in king joão's days included a considerable cargo of ready-dressed stones and materials for monuments, and that from the quantity of discoveries these expeditions made, the sixteenth century portuguese homeward bound must have been flying as light as the cardiff bound collier of to-day. still it is remarkable that with all the wealth of detail that we have of these portuguese discoveries in the fifteenth century there is no mention of the french being on the coast before pedro do cintra reaches sierra leone and calls it by this name because of the thunder on the mountains roaring like a lion, and so on; but he says nothing of french factories ashore. azambuja gives quantities of detail regarding the building of san gorge da mina, but never says a word about there being already at this place a french fort; yet sieur villault, escuyer, sieur de bellfond,[ ] speaks of it with detail and certainty. also m. robbe says that one of the ships sent out by the association of merchants in was called the _virgin_, that she got as far as kommenda, and thence to the place where mina stands, and that next year they built at this place a strong house, in which they kept ten or twelve of their men to secure it; and they were so fortunate in this settlement that in the colony was considerably enlarged, and did a good trade until , when, owing to the wars in france, the store of these adventurers being exhausted, they were obliged to quit not only mina, but their other settlements, as sestro paris, cape mount, sierra leone, and cape verde. villault, who went to west africa to stir up the french to renew the guinea trade, openly laments the folly of the french in ever having abandoned it owing to certain prejudices they had taken against the climate. his account of it is that about the year some adventurers of dieppe, a port in normandy, who as descendants of the normans, were well used to long voyages, sailed along the coast of the negroes, guinea, and settled several colonies in those parts, particularly about cape verde, in the bay of rio fesco, and along the melequeta coast. to the bay, which extends from cape ledo to cape mount they gave the name of the bay of france; that of petit dieppe to the village of rio corso (between rio france and rio sestro); that of sestro paris to grand sestro, not far from cape palmas; while they carried to france great quantities of guinea pepper and elephants' tusks, whence the inhabitants of dieppe set up the trade of turning ivory and making several useful works, as combs, for which they grew famous, and still continue so. villault also speaks of "a fair church still in being" at elmina, adorned with the arms of france, and also says that the chief battery to the sea is called by the natives la battarie de france; and he speaks of the affection the natives have for france, and says they beat their drums in the french manner. barbot also speaks of the affection of the natives for the french, and says that on his last voyage in the king sent him his second son as hostage, if he would come up to great kommondo, and treat about settling in his country, although he had refused the english and the dutch. barbot, however, does not agree with villault about the prior rights of france to the discovery of guinea; he thinks that if these facts be true it is strange that there is no mention of so important an enterprise in french historians, and concludes that it would be unjust to the portuguese to attribute the first discovery of this part of the world to the french. he also thinks it evidence against it that the portuguese historians are silent on the point, and that azambuja, when he began to build his castle at elmina in , never mentions there being a castle there that had been built by frenchmen in . this, however, i think is not real evidence against the prior right of france. take, for instance, the examples you get constantly when reading the books of portuguese and dutch writers on guinea. you cannot fail to be struck how they ignore each other's existence as much as possible when credit is to be given; indeed were it not for the necessity they feel themselves under of abusing each other, i am sure they would do so altogether, but this they cannot resist. here is a sample of what the portuguese say of the dutch: "that the rebels (meaning the dutch) gained more from the blacks by drunkenness, giving them wine and strong liquors, than by force of arms, and instructing them as ministers of the devil in their wickedness. but that their dissolute lives and manners, joined to the advantage which the portuguese at mina, though inferior in numbers, had gained over them in some rencontres, had rendered them as contemptible among the blacks for their cowardice as want of virtue. that however the blacks, being a barbarous people, susceptible of first impressions, readily enough swallowed calvin's poison (protestantism), as well as took off the merchandise which the dutch, taking advantage of the portuguese indolence sold along the coast, where they were become absolute pirates." then, again, the same author says, "the quantity of merchandises brought by the dutch and their cheapness, has made the barbarians greedy of them, although persons of quality and honour assured them that they would willingly pay double for portuguese goods, as suspecting the dutch to be of less value, buying them only for want of better."[ ] i could give you also some beautiful examples of what the dutch say of the portuguese and the english, and of what the french say of both, but i have not space; moreover, it is all very like what you can read to-day in things about rival nations and traders out in west africa. i myself was commonly called by the portuguese there a pirate because i was english, and that was the proper thing to call the english,--there was no personal incivility meant; and i quote the above passage just to impress on you that when you are reading about west african affairs, either ancient or modern, you must make allowance for this habit of speaking of rival nations--it is the climate. and although the portuguese and the dutch may choose to ignore the french early discoveries, yet they both showed a keen dread of the french from their being so popular with the natives, and did their utmost to oust them from the west coast, which they succeeded in doing for a long period. and then again to this day, when a trader in west africa finds a place where trade is good, he does not cable home to the newspapers about it. if it is necessary that any lying should be done about that place he does it himself; but what he strives most to do is to keep its existence totally unknown to other people; sooner or later some other trader comes along and discovers it, and then that place becomes unhealthy for one or the other of its discoverers,--and that is the climate again. thus by the light of my own dispassionate observations in west africa, i am quite ready to believe in that early french discovery; and i quite agree with villault about the quantity of words derived from the french that you will find to this day among the native tongues, and even in the trade english of the coast, and in districts that have not been under french sway in the historical memory of man. one of these words is the word "ju ju," always regarded by the natives as a foreign word. their own word for religion, or more properly speaking for sacred beings, is "bosum," or "woka." they only say "ju ju" so that you white man may understand. the percentage, however, of portuguese words in trade english is higher than that of french. after the fifteenth century it is not needful now to discuss in detail the subject of the french presence in west africa; for both dutch and portuguese freely own to the presence there of the frenchmen, and openly state that they were a source of worry and expense to them, owing to the way the natives preferred the french to either of themselves. the whole subject of the french conquests in africa is an exceedingly interesting one, and one i would gladly linger over, for there is in it that fascination that always lies in a subject which contains an element of mystery. the element of mystery in this affair is, why france should have persisted so in the matter--why she should have spent blood and money on it to the extent she has, does, and i am sure will continue to do, without its ever having paid her in the past, or paying her now, or being likely to pay her in the future, as far as one can see. there are moments when it seems to me clear enough why she has done it all; but these moments only come when i am in an atmosphere reeking of la gloire or la france--a thing i own i much enjoy; but when i am back in the cold intellectual greyness of commercial england, france's conduct in africa certainly seems a little strange and curious, and far more inexplicable than it was when one was oneself personally risking one's life and ruining one's clothes, after a beetle in the african bush. i really think it is this sporting instinct in me that enables me to understand france in africa at all; and which gives me a thrill of pleasure when i read in the newspapers of her iniquitous conduct in turning up, flag and baggage, in places where she had no legal right to be, or, worse still, being found in possession of bits of other nations' hinterland when a representative of the other arrives there with the intention of discovering it, and to his disgust and alarm finds the most prominent object in the landscape is the blue to the mast, blood to the last, flag of france, with a fire-and-flames frenchman under it, possessed of a pretty gift of writing communications to the real owner of that hinterland--a respectable representative of england or germany--communications threatening him with immediate extinction, and calling him a filibuster and an assassin, and things like that. for the life of me i cannot help a "go it, sall, and i'll hold your bonnit" feeling towards the frenchman. it is not my fault entirely. gladly would i hold my own countryman's bonnet, only he won't go it if i do; so i have to content myself with the knowledge that england has made the west coast pay, and that she certainly did beat the dutch and portuguese off the coast in a commercial war. still she will never beat france off in that way, because the french interest in africa is not a commercial one. france can and will injure our commerce in west africa, in all probability she will ultimately extinguish it, if things go on as they are going, while we cannot hit back and injure her commercial prosperity there because she has none to injure. there is also another point of great interest, and that is the different effect produced by the governmental interference of the two nations in expansion of territory. that the expansion of trade, and spheres of influence are concurrent in this region is now recognised by our own government;[ ] although the government somewhat flippantly remarks "possibly too late." it is, in my opinion, certainly too late as regards both sierra leone and the gold coast; but yet we see small evidence of our government taking themselves seriously in the matter, or of their feeling a regret for having failed to avail themselves of the work done for england on the west coast by some of the noblest men of our blood. i have often heard it said it was a sad thing for an englishman to contemplate our west african possessions, save one, the royal niger; but i am sure it is a far sadder thing for an englishwoman who is full of the pride of her race, and who well knows that that pride can only be justified by its men, to see on the one hand the splendid achievements of mungo park, the two landers, the men who held the gold coast for england when the government abandoned it after the battle of katamansu, of winwood reade who, in the employ of messrs. swanzy, won the right to the niger behind sierra leone, and many others; and on the other hand to see the map of west africa to-day, which shows only too clearly that the english government's last chance of saving the honour of england lies in their supporting the royal niger company. it seems that as soon as a west coast region falls under direct governmental control with us a process of petrification sets in, and a policy of international amiability and reubenism, for which we have scriptural authority to expect nothing but failure. it was of course necessary for our government to take charge in west africa when the partitioning of that continent took place; but i fail to admire those men who at the council board of europe lost for england what had been won for her by better, braver men. still it is no use, in these weird un-shakespearian times, for any one to use strong language, so i'll turn to the consideration of the advance made in west africa by france; for any one can understand how a woman must admire the deeds of brave men and the backing up of those deeds by a brave government. the earlier history of the french occupation of africa is that of a series of commercial companies, who all came to a bad end. of the association of the merchants of dieppe and rouen in the fourteenth century i have already spoken; and whatever may be the difficulty of proving its existence in , there is, i believe, no one who doubts that it had an existence that terminated in . the french authorities ascribe its fall to the wars in france that succeeded the death of charles vi, , and to the death of some of the principal merchants belonging to it; but "the greatest cause of all was that many who had gotten vast riches began to be ashamed of the name of traders, although to that they owed their fortunes, and allying with the nobility set up as quality," and neglected business in the usual way, when this happens. the most flourishing settlements went into decay, and were abandoned all save one, on the isle of sanaga, or what labat calls the niger, the river we now call the senegal.[ ] this french settlement is to this day one of the main french ports in africa, and it has remained in their possession, with the brief interval of falling into the hands of the english for a few months. the company that took over the enterprise of this rouen and dieppe association in was called the compagnie des indes occidentals; it paid for the stock and rights of the previous association the sum of , livres, and it had tremendous ambitions, for not only did it buy up the west african enterprise, but also the rights of the lords proprietors in the isles of martinique, guadaloupe, st. christopher, santa cruz, and maria galanta in the west indies. this company came to a sad end when it had still thirty years of its charter to run; in it sold its remaining term of west african rights to a new company called d'afrique for livres. its west indian possessions the king seized in , and united them with the crown. its successor, the compagnie d'afrique, started with its thirty years' charter, and all the great ambitions of its predecessor. the king gave it every assistance in the way of ships and troops to carry out its designs; and it availed itself of these, for finding its trade incommoded by the dutch, who were then settled at anguin and goree in , it got the king to remove the dutch nuisance from goree by an expedition under count d'estras, and in , by an expedition of its own, under m. de casse, it cleared the dutch out of anguin. this company also made many treaties with the native chiefs. in , by means of treaty with the chiefs of rio fresco, nowadays barbarously spelt rufisque, and portadali, now portindal, and joal, whose name is still uninjured, it acquired rights over all the territory between cape verde and the gambia;[ ] an exclusion from there of all other traders, and an exemption from all customs; and in addition to these enterprises it entered into a contract with the king of france to provide him with , negroes per annum for his west indian islands, and as many more as he might require for use in the galleys. shortly after this the compagnie d'afrique expired in bankruptcy, compounding with its creditors at the rate of _s._ in the £, which i presume was paid mainly out of the , , livres for which it sold its claim to its successors. the successors were a little difficult to find at first, for there seems to have been what one might call distaste for west african commercial enterprise among the french public just then. however, a company was got together to buy up its rights, accept its responsibilities and carry on business in . in the matter of the company that succeeded the d'afrique, confusion is added to catastrophe, owing to the then minister of state, m. seignelay, for some private end, having divided up the funds and created two separate companies,--one to have the trade from cape blanco and the gambia--the compagnie du senegal; the other to hold the rest of the guinea trade to the cape of good hope, the compagnie du guinea. this arrangement, of course, left the senegal company with all the responsibility of the compagnie d'afrique, and without sufficient funds to deal with them; and the compagnie du senegal complained, when, in , it found its affairs in much confusion, throwing the blame on the government; but, says astley, "the great are seldom without excuses for what they do," and the division of the concession was persisted in, on the grounds that when the company that succeeded d'afrique was intact it failed to fulfil the government contract of sending , negroes annually to the west indies; and also that it had not imported as much gold from africa as it might have done. against this the directors remonstrated loudly, saying that, during the two years and a half during which they had been responsible for exporting negroes to the west indies, they had supplied , negroes, that the register of the mint proved they had sent home in three years marks of gold, and that it had cost them , livres to re-establish the trade of the compagnie d'afrique, for which they had already paid more than it was worth. all they got by these complaints was an extension of their trade rights from gambia to sierra leone and a confirmation of their monopoly in exporting negroes to the french west indies, and of their rights to anguin and goree, that is to say, a promise of government assistance if those dutch should come and attempt to reinstate themselves to the incommodation of french commerce. all this however did not avail to make the compagnie du senegal flourish, so in it sold its remaining seventeen years of rights for , livres, to sieur d'apougny, one of the old directors; and this enterprising man secured the assistance of eighteen new shareholders, and obtained from the crown a new charter, and started afresh under the name of the "compagnie du senegal, cap nord et coté d'afrique." it did not prosper; nevertheless it may be regarded as having produced the founder of modern senegal, for it sent out to attend to its affairs, when things were in a grievous mess, one of the greatest men who have ever gone from europe to africa--namely, sieur brüe. the name of this company of sieur d'apougny was d'afrique; and the usual thing happened to it in , when, for , livres, it made over its rights to a set of rouen merchants, reserving, however, to itself the right of carrying on certain branches of the trade for which it held government contracts; failing to carry these out they were taken from it and handed over to the company of rouen merchants, who succumbed to their liabilities in . their rights were then bought up, for , , livres, by the already established mississippi company of paris--a company which survived until . in the english again captured st. louis, the french main post in senegal. in the french recaptured it, and it was ceded to them by england officially in the treaty of . this was merely the usual kind of international amenity prevalent on the west coast in those days. dutch, french, english, danes, portuguese, and courlanders would gallantly seize each other's property out there, while their respective governments at home, if the matter were brought before their notice, and it was apparently worth their while, disowned all knowledge of their representatives' villainies and returned the booty to the prior owner on paper. the aggrieved power then engaged in the difficult undertaking of regaining possession; the said original villain knowing little and caring less about the arrangements made on the point by his home government. but just at this period england dealt french trade a frightful blow. the whole of her iniquity took the form of one john law, a native of edinburgh,[ ] who raised himself to the dignity of comptroller-general of the finance of france by a specious scheme for a bank, an east india company and a mississippi company, by the profits of which the french national debt was to be paid off, a thing then in urgent need of doing, and every one connected with the affair was to make their fortunes, an undertaking always in need of doing in any country. the french government gave him every encouragement, and in he opened the bank; in the shares of that bank were worth more than eighty times the current specie in france; in that bank burst, spreading commercial ruin. to this may be ascribed the period of paralysis in the senegal trade from . the compagnie de senegal had handed over their interest to the mississippi company involved in john law's bank scheme. after this, up to , france like f. m. the duke of wellington anent playing upon the harp, "had other things to do" than attend to west africa. during the napoleonic wars england took all the french possessions in west africa, but by the treaty of paris of she handed back those in senegal, save the gambia. the french vessel sent out to take over the territory was the ill-starred and ill-navigated _méduse_. owing to her wreck it was not until that france replaced officially her standard on this coast. on the th of january of that year, and represented by colonel smaltz, she again entered into possession of goree and st. louis in the mouth of the senegal, which was practically all she had, and that was in a very unsatisfactory state. colonel smaltz, in , had to come to an agreement with the oulof chief of the st louis district to pay him a subsidy, but a mere catalogue of the wars between the french and the oulofs is not necessary here; they were mutually unsatisfactory until there enters on the scene that second great founder of the french power in africa, general faidherbe, in . faidherbe is indeed the founder; but had it not been for sieur brüe and his travels far into the interior, and the evidence he collected regarding the riches therein, and of the general value of the country, it is not likely that, as things were in , france would have troubled herself so much about extending her power in senegal. faidherbe was also one of those men who get possessed by a belief in the future of west africa, regardless of any state of dilapidation they may find it in, and who have the power of infusing their enthusiasm into the minds of others; and he roused france to the importance of senegal, saying prophetically, "our possession on the west coast of africa is possibly the one of all our colonies that has before it the greatest future, and it deserves the whole sympathy and attention of the empire." these were words more likely to inspire france or any other reasonable power with a desire to give senegal attention, than those used by the previous french visitor there, m. sanguin, in , who, speaking of the island of st. louis, says it consists entirely of burning sands on whose barren surface you sometimes meet with scattered flints thrown out among their ballast by ships, and the ruins of buildings formerly erected by europeans; but he remarks it is not surprising the sands are barren, for the air is so strongly impregnated with salt, which pervades everything and consumes even iron in a very short space of time. the heat he reports unpleasant, and rendered thus more so by the reflection from the sand. if the island were not all it might be, one might still hope for better things ashore on the mainland, but not according to m. sanguin. the mainland is covered with sand and overrun with mangles, not the sort, you understand, that vulgar little english boys used to state their mothers had sold and invested the money in a barrel organ, but what we now call mangroves; then, mentioning that the st. louis water supply was the cause of most of those maladies which carry off the europeans so rapidly, that at the end of every three years the colony has a fresh set of inhabitants, m. sanguin discourses on the charms of west african night entertainments in a most feeling and convincing way, stating that there was an infinity of gnats called mosquitoes, which exist in incredible quantities. he does not mind them himself, oh dear no! being a sort of savage, he says, totally indifferent to the impression he may create in the fair sex, so that, if you please, he smears himself over with butter, which preserves him from the mosquitoes' impertinent stings. how he came by a sufficiency of butter for this purpose i won't pretend to know; but he knew mosquitoes, for impertinent is a perfect word for them. m. sanguin, however, was not the sort of man, with all his ability and enterprise, to advertise senegal successfully to france. whatever frenchman would care to go to a land where he needs must be sufficiently indifferent to the fair sex to smear himself with butter! dire and awful dangers and miscellaneous horrors, even to being carried off by maladies among mangles in an atmosphere stiff with mosquitoes, but not that! now faidherbe was different. remember to the honour of the man he started with the above-described environment, but he took the grand tone and did not dwell on local imperfections; the burning sands of senegal he mentioned, as all who know them are, by a natural constraint, forced, as azurara would say, to do, but he said our intentions are pure and noble, our cause is just, the future cannot fail us;[ ] and with such words, to his credit and to the credit of la france, he spoke to her heart; and he spoke truly, for with all its failures, with all the fearful loss of the lives of frenchmen, senegal is a grand thing, and it is a great thing for france, for from it has risen her masterdom over the western soudan--a work also inaugurated by faidherbe, through his support of lieutenant maze, who reached the niger. practical in his work, faidherbe was also--by rebuilding the fort at medina--the annexation of the oulof country ( ); the institution of a battalion of native tirailleurs ( ); the telegraph line between st. louis and goree ( ); the construction of the harbour at darkar and the erection of a first-class lighthouse at cape verd ( ); and the annexation of the kingdom of cayore ( ). a grand record! and one that would be grander for france were it not for the mismanagement that followed faidherbe's rule in commercial and financial matters. the want of financial success in her enterprise in west africa is a matter that has constantly irritated france. she is continually saying: "english possessions on that coast pay, why should not mine?" it is not my business to obtrude on her an answer, i merely dwell on the subject because i clearly see there are creeping nowadays into our own methods of managing africa, those very same causes of financial failure that have afflicted her, namely, too high tariffs, too exaggerated views of the immediate profits to be got from those regions, and certain unfair methods of dealing with natives. in attempting, however, to account for the trade from the french possessions in west africa being proportionately so small to the immense area of country, the make of the country and its native inhabitants must be taken into consideration. enormous districts of the french possessions are, to put it mildly, not fertile, and capable of producing in the way of a marketable commodity only gum, which is gathered from the stems of the acacia horrida. it is an excellent gum, and there is plenty of this acacia, and other gum-yielding acacias, but pickers are not so plentiful, particularly now french authorities object to native enterprise taking the form of raiding districts for slaves to employ in the industry. other enormous districts, however, are as fertile as need be, and densely forested with forests rich in magnificent timber and rubber wealth. the inhabitants, a most important factor in the prosperity or otherwise, of west african regions, are varied, but roughly speaking, we may say france possesses the whole of the tawny moors, and tawny moors have their good points and their bad. their good point, from our present point of view, is their commercial enterprise. from the earliest historical account we have of them to the present day, it has been their habit to suck the trade out of the rich and fertile districts, carry it across the desert, and trade it with the white moors, who, in their turn, carried it to the mediterranean and red sea ports. the opening of the west coast seaboard trade, inaugurated by the portuguese, has acted as a commercial loss to the tawny moors during the past years, and must be held, in a measure, accountable for the decay of the great towns of timbuctoo, jenne, mele, and so on, though only in a measure, for herein comes the bad point of the inhabitants of the western soudan, from our point of view, namely, their devotion to religious differences and politics, which prevents their attending to business. as this state of internecine war came on about the same period as the opening to the black moors and negroes of a market direct with european traders in the bight of benin, it hurried the tawny moors to commercial decay. timbuctoo never recovered the blow dealt her by the moorish conquest in . at the breaking up of the empire of askia the great, revolt and war raged through the region, jenne revolted in the west, an example followed by the touaregs fulah and malinkase tribes. both north and south were thrown into confusion, and timbuctoo, their intermediary, finding her commerce injured, rebelled in her turn. she was conquered and brutally repressed by the moorish conquerors in . a terrible dearth provoked by a lack of rain visited the town, and her inhabitants were reduced to eating the corpses of animals, and even of men. this was followed by the pestilence of ,[ ] but through this arose any quantity of wars and upheavals of political authority among the tawny moors in the early days of european intercourse with the west african coast. they assumed a more acute, religious form in our own century, or to be more accurate just at the end of the eighteenth, when shazkh utham danfodio arose among the fulahs as a religious reformer, and a warrior missionary. he was a great man at both, but as a disturber of traffic still greater, a thing that cannot be urged to so great an extent against the other great muslam missionary umaru l'haji. still his gathering together an army of , men in - , and going about with them on a series of proselytizing expeditions against any tribe in the upper niger and senegal region he found to be in an unconverted state, was little better than a nuisance to the french authorities at that time. danfodio's affairs have fallen into the hands of england to arrange, and very efficiently her great representative in west africa, the royal niger company, has arranged them. but for our danfodio and his consequences, france has had twenty, and she has dealt with them both gallantly and patiently. but there will always be, as far as one can see, trouble for france with her tawny moors, now that the sources of their support are cut off from them by many of the districts they once drew their trade from--the sea-board districts of the benin bight, like sierra leone, the gold coast and lagos, in the english niger--being in the hands of a nation whose commercial instincts enable it to see the benefits of lower tariffs than france affects. even were our tariffs to be raised to-morrow, the trade would again begin to drain back into the hands of its old owners, the tawny moors, for the western soudan is being pacified by france. if some way is not devised of providing the tawny moors with trade sufficient to keep them, things must go badly there, owing to the unfertility of the greater part of their country and the increase of the population arising from the pacification of the western soudan, which france is effecting. i will dwell no longer on this sketch of the history of the advance of france in western africa. we in england cannot judge it fairly. nationally, her honour there is our disgrace; commercially, her presence is our ruin. two things only stand out from these generalisations. the royal niger company shows how great england can be when she is incarnate in a great man, for the royal niger company is so far sir george taubman-goldie. the other thing that stands out unstained by comatose indifference to the worth of west africa to england is her commerce as represented by her west coast traders, who have held on to the coast since the sixteenth century with a bulldog grip, facing death and danger, fair weather and foul. fine things both these two things are, but they do not understand each other; they would certainly not understand me regarding their affairs were i to talk from june to january, so i won't attempt to, but speak to the general public, who so far have understood neither sir george goldie, nor the west coast trader, nor for the matter of that their mutual foe france, and i beg to say that france has not been so destructive an enemy to england there as england's own folly has been as incarnate in the parliamentary resolution of ; that the achievements of france in exploration in the western soudan make one of the grandest pages of all european efforts in africa; that the influence of france over the natives has been, is, and, i believe, will remain good. "our intentions are pure and noble, our cause is just, the future cannot fail us," said faidherbe. so far as the natives are concerned, this has been the policy of france in western africa. so far as diplomatic relations with ourselves, humanly speaking, it has not; but diplomacy is diplomacy, and the amount of probity--justice--in diplomacy is a thing that would not at any period cover a threepenny-bit. it is a form of war that shows no blood, but which has not in it those things which sanctify red war, honour and chivalry. nevertheless, diplomacy is an essential thing in this world; it does good work, it saves life, it increases prosperity, it advances the cause of religion and knowledge, and therefore the world must not be hard on it for its being--what it is. personally, i prefer contemplating other things, and so i turn to commerce. illustration: st. paul do loanda. [_to face page ._] footnotes: [ ] see the first edition of _henry the navigator_, by r. h. major, who, with the enormous wealth of his knowledge, vigorously defends the claim to portuguese priority; although i do not quite agree with him on the value of the absence of evidence in disproving the french claim i am deeply indebted to him for the mention of references on the point. [ ] this is an interesting case of the alteration that has taken place in portuguese place names in west africa. angra des ruives in english is gurnard bay, and this name was given to it by the portuguese because of the quantity of this fish found there. in the _west african pilot_ you find the place called garnet bay, and the _pilot_ says "fish are abundant"; but as it does not say that garnets abound there, nor that it was discovered by lord wolseley, i think there is reason to believe that its name is gurnard bay, in translation of angra des ruives. [ ] _prince henry the navigator_; major. [ ] labat, _afrique occidentale_, vol. iv. p. . . [ ] equal to nearly £ english per annum. [ ] _a relation of the coasts of africa called guinea collected by sieur villault, escuyer, sieur de bellfond, in the years - ._ london: john starkey, . [ ] vas conselo's _life of king joão_. [ ] duke of devonshire's speech at liverpool, june, . [ ] labat. at present the isle of st. louis, and what is called the niger, is the river sanaga--or senega and senegal, as the french corrupt it.--astley, . [ ] an extent of thirty leagues and six leagues within the land.--labat, p. . [ ] john law was the eldest son of an edinburgh goldsmith, born about . "bred to no business, but possessed of great abilities, and a fertile invention," he, when very young, recommended himself to the king's ministers in scotland to arrange fiscal matters, then in some confusion from the union of the kingdoms. his scheme, however, was not adopted. great at giving other people good advice on money matters, he failed to manage his own. after a gay career in edinburgh, and gaining himself the title of "beau law," he got mixed up in a duel, and fled to the continent. he was banished from venice and genoa for draining the youth of those cities of their money, and wandered about italy, living on gaming and singular bets and wagers. he proposed his scheme to the duke of savoy, who saw by this scheme he could soon, by deceiving his subjects in this manner, get the whole of the money of the kingdom into his possession; but as law could not explain what would happen then, he was repulsed, and proceeded to paris, where, under the patronage of the duc d'orleans, they found favour with louis xiv. when his crash came he was exiled, and died in venice in . [ ] _notice de senegal_, paris, , p. . [ ] for an interesting account of timbuctoo and its history, see _timbuctoo the mysterious_, by m. felix dubois. . chapter xii commerce in west africa concerning the reasons that deter this writer from entering here on a general history of the english, dutch and portuguese in western africa; to which is added some attempt to survey the present state of affairs there. lack of space, not lack of interest, prevents me from sketching the careers of other nations in west africa even so poorly as i have that of france; but the truth is, the material for the history of the other nations is so enormous that in order to present it with anything approaching clearness or fairness, folio volumes are required. i have a theory of the proper way to write the history of all european west african enterprises--a theory i shall endeavour to put into practice if i am ever cast ashore on an uninhabited island, with a suitable library, a hogshead of ink, a few tons of writing paper, accompanied by pens, and at least a quarter of a century of uninterrupted calm at my disposal. the theory itself is short, so i can state it here. pay no attention to the nasty things they say about each other--it's the climate. the history of the portuguese occupation of west africa is the great one. the material for its early geographico-historical side is in our hands, owing to the ability of mr. major and his devotion to the memory of prince henry the navigator. but the history of portugal in west africa from the days of the navigator onwards wants writing. sir a. b. ellis fortunately gives us, in his history of the gold coast, an account of the part that portugal played there, but, except for this region, you must hunt it up second-hand in the references made to it by prejudiced rivals, or in scattered portuguese books and manuscripts. while as for the commercial history of portugal in west africa, although it has been an unbroken one from the fifteenth century to our own time, it has so far not been written at all. this seems to me all the more deplorable, because it is full of important lessons for those nations who are now attempting to exploit the regions she first brought them into contact with. it must be noted, for one thing, that portugal was the first european nation to tackle africa in what is now by many people considered the legitimate way, namely, by direct governmental control. other nations left west african affairs in the hands of companies of merchant adventurers and private individuals for centuries. nevertheless, portugal is nowadays unpopular among the other nations engaged in exploiting africa. i shrink from embroiling myself in controversy, but i am bound to say i think she has become unpopular on account of prejudice, coupled with that strange moral phenomenon that makes men desirous of persuading themselves that a person they have treated badly deserves such treatment. the more powerful european nations have dealt scandalously, from a moral standpoint, with portugal in africa. this one could regard calmly, it being in the nature of powerful nations to do this sort of thing, were it not for the airs they give themselves; and to hear them talking nowadays about portugal's part in african history is enough to make the uninitiated imagine that the sweet innocent things have no past of their own, and never knew the price of black ivory. "oh, but that is all forgiven and forgotten, and portugal is just what she always was at heart," you say. well, portugal at heart was never bad, as nations go. her slaving record is, in the point of humanity to the cargo, the best that any european nation can show who has a slaving west african past at all. the thing she is taxed with nowadays mainly is that she does not develope her possessions. developing african possessions is the fashion, so naturally portugal, who persists on going about in crinoline and poke bonnet style, gets jeered at. this is right in a way, so long as we don't call it the high moral view and add to it libel. i own that my own knowledge of portuguese possessions forces me to regard those possessions as in an unsatisfactory state from an imperialistic standpoint; a grant made by the home government for improvements, say roads, has a tendency to--well, not appear as a road. some one--several people possibly--is all the better and happier for that grant; and after all if you do not pay your officials regularly, and they are not englishmen, you must take the consequences. even when an honest endeavour is made to tidy things up, a certain malign influence seems to dodge its footsteps in a portuguese possession. for example, when i was out in ' , portugal had been severely reminded by other nations that this was the nineteenth century. bom dios--bother it, i suppose it is--says portugal--must do something to smarten up dear angola. she is over now, and hasn't had any new frocks since the slave trade days; perhaps they are right, and it's time this dear child came out. so loanda, angola, was ordered street lamps--stylish things street lamps!--a telephone, and a water supply. now, say what you please, loanda is not only the finest, but the only, city in west africa. "lagos! you ejaculate--you don't know lagos." i know i have not been ashore there; nevertheless i have contemplated that spot from the point of view of lagos bar for more than thirty solid hours, to say nothing of seeing photographs of its details galore, and i repeat the above statement. yet for all that, loanda had no laid-on water supply nor public street lamps until she was well on in her th year, which was just before i first met her. during the past she had had her water brought daily in boats from the bengo river, and for street lighting she relied on the private enterprise of her citizens.[ ] the reports given me on these endeavours to develope were as follows. as for the water in its laid-on state, it was held by the more aristocratic citizens to be unduly expensive ( reis per cubic metre), and they grumbled. the general public, though holding the same opinion, did not confine their attention to grumbling. stand-pipes had been put up in suitable places and an official told off to each stand-pipe to make a charge for water drawn. water in west africa is woman's palaver, and you may say what you please about the down-troddenness of african ladies elsewhere, but i maintain that the west african lady in the matter of getting what she wants is no discredit to the rest of the sex, black, white, or yellow. in this case the ladies wanted that water, but did not go so far as wanting to pay for it. in the history given to me it was evident to an unprejudiced observer that they first tried kindness to the guardian officials of the stand-pipes, but these men were of the st. anthony breed, and it was no good. checked, but not foiled, in their admirable purpose of domestic economy, those dear ladies laid about in their minds for other methods, and finally arranged that one of a party visiting a stand-pipe every morning should devote her time to scratching the official while the rest filled their water pots and hers. this ingenious plan was in working order when i was in loanda, but since leaving it i do not know what modification it may have undergone, only i am sure that ultimately those ladies will win, for the african lady--at any rate the west coast variety--is irresistible; as livingstone truly remarked, "they are worse than the men." in the street lamp matter i grieve to say that the story as given to me does not leave my own country blameless. portugal ordered for loanda a set of street lamps from england. she sent out a set of old gas lamp standards. there being no gas in loanda there was a pause until oil lamps to put on them came out. they ultimately arrived, but the p.w.d. failed to provide a ladder for the lamplighter. hence that worthy had to swarm each individual lamp-post, a time-taking performance which normally landed him in the arms of aurora before loanda was lit for the night; but however this may be, i must own that loanda's lights at night are a truly lovely sight, and its p.w.d.'s chimney a credit to the whole west coast of africa, to say nothing of its observatory and the weather reports it so faithfully issues, so faithfully and so scientifically that it makes one deeply regret that loanda has not got a climate that deserves them, but only one she might write down as dry and have done with it. [illustration: cliffs at loanda. [_to face page ._] the present position of the angola trade is interesting, instructive, and typical. i only venture to speak on it in so far as i can appeal to the statements of mr. nightingale, who is an excellent authority, having been long resident in angola, and heir to the traditions of english enterprise there, so ably represented by the firm of newton, carnegie and co. the trade of ka kongo, the dependent province on angola, i need not mention, because its trade is conditioned by that of its neighbours congo français and the congo belge. [illustration: dondo angola. [_to face page ._] the interesting point--painfully interesting--is the supplanting of english manufactures, and the way in which the english shipping interest[ ] at present suffers from the differential duties favouring the portuguese line, the empreza nacional de navigacão a vapor. this line, on which i have had the honour of travelling, and consuming in lieu of other foods enough oil and olives for the rest of my natural life, is an admirable line. it shows a calm acquiescence in the ordinances of fate, a general courteous gentleness, combined with strong smells and the strain of stringed instruments, not to be found on other west coast boats. it runs two steamers a month ( th and rd) from lisbon, and they call at madeira, st. vincent, santiago, principe and san thome islands, kabinda, san antonio (kongo), ambriz, loanda, ambrizzette, novo redondo, benguella, mossamedes and port alexander, every alternate steamer calling at liverpool. the other steamboat lines that visit loanda are the african and british-african of liverpool, which run monthly, in connection with the other south-west african ports; and the woermann line from hamburg. the french chargeurs-reunis started a line of steamers from havre _via_ lisbon to loanda, madagascar, delagoa bay, touching at capetown, when so disposed, but this line has discontinued calling in on loanda. the other navigation for angola is done by the rio quanza company, which runs two steamers up that river as far as dondo; but this industry, dondo included, mr. nightingale states to be in a parlous state since the extension of the royal trans-african railway company[ ] to cazengo, "as all the coffee which previously came _via_ dondo by means of carriers, now comes by rail, the town of dondo is almost deserted; the house property which a few years ago was valued at £ , sterling, to-day would not realise £ , ." i may remark in this connection, however, not to raise the british railway-material makers' feelings unduly, that all this railway's rolling stock and material is belgian in origin. this seems to be the fate of african railways. i am told it is on account, for one thing, of the way in which the boilers of the english locomotives are set in, namely, too stiffly, whereby they suffer more over rough roads than the more loosely hung together foreign-made locomotives; and, for another, that english-made rolling stock is too heavy for rough roads, and that roads under the conditions in africa cannot be otherwise than rough, &c. it is not, however, belgian stuff alone that is competing and ousting our own from the markets of angola. american machinery, owing to the personal enterprise of several american engineering firms, is supplying steam-engines and centrifugal pumps for working salt at cucuaco, and machinery for dealing with sugar-cane. mr. nightingale says the cultivation of the sugar-cane is rapidly extending, for the sole purpose of making rum. the ambition of every small trader, after he has put a few hundreds of milreis together, is to become a fazendeiro (planter) and make rum, for which there is ever a ready sale. but regarding the machinery, mr. nightingale says: "up to the present time no british firm has sent out a representative to this province. there is a fair demand for cane-crushing mills, steam engines and turbines. a representative of an american firm is out here for the third time within four years, and has done good business; and there is no reason why the british manufacturers should not do as well. the american machinery is inferior to british makes, and cheaper; but it sells well, which is the principal thing." [illustration: trading stores. _to face page ._] it is the same story throughout the angola trade. no english matches come into its market. the companhia de mossemedes, which is only nominally portuguese, and is worked by german capital, has obtained from the government an enormous tract of country stretching to the zambesi, with rights to cure fish and explore mines. cartridges made in holland, and an iron pier made in belgium, an extinct trade in soap and a failing one in manchester goods,[ ] and gunpowder, are all sad items in mr. nightingale's lament. small matters in themselves, you may think, but straws show which way the wind blows, and it blows against england's trade in every part of africa not under england's flag. it would not, however, be fair to put down to differential tariffs alone our failing trade in angola, because our successful competitors in hardware and gunpowder are other nations who have to face the same disadvantages--germany, holland, and belgium. portugal herself is now competing with the manchester goods. she does so with well-made stuffs, but she is undoubtedly aided by her tariff. the consular report ( ) says: "the falling off in manchester cotton since shows a diminution of , , kilos. cotton, if coming from manchester via lisbon, , , , duties per cent, or reis per kilo, equal , milreis (about £ , ); cotton coming from portugal, , , kilos, duties reis per kilo, equal to , dollars, reis (about £ , ), showing a difference in the receipts for one year of £ , ." there is in this statement, i own, a certain obscurity, which has probably got into it from the editing of the home officials. i do not know if the , , kilos, representing the difference between what england shipped to angola in and what she shipped in , was supplied in the latter years from portugal of portuguese manufacture; but assuming such to have been the case, the position from a tariff point of view would work out as follows: , , kilos of cottons from manchester would pay duty, at reis per kilo, , - / milreis. taking the exchange at _s._ sterling per milreis, this amounts to £ , . if this quantity of manchester-made cottons had gone to lisbon, and there become nationalised, and sent forward to angola in portuguese steamers, the duty would have been per cent. of reis per kilo, or say , milreis, equal to £ , ; but if this quantity were manufactured in portugal, and shipped by portuguese steamers, the duty would be reis per kilo, equal to £ , . the premium in favour of portuguese production on this quantity is therefore £ , , a terrific tax on the portuguese subjects of angola, for one year, in one class of manufactures only. the deductions, however, that mr. nightingale draws from his figures in regard to portugal and her province are quite clear. he says, "there is no doubt that the province of angola is a very rich one. no advantages are held out for merchants to establish here, and thus bring capital into the place, which means more business, the opening up of roads, and the development of industries and agriculture. generally the colony exists for the benefit of a few manufacturers in portugal, who reap all the profit." again, he says, "the merchants are much too highly taxed, a good fourth part of their capital is paid out in duties, with no certainty when it will be realised again. angola, with plenty of capital, moderate taxes and low duties, might in a few years become a most flourishing colony." now here we come to the general problem of the fiscal arrangements suitable for an african colony; and as this is a subject of great importance to england in the administration of her colonies, and errors committed in it are serious errors, as demonstrated by the late war in sierra leone,--the most serious even we have had for many years to deal with in west africa,--i must beg to be allowed to become diffuse, humbly stating that i do not wish to dogmatise on the matter, but merely to attract the attention of busy practical men to the question of the proper system to employ in the administration of tropical possessions. this seems to me a most important affair to england, now that she has taken up great territories and the responsibilities appertaining to them in that great tropical continent, africa. there are other parts of the world where the suitability of the system of government to the conditions of the governed country is not so important. [illustration: st. paul do loanda. [_to face page ._] it seems to me that the deeper down from the surface we can go the greater is our chance of understanding any matter; and i humbly ask you to make a dive and consider what reason european nations have for interfering with africa at all. there are two distinct classes of reasons that justify one race of human beings interfering with another race. these classes are pretty nearly inextricably mixed; but if, like mark twain's horse and myself, you will lean against a wall and think, i fancy you will see that primarily two classes of reasons exist--(_a_), the religious reason, the rescue of souls--a reason that is a duty to the religious man as keen as the rescue of a drowning man is to a brave one; (_b_), pressure reasons. these pressure reasons are divisible into two sub-classes--( ) external; ( ) internal. now of external pressure reasons primarily we have none in africa. the african hive has so far only swarmed on its own continent; it has not sent off swarms to settle down in the middle of civilisation, and terrify, inconvenience, and sting it in a way that would justify civilisation not only in destroying the invading swarm, but in hunting up the original hive and smoking it out to prevent a recurrence of the nuisance, as the roman empire was bound to try and do with its barbarians. such being the case,[ ] we can leave this first pressure reason--the war justification--for interfering with the african--on one side, and turn to the other reason,--the internal pressure reasons acting from within on the european nations. these are roughly divisible into three sub-classes:--( ) the necessity of supplying restless and ambitious spirits with a field for enterprise during such times as they are not wanted for the defence of their nation in europe--france's reason for acquiring africa; ( ) population pressure; ( ) commercial pressure. the two latter have been the chief reason for the teutonic nations, england and germany, overrunning the lands of other men. this teutonic race is a strong one, with the habit, when in the least encouraged by peace and prosperity, of producing more men to the acre than the acre can keep. being among themselves a kindly, common-sense race, it seems to them more reasonable to go and get more acres elsewhere than to kill themselves off down to a level which their own acres could support. the essential point about the "elsewhere" is that it should have a climate suited to the family. these migrations to other countries made under the pressure of population usually take place along the line of least resistance, namely, into countries where the resident population is least able to resist the invasion, as in america and australia; but occasionally, as in the case of canada and the cape, they follow the conquest of an european rival who was the pioneer in rescuing the country from savagery. i am aware that this hardly bears out my statement that the teutonic races are kindly, but as i have said "among themselves," we will leave it; and to other people, the original inhabitants of the countries they overflow, they are on the whole as kindly as you can expect family men to be. a distinguished frenchman has stated that the father of a family is capable of anything; and it certainly looks as if he thought no more of stamping out the native than of stamping out any other kind of vermin that the country possessed to the detriment of his wife and children. i do not feel called upon to judge him and condemn, for no doubt the father of a family has his feelings; and as it must have been irritating to an ancestor of modern america to come home from an afternoon's fishing and find merely the remains of his homestead and bits of his family, it was more natural for him to go for the murderers than strive to start an aborigines' protection society. though why, caring for wife and child so much as he does, the teuton should have gone and planted them, for example, in places reeking with red indians is a mystery to me. i am inclined to accept my french friend's explanation on this point, namely, that it arose from the teuton being a little thick in the head and incapable of considering other factors beyond climate. but this may be merely thickness in my own head--a hopelessly teutonic one. however, the occupation of territory from population pressure in europe we need not consider here; for it is not this reason that has led europe to take an active interest in tropical africa. it is a reason that comes into african affairs only--if really at all--in the extreme north and extreme south of the continent--algeria and the cape. the vast regions of africa from ° n. to ° s., have long been known not to possess a climate suitable for colonising in. "men's blood rapidly putrifies under the tropic zone." "tropical conditions favour the growth of pathogenic bacteria"--a rose called by another name. anyhow, not the sort of country attractive to the father of a family to found a home in. yet, as in spite of this, european nations are possessing themselves of this country with as much ardour as if it were a health resort and a gold mine in one, it is plain they must have another reason, and this reason is in the case of germany and england primarily commercial pressure. these two teutonic nations have the same habit in their commercial production that they have in their human production,--the habit of overdoing it for their own country; and just as lancashire, for example, turns out more human beings than can comfortably exist there, so does she turn out more manufactured articles than can be consumed there; and just as the surplus population created by a strong race must find other lands to live in, so must the surplus manufactures of a strong race find other markets; both forms of surplus are to a strong race wealth. the main difference between these things is that the surplus manufactured article is in no need of considering climate in the matter of its expansion. it stands in a relation to the man who goes out into the world with it akin to that of the wife and family to the colonist; the trader will no more meekly stand having his trade damaged than the colonist will stand having his family damaged; but at the same time, the mere fact that the climate destroys trade-stuff is, well, all the better for trade, and trade, moreover, leads the trader to view the native population from a different standpoint to that of the colonist. to that family man the native is a nuisance, sometimes a dangerous one, at the best an indifferent servant, who does not do his work half so well as in a decent climate he can do it himself. to the trader the native is quite a different thing, a customer. a dense native population is what the trader wants; and on their wealth, prosperity, peace and industry, the success of his endeavours depends. now it seems to me that there are in this world two classes of regions attractive to the great european manufacturing nations, england and germany, wherein they can foster and expand their surplus production of manufactured articles. ( ) such regions as india and china. ( ) such regions as africa. the necessity of making this division comes from the difference between the native populations. in the first case you are dealing with a people who are manufacturers themselves, and you are selling your goods mainly against gold. in the second the people are not manufacturers themselves except in a very small degree, and you are selling your goods against raw material. in a bustling age like this there seems to be a tendency here and in germany to value the first form of market above the second. i fail to see that this is a sound valuation. the education our commerce gives will in a comparatively short time transform the people of the first class of markets into rival producers of manufactured articles wherewith to supply the world's markets. we by our pacification of india have already made india a greater exporter than she was before our rule there. if china is opened up, things will be even worse for england and germany; for the chinese, with their great power of production, will produce manufactured articles which will fairly swamp the world's markets; for, sad to say, there is little doubt but they can take out of our hands all textile trade, and probably several other lines of trade that england, germany, and america now hold. india and china being populated, the one by a set of people at sixes and sevens with each other, and the other by a set of people who, to put it mildly, are not born warriors, cannot, except under the dominion and protection of a powerful european nation, commercially prosper. but england and germany are not everybody. there is france. i could quite imagine france, for example, in possession of china, managing it on similar lines to those on which she is now managing west africa, but with enormously different results to herself and the rest of the world. her system of differential tariffs, be it granted, keeps her african possessions poor, and involves her in heavy imperial expenditure; but the chinaman's industry would support the french system, and thrive under her jealous championship. this being the case, it is of value to england and germany to hold as close a grip as possible over such regions as india and china, even though by so doing they are nourishing vipers in their commercial bosoms. the case of the second class of markets--the tropical african--is different. such markets are of enormous value to us; they are, especially the west african ones, regions of great natural riches in rubber, oil, timber, ivory, and minerals from gold to coal. they are in most places densely populated with customers for england's manufactured goods. the advantages of such a region to a manufacturing nation like ourselves are enormous; for not only do we get rid there of our manufactured goods, but we get, what is of equal value to our manufacturing classes, raw material at a cheap enough rate to enable the english manufacturers to turn out into the markets of the civilised world articles sufficiently cheap themselves to compete with those of other manufacturing nations. [illustration: in an angola market.] [illustration: a man of south angola. [_to face page ._] the importance to us of such markets as africa affords us seems to me to give us one sufficient reason for taking over these tropical african regions. i do not use the word justification in the matter, it is a word one has no right to use until we have demonstrated that our interference with the native population and our endeavours for our own population have ended in unmixed good; but it is a sound reason, as good a reason as we had in overrunning australia and america. indeed, i venture to think it is a better one, for the possession of a great market enables thousands of men, women and children to live in comfort and safety in england, instead of going away from home and all that home means; and this commercial reason,--for all its not having a high falutin sound in it,--is the one and only expansion reason we have that in itself desires the national peace and prosperity of the native races with whom it deals. it seems to me no disgrace to england that her traders are the expanding force for her in africa. there are three classes of men who are powers to a state--the soldier, the trader, and the scientist. their efforts, when co-ordinated and directed by the true statesman--the religious man in the guise of philosopher and poet--make a great state. being english, of course modesty prevents my saying that england is a great state. i content myself by saying that she is a truly great people, and will become a great state when she is led by a line of great statesmen--statesmen who are not only capable, as indeed most of our statesmen have been, of seeing the importance of india and the colonies, but also capable of seeing the equal importance to us of markets. england's democracy must learn the true value of the markets that our fellow-countrymen have so long been striving to give her, and must appreciate the heroism those men have displayed, only too often unrequited, never half appreciated by the sea-wife, who "breeds a breed of rovin' men and casts them over sea." those who go to make new homes for the old country in australia and america do not feel her want of interest keenly; but those heroes of commerce who go to fight and die in fever-stricken lands for the sake of the old homes at home, do feel her want of interest. i am not speaking hastily, nor have i only west africa in my mind in this matter; there are other regions where we could have succeeded better, with advantage to all concerned--malaya, british guiana, new guinea, the west indies, as well as west africa. if you examine the matter i think you will see that all these regions we have failed in are possessed of unhealthy climates, while the regions we have succeeded with are those possessed of healthy climates. the reason for this difference in our success seems to me to lie mainly in our deficiency of statesmanship at home. we really want the humid tropic zone more than other nations do; a climate that eats up steel and hardware as a rabbit eats lettuces is an excellent customer to a hardware manufacturing town, &c. a region densely populated by native populations willing to give raw trade stuffs in exchange for cotton goods, which they bury or bang out on stones in the course of washing or otherwise actively help their local climate to consume, is invaluable to a textile manufacturing town. yet it would be idle to pretend that our government has realised these things. our superior ability as manufacturers, and the great enterprise of our men who have gone out to conquer the markets of the tropics, have given us all the advantages we now enjoy from those markets, but they could do no more; and now, when we are confronted by the expansion of other european nations, those men and their work are being lost to england. our fellow-countrymen will go anywhere and win anywhere to-day just as well as yesterday, where the climate of the region allows england to throw enough of them in at a time to hold it independent of the home government; but in places where we cannot do this, in the unhealthy tropical regions where those men want backing up against the aggression on their interests of foreign governments, well, up to the present they have not had that backing up, and hence we have lost to england in england the advantages we so easily might have secured. an american magazine the other day announced in a shocked way that i could evidently "swear like a trooper!" i cannot think where it got the idea from; but really!--well, of course i don't naturally wish to, but i cannot help feeling that if i could it would be a comfort to me; for when i am up in the great manufacturing towns, england properly so called, their looms and forges seem to me to sing the same song to the great maker of fate--we must prosper or england dies. and there is but one thing they can prosper on--for there is but one feeding ground for them and all the thousands of english men, women and children dependent on them--the open market of the world. to me the life blood of england is her trade. her soul, her brain is made of other things, but they should not neglect or spurn the thing that feeds them--commerce--any more than they should undervalue the thing that guards them--the warrior. but, you will say, we will not be tied down to this commercial reason as england's reason for taking over the administration of tropical africa. my friend, i really think on the whole you had better--it's reasonable. i grant that it has not been the reason why english missionaries and travellers have risked their lives for the good of africa, or of human knowledge, but as a ground from which to develop a policy of administering the country this commercial one is good, because it requires as aforesaid the prosperity of the african population; and your laudable vanities in the matter i cannot respect, when i observe right in the middle of the map of africa an enormous region called the congo free state. i have reason to believe that that region was opened up by englishmen--livingstone, stanley, speke, grant and burton. if you had been so truly keen on suppressing arab slavery and native cannibalism, there was a paradise for you! yet, you hand it over to some one else. was it because you thought some one else could do it better? or--but we will leave that affair and turn to the consideration of the possibility of administering tropical africa, governmentally, to the benefit of all concerned. footnotes: [ ] loanda has now a gas company, and the installation is well under way, under belgian supervision. [ ] referring to cotton goods, the foreign office report on the trade of angola for ( ) says the same cottons coming from manchester would pay reis per kilo in foreign bottoms, and per cent of reis if coming in portuguese bottoms and nationalised in lisbon. [ ] angola also has a small railway from catumbella to benguella, a distance of kiloms. and is contemplating constructing an important line from either benguella or mossamedes up to caconda. [ ] the imports in from england being , kilos, against , , in --a difference of , , kilos against manchester.--_foreign office annual series, consular report, no. _. [ ] in saying this i am aware of the conduct of carthage and of the barbary moors. but neither of these were primarily african. the one was instigated by greece, the other by the vandals and the arabs. chapter xiii the crown colony system wherein it is set down briefly why it is necessary to enter upon this discussion at all. now, you will say, wherefore should the general public in england interest itself in this matter? surely things are now governmentally administered in england's west african colonies for the benefit of all parties concerned. well, that is just exactly and precisely what they are not. the system of crown colonies, when it is worked by portuguese, does, at any rate, benefit some of the officials; but english officials are incapable of availing themselves of the opportunities this system offers them; and therefore, as this form of opportunity is the only benefit the thing can give any one, the sooner the crown colony system is removed from the sphere of practical politics and put under a glass case in the south kensington museum, labelled "extinct," the better for every one. i beg you, before we go further in this matter, to look round the world calmly, and then, when you have allowed the natural burst of enthusiasm concerning the extent and the magnificence of the british empire to pass, you will observe that in the more unhealthy regions england has failed. i say she has failed because of the crown colony system--failed with them even during days wherein she has had to face nothing like what she has to face to-day from the commercial competition of other nations. in order to justify myself for holding the view that it is possible for any system of english administration to fail anywhere, i would draw your attention to the fact that the system used by us for governing unhealthy regions is the crown colony system. the two things go together, and we must assign one of them as the reason of our failure. you may, if it please you, put it down to the other thing, the unhealthiness. i cannot, for i know that no race of men can battle more gallantly with climate than the english--no other race of men has shown so great a capacity as we have to make the tropics pay. still to-day we stand face to face with financial disaster in tropical regions. if you will look through a list of england's tropical unhealthy possessions, leaving out west africa, you will see nothing but depression. there are the west indies, british guiana, and british honduras. all of these are naturally rich regions and accessible to the markets of the world. there is not one of them hemmed in by great mountain chains or surrounded by arid deserts, across which their products must be transported at enormous cost. they are all on our highway--the sea; nor are they sparsely populated. their population, according to the latest government returns, is , , , and this estimate is acknowledged to be necessarily imperfect and insufficient. but with all these advantages we find no prosperity there under our rule. nothing but poverty and discontent and now pauperisation in the shape of grants from the imperial exchequer. you say, "oh! but that is on account of the sugar bounties and the majority of the population not being english;" but that argument won't do. look at the canary islands. they were just as hard hit by aniline dyes supplanting cochineal. their population is not mainly english; but down on those islands came an englishman, the spanish government had the sense to let him have his way, and that englishman, mr. a. l. jones, of liverpool, has, in a space of only fifteen years, made those islands a source of wealth to spain, instead of paupers on an imperial bounty. "but," you say, "we have other regions under the crown colony system that are not west indian." granted, but look at them. there are the west african group; a group of three in the mediterranean, gibraltar, malta, and cyprus, two fortifications and a failure; away out east another group, which are prosperous from the fact that they are surrounded by countries whose fiscal arrangements are providentially worse than their own, and this seems to be the only condition which can keep a crown colony on its financial legs at all. for all our crown colonies adjacent to countries who can compete with them in trade matters are paupers, or their efficiency and value to the empire is in the sphere of military and naval affairs, as posts and coaling stations. these possessions of the gibraltar, malta, and hong-kong brand should be regarded as being part of our navy and army, and not confused with colonies, though essential to them. "still," you say, "you are forgetting ceylon, the fiji islands, the falklands, and the mauritius." i am not. ceylon is part of india and practically an indian province, so is out of my arguments. i present you with the others wherefrom to build up a defence of the crown colony system. say, "see the falklands off cape horn, with a population of , , and heaps of sheep and a satisfactory budget." i can say nothing against them, and may possibly be forced to admit that for such a region, off cape horn, and with a population mainly of sheep, the crown colony system may be a heaven-sent form of administration. but i think england would be wiser if she looked carefully at the west indian group and recognised how like their conditions are to those of the west african group, for in their disastrous state of financial affairs you have an object lesson teaching what will be the fate of crown colonies in west africa--gambia, sierra leone, the gold coast and lagos--if she will be not warned in time to alter the system at present employed for governing these possessions. it is an object lesson in miniature of what will otherwise be an infinitely greater drain on the resources of england, for west africa is immensely larger, immensely more densely populated, and immensely more deadly in climate than the west indies. for one englishman killed by the west indies west africa will want ten; for every £ , , £ , --and all for what? only for the sake of a system--a system intrinsically alien to all english ideals of government--a system that doddered along until mr. chamberlain expected it to work and then burst out all over in rows, and was found to be costing some per cent. of the entire bulk of white trade with west africa; a system that, let the land itself be ever so rich, can lead to nothing but heart-breaking failure. now i own the crown colony system looks well on paper. it consists of a governor, appointed by the colonial office, supported by an executive and legislative council (both nominated), and on the gold coast with two unofficial members in the legislative body. these councils, as far as the influence they have, are dead letters, and legislation is in the hands of the governor. this is no evil in itself. you will get nothing done in tropical africa except under the influence of individual men; but your west african governor, though not controlled by the councils within the colony, is controlled by a power outside the colony, namely the colonial office in london. up to our own day the colonial office has been, except in the details of domestic colonial affairs, a drag-chain on english development in western africa. it has not even been indifferent, but distinctly, deliberately adverse. in the year a select committee of the house of commons inquired into and reported upon the state of british establishments on the western coast of africa. "it was a strong committee, and the report was brief and decided. recognising that it is not possible to withdraw the british government wholly or immediately from any settlements or engagements on the west african coast, the committee laid down that all further extension of territory or assumption of government, or new treaties offering any protection to native tribes, would be inexpedient, and that the object of our policy should be to encourage in the natives the exercise of those qualities which may render it possible for us more and more to transfer to them the administration of all the governments with a view to the ultimate withdrawal from all, except, perhaps, sierra leone."[ ] remember also this. this one in was not the first of those sort of fits the colonial office had in west african affairs. it was just as bad after the battle of katamansu in , and had it not been for the english traders our honour to the natives we had made treaties with would have been destroyed, and the gold coast lost whole and entire. this policy of has remained the policy of the english government towards west africa up to . in spite of it, the english have held on. governor after governor, who, as soon as he became acquainted with the nature of the region, has striven to rouse official apathy, has been held in, and his spirit of enterprise broken by official snubs, and has been taught that keeping quiet was what he was required to do. it broke many a man's heart to do it; but doing it worked no active evil on the colony under his control, the affairs of which financially prospered in the hands of the trading community so well, that not only had no west african colony any public debt, except sierra leone, which was a philanthropic station, but the gold coast, for example, had sufficient surplus to lend money to colonies in other parts of the world. but at last the time came when the aggression on africa by the continental powers fulfilled all the gloomy prophecies which the merchants of liverpool had long been uttering; and one possession of ours in west africa after another felt the effects of the activity of other nations and the apathy of our own. they would have felt it in vain, and have utterly succumbed to it, had it not been for two englishmen. sir george taubman goldie, who, when in west africa on a voyage of exploration, recognised the possibilities of the niger regions, and secured them for england in the face of great difficulties; and mr. chamberlain. concerning sir george goldie's efforts in securing a most important section of west africa for england, i shall have occasion to speak later. concerning mr. chamberlain, i may as well speak now; but be it understood, both these men, whatever their own ideas on their work may be, were men who came up at a critical point to reinforce liverpool and bristol and london merchants, who had fought for centuries--not to put too fine a point on it--from the days of edward iv. for the richest feeding grounds in all the world for england's manufacturing millions. the dissensions, distrust and misunderstandings which have raged among these three representatives of england's majesty and power, are no affair of mine, as a mere general student of the whole affair, beyond the due allowance one must make for the grave mischief worked by the human factors. well, as aforesaid, mr. chamberlain alone of all our statesmen saw the great possibilities and importance of western africa, and thinking to realise them, forthwith inaugurated a policy which if it had had sound ground to go on, would have succeeded. it had not, it had the crown colony system--and our hope for west africa is that so powerful a man as he has shown himself to be in other political fields, may show himself to be yet more powerful, and formulate a totally new system suited for the conditions of west africa, and not content himself with the old fallacy of ascribing failure to the individuals, white or black, government official or merchant or missionary, who act under the system which alone is to blame for england's present position in west africa; but i own that if mr. chamberlain does this he will be greater than one man can ever be reasonably be expected to be, and again it is, i fear, not possible to undo what has been done by the resolution of . possibly the greatest evil worked by this resolution has been the separation of sympathy between the merchants and the government. since these two english factors have been working really against each other. possibly the greatest touch of irony in modern politics is to be found in a despatch dated march th, , addressed to the british ambassador at paris, wherein it is said, "the colonial policy of great britain and france in west africa has been widely different. france from her basis on the senegal coast has pursued steadily the aim of establishing herself on the upper niger and its affluents; this object she has attained by a large and constant expenditure, and by a succession of military expeditions. great britain, on the other hand, has adopted the policy of advance by commercial enterprise; she has not attempted to compete with the military operations of her neighbour."[ ] i should rather think she hadn't! let alone the fact that france did not expand mainly by military operations, but through magnificent explorers backed up by sound sense. while, as for great britain "adopting the policy of advance by commercial enterprise"--well, i don't know what the writer of that despatch's ideas on "adoption" are, but suppression would be the truer word. had great britain given even her countenance to "commercial enterprise," she would have given it by now representation in her councils for west africa, a thing it has not yet got. true, there is the machinery for this representation ready in the chambers of commerce, but these chambers have no real power whatsoever as far as west african affairs are concerned; they are graciously permitted to send deputations to the colonial office and write letters when they feel so disposed, but practically that is all. truly it is a ridiculous situation, because west africa matters to no party in england so much as it matters to the mercantile. i am aware i shall be told that it is impossible that one section of englishmen can have a greater interest in any part of the empire than another section, and, for example, that west africa matters quite as much to the religious party as it does to the mercantile. but, to my mind, neither religion nor science is truly concerned in the political aspect of west africa. it should not matter, for example, to the missionary whether he works under one european government or another, or a purely native government, so long as he is allowed by that government to carry on his work of evangelisation unhindered; nor, similarly, does it matter to the scientific man, so long as he is allowed to carry on his work; but to the merchant it matters profoundly whether west africa is under english or foreign rule, and whether our rule there is well ordered. for one thing, on the merchants of west africa falls entirely the duty of supplying the revenue which supports the government of our colonies there; and for another, it seems to me that whether the government he is under is english or no does matter very much to the english merchant. his duty as an englishman is the support of the population of his own country, directly the support of its manufacturing classes. everything that tends to alienate his influence from the service of his fellow-countrymen is a degradation to him. he may be individually as successful in trading with foreign-made goods, but as a member of the english state he is at a lower level when he does so; he becomes a mere mercenary in the service of a foreign power engaged in adding to the prosperity of an alien nation. again, in this matter the difference between the religious man and the commercial shows up clearly. let the religion of the missionary be what it may, his aim is according to it to secure the salvation of the human race. what does it matter to him whether the section of the human race he strives to save be black, white, or yellow? nothing; as the noble records of missions will show you. therefore i repeat that west africa matters to no party in the english state so much as it matters to the mercantile. with no other party are true english interests so closely bound up. west africa probably will never be a pleasant place wherein to spend the winter months, a holiday ground that will serve to recuperate the jaded energies of our poets and painters, like the alps or italy; probably, likewise, it will never be a place where we can ship our overflow population; and for the same reason--its unhealthiness--it will be of no use to us as a military academy, for troops are none the better for soaking in malaria and operating against ill-armed antagonists. but west africa is of immense use to us as a feeding-ground for our manufacturing classes. it could be of equal value to england as a healthy colony, but in a reverse way, for it could supply the wealth which would enable them to remain in england in place of leaving it, if it were properly managed with this definite end in view. it is idle to imagine that it can be properly managed unless commercial experts are represented in the government which controls its administration, as is not the case at present. it is no case of abusing the men who at present strive to do their best with it. they do not set themselves up as knowing much about trade, and they constantly demonstrate that they do not. armed with absolutely no definite policy, subsisting on official and non-expert trade opinion, they drift along, with some nebulous sort of notion in their heads about "elevating the african in the plane of civilisation." now, of course, there exists a passable reason for things being as they are in our administration of west africa. england is never malign in intention, and never rushes headlong into a line of policy. therefore, in order to comprehend how it has come about that she should have a system so unsuited to the regions to which it is applied, as the crown colony system is unsuited to west africa, we must calmly investigate the reason that underlies this affair. this reason, which is the cause of all the trouble, is a misconception of the nature of west africa, and it must be considered under two heads. the thing behind the resolution of is the undoubted fact that west africa is no good for a colony from its unhealthiness. there is no one who knows the coast but will grant this; but surely there is no one who knows, not only the west coast of africa but also the necessities of our working classes in england, who can fail to recognise that this is only half an argument against england holding west africa; because we want something besides regions whereto we can send away from england men and women, namely, we want regions that will enable us to keep the very backbone of england, our manufacturing classes, in a state of healthy comfort and prosperity at home in england, in other words, we want markets. alas! in england the necessity for things grows up in a dumb way, though providentially it is irresistibly powerful; once aroused it forces our statesmen to find the required thing, which they with but bad grace and grievous groans proceed leisurely to do. this is pretty much the same as saying that the english are deficient in statesmanship, and this is what i mean, and i am convinced that no other nation but our own could have prospered with so much of this imperfection; but remember it is an imperfection, and is not a thing to be proud of any more than a stammer. external conditions have enabled england so far barely to feel her drawback, but now external conditions are in a different phase, and she must choose between acquiring statesmanship competent to cope with this phase, or drift on in her present way until the force of her necessities projects her into an european war. a perfectly unnecessary conclusion to the pressure of commercial competition she is beginning to feel, but none the less inevitable with her present lack of statecraft. the second part of the reason of england's trouble in west africa is that other fallacious half reason which our statesmen have for years been using to soothe the minds of those who urged on her in good time the necessity for acquiring the hinterlands of west africa, namely, "after all, england holds the key of them in holding the outlets of the rivers." and while our statesmen have been saying this, france has been industriously changing the lock on the door by diverting trade routes from the hinterland she has so gallantly acquired, down into those seaboard districts which she possesses. "well, well, well," you will say, "we have woke up at last, we can be trusted now." i own i do not see why you should expect to be suddenly trusted by the men with whose interests you have played so long. i remember hearing about a missionary gentleman who was told a long story by the father of a bad son, who for years went gallivanting about west africa, bringing the family into disrepute, and running up debts in all directions, and finally returned to the paternal roof. "dear me! how interesting," said the missionary; "quite the parable of the prodigal son! i trust, my friend, you remembered it, and killed the fatted calf on his return?" "no, sar," said the parent; "but i dam near kill that ar prodigal son." footnotes: [ ] see lucas's _historical geography of the british colonies_, oxford, . [ ] parliamentary paper, c , . chapter xiv the crown colony system in west africa wherein is set down briefly in what manner of ways the crown colony system works evil in western africa. i have attempted to state that the crown colony system is unsuited for governing western africa, and have attributed its malign influence to its being a system which primarily expresses the opinions of well-intentioned but ill-informed officials at home, instead of being, according to the usual english type of institution, representative of the interests of the people who are governed, and of those who have the largest stake in the countries controlled by it--the merchants and manufacturing classes of england. it remains to point out how it acts adversely to the prosperity of all concerned; for be it clearly understood there is no corruption in it whatsoever: there is waste of men's lives, moneys, and careers, but nothing more at present. by-and-by it will add to its other charms and functions that of being, in the early future, a sort of patent and successful incubator for hatching a fine lively brood of little englanders, who will cry out, "what is the good of west africa?" and so forth; and they will seem sweetly reasonable, because by then west africa will be down on the english rates, a pauper. it may seem inconceivable, however, that the present governing body of west africa, the home officials, and the english public as represented in parliament, can be ill-informed. west africa has not been just shot up out of the ocean by a submarine volcanic explosion; nor are we landing on it out of noah's ark, for the thing has been in touch with europe since the fifteenth century; yet, inconceivable as it may seem that there is not by now formulated and in working order a method of governing it suitable for its nature, the fact that this is so remains, and providentially for us it is quite easy of explanation without abusing any one; though no humane person, like myself for example, can avoid sincerely hoping that mr. kipling is wrong when he sings "deep in all dishonour have we stained our garments' hem. yet be ye not dismayed, we have stumbled and have strayed. our leaders went from righteousness, the lord will deal with them." for although it is true that we have made a mess of this great feeding ground for england's manufacturing millions; yet there are no leaders on whom blame alone can fall, whom we can make scapegoats out of, who can be driven away into the wilderness carrying the sins of the people. the blame lies among all those classes of people who have had personally to deal with west africa and the present system; and the crown colony system and the resolution of ' are merely the necessary fungi of rotten stuff, for they have arisen from the information that has been, and has not been, placed at the disposal of our government in england by the government officials of west africa, the missionaries, and the traders. we will take the traders' blame first--their contribution to the evil dates from about and consists in omission--frankly, i think that they, in their generation, were justified in not telling all they could tell about the coast. they found they could get on with it, keep it quiet and manage the natives fairly well under the system of courts of equity in the rivers, and the committee of merchants with a governor approved of by the home government, which was working on the gold coast up to . in there arose the affair of governor maclean, and the inauguration of the line of policy which resulted in the resolution of . the governmental officials having cut themselves off from the traders and taken over west africa, failed to manage west africa, and so resolved that west africa was not worth managing,--a thing they are bound to do again. the abuse showered on the merchants, and the terrific snubs with which the government peppered them, did not make the traders blossom and expand, and shower information on those who criticised them--there are some natures that are not sweetened by adversity. moreover, the government, when affairs had been taken over by the offices in london, took the abhorrent form of customs, and displayed a lively love of the missionary-made african, as he was then,--you can read about him in burton[ ]--and for the rest got up rows with the traders' best customers, the untutored african; rows, as the traders held, unnecessary in their beginning and feeble-handed in their termination. the whole of this sort of thing made the trader section keep all the valuable information to itself, and spend its energies in eluding the customs, and talking what burton terms "commercial english." then we come to the contribution made by the government officials to the formation of an erroneous opinion concerning the state of affairs in west africa. this arose from the conditions that surrounded them there, and the way in which they were unable, even if they desired, to expand their influence, distrusted naturally enough by the trading community since , held in continuously by their home instructions, and unprovided with a sufficient supply of men or money on shore to go in for empire making, and also villainously badly quartered,--as you can see by reading ellis's _west african sketches_. it is small wonder and small blame to them that their account of west africa has been a gloomy one, and such it must remain until these men are under a different system: for all the reasons that during the past have caused them to paint the coast as a place of no value to england, remain still in full force,--as you can see by studying the disadvantages that service in a west african crown colony presents to-day to a civilian official. firstly, the climate is unhealthy, so that the usual make of englishman does not like to take his wife out to the coast with him. this means keeping two homes, which is expensive, and it gives a man no chance of saving money on an income say of £ a year, for the official's life in west africa is necessarily, let him be as economical as he may, an expensive one; and, moreover, things are not made more cheerful for him by his knowing that if he dies there will be no pension for his wife. secondly, there being no regular west african service, there is no security for promotion; owing to the unhealthiness of the climate it is very properly ordained that each officer shall serve a year on the coast, and then go home on a six months' furlough. it is a fairly common thing for a man to die before his twelve months' term is up, and a still more common one for him to have to go on sick leave. of course, the moment he is off, some junior official has to take his place and do his work. but in the event of the man whose work he does dying, gaining a position in another region, or promotion, the man who has been doing the work has no reason to hope he will step into the full emoluments and honours of the appointment, although experience will thus have given him an insight into the work. on the contrary, it too often happens that some new man, either fresh from london or who has already held a government appointment in some totally different region to the west african, is placed in the appointment. if this new man is fresh to such work as he has to do, the displaced man has to teach him; if he is from a different region, he usually won't be taught, and he does not help to develop a spirit of general brotherly love and affection in the local governmental circles by the frank statement that he considers west african officials "jugginses" or "muffs," although he fairly offers to "alter this and show them how things ought to be done." then again the civilian official frequently complains that he has no such recognition given him for his services as is given to the military men in west africa. i have so often heard the complaint, "oh, if a man comes here and burns half a dozen villages he gets honours; while i, who keep the villages from wanting burning, get nothing;" and mind you, this is true. like the rest of my sex i suffer from a chronic form of scarlet fever, and, from a knowledge of the country there, i hold it rubbish to talk of the brutality of mowing down savages with a maxim gun when it comes to talking of west african bush fighting; for your west african is not an unarmed savage, he does not assemble in the manner of dr. watts's ants, but wisely ensconces himself in the pleached arbours of his native land, and lets fly at you with a horrid scatter gun. this is bound to hit, and when it hits makes wounds worse than those made by a maxim; in fact he quite turns bush fighting into a legitimate sport, let alone the service done him by his great ally, the climate. still, it is hard on the civilian, and bad for english interests in west africa, that the man who by his judgment, sympathy, and care, keeps a district at peace, should have less recognition than one who, acting under orders, doing his duty gallantly, and all that, goes and breaks up all native prosperity and white trade. all these things acting together produce on the local government official a fervid desire to get home to england, and obtain an appointment in some other region than the west coast. i feel sure i am well within the mark when i say that two-thirds of the present government officials in the west african english crown colonies have their names down on the transfer list, or are trying to get them there; and this sort of thing simply cannot give them an enthusiasm for their work sufficient to ensure its success, and of course leads to their painting a dismal picture of west africa itself. i am perfectly well aware that the conditions of life of officials in west africa are better than those described by ellis. nevertheless, they are not yet what they should be: a corrugated iron house may cost a heap of money and yet not be a paradise. i am also aware that the houses and general supplies given to our officials are immensely more luxurious than those given to german or french officials; but this does not compensate for the horrors of boredom suffused with irritation to which the english official is subjected. more than half the quarrelling and discontent for which english officials are celebrated, and which are attributed to drink and the climate, simply arise from the domestic arrangements enforced on them in coast towns, whereby they see far too much of each other. if you take any set of men and make them live together, day out and day in, without sufficient exercise, without interest in outside affairs, without dividing them up into regular grades of rank, as men are on board ship or in barracks, you are simply bound to have them dividing up into cliques that quarrel; the things they quarrel over may seem to an outsider miserably petty, but these quarrels are the characteristic eruption of the fever discontent. and may i ask you if the opinion of men in such a state is an opinion on which a sound policy wherewith to deal with so complex a region can be formed? i think not, yet these men and the next class alone are the makers of our present policy--the instructors of home official opinion. the next class is the philanthropic party. it is commonly confused with the missionary, but there is this fundamental difference between them. the missionary, pure and simple, is a man who loves god more than he loves himself, or any man. his service (i am speaking on fundamental lines, as far as i can see) is to place in god's charge, for the glory of god, souls, that according to his belief, would otherwise go elsewhere. the philanthropist is a person who loves man; but he or she is frequently no better than people who kill lapdogs by over-feeding, or who shut up skylarks in cages, while it is quite conceivable to me, for example, that a missionary could kill a man to save his soul, a philanthropist kill his soul to save his life, and there is in this a difference. i have never been able to get up any respectful enthusiasm for the so-called philanthropist, so that i have to speak of him with calm care; not as i have spoken of the missionary, feeling he was a person i could not really harm by criticising his methods. it is, however, nowadays hopeless to attempt to separate these two species, distinct as i believe them to be; and they together undoubtedly constitute what is called the mission party not only in england but in germany. i believe this alliance has done immense harm to the true missionary, for to it i trace that tendency to harp upon horrors and general sensationalism which so sharply differentiates the modern from the classic missionary reports. take up that noble story of dennis de carli and michael angelo of gattina, and read it through, and then turn on to wise, clear-headed merolla da sorrento, and read him; you find there no sensationalism. now and again, when deeply tried, they will say, "these people live after a beastly manner, and converse freely with the devil," but you soon find them saying, "among these people there are some excellent customs," and they give you full details of them, with evident satisfaction. you see it did not fundamentally matter to these early missionaries whether their prospective converts "had excellent customs" or "lived after a beastly manner," from a religious standpoint. not one atom--they were the sort of men who would have gone for plato, socrates, and all the classics gaily, holding that they were not christians as they ought to be; but this never caused them to paint a distorted portrait of the african. this thing, i believe, the modern philanthropist has induced the modern missionary only too frequently to do, and the other regrettable element which has induced him to do it has been the apathy of the english public, a public which unless it were stirred up by horrors would not subscribe. again the blame is with england at home, but the harm done is paid for in west africa. the portrait painted of the african by the majority, not all, but the majority of west african mission reports, has been that of a child, naturally innocent, led away and cheated by white traders and grievously oppressed by his own rulers. i grant you, the african taken as a whole is the gentlest kind of real human being that is made. i do not however class him with races who carry gentleness to a morbid extent, and for governmental purposes you must not with any race rely on their main characteristic alone; for example, englishmen are honest, yet still we require the police force. the evil worked by what we must call the missionary party is almost incalculable; from it has arisen the estrangement of english interests, as represented by our reason for adding west africa to our empire at all--the trader--and the english government as represented by the crown colony system; and it has also led to our present policy of destroying powerful native states and the power of the african ruling classes at large. secondarily it is the cause of our wars in west africa. that this has not been and is not the desire of the mission party it is needless to say; that the blame is directly due to the crown colony system it is as needless to remark; for any reasonable system of its age would long ere now have known the african at first hand, not as it knows him, and knows him only, at its head-quarters, london, from second-hand vitiated reports. it has, nowadays, at its service the common sense and humane opinions of the english trade lords as represented by the chambers of commerce of liverpool and manchester; but though just at present it listens to what they say--thanks to mr. chamberlain--yet it cannot act on their statements, but only querulously says, "your information does not agree with our information." allah forbid that the information of the party with whom i have had the honour to be classed should agree with that sort of information from other sources; and i would naturally desire the rulers of west africa to recognise the benefit they now enjoy of having information of a brand that has not led to such a thing as the sierre leone outbreak for example, and to remember in this instance that six months before the hut tax there was put on, the chambers had strongly advised the government against it, and had received in reply the answer that "the secretary of state sees no reason to suppose that the hut tax will be oppressive, or that it will be less easy to collect in sierra leone than in gambia." why, you could not get a prophetic almanac into a second issue if it were not based on truer knowledge than that which made it possible for such a thing to be said. nevertheless, no doubt this remarkable sentence was written believing the same to be true, and confiding in the information in the hands of the colonial office from the official and philanthropic sources in which the office believes. footnotes: [ ] _wanderings in west africa_, vol. i., . chapter xv more of the crown colony system wherein is set down the other, or main, reason against this system. having attempted to explain the internal evils or what one might call the domestic rows of the crown colony system, i will pass on to the external evils--which although in a measure consequent on the internal are not entirely so, and this point cannot be too clearly borne in mind. tinker it up as you may, the system will remain one pre-eminently unsuited for the administration of west africa. you might arrange that officials working under it should be treated better than the official now is, and the west african service be brought into line in honour with the indian, and afford a man a good sound career. you might arrange for the chambers of commerce, representing the commercial factor, to have a place in colonial office councils. but if you did these things the crown colony system would still remain unsuited to west africa, because it is a system intrinsically too expensive in men and money, so that the more you develop it the more expensive it becomes. concerning this system as applied to the west indies a west indian authority the other day said it was putting an elephant to draw a goat chaise; concerning the west african application of it, i should say it was trying to open a tin case with a tortoise-shell paper knife. of course you will say i am no authority, and you must choose between those who will tell you that only a little patience is required and the result of the present governmental system in west africa will blossom into philanthropic and financial successes, and me who say it cannot do so but must result in making west africa a debt-ridden curse to england. all i can say for myself is that i am animated by no dislike to any set of men and without one farthing's financial interest in west africa. it would not affect my income if you were to put per cent. ad valorem duty on every trade article in use on the coast and flood the coast with officials, paid as men should be paid who have to go there, namely, at least three times more than they are at present. my dislike to the present state of affairs is solely a dislike to seeing my country, to my mind, make a fool of herself, wasting men's lives in the process and deluding herself with the idea that the performance will repay her. personally, i cannot avoid thinking that before you cast yourself in a whole-souled way into developing anything you should have a knowledge of the nature of the thing as it is on scientific lines. education and development unless backed by this knowledge are liable to be thrown away, or to produce results you have no use for. i remember a distressing case that occurred in west africa and supports my opinion. a valued friend of mine, a seaman of great knowledge and experience, yet lacking in that critical spirit which inquires into the nature of things before proceeding with them, confident alone in the rectitude of his own intentions, bought a canary bird at a canary island. he knew that the men who sell canaries down there are up to the sample description of deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. so he brought to bear upon the transaction a deal of subtlety, but neglected fundamental facts, whereby his triumph at having, on the whole, done the canary seller brown by getting him to take in part value for the bird a box of german colonial-grown cigars, was vanity. for weeks that gallant seaman rubbed a wet cork up and down an empty whisky bottle within the hearing of the bird, which is the proper thing to do providing things are all right in themselves, and yet nothing beyond genial twitterings rewarded his exertions. so he rubbed on for another week with even greater feeling and persuasive power, and then, to drop a veil upon this tragedy of lost endeavour, that canary laid an egg. now, if that man had only attended to the nature of things and seen whether it were a cock or hen bird, he would not have been subjected to this grievous disappointment. similarly, it seems to me, we are, from the governmental point of view, like that sea captain--swimming about in the west african affair with a lot of subtle details, in an atmosphere of good intentions, but not in touch with important facts; we are acting logically from faulty premises. now, let us grant that the crown colony system is not fully developed in west africa, for if it were, you may say, it would work all right; though this i consider a most dangerous idea. let us see what it would be if it were fully developed. mr. st. loe strachey[ ] thus defines crown colonies:--"these are possessions which are for the most part peopled by non-european races of dark colour, and governed not by persons elected by themselves, but by a governor and other officials sent out from england. the reason for this difference is a very simple one. those colonies which are peopled by men of english and european races can provide themselves with a better government than we can provide them with from here. hence they are given responsible governments. "those colonies in which the english or european element is very small can best be governed, it is found, by the crown colony system. the native, dark-skinned population are not fit to govern themselves--they are too ignorant and too uncivilised, and if the government is left entirely in the hands of the small number of whites who may happen to live in the colony, they are apt not to take enough care of the interests of the coloured inhabitants. the simplest form of the crown colony is that found in some of the smaller groups of islands in the west indies. here a governor is sent out from england, and he--helped by a secretary, a judge, and other officials--governs the island, reporting his actions to the colonial office, and consulting the able officials there before he takes important steps. in most cases, however, the governor has a council, either nominated from among the principal persons in the colony, or else elected by the inhabitants. in some cases--jamaica or barbadoes, for example--the council has very great power, and the type of government may be said to approach that of the self-governing colonies." now, in west africa the system is the same as that "found in some of the smaller groups of the west indian islands," although these west african colonies have each a nominated council of some kind. i should hesitate to say, however, "to assist the governor." being nominated by him they can usually manage to agree with him; it is only another hindrance or superfluous affair. before taking any important steps the west african governor is supposed to consult the officials at the colonial office; but as the colonial office is not so well informed as the governor himself is, this can be no help to him if he be a really able man, and no check on him if he be not an able man. for, be he what he may, he is the representative of the colonial office; he cannot, it is true, persuade the colonial office to go and involve itself in rows with european continental powers, because the office knows about them; but if he is a strong-minded man with a fad he can persuade the colonial office to let him try that fad on the natives or the traders, because the colonial office does not know the natives nor the west african trade. you see, therefore, you have in the governor of a west african possession a man in a bad position. he is aided by no council worth having, no regular set of experts; he is held in by another council equally non-expert, except in the direction of continental politics. he may keep out of mischief; he could, if he were given either time or inducement to study the native languages, laws, and general ethnology of his colony, do much good; but how can he do these things, separated from the native population as he necessarily is, by his under officials, and with his time taken up, just as every official's time is taken up under the crown colony system, with a mass of red-tape clerkwork that is unnecessary and intrinsically valueless? i do not pretend to any personal acquaintance with english west african governors. i only look on their affairs from outside, but i have seen some great men among them. one of them who is dead would, i believe, had the climate spared him, have become a man whom every one interested in west africa would have respected and admired. he came from a totally different region, the straits settlements. he found his west african domain in a lethargic mess, and he hit out right and left, falling, like the rain, on the just and the unjust. i do not wish you to take his utterances or his actions as representing him; but from the spirit of them it is clear he would have become a great blessing to the coast had he but lived long enough. i am aware he was unpopular from his attempts to enforce the ill-drafted land ordinance, but primarily responsible for this ill-judged thing he was not. in addition to sir william maxwell there have been, and are still, other governors representative of what is best in england; but, circumstanced as they are under this system, continually interrupted as their work is by death or furloughs home, neither england nor west africa gets one-tenth part of the true value of these men. in addition to the governor, there are the other officials, medical, legal, secretarial, constabulary, and customs. the majority of these are engaged in looking after each other and clerking. clerking is the breath of the crown colony system, and customs what it feeds on. owing to the climate it is practically necessary to have a double staff in all these departments,--that is what the system would have if it were perfect; as it is, some official's work is always being done by a subordinate; it may be equally well done, but it is not equally well paid for, and there is no continuity of policy in any department, except those which are entirely clerk, and the expense of this is necessarily great. the main evil of this want of continuity is of course in the governors--a governor goes out, starts a new line of policy, goes home on furlough leaving in charge the colonial secretary, who does not by all means always feel enthusiastic towards that policy; so it languishes. governor comes back, goes at it again like a giant refreshed, but by no means better acquainted with local affairs for having been away; then he goes home again, or dies, or gets a new appointment; a brand new governor comes out, he starts a new line of policy, perhaps has a new colonial secretary into the bargain; anyhow the thing goes on wavering, not advancing. the only description i have heard of our policy in west african colonies that seems to me to do it justice is that given by a medical friend of mine, who said it was a coma accompanied by fits. of course this would not be the case if the colonial office had a definite detailed policy of its own, and merely sent out men to carry it out; but this the colonial office has not got and cannot have, because it has not got the scientific and commercial facts of west africa in its possession. it has therefore to depend on the governors it sends out; and these, as aforesaid, are men of divers minds. one governor is truly great on drains; he spends lots of money on them. another governor thinks education and a cathedral more important; during his reign drains languish. yet another governor comes along and says if there are schools wanted they should be under non-sectarian control, but what is wanted is a railway; and so it goes on, and of course leads to an immense waste of money. and this waste of money is a far more serious thing than it looks; for it is from it that the policy has arisen, of increasing customs dues to a point that seriously hampers trade development, and the far more serious evil of attempting directly as well as indirectly to tax the native population. i am bound to say i believe any ordinary englishman would be fairly staggered if he went out to west africa and saw what there was to show for the expenditure of the last few years in our crown colonies there,[ ] and knew that all that money had been honestly expended in the main, that none of it had been appropriated by the officials, that they had only had their pay, and that none too great. but, you will say, after all, if west africa is as rich as it is said to be, surely it can stand a little wasteful expenditure, and support an even more expensive administration than it now has. all i can say is, that it can stand wasteful expenditure, but only up to a certain point, which is now passed; it would perhaps be more true to say it could stand wasteful expenditure before the factor of the competition of french and german colonies alongside came in; and that a wasteful expenditure that necessitates unjust methods of raising revenue, such as direct taxation on the natives, is a thing west africa will not stand at all. of course you can do it; you can impose direct taxation on the native population, but you cannot make it financially pay to do so; for one thing, the collection of that tax will require a considerable multiplication of officials black and white, the black section will by their oppressive methods engender war, and the joint body will consume more than the amount that can be collected. from a fiscal standpoint direct taxation of a non-mohammedanised or non-christianised community is rank foolishness, for reasons known to every ethnologist. as for the natural riches of west africa, i am a profound believer in them, and regard west africa, taken as a whole, as one of the richest regions in the world; but, as sir william maxwell said, "i am convinced that, from causes wholly unpreventable, west africa is and must remain a place with certain peculiar dangers of its own"[ ]; therefore it requires most careful, expert handling. it is no use your trying to get its riches out by a set of hasty amateur experiments; it is no use just dumping down capital on it and calling these goings on "developing the resources," or "raising the african in the plane of civilisation;" because these goings on are not these things, they are but sacrifices on the altars of folly and idleness. properly managed, those parts of west africa which our past apathy has left to us are capable of being made into a group of possessions before which the direct value to england, in england, of all the other regions that we hold in the world would sink into insignificance. sir william maxwell, when he referred to "causes wholly unpreventable," was referring mainly to the unhealthiness of west africa. there seems no escape from this great drawback. every other difficulty connected with it one can imagine removable by human activity and ingenuity--even the labour difficulty--but, i fear, not so the fever. although this is not a thing to discourage england from holding west africa, it is a thing which calls for greater forethought in the administration of it than she need give to a healthy region. in a healthy region it does not matter so much whether there is an excess over requirements in the number of men employed to administer it, but in one with a death rate of at least per cent. of white men it does matter. i confess it is this excessive expenditure of men which i dislike most in the crown colony system, though i know it cannot help it; it is in the make of the thing. if these men were even employed in some great undertaking it would be less grievous; but they are many of them entirely taken up with clerk work, and all of them have to waste a large percentage of their time on it. some of the men undoubtedly get to like this, but it is a morbid taste. i know one of our possessions where the officials even carry on their personal quarrels with each other on government paper in a high official style, when it would be better if they put aside an hour a week and went and punched each other's heads, and gave the rest of their time to studying native law and languages and pottering about the country getting up information on it at large, so that the natives would become familiarised with the nature of englishmen first-hand, instead of being dependent for their knowledge of them on interpreters and the set of subordinate native officials and native police. i wish that it lay in my power to place before you merely a set of figures that would show you the present state of our west african affairs, but such figures do not exist. practically speaking, there are no reliable figures for west african affairs. they are not cooked, but you know what figures are--unless they be complete and in their proper stations, they are valueless. the figures we have are those which appear in "the colonial annual series" of reports. these are not annual; for example, the gold coast one was not published for three years; but no matter, when they are published they are misleading enough, unless you know things not mentioned in them but connected with them. however, we will just run through the figures published for one west african crown colony. for many reasons i am sorry to have to take those regarding sierra leone, but i must, as at present they are the most correct available. now the element of error which must be allowed for in these arises from the proximity of the french colony of french guinea, which is next door to sierra leone. that colony has been really developing its exports. goods have, up to last year, come out through our colony of sierra leone, and have been included with the exports of sierra leone itself, though sierra leone has not dwelt on this interesting fact. and, equally, since goods going into french guinea have gone in through sierra leone, and though traceable with care, have been put in with the total of the imports. so you see it is a little difficult to find out whether it has been french guinea or sierra leone that has really been doing the trade mentioned in the figures. nevertheless, it has been customary to take these joint, mixed up figures and get happy over "the increase of trade in sierra leone during the past ten years"; but a little calm consideration will prevent you from falling into this idle error. personally i think that if you are cautious you will try and estimate the trade by the exports; for among the imports there are government stores, railway material, &c., things that will have some day to be paid for, because it is the rule not to assist a colony under the system until it has been reduced to a west indian condition; whereas the exports give you the buying power of the colony, and show the limits of the trade which may be expected to be done under existing conditions. now, the annual total exports during the five years ending-- , amounted in value to, £ , , " " " £ , , " " " £ , , " " " £ , , " " " £ , these figures show for the twenty-five years an increase of less than per cent., or about / per cent, per annum; and this is not so very thrilling when one comes to think that that per cent., and probably more, is showing the increase in the trade not of sierra leone, but of french guinea, and remembers that in the exports were £ , , an amount they have not since touched. then again even in error you are never quite sure if your colonial annual is keeping line; sometimes you will get one by a careful conscientious secretary who takes no end of trouble, and tells you lots of things which you would like to hear about next year, only next year you don't. for example, in sierra leone affairs the report for gave you the imports for consumption in the colony, while that of represented the total imports, including those afterwards shipped to french guinea and elsewhere; and again, in estimating the value of the imports gambia adds the cost of freight and insurance to the invoice value of imports, and the cost of package to the declared value of exports. so far, only gambia does this, but at any moment an equally laudable spirit might develop in one of the other colonies, and cause further distraction to the student of their figures. besides these clerking errors of omission, there is a constant unavoidable error arising from the so-called smuggling done by the native traders in the hinterland. remember that colonies which you see neatly enough marked on a map of west africa with french, english, german, are not really each surrounded by a set of great walls of china. for example, under the present arrangement with france, if france keeps to that beautiful article ix. in the niger convention and does not tax english goods more than she at present taxes french goods on the ivory coast--cottons of english manufacture will be able to be sold per cent. cheaper in the french territory than in the adjacent english gold coast. up to the present time it has paid the native hinterland trader to come down into the gold coast and buy his cotton goods, for english cottons suit his west african markets better than other makes, that is to say they have a higher buying power; and then he went down into the french ivory coast and bought his spirits and guns, which were cheaper there because of lower duty. having got his selection together he went off and did business with the raw material sellers, and sold the raw material he had purchased back to the two coasts from which he had bought his selection, sending the greater part of it to the best market for the time being. now you have changed that, or, rather, you have given france the power to change it by selling english cottons cheaper than they can be sold in your own possessions, and thereby rendered it unnecessary for the hinterland traders to buy on the gold coast at all. it will remain necessary for him to buy on the ivory coast, for spirits and guns he must have; and if he can get his cottons at the same place as he gets these, so much the better for him. it is doubtful, however, whether henceforth it will be worth his while to come down and sell his raw material in your possessions at all. he may browse around your interior towns and suck the produce out of them, but it will be to the enrichment of the french colony next door; and, of course, as things are even now, this sort of thing, which goes on throughout all the various colonies of france, england, germany and portugal, does not tend to give true value to the official figures concerning trade published by any one of them. i have no intention, however, of dwelling on the various methods employed by native smugglers with a view to aiding their suppression. it may be a hereditary taint contracted by my ancestors while they sojourned in devon, it may be private personal villainy of my own; but anyhow, i never feel, as from an official standpoint i ought, towards smugglers. i do not ask you to regard the african native trader as a sweet innocent who does not realise the villainy of his doings,--he knows all about it; but only once did i feel harshly towards him over smuggling. a native trader had arranged to give me a lift, as it were, in his canoe, and i noticed, with a flattered vanity and a feeling of gratitude, how very careful he had been to make me quite comfortable in the stern, with a perfect little nest of mats and cloths. when we reached our destination and that nest was taken to pieces, i saw that what you might call the backbone of the affair was three kegs of gunpowder, a case of kerosine, and some packages of lucifer matches. that rascal fellow black, as barbot would call him, had expected we should meet the customs patrol boat, and, basely encroaching on the chivalry of the white man towards the white woman judged that i and my nest would not be overhauled. if there had been a guardian cherub for the brussels convention or for customs doubtless i should have been blown sky high and have afforded material for a moral tale called "the smuggler's awful end," but there are no cherubs who watch over customs or the brussels convention in west africa and i have no intention of volunteering for such an appointment. but to return to the sierra leone finances and the relationship which the expenditure of that colony bears to the revenue. the increase in the imports is apparently the thing depended on to justify the idea that as the trade has increased the governmental expenditure has a right to do so likewise. the imports increase in is given as £ , . from this you must deduct for railway material, £ , , and for the increased specie import, £ , , which leaves you an increase of imports of £ , from - , and remember a good percentage of this remainder of £ , belongs to french guinea. now the expenditure on the government of sierra leone has increased from £ , in to £ , , being an increase at the rate of . per cent., whereas the exports during the same period have increased at the rate of . per cent, or from £ , to £ , . in other words, whereas in the government expenditure amounted to . per cent, the exports in amounted to . per cent. the sum of £ , of this increase is credited to police, gaols, transport, and public works;[ ] and if this is to be the normal rate of increase, the prospects of the colony are serious; for it contains no rich mineral deposit as far as is at present known, nor are there in it any great native states. as far as we know, sierra leone must for an immense period depend on bush products collected by the natives, whose trade wants are only a few luxuries. for it must be remembered that in all these west african colonies there is not one single thing europeans can sell to the natives that is of the nature of a true necessity, a thing the natives must have or starve. there is but one thing that even approaches in the west african markets to what wheat is in our own--that thing is tobacco. next in importance to it, but considerably lower, is the group of trade articles--gunpowder, guns, and spirits, next again salt, and below these four staples come manchester goods and miscellanies; the whole of the rest that lies in the power of civilisation to offer to the west african markets are things that are luxuries, things that will only be purchased by the native when he is in a state of prosperity. this subject i have, however, endeavoured to explain elsewhere.[ ] we have for sierra leone, fortunately, a scientific authority to refer to on this matter of the natural resources of the country, and the amount of the natural riches we may presume we can take into account when arranging fiscal matters. this authority is the report of mr. scott-elliott on the district traversed by the anglo-french boundary commission.[ ] regarding mineral, the report states "that the only mineral of importance is iron, of which the country appears to contain a very large amount. there is a particularly rich belt of titaniferous iron ore in the hills behind sierra leone." titaniferous iron is an excellent thing in its way, and good for steel making; but it exists nearer home and in cheaper worked regions than sierra leone. the soil is grouped by the report into three classes: " . that of the plateaux and hills above , , or sometimes descending to , feet, which is due to the disintegration of gneiss and granite rocks. " . the red laterite which covers almost invariably all the lower hills from the sea level to , or , feet. " . the alluvium, due either to the action of the mangroves along the coast, or to rivers and streams inland." these soils are capable of and do produce fine timber, rubber, oil and rice, and the general tropical food stuffs, but these, except the three first, are not very valuable export articles. whether it is possible to enhance the agricultural value of the alluvium regions by growing tobacco, jute, coffee, cocoa, cotton and sugar, for export, is by some authorities regarded as doubtful on account of the labour problem; but at any rate, if these industries were taken in hand on a large scale, a scale sufficient materially to alter the resources of a west african colony, they would require many years of fostering, and it would be long before they could contribute greatly to the resources of such a colony as sierra leone, in the face of the organised production and cheaper labour, wherewith the supply now in the markets of europe could be competed with. i have had the advantage of associating with german and portuguese and french planters of coffee and cocoa. these are the planters who up to the present have been the most successful in west africa. i do not say because they are better men, but because they have better soils and better labour than there is in our colonies. by these gentlemen i have been industriously educated in soils, &c.; and from what i have learnt about this matter i am bound regretfully to say that most of the soil of the english possessions is not really rich, taken in the main. there are in places patches of rich soil; and the greater part of our soil will be all the better this day , years hence; but at present the soil is mainly sour clay, slime and skin soils, skin soils over rock, skin soils over sour clay, skin soils over water-logged soil. we have, alas, not got the rich volcanic earth of cameroon, fernando po, and san thome and principe. the natives who work the soil understand it fairly well, and negro agriculture is in a well-developed state, and their farms are most carefully tended and well kept. the rule along the bight of benin and biafra is to change the soil of the farm at least every third year; this they do by cutting down a new bit of bush, burning the bush on the ground at the end of the dry season, and planting the crops. the old farm is then allowed to grow bush or long grass, whichever the particular district goes in for, until the time comes to work back on that piece of land again, when the bush which has grown is in its turn cut down and the ground replanted. this burning of the trees or grass is clearly regarded by the native agriculturist as manuring; it is practically the only method of manuring available for them in a country where cattle in quantities are not kept. it is a wasteful way with timber and rubber growing on the ground of course; but not so wildly wasteful as it looks, for your negro agriculturist does not go to make his farm on bits of forest that require very hard clearing work. he clears as easily as he can by means of collecting the great fluffy seed bunches of a certain tree which are inflammable and adding to them all the other inflammable material he can get; he then places these bonfires in the bit of forest he wants to clear and sets fire to them on a favourable night, when the proper sort of breeze is blowing to fan the flames; when the conflagration is over, he fells a few of the trees and leaves the rest standing scorched but not killed. moreover, of course an african gentleman cannot go and make his farm anywhere he likes: he has to stick to the land which belongs to his family, and work round and round on that. this gives a highly untidy aspect to the family estate, you might think; considering the extent of it, a very small percentage must be kept under cultivation and the rest neglected. but this is not really so; if you were to go and take away from him a bit of the neglected land, you would be taking his farm, say for the year after next and grievously inconvenience him, and he would know it. the native method of making farms does not, indeed, do so much harm in well-watered, densely-populated regions like those of sierra leone or the niger delta; but it does do an immense amount of harm in regions that are densely populated and require to make extensive farms, more particularly in the regions of lagos and the gold coast, where the fertile belt is only a narrow ribbon, edged on the one side by the sand sea of the sahara, and on the other by the salt sea of the south atlantic. you can see the result of it in the district round accra, which has always been heavily populated; for hundreds of years the forest has been kept down by agricultural enterprise. consequences are, the rainfall is now diminished to a point that threatens to extinguish agriculture, at any rate, a sufficient agriculture to support the local population; and it is not too much to say you can read on the face of the accra plain famines to come. there is little reason to doubt that both the african deserts, the sahara and the kalahari, are advancing towards the equator. round loanda you come across a sand-logged region of some fifty square miles, where you get the gum shed by forests that have gone, humanly speaking, never to return; human agency is largely responsible, it is like sawing the branch of a tree partially through, and then the wind breaks it off. forest destruction in lands adjacent to deserts is the same thing; the forest is destroyed to a certain extent, an extent that diminishes the rainfall and makes it unable to resist the desert winds, and then--finis. in the regions of the double rains in the great forest belt of africa things are different, so you cannot generalise for west africa at large in this matter. it is one thing for forest destruction to go on in the gold coast, quite another for it to go on in calabar or congo français, where men fight back the forest as dutchmen fight the sea. but i apologise. this, you will say, is not connected with governmental expenditure, &c.; but it is to me a more amusing subject, and indirectly has a bearing; for example, government expenditure in the direction of instituting a forestry department would be right enough in some regions, but unnecessary in others. to return to this agriculture in sierra leone. well, it is, like all west african agriculture, spade husbandry. it is concerned with the cultivation of vegetables for human consumption alone. in the interior of sierra leone and throughout the western soudan, for which sierra leone was once a principal port, there is a fair cattle country, and an old established one, as is shown by the exports of hides mentioned in the writers of the seventeenth century. yet it would be idle for the most enthusiastic believer in west africa to pretend that the western soudan is coming on to compete with argentina or australia in the export of frozen meat; the climate is against it, and therefore this cattle country can only be represented in trade in a hide and horn export. wool--as the sheep won't wear it, preferring hair instead and that of poor quality--need not i think be looked forward to from west africa at all. i have taken the published accounts of sierra leone, because, as i have said, they are the most complete. they are also, in the main, the most typical. it is true that sierra leone has not the gold wealth, nor the developing timber industry of the gold coast; but if you ignore french guinea, and include the things belonging to it with the sierra leone totals, you will get a fairly equivalent result. lagos has not yet shown a mineral export, but it and the gold coast have shown of late years an immensely increased export of rubber. rubber, oil, and timber are the three great riches of our west african possessions, the things that may be relied on, as being now of great value and capable of immense expansion. but these things can only be made serviceable to the markets of the world and a source of riches to england by the co-operation of the natives of the country. in other words, you must solve the labour problem on the one hand, and increase the prosperity of the native population on the other, in order to make west africa pay you back the value of the life and money already paid for her. this solution of the labour problem and this co-operation of the natives with you, the crown colony system will never gain for you, because it is too expensive for you and unjust to them, not intentionally, not vindictively nor wickedly, but just from ignorance. it destroys the native form of society, and thereby disorganises labour. it has no power of re-organising it. you hear that people are leaving coomassie and benin, instead of flocking in to those places, as they were expected to after the destruction of the local tyrannies. english influence in west africa, represented as it now is by three separate classes of englishmen, with no common object of interest, or aim in policy, is not a thing capable of re-organising so difficult a region. i have taken the sierra leone figures because, as i have said, they are the most complete and typical, and the state of the trade and the expenditure on the government are those prior to the hut tax war. so they cannot be ascribed to it, nor can the plea be lodged that the expenditure was an enforced one. these figures merely show you the thing that led up to the hut tax war and the heavy enforced expenditure it has and will entail, and my reason for detaining you with them is the conviction that a similar policy pursued in our other colonies will lead to the same results--the destruction of trade and the imposition on the colonies of a debt that their natural resources cannot meet unless we are prepared to go in for forced labour and revert to the slave trade policy. it seems clear enough that our present policy in the crown colonies, of a rapidly increasing expenditure in the face of a steadily falling trade, must necessarily lead our government to seek for new sources of revenue beyond customs dues. new sources under our present system can only be found in direct taxation of the native population; the result of this is now known. i will not attempt to deal fully with the figures we possess for our remaining crown colonies in western africa,--gambia, the gold coast, and lagos,--but merely refer to a few points regarding them that have so far been published. when the result of the policy pursued in these colonies leads to the inevitable row, and the figures are dealt with by competent men, there is, to my mind, no doubt that a state equal to that of sierra leone as a fool's paradise will be discovered; and the deplorable part of the thing is, that the trade palavers of the chambers and the colonial office will give to hasty politicians the idea that west africa is not worthy of imperial attention, and large quantities of the blame for this failure of our colonies will be put down quite unjustly to french interference. that french interference has troubled our colonies there, no one will attempt to deny; or that if it had been acting on them when they were in a healthy state it would merely have had a tonic effect, as it has had on the royal niger company's territories; but, acting on the crown colonies in their present state, french influence has naturally been poisonous. even i, not given to sweet mouth as i am, shrink from saying what has been the true effect on the crown colonies of england of the policy pursued by us towards french advance. this only will i say, that the french policy is no discredit to france. regarding the financial condition of gambia it is not necessary for us to worry ourselves. gambia is a nuisance to france. she loves to have high dues, and she cannot have them round gambia way. she has had to encyst it, or it would be to her senegal and french guinea possessions a regular main to lay on smuggling. knowing this she has encysted it; it pays better to smuggle from french guinea into gambia or sierra leone than from gambia or sierra leone into the french possessions. this is a grave commercial position for us, but to it is largely owing the advance of the prosperity of these french possessions during the past three years. the gold coast has on the west a french possession, the ivory coast, on the east the german togoland. togo is a narrow strip, and to its east and surrounding it to the north is the french colony of dahomey, whose recent expansion has told heavily on its next-door neighbours, both togo and the english colony to the east, lagos. i give below the latest available figures for the foreign west african possessions.[ ] unfortunately there are no figures available for the french sudan which would represent the real value of the trade; the total value of trade is, however, considerable. you must remember that in dealing with french colonies you are dealing with those of a nation not gifted with commercial intelligence; and that, in spite of the perpetual hampering of trade in french colonies, the granting of concessions to french firms who have not the capital to work them, but are only able to prevent any one else doing so, the high differential tariffs, in some cases per cent., which up to the present time have been levied on english goods, &c.; the english traders nevertheless work in the markets of the french colonies, and work mainly on french goods. of the £ , representing the ivory coast trade for the first quarter of this year, over £ , was english trade, and of the dahomey £ , for the same period, £ , . in reading the imports figures for these french colonies in upper guinea, you must remember that those imports include material for the well directed, unamiable intention of france to cut us off from what she regards as her own western soudan; it is a form of investment far more profitable than our expenditure on railways, gaols, prisons, and frontier police. it is one that, presuming this highly unlikely thing--france becoming commercially intelligent--would any year now enable her entirely to pocket the west african trade down to lagos from senegal. she may do it at any moment, though it is a very remote possibility. so we will return to the gold coast finances, though our authorities on them are at present meagre. in the gold coast government was financially in a flourishing condition. on the st of january, , there was a sum of £ , _s._ _d._ standing to the credit of the colony, which was increased to £ , _s._ _d._ on the st of january, , and to £ , _s._ _d._ on the st of january, , and the colony had no public debt. there was no native direct taxation. the customs dues were lower than they are now. the extremely careful official who drew up the report shows evidence of realising that customs represent an indirect taxation on the native population, for he says: "in sierra leone and lagos the taxation per head is very much higher (than _s._ _d._ per head), in the former nine times, and in the latter seven times."[ ] however, in all three colonies, apart from the attempts at direct taxation, the indirect taxation on the native has considerably increased by now. the report for shows the colony still progressing rapidly, the trade of it amounting in value to £ , , _s._ _d._, of which £ , _s._ _d._ represented the imports, and £ , _s._ _d._ the exports. the expenditure showed a large increase as compared with previous years. it amounted to £ , _s._ _d._, being £ , _s._ _d._ in excess of the revenue for the year, and £ , _s._ _d._ more than in . the principal items of increase were public works, upon which the sum of £ , _s._ _d._ was spent, and the expedition in defence of the protected district of attabubu against an ashanti invasion, which cost £ , _s._ the gold coast assets on st of december, , stood at £ , _s._ _d._[ ] then came the last ashanti war, regarding which i beg to refer you to dr. freeman's book.[ ] no one can deny that he has both experience and intelligence enough to justify him in offering his opinion on the matter. i entirely accept his statements from my knowledge of native affairs elsewhere in west africa. anyhow, the last ashanti war absorbed a good deal of the assets of the gold coast. there is no published authority to cite, but i do not think there is an asset now standing to the credit of the gold coast colony, unless it be a loan. the income for the gold coast colony in was £ , _s._ _d._, the expenditure £ , _s._ _d._ the exports £ , , against £ , in ; but the imports were £ , , against £ , . since the customs dues have risen; but, _per contra_, the expenditure has also risen, in consequence of the expenses arising from the occupation of ashanti, and the gold coast railway. the occupation of ashanti and the railway must be looked on in the light of investments--investments that will be profitable or unprofitable, according to their administration, which one must trust will be careful, for they are both things you cannot just dump your money down on and be done with, for the up-keep expenses of both are necessarily large. the subject of west african railways is one that all who are interested in the future of our possessions there should study most carefully, for two main reasons. firstly, that there is possibly no other way in which money can be spent so unprofitably and extensively as on railways in such a region. secondly, because railways are in several districts there--districts with no water carriage possibilities--simply essential to the expansion of trade. in other words, if you make your railway through the right district, in the right way, it is a thing worth having, a sound investment. if you do not, it is a thing you are better without; not an investment, but an extravagance. the cost of its construction must fall on the colony, alike in money and the distraction, from ordinary trade, of the local labour supply. in both countries the cost of a railway out there is necessarily great. i hastily beg to observe i am not aiming at a rivalry with martin tupper in saying this, but am only driven to it by so many people in their haste saying "oh, for goodness gracious sake! let the government make a railway anywhere; it's done little enough for us, and any railway is better than none." there has been considerable difficulty over the gold coast railway already, though it is only just now entering on the phase of actual existence. surveys have been made for it in all directions. surveys are expensive things out there. but the general idea the government gave the chambers of commerce was that, at any rate, this railway was to run up into ashanti, and be a great general trade artery for the colony. the other day manchester found out, quite unexpected like, that the government whose affections commerce had regarded as safely and properly set on the hinterland trade was off, if you please, flirting round the corner with a group of gold mines at tarquah, and intended, nay, was even then proceeding with the undertaking of running the one and only gold coast railway just up to tarquah, and no further, until this section paid. manchester, very properly shocked at this fickleness in the government and its heartless abandonment of the hinterland trade, said things, interesting and excited things, in its _guardian_; but, beyond illustrating the truth of the old adage that it's "well to be off with the old love before you are on with the new," things of no avail. this tarquah railway is estimated to cost £ , per mile. it is to be financed by a loan, raised by the crown colony agents, of £ , . we have ample reason to believe that this £ , per mile will not represent one-third of its final cost from demonstrations by the uganda, congo belge, and senegal railways; more particularly are we so assured from the knowledge that the railway's construction will be in the hands of nominees of the crown agents, whose method of arranging for the construction of these railways is curious. they do not invite tenders for material or freight in the open market, and they do not give the taxed people in the country itself any opportunity for contracting for the supply of as much local material as possible--things it would be alike fair and business-like to do. exceedingly curious, moreover, is the fact that the nominees of the crown agents' employers are not subject to the control of the local governmental authorities on the coast, their sole connection with the affair apparently being confined to the passing of ordinances, as per instruction from the colonial office, authorising loans for the payment of the debt incurred by making the railway. there is no doubt that any gold coast railway which is ever to pay even for its coal must run through a rich bit of the local gold reefs. similarly, there is no doubt that the gold mines of the gold coast have been terribly kept back by lack of transport facilities for the machinery necessary to work them; but there is, nevertheless, evidently much that is unsound in the present railway scheme. if the charge for it, as some suggest, were to be thrown on the gold mines, it would be as heavy a charge as the old bad transport was, and they would be no less hampered. if, as is most likely, the charge for the railway be thrown on the general finance of the colony, it will be a drain on other forms of trade, without in any way improving them; in fact, during its construction, it will absorb labour from the general trade--oil, rubber, and timber--and, if it extensively increases the gold-mining industry, it will keep the labour tied to it chronically, to the disadvantage of other trades. lagos, our next crown colony, is a very rich possession, and under sir alfred moloney, who discovered the use of the kicksia africana as a rubber tree, and sir gilbert carter, who fostered the industry and opened the trade roads, sprang in a few years into a phenomenal prosperity. then came the french aggression on its hinterland, the seizing of nikki, which was one of those _foci_ of trade routes, though possibly, as many have said, a non-fertile bit of country in itself. to give you some idea of the bound up in prosperity made by lagos, the exports in were £ , ; in , £ , . the main advance has been in rubber, which in was exported from lagos to the value of £ , . early in this year, however, the state of the lagos trade was considered so unsatisfactory that a local commission to inquire into the causes of this state of affairs was appointed. the publication of the government trade returns for supported the long grumble that had been going on about the bad state of trade in lagos, the imports for showing a decrease on those of by £ , . the _board of trade journal_, quoting from the _lagos weekly record_ of february th, , says, "an examination of the export returns affords a clue to the direction of such decrease. it is to be noted that notwithstanding that the export of rubber in shows an excess of £ , above that exported in , yet in the aggregate of the total exports of the two years that of shows a decrease of £ , ; this is due to the great falling off which is perceptible in the palm oil and kernel trade, which together show a decrease in of £ , as compared with the quantities exported in ; while as compared with the exports in the decrease amounts to £ , . the returns show a steady and increasing decline in the exports of these products, for while the decrease in as compared with was only £ , , the decrease had risen in as compared with the previous year to £ , , as already intimated, which implies that there has been a further falling off of the trade to the extent of nearly £ , . this manifest excessive diminution in what must be regarded as the staple commodities of the trade is undoubtedly a serious indication, for though these commodities come under the classification of jungle products they are not liable to exhaustion as are the rubber or timber industries, and hence they form the only reliable commodities upon which the trade must expand. the dislocation of the labour system in the hinterland is no doubt responsible in a large measure for the falling off in the yield of these products, while in many instances they have been abandoned for the more remunerative rubber business. but, be the circumstances what they may, it is evident that there has been an actual decrease of trade to the extent of over £ , ." this was the state of affairs the local committee was appointed to deal with. its discussions were long and careful. i will not attempt to drag you through its final report, which a grossly ungrateful public in lagos sniffed at because it merely seemed carefully to reproduce every one's opinion on the causes of the falling off of trade and to agree with it solemnly; but, like the rest of the local world, it made no sweeping suggestion of means whereby things could be altered. since the committee, however, was formed, there has been a greater interest taken in expenditure, healthy in its way, but too often ignoring the fact, that it is not so much the amount of money that is spent governmentally that constitutes waste, but the things on which it is expended. large sums have been spent in lagos, i am informed, on building a government house that every valuable governor ought to be paid to keep out of, so unhealthy is its situation, and again on bridging a lagoon that has no particular sound bottom to it worth mentioning. that such forms of expenditure are not the necessary grooves into which a place like lagos is driven in order to get rid of its money is undoubted. the local press at any rate indicates other grooves; for example here is a cheerful little paragraph: "_a propos_ of what was said in your last issue about the grave-diggers, there is no doubt that something should be done to relieve the men from the strain of work to which they are continuously subjected. the demands of a constantly increasing death rate, which has caused the cemeteries to be enlarged, make it necessary that the number of grave-diggers should be increased. besides, these men are poorly paid for the work they do. of the twenty grave-diggers, six are paid at the rate of _s._ per diem, and the rest at the rate of _d._ they have no holidays, either, like other people. while the government labourers, of whom there is a host, may skulk half their time, the hard-working grave-digger is at it from a.m. to p.m. every day, sundays included, for the grim reaper is ever busy. the keeper of the graveyards, also, has much to do for the paltry salary he receives. i would earnestly appeal to the authorities to do something to raise the burden of this overworked staff."[ ] so would i, but rather in the direction of giving the "grim reaper" and the grave-diggers fewer people to bury. i must also give you another beautiful little bit of local colour, although it suggests further expenditure. "it is satisfactory to note that the chamber of commerce intends to take up the question of the swamp near the petroleum magazine. since the government made the causeway leading to the dead-house and cut off the tidal inflow, the upper portion of the swamp has been formed into a most noxious disease-breeding sink, into which refuse of all kinds is thrown, the stagnant waters and refuse combining, under the effects of the sun, to emit a most formidable pestilential effluvia. in the interests of humanity something should be done to abate this nuisance."[ ] however, i leave these local questions of lagos town. they just present a pretty picture of the difficulties that surround dealing with a place that has by nature swamps, that must have dead-houses, grave-diggers, and extensive cemetery accommodation, and that is peopled by natives who will instinctively throw refuse into any hole; with evidently a large death rate in the native population and a published death rate in whites of per thousand. let us now return to the higher finance. "the total expenditure of lagos in amounted to £ , _s._ _d._ the expenditure has risen in to £ , , which gives an excess of £ , . the total cost of the staff in was £ , , while the present cost amounts to £ , , which is an increase of £ , . this increase, apart from the augmentation in the governor's salary, is mainly in respect to the following departments:--secretariat, harbour department, constabulary and police, and the public works department. the cost of working the secretariat has been increased by £ , , due to the following additional officers:--two assistant colonial secretaries, a chief clerk, and a first clerk. it is well known that in , when the department cost the colony about one-half its present expenses as regards the european staff, the work was performed with efficiency and despatch; while at present it is not only difficult to get business got through, but, what is more, if the business is not followed up with watchful care, it will become lost in the superabundance of assistants and clerks who crowd the department, and the practical expression of whose work is more discernible on the public revenue than anything else."[ ] the _lagos record_ goes on to say, "there is room for retrenchment in the matter of expenditure on account of the european official staff." i do not follow it here. it is room for retrenchment in mere routine workers, black and white, that is wanted, and the liberation of the europeans to do work worth their risking their lives in west africa for. the percentage of black officials, mainly clerks--excellent and faithful to their duties--is increasing in all our colonies there too rapidly; and the existence of poorly paid but numerous posts under government with a certain amount of prestige, is a dangerous allurement to native young men, tempting them from nobler careers, and forming them into a sort of wall-class between the english official and the main body of the native population. take, for example, the number of government servants at the gold coast, according to sir william maxwell, ;-- european native civil officers. clerks. hausas. police. accra cape coast elmina an awful percentage of clerks is for such a country, more clerks than police, only less government native clerks than soldiers in the army; and you may depend upon it the white officials are clerking away, more or less, too. i always think how very apposite the answer of an official was to the criticism of excessive expenditure: "sir, there is no reckless expenditure; every j pen has to be accounted for!" no, i am quite unable to agree that anything but the crown colony system is to blame, and that because it is engaged in administering a district with no possibilities in it for england save commercial matters, in which the crown colony system is not well informed. i have only quoted these figures to show you that lagos and the gold coast are merely keeping line with sierra leone--increasing their expenditure in the face of a falling trade, with a dark trade future before them, on account of french activity in cutting them off from their inland markets, and of their own mismanagement of the native races. the trade and the prosperity of west africa depend on jungle products. there is no more solid reason to fear the extinction of west africa's jungle products of oil, timber, fibre, rubber, than there is to worry about the extinction of our own coal-fields--probably not so much--for they rapidly renew themselves. yes, even rubber, though that is slower at it than palm oil and kernel; and at present not one-tenth part of the jungle products are in touch with commerce; and save gold, and that to a very small extent, the mineral wealth of west africa is untouched. it is not in all regions only titaniferous iron; there are silver, lead, copper, antimony, quicksilver, and tin ores there unexploited, and which it would not be advisable to attempt to exploit until the so-called labour problem is solved. this problem is really that of the co-operation for mutual benefit of the african and the englishman. in the solution of this problem alone lies the success of england in west africa, not of england herself, for england could survive the loss of west africa whole, though doing so would cost her dear alike in honour and in profit. the crown colony system which now represents england in west africa will never give this solution. it necessarily destroys native society, that is to say, it disorganises it, and has not in it the power to reorganise. as i have already endeavoured to show, english influence in west africa, as represented by the crown colony system, consists of three separate classes of englishmen with no common object of interest, and is not a thing capable of organising so difficult a region. all these three classes, be it granted, each represent things for the organisation of a state. no state can exist without having the governmental, the religious, and the mercantile factors, working together in it; but in west africa these representatives of the english state are things apart and opposed to each other, and do not constitute a state. you might as well expect to get the functions of a state, good government, out of these three disconnected classes of englishmen in africa, as expect to know the hour of day from the parts of a watch before they were put together. you will see i have humbly attempted to place this affair before you from no sensational point of view, but from the commercial one--the value of west africa to england's commerce--and have attempted to show you how this is suffering from the adherence of england to a form of government that is essentially un-english. i have made no attack on the form of government for such regions formulated in england's more intellectual though earlier period of elizabeth, the chartered company system as represented by the royal niger company. i have neither shares in, nor reason to attack the royal niger company, which has in a few years, and during the period of the hottest french enterprise, acquired a territory in west africa immensely greater than the territory acquired during centuries under the crown colony system; it has also fought its necessary wars with energy and despatch, and no call upon imperial resources; it has not only paid its way, but paid its shareholders their per cent., and its bitterest enemies say darkly, far more. i know from my knowledge of west africa that this can only have been effected by its wise native policy. i know that this policy owes its wisdom and its success to one man, sir george taubman goldie, a man who, had he been under the crown colony system, could have done no more than other men have done who have been governors under it; but, not being under it, the territories he won for england have not been subjected to the jerky amateur policy of those which are under the crown colony system. for nearly twenty years the natives under the royal niger company have had the firm, wise, sympathetic friendship of a great englishman, who understood them, and knew them personally. it is the continuous influence of one great englishman, unhampered by non-expert control, that has caused england's exceedingly strange success in the niger; coupled with the identity of trade and governmental interest, and the encouragement of religion given by the constitution and administration of the niger company. this is a thing not given by all chartered companies; indeed, i think i am right in saying that the niger and the north borneo companies stand alone in controlling territories that have been essentially trading during recent years. this association of trade and government is, to my mind, an _absolutely necessary restraint_ on the charter company form of government;[ ] but there is another element you must have to justify charters, and that is that they are in the hands of an englishman of the old type. i am perfectly aware that the natives of lagos and other crown colonies in west africa are, and have long been, anxious for the chartered company of the niger to be taken over by the government, as they pathetically and frankly say, "so that now the trade in their own district is so bad, it may get a stimulus by a freer trade in the niger," and the native traders not connected with the company may rush in; while officials in the crown colonies have been equally anxious, as they say with frankness no less pathetic, so that they may have chances of higher appointments. i am equally aware that the merchants of england not connected with the niger company, which is really an association of african merchants, desire its downfall; yet they all perfectly well know, though they do not choose to advertise the fact, that three months crown colony form of government in the niger territories will bring war, far greater and more destructive than any war we have yet had in west africa, and will end in the formation of a debt far greater than any debt we now have in west africa, because of the greater extent of territory and the greater power of the native states, now living peacefully enough under england, but not under england as misrepresented by the crown colony system. i am not saying that chartered companies are good; i am only saying they are better than the crown colony plan; and that if the crown colony system is substituted for the chartered company, which is directly a trading company, england will have to pay a very heavy bill. there would be, of course, a temporary spurt in trade, but it would be a flash in the pan, and in the end, an end that would come in a few years' time, the british taxpayer would be cursing west africa at large, and the niger territories in particular. personally, i entirely fail to see why england should be tied to either of these plans, the crown colony or the chartered company, for governing tropical regions. have we quite run out of constructive ability in statecraft? is it not possible to formulate some new plan to mark the age of victoria? footnotes: [ ] _industrial and social life of the empire._ macmillan and co. [ ] for lagos, gold coast, sierra leone and gambia from to , £ , , . [ ] forty-eighth annual report liverpool chamber of commerce, . [ ] £ increase. expenditure on police and gaols, , £ " " " , , expenditure on transport , " " " , , expenditure on public works , " " " , , ------ aggregate increase , [ ] "the liquor traffic in west africa," _fortnightly review_, april, . [ ] _colonial reports, miscellaneous, no. , ._ g. f. scott elliott m.a., f.l.s., and c. a. raisin, b.sc. [ ] french colonies-- imports. exports . . . . £ £ £ £ senegal , , , , , , french guinea , , * , , * ivory coast , , , , dahomey , , , , french congo , ** , ** * for nine months only. ** no statistics. trade of dahomey and the ivory coast for the first three months of -- imports. exports. total trade. £ £ £ ivory coast , , , dahomey , , , german possessions-- imports. exports. . . . . . . £ £ £ £ £ £ togoland , , , , , , cameroon , , * , , * --------------------------------------------- total , , * , , * * no figures for calendar year. _board of trade journal_, september, . [ ] _colonial annual_, no. , gold coast for , published . [ ] ditto, no. . [ ] _ashanti and jaman._ constable, . [ ] _lagos standard_, september , . [ ] _lagos weekly record_, september , . [ ] _lagos weekly record_, august , . [ ] see introduction to _folk lore of the fjort_. r. e. dennett. david nutt, . chapter xvi the clash of cultures wherein this student, realising as usual, when too late, that the environment of such opinions as are expressed above is boiling hot water, calls to memory the excellent saying, "as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb," and goes on. i have no intention, however, of starting a sort of open-air steam laundry for west african washing. i have only gone into the unsatisfactory-to-all-parties-concerned state of affairs there not with the hope, but with the desire, that things may be improved and further disgrace avoided. it would be no good my merely stating that, if england wishes to make her possessions there morally and commercially pay her for the loss of life that holding them entails, she must abolish her present policy of amateur experiments backed by good intentions, for you would naturally not pay the least attention to a bald statement made by merely me. so i have had to place before you the opinions of others who are more worthy of your attention. i must, however, for myself disclaim any right to be regarded as the mouthpiece of any party concerned, though major lugard has done me the honour to place me amongst the liverpool merchants. i can claim no right to speak as one of them. i should be only too glad if i had this honour, but i have not. there was early this year a distressing split between liverpool and myself--whom i am aware they call behind my back "our aunt"--and i know they regard me as a vexing, if even a valued, form of relative. this split, i may say (remembering mr. mark twain's axiom, that people always like to know what a row is about), arose from my frank admiration of both the royal niger company and france, neither of which liverpool at that time regarded as worthy of even the admiration of the most insignificant; so its _journal of commerce_ went for me. the natural sweetness of my disposition is most clearly visible to the naked eye when i am quietly having my own way, so naturally i went for its _journal of commerce_. providentially no one outside saw this deplorable family row, and mr. john holt put a stop to it by saying to me, "say what you like, you cannot please all of us;" had it not been for this i should not have written another line on the maladministration of west africa beyond saying, "call that crown colony system you are working there a government! england, at your age, you ought to be ashamed of yourself!" but you see, as things are, i am not speaking for any one, only off on a little lone fight of my own against a state of affairs which i regard as a disgrace to my country. well but, you may say, after all what you have said points to nothing disgraceful. you have expressly said that there is no corruption in the government there, and the rest of the things--the change of policy arising from the necessity for white men to come home at the least every twelve months, the waste of money necessary to local exigencies, and the fact that officers and gentlemen cannot be expected to understand and look after what one might call domestic expenses--may be things unavoidable and peculiar to the climate. to this i can only say, given the climate, why do you persist in ignoring the solid mass of expert knowledge of the region that is in the hands of the mercantile party, and go on working your governors from a non-expert base? you have in england an unused but great mass of knowledge among men of all classes who have personally dealt with west africa--yet you do not work from that, organise it, and place it at the service of the brand new governors who go out; far from it. i know hardly any more pathetic sight than the new official suddenly appointed to west africa buzzing round trying to find out "what the place is really like, you know." i know personally one of the greatest of our governors who have been down there, a man with iron determination and courage, who was not content with the information derivable from a list of requisites for a tropical climate, the shorter hausa grammar and a nice cheery-covered little work on diseases--the usual fillets with which england binds the brows of her sacrifices to the coast--but went and read about west africa, all by himself, alone in the british museum. he was a success, but still he always declares that the only book he found about this particular part was a work by a belgian, with a frontispiece depicting the author, on an awful river, in the act, as per inscription, of shouting, "row on, brave men of kru!" which, as subsequent knowledge showed him that bravery was not one of the main qualities of the kru men, shook him up about all his british museum education. so in the end he, like the rest, had to learn for himself, out there. of course, if the governors were carefully pegged down to a west african place and lived long enough, and were not by nature faddists, doubtless they would learn, and in the course of a few years things would go well; but they are not pegged down. no sooner does one of them begin to know about the country he is in charge of than off he is whisked and deposited again, in a brand new region for which west africa has not been a fitting introduction. then, as for the domestic finance, why expect officers and lawyers, doctors and gentlemen from clubland to manage fiscal matters? of course they naturally don't know about trade affairs, or whether the public works department is spending money, or merely wasting it. you require professional men in west africa, but not to do half the work they are now engaged on in connection with red tape and things they do not understand. of course, errors of this kind may be merely folly, you may have plenty more men as good as these to replace them with, so it may matter more to their relations than to england if they are wasted alike in life and death, and you are so rich that the gradual extinction of your tropical trade will not matter to your generation. but as a necessary consequent to this amateurism, or young gentlemen's academy system, the crown colony system, there is disgrace in the injustice to and disintegration of the native races it deals with. now when i say england is behaving badly to the african, i beg you not to think that the philanthropic party has increased. i come of a generation of danes who when the sun went down on the wulpensand were the men to make light enough to fight by with their morning stars; and who, later on, were soldiers in the low countries and slave owners in the west indies, and i am proud of my ancestors; for, whatever else they were, they were not humbugs; and the generation that is round me now seems to me in its utterances at any rate tainted with humbug. i own that i hate the humbug in england's policy towards weaker races for the sake of all the misery on white and black it brings; and i think as i see you wasting lives and money, sowing debt and difficulties all over west africa by a hut tax war in sierra leone, fighting for the sake of getting a few shillings you have no right to whatsoever out of the african,--who are you that you should point your finger in scorn at my tribe? i as one of that tribe blush for you, from the basis that you are a humbug and not scientific, which, i presume you will agree is not the same thing as my being a philanthropist. i had the honour of meeting in west africa an english officer who had previously been doing some fighting in south africa. he said he "didn't like being a butterman's nigger butcher." "oh! you're all right here then," i said; "you're out now for exeter hall, the plane of civilisation, the plough, and the piano." i will not report his remarks further; likely enough it was the mosquitoes that made him say things, and of course i knew with him, as i know with you, butchery of any sort is not to your liking, though war when it's wanted is; the distinction i draw between them is a hard and fast one. there is just the same difference to my mind between an unnecessary war on an unarmed race and a necessary war on the same race, as there is between killing game that you want to support yourself with or game that is destructive to your interests, and on the other hand the killing of game just to say that you have done it. this will seem a deplorably low view to take, but it is one supported by our history. we have killed down native races in australasia and america, and it is no use slurring over the fact that we have profited by so doing. this argument, however, cannot be used in favour of killing down the african in tropical africa, more particularly in western tropical africa. if you were to-morrow to kill every native there, what use would the country be to you? no one else but the native can work its resources; you cannot live in it and colonise it. it would therefore be only an extremely interesting place for the zoologist, geologist, mineralogist, &c., but a place of no good to any one else in england. this view, however, of the profit derivable from and justifying war you will refuse to discuss; stating that such profit in your wars you do not seek; that they have been made for the benefit of the african himself, to free him from his native oppressors in the way of tyrannical chiefs and bloody superstitions, and to elevate him in the plane of civilisation. that this has been the intention of our west african wars up to the sierra leone war, which was forced on you for fiscal reasons, i have no doubt: but that any of them advanced you in your mission to elevate the african, i should hesitate to say. i beg to refer you to dr. freeman's opinions on the ashantee wars on this point,[ ] but for myself i should say that the blame of the failure of these wars to effect their desired end has been due to the want of power to re-organise native society after a war; for example, had the ashantee war been followed by the taking over of ashantee and the strong handling of it, there would not have been an ashantee war; or, to take it the other way, if you had followed up the battle of katamansu in , you need not have had an war even. dr. freeman holds, that if you had let the ashantis have a sea-port and generally behaved fairly reasonably, you need hardly have had ashantee wars at all. but, however this may be, i think that a good many of the west african wars of the past ten years have been the result of the humbug of the previous sixty, during which we have proclaimed that we are only in africa for peaceful reasons of commerce, and religion, and education, not with any desire for the african's land or property: that, of course, it is not possible for us to extend our friendship or our toleration to people who go in for cannibalism, slave-raiding, or human sacrifices, but apart from these matters we have no desire to meddle with african domestic affairs, or take away their land. this, i own, i believe to have honestly been our intention, and to be our intention still, but with our stiff crown colony system of representing ourselves to the african, this intention has been and will be impossible to carry out, because between the true spirit of england and the spirit of africa it interposes a distorting medium. it is, remember, not composed of englishmen alone, it includes educated natives, and yet it knows the true native only through interpreters. but why call this humbug? you say. well, the present policy in africa makes it look so. frankly, i do not see how you could work your original policy out unless it were in the hands of extremely expert men, patient and powerful at that. too many times in old days have you allowed white men to be bullied, to give the african the idea that you, as a nation, meant to have your way. too many times have you allowed them to violate parts of their treaties under your nose, until they got out of the way of thinking you would hold them to their treaties at all, and then suddenly down you came on them, not only holding them to their side of the treaties, but not holding to your own, imposing on them restrictions and domestic interference which those treaties made no mention of at all. i have before me now copies of treaties with chiefs in the hinterland of our crown colonies, wherein there is not even the anti-slavery clause--treaties merely of friendship and trade, with the undertaking on the native chief's part to hand over no part or right in his territories to a foreign power without english government consent. yet, in the districts we hold from the natives under such treaties, we are contemplating direct taxation, which to the african means the confiscation of the property taxed. we have, in fact, by our previous policy placed ourselves to the african with whom we have made treaties, in the position of a friend. "big friend," it is true, but not conqueror or owner. our departure now from the "big friend" attitude into the position of owner, hurts his feelings very much; and coupled with the feeling that he cannot get at england, who used to talk so nicely to him, and whom he did his best to please, as far as local circumstances and his limited power would allow, by giving up customs she had an incomprehensible aversion to, it causes the african chief to say "god is up," by which i expect he means the devil, and give way to war, or sickness, or distraction, or a wild, hopeless, helpless, combination of all three; and then, poor fellow, when he is only naturally suffering from the dazzles your west african policy would give to an iron post, you go about sagely referring to "a general antipathy to civilisation among the natives of west africa," "anti-white-man's leagues," "horrible secret societies," and such like figments of your imagination; and likely enough throw in as a dash for top the statement that the chief is "a drunken slave-raider," which as the captain of the late s.s. _sparrow_ would say, "it may be so, and again, it mayn't." anyhow it seems to occur to you as an argument only after the war is begun, though you have known the man some years; and it has not been the ostensible reason for any west african war save those in the niger company's territories, which run far enough inland to touch the slave-raiding zone, and which are entirely excluded from my arguments because they have been in the hands of experts on west africa in war-making and in war-healing. our past wars in west africa, i mean all our wars prior to the hut-tax war, have been wars in order to suppress human sacrifice, to protect one tribe from the aggression of another, and to prevent the stopping of trade by middlemen tribes. these things are things worth fighting for. the necessity we have been under to fight them has largely arisen from our ancestors shirking a little firm-handedness in their generation. there is very little doubt that, owing to a want of reconstruction after destruction, these wars have not been worth to the empire the loss of life and money they have cost; but this is nothing against us as fighters nor any real disgrace to our honour, but merely a slur on our intellectual powers in the direction of statecraft. they are wars of a totally different character to those of the hut-tax kind, that arise from aggressions on native property: the only thing in common between them is the strain of poor statecraft. this imperfection, however, exists to a far greater extent in hut-tax war, for to it we owe that general feeling of dislike to the advance of civilisation you now hear referred to. that, to a certain extent, this dislike already exists as the necessary outcome of our policy of late years, and that it will increase yearly, i fear there is very little doubt. it is the toxin produced by the microbe. it is the consequence of our attempt to introduce direct taxation, which seems to me to be an affair identical with your greased cartridges for india. doubtless, such people ought not to object to greased cartridges; but, doubtless, such people as we are ought not to give them, and commit, over again, a worthless blunder, with no bad intention be it granted, but with no common sense. it has been said that the sierra leone hut-tax war is "a little indian mutiny"; those who have said it do not seem to have known how true the statement is, for these attacks on property in the form of direct taxation are, to the african, treachery on the part of england, who, from the first, has kept on assuring the african that she does not mean to take his country from him, and then, as soon as she is strong enough, in his eyes, deliberately starts doing it. when you once get between two races the feeling of treachery, the face of their relationship is altered for ever, altered in a way that no wholesome war, no brutality of individuals, can alter. black and white men for ever after a national breach of faith tax each other with treachery, and never really trust each other again. the african, however, must not be confounded with the indian. externally, in his habits he is in a lower culture state; he has no fanatical religion that really resents the incursions of other religions on his mind; fetish can live in and among all sorts and kinds of religions without quarrelling with them in the least, grievously as they quarrel with fetish; he has no written literature to keep before his eyes a glorious and mythical past, which, getting mixed up with his religious ideas, is liable in the indian to make him take at times lobster-like backward springs in the direction of that past, though it was never there, and he would not have relished it if it had been. nevertheless, the true negro is, i believe, by far the better man than the asiatic; he is physically superior, and he is more like an englishman than the asiatic; he is a logical, practical man, with feelings that are a credit to him, and are particularly strong in the direction of property; he has a way of thinking he has rights, whether he likes to use them or no, and will fight for them when he is driven to it. fight you for a religious idea the african will not. he is not the stuff you make martyrs out of, nor does he desire to shake off the shackles of the flesh and swoon into nirvana; and although he will sit under a tree to any extent, provided he gets enough to eat and a little tobacco, he won't sit under trees on iron spikes, or hold a leg up all the time, or fakirise in any fashion for the benefit of his soul or yours. his make of mind is exceedingly like the make of mind of thousands of englishmen of the stand-no-nonsense, englishman's-house-is-his-castle type. yet, withal, a law-abiding man, loving a live lord, holding loudly that women should be kept in their place, yet often grievously henpecked by his wives, and little better than a slave to his mother, whom he loves with a love he gives to none other. this love of his mother is so dominant a factor in his life that it must be taken into consideration in attempting to understand the true negro. concerning it i can do no better than give you the reverend leighton wilson's words; for this great missionary knew, as probably none since have known, the true negro, having laboured for many years amongst the most unaltered negro tribes--the grain coast tribes--and his words are as true to-day of the unaltered negro as on the day he wrote them thirty-eight years ago, and leighton wilson, mind you, was no blind admirer of the african. "whatever other estimate we may form of the african, we may not doubt his love for his mother. her name, whether dead or alive, is always on his lips and in his heart. she is the first being he thinks of when awakening from his slumbers and the last he remembers when closing his eyes in sleep; to her he confides secrets which he would reveal to no other human being on the face of the earth. he cares for no one else in time of sickness, she alone must prepare his food, administer his medicine, perform his ablutions, and spread his mat for him. he flies to her in the hour of his distress, for he well knows if all the rest of the world turn against him she will be steadfast in her love, whether he be right or wrong. "if there be any cause which justifies a man in using violence towards one of his fellow men it would be to resent an insult offered to his mother. more fights are occasioned among boys by hearing something said in disparagement of their mothers than all other causes put together. it is a common saying among them, if a man's mother and his wife are both on the point of being drowned, and he can save only one of them, he must save his mother, for the avowed reason if the wife is lost he may marry another, but he will never find a second mother."[ ] among the tribes of whom wilson is speaking above, it is the man's true mother. among the niger delta tribes it is often the adopted mother, the woman who has taken him when, as a child, he has been left motherless, or, if he is a boughten child, the woman who has taken care of him. among both, and throughout all the bushmen tribes in west africa, however, this deep affection is the same; next to the mother comes the sister to the african, and this matter has a bearing politically. there is little doubt that there exists a distrustful feeling towards white culture. up to our attempt to enforce direct taxation it was only a distrustful feeling that a few years careful, honest handling would have disposed of. since our attempt there is no doubt there is something approaching a panicky terror of white civilisation in all the native aristocracies and property owners. it is not, i repeat, to be attributed to fetish priests. certainly, on the whole, it is not attributable to a dislike of european customs or costumes; it is the reasonable dislike to being dispossessed alike of power and property in what they regard as their own country. a considerable factor in this matter is undoubtedly the influence of the women--the mothers of africa. just as your african man is the normal man, so is your african woman the normal woman. i openly own that if i have a soft spot in my feelings it is towards african women; and the close contact i have lived in with them has given rise to this, and, i venture to think, made me understand them. i know they have their faults. for one thing they are not so religiously minded as the men. i have met many african men who were philosophers, thinking in the terms of fetish, but never a woman so doing. be it granted that on the whole they know more about the details of fetish procedure than the men do. yet though frightened of them all, a blind faith in any mortal ju ju they do not possess. your african lady is artful with them, not philosophic, possibly because she has other things to do--what with attending to the children, the farm, and the market--than go mooning about as those men can. for another thing they go in for husband poisoning in a way i am unable to approve of. well, it may be interesting to inquire into the reasons that make the west african woman a factor against white civilisation. these reasons are--firstly, that she does not know practically anything about it; and, secondly, she has the normal feminine dislike to innovations. missionary and other forms of white education have not been given to the african women to anything like the same extent that they have been given to the men. i do not say that there are not any african women who are not thoroughly educated in white education, for there are, and they can compare very favourably from the standpoint of their education with our normal women; but these have, i think i may safely say, been the daughters of educated african men, or have been the women who have been immediately attached to some mission station. i have no hesitation in saying that, considering the very little attention that has been given to the white education of the african women, they give evidence of an ability in due keeping with that of the african men. but all i mean to say is, that our white culture has not had a grasp over the womankind of africa that can compare with that it has had over the men; for one woman who has been brought home to england and educated in our schools, and who has been surrounded by english culture, &c., there are men. but into the possibilities of the african woman in the white education department i do not mean to go; i am getting into a snaggy channel by speaking on woman at all. it is to the mass of african women, untouched by white culture, but with an enormous influence over their sons and brothers, that i am now referring as a factor in the dislike to the advance of white civilisation; and i have said they do not like it because, for one thing, they do not know it; that is to say, they do not know it from the inside and at its best, but only from the outside. viewed from the outside in west africa white civilisation, to a shrewd mind like hers, is an evil thing for her boys and girls. she sees it taking away from them the restraints of their native culture, and in all too many cases leading them into a life of dissipation, disgrace, and decay; or, if it does not do this, yet separating the men from their people. the whole of this affair requires a whole mass of elaborate explanations to place it fairly before you, but i will merely sketch the leading points now. ( ) the law of mütterrecht makes the tie between the mother and the children far closer than that between the father and them: white culture reverses this, she does not like that. ( ) between husband and wife there is no community in goods under native law; each keeps his and her separate estate. white culture says the husband shall endow his wife with all his worldly goods; this she knows usually means, that if he has any he does not endow her with them, but whether he has or has not he endows himself with hers as far as any law permits. similarly he does not like it either. these two white culture things, saddling him with the support of the children and endowing his wife with all his property, presents a repulsive situation to the logical african. moreover, white culture expects him to think more of his wife and children than he does of his mother and sisters, which to the uncultured african is absurd. then again both he and his mother see the fearful effects of white culture on the young women, who cannot be prevented in districts under white control from going down to the coast towns and to the devil: neither he nor the respectable old ladies of his tribe approve of this. then again they know that the young men of their people who have thoroughly allied themselves to white culture look down on their relations in the african culture state. they call the ancestors of their tribe "polygamists," as if it were a swear-word, though they are a thousand times worse than polygamists themselves: and they are ashamed of their mothers. it is a whole seething mass of stuff all through and i would not mention it were it not that it is a factor in the formation of anti-white-culture opinion among the mass of the west africans, and that it causes your west african bush chief to listen to the old woman whom you may see crouching behind him, or you may not see at all, but who is with him all the same, when she says, "do not listen to the white man, it is bad for you." he knows that the interpreter talking to him for the white man may be a boughten man, paid to advertise the advantages of white ways; and he knows that the old woman, his mother, cannot be bought where his interest is concerned: so he listens to her, and she distrusts white ways. i am aware that there is now in west africa a handful of africans who have mastered white culture, who know it too well to misunderstand the inner spirit of it, who are men too true to have let it cut them off in either love or sympathy from africa,--men that, had england another system that would allow her to see them as they are, would be of greater use to her and africa than they now are; but i will not name them: i fight a lone fight, and wish to mix no man, white or black, up in it, or my heretical opinions. that handful of african men are now fighting a hard enough fight to prevent the distracted, uninformed africans from rising against what looks so like white treachery, though it is only white want of knowledge; and also against those "water flies" who are neither africans nor europeans, but who are the curse of the coast--the men who mislead the white man and betray the black. next to this there is another factor almost equally powerful, with which i presume you cannot sympathise, and which i should make a mess of if i trusted myself to explain. therefore i call in the aid of a better writer, speaking on another race, but talking of the identical same thing. "in these days the boot of the ubiquitous white man leaves its mark on all the fair places of the earth, and scores thereon an even more gigantic track than that which affrighted robinson crusoe in his solitude. it crushes down the forest, beats out roads, strides across the rivers, kicks down native institutions, and generally tramples on the growths of natives and the works of primitive man, reducing all things to that dead level of conventionality which we call civilisation. "incidentally it stamps out much of what is best in the customs and characteristics of the native races against which it brushes; and though it relieves him of many things which hurt or oppressed him ere it came, it injures him morally almost as much as it benefits him materially. we who are white men admire our work not a little--which is natural, and many are found willing to wear out their souls in efforts to convert the thirteenth century into the nineteenth in a score of years. the natives, who for the most part are frank vandals, also admire efforts of which they are aware that they are themselves incapable, and even the _laudator temporis acti_ has his mouth stopped by the cheap and often tawdry luxury which the coming of the white man has placed within his reach. so effectually has the heel of the white man been ground into the face of pérak and selangor, that these native states are now only nominally what their name implies. the white population outnumbers the people of the land in most of the principal districts, and it is possible for a european to spend weeks in either of these states without coming into contact with any asiatics save those who wait at table, clean his shirts, or drive his cab. it is possible, i am told, for a european to spend years in pérak or selangor without acquiring any profound knowledge of the natives of the country or of the language which is their special medium. this being so, most of the white men who live in the protected native states are somewhat apt to disregard the effect their actions have upon the natives and labour under the common european inability to view natives from a native standpoint. moreover, we have become accustomed to existing conditions; and thus it is that few perhaps realise the precise nature of the work which the british in the peninsula have set themselves to accomplish. what we are really attempting, however, is nothing less than to crush into twenty years the revolution in facts and in ideas, which, even in energetic europe, six long centuries have been needed to accomplish. no one will, of course, be found to dispute that the strides made in our knowledge of the art of government since the thirteenth century are prodigious and vast, nor that the general condition of the people of europe has been immensely improved since that day; but nevertheless one cannot but sympathise with the malays who are suddenly and violently translated from the point to which they have attained in the natural development of their race, and are required to live up to the standard of a people who are six centuries in advance of them in national progress. if a plant is made to blossom or bear fruit three months before its time it is regarded as a triumph of the gardener's art; but what then are we to say of this huge moral forcing system we call 'protection'? forced plants we know suffer in the process; and the malay, whose proper place is amidst the conditions of the thirteenth century, is apt to become morally weak and seedy and lose something of his robust self respect when he is forced to bear nineteenth century fruit."[ ] now, the above represents the state of affairs caused by the clash of different culture levels in the true negro states, as well as it does in the malay. these two sets of men, widely different in breed, have from the many points of agreement in their state-form, evidently both arrived in our thirteenth century. the african peoples in the central east, and east, and south, except where they are true negroes, have not arrived in the thirteenth century, or, to put it in other words, the true negro stem in africa has arrived at a political state akin to that of our own thirteenth century, whereas the bantu stem has not; this point, however, i need not enter into here. there are, of course, local differences between the malay peninsula and west africa, but the main characteristics as regards the state-form among the natives are singularly alike. they are both what mr. clifford aptly likens to our own european state-form in the thirteenth century; and the effect of the white culture on the morals of the natives is also alike. the main difference between them results from the malay peninsula being but a narrow strip of land and thinly peopled, compared to the densely populated section of a continent we call west africa. therefore, although the malay in his native state is a superior individual warrior to the west african, yet there are not so many of him; and as he is less guarded from whites by a pestilential climate, his resistance to the white culture of the nineteenth century is inferior to the resistance which the west african can give. the destruction of what is good in the thirteenth century culture level, and the fact that when the nineteenth century has had its way the main result is seedy demoralised natives, is the thing that must make all thinking men wonder if, after all, such work is from a high moral point of view worth the nineteenth century doing. i so often think when i hear the progress of civilisation, our duty towards the lower races, &c., talked of, as if those words were in themselves ju ju, of that improving fable of the kind-hearted she-elephant, who, while out walking one day, inadvertently trod upon a partridge and killed it, and observing close at hand the bird's nest full of callow fledglings, dropped a tear, and saying "i have the feelings of a mother myself," sat down upon the brood. this is precisely what england representing the nineteenth century is doing in thirteenth century west africa. she destroys the guardian institution, drops a tear and sits upon the brood with motherly intentions; and pesky warm sitting she finds it, what with the nature of the brood and the surrounding climate, let alone the expense of it. and what profit she is going to get out of such proceedings there, i own i don't know. "ah!" you say, "yes, it is sad, but it is inevitable." i do not think it is inevitable, unless you have no intellectual constructive statecraft, and are merely in that line an automaton. if you will try science, all the evils of the clash between the two culture periods could be avoided, and you could assist these west africans in their thirteenth century state to rise into their nineteenth century state without their having the hard fight for it that you yourself had. this would be a grand humanitarian bit of work; by doing it you would raise a monument before god to the honour of england such as no nation has ever yet raised to him on earth. there is absolutely no perceivable sound reason why you should not do it if you will try science and master the knowledge of the nature of the native and his country. the knowledge of native laws, religion, institutions, and state-form would give you the knowledge of what is good in these things, so that you might develop and encourage them; and the west african, having reached a thirteenth century state, has institutions and laws which with a strengthening from the european hand would by their operation now stamp out the evil that exists under the native state. what you are doing now, however, is the direct contrary to this: you are destroying the good portion and thereby allowing what is evil, or imperfect, in it as in all things human, to flourish under your protection far more rankly than under the purely native thirteenth century state-form, with fetish as a state religion, it could possibly do. i know, however, there is one great objection to your taking up a different line towards native races to that which you are at present following. it is one of those strange things that are in men's minds almost without their knowing they are there, yet which, nevertheless, rule them. this is the idea that those africans are, as one party would say, steeped in sin, or, as another party would say, a lower or degraded race. while you think these things, you must act as you are acting. they really are the same idea in different clothes. they both presuppose all mankind to have sprung from a single pair of human beings, and the condition of a race to-day therefore to be to its own credit or blame. i remember one day in cameroons coming across a young african lady, of the age of twelve, who i knew was enjoying the advantages of white tuition at a school. so, in order to open up conversation, i asked her what she had been learning. "ebberyting," she observed with a genial smile. i asked her then what she knew, so as to approach the subject from a different standpoint for purposes of comparison. "ebberyting," she said. this hurt my vanity, for though i am a good deal more than twelve years of age, i am far below this state of knowledge; so i said, "well, my dear, and if you do, you're the person i have long wished to meet, for you can tell me why you are black." "oh yes," she said, with a perfect beam of satisfaction, "one of my pa's pa's saw dem patriark noah wivout his clothes." i handed over to her a crimson silk necktie that i was wearing, and slunk away, humbled by superior knowledge. this, of course, was the result of white training direct on the african mind; the story which you will often be told to account for the blackness and whiteness of men by africans who have not been in direct touch with european, but who have been in touch with muhammedan, tradition--which in the main has the same semitic source--is that when cain killed abel, he was horrified at himself, and terrified of god; and so he carried the body away from beside the altar where it lay, and carried it about for years trying to hide it, but not knowing how, growing white the while with the horror and the fear; until one day he saw a crow scratching a hole in the desert sand, and it struck him that if he made a hole in the sand and put the body in, he could hide it from god, so he did; but all his children were white, and from cain came the white races, while abel's children are black, as all men were before the first murder. the present way of contemplating different races, though expressed in finer language, is practically identical with these; not only the religious view, but the view of the suburban agnostic. the religious european cannot avoid regarding the races in a different and inferior culture state to his own as more deeply steeped in sin than himself, and the suburban agnostic regards them as "degraded" or "retarded" either by environment, or microbes, or both. i openly and honestly own i sincerely detest touching on this race question. for one thing, science has not finished with it; for another, it belongs to a group of subjects of enormous magnitude, upon which i have no opinion, but merely feelings, and those of a nature which i am informed by superior people would barely be a credit to a cave man of the palæolithic period. my feelings classify the world's inhabitants into englishmen, by which i mean teutons at large, foreigners, and blacks. blacks i subdivide into two classes, english blacks and foreign blacks. english blacks are africans. foreign blacks are indians, chinese, and the rest. of course, everything that is not teutonic is, to put it mildly, not up to what is; and equally, of course, i feel more at home with and hold in greater esteem the english black: a great, strong kruman, for example, with his front teeth filed, nothing much on but oil, half a dozen wives, and half a hundred jujus, is a sort of person whom i hold higher than any other form of native, let the other form dress in silk, satin, or cashmere, and make what pretty things he pleases. this is, of course, a general view; but i am often cornered for the detail view, whether i can reconcile my admiration for africans with my statement that they are a different kind of human being to white men. naturally i can, to my own satisfaction, just as i can admire an oak tree or a palm; but it is an uncommonly difficult thing to explain. all i can say is, that when i come back from a spell in africa, the thing that makes me proud of being one of the english is not the manners or customs up here, certainly not the houses or the climate; but it is the thing embodied in a great railway engine. i once came home on a ship with an englishman who had been in south west africa for seven unbroken years; he was sane, and in his right mind. but no sooner did we get ashore at liverpool, than he rushed at and threw his arms round a postman, to that official's embarrassment and surprise. well, that is just how i feel about the first magnificent bit of machinery i come across: it is the manifestation of the superiority of my race. in philosophic moments i call superiority difference, from a feeling that it is not mine to judge the grade in these things. careful scientific study has enforced on me, as it has on other students, the recognition that the african mind naturally approaches all things from a spiritual point of view. low down in culture or high up, his mind works along the line that things happen because of the action of spirit upon spirit; it is an effort for him to think in terms of matter. we think along the line that things happen from the action of matter upon matter. if it were not for the asiatic religion we have accepted, it is, i think, doubtful whether we should not be far more materialistic in thought-form than we are. this steady sticking to the material side of things, i think, has given our race its dominion over matter; the want of it has caused the african to be notably behind us in this, and far behind those asiatic races who regard matter and spirit as separate in essence, a thing that is not in the mind either of the englishman or the african. the englishman is constrained by circumstances to perceive the existence of an extra material world. the african regards spirit and matter as undivided in kind, matter being only the extreme low form of spirit. there must be in the facts of the case behind things, something to account for the high perception of justice you will find in the african, combined with an inability to think out a pulley or a lever except under white tuition. similarly, taking the true negro states, which are in its equivalent to our thirteenth century, it accounts for the higher level of morals in them than you would find in our thirteenth century; and i fancy this want of interest and inferiority in materialism in the true negro constitutes a reason why they will not come into our nineteenth century, but, under proper guidance could attain to a nineteenth century state of their own, which would show a proportionate advance. the simile of the influence of the culture of rome, or rather let us say the culture of greece spread by the force of rome, upon barbarian culture is one often used to justify the hope that english culture will have a similar effect on the african. this i do not think is so. it is true the culture of rome lifted the barbarians from what one might call culture to culture , but the romans and the barbarians were both white races. but you see now a similar lift in culture in africa by the influence of mohammedan culture, for example in the hausa states and again in the western soudan, where there is no fundamental race difference. in both english and mohammedan berber influence on the african there is another factor, apart from race difference; namely, that the two higher cultures are in a healthier state than that of rome was at the time it mastered the barbarian mind; in both cases the higher culture has the superior war force. this seems to me simply to lay upon us english for the sake of our honour that we keep clean hands and a cool head, and be careful of justice; to do this we must know what there is we wish to wipe out of the african, and what there is we wish to put in, and so we must not content ourselves by relying materially on our superior wealth and power, and morally on catch phrases. all we need look to is justice. love for our fellow-man, pity, charity, mercy, we need not bother our heads about, so long as we are just. these things are of value only when they are used as means whereby we can attain justice. it is no use saying that it matters to a teuton whether the other race he deals with is black, white, yellow--i can quite conceive that we should look down on a pea-green form of humanity if we had the chance. naturally, i think this shows a very proper spirit. i should be the last to alter any of our teutonic institutions to please any race; but when it comes to altering the institutions of another race, not for the reason even of pleasing ourselves but merely on the plea that we don't understand them, we are on different ground. if those ideas and institutions stand in the way of our universal right to go anywhere we choose and live as honest gentlemen, we have the power-right to alter them; but if they do not we must judge them from as near a standard of pure justice as we can attain to. there are many who hold murder the most awful crime a man can commit, saying that thereby he destroys the image of his maker; i hold that one of the most awful crimes one nation can commit on another is destroying the image of justice, which in an institution is represented more truly to the people by whom the institution has been developed, than in any alien institution of justice; it is a thing adapted to its environment. this form of murder by a nation i see being done in the destruction of what is good in the laws and institutions of native races. in some parts of the world, this murder, judged from certain reasonable standpoints, gives you an advantage; in west africa, judged from any standpoint you choose to take, it gives you no advantage. by destroying native institutions there, you merely lower the moral of the african race, stop trade, and the culture advantages it brings both to england and west africa. i again refer you to the object lesson before you now, the hut tax war in sierra leone. awful accusations have been made against the officers and men who had the collecting of this tax. in the matter of the native soldiery, there is no doubt these accusations are only too well founded, but the root thing was the murder of institutions. the worst of the whole of this miserable affair is that a precisely similar miserable affair may occur at any time in any of our west african crown colonies--to-morrow, any day,--until you choose to remove the crown colony system of government. it has naturally been exceedingly hard for men who know the colony and the natives, with the experience of years in an unsentimental commercial way, to keep civil tongues in their heads while their interests were being wrecked by the action of the government; but whether or no the white officers were or were not brutal in their methods we must presume will be shown by sir david chalmers's report. i am unable to believe they were. but there is no manner of doubt that outrages have been committed, disgraceful to england, by the set of riff-raff rascal blacks, who had been turned out by, or who had run away from, the hinterland tribes down into sierra leone colony, and there been turned, by an ill-informed government, into police, and sent back with power into the very districts from which they had, shortly before, fled for their crimes. i entirely sympathise, therefore, with the rage of liverpool and manchester, and of every clear-minded common-sense englishman who knows what a thing the hut tax war has been. and i want common-sense englishmen to recognise that a system capable of such folly, and under which such a thing could happen in an english possession, is a system that must go. for a system that gets short of money, from its own want of business-like ability, and then against all expert advice goes and does the most unscientific thing conceivable under the circumstances, to get more, is a thing that is a disgrace to england. yet the sierra leone colony was capable of this folly, and the people in london were capable of saying to liverpool and manchester, that no difficulty was expected from the collection of the tax. if this is so in our oldest colony, what reason have we to believe that in the others we are safer? any of them, in combination with london, may to-morrow go and do the most unscientific thing conceivable, and disgrace england, in order to procure more local revenue, and fail at that. the desire to develop our west african possessions is a worthy one in its way, but better leave it totally alone than attempt it with your present machinery; which the moment it is called upon to deal with the administration of the mass of the native inhabitants gives such a trouble. and remember it is not the only trouble your crown colony system can give; it has a few glorious opportunities left of further supporting everything i have said about it, and more. but i will say no more. you have got a grand rich region there, populated by an uncommon fine sort of human being. you have been trying your present set of ideas on it for over years; they have failed in a heart-breaking drizzling sort of way to perform any single solitary one of the things you say you want done there. west africa to-day is just a quarry of paving-stones for hell, and those stones were cemented in place with men's blood mixed with wasted gold. prove it! you say. prove it to yourself by going there--i don't mean to blazes--but to west africa. footnotes: [ ] _ashantee and jaman_, freeman (constable and co., ). [ ] _western africa_, wilson, , p. . [ ] _east coast etchings._ h. clifford, singapore, . chapter xvii an alternative plan wherein the student, having said divers harsh things of those who destroy but do not reconstruct, recognises that, having attempted destruction, it is but seemly to set forth some other way whereby the west african colonies could be managed. west africa, i own, is a make of country difficult for a power with a different kind of culture, climate and set of institutions, and so on, to manage from europe satisfactorily. but, as things go, i venture to think it presents no especial difficulty; that all the difficulties that exist in this matter are difficulties arising from misunderstandings,--things removable, not things of essence, barring only fever. also i feel convinced that no one of our english governmental methods at present existing is suitable for its administration. it is no use saying, look at our indian system, why not just introduce that into west africa? i have the greatest admiration for our indian system; it is the right thing in the right place, thanks to its having healthily grown up, fostered by experts, military and civil. nevertheless it would not do for west africa to-day. what we want there is the sowing of a similar system, not the transplanting of the indian in its perfect form, for that is to-day for west africa infinitely too expensive. if a man before his fortune is made spends a fortune, he ends badly; if he measures his expenditure with his income and develops his opportunities, he ends as a millionaire; and we must never forget that great dictum that the state is the perfection of the individual man, and should mould our politics accordingly. i hold it to be a sound and healthy idea of ours that our possessions over-sea should pay their own way, and i therefore distrust the cucumber-frame form of financial politics that at present holds the field in west african affairs. it has been the pride and boast of the west african colonies that they have paid their way; let it remain so. it seems to me unsound that our colonies there should receive loans wherewith to carry on; for, for one thing, it makes them carry on more than is good for them, and merely means a piling up of debt; and, for another, it gives west africa the notion that it is england's business to support her, which to my mind it distinctly is not; for if we wanted a lapdog set of colonies we could get healthier ones elsewhere. moreover, it pauperises instead of fostering the proper pride, without which nothing can flourish. apart from our indian system, we have, for governing those regions where our race cannot locally produce a sufficient population of its own to take the reins of government out of the hands of officialdom in england, only two other systems, namely, the chartered company and the crown colony. i beg to urge that it is high time we had a third system. concerning the crown colony system for africa, i have spoken as tolerantly as i believe it is possible for any one acquainted with its working in west africa to speak. if i were to say any more i might say something uncivil, which, of course, i do not wish to do. concerning the chartered company system, i need only remark that there are two distinct breeds of chartered companies--the one whose attention is turned to the trade, the other whose attention is turned to the lands over which its charter gives it dominion. the first kind is represented in africa by the royal niger company, the second by the south african. the second form of chartered company, that interested in land, we have not in west africa under the name of a company; but the present crown colony system represents it, and i feel certain that whatever good the south african company may have done for the empire in south africa, it has done an immense amount of harm in western africa. for some, to me unknown, reason the south african company has found favour in the sight of officialdom in london; and, fascinated by its success in south africa, yet recognising its drawbacks, officialdom has attempted to introduce what they regard as best in the south african system into west africa. i do not think any student can avoid coming to the conclusion that the policy which is now driving the crown colonies in west africa is one and the same with that of mr. rhodes. i do not mean that mr. rhodes, had he had the handling of west africa, would himself have used this form of policy. he formulated it for south africa; but, with his careful study of such things as local needs, he would have formulated another form for west africa, which is a totally different region. to take only two of the differences, and state them brutally. first, in west africa the most valuable asset you have is the native: the more heavily the district there is populated with africans, and the more prosperous those natives are, the better for you; for it means more trade. all the gold, ivory, oil, rubber, and timber in west africa are useless to you without the african to work them; you can get no other race that can replace him, and work them; the thing has now been tried, and it has failed. whereas in south africa the converse is true: you can do without the african there, you can replace him with pretty nearly any other kind of man you like, or do the work yourself. the second difference is, that the land in south africa is worth your having, you can go and domesticate on it; whereas in west africa you cannot. a failure to recognise these differences is at the root of our present ill-judged west african policy, outside the royal niger company's domain; by introducing south african methods we are trying to get what is of no use to us, the _landes hoheit_, and thereby devastating what is of use to us, the trade. however, i will not detain you over this interesting question of chartered company government. i merely wish to draw your attention to the two breeds, the land company, and the trade company; and to urge that they are things to be applied in their respective proper environments. i can honestly assure you, i know every blessed, single, mortal thing that can be said against the trade form which i admire, for i have lived under a hail of this sort of information since i was discovered by my big juju, liverpool, to be such an admirer of what i called a co-ordinate system of government and trade, and liverpool called divers things. i shall go to my grave believing that liverpool had reasons for attacking the company, but neglected fundamental facts in its controversy with the trade company, which, to it, was "a little more than kith, and less than kind." the royal niger company has demonstrated its adaptation to its environment. without any forced labour, without any direct taxation, it has paid. i venture to think, though i have no doubt it would severely hurt the feelings of the r.n.c., that we may regard the royal niger company as representing the perfected system of native government in west africa plus english courage and activity. i believe that on this foundation has been built its success. for say what you like, if the royal niger had not got on well with the natives in its territories--dealt cleanly, honestly, rationally with them--it would never have extended its influence in the grand way it has, represented only by a mere handful of white men, in what is, as far as we know, the most densely populated region with the highest and most organised form of native power in all tropical africa. had it not been to the natives it ruled a just, honourable, and desirable form of government, it would long ago have been stamped out by them, or would have been compelled to call in england's armed support to maintain it, as the crown colony system has been compelled to do in sierra leone and on the gold coast. it has not had to call in imperial assistance, and it has paid its shareholders--a sound, healthy conduct; but, nevertheless, remember that all the great debt of gratitude you and every one of the english owe the royal niger company for defending the honour of england against continental enterprise, for maintaining the honour of england in the eyes of the native races with whom it had made treaties, you do not owe to the chartered company _system_, but to sir george goldie, the man who had to use it because it was the _best_ existing system available for such a region. you have too much sense to give all the honour to lord kitchener of khartoum's sword, though a sword is an excellent thing. i trust, therefore, you have too much sense to give all honour to the chartered company, even when it is a trading company. trade is an excellent thing, but, in the case of the royal niger, this very factor, trade, restricts the man who uses the chartered company to a set of white men and a set of black. therefore, never can i feel that either liverpool or the brass men have profited by the r.n.c. as they would have done if there had been a better system available for dealing with what mr. st. loe strachey delicately calls "a dark-skinned population" with an insufficient local white population at hand. briefly, i should say that the chartered company system keeps its "ain fish-guts for its ain sea-maws" too much. therefore now, when, like many before me who have laboured strenuously to reform, i have given up the idea that reformation is possible for the individual on whom they have expended their powers, and have decided that there are some people whom you can only reform with a gun, i will start reforming myself, and say the chartered company system is not good enough, taken all round as things are, for west africa for these reasons. first, a chartered company consists of a band of merchants, ruling through, and by, a great man. if that great man who expands the influence and power of the company lives long enough to establish a form of policy, well and good. i have sufficient trust in the common sense of a band of english merchants, provided their interest is common, to believe they will adhere to the policy; but suppose he does not, or suppose you do not start with a good man, you will merely have a mess, as has been demonstrated by the perpetual failures of our french friends' chartered companies. by the way, i may remark that although france is no great admirer of the chartered system with us, she is devoted to it for herself, sprinkling all her west african possessions with them freely, only unfortunately, as their names are usually far longer than their banking accounts, they do not grow conspicuous; even apart from these private and subsidised chartered companies in french possessions, france follows the chartered system imperially in west africa by keeping out non-french trade with differential tariffs, and so on. but, after all, in this matter she is no worse than english critics of the royal niger; and it is a common trait of all west african palavers that those who criticise are amply well provided themselves with the very faults they find so repulsive in others--it's the climate. secondly, the chartered company represents english trade interests in sections, instead of completely; english honour, common sense, military ability, and so on, the royal niger under sir george goldie has represented more perfectly than these things have ever been represented in west--or, i may safely say, africa at large; but the trade interests of england it has only represented partially, or in other words, it has only represented the trade interests of its shareholders and the natives it has made treaties with, and what we want is something that will represent our trade interests there completely. therefore, i do not advocate it as the general system for west africa, for under another sort of man it might mean merely a more rapid crash than we are in for with the crown colony system. to my dying day i shall honour that great trade company, the royal niger, for representing england, that is, england properly so-called, to the world at large, during one of the darkest ages we have ever had since charles ii.; and, i believe that it, with the committee of merchants who held the gold coast for england after the battle of katamansu, when her officials would have abandoned alike the gold coast and her honour in west africa, will stand out in our history as grand things, but yet i say we want another system. "du binst der geist der stets verneint!" you ejaculate. you do not like crown colonies. you won't grovel to chartered companies, however good. you prove, on your own showing, that there is not in west africa a sufficiently large, or a sufficiently long resident, local english population--what with their constantly leaving for home or for the cemetery--to form an independent colony. what else remains? well, i humbly beg to say that there is another system--a system that pays in all round peace and prosperity--a system whereby a region with a native population--a lively one in a thirteenth century culture state--of about , , , is ruled. the total value of exports from the regions i refer to averages £ , , , out of a country of very much the same make as west africa; the floating capital in its trade is some £ , , ; its actual land area is , square miles; yet its trade with its european country amounts, nevertheless, to at least one half of that carried on between india and england. if you apply the system that has built this thing up, practically since , to west africa, you will not get the above figures out in forty years; but you will get at least two-thirds of them; and that would be a grand rise on your present west african figures, and in time you could surpass these figures, for west africa is far larger, and far nearer european markets, and you have the advantage of superior shipping. the region i am citing is not so unhealthy for whites as west africa. still, it has a stiff death-rate of its own; even nowadays, when it has pulled that death-rate down by science--a thing, i may remark, you never trouble your head about in west africa, or think worthy of your serious attention. i will not insult your knowledge by telling you where this system is working to-day, or who works it, and all that. the same consideration also bars me from applying for a patent for this system; for although i lay it before you altered to what i think suitable for west africa, the main lines of the system remain. the only thing i confess that makes me shaky about its being applied to west africa is, that this system requires and must have experts black and white to work it, both at home in england and out in west africa. still, you have a sufficient supply of such experts, if only you would not leave things so largely in the hands of clerks and amateurs; who, with the assistance of faddists and renegade africans, break up the native true negro culture state, leaving you little sound stuff to work on in the regions now under the crown colony system. before i proceed to sketch the skeleton of the other system, i must lay before you briefly the present political state of west africa in the words of the greatest living expert on the subject, as they are given in a remarkable article in the _edinburgh review_ for october, . "the weighty utterance of sir george goldie should never be forgotten, 'central african races and tribes have, broadly speaking, no sentiment of patriotism as understood in europe.' there is, therefore, little difficulty in inducing them to accept what german jurisconsults term 'ober hoheit,' which corresponds with our interpretation of our vague term 'protectorate.' but when complete sovereignty or 'landes hoheit,' is conceded, they invariably stipulate that their local customs and systems of government shall be respected. on this point they are, perhaps, more tenacious than most subject races with whom the british empire has had to deal; while their views and ideas of life are extremely difficult for an englishman to understand. it is therefore certain that even an imperfect and tyrannical native african administration, if its extreme excesses were controlled by european supervision, would be in the early stages productive of far less discomfort to its subjects than well-intentioned but ill-directed efforts of european magistrates, often young and headstrong, and not invariably gifted with sympathy and introspective powers. if the welfare of the native races is to be considered, if dangerous revolts are to be obviated, the general policy of ruling on african principles through native rulers must be followed for the present. yet it is desirable that considerable districts in suitable localities should be administered on european principles by european officials, partly to serve as types to which the native governments may gradually approximate, but principally as cities of refuge in which individuals of more advanced views may find a living if native government presses unduly upon them, just as in europe of the middle ages men whose love of freedom found the iron-bound system of feudalism intolerable, sought eagerly the comparative liberty of cities."[ ] there are a good many points in the above classic passage on which i would fain become diffuse, but i forbear; merely begging you to note carefully the wording of that part concerning government by natives ruling on african principles, because here is a pitfall for the hasty. you will be told that this is the present policy in crown colonies--but it is not. what they are doing is ruling on european principles through natives, which is a horse of another colour entirely and makes it hot work for the unfortunate native catspaw chief, and so all round unsatisfactory that no really self-respecting native chief will take it on. well, to return to that other system: what it has got to do is to unite english interests--administrative, commercial and educational--into one solid whole, and combine these with native interests; briefly, to be a system where the englishman and the african co-operate together for their mutual benefit and advancement, and therefore it must be a representative system, and one of those groups of representative systems which form the british empire. for reasons i need not discuss here it must be a duplicate system, with an english and an african side, these two united and responsible to the english crown, but both having as great a share of individual freedom in africa as possible. by and by the necessity for the duplicate system may disappear, but at present it is necessary. i will take the english side first. there should be in england an african council, in whose hands is the power of voting supplies and of appointing the governor-general, subject to the approval of the crown, and to whom firms trading in africa should be answerable for the actions of their representatives. this council should be of nominated members, from the chambers of commerce of liverpool, manchester, london, bristol, and glasgow. of course, they should not be paid members. this council would occupy a similar position in west african administration to that which the house of commons occupies in english. under this grand council there should be two sub-councils reporting to it, one a joint committee of english lawyers and medical men, the other a committee of the native chiefs. neither of these councils should be paid, but sufficient should be granted them to pay their working expenses. the members of these sub-councils of the grand council should be appointed--the medical and legal committee by say, the lord chancellor and the college of physicians respectively, and the committee of african chiefs by the chiefs in west africa. i make no pretence at believing that either of these sub-councils for the first few years of their existence will be dove-cots--lawyers and doctors will always fight each other: but the lawyers will hold the doctors in and _vice versa_, and the common sense of the grand council will hold them both well down to practical politics. with the council of chiefs there will probably be less trouble, and this council will be an ambassador to the white government at headquarters capable of representing to it native opinion and native requirements. representing the grand council and nominated by it, subject to the approval of the crown, as represented by the chief secretary for the colonies and the privy council, there must be one governor-general for west africa: he must be supreme commander of the land and sea forces, with the right of declaring peace and war, and concluding treaties with the native chiefs; he must be a proved expert in west african affairs; he must be paid, say, £ , a year; he must spend six months on the coast on a tour of inspection, during which he must be accessible alike to the european and native. he may, if he sees fit, spend more than six months out there; but it is not advisable he should reside there permanently, for if he does so, he will assuredly get out of touch with the grand council, of which he should _ex officio_ be chairman or president. this grand council with its sub-councils is all that is required in england for the government of west africa. it is not, as you see, an expensive system _per se_: with its power to raise supplies, it could vote itself sufficient to carry on its out-of-pocket expenses in the matter of clerks and goods inspectors. the connecting link between it and africa is the governor-general; between it and england, the chief secretary for the colonies--not the colonial, or foreign, or any other existing office: things it should be equal with, not subject to. out in africa, the governor-general should be the representative of the english _raj_--the ober hoheit of england--and the head of the system of landes hoheit, represented by the african chiefs; in him the two must join. under his control, on the european side, must be the few european officials required to administer the country locally. these must be carefully picked, experienced men, provided with sufficient power to enforce their rule with promptitude when it comes to details; but the policy of the ober hoheit should be the policy of the governor and grand council, not of the individual official. immediately in grade under the governor-general should come a set of district commissioners or governors, one for each of the present colonies. these men should be the resident representatives of the governor-general, and responsible to him for the affairs, trade and political, of their districts. these district commissioners should be paid £ , a year each, and have a term of residence on the coast of twelve months, with six months' furlough at home on half pay, the other half of the pay going to the men who represent them during their absence at home--the senior sub-commissioners of their districts.[ ] the next grade are the sub-commissioners. these are only required in the districts now termed protectorates; the europeanised coast towns to be under a different system i will sketch later. well, these protectorate districts should be divided up among sub-commissioners, who should each reside in his allotted district. they should be responsible directly to the district commissioner, and they should represent to him constantly the chiefs' council of the sub-district and the trade, and on the other hand represent trade and the ober hoheit things to the native chiefs. these men, therefore, will be the backbone of the system, and primarily on them will depend its success; so they must be expert men--well acquainted with the native culture state, and with the trade. each of these sub-commissioners should have in his district, his own town, from which he should frequently make tours of inspection round his district at large; but this town should be what sir george goldie calls "a town of refuge." english law should rule in it absolutely, administered by an official, one of the class of men approved by the legal sub-council of the grand council. the sub-commissioner should also have in his town a medical staff of three men, nominated by the medical side of the sub-council of the grand council. these three (chief medical, assistant medical, and dispenser) should have a hospital provided, where they can carry on their work properly. also in this town should be the military force sufficient to enforce rule in the district--either to go and prevent one chief bagging another chiefs belongings, or to assist a chief in a domestic crisis. it is impossible to say how large a military staff a sub-commissioner would require; some districts would require no more than fifty soldiers, while another might require . details of this kind the governor-general must decide; but whatever size this force may be, it should be composed of troops under efficient military control. i believe the west indian troops to be the best for this service; but here again you will meet, if you take the trouble to inquire of people who ought to know, the greatest haziness of mind combined with an enormous difference of opinion. some will tell you that the west indians are no good, that they are cowardly and unfit for bush work, and require as many carriers as a white regiment. others say the opposite, and hold forth on the evil of using raw savages as troops in such a country, and placing men who have been cast out on account of crime into positions of power and authority in the very districts wherein all the power they should have by rights would be to swing at the end of a rope. there is much to be said on both sides; the only thing i will say is that military affairs in west africa are in much the same scrappy mess as civil, and require reorganisation. there is, no doubt, excellent fighting material in many west african tribes, and turbulent native spirits are all the better for military organisation and discipline; it is certain, however, that such men should be deported from districts wherein they have private scores to settle, and used elsewhere after they have been disciplined. if it were possible for the native regiments now being drilled in the hinterlands of our colonies out there to be used actively to guard our people from foreign aggression, there would be a good reason for having them, but recent events have demonstrated, in the gold coast hinterland for example, that they cannot, according to government notions, be so employed. therefore they are worse than useless, for they merely add to the unjustifiable aggressions on the native residents by aggressions of their own; such things as native police under the white government side for the districts of the protectorate should not exist. they are a sort of wild fowl who will get you and themselves into more rows than they will ever get any one out of, and they will squeeze you and the native population into the bargain. the chiefs of the district should be responsible for the internal administration of justice among their own people. if a chief fails in this he should be removed, with the assistance of the military force at the command of the sub-commissioner. when, in fact, a chief is found to be going astray, the fact should be promptly brought before the council of chiefs; a definite short time, say a month, should be allowed them to bring him to his bearings, and if at the expiration of this time they fail to do so, without any further delay the sub-commissioner should step in. in a very short time the chiefs' council would see the advisability of keeping this from happening, and also see that it can only be prevented by enforcing good government among themselves. well, this west indian guard should of course be under its proper military officers, and at the disposal of the sub-commissioner, and well installed in barracks, and made generally as happy as circumstances will permit. then again in each town which forms the centre of a sub-commissioner's district there should be representatives of any firms who may wish to trade there. they can each have their separate factories, or form a local association for working the trade of the district as it pleases them. i think it would be advisable that in each of these towns away in the interior there should be a warehouse, whereto all goods coming up for the separate trading firms should be delivered, and wherein all exports ready for transport to the coast should be lodged, and the figures concerning these things ascertained. this should be the business of the sub-commissioner's secretary, and he can be aided in it by a black clerk. but it would not be a custom-house, because customs, like native regiments, do not exist out there under this system. if any of the firms like to establish sub-factories in the district outside the town, they should have every facility impartially afforded them to do so. any attack made on them by the natives should be promptly revenged, but outside the town in all trade matters the native law should rule under the administration of the local chief, with a power (in important cases--say, over £ involved) of appeal to the chiefs' council, and from that, if need be to the sub-commissioner. now in this town, acting with and directing the council of chiefs, you will have all that the hinterland districts in west africa at present require for their administration and development, except, you will say, religion and education. as for the first, as represented by the missions, i think they will do best away from the rest, as i will presently attempt to explain. as for education, that will be in their hands too, and with them. the missionary stations about the district, however, will be under the direct control and protection of the sub-commissioner and his town. no gaol will be required there or elsewhere in west africa; the sort of thing a gaol represents is better represented by a halter and convict labour gang. so much, as old peter heylin would say, for the sub-commission. the district commissioner for a colony and its hinterland should have a residence at one of the chief towns on the coast, making tours round to his sub-commissioners as occasion requires; and he should always be accessible both to his sub-commissioners and to the district chiefs. at his head town should be the headquarters of the military force required by his colony, and the headquarters of the labour service. we will now turn to the administration of the coast towns, places that have been long in our possession and have a sufficient white and europeanised african population to justify us in regarding them as english possessions in the landes hoheit sense. these towns should be governed by municipality, and should be under english law, having accredited magistrates approved of by the grand council and paid, not by the municipalities, but by the grand council. each municipality should occupy in the system an identical position to that occupied by the sub-commissioner in his town, and communicate with the district commissioner direct, receive all goods, and make returns of them to him. they should each have and be responsible for hospitals and schools within the town, and for its police, lighting, and sanitary affairs. each municipality should be paid by the government the same pay as a sub-commissioner, £ , a year. they should get their extra resources from a charge on the trade of the town at a fixed rate made by the grand council for all municipalities under the system. this system would do away with the division of our possessions, at present so misleading and vexatious and unnecessary, into colonies and protectorates, and substitute for that division the just division into regions under our landes ober hoheit (municipalities), and those under our ober hoheit--(sub-commissioners' districts). both alike would be under the governor-general as representing the grand council. there still remains one important new development in our west african methods--the organisation of native labour. the institution of a regular and reliable labour supply seems to me one of the most vital things for the progress of west africa. there is undoubtedly in west africa an enormous supply of labour, and that the true negro can work and work well the krumen have amply demonstrated. all that is required is method and organisation. this you could easily supply. if, for example, you were to direct those energies of yours which are now employed in raising native regiments in the hinterland to raising and regulating a native labour army, it would be better. a native regiment of soldiers is a thing you do not want in any hinterland district, whereas the native regiment of labourers is a thing you do want very badly. there is also in this connection another fact: while, under the present state of affairs, one colony will be choked with men anxious for work, and another colony will be starving for labour, if all the english colonies were united under one system, and a regular labour department were instituted, this would be obviated. there exist in west africa two sources of labour supply, but i think the labour department had better deal with only one of them--the free paid labour--the other, the convict, would be better placed under the kind care of the municipalities. all persons convicted of offences other than capital, should be, at the discretion of the magistrates, sentenced to a fine, or so many weeks' labour. the whole of this labour should be devoted to the public works department of the municipality, not of the state, and above all, should not be sent away up into the hinterland, where there will be no one to look after it as convict labour requires. quite apart from this, there should be the state labour department, whose jurisdiction would extend over both colony and hinterland, and whose white officials should be a distinct line in the service; one or more of these officials should be in every hinterland sub-commissioner's town. they would be recruiters and drillers of labourers, just as you now have recruiters and drillers of soldiers there; and a requisition should be made to all the chiefs, to draft into this labour army any person, under their rule, who might be anxious to serve as a labourer; and they should also have power to enrol any labour volunteer recruits that might come into the town, provided the chiefs could not show a satisfactory reason against their so doing. this labour army should be divided up into suitably sized gangs, with a head man elected by his gang, and be employed in the transport work required by the government, or let out by the government to private individuals requiring labour within the district, or drafted to other english colonies on the coast, if occasion required, to do certain jobs--i do not say for certain spaces of time, because piecework is the best system for west africa. an attempt should be made gradually to induce the hinterland chiefs to adopt the kru social system, wherein every man serves so many years as a labourer, then, about the age of thirty, joins the army and becomes a compound soldier-policeman, ending up in honour and glory as a local magistrate. but it must be remembered that domestic slavery is not a great institution among the kru tribes, as it is amongst the hinterland tribes in our colonies; the kru system could not, therefore, be immediately introduced. we now come to the question of where the revenue is to come from to support this system. there is no difficulty about that in itself; the difficulty comes in in the method to be employed in its collection. when one has a chartered trading company it is, of course, a simple matter; when you have a crown colony it is done by means of the custom-house system. the alternative system, however, is not a chartered company; under it individual firms, so long as they can show sufficient capital and good faith, would work the details of their trade out there as freely and privately as in england. i think every effort should be made to do away in west africa with the custom-house system as it exists in english crown colonies. in cameroon it is better, but in our crown colonies and also in the niger coast protectorate it is ruinous to the tempers of ship masters and shippers, and the cause of a great waste of time--decidedly one of the main causes of the undue length of voyages to and from the coast. it seems to me that the revenue of our west african possessions must be a charge on the trade; and that this charge should, as much as possible, be collected in europe from the shippers instead of from their representatives on the coast. if i were king in babylon, i would make all the trade to west africa pass through liverpool, and pay its customs there to a custom-house of the grand council, or through the english ports of the other chambers represented on the grand council--each chamber being responsible for the trade of its port. i am aware that this would cause difficulty with the increasing continental trade; but this would be obviated by affiliating hamburg and havre to the council and giving into their hands the collections of the dues at those ports. the grand council should fix annually the amount of the trade tax, and it should have at its disposal for this matter the figures sent home by the separate district commissioners in west africa. the sub-commissioner of a district should know the amount of trade his district was doing, and be paid a commission on it to stimulate his interest. if the goods used in his district were delivered at one warehouse in his town, he would have little difficulty in getting the figures, which he should pass on to the district commissioner, who should forward them to the grand council with report in duplicate to the governor-general, so that that officer might keep his finger on the pulse of the prosperity of each district; similarly, the municipalities should report to him the trade done in the towns under their control. in addition, the government, that is to say, the grand council, should take over the monopoly of the tobacco import and the timber export. by using tobacco in the same way as european governments use coinage, an immense revenue could be very cheaply obtained. the grand council should sell the tobacco to the individual traders who work the west african markets, allowing no other tobacco to be used in the trade; this revenue also could be collected in europe. the timber industry should, i think, be under governmental control, both for the sake of providing the government with revenue and for the sake of protecting the forests from destruction in those districts where forest destruction is a danger to the common weal, by weakening the forest barriers against the sahara. the return that the government should make for these monopolies to the independent trader should be, among other things, transport. in the course of a few years the government would have in hand a sufficient surplus to build a pier across the gold coast surf. it is possible to build piers across the west coast surf, for the french have done it. i would not advocate one great and mighty pier, that ocean-going steamers could go alongside, for all the gold coast ports, but a set of =t=-headed piers where surf boats or lighters could discharge, and the employment of stout steam tugs to tow surf boats and lighters to and fro between the lighters and the pier. then again, every mile of available waterway inland should be utilised, and patrolled by government cargo boats of the lawn-mower or flat-iron brand, as the chargeurs-reunis are subsidised to patrol the ogowé. on the gold coast you have the volta and the ancobra available for this; in sierra leone and lagos you have many waterways penetrating inland. land transport should also be in the hands of the government, and goods delivered free of extra charge at the towns of the sub-commissioners; this could be done by the labour department. when sufficient surplus revenue was in hand, light railways on the french system should be built, similarly delivering, free of freight, the goods belonging to the inland registered traders, but charging freight for passengers and local goods traffic. a telegraph and postal service should also be another source of revenue, if thrown open at a low charge to the general public. if there is a telegraph office in west africa, where telegrams can be sent at a reasonable rate, the general public will throw away a lot of money on it in a fiscally fascinating way. these various sources of revenue will place in the hands of the grand council a sufficient revenue, and if that revenue is expended by them in developing methods of transport, i am confident that the trade of the district, in the hands of the private firms, will healthily expand, alike rapidly and continuously, and thereby supply more revenue, which, expended with equal wisdom, will again increase the trade and prosperity of the region, and make west africa into a truly great possession. the things i depend on for the development of west africa, are mainly two. first, the sub-commissioner's town, acting in fellowship with the chiefs' council of the district. the example of that town will stimulate the best of the chiefs to emulation; it will by every self-respecting chief, be regarded as stylish to have clean wide streets and shops, a telegraph and post-office, and things like that. seeing that his elder brother, the sub-commissioner, has a line of telegraph connecting him with the district commission town, he will want a line of telegraph too. by all means let him have it; let him have the electric light and a telephone, if he feels he wants it, and will pay for it; but don't force these things, let them come, natural like. the great thing, however, in the sub-commissioner's town is that it should be so ruled and governed that it does not become a thing like our coast towns now, sink-holes of moral iniquity, that stink in the nose of a respectable african--things he hates to see his sons and daughters and people go down into. secondly, i depend on municipal government on the lines i have laid down for the coast towns. the government of these municipalities would be in the hands of the representatives of the trading firms, and the more important native traders--people, as i hold, perfectly capable of dealing with affairs, and having a community of interests. the great difficulty in arranging any system for the government of west africa lies not in the true difficulties this region presents, but in the fictitious difficulties that are the growth of years of mutual misunderstanding and misrepresentation. that great mass of mutual distrust, so that to-day down there white man distrusts white man and black, black man distrusts black man and white, may seem on a superficial review to be justified. but if you go deeper you will find that this distrust is the mere product of folly and ignorance, and is therefore removable. the great practical difficulty lies in arranging a system whereby the white trader can work on every legitimate line absolutely free from governmental hindrance. i have too great a respect for the west coast traders to publish any criticism on them. i hold that the competition among them is too severe for them to face the present state of west africa and prosper as men should who run so great a risk of early death as the west coast trader runs. i should like to know who profits by their internecine war; i think no one but the native buyers of their goods. again now, under the present crown colony system, the traders, knowing they are the people who have paid for the government for years, who have given it the money it lives on, naturally ask for something back in the way of local improvements. the government has now no money to carry out these improvements, unless it borrows it. the government as at present existing must necessarily waste that borrowed money just as it has wasted the money the traders have paid it; therefore the consequences of improvements under the present system must be debt, which the traders must pay in the end. i would therefore urge the traders to abandon a policy of demanding improvements and protection in their trade relationships with the natives, such as ordinances against adulteration of produce, &c., and to realise that by gaining these things they are but enslaving themselves in the future. let them rather adopt the policy of altering the form of government before they proceed to urge further governmental expenditure. if the traders require a dry-nurse system, let them formulate one in place of the one sketched above. i do not, however, think they want anything of the kind, unless they are indeed degenerate; but, if they do, i beg them to bear in mind that you cannot have an alexandra feeding bottle and a latch key; they must choose one or the other. at present, the crown colony system gives neither. under it the trader is treated like a child, a neglected child, one of those interesting but unfortunate children who have to support an elderly relative, who would be all the better for a cheap funeral. upon the missionary and educational side of the system i have advocated i need not enlarge. just as trade should go on under it free, so should mission effort; there should be no governmental forcing of either, but it should be steadily borne in mind that the regeneration of the considerable amount of broken up stuff which exists in the coast town regions--the africans who have lost their old culture and their old fetish regulation or conduct without being completely europeanised--is a work that can only be effected by the missionary, and therefore in the hands of the missions should be placed the whole education department, with the one demand on it from the government that in their schools every scholar should have the opportunity of acquiring a sound education in the rudiments of english reading, writing and arithmetic. give him this knowledge, and your brilliant young african has demonstrated that he can rise to any examination such as an european university offers him. under the system i advocate there need be no limitation as to colour in the officials employed in the municipalities. in the sub-commissioners' towns the head officials must be englishmen, but among the regions under the landes hoheit in the hinterland, africans educated as doctors or as traders could have grand careers provided they did honest work. the consideration of the african side of this system of administration is a thing into which--after all the long recitation i have inflicted on you concerning african religion and law--i am not justified in plunging here. i will merely, therefore, lay before you a statement of african common law, so that you may see the african principle through which the landes hoheit--the government of africa by africans--would work. i am confident that the thing--the african principle--is so sound that it could work; there is no need for us to put our commerce under it, any more than there is need that we should attempt to put the african's private property under our own law; but a healthy commerce and a healthy law should co-operate, and can co-operate. footnotes: [ ] preface by sir george goldie to vandeleur's _campaigning on the upper nile and niger_, . [ ] the time which a man ought to be expected to remain in west africa is difficult to determine--representatives of trading firms are expected to remain out two years, and the mortality among them is certainly no higher than among the officials with their twelve months' service. it is contended by the commercial party that it takes a man several months after returning from furlough to get into working order again, that under the twelve months' system no sooner has he done this than he is off on furlough again, in short that the system is foolish and wasteful in the extreme. on the other hand the advocates of the short service plan contend that a man is not fit for work at all after twelve months in west africa, and that if he is not definitely ill, he has at any rate lost all energy. personally, i fancy it depends on the individual, and that with a definite policy the short service plan will be quite safe. chapter xviii african property wherein some attempt is made to set down the divers kinds of property that exist among the people of the true negro race in western africa, and the law whereby it is governed. in speaking on the subject of african property and the laws which guard it in its native state, i must, in the space at my disposal here, confine myself to speaking of these things as they are in one division of the many different races of human beings that inhabit that vast continent of africa; and, in order to present the affair more clearly, i must take them as they exist in their most highly developed state, namely, among the people of the true negro stock, for it is among these people that pure african culture has reached so far its fullest state of development. the distribution zone of this true negro stock cannot yet be fixed with any approach to accuracy, but we know that the seaboard of the regions inhabited by the true negro is that vast stretch of the african west coast from a point south of the gambia river to a point just north of cameroon river, in the region of the rio del rey. we can safely say, within this region you will find the true negro, but we cannot safely say how far inland, or how far down south of the rio del rey we shall find him. that this stock extends through up to the nile regions; that it stretches far away south of the nile in the interior of the upper congo regions, appearing in the azenghi; that it stretches south on the coast line below the rio del rey, appearing as the so-called noble tribes of the bight of panavia, the ajumba, mpongwe, igalwa, and also as osheba, befangh, will be demonstrated i believe when we have a sufficient supply of ethnological observers in africa. but it must be remembered that you can only get the true negro unadulterated in the coast regions of western africa between the rivers gambia and cameroon. [illustration: a housa. [_to face page ._] in the fringe regions of the west soudan you have an adulterated form of him--adulterated in idea with mohammedanism, and the berber races; to the east and to the south with that other great african race division, the bantu. i venture to think that bantu adulteration mainly takes the form of language. we have in our own continent many instances of races of greater strength and conquering power adopting the language of the weaker peoples whom they have conquered, when the language has been one more adapted to the needs of life and more widely diffused than their own, and therefore more suited to commercial intercourse. the negro languages are poor, and, moreover, they differ among themselves so gravely that one tribe cannot understand another tribe that lives even next door to it. i know such languages in the region of the niger delta alone. now this sort of thing means interpreters, and is hindersome to commercial intercourse, and therefore you always find the true negro, when he is in a district where he has opportunities of trading with other peoples, adopting their language, and making for use in public life a corrupt english, portuguese, or arabic lingo. similarly, it seems to me, he has in the regions he has conquered in southern and central africa, adopted bantu, and much the same thing has happened, and is still happening, there, as happened in southern and central europe. just as the powerful barbarian stocks adopted latin in a way that must keep priscian's head still in bandages and to this day seriously mar his happiness in the elysian fields, so have the true negroes adopted the flexible bantu languages. but it would be as unscientific to regard a spaniard or a frenchman as a full-blooded ancient roman, as to regard many of the negro tribes now speaking bantu language as bantu men. the negro has, moreover, not only adopted bantu languages in some regions, such as the mpongwe, for example, but he has also adopted to a certain extent bantu culture. i am sure those of you who have lived among the true negroes and true bantu, will agree with me that these cultures differ materially. africa, so far as i know it, namely, from sierra leone to benguela, smells generally rather strong, but particularly so in those districts inhabited by the true negro. this pre-eminence the true negroes attain to by leaving the sanitary matters of villages and towns in the hands of providence. the bantu culture looks after the cleaning and tidying of the village streets to a remarkable degree, though by no means more clean in the houses, which, in both cultures, are quite as clean and tidy as you will find in england. again, in the bantu culture you will find the slaves living in villages apart: inside the true negro they live with their owners; and there are other points which mark the domestic cultures of these people as being different from each other, which i need not detain you with now. all these points in bantu domestic culture the true negro will adopt, as well as language; but there seem to be two points he does not readily adopt, or rather two points in his own culture to which he clings. one is the religious: in bantu you find a great female god, who, for practical purposes, is more important than the great male god, in so far as she rules mundane affairs. in the true negro the great gods are male. there are great female gods, but none of them occupy a position equal to that occupied by nzambi, as you find the bantu great female god called among the people who are undoubtedly true bantu, the fjort. the other, is the form of the state, and one important part of that form is the institution in the negro tribes of a regular military organisation, with a regular war lord, not one and the same with the peace lord. [illustration: house property in kacongo.] [illustration: bubies of fernando po. [_to face page ._] this, i am aware, is not the customary or fashionable view of race distribution in africa, but allow me to recall to your remembrance one of the most fascinating books ever written, _the adventures of andrew battel, of leigh in essex_, who for eighteen years lived among the districts of the lower congo. i do this in order to show that i am not theorising in this matter. andrew battel left london on a ship sweetly named _the may morning_, and having a consort named the _dolphin_--they were pinnaces of fifty tons each--on the th of april, . with very little delay they fell into divers disasters, and andrew became a prisoner in the hands of the portuguese at loanda. he had a very bad time of it, the portuguese then regarding all englishmen as pirates and nothing more, except heretics and vermin. andrew, with the enterprise and common sense of our race, escaped several times from captivity, and, with the stupidity of our race fell into it again, but his great escape was when he fell in with the ghagas. well, these ghagas, andrew battel and the portuguese historians say, were a fearful people, who came from behind sierra leone, and when the kingdom of congo was discovered by diego caõ in , the ghagas were attacking it so severely that, but for the timely arrival of the portuguese and the help they gave congo, there would in a very short time have been no kingdom of congo left to discover; and to this day dr. blyden, who went there on a government mission, says that up by fallaba, in the sierra leone hinterland, you will now and then see a ghaga--a man feared, a man of whom the country people do not know where his home is, nor what he eats or how he lives, but from whom they shrink as from a superior terrible form of human being--a remnant, or remainder over, of those people whose very name struck terror throughout central equatorial africa in the th century, when, for some reason we do not know, they made a warlike migration down among the peaceful feeble bantu. if you will carefully study the account given of the organisation of the ghagas and also of the organisation of the kingdom of congo, i think you will see that in the ghagas you have a true negro state form, while in the congo kingdom you have something different; something that is nowadays called bantu. what became of the ghagas when foiled by the portuguese in destroying the kingdom of congo is not exactly known, but there is a definite ground for thinking that, modified by intermarriage and a different environment, they split up, and are now represented by the warlike south african tribes and east african tribes, such as the matabele, and the massai, and so on. the modification of this portion of the true negro stem in the south and the east is akin to the modification the stem has undergone nearer to its true home on the west coast of africa, where to the north of sierra leone and behind the coast regions of the ivory, gold, and slave coasts it has, by admixture with the berber tribes of the western soudan, produced the black moors, namely the mandingo, the hausa, and oullaf. these black moors of the western soudan have attained to a high pitch of barbaric culture; it appears to be a further development of the true negro culture, but it is so suffused with the mohammedan idea and law that it is not in this state that we can best study the native culture of the pure negro. neither can we study it well in those south and east regions where it has adopted bantu language and culture to a certain extent. i will not, however, attempt to enter here upon the question of the continental distribution of the negro and bantu stocks; i will merely beg observers of african tribes to note carefully whether their tribe is given to street-cleaning, to keeping slaves in separate villages, or to venerating a great female god. if it is, it has got a bantu culture; if, in addition, it has a regular military organisation, or a keen commercial spirit, or a certain ability to rule over the tribes round it, i beg they will suspect negro blood and do their best to give us that tribe's migration history; and then we may in future times be able to settle the question of race distribution on better lines than our present state of knowledge allows of. having said that the law and institutions of the true negro stock cannot best be studied in those regions where they are adulterated by alien cultures, it remains to say where they can best be studied. i think that undoubtedly this region is that of the oil rivers. the thing you must always bear in mind when observing institutions and so on from sierra leone down to lagos, is that the fertile belt between the salt sea of the bight of benin and the sand sea of sahara is but a narrow band of forest and fertile country, while, when you get below lagos--lagos itself is a tongue of the western soudan coming down to the sea--you are in the true heart of africa, the equatorial forest belt; and that it is in this belt that you will get your materials at their purest. therefore take the regions inhabited by the true negro. in the regions from sierra leone to the gold coast, you have, it is true, not much white influence or adulteration, mainly because of the rock-reefed shore being dangerous to navigators. there is in this region undoubtedly a great and yearly increasing so-called arab, but really mohammedanised berber, influence working on the true negro. the natives themselves have their state-form in a state of wreckage from the destruction of the old empire of meli, which fell, from reasons we do not know, some time in the th century. we have, however, miserably little information on this particular region of sierra leone, the pepper and ivory coasts, owing to its never having been worked at by a competent ethnologist; but the accounts we have of it show that the secret societies have here got the upper hand to an abnormal extent for the negro state. then we come to the gold coast region which has been so excellently worked at by the late sir a. b. ellis. here you have a heavy amount of adulteration in idea, and, moreover, the long-continued white influence-- - --has decidedly tended to a disorganisation of the negro state-form, and to an undue development of the individual chief; nevertheless the law-form now existent on the gold coast is, when tested against a knowledge of the pure negro law-form as found in the oil rivers, almost unaltered, and i think if you will carefully study that valuable book, sarbar's _fanti customary law_, you will also see that the state-form is identical in essence with that of the oil rivers--the house system. the house is a collection of individuals; i should hesitate to call it a developed family. i cannot say it is a collection of human beings, because the very dogs and canoes and so on that belong to it are part of it in the eye of the law, and capable therefore alike of embroiling it and advancing its interests. these houses are bound together into groups by the long ju-ju proper to the so-called secret society, common to the groups of houses. the house itself is presided over by what is called, in white parlance, a king, and beneath him there are four classes of human beings in regular rank, that is to say, influence in council: firstly, the free relations of the king, if he be a free man himself, which is frequently not the case; if he be a slave, the free people of the family he is trustee for; secondly, the free small people who have placed themselves under the protection of the house, rendering it in return for the assistance and protection it affords them service on demand; the third and fourth classes are true slave classes, the higher one in rank being that called the winnaboes or trade boys, the lower the pull-away boys and the plantation hands.[ ] the best point in it, as a system, is that it gives to the poorest boy who paddles an oil canoe a chance of becoming a king. property itself in west africa, and as i have reason to believe from reports in other parts of tropical africa that i am acquainted with, is firmly governed and is divisible into three kinds. firstly, ancestral property connected with the office of headmanship, the stool, as this office is called in the true negro state, the cap, as it is called down in bas congo; secondly, family property, in which every member of the family has a certain share, and on which he, she, or it has a claim; thirdly, private property, that which is acquired or made by a man or woman by their personal exertions, over and above that which is earned by them in co-operation with other members of their family which becomes family property, and that which is gained by gifts or made in trade by the exercise of a superior trading ability. every one of these forms of property is equally sacred in the eye of the african law. the property of the stool must be worked for the stool; working it well, increasing it, adds to the importance of the stool, and makes the king who does so popular; but he is trustee, not owner, of the stool property, and his family don't come in for that property on his death, for every profit made by the working of stool property is like this itself the property of the stool, and during the king's life he cannot legally alienate it for his own personal advantage, but can only administer it for the benefit of the stool. the king's power over the property of the family and the private property of the people under his rule, consists in the right of ban, but not arrière ban. family property is much the same as regards the laws concerning it as stool property. the head of the family is the trustee of it. if he is a spendthrift, or unlucky in its management, he is removed from his position. any profit he may make with the assistance of a member of his own family becomes family property; but of course any profit he may make with the assistance of his free wives or wife, a person who does not belong to his family, or with the assistance of an outsider, may become his own. private property acquired in the ways i have mentioned is equally sacred in the eyes of the law. i do not suppose you could find a single human being, slave or free, who had not some private property of his or her very own. amongst that very interesting and valuable tribe, the kru, where the family organisation is at its strictest, you can see the anxiety of the individual kruman to secure for himself a little portion of his hard-earned wages and save it from the hands of his family elders. the kruman's wages are paid to him, or changed by him, into cloths and sundry merchandise, and he is not paid off until the end of his term of work. so he has to hurry up in order to appropriate to himself as much as he can on the boat that takes him back to his beloved "we" country, and industriously make for himself garments out of as much of his cotton goods as he can; for even a man's family, even in kru country, will not take away his shirt and trousers, but i am afraid there is precious little else that the kruman can save from their rapacity. what he can save in addition to these, he informs me, he gives to his mother, or failing his mother, to a favourite sister, who looks after it and keeps it for him, she being, woman-like, more fit to quarrel if need be with the family elders than he is himself. but all private property once secured is sacred, very sacred, in the african state-form. i do not know from my own investigations, nor have i been able to find evidence in the investigations of other observers, of any king, priesthood, or man, who would openly dare interfere with the private property of the veriest slave in his district, diocese, or household. i know this seems a risky thing to say, and i do not like to say it because i feel that if i were a betting man i could make a good thing over betting on it, for experience has taught me that every time an african's property is taken by a fellow african under native law, and in times of peace, it is taken after it is confiscated by its original owner, either in bankruptcy or crime. you will hear dozens of accounts of how everything an african possessed was seized on, etc., but if you look into them you will find in every case that the individual so cleaned out owed it all, and frequently far more, before he or she fell into the hands of the official receiver, the local chief. one of the most common causes of an individual's entire estate being seized upon is a conviction for witchcraft. every form of property in africa is liable to be called on to meet its owner's debts, and the witch's is too heavy a debt for any individual's private estate to meet and leave a surplus. for not only does the witch owe to the family of the person, of whose murder he or she is convicted, the price of that life, but it is felt by the community that the witch has not been found out in the first offence, and so every miscellaneous affliction that has recently happened is put down to the convicted witch's account. mind you, i do not say _all_ these claims are _satisfied_ out of the estate of the witch deceased, (witches are always deceased by the authorities with the utmost despatch after conviction) because the said property has during the course of the trial got into the hands of officialdom and has a natural tendency to stop there. but one thing is certain, there is no residuary estate for the witch's own relations. not that for the matter of that they would dare claim it in any case, lest they should be involved with the witch and accused as accomplices. still, legally, the witch's relations have the consolation of knowing that, if things go smoothly and they evade being accused of a share in the crime, they cannot be called on to meet the debts incurred by the witch. from a family point of view better a dead witch than a live speculative trader. the reason of this delicate little point of law i confess gave me more trouble to discover than it ought to have done, for the explanation was quite simple, namely, the witch's body had been taken over by the creditors. now, according to african law, if you take a man's life, or, for the matter of that, his body, dead or alive, in settlement of a debt, your claim is satisfied. you have got legal tender for it. i remember coming across an amusing demonstration of this law in the colony of cameroon. there was, and still is, a windy-headed native trader there who for years has hung by the hair of loans over the abyss of bankruptcy. all the local native traders knew that man, but there arrived a new trader across from calabar district who did not. like the needle to the pole, our friend turned to him for a loan in goods and got it, with the usual result namely, excuses, delays, promises--in fact anything but payment; enraged at this, and determined to show the cameroon traders at large how to carry on business on modern lines, the young calabar trader called in the government and the debtor was gently but firmly confined to the government grounds. of course he was not put in the chain-gang, not being a serious criminal, but provided with a palm-mat broom he proceeded to do as little as possible with it, and lead a contented, cheerful existence. it rather worried the calabar man to see this, and also that his drastic measure caused no wild rush to him of remonstrating relations of the imprisoned debtor; indeed they did not even turn up to supply the said debtor with food, let alone attempt to buy him off by discharging his debt. in place of them, however, one by one the cameroon traders came to call on the calabar merchant, all in an exceedingly amiable state of mind and very civil. they said it gave them pleasure to observe his brisk method of dealing with that man, and it was a great relief to their minds to see a reliable man of wealth like himself taking charge of that debtor's affairs, for now they saw the chance of seeing the money they had years ago advanced, and of which they had not, so far, seen a fraction back, neither capital nor interest. the calabar man grew pale and anxious as the accounts of the debts he had made himself responsible for came in, and he knew that if the debtor died on his hands, that is to say in the imprisonment he had consigned him to, he would be obliged to pay back all those debts of the cameroon man, for the german government have an intelligent knowledge of native law and carry it out in cameroon. still the calabar man did not like climbing down and letting the man go, so he supplied him with food and worried about his state of health severely. this that villainous cameroon fellow found out, and was therefore forthwith smitten with an obscure abdominal complaint, a fairly safe thing to have as my esteemed friend dr. plehn was absent from that station, and therefore not able to descend on the malingerer with nauseous drugs. it is needless to say that at this juncture the calabar man gave in, and let the prisoner out, freeing himself thereby from responsibility beyond his own loss, but returning a poorer and a wiser man to his own markets, and more assured than ever of the villainy of the whole dualla tribe. in any case legally the relatives of a debtor seized or pawned can redeem, if they choose, the person or the body by paying off the debt with the interest, - / per cent. per annum, to the common rate. great sacrifices and exertions are made by his family to redeem almost every debtor, and the family property is strained to its utmost on his or her behalf; but in the case of a witch it is different, no set of relatives wish to redeem a convicted witch, who, reduced by the authorities to a body, and that mostly in bits and badly damaged, is not a thing desirable. no! they say society has got him and we are morally certain he must have been illegitimate, for such a thing as a witch never happened in our family before, and if we show the least interest in the remains we shall get accused ourselves. of course if a man or woman's life is taken on any other kind of accusation save witchcraft, the affair is on a different footing. the family then forms a higher estimate of the deceased's value than they showed signs of to him or her when living, and they try to screw that value to the uttermost farthing out of the person who has killed their kinsman. society at large only regards you for doing this as a fool man to think so highly of the departed, whose true value it knows to be far below that set on him. in the case of a living man taken for debt, he is a slave to his creditor, a pawn slave, but not on the same footing as a boughten slave; he has not the advantages of a true slave in the matter of succeeding to the wealth or position of the house, but against that he can be a free man the moment his debts are paid. this may be a theoretical possibility only, just as it would be theoretical for me to expect my family to bail me out if the bail were a question of a million sterling, but in legal principle the redemption is practicable. in the case of taking a dead body another factor is introduced. by taking charge of and interring a body, you become the executor to the deceased man's estate. i have known three sets of relatives arrive with three coffins for one body, and a consequential row, for a good deal can be made by an executor; but if you make yourself liable for the body's liabilities care is needed, and there is no reckless buying of bodies with whose private affairs you are not conversant, in west africa. it is far too wild a speculation for such quiet commercial men as my african friends are. hence it comes that a negro merchant on a trading tour away from his home, overtaken by death in a town where he is not known, is not buried, but dried and carefully put outside the town, or on the road to the market, the road he came by, so that any one of his friends or relations, who may perchance come some time that way, can recognise the remains. if they do they can take the remains home and bury them if they like, or bury them there, free and welcome, but the local county council will do nothing of the kind. a nice thing a set of respectable elders, or as their fanti, name goes paynim, would let themselves in for by burying the body of a gentleman who happened to have four murders, ten adultery cases, a crushing mass of debt, and no earthly assets save a few dilapidated women, bad ones at that, and a whole pack of children with the kraw kraw, or the guinea worm, or both together and including the yaws. this brings us to another way besides witchcraft whereby a gentleman in west africa can throw away a fine fortune by paying his debts, namely, the so-called adultery. adultery out there, i hastily beg to remark, may be only brushing against a woman in a crowded market place or bush path, or raising a hand in defence against a virago. it's the wrong word, but the customary one to use for touching women, and it is exceedingly expensive and a constant source of danger to the most respectable of men, the demands made on its account being exorbitant: sometimes so exorbitant that i have known of several men who, in order to save their family from ruin--for if their own private property were insufficient to meet it the family property would be liable for the balance--have given themselves up as pawn-slaves to their accusers. there is but one check on this evil of frivolous and false accusation, and that is that when there have been many cases of it in a district, the cult of the law god of that region gets a high moral fit on and comes down on that district and eats the adultery. i need not say that this is to the private benefit of no layman in the district, for notoriously it is an expensive thing to have the law god down, and a thing every district tries to avoid. there is undoubtedly great evil in this law, which presses harder on private and family property than anything else, harder even than accusations of witchcraft; but it safeguards the women, enabling them to go to and fro about the forest paths, and in the villages and market places at home, and far from home, without fear of molestation or insult, bar that which they get up amongst themselves. the methods employed in enforcing the payment of a debt are appeal to the village headman or village elders; or, after giving warning, the seizure of property belonging to the debtor if possible, or if not, that of any other person belonging to his village will do. this procedure usually leads to palaver, and the elders decide whether the amount seized is equal to the debt or whether it is excessive; if excessive the excess has to be returned, and there is also the appeal to the law society. in the regions of the benin bight we have also, as in india, the custom of collecting debts by dharna. in west africa the creditor who sits at the debtor's door is bound to bring with him food for one day, this is equivalent to giving notice; after the first day the debtor has to supply him with food, for were he to die he would be answerable for his life and the worth thereof in addition to the original debt. if i mention that there is no community of goods between a man and his wife (women owning and holding property under identical conditions to men in the eye of the law), i think i shall have detained you more than long enough on the subject of the laws of property in west africa. you will see that the thing that underlies them is the conception that every person is the member of some family, and all the other members of the family are responsible for him and to him and he to them; and every family is a member of some house, and all the other members of the house are responsible for and to the families of which it is composed. the natural tendency of this is for property to become joint property, family property, or to be absorbed into family property. a man by his superior ability acquires, it may be, a considerable amount of private property, but at his death it passes into the hands of the family. there are wills, but they are not the rule, and they more often refer to an appointment of a successor in position than to a disposal of effects. the common practice of gifts there supplies the place of wills with us; a rich man gives his friend or his favourite wife, child, or slave, things during his life, while he can see that they get it, and does not leave the matter till after his death. the good point about the african system is that it leaves no person uncared for; there are no unemployed starving poor, every individual is responsible for and to his fellow men and women who belong to the same community, and the naturally strong instinct of hospitality, joined with the knowledge that the stranger within the gates belongs to a whole set of people who will make palaver if anything happens to him, looks well after the safety of wanderers in negro land. the bad point is, of course that the system is cumbersome, and, moreover, it tends, with the operation of the general african law of _mutterrecht_, the tracing of descent through females, to prevent the building up of great families. for example, you have a great man, wise, learned, just, and so on; he is esteemed in his generation, but at his death his property does not go to the sons born to him by one of his wives, who is a great woman of a princely line, but to the eldest son of his sister by the same mother as his own. this sister's mother and his own mother was a slave wife of his father's; this, you see, keeps good blood in a continual state of dilution with slave blood. the son he has by his aristocratic wife may come in for the property of her brother, but her brother belongs to a different family, so he does not take up his father's greatness and carry it on with the help his father's wealth could give him in the father's family. i do not say the system is unjust or anything like that, mind; i merely say that it does not tend to the production of a series of great men in one family. nevertheless, when once you have mastered the simple fundamental rules that underlie the native african idea of property they must strike you as just, elaborately just; and there is another element of simplicity in the thing, and that is that all forms of property are subject to the same law, land, women, china basons, canoes, slaves, it matters not what, there is the law. you will ofter hear of the vast stretches of country in africa unowned, and open to all who choose to cultivate them or possess them. well, those stretches of unowned land are not in west africa. i do not pretend to know other parts of the continent. in west africa there is not one acre of land that does not belong to some one, who is trustee of it, for a set of people who are themselves only life tenants, the real owner being the tribe in its past, present, and future state, away into eternity at both ends. but as west african land is a thing i should not feel, even if i had the money, anxious to acquire as freehold, and as you can get under native law a safe possession of mining and cultivation rights from the representatives living of the tribe they belong to, i do not think that any interference is urgently needed with a system fundamentally just. after having said so much on african native property, it may be as well to say what african property consists of. it is not necessary for me to go into the affair very fully, but you will remember, i am sure, the old statement of "women and slaves constitute the wealth of an african." the african himself would tell you nine times in ten that women and slaves caused him the lack of it. still they are undoubtedly a factor in the true negro's wealth, but to consider them property it is necessary to consider them as property in different classes. here and now i need only divide them into two classes--wives properly so-called, and male and female slaves. the duty of the slave is to increase directly the wealth of his or her owner--that of the wife to increase it also, but in a different manner, namely, by bringing her influence to bear for his advantage among her own family and among the people of the district she lives in. a big chief will have three or more of these wives, each of them living in her own house, or in the culture state of calabar, in her own yard in his house, having her own farm away in the country, where she goes at planting and harvest times. she possesses her own slaves and miscellaneous property, which includes her children, and the main part of this property is really the property of her family, just as most people's property is in west africa. the husband will reside with each of these wives in turn, yet he has a home of his own, with his slave wives, and his children properly so called, similarly having his own farm and miscellaneous property, which similarly belongs mainly to his family, and this house is usually presided over by his mother, or failing her a favourite sister. the immediate rule of a husband over his wife may be likened to that of a constitutional monarch, that of a man or woman over a slave to that of an absolute monarch, though true absolutism is in the negro state-form not to be found in any individual man. the nearest approach to it is, very properly, in the hands of the cult of the law god, the tribal secret society, but even from that society the individual can appeal, if he dare, to long ju ju. the other forms of wealth possessed by an african, his true wealth, are market rights, utensils, canoes, arms, furniture, land, and trade goods. it is in his capacity to command these things in large quantities that his wealth lies, it is his wives and slaves who enable and assist him to do this thing. so take the whole together and you will see how you can have a very rich african, rich in the only way it is worth while being rich in, power, yet a man who possibly could not pay you down £ , but a real millionaire for all that. footnotes: [ ] see "lecture on african religion and law," published by leave of the hibbert trustees in the _national review_. september, . appendices [illustration: ja ja, king of opobo. [_to face page ._] appendix i a short description of the natives of the niger coast protectorate, with some account of their customs, religion, trade, &c. by m. le comte c. n. de cardi. it is with some diffidence i attempt this task, because many more able men have written about this country, with whom occasionally i shall most likely be found not quite in accord; but if a long residence in and connection with a country entitles one to be heard, then i am fully qualified, for i first went to western africa in , and my last voyage was in . previous to , the date at which this coast (benin to old calabar) was formed into a british protectorate under the name of the oil rivers protectorate, now the niger coast protectorate, each of the rivers frequented by europeans for the purpose of trade was ruled over more or less intelligently by one, and in some cases by two, sable potentates, who were responsible to her britannic majesty's consul for the safety and well-being of the white traders; also for the fostering of trade in the hinterlands of their district, for which good offices they were paid by the white traders a duty called "comey," which amounted to about s. d. per ton on the palm oil exported. when the palm kernel trade commenced it was generally arranged that two tons of palm kernels should be counted to equal one ton of palm oil so far as regards fiscal arrangements. the day this duty was paid was looked upon by the king, or kings if there were two of them, as a festival; in earlier years a certain amount of ceremony was also observed. the king would arrive on board the trader's hulk or sailing ship (some firms doing their trade without the assistance of a hulk) to an accompaniment of war horns, drums, and other savage music. with the king would generally come one or two of his chiefs and his ju-ju man, but before mounting the gangway ladder a bottle of spirit or palm wine would be produced from some hidden receptacle, one of the small boys, who always follow the kings or chiefs to carry their handkerchiefs and snuff-boxes, would then draw the cork and hand a wine-glass and the bottle to the ju-ju man, who would pour himself out a glass, saying a few words to the ju-ju of the river, at the same time spilling a little of the liquor into the water; he would then drink up what remained in the glass, hand glass and bottle to the king, who would then proceed as the ju-ju man had done, being followed on the same lines by the chiefs who were with him. their devotions having thus been duly attended to, the king, ju-ju man and his attendant chiefs would mount the ladder to the deck of the vessel. the european trader would, as a rule, be there to receive him and escort him on to the poop, where the king would be asked to sit down to a sumptuous repast of pickled pork, salt beef, tinned salmon, pickles and cabin biscuits. there would be also roast fowls and goat for the trader and his assistants, and for vegetables yams and potatoes, the latter a great treat for the white men, but not thought much of by the natives. the king with his friends making terrific onslaughts on the pork, beef and tinned salmon, after having eaten all they could would ask for more, and pile up a plate of beef, pork and salmon, if there was any left, to pass out to their attendants on the main deck, at the same time begging some biscuits for their pull-away boys in the canoe, a request always acceded to. drinkables, you will observe, so far have had no part in the feed; it is because these untutored natives follow nature's laws much closer than europeans, and never drink until they have finished eating. the king, having done justice to the victuals, now politely intimates to the european trader that "he be time for wash mouth." being asked what his sable majesty would like to do it in, he generally elects "port win," as the natives call port wine. his chiefs, not being such connoisseurs as his majesty, are, as a rule, satisfied with a bottle or two of beer or gin, carefully sticking to the empty bottles. in the meantime, had you looked over the side of the ship, you would have wondered what his majesty's forty or fifty canoe boys were doing, so carefully divesting themselves of every rag of cloth and hiding it by folding it up as small as possible and sitting on it. this was so as to point out to the trader, when he came to the gangway to see the king away, that "he no be proper for king's boys no have cloth." the king, having duly washed his mouth, is now ready to proceed with the business of his visit. the payment of the comey is very soon arranged, it being a settled sum and the different goods having their recognised value in pawns, bars, coppers or crues according to the currency of the particular river. but the "shake hand"[ ] is now to be got through, and the "dashing"[ ] to the king; his friends who are with him want their part, and it would surprise a stranger the number of wants that seem to keep cropping up in a west african king's mind as he wobbles about your ship, until, finding he has begged every mortal thing that he can, he suddenly makes up his mind that further importunity will be useless; he decides to order his people into his canoe, which in most cases they obey with surprising alacrity, brought about, i have no doubt, by the thought that now comes their turn. arrived at the gangway, his majesty, in the most natural way imaginable, notices for the first time (?) that his boys are all naked, and turning with an appealing look to the trader, he points out the bareness of the royal pull-away boys, and intimates that no white trader who respects himself could think of allowing such a state of things to continue a moment longer. this meant at least a further dash of four dozen fishermen's striped caps and about twelve pieces of manchester cloth. one would suppose that this was the last straw, but before his majesty gets into his canoe several more little wants crop up, amongst others a tot of rum each for his canoe boys, and perchance a few fathoms of rope to make a new painter for his canoe, until sometimes the white trader almost loses his temper. i have heard of one (?) who did on one occasion, and being an irishman, he thus apostrophised one of these sable kings, "be jabers, king, i am thinking if i dashed you my ship you would be after wanting me to dash you the boats belonging to her, and after that to supply you with paint to paint them with for the next ten years." there was a glare in that irishman's eye, and that king noticed it, and decided the time had come for him to scoot, and history says he scooted. in the early days of the palm oil trade, the custom inaugurated by the slave traders of receiving the king on his visit to the ship was by a salute of six or seven guns, and another of equal number on his departure, the latter being an intimation to all whom it might concern that his majesty had duly received his comey, and that trade was open with the said ship. this was continued for some years, but as the security of the seas became greater in those parts the trading ships gave up the custom of carrying guns, and the intimation that the king "done broke trade" with the last arrival was effected by his majesty sending off a canoe of oil to the ship, and the sending round of a verbal message by one of the king's men. since the year the kings of the oil rivers have been relieved of the duty of collecting comey, as a regular government of these rivers has been inaugurated by h.b.m. government, comey being replaced by import duties. native system of government in benin, and religion though there is a great similarity in the native form of government in these parts, it would be impossible to convey a true description of the manners and customs of the various places if i did not treat of each river and its people separately; i shall therefore commence by describing the people of benin. the benin kingdom, so far as this account of it will go, was said to extend from the boundaries of the mahin country (a district between the british colony of lagos and the benin river) and the river ramos; thus on the coast line embracing the rivers benin, escravos, and forcados, also the hinterland, taking in warri up to the yoruba states. for the purpose of the work i have set myself, i shall treat of that part of the kingdom that may be embraced by a line drawn from the mouth of the river ramos up to the town of warri, thence to benin city, and brought down to the coast a little to the north of the benin river. this tract of country is inhabited by four tribes, viz., the jakri tribe, the dominant people on the coast line; the sobo tribe, a very timid but most industrious people, great producers of palm oil, as well as being great agriculturists; an unfortunate people placed as they were between the extortions of the jakris and the slave raiding of the benin city king for his various sacrificial purposes; the third tribe are the ijos, inhabiting the lower parts of the escravos, forcados, and ramos rivers; this latter tribe are great canoe builders and agriculturists in a small way, produce a little palm oil, and by some people are accused of being cannibals; this latter accusation i don't think they deserve, in the full acceptation of the word, for thirty-three years ago i passed more than a week in one of their towns, when i was quite at their mercy, being accompanied by no armed men and carrying only a small revolver myself, which never came out of my pocket. since when i have visited some of their towns on the bassa creek outside the boundary i have drawn for the purpose of this narrative, and never was i treated with the least disrespect. the fourth tribe is the benin people proper, whose territory is supposed to extend as far back as the boundaries of the yoruba nation, starting from the right bank of the benin river. in this territory is the once far-famed city of benin, where lived the king, to whom the jakri, the sobo, and the ijo tribes paid tribute. these people have at all times since their first intercourse with europeans, now some four hundred years, been renowned for their barbaric customs. the earlier travellers who visited benin city do not mention human sacrifices among these customs, but i have no doubt they took place; as these travellers were generally traders and wanted to return to benin for trade purposes, they most likely thought the less said on the subject the best. i find, however, that in the last century more than one traveller mentions the sacrifice of human beings by the king of benin, but do not lead one to imagine that it was carried to the frightful extent it has been carried on in later years. i think myself that the custom of sacrificing human beings has been steadily increasing of late years, as the city of benin became more and more a kind of holy city amongst the pagan tribes. their religion, like that of all the neighbouring pagans, admits of a supreme being, maker of all things, but as he is supposed to be always doing good, there is no necessity to sacrifice to him. they, however, implicitly believe in a malignant spirit, to whom they sacrifice men and animals to satiate its thirst for blood and prevent it from doing them any harm. some of the pagan customs are of a sanitary character. take, for instance, the yam custom. this custom is more or less observed all along the west coast of africa, and where it is unattended by any sacrificing of human or animal life, except the latter be to make a feast, it should be encouraged as a kind of harvest festival. when i say this was a sanitary law, i must explain that the new yams are a most dangerous article of food if eaten before the yam custom has been made, which takes place a certain time after the yams are found to be fit for taking out of the ground. the new yams are often offered for sale to the europeans at the earliest moment that they can be dug up, some weeks in many cases before the custom is made; the consequence is that many europeans contract severe attacks of dysentery and fever about this time. the well-to-do native never touches them before the proper time, but the poorer classes find it difficult to keep from eating them, as they are not only very sweet, but generally very cheap when they first come on the market. the king of benin was assisted in the government of his country and his tributaries by four principal officers; three of these were civil officers; these officers and the ju-ju men were the real governors of the country, the king being little more than a puppet in their hands. it was these three officers who decided who should be appointed governor of the lower river, generally called new benin. their choice as a rule fell upon the most influential chief of the district, their last choice being nana, the son of the late chief alumah, the most powerful and richest chief that had ever been known amongst the jakri men. i shall have more to say about nana when i am dealing with the jakri tribe. amongst the principal annual customs held by the king of old benin, were the customs to his predecessors, generally called "making father" by the english-speaking native of the coast. the coral custom was another great festival; besides these there were many occasional minor customs held to propitiate the spirit of the sun, the moon, the sky, and the earth. at most of these, if not all, human sacrifices were made. kings of benin did not inherit by right of birth; the reigning king feeling that his time to leave this earth was approaching, would select his successor from amongst his sons, and calling his chief civil officer would confide to him the name of the one he had selected to follow him. upon the king's death this officer would take into his own charge the property of the late king, and receive the homage of all the expectant heirs; after enjoying the position of regent for some few days he would confide his secret to the chief war minister, and the chosen prince would be sent for and made to kneel, while they declared to him the will of his father. the prince thereupon would thank these two officers for their faithful services, and then he was immediately proclaimed king of benin. now commences trouble for the non-successful claimants; the king's throne must be secure, so they and their sons must be suppressed. as it was not allowed to shed royal blood, they were quietly suffocated by having their noses, mouths and ears stuffed with cloth. to somewhat take the sting out of this cruel proceeding they were given a most pompous funeral. whilst on the subject of funerals i think i had better tell you something about the funeral customs of the benineese. when a king dies, it is said, his domestics solicit the honour of being buried with him, but this is only accorded to a few of his greatest favourites (i quite believe this to have been true, for i have seen myself slaves of defunct chiefs appealing to be allowed to join their late master); these slaves are let down into the grave alive, after the corpse has been placed therein. graves of kings and chiefs in western africa being nice roomy apartments, generally about feet by by , but in benin, i am told, the graves have a floor about feet by , with sides tapering to an aperture that can be closed by a single flag-stone. on the morning following the interment, this flag-stone was removed, and the people down below asked if they had found the king. this question was put to them every successive morning, until no answer being returned it was concluded that the slaves had found their master. meat was then roasted on the grave-stone and distributed amongst the people with a plentiful supply of drink, after which frightful orgies took place and great licence allowed to the populace--murders taking place and the bodies of the murdered people being brought as offerings to the departed, though at any other time murder was severely punished. chiefs and women of distinction are also entitled to pompous funerals, with the usual accompaniment of massacred slaves. if a native of benin city died in a distant part of the kingdom, the corpse used to be dried over a gentle fire and conveyed to this city for interment. cases have been known where a body having been buried with all due honours and ceremonies, it has been afterwards taken up and the same ceremonies as before gone through a second time. the usual funeral ceremonies for a person of distinction last about seven or eight days, and consist, besides the human sacrifices, of lamentations, dancing, singing and considerable drinking. the near relatives mourn during several months--some with half their heads shaved, others completely shaven. the law of inheritance for people of distinction differs from that of the kings in the fact that the eldest son inherits by right of primogeniture, and succeeds to all his father's property, wives and slaves. he generally allows his mother a separate establishment and maintenance and finds employment and maintenance for his father's other wives in the family residence. he is expected to act liberally with his younger brothers, but there is no law on this question. before entering into full possession of his father's property he must petition the king to allow him to do so, accompanying the said petition with a present to the king of a slave, as also one to each of the three great officers of the king. this petition is invariably granted. a widow cannot marry again without the permission of her son, if she have a son; or if he be too young, the man who marries her must supply a female slave to wait upon him instead of his mother. theft was punished by fine only, if the stolen property was restored, but by flogging if the thief was unable to make restitution. murder was of rare occurrence. when detected it was punished with death by decapitation, and the body of the culprit was quartered and exposed to the beasts and birds of prey. if the murderer be a man of some considerable position he was not executed, but escorted out of the country and never allowed to return. in case of a murder committed in the heat of passion, the culprit could arrange matters by giving the dead person a suitable funeral, paying a heavy fine to the three chief officers of the king and supplying a slave to suffer in his place. in this case he was bound to kneel and keep his forehead touching the slave during his execution. in all cases where an accusation was not clearly proved, the accused would have to undergo an ordeal to prove his guilt or innocence. to fully describe the whole of these would fill several hundred pages, and as most of them could be managed by the ju-ju men in such a way, that they could prove a man guilty or innocent according to the amount of present they had received from the accused's friends, i will pass on to other subjects. adultery was very severely punished in whatever class it took place; in the lower classes all the property of the guilty man passed at once to the injured husband, the woman being severely flogged and expelled from her husband's house. amongst the middle class this crime could be atoned for by the friends of the guilty woman making a money present to the injured husband; and the lady would be restored to her outraged lord's favour. the upper classes revenged themselves by having the two culprits instantly put to death, except when the male culprit belonged to the upper classes; then the punishment was generally reduced to banishment from the kingdom of benin for life. amongst these people one finds some peculiar customs concerning children. amongst others, a child is supposed to be under great danger from evil spirits until it has passed its seventh day. on this day a small feast is provided by the parents; still it is thought well to propitiate the evil spirits by strewing a portion of the feast round the house where the child is. twin children, according to some accounts, were not looked upon with the same horror in benin as they are in other parts of the niger delta; as a fact, they were looked upon with favour, except in one town of the kingdom, the name of which i have never been able to get, nor have i been able to locate the spot; but wherever it is, i am informed both mother and children were sacrificed to a demon, who resided in a wood in the neighbourhood of this town. this law of killing twin children, like most ju-ju laws, could be got over if the father was himself not too deeply steeped in ju-juism, and was sufficiently wealthy to bribe the ju-ju priests. the law was always mercilessly carried out in the case of the poorer class of natives--the above refers solely to the part of benin kingdom directly under the king of old benin, and does not hold good with regard to the sobos, jakris, or ijos. origin of the benin city people according to clapperton the benin people are descendants of the yoruba tribes, the yoruba tribes being descended from six brothers, all the sons of one mother. their names were ikelu, egba, ijebu, ifé, ibini (benin), and yoruba. according to the late sultan bello (the foulah chief of sokoto at the time of captain clapperton's visit to that city), the yoruba tribes are descended from the children of canaan, who were of the tribe of nimrod. in my opinion there is room for much speculation on this statement of the sultan bello. it is a very curious fact that the people of benin city have been, from the earliest accounts we have of them, great workers in brass. might not the ancestors of this people have brought the art of working in brass with them from the far distant land of canaan? moses, when speaking of the land of canaan, says, "out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass" (deut. viii. ). here we must understand copper to be meant; because brass is not dug out of the earth, but copper is, and found in abundance in that part of the world. yet another curious subject for reflection, from the first information that european travellers give us (_circa_ ) in their descriptions of the city of benin, mention has invariably made of towers, from the summits of which monster brass serpents were suspended. upon the entry of the punitive expedition into benin city in the month of february, , benin city still possessed one of these serpents in brass, not hanging from a tower, but laid upon the roof of one of the king's houses. might not these brazen serpents be a remnant of some tradition handed down from the time of moses? for do we not read in the scriptures, that the people of israel had sinned; and god to punish them sent fiery serpents, which bit the people, and many died. then moses cried to god, and god told him to make a serpent of brass, and set it on a pole. (numbers xxi. .) while on the subject of serpents, i may mention that in the neighbourhood of benin, there is a ju-ju ordeal pond or river, said to be infested with dangerous and poisonous snakes and alligators, through which a man accused of any crime passing unscathed proves his innocence. there are some other customs connected with the position of the king of benin, as the head of the ju-juism of his country, which seem to have some trace of a biblical origin, but which i will not discuss here, but leave to the ethnologists to unravel, if they can. that they were a superior people to the surrounding tribes is amply demonstrated by their being workers in brass and iron; displaying considerable art in some of their castings in brass, iron, copper and bronze, their carving in ivory, and their manufacture of cotton cloth--no other people in the delta showing any such ability. the jakri tribe, who inhabit that part of the country lying between the sobo country and the ijo country, were the dominant tribe in the lower or new benin country. being themselves tributary to the benin king, they dare not make the sobo or ijo men pay a direct tribute to them for the right to live, but they indirectly took a much larger tribute from them than ever they paid the king of benin. the jakris were the brokers, and would not allow either of the above-named tribes to trade direct with the white men. the principal towns of the jakri men were:--brohemie[ ] (destroyed by the english in ): this town was generally called nana's town of late years. nana was governor of the whole of the country lying between a line drawn from the gwato creek to wari and the sea-coast; his governorship extending a little beyond the benin river, and running down the coast to the ramos river. this appointment he held from the king of benin, and was officially recognised by the british consul as the head-man of the jakri tribe, and for any official business in connection with the country over which he was governor. jeboo or chief peggy's town, situated on the waterway to lagos; jaquah town or chief ogrie's town. the above towns are all on the right bank of the river. on the left bank of the river are found the following towns:--bateri, or chief numa's town, lying about half an hour's pull in a boat from déli creek. chief numa, was the son of the late chief chinomé, a rival in his day to allumah, the father of nana, the late governor; chinomé was the son of queen doto of wari, who years ago was most anxious to see the white man at her town, and repeatedly advised the white men to use the forcados for their principal trading station; but the old chief allumah was against any such exodus, and as he was a very big trader in palm-oil, he of course carried the day, and the white men stuck to their swamp at the mouth of the river benin. close to numa's town his brother fragoni has established a small town. at some little distance from bateri is booboo, or the late chief bregbi's town. galey, the eldest son of the late chinomé, has a small town in the déli creek. this man, though the eldest son of the late chief chinomé, is not a chief, though his younger brother numa is. here is a knotty point in jakri law of inheritance, which differs from the benin city law on the subject. wari, the capital of jakri, though almost if not actually as old a town as benin city, has never had the bad reputation that the latter city has always had. i attribute this to the fact that the ladies of warri have always been a power in the land. sapele is a place that has come very much into notice since the country has been under the jurisdiction of the niger coast protectorate, and is without doubt one of the best stations on the benin territory. i am glad to say that the europeans have at last deserted to a great extent their factories at the mouth of the benin river, and are now principally located at sapele and wari. the jakri tribe claim to be of the same race as the people of benin city and kingdom. this i am inclined to dispute; i think they were a coast tribe like the ijos. tradition says that wari was founded by people from benin kingdom and for many years was tributary to the king of benin, but in wari was reported to be quite independent. they may have become almost the same race by intermarriage with the benin people that went to wari; but that they were originally the same race i say no. the religion of the jakri tribe and the native laws and system of ordeals were, as far as i have been able to ascertain, identical with those of the benin kingdom; with the exception of the human sacrifices and their law of inheritance which does not admit the right of primogeniture--following in this respect, the laws of the bonny men and their neighbours. twin children are usually killed by the jakris, and the mother driven into the bush to die. the jakri tribe are, without doubt, one of the finest in the niger coast protectorate; many of their present chiefs are very honest and intelligent men, also excellent traders. their women are noted as being the finest and best looking for miles round. the jakri women have already made great strides towards their complete emancipation from the low state in which the women of neighbouring tribes still find themselves, many of them being very rich and great traders. the sobo tribe have been kept so much in the background by the jakris that little is known about them. what little is known of them is to their credit. we now come to the ijo tribe, or at least, that portion of them that live within the niger coast protectorate; these men are reported by some travellers to be cannibals, and a very turbulent people; this character has been given them by interested parties. their looks are very much against them as they disfigure their faces by heavy cuts as tribal marks, and some pick up the flesh between their eyes making a kind of ridge, that gives them a savage expression. though i have put the limit of these people at the river ramos, they really extend along the coast as far as the western bank of the akassa river. they have never had a chance and, with the exception of large timber for making canoes, their country does not produce much. though i have seen considerable numbers of rubber-producing trees in their country, i never was able to induce them to work it. no doubt they asked the advice of their ju-ju as to taking my advice, and he followed the usual rule laid down by the priesthood of ju-ju-ism, no innovations. whilst i was in the ijo country i carefully studied their ju-ju, as i had been told they were great believers in, and practisers of ju-ju-ism. i found little in their system differing from that practised in most of the rivers of the delta. in all these practices human agency plays a very large part, and this seems to be known even to the lower orders of the people; as an instance, i must here relate an experience i once had amongst the ijos. i had arranged with a chief living on the bassa creek to lend me his fastest canoe and twenty-five of his people, to take me to the brass river; the bargain was that his canoe should be ready at cock-crow peak the following morning. i was ready at the water-side by the time appointed, but only about six of the smallest boys had put in an appearance; the old chief was there in a most furious rage, sending off messengers in all directions to find the canoe boys. after about two hours' work and the expenditure of much bad language on the part of the old chief, also some hard knocks administered to the canoe boys by the men who had been sent after them, as evidenced by the wales i saw on their backs, the canoe was at last manned, and i took my seat in it under a very good mat awning which nearly covered the canoe from end to end, and thanking my stars that now my troubles had come to an end i hoped at least for a time. i was, however, a very big bit too premature, for before the old chief would let the canoe start, he informed me he must make ju-ju for the safety of his canoe and the safe return of it and all his boys, to say nothing of my individual safety. one of the first requirements of that particular ju-ju cost me further delay, for a bottle of gin had to be procured, and as the daily market in that town had not yet opened, and no public house had yet been established by any enterprising ijo, it took some time to procure. on the arrival of the article, however, my friend the old chief proceeded in a most impressive manner to repeat a short prayer, the principal portion i was able to understand and which was as follows: "i beg you, i beg you, don't capsize my canoe. if you do, don't drown any of my boys and don't do any harm to my friend the white man." this was addressed to the spirit of the water; having finished this little prayer, he next sprinkled a little gin about the bows of the canoe and in the river, afterwards taking a drink himself. he then produced a leaf with about an ounce of broken-up cooked yam mixed with a little palm oil, which he carefully fixed in the extreme foremost point of the canoe. at last this ceremony was at an end and we started off, but alas! my troubles were only just beginning. we had been started about half an hour, and i had quietly dozed off into a pleasant sleep, when i was awakened by feeling the canoe rolling from side to side as if we were in rough water; just then the boys all stopped pulling, and on my remonstrance they informed me ju-ju "no will," _id est_, that the ju-ju had told them they must go back. i used gentle persuasion in the form of offers of extra pay at first, then i stormed and used strong language, or at least, what little ijo strong language i knew, but all to no avail. i then began to inquire what ju-ju had spoken, and they pointed out a small bird that just then flew away into the bush; it looked to me something like a kingfisher. the head boy of the canoe then explained to me that this ju-ju bird having spoken, _id est_, chirped on the right-hand side of the canoe, and the goat's skull hanging up to the foremost awning stanchion having fallen the same way (this ornament i had not previously noticed), signified that we must turn back. so turn back we did, though i thought at the time the boys did not want to go the journey, owing to the almost continual state of quarrelling that had been going on for years between the ijos and the brassmen. i was not far wrong, for when we eventually did arrive at brass, i had to hide these ijo people in the hold of my ship, as the very sight of a brassman made them shiver. the following morning the same performance was gone through; we started, and at about the same point ju-ju spoke again; again we returned. my old friend the chief was very sorry he said, but he could not blame his boys for acting as they had done, ju-ju having told them to return. he would not listen when i told him i felt confident his boys had assisted the ju-ju by making the canoe roll about from side to side. however, i thought the matter over to myself during that second day, and decided i would make sure one part of that ju-ju should not speak against me the next morning, and that was the goat's skull, so during that night after every ijo was fast asleep, i visited that skull and carefully secured it to its post by a few turns of very fine fishing line in such a manner that no one could notice what i had done, if they did not specially examine it. i dare not fix it to the left, that being the favourable side, for fear of it being noticed, but i fixed it straight up and down, so that it could not demonstrate against my journey. i retired to my sleeping quarters and slept the sleep of the just, and next morning started in the best of spirits, though continually haunted by the fear that my little stratagem might be discovered. we had got about the same distance from the town that we had on the two previous mornings when the canoe began to oscillate as usual, caused by a combined movement of all the boys in the canoe, i was perfectly convinced, for the creek we were in was as smooth as a mill pond. many anxious glances were cast at the skull, and the canoe was made to roll more and more until the water slopped over into her, but the skull did not budge, and, strange to relate, the bird of ill omen did not show itself or chirp this morning, so the boys gave up making the canoe oscillate and commenced to paddle for all they were worth, and the following evening we arrived at my ship in brass. we could have arrived much earlier, but the ijos did not wish to meet with any brassmen, so we waited until the shades of night came on, and thus passed unobserved several brass canoes, arriving safely at my ship in time for dinner. i carefully questioned the head boy of the ijo boys all about this bird that had given me so much trouble. he explained to me that once having passed a certain point in the creek, the bird not having spoken and the skull not having demonstrated either, it was quite safe to continue on our journey, conveying to me the idea that this bird was a regular inhabitant of a certain portion of the bush, which was also their sacred bush wherein the ju-ju priests practised their most private devotions. the same species of bird showed itself several times both on the right of us and on the left of us as we passed through other creeks on our way to brass, but the canoe boys took no notice of it. in dealing with the benin kingdom i have allowed myself somewhat to encroach upon the royal niger company's territory, which commences on the left bank of the river forcados and takes in all the rivers down to the nun (akassa), and the sea-shore to leeward of this river as far as a point midway between the latter river and the mouth of the brass river, thence a straight line is drawn to a place called idu, on the niger river, forming the eastern boundary between the royal niger company's territory and the niger coast protectorate. i have not defined the western boundary between the royal niger company's territory and the other portion of the niger coast protectorate otherwise than stating that it commences on the seashore at the eastern point of the forcados. benin kingdom, as a kingdom, may now be numbered with the past. for years the cruelties known to be enacted in the city of benin have been such that it was only a question of ways and means that deterred the protectorate officials from smashing up the place several years ago. it is a very curious trait in the character of these savage kinglets of western africa how little they seem to have been impressed by the downfall of their brethren in neighbouring districts. though they were well acquainted with all that was passing around them. thus the fall of ashantee in was well known to the king of dahomey, yet he continued on his way and could not believe the french could ever upset him. nana, the governor of the lower benin or jakri, could not see in the downfall of ja ja that the british government were not to be trifled with by any petty king or governor of these rivers; though nana was a most intelligent native, he had the temerity to show fight against the protectorate officials, and of course he quickly found out his mistake, but alas! too late for his peace of mind and happiness; he is now a prisoner at large far away from his own country, stripped of all his riches and position. here was an object lesson for abu bini, the king of benin, right at his own door, every detail of which he must have heard of, or at least his ju-ju priests must have heard of the disaster that had happened to nana, his satrap. nothing daunted abu bini and his ju-ju priests continued their evil practices; then came the frightful benin massacre of protectorate officials and european traders, besides a number of jakris and kruboys in the employment of the protectorate. the first shot that was fired that january morning, , by the emissaries of king abu bini, sounded the downfall of the city of benin and the end of all its atrocious and disgusting sacrificial rites, for scarcely three months after the punitive expedition camped in the king's palace at old benin. the two expeditions that have had to be sent to benin river within the last few years have been two unique specimens of what british sailors and soldiers have to cope with whilst protecting british subjects and their interests, no matter where situated. i do not suppose that there are in england to-day one hundred people who know, and can therefore appreciate at its true value, the risk that each man in those two expeditions ran. in the attack on nana's town the british sailors had to walk through a dirty, disgusting, slimy mangrove swamp, often sinking in the mud half way up their thighs, and this in the face of a sharp musketry fire coming from unseen enemies carefully hidden away, in some cases not five yards off, in dense bush, with occasional discharges of grape and canister. but nothing stopped them, and nana's town was soon numbered with the things that had been. it was the same to a great extent in the attack on benin, only varied by the swamps not being quite so bad as at nana's town, but the distance from the water side was much farther; in the former case one might say it was only a matter of minutes once in touch with the enemy; in the attack on benin city it was a matter of several days marching through dense bush, where an enemy could get within five yards of you without being seen, and in some places nearer. almost constantly under fire, besides a sun beating down on you so hot that where the soil was sandy you felt the heat almost unbearable through the soles of your boots, to say nothing of the minor troubles of being very short of drinking water, and at night not being able to sleep owing to the myriads of sand-flies and mosquitoes; getting now and again a perfume wafted under your nostrils, in comparison with which a london sewer would be eau de cologne. i was once under fire for twelve hours against european trained troops, so know something about a soldier's work, and for choice i would prefer a week's similar work in europe to two hours' west african bush and swamp fighting, with its aids, fever and dysentery. before i quit benin i want to mention one thing more about ju-ju. when the attack was made on benin city, the first day's march had scarcely begun when two white men were killed and buried. after the column passed on, the natives came and dug the bodies up, cut their heads and hands off, and carried them up to benin city to the ju-ju priests, who showed them to the king to prove to him that his ju-ju, managed by them, was greater than the white man's; in fact, the king, i am told, was being shown these heads and hands at the moment when the first rockets fell in benin city. those rockets proved to him the contrary, and he left the city quicker than he had ever done in his life before. to point out to my readers how all the natives of the delta believed in the power of the benin ju-ju, i must tell you none of them believed the english had really captured the king until he was taken round and shown to them, the belief being that, on the approach of danger, he would be able to change himself into a bird and thus fly away and escape. brass river brass river is then the first river we have to deal with on the niger coast protectorate, to the eastward of the royal niger company's boundary. the inhabitants of brass call their country nimbé and themselves nimbé nungos, the latter word meaning people. their principal towns were obulambri and basambri, divided only by a narrow creek dry at low water. in each of these towns resided a king, each having jurisdiction over separate districts of the nimbé territory; thus the king of obulambri was supposed to look after the district on the left hand of the river brass, his jurisdiction extending as far as the river st. barbara. the king of basambri's district extended from the right bank of the brass river, westward as far as the middleton outfalls; included in this district was the nun mouth of the river niger. these two kinglets had a very prosperous time during the closing days of the slave trade, as most of the contraband was carried on through the brass and the nun river both by bonnymen and new calabar men after they had signed treaties with her majesty's government to discontinue the slave trade in their dominions. when eventually the trade in slaves was finally put down their prosperity was not at an end, for they went largely into the palm oil trade, and did a most prosperous trade along the banks of the niger as far as onitsa. though these two kings always objected to the white men opening up the niger, and did their utmost to retard the first expeditions, they were not slow in demanding comey from the early traders who established factories in the nun mouth of the niger; this part of the niger is also called the akassa. these people are a very mixed race, and to describe them as any particular tribe would be an error. i believe the original inhabitants of the mouths of these rivers were the ijos, and that the towns of obulambri and bassambri were founded by some of the more adventurous spirits amongst the men from the neighbourhood of sabogrega, a town on the niger; being afterwards joined by some similar adventurers from bonny river. the three people are closely connected by family ties at this day. as a rule these people have always had the character of being a well behaved set of men; it is a notable fact in their favour that they were the only people that, once having signed the treaty with her majesty's government to put down slavery, honestly stuck to the terms of the treaty; unlike their neighbours, they did so, though they were the only people who did not receive any indemnity. they, however, have occasionally lost their heads and gone to excesses unworthy of a people with such a good reputation as they have generally enjoyed. their last escapade was the attack on the factory of the royal niger company at akassa some few years ago, and for which they were duly punished; their dual mud and thatch capital was blown down, and one small town called fishtown destroyed. impartial observers must have pitied these poor people driven to despair by being cut off from their trading markets by the fiscal arrangements of the royal niger company. the latter i don't blame very much, they are traders; but the line drawn from idu to a point midway between the brass river and the nun entrance to the niger river, as being the boundary line for fiscal purposes between the royal niger company and the niger coast protectorate, was drawn by some one at downing street who evidently looked upon this part of the world as a cheesemonger would a cheese. in it was at abo on the niger where lander the traveller met with the brassmen, who took him down to obulambri, but no ship being in brass river, they took him and his people over to akassa, at the nun mouth of the niger, to an english ship lying there. history says he was anything but well received by the captain of this vessel, and that the brassmen did not treat him as well as they might; however, they did not eat him, as they no doubt would have done could they have looked into the future. whatever their treatment of lander was, it could not have been very bad, as they received some reward for what assistance they had given him some time after. it was amongst these people that i was enabled to study more closely the inner working of the domestic slavery of this part of western africa, and where it was carried on with less hardship to the slaves themselves than any place else in the delta, until the niger company's boundary line threw most of the labouring population on the rates, at least they would have gone on the rates if there had been any to go on, but unfortunately the municipal arrangements of these african kingdomlets had not arrived at such a pitch of civilisation; the consequence was many died from starvation, others hired themselves out as labourers, but the demand for their services was limited, as they compared badly with the fine, athletic krumen, who monopolise all the labour in these parts. then came the punitive expedition for the attack on akassa that wiped off a few more of the population, so that to-day the brassmen may be described as a vanishing people. the various grades of the people in brass were the kings, next came the chiefs and their sons who had by their own industry, and assisted in their first endeavours by their parents, worked themselves into a position of wealth, then came the winna-boes, a grade mostly supplied by the favourite slave of a chief, who had been his constant attendant for years, commencing his career by carrying his master's pocket-handkerchief and snuff-box, pockets not having yet been introduced into the native costume; after some years of this duty he would be promoted to going down to the european traders to superintend the delivery of a canoe of oil, seeing to its being tried, gauged, &c. this first duty, if properly performed, would lead to his being often sent on the same errand. this duty required a certain amount of _savez_, as the natives call intelligence, for he had to so look after his master's interests that the pull-away boys that were with him in the canoe did not secrete any few gallons of oil that there might be left over after filling up all the casks he had been sent to deliver; nor must he allow the white trader to under-gauge his master's casks by carelessness or otherwise. if he was able to do the latter part of his errand in such a diplomatic manner that he did not raise the bile of the trader, that day marked the commencement of his upward career, if he was possessed of the bump of saving. all having gone off to the satisfaction of both parties, the trader would make this boy some small present according to the number of puncheons of oil he had brought down, seldom less than a piece of cloth worth about s. d., and, in the case of canoes containing ten to fifteen puncheons, the trader would often dash him two pieces of cloth and a bunch or two of beads. this present he would, on his return to his master's house, hand over to his mother (_id est_, the woman who had taken care of him from the time when he was first bought by his brass master). she would carefully hoard this and all subsequent bits of miscellaneous property until he had in his foster-mother's hands sufficient goods to buy an angbar of oil--a measure containing thirty gallons. then he would approach his master (always called "father" by his slaves) and beg permission to send his few goods to the niger markets the next time his master had a canoe starting--which permission was always accorded. he had next to arrange terms with the head man or trader of his master's canoe as to what commission he had to get for trading off the goods in the far market. in this discussion, which may occupy many days before it is finally arranged, the foster-mother figures largely; and it depends a great deal upon her standing in the household of the chief as to the amount of commission the trade boy will demand for his services. if the foster-mother should happen to be a favourite wife of the chief, well, then things are settled very easily, the trade boy most likely saying he was quite willing to leff-em to be settled any way she liked; if, on the contrary, it was one of the poorer women of the chiefs house, mr. trade-boy would demand at least the quarter of the trade to commence with, and end up by accepting about an eighth. as the winnabo could easily double his property twice a year--and he was always adding to his store in his foster-mother's hands from presents received each time he went down to the white trader with his father's oil--it did not take many years for him to become a man of means, and own canoes and slaves himself. many times have i known cases where the winnabo has repeatedly paid up the debts of his master to the white man. according to the law of the country, the master has the right to sell the very man who is paying his debts off for him; but i must say i never heard a case of such rank ingratitude, though cases have occurred where the master has got into such low water and such desperate difficulties that his creditors under country law have seized everything he was possessed of, including any wealthy winnaboes he might have. some writers have said this class could purchase their freedom; with this i don't agree. the only chance a winnabo had of getting his freedom was, supposing his master died and left no sons behind him old enough or capable enough to take the place of their father, then the winnabo might be elected to take the place of his defunct master: he would then become _ipso facto_ a chief, and be reckoned a free man. if he was a man of strong character, he would hold until his death all the property of the house; but if one of the sons of his late master should grow up an intelligent man, and amass sufficient riches to gather round him some of the other chief men in the town, then the question was liable to be re-opened, and the winnabo might have to part out some of the property and the people he had received upon his appointment to the headship of the house, together with a certain sum in goods or oil, which the elders of the town would decide should represent the increment on the portion handed over. i have never known of a case where the whole of the property and people have been taken away from a winnabo in brass; but i have known it occur in other rivers, but only for absolute misuse, misrule, and misconduct of the party. egbo-boes are the niggers or absolute lower rank of slaves, who are employed as pull-away boys in the oil canoes and gigs of the chiefs, and do all the menial work or hard labour of the towns that is not done by the lower ranks of the women slaves. the lot of these egbo-boes is a very hard one at times, especially when their masters have no use for them in their oil canoes. at the best of times their masters don't provide them with more food then is about sufficient for one good square meal a day; but, when trade is dull and they have no use for them in any way, their lot is deplorable indeed. this class has suffered terribly during the last ten years owing to the complete stoppage of the brassmen's trade in the niger markets. this class had few chances of rising in the social scale, but it was from this class that sprang some of the best trade boys who took their masters' goods away up to abo and occasionally as far as onitsa, on the niger. cases have occurred of boys from this class rising to as good a position as the more favoured winnaboes; but for this they have had to thank some white trader, who has taken a fancy to here and there one of them, and getting his master to lend him to him as a cabin boy--a position generally sought after by the sons of chiefs, so as to learn "white man's mouth," otherwise english. the succession laws are similar to those of the other coast tribes one meets with in the delta, but to understand them it requires some little explanation. a tribe is composed of a king and a number of chiefs. each chief has a number of petty chiefs under him. perhaps a better definition for the latter would be, a number of men who own a few slaves and a few canoes of their own, and do an independent trade with the white men, but who pay to their chiefs a tribute of from to per cent, on their trade with the white man. in many cases the white man stops this tribute from the petty chiefs and holds it on behalf of the chief. this collection of petty chiefs with their chief forms what in coast parlance is denominated a house. the house may own a portion of the principal town, say obulambri, and also a portion in any of the small towns in the neighbouring creeks, and it may own here and there isolated pieces of ground where some petty chief has squatted and made a clearance either as a farm or to place a few of his family there as fishermen; in the same way the chief of the house may have squatted on various plots of ground in any part of the district admitted by the neighbouring tribes to belong to his tribe. all these parcels and portions of land belong in common to the house--that is, supposing a petty chief having a farm in any part of the district was to die leaving no male heirs and no one fit to take his place, the chief as head of the house would take possession, but would most likely leave the slaves of the dead man undisturbed in charge of the farm they had been working on, only expecting them to deliver him a portion of the produce equivalent to what they had been in the habit of delivering to their late master, who was a petty chief of the house. the head of the house would have the right of disposal of all the dead man's wives, generally speaking the younger ones would be taken by the chief, the others he would dispose of amongst his petty chiefs; if, as generally happens, there were a few aged ones amongst them for whom there was no demand he would take them into his own establishment and see they were provided for. as a matter of fact, all the people belonging to a defunct petty chief become the property of the head of the house under any circumstances; but if the defunct had left any man capable of succeeding him, the head chief would allow this man to succeed without interfering with him in any way, provided he never had had the misfortune to raise the chief's bile; in the latter case, if the chief was a very powerful chief, whose actions no one dare question, the chances are that he would either be suppressed or have to go to long ju-ju to prosecute his claim, the expenses of which journey would most likely eat up the whole of the inheritance, or at least cripple him for life as far as his commercial transactions were concerned. it is of course to the interest of the head of a house to surround himself with as many petty chiefs as he possibly can, as their success in trade, and in amassing riches whether in slaves or goods, always benefits him; even in those rivers where no heavy "topside" is paid to the head of the house by the white traders, the small men or petty chiefs are called upon from time to time to help to uphold the dignity of the head chief, either by voluntary offerings or forced payments. public opinion has a good deal to say on the subject of succession; and though a chief may be so powerful during his lifetime that he may ride roughshod over custom or public opinion, after his death his successor may find so many cases of malversation brought against the late chief by people who would not have dared to open their mouths during the late chief's lifetime, that by the time they are all settled he finds that a chief's life is not a happy one at all times. claims of various kinds may be brought up during the lifetime of a chief, and three or four of his successors may have the same claim brought against them, each party may think he has settled the matter for ever; but unless he has taken worst, the descendants of the original claimants will keep attacking each successor until they strike one who is not strong enough to hold his own against them, and they succeed in getting their claim settled. this settlement does not interfere with the losing side turning round and becoming the claimants in their turn. some of these family disputes are very curious; take for instance a case of a claim for five female slaves that may have been wrongfully taken possession of by some former chief of a house, this case perhaps is kept warm, waiting the right moment to put it forward, for thirty years, the claim then becomes not only for the original five women, but for their children's children and so on. religion the brass natives to-day are divided into two camps as far as religion is concerned: the missionary would no doubt say the greater number of them are christians, the ordinary observer would make exactly the opposite observation, and judging from what we know has taken place in their towns within the last few years, i am afraid the latter would be right. the church missionary society started a mission here in ; it is still working under another name, and is under the superintendence of the rev. archdeacon crowther, a son of the late bishop crowther. their success, as far as numbers of attendants at church, has been very considerable; and i have known cases amongst the women who were thoroughly imbued with the christian religion, and acted up to its teaching as conscientiously as their white sisters; these however are few. with regard to the men converts i have not met with one of whom i could speak in the same terms as i have done of the women. whilst fully recognising the efforts that the missionaries have put forth in this part of the world, i regret i can't bear witness to any great good they have done. this mission has been worked on the usual lines that english missions have been worked in the past, so i must attribute any want of success here as much to the system as anything. one of the great obstacles to the spread of christianity in these parts is in my opinion the custom of polygamy, together with which are mixed up certain domestic customs that are much more difficult to eradicate than the teachings of ju-ju, and require a special mission for them alone. almost equal to the above as an obstacle in the way of christianity is what is called domestic slavery; europeans who have visited western africa speak of this as a kind of slavery wherein there is no hardship for the slave; they point to cases where slaves have risen to be kings and chiefs, and many others who have been able to arrive at the position of petty chief in some big man's house. i grant all this, but all these people forget to mention that until these slaves are chiefs they are not safe; that any grade less than that of a chief that a slave may arrive to does not secure him from being sold if his master so wished. further, domestic slavery gives a chief power of life and death over his slave; and how often have i known cases where promising young slaves have done something to vex their chief their heads have paid the penalty, though these young men had already amassed some wealth, having also several wives and children. people who condone domestic slavery, and i have heard many kindly-hearted people do so, forget that however mild the slavery of the domestic slave is on the coast, even under the mildest native it is still slavery; further, these slaves are not made out of wood, they are flesh and blood, they in their own country have had fathers and mothers. during my lengthened stay on the coast of africa i never questioned a slave about his or her own country that i did not find they much preferred their own country far away in the interior to their new home. some have told me that they had been travelling upwards of two months and had been handed from one slave dealer to another, in some cases changing their owner three or four times before reaching the coast. on questioning them how they became slaves, i have only been told by one that her father sold her because he was in debt; several times i have been told that their elder brothers have sold them, but these cases would not represent one per cent. of the slaves i have questioned; the almost general reply i have received has been that they had been stolen when they had gone to fetch water from the river or the spring, as the case might be, or while they have been straying a little in the bush paths between their village and another. sometimes they would describe how the slave-catchers had enticed them into the bush by showing them some gaudy piece of cloth or offered them a few beads or negro bells, others had been captured in some raid by one town or village on another. therefore domestic slavery in its effect on the interior tribes is doing very near the same amount of harm now that it did in days gone by. it keeps up a constant fear of strangers, and causes terrible feuds between the villages in the interior. what is the use of all the missionaries' teaching to the young girl slaves so long as they are only chattels, and are forced to do the bidding of their masters or mistresses, however degrading or filthy that bidding may be? the ju-juism of brass is a sturdy plant, that takes a great deal of uprooting. a few years ago a casual observer would have been inclined to say the missionaries are making giant strides amongst these people. i remember, as evidence of how keenly these people seemed to take to christianity up to a certain point, a little anecdote that the late bishop crowther once told me about the brass men. i think it must have been a very few years before his death. i saw the worthy bishop staggering along my wharf with an old rice bag full of some heavy articles. on arriving on my verandah he threw the bag down, and after passing the usual compliments, he said, "you can't guess what i have got in that bag." i replied i was only good at guessing the contents of a bag when the bag was opened; but judging from the weight and the peculiar lumpy look of the outside of the bag, i should be inclined to guess yams. "had he brought me a present of yams?" i continued. "no," he replied; "the contents of that bag are my new church seats in the town of nimbé; the church was only finished during the week, and i decided to hold a service in it on sunday last; and, do you believe me, those logs of wood are a sample of all we had for seats for most part of the congregation! i have therefore brought them down to show you white gentlemen our poverty, and to beg some planks to make forms for the church." i promised to assist him, and he left, carefully walking off with his bag of fire-wood, for that was all it was, cut in lengths of about fifteen inches, and about four inches in diameter. here ends my anecdote, so far as the bishop was concerned, for he never came back to claim the fulfilment of my promise; but later on one of my clerks reported to me that there had been a great run on inch planks during the week, and that the purchasers were mostly women, and the poorest natives in the place. this fact, coupled with the fact that the bishop never came back for the planks he had begged of me, caused me to make some inquiries, and i found that the church had been plentifully supplied with benches by the poorer portion of the congregation. yet how many of these earnest people could one guarantee to have completely cast out all their belief in ju-juism? if i were put upon my oath to answer truthfully according to my own individual belief, i am afraid my answer would be _not one_. what an awful injustice the missionary preaches in the estimation of the average native woman, when he advises the native of west africa to put away all his wives but one. supposing, for instance, it is the case of a big chief with a moderate number of wives, say only twenty or thirty, he may have had children by all of them, or he may have had children by a half dozen of them,--what is to become of those wives he discards? are they to be condemned to single blessedness for the remainder of their days? native custom or etiquette would not allow these women to marry the other men in the chief's house; they can't marry into other houses, because they would find the same condition of things there as in their own husband's house, always supposing christianity was becoming general. these difficulties in the way of the missionary are the ju-ju priests' levers, which they know well how to use against christianity, and which accounts for the frequent slide back to ju-juism, and in some cases cannibalism of otherwise apparently semi-civilized africans. the pagan portion of the inhabitants of the brass district have still their old belief in the ju-ju priests and animal worship. the python is the brass natives' titular guardian angel. so great was the veneration of this ju-ju snake in former times, that the native kings would sign no treaties with her britannic majesty's government that did not include a clause subjecting any european to a heavy fine for killing or molesting in any way this hideous reptile. when one appeared in any european's compound, the latter was bound to send for the nearest ju-ju priest to come and remove it, for which service the priest expected a dash, _id est_, a present; if he did not get it, the chances were the priest would take good care to see that that european found more pythons visited him than his neighbours; and as a rule these snakes were not found until they had made a good meal of one of the white man's goats or turkeys, it came cheaper in the long run to make the usual present. it is now some twenty years ago that the then agent of messrs. hatton and cookson in brass river found a large python in his house, and killed it. this coming to the ears of the natives and the ju-ju priests, caused no little excitement; the latter saw their opportunity, worked up the people to a state of frenzy, and eventually led them in an attack on the factory of messrs. hatton and cookson, seized the agent and dragged him out of his house on to the beach, tied him up by his thumbs, each ju-ju priest present spat in his mouth, afterwards they stripped him naked and otherwise ill treated him, besides breaking into his store and robbing him of twenty pounds worth of goods. the british consul was appealed to for redress, and upon his next visit to the river inquired into the case, but, _mirabile dictu_, decided that he was unable to afford the agent any redress, as he had brought the punishment on himself. i don't mention the name of this consul, as it would be a pity to hand down to posterity the fact that england was ever represented by such an idiot. besides the python the brass men had several other secondary ju-jus; amongst others may be mentioned the grey and white kingfisher, also another small bird like a water-wagtail, besides which, in common with their neighbours, they believed in a spirit of the water who was supposed to dwell down by the bar, and to which they occasionally made offerings in the shape of a young slave-girl of the lightest complexion they could buy. the burial customs of this people differed little from others in the niger delta, but as i was present at the burial of two of their kings--viz. king keya and king arishima, at which i saw identically the same ceremonial take place, i will describe what i saw as far as my memory will serve me, for the last of these took place about thirty years ago. the grave in this instance was not dug in a house, but on a piece of open ground close to the king's house, but was afterwards roofed over and joined on to the king's houses. the size of the grave was about fourteen by twelve feet, and about eight feet deep. at the end where the defunct's head would be, was a small table with a cloth laid over it, upon this were several bottles of different liquors, a large piece of cooked salt beef and sundry other cooked meats, ship's biscuits, &c. the ceiling of this chamber was supported by stout beams being laid across the opening, upon which would be placed planks after the body had been lowered into position, then the whole would be covered over with a part of the clay that had been taken out of the hole, the rest of the clay being afterwards used to form the walls of the house, that was eventually constructed over the grave; a small round hole about three inches in diameter being made in the ceiling of the grave, apparently about over the place where the head of the corpse would lay. down this would be poured palm wine and spirits on the anniversaries of the king's death, by his successor and by the ju-ju priests. this part of the ceremony would be called "making his father," if it was a son who succeeded; if it was not a son, he would describe it as "making his big father"; though he was perhaps no blood relation at all. previous to the burial the body of the king lay in state for two days in a small hut scarcely five feet high, with very open trellis work sides. i believe they would have kept the body unburied longer if they could have done so, but at the end of the second day his highness commenced to be very objectionable. the king's body was dressed for this ceremony in his most expensive robes, having round the neck several necklaces of valuable coral, to which his chiefs would add a string more or less valuable according to their means, as they arrived for the final ceremony. the europeans were expected to contribute something towards the funeral expenses, which contribution generally consisted of a cask of beef, a barrel of rum, a hundredweight of ship's biscuits, and from twenty to thirty pieces of cloth. even in this there was a certain amount of rivalry shown by the europeans, to their loss and the natives' gain. one knowing trader amongst them on this occasion had just received a consignment of imitation coral, an article at that time quite unknown in the river, either to european trader or to natives; so he decided to place one of these strings of imitation coral round the king's neck himself, and thus create a great sensation, for had it been real coral its value would have been one hundred pounds. he had, however, not counted on the king's very objectionable state, and when he proceeded to place his offering round the king's neck, he nearly came to grief, and did not seem quite himself until he had had a good stiff glass of brandy and water. the news spread like wildfire of this man's munificence, and soon the principal chiefs waited upon him to thank him for his present to their dead king; the other europeans were green with jealousy, though each had in his turn tried to outdo his neighbour; unfortunately, there was a scotchman there "takin' notes," and faith he guessed a ruse, but he was a good fellow and friend of the donor, and kept the secret for some years, and did not tell the tale until it could do his friend no harm. the cannons had been going off at intervals for the last two days. towards ten o'clock of the second night after death the king was placed in a very open-work wicker casket, and carried shoulder high round the town, and then finally deposited in his grave. during this time the cannons were being continually fired off, and individuals were assisting in the din by firing off the ordinary trade gun. i and another european concealed ourselves near the grave, and carefully watched all night to see if they sacrificed any slaves on the king's grave, or put any poor creatures down into the grave to die a lingering death; but we saw nothing of this done, though we had been informed that no king or chief of brass was ever buried without some of his slaves being sent with him into the next world; as our informant explained, how would they know he had been a big man in this life if he did not go accompanied by some of his niggers into the next? the firing of cannon is kept up at intervals for an indefinite number of days after the final interment; but there is no hard and fast rule as to its duration as far as i have been able to ascertain, and i think myself it is ruled by the greater or less liberality of the successors, who are the ones who have to pay for the gunpowder. amongst other customs that are common to all these rivers and this river is the killing of twin children; but since the mission has been established here the missionaries have done their utmost to wean the people from this remnant of savagery. a curious custom that i have heard of in most of these rivers is the throwing into the bush, to be devoured by the wild beasts, any children that may be born with their front teeth cut. i found this custom in brass, but with an exception, _id est_, i knew a pilot in twon town who had had the misfortune to be born with his upper front teeth through; whether it was because it was only the upper teeth that were through, or whether it was that the law is not so strictly carried out in the case of a male, i was never able to make sure of; however, he had been allowed to live, but it appears in his case some part of the law had to be carried out at his death, viz. he was not allowed to be buried, but was thrown into the bush, to fall a prey to the wild beasts, and any property he might die possessed of could not be inherited by any one, but must be dissipated or thrown into the bush to rot. i believe the venerable archdeacon crowther has been instrumental in saving several of these kind of children in bonny. the women of brass are, like their sisters in benin river, moving on towards women's rights; for though they have been for many generations the hewers of wood and drawers of water, and made to do most of the hard work of the country, they had commenced some years ago to enjoy more freedom than their sisters in the leeward rivers. they still do most of the fishing, and the fishing girls of twon town used to present a pretty sight as some fifteen or twenty of their tiny canoes used to sweep past the european factories, each canoe propelled by two or three graceful, laughing, chattering girls; with them would generally be seen a canoe or two paddled by some dames of a maturer age. though _passée_ as far as their looks were concerned, they could still ply their paddle as well as the best amongst the younger ones, as they forced their frail canoes through water to some favourite quiet blind creek where the currentless water allowed them to use their preparation[ ] for stupefying the fish, and in little over three hours you might see them come paddling back, each tiny canoe with from fifty to a hundred small grey mullet, sometimes with more and occasionally with a few small river soles. the brass man, like his neighbours, had his public ju-ju house as well as his private little ju-ju chamber, the latter was to be found in any brass man's establishment which boasted of more than one room; those who could not afford a separate chamber used to devote a corner of their own room, where might be seen sundry odds and ends bespattered with some yellow clay, and occasionally a white fowl hung by the leg to remain there and die of starvation and drop gradually to pieces as it decomposed. the public ju-ju house at obulambri was not a very pretentious affair; it consisted of a native hut of wattle and daub, the walls not being carried more than half way up to the eaves, roofed with palm mats; in the centre was an iron staff about five feet high, surrounded by eight bent spear heads; this was called a tokoi, at the foot of it was a hole about three inches in diameter, down which the ju-ju priests would pour libations of tombo or palm wine, as a sacrifice to the ju-ju. i was informed that this ju-ju house was built over the grave of the original founder of obulambri town. behind the tokoi, on a kind of altar raised about eighteen inches from the ground, were displayed about a dozen human skulls; at the time i visited it the ju-ju man explained to me that the greater part of these had belonged to new calabar prisoners taken in their last war with those people; besides the skulls were sundry odds and ends of native pottery, as also a few bowls and jugs of european manufacture. what part this pottery played in their devotions i could never get a ju-ju man to explain, some of them appeared to have held human blood. stacked up in one corner were a few human bones, principally thigh and shin bones. the brassmen do not often sacrifice human beings to their ju-jus, except in time of war, when all prisoners without exception were sacrificed. their ju-ju snake occasionally secured a small child by crawling unobserved into a house when the elders were absent or asleep. i once was passing through a small fishing village in the st. nicholas river, when most of the inhabitants were away fishing, and hearing terrible screams went to see what was the cause of the trouble, and found several women wringing their hands and running to and fro in front of a small hut. for several minutes i could not get them to tell me what was the cause of their trouble; at last one of them trembling, with the most abject fear and quite unable to speak, pointed to the door of the hut. i went and looked in, but it was so dark i could see nothing at first, so stepped inside; when, getting accustomed to the semi-darkness, i saw a large python, some ten or twelve feet long, hanging from the ridge pole of the hut immediately over a child about two years old that was calmly sleeping. to snatch up the child and walk out was the work of a moment. i then found that the woman who had pointed to the door of the hut was the mother of the child--her gratitude to me for delivering her child from certain death can be more easily imagined than described. upon asking why she had not acted as i had done, she replied she dare not have interfered with the snake in the way i had done. i afterwards asked several of the more intelligent natives of brass if the ju-ju law did not allow a mother to save her child in such a case. some said she was a fool woman, and that she could have taken her child away the moment she saw it in danger; but others said had she done so, she would have been liable to be killed herself or pay a heavy fine to the ju-ju priests; and i am inclined to believe the latter version to be correct.[ ] amongst other curious customs these people make use of the feather ordeal, to find out robbery, witchcraft, and adultery, &c. in this ordeal it rests a great deal with the ju-ju man who performs it whether it proves the party guilty or not. this ordeal is performed as follows:--the ju-ju man takes a feather from the underpart of a fowl's wing, making choice of a stronger or weaker one, according to how he intends the ordeal shall demonstrate, then, drawing the tongue of the accused as far out of his mouth as he can, forces the quill of the feather through from the upper side and draws it out by grasping the point of the feather from the under side of the tongue; if the feather is unbroken the accused person is proved guilty, if on the contrary the feather breaks in the attempt to pass it through the tongue it proves the innocence of the person. it may be seen from this description how very easy it was to prove a person innocent, the mere fact of the feather breaking in the attempt to push it through the tongue being sufficient; thus, when suitably approached, the ju-ju man could not only prove a person's innocence, but also save him any inconvenience in eating his mess of foo foo and palaver sauce that evening. new calabar the intervening rivers between the brass and new calabar rivers are the st. nicholas, the st. barbara, the st. bartholomew, and the sombrero; the influence of the king of new calabar may be said to commence at the st. bartholomew river, extending inland to about five or ten miles beyond the town of bugama. the lower parts of the st. bartholomew and the numerous creeks, running between that river and new calabar are mostly inhabited by fishermen and their families, their towns and villages being without exception the most squalid and dirty of any to be found in the delta. beyond fishing, the males seem to do little else than sleep; occasionally the men assist their wives and children in making palm-leaf mats, used generally all over the delta in place of thatch--not a very profitable employment, as the demand varies considerably according to the seasons. after a very rough and boisterous rainy season, the price may be two shillings and sixpence, or its equivalent, for four hundred of these mats, each mat being a little over two feet in length, but falling in bad times to two shillings and sixpence for five to six hundred. a roof made with these mats threefold thick will last for three years. these people call themselves calabar men simply because they live within the influence of the calabarese. in the upper part of these small rivers, about a day's journey by canoe from the mouth of st. bartholomew, is the chief town of a small tribe of people called the billa tribe, connected by marriage with the bonny men, several of the kings of bonny having married billa women. these people are producers in a small way of palm-oil, and though they are located so close to the new calabar people, prefer to sell their produce to the bonny men, who send their canoes over to the billa country to fetch the oil, the latter people not having canoes large enough for carrying the large puncheons which the bonny men send over to collect their produce in. the new calabar men are now split up into three towns called bugama, where the king lives; abonema, of which bob manuel is the principal chief; and backana, where the barboy house reside. besides they have numerous small towns scattered about in the network of creeks connecting the calabar river with the sombrero river. previous to these people all dwelt together in one large town on the right bank of the calabar river, nearly opposite to where the creek, now called the cawthorne channel,[ ] branches off from the main river. for some few years previous the chief of the barboy house, will braid, had incurred the displeasure of the amachree house, which was the king's house. for certain private reasons the king, with whom sided most of the other chiefs, had decided to break down the barboy house, which had been a very powerful house in days anterior to the present king's father, and tradition says that the barboys had some right to be the reigning house. will braid, the head of the house at this time, had by his industry and honourable conduct raised the position of the house to very near its former influence. this was one of the private reasons that caused the king to look on him with disfavour. when one of these west african kinglets decides that one of their chiefs is getting too rich, and by that means too powerful, he calls his more immediate supporters together, and they discuss the means that are to be used to compass the doomed one's fall. if he be a man of mettle, with many sub-chiefs and aspiring trade boys, the system resorted to is to trump up charges against him of breaches of agreement as to prices paid by him or his people in the ibo markets for produce, and fine him heavily. if he pays without murmur, they leave him alone for a time; but very soon another case is brought against him either on the same lines or for some breach of native etiquette, such as sending his people into some market to trade where, perchance, he has been sending his people for years; but the king and his friendly chiefs dish up some old custom, long allowed to drop in abeyance, by which his house was debarred from trading in that particular market. the plea of long usance would avail him little; another fine would be imposed. this injustice would generally have the effect desired, the doomed one would refuse to pay, then down the king would come on him for disregarding the orders of himself and chiefs; fine would follow fine, until the man lost his head and did some rash act, which assisted his enemies to more certainly compass his ruin. or he does what i have seen a persecuted chief do in these rivers on more than one occasion: that is, he gathers all his wives and children about him, together with his most trusted followers and slaves, also any of his family who are willing to follow him into the next world, lays a double tier of kegs of gunpowder on the floor of the principal room in his dwelling-house and knocks in the heads of the top tier of kegs. placing all his people on this funeral pile, he seats himself in the middle with a fire-stick grasped in his hand, then sends a message to the king and chiefs to come and fetch the fines they have imposed on him. the king and chiefs generally shrewdly guessed what this message meant, and took good care not to get too near, stopping at a convenient distance to parley with him by means of messengers. the victim finding there was no chance of blowing up his enemies along with himself and people, would plunge the fire-stick into the nearest keg, and the next moment the air would be filled with the shattered remains of himself and his not unwilling companions. having digressed somewhat to explain how chiefs are undone, i must continue my account of the new calabar people and the cause of their deserting their original town. this was brought about by will braid, on whom the squeezing operation had been some time at work. he turned at bay and defied the king and chiefs; this led to a civil war, in which he was getting the worst of the game, so one dark night he quietly slipped away with most of his retainers and took refuge in bonny. this led to complications, for bonny espoused the cause of w. braid and declared war against new calabar; thus in place of suppressing will braid they came near to being suppressed themselves, the bonny men very pluckily establishing themselves opposite new calabar town, where they threw up a sand battery, in which they placed several rifled cannon, and did considerable damage to the new calabar town, from whence a feeble return fire was kept up for several days, during which time the calabar men occupied themselves in placing their valuables and people in security, and eventually, unknown to the bonny men, clearing out all their war canoes and fighting men through creeks at the back of their town to the almost inaccessible positions of bugama and abonema. the bonny men continued the bombardment, but finding there was no reply from the town, despatched, during the night, some scouts to find out what was the position of things in the new calabar town; on their return they reported the town deserted. the bonny men lost no time in following the new calabar men to their new position, but found bugama inaccessible, so turned their attention to abonema, which they very pluckily assaulted, but were repulsed with considerable loss, losing one of their best war canoes, in which was a fine rifled cannon; at the same time the bonny chief, waribo, who had most energetically led the assault, barely escaped with his life, as he was in the war canoe that had been sunk by the new calabar men. this victory was very pluckily gained by chief bob manuel and his people, who were greatly assisted in the defence of their position by having been supplied at an opportune moment with a mitrailleuse by one of the european traders in the new calabar river. this defeat somewhat cooled the courage of the bonny men; the war however continued to be carried on in a desultory manner for several months, until both sides were tired of the game, and at last all the questions in dispute between the king and chiefs of new calabar and will braid, and the matters in dispute between the new calabar men and the bonny men were by mutual agreement left to the arbitration of the king and chiefs of okrika, and king ja ja and the chiefs of opobo. the arbitrators met on board one of her majesty's vessels in bonny river in , king ja ja being represented by chief cookey gam and several other chiefs, the king and chiefs of okrika being in full force. the result of the arbitration did not give complete satisfaction to any party, owing to the advice of ja ja on the affair not having been listened to in its entirety. however, w. braid returned to new calabar territory and founded a town of his own, assisted by his very faithful chief yellow of young town. thus ended the last war between the old rivals bonny and new calabar. it is on record that these two countries had been scarcely ever at peace for any length of time since new calabar was first founded some two hundred and fifty years ago, when, tradition says, one of the ephraim duke family left old calabar and settled at the spot from whence they retired in . old traders i met with in the early sixties informed me that during one of these wars, between the years and , the king pepple, then reigning in bonny succeeded in capturing the king of calabar of that time (the grandfather of the last king amachree), and to celebrate his victory and royal capture, made a great feast to which he invited all the european slave traders then in his country. the feast was a right royal one, the king had a special dish prepared for himself which was nothing less than the heart of his royal captive, torn from his scarcely lifeless body. the new calabar people, though said to be descended from the old calabar race, have not retained any of the characteristics of the latter, neither in their language nor dress, nor have they retained the elaborate form of secret society or native freemasonry peculiar to the efik[ ] race called egbo. their religion is the same animistic form of ju-juism and belief in the oracle they call long ju-ju situated in the vicinity of bende in the hinterland of opobo, common to all the inhabitants of the delta; besides the latter, they are believers in the power of a ju-ju in some mystic grove in the oru country. the peculiar test at this latter place is said to have been established by some ancient dame having uttered some fearful curse or wish at the spot where the ordeal is administered. the descriptions of this are rather vague, as no one who has undergone it has ever been known to return, that is, if he has really seen the oracle work, for if it works it is a sign of his guilt and drowns him; if he is innocent it does not work, so on his return he is not in a position to describe it. but the proprietors of this interesting ju-ju have for very many years found that a nigger fetches a better price alive than when turned into butcher's meat; they have therefore been in the habit of selling the guilty victim into slavery in as far distant a country as possible; but occasionally one of these men have drifted down to the coast again, but dare not return to his own country as no one would believe he was anything else but a spirit. one of these "spirits" i had the pleasure to interview on one occasion, and he told me that the only ones who were actually drowned were the old or unsaleable men; when two men went to this ju-ju or ordeal well, to decide some vital question between them, the party taking best would want to see his dead or drowned opponent; for this purpose the ju-ju priests always kept a few of the old and decrepit votaries on hand to be drowned as required, but the opponent was never allowed to stand by and see the oracle work, but was taken up to the well and allowed to see a dead body lying at the bottom, and after he had glanced in and satisfied himself there was a drowned person there, he would be hurried away by the ju-ju priests and their assistants. that these priests had the supernatural power to make the water rise up in the well, this "spirit" thoroughly believed, and when i offered the suggestion of an underground water supply brought from some higher elevation, he scouted the idea and gave me his private opinion thus: "white man he no be fit savey all dem debly ting ju-ju priest fit to do; he fit to change man him face so him own mudder no fit savey him; he fit make dem tree he live for water side, bob him head down and drink water all same man; he fit make himself alsame bird and fly away; you fit to look him lib for one place and you keep you eye for him, he gone, you no fit see him when he go." which little speech turned into ordinary english meant to say that white people could not understand the devilish tricks the ju-ju priests were able to do, they could so disguise a person that his own mother would not recognise him, this without the assistance of any make-up but simply from their devilish science; that they could cause a tree on the banks of a river to bend its stem and imbibe water through its topmost branches; that they could change themselves into birds and fly away; and lastly, that they could make themselves invisible before your eyes and so suddenly that you could not tell when they had done so. i asked him why the ju-ju man had not altered him, so that when he sold him it would be impossible for any one who had known him in his own country ever to recognise him if they saw him in another. his reply was: "ju-ju man savey them man what believe in ju-ju no will believe me dem time i go tell dem i be dem os[=u]k[=u] of young town come back from long ju-ju. he savey all man go run away from me in my own country." "well," i said, "how about the people amongst whom you now are? they believe in very nearly the same ju-jus that your own people do, what do they say about you?" "oh! they say i be silly fellow and no savey i done die one time, and been born again in some other country." i then asked him how they accounted for his knowing about the people who were still alive in his own country and to be able to talk about matters which had taken place there within the previous five or six years. then i got the word the inquirer in this part of the world generally gets when he wishes to dive into the inner circles of native occultism, viz., "anemia," which means "i don't know." the chiefs in new calabar in the days of the last king's father were an extremely fine body of men, both physically and commercially; the latter quality they owed to the strong hand the king kept over them, and the excellent law he inaugurated when he became the king with regard to trade, viz., that no new calabar chief or other native was allowed to take any goods on credit from the europeans. his power was absolute, and considering that he inherited his father's place at a time when the country was in the throes of war with bonny--his father being the king captured by the king of bonny mentioned previously--the success of his rule was wonderful, for he pulled his country together and carried on the war with such ability that bonny ultimately was glad to come to terms; a peace was agreed upon which lasted many years, until the old king of bonny died, and his son wishing to emulate his father re-opened hostilities, but with such ill-success and loss to his country that it eventually led to his being deposed and exiled from his country for some years. the new calabar people are and have been always great believers in ju-juism, the head ju-ju priest being styled the ju-ju king and ranking higher than the king in any matters relating to purely native affairs. the shark is their principal animal deity, to which they were in the habit of sacrificing a light-coloured child every seven years. this used to be openly and ostentatiously performed by a procession of a half-dozen large canoes being formed up at the town of new calabar, each canoe being manned by forty to fifty paddlers; in the midships of each canoe a deck some ten feet long would be placed on which the ju-ju priests and a number of the younger chiefs and the grown-up sons of the chief men would huddle together and keep up a continuous howling and dancing, accompanied with the waving of their hands and handkerchiefs, until they arrived down near the mouth of the river. when the water began to be so rough that the singers and dancers could not keep their feet, it was a sign the offering must be cast into the sea; the ju-ju men and their assistants all supplicating their friend the shark to intercede with the spirit of the water to keep open the entrance to their river and cause plenty of ships to come to their river to trade. their ju-ju house in their original town was a much larger and more pretentious edifice than that of bonny, garnished with human and goats' skulls in a somewhat similar manner, unlike the bonny ju-ju house in the fact that it was roofed over, the eaves of which were brought down almost to the ground, thus excluding the light and prying eyes at the same time; at either side of the main entrance, extending some few feet from the eaves, was a miscellaneous collection of iron three-legged pots, various plates, bowls and dishes of staffordshire make, all of which had some flower pattern on them, hence were ju-ju and not available for use or trade--the old-fashioned lustre jug, being also ju-ju, was only to be seen in the ju-ju house, though a great favourite in bonny and brass as a trade article--at this time all printed goods or cloth with a flower or leaf pattern on them were ju-ju. any goods of these kinds falling into the hands of a true believer had to be presented to the ju-ju house. as traders took good care not to import any such goods, people often wondered where all these things came from. had they arrived shortly after a vessel bound to some other port had had the misfortune to be wrecked off new calabar, they would have solved the problem at once, for anything picked up from a wreck which is ju-ju has to be carried off at once to the ju-ju house. i remember on one occasion visiting this ju-ju house just after a large ship called the _clan gregor_ bound into bonny had been wrecked off new calabar, and found the ju-ju house decked both inside and out with yards of coloured cottons from roof to floor; but the ju-ju priests did not get all their rights, for some tricky natives on salving a bale of goods would carefully slit the bale just sufficiently to see what were the goods inside, and should they be ju-ju would not open them, but take them to their particular friend amongst the european traders, and get him to send them away to some other river for sale on joint account. every eighth day is called calabar sunday, the day following being formerly the market day or principal receiving day for the white traders of the native produce, which consisted principally, and still does, of palm oil. the native sunday was passed in olden days by the chief in receiving visits from the white men and jamming[ ] with them for any produce he had the intention of selling the following day, or clearing up any little ju-ju matters that he had been putting off for the want of a slack day, not because it was his sunday, but because that was a day on which by custom he could not visit the ships. i remember it was on paying a visit to old king amachree, the father of the late king of the same name, i saw for the first time a native sacrifice. i was then little more than a boy as a matter of fact, i was under seventeen years of age, but filling a man's place in new calabar who had been invalided home. the old king had taken me under his special protection and gave me much good advice and counsel, which was of great use to me in my novel position. my employers ought to have been very thankful to him, for though i was the youngest trader in the river by some twelve years, i held my own with them and got a larger share of the produce of the river than my predecessor had done, all owing to the old brick of a king, who would come and see how i was doing on the big trade days, and if he thought i was not doing as well as my neighbours he would send off a message to a small creek close to the shipping, where the natives used to wait with their oil until it was jammed for, _id est_, agreed for, and order three or four canoes of oil to be sent off to me, though i had not seen its owner to agree with him as to what he was to get for it. i held this appointment for a little over six months, when, my senior having returned, i had to go back to my duties in bonny under the chief agent of the firm, a captain peter thompson, one of the kindest-hearted skippers that ever entered bonny river. in those days we all had some nickname that we were known by amongst the natives, and another amongst the white men. amongst the former he was called calla thompson, because he was short, in contradistinction to another thompson who was tall, called opo thompson; but his name amongst the white men was panter thompson, owing to his inability to pronounce the "th" in panther during a discussion as to whether we had tigers or only panthers on the west coast of africa. poor panter, after a most successful voyage of a little over two years, was preparing to return home, and had only a few more weeks to remain in bonny, when in stepping into his boat his foot slipped and he fell into the river at a point known to be infested with sharks. a brother skipper jumped into the boat, and actually clutched him by his cap at the same moment poor panter said "i am gone, ned!" no doubt feeling himself being drawn down by some hungry shark. his son now commands one of the finest steamers of the african steamship company, and seems to have inherited in a marked degree all the good qualities of his father; so, travellers to west africa, if you want a comfortable ship and a thorough good fellow to travel with, take your passage in the ship commanded by captain willie thompson, r.n.r. but this is digressing. i must get back to new calabar and tell you what i saw at my introduction to ju-juism under the auspices of dear old king amachree. the occasion was the swearing ju-ju with some people in the interior, with whom they had only lately opened up commercial relations, and they wanted them to swear they would trade with no other people but them. the deputation, who represented the market people, looked as wild a lot as one could wish to see, and, as far as i could make out, the ceremony i was watching was a kind of preliminary canter to a more impressive, and most likely more diabolical one to be carried out at some future date in the stranger folks' country. on this occasion the officiating ju-ju priest did not seem to address any of his words to the strangers, who looked on with a certain amount of fear depicted in their countenance. the ju-ju priest was clothed (?) in a superb dark-coloured and greasy-looking rag about his loins, barely sufficient to satisfy the easiest going of european lord chamberlains; but from the expressive grunts of satisfaction which greeted his appearance in the ju-ju house, i was led to suppose his dress was quite correct and proper for the occasion. his head was shaved on the right side, and all down his right side and leg he had been dusted over with some greyish-white native chalk. he said a few words in an undertone to one of his assistants, who went out of sight for a moment or so and quickly returned with a very fine almost milk-white goat, the poor beast seeming to anticipate its fate from its fearfully loud bleating. the ju-ju priest seized the poor beast by its muzzle with his left hand, and dexterously tossing its body under his left arm, forced its head back towards his left shoulder until the neck of the beast formed an arc, his assistant handing him at this moment a very sharp white-handled spear-pointed knife, which he drew across the animal's throat, almost severing its head from its body. quick as lightning he dropped on one knee and held the bleeding animal over a receptacle, having the appearance of a large soup plate, fashioned in the clay of the ground immediately in front of the altar arrangement. in the centre of this plate was a hole down which the quickly coagulating blood slowly trickled; after the interval of what appeared to me minutes, but was in fact most likely less than a minute, the ju-ju man laid the lifeless body of the goat down with its neck over the opening in the plate, leaving it there to drain. at the moment of the sacrifice various gongs and old ship bells were struck by young men stationed near them for that purpose--a wrecked ship's bell being generally presented to the ju-ju house, though not as in the case of ju-ju goods by law prescribed. new calabar people had been fairly well observant of this custom, and the wrecks numerous, judging from the number of ships' bells in the ju-ju house. at every movement of the ju-ju priest the king and chief would grunt out a noise very much resembling that auld scotch word "ahum." the ju-ju house had amongst its possessions several ill-shapen wooden idols, and scattered about the affair that represented an altar were various small idols looking very much like children's dolls; also several large elephant's tusks, and two or three very well carved ones, with the usual procession of coated and naked figures winding round them. the present king of new calabar[ ] is a son of my old friend king amachree, and is called king amachree also, but has shown little of the ability of his late father, being completely led by the nose by his brother george amachree, who practically rules both king and people. the former is a small, quiet, and rather amiable man, but of a vacillating and unreliable character; his brother and prime minister is, on the contrary, a tall and very fine specimen of the negro race, endowed by nature with a very suave and not unmusical voice, a very able speaker, clear and logical reasoner, but of a very grasping nature--an excellent and successful trader and exceedingly nice man to deal with, as long as he has got things moving the way that suits him and his policy; but when thwarted in his designs, trading or political, he becomes a difficult customer to deal with, and a very unpleasant and objectionable type of negro "big man." nevertheless, had he had the fortune to have been born in a civilised africa, i feel confident his natural abilities, assisted by education, would have made him a man of eminence in whatever country his lot might have been cast. most of the new calabar chiefs bear a very favourable repute amongst the white traders, and compare very favourably intellectually with the neighbouring chiefs of the niger delta. another chief of no mean capacity is bob manuel, of abonema, exceedingly neat, almost a dandy in appearance, a very shrewd trader, clear and concise in his speech, honourable in all his dealings, of a very reserved temperament; but a charming man to talk with, once started on any topic that interests him or his visitor. owing to some peculiarities in their dress, the new calabar chiefs are very different to the chiefs in other parts of the delta. they never appear outside of their houses unless robed in long shirts (made of real india madras of bold check patterns, in which no other colour but red, blue and white is ever allowed to be used) reaching down to their heels; under this they wear a singlet and a flowing loin cloth of the same material as their shirts. of late years, during the rainy season, some of them have added elastic-side boots and white socks, but the most curious part of their get-up is their head-gear, for since about they have taken to wearing wigs. these are only worn on high days and holidays and at special functions, but the effect sometimes is so utterly ridiculous as to be more than strangers can look at without laughing. imagine an immensely stout and somewhat podgy negro with elastic-side boots, white stockings, long shirt, several strings of coral hung round his neck and hanging in festoons down as far as where his waistcoat would end, did he wear one, a charles ii. light flaxen wig, the latter topped up by an ordinary stove-pipe black silk hat! this fashion of wearing wigs, i am afraid, was unconsciously inaugurated by me, having taken with me in to new calabar some wigs that i had used in some private theatricals in england. a chief named tom fouché saw them, and was enchanted with a nigger's trick wig, the top of which could be raised by pulling a hidden silk cord, and eventually he became the proud possessor of my stock, and produced a great sensation the first public festival he appeared at. previous to this i never saw a wig in new calabar; as a matter of fact, they have no excuse for them, a bald-headed native being an almost unheard-of curiosity, and grey or white heads are very scarce. alas! like all pioneers, i did not reap the reward i should have done, as i left the new calabar river before the fashion had caught on, and messrs. thomas harrison and co., of liverpool, became the principal purveyors of wigs to the court of new calabar. these people are remarkable for the bold stand they have made against the persecution of their neighbours almost from the day their founder planted his foot on the new calabar soil, or mud rather, i should say; besides their wars with the bonny men, they were often attacked by the brass men, allies of bonny. with the okrika men they were almost constantly at war. this latter was a kind of guerilla warfare carried on in the creeks, and consisted in seizing any unprotected small canoe with its crew of two or three men or women and cargo, the latter generally being yams or indian corn, the custom being on both sides to eat these prisoners. the church missionary society established a mission here in , but during the war of and the missionary had to leave. their success had not been brilliant up to this date, owing, no doubt, in some measure, to the immense power wielded by the ju-ju priests in new calabar. it was not until - that the missionaries were able to again commence their labours amongst these people, and then not in the principal town. archdeacon crowther, however, succeeded about this time in getting a plot of ground in bob manuel's town, abonema, for the purpose of building a mission station. as to the success of this last effort i can't speak from personal observation, as i left this river shortly afterwards myself; in fact, it was on my last visit to abonema that i conveyed in my steamer, the _quorra_, the missionary and his wife to their new home from brass. they were a young couple of very well educated and most intelligent sierra leone natives. bonny and the pepple family this river was the most important slave market in the delta, as a matter of fact surpassing in numbers of slaves exported any other single slave-dealing station on the west or south-west coast of africa. according to mr. clarkson, the historian of the abolition of the slave-trade, this river and old calabar exported more slaves than all the other slave-dealing centres on the west and south-west coasts of africa combined. it is a well-known fact that for about two hundred years the average annual output of slaves through the bonny river was about , (this included the shipments from new calabar), totalling up to the immense number of , , souls taken out of this part of africa during two centuries. the above figures do not represent the total depletion this part of africa suffered during this time. to the above immense number of slaves exported must be added the number of lives lost in the raids made on the ibo villages for the purpose of capturing the people to sell as slaves; we must also add the number that died on their way down from the interior to the coast, and to these again must be added the slaves refused by the european trader by reason of any defect, malformation, or incipient signs of disease. the fate of these poor souls was sad; but perhaps many of their brethren envied them their quick release from the cares of this world. the native slave-dealer was too practical a man to burden himself with mouths to fill that he could not immediately turn into cloth, rum, gunpowder or coral, so oftener than otherwise he would simply tell his own niggers to drop their canoe astern of the slave ship, cut the rejected slaves heads off, and cast their bodies into the river to feed the sharks, this often taking place within sight of the european slaver. a very moderate allowance for loss of life between the interior and the slave-ship from the above-mentioned causes would be at the least per cent.; thus totalling the immense number of , , souls sent out of this one district in about two centuries. the greater number of these were ibos, a slave much sought after in the olden days by planters in the west indies and the southern states of america. i have mentioned these latter facts here to point out to my readers that the so-called benevolent domestic slavery as practised on the coast of western africa and tolerated in her britannic majesty's west african colonies, must, as a natural consequence, lead to a deplorable loss of life, though not in so wholesale a manner as the export of slaves led to in former days. the bonny people claim to be descended from the ibo tribe, but i should be inclined to think that their proper description to-day would be a mixture of ibos, kwos, billa, and sundry infusions of blood from inter-marriage with the female slaves brought down by the slave-dealers from places lying beyond and at the back of the ibo people. whatever their origin may have been, a commercial spirit is, and has been since their first intercourse with europeans, a very highly developed trait in their character. as i have already shown, they were the greatest slave traders in western africa, and when that, for them, lucrative trade was finally put a stop to by the treaty signed on the st of november, , between her britannic majesty's consul and king pepple, whereby king pepple was to receive an annual present of $ , for six years--[previous to this, one, if not two treaties had been signed by king pepple, with her britannic majesty's representatives, with the same object; but the greed of gain had been too much for his dusky majesty, combined with the continued presence on the coast of the spanish slave-dealers; one of the latter being established at brass as late as ]--they then turned their whole attention to the legitimate trade of palm oil, and soon became the largest exporters of that article on the west coast of africa. their trade in this article had not been inconsiderable since , at which date the liverpool merchants had seriously turned their attention to legitimate trade. in - , the export of palm oil was already about , tons, all carried in sailing vessels principally owned in liverpool, and mostly by firms that had been in the slave trade. like the natives of brass, many of these people have embraced the christian faith, the church missionary society having placed one of their stations here in , some two years earlier than the brass mission was commenced. their endeavours have certainly met with considerable success in prevailing upon a large number of the natives to give up many of their ju-ju practices; amongst others, the worship of the iguana, an immense lizard, which from time immemorial had been the bonny man's titular guardian angel. they not only got them to give up worshipping this saurian, but also, to mark a new departure in their religious ideas, the missionaries prevailed upon the people to organise a general iguana hunt; so, following the old saying of "the better the day, the better the deed," one easter sunday, about the year or , or about twenty-two years after the establishment of the mission, the bells of the mission church rang out the signal for the wholesale slaughter of these reptiles. to such an extent and with such good will did the people work that day, that by evening time not one was left alive in the town. that day it was everybody's job to kill these reptiles, but it was nobody's job to clear away the dead bodies, there being no county council in bonny to see to the scavenger work after this animal st. bartholomew; the consequence was the stench was so great from the decaying bodies that every european predicted a general sickness would be the natural outcome of it all; but no such unlucky event happened, and the natives did not seem to notice the extra strong perfume very much--one of them observing, to a growl about it by a white man, that "it be all same them trade beef you sell we people for chop." the bonny men until late years were steeped in all the most vile practices of ju-juism--sacrificing human beings to their various ju-jus, and eating all their prisoners captured in war, certain of their ju-ju practices demanding an annual human sacrifice. if at this time they happened to be at peace with their neighbours, and consequently without any prisoner to be sacrificed, the ju-ju men would disguise themselves in some fantastic dress (some europeans have said they disguise themselves as leopards; i have never seen this disguise used, and doubt it very much), and prowl about the town and its byeways, seizing for their purpose in preference some stray stranger that might be staying in the town; failing a stranger, some noted bad character belonging to the town in whose fate no one would be greatly interested would be seized upon. to say these practices are completely stamped out would be, perhaps, not quite the truth; but that they are being stamped out i feel convinced, and considering what believers in ju-ju these people have been, i think i may say fairly quick. the common sense of the people is assisting very much, and the women are showing themselves capable of something better than what their former state condemned them to. the final decision to slaughter the iguana some years ago was brought about by them in a great measure on solid common sense grounds, for had not the iguana been their mortal enemy for years by eating their fowls and chickens before their eyes, thus destroying about the only means a woman of the lower class, or one who had ceased to please her lord and master, had of making a little pin money. the ju-ju house of bonny, once the great show place of the town, has now completely disappeared and its hideous contents are scattered; strange to say, i saw, only a few weeks ago, in the house of a lady in london, one of the sacrificial pots of native earthenware that had done duty for many generations in the bonny ju-ju house. a description of this ju-ju house may be interesting to some of my readers. it was an oblong building of about forty feet long by thirty broad, surrounded by mud walls about eight or ten feet high; one portion over where the altar stood had had sticks arranged, as if the intention had been at some time to roof it over; at the end behind the altar the wall had been built in a semicircle; the altar looked very much like an ordinary kitchen plate rack with the edges of the plate shelves picked out with goat skulls. there were three rows of these, and on the three plate shelves a row of grinning human skulls; under the bottom shelf, and between it and the top of what would be in a kitchen the dresser, were eight uprights garnished with rows of goats' skulls, the two middle uprights being supplied with a double row; below the top of the dresser, which was garnished with a board painted blue and white, was arranged a kind of drapery of filaments of palm fronds, drawn asunder from the centre, exposing a round hole with a raised rim of clay surrounding it, ostensibly to receive the blood of the victims and libations of palm wine. to one side, and near the altar, was a kind of roughly made table fixed on four straight legs; upon this was displayed a number of human bones and several skulls; leaning against this table was a frame looking very like a chicken walk on to the table; this also was garnished with horizontal rows of human skulls--here and there were to be seen human skulls lying about; outside the ju-ju house, upon a kind of trellis work, were a number of shrivelled portions of human flesh. whilst writing about the wholesale slaughter of iguanas i forgot to mention that this was not the first time an animal that was ju-ju and held in high veneration had had a general battue arranged for it. the monkey used to hold a place in bonny equal with the iguana, but for some reason or another it fell from its high estate, and was as ruthlessly slaughtered by its quondam worshippers. other ju-jus were the shark and the spirit of the water, or supposed guardian angel of the bar. the bull was at one time worshipped, but not of late years; but still fresh beef was ju-ju, and twenty years ago no bonny gentleman would touch it. like fresh beef, milk of cows or goats was never used by natives, neither were eggs eaten by bonny men or any of the neighbouring coast tribes. native houses in bonny are very little different to the general run of native houses along this coast, as far as the external appearance goes; but inside they are perfect hampton court mazes to the uninitiated. a noticeable peculiarity is that the entrance door and all the other doorways in a native house have a fixed barrier about eighteen inches high between each room from whence start the doorways proper. this forms a very favourite seat of the master of the house or his wife, but one must never step over them while any one is sitting on them; a man stepping over one while a man is sitting there means "poison for eye," as the natives express it, which means to say your action will cause them sickness. a man doing the same when a female is sitting in this position has a much more significant meaning, and for a slave would entail a good flogging. no community of natives demonstrates the peculiar workings of domestic slavery so well as these people, for in no other place on the coast can any one find so many instances of the rapid rise of a bought slave from the lowest rung of the slave ladder to the topmost. the bought slave was quite a different class to the son of a slave born in bonny of slave parents; for outside the direct descendants of the pepple family, the freemen of bonny could be counted on one hand; therefore, a slave born in bonny was looked upon as being almost equal with a freeman. these were called bonny free; and the bonny free, though they boast of their birth, can't boast of the most brains, for the most intelligent men of these people--especially during the last fifty years--have been bought slaves, with few exceptions. in , the then reigning king pepple had to get captain craigie of h.m. navy to assist him in asserting his rights, a slave of his having usurped his place. a few years after, in , this same king pepple was deposed by his chiefs for making continuous war on new calabar, and thus draining the wealth of the country, as well as for his cruelties to his own people; they, at the same time, found out another charge against him that he was an usurper, as there was a young man named dapho pepple, a son of his elder brother, who was entitled to the throne, and, with the assistance of the late consul beecroft, the change was made and the fighting king pepple was taken away to fernando po, and eventually found his way to england in ; there he resided four years, was carefully looked after by the temperance party, and eventually became a convert to christianity. several sets of verses were strung together for and about him by the goody goody papers of the time. he made strong appeals to the british public for £ , to establish a mission in his country; but in this matter i am afraid he was not successful, as the mission was never started by him, and on his arrival home in bonny river, in august, , there was a dearth of current coin in the royal pockets. the following is king pepple's address in verse, which, he asserted, he spoke when seeking funds to establish a mission in his country. he only asked for a modest £ , . i never heard what he got, but one thing i do know, whatever he did get, he never expended a shilling of it for the purpose it was given him:-- beloved bretheren, young and old, i come to day to ask for gold to help the missionary coons who brave bonny's hot simoons. tooralooral! rich and poor, a pewter plate is at the door! now why must each of you decide your heart and purse to open wide? it is because the imbued sin that e'en now lurks each heart within tooralooral! with all its might is prompting you to close them tight. and then it must not be forgot that hell is wide and awful hot, and gibbering fiends around us grin with joy to see us tumble in. tooralooral! don't forget the devil he may have you yet. but would you from destruction turn, nor 'mid sulphurous vapours burn, but each become a blessed spirit, and kingdom come with joy inherit. tooralooral! tip us a bob, to help us on our holy job. remember, friends, we are but dust, and die in course of time we must. to show the seeds have taken root by yielding up the proper fruit, tooralooral! are you willing to subscribe another shilling? if you will help to save the nigger your crown of glory shall be bigger, more white your robes, your sandals smarter, when we shall meet above herear'ter tooralooral! psalms and hymns, cherubs sweet and seraphims. fields of glory, floods of light, sweet effulgence, angels bright, sounds symphoneous, jewels rare, sheets of gold and perfumed air. tooralooral! fellow men, hallelujah! and amen. by what specious reasoning he succeeded in prevailing upon the authorities at the foreign office to countenance his return to bonny, or what he described as his dominions, i know not. the fact, however, is on record that he did get this permission, and that he found some good friends in london to assist him with sufficient cash to pay £ down on account of the charter of the _bewley_, a small vessel of only about tons register, which was to carry him and his consort, the queen eleanor, better known in bonny as allaputa, and their royal suite, which consisted of nine english men and two english women; amongst the former he had nominated the following officials, viz., premier, secretary, an assistant secretary, three clerks, and one doctor, a farmer, and a valet for himself. mrs. wood, the gardener's wife, was to be schoolmistress, and the other english woman was to act as a maid of honour to the queen eleanor. all these people had agreements for salaries varying from £ to £ per annum, some of them with an allowance of £ for uniform; several of the agreements contained a clause that stipulated that the king was to supply them with suitable apartments in the royal palace. on arriving in the bonny river, these poor people had a rude awakening, for they found that the king was not wanted by his people, had no royal palace, and no revenues. however, they did not immediately quit the service of the dusky monarch, but held on in the hope of getting sufficient arrears of pay out of him to pay their passages home; they had some reason for their action, for the old king still had a strong party friendly to him in the town. the king funked landing amongst his late subjects, and he remained on board the _bewley_, until the th of october, landing at last with many misgivings. strange to relate, the same day the walls of the bonny ju-ju house crumbled to bits, caused, no doubt, by the heavy rains, but the king looked upon it as an omen boding no good to him. when the king landed, the captain of the _bewley_ gave the european suite notice that he could not supply them with food any longer, as the king was not able to pay him what he owed the ship. these poor people now found themselves in a sad plight, but the liverpool supercargoes in the river gave them quarters in their different sailing vessels and hulks. those who wished to try their luck in some other place on the coast had their passages paid by the supercargoes of the river; miss mary, the queen's maid of honour, was about the first to be sent home, the gardener and his wife left in november, and by the end of december the last of the king's white suite left the river. none were ever paid their arrears of wages, the king being with difficulty made to find £ towards the passage money of the doctor. strange to relate, though these eleven white people could not be said to have passed their time in bonny river under the best conditions for health, being cooped up on board a vessel of only tons register, yet only one of them died, that one being the king's valet. all had remained more than two months in the river, some four months, at a time, when, according to some authorities, the coast climate is most to be dreaded. king pepple never regained his ancient sway over the bonny people, and after lingering in very indifferent health a few years, during which time he was every now and again springing some new intrigue on his people, he passed away at ju-ju town, where he had been living almost ever since his return to his native land, for his health's sake, he asserted, but rumour had it that he felt himself safer away from the vicinity of his more powerful chiefs. after his death, the affairs of bonny went back into the hands of the four regents, as they had been since the death of king dapho up to the time of king pepple's return in , and in a great measure remained during the few years pepple lived. these regents had originally been appointed by the late acting consul lynslager on the st of september, , and were the heads of the following houses:-- _name of house._ _native name of chief in_ _name of chief in_ _possession in ._ _possession in ._ annie pepple elolly pepple ja ja. captain hart apho dappa still alive. adda allison generally called addah. " " manilla pepple erinashaboo warrabo. oko jumbo } advisers to the regents, still alive. jim banago } both wealthy men. squeeze banago. the above lists show in a very marked manner the favourable side of domestic slavery; every one of the above chiefs were bought slaves or the sons of bought slaves, and in that case would be bonny free. ja ja was bought by adda allison, and by him presented to elolly pepple, the name ja ja signifying a present in some native language in the hinterland of bonny. oko jumbo was a slave bought by manilla pepple. captain hart was a slave bought from the okrika people, and had been head slave of the late king dapho. the others i am not sure about, but squeeze banago and warrabo may have been bonny free, though i have my doubts, but in no case from up to this date, , had a son inherited from his father. i don't wish to be understood never did; because cases have occurred, and did occur during this time, where the son followed the father, but in these six principal houses the chief was not the son of the former head of the house. a house, in native parlance, meant a number of petty chiefs congregated together for mutual protection, owning allegiance generally to the richest and most intelligent one amongst them, whom they called their father, and the europeans called a chief. a house could be formed as oko jumbo formed his. he, as i have said above, was a bought slave, yet, by his superior intelligence and industry, he amassed, in early life, great wealth, was able to buy numerous slaves, some of whom showed similar aptitude to himself, to whom he showed the same encouragement that his master had shown him, and allowed them to trade on their own account. these men in their turn bought slaves, and allowed them similar privileges. this kind of evolution went on with uninterrupted success until oko jumbo, after twenty years' trading, found himself at the head of five or six hundred slaves; for, according to country law, all the slaves bought by his favoured slaves (now become petty chiefs or head boys) belonged to him as he belonged to manilla pepple; but owing to his accumulated riches and numerous followers he was beginning to take rank as a chief and head of a house. one must not think that the assistance given by an owner of slaves to here and there one, as described above, is all pure philanthropy; it is nothing of the kind, for for every hundred pounds worth of trade the slave does on his own account nowadays means £ into the coffers of his master. in the early sixties this profit was not so great, but it represented in those days a ten to fifteen per cent. commission to the head of the house. there were five kinds of commission paid by the european traders to the heads of houses. there were ex bar, custom bar, work bar, gentlemen's dash and boys' dash, and as a slave who had been allowed to trade by his master rose in the social scale he marked the different stages he passed through by being allowed gradually to claim these various commissions on his own oil from the europeans; thus at first he would get only the boys' dash, = pes of small manchester cloth, value about s., and a fisherman's red cap, worth about d. the latter was supposed to go to his pull-away boys to buy palm wine. the second stage in his progress would be marked by his being allowed to take the gentlemen's dash, consisting of two pes of cloth, value s. d. each. the third he would be allowed to receive a portion of the work bar on his oil, sometimes only a third, gradually increasing until he would be allowed to claim the whole work bar. on arriving at this latter stage he would be expected to provide a war canoe and men and arms for the same, ready at any moment to turn out and fight for the general good of the country or to take part in any quarrel between his master and any other chief in bonny, or to attend his master with it when he wished to visit any small country and make a little naval demonstration if these people had been a little slack in paying their debts. in course of time, this man, having supplied a war canoe, would aspire to being recognised as a chief, and thus be entitled to wear an eagle's feather in his hat. to arrive at this stage he would have to make some payments to the principal ju-ju men of the town, and if he never had been at war, and thus missed the opportunity of cutting an enemy's head off, he must purchase a slave for this purpose and cut the poor creature's head off in cold blood in the ju-ju house. this function was rigorously insisted upon by the ju-ju men, and under no circumstances would they allow a man to become a chief who had not cut a man's head off, either in war or in cold blood. after this ceremony, the new-made chief would be duly introduced, at a public meeting, to all the other chiefs, and the next day several brother chiefs would accompany him round to the various trading ships in the port, to intimate to the europeans that he was a full chief, and entitled to receive all the work bar, ex bar, gentlemen's dash and boys' dash that a chief was entitled to. i have previously mentioned custom bar; this originally was paid only to the king, and consisted of one iron bar upon every puncheon of oil bought by the european trader; in early days the king used to put a boy on board each ship to collect this toll, but in course of time found that he was more sure to be honestly dealt with if he left the white man to pay him occasionally what was due to him, than to receive it daily through his bar-boy. on the deposition of king pepple, the custom bar was collected by the four regents, whose descendants demanded it as a right, even after the return of the king, and continued to get it, until a few years ago, when all these bars were abolished in bonny by mutual consent, and in their place was paid "topping," varying from time to time, according to the saneness of the white traders, from twenty to thirty per cent. on the price of the oil, gentlemen's and boys' dash still being continued. referring back to the head-cutting ceremony, i must here mention a curious fact, when one remembers the savage state of these people, that i have known many bonny men who were in a position to be made chiefs, and had conformed to all the preliminary forms, but who shirked the head cutting in cold blood, preferring thus to continue head boys only, until forced by the chiefs (generally instigated by the ju-ju men) to complete the ceremony. one in particular, named jungo, i remember, who at the time of the civil war in bonny in had been for some time eligible to become a chief, yet shirked the head cutting; he was amongst those who followed ja ja in his retreat to the ekomtoro, afterwards called the opobo; it was not until some years after arriving in the opobo that some ju-ju priest remembered that jungo had not distinguished himself during the war, and that he had yet to perform his head cutting. poor jungo was one of the mildest natured black men i have ever known, and tried all kinds of schemes to get out of the ordeal, even offering to give up some of his acquired rights, but public opinion and the ju-ju priests were too much for him, and the slave to be sacrificed was bought, and the ceremony carried out by jungo; but he was such a poor performer that he unintentionally caused considerably more pain to his victim than necessary, for jungo tried to do the terrible deed by striking with his face turned the other way, the victim absolutely cursing him for his bungling. this latter episode may, perhaps, be put down as a traveller's yarn, but it is not at all to be wondered at, when it is known that these poor wretches are made drunk previous to being decapitated. having described how a slave might become a chief, i will now describe how one became the head of a house or chief, and afterwards made himself a king, and one of the most powerful in this part of africa. when elolly pepple died (some say he was poisoned), shortly after the return of king pepple in , the annie pepple house was for some time left without a head. the various chiefs held repeated meetings, and the generally coveted honour did not seem to tempt any of them; by right of seniority a chief named uranta (about the freest man in the house, some asserted he was absolutely free), was offered the place, but he, for private reasons of his own, refused. after uranta there were annie stuart, black foobra and warrasoo, all men of some considerable riches and consideration, but they also shirked the responsibility, for elolly had been a very big trader, and owed the white men, it was said, at the time of his death, a thousand or fifteen hundred puncheons of oil, equivalent to between ten and fifteen thousand pounds sterling, and none of the foremost men of the house dare tackle the settlement of such a large debit account, fearing that the late chief had not left sufficient behind him to settle up with, without supplementing it with their own savings, which might end in bankruptcy for them, and their final downfall from the headship. at this time there was in the house a young man who had not very long been made a chief, though he had, for a considerable number of years, been a very good trader, and was much respected by the white traders for his honesty and the dependence they could place in him to strictly adhere to any promise he made in trade matters. this young chief was ja ja, and though he was one of the youngest chiefs in the house, he was unanimously elected to fill the office. he, however, did not immediately accept, though his being unanimously elected amounted almost to his being forced to accept. he first visited _seriatim_ each white trader, counted book (as they call going through the accounts of a house), and found that though there was a very large debit against the late chief, there was also a large credit, as a set off, in the way of sub-chief's work bars and the late elolly's own work bars. at the same time, he arranged with each supercargo the order in which he would pay them off, commencing with those who were nearing the end of their voyage, and getting a promise from each that if he settled according to promise they would get their successor to give him an equal amount of credit that they themselves had given the late elolly. a few days after, at a public meeting of the chiefs of the annie pepple house, he intimated his readiness to accept the headship of the house, distinctly informing them that, as they had elected him themselves, they must assist him in upholding his authority over them as a body, which would be no easy task for him when there were so many older and richer chiefs in the house who were more entitled than he was to the post. the older chiefs, only too delighted to have found in ja ja some one to take the responsibility of the late chief's debts and the troubles of chieftainship off their shoulders, were prepared, and did solemnly swear, to assist him with their moral support, taking care not to pledge themselves to assist him in any of the financial affairs of the house. ja ja had not been many months head of the annie pepple house before he began to show the old chiefs what kind of metal he was made of; for during the first twelve months he had selected from amongst the late elolly's slaves no less than eighteen or twenty young men, who had already amassed a little wealth, and whom he thought capable of being trusted to trade on their own account, bought canoes for them, took them to the european traders, got them to advance each of these young men from five to ten puncheons worth of goods, he himself standing guarantee for them. this operation had the effect of making ja ja immediately popular amongst all classes of the slaves of the late chief. at the same time, the slaves of the old chief of the house began to see that there was a man at the head of the house who would set a good example to their immediate masters. some of these young men are now wealthy chiefs in opobo, and as evidence that they had been well chosen, ja ja was never called upon to fulfil his guarantee. two years after ja ja was placed at the head of the house the late elolly's debts were all cleared off, no white trader having been detained beyond the date ja ja had promised the late chief's debts should be paid by. in consideration for the prompt manner in which ja ja had paid up, he received from each supercargo whom the late chief had dealt with a present varying from five to ten per cent. on the amount paid. from this date ja ja never looked back, becoming the most popular chief in bonny amongst the white men, and the idol of his own people, but looked upon with jealousy by the manilla pepple house, to which belonged the successful slave, oko jumbo, who was now, both in riches and power, the equal of ja ja, though never his equal in popularity amongst the europeans. though there was a king in bonny, and warribo was the head of the manilla house, _id est_, the king's house, oko jumbo and ja ja were looked upon by every one as being the rulers of bonny. the demon of jealousy was at work, and in the private councils of the manilla house it was decided that ja ja must be pulled down, but the only means of doing it was a civil war. the risks of this oko jumbo, warribo and the king did not care to face, as though the oko jumbo party was most numerous, each side was equally supplied with big guns and rifles up to a short time before the end of , when two european traders, on their way home, picked up a number of old lb. carronades at sierra leone, and shipped the same down to oko jumbo. this sudden accession of war material, of course, put him in a position to provoke ja ja, and he cast about for a _causus belli_, but ja ja was an astute diplomatist, and managed to steer clear of all his opponent's pitfalls. a very small matter is often seized upon by natives as a means to provoke a war, and in this case the cause of quarrel was found in "that a woman of the annie pepple house had drawn water from some pond belonging to the manilla pepple house." this was thought quite sufficient. a most insulting message was sent to ja ja, intimating that the time had come when nothing but a fight could settle their differences. his reply was characteristic of the man; he reminded them that he had no wish to fight, was not prepared, and, furthermore, that neither he, nor they, had paid their debts to the europeans. the latter part of the message was too much for an irascible, one-eyed old fighting chief named jack wilson pepple, so off he marched to his own house, and fired the first round shot into the annie pepple part of the town, and civil war was commenced. it was a bit overdue, the last having taken place in . as a rule, they come round about every ten years, like the epidemics of malignant bilious fever of the coast. the annie pepple house was not slow to reply, but ja ja knew he was over-matched, both in guns and numbers of fighting men, so he only kept up a semblance of a fight sufficiently long to allow him to make a retreat to a small town called tombo, in the next creek to the bonny creek, only about three miles from bonny by water, less by land. from here he was in a better position to parley with his opponents, and make terms if possible, but he soon saw that no arrangement less than the complete humiliation of himself and people was going to satisfy his enemies, for besides the jealousy of oko jumbo, the young king george pepple, son of the gentleman who had been to england and brought out the european suite, had not forgotten that the annie pepple house, represented by the late elolly, had been the chief opponents of his late father when he returned to bonny in after his exile. this young man had been educated in england, and i must say did credit to whoever had had charge of his education. he both spoke and wrote english correctly, and had his father been able to hand over to him the kingship as he had received it in , he might have blossomed into a model king in west africa; but, alas! the only thing he inherited from his father beyond the kingship was debt--king only in name, receiving only so much of his dues as the principal chiefs liked to allow him, not having the means of being a large trader, looked upon with scant favour by the europeans, and owing to his english education lacking the rude ability of such men as oko jumbo and ja ja to make a position for himself, he became but a puppet in the hands of his principal chiefs; a fate, i am afraid, which has generally befallen the native of these parts who has attempted to retain any of the teachings of christianity on his return amongst his pagan brethren. few people can understand the reason of this. it is simply another proof of the wonderful power of ju-ju amongst these people, for it is to that occult influence that i trace the general ill-success of the educated native of the delta in his own country,--unless he returns to all the pagan gods of his forefathers, and until he does so many channels of prosperity are completely closed to him. i am afraid i have wandered a little from my subject, but in doing so i hope i have made some things clear that otherwise might have appeared a little mixed from an european point of view, so will now return to ja ja. from tombo town ja ja communicated with the bonny court of equity, and a truce was arranged, native meetings followed, and after several weeks of palavering, no better terms were offered ja ja than had before been offered to him. the white men interested themselves in the matter, and held meetings innumerable, until at last they were as divided as the natives. with the exception of one or two at the outside, they understood so little of the occult workings of native squabbles that they could do little to smooth matters over. in the meantime, ja ja had been studying a masterly plan of retreat from tombo town to a river called the ekomtoro, also called the rio condé in ancient maps. once in this river, by fortifying two or three points he would be able to completely turn the tables on his enemies by barring their way to the eboe markets, but to get there he would have to pass one, if not two, fortified points held by the manilla pepple people. besides this, what would his position be when there, if he could not get any white men there to trade with? luckily for him, there dropped from the clouds the very man he wanted. this was a trader named charley, who had been in the bonny river some years before, and was now established at brass on his own account. at an interview with ja ja, that did not last half an hour, the whole plan of campaign was arranged. charley returned to brass and confided the scheme to his friend, archie mceachan, who decided to join him. thus ja ja had the certainty of support in his new home if he could only get there, and get there he did. being shortly after joined by these two white traders trade was opened in the ekomtoro, and on christmas day, , ekomtoro was named the [)o]p[)o]b[=o] river, after [)o]p[)o]b[=o], the founder of the town of "grand bonny," as bonny men delight to call their mud and thatch capital. the name of [)o]p[)o]b[=o] was chosen by ja ja himself. to students of the peculiar relationship existing between a bought slave and his master, the latter looked up to and called father by his slave, this choice of the name of a man who had been a great man in his father's house, _id est_, his master's, demonstrates in a striking manner the veneration a bought slave, under the system of domestic slavery in these parts, in many cases displays, equalling in every respect that of the free-born direct descendant. the tables were now turned with a vengeance, and ja ja remained the master of the position, and for several years kept the bonny men out of the eboe and qua markets; eventually agreeing to have the differences between himself and the manilla pepple people settled by the arbitration of the new calabar and the okrika chiefs with commodore commerell and mr. charles livingstone, her britannic majesty's consul for the bights of benin and biafra, as referees. evidently the arbitrators considered that ja ja was in no way to blame for the civil war that had taken place in bonny, for in the division of the markets that had been common property when ja ja and his people had formed an integral part of the bonny nation, the greater part was given to ja ja and his right to remain where he had established himself fully recognised. immediately on this settlement being come to, her britannic majesty's consul entered into a commercial treaty with ja ja recognising him as king of opobo. this treaty was signed january th, , the deed of arbitration having been signed the day previous. in giving my readers the history of this man up to this point, i have always had in my mind the question of domestic slavery, being anxious to give its most favourable side as fair an exposition as its unfavourable. i have in previous pages mentioned some of the latter, but those remarks only dealt with the early stages of the slave's condition after capture in the interior and his risks of arriving alive at his destination. i have now to deal with him as a chattel of one of the petty chiefs, chiefs or kings of western africa, admitting that his chances of improving his condition are manifold, his life until he gets his foot on the first rung of the ladder of advancement is terrible; he never knows from one moment to another when he may be re-sold, he is badly fed, in fact, some masters never feed their slaves at all when they are not actually employed pulling a canoe or doing other labour such as making farm, cutting sticks for house-building, &c. failing these employments, the slave has all his time to himself. his chances of putting this time to any profit are very few in the oil rivers; and should he by chance get some employment from a white man, his owner takes good care to receive his pay, the only thing the slave getting out of it being three full meals a day for a few days, making the starvation fare he is accustomed to the harder to bear afterwards. were it not for their adopted mother, _id est_, the woman they are given to on being bought, their state would be absolutely unbearable in times of forced idleness; but these women almost invariably have considerable affection for their numerous adopted children, and though their means may be very limited, they generally manage to supply them with at least one meal a day in return for the many little services they perform for them, such as fetching water, carrying firewood in from the bush, selling their few fowls and eggs to the white men, and doing any other little matter of trade for them. even those slaves who have been lucky enough to fall into the hands of a master who sees that they at least do not starve, have along with their less lucky brethren to put up with the ungovernable fits of temper which some of these black slave owners display at times, in many cases inflicting the most terrible punishment for trivial offences, as often as not only on suspicion that the slave was guilty. amongst the numerous punishments i have known inflicted are the following. ear cutting in its various stages, from clipping to total dismemberment; crucifixion round a large cask; extraction of teeth; suspension by the thumbs; chilli peppers pounded and stuffed up the nostrils, and forced into the eyes and ears; fastening the victim to a post driven into the beach at low water and leaving him there to be drowned with the rising tide, or to be eaten by the sharks or crocodiles piecemeal; heavily ironed and chained to a post in their master's compound, without any covering over their heads, kept in this state for weeks, with so little food allowed them that cases have been known where the irons have dropped off them, but they, poor wretches, were too weak to escape, as they had been reduced to living skeletons; impaling on stakes; forcing a long steel ram rod through the body until it appeared through the top of the skull. the above are a few of the punishments that even to this day are practised, not only in the niger delta, but in the outlying districts of the west african colonies. it is very rare that the government officials get to know anything about them; and when they do, it is difficult to procure a conviction owing to the fear natives have to come forward and act as witnesses. besides the punishments enumerated above, there are many others, some of which are too horrible to be described here. one often hears people who know a little about west africa talk about native law, but they forget to mention, if they happen to know it, that in a powerful chief's house there is only one exponent of the law, and that is the chief; for him native law only begins to have effect when it is a matter between himself and some other chief, or a combination of chiefs, whose power is equal or superior to his own. as an instance of the form which native justice (?) sometimes takes, i will relate what took place some years ago in one of the oil rivers. an old and very powerful chief had a young wife of whom he was immoderately jealous. amongst his favourite attendants was a young male slave, a mere boy, to whom he had given many tokens of his favour; but the demon of jealousy whispered to him that his young slave boy was looked upon with too much favour by his young wife--herself little more than a child. that a slave of his should dare to cast his eyes on his wife was more than this terrible old chief could stand, so he decided to put an end at once to the love dreams of his slave, and at the same time point out to any other enterprising slave of his how dangerous it was to aspire to the forbidden favours of a chief's wife. so he ordered his young wife to cook him a specially good palm oil chop, a native dish of great repute, for his breakfast the following morning. the next morning when he sat down to his breakfast his favourite slave was behind his chair in attendance; his young wife was present to see her lord and master was properly served--the wives do not sit at table with their husbands--when suddenly the chief turned in his chair and ordered his young slave to sit at table with him. naturally the slave hesitated to accept such an unheard-of honour as to sit at table with his master; quickly scenting something terrible was going to befall him, he attempted to leave the apartment, but other slaves quickly barred his way, and he was brought back trembling with fright, the beads of perspiration rolling down his face and body in little rivulets, and placed in a chair opposite his master, who, all this time had not displayed any signs of anger; gradually the boy began to regain somewhat his scattered senses. finding his master displayed no signs of anger, he began to do as he was ordered, the chief at the same time plied him with repeated doses of spirits, till at last the boy began to chatter, and attacked the food with a will. at length, having eaten and drunk till he could scarcely stand, his master asked him had he enjoyed his young mistress's cooking. on his replying yes, the chief called for a revolver, and telling him it was the last thing he ever would enjoy of his young mistress, he emptied the six chambers of the revolver into the poor lad's head; then having ordered his body to be thrown into the river, went on with the usual occupations of the day, never having once mentioned the reason of his act to his people nor explaining his meaning to his young wife. to the native mind the chief's actions spoke as plainly as possible; but not having spoken, his wife's family could not, had they wished, have made a palaver about his wife's good fame; for though the chief was originally a bought slave or nigger himself, his young wife was country free, her family being sufficiently powerful to have made things uncomfortable for him if he had accused her without proof of guilt. had she been a slave, the chances are she would have been slaughtered. i do not wish to convey to my readers the idea that all chiefs in the niger delta are cruel monsters, but they all have power of life and death over their slaves; the mildest of them occasionally may find themselves so placed that they are compelled in conformity with some ju-ju right to sacrifice a slave or two. the ordinary punishments for theft and insubordination practised amongst these people are often terribly cruel and unnecessarily severe. of course the government of the niger coast protectorate is steadily breaking down these savage customs, wherever and whenever they hear of them being practised within their jurisdiction; but the formation of the country, the dense forests, and the superstition of the people, all assist in keeping most cases from coming to their knowledge. before taking leave of the bonny people, i must not omit to mention that the custom of destroying twin children and children who had the misfortune to be born with teeth was, and is, a custom still observed amongst them. another custom prevalent amongst these people, and common more or less to all other natives in the delta, was the destroying of any woman if she became the mother of more than four children. andoni river and its inhabitants. this river lies a few miles to the east of bonny river. the inhabitants of the lower part of the river are called andoni men, and during the slave-dealing days these people were as well known to europeans as the bonny men, but, owing in a great measure to the much deeper water at the entrance to bonny river than was to be found on the andoni bar, the former river offering thus more facilities for deep-draughted ships, the traders gradually deserted the andoni altogether, though these people were, i believe, the original owners of the land now claimed by the bonny people as forming the bonny kingdom. the andoni men, being deserted by the european traders, gradually became a race of fishermen and small farmers. the bonny men, having become the dominant race, and not allowing the andonis any intercourse with the white traders in their river, the andoni men protested against this treatment, and waged war against the bonny men on many occasions in the early part of this century. the last war between these two peoples continued for some years; the bonny men not always getting the best of these encounters, were very glad to come to terms with them in , a treaty being then signed between the two tribes, wherein the andoni men were secured equal rights with the bonny men, but the commercial enterprise of these people seems to have died out. yet the king of doni town, as their principal town is called in old maps, was reported by traders, who visited him in , as being a man of some intelligence, speaking the portuguese language fluently, and having some knowledge of the roman catholic faith, yet still adhering to all the customs of ju-juism, furthermore describing the people as being such implicit believers in their ju-ju that they would kill any one who touched any of the idols in their ju-ju house. this may have been true at the time, but about five and twenty years ago i visited the town of doni, as also their ju-ju house, and handled some of their idols, and they showed no irritation at my so doing. i had, of course, asked permission to do so of the ju-ju man who was showing me round. i have no doubt they would resent any one interfering with them without their permission. when i visited these people they gave me the idea that they had never seen a white man, or had any communication with him, for i vainly searched for any evidence that the white man had ever been established in their river. from all i was able to gather of their manners and customs i found that they differed little from any of their neighbours, though they are always described by interested parties as being inveterate cannibals and dangerous people for strangers to visit. opobo river. after leaving andoni, and continuing down the coast some ten or fifteen miles, the opobo discharges itself into the sea. this river, marked in ancient maps as the rio condé and ekomtoro, is the most direct way to the ibo palm-oil-producing country. this river was well known to the portuguese and spanish slave traders, but as bonny became the great centre for the slave trade, this river was completely deserted and forgotten to such an extent that, though an opening in the coast line was shown on the english charts where this river was supposed to be, it was never thought worth the trouble of naming, and remained quite unknown to the english traders until it came suddenly into repute, owing to ja ja establishing himself here in . the people here are the bonny men and their descendants who followed ja ja's fortunes, therefore their manners and customs are identical with those of bonny. the physical appearance of these people is somewhat better than that of the bonny men, owing, i think, to the position of their town, which is built on a better soil, and raised a few feet higher than that of bonny from the level of the river, also their uninterrupted successful trade since their arrival in this country has doubtless not a little contributed to their improved condition, while, on the other hand, the bonny men suffered severely during the years from to , owing to ja ja barring their way to the markets, and they seem never to have recovered themselves. trading stations of the white men are at the mouth of the river and at eguanga, the latter a station a few miles above opobo town. opobo became, under king ja ja's firm rule, one of the largest exporting centres of palm oil in the delta, and for years king ja ja enjoyed a not undeserved popularity amongst the white traders who visited his river, but a time came when the price of palm oil fell to such a low figure in england that the european firms established in opobo could not make both ends meet, so they intimated to king ja ja that they were going to reduce the price paid in the river, to which he replied by shipping large quantities of his oil to england, allowing his people only to sell a portion of their produce to the white men. the latter now formulated a scheme amongst themselves to divide equally whatever produce came into the river, and thus do away with competition amongst themselves. ja ja found that sending his oil to england was not quite so lucrative as he could wish, owing to the length of time it took to get his returns back, namely, about three months at the earliest, whilst by selling in the river he could turn over his money three or four times during that period. he therefore tried several means to break the white men's combination, at last hitting upon the bright idea of offering the whole of the river's trade to one english house. the mere fact of his being able to make this offer shows the absolute power to which he had arrived amongst his own people. his bait took with one of the european traders; the latter could not resist the golden vision of the yellow grease thus displayed before him by the astute ja ja, who metaphorically dangled before his eyes hundreds of canoes laden with the coveted palm oil. a bargain was struck, and one fine morning the other white traders in the river woke up to the fact that their combination was at an end, for on taking their morning spy round the river through their binoculars (no palm oil trader that respects himself being without a pair of these and a tripod telescope, for more minute observation of his opponents' doings) they saw a fleet of over a hundred canoes round the renegade's wharf, and for nearly two years this trader scooped all the trade. the fat was fairly in the fire now, and the other white traders sent a notice to ja ja that they intended to go to his markets. ja ja replied that he held a treaty, signed in , by mr. consul charles livingstone, her britannic majesty's consul, that empowered him to stop any white traders from establishing factories anywhere above hippopotamus creek, and under which he was empowered to stop and hold any vessel for a fine of one hundred puncheons of oil. in june, , the traders applied to mr. consul white, who informed king ja ja that the protectorate treaty meant freedom of navigation and trade. so the traders finding their occupation gone, decided amongst themselves to take a trip to ja ja's markets, the only sensible thing they had done since the trouble commenced. this was a step in the right direction, namely, by attempting to break down the curse of western africa _id est_, the power of the middle-man. the names of the four traders who first attempted to trade in the ibo markets of king ja ja deserve to be recorded, for their action was not without great risk to themselves. they were: mr. s. b. hall } mr. thomas wright } english mr. richard foster } mr. a. e. brunschweiler--swiss. to these must be added the name of mr. f. d. mitchell, who, though not in the first trip to the markets, joined in the subsequent attempt to establish business amongst the interior tribes. their reception at the markets was not altogether a success, owing to the reception committee, or whatever represented it in those parts, being packed with either ja ja's own people or ibos favourable to him. this good beginning was continued under great difficulties by these first traders with little profit or success for about two years, owing to the great power of ja ja amongst the interior tribes and the pressure he was able to bring to bear on the ibo and kwo natives. in the meantime, clouds had been gathering round the head of king ja ja. his wonderful success since had gradually obscured his former keen perception of how far his rights as a petty african king would be recognised by the english government under the new order of things just being inaugurated in the oil rivers; honestly believing that in signing the protectorate treaty of december th, , with the _sixth_ clause crossed out, he had retained the right given him by the commercial treaty of to keep white men from proceeding to his markets, he got himself entangled in a number of disputes which culminated in his being taken out of the opobo river in september, , by her britannic majesty's consul, mr. h. h. johnston, c.b., now sir harry johnston, and conveyed to accra, where he was tried before admiral sir hunt grubbe, who condemned him to five years' deportation to the west indies, making him an allowance of about £ per annum and returning a fine of thirty puncheons of palm oil, value about £ in those days, which the late consul hewett had imposed upon him, a fine that the admiral did not think the consul was warranted in having imposed. poor ja ja did not live to return to his country and his people whom he loved so well, and whose condition he had done so much to improve, though at times his rule often became despotic. one trait of his character may interest the public just now, as the liquor question in west africa is so much _en evidence_, and that is, that he was a strict teetotaler himself and inculcated the same principles in all his chiefs. in his eighteen years' rule as a king in opobo he reduced two of his chiefs for drunkenness--one he sent to live in exile in a small fishing village for the rest of his life, the other, who had aggravated his offence by assaulting a white trader, he had deprived of all outward signs of a chief and put in a canoe to paddle as a pull-away boy within an hour of his committing the offence. during the ashantee campaign of sir garnet wolseley sent captain nicol to the oil rivers to raise a contingent of friendly natives; on his arrival in bonny he was not immediately successful, so continued on to opobo, where he was the guest of the writer. upon captain nicol explaining his errand, ja ja furnished him with over sixty of his war-boys, most of whom had seen considerable fighting in the late war between bonny and opobo. the news reaching bonny of what ja ja had done, put the bonny men upon their mettle, and when captain nicol reached bonny on his way back to ashantee, he found a further contingent waiting for him from the bonny chiefs. this combined contingent did good work against the ashantees, being favourably mentioned in despatches. poor captain nicol, who raised them, and commanded them in most of their engagements with the enemy, was, i regret to say, killed whilst gallantly leading them on in one of the final rushes just before coomassie was taken. in recognition of the above services of his men, her most gracious majesty queen victoria presented king ja ja with a sword of honour, the king of bonny receiving one at the same time. shipwrecked people were always sure of kindly treatment if they fell into the hands of ja ja's subjects, for he had given strict orders to his people dwelling on the sea-shore to assist vessels in distress and convey any one cast on shore to the european factories, warning them at the same time on no account to touch any of their property. he was also the first king in the delta to restrain his people from plundering a wrecked ship, though the custom had been from time immemorial that a vessel wrecked upon their shores belonged to them by rights as being a gift from their ju-ju--an idea held by savage people in many other parts of the world. it seems a pity that a man who had so many good qualities should have ended as he did. he was a man who, properly handled, could have been made of much use in the opening up of his country. unfortunately, the late consul hewett was prejudiced against ja ja from his first interview with him, finding in this nigger king a man of superior natural abilities to his own. had the late mr. consul hewett had the fiftieth part of the ability in dealing with the natives his sub and successor, mr. h. h. johnston, showed, there would never have been any necessity to deport ja ja. unfortunately, between ja ja's stubbornness and the late consul hewett's bungling, matters had come to such a pass that some decisive measures were actually necessary to uphold the dignity of the consular office. when mr. h. h. johnston succeeded the late mr. consul hewett, the opobo palaver was in about as muddled a state as it was possible for it to have got into. matters had been in an unsatisfactory state for some years between king ja ja and the late consul. ja ja had over-stepped the bounds of propriety in more ways than one. he tried the same tactics with mr. johnston, who to look at, is the mildest-looking little man you can imagine, and therefore did not fill the native's eye as a ruler of men; but mr. johnston very soon let ja ja and the natives generally see he was made of different stuff to his predecessor, and the first attempts on ja ja's part not to act up to the lines he laid down for him settled his fate. mr. johnston offered him the choice of delivering himself up quietly as a prisoner or being treated as an enemy of the queen, his town destroyed and himself eventually captured and exiled for ever. he elected to give himself up, was taken to accra and there tried and condemned after a fair hearing. i was present myself at the trial, and old friend as i was to him, i don't think the verdict would have been otherwise had i been in the judge's place, though there were many extenuating circumstances in his case, all of which were fully considered by admiral hunt grubbe in his final sentence. i feel confident that had mr. consul johnston had the management of affairs in the opobo a few years earlier, ja ja would never have been deported, and instead of having to censure him, he would have handled him in such a manner as to make use of his influence in furthering british interests. i do not think i can describe the late king ja ja better than mr. consul johnston did in a letter he addressed to lord salisbury under date of september th, , wherein he writes as follows:--"ja ja's chief friends and supporters for years past have been the naval officers on the coast. his generous hospitality, his frank, engaging manner, his naïf discourse, and amusing crudities of diction have gained the ready sympathy of these gentlemen; no doubt ja ja is no common man, though he is in origin a runaway slave,[ ] he was cut out by nature for a king, and he has the instinct of rule, though it not unfrequently degenerates into cruel tyranny. "his demeanour is marked by quiet dignity, and his appearance and conversation are impressive. "nevertheless, i know ja ja to be a deliberate liar,[ ] who exhibits little shame or confusion when his falsehoods are exposed. he is a bitter and unscrupulous enemy[ ] of all who attempt to dispute his trade monopolies, and the five british firms whose trade he has almost ruined during the past two years." a complaint often made against the government by merchants established on the west coast of africa is want of official protection and assistance; in many cases in the past this has been the case; but they certainly could not make this complaint during the few months that mr. consul johnston was at the head of the consular service in the oil rivers. i will here give a summary of what exertions were made by the government to assist the merchants in their praiseworthy attempts to get behind the middlemen in this one river, where ja ja was always given the credit of being the head and front of the obstruction, nothing ever being said about the king and chiefs of bonny, who were equally interested with ja ja in keeping the white men out of the markets, their principal markets being on the river opobo. owing to the energetic representations of mr. consul h. h. johnston, the british government placed at his disposal for the settlement of the market question and the ja ja palaver the following government vessels, viz., the _watchful_, the _goshawk_, the _alecto_, the _acorn_, the _royalist_, and the _raleigh_, the latter bringing admiral sir hunt grubbe up from the cape of good hope for the trial of king ja ja. result: within a very short time after the deportation of ja ja, all the firms who had been so anxious to establish in the interior markets and thus get behind the middlemen (without doubt the curse of the oil rivers and every part of africa where they are tolerated) gave up trading at the interior markets that had caused the government so much trouble to open for them, and made an agreement with the middlemen, represented in this case by the bonny men and opobo men, that they would not attempt to trade any more in the interior markets if the middlemen would promise to trade with no european firm that attempted to trade in the interior markets. on the writer's last visit to the opobo in there was only one firm trading in the interior markets, and that firm was not one of those that were in the river at the time of the clamour for the removal of ja ja and the opening of the interior in . kwo ibo. this river was first visited in modern days in by the late mr. archie mceachan, who found the people very troublesome to deal with, and did not long remain there. no doubt the people were not so easy to deal with as those natives that have been for some hundreds of years dealing with europeans; but as he was at the same time posing as a friend and supporter of ja ja, and the oil he got in kwo ibo was being diverted from ja ja's markets, the latter no doubt exerted a certain amount of pressure on his friend, and aided, if he did not actually cause him to decide to withdraw from kwo ibo. kwo ibo lay fallow for some time, then one or two sierra leone men attempted to trade there, but with little success, owing to the influence king ja ja had in the country. it was not until - that any sustained effort was made to trade in this river; but about this time a mr. watts established a small trading station there, and succeeded in creating a trade, though he had a very difficult task to combat the opposition of king ja ja, who considered he was being defrauded of some of his supposed just rights. had mr. watts pushed his way into the interior markets and dealt direct with the producers, he would deserve the united thanks of every merchant connected with the trade in the niger delta; but he did not, and contented himself with buying his produce on a little better terms than he could have done in opobo or old calabar, and created another set of middlemen, who to-day consider they, like their neighbours, are justified in doing their utmost in keeping the european out of the interior. mr. watts eventually sold out his interest in the trade of this river to the combination of river firms now known under the name of the african association of liverpool. a mission has been established here for some years and i had the pleasure of meeting the missionary in charge, some two years ago, on his way home after a long sojourn in the kwo ibo; his description of the people and of the success of his mission work was most interesting. if he has returned to the seat of his labours and is still alive, i can only wish him every success in the work in which evidently his whole heart was centred. the name kwo ibo, which has been given to this river, gives one the idea that the inhabitants are a mixture of kwos and ibos. this to a certain extent may be a very good description as regards the inhabitants of the upper reaches of the river, which takes its rise, so it is supposed, in a lake in the ibo country, afterwards passing through the kwo, and discharges itself into the sea about half-way between the east point of the opobo river and the tom shotts point. the lower part of the river is inhabited principally by andoni men by origin, but calling themselves ibenos or ibrons. these people deserve a great deal of credit for the plucky manner in which they withstood the numerous attacks the late king ja ja made upon them, and their stubborn refusal to discontinue trading with the white men established in their river, though they were but ill-provided with arms to defend themselves. during several years they must have suffered severely from the repeated raids the late king ja ja made upon them, not only from losses in battle, but also in having their towns destroyed and many of their people carried off as prisoners. some of the earlier raids made by ja ja, i must in fairness to him say, were to a great extent brought on by the actions of the ibrons themselves, who were not slow to attack and slay any opobo men they caught wandering about, if the latter were not in sufficient numbers to defend themselves. in language, these people are closely allied to the old calabar people, and many of their customs show them to have had more communication with those people than they have had with the andoni people, at any rate for many years. i find no mention amongst the writings of the early travellers to western africa of their having visited this river, nor is it even named on any old chart that i have consulted, though on some i have seen a river indicated at the spot where the kwo ibo enters the sea. needless to mention, they were, and the majority are to-day, steeped in ju-juism, witchcraft, and their attendant horrors. the kwo people, whose country lies on both sides of the kwo ibo, and behind the ibenos, are the tribe from whom were drawn the supplies of kwo or kwa slaves known under the name of the mocoes in the west indies. old calabar. i now come to the last river in the niger coast protectorate, both banks of which belong to england, the next river being the rio del rey, of which england now only claims the right bank, germany claiming the left and all the territory south to the river campo, a territory almost as large as, if not equal to, the whole of the niger coast protectorate, which ought to have been english, for was it not english by right of commercial conquest, if by no other, and for years had been looked upon by the commanders of foreign naval vessels as under english influence? owing to some one blundering, this nice slice of african territory was allowed to slip into the hands of the germans, hence my account of the oil rivers ought to be called an account of the oil rivers reduced by germany. in speaking of the inhabitants of this river, i must also include the people who inhabit the lower part of the cross river. this explanation would not have been necessary some few years ago, but i notice the more recent hydrographers make the cross river the main river and the old calabar only a tributary of that river, which is, without doubt, the most correct. the principal towns are duke town (where are to be found nowadays the headquarters of the niger coast protectorate, the presbyterian mission, and the principal trading factories of the europeans), henshaw town, creek and town; besides these, the various kings and chiefs have numberless small towns and villages in the environs. in the lower part of the cross river are many fishing villages, the inhabitants of which are looked upon as old calabar people, and owing to the latter being the dominant race they have to-day lost, or very nearly so, any trace of their forefathers, who i believe to have been kwos with a strong strain of andoni blood. these villages did, in days anterior to the advent of the european traders, an immense business with the interior in dried shrimps, the latter being used by the natives, not only as a flavouring to their stews and ragouts, but as a substitute for the all necessary salt. the original inhabitants of the district now occupied by the old calabar people were the akpas, whom the calabarese drove out, and to a great extent afterwards absorbed. this immigration of the calabarese is said to have taken place very little over one hundred and fifty years ago. originally coming from the upper ibibio district of the cross river, they belong to the efik race, and speak that language, though nowadays, owing to numerous intermarriages with cameroon natives and the great number of slaves bought from the cameroons district, they are of very mixed blood. most of the kings and chiefs of old calabar owe their rank and position to direct descent, some of them being of ancient lineage, a fact of which they are very proud. in this respect they differ in a great measure from their neighbours in bonny and opobo, where, oftener than otherwise, the succession falls to the most influential man in the house, slave or free-born. the principal town of these people boasted, some few years ago, of many very nice villa residences, belonging to the chiefs, built of wood, and roofed with corrugated iron, mostly erected by a scotch carpenter, who had established himself in old calabar, and who was in great request amongst the chiefs as an architect and builder. unfortunately, these houses being erected haphazard amongst the surrounding native-built houses did not lend that air of improvement to the town they might otherwise have done if the chiefs had studied more uniformity in the building of the town, and arranged for wide streets in place of alley ways, many of which are not wide enough to let two calabar ladies of the higher rank pass one another without the risk of their finery being daubed with streaks of yellow mud from the adjacent walls. the native houses of the better classes are certainly an improvement upon any others in the protectorate, showing as they do some artistic taste in their embellishments. they are generally built in the form of a square or several squares, more or less exact, according to the extent of ground the builder has to deal with and the number of apartments the owner has need for. in some cases, i have seen a native commence his building operations by marking out two or three squares or oblongs, about twenty feet by fifteen, round which he would build his various apartments or rooms. in the centre of the inner squares, which are always left open to the sky, you almost invariably find a tree growing, either left there purposely when clearing the ground, or planted by the owner; occasionally you will find a fine crop of charms and ju-jus hanging from the branches of these trees. the inner walls, especially of the courtyards, are in most cases tastefully decorated with paintings, somewhat resembling the arabesque designs one sees amongst the moors. no doubt this art and that of designing fantastic figures on brass dishes, which they buy from the europeans and afterwards embellish with the aid of a big-headed nail and a hammer, comes to them from the mohammedans of the niger, of whom they used to see a good deal in former days. with regard to the dress of these people, i have not anything so interesting to relate about them as i had of the new calabar gentlemen. except on high days and holidays, there is little to distinguish the upper classes here from the same classes in any of the other rivers of the protectorate, except that it might be in the peculiar way they knot the loin cloth on, leaving it to trail a little on the ground on one side, and their great liking for scarlet and other bright coloured stove-pipe hats. on their high festivals the kings appear in crowns and silk garments; the chiefs, who do not stick to the native gala garments of many-hued silks, generally appear in european clothes, not always of irreproachable fit, their queen, as every chief calls his head wife, appearing in a gorgeous silk costume that may have been worn several seasons before at ascot or goodwood by a london belle. sometimes you may be treated to the sight of a dusky queen gaily displaying her ample charms in a low-cut secondhand dinner or ball dress that may have created a sensation when first worn at some swagger function in london or paris. as the native ladies do not wear stays, and one of the greatest attributes of female beauty in calabar is plumpness, and plenty of it, you may imagine that the local _modiste_ has her wits greatly exercised in devising means to fill up the gaping space between the hooks and eyes. i once heard a captain of one of the mail steamers describe this job as "letting in a graving piece down the back." one of the customs peculiar to the old calabar people, practised generally amongst all classes, but most strictly observed by the wealthier people, is for a girl about to become a bride to go into retirement for several weeks just previous to her marriage, during which time she undergoes a fattening treatment, similar to that practised in tunis. the fatter the bride the more she is admired. it is said that during this seclusion the future bride is initiated into the mysteries of some female secret society. many of the chiefs are very stout, and given to _embonpoint_, a fact of which they are very proud. the lower-class women are not troubled with too much clothing, but still ample enough for the country and decency's sake. as one strolls through the town to see the market or pay a visit to some chief, one often encounters young girls, and sometimes women, in long, loose, flowing robes, fitting tight round the neck, and on inquiring who these are, the reply generally comes, "dem young gal be mission gal, dem tother one he be saleone woman." the mission here is the united presbyterian mission of scotland,[ ] and a great deal of good has been done by it for these people, and is being done now, and great hopes are expected from their industrial mission, started only a few years ago, therefore, it would be unfair to make further comment on the latter; it is a step in the right direction. some of the missionaries to old calabar have put in about forty years of active service, most of it passed on the coast. amongst others who have lived to a great age in this mission should be mentioned the rev. mr. anderson, who lived to the advanced age of between eighty and ninety years, greatly respected by both the european and native population. amongst the lady missionaries the name of miss slessor stands out very prominently, and, considering the task she has set herself, viz., the saving of twin children and protection of their mothers, her success has been marvellous, for the calabarese is, like his neighbours, still a great believer in the custom that says twin children are not to be allowed to live. this lady has passed about twenty years in old calabar, a greater part of the last ten years all alone at okÿon, a district which the people of duke town and the surrounding towns preferred not to visit, if they could manage any business they had with the people of okÿon without going amongst them. many of these old customs will now be much more quickly stamped out than in the past, owing to the fact that it is in the power of the consul-general to punish the natives severely who practise them. the preaching and exhortation of the missionaries to the people in the past was met by the very powerful argument, in a native's mind, that "it was a custom his father had kept from time immemorial, and he did not see why he should not continue it," the ju-ju priests being clever enough to point out to the natives that, though the missionaries preached against ju-juism, they could not punish its votaries. but that is all changed now, and even the ju-ju priests begin to feel that the power of the consul-general is much greater than that of their grinning idols and trickery. though these people have been in communication with europeans for at least two centuries, and under british influence for upwards of sixty years, and a mission has been established in their principal town for the best part of fifty years, it was a common thing to see human flesh offered for sale in the market within a very few years of the establishment of the british protectorate. in judging the result of missionary effort in this river, or, in fact, any other part of western africa, one is apt to exclaim, "what poor results for so much expenditure in lives and money!" the cause is not far to seek if one knows the native, and has sufficiently studied his ways and customs as to be able to understand or read what is working in his brain. the upper or dominant classes, consisting of the kings, the chiefs, the petty chiefs and the trade boys (the latter being the traders sent into the far distant markets to buy the produce for their masters, and it is from this class that many of the chiefs in most of these rivers spring) are all, to a man, working either openly or secretly against the missionaries. even when they have become converts and communicants, in very many cases they are as much an opponent as ever of the missionary. i can fancy i see some enthusiastic missionary jumping up with indignation depicted in every feature to tell me i am not telling the truth about his particular converts. well, as i expect to be called a liar, i have taken care to admit that a very few converts are not opposed to the missionary, in order that i may say to any missionary that particularly wishes to wipe the floor with me that perchance his special converts are included in the minority that is represented by the very few cases where the convert is wholly and solely for the mission. what are the causes that lead these people to work against the missions? first and foremost is ju-ju and its multifarious ramifications, consisting of ju-ju priests of the district, the ju-ju priests of the surrounding country, and the travelling ju-ju men, described by the natives as witch doctors, who keep up a communication of ideas and thought from end to end of the pagan countries of west and south-west africa. secondly, not only is the teaching of christianity opposed to ju-juism, but it is also opposed to the whole fabric of native customs other than ju-juism. polygamy, for example, is an actual necessity, according to native custom, thus a wife after the birth of an infant retires from the companionship of her husband and devotes herself for the following two years to the cares of nursing. then, again, at certain times, according to native custom, a woman is not allowed to prepare food that has to be eaten by others than herself. this would place the man with only one wife in a peculiar position, as it is a general custom in all these rivers, from the kings downwards, to have their food cooked by one of their wives. this custom arises from the fact that poisoning is known to be very much practised amongst all the pagan tribes, and experience has taught the men that their greatest safety lies in the faithfulness of their wives, for the wives are aware that they have all to lose and nothing to gain by the death of their husbands. many people who have visited western africa will say that the reports of secret poisoning on the coast are travellers' yarns; but to refute that i will here describe a custom met with still in many places on the coast, and invariably practised amongst all natives in the purely native towns in the immediate vicinity of the coast towns. even the coast towns people practise it still in every case amongst themselves and in some cases with the europeans. of course, i don't say that the educated negro or coloured missionary will do it with europeans, but many of the educated natives will do it with the uneducated native, and this custom is that your native host will never offer you food or drink without first tasting it to show you it is not poisoned. while i am on this topic, let me give any would-be travellers amongst the pagans a bit of advice. once they strike in amongst the purely native, always follow this custom; it will do no harm and may save them from unpleasant experiences. thirdly, the native instinct of self-preservation is as much the first law of nature to the negro as it is to the rest of mankind. at first sight it might be said, "where is the link between self-preservation and missionary effort, and how comes it to work against the missions?" i will try to explain this point as clearly as possible. naturally the first people the missionary came in contact with were the coast tribes. these people, in almost if not every case, are non-producers, being simply the brokers between the white man and the interior; in not a few cases behind the coast tribes are other tribes who are again non-producers and are the brokers of the coast brokers, or make the coast brokers pay a tribute to them for passing through their country. no place so well illustrated this system as the trade on the lower niger as it used to be conducted by the brass, new calabar and bonny men. previous to the advent of the royal niger company in that river, these people paid a small tribute to perhaps a dozen different towns on their way up to abo on the niger--some of the brass men used even to get as far as onicha or onitsha. now that the royal niger company is trading on the niger, none of these people can go to the niger to trade. well, there you have one of the great objections to mission effort. each of these small tribes who were non-producers have lost the tribute they used to exact from the brass, bonny and new calabar native brokers, therefore all the non-producers are averse to the white man passing beyond them, be he missionary or trader. of course, the greatest objectors to the white man penetrating into the interior are the coast middlemen, for it strikes at once at the source of all their riches, all the grandeur of their chieftainship, and for the rising generation all hope of their ever arriving to be a chief like their father or their masters, and have a large retinue of slaves, for the favourite slaves are in no way anxious to see slavery abolished, because with its abolition they only foresee ruin to their ambitious views. thus you will understand me when i point out to you the weak spot in nine-tenths of the mission effort. they have been trying to look after the negro's soul and teaching him christianity, which in the native mind is cutting at the root, not only of all their ancient customs, but actually aims at taking away their living without attempting to teach them any industrial pursuit which may help them in the struggle for life, which is daily getting harder for our african brethren as it is here in england. when i am speaking of mission effort i ought to include government effort in the older colonies. no attempt has been made, as far as i am aware of, to open technical schools or to assist the natives to learn how to earn their living other than by being clerks or petty traders. secret societies and festivals in old calabar--and the countries up the cross river to describe all the customs of the old calabar people would take up more space than i am allowed to monopolise in this work. they have numerous plays or festivals, in which they delight to disguise themselves in masks of the most grotesque ugliness. these masks are, in most cases, of native manufacture, and seem always to aim at being as ugly as possible. i never have seen any attempt on the part of a native manufacturer of masks to produce anything passably good looking. egbo, the great secret society of these people, is a sort of freemasonry, having, i believe, seven or nine grades. to attempt to describe the inner working of this society would be impossible for me, as i do not belong to it. though several europeans have been admitted to some of the grades, none have ever, to my knowledge, succeeded in being initiated to the higher grades. the uses of this society are manifold, but the abuses more than outweigh any use it may have been to the people. as an example, i may mention the use which a european would make of his having egbo, viz., if any native owed him money or its equivalent, and was in no hurry to pay, the european would blow[ ] egbo on the debtor, and that man could not leave his house until he had paid up. egbo could be, and was, used for matters of a much more serious nature than the above, such as the ruin of a man if a working majority could be got together against him. this society could work much more swiftly than the course adopted in other rivers to compass a man's downfall; _vide_ will braid's trouble with his brother chiefs in new calabar. the country up the cross river, which is the main stream into the interior, improves a very few miles after leaving old calabar; in fact, the mangrove disappears altogether within twenty miles of duke town, being replaced by splendid forest trees and many clearings, the latter being, in some instances, the farms of old calabar chiefs. on arriving at ikorofiong, which is on the right bank of the river, you find yourself on the edge of the ikpa plain, which extends away towards opobo as far as the eye can see. i visited this place thirty-five years ago, and stayed for a couple of days in the mission house, the gentleman then in charge being a dr. bailey. at that time this was the farthest station of the old calabar mission; since then they have established themselves in umon, and have done great service amongst these people, who were previously to the advent of the mission terribly in the toils of their ju-ju priests. the people of umon speak a language quite different from the calabarese. umon is about one hundred miles by water from old calabar. twenty or thirty miles further up the cross river you come to the akuna-kuna country, inhabited by a very industrious race of people, great producers and agriculturists, and having abundance of cattle, sheep, goats and poultry. these people received one of her majesty's consuls with such joy and good feeling, and so loaded him with presents of farm produce, that his kroo boatmen suffered severely from indigestion while they remained in the akuna-kuna country. a little farther up the river is the town of ungwana, a mile or so beyond which is now to be found a mission station. this district is called iku-morut, and a few years ago the inhabitants were never happy unless they were at war with the akuna-kuna people. this state of things has been much modified by the presence in the country of protectorate officials. about sixty miles by river beyond iku-morut is the town ofurekpe, in the apiapam district. this place, its chief and people are everything to be desired, the town is clean, the houses are commodious, the inhabitants are friendly, and their country is delightful. they are a little given to cannibalism, but, i am very credibly informed, only practise this custom on their prisoners of war. beyond this point the river passes through the atam district, a country inhabited, so i was informed, by the most inveterate of cannibals. not having visited these people, i am not able to speak from personal experience; but as i have generally found in western africa that a country bearing a very bad character does not always deserve all that is said against it, i shall give this country the benefit of the doubt, and say that once the natives get accustomed to having white people visit them, and have got over the fearful tales told them by the interested middlemen about the ability of the white men to witch them by only looking at them, then they will be as easy to deal with, if not easier, than the knowing non-producers. i know of one interior town, not in old calabar, where the principal chief had given a warm welcome to a white man and allotted him a piece of ground to build a factory on, which he was to return and build the following dry season. before the time had elapsed the chief died, without doubt poisoned by some interested middleman. when the white man went up to the country according to his agreement, the new chief would not allow him to land, and accused him of having bewitched the late chief. the white trader was an old bird and not easily put off any object he had in view, so stuck to his right of starting trade in the country, and by liberal presents to the new chief at last succeeded in commencing operations, with the result that the new chief died in a very short time and the white man, who was put in charge of the factory, was shot dead whilst passing through a narrow creek on his way to see his senior agent, this being done in the interior country so as to throw the blame upon the people he was trading with. no one saw who fired the fatal shot, and the body was never recovered, as the boys who were with him were natives belonging to the coast people and in their fright capsized the small canoe he was travelling in, so they reported; but some months after the white man's ring mysteriously turned up, the tale being it was found in the stomach of a fish. i will here describe one other very practical custom that used to be observed all over the old calabar and cross river district, but which has disappeared in the lower parts of the river, owing no doubt to the efforts of the missionaries having been successful in instilling into the native mind a greater respect for their aged relatives than formerly existed. if it ever occurs nowadays in the calabar district it can only take place in some out of the way village far away in the bush, from whence news of a little matter of this kind might take months to reach the ears of the government or the missionary; but this custom is still carried on in the upper cross river, and consists in helping the old and useless members of the village or community out of this world by a tap on the head, their bodies are then carefully smoke-dried, afterwards pulverised, then formed into small balls by the addition of water in which indian corn has been boiled for hours--this mixture is allowed to dry in the sun or over fires, then put away for future use as an addition to the family stew. with all the cannibalistic tastes that these people have been credited with, i have only heard of them once ever going in for eating white men, and this occurred previous to the arrival in the old calabar river of the efik race, if we are to trust to what tradition tells us. it appears that in - four english sailors were captured by the then inhabitants of the old calabar river; three of them were immediately killed and eaten, the fourth being kept for a future occasion. whether it was that being sailors, and thus being strongly impregnated with salt horse, tobacco and rum, their flesh did not suit the palate of these natives i know not, but it is on record that the fourth man was not eaten, but kindly treated, and some years after, when another english ship visited the river, he was allowed to return to england in her. since that date, as far as i know, no white men have ever been molested by the old calabar people. there has been occasionally a little friction between traders and natives, but nothing very serious, though it is said some queer transactions were carried on by the white men during the slave-dealing days. footnotes: [ ] "shake-hand" was a present given by a trader each voyage on his arrival on the coast to the king and the chiefs who traded with him; the europeans themselves gradually increased this to such an extent that some of the kings began to look upon it as a right, which led to endless palavers; if it is not completely abolished by now, it ought to be. [ ] "dashing"--native word for making presents. this word is a corruption of a portuguese word. [ ] brohemie, founded by the late chief alluma between fifty and sixty years ago. chinomé, a powerful chief, fought with allumah in - for supremacy; the former was conquered, and died some few years after. chief dudu, not mentioned in the text, founded in dudu town, and is to-day a most loyal and respected chief. chief peggy died in . chief ogrie died in , chief bregbi also died some years ago. [ ] this preparation is made from the pericarp of the raphia vinifera pounded up into a pulplike mass, which they mix in the water in their canoes and then bale out into the water in the creek. [ ] one good thing the missionaries have done since they have been in brass, and that is, that, of persuading the natives, or at least the greater part of them, to give up the worship of this snake; and this part must have included the most influential portion of brass society, for since about the year the ju-ju snake is killed wherever seen without any disastrous consequences to the killer. [ ] as an evidence of how secret the natives of these parts have always tried to keep, and have to a great extent kept, the knowledge of the various various creeks from the white men since the abolition of the slave trade, i may point to this creek, which is clearly marked and the soundings given in the old charts, _circa_ , but was quite unknown to the present generation of traders, until capt. cawthorne, of the african steamship company rediscovered it about - . i well remember this creek being carefully described to me by bonny men in as the haunt of lawless outcasts from bonny and the surrounding countries, cannibals and pirates. about this time i was stationed in new calabar, and in roaming about the creeks looking for something to shoot, i came across this beautiful wide creek and followed it until i sighted breaker island; but being only in a small shooting canoe i was forced to turn back the way i had come. the next morning i was favoured by the visit of king amachree, the father of the present king, who said he had heard from his people that i had been down this creek, and he had come to warn me of the danger i ran in visiting that creek, giving me the same description that the bonny men had done some months earlier. i laughed and told him i had heard the same yarn from the bonny men. later in the same year i mentioned my visit to an old freeman in bonny, named bess pepple. he being a little inebriated at the time, let his tongue wag freely, and informed me that it was a creek often used by the slavers during the time the preventive squadron was on the coast, to take in their cargo. in one instance that he remembered he said there were five slavers up that creek when two of her majesty's gunboats were in bonny, about the year . about this time ( ) a mate of a ship who was in charge of a small schooner running between new calabar and bonny was forced by stress of weather to anchor inside the seaward mouth of this creek, and was attacked during the night by some natives, carried on shore, tied to a tree and flogged, the cargo of the schooner plundered, and the kroomen also flogged. complaint being made to the kings of new calabar and bonny, they both replied with the same tale: "we no done tell you we no fit be responsible for dem men who live for dem creek; he be dam pirate." this was true they had, but the mate swore he recognised some bonny men amongst his assailants. [ ] efik race--the inhabitants of old calabar, said to have come from the ibibio country, a district lying between kwo country and the cross river. [ ] jamming, a trade term, meaning making an agreement to buy or sell anything at an agreed price. [ ] this king is now dead, he was the last of the kings of new calabar, the country being now ruled over by a native council under the direction of the niger coast protectorate officials. [ ] this is an error into which the late consul hewett no doubt led mr. johnston, as ja ja had been since - a chief in bonny and recognised as one of the regents of that place; originally a slave, i will admit, but not a runaway one. [ ] this failing is called diplomacy in civilised nations. [ ] monopolies have led europeans on the west coast of africa to be equally as unscrupulous and bitter enemies of any one, white or black, who have attempted to dispute their trade monopolies. [ ] established in old calabar in . [ ] it is called blowing egbo because notice is given of the egbo law being set in motion against any one by one of the myrmidons of egbo blowing the egbo horn before the party's house. appendix ii part i a voyage to the african oil rivers twenty-five years ago. by john harford it was in the month of december, , when i with seventeen others left our good old port of bristol bound for one of the west african oil rivers on a trading voyage. it was a splendid morning for the time of year: bright, fine, and clear, when we were towed through our old lock gates, with the hearty cheers, good-byes, and god-speed-yous from our friends ringing in the air; and although there were some of us made sad by the parting kiss, which to many was the last on this earth, there was one whose heart felt so glad that he has often described the day as being one of the happiest in his life, and that one was your humble servant, the writer. our first start was soon delayed, as we had to anchor in king road and wait a fair wind. and now a word to any hearers who may be about to start on a new venture. always wait for a fair wind--when that comes make the best use you can of it. our fair wind came after some two weeks, and lasted long enough for us to get clear of the english land; but before we were clear of the irish, we encountered head winds again. being too far out to return, we had to beat our ship about under close reefed topsails for another week. this was a rough time for all on board. at last the wind changed, and we this time succeeded in clearing the bay of biscay and then had a fairly fine run until we reached st. antonia, one of the cape de verde islands. this we sighted early one morning, and in the brilliant tropical sunshine it appeared to me almost a heavenly sight. we soon passed on, the little island disappeared, and once more our bark seemed to be alone on the mighty ocean. after a week or so we sighted the mainland of that great and wonderful continent africa--wonderful, i say, because it has been left as if it were unknown for centuries, while countries not nearly its equal in any way have had millions spent upon them. our first land fall was a port of liberia. liberia, i must tell you, is part of the western continent with a seaboard of some miles. it was taken over by the american republic and made a free country for all those slaves that were liberated in the time of the great emancipation brought about by that good man william e. channing. here, on their own land, these people, who years before had been kidnapped from their homes, were once more free. after a week's buffeting about with cross currents and very little wind we at last reached the noted headland of cape palmas, a port of liberia; we anchored here for one night and next morning were under way again. this time, having a fair wind and the currents with us, we soon made our next stopping place, which was a little village on the coast-line called beraby. here we had our first glimpse of african life. directly we dropped anchor a sight almost indescribable met the eye of what appeared to be hundreds of large blackbirds in the water. we had not long to wait before we knew it was something more than blackbirds, for soon the ship was crowded from stem to stern with natives from the shore jabbering away in such a manner very alarming to a new-comer. i am not ashamed to confess that i was anything but sorry when the ship was cleared and we were off once more; this was soon done as we had only to take on board our kroo men, or boys, as they are always called, although some of them are as finely built as ever a man could wish to be. we took about twenty of these boys, who engage for the voyage and become, like ourselves, part of the ship's crew. after each one had received one month's pay from our captain, and duly handed it over to their friends, and said their good-byes, general good-wishes were given, and we again up anchor, and set sail for the well-known port of half jack, which ought to be called the bristol port of half jack, for here we met some half-dozen bristol ships, who gave our captain a regular good old bristol welcome. a few words about this important port may be of interest, although i am sorry to say we have managed to let it, valuable as it is, get into the hands of the french, like many more in that part. half jack is a very low-lying country with a large lagoon, as it is called running, between it and the mainland. along the sides of this lagoon the country villages are situated, which produce that great product palm oil; this is sold to the half jack men, who in turn sell to our bristol men and they ship it to all parts of europe. we now leave half jack to its traders and natives, and after our captain has paid his complimentary visits, we set sail for the gold coast town of accra; but before reaching that, we have to pass many fine ports and splendid headlands. axim, in particular, i must mention, as it has recently come very much to the fore, owing to the great quantity of mahogany that is now being exported from there, a wood that has revolutionised the furniture industries of this country--it has also enabled the thrifty men and women of england to make their homes more bright and cheerful by giving them the very cheap and beautiful furniture they could not have dreamed of years ago, when the only mahogany procurable was the black spanish, which was far too expensive for ordinary persons to think about. axim, in addition to this great export of wood, is the port of departure for the west african gold mines, and they will i have no doubt, in time prove of great value. the ancobra river empties itself here. axim being at its mouth, this river would be very useful in helping to develop the interior of this part, were it not that the mouth was so shallow and dangerous, two obstacles that the science of the future will, i expect, remove. we are now passing some of the finest specimens of coast scenery it is possible to see. i can better describe it by comparing it somewhat to our north devon and cornwall coasts, such splendid rocks and headlands and land that i venture to say will eventually prove very valuable. we next come to the important town of elmina, one of the departure ports of the ashantee country, and also where all noted prisoners are kept. king prempeh, late of ashantee, is now awaiting her majesty's pleasure there; many others have found elmina their home of detention after attempting to disobey our gracious queen's commands. cape coast castle is our next noted place. this is the chief departure port for the ashantee country, and was at one time the government seat for the gold coast colony. it is a very fine rock-bound port, and from the sea its square-topped, white-washed houses, and its castle on the higher promontory, form an imposing-looking picture. it is second to accra for importance in this part; much gold comes from here. it is also a celebrated place for the african-made gold jewellery, some of which is very beautiful in design and workmanship. the grey parrots form a great article of barter here. hundreds of these birds are brought to liverpool every week, i may almost say all from this place. the people are chiefly of the fantee tribe, and a fine and intelligent race they are. they have good schools, and many of the younger men ship off to other parts of the coast as clerks, &c. good cooks may be engaged from here, which is a fact i think well worth mentioning. and now we sail on to the present seat of government for the gold coast colony, accra. this is a fine country, a flat, table-like land along the front, with the hills of the hinterland rising in the background. the landing here is somewhat dangerous in the rough season, and great care has to be taken by the men handling the surf-boats to avoid them capsizing. many lives have been lost here in days gone by. i told you before why we called at the kroo village beraby, and the port of half jack. we now anchored at accra to engage our black mechanics, for which the place is noted. here you may procure any kind of mechanic you may mention--coopers, carpenters, gold-and silver-smiths, blacksmiths, &c. in those early days the coopers and carpenters were engaged to assist our bristol men, but to-day the whole of the work is done by the natives themselves. i do not think you would find a white cooper or carpenter in any of the lower ports, some of the natives being very clever with their tools. we also engaged our cooks, steward, and laundry men, which any establishment of any size in these parts must keep. for all these trades the natives have to thank chiefly the basel mission, which is, i believe, of swiss origin. this mission started years ago to not only teach the boys the word of god, but to teach them at the same time to use their hands and brains in such a way that they were bound to become of some use to their fellow men, and command ready employment. this mission, i cannot help feeling, has been one of the greatest blessings they have ever had on that great continent. it has sent out hundreds of men to all parts, and to-day the whole of the west coast is dependent upon accra for its skilled labour. this way of instructing the natives is now, i am pleased to say, being followed by nearly all our missionary societies, and it is certainly one of the best means of civilising a great people like the africans are. not to take powder and shot and shoot them down because they don't understand our christian law, but teach them how to make and construct, that they in time may become useful citizens, and that they may be better able to learn the value of the many valuable products growing in their midst, they will be ever thankful to us and bless our advent among them. these accra people are a very fine race, clean, and distinctly above the ordinary type of negro, clearer cut features, well-built men and women. the women, especially, are superior to any of the west africans i have met with up to the present. they, like their husbands, are fond of dress, and, like their husbands too, are hard-working and industrious; this was shown by the readiness of these people to undertake the porterage in the prompt manner they did for the late ashantee expedition, and which must have done a great deal towards bringing about the success of the same. you will be better able to understand this if you will suppose, we will say, six thousand men were landed at land's end, their destination being bristol, and with no train or horse to carry the food supply and ammunition, let alone the heavy guns. for this work some thousands of porters are required, each one of which must carry from to pounds in weight. this is carried on the head, and when i tell you these people think nothing of doing twenty miles a day, day after day, you will realise how physically strong they must be. the manner in which they rallied round the government--men, women, and children--as soon as it was decided an expedition should be sent, must have been very encouraging to those in command. one thing, however, about these accra people, while they have very much improved themselves in their dress they have not improved their villages as much as we would wish to see, but this will all come in time. our old towns used to abound in narrow courts and lanes, while we to-day like to see open spaces, broad streets, &c., with plenty of fresh air, knowing it is an absolute necessity to us, and it should be the first care of our councillors to do away as far as possible with all dens and alleys, so that if the cottage is small, the cottager can breathe pure, fresh air; for, as you all know, the working man's stock-in-trade is his health--when that goes, the cupboard is often bare. now, i think it is about time we hove anchor and said good-bye to accra. our coopers and carpenters are engaged, and our crew being completed we set sail for our destination. after being some four or five days crossing the bight of biafra, we sighted the island of fernando po. here our captain having to do a little business, we anchor for the night in the harbour of santa isabel. the little island of fernando po once belonged to us, but we exchanged it some years ago with the spanish government for another island in the west indies, which our government thought of more value. this, as far as the west coast was concerned, was a pity, because at the time i am speaking of the island was a flourishing place, with about half-a-dozen or so english merchants, and a fairly good hotel; but not so now, for while there is still business going on, the place is not advancing, and a place that does not advance must go back. the chief merchants there to-day are english. this the spanish would not have if they could help it, but being under certain obligations to them they suffer them to remain. the first view of fernando po when you arrive in the bay is a perfect picture; it makes one almost feel they would never like to leave there; its white houses all round the front on the higher level, its wharves and warehouses at the bottom, and its beautiful mountain rising magnificently in the background. its whole appearance is very similar to the island of teneriffe. it seems strange that here, almost in the middle of the tropics, if you have any desire to feel an english winter, you have only to go to the top of the fernando po mountain, which can easily be done in two days, or even less, for while at the foot the thermometer is registering ° or ° in the shade, on the top there is always winter cold and snow. now, i think we had better continue our journey. we took a few passengers on board, and then set sail for the cameroon river. this being only fifty or sixty miles distant, we were not long before we came to anchor off what is called the dogs' heads. here we had to wait the flood, and almost three-quarter tide, to enable our ship to pass safely over a shallow part of the river called the flats. now we come in sight of the then noted king bell's town, called after a king of that name. here our ship is moored with two anchors, and here she has to remain until the whole of her cargo has been purchased. this was done, and is even to-day, by barter, that is exchanging the goods our ship has brought out for the products of the country, which at that time consisted only of palm oil, ivory, and cocoa-nuts; but before we commence to trade the ship has to be dismantled--top spars and yards taken down, and carefully put away with the rigging and running gear; spars are then run from mast to mast, and bow to stern, forming a ridge pole; then rafters are fastened to these coming down each side, supported by a plate running along the side, supported by upright posts or stanchions; the rafters are then covered with split-bamboos, over these are placed mats made from the bamboo and palm trees. it takes, of course, some thousands of mats to cover the ship all over, but this is done in about a month, and all by natives who are engaged for that particular work and belonging to that place. our ship now being housed in, all hands who have not been sent to assist in taking another ship to england are given their different duties to assist the captain in carrying on the trade. trading in the cameroons each ship in those days had what was then called a cask house, that was a piece of land as nearly opposite as possible to where the ship lay moored. this land was always kept fenced round with young mangrove props or sticks, forming a compound; inside this compound would be two, perhaps three, fairly good sized stores or warehouses, and also an open shed for empty casks which had to be filled with palm oil and stowed in the ship for the homeward voyage. now the first work to be done after the ship was made ready for trading, was to land as much of her cargo as was not immediately required for trading purposes, such as salt, caskage, earthenware, and all heavy goods. salt in those days, as in the present, formed one of the staple articles of trade, therefore a ship would generally have from to tons of this on board, all of which would have to be landed into one of these store houses. at that time that meant a lot of labour, as every pound had to be carried by the natives from the boats to the store in baskets upon the head, over a long flat beach. to-day all this is altered, the salt is sent out in bags, and each store has a good iron wharf running out into the river with trolly lines laid upon it, which runs the goods right into the store, and so saves an immense amount of labour. after the salt came the casks, packed in what are called shooks; that is, the cask when emptied at home here, is knocked down and made into a small close package and in that condition only taking up an eighth part of the room it would take when filled with the palm oil, thus enabling the ship to carry, in addition to her cargo, enough casks to fill her up again completely when filled with oil. to carry on this work the crew of the ship was divided into two parts, one to work on board, the other on shore. the shore work was generally allotted to the kroo boys we engaged up the coast, with one of the white men in charge, while the white crew with three or four natives would work the ship. in addition to all this work, trade would be going on every day, which meant or so natives coming and going constantly from half-past five in the morning until three or four in the afternoon, when trade would cease for the day. this release, i need scarcely tell you, was most welcome to us all, for during the whole of this time the ship was nothing but a continual babel, which not unfrequently ended in a free fight all round, when, of course, a little force had to be used to restore quiet. the trading would be carried on in this way. the after end of the ship was partitioned off and made to resemble a shop as nearly as possible, in this were displayed goods of all kinds and descriptions too numerous to mention here. in front of this shop, at a small table, the captain sat, while an assistant would be in the shop ready to pass any goods that were required out to the purchasers, who first had to take their produce, whatever it might be, to the mate, who would be on the main deck to examine the oil and see that it was clean and free from dirt of any kind; he would also measure whatever was brought by the natives, then give them a receipt, or what was commonly called a book. this book was taken to the captain, who would ask what they required. all that could be paid for from the shop was handed over, while for the heavy goods another receipt or book was given which had to be handed to the man in charge of the store on the beach, who gave the native his requirements there. so the work would go on from day to day, and month to month, until the whole of the ship's cargo had been bought, then the mat roof was taken off, masts and spars rigged up, sails bent and the ship made ready to sail for old england. this, i must tell you, was a happy time for all on board, after lying, as we often did, some fourteen or fifteen months in the manner i have described. during these long months many changes took place; some of our crew fell ill with fever, and worst of all dysentery, one of the most terrible diseases that had to be contended with at that time. three of our number, one after the other, we had to follow to the grave, while others were brought down to a shadow. here i experienced my first attack of african fever, which laid me low for some two weeks. i remember quite well getting out of my bed for the first time; i had no idea i had been so ill; i could not stand, so had to return to my berth again. this was a rough time for us--we had no doctor, and very little waiting upon, i can tell you. if the constitution of the sufferer was not strong enough to withstand the attack he generally had to go under, as it was impossible for the captain to look after the sick and do his trade as well, and as he was the only one supposed to know anything about medicine, it was a poor look out. (i have known, after a ship had been out a few months, not a white man able to do duty out of the whole of the crew.) these were our hard times, as, in addition to working all day, the white crew had to keep the watch on board through the night, while the kroo boys did the same on shore. so that when any of our men were ill, the watch had to be kept by the two or three that were able. many a night after a hard day's work i have fallen fast asleep as soon as i had received my instructions from the man i relieved. i fear my old captain got to know this, for he used to come on deck almost always in my watch, and sometimes ask me the time, which i very rarely could tell him. one night he caught me nicely. i was fast asleep, when suddenly i felt something very peculiar on my face. i put my hands up to rub my eyes as one does when just awakening, and, to my horror, my face was covered with palm oil, our captain standing at the cabin door laughing away. "what is the matter?" he said; "has anything happened?" "yes," i replied; "you have given me the contents of the oil-can." i need scarcely tell you i did not sleep much on watch after that. the wonder to me now is that we did not lose more lives during that trying time. rumours of wars, as they were called, amongst the natives occasionally reached us, but we were left pretty much unmolested. one day the captain and i had a free fight with fifty or sixty natives, some of whom had stolen a cask from our store, which i happened to discover. we got our cask back and a few of them had more than they bargained for. another time while i was on board a ship fitting out for home, the captain of her saw a native chief coming alongside who was heavily in his debt, so he made up his mind, without saying a word to any one, to make him a prisoner, so he invited him downstairs to have a glass of wine, leaving the forty or so people who had accompanied their chief in his canoe on deck. the captain then quietly locked him up, the chief shouted for assistance, his people rushed down and the tables were soon turned, for they took the captain prisoner and nearly killed him into the bargain, one man striking him with a sword nearly severed his hand from his arm, the two or three whites on board were powerless. the natives having taken complete charge of the ship, we managed to hoist our flag for assistance, which was soon at hand, but too late to be of any use, for as soon as they had liberated their chief from his imprisonment, they all made off as quickly as they could to their own village. the captain was of course greatly to blame for not saying a word to any of us of his intention and for so underrating the strength of the chief's people. the chief was eventually brought to justice, however, by our own consul. one other little break occurred to me to vary the monotony of those long months. attached to our ship was a small cutter which used to run down to small villages outside the cameroon river. to one called victoria i journeyed once with the mate and our little craft on a small trading venture. victoria is situated at the foot of the splendid cameroon mountain, which, like its neighbour at fernando po, always has snow at the peak; it is over , feet high and at that time only one or two men had ventured to the summit--one was, i believe, the late sir richard burton. since then several others have succeeded, amongst them the present sir harry johnston, who did a lot of travelling when he was vice-consul, in those parts. victoria is a snug little place. it was founded some years ago by a very old missionary, a mr. seagar, a man who did a great work in his time and whose name will never be forgotten in the cameroon river. it lies in what is called ambas bay, which is sheltered somewhat from the south-west winds by two small islands. on one of these a british consulate was erected a few years ago. the whole of this part as well as the cameroon river is now a portion of the german colony. we soon completed our business here and returned once more to our duties in the river. between victoria and cameroon is the village of bimbia, said to be one of the most noted slave depots in the district. hundreds of slaves used to be shipped from here in the days when the trade was allowed, and it is said that some time after the trade was prohibited one of these slave ships was just about to embark her human freight, when a british man-o'-war hove in sight. the captain, thinking his ship would be taken--and it was, i believe--and wanting to secure the golden dollars he had, took them to the shore and buried them. this is said to be thousands and thousands of pounds and is still unfound, so goes the tale. i tell it to you as it was told to me. our daily routine in the river was so similar that we will now consider the whole of the ship's cargo had been bought, and she is getting ready to make a start for home, which we were all very glad of; but our joy did not last long, for the mail arriving just at that time with letters from england, the captain received communication from our owners that they were sending out another ship, which he was instructed was for our chief mate to take charge of. that meant that the mate would have to remain to lay the cargo of her, while our old ship went home; but the poor man had been very ill for some time previous to this news, and was totally unfit to take charge; so under the circumstances there was only one thing to be done, and that was for the captain to remain and send the mate home. as soon as this was decided upon, two of us were asked to stay behind and help to work the newly-arrived vessel. i was one, the cook was the other (our skipper liked to be looked after in the eating department). well, we soon settled down in our new quarters, and in a week or so said good-bye to our old ship and shipmates, who were jolly glad to get out of the river, and did not envy us poor fellows who had to go through all the old duties over again without a bit of change. however, we entered upon our work with cheerful hearts. we had a good captain, and had no intention of leaving him as long as he remained out. perhaps a word or two about the natives' trade tricks might interest you, then you will see a mate's life on an african trading ship was not altogether a "bed of roses"; and he had to be pretty sharp to catch them, otherwise our wily friends would be sure to have him. for instance, they had a happy knack of half-filling their casks with thick wood, secured in such a way to the inside of the heads that, instead of there being fifty gallons of oil in the cask which it would measure by the gauging rod, it would possibly not contain more than twenty-five; water, too, was very often introduced to make up a deficiency, and if you happened to tell our friend his oil contained water, you were told not water, it is rain. another dodge was to mix a certain kind of herb with the oil, which caused it to ferment, so that half casks could very easily be made to look full ones. dirt as well was freely used by the natives when they thought they could get it passed, so one had to keep one's eyes open. appendix ii part ii pioneering in west africa; or, "the opening up of the qua iboe river" in the year , i was asked by a liverpool firm to undertake certain work in connection with one of the trading establishments on the old calabar river. the offer came at a very opportune time. being anxious to improve my position, like most young fellows, i accepted, and was soon on the way to my new undertaking. my first business was to take an old ship, that had seen the best of her days, and had been lying there in the stream for many years as a trading hulk, now being considered unsafe to remain longer afloat. i had to place her on the beach in such a way that she could still be used as a trading establishment. this was not a small matter, as the beach upon which she had to be placed was not a good one for the purpose. however, i found that if i could get her to lie on a certain spot i had carefully marked out, there was every possibility of a success; but i fear i was the only one that thought so, as it was fully twelve months before my senior would let me undertake the venture; at last i got his consent, and in a very short time the vessel was landed safely, and, i am pleased to say, did duty for over ten years. it was while waiting for this consent that the beginning of the events i am going to narrate took place. business was somewhat quiet in the old calabar, so our senior thought he would go for a bit of an excursion to a place called qua iboe, which was supposed to be a small tributary of the great river of old calabar, but which he found to his astonishment was some twenty-five miles westward of the mouth of the old calabar, and ninety miles from our main station at calabar; however, he did not like to return without seeing the place, so he and his crew went, and after two or three days' journey, they suddenly found themselves in the midst of breakers, and it was only by luck they got washed into the mouth of the river qua iboe, half-dead with fright, so much so that our senior would not venture back in the boat, but preferred walking overland. after being absent seven or eight days, he returned to headquarters with a very lively recollection of what he had gone through. not being accustomed to the sea, the knocking about of the small boat very much upset him, then the long overland journey back took all the pleasure out of what he had intended to be a little holiday. consequently, on his return he had but little to say about the river he had gone to see; and not being of a talkative disposition, had i not pressed him on the subject, i think, as far as our establishment was concerned, the qua iboe would have been a blank space on the map to-day, as many more fine places are in that great continent. so while we were at dinner, an evening or so after his return, feeling very anxious to hear something about his excursion, i remarked that we had not heard him say much about the new river. "no," said he; "for the simple reason is that i know but very little about it, except that i nearly got capsized in the breakers." "well," i said, "is it a river of any size? would it not be a good place to open up a new business?" "oh, yes!" he said; "the river is a fair size, and it may or may not be a good place for business. we can't go there, we have not the means; we could not go without a vessel of some sort." "well," said i, "would you go if you could? or, in other words, will you give me all the support i need if i undertake to go?" "yes, certainly," he said; "i shall be only too pleased to give you anything we have here." that night i got to work and laid out all my plans. first i had to find a vessel. we had attached to our hulk a good large boat that would carry about ten tons. this boat i soon got rigged up with mast and sails. this done, i had a house constructed about sixty or seventy feet long by twenty wide, made ready to be put up on whatever spot i should pitch upon when i reached my new destination. this work, of course, took some little time. however, the eighth day after i had my senior's consent to go, i was sailing away from the old calabar, with my little craft and sixteen people besides myself. it took some four or five days to get to the long-looked-for qua iboe. at last we were rewarded with a glimpse of the bar and its breakers, which we had to pass before we could get into the river. we, however, reached it safely, and with thankful hearts i can tell you, as our journey had been anything but a pleasant one--so many of us in such a small craft. i felt bound to take this number, as in addition to wanting these people for the building of the establishment, i wished to make as big a show as i could to the, at that time, unknown natives, who had the reputation of being as bad a lot as were to be met with anywhere on the west coast. anyhow, i thought they would have to be pretty bad if i could not make something of them, so i sailed my boat flying up the river to the first village, which was supposed to be the senior one in the river, and was always called big town. it was just dusk when we arrived. we dropped anchor, and decided to rest for the night; but i found the villagers very excited, and not liking at all my advent among them, as they had just had news from the up-country informing them that if they allowed a white man to remain in their river, king ja ja, who was the very terror not only of this place, but of some fifty or sixty miles all round, had threatened to burn their towns down; he laying claim to all this country, allowed no one to trade there but himself. the advice i had from these people was that i had better go back and leave them and their river to themselves. but i said, no, i am not going back. i have come to open a trading station and to remain with you, and that king ja ja, or any one else but our british consul, would never drive me from that river alive. i saw, though, it was useless taking any notice of these frightened people, so i up anchor the next morning, and sailed up the river; near the next village i saw a suitable spot for our establishment. i at once anchored our boat, landed our people with house and everything we had brought, put up a bit of a shanty to sleep under for the time, and set to work to build our house; this, i may tell you, did not take long, for by the end of the week we had a fine-looking place up, such a one had never been seen in that part before. the house complete, my next work was to get goods for the natives to buy from us. this meant a journey for me. ten days after our first arrival, our house and store were up and built, and i was away to the old calabar in our boat with some of my people to get goods to start our trade with; the remainder stayed to put the finishing touches to our building and to clear the land near. i was soon back at my post again and trade started. after this i had to make several journeys to keep our supply good, and all went well for about three months, with the exception of continuous rumours as to what king ja ja intended to do; these i took no notice of, as i did not anticipate he would molest me or my people. however, my peaceful occupation was not to last for long; for while i was away at old calabar replenishing our stock, a day or two previous to my return king ja ja, with about a thousand of his men, pounced down unexpectedly on these qua iboe people, burnt down seven villages, took one hundred prisoners, and drove the remainder of the population into the woods, cutting down every plantain tree, and destroying everything in the way of food stuff that was growing in the place. i arrived off the bar the day after this terrible business had taken place. when i left the river i left twelve of my people there. the head man had instructions that as soon as they saw me off the bar, when the tide was right for me to come in, to hoist a white flag. the day i arrived, after waiting until i knew high water must have passed, i took my glasses, but there was not a soul visible. not caring to risk our little vessel without the signal, i took a small boat we had with us and started over the bar into the river. what my surprise was you will readily understand when, arriving at the store, i found only one man, half-dead with fright, and crying like a child; all i could get out of him was that ja ja had been there and killed every one in the place. the first thing i did was to at once return to the vessel, and bring her in with the remainder of my people. we landed all our stores, then i immediately hoisted our english ensign on the flag-staff. i prayed to the almighty to defend us and the country from the tyranny of these dreadful men who had caused so much misery for these poor people. their wretchedness i was soon brought face to face with. the morning after my arrival, if ever a man's heart was softened mine was, and the tears came to my eyes when i saw crawling into the house from the woods a poor, half-starved cripple child, covered with sores, and in a dreadful state. we took it in at once and cared for it. then i sent my people into the woods to see if they chanced to come across any one, and to tell them to come in under our flag, and i would see that no harm again befell them. in this we were very successful, for one after the other they arrived, more dead than alive, until some of them were in and around our house. the next thing to be thought about was food for them. my last cargo fortunately was all rice and biscuits. this relieved me somewhat, and i felt we could at least manage for a short time. to find food for such a great number gave me, as you may suppose, serious thought, for there was not a scrap left in the district; the land in this particular part being of a poor nature, the food grown at the best of times was very small, and this little had all been destroyed. but we had not to wait long before witnessing one of the greatest blessings that could have happened. as soon as the men had somewhat recovered from their fright, they began to go out into the river to fish, when such quantities were caught that never in the remembrance of any person in that country had such an amount of fish been seen. load after load was brought to the shore, in fact, some had to spoil before it could be cured. what did all this wonderful catch bring about? while a short time before these people had been in the greatest poverty and distress, now they are rejoicing and thankful for this abundance of food and wealth. i say wealth because fish in this part of africa is more precious than gold with us. with fish anything can be bought in the market, from the smallest article to the largest slave. so you see here was our relief brought about by the ever bountiful providence, whose all-seeing eye is ever near those who are in want and need and ask his aid, whether it be the poorest slave in africa or the orphan child in england. from this time we began to gather strength day by day. new arrivals came in who had managed to get away to some place of safety until they felt they could return to their native place with security. as soon as ja ja and his men had destroyed the villages they returned to their town of opobo, with the hundred prisoners, the whole of whom they massacred in cold blood, and exhibited to their townspeople, and, i am sorry to say, to some europeans, for days. while this fearful murdering was going on twenty-five miles away from us i, with a few of the most courageous ibunos, or qua iboe people, made a tour of the principal villages in the ibuno country to let the inhabitants know of the deadly onslaught that had been committed on the people at the mouth of the river. they all swore to stand by us to a man, and to keep themselves free from ja ja's tyrannical rule. after making this round we returned to the mouth of the river and turned our attention to the defence of the new villages that were about to be built. a little accident occurred to us while leaving the last village, called ikoropata, that may be worth mentioning as a warning to others who might be placed in a similar situation. we had just started after having a long palaver with the chiefs, our men, about twenty, marching in single file, i near the leading man. all at once i noticed he was carrying his gun in a very alarming and unsuitable way. had it gone off by accident, which is not an unusual occurrence, the man behind him was bound to receive the contents, with perhaps fatal results. having stopped them and explained the danger of carrying guns in this position, we started off again, every man with his weapon to his shoulder. strange to say, a few minutes after the very man's gun i had noticed at first blew off into the air with a tremendous report. had this happened before, i fear we might have had to take one of our comrades back more dead than alive. the escape was a marvellous one, and not easily forgotten by any of us. now being back amongst our own people, we set about to get all the guns we could together, and all able bodied men i told off for gun practice and defence drill. this i carried on day after day, until we had quite a little band of well-trained men. all this time we were continually receiving rumours from the opobo side as to what ja ja's next intentions were, and to keep up the excitement he sent about men as near the mouth of the river as he dared. they settled themselves in a creek two or three miles away from us, and here they used to amuse themselves by letting off now and again a regular fusilade of guns. this generally occurred in the middle of the night when every one but the watchmen had gone to sleep, and had such an effect on the frightened ibunos that often two-thirds of them would rush off to the woods under the impression that the opobos were again making a raid upon them. this went on for weeks, so much so that i was almost losing heart, and sometimes thought i should never get confidence in the people. at last, to my great surprise one evening in walked to my house the whole of the chiefs, who had just held a meeting in the village and passed a law that no person should again leave the town. they said they had come to tell me they felt ashamed of themselves for running away so many times and leaving me alone and unprotected in their country, and had decided to leave me no more, but that every man should stand and die if needs be for the defence of their towns. whether ja ja's people heard of this resolution i don't know, but they soon dropped their gun firing at night, and eventually left their camping ground. their next move was to get into the ibunos' markets, and worry them there. this i was determined should not be done if i could help it. it was a long time before there was any real disturbance, although i could see that the ibunos were daily getting more frightened that the opobo people would monopolise their markets, and in that case they knew there would be very little chance for them. at last news came down the river that the opobos had that afternoon sent a canoe to a market or town called okot for the purpose of starting a trade with the natives. now okot was at that time one of the best markets the ibunos had, and for them to be suddenly deprived of this trading station would be a terrible calamity to us all. i did not know what was to be done. the ibunos would not go to the market to face the opobos, neither would they go further up the river for fear of being molested by them. the only thing to do was to go myself and start a station at the same place, and which would enable me to keep an eye on their movements, so i at once made ready to start the same evening, and by five o'clock next morning i landed at okot, and found the opobo canoe there also, but like all africans, time not being an object to them, they had not gone to the king or the owner of the land at the landing place. we did not wake the opobos up on our arrival, but i immediately started for the village, and at daylight walked into the presence of the king of that part, who was so surprised to see a white man in his village that it took him some time to believe his eyes. poor old chap! i fear he must have wished several times afterwards that he had never seen a white man, for he was taken prisoner by the government in or for insisting, i believe, in carrying out some human sacrifice at one of the feast times, and died in prison. but to return to my mission. i soon made him understand that i had come to start a trading station at his beach, but before doing this i had to secure the land at the landing place for the purpose. this he readily consented to, telling me at the same time that although the land at that particular spot did not belong to him he would instruct the owner of it to sell me all i wanted. so after paying the usual compliments to the old king, i started back for the landing place with the owner, who had already sold his right to me, and was now only coming to show us the extent, which was the whole of the land of any use on this spot. just as we got back we found our opobo friends preparing to go to the village to see the king and also get permission to build on this land, but their surprise on being told by him that he had no land on the spot to give them i will leave you to imagine. but the opobos at that time took a lot of beating, and they decided to build a house without getting the permission of any one, and an iron roofed house too, which was considered by the natives then a great thing. after the house had stood for some time, our consul being in the river, we had the disputed land brought before him and thoroughly discussed. after hearing evidence on both sides for two days, it was decided that it belonged to us, and the opobos were ordered to remove their house. but before this settlement occurred we had a lot to contend with from them. they did all in their power to debar us from keeping our establishments open there, and for two or three years we had continual trouble with them, occasionally firing at our people; luckily they seldom hit any one. then they tried competing with us in trading. this i did not mind, as i considered it a fair means of testing who was who. ja ja, i knew, was a very rich man, and if we attempted to follow them in their extravagant prices we should soon be ruined. my policy was to let them go ahead, which they did, paying almost twice as much for their produce as we could possibly afford to pay. this lasted a great deal longer than i anticipated, and i feel sure ja ja must have lost a deal of money. after about twelve months of this reckless trading we were left pretty much to ourselves at okot, and being fairly well settled down i began to look about for a good beach to start my next establishment. i had not to look far. on the left bank of the river, about two and a half miles down from okot, was the landing beach of eket. here there is a rising cliff about fifty feet high, and i had often remarked when passing this spot, "if i were going to build a house to live in here i should like to build it on this hill." the situation was so good, as it was right in an elbow of the river, and from the top of the hill you had a view of the river branching off both up and down at right angles. an opportunity occurring for me to start a house at eket, i went and saw the people, who were very pleased for me to come among them. so a little house was built, and a young coloured assistant named william sawyer placed in charge, who proved to be one of the best men i ever had in the country. he needed to be, too, for the ekets were the most trying of any of the peoples we had to deal with. i never left my stations for any length of time. once or twice a week i visited them, but no matter how short a time i was away there was always a grievance to be settled at eket. poor sawyer had a terrible time; the people had an idea they could do as they liked with the factory keeper, and would often walk off with the goods without paying for them, which mr. sawyer naturally objected to, usually ending in a free fight, sometimes my people coming off second best. the trade at that time at eket was not large, although it was a good one, and i did not want to give it up if it could be helped. but my patience came to an end when i arrived upon the scene one day and found mr. sawyer had been terribly handled the day before. there had been a big row, and i could see by his face he had had very much the worst of the fight. i felt i could not allow this any longer, so summoned a meeting of all the chiefs and people. we had a very large meeting, one of the largest i ever remember, and after explaining to them my reason for calling them together, told them it was my intention to close the little house and go to some people higher up the river, who would be pleased for us to come among them, and would not ill-use my people as the ekets were doing, and showing them how badly they had treated mr. sawyer, who had done nothing more than his duty in trying to protect the property that was under his care, and which they seemed to think they had a better right to than he. when they had heard my complaint and warning to close the house, the old and ever respected chief of all the ekets rose to his feet. the people seeing this, there was silence in a moment (which every one knows who has happened to have been present at an african palaver is indeed a rarity), he being much loved and reverenced in his own town. as soon as he started i felt we were going to hear something worth hearing, and we did, for if ever there was a born statesman this was one. he said, "we have heard with sorrow of the way in which your people have been so ill-used by our people, and it is a shame to us a stranger should be so treated who is trying to do his best to bring business among us. not only have you brought a business to us, where we can come and exchange our produce for our requirements, but you have opened our eyes to the light, as it were, and we have no intention that you should leave us. you have been sent to us by abassy (which means god), and he will never let you leave us. your trade will grow in such a way that you will see here on this beach far more trade than you will be able to cope with, so cast away from your mind the thought of leaving us. the disturbances that have been going on we will stop. it is not our wish that it has been so; it is the young boys of the village who know no better. we will put a stop to it in such a way that you will find your people from this time will have but little to complain about." after such a speech you may be sure i gave up all thought of leaving the eket people, and i need scarcely tell you that this same spot has become the centre of the whole of the trade of this river. the words spoken by the venerable and, i believe, good old chief came as true as the day. we did see often and often more trade than we could cope with, and the establishment grew in such a way that the natives themselves often used to wonder. i never had anything to do with a more prosperous undertaking in africa, and to-day there are few establishments on the west coast that can surpass it, either in its quiet, steady trade or healthy climate. i used to say one could live as long as they liked. on the hill there is a very fine house, with acres and acres of good land at the back of it, while at the foot of the hill are all the stores and the shop where the daily work and trade goes on year in year out. several very remarkable incidents happened here. one evening, just as we were going to dinner, a woman came and stood a little way from the house. i could see that she was crying bitterly and evidently in great distress. "what is the matter?" i said. "affya (that is her brother) is dying, and i want you to come and see him before it is too late." now affya was one of the finest young fellows at eket, and one whom i felt would be a sad loss to a people who wanted so much leading and governing, as it were. so i lost no time, but went off at once with the woman to see if i could do anything. on our arrival at the house things looked bad enough, and i feared the worst when i saw him laid out, as every one there thought, for dead--the finest young fellow at eket. i fell on my knees by his side and prayed as earnestly as man could to our heavenly father, and begged for this life to be spared to us. all at once he moved as though suddenly aroused from sleep, and in a moment i had him up and on the back of one of my boys, and away to eket house as fast as possible, and laid him on the verandah to sleep and rest free from the close and stuffy hut he had been in before. after a little nourishment he slept all night. i kept watch near him, and next morning what was my surprise when he told me he was feeling quite strong and able to walk back to the village. this i allowed him to do after the sun had got well high, as i could plainly see the lad was out of all danger. should these lines ever get into the hands of that lad, for lad he will always be to me, i feel very sure he will say, "yes, this wonderful returning to life did indeed happen to me, affya, son of uso, at eket, at the village of usoniyong, in the month of july, ." this is one of the many incidents that occurred whilst i was in charge at eket and the qua iboe river. another evening, just after dinner, my steward came to me saying there was a rat under the house (our house stood on iron columns). "a rat," i said; "what do you mean?" "well, a small woman." "go and bring her up; do not be afraid." he looked at me as much as to say you will be afraid when i do bring her up. presently he appeared with a child in his arms, such a sight i never shall forget--almost starved to death, and covered with marks where she had been burnt with fire-sticks. this poor little thing, after wandering many days in the wood, at last found her way to our house. she was too ill to have anything done to her that evening, so i had a bed made for her in the sitting-room, close to my door, so that i could hear should she get frightened in the night. the little thing woke up many times, but was soon off to sleep again when i had patted and spoken to it. the next day we had her seen to, the steward boy set about and made her some dresses, and after a warm bath and plenty of food, in a few days the little girl was the life of our house. the poor little thing had been left without father or mother, and had become dependent upon an uncle, or some other relative, who had ill-used her in such a terrible manner that he had left her for dead. how she ever found strength to get to our house was almost a mystery. after being with us for twelve months, some other relatives laid claim to her, and as i was just leaving for england, i allowed them to take her, but not without making four or five of the principal chiefs responsible for her welfare. she will now be a grown woman, but will look back upon those happy months with pleasure, i feel sure. another incident may be of interest--quite a change of scene--showing you how you may be as kind and as good to a people as it is possible to be, yet you must always be ready to defend yourself at a moment's notice, which will be seen from the following circumstances. we had been troubled for some time past with night robberies, not very serious at first, but they became more frequent than i cared about. i gave the matter serious attention, but we could not trace the thieves, do what we would; the strange thing was, that as soon as a robbery had been committed, a native, a sort of half slave, was sure to be seen about the beach putting on what seemed to me a sort of bravado manner; but, of course, he never knew anything about the people who had been tampering with the premises, and he always appeared to be surprised to think that any one should do such a thing, but at last matters came to a climax; our plantain trees had been cut down, and a whole lot of fine plantains stolen, as well as a lot of wire fencing. i was vexed to the extreme when this dastardly work was brought to my notice. but what was my surprise, no sooner had my lad reported the matter to me, when along walked the very man i have just described, looking as bold as brass. said i to myself, "if you have not done this stealing you know something about it, and you will have to give an account of your movements before you leave these premises." so i sent orders to have him immediately put under arrest, which was done, and he was given to understand that until the thieves, whoever they were, had been brought to justice, he would have to remain under arrest. this was an unexpected blow for my friend, but he proved one too many for my people. he managed to get the best side of his keeper, and slipped; next morning we had no prisoner, the bird had flown. i knew he would work no good for us in the villages, neither did he; he went from village to village, right through the eket country, telling the people the most dreadful things, and the most abominable lies, of what had been done to him the short time he was our prisoner; so much so, that he got the people quite furious against me and my people. just as an agitator will work up strife in england if he is not checked, so it was with this man; he got every village to declare war against me. this went on for three or four days, until he got them all to concentrate themselves. they were all brought one night to within a quarter of a mile of our establishment; here they had their war dances all night, yet i did not think there was any likelihood of their attacking us. still, for a couple of days things did not appear right, the people seemed strange in their manner; so i thought it not wise to be caught napping, and i made some preparations for an attack if we were to have one, and had the gatling gun placed in position at the rear of the house. this i felt was quite enough to defend the house, if i could but get a fair chance to use it, although i was in hope i should not be called upon to do so. we had not long to wait, for at . in the morning after a continuous beating of drums all night, i got up and walked out on the verandah, which was my usual custom, not thinking we were going to be attacked, but when i looked round, the wood and bush seemed to be alive with people, and some of them were already advancing towards the house, while one chief, more daring than the others, came on near enough for me to speak to him. seeing this unexpected development of affairs, and the suspicious look of my friend near at hand, i called to my boy, who was near, to bring my revolver, and no sooner had the chief got within twenty paces or so of the house, when i called upon him to stop and tell me what was their mission so early in the morning. he said they had come to talk over the matter of the man i had imprisoned. but i said this is not the time of day we usually talk over matters we may have in dispute--the afternoon being always the recognised time. "yes," said my friend, "but we want to settle matters now." "all right," i said, and with that i held my revolver at his head, and ordered him to stand, and not move an inch, or i would shoot him dead on the spot. the people at the back, seeing what was taking place, began to move towards the house. i said to my boy, "run to the beach and tell mr. sawyer to come up." this was my coloured assistant, whom i knew i could trust. the lad was away, and mr. sawyer at my side before the people had got too near. "what am i to do, sir?" "take this revolver and hold it to that man's head, whilst i jump to the gatling; if he moves, shoot him down." there was not half a move in him, and in a moment i was at the gatling. by this time there was a general move forward from all parts of the bush, but no sooner did this black mass see i was at the gun, and determined to fight or die, quicker than i can write these words, i saw the whole body fall back in dismay. there was my opportunity. i jumped from the gatling, went straight to the people, and demanded of them what they wanted to do. their answer was--"we don't know; we are a lot of fools, and we have lost our heads; send us back, we have no business to come to fight against you, and we don't want to." by seven o'clock that morning the trade was going on in our establishment as though nothing had happened. this little incident i have always described as a bloodless battle, won in a few moments; yes, in almost less time than it has taken me to write its description. this matter we finally settled, after holding a large meeting with all the chiefs and people. the laws of these people are very definite; you must have absolute proof of a person's guilt, before you can even accuse him. i had to sit as judge over my own case, which was rather an unfair position for one to be placed in. but as the laws are definite it was simple enough to decide. the question was--"had i any proof that this man was one of the thieves, or in any way connected with the affair?" i had not; my evidence was purely suppositional. this ended the matter. i was in the wrong, therefore i had no alternative but to put a fine upon myself, which i did, and was very pleased to end what had nearly cost me my life, and probably also a number of my people. after this affairs went on merrily at eket. there was a place called okon some few miles up the river from eket, and here i proposed to start another establishment, so had made all preparations at ibuno for that purpose, and left the latter place with my boat, people, provisions and materials. we arrived at okot overnight, intending to sleep there, as it was the nearest beach to okon. all went well until the next morning, when we were preparing to start. my factory keeper at okot came to me in the most serious manner possible, wanting to know if i really meant going to okon. i said "certainly, we have come up for the purpose." "well," he said, "i think you had better not go; there are very nasty rumours about here that it is intended to do you some harm if you should attempt to open up at okon; in other words, men have been appointed to take your life." "all right," i said; "we must take our chance; we shall not turn back until we have tried." so away we went, i in a small boat with a few boys, the others in another boat with the etceteras. we arrived at okon and landed our goods, but we found a number of ja ja's people had arrived before us. i took no notice of them any more than passing the time of day. however, i must confess i did not like their demeanour. nothing was said and our provisions were safely housed in a native shanty. here i intended to remain while building our own house. the timber, iron and other goods were placed on the spot we intended to occupy. this done, i started off with a couple of boys to acquaint the king and the people of the village of our arrival, and to get the king or some of his chiefs to come down and allot me the land i required. we had been in the village some little time, and matters were well-nigh settled, when all at once there was a general stampede from the meeting house, and just at that moment i heard a regular fusilade of guns, and in came running one of my people from the beach, nearly frightened to death. "massa, massa, come quick to the beach; ja ja's men have burnt down the house and want to shoot us all, and all our goods are in their hands." by this time a lot of ja ja's men were in the village, and i was left absolutely alone with the exception of my own boys and the one that had run up from the beach. every native had rushed to his compound as soon as the firing had commenced. i turned to my boys, told them not to fire, but to keep cool, do as i told them, and be ready to protect themselves if any one attacked them, not else. so down we slowly walked to the beach. here was a sight for me! all my goods thrown to the four winds, my house burnt to the ground, and about a hundred or more of ja ja's or opobo men arranged up in line, every man with his rifle and cutlass, ready to fight, which they evidently anticipated i should do as soon as i appeared on the scene; but this i had no intention of doing. to attempt to show fight against such odds would have been simply suicidal, so i made up my mind to show the best front possible under the circumstances, called my boys, placed them in equal numbers on either side of me, with our backs to the bush and facing our would-be enemies. i then inquired what they wished to do. drawing my revolver, which was a six chambered one, i held it up. "if you want my life you may have it, but, first, _let me tell you, inside this small gun i hold six men's lives; those six men i_ will _have_, then you may have me." not a word was uttered. then i said, "if you do not want that, i and my people will leave you here in possession of these goods and the house that you have already partly destroyed." with this i ordered my boys to the boats, to which we went quietly and in order, leaving our opobo friends dumbfounded and baulked of the main object of their mission. when we had got well clear of the beach i was thankful indeed, for never was a man nearer death than i was at that time, i think. we went down to ibuno as fast as our boats could go, our boys singing as kroo boys can sing when they feel themselves free from danger. i only stayed a few hours at ibuno. as soon as the tide served i made right away to old calabar to lay the whole affair before h.m. consul. after this i felt i had done my duty in the matter of the opobo business. the affair was, of course, settled against the opobos, and they had to leave the okon beach to us absolutely. i must not deal with the rough side only of pioneer life in west africa, so i think i will just touch upon one of the many kindnesses shown to me by the ibunos during these troublous times. the qua iboe bar, like many others along the coast, more so in this particular part, is very treacherous, being composed of quicksand. it is always on the move, so the channel changes from place to place. sometimes you go in and out at one side, sometimes at the other, and sometimes straight through the centre. these moving sands require a great deal of careful watching and constant surveying, which i used to invariably see to and do myself about once a fortnight. while out on this work one day, with four boys and mr. williams, who at that time had a small establishment at ibuno, and was as anxious as i was to know the true position of the channel, we were both working small sailing craft--we had not risen to a steamer then--(now there is, and has been for a considerable time, one working the same river), and started off, the weather being fairly fine, and to all appearances the sea very quiet. all went well with us going out. i got soundings right through the channel, and after passing safely we turned our boat about to come back into the river again. along we came until we got right into the centre of the bar, then suddenly a sea took us, and before any one could speak the boat was over. we were under water and the boat on top of us. being a good swimmer, i was not afraid, but immediately dived down and came up alongside the boat. my boys were round me like a swarm of fish, not knowing whether i could swim or not. i soon put their minds at rest and told them not to trouble about me, but to get everything together belonging to the boat and get her righted. this done, "now," i said, "if you will all keep your heads and do as you are told, we shall get the boat and ourselves through all right." so we divided, three on one side, three on the other, and swam with the boat until we reached the beach, which was about a mile and a half distant, and i can tell you took us some considerable time. before we landed we had been something like three hours in the water, which is no small matter anywhere, much less in west africa, where one is not always in the best of condition. mr. williams got very frightened and, i think, was in doubt once or twice as to whether we should reach the shore; but we did, and were truly thankful, and although we did not openly show it, we gave none the less hearty thanks from our inmost hearts. after landing we righted our boat and paddled off up river to our factory. here we arrived before any of the natives knew what had happened. our boys soon put the news about, as they felt they had had a marvellous escape. mr. williams and i drank as much brandy as we could manage, then i jumped into bed and remained until the next morning. i believe he did the same too. at daylight i awoke and felt, to my surprise, as well as i ever felt in my life. being so long in the water, i fully anticipated a severe attack of fever next day, but it wasn't so, and i was about my business as though nothing had happened. i don't think i should have thought any more about it had not the ibunos so forcibly reminded me of the danger we really had passed through. after having so many narrow escapes this one appeared to pass as a matter of ordinary occurrence. not so to them; the afternoon of the day after the accident, while i was out about the work, i saw an unusual number of natives going to the house, each little contingent carrying baskets of yams and fish. i had not long to wait before one of my boys came to tell me the ibuno people wished to speak with me at the house. i went to them at once. here was my dining room full of natives, and in the centre a pile of yams two or three feet high, and fish, the very finest that had been caught that day, as well as some very beautiful dried fish, enough to last me and my people, i should think, a month or more. this sight took me rather by surprise, not quite knowing what was about to take place. i took the chair which was placed for me and waited. all being quiet, one of the chiefs rose up and said, "we know you are somewhat surprised to see all us villagers here to-day, and also the food we have brought with us which is now in front of you, but we have come to tell you how sorry we all were, men, women and children throughout our villages, when we heard you had been thrown into the sea, and all had such a narrow escape of losing your lives. we are all the more sorry to think that not one of our people were able to render you the slightest assistance. had we seen you or known what was taking place every canoe would have come to your aid, but we did not, and while we were sitting comfortably in our houses you were struggling in the water. to us this has been a grief, and to show you how thankful we are to think you have been preserved to us through this danger and many others, we have brought for your acceptance the best we can offer you. we are but poor, as you know, but these gifts come from our hearts as a present to you and a thank-offering to our father in heaven who has been pleased to restore you to us unhurt. we are, we must tell you, thankful in more ways than one for your deliverance, because had you been lost our great enemy ja ja would at once have said his ju ju had worked that it should be so." with this he sat down. for me to attempt to express what i felt at that moment would be impossible; i must say i felt a very unpleasant feeling in my throat, and i don't know but that some of the water i had had too much of the day before was having a good try to assert itself. if it had, it was not to be wondered at; for any one would have to have been hard indeed if such kindness did not touch them; even the strongest of us are bound sometimes to give way for a moment. i did not attempt to hide from them the fulness of my heart, and the gratitude i felt for such kindness, where i least expected it. i told them i had not thought much of the accident, but i was thankful to think my life and my people had been spared, and i only hoped i should live to show them how their great kindness would ever be remembered by me, and would not be forgotten as long as life lasted. after general thanks our meeting broke up and ended, but has never been forgotten. after we had got fairly well established and our trade began to develop itself, our firm at liverpool chartered a small brig, with a general cargo of goods for us, which in due time i was notified of. now this was a great event, not only for us, but for the river, as this would be the first sailing ship that had ever entered the qua iboe to bring in and take out a cargo direct. everything that had been done before this was by small craft, and transhipped at one of the main rivers; so i was very anxious that the arrival of this ship should be made as complete a success as possible. i knew it would be next to impossible to bring her in right over the bar, as deeply laden as she would be from england, as our depth of water was not more than ft. in. to ft. at spring tides, and this vessel would draw from to ft. at the very least. in due time the little ship was sighted off the bar. as soon as the tide made, i put off to her to receive her letters, and to give the captain instructions as to what i wished him to do. on arriving alongside, the first thing i found was that her draft of water was ft., so i told the captain he could not possibly go into the river with that draft, so we decided to lighten her all we could; i left again for the shore to make all the necessary arrangements to this end. the next morning our boats were started off out; the day being fine they all got alongside without much trouble, and brought away as much as they could carry, which was not more than about twenty tons; this from did not make much impression on the ship's draught. next day all the boats were again despatched; this time the weather was anything but favourable, and, to my dismay, while all the boats crossed the bar in safety, not one could get to the ship; the wind and current being so strong down from the westward against them, they all fell away to leeward. when night came on they anchored, as they could neither get to the ship nor back to the river; here they were without food or fire. all remained until the next day, when the weather, if anything, was worse; so when evening came and they all found it was useless trying to get back into the river or to the ship, and being without food, they all ran before the wind for the old calabar river, which was some twenty-five miles to the mouth, then about thirty-five miles more of river, until they got to our establishment there; here they eventually arrived nearly starved; while i, with only one boy, was left at the ibuno factory in a dreadful state of mind, as you may imagine, wondering what had happened to our people, and also what was to be done with the ship and cargo. the spring tides were upon us, and the vessel either had to come in at once, or remain out another fortnight, and be under demurrage, which meant a very serious matter for us. being our first ship, it was most unfortunate. the only thing to do was to bring her in as she stood. this had to be done at all costs; so i at once got mr. williams, who, by-the-bye, was generally to the fore in time of need, to lend me his boat, with three of his boys; these, with my one, made up some sort of a crew. away we went, and got safely out. on the way i had a good survey of the bar, so as to get every inch of the water it was possible. this carefully done, we arrived alongside the ship, and no one was more surprised than the captain, when i told him i had come out to take his ship into the river, if he was ready. "yes," he said; "if you will undertake to do it." "i will," i said. "you work your ship as i tell you, and we shall get in all right, i feel confident." the order was given to loose all sails and heave anchor, which was done in a very short time. as the tide was near to being high, there was no time to be lost. we were soon under way, and our little craft, with all sails set, bounding for the bar. i had my channel to a nicety; over we went, to my astonishment, without a touch. the relief i felt when this was passed, i am unable to describe. in a short time the first ship that had ever entered qua iboe river from england direct was anchored off our factory. the natives crowded down to see this, to them, wonderful sight, and when i landed i was immediately carried on the shoulders of some of the crowd up to my house. the delight in the river that evening was great indeed; so much so, that i shall not easily forget that event. still, my troubles were not quite at an end, for while we had the ship in, we had no one to discharge her cargo; but "necessity being the mother of invention," i called the chiefs of the village together, and told them of my position. one boy was all i had, and the cargo must come out of the ship. "all right," they said, "show our people what has to be done; we will discharge the ship." next morning our beach was alive with people, and by the evening of the next day she was completely discharged and ready for homeward cargo. we could now afford to take more time. the next thing was to commence loading; this we had got well on with, when our people returned. after this we were not long in getting our ship ready for going out over the bar again, which was done as successfully as she was brought in. after getting her clear we ran her to old calabar to complete her loading for england. this ended our first ship, others followed after, one of which got left on the bar a wreck, and another turned back and was condemned in the river. we soon gave up the idea of working sailing ships. a small steamer was bought, and after this things went fairly well. appendix iii trade goods used in the early trade with africa as given by barbot and other writers of the seventeenth century. by m. h. kingsley "those used in trade by the senga company of senegal at st. lewis and goree and their dependent factories of rufisco, camina, juala, gamboa (gambia), _circa_ . "for the convenience of trade between the french at the senega and the natives, all european goods are reduced to a certain standard, viz., hides, bars, and slaves, for the better understanding whereof i give some instances. one bar of iron is reckoned as worth hides, cutlace the same, cluster of bugles weighing - / lbs. as hides, bunch of false pearls hides, bunch of gallet hides, hogshead of brandy from to hides. bugles are very small glass beads, and mostly made at venice, and sold in strings and clusters. at goree the same goods bear not quite so good a rate, as, for example, a hogshead of brandy brings but hides, lb. of gunpowder hides, piece of eight hides, oz. of coral or hides, oz. of crystal hide, an ounce of yellow amber hides. "a slave costs from to bars of iron, and sometimes , at porto d'ali to , and much more at gamboa, according to the number of ships, french, english, portuguese, and dutch, which happen to be there at the same time. the bar of iron is rated at hides. "besides these, which are the most staple commodities, the french import common red, blue, and scarlet cloth, silver and brass rings or bracelets, chains, little bells, false crystal, ordinary and coarse hats, _dutch_ pointed knives, pewter dishes, silk sashes with false gold and silver fringes, blue serges, _french_ paper, steels to strike fire, _english_ sayes, _roan_ linen, salamporis, platillies, blue callicoes, taffeties, chintzs, cawris or shells, by the french called _bouges_, coarse north, red cords called _bure_, lines, shoes, fustian, red worsted caps, worsted fringe of all colours, worsted of all kinds in skeins, basons of several sizes, brass kettles, yellow amber, maccatons, that is, beads of two sorts, pieces of eight of the old stamp, some pieces of sols value, either plain or gilt, dutch cutlaces, straight and bow'd, and clouts, galet, martosdes, two other sorts of beads of which the blacks make necklaces for women, white sugar, musket balls, iron nails, shot, white and red frize, looking-glasses in plain and gilt frames, cloves, cinnamon, scissors, needles, coarse thread of sundry colours, but chiefly red, yellow, and white, copper bars of a pound weight, ferrit, men's shirts, coarse and fine, some of them with bone lace about the neck, breast, and sleeves, _haerlem_ cloths, _coasveld_ linen, _dutch_ mugs, white and blue, _leyden_ rugs or blankets, _spanish_ leather shoes, brass trumpets, round padlocks, glass bottles with a tin rim at the mouth, empty trunks or chests, and a sort of bugle called pezant, but above all, as was said above, great quantities of brandy, and iron in bars; particularly at goree the company imports , or more every year of those which are made in their province of _brittany_, all short and thin, which is called in london narrow flat iron, or half flat iron in sweden, but each bar shortened or cut off at one end to about to inches, so that about of these bars weigh a ton english. it is to be observed that such voyage-iron, as it is called in london, is the only sort and size used throughout all nigritia, guinea, and west ethiopia in the way of trade. lastly, a good quantity of cognac brandy, both in hogsheads and rundlets, single and double, the double being , the single gallons. "the principal goods the french have in return for these commodities from the _moors_ and _blacks_ are slaves, gold dust, elephants' teeth, beeswax, dry and green hides, gum-arabic, ostrich feathers, and several other odd things, as ambergris, cods of musk, tygers' and goats' skins, provisions, bullocks, sheep, and teeth of sea-horses (hippopotamus)." the main trade of the senga or senegal company seems to have been gum and slaves in these regions. gold dust they got but little of in senegal, the portuguese seeming to have been the best people to work that trade. the ivory was, according to barbot, here mainly that picked up in woods, and scurfy and hollow, or, as we should call it, kraw kraw ivory, the better ivory coming from the qua qua ivory coast. hides, however, were in the seventeenth century, as they are now, a regular line in the trade of senegambia, and the best hides came from the senegal river, the inferior from rufisco and porto d'ali. barbot says: "they soak or dye these hides as soon as they are flayed from the beast, and presently expose them to the air to dry; which, in my opinion, is the reason why, wanting the true first seasoning, they are apt to corrupt and breed worms if not looked after and often beaten with a stick or wand, and then laid up in very dry store houses." i have no doubt barbot is right, and that there is not enough looking after done to them now a days, so that the worms have their own way too much. the african hides were held in old days inferior to those shipped from south america, both in thickness and size, and were used in france chiefly to cover boxes with; but in later times, i am informed, they were sought after and split carefully into two slices, serving to make kid for french boots. "the french reckoned the trade of the senga company to yield or per cent, advance upon invoice of their goods, and yet their senga company, instead of thriving, has often brought a noble to ninepence. nay, it has broken twice in less than thirty years, which must be occasioned by the vast expense they are at in europe, africa, and america, besides ill-management of their business; but this is no more than the common fate of dutch and english african companies, as well as that to make rather loss than profit, because their charges are greater than the trade can bear, in maintaining so many ports and other forts and factories in africa, which devour all the profits." i quote this of barbot as an interesting thing, considering the present state of west coast colonial finance. gambia trade, . "the factors of the english company at james fort, and those of the french at albreda and other places, drive a very great trade in that country all along the river in brigantines, sloops, and canoes, purchasing-- elephants' teeth, beeswax, slaves, pagnos (country-made clothes), hides, gold and silver, and goods also found in the sengal trade. in exchange they give the _blacks_-- bars of iron, drapery of several sorts, woollen stuffs and cloth, linen of several sorts, coral and pearl, brandy or rum in anchors, firelocks, powder, ball and shot, sleysiger linen, painted callicoes of gay colours, shirts, gilded swords, ordinary looking-glasses, salt, hats, _roan_ caps, all sorts and sizes of bugles, yellow amber, rock crystal, brass pans and kettles, paper, brass and pewter rings, some of them gilt, box and other combs, _dutch_ earthen cans, false ear-rings, satalaes, and sabres or cutlaces, small iron and copper kettles, _dutch_ knives called _bosmans_, hooks, brass trumpets, bills, needles, thread and worsted of several colours." this selection practically covered the trade up to sierra leone. sierra leone, . "exports.--elephants' teeth, slaves, santalum wood, a little gold, much beeswax with some pearls, crystal, long peppers, ambergris, &c. the ivory here was considered the best on the west coast, being, says barbot, very white and large, have had some weighing to lbs., at a very modest rate lbs. of ivory for the value of five livres _french_ money, in coarse knives and other such toys. the gold purchased in sierra leone, the same authority states, comes from mandinga and other remote countries towards the niger or from south guinea by the river mitomba. the trade selection was: french brandy or rum, iron bars, white callicoes, sleysiger linen, brass kettles, earthen cans, all sorts of glass buttons, brass rings or bracelets, bugles and glass beads of sundry colours, brass medals, earrings, _dutch_ knives, _bosmans_, first and second size, hedging bills and axes, coarse laces, crystal beads, painted callicoes (red) called chintz, oil of olive, small duffels, ordinary guns, muskets and fuzils, gunpowder, musket balls and shot, old sheets, paper, red caps, men's shirts, all sorts of counterfeit pearls, red cotton, narrow bands of silk stuffs or worsted, about half a yard broad for women, used about their waists. the proper goods to purchase, the cam wood and elephants' teeth in sherboro' river, are chiefly these:-- brass basons and kettles, pewter basons, and tankards, iron bars, bugles, painted callicoes, _guinea_ stuffs or cloths, _holland_ linen or cloth, muskets, powder, and ball. a ship may in two months time out and home purchase here fifty-six tons of cam wood and four tons of elephants' teeth or more." the trade selection for the pepper coast was practically the same as for sierra leone, only less extensive and cheaper in make, and had a special line in white and blue large beads. the main export was manequette pepper and rice, the latter of which was to be had in great quantity but poor quality at about a halfpenny a pound; and there was also ivory to be had, but not to so profitable an extent as on the next coast, the ivory. the same selection of goods was used for the ivory coast trade as those above-named, with the addition of contaccarbe or contabrode, namely, iron rings, about the thickness of a finger which the blacks wear about their legs with brass bells, as they do the brass rings or bracelets about their arms in the same manner. the natives here also sold country-made cloths, which were bought by the factors to use in trade in other districts, mainly the gold coast; the ivory coast cloths come from inland districts, those sold at cape la hou are of six stripes, three french ells and a half long, and very fine; those from corby la hou of five stripes, about three ells long, and coarser. they also made "clouts" of a sort of hemp, or plant like it, which they dye handsomely, and weave very artificially. the gold coast. this coast has, from its discovery in the th century to our own day, been the chief trade region in the bight of benin; and barbot states that the amount of gold sent from it to europe in his day was £ , value per annum. the trade selection for the gold coast trade in the th and th centuries is therefore very interesting, as it gives us an insight into the manufactures exported by european traders at that time, and of a good many different kinds; for english, french, portuguese, dutch, danes and brandenburghers were all engaged in the gold coast trade, and each took out for barter those things he could get cheapest in his own country. "the _french_ commonly," says barbot, "carry more brandy, wine, iron, paper, firelocks, &c., than the _english_ or _dutch_ can do, those commodities being cheaper in _france_, as, on the other hand, they (the _english_ and _dutch_) supply the guinea trade with greater quantities of linen, cloth, bugles, copper basons and kettles, wrought pewter, gunpowder, sayes, perpetuanas, chintzs, cawris, old sheets, &c., because they can get these wares from _england_ or _holland_. "the _french_ commonly compose their cargo for the gold coast trade to purchase slaves and gold dust; of brandy, white and red wine, ros solis, firelocks, muskets, flints, iron in bars, white and red contecarbe, red frize, looking glasses, fine coral, sarsaparilla, bugles of sundry sorts and colours and glass beads, powder, sheets, tobacco, taffeties, and many other sorts of silks wrought as brocardels, velvets, shirts, black hats, linen, paper, laces of many sorts, shot, lead, musket balls, callicoes, serges, stuffs, &c., besides the other goods for a true assortment, which they have commonly from _holland_. "the _dutch_ have _coesveld_ linen, slezsiger lywat, old sheets, _leyden_ serges, dyed indigo-blue, perpetuanas, green, blue and purple, _konings-kleederen_, annabas, large and narrow, made at _haerlem_; _cyprus_ and _turkey_ stuffs, _turkey_ carpets, red, blue and yellow cloths, green, red and white _leyden_ rugs, silk stuffs blue and white, brass kettles of all sizes, copper basons, _scotch_ pans, barbers' basons, some wrought, others hammered, copper pots, brass locks, brass trumpets, pewter, brass and iron rings, hair trunks, pewter dishes and plates (of a narrow brim), deep porringers, all sorts and sizes of fishing hooks and lines, lead in sheets and in pipes, sorts of _dutch_ knives, _venice_ bugles and glass beads of sundry colours and sizes, sheep skins, iron bars, brass pins long and short, brass bells, iron hammers, powder, muskets, cutlaces, cawris, chintz, lead balls and shot, brass cups with handles, cloths of _cabo verdo_, _qua qua_, _ardra_ and _rio forcada_, blue coral, _alias_ akory from benin, strong waters and abundance of other wares, being near sorts, as a _dutchman_ told me." i am sorry barbot broke down just when he seemed going strong with this list, and i was out of breath checking the indent, and said "other wares," but i cannot help it, and beg to say that this is the true assortment for the gold coast trade in . the english selection "besides many of the same goods above mentioned have tapseils, broad and narrow, nicanees fine and coarse, many sorts of chintz or _indian_ callicoes printed, tallow, red painting colours, _canary_ wine, sayes, perpetuanas inferior to the _dutch_ and sacked up in painted tillets with the _english_ arms, many sorts of white callicoes, blue and white linen, _china_ satins, _barbadoes_ rum, other strong waters and spirits, beads of all sorts, buckshaws, _welsh_ plain, boy-sades, romberges, clouts, gingarus, taffeties, amber, brandy, flower, _hamburgh_ brawls, and white, blue and red chequered linen, narrow _guinea_ stuffs chequered, ditto broad, old hats, purple beads. the _danes_, _brandenburghers_ and _portuguese_ provide their cargoes in _holland_ commonly consisting of very near the same sort of wares as i have observed the _dutch_ make up theirs, the two former having hardly anything of their own proper to the trade of the gold coast besides copper and silver, either wrought or in bullion or in pieces of eight, which are a commodity also there. "the _portuguese_ have most of their cargoes from _holland_ under the name of _jews_ residing there, and they add some things of the product of _brazil_, as tobacco, rum, tame cattle, _st. tome_ cloth, others from _rio forcado_ and other circumjacent places in the gulf of guinea." use made of european goods by the natives of the gold coast. barbot. "the broad linen serves to adorn themselves and their dead men's sepulchers within, they also make clouts thereof. the narrow cloth to press palm oil; in old sheets they wrap themselves at night from head to foot. the copper basons to wash and shave. the _scotch_ pans serve in lieu of butchers' tubs when they kill hogs or sheep, from the iron bars the smiths forge out all their weapons, country and household tools and utensils; of frize and perpetuanas, they make girts fingers broad to wear about their waists and hang their sword, dagger, knife and purse of money or gold, which purse they commonly thrust between the girdle and their body. they break _venice_ coral into or parts, which afterwards they mould into any form on whetstones and make strings or necklaces which yield a considerable profit; of or ells of _english_ or _leyden_ serges, they make a kind of cloak to wrap about their shoulders and stomachs. of chintz, perpetuanas, printed callicoes, tapsiels and nicanees, are made clouts to wear round their middles. the wrought pewter, as dishes, basons, porringers, &c., serve to eat their victuals out of, muskets, firelocks and cutlaces they use in war; brandy is more commonly spent at their feasts, knives to the same purposes as we use them. with tallow they anoint their bodies from head to toe and even use it to shave their beards instead of soap. fishing hooks for the same purpose as with us. _venice_ bugles, glass beads and contacarbe, serve all ages and sexes to adorn their heads, necks, arms and legs very extravagantly, being made into strings; and sarsaparilla."--well, i think i have followed barbot enough for the present on this point, and turn to his description of the dues the natives have to pay to native authorities on goods bought of europeans, which amounted to per cent. paid to the proper officers; the kings of the land have at each port town, and even fishes, if it exceeds a certain quantity pays in ; these duties are paid either in coin or value. up the inland they pay no duty on river fish, but are liable to pay a capitation fee of one shilling per head for the liberty of passing down to the sea-shore either to traffic or attend the markets with their provisions or other sorts of the product of the land, and pay nothing at their return home, goods or no goods, unless they by chance leave their arms in the village, then the person so doing is to pay one shilling. the collectors account quarterly with their kings, and deliver up what each has received in gold at his respective post, but the fifth part of the fish they collect is sent to the king as they have it, and serves to feed his family. no fisherman is allowed to dispose of the first fish he has caught till the duty is paid, but are free to do it aboard ships, which perhaps may be one reason why so many of them daily sell such quantities of their fish to the seafaring men. barbot, remarking on this gold coast trade, says: "the blacks of the gold coast, having traded with europeans ever since the th century, are very well skilled in the nature and proper qualities of all european wares and merchandize vended there; but in a more particular manner since they have so often been imposed on by the europeans, who in former ages made no scruple to cheat them in the quality, weight and measures of their goods which at first they received upon content, because they say it would never enter into their thoughts that white men, as they call the europeans, were so base as to abuse their credulity and good opinion of us. but now they are perpetually on their guard in that particular, examine and search very narrowly all our merchandize, piece by piece, to see each the quality and measure contracted for by samples; for instance, if the cloth is well made and strong, whether dyed at _haerlem_ or _leyden_--if the knives be not rusty--if the basons, kettles, and other utensils of brass and pewter are not cracked or otherwise faulty, or strong enough at the bottom. they measure iron bars with the sole of the foot--they tell over the strings of contacarbel, taste and prove brandy, rum or other liquors, and will presently discover whether it is not adulterated with fresh or salt water or any other mixture, and in point of french brandy will prefer the brown colour in it. in short they examine everything with as much prudence and ability as any european can do." "the goods sold by _english_ and _dutch_, _danes_, _brandenburghers_, &c., ashore, out of these settlements are generally about per cent. dearer to the blacks than they get aboard ships in the roads; the supercargoes of the ships commonly falling low to get the more customers and make a quicker voyage, for which reason the forts have very little trade with the blacks during the summer season, which fills the coast with goods by the great concourse of ships at that time from several ports of europe; and as the winter season approaches most of them withdraw from the coast, and so leave elbow room for the fort factors to trade in their turn during that bad season. "in the year the gold trade yielded hardly per cent. to our french ships, clear of any charges; but that might be imputed to the great number of trading ships of several european nations which happened to be at that time on the coast, whereof i counted in less than a month's time: had the number been half as great that trade would have appeared per cent. or more, and if a cargo were properly composed it might well clear per cent. in a small ship sailing with little charge, and the voyage directly home from this coast not to exceed or months out and home, if well managed." these observations of barbot's are alike interesting and instructive, and in principle applicable to the trade to-day. do not imagine that barbot was an early member of the aborigines' protection society when he holds forth on the way in which europeans "in former ages" basely dealt with the angelic confidence of the blacks. one of his great charms is the different opinions on general principles, &c., he can hold without noticing it himself: of course this necessitates your reading barbot right through, and that means pages folio in double column, or something like , pages of a modern book; but that's no matter, for he is uniformly charming and reeks with information. well, there are other places in barbot where he speaks, evidently with convictions, of "this rascal fellow black," &c. and gives long accounts of the way in which the black man cheats with false weights and measures, and adulterates; and if you absorb the whole of his information and test it against your own knowledge, and combine it with that of others, i think you will come to the conclusion that it is not necessary for the philanthropist to fidget about the way the european does his side to the trade; the moralist may drop a large and heavy tear on both white and black, but that is all that is required from him. unfortunately this is not all that is done nowadays: the black has got hold of governmental opinion, and just when he is more than keeping his end up in commercial transactions, he has got the government to handicap his white fellow-trader with a mass of heavy dues and irritating restrictions, which will end most certainly in stifling trade. my firm conviction is that black and white traders should be left to settle their own affairs among themselves. selection of goods for fida or onidah, called by the french juida, now known as dahomey, with main seaport whydah. the french opened trade in this district in , when the dutch were already there. "the main export of this coast was 'slaves, cotton cloth, and blue stones, called agoy or accory, very valuable on the gold coast.' "the best commodity the europeans can carry thither to purchase is boejies or cawries, so much valued by the natives, being the current coin there and at popo, fida, benin and other countries further east, without which it is scarcely possible to traffic there. near to boejies the flat iron bars for the round or square will not do, and again next to iron, fine long coral, _china_ sarcenets, gilt leather, white damask and red, red cloth with large lists, copper bowls or cups, brass rings, _venice_ beads or bugles of several colours, agalis, gilded looking glasses, _leyden_ serges, platilles, linen morees, salampores, red chints, broad and narrow tapsiels, blue canequins, broad gunez and narrow (a sort of linen), double canequins, french brandy in ankers or half-ankers (the anker being a gallon rundlet), canary and malmsey, black caudebec hats, italian taffeties, white or red cloth of gold or silver, _dutch_ knives, _bosmans_, striped armoizins, with white or flowered, gold and silver brocadel, firelocks, muskets, gunpowder, large beads from _rouen_, white flowered sarcenets, _indian_ armorzins and damask napkins, large coral earrings, cutlaces gilded and broad, silk scarfs large umbrellors, pieces of eight, long pyramidal bells." all the above-mentioned goods are also proper for the trade in _benin_, _rio lagos_ and all along the coast to _rio gabon_. benin trade goods. "exports, : cotton cloths like those of _rio lagos_, women slaves, for men slaves (though they be all foreigners, for none of the natives can be sold as such) are not allowed to be exported, but must stay there; jasper stones, a few tigers' or leopards' skins, acory or blue coral, elephants' teeth, some pieminto, or pepper. the blue coral grows in branching bushes like the red coral at the bottom of the rivers and lakes in benin, which the natives have a peculiar art to grind or work into beads like olives, and is a very profitable merchandise at the gold coast, as has been observed. "the benin cloths are of bands striped blue and white, an ell and a half long, only proper for the trade at _sabou river_ and at _angola_, and called by the blacks _monponoqua_ and the blue narrow cloths _ambasis_; the latter are much inferior to the former every way, and both sorts made in the inland country. "the european goods are these: cloths of gold and silver, scarlet and red cloth, all sorts of calicoes and fine linen, _haerlem_ stuffs with large flowers and well starched, iron bars, strong spirits, rum and brandy, beads or bugles of several colours, red velvet, and a good quantity of boejies, cawries as much as for the ardra (fida) trade being the money of the natives, as well as them; false pearls, dutch cans with red streaks at one end, bright brass large rings from to - / ounces weight each, earrings of red glass or crystal, gilt looking glasses, crystal, &c." ouwere (now called warri) trade, and the new calabar trade, . "exports mainly slaves and fine cloths from new calabar district and ouwere. 'the principal thing that passes in calabar as current money among the natives is brass rings for the arms or legs, which they call _bochie_, and they are so nice in the choice of them, that they will often turn over a whole cask before they find to please their fancy.' "the _english_ and _dutch_ import there a great deal of copper in small bars, round and equal, about feet long, weighing about - / lbs., which the blacks of calabary work with much art, splitting the bar into parts from one end to the other, which they polish as fine as gold, and twist the pieces together very ingeniously into cords to make what form of arm rings they please." old calabar trade, . "the most current goods of europe for the trade of old calabar to purchase slaves and elephants' teeth are iron bars, in quality and chiefly, copper bars, blue rags, cloth and striped _guinea_ clouts of many colours, horse bells, hawks' bells, rangoes, pewter basons of , , and lbs. weight, tankards of ditto of , , and lbs. weight, beads very small and glazed yellow, green, purple and blue, purple copper armlets or arm rings of _angola_ make, but this last sort of goods is peculiar to the _portuguese_." the blacks there reckon by copper bars, reducing all sorts of goods to such bars; for example, bar of iron, copper bars; a man slave for and a woman slave for or copper bars. trade of rio del rey, ambozes country, camarones river, and down to rio gabon. "the _dutch_ have the greatest share in the trade here in yachts sent from mina on the gold coast, whose cargo consists mostly of small copper bars of the same sort as mentioned at old calabar, iron bars, coral, brass basons, of the refuse goods of the gold coast, bloom coloured beads or bugles and purple copper armlets or rings made at _loanda_ in _angola_, and presses for lemons and oranges. in exchange for which they yearly export from thence or slaves, and about or tons weight of fine large teeth, or of which commonly weigh above a hundredweight, besides accory, javelins and some sorts of knives which the blacks there make to perfection, and are proper for the trade of the gold coast." "_ambozes_ country, situated between the _rio del rey_ and _rio camarones_, is very remarkable for the immense height of the mountains it has near the sea-shore, which the spaniards call _alta tierra de ambozi_, and reckon some of them as high as the _pike of teneriffe_ (this refers to the great camaroon, , feet). trade in teeth, accory and slaves, for iron and copper bars, brass pots and kettles, hammered bugles or beads, bloom colour purple, orange and lemon colour, ox horns, steel files, &c." the trade in the rio gabon at this time was inferior to that at cape lopez. indeed, the ascendency the gaboon trade attained to in the middle parts of this th century was an artificial one, the natural outlet for the trade being the districts round the mouth of the ogowé river, which penetrates through a far greater extent of country than the rivers rembwe and ncomo, which form the gaboon estuary or _rio gabon_ of barbot. "great numbers of ships ran to _cape lopez gonzalves_ in the seventeenth century, and did a pretty brisk trade in cam wood, beeswax, honey and elephants' teeth, of which last a ship may sometimes purchase three or four thousand-weight of good large ones and sometimes more, and there is always an abundance of wax; all which the europeans purchase for knives called _bosmans_, iron bars, beads, old sheets, brandy, malt, spirits or rum, axes, the shells called cauris, annabas, copper bars, brass basons, from eighteen-pence to two shillings apiece, firelocks, muskets, powder, ball, small shot, &c." selection of goods for the islands fernando po, st. thomas's, prince's, and annobon. there were about ships per annum calling and trading at san tomé in the seventeenth century. the goods in "_french_ ships particularly consist in _holland_ cloth or linen as well as of _rouen_ and _brittany_, thread of all colours, serges, silk stockings, fustians, _dutch_ knives, iron, salt, olive oil, copper in sheets or plates, brass kettles, pitch, tar, cordage, sugar forms (from to lbs. apiece), brandy, all kinds of strong liquors and spirits, _canary_ wines, olives, carpets, fine flour, butter, cheese, thin shoes, hats, shirts, and all sorts of silks out of fashion in _europe_, hooks, &c., of each sort a little in proportion." in connection with this now but little considered island of san tomé, so called from having been discovered in the year , under the direction of henry the navigator, on the feast day of the apostle thomas, there is an interesting bit of history, which has had considerable bearing on the culture of the lower congo regions. the portuguese, observing the fertility of the soil of this island, decided to establish a colony there for the convenience of trading in the guinea regions; but the climate was so unwholesome that an abundance of men died before it was well settled and cultivated. "violent fevers and cholicks that drove them away soon after they were set a-shore." "the first design of settling there was in the year but perceiving how many perished in the attempt, and that they could better agree with that of the continent on the coast of guinea, it was resolved by king jaõ ii. of portugal that all the jews within his dominions, which were vastly numerous, should be obliged to receive baptism, or upon refusal be transported to the coast of guinea, where the portuguese had already several considerable settlements and a good trade, considering the time since its first discovery. "a few years after such of those jews as had escaped the malignant air, were forced away to this isle of san tomé; these married to black women, fetched from angola in great numbers, with near , men of the same country. "from these jews married to black women in process of time proceeded mostly that brood of mulattos at this day inhabiting the island. most of them boast of being descended from the portuguese; and their constitution is by nature much fitter to bear with the malignity of the air." (for a full account of this matter see the _history of portugal_ by faria y sousa, p. .) san tomé is now very flourishing, on account of its soil being suited to cocoa and coffee, and there are to-day there plenty of full-blooded portuguese; but the old strain of jewish mulattos still exists and is represented by individuals throughout all the coast regions of west africa. moreover, these mulattos secured in the seventeenth century a monopoly for portugal of the slave trade in the lower congo, and i largely ascribe the prevalence of customs identical with those mentioned in the old testament that you find among the fjort tribes to their influence, although you always find such customs represented in all the native cultures in west africa (presumably because the west african culture is what the germans would call the _urstuff_), but i fancy in no culture are they so developed as among the fjorts.[ ] trade goods for congo and cabenda, . "blue bafts, a piece containing yards and of a deep almost black colour, and is measured either with a stick of inches, of which sticks make a piece, or by a lesser stick, inches long, of which are accounted a piece, _guinea_ stuffs, pieces to make a piece, tapseils have the same measure as blue bafts. nicanees, the same measure. black bays, - / yards for a piece, measured by sticks of inches each. annabasses, to the piece. painted callicoes, yards to the piece. blue paper slesia, piece for a piece. scarlet, stick of inches or / a yard is accounted a piece. muskets, for a piece. powder, the barrel or rundlet of lbs. goes for a piece. brass basons, for a piece. we carry thither the largest. pewter basons of , , and lb. the no. goes to the piece, and those of lb. to a piece. blue perpetuanas have become but of late in great demand, they are measured as blue bafts, yards making the piece. dutch cutlaces are the most valued because they have edges, such go for a piece. coral, the biggest and largest is much more acceptable here than small coral, which the blacks value so little that they will hardly look on it, usually - / oz. is computed a piece. _memorandum._ a whole piece of blue bafts contains commonly - / yards, however some are shorter and others exceed. _pentadoes._ commonly contain or - / to the piece. _tapseils._ the piece usually holds yards. _nicanees._ the piece is or - / yards long." the main export of congo was slaves and elephants' teeth and grass clothes called tibonges, were used by the portuguese as at loando in angola. some of them single marked with the arms of portugal, and others double marked, and some unmarked. the single marked cloth was equal in value to unmarked, equal to about pence. trade goods for san paul do loanda. "cloths with red lists, great ticking with long stripes and fine wrought red kerseys, _silesia_ and other fine linen, fine velvet, small and great gold and silver laces, broad black bays, _turkish_ tapestry or carpets, white and all sorts of coloured yarns, blue and black beads, stitching and sewing silk, _canary_ wines, brandy, linseed oil, seamen's knives, all sorts of spices, white sugar and many other commodities and trifles as great fish-hooks, pins a finger long, ordinary pins, needles and great and small hawks' bells. "the _english_ compose their cargoes generally of brass, basons, annabasses, blue bafts, paper, brawls, _guinea_ stuffs, muskets, powder, nicanees, tapseils, scarlet, _slesia's_, coral, bags, wrought pewter, beads, pentedoes, knives, spirits, &c., all sorts of haberdashery, silks, linens, shirts, hats, shoes, &c., wrought pewter plates, dishes, porringers, spoons of each a little assortment are also very probably vended among the _portuguese_, and also all manner of native made cloths from other parts of _guinea_ fetch good prices in _angola_." [illustration: _miss kingsley's "studies in west africa"_ tropical west africa.] footnotes: [ ] for the reasons for the unhealthiness of this island see _travels in west africa_ (macmillan), p. . index a abiabok, , - abiadiong, abonema (_see_ new calabar) abrah, oracle at, administration (_see_ crown colony) adultery laws, , , african-- acclimatisation of, west indians, - agriculture, nature of, , , , - , alemba rapid fetish, alumah, king, amachree, king, , , _amomum_, anamaquoa, ancestor worship, - andoni, - , angola, , animal deities, , (_see_ snake and shark) ants-- driver, - _myriaica molesta_, , apothecary, - ashantee, , , assini, , atlantis, ayzingo, azambuja, b bafangh, bakele, bantu, (_see_ negro) bar, custom, barbot, , , and appendix iii. basel mission, bastian, , baths, medical, , bence island, benga, , benguella, , - benin, bight of, fetish of, - (_see_ appendix i) natives of kingdom, - binger, bob manuel, king, , bonny, , - , , "free," , brahmanism, brass river, , - bristol, brohemie, brüe sieur, - burial customs, - , - bush fighting, soul, , c cabinda, , calabar, , - fetish, history, - new, cameroons, , , , canoes, - catfish, , centipedes, chamberlain, rt. honble. j., chambers of commerce, charms, - chiloango, - clerks, , coinage, native, colonial office, , - comey, , , competition, comte, congo-- belge, river, , cookey gam, king, corisco, - crabs, crocodiles, worship of, crown colony, , , , , , , - statistics, , crowther-- bishop, archdeacon, , "customs," native, (_see_ fetish) fiscal, , , , , d dahomey-- fetish, fiscal, - danfodio, dash, de brosses, debtors, , dennett, r. e., , , , de zurara, , dieppe, , - diplomacy, direct taxation, disease (_see_ doctor) ague, boisi, fvuma, hysteria, leprosy, malignant melancholy, pneumonia, small-pox, - soul, diseases of, , , worms, yaws, doctor (_see_ apothecary) clinical, - witch, , , , , dream-soul, , drum fish, duppy, dutch, , dye wood, e eboes, (_see_ ibo) ebony, ebumtup, _edinburgh review_, egbo (_see_ law god) electrical fish, ellis, sir a. b., - , , - elmina, emanequetta, expenditure (_see_ crown colony) exports, f face, throwing the, - familiar spirits, fangaree charms, father, making, - , fetish, - "customs," , , days, , definitions of, , , , derivation of the word, gods and goddesses-- abassi-boom, mbuiri, nkala, nyankupong, nzambi , , nzambi mpungu, sasabonsum, srahmantin, house, description of, , man, , schools of, calabar, , , mpongwe, , , nkissism, - tshi and ewe and yoruba, fiscal arrangements, (_see_ crown colony) fish, quality of, , - fishing, appliances, - canoes, native methods of, - , floating islands, french, early exploration by the, , statistics, colonial, frogs, funerals, , - g ga, gesture, ghagas, glamour, gods (_see_ fetish), goethe, - gorillae, , governor, , , native, grain coast, - of paradise, - guineamen, günther, dr., h hanno, - head cutting, hero worship, - hoheit, landes and ober, - , house system, , - human sacrifices, - i ibbibios, igalwa, ijos, , immortal soul, , imports, inheritance, - insects, - islam and fetish, ivory coast, - trade of, - , j ja ja, king, , , , - jakris, - , - jam, jannequin, jews, jobson, - ju ju, (_see_ fetish) long, , , , , trade, k kitty-katty, kla, koromantin slaves, krumen, , , , , kufong, , kwo ibo, , , and appendix ii l labat, lagos, colony, land, landana, law, john, law, native-- adultery, , god society, property, , , , - . leo africanus, leopard worship, , liberia, , - (_see_ grain coast) loanda, , loango, lucan, dr., lyall, sir alfred, on witchcraft, , m machinery, maine, sir henry, malagens, malignant melancholy, - manchester, , manilla, manioc, markets, maxwell, sir wm., meleguetta coast, - melli, - , mendi, merolla, , minstrels, missionary, , , , , mohammedanism and fetish, - , monrovia, monteiro, mpongwe, mungo mah lobeh, murder, music, - _mutterrecht_, n nassau, dr., , , - , nana, , negro, - nganga bilongo (_see_ apothecary) niger company, , , , nkala, nkissism, - , nyankupong, nzambi, , , - , nzambi mpungu, , o obeah, , , ogi, ogowé, , , oko jumbo, king, , - ombuiri, opobo, , , - ordeal, , , oru, oulof, ouwere, , p palm oil, (_see_ appendix i) panavia, paradise grains, - parliamentary resolution ( ), , , pepple, king, , , , - , pepper coast (_see_ grain) phoenicians, (_see_ hanno) police, , poorah, portuguese, , - , , stone monuments, post-mortem, priests, - , , - , , (_see_ fetish man) property-- ancestral, family, private, - stool, r railways, , religion, native (_see_ fetish) revenue, , (_see_ crown colony) native, - , s sails, - sataspes, san andrew, rio, , , sanguin, sasabonsum, - scorpion, , , senegal, , shadow-soul, , - shake hand, shark, sierra leone, , , , resources of, sisa, - sleep disease, - stages of, - small-pox, - smaltz, snake worship, , - , sobo, societies, secret, , , - (_see_ law god) song-net, - soul, - fetish view of the, - division of the human, - south africa, spiders, spinoza - , spirit and matter, native view of, - spirits, classes of, familiar, touch of, srahmandazi, , , srahmantin, statesmanship, statistics, - t tchanga (voudou), "them," theopompus, timber, - timbuctoo, tom-toms, topping, tornadoes, - , - trade (_see_ crown colony) gold, - , palm oil, - rubber, salt, - , timber, tobacco, , tshi, , twins, treatment of, tylor, professor, u ukukiwe, umaru l'haji, v vegetation, - virtue, native idea of, volta, voudou, - w wanga (obeah), - , war, warri, , , wealth, "well-disposed ones," west africa, political aspect of, west indies, , will braid, - wills, winnebah, winnaboes, - witchcraft, - law, (_see_ fetish) x xylophonic instruments, y yam custom, - , yaws, z zaire, the end richard clay and sons, limited: london and bungay. [illustration: _miss kingsley's "studies in west africa"_ map of the niger delta.] transcriber's notes: the following typographical errors/spelling errors have been corrected. the pages refer to the original printed text. p. the town be took by locusts!["] : added closing quote p. you remember d----?["] : added closing quote. p. regarding this affair[.] : repaired p. ar[r]ives : corrected. p. timbucto[o], added, to match other instances. p. bodajor --> bojador : corrected p. the footnote is unnumbered, and [ ] has been provided. p. about £ , [)]: added missing right parenthesis] p. sink--holes --> sink-holes : corrected p. an[n]iversaries : corrected p. on the floor [fo] --> of : corrected p. number of , , [ ] souls : added p. n monopolies[,] have led : removed p. i did not like their demeanour[.] : added p. our goods are in their hands.["] : added p. own way too much[.] : repaired p. perpetually on[,] their guard : removed p. to the great [m/n]umber : typo corrected p. being a gallon rundlet[)] : closing parenthesis added p. clerks, , [,] : removed the following words appear as variants and have been left as printed: ogowe ( ) / ogowé ( ) filiaria perstans ( ) / filaria perstans ( ) mütterrecht ( ) / mutterrecht ( ) bassambri ( ) / basambri ( ) the following words appear with and without hyphens. the various spellings are left as printed. where the printed text introduces a hyphen at end-of-line, the hyphen is retained only if that variant is otherwise predominant. scott-elliott/scott elliot--(in the literature the name is uniformly hyphenated.) sea-shore/seashore headquarters/headquarters ashore / a-shore (hyphenated only in a quoted passage) craw-fish / crawfish ear-rings / earrings firewood / fire-wood headman / head-man inter-marriage / intermarriage ju-ju / juju re-captured / recaptured re-organized / reorganized sand-flies / sandflies middleman / middle-man sandbanks / sand-banks winna-boes / winnaboes small-pox / smallpox _doctor dolittle's post office_ written and illustrated by hugh lofting published by r a stokes co. at fourth av. new york _copyright, , by_ frederick a. stokes company _all rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign languages_ _printed in the united states of america_ [illustration: "it was mournful scenery"] _contents_ prologue part i i zuzana ii the doctor's reception on the warship iii a great gunner iv the royal mails of fantippo v the voyage delayed vi no-man's-land vii the animals' paradise viii the swiftest mail in the world part ii i a most unusual post office ii cheapside iii the birds that helped columbus iv cape stephen light v gulls and ships vi weather bureaus vii teaching by mail part iii i the animals' magazine ii the doctor's story iii gub-gub's story iv dab-dab's story v the white mouse's story vi jip's story vii too-too's story viii the pushmi-pullyu's story part iv i parcel post ii the great mail robbery iii pearls and brussels sprouts iv pearl divers v obombo's rebellion vi the doctor's release vii a mysterious letter viii the land of the mangrove swamps ix the secret lake x the postmaster-general's last order xi good-bye to fantippo _illustrations_ "it was mournful scenery" _frontispiece_ "john dolittle talked to the woman" "looking into all the bays" "'where have you been?'" "the birds spread themselves out along the coast" "'_fire!_' said speedy" "the bluejackets crowded to the rail" "a rare fantippo stamp" "the doctor gave the king a cup of china tea" "'good morning! what can i do for you?'" "they found the doctor shaving" "thousands of swallows built their nests in her rigging" "'turn back, jip!' gasped the doctor" "'all we eat is bananas'" "he was pulling out a loose tooth" "they sat down in the shade of a palm tree" "he began his great inauguration speech" "he put his large face in at the information window" "the houseboat post office of no-man's-land" "jip hung up the sign" "he held scribbling classes for the animals" "cheapside, the london sparrow" "the double letter boxes of fantippo" "the royal peacock complained that cheapside had made faces at him" "'great heavens, doctor, i've gained an ounce!'" "the sailors were ready to kill their admiral" "there were many rocks and shallows near the end of cape stephen" "the gulls dashed themselves into the wheelman's face" "the doctor lit the candle" "the doctor and dab-dab cooked his breakfast for him" "the gull caught the tomato skin with a lightning lunge" "the gull took a fresh piece of toast" "the doctor took an armchair beside the kitchen stove" "john dolittle saw him snooping around the post office" "the doctor experimented on jip" "it was certainly a wonderful collection of objects" "it was sir timothy quisby, our most expensive patient" "he had fallen into the soup" "she made a regular pet of him" "'we'll keep the black and white one, liza'" "the old rat laughed a quavering laugh" "upstairs where the dye vats stood" "the doctor cut off all my fur" "his pictures are just awful" "a retriever came up with a gold watch and chain" "'come over here by the trough'" "the doctor span the penny" "'what was that?'" "they'd run off with it and swallow it" "i jabbed the watchman" "i leapt as i have never leapt before" "putting the king's bicycle together" "dab-dab looked over his shoulder" "they reminded him of old broken down cab horses" "i put the parcel down" "wilkins levelled a pistol at the doctor's head" "'_pst!_' i whispered to the wife" "the rout of the amazons" "'oh, i think this is an awful place!'" "the young ones were with her" "gub-gub dives for pearls" "the doctor patted him on the shoulder" "in the jungle obombo made speeches" "'how dare you speak to me like that?'" "the white mouse would roll them down the hole" "'do you realize what that pearl means to us?'" "the king saw the doctor's canoe arriving" "in popped the head of an enormous snake" "the canoe was yanked from under them" "the doctor saw the shape of an enormous turtle" "the trees bent down with his weight" "the doctor was washing his face in the lake" "dab-dab, the economical housekeeper, blew out the candle" "mixing the turtle's medicine" "a never-ending stream of big birds" "dab-dab prepared a meal" "a wooden statue still stands to his memory" doctor dolittle's post office prologue nearly all of the history of doctor dolittle's post office took place when he was returning from a voyage to west africa. therefore i will begin (as soon as i have told you a little about how he came to take the journey) from where he turned his ship towards home again and set sail for puddleby-on-the-marsh. some time before this the pushmi-pullyu, after a long stay in england, had grown a little homesick for africa. and although he was tremendously fond of the doctor and never wanted to leave him altogether, he asked him one winter day when the weather was particularly cold and disagreeable if he would mind running down to africa for a holiday--just for a week or two. the doctor readily agreed because he hadn't been on a voyage in a long while and he felt he too needed a change from the chilly december days of england. so he started off. besides the pushmi-pullyu he took dab-dab the duck, jip the dog, gub-gub the pig, too-too the owl, and the white mouse--the same good company he had had with him on his adventurous return from the land of the monkeys. for this trip the doctor bought a little sailing boat--very old and battered and worn, but a good sound craft for bad weather. they sailed away down to the south coast of the bight of benin. there they visited many african kingdoms and strange tribes. and while they were ashore the pushmi-pullyu had a chance to wander freely through his old grazing grounds. and he enjoyed his holiday thoroughly. one morning the doctor was delighted to see his old friends the swallows gathering once more about his ship at anchor for their yearly flight to england. they asked him whether he too was returning; because if so, they said, they would accompany him, the same as they had done when he was escaping from the kingdom of jolliginki. as the pushmi-pullyu was now quite ready to leave, the doctor thanked the swallows and told them he would be delighted to have their company. then for the remainder of that day all was hustle and hurry and bustle, getting the ship provisioned and making preparations for the long trip back to england. by the following morning everything was in readiness to put to sea. the anchor was drawn up and with all sail set the doctor's ship moved northward before a favorable wind. and it is from this point that my story begins. part i _chapter i_ zuzana one morning in the first week of the return voyage when john dolittle and his animals were all sitting at breakfast round the big table in the cabin, one of the swallows came down and said that he wanted to speak to the doctor. john dolittle at once left the table and went out into the passage where he found the swallow-leader himself, a very neat, trim, little bird with long, long wings and sharp, snappy, black eyes. speedy-the-skimmer he was called--a name truly famous throughout the whole of the feathered world. he was the champion flycatcher and aerial acrobat of europe, africa, asia, and america. for years every summer he had won all the flying races, having broken his own record only last year by crossing the atlantic in eleven and a half hours--at a speed of over two hundred miles an hour. "well, speedy," said john dolittle. "what is it?" "doctor," said the little bird in a mysterious whisper, "we have sighted a canoe about a mile ahead of the ship and a little to the eastward, with only a black woman in it. she is weeping bitterly and isn't paddling the canoe at all. she is several miles from land--ten, at least, i should say--because at the moment we are crossing the bay of fantippo and can only just see the shore of africa. she is really in dangerous straits, with such a little bit of a boat that far out at sea. but she doesn't seem to care. she's just sitting in the bottom of the canoe, crying as if she didn't mind what happens to her. i wish you would come and speak to her, for we fear she is in great trouble." "all right," said the doctor. "fly slowly on to where the canoe is and i will steer the ship to follow you." so john dolittle went up on deck and by steering the boat after the guiding swallows he presently saw a small, dark canoe rising and falling on the waves. it looked so tiny on the wide face of the waters that it could be taken for a log or a stick--or, indeed, missed altogether, unless you were close enough to see it. in the canoe sat a woman with her head bowed down upon her knees. "what's the matter?" shouted the doctor, as soon as he was near enough to make the woman hear. "why have you come so far from the land? don't you know that you are in great danger if a storm should come up?" slowly the woman raised her head. "go away," said she, "and leave me to my sorrow. haven't you white men done me enough harm?" john dolittle steered the boat up closer still and continued to talk to the woman in a kindly way. but she seemed for a long time to mistrust him because he was a white man. little by little, however, the doctor won her confidence and at last, still weeping bitterly, she told him her story. [illustration: "john dolittle talked to the woman"] these were the days, you must understand, when slavery was being done away with. to capture, to buy or to sell slaves had, in fact, been strictly forbidden by most governments. but certain bad men still came down to the west coast of africa and captured or bought slaves secretly and took them away in ships to other lands to work on cotton and tobacco plantations. some african kings sold prisoners they had taken in war to these men and made a great deal of money that way. well, this woman in the canoe belonged to a tribe which had been at war with the king of fantippo--an african kingdom situated on the coast near which the swallows had seen the canoe. and in this war the king of fantippo had taken many prisoners, among whom was the woman's husband. shortly after the war was over some white men in a ship had called at the kingdom of fantippo to see if they could buy slaves for tobacco plantations. and when the king heard how much money they were willing to give for black slaves he thought he would sell them the prisoners he had taken in the war. this woman's name was zuzana and her husband was a very strong and fine-looking man. the king of fantippo would have kept zuzana's husband for this reason, because he liked to have strong men at his court. but the slave traders also wanted strong men, for they could do a lot of work on the plantations. and they offered the king of fantippo a specially high price for zuzana's husband. and the king had sold him. zuzana described to the doctor how she had followed the white man's ship a long way out in a canoe, imploring them to give her back her husband. but they had only laughed at her and gone on their way. and their ship had soon passed out of sight. that was why, she said, she hated all white men and had not wanted to speak to the doctor when he had hailed her canoe. the doctor was dreadfully angry when he had heard the story. and he asked zuzana how long ago was it that the slaver's ship bearing her husband had left. she told him it was half an hour ago. without her husband, she said, life meant nothing to her, and when the ship had passed from view, going northward along the coast, she had burst into tears and just let the canoe drift, not even having the heart to paddle back to land. the doctor told the woman that no matter what it cost he was going to help her. and he was all for speeding up his ship and going in chase of the slave boat right away. but dab-dab the duck warned him that his boat was very slow and that its sails could be easily seen by the slavers, who would never allow it to come near them. so the doctor put down his anchor and, leaving the ship where it was, got into the woman's canoe. then, calling to the swallows to help him as guides, he set off northward along the coast, looking into all the bays and behind all the islands for the slave ship which had taken zuzana's husband. [illustration: "looking into all the bays"] but after many hours of fruitless search night began to come on and the swallows who were acting as guides could no longer see big distances, for there was no moon. poor zuzana began weeping some more when the doctor said he would have to give up for the night. "by morning," said she, "the ship of the wicked slave dealers will be many miles away and i shall never get my husband back. alas! alas!" the doctor comforted her as best he could, saying that if he failed he would get her another husband, just as good. but she didn't seem to care for that idea and went on wailing, "alas! alas!" she made such a noise that the doctor couldn't get to sleep on the bottom of the canoe--which wasn't very comfortable, anyway. so he had to sit up and listen. some of the swallows were still with him, sitting on the edge of the canoe. and the famous skimmer, the leader, was also there. they and the doctor were talking over what they could do, when suddenly the skimmer said, "sh! look!" and pointed out to the westward over the dark, heaving sea. even zuzana stopped her wailing and turned to look. and there, away out on the dim, black edge of the ocean, they could see a tiny light. "a ship!" cried the doctor. "yes," said speedy, "that's a ship, sure enough. i wonder if it's another slave ship." "well, if it's a slave ship, it's not the one we're looking for," said the doctor, "because it's in the wrong direction. the one we're after went northward." "listen, doctor," said speedy-the-skimmer, "suppose i fly over to it and see what kind of a ship it is and come back and tell you. who knows? it might be able to help us." "all right, speedy. thank you," said the doctor. so the skimmer sped off into the darkness toward the tiny light far out to sea, while the doctor fell to wondering how his own ship was getting on which he had left at anchor some miles down the coast to the southward. after twenty minutes had gone by john dolittle began to get worried, because the skimmer, with his tremendous speed, should have had time to get there and back long ago. but soon with a flirt of the wings the famous leader made a neat circle in the darkness overhead and dropped, light as a feather, on to the doctor's knee. "well," said john dolittle, "what kind of a ship was it?" "it's a big ship," panted the skimmer, "with tall, high masts and, i should judge, a fast one. but it is coming this way and it is sailing with great care, afraid, i imagine, of shallows and sandbars. it is a very neat ship, smart and new-looking all over. and there are great big guns--cannons--looking out of little doors in her sides. the men on her, too, are all well dressed in smart blue clothes--not like ordinary seamen at all. and on the ship's hull was painted some lettering--her name, i suppose. of course, i couldn't read it. but i remember what it looked like. give me your hand and i'll show you." then the skimmer, with one of his claws, began tracing out some letters on the doctor's palm. before he had got very far john dolittle sprang up, nearly overturning the canoe. "h. m. s.!" he cried. "that means her majesty's ship. it's a man-o'-war--a navy vessel. the very thing we want to deal with slave traders!" _chapter ii_ the doctor's reception on the warship then the doctor and zuzana started to paddle their canoe for all they were worth in the direction of the light. the night was calm, but the long swell of the ocean swung the little canoe up and down like a seesaw and it needed all zuzana's skill to keep it in a straight line. after about an hour had gone by the doctor noticed that the ship they were trying to reach was no longer coming toward them, but seemed to have stopped. and when he finally came up beneath its towering shape in the darkness he saw the reason why--the man-o'-war had run into his own ship, which he had left at anchor with no lights. however, the navy vessel had fortunately been going so carefully that no serious damage, it seemed, had been done to either ship. finding a rope ladder hanging on the side of the man-o'-war, john dolittle climbed up it, with zuzana, and went aboard to see the captain. he found the captain strutting the quarterdeck, mumbling to himself. "good evening," said the doctor politely. "nice weather we're having." the captain came up to him and shook his fist in his face. "are you the owner of that noah's ark down there?" he stormed, pointing to the other ship alongside. "er--yes--temporarily," said the doctor. "why?" "well, will you be so good," snarled the captain, his face all out of shape with rage, "as to tell me what in thunder you mean by leaving your old junk at anchor on a dark night without any lights? what kind of a sailor are you? here i bring her majesty's latest cruiser after jimmie bones, the slave trader--been hunting him for weeks, i have--and, as though the beastly coast wasn't difficult enough as it is, i bump into a craft riding at anchor with no lights. luckily, i was going slow, taking soundings, or we might have gone down with all hands. i hallooed to your ship and got no answer. so i go aboard her, with pistols ready, thinking maybe she's a slaver, trying to play tricks on me. i creep all over the ship, but not a soul do i meet. at last in the cabin i find a pig--_asleep in an armchair_! do you usually leave your craft in the charge of a pig, with orders to go to sleep? if you own the ship, why aren't you on her? where have you been?" [illustration: "'where have you been?'"] "i was out canoeing with a lady," said the doctor, and he smiled comfortingly at zuzana, who was beginning to weep again. "_canoeing with a lady!_" spluttered the captain. "well, i'll be----" "yes," said the doctor. "let me introduce you. this is zuzana, captain--er----" but the captain interrupted him by calling for a sailor, who stood near. "i'll teach you to leave noah's arks at anchor on the high seas for the navy to bump into, my fine deep-sea philanderer! think the shipping laws are made for a joke? here," he turned to the sailor, who had come in answer to his call, "master-at-arms, put this man under arrest." "aye, aye, sir," said the master-at-arms. and before the doctor knew it he had handcuffs fastened firmly on his wrists. "but this lady was in distress," said the doctor. "i was in such a hurry i forgot all about lighting the ship. in fact, it wasn't dark yet when i left." "take him below!" roared the captain. "take him below before i kill him." and the poor doctor was dragged away by the master-at-arms toward a stair leading to the lower decks. but at the head of the stairs he caught hold of the handrail and hung on long enough to shout back to the captain: "i could tell you where jimmie bones is, if i wanted to." "what's that?" snorted the captain. "here, bring him back! what was that you said?" "i said," murmured the doctor, getting his handkerchief out and blowing his nose with his handcuffed hands, "that i could tell you where jimmie bones is--if i wanted to." "jimmie bones, the slaver?" cried the captain. "that's the man the government has sent me after. where is he?" "my memory doesn't work very well while my hands are tied," said the doctor quietly, nodding toward the handcuffs. "possibly if you took these things off i might remember." "oh, excuse me," said the captain, his manner changing at once. "master-at-arms, release the prisoner." "aye, aye, sir," said the sailor, removing the handcuffs from the doctor's wrists and turning to go. "oh, and by the way," the captain called after him, "bring a chair up on deck. perhaps our visitor is tired." then john dolittle told the captain the whole story of zuzana and her troubles. and all the other officers on the ship gathered around to listen. "and i have no doubt," the doctor ended, "that this slaver who took away the woman's husband was no other than jimmie bones, the man you are after." "quite so," said the captain. "i know he is somewhere around the coast. but where is he now? he's a difficult fish to catch." "he has gone northward," said the doctor. "but your ship is fast and should be able to overtake him. if he hides in some of these bays and creeks i have several birds here with me who can, as soon as it is light, seek him out for us and tell us where he is." the captain looked with astonishment into the faces of his listening officers, who all smiled unbelievingly. "what do you mean--birds?" the captain asked. "pigeons--trained canaries, or something?" "no," said the doctor, "i mean the swallows who are going back to england for the summer. they very kindly offered to guide my ship home. they're friends of mine, you see." this time the officers all burst out laughing and tapped their foreheads knowingly, to show they thought the doctor was crazy. and the captain, thinking he was being made a fool of, flew into a rage once more and was all for having the doctor arrested again. but the officer who was second in command whispered in the captain's ear: "why not take the old fellow along and let him try, sir? our course was northward, anyway. i seem to remember hearing something, when i was attached to the home fleet, about an old chap in the west counties who had some strange powers with beasts and birds. i have no doubt this is he. dolittle, he was called. he seems harmless enough. there's just a chance he may be of some assistance to us. the natives evidently trust him or the woman wouldn't have come with him--you know how scared they are of putting to sea with a white man." after a moment's thought the captain turned to the doctor again. "you sound clean crazy to me, my good man. but if you can put me in the way of capturing jimmie bones the slaver i don't care what means you use to do it. as soon as the day breaks we will get under way. but if you are just amusing yourself at the expense of her majesty's navy i warn you it will be the worst day's work for yourself you ever did. now go and put riding lights on that ark of yours and tell the pig that if he lets them go out he shall be made into rashers of bacon for the officers' mess." there was much laughter and joking as the doctor climbed over the side and went back to his own ship to get his lights lit. but the next morning when he came back to the man-o'-war--and about a thousand swallows came with him--the officers of her majesty's navy were not nearly so inclined to make fun of him. the sun was just rising over the distant coast of africa and it was as beautiful a morning as you could wish to see. speedy-the-skimmer had arranged plans with the doctor overnight. and long before the great warship pulled up her anchor and swung around upon her course the famous swallow leader was miles ahead, with a band of picked hunters, exploring up creeks and examining all the hollows of the coast where the slave trader might be hiding. speedy had agreed with the doctor upon a sort of overhead telegraph system to be carried on by the swallows. and as soon as the millions of little birds had spread themselves out in a line along the coast, so that the sky was speckled with them as far as the eye could reach, they began passing messages, by whistling to one another, all the way from the scouts in front back to the doctor on the warship, to give news of how the hunt was progressing. [illustration: "the birds spread themselves out along the coast"] and somewhere about noon word came through that bones's slave ship had been sighted behind a long, high cape. great care must be taken, the message said, because the slave ship was in all readiness to sail at a moment's notice. the slavers had only stopped to get water and look-outs were posted to warn them to return at once, if necessary. when the doctor told this to the captain the man-o'-war changed her course still closer inshore, to keep behind the cover of the long cape. all the sailors were warned to keep very quiet, so the navy ship could sneak up on the slaver unawares. now, the captain, expecting the slavers to put up a fight, also gave orders to get the guns ready. and just as they were about to round the long cape one of the silly gunners let a gun off by accident. "_boom!_" ... the shot went rolling and echoing over the silent sea like angry thunder. instantly back came word over the swallows' telegraph line that the slavers were warned and were escaping. and, sure enough, when the warship rounded the cape at last, there was the slave ship putting out to sea, with all sail set and a good ten-mile start on the man-o'-war. _chapter iii_ a great gunner and then began a most exciting sea race. it was now two o'clock in the afternoon and there were not many hours of daylight left. the captain (after he had done swearing at the stupid gunner who had let off the gun by accident) realized that if he did not catch up to the slaver before dark came on he would probably lose him altogether. for this jim bones was a very sly and clever rascal and he knew the west coast of africa (it is sometimes called to this day _the slave coast_) very well. after dark by running without lights he would easily find some nook or corner to hide in--or double back on his course and be miles away before morning came. so the captain gave orders that all possible speed was to be made. these were the days when steam was first used on ships. but at the beginning it was only used together with the sails, to help the power of the wind. of this vessel, h. m. s. _violet_, the captain was very proud. and he was most anxious that the _violet_ should have the honor of catching bones the slaver, who for so long had been defying the navy by carrying on slave trade after it had been forbidden. so the _violet's_ steam engines were put to work their hardest. and thick, black smoke rolled out of her funnels and darkened the blue sea and smudged up her lovely white sails humming tight in the breeze. then the engine boy, also anxious that his ship should have the honor of capturing bones, tied down the safety valve on the steam engine, to make her go faster, and then went up on deck to see the show. and soon, of course, one of the _violet's_ brand new boilers burst with a terrific bang and made an awful mess of the engine room. but, being a full-rigged man-o'-war, the _violet_ was still a pretty speedy sailer. and on she went, furiously plowing the waves and slowly gaining on the slave ship. however, the crafty bones, with so big a start, was not easy to overtake. and soon the sun began to set and the captain frowned and stamped his feet. for with darkness he knew his enemy would be safe. down below among the crew, the man who had fired the gun by accident was having a terrible time. all his companions were setting on him and mobbing him for being such a duffer as to warn bones--who would now almost certainly escape. the distance from the slaver was still too great to use the kind of guns they had in those days. but when the captain saw darkness creeping over the sea and his enemy escaping, he gave orders to man the guns, anyway--although he hadn't the least hope that his shots would hit the slaver at that distance. now, speedy-the-skimmer, as soon as the race had begun, had come on to the warship to take a rest. and he happened to be talking to the doctor when the order to man the guns came down from the captain. so the doctor and speedy went below to watch the guns being fired. they found an air of quiet but great excitement there. each gunner was leaning on his gun, aiming it, watching the enemy's ship in the distance and waiting for the order to fire. the poor man who had been mobbed by his fellows was still almost in tears at his own stupid mistake. suddenly an officer shouted "_fire!_" and with a crash that shook the ship from stem to stern eight big cannon balls went whistling out across the water. but not one hit the slave ship. _splash! splash! splash!_ they fell harmlessly into the water. "the light's too bad," grumbled the gunners. "who could hit anything two miles away in this rotten light?" then speedy whispered in the doctor's ear: "ask them to let me fire a gun. my sight is better than theirs for bad light." but just at that moment the order came from the captain, "_cease firing!_" and the men left their places. as soon as their backs were turned speedy jumped on top of one of the guns and, straddling his short, white legs apart, he cast his beady little black eyes along the aiming sights. then with his wings he signaled to the doctor behind him to swing the gun this way and that, so as to aim it the way he wanted. "_fire!_" said speedy. and the doctor fired. [illustration: "'_fire!_' said speedy"] "what in thunder's this?" roared the captain from the quarterdeck as the shot rang out. "didn't i give the order to cease firing?" but the second in command plucked him by the sleeve and pointed across the water. speedy's cannon ball had cut the slaver's mainmast clean in two and brought the sails down in a heap upon the deck! "holy smoke!" cried the captain. "we've hit him! look, bones is flying the signal of surrender!" then the captain, who a moment before was all for punishing the man who had fired without orders, wanted to know who it was that aimed that marvelous shot which brought the slaver to a standstill. and the doctor was going to tell him it was speedy. but the skimmer whispered in his ear: "don't bother, doctor. he would never believe you, anyway. it was the gun of the man that made the mistake before that we used. let him take the credit. they'll likely give him a medal, and then he'll feel better." and now all was excitement aboard the _violet_ as they approached the slave boat lying crippled in the sea. bones, the captain, with his crew of eleven other ruffians, was taken prisoner and put down in the cells of the warship. then the doctor, with zuzana, some sailors and an officer, went on to the slave ship. entering the hold, they found the place packed with slaves with chains on them. and zuzana immediately recognized her husband and wept all over him with joy. the black men were at once freed from their chains and brought on to the man-o'-war. then the slave ship was taken in tow by the _violet_. and that was the end of mr. bones's slave trading. then there was much rejoicing and hand-shaking and congratulation on board the warship. and a grand dinner was prepared for the slaves on the main deck. but john dolittle, zuzana and her husband were invited to the officers' mess, where their health was drunk in port wine and speeches were made by the captain and the doctor. the next day, as soon as it was light, the warship went cruising down the coast again, putting the black people ashore in their own particular countries. this took considerable time, because bones, it seemed, had collected slaves from a great many different tribes. and it was after noon before the doctor, with zuzana and her husband, were returned to john dolittle's ship, who still had her lights faithfully burning in the middle of the day. then the captain shook hands with the doctor and thanked him for the great assistance he had given her majesty's navy. and he asked him for his address in england, because he said he was going to tell the government about him and the queen would most likely want to make him a knight or give him a medal or something. but the doctor said he would rather have a pound of tea instead. he hadn't tasted tea in several months and the kind they had in the officers' mess was very good. so the captain gave him five pounds of the best china tea and thanked him again in the name of the queen and the government. then the _violet_ swung her great bow around to the north once more and sailed away for england, while the bluejackets crowded the rail and sent three hearty cheers for the doctor ringing across the sea. [illustration: "the bluejackets crowded to the rail"] and now jip, dab-dab, gub-gub, too-too and the rest of them gathered around john dolittle and wanted to hear all about his adventures. and it was tea time before he had done telling them. so the doctor asked zuzana and her husband to take tea with him before they went ashore. this they were glad to do. and the doctor made the tea himself and it was very excellent. over the tea zuzana and her husband (whose name was begwe) were conversing about the kingdom of fantippo. "i don't think we ought to go back there," said begwe. "i don't mind being a soldier in the fantippo army, but suppose some other slaver comes along. maybe the king would sell me again. did you send that letter to our cousin?" "yes," said zuzana. "but i don't think he ever got it. because no answer came." the doctor asked zuzana how she had sent the letter. and then she explained to him that when bones had offered a big price for begwe and the king had been tempted to sell him she had told the king she would get twelve oxen and thirty goats from a rich cousin in their own country if he would only wait till she had written to him. now, the king of fantippo was very fond of oxen and goats--cattle being considered as good as money in his land. and he promised zuzana that if she got the twelve oxen and thirty goats in two days' time her husband should be a free man, instead of being sold to the slavers. so zuzana had hurried to a professional letter writer (the common people of those tribes couldn't write for themselves, you see) and had a letter written, begging their cousin to send the goats and oxen to the king without delay. then she had taken the letter to the fantippo post office and sent it off. but the two days went by and no answer came--and no cattle. then poor begwe had been sold to bones's men. _chapter iv_ the royal mails of fantippo now, this fantippo post office of which zuzana had spoken to the doctor was rather peculiar. for one thing, it was, of course, quite unusual to find a post office or regular mails of any kind in a savage african kingdom. and the way such a thing had come about was this: a few years before this voyage of the doctor's there had been a great deal of talk in most civilized parts of the world about mails and how much it should cost for a letter to go from one country to another. and in england a man called rowland hill had started what was called "the penny postage," and it had been agreed that a penny a letter should be the regular rate charge for mails from one part of the british isles to another. of course, for specially heavy letters you had to pay more. then stamps were made, penny stamps, twopenny stamps, twopence-halfpenny stamps, sixpenny stamps and shilling stamps. and each was a different color and they were beautifully engraved and most of them had a picture of the queen on them--some with her crown on her head and some without. and france and the united states and all the other countries started doing the same thing--only their stamps were counted in their own money, of course, and had different kings or queens or presidents on them. very well, then. now, it happened one day that a ship called at the coast of west africa, and delivered a letter for koko, the king of fantippo. king koko had never seen a stamp before and, sending for a white merchant who lived in his town, he asked him what queen's face was this on the stamp which the letter bore. then the white merchant explained to him the whole idea of penny postage and government mails. and he told him that in england all you had to do when you wanted to send a letter to any part of the world was to put a stamp on the envelope with the queen's head on it and place it in a letter-box on the street corner, and it would be carried to the place to which you addressed it. "ah, hah!" said the king. "a new kind of magic. i understand. very good. the high kingdom of fantippo shall have a post office of its own. and _my_ serene and beautiful face shall be on all the stamps and _my_ letters shall travel by faster magic than any of them." [illustration: "a rare fantippo stamp"] then king koko of fantippo, being a very vain man, had a fine lot of stamps made with his pictures on them, some with his crown on and some without; some smiling, some frowning; some with himself on horseback, some with himself on a bicycle. but the stamp which he was most proud of was the tenpenny stamp which bore a picture of himself playing golf--a game which he had just recently learned from some scotchmen who were mining for gold in his kingdom. and he had letter-boxes made, just the way the white trader had told him they had in england, and he set them up at the corners of the streets and told his people that all they had to do was to put one of his stamps on their letters, poke them into these boxes and they would travel to any corner of the earth they wished. but presently the people began complaining that they had been robbed. they had paid good money for the stamps, they said, trusting in their magic power, and they had put their letters in the boxes at the corners of the streets as they had been told. but one day a cow had rubbed her neck against one of the letter boxes and burst it open, and inside there were all the people's letters, which had not traveled one inch from where they put them! then the king was very angry and, calling for the white trader, he said: "you have been fooling my majesty. these stamps you speak of have no magic power at all. explain!" then the trader told him that it was not through magic in the stamps or boxes that letters traveled by mail. but proper post offices had mail-men, or postmen, who collected the letters out of these boxes. and he went on to explain to the king all the other duties of a post office and the things that made letters go. so then the king, who was a persevering man, said that fantippo should have its post office, anyway. and he sent to england for hundreds of postmen's uniforms and caps. and when these arrived he dressed a lot of black men up in them and set them to work as postmen. but the black men found the heavy uniforms dreadfully hot for fantippo weather, where they wear only a string of beads. and they left off the uniforms and wore only the caps. that is how the fantippo postman's uniform came to be a smart cap, a string of beads and a mail bag. then when king koko had got his mail-men, the royal fantippo post office began really working. letters were collected from the boxes at street corners and sent off when ships called; and incoming mail was delivered at the doors of the houses in fantippo three times a day. the post office became the busiest place in town. now, the peoples of west africa have curious tastes in dress. they love bright things. and some fantippo dandy started the idea of using up old stamps off letters by making suits of clothes out of them. they looked very showy and smart and a suit of this kind made of stamps became a valuable possession among the natives. about this time, too, in the civilized parts of the world one of the things that arose out of all this penny-postage business was the craze or hobby for collecting stamps. in england and america and other countries people began buying stamp albums and pasting stamps in them. a rare stamp became quite valuable. and it happened that one day two men, whose hobby was collecting stamps, came to fantippo in a ship. the one stamp they were both most anxious to get for their collections was the "twopenny-halfpenny fantippo red," a stamp which the king had given up printing--for the reason that the picture of himself on it wasn't handsome enough. and because he had given up printing it, it became very rare. as soon as these two men stepped ashore at fantippo a porter came up to them to carry their bags. and right in the middle of the porter's chest the collectors spied the twopenny-halfpenny fantippo red! then both of the stamp collectors offered to buy the stamp. and as each was anxious to have it for his collection, before long they were offering high prices for it, bidding against one another. king koko got to hear of this and he called up one of these stamp collectors and asked him why men should offer high prices for one old used stamp. and the white man explained to him this new craze for stamp collecting that was sweeping over the civilized world. so king koko, although he thought that the civilized world must be crazy, decided it would be a good idea if _he_ sold stamps for collections--much better business than selling them at his post office for letters. and after that whenever a ship came into the harbor of fantippo he sent his postmaster-general--a very grand man, who wore _two_ strings of beads, a postman's cap and no mail bag--out to the ship with stamps to sell for collections. such a roaring trade was done in this way that the king set the stamp printing presses to work more busily than ever, so that a whole new set of fantippo stamps should be ready for sale by the time the same ship called again on her way home to england. but with this new trade in selling stamps for stamp collections, and not for proper mailing purposes, the fantippo mail service was neglected and became very bad. now, doctor dolittle, while zuzana was talking over the tea about her letter which she had sent to her cousin--and to which no answer had ever come--suddenly remembered something. on one of his earlier voyages the passenger ship by which he had been traveling had stopped outside this same harbor of fantippo, although no passengers had gone ashore. and a postman had come aboard to sell a most elegant lot of new green and violet stamps. the doctor, being at the time a great stamp collector, had bought three whole sets. and he realized now, as he listened to zuzana, what was wrong with the fantippo post office and why she had never got an answer to the letter which would have saved her husband from slavery. as zuzana and begwe rose to go, for it was beginning to get dark, the doctor noticed a canoe setting out toward his ship from the shore. and in it, when it got near, he saw king koko himself, coming to the white man's boat with stamps to sell. so the doctor got talking to the king and he told him in plain language that he ought to be ashamed of his post office. then, giving him a cup of china tea, he explained to him how zuzana's letter had probably never been delivered to her cousin. [illustration: "the doctor gave the king a cup of china tea"] the king listened attentively and understood how his post office had been at fault. and he invited the doctor to come ashore with zuzana and begwe and arrange the post office for him and put it in order so it would work properly. _chapter v_ the voyage delayed after some persuasion the doctor consented to this proposal feeling that perhaps he could do some good. little did he realize what great labors and strange adventures he was taking upon himself as he got into the canoe with the king, begwe and zuzana to be paddled to the town of fantippo. this place he found very different from any of the african villages or settlements he had ever visited. it was quite large, almost a city. it was bright and cheerful to look at and the people, like their king, all seemed very kind and jolly. the doctor was introduced to all the chief men of the fantippo nation and later he was taken to see the post office. this he found in a terrible state. there were letters everywhere--on the floors, in old drawers, knocking about on desks, even lying on the pavement outside the post office door. the doctor explained to the king that this would never do, that in properly-run post offices the letters that had stamps on were treated with respect and care. it was no wonder, he said, that zuzana's letter had never been delivered to her cousin if this was the way they took care of the mails. then king koko again begged him to take charge of the post office and try to get it running in proper order. and the doctor said he would see what he could do. and, going into the post office, he took off his coat and set to work. but after many hours of terrific labor, trying to get letters sorted and the place in order, john dolittle saw that such a tremendous job as setting the fantippo post office to rights would not be a matter of a day or two. it would take weeks at least. so he told this to the king. then the doctor's ship was brought into the harbor and put safely at anchor and the animals were all taken ashore. and a nice, new house on the main street was given over to the doctor for himself and his pets to live in while the work of straightening out the fantippo mails was going on. well, after ten days john dolittle got what is called the _domestic mails_ in pretty good shape. domestic mails are those that carry letters from one part of a country to another part of the same country, or from one part of a city to another. the mails that carry letters outside the country to foreign lands are called _foreign mails_. to have a regular and good service of foreign mails in the fantippo post office the doctor found a hard problem, because the mail ships which could carry letters abroad did not come very often to this port. fantippo, although king koko was most proud of it, was not considered a very important country among the regular civilized nations and two or three ships a year were all that ever called there. now, one day, very early in the morning, when the doctor was lying in bed, wondering what he could do about the foreign mail service, dab-dab and jip brought him in his breakfast on a tray and told him there was a swallow outside who wanted to give him a message from speedy-the-skimmer. john dolittle had the swallow brought in and the little bird sat on the foot of his bed while he ate his breakfast. "good morning," said the doctor, cracking open the top of a hard-boiled egg. "what can i do for you?" [illustration: "'good morning! what can i do for you?'"] "speedy would like to know," said the swallow, "how long you expect to stay in this country. he doesn't want to complain, you understand--nor do any of us--but this journey of yours is taking longer than we thought it would. you see, there was the delay while we hunted out bones the slaver, and now it seems likely you will be busy with this post office for some weeks yet. ordinarily we would have been in england long before this, getting the nests ready for the new season's families. we cannot put off the nesting season, you know. of course, you understand we are not complaining, don't you? but this delay is making things rather awkward for us." "oh, quite, quite. i understand perfectly," said the doctor, poking salt into his egg with a bone egg-spoon. "i am dreadfully sorry. but why didn't speedy bring the message himself?" "i suppose he didn't like to," said the swallow. "thought you'd be offended, perhaps." "oh, not in the least," said the doctor. "you birds have been most helpful to me. tell speedy i'll come to see him as soon as i've got my trousers on and we'll talk it over. something can be arranged, i have no doubt." "very good, doctor," said the swallow, turning to go. "i'll tell the skimmer what you say." "by the way," said john dolittle, "i've been trying to think where i've seen your face before. did you ever build your nest in my stable in puddleby?" "no," said the bird. "but i am the swallow that brought you the message from the monkeys that time they were sick." "oh, to be sure--of course," cried the doctor. "i knew i had seen you somewhere. i never forget faces. you had a pretty hard time coming to england in the winter, didn't you--snow on the ground and all that sort of thing. very plucky of you to undertake it." "yes, it was a hard trip," said the swallow. "i came near freezing to death more than once. flying into the teeth of that frosty wind was just awful. but something had to be done. the monkeys would most likely have been wiped right out if we hadn't got you." "how was it that you were the one chosen to bring the message?" asked the doctor. "well," said the swallow, "speedy did want to do it himself. he's frightfully brave, you know--and fast as lightning. but the other swallows wouldn't let him. they said he was too valuable as a leader. it was a risky job. and if he had lost his life from the frost we'd never be able to get another leader like him. because, besides being brave and fast, he's the cleverest leader we ever had. whenever the swallows are in trouble he always thinks of a way out. he's a born leader. he flies quick and he thinks quick." "humph!" murmured the doctor, as he thoughtfully brushed the toast crumbs off the bed clothes. "but why did they pick you to bring the message?" "they didn't," said the swallow. "we nearly all of us volunteered for the job, so as not to have speedy risk his life. but the skimmer said the only fair way was to draw lots. so we got a number of small leaves and we took the stalks off all of them except one. and we put the leaves in an old cocoanut shell and shook them up. then, with our eyes shut, we began picking them out. the swallow who picked the leaf with the stalk on it was to carry the message to england--and i picked the leaf with the stalk on. before i started off on the trip i kissed my wife good-bye, because i really never expected to get back alive. still, i'm kind of glad the lot fell to me." "why?" asked the doctor, pushing the breakfast tray off his knees and punching the pillows into shape. "well, you see," said the swallow, lifting his right leg and showing a tiny red ribbon made of corn silk tied about his ankle, "i got this for it." "what's that?" asked the doctor. "that's to show i've done something brave--and special," said the swallow modestly. "oh, i see," said the doctor. "like a medal, eh?" "yes. my name is quip. it used to be just plain quip. now i'm called _quip the carrier_," said the small bird proudly gazing down at his little, stubby white leg. "splendid, quip," said the doctor. "i congratulate you. now i must be getting up. i've a frightful lot of work to do. don't forget to tell speedy i'll meet him on the ship at ten. good-bye! oh, and would you mind asking dab-dab, as you go out, to clear away the breakfast things? i'm glad you came. you've given me an idea. good-bye!" [illustration: "they found the doctor shaving"] and when dab-dab and jip came to take away the tray they found the doctor shaving. he was peering into a looking glass, holding the end of his nose and muttering to himself: "_that's_ the idea for the fantippo foreign mail service--i wonder why i never thought of it before. i'll have the fastest overseas mail the world ever saw. why, of course! that's the idea--_the swallow mail_!" _chapter vi_ no-man's-land as soon as he was dressed and shaved the doctor went down to his ship and met the skimmer. "i am terribly sorry, speedy," said he, "to hear what a lot of trouble i have been giving you birds by my delay here. but i really feel that the business of the post office ought to be attended to, you know. it's in a shocking state--honestly, it is." "i know," said speedy. "and if we could we would have nested right here in this country to oblige you, and not bothered about going to england this year. it wouldn't have mattered terribly much to miss one summer in the north. but, you see, we swallows can't nest very well in trees. we like houses and barns and buildings to nest in." "couldn't you use the houses of fantippo?" asked the doctor. "not very well," said speedy. "they're so small and noisy--with the native children playing around them all day. the eggs and young ones wouldn't be safe for a minute. and, then, they're not built right for us--mostly made of grass, the roofs sloping wrong, the eaves too near the ground, and all that. what we like are solid english buildings, where the people don't shriek and whoop and play drums all day--quiet buildings, like old barns and stables, where, if people come at all, they come in a proper, dignified manner, arriving and leaving at regular hours. we like people, you understand--in their right place. but nesting mother birds must have quiet." "humph! i see," said the doctor. "of course, myself, i rather enjoy the jolliness of these fantippos. but i can quite see your point. by the way, how would my old ship do? this ought to be quiet enough for you here. there's nobody living on it now. and, look, it has heaps of cracks and holes and corners in it where you could build your nests. what do you think?" "that would be splendid," said speedy--"if you think you won't be needing the boat for some weeks. of course, it would never do if, after we had the nests built and the eggs laid, you were to pull up the anchor and sail away--the young ones would get seasick." "no, of course not," said the doctor. "but there will be no fear of my leaving for some time yet. you could have the whole ship to yourselves and nobody will disturb you." "all right," said speedy. "then i'll tell the swallows to get on with the nest building right away. but, of course, we'll go on to england with you when you are ready, to show you the way--and also to teach the young birds how to get there, too. you see, each year's new birds make their first trip back from england to africa with us grown ones. they have to make the first journey under our guidance." "very good," said the doctor. "then that settles that. now i must get back to the post office. the ship is yours. but as soon as the nesting is over come and let me know, because i have a very special idea i want to tell you about." so the doctor's boat was now turned into a nesting ship for the swallows. calmly she stood at anchor in the quiet waters of fantippo harbor, while thousands and thousands of swallows built their nests in her rigging, in her ventilators, in her portholes and in every crack and corner of her. [illustration: "thousands of swallows built their nests in her rigging"] no one went near her and the swallows had her to themselves. and they agreed afterward that they found her the best place for nesting they had ever used. in a very short time the ship presented a curious and extraordinary sight, with the mud nests stuck all over her and birds flying in thousands round her masts, coming and going, building homes and feeding young ones. and the farmers in england that year said the coming winter would be a hard one because the swallows had done their nesting abroad before they arrived and only spent a few weeks of the autumn in the north. and later, after the nesting was all over, there were more than twice as many birds as there were before, of course. and you simply couldn't get on to the ship for the tons and tons of mud on her. but the parent birds, as soon as the young ones were able to fly, set their children to work clearing up the mess. and all that mud was taken off and dropped into the harbor, piece by piece. and the doctor's ship was left in a cleaner state than it had ever been before in its whole life. now, it happened one day that the doctor came to the post office, as usual, at nine o'clock in the morning. (he had to get there at that time, because if he didn't the postmen didn't start working.) and outside the post office he found jip, gnawing a bone on the pavement. something curious about the bone struck the doctor, who was, of course, being a naturalist, quite a specialist in bones. he asked jip to let him look at it. "why, this is extraordinary!" said the doctor, examining the bone with great care. "i did not know that this class of animals were still to be found in africa. where did you get this bone, jip?" "over in no-man's-land," said jip. "there are lots of bones there." "and where might no-man's-land be?" said john dolittle. "no-man's-land is that round island just outside the harbor," said jip--"you know, the one that looks like a plum pudding." "oh, yes," said the doctor. "i know the island you mean. it's only a short distance from the mainland. but i hadn't heard that that was the name of it. humph! if you'll lend me this bone a while, jip, i think i'll go to see the king about it." so, taking the bone, john dolittle went off to call on king koko, and jip asked if he might come along. they found the king sitting at the palace door, sucking a lollipop--for he, like all the fantippos, was very fond of sweetmeats. "good morning, your majesty," said the doctor. "do you happen to know what kind of animal this bone belongs to?" the king examined it, then shook his head. he didn't know much about bones. "maybe it's a cow's bone," said he. "oh, certainly not," said john dolittle. "no cow ever had a bone like that. that's a jaw--but not a cow's jaw. listen, your majesty, would you mind lending me a canoe and some paddlers? i want to go over to visit no-man's-land." to the doctor's astonishment the king choked on his lollipop and nearly fell over his chair backwards. then he ran inside the palace and shut the door. "how extraordinary!" said john dolittle, entirely bewildered. "what ails the man?" "oh, it's some humbug or other," growled jip. "they're a superstitious lot, these natives. let's go down to the harbor, doctor, and try to hire a canoe to take us." so they went down to the water's edge and asked several of the canoesmen to take them over to no-man's-land. but every one they asked got dreadfully frightened and refused to talk when the doctor told them where he wanted to go. they wouldn't even let him borrow their canoes to go there by himself. at last they found one very old boatman who loved chatting so much that, although he got terribly scared when john dolittle mentioned no-man's-land, he finally told the doctor the reason for all this extraordinary behavior. "that island," said he--"we don't even mention its name unless we have to--is the land of evil magic. it is called (the old man whispered it so low the doctor could scarcely hear him) no-man's-land, because no man lives there. no man ever even goes there." "but why?" asked the doctor. "_dragons live there!_" said the old boatman, his eyes wide and staring.--"enormous horned dragons, that spit fire and eat men. if you value your life never go near that dreadful island." "but how do you know all this," asked the doctor, "if nobody has ever been there to see if it's true or not?" "a thousand years ago," said the old man, "when king kakaboochi ruled over this land, he put his mother-in-law upon that island to live, because she talked too much and he couldn't bear her around the palace. it was arranged that food should be taken to her every week. but the first week that the men went there in canoes they could find no trace of her. while they were seeking her about the island a dragon suddenly roared out from the bushes and attacked them. they only just escaped with their lives and got back to fantippo and told king kakaboochi. a famous wizard was consulted, and he said it must have been the king's mother-in-law herself who had been changed into a dragon by some magic spell. since then she has had many children and the island is peopled with dragons--_whose food is men_! for whenever a canoe approaches, the dragons come down to the shores, breathing flame and destruction. but for many hundreds of years now no man has set foot upon it. that is why it is called--well, you know." after he had told this story the old man turned away and busied himself with his canoe, as though he were afraid that the doctor might again ask him to paddle him to the island. "look here, jip," said john dolittle, "you said you got this bone from no-man's-land. did you see any dragons there?" "no," said jip. "i swam out there--just to get cool. it was a hot day yesterday. and then i didn't go far inland on the island. i found many bones on the beach. and as this one smelled good to me, i picked it up and swam back here with it. i was more interested in the bone and the swim than i was in the island, to tell you the truth." "it's most extraordinary," murmured the doctor--"this legend about the island. it makes me more anxious than ever to go there. that bone interests me, too, immensely. i've seen only one other like it--and that was in a natural history museum. do you mind if i keep it, jip? i'd like to put it in my own museum when i get back to puddleby." "not at all," said jip. "look here, doctor, if we can't raise a canoe, let's you and i swim out to the island. it's not over a mile and a half and we're both good swimmers." "that's not a bad idea, jip," said the doctor. "we'll go down the shore a way till we're opposite the island, then we won't have so far to swim." so off they went. and when they had come to the best place on the shore the doctor took off his clothes and, tying them up in a bundle, he fastened them on his head, with the precious high hat on the top of all. then he waded into the surf and, with jip beside him, started swimming for the island. now this particular stretch of water they were trying to cross happened to be a bad place for swimming. and after about a quarter of an hour jip and the doctor felt themselves being carried out to sea in the grip of a powerful current. they tried their hardest to get to the island. but without any success. "let yourself drift, doctor," panted jip. "don't waste your strength fighting the current. let yourself drift. even if we're carried past the island out to sea we can land on the mainland further down the coast, where the current isn't so strong." but the doctor didn't answer. and jip could see from his face that his strength and breath were nearly gone. then jip barked his loudest, hoping that possibly dab-dab might hear him on the mainland and fly out and bring help. but, of course, they were much too far from the town for anyone to hear. "turn back, jip," gasped the doctor. "don't bother about me. i'll be all right. turn back and try and make the shore." [illustration: "'turn back, jip!' gasped the doctor"] but jip had no intention of turning back and leaving the doctor to drown--though he saw no possible chance of rescue. presently john dolittle's mouth filled with water and he began to splutter and gurgle and jip was really frightened. but just as the doctor's eyes were closing and he seemed too weak to swim another stroke a curious thing happened. jip felt something come up under the water, right beneath his feet, and lift him and the doctor slowly out of the sea, like the rising deck of a submarine. up and up they were lifted, now entirely out of the water. and, gasping and sprawling side by side, they gazed at one another in utter astonishment. "what is it, doctor?" said jip, staring down at the strange thing, which had now stopped rising and was carrying them like a ship, right across the strong course of the current, in the direction of the island. "i haven't the--hah--remotest--hah--idea," panted john dolittle. "can it be a whale? no, because the skin isn't a whale's. this is fur," he said, plucking at the stuff he was sitting on. "well, it's an animal of some kind, isn't it?" said jip. "but where's its head?" and he gazed down the long sloping back that stretched in a flat curve in front of them for a good thirty yards. "its head is under water," said the doctor. "but there's its tail, look, behind us." and turning around jip saw the longest tail that mortal beast ever had, thrashing the water and driving them toward the island. "i know!" cried jip. "it's the dragon! this is king kakaboochi's mother-in-law we're sitting on!" "well anyway thank goodness she rose in time!" said the doctor, shaking the water out of his ears. "i was never so near drowning in my life. i suppose i'd better make myself a little more presentable before she gets her head out of water." and, taking down his clothes off his own head, the doctor smartened up his high hat and dressed himself, while the strange thing that had saved their lives carried them steadily and firmly toward the mysterious island. _chapter vii_ the animals' paradise at length the extraordinary creature that had come to their rescue reached the island; and with jip and the doctor still clinging to his wide back, he crawled out of the water on to the beach. and then john dolittle, seeing its head for the first time, cried out in great excitement: "jip, it's a quiffenodochus, as sure as i'm alive!" "a quiffeno-what-us?" asked jip. "a quiffenodochus," said the doctor--"a prehistoric beast. naturalists thought they were extinct--that there weren't any more live ones anywhere in the world. this is a great day, jip. i'm awfully glad i came here." the tremendous animal which the fantippans had called a dragon had now climbed right up the beach and was standing fully revealed in all his strangeness. at first he looked like some curious mixture between a crocodile and a giraffe. he had short, spreading legs, but enormously long tail and neck. on his head were two stubby little horns. as soon as the doctor and jip had climbed down off his back he swung his head around on the end of that enormous neck and said to the doctor: "do you feel all right now?" "yes, thanks," said john dolittle. "i was afraid," said the creature, "that i wouldn't be in time to save your life. it was my brother who first saw you. we thought it was a native and we were getting ready to give him our usual terrifying reception. but while we watched from behind the trees my brother suddenly cried: 'great heavens! that's doctor dolittle--and he's drowning. see, how he waves his arms! he must be saved at any cost. there isn't one man like that born in a thousand years! let's go after him, quick!' then word was passed around the island that john dolittle, the great doctor, was drowning out in the straits. of course, we had all heard of you. and, rushing down to a secret cove which we have on the far side of the island, we dashed into the sea and swam out to you under water. i was the best swimmer and got to you first. i'm awfully glad i was in time. you're sure you feel all right?" "oh, quite," said the doctor, "thank you. but why did you swim under water?" "we didn't want the natives to see us," said the strange beast. "they think we are dragons--and we let them go on thinking it. because then they don't come near the island and we have our country to ourselves." the creature stretched his long neck still longer and whispered in the doctor's ear: "they think we live on men and breathe fire! but all we ever really eat is bananas. and when anyone tries to come here we go down to a hollow in the middle of the island and suck up the mist, the fog, that always hangs around there. then we come back to the beach and roar and rampage. and we breathe the fog out through our nostrils and they think it's smoke. that's the way we've kept this island to ourselves for a thousand years. and this is the only part of the world where we are left--where we can live in peace." [illustration: "'all we eat is bananas'"] "how very interesting!" said the doctor. "naturalists have thought your kind of animals are no longer living, you know. you are quiffenodochi, are you not?" "oh, no," said the beast. "the quiffenodochus has gone long ago. we are the piffilosaurus. we have six toes on the back feet, while the quiffenodochi, our cousins, have only five. they died out about two thousand years ago." "but where are the rest of your people?" asked the doctor. "i thought you said that many of you had swum out to rescue us." "they did," said the piffilosaurus. "but they kept hidden under the water, lest the natives on the shore should see and get to know that the old story about the dragon's mother-in-law wasn't true. while i was bringing you here they were swimming all around you under the water, ready to help if i needed them. they have gone around to the secret cove so they may come ashore unseen. we had better be going on ourselves now. whatever happens, we mustn't be seen from the shore and have the natives coming here. it would be the end of us if that should ever happen, because, between ourselves, although they think us so terrible, we are really more harmless than sheep." "do any other animals live here?" asked the doctor. "oh, yes, indeed," said the piffilosaurus. "this island is entirely peopled by harmless, vegetable-feeding creatures. if we had the others, of course, we wouldn't last long. but come, i will show you around the island. let us go quietly up that valley there, so we shan't be seen till we reach the cover of the woods." then john dolittle and jip were taken by the piffilosaurus all over the island of no-man's-land. the doctor said afterward that he had never had a more enjoyable or more instructive day. the shores of the island all around were high and steep, which gave it the appearance jim had spoken of--like a plum pudding. but in the centre, on top, there was a deep and pleasant hollow, invisible from the sea and sheltered from the winds. in this great bowl, a good thirty miles across, the piffilosauruses had lived at peace for a thousand years, eating ripe bananas and frolicking in the sun. down by the banks of the streams the doctor was shown great herds of hippopotami, feeding on the luscious reeds that grew at the water's edge. in the wide fields of high grass there were elephants and rhinoceri browsing. on the slopes where the forests were sparse he spied long-necked giraffes, nibbling from the trees. monkeys and deer of all kinds were plentiful. and birds swarmed everywhere. in fact, every kind of creature that does not eat meat was there, living peaceably and happily with the others in this land where vegetable food abounded and the disturbing tread of man was never heard. standing on the top of the hill with jip and the piffilosaurus at his side, the doctor gazed down over the wide bowl full of contented animal life and heaved a sigh. "this beautiful land could also have been called the 'animals' paradise,'" he murmured. "long may they enjoy it to themselves! may this, indeed, be _no-man's-land_ forever!" "you, doctor," said the deep voice of the piffilosaurus at his elbow, "are the first human in a thousand years that has set foot here. the last one was king kakaboochi's mother-in-law." "by the way, what really became of her?" asked the doctor. "the natives believe she was turned into a dragon, you know." "we married her off," said the great creature, nibbling idly at a lily stalk. "we couldn't stand her here, any more than the king could. you never heard anybody talk so in all your life. yes, we carried her one dark night by sea far down the coast of africa and left her at the palace door of a deaf king, who ruled over a small country south of the congo river. he married her. of course, being deaf, he didn't mind her everlasting chatter in the least." and now for several days the doctor forgot all about his post office work and king koko and his ship at anchor, and everything else. for he was kept busy from morning to night with all the animals who wanted to consult him about different things. many of the giraffes were suffering from sore hoofs and he showed them where to find a special root that could be put into a foot bath and would bring immediate relief. the rhinoceroses' horns were growing too long and john dolittle explained to them how by grinding them against a certain kind of stone and by eating less grass and more berries they could keep the growth down. a special sort of nut tree that the deer were fond of had grown scarce and almost died out from constant nibbling. and the doctor showed the chief stags how, by taking a few nuts and poking them down into the soft earth with their hoofs before the rainy season set in, they could make new trees grow and so increase the supply. [illustration: "he was pulling out a loose tooth"] one day when he was pulling out a loose tooth for a baby hippopotamus with his watch-chain, speedy-the-skimmer turned up, looking rather annoyed. "well," said the neat little bird, settling down on the ground at his feet, "i've found you at last, doctor. i've been hunting all over creation for you." "oh, hulloa, speedy," said the doctor. "glad to see you. did you want me for something?" "why, of course, i did," said speedy. "we finished the nesting season two days ago, and you had said you wanted to see me about some special business as soon as it was over. i went to your house, but dab-dab had no idea where you could be. then i hunted all over. at last i heard some gossiping boatmen down at the harbor say that you came to this island five days ago and had never returned. all the fantippans have given you up for lost. they say you have surely been eaten by the dragons that live here. i got an awful fright--though, of course, i didn't quite believe the dragon story. still, you had been gone so long i didn't know what to make of it. the post office, as you can imagine, is in a worse mess than ever." "humph!" said the doctor, who had now got the loose tooth out and was showing the baby hippo how to rinse his mouth in the river. "i'm sorry. i suppose i should have sent you a message. but i've been so awfully busy. let's go up under the shade of those palms and sit down. it was about the post office that i wanted to talk to you." _chapter viii_ the swiftest mail in the world so the doctor and jip and speedy-the-skimmer sat down in the shade of the palm trees and for the first time plans for that great service which was to be known as the swallow mail were discussed. [illustration: "they sat down in the shade of a palm tree"] "now, my idea, speedy, is this," said the doctor. "regular foreign mails are difficult for the fantippo post office because so few boats ever call there to bring or take the mails. now, how would it be if you swallows did the letter carrying?" "well," said speedy, "that would be possible. but, of course, we could only do it during certain months of the year when we were in africa. and then we could only take letters to the mild and warm countries. we should get frozen if we had to carry mail where severe winters were going on." "oh, of course," said the doctor. "i wouldn't expect you to do that. but i had thought we might get the other birds to help--cold-climate birds, hot-climate ones and temperate. and if some of the trips were too far or disagreeable for one kind of birds to make, we could deliver the mail in relays. i mean, for instance, a letter going from here to the north pole could be carried by the swallows as far as the north end of africa. from there it would be taken by thrushes up to the top of scotland. there seagulls would take it from the thrushes and carry it as far as greenland. and from there penguins would take it to the north pole. what do you think?" "i think it might be all right," said speedy, "if we can get the other birds to go in with us on the idea." "well, you see," said john dolittle, "i think we might, because we could use the mail service for the birds themselves, and the animals, too, to send their letters by, as well as the fantippans." "but, doctor, birds and animals don't send letters," said speedy. "no," said the doctor. "but there's no reason why they shouldn't begin. neither did people write nor send letters once upon a time. but as soon as they began they found it very useful and convenient. so would the birds and animals. we could have the head office here in this beautiful island--in this animals' paradise. you see, my idea is, firstly, a post office system for the education and betterment of the animal kingdom, and, secondly, a good foreign mail for the fantippans. do you think we could ever find some way by which birds could write letters?" "oh, yes, i think so," said speedy. "we swallows, for instance, always leave marks on houses where we have nested which are messages for those who may come after us. look"--speedy scratched some crosses and signs in the sand at the doctor's feet--"that means '_don't build your nest in this house. they have a cat here!_' and this"--the skimmer made four more signs in the sand--"this means '_good house. flies plentiful. folks quiet. building mud can be found behind the stable._'" "splendid," cried the doctor. "it's a kind of short-hand. you say a whole sentence in four signs." "and, then," speedy went on, "nearly all other kinds of birds have a sign language of their own. for example, the kingfishers have a way of marking the trees along the river to show where good fishing is to be found. and thrushes have signs, too; one i've often seen on stones, which means '_crack your snail shells here_.' that's so the thrushes won't go throwing their snail shells all over the place and scare the live snails into keeping out of sight." "there you are," said the doctor. "i always thought you birds had at least the beginnings of a written language--otherwise you couldn't be so clever. now all we have to do is to build up on these signs a regular and proper system of bird-writing. and i have no doubt whatever that with the animals we can do the same thing. then we'll get the swallow mail going and we'll have animals and birds writing letters to one another all over the world--and to people, too, if they want to." "i suspect," said speedy, "that you'll find most of the letters will be written to you, doctor. i've met birds all over creation who wanted to know what you looked like, what you ate for breakfast and all sorts of silly things about you." "well," said the doctor. "i won't mind that. but my idea is firstly an educational one. with a good post office system of their own, i feel that the condition of the birds and animals will be greatly bettered. only to-day, for example, some deer on this very island asked me what they should do about their nut trees which were nearly eaten up. i showed them at once how they could plant seeds and grow more trees. heaven knows how long they had been going on short rations. but if they'd only been able to write to me, i could have told them long ago--by swallow mail." then the doctor and jip went back to fantippo, carried by the piffilosaurus, who landed them on the shore under cover of night, so no one would see them. and in the morning john dolittle called upon the king again. "your majesty," said the doctor, "i have now a plan to provide your country with an excellent service of foreign mails if you will agree to what i suggest." "good," said the king. "my majesty is listening. proceed. let me offer you a lollipop." the doctor took one--a green one--from the box the king held out to him. king koko was very proud of the quality of his lollipops--made in the royal candy kitchen. he was never without one himself, and always wore it hung around his neck on a ribbon. and when he wasn't sucking it he used to hold it up to his eye and peer through it at his courtiers. he had seen white men using quizzing glasses, and he had his lollipops made thin and transparent, so he could use them in this elegant manner. but constant lollipops had ruined his figure and made him dreadfully stout. however, as fatness was considered a sign of greatness in fantippo, he didn't mind that. "my plan," said the doctor, "is this: the domestic mails of fantippo, after i have instructed the postmen a little more, can be carried by your own people. but the handling of foreign mails as well as the domestic ones is too much for them. and, besides, you have so few boats calling at your port. so i propose to build a floating post office for the foreign mails which shall be anchored close to the island called"--(the doctor only just stopped himself in time from speaking the dreaded name)--"er--er--close to the island i spoke of to you the other day." "i don't like that," said the king, frowning. "your majesty need have no fear," the doctor put in hurriedly. "it will never be necessary for any of your people to land upon the island. the foreign mail post office will be a houseboat, anchored a little way out from the shore. and i will not need any fantippan postmen to run it at all. on the contrary, i make it a special condition on your part that--er--the island we are speaking of shall continue to be left undisturbed for all time. i am going to run the foreign mails office in my own way--with special postmen of my own. when the fantippans wish to send out letters to foreign lands they must come by canoe and bring them to the houseboat post office. but incoming letters addressed to the people in fantippo shall be delivered at the doors of the houses in the regular way. what do you say to that?" "i agree," said the king. "but the stamps must all have my beautiful face upon them, and no other." "very good," said the doctor. "that can be arranged. but it must be clearly understood that from now on the foreign mails shall be handled by my own postman--in _my_ way. and after i have got the domestic post office running properly in fantippo you must see to it that it continues to work in order. if you will do that in a few weeks' time i think i can promise that your kingdom shall have the finest mail service in the world." then the doctor asked speedy to send off messages through the birds to every corner of the earth. and to ask all the leaders of seagulls, tomtits, magpies, thrushes, stormy petrels, finches, penguins, vultures, snow buntings, wild geese and the rest to come to no-man's-land, because john dolittle wanted to speak to them. and in the meantime he went back and continued the work of getting the domestic mail service in good running order at the post office at fantippo. so the good speedy sent off messengers; and all around the world and back again word was passed from bird to bird that john dolittle, the famous animal doctor, wished to see all the leaders of all kinds of birds, great and small. and presently in the big hollow in the centre of no-man's-land they began to arrive. after three days speedy came to the doctor and said: "all right, doctor, they are ready for you now." a good strong canoe had by this time been put at the doctor's service by the king, who was also having the post office houseboat built at the doctor's orders. so john dolittle got into his canoe and came at length to the same hill where he had before gazed out over the pleasant hollow of the animals' paradise. and with the skimmer on his shoulder he looked down into a great sea of bird faces--leaders all--every kind, from a hummingbird to an albatross. and taking a palm leaf and twisting it into a trumpet, so that he could make himself heard, he began his great inauguration speech to the leaders which was to set working the famous swallow mail service. [illustration: "he began his great inauguration speech"] after the doctor had finished his speech and told the leaders what it was he meant to do, the birds of the world applauded by whistling and screeching and flapping their wings, so that the noise was terrible. and in the streets of fantippo the natives whispered it about that the dragons were fighting one another in no-man's-land. then the doctor passed down among the birds and, taking a notebook, he spoke to each leader in turn, asking him questions about the signs and sign language that his particular kind of bird was in the habit of using. and the doctor wrote it all down in the notebook and took it home with him and worked over it all night--promising to meet the leaders again the following day. and on the morrow, crossing once again to the island, he went on with the discussion and planning and arrangement. it was agreed that the swallow mail service should have its head office here in no-man's-land. and that there should be branch offices at cape horn, greenland, in christmas island, tahiti, kashmir, thibet and puddleby-on-the-marsh. most of the mails were arranged so that those birds who migrated or went to other lands in the winter and back again in summer should carry the letters on their regular yearly journeys. and as there are some kinds of birds crossing from one land to another in almost every week of the year, this took care of much of the mails without difficulty. then, of course, there were all those birds who don't leave their home lands in winter, but stay in one country all the time. the leaders of these had come under special guidance of other birds to oblige the doctor by being present at the great meeting. they promised to have their people all the year round take care of letters that were brought to their particular countries to be delivered. so between one thing and another, much of the planning and arrangement of the service was got through in these first two meetings. then the doctor and the leaders agreed upon a regular kind of simple, easy writing for all birds to use, so that the addresses on the envelopes could be understood and read by the post birds. and at last john dolittle sent them off home again, to instruct their relatives in this new writing and reading and explain to all the birds of all the world how the post office was going to work and how much good he hoped it would do for the education and betterment of the animal kingdom. then he went home and had a good sleep. the next morning he found that king koko had got his post office houseboat ready and finished--and very smart it looked. it was paddled out and anchored close to the shore of the island. then dab-dab, jip, too-too, gub-gub, the pushmi-pullyu and the white mouse were brought over, and the doctor gave up his house on the main street of fantippo and settled down to live at the foreign mails post office for the remainder of his stay. and now john dolittle and his animals got tremendously busy arranging the post office, its furniture, the stamp drawers, the postcard drawers, the weighing scales, the sorting bags and all the rest of the paraphernalia. dab-dab, of course, was housekeeper, as usual, and she saw to it that the post office was swept properly every morning. jip was the watchman and had charge of locking up at night and opening in the morning. too-too, with his head for mathematics, was given the bookkeeping, and he kept account of how many stamps were sold and how much money was taken in. the doctor ran the information window and answered the hundred and one questions that people are always asking at post offices. and the good and trusty speedy was here, there and everywhere. and this was how the first letter was sent off by the swallow mail: king koko himself came one morning and, putting his large face in at the information window, asked: "what is the fastest foreign mail delivery ever made by any post office anywhere in the world?" [illustration: "he put his large face in at the information window"] "the british post office is now boasting," said the doctor, "that it can get a letter from london to canada in fourteen days." "all right," said the king. "here's a letter to a friend of mine who runs a shoe-shine parlor in alabama. let me see how quickly you can get me an answer to it." now, the doctor really had not got everything ready yet to work the foreign mails properly and he was about to explain to the king. but speedy hopped up on the desk and whispered: "give me that letter, doctor. we'll show him." then going outside, he called for quip the carrier. "quip," said speedy, "take this letter to the azores as fast as you can. there you'll just catch the white tailed carolina warblers about to make their summer crossing to the united states. give it to them and tell them to get the answer back here, as quick as they know how." in a flash quip was gone, seaward. it was four o'clock in the afternoon when the king brought that letter to the doctor. and when his majesty woke up in the morning and came down to breakfast there was the answer to it lying beside his plate! part ii _chapter i_ a most unusual post office nobody thought, not even john dolittle himself, when the swallow mail was first started, what a tremendous system it would finally grow into and what a lot of happenings and ideas would come about through it. of course such an entirely new thing as this required a great deal of learning and working out before it could be made to run smoothly. something new, some fresh problem, cropped up every day. but although the doctor, at all times a busy man, was positively worked to death, he found it all so interesting that he didn't mind. but the motherly dab-dab was dreadfully worried about him; for indeed at the beginning he seemed never to sleep at all. certainly in the whole history of the world there never was another post office like the doctor's. for one thing, it was a houseboat post office; for another, tea was served to everybody--the clerks and the customers as well--regularly at four o'clock every afternoon, with cucumber sandwiches on sundays. paddling over to the foreign mails post office for afternoon tea became quite the fashionable thing to do among the more up-to-date fantippans. a large awning was put over the back entrance, forming a pleasant sort of veranda with a good view of the ocean and the bay. and if you dropped in for a stamp around four o'clock, as likely as not you would meet the king there, and all the other high notables of fantippo, sipping tea. [illustration: "the houseboat post office of no-man's-land"] another thing in which the doctor's post office was peculiar was its pens. most post offices, the doctor had found, always had abominably bad pens that spluttered and scratched and wouldn't write. in fact very many post offices even nowadays seem to pride themselves on their bad pens. but the doctor saw to it that _his_ pens were of the very best quality. of course, in those times there were no steel pens. only quills were used. and john dolittle got the albatrosses and the seagulls to keep for him their tail feathers which fell out in the moulting season. and of course, with such a lot of quills to choose from, it was easy to have the best pens in the post office. still another thing in which the doctor's post office was different from all others was the gum used on the stamps. the supply of gum which the king had been using for his stamps ran short and the doctor had to set about discovering and making a new kind. and after a good deal of experiment he invented a gum made of licorice, which dried quickly and worked very well. but, as i have said, the fantippans were very fond of sweetmeats. and soon after the new gum was put into use the post office was crowded with people buying stamps by the hundred. at first the doctor could not understand this sudden new rush of business--which kept too-too, the cashier, working overtime every night, adding up the day's takings. the post office safe could hardly hold all the money taken in and the overflow had to be put in a vase on the kitchen mantelpiece. but presently the doctor noticed that after they had licked the gum off the stamps, the customers would bring them back and want to exchange them for money again. now, it is a rule that all post offices have to exchange their own stamps, when asked, for the price paid for them. so long as they are not torn or marked it doesn't matter whether the gum has been licked off or not. so the doctor saw that he would have to change his kind of gum if he wanted to keep stamps that would stick. and one day the king's brother came to the post office with a terrible cough and asked him in the same breath (or gasp) to give him five half-penny stamps and a cure for a cough. this gave the doctor an idea. and the next gum which he invented for his stamps he called _whooping-cough gum_. he made it out of a special kind of sweet, sticky cough-mixture. he also invented a _bronchitis gum_, a _mumps gum_ and several others. and whenever there was a catching disease in the town the doctor would see that the proper kind of gum to cure it was issued on the stamps. it saved him a lot of trouble, because the people were always bothering him to cure colds and sore throats and things. and he was the first postmaster general to use this way of getting rid of sickness--by serving round pleasant medicine on the backs of stamps. he called it _stamping out_ an epidemic. one evening at six o'clock jip shut the doors of the post office as usual, and hung up the sign "_closed_" as he always did at that hour. the doctor heard the bolts being shot and he stopped counting postcards and took out his pipe to have a smoke. [illustration: "jip hung up the sign"] the first hard work of getting the post office in full swing was now over. and that night john dolittle felt when he heard the doors being shut that at last he could afford to keep more regular hours and not be working all the time. and when jip came inside the registered mail booth he found the doctor leaning back in a chair with his feet on the desk, gazing around him with great satisfaction. "well, jip," said he with a sigh, "we now have a real working post office." "yes," said jip, putting down his watchman's lantern, "and a mighty good one it is, too. there isn't another like it anywhere." "you know," said john dolittle, "although we opened more than a week ago i haven't myself written a single letter yet. fancy living in a post office for a week and never writing a letter! look at that drawer there. ordinarily the sight of so many stamps would make me write dozens of letters. all my life i never had a stamp when i really wanted to write a letter. and--funny thing!--now that i'm living and sleeping in a post office i can't think of a single person to write to." "it's a shame," said jip. "and you with such beautiful handwriting too--as well as a drawerful of stamps! never mind; think of all the animals that are waiting to hear from you." "of course, there's sarah," the doctor went on puffing at his pipe dreamily. "poor dear sarah! i wonder whom she married. but there you are, i haven't her address. so i can't write to sarah. and i don't suppose any of my old patients would want to hear from me." "i know!" cried jip, "write to the cats'-meat-man." "he can't read," said the doctor gloomily. "no, but his wife can," said jip. "that's true," murmured the doctor. "but what shall i write to him about?" just at that moment speedy-the-skimmer came in and said: "doctor, we've got to do something about the city deliveries in fantippo. my post-birds are not very good at finding the right houses to deliver the letters. you see we swallows, although we nest in houses, are not regular city birds. we pick out lonely houses as a rule--in the country. city streets are a bit difficult for swallows to find their way round in. some of the post-birds have brought back the letters they took out this morning to deliver, saying they can't find the houses they are addressed to." "humph!" said the doctor. "that's too bad. let me think a minute. oh, i know i'll send for cheapside." "who is cheapside?" asked speedy. "cheapside is a london sparrow," said the doctor, "who visits me every summer in puddleby. the rest of the year he lives around st. paul's cathedral. he builds his nest in st. edmund's left ear." "_where?_" cried jip. "in the left ear of a statue of st. edmund on the outside of the chancel--the cathedral, you know," the doctor explained. "cheapside's the very fellow we want for city deliveries. there's nothing about houses and towns he doesn't know. i'll send for him right away." "i'm afraid," said speedy, "that a post-bird--unless he was a city bird himself--would have a hard job finding a sparrow in london. it's an awful big city, isn't it?" "yes, that's so," said john dolittle. "listen, doctor," said jip. "you were wondering just now what to write the cats'-meat-man about. let speedy write the letter to cheapside in bird scribble and you inclose it in a letter to the cats'-meat-man. then when the sparrow comes to puddleby for his summer visit the cats'-meat-man can give it to him." "splendid!" cried the doctor. and he snatched a piece of paper off the desk and started to write. "and you might ask him too," put in dab-dab who had been listening, "to take a look at the back windows of the house to see that none of them is broken. we don't want the rain coming in on the beds." "all right," said the doctor. "i'll mention that." so the doctor's letter was written and addressed to _matthew mugg, esquire, cats' meat merchant, puddleby-on-the-marsh, slopshire, england_. and it was sent off by quip-the-carrier. the doctor did not expect an answer to it right away because the cats'-meat-man's wife was a very slow reader and a still slower writer. and anyhow, cheapside could not be expected to visit puddleby for another week yet. he always stayed in london until after the easter bank holiday. his wife refused to let him leave for the country till the spring family had been taught by their father how to find the houses where people threw out crumbs; how to pick up oats from under the cab horses' nose bags without being stamped on by the horses' hoofs; how to get about in the trafficky streets of london and a whole lot of other things that young city birds have to know. in the meantime, while quip was gone, life went forward busily and happily at the doctor's post office. the animals, too-too, dab-dab, gub-gub, the pushmi-pullyu, the white mouse and jip all agreed that they found living in a houseboat post office great fun. whenever they got tired of their floating home they would go off for picnic parties to the island of no-man's-land, which was now more often called by the name john dolittle had given it, "the animals' paradise." on these trips too, the doctor sometimes accompanied them. he was glad to, because he so got an opportunity of talking with the many different kinds of animals there about the signs they were in the habit of using. and on these signs, which he carefully put down in notebooks, he built up a sort of written language for animals to use--or _animal scribble_, as he called it--the same as he had done with the birds. [illustration: "he held scribbling classes for the animals"] whenever he could spare the time he held afternoon scribbling classes for the animals in the great hollow. and they were very well attended. he found the monkeys, of course, the easiest to teach and, because they were so clever, he made some of them into assistant teachers. but the zebras were quite bright too. the doctor discovered that these intelligent beasts had ways of marking and twisting the grasses to show where they had smelled lions about--though, happily, they did not have to use this trick in the animals' paradise but had brought it with them when they had swum across from the mainland of africa. the doctor's pets found it quite thrilling to go through the mail that arrived each day to see if there were any letters for them. at the beginning of course there wasn't much. but one day quip had returned from puddleby with an answer to the doctor's letter to the cats'-meat-man. mr. matthew mugg had written (through his wife) that he had hung the letter for cheapside on an apple tree in the garden where the sparrow would surely see it when he arrived. the windows of the house were all right, he wrote; but the back door could do with a coat of paint. and while quip had been waiting for this letter to be written he had filled in the time at puddleby by gossiping with all the starlings and blackbirds in the doctor's garden about the wonderful new animals' post office on the island of no-man's-land. and pretty soon every creature in and around puddleby had got to hear of it. after that, of course, letters began to arrive at the houseboat for the doctor's pets. and one morning, when the mail was sorted, there was a letter for dab-dab from her sister; one for the white mouse written by a cousin from the doctor's bureau drawer; one for jip from the collie who lived next door in puddleby and one for too-too, telling him he had a new family of six young ones in the rafters of the stable. but there was nothing for gub-gub. the poor pig was nearly in tears at being left out. and when the doctor went into town that afternoon gub-gub asked could he come along. the next day the post-birds complained that the mail was an extra heavy one. and when it was sorted, there were ten thick letters for gub-gub and none for anybody else. jip got suspicious about this and looked over gub-gub's shoulder while he opened them. in each one there was a banana skin. "who sent you those?" asked jip. "i sent them to myself," said gub-gub, "from fantippo yesterday. i don't see why you fellows should get all the mail. nobody writes to me, so i write to myself." _chapter ii_ cheapside it was a great day at the doctor's post office when cheapside, the london sparrow, arrived from puddleby to look after the city deliveries for fantippo. the doctor was eating his lunch of sandwiches at the information desk when the little bird popped his head through the window and said in his cheeky cockney voice: "'ulloa, doctor, 'ere we are again! what ho! the old firm! who would 'ave thought you'd come to this?" cheapside was a character. anyone on seeing him for the first time would probably guess that he spent his life in city streets. his whole expression was different from other birds. in speedy's eyes, for instance--though nobody would dream of thinking him stupid--there was an almost noble look of country honesty. but in the eyes of cheapside, the london sparrow, there was a saucy, dare-devil expression that seemed to say "don't you think for one moment that you'll ever get the better of me. i'm a cockney bird." [illustration: "cheapside, the london sparrow"] "why, cheapside!" cried john dolittle. "at last you've come. my, but it's good to see you! did you have a pleasant journey?" "not bad--not 'alf bad," said cheapside, eyeing some crumbs from the doctor's lunch which lay upon the desk. "no storms. pretty decent travellin'. 'ot? well, i should say it _was_ 'ot. 'ot enough for an 'ottentot!... quaint place you 'ave 'ere--sort of a barge?" by this time all the animals had heard cheapside arriving and they came rushing in to see the traveler and to hear the news of puddleby and england. "how is the old horse in the stable?" asked john dolittle. "pretty spry," said cheapside. "course 'e ain't as young as 'e used to be. but 'e's lively enough for an old 'un. 'e asked me to bring you a bunch of crimson ramblers--just bloomin' over the stable door, they was. but i says to 'im, i says, 'what d'yer take me for, an omnibus?' fancy a feller at my time of life carrying a bunch of roses all the way down the atlantic! folks would think i was goin' to a weddin' at the south pole." "gracious, cheapside!" said the doctor, laughing. "it makes me quite homesick for england to hear your cockney chirp." "and me, too," sighed jip. "were there many rats in the woodshed, cheapside?" "'undreds of them," said the sparrow--"as big as rabbits. and that uppish you'd think they owned the place!" "i'll soon settle _them_, when i get back," said jip. "i hope we go soon." "how does the garden look, cheapside?" asked the doctor. "a ," said the sparrow. "weeds in the paths, o' course. but the iris under the kitchen window looked something lovely, they did." "anything new in london?" asked the white mouse who was also city bred. "yes," said cheapside. "there's always something doing in good old london. they've got a new kind of cab that goes on two wheels instead of four. a man called 'ansom invented it. much faster than the old 'ackneys they are. you see 'em everywhere. and there's a new greengrocer's shop near the royal exchange." "i'm going to have a greengrocer's shop of my own when i grow up," murmured gub-gub, "--in england where they grow good vegetables--i'm awfully tired of africa--and then i'll watch the new vegetables coming into season all the year round." "he's always talking about that," said too-too. "such an ambition in life to have--to run a greengrocer's shop!" "ah, england!" cried gub-gub sentimentally. "what is there more beautiful in life than the heart of a young lettuce in the spring?" "'ark at 'im," said cheapside, raising his eyebrows. "ain't 'e the poetical porker? why don't you write a bunch of sonnets to the skunk-kissed-cabbages of louisiana, mr. bacon?" "well, now, look here, cheapside," said the doctor. "we want you to get these city deliveries straightened out for us in the town of fantippo. our post birds are having great difficulty finding the right houses to take letters to. you're a city-bird, born and bred. do you think you can help us?" "i'll see what i can do for you, doc," said the sparrow, "after i've taken a look around this 'eathen town of yours. but first i want a bath. i'm all heat up from flying under a broiling sun. ain't you got no puddles round here for a bird to take a bath in?" "no, this isn't puddly climate," said the doctor. "you're not in england, you know. but i'll bring you my shaving mug and you can take a bath in that." "mind, you wash the soap out first, doc," chirped the sparrow, "it gets into my eyes." the next day after cheapside had had a good sleep to rest up from his long journey the doctor took the london sparrow to show him around the town of fantippo. "well, doc," said cheapside after they had seen the sights, "as a town i don't think much of it--really, i don't. it's big. i'll say that for it. i 'ad no idea they 'ad towns as big as this in africa. but the streets is so narrow! i can see why they don't 'ave no cabs 'ere--'ardly room for a goat to pass, let alone a four-wheeler. and as for the 'ouses, they seem to be made of the insides of old mattresses. the first thing we'll 'ave to do is to make old king cocoanut tell 'is subjects to put door knockers on their doors. what is 'ome without a door knocker, i'd like to know? of course, your postmen can't deliver the letters, when they've no knockers to knock with." "i'll attend to that," said the doctor. "i'll see the king about it this afternoon." "and then, they've got no letter boxes in the doors," said cheapside. "there ought to be slots made to poke the letters in. the only place these bloomin' 'eathens have for a postman to put a letter is down the chimney." "very well," said the doctor. "i'll attend to that, too. shall i have the letter boxes in the middle of the door, or would you like them on one side?" "put 'em on each side of the doors--two to every 'ouse," said cheapside. "what's that for?" asked the doctor. "that's a little idea of my own," said the sparrow. "we'll 'ave one box for the bills and one for sure-enough letters. you see, people are so disappointed when they 'ear the postman's knock and come to the door, expecting to find a nice letter from a friend or news that money's been left them and all they get is a bill from the tailor. but if we have two boxes on each door, one marked '_bills_,' and the other '_letters_,' the postman can put all the bills in one box and the honest letters in the other. as i said, it's a little idea of my own. we might as well be real up-to-date. what do you think of it?" "i think it's a splendid notion," said the doctor. "then the people need only have one disappointment--when they clear the bill box on the day set for paying their debts." "that's the idea," said cheapside. "and tell the post-birds--as soon as we've got the knockers on--to knock once for a bill and twice for a letter, so the folks in the 'ouse will know whether to come and get the mail or not. oh, i tell you, we'll show these poor pagans a thing or two before we're finished! we'll 'ave a post office in fantipsy that really is a post office. and, now, 'ow about the christmas boxes, doctor? postmen always expect a handsome present around christmas time, you know." "well, i'm rather afraid," said the doctor doubtfully, "that these people don't celebrate christmas as a holiday." "_don't celebrate christmas!_" cried cheapside in a shocked voice. "what a disgraceful scandal! well, look here, doctor. you just tell king cocoa-butter that if 'e and 'is people don't celebrate the festive season by giving us post-birds christmas-boxes there ain't going to be no mail delivered in fantipsy from new year's to easter. and you can tell 'im i said so. it's 'igh time somebody hen-lightened 'is hignorance." "all right," said the doctor, "i'll attend to that, too." "tell 'im," said cheapside, "we'll expect two lumps of sugar on every doorstep christmas morning for the post-birds. no sugar, no letters!" that afternoon the doctor called upon the king and explained to him the various things that cheapside wanted. and his majesty gave in to them, every one. beautiful brass knockers were screwed on all the doors--light ones, which the birds could easily lift. and very elegant they looked--by far the most up-to-date part of the ramshackle dwellings. the double boxes were also put up, with one place for bills and one for the letters. [illustration: "the double letter boxes of fantippo"] john dolittle instructed king koko as well in the meaning of christmas time, which should be a season for giving gifts. and among the fantippo people the custom of making presents at christmas became very general--not only to postmen, but to friends and relatives, too. that is why when, several years after the doctor had left this country, some missionaries visited that part of africa, they found to their astonishment that christmas was celebrated there, although the people were heathens. but they never learned that the custom had been brought about by cheapside, the cheeky london sparrow. and now very soon cheapside took entire charge of the city delivery of mails in fantippo. of course, as soon as the mail began to get heavy, when the people got the habit of writing more to their friends and relatives, cheapside could not deal with all the mail himself. so he sent a message by a swallow to get fifty sparrows from the streets of london (who were, like himself, accustomed to city ways), to help him with the delivery of letters. and around the native holiday seasons, the harvest moon and the coming of the rains, he had to send for fifty more to deal with the extra mail. and if you happened to pass down the main street of fantippo at nine in the morning or four in the afternoon you would hear the _rat-tat-tat_ of the post-sparrows, knocking on the doors--_tat-tat_, if it was a real letter, and just _rat!_ if it was a bill. of course, they could not carry more than one or two letters at a time--being such small birds. but it only took them a moment to fly back to the houseboat for another load, where too-too was waiting for them at the "city" window with piles of mail, sorted out into boxes marked "_central_," "_west central_," "_southwest_," etc., for the different parts of the town. this was another idea of cheapside's, to divide up the city into districts, the same as they did in london, so the mail could be delivered quickly without too much hunting for streets. cheapside's help was, indeed, most valuable to the doctor. the king himself said that the mails were wonderfully managed. the letters were brought regularly and never left at the wrong house. he had only one fault, had cheapside. and that was being cheeky. whenever he got into an argument his cockney swearing was just dreadful. and in spite of the doctor's having issued orders time and time again that he expected his post office clerks and mail birds to be strictly polite to the public, cheapside was always getting into rows--which he usually started himself. one day when king koko's pet white peacock came to the doctor and complained that the cockney sparrow had made faces at him over the palace wall the doctor became quite angry and read the city manager a long lecture. [illustration: "the royal peacock complained that cheapside had made faces at him"] then cheapside got together a gang of his tough london sparrow friends and one night they flew into the palace garden and mobbed the white peacock and pulled three feathers out of his beautiful tail. this last piece of rowdyism was too much for john dolittle and, calling up cheapside, he discharged him on the spot--though he was very sorry to do it. but when the sparrow went all his london friends went with him and the post office was left with no city birds to attend to the city deliveries. the swallows and other birds tried their hardest to get letters around to the houses properly. but they couldn't. and before long complaints began to come in from the townspeople. then the doctor was sorry and wished he hadn't discharged cheapside, who seemed to be the only one who could manage this part of the mails properly. but one day, to the doctor's great delight--though he tried hard to look angry--cheapside strolled into the post office with a straw in the corner of his mouth, looking as though nothing had happened. john dolittle had thought that he and his friends had gone home to london. but they hadn't. they knew the doctor would need them and they had just hung around outside the town. and then the doctor, after lecturing cheapside again about politeness, gave him back his job. but the next day the rowdy little sparrow threw a bottle of post office ink over the royal white peacock when he came to the houseboat with the king to take tea. then the doctor discharged cheapside again. in fact, the doctor used to discharge him for rudeness regularly about once a month. and the city mails always got tied up soon after. but, to the doctor's great relief, the city manager always came back just when the tie-up was at its worst and put things right again. cheapside was a wonderful bird. but it seemed as though he just couldn't go a whole month without being rude to somebody. the doctor said it was in his nature. _chapter iii_ the birds that helped columbus after the doctor had written his first letter by swallow mail to the cats'-meat-man he began to think of all the other people to whom he had neglected to write for years and years. and very soon every spare moment he had was filled in writing to friends and acquaintances everywhere. and then, of course, there were the letters he sent to and received from birds and animals all over the world. first he wrote to the various bird leaders who were in charge of the branch offices at cape horn, thibet, tahiti, kashmir, christmas island, greenland and puddleby-on-the-marsh. to them he gave careful instructions how the branch post offices were to be run--always insisting on strict politeness from the post office clerks; and he answered all the questions that the branch postmasters wrote asking for guidance. and he sent letters to various fellow naturalists whom he knew in different countries and gave them a whole lot of information about the yearly flights or migration of birds. because, of course, in the bird mail business he learned a great deal on that subject that had never been known to naturalists before. outside the post office he had a notice board set up on which were posted the outgoing and incoming mails. the notices would read something like this: _next wednesday, july , the red-winged plovers will leave this office for denmark and points on the skager rack. post your mail early, please. all letters should bear a four-penny stamp. small packages will also be carried on this flight for morocco, portugal and the channel islands._ whenever a new flight of birds were expected at no-man's-land the doctor always had a big supply of food of their particular kind got ready for their arrival before-hand. he had at the big meeting with the leaders put down in his notebook the dates of all the yearly flights of the different kinds of birds, where they started from and where they went to. and this notebook was kept with great care. one day speedy was sitting on top of the weighing scales while the doctor was sorting a large pile of outgoing letters. suddenly the skimmer cried out: "great heavens, doctor, i've gained an ounce! i'll never be able to fly in the races again. look, it says four and a half ounces!" [illustration: "'great heavens, doctor, i've gained an ounce!'"] "no, speedy," said the doctor. "see, you have an ounce weight on the pan as well as yourself. that makes you only three and a half ounces." "oh," said the skimmer, "is that the trouble? i was never good at arithmetic. what a relief! thank goodness, i haven't gained!" "listen, speedy," said the doctor, "in this batch of mail we have a lot of letters for panama. what mails have we got going out to-morrow?" "i'm not sure," said speedy. "i'll go and look at the notice board. i think it's the golden jays.... yes," he said, coming back in a moment, "that's right, the golden jays to-morrow, tuesday, the th, weather permitting." "where are they bound for, speedy?" asked the doctor. "my notebook's in the safe." "from dahomey to venezuela," said speedy, raising his right foot to smother a yawn. "good," said john dolittle. "then they can take these panama letters for me. it won't be much out of their way. what do golden jays eat?" "they are very fond of acorns," said speedy. "all right," said the doctor. "please tell gub-gub for me to go across to the island and get the wild boars to gather up a couple of sacks of acorns. i want all the birds who work for us to have a good feed before they leave the main office for their flights." the next morning when the doctor woke up he heard a tremendous chattering all around the post office and he knew that the golden jays had arrived overnight. and after he had dressed and come out on to the veranda, there, sure enough, they were--myriads of very handsome gold and black birds, swarming everywhere, gossiping away at a great rate and gobbling up the acorns laid out for them in bushels. the leader, who already knew the doctor, of course, came forward to get orders and to see how much mail there was to be carried. after everything had been arranged and the leader had decided he need expect no tornadoes or bad weather for the next twenty-four hours, he gave a command. then all the birds rose in the air to fly away--whistling farewell to postmaster general dolittle and the head office. "oh, by the way, doctor," said the leader, turning back a moment, "did you ever hear of a man called christopher columbus?" "oh, surely," said the doctor. "he discovered america in ." "well, i just wanted to tell you," said the jay, "that if it hadn't been for an ancestor of mine he wouldn't have discovered it in --later perhaps, but not in ." "oh, indeed!" said john dolittle. "tell me more about it." and he pulled a notebook out of his pocket and started to write. "well," said the jay, "the story was handed down to me by my mother, who heard it from my grandmother, who got it from my great-grandmother, and so on, way back to an ancestor of ours who lived in america in the fifteenth century. our kind of birds in those days did not come across to this side of the atlantic, neither summer nor winter. we used to spend from march to september in the bermudas and the rest of the year in venezuela. and when we made the autumn journey south we used to stop at the bahama islands to rest on the way. "the fall of the year was a stormy season. gales and squalls were blowing up all the time and we did not get started on our trip until the second week in october. my ancestor had been the leader of the flock for a long time. but he had grown sort of old and feeble and a younger bird was elected in his place to lead the golden jays to venezuela that year. the new leader was a conceited youngster, and because he had been chosen he thought he knew everything about navigation and weather and sea crossings. "shortly after the birds started they sighted, to their great astonishment, a number of boats sailing on a westward course. this was about half way between the bermudas and the bahamas. the ships were much larger than anything they had ever seen before. all they had been accustomed to up to that time were little canoes, with indians in them. "the new leader immediately got scared and gave the order for the jays to swing in further toward the land, so they wouldn't be seen by the men who crowded these large boats. he was a superstitious leader and anything he didn't understand he kept away from. but my ancestor did not go with the flock, but made straight for the ships. "he was gone about twenty minutes, and presently he flew after the other birds and said to the new leader: 'over there in those ships a brave man is in great danger. they come from europe, seeking land. the sailors, not knowing how near they are to sighting it, have mutinied against their admiral. i am an old bird and i know this brave sea-farer. once when i was making a crossing--the first i ever made--a gale came up and i was separated from my fellows. for three days i had to fly with the battering wind. and finally i was blown eastward near the old world. just when i was ready to drop into the sea from exhaustion i spied a ship. i simply had to rest. i was weather-beaten and starving. so i made for the boat and fell half dead upon the deck. the sailors were going to put me in a cage. but the captain of the ship--this same navigator whose life is now threatened by his rebellious crew in those ships over there--fed me crumbs and nursed me back to life. then he let me go free, to fly to venezuela when the weather was fair. we are land birds. let us now save this good man's life by going to his ship and showing ourselves to his sailors. they will then know that land is near and be obedient to their captain." "yes, yes," said the doctor. "go on. i remember columbus writing of land birds in his diary. go on." "so," said the jay, "the whole flock turned and made for columbus's fleet. they were only just in time. for the sailors were ready to kill their admiral, who, they said, had brought them on a fool's errand to find land where there was none. he must turn back and sail for spain, they said, or be killed. [illustration: "'the sailors were ready to kill their admiral'"] "but when the sailors saw a great flock of land birds passing over the ship going southwest instead of west, they took new heart, for they were sure land must lie not far to the southwestward. "so we led them on to the bahamas. and on the seventh day, very early in the morning, the crew, with a cry of 'land! land!' fell down upon their knees and gave thanks to heaven. watling's island, one of the smaller bahamas, lay ahead of them, smiling in the sea. "then the sailors gathered about the admiral, christopher columbus, whom a little before they were going to kill, and cheered and called him the greatest navigator in the world--which, in truth, he was. "but even columbus himself never learned to his dying day that it was the weather-beaten bird who had fallen on his friendly deck some years before, who had led him by the shortest cut to the land of the new world. "so you see, doctor," the jay ended, picking up his letters and getting ready to fly, "if it hadn't been for my ancestor christopher columbus would have had to turn back to please his sailors, or be killed. if it hadn't been for him america would not have been discovered in --later, perhaps, but not in . good-bye! i must be going. thanks for the acorns." _chapter iv_ cape stephen light on the coast of west africa, about twenty miles to the northward of fantippo, there was a cape running out into the sea which had a lighthouse on it called the cape stephen light. this light was kept carefully burning by the government who controlled that part of africa, in order that ships should see it from the sea and know where they were. it was a dangerous part of the coast, this. there were many rocks and shallows near the end of cape stephen. and if the light were ever allowed to go out at night, of course, ships traveling that part of the sea would be in great danger of running into the long cape and wrecking themselves. [illustration: "there were many rocks and shallows near the end of cape stephen"] now, one evening not long after the golden jays had gone west, the doctor was writing letters in the post office by the light of a candle. it was late and all the animals were fast asleep long ago. presently while he wrote he heard a sound a long way off, coming through the open window at his elbow. he put down his pen and listened. it was the sound of a seabird, calling away out at sea. now, seabirds don't, as a rule, call very much unless they are in great numbers. this call sounded like a single bird. the doctor put his head through the window and looked out. it was a dark night, as black as pitch, and he couldn't see a thing--especially as his eyes were used to the light of the candle. the mysterious call was repeated again and again, like a cry of distress from the sea. the doctor didn't know quite what to make of it. but soon he thought it seemed to be coming nearer. and, grabbing his hat, he ran out on to the veranda. "what is it? what's the matter?" he shouted into the darkness over the sea. he got no answer. but soon, with a rush of wings that nearly blew his candle out, a great seagull swept down on to the houseboat rail beside him. "doctor," panted the gull, "the cape stephen light is out. i don't know what's the matter. it has never gone out before. we use it as a land-mark, you know, when we are flying after dark. the night's as black as ink. i'm afraid some ship will surely run into the cape. i thought i'd come and tell you." "good heavens!" cried the doctor. "what can have happened? there's a lighthouse keeper living there to attend to it. was it lighted earlier in the evening?" "i don't know," said the gull. "i was coming in from catching herring--they're running just now, you know, a little to the north. and, expecting to see the light, i lost my way and flew miles too far south. when i found out my mistake i went back, flying close down by the shore. and i came to stephen cape, but it had no light. it was black as anything. and i would have run right into the rocks myself if i hadn't been going carefully." "how far would it be from here?" asked john dolittle. "well, by land it would be twenty-five miles to where the lighthouse stands," said the gull. "but by water it would be only about twelve, i should say." "all right," said the doctor, hurrying into his coat. "wait just a moment till i wake dab-dab." the doctor ran into the post office kitchen and woke the poor housekeeper, who was slumbering soundly beside the kitchen stove. "listen, dab-dab!" said the doctor, shaking her. "wake up! the cape stephen light's gone out!" "whazhat?" said dab-dab, sleepily opening her eyes. "stove's gone out?" "no, the lighthouse on cape stephen," said the doctor. "a gull just came and told me. the shipping's in danger. wrecks, you know, and all that. wake up and look sensible, for pity's sake!" at last poor dab-dab, fully awakened, understood what was the matter. and in a moment she was up and doing. "i know where it is, doctor. i'll fly right over there.--no, i won't need the gull to guide me. you keep him to show you the way. follow me immediately in the canoe. if i can find out anything i'll come back and meet you half way. if not, i'll wait for you by the lighthouse tower. thank goodness, it's a calm night, anyway--even if it is dark!" with a flap of her wings, dab-dab flew right through the open window and was gone into the night, while the doctor grabbed his little black medicine bag and, calling to the gull to follow him, ran down to the other end of the houseboat, untied the canoe and jumped in. then he pushed off, headed around the island of no-man's-land and paddled for all he was worth for the seaward end of cape stephen. about half way to the long neck of land that jutted out into the gloomy ocean the doctor's canoe was met by dab-dab--though how she found it in the darkness, with only the sound of the paddle to guide her, goodness only knows. "doctor," said she, "if the lighthouse keeper is in there at all he must be sick, or something. i hammered on the windows, but nobody answered." "dear me!" muttered the doctor, paddling harder than ever, "i wonder what can have happened?" "and that's not the worst," said dab-dab. "on the far side of the cape--you can't see it from here--there's the headlight of a big sailing ship, bearing down southward, making straight for the rocks. they can't see the lighthouse and they don't know what danger they're in." "good lord!" groaned the doctor, and he nearly broke the paddle as he churned the water astern to make the canoe go faster yet. "how far off the rocks is the ship now?" asked the gull. "about a mile, i should say," said dab-dab. "but she's a big one--judging by the height of her mast-light--and she won't be long before she's aground on the cape." "keep right on, doctor," said the gull. "i'm going off to get some friends of mine." and the seagull spread his wings and flew away toward the land, calling the same cry as the doctor had heard through the post office window. john dolittle had no idea of what he meant to do. nor was the gull himself sure that he would be in time to succeed with the plan he had in mind. but presently, to his delight, the seabird heard his call being answered from the rocky shores shrouded in darkness. and soon he had hundreds of his brother gulls circling round him in the night. then he took them to the great ship, which was sailing calmly onward toward the rocks and destruction. and there, going forward to where the helmsman held the spokes of the wheel and watched the compass swinging before him in the light of a little, dim lamp, the gulls started dashing themselves into the wheelman's face and covering the glass of the compass, so he could not steer the ship. [illustration: "the gulls dashed themselves into the wheelman's face"] the helmsman, battling with the birds, set up a yell for help, saying he couldn't see to steer the boat. then the officers and sailors rushed up to his assistance and tried to beat the birds off. in the meantime the doctor, in his canoe, had reached the end of cape stephen and, springing ashore, he scrambled up the rocks to where the great tower of the lighthouse rose skyward over the black, unlighted sea. feeling and fumbling, he found the door and hammered on it, yelling to be let in. but no one answered him. and dab-dab whispered in a hoarse voice that the light of the ship was nearer now--less than half a mile from the rocks. then the doctor drew back for a run and threw his whole weight against the door. but the hinges and lock had been made to stand the beating of the sea and they budged no more than if he had been a fly. at last, with a roar of rage, the doctor grabbed up a rock from the ground as big as a chair and banged it with all his might against the lock of the lighthouse door. with a crash the door flew open and the doctor sprang within. on the ship the seamen were still fighting with the gulls. the captain, seeing that no helmsman could steer the boat right with thousands of wings fluttering in his eyes, gave the orders to lay the ship to for a little and to get out the hose pipes. and a strong stream of water was turned on to the gulls around the helmsman, so they could no longer get near him. then the ship got under way again and came on toward the cape once more. inside the lighthouse the doctor found the darkness blacker still. with hands outstretched before him, he hurried forward and the first thing he did was to stumble over a man who was lying on the floor just within the door. without waiting to see what was the matter with him, the doctor jumped over his body and began to grope his way up the winding stairs of the tower that led to the big lamp at the top. meanwhile dab-dab stayed below at the door, looking out over the sea at the mast light of the ship--which, after a short delay, was now coming on again toward the rocks. at any minute she expected the great beam of the lighthouse lamp to flare out over the sea, as soon as the doctor should get it lit, to warn the sailors of their danger. but, instead, she presently heard the doctor's agonized voice calling from the head of the stairs: "dab-dab! dab-dab! i can't light it. _we forgot to bring matches!_" "well, what have you _done_ with the matches, doctor?" called dab-dab. "they were always in your coat." "i left them beside my pipe on the information desk," came the doctor's voice from the top of the dark stairs. "but there must be matches in the lighthouse somewhere. we must find them." "what chance have we of that?" shouted dab-dab. "it's as black as black down here. and the ship is coming nearer every minute." "feel in the man's pockets," called john dolittle. "hurry!" in a minute dab-dab went through the pockets of the man who lay so still upon the floor. "he hasn't any matches on him," she shouted. "not a single one." "confound the luck!" muttered john dolittle. and then there was a solemn silence in the lighthouse while the doctor above and dab-dab below thought gloomily of that big ship sailing onward to her wreck because they had no matches. but suddenly out of the black stillness came a small, sweet voice, singing, somewhere near. "dab-dab!" cried the doctor in a whisper. "do you hear that? a canary! there's a canary singing somewhere--probably in a cage in the lighthouse kitchen!" in a moment he was clattering down the stairs. "come on," he cried. "we must find the kitchen. that canary will know where the matches are kept. find the kitchen!" then the two of them went stumbling around in the darkness, feeling the walls, and presently they came upon a low door, opened it and fell headlong down a short flight of steps that led to the lighthouse kitchen. this was a little underground room, like a cellar, cut out of the rock on which the lighthouse stood. if there was any fire or stove in it it had long since gone out, for the darkness here was as black as anywhere else. but as soon as the door had opened, the trills of the song bird grew louder. "tell me," called john dolittle, in canary language, "where are the matches? quick!" "oh, at last you've come," said a high, small, polite voice out of the darkness. "would you mind putting a cover over my cage? there's a draught and i can't sleep. nobody's been near me since midday. i don't know what can have happened to the keeper. he always covers up my cage at tea-time. but to-night i wasn't covered at all, so i went on singing. you'll find my cover up on the----" "_matches! matches!_ where are the matches?" screamed dab-dab. "the light's out and there's a ship in danger! where are the matches kept?" "on the mantelpiece, next to the pepper box," said the canary. "come over here to my cage and feel along to your left--high up--and your hand will fall right on them." the doctor sprang across the room, upsetting a chair on his way, and felt along the wall. his hand touched the corner of a stone shelf and the next moment dab-dab gave a deep sigh of relief, for she heard the cheerful rattle of a box of matches as the doctor fumbled to strike a light. "you'll find a candle on the table--there--look--behind you," said the canary, when the match light dimly lit up the kitchen. with trembling fingers the doctor lit the candle. then, shielding the flame with his hand, he bounded out of the room and up the stairs. [illustration: "the doctor lit the candle"] "at last!" he muttered. "let's hope i'm not too late!" at the head of the kitchen steps he met the seagull coming into the lighthouse with two companions. "doctor," cried the gull, "we held off the ship as long as we could. but the stupid sailors, not knowing we were trying to save them, turned hoses on us and we had to give up. the ship is terribly near now." without a word the doctor sped on up the winding steps of the tower. round and round he went, upward, till he was ready to drop from dizziness. at length reaching the great glass lamp chamber at the top, he set down his candle and, striking two matches at once he held one in each hand and lit the big wick in two places. by this time dab-dab had gone outside again and was watching over the sea for the oncoming ship. and when at last the great light from the big lamp at the top of the tower suddenly flared out over the sea there was the bow of the vessel, not more than a hundred yards from the rocky shore of the cape! then came a cry from the look-out, shouted orders from the captain, much blowing of whistles and ringing of bells. and just in time to save herself from a watery grave, the big ship swung her nose out to sea and sailed safely past upon her way. _chapter v_ gulls and ships the morning sun peeping in at the window of the lighthouse found the doctor still working over the keeper where he lay at the foot of the tower stairs. "he's coming to," said dab-dab. "see, his eyes are beginning to blink." "get me some more clean water from the kitchen," said the doctor, who was bathing a large lump on the side of the man's head. presently the keeper opened his eyes wide and stared up into the doctor's face. "who?----what?"----he murmured stupidly. "the light!--i must attend to the light!--i must attend to the light!" and he struggled weakly to get up. "it's all right," said the doctor. "the light has been lit. and it's nearly day now. here, drink this. then you'll feel better." and the doctor held some medicine to his lips which he had taken from the little black bag. in a short while the man grew strong enough to stand on his feet. then, with the doctor's help, he walked as far as the kitchen, where john dolittle and dab-dab made him comfortable in an armchair, lit the stove and cooked his breakfast for him. [illustration: "the doctor and dab-dab cooked his breakfast for him"] "i'm mighty grateful to you, stranger, whoever you be," said the man. "usually there's two of us here, me and my partner, fred. but yesterday morning i let fred go off with the ketch to get oysters. that's why i'm alone. i was coming down the stairs about noon, from putting new wicks in the lamp, when my foot slipped and i took a tumble to the bottom. my head fetched up against the wall and knocked the senses right out of me. how long i lay there before you found me i don't know." "well, all's well that ends well," said the doctor. "take this; you must be nearly starved." and he handed the keeper a large cup of steaming coffee. about ten o'clock in the morning fred, the partner, returned in the little sail-boat from his oyster-gathering expedition. he was very much worried when he heard of the accident which had happened while he had been off duty. fred, like the other keeper, was a londoner and a seaman. he was a pleasant fellow and both he and his partner (who was now almost entirely recovered from his injury) were very glad of the doctor's company to break the tiresome dullness of their lonely life. they took john dolittle all over the lighthouse to see the workings of it. and outside they showed him with great pride the tiny garden of tomatoes and nasturtiums which they had planted near the foot of the tower. they only got a holiday once a year, they told john dolittle, when a government ship stopped near cape stephen and took them back to england for six weeks' vacation, leaving two other men in their place to take care of the light while they were gone. they asked the doctor if he could give them any news of their beloved london. but he had to admit that he also had been away from that city for a long time. however, while they were talking cheapside came into the lighthouse kitchen, looking for the doctor. the city sparrow was delighted to find that the keepers were also cockneys. and he gave them, through the doctor, all the latest gossip of wapping, limehouse, the east india docks and the wharves and the shipping of london river. the two keepers thought that the doctor was surely crazy when he started a conversation of chirps with cheapside. but from the answers they got to their questions they could see there was no fake about the news of the city which the sparrow gave. cheapside said the faces of those two cockney seamen were the best scenery he had looked on since he had come to africa. and after that first visit he was always flying over to the lighthouse in his spare time to see his new friends. of course, he couldn't talk to them, because neither of them knew sparrow talk--not even cockney sparrow talk. but cheapside loved being with them, anyway. "they're such a nice, wholesome, christian change," he said, "after these 'ere 'eathen hidolaters. and you should just hear fred sing 'see that my grave's kept green.'" the lighthouse keepers were sorry to have the doctor go and they wouldn't let him leave till he promised to come and take dinner with them next sunday. then, after they had loaded his canoe with a bushel of rosy tomatoes and a bouquet of nasturtiums, the doctor, with dab-dab and cheapside, paddled away for fantippo, while the keepers waved to them from the lighthouse door. the doctor had not paddled very far on his return journey to the post office when the seagull who had brought the news of the light overtook him. "everything all right now, doctor?" he asked as he swept in graceful circles around the canoe. "yes," said john dolittle, munching a tomato. "the man got an awful crack on the head from that fall. but he will be all over it in a little while. if it hadn't been for the canary, though, who told us where the matches were--and for you, too, holding back the sailors--we would never have saved that ship." the doctor threw a tomato skin out of the canoe and the gull caught it neatly in the air before it touched the water. "well, i'm glad we were in time," said the bird. "tell me," asked the doctor, watching him thoughtfully as he hovered and swung and curved around the tiny boat, "what made you come and bring me the news about the light? gulls don't, as a rule, bother much about people or what happens to ships, do they?" "you're mistaken, doctor," said the gull, catching another skin with deadly accuracy. "ships and the men in them are very important to us--not so much down here in the south. but up north, why, if it wasn't for the ships in the winter we gulls would often have a hard time finding enough to eat. you see, after it gets cold fish and sea foods become sort of scarce. sometimes we make out by going up the rivers to towns and hanging about the artificial lakes in parks where fancy waterfowl are kept. the people come to the parks and throw biscuits into the lakes for the waterfowl. but if we are around the biscuits get caught before they hit the lake--like that," and the gull snatched a third tomato skin on the wing with a lightning lunge. [illustration: "the gull caught the tomato skin with a lightning lunge"] "but you were speaking of ships," said the doctor. "yes," the gull went on--rather indistinctly, because his mouth was full of tomato skin--"we find ships much better for winter feeding. you see, it isn't really fair of us to go and bag all the food from the fancy waterfowl in parks. so we never do it unless we have to. usually in winter we stick to the ships. why, two years ago i and a cousin of mine lived the whole year round following ships for the food scraps the stewards threw out into the sea. the rougher the weather, the more food we get, because then the passengers don't feel like eating and most of the grub gets thrown out. yes, i and my cousin attached ourselves, as it were, to the _transatlantic packet line_, which runs ships from glasgow to philadelphia, and traveled back and forth with them across the ocean dozens of trips. but later on we changed over to the _binnacle line_--tilbury to boston." "why?" asked the doctor. "we found they ran a better table for their passengers. with the _binnacle_, who threw us out morning biscuits, afternoon tea and sandwiches last thing at night--as well as three square meals a day--we lived like fighting cocks. it nearly made sailors of us for good. it's a great life--all you do is eat. i should say gulls are interested in men and ships, doctor--very much so. why, i wouldn't have an accident happen to a ship for anything--especially a passenger ship." "humph! that's very interesting," murmured the doctor. "and have you seen many accidents--ships in trouble?" "oh, heaps of times," said the gull--"storms, collisions at night, ships going aground in the fog, and the rest. oh, yes, i've seen lots of boats in trouble at sea." "ah!" said the doctor, looking up from his paddling. "see, we are already back at the post office. and there's the pushmi-pullyu ringing the lunch bell. we're just in time. i smell liver and bacon--these tomatoes will go with it splendidly. won't you come in and join us?" he asked the gull. "i would like to hear more about your life with ships. you've given me an idea." "thank you," said the gull. "i am feeling kind of peckish myself. you are very kind. this is the first time i've eaten ship's food _inside_ a ship." and when the canoe was tied up they went into the houseboat and sat down to lunch at the kitchen table. "well, now," said the doctor to the gull as soon as they were seated, "you were speaking of fogs. what do you do yourself in that kind of weather--i mean, you can't see any more in the fog than the sailors can, can you?" "no," said the gull, "we can't _see_ any more, it is true. but, my goodness! if we were as helpless in a fog as the sailors are we'd always be lost. what we do, if we are going anywhere special and we run into a fog, is to fly up above it--way up where the air is clear. then we can find our way as well as ever." "i see," said the doctor. "but the storms, what do you do in them to keep yourselves safe?" "well, of course, in storms--bad storms--even seabirds can't always go where they want. we seagulls never try to battle our way against a real gale. the petrels sometimes do, but we don't. it is too tiring, and even when you can come down and rest on the water, swimming, every once in a while, it's a dangerous game. we fly with the storm--just let it carry us where it will. then when the wind dies down we come back and finish our journey." "but that takes a long time, doesn't it?" asked the doctor. "oh, yes," said the gull, "it wastes a little time. but, you know, we very seldom let ourselves get caught by a storm." "how do you mean?" asked john dolittle. "we know, before we reach one, where it is. and we go around it. no experienced sea bird ever runs his head into a bad storm." "but how do you know where the storms are?" asked the doctor. "well," said the gull, "i suppose two great advantages we birds have over the sailors in telling when and where to expect bad weather are our good eyesight and our experience. for one thing, we can always rise high in the air and look over the sea for a distance of fifty or sixty miles. then if we see gales approaching we can turn and run for it. and we can put on more speed than the fastest gale that ever blew. and then, another thing, our experience is so much better than sailors'. sailors, poor duffers, think they know the sea--that they spend their life on it. they don't--believe me, they don't. half the time they spend in the cabin, part of the time they spend on shore and a lot of the time they spend sleeping. and even when they are on deck they're not always looking at the sea. they fiddle around with ropes and paint brushes and mops and buckets. you very seldom see a sailor _looking_ at the sea." "i suppose they get rather tired of it, poor fellows!" murmured the doctor. "maybe. but, after all, if you want to be a good seaman the sea is the thing that counts, isn't it? that's the thing you've got to look at--to study. now, we sea birds spend nearly all our lives, night and day, spring, summer, autumn and winter, _looking at the sea_. and what is the result?" asked the gull, taking a fresh piece of toast from the rack that dab-dab handed him. "the result is this: we _know_ the sea. why, doctor, if you were to shut me up in a little box with no windows in it and take me out into the middle of any ocean you liked and then opened the box and let me look at the sea--even if there wasn't a speck of land in sight--i could tell you what ocean it was, and, almost to a mile, what part of it we were in. but, of course, i'd have to know what date it was." [illustration: "the gull took a fresh piece of toast"] "marvelous!" cried the doctor. "how do you do it?" "from the color of it; from the little particles of things that float in it; from the kind of fishes and sea creatures swimming in it; from the way the little ripples rippled and the big waves waved; from the smell of it; from the taste, the saltness of it and a couple of hundred other things. but, you know, in most cases--not always, but in most cases--i could tell you where we were with my eyes shut, as soon as i got out of the box, just from the wind blowing on my feathers." "great heavens!" the doctor exclaimed. "you don't say!" "that's the main trouble with sailors, doctor. they don't know winds the way they ought. they can tell a northeast wind from a west wind. and a strong one from a weak one. and that's about all. but when you've spent most of your life, the way we have, flying among the winds, using them to climb on, to swoop on and to hover on, you get to know that there's a lot more to a wind besides its direction and its strength. how often it puffs upward or downward, how often it grows weak or grows strong, will tell you, if you know the science of winds, a whole lot." _chapter vi_ weather bureaus when the lunch was over the doctor took an armchair beside the kitchen stove and lit his pipe. "i am thinking," he said to the gull, "of starting a new department in my post office. many of the birds who have helped me in this mail business seem to be remarkably good weather prophets. and what you have just told me about your knowledge of the sea and storms has given me the idea of opening a weather bureau." [illustration: "the doctor took an armchair beside the kitchen stove"] "what's that?" asked jip, who was brushing up the table crumbs, to be put out later for the birds on the houseboat deck. "a weather bureau," said the doctor, "is a very important thing--especially for shipping and farmers. it is an office for telling you what kind of weather you're going to have." "how do they do it?" asked gub-gub. "they don't," said the doctor--"at least they do sometimes. but as often as not they're wrong. they do it with instruments--thermometers, barometers, hygrometers and wind gauges and things. but most weather bureaus so far have been pretty poor. i think i can do much better with my birds. they very seldom go wrong in prophesying the weather." "well, for what parts of the world do you want to know the weather, doctor?" asked the gull. "if it's just for fantippo or west africa it will be easy as pie. all you ever get here is tornadoes. the rest of the year is just frying heat. but if you want to prophesy the weather for the straits of magellan or nova zembla or those countries where they have all sorts of fancy weathers, it will be a different matter. even prophesying the weather for england would keep you busy. myself, i never thought that the weather itself knew what it was going to do next in england." "the english climate's all right," put in cheapside, his feathers ruffling up for a fight. "don't you get turning up your long nautical nose at england, my lad. what do you call this 'ere? a climate? well, i should call it a turkish bath. in england we like variety in our climate. and we get it. that's why englishmen 'ave such 'earty red faces. 'ere the poor creatures turn black." "i would like," said the doctor, "to be able to prophesy weather for every part of the world. i really don't see why i shouldn't; this office, together with my branch offices, is in communication with birds going to every corner of the earth. i could improve the farming and the agriculture of the whole human race. but also, and especially, i want to have a bureau for ocean weather, to help the ships." "ah," said the gull, "for land weather i wouldn't be much help to you. but when it comes to the oceans, i know a bird who can tell you more about sea weather than any bureau ever knew." "oh," said the doctor, "who is that?" "we call him one eye," said the gull. "he's an old, old albatross. nobody knows how old. he lost an eye fighting with a fish eagle over a flounder. but he's the most marvelous weather prophet that ever lived. all sea birds have the greatest respect for his opinions. he has never been known to make a mistake." "indeed?" said the doctor. "i would like very much to meet him." "i'll get him for you," said the gull. "his home is not very far from here--out on a rock off the angola coast. he lives there because the shellfish are so plentiful on the rock and he's too feeble--with his bad sight--to catch the other kinds of livelier fish. it's a sort of dull life for his old age, after all the great traveling he has done. he'll be no end pleased to know you want his help. i'll go and tell him right away." "that will be splendid," said the doctor. "i think your friend should be very helpful to us." so the gull, after thanking the doctor and dab-dab for a very excellent luncheon, took a couple of postcards which were going to angola and flew off to get one eye, the albatross. later in the afternoon the gull returned and with him came the great one eye, oldest of bird weather prophets. the doctor said afterward that he had never seen a bird who reminded him so much of a sailor. he had the rolling, straddling walk of a seafaring man; he smelt strongly of fish; and whenever he spoke of the weather he had an odd trick of squinting up at the sky with his one eye, the way old sailors often do. he agreed with the doctor that the idea of a bird weather bureau was quite a possible thing and would lead to much better weather reports than had so far been possible. then for a whole hour and a half he gave the doctor a lecture on winds. every word of this john dolittle wrote down in a notebook. now the wind is the chief thing that changes the weather. and if, for instance, you know that it is raining in the channel islands at tea-time on a thursday--and there's a northeast wind blowing--you can be pretty sure that the rain will reach england some time thursday night. the next thing that the doctor did was to write to all the branch postmasters and have them arrange exactly with the different kinds of birds a time for them to start their yearly migrations--not just the second week in november, or anything like that--but an exact day and hour. then by knowing how fast each kind of bird flies, he could calculate almost to a minute what time they should arrive at their destination. and if they were late in arriving, then he would know that bad weather had delayed them on the way or that they had put off their starting till storms died down. the doctor, the gull, one eye, dab-dab, cheapside, speedy-the-skimmer and too-too the mathematician put their heads together and discussed far into the night, working out a whole lot more arrangements and particulars for running a good weather bureau. and a few weeks later a second brand new notice board appeared on the walls of the doctor's post office, beside the one for outgoing and incoming mails. the new notice board was marked at the top _weather reports_, and would read something like this: _the green herons were one day, three hours and nine minutes late in their arrival at cape horn from the sandwich islands. wind coming south-southeast. blustery weather can be expected along the west coast of chili and light gales in the antarctic sea._ and then the land birds, particularly those that live on berries, were very helpful to the doctor in telling him by letter if the winter was going to be a hard one or not in their particular country. and he used to write to farmers all over the world, advising them whether they could expect a sharp frost, a wet spring or a dry summer--which, of course, helped them in their farming tremendously. and then the fantippans, who so far had been very timid about going far out to sea on account of storms, now that they had a good weather bureau and knew what weather to expect, began building larger sailboats, instead of their little frail canoes. and they became what is called a mercantile nation, traded up and down the shores of west africa, and even went as far south as the cape of good hope and entered the indian ocean to traffic in goods with people of foreign lands. this made the kingdom of fantippo much richer and more important than it had been before, of course. and a large grant of money was given by the king to the foreign mails post office, which was used by the doctor in making the houseboat better and bigger. and soon the no-man's-land weather bureau began to get known abroad. the farmers in england, who had received such good weather reports by letter from the doctor, went up to london and told the government that their own reports were no good, that a certain john dolittle, m.d., was writing them much better reports from some place in africa. and the government got quite worked up about it. and they sent the royal meteorologist, an old gray-haired weather man, down to fantippo to see how the doctor was doing it. [illustration: "john dolittle saw him snooping around the post office"] john dolittle saw him one day, snooping around the post office, looking at the notice boards and trying to find out things. but he found out nothing. and when he got back to england he said to the government: "he hasn't any new instruments at all. the man's a fake. all he has down there is an old barge and a whole lot of messy birds flying around." _chapter vii_ teaching by mail the educational side of the doctor's post office was a very important one and it grew all the time. as he had said to the skimmer at the beginning, as soon as the birds and animals realized the helpfulness of having a post office of their own they used it more and more. and, of course, as speedy had foretold, they wrote most of their letters to the doctor. soon the poor man was swamped with mail, asking for medical advice. the esquimaux sleigh dogs wrote all the way from the arctic continent to know what they should do about their hair falling out. hair--which was all the poor creatures had to keep them warm against the polar winds--was, of course, very important to them. and john dolittle spent a whole saturday and sunday experimenting with hair tonics on jip to find a way to cure their trouble. jip was very patient about it, knowing that the doctor was doing it for the good of his fellow dogs. and he did not grumble--although he did mention to dab-dab that he felt like a chemist's shop from all the different hair oils the doctor had used on him. he said they ruined his keen nose entirely for two weeks, so he couldn't smell straight. [illustration: "the doctor experimented on jip"] and besides the letters asking for medical advice, the doctor got all sorts of requests from animals all over the world for information about food for their babies, nesting materials and a thousand other things. in their new thirst for education the animals asked all manner of questions, some of which neither the doctor nor anybody else could answer: what were the stars made of? why did the tide rise and fall--and could it be stopped? then, in order to deal with this wide demand for information which had been brought about by his post office, john dolittle started, for the first time in history, courses by correspondence for animals. and he had printed forms made, called "things a young rabbit should know," "the care of feet in frosty weather," etc., etc. these he sent out by mail in thousands. and then because so many letters were written him about good manners and proper behavior, he wrote a "book of etiquette for animals." it is still a very famous work, though copies of it are rare now. but when he wrote it the doctor printed a first edition of fifty thousand copies and sent them all out by mail in one week. it was at this time, too, that he wrote and circulated another very well-known book of his called "one-act plays for penguins." but, alas! instead of making the number of letters he had to answer less, the doctor found that by sending out books of information he increased a hundredfold the already enormous mail he had to attend to. this is a letter he received from a pig in patagonia: "dear doctor--i have read your 'book of etiquette for animals' and liked it very much. i am shortly to be married. would it be proper for me to ask the guests to bring turnips to my wedding, instead of flowers? "in introducing one well-bred pig to another should you say 'miss virginia ham, "_meet_" mr. frank footer,' or 'get acquainted?' "yours truly, "bertha bacon. "p. s.--i have always worn my engagement ring in my nose. is this the right place?" and the doctor wrote back: "dear bertha--in introducing one pig to another i would avoid using the word '_meet_.' 'get acquainted' is quite all right. remember that the object of all etiquette and manners should be to make people comfortable--not uncomfortable. "i think turnips at a wedding quite proper. you might ask the guests to leave the tops on. they will then look more like a bouquet. "sincerely yours, "john dolittle." part iii _chapter i_ the animals' magazine the next thing i must tell you about is the prize story competition: the fame of the puddleby fireside-circle, where the doctor had amused his pets with so many interesting tales, had become quite a famous institution. too-too had gossiped about it; gub-gub, jip and the white mouse had boasted of it. (you see, they were always proud that they could say they were part of the great man's regular household.) and before long, through this new post office of their own, creatures all over the world were speaking of it and discussing it by letter. next thing, the doctor began to receive requests for stories by mail. he had become equally famous as an animal doctor, an animal educator and an animal author. from the far north letters came in by the dozen from polar bears and walruses and foxes asking that he send them some light entertaining reading as well as his medical pamphlets and books of etiquette. the winter nights (weeks and weeks long up there) grew frightfully monotonous, they said, after their own supply of stories had run out--because you couldn't possibly sleep all the time and something had to be done for amusement on the lonely ice-floes and in the dens and lairs beneath the blizzard-swept snow. for some time the doctor was kept so busy with more serious things that he was unable to attend to it. but he kept it in mind until he should be able to think out the best way of dealing with the problem. now his pets, after the post office work got sort of settled and regular, often found it somewhat hard to amuse themselves in the evenings. one night they were all sitting around on the veranda of the houseboat wondering what game they could play when jip suddenly said: "i know what we can do--let's get the doctor to tell us a story." "oh, you've heard all my stories," said the doctor. "why don't you play _hunt-the-slipper_?" "the houseboat isn't big enough," said dab-dab. "last time we played it gub-gub got stuck by the pushmi-pullyu's horns. you've got plenty of stories. tell us one, doctor--just a short one." "well, but what shall i tell you a story about?" asked john dolittle. "about a turnip field," said gub-gub. "no, that won't do," said jip. "doctor, why don't you do what you did sometimes by the fire in puddleby--turn your pockets out upon the table till you come to something that reminds you of a story--you remember?" "all right," said the doctor. "but----" and then an idea came to him. "look here," he said: "you know i've been asked for stories by mail. the creatures around the north pole wanted some light reading for the long winter nights. i'm going to start an animals' magazine for them. i'm calling it _the arctic monthly_. it will be sent by mail and be distributed by the nova zembla branch office. so far, so good. but the great problem is how to get sufficient stories and pictures and articles and things to fill a monthly magazine--no easy matter. now listen, if i tell you animals a story to-night, you'll have to do something to help me with my new magazine. every night when you want to amuse yourselves we'll take it in turns to tell a story. that will give us seven stories right away. there will be only one story printed each month--the rest of the magazine will be news of the day, a medical advice column, a babies' and mothers' page and odds and ends. then we'll have a prize story competition. the readers shall judge which is the best; and when they write to us here and tell us, we'll give the prize to the winner. what do you say?" "what a splendid idea!" cried gub-gub. "i'll tell my story to-morrow night. i know a good one. now go ahead, doctor." then john dolittle started turning his trousers pockets out onto the table to try and find something that reminded him of a story. it was certainly a wonderful collection of objects that he brought forth. there were pieces of string and pieces of wire, stub ends of pencils, pocket-knives with the blades broken, coat buttons, boot buttons, a magnifying glass, a compass and a corkscrew. [illustration: "it was certainly a wonderful collection of objects"] "there doesn't seem to be anything very hopeful there," said the doctor. "try in your waistcoat pockets," said too-too. "they were always the most interesting. you haven't turned them out since you left puddleby. there must be lots in them." so the doctor turned out his waistcoat pockets. these brought forth two watches (one that went and one that didn't), a measuring tape, a piece of cobbler's wax, a penny with a hole through it and a clinical thermometer. "what's that?" asked gub-gub, pointing to the thermometer. "that's for taking people's temperature with," said the doctor. "oh, that reminds me----" "of a story?" cried too-too. "i knew it would," said jip. "a thing like that must have a story to it. what's the name of the story, doctor?" "well," said the doctor, settling himself back in his chair, "i think i'll call this story 'the invalids' strike.'" "what's a strike?" asked gub-gub. "and what on earth is an invalid?" cried the pushmi-pullyu. "a strike," said the doctor, "is when people stop doing their own particular work in order to get somebody else to give them what they want. and an invalid--well, an invalid is a person who is always--er, more or less--ill." "but what kind of work is invalids' work?" asked the white mouse. "their work is--er, staying--ill," said the doctor. "stop asking questions or i'll never get this story started." "wait a minute," said gub-gub. "my foot's gone to sleep." "oh, bother your feet!" cried dab-dab. "let the doctor get on with his story." "is it a good story?" asked gub-gub. "well," said the doctor, "i'll tell it, and then you can decide for yourself. stop fidgeting, now, and let me begin. it's getting late." _chapter ii_ the doctor's story as soon as the doctor had lit his pipe and got it well going he began: "many years ago, at the time i bought this thermometer, i was a very young doctor, full of hope, just starting out in business. i fancied myself a very good doctor, but i found that the rest of the world did not seem to think so. and for many months after i began i did not get a single patient. i had no one to try my new thermometer on. i tried it on myself quite often. but i was always so frightfully healthy i never had any temperature anyway. i tried to catch a cold. i didn't really want a cold, you understand, but i did want to make sure that my new thermometer worked. but i couldn't even catch a cold. i was very sad--healthy but sad. "well, about this time i met another young doctor who was in the same fix as myself--having no patients. said he to me: 'i'll tell you what we'll do, let's start a sanitarium.'" "what's a sanitarium?" asked gub-gub. "a sanitarium," said the doctor, "is a sort of mixture between a hospital and a hotel--where people stay who are invalids.... well, i agreed to this idea. then i and my young friend--his name was phipps, dr. cornelius q. phipps--took a beautiful place way off in the country, and we furnished it with wheel chairs and hot-water bottles and ear trumpets and the things that invalids like. and very soon patients came to us in hundreds and our sanitarium was quite full up and my new thermometer was kept very busy. of course, we made a lot of money, because all these people paid us well. and phipps was very happy. "but i was not so happy. i had noticed a peculiar thing: none of the invalids ever seemed to get well and go away. and finally i spoke of this to phipps. "'my dear dolittle,' he answered, '_go away_?--of course not! we don't want them to go away. we want them to stay here, so they'll keep on paying us.' "'phipps,' i said, 'i don't think that's honest. i became a doctor to cure people--not to pamper them.' "well, on this point we fell out and quarreled. i got very angry and told him i would not be his partner any longer--that i would pack up and go the following day. as i left his room, still very angry, i passed one of the invalids in his wheel chair. it was sir timothy quisby, our most important and expensive patient. he asked me, as i passed, to take his temperature, as he thought he had a new fever. now, i had never been able to find anything wrong with sir timothy and had decided that being an invalid was a sort of hobby with him. so, still, very angry, instead of taking his temperature, i said quite rudely: 'oh, go to the dickens!' [illustration: "it was sir timothy quisby, our most expensive patient"] "sir timothy was furious. and, calling for dr. phipps, he demanded that i apologize. i said i wouldn't. then sir timothy told phipps that if i didn't he would start an invalids' strike. phipps got terribly worried and implored me to apologize to this very special patient. i still refused. "then a peculiar thing happened. sir timothy, who had always so far seemed too weak to walk, got right out of his wheel chair and, waving his ear trumpet wildly, ran around all over the sanitarium, making speeches to the other invalids, saying how shamefully he had been treated and calling on them to strike for their rights. "and they did strike--and no mistake. that night at dinner they refused to take their medicine--either before or after meals. dr. phipps argued with them, prayed them, implored them to behave like proper invalids and carry out their doctors' orders. but they wouldn't listen to him. they ate all the things they had been forbidden to eat, and after dinner those who had been ordered to go for a walk stayed at home, and those who had been ordered to stay quiet went outside and ran up and down the street. they finished the evening by having a pillow fight with their hot-water bottles, when they should have been in bed. the next morning they all packed their own trunks and left. and that was the end of _our_ sanitarium. "but the most peculiar thing of all was this: i found out afterward that every single one of those patients had got well! getting out of their wheel chairs and going on strike had done them so much good they stopped being invalids altogether. as a sanitarium doctor, i suppose i was not a success--still, i don't know. certainly i cured a great many more patients by going _out_ of the sanitarium business than phipps ever did by going into it." _chapter iii_ gub-gub's story the next night, when they were again seated around the veranda after supper, the doctor asked: "now, who's going to tell us a story to-night? didn't gub-gub say he had one for us?" "oh, don't let him tell one, doctor," said jip. "it's sure to be stupid." "he isn't old enough to tell a good story," said dab-dab. "he hasn't had any experience." "his only interest in life is food, anyway," said too-too. "let someone else tell a story." "no, now wait a minute," cried the doctor. "don't all be jumping on him this way. we were all young once. let him tell his story. he may win the prize. who knows? come along, gub-gub. tell us your story. what's the name of it?" gub-gub fidgeted his feet, blushed up to the ears, and finally said: "this is a kind of a crazy story. but it's a good one. it's--er--er--a piggish fairy tale. it's called 'the magic cucumber.'" "gosh!" growled jip. "more food!" murmured too-too. "what did i tell you?" "tee-hee-hee!" tittered the white mouse. "go on, gub-gub," said the doctor. "don't take any notice of them. i'm listening." "once upon a time," gub-gub began, "a small pig went out into the forest with his father to dig for truffles. the father pig was a very clever truffle digger, and just by smelling the ground he could tell with great sureness the places where truffles were to be found. well, this day they came upon a place beneath some big oak trees and they started digging. presently, after the father pig had dug up an enormous truffle and they were both eating it, they heard, to their great astonishment, the sound of voices coming from the hole out of which they had dug the truffle. "the father pig hurried away with his child because he did not like magic. but that night the baby pig, when his mother and father were fast asleep, crept out of his sty and went off into the woods. he wanted to find out the mystery of those voices coming from under the ground. "so, reaching the hole where his father had dug up the truffle, he set to work digging for himself. he had not dug very long when the earth caved right in underneath him and he felt himself falling and falling and falling. at last he came to a stop, upside down in the middle of a dining table. the table was all set for dinner--and he had fallen into the soup. he looked about him and saw seated around the table many tiny little men, none of them more than half as big as himself and all a dark green in color. [illustration: "he had fallen into the soup"] "'where am i?' asked the baby pig. "'you're in the soup,' said the little men. "the baby pig was at first terribly frightened. but when he saw how small were the men around him his fear left him. and before he got out of the soup tureen on the table he drank up all the soup. he then asked the little men who they might be. and they said: "'we are _the cook goblins_. we live under the ground and we spend half our time inventing new things to eat and the other half in eating them. the noise you heard coming out of the hole was us singing our food hymns. we always sing food hymns whenever we are preparing particularly fine dishes.' "'good!' said the pig. 'i've come to the right place. let us go on with the dinner.' "but just as they were about to begin on the fish (the soup was already gone, you see), there was a great noise outside the dining hall and in rushed another lot of little men, a bright red in color. these were _the toadstool sprites_, ancient enemies of the cook goblins. a tremendous fight began, one side using toothpicks for spears and the other using nut crackers for clubs. the pig took the side of his friends the cook goblins, and, being as big as any two of the enemy put together, he soon had the toadstool sprites running for their lives. "when the fight was over and the dining hall cleared the cook goblins were very grateful to the baby pig for his valuable assistance. they called him a conquering hero and, crowning him with a wreath of parsley, they invited him to the seat of honor at the dining table and went on with the meal. "never had the baby pig enjoyed a meal so much in all his life as he did that one. he found that the cook goblins, as well as inventing new and marvelously tasty dishes, had also thought out a lot of new things in the way of table furnishings. for instance, they served pin cushions with the fish. these were to stick your fishbones in, instead of leaving them to clutter up your plate. pudding-fans were another of their novelties--fans for cooling off your pudding with, instead of blowing on it. then they had cocoa-skin clothes lines--little toy clothes lines to hang the skin off your cocoa on, neatly. (you know what a nasty mess it makes draped over the rim of your cup.) and when the fruit came on, tennis racquets were handed around also. and if anyone at the other end of the table asked you for an apple, instead of going to all the work of handing down a heavy bowl of fruit, you just took an apple and served it at him like a tennis ball, and he would catch it at the other end of the table on the point of a fork. "these things added a good deal of jolliness to the meal and some of them were very clever inventions. why, they even had a speaking tube for things you are not allowed to mention at table." "a speaking tube!" the white mouse interrupted. "how was it used? i don't understand." "well," said gub-gub, "you know how people are always telling you 'you mustn't speak about those things at table!' well, the cook goblins had a speaking tube in the wall which led, at the other end, to the open air outside. and whenever you wanted to talk about any of the things forbidden at table you left the table and went and said it into the speaking tube; then you came back to your seat. it was a very great invention.... well, as i was saying, the baby pig enjoyed himself tremendously. and when the meal was over he said he must be going back because he wanted to get into the sty before his mother and father should be awake. "the cook goblins were sorry to see him go. and as a farewell present in return for the help he had given them against their enemies, they gave him the magic cucumber. now, this cucumber, if you cut off even the smallest part of it and planted it, would grow immediately into a whole field of any fruit or vegetable you wished. all you had to do was to say the name of the vegetable you wanted. the baby pig thanked the cook goblins, kissed them all goodby and went home. "he found his mother and father still asleep when he got back. so after carefully hiding his magic cucumber under the floor of the cow barn, he crept into the sty and went fast asleep. "now, it happened that a few days later a neighboring king made war upon the king that owned the country where the pig family lived. things went very badly for the pigs' king, and, seeing that the enemy were close at hand, he gave orders that all cattle and farm animals and people should be brought inside the castle walls. the pig family was also driven into the castle grounds. but before he left, the baby pig went and bit off a piece of his magic cucumber and took it along with him. "soon after, the enemy's army closed about the castle and tried to storm it. then for many weeks they remained there, knowing that sooner or later the king and the people in the castle would run short of food and have to give in. "now, it happened that the queen had noticed the baby pig within the castle grounds and, being a princess of irish blood, she took a great fancy to him and had a piece of green ribbon tied about his neck and made a regular pet of him, much to the disgust of her husband, the king. [illustration: "she made a regular pet of him"] "well, the fourth week after the enemy came the food in the castle was all gone and the king gave orders that the pigs must be eaten. the queen raised a great outcry and begged that her pet should be spared. but the king was very firm. "'my soldiers are starving,' said he. 'your pet, madam, must be turned into sausages.' "then the baby pig saw that the time to use the goblins' magic gift had come. and, rushing out into the castle garden, he dug a hole and planted his piece of cucumber right in the middle of the king's best rosebed. "'parsnips!' he grunted, as he filled in the hole. 'may they blossom acres wide!' "and, sure enough, he had hardly said the words before all over the king's garden parsnips began springing up thick and fast. even the gravel walks were covered with them. "then the king and his army had plenty of food and, growing strong on the nutritious parsnips, they sallied forth from the castle, smote the enemy, hip and thigh, and put them to flight. "and the queen was allowed to keep her pet pig, which rejoiced her kind heart greatly--she being of irish blood royal. and he became a great hero at the court and was given a sty studded with jewels in the centre of the castle garden--on the very spot where he had planted the magic cucumber. and they all lived happily ever after. and that is the end of the piggish fairy tale." _chapter iv_ dab-dab's story the animals now began to look forward to the evening story-telling--the way people do to regular habits that are pleasant. and for the next night they arranged among themselves before-hand that it should be dab-dab's turn to tell a tale. after they were all seated on the veranda the housekeeper preened her feathers and in a very dignified voice began: "on the outskirts of puddleby-on-the-marsh there lives a farmer who swears to this day that his cat can understand every word he says. it isn't true, but both the farmer and his wife think it is. and i am now going to tell you how they came to get that idea. "once when the doctor was away in scotland, looking for fossils, he left me behind to take charge of the house. the old horse in the stable complained to me one night that the rats were eating up all his corn. while i was walking around the stable, trying to think out what i should do about it i spied an enormous white persian cat stalking about the premises. now, i myself have no love for cats. for one thing, they eat ducklings, and for another, they always seem to me sort of sneaky things. so i ordered this one to get off the doctor's property. to my surprise, she behaved very politely--said she didn't know she was trespassing and turned to leave. then i felt sort of guilty, knowing the doctor liked to be hospitable to every kind of animal, and, after all, the cat wasn't doing any harm there. so i overtook her and told her that if she didn't kill anything on the place she could come and go as she pleased. "well, we got chatting, the way people do, and i found out that the cat lived at a farmer's house about a quarter of a mile down the oxenthorpe road. then i walked part of the way home with her, still chatting, and i found that she was a very agreeable individual. i told her about the rats in the stable and the difficulty i had in making them behave, because the doctor wouldn't allow any one to kill them. and she said, if i wished, she'd sleep in the stable a few nights and the rats would probably leave as soon as they smelled her around. "this she did, and the results were excellent. the rats departed in a body and the old horse's corn-bin was left undisturbed. then she disappeared and for several nights i saw nothing of her. so one evening i thought it would be only decent of me to call at her farm down the oxenthorpe road, to thank her. "i went to her farm and found her in the farm-yard. i thanked her for what she had done and asked her why she hadn't been around to my place of late. "'i've just had kittens,' she said. 'six--and i haven't been able to leave them a moment. they are in the farmer's parlor now. come in and i'll show them to you.' "so in we went. and on the parlor floor, in a round basket, there were six of the prettiest kittens you ever saw. while we were looking at them we heard the farmer and his wife coming downstairs. so, thinking they might not like to have a duck in the parlor (some folks are so snobbish and pernickety, you know--not like the doctor), i hid myself behind a closet door just as the farmer and his wife came into the room. "they leaned over the basket of kittens, stroked the white cat and started talking. now, the cat didn't understand what they said, of course. but i, being round the doctor so much and discussing with him the differences between duck grammar and people's grammar, understood every word they uttered. "and this is what i heard the farmer say to his wife: 'we'll keep the black and white kitten, liza. i'll drown the other five to-morrow morning. won't never do to have all them cats running around the place.' his grammar was atrocious. [illustration: "'we'll keep the black and white one, liza'"] "as soon as they had gone i came out of the closet and i said to the white cat: 'i shall expect you to bring up these kittens to leave ducklings alone. now listen: to-night, after the farmer and his wife are in bed, take all your kittens _except the black and white one_, and hide them in the attic. the farmer means to drown them and is going to keep only one.' "the cat did as i bade her. and next morning, when the farmer came to take the kittens away, he found only the black and white one--the one he meant to keep. he could not understand it. some weeks later, however, when the farmer's wife was spring cleaning, she came upon the others in the attic, where the mother cat had hidden them and nursed them secretly. but they were now grown big enough to escape through the window and they went off to find new homes for themselves. "and that is why to this day that farmer and his wife swear their cat can understand english, because, they say, she must have heard them when they were talking over the basket. and whenever she's in the room and they are gossiping about the neighbors, they always speak in whispers, lest she overhear. but between you and me, she doesn't really understand a single word they say." _chapter v_ the white mouse's story "who's turn is it to give us a story now?" asked the doctor, when the supper things were cleared away the following evening. "i think the white mouse ought to tell us one," said jip. "very well," said the white mouse. "i will tell you one of the days of my youth. the doctor knows this story, but the rest of you have never heard it." and smoothing back his white whiskers and curling his pink tail snugly about his small, sleek body, he blinked his eyes twice and began: "when i was born i was one of seven twins. but all my brothers and sisters were ordinary mouse color and i alone out of the whole family was white. my color worried my mother and father a great deal. they said i was so conspicuous and would certainly, as soon as i left the nest, get caught by the first owl or cat that came along. "we were city folk, my family were--and proud of it. we lived under the floor of a miller's shop. across the street from our place was a butcher's shop, and next door to us was a dyer's--where they dyed cloth different colors before it went to the tailor's to be made into suits. "now, when we children grew up big enough to go off for ourselves our parents gave us all sorts of careful instructions about escaping cats and ferrets and weasels and dogs. but over poor me they shook their heads. they really felt that there was not much hope of my leading a peaceful life with white fur that could be seen a mile off. "well, they were quite right. my color got me into trouble the first week that i set out to seek my fortune--but not in the way they thought it would. the son of the miller who owned the shop where we lived found me one morning in a bin of oats. "'ah, hah!' he cried. 'a white mouse! the very thing i've been wanting!' "and he caught me in a fishing net and put me in a cage, to keep as a pet. "i was very sad at first. but after a while i got sort of used to the life. the boy--he was only eight years old--treated me kindly and fed me regularly each day. i grew almost fond of the funny, snub-nosed lad and became so tame that he would let me out of my cage sometimes and i would run up and down his sleeve. but i never got a chance to escape. "after some months i began to grow weary of the silly life i was leading. and then, too, the wild mice were so mean to me. they used to come around at night and point at me through the wire of my cage, saying: "'look at the tame white mouse! tee-hee-hee! a plaything for children! good little mousey! come and have 'ims facey washed!' the stupid little idiots! "well, finally i set to work and thought out a clever plan of escape. i gnawed a hole through the wooden floor of my cage and kept it covered with straw, so the boy couldn't see it. and one night when i heard him safely snoring--he always kept my cage at the head of his bed--i slipped out of the hole and got away. "i had many adventures with cats. it was winter time and the snow lay thick upon the ground. i started off to explore the world, rejoicing in my liberty. going around to the back of the house, i passed from the miller's yard into the dyer's yard, next door. in the yard was a dyeing shed and i noticed two owls sitting on the top of it in the moonlight. "entering the shed, i met a rat, very old and very thin. said he to me: "'i am the oldest rat in the town and i know a great deal. but, tell me, why do you come here into the dyeing shed?' "'i was looking for food,' i said. "the old rat laughed a cracked and quavering laugh, with no joy in it at all. [illustration: "the old rat laughed a quavering laugh"] "'there's no food here,' he said, 'only dyes of different colors.' and he pointed to the big dye vats, all in a row, that towered in the half darkness above our heads. "'any food there was here i've eaten,' he went on sadly, 'and i dare not go out for more because the owls are waiting on the roof. they'd see my dark body against the snow and i'd stand no chance of escape. i am nearly starved.' and he swayed weakly on his old feet. 'but now you've come, it's different. some good fairy must have sent you to me. i've been sitting here for days and nights on end, hoping a white mouse might come along. with your white fur, you understand, the owls can't see you so well against the snow. that's what's called _protective coloration_. i know all about natural history--i'm very old, you see. that is why you managed to get in here without being caught. go out now, for pity's sake, and bring me the first food of any kind that you can find. the owls by night and the cats by day have kept me shut in here since the snow came without a bite to eat. you are only just in time to save my life.' "so off i went across the moonlit snow and the blinking owls on the roof of the dyeing shed never spotted me. against the whiteness i was nearly invisible. i felt quite proud. at last my white fur was coming in handy. "i found a garbage can and, picking out some bacon rinds, i carried them back to the starving rat. the old fellow was ever so grateful. he ate and ate--my whiskers, how he ate! finally he said: "'ah! now i feel better.' "'you know,' said i, 'i have only just escaped from captivity. i was kept as a pet by a boy. so far being white has only been a great inconvenience to me. the cats could see me so well life wasn't worth living.' "'well, now, i'll tell you what we'll do,' said he, 'you come and live in this dyeing shed with me. it isn't a bad place--quite warm and snug under the floors, and the foundations are simply riddled with holes and corridors and hiding places. and while the snow is here you can go out and get the food for both of us--because you can't be seen so well against the snow. and when the winter is over and the earth is black again _i_ will do the food hunting outside and _you_ can do the staying at home. you see, this is a good place to live in in another way--there is nothing for rats and mice to destroy here, so people don't bother about you. other places--like houses and food shops and mills--folks are always setting traps and sending ferrets after you. but no one minds rats living in a dyeing shed, see? foolish young rats and mice go and live where there's lots of food. but not for me! i'm a wise one, i am.' "well, we agreed upon this arrangement and for a whole year i lived at the dyer's with the old wise rat. and we lived high--no mistake! not a soul ever bothered us. in the winter days i did the foraging and when summer came my old partner, who knew where to get the choicest foods in town, kept our larder stocked with the daintiest delicacies. ah, many's the jolly meal i've had under the floor of the dye shed with that old veteran, chuckling in whispers as we heard the dyers overhead mixing the dyes in the great big vats and talking over the news of the town! [illustration: "upstairs where the dye vats stood"] "but none of us are ever content for long, you know--foolish creatures that we are. and by the time the second summer was coming i was longing to be a free mouse, to roam the world and all that sort of thing. and then, too, i wanted to get married. maybe the spring was getting into my blood. so one night i said to the old rat: "'rat,' i said, 'i'm in love. all winter, every night i went out to gather fodder, i've been keeping company with a lady mouse--well-bred she is, with elegant manners. i've a mind to settle down and have a family of my own. now, here comes the summer again and i've got to stay shut up in this miserable shed on account of my beastly color.' "the old rat gazed at me thoughtfully a moment and i knew that he was going to say something particularly wise. "'young man,' says he at last, 'if you've a mind to go i reckon i can't stop you--foolish young mad-cap though i think you. and how i'll ever shift for myself after you've gone goodness only knows. but, seeing you have been so useful to me this past year and more, i'll help you.' "so saying, he takes me upstairs to where the dye vats stood. it was twilight and the men were gone. but we could see the dim shapes of the big vats towering above our heads. then he takes a string that lay upon the floor and, scaling up the middle vat, he lets the string down inside. "'what's that for?' i asked. "'that's for you to climb out by, after you've taken a bath. for you to go abroad in summer with a coat like yours would mean certain death. so i'm going to dye you black.' "'jumping cheese!' i cried. '_dye me black!_' "'just that,' says he. 'it's quite simple. scale up that middle vat now--on to the edge--and dive right in. don't be afraid. there's a string there for you to climb out by.' "well, i was always adventurous by nature. and, plucking up my courage, i scrambled up the vat, on to the edge of it. it was awful dark and i could just see the dye, glimmering murky and dim, far down inside. "'go ahead,' said the old rat. 'don't be afraid--and be sure you dip your head and all under.' "well, it took an awful lot of nerve to take that plunge. and if i hadn't been in love i don't suppose i'd ever have done it. but i did--i dove right down into the dye. "i thought i'd never come up again, and even when i did i nearly drowned before i found the string in the dark and scrambled, gasping for breath, out of the vat. "'fine!' says the old rat. 'now run around the shed a few times, so you won't take a chill. and then go to bed and cover up. in the morning when it's light you'll find yourself very different.' "well--tears come to my eyes when i think of it--the next day, when i woke up, expecting to find myself a smart, decent black, i found instead that i had dyed myself a bright and gaudy _blue_! that stupid old rat had made a mistake in the vats!" the white mouse paused a moment in his story, as though overcome with emotion. presently he went on: "never have i been so furious with anyone in my life as i was with that old rat. "'look! _look_ what you've done to me now!' i cried. 'it isn't even a navy blue. you've made me just hideous!' "'i can't understand it,' he murmured. 'the middle vat _used_ to be the black one, i know. they must have changed them. the blue one was always the one on the left.' "'you're a stupid old duffer!' i said. and i left the dye shed in great anger and never went back to it again. "well, if i had been conspicuous before, now i was a hundred times more so. against the black earth, or the green grass, or the white snow, or brown floors my loud, sky-blue coat could be seen as plain as a pikestaff. the minute i got outside the shed a cat jumped for me. i gave her the slip and got out into the street. there some wretched children spotted me and, calling to their friends that they had seen a blue mouse, they hunted me along the gutter. at the corner of the street two dogs were fighting. they stopped their fight and joined the chase after me. and very soon i had the whole blessed town at my heels. it was awful. i didn't get any peace till after night had fallen, and by that time i was so exhausted with running i was ready to drop. "about midnight i met the lady mouse with whom i was in love, beneath a lamp-post. and, would you believe it? she wouldn't speak to me! cut me dead, she did. "'it was for your sake i got myself into this beastly mess,' i said, as she stalked by me with her nose in the air. 'you're an ungrateful woman, that's what you are.' "'oh, la, la, la!' said she, smirking. 'you wouldn't expect any self-respecting person to keep company with a _blue_ mouse, would you?' "later, when i was trying to find a place to sleep, all the mice i met, wherever there was any light at all, made fun of me and pointed at me and jeered. i was nearly in tears. then i went down to the river, hoping i might wash the dye off and so get white again. that, at least, would be better than the way i was now. but i washed and i swam and i rinsed, all to no purpose. water made no impression on me. "so there i sat, shivering on the river bank, in the depths of despair. and presently i saw the sky in the east growing pale and i knew that morning was coming. daylight! that for me meant more hunting and running and jeering, as soon as the sun should show my ridiculous color. "and then i came to a very sad decision--probably the saddest decision that a free mouse ever made. rather than be hunted and jeered at any more i decided that i would sooner be back in a cage, a pet mouse! yes, there at least i was well treated and well fed by the snub-nosed miller lad. i would go back and be a captive mouse. was i not spurned by my lady love and jeered at by my friends? very well then, i would turn my back upon the world and go into captivity. and then my lady love would be sorry--too late! "so, picking myself up wearily, i started off for the miller's shop. on the threshold i paused a moment. it was a terrible step i was about to take. i gazed miserably down the street, thinking upon the hardness of life and the sadness of love, and there, coming toward me, with a bandage around his tail, was my own brother! "as he took a seat beside me on the doorstep i burst into tears and told him all that had happened to me since we left our parents' home. "'i am terribly sorry for your bad luck,' said he when i had ended. 'but i'm glad i caught you before you went back into captivity. because i think i can guide you to a way out of your troubles.' "'what way is there?' i said. 'for me life is over!' "'go and see the doctor,' said my brother. "'what doctor?'" i asked. "'there _is_ only one doctor,' he answered. 'you don't mean to say you've never _heard_ of him!' "and then he told me all about doctor dolittle. this was around the time when the doctor first began to be famous among the animals. but i, living alone with the old rat at the dyer's shed, had not heard the news. "'i've just come from the doctor's office,' said my brother. 'i got my tail caught in a trap and he bandaged it up for me. he's a marvelous man--kind and honest. and he talks animals' language. go to him and i'm sure he'll know some way to clean blue dye off a mouse. he knows everything.' "so that is how i first came to john dolittle's house in puddleby. the doctor, when i told my troubles to him, took a very small pair of scissors and cut off all my fur, so i was as bald and as pink as a pig. then he rubbed me with some special hair restorer for mice--a patent invention of his own. and very soon i grew a brand new coat of fur, as white as snow! [illustration: "the doctor cut off all my fur"] "and then, hearing what difficulty i had had keeping away from cats, the doctor gave me a home in his own house--in his own piano, in fact. and no mouse could wish for more than that. he even offered to send for the lady i was in love with, who would, no doubt, think differently about me, now that i was white again. but i said: "'no, doctor. let her be. i'm through with women for good.'" _chapter vi_ jip's story the next night jip was called upon for a story. and after thinking a moment he said: "all right, i'll tell you the story of 'the beggar's dog.'" and the animals all settled down to listen attentively, because jip had often told them stories before and they liked his way of telling them. "some time ago," jip began, "i knew a dog who was a beggar's dog. we met by chance one day, when a butcher's cart had an accident and got upset. the butcher's boy who was driving the cart was a stupid boy whom all the dogs of that town heartily disliked. so when his cart hit a lamp-post and over-turned, spilling mutton chops and joints all over the street, we dogs were quickly on the scene and ran off with all his meat before he had time to pick himself up out of the gutter. "it was on this occasion, as i said, that i fell in with the beggar's dog. i found him bolting down the street beside me, with a choice steak flapping merrily around his ears. myself, i had pinched a string of sausages and the beastly things kept getting tangled up in my legs,--till he came to my rescue and showed me how to coil them up neatly so i could run with them without getting tripped. "after that the beggar's dog and i became great friends. i found that his master had only one leg and was very, very old. "'he's most frightfully poor,' said my friend. 'and he's too old to work, you see--even if he had two legs to get around on. and now he has taken to pavement art. you know what that is--you draw pictures on the pavement in colored chalks and you write under them: "_all my own work._" and then you sit by the side of them, with your cap in your hand, waiting for people to give you pennies.' "'oh, yes,' i said, 'i know. i've seen pavement artists before.' "'well,' said my friend, 'my beggar doesn't get any pennies. and i know the reason why: his pictures aren't good enough--not even for pavement art. myself, i don't pretend to know much about drawing. but his pictures are just awful--_awful_. one kind old lady the other day stopped before our stand--wanting to encourage him, you know--and, pointing to one picture, she said, "_oh, what a lovely tree!_" the picture was meant to be a lighthouse in the middle of the ocean, with a storm raging around it. that's the kind of an artist my man is. i don't know what to do about him.' [illustration: "his pictures are just awful"] "'well, look here,' i said, 'i have an idea. since your man can't work for himself, suppose you and i go into the bone-hiring business.' "'what on earth is that?' he asked. "'well,' i said, 'people hire out bicycles and pianos for rent, don't they? so, why can't you and i rent out bones for dogs to chew? they won't be able to pay us in money of course, so we'll get them to bring us things, instead. then the beggar can sell the things and get money.' "'that's a good notion,' said he. 'let's start to-morrow.'" "so the following day we found an empty lot, where people used to dump rubbish, and dug an enormous hole, which was to be our bone shop. then we went around the back doors of all the richest people's houses early in the morning and picked out the best bones from the garbage cans. we even snatched a few from other dogs who were tied to kennels and couldn't run after us--rather a dirty trick, but we were working in a good cause and were not particular. then we took all these bones and put them in the hole we had dug. by night we kept them covered up with earth, because we didn't want them stolen--and, besides, some dogs prefer their bones buried a few days before they chew them. it gets them seasoned-like. and then by day we stood over our wares, calling out to all the dogs that passed by: "'bones for hire! beef bones, ham bones, mutton bones, chicken bones! all juicy! step up, gentlemen, and take your choice! bones for hire!' "well, right from the start we did a roaring trade. all the dogs for miles around heard of us and came to hire bones. and we would charge them according to the length of time they wanted to hire them. for instance, you could rent a good ham bone for one day for a candlestick or a hair brush; for three days for a violin or an umbrella. and if you wanted your bone for a whole week you had to bring us a suit of clothes in payment. "well, for a while our plan worked splendidly. the beggar sold the things that we got in payment from the dogs and he had money to live on. "but we never thought where the dogs might be getting all these things they brought us. the truth is, we didn't bother very much, i'm afraid. anyway at the end of our first week of brisk trade we noticed a great many people going through the streets as though they were looking for something. and presently these people, seeing our shop in the empty lot, gathered around us, talking to one another. and while they were talking a retriever came up to me with a gold watch and chain in his mouth, which he wanted to exchange for a ham bone. [illustration: "a retriever came up with a gold watch and chain"] "well, you should have seen the excitement among the people then! the owner of the watch and chain was there and he raised a terrible row. and then it came out that these dogs had been taking things from their masters' homes to hire bones with. the people were dreadfully annoyed. they closed up our bone shop and put us out of business. but they never discovered that the money we had made had gone to the beggar. "of course, we hadn't made enough to keep him in comfort for long and very soon he had to become a pavement artist again and was as badly off as he had ever been--and the pictures he drew were worse, if anything, than before. "now it happened one day, when i was wandering around in the country outside the town, that i met a most conceited spaniel. he passed me with his nose turned up in the air in such a cheeky manner that i said to him, i said: 'what makes you so stuck up?' "'my master has been ordered to paint the portrait of a prince,' he said, putting on no end of elegance. "'who is your master?' i said. 'anybody would think you were going to paint the portrait yourself.' "'my master is a very famous artist,' said he. "'what's his name?' i asked. "'george morland,' said the spaniel. "'george morland!' i cried. 'is he in these parts now?' "'yes,' said the spaniel. 'we are staying at _the royal george_. my master is painting some pictures of the country and next week he is going back to london to commence on the portrait of the prince.' "now, it happened that i had met this george morland, who was, and is still, perhaps the most famous painter of farm-life pictures the world has ever known. i am proud to be able to say that i knew him. he was especially good at painting horses in stables, pigs in stys, roosters and dogs hanging around kitchen doors, and things like that. "so, without letting the spaniel see that i was following him, i went after him, to see where he was going. "he led me to a lonely old farm out on the hills. and there, concealing myself in some bushes, i watched the great morland painting one of his famous farm scenes. "presently he laid down his paint brush and muttered to himself: 'i need a dog--by the watering trough there--to fill out the picture. i wonder if i could get that fool spaniel to lie still for five minutes.... here, spot, spot! come here!' "his spaniel, spot, came up to him. and george, leaving his painting for a moment, placed the spaniel beside the watering trough and flattened him out and told him to keep still. i could see that george's idea was to have him look as though he were asleep in the sun. george simply loved to paint animals asleep in the sun. "well, that blockhead of a spaniel never kept still one minute. first, he was snapping at the flies that bit his tail; then he was scratching his ear, then barking at the cat--never still. and, of course, george couldn't paint him at all, and at last he got so angry he threw the paint brush at him. "then an idea came to me--one of the best ideas i ever had. i left the bushes and came trotting up to george, wagging my tail. and how i thrilled with pride as the great morland recognized me! for, mind you, he had met me only once before--back in the autumn of . "'why, it's jip!' he cried. 'good dog. come here. you're the very fellow i want.' "then while he gathered up the things he had thrown at the spaniel he went on talking to me--the way people do talk to dogs, you know. of course, he didn't expect me to understand what he said, but i did--every word. "'i want you to come over here by the trough, jip,' said he. 'all you've got to do is to keep still. you can go to sleep if you like. but don't move or fidget for ten minutes. think you can do that?' [illustration: "'come over here by the trough'"] "and he led me over to the trough, where i lay down and kept perfectly still while he painted me into the picture. that picture now hangs in the national gallery. it's called _evening on the farm_. hundreds of people go to see it every year. but none of them know that the smart-looking dog sleeping beneath the watering trough is none other than myself--except the doctor, whom i took in to see it one day when we were up in london, shopping. "well, now, as i told you, i had an idea in all this. i hoped that if i did something for george morland perhaps i could get him to do something for me. but, of course, with him not knowing dog talk it was a bit difficult to make him understand. however, while he was packing up his painting things i disappeared for a while, just as though i was going away. then i came rushing back to him in a great state of excitement, barking, trying to show him something was wrong and that i wanted him to follow me. "'what's the matter, jip?' said he. 'house on fire or something?' "then i barked some more and ran a little way in the direction of the town, looking back at him to show him i wanted him to come with me. "'what ails the dog?' he murmured to himself. 'can't be anybody drowning, because there's no river near.... oh, all right, jip, i'll come. wait a second till i get these brushes cleaned.' "then i led him into the town. on the way there every once in a while he would say to himself: 'i wonder what can be the matter. something's wrong, that's sure, or the dog wouldn't carry on so.' "i took him down the main street of the town till we came to the place where the beggar had his pictures. and as soon as george saw the pictures he _knew_ what was wrong. "'heaven preserve us!' he cried. 'what a dreadful exhibition! no wonder the dog was excited.' "well, it happened that as we came up the one-legged beggar, with his own dog beside him, was at work on a new drawing. he was sitting on the pavement, making a picture on canvas with a piece of chalk of a cat drinking milk. now, my idea was that the great morland--who, no matter what people say about him, was always a most kind-hearted man--should make some good pictures for the beggar to show, instead of the dreadful messes that he made himself. and my plan worked. "'man alive!' said george, pointing to the picture the beggar was doing, 'a cat's spine doesn't curve that way--here, give me the chalk and let me do it.' "then, rubbing out the whole picture, george morland re-drew it in his way. and it was so lifelike you could nearly hear the cat lapping up the milk. "'my! i wish i could draw that way,' said the beggar. 'and so quick and easy you do it--like it was nothing at all.' "'well, it comes easy,' said george. 'maybe there's not so much credit in it for that. but, tell me, do you make much money at this game?' "'awful little,' said the beggar. 'i've taken only twopence the whole day. i suppose the truth is i don't draw good enough.' "i watched morland's face as the beggar said this. and the expression that came into it told me i had not brought the great man here in vain. "'look here,' he said to the beggar. 'would you like me to re-draw all your pictures for you? of course, those done on the pavement you couldn't sell, but we can rub them out. and i've got some spare canvases in my satchel here. maybe you could sell a few. i can sell pictures in london any day in the week. but i've never been a pavement artist before. it would be rather a lark to see what happens.' "then morland, all busy and excited, like a schoolboy, took the beggar's chalk pictures from against the wall and, rubbing them out, did them over the way they should be done. he got so occupied with this that he didn't notice that a whole crowd of people was gathering around, watching. his work was so fine that the people were spellbound with the beauty of the cats and dogs and cows and horses that he drew. and they began asking one another in whispers who the stranger could be who was doing the pavement artist's pictures for him. "the crowd grew bigger and bigger. and presently some one among the people who had seen morland's pictures before recognized the work of the great artist. and then whispers went through the crowd--'it's morland--the great morland, himself.' and somebody went off and told a picture dealer--that is, a man who buys and sells pictures--who had a shop in the high street, that george morland was drawing in the market-place for a lame beggar. "and the dealer came down. and the mayor came down--and all the rich folk and poor folk. so, when the whole town was gathered around, the people began offering to buy these pictures, asking the beggar how much he wanted for them. the old duffer was going to sell them at sixpence apiece, but morland whispered to him: "'twenty guineas--don't sell a blessed one under twenty guineas. you'll get it.' "and sure enough, the dealer and a few of the richer townsfolk bought the whole lot at twenty guineas apiece. "and when i went home that night i felt i had done a good day's work. for my friend's master, the one-legged beggar, was now rich enough to live in comfort for the rest of his life." _chapter vii_ too-too's story all the animals had now told a story except too-too, the owl, and the pushmi-pullyu. and the following night, a friday, it was agreed that they should toss a coin (the doctor's penny that had a hole through it) to see which of these two should tell a tale. if the penny came down heads it was to be the pushmi-pullyu, and if it came down tails it was to be too-too's turn. the doctor span the penny and it came down tails. [illustration: "the doctor span the penny"] "all right," said too-too. "then that makes it my turn, i suppose. i will tell you a story of the time--the only time in my life--that i was taken for a fairy. fancy me as a fairy!" chuckled the little round owl. "well, this is how it happened: one october day, toward evening, i was wandering through the woods. there was a wintry tang in the air and the small, furred animals were busy among the dry, rustly leaves, gathering nuts and seeds for food against the coming of snow. i was out after shrew mice, myself--a delicacy i was extremely fond of at that time--and while they were busy foraging they made easy hunting. "in my travels through the woods i heard children's voices and the barking of a dog. usually i would have gone further into the forest, away from such sounds. but in my young days i was a curious bird and my curiosity often led me into many adventures. so instead of flying away, i went toward the noises i heard, moving cautiously from tree to tree, so that i could see without being seen. "presently i came upon a children's picnic--several boys and girls having supper in a grove of oak trees. one boy, much larger than the rest, was teasing a dog. and two other children, a small girl and a small boy, were objecting to his cruelty and begging him to stop. the bully wouldn't stop. and soon the small boy and girl set upon him with their fists and feet and gave him quite a fine drubbing--which greatly surprised him. the dog then ran off home and presently the small boy and girl--i found out afterwards they were brother and sister--wandered off from the rest of the picnicking party to look for mushrooms. "i had admired their spirit greatly in punishing a boy so much bigger than they were. and when they wandered off by themselves, again out of curiosity, i followed them. well, they traveled quite a distance for such small folk. and presently the sun set and darkness began to creep over the woods. "then the children thought to join their friends again and started back. but, being poor woodsmen, they took the wrong direction. it grew darker still, of course, as time went on, and soon the youngsters were tumbling and stumbling over roots they could not see and getting pretty thoroughly lost and tired. "all this time i was following them secretly and noiselessly overhead. at last the children sat down and the little girl said: "'willie, we're lost! whatever shall we do? night is coming on and i'm _so_ afraid of the dark.' "'so am i,' said the boy. 'ever since aunt emily told us that spooky story of the "bogey in the cup-board" i've been scared to death of the dark.' "well, you could have knocked me down with a feather. of course, you must realize that was the first time i had ever heard of any one's being afraid of the dark. it sounds ridiculous enough to all of you, i suppose, but to me, who had always preferred the cool, calm darkness to the glaring, vulgar daylight, it seemed then an almost unbelievable thing that anyone could be afraid merely because the sun had gone to bed. "now, some people have an idea that bats and owls can see in the dark because we have some peculiar kind of eyes. it's not so. peculiar ears we have--but not eyes. we can see in the dark because we practise it. it's all a matter of practice--the same as the piano or anything else. we get up when other people go to bed, and go to bed when other people get up, because we prefer the dark; and you'd be surprised how much nicer it is when you get used to it. of course, we owls are specially trained by our mothers and fathers to see on very dark nights when we are quite young. so it comes easier to us. but anybody can do it--to a certain extent--if they only practise. "well, to return to the children: there they were, all fussed and worried and scared, sitting on the ground, weeping and wondering what they could do. then, remembering the dog and knowing they were kind to animals, i thought i would try to help them. so i popped across into the tree over their heads and said in the kindliest, gentlest sort of a voice '_too-wit, too-hoo!_'--which means in owl language--as you know--'it's a fine night! how are you?' "then you should have seen those poor children jump! "'ugh!' says the little girl, clutching her brother around the neck. 'what was that, a spook?' "'i don't know,' says the little boy. 'gosh, but i'm scared! isn't the dark awful?' [illustration: "'what was that?'"] "then i made two or three more attempts to comfort them, talking kindly to them in owl language. but they only grew scareder and scareder. first, they thought i was a bogey; then an ogre; then a giant of the forest--me, whom they could put in their pockets! golly, but these human creatures do bring up their children in awful ignorance! if there ever was a bogey or a giant or an ogre--in the forest or out of it--i've yet to see one. "then i thought maybe if i went off through the woods too-witting and too-hooing all the way, they would follow me and i could then lead them out of the forest and show them the way home. so i tried it. but they didn't follow me, the stupid little beggars--thinking i was a witch or some evil nonsense of that kind. and all i got for my too-witting and too-hooing all over the place was to wake up another owl some distance off, who thought i was calling to him. "so, since i wasn't doing the children any good, i went off to look up this other owl and see if he had any ideas to suggest. i found him sitting on the stump of a hollow birch, rubbing his eyes, having just got out of bed. "'good evening,' says i. 'it's a fine night!' "'it is,' says he, 'only it's not dark enough. what were you making all that racket over there for just now? waking a fellow out of his sleep before it's got properly dark!' "'i'm sorry,' i said, 'but there's a couple of children over in the hollow there who've got lost. the little silly duffers are sitting on the ground, bawling because the daylight's gone and they don't know what to do.' "'my gracious!' says he. 'what a quaint notion. why don't you lead them out of the woods? they probably live over in one of those farms near the crossroads.' "'i've tried,' i said. 'but they're so scared they won't follow me. they don't like my voice or something. they take me for a wicked ogre, and all that sort of rot.' "'well,' says he, 'then you'll have to give an imitation of some other kind of creature--one they're not scared of. are you any good at imitations? can you bark like a dog?' "'no,' i said. 'but i can make a noise like a cat. i learned that from an american catbird that lived in a cage in the stable where i spent last summer.' "'fine,' says he. 'try that and see what happens!' "so i went back to the children and found them weeping harder than ever. then, keeping myself well hidden down near the ground among the bushes, i went '_meow! me-o-w!_' real catlike. "'oh, willie,' says the little girl to her brother, 'we're saved!' ('saved,' mark you, when neither of the boobies was in the slightest danger!) 'we're saved!' says she. 'there's tuffie, our cat, come for us. she'll show us the way home. cats can always find their way home, can't they, willie? let's follow her!'" for a moment too-too's plump sides shook with silent laughter as he recalled the scene he was describing. "then," said he, "i went a little further off, still taking great care that i shouldn't be seen, and i meowed again. "'there she is!' said the little girl. 'she's calling to us. come along, willie.' "well, in that way, keeping ahead of them and calling like a cat, i finally led the children right out of the woods. they did a good deal of stumbling and the girl's long hair often got caught in the bushes. but i always waited for them if they were lagging behind. at last, when we gained the open fields, we saw three houses on the sky line, and the middle one was all lighted up and people with lanterns were running around it, hunting in all directions. "when i had brought the children right up to this house their mother and father made a tremendous fuss, weeping over them, as though they had been saved from some terrible danger. in my opinion grown-up humans are even more stupid than the young ones. you'd think, from the way that mother and father carried on, that those children had been wrecked on a desert island or something, instead of spending a couple of hours in the pleasant woods. "'how ever did you find your way, willie?' asked the mother, wiping away her tears and smiling all over. "'tuffie brought us home,' says the little girl. 'she came out after us and led us here by going ahead of us and meowing.' "'_tuffie!_' says the mother, puzzled. 'why, the cat's asleep in the parlor in front of the fire--been there all evening.' "'well, it was some cat,' says the boy. 'he must be right around here somewhere, because he led us almost up to the door.' "then the father swings his lantern around, looking for a cat; and before i had time to hop away he throws the light full on me, sitting on a sage bush. "'why, it's an _owl_!' cries the little girl. "'_meow!_' says i--just to show off. '_too-wit, too-hoo! meow! meow!_' and with a farewell flip of the wing i disappeared into the night over the barn roof. but as i left i heard the little girl saying in tremendous excitement: "'oh, mother, a fairy! it was a fairy that brought us home. it must have been--disguised as an owl! at last! at last i've seen a fairy!' "well, that's the first and last time i ever expect to be taken for a fairy. but i got to know those children quite well. they were a real nice couple of kiddies--even if the little girl did keep on insisting that i was a fairy in disguise. i used to hang around their barn, nights, looking for mice and rats. but if those youngsters ever caught sight of me they'd follow me everywhere. after bringing them safely home that evening i could have led them across the sahara desert and they'd follow--certain in their minds that i was the best of all good fairies and would keep them out of harm. they used to bring me mutton chops and shrimps and all the best tit-bits from their parents' table. and i lived like a fighting cock--got so fat and lazy i couldn't have caught a mouse on crutches. "they were never afraid of the dark again. because, you see--as i said to the doctor one day, when we were talking over the multiplication tables and other philosophy--fear is usually ignorance. once you know a thing, you're no longer afraid of it. and those youngsters got to know the dark--and then they saw, of course, that it was just as harmless as the day. "i used to take them out into the woods at night and across the hills and they got to love it--liked the adventure, you know. and thinking it would be a good thing if some humans, anyway, had sense enough to travel without sunlight, i taught them how to see in the dark. they soon got on to it, when they saw how i always shaded my eyes in the light of a lantern, so as not to get the habit of strong light. well, those young ones became real expert--not so good as an owl or a bat, of course, but quite good at seeing in the dark for anyone who had not been brought up that way. "it came in handy for them, too. that part of the country got flooded one springtime in the middle of the night and there wasn't a dry match or a light to be had anywhere. then those children, who had traveled all that country scores of times in the dark with me, saved a great many lives. they acted as guides, you understand, and took the people to safety, because they knew how to use their eyes, and the others didn't." too-too yawned and blinked up sleepily at the lantern hanging above his head. "seeing in the dark," he ended, "is all a matter of practice--same as the piano or anything else." _chapter viii_ the pushmi-pullyu's story and now it came, at last, to the pushmi-pullyu's turn for a story. he was very shy and modest and when the animals asked him the following night he said in his very well-bred manner: "i'm terribly sorry to disappoint you, but i'm afraid i don't know any stories--at least none good enough to entertain you with." "oh, come on, push," said jip. "don't be so bashful. we've all told one. you don't mean to say you've lived all your life in the african jungle without seeing any adventures? there must be lots of yarns you could tell us." "but i've mostly led such a quiet life, you see," said the pushmi-pullyu. "our people have always kept very much to themselves. we mind our own business and don't like getting mixed up in scandals and rows and adventures." "oh, but just think a minute," said dab-dab. "something will come to you.... don't pester him," she whispered to the others. "just leave him alone and let him think--he's got two heads to think with, you know. something will come to him. but don't get him embarrassed, whatever you do." for a moment or two the pushmi-pullyu pawed the deck of the veranda with his dainty hoofs, as if wrapped in deep thought. then, looking up with one of his heads, he began speaking in a quiet voice, while the other coughed apologetically below the level of the tea-table. "er--this isn't much of a story--not really. but perhaps it will serve to pass the time. i will tell you about the badamoshi ostrich hunters. you must know, then, that the black peoples have various methods of hunting wild animals. and the way they go about it depends on the kind of animal they mean to hunt. for example, if they want giraffes they dig deep holes and cover them up with light boughs and grass. next, they wait until the giraffe comes along and walks over the hole and falls in. then they run up and catch him. for certain kinds of rather stupid deer they make a little screen of branches and leaves about the size of a man. and the hunter, holding the screen in front of him like a shield, creeps slowly forward until he is close to the deer and then fires his spear or arrow. of course, the stupid deer thinks the moving leaves are just trees being swayed by the wind and takes very little notice, if the hunter is careful to approach quietly enough. "they have various other dodges, more or less underhanded and deceitful, for getting game. but the one invented by the badamoshi ostrich hunters was perhaps the meanest of them all. briefly, this was it: ostriches, you know, usually go about in small herds, like cattle. and they're rather stupid. you've heard the story about their sticking their heads in the sand when a man comes along, thinking that because they can't see the man, the man can't see them. that doesn't speak very well for their intelligence, does it? no. very well then. now, in the badamoshi country there wasn't much sand for the ostriches to stick their heads in--which in a way was a good thing for them. because there, when a man came along, they ran away instead--i suppose to look for sand. anyhow, the running away saved their lives. so the hunters of badamoshi had to think out some dodge of coming near enough to the ostriches to get among the herd and kill them. and the way they thought out was quite clever. as a matter of fact, i by chance came upon a group of these hunters in the woods one day, practising their new trick. they had the skin of an ostrich and were taking it in turns, putting it over their heads and trying to walk and look like a real ostrich, holding up the long neck with a stick. keeping myself concealed, i watched them and saw at once what their game was. they meant to disguise themselves as ostriches and walk among the herd and kill them with axes which they kept hidden inside the skin. "now, the ostriches of those parts were great friends of mine--had been ever since they put the badamoshis' tennis court out of business. the chief of the tribe some years before, finding a beautiful meadow of elephant grass--which happened to be my favorite grazing ground--had the fine hay all burnt off and made the place into a tennis court. he had seen white men playing that game and thought he'd like to play it, too. but the ostriches took the tennis balls for apples and ate them--you know, they're dreadfully unparticular about their food. yes, they used to sneak around in the jungles on the edge of the tennis court and whenever a ball was knocked out of the court they'd run off with it and swallow it. by eating up all the chief's tennis balls in this way they put the tennis court out of business, and my beautiful grazing ground soon grew its long grass again and i came back to it. that is how the ostriches happened to be friends of mine. [illustration: "they'd run off with it and swallow it"] "so, seeing they were threatened by a secret danger, i went off and told the leader of the herd about it. he was frightfully stupid and i had the hardest work getting it into his head. "'now, remember,' i said as i was leaving, 'you can easily tell the hunter when he comes among your herd from the color and shape of his legs. ostriches' legs are a sort of gray--as you see from your own--and the hunters' legs are black and thicker.' you see, the skin which the badamoshis were going to use did not cover the hunters' legs. 'now,' i said, 'you must tell all your birds when they see a black-legged ostrich trying to make friends with them to set on him and give him a good hiding. that will teach the badamoshi hunters a lesson.' "well, you'd think after that everything should have gone smoothly. but i had not counted on the extraordinary stupidity of ostriches. the leader, going home that night, stepped into some marshy, boggy places and got his stupid long legs all over black mud--caked with it, thick. then before he went to bed he gave all the ostriches the careful instructions which i had given to him. "the next morning he was late in getting up and the herd was out ahead of him, feeding in a pleasant place on the hillside. then that numbskull of a leader--the stupidest cock ostrich of them all--without bothering to brush the black mud off his legs which he had stepped into the night before, comes stalking out into the open space like a king, expecting a grand reception. and he got a grand reception, too--the ignoramus! as soon as the others saw his black legs they passed the word around quickly and at a given signal they set on the poor leader and nearly beat the life out of him. the badamoshis, who had not yet appeared at all, arrived upon the scene at this moment. and the silly ostriches were so busy beating their leader, whom they took for a hunter in disguise, that the black men came right up to them and would have caught the whole lot if i hadn't shouted in time to warn them of their danger. "so, after that, of course, i saw that if i wanted to save my good but foolish friends from destruction, i had better do something on my own account. "and this was what i thought i'd do: when the badamoshi hunters were asleep i would go and take that ostrich skin--the only one they had--away from them and that would be the end of their grand new hunting trick. "so in the dead of night i crept out of the jungle and came to the place where the hunters' huts were. i had to come up from the leeward side, because i didn't want to have the dogs get my scent on the wind. i was more afraid of the hunters' dogs, you see, than i was of the hunters themselves. from the men i could escape quite easily, being much swifter than they were; but dogs, with their sense of smell, are much harder to get away from, even when you can reach the cover of the jungle. "well, then, coming up from the leeward side, i started searching around the huts for the ostrich skin. at first i couldn't find it anywhere. and i began to think they must have hidden it some place. now, the badamoshis, like a good many black races, when they go to bed for the night, always leave one of their number outside the huts to watch and keep guard. i could see this night-watchman at the end of the row of huts, and of course i was careful not to let him see me. but after spending some time hunting for this ostrich skin i noticed that the watchman had not moved at all, but stayed in the same place, squatting on a stool. then i guessed he had probably fallen asleep. so i moved closer and i found, to my horror, that he was wearing the ostrich skin as a blanket--for the night was cool. "how to get it without waking him was now the problem. on tiptoe--hardly breathing--i went up and began to draw it gently off his shoulders. but the wretched man had tucked part of it in under him and i couldn't get it free while he was sitting down. "then i was in despair and i almost gave up. but, thinking of the fate that surely awaited my poor, foolish friends if i didn't get that skin, i decided on desperate measures. suddenly and swiftly i jabbed the watchman in a tender spot with one of my horns. with an '_ouch!_' you could hear a mile off, he sprang in the air. then, snatching the bird skin from under him, i sped off into the jungle, while the badamoshis, their wives, the dogs and the whole village woke up in an uproar and came after me like a pack of wolves. [illustration: "i jabbed the watchman"] "well," the pushmi-pullyu sighed as he balanced his graceful body to the slight rolling of the houseboat, "i hope never again to have such a race for my life as i had that night. cold shivers run down my spine still whenever i think of it--the barking of the dogs and the shouting of the men and the shrieking of the women and the crashing of the underbrush as my pursuers came tearing through the jungle, hot upon my trail. "it was a river that saved me. the rainy season was on and the streams were in flood. panting with terror and fatigue, i reached the bank of a swirling torrent. it was fully twenty-five feet wide. the water was simply raging down it. to try and swim it would be madness. looking backward, i could see and hear my pursuers close upon my heels. again i had to take desperate measures. drawing back a little to get space for a run and still clutching that wretched ostrich skin firmly in my mouth, i rushed at the river at full speed and leaped--as i have never leaped in my life--clear across to the further bank. as i came down in a heap i realized i had only just been in time, for my enemies had already come up to the river on the side that i had left. shaking their fists at me in the moonlight, they were trying to find a way to get across to me. the dogs, eagerest of all, tried, some of them, to swim; but the swift and raging waters swept them down the stream like corks and the hunters were afraid to follow their example. [illustration: "i leapt as i have never leapt before"] "with a thrill of triumph, i dropped the precious ostrich skin before their very eyes into the swirling river, where it quickly disappeared from view. a howl of rage went up from the badamoshis. "then i did something i've been sorry for all my life. you know how my people have always insisted on good manners and politeness. well--i blush to recall it--in the excitement of the moment i stuck out both my tongues at the baffled foe across the river. there was no excuse for it--there never is for deliberate rudeness. but it was only moonlight and i trust the badamoshis didn't see it. "well, though i was safe for the present, my troubles were not over by any means. for some time the badamoshis now left the ostriches alone and turned their whole attention to hunting me. they badgered my life out. as soon as i had moved from one part of the country to get away from their pestering they'd find out where i was and pursue me there. they laid traps for me; they set pitfalls; they sent the dogs after me. and although i managed for a whole year to keep away from them, the constant strain was very wearing. "now, the badamoshis, like most savage peoples, are very superstitious. and they are terribly afraid--in the way that too-too was speaking of last night--of anything they can't understand. nearly everything they can't understand they think is a devil. "well, after i had been hunted and worried for a long time, i thought i would take a leaf out of their own book, so to speak, and play something like the same trick on them as they had tried to play on the ostriches. with this idea in mind, i set about finding some means to disguise myself. one day, passing by a tree, i found a skin of a wild ox spread out by some huntsman to dry. this i decided was just the thing i wanted. i pulled it down and, lowering one of my heads, i laid one pair of my horns flat along my back--like this--and drew the cowhide over myself, so that only one of my heads could be seen. "it changed my appearance completely. moving through the long grass, i looked like some ordinary kind of deer. so, disguised in this manner, i sauntered out into an open meadow and grazed around till my precious badamoshis should appear. which they very shortly did. "i saw them--though they didn't know it--creeping about among the trees on the edge of the meadow, trying to get near without scaring me. now, their method of hunting small deer is this: they get up into a tree and lie along a lower branch, keeping very still. and when the deer passes under the tree they drop down upon his hindquarters and fell him to the ground. "so presently, picking out the tree where i had seen the chief himself go and hide, i browsed along underneath it, pretending i suspected nothing at all. then when the chief dropped on what he thought was my hindquarters, i struck upward with my other horns, hidden under the cowhide, and gave him a jab he will remember the rest of his days. "with a howl of superstitious fright, he called out to his men that he had been stuck by the devil. and they all ran across the country like wildfire and i was never hunted or bothered by them again." * * * * * everybody had now told a tale and the _arctic monthly's prize story competition_ was declared closed. the first number of the first animals' magazine ever printed was, shortly after that, issued and circulated by swallow mail to the inhabitants of the frozen north. it was a great success. letters of thanks and votes on the competition began pouring in from seals and sea-lions and caribou and all manner of polar creatures. too-too, the mathematician, became editor; dab-dab ran the mothers' and babies' page, while gub-gub wrote the gardening notes and the pure foods column. and the _arctic monthly_ continued to bring happiness to homes and dens and icebergs as long as the doctor's post office existed. part iv _chapter i_ parcel post one day gub-gub came to the doctor and said: "doctor, why don't you start a parcel post?" "great heavens, gub-gub!" the doctor exclaimed. "don't you think i'm busy enough already? what do you want a parcel post for?" "i'll bet it's something to do with food," said too-too, who was sitting on the stool next to the doctor's, adding up figures. "well," said gub-gub, "i was thinking of sending to england for some fresh vegetables." "there you are!" said too-too. "he has a vegetable mind." "but parcels would be too heavy for the birds to carry, gub-gub," said the doctor--"except perhaps the small parcels by the bigger birds." "yes, i know. i had thought of that," said the pig. "but this month the brussels sprouts will be coming into season in england. they're my favorite vegetable, you know--after parsnips. and i hear that a special kind of thrushes will be leaving england next week to come to africa. it wouldn't be too much to ask them to bring a single brussels sprout apiece, would it? there will be hundreds of birds in the flight and if they each brought a sprout we'd have enough to last us for months. i haven't tasted any fresh english vegetables since last autumn, doctor. and i'm so sick of these yams and okras and african rubbish." "all right, gub-gub," said the doctor, "i'll see what i can do. we will send a letter to england by the next mail going out and ask the thrushes to bring you your brussels sprouts." well, that was how still another department, the parcel post, was added to the foreign mails office of fantippo. gub-gub's sprouts arrived (tons of them, because this was a very big flight of birds), and after that many kinds of animals came to the doctor and asked him to send for foreign foods for them when their own ran short. in this way, too, bringing seeds and plants from other lands by birds, the doctor tried quite a number of experiments in planting, and what is called acclimatizing, fruits and vegetables and even flowers. and very soon he had an old-fashioned window-box garden on the houseboat post office blooming with geraniums and marigolds and zinnias raised from the seeds and cuttings his birds brought him from england. and that is why many of the same vegetables that grow in england can still be found in a wild state in africa. they came there through gub-gub's passion for the foods he had been brought up on. a little while after that, by using the larger birds to carry packages, a regular parcel post every two months was put at the service of the fantippans; and alarm clocks and all sorts of things from england were sent for. king koko even sent for a new bicycle. it was brought over in pieces, two storks carrying a wheel each, an eagle the frame and crows the smaller parts, like the pedals, the spanners and the oil can. when they started to put it together again in the post office a part--one of the nuts--was found to be missing. but that was not the fault of the parcel post. it had been left out by the makers, who shipped it from birmingham. but the doctor wrote a letter of complaint by the next mail and a new nut was sent right away. then the king rode triumphantly through the streets of fantippo on his new bicycle and a public holiday was held in honor of the occasion. and he gave his old bicycle to his brother, prince wolla-bolla. and the parcel post, which had really been started by gub-gub, was declared a great success. [illustration: "putting the king's bicycle together"] some weeks later the doctor received this letter from a farmer in lincolnshire: "dear sir: thank you for your excellent weather reports. by their help i managed to raise the finest crop of brussels sprouts this year ever seen in lincolnshire. but the night before i was going to pick them for market they disappeared from my fields--every blessed one of them. how, i don't know. maybe you could give me some advice about this. "your obedient servant, "nicholas scroggins." "great heavens!" said the doctor: "i wonder what happened to them." "gub-gub ate them," said too-too. "those are the sprouts, no doubt, that the thrushes brought here." "dear me!" said the doctor. "that's too bad. well, i dare say i'll find some way to pay the farmer back." for a long time dab-dab, the motherly housekeeper, had been trying to get the doctor to take a holiday from his post office business. "you know, doctor," said she, "you're going to get sick--that's what's going to happen to you, as sure as you're alive. no man can work the way you've been doing for the last few months and not pay for it. now you've got the post office going properly, why don't you hand it over to the king's postmen to run and give yourself a rest? and, anyway, aren't you ever going back to puddleby?" "oh, yes," said john dolittle. "all in good time, dab-dab." "but you _must_ take a holiday," the duck insisted. "get away from the post office for a while. go up the coast in a canoe for a change of air--if you won't go home." well, the doctor kept saying that he would go. but he never did--until something happened in the natural history line of great enough importance to take him from his post office work. this is how it came about: one day the doctor was opening the mail addressed to him, when he came upon a package about the size and shape of a large egg. he undid the outer wrapper, which was made of seaweed. inside he found a letter and a pair of oyster shells tied together like a box. [illustration: "dab-dab looked over his shoulder"] somewhat puzzled, the doctor first read the letter, while dab-dab, who was still badgering him about taking a holiday, looked over his shoulder. the letter said: "dear doctor: i am sending you, inclosed, some pretty pebbles which i found the other day while cracking open oysters. i never saw pebbles of this color before, though i live by the seashore and have been opening shellfish all my life. my husband says they're oyster's eggs. but i don't believe it. would you please tell me what they are? and be careful to send them back, because my children use them as playthings and i have promised them they shall have them to keep." then the doctor put down the letter and, taking his penknife, he cut the seaweed strings that neatly held the oyster shells together. and when he opened the shells he gave a gasp of astonishment. "oh, dab-dab," he cried, "how beautiful! look, look!" "pearls!" whispered dab-dab in an awed voice, gazing down into the doctor's palm. "pink pearls!" "my! aren't they handsome?" murmured the doctor. "and did you ever see such large ones? each one of those pearls, dab-dab, is worth a fortune. who the dickens is this that sent them to me, anyhow?" and he turned to the letter again. "it's from a spoonbill," said dab-dab. "i know their writing. they are a sort of a cross between a curlew and a snipe. they like messing around lonely seacoast places, hunting for shellfish and sea worms and stuff like that." "well, where is it written from?" asked the doctor. "what do you make that address out to be--at the top of the page there?" dab-dab screwed up her eyes and peered at it closely. "it looks to me," she said, "like the harmattan rocks." "where is that?" asked the doctor. "i have no idea," said dab-dab. "but speedy will know." and she went off to fetch the skimmer. speedy said, yes, he knew--the harmattan rocks were a group of small islands off the coast of west africa, about sixty miles further to the northward. "that's curious," said the doctor. "i wouldn't have been so surprised if they had come from the south sea islands. but it is rather unusual to find pearls of any size or beauty in these waters. well, these must be sent back to the spoonbill's children--by registered parcel post, of course. though, to tell you the truth, i hate to part with them--they are so lovely. they can't go before to-morrow, anyway. i wonder where i can keep them in the meantime. one has to be frightfully careful with gems as valuable as these. you had better not tell anyone about them, dab-dab--except jip the watchman and the pushmi-pullyu. they must take it in turns to mount guard at the door all night. men will do all sorts of things for pearls. we'll keep it a secret and send them right back first thing to-morrow morning." even while the doctor was speaking he noticed a shadow fall across the desk at which he was standing. he looked up. and there at the information window was the ugliest man's face he had ever seen, staring in at the beautiful pearls that still lay on the palm of his hand. the doctor, annoyed and embarrassed, forgot for the first time in his post office career to be polite. "what do _you_ want?" he asked, thrusting the pearls into his pocket. "i want a postal order for ten shillings," said the man. "i am going to send some money to my sick wife." the doctor made out the postal order and took the money, which the man handed through the window. "here you are," he said. then the man left the post office and the doctor watched him go. "that was a queer-looking customer, wasn't he?" he said to dab-dab. "he was, indeed," said the duck. "i'm not surprised his wife is sick, if she has a husband with a face like that." "i wonder who he is," said john dolittle. "it isn't often we have white men coming in here. i don't much like the looks of him." the following day the pearls were wrapped up again the way they had arrived, and after a letter had been written by the doctor explaining to the spoonbill what the "pebbles" really were, they were sent off by registered parcel post to the harmattan rocks. the bird chosen to take the package happened to be one of the thrushes that had brought the brussels sprouts from england. these birds were still staying in the neighborhood. and though a thrush was a somewhat small bird to carry parcel post, the package was a very little one and the doctor had nobody else to send. so after explaining to the thrush that registered mail should be guarded very carefully by postmen, the doctor sent the pearls off. then he went to call on the king, as he did every so often. and in the course of conversation john dolittle asked his majesty if he knew who the white stranger might be that had called at the houseboat for a postal order. after he had listened to the description of the man's cross-eyed, ugly face, the king said, yes, he knew him very well. he was a pearl fisherman, who spent most of his time in the pacific ocean, where fishing for pearls was more common. but, the king said, he often came hanging around these parts, where he was known to be a great villain who would do anything to get pearls or money. jack wilkins was his name. the doctor, on hearing this, felt glad that he had already got the pink pearls safely off to their owner by registered mail. then he told the king that he hoped shortly to take a holiday because he was overworked and needed a rest. the king asked where he was going, and the doctor said he thought of taking a week's canoe trip up the coast toward the harmattan rocks. "well," said his majesty, "if you are going in that direction you might call on an old friend of mine, chief nyam-nyam. he owns the country in those parts and the harmattan rocks themselves. he and his people are frightfully poor, though. but he is honest--and i think you will like him." "all right," said the doctor, "i'll call on him with your compliments." the next day, leaving speedy, cheapside and jip in charge of the post office, the doctor got into his canoe with dab-dab and paddled off to take his holiday. on the way out he noticed a schooner, the ship of jack wilkins, the pearl fisherman, at anchor near the entrance to fantippo harbor. toward evening the doctor arrived at a small settlement of straw huts, the village of chief nyam-nyam. calling on the chief with an introduction from king koko, the doctor was well received. he found, however, that the country over which this chief ruled was indeed in a very poor state. for years powerful neighbors on either side had made war on the old chief and robbed him of his best farming lands, till now his people were crowded onto a narrow strip of rocky shore where very little food could be grown. the doctor was particularly distressed by the thinness of the few chickens pecking about in the streets. they reminded him of old broken-down cab-horses, he said. [illustration: "they reminded him of old broken down cab horses"] while he was talking to the chief (who seemed to be a kindly old man) speedy swept into the chief's hut in a great state of excitement. "doctor," he cried, "the mail has been robbed! the thrush has come back to the post office and says his package was taken from him on the way. _the pearls are gone!_" _chapter ii_ the great mail robbery "great heavens!" cried the doctor, springing up. "the pearls gone? and they were registered, too!" "yes," said speedy, "here's the thrush himself. he'll tell you all about it." and going to the door, he called in the bird who had carried the registered package. "doctor," said the thrush, who was also very upset and breathless, "it wasn't my fault. i never let those pearls out of my sight. i flew straight off for the harmattan rocks. but part of the trip i had to go over land, if i took the shortest cut. and on the way i saw a sister of mine whom i hadn't met in a long time, sitting in a tree in the jungle below me. and i thought it would be no harm if i went and talked to her a while. so i flew down and she was very glad to see me. i couldn't talk properly with the string of the package in my mouth, so i put the parcel down on the bough of the tree behind me--right near me, you understand--and went on talking to my sister. and when i turned around to pick it up again it was gone." [illustration: "i put the parcel down"] "perhaps it slipped off the tree," said the doctor, "and fell down into the underbrush." "it couldn't have," said the thrush. "i put it into a little hollow in the bark of the bough. it just couldn't have slipped or rolled. somebody must have taken it." "dear me," said john dolittle. "robbing the mails; that's a serious thing. i wonder who could have done it?" "i'll bet it's jack wilkins, the cross-eyed pearl fisherman," whispered dab-dab. "a man with a face like that would steal anything. and he was the only one, besides us and speedy, who knew the pearls were going through the mails. it's wilkins, sure as you're alive." "i wonder," said the doctor. "they do say he is a most unscrupulous customer. well, there's nothing for it, i suppose, but that i should paddle back to fantippo right away and try to find him. the post office is responsible for the loss of registered mail, and if mr. wilkins took those pearls i'm going to get them back again. but after this we will make it a post office rule that carriers of registered mail may not talk to their sisters or anyone else while on duty." and in spite of the lateness of the hour, john dolittle said a hasty farewell to chief nyam-nyam and started off by moonlight for fantippo harbor. in the meantime, speedy and the thrush flew over the land by the short cut to the post office. "what are you going to say to wilkins, doctor?" asked dab-dab as the canoe glided along over the moonlit sea. "it's a pity you haven't got a pistol or something like that. he looks a desperate character and he isn't likely to give up the pearls without a fight." "i don't know what i'll say to him. i'll see when i get there," said john dolittle. "but we must be very careful how we approach, so that he doesn't see us coming. if he should pull up his anchor and sail away we would never be able to overtake him by canoe." "i tell you what, doctor," said dab-dab, "let me fly ahead and do a little spying on the enemy. then i'll come back and tell you anything i can find out. maybe he isn't on his schooner at all at present. and we ought to be hunting him somewhere else." "all right," said the doctor. "do that. it will take me another four hours at least to reach fantippo at this pace." so dab-dab flew away over the sea and john dolittle continued to paddle his canoe bravely forward. after about an hour had passed he heard a gentle sort of whispered quacking high overhead and he knew that his faithful housekeeper was returning. presently, with a swish of feathers, dab-dab settled down at his feet. and on her face was an expression which meant great news. "he's there, doctor--and he's got the pearls, all right!" said she. "i peeked through the window and i saw him counting them out from one little box into another by the light of a candle." "the villain!" grunted the doctor, putting on all the speed he could. "let's hope he doesn't get away before we reach fantippo." dawn was beginning to show before they came in sight of the ship they sought. this made approaching the schooner without being seen extremely difficult. and the doctor went all the way around the island of no-man's-land, so as to come upon the ship from the other side, where he would not have to cross so large an open stretch of sea. paddling very, very softly, he managed to get the canoe right under the bow of the ship. then, tying his own craft so it couldn't float away, he swarmed up the schooner's anchor chain and crept on to the boat on hands and knees. full daylight had not yet come and the light from a lamp could be seen palely shining up the stairs which led to the cabin. the doctor slid forward like a shadow, tiptoed his way down the stairs and peered through the partly opened door. the cross-eyed wilkins was still seated at the table, as dab-dab had described, counting pearls. two other men were asleep in bunks around the room. the doctor swung open the door and jumped in. instantly wilkins sprang up from the table, snatched a pistol from his belt and leveled it at the doctor's head. [illustration: "wilkins levelled a pistol at the doctor's head"] "move an inch and you're a dead man!" he snarled. the doctor, taken aback for a moment, gazed at the pistol muzzle, wondering what to do next. wilkins, without moving his eyes from the doctor for a second, closed the pearl box with his left hand and put it into his pocket. while he was doing this, however, dab-dab sneaked in under the table, unseen by anyone. and suddenly she bit the pearl fisherman in the leg with her powerful beak. with a howl wilkins bent down to knock her off. "now's your chance, doctor!" yelled the duck. and in the second while the pistol was lowered the doctor sprang onto the man's back, gripped him around the neck, and with a crash the two of them went rolling on the floor of the cabin. then a tremendous fight began. over and over and over they rolled around the floor, upsetting things in all directions, wilkins fighting to get his pistol hand free, the doctor struggling to keep it bound to his body, dab-dab hopping and flying and jumping and flapping to get a bite in on the enemy's nose whenever she saw a chance. at last john dolittle, who for his size, was a very powerful wrestler, got the pearl fisherman in a grip of iron where he couldn't move at all. but just as the doctor was forcing the pistol out of his enemy's hand, one of the other men, who had been aroused by the noise of the fight, woke up. and, leaning out of his bunk from behind the doctor's back, he hit him a tremendous blow on the head with a bottle. stunned and senseless, john dolittle fell over in a heap and lay still upon the floor. then all three men sprang on him with ropes and in a minute his arms and legs were tied and the fight was over. * * * * * when he woke up the doctor found himself lying at the bottom of his own canoe, with dab-dab tugging at the ropes which bound his wrists to get him free. "where is wilkins?" he asked in a dazed, sleepy kind of way. "gone," said dab-dab; "and the pearls with him--the scoundrel! as soon as they had dumped you in the canoe they pulled up the anchor, hoisted sail and got away. they were in an awful hurry and kept looking out to sea with telescopes and talking about the revenue cutter. i guess they are wanted by the government for a good many bad deeds. i never saw a tougher-looking crowd of men in all my life. see, i've got the rope around your hands free now; you can do the rest better yourself. does your head hurt much?" "it's a bit dizzy still," said the doctor, working at the rope about his ankles. "but i'll be all right in a little." presently when he had undone the cord that tied his feet, john dolittle stood up and gazed over the ocean. and there, on the sky line, he could just see the sails of wilkins' schooner disappearing eastward. "villain!" was all he said between his clenched teeth. _chapter iii_ pearls and brussels sprouts disappointed and sad, dab-dab and the doctor started to paddle their way back. "i think i'll stop in at the post office before i return to chief nyam-nyam's country," said the doctor. "there's nothing more i can do about the pearls, i suppose. but i'd like to see if everything else is going all right." "wilkins may get caught yet--by the government," said dab-dab. "and if he does we might get the pearls back, after all." "not much chance of that, i'm afraid," said john dolittle. "he will probably sell them the first chance he gets. that's all he wants them for--for the money they'll bring in. whereas the young spoonbills appreciated their beauty. it's a shame they should lose them--and when they were in my care, too. well--it's no use crying over spilt milk. they're gone. that's all." as they were approaching the houseboat they noticed a large number of canoes collected about it. to-day was not one of the outgoing or incoming mail days and the doctor wondered what the excitement could be. fastening up his own canoe, he went into the post office. and inside there was quite a crowd. he made his way through it with dab-dab and in the registered mail booth he found all the animals gathered around a small black squirrel. the little creature's legs were tied with post office red tape and he seemed very frightened and miserable. speedy and cheapside were mounting guard over him, one on each side. "what's all this about?" asked the doctor. "we've caught the fellow who stole the pearls, doctor," said speedy. "and we've got the pearls, too," cried too-too. "they're in the stamp drawer and jip is guarding them." "but i don't understand," said john dolittle. "i thought wilkins had made off with them." "those must have been some other stolen pearls, doctor," said dab-dab. "let's take a look at the ones jip has." the doctor went and opened the stamp drawer. and there, inside, sure enough, were the three pink beauties he had sent by registered mail. "how did you find them?" he asked, turning to speedy. "well, after you had set off in the canoe," said the skimmer, "i and the thrush stopped on our way back here at the tree where he had lost the package. it was too dark then to hunt for it, so we roosted in the tree all night, intending to look in the morning. just as dawn was breaking we saw this wretched squirrel here flirting about in the branches with an enormous pink pearl in his mouth. i at once pounced on him and held him down, while the thrush took the pearl away from him. then we made him tell us where he had hidden the other two. and after we had got all three of them we put the squirrel under arrest and brought him here." "dear me!" said the doctor, looking at the miserable culprit, who was all tied up with red tape. "what made you steal the pearls?" at first the squirrel seemed almost too frightened to speak. so the doctor took a pair of scissors and cut the bonds that held him. "why did you do it?" he repeated. "i thought they were brussels sprouts," said the squirrel timidly. "a few weeks ago when i and my wife were sitting in a tree we suddenly smelled the smell of brussels sprouts, awful strong, all about us. i and my wife are very fond of this vegetable and we wondered where the smell was coming from. and then, looking up, we saw thousands of thrushes passing overhead, carrying brussels sprouts in their mouths. we hoped they would stop so we could get a few. but they didn't. so we agreed that perhaps more would be coming over in a few days. and we arranged to stay around that same tree and wait. and, sure enough, this morning i saw one of these same thrushes alight in the tree, carrying a package. '_pst!_' i whispered to the wife. 'more brussels sprouts. let's bag his parcel while he's not looking!' and bag it i did. but when we opened it we found nothing but these wretched gew-gaws. i thought they might be some new kind of rock candy and i was on my way to find a stone to crack them with when this bird grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and arrested me. i didn't want the beastly pearls." [illustration: "'_pst!_' i whispered to the wife"] "well," said the doctor, "i'm sorry you've been put to such inconvenience. i'll have dab-dab carry you back to your family. but, you know, robbing the registered mail is a serious thing. if you wanted some brussels sprouts you should have written to me. after all, you can't blame the birds for putting you under arrest." "stolen fruit's the sweetest, doctor," said cheapside. "if you 'ad given 'im a ton of 'ot-'ouse grapes 'e wouldn't 'ave enjoyed 'em 'alf as much as something 'e pinched. i'd give 'im a couple of years 'ard labor, if i was you--just to learn 'im to leave the mails alone." "well, never mind, we'll forget it," said the doctor. "it's only a boyish escapade." "boyish fiddlesticks!" growled cheapside. "'e's the father of a large family--and a natural-born pickpocket. all squirrels are like that. don't i know 'em in the city parks--with their mincin' ways that the folks call 'cute'? cheekiest beggars that ever was--pinch a crumb from under your nose and pop into an 'ole with it before you could get your breath. boyish hescapade!" "come along," said dab-dab, picking the wretched culprit up in her big webbed feet. "i'll take you back to the mainland. and you can thank your lucky stars that it's the doctor who is in charge of this post office. it's to jail you really ought to go." "oh, and hurry back, dab-dab," the doctor called after her as she flapped her way through the open window and set off across the sea with her burden. "i'm going to start right away for chief nyam-nyam's country as soon as you are ready. "i'll take the pearls myself this time," he said to speedy, "and hand them over to the spoonbill in person. we don't want any more accidents happening to them." about noon the doctor started out a second time upon his holiday trip and as gub-gub, jip and the white mouse begged to be taken along, the canoe was well loaded. they reached nyam-nyam's village about six o'clock in the evening and the old chief prepared a supper for his guests. there was very little to eat at it, however. and the doctor was again reminded how poor these people were. while talking with the old chief the doctor found out that the worst enemy his country had was the kingdom of dahomey. this big and powerful neighbor was, it seemed, always making war upon chief nyam-nyam and cutting off parts of his land and making the people poorer still. now, the soldiers of dahomey were amazons--that is, they were women soldiers. and although they were women, they were very big and strong and there were a terrible lot of them. so whenever they attacked the small country next to them they easily won and took what they wanted. as it happened, they made an attack that night while the doctor was staying with the chief. and about ten o'clock everybody was awakened out of his sleep with cries of "war! war! the amazons are here!" there was terrible confusion. and until the moon had risen people were hitting and falling over one another everywhere in the darkness, not knowing friend from enemy. when it was possible to see, however, the doctor found that most of chief nyam-nyam's people had fled off into the jungle; and the amazons, in thousands, were just going through the village, taking anything they fancied. the doctor tried to argue with them, but they merely laughed at him. [illustration: "the rout of the amazons"] then the white mouse, who was watching the show from the doctor's shoulder, whispered in his ear: "if this is an army of women, doctor, i think i know of a way to deal with them. women are terribly afraid of mice, you know. i'll just go off and collect a few in the village and see what we can do." so the white mouse went off and gathered an army of his own, about two hundred mice, which lived in the grass walls and floors of the huts. and then suddenly they attacked the amazons and began nipping them in the legs. with shrieks and howls the fat women soldiers dropped the things they had been stealing and ran helter-skelter for home. and that was one time the famous amazons of dahomey _didn't_ have it all their own way. the doctor told his pet he could be very proud of himself. for he was surely the only mouse in the world that ever won a war. _chapter iv_ pearl divers the next morning the doctor was up early. after a light breakfast (it was impossible to get any other kind in that poverty-stricken country) he asked nyam-nyam the way to the harmattan rocks and the chief told him they were just beyond sight from here, about an hour and a half's paddle straight out into the ocean. so the doctor decided that he had better have a sea bird to guide him. and dab-dab went and got a curlew who was strolling about on the beach, doing nothing in particular. this bird said he knew the place quite well and would consider it an honor to act as guide to john dolittle. then, with jip, dab-dab, gub-gub and the white mouse, the doctor got into his canoe and started off for the harmattan rocks. it was a beautiful morning and they enjoyed the paddle--though gub-gub came very near to upsetting the canoe more than once, leaning out to grab for passing sea weed, which he had noticed the curlew eating. finally, for safety's sake, they made him lie down at the bottom of the canoe, where he couldn't see anything. about eleven o'clock a group of little rocky islands were sighted, which their guide said were the harmattan rocks. at this point in their journey the mainland of africa was just disappearing from view on the sky-line behind them. the rocks they were coming to seemed to be the home of thousands of different kinds of sea birds. as the canoe drew near, gulls, terns, gannets, albatrosses, cormorants, auklets, petrels, wild ducks, even wild geese, came out, full of curiosity to examine the stranger. when they learned from the curlew that this quiet little fat man was none other than the great doctor dolittle himself they passed word back to the rocks; and soon the air about the canoe was simply thick with wings flashing in the sunlight. and the welcome to their home that the sea birds screeched to the doctor was so hearty and noisy you couldn't hear yourself speak. it was easy to see why this place had been chosen for a home by the sea birds. the shores all around were guarded by half-sunken rocks, on which the waves roared and broke dangerously. no ship was ever likely to come here to disturb the quiet life of the birds. indeed, even with a light canoe that could go in shallow water, the doctor would have had hard work to make a landing. but the welcoming birds guided him very skillfully around to the back of the biggest island, where a bay with deep water formed a pretty sort of toy harbor. the doctor understood now why these islands had been left in the possession of the poor chief: no neighbors would consider them worth taking. hard to approach, with very little soil in which crops could be grown, flat and open to all the winds and gales of heaven, barren and lonesome, they tempted none of the chief's enemies. and so for many, many years they remained the property of nyam-nyam and his people--though indeed even they hardly ever visited them. but in the end the harmattan rocks proved to be of greater value than all the rest of the lands this tribe had lost. "oh, i think this is an awful place," said gub-gub as they got out of the canoe. "nothing but waves and rocks. what have you come here for, doctor?" [illustration: "'oh, i think this is an awful place!'"] "i hope to do a little pearl fishing," said john dolittle. "but first i must see the spoonbill and give her this registered package. dab-dab, would you please try to find her for me? with so many millions of sea birds around, myself, i wouldn't know how to begin to look for her." "all right," said dab-dab. "but it may take me a little time. there are several islands and quite a number of spoonbills. i shall have to make inquiries and find out which one sent you the pearls." so dab-dab went off upon her errand. and in the meantime the doctor talked and chatted with various sea bird leaders who had already made his acquaintance at the great conference in the hollow of no-man's-land. these kept coming up to him, anxious to show off before their fellows the fact that they knew the great man personally. and once more the doctor's notebook was kept busy with new discoveries to be jotted down about the carriage of mail by birds that live upon the sea. the birds, who at first followed the doctor in droves around the main island wherever he went, presently returned to their ordinary doings when the newness of his arrival had worn off. and after dab-dab had come back from her hunt and told him the spoonbill lived on one of the smaller islands, he got back into his canoe and paddled over to the rock she pointed out. here the spoonbill was waiting for him at the water's edge. she apologized for not coming in person to welcome him, but said she was afraid to leave her babies when there were sea eagles around. the little ones were with her, two scrubby, greasy youngsters, who could walk but not fly. the doctor opened the package and gave them back their precious toys; and with squawks of delight they began playing marbles on the flat rocks with the enormous pink pearls. [illustration: "the young ones were with her"] "what charming children you have," said the doctor to the mother spoonbill, who was watching them proudly. "i'm glad they've got their playthings safely back. i wouldn't have had them lose them for anything." "yes, they are devoted to those pebbles," said the spoonbill. "by the way, were you able to tell me what they are? i found them, as i wrote you, inside an oyster." "they are pearls," said the doctor, "and worth a tremendous lot. ladies in cities wear them around their necks." "oh, indeed," said the bird. "and why don't the ladies in the country wear them, too?" "i don't just know," said the doctor. "i suppose because they're too costly. with any one of those pearls you could buy a house and garden." "well, wouldn't you like to keep them, then?" asked the spoonbill. "i could get the children something else to play with, no doubt." "oh, no," said the doctor, "thank you. i have a house and garden." "yes, doctor," dab-dab put in, "but you wouldn't be bound to buy a second one with the money you would get for the pearls. it would come in real handy for something else, you know." "the baby spoonbills want them," said john dolittle. "why should i take them away from them?" "balls of pink putty would suit them just as well," snorted dab-dab. "putty is poisonous," said the doctor. "they appreciate the beauty of the pearls. let them have them. but," he added to the mother spoonbill, "if you know where any more are to be found i should be glad to know." "i don't," said she. "i don't even know how these came to be in the possession of the oyster i ate." "pearls always grow in oysters--when they grow at all," said the doctor. "but they are rare. this is the point that most interests me--the natural history of pearls. they are said to form around a grain of sand that gets into the oyster's shell by accident. i had hoped that if you were in the habit of eating oysters you could give me some information." "i'm afraid i can't," said the spoonbill. "to tell you the truth, i got those oysters from a pile which some other bird had left on the rock here. he had eaten his fill, i suppose, and gone away. there are a good many left still. let's go over to the pile and crack a few. maybe they've all got pearls in them." so they went across to the other side of the little island and started opening oysters. but not another pearl did they find. "where are the oyster beds around here?" asked the doctor. "between this island and the next," said the spoonbill. "i don't fish for them myself because i'm not a deep diver. but i've seen other kinds of sea birds fishing in that place--just about half way between this island and that little one over there." "i'll go out with her, doctor," said dab-dab, "and do a little fishing on my own account. i can dive pretty deep, though i'm not a regular diving duck. maybe i can get some pearls for you." so dab-dab went out with the spoonbill and started pearl fishing. then for a good hour and a half the faithful housekeeper fished up oyster after oyster and brought them to the doctor on the island. he and the animals found opening them quite exciting work, because you never knew what you might discover. but nothing was found in the shells but fat oysters and thin oysters. "i think i'd like to try a hand at diving myself," said the doctor, "if the water is not too deep. i used to be quite good at fishing up sixpences from the bottom of the swimming pool when i was a boy." and he took off his clothes, got into the canoe and paddled out with the animals till he was over the oyster beds. then he dove right down into the clear green water, while jip and gub-gub watched him with intense interest. but when he came up, blowing like a seal, he hadn't even got an oyster. all he had was a mouthful of seaweed. "let's see what i can do," said jip. and out of the canoe jumped another pearl fisherman. then gub-gub got all worked up and before anybody could stop him _he_ had taken a plunge. the pig went down so quick and so straight he got his snout stuck in the mud at the bottom, and the doctor, still out of breath, had to go down after him and get him free. the animals by this time were at such a pitch of excitement that even the white mouse would have jumped in if gub-gub's accident hadn't changed his mind. [illustration: "gub-gub dives for pearls"] jip managed to bring up a few small oysters, but there were no pearls in them. "i'm afraid we're pretty poor fishers," said john dolittle. "of course, it's possible that there may not be any more pearls there." "no, i'm not satisfied yet," said dab-dab. "i'm pretty sure that there are plenty of pearls there--the beds are enormous. i think i'll go around among the sea birds and try to find out who it was got those oysters our spoonbill found the pearls in. the bird that fished up that pile was an expert oyster diver." so while the doctor put his clothes on and gub-gub washed the mud out of his ears, dab-dab went off on a tour of inquiry around the islands. after about twenty minutes she brought back a black duck-like bird with a tuft on his head. "this cormorant, doctor," said she, "fished up that pile of oysters." "ah," said john dolittle, "perhaps we shall find out something now. can you tell me," he asked the cormorant, "how to get pearls?" "pearls? what do you mean?" said the bird. then dab-dab went and borrowed the playthings from the spoonbill's children to show him. "oh, those things," said the cormorant. "those come in bad oysters. when i go oyster fishing i never pick up that kind except once in a while by accident--and then i never bother to open them." "but how do you tell oysters of that kind from the others?" asked the doctor. "by sniffing them," said the cormorant. "the ones that have those things in them don't smell fresh. i'm frightfully particular about my oysters." "do you mean to say that even when you are right down under the water you could tell an oyster that had pearls in it from one that hadn't--just by sniffing it?" "certainly. so could any cormorant." "there you are, doctor," said dab-dab. "the trick's done. now you can get all the pearls you want." "but these oyster beds don't belong to me," said john dolittle. "oh, dear!" sighed the duck. "did anyone ever see a man who could find so many objections to getting rich? who do they belong to, then?" "to chief nyam-nyam and his people, of course. he owns the harmattan rocks. would you mind," the doctor asked, turning to the cormorant, "getting me a few oysters of this kind to look at?" "with the greatest of pleasure," said the cormorant. and he flew out over the oyster beds and shot down into the sea like a stone. in a minute he was back again with three oysters--two in his feet and one in his mouth. the animals gathered around with bated breath while the doctor opened them. in the first was a small gray pearl; in the second a middle-sized pink pearl, and in the third two enormous black ones. "gosh, how lovely!" murmured gub-gub. "pearls before swine," giggled the white mouse. "tee, hee!" "how uneducated you are!" snorted the pig, turning up his snout. "ladies before gentlemen; _swine_ before _pearls_!" _chapter v_ obombo's rebellion late that same afternoon the doctor returned to chief nyam-nyam's village. and with him he took the cormorant as well as dab-dab and his animals. as he arrived at the little group of straw houses he saw that there was some kind of a commotion going on. all the villagers were gathered about the chief's hut; speeches were being made and everyone seemed in a great state of excitement. the old chief himself was standing at the door, and when he saw his friend, the doctor, approaching on the edge of the crowd, he signaled him to come into the hut. this the doctor did. and as soon as he was inside the chief closed the door and began to tell him what the trouble was. "great trials have overtaken me in my old age, oh white man," said he. "for fifty years i have been head of this tribe, respected, honored and obeyed. now my young son-in-law, obombo, clamors to be made chief and many of the people support him. bread we have none; food of any kind is scanty. and obombo tells the tribesmen that the fault is mine--that he, if he is made chief, will bring them luxury and prosperity. it is not that i am unwilling to give up the chieftaincy, but i know this young upstart who would take my place means to lead the people into war. what can he do by going to war? can he fill the people's stomachs? in wars we have always lost. our neighbors are large peoples, while we are the smallest tribe in all west africa. so we have been robbed and robbed, till now the mothers and children clamor at my door for bread. alas, alas, that i should ever see this day!" the old chief sank into his chair as he ended and burst out weeping. the doctor went up and patted him on the shoulder. [illustration: "the doctor patted him on the shoulder"] "chief nyam-nyam," said he, "i think i have discovered something to-day which should make you and your people rich for the remainder of your lives. go out now and address the tribesmen. promise them in my name--and remind them that i come recommended by king koko--promise them from me that if they will abide peacefully under your rule for another week the country of chief nyam-nyam will be made famous for its riches and prosperity." then the old chief opened the door and made a speech to the clamoring crowd outside. and when he had ended obombo, the son-in-law, got up and began another speech, calling on the people to drive the old man out into the jungle. but before he had got halfway through the crowd began to murmur to one another: "let us not listen to this forward young man. it is far better that we abide the white man's promise and see what comes. he is a man of deeds, not words. did he not put the amazons to flight with a magic mouse that lives in his pocket? let us side with the white man and the venerable nyam-nyam, who has ruled us with kindness for so long. obombo would but lead us into war, and bring us to greater poverty still." soon hisses and groans broke out among the crowd and, picking up pebbles and mud, they began pelting obombo so he could not go on with his speech. finally he had to run for the jungle himself to escape the fury of the people. then when the excitement had died down and the villagers had gone peacefully to their homes, the doctor told the old chief of the wealth that lay waiting for him in the oysters of the harmattan rocks. and the cormorant agreed to oblige john dolittle by getting a number of his relatives to do pearl fishing for these people, who were so badly in need of money and food. and during the next week the doctor paddled the old chief to the rocks twice a day. a great number of oysters were fished up by the cormorants and the pearls were sorted by the doctor, put in little boxes and sent out to be sold. john dolittle told the old chief to keep the matter a secret and only to intrust the carrying to reliable men. and soon money began to pour into the country from the pearl fishing business which the doctor had established and the people were prosperous and had all the food they wanted. by the end of that week the doctor had, indeed, made good his promise. the country of chief nyam-nyam became famous all along the coast of west africa as a wealthy state. but wherever money is made in large quantities and business is good, there strangers will always come, seeking their fortune. and before long the little village that used to be so poor and insignificant was full of traders from the neighboring kingdoms, buying and selling in the crowded, busy markets. and, of course, questions were soon asked as to how this country had suddenly got so rich. and, although the chief had carried out the doctor's orders and had only intrusted the secret of the fisheries to a few picked men, folks began to notice that canoes frequently came and went between the harmattan rocks and the village of chief nyam-nyam. then spies from those neighboring countries who had always been robbing and warring upon this land began to sneak around the rocks in canoes. and, of course, very soon the secret was out. and the emir of ellebubu, who was one of the big, powerful neighbors, called up his army and sent them off in war canoes to take possession of the harmattan rocks. at the same time he made an attack upon the village, drove everybody out, and carrying off the doctor and the chief, he threw them into prison in his own country. then at last nyam-nyam's people had no land left at all. and in the jungle, where the frightened villagers had fled to hide, obombo made whispered speeches to little scattered groups of his father-in-law's people, telling them what fools they had been to trust the crazy white man, instead of listening to him, who would have led them to greatness. [illustration: "in the jungle obombo made speeches"] now, when the emir of ellebubu had thrown the doctor into prison he had refused to allow dab-dab, jip or gub-gub to go with him. jip put up a fight and bit the emir in the leg. but all he got for that was to be tied up on a short chain. the prison into which the doctor was thrown had no windows. and john dolittle, although he had been in african prisons before, was very unhappy because he was extremely particular about having fresh air. and besides, his hands were firmly tied behind his back with strong rope. "dear me," said he while he was sitting miserably on the floor in the darkness, wondering what on earth he was going to do without any of his animals to help him, "what a poor holiday i am spending, to be sure!" but presently he heard something stirring in his pocket. and to his great delight, the white mouse, who had been sleeping soundly, entirely forgotten by the doctor, ran out on his lap. "good luck!" cried john dolittle. "you're the very fellow i want. would you be so good as to run around behind my back and gnaw this beastly rope? it's hurting my wrists." "certainly," said the white mouse, setting to work at once. "why is it so dark? i haven't slept into the night, have i?" "no," said the doctor. "it's only about noon, i should say. but we're locked up. that stupid old emir of ellebubu made war on nyam-nyam and threw me into jail. bother it, i always seem to be getting into prison! the worst of it was, he wouldn't let jip or dab-dab come with me. i'm particularly annoyed that i haven't got dab-dab. i wish i knew some way i could get a message to her." "well, just wait until i have your hands free," said the white mouse. "then i'll see what can be done. there! i've bitten through one strand. now wiggle your hands a bit and you can undo the whole rope." the doctor squirmed his arms and wrists and presently his hands were free. "thank goodness, i had you in my pocket!" he said. "that was a most uncomfortable position. i wonder what kind of a prison old nyam-nyam got. this is the worst one i was ever in." in the meantime the emir, celebrating victory in his palace, gave orders that the harmattan rocks, which were now to be called the royal ellebubu pearl fisheries, would henceforth be his exclusive, private property, and no trespassing would be allowed. and he sent out six special men with orders to take over the islands and to bring all the pearls to him. now the cormorants did not know that war had broken out, nor anything about the doctor's misfortune. and when the emir's men came and took the pearl oysters they had fished up the birds supposed they were nyam-nyam's men and let them have them. however, it happened, luckily, that this first load of oysters had only very small and almost worthless pearls in them. jip and dab-dab were still plotting to find some way to reach the doctor. but there seemed to be nothing they could think of. inside the prison the doctor was swinging his arms to get the stiffness out of them. "you said something about a message you had for dab-dab, i think," peeped the white mouse's voice from the darkness of the corner. "yes," said the doctor--"and a very urgent one. but i don't see how on earth i'm going to get it to her. this place is made of stone and the door's frightfully thick. i noticed it as i came in." "don't worry, doctor, i'll get it to her," said the mouse. "i've just found an old rat hole over here in the corner. i popped down it and it goes under the wall and comes out by the root of the tree on the other side of the road from the prison." "oh, how splendid!" cried the doctor. "give me the message," said the white mouse, "and i'll hand it to dab-dab before you can say jack robinson. she's sitting in the tree, where the hole comes out." "tell her," said the doctor, "to fly over to the harmattan rocks right away and give the cormorants strict orders to stop all pearl fishing at once." "all right," said the mouse. and he slipped down the rat hole. dab-dab, as soon as she got the message, went straight off to the pearl fisheries and gave the doctor's instructions to the cormorants. she was only just in time. for the emir's six special men were about to land on the islands to get a second load of pearls. dab-dab and the cormorants swiftly threw back into the sea the oysters that had been fished up and when the emir's men arrived they found nothing. after hanging around a while they paddled back and told the emir that they could find no more pearl oysters on the rocks. he sent them out to look again; but they returned with the same report. then the emir was puzzled and angry. if nyam-nyam could get pearls on the harmattan rocks, why couldn't he? and one of his generals said that probably the white man had something to do with it, since it was he who had discovered and started the fisheries. so the emir ordered his hammock men and had himself carried to the doctor's prison. the door was unlocked and the emir, going inside, said to the doctor: "what monkey business have you done to my pearl fisheries, you white-faced villain?" "they're not your pearl fisheries, you black-faced ruffian," said the doctor. "you stole them from poor old nyam-nyam. the pearls were fished for by diving birds. but the birds are honest and will work only for honest people. why don't you have windows in your prisons? you ought to be ashamed of yourself." then the emir flew into a terrible passion. "how dare you speak to me like that? i am the emir of ellebubu," he thundered. [illustration: "'how dare you speak to me like that?'"] "you're an unscrupulous scoundrel," said the doctor. "i don't want to talk to you." "if you don't make the birds work for me i'll give orders that you get no food," said the emir. "you shall be starved to death." "i have told you," said the doctor, "that i don't desire any further conversation with you. not a single pearl shall you ever get from the harmattan fisheries." "and not a bite to eat shall you ever have till i do," the emir yelled. then he turned to the prison guards, gave instructions that the doctor was not to be fed till further orders and stalked out. the door slammed shut with a doleful clang and after one decent breath of fresh air the doctor was left in the darkness of his stuffy dungeon. _chapter vi_ the doctor's release the emir of ellebubu went back to his palace feeling perfectly certain that after he had starved john dolittle for a few days he would be able to make him do anything he wanted. he gave orders that no water should be served to the prisoner either, so as to make doubly sure that he would be reduced to obedience. but immediately the emir had left, the white mouse started out through the rat hole in the corner. and all day and all night he kept busy, coming and going bringing in crumbs of food which he gathered from the houses of the town: bread crumbs, cheese crumbs, yam crumbs, potato crumbs and crumbs of meat which he pulled off bones. all these he stored carefully in the doctor's hat in the corner of the prison. and by the end of each day he had collected enough crumbs for one good square meal. the doctor said he never had the slightest idea of what he was eating, but as the mealy mixture was highly digestible and nutritious he did not see why he should mind. to supply his master with water the mouse got nuts, and after gnawing a tiny hole in one end he would chop the nut inside into pieces and shake it out through the hole. then he would fill the empty shell with water and seal up the hole with gum arabic which he got from trees. the water-filled nuts were a little heavy for him to carry, so dab-dab would bring them from the river as far as the outside end of the rat hole, and the white mouse would roll them down the hole into the prison. [illustration: "the white mouse would roll them down the hole"] by getting his friends, the village mice, to help him in the preparation of these nuts, he was able to supply them in hundreds. then all the doctor had to do when he wanted a drink was to put one in his mouth, crack it with his teeth, and after the cool water had run down his throat, spit the broken shells out. the white mouse also provided crumbs of soap, so that his master could shave--for the doctor, even in prison, was always very particular about this part of his appearance. well, when four days had passed the emir of ellebubu sent a messenger to the prison to inquire if the doctor was now willing to do as he was told. the guards after talking to john dolittle brought word to the emir that the white man was as obstinate as ever and had no intention of giving in. "very well," said the emir, stamping his foot, "then let him starve. in ten days more the fool will be dead. then i will come and laugh over him. so perish all wretches who oppose the wishes of the emir of ellebubu!" and in ten days' time he went to the prison, as he had said, to gloat over the terrible fate of the white man. many of his ministers and generals came with him to help him gloat. but when the prison door was opened, instead of seeing the white man's body stretched upon the floor, the emir found the doctor smiling on the threshold, shaved and hearty and all spruced up. the only difference in his appearance was that with no exercise in prison he had grown slightly stouter and rounder. the emir stared at the prisoner open-mouthed, speechless with astonishment. now, the day before this he had heard for the first time the story of the rout of the amazons. the emir had refused to believe it. but now he began to feel that anything might be true about this man. "see," one of the ministers whispered in his ear, "the sorcerer has even shaved his beard without water or soap. your majesty, there is surely evil magic here. set the man free before harm befall. let us be rid of him." and the frightened minister moved back among the crowd so the doctor's evil gaze could not fall upon his face. then the emir himself began to get panicky. and he gave orders that the doctor should be released right away. "i will not leave here," said john dolittle, standing squarely in the door, "till you have windows put in this prison. it's a disgrace to lock up anyone in a place without windows." "build windows in the prison at once," the emir said to the guards. "and after that i won't go," said the doctor--"not till you have set chief nyam-nyam free; not till you have ordered all your people to leave his country and the harmattan rocks; not till you have returned to him the farming lands you robbed him of." "it shall be done," muttered the emir, grinding his teeth--"only go!" "i go," said the doctor. "but if you ever molest your neighbors again i will return. beware!" then he strode through the prison door out into the sunlit street, while the frightened people fell back on either side and covered their faces, whispering: "magic! do not let his eye fall on you!" and in the doctor's pocket the white mouse had to put his paws over his face to keep from laughing. and now the doctor set out with his animals and the old chief to return to nyam-nyam's country from the land where he had been imprisoned. on the way they kept meeting with groups of the chief's people who were still hiding in the jungle. these were told the glad tidings of the emir's promise. when they learned that their land was now free and safe again the people joined the doctor's party for the return journey. and long before he came in sight of the village john dolittle looked like a conquering general coming back at the head of an army, so many had gathered to him on the way. that night grand celebrations were made in the chief's village and the doctor was hailed by the people as the greatest man who had ever visited their land. two of their worst enemies need now no longer be feared--the emir had been bound over by a promise and dahomey was not likely to bother them again after the fright the amazons got on their last attack. the pearl fisheries were restored to their possession. and the country should now proceed prosperously and happily. the next day the doctor went out to the harmattan rocks to visit the cormorants and to thank them for the help they had given. the old chief came along on this trip, and with him four trustworthy men of his. in order that there should be no mistake in future, these men were shown to the cormorants and the birds were told to supply them--and no others--with pearl oysters. while the doctor and his party were out at the rocks an oyster was fished up that contained an enormous and very beautiful pearl--by far the biggest and handsomest yet found. it was perfect in shape, flawless and a most unusual shade in color. after making a little speech, the chief presented this pearl to the doctor as a small return for the services he had done him and his people. "thank goodness for that!" dab-dab whispered to jip. "do you realize what that pearl means to us? the doctor was down to his last shilling--as poor as a church mouse. we would have had to go circus-traveling with the pushmi-pullyu again, if it hadn't been for this. i'm so glad. for, for my part, i shall be glad enough to stay at home and settle down a while--once we get there." [illustration: "'do you realize what that pearl means to us?'"] "oh, i don't know," said gub-gub. "i love circuses. i wouldn't mind traveling, so long as it's in england--and with a circus." "well," said jip, "whatever happens, it's nice the doctor's got the pearl. he always seems to be in need of money. and, as you say, dab-dab, that should make anybody rich for life." but while the doctor was still thanking the chief for the beautiful present, quip-the-carrier flew up with a letter for him. "it was marked 'urgent,' in red ink, doctor," said the swallow, "so speedy thought he had better send it to you by special delivery." john dolittle tore open the envelope. "who's it from, doctor?" asked dab-dab. "dear me," muttered the doctor, reading. "it's from that farmer in lincolnshire whose brussels sprouts we imported for gub-gub. i forgot to answer his letter--you remember, he wrote asking me if i could tell him what the trouble was. and i was so busy it went clean out of my mind. dear me! i must pay the poor fellow back somehow. i wonder--oh, but there's this. i can send him the pearl. that will pay for his sprouts and something to spare. what a good idea!" and to dab-dab's horror, the doctor tore a clean piece off the farmer's letter, scribbled a reply, wrapped the pearl up in it and handed it to the swallow. "tell speedy," said he, "to send that off right away--registered. i am returning to fantippo to-morrow. good-bye and thank you for the special delivery." as quip-the-carrier disappeared into the distance with the doctor's priceless pearl dab-dab turned to jip and murmured: "there goes the dolittle fortune. my, but it is marvelous how money _doesn't_ stick to that man's fingers!" "heigh ho!" sighed jip, "it's a circus for us, all right." "easy comes, easy goes," murmured gub-gub. "never mind. i don't suppose it's really such fun being rich. wealthy people have to behave so unnaturally." _chapter vii_ a mysterious letter we are now come to an unusual event in the history of the doctor's post office, to the one which was, perhaps, the greatest of all the curious things that came about through the institution of the swallow mail. on arriving back at the houseboat from his short and very busy holiday the doctor was greeted joyfully by the pushmi-pullyu, too-too, cheapside and speedy the skimmer. king koko also came out to greet his friend when he saw the arrival of the doctor's canoe through a pair of opera glasses (price ten shillings and sixpence) which he had recently got from london by parcel post. and the prominent fantippans, who had missed their afternoon tea and social gossip terribly during the postmaster's absence, got into their canoes and followed the king out to the foreign mails office. [illustration: "the king saw the doctor's canoe arriving"] so for three hours after his arrival--in fact, until it was dark--the doctor did not get a chance to do a thing besides shake hands and answer questions about how he had enjoyed his holiday, where he had been and what he had done. the welcome he received on his return and the sight of the comfortable houseboat, gay with flowering window boxes, made the doctor, as he afterward said to dab-dab, feel as though he were really coming home. "yes," said the housekeeper, "but don't forget that you have another home, a real one, in puddleby." "that's true," said the doctor. "i suppose i must be getting on to england soon. but the fantippans were honestly pleased to see us, weren't they? and, after all, africa is a nice country, now, isn't it?" "yes," said dab-dab, "a nice enough country for short holidays--and long drinks." after supper had been served and eaten and the doctor had been made to tell the story of the pearl fisheries all over again for the benefit of his own family circle, he at last turned to the enormous pile of letters which were waiting for him. they came, as usual, from all parts of the world, from every conceivable kind of animal and bird. for hours he waded patiently through them, answering them as they came. speedy acted as his secretary and took down in bird and animal scribble the answers that the doctor reeled off by the dozen. often john dolittle dictated so fast that the poor skimmer had to get too-too (who had a wonderful memory) to come and help listen, so nothing should be missed through not writing it down quick enough. toward the end of the pile the doctor came across a very peculiar thick envelope, all over mud. for a long time none of them could make out a single word of the letter inside, nor even who it was from. the doctor got all his notebooks out of the safe, compared and peered and pored over the writing for hours. mud had been used for ink. the signs were made so clumsily they might almost be anything. but at last, after a tremendous lot of work, copying out afresh, guessing and discussing, the meaning of the extraordinary letter was pieced together, and this is what it said: "dear doctor dolittle: i have heard of your post office and am writing this as best i can--the first letter i ever wrote. i hear you have a weather bureau in connection with your post office and that a one-eyed albatross is your chief weather prophet. i am writing to tell you that i am the oldest weather prophet in the world. i prophesied the flood, and it came true to the day and the hour i said it would. i am a very slow walker or i would come and see you and perhaps you could do something for my gout, which in the last few hundred years has bothered me a good deal. but if you will come to see me i will teach you a lot about weather. and i will tell you the story of the flood, which i saw with my own eyes from the deck of noah's ark. "yours very truly, "mudface." "p. s.--i am a turtle." at last, on reading the muddy message through, the doctor's excitement and enthusiasm knew no bounds. he began at once to make arrangements to leave the following day for a visit to the turtle. but, alas! when he turned again to the letter to see where the turtle lived, he could find nothing to give a clue to his whereabouts! the mysterious writer who had seen the flood, noah and the ark had forgotten to give his address! "look here, speedy," said john dolittle, "we must try and trace this. let us leave no stone unturned to find where this valuable document came from. first, we will question everyone in the post office to find out who it was delivered it." well, everyone in turn, the pushmi-pullyu, cheapside, too-too, quip-the-carrier, all the swallows, any stray birds who were living in the neighborhood, even a pair of rats who had taken up their residence in the houseboat, were cross-examined by the doctor or speedy. but no one had seen the letter arrive; no one could tell what day or hour it had come; no one could guess how it got into the pile of the doctor's mails; no one knew anything about it. it was one of those little post office mysteries that are always cropping up even in the best-run mail systems. the doctor was positively heartbroken. often in his natural history meditations he had wondered about all sorts of different matters connected with the ark; and he had decided that noah, after his memorable voyage was over, must have been a great naturalist. now had come most unexpectedly a chance to hear the great story from an eye-witness--from someone who had actually known and sailed with noah--and just because of a silly little slip like leaving out an address the great chance was to be lost! all attempts to trace the writer having failed, the doctor, after two days, gave it up and went back to his regular work. this kept him so busy for the next week that he finally forgot all about the turtle and his mysterious letter. but one night, when he was working late to catch up with the business which had multiplied during his absence, he heard a gentle tapping on the houseboat window. he left his desk and went and opened it. instantly in popped the head of an enormous snake, with a letter in its mouth--a thick, muddy letter. [illustration: "in popped the head of an enormous snake"] "great heavens!" cried the doctor. "what a start you gave me! come in, come in, and make yourself at home." slowly and smoothly the snake slid in over the window sill and down on to the floor of the houseboat. yards and yards and more yards long he came, coiling himself up neatly at john dolittle's feet like a mooring rope on a ship's deck. "pardon me, but is there much more of you outside still?" asked the doctor. "yes," said the snake, "only half of me is in yet." "then i'll open the door," said the doctor, "so you can coil part of yourself in the passage. this room is a bit small." when at last the great serpent was all in, his thick coils entirely covered the floor of the doctor's office and a good part of him overflowed into the passage outside. "now," said the doctor, closing the window, "what can i do for you?" "i've brought you this letter," said the snake. "it's from the turtle. he is wondering why he got no answer to his first." "but he gave me no address," said john dolittle, taking the muddy envelope from the serpent. "i've been trying my hardest ever since to find out where he lived." "oh, was that it?" said the snake. "well, old mudface isn't much of a letter-writer. i suppose he didn't know he had to give his address." "i'm awfully glad to hear from him again," said the doctor. "i had given up all hope of ever seeing him. you can show me how to get to him?" "why, certainly," said the big serpent. "i live in the same lake as he does, lake junganyika." "you're a water snake, then, i take it," said the doctor. "yes." "you look rather worn out from your journey. is there anything i can get you?" "i'd like a saucer of milk," said the snake. "i only have wild goats' milk," said john dolittle. "but it's quite fresh." and he went out into the kitchen and woke up the housekeeper. "what do you think, dab-dab," he said breathless with excitement, "i've got a second letter from the turtle and the messenger is going to take us to see him!" when dab-dab entered the postmaster's office with the milk she found john dolittle reading the letter. looking at the floor, she gave a squawk of disgust. "it's a good thing for you sarah isn't here," she cried. "just look at the state of your office--it's _full of snake_!" _chapter viii_ the land of the mangrove swamps it was a long but a most interesting journey that the doctor took from fantippo to lake junganyika. it turned out that the turtle's home lay many miles inland in the heart of one of the wildest, most jungly parts of africa. the doctor decided to leave gub-gub home this time and he took with him only jip, dab-dab, too-too and cheapside--who said he wanted a holiday and that his sparrow friends could now quite well carry on the city deliveries in his absence. the great water snake began by taking the doctor's party down the coast south for some forty or fifty miles. there they left the sea, entered the mouth of a river and started to journey inland. the canoe (with the snake swimming alongside it) was quite the best thing for this kind of travel so long as the river had water in it. but presently, as they went up it, the stream grew narrower and narrower. till at last, like many rivers in tropical countries, it was nothing more than the dry bed of a brook, or a chain of small pools with long sand bars between. overhead the thick jungle arched and hung like a tunnel of green. this was a good thing by day-time, as it kept the sun off better than a parasol. and in the dry stretches of river bed, where the doctor had to carry or drag the canoe on home-made runners, the work was hard and shade something to be grateful for. at the end of the first day john dolittle wanted to leave the canoe in a safe place and finish the trip on foot. but the snake said they would need it further on, where there was more water and many swamps to cross. as they went forward the jungle around them seemed to grow thicker and thicker all the time. but there was always this clear alley-way along the river bed. and though the stream's course did much winding and twisting, the going was good. the doctor saw a great deal of new country, trees he had never met before, gay-colored orchids, butterflies, ferns, birds and rare monkeys. so his notebook was kept busy all the time with sketching and jotting and adding to his already great knowledge of natural history. on the third day of travel this river bed led them into an entirely new and different kind of country. if you have never been in a mangrove swamp, it is difficult to imagine what it looks like. it was mournful scenery. flat bog land, full of pools and streamlets, dotted with tufts of grass and weed, tangled with gnarled roots and brambling bushes, spread out for miles and miles in every direction. it reminded the doctor of some huge shrubbery that had been flooded by heavy rains. no large trees were here, such as they had seen in the jungle lower down. seven or eight feet above their heads was as high as the mangroves grew and from their thin boughs long streamers of moss hung like gray, fluttering rags. the life, too, about them was quite different. the gayly colored birds of the true forest did not care for this damp country of half water and half land. instead, all manner of swamp birds--big-billed and long-necked, for the most part--peered at them from the sprawling saplings. many kinds of herons, egrets, ibises, grebes, bitterns--even stately anhingas, who can fly beneath the water--were wading in the swamps or nesting on the little tufty islands. in and out of the holes about the gnarled roots strange and wondrous water creatures--things half fish and half lizard--scuttled and quarreled with brightly colored crabs. for many folks it would have seemed a creepy, nightmary sort of country, this land of the mangrove swamps. but to the doctor, for whom any kind of animal life was always companionable and good intentioned, it was a most delightful new field of exploration. they were glad now that the snake had not allowed them to leave the canoe behind. for here, where every step you took you were liable to sink down in the mud up to your waist, jip and the doctor would have had hard work to get along at all without it. and, even with it, the going was slow and hard enough. the mangroves spread out long, twisting, crossing arms in every direction to bar your passage--as though they were determined to guard the secrets of this silent, gloomy land where men could not make a home and seldom ever came. indeed, if it had not been for the giant water snake, to whom mangrove swamps were the easiest kind of traveling, they would never have been able to make their way forward. but their guide went on ahead of them for hundreds of yards to lead the way through the best openings and to find the passages where the water was deep enough to float a canoe. and, although his head was out of sight most of the time in the tangled distance, he kept, in the worst stretches, a firm hold on the canoe by taking a turn about the bowpost with his tail. and whenever they were stuck in the mud he would contract that long, muscular body of his with a jerk and yank the canoe forward as though it had been no more than a can tied on the end of a string. dab-dab, too-too and cheapside did not, of course, bother to sit in the canoe. they found flying from tree to tree a much easier way to travel. but in one of these jerky pulls which the snake gave on his living towline, the doctor and jip were left sitting in the mud as the canoe was actually yanked from under them. this so much amused the vulgar cheapside, who was perched in a mangrove tree above their heads, that he suddenly broke the solemn silence of the swamp by bursting into noisy laughter. [illustration: "the canoe was yanked from under them"] "lor' bless us, doctor, but you do get yourself into some comical situations! who would think to see john dolittle, m.d., heminent physician of puddleby-on-the-marsh, bein' pulled through a mud swamp in darkest africa by a couple of 'undred yards of fat worm! you've no idea how funny you look!" "oh, close your silly face!" growled jip, black mud from head to foot, scrambling back into the canoe. "it's easy for you--you can fly through the mess." "it 'ud make a nice football ground, this," murmured cheapside. "i'm surprised the hafricans 'aven't took to it. i didn't know there was this much mud anywhere--outside of 'amstead 'eath after a wet bank 'oliday. i wonder when we're going to get there. seems to me we're comin' to the end of the world--or the middle of it. 'aven't seen a 'uman face since we left the shore. 'e's an exclusive kind of gent, our mr. turtle, ain't 'e? meself, i wouldn't be surprised if we ran into old noah, sitting on the wreck of the hark, any minute.... 'elp the doctor up, jip. look, 'e's got his chin caught under a root." the snake, hearing cheapside's chatter, thought something must be wrong. he turned his head-end around and came back to see what the matter was. then a short halt was made in the journey while the doctor and jip cleaned themselves up, and the precious notebooks, which had also been jerked out into the mud, were rescued and stowed in a safe place. "do no people at all live in these parts?" the doctor asked the snake. "none whatever," said the guide. "we left the lands where men dwell behind us long ago. nobody can live in these bogs but swamp birds, marsh creatures and water snakes." "how much further have we got to go?" asked the doctor, rinsing the mud off his hat in a pool. "about one more day's journey," said the snake. "a wide belt of these swamps surrounds the secret lake of junganyika on all sides. the going will become freer as we approach the open water of the lake." "we are really on the shores of it already, then?" "yes," said the serpent. "but, properly speaking, the secret lake cannot be said to have shores at all--or, certainly, as you see, no shore where a man can stand." "why do you call it the secret lake?" asked the doctor. "because it has never been visited by man since the flood," said the giant reptile. "you will be the first to see it. we who live in it boast that we bathe daily in the original water of the flood. for before the forty days' rain came it was not there, they say. but when the flood passed away this part of the world never dried up. and so it has remained, guarded by these wide mangrove swamps, ever since." "what was here before the flood then?" asked the doctor. "they say rolling, fertile country, waving corn and sunny hilltops," the snake replied. "that is what i have heard. i was not there to see. mudface, the turtle, will tell you all about it." "how wonderful!" exclaimed the doctor. "let us push on. i am most anxious to see him--and the secret lake." _chapter ix_ the secret lake during the course of the next day's travel the country became, as the snake had foretold, freer and more open. little by little the islands grew fewer and the mangroves not so tangly. in the dreary views there was less land and more water. the going was much easier now. for miles at a stretch the doctor could paddle, without the help of his guide, in water that seemed to be quite deep. it was indeed a change to be able to look up and see a clear sky overhead once in a while, instead of that everlasting network of swamp trees. across the heavens the travelers now occasionally saw flights of wild ducks and geese, winging their way eastward. "that's a sign we're near open water," said dab-dab. "yes," the snake agreed. "they're going to junganyika. it is the feeding ground of great flocks of wild geese." it was about five o'clock in the evening when they came to the end of the little islands and mud banks. and as the canoe's nose glided easily forward into entirely open water they suddenly found themselves looking across a great inland sea. the doctor was tremendously impressed by his first sight of the secret lake. if the landscape of the swamp country had been mournful this was even more so. no eye could see across it. the edge of it was like the ocean's--just a line where the heavens and the water meet. ahead to the eastward--the darkest part of the evening sky--even this line barely showed, for now the murky waters and the frowning night blurred together in an inky mass. to the right and left the doctor could see the fringe of the swamp trees running around the lake, disappearing in the distance north and south. out in the open great banks of gray mist rolled and joined and separated as the wailing wind pushed them fretfully hither and thither over the face of the waters. "my word!" the doctor murmured in a quiet voice. "here one could almost believe that the flood was not over yet!" "jolly place, ain't it?" came cheapside's cheeky voice from the stern of the canoe. "give me london any day--in the worst fog ever. this is a bloomin' eels' country. look at them mist shadows skatin' round the lake. might be old noah and 'is family, playin' 'ring-a-ring-a-rosy' in their night-shirts, they're that lifelike." "the mists are always there," said the snake--"always have been. in them the first rainbow shone." "well," said the sparrow, "i'd sell the whole place cheap if it was mine--mists and all. 'ow many 'undred miles of this bonny blue ocean 'ave we got to cross before we reach our mr. mudface?" "not very many," said the snake. "he lives on the edge of the lake a few miles to the north. let us hurry and try to reach his home before darkness falls." once more, with the guide in front, but this time at a much better pace, the party set off. as the light grew dimmer the calls of several night birds sounded from the mangroves on the left. too-too told the doctor that many of these were owls, but of kinds that he had never seen or met with before. "yes," said the doctor. "i imagine there are lots of different kinds of birds and beasts in these parts that can be found nowhere else in the world." at last, while it was still just light enough to see, the snake swung into the left and once more entered the outskirts of the mangrove swamps. following him with difficulty in the fading light, the doctor was led into a deep glady cove. at the end of this the nose of the canoe suddenly bumped into something hard. the doctor was about to lean out to see what it was when a deep, deep bass voice spoke out of the gloom quite close to him. "welcome, john dolittle. welcome to lake junganyika." then looking up, the doctor saw on a mound-like island the shape of an enormous turtle--fully twelve feet across the shell--standing outlined against the blue-black sky. [illustration: "the doctor saw the shape of an enormous turtle"] the long journey was over at last. doctor dolittle did not at any time believe in traveling with very much baggage. and all that he had brought with him on this journey was a few things rolled up in a blanket--and, of course, the little black medicine-bag. among those things, luckily, however, were a couple of candles. and if it had not been for them he would have had hard work to land safely from the canoe. getting them lighted in the wind that swept across the lake was no easy matter. but to protect their flame too-too wove a couple of little lanterns out of thin leaves, through which the light shone dimly green but bright enough to see your way by. to his surprise, the doctor found that the mound, or island, on which the turtle lived was not made of mud, though muddy footprints could be seen all over it. it was made of stone--of stones cut square with a chisel. while the doctor was examining them with great curiosity the turtle said: "they are the ruins of a city. i used to be content to live and sleep in the mud. but since my gout has been so bad i thought i ought to make myself something solid and dry to rest on. those stones are pieces of a king's house." "pieces of a house--of a city!" the doctor exclaimed, peering into the wet and desolate darkness that surrounded the little island. "but where did they come from?" "from the bottom of the lake," said the turtle. "out there," mudface nodded toward the gloomy wide-stretching waters, "there stood, thousands of years ago, the beautiful city of shalba. don't i know, when for long enough i lived in it? once it was the greatest and fairest city ever raised by men and king mashtu of shalba the proudest monarch in the world. now i, mudface the turtle, make a nest in the swamp out of the ruins of his palace. ha! ha!" "you sound bitter," said the doctor. "did king mashtu do you any harm?" "i should say he did," growled mudface. "but that belongs to the story of the flood. you have come far. you must be weary and in need of food." "well," said the doctor, "i am most anxious to hear the story. does it take long to tell?" "about three weeks would be my guess," whispered cheapside. "turtles do everything slow. something tells me that story is the longest story in the world, doctor. let's get a nap and a bite to eat first. we can hear it just as well to-morrow." so, in spite of john dolittle's impatience, the story was put off till the following day. for the evening meal dab-dab managed to scout around and gather together quite a nice mess of fresh-water shellfish and too-too collected some marsh berries that did very well for dessert. then came the problem of how to sleep. this was not so easy, because, although the foundations of the turtle's mound were of stone, there was hardly a dry spot on the island left where you could lie down. the doctor tried the canoe. but it was sort of cramped and uncomfortable for sleeping, and now even there, too, the mud had been carried by dab-dab's feet and his own. in this country the great problem was getting away from the mud. "when noah's family first came out of the ark," said the turtle, "they slept in little beds which they strung up between the stumps of the drowned trees." "ah, hammocks!" cried the doctor. "of course--the very thing!" then, with jip's and dab-dab's help, he constructed a very comfortable basket-work hammock out of willow wands and fastened it between two larger mangroves. into this he climbed and drew the blanket over him. although the trees leaned down toward the water with his weight, they were quite strong and their bendiness acted like good bed springs. [illustration: "the trees bent down with his weight"] the moon had now risen and the weird scenery of junganyika was all green lights and blue shadows. as the doctor snuffed out his candles and jip curled himself up at his feet the turtle suddenly started humming a tune in his deep bass voice, waving his long neck from side to side in the moonlight. "what is that tune you are humming?" asked the doctor. "that's the 'elephants' march,'" said the turtle. "they always played it at the royal circus of shalba for the elephants' procession." "let's 'ope it 'asn't many verses," grumbled cheapside, sleepily putting his head under his wing. the sun had not yet risen on the gloomy waters of lake junganyika before jip felt the doctor stirring in his hammock, preparing to get up. presently dab-dab could be heard messing about in the mud below, bravely trying to get breakfast ready under difficult conditions. next cheapside, grumbling in a sleepy chirp, brought his head out from under his wing, gave the muddy scenery one look and popped it back again. but it was of little use to try to get more sleep now. the camp was astir. john dolittle, bent on the one idea of hearing that story, had already swung himself out of his hammock and was now washing his face noisily in the lake. cheapside shook his feathers, swore a few words in cockney and flew off his tree down to the doctor's side. [illustration: "the doctor was washing his face in the lake"] "look 'ere, doctor," he whispered, "this ain't an 'olesome place to stay at all. i'm all full of cramp from the damp night air. you'd get webfooted if you loitered in this country long. listen, you want to be careful about gettin' old mudface started on his yarn spinning. d'yer know what 'e reminds me of? them old crimea war veterans. once they begin telling their reminiscences there's no stoppin' 'em. 'e looks like one, too, with that long, scrawny neck of 'is. tell 'im to make it short and sweet--just to give us the outline of his troubles, like, see? the sooner we can shake the mud of this place off our feet and make tracks for fantippo the better it'll be for all of us." well, when breakfast had been disposed of the doctor sharpened his pencil, got out a notebook and, telling too-too to listen carefully, in case he should miss anything, he asked the turtle to begin the story of the flood. cheapside had been right. although it did not take a fortnight to tell it did take a very full day. slowly and evenly the sun rose out of the east, passed across the heavens and sank down into the west. and still mudface went murmuring on, telling of all the wonders he had seen in days long ago, while the doctor's pencil wiggled untiringly over the pages of his notebook. the only interruptions were when the turtle paused to lean down and moisten his long throat with the muddy water of the lake, or when the doctor stopped him to ask a question on the natural history of antediluvian times. dab-dab prepared lunch and supper and served them as silently as she could, so as not to interrupt; but for the doctor they were very scrappy meals. on into the night the story went. and now john dolittle wrote by candle-light, while all his pets, with the exception of too-too, were already nodding or dozing. at last, about half past ten--to cheapside's great relief--the turtle pronounced the final words. "and that, john dolittle, is the end of the story of the flood by one who saw it with his own eyes." for some time after the turtle finished no one spoke. even the irreverent cheapside was silent. little bits of stars, dimmed by the light of a half-full moon, twinkled like tiny eyes in the dim blue dome that arched across the lake. away off somewhere among the tangled mangroves an owl hooted from the swamp and too-too turned his head quickly to listen. dab-dab, the economical housekeeper, seeing the doctor close his notebook and put away his pencil, blew out the candle. [illustration: "dab-dab, the economical housekeeper, blew out the candle"] at last the doctor spoke: "mudface, i don't know when, in all my life i have listened to a story that interested me so much. i--i'm glad i came." "i too am glad, john dolittle. you are the only one in the world now who understands the speech of animals. and if you had not come my story of the flood could not have been told. i'm getting very old and do not ever move far away from junganyika." "would it be too much to ask you?" said the doctor, "to get me some souvenir from the city below the lake?" "not at all," said the turtle. "i'll go down and try to get you something right away." slowly and smoothly, like some unbelievable monster of former days, the turtle moved his great bulk across his little island and slid himself into the lake without splashing or disturbance of any kind. only a gentle swirling in the water showed where he had disappeared. in silence they all waited--the animals now, for the moment, reawakened and full of interest. the doctor had visions of his enormous friend moving through the slime of centuries at the bottom of the lake, hunting for some souvenir of the great civilization that passed away with the flood. he hoped that he would bring a book or something with writing on it. instead, when at last he reappeared wet and shining in the moonlight, he had a carved stone window-sill on his back which must have weighed over a ton. "lor' bless us!" muttered cheapside. "what a wonderful piano-mover 'e would make to be sure! great carter patterson! does 'e think the doctor's goin' to 'ang that on 'is watch-chain?" "it was the lightest thing i could find," said the turtle, rolling it off his back with a thud that shook the island. "i had hoped i could get a vase or a plate or something you could carry. but all the smaller objects are now covered in fathoms of mud. this i broke off from the second story of the palace--from the queen's bedroom window. i thought perhaps you'd like to see it anyway, even if it was too much for you to carry home. it's beautifully carved. wait till i wash some of the mud off it." the candles were lighted again and after the carvings had been cleaned the doctor examined them with great care and even made sketches of some of them in his notebook. by the time the doctor had done, all his party, excepting too-too, had fallen asleep. it was only when he heard jip suddenly snore from the hammock that he realized how late it was. as he blew out the candles again he found that it was very dark, for now the moon had set. he climbed into bed and drew the blankets over him. _chapter x_ the postmaster general's last order when dab-dab roused the party next morning the sun was shining through the mist upon the lake doing its best to brighten up the desolate scenery around them. poor mudface awoke with an acute attack of gout. he had not been bothered by this ailment since the doctor's arrival. but now he could scarcely move at all without great pain. and dab-dab brought his breakfast to him where he lay. john dolittle was inclined to blame himself for having asked him to go hunting in the lake for souvenirs the night before. "i'm afraid that was what brought on the attack," said the doctor, getting out his little black bag from the canoe and mixing some medicines. "but you know you really ought to move out of this damp country to some drier climate. i am aware that turtles can stand an awful lot of wet. but at your age one must be careful, you know." [illustration: "mixing the turtle's medicine"] "there isn't any other place i like as well," said mudface. "it's so hard to find a country where you're not disturbed these days." "here, drink this," the doctor ordered, handing him a tea-cup full of some brown mixture. "i think you will find that that will soon relieve the stiffness in your front legs." the turtle drank it down. and in a minute or two he said he felt much better and could now move his legs freely without pain. "it's a wonderful medicine, that," said he. "you are surely a great doctor. have you got any more of it?" "i will make up several bottles of the mixture and leave them with you before i go," said john dolittle. "but you really ought to get on high ground somewhere. this muddy little hummock is no place for you to live. isn't there a regular island in the lake, where you could make your home--if you're determined not to leave the junganyika country?" "not one," said the turtle. "it's all like this, just miles and miles of mud and water. i used to like it--in fact i do still. i wouldn't wish for anything better if it weren't for this wretched gout of mine." "well," said the doctor, "if you haven't got an island we must make one for you." "make one!" cried the turtle. "how would you go about it?" "i'll show you very shortly," said john dolittle. and he called cheapside to him. "will you please fly down to fantippo," he said to the city manager, "and give this message to speedy-the-skimmer. and ask him to send it out to all the postmasters of the branch offices: the swallow mail is very shortly to be closed--at all events for a considerable time. i must now be returning to puddleby and it will be impossible for me to continue the service in its present form after i have left no-man's-land. i wish to convey my thanks to all the birds, postmasters, clerks and letter-carriers who have so generously helped me in this work. the last favor which i am going to ask of them is a large one; and i hope they will give me their united support in it. i want them to build me an island in the middle of lake junganyika. it is for mudface the turtle, the oldest animal living, who in days gone by did a very great deal for man and beast--for the whole world in fact--when the earth was passing through the darkest chapters in all its history. tell speedy to send word to all bird leaders throughout the world. tell him i want as many birds as possible right away to build a healthy home where this brave turtle may end his long life in peace. it is the last thing i ask of the post office staff and i hope they will do their best for me." cheapside said that the message was so long he was afraid he would never be able to remember it by heart. so john dolittle told him to take it down in bird scribble and he dictated it to him all over again. that letter, the last circular order issued by the great postmaster general to the staff of the swallow mail, was treasured by cheapside for many years. he hid it under his untidy nest in st. edmund's left ear on the south side of the chancel of st. paul's cathedral. he always hoped that the pigeons who lived in the front porch of the british museum would some day get it into the museum for him. but one gusty morning, when men were cleaning the outside of the cathedral, it got blown out of st. edmund's ear and, before cheapside could overtake it, it sailed over the housetops into the river and sank. the sparrow got back to junganyika late that afternoon. he reported that speedy had immediately, on receiving the doctor's message, forwarded it to the postmasters of the branch offices with orders to pass it on to all the bird-leaders everywhere. it was expected that the first birds would begin to arrive here early the following morning. it was speedy himself who woke the doctor at dawn the next day. and while breakfast was being eaten he explained to john dolittle the arrangements that had been made. the work, the skimmer calculated, would take three days. all birds had been ordered to pick up a stone or a pebble or a pinch of sand from the seashore on their way and bring it with them. the larger birds (who would carry stones) were to come first, then the middle-sized birds and then the little ones with sand. soon, when the sky over the lake was beginning to fill up with circling ospreys, herons and albatrosses, speedy left the doctor and flew off to join them. there, taking up a position in the sky right over the centre of the lake, he hovered motionless, as a marker for the stone-droppers. then the work began. all day long a never-ending stream of big birds, a dozen abreast, flew up from the sea and headed across lake junganyika. the line was like a solid black ribbon, the birds, dense, packed and close, beak to tail. and as each dozen reached the spot where speedy hovered, twelve stones dropped into the water. the procession was so continuous and unbroken that it looked as though the sky were raining stones. and the constant roar of them splashing into the water out of the heavens could be heard a mile off. [illustration: "a never-ending stream of big birds"] the lake in the centre was quite deep. and of course tons and tons of stone would have to be dropped before the new island would begin to show above the water's surface. this gathering of birds was greater even than the one the doctor had addressed in the hollow of no-man's-land. it was the biggest gathering of birds that had ever been seen. for now not only the leaders came but thousands and millions of every species. john dolittle got tremendously excited and jumping into his canoe he started to paddle out nearer to the work. but speedy grew impatient that the top of the stone-pile was not yet showing above the water; and he gave the order to double up the line--and then double again, as still more birds came to help from different parts of the world. and soon, with a thousand stones falling every fraction of a second, the lake got so rough that the doctor had to put back for the turtle's hummock lest his canoe capsize. all that day, all that night and half the next day, this continued. at last about noon on the morrow the sound of the falling stones began to change. the great mound of seething white water, like a fountain in the middle of the lake, disappeared; and in its place a black spot showed. the noise of splashing changed to the noise of stone rattling on stone. the top of the island had begun to show. "it's like the mountains peeping out after the flood," mudface muttered to the doctor. then speedy gave the order for the middle-sized birds to join in; and soon the note of the noise changed again--shriller--as tons and tons of pebbles and gravel began to join the downpour. another night and another day went by, and at dawn the gallant skimmer came down to rest his weary wings; for the workers did not need a marker any longer--now that a good-sized island stood out on the bosom of the lake for the birds to drop their burdens on. bigger and bigger grew the home-made land and soon mudface's new estate was acres wide. still another order from speedy; and presently the rattling noise changed to a gentle hiss. the sky now was simply black with birds; the pebble-shower had ceased; it was raining sand. last of all, the birds brought seeds: grass seeds, the seeds of flowers, acorns and the kernels of palms. the turtle's new home was to be provided with turf, with wild gardens, with shady avenues to keep off the african sun. when speedy came to the hummock and said, "doctor, it is finished," mudface gazed thoughtfully out into the lake and murmured: "now proud shalba is buried indeed: she has an island for a tombstone! it's a grand home you have given me, john dolittle.--alas, poor shalba!--mashtu the king passes. but mudface the turtle--lives on!" _chapter xi_ good-bye to fantippo mudface's landing on his new home was quite an occasion. the doctor paddled out alongside of him till they reached the island. until he set foot on it, john dolittle himself had not realized what a large piece of ground it was. it was more than a quarter of a mile across. round in shape, it rose gently from the shores to the flat centre, which was a good hundred feet above the level of the lake. mudface was tremendously pleased with it; climbing laboriously to the central plateau--from where you could see great distances over the flat country around--he said he was sure his health would quickly improve in this drier air. dab-dab prepared a meal--the best she could in the circumstances--to celebrate what she called the turtle's house-warming. and everyone sat down to it; and there was much gayety and the doctor was asked to make a speech in honor of the occasion. [illustration: "dab-dab prepared a meal"] cheapside was dreadfully afraid that mudface would get up to make a speech in reply and that it would last into the following day. but to the sparrow's relief the doctor, immediately he had finished, set about preparations for his departure. he made up the six bottles of gout mixture and presented them to mudface with instructions in how it should be taken. he told him that although he was closing up the post office for regular service it would always be possible to get word to puddleby. he would ask several birds of passage to stop here occasionally; and if the gout got any worse he wanted mudface to let him know by letter. the old turtle thanked him over and over again and the parting was a very affecting one. when at last the goodbyes were all said, they got into the canoe and set out on the return journey. reaching the mouth of the river at the southern end of the lake they paused a moment before entering the mangrove swamps and looked back. and there in the distance they could just see the shape of the old turtle standing on his new island, watching them. they waved to him and pushed on. "he looks just the same as we saw him the night we arrived," said dab-dab--"you remember? like a statue on a pedestal against the sky." "poor old fellow!" murmured the doctor. "i do hope he will be all right now.... what a wonderful life!--what a wonderful history!" "didn't i tell you, doctor," said cheapside, "that it was going to be the longest story in the world?--took a day and half a night to tell." "ah, but it's a story that nobody else could tell," said john dolittle. "good thing too," muttered the sparrow. "it would never do if there was many of 'is kind spread around this busy world.--of course, meself, i don't believe a word of the yarn. i think he made it all up. 'e 'ad nothin' else to do--sittin' there in the mud, century after century, cogitatin'." the journey down through the jungle was completed without anything special happening. but when they reached the sea and turned the bow of the canoe westward they came upon a very remarkable thing. it was an enormous hole in the beach--or rather a place where the beach had been taken away bodily. speedy told the doctor that it was here that the birds had picked up the stones and sand on their way to junganyika. they had literally carried acres of the seashore nearly a thousand miles inland. of course in a few months the action of the surf filled in the hole, so that the place looked like the rest of the beach. but that is why, when many years later some learned geologists visited lake junganyika, they said that the seashore gravel on an island there was a clear proof that the sea had once flowed through that neighborhood. which was true--in the days of the flood. but the doctor was the only scientist who knew that mudface's island, and the stones that made it, had quite a different history. on his arrival at the post office the doctor was given his usual warm reception by the king and dignitaries of fantippo who paddled out from the town to welcome him back. tea was served at once; and his majesty seemed so delighted at renewing this pleasant custom that john dolittle was loath to break the news to him that he must shortly resign from the foreign mail service and sail for england. however, while they were chatting on the veranda of the houseboat a fleet of quite large sailing vessels entered the harbor. these were some of the new merchant craft of fantippo which plied regularly up and down the coast, trading with other african countries. the doctor pointed out to the king that mails intended for foreign lands could now be quite easily taken by these boats to the bigger ports on the coast where vessels from europe called every week. from that the doctor went on to explain to the king, that much as he loved fantippo and its people, he had many things to attend to in england and must now be thinking of going home. and of course as none of the natives could talk bird-language, the swallow mail would have to be replaced by the ordinary kind of post office. the doctor found that his majesty was much more distressed at the prospect of losing his good white friend and his afternoon tea on the houseboat than at anything else which the change would bring. but he saw that the doctor really felt he had to go; and at length, with tears falling into his tea-cup, he gave permission for the postmaster general of fantippo to resign. great was the rejoicing among the doctor's pets and the patient swallows when the news got about that john dolittle was really going home at last. gub-gub and jip could hardly wait while the last duties and ceremonies of closing the houseboat to the public and transferring the foreign mails service to the office in the town were performed. dab-dab bustled cheerfully from morning to night while cheapside never ceased to chatter of the glories of london, the comforts of a city life and all the things he was going to do as soon as he got back to his beloved native haunts. there was no end to the complimentary ceremonies which the good king koko and his courtiers performed to honor the departing doctor. for days and days previous to his sailing, canoes came and went between the town and the houseboat bearing presents to show the good will of the fantippans. during all this, having to keep smiling the whole time, the doctor got sadder and sadder at leaving his good friends. and he was heartily glad when the hour came to pull up the anchor and put to sea. people who have written the history of the kingdom of fantippo all devote several chapters to a mysterious white man who in a very short space of time made enormous improvements in the mail, the communications, the shipping, the commerce, the education and the general prosperity of the country. indeed it was through john dolittle's quiet influence that king koko's reign came to be looked upon as the golden age in fantippan history. a wooden statue still stands in the market-place to his memory. [illustration: "a wooden statue still stands to his memory"] the excellent postal service continued after he left. the stamps with koko's face on them were as various and as beautiful as ever. on the occasion of the first annual review of the fantippo merchant fleet a very fine two-shilling stamp was struck in commemoration, showing his majesty inspecting his new ships through a lollipop quizzing-glass. the king himself became a stamp-collector and his album was as good as a family photo-album, containing as it did so many pictures of himself. the only awkward incident that happened in the record of the post office which the doctor had done so much to improve was when some ardent stamp-collectors, wishing to make the modern stamps rare, plotted to have the king assassinated in order that the current issues should go out of date. but the plot was happily discovered before any harm was done. years afterwards, the birds visiting puddleby told the doctor that the king still had the flowers in the window-boxes of his old houseboat carefully tended and watered in his memory. his majesty, they said, never gave up the fond hope that some day his good white friend would come back to fantippo with his kindly smile, his instructive conversation and his jolly tea-parties on the post office veranda. the end where animals talk west african folk lore tales by robert h. nassau author of "fetichism in west africa," "the youngest king," etc. richard g. badger the gorham press boston preface the typical native african ekano or legend is marked by repetition. the same incidents occur to a succession of individuals; monotony being prevented by a variation in the conduct of those individuals, as they reveal their weakness or stupidity, artifice or treachery. narrators, while preserving the original plot and characters of a tale, vary it, and make it graphic by introducing objects known and familiar to their audience. these inconsistencies do not interfere with belief or offend the taste of a people with whom even the impossible is not a bar to faith; rather, the inconsistency sharpens their enjoyment of the story. surprise must not be felt at the impossibility of some of the situations; e.g., the swallowing by an animal of his wife, baggage and household furniture, as a means of hiding them. the absurdity of such situations is one of the distinctive attractions to the minds of the excited listeners. variations of the same tale, as told in different tribes, were inevitable among a people whose language was not written until within the last hundred years; the tales having been transmitted verbally, from generation to generation, for, probably, thousands of years. as to their antiquity, i believe these tales to be of very ancient origin. no argument must be taken against them because of the internal evidence of allusion to modern things, or implements, or customs of known modern date; e.g., "cannon," "tables," "steamships," etc., etc. narrators constantly embellish by novel additions; e.g., where, in the original story, a character used a spear, the narrator may substitute a pistol. almost all these tales locate themselves in supposed pre-historic times, when beasts and human beings are asserted to have lived together with social relations in the same community. an unintended concession to the claims of some evolutionists! the most distinctive feature of these tales is that, while the actors are beasts, they are speaking and living as human beings, acting as a beast in human environment; and, instantly, in the same sentence, acting as a human being in a beast's environment. this must constantly be borne in mind, or the action of the story will become not only unreasonable but utterly inexplicable. the characters in the stories relieve themselves from difficult or dangerous situations by invoking the aid of a powerful personal fetish-charm known as "ngalo"; a fetish almost as valuable as aladdin's lamp of the arabian nights. and yet, with inconsistency, notwithstanding this aid, the actors are often suffering from many small evils of daily human life. these inconsistencies are another feature of the ekano that the listeners enjoy as the spice of the story. from internal evidences, i think that the local sources of these tales were arabian, or at least under arabic, and perhaps even egyptian, influences. (observe the prefix, ra, a contraction of rera equals father, a title of honor, as "lord," or "sir," or "master," in names of dignitaries; e.g. ra-marânge, ra-mborakinda, ra-meses.) this is consistent with the fact that there is arabic blood in the bantu negro. the invariable direction to which the southwest coast tribes point, as the source of their ancestors, is northeast. such an ethnologist as sir h. h. johnston traces the bantu stream southward on the east coast to the cape of good hope, and then turns it northward on the west coast to the equator and as far as the fourth degree of north latitude, the very region from which i gathered these stories. only a few men, and still fewer women, in any community, are noted as skilled narrators. they are the literati. the public never weary of hearing the same tales repeated; like our own civilized audiences at a play running for a hundred or more nights. they are made attractive by the dramatic use of gesture, tones, and startling exclamations. the occasions selected for the renditions are nights, after the day's works are done, especially if there be visitors to be entertained. the places chosen are the open village street, or, in forest camps where almost all the population of a village go for a week's work on their cutting of new plantations; or for hunting; or for fishing in ponds. the time for these camps is in one of the two dry seasons: where the booths erected are not for protection against rain, but for a little privacy, for the warding off of insects, birds and small animals, and for the drying of meats. at such times, most of the adults go off during the day for fishing; or, if for hunting, only the men; the children being guarded at their plays in the camp by the older women, who are kept occupied with cooking, and with the drying of meats. at night, all gather around the camp-fire; and the tales are told with, at intervals, accompaniment of drum; and parts of the plot are illustrated by an appropriate song, or by a short dance, the platform being only the earth, and the scenery the forest shadows and the moon or stars. the bantu language has very many dialects, having the same grammatical construction, but differing in their vocabulary. the name of the same animal therefore differs in the three typical tribes mentioned in these tales; e.g., leopard, in mpongwe, equals njegâ; in benga, equals njâ; and in fang, equals nze. pronunciation in all the dialects of the bantu language, consonants are pronounced, as in english; except that g is always hard. the vowels are pronounced as in the following english equivalent:-- a as in father e.g., kabala â as in awe e.g., njâ. e as in they e.g., ekaga. e as in met e.g., njegâ. i as in machine e.g., njina. o as in note e.g., kombe. u as in rule e.g., kuba. a before y is pronounced ai as a diphthong, e.g., asaya. close every syllable with a vowel, e.g., ko-ngo. where two or more consonants begin a syllable, a slight vowel sound may be presupposed, e.g., ngweya, as if ingweya. ng has the nasal sound of ng in "finger," as if fing-nger, (not as in "singer,") e.g., mpo-ngwe. contents part first mpongwe tribe tale page do not trust your friend leopard's hunting-camp tests of death: st version nd version tasks done for a wife; and, the giant goat a tug-of-war agenda: rat's play on a name "nuts are eaten because of angângwe": a proverb who are crocodile's relatives? who is king of birds? and, why chickens live with mankind "njiwo died of sleep:" a proverb which is the fattest:--manatus, hog, or oyster? why mosquitoes buzz unkind criticism the suitors of princess gorilla leopard of the fine skin why the plantain-stalk bears but one bunch part second benga tribe swine talking crocodile origin of the elephant leopard's marriage journey tortoise in a race goat's tournament why goats became domestic igwana's forked tongue what caused their deaths? a quarrel about seniority the magic drum the lies of tortoise "death begins by some one person": a proverb tortoise and the bojabi tree the suitors of njambo's daughter tortoise, dog, leopard, and the njabi fruit a journey for salt a plea for mercy the deceptions of tortoise leopard's hunting companions is the bat a bird or a beast? dog, and his human speech, st version nd version the savior of the animals origin of the ivory trade, st version nd version dog and his false friend leopard a trick for vengeance not my fault! do not impose on the weak borrowed clothes the story of a panic a family quarrel the giant goat the fights of mbuma-tyetye; and, an origin of leopard a snake's skin looks like a snake part third fang tribe candor which is the better hunter, an eagle or a leopard? a lesson in evolution parrot standing on one leg a question of right of inheritance tortoise covers his ignorance a question as to age abundance: a play on the meaning of a word an oath: with a mental reservation the treachery of tortoise a chain of circumstances part first mpongwe foreword the following sixteen tales were narrated to me, many years ago, by two members of the mpongwe tribe (one now dead) at the town of libreville, gaboon river, equatorial west africa. both of them were well-educated persons, a man and a woman. they chose legends that were current in their own tribe. they spoke in mpongwe; and, in my english rendition, i have retained some of their native idioms. as far as i am aware none of these legends have ever been printed in english, excepting tale , a version of which appeared in a british magazine from a writer in kamerun, after i had heard it at gaboon. also, excepting tale . it appeared, in another form, more than fifty years ago, in rev. dr. j. l. wilson's "western africa." but my narrator was not aware of that, when he told it to me. tale do not trust your friend place country of the animals persons njegâ (leopard) ntori (wild rat) ra-marânge (medicine man) nyare (ox) ngowa (hog) nkambi (antelope) leopard's wife; and others note a story of the treachery of the leopard as matched by the duplicity of the rat. in public mourning for the dead, it is the custom for the nearest relative or dearest friend to claim the privilege of sitting closest to the corpse, and nursing the head on his or her lap. at a time long ago, the animals were living in the forest together. most of them were at peace with each other. but leopard was discovered to be a bad person. all the other animals refused to be friendly with him. also, wild rat, a small animal, was found out to be a deceiver. one day, rat went to visit leopard, who politely gave him a chair, and rat sat down. "mbolo!" "ai, mbolo!" each saluted to the other. leopard said to his visitor, "what's the news?" rat replied, "njegâ! news is bad. in all the villages i passed through, in coming today, your name is only ill-spoken of, people saying, 'njegâ is bad! njegâ is bad!'" leopard replies, "yes, you do not lie. people say truly that njegâ is bad. but, look you, ntori, i, njegâ, am an evil one: but my badness comes from other animals. because, when i go out to visit, there is no one who salutes me. when anyone sees me, he flees with fear. but, for what does he fear me? i have not vexed him. so, i pursue the one that fears me. i want to ask him, 'why do you fear me?' but, when i pursue it, it goes on fleeing more rapidly. so, i become angry, wrath rises in my heart, and if i overtake it, i kill it on the spot. one reason why i am bad is that. if the animals would speak to me properly, and did not flee from me, then, ntori, i would not kill them. see! you, ntori, have i seized you?" rat replied, "no." then leopard said, "then, ntori, come near to this table, that we may talk well." rat, because of his subtlety and caution, when he took the chair given him on his arrival, had placed it near the door. leopard repeated, "come near to the table." rat excused himself, "never mind; i am comfortable here; and i came here today to tell you that it is not well for a person to be without friends; and, i, ntori, i say to you, let us be friends." leopard said, "very good!" but now, even after this compact of friendship, rat told falsehoods about leopard; who, not knowing this, often had conversations with him, and would confide to him all the thoughts of his heart. for example, leopard would tell to rat, "tomorrow i am going to hunt ngowa, and next day i will go to hunt nkambi," or whatever the animal was. and rat, at night, would go to hog or to antelope or the other animal, and say, "give me pay, and i will tell you a secret." they would lay down to him his price. and then he would tell them, "be careful tomorrow. i heard that njegâ was coming to kill you." the same night, rat would secretly return to his own house, and lie down as if he had not been out. then, next day, when leopard would go out hunting, the animals were prepared and full of caution, to watch his coming. there was none of them that he could find; they were all hidden. leopard thus often went to the forest, and came back empty-handed. there was no meat for him to eat, and he had to eat only leaves of the trees. he said to himself, "i will not sit down and look for explanation to come to me. i will myself find out the reason of this. for, i, njegâ, i should eat flesh and drink blood; and here i have come down to eating the food of goats, grass and leaves." so, in the morning, leopard went to the great doctor ra-marânge, and said, "i have come to you, i, njegâ. for these five or six months i have been unable to kill an animal. but, cause me to know the reason of this." ra-marânge took his looking-glass and his harp, and struck the harp, and looked at the glass. then he laughed aloud, "ke, ke, ke--" leopard asked, "ra-marânge, for what reason do you laugh?" he replied, "i laugh, because this matter is a small affair. you, njegâ, so big and strong, you do not know this little thing!" leopard acknowledged, "yes: i have not been able to find it out." ra-marânge said, "tell me the names of your friends." leopard answered "i have no friends. nkambi dislikes me, nyare refuses me, ngowa the same. of all animals, none are friendly to me." ra-marânge said, "not so; think exactly; think again." leopard was silent and thought; and then said, "yes, truly, i have one friend, ntori." the doctor said, "but, look! if you find a friend, it is not well to tell him all the thoughts of your heart. if you tell him two or three, leave the rest. do not tell him all. but, you, njegâ, you consider that ntori is your friend, and you show him all the thoughts of your heart. but, do you know the heart of ntori, how it is inside? look what he does! if you let him know that you are going next day to kill this and that, then he starts out at night, and goes to inform those animals, 'so-and-so, said njegâ; but, be you on your guard.' now, look! if you wish to be able to kill other animals, first kill ntori." leopard was surprised, "ngâ! (actually) ntori lies to me?" ra-marânge said, "yes." so, leopard returned to his town. and he sent a child to call rat. rat came. leopard said, "ntori! these days you have not come to see me. where have you been?" rat replies, "i was sick." leopard says, "i called you today to sit at my table to eat." rat excused himself, "thanks! but the sickness is still in my body; i will not be able to eat." and he went away. whenever rat visited or spoke to leopard, he did not enter the house, but sat on a chair by the door. leopard daily sent for him; he came; but constantly refrained from entering the house. leopard says in his heart, "ntori does not approach near to me, but sits by the door. how shall i catch him?" thinking and thinking, he called his wife, and said, "i have found a plan by which to kill ntori. tomorrow, i will lie down in the street, and you cover my body with a cloth as corpses are covered. wear an old ragged cloth, and take ashes and mark your body, as in mourning; and go you out on the road wailing, 'njegâ is dead! njegâ, the friend of ntori is dead!' and, for ntori, when he shall come as a friend to the mourning, put his chair by me, and say, 'sit there near your friend.' when he sits on that chair, i will jump up and kill him there." his wife replies, "very good!" next morning, leopard, lying down in the street, pretended that he was dead. his wife dressed herself in worn-out clothes, and smeared her face, and went clear on to rat's village, wailing "ah! njegâ is dead! ntori's friend is dead!" rat asked her, "but, njegâ died of what disease? yesterday, i saw him looking well, and today comes word that he is dead!" the wife answered, "yes: njegâ died without disease; just cut off! i wonder at the matter--i came to call you; for you were his friend. so, as is your duty as a man, go there and help bury the corpse in the jungle." rat went, he and leopard's wife together. and, behold, there was leopard stretched out as a corpse! rat asked the wife, "what is this matter? njegâ! is he really dead?" she replied, "yes: i told you so. here is a chair for you to sit near your friend." rat, having his caution, had not sat on the chair, but stood off, as he wailed, "ah! njegâ is dead! ah! my friend is dead!" rat called out, "wife of njegâ! njegâ, he was a great person: but did he not tell you any sign by which it might be known, according to custom, that he was really dead?" she replied, "no, he did not tell me." (rat, when he thus spoke, was deceiving the woman.) rat went on to speak, "you, njegâ, when you were living and we were friends, you told me in confidence, saying, 'when i, njegâ, shall die, i will lift my arm upward, and you will know that i am really dead.' but, let us cease the wailing and stop crying. i will try the test on njegâ, whether he is dead! lift your arm!" leopard lifted his arm. rat, in his heart, laughed, "ah! njegâ is not dead!" but, he proceeded, "njegâ! njegâ! you said, if really dead, you would shake your body. shake! if it is so!" leopard shook his whole body. rat said openly, "ah! njegâ is dead indeed! he shook his body!" the wife said, "but, as you say he is dead, here is the chair for you, as chief friend, to sit on by him." rat said, "yes: wait for me; i will go off a little while, and will come." leopard, lying on the ground, and hearing this, knew in his heart, "ah! ntori wants to flee from me! i will wait no longer!" up he jumps to seize rat, who, being too quick for him, fled away. leopard pursued him with leaps and jumps so rapidly that he almost caught him. rat got to his hole in the ground just in time to rush into it. but his tail was sticking out; and leopard, looking down the hole, seized the tail. rat called out, "you have not caught me, as you think! what you are holding is a rootlet of a tree." leopard let go of the tail. rat switched it in after him, and jeered at leopard, "you had hold of my tail! and you have let it go! you will not catch me again!" leopard, in a rage, said, "you will have to show me the way by which you will emerge from this hole; for, you will never come out of it alive!" some narrators carry the story on, with the ending of tale no. , the story of rat, leopard, frog and crab. leopard's pretence of death appears also in tale no. . tale leopard's hunting camp persons ntori (a very large forest rat) njegâ (leopard) and other animals note besides the words for "hunger" and "famine," the bantu languages have a third word meaning, "longing for meat." in this story, leopard's greed is matched by the artifice of rat:--it was a practice of african natives to hide their ivory tusks in streams of water until a time convenient for selling them. polite natives will neither sit uninvited in the presence of their superiors, nor watch them while eating. if need be, to secure privacy, a temporary curtain will be put up, and the host will retire, leaving the guest alone. rude or uncivilized tribes are offensive in their persistent effort to see a white foreigner's mode of eating. one of the tricks of native sorcerers is to jump into a fire. it was a time of ngwamba (meat-hunger) among the animals in njambi's kingdom. leopard, being the eldest in his tribe, said to rat, "ntori! child! this is a hard time for meat. i think we better go to the forest, and make a olako (camp) for hunting." rat replied "good! come on!" so they began to arrange for the journey. the preparation of food, nets, baskets, and so forth, occupied several days. when all was ready, they started. having come to a proper place in the forest, they selected a site where they would build up their booths. leopard was to have his own separate camp with his wives and his children and his people; and rat his, with his wives and his children, and his people. so they began to make two camps. leopard said, "ntori! child! i have mine here. you go there yonder." so they built their booths for sleeping-places; and rested another day; and then built their arala (drying frames) over their fire-places for smoke-drying the meat that they hoped to obtain. next day, they prepared their guns, and started out on the hunt. on that very first day, they met game, and, ku! (bang) went their guns, killing an elephant, and, ku! a wild ox. then leopard said, "ntori! child! we are successful! let us begin the work of cutting up!" after all the carcasses had been cut up, came the time to divide the meat between the two companies. so, leopard said, "as i am your uncle, i precede; i will choose first, and will give you the remainder." so leopard chose, taking out all the best pieces. when rat saw that most of the meat was going to leopard's side, he thought it time to begin to get his share. but when rat laid hold of a nice piece, leopard would say, "no! child! do not take the best: that belongs to your uncle"-- and leopard would claim the piece, and hand it over to his women. so it went on in the same way; to every nice piece that rat chose, leopard objected that it belonged to him. after leopard had taken all he wanted, there were left only the bowels and the heads and legs for rat. then they each went to their own camping-place, to spread the meat on their arala, and to cook their dinner. but, all the while that rat was spreading bones and bowels on his orala, he was vexed; for, there was very little meat on those bones; while leopard's people's arala were full of meat, and savory portions were simmering on their fires tied in bundles (agewu) of plantain leaves. at the noon meal, leopard sat down with his family, and rat with his. but rat had only poor food; while leopard and his people were rejoicing with rich meat. the second day was very much the same as the first. it was rat who did most of the hunting. with him it was, ku! (bang!), and some beast was down; and, ku! and some other beast was down. whenever rat fired, leopard would shout out, "ntori! child! what have you got?" and it was rat who would shout in reply, "nyare" (ox), or "njâku" (elephant), or "nkambi!" (antelope), or whatever the game might be. and it was leopard who offensively patronized him, saying, "that is a good boy, tata! (little father); bring it here to your uncle." then rat and all the servants would carry the carcass to leopard. so that day, the cutting and dividing was just like the first day; leopard claiming and taking the best, and leaving the skeleton and scraggy pieces and the bowels for rat. after that second day's hunt, rat was tired of this way of dividing, in which he got only the worthless pieces. so he decided to get back some of leopard's meat by artifice, for his own table, even if he had to take it from leopard's orala itself. he began to devise what he should do. as he was out walking, he came to a brook in which were sunken logs of hard heavy wood. they had lain there a long time, and were black with outside decay. with his machete in hand, he dived; and remaining under the water, he scraped the logs till he had removed the dark outside, and exposed the white inner wood. he kept on at the job scraping and scraping until the logs appeared white like ivory. then he went back to leopard's camp, and, with pretence of excitement, exclaimed, "mwe njegâ! i think we will be going to be rich. you don't know what i've found! such a big ivory-tusk hidden in the water! i think we better leave off hunting meat, and go to get this fine ivory." leopard replied, "good! come on!" the next day, they first arranged their fires so that the smoke-drying of their meat might continue during their absence; and then started for the ivory. they all prepared themselves, for diving, by taking off their good clothing, and wearing only a small loin-cloth. their entire companies went, men, women, and children, leaving not a single person in the camps. leopard says, "you, ntori, go first, as you know where the place is." rat says, "good! come on!" and they went on their way. arrived at the brook, rat says, "you all come on, and dive." leopard asks, "my son! is it still there?" rat, pointing, answers, "yes! my ivory is there." leopard, looking down in the water says, "i see no ivory!" rat, still pointing, replies, "there! those white things! don't you see them?" leopard says, "i never saw ivory look like logs." rat answered, "no? but this is a new kind. i assure you they are ivory! i have been down there, and i cleaned the mud off of them." leopard was satisfied, and said, "good! come on!" and they all dived. they laid hold of the supposed ivory, and pulled, and pushed, and lifted, and worked. but it was stuck fast, and they could not move it. while they were thus working, rat suddenly cried out, "njegâ! o! i forgot something! i must go quickly back to the olako. i will not be gone long. i shall return soon." rat came out of the brook; ran to the camp; took of his own bundles of bones and scraggy pieces, and put them on leopard's drying-frames, and took the same number of bundles of good meat from leopard's frames. then he ran back to the brook, to continue the work at the so-called ivory. soon after that, rat says, "mwe njegâ! it is time to return to the olako; we have worked long; i am hungry." leopard says, "good! come on!" so they returned to the camp to eat. rat says, "njegâ! as i am so hungry, i will not wait with you, but will go to my own olako at once. and i will put up a curtain between us, as it is a shame for one to eat in the presence of his elder." so rat put up a curtain; and opened a bundle of nice meat; and he and his people began to eat. when leopard took down one of his bundles, and opened it to share with his women, he was amazed, and said, "see! only bones and mean pieces! ah! what is this matter!" and he called out to the other camp, "ntori! tata!" rat responds, "eh! mwe njegâ?" leopard inquires, "what kind of meat are you eating?" rat answers, "my own, from my own bundles. but what kind have you, mwe njegâ?" leopard says, "my women prepared meat that was nice; but now i have only bones. i am surprised at that." the next, the fourth day, rat said to leopard, "i think we better change from the hard work on the ivory. let us go hunting today; and tomorrow we will resume the ivory." leopard assented "good! come on!" and they started out to hunt. they were successful again as on the previous days. at the time of the division of the meat, rat showed no displeasure at leopard's taking the best pieces; as he had now his own artifice to get them back. and the meats of the day were placed on their owners' respective drying-frames. by this day's doings, many of leopard's baskets were full, ready to be taken to town, while most of rat's were still empty. on the fifth day, they went to the brook again, to their fruitless work of pulling at the so-called ivory. the same things happened as before; rat remembers that he has forgotten something; has to go in haste to the camp; rapidly changes the bundles on his and leopard's frames; returns to the brook; they all come back to the camp to eat; and there were repeated leopard's surprise, and his questions to rat about the kinds of meat they were eating. thus they continued; on alternate days hunting, and working at the ivory that was stuck immovably fast in the mud; and rat stealing; and leopard complaining. finally, leopard became tired of his losses; and, one day, without letting anyone know what he intended doing, he said, "i will take a little walk." rat says, "you go alone? may i accompany you?" leopard said, "no! i go alone; i won't be long away; and i do not go far." so leopard went to the wizard ra-marânge, whom as soon as he saw him, exclaimed, "what are you come for? are you in trouble?" leopard told him the matter of the losses of the meat. then ra-marânge jumped into his fire, and emerged powerful and wise. and he said, "i will make for you something that will find out for you who it is that takes your meat." so ra-marânge made a little image of a man, and conferred on it wisdom and power, and gave it to leopard, who took it to his camp, and hid it in his hut. the next day they all resumed the work at the brook, with the ivory. there was the same diving, the same fruitless pulling, rat's same need of going back to the camp, and his same attempts at stealing. while he was doing this, he sees something like a little man standing near him. rat puts out his hand to take from leopard's bundles as usual, and the image catches him by the wrist of that hand. rat indignantly says, "you! this little fool! leave me! what do you catch me for?" but the image was silent; nor did it let go its hold. so rat struck at it with his other hand. and the image caught that hand with its other hand. then rat was angry and kicked with one foot at a leg of the image. and that foot was retained by that leg of the image. rat kicked with his remaining foot; it also was retained by the image's other leg. he was thus held in the power of the image. rat, in desperation, said, "let me go!" the image spoke, and simply said, "no!" rat felt he was in a bad situation; but he put on a bold face. he knew that, by his long delay, the others must have given up the work at the brook, and would by now be returning to the camp; and, in a little while, he would be discovered. to forestall that discovery, he shouted out, "mwe nejgâ, come quickly! i've found the person who changes your bundles!" leopard, on the path, heard his voice, and replied, "my child, is that so? hold him fast!" rat still daringly said, "come quickly! he wants to get away from my grasp!" leopard replied, "hold fast! i am coming!" they all came hastily, both of rat's people, and of leopard's people; and there they saw rat held fast by the hands and legs of the image. leopard asked, "where is he?" rat, daring to the last, said, "this little man here that i am holding." leopard said, "now that i am here, let go of him, for i will take charge of him." rat struggled, but in vain. leopard several times repeated his direction to rat, "let go of him!" but rat was utterly unable to withdraw his limbs from the power of the image. and he gave up the effort, in shame. then leopard had to help release rat; the conferred power of the image being subservient to him. he did not strike rat, he being his relative. but rebuked him, "ah! ntori! now i know it was you who made all the trouble about my meat!" and he took back all his fine bundles, and returned rat his poor bundles. rat went to his own camp ashamed, but still angry at the unjust division of the meat. as leopard's baskets were now full, he announced that they should prepare to break camp, and return to town. rat's women murmured, "ah! all going away, and our baskets almost empty!" rat comforted them, "yes; it is so; but, we will find a way to fill them!" so, the next day, while the others were gone to get leaves and vines with which to tie up their baskets, rat took his empty ones to the brook and filled them with stones, and tied them up with leaves, as if they contained meat. on the following day, as they were about to start on their journey, rat said to leopard, "as you are the elder, go you first, and i will follow." leopard said, "good! come on!" and they went on the path, rat keeping close behind leopard's people. (baskets being carried tied on the back with a strap over the forehead, the bearer leans heavily forward, and cannot see what is happening behind.) rat had prepared a hook with a handle. from time to time, as they came to narrow places in the path where thorny branches met, he would strike the hook into some basket before him, and in pretence, would say, "wait! a thorn on this branch has caught your basket! let me unfasten it." while the carrier would stand still for rat to release the branch, the latter seized the chance to take pieces of meat from the basket, and substitute stones from his own baskets. the way was long; and, at every obstructed place, rat kept on at his pretence of helping to free some basket of leopard's from the thorns that caught it, and changed pieces of good meat for his stones. before they reached leopard's town, darkness began to fall, and both companies were very tired, especially that of leopard; for, their baskets seemed to have grown heavier. rat said, "njegâ! all this hard day's walk! hide our baskets, yours in one place, and mine in another, and let us go on to town and sleep; and we will send back our women for the baskets in the morning." leopard assented, "good! come on!" so they left their baskets, and all went to town. the next morning, rat sent his people very, very early. leopard sent his later, at the usual time of morning business. when his people were going they met rat's people coming back with their loads, and exclaimed, "you are loaded already!" when leopard's people brought their baskets to the town, and opened them, they were amazed to find that they had little else than stones and bones. leopard was very angry; and, going to rat, he began to scold, "you have taken away my meat!" "no i have my own. look! these baskets, you know them, they are mine! perhaps some one stole your meat in the night and put the stones in place. but, as you are in such a trouble, i will share with you of mine." so he called to his women, "give njegâ a few pieces of meat." leopard took the meat, and rat and his people went away to their own town. but leopard was not satisfied. he was sure that rat had played him a trick. he had forgiven rat his stealing at the camp; but, for this last trick, he meditated revenge. tale tests of death-- st version persons njegâ (leopard) ntori (wild-rat) note it is the proper and most friendly mode, that relatives and friends should hasten to visit their sick, on the very first information, without waiting to be invited or summoned. leopard told his head-wife, "ntori has taken our meat and deceived me in all these ways; i will kill him and eat him." so he pretended to be sick. the next day, news was sent to rat that his uncle leopard was sick of a fever. the following day, word was again sent that he was very sick indeed, and that he wanted a parting word with rat. rat sent back a message, "i hear; and i will come tomorrow." rat suspected some evil, and did not believe that leopard was sick. so he went to the forest, and collected all kinds of insects that sting, and tied them into five little bundles. next day, word came to him, "njegâ is dead." rat went quickly, taking the five little bundles with him. when he reached leopard's town, he joined the crowd of mourners in the street, and lifted up his voice in wailing. leopard's head-wife went to him, and said, "come into the house, and mourn with me, at your uncle's bed-side." rat went with her; but he did not take the seat that was offered him, as a near relative, at the supposed dead man's head. he first explained, "after a person is reported dead, it is proper to make five tests to prove whether he is really dead, before we bury him." so he stood by the bed, at a point safe from leopard's hands, and opened a bundle, and lifting the shroud, quickly laid the bundle on leopard's naked body. the insects, infuriated by their imprisonment, flew out and attacked leopard's body, as it was the object nearest to them, and they were confined under the shroud. leopard endured, and did not move. rat opened a second bundle, and thrust it also on another part of leopard's body. leopard could scarcely refrain from wincing. rat opened a third, and laid it in the same way on another part. leopard's face began to twitch with the torture. rat opening a fourth, used it in the same way; and leopard in pain began to twist his body; but, when rat opened the fifth bundle, leopard could endure the stings no longer. he started up from the bed, holding a dagger he had hidden under the bed-clothing. but rat was too agile for him, and ran out before leopard could fully rise from his supposed death-bed, and escaped to his own place. the mourners fled from the furious insects, and leopard was left in agony under the poison of their stings. tale tests of death--second version persons njegâ (leopard) ibâbâ (jackal) with ngomba (porcupine) nkambi (antelope) njâgu (elephant) iheli (gazelle) ekaga (tortoise) with ndongo (pepper) hako (ants) and nyoi (bees) and others note all of a neighborhood go to a mourning for a dead person. failure to go would have been regarded, formerly, as a sign of a sense of guilt as the cause of the death. formerly, at funerals, there was great destruction. some of a man's wives and slaves were buried with him, with a large quantity of his goods; and his fruit trees adjacent to the houses were ruthlessly cut down. all, as signs of grief; as much as to say, "if the beloved dead cannot longer enjoy these things, no one else shall." the ancestor of the leopards never forgave the ancestor of the gazelles, but nursed his wrath at the trick which the latter had played on him with the insects. unable to catch gazelles, because of their adroitness, the leopard wrecks his anger on all other beasts by killing them at any opportunity. these two beasts, leopard and jackal, were living together in the same town. leopard said to jackal, "my friend! i do not eat all sorts of food; i eat only animals." so, one day, leopard went to search for some beast in the forest. he wandered many hours, but could not find any for his food. on another day, leopard said to jackal, "my friend! let us arrange some plan, by which we can kill some animal. for, i've wandered into the forest again and again, and have found nothing." leopard made these remarks to his friend in the dark of the evening. so they sat that night and planned and, after their conversation, they went to lie down in their houses. and they slept their sleep. then soon, the daylight broke. and leopard, carrying out their plan, said to jackal, "take up your bedding, and put it out in the open air of the street." jackal did so. leopard laid down on that mattress, in accordance with their plan, and stretched out like a corpse lying still, as if he could not move a muscle. he said to jackal, "call ngomba, and let him come to me." so jackal shouted, "come! ngomba, come! that beast that kills animals is dead! come!" so porcupine came to the mourning, weeping, and wailing, as if he was really sorry for the death of his enemy. he approached near the supposed corpse. and he jeered at it. "this was the person who wasted us people; and this is his body!" leopard heard this derision. suddenly he leaped up. and porcupine went down under his paw, dead. then leopard said to his friend jackal, "well! cut it up! and let us eat it." and they finished eating it. on another day, leopard, again in the street, stretched himself on the bedding. at his direction, jackal called for antelope. antelope came; and leopard killed him, as he had done to porcupine. on another day, ox was called. and leopard did to ox the same as he had done to the others. on another day, elephant was called in the same way; and he died in the same way. in the same way, leopard killed some of almost all the other beasts one after another, until there were left only two. then jackal said, "njegâ! my friend! there are left, of all the beasts, only two, iheli and ekaga. but, what can you do with iheli? for, he has many artifices. what, also, can you do against ekaga? for, he too, has many devices." leopard replied, "i will do as i usually have done; so, tomorrow, i will lie down again, as if i were a corpse." that day darkened into night. and another daylight broke. and leopard went out of the house to lie down on the bedding in the street. each limb was extended out as if dead; and his mouth open, with lower jaw fallen, like that of a dead person. then jackal called, "iheli! come here! that person who wastes the lives of the beasts is dead! he's dead!" gazelle said to himself, "i hear! so! njegâ is dead? i go to the mourning!" gazelle lived in a town distant about three miles. he started on the journey, taking with him his spear and bag; but, he said to himself, "before i go to the mourning, i will stop on the way at the town of ekaga." he came to the town of tortoise, and he said to him, "chum! have you heard the news? that person who kills beasts and mankind is dead!" but tortoise answered, "no! go back to your town! that person is not dead. go back!" gazelle said, "no! for, before i go back to my town, i will first go to njegâ's to see." so tortoise said, "if you are determined to go there, i will tell you something." gazelle exclaimed, "yes! uncle, speak!" then tortoise directed him, "take ndongo." gazelle took some. tortoise said, "take also hako, and take also nyoi. tie them all up in a bundle of plantain leaves." (he told gazelle to do all these things, as a warning.) and tortoise added, "you will find njegâ with limbs stretched out like a corpse. take a machete with you in your hands. when you arrive there, begin to cut down the plantain-stalks. and you must cry out 'who killed my uncle? who killed my uncle?' if he does not move, then you sit down and watch him." so gazelle went, journeyed and came to that town of mourning. he asked jackal, "ibâbâ! this person, how did he die?" jackal replied, "yesterday afternoon this person was seized with a fever; and today, he is a corpse." gazelle looked at leopard from a distance, his eyes fixed on him, even while he was slashing down the plantains, as he was told to do. but, leopard made no sign, though he heard the noise of the plantain-stalk falling to the ground. presently, jackal said to gazelle, "go near to your uncle's bed, and look at the corpse." leopard began in his heart to arrange for a spring, being ready to fight, and thinking, "what time iheli shall be near me, i will kill him." gazelle approached, but carefully stood off a rod distant from the body of leopard. then gazelle drew the bundle of ants out of his bag, and said to himself, "is this person, really dead? i will test him!" but, gazelle stood warily ready to flee at the slightest sign. he quickly opened the bundle of insects; and he joined the three, the ants, the bees, and the pepper, all in one hand; and, standing with care, he threw them at leopard. the bundle of leaves, as it struck leopard, flew open. being released, the bees rejoiced, saying, "so! i sting njegâ!" pepper also was glad, saying, "so! i will make him perspire!" ants also spitefully exclaimed, "i've bitten you!" the pain of all these made leopard jump up in wrath; and he leaped toward gazelle. but he dashed away into the forest, shouting as he disappeared, "i'm not an iheli of the open prairie, but of the forest wilderness!" so, he fled and came to the town of tortoise. there he told tortoise, "you are justified! njegâ indeed is not dead! he was only pretending, in order to kill." and tortoise, remarked, "i am the doyen of beasts. being the eldest, if i tell any one a thing, he should not contradict me." tale tasks done for a wife place in njambi's kingdom persons a rich merchant and his daughter njâgu (elephant) njegâ (leopard) njina (gorilla) nguvu (hippopotamus) ekaga (tortoise) mbodi (an enormous goat) servants, and townspeople note the artifices of tortoise compete with the strength of leopard. the story of the giant goat is a separate tale in no. , of part second. in the time when mankind and all other animals lived together, to all the beasts the news came that there was a merchant in a far country, who had a daughter, for whom he was seeking a marriage. and he had said, "i do not want money to be the dowry that shall be paid by a suitor for my daughter. but, whosoever shall do some difficult works, which i shall assign him, to him i will give her." all the beasts were competing for the prize. first, elephant went on that errand. the merchant said to him, "do such-and-such tasks, and you shall have my daughter. more than that, i will give you wealth also." elephant went at the tasks, tried, and failed; and came back saying he could not succeed. next, gorilla stood up; he went. and the merchant told him, in the same way as to elephant, that he was to do certain tasks. gorilla tried, and failed, and came back disgusted. then, hippopotamus advanced, and said he would attempt to win the woman. his companions encouraged him with hopes of success, because of his size and strength. he went, tried, and failed. thus, almost all beasts attempted, one after another; they tried to do the tasks, and failed. at last there were left as contestants, only leopard and tortoise. neither was disheartened by the failure of the others; each asserted that he would succeed in marrying that rich daughter. tortoise said, "i'm going now!" but leopard said, "no! i first!" tortoise yielded, "well, go; you are the elder. i will not compete with you. go you, first!" leopard went, and made his application. the merchant said to him, "good! that you have come. but, the others came, and failed. try you." leopard said, "very well." he tried, and failed, and went back angry. tortoise then went. he saluted the merchant, and told him he had come to take his daughter. the merchant said, "do so; but try to do the tasks first." tortoise tried all the tasks, and did them all. the first was that of a calabash dipper that was cracked. the merchant said to him, "you take this cracked calabash and bring it to me full of water all the way from the spring to this town." tortoise looking and examining, objected, "this calabash! cracked! how can it carry water?" the merchant replied, "you yourself must find out. if you succeed, you marry my daughter." tortoise took the calabash to the spring. putting it into the water, he lifted it. but the water all ran out before he had gone a few steps. again he did this, five times; and the water was always running out. sitting, he meditated, "what is this? how can it be done?" thinking again, he said, "i'll do it! i know the art how!" he went to the forest, took gum of the okume (mahogany tree) lighted a fire, melted the gum, smeared it over the crack, and made it water-tight; then, dipping the calabash into the spring, it did not leak. he took it full to the father-in-law, and called out, "father-in-law! this is the calabash of water." the merchant asked, "but what did you do to it?" he answered "i mended it with gum." the father said, "good for you! the others did not think of that easy simple solution. you have sense!" tortoise then said, "i have finished this one task; today has passed. tomorrow i will begin on the other four." the next morning, he came to receive his direction from the merchant, who said, "ekaga! you see that tall tree far away? at the top are fruits. if you want my daughter, pluck the fruits from the top, and you shall marry her." tortoise went and stood watching and looking and examining the tree. its trunk was all covered with soap, and impossible to be climbed. he returned to the merchant, and asked, "that fruit you wish, may it be obtained in any way, even if one does not climb the tree?" he was answered, "yes, in any way, except cutting down the tree. only so that i get the fruit, i am satisfied." tortoise had already tried from morning to afternoon to climb that tree, but could not. so, after he had asked the merchant his question, he went back to the tree; and from evening, all night and until morning, he dug about the roots till they were all free. and the tree fell, without his having "cut" the trunk at all. so he took the fruit to the merchant, and told him that he had not "cut down" the tree, but that he had it "dug up." the merchant said, "you have done well. people who came before you failed to think of that. good for you!" on the third day, the merchant said to the spectators, "i will not name the other three tasks. you, my assistants, may name them." so they thought of one task after another. but one and another said, "no, that is not hard; let us search for a harder." finally, they found three hard tasks. tortoise was ready for and accomplished them all. then the merchant announced, "now, you may marry my daughter; and tomorrow you shall make your journey." they made a great feast; an ox was killed; and they had songs and music all night, clear on till morning. but, while all this was going on, leopard, who was left at his town, was saying to himself, "this ekaga! he has stayed five days! had he failed, he would not have stayed so long! so! he has been able to do the tasks! is that a good thing?" (on the day that tortoise started on the journey to seek the merchant's daughter, leopard had been heard to say, "if ekaga succeeds in getting that wife, i will take her from him by force.") when tortoise was ready to start on his return journey with his wife, the father-in-law gave him very many things, slaves and goats and a variety of goods, and said, "go, you and your wife and these things. i send people to escort you part of the way. they are not to go clear on to your town, but are to turn back on the way." tortoise and company journeyed. when the escort were about to turn back, tortoise said, "day is past. make an olako (camp) here. we sleep here; and, in the morning, you shall go back." that night he thought, "njegâ said he would rob me of my wife. perhaps he may come to meet me on the way!" so, he swallowed all of the things, to hide them,--wife, servants, and all. while tortoise was thus on the way, leopard had planned not to wait his return to town, but had set out to meet him. so, in the morning, the two, journeying in opposite directions, met. tortoise gave leopard a respectful "mbolo!" and leopard returned the salutation. leopard asked, "what news? that woman, have you married her?" tortoise answered, "that woman! not at all!" leopard looking at tortoise's style and manner as of one proud of success, said, "surely you have married; for you look happy, and show signs of success." but tortoise swore he had not married. leopard only said, "good." then tortoise asked, "but, where are you going?" leopard answered, "i am going out walking and hunting. but you, where are you going?" tortoise replied, "i did not succeed in marrying the woman; so i am going back to town. i tried, but i failed." "but," said leopard, "what then makes your belly so big?" tortoise replied, "on the way i found an abundance of mushrooms, and i ate heartily of them. if you do not believe it, i can show you them by vomiting them up." leopard said, "never mind to vomit. go on your journey." and leopard went on his way. but, soon he thought, "ah! ekaga has lied to me!" so he ran around back, and came forward to meet tortoise again. tortoise looked and saw leopard coming, and observed that his face was full of wrath. he feared, but said to himself, "if i flee, njegâ will catch me. i will go forward and try artifice." as he approached leopard, the latter was very angry, and said, "you play with me! you say you have not married the woman i wanted. tell me the truth!" tortoise again swore an oath, "no! i have not married the woman! i told you i ate mushrooms, and offered to show you; and you refused." so leopard said, "well, then, vomit." tortoise bent over, and vomited and vomited mushrooms and mushrooms; and then said triumphantly, "so! njegâ you see!" leopard looked, and said, "but, ekaga, your belly is still full,--go on vomiting." tortoise tried to excuse himself, "i have done vomiting." leopard persisted, "no! keep on at it." tortoise went on retching; and a box of goods fell out of his mouth. leopard still said, "go on!" and tortoise vomited in succession a table and other furniture. he was compelled to go on retching; and slaves came out. and at last, up was vomited the woman! leopard shouted, "ah! ekaga! you lied! you said you had not married! i will take this woman!" and he took her, sarcastically saying, "ekaga, you have done me a good work! you have brought me all these things, these goods, and slaves, and a wife! thank you!" tortoise thought to himself, "i have no strength for war." so, though anger was in his heart, he showed no displeasure in his face. and they all went on together toward their town. with wrath still in his heart, he went clear on to the town, and then made his complaint to each of the townspeople. but they all were afraid of leopard, and said nothing, nor dared to give tortoise even sympathy. there was in that country among the mountains, an enormous goat. the other beasts, all except leopard, were accustomed to go to that goat, when hungry, and say, "we have no meat to eat." and the goat allowed them to cut pieces of flesh from his body. he could let any part of the interior of his body be taken except his heart. all the animals had agreed among themselves not to tell leopard where they got their meat, lest he, in his greediness, would go and take the heart. so they had told him they got their meat as he did, hunting. tortoise, angry because leopard has taken his wife, said to himself, "i will make a cause of complaint against njegâ that shall bring punishment upon him from our king. i will cause njegâ to kill that goat." on another day, tortoise went and got meat from the goat, and came back to town, and did not hide it from leopard. leopard said to him, "ekaga! where did you get this meat?" tortoise whispered, "come to my house, and i will tell you." they went. and tortoise divided the meat with him, and said, "do not tell on me: but, we get the meat off at a great goat. tomorrow, i go; and you, follow behind me." so, the next day, they went, tortoise as if by himself, and leopard following, off to the great goat. arrived there, leopard wondered at the sight, "o! this great goat! but, from where do you take its meat?" tortoise replied, "wait for me! you will see!" he went, and leopard followed. tortoise said to the goat, "we have meat-hunger: we come to seek meat from you." the goat's mouth was open as usual; tortoise entered, and leopard followed, to get flesh from inside. in the goat's interior was a house, full of meat; and they entered it. leopard wondered at its size; and tortoise told him, "cut where you please, but not from the heart, lest the goat die." and they began to take meat. leopard, with greediness, coveting the forbidden heart, went with knife near to it. tortoise exclaimed, "there! there! be careful." but leopard, though he had enough other flesh, longed for the heart, and was not satisfied. he again approached with the knife near it: and tortoise warned and protested. these very prohibitions caused leopard to have his own way, and his greediness overcame him. he cut the heart: and the goat fell dying. tortoise exclaimed, "eh! njegâ! i told you not to touch the heart! because of this matter i will inform on you." and he added, "since it is so, let us go." but leopard said, "goat's mouth is shut. how shall we get out? let us hide in this house." and he asked, "where will you hide?" tortoise replied, "in the stomach." leopard said, "stomach! it is the very thing for me, njegâ, myself!" so ekaga consented, "well! take it! i will hide in the gall-bladder." so they hid, each in his place. soon, as they listened, they heard voices shouting, "the goat is dead! a fearful thing! the goat is dead!" that news spread, and all who had been accustomed to get flesh there, came to see what was the matter. they all said that, as the goat was dead, it was best to cut and divide him. they slit open the belly, and said, "lay aside this big stomach; it is good; but throw away the bitter gall-sac." they looked for the heart; but there was none! a child, to whom had been handed the gall-bladder to throw it away, was flinging it into some bushes. as he did so, out jumped something from among the bushes; and the child asked, "who are you?" the thing replied, pretending to be vexed, "i am ekaga; i come here with the others to get meat, and you, just as i arrived, throw that dirty thing in my face!" the other people pacified him, "do not get angry. excuse the child. he did not see you. you shall have your share." then tortoise called out, "silence! silence! silence!" they all stood ready to listen, and he said, "do not cut up the goat till we first know who killed it. that stomach there! what makes it so big?" leopard, in the stomach, heard; but he did not believe that tortoise meant it, and thought to himself, "what a fool is this ekaga, in pretending to inform on me, by directing attention to the stomach!" tortoise ordered, "all you, take your spears, and stick that stomach! for the one who killed goat is in it!" and they all got their spears ready. leopard did not speak or move; for, he still thought tortoise was only joking. tortoise began with his spear, and the others all thrust in. and leopard holding the heart, was seen dying! all shouted, "ah! njegâ killed our goat! ah! he's the one who killed it." tortoise taunted leopard, "asai! (shame for you) you took my wife; and now you are dead!" leopard died. they divided the goat, and returned to town. tortoise took again his wife and all his goods, now that leopard was dead. and he was satisfied that his artifice had surpassed leopard's strength. tale a tug-of-war persons ekaga (tortoise) njâgu (elephant) ngubu (hippopotamus) note african natives are sensitive about questions of equality and seniority. a certain term, "mwera" (chum) may be addressed to other than an equal, only at risk of a quarrel. a story of the trick by which tortoise apparently proved himself the equal of both elephant and hippopotamus. observe the preposterous size of elephant's trunk! but everything, to the native african mind, was enormous in the pre-historic times. leopard was dead, after the accusation against him by tortoise for killing the great goat. the children of leopard were still young; they had not grown to take their father's power and place. and tortoise considered himself now a great personage. he said to people, "we three who are left,--i and njâgu and ngubu, are of equal power; we eat at the same table, and have the same authority." every day he made these boasts; and people went to elephant and hippopotamus, reporting, "so-and-so says ekaga." elephant and hippopotamus laughed, and disregarded the report, and said, "that's nothing, he's only to be despised." one day hippopotamus met elephant in the forest; salutations were made, "mbolo!" "ai, mbolo!" each to the other. hippopotamus asked elephant about a new boast that tortoise had been making, "have you, or have you not heard?" elephant answered, "yes, i have heard. but i look on it with contempt. for, i am njâgu. i am big. my foot is as big as ekaga's body. and he says he is equal to me! but, i have not spoken of the matter, and will not speak, unless i hear ekaga himself make his boast. and then i shall know what i will do." and hippopotamus also said, "i am doing so too, in silence. i wait to hear ekaga myself." tortoise heard of what elephant and hippopotamus had been threatening, and he asked his informant just the exact words that they had used, "they said that they waited to hear you dare to speak to them; and that, in the meanwhile, they despised you." tortoise asked, "so! they despise me, do they?" "yes," was the reply. then he said, "so! indeed, i will go to them." he told his wife, "give me my coat to cover my body." he dressed; and started to the forest. he found elephant lying down; his trunk was eight miles long; his ears as big as a house, and his four feet beyond measure. tortoise audaciously called to him, "mwera! i have come! you don't rise to salute me? mwera has come!" elephant looked, rose up and stared at tortoise, and indignantly asked, "ekaga! whom do you call 'mwera'?" tortoise replied, "you! i call you 'mwera.' are you not, njâgu?" elephant, with great wrath, asked, "ekaga! i have heard you said certain words. it is true that you said them?" tortoise answered, "njâgu, don't get angry! wait, let us first have a conversation." then he said to elephant, "i did call you, just now, 'mwera'; but, you, njâgu, why do you condemn me? you think that, because you are of great expanse of flesh, you can surpass ekaga, just because i am small? let us have a test. tomorrow, sometime in the morning, we will have a lurelure (tug-of-war)." said elephant, "of what use? i can mash you with one foot." tortoise said, "be patient. at least try the test." so, elephant, unwilling, consented. tortoise added, "but, when we tug, if one overpulls the other, he shall be considered the greater; but, if neither, then we are mwera." then tortoise went to the forest, and cut a very long vine, and coming back to elephant, said "this end is yours. i go off into the forest with my end to a certain spot, and tomorrow i return to that spot; and we will have our tug, and neither of us will stop, to eat or sleep until either you pull me over or the vine breaks." tortoise went far off with his end of the vine to the town of hippopotamus, and hid the vine's end at the outskirts of the town. he went to hippopotamus and found him bathing, and going ashore, back and forth, to and from the water. tortoise shouted to him, "mwera! i have come! you! come ashore! i am visiting you!" hippopotamus came bellowing in great wrath with wide open jaws, ready to fight, and said, "i will fight you today! for, whom do you call 'mwera'?" tortoise replied, "why! you! i do not fear your size. our hearts are the same. but, don't fight yet! let us first talk." hippopotamus grunted, and sat down; and tortoise said, "i, ekaga, i say that you and i and njâgu are equal, we are mwera. even though you are great and i small, i don't care. but if you doubt me, let us have a trial. tomorrow morning let us have a lurelure. he who shall overcome, shall be the superior. but, if neither is found superior, then we are equals." hippopotamus exclaimed that the plan was absurd; but, finally he consented. tortoise then stood up, and went out, and got his end of the vine, and brought it to hippopotamus, and said, "this end is yours. and i now go. tomorrow, when you feel the vine shaken, know that i am ready at the other end; and then you begin, and we will not stop to eat or sleep until this test is ended." hippopotamus then went to the forest to gather leaves of medicine with which to strengthen his body. and elephant, at the other end, was doing the same, making medicine to give himself strength; and at night they were both asleep. in the morning, tortoise went to the middle of the vine, where at its half-way, he had made on the ground a mark; and he shook it towards one end, and then towards the other. elephant caught his end, as he saw it shake, and hippopotamus did the same at his end. "orindi went back and forth" (a proverb of a fish of that name that swims in that way), elephant and hippopotamus alternately pulling. "nkendinli was born of his father and mother" (a proverb, meaning distinctions in individualities). each one, hippopotamus and elephant, doing in his own way. tortoise smiled at his arrangement with each, that, in the tug, if one overcame, it would be proved by his dragging the other; but, if neither overcame, they were not to cease, until the vine broke. elephant holding the vine taut, and hippopotamus also holding it taut, tortoise was laughing in his heart as he watched the quivering vine. he went away to seek for food, leaving those two at their tug, in hunger. he went off into the forest and found his usual food, mushrooms. he ate his belly full, and then took his drink; and then went to his town to sleep. he rose in late afternoon, and said to himself, "i'll go and see about the tug, whether those fools are still pulling." when he went there, the vine was still stretched taut; and he thought, "asai! shame! let them die with hunger!" he sat there, the vine trembling with tensity, and he in his heart mocking the two tired beasts. the one drew the other toward himself; and then, a slight gain brought the mark back; but neither was overcoming. at last tortoise nicked the vine with his knife; the vine parted; and, at their ends, elephant and hippopotamus fell violently back onto the ground. tortoise said to himself, "so! that's done! now i go to elephant with one end of the broken vine; tomorrow to hippopotamus." he went, and came on to elephant, and found him looking dolefully, and bathing his leg with medicine, and said, "mwera! how do you feel? do you consent that we are mwera?" elephant admitted, "ekaga, i did not know you were so strong! when the vine broke, i fell over and hurt my leg. yes, we are really equal. really! strength is not because the body is large. i despised you because your body was small. but actually, we are equal in strength!" so they ate and drank and played as chums; and tortoise returned to his town. early the next morning, with the other end of the broken vine, he went to visit hippopotamus, who looked sick, and was rubbing his head, and asked, "ngubu! how do you feel, mwera?" hippopotamus answered, "really! ekaga! so we are equals! i, ngubu, so great! and you, ekaga, so small! we pulled and pulled. i could not surpass you, nor you me. and when the vine broke, i fell and hurt my head. so, indeed strength has no greatness of body." tortoise and hippopotamus ate and drank and played; and tortoise returned to his town. after that, whenever they three and others met to talk in palaver (council) the three sat together on the highest seats. were they equal? yes, they were equal. tale agenda: rat's play on a name persons njegâ (leopard) ntori (rat) rângi (frog) igâmbâ (crab) note in native african etiquette, a company of persons is saluted with the use of the verb in the plural; but only the oldest, or the supposed leader, if his name is known, is mentioned by name. the native custom among polite tribes, is to leave a guest to eat without being watched. the twitching of a muscle of an arm, or any other part of the body (called okalimambo) is regarded as a sign of coming evil. compare macbeth, act , scene . "by the pricking of my thumb something wicked this way comes." the absurd and the unreasonable (e.g., the swallowing of a wife, goats, servants, etc.) are a constant feature of the native legends in their use of the impossible. all native africans have more than one name, and often change their names to suit circumstances. but, while all their names have a meaning (just as our english names, "augustus," "clara," etc.) those meanings are not thought of when denominating an individual; e.g., "bwalo" which means canoe. leopards do not like to wet their feet. leopard wanted a new wife. so he sought for a young woman of a far country, of whom he heard as a nice girl, a daughter of one of the kings of that country. he did not go himself, but sent word, and received answer by messenger. neither the woman nor her father had ever seen leopard. they knew of him only by reputation. the king was pleased with the proposed alliance, and assented, saying, "yes! i am willing. go! get yourself ready, and come with your marriage company." so leopard went around and invited many other beasts, "come! and help me get a new one!" they all replied, "yes!" and they all started together for the king's town. when they had gone half-way, one of their number, a big forest rat said, "brothers! let us begin here to change our names, so that when we get to the town, we shall not be known by our usual names." but leopard refused, "no! i won't! i stick by my old name. my name is njegâ." all the others said the same, and retained their own names. but rat insisted for himself, "i will not be called ntori. i will be called 'strangers.' my name is agenda," (the plural of ogenda which means "stranger"). when they approached the town, the inhabitants, with great politeness, ran out to welcome them, shouting, "agenda! saleni, saleni!" (strangers! welcome ye! welcome ye!) rat turned to the company and said, "hear that! you see they are saluting me as the leader of this company." upon their entering the town, they were shown to the large public reception-house; and the people said to them, "now! strangers (agenda!), march in!" rat turned again to his companions, and said, "you see! they have again addressed me specially by name, asking me to take possession of this room." they all went in feeling uncomfortably; but rat said to them, "never mind! though this room was evidently prepared specially for me, i am not selfish, and i invite you to share it with me." after the visitors had all been seated, the people came to give them the formal final salutation, saying "strangers (agenda), mbolani! (long life to ye)." rat promptly whispered to his companions, saying, "this mbolo is to me for you, i alone will respond to it." so, only he replied, "ai mbolani! ai." (mbolani is the second person plural of the irregular defective verb mbolo equal to "live long.") the day passed. in the evening, the people brought in an abundant supply of food, and set it down on the table, saying, "strangers (agenda!), eat! here is your food!" and they went out, closing the door, so that the guests in their eating should not be annoyed by spectators. then rat said, "you see! all this food is mine, though i am not able to eat it all." he alone began to eat of it. when he had satisfied his appetite, he said, "truly this food is my own, but i am sorry for you, and i will give you of it." so he gave out to each, one by one, very small pieces of fish and plantain. in the morning, the people thoughtfully sent water for the usual morning washing of hands and face. rat hasted to open the door; and the slaves carrying the vessels of water, said to him, "these are sent to the strangers (agenda)." so rat took the water and used it all for himself. this second day was a repetition of the first. the townspeople continued their hospitality, sending food and drink and tobacco and fruits; and making many kind inquiries of what "the agenda" would like to have. rat, received all these things as for himself; while the rest of the company felt themselves slighted, and were hungry and disgusted. on the third day, the company said among themselves, "njegâ told us that our visit was to last the usual five days; but we cannot stand such treatment as this!" and they began to run away, one by one. even leopard himself followed them, provoked at his expected father-in-law's supposed neglect of him. but, before leopard had gone, rat went to the bride elect, and said, "i never saw such a party as this! they do not eat, and are not willing to await the marriage dance for the bride on the fifth day." when they were all secretly gone, leaving rat alone, he said to the woman, "i will tell them all to go, even my friend njegâ whom i brought to escort me. but i will not go without you, even if we have not had the dance; for, i am the one who was to marry you." and the father of the girl said to rat, "since they have treated you so, never mind to call them again for the dance. you just take your wife and go." so the king gave his daughter farewell presents of boxes of clothing, and two female servants to help her, and a number of goats, and men-servants to carry the baggage. rat and wife and attendants set out on their journey. when they were far away from the king's town, rat exclaimed, "i feel okalimambo (premonition)." (he suspected that leopard was somewhere near.) so he dismissed the men-servants, and sent them back to the king. and then quickly, in order to hide them, he swallowed the woman and the two maid-servants and all the boxes of clothing, and the goats. rat then went on, and on, and on, with his journey, until at a cross-roads, he saw leopard coming cross-ways toward him; and he called out, "who are you?" the reply came, "i am njegâ. and who are you?" rat answered, "ntori." then leopard called to him, "come here!" "no!" said rat, "i am in a hurry, and want to get home--" and he went on without stopping. so leopard said, "well, i pass on my way too!" "good!" said rat, "pass on!" and they went on their separate ways. but leopard, at a turn in his road, rounded back, and hasted by another path to get in front of rat. when leopard again saw rat a short distance before him, he calls out, "who are you?" the reply was "ntori; and who are you?" leopard answered, "i'm njegâ. stop on your way, and come here to me!" rat replied, "no! you asked me once before to stop, and i refused. and i refuse now; i must pass on." because of rat's unwillingness to stop, leopard began to chase him, and to shout at him, "you have my wife!" rat answered back, "no! i have no wife of yours!" "you lie! you have the woman with you. what makes your body so big?" rat ran as fast as he could, with leopard close after him. rat's home is always a hole in the ground; and, as he was hard pressed in his flight, he dashed into the first hole he came to, which happened to be a small opening into a cave. but his tail was not yet drawn in and leopard was so near that he seized it. projecting from the mouth of the hole there was also the small root of a tree. rat called out, "friend njegâ! what do you think you have caught hold of?" "your tail!" said leopard. said rat, "that is not my tail! this other thing near you is my tail!" so leopard let go of the tail, and seized the root. rat slid quickly to the bottom of the hole, and called out, "o! njegâ! i did not think you were so silly! you had hold of my tail, and you let me go! you just look at your hand; you will see my tail-hairs clinging to it!" leopard went away in wrath; and, finding frog at a near-by brook, he said to him, "rângi! you just watch. i do not want ntori to escape from that hole. watch, while i go to get some fire, with which to burn him out." shortly after leopard had gone, rat began to creep out. seeing frog standing on guard, he said, "good rângi! let me pass!" but frog replied, "no! i have my orders to watch you here." then said rat, "if that is so, why don't you come close here, and attend to your duty? you are too far from this hole. if a person is set to watch, he should be near the thing he watches. as far as you are there, i could, if i tried, get out without your catching me. so, it is better for you to have a good look down this hole." while rat was saying all this, he was near the mouth of the hole; but, as frog approached, he receded to the bottom, and went to the back end of the cave, where cayenne pepper bushes were growing. frog came to the edge of the hole, and looking down, saw nothing. during this while, rat was plucking pepper-pods and chewing them, retaining them in his mouth. returning again to the entrance, he saw frog still watching, and he said, "rângi! get out of my way, and let me pass. let me out!" frog replied, "i will not!" rat asked, "do you know me?" frog replied, "not very well." then rat said, "come near! open your eyes wide, and take a good look at me!" as soon as frog's eyes were wide open, rat blew the pepper into them. this so startled frog that he fell back, his eyes blinded by the smarting; and rat jumped out and ran away. frog, heedless of his prisoner, was jumping about in pain; and, abandoning his post, crawled to the water of the brook not far away, and tumbled into it to wash his eyes. now, by this time, leopard had returned with his fire. seeing no one on guard, he called out, "rângi! rângi! where are you?" frog, at the bottom of the brook, was still in agony with his eyes. he knew well that rat was gone; but, in his vexation, he answered, "ntori is there! put in your fire!" so, leopard put fire into the hole, and made a great smoke, but there was no sign of rat. after a long time, leopard became tired at not finding rat, and called out, "rângi! rângi! where indeed is ntori? he has not come out by this fire!" then frog answered, "ntori is not there. i just lied to you in vexation of the pain i got through serving you." so, leopard was very angry and said to frog, "you have deceived and fooled me! i will just come and eat you up!" said frog, "good! come on!" leopard ran to the brook, but, as frog was at the bottom, leopard had first to drink all the water, before he could reach him. leopard drank and drank. but, as soon as the water was nearly drunk up, frog jumped out, and hopped away to an adjacent pond. there leopard followed, and began to drink up that water also. he drank, and drank, and drank, until he became so full and his belly so swollen that his feet no longer touched the ground; and he fell over on his back, before he had entirely emptied the pond. he was in such great pain, in his swollen belly, that he was helpless, and cried out to passersby, "please, open a little hole in my body, and let out this water!" but each of the passersby said, "no! i am afraid that after i have helped you, then you will eat me." at last, among those who passed by, came crab. leopard pleaded with him, "igâmbâ! please! open my skin. let out this water, so that i may live!" at first, crab replied as the others, "no! i fear that after i help you, you will eat me." but leopard begged so piteously that crab consented, and scratched leopard's skin with one of his claws. and the water spurted out! it came in so fast a current that it began to sweep crab away. so leopard cried out, "igâmbâ! please! do not let yourself be taken away! catch hold on some root or branch!" crab did so, holding on to a projecting root. when the water had subsided, and crab was safe, leopard was able to rise; and he said, "igâmbâ! you have been kind to me; let me take you home, and i will be good to you; i will cook dinner, so we can eat together." crab agreed, and they went together. leopard began to cook a kind of yam called nkwa, making a pot full of it. (when it is thoroughly cooked, it is soft and sticky.) the yam being finally ready to be eaten, leopard said, "we do not put this food out on plates, but we bring the entire pot, and every one will help himself from it with his hands." leopard thereupon began to take out handfuls of the nkwa, and to eat it. crab tried to do the same, putting a claw into the sticky mass. but its heat burned his tender skin, and, in jerking his claw away, it stuck fast in the nkwa, and broke off. as soon as that happened, leopard snatched up the claw and ate it. crab protested, "ah! njegâ! you are eating my claw!" said leopard, "excuse me! no, i thought it was nkwa." so the dinner went on; leopard greedily eating, crab trying in vain to eat, and losing claw after claw, which leopard in succession promptly ate. now, when leopard had finished eating all the food, crab's claws were all gone, and he had not been able to eat at all, and was left hungry. so leopard says to crab, "now, as you are so helpless, what must i do for you?" he hoped that crab, in despair, would tell him to eat him. but leopard really was not hungry just then; and, when crab said, "if you will just put me into some shallow water for two months, then all my claws will grow all right again," leopard replied, "good!" and he took crab and placed him in a small stream of water. the next day, leopard, being now hungry to eat crab, came to the water and called out, "igâmbâ! igâmbâ! have you your claws grown now?" the reply was, "why! no! i told you two months yesterday, when you put me in here." on the third day, leopard came again to the water, and cried out to crab, "have your claws sprouted? have they grown again?" "no!" said crab curtly. leopard continued thus day by day, vexing crab with inquiries, as if anxious about his health, but really desirous of an excuse to eat him, yet ashamed to do so by violence, because of crab's kindness to him when he had the water-colic. at last, crab became tired of leopard's visits. hopeless to defend himself if leopard should finally use force, he gave up in despair, and said, "so! i see why you ask me every day. you know that i told you two months. if you are determined to eat me, come on, and end the trouble at once!" with this permission as an excuse, leopard was glad. he stepped to the edge of the water and took away crab for his dinner. that was the return for crab's kindness to him. after this, leopard went out again to try to find rat, but he never found him. tale "nuts are eaten because of angÂngwe"; a proverb places kingdom of the hogs; the forest; and towns persons angângwe, king of hogs a hunter ingowa (hogs; singular ngowa) njina (gorilla) nyare (ox) nkambi (antelope) njâgu (elephant) note "inkula si nyo o'kângâ 'ngângwe." this is a proverb expressing the obligation we all owe to some superior protecting powers. the hogs had cleared a space in the forest, for the building of their town. they were many; men and women and children. in another place, a hunter was sitting in his town. every day, at daybreak, he went out to hunt. when he returned in the afternoons with his prey, he left it a short distance from the town, and entering his house, would say to his women and children, "go to the outskirts of the town, and bring what animal you find i have left there." one day, having gone hunting, he killed elephant. the children went out to cut it up and bring it in. another day, he killed gorilla. and so, each day, he killed some animal. he never failed of obtaining something. one day, his children said to him, "you always return with some animal; but you never have brought us ngowa." he replied, "i saw many ingowa today, when i was out there. but, i wonder at one thing; that, when they are all together eating, and i approach, they run away. as to ingowa, they eat nkula nuts and i know where the trees are. well, then, i ambush them; but, when i go nearer, i see one big ngowa not eating, but going around and around the herd. whether it sees me or does not see, sure when i get ready to aim my gun, then they all scatter. the reason that ingowa escape me, i do not know." the hogs, when they had finished eating, and were returning to their own town, as they passed the town of elephant, heard mourning; and they asked, "who is dead?" the answer was, "njâgu is dead! njâgu is dead!" they inquired, "he died of what disease?" they were told, "not disease; hunter killed him." then another day, when ox was killed, his people were heard mourning for him. another day, antelope was killed; and his people were mourning for him. all these animals were dying because of hunter killing them. at first, the hogs felt pity for all these other beasts. but, when they saw how they were dying, they began to mock at them, "these are not people! they only die! but, as to us ingowa, hunter is not able to kill us. we hear only the report that there is such a person as hunter, but he is not able to kill us." when hogs were thus boasting, their king, angângwe, laughed at them, saying, "you don't know, you ingowa! you mock others, that hunter kills them?" they answered, "yes, we mock at them; for, we go to the forest as they do, but hunter does not touch us." angângwe asked, "when you thus in the forest eat your inkula-nuts, you each one eat them by his own strength and skill?" they answered, "yes; ourselves we go to the forest on our own feet; we ourselves pick up and eat the inkula. no one feeds us." angângwe said, "it is not so. those inkula you eat si nyo o'kângâ wa oma (they are eaten because of a person)." they insisted, "no, it is not so. inkula have no person in particular to do anything about them." thus they had this long discussion, the hogs and their king; and they got tired of it, and lay down to sleep. in the morning, when daylight came, the king said, "a journey for nuts! but, today, i am sick. i am not able to go to gather nuts with you. i will stay in town." the hogs said, "well! we do not mistake the way. it is not necessary for you to go." when they went, they were jeering about their king, "angângwe said, 'inkula si nyo o'kângâ w' oma'; but we will see today without him." they went to the nkula trees, and found great abundance fallen to the ground during the night. the herd of hogs, when they saw all these inkula, jumped about in joy. they stooped down to pick up the nuts, their eyes busy with the ground. they ate and ate. no one of them thought of hunter, whether he was out in the forest. but, that very morning, hunter had risen, taken his gun and ammunition-box, and had gone to hunt. and, after awhile, he had seen the hogs in the distance. they were only eating and eating, not looking at anything but nuts. hunter said in his heart, "these hogs, i see them often, but why have i not been able to kill them?" he crept softly nearer and nearer. creeping awhile then he stood up to spy; and again stooping, and again standing up to spy. he did not see the big hog which, on other days, he had always observed going around and around the herd. hunter stooped close to the ground, and crept onward. then, as he approached closer, the hogs still went on eating. he bent his knee to the earth, and he aimed his gun! ingowa still eating! his gun flashed! and ten hogs died! the hogs fled; some of them wounded. those who were not wounded, stopped before they reached their town, and said, "let us wait for the wounded." they waited. when the hindmost caught up and joined the others, they showed them their wounds, some in the head, some in the legs. these wounded ones said, "as we came, we saw none others behind us. there are ten of us missing; we think they are dead." so, they all returned toward their town; and, on their way, began to mourn. when they had come clear on to the town, angângwe asked, "what news, from where you come?" they answered, "angângwe! evil news! but we do not know what is the matter. only we know that the words you said are not really so, that 'nuts are eaten because of a certain person.' because, when we went, each one of us gathered by his own skill, and ate by his own strength, and no one trusted to any one else. and when we went, we ate abundantly, and everything was good. except that, hunter has killed ten of us. and many others are wounded." the king inquired, "well! have you brought nuts for me who was left in town?" they replied, "no; when hunter shot us, we feared, and could no longer wait." then angângwe said, "i told you that inkula are eaten because of a person, and you said, 'not so.' and you still doubt me." another day, the hogs went for inkula; and the king, remained in town. and, as on the other day, hunter killed them. so, for five successive days, they went, the king staying in town; and hunter killing them. finally, angângwe said to himself, "ingowa have become great fools. they do not consent to admit that nuts are eaten by reason of a certain person. they see how hunter kills them; and they still doubt my words. but, i pity them. tomorrow, i will go with them to the nuts. i will explain to them how hunter kills them." so, in the morning, the king ordered, "come all to nuts! but when we go for the nuts, if i say, 'ngh-o-o!' then every one of you who are eating them must start to town, and not come back, because then i have seen or smelt hunter; and i grunt to let you know." all the hogs agreed. they went on clear to the nkula trees, and ate, they stooping with eyes to the ground. but angângwe, not eating, kept looking here and there. he sniffed wind from south to north, and assured them, "eat you all! i am here!" he watched and watched; and presently he saw a speck far away. he passed around to sniff the wind. his nose uplifted, he caught the odor of hunter. he returned to the herd, grunted "ngh-o-o." and he and they all fled. they arrived safely at town. then he asked them, "who is dead? who is wounded?" they assured, "none." he said, "good!" thus they went nutting, for five consecutive days, they and their king, angângwe only keeping watch. and none of them died by hunter. then angângwe said to them, "today let us have a conversation." and he began, "i told you, inkula si nyo o'kângâ w' oma; you said, 'not so!' but, when you went by yourselves to eat nuts, did not hunter kill you? and these five days that we have gone, you and i together, and you obeyed my voice, who has died?" they then replied, "no one! no one! indeed, you spoke truly. you are justified. inkula si nyo o'kângâ wa 'ngângwe. it is so!" tale who are crocodile's relatives? persons ngando (crocodile) sinyani (birds) sinyama (beasts) note an argument in evolution--when and how does life begin? crocodile was very old. finally he died. news of his death spread abroad among the beasts; and his relatives and friends came to the mourning. after a proper number of days had passed, the matter of the division of the property was mentioned. at once a quarrel was developed, on the question as to who were his nearest relatives. the tribe of birds said, "he is ours and we will be the ones to divide the property." their claim was disputed, others asking, "on what ground do you claim relationship? you wear feathers; you do not wear plates of armor as he." the birds replied, "true, he did not wear our feathers. but, you are not to judge by what he put on during his life. judge by what he was in his life's beginning. look you! in his beginning, he began with us as an egg. we believe in eggs. his mother bore him as an egg. he is our relative, and we are his heirs." but the beasts said, "not so! we are his relatives, and by us shall his property be divided." then the council of animals demanded of the beasts on what ground they based their claim for relationship, and what answer they could make to the argument of the birds as to crocodile's egg-origin. the beasts said, "it may be true that the mark of tribe must be found, in a beginning, but not in an egg. for, all beings began as eggs. life is the original beginning. look you! when life really begins in the egg, then the mark of tribe is shown. when ngando's life began, he had four legs as we have. we judge by legs. so we claim him as our relative. and we will take his property." but, the birds answered, "you beasts said we were not relatives because we wear feathers, and not ngando-plates. but, you, look you! judge by your own words. neither do you wear ngando-plates, you with your hair and fur! your words are not correct. the beginning of his life was not, as you say, when little ngando sprouted some legs. there was life in the egg before that. and his egg was like ours, not like what you call your eggs. you are not his relatives. he is ours." but the beasts disputed still. so the quarrel went back and forth. and they never settled it. tale who is king of birds? places the country of birds in njambi's kingdom njambi's town persons ra-njambi (lord or master of all) njâgâni (chicken) ngozo (parrot) ngwanyâni (eagle) ugulungu (schizorhis, plantain-eater) note st--ability to speak a greater gift than ability in walking, flying, or any other force. nd--why chickens live with mankind. all the birds had their dwelling-place in a certain country of njambi's kingdom. the pelicans, chickens, eagles, parrots and all other winged kinds all lived together, separated from other animals, in that country under the great lord njambi. one day, they were discussing together on the question, "who is king of the birds?" they all, each one, named himself, e.g., the chicken said, "i!;" the parrot, "i!" the eagle "i!" and so on. every day they had this same discussion. they were not able to settle it, or to agree to choose any one of their number. so, they said, "let us go to ra-njambi, and refer the question to him." they agreed; and all went to him so that he might name who was the superior among them. when they all had arrived at njambi's town, he asked, "what is the affair on which you have come?" they replied, "we have come together here, not to visit, but for a purpose. we have a discussion and a doubt among ourselves. we wish to know, of all the birds, who is head or chief. each one says for himself that he is the superior. this one, because he knows how to fly well; that one because he can speak well; and another one, because he is strong. but, of these three things,--flight, speech, and strength, we ask you, which is the greatest?" immediately all the birds began a competition, each one saying, "choose me; i know how to speak!" njambi silenced them, and bade them, "well, then, come here! i know that you all speak. but, show me, each one of you, your manner of speaking." so eagle stood up to be examined. njambi asked him, "how do you speak? what is your manner of talking?" eagle began to scream, "so-o-we! so-o-we! so-o-we!" njambi said, "good! now call me your wife!" the wife of eagle came, and njambi said to her, "you are the wife of ngwanyâni, how do you talk?" the wife replied, "i say, 'so-o-we! so-o-we! so-o-we!'" ra-njambi said to eagle, "indeed! you and your wife speak the same kind of language." eagle answered, "yes; i and my wife, we speak alike." they were ordered, "sit you aside." then ra-njambi directed, "bring me here ngozo." and he asked, "ngozo, how do you talk? what is your way of speaking?" parrot squawked, "i say, 'ko-do-ko!'" ra-njambi ordered, "well, call me your wife!" she came; and he asked her, "how do you talk? talk now!" the wife replied, "i say, 'ko-do-ko!'" njambi asked parrot, "so! your wife says, 'ko-do-ko?'" parrot answered "yes; my wife and i both say, 'ko-do-ko.'" njambi then ordered, "call me here, ugulungu." he came, and was asked, "and how do you talk?" he shouted, "i say, 'mbru-kâ-kâ! mbru-kâ-kâ! mbru!'" njambi told him, "call me your wife!" she came, and, when asked, spoke in the same way as her husband. njambi dismissed them, "good! you and your wife say the same thing. good!" so, all the birds, in succession, were summoned; and they all, husband and wife, had the same mode of speaking, except one who had not hitherto been called. njambi finally said, "call njâgâni here!" the cock stood up, and strutted forward. njambi asked him, "what is your speech? show me your mode of talking!" cock threw up his head, stretched his throat, and crowed, "kâ-kâ-re-kââ." njambi said, "good! summon your wife hither." the wife came; and, of her, njambi asked, "and, what do you say?" she demurely replied, "my husband told me that i might talk only if i bore children. so, when i lay an egg, i say 'kwa-ka! kwa-ka!'" njambi exclaimed, "so! you don't say, 'kâ-kâ-re-kââ,' like your husband?" she replied, "no, i do not talk as he." then njambi said to cock, "for what reason do you not allow your wife to say, 'kâ-kâ-re-kââ?'" cock replied, "i am njâgâni, i respect myself. i jeer at all these other birds. their wives and themselves speak only in the same way. a visitor, if he comes to their towns, is not able to know, when one of them speaks, which is husband and which is wife, because they both speak alike. but i, njâgâni, as to my wife, she is unable to speak as i do. i do not allow it. a husband should be at the head; and in his wife it is not becoming for her to be equal with him or to talk as well as he does." njambi listened to this long speech; and then inquired, "have you finished?" chicken answered, "yes." njambi summoned all the birds to stand together in one place near him, and he said, "the affair which you brought to me, i settle it thus:--njâgâni is your head; because you others all speak, husband and wife, each alike. but, he speaks for himself in his own way, and his wife in her way; to show that a husband has priority and superiority over a wife. therefore, as he knows how to be head of his family, it is settled that njâgâni is head also of your tribe." but, njambi went on to say, "though this is true, you, njâgâni, don't you go back again into the forest, to your kingship of the birds. for the other birds will be jealous of you. you are not strong, you cannot fight them all. lest they kill you, stay with me in my town." cock went to get his wife and children, and returned and remained there with ra-njambi. therefore, the original bird to dwell among mankind was the chicken. when the other birds scattered and went back to their own forest country without their king, they said, "let it be so! we will not choose another king. our king has left us, and has emigrated to another country, and has sat down in njambi's town." so, the birds have lived in the forest without any king. there is another story which gives a different explanation of chickens being the first of birds to dwell among mankind. the birds had no fire. they had to eat their food raw, and to shiver on cold days. in flying over the other countries, they saw mankind using, in the preparation of their food, a thing which birds did not have. they observed that that thing seemed to add much to the comfort of mankind. so, they chose chicken, not as their king, but, because he knew so well how to speak, to go as their messenger, to ask mankind to share that thing with them. chicken left the forest, and started on his journey, and came to the towns of men. he found so much food lying around, and it tasted so good because it had been touched by that bright thing which he heard people call "fire," that he delayed the delivery of his message. and men were pleased with his usefulness in awaking them in the morning, as he called them to get up and make their fires. the situation was so comfortable, as mankind allowed him to walk in and out of their houses at will, that he forgot his errand, and chose to stay with men, and never went back to the forest. the birds, having no one else who united both audacity to act and ability to speak, never sent another messenger on that errand, and they remain without fire to this day. tale "njiwo died of sleep": a proverb persons njiwo (a species of antelope) nyare (ox) note an event (the supposed death of the red antelope) is traced to its first cause (sleep) back of the immediate causes (the people who actually sought to kill him). whence the proverb, "eziwo a juwi na antyâvinâ." "eziwo" is a familiar way of pronouncing njiwo. antelope and ox went to a town to dance bweti (a certain spirit-dance). after the dance, antelope, exhausted with the exercise, fell asleep in the bweti-house. while he was there, certain persons made a plot to kill him. ox heard of it, and came to warn him, calling gently, (lest he should be overheard and himself seized), "njiwo! eziwo!" but antelope did not hear, and ox made no further effort, and ran away to his home in fear for his own life. then came antelope's wife, while he still slept, and loudly called him. he, only half-awake, grumbled, "what do you call me for? let me rest. i'm tired by the dancing." she persisted, "i call you because certain persons want to kill you." but, he, still heavy with sleep, did not understand, and was not willing to rise, and went on sleeping. then his wife, unable to arouse him, went to call other people to help her. while she was away, his enemies came and tied him with ropes, and left him there tied, still sleeping, alone in the house. they locked the house, and went away, intending to return and kill him when he should awake. before they came back, his wife returned with aid; and, with machetes and knives, they cut open the door, and found him with his limbs tied, and still sleeping. they roughly shook him, and he, half-conscious, asked, "what do you want here?" his wife replied, "i have come to carry you away." so, she untied the ropes, and they lifted him and carried him away, still too sleepy to walk himself. while all this was going on, the people of the town to which ox had fled, asked him, "there were two of you who went to dance bweti. you are here, but where is the other?" ox, assuming that antelope was dead, and not knowing what antelope's wife had done, told how he had been unable to waken him, and said, "eziwo was killed while asleep." then the village people said regretfully, "eh! eziwo! sleep has killed him!" in the meantime, antelope and his wife had reached the town, where the news of his death had preceded them; and the people wondered, saying, "nyare reported that you were cut to pieces!" then antelope's wife explained that he would have been killed, because ox had not made every effort to arouse him from his deep sleep. so the friendship of ox and antelope ended. and the proverb came, that, "eziwo died of sleep." tale which is the fattest? persons king ra-mborakinda manga (manatus) ngowa (hog; pl. ingowa) arandi (oyster) note accept no challenge whose test you know you cannot endure. oyster, without fat, accepted the challenge of the fat hog and the fatter manatus. the fat of the manatus, or dugong seal, is delicious and very abundant. ra-mborakinda was dwelling in his town, with his people and the glory of his kingdom. there were gathered there the manatus, the oyster and the hog, waiting to be assigned their kingdoms. to pass the time, while waiting until the king should summon them for their assignments, oyster said, "you, manga, and ngowa, let us have a dance!" and they went to exhibit before the king. they danced and danced, each one dancing his own special dance. after that they made a fire, each one at his own fire-place, and sat down to rest. then hog proposed a new entertainment. he said, "you, arandi, and manga, we all three shall test ourselves by fire, to see who has the most fat." and they all three went into their respective fire-places, hog into his, and manatus into his, and oyster into its. under the influence of the heat, the fat in their bodies began to melt. then the king announced, "to the one who shall prove to have the most fat, i will give a great extent of country as its kingdom." so, they all three tried to show much fat, in their effort to win the prize. presently, the fat of hog began to cease exuding, for he had not a great deal. as to oyster, it had no fat. what it produced was not fat at all, but water; and that was in such quantity that it put out its fire. these facts about the hog and oyster were reported to the king, and when he inquired how manatus was getting on, lo! it was found that she had such abundance of fat, that the oil flowing from her had burst into flame and had set the town on fire. at this, the king wondered, and exclaimed, "this manga, that lives in the water, has yet enough fat to set the town afire!" then manatus with hog and oyster went and sat together in the open court before the king's house, to await what would be his decision. when he was ready, he sent two heralds to summon not only those three, but all the tribes of the beasts of the forest, and of the fishes of the sea; and the town was full of these visitors. but, hog and all his tribe had become impatient of waiting, and had gone off for a walk. all the other animals that had been summoned, came into the king's presence, and he, having ascended his throne, said, "i am ready now to speak with these three persons; but, i see that the ingowa are not here. so, because of their disrespect in going off to amuse themselves with a walk instead of waiting for me, i condemn that they shall no longer wear any horns." then the king announced that, as manatus had the most fat, her promised territory should be the sea, and of it she should be ruler. but, manatus said, "i do not want to live in the sea, lest i be killed there." the king asked, "then, where will you prefer to live?" she answered, "in such rivers as i shall like." that is the reason that the manatus lives only in rivers and bays. for, one day she and her children had floated with the tide to the mouth of a river and into the sea; and some of them had been killed there by sharks and other big fish. so, the manatus is never now found near the sea on ordinary tides, but only when high tides have swept it down. just as the king had made his announcement, the company of hogs returned and entered the assembly. they explained, "we have just come back from our walk, and we wish to resume our horns which we left here." but the king refused, and kept possession of the horns. hog begged, "please! let me have my horns!" but the king swore an oath, saying, "o savi! (by the blessing!) wherever you go, and whatever you be, you shall have no horns." so the hogs departed. now oyster stood up, and said, "i wish to go to my place. where shall it be?" the king said, "i will give you no other place than what you already have had. i do not wish to put you into the fresh-water springs and brooks with manga. you shall go into the salty waters." so oyster went; and its race lives on the edge of the rivers, near the sea, in brackish waters. and the king said to oyster, "all the tribes of mankind, by the sea, when they fail to obtain other fish, shall be allowed to eat you." all knew that this was a punishment given by the king to oyster, for having dared the test by fire, pretending that it had fat, the while it had none. tale why mosquitoes buzz persons mbo (mosquito) oroi (ear) aga (hands) note it is a practice of african natives, after taking a bath, to anoint their bodies with some oil or grease. in the time of long-ago, in njambi's town, mosquito and ear went out to take a bath together. after taking her bath, ear began to rub an oily substance over herself; while mosquito did not. so ear said to mosquito, "why do you leave your skin so rough? it is better to rub on a little oil." mosquito replied, "i have none." so ear said, "indeed! i did not know that. i will give you part of mine, as i have plenty." mosquito had to wait the while that ear was rubbing the soft wax over herself. but, as soon as ear had finished, she put back the wax into her ear where she usually kept it, and did not fulfill her promise to mosquito. when mosquito saw this, that the wax was put away, he came near to the door, and said, "i want the oil you promised for rubbing on my body." but ear took no notice of him, except to call on hands to drive mosquito away. so, to this day, mosquito is not willing to cease making his claim for the unfulfilled promise; and is always coming to our ears, and buzzing and crying. always mosquito comes and says, "i want my oil, bz-z-z-z." but ear remains silent, and gives no answer. and mosquito keeps on grumbling and complaining, and gets angry and bites. tale unkind criticism persons tyema (a black monkey) ekaga (tortoise) note this story is probably of comparatively recent origin though known at least fifty years ago. it seems to point to the time when white men began to taunt negroes because of their color, the common insult by an angry white master being "you black monkey!" the tale cannot antedate the first coming of white men to west africa three hundred years ago; for, no native would have invented this insult, though they do now imitate white men, when, in a quarrel, they wish to taunt an opponent. the black monkey, up a tree, saw tortoise passing beneath, slowly and awkwardly moving step by step. monkey laughed at the dull manner and appearance of tortoise; and, to tease one whom he thought stupid and unable to resent insult, he jumped down onto the back of tortoise. there, safely perched, he jeered at tortoise, saying many unkind things. tortoise was unable to throw off his tormentor; nor could he reach him. his short hands and feet could not touch monkey. so, tortoise was compelled to carry monkey on the way, the while that the latter was taunting him. finally, the patience of tortoise was exhausted, and, his indignation being aroused, he stopped, and said angrily, "get off of my back, you black monkey!" monkey was sensitive about his color; and, at that word "black," he slipped off, and went away ashamed. but he was angry also, and determined to have some revenge. some time after this, monkey made a feast, and invited a number of beasts, among the rest tortoise. but monkey purposely placed all the dishes up high, so that tortoise, unable to reach to them, could get no food, as he vainly went around and around the table. all the while, monkey was sarcastically urging him to come and help himself and eat. tortoise bore it without complaint; and at the end of the feast, he went away hungry. but he also determined to have his revenge. on another day, tortoise made a feast, and invited the same persons who had seen his humiliation at the house of monkey. monkey came to the feast. but tortoise had prepared the food in only one dish, around which the company were to sit on the ground, and from which they were to eat with their hands. before calling them to eat, tortoise had provided water and soap for them to wash their hands previous to their putting them into the same dish. as monkey was about to put his, tortoise reminded him that it was black, and that he should first wash it. he said, "here is water, and the soap by which white people keep their hands from getting black." monkey was ashamed, and lathered the soap over his hands until they were white with foam. "now," said tortoise, "put your hand into the water to remove the foam." monkey did so; and his hands were still black. the rest of the company objected to his black hand going into their food. and he went away ashamed and hungry. tale the suitors of princess gorilla place njambi's country persons king njina (gorilla) and his daughter njâgu (elephant) nguwu (hippopotamus) bejaka (fishes: sing. ejaka) ngowa (hog) njegâ (leopard) telinga (a very small monkey) note this story evidently dates back to the first introduction of rum into africa. gorilla's "new kind of water" was rum. telinga's cheating did not finally succeed in obtaining him the wife; but was the cause of his now living only in trees; whereas formerly he lived in the long grass. the telinga are very numerous, and they all look so alike that one cannot be distinguished from another. in the story, he had arranged with all his companions to help him drink. in the gorilla country there are no lions, and there he is readily called the king of beasts, because of the fearful length and strength of his arms. how absurd that so horribly ugly a caricature of a human being should be supposed to have a beautiful daughter! king gorilla had a daughter, whose beauty had been much praised. she being of marriageable age, he announced to all the tribes that he would give her in marriage to any one who could accomplish a certain task. he said he would not take any of the goods usually given in payment for a wife, as dowry. but, that he had a new kind of water, such as had never before been seen; and, whoever could drink an entire barrelful of it, should have the prize that had been coveted by many. so, all the tribes came together one day in the forest country of the king, to compete for the young woman, and the paths were crowded with the expectant suitors on their way to the king's court. first, because of his size, elephant stepped forward. he walked with his solemn dignity, his ponderous feet sounding, tubu, tubu, as he strode toward where the barrel stood. he could, however, scarcely suppress his indignation, in the presence of the king, at what he considered the insultingly small test to which he was about to be subjected. he thought in his heart, "that barrelful of water! why! i, njâgu, when i take my daily bath, i spurt from my trunk many barrelfuls over my whole body, and i drink half a barrelful at every meal. and this! why! i'll swallow it down in two gulps!" he thrust his proboscis into the barrel to draw up a big mouthful. but, he instantly withdrew it, before he began to suck up any of it. "the new water" stung him. he lifted his trunk, and trumpeting with rage, declared that the task was impossible. many in the company, who had feared that the big elephant would leave no chance for them, secretly rejoiced at his failure; and began to hope for themselves. then hippopotamus blundered forward. he was in haste, for he was sure he would succeed. he was not as big or heavy as elephant, though he was more awkward. but he did not hesitate to boast aloud what he could do. "you, njâgu, with your big body, afraid of that little barrel of water! why! i live in water half of the time. and when i begin to drink in a river, i cause the bejaka to be frightened." so he came bellowing and roaring, in order to impress the young woman with his importance. but his mouth had not sunk into the barrel as he thrust his nose in, before he jerked his head up with a bigger bellow of pain and disgust at the new water. without making even a bow to the king, he shambled off to a river to wash his mouth. next came hog. he said to gorilla, "king gorilla, i do not boast like those two other fellows, nor will i insult you as they have done, even if i fail. but, i do not think i shall fail. i am accustomed to putting my nose into all sorts of dirty places; so i shall try." he did try, slowly and carefully. but, even he, used to all sorts of filth and bad smells, turned from the barrel in disgust, and went away grunting. then leopard came bounding forward, boasting and jumping from side to side to show his beautiful skin to the young woman. he derided the other three who had preceded him. "o! you fellows! you had no chance at all, even if you had drunk up that water. the woman would not look at you, nor live with such blundering, awkward gawks as you. look at my graceful body and tail! these strong but soft paws of mine! and, as to that barrel, you shall see in a few minutes. though we of the cat tribe do not like to wet our feet, i will do it for the sake of the woman. i'm the dandy of the forest, and i shall go at it more gracefully than you." he leaped onto the barrel. but, its very fumes sickened him. he made one vain effort. and with limp tail between his legs he crawled away to hide his shame. one after another of the various beasts attempted. and all failed. finally, there crept forward the little telinga. he had left the hundreds of his tribe of little monkeys hidden out in the grass field. as he advanced, there was a murmur of surprise from the unsuccessful spectators. even king gorilla could not refrain from saying, "well! my little fellow! what do you want?" telinga replied, "your majesty, did not you send word to all the tribes that any one might compete?" "yes, i did," he answered. and telinga said, "then i, telinga, small as i am, i shall try." the king replied, "i will keep my royal word. you may try." "but, your majesty," asked telinga, "is it required that the barrel must be drank at one draught? may i not, between each mouthful, take a very short rest out in the grass?" said gorilla, "certainly, just so you drink it today." so telinga took a sip, and leaped off into the grass. and, apparently, he immediately returned, and took another sip and leaped back into the grass; and, apparently, immediately returned again. and apparently--(they were his companions who had come one by one to help him!) thus the barrelful of firewater was rapidly sipped away. king gorilla announced telinga as the winner of the prize. what the young woman thought of the loss of her graceful lovers, the antelopes and others, is not known. for, when telinga advanced to take her, leopard and others dashed at him, shouting, "you miserable little snip of a fellow! you've won her; but if we can't have her you shan't. there! take that! and that! and that!" as they began to beat and kick and bite him. in terror, he jumped into the trees, abandoning his bride. and he and his tribe have remained in the trees ever since, afraid to come down to the ground. tale leopard of the fine skin place town of king mborakinda persons king mborakinda ilâmbe, his daughter ra-marânge, a doctor and other people njegâ (leopard) kabala (a magic horse) ogula-ya-mpazya-vazya, a sorcerer note leopards can swim if compelled to, but they do not like to enter water, or wet their feet in any way. at the town of ra-mborakinda, where he lived with his wives and his children and his glory, this occurred. he had a beloved daughter, by name ilâmbe. he loved her much; and sought to please her in many ways, and gave her many servants to serve her. when she grew up to womanhood, she said that she did not wish any one to come to ask her in marriage; that she herself would choose a husband. "moreover, i will never marry any man who has any, even a little bit of, blotch on his skin." her father did not like her to speak in that way; nevertheless, he did not forbid her. when men began to come to the father and say, "i desire your daughter ilâmbe for a wife," he would say, "go, and ask herself." then when the man went to ilâmbe's house, and would say, "i have come to ask you in marriage," her only reply was a question, "have you a clear skin, and no blotches on your body?" if he answered, "yes," ilâmbe would say, "but, i must see for myself; come into my room." there she required the man to take off all his clothing. and if, on examination, she saw the slightest pimple or scar, she would point toward it, and say, "that! i do not want you." then perhaps he would begin to plead, "all my skin is right, except--." but she would interrupt him, "no! for even that little mark i do not want you." so it went on with all who came, she finding fault with even a small pimple or scar. and all suitors were rejected. the news spread abroad that ra-mborakinda had a beautiful daughter, but that no one was able to obtain her, because of what she said about diseases of the skin. still, many tried to obtain her. even animals changed themselves to human form, and sought her, in vain. at last, leopard said, "ah! this beautiful woman! i hear about her beauty, and that no one is able to get her. i think i better take my turn, and try. but, first i will go to ra-marânge." he went to that magic-doctor, and told his story about ra-mborakinda's fine daughter, and how no man could get her because of her fastidiousness about skins. ra-marânge told him, "i am too old. i do not now do those things about medicines. go to ogula-ya-mpazya-vazya." so, leopard went to him. as usual, the sorcerer ogula jumped into his fire; and coming out with power, directed leopard to tell what he wanted. so he told the whole story again, and asked how he should obtain the clean body of a man. the sorcerer prepared for him a great "medicine" by which to give him a human body, tall, graceful, strong and clean. leopard then went back to his town, told his people his plans, and prepared their bodies also for a change if needed. having taken also a human name, ogula, he then went to ra-mborakinda, saying, "i wish your daughter ilâmbe for wife." on his arrival, at ra-mborakinda's, the people admired the stranger, and felt sure that ilâmbe would accept this suitor, exclaiming, "this fine-looking man! his face! and his gait! and his body!" when he had made his request of ra-mborakinda, he was told, as usual, to go to ilâmbe and see whether she would like him. when he went to her house, he looked so handsomely, that ilâmbe was at once pleased with him. he told her, "i love you; and i come to marry you. you have refused many. i know the reason why, but i think you will be satisfied with me." she replied, "i think you have heard from others the reason for which i refuse men. i will see whether you have what i want." and she added, "let us go into the room; and let me see your skin." they entered the room; and ogula-njegâ removed his fine clothing. ilâmbe examined with close scrutiny from his head to his feet. she found not the slightest scratch or mark; his skin was like a babe's. then she said, "yes! this is my man! truly! i love you, and will marry you!" she was so pleased with her acquisition, that she remained in the room enjoying again a minute examination of her husband's beautiful skin. then she went out, and ordered her servants to cook food, prepare water, etc., for him; and he did not go out of the house, nor have a longing to go back to his town, for he found that he was loved. on the third day, he went to tell the father, ra-mborakinda, that he was ready to take his wife off to his town. ra-mborakinda consented. all that day, they prepared food for the marriage-feast. but, all the while that this man-beast, ogula-njegâ was there, ra-mborakinda, by his okove (a magic fetish) knew that some evil would come out of this marriage. however, as ilâmbe had insisted on choosing her own way, he did not interfere. after the marriage was over, and the feast eaten, ra-mborakinda called his daughter, and said, "ilâmbe, mine, now you are going off on your journey." she said, "yes; for i love my husband." the father asked, "do you love him truly?" she answered "yes." then he told her, "as you are married now, you need a present from me, as your ozendo (bridal gift)." so, he gave her a few presents, and told her, "go to that house," indicating a certain house in the town; and he gave her the key of the house, and told her to go and open the door. that was the house where he kept all his charms for war, and fetishes of all kinds. he told her, "when you go in, you will see two kabala, standing side by side. the one that will look a little dull, with its eyes directed to the ground, take it; and leave the brighter looking one. when you are coming with it, you will see that it walks a little lame. nevertheless, take it." she objected, "but, father, why do you not give me the finer one, and not the weak one?" but he said, "no!" and made a knowing smile, as he repeated, "go, and take the one i tell you." he had reason for giving this one. the finer-looking one had only fine looks; but this other one would some day save her by its intelligence. she went and took horse, and returned to her father; and the journey was prepared. the father sent with her, servants to carry the baggage, and to remain with and work for her at the town of her marriage. she and her husband arranged all their things, and said good-bye, and off they went, both of them sitting on horse's back. they journeyed and they journeyed. on the way, ogula-njegâ, though changed as to his form and skin, possessed all his old tastes. having been so many days without tasting blood or uncooked meats, as they passed through the forest of wild beasts, the longing came on him. they emerged onto a great prairie, and journeyed across it toward another forest. before they had entirely crossed the prairie, the longing for his prey so overcame him that he said, "wife, you with your kabala and the servants stay here while i go rapidly ahead; and wait for me until i come again." so he went off, entered the forest, and changed himself back to leopard. he hunted for prey, caught a small animal, and ate it; and another, and ate it. after being satisfied, he washed his hands and mouth in a brook; and, changing again to human form, he returned on the prairie to his wife. she observed him closely, and saw a hard, strange look on his face. she said, "but, all this while! what have you been doing?" he made an excuse. they went on. and the next day, it was the same, he leaving her, and telling her to wait till he returned; and hunting and eating as a leopard. all this that was going on, ilâmbe was ignorant of. but horse knew. he would speak after awhile, but was not ready yet. so it went on, until they came to leopard's town. before they reached it, ogula-njegâ, by the preparations he had first made, had changed his mother into a human form in which to welcome his wife. also the few people of the town, all with human forms, welcomed her. but, they did not sit much with her. they stayed in their own houses; and ogula-njegâ and his wife stayed in theirs. for a few days, leopard tried to be a pleasant ogula, deceiving his wife. but his taste for blood was still in his heart. he began to say, "i am going to another town; i have business there." and off he would go, hunting as a leopard; when he returned, it would be late in the day. so he did on other days. after a time, ilâmbe wished to make a food-plantation, and sent her men-servants to clear the ground. ogula-njegâ would go around in the forest on the edge of the plantation; and catching one of the men, there would return that day one servant less. one by one, all the men-servants were thus missing; and it was not known what became of them, except that leopard's people knew. one night ogula-njegâ was out; and, meeting one of the female servants, she too was reported missing. sometimes, when ogula-njegâ was away, ilâmbe, feeling lonesome, would go and pet horse. after the loss of this maid-servant, horse thought it was time to warn ilâmbe of what was going on. while she was petting him, he said, "eh! ilâmbe! you do not see the trouble that is coming to you!" she asked, "what trouble?" he exclaimed, "what trouble? if your father had not sent me with you, what would have become of you? where are all your servants that you brought with you? you do not know where they go to, but i know. do you think that they disappear without a reason? i will tell you where they go. it is your man who eats them; it is he who wastes them!" she could not believe it, and argued, "why should he destroy them?" horse replied, "if you doubt it, wait for the day when your last remaining servant is gone." two days after that, at night, another maid-servant disappeared. another day passed. on another day, ogula-njegâ went off to hunt beasts, with the intention that, if he failed to get any, at night he would eat his wife. when he had gone, ilâmbe, in her loneliness, went to fondle horse. he said to her, "did i not tell you? the last maid is gone. you yourself will be the next one. i will give you counsel. when you have opportunity this night, prepare yourself ready to run away. get yourself a large gourd, and fill it with ground-nuts; another with gourd-seeds; and another with water." he told her to bring these things to him, and he would know the best time to start. while they were talking, leopard's mother was out in the street, and heard the two voices. she said to herself, "ilâmbe, wife of my son, does she talk with kabala as if it was a person?" but, she said nothing to ilâmbe, nor asked her about it. night came on; and ogula-njegâ returned. he said nothing; but his face looked hard and bad. ilâmbe was troubled and somewhat frightened at his ugly looks. so, at night, on retiring, she began to ask him, "but why? has anything displeased you?" he answered, "no; i am not troubled about anything. why do you ask questions?" "because i see it in your face that your countenance is not pleasant." "no; there's no matter. everything is right. only, about my business, i think i must start very early." ogula-njegâ had begun to think, "now she is suspecting me. i think i will not eat her this night, but will put it off until next night." that night, ilâmbe did not sleep. in the morning, leopard said that he would go to his business, but would come back soon. when he was gone away to his hunting work, ilâmbe felt lonesome, and went to horse. he, thinking this a good time to run away, they started at once, without letting any one in the village know, and taking with them the three gourds. horse said that they must go quickly; for, leopard, when he discovered them gone, would rapidly pursue. so they went fast and faster, horse looking back from time to time, to see whether leopard was pursuing. after they had been gone quite a while, ogula-njegâ returned from his business to his village, went into his house, and did not see ilâmbe. he called to his mother, "where is ilâmbe?" his mother answered, "i saw ilâmbe with her kabala, talking together; they have been at it for two days." ogula-njegâ began to search; and, seeing the hoof-prints, he exclaimed, "mi asaiya (shame for me). ilâmbe has run away. i and she shall meet today!" he instantly turned from his human form back to that of leopard, and went out, and pursued, and pursued, and pursued. but, it took some time before he came in sight of the fugitives. as horse turned to watch, he saw leopard, his body stretched low and long in rapid leaps. horse said to ilâmbe, "did i not tell you? there he is, coming!" horse hasted, with foam dropping from his lips. when he saw that leopard was gaining on them, he told ilâmbe to take the gourd of peanuts from his back, and scatter them along behind on the ground. leopards like peanuts; and when ogula-njegâ came to these nuts, he stopped to eat them. while he was eating, horse gained time to get ahead. as soon as leopard had finished the nuts, he started on in pursuit again, and soon began to overtake. when he approached, horse told ilâmbe to throw out the gourd-seeds. she did so. leopard delayed to eat these seeds also. this gave horse time to again get ahead. thus they went on. leopard, having finished the gourd-seeds, again went leaping in pursuit; and, for the third time, came near. horse told ilâmbe to throw the gourd of water behind, with force so that it might crash and break on the ground. as soon as she had done so, the water was turned to a stream of a deep wide river, between them and leopard. then he was at a loss. so, he shouted, "ah! ilâmbe! mi asaiya! if i only had a chance to catch you!" so, he had to turn back. then horse said, "we do not know what he may do yet; perhaps he may go around and across ahead of us. as there is a town which i know near here, we had better stay there a day or two while he may be searching for us." he added to her, "mind! this town where we are going, no woman is allowed to be there, only men. so, i will change your face and dress like a man's. be very careful how you behave when you take your bath, lest you die." ilâmbe promised; and horse changed her appearance. so, a fine-looking young man was seen riding into the street of the village. there were exclamations in the street, "this is a stranger! hail! stranger; hail! who showed you the way to come here?" this young man answered, "myself; i was out riding; i saw an open path; and i came in." he entered a house, and was welcomed; and they told him their times of eating, and of play, etc. but, on the second day, as this young man went out privately, one of the men observed, and said to the other, "he acts like a woman!" the others asked, "really! you think so?" he asserted, "yes! i am sure!" so, that day ilâmbe was to meet with some trouble; for, to prove her, the men had said to her, "tomorrow we all go bathing in the river, and you shall go with us." she went to ask horse what she should do. he rebuked her, "i warned you, and you have not been careful. but, do not be troubled; i will change you into a man." that night, ilâmbe went to horse; and he changed her. he also told her, "i warn you again. tomorrow you go to bathe with the others, and you may take off your clothes; for, you are now a man. but, it is only for a short time, because we stay here only a day and a night more, and then we must go." the next morning all the town went to play, and after that to bathe. when they went into the water, the other men were all expecting to see a woman revealed; but they saw that their visitor was a man. they admired his wonderfully fine physique. on emerging from the water, the men said to the one who had informed on ilâmbe, "did you not tell us that this was a woman? see, how great a man he is!" as soon as they said that, the young man ilâmbe was vexed with him, and began to berate him, saying, "eh! you said i was a woman?" and she chased him and struck him. then they all went back to the town. in the evening, horse told ilâmbe, "i tell you what to do tomorrow. in the morning, you take your gun, and shoot me dead. after you have shot me, these men will find fault with you, saying 'ah! you shoot your horse, and did not care for it?' but, do not say anything in reply. cut me in pieces, and burn the pieces in the fire. after this, carefully gather all the black ashes; and, very early in the following morning, in the dark before any one is up, go out of the village gateway, scatter the ashes, and you will see what will happen." the young man did all this. on scattering the ashes, he instantly found himself changed again to a woman, and sitting on horse's back; and they were running rapidly away. that same day, in the afternoon, they came to the town of the father ra-mborakinda. on their arrival there, they (but especially horse) told their whole story. ilâmbe was somewhat ashamed of herself; for, she had brought these troubles on herself by insisting on having a husband with a perfectly fine skin. so, her father said, "ilâmbe, my child, you see the trouble you have brought on yourself. for you, a woman, to make such a demand was too much. had i not sent kabala with you, what would have become of you?" the people gave ilâmbe a glad welcome. and she went to her house, and said nothing more about fine skins. tale why the plantain-stalk bears but one bunch persons oyila (oil-palm tree) mbindi (wild goat) akândâ (plantain-stalk) note according to native law of hospitality, duty to a guest requires almost any sacrifice. this is oriental. (see genesis chap. , vs. .) a plantain-stalk bears but one bunch. therefore, to gather the fruit, the stalk with apparent ruthlessness is cut down. but, there are always from two to five young sprouts at the base, from feet to feet in height, which, in succession, take the place of the parent stem. observe the cannibalism. all african tribes were formerly cannibals. many interior tribes still are. this story is a marked illustration of the characteristic impossibilities in native tales, "plantain" being at one and the same time a plant and a human being! palm-tree produced plantain tree. then there stood up an animal called wild goat, and it went to seek marriage with palm-tree's daughter plantain. it was so arranged; and the marriage was held. as goat and his wife were about departing to his own town, palm-tree gave some parting advice to her daughter plantain; "when you shall be about to become a mother, come back and stay with me." not long after this, plantain was to become a mother; and people went to palm-tree to inform her of the fact. this daughter plantain did not obey her mother's directions, but remained in the town until her child was born. this was told to mother palm-tree, who was dissatisfied, and said, "eh! i told akândâ to have her child born with me!" the reason that palm-tree had given this direction to plantain was, that, as her own custom, in bearing her palm-nuts, was to have several bunches in sight at one time, and ripening in succession, she wished her daughter to have the same habit. after plantain had borne her child, it grew well and became very strong. one day, strangers came to the town on a visit; and, when the villagers looked for food for the visitors, to their shame, they found they had none. then one of the women of the village said, "well! let us cut down this akândâ, and cook it and eat it." so, a machete was seized, and plantain's stalk was slashed, and palm-tree's child plantain was taken and cooked and eaten. at this, people went and told palm-tree, saying, "your child is cut down, and is cooked and eaten." the mother palm-tree helplessly replied, "what can i do?" all this while, the husband goat had been away on a journey. when he returned, and came to his town, and found that his wife, palm-tree's child, was not there, he asked, "my wife; is she dead?" the people answered him, "yes!" "but," he asked, "for what reason did she die?" they answered, "because the people of the town had no food for their guests." mbindi complained further, saying, "so! when akândâ was cooked, you gave your guests only plantains; were you so inhospitable as to give them also no meat or fish?" at this the people were vexed, and they said, "well then! let this husband be killed and eaten as the meat!" so they killed and ate him. this news, people also carried to palm-tree, telling her that plantain's husband was also killed and eaten. then palm-tree came to the town to speak about the death of plantain. the people justified themselves, saying, "but, what else could we do? it was necessary to provide for the guests." palm-tree submitted, "truly, had akândâ obeyed me and come to me and borne her child in my presence, she would have had abundance, and would not have died." part second benga tribe foreword the tales of this second part had their source with narrators of benga-speaking tribes of corisco island, the region of the bonito river, and batanga. nos. , , and were written in benga by the pioneer missionaries, rev. messrs. mackey and clemens, from the dictation in benga by natives of corisco, more than years ago; and were printed as reading-lessons in the primer used in their schools. i have translated them into english. they having thus passed twice through foreign thought, have lost most of their native idioms. tale was independently re-told me at batanga within the past few years, by a narrator living there. it differs from the version printed in the primer, and i have combined the two. the remaining thirty tales were given me at batanga; by three adult narrators, all of them civilized men. they spoke them with me alone, or in the presence of one or two silent attendants, sentence by sentence, in their bapuku dialect of the benga language. i rapidly made notes in an english translation of their principal words. this was always at night, in order to leave the narrator at that ease which he would naturally feel if he was telling the story to an audience in the street, as he is accustomed to do in the evenings. for that purpose also, i shaded my lamp, using its light only for my pencil; he therefore spoke unrestrainedly. next morning, with my memory still fresh of the night's story, i filled out the sentences. this set of the tales therefore is more native, in the preservation of its idioms, than any other part. tale swine talking persons ingowa (hogs) note unlike other native legends based on "they say," the native narrator, now more than years ago, gave the name and family name of the man who is stated to have reported that he heard swine talking with human speech. there was a certain man in the time long ago, by name bokona, whose family name was bodikito. he went to the depths of the forest to do some business. when he was about to return in the afternoon to go to his village, he heard in advance of him, a noise of conversation. he thought that perhaps they were people (of whose presence he was not aware; for, there were no villages in that part of the forest). but, when he had approached the spot, he did not see people; but only a herd of hogs speaking with the voices of people. he was thus perfectly sure that they speak the language of mankind. tale crocodile persons ngando (crocodile) two children, and towns-people two children were bathing in a river; and a crocodile came where they were. it seized one, and, grasping it with its teeth, went with it to its hole in the river bank. it did not kill him, but said to him, "i leave you here, and i go straight back to bring the other one who remained." after the crocodile had left, the one thus put into the hole, turning his eyes about, saw it full of living fish (kept on hand by the crocodile as its food-supply). he saw also that there was another opening in the cavity, above, just over his head. climbing up and jumping through it, he rapidly went straight away to his village. he related all this incident to the people. then they gladly fired guns, for welcome of the child. when the crocodile reached the bathing-place on its return, it did not see the one whom it had left there; and it was angry. while it was thus angry, the people shot at it with guns, but their shots could not even wound it; and it went back again to its hole to seek for and eat the child whom it had seized. when it again entered into the hole and searched, and did not find him, it was very angry, and pursued him, going up to the very middle of the village. for three days it was there barking in the village, and trying to kill some one. tale origin of the elephant persons uhâdwe, bokume and njâku sons of njambi the creator towns-people, sailors and others note i have never seen the place; but, intelligent natives, (though they did not believe in the legend itself) told me there was the likeness to a human foot-print in a rock on the beach of the north shore of corisco bay. doubtless a fossil. uhâdwe, bokume, and njâku were human beings, all three born of one mother. (afterwards bokume was called "njâpe.") as time went on, uhâdwe called his brethren, bokume and njâku, and said, "my brothers! let us separate; myself, i am going to the great sea; you, bokume go to the forest; you, njâku, also go to the forest." bokume went to the forest and grew up there, and became the valuable mahogany tree (okume). njâku departed; but he went in anger, saying, "i will not remain in the forest, i am going to build with the towns-people." he came striding back to the town. as he emerged there from the forest, his feet swelled and swelled, and became elephant feet. his ear extended 'way down. his teeth spreading, this one grew to a tusk, and that one grew to a tusk. the towns-people began to hoot at him. and he turned back to the forest. but, as he went, he said to them, "in my going now to the forest, i and whatever plants you shall plant in the forest shall journey together," (i.e., that their plantations should be destroyed by him). so njâku went; and their food went. when uhâdwe had gone thence and emerged at the sea, from the place where he emerged there grew the stem of "bush-rope" (the calamus palm); and the staff he held became a mangrove forest. the footprints where he and his dog trod are there on the beach of corisco bay until this day. he created a sand-bank from where he stood, extending through the ocean, by which he crossed over to the land of the great sea. when he reached that land, he prepared a ship. he put into it every production by which white people obtain wealth, and he said to the crew, "go ye and take for me my brother." the ship came to africa and put down anchor; but, for four days the crew did not find any person coming from shore to set foot on the ship, or to go from the ship to set foot ashore, the natives being destitute of canoes. finally, uhâdwe came and appeared to the towns-people in a dream, and said, "go ye to the forest and cut down njâpe, dig out a canoe, and go alongside the ship." early next morning they went to the forest, and came to the okume trees; they cut one down, and hacked it into shape. they launched it on the sea, and said to their young men, "go!" four young men went into the canoe to go alongside the ship. when they had nearly reached it, looking hither and thither they feared, and they stopped and ceased paddling. the white men on the ship made repeated signs to them. then the young men, having come close, spoke to the white men in the native language. a white man answered also in the same language. that white man said, "i have come to buy the tusks of the beast which is here in the forest with big feet and tusks and great ears, that is called njâku." they said, "yes! a good thing!" when they were about leaving, the white man advancing to them, deposited with them four bunches of tobacco, four bales of prints, four caps, and other things. when they reached the shore, they told the others, "the white men want njâku's tusks; and also they have things by which to kill his tribe." the next morning, they went to the white men; they were trusted with guns and bullets and powder; they went to the forest, and fought with the elephants. in two days the ship was loaded, and it departed. this continues to happen so until this day, in the ivory-trade. tale leopard's marriage journey persons njambi (chief of a town) njâ (leopard) etoli (house-rat) mbindi (wild goat) vyâdu (antelope) ehibo (red antelope) iheli (gazelle) ekwedikwedi (fire-fly) leopard wanted to marry, and he sought a betrothal at njambi's town. secretly, njambi had arranged with leopard that he should bring him no goods in payment of the "dowry," but only the bodies of animals. leopard agreed, and said to njambi's daughter, "i will dowry you only with animals." he returned to his home for a few days; and then he called rat to escort him to the town of his prospective father-in-law. rat consented. and they started on their journey. on their way, they came to a wide river; and leopard said to rat, "before one crosses this river, he must throw his knife into it." rat threw his knife; and so (apparently) did leopard. they crossed; went on their way, and came to a kuda tree; and they stopped, and began to gather the nuts. leopard drew his knife from its sheath, and splitting the nut-shells and eating the kernels, said derisively to rat, "one who has no knife will not be able to eat kuda." rat, in his helplessness, made no protest. and they went on. they came to a certain "medicine" tree; and leopard said, "etoli, if i shall fall sick on the way, and i tell you to go back and get the bark of a certain tree for medicine, see! this is the tree." finally, they came to the town of the woman whom leopard was to marry. there, food was cooked for them. just before they were to sit down to eat, leopard exclaimed, "etoli! i am sick! go, and get that medicine for me!" while rat was gone, leopard ate up almost all the food, leaving only a few scraps for rat. at night, inside of the entrance of the house where the two strangers were to sleep, was a pit already dug. leopard knew of it, and jumped over it; but rat fell into it. leopard shouted to the town's-people, "this is the animal i brought to pay on my dowry! come, and take him!" the people came, caught rat, and ate him. the next morning, leopard's father-in-law had food prepared for him; he ate; and returned to his town. there, the relatives of rat asked him, "where is the little one you took to escort you?" leopard replied, "he refused to return, staying there with the woman." again, leopard prepared gifts of dried fish and tobacco for his mother-in-law, and arranged for another journey. he called to his relative, "brother" wild-goat, "come, escort me to the town of my marriage." wild goat consented; and they started. they came to the river; and, as in the case of rat, leopard said to goat, "you will first throw away your knife, before you can cross this river." goat actually did so; leopard pretending to do so. continuing their journey, they came to that kuda tree. leopard was careful to stand on a side of the tree opposite to goat, as they gathered the nuts. but, he said provokingly, "one can not eat kuda without a knife." wild goat innocently replied, "but, you, njâ, you are eating nuts! did you bring two knives?" they journeyed on, and came to the medicine tree. and leopard gave to goat the same directions about it as he had given to rat. when they reached the marriage town, food was set before them. but leopard immediately began to groan and scream, "i'm dead! i'm dead! i'm dead with pain!" wild goat sympathisingly inquired, "what shall i do to help you?" leopard replied, as in the case of rat, "go back to that tree, and get its bark as a medicine for me." wild goat went; and while he was away, leopard ate the food, leaving very little of it. on his return, wild goat protested at so little being given him. leopard explained, "in my great suffering from tooth-ache, i ate nothing. perhaps it was the town's-people who ate up the food, leaving you only these pieces." after they had eaten, they were called to the reception-house, and spent the evening in conversation with the people of the town. then, they were shown to the house in which they were to sleep. it was the one with the pit-fall inside the door-way. leopard, of course, jumped over it; but wild goat fell into it. and, as in the case of rat, leopard called out, "people of the town! this is your dowry-goods! i have brought it to you!" the next morning, leopard took his journey, and came back home. when the people of his town asked him, as in the case of rat, "where is the friend you took with you?" he made the same reply, "don't ask me! he is entangled off there with women." on a third journey, leopard called antelope to accompany him. antelope agreed. they came to the river; and as before leopard told how that river could not be crossed by travelers unless their knives were thrown away. this, antelope did. then, they came to the kuda tree. there, antelope heard leopard splitting the nuts, and asked him. "did you not throw away your knife? do you travel with two?" leopard answered, "yes! i always travel with two." then, they came to the medicine tree. and leopard explained about its bark being the cure for his frequent tooth-aches, when eating at his father-in-law's town. they came to the town. and when food was brought to them, leopard cried out, "o! my tooth! my tooth!" antelope asked, "where is your medicine that you said you use?" leopard answered, "at the tree which i showed you on the way. go, and get it." while antelope was gone, leopard ate up almost all the food. on returning, antelope exclaimed "what! only this little food for me?" leopard explained, "with my great tooth-ache, i ate none. nothing happened, except that the town's-people came, and were eating up the food; and i, in my kindness for you, begged them to leave at least a little for you." antelope handed him the medicine, and leopard said, "put it down there"; and he threw it away, while antelope's back was turned. after they had eaten, they went to their room for the night. leopard, as usual, jumped over the pit; but antelope fell in. and leopard gave his shout to the people to come and take the dowry-goods he had brought. the next morning, after breakfast, leopard again started on his home journey. there, again he was anxiously asked, "but, those whom you take with you don't come back! why?" he made the same reply, "they know why! off there are damsels and dancing; and they were unable to return." for his next journey, leopard asked red antelope, who heartily replied, "yes, come on! there is nothing to prevent my going on a journey!" they journeyed, and they came to the river. there, leopard made his statement about the necessity of throwing their knives into the river. red antelope wondered a little, but he consented saying, "yes, but what is that to me?" said leopard, "well, then, shut your eyes, and i will be the first to throw, lest you say i am deceiving you." said red antelope, "yes." and he shut his eyes tightly. then leopard, having a stone in his hand, flung it into the water, saying, "i've thrown mine; throw also yours!" red antelope demanded, "but, you must shut your eyes also." leopard half-closed his eyes, and red antelope, knife in hand, flung it into the water. then, wading across, they went on and on to the base of the kuda tree. said leopard, "mr. ehibo, this kuda is eaten of here only by each person on his own side of the trunk." red antelope assented; and they turned, this one to one side, and that one to the other side. there, as red antelope was vainly trying to crack the nuts with his teeth, leopard was deriding him while himself was comfortably using his knife. then, leopard said, "let us go on; for, the day is declining." red antelope agreed. as they went, they came to an ebwehavu tree. and leopard said, "let us climb for bebwehavu fruits. but, when we climb this particular tree, it is the practice here, to climb, one by one. while the one is climbing, the other has his eyes shut; and, the climbing is done, not by the trunk, but by this adjoining bongo tree which you see here. but, first, close your eyes, and i will go up." (the bongo's trunk is covered with hard sharp thorns.) red antelope stood, with his eyes tightly closed. leopard grasped a vine; and, with one swing, he at once was up the tree. red antelope began climbing that bongo, creeping slowly to the top, his whole body spoiled, and nothing on him but blood and blood. said leopard, "this ebwehavu is accustomed to be plucked only the green unripe, but the dark ripe ones are to be left." that seemed strange to red antelope, nevertheless he said, "yes." but leopard was plucking the ripe and leaving the green. when they had finished plucking, leopard said, "ehibo! shut eyes! that i may descend!" red antelope shut his eyes. leopard grasped the vine; and, with one spring, was on the ground. then, he said, "now, ehibo, descend." red antelope began descending by the bongo, down, down, landing finally on the ground. leopard waited for him; and then said, "having no fire, how shall we cook those green bebwehavu?" just then, he saw a fire-fly passing; and he said. "mr. ehibo! pursue! that's fire passing there!" red antelope bent in rapid pursuit. leopard turned to the base of the tree, gathered dried fire-wood, struck his flint, lighted a fire, cooked his fruits, ate them, finished, and put out his fire. red antelope, back again, said, "i did not reach it, i'm tired." leopard said, "well, let it go. i chewed mine uncooked. but, let us journey; and, as you go, you chew yours." they went on, and came to the town of the marriage. food was cooked and set for them in their room. said leopard, "ehibo, sit you on the floor, while i eat at the table. and, while i eat the flesh, you eat the bones." red antelope had become so utterly wearied and humiliated that he did not resent this indignity. they ate. and then leopard said, "ehibo, sweep up the scraps, and go and throw them into the back yard." (immediately on his arrival at the town, leopard had gone alone to his father-in-law, and said, "i have brought you an animal. but, let another pit, this time, be dug in the back yard of the room where we shall be. and, do you put spears and daggers and all kinds of sharp sticks there. when i shall send him to throw away the sweepings, and he shall fall in, kill ye him.") red antelope swept, and scraped up the sweepings, and threw them into a basket. he turned with them to the back yard, to fling them away. as he was about to do so, he slipped down to the bottom of the pit. impaled on the spears, he was unable to jump out. when the town's-people arrived, they thrust him through with sharp poles; and he lay dead. when leopard returned home, red antelope's people asked, "where is ehibo?" leopard made his former answer, "ehibo was hindered by the hospitality of that marriage town, with its food and its women; and, he said, 'i won't go back!'" thus, with each journey, leopard called for another animal. they went, over the same route; and the same things happened each time. so, matters went on for a long while. but, gazelle, a very smart beast, began to suspect, observing that none of leopard's travel-companions ever came back. in his heart, he thought to himself, "leopard deceives people!" he determined to find out, by offering to go, and watch for himself. at last, he said, "uncle njâ, let me go to escort you to the town of your marriage. when next you go on your journey, call me to go with you." said leopard, "i don't want you." (he suspected gazelle's smartness.) gazelle insisted, "uncle, as to these others whom you have invited to go with you, and not the rather me, your relative?" so, leopard agreed, "yes, let us go." by the next morning they started on their journey, going on and on, clear to the big river. there, as usual, leopard told about knives to be thrown into the river; and he said, "nephew iheli, you first throw your knife." said gazelle, "first, you throw yours, then i will throw mine also." said leopard, "well! shut your eyes!" gazelle half-closed his hands on his eyes, and was peeping. he saw leopard seize a chunk of wood and fling it in the water. then he said, "shut eyes! let me also throw mine!" leopard's eyes shut tight. gazelle, seizing a stick, flung it into the water. then, they crossed the river, and went on and on, until they came to the base of the kuda tree. leopard made his usual statement about parties eating the nuts on opposite sides of the tree. gazelle, with apparent obedience, said, "yes." leopard, with knife drawn, began to hack and split the nuts, throwing the kernels into his mouth, and making his usual derisive remark, "by the truth! a person without a knife can not eat the kernels of kuda." gazelle also, hacking his, and throwing them into his mouth, said, "just exactly so! a person without a knife can not eat the kernel of kuda-nut!" leopard exclaimed, "what are you doing? have you two knives?" gazelle replied, "but, what are you doing? had you two knives?" leopard answered, "yes, for, i am the senior." gazelle responded, "and i also carry two knives; for, i also am an adult." leopard only said, "iheli! come on!" they went on, until they came to the ebwehavu tree. there, leopard made his usual explanation of climbing only by means of the bongo tree. gazelle agreed, and said, "yes; climb you first." leopard said, "shut your eyes." gazelle stood, with eyes apparently tightly closed. with one swing on a vine, leopard is up the tree. said gazelle, "you also, shut your eyes. let me go up." leopard pretended to shut his eyes. and gazelle, with one swing, was also up the tree. leopard made his usual statement about plucking only the green fruit. to which, gazelle seemed to assent. and they descended the tree, without leopard attempting to deceive gazelle about the bongo tree. but, leopard seeing the sun going down, said, "iheli! pursue! that's fire that's going there!" but, gazelle showed he was not deceived, by simply saying, "that's not fire!" so, leopard gathered fire-wood; and they cooked and ate their bebwehavu. then, they resumed their journey, and came to the medicine tree. there leopard told his usual story about the bark of that tree being his great cure-all. gazelle quietly said, "yes." but, when they left the tree, and had gone a short distance farther, he exclaimed, "o! i forgot my staff! i must go back and get it!" he went back to the tree, stripped bark from it, put it into his traveling-bag, and overtook leopard. and they came on together to the town. after they had entered their house, gazelle remarked to leopard, "let me go out and see the other fellows, who came with you on your previous journeys, and who, you said, had stayed here with the women." he went out; and returned, saying, "i saw the women, but none of those fellows." food was cooked for them, and they sat down to eat. but, suddenly, leopard broke out in groans, "iheli! i feel a pain in my stomach; go, get bark of that tree i showed you. the medicine! get the medicine!" gazelle answered "yes, but just wait until i finish my plate;" and he continued eating rapidly. leopard was distressed to see the food disappearing; but, as he had pretended sickness, he did not dare begin to eat. when, finally there was but little food left, gazelle introduced his hand into his bag, and, handing out the pieces of bark, said, "here's your medicine! that's it!" leopard said, "yes, just leave it there. i do not need the medicine now. the pain has ceased. let us first eat. we will eat together." after finishing their eating, gazelle swept up the scraps, and placed them in a basket. said leopard, "come, i will go with you to show you the place where sweepings are to be thrown." gazelle was about to fling the basket, as leopard came to push him into the pit. but, gazelle lightly leaped across to the other side of it, and cried out, "uncle! what do you want to do to me?" leopard said, "that's nothing!" it being night, they went to their sleeping-room, leopard accompanied by his wife. he and she carefully jumped over the other pit that was inside of the door-way of that house. gazelle also jumped, with careful observation, the while that people stood outside expecting him to fall into it. they retired for the night, leopard and his wife on the bed; gazelle on a mat on the floor. said gazelle, "uncle, if you hear me stertorously snoring, then i am awake; but, if silently, then i am asleep." in a little while, gazelle feigned gentle snoring. leopard thinking gazelle was asleep, took an iron rod, and thrust it into the fire. gazelle saw what he was doing. when it was red-hot, he removed it, and, stepping softly, was about to stab gazelle with it; who, quickly moving aside, exclaimed, "eh! what are you doing?" leopard coolly replied, "nothing; i was only brushing away an insect that was biting you." gazelle thought within himself, "njâ will surely kill me to-night." so, he took chalk, and secretly marked circles around his eyes, making himself look as if his eyes were open and he awake, even if he should actually be asleep. after a while, leopard slept, sound asleep with his wife. then gazelle passed over to leopard's bed, and lifting the woman (unconscious in her sleep) to his mat on the floor, laid down in her place, beside leopard in the bed. during the night, leopard awoke, and, not noticing, in the darkness, the change at his side, went with the rod, to the mat where he supposed gazelle was sleeping, and stabbed the woman to death. then gazelle (who had remained awake) cried out, "eh! you kill another person? you are killing your wife!" leopard exclaimed, "umph! is that you? i said to myself that this was you!" gazelle said, "yes! what did you go to my bed for? so, then! i am the one you wanted to kill!" leopard confessed, "it is true that i came here to kill you, thinking this was you. but, as the matter is thus, say no more about it. let us cut up and eat this woman. come, cut up!" but, gazelle said, "i? when the town's-people hear the chopping, then won't they say, 'what animal has iheli killed in his brother-in-law's town, that he is cutting it up at night?' yourself, cut her to pieces." so, leopard said, "well, leave the work on the body of the woman to me; but, do you attend to the cooking." said gazelle, "i? when the town's people shall hear the kettle boiling, then will they say, 'whom has iheli killed in the town of his brother-in-law, that he cooks at night?'" leopard boiled the kettle. it was cooked; and he said to gazelle, "go, cut down a bunch of plantains, out there in the back-yard." (this he said, hoping that gazelle would fall into that pit, either in going out or coming in.) but, gazelle said, "i? when the town's people hear the strokes of the machete, and the crash of the fall of the bunch, then, will they not suspect me, and say, 'what meat has iheli killed, that he is cutting down a plantain at night?' cut it yourself." leopard went and cut down a bunch of plantains, and said to gazelle, "now, come and peel the plantains, and cook them." gazelle refused, "no; do you peel and cook. i'm in bed. i'll eat only greens." then leopard said (making a last effort to get gazelle into the pit), "well, go to the back-yard, and pluck pepper for the soup." gazelle again refused, "no; when the town's-people hear the plucking of the pods, will they not say, 'what animal has iheli killed that he is gathering pepper for the soup?'" finally, leopard, having done all the work, and finished cooking, and set the table, said, "come, iheli, i have finished all. come, and eat." gazelle came, but said, "first, put out all the lights." leopard did so. and gazelle added, "we will understand that whichever, at the close of the meal, has the largest pile of bones by his plate, shall be known as the one who killed the woman." leopard agreed. the light having been extinguished, they ate in darkness. but, while they were eating, gazelle chose only the bony pieces that had little meat; and, having picked them, he quietly laid the bones by leopard's plate. when they had finished eating, the torches were re-lighted, and gazelle cried out at leopard's big pile of bones. they were counted. and gazelle said, "did you not say that whoever had the most bones would prove himself the murderer? so! indeed! you are the one who killed another person's child!" leopard evaded, and said, "but, iheli, take a broom and sweep up the scraps from the floor, and throw them into the yard." (making thus a final effort to get gazelle into that pit.) but, gazelle, refused, "no; yourself do it. when the town's-people hear the bones falling as they are thrown in the yard, will they not suspect me, and say, 'what animal has iheli killed at night, that he is clearing away the scraps?'" leopard swept up the floor and table, and threw the pieces into the backyard. as they were finishing, day began to dawn. gazelle said, "njâ, the day is breaking; let us seek hiding-places; for, when the people come in, in the morning, and find that their daughter is dead, lest they kill us." so, they began to look around for hiding-places. gazelle said, "i shall hide in this big box on the floor." but, leopard objected, "no; that traveling-box befits me; and, as the elder, i shall take it." gazelle said, then, "well, i'll hide under the bed." but, leopard again objected (hoping to leave gazelle without a place). "no; that also is my place; it suits me." gazelle protested, "you are claiming this and that place! where shall i go? well! i see! i'll hide over the door." "yes" said leopard, "that's the hiding-place for a young person like you." (this he said, still thinking of the pit near the door.) gazelle agreed, saying, "i am here, by the door. you get into that box, and i'll tie it with a string, as if no one was in it." leopard objected, "but, the string will hinder my breaking out." "no," replied gazelle, "it shall be a weak twine. you can easily burst it, when you fling up the lid, and jump out, and run away." leopard got into the box, and gazelle began to tie it with a heavy chain. leopard hearing the clanking, exclaimed, "with a chain, iheli?" gazelle had the chain fast; and he coolly replied, "it's only a little one." then he piled heavy stones on the box. as day broke, he took his stand among a bundle of dried plantain-leaves that was over the door-way. the towns-people sent a child to open the door of the strangers' house, to call them to eat. as the child was about to enter, gazelle struck him a blow on the head; and the child went away wailing with pain. the child's father said to his family that he would go to see what was the matter. as he pushed wide open the door of the strangers' house, gazelle slid down, sprang out, and ran rapidly away, shouting, "njâ is there! njâ is in that box! he it is who has killed your woman!" and the towns-people shouted after him, "is that so? well, you're off, iheli! go!" leopard, when he heard that, made desperate efforts to get out of the box. the town's-men entered the house and found the box with leopard tied in it. they fired their guns at him, and killed him. as they did so, they reproached him, "why did you kill our daughter, whom you came to marry?" then they gathered together a great pile of fire-wood in the street, thrust on to it the dead body of leopard, and burned him there. gazelle went back to the town of beasts, and they asked him, "where is he with whom you went on your journey?" gazelle told them, "he is dead. he it was who killed the other beasts who went with him. and he is now killed by the relatives of the woman whom he was to marry, but whom also he had murdered." for this reason, that gazelle informed on leopard in the box, the relatives of leopard since then have no friendship with gazelle, and always pursue and try to kill him. the entire leopard tribe have kept up that feud with the gazelle tribe, saying, "you caused our father's death." and they carry on their revenge. tale tortoise in a race persons kudu (tortoise) mbalanga (antelope) note discussions about seniority are common causes of quarrel in africa. the reason assigned why tortoises are so spread everywhere is that the antelope tribe, in public-meeting, recognized their superiority. at batanga, gaboon, ogowe, and everywhere on the equatorial west coast, there are tortoises even in places where there are no other animals. on account of this, the tortoise is given many names; and has many nicknames in the native tribes, e.g., "manyima," and "evosolo." tortoise had formerly lived in the same town with several other animals. but, after awhile, they had decided to separate, and each built his own village. one day, tortoise decided to roam. so he started, and went on an excursion; leaving his wife and two children in the village. on his way, he came to the village of antelope. the latter welcomed him, killed a fowl, and prepared food for him; and they sat at the table, eating. when they had finished eating, antelope asked, "kudu! my friend, what is your journey for?" tortoise answered, "i have come to inquire of you, as to you and me, which is the elder?" antelope replied, "kudu! i am older than you!" but tortoise responded, "no! i am the elder!" then antelope said, "show me the reason why you are older than i!" tortoise said, continuing the discussion, "i will show you a sign of seniority. let us have a race, as a test of speed." antelope replied derisively, "aiye! how shall i know to test speed with kudu? does kudu race?" however, he agreed, and said, "well! in three days the race shall be made." tortoise spoke audaciously, "you, mbalanga, cannot surpass me in a race!" antelope laughed, having accepted the challenge; while tortoise pretended to sneer, and said, "i am the one who will overcome!" the course chosen, beginning on the beach south of batanga, was more than seventy miles from the campo river northward to the balimba country. then tortoise went away, going everywhere to give directions, and returned to his village. he sent word secretly to all the tortoise tribe to call them. when they had come very many of them together, he told them, "i have called my friend mbalanga for a race. i know that he can surpass me in this race, unless you all help me in my plan. he will follow the sea-beach. you all must line yourselves among the bushes at the top of the beach along the entire route all the way from campo to balimba. when mbalanga, coming along, at any point, looks around to see whether i am following, and calls out, 'kudu! where are you?' the one of you who is nearest that spot must step out from his place, and answer for me, 'here!'" thus he located all the other tortoises in the bushes on the entire route. also, he placed a colored mark on all the tortoises, making the face of every one alike. he stationed them clear on to the place where he expected that antelope would be exhausted. then he ended, taking his own place there. antelope also arranged for himself, and said, to his wife, "my wife! make me food; for, kudu and i have agreed on a race; and it begins at seven o'clock in the morning." when all was ready, antelope said, to (the one whom he supposed was) kudu, "come! let us race!" they started. antelope ran on and on, and came as far as about ten miles to the town of ubenji, among the igara people. at various spots on the way tortoise apparently was lost behind; but as constantly he seemed to re-appear, saying, "i'm here!" at once, antelope raced forward rapidly, pu! pu! pu! to a town named ipenyenye. then he looked around and said, "where is kudu?" a tortoise stepped out of the bushes, saying "here i am! you haven't raced." antelope raced on until he reached the town of beyâ. again looking around, he said, "where is kudu?" a tortoise stepped out, replying, "i'm here!" antelope again raced, until he reached the town lolabe. again he asked, "where is kudu?" a tortoise saying to himself, "he hasn't heard anything," replied, "here i am!" again antelope raced on as far as from there to a rocky point by the sea named ilale-ja-moto; and then he called, "wherever is kudu?" a tortoise ready answered, "here i am!" from thence, he came on in the race another stretch of about ten miles, clear to the town of bongaheli of the batanga people. at each place on the route, when antelope, losing sight of tortoise, called, "kudu! where are you?" promptly the tortoise on guard at that spot replied, "i'm here!" then on he went, steadily going, going, another stretch of about twenty miles to plantation beach. still the prompt reply to antelope's call, "kudu, where are you?" was, "i'm here!" as he started away from plantation, the wearied antelope began to feel his legs tired. however, he pressed on to small batanga, hoping for victory over his despised contestant. but, on his reaching the edge of balimba, the tortoise was there ready with his, "i'm here!" finally, on reaching the end of the balimba settlement, antelope fell down, dying, froth coming from his mouth, and lay dead, being utterly exhausted with running. but, when tortoise arrived, he took a magic-medicine, and restored antelope to life; and then exulted over him by beating him, and saying, "don't you show me your audacity another day by daring to run with me! i have surpassed you!" so, they returned separately to their homes on the campo river. tortoise called together the tortoise tribe; and antelope called all the antelope tribe. and they met in a council of all the animals. then tortoise rose and spoke--"all you kudu tribe! mbalanga said i would not surpass him in a race. but, this day i have surpassed!" so the antelope tribe had to acknowledge, "yes, you, kudu, have surpassed our champion. it's a great shame to us; for, we had not supposed that a slow fellow such as we thought you to be, could possibly do it, or be able to out-run a mbalanga." so the council decided that, of all the tribes of animals, tortoise was to be held as greatest; for, that it had out-run antelope. and the animals gave tortoise the power to rule. tale goat's tournament persons tomba (goat) njâ (leopard) note the reason why leopards wander everywhere, and fight all other animals, is their shame at being overcome by a goat. their ancestor had said, "i did not know that a goat could overcome me." the tribe of goats sent a message to the tribe of leopards, saying, "let us have a wrestling match, in an effort to see which is the stronger." then leopard took counsel with his tribe, "this tribe of goats! i do not see that they have any strength. let us agree to the contest; for, they can do nothing to me." so, the goat tribe gathered all together; and the leopard tribe all together; and they met in a street of a town, to engage in the drumming and dancing and singing usually preceding such contests. for the wrestling, they joined in thirty pairs, one from each tribe. the first pair wrestled; and the representative of the leopards was overcome and thrown to the ground. another pair joined; and again the leopard champion was overcome. a third pair joined and wrestled, contesting desperately; the leopard in shame, and the goat in exultation. again the leopard was overcome. there was, during all this time, drumming by the adherents of both parties. the leopard drum was now beaten fiercely to encourage their side, as they had already been overcome three times in succession. then, on the fourth effort, the leopard succeeded in overcoming. again a pair fought; and leopard overcame a second time. the sixth pair joined; and leopard said, "today we wrestle to settle that doubt as to which of us is the stronger." so, pair after pair wrestled, until all of the thirty arranged pairs had contested. of these, the leopard tribe were victors ten times; and the goat tribe twenty times. then the leopard tribe said, "we are ashamed that the report should go out among all the animals that we beat only ten times, and the tomba twenty times. so, we will not stay any longer here, with their and our towns near together:" for they knew that their leopard tribe would always be angry when they should see a company of goats passing, remembering how often they were beaten. so, they moved away into the forest distant from their hated rivals. in their cherished anger at being beaten, and to cover their shame, leopard attacks a goat when he meets him alone, or any other single beast known to be friendly to the goats, e.g., oxen or antelopes. tale why goats became domestic persons tomba-ya-taba (goat) with etoli, plural betoli (rat) vyâdu (antelope, plural lâdu) njâ (leopard) ko (wild-rat) njâku (elephant) mankind nyati (ox) goat and his mother lived alone in their village. he said to her, "i have here a magic-medicine to strengthen one in wrestling. there is no one who can overcome me, or cast me down; i can overcome any other person." the other beasts heard of this boast; and they took up the challenge. first, house-rats, hundreds of them, came to goat's village, to test him. and they began the wrestling. he overcame them, one by one, to the number of two hundred. so, the rats went back to their places, admitting that they were not able to overcome him. then, forest-rat came to wrestle with goat. he overcame them also, all of them. and they went back to their own place defeated. then, the antelope came to wrestle with goat. he overcame all the antelopes, every one of them; not one was able to withstand him. and they also went back to their places. also, elephant with all the elephants, came on that same challenge. goat overcame all the elephants; and they too, went back to their place. thus, all the beasts came, in the same way, and were overcome in the same way, and went back in the same way. but, there still remained one beast, only one, leopard, who had not made the attempt. so he said he would go; as he was sure he could overcome. he came. goat overcame him also. so, it was proved that not a single beast could withstand goat. then the father of all-the-leopards said, "i am ashamed that this beast should overcome me. i will kill him!" and he made a plan to do so. he went to the spring where mankind got their drinking-water. and he stood, hiding at the spring. men of the town went to the spring to get water; leopard killed two of them. the people went to tell goat, "go away from here, for leopard is killing mankind on your account." the mother of goat said to him, "if that is so, let us go to my brother vyâdu." so they both went to go to uncle antelope. and they came to his village. when they told him their errand, he bravely said, "remain here! let me see njâ come here with his audacity!" they were then at antelope's village, about two days. on the third day, about eight o'clock in the morning, leopard came there as if for a walk. when antelope saw him, goat and his mother hid themselves; and antelope asked leopard, "what is your anger? why are you angry with my nephew?" at that very moment while antelope was speaking, leopard seized him on the ear. antelope cried out, "what are you killing me for?" leopard replied, "show me the place where tomba-taba and his mother are." so, antelope being afraid said, "come tonight, and i will show you where they sleep. and you kill them; but don't kill me." while he was saying this, goat overheard, and said to his mother, "we must flee, lest njâ kill us." so, at sun-down, that evening, goat and his mother fled to the village of elephant. about midnight, leopard came to antelope's village, according to appointment, and looked for goat, but did not find him. leopard went to all the houses of the village, and when he came to antelope's own, in his disappointment, he killed him. leopard kept up his search, and followed to find where goat had gone. following the tracks, he came to the village of elephant. when he arrived there, elephant demanded, "what's the matter?" and the same conversation was held, as at antelope's village, and the incidents happened as at that village, ending with elephant's being killed by leopard. for, goat and his mother had fled, and had gone to the village of ox. leopard followed, and came to ox's village. there all the same things were said and done, as in the other villages, and ending with goat and his mother fleeing, and ox being killed. then, the mother, wearying of flight, and sorry at causing their entertainers to be killed, said, "my child! if we continue to flee to the villages of other beasts, njâ will follow, and will kill them. let us flee to the homes of mankind." so, they fled again, and came to the town of man, and told him their story. he received them kindly. he took goat and his mother as guests, and gave them a house to live in. one time, at night, leopard came to the town of man, in pursuit of goat. but man said to leopard, "those beasts whom you killed, failed to find a way in which to kill you. but, if you come here, we will find a way." so, that night, leopard went back to his village. on another day, mankind began to make a big trap, with two rooms in it. they took goat and put him in one room of the trap. night came. leopard left his village, still going to seek for goat; and he came again to the town of man. leopard stood still, listened, and sniffed the air. he smelled the odor of goat, and was glad, and said, "so! this night i will kill him!" he saw an open way to a small house. he thought it was a door. he entered, and was caught in the trap. he could see goat through the cracks in the wall, but could not get at him. goat jeered at him, "my friend! you were about to kill me, but you are unable." daybreak came. and people of man's town found leopard in the trap, caught fast. they took machetes and guns, and killed him. then man said to goat, "you shall not go back to the forest; remain here always." this is the reason that goats like to live with mankind, through fear of leopards. tale igwana's forked tongue persons ngâmbi (igwana) njâ (leopard) betoli (rats) vyâdu (antelope) iheli (gazelle) ehibo (red antelope) note natives believe that the igwana kills with its long tongue. this story assigns the fear of leopards as a reason why igwanas like to live near water. igwanas swim readily, while leopards (as all the cat-tribe) do not like even to wet their feet. there were two friends, igwana and leopard, living in the same village, one at each end. igwana had six wives; leopard also had six. leopard begot twenty children; igwana had eight. one time, at night, they were sitting with their wives and children in the street, in a conversation. leopard said to igwana, "ngâmbi! i have a word to say to you." igwana said, "speak." then leopard said, "i wish you and me to have our food together." igwana agreed, "well." and leopard arranged, "for two months, you shall come and eat in my house; and then, for two months, i at your house." and they separated, to go to their houses for sleep. soon the night passed, and day broke. leopard went to the forest and killed an antelope. he and igwana and their families spent four days in eating it. on another day, leopard went to the forest and killed a gazelle. it also was finished in four days. and again, leopard went to the forest, and killed a red antelope. they were occupied in eating it also four days. so, they continued all the two months. then leopard said, "ngâmbi! it is your time to begin the food." igwana replied, "i have no wild meat, only vegetables." on the following day, igwana got ready his food and sent word for leopard to come to eat. he came and ate, there being on the table only vegetables and salt. then the day darkened; and, in the evening they all came together in one place, as usual. leopard said to igwana, "i began my turn with meats in my house, and you ate them. i cannot eat only vegetables and salt." igwana explained, "i do not know the arts for killing beasts." leopard told him, "begin now to try the art of how to catch beasts." igwana replied, "if i begin a plan for catching beasts, that plan will be a dreadful one." leopard exclaimed, "good! begin!" igwana promised, "tomorrow i will begin." and they all went to their houses to sleep their sleep. the night passed, and day broke. igwana started out very early in the morning. on the way, he came to a big tree. he stood at its base, and, with a cord, he loosely tied his own hands and feet around the tree. then he began to squeak as if in pain, "hwa! hwa! hwa!" three times. at that same time, a child of leopard had gone wandering out into the forest. he found igwana tied to the tree and crying. igwana said to him, "ah! my child! come near me, and untie me." the child of leopard came near to him; and then igwana thrust his forked tongue into the nostrils of young leopard, and pulled his brains out, so that the child died. then igwana untied himself, skinned the young leopard, divided it, tied the pieces in a big bundle of leaves, and took them and the skin to the village. there he gave the meat to his wife, who put it in a pot. and he went to his house, and left the skin hanging in his bedroom. then when the meat was cooked, he sent word for leopard to come and eat. leopard came and sat down at the table, and they ate. as they were eating, leopard said, "ah! my friend! you said you did not know how to catch beasts! what is this fine meat?" igwana replied, "i am unable to tell you. just you eat it." so, they ate, and finished eating. igwana continued that way for two weeks, killing the young leopards. at that leopard said to himself, "i had begotten twenty children, but now i find only ten. where are the other ten?" he asked his children where their brothers were. they answered that they did not know, "perhaps they were lost in the forest." the while that igwana was killing the young leopards, he had hidden their skins all in his bedroom. on another day, leopard and igwana began a journey together to a place about forty miles distant. before he started, igwana closed his house, and said to his children, "njâ and i are going on a journey; while i am away, do not let any one enter into my bedroom." and they two went together on their journey. they reached their journey's end, and were there for the duration of seven days. while they were gone, there was no one to get meat for their people, and there came on their village a great njangu (hunger for meat). one of those days, in the village, so great was that famine that the children of leopard were searching for rats for food. the rats ran away to the house of igwana that was shut up; and the children of leopard pursued. but the children of igwana said to them, "do not enter the house! our father forbade it! stop at the door-way!" but the young leopards replied, "no! all the betoli have run in there. we must follow." so, they broke down the door. there they found skins of young leopards, and they exclaimed, "so! indeed! ngâmbi kills our brothers!" and two days later, the two fathers came back to the village. the young igwanas told their father that the young leopards had broken the door, and found leopard-skins hanging inside. igwana asked them, "really? they saw?" the young igwanas answered, "yes! they saw!" then igwana said, "be on your guard! for, njâ will be angry with me." also, the young leopards said to their father, "paia! so it is that ngâmbi killed our brothers. we saw their skins in his bedroom." leopard asked, "truly?" they answered, "yes! we saw!" he said only, "well, let it be." on another day, leopard said, "this night i will go to ngâmbi to kill him and all his children." the wife of igwana heard this, and told him, "tonight, njâ will come to kill you and our children." at this, igwana said to himself "but! we must flee, i, and my children, and my wives!" so, they all went and hid in the water of a small stream. leopard came, in the dark of the morning, to igwana's house, and entered it; but he saw no people, only the skins of his children. so he exclaimed, "at whatever place i shall see ngâmbi, i will kill and eat him. we, he and i, have no more friendship!" tale what caused their deaths? persons mbwa (dog) kudu (tortoise) mbala (squirrel) note dog and squirrel were of the same age, and they met with the same end. they each had an object of their special liking, the excessive use of which finally was the cause of their death. dog, squirrel, tortoise and others were living in one town. they all, at that time, ate of the same kind of food. but, they were at peace in that village during only two weeks. then squirrel and dog said to tortoise, "let us divide, and have peace each at our separate villages. you, kudu, and the others can stay at this spot if you like." squirrel said he would remove to a place about three miles distant north. dog went about three miles in the opposite direction. so, each had his own little hamlet. on another day, squirrel said to his wife, "i am going on a journey to see my friend mbwa." he started, came to dog's place, and entered the house. dog welcomed him, played with him, and killed a fowl for their dinner. with squirrel had come one of his wives. while the women were cooking inside the house, dog and squirrel were sitting in the ikenga (reception-room). they were conversing there. after awhile, dog said to squirrel "excuse me, i will go to see about the food." he went inside, and lay down near the fire, and squirrel was left alone. dog stayed there inside the house, until the food was cooked. then he came out to his friend, and began to set the table, while the women came in with the food, and put it on the table. dog drew up by the table ready to eat; and squirrel also; and squirrel's wife, and dog's wife also, making four at the table. during the eating, squirrel said to dog, "my friend! when you left me here in the ikenga, where did you go to, the while that the women were cooking the food?" dog answered, "ah! my friend, you know that i like fire very much. while we were talking here, you and i, cold seized me." then squirrel said, "ah! my friend, you like fire too much; i think you will die of fire some day." they finished the food; and after that, squirrel prepared his return journey to his village. and he said to dog, "my friend mbwa, how many days before you shall come to my place?" dog answered, "in two days, then will i come." so, squirrel returned to his village. his wives and children told him the daily news of what had occurred in the village while he was away. and he told them about what he had seen at dog's. and he added, "but, there is one thing i noticed; my friend mbwa likes fire very much." he waited the two days; dog came on his visit; and squirrel killed a fowl for his guest. and he bade his woman cook the fowl. in the meanwhile, dog and squirrel sat in the ikenga conversing. presently squirrel said to dog, "excuse me, i am going. i will return." squirrel went out into his garden, and climbed up a banana stalk, and began eating the ripe fruit at the top of the bunch. after awhile, he came down again. and he went into the ikenga to prepare the table for the food. when it was ready, dog sat up at the table. with him were his wife, and squirrel and squirrel's wife. presently, dog inquired of squirrel, "my friend! when you left me sitting here alone, where did you go to?" squirrel answered, "my friend! you know i like to eat bananas. so, i was up the tree," then dog said, "my friend! you love bananas too much; some day, you will die with them." when they had finished their food, dog said, "i am on my return to my village." so he returned thither. but he was arrived there only two days when he happened to fall into the fire-place. and he died in the fire. the news was carried to his friend squirrel, "your friend mbwa is dead by fire." squirrel replied, "yes, i said so; for he loved fire too much." on another day, in man's town, a person went to look for food at his banana tree. and he saw that the fruit was eaten at the top, by some animal. so, that man made a snare at the banana tree. on the next day, squirrel said to himself, "i'm going to eat my banana food wherever i shall find it." he came to the town of man, and climbed the tree. the snare caught and killed him; and he died there. the man came and found the body of squirrel; and he exclaimed "good!" the news was carried to the village of squirrel's children, "your father is dead, at a banana tree." and they said, "yes; for our father loved bananas very much. he had said that mbwa would die by fire because he loved fire. and himself also loved bananas." tale a quarrel about seniority persons ihendi (squirrel) and children ikundu (vengeance) ihana (help) pe (viper) a hunter note this story suggests that when a neighbor flatters another, suspicion is raised that he is plotting some evil. squirrel and the adder professed great friendship; but their friendship was soon broken. claims of seniority are a constant cause of native quarrels. a certain fetish-charm or "medicine" (generally poisonous) is supposed to be able to decide, on its being drunk by accused parties, as to their guilt or innocence. there is a common belief in premonitions by unusual beats of the heart, or twitching of any muscle. squirrel and adder were great friends, living in the same town. each of them had two wives. one day, in the afternoon, squirrel and one of his wives went into the house of adder. the latter said to his wife, "make ready food." so, she made a great deal of food. then he said to his friend squirrel, "come, eat!" but squirrel said, "i won't eat alone without my wife." so he called his wife to eat. his wife came and ate at the table. then he said to adder, "also, you call your wife to eat with us." so adder's wife came. and squirrel said to adder, "now let us eat; for, everything is right." so they began to eat. while they were eating, adder said, "i have a word to say about you, ihendi." squirrel replied, "speak your word; i will listen." then adder asked, "you, ihendi, and i, pe; which is the elder? and your wife and my wife; also which is the elder?" squirrel replied, "i am the elder, and my wife is older than your wife." but adder said, "no! i am the elder; and my wife is older than yours." squirrel responded, "i will give you my answer tomorrow in my own house." this occurred in the evening. then the day darkened, and squirrel went to his house to lie down. adder also went to lie down in his bedroom. in the night, squirrel remarked to his wife, "my wife! what sort of a word is this that pe has spoken about so to me? i don't know about his birth, and he does not know of mine. we have no other person in the town who is able to decide which of us is the elder, and which the younger. this question has some affair behind it." his wife replied "i think that pe wants to get up a quarrel in order to kill you or our children." squirrel had two children, one named vengeance and the other help. squirrel replied to his wife, "no! i will have no discussion with pe; but tomorrow there shall be only a test of medicine." soon the day broke. squirrel sent word to pe, "chum! you and i will have today nothing else but a medicine-test and no quarrel. for, you and i profess to love each other. i do this to prove both yourself and myself, lest you get up some affair against me, even though we love each other very much." adder consented, "yes; get the medicine. i will know then what i shall say." squirrel went to the forest to get leaves and bark of a certain tree for the kwai (test). on his return, he said to adder, "here is the test; let us drink of it." adder replied, "the medicine is of your getting. you first drink of it." squirrel agreed, "yes, i will drink first." so, squirrel, conscious of his innocence, drank the test and swore an oath, "if i meet pe's mother, it shall be only in peace. or his father, only peace; or his children, only peace." squirrel added, "i have finished speaking for my part." and he sat down on the ground. then adder arose from his seat and stood up. and he exclaimed, "yes! let it be so!" he took up the medicine from the ground; and he drank of it greedily. and he swore, "if i meet with the children of ihende, it will be only to swallow them. or, father of ihende, only to eat him; or mother of ihende, only to eat her!" then he sat down. but, squirrel exclaimed, "ha! my friend! you saw how i drank my share of the medicine, and i have not spoken thus as you. for what reason have you thus spoken?" adder answered, "yes! i said so; and i will not alter my words." they dispersed from the medicine ordeal, and went each to his house. then that day darkened into night. and they all went to their sleep. soon the next day broke. squirrel and his wife prepared for a journey to the forest to seek food. he said to his wife, "leave the children in the house." so the woman shut them in, and closed the doors tight. and he and she went off to the forest. later on in the morning, adder arose from his place, and he said to himself, "i'm going to stroll over to the house of my friend ihende." so he came to squirrel's house, and found no one there. he tried to break in the door; finally, he succeeded in opening it; and he entered the house. he found the two children of squirrel lying together asleep. he shook them, and they awoke. he asked them, "where is my friend?" they answered, "our father and mother have gone to the forest." then adder suddenly joined the two children together and swallowed them. (they were both of them lads.) then he went out of the house, and closed the door. his stomach being distended with what he had swallowed, he went back to his house, and laid down on his bed. off in the forest, squirrel said to his wife, "my heart beats so strangely! i have eaten nothing here; what should disturb my heart?" his wife replied, "well! let us hasten back to town. perhaps some affair has happened in our house!" they hastily gathered their food, to go back rapidly to town. on their arrival, they went at once to their house. looking at the door, the wife exclaimed, "i did not leave this door so! who has been at it?" her husband urged, "quickly! open the door! let us enter at once!" they opened the door; and found no one in the house. then squirrel, fearing evil, said to her, "stay you here! i will go over to pe's house. i know that fellow!" he came to adder's house, and found him distended with this stomach. squirrel asked him, "chum! have you been at my house?" adder answered, "yes, i went to your house; but i have done nothing there." squirrel asked him, feeling sure of his guilt, "but, where then are my children? why did you not leave even one of them? ah! my friend!" adder replied, "when we drank the test, did i not swear the truth that if i met with your children, i would swallow them?" squirrel answered, "yes! and you have kept your word well! but you shall see something just now and here!" adder laughed, and said, "what can you do? you have no strength like mine." close by the house of adder (which was only a hole in the ground) was a large tree. squirrel went out of the house, and climbed to the top of the tree. there he began to wail for his dead, and cried out, "ikundu ja mâ! ikundu ja mâ!" (a play on words: either an apostrophe to the name of one of his children, or a prayer for vengeance.) another squirrel, that was a mile or two away, heard the wailing; and it came to where squirrel was. also his wife followed squirrel to that tree; and she wailed too. and other squirrels came; about twenty. a hunter, living in the town of mankind, started from his town to go hunting. coming along the path, he heard squirrel crying. looking up, he exclaimed, "o! how many squirrels!" he thought to himself, "why do these animals make this noise, and keep looking down at the foot of this big tree?" he approached near to the tree; and they dispersed among the branches. he then said to himself, "i will look around here at the bottom; for, as those squirrels continue their cry, they keep looking down here." searching at the foot of the tree, he saw a hole, like the home of some beast. looking in, he saw the adder sluggish in his distention. the hunter killed it with his machete. and he took the dead adder with him to the town of mankind. squirrel, from the tree-top, shouted after dead adder, "you have seen my promised ikundu." (another play on words; either--"you saw my child;" or, "you see my vengeance.") tale the magic drum persons kudu (tortoise) king maseni, a man njâ (leopard) ngâmâ (a magic drum) note the reason is here given why the turtle tribe of tortoises likes to live only in water; viz., their fear of the vengeance of the descendants of leopard the king, because of the whipping to which he was subjected by the trick of the ancestor of the tortoises. in the ancient days, there were mankind and all the tribes of the animals living together in one country. they built their towns, and they dwelt together in one place. in the country of king maseni, tortoise and leopard occupied the same town; the one at one end of the street, and the other at the other. leopard married two women; tortoise also his two. it happened that a time of famine came, and a very great hunger fell on the tribes covering that whole region of country. so, king maseni issued a law, thus:--"any person who shall be found having a piece of food, he shall he brought to me." (that is, for the equal distribution of that food.) and he appointed police as watchmen to look after that whole region. the famine increased. people sat down hopelessly, and died of hunger. just as, even today, it destroys the poor; not only of africa, but also in the lands of manga-manene (white man's land). and, as the days passed, people continued sitting in their hopelessness. one day, tortoise went out early, going, going and entering into the jungles, to seek for his special food, mushrooms. he had said to his wife, "i am going to stroll on the beach off down toward the south." as he journeyed and journeyed, he came to a river. it was a large one, several hundred feet in width. there he saw a coco-nut tree growing on the river-bank. when he reached the foot of the tree, and looked up at its top, he discovered that it was full of very many nuts. he said to himself. "i'm going up there, to gather nuts; for, hunger has seized me." he laid aside his traveling-bag, leaving it on the ground, and at once climbed the tree, expecting to gather many of the nuts. he plucked two, and threw them to the ground. plucking another, and attempting to throw it, it slipped from his hand, and fell into the stream running below. then he exclaimed, "i've come here in hunger; and does my coco-nut fall into the water to be lost?" he said to himself, "i'll leave here, and drop into the water, and follow the nut." so, he plunged down, splash! into the water. he dove down to where the nut had sunk, to get it. and he was carried away by the current. following the nut where the current had carried it, he came to the landing-place of a strange town, where was a large house. people were there in it. and other people were outside, playing. they called to him. from the house, he heard a voice, saying "take me! take me! take me!" (it was a drum that spoke.) at the landing-place was a woman washing a child. the woman said to him, "what is it that brought you here? and, kudu, where are you going?" he replied, "there is great hunger in our town. so, on my way, i came seeking for my mushrooms. then it was that i saw a coco tree; and i climbed it; for, i am hungry and have nothing to eat. i threw down the nuts. one fell into the river. i followed it; and i came hither." then the woman said, "now then, you are saved." and she added, "kudu! go to that house over there. you will see a thing there. that thing is a drum. start, and go at once to where the drums are." others of those people called out to him, "there are many such things there. but, the kind that you will see which says, 'take me! take me!' do not take it. but, the drum which is silent and does not speak, but only echoes, 'wo-wo-wo,' without any real words, you must take it. carry it with you, and tie it to that coco tree. then you must say to the drum, 'ngâmâ! speak as they told to you!'" so, tortoise went on, and on, to the house, and took the drum, and, carrying it, came back to the river bank where the woman was. she said to him, "you must first try to learn how to use it. beat it!" he beat it. and, a table appeared with all kinds of food! and, when he had eaten, he said to the drum, "put it back!" and the table disappeared. he carried the drum with him clear back to the foot of the coco tree. he tied it with a rattan to the tree, and then said to the drum, "ngâmâ! do as they said!" instantly, the drum set out a long table, and put on all sorts of food. tortoise felt very glad and happy for the abundance of food. so he ate and ate, and was satisfied. again he said, "ngâmâ! do as they said!" and drum took back the table and the food to itself up the tree, leaving a little food at the foot; and then came back to the hand of tortoise. he put this little food in his traveling-bag, and gathered from the ground the coco-nuts he had left lying there in the morning, and started to go back to his town. he stopped at a spot a short distance in the rear of the town. so delighted was he with his drum that he tested it again. he stood it up, and with the palm of his hand struck it, tomu! a table at once stood there, with all kinds of food. again he ate, and also filled his traveling-bag. then he said to a tree that was standing near by, "bend down!" it bowed; and he tied the drum to its branch; and went off into the town. the coco-nuts and the mushrooms he handed to his women and children. after he had entered his house, his chief wife said to him, "where have you been all this long while since the morning?" he replied evasively, "i went wandering clear down to the beach to gather coco-nuts. and, this day i saw a very fine thing. you, my wife, shall see it!" then he drew out the food from the bag, potatoes, and rice, and beef. and he said, "the while that we eat this food, no one must show any of it to njâ." so, they two, and his other wife and their family of children ate. soon day darkened; and they all went to go to sleep. and soon another day began to break. at day-break, tortoise started to go off to the place where was the drum. arrived there, he went to the tree, and said to the drum, "ngâmâ! do as they said!" the drum came rapidly down to the ground, and put out the table all covered with food. tortoise took a part, and ate, and was satisfied. then he also filled the bag. then said he to the drum, "do as you did!" and drum took back the things, and went up the tree. on another day, at day-break, he went to the tree and did the same way. on another day, as he was going, his eldest son, curious to find out where his father obtained so much food, secretly followed him. tortoise went to where the drum was. the child hid himself, and stood still. he heard his father say to the tree, "bend!" and its top bent down. the child saw the whole process, as tortoise took the drum, stood it up, and with the palm of his hand, struck it, ve! saying, "do as you have been told to do!" at once a table stood prepared, at which tortoise sat down and ate. and then, when he had finished, saying, "tree! bend down," it bent over for drum to be tied to it. he returned drum to the branch; and the tree stood erect. on other days, tortoise came to the tree, and did the same way, eating; and returning to his house; on all such occasions, bringing food for his family. one day, the son, who had seen how to do all those things, came to the tree, and said to it, "bow down." it bowed; and he did as his father had done. so drum spread the table. the child ate, and finished eating. then said he to drum, "put them away!" and the table disappeared. then he took up the drum, instead of fastening it to the tree, and secretly carried it to town to his own house. he went to call privately his brothers, and his father's women, and other members of the family. when they had come together in his house, at his command, the drum did as usual; and they ate. and when he said to the drum, "put away the things!" it put them away. tortoise came that day from the forest where he had been searching for the loved mushrooms for his family. he said to himself, "before going into the town, i will first go to the tree to eat." as he approached the tree, when only a short distance from it, the tree was standing as usual, but the drum was not there! he exclaimed, "truly, now, what is this joke of the tree?" as he neared the foot of the tree, still there was no drum to be seen! he said to the tree, "bow down!" there was no response! he passed on to the town, took his axe, and returned at once to the tree, in anger saying, "lest i cut you down, bend!" the tree stood still. tortoise began at once with his axe chopping, ko! ko! the tree fell, toppling to the ground, tomu! he said to it, "you! produce the drum, lest i cut you in pieces!" he split the tree all into pieces; but he did not see the drum. he returned to the town; and, as he went, he walked anxiously saying to himself, "who has done this thing?" when he reached his house, he was so displeased that he declined to speak. then his eldest son came to him, and said, "o! my father! why is it that you are silent and do not speak? what have you done in the forest? what is it?" he replied, "i don't want to talk." the son said, "ah! my father! you were satisfied when you used to come and eat, and you brought us mushrooms. i am the one who took the drum." tortoise said to him, "my child, now bring out to us the drum." he brought it out of an inner room. then tortoise and the son called together all their people privately, and assembled them in the house. they commanded the drum. it did as it usually did. they ate. their little children took their scraps of potatoes and meat of wild-animals, and, in their excitement, forgot orders, and went out eating their food in the open street. other children saw them, and begged of them. they gave to them. among them were children of leopard, who went and showed the meat to their father. all suddenly, leopard came to the house of tortoise, and found him and his family feasting. leopard said, "ah! chum! you have done me evil. you are eating; and i and my family are dying with hunger!" tortoise replied, "yes, not today, but tomorrow you shall eat." so, leopard returned to his house. after that, the day darkened. and they all went to lie down in sleep. then, the next day broke. early in the morning, tortoise, out in the street, announced, "from my house to njâ's there will be no strolling into the forest today. today, only food." tortoise then went off by himself to the coco tree (whither he had secretly during the night carried the drum). arrived at the foot of the tree, he desired to test whether its power had been lost by the use of it in his town. so, he gave the usual orders; and they were, as usually obeyed. tortoise then went off with the drum, carrying it openly on his shoulder, into the town, and directly to the house of leopard, and said to him, "call all your people! let them come!" they all came into the house; and the people of tortoise also. he gave the usual commands. at once, drum produced abundance of food, and a table for it. so, they all ate, and were satisfied. and drum took back the table to itself. drum remained in the house of leopard for about two weeks. it ended its supply of food, being displeased at leopard's rough usage of itself; and there was no more food. leopard went to tortoise, and told him, "drum has no more food. go, and get another." tortoise was provoked at the abuse of his drum, but he took it, and hung it up in his house. at this time, the watchmen heard of the supply of food at leopard's house, and they asked him about it. he denied having any. they asked him, "where then did you get this food which we saw your children eating?" he said, "from the children of kudu." the officers went at once to king maseni, and reported, "we saw a person who has food." he inquired, "who is he?" they replied, "kudu." the king ordered "go ye, and summon kudu." they went and told tortoise, "the king summons you." tortoise asked, "what have i done to the king? since the king and i have been living in this country, he has not summoned me." nevertheless, he obeyed and journeyed to the king's house. the king said to him, "you are keeping food, while all the tribes are dying of hunger? you! bring all those foods!" tortoise replied, "please excuse me! i will not come again today with them. but, tomorrow, you must call for all the tribes." the next morning, the king had his bell rung, and an order announced, "any person whatever, old or young, come to eat!" the whole community assembled at the king's house. tortoise also came from his town, holding his drum in his hand. the distant members of that tribe, (not knowing and not having heard what that drum had been doing) twitted him, "is it for a dance?" entering into the king's house, tortoise stood up the drum; with his palm he struck it, ve! saying, "let every kind of food appear!" it appeared. the town was like a table, covered with every variety of food. the entire community ate, and were satisfied; and they dispersed. tortoise took the drum, and journeyed back to his town. he spoke to his hungry family, "come ye!" they came. they struck the drum; it was motionless; and nothing came from it! they struck it again. silent! (it was indignant at having been used by other hands than those of tortoise.) so, they sat down with hunger. the next day, tortoise went rapidly off to the coco tree, climbed it, gathered two nuts, threw one into the river, dropped into the stream, and followed the nut as he had done before. he came as before to that landing-place, and to the woman, and told her about the failure of the drum. she told him that she knew of it, and directed him to go and take another. he went on to that house, and to those people. and they, as before, asked him, "kudu! whither goest thou?" he replied, "you know i have come to take my coco-nut." but they said, "no! leave the nut, and take a drum." and, as before, they advised him to take a silent one. so, he came to the house of drums. these called to him, "take me! take me!" then, he thought to himself, "yes! i'll take one of those drums that talk. perhaps they will have even better things than the other." so, he took one, and came out of the house, and told those people "i have taken. and, now, for my journey." he started from the landing-place, and on up the river, to the foot of the coco-tree. he tied the drum to the tree with a cord, as before, set it up, and gave it a slap, ve! and a table stood there! he said, "ngâmâ! do as you usually do!" instantly, there were thrown down on the table, mbwâ! whips instead of food. tortoise, surprised, said, "as usual!" the drum picked up one of the whips, and beat tortoise, ve! he cried out with pain, and said to the drum, "but, now do also as you do. take these things away." and drum returned the table and whips to itself. tortoise regretfully said to himself, "those people told me not to take a drum that talked; but my heart deceived me." however, a plan occurred to him by which to obtain a revenge on leopard and the king for the trouble he had been put to. so, taking up the drum, he came to his own town, and went at once to the house of leopard. to whom he said, "to-morrow come with your people and mine to the town of king maseni." leopard rejoiced at the thought, "this is the drum of food!" then tortoise journeyed to the king's town, and said, "i have found food, according to your order. call the people tomorrow." in the morning, the king's bell was rung, and his people, accompanied by those of tortoise and leopard, came to his house. tortoise privately spoke to his own people, "no one of you must follow me into the house. remain outside of the window." tortoise said to the king, "the food of today must be eaten only inside of your house." so, the king's people, with those of leopard, entered into the house. there, tortoise said, "we shall eat this food only if all the doors and windows are fastened." so, they were fastened (excepting one which tortoise kept open near himself). then, the drum was sounded, and tortoise commanded it, "do as you have said." and, the tables appeared. but, instead of food, were whips. the people wondered, "ah! what do these mean? where do they come from?" tortoise stationed himself by the open window, and commanded the drum, "as usual!" instantly the whips flew about the room, lashing everybody, even the king, and especially leopard. the thrashing was great, and leopard and his people were crying with pain. their bodies were injured, being covered with cuts. but, tortoise had promptly jumped out of the window. and, standing outside, he ordered, "ngâmâ! do as you do!" and the whips and tables returned to it, and the whipping ceased. but, tortoise knew that the angry crowd would try to seize and kill him. so, taking advantage of the confusion in the house, he and his people fled to the water of the river, and scattered, hiding among the logs and roots in the stream. as he was disappearing, leopard shouted after him, "you and i shall not see each other! if we do, it will be you who will be killed!" tale the lies of tortoise persons njâ (leopard) kudu (tortoise) etoli (rat) embonda (prairie antelope) iheli (gazelle) ngando (crocodile) ngomba (porcupine) note african natives climb the palm-tree, cut out a cavity in the heart at the leafy top, and fasten a vessel below the cavity, to catch the sweet, milky juice that exudes. this is unintoxicating. but, like cider, it becomes intoxicating if kept a few days. the cutting destroys the tree in two or three months. the beginning of this tale is that leopard went to the forest, to cut an itutu tree (bamboo-palm) for palm-wine. after he had fastened the bowl at the cavity he had cut at the top in the heart of the tree, then he came back to town. tortoise came along to that palm-wine tree; and he climbed to the top. there he found that the sap had already collected in the bowl. and he drank three tumblerfuls. excited by his success, he shouted out aloud, "i'm drunk! i'm drunk!" off in the forest, wild rat heard his voice, and, following the sound, came to the place. to tortoise, rat said, "whose wine-tree is this?" tortoise replied, "my own!" so, rat begged of him, "give me a glassful!" tortoise told him "climb up! of what are you afraid?" so, rat climbed up the tree. he also drank two glassfuls. presently, tortoise heard leopard coming, and he said to rat. "await me here, i'm just going down to the ground." when he reached the ground, tortoise hid his body in a hole at the base of the tree. in a very little while, leopard arrived at the tree. he lifted up his eyes to the top and saw rat there. to him leopard said, "who owns this palm-tree?" rat replied, "my chum, kudu." but, leopard asked, "this kudu, where is he?" then leopard flung one of his claws at rat. it stuck in him, and rat fell dead. leopard took rat's body and went away with it to his town. and he said to his wife, "cook this; this is our meat." soon after leopard had gone from the tree, tortoise came out of his hiding, and climbed the tree a second time. then, having drank again, he shouted, as before, "i'm drunk! i'm drunk!" in his hole off among the rocks, porcupine heard tortoise shouting; and he came to the tree, and asked for a drink. tortoise told him to climb; adding, "what are you afraid of?" so, porcupine followed tortoise up the tree, and drank two glassfuls of the wine. again tortoise heard leopard coming, recognizing the thud of his steps as he leaped on the way. so, tortoise cried out, as if in pain, "o! my stomach hurts me! i'm going down!" at the base, he hid himself again in the cavity of the tree. in a little while, leopard appeared standing at the foot of the tree. looking up, he saw porcupine there. and he inquired, "ngomba! who owns this tree?" porcupine answered, "chum kudu!" leopard asked, "this kudu, who is he? i want to see him." porcupine replied, "kudu has gone off, his stomach paining him." then leopard exclaimed, "so! indeed! you are the ones who use up all my wine here!" and he added, "what day i shall meet kudu i do not know. but, that day we will meet in fight." while he was saying all this, tortoise, in the hole at the tree, heard. then leopard threw a claw at porcupine. porcupine fell down to the ground a corpse. leopard taking it, went away with it to his town, and said to his wife, "cook this meat, and let us eat it." after leopard had left the tree, tortoise emerged from his hiding-place. he climbed the tree a third time, and took a cup, and drank two glassfuls. again he shouted, "i, kudu, i'm drunk! i, kudu, i'm drunk!" out on a prairie, antelope heard the shouting; and he came to the tree. seeing tortoise, he said, "chum, give me a glass of wine!" tortoise directed him, "climb up! of what are you afraid?" so, antelope went up the tree, and drank. soon tortoise heard leopard coming, bounding through the forest. and tortoise said to antelope, "chum! my bowels pain me; i'll soon return." he descended, and hid his body as before. leopard arrived as before. and he spoke to antelope; and then killed it with another of his claws. he took its carcass to his town, and bade his wife cook it, as had been done with the others. after leopard had gone from the tree, tortoise climbed the tree a fourth time, again he drank; and again he shouted, changing his words slightly, "i've drank! i've drank!" in the jungle, gazelle heard, and came to the base of the tree, but said nothing. tortoise spoke first, "o! my nephew! the wine is finished!" gazelle asked, "who owns this tree?" tortoise answered, "it's my own, and not another's." when he came from the jungle, gazelle had brought with him a bag. as gazelle still stood at the foot of the tree, tortoise said to him, "come up here! what do you fear?" so, gazelle climbed; but went up only half-way. while the two were thus apart, and before gazelle had drunk any of the wine, tortoise heard leopard coming, leaping through the bushes. then tortoise said to gazelle, "ah! nephew! let me pass! my stomach hurts me!" but gazelle said, "no! uncle, let us stay and drink." tortoise heard leopard nearing the tree; and he said to gazelle, "ah! hurry! let me pass! how my stomach hurts!" gazelle said, "no! uncle, we'll go down together." while they were thus talking, leopard reached the foot of the tree. then gazelle took tortoise and hid him in the bag. leopard exclaimed, "iheli! who owns this tree?" gazelle replied, "this is the palm-wine tree of my uncle." leopard asked, "who is your uncle?" gazelle answered, "kudu." so, leopard began to prepare to climb the tree, in order to fight with gazelle. then gazelle put his hand into the bag, and drew out tortoise, tightly grasped in his hand. and he flung tortoise violently into leopard's face. leopard fell to the ground, dazed with the blow, while gazelle leaped to the ground, and fled off in the forest. when leopard rose from the earth, he found tortoise sprawling helpless on its back. leopard tied a string to him, and went away with him to town. and he said to his wife, "my wife! this is the person who drinks at my wine-tree!" so he suspended him by the string, waiting to kill him next day. the day began to darken towards night; and they went to their sleep. then came the daylight of next morning. leopard said to his wife, "i'm going to a palaver (council) at a place three miles distant. take kudu and cook him with udika (gravy of kernels of wild mango). when i come back, let me find the food all ready to be eaten at once." so, leopard went on his journey. and his wife remained to do her work. but, she exclaimed, "ah! i forget what my husband told me!" tortoise, overhearing her said, "your husband said, 'take the dried etoli from the shelf, and cook it with udika; give it to kudu, and let him eat it; and then take kudu and wash him in the water of the brook.'" the woman gladly listened, and said, "eh! kudu! you remember well what my husband said to me!" so, she did about the food as tortoise had reported, and gave it to him to eat. when tortoise had finished eating, the woman went with him to wash him in the water at the edge of the brook. while she was doing this, tortoise asked, "throw me off into the water where it is deep." the woman did so. and tortoise shouted, "so! you will die this day by your husband's hands!" the woman began to see her mistake, and she begged tortoise, "come! let us go back to town." but tortoise said, "i shan't come! i'm here safe in my place down in the bottom of the stream." then the woman went back to her town; and as she went, she went crying. late in the day, leopard returned from the discussions of the council. and he said to his wife, "o! my wife! i'm just dying of hunger!" she told him, "ah! my husband! kudu has run away!" leopard, in his anger, flung a claw at her; and she died on the spot. tortoise, in the meanwhile, went as fast as he could under the water of the stream. and he came to the house of crocodile, and crept into the doorway. crocodile, in tears, met him with the words, "ah! kudu! i'm just dying here with grief and crying." tortoise asked her, "what is the matter?" she told him, "i've laid a hundred eggs, but none of them had children in them." tortoise replied, "that's my work, the causing of eggs to have children. shall i do it?" crocodile consented, "yes, i've here three hundred other eggs; you may make them have children." tortoise told her, "i'm the only one to do that thing." so, crocodile said, "go into this room, and do it." tortoise went into the room, found the eggs there; and said to crocodile, "give me here a kettle, also firewood and water. give me my food here. for, i will not go out of this house; i will go out only at the time when i shall have caused the eggs to have children." crocodile agreed, saying, "yes, i am willing. it is well." and she gave direction to her people, "give kudu all the things he has asked for there." then tortoise locked all the doors, and stayed inside the room. he began to arrange the fire-wood, and set the kettle and put water in it. in the afternoon, he took twenty eggs, and cooked, and ate them with his food. at night, all went to sleep. at daybreak, he cooked twenty more eggs, and ate them; at noon he cooked and ate more; and at evening supper, he cooked and ate some more. so, he spent about seven days in eating all the eggs. then he called out to crocodile "do you want to hear the little crocodiles talk?" crocodile replied, "yes! i want to hear!" tortoise took two pieces of broken plates, and scraped one across the other, making a rasping sound. crocodile and the people of the town heard the squeaking sounds, and they exclaimed in joy. "so! so, so!" they replied to tortoise, "we hear the little ones talking!" tortoise also told them, "tomorrow, then, i will make a medicine to cause them to talk loudly." but crocodile began to have some doubts. and day darkened to night. very early in the next morning, crocodile's doubts having increased, she rose up without calling her people. and she went slowly alone to peep through a crack into the room of tortoise. she saw only the piles of egg-shells; and she wondered, "where are the little ones?" then she went softly back to her own room; and she told the townspeople, "get up! let us open the room of kudu!" they all got up, and they went to the house. they broke the room door by force; and they found tortoise sitting among the scattered shells of the eggs. the crocodile exclaimed, "kudu! have you deceived me? your life too ends today!" they tied tortoise, and put him in the kettle; and they killed him there. they divided his flesh onto their plates. and crocodile and her people ate tortoise. this is the end of the lies of tortoise. tale "death begins by some one person": a proverb persons kâ (a very big snail) ngâmbi (igwana) kudu (tortoise) lonâni (birds) kema (monkeys) a man note trouble came to all these animals, even to the innocent, through the noise of some of them. igwanas are supposed, by the natives, to be deaf. snail, igwana and tortoise all lived together in one village. one day, tortoise went to roam in the forest. there he found a large tree called evenga. he said to himself, "i will stay at the foot of this tree, and wait for the fruit to fall." during two days, he remained there alone. on the third day, igwana said to snail, "i must go and search for our chum kudu, wherever he is." so, igwana went; and he found tortoise in a hole at the foot of that tree. igwana said to him, "chum! for two days i haven't seen you!" tortoise replied, "i shan't go back to the village; i will remain here." then igwana said to him, "well, then; let us sit here together in the same spot." tortoise objected, "no!" so igwana climbed up the trunk a very short distance, and clung there. after two days, snail, who had been left alone, said to himself, "i must follow my friends, and find where they are." so, snail journeyed, and found tortoise and igwana there at that tree. looking at the tree, he exclaimed, "ah! what a fine tree under which to sit!" the others replied, "yes; stay here!" so snail said to igwana, "i will stay near you, chum ngâmbi, where you are." but igwana objected, "no!" there was a vine hanging down from the treetop to the ground, and snail climbed up the vine. thus the three friends were arranged; tortoise in the hole at the foot of the tree, igwana up the trunk a short way, and snail on the vine half-way to the top. igwana held on where he was, close to the bark of the tree. he was partly deaf, and did not hear well. after two days, the tree put forth a great abundance of fruit. the fruit all ripened. very many small birds came to the tree-top to eat the fruit. and very many small monkeys too, at the top. also big monkeys. and also big birds. all crowded at the top. they all began to eat the fruit. as they ate, they played, and made a great deal of noise. tortoise hearing this noise, and dreading that it might attract the notice of some enemy, called to igwana, "ngâmbi! tell kâ to say to those people there at the top of the tree, to eat quietly, and not with so much noise." tortoise himself did not call to snail, lest his shout should add to the noise. he only spoke in a low voice to igwana. but, to confirm his words, he quoted a proverb, "iwedo a yalakendi na moto umbaka" (death begins by one person). this meant that they all should be watchful, lest danger come to them all by the indiscretion of a few. but igwana did not hear; and was silent. tortoise called again, "ngâmbi! tell kâ to tell those people to eat quietly, and without noise." igwana was silent, and made no answer. a third and a fourth time, tortoise called out thus to igwana; but he did not hear. so, tortoise said to himself, "i won't say any more!" a man from njambo's town had gone out to hunt, having with him bow and arrow, a machete, and a gun. in his wandering, he happened to come to that tree. hearing the noise of voices, he looked up and saw the many monkeys and birds on the tree. he exclaimed to himself, "ah! how very many on one tree, more than i have ever seen!" he shot his arrow; and three monkeys fell. he fired his gun, and killed seven birds. then the birds and the monkeys all scattered and fled in fear. the man also looked at the foot of the tree, and saw tortoise in the hole. he drew him out, and thrust him into his hunting-bag. then he looked on the other side of the tree, and saw igwana within reach. he rejoiced in his success, "oh! igwana here too!" he struck him with the machete; and igwana died. observing the vine, the man gave it a pull. and down fell snail! the man exclaimed, "so! this is snail!" as the man started homeward carrying his load of animals, tortoise in the bag, mourning over his fate, said to the dead igwana and the others, "i told you to call to kâ to warn kema and lonani; and, now death has come to us all! if you, kema and lonani, in the beginning, on the tree-top, had not made such a noise, man would not have come to kill us. this all comes from you." and man took all these animals to his town, and divided them among his people. tale tortoise and the bojabi tree place country of all-the-beasts persons mbâmâ (boa constrictor) kudu (tortoise) etoli (house rat) vyâdu (antelope) njâku (elephant) iheli (gazelle) ngomba (porcupine) nyati (ox) and the bojabi tree note african natives hesitate to eat of an unknown fruit or vegetable, unless they see it first partaken of by some lower animal. all the tribes of beasts were living in one region, except one beast, which was staying in its separate place. its name was boa constrictor. his place was about thirty miles away from the others. in the region of all those beasts, there was a very large tree. its name was bojabi. but none of those beasts knew that that was its name. there fell a great famine on that country-of-all-the-beasts. in their search for food, they looked at that tree; and they said, "this tree has fine-looking fruit; but, we do not know its name. how then shall we know whether it is fit to be eaten?" after some discussion, they said, "we think our father mbâmâ will be able to know this tree's name." so they agreed, "let us send a person to mbâmâ to cause us to know the name of the tree." they selected rat, and said to him, "you, etoli, are young; go you, and inquire." they also decided that, "whoever goes shall not go by land along the beach, but by sea." (this they said, in order to prove the messenger's strength and perseverance; whether he would dally by the way ashore, or paddle steadily by sea.) also, they told rat that, in going, he should take one of the fruits of the tree in his hand, so that boa might know it. so, rat took the bojabi fruit, stepped into a canoe, and began to paddle. he started about sun-rise in the morning. in the middle of the afternoon, he arrived at his journey's end. he entered into the reception-room of boa's house, and found him sitting there. boa welcomed him, and said to his wife, "prepare food for our guest, etoli!" and he said to rat, "stranger! eat! and then you will tell me what is the message you have brought." rat ate and finished, and began to tell his message thus:--he said, "in our country we have nothing there but hunger. but there is there a tree, and this is its fruit. whether it is fit to be eaten or not, you will tell us." boa replied, "that tree is bojabi; this fruit is njabi; and it is to be eaten." then the day darkened to night. and they slept their sleep. and then the next day broke. and boa said to rat, "begin your journey, etoli! the name of the tree is bojabi. do not forget it!" rat stepped into his canoe, and began to paddle. he reached his country late in the afternoon. he landed. and he remained a little while on the beach, dragging the canoe ashore. so occupied was he in doing this, that he forgot the tree's name. then he went up into the town. the tribes of all-the-beasts met him, exclaiming, "tell us! tell us!" rat confessed, "i have forgotten the name just this very now." then, in their disappointment, they all beat him. on another day, they said to porcupine, "ngomba! go you!" but they warned rat, "if ngomba brings the name, you, etoli, shall not eat of the fruit." porcupine made his journey also by sea, and came to the town of boa. when porcupine had stated his errand, boa told him, "the tree's name is bojabi. now, go!" porcupine returned by sea, and kept the name in his memory, until he was actually entering the town of his home; and, then, he suddenly forgot it. the tribes of all-the-beasts called out to him, as they saw him coming, "ngomba! tell us! tell us!" when he informed them that he had forgotten it, they beat him, as they had done to rat. they had also in that country, another plant which was thought not proper to be eaten. they did not know that its leaves were really good for food. on another day, they said to antelope, "go you; and tell mbâmâ, and ask him which shall we eat, this fruit or these leaves. what shall we beasts do?" antelope went by sea; and came to boa's town. and he asked boa, "what do you here eat? tell us." boa replied, "i eat leaves of the plants, and i drink water; that is all i do. and the name of the tree that bears that fruit is bojabi. you, all the beasts, what are you to eat? i have told you." antelope slept there that night. and the next day, he started on his return journey. at his journey's end, as he was about to land on the beach, a wave upset the canoe, and he fell into the sea. in the excitement, he forgot the name. the anxious tribes of all-the-beasts had come down to the beach to meet him, and were asking, "what is the name? tell us!" he replied, "had i not fallen into the water, i would not have forgotten the name." then, in their anger, they beat him. almost all the beasts were thus tried for that journey; and they all failed in the same way, with the name forgotten, even the big beasts like ox and elephant. there was no one of them who had succeeded in bringing home the name. but there was left still, one who had not been tried. that was tortoise. so, he said, "let me try to go." they were all vexed with him, at what they thought his audacity and presumption. they began to beat him, saying, "even the less for us, and more so for you! you will not be able!" but gazelle interposed, saying, "let kudu alone! why do you beat him? let him go on the errand. we all have failed; and it is well that he should fail too." tortoise went to his mother's hut, and said to her, "i'm going! how shall i do it?" his mother told him, "in your going on this journey, do not drink any water while at sea, only while ashore. also, do not eat any food on the way, but only in the town. do not perform any call of nature at sea, only ashore. for, if you do any of these things on the way, you will be unable to return with the name. for, all those who did these things on the way, forgot the name." so tortoise promised, "yes, my mother, i shall not do them." on another day, tortoise began his journey to boa, early. he paddled and he paddled, not stopping to eat or drink, until he had gone about two-thirds of the way. then hunger and thirst and calls of nature seized him. but he restrained himself, and went on paddling harder and faster. these feelings had seized him about noon; and they ceased an hour later. he continued the journey; and, before four o'clock in the afternoon, had arrived at boa's. there tortoise entered boa's house, and found him sitting. boa saluted, and said, "legs rest; but the mouth will not. wife! bring food for kudu!" the wife brought food, and tortoise ate. then boa said to tortoise, "tell me what the journey is about." tortoise told him, "a great hunger is in our place. there also we have two plants; the one,--this is its fruit; and this grass,--the leaves. are they eaten?" boa replied, "the tree of this fruit, its name is bojabi; and it is eaten. but, i, mbâmâ, here, i eat leaves and drink water; and that is enough for me. these things are the food for all-us beasts. we have no other food. go and tell all-the-beasts so." tortoise replied, "yes; it is well." then the day darkened, and they slept. and another day came. and tortoise began his journey of return to his home. as he went, he sang this song, to help remember the name:--"njâku! jaka njabi. de! de! de!" (elephant! eat the bojabi fruit. straight! straight! straight!) the chorus was "bojabi," and, in each repetition of the line, he changed the name of the animal, thus:--"nyati! jaka njabi. de! de! de. bojabi" (ox! eat the bojabi fruit. straight! straight! straight! bojabi!) he thus nerved himself to keep straight on in his journey. and, as he went, he kept repeating the chorus. "bojabi, bojabi! bojabi!" he had gone about one-third of the way, when a large wave came and upset the canoe, and threw him, pwim! into the water. he clung to the canoe, and the wave carried it and him clear ashore, he still repeating the word, "bojabi! bojabi!" ashore, he began to mend the canoe; but, all the while, he continued singing, "bojabi!" when he had repaired the canoe, he started the journey again, and went on his way, still crying out, "bojabi!" by that time, all-the-beasts had gathered on the beach to wait the coming of tortoise. he came on and on, through the surf near to the landing-place of the town. as he was about to land, a great wave caught him, njim! and the canoe. but, he still was shouting, "bojabi!" though all-the-beasts heard the word, they did not know what it meant, or why tortoise was saying it. they ran into the surf, and carried the canoe and tortoise himself up to the top of the beach. and they, all in a hurry, begged, "tell us!" he replied, "i will tell you only when in the town." in gladness, they carried him on their shoulders up into the town. then he said, "before i tell you, let me take my share of these fruits lying out there in the yard." they agreed; and he carried a large number, hundreds of them, into his house. then he stated, "mbâmâ said, 'its name is bojabi.'" and all-the-beasts shouted in unison, "yes! bojabi!" then they all began to scramble with each other in gathering the fruit; so that tortoise would have been unable to get any, had he not first taken his share to his mother, whose advice had brought him success. he also reported to them, "mbâmâ told me to tell you that himself eats leaves and grass, and drinks water, and is satisfied. for, that is the food of all-the-beasts." had it not been for boa, the beasts would not have known about eating leaves. but, though that is so, the diligence and skill, in this affair, was of tortoise. so, all-the-beasts agreed:--"we shall have two kings, kudu and mbâmâ, each at his end of the country. for, the one with his wisdom told what was fit to be eaten; and, the other, with his skill, brought the news." tale the suitors of njambo's daughter place in njambo's town persons njambo and his daughter ndenga etoli (house rat) njâ (leopard) ko (forest rat) nyati (ox) kudu (tortoise) njâku (elephant) note africans cut down trees, not at the base, but some or feet up where the diameter is less. they sit in the circle of a rope enclosing the tree and their own body, the rope resting against their backbone at the loins, and their feet braced against the tree trunk. the reason why tortoise lives in brooks is his fear of leopard. all the beasts were living long ago in one place, separate from the towns of mankind; but they had friendship for and married with each other. among the towns of mankind was living a man named njambo. there was born to him a female child named ndenga. in the town, at one end of it, there was a very large tree. njambo said of his daughter, "this child shall be married only with beasts." so when the beasts heard of that one of them, house-rat, said, "i'm going to marry that woman!" so he went to the father to arrange what things he should pay on the dowry. njambo said to him, "i do not want goods. but, if any one shall be able to hew down this tree, he shall marry my child." at once, rat took the axe that njambo handed him, and began to hack at the tree. he tried and tried, but was not able to make the axe enter at all. at last, he wearied of trying and stopped. he said to himself, "if i go to njambo, and tell him i am unable to do the task, he will kill me." so, he left the axe, at the foot of the tree, and fled to his town. njambo waited a while, but seeing no signs of rat's coming to him to report, himself came to the tree, and found only the axe, but saw no person. he took up the axe, and went with it back to his house. off in the forest, all-beasts saw rat returning, and were surprised that he came alone. they asked him, "where is the woman?" rat answered, "i wearied of trying to get the woman, by reason of the greatness of the task of cutting down a tree. so, i gave up the work, and fled, and have come home." then all the beasts derided him, saying, "you like to live in another person's house, and scramble around, and nibble at other people's food, but you are not able to marry a wife!" then forest-rat said, "i will marry that woman!" so he went to njambo for the marriage, and came to the town. njambo said to him, "i do not object to anybody for the marriage, but, i will only test you by that tree off yonder. if you are willing to hew the tree, you may marry this woman!" this forest-rat replied, "yes! i shall wait here today; and will cut down the tree early tomorrow morning." that day darkened. and njambo's people cooked food for forest-rat as their guest. they all ate; and then they went to lie down to sleep. then after awhile, the light of another day began to break. they arose. and they gave forest-rat an axe. he took it, and went to the foot of the tree. he fastened two cords, with which to climb up to where the tree was at half its thickness. there he tried to cut the tree. but he was unable to cut away even the smallest chip. at last he exclaimed, "ah! brother etoli is justified! i am not able to cut this tree, because of its hardness." so, he came down the tree, and left the axe at the foot, saying, "if i go back to the house of this man, he will kill me. no! i am fleeing." when he arrived at his town, the other people asked him, "where's the woman?" he answered, "the woman is a thing easy to marry, but the tree was a hard thing to cut." after waiting awhile for the forest-rat, njambo came to the foot of the tree; and, seeing the axe lying, took it, and went with it to his house. then leopard tried for the woman; and failed in the same way as the two who preceded him. next, elephant tried, and failed in the same way. so did ox in the same way. and all the other beasts, one after another, in the same way, wearied of the task for obtaining this woman. but, there was left still one beast, tortoise, that had not made the attempt at the marriage. he stood up, and said, "i will go; and i shall marry that woman at njambo's town!" ox heard tortoise say that; and struck him, saying, "why! even more so we; and the less so you, to attempt to obtain her!" but elephant said to ox, "let kudu alone! let us see him marry the woman!" so, tortoise made his journey to njambo's town, and came there late in the afternoon. he said to njambo, "i have come to marry your child." njambo replied, "well! let it be so!" tortoise said to njambo, "first, call your daughter, to see if she shall like me." when she entered the room, tortoise asked her, "do you love me?" she answered, "yes! i love you with all my heart." this made tortoise glad; for the woman was very beautiful to look upon. then njambo told him, "kudu, i want no goods for her; only the cutting of the tree." tortoise assented, "yes! i will try." so they all went to sleep that night. and then the next day broke. an hour after sunrise, njambo called tortoise, and, showing him the axe, said, "this is the axe for the tree." tortoise took the axe, and went to the foot of the tree. he looked at its sides closely, and saw there was a difference in them. he also looked very steadily at the top of the tree. then he took rattan ropes, and mounted to the middle of the thickness of the tree. he chose also the side opposite that at which the others had cut. he found it soft when he began to cut; and, at once the chips began to fall to the ground. he had begun the chopping early, and by the middle of the morning, the tree began to fall. and it fell to the ground with a great crash, nji-i! njambo heard the fall of the tree, and he came to see it. and he said to tortoise, "you have done well, because you have cut down the tree. but, finish the job by cutting off the top end with its branches. that will leave the trunk clear." tortoise asked njambo, "what will you do with the log?" njambo answered him, "to make a canoe." so, tortoise cut off also the end of the tree with its branches. then njambo told him, "come on, into the town, to take your wife; because you have cut down the tree; that is the price i asked." the two came to the house in the town; and njambo brought his daughter to tortoise, saying, "this is your wife. and i give with the woman these other things." those things were only different kinds of food. tortoise made his journey with his wife towards his town. he journeyed, going, going on, until he had reached half of the way. then he said to his wife, "what shall i do? for, njâ is ahead in the way?" the wife replied, "no! go on! i think njâ will do nothing to us." shortly afterward, they met with leopard in the path. leopard said to tortoise, "ah! chum! this wife is not proper for you to marry, only with me, njâ." tortoise said "no!" but leopard insisted, "no! i take this one! i will give you another wife in her place." so, he snatched the woman from tortoise, and ran away with her to his town. tortoise went on his way, as he went, crying, till he came to his own village. there elephant asked him, "why do you cry as you go? has njambo struck you about the affair of the marriage? for, we had heard the news that you had cut down the tree, and had taken the woman. what then is the reason?" tortoise answered, "yes! i married the woman, because i had cut down the tree. but njâ took the woman away." then elephant called all the beasts together to take counsel. he said to them, "what shall we do, because njâ has taken away the wife of kudu?" they all replied, "we are all afraid of njâ. none of us can dare to say anything to him. for, he kills us people. so, our decision is: let kudu give up his wife to njâ." but tortoise said, "i am unable to leave her. if it be death, i will die because of my wife." so, they all dispersed from the house of tortoise, and went to their own houses. at that time, leopard had eight wives. tortoise removed from the town-of-all-the-beasts, and built a village for himself, about one-and-a-half miles away. he built on the public highway, where passed by all people. he put a very large stone in front of his door-yard, large enough for one to sit down on it. he made also a bench near the stone. and he put a plate with water in it on the ground by the stone. then he placed a certain magic-medicine on the seat of the bench. and he uttered a charm: "let any one else who sits on this seat go free from it. but, if it be njâ, let him not go from it." he finished all these things late in the afternoon. the day darkened, and he went to his house, and slept his sleep. soon the day broke. that day, elephant said, "i'm going to the forest, and my wives with me." as he came on his way, he passed by the street of tortoise's house. he observed the stone and the bench and the water. he exclaimed, "ah! i'll sharpen my machete here!" so, he sat down on the bench, and sharpened his machete. then, went on his way into the forest with his wives. after a while, ox came on his journey, and saw the stone and water. he also sat down on the bench, and sharpened his machete. and then went on his way into the forest with his wives. soon afterward, leopard journeyed along with all his eight, and the new one, the ninth, the wife of tortoise. he came to the house of tortoise. looking into the door-yard, he exclaimed, "ah! good! and fine! that kudu has prepared these things." tortoise was in the house; he saw leopard coming, and he rejoiced, "very good! indeed! for the coming of this person." leopard sat down on the bench, and sharpened his machete on the stone with the water of the plate. his women standing by, waited for him to finish the sharpening. when he had finished, he said, "i will get up, and start the journey again." but, he stuck fast to the bench. he exclaimed, "my women! i am unable to rise! what shall i do?" the "medicine" on the bench began to sting him like bees. and he cried out, "ah! i'm dead! for, i am unable to rise!" tortoise, coming out into the yard, said to leopard, "i am the one who caused you this. you will not move thence until you give me back my wife. if you do not, you will remain there a whole month, a whole year." at this, leopard felt very much grieved; and he inquired of his women, "the wife of kudu is here in this company?" the woman answered, "yes! i'm here." then leopard said, "please, kudu, take your wife, and remove me from this bench. it hurts me." so, tortoise took his wife. and he added, "i want also my food you took from us in the path." leopard sent a child back to his town in haste to cut plantains. the child went; and the plantains were brought. tortoise took them, and said, "njâ! you are done, for your part. i have taken all i owned. but, if i release you, you will kill me, and take again my wife. you shall be released only after i have fled." so, tortoise fled with his wife and all his goods into a stream of water. when safely there, he shouted, "let njâ remove from that seat!" at once, leopard stood up, and was free. and he went back to his town, giving up his intended journey into the forest. tale tortoise, dog, leopard and the njabi fruit persons njâ (leopard) mbwa (dog) kudu (tortoise) inâni (a bird) and other beasts note: observe the cannibalism of the human-animals. at first, all animals were living in one region. of these, tortoise and dog lived together in one place, and built a town by themselves. but, all the others, leopard, hippopotamus, elephant, ox, etc., lived together in another place. after some time, a great famine fell on the part of the country where tortoise and dog lived; and they had to seek for any kind of food. one day tortoise said to dog, "i'm going awalking into the forest." so, early at daybreak, he started off to seek for mushrooms. all those other beasts that were living together had a kind of tree called bojabi, bearing a very large heavy fruit called njabi. and they had all agreed, "there are no other animals, but our own companies, who shall eat of the fruit of this tree." they were accustomed, whenever they had eaten of this fruit, to go to an adjacent prairie, to play. so that day, on his journey, tortoise happened to come to the foot of that tree. the ripe fruit were falling from it, and quantities were lying on the ground. he exclaimed "eme! (indeed!), ibele! (splendid), eme! abundance of food!" he gathered, and ate, and stayed a while gathering others, which he would carry back to his town. while doing this, a fruit fell from the branch above, and struck him hard on the back. the blow hurt him; but he only said, "ah! the back of an aged person!" (my back feels like that of an aged person.) this he said because of the pain it gave him; but he made no out-cry. he had with him a bag, into which he put food on a journey. so, he filled it with the fruits, and resumed his journey to go back to his town. on his arrival at his house, his wife said to him, "why did you delay so long?" he replied, "i found a tree belonging to the tribes-of-all-the-beasts. had they seen me, they would have killed me." and, he drew the fruits from the bag, and gave his wife and children, saying, "eat ye!" but, he added, "while you eat of it, do not allow mbwa to see it." one of the children ran out into the street, with the fruit grasped in his hand. just then, dog happened to meet the child in the street, and asked him, "who gave you this fruit, child of kudu?" the child answered, "my father came from the forest, and brought this fruit with him." in the evening, when the day had darkened, dog came and said to tortoise, "my friend! you are a bad fellow; for, we live together in one place, and you do not share with me! chum! is it possible that you eat such good things here? where did you discover them?" tortoise then gave dog and his children a share. but, he was not willing to tell the place of that tree. he evaded, by saying, "as i went, i forced my way through the jungle of the forest. but, i did not find any mushrooms; they are about done. also, we are not allowed to go to the place where this fruit grows." so it went on for some time. on another evening, tortoise remarked, in conversation with dog, that he would be going into the forest next day. dog said nothing, but went back to his house, as if to sleep; while tortoise remained in his house, and went to bed. tortoise had left his hunting-bag hanging in the public reception-room by his house. at night, dog arose from his house, and slowly and stealthily went to the house of tortoise, clear into that room. entering it secretly, and finding the bag, he threw ashes into its mouth and then, with his knife, made holes in it at the lower end. for, he said to himself, "when tortoise shall go out early, then i will follow him." then he went back to his house, and laid down again. when day-light began to break, early in the morning, tortoise arose, took the bag, and started on a journey to that forest tree which belonged to the beasts. as he went the ashes sifted through the holes in the bottom of the bag, and fell on the path. he finally arrived at the tree. dog also arose early, and found which way tortoise had gone, by the dropping of the ashes; for, as he went, dog was looking out for the marks on the way; and, following the signs, they clearly showed him the route, until he reached the tree, soon after tortoise had arrived. tortoise exclaimed, "ah! chum! what have you come here to do? who called you, you with your loud howling? do you know who own this tree? can you endure if one of these fruits should fall down on you? for, if you cry out in pain, then the owners of this tree will catch both you and me. if they seize me, who am kudu, what shall i do? for, i, kudu, do not know how to run rapidly." then dog said, "if they come to seize you, i will come to take you from their hands." at this, tortoise laughed out aloud, "those beasts of strength! when they seize me, you will come and take me from them? really?" just then while they were thus speaking, two of the fruits fell on tortoise's back, at the same time, with a thud, ndu! ndu! though in pain, he only unconcernedly remarked, "the hardened skin of an aged person! ah! the back of an old man!" and went on eating. dog exclaimed, "o! chum! that big thing struck you, and you were able to refrain from crying!" tortoise replied, "wait till yours also!" presently a very small fruit thus fell, and hit dog on the head. he howled lustily, "ow! ow! ow! ow!" tortoise said to him, "did i not tell you so!" there came down another fruit, and fell on tortoise; he quietly disregarded it. another then fell on dog with a thump, ngomu! and he ran off howling, "mwâ! mwâ!" all this while, leopard had been up the tree. it was he who had flung the fruit at dog and tortoise. when dog ran, leopard instantly descended the tree, and, disregarding tortoise, chased dog; but could not overtake him. had he caught dog, seizing him tightly, he would have killed him with one blow of his paw, ndi! and would have eaten him on the spot. while leopard was away, tortoise was in fear and did not know what to do, for he knew that he could not run from leopard. a bird whistled, "pu! pu! pu! chum kudu, hide! hide!" so tortoise went into a hole at the base of the tree, and hid there. leopard, on his return, sought for tortoise, but could not find him. so, he climbed the tree again, and gathered his fruits, and went off towards the town of the beasts. but, he met those beasts coming; for, they had heard the howls of dog, and had shouted at him, "he! e. e.! wait for us! don't be afraid!" all those people-of-the-tree came and gathered about its trunk. they searched; and presently they saw tortoise. they exclaimed, "so! you are the one who eats for us the fruit of this tree! you shall die!" they tied him, and took him with them to their town. there they suspended him from the roof of a house, saying, "to-morrow, you will be eaten!" off at his town, the wife of tortoise asked dog, "where is my husband?" dog answered, "i think that the tribes-of-all-the-beasts have caught him." after a while, dog, thinking, said to himself, "i remember my word that i said to kudu, 'if they seize you, i will come to take you.'" so, dog went and gathered shells of a very large snail named kâ. he took a large number, pierced each one with a hole, and strung them all on a string. these he placed about his neck; and, as he went along, he wriggled his body, and the shells struck together like little bells. then said he to himself, "the time is fulfilled for taking away my friend." so, he went rapidly to where the tribes-of-the-beasts had a spring for their drinking-water. those beasts had sent one of their lads to get water with which to cook tortoise. the lad came to the spring. dog jingled the shells; and, the lad ran back to town screaming, "there's some thing at the spring, which kills!" then the tribes sent a young man stronger than the lad, and said to him, "go you, and get water at the spring." when the young man came near the spring, dog jingled the shells, as before. and, the young man fled in fear. so, the people of the town said, "let us all go to the spring together; for, that thing can not hurt us all." so they came to the spring. dog seeing that all were coming, left the spring, and ran around to their town by another path, to take tortoise away. dog found tortoise suspended by a rope. he bit through the rope, and, with tortoise on his back, he ran rapidly to their town. those of the tribes who first arrived at the spring, searched, inquiring, "where is it? where is it? where is it?" discovering nothing, they returned to the town. then, they could not find tortoise. and they said, "let be! kudu has slipped away." one day after this, the wife of dog and the wife of tortoise went into the forest to their gardens to seek for food. and their children went out on the prairie, to play. dog and tortoise both remained in the town. notwithstanding that dog had saved his life, tortoise was still angry at him for having spoiled their going to the njabi tree. tortoise came to dog's end of the town and said to him, "let us shave our foreheads." dog was pleased, and said, "kudu, you first do me; then i will do you." so tortoise took the razor, and he shaved away dog's front locks. then tortoise said to dog, "let me shave also your neck." dog bent down his head. tortoise slashed the entire neck, cutting dog's head off. and dog fell down a corpse. tortoise cut up the body, and put the pieces in a kettle of water on the fire. also, he gathered pepper pods, and ground them for the seasoning. he looked for salt, and saw it was up on top of a shelf. so, he took three chairs, putting them on top of one another, by which to climb up. as he was creeping up, the chairs fell over on the ground. as they fell, he tumbled also down, almost into the kettle of hot water, where were boiling the pieces of dog. but, tortoise scrambled away, and went off to his end of the town. after a while the children of dog came back from their play, and not finding their father in his house, they came to the house of his friend tortoise, and asked, "where is our father?" tortoise replied, "as for me, where i was, i did not see him. when he went from here, who sent for him?" when the two women returned, dog's wife found, but did not recognize, the pieces of meat in her kettle. she wailed and mourned for him as dead. when, by the next day, the people of dog did not find him, they said, "he is dead." but they suspected tortoise. the wife of tortoise also doubted him, and deserting him, returned to the house of her father. so, tortoise left them all, and went to another place, fearing they would charge him with the death of dog. tale a journey for salt persons njâbu (civet) mbâmâ (boa) ngweya (hog) kudu (tortoise) a man, and hunters note interior tribes formerly obtained their salt from sea-water evaporated by the coast tribes in large shallow brass pans, called "neptunes," imported by foreign traders. all these four beasts were neighbors, living together in one town. one time, in the evening, about an hour after the regular six o'clock sunset, they all, were sitting conversing in the street. then tortoise said to the others, "here! i have something to say! i wish to talk with you. tomorrow, let us go on a journey, to take a walk through the forest down to the sea, to buy salt." they all assented, "yes! so let it be!" late at night, they dispersed to their houses, to lie down for sleep. after awhile, the day began to break. early in the morning, they prepared for their journey. and tortoise said to them, "i have here another thing to say; my last word. that is: as we go, no one of us is to start any new affair on the way; only steadily down to the seacoast." they all said, "yes! we are agreed." so, they started through the forest, going on their journey. they went, and they went, on and on, expecting to go a long way, until they should by evening come to their camping-place for the night. but, on the way, civet began to say, "ah! my stomach aches! ah! my stomach aches!" tortoise asked, "what do you mean by 'stomach-ache?'" civet answered, "'stomach-ache' means that my bowels trouble me, and that i need to go." tortoise said, "well! go! step aside from the path into the bushes, and we will wait for you here." but civet said, "no! not in the bushes; for, i must go back to the kitchen-garden of my mother in our town." tortoise exclaimed, "by no means! when we arranged for this journey, what did i say in the town?" they all admitted, "you said that none of us should start any affair on the way." therefore tortoise said, "but, you, njâbu, have begun a new matter on the way. if so, this journey is going to end in trouble!" nevertheless, civet ran rapidly back before night to his mother's kitchen-garden in his town, at the place where he usually went, while the three others sat down in the path to await his return. after a long time, civet, having relieved himself, came again by night to his companions, saying, "i am feeling very well." the next day, they all rose, saying, "now! let us resume our journey!" and they started again. they walked, and they walked, until boa cried, "o! my stomach! o! my stomach aches!" then tortoise asked him, "what is 'stomach ache'?" boa replied, "it means that hunger has seized me." so tortoise said, "yes, that's right. we have with us food for the journey ready. so, come, all of you, let us all eat." but boa said, "no! not this food. i must go and seek other food." tortoise inquired, "what other kind of food?" boa said, "let me go over yonder a little way; and i shall return." as he was going, he came in sight of a red antelope. boa curled his body in folds, according to his manner of crushing his prey. the antelope happened along; and boa seized and killed it. he covered it with saliva very much, as is its manner in swallowing its prey. and, carrying it to their camp, boa lay down with it. tortoise said, "we will all eat together of it." but boa replied, "we do not give each other in the town; shall we give each other on the journey?" then he swallowed the entire carcass. presently he called the other three; and they went to him. and he said to them, "i have finished eating, and i am satisfied." so, tortoise said, "come on, then; let us continue our journey." but boa said, "no! i shall leave this place only when this beast i have eaten dissolves." tortoise expostulated, "indeed! chum! i said in the town, 'let no one begin any matter on the way,' yet, first njâbu began his affair; and now you, mbâmâ, begin yours!" however, they all sat down, and waited for boa's food to digest. for an entire month they waited there, delaying while that food was being digested. finally, boa said, "now, we will journey, but first i will go to the river to drink." he drank a very great deal of water, which acted as a purgative to relieve his bowels of the bones of the antelope. then he reported to the others, "i am feeling very well. let us go." they went, and they went. and they came to a large tree so recently fallen across the path that its leaves were still green. hog jumped over to the other side of it. also, boa crawled over it. and civet leaped over it. they called to tortoise, who was vainly trying to climb over it, "come on! let us go ahead! jump!" but, tortoise being vexed, said, "no! i won't go! you know i have no long legs. what can i do! so, i shall leave this spot only when this tree has rotted through, giving me an open way!" they all wondered, and said, "no! this tree is new and fresh. it will rot in how many days?" tortoise replied, "not me! you! for, had not you two, njâbu and mbâmâ, delayed us, we would already have passed this spot long before this tree fell. you, njâbu, first began a matter; soon, you, mbâmâ, began your matter; now, this is my matter. now wait for me." so, they waited and waited. but, while waiting, the other three went out sometimes by early daylight in the morning to an adjacent plantation, and found there corn, yams, plantains, and all kinds of food. civet and hog said, "we must eat!" they ate up the corn, and finished the plantains. one day, a man of another town, was wandering in the forest. as he journeyed, he was looking from side to side on the way, peering for what he might find. and he saw many tracks of beasts. examining them closely, he said, "this track looks like that of a tortoise! yes, and this like a hog's! and, here, o! this other is of a civet! and, ha! ha! a trail of a boa is this!" he exclaimed, "how many beasts this place has! i will call the townspeople to come and kill these beasts; for, there must be many." so, he hurried rapidly back, and arrived at the town. when there, he shouted, "come on, men! come to the forest! i've found many beasts!" the owner of the plantation came along. his people took their guns; and some took machetes; and some, spears and knives. others took nets. and they all went together at once. they also had with them, dogs, to whose necks they tied little bells. when they came to that place where the four beasts were, the dogs barked and shook their bells as they raced. and the men began to shout "hâ! hâ!" to drive the beasts into the net. they first came upon hog, fired a gun at him, and he died. next, they came upon civet, and pierced him with a spear. they killed also boa, who was lying dormant by the log. and they saw the other beast, tortoise, on one side of the log, trying to conceal itself among the decayed leaves, and seized it. having the three dead bodies, they kept tortoise alive, and tied him with a cord. they had begun the killing of these beasts late in the afternoon, and they reached their town about sunset. and they said, "put all the carcasses in one house; but suspend tortoise from the roof." they consulted, "we shall eat those beasts only tomorrow; for, the evening is too late to cut them up and cook them." so, they all went to sleep. near midnight, tortoise, after a long effort, wriggled out of the coils of the cord. he came to the corner of the room where were the bodies of the other three beasts. he said over civet's body, "did i not say to you, 'begin no new matter on the way?' and now you are a corpse." and over boa, he said, "you too; i told you not to begin a matter; and now you are a dead body. had we not begun these matters on the way, we would have finished our journey safely." then he scratched a hole under the wall of the house, and escaped to the forest. after that, the day broke. and the townspeople said among themselves, "bring the beasts outside of the house; let us cut them up." they did so with the three dead bodies. and they told a lad, "bring the kudu that is suspended from the rafters." the lad looked and reported, "i have seen no kudu." they all went to look for it, and could see nothing of it. so, they said, "let us eat these. let the other go; for, it has run away." tale a plea for mercy persons njâbu (civet) uhingi (genet) kuba (chicken) vyâdu (antelope) kudu (tortoise) ivenga, a woman and her husband njambo note this tale seems to be a version of no. . the plea of tortoise that he did not spoil the fruits of plantations is true; it does not injure the gardens of the natives. these four beasts were living in one town; civet, in his own house; tortoise in his; antelope also in his; genet too in his own. but their four houses opened on to one long street. one day, in the afternoon, they all were in that street, sitting down in conversation. tortoise said to them, "i have here a word to say." they replied "well! speak!" at that time, their town had a great famine. so, tortoise said, "tomorrow, we will go to seek food." they replied, "good! just as soon as the day, at its first break." then they scattered, and went to their houses to lie down for sleep. soon, the day broke. and they all got up, and were ready by sunrise at six o'clock. they all went on their journey to find food. they searched as they walked a distance of several miles. then they came to a plantation of njambo's wife ivenga. it was distant from njambo's town about one hour's walk. it had a great deal of sugar-cane; also of yams and cassava. it had also a quantity of sweet potatoes. there also, the chickens of njambo were accustomed to go to scratch for worms among the plants. at once, civet exclaimed, "i'll go no further! i like to eat sugar-cane!" so he went to the plot of cane. antelope also said, "i too! i'll not go any further. i like to eat leaves of potato and cassava." so he went to the plot of cassava. and genet said, "yes! i see kuba here! i like to eat kuba! i'll go no further!" so, he went after the chickens. but first, the three had asked tortoise, "kudu! what will you do? have you nothing to eat?" tortoise answered, "i have nothing to eat. but, i shall await you even two days, and will not complain." so, civet remarked, "yes! i will not soon leave here, till i eat up all this cane. then i will go back to town." antelope also said, "yes! the same. i will remain here with the potato leaves till i finish them, before i go back." genet also said, "yes! i see many kuba here. i will stay and finish them." tortoise only said, "i have nothing to say." in that plantation was a large tree; and tortoise went to lie down at its foot. they were all there about four days, eating and eating. on the fifth day, njambo's wife ivenga in the town said to herself, "i'll go today, and see about my plantation, how it is." she came to the plantation, and when she saw the condition in which it was, she lifted up her voice, and began to wail a lamentation. she saw that but little cane was left, and not much of potatoes. looking in another part of the plantation, she saw lying there, very many feathers of chickens. she ran back rapidly to town to tell her husband. but, she was so excited she could scarcely speak. he asked her, "what's the matter, ivenga?" she answered, "i have no words to tell you. for, the plantation is left with no food." then, the man called twenty men of the town; and he said to them, "take four nets!" they took the nets, and also four dogs, with small bells tied to the necks of the dogs. the men had also guns and spears and machetes in their hands. they followed into the forest; and they came on to three of the beasts. they came first upon antelope, with their dogs; and they shot him dead. then the dogs came on genet, and they followed him; and soon he was shot with a gun. they came also on civet, and killed him. taking up the carcasses, they said to each other, "let us go back to town." on the way, they came to the big tree, and found tortoise lying at the base. they took him also, and then went on to their town. arrived there, njambo ordered, "put kudu in a house and suspend him from the roof." also he ordered, "take off the skin of vyâdu and hang it in the house where kudu is." he added, "take off also the skin of njâbu." they did so, and they put it into that house. he directed that genet should also be skinned, and his skin hung in that same house. so, there was left of these beasts in the street, only the flesh of their bodies. these the men cut up and divided among themselves. and they feasted for several days. on the fourth day afterward, njambo said to his wife, "i'm going on a visit to a town about three miles away. do you, while i am away, kill kudu, and prepare him with ngândâ for me, by my return." the woman got ready the ngândâ seeds (gourd) for the pudding, and then went into the room to take tortoise. in the dim light, she lifted up her hand, and found the string that suspended tortoise. but, before she untied it, tortoise said, "just wait a little." the woman took away her hand, and stood waiting. tortoise asked her, "this skin there looks like what?" the woman replied, "a skin of vyâdu." and tortoise inquired, "what did vyâdu do?" the woman answered, "vyâdu ate my potatoes in the plantation, and my husband killed him for it." tortoise said, "that is well." then tortoise again asked, "this other skin is of what animal?" the woman replied, "of uhingi." tortoise inquired, "what did uhingi do?" the woman answered, "uhingi killed and ate my and my husband's kuba; and he was killed for that." then tortoise said, "very good reason!" again tortoise asked the woman, "this other skin?" she answered, "of njâbu." tortoise asked, "njâbu, what did he do?" she answered, "njâbu ate my sugar-cane, and my husband killed him." tortoise said, "a proper reason! but, you, you are going to kill me and cook me with ngândâ-pudding. what have i done?" the woman had no reason to give. so she left tortoise alive, and began to cook the gourd-seeds with fish. soon, njambo himself came back, and his wife set before him the ngândâ and fish. but he objected, "ah! my wife! i told you to cook kudu; and you have cooked me fish. why?" the woman told him, "my husband! first finish this food, and then you and i will go to see about kudu." so, njambo finished eating, and ivenga removed the plates from the table. then they two went into the room where tortoise was suspended. the woman sat, but njambo was standing ready to pluck down tortoise. then tortoise said to njambo, "you, man! just wait!" the woman also said to njambo, "my husband! listen to what kudu says to you." tortoise asked, "you, man, what skin is this?" njambo answered, "of vyâdu. i killed him on account of this eating my plantation." then tortoise asked, "and that skin?" njambo answered, "of uhingi; and i killed him for eating my kuba." tortoise again asked, "and this other?" njambo answered, "of njâbu; for eating my sugar-cane." then tortoise said, "there were four of us in the plantation. what have i eaten? tell me. if i have eaten, then i should die." njambo told him, "i've found no reason against you." tortoise then asked, "then, why should i die?" so, njambo untied tortoise from the roof, and said to ivenga, "let kudu go; for, i find no reason against him. let him go as he pleases." so, ivenga set tortoise free; and he hasted back to his town in peace. tale the deceptions of tortoise persons njâ (leopard) kudu (tortoise) ngâmbi (igwana) mbâmâ (boa) ngando (crocodile) with men, a woman, and child note a portion of this tale seems to be a version of no. . leopard and tortoise built together a large town. leopard said to tortoise, "i will live with you, but i shall not be able to eat with you; for, i am a great man, and i eat alone." some time after this, tortoise went away, and married a wife. one day, his wife being hungry, he went off into the forest to seek food for her. and he found mushrooms. he gathered them; took them and returned with them to the town. there he said to his wife, "eat!" and she ate. some time after this, the woman was about to become a mother. and, on another day, tortoise went again into the forest to find food for his wife. as before, he gathered mushrooms. but, when he brought them to his wife, she said to him, "i don't like these things; the same every day!" so, tortoise went off again to seek food in the forest. he came near a strange town, and heard voices of mankind talking. in fear, he hid himself, and watched what would happen. he observed that there were men going off into the forest, with implements of search for wild animals. he saw them, but kept himself closely hidden. when they had gone, he came out of his hiding, and went into one of these houses of men, and sat down there. then he walked into the rooms. on the shelves of the kitchen, he saw a large quantity of wild meat drying. he took of that meat, and went away with it to his own town. he found on his arrival that his wife had already borne her child, the little tortoise. when tortoise showed her the meat, she asked him, "where did you get all this meat?" he replied evasively, "you told me to get you meat; so i went; and i have come with it." the woman was glad, and said, "do so every day!" so, another time, tortoise again went off into the forest. and he came to the town of those men. they were not there; for, they had gone off on their hunting. he went again into their house; took of their meat, and returned to his place. on giving the food to his wife, he said to her, "do not show njâ this meat!" after this, little tortoise grew, and began to go by itself, walking about the town. tortoise told the child, "do not show njâ the things you eat." but, the child did not obey. one day, it went off toward leopard's house, having in its hand the flesh of the wild animal it was eating. tortoise saw his child going and called him back, but, he ran rapidly away to leopard's; who, seeing the child with food in its hand, cried out, "come here!" leopard took hold of the child's hand to see what meat he was eating, and said to him, "your father has no gun; where does he get all this meat?" the child was silent, not knowing whence the meat came, and did not answer; and he returned to his father's house. so, leopard said to himself, "kudu and i must have a talk." he told his wife to make ready their food. she did so. then he told one of his children, "go! call kudu to come and eat with me." the child went and told as he was bidden. tortoise sent word, "i can't come." his wife, however, said to him, "go!" tortoise objected to her, saying, "i'm afraid of that man!" still his wife said to him, "go!" so, he went. leopard set out the food that had been prepared. then he asked tortoise, "where did you get the meat which i saw with your child?" tortoise replied, "i picked it up." leopard said, "no! don't tell lies!" they changed the conversation, and went on eating. when they were done, tortoise went back to his house. next day, leopard said to his people, "i'm going to visit kudu." so he went, and entered into the house of the wife of tortoise. there he saw much dried wild meat. he exclaimed, "o! kudu! you told me falsely! you and i living in the same town, can't you let me know what happens?" then leopard went back to his house. that evening he said to his children, "go to the house of kudu. if you see a hunting-bag hanging there, take hold of it; with a knife pierce holes in the bottom; and fill the bag with ashes." they did so, putting in much ashes. they returned to their father, and told him what they had done. he replied, "very good!" that night, tortoise said to his wife, "tomorrow, i shall not go out hunting." but, she said, "yes! go! and kill me some animal." so, he consented. then day began to break. tortoise went into the entrance-room; thence he took his hunting-bag; but, in the dark of the morning, he saw nothing wrong about it. and he went on his way. soon, also, leopard came out of his house; and, going to the house of tortoise, he inquired, "kudu is in the house?" the wife of tortoise from her bed-room, replied, "kudu is not here." then leopard went into the entrance-room of tortoise; and looking about, he saw that the bag was not there. so, he followed after tortoise; and, as he walked, he looked out for marks of the ashes. he followed, and he followed; and finally overtook tortoise. tortoise, as soon as he saw leopard coming, said to him, "i'm going back to town!" leopard asked, "why? don't go! why do you go?" tortoise, remembering his having said he was "a great man," answered, "because you are proud." but, leopard insisted, "no! go on where you were going." so, tortoise consented, "well, let us go!" they went, and came to the town of men. and they found that the men were gone off into the forest. tortoise observed that the house was closed and locked. leopard said to him, "open the house!" but tortoise replied, "you, njâ you open the house!" but, leopard said, "i am a stranger here; you travel here continually; you know the way!" so, tortoise opened the house; and they both entered. leopard saw the bodies of many wild animals drying in the house. tortoise said to him, "carry the meat, and let us go!" but, leopard said, "no! i'm staying here, and will cook some meat here." tortoise objected, "no! take the meat and let us go. for, here are great men who kill us people." however, leopard insisted, "no! first let me eat." so, tortoise said, "very well! i'll carry away my share; for, i'm going." but leopard still insisted, "no! wait for me." so, tortoise yielded, and waited for him in the house. leopard cooked his meat. while the pot was on the fire-place, and before he had eaten, suddenly the men returned. tortoise exclaimed, "the men of the town have returned! what shall we do?" for himself, tortoise said, "i'm going to hide in the bedroom!" but, leopard said, "no! i'm the elder; the bedroom is the place for me." he went into the bedroom. tortoise remained in the reception-room, and hid himself in a pile of the women's cassava leaves. soon afterward, the men also came into that room. and a woman said, "i left those leaves here when i was cooking. i must throw them into the back yard." so, she swept the leaves (with tortoise unseen among them) in a heap, and threw them out doors. in the bedroom, where leopard had hidden, there was a child of this woman, sick with a skin-disease. the woman called out to her child, "my child! are you there?" the child replied, "yes!" the men in the entrance-room, observing the pot on the fire, asked the woman, "while we were away, did you leave a kettle on the fire-place?" the woman, thinking the pot belonged to someone else who had been cooking, answered, "no." the men then directed her, "make food for us!" so, she made them food in that pot which leopard had left, adding other meat to it. the child in the bedroom, smelling the odor of cooking, called out, "mother! i want to eat!" so, the mother made food for him. and she took the plate to him, setting it down in the doorway, (but did not enter the room, and so did not see leopard). leopard took the child's food. the child, in terror, made no out-cry. leopard ate up all the food. then the child began to weep. the mother, hearing, asked, "why do you cry?" the child answered, "for hunger." she wondered that that plateful had not been sufficient; but, she made him more food. and she brought it to him into the room, but she did not see the leopard; nor did the child tell her. she left the food there, and went out. the child was about to take the food to eat it, when leopard again snatched it away. but, even then, the child, in fear, did not scream out. and leopard ate all the food. then the child began to weep out aloud. the mother again asked, "what do you want?" the child answered, "i want food." the mother wondered much, and, hastening into the bedroom, she saw leopard. then she shouted, "men! here's njâ!" the men came, and they killed leopard. all this while, tortoise remained hidden in the bushes outside; and he heard all that was happening. he said to himself, "i'm going to town to tell the children of njâ that he is dead." so, he went back to his town. at first, he told only his wife, "men have killed njâ." then he said, "i must now call the children of njâ." so, he called all the people of leopard. and he said to them, "i will tell you something; but, don't kill me for my evil news. so, i tell you, njâ is dead!" they all laughed in derision, as if it was not possible, "we will know about that matter tomorrow!" and that day darkened. in the evening, tortoise told his wife and children, "we must flee to another place." for, he feared that leopard's people would charge him with their father's death. so, that night they fled. and they built their town far away at another place. when the children of leopard saw that tortoise had fled, they believed him guilty; and they said, "the day we shall see kudu, we will kill him." tortoise and his family had been living at their new place only about a month, when, one day, he said to his family, "i'm going on a journey to the town of mbâmâ." so he went to that town. he stayed there visiting about a week. while there, he said to boa, "if a child of njâ comes here, hide me." shortly afterward, a child of leopard did come. boa took tortoise, and set him for safety on a rock in the middle of the river. tortoise sat there a long time; and, while there, he laid what looked like an egg. surprised, he threw it into the water; and it floated away. finally it came ashore at the landing-place of crocodile's town. crocodile saw it, and said, "go, and seek the person who made this thing." his children went to seek. they journeyed, and found tortoise, and took him. they brought him to their father, and told him, "this is the person." crocodile asked tortoise, "you made this thing?" tortoise said "yes!" then crocodile told him, "make me many of these things." so tortoise told him, "bring me here a great many plantains; and arrange the house in order." crocodile arranged all the house nicely. tortoise entered it, and was given an inside room. he remained there in that room all by himself with the plantains. at last, one day he emerged. and he said to crocodile, "send me in company with one of your people across the river." crocodile told him, "you yourself name the person who shall go with you." tortoise said he wanted crocodile's cousin igwana, who was living there with crocodile's people. so igwana and tortoise got into a canoe, and started to cross the river. crocodile then entered the room where tortoise had been. searching there, he did not find any of the things which tortoise had promised to make. so crocodile shouted after tortoise, whose canoe had not yet crossed the river, to come back. tortoise heard; and he asked igwana, "do you hear how crocodile is calling to you? don't you know what he is saying?" (natives believe the igwana to be deaf.) igwana answered, "no! what does he say?" tortoise said, "he tells you to paddle faster! don't be so slow!" so, igwana paddled rapidly; and soon his work was finished; and they reached the other side. there, tortoise got out of the canoe; and he told igwana to go back. igwana did so. and tortoise went on his way. after a while, a child of leopard met with tortoise on the path. the child asked him, "is not this kudu?" tortoise replied, "yes, i am he." then the child of leopard said to him, "you killed my father! i shall also kill you!" so, he killed tortoise. tale leopard's hunting companions persons njâ (leopard) and his nephew etoli (house-rat) ngomba (porcupine) iheli (gazelle) nyati (ox) njâku (elephant) ko (wild-rat) kudu (tortoise) indondobe (wagtail) leopard and other beasts, with a son of leopard's sister, were residing in the same town. one day, leopard said to the others, "i have here a word to say." they replied, "tell it." "we must go to kill beasts (not of our company) for our food, at a place which i will show you a number of miles away." and they made their arrangements. after two days, he said, "now, for the journey!" so they finished their preparations. and leopard said to his nephew, "you stay in the town. i and the others will go to our work." they began their journey, and had gone only a part of the way, when leopard exclaimed, "i forgot my spear! wait for me while i go back to the town." there he found his nephew sitting down, waiting. leopard said to him, "i have come to tell you that, every day, while we are away, you must come early to where we are killing the animals; and secretly you must take away the meat and bring it here to my house." the nephew heard and promised. leopard returned to the others who were awaiting him on the road, and told them to come on. they went, and they arrived at the spot which he had chosen. there they hastily built a small house for their camp. the next day they said, "now, let us go and make our snares for the animals." they began making snares; and set their traps early in the afternoon. a few hours later, they returned to the camp. later still, before sunset, they said, "let us go to examine our snares." they found they had caught an igwana. they killed it and put it on the drying-frame over the fire in the house. then the day darkened. and they went to their sleep. and then the day broke. and leopard said, "while we go to the snares, who shall remain to take care of this house?" they agreed, "let etoli stay at the camp." house-rat assented, "all right." so the others went away together. the camp had been made near a small stream. at that same hour, leopard's nephew came to the camp, according to his uncle's directions. he had in his hands a plate and a drum. he came near to the house cautiously. with the plate he twice swept the surface of the water, as if bailing out a canoe. rat heard the swish of the water, and called out, "who is splashing water there? who is dabbling in this water?" the nephew responded, "it is i, a friend." and rat said, "well, then come." the nephew came to the house. after a little conversation, he said to rat, "i have here a drum, and, while i beat it, you dance for me." rat was pleased, and said, "very well." so, the nephew beat the drum, and rat danced. after a while, the nephew said to rat, "go you, out into the front, and dance there, while i beat the drum here." as rat went out, the nephew snatched the dried meat and ran away with it, suddenly disappearing around a corner of the house. he came to the town, and placed the meat in his own house. rat waited a while in the front, and, not hearing the drum came back into the house, and called out, "chum! where are you?" he looked about, and his eyes falling on the drying-frame, he saw that the dried meat was not there. he began to mourn, "ah! leopard will kill me to day, because of the loss of his meat." while he was thus speaking, the company of trappers, together with leopard, came back from their morning's work. leopard told rat all that had occurred to them in the forest at their traps and snares; and then said, "now, tell me what you have been doing, and the happenings of this camp." rat told him, "some one has come and taken away the dried meat, but i did not see who it was." leopard said, "you are full of falsehood. yourself have eaten it while we were away in the forest." so, leopard gave him a heavy flogging. then they put on the drying-frame the animal they had trapped that day. the next day they went again to the forest; and wild-rat was left in charge of the camp. the nephew came, as on the day before, with his plate and drum, and did in the same way at the water. and he deceived the wild-rat with his drumming, in the same way as he had done to house-rat. when leopard and the others came back from the forest, wild-rat told him of the loss of the meat; and said that he had seen no one, and did not know who took it. leopard said to him, "you, ko, have eaten the meat, just as your relative etoli ate his yesterday." thus leopard and his company went each day to the traps. on the third day, porcupine was caught; on the fourth gazelle; on the fifth, ox; on the sixth, elephant. beast after beast was caught, killed and dried; and, day by day, the meat of all was stolen. the last to be thus caught and stolen was tortoise. the nephew in leopard's town, looked with satisfaction on the pile of dried meat that had been collected in his own house. he said to himself, "my uncle told me to gather them; and i have done so. but, i will not put them in uncle's house." in the camp, there was left only one animal of leopard's companions that had not been placed on guard. it was a bird, a water wag-tail. it said to leopard one day, "while you all go on your errand today, i will remain as keeper of the house." leopard replied, "no! my friend, i don't wish you to remain." (for, leopard knew that that bird was very cautious and wise, more so than some other animals.) nevertheless, they went, leaving the bird in charge of the house. the nephew came, as usual, with his plate and drum. he splashed the water of the stream as usual, to see whether there was anyone in the house to respond. and the bird asked, "who are you?" the nephew answered, in a humble voice, "i." he came on through the stream, on his way, catching two cray-fish. he entered the house, and he said to the bird, "get me some salt, and a leaf in which to tie and roast these cray-fish." when the bird gave him the leaf, he tied them in it, and laid the small bundle on the coals on the fire-place. but he at once took up the bundle, opened it, and ate the fish, before they were really cooked. the bird said to him, "those fish were not yet cooked. your stomach is like your uncle njâ's. both you and your uncle like to eat things raw." the bird at once suspected that the nephew was the thief. when the nephew said, "i have here a drum," bird at once, as if very willing, replied, "drum! i want to dance." the nephew was standing in the front with his drum, and he said to bird, "come and dance out here; for, the drum sounds much better outside." but the bird said, "i will not dance in the same place with you." the nephew then said, "well, then; change places; you come here, and i go into the house." but the bird refused, "no! i stay in the house." most of the morning was thus spent by the nephew trying to deceive the bird, and get into the house alone. finally, the nephew wearied, and gave up the effort and left. soon the company of trappers with leopard returned from the forest. he told the bird all the news of their forest work. looking at the drying-frames, leopard saw that the dried meat was still there. he thought in his heart, "my nephew has not come today to get this meat." the bird then told leopard all the news of the camp, and how the nephew had been acting. at the last, he exclaimed, "so! it is your nephew who has been coming here every day to take away the dried meat!" and all the animals agreed, "so! so! that's so!" but leopard replied, "i don't believe it. but, let us adjourn and examine." (he supposed the meat was hidden in his own house, and would not be discovered.) they all scattered, and hastened to their town. there they entered the nephew's house; and there they found a great pile of dried meat. they proved the theft on leopard himself, pointing out, "here is the very meat in the house of one of your own family. we are sure that you yourself made the conspiracy with your nephew for him to do the stealing for you." and they all denounced him, "you are a thief and a liar! you shall not join with us any more in the same town." leopard went away in wrath saying, "do you prove it on me? well then! all you beasts, whenever and wherever i shall meet you, it will be only to eat you!" so, leopards are always enemies to all other animals, and they kill them whenever they are able. tale is the bat a bird or a beast? persons ndemi (bat) and his mother joba (the sun) vyâdu (antelope) hako (ants) other animals and birds note in tropical africa, it is not usual to retain a corpse unburied as long as hours. bat retained his mother's corpse too long. the "driver" ants of that country are natural scavengers. a reason why bats are not seen in the day time:--also, why they make their plaintive cry at night, as if they were calling for their mother. bat lived at a place by itself, with only its mother. shortly after their settling there, the mother became sick, very near to death. bat called for antelope, and said to him, "make medicine for my mother." antelope looked steadily at her to discern her disease. then he told bat, "there is no one who can make the medicine that will cure your mother, except joba." having given this information, antelope returned to his own place. on another day, early in the morning, bat arose to go to call sun. he did not start until about seven o'clock. he met sun on the road about eleven o'clock. and he said to sun, "my journey was on the way to see you." sun told him, "if you have a word to say, speak!" so bat requested, "come! make medicine for my mother. she is sick." but sun replied, "i can't go to make medicine unless you meet me in my house; not here on the road. go back; and come to me at my house tomorrow." so, bat went back to his town. and the day darkened. and they all slept their sleep. and the next day broke. at six o'clock, bat started to go to call sun. about nine o'clock, he met sun on the path; and he told sun what he was come for. but sun said to him, "whenever i emerge from my house, i do not go back, but i keep on to the end of my journey. go back, for another day." bat returned to his town. he made other journeys in order to see sun at his house, five successive days; and every day he was late, and met sun already on the way of his own journey for his own business. finally, on the seventh day, bat's mother died. then bat, in his grief, said, "it is joba who has killed my mother! had he made medicine for me, she would have recovered." very many people came together that day in a crowd, at the kwedi (mourning) for the dead. the wailing was held from six o'clock in the morning until eleven o'clock of the next day. at that hour, bat announced, "let her be taken to the grave." he called other beasts to go into the house together with him, in order to carry the corpse. they took up the body, and carried it on the way to the grave. on their arrival at the grave, these beasts said to bat, "we have a rule that, before we bury a person, we must first look upon the face." (to identify it). so, they opened the coffin. when they had looked on the face, they said, "no! we can't bury this person; for, it is not our relative, it does not belong to us beasts. this person indeed resembles us in having teeth like us. and it also has a head like us. but, that it has wings, makes it look like a bird. it is a bird. call for the birds! we will disperse." so, they dispersed. then bat called the birds to come. they came, big and little; pelicans, eagles, herons and all the others. when they all had come together, they said to bat, "show us the dead body." he told them, "here it is! come! look upon it!" they looked and examined carefully. then they said, "yes! it resembles us; for, it has wings as we. but, about the teeth, no! we birds, none of us, have any teeth. this person does not resemble us with those teeth. it does not belong to us." and all the birds stepped aside. during the while that the talking had been going on, ants had come and laid hold of the body, and could not be driven away. then one of the birds said to bat, "i told you, you ought not to delay the burial, for, many things might happen." the ants had eaten the body and there was no burial. and all the birds and beasts went away. bat, left alone, said to himself, "all the fault of all this trouble is because of joba. if he had made medicine, my mother would not be dead. so, i, ndemi, and joba shall not look on each other. we shall have no friendship. if he emerges, i shall hide myself. i won't meet him or look at him." and he added, "i shall mourn for my mother always. i will make no visits. i will walk about only at night, not in the daytime, lest i meet joba or other people." tale dog, and his human speech ( st version) persons mbwa (dog), and his mother a man njambo, and daughter eyâle note in the pre-historic times, from which these tales come, all animals, both human and (what we now call) the lower animals, were supposed to associate together, even in marriage. this son mbwa, in form (and speaking also) like what we now call a "dog," spoke also with human speech. the reason is here given why this ancestor of dogs left the country of the beasts. but, though dogs now live with mankind, they cannot use human speech as their ancestor did. they can only say "ow! ow!" dog and his mother were the only inhabitants of their hamlet. he had the power to speak both as a beast and as a human being. one day the mother said to the son, "you are now a strong man; go, and seek a marriage. go, and marry eyâle, the daughter of njambo." and he said to his mother, "i will go tomorrow." that day darkened. and they both went to lie down in their places for sleep. then soon, another day began to break. dog said to his mother, "this is the time of my journey." it was about sun-rise in the morning. and he began his journey. he went the distance of about eight miles; and arrived at the journey's end before the middle of the morning. he entered the house of njambo, the father of eyâle. njambo and his wife saluted him, "mbolo!" and he responded, "ai! mbolo!" njambo asked him, "my friend! what is the cause of your journey?" dog, with his animal language, answered, "i have come to marry your daughter eyâle." njambo consented; and the mother of the girl also agreed. they called their daughter, and asked her; and she also replied, "yes! with all my heart." this young woman was of very fine appearance in face and body. so, all the parties agreed to the marriage. after that, about sun-set in the evening, when they sat down at supper, the son-in-law, dog, was not able to eat for some unknown reason. that day darkened; and they went to their sleep. and, then, the next daylight broke. but, by an hour after sunrise in the morning, dog had not risen; he was still asleep. the mother of the woman said to her, "get some water ready for the washing of your husband's face, whenever he shall awake." she also said to her daughter, "i am going to go into the forest to the plantation to get food for your husband; for, since his coming, he has not eaten. also, here is a chicken; the lads may kill and prepare it. but, you yourself must split ngândâ (gourd-seeds, whose oily kernels are mashed into a pudding)." she handed eyâle the dish of gourd-seeds, and went off into the forest. njambo also went away on an errand with his wife. the daughter took the dish of seeds, and, sitting down, began to shell them. as she shelled, she threw the kernels on the ground, but the shells she put on a plate. shortly after the mother had gone, dog woke from sleep. he rose from his bed, and came out to the room where his wife was, and stood near her, watching her working at the seeds. he stood silent, looking closely, and observed that she was still throwing away the kernels, the good part, and saving the shells on the plate. he spoke to her with his human voice, "no! woman! not so! do you throw the good parts, to the ground, and the worthless husks onto the plate?" while he was thus speaking to his wife, she suddenly fell to the ground. and at once she died. he laid hold of her to lift her up. but, behold! she was a corpse. soon afterwards, the father and the mother came, having returned from their errands. they found their child a corpse; and they said to dog, "mbwa! what is this?" he, with his own language replied, "i cannot tell." but, they insisted, "tell us the reason!" so dog spoke with his human voice, "you, woman, went to the forest while i was asleep. you, man, you also went in company of your wife, while i was asleep. when i rose from sleep, i found my wife was cracking ngândâ. she was taking the good kernels to throw on the ground, and was keeping the shells for the plate. and i spoke and told her, 'the good kernels which you are throwing on the ground are to be eaten, not the husks.'" while he was telling them this, they too, also fell to the ground, and died, apparently without cause. when the people of the town heard about all this, they said, "this person carries an evil medicine for killing people. let him be seized and killed!" so dog fled away rapidly into the forest; and he finally reached the hamlet of his mother. his body was scratched and torn by the branches and thorns of the bushes of the forest, in his hasty flight. his mother exclaimed, "mbwa! what's the matter? such haste! and your body so disordered!" he replied, using their own language, "no! i won't tell you. i won't speak." but, his mother begged him, "please! my child! tell me!" so, finally, he spoke, using his strange voice, and said, "my mother! i tell you! njambo and his wife liked me for the marriage; and the woman consented entirely. i was at that time asleep, when the man and his wife went to the forest. when i rose from my sleep, i found the woman eyâle cracking ngândâ, and throwing away the kernels, and keeping the husks. and i told her, 'the good ones which you are throwing away are the ones to be eaten.' and, at once she died." while he was speaking thus to his mother, she also fell dead on the ground. the news was carried to the town of dog's mother's brother, and very many people came to the mourning. his uncle came to dog, and said, "mbwa! what is the reason of all this?" but dog would not answer. he only said, "no! i won't speak." then they all begged him, "tell us the reason." but he replied only, "no! i won't speak." finally, as they urged him, he chose two of them, and said to the company, "the rest of you remain here, and watch while i go and speak to these two." then dog spoke to those two men with the same voice as he had to his mother. and, at once they died, as she had died. then he exclaimed, "ah! no! if i speak so, people will come to an end!" and all the people agreed, "yes, mbwa! it is so. your human speech kills us people. don't speak any more." and he went away to live with mankind. tale dog, and his human speech ( nd version) persons njambo, his wife nyangwa-mbwa, and his son mbwa (dog) the prophet, totode, and a sorcerer, nja-ya-melema-mya-bato his three other wives, majanga, inyanji, mamendi; and her two twins. note some african ant-hills are built in upright pillars, varying in diameter from to inches, and in height from ft. to ft. the bearing of a monstrosity formerly was punished (and in some tribes still) by driving the mother into seclusion in the forest, and generally with killing of the child. in some tribes, twins were considered monstrosities. the "heart-beat" of nyangwa-mbwa was the commonly believed premonition of coming evil. there are many kinds of food, of which women are not allowed to partake. though the three sisters were daughters of the same mother, the jealousy of two of them for the other one led them to hatred, and an attempt at murder. their curse laid on mbwa caused him to be a speechless beast; for, previous to that, he was talking as a human being. "heart-life" is an entity distinct from both body and soul. njambu married a woman named nyangwa-mbwa. she bore a creature that looked like no animal that existed at that time. but, because he spoke as a human being, he was not considered a beast. he was given part of his mother's name, mbwa. njambu added other marriages. among them he obtained three women, each one of whom had a special office. that of majanga was to keep things clean. that of inyanji for planting. mamendi said that her work should be to bear twins. now, these three women were sisters. the other two were jealous of mamendi, because her work was greater and more honorable than theirs. in the course of time, mamendi conceived; her pregnancy went regularly on. and the time for her confinement came. majanga and inyanji went to deliver her. but they tied a napkin over her face, and covered her eyes lest she should see what they would do to her. when the time of the birth was at hand, she bore twins. then inyanji and majanga threw the twins into the pig-pen. and they took two ant-hills (slender conical structures). they smeared them with blood. and they went and showed them to njambu as the things which mamendi had borne. njambu said, "go! and throw those things into the forest." but mbwa was going about; and as he went, he was scenting, till he came to the pig-pen; and he saw the twins. he took them, and carried them to his mother in their hut, which was isolated from the town. when the two women had left the twins in the pig-pen, their intention was that the pigs might kill them; and the women did not know that mbwa had removed them. the twins stayed with nyangwa-mbwa, and she fed them and nursed them. but, when majanga and inyanji heard that those children were in the hamlet of mbwa's mother, they said, "we will go there tomorrow." early in the morning, nyangwa-mbwa had gone to the forest to her garden. when the two women came, they found the twins lying down. so, they struck them a blow; and they died. the while that nyangwa-mbwa was in the forest, her heart beat with anxiety. she at once picked up her basket, and came to her village, and found the corpses of both the twins. then she began to cry. mbwa also came, and found the dead bodies stretched out. right away, he knew what had happened. so he went to the prophet totode, and inquired what he should do. totode asked him, "are you able to go to the town of doctor nja-ya-melema-mya-bato? (hunger-for-the-hearts-of-people)." he agreed "yes, i will go there." then he went to the town of the doctor. a child of the doctor spoke to mbwa, and asked, "what have you come to do?" he answered, "i have come to seek heart-life; because my father's wives have killed from me two children." already nja-ya-melema-mya-bato had gone to kill people for himself. in a little while he returned and suddenly, pieces of meat (from the dead bodies) began to fall, kidi! kidi! being thrown out on the ground in the street. mbwa, awaiting a chance, hid himself under a bed. then came the doctor bringing in the heart-lives of the men he had killed. mbwa, without permission, seized two of the hearts, and ran out quickly. nja-ya-melema-mya-bato followed after him, running rapidly, da! da! da! but he did not overtake mbwa. mbwa ran in haste with the hearts, on to his village. there he thrust the new lives into the children. the twins arose again to life and stood, to show themselves, and then they sat down. those twins went on growing, and became stout young men. one day they said to mbwa, "we want guns." he went to his father, in the town, and said, "i want two guns." his father produced two guns for him. he took them, went to his home, and handed them to the twins. then they tried the guns, and loaded them. next day, in the morning, they went out early to hunt; they killed two gazelles; and they took them to their village. mbwa cut up one of the beasts; and he said to his mother, "cook it." then he took the other one to his father. his father cut it up; and he called majanga and inyanji; and, dividing the meat, he said to them, "go ye, and cook these in the pot, and those in a jomba." (mbwa himself was still in the house watching them.) they boiled, and cooked; they put in the salt and pepper; and were about to taste the soup when mbwa said, "not so! this meat is not to be eaten by women." they took the food to the reception-house, where their husband njambu ate; and he laid aside some for them. but, what he laid aside for those women, mbwa drew away and ate. then he returned to his home. his mother made food; and they ate, all four of them. next morning, the twins returned to their hunting. they killed also three antelopes, and they carried them to take them to their home, and left them in the path on the way outside of the village. in the village, they said to mbwa, "go, and bring the beasts from the forest." mbwa started, and brought them to the village. he carried two to his father. his brothers exclaimed, "where does mbwa kill all those animals?" his father cut up the animals, and divided one with his children. he cut up the other, saying, "this belongs to myself." then he prepared some to be cooked in momba (bundles tied in plantain leaves), and some to be dried, and some to be boiled. the women boiled the food (mbwa still watching them). when it was cooked, they lifted up the pot from the fire, and they were about to taste it, when mbwa said, "no! you must not taste it!" they put it in bowls, and set the food before their husband; and he ate. when he was about to give some to his wives, mbwa said, "not so!" the twins continued with their hunting just the same as at the first. almost every day they were killing some animal. and mbwa continued also with carrying meat to the town of his father. finally, the twins became full-grown men. then mbwa said to himself, "now, i'm ready to bring this matter to the ears of the people." when another day came, he said to his father, "tomorrow, call all the people of the town together, in the afternoon." on the next day, his father did so. mbwa dressed the twins very finely; and brought out three chairs, two for the twins, and one for his mother. all the people collected together. thereupon, he brought forward his mother, and the twins. the people fixed their eyes on them; for they had not seen them in their little hamlet in the forest. the people exclaimed, "what fine-looking persons!" then mbwa stood up. he said, "ye people! i have called you all that ye may recognize these two young men." the people said that they did not know them. he continued, "these are my father's children. for, my father had married these three women. also, they had three duties; majanga, her duty of keeping the house clean; inyanji, her duty of planting; and mamendi's was the bearing of twins. mamendi became a mother. on the day of her confinement, her two sisters went to deliver her. they took a napkin and covered her eyes. and she bore these two twins. they threw them inside the pig-pen. and they took two small earthen pillars instead, and they went and showed them to their husband. then, i entered the pig-pen; and i took these children out; and brought them to my mother. so, these children grew up. and they began hunting. you, my father, you remember when i brought you the wild meat, and you were about to give to these women; but, i went and took away the food. the reason is, because they are the ones who tried to kill the children. i brought them up from childhood to be men as now. so, this caused me to bring this case before the presence of all people; for, i say that those two women were murderesses. so, then, my father, these are your children; but, if you retain those women, these two twins shall not be your sons." upon this, the father of mbwa said, "catch ye both of the women!" and they were bound in that self-same hour. (they had supposed that the twins had died when they had struck them in the hamlet of mbwa's mother.) they could not deny. in their anger, as they were led away, they called out to mbwa, "mbwa-o!" he assented, "eh? what is it?" they replied in anger, for having informed on them. and they laid a curse on him, saying, "you will never speak again with the voice of a human being. you shall be a dumb beast." but, the people took them, to be thrown into the depth of the sea. tale the savior of the animals persons njambo and wife and son utigebodi ngwayi (partridge) the prophet njambi yungu (eagle) etoli (rat) njâku (elephant) nyati (ox) kudu (tortoise) njâ (leopard) ngomba (porcupine) inâni (bird) note this story plays on the meaning of the name u-tige-bode. it is an ancient word, not now used, meaning, "he-who-saves-people." in the son's given name; his saving of the unworthy, in response to their appeals for mercy; his bearing of his father's wrath; his punishment on a tree; the derision of the very passers by, for whom he was to die, i think the legend echoes, even though faintly, the story of the christ. njambo married two women. he begot twenty-three children. and they all died. also one of the wives died. there were left only himself, and one wife. the woman was old, and the man also was old. but, the woman was again to become a mother; and, at the proper time, she bore a child. the child was a male. the woman called the husband, saying, "come! and give your boy a name." the husband said, "the name of the child is utigebode." after this, the child grew to be a large man. one day, he said to his father, "paia! i'm going to set snares in the forest." the father replied, "yes! go! and catch me food!" he went. and he returned that morning. in the afternoon, he went back to examine the snares. and he found that two partridges were caught. he exclaimed, "i'm very glad! my father shall eat one today, and the other shall be kept for tomorrow." then the partridges asked him, "what is your name?" he answered, "one-who-saves-people." then the partridges said, "if that is so, why are you about to kill us?" on another day, in the morning, he went again to examine his snares. and he found two antelope (tragelephas). he was glad; and he said, "i feel very good! my father shall eat one; and the other can be cooked for another day." the antelopes asked him, "what's your name?" he answered, "one-who-saves-people." again, they asked, "why then are you about to kill us?" he replied, "that's so! well! go!" and he returned to town. that afternoon he went out again, and found two gazelles. and he said, "i'll take these two to town at once; and my father shall eat one today, and the other tomorrow." but the gazelles said, "no!--you are the one-who-saves-people! why then should you kill us?" so he loosed them, and let them go. he did the same way to two elephants. and with two oxen. at another time he found two tortoises. and the tortoises spoke to him as had done the others. and on another day, he found two leopards. and, he released the leopards, in the same way. at another time, two porcupines, in the same way. one after another, almost all the beasts were thus trapped and released. there was not one beast brought by utigebode to his village; he freed them all. so, his father said to him, "my child! since you have set your snares, i have not seen you bring in a single beast, even an etoli. what are you doing? i shall change your name. for, now that i am old, it is right for you to save me, and help me with food." utigebode replied evasively, "since i set the snares, i have not caught even a inâni." the father said, "well! if it is true that you have not killed any beast or bird, i will know tomorrow." the next day broke; and the father went to the village of prophet njambi. the prophet saluted him, "what have you come for?" njambo replied, "i come to you for you to tell me about my son, whether in his hunting he kills beasts, or whether he does not." njambi answered, "he snares them constantly; but, because of the name you gave him, he saves the lives of the people of the tribes of beasts." the prophet added, "if there be a doubt, i will show you a way to prove my words. when you go back to town you will meet iheli at the end of the village. when you meet with him, call for the people to set nets to catch him. but, yourself shall stand and watch what the beast does before your eyes." njambo arose to go, and bade goodbye, saying, "this is my return journey to my village." and it was so that, on nearing the end of the village, he met with gazelle. njambo shouted, "men! spread your nets! here is a beast! let us catch it!" his men brought their nets, and began to surround gazelle. and the son utigebode came to assist. the men were shouting, "hâ-hâ! hâ-hâ!" to frighten the animal towards the nets. gazelle looked forward, watching utigebode closely; and it said to itself, "if i go toward the nets, i shall be caught; but, i will go toward utigebode and shall be saved." so, gazelle ran toward utigebode, and he caught it as if to kill it. but gazelle cried out, "eh! utigebode! you, the savior, will you be the one to kill me?" so, utigebode said, "pass on! for, it is true that i am the-one-who-saves." and gazelle fled to the forest. then njambo was very angry, and said to utigebode, "ah! my child! i have found you in your falsehood! was it not you who said you caught no beast? so! you have been releasing them!" then the company all went back to their village with their nets. they arrived there during the daytime. and the father ordered his son, "go! climb that coco tree, and bring me a nut." the son began to climb the tree. but, as he climbed, the father, by magic-power, caused the tree to grow rapidly upward. when, finally, utigebode reached the top, he was unable to come down the excessively long tree-trunk. he began to call to his father for help, "my father!" but the father was still very angry, and replied, "call your friends, the beasts and birds, to save you. i will not help you." and njambo went to sit down in his village, leaving his son in the treetop. the son saw eagle passing, and he called to it, "yungu! help me!" eagle replied, "i am not able to carry a man; you are heavy;" so, eagle passed on. utigebode saw many beasts one after another passing below, and he called to them, "save me!" but, they said, "we have no wings with which to go up to you. how can we get you down? we are not birds that could let you down. we beasts are unable to help you. do not expect us." he was left there in the tree-top a period of two weeks, living only on the coconuts; and then he died, and his body fell to the earth. njambo came out to see the corpse, and he said to it, "you have died through lack of obedience. you disobeyed me; and your beasts did not help you." the father and the mother lived another year in their village; and then they died, because they had no children to help them with food or clothes. and the people came from other villages to bury them. tale origins of the ivory trade ( st version) persons king ukanakâdi, and his son lombolokindi, and his mother, with birds and other animals tombeseki (a magic-spear); an old woman njâku (elephant); an ox (a metamorphosed man) a foreign vessel, and traders ukanakâdi lived in his great house, having with him his many wives. one of them bore him a son whom he named lombolokindi. as time passed on, the child grew in size, and strength, and skill. because of this, his mother was treated by ukanakâdi with special favor. this aroused the jealousy of one of the other wives. she took the child one day, and secretly gave him a certain evil medicine, which caused him to be constantly hungry, hungry, hungry. even when he ate enormously, no amount of food could fill his stomach or satisfy his appetite. ukanakâdi finally was angry at the child, and said to the mother, "all the food of my plantations is finished, eaten up by your child. we have no more plantains, no more cassava, no more eddoes, nor anything else in our plantations or in our kitchen-gardens. you have brought a curse upon us! go away to your father's house!" (he said this, not knowing that a fetish-medicine had caused all the trouble.) so the mother went away with her child to her father's house. but there too, the boy ate up all the food of the gardens, until there was none left. then her father said to her, "all my food is done here; go with your child to your grandfather, and find food there." so, she went to her grandfather's. but there the same trouble followed. after she had been there some time, and the child was now a stout lad, and she saw that they were no longer welcome, she said to herself, "alas! it is so! all my people are weary of me! i will not longer stay at grandfather's. i will go wandering into the forest, and, with the child, will see what i can get." taking with her only two ears of corn, she went far off with the lad into the forest. after much wandering, and eating only wild fruits, she selected a spot without having any idea of the locality, and built a shed for a camp in which to stay. at this place, she planted the corn. it quickly sprang up, and bore abundantly. and she planted other gardens. after a time came very many birds; and they began to eat up the corn. she exclaimed, "my son and i alone have come here, and have planted our corn. how is this that all the birds have come so soon to destroy it?" and the son, who by this time had grown to be almost a young man, said to her, "mother, why do you allow the birds to eat? why don't you do something?" she replied, "why do the birds thus destroy the corn? what can i do?" so he came out of the shed into the yard in front of their house and shouted at the birds, "you birds! who have come here to spoil my corn, with this stick i will kill you all!" but the birds jeered at him, saying, "no! not all! only one shall die!" the young man went into the house, took up a magic spear-head he owned, fitted it onto a stick as a shaft; and going out again, he hurled it at the birds. the spear flew at them, pursuing each one, and piercing every one of them in succession. then it flew on and on, away out into the forest. the young man took up another medicine-charm that he had with him, and, calling to his spear by name, shouted after it, "tombeseki-o-o! come back, back, back, here! again, again, again, return!" the spear heard him, and obeyed, and came back. he laid hold of it, and put it again in the shed. so, he and his mother lived there. she planted a very large garden of plantains, cassava, and many other vegetables, a very large quantity. and her gardens grew, and bore fruit in plenty. then there came all kinds of small animals, hogs, and antelopes, and gazelles, very many; and they spoiled the gardens, eating the fruit, and breaking down the stalks. the mother exclaimed, "my son! the animals have finished all my food of the gardens; everything is lost! why is this?" he replied, "yes, it is so! and when they come again tomorrow, i know what i will do to them!" when they came the next day, he went into the house, took the spear, flung it; and it flew from beast to beast, piercing all of them in succession. then it went off, flying into the forest, as before. he called after it to return. the spear heard, and obeyed, and came back to the house. then he and his mother sat down in the house, complaining of their hunger, and how the animals had spoiled their gardens. so the mother went out, and gathered up what little remained, brought it into the house, and cooked it, leaves and all. when the mother had planted a third garden, and it had grown, a herd of elephants came to destroy it. she cried out, "ah! njâku! what shall i do? you have come to destroy all my gardens! shall i die with hunger?" the son brought out his spear, and shouting at the elephants, threatened to kill them all. but the herd laughed and said, "when you throw that spear, only one of us shall fall." he threw the spear at the one that spoke. it struck him and all the elephants in succession; and they all died. the spear kept on in its flight into the forest. the young man cried after it, "spear! spear! come back, come back!" and it came to him again. each time that the spear had thus gone through the forest, it had mowed down the trees in its path; and thus was made the clearing which the mother had at once utilized for the planting of her successive gardens. after the elephants, mother and son sat down again in their hunger; they had nothing to eat but leaves. these she cooked; and they ate them all at once. then she planted another garden, thinking that now there were no more beasts who would come to ravage. but she did not know that there was still left in the forest one very, very large elephant that had not been in the company of the herd that the son had killed. there was also, in that forest, one very, very large ox. when the gardens had grown, that ox came, and began to destroy. the young man hurled his spear at the ox. it was wounded, but did not fall; and it went away into the forest with the spear sticking in its side. the young man pursued the ox, following, following, following far away. but he did not overtake it. on his way, he reached unexpectedly a small, lonely hut, where an old woman was living by herself. when she saw him, she said to him, "do not follow any longer. that ox was a person like yourself. he is dead; and his people have hung up that spear in their house." the young man told the old woman that he was very hungry. so she cut down for him an entire bunch of plantains. he was so exceedingly hungry that he could not wait; and before the plantains were entirely cooked, he began to eat of them, and ate them all. the old woman exclaimed, "what sort of a person is this who eats in this way?" in her wisdom, thinking over the matter, she felt sure it was some disease that caused his voracity. the man, being tired with his journey, fell asleep; and she, by her magic power, caused him to hear or feel nothing. while he was in this state, she cut him open. as she did so, his disease rushed out with a whizzing sound; and she cut away, and removed a tumor, that looked like a stone of glass. that was the thing that had caused his excessive hunger all his life. by her power, she closed the wound. when he awoke, she cooked food for him, of which he ate, and was satisfied with an ordinary amount like any other person. she then told him what she had done, and said, "as you are now cured, you may pursue that ox. you will reach his town, and you will obtain your spear. but, as you go there, you must make a pretense. you must pretend that you are mourning for the dead. you must cry out in wailing, 'who killed my uncle-o-o! who killed my uncle-o-o!'" thus he went on his way; and finally came to a town where was a crowd of people gathered in and about a house of mourning. beginning to wail, he went among the mourners. they received him, with the idea that he was some distant relative who had come to attend the funeral. he walked up the street of this town of the ox-man, and entering into the house of mourning, said, "had not the way been so long, my mother also would have come; but, i have come to look at that thing that killed my uncle." they welcomed him, commended his devotion, and said, "you will not go today. stay with us. sleep here tonight; and tomorrow you shall see and take away with you, to show to your mother, that thing." so, the next day, they gave him the spear, and said, "go, but do not delay. return for the closing ceremony (the "washing") of the mourning." he went away, and came again to the old woman. she said to him, when he showed her the spear, "i told you truly that you would obtain it. but, go with it and this bundle i have made of the tumor of your disease, and show them to your mother." so he came back to his mother. she rejoiced; and, not knowing that he was cured, she cooked a very large and unusually varied quantity of food, for his unusual hunger, two whole bunches of plantains, and eddoes, and potatoes, and yams, etc. of this he ate only a little, sufficient for an ordinary hunger. as he had not yet told her of his being cured, she cried out in surprise, "what is this? my son will die, for not eating!" and she asked him, "what is the matter?" he replied, "no, i have eaten, and am satisfied. and, mother, this bundle is what i was cured of." then he told her of what that old woman had done. on another day, that great elephant that had remained in the forest, came and began to eat in the garden. the son said, "mother! what shall i do? i thought i had killed all the elephants. i did not know there was this great big one left!" (nor did he just then know there were left a very great many more.) taking his spear, he hurled it, and wounded the elephant. it did not fall, but went away with the spear in its side. the man followed, followed, followed, pursuing the elephant, not, as the other animals had gone, into the forest, but away toward the sea; and it died on the sea beach. there the man found it and his spear. the sea was new to him; he had not seen it since his childhood. he climbed up on the elephant's body, in order to see all around. as he turned his eyes seaward, he saw a ship coming on the horizon. also, the people on this ship were looking landward, and they said, "there is something standing on the shore like a person. let the vessel go there, and see what is ashore." so, the ship anchored, and a surf-boat was launched into the water to go ashore. when the crew landed, they saw the carcass of the elephant, and a person standing with a spear who warned them, "do not approach near to me!" but they replied, "we do not want you, nor will we hurt you. but we want these tusks of ivory of this elephant. we want elephants." wondering at this wish, he cut out the tusks, and gave them to the strangers, adding, "off in the forest are very, very many more tusks, more than i can number. you seem to like them; but they are of no use to me." they earnestly said, "but, bring them, bring them! we will buy them of you with abundance of goods." he agreed, and promised, "i am going now; but, let your ship wait, and i will bring all of those things as many as it is possible for me to carry." so, he went back to his mother; and he and she carried many, many tusks. they filled the ship full; and the crew of the ship sent ashore an immense quantity of goods. when the vessel went away, it left ashore two carpenters, with direction to build a fine house, and have it completed before the vessel should come again. the man remained there awhile with the carpenters, after the ship had gone. one day, looking, on a journey down the coast, at a point of land, he was surprised to recognize his father's town, where he and his mother had lived in his childhood. he said to himself, "that's my father's town! i want them to come to me, and live at my town!" he sent word to them; they removed, and all of them came to live with him. and he married one of their young women. (in the meanwhile, he had brought his mother from the forest.) while he was living at his new home, one day looking seaward, he saw the promised ship coming to get more ivory, and to give more goods. and he went off to the vessel. among the women who were still living of his father's people who had known him as a child, was the one who had given him the evil "medicine" long ago; her object in giving it having been to kill him. after he had gone off to the vessel, this woman came to his wife's home, and, seeing the spear hanging tied from the roof, said, "what is that thing tied there?" his wife replied, "it is a kind of "medicine" of my husband's. it must not be touched." but the woman said, "i know that thing; and what it does." then she seized it, and put into it its handle the man had removed. she hurled the spear out to sea, and it went on and on, passing over the ship. the man sitting in the saloon, said to the crew, as he recognized the spear in its flight, "i saw something pass over the ship!" he went up on deck, and called after it, "my spear! come back! come! come! come back!" and he told all the people of the vessel to go below lest they should be injured. the spear turned and came back to him; and he took possession of it. then said he to the crew, "come! escort me ashore!" they landed him ashore, and waited to see what he intended doing. he called all his father's family, and asked, "why is it that you have tried to kill me today with this spear! for this, i will this day kill all of you." he summoned all the people to come together. when they had come, he had his mother bring out that tumor bundle, and said, "this is the thing of long ago with which that woman (pointing to the one who in childhood had given him the evil disease) tried to injure me. and, for the same reason, she threw the spear today; thus trying a second time to kill me. none of you have rebuked her. so, i shall kill you all as her associates." though they were of his father's family, he attacked and killed them all. the whole town died that day, excepting himself, his wife, his mother, and his sister. these four, not liking to remain at that evil place, went off and took passage on the ship. so, he journeyed, and came to the country of the white people at manga-manene; and never returned to africa. but, he kept up a trade in ivory with his native country. but for him, that trade would not have been begun. for, besides his having brought the first elephant to the sea coast, he told the people of manga-manene beyond the great sea, about the tribes of people, and about the elephants that were so abundant, in africa. and that is all. tale origin of the ivory trade ( nd version) persons king njambu, and his four wives ngwe-konde (mother-of-queens) ngwe-lege (mother-of-poverty) ivenga (watching); ngwe-sape (mother of a lock) njambu's son, savulaka (gluttony) the spirit of an uncle; mekuku (spirits of the dead) a magic spear; a great elephant (a metamorphosed man) birds, and other beasts njambu built a town; and married four women. this one, ngwe-konde, that one ngwe-lege, another one ivenga, another ngwe-sape. after njambu had lived there a short time all his wives were about to become mothers. then ngwe-konde took a net, and (by magic art) threw it into the womb of ngwe-lege. the net entered the belly of her child. at the time of their confinement, they all gave birth. the infants were washed. they were dressed also, and were given suck. also, they were assigned their names. that of ngwe-lege's was savulaka. when he was given the breast, he was not satisfied, he was only crying and crying; for, whoever held him, there were only cries and cries. when his mother would nurse him, there was only crying. his father said, "if it is like this, then, lest he die, feed him the food of adults." his mother cut down a plantain bunch; she boiled it; it was cooked. the child ate, and finished the plantains; and yet it was crying and crying. they cut down another bunch; it was boiled, it was cooked. at only one eating, he finished the food, with cries in his mouth. two more bunches were boiled; he ate. all at once, though born only that day, he spoke, "my mother! hunger!" four bunches were cut down; they were cooked; he ate, and finished them, but with crying. then he was cooked for ten times; he ate; and at once finished. the people cooked, and he ate. the plantains of his father's town were all cleared off, the entire town was left like a prairie. the father spoke to the mother, and said, "no! go away with him to your father's town." ngwe-lege picked up her child, carrying him away. she with the child went on, to the town of her father. her father asked her, "my child! wherefore the crying, and your carrying the infant?" she replied, "my father! i know not! this one whom you see, since he was born, is not filled. he has made an end to all the plantains of his father's town, leaving the town a prairie. and his father said to me, 'just go and take him to your father's.' so, i have brought him." the towns-people all were laughing, "kye! kye! kye!" they said, "what? really, food? no! it's something else, not food. but, enter into the house." she says, "you are talking foolishly." the child began to cry. they said, "let us see!" then, at once, they began to cook; the food is ready; he eats; and finishes it. other food was placed; he ate it at once. food was cooked again. at once, all of it, and the dishes, and the jars, and the plates, were swallowed up by him. food is cooked again, and he ate; and then said, "my mother! hunger!" food is cooked again; he ate until he finished all the pots. all the food of the town, and all the gardens were done. her father spoke to her saying, "my child! just carry him to the town of your grandfather." she then carried the child, still crying with hunger, and made her journey, and came to her grandfather's town. the people there said, "what is it; for the crying?" she told all the whole affair to them. they inquired, "food?" she replied, "yes." they cooked, and he ate, and finished. they cooked again; and he finished all, even to the leaves in which the food was wrapped. they said, "such a kind of child has never been born before!" suddenly, the child savulaka ceased to be a child; and, as a man, said to his mother, "my mother! wash me some mekima (rolls of mashed boiled plantains)." so, his mother made the mekima. in the morning, very early, savulaka starts on a journey. he went stepping very quickly, on, still with his journey; and, as he went, he talked to himself. he said, "this thing which has been done to me, now, what is it?" he still went on with the journey, until, at night, he lay down in the forest. early in the morning, he starts again for his journey. as he was going in the forest he met with a person (a brother of his mother, who belonged to a town of the mekuku). this person inquired, "where are you going to?" (savulaka was still eating the mekima, even its leaves going into his mouth.) this person also said to him, "stop at once!" then he stood still. the person said, "i, your uncle, the brother of your mother, am the one who is inquiring of you." savulaka answered him, saying, "i'm not able to tell you." but presently he did tell all the matter to him. so, the uncle said to him, "come, to my town." then both of them returned on the path. in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, they are at the town. the uncle said, "my child, you are cured!" he put for him a medicine in a syringe, and gave him an injection. when he withdrew the syringe, here, at once, a net began to come out quick as ever it could move from the bowels! then his uncle spoke and told him, "it is thy father's wife who put the net into your bowels." food was cooked for him; he began to eat a little as people usually eat. his uncle said unto him, "you shall go tomorrow." on the morrow, early in the morning, his uncle took all kinds and sorts of vegetables; and he took also a spear; and malagetta pepper ("guinea-grains," a species of cardomom), and handed them to him; and told him, "when you reach home, you must plant a garden." the uncle said to him, "close your eyes!" he closed his eyes tight. on opening his eyes, he at once found himself near his home, and his mother on the path, her form bent stooping down seeking for him. he then entered their house, and sat down, and his mother greeted him to her satisfaction. the mother took food, and boiled it; it was cooked; she removed it from the fire; she sat the food before savulaka. and he ate only two fingers of plantains. his mother began to wonder. then he said to himself, "now, let me try to do as my uncle has told me." he said, "ngalo! (a fetish charm) i want this forest here to be cleared, all of it." (as quickly as i speak here, at once the garden was finished, like the passing of yesterday.) he said to his mother, "take a list of all the plants i have brought; then let us go and plant them." so, he and his mother went to plant; that very day the garden was completely finished. previously to that, his uncle had warned him, "when the plants are sprung up, you will see kenene (a kind of small bird) coming to eat them. when they shall arrive, they will be many. then you take the spear; fail not to use the cardomoms with it." the food increased; and the small birds came in countless numbers. savulaka took up the spear, and threw it at them; and all, even to the young birds, perished. then he returned to his mother, and said, "my mother! go and pick up the sele" (another name of kenene). she gathered them; leaving many remaining abandoned in the forest. the village was filled with the sele. the same thing happened with all other kinds of birds. the same with every beast. then elephants came to the garden. the man picked up the spear and the cardomoms. when he came to the garden, he lifted up the spear, and threw it, and wounded the elephants. numbers of elephants that were eating in the garden, were killed. they were gathered, and the whole village was filled with the smell of the rotting meat; so that hardly any one would come to the village. i am not able to tell you the abundance of tusks; the mendanda (long ones), and the makubu (short thick ones), and the begege ("scrivillers," the small ones), that cannot be counted. the next morning, other elephants came again. the man took up the spear, but he forgot the cardomom-pepper. when he arrived where they were, he did not wait, but hastily threw the spear after an elephant, the leader of the herd, who turned aside, and ran away with the spear in its body. the man followed him, but he did not reach him. then he returned to his mother; and said to her, "my mother! mash me some mekima." (food for a journey.) in the next morning, the man started on the journey, stepping quickly as ever, until he came to his uncle's town. he was about to pass his uncle by, not seeing him (a spirit). the uncle said to him, "stand there!" so he stood. the uncle directed, "enter the house!" he entered, and sat down; and his uncle said to him, "did i not tell you that when you are going to kill an animal, you must not omit the pepper-grains? sit down there; wait. don't you go out. i must go and take for you your spear." but, lo! it was the chief of that very town, whom he had wounded, and who had come back to the town, and died. (that chief had metamorphosed himself into the form of an elephant.) the uncle passed out, and went to the other end of the town; and there he found the spear. he took it, and gave it to savulaka, and said, "go!" savulaka went; and met his mother on the way, waiting for him. then they went home to their village. next morning, he fastened the spear handle. elephants in the plantation shouted, "we have come!" the man stood up, and snatched his spear. the elephants stood waiting. the man said, "here it is!" and flung it at them. and the carcasses of all fell in a heap. he said to the people of the village, "go ye!" they went, and found dead bodies without number; the tusks the same, without number. after that, white-man came with a quantity of goods. the town of savulaka was crowded with goods in abundance; every kind of foreign article. white men came to see ivory. the sailing-vessels and steamers came any day (not only on scheduled dates). thus it was that ivory was exported, and goods imported. business of trading was made. savulaka had a great many traders. all his father's brothers, and mother's brothers, all their dwelling was in the town of savulaka. rum was drunk constantly, and they were constantly intoxicated. ivory went to white man's land. white men's things came, and were sent up to the interior. this trade is going on to the present days. it was a man who commenced with the thought of trading; it was commenced by that one man. all the african tribes are now changed from what they were originally. at first we negroes had no (proper) knowledge. they spoke with wonder over the things that are made in europe by white men. they said, "these are made by the spirits of the dead; they are not made by the living." because our people believed that the departed spirits have their home beyond the sea. why? because savulaka brought his wonderful spear (by which so much ivory was obtained) from the spirit-town. tale dog and his false friend leopard persons mbwa (dog) ngiya (gorilla) njâ (leopard) note the origin of the hatred between dogs and leopards. friends should not have arguments. an argument separates a company. dog and leopard built a town. dog then begot very many children. leopard begot his many also. they had one table together. they conversed, they hunted, they ate, they drank. one day, they were arguing: leopard said, "if i hide myself, you are not able to see me." dog replied, "there is no place in which you can hide where i cannot see you." the next day, at the break of the day, leopard emerged from his house at batanga, and he went north as far as from there to bahabane near plantation. dog, in the next morning, emerged. he asked, "where is chum njâ?" the women and children answered, "we do not know." dog also started, and went: and as he went, smelling, until he arrived at plantation (about miles). he came and stood under the tree up which leopard was hidden; and he said, "is not this you?" both of them returned, and came to their town. food had been prepared; and they ate. leopard said, "chum! you will not see me here tomorrow." when the next day began to break, leopard started southward, as far as to lolabe (about miles). next day, in the morning, dog stood out in the street, lifted up his nose, and smelled. he also went down southward, clear on till he came to lolabe; and standing at the foot of a tree, he said, "is not this you?" leopard came down from the top of the tree; they stood; and then they returned to their town. food was cooked for them; they ate, and finished. leopard said, "chum! you will not see me tomorrow again, no matter what may take place." dog asked, "true?" leopard replied, "yes!" in the morning, leopard started southward, for a distance like from batanga to campo river (about miles). at the opening of the next day, dog emerged, and, standing and smelling, he said, looking toward the south, "he went this way." dog also went to campo. he reached leopard, and said, "is not this you?" they came back to their town; they were made food; and they ate. the next day, leopard emerged early. he went northward, as far as from batanga to lokonje (about miles). dog sniffed the air, and followed north also. in a steady race, he was soon there; and he reached leopard. so, leopard said, "it is useless, i will not attempt to hide myself again from mbwa." thereupon, dog spoke to leopard and said, "it is i, whom, if i hide myself from you, you will not see." leopard replied, "what! even if you were able to find me, how much more should i be able to find you!" so, dog said to him, "wait, till daybreak." when the next day broke, dog passed from his house like a flash unseen, vyu! to leopard's. and, underneath the bed of leopard in his public reception-house, he lay down. then leopard (who had not seen him) came to the house of dog; he asked the women, "where is mbwa?" they said, "thy friend, long ago, has gone out hence, very early." leopard returned to his house, and he said to his children, "that fellow! if i catch him! i do not know what i shall do to him!" he started southward on the journey, as far as lolabe; and did not see dog. so he returned northward a few miles, as far as boje, and did not see him. down again south to campo; and he did not see him. that first day, he did not find him at all. then he returned toward batanga, and went eastward to nkâmakâk (about miles); and he did not see him. he went on northward to ebaluwa (about miles); did not see him. up north-west to lokonje; he did not see him. and leopard, wearied, went back to his town. coming to the bed (not knowing dog was there) he lay down very tired. he said to his people, "if i had met him today, then you would be eating a good meat now." all these words were said in the ears of dog, the while that dog was underneath the bed. then dog leaped out, pwa! leopard asked, "where have you been?" dog answered, "i saw you when you first passed out." leopard said, "true?" and dog says, "yes!" then dog went out far to his end of the town. and, knowing that leopard intended evil toward him, he said to his children, "let us go and dig a pit." so they went and dug a pit in the middle of the road. then dog told his wives and children, "go ye before, at once!" he also said, "i and this little mbwa, which can run so fast, we shall remain behind." then the others went on in advance. (before that, leopard, observing some movements of the mbwa family, had been speaking to himself, "i do not know the place where mbwa and his children will go today.") dog warned this young one, "when you are pursued, you must jump clear across that pit." then dog, to cover the retreat of his family, came alone to leopard's end of the town. he and his children chased after him. dog ran away rapidly, and escaped. when leopard's company arrived at the house of dog, they found there only that little dog. so they said, "come ye! for there is no other choice than that we catch and eat this little thing." thereupon, leopard chased after the little dog; but it leaped away rapidly, and leopard after him. when the little dog was near the pit, it made a jump. (leopard did not know of the pit, nor why the dog jumped.) when leopard was come to the pit, he fell inside, tumbling, volom! his enemy gorilla was following after leopard, also in pursuit of dog. he also fell into the pit, headlong, volom! finding leopard there, gorilla said, "what is this?" leopard stood at one side, and gorilla at the other. when the one would be about to go near the other, if the other attempted to go near him, he would begin to growl, saying, "you must not approach here!" dog, standing at the edge above, was laughing at them, saying, "fight ye your own fight! did you want only me?" but leopard and gorilla were not fighting in the pit. if the one approached, the other retreated. dog spoke to them and said in derision. "i have no strength; but as to your fight, was it seeking only me?" tale a trick for vengeance persons kudu (tortoise) ko (wild-rat) njâ (leopard) note because of deaths and sicknesses, african natives are constantly changing the location of their villages, believing the old sites infested by malevolent spirits. the whole mass of beasts were living in one place. they built houses; they cleared the forest for plantations. after this, tortoise said, "i'm going to find my own place." so, he went and built in a place which he called malende-ma-kudu. the fame of it was spread abroad, people talking about "malende-ma-kudu." leopard arose, came to the town of tortoise, and said, "i have come to build here." tortoise consented, "you may build." leopard said, "i'm going to build at the end of the path, and by the spring." and he built there. one day, a child of tortoise was passing by near the spring; and leopard seized him, ku! another day, another one was passing; leopard seized him, also, ku! then tortoise said, "this is an evil place, i'm going to move from here." so he went and built another town called jamba. leopard came also, saying, "kudu! i'm coming to build!" then tortoise said, "really! what have your affairs to do with me? nevertheless, come and build." and leopard built at the end, by the spring. when the children of tortoise were passing by the spring, leopard constantly killed them. tortoise wondered, "this thing which is destroying my children, what is it?" thus day by day, leopard was killing the children of tortoise. tortoise prepared again to remove, saying that he would go away and build another town to be called dang. he went there. and the fame of it was spread around, people saying, "dang, the town of kudu!" everybody was saying, "we are going to the town of kudu; dang, the town of kudu!" leopard comes again, and says, "i also have come to build here." tortoise said to him, "wait! really; why did you leave the other people?" however, tortoise said to him, "build." and leopard built as usual. also, when the children of tortoise were passing to the spring, they were missing. and tortoise felt sure that leopard had seized them. thereupon tortoise made a plan for himself. he called wild-rat privately, saying, "i have heard that you know how to dig holes." wild-rat replied, "it is my work." tortoise said, "but, i want you to dig me a tunnel from this room here, out to, and up towards the street, by measure." so, wild-rat dug a big hole, in size sufficient for tortoise and his traveling-bag and his spears. then tortoise went and gathered together his spears and his traveling-bag. he went out the next day, early in the morning, and stood and announced in the street, "all the tribes must come! i want to tell them the news of what i have seen." then all the beasts came to meet in the town of tortoise. it was full of every kind of beast. tortoise spoke, and said, "i have called you to say, that really we are not worth anything at all. actually, the only dwelling we have is in the grave. all those my children who have died here, is it possible that it is my father (of spirits) who takes them? i met them sitting down in the reception-house of that father, playing." the people said to him, "this is a dream." he replied, "no! it is open to sight." some said, "it is a lie." but tortoise said, "you have doubted me? well, tomorrow you must dig me a grave; and you shall see how i am going." they said, "yes! let us see!" on the next day, in the morning, they were called together. he said, "dig me a pit here." (he pointed to the privately measured spot over the tunnel which wild-rat had already made for him.) they dug it wide and deeply. then, this tortoise took his spears and his bag; and with these under his arm, he descended into the pit, and bade the people fill in the earth. he went to one side, until he reached and entered that tunnel of his which wild-rat had dug for him. and unseen he passed up to his room in his house, and lay down. before that, he had promised the people, saying, "i shall lie there (in the pit) for six days." before tortoise had disappeared, the people (following his orders) began to throw back the earth into the pit, filling it solidly. after tortoise had laid in his house for six days, he suddenly appeared in the street; and he called all the mass of the beasts, and he told them the news. he said, "over there is so beautiful! i will not stay in this town any more for as long as ten days. but, as i am here, i shall lie here only for three days, and two days over there." at once tortoise was regarded as a person of great importance, and his fame was spread abroad. thereupon, leopard, (feeling jealous of the wonderful experience of tortoise) said to his children, "even kudu! how much rather that i should get to that beautiful place! dig me mine own pit. i also am going to see my forefathers. i and they, we have not seen each other for a long time." so, they dug a big pit. he announced, "i will lie there for seven days; on the eighth, then i shall come." then he descended into the pit. and they rapidly filled it up with earth. leopard, below, sought a cavity by which to pass on (as he thought) to the land of spirits; but, there was none. and he died. his children waited eight days; but they saw not their father. then they asked tortoise, "as to our father, up to this day, what has happened to him?" tortoise answered them, "why are you asking me this? when i went, what did my family ask of you? maybe, your father remained to follow the pleasures of over there!" the women of leopard had kept him some food, making it ready for him for the eighth day. but (giving up hope of him) they ate it. while they were still waiting, actually leopard had begun to rot there (in the pit). tortoise, fearing possible difficulty, gathered together his wives and remaining children, and fled with them into the forest afar off. tale not my fault! persons yongolokodi (chameleon) ko (wild rat) men, hunters chameleon and all the other beasts built their villages near together, making a large town. and there was a time of great hunger. after that, there came a harvest time of large fruitage. the great produce could not be gathered for abundance. then came chameleon to the village of wild-rat, and he said to him, "chum, ko! this harvest is a great thing!" rat said, "don't speak about it!" not long afterward, mankind laid their snares, and the hunters prepared their bows. for, beasts and birds had come in crowds to eat of the abundance; and man had overhead them speaking of it. gunners came; the shots resounded; bows were twanged; the snares caught. rat fell into one of the traps. chameleon seeing him, and desiring to justify himself, reminded rat that rat himself had told him not to let others know of the great abundance, and that he himself had obeyed; that therefore he was not the cause of rat's misfortune. so, chameleon said, "i did not speak of it." tale do not impose on the weak persons yongolokodi (chameleon) njâ (leopard) note chameleons move very slowly. this story is given as a reason why, even if one is small in body, he should not be despised, as though he had no strength, or as though he could with impunity be deprived of his rights, e.g., in a race or in wrestling, or in any other circumstances. leopard and chameleon lived apart. this one had his village, and that one his. this one did his own business; that one his. and they were resting quietly in their abodes. chameleon had a herd of sheep and of goats. leopard came to the village of chameleon on an excursion; and he saw the herd of sheep and of goats. he said to chameleon, "chum! give me a loan of sheep to raise on shares." chameleon made food for him; and, when they had eaten, he said to leopard, "you can send children tomorrow, to come and take the loan of sheep on shares." they had their conversation, talking, and talking. when they had ended, leopard said, "my fellow! i'm going back." his friend said to him, "very good." leopard went on to his village. he said, "my wife! i came on an excursion, to the town of yongolokodi. he treated me with hospitality to the very greatest degree. also he has given me sheep on shares." the next day, in the morning, he sent his children to the town of chameleon to take the herd of sheep. they went; and they brought them; and goats also. (a "day" in an ekano tale is without limit as to length or shortness.) the goats and sheep increased, until the village of leopard was positively full of them crowded in abundance. about three years passed, and chameleon said to himself, "our herd with chum must be about sufficient for division." thereupon he started on his journey crawling, naka, naka, naka, until he came to the house of his friend leopard. leopard said to his wife, "make food!" it was cooked, they ate, and rested. chameleon said to leopard, "chum! i have come, that we should divide the shares of the herd." leopard replied, "good! but, first go back today. who can catch goats and sheep on a hot day like this? come tomorrow morning." chameleon said, "very good." and he went back to his village. the next day, in the morning, he rose to go to the village of leopard. (actually, after midnight, leopard had already opened the pens, and all the animals were scattered outside.) he protested regret to chameleon, and said, "chum! go back! i don't know how those fellows have opened their pens. i was expecting you, for this day; i had let my herdman know that a person was coming on the morrow. so, go back. and, as i am going tomorrow to the swamp for bamboo, you must come only on the second day." chameleon submissively replied, "very good." chameleon continued coming; and his treatment was just so every time, with excuses. leopard, hoping, said to himself, "perhaps he will die on the way," because he saw him walking so slowly, naka, naka. and chameleon kept on patiently going back and forth, back and forth. one night, leopard and his wife were lying down; whereupon his wife asked him, "what is the reason that you and yongolokodi have not divided the shares of the herd? do you think he will die of this weakness?" leopard answered, "no! it is not weakness, njambe is the one who created him so; it is his own way of walking." finally, chameleon said to himself, "i must see what njâ intends to do to me; whether he thinks that he shall eat my share." he went by night and waited outside of leopard's. next day, in the morning, as leopard rose to go out, he found, unexpectedly, as he emerged from the house, chameleon sitting on the threshold. there was no other deception that leopard could seek; for, the animals were still in their pens. so, he called his children, and said, "tie the goats and sheep with cords." so they tied them all. and he and chameleon divided them. then this one returned to his place; and that one to his. tale borrowed clothes persons koho (parrot) kuba (chicken) note a story of the cause of the enmity between chickens and parrots. when a chicken comes near to a parrot, the latter turns to one side, saying, "wâ!"; for fear that the chicken will take his fine feathers from him. parrot and chicken were fowls living in a village of mankind near a town; which they had built together. they were living there in great friendship. then parrot said to chicken, "chum! i'm going to make an engagement for marriage." so, he prepared his journey. and he asked chicken, "chum! give me now thy fine dress!" (for the occasion.) chicken, said, "very good!" and he handed his tail feathers to him. thereupon, parrot went on his marriage journey. when he came home again, he said to himself, "these feathers become me. i will not return them to kuba." so, when chicken said to him, "return me my clothes," he replied, "i will not return them!" chicken, seeing that parrot was retaining the feathers, said sarcastically, "accept your clothing!" thereupon, parrot, pretending to be wronged, said, "fellow! why do you put me to shame? i did not say that i would take your clothing altogether, only that we should exchange clothes." at night, then, parrot took all his family, and they flew up in the air away. at once, he decided to stay there, and did not come to live on the ground again. chicken was left remaining with mankind in the town. whenever chicken began to call to parrot up in the treetops, asking for his clothes, parrot only screamed back "wâ! wâ!" that was a mode of speech by which to mock at chicken. tale the story of a panic persons edubu (adder) ikingi (fly) ko (wild-rat) ngomba (porcupine) njâku (elephant) ngubu (hippopotamus) nyati (ox) bejaka (fishes) ngando (crocodile) note native africans after bathing, rub more or less of some oil, either native palm, or foreign pomade, on their bodies. in the dry seasons, when the rivers are low, fish are caught by building dams across the streams, and then bailing out the water from the enclosed spaces. observe flies, as carriers of disease. adder went to bathe. he returned, and anointed himself with nyimba oil (oil of bamboo-palm nuts), and then climbed out on to a branch of a cayenne-pepper bush. fly came and settled upon adder's back. adder, being annoyed, drove fly away. then fly said to adder, in anger, "know you not that it is i who cause even njâku, with his big tusks, to rot? and that i can cause nyati and ngubu to rot? and i can cause mankind to rot! then how much more you, this thing who has only ribs and ribs!" when adder heard this, he was alarmed, and he entered into the hole of wild-rat. wild-rat asked him, "chum adder! where do you come from in such haste?" he answered, "i have seen a being which does not hesitate to cause beasts and even mankind to rot. therefore, i am fled, by reason of fear of ikingi." whereupon wild-rat, frightened, arose, and entered hastily into the town of porcupine. porcupine, alarmed, asked wild-rat, "what is it?" he answered, "i'm afraid of ikingi; edubu says that it is he who causes both mankind and beasts to rot." then porcupine, in fear went out, running, going to the town of hog. whereupon hog, being startled, asked him, "chum! what is it?" he answered him, "i'm afraid of ikingi. ngomba says that he is the one who causes both beasts and mankind to rot." hog at once ran out in terror, and went to a river with all his family. and the water of the river was promptly crowded out, leaving its channel dry. then the fishes (mistaking this motion of the water) arose in haste, saying, "the people who bail the river have come!" and they fled. then crocodile opened his mouth wide; and the fishes in their flight began to enter into his stomach. among them was ingongo-kenda (a young kenda; a fish with spines like a catfish). when crocodile was about to swallow, the spines caught fast in his throat. and crocodile died at once. then the fishes sang a song of rejoicing. "ngando, with stealing, ngando died by a sting in his throat." such was the death that crocodile died, on account of his attempt to swallow fishes, who had rushed into his open mouth, as they fled, alarmed by the confusion raised by the panic of the other animals. tale a family quarrel persons iheli (gazelle) njâ (leopard) note among native africans, in the case of a man and his wife, even if they fight together, her father or her brother usually do not interfere. for, every man who is married knows that his own wife will some day offend himself. gazelle and leopard built a town; living this one at his end of it; that one at the other end. after they had built; they cleared the forest for plantations; they married wives; and they sat down, resting in their seats. gazelle had married the sister of leopard who was of a proud disposition. and leopard had publicly threatened, "the person who makes trouble for my sister, i will show him a thing." one day, the sister of leopard began to give gazelle some impertinence. gazelle said to her, "shut your mouth!" she replied, "i won't shut it!" gazelle threatened, "lest i beat you!" she dared him, "come and beat me! you will see my brother coming to chew you!" gazelle ran after her, struck her, ndo! and knocked her to the ground, ndi! as she lay there, he kept on beating her, and beating her, and shouting, "who has married! who has not married?" leopard bristled up his whole mane, full of anger, and was about to go to gazelle's end of the town to fight. but the older people said to him, "you hear what iheli says, 'who has not married'?" leopard was at once disheartened. he saw there was no place for his bravery in a matter of marriage. tale the giant goat persons kudu (tortoise) njâ (leopard) a giant goat (mbodi) ngweya (hog) betoli (rats) ngwai (partridge) note tortoise and leopard had lived in peace in the same town, until their mutual use and abuse of the great goat, the gift of njambe, the creator. a leopard is not satisfied unless he first takes the heart of the animal he has killed. tortoise and leopard built a town together. there they stayed. after they had built, they cleared plantations. their food was only vegetables; for, they had no meat. their hunger for meat became great. their hunters killed nothing. one day, tortoise, as he went in search of food, going and penetrating in the forest, came upon the goat of njambe (a mythical, enormous animal) in the forest by itself, and tied. it told tortoise who and what it was, and invited him to enter. he said to it, "mbodi, friend-of-njambe! open for me your house!" the goat opened an aperture of its body; tortoise entered in; and it closed the aperture. inside of the goat, tortoise cut pieces of fine fat, and tied them into two bundles. then he said, "mbodi, friend of njambe! open for me the house!" it opened the aperture; tortoise at once went out; and it shut it. tortoise returned to his town, and cut up the meat. he said to his women, "make ready leaves for momba!" (bundles of green plantain leaves in which meats are cooked over hot coals). they at once plucked the leaves, tied up the momba, and put them over the fireplace. they set soup also on the fireplace. when it was boiled, they spread the table, sat down together, and ate. the children of leopard, smelling a tempting odor, came to tortoise's end of the town. the children of tortoise showed their food to them, saying, exultingly, "ye! do you eat such as that?" a child of leopard said, "chum! let me taste it!" and he allowed him to taste it. the children of leopard went off hurriedly to their father, saying, "father! such an animal as your friend has killed! perhaps it is ngweya; we do not know." then leopard went to where tortoise was, and he asked him, "chum! as to this meat-hunger, what shall we do? let us arrange for the town." tortoise responded. "yes, i am willing." so, in the evening, he invited his friend leopard that he should come and eat food. leopard came; they sat down together; and they ate. when leopard had tasted, he exclaimed, "man! what animal is this?" but tortoise would not tell him. when they had finished eating, leopard said to himself, "i must know where tortoise goes!" on the next day, before the ngwai (a bird, that announces the first coming of daylight) had sounded, tortoise went out clear on to where was that giant goat. he spoke, as on his previous journey, "o! mbodi! friend of the creator! open for me the house!" it at once opened the aperture; he entered in; and began to slice pieces of meat from the goat's inside. when he had finished, he said, "open for me the house!" it opened the aperture; and he emerged and went back to his town. there he spoke to his women, saying, "cook ye!" they boiled the meat; it was cooked; he invited leopard; they ate; and finished. and leopard went back to his house. but, when night came, leopard took ashes, and, going to the house of tortoise, thrust the ashes into tortoise's traveling-bag, and stabbed holes in it. said he to himself, "when tortoise carries it, then the ashes will fall down." this he did, so that he might follow to the place where tortoise would go. next day, tortoise was up at the same time with the first ngwai. and at daybreak, leopard followed, observing the ground closely with his eyes; and he saw the ashes. the fellow, at once, went on his journey, striding quickly, quickly, until he reached to where the great goat was standing. it explained to him, as it had to tortoise, its use, and invited him to enter. said he, "o! mbodi of my father njambe! open to me the house!" and it opened the hole. he entered; and he discovered tortoise cutting meat. tortoise was displeased, and said to him, "chum! is that the way you do?" they cut pieces of meat, they got ready, and they went back to town. the next day, although tortoise was vexed at leopard, they started together on their journey; and they arrived at the goat. they said as before, "o! mbodi! friend! open to us the house!" it opened the aperture; and they entered. tortoise warned leopard, "chum! njâ! don't touch the heart!" they cut meat. then leopard said that he was going to lay hold of the heart. but tortoise said, "no!" leopard cut and cut, and was going on to the heart. tortoise again said to him, "not so!" they went on cutting. finally leopard laid hold of the heart! the goat at once made a great outcry, "ma-a! mba-a!" and died instantly. the people of the town that was near by, heard, and they said, "the mbodi! what has happened to it? young men! go ye! hasten ye! for, that mbodi is crying!" they went, and discovered the body of the goat stretched out. they went back to the town and told the people that, "the mbodi is dead!" while this was going on, as soon as tortoise inside the body knew that the goat was dying, he began to seek for a hiding-place. he said, "i am for the stomach!" leopard said, "no! that is the hiding-place of the elder one" (himself). then tortoise said, "i will go and hide in the bowels." leopard said, "that also is the hiding place of the elder." then tortoise said, "well! i'm going to hide in the fountain of the water of the belly" (the urinary bladder). leopard said, "yes! that is the share of the younger." tortoise thrust himself in there. leopard jumped into the stomach. when the people came, they discovered the goat lying flat, and they said, "tie ye it!" (to carry it away). others said, "no! let it be butchered here." they all said, "yes!" and they cut it in pieces. they took out the entire stomach, and laid it aside. they took that fountain, and flung it out in the bushes. concealed by the bushes, tortoise crawled out of the sac, and, pretending to be displeased, called out, "who dashed that dirty water in my face, as i was coming here, seeking for my fungi here in the forest?" they apologized, saying. "chum! we did not know you were in those bushes. but, come, and join us." so, he went there; and he, in pretence, exclaimed, "what thing can so suddenly have killed friend-creator his mbodi there? alas! but, ime! what a large stomach that is! would you say that it was not it that killed mbodi? let us send some children to pierce that stomach. but ye! when ye shall go to pierce it, first bring spears, then jab the spears through it. i have not seen such a stomach as that!" they finished the cutting in pieces; and they gave tortoise his share of the animal. he left, bidding them await his return. he went hastily with the meat to his town, and sat down to rest for only a little while. then he rapidly went back again to see what would happen to leopard. the family of njambe had taken that stomach and laid it in the water of a stream. then they took spears, and they stabbed it. leopard, being wounded, struggled up and down as he tried to emerge from inside the stomach. the people, when they saw this, shouted, "aw! lâ! lâ! lâ!" and there was leopard lying dead! for, in stabbing that stomach, the spears had reached leopard. tortoise said to them, "give me the skin of leopard!" so they handed it to him. he went off with it to his house. when it was dried, he took it into his inner room, and hung it up. he said to his children, "let no person bring any of the children of njâ into this room." before that time, the children of tortoise and of leopard always hunted small animals; and they were accustomed daily to kill rats in their houses. on another day, the children of leopard having no meat, and not knowing that their father was dead said, "a hunt for betoli tomorrow!" the children of tortoise replied, "yes!" early in the next day then, the children of leopard made ready and called for those of tortoise; and they all started together. they began at first at leopard's end of the town; and, going from house to house, opened the houses and killed rats. they passed on toward tortoise's end of the town, opening houses, and killing rats. when they came to the room of tortoise himself, his children said to the others, "no!" the children of leopard asked them, "why?" as they arrived at the door, the children of tortoise said, "our father said that, even for catching rats, we should not enter that room." but the children of leopard broke down the door, and entered into the room. there they lifted their eyes, and discovered the skin of their father leopard hanging! at once, they all hasted out of the house. but, suppressing their sorrow and indignation, shortly after this, they all said, "to go to throw wheels on the beach!" (a game; solid wheels, about eight or ten inches in diameter, and some three inches thick, chopped out of an enormous tuber). they made ready their little spears, and they all went in a company. their challenge was, "to the beach!" these arranged themselves on one side, and those on the other. the children of tortoise began the game, rolling the wheel to the children of leopard. these latter, as the wheel rolled by, pierced its center with all their spears; none failed. the leopard company shouted in victory. "boho, eh?" and the tortoise company dared them with, "iwâ!" then the leopard company insultingly retorted, "we are the ones who are accustomed to sleep with people's sisters, and continue to eat with them!" (i.e., that they could commit crimes with impunity, and still be allowed the intimate friendship of eating together, without the others daring to punish them). then the leopard company bowled the wheel toward the side of the tortoise company. these latter pierced the wheel with all their spears; none missed. the tortoise company shouted for victory, "boho! eh?" and the leopard company dared them with, "iwâ!" then the tortoise children shouted boastfully, "we are those who are accustomed to kill people's fathers, and hang up their skins, eh?" at this, the leopard children began to rage, and joined a fight with the children of tortoise. the children of tortoise, and himself, and their wives and their children, fled and scattered over the logs into the stream of water, and hid themselves in holes, and never came back to town. tale the fights of mbuma-tyetye and an origin of the leopard persons mekuku, and two of his sons mbuma-tyetye and njâ king njambu betoli (rats) mwamba (snakes) ngângâlâ (millepedes) kedi (stinging ants) njambu ya mekuku (spirits), and his town women hidden in chests ngwaye (partridge) kâ (snails) ihonga-honga (a giant tooth) hova (a magic gourd) tângâ (horn) ibumbu (bundle of medicine) kanja (a bowl) ikanga (spear) ngalo (a magic amulet) note ngalo is a powerful fetish-charm. sitting in a visitor's lap for a few moments, is a mode of welcome. "njambu" is one of their forms of spelling the name of the creator; very commonly used also for human beings. the account of the wrestling-match is suggestive of the surroundings of a modern athletic field. njambu built a town. he continued there a long time. after he had finished the town, he married very many wives. after a short time they all of them bore children. those births were of many sons. he gave them names: among them were, upuma-mwa-penda (year-of-doubt), and njâ (leopard). and again, his wives, after a short time, all of them became mothers. this time, they gave birth to a large number of daughters. he gave them also names. his town was full with men and women; they were crowded. and all busy. they that worked at stakes, went to cut saplings; those that made rattan-ropes, went to cut the rattan-vine; they that shaped the bamboo for building, went to cut the bamboo-palms; they that made thatch went to gather the palm-leaves; they that set up the stakes of the house-frame went to thrust them into the ground; they who fastened the walls, fastened them; they who tied thatch on the roof, tied it; they who split the rattan vines for tying, split them. the town was full of noise. the children of njambu kept their father's town in motion. they rejoiced in the abundance of people and their force. they took dowries also for their sisters, and gave them in marriage to young men of other towns. arguments were discussed; stories about white men were told; amusements were played; food was eaten; and the sons of njambu married wives. one of njambu's sons, upuma-mwa-penda, said to his mother, "make me mekima," (mashed plantain). his mother asked him, "where are you going with the mekima?" he answered, "i'm going to seek a marriage." and she said "good!" in the morning, he took his rolls of mashed plantains, and started to go on his journey. he said to his mother, "you must keep my house." she replied, "it is well." he went on, on, on, until, on the road ahead, he met with two rats, who were fighting. he took an ukima-roll, divided it, and gave to them, saying, "take ye and eat." they accepted, and told him, "you shall arrive at the end." he goes on stepping quickly, quickly; and meets two snakes fighting. he parted them. he took an ukima-roll and gave to them; they ate. they said to him, "you shall reach the end." he goes on with his journey, until ahead were two millepedes fighting. he said to them, "for what are you killing each other?" he parted them, and gave them an ukima-roll. they took it and said, "you shall reach the end!" he lay down in the forest at night. at midnight, his mother saw, in her sleep, something that said, "go with thy two daughters in the morning, and take food for mbuma-tyetye (another name for upuma-mwa-penda)." early in the morning, she awoke her two daughters, and said, "come! let us go to follow after your brother; he is still on his way." they started, on, on, on, until they found him sitting down in the path. they brought out the food from their traveling-bag, and they said, "we have come to give you food." they prepared the meal, and they ate. and they slept that night in the forest. next morning, they started again, and they walked on, on, on, with their journey. as they came on their way, they listened ahead, and they heard something, saying, "eh! fellows, eh! eh! fellows eh! nobody shall pass! nobody shall pass here!" when they drew near, they met an immense quantity of red stinging ants spread from the ground up to the tree-tops, entirely closing the way. mbuma-tyetye and his company said, "ah! these are they who were shouting here!" he advanced to the fight, and called to his younger sister, "come on!" she lifted her foot just to tread upon the ants; and they instantly entirely covered her. he and his company tried in vain to draw her back. the ants shouted, to strengthen themselves. "eh! fellows, eh!" he, still fighting, called to the elder sister, "on ahead!" just as she lifted her foot, there came all the tribe of red ants, and would have covered her up. the woman jumped to one side vigorously, and stood there in that spot, fanning away the sweat of her exertions, pe, pe, pe. she returned again to the ants; and they met. she called out, "ngalo! hot water!" and it appeared. she took it, and dashed it at the red ants. but they all went into their holes; and came out at another opening, again closing the path. she still stood there ready to fight; but they covered her, and dragged her behind them. the ants shouted over their victory, "eh! fellows, eh! today no person passes here!" the son called to his mother, "mother! come on!" his mother said, "my child! i am unable." he called, "ngalo! fire!" fire at once appeared. having drawn back the corpses of his sisters, he seized the fire, and thrust it into the nests of the ants. he thrust it also among the trees. the flame ignited them; and the surrounding forest burned to ashes with all the trees. and the ants were all burned too. then he brought his sisters to life, by taking that ashes, and throwing it over them, and down their throats into their stomachs. when the day darkened, he said, "ngalo! a house!" a tent at once appeared, with a table, and tumblers, and water, and all food. they sat there and ate. when they finished eating, they set tea on the table. they drank; they talked of their experiences. when they ended, they said, "let us lie down together." so they lay down for the night. as the next day was coming, a partridge gave forth its voice, "rise! tyâtyâ lâ! tyâtyâ lâ!" and the day broke also. they wash their faces; they set tea on the table, and drank it. they folded the tent-house, and swallowed it, (as a mode of carrying it). they started with their journey, and went conversing on the way. as they came along, something was heard ahead. they listened, and heard a song. "gribâmbâ! eh! gribâmbâ! eh!" mbuma-tyetye and his mother and sisters kept on going toward the sound, which continued, "dingâlâ! eh! a person will not pass! no doubt about it! dingâlâ! eh! wherever he comes from, he can pass here only by coming from above." the man and his company approached the source of the song, and exclaimed, "there it is!" they went on and found the entire tribe of snails filling the road hither and yonder. he said to his mother, "what shall we do with the kâ tribe?" they sat down to consider. they decided, "a fight! this very day!" they sat still, and rested for a while. then he went ahead and shouted to his younger sister, "come!" she called out, "ngalo! a short sword!" it appeared. she called again, "a strong cloth!" it appeared, and she dressed herself with it. as she approached the snails, one of them fell on her head with a thud, ndi! she took the sword, and struck it, ko! the snails shouted, "we're nearing you!" a crowd of them came rapidly, one after another; in a heap, they entirely covered her, vyâ! and she lay a corpse! the snails swarmed over her, and taking her, threw her behind them. they shouted in victory, "tâkâ! dingâlâ! eh!" then the elder sister said she was going to help her brother in facing the snails. her mother objected, "you? stay!" but she replied, "let me go!" she girded her body tightly, and then she entered the fight. the snails surrounded her. they were about to drag her to their rear, when, she, at the side of the path, attempted to spring from them. but they swarmed over her. and she lay a corpse! the mother was crying out, "o! my child!" when the snails covered her too. mbuma-tyetye retreated, to rest himself for a short time, and called out, "ngalo! a helmet!" it appeared. he fitted it to his head. he called again, "ngalo! a glass of strong drink, and of water too!" it appeared. he asked for tobacco. it appeared. "matches!" they appeared. he struck a match, and smoked. as he thrust the cigar in his mouth, it stimulated him; it told him things of the future in its clouds of smoke. after he had rested, he stood up, again for the fight. the snails tuned their song: "iyâ! dingâlâ! disabete! iyâ! dingâlâ! sâlâlâsâlâ! disabete! iyâ! dingâlâ! iyâ! dingâlâ! iyâ! dingâlâ! sâlâlâsâlâ! iyâ! dingâlâ! eh! bamo-eh!" the snails, in their fierce charge, killed him, and were about to take away the corpse; when, his ngalo returning him to life, he sprang erect, and cried out, "ah! my father njambu! dibadi-o!" and he took up his war-song:-- "tata njambu ya milole, milole mi we. ta' njambu! milole mi we. ta' njambu! milole mi we. milole mi we. ta' njambu!" all that while, the mother and his sisters were lying dead. the snails were shouting in their victory, "tâkâ!" mbuma-tyetye took a short broad knife in his hands, and shouted, "dibadi!" he girded his body firmly, and stood erect. he called out in challenge, "i've come!" the snails answered, "you've reached the end!" they fought. the man took his sword. the snails fell down on him, ndwa! but the man stood up, and moved forward. he laid hold of a small tree. he cut it, and whirled it about at the snails. and the snails fell down on the ground, po! but they rose up again flinging themselves upon the man, ndwa! the man jumped aside crying out, "ah! my father njambu! dibadi-o!" he took fire, thrust it among the tribe of snails, and every one fell down on the ground, mbwâ! then he shaped a leaf into a funnel, and dropped a medicine into the noses of his mother and sisters. they slowly rose and tried to sit up. he poured the ashes of the snails over them, po! they breathed it into their stomachs, kii! and they came fully to life. then they said, "you are safe! now! for our return home!" he said, "good!" and they returned. mbuma-tyetye continued his own journey, on, on, on, until at a cross-roads, he found a giant tooth, as large as a man. tooth asked, "where are you going?" said he, "i'm going to seek a marriage at a town of njambu-ya-mekuku." then, with his axe in hand, he turned aside from the path; chopped firewood, chop, chop, chop, chop, mbwâ! then he kindly carried a lot of it, and presented it to tooth. he also opened his bag, and taking out an ukima roll, laid it down at the feet of tooth; also a bundle of gourd-seeds, and laid it down; and then he said, "i'm going." but the giant tooth, pleased with him, said to him, "just wait!" so, he waited; and, while waiting, said, "ngalo! a fine house!" it appeared there. "a table!" there! "good food!" there! "fine drink!" there! they two ate, and drank, and had conversation together. tooth said to him, "where you go, do not fear." it brought out from its hut a water-gourd, and said, "i will not show you more, nor will i tell you anything at all, but this hova itself will tell you." then tooth said to him, "go well!" the man took the gourd and clung to it as if it was a treasure. he started again on his journey, and had gone but a little way, when he found kuda-nuts in immense abundance. he took up one, drew his knife, cracked the nut, and threw the kernel into his mouth. he stooped again, and was about to pick up another, when the gourd warned him, "i! i!" so, he left the nuts. he came on in his journey, and found in abundance wild mangoes. he took one, split it, and bit out a piece; and was about to add another, when the warning came, "i! i!" so, he left the mangoes; yet his belly felt full. still on his journey, thirst for water seized him at a stream. he took his cup, plunged it into the water, filled it, drank, and was about to take more, when the warning said, "i! i!" and he left the water. yet his belly felt full. on his journey still, till he came to a large river. there he stood, and listened, as he heard a boat-song, "ayehe! âhe! âyehe! e!" there passed by the sound of paddles, wom'! wom'! but he saw no person; nor did he see any canoe. gourd said to him, "call!" then he called out, "who are these? bring me a canoe!" a voice replied, "who are you?" he answered, "i!" the canoe came nearer, its crew singing, singing, until it grounded on the beach. he saw what seemed only a great log! gourd said to him, "embark!" he got in. the crew also (apparently) got in again; for, the sound of paddles was again heard, worom'! worom'! instead of going straight across the river, they pulled far up stream, and then came all the way down again on the other side. as they came, they were constantly keeping up the song, until they grounded at the landing-place at that other side. still he saw nothing of the invisible boatmen, when he landed. ascending the bank of the stream, he saw a strange new town. he entered its public reception-house, and sat down. as he was looking for some one to come, a horn came and sat on his lap, and then moved away. a bundle of medicine came, sat, and moved away. a bowl came and sat. a spear came and sat. all these things saluted him. behold! they were the people of that town (in disguise); but he saw none of them. gourd said to him, "come and escort me into the back-yard." he at once stepped out; and, when in the back-yard, it said. "put me down." (it had been carried suspended from his shoulder.) he put it down, standing it at the foot of a plantain-stalk. gourd making a leaf funnel, dropped something into his eyes. his eyes suddenly, kaa! were opened, and he saw everything, and all the people, and the whole street. returning to the house, he sat down. maidens came. such goodness as you have scarcely known! forms lovely to see! the chief of the town said, "make ye food!" it was made at once. then one whom he chose was given him for his wife. she and this young son-in-law were left sitting in the house. the wife began to weep, saying to herself, "what will be his manner of eating?" (a test to be applied to him as suitor). the gourd called him with a voice like the stroke of a bell, ngeng! he went out to the gourd, and it said to him, "when you shall eat, take one piece of plantain, flesh of the fowl, and then dip one spoonful of the udika (wild-mango gravy), put them in your mouth; and thou shalt say unto her, 'take; you may remove the food.' you shall see what will happen." he did so. his wife laughed in her heart; and she went and told her mother, "he is a person of sense." the towns-people said to her, "what did he do?" she evasively said to them. "let us see!" in the evening, the father-in-law said to him, "you have found us here in the midst of a work of garden-making for your mother-in-law." (a man is always expected to do some work for his wife's mother.) he said. "that's good, father!" gourd called to him, and told him, "it is not a garden; it is an entire forest; it is not planted; it is all wild country. but, tomorrow, at daylight, early, you say to your wife that she must go and show you. you must take one young plantain-set, and a machete, and an axe. when you shall arrive there, then you shall say to her, 'go back!' and she will go back. then, you will slash with the machete, kwa! and leave it. you take also the axe and cut, ka! and say, 'ngunga-o! mekud' o! makako ma dibake man­jeya-o!' you shall see what will happen. then you insert the plantain-set in the ground. then you set up a bellows, and work it. and you shall see what will happen." (all that garden-plan was made by the townspeople in order that he might weary of the task, and they then find excuse for killing him. for they were cannibals.) at daybreak, he did so. he called his wife. he and she went on until they came to the chosen spot. said he, "go back!" the woman went back. he did just as he had been directed, as to the clearing, and the felling, the incantation, and the planting. the plantains bore, and ripened at once. every kind of food developed in that very hour. the man went back to the town, and sat down. they set before him food. they sent a child to spy the garden. the child returned, excitedly saying, "men! the entire forest! with all such foods! only ripe ones!" they said to him, "you're telling a falsehood!" and they said, "let another go and see." he went; and returned thence with a ripe plantain held in his hand. in the evening, the chief said to him, "sir! tomorrow, people will have been filled with hunger for meat. a little pond of your mother-in-law is over there. tomorrow it is to be bailed out." (in order to get the fish that would be left in the bottom pools.) gourd called him, ngeng! he went to it, and it said, "that is not a pond, it is a great river, (like the lobi at batanga). however, when you shall go, you must take one log up stream and one log down stream (for a pretence of dams). you shall see what will happen. then you must bail only once, and say, 'itata-o!' you shall see." next morning, he did so. and the whole river was drained; and the fish were left in the middle, alone. he returned to the town, and sat down. the people went to see; and, they were frightened at the abundance of fish. for a whole month, fish were gathered; and fish still were left. the chief went to call his townspeople, saying, "we will do nothing to this fellow. let him alone; for, you have tried him with every test." they said, "yes; and he has lingered here," (i.e., was no longer a stranger; and therefore should not be eaten). but, they said, "tomorrow there will be only wrestling." (this was said deceitfully.) in the evening, the father-in-law called him, saying, "mbuma-tyetye, tomorrow there is only wrestling. you have stayed long here. as you are about to go away with my child, there is left only one thing more that she wants to see, that is, the wrestling tomorrow." gourd called him, and said to him, "it is not only for wrestling. you know the part of the village where is the wrestling-ground. there is a big pit there. you will take care if you are near that pit; and you must push them in." in the evening, food was made, and soon it was ready. he and his wife ate, and finished. they engaged in conversation. they took pleasure over their love that night. the next day, in the morning, very early, the drums, both the elimbi and the common, began promptly to tell things in the street. (the elimbi is a specially made drum used to transmit information by a system of signal strokes. news is thus carried very far and very rapidly.) the gourd called him, and handed him a leaf of magic-medicine, to hold in his hand, saying, "go; fear not!" the townspeople began to shout back and forth a song (to arouse enthusiasm). two companies ranged on each side of the street, singing. "engolongolo! hâ! hâ! engolongolo! hâ! hâ!" "engolongolo! hâ! hâ! engolongolo! hâ! hâ!" hearing their song as a challenge, the young man went out of the house into the street. up to this point, the strongest wrestler of the town, named ekwamekwa, was not with them; he was out in the forest, felling trees. when the towns-people saw the young man standing in the street, they advanced as many as a hundred all at once. he laid his hands upon them, and they all went back; he also went back. soon he advanced again, and his single opponent advanced. they two laid their hands on each other's shoulders. the townspeople began another song, as if in derision. "o! o! a! o! o! a! o! o! a!" at once, he seized his opponent, and threw him into the pit. thereupon, his father-in-law shouted in commendation, "iwâ!" another one came forward; mbuma-tyetye advanced; and as they met together, he took him, and threw him into the pit. again the shout, "iwâ!" the sisters of the two men in the pit began to cry. the others said to the girls, "what are you doing? he shall die today! it is we who shall eat those entrails today!" (among cannibals, a choice portion.) another one was coming, and, as they met together, again the shout of derision, "o! o! o! a! o! o! o! a! o! o! o! a!" but, at one fling, mbuma-tyetye cast him into the pit. "iwâ" was repeated. the sister of him who was thrown thus into the pit began to cry. the people rebuked her, "mbâbâ! mbâbâ! join in the singing!" another one was coming; mbuma-tyetye advanced; and as they came together, he lifted him, holding him by the foot. the singers, to encourage their man, said responsively, "dikubwe! dikubwe! fear not an elephant with his tusks! take off! take off!" mbuma-tyetye lifted him, and promptly pushed him down into the pit, with a thud, 'kodom'! the people began to call out anxiously, "we-e! we-e! o! they are overcome! they are overcome! o! some one must go hastily, and call ekwamekwa, and tell him that people are being destroyed in the town, and he must come quickly." some one got up, and ran to call ekwamekwa, wailing as he went, "iyâ! iyâ! iyâ! ekwamekwa, iyâ-o! come! people are exterminated in the town!" he heard with one ear (i.e. at once). he snatched up his machete and axe, saying, "what is it?" the messenger repeated, "come! a being from above has destroyed many a one in the town!" the man ekwamekwa, full of boasting, said, "is it possible there is no man in the town?" he came, already shaking the muscles of his chest, pwâ! pwâ (a custom with native wrestlers, as a lion his mane). his muscles were quivering with rage, nyâ! nyâ! nyâ! the drums, both the elimbi-telegraph and the common, were being beaten, and were sounding without intermission. the singers were shouting; the wrestlers' bodies had perspiration flowing from them. the noise of the people, of the telegraph drums and other drums, and sticks (sticks beating time) were rattling kwa! kwa! kwa! as ekwamekwa appeared, the women and children raised their shrill voices. the shouters yelled, "a! lâ! lâ! lâ! â!" mbuma-tyetye advanced at once. he and ekwamekwa laid hold of one another, and alternately pressed each other backward and forward. the one tried tricks to trip the other, and the other tried the same. ekwamekwa held him, and was about to throw him on the ground. the other jumped to one side, and stood, his muscles quivering, po! po! po! tensely. ekwamekwa seized him about the waist and loins. the people all were saying, "let no one shout!" (lest ekwamekwa be confused). they said, "make no noise! he is soon going to be eaten!" and it was a woman who said, "get ready the kettle!" ekwamekwa still held him by the loins. so, they called out, "down with him! down with him!" but mbuma-tyetye shouted, "i'm here!" he put his foot behind ekwamekwa's leg, and lifted him, and threw him into the pit, kodom! then there was a shout of distress by the people, "a! â! â! â!" and ekwamekwa called out, "catch him! catch him!" mbuma-tyetye, lifting his feet, ran to his father-in-law's end of the town, and all the men came after him. his father-in-law protected him, and said to them, "you can do nothing with this stranger!" at night, the chief said to him, "sir, you may go away tomorrow." at daybreak, food was cooked. the chief njambu-ya-mekuku, put his daughters into large chests. in one was a lame one; another, covered with skin disease; and another, with a crooked nose; and others, with other defects in other chests, each in her own chest. but, he put the wife into a poor chest all dirty outside with droppings of fowls, and human excrement, and ashes. in it also, he placed a servant and all kinds of fine clothing. then said he to mbuma-tyetye, "choose which chest contains your wife." the gourd at once called him, and it said to him, "lift me up!" it whispered to him, "the chest which is covered with dirt and filth, it is the one which contains your wife. even if they say, 'ha! ha! he has had all his trouble for nothing; he has left his wife,' do you nevertheless carry it, and go on with your journey." he came to the spot where the chests were. the chief said again, "choose, from the chests, the one which contains your wife." mbuma-tyetye picked up the poor one. they shouted. but, he at once started on his journey, and on, until he came to the river, stepped into a canoe, paddled to the other side, landed, and went on, carrying the chest. almost in an instant (by his magic ngalo) he was at the place of the great tooth. it asked, "how is it there?" he replied, "good!" the gourd, in leaving, reported to its mother, the tooth, "a fine fellow, that person there!" he went on with his journey, his feet treading firmly. almost with one stride (by aid of his ngalo), in the twinkling of eyes, he was near the spring at his own town. then he said, "now let me open the chest here!" on his opening it, a maiden attended by her servant came stepping out, arrayed in the clothing which had been placed in the chest for her dress. one's eyes would ache at sight of her silks, and the fine form of her person. and you or any other one could say, "yes! you are a bride! truly a bride!" two young women rose up in the town to go to the spring to dip up water. they were just about to come to the spring, when they saw their brother and his wife and her servant. they two went back together rapidly to the town, saying, "well! if there isn't the woman whom mbuma-tyetye has married! they are two women and himself!" the town emptied itself to go and meet them on the path. his father took powder and guns, with which to announce the arrival; and cannon were roaring. when the young woman came and stood there in the street, there was only shouting and shouting, in admiration. another brother, named njâ, when he came to see her, was so impressed to get a wife like her, that, without waiting for the salutations to be made, he said to his mother, "my mother! make for me my mekima, too." mbuma-tyetye entered into the house, he and his wife. at once hot water was set before them, and they went to bathe. when they had finished, they entered the public reception-room. njâ, impatient to get away and, in impolite haste, said, "now, for my journey!" his brother advised him, "first wait; let me tell you how the way is." he replied, "not so!" and he started off on his journey. the others sat down to tell, and to hear the news. they told mbuma-tyetye the affairs of the town; and he responded as to how he had come. when he had completely finished, he was welcomed, "iye! oka! oka-o! but now, sit down and stay." now, when njâ had gone, he met the two millepedes fighting. he exclaimed, "by my father njambu! what is this?" he stood there with laughter, "kye! kye! kye!" he clapped his hands, "kwâ! kwâ! you! there! let me pass!" they asked, "give us an ukima." he stood laughing, kwa! kwa! saying, "i will see this today! food that is eaten by a human being! is it so that they have teeth? as i see it, they, having no mouths, how can they eat?" but he opened his food-bag, took an ukima, and gave them a small piece. they rebuked him for his meanness, and laid a curse on him, "aye! you will not reach the end." he responded, "i won't reach my end, eh? humph! i'm going on my journey!" he left them; and they grabbed at the very little piece of ukima he had given them. he cried out, "journey!" and went on both by day and by night, traveling until he met the two snakes fighting. he derided them, and took a club, and was about to strike them, when they cursed him, "you will not reach the end!" however, he gave them, at their request, an ukima, and passed on. as he turned to go, and was leaving them, they made signs behind him, repeating their curse, "he will not reach safely!" and they added, "he has no good sense; let us leave him." he still cried out, "journey!" and went on to that place of ihonga-na-ihonga whose size filled all the width of the way. he made a shout, raising it very loud, and repeated his exclamation, "by my father, njambu! thou who hast begotten me, thou hast not seen such as this!" tooth asked, "where are you going?" he, astonished, exclaimed, "ah! it can talk! alas! for me!" and he added a shout again, with laughter, "kwati! kwati! kwati!" it spoke and said, "please, split for me fire-wood." he replied, "what will fire-wood do for you?" he, however, split the wood hastily, ko! ko! ke! and left it in a pile. it said, "leave me an ukima." he responded, "yes; let me see what it will do with it now!" he opened his food-bag, and laid an ukima down disrespectfully, and said, "eat! let me see!" tooth said to him, "sleep here!" said he, "if i sleep here, what is there for me to sit on?" it replied only, "sleep here!" he said, "yes!" then he invoked his ngalo, "a seat!" it appeared, and he sat down. in the evening, he invoked, "ngalo, a house!" it appeared. "a bed!" it appeared. "a table!" it appeared. "food!" it was set out. he ate, but did not offer any to tooth, and fell into a deep sleep. at daybreak, he was given water to wash his face, and food; and he ate it. then the tooth said to him, "now, this is a hova; go; the hova will tell you what you should do." said he sarcastically "good! a good thing!" and he started on his journey. but, when he was gone, he despised the gourd, and said to himself, "what can this water-jar do for me? i shall leave it here." and he laid it down at the foot of a buda tree. there were many kuda (nuts of the buda) lying on the ground. he prepared a seat, and sat down. he gathered the kuda nuts in one place. he took up a nut, broke it, threw its kernel into his mouth, and chewed it. he picked up another one, and was going to break it. gourd warningly said, "i! i!" he replied, "is it that you want me to give it to you?" gourd answered only, "i-i!" and he said, "but, then, your 'i! i!' what is it for?" he broke many of the nuts, taking them up quickly; and finished eating all. and still his stomach felt empty, as if he had eaten nothing. he then said, "the journey!" he started, still carrying with him the gourd, going on, on, until he came to the bwibe tree (wild mango). that bwibe was sweet. he collected the mibe fruits, and began to split them. he split many in a pile, and then said, "now! let me suck!" he sucked them all, but he felt no sense of repletion, although the gourd had warned him. he took the skins of the mibe fruit, and angrily thrust them inside the gourd's mouth, saying, "eat! you who have no teeth, what makes you say i must not eat? but, take you!" he goes on with his journey. and he found water. he took his drinking-vessel, plunged it into the water, dipped, put it to his mouth, drank, and drained the vessel. he wanted more, plunged the vessel, and drank, draining the vessel. he took more again, disregarding the warnings of gourd. the water said to him, "here am i, i remain myself." (i.e. i will not satisfy you.) he gave up drinking, and started his journey again, journeying, journeying, crossed some small creeks, and passed clear on, until he came to the river. as he listened, he heard songs passing by. he said to himself. "now! those who sing, where are they?" the gourd spoke to him, saying, "call for the canoe!" he replied, "how shall i call for a canoe, while i see no people?" gourd repeated to him, "call!" then he shouted out, "you, bring me the canoe!" voices asked, "who art thou?" he answered, "i! njâ!" some of the voices said, "come! let us ferry him across." others said, "no!" but the rest answered, "come on!" then they entered their canoe, laid hold of their paddles, and came singing, "kapi, madi, madi, sa! kapi, mada, mada, sa!" and they came to the landing. he saw nothing but what seemed a log, and exclaimed, "how shall i embark in a log, while there is neither paddle, nor a person for a crew?" but gourd directed him, "embark!" so, he went in the log. they paddled, and brought him to the other side. he jumped ashore, and stood for a moment. then he moved on with the journey, walking on to a certain town (that town of the spirits). he saw nobody, but entered into the public reception-house, and sat down. gourd spoke to him, saying, "come, and escort me to the back-yard." he curtly answered, "yes." he carried it, and stood it at the foot of a plantain stalk. then he went back to the reception-house and sat down. a bundle of medicines came to salute him, and was about to sit on his lap. he jumped up saying, "what is this?" he sat down again. another bundle fell on his lap. he exclaimed, "hump! what is that?" the bundle being displeased, replied, "you will not come to the end." (i.e. you will not have a successful journey.) the gourd called him; and he went to the back-yard. the gourd said to him, "stand up!" and he stood up. then the gourd took a leaf, folded it as a funnel, and dropped a medicine into his eyes; and he began to see everything clearly. he said, "this is the only thing which i can see that this hova has done for me." he passed by, and entered the reception-house again, and sat down. a person came saluting him, "mbolo!" he responded, "ai!" another came, "mbolo!" he replied, "ai!" they cooked food, and got it ready to bring to him. during this while, he told his errand, and was given a wife. gourd called him. he went out to it: and it directed him, "when you are going to eat, you must take only one piece of plantain, and a piece of the flesh of the fowl. then you dip it into the udika-gravy, and put it into your mouth; and you will chew it; and when you have swallowed it, then you leave the remainder of the food." he disregardfully said, "yes! yes!" and he laughed, "kye! kye! kye! i do not know what this hova means! and that 'remainder,' shall i give it to it?" and he entered the house again, and sat down. the food was set out. little children came; they said to each other, "let us see how he will eat." he took up a piece of plantain, and put it in his mouth; he took a fowl's leg, put it in his mouth; and gnawed the flesh off of the bone. he took up another piece of plantain, dipped a spoon into the udika-gravy, and put it into his mouth; he took a piece of meat and a plantain, and swallowed them. the little children began to jeer at him, "he eats like a person who has never eaten before." he rose; but felt as if his stomach was empty. he again seated himself, and he and his wife played games together. soon he said, "my body feels exhausted with hunger"; food was again made and was set out; he ate. the result was the same. the evening meal was also prepared; he ate, and finished; and still was hungry. in the evening, the chief of the town called together the tribe and said to them, "men! i see that this fellow has no sense; let him return to his place." on another day, njâ said to himself, "let me try, as the hova has advised me, about the food." they cooked; they set it on the table. he took a piece of plantain, and some flesh of the fowl; he placed them on a spoon, and dipped them into the udika, and put them into his mouth. he rose up, saying, "i have finished!" and his stomach felt replete. then he thought to himself, "so! is it possible that this hova knows the affairs of the spirits?" the next time when food was spread on the table, he did the same way; and his stomach was satisfied. another day broke, and his father-in-law said to him, "on the morrow will be your journey." when the next day dawned, the chief brought out the chests containing his daughters, and said, "now, then! choose the one that you will take with you." the gourd whispered to him, "do not take the fine-looking one; you must take the one you see covered with filth." he responded, "not i!" the one he chose was the fine one. he took it up, and carried it away. the town's-people began to cry out (in pretence), "oh! he has taken from us that fine maiden of ours!" he was full of gladness that at last he was married. but, really, he was carrying a woman, crooked-nosed, and all of whose body was nothing but skin-disease, and pus oozing all over her. he went on his journey, on, on, on, on, until the town of the tooth. said he, "here's your hova!" the tooth requested, "tell me the news from there." the gourd whispered to tooth, "let this worthless fellow be! let him go! he did not marry a real woman. so, he is not a person." the man at once went on with his journey, continuously, until he came to the spring by his own town. said he, "let me bathe!" he put down the chest, and threw his body with a plunge, into the water. he bathed himself thoroughly, and emerged on the bank. then he said to himself, "now, then, let me open the chest!" the key clicked, and the chest opened. a sick woman stepped out! he demanded, "who brought you here?" she replied, "you." said he in astonishment, "i?" "yes," answered she. he, in anger, said, "go back! do not come at all to the town!" he at once started to go to the town; and the woman slowly followed. there were two children who were going to the spring. as they went, they met with her; and they cried out in fear, "aye! aye! aye! a ghost! aye!" and they went back together in haste to the town. the town's-people asked them, "what's the matter?" they said, "come! there's a ghost at the spring!" the woman continued slowly coming. other children said, "let us go! does a ghost come in the daytime? that is not so!" as they came on the path, they met her. they asked her, "who has married you?" she replied, "isn't it njâ?" the children excitedly cried out shrilly, "a! lâ! lâ!" they went back quickly to the town, saying, "come ye! see the wife of njâ!" the town emptied itself to go and see her. and they inquired of her, "who is it who has married you?" she answered, "is it not njâ?" and the shrill cry of surprise rose again, "a! lâ! lâ! lâ!" when they reached the town, njâ rose in anger from his house, picked up his spear, stood facing them, and threatened with his spear, "this is it!" he passed by them into the back-yard, and changed his body to that of a new kind of beast, with spots all over his skin. at once he stooped low on four legs; and thrust out his claws; and begun a fight with the people of the town, as a leopard. then he went, leaping off into the forest. from there, he kept the name "njâ," and has continued his fight with mankind. the hatred between leopards and mankind dates from that time. some of the people of that country had said to mbuma-tyetye that he would not be able to marry at the town of the spirits, and had tried to hinder him. but he did go, and succeeded in marrying a daughter of njambu-ya-mekuku; while njâ, attempting to do the same, and not waiting for advice from his brother, and treating with disrespect the spirits on the way, failed. tale a snake's skin looks like a snake persons bokeli, son of njambe-ya-manga jâmbâ, daughter of njambe-ya-madiki ko (wild rat) mbindi (wild goat) etungi, a town idler kuba (chicken) note bokeli was like a snake. when a snake changes and throws off his old skin, that slough, when it is left lying at any place, is almost as fearful to see, as the snake itself. the list of the dowry goods for jâmbâ is a good illustration of native exaggeration. njambe-of-the-interior begot a daughter called jâmbâ. and njambe-of-the-sea-coast begot a son called bokeli. many men arrived at the town of njambe-of-the-interior, asking jâmbâ for marriage. there they were killed (njambe's people were cannibals), not being able to fulfill the tests to which they were subjected. so, people said, "jâmbâ will not be married!" finally bokeli, the son of njambe-of-the-sea-coast, said, "i am going to take jâmbâ for marriage." he prepared for his journey; he went; and he arrived at the town. he at once entered into the public reception-house, and sat down. there the people of the town exclaimed, "a fine-looking man!" and they saluted him, "mbolo!" the young women at once went to tell jâmbâ, saying, "what a fine-looking man has come to marry you!" previous to this, the mother of jâmbâ, who was lame with sores, was lying in the house. if a prospective son-in-law laughed in her presence, she would say to her husband, "he is mocking at me!" then that visitor would die. all the men who had come there to marry, were killed in that way. before this (as bokeli understood the speech of all beasts and of birds) when he entered into the reception-house, a cock in the town spoke to him, and said, "if your hope for food rests on me, you will not eat! i will not be killed for you; neither shall you eat at all!" also a loin of wild-goat meat, hanging in the kitchen, said, "for me, you will not eat!" but njambe (who had overheard the cock, and who was thinking of food for his guest) ordered, "today, catch ye kuba!" but cock ran off to the forest. then the people said, "take the leg of mbindi!" the leg of wild-goat protested, "i?" and it rotted. they sought some other thing to cook for bokeli; but, there was nothing. so, njambe sent his sons hunting to kill wild beasts. then, the mother of jâmbâ called for bokeli, saying, "he must come; let me see him." so, he entered into her house, and he sat down. they began to converse. it was but a little while then that the mother said to her daughter, "search for me on the drying frame (over the fire-place); you will find ko there; take it for the guest, and cook it." the wild-rat spoke, saying, "if it is i, he will not possibly eat!" at this, bokeli broke into a laugh. the mother was displeased, and said, "you are laughing at me!" bokeli replied, "no!" but, the woman flung into a rage, and threw herself down on the ground, ndi! she exclaimed, "ah! njambe! he laughed at me! catch him! and let him go to die!" they laid hold of him, and brought him out of the house. they were about to go a little further to the end of the town, when he suddenly pretended he was a corpse, and leaving his body, his spirit went back home, and assumed another body. they became quiet, all of them being startled. when they moved him, he was as cold as cold victuals. they said, "what shall we do here?" some of them advised, "let us take jâmbâ and this corpse, and let us go together to his father, and explain, 'bokeli is dead, but this woman is his wife.'" others said, "what! lest his father will kill us!" then they decided, "not so! but, let us send as messenger some etungi (useless person; no loss if he should be killed) to the father's town." the etungi went on that errand. when he arrived at bokeli's town, he met bokeli sitting at the village smithy, and, not recognizing him, was intending to pass him by. thereupon, bokeli called to him, "brother-in-law! what are you doing? you have found me sitting here, but you seem about to entirely pass me by. though all your family do not like me, come in to the reception-house." the etungi thought to himself, "ah! i am dead! is not this a brother of bokeli?" bokeli called to his mother, and told her, "bring out that food of mine quickly that is there! my brother-in-law has come; he feels hungry!" they set the food as soon as possible. and the etungi ate. bokeli asked him, "where are you going to?" the etungi replied, "i'm on my way going to tell njambe that his son bokeli is dead." bokeli said to him, "this is i." then he gave the etungi a shirt and a cloth and a hat, as proofs of his reality. the etungi returned to his town. and he reported to the people in the town, "bokeli is not dead; i met him at the bellows, working." they thought he was lying, and they said, "let him be beaten!" but the etungi replied, "true! see ye this shirt, and the cloth, and this hat!" he added, "he that doubts must first go and see." then went kombe. when he arrived, he found bokeli at the bellows. when bokeli saw him coming, he arose at once, and went to his mother in the house; he seized a machete, and cut down a plantain bunch, yo! and he said to his mother, "make haste to cook it!" kombe had by that time entered the reception-house. bokeli welcomed him, sa-a! and said, "sit down!" kombe sat down. food had been cooked; and he ate. kombe then says, "i'm going back!" bokeli at once put down at his feet the dowry for jâmbâ, cloths, shirts, hats, etc, etc. kombe carried away the things. and having arrived at his town, he says, "it is true!" their father njambe directed, "come ye! over there with a present as a propitiation!" then he gathered goats, fowls, ducks, plantains, dried meats, fishes, all sorts and kinds. he ordered, "make ye a bier, and carry the corpse. i am going, even if i die!" (he still had a doubt about the real bokeli.) they did so. they carried the presents, and they went, going on the journey. when those in front had arrived at the half-way of the road, the father said to his children, "you must now remain here. i shall first go to the town. if you hear a sound of guns, you will know that i am killed; then ye must go back." the father njambe took jâmbâ to accompany him, and his wives with him. when bokeli saw them coming, at once the cannon were loaded, and were fired in a salute of welcome, and all the guns and musical instruments sounded, and people saying, "the bride is come!" the children of njambe who were left on the way, when they heard the sounds of the cannons and guns, said to themselves that their father was killed, and they scattered and hid themselves. but he hastily started and went back to the place where he had left them; and he found nobody there. he called them; and they came out of their hiding. he commanded, "throw away this thing (the supposed corpse); take up the goods; come to the town of bokeli." then they went to the town. they found jâmbâ and her husband bokeli sitting and playing. and they were treated with much kindness. oxen and pigs were killed; they ate; they drank; and had great fun and very much enjoyment. njambe-of-the-interior then said that he was ready to journey back to his town. but his friend njambe-of-the-sea-coast said, "not today, but tomorrow in the morning; then i will give you the dowry." on the next day, they delivered the dowry; five millions of spear-heads (an iron currency); knives also, a million; one thousand hats; one thousand shirts; one hundred cloths; bags and trunks one hundred; bales of all kinds of white man's things; and native things in abundance; cattle also in abundance. then they went away with them to their town. and bokeli and jâmbâ remained in the seaside town with their marriage. part third fang tribe foreword in this part, are tales told me by an old batanga man, of the banâkâ tribe. he could not give me the time to come to my room, and tell me, sentence by sentence, as the other two narrators had done. but, having some education, he wrote the stories in his native language, and, at my leisure, i translated them. the translation is literal, except when the short phrases, clear to native thought, would have been an imperfect sentence to an english eye; or, where an allusion to well-known native customs, perfectly obvious to a native, would have been obscure to most readers. in such cases, i have sacrificed to clearness the concise native idiom. to a student of higher criticism, the sentences which are mine will reveal themselves. in my literal translations of the native, i have used very simple short words, mostly of anglo-saxon origin. in my own paraphrases, words of latin origin have appeared. some tales of this part are of fang origin from the bulu tribe of the interior. my batanga friend told me he heard them from bulu people visiting at the coast, and he wrote them as they were then current on the coast. after i had translated them from his banâkâ vernacular, i found, and pointed out to him, that some of them had already been printed in fang, as specimens of bulu idioms, in a published grammar of the bulu-fang language ("handbook of bulu, by g. s. bates"). this explanation is proper to be made, that while, unknown to me, mr. bates was collecting direct from his bulu informants in the interior, my batanga friend had collected for me, from his bulu visitors; and the tales were in my possession, translated into english by myself, before i saw mr. bates' book, or even knew of its existence. tale candor persons ngiya (gorilla) ingenda (a small monkey) gorilla, among all beasts, was derided and jeered at by them. they called him "broken-face." so, he spoke to ingenda of the monkey tribe, and ordered it, "just examine for me this face of mine; whether it is really so, you tell me." the monkey was afraid to refuse, and afraid also to tell the truth. so it ascended a tree; and, as it went, it plucked the fruits. it said to gorilla, "i must first eat before answering your question; i feel hungry." (as an excuse to give itself time to escape.) so ingenda went; and, by the time it had eaten two of the fruits, it was near the tree-top. then it called to gorilla "look here! with your face turned upward." so the gorilla looked, with its face upward. and ingenda, being in a safe place, acknowledged, "it is really so, really so." gorilla was angry; but was helpless to revenge itself on ingenda for its candid statement; for, he had no way by which to catch him. and ingenda went off, leaping as it went from tree-top to tree-top. tale which is the better hunter, an eagle or a leopard? persons mbela (eagle) nje (leopard) eagle and leopard had a discussion about obtaining prey. eagle said, "i am the one who can surpass you in preying." leopard said, "not so! is it not i?" then eagle said, "wait; see whether you are the one to surpass me in preying." thereupon he descended from above, seized a child of leopard, and flew up with it to his nest. leopard exclaimed, "alas! what shall i do?" and he went, and went, walking about, coming to one place, and going to another, wishing to fly in order to go to the rescue of his child. he could not fly, for want of wings; therefore it was the other one who flew up and away. so it was that the eagle proved that he surpassed the leopard in seeking prey. tale a lesson in evolution persons unyunge (the shrew-mouse) po (a lemur) note the development of the shrew's long nose, and of the lemur's big eyes. shrew and lemur were neighbors in the town of beasts. at that time, the animals did not possess fire. lemur said to shrew, "go! and take for us fire from the town of mankind." shrew consented, but said, "if i go, do not look, while i am gone, toward any other place except the path on which i go. do not even wink. watch for me." so shrew went, and came to a town of men; and found that the people had all emigrated from that town. yet, he went on, and on, seeking for fire; and for a long time found none. but, as he continued moving forward from house to house, he at last found a very little fire on a hearth. he began blowing it; and kept on blowing, and blowing; for, the fire did not soon ignite into a flame. he continued so long at this that his mouth extended forward permanently, with the blowing. then he went back, and found lemur faithfully watching with his eyes standing very wide open. shrew asked him, "what has made your eyes so big?" in return, lemur asked him, "what has so lengthened your mouth to a snout?" tale parrot standing on one leg persons njâku (elephant) koho (parrot) iwedo (death) note in former times, in the days of witchcraft, it was the custom not to bury a corpse until the question was settled who or what had caused the death. this investigation sometimes occupied several days; during which time decomposition was hindered by the application of salt, and even by drying the remains in the smoke of a fire. elephant built his own town; and parrot built also his. then the children of parrot went a-hunting every day; and when they came back, the town had wild meat in abundance, hida! hida! one day elephant announced, "i must go on an excursion to the town of chum koho." he arrived there and found him, with that fashion of his, of standing with one leg bent up under his feathers hidden. his friend elephant asked him, "chum! what have you done to your leg?" he answered him (falsely), "my children have gone with it a-hunting." elephant being astonished said, "on your oath?" he replied, "truly!" then elephant said, "i came to see you, only to see. i'm going back." the other said, "yes; very good." elephant returned to his town, and said to his children, "arrange the nets today; tomorrow for a hunt!" the next day, the children made ready. and he, ashamed that a small bird should do a greater act than himself said, "take ye a saw, and cut off my leg." his children did not hesitate at his command, as they were accustomed to implicit obedience. so, they cut it off; and they carried with them, as he directed, the leg, on their hunt. when they were gone, to their father elephant came death, saying, "i have arrived!" people of the town cried for help, "come ye! njâku is not well!" but, the children were beyond hearing, being still away at the hunt. during their absence, elephant died. when they arrived, they found their father a corpse. people wondered, saying, "what is this? since we were born, we have not heard this, that hunting is carried on with the legs of one who remains behind in the town." when others, coming to the funeral, from other towns, asked the children, "who was the person who counseled you such advice as that?" they said, "himself it was who told us; he said to us 'cut.' so we cut." then, on farther investigation, the people said, "the blame belongs to koho," so, they called parrot to account. but, parrot said, "it is not mine. i did not tell him to cut off his leg." so, the charge was dismissed. and the burial proceeded. tale a question of right of inheritance persons utati-mboka (a sparrow) koho (parrot) a man note sparrow based his claim on the grounds of companionship, and community of interests. parrot's claim is based on a very common line of argument in native disputes not only about property, but in all questions of liability. parrot and sparrow argued about their right to inherit the property that a man had left. the sparrow said, "the man and i lived all our days in the same town. if he moved, i also moved. our interests were similar. at whatever place he went to live, there also i stood in the street." the parrot spoke, and based his claim on the ground that he was the original cause of the man's wealth. he said, "i was born in the tree-tops; then the man came and took me, to live with him. "when my tail began to grow, he and his people took my feathers; with which they made a handsome head-dress; which they sold for very many goods; with which they bought a wife; and that woman bore daughters; who, for much money, were sold into marriages; and their children also bore other children; wherefore, for that reason, it is that i say that i caused for them all these women, and was the foundation of all this wealth." this was what parrot declared. so, the people decided, "koho is the source of those things." and he was allowed to inherit. tale tortoise covers his ignorance persons kudu (tortoise) iheli (gazelle) nje (leopard) a vine note it is customary for men to do some service for their fathers and mothers-in-law. tortoise arose and went to the town of his father-in-law leopard. leopard sent him on an errand, saying, "go, and cut for me utamba-mwa-ivâtâ." (the fiber of a vine is used for making nets.) then he went. but, while he still remembered the object, he forgot the name of the kind of vine that was used for that purpose. and he was ashamed to confess his ignorance. so, he came back to call the people of the town, and said, "come ye and help me! i have enclosed iheli in a thicket." the people came, and at once they made a circle around the spot. but when they closed in, they saw no beasts there. then tortoise called out, "let someone of you cut for me, utamba-mwa-ivâtâ." (as if that was the only thing needed to catch the animal which he had said was there.) thereupon, his brother-in-law cut for him a vine which he brought to him, saying, "here is an ihenga vine which we use for making nets." whereupon tortoise exclaimed, "is it possible that it was the ihenga vine that i mistook?" tale a question as to age persons asanze (a shrike) kudu (tortoise) and other animals njâbâ (civet) uhingi (genet) edubu (snake) note differences in age as revealed by differences in taste for food. shrike was a blacksmith. so, all the beasts went to the forge at his town. each day, when they had finished at the anvil, they took all their tools and laid them on the ground (as pledges). before they should go back to their towns, they would say to the bird, "show us which is the eldest, and then you give us the things, if you are able to decide our question." he looked at and examined them; but he did not know, for they were all apparently of the same age; and they went away empty-handed, leaving their tools as a challenge. every day it was that same way. on another day, tortoise being a friend of the bird, started to go to work for him at the bellows. also, he cooked three bundles of food; one of civet with the entrails of a red antelope; and one of genet; and one of an edubu-snake. (suited for different tastes and ages.) then he blew at the bellows. when the others were hungry at meal time, tortoise took up the jomba-bundles; and he said, "come ye! take up this jomba of njâbâ with the entrails, and eat." (they were the old ones who chose to come and eat it.) again tortoise said, "come ye! take up the jomba of uhingi." (they were the younger men who chose to pick it up and eat it.) he then took up the jomba of the snake. and he said, "come ye! and take of the jomba of edubu." (those who took it were the youngest.) after awhile they all finished their work at the bellows. they still left their tools lying on the ground, and came near to the bird, and they said, as on other occasions, "show us who is the eldest." then tortoise at the request of the bird, announced the decision, as if it was its own, "ye who ate of the njâbâ are the ones who are oldest; ye who ate of uhingi are the ones who are younger men; and ye who ate of the edubu are the ones who are the youngest." so, they assented to the decision, and took away their belongings. tale abundance: a play on the meaning of a word persons a hunter; man mbindi (wild goat) a dwarf, with magic-power bwinge (abundance, or "more") ngweya (hog) ungumba (riches) note the man's patience finally brought to him the plenty which was promised him. "bwinge" might be the name of a person or of a thing; or, it could be the "abundance" for which the hunter hoped. there was a certain man who was very poor; he had no goods with which to buy a wife. he went one day into the forest to set snares. on the morrow, he went off to examine them; and found a wild-goat caught in the snares. he rejoiced and said, "i must eat mbindi today!" but the wild-goat said to that man, "let me alone, bwinge is coming after awhile." so, the man, thinking that "bwinge" was the name of some other and more desirable animal, at once let the wild-goat loose, and went off to his town. on the next day, the man went to examine the snare, to see whether bwinge was there, and found hog caught fast in the net. and he exclaimed, "i must eat ngweya today!" but the hog said, "let me go. bwinge is coming." the man at once left the hog, (still thinking that many more were coming); and it went away. the man wondered, and said to himself, "what thing is it that is named 'bwinge'?" on another day, he went to set his snare. he found there a dwarf child of a human being; and, in anger, he said, "you are the one who has caused me to send away the beasts? is it possible that you are he who is 'bwinge'? i shall kill you." but the dwarf said, "no! don't kill me. i will call ungumba for you." so, the man said, "call in a hurry!" the dwarf ordered, "let guns come!" and they at once came. (this was done by the dwarf's magic-power.) the man again said, "call, in a hurry!" the dwarf called for women; and they came. the man again said to him, "call for goats, in a hurry!" and they came, with abundance of other things. then the man freed him, and said to him, "go!" the man also went his way with his riches. and he became a great man. this was because of his patient waiting. tale an oath, with a mental reservation persons ibembe (dove) nje (leopard) ngando (crocodile) note covenants among natives are made under oath, by the two parties eating together of some fetish-mixture, called a "medicine"; which, being connected with some spirit, is supposed to be able to punish any infraction of the covenant. because dove "abused" leopard, that is, deceived him, the dove no longer builds its nest on the ground, through fear of leopards. dove was building in a tree-trunk by a river, because it preferred to walk on the ground. and crocodile just then emerged from the river to the bank, and lay on his log where he usually rested. they two said, "let us eat a medicine-charm." so, dove agreed, and swore, saying, "i say to you that, when anything at all shall happen openly, if i do not tell it to you, then may this medicine find me out and kill me." crocodile also uttered his oath, "when whatever thing shall come out from the river onto the ground, if i do not tell it to you, this medicine must find me out and kill me!" when they had finished their covenant, crocodile returned to his hollow in the ground by the river. dove also arose, and went away, walking to his place. then he and leopard suddenly met, on the path. leopard asked, "are you able to see ngando for me? i want to eat it." dove answered, "ah! would that you and i were living in one place with an agreement!" leopard replied, "come then! let us, i and you, eat a medicine." so leopard began. he said as his oath: "anything at all that shall come to my place where i dwell, if i be there, and it wants to get hold of you, if i tell it not to you, let this medicine find and certainly kill me!" dove also with his oath, said, "if i see ngando, and i do not tell you, let this medicine find me and certainly kill me!" so, they made their promise; then they separated; and each one went to his own village. thus dove and leopard ate their kind of "medicine," after dove and crocodile had already eaten theirs. then, one day, crocodile came out from the river. dove at once began to tell leopard, saying, "he has emerged from the river and is about to settle on the log!" so, leopard began slowly to come, and watching crocodile, as he came. when he was near, in his advance, dove spoke, telling crocodile, and said, "your watcher! your watcher is coming! do not approach here!" thereat, crocodile slipped back into the water. the next time that dove and leopard met, leopard demanded, "what is this you have done to me? you swore to me this: 'if i see crocodile i will tell you; and you must come catch him.' now, as soon as you saw me, you turned around, and told crocodile, 'fall into the river!' you have mocked me!" and leopard grew very angry. tale the treachery of tortoise persons mbâmâ (boa constrictor) kudu (tortoise) nje (leopard) note observe the cannibalism of the story. leopard married a wife. after awhile she was about to become a mother. boa also married a wife; and, after awhile, she also, was about to become a mother. in a short time, like the drinking of a draught of water, the month passed, both for leopard's wife and for boa's wife also. then boa's wife said, "it is time for the birth!" so she gave birth to a child. and she lay down on her mother's bed. when they were about to cook food for her, she said, "i want to eat nothing but nje!" the next day, the wife of leopard said, "it is time for the birth!" and she also gave birth to a child. food was given to her. but she said, "i am wanting only mbâmâ!" when told of his wife's wish, boa said, "what shall i do? where shall i go? where shall i find mangwata?" (a nickname for leopard.) also, leopard said, in regard to his wife's wish, "where shall i find mbâmâ?" then leopard went walking, on and on, and looking. he met with manima-ma-evosolo (a nickname for tortoise). leopard asked him, "can you catch me mbâmâ?" manima said, "what's that?" and he laughed, kye! kye! kye; and said, "that is as easy as play." leopard said, "chum, please do such a thing for me." and tortoise said, "very good!" when they separated, and tortoise was about to go a little further on ahead, at once he met with boa. and boa asked him, "chum! manima-ma-evosolo! where have you come from?" tortoise answered, "i have come, going on an excursion." boa asked to tortoise, "but, could you catch me nje?" he replied, "that is a little thing." then boa begged him, "please, since my wife has born a child, she has not eaten anything. she says she wants to eat only nje." tortoise returned back at once to his village. he called to the people of his village, saying, "come ye! to make for me a pit." they at once went, and dug a pit. when they had finished it, tortoise went to leopard, and said to him, "come on!" leopard at once started on the journey (thinking he was going to get boa). when they came to the place of the pit, leopard fell suddenly into it headlong, volomu! he called to tortoise, saying, "chum! where is mbâmâ?" (leopard did not understand that he was being deceived.) tortoise did not reply, but started off clear to the village of boa. he said to boa, "come on!" boa did not doubt at all that he was going to get leopard. he started, and went with tortoise towards the pit. when he was passing near the spot, boa fell headlong into the pit, volumu! and leopard exclaimed, "ah! now, what is this?" tortoise only said to them, "you yourselves can kill each other." tale a chain of circumstances persons etanda (cockroach) kudu (tortoise) kuba (chicken) uhingi (genet) nje (leopard) a man note a cause, from which came the enmity between leopards, and other wild animals, and mankind. observe the resemblance to "the house that jack built." tortoise was a blacksmith, and allowed other people to use his bellows. cockroach had a spear that was known of by all people and things. one day, he went to the smithy at the village of tortoise. when he started to work the bellows, as he looked out in the street, he saw chicken coming; and he said to tortoise, "i'm afraid of kuba, that he will catch me. what shall i do?" so tortoise told him, "go! and hide yourself off there in the grass." at once he hid himself. then arrived chicken, and he, observing a spear lying on the ground, asked tortoise, "is not this etanda's spear?" tortoise assented, "yes, do you want him?" and chicken said, "yes, where is he?" so tortoise said, "he hid himself in the grass on the ground yonder; catch him." then chicken went and caught cockroach, and swallowed him. when chicken was about to go away to return to his place, tortoise said to him, "come back! work for me this fine bellows!" as chicken, willing to return a favor, was about to stand at it, he looked around and saw genet coming in the street. chicken said to tortoise, "alas! i'm afraid that uhingi will see me, where shall i go?" so, tortoise says, "go! and hide!" chicken did so. when genet came, he, seeing the spear, asked, "is it not so that this is etanda's spear?" tortoise replied, "yes." genet asked him, "where is etanda?" he replied, "chicken has swallowed him." genet inquired, "and where is chicken?" tortoise showed him the place where chicken was hidden. and genet went and caught and ate chicken. when genet was about to go, tortoise called to him, "no! come! to work this fine bellows." genet set to work; but, when he looked into the street, he hesitated; for, he saw leopard coming. genet said to tortoise, "i must go, lest nje should see me!" then tortoise said, "go! and hide in the grass." so, genet hid himself in the grass. leopard, having arrived and wondering about the spear, asked tortoise, "is it not so that this is the spear of etanda?" tortoise answered, "yes." then leopard asked, "where is etanda?" tortoise replied, "kuba has swallowed him." "and, where is kuba?" tortoise answered, "uhingi has eaten him." then leopard asked, "where then is uhingi?" tortoise asked, "do you want him? go and catch him! he is hidden yonder there." then leopard caught and killed genet. leopard was going away, but tortoise told him, "wait! come! to work this fine bellows." when leopard was about to comply, he looked around the street, and he saw a human being coming with a gun carried on his shoulder. leopard exclaimed, "kudu-o! i do not want to see a man, let me go!" then tortoise said to him, "go! and hide." leopard did so. when the man had come, and he saw the spear of cockroach, he inquired, "is it not so that this is cockroach's wonderful spear?" tortoise answered, "yes." and the man asked, "where then is cockroach?" tortoise answered, "kuba has swallowed him." man asked, "and where is chicken?" tortoise answered, "uhingi has eaten him." man asked, "and where is genet?" tortoise answered, "nje has killed him." man asked, "and where is leopard?" tortoise did not at once reply; and man asked again, "where is leopard?" the tortoise said, "do you want him? go! and catch him. he had hidden himself over there." then the man went and shot leopard, who had killed genet, who had eaten chicken, who had swallowed cockroach, who owned the wonderful spear, at the smithy of tortoise. index of names of animals, etc., among certain tribes on the west african equator. ==================+=============+===========+===========+=========+========= english | benga | mpongwe | bapuku | kombe | fang ------------------+-------------+-----------+-----------+---------+--------- adder | edubu | | | | ant, red | kedi | | | | ant, black | hako | | | | antelope | vyâdu | nkambi | vyâdu | | antelope, | | | | | tragelephas | mbalanga | | | | antelope, red | ehibo | { njivo | ehibo | | | | { eziwo | | | bat | ndemi | | | | beast | tito | nyama | | | bird | inâni | nyâni | inâni | | boa constrictor | mbâmâ | mbâmâ | mbâmâ | | chameleon | yongolokodi | | | | chicken | kuba | njâgâni | kuba | | ku chimpanzee | kwiya | | | | civet | njâbâ | | | | cockroach | etanda | | | | fefaye crab | jâmbâ | igâmbâ | jâmbâ | | crocodile | ngando | ngando | ngando | | ngane dog | mbwa | mbwa | mbwa | | dove | ibembe | | | | yum eagle | mbela | kungu | yungu | | ndowe ear | ditâ | oroi | itâi | | elephant | njâku | njâgu | njâku | râku | yâwo frog | jonda | rânge | eloto | | gazelle (forest) | iheli | | | vizyele | okwen gazelle (prairie) | embonda | | | | genet | uhingi | osinge | uhingi | | nsin goat (domestic) | tomba | mboni | mbodi | | goat (wild) | mbindi | mbinji | mbindi | | mvin gorilla | ngiya | njina | ngiya | | nji hippopotamus | ngubu | nguvu | | | hog | ngweya | ngowa | | | ngowe igwana | ngâmbi | | | | jackal | ibâbâ | | | | lemur | po | | | | ojam leopard | njâ | njegâ | | | nje lizard | ehelele | | | | manatus | manga | manga | | | millepede | ngângâlâ | | | | monkey | kema | { ingenda | | | | | { telinga | | tyema | kowe mosquito | ikungu | mbo | | | mouse house | mpogo | | ihuka | | mouse, shrew | unyunge | | | | mbasume ox | nyati | nyare | | | oyster | itandi | orandi | itambi | | palm-tree, oil | mbila | oyila | ilende | | partridge | ngwayi | nkwani | | | parrot | koho | ngozyo | | | kos plantain | ekâi | akândâ | | | porcupine | ngomba | | | | rat (domestic) | etoli | | | | rat (wild) | ko | | | | sheep | udâmbe | odâmbe | | | shrike | asanze | | | | asanze snail | kâ | | | | snail (giant) | idibavolo | | | | snake | mbâmbâ | omwamba | | | sparrow | utatimboka | | | | moakumba squirrel | ihende | senji | mbala | | sun | joba | nkombe | | | tortoise | kudu | ekaga | | | kulu viper | pe | ompene | pe | | wag-tail | | | indondobe | | ------------------+-------------+-----------+-----------+---------+--------- [illustration: gorilla hunting. chap. xxxii.] stories of the gorilla country narrated for young people by paul du chaillu author of "discoveries in equatorial africa" etc., etc. new and cheaper edition london sampson low, marston & company _limited_ st. dunstan's house fetter lane, fleet street, e.c. [_all rights reserved_] london: printed by gilbert and rivington, ld., st. john's house, clerkenwell road, e.c. contents. page preliminary chapter chapter ii. arrival on the coast--a king and his palace--dancing and idol-worship chapter iii. a week in the woods--a tornado--the leopards prowling about--i kill a cobra and a scorpion--fight with a buffalo--hunting for wild boars--a leopard takes a ride on a bull--sick with the fever chapter iv. a village on the seashore--lying in wait for a leopard chapter v. the bay of corisco--the mangrove trees--the wonderful flocks of birds--what i found in the pouch of a pelican--how an old king is buried, and the new king crowned chapter vi. an old man killed for witchcraft--my journey to the country of the cannibals--starting on the route chapter vii. our journey through the wilderness continued--a rebellion in camp--nothing to eat--i shoot a fish and miss an elephant--i kill a big snake and the others eat him--my first sight of gorillas chapter viii. i arrive among the cannibals--their spears, bows, and battle-axes--they take me for a spirit--their king shakes when he sees me--i give him a looking-glass--it astonishes him chapter ix. an elephant hunt chapter x. life among the cannibals--curious musical instruments--cooking utensils--a blacksmith's bellows and anvil--cannibal diet chapter xi. journey to yoongoolapay--hunting with nets--the terrible bashikonay ants chapter xii. returning to the coast--caverns and waterfalls in the highlands--crossing a river on mangrove roots--stirring up a big snake--a mutual scare chapter xiii. cape lopez and an open prairie once more--king bango and his three hundred wives--his five idols--slave barracoons--the corpse and the vultures chapter xiv. slave barracoons--a big snake under my bed--a slave-ship off the coast chapter xv. going into the interior--sleeping with the king's rats--the chimpanzee--kill a gazelle--too cold to sleep--the grey partridge chapter xvi. the hippopotamus--a speck of war--reach ngola--a sunday talk--the black man's god and the white man's god--how king njambai punished his wife--we build an olako in the woods chapter xvii. an unsuccessful hunt for elephants--i take aim at a buffalo--a leopard in the grass near us--we shoot the leopard and her kitten--great rejoicing in camp--who shall have the tail?--a quarrel over the brains--the guinea hens--the monkeys chapter xviii. alone in camp--hunting for elephants--aboko kills a rogue--i cut another python in two--we shoot some wild boars--a buffalo hunt--return to sangatanga--king bango sick chapter xix. a jolly excursion party--a race for the fishing banks--the oroungou burial-ground chapter xx. our camp at point fetish--an african watering-place--fishing, but not bathing--the sharks--curing mullets, etc.--turning turtles--bird shooting--a leopard springs upon us chapter xxi. bound for the interior--a sea voyage--a tornado--we reach the fernand-vaz--sangala wishes to detain me--a night alarm--prospect of a war--arrayed for battle--a compromise--my commi friends chapter xxii. i build a village, and call it washington--i start for the interior--my speech on leaving--the people applaud me vociferously, and promise to be honest--we reach aniambia--the "big king," olenga-yombi--a royal ball in my honour--the superstitions of the natives--a man tossed by a buffalo chapter xxiii. capture of a young gorilla--i call him "fighting joe"--his strength and bad temper--he proves untameable--joe escapes--recaptured--escapes again--unpleasant to handle--death of "fighting joe" chapter xxiv. the hippopotamus--a duel--shooting on the river--nearly upset--a night-hunt on land--my companion fires and runs--appearance and habits of the hippopotamus chapter xxv. visit of king quengueza--i promise to visit him--the kindness of the commi--the dry season of the fernand-vaz--plenty of birds and fishes--the marabouts--the eagles--a bad wound chapter xxvi. another expedition to lake anengue--difficult passage up the river--the crocodiles--king damagondai and his troubles--i buy an mbuiti, or idol chapter xxvii. a visit to king shimbouvenegani--his royal costume--hunting crocodiles--how they seize their prey--the nkago--the ogata chapter xxviii. the nshiego mbouvé--bald-headed apes--their houses in the trees--lying in wait for them--we kill a male--the shrieks of his mate--description of the animal--farewell to shimbouvenegani chapter xxix. war threatened--oshoria arms his men--we bluff them off, and fall sick with fever--the _mbola ivoga_, or end of mourning time--a death and burial--finding out the sorcerer--the village deserted--i become viceroy at washington chapter xxx. hunting in the woods--the mboyo wolf--we catch another young gorilla--he starves to death chapter xxxi. going to unknown regions--quengueza sends his son as a hostage--i take him along with me--reception by the king--our speeches--quengueza afraid of a witch--an incantation scene chapter xxxii. gorilla hunting--my companions, mombon, etia, and gambo--etia kills a large gorilla---we make up a large party--camp stories about gorillas--we capture a young gorilla--her untimely death chapter xxxiii. voyage up the river--we build a village near obindji--quengueza's plan for keeping the sabbath--kindness of the natives--a trial by ordeal chapter xxxiv. the kooloo-kamba--the gouamba, or meat-hunger--exploring the forest--gorilla hunting--within eight yards of a large gorilla--he roars with rage and marches upon us chapter xxxv. we go up the river to n'calai boumba--a severe attack of fever--the tender care of the natives for me--anguilai accuses his people of bewitching me--i go out and quiet him--a boy cut to pieces for witchcraft--a useful idol--the ebony trees chapter xxxvi. hunting for food--we kill a female nshiego mbouvé--a young nshiego with a white face--he becomes my pet tommy--his affection for me--his stealing pranks--tommy gets drunk--his behaviour at meals--his sudden death--conclusion list of illustrations. gorilla hunting frontispiece my reception by the king enticing the leopard flocks of birds scene with the mbousha killing the snake king astonished at looking-glass entrapping the elephant fan blacksmiths at work the handja net-hunting mangrove swamp. tumbling and falling slave barracoons. burial ground embarking slaves the gazelle after dinner a leopard and her young one aboko kills a rogue elephant fishing turning turtles just before sunrise our schooner caught in a tornado african ball. king olenga-yombi dancing capturing a young gorilla hippopotami at home marabouts, storks, and pelicans the king receives me a crocodile hunt the nshiego mbouvÉ expiration of mourning wolf hunting an incantation scene a trial by ordeal the gorilla marches upon us meeting the mbuiti a young nshiego mbouvÉ with a white face [illustration] [illustration] stories of the gorilla country. preliminary chapter. i had passed several years on the african coast before i began the explorations recorded in my first book. in those years i hunted, traded with the natives, and made collections in natural history. in such a wild country as africa one does not go far without adventures. the traveller necessarily sees what is strange and wonderful, for everything is strange. in this book i have attempted to relate some of the incidents of life in africa for the reading of young folks. in doing this i have kept no chronological order, but have selected incidents and adventures here and there as they seem to be fitted for my purpose. i have noticed that most intelligent boys like to read about the habits of wild animals, and the manners and way of life of savage men; and of such matters this book is composed. in it i have entered into more minute details concerning the life of the native inhabitants than i could in my other books, and have shown how the people build their houses, what are their amusements, how they hunt, fish, eat, travel, and live. whenever i am at a friend's house the children ask me to tell them something about africa. i like children, and in this book have written especially for them. i hope to interest many who are yet too young to read my larger works. [illustration] [illustration: my reception before the king.] chapter ii. arrival on the coast--a king and his palace--dancing and idol-worship. some years ago a three-masted vessel took me to a wild country on the west coast of africa near the equator. it was a very wild country indeed. as we came in sight of the land, which was covered with forest, canoes began to start from the shore towards us; and, as we neared the land, we could see the people crowding down on the beach to look at the strange sight of a vessel. the canoes approached the vessel in great numbers. some of them were so small that they looked like mere nutshells. indeed, some of the men paddled with their feet; and one man carried his canoe ashore on his shoulder. at last, the natives came on board, and what funny people they were! i could not discern one from another; they seemed to me all alike. what a queer way of dressing they had too! you would have laughed to see them. some had only an old coat on. others had an old pair of trousers which probably had belonged to some sailor; these wore no shirt or coat. some had only an old ragged shirt, and some again had nothing on except an old hat. of course none of them had shoes. how they shouted and hallooed as they came about the vessel! they seemed to speak such a strange language. no one on board appeared to understand them. they made so great a noise that i thought i should become deaf. one of them had a fowl to sell; another brought an egg or two; and another a few bunches of plantains. our captain knew the coast; for he had long been an african trader, though he had never been at this place before. the ship cast anchor. it was not far from a river called benito. i left the vessel and went ashore with some others. as i landed i was surrounded immediately by crowds of natives, who looked so wild and so savage that i thought they would kill me at once. i was led to the village, which stood not far from the sea, and was hidden from view by the very large trees and the great forest that surrounded it. on one side of the village was a prairie. i shall always remember this village. it was the first african village i had ever seen; and it was unlike those built in southern africa. don't think for a moment that i am going to speak to you of stone or wooden houses. no! these wild people lived in queer little huts, the walls of which were made of the bark of trees, and were not more than four or five feet high. the top of the roof was only about seven or eight feet from the ground. the length of these huts was about ten or twelve feet, and they were seven or eight feet wide. there were no windows, and the door was very small. they immediately took me to one of these houses, and said they gave it to me. they meant that it was mine as long as i would stay with them. it belonged to the son of the king. so i went in. but where was i to sit down? there was no chair to be seen. patience, thought i. these people had probably never seen a chair in their lives. it was so dark i could not see at first. by and by i saw how the hut was furnished. there were some calabashes to hold water, and two or three cooking pots. there were some ugly-looking spears, an axe, and two or three large and queer-looking knives, which could sever the head of a man at one blow. of course i looked for a bed: i need not tell you there was none; but, instead, there were some sticks to lie upon. the very look of this sleeping-place made me shudder; i thought of snakes, scorpions, and centipedes. the dark hut seemed the very place for them. shortly after the king's son came. if i remember well, his name was _andèké_. he told me that his father, the king, was ready to receive me. the king ready to receive me! this was a great announcement. i must dress. but how? there was no washing-basin to wash myself in; besides, i had forgotten my soap. i was glad i had no beard at that time; for i do not know how i could have shaved. in short, i resolved to go and see his majesty as i was. the sun being very warm, i took my umbrella with me. the people conducted me to the royal palace. what do you suppose a palace to be in the benito country? the king's palace was made of the same material (bark of trees) as the houses i have just described to you; and it was only about twice as big. as i entered i went towards the king, who was seated on a stool. another empty stool was by his side. i may say that apourou--such was the king's name--did not come up to my ideas of a king. in fact, i should have laughed at him had i dared. his costume was composed of a red soldier's coat, and he wore a little bit of calico round his waist. that was all. you must understand he had no shirt. he was a tall, slim negro, with grey hair, and had large scars on his face, and his whole body was covered with tattoos. he wore large earrings. he was smoking a big ugly pipe. he looked at me, and i looked at him. the room was full of people, and the king had several of his wives around him. the queen was there. would you believe it? in that country a man marries as many wives as he chooses! the king looked at me for a long time without saying a word. finally he opened his mouth, clapped his hands, and said i was a funny-looking _fellow_. he next said he was very glad to see me, and would take care of me. then he touched my hair, and said i must give him some. he would like to have me remain with him always. at this the people shouted, "we want the _ntangani_ to stay with us!" * * * * * what do you think he did next? he quietly proposed to me that i should get married to some of his countrywomen; and added that whomsoever i should choose would become my wife. the suggestion was received by all the people with a tremendous grunt of approval, to show that they thought just as their king. then they shouted, "the girl he likes he shall marry!" i said, "i don't want to get married, i am too young." i did not want to tell him that i would not, for all the world, marry one of his people. it was getting very warm in the hut, and there was a strong odour. the people were packed so closely together that they reminded one of herrings in a barrel, and you must remember i said the house had no windows. then the king presented me with one fowl, two eggs, and one bunch of plantain; and as i went away he said i had better give him my umbrella. but i went off as if i had not heard what he said. i thought it was rather too much for a king to ask a stranger to give up his umbrella. i had just begun to learn what african kings were. the people followed me everywhere; i wish i could have understood their language. one man could talk english, and i am going now to give you a specimen of his english. when he thought i must be hungry, he said, "want chop? want chop?" when he saw that i could not understand what he meant, he made signs with his hands and mouth, which at once explained to me that he had asked me if i wanted to eat. i said, "yes;" and after a while, some cooked plantains, with some fish, were brought to me. i did not care for the plantains; it was the first time i had ever tasted them. after my meal, i walked through the street of the village and came to a house, in the recess of which i saw an enormous idol. i had never in all my life seen such an ugly thing. it was a rude representation of some human being, of the size of life, and was made of wood. it had large copper eyes, and a tongue of iron, which shot out from its mouth to show that it could sting. the lips were painted red. it wore large iron earrings. its head was ornamented with a feather cap. most of the feathers were red, and came from the tails of grey parrots, while the body and face were painted red, white, and yellow. it was dressed in the skins of wild animals. around it were scattered skins of tigers and serpents, and the bones and skulls of animals. some food also was placed near, so that it might eat if it chose. it was now sunset; and night soon set in over the village. for the first time in my life i stood alone in this dark world, surrounded by savages, without any white people near me. there was no light in the street, and only the reflection of the fires could be seen now and then. how dismal it was! i looked at my pistols and my guns, and was glad to find that they were in good order. by-and-by the people began to come out of their huts; and i saw some torches lighted, and taken towards the large _mbuiti_ as they call the idol, and there placed on the ground. the large drums or tom-toms were also carried there; and the women and men of the village gathered around. the tom-toms beat; and, soon after, i heard the people singing. i went to see what was the matter. what a sight met my eyes! the men had their bodies painted in different colours. some had one cheek red and the other white or yellow. a broad white or yellow stripe was painted across the middle of the chest and along both the arms. others had their bodies spotted. most ugly they looked! the women wore several iron or brass rings around their wrists and ankles. then the singing began, and the dancing! i had never seen such dancing before. it was very ungraceful. the drummers beat on the tom-toms with all their might. as they became warm with exertion their bodies shone like seals, so oily were they. i looked and looked, with my eyes wide open; i was nearly stunned with the noise. as the women danced and sung, the brass and iron rings which they wore struck against each other, and kept time with the music and the beating of the tom-toms. but why were they all there dancing and screeching around the idol? i will tell you. they were about to start on a hunting expedition, and they were asking the idol to give them good luck in their sport. when i found it was to be a hunting expedition, i wanted to go at once with these savages, though i was only a lad under twenty years old. i retired to my hut with a valiant heart; i was going to do great things. if you had been in my place, boys, would you not have felt the same? would you have left the gorillas alone? i am sure you all shout at once, "no! no!" would you have let the elephants go unmolested in the forest? "certainly not," will be your answer. and what about the chimpanzee, and the big leopards who carry away so many people and eat them, the huge buffaloes, the wild boars, the antelopes, and the gazelles? would you have left the snakes alone? perhaps you are all going to say "yes" to that; and i think you are right, for many of these snakes are very poisonous, and they are numerous in these great forests; for the country i am telling you about is nothing but an immense jungle. when a man is bitten by one of these snakes he often dies in a few minutes. there is also to be found in these woods an immense python, or boa, that swallows antelopes, gazelles, and many other animals. i shall have a good deal to tell you about them by-and-by. so i resolved that i would try to see all these native tribes; that i would have a peep at the cannibals; that i would have a good look also at the dwarfs. i am sure, that if any one of you had been with me on that coast, you would have said to me, "du chaillu, let us go together and see all these things, and then come back home and tell the good folks all we have seen." yes, i am certain that every one of you would have felt as i did. [illustration] [illustration] chapter iii. a week in the woods--a tornado--the leopards prowling about--i kill a cobra and a scorpion--fight with a buffalo--hunting for wild boars--a leopard takes a ride on a bull--sick with the fever. now, boys, fancy yourselves transported into the midst of a very dense and dark forest, where the trees never shed their leaves all at one time, where there is no food to be had, except what you can get with your gun, and where wild beasts prowl around you at night, while you sleep. i found myself in such a place. immediately after we arrived in those gloomy solitudes we began to build an olako to shelter us from the rains. i must tell you that benito is a very strange country. it is situated, as you have seen by the map, near the equator. of course, you know what the equator is? there, at a certain time of the year, the sun is directly above your head at noon, and hence it is the hottest part of the earth. the days and nights are of the same length. the sun rises at six o'clock in the morning, and the sunset takes place at six o'clock in the evening. there is only a difference of a few minutes all the year round. there is no twilight, and half an hour before sunrise or after sunset it is dark. there is no snow, except on very high mountains. there is no winter. there are only two seasons--the rainy season and the dry season. our winter time at home is the time of the rainy season in equatorial africa, and it is also the hottest period of the year. it rains harder there than in any other country. no such rain is to be witnessed either in the united states or europe. and as to the thunder and lightning! you never have heard or seen the like; it is enough to make the hair on your head stand on end. then come the tornados, a kind of hurricane which, for a few minutes, blows with terrific violence, carrying before it great trees. how wild the sky looks! how awful to see the black clouds sweeping through the sky with fearful velocity! so you will not wonder that we busied ourselves in preparing our shelter, for i remember well it was in the month of february. we took good care not to have big trees around us, for fear they might be hurled upon us by a tornado, and bury us all alive under their weight. accordingly we built our olako near the banks of a beautiful little stream, so that we could get as much water as we wanted. then we immediately began to fell trees. we carried two or three axes with us, for the axe is an indispensable article in the forests. with the foliage we made a shelter to keep off the rain. while the men were busy building the olako, the women went in search of dried wood to cook our supper. we had brought some food from the village with us. we were ready just in time. a most terrific tornado came upon us. the rain poured down in torrents. the thunder was stunning. the lightning flashed so vividly and often as nearly to blind us. our dogs had hidden themselves, indeed all animals and birds of the forest were much frightened, which was not to be wondered at. how thankful i was to be sheltered from such a storm! we had collected plenty of fuel, and our fires burned brightly. we formed a strange group while seated around the fires, the men and women smoking their pipes and telling stories. we had several fires, and, as they blazed up, their glare was thrown out through the gloom of the forest, and filled it with fantastic shadows. though tired, everybody seemed merry. we were full of hope for the morrow. every one spoke of the particular animal he wished to kill, and of which he was most fond. some wished for an antelope, others for an elephant, a wild boar, or a buffalo. i confess that i myself inclined towards the wild boar; and i believe that almost every one had the same wish, for that animal, when fat, is very good eating. indeed, they already began to talk as if the pig were actually before them. all fancied they could eat a whole leg apiece, and their mouths fairly watered in thinking about it. no wonder they are so fond of meat, they have it so seldom. who among us does not relish a good dinner, i should like to know? by-and-by all became silent; one after the other we fell asleep, with the exception of two or three men who were to watch over the fires and keep them bright; for there were plenty of leopards prowling in the neighbouring forest, and none of us wanted to serve as a meal for them. in fact, before going to sleep, we heard some of these animals howling in the far distance. during the night, one came very near our camp. he went round and round; and, no doubt, lay in wait to see if one of us would go out alone; and then he would have pounced upon the careless fellow. i need not say we did not give him a chance; and you may be sure we kept the fire blazing. finally, we fired a few guns, and he went off. these leopards are dreadful animals, and eat a great many natives. they are generally shy; but once they have tasted human flesh, they become very fond of it, and the poor natives are carried off, one after another, in such numbers that the villages have to be abandoned. the next day we went hunting. i had hardly gone into the forest when i saw, creeping on the ground under the dry leaves, an enormous black snake: i fancy i see it still. how close it was to me! one step more and i should have just trodden upon it, and then should have been bitten, and a few minutes after have died, and then, boys, you know i should have had nothing to tell you about africa. this snake was a cobra of the black variety (_dendrapspis angusticeps_). it is a very common snake in that region; and, as i have said, very poisonous. as soon as the reptile saw me, he rose up, as if ready to spring upon me, gave one of his hissing sounds, and looked at me, showing, as he hissed, his sharp-pointed tongue. of course, the first thing i did was to make a few steps backward. then, levelling my gun, i fired and killed him. he was about eight feet long. i cut his head off, and examined his deadly fangs. what horrible things they were! they looked exactly like fish bones, with very sharp ends. i looked at them carefully, and saw that he could raise and lower them at will; while the teeth are firmly implanted in a pouch, or little bag, which contains the poison. i saw in the end of the fang a little hole, which communicated with the pouch. when the snake opens his mouth to bite, he raises his fangs. then he strikes them into the flesh of the animal he bites, and brings a pressure on the pouch, and the poison comes out by the little hole i have spoken of. i cut open the cobra, and found in his stomach a very large bird. andèké packed the bird and snake in leaves, and, on our return to the camp, the men were delighted. in the evening they made a nice soup of the snake, which they ate with great relish. i had also killed a beautiful little striped squirrel, upon which i made my dinner. i felt almost sorry to kill it, it was such a pretty creature. in the evening, as i was siting by the fire, and looking at the log that was burning, i spied a big ugly black scorpion coming out of one of the crevices. i immediately laid upon its back a little stick which i had in my hand. you should have seen how its long tail flew up and stung the piece of wood! i shuddered as i thought that it might have stung my feet or hands, instead of the wood. i immediately killed it, and the natives said these scorpions were quite common, and that people have to be careful when they handle dry sticks of wood, for these poisonous creatures delight to live under the dry bark, or between the crevices. a nice country this to live in! thought i, after killing a snake and a scorpion the same day! so when i lay down on my pillow, which was merely a piece of wood, i looked up to see if there was any scorpions upon it. i did not see any; but, during the night, i awoke suddenly and started up. i thought i felt hundreds of them creeping over me, and that one had just stung me, and caused me to wake up. the sweat covered my body. i looked around and saw nothing but sleeping people. there was no scorpion to be found. i must have been dreaming. not far from our camp was a beautiful little prairie. i had seen, during my rambles there, several footprints of wild buffaloes; so i immediately told andèké we must go in chase of them. andèké, the son of the king, was a very nice fellow, and was, besides, a good hunter--just the very man i wanted. so we went towards the little prairie, and lay hidden on the borders of it, among the trees. by-and-by i spied a huge bull, who was perfectly unaware of my presence, for the wind blew from him to me; had the wind blown the other way, the animal would have scented me and made off. as it was, he came slowly towards me. i raised my gun and fired. my bullet struck a creeper, on its way, and glanced aside, so i only wounded the beast. turning fiercely, he rushed at me in a furious manner, with his head down. i was scared; for i was, at that time, but a young hunter; i got ready to run, though i had a second barrel in reserve. i thought the infuriated bull was too powerful for me, he looked so big. just as i was about to make my escape, i found my foot entangled and hopelessly caught in a tough and thorny creeper. the bull was dashing towards me with head down and eyes inflamed, tearing down brushwood and creepers, which barred his progress. turning to meet the enemy, i felt my nerves suddenly grow firm as a rock. if i missed the bull all would be over with me. he would gore me to death. i took time to aim carefully, and then fired at his head. he gave one loud, hoarse bellow, and tumbled almost at my feet. in the meantime, andèké was coming to the rescue. i must say i felt very nervous after all was over. but being but a lad, i thought i had done pretty well. it was the first direct attack a wild beast had ever made upon me. i found afterwards, that the bulls are generally very dangerous when wounded. now i must tell you how this beast looked. he was one of the wild buffaloes frequently to be met with in this part of africa. during the greater part of the day they hide in the forest. when much hunted they become very shy. they are generally found in herds of from ten to twenty-five, though i have found them sometimes in much greater number. this animal (_bos brachicheros_) is called by some of the natives "niaré." it is of the size of our cattle. it is covered with thin red hair, which is much darker in the bull than in the cow. the hoofs are long and sharp; the ears are fringed with most beautiful silky hair; the horns are very handsome, and bend backward in a graceful curve. in shape, the buffalo looks like something between an antelope and a common cow; and, when seen afar off, you might think these wild buffaloes were a herd of cattle at home. how glad the people were when andèké and i brought the news that we had killed a bull! there was great rejoicing. but i was tired and remained in the camp; while they went with knives and swords to cut the buffalo to pieces, and bring in the flesh. what a fine place it was for hunting! the animals seemed to come down from the mountains beyond, and remain in the flat woody country along the seashore. there were a great many wild boars. you know we all wanted one of these. so one night andèké and i agreed to go and lie in wait for them on the prairie. in order to look like andèké, i blackened my face and hands with charcoal, so that in the night the colour of my face could not be distinguished. we started from the camp before dark, and reached the prairie before night. i stationed myself behind a large ant-hill not far from the open space. there i lay; one hour passed--two hours--three hours, and still neither wild boar nor buffaloes. i looked at andèké. he was fast asleep, at the foot of another ant-hill close by. once i saw a whole herd of gazelles pass by; but they were too far from me. occasionally a grunt or the cracking of a twig, told me that a wild boar was not far off. at last everything became silent, and i fell asleep unconsciously. suddenly i was awakened by an unearthly roar--the yell of a wild beast. i rubbed my eyes in a hurry--what could be the matter? i looked round me, and saw nothing. the woods were still resounding with the cry that had startled me. then i heard a great crash in the forest, made by some heavy animal running away. then i saw emerge from the forest a wild bull, on whose neck crouched an immense leopard. the poor buffalo reared, tossed, roared and bellowed; but in vain. the leopard's enormous claws were firmly fixed in his victim's body, while his teeth were sunk deeply in the bull's neck. the leopard gave an awful roar, which seemed to make the earth shake. then both buffalo and leopard disappeared in the forest, and the roars, and the crashing of the trees, soon ceased. all became silent again. i had fired at the leopard, but it was too far off. we stayed a week here, and i enjoyed myself very much in the woods. i collected birds and butterflies, killed a few nice little quadrupeds, and then we returned to the seashore village. there the fever laid me low on my bed of sickness. how wretched i felt! i had never had the fever before. for a few days my head was burning hot. when i got better, and looked at myself in my little looking-glass i could not recognise myself; i had not a particle of colour left in my cheeks and i looked as yellow and pale as a lemon. i got frightened. this fever was the forerunner of what i had to expect in these equatorial regions. [illustration] [illustration: enticing the leopard.] chapter iv. a village on the seashore--lying in wait for a leopard. on the promontory called cape st. john, about a degree north of the equator stood a mbinga village, whose chief was called imonga. this was, i think, in the year . the country around was very wild. the village stood on the top of a high hill which ran out into the sea, and formed the cape itself. the waves there beat with great violence against a rock of the tertiary formation. it was a grand sight to see those angry billows white with foam dashing against the shore. you could see that they were wearing away the rock. to land there safely was very difficult. there were only two or three places where between the rocks a canoe could reach the shore. the people were as wild as the country round them, and very warlike. they were great fishermen, and many of them spent their whole time fishing in their little canoes. game being very scarce, there were but few hunters. imonga, the chief, had a hideous large scar on his face, which showed at once that he was a fighting man. not a few of his men showed signs of wounds which they had received in battle. many of these fights or quarrels took place in canoes on the water, among themselves, or with people of other villages. i do not know why, but imonga was very fond of me, and so also were his people. but one thing revolted me. i found that several of imonga's wives had the first joint of their little finger cut off. imonga did this to make them mind him; for he wanted his wives to obey him implicitly. the woods around the village were full of leopards. they were the dread of the people, for they were constantly carrying off some one. at night, they would come into the villages on their errands of blood, while the villagers were asleep. there was not a dog nor a goat left; and within two months three people had been eaten by them; the very places could be seen in the huts where the leopards had entered. they would tear up the thin thatched palm leaves of the roofs, and having seized their victims, they would go back through the hole with a tremendous leap, and with the man in their jaws, and run off into the forest. the last man taken uttered a piercing cry of anguish, which awoke all the villagers. they at once arose and came to the rescue, but it was too late. they only found traces of blood as they proceeded. the leopard had gone far into the woods, and there devoured his victim. of course there was tremendous excitement, and they went into the forest in search of the leopard; but he could never be found. there were so many of these savage beasts that they even walked along the beach, not satisfied with the woods alone; and when the tide was low, during the night, the footprints of their large paws could be seen distinctly marked on the sand. after ten or eleven o'clock at night, no native could be seen on the seashore without torches. during the day the leopard hides himself either in the hollow of some one of the gigantic trees, with which these forests abound, or sleeps quietly on some branch, waiting for the approach of night. he seldom goes out before one o'clock in the morning, unless pressed by hunger, and about four o'clock he goes back to his lair. i was now getting accustomed to face danger. killing the buffalo that attacked me had given me confidence. to kill a leopard must be my next exploit. i selected a spot very near the sands of the sea, where i remarked the leopards used to come every night, when the tide was low. i chose a day when the moon began to rise at midnight, so that it might not be so dark that i could not take a good aim at the leopard, and see what was going on. i then began to build a kind of pen or fortress; and i can assure you i worked very hard at it. every day i went into the forest and cut branches of trees, with which i made a strong palisade. every stick was about six feet high, and was put in the ground about a foot deep. these posts were fastened together with strong creepers. my little fortress, for so i must call it, was about five feet square. this would never answer; for the leopard might leap inside and take hold of me. so with the help of some strong branches all tied strongly together i built a roof. then i made loopholes on all sides for my guns, so that i might fire at the beast whenever he came in sight. i was glad when i had finished, for i felt very tired. my axe was not sharp, and it had required several days to complete my work. one clear starlight night, at about nine o'clock, i went and shut myself up in my fortress. i had taken a goat with me, which i tied a few yards from my place of concealment. it was quite dark. after i had tied the goat, i went back and shut myself very securely inside my stronghold. i waited and waited, but no leopard came. the goat cried all the time. it was so dark that even if the leopard had come i could not have seen it. the moon rose by one o'clock. it was in its last quarter; and very strange and fantastic it made everything look. there were the shadows of the tall trees thrown upon the white sand of the beach, while in the forest the gloom was somewhat greater. the sea came rolling on the beach in gentle waves, which, as they broke, sent up thousands of bright, phosphorescent flashes. there was a dead silence everywhere, except when the goat cried, or some wild beast made the forest resound with its dismal howl. the wind whispered gently, mournfully through the woods. i could not account for it, but now and then a cold shudder ran through me. i was quite alone, for the negro i had taken with me was fast asleep. one o'clock. no leopard. i looked in vain all round me: i could see nothing. two o'clock. nothing yet. suddenly, i spied something a long way off on the beach, so far that i could not make out what it was. it came slowly towards me. what could it be? i asked myself. soon i recognised a big spotted leopard. the goat, which had seen it, began to cry more loudly. the big beast came nearer and nearer. he began to crouch. then he lay flat on the ground. how his eyes glittered! they looked like two pieces of bright, burning charcoal. my heart beat. the first thought that came to me was--is my house strong enough to resist his attack, in case i should wound him, or if, perchance, he should prefer me to the goat, and make an onslaught upon it? the savage beast crawled nearer, and again crouched down on the ground. i took my gun; and, just as i was getting ready to fire, he made an immense leap, and bounded upon the goat. i fired. i do not know how, but, in the twinkling of an eye, the goat was seized, and both leopard and goat disappeared in the dark forest. i fired again, but with no better success. in the morning, i saw nothing but the traces of the poor goat's blood. i did not return to the village till morning; for i dared not go outside of my palisade that night. so, the goat being gone, i concluded i had better light a fire, to warm myself, and drive away the mosquitoes. i always carried a box of matches with me. i struck one, and soon succeeded in making a blaze with the little firewood i had collected. strange enough i must have looked, inside of my cage, while the fire sent its glimmering light around. finally, seeing that everything was well secured, i went to sleep, taking good care to put myself in the middle of the fort, so that if, by any chance, a leopard came, he could not get hold of me with his paw. when i awoke it was broad daylight, and i immediately started for imonga's village. [illustration] [illustration: flocks of birds.] chapter v. the bay of corisco--the mangrove trees--the wonderful flocks of birds--what i found in the pouch of a pelican--how an old king is buried, and the new king crowned. now that you have followed me in the benito country, and to cape st. john, i will take you a little further down the coast to the bay of corisco. there, two rivers empty their waters into the sea. one of them is called the muni river, and the other the monda. i will leave the muni, for we shall have to come to it by-and-by, and will speak to you only of the monda. it is throughout a low-banked swampy stream. the banks are covered with mangrove trees. every limb or branch that grows in the water is covered with oysters--real oysters too; so that at low tide you can see, in some places for a long distance, immense beds of this kind of shell-fish. the mangroves, on which the oysters grow so curiously, are very extraordinary trees. the main trunk, or parent tree, grows to an immense size. from a single tree a whole forest will grow up in time, for the branches send down shoots into the ground, which in their turn take root and become trees; so that, generally, almost the whole of the mangrove forest may be said to be knitted together. the inhabitants of the country at the mouth of the river are called shekiani. they are a very warlike tribe, and many of them are armed with guns, which they obtain from the vessels that come here from time to time to buy bar wood, ivory, or india-rubber. i arrived at the mouth of the river, in a small canoe, manned by several mbinga men. the canoe was made of the trunk of a single tree, and had a mat for a sail. at the mouth of the river, high above the swamps that surround its banks, are two hills. on the top of one of these hills, a village was situated. there i stayed. it was a village of insignificant size. at low tide, the high muddy banks of the river are exposed. so many birds as are there, i never saw elsewhere: they are to be seen in countless thousands. the shore, the mud islands, and the water were so covered with them, that it was really a sight worth seeing. here and there flocks of pelicans swam majestically along, keeping at a good distance from my canoe. you would probably wish to know what these pelicans are like. i will tell you. they are large birds, and have an enormous bill, under which is a large pouch, capable of containing several pounds of fish. they have webbed feet, and their feathers are white. i wish you could see them looking out for their prey. how slyly they pry in the water for the fish they are in search of, and how quickly they pounce upon them unawares with their powerful beak! in an instant the fish are killed and stored away in the pouch; and when this is full, then master pelican begins to eat. the fish are put in the pouch as if it were a storehouse. now and then a string of flamingoes go stretching along the muddy shore, looking for all the world like a line of fire. most beautiful are these flamingoes! and very singular they appear when not on the wing, but standing still on their long red legs! they are very wild, however, and difficult of approach. wherever the mud peeped out of the water, there were herons, cranes, gulls of various kinds. scattered everywhere were seen those beautiful white birds (_egretta flavirostris_). some of the shore trees were covered with them, looking like snow in the distance. of course i wished to kill some of these birds. so i took a tiny little canoe, and covered it with branches of trees, that the birds might think it was a tree coming down the stream, as is often the case. then i took a shekiani with me to paddle, and, putting two guns in the canoe, we made for the pelicans. the sly birds seemed to suspect something, and did not give me a chance to approach them for a long time. but, as you know, in order to succeed in anything, people must have patience and perseverance. so, after chasing many, i finally succeeded in approaching one. he was just in the act of swallowing a big fish, when--bang!--i fired, and wounded him so that he could not fly. his wing had been broken by my shot. at the noise made by firing my gun, the birds flew away by thousands. i made for master pelican. the chase became exciting; but at last we succeeded in coming near him. but how to get hold of him was now the question. his wing only was broken; and, with his great beak, he might perhaps be able to cut one of my fingers right off. i was afraid to spoil his feathers if i fired again. he became exhausted, and with one of the paddles i gave him a tremendous blow on the head, which stunned him. another blow finished him, and we lifted him into the canoe. i cannot tell you how pleased i was. his pouch was full of fish. they were so fresh that i resolved to make a meal out of them. i had hardly put the bird at the bottom of the canoe, when there came flying towards me a flock of at least two hundred flamingoes. in a moment i had my gun in readiness. would they come near enough for me to get a shot at them? i watched them anxiously. yes! now they are near enough; and--bang! bang!--i fired the two barrels right into the middle of the flock, and two beautiful flamingoes fell into the water. quickly we paddled towards them. in order to go faster i took a paddle also, and worked away as well as i could. they were dead. both had received shots in the head. we made for the shore. when i opened the pouch of the pelican--just think of it!--i found a dozen large fishes inside! they were quite fresh; and i am sure they had not been caught more than half an hour. you will agree with me that the pelican makes quick work when he goes a-fishing. in the evening i felt so tired that i went straight to bed; and i slept so soundly, that if the shekianis had chosen, they could have murdered me without my even opening my eyes. this village had a new king; and i wondered if his majesty were made king in the same fashion as the sovereign of the mpongwe tribe; a tribe of negroes among whom i have resided, and i will tell you how their king was made. old king glass died. he had been long ailing, but clung to life with determined tenacity. he was a disagreeable old heathen; but in his last days he became very devout--after his fashion. his idol was always freshly painted, and brightly decorated; his fetich, or "monda," was the best cared for fetich in africa, and every few days some great doctors were brought down from the interior, and paid a large fee for advising the old king. he was afraid of witchcraft: he thought everybody wanted to put him out of the way by bewitching him. so the business of the doctors was to keep off the witches, and assure his majesty that he would live a long time. this assurance pleased him wonderfully, and he paid his doctors well. the tribe had got tired of their king. they thought, indeed, that he was himself a most potent and evil-disposed wizard; and, though the matter was not openly talked about there were very few natives indeed who would pass his house after night, and none who could be tempted inside, by any slighter provocation than an irresistible glass of rum. in fact, if he had not been a great king, he would probably have been killed. when he got sick at last, everybody seemed very sorry; but several of my friends told me in confidence, that the whole town hoped he would die; and die he did. i was awakened one morning, by those mournful cries and wails with which the african oftener covers a sham sorrow than expresses a real grief. all the women of the village seemed to be dissolved in tears. it is a most singular thing to see how readily the women of africa can supply tears on the slightest occasion, or for no occasion at all. they will cry together, at certain times of the day, on mourning occasions, when a few minutes before they were laughing. they need no pain or real grief to excite their tears. they can, apparently, weep at will. the mourning and wailing on this occasion lasted six days. on the second day the old king was secretly buried, by a few of the most trusty men of the tribe, very early in the morning, before others were up; or perhaps at night. some said he had been buried at night, while others said he had been buried in the morning, thus showing that they did not know. this custom arises from a belief that the other tribes would much like to get the head of the king, in order that with his brains they might make a powerful fetich. during the days of mourning, the old men of the village busied themselves in choosing a new king. this, also, is a secret operation, and the result is not communicated to the people generally till the seventh day. it happened that njogoni (fowl), a good friend of mine, was elected. i do not know that njogoni had the slightest suspicion of his elevation. at any rate, he shammed ignorance very well. while he was walking on the shore, on the morning of the seventh day--probably some one had told him to go--he was suddenly set upon by the entire populace, who proceeded with a ceremony which is preliminary to the crowning. in a dense crowd they surrounded him, and then began to heap upon him every manner of abuse that the worst of mobs could imagine. some spat in his face. some beat him with their fists, not very hard of course. some kicked him. others threw dirty things at him. those unlucky cues who stood on the outside and could only reach the poor fellow with their voices, assiduously cursed him, and also his father, and especially his mother, as well as his sisters and brothers, and all his ancestors to the remotest generation. a stranger would not have given a farthing for the life of him who was presently to be crowned. amid the noise and struggle, i caught the words which explained all to me; for every few minutes some fellow, administering a comparatively severe blow or kick, would shout out, "you are not our king yet; for a little while we will do what we please with you. by-and-by we shall have to do your will." njogoni bore himself like a man, and a prospective king, and took all this abuse with a smiling face. when it had lasted about half an hour, they took him to the house of the old king. here he was seated, and became again for a little while the victim of his people's curses and ill-usage. suddenly all became silent, and the elders of the people rose, and said solemnly (the people repeating after them), "now we choose you for our king; we engage to listen to you, and to obey you." then there was silence; and presently the silk hat, of "stove-pipe" fashion, which is the emblem of royalty among the mpongwe and several other tribes, was brought in, and placed on njogoni's head. he was then dressed in a red gown, and received the greatest marks of respect from all those who had just now abused him. then followed six days of festival, during which the poor king, who had taken the name of his predecessor, was obliged to receive his subjects in his own house, and was not allowed to stir out. the whole time was occupied in indescribable gorging of food, and drinking of bad rum and palm wine. it was a scene of beastly gluttony and drunkenness and uproarious confusion. strangers came from the surrounding villages. everything to eat and drink was furnished freely, and all comers were welcome. old king glass, for whom during six days no end of tears had been shed, was now forgotten; and _new_ king glass, poor fellow, was sick with exhaustion. finally, the rum and palm wine were drank up, the food was eaten, the allotted days of rejoicing had expired, and the people went back to their homes. [illustration] [illustration: scene with the mbousha.] chapter vi. an old man killed for witchcraft--my journey to the country of the cannibals--starting on the route. in the year i was again in the equatorial regions. i was in the great forest, on my way to the cannibal country; yes, the country where the people eat one another. it was a long way off, and how was i to get there through the dense jungle? how was i to find my way in that vast african forest? these were the thoughts that troubled me when i was in the village of dayoko. the village of dayoko lies not far from the banks of the ntambounay river, and is surrounded by beautiful groves of plantain trees. dayoko is one of the chiefs of the mbousha tribe, and a wild and savage set of people they are i can tell you. but dayoko became my friend, and said he would spare me a few men to take me part of the way. these mbousha people look very much like the shekiani i have already described. they are superstitious and cruel, and believe in witchcraft. i stayed among them only a few days. i will now tell you what i saw there. in a hut i found a very old man. his wool (hair) was white as snow, his face was wrinkled, and his limbs were shrunken. his hands were tied behind him, and his feet were placed in a rude kind of stocks. several negroes, armed to the teeth, stood guard over him, and now and then insulted him by angry words and blows, to which he submitted in silence. what do you suppose all this meant? this old man was to be killed for witchcraft! a truly horrible delusion this witchcraft is! i went to dayoko, the chief, to try to save the old man's life, but i saw it was in vain. during the whole night i could hear singing all over the town as well as a great uproar. evidently they were preparing for the sacrifice of the old man. early in the morning the people gathered together with the fetich-man. his blood-shot eyes glared in savage excitement, as he went around from man to man. in his hands he held a bundle of herbs with which he sprinkled, three times, those to whom he spoke. meantime, there was a man on the top of a high tree close by, who shouted, from time to time, "jocou! jocou!" at the same time shaking the trees. "_jocou_" means "devil" among the mbousha; and the business of this man was to scare the evil spirit, and keep it away. at last they all declared that the old man was a most potent wizard, that he had killed many people by sorcery, and that he must be killed. you would like to know, i dare say, what these africans mean by a wizard, or a witch? they believe that people have, within themselves, the power of killing anyone who displeases them. they believe that no one dies unless some one has bewitched him. have you ever heard of such a horrible superstition? hence those who are condemned for witchcraft are sometimes subjected to a very painful death; they are burnt by slow fire, and their bodies are given to the bashikouay ant to be devoured. i shall have something to tell you about ants by-and-by. the poor wretches are cut into pieces; gashes are made over their bodies and cayenne pepper is put into the wounds. indeed it makes me shudder to think of it, for i have witnessed such dreadful deaths, and seen many of the mutilated corpses. after i witnessed the ceremony, the people scattered, and i went into my hut, for i was not well. after a while i thought i saw a man pass my door, almost like a flash, and after him rushed a horde of silent but infuriated men towards the river. in a little while, i heard sharp, piercing cries, as of a man in great agony, and then all became still as death. i came out, and going towards the river was met by the crowd returning, every man armed, with axe, spear, knife or cutlass; and these weapons, as well as their own hands, and arms, and bodies were sprinkled with blood. they had killed the poor old man they called a wizard, hacked him to pieces, and finished by splitting open his skull, and scattering the brains into the water. then they returned. at night these blood-thirsty men seemed to be as gentle as lambs, and as cheerful as if nothing had happened. ought we not to be thankful that we were born in a civilized country? now came the "grand palaver" over my departure. i called dayoko and all the elders of the village together. when they had all assembled, i told them i must go into the fan country inhabited by the cannibals. dayoko said i should be murdered by the cannibals, and eaten up, and tried to dissuade me from going. finally i said that go i would. so it was determined that i should go under dayoko's protection. accordingly he gave me two of his sons to accompany me, and ordered several men to carry my chests, guns, powder, bullets, and shot. they were to take me to one of dayoko's fathers-in-law, a mbondemo chief who lived in the mountains. i was going farther and farther from the sea; if the savages were to leave me and run away in the forest, what would become of me? we started in canoes, ascended the muni river, and then paddled up the river called the ntambounay (you must not mind these hard names, they are not of my choice. i must call things by the names the natives give them). after paddling all day, towards sunset we all felt very tired; for we had gone a long way up the river, and reached a shekiani village. i was quite astonished to meet shekiani here, but so it happened. i shall always remember this shekiani village, for i thought i should be murdered and plundered there. after we had landed in the village, i was told at once, that i could not go any further, for the road belonged to them. i must pay a tribute of six shirts similar to those i wore, three great-coats, beads, etc., etc. this would have entirely ruined me. i could not sleep at all. through the whole night a crowd surrounded my hut, talking, shouting, and singing in the greatest excitement. my guns and revolvers were all loaded and i made up my mind not to be killed without fighting desperately. if i was to die, i resolved at all events to die like a brave man. all my party were in my hut except dayoko's two sons, who had gone to talk with the shekiani chief. the shekiani chief was a friend of dayoko, and dayoko's sons told him i was their father's stranger-friend. at last, things became more quiet; and, towards morning, the people were still or asleep. we left the hut. all was still peaceful. my men said that dayoko's sons had a big fetich to avert war. i gave a present to the shekiani chief, and off we started. we left our large canoes and took smaller ones; for we were to go through a very small stream. as we ascended the beautiful river, we could see the lofty mountains of the interior. a great many islands studded the stream. from the trees on the banks, the monkeys looked down at us with astonishment. what curious creatures they were, with their black faces peeping out through the dark foliage, and looking as if they were making grimaces at us. by-and-by we left the river and made our way along the creeks or through the woods towards the mbondemo village. now and then we walked freely through the wide openings which the elephants had made. the rushing of a herd of elephants effects quite a clearing in the forest. on we went, till finally we came to a place where a great number of large trees had been prostrated. wherever we looked, trees were lying on the ground, many of them of enormous size. as i looked i heard, not far off, a tremendous crash--a most awful noise. i could not conjecture what was the matter. it turned out that a tree had come down; and as it fell, being a huge one, it crushed a dozen others around it, and each as it broke gave a great crash, so that the combined effect was awful to hear. we had to go through these fallen trees; and what tough work it was! i never had seen anything like it. now we had to climb on a fallen tree and follow its trunk; then we had to come down, and were entangled in its branches or in those of other trees. at other times we had to creep under them. i was continually afraid that my gun would be fired off by some creepers or boughs getting hold of the trigger. at last, when my patience was entirely gone, and my few clothes literally hanging in ribbons about me, my legs sadly wounded, and my face and hands scratched, we arrived at the camp of the mbondemos, situated almost at the foot of the mountain. these mountains were covered with an immense forest; and so thick were the trees that no open view could be obtained in any direction. the mountains ended somewhere in the interior, no one knew where, but this they knew, that it was near the home of the fans, a cannibal tribe, and that elephants were plentiful, and gorillas were occasionally seen there. this encampment of the mbondemos was called an olako. there was not a house in the camp, and it was a romantic scene to look at. scattered under huge trees, on the edge of the woods, were leafy shelters, opening towards the forest. under these the people lived. a few sticks put close together formed their beds. they contrived to sleep upon them, and i did the same. i assure you that they were hard enough, and reminded me that a mattress was a very good thing. every family had its fire prepared beside the beds; and around these fires in the evening they clustered, men, women, and children. the chief of this mbondemo encampment was called mbéné, and i liked him very much. he was very kind to me, and always tried to furnish me with food. there was scarcity of provisions, at the time, in the camp of the mbondemos. there were no plantain and cassada fields near, and often i had to go without breakfast or dinner. the people lived chiefly on the nuts of the forest, and at that season of the year these were very scarce. poor mbéné said they had very little to eat, but would give me what they could. i had carried with me a few little crackers, which i found very precious, more precious than gold, and which i reserved for time of sickness; but one by one they disappeared. i looked at them every time i took one; but i felt so hungry that i could not refrain from eating them. have you known what hunger is--real craving hunger? i can assure you it is a dreadful feeling. during that time of the year, this people had half the time nothing to eat but the nut of a kind of palm. this nut was so bitter i could scarcely eat it. it is shaped like an egg, with rounded ends. to prepare it for eating, it is divested of its husk, and soaked in water for twenty-four hours, when it loses part of its exceedingly bitter taste, and becomes tolerably palatable, that is, to a starving man. sometimes hunger will make them eat the nut without soaking it. i have done so myself, when lost in the forest. it is dreadfully disagreeable. now and then, the women succeeded in getting a few little fish in the streams, and gave me some. i could bear a good deal, for i had firmly resolved to go into the cannibal country. these mbondemos are continually moving their villages. mbéné has moved his village three times within a few years. i asked him why he made these frequent changes. he said he moved the first time because a man had died, and the place was "not good" after that event. the second time he was forced to move because they had cut down all the palm trees, and would get no more mimbo (palm wine), a beverage of which they are excessively fond. they tap the palm, just as the maple tree is tapped in america, only they tap the tree at the top. this palm wine has somewhat of a milky colour; and, when drunk in great quantity, it intoxicates. the palm trees are very plentiful all over this part of the country, and it seems easier for them to move than to take care of the trees surrounding their settlements, useful as they are to them; for they furnish not only the wine they love, but the bitter nut i mentioned before, which often keeps them from actual starvation. when the tree is cut down they get what we call the palm cabbage which grows at the top. when cooked this palm cabbage is very good. a country which has plenty of palm trees, plenty of game, a good river or rivulet, and plenty of fish, is the country for a mbondemo settler or squatter. in these forests there is a vine or creeper which i might call the traveller's vine. if thirsty you may cut it, and within less than a minute a tumblerful of water will come out of it. this vine hangs about in the forest, and seemed to me to grow without leaves. what a capital thing it would be if water were not abundant in this country! the water procured from it has hardly any taste, and is perfectly pure and limpid. being unable to endure the continual hunger, i called mbéné, and told him that his place had no food to give, and he must take me to a country where there was something to eat, and which would be on my way to the fan country. good mbéné said, "spirit, i will try the best i can to take you where you want to go. i will send some of my people with you." in the meantime, dayoko's people had all returned to their village. these forests had no game. i spent hour after hour scouring the forest, but i could see nothing, except birds, some of which were extremely pretty. i am afraid that if i had succeeded in killing a snake i should have eaten it, as i felt desperately hungry. i did not like the bitter nuts; so it was agreed that mbéné's brother mcomo, together with several of his people, should accompany me as far as the country of the fan tribe. i could hardly believe such good news to be true. mbéné's wife always cooked my food. she was a dear good old woman, and i gave her a fine necklace of beads when i left. she was delighted with my present. they were big white porcelain beads of the size of a pigeon's egg. one day mbéné succeeded in getting a fowl for me. his wife cooked it; she made soup, and put plenty of cayenne pepper into it. i had also some plantain. how i enjoyed this meal! the more so that it was probably the last i should get for a good many days, unless we were unusually lucky, and should kill some antelopes or elephants on our road to the fan country. elephant meat is execrable, as you would say on tasting it. but as you may not have the chance i will tell you by-and-by how it tastes. as much food as possible was collected for our journey, and at last everything was ready. [illustration] [illustration: killing the snake. chap. vii.] [illustration] chapter vii. our journey through the wilderness continued--a rebellion in camp--nothing to eat--i shoot a fish and miss an elephant--i kill a big snake, and the others eat him--my first sight of gorillas. before we renewed our journey the natives had done all they could to gather provisions; but the result was poor enough. by going to distant villages they had succeeded in getting a few bunches of plantain. mcomo, mbéné's brother, backed out. he said he was not going into the cannibal country to be eaten up. but i must tell you that mbéné had some friends among the cannibals. and he sent with me two of his sons called miengai and makinda, together with twelve good hunters, and six women who were the wives of some of the men. the women carried the provisions, etc. i took seventy pounds of shot and bullets, nineteen pounds of powder, ten pounds of arsenic for preserving the birds and animals i should kill, for i knew i should probably succeed in getting some new specimens. when all was arranged, when everybody had taken leave of all his friends, for this was a very great journey, and they came back half-a-dozen times to take leave over again, or say something they had forgotten, when all the shouting and quarrelling about who should carry the smallest load was over, we at last got away. we had left the camp of mbéné behind us at a distance of about five miles when we came to the banks of a little river called the noonday, a clear and beautiful stream. i was ahead of the party with miengai, and was waiting for the others to come up before crossing. as we stood on the banks i spied a fish swimming along. immediately the thought came into my mind, "how nicely that fish would taste if i could get it and boil it in a pot over the fire!" i fired a charge of small shot into it; but no sooner had i pulled the trigger than i heard a tremendous crash on the opposite bank about six or seven yards off. small trees were torn down violently, and then we heard the shrill trumpetings of a party of frightened elephants. they were probably sleeping or standing in a dead silence on the opposite bank in the jungle. i was sorry i had fired, for after crossing the stream we might have killed an elephant. poor miengai was terribly vexed. "i am sure," said he, "they had big tusks of ivory." our party, as soon as they heard the gun, came up in haste, and asked what was the matter. when they heard the story they began to lament our not killing an elephant; for then we should have had meat enough for the whole journey; and they shouted with one accord: "elephant meat is so good!" this exclamation made me wonder how an elephant steak would taste. on we went, and got fairly into the mountainous country. the hills became steeper as we advanced. how tired i felt; for the diet at mbéné's camp had not strengthened me. these mbondemos had a great advantage over me. they used their bare feet almost as deftly as monkeys, and hence got their foothold more easily than i. miengai and i were in advance. all at once he made me a sign to keep very still. i thought he had discovered a herd of elephants, or seen the traces of an enormous leopard. he cocked his gun; i cocked mine; the other men did the same; and there we stood in perfect silence, for at least five minutes. suddenly miengai sent a "hurrah" echoing through the forest. it was immediately answered by shouts from many voices not very far off, but whose owners were hidden from us by huge rocks and trees. miengai replied with the fierce shout of the mbondemo warriors, and was again answered. thinking we were going to have a general fight, i looked carefully after my powder flask and my bullets, and found they were all right. going a little farther on, we came in sight of the encampment of a large party, who proved to be some of mbéné's people just returning from a trading expedition to the interior. two men of this camp offered to go with us. their names were ngolai and yeava. we consented to take them. what a journey it was! nothing but thick woods to struggle through, hills to climb, rivers to cross, and nearly all the time it rained; in fact, i was wet from morning to night. how glad i was when, in the evening, we had made our camp, and built great fires! for my part, i had three fires lit about my bed of leaves; and in the evening i always hung up my clothes to dry, so as to have them ready for the next day. one morning my men came to tell me they were tired, and would not go a step farther unless i gave them more cloth. they seemed in earnest; and i began to question myself whether they meant to plunder me or to leave me in these mountains. to be left thus alone would have been almost certain death. to give them what they asked was to show them i was afraid of them. if they knew i was afraid of them i did not know what they might next do. so i determined to put on a bold front. taking my two revolvers in my hand, i said: "i will not give you any more cloth. i will not let you leave me, because your father mbéné has given you to me to accompany me to the fan tribe. you must therefore go with me, or" (here i motioned with my pistols) "there will be war between us. but," said i, "this is a very hard road, and at the end of the journey i will give you something more." this satisfied them, and we again resumed our journey. up, and up, and up we struggled, and now we began to meet with immense boulders. not the scream of a bird, or the shrill cry of a monkey, broke the stillness of the dark solitude. nothing was heard but the panting breaths of our party as we ascended the hills. at last we came to an immense mountain torrent, which rushed down the hillside with fearful force, and was white with foam. its course was full of huge granite boulders, which lay about as though the titans had been playing at skittles in that country. against these the angry waters dashed as if they would carry all before them, and, breaking, threw the milky spray up to the very tree-tops. as i looked up the torrent seemed to pour its foaming waters directly down upon us. this was the head of the ntambounay river which i had ascended in a canoe, and on the banks of which i came near being murdered in the shekiani village. what a change had taken place in it! here a canoe would be dashed into a hundred pieces against the rocks. i was so thirsty and tired that i went to the river's bank, and drank a few handfuls of the pure, clean cold water. after resting a little while, we continued our course till we reached the top of a very high mountain, whence i could see all the country round. how wild and desolate it looked! nothing but forest and mountains stretching away as far as the eye could reach. i was sitting under a very large tree, when, suddenly looking up, i saw an immense serpent coiled upon the branch of a tree just above me; and i really could not tell whether he was not about to spring upon me and entangle me in his huge folds. you may well believe that i very quickly "stood from under." i rushed out, and taking good aim with my gun, i shot my black friend in the head. he let go his hold, tumbled down with great force, and after writhing convulsively for a time, he lay before me dead. he measured thirteen feet in length, and his ugly fangs proved that he was venomous. my men cut off the head of the snake, and divided the body into as many pieces as there were people. then they lighted a fire, and roasted and ate it on the spot. they offered me a piece; but, though very hungry, i declined. when the snake was eaten i was the only individual of the company that had an empty stomach; i could not help reflecting on the disadvantage it is sometimes to have been born and bred in a civilized country, where snakes are not accounted good eating. we now began to look about the ruins of the village near which we sat. a degenerate kind of sugar-cane was growing on the very spot where the houses had formerly stood. i made haste to pluck some of this, and chew it for the little sweetness it had. while thus engaged my men perceived what instantly threw us all into the greatest excitement. here and there the cane was beaten down or torn up by the roots; and, lying about, were fragments which had evidently been chewed. there were also footprints to be seen, which looked almost like those of human beings. what could this mean? my men looked at each other in silence, and muttered, "nguyla!" (gorillas!). it was the first time i had seen the footprints of these wild men of the woods, and i cannot tell you how i felt. here was i now, it seemed, on the point of meeting, face to face, that monster, of whose ferocity, strength, and cunning the natives had told me so much, and which no white man before had hunted. my heart beat till i feared its loud pulsations would alarm the gorilla. i wondered how they looked. i thought of what hanno the carthaginian navigator said about the wild hairy men he had met on the west coast of africa more than two thousand years ago. by the tracks it was easy to know that there must have been several gorillas in company. we prepared at once to follow them. the women were terrified. they thought their end had come--that the gorilla would be soon upon them. so, before starting in search of the monster, we left two or three men to take care of them and reassure them. then the rest of us looked once more carefully at our guns; for the gorilla gives you no time to reload, and woe to him whom he attacks! we were fortunately armed to the teeth. my men were remarkably silent, for they were going on an expedition of more than usual risk; for the male gorilla is literally the king of the forest--the king of the equatorial regions. he and the crested lion of mount atlas are the two fiercest and strongest beasts of that continent. the lion of south africa cannot be compared with either for strength or courage. as we left the camp, the men and women left behind crowded together, with fear written on their faces. miengai, ngolai, and makinda set out for the hunt in one party; myself and yeava formed another. we determined to keep near each other; so that in case of trouble, or in a great emergency, we might be at hand to help one another. for the rest, silence and a sure aim were the only cautions to be given. as we followed the footprints, we could easily see that there were four or five of them, though none appeared very large. we saw where the gorillas had run along on all fours, which is their usual mode of progression. we could perceive also where, from time to time, they had seated themselves to chew the canes they had borne off. the chase began to be very exciting. we had agreed to return to the women and their guards and consult about what was to be done, after we had discovered the probable course of the gorilla; and this was now done. to make sure of not alarming our prey, we moved the whole party forward a little way, to some leafy huts, built by passing traders, and which served us for shelter and concealment. here we bestowed the women, whose lively fear of the terrible gorilla arises from various stories current among the tribes, of women having been carried off into the woods by the fierce animal. then we prepared once more to set out on our chase, this time hopeful to get a shot. looking once more to our guns, we started off. i confess that i was never more excited in my life. for years i had heard of the terrible roar of the gorilla, of its vast strength, of its fierce courage when only wounded. i knew that we were about to pit ourselves against an animal which even the enormously large leopards of the mountains fear, which the elephants let alone, and which perhaps has driven away the lion out of this territory; for the "king of beasts," so numerous elsewhere in africa, is not met with in the land of the gorilla. we descended a hill, crossed a stream on a fallen log, crept under the trees, and presently approached some huge boulders of granite. in the stream we had crossed we could see plainly signs that the animals had just crossed it, for the water was still disturbed. our eyes wandered everywhere to get a glimpse of our prey. alongside of the granite blocks lay an immense dead tree, and about this the gorillas were likely to be. our approach was very cautious; i wish you could have seen us. we were divided into two parties. makinda led one, and i the other. we were to surround the granite block, behind which makinda supposed the gorillas to be hiding. with guns cocked and ready we advanced through the dense wood, which cast a gloom, even in midday, over the whole scene. i looked at my men, and saw that they were even more excited than myself. slowly we pressed on through the dense bush, dreading almost to breathe, for fear of alarming the beasts. makinda was to go to the right of the rock, while i took the left. unfortunately he and his party circled it at too great a distance. the watchful animals saw him. suddenly i was startled by a strange, discordant, half human, devilish cry, and beheld four young and half-grown gorillas running towards the deep forest. i was not ready. we fired, but hit nothing. then we rushed on in pursuit; but they knew the woods better than we. once i caught a glimpse of one of the animals again; but an intervening tree spoiled my mark, and i did not fire. we pursued them till we were exhausted, but in vain. the alert beasts made good their escape. when we could pursue no more we returned slowly to our camp, where the women were anxiously expecting us. i protest i felt almost like a murderer when i saw the gorilla this first time. as they ran on their hind legs, with their heads down, their bodies inclined forward, their whole appearance was that of hairy men running for their lives. add to all this their cry, so awful, yet with something human in its discordance, and you will cease to wonder that the natives have the wildest superstitions about these "wild men of the woods." in our absence the women had made large fires, and prepared the camp. i changed my clothes, which had become drenched by the frequent torrents and puddles we ran through in our eager pursuit. then we sat down to our supper, which had been cooked in the meantime. i noticed that all my plantains were gone--eaten up. what was to become of us in the great forest? i had only two or three biscuits, which i kept in case of actual starvation or sickness. as we lay by the fire in the evening before going to sleep, the adventure of the day was talked over to those who had not gone with us; and, of course, there followed some curious stories of the gorillas. i listened in silence. one of the men told a story of two mbondemo women who were walking together through the woods, when suddenly an immense gorilla stepped into the path, and, clutching one of the women, bore her off in spite of the screams and struggles of both. the other woman returned to the village much frightened, and told the story. of course her companion was given up for lost. great was the surprise when, a few days afterwards, she returned to her home. "yes," said one of the men, "that was a gorilla inhabited by a spirit." this explanation was received by a general grunt of approval. one of the men told how, some years ago, a party of gorillas were found in a cane-field tying up the sugar-cane in regular bundles, preparatory to carrying it away. the natives attacked them, but were routed, and several killed, while others were carried off prisoners by the gorillas; but in a few days they returned home, not uninjured indeed, for the nails of their fingers and toes had been torn off by their captors. then several people spoke up, and mentioned names of dead men whose spirits were known to be dwelling in gorillas. finally came the story that is current among all the tribes who are acquainted with the habits of the gorilla, that this animal will hide himself in the lower branches of a tree, and there lie in wait for people who go to and fro. when one passes sufficiently near, the gorilla grasps the luckless fellow with his powerful feet, which he uses like giants' hands, and, drawing the man up in to the tree, he quietly chokes him there. hunger and starvation began to tell upon us severely. when we started i did not calculate on meeting with gorillas. i had eaten all my sea bread. there was not a particle of food among us, and no settlement near us. i began to feel anxious for fear that we should die. berries were scarce; and nuts were hardly to be found. the forest seemed deserted. there was not even a bird to kill. to make matters worse, we had been misled. we were lost--lost in the great forest!--and we failed to reach a certain settlement where we had expected to arrive. travelling on an empty stomach is too exhausting to be very long endured. the third day i awoke feeble, but found that one of the men had killed a monkey. this animal, roughly roasted on the coals, tasted delicious. how i wished we had ten monkeys to eat! but how glad and grateful we were for that single one. presently, makinda, looking up, discovered a beehive. he smoked the bees out, and i divided the honey. there might have been a fight over this sweet booty had i not interposed and distributed it in equal shares. serving myself with a portion not bigger than i gave the rest, i at once sat down, and devoured honey, wax, dead bees, worms, dirt, and all; i was so hungry. i was only sorry we had not more. i had really a hard time getting through the old elephant tracks, which were the best roads through the jungle. the men seemed to have lost their way. we saw no animals, but found several gorillas' tracks. at last my men began to talk more cheerfully; they knew where they were: and, soon after, i saw the broad leaves of the plantain, the forerunner of an african town. but, alas! as we approached, we saw no one coming to meet us; and when we reached the place we found only a deserted village. but even for this how thankful i was! since i left dayoko i had experienced nothing but hunger and starvation; and these were the first human habitations we had met. presently, however, some mbicho people made their appearance. they were relatives of mbéné, and their village was close by. they gave us some plantains, but no fowls. i wished very much to get a fowl. i felt gouamba (which means hunger) for meat, and knew that a good warm fowl broth would have done me a great deal of good. we spent the evening in the houses, drying and warming ourselves. it was much better than the forest, even if it was only a deserted town. i asked if we should ever reach the cannibal country, and found that, with the exception of the mbicho village near at hand, we were already surrounded on three sides by fan villages. i was too tired to rest. besides, i was getting deep into the interior of africa, and was in the neighbourhood of the fans, the most warlike tribe that inhabited the country. so i barricaded my hut, got my ammunition ready, saw that my guns were all right, and then lay awake for a long time, before i could go to sleep. [illustration] [illustration: king astonished at looking-glass.] chapter viii. i arrive among the cannibals--their spears, bows, and battle-axes--they take me for a spirit--their king shakes when he sees me--i give him a looking-glass--it astonishes him. we were, at last, near the fan country. we had passed the last mbichos village, and were on our way to the villages of the _man-eaters_. i remember well the first fan village i approached. it stood on the summit of a high hill in the mountains. all its inhabitants were very much excited when they perceived we were coming towards it, through the plantation path; for the trees around the hill had been cut down. the men were armed to the teeth, as we entered the village, and i knew not whether hundreds of spears and poisoned arrows might not be thrown at me, and i be killed on the spot. what dreadful spears those cannibals had; they were all barbed. each man had several in his hand; and, besides, had a shield made of elephant's hide, to protect himself with. others were armed with huge knives, and horrible-looking battle-axes, or with bows and poisoned arrows. wild shouts of astonishment, which, for all i knew, were war-shouts, greeted me as i entered the village. i must own that i felt not quite at my ease. how wild and fierce these men looked! they were most scantily dressed. when they shouted, they showed their teeth, which were filed to a point, and coloured black. their open mouths put me uncomfortably in mind of a tomb; for how many human creatures each of these men had eaten! how ugly the women looked! they were all tattooed, and nearly naked. they fled with their children into their houses, as i passed through the street, in which i saw, here and there, human bones lying about. yes, human bones from bodies that had been devoured by them! such are my recollections of my first entrance into a village of cannibals. the village was strongly fenced, or palisaded; and on the poles were several skulls of human beings and of gorillas. there was but a single street, about two-thirds of a mile long. on each side of this were low huts, made of the bark of trees. i had hardly entered the village when i perceived some bloody remains, which appeared to me to be human. presently we passed a woman who was running as fast as she could towards her hut. she bore in her hand a piece of a human thigh, just as we should go to market and carry thence a joint or steak. this was a very large village. at last we arrived at the palaver house. here i was left alone with mbéné for a little while. there was great shouting going on at a little distance, at the back of some houses. one of them said they had been busy dividing the body of a dead man, and that there was not enough for all. they flocked in presently, and soon i was surrounded by an immense crowd. not far from me was a ferocious-looking fellow. on one arm he supported a very large shield, made of an elephant's hide, and of the thickest part of the skin, while in his other hand he held a prodigious war-knife, which he could have slashed through a man in a jiffy. some in the crowd were armed with cross-bows, from which were shot either iron-headed arrows, or the little, insignificant-looking, but really most deadly darts, tipped with poison. these are made of slender, harmless reeds, a foot long, whose sharpened ends are dipped in a deadly vegetable poison, which these people know how to make. these poisoned darts are so light that they would blow away, if simply laid in the groove of the bow. hence they use a kind of sticky gum to hold them. the handle of the bow is ingeniously split; and, by a little peg, that acts as a trigger, the bow-string is disengaged. the bow is very stiff and strong, and sends the arrow to a great distance. as you see by the representation of a fan bowman, they have to sit down and apply both feet to the middle of the bow, while they pull with all their strength on the string to bend it back. these little poisoned arrows are much dreaded by them, and are very carefully kept in little bags, which are made of the skin of wild animals. some bore on their shoulders the terrible war-axe. a single blow of this axe suffices to split a human skull. i saw that some of these axes, as well as their spears and other ironwork, were beautifully ornamented. the war-knife, which hangs by their side, is a terrible weapon. it is used in hand-to-hand conflict, and is designed to be thrust through the enemy's body. there was also another sort of huge knife used by some of the men in the crowd before me. it was a foot long, about eight inches wide, and is used to cut through the shoulders of an adversary. it must do tremendous execution. a few of the men had also a very singular pointed axe, which is thrown from a distance. when thrown, it strikes with the point down, and inflicts a terrible wound. they handle it with great dexterity. the object aimed at with this axe is the head. the point penetrates to the brain, and kills the victim immediately. the spears were six or seven feet long, and are ingeniously adapted to inflict terrible wounds. they are thrown with an accuracy and a force which never ceased to astonish me. the long, slender staff fairly whistles through the air; and woe to the man who is within twenty or thirty yards of their reach. most of the knives and axes were ingeniously sheathed in covers made of snake or antelope skins, or of human skin. these sheaths were slung round the shoulder or neck by cords, which permit the weapon to hang at the side, out of the wearer's way. these fan warriors had no armour. their only weapon of defence is the huge shield of elephant hide, of which i spoke to you. it is three and a half feet long, by two and a half feet wide. besides their weapons, many of the men wore a small knife, as a table-knife, or jack-knife. from this description of the men by whom i was surrounded, you may judge with what amazement i looked around me, with my guns in my hands. it was a grand sight to see such a number of stalwart, martial, fierce-looking fellows, fully armed, and ready for any desperate fray, gathered together. finer-looking savages i never saw; and i could easily believe them to be brave; and the completeness of their war-like equipments proved that fighting is a favourite pastime with them. no wonder they are dreaded by all their neighbours! here was i, at this time only a lad, alone in the midst of them. presently came the king, a ferocious-looking fellow. his body was naked. his skin in front was painted red, and his chest, stomach, and back were tattooed in a rude but effective manner. he was covered with charms, and he wore round his neck a necklace made with leopard's teeth. he was fully armed. most of the fans wore queues; but the queue of ndiayai, the king, was the biggest of all, and terminated in two tails, in which were strung brass rings. his beard was plaited in several plaits, which contained white beads. his teeth were filed sharp to a point. he looked like a perfect glutton of human flesh. i looked around me in a cool, impassive manner. ndiayai, the king, fairly shook at the sight of me. he had refused to come and see me, at first, from a belief that he would die in three days after setting eyes on me. but mbéné had persuaded him to come. ndiayai was accompanied by the queen, the ugliest woman i ever saw, and very old. she was called mashumba. she was nearly naked, her only covering being a strip of cloth about four inches wide, made of the soft bark of a tree, and dyed red. her body was tattooed in the most fanciful manner; her skin, from long exposure, had become rough and knotty. she wore two enormous iron anklets, and had, in her ears, a pair of copper rings, two inches in diameter. i could easily put my little fingers in the holes through which the earrings passed. the people looked at me, wondered at my hair, but never ceased to look at my feet. "look at the strange being," said they to each other, "his feet are not of the colour of his face, and he has no toes!" finally, the king said to mbéné that, when surrounded by his people, he was not afraid of anybody. i could well believe him. when fighting they must look perfect devils. when night came i entered my house, and looked about to see how i could barricade myself for the night; for i did not fancy putting myself entirely at the mercy of these savage fans. their weapons had been sufficient to show me that they were men who were not afraid to fight. i told mbéné to send for ndiayai. the king came, and i presented him a large bunch of white beads, a looking-glass, a file, fire-steels, and some gun-flints. his countenance beamed with joy. i never saw such astonishment as he exhibited when i held the looking-glass before his face. at first he did not know what to make of it, and did not want to take the glass, till mbéné told him that he had one. he put his tongue out, and he saw it reflected in the looking-glass. then he shut one eye, and made faces; then he showed his hands before the looking-glass--one finger--two fingers--three fingers. he became speechless, and with all i had given him, he went away as "happy as a king"; and "every inch a (savage) king" he was. shortly afterwards, mashumba, the queen, thinking that probably i had something for her, also came and brought me a basketful of plantains. they were cooked. at once the idea rushed into my mind, that perhaps the very same pot that cooked the plantains had cooked a fan's head in the morning; and i began to have a horrible loathing of the flesh-pots of these people. i would not have cooked in their pots for the world. a little after dark, all became silent in the village. i barred my little bit of a door as well as i could with my chest, and, lying down on that dreadful fan bed, i placed my gun by my side, and tried hard, but in vain, to go to sleep. i wondered how many times human flesh had entered the hut i was in. i thought of all i had seen during the day, which i have related to you. the faces of those terrible warriors, and the implements of war, were before my eyes though it was pitch dark. was i afraid? certainly not. what feeling was it that excited me? i cannot tell you. it was certainly not fear; for if anyone the next day had offered to take me back where i came from, i should have declined the offer. probably i was agitated by the novel and horrible sights that had greeted my eyes, and which exceeded all my previous conceptions of africa. now and then i thought that as these men not only killed people, but ate them also, they might perhaps be curious to try how i tasted. hour after hour passed, and i could not get to sleep. i said my bed was a dreadfully bad one. it was a frame composed of half a dozen large round bamboos. i might as well have tried to sleep on a pile of cannonballs. finally, i succeeded in going to sleep, holding my gun tightly under my arm. when i got up in the morning, and went out at the back of the house, i saw a pile of ribs, leg and arm bones, and skulls, piled together. the cannibals must have had a grand fight, not long before, and devoured all their prisoners of war. in what was i to wash my face? i resolved at last not to wash at all. [illustration: entrapping the elephant.] chapter ix. an elephant hunt. after a few days the fans began to get accustomed to me, and i to them; and we were the best friends in the world. they are great hunters. one day a woman returning from the plantations brought news, that she had seen elephants; and that one of the plantain fields had been entirely destroyed by them. this was an event of common occurrence in the country; for the elephants are not very particular, and whatever they like they take; not caring a bit how much hunger they may occasion among the poor natives. when the news arrived, a wild shout of joy spread among the villagers. the grim faces of the fans smiled; and in doing so, showed their ugly filed teeth. "we are going to kill elephants," they all shouted. "we are going to have plenty of meat to eat," shrieked the women. so in the evening a war-dance took place; a war-dance of cannibals! it was the wildest scene i ever saw. it was pitch-dark; and the torches threw a dim light around us, and showed the fantastic forms of these wild men. really it was a wild scene. they were all armed as if they were going to war. how they gesticulated! what contortions they made! what a tumult they raised! how their wild shouts echoed from hill to hill, and died away in the far distance! they looked like demons. their skins were painted of different colours; and, as the dancing went on, their bodies became warm, and shone as if they had been dipped in oil. suddenly a deafening shout of the whole assemblage seemed to shake the earth. their greatest warrior (leopard) came to dance. leopard was, it appears, the bravest of them all. he had killed more people in war than anybody else. he had given more human food to his fellow-townsmen than many other warriors put together. hence they all admired and praised him; and a song describing his feats of arms was sung by those who surrounded him. how ferocious he looked! he was armed to the teeth. he had a spear like one of those i have already described. a long knife hung by its side, and the hand that held the shield carried a battle-axe also. in dancing, he acted at times as if he were defending himself against an attack; at other times, as if he were himself attacking somebody. once or twice i really thought he meant to throw his spear at someone. i could hardly breathe while looking at him. he appeared actually to be a demon. finally he stopped from sheer exhaustion, and others took his place. the next day the men furbished up their arms. i myself cleaned my guns, and got ready for the chase; so that, if i could get a chance, i might send a bullet through an elephant. the war-dish was cooked. it is a mixture of herbs, and is supposed to inspire people with courage. they rubbed their bodies with it, and then we started. there were about five hundred men. after leaving the village we divided into several parties. each party was well acquainted with the forest, and knew just where to go. the march was conducted in perfect silence, so that we might not alarm the elephants. after proceeding six hours we arrived not far from the hunting-ground where the elephants were supposed to be. the fans built shelters, and these were hardly finished when it began to rain very hard. the next day some fans went out to explore the woods, and i joined the party. the fallen trees, the broken-down limbs, the heavy footprints, and the trampled underbrush, showed plainly that there had been many elephants about. there were no regular walks, and they had strayed at random in the forest. when the elephants are pleased with a certain neighbourhood, they remain there a few days. when they have eaten all the food they like, and nothing remains, they go on to some other place. the forest here, as everywhere else, was full of rough, strong, climbing plants, many of which reach to the top of the tallest trees. they are of every size; some bigger than a man's thigh, while many are as large as the ropes of which the rigging of a ship is made. these creepers the natives twist together; and, after working very hard, they succeed in constructing a huge fence, or obstruction. of course, it is not sufficient to hold the elephant; but when he gets entangled in its meshes, it is strong enough to check him in his flight, till the hunters can have time to kill him. when an elephant is once caught, they surround the huge beast, and put an end to his struggles by incessant discharges of their spears and guns. while the others worked, i explored the forest. seeing that the men were careful in avoiding a certain place, i looked down on the ground, and saw nothing. then, looking up, i saw an immense piece of wood suspended by the wild creepers, high in the air; and, fixed in it at intervals, i saw several large, heavy, sharp pointed pieces of iron pointing downwards. the rope that holds up this contrivance is so arranged that the elephant cannot help touching it, if he passes underneath. then the _hanou_ (such is the name given to the trap) is loosened, it falls with a tremendous force on his back; the iron points pierce his body, and the piece of wood, in falling, generally breaks his spine. i also saw in different places, large, deep ditches, intended as pitfalls for the elephant. when he runs away, or roams around at night, he often falls into these pits, and that is the end of him; for, in falling, he generally breaks his legs. sometimes, when the natives go and visit the pit they have made, they find nothing but the bones of the elephant and his ivory tusks. the fence that the natives had made must have been several miles long, and in many places was several rows deep; and now there were elephant pits beside, and the _hanous_. we were, you must remember, in a mountainous country; and i could scarcely believe my eyes when i saw plainly the footprints of this animal where i myself had to hold to the creepers to be able to ascend. when everything was ready, part of the men went silently and hid themselves upon the limbs or besides the trunks of trees near the barrier or "tangle." others of us took a circuitous route in an opposite direction from that in which we had come. after we had got miles away from the "tangle," we formed a chain as long in extent as the fence, and moved forward, forming a semi-circle, with the men ten or twenty yards apart from each other. presently, all along the line the hunting horns were sounded, wild shouts were sent up, and, making all the noise they could, the fans advanced in the direction of the "tangle." the elephants were entrapped. hearing the noise, of course they moved away from us, breaking down everything before them in their flight. if they tried to go to the right, they heard the same wild shouts; if they tried to go to the left, they heard the same. there was no other way for them to go but straight ahead; and there, though they did not know it, were the tangle, the pits, and the _hanous_. they were going to surer death than if they had tried to break our lines; for then most, if not all of them, would have escaped. we were too far from each other to hinder them. onward we pressed, the circle of those giving chase becoming smaller and smaller, and the crashing of the underbrush more distinct, as we approached the elephants in their flight. the men's countenances became excited. they got their spears in readiness; and soon we came in sight of the tangles. what an extraordinary sight lay before me; i could distinguish one elephant, enraged, terrified, tearing at everything with his trunk and feet, but all in vain! the tough creepers of the barrier in no instance gave way before him. spear after spear was thrown at him. the fans were everywhere, especially up on the trees, where they were out of the reach of the elephant. the huge animal began to look like a gigantic porcupine, he was stuck so full of spears. poor infuriated beast! i thought he was crazy. every spear that wounded him made him more furious! but his struggles were in vain. he had just dropped down when i came close to him; and to end his sufferings, i shot him through the ear. after a few convulsions of limb all became quiet. he was dead. some of the elephants had succeeded in going through the tangle, and were beyond reach. four elephants had been slain; and i was told that a man had been killed by one of the elephants, which turned round and charged his assailants. this man did not move off in time, and was trampled under foot by the monstrous beast. fortunately, the elephant got entangled; and, in an instant, he was covered with spears, and terribly wounded. after much loss of blood he dropped down lifeless. i am sure you will agree with me, after the description i have given of a fan elephant hunt, that the men of this tribe are gifted with remarkable courage and presence of mind. they have certain rules for hunting the elephant. these tell you never to approach an elephant, except from behind; he cannot turn very fast, and you have, therefore, time to make your escape. he generally rushes blindly forward. great care must also be taken that the strong creepers, which are so fatal to the elephant, do not also catch and entangle the hunters themselves. a man lying in wait to spear an elephant should always choose a stout tree, in order that the infuriated beast, should he charge at it, may not uproot it. the next day, there was a dance round the elephant, while the fetich-man cut a piece from one of the hind legs. this was intended for their idol. the meat was cooked in presence of the fetich-man, and of those who had speared the elephant. as soon as all the meat had been cooked they danced round it; and a piece was sent into the woods for the spirit to feed upon, if he liked. the next day, the meat was all cut up in small pieces, then hung up and smoked. the cooking and smoking lasted three days, and i can assure you it is the toughest meat i ever tasted. of course, like the fans, i had no other food; and for three days i ate nothing but elephant meat. i wish i could give you a notion how it tastes; but really i do not know what to compare it with. beef, mutton, lamb, pork, venison, make not the slightest approach to a resemblance: and as for poultry, such a comparison would be positively aggravating! the proboscis being one of the favourite morsels, a large piece of it was given to me. the foot is another part reputed to be a great dainty, and two feet were sent me, together with a large piece of the leg for a roast. but the meat was so tough that i had to boil it for twelve hours; and then i believe it was as tough as ever; it seemed to be full of gristle. so, the next day, i boiled it again for twelve hours; all my trouble, however, was unavailing, for it was still hopelessly tough! i may say, that the more i ate of elephant meat the more i got to dislike it. i do not think i shall ever hanker after elephant steak as long as i live. i wonder if you boys would like it? i wish i had some, and could induce you to taste of it. i am inclined to think you would agree with me, and never desire to renew your acquaintance with it. how glad i was when i returned to ndiayai village; and no wonder, for we had rain every day in the woods. as for the poor man who had been killed by the elephant, his body was sent to another clan to be devoured; for the cannibals do not eat their own people. [illustration] [illustration: fan blacksmiths at work.] chapter x. life among the cannibals--curious musical instruments--cooking utensils--a blacksmith's bellows and anvil--cannibal diet. after we reached ndiayai, i went back to my little hut, and found everything i had left there. i had hidden my powder and shot in different places, and had dug holes in which to hide my beads. the news had spread among the surrounding cannibal villages that the spirit, as they called me, was still in the village of ndiayai, and the people flocked to see me. among those who came to see me, was a chief of the name of oloko. he gave me the long war knife, of which you have seen a drawing, and explained to me how it had several times gone right through a man. mbéné went away for a while, and left me entirely alone with these cannibals. during his absence i studied the habits of these strange people; and you may be sure that wherever i went i kept my eyes wide open. by the way, i see i have omitted to give a description of the town of king ndiayai. it was a very large town, composed of a single street. when i say a large town, i do not mean, of course, that it could bear any comparison as to size with london, paris, or new york. i mean that it was a large town for this part of africa. it contained five or six hundred men. the houses were quite small, and were all made of the bark of trees; none of them had windows. they were nearly all of the same size. strange to say, these fans seemed to be very fond of music, and very funny instruments they make use of. to hear some of their music would make you laugh. they have not the slightest idea of what we consider harmony in sound; but they evidently have a great liking for music after their own notion. it is very much the same with their dancing. they have not the slightest idea of the dances in use with us, such as waltzes, galops, polkas, or quadrilles; and i am sure if they were to see us dancing in our fashion, they would laugh quite as much as you would laugh if you could see them capering in their uncouth style. like all the savage tribes of africans, they are very fond of the tom-tom, or drum. those drums are of different sizes, but many are from four to six feet in length, and about ten inches in diameter at one end, but only six or seven at the other. the wood is hollowed out quite thin, and skins of animals are stretched tightly over the ends. the drummer holds the tom-tom slantingly between his legs; and, with two sticks, he beats furiously upon the larger end of the drum, which is held uppermost. sometimes they beat upon it with their hands. the people form a circle round the tom-tom, and dance and sing, keeping time with it. they often invited me to hear them. but now i am going to speak to you of a far more curious instrument. it is called by these cannibals the handja; and i never saw it except among their tribes. ndiayai was very fond of hearing the handja, and i often went to his shed to hear someone play upon it. sometimes, on these occasions, ndiayai would come out surrounded by queen mashumba and some of his other wives, and listen for an hour or two to the music of the handja. i give you a representation of the handja (_see_ p. ), so you will understand better when i describe it to you. it consists of a light reed frame, about three feet long, and eighteen inches wide, in which are set, and securely fastened, a number of hollow gourds. the handja i saw contained seven gourds. these gourds are covered by strips of a hard, red wood, found in the forest. these gourds and cylinders, as you see, are of different sizes, so graduated that they form a regular series of notes. each gourd has a little hole which is covered with a skin thinner than parchment. and what kind of skin do you think it was? it was the skin of the very large spider which abounds in that country, and from which i should not care to receive a bite, it is so poisonous. the performer sits down, with the frame across his knees, and strikes the strips lightly with a stick. there are two sticks, one of hard wood, the other of much softer wood. the instrument is played on the same principle as a chime of bells, or an instrument used in france, and which, perhaps, some of you have seen, composed of a series of glasses. the tone of the handja is very clear and good, and though their tunes were rude, they played them with considerable skill. [illustration: the handja.] the fans work iron better than any tribe i met with. they are very good blacksmiths. their warlike habits have made iron a very necessary article to them. it is very plentiful in their mountainous country. before you is a picture of two fan blacksmiths. look at the curious bellows they have. it is made of two short, hollow cylinders of wood, surmounted by skins, very well fitted on, and having an appropriate valve for letting in the air. as you see, the bellows-blower is on his knees, moving down these coverings with great rapidity. there are two small wooden pipes, connected with two iron tubes which go into the fire. the anvil, as you see in the picture, is a solid piece of iron. the sharp end is stuck into the ground; and the blacksmith sits alongside his anvil, and beats his iron with a singular-looking hammer, clumsy in form, and with no handle; in fact it is merely made of a heavy piece of iron. the blacksmiths sometimes spend many days in making a battle-axe, knife or spear. they make, also, their own cooking utensils and water-jugs. these are of the shape you see in the picture before you. they also make their own pipes, for they are great smokers. some of their pipes are not at all ungraceful in shape. besides the water-jug, they frequently use the calabash, as a vessel to carry water in; and some of their calabashes are really pretty, and very nicely ornamented. some of the spoons, with which they eat their human broth, are very beautiful. they are made of various woods, and sometimes of ivory. it is quite sickening to think what horrible people these fans are! such inveterate cannibals are they, that they even eat the poor wretches who die of disease. as i was talking to the king one day, some fans brought in a dead body, which they had bought or bartered for, in a neighbouring town, and which was to be divided among them. i could see that the man had died of some disease; for the body was very lean. they came round it with their knives; and ndiayai left me to superintend the distribution. i could not stand this; and when i saw them getting ready, i left the spot, and went to my hut. afterwards, i could hear them growing noisy over the division of their horrid spoil. in fact, the fans seem to be perfect ghouls. those who live far in the interior practise unblushingly their horrid custom of eating human flesh. it appears they do not eat the dead of their own family, but sell the corpse to some other clan, or make an agreement that when one of their number dies they will return the body in exchange. until i saw these things i could not believe a story i had often heard related among the mpongwe tribe, which is as follows: a party of fans once came down to the seashore to view the ocean. while there, they actually stole a freshly-buried body from the cemetery, and cooked and ate it. another body was taken by them and conveyed into the woods, where they cut it up, and smoked the flesh. these acts created a great excitement among the mpongwes. but you must not think that the fans are continually eating human flesh. they eat it when they can get it, but not every day. they kill no one on purpose to be eaten. one day ndiayai took me to an osheba town, the king of which tribe was his friend; and let me tell you that the oshebas were also great man-eaters, like the fans, whom they greatly resemble in appearance. the chief of that osheba village was called bienbakay. the fans are the handsomest and most resolute-looking set of negroes i have ever seen in the interior. eating human flesh does not seem to disagree with them, though i have since seen other fan tribes whose men had not the fine appearance of these mountaineers. here, as everywhere else, the character of the country doubtless has much to do with the matter of bodily health and growth. these cannibals were living among the mountains, and had come from still higher mountain regions, and this accounts for their being so robust and hardy. the strangest thing in connection with the fans, next to their hideous cannibalism, is their constant encroachments upon the land westward. year by year they have been advancing nearer to the sea. town after town has been settled by them on the banks of the gaboon river. in fact, they seem to be a conquering race, driving every other tribe before them. the colour of these people is dark brown rather than black. they feed much upon manioc and the plantain. they have also two or three kinds of yams, splendid sugar-cane, and squashes, all of which they cultivate with considerable success. manioc seemed to be the favourite food. enormous quantities of squashes are raised, chiefly for the seeds, which, when pounded and prepared in their fashion, are much prized by them, and i confess i relished this food myself. at a certain season, when the squash is ripe, their villages seem covered with the seeds, which everybody spreads out to dry. when dried they are packed in leaves, and placed over the fireplaces in the smoke, to keep off an insect which also feeds upon them. they are all suspended by a cord, for, besides being infested by insects, they are subject to the depredations of mice and rats, both of which are fond of them. the process of preparation is very tedious. a portion of the seeds is boiled, and each seed is divested of its skin; then the mass of pulp is put into a rude wooden mortar and pounded, a vegetable oil being mixed with it before it is cooked. while on the subject of the food of the cannibals, i ought to mention that they do not sell the bodies of their chiefs, kings, or great men; these receive burial, and remain undisturbed. it is probable also that they do not eat the corpses of people who die of special diseases. [illustration: net-hunting.] chapter xi. journey to yoongoolapay--hunting with nets--the terrible bashikonay ants. on my way to the seashore from the cannibal country, i had a good deal of trouble. i had taken quite another route to come back; mbéné and his people left me on the banks of a river called the noya, at the village of a chief called wanga. from there i pushed my way towards yoongoolapay, a village, whose chief is called alapay. but before reaching that place, we came one evening to a village called ezongo. the inhabitants, seeing our heavy loads, turned out with the greatest amount of enthusiasm to receive me. their ardour cooled somewhat when they learned the contents of my packages, for they were the birds and animals i had collected. the rascally chief, thinking i must place a great value on things i had gone so far to get, determined to detain me till i paid a heavy price to get away; and for a while things looked as if i should have a good deal of trouble. the king, urged on by his people, who seemed to be a greedy set of rascals, insisted on his price, which would have left me empty-handed. at last my mbicho guides from the noya tried to settle the matter. they were wise enough to get the king to come to me with them alone. i gave the rascal a coat and an old shirt, and i told him, what was literally true, that i was very poor, and could not pay what his people wanted. after this palaver he went out at once and harangued the turbulent extortioners. so i passed on safely to the village of my old friend, king alapay, whom i had known before, and who was very glad to see me again. he asked me to stay some days; and being really worn out with constant exposure, much anxiety, and frequent annoyance, i determined to do so. his village is charmingly situated upon a high hill, which overlooks the surrounding country, and has a beautiful stream skirting its base. moreover, i found the people very kind, peaceable, and hospitable. a considerable number of independent mbicho villages lay within a circuit of a few miles, the inhabitants of which lived in great harmony with one another, having prudently intermarried to such a degree that they really constitute a large family. i was made welcome among them all, and spent some very pleasant days in hunting with these kind-hearted people, and particularly in that kind of sport called by them _asheza_, or net-hunting, a practice very common among the bakalai, who called it _ashinga_. this singular sport is very much practised in this part of africa; and, as it is generally successful, it is a local amusement, and brings out the best traits of the natives. i was always very fond of it. the ashinga nets are generally made of the fibres of the bark of a kind of tree, which are twisted into stout cords. they are from sixty to eighty feet long, and four to five feet high; and every well-to-do village owns at least one. but, as few villages have enough nets to make a great spread, it generally happens that several unite in a grand hunt, and divide the proceeds, the game caught in any particular net falling to the share of its owners. the first day we went out, the people of half a dozen villages met together at an appointed place, the men of each bringing their nets. then we set out for a spot about ten miles off, where they had a clearing in the dense woods, which had been used before, and was one of their hunting-grounds. we moved along in silence, so as not to alarm the animals which might be near our ground. the dogs--for dogs are used in this hunt--were kept still, and close together. finally, we arrived on the ground, and the work of spreading the toils began. each party stretched a single net, tying it up by creepers to the lower branches of trees. as all worked in the same direction, and each took care to join his net to that of his neighbour, in a very short time we had a line of netting running in a wide half circle, and at least half a mile long. this done, a party went out on each side, to guard against the chance of escape, and the rest of us were ready to beat the bush. we started at about a mile from the nets, and, standing about fifty yards from each other, we advanced gradually, shouting and making all the noise we could, at the same time keeping our arms in readiness to shoot or spear down anything which might come in our way. though this very spot had been frequently used for net-hunting, and was therefore better cleared than the neighbouring woods, yet we were obliged to proceed almost step by step. nearly every native carried, besides his gun, a heavy cutlass or bill, with which it was necessary literally to hew out a way, the vines and creepers making a network which only the beasts of the forest could glide through without trouble. as we advanced, so did the men that guarded the flanks; and thus our party gradually closed round the prey. presently we began to hear shouts, but we could see nothing; and i could only hold my gun in readiness and pray that my neighbours might not shoot me by mistake; for they are fearfully reckless when on a chase. the dogs had for some time been let loose. at last we came in sight of the nets. we had caught a gazelle of very minute size, called _ncheri_. it is a very graceful little animal, and would make a pretty pet, though i have never seen one tamed. a large antelope also was brought to bay, and shot before i came up; and another antelope, being shot at and missed, rushed forward and got entangled in the net. having drawn this cover, we gathered up the nets and went off with the dogs, who enjoyed the sport vastly, to try another place. after walking about three-quarters of an hour we again spread our nets. here we had better luck, catching a considerable number of antelopes, gazelles, and some smaller animals. it was pretty busy work for us. nearly all the animals got very much entangled, and the more they tried to get through the nets the more they became bewildered. before breaking up, all the game caught was laid together, that all might see it. and now i had an opportunity to notice the curious little sharp-eared dogs, about a foot high, which had been so useful in driving the animals into our toils. they stood looking at their prizes with eager and hungry eyes. these dogs often go and hunt for themselves; and it is no unusual thing for half-a-dozen dogs to drive an antelope to the neighbourhood of their village, when their barking arouses the hunters, who come out and kill their quarry. it was almost dark when we returned to the village of alapay. one antelope was put aside for me, being a peculiar species which i wanted to stuff; and the rest of the meat was immediately divided. the villagers were delighted at our luck. we were all very hungry, and cooking began at once. i could hardly wait for the dinner, which was one worthy of an emperor's palate. it consisted of plantain, cooked in various ways, and venison of the tenderest sort, stewed in lemon-juice, and afterwards roasted on charcoal. i was glad to go to bed early, for i felt very tired. i had travelled during the day very nearly thirty miles. but i had scarcely got sound asleep when i was fairly turned out of the house by a furious attack of the bashikonay ants. they were already upon me when i jumped up, and i was bitten by them terribly. i ran out into the street, and called for help and torches. the natives came out, the lights were struck, and presently i was relieved. but now we found that the whole village was attacked. a great army of ants was pouring in on us, attracted doubtless by the meat in the houses, which they had smelt afar off. my unfortunate antelope had probably brought them to my door. all hands had to turn out to defend themselves. we built little cordons of fires, which kept them away from places they had not entered, and in this way protected our persons from their attacks. we scattered hot ashes and boiling water right and left; and towards morning, having eaten everything they could get at, they left us in peace. as was to be expected, my antelope was literally eaten up--not a morsel left. the vast number, the sudden appearance, and the ferocity of these frightful creatures never ceased to astonish me. on this occasion they had come actually in millions. the antelope on which they fed was a vast mass of living ants, which we could not approach; and it was only when many fires were lighted that they were forced from their onward and victorious course, which they generally pursue. then, however, they retreated in parties with the greatest regularity, vast numbers remaining to complete the work of destruction. little would i give for the life of a man who should be tied up to a tree when these ants pass that way and attack him; in two or three hours nothing would be left of him but the bare bones. [illustration] [illustration: mangrove swamp. tumbling and falling.] chapter xii. returning to the coast--caverns and waterfalls in the highlands--crossing a river on mangrove roots--stirring up a big snake--a mutual scare. i left the good villagers of yoongoolapay, and pursued my way to the seashore. on the route we came to a high ridge, or plateau. this was the highest land i had seen between the moonda and the mani, and it is probable that, if it had not been for the trees, i should have seen the ocean very well. along this ridge were strewn some of the most extraordinary boulders i ever saw. these immense blocks of granite covered the ground in every direction. several of them were between twenty and thirty feet high, and about fifty feet long. near the largest of these granite masses a huge rock rose some forty or fifty feet out of the ground. i saw an opening in the solid rock, leading to a fine large cavern. it had no doubt been made by the hands of man; it was not of natural formation, for the entrance had evidently been cut out of the solid rock by human beings; and now it was much used by the natives as a house to stop in over night when they were travelling to and fro. its vast opening admits such a flood of sunlight and air that it is not likely to be used as a lair for wild beasts. we saw the remains of several fires inside, but i am bound to say we saw also the tracks of leopards and other dangerous beasts on the outside, for which reason i did not care to sleep there. while exploring the cavern i thought several times i heard a trickling, which was almost like the noise of rain, and which i had not noticed before, probably on account of the great shouting of my men. but when we got out i was surprised to find not a cloud in the sky. turning for an explanation to alapay, he led me along a path, and as we went forward the trickling noise gradually grew into the sound of rushing waters. presently we came to the edge of a steep declivity, and here i saw before and around me a most charming landscape, the centre of which was a most beautiful waterfall. a little stream, which meandered along the slope of the plateau, and which had hitherto escaped our view, had here worn its way through a vast granite block which barred its course. rushing through the narrow and almost circular hole in this block, it fell in one silvery leap perpendicularly forty or fifty feet. the lower level of the stream ran along between high, steep banks covered with trees, the right bank being quite abrupt. it was a miniature niagara. clear, sparkling, and pure as it could be, the water rushed down to its pebbly bed--a sight so charming that i sat down for some time and feasted my eyes upon it. i then determined to have a view from below. after some difficult climbing we got to the bottom, and there beheld, under the fall, a large hole in the perpendicular face of the rock, which evidently formed the mouth of a cavern. the opening of the cavern was partly hidden by the waterfall, and was cut through solid rock. between the opening and the waterfall there were a few feet of clear space, so that by going sideways one could make good his entrance into the cavern without receiving a shower bath. i determined to enter this cavern; but before venturing i went first and tried to get a peep at the inside. it was so dark that i could see nothing, so it was not very inviting. we lit torches; i took my revolver and gun, and, accompanied by two men, who also were armed with guns, we entered. how dark it was! once inside, we excited the astonishment of a vast number of huge vampire bats. there were thousands and thousands of them. they came and fluttered around our lights, threatening each moment to leave us in darkness, and the motion of their wings filled the cavern with a dull thunderous or booming roar. it really looked an awful place, and the dim light of our torches gave to every shadow a fantastic form. the cavern was rather rough inside. when we had advanced about one hundred yards we came to a stream, or puddle of water, extending entirely across the floor, and barring our way. my men, who had gone thus far under protest, now desired to return, and urged me not to go into the water. it might be very deep; it might be full of horrible water snakes; all sorts of wild beasts might be beyond, and land snakes also. at the word snake i hesitated, for i confess to a great dread of serpents in the dark, or in a confined place, where a snake is likely to get the advantage of a man. a cold shudder ran through me at the thought that, once in the water, many snakes might come and swim round me, and perhaps twist themselves about me as they do around the branches of trees. so i paused and reflected. while peering into the darkness beyond i thought i saw two eyes, like bright sparks or coals of fire, gleaming savagely at us. could it be a leopard, or what? without thinking of the consequences, i levelled my gun at the shining objects and fired. the report, for a moment, deafened us. then came a redoubled rush of the great hideous bats. it seemed to me that millions of these animals suddenly launched out upon us from all parts of the surrounding gloom. some of these got caught in my clothes. our torches were extinguished in an instant, and, panic-stricken, we all made for the cavern's mouth. i had visions of enraged snakes springing after and trying to catch me. we were all glad to reach daylight once more, and nothing could have induced us to try the darkness again. i confess that, though i think it takes a good deal to frighten me, i did not at all relish remaining there in entire darkness. the scene outside was as charming as that within was hideous. i stood a long time looking at one of the most beautiful landscapes i ever beheld in africa. it was certainly not grand, but extremely pretty. before me, the little stream whose fall over the cliff filled the forest with a gentle murmur, resembling very much, as i have said, when far enough off, the pattering of a shower of rain, ran along between steep banks, the trees of which seemed to meet above it. away down the valley we could see its course, traced like a silver line over the plain, till it was lost to our sight in a denser part of the forest. i have often thought of these caverns since i saw them, and i have regretted that i did not pay more attention to them. if i had made my camp in the vicinity, and explored them and dug in them for days, i think that i should have been amply rewarded for the trouble. at that time i did not feel greatly interested in the subject. i had not read the works of m. boucher de perthes and others, or heard that the bones of animals now extinct had been discovered in caverns in several parts of europe, and that implements made of flint, such as axes, sharp-pointed arrows, etc., etc., had been found in such places. if i had excavated i might perhaps have found the remains of charcoal fires, or other things, to prove that these caverns had been made by men who lived in africa long before the negro. i feel certain these caverns must have been human habitations. i do not see how they could have been made except by the hand of man. on my last journey i thought once or twice of going to them from the fernand-vaz, to explore and dig in them. i thought i might be rewarded for labour by discovering the bones of unknown beasts, or of some remains of primitive men. these caverns are fortunately not far away from the sea--i should think not more than ten or fifteen miles--and are situated between the muni and the moonda rivers. anyone desiring to explore them would easily find the way to them. the cavern under the waterfall would be extremely interesting to explore. the valley itself was a pleasant wooded plain, which, it seemed, the hand of man had not yet disturbed, and whence the song of birds, the chatter of monkeys, and the hum of insects came up to us, now and then, in a confusion of sounds very pleasant to the ear. but i could not loiter long over this scene, being anxious to reach the seashore. after we set off again we found ourselves continually crossing or following elephant tracks, so we walked very cautiously, expecting every moment to find ourselves face to face with a herd. by-and-by the country became quite flat, the elephant tracks ceased, and presently, as we neared a stream, we came to a mangrove swamp. it was almost like seeing an old friend, or, i may say, an old enemy, for the remembrances of mosquitoes, tedious navigation, and malaria which the mangrove tree brought to my mind were by no means pleasant. it is not very pleasant to be laid up with african fever, i assure you. from a mangrove tree to a mangrove swamp and forest is but a step. they never stand alone. presently we stood once more on the banks of the little stream, whose clear, pellucid water, had so charmed me a little farther up the country. now it was only a swamp, a mangrove swamp. its bed, no longer narrow, was spread over a flat of a mile, and the now muddy water meandered slowly through an immense growth of mangroves, whose roots extended entirely across, and met in the middle, where they rose out of the mire and water like the folds of some vast serpent. it was high tide. there was not a canoe to be had. to sleep on this side, among the mangroves, was to be eaten up by the mosquitoes, which bite much harder than those of america, for they can pierce through your trousers and drawers. this was not a very pleasant anticipation, but there seemed to be no alternative, and i had already made up my mind that i should not be able to go to sleep. but my men were not troubled at all with unpleasant anticipations. we were to cross over, quite easily too, they said, on the roots which projected above the water, and which lay from two to three feet apart, at irregular distances. it seemed a desperate venture, but they set out jumping like monkeys from place to place, and i followed, expecting every moment to fall in between the roots in the mud, there to be attacked, perhaps, by some noxious reptile whose rest my fall would disturb. i had to take off my shoes, whose thick soles made me more likely to slip. i gave all my baggage, and guns, and pistols to the men, and then commenced a journey, the like of which i hope never to take again. we were an hour in getting across--an hour of continual jumps and hops, and holding on. in the midst of it all a man behind me flopped into the mud, calling out, "omemba!" in a frightful voice. now, _omemba_ means snake. the poor fellow had put his hands on an enormous black snake, and, feeling its cold, slimy scales, he let go his hold and fell. all hands immediately began to run faster than before, both on the right and the left. there was a general panic, and every one began to shout and make all kinds of noises to frighten the serpent. the poor animal also got badly scared, and began to crawl away among the branches as fast as he could. unfortunately his fright led him directly towards me, and a general panic ensued. everybody ran as fast as he could to get out of danger. another man fell into the mud below, and added his cries to the general tumult. two or three times i was on the point of getting a mud bath myself, but i luckily escaped. my feet were badly cut and bruised, but at last we were safe across, and i breathed freely once more, as soon after i saw the deep blue sea. [illustration: slave barracoons. burial ground. chap. xiii.] [illustration] chapter xiii. cape lopez and an open prairie once more--king bango and his three hundred wives--his five idols--slave barracoons--the corpse and the vultures. cape lopez is a long sandy arm of land reaching out into the sea. as you approach it from the ocean it has the appearance of overflowed land. it is so low that the bushes and the trees growing on it seem, from a distance seaward, to be set in the water. the bay formed by cape lopez is about fourteen miles long. among several small streams which empty their water into it is the nazareth river, one of whose branches is the fetich river. the bay has numerous shallows and small islands, and abounds in all sorts of delicious fish. on the cape itself many large turtles from the ocean come to lay their eggs. i will tell you by-and-by what a nice time i had fishing at cape lopez; but i have many other things to talk about before i come to that. i arrived at cape lopez one evening when it was almost dark. the next morning i prepared myself for a visit to king bango, the king of the country. the royal palace is set up on a tolerably high hill, and fronts the seashore. between the foot of this hill and the sea there is a beautiful prairie, over which are scattered the numerous little villages called sangatanga. i never tired of looking at this prairie. i had lived so long in the gloomy forest that it gave me great delight to see once more the green and sunlit verdure of an open meadow. i found the royal palace surrounded by a little village of huts. as i entered the village i was met by the _mafouga_, or officer of the king, who conducted me to the palace. it was an ugly-looking house of two stories, resting on pillars. the lower story consisted of a dark hall, flanked on each side by rows of small dark rooms, which looked like little cells. at the end of the hall was a staircase, steep and dirty, up which the mafouga piloted me. when i had ascended the stairs i found myself in a large room, at one end of which was seated the great king bango, who claims to be the greatest chief of this part of africa. he was surrounded by about one hundred of his wives. king bango was fat, and seemed not over clean. he wore a shirt and an old pair of pantaloons. on his head was a crown, which had been presented to him by some of his friends, the portuguese slavers. over his shoulders he wore a flaming yellow coat, with gilt embroidery, the cast-off garment of some rich man's lacquey in portugal or brazil. when i speak of a crown you must not think it was a wonderful thing, made of gold and mounted with diamonds. it was shaped like those commonly worn by actors on the stage, and was probably worth, when new, about ten dollars. his majesty had put round it a circlet of pure gold, made with the doubloons he got in exchange for slaves. he sat on a sofa, for he was paralyzed; and in his hand he held a cane, which also answered the purpose of a sceptre. this king bango, whom i have described so minutely, was the greatest slave king of that part of the coast. at that time there were large slave depôts on his territory. he is a perfect despot, and is much feared by his people. he is also very superstitious. though very proud, he received me kindly, for i had come recommended by his great friend, rompochombo, a king of the mpongwe tribe. he asked me how i liked his wives. i said, very well. he then said there were a hundred present, and that he had twice as many more, three hundred in all. fancy three hundred wives! he also claimed to have more than six hundred children. i wonder if all these brothers and sisters could know and recognise each other! the next night a great ball was given in my honour by the king. the room where i had been received was the ball-room. i arrived there shortly after dark, and i found about one hundred and fifty of the king's wives, and i was told that the best dancers of the country were there. i wish you could have seen the room. it was ugly enough; there were several torches to light it; but, notwithstanding these, the room was by no means brilliantly illuminated. the king wanted only his wives to dance before me. during the whole of the evening not a single man took part in the performance; but two of his daughters were ordered to dance, and he wanted me to marry one of them. not far from the royal palace were three curious and very small houses, wherein were deposited five idols, which were reputed to have far greater power and knowledge than the idols or gods of the surrounding countries. they were thought to be the great protectors of the oroungou tribe, and particularly of sangatanga and of the king. so i got a peep inside the first house. there i saw the idol called pangeo; he was made of wood, and looked very ugly; by his side was his wife aleka, another wooden idol. pangeo takes care of the king, and of his people, and watches over them at night. i peeped also into the second little house. there i saw a large idol, called makambi, shaped like a man, and by his side stood a female figure, abiala his wife. poor makambi is a powerless god, his wife having usurped the power. she holds a pistol in her hand, with which, it is supposed, she can kill anyone she pleases; hence the natives are much afraid of her; and she receives from them a constant supply of food, and many presents (i wonder who takes the presents away). when they fall sick, they dance around her, and implore her to make them well; for these poor heathen never pray to the true god. they put their trust in wooden images, the work of their own hands. i looked into the third house, and there i saw an idol called numba. he had no wife with him, being a bachelor deity. he is the oroungou neptune and mercury in one--neptune in ruling the waves, and mercury in keeping off the evils which threaten from beyond the sea. as i came away after seeing the king, i shot at a bird sitting upon a tree, but missed it, for i had been taking quinine and was nervous. but the negroes standing around at once proclaimed that this was a "fetich bird,"--a sacred bird--and therefore i could not shoot it, even if i fired at it a hundred times. i fired again, but with no better success. hereupon they grew triumphant in their declarations; while i, loth to let the devil have so good a witness, loaded again, took careful aim, and, to my own satisfaction and their utter dismay, brought my bird down. during my stay in the village, as i was one day out shooting birds in a grove, not far from my house, i saw a procession of slaves coming from one of the barracoons toward the farther end of my grove. as they came nearer, i saw that two gangs of six slaves each, all chained about the neck, were carrying a burden between them, which i knew presently to be the corpse of another slave. they bore it to the edge of the grove, about three hundred yards from my house; and, throwing it down there on the bare ground, they returned to their prison, accompanied by the overseer, who, with his whip, had marched behind them. "here, then, is the burying-ground of the barracoons," i said to myself sadly, thinking, i confess, of the poor fellow who had been dragged away from his home and friends; who, perhaps, had been sold by his father or relatives to die here and be thrown out as food for the vultures. even as i stood wrapped in thought, these carrion birds were assembling, and began to darken the air above my head; ere long they were heard fighting over the corpse. the grove, which was, in fact, but an african aceldama, was beautiful to view from my house; and i had often resolved to explore it, or to rest in the shade of its dark-leaved trees. it seemed a ghastly place enough now as i approached it more closely. the vultures fled when they saw me, but flew only a little way, and then perched upon the lower branches of the surrounding trees, and watched me with eyes askance, as though fearful i should rob them of their prey. as i walked towards the corpse, i felt something crack under my feet. looking down, i saw that i was already in the midst of a field of skulls and bones. i had inadvertently stepped upon the skeleton of some poor creature who had been lying here long enough for the birds and ants to pick his bones clean, and for the rains to bleach them. i think there must have been the relics of a thousand skeletons within sight. the place had been used for many years; and the mortality in the barracoons is sometimes frightful, in spite of the care they seem to take of their slaves. here their bodies were thrown, and here the vultures found their daily carrion. the grass had just been burnt, and the white bones scattered everywhere, gave the ground a singular, and, when the cause was known, a frightful appearance. penetrating farther into the bush, i found several great piles of bones. this was the place, years ago--when cape lopez was one of the great slave markets on the west coast, and barracoons were more numerous than they are now--where the poor dead were thrown, one upon another, till even the mouldering bones remained in high piles, as monuments of the nefarious traffic. such was the burial-ground of the poor slaves from the interior of africa. [illustration] [illustration: embarking slaves.] chapter xiv. slave barracoons--a big snake under my bed--a slave ship off the coast. one day i passed by an immense enclosure, protected by a fence of palisades about twelve feet high, and sharp-pointed at the top. passing through the gate, which was standing open, i found myself in the midst of a large collection of shanties, surrounded by shady trees, under which were lying, in various positions, a great many negroes. as i walked round, i saw that the men were fastened, six together, by a little stout chain, which passed through a collar secured about the neck of each. here and there were buckets of water for the men to drink; and they being chained together, when one of the six wanted to drink, the others had to go with him. then i came to a yard full of women and children. these could roam at pleasure through their yard. no men were admitted there. these people could not all understand each other's language; and you may probably wish to know who they were. they were africans belonging to various tribes, who had been sold, some by their parents or by their families; others by the people of their villages. some had been sold on account of witchcraft; but there were many other excuses for the traffic. they would find suddenly that a boy or girl was "dull," and so forth, and must be sold. many of them came from countries far distant. some were quite merry; others appeared to be very sad, thinking that they were bought to be eaten up. they believed that the white men beyond the seas were great cannibals, and that they were to be fattened first and then eaten. in the interior, one day, a chief ordered a slave to be killed for my dinner, and i barely succeeded in preventing the poor wretch from being put to death. i could hardly make the chief believe that i did not, in my own country, live on human flesh. under some of the trees were huge caldrons, in which beans and rice were cooking for the slaves; and others had dried fish to eat. in the evening they were put into large sheds for the night. one of the sheds was used as a hospital. in the midst of all this stood the white man's house--yes, the white man's house!--and in it were white men whose only business was to buy these poor creatures from the oroungou people! after i had seen everything, i left the barracoon--for that is the name given to such a place as i have just described. i wandered about, and it was dark before i returned to the little bamboo house which the king had given me. i got in, and then, striking a match carefully, i lighted a torch, so that i might not go to bed in darkness. you may smile when i say bed, for my couch was far from bearing any resemblance to our beds at home, with mattresses and pillows, and sheets and blankets. travellers in equatorial africa are utter strangers to such luxuries. after i had lighted the torch, i cast my eyes round to see if anything had been disturbed; for a thief, so disposed, could easily break into these houses. i noticed something glittering and shining under my akoko, or bedstead. the object was so still that i did not pay any attention to it; in fact, i could not see it well by the dim light of the torch. but when i approached the bed to arrange it, i saw that the glitter was produced by the shining scales of an enormous serpent, which lay quietly coiled up there within two feet of me. what was i to do? i had fastened my door with ropes. if the snake were to uncoil itself and move about, it might, perhaps, take a spring and wind itself about me, quietly squeeze me to death, and then swallow me as he would a gazelle. these were not comforting thoughts. i was afraid to cry out for fear of disturbing the snake, which appeared to be asleep. besides, no one could get in, as i had barricaded the only entrance, so i went quietly and unfastened the door. when everything was ready for a safe retreat, i said to myself, "i had better try to kill it." then, looking for my guns, i saw, to my utter horror, that they were set against the wall at the back of the bed, so that the snake was between me and them. after watching the snake intently, and thinking what to do, i resolved to get my gun; so, keeping the door in my rear open, in readiness for a speedy retreat at the first sign of life in the snake, i approached on tip-toe, and, in a twinkling of an eye, grasped the gun which was loaded heavily with large shot. how relieved i felt at that moment! i was no longer the same man. fortunately, the snake did not move. with my gun in one hand i went again towards the reptile, and, fairly placing the muzzle of the gun against it, i fired, and then ran out of the house as fast as i could. at the noise of the gun there was a rush of negroes from all sides to know what was the matter. they thought some one had shot a man, and run into my house to hide himself; so they all rushed into it, helter-skelter; but i need not tell you they rushed out just as fast, on finding a great snake writhing about on the floor. some had trodden upon it and been frightened out of their wits. you have no idea how they roared and shouted; but no one appeared disposed to enter the house again, so i went in cautiously myself to see how matters stood, for i did not intend to give undisputed possession of my hut so easily to mr. snake. i entered and looked cautiously around. the dim light of the torch helped me a little, and there i saw the snake on the ground. its body had been cut in two by the discharge, and both ends were now flapping about the floor. at first i thought these ends were two snakes, and i did not know what to make of it; but as soon as i perceived my mistake, i gave a heavy blow with a stick on the head of the horrible creature, and finished it. then i saw it disgorge a duck--a whole duck--and such a long duck! it looked like an enormous long-feathered sausage. after eating the duck, the snake thought my bedroom was just the place for him to go to sleep in and digest his meal; for snakes, after a hearty meal, always fall into a state of torpor. it was a large python, and it measured--would you believe it?--eighteen feet. fancy my situation if this fellow had sprung upon me and coiled round me! it would soon have been all over with me. i wonder how long it would have taken to digest me, had i been swallowed by the monster! one fine day, while walking on the beach of this inhospitable shore, i spied a vessel. it approached nearer and nearer, and at last ran in and hove-to a few miles from the shore. immediately i observed a gang of slaves rapidly driven down from one of the barracoons. i stood and watched. the men were still in gangs of six, but they had been washed, and each had a clean cloth on. the canoes were immense boats, with twenty-six paddles, and about sixty slaves each. the poor slaves seemed much terrified. they had never been on the rough water before, and they did not know what that dancing motion of the sea was. then they were being taken away, they knew not whither. as they skimmed over the waves and rolled, now one way, now another, they must have thought their last day had come, and that they were to be consigned to a watery grave. i was glad that these poor creatures could not see me, for i was hidden from their view by trees and bushes. i felt ashamed of myself--i actually felt ashamed of being a white man! happily, such scenes are rarely if ever witnessed nowadays, and the slave trade will soon belong to the past. two hours afterwards, the vessel, with a cargo of six hundred slaves, was on her way to cuba. [illustration: the gazelle.] chapter xv. going into the interior--sleeping with the king's rats--the chimpanzee--kill a gazelle--too cold to sleep--the grey partridge. after this i went again to visit king bango, and was announced to his majesty by his great mafouga. i had an important object in paying this visit. i wished to ask the king to permit me to go into the interior and to spare me some people to show me the way. bango liked me, though i had declined to marry one of his beautiful daughters. so he granted my request, and gave me twenty-five men, some of whom were reputed great hunters in that country. they had killed many elephants and brought all the ivory to their king. they were the providers of the royal table, and passed their lives in the hunt and in the forest. we made great preparations for the chase, for game was said to be plentiful. we were to encamp many days in the forest, and to have a jolly time, and a hard time, too, for the hunter's life is not an easy one. i was invited by the king to sleep in his palace, so that the next day i might start early; so i was led to my bedroom by the great mafouga. it was so dirty and gloomy that i wished myself fast asleep under a tree in the forest. i looked around, thinking that perhaps the king wanted to get rid of me, and had invited me there to have me murdered; but finding nothing suspicious, i concluded that old king bango had never entertained such ideas, and i felt vexed at myself for having such thoughts on my mind. then i extinguished the light and lay down on the royal couch. i had scarcely lain down when i began to hear a strange noise. at first i did not know what it meant. the noise in the room increased. what could it be? i tried to see through the darkness, but could distinguish nothing. just then i felt something getting under my blanket. confounded, i jumped up, not knowing what it might be. it was an enormous rat. as soon as i got up, i heard a perfect scrambling of rats going back where they came from, and then all became silent. i lay down on the bed again and tried to sleep, but in vain, on account of the assaults and gambols of the rats, of which there was a prodigious number. they seemed inclined to dispute possession of my room with me. they were continually on my bed, and running over my face. i soon got quite enough of the royal palace. i wished i had never come into it. but it was an excellent place for getting up early. no sooner had the morning twilight made its appearance than i rose and called my men together; and, though we could hardly see, we set out at once on the march. i went in advance with aboko, my head man, and niamkala, the next best man, at my side. both these men were great hunters, and had spent the principal part of their lives in the woods. they seemed really like men of the woods, so very wild were their looks. aboko was a short, somewhat stout man; very black, and extremely muscular, very flat-nosed, and with big thick lips. his eyes were large and cunning, and seemed to wander about; his body bore marks of many scratches from thorny trees and briars; his legs displayed great strength. niamkala, on the contrary, was tall and slender, not very dark; he had sharp piercing eyes, and seemed to be continually looking after something. both were first-rate elephant hunters. aboko, niamkala, and i became great friends, for we were all three hunters, and loved the woods. our way led through some beautiful prairies, each surrounded by dark forests, and seeming like natural gardens planted in this great woody wilderness. the country was really lovely. the surface was mostly rolling prairie, with a light sandy soil. the highest hills often broke into abrupt precipices, on which we would come suddenly; and if any of us had tumbled down to the bottom, he would never have been heard of again. the woods are the safe retreat of the elephant. great herds of buffaloes are found there, also antelopes, which go out into the great grass fields by night to play and feed. leopards are also abundant. i was much pleased to be able to travel in an open space, and not always through the dark forest the breeze fanned our faces as we went onward. presently we saw the footprints of huge elephants and of wild buffaloes. friend aboko now warned us to look sharp, for we were sure to see game. sure enough, he had hardly spoken when we saw a bull standing, deer-like, upon the edge of the wood, watching us, i suppose, and no doubt greatly puzzled to make out what kind of animals we were. he stood for some minutes, safe out of range, and then turned into the woods, evidently not liking our appearance. we ran around to intercept him; and i waited at one pass in the woods, for aboko to go clear around and drive the bull towards me. i was waiting, when suddenly i saw something approaching me out of the deep gloom of the forest. i thought it was aboko coming towards me, and i waited anxiously for news. i did not say a word for fear of frightening the game that might be near us. the object came nearer and nearer to me, till i thought i could recognise aboko's dark face distinctly through the foliage. i stood with my gun resting on the ground, when suddenly i heard a shrill scream, and then what i thought to be aboko turned and ran back into the woods, showing a broad, big hairy body. it was one of the wild men of the woods--the chimpanzee--and a big one it was, i assure you. how glad i was to have seen this wild man of the woods! for a few minutes i felt so astonished that i did not move. his black face certainly did look very much like that of an african, so much so that, as i have already said, i took the chimpanzee to be aboko. by-and-by the real aboko made his appearance. this time there was no illusion, and we had a good laugh over my mistake. i felt quite vexed that i had not shot the chimpanzee. i should have liked so much to look at the animal closely. but i felt it was almost like shooting a man. we left the woods, and started once more for the interior. we had not been long on our way when i spied a gazelle right in the middle of the prairie. how could one approach it without being seen? for the grass was short. we wanted very much to kill it, for we had not killed anything yet; and what were we to have for our dinner and supper? no one likes to go without dinner, especially when working hard. aboko, niamkala, and i held a council. we lay down flat on the ground for fear of being seen; and finally it was agreed that i should go towards the gazelle with my long range gun and shoot it if i could. so i started. i almost crawled, now and then raising my head just to the level of the grass, to see if the animal was still there. when i thought i was near enough, i quietly lay down flat on the ground and rested my gun on an ant-hill that looked like a mushroom. taking careful aim at the unsuspicious animal i fired, and down it tumbled, to my great delight. aboko and niamkala, who had been watching afar off, came rushing and shouting, their faces beaming with joy. the prospect of a good dinner cheered them up. others of the party soon joined us. the gazelle was cut upon the spot, and we continued our journey till we came to a beautiful little stream, which was too deep to be forded. a huge tree had been felled, and we crossed to the other side on it, though it was hard work. i assure you i thought once or twice i should have tumbled into the water. at sunset we stopped, quite tired out. we made our camp in the midst of the prairie in order to have the nice grass to lie upon. it was the dry season, and we were not afraid of getting wet. the people went into the nearest forest and collected an immense quantity of firewood, not a difficult task, as so many dead limbs were lying on the ground. we lighted a great many large fires, which blazed up fiercely, for the wind blew hard. the country around was illuminated, and the glare of our fires must have been seen a long way off. we took our dinner and supper at the same time. i roasted my own share of the gazelle myself; i put a piece of stick through the flesh and laid the skewer across two forked sticks, which i fixed in the ground on each side of the fire. i longed for some lard to baste the roasting meat, but i was thankful for the good dinner i had, and i enjoyed it thoroughly. i had a little bit of salt to eat with it, and also some nice cayenne pepper. my men also seemed to enjoy their meal very much, for they had meat to their heart's content; and these negroes are very gluttonous generally. it was laughable to see how lazily we lay around on the grass by our fires; some were smoking, others tried to sleep, while others told stories; but we all tried to warm ourselves, and kept continually adding fuel to the already bright fires. the night was clear and almost frosty. the stars shone brilliantly above our heads, and it was bright moonlight. it became so windy and cold that we regretted we had not encamped by the forest, where we should have been sheltered from the wind. it was too cold to sleep, even with my blanket; and my poor men, who had no blankets, were shivering around the fires. so at two o'clock in the morning i ordered the men to get up. a couple of hours' sharp walking brought us to a thick wood, and there we were sheltered. we quickly made up one very large fire, big enough for all of us, and stretched ourselves pell-mell around it for a short nap. we were so tired that we soon fell asleep, not caring for leopards or anything else. we were awakened by the cry of the grey partridge (_francolinus squamatus_), called _quani_ by the natives. i will now say a word about these partridges. unlike our partridges, they perch on trees. when evening comes, the old cock perches himself first, and calls the flock together. they all settle near each other. in the morning, before daylight, they begin to cluck; and it was this noise that we heard. they do not sleep on the ground, like our partridges, because there are too many snakes crawling about, and too many carnivorous animals. [illustration] [illustration: after dinner.] chapter xvi. the hippopotamus--a speck of war--reach ngola--a sunday talk--the black man's god and the white man's god--how king njambai punished his wife--we build an olako in the woods. sunrise found us under way again; and before us lay a fine stretch of prairie, on the farther borders of which were quietly grazing several herds of buffaloes, which, as we approached them, quickly ran into the woods. while they remained in sight they gave the country a civilized appearance; it looked like a large grazing farm in june, with cattle, and hay almost ready for harvest; a fine, quiet, old-country picture here in the wilds of africa, that reminded me so much of home scenes that i felt happy and elated. we pushed on rapidly in order to travel as far as possible before the heat of the day should set in. we came to a large pool or lakelet; and, while looking at the water, i suddenly saw something strange coming out from under its surface. it was a hippopotamus--the first i had seen. i thought it was a log of wood; then i fancied it was the head of a horse; for certainly, from a distance, the head of a hippopotamus looks like that of a horse. then i heard a great grunt, and down went the head under the water. suddenly a number of the animals made their appearance; there were at least a dozen of them. they began sporting in the water, now popping their huge heads out and snorting, and then diving to the bottom and remaining there for some time. i watched them for a while, and then i took my gun, intending to send a bullet into the head of one and haul him ashore; but aboko said they would sink to the bottom. not wishing to kill one of these creatures for nothing, i took aboko's advice, and we went away. we had not met a single human being since we left sangatanga till now. as we journeyed, i saw in the distance what i at first took to be a herd of buffaloes, but soon perceived it was a caravan of natives coming in our direction. immediately we looked at our guns; for in this country there is no law, and every man's hand is against his brother. we saw that they, too, prepared for an encounter; that most of them hid in the grass, watching. four fellows came towards us to reconnoitre, and to ask if it was peace or war, when suddenly they got a glimpse of me, and i do not know how, but they at once saw, from the fact of my being there, that there would be no war. they shouted to their companions to come and see the otangani. they were shekianis, who, as i have said, are a very warlike people, and this part of the country, i was told, was thickly inhabited by them. we left them in the midst of their wonders, and travelled as fast as we could, for we wanted to reach a village of their tribe, named ngola, whose chief was a friend of king bango, and was his vassal, having married one of his daughters. at last, after much travelling, we reached the village of ngola. as we approached, and as soon as the women caught sight of me, they ran screaming into the houses. njambai, the chief, received us very kindly, and gave me a house to live in. ngola was a very pretty village, and the house i lived in belonged to shinshooko, the brother of the chief. you will agree with me that shinshooko had a funny name. he was a worthy fellow, and tolerably honest, too, for he gave me the key of one of his doors--(i wonder where he got the old padlock that was on it)--and he recommended me to shut my door every time i went away, as the people might steal something. sunday came; i remained in the village. they all understood the oroungou language so i could speak to them. i told them there was no such thing as witchcraft, and that it was very wrong to accuse people of it and kill them; that there was only one god, who made both the whites and the blacks, and we should all love him. this elicited only grunts of surprise and incredulity. they all shouted that there were two gods,--the god of the _ntangani_ (white men) and the god of the _alombai_ (black men). the god of the black men had never given them anything, while the god of the white men had sent them guns, powder, and many other fine things. then shinshooko remarked, "you have rivers of _alongon_ (rum) flowing through your land. when i go to sangatanga i taste it at king bango's; how much i should like to live on the banks of such rivers!" they would not believe that we had only rivers of water like theirs; and that we ourselves made our powder, and guns, and rum also. i stayed for a few days in the village of ngola, where the people were very kind to me. one day i heard a woman crying out, as if she were in great pain. asking what was the matter, a man told me the king was punishing one of his wives; and others said that, if i did not go to her help, she might be killed. i hurried to the king's house, and there, in front of the verandah, a spectacle met my eyes, which froze my blood with horror. a woman was tied by the middle to a stout stake driven into the ground. her legs were stretched out and fastened to other smaller stakes, and stout cords were bound round her neck, waist, ankles, and wrists. these cords were being twisted with sticks; and when i arrived the skin was bursting from the terrible compression. the poor woman looked at me. the king was in a perfect rage; he himself was the chief executioner. his eyes were blood-shot, and his lips were white with foam. i had to be careful in expostulating with the king, for fear that he might kill her at once, in a fit of rage. i walked up, and, taking him by the arm, i asked him for my sake to release the poor woman, and not to kill her. he seemed to hesitate; he did not answer, and went into his house. i threatened to leave if he did not release her. finally he consented, and said: "let her loose yourself; i give her to you." how glad i was! i rushed out immediately and began to untie the savage cords, and to cut them away with my knife. the poor creature was covered with blood. i sent her to my house and took care of her. i learned that she had stolen some of her husband's beads. after this, i left the shekiani village of ngola and went on my journey with my friends, aboko and niamkala. we travelled on, till, on reaching a place in the midst of a forest, not far from a little lake, we determined to build an olako; for i liked the country so much that i did not want to leave it. there were a great many wild animals in the neighbourhood, and we thought the place was likely to afford us good sport, especially as the lake would draw beasts down to its banks to drink. we were not only near water, but we had a wide stretch of forest and prairie-land about us. we worked very hard that day, building and arranging our encampment, in such a way as to make everything comfortable and secure. of course we selected the prettiest part of the forest, and where there were many tall and shady trees. we first cut the underbrush from under the trees, and also many of the vines or creepers, which looked very singular as they hung down over our heads. then we collected a great number of large leaves, which are called by some tribes _shayshayray_ and _guaygayrai_, to roof our sheds with. after this we proceeded to cut a number of small sticks, seven or eight feet long, and began to construct our habitations. then we cut branches of trees to shield us from the wind, and collected a great quantity of firewood, for we had made up our minds to keep ourselves warm. after we had arranged and lighted the fires, our camp looked quite like a little village. it was very romantic and beautiful. i had arranged my own shelter very nicely; and it was first in the row. to be sure, my bed was rather hard, being composed of sticks and leafy branches; while for a pillow i had merely a piece of wood. in the midst of our work, ten slaves of njambai came, laden with provisions, which the good fellow had sent after me. after doing a hard day's work, i think we deserved to rest comfortably in the evening. we began cooking our dinner; and a right good dinner it was. my men had monkey and buffalo-meat; but i had a nice fat fowl, which my friend njambai had sent me. before dinner i warned my men to be honest, and keep their fingers at home. they were good fellows, but i found that all savages will steal. so i threatened to kill the first man i caught meddling with my property, and told them i would shoot without mercy; "and then," said i, with great sternness, "when i have blown your brains out, i will settle the matter with your king." to which aboko coolly replied that the settlement was not likely to do them any particular good. of course they all protested that they were honest; but i knew them better than they knew themselves; i knew the effect of temptation on them, poor fellows! and had more confidence in their faith that i would kill the thief than i had in their good resolutions. when this little matter was settled, they drew around the blazing fire. by this time, the buffalo-meat suspended in a huge kettle over the fire was cooked and ready to be eaten; the monkeys had been roasted on charcoal; my fowl had been cooked; and before us was a great pile of roasted plantain. we enjoyed a hearty meal together; i eating off a plate, and using a fork, while the black fellows took fresh leaves for plates, and used the "black man's fork," as they call their five fingers. after dinner, they drank a large calabash-full of palm wine that had been brought from ngola; and then, to crown their feast, with the greatest delight of all, i went to one of my boxes, and, lifting the lid, while the shining black faces peered at me with saucer-eyes of expectation, i took out a huge plug of kentucky tobacco. there was a wild hurrah of joy from them all. they shouted that i was their friend; they loved only me; they would go with nobody else; i was their good spirit; i was like one of themselves. i distributed the tobacco among them; and in a few minutes all were lying about the fire, or seated round it, with their pipes in their mouths. after making the fire burn brightly i, being tired, went and lay down, as you see me in the picture. my blanket was the only article of bedding i had; i wrapped this around me, and rested my head on my wooden pillow, which i assure you was not of the softest kind. i felt pleased to see my men so contented. their wild stories of hunting adventures, of witchcraft, and evil spirits well fitted the rude, picturesque surroundings; and they lay there talking away, till, at last, i was obliged to remind them that it was one o'clock, and time to go to sleep, especially as some of us were to get up very early and go hunting. then all became silent, and soon we all fell asleep, except the men appointed to keep the fires bright, on account of the leopards, and also to watch that we might not be surprised by some enemy. [illustration] [illustration: a leopard and her young one.] chapter xvii. an unsuccessful hunt for elephants--i take aim at a buffalo--a leopard in the grass near us--we shoot the leopard and her kitten--great rejoicing in camp--who shall have the tail?--a quarrel over the brains--the guinea hens--the monkeys. early the next morning, aboko and i got up. aboko covered himself with his war fetiches, and also with the fetiches that were to bring good luck, and give him a steady hand. on the middle of his forehead was a yellow spot made with clay. when he had finished these preparations we started. our desire was to kill elephants. we saw plenty of tracks, and we hunted all day long. in many places, to judge by the tracks, the elephants had been only an hour or two before ourselves. but we did not see a single elephant, and i killed only a few monkeys for my men's dinner, as well as a few birds. we were returning to the camp, rather down-hearted, when i heard the cry of the grey male partridge, of which i have already spoken, calling for his mates to come and perch on the tree he had chosen. we turned back to get a shot, if possible, for they are fine eating. we were just on the edge of the forest; and, as i pushed out into the prairie, suddenly i saw several buffaloes, one of which i made sure of as he stood a little in advance of the rest, where the grass was high enough for a stealthy approach. i immediately put a ball into the barrel that had only shot, so that i might have my two barrels loaded with bullets. then aboko and i advanced slowly towards the unconscious bull, which stood a fair mark, and i was about to raise my gun when aboko made a quick sign to hold still and listen. aboko, at the same time, breathed as if he were smelling something. i did not know why it was that aboko had stopped me, but i knew there must be better game at hand, or some other good reason for his doing so. perhaps he had heard the footstep of an elephant. i looked at his face, and saw that it appeared anxious. as we stood perfectly motionless, i heard, at apparently a little distance before us, a low purring sound, which might have been taken, by a careless ear, for the sound of the wind passing through the grass. but to aboko's quick ear it betokened something else. his face grew very earnest, and he whispered to me "njego" (leopard). what were we to do? the noise continued. we cocked our guns, and moved, slowly and cautiously, a few steps ahead, to get a position where we thought we might see over the grass. the leopard might pounce upon us at any moment. what would prevent him from doing so if he chose? certainly not our guns, for we did not know exactly where the beast was. to tell you the truth, i did not feel comfortable at all; i had a slight objection to being carried away in the jaws of a leopard and devoured in the woods. our situation was far from being a pleasant one. the leopard comes out generally by night only, and nothing but extreme hunger will bring him out of his lair in open day. when he is hungry, he is also unusually savage, and very quick in his motions. we knew the animal was near, but we could not succeed in getting a sight of him. as the wind blew from him towards us, i perceived plainly a strong peculiar odour which this animal gives out; and this fact proved, still more decidedly, that the leopard could not be far off. the thought passed through my mind: is he watching us? is he coming towards us--crouching like a cat on the ground, and ready to spring upon us when near enough? do his eyes penetrate the grass which we cannot see through? if so, is he ready to spring? meantime our buffalo-bull stood stupidly before his herd, not twenty yards from us, utterly innocent of the presence of so many of his formidable enemies--the leopard, aboko, and myself. just then we moved a little to one side, and, peering through an opening in the grass, i beheld an immense leopard, a female, with a tiny young leopard by her side. the beast saw us at the same moment, having turned her head quickly at some slight noise we made. she had been watching the buffalo so intently as not to notice our approach. it seemed to me as if a curious look of indecision passed over her face. she, too, had more game than she had looked for, and was puzzled which to attack first. her long tail swished from side to side, and her eyes glared, as she hesitated for a moment to decide which of the three--the bull, aboko, or me--to pounce upon and make her victim. but i saved her the trouble of making up her mind; for, in far less time than it takes me to tell you what took place, i had put a ball into her head, which, luckily for us, relieved her of further care for prey. she dropped down dead. at the same moment aboko fired into the little leopard and killed it. at the noise of the guns, the buffalo-bull and the herd decamped in the opposite direction, at a tremendous pace, the bull little knowing the circumstances to which he owed his life. i felt much relieved, for i had never before been in quite so ticklish a situation, and i felt no particular desire ever to be in a similar plight again. when we returned to the camp there was a great excitement as soon as they heard the news that two leopards had been killed. aboko carried in the young leopard on his back; but mine was too heavy, and had to be left in the field. guns were fired in rejoicing; and the big leopard was fetched in. when the people returned with it to the camp, all shouted, "what an enormous beast! what an enormous beast! we heard gun firing," etc., etc. in the midst of this noise niamkala made his appearance with some of our party, bringing in some wild boars and a pretty little gazelle which the natives called _ncheri_. of course the wild boars had been cut up into several pieces, for they were too heavy to carry whole. niamkala and his party were received with great cheers. the prospect of a good supper brightened all their faces, and mine also; and i shouted, "well done, niamkala and boys!" everything was brought to my feet. there was so much to eat that there was no use in dividing the meat into equal shares; so i let everyone take as much as he liked. after supper the leopards were hung on a pole resting on two forked sticks; and then the negroes danced round them. they sang songs of victory, and exulted over and abused the deceased leopard (the mother). they addressed to her comical compliments upon her beauty (and the leopard is really a most beautiful animal). they said, "what a fine coat you have!" (meaning her skin). "we will take that coat off from you." they shouted, "now you will kill no more people! now you will eat no more hunters! now you cannot leap upon your prey! what has become of the wild bull you were looking after so keenly? would you not have liked to make a meal of aboko or of chaillie?" (for they called me chaillie). thus they sang and danced round till towards morning, when i made them go to sleep. next morning there was great quarrelling among my men. what could be the matter? i found that niamkala was declaring his determination to have the end of my leopard's tail, while the rest of the hunters asserted their equal right to it. aboko said he did not care, as he would have the tail of the one he had killed. i skinned the two leopards in the most careful manner, and gave the end of the tail to niamkala, and i promised fasiko to give him the tail of the next one i should kill. they all shouted, "i hope you will kill leopards enough to give to each of us a tail!" poor fasiko looked very down-hearted. when i inquired why, he said, "don't you know that when a man has the end of a leopard's tail in his possession he is sure to be fortunate in winning the heart of the girl he wants to marry?" i said, "fasiko, you have one wife, what do you care for a leopard's tail?" he replied, "i want a good many wives." the palaver about the tail was hardly over when another quarrel broke out. this time it was about the brains. aboko, niamkala, and fasiko each wanted the whole brain of the animal. the others said they must have some too; that there was only one end to each tail, but that the brains could be divided among them all. for a few minutes a fight seemed imminent over the head of the leopard. i said, "you may quarrel, but no fighting. if you do you will see me in the fight; and i will hit everybody, and hit hard too." at the same time i pointed out to them a large stick lying by my bedside. this immediately stopped them. they all wanted the brain, they said, because, when mixed with some other charms, it makes a powerful _monda_ (fetiche), which gives its possessors dauntless courage and great fortune in the hunt. happily, i was able to persuade my three best hunters that they wanted no such means to bolster up their courage. the dispute over the brains being settled, aboko, in the presence of all the men, laid the liver before me. as this had no value or interest for me, since i was certainly not going to eat the liver of the leopard for my dinner, i was about to kick it aside, when they stopped me, and entreated me to take off the gall and destroy it, in order to save the party from future trouble. these negroes believe the gall of the leopard to be deadly poison, and my men feared to be suspected by their friends or enemies at sangatanga of having concealed some of this poison. so i took off the gall, put it under my feet and destroyed it, and then, taking the earth in which it had been spilled, i threw it in every direction, for i did not want any of these poor fellows to be accused of a crime, and lose their lives by it. i intended to inform the king, on my return, that we had destroyed the liver. but i told my men that their belief was all nonsense, and a mere superstition. they said it was not. as i could not prove their notion to be false, i stopped the discussion by saying i did not believe it. having plenty of game, we carried the leopard-meat a long way off, and threw it away. we did not go hunting for two days, but spent our time in smoking the meat we had on hand. it was just the sort of weather for hunting, and for living in the woods. the air was cool and refreshing, for it was june, and the dry season; but the sky was often clouded, which prevented the sun from being oppressive. to add to our pleasure, the forest trees were in bloom, and many of them were fragrant. the nights were very cold indeed for this country, the thermometer going down to sixty-eight degrees fahrenheit. the wind blew hard, but against that we managed to protect ourselves. the dews were not nearly so heavy as they are in the rainy season. the grass was in great part burned off the prairies. every day we succeeded in shooting more or less game, among which were antelopes, gazelles, wild boars, monkeys without number, and guinea fowls. these guinea fowls were of a beautiful species. in this country you have never seen any like them. my joy was great when i killed this hitherto unknown species of guinea-fowl (_numida plumifera_). it is one of the handsomest of all the guinea-fowls yet discovered. its head is naked, the skin being of a deep bluish-black tinge, and is crowned with a beautiful crest of straight, erect, narrow, downy feathers, standing in a bunch close together. the plumage of the body is of a fine bluish-black ground, variegated with numerous _eyes_ of white, slightly tinged with blue. the bill and legs are coloured a blue-black, similar to the skin of the head. this bird is not found near the seashore. it is very shy, but marches in large flocks through the woods. at night they perch on trees, where they are protected from the numerous animals which prowl about. i killed several beautiful monkeys called by the natives _mondi_. what curious-looking monkeys they were! only the stuffed specimen of a young one had been received in england before this time. the mondi is entirely black, and is covered with long shaggy hair. it has a very large body, and a funny little head, quite out of proportion to the size of the animal. it is a very beautiful monkey; the hair is of a glossy jet black; and it has a very long tail. in africa no monkeys have prehensile tails; i mean by that, tails which they can twist round the branch of a tree, and so hang themselves with the head downwards. that kind of monkey is only found in south america. the mondi has a dismal cry, which sounds very strangely in the silent woods, and always enabled me to tell where these monkeys were. [illustration: aboko kills a rogue elephant. chap. xviii.] [illustration] chapter xviii. alone in camp--hunting for elephants--aboko kills a rogue elephant--i cut another python in two--we shoot some wild boars--a buffalo hunt--return to sangatanga--king bango sick. one fine day i remained in the camp, for i had been hunting so much that i wanted a day of rest. all the others had gone to hunt. i was left alone, and i enjoyed the solitude, everything around me was so beautiful and quiet. nature seemed to smile on all sides. i placed myself at the foot of a large tree, and wrote in my journals; and then i thought of the dear friends i had at home, and wondered if they sometimes thought of me. then i called to mind all i had seen in the wonderful country which i had explored. i could hardly believe it myself: it seemed like a dream. what extraordinary people, and what curious beasts, had i not met! how many wonderful dangers i had escaped! how kind god had been in protecting me! how he had watched over the poor lonely traveller, and taken care of him during sickness! thus my heart went up in gratitude, and i silently implored that the protection of god might still be granted me. towards sunset, aboko and niamkala made their appearance, and brought a fine young boar with them. as usual, without saying a word, they came right to me, and put the dead animal at my feet. then, seating themselves and clapping their hands, aboko began to tell me what had happened from the time they started in the morning until the time they returned. they forgot nothing, even mentioning the tracks of the animals they had seen. they reported they had found fresh elephant tracks, and thought the elephants had made their head-quarters there for a few days. after hearing this, we immediately resolved that we would all turn out after elephants on the following day. accordingly, in the evening, we cleaned and prepared our guns, and everybody went to sleep early. the next morning we started about daybreak, each of us carrying some provisions. we were to fire no guns in the forest, for fear of frightening the elephants, who are very shy in this region. we had taken pains to load our guns in the most careful manner. we hunted all day, but in vain; no elephants were to be seen. we slept out in the woods, for we were too far from the camp to return. we felt so tired that we had only sufficient strength left to enable us to fetch firewood, and to cut a few branches of trees and lie down upon them. i had lost or forgotten the matches, so i had to light the fire with a piece of steel and a gun-flint. this took a little longer. very soundly we all slept, as you may easily suppose. when i awoke in the midst of the night our fires were almost out; at least they did not blaze up enough to frighten the wild beasts. aboko, niamkala, and fasiko were snoring tremendously. one was lying flat on his back, the other had his legs up, while fasiko had his arm extended at full length. by the side of each was his gun, which touched him in some way, so that it could not be taken without awaking him. i believe it was their snoring that had aroused me. they were so tired, and seemed to sleep so soundly, that i did not want to wake them, so i went and added fuel to the fire, which soon began to blaze up again. the next day found us again exploring the woods in every direction. elephants certainly were not plentiful; besides they travelled much in search of their favourite food--a kind of fern, which was not very abundant. again i got very tired; but at last, in the afternoon, we came across our quarry. emerging from a thick part of the forest into a prairie which bordered it, we saw to our left, just upon the edge of the wood, a solitary bull elephant. there we stood still. i wonder what he was thinking about! i had seen the great beast in menageries, and also among the fans, and i have described to you an elephant hunt in their country, but then there was great confusion. here, the huge animal stood quietly by a tree, innocent of our presence; and now, for the first time in my life, i was struck with the vast size of this giant of the forests. large trees seemed like small saplings when compared with the bulk of this immense beast which was standing placidly near them. what were we to do but to kill him? though i felt a sense of pity at trying to destroy so noble an animal, yet i was very anxious to get the first shot myself; for it was a "rogue elephant"--that is, an elephant unattached.[ ] it was an old one, as we could see by the great size of its tusks. i remembered that rogue elephants are said to be very ferocious. so much the better, i thought. i had killed a good deal of game, and i had ceased to be afraid of any of them, though i felt that hunting was no child's play. [ ] sir emerson tennent ("ceylon," vol. ii. p. ) speaks of "the class of solitary elephants, which are known by the term of _goondapo_, in india, and from their vicious propensities, and predatory habits, are called hora, or rogues, in ceylon." you must not think that we were standing up all this time in sight of the elephant. as soon as we had seen him, we lay down and hid ourselves in the forest, in such a manner as not to lose sight of him. then we held a grand council, and talked over what must be done to bag the beast. the grass was burnt in every direction to the leeward of him, and we dared not risk approaching him from the windward for fear he should smell us. what was to be done? the eyes of my men were fixed upon me with a keenly inquisitive look. they expected me to tell them what i thought best to do about the matter. i looked at the country, and saw that the grass was very short; and, after taking account of all the chances of approach, i was compelled to admit that i could not manage to get near the beast myself with any certainty. i could not crawl on the ground; my clothes were sure to be seen by the elephant; therefore, as a sensible hunter, i was reluctantly compelled to resign in favour of aboko, who, i thought, was the best man for the difficult undertaking. his eyes glistened with pleasure as he thought that now he could show his skill. besides, among hunters there is something pleasant and exciting in knowing that you are about to rush into danger. after cocking his musket, aboko dropped down in the short grass, and began to creep up to the elephant slowly on his belly. the rest of us remained where we had held our council, and watched aboko as he glided through the grass for all the world like a huge boa-constrictor; for, from the slight glimpses we caught, his back, as he moved farther and farther away from us, resembled nothing so much as the folds of a great serpent winding his way along. finally we could no longer distinguish any motion. then all was silence. i could hear the beating of my heart distinctly, i was so excited. the elephant was standing still, when suddenly the sharp report of a gun rang through the woods and over the plain, and elicited screams of surprise from sundry scared monkeys who were on the branches of a tree close by us. i saw the huge beast helplessly tottering till he finally threw up his trunk, and fell in a dead mass at the foot of a tree. then the black body of aboko rose; the snake-like creature had become a man again. a wild hurrah of joy escaped from us; i waved my old hat, and threw it into the air, and we all made a run for the elephant. when we arrived, there stood aboko by the side of the huge beast, calm as if nothing had happened, except that his body was shining with sweat. he did not say a word, but looked at me, and then at the beast, and then at me again, as if to say: "you see, chaillu, you did right to send me. have i not killed the elephant?" the men began to shout with excitement at such a good shot. "aboko is a man," said they, as we looked again at the beast, whose flesh was still quivering with the death agony. aboko's bullet had entered his head a little below the ear, and, striking the brain, was at once fatal. aboko began to make fetich-marks on the ground around the body. after this was done we took an axe, which fasiko had carried with him, and broke the skull, in order to get out the two tusks, and very large tusks they were. of course we could not carry off the elephant, so aboko and i slept that night near our prize on the grass and under the tree. niamkala and fasiko had started for the camp to tell the men the news, and the next morning all the men hurried out. while quietly resting under the shade of a tree close to the elephant, i spied them coming. as soon as they recognised us they shouted, and, when near enough, they made a spring at aboko and then at the elephant. all the cutlasses, all the axes and knives that were in the camp, had been sharpened and brought out. then the cutting up of the elephant took place. he was not very fat. what a huge beast he was! what a huge liver he had! what an enormous heart, too! the trunk, being considered a choice morsel, was cut into small pieces. the meat was to be smoked immediately, and then carried to sangatanga, to be sold and given away. great bargains were looming before the men's eyes; they were all to get rich by selling the elephant's meat. i never saw men more happy than these poor fellows were. the negroes believe in eating. mine ate nothing but meat, and they ate such quantities of it that several of them got sick, and i was obliged to give them laudanum in brandy to cure them. they almost finished my little stock of brandy. the camp was full of meat, and as we had no salt, the odour that came from it was not particularly agreeable. indeed, i had to have a separate shanty built on one side, and to the windward of the camp. i could not stand the stench. at night the negroes lay around the fires, the jolliest of mortals, drinking palm-wine, which they made regularly from the neighbouring palm-trees, and smoking tobacco when i was generous enough to give them some. in fact, they were as honest a set of negroes as i had met with anywhere, really good fellows. as time passed on you must not think that i did nothing but kill animals. i rambled through the forest, and studied everything i saw. sometimes, when too far away from the camp, and after a day of hard hunting, i slept soundly under a tree by the side of a big fire, with my gun by my side. i thought i would go hunting one day for wild animals; on another, for birds; and, when too tired to travel, i would remain in the camp, sleeping sweetly on my primitive couch, which consisted of a couple of mats spread on the bare and soft earth, with a thick blanket for cover, the foliage of a tree and the blue starlit sky being my canopy and roof. i had given up sleeping upon bare sticks, finding it too hard. as fresh boar tracks had been seen near the camp, i could not resist the temptation of having another hunt after that savage beast. however tired i might be, i could hardly keep still whenever news came that game was near us. i was always in the hope of finding some new animal or something curious to stuff and bring home, to show what i had done. we had not gone far when we heard, to the right of us, the grunting of some wild boars. as they are very wild, we jumped hastily behind a fallen tree to hide ourselves. in our haste to do this, i heedlessly stepped on something in my path, and, looking down, found i was running upon an immense serpent, a huge python, which lay snugly coiled up beside the tree. happily, he was in a state of stupefaction, consequent, probably, on having eaten too heavy a dinner. he scarcely moved, and did not raise his head. i ran to niamkala, and borrowed a kind of heavy cutlass which he carried with him, and with a blow of this i cut the python in two pieces, which instantly began to squirm about in a very snaky and horrible way. during his death-struggle the monster disgorged the body of a young gazelle, which was in a half digested condition. this python was not quite twenty feet long--a pretty good-sized one, you may judge. the noise we made in killing the snake of course frightened the wild pigs. we pursued them, and succeeded, by good management, and after a hard chase of an hour, in coming up with the herd. they were ten in number, and we managed to bag two. they were not very large. besides these pigs, my hunters carried the two halves of the serpent to the camp. we were received there with demonstrations of joy. they made a kind of soup with the boa, and seemed to relish it very much. i did not taste it, and can therefore say nothing against it. i never saw a country like this for game. there was so much prairie land that it reminded me of southern africa. the contrast with the great forest, where i had travelled for days without seeing anything, was very great. for a few days i remained quiet in the camp. the men had in the meantime been hunting and exploring in various directions. as they reported that great herds of buffaloes frequented every night a prairie situated about ten miles from our camp, i determined to have a hunt for them. i was very fond of buffaloes, at least of their meat. we set out and left our camp just before sunset. our route was through the midst of prairie land, and by eight o'clock in the evening we reached the forest beyond. there we hoped to find our game; and securing for ourselves safe hiding-places in the woods on the edge of the plain, we lay down and waited. now, waiting is generally tedious, but waiting in a cold night from eight to two o'clock, every moment expecting that which does not come, is apt to try one's patience severely. mine was entirely gone, and i wished myself comfortably under my blanket in camp, when suddenly the buffaloes came. aboko heard them coming, and presently a herd of about twenty-five animals emerged from the woods, and scattered quietly about the grassy plain. the moon was going down, and we could see from our hiding-places the long shadows of the buffaloes, silently gliding one way or another, but never near enough to us for a shot. soon they felt quite at ease, and began feeding, ever and anon gambling sportively with one another. seeing them engaged, we crawled towards them slowly and with great care. we had almost got within safe range when a sudden change of wind discovered us to them. they snuffed up the air suspiciously, and instantly gathering together, they disappeared in the woods. there was ill luck! my hunters cursed in shekiani, and i grumbled in several languages. but there was still hope. silently we crawled back to our lair, and waited patiently for two mortal hours; when at last two--a bull and a cow--stalked leisurely into the fields and began to crop the grass. it was now dark. the moon had gone down, leaving us only the uncertain light of the stars. we watched the motions of the buffaloes until we thought we could venture, and then silently crawled towards them again. this time we got within range. i chose the bull for my shot, and niamkala took the cow, while aboko was ready to second me with his gun in case i should not kill my animal. we fired both at once, and by good luck, for the light was not enough to afford a chance for a fair shot, both the animals fell down dead. daylight soon appeared, and we resolved to return to the camp and send men to bring in the meat, thinking that no wild beasts would trouble our prizes at such unseasonable hours. aboko and niamkala first cut off the bushy tails of black glossy hair, and then we made for the camp, where they showed to our companions these trophies of our chase. the men made haste, and reached the place early, but not before the cow was half eaten by a hungry leopard. the poor leopard who ventured out so early in the morning must have been nearly famished. i did not grudge him his meal, though i should have liked to watch for him and shoot him, had i thought of his coming, for i had plenty of friends to whom i could have given his skin on my return. a few days afterwards we broke up our camp, and loaded ourselves with the birds and beasts i had killed and prepared, and also with the meat which my men had smoked; and all the time they were boasting of how much tobacco and other dainties they would get for this. they seemed very jolly, though groaning under their burdens; and i was pleased to see them so happy. the specimens of the _bos brachicheros_ were an inconvenient load, and i was obliged to be very careful with them. when i reached sangatanga i found that the king was in worse health than he was when i had left. he was alarmed, fearing he would die. he remarked that it was singular he had been taken worse immediately after my departure; and that, in fact, he grew sick on the very night when i slept in his house. [illustration: fishing] chapter xix. a jolly excursion party--a race for the fishing banks--the oroungou burial-ground. not long after we returned from our hunting expedition, i prepared to go to fetich point on a fishing excursion. for this purpose it was necessary to have canoes. i had called on king bango since i returned, but, remembering the rats, i had respectfully declined the hospitality of his palace. nevertheless, he remained my friend and gave me all the men i wanted. i not only wanted to fish, but i also wished to see the burial-ground of the oroungous, which is not far from fetich point. there were also some enormous turtles on fetich point, i was told, and i wished to catch some of them. my old hunting friend, fasiko, had got together a party of forty men. besides fetich point, i was to visit the fetich river, and the end of cape lopez. there being no houses whatever there, the women had prepared for us a great quantity of powdered manioc, baskets of ground nuts, sweet potatoes, and bunches of plantain. we had a very large outfit. fasiko got together a lot of mats to sleep upon, and kettles to cook in, and a great quantity of salt, with which to salt the fish we hoped to catch. we had several fish-nets made, of the fibre of a vine. we also had fish-hooks; and i took an enormous hook to catch sharks. i always had a hatred of sharks, they are such savage and voracious monsters. we had a great number of baskets. the women carried these to put the fish in. we did not forget guns; for leopards lurk in the jungle, on the south side of the cape, and the boa hangs from the trees, waiting for his prey. if you got up early there, as everybody at a watering-place should, you can see huge elephants trotting down along the beach, and cooling their tender toes in the surf. it was a very jolly party, for cape lopez is the cape may, or nahant of sangatanga. the dry season there answers to our july, when "everybody that is anybody" is supposed to be "out of town and down by the seaside." niamkala and aboko were of the party; for we were great friends; and wherever i went they wanted to go with me. they were slaves of king bango; but we had shared the same dangers, we had shared the same pleasures. at last everything was ready. i embarked in the biggest canoe, which was manned by sixteen oarsmen. as usual, there was a good deal of shouting and bustle before we got off. the sails, made with matting, were unfurled, and we set out across the bay. we had an exciting race to see which canoe was the fastest. there was a stiff _breeze_; but unfortunately the wind was nearly in our faces, so that our sails were of little use. the men worked lustily at their paddles, and as they paddled they sang their wild canoe songs. the morning was clear and bright, but in the afternoon the sky became clouded. we reached fetich point a little before sunset; and the men, who seemed as lively and jolly as could be, at once cast their net, in a way not materially different from our mode of using the hand-net, and made a great haul of fish, the principal part of which were mullets. how beautiful they looked! they seemed like silver fish. the men went immediately in search of firewood. we lighted our fires; and, having cooked and eaten our fish, which were delicious, we prepared for a night's rest by spreading mats upon the sand. it was terribly cold; for we were not sheltered from the wind, which went right through my blanket. not far from fetich point is the river tetica, one of the tributaries of the nazareth river. the nazareth falls into the bay, through a tangled, dreary, and poisonous track of back country, consisting of mangrove swamps, like those i have described on the monda river, and where, i daresay, no animals, except serpents, are to be found. there are no human habitations there. in the morning, i wished to see the oroungou burial-ground, before starting for cape lopez itself. it lay about a mile from our camp, towards sangatanga, from which it is distant about half a day's pull in a canoe. it was only by the promise of a large reward that i persuaded niamkala to accompany me. the negroes visit the place only on funeral errands, and hold it in the greatest awe, conceiving that here the spirits of their ancestors wander about, and that they are not lightly to be disturbed. niamkala and i left the camp, and, following the seashore, we soon reached the place. it is in a grove of noble trees, many of them of magnificent size and shape. as i have said, the natives hold the place in great reverence. the grove is by the sea. it is entirely cleared of underbrush; and, as the wind sighs through the dense foliage of the trees, and whispers in their darkened, somewhat gloomy recesses, there is something awful about the place. i thought how many lives had been sacrificed on these graves. niamkala stood in silence by the strand, while i entered the domain of the oroungou dead. the corpses are not put below the surface. they lie about beneath the trees, in huge wooden coffins, many of which are made of trees. by far the greater number were crumbling away. some new ones betokened recent arrivals. the corpses of some had only been surrounded by a mat. here was a coffin falling to pieces, and disclosing a grinning skeleton within. on the other side were skeletons, already without their covers, which lay in the dirt beside them. everywhere were bleached bones, and mouldering remains. it was curious to see the brass anklets and bracelets, in which some oroungou maiden or wife had been buried, still surrounding her whitened bones, and to note the remains of articles which had been laid in the coffin or put by the side of some wealthy fellow now crumbling to dust. what do you think these articles were? umbrellas, guns, spears, knives, bracelets, bottles, cooking-pots, swords, plates, jugs, glasses, etc. in some places there remained only little heaps of shapeless dust, from which some copper, or iron, or ivory ornaments, or broken pieces of the articles i have just mentioned, gleamed out, to prove that here, too, once lay a corpse, and exemplifying the saying of the bible, "dust, to dust thou shalt return." i could not help saying to myself. "man, what art thou?" suddenly i came to a corpse that must have been put there only the day before. the man looked asleep, for death does not show its pallor in the face of the negro as it does in that of the white man. this corpse had been dressed in a coat, and wore a necklace of beads. by his side stood a jar, a cooking-pot, and a few other articles, which his friend, or his heir, had put by his side. passing on into a yet more sombre gloom, i came at last to the grave of old king pass-all, the brother of the present king. niamkala had pointed out to me the place where i should find it. the huge coffin lay on the ground, and was surrounded on every side with great chests, which contained some of the property of his deceased majesty. many of them were tumbling down, and the property destroyed. the wood, as well as the goods, had been eaten up by the white ants. among some of these chests, and on the top of them, were piled huge earthenware jugs, glasses, mugs, plates, iron pots, and brass kettles. iron and copper rings, and beads were scattered around, with other precious things which pass-all had determined to carry to the grave with him. there lay also the ghastly skeletons of the poor slaves, who, to the number of one hundred, were killed when the king died, that he might not pass into the other world without due attendance. it was a grim sight, and one which filled me with a sadder feeling than even the disgusting slave barracoons had given me. the land breeze was blowing when i returned, and we started for the sandy point of the cape. it is a curious beach, very low, and covered with a short scrub, which hides a part of the view, while the sand ahead is undistinguishable at a distance from the water, above which it barely rises. i was repeatedly disappointed, thinking we had come to the end, when in fact we had before us a long narrow sand-spit. finally we reached the extreme end, and landed in smooth water on the inside of the spit. the point gains continually upon the sea. every year a little more sand appears above the water, while the line of short shrubs, which acts as a kind of dam or breakwater, is also extended, and holds the new land firm against the encroachments of old neptune. among these shrubs we built our camp, and here for some days we had a very pleasant and lively time. the weather was delightful; we had no rain, it being the dry season, and we were not afraid of the awful tornadoes. [illustration] [illustration: turning turtles just before sunrise.] chapter xx. our camp at point fetich--an african watering-place--fishing, but not bathing--the sharks--curing mullets, etc.--turning turtles--bird shooting--a leopard springs upon us. our camp presented a very picturesque appearance, and was unlike the one described a little while ago, and of which i gave you a picture. here each man had built for himself a cosy shade with mats, which, by the way, are very beautiful. these mats are about five or six feet in length and three feet wide. we made our walls of them, so that we were sheltered from the wind. our houses looked very much like large boxes. as usual, the first day was occupied in making everything comfortable, and in collecting firewood, which it was not so easy a matter to find, for the shrubs did not furnish much, and we had to go far to get it; afterwards it was made the business of the children to gather brushwood for the fires; and the poor children had hard work too. we built large _oralas_, or frames, on which to dry the fish when salted, or to smoke it by lighting a fire beneath, in which case the oralas were built higher. some had brought with them large copper dishes, called neptunes, which looked like gigantic plates, in which they were to boil down salt water to get supplies of salt for salting the fish, and to take home with them. some of the women were all day making salt; when made, it was packed securely in baskets, and placed near the fire to keep it dry. every day we had some new kind of fish to eat, or to salt down. as for myself, as i have said, i had brought along an immense shark-hook and a stout rope. the hook was attached to a strong chain two feet long, so that the teeth of the shark could not cut the line if they should swallow the piece of meat or the large fish put on the hook for a bait. there were so many sharks swarming in the waters about the cape that they were often almost washed upon the beach by the waves. i never saw such an immense number. the chinese, who eat sharks' fins, would find enough here to glut the canton market. in truth, i sometimes trembled when in a canoe at the idea that it might upset, for if that had happened, in a short time i should have been seized by a dozen hungry sharks, been dragged to the bottom of the sea, and there been devoured. these sharks are certainly the lions and tigers of the water: they show no mercy. the very sight of them is horrible, for you cannot help thinking and saying to yourself, "i wonder how many people this shark has eaten!" there is a superstition among sailors that whenever there is a sick person aboard, the sharks will follow the ship, watching for the corpse to be thrown overboard. i confess i felt a hatred for sharks, and while at cape lopez i killed as many of them as i could. almost every day you could have seen me in a canoe near the shore, throwing my shark-hook into the sea, and after awhile making for the beach, and calling all the men together to pull with all our might, and draw in my victim. one day i took a blue-skin shark. he was a tremendous fellow. i thought we should never be able to haul him ashore, or that the line would part. it took us an hour before we saw him safely on the beach. now and then i thought he would get the better of us, and that we should have to let the line go, or be pulled into the water. at last he came right up on the beach, and a great shout of victory welcomed him. aboko was ready for him, and with a powerful axe he gave him a tremendous blow that cut off his tail. then we smashed his head, and cut his body into several pieces, which quivered to and fro for some time. in his stomach we found a great number of fish. if i remember correctly, he had six or seven rows of teeth, and such ugly teeth! i pity the poor man whose leg should unfortunately get caught between them. hardly a day passed that i did not catch some sharks, and then for a bait i used to put on my hook a piece of their own flesh, which, like the cannibals, they ate apparently without any remorse. there is another species of shark, of a grey leaden colour, which is shorter and thicker than the blue-skin shark; it has a broader head, and a much wider mouth, and is far more voracious. this species is the most common. it will attack a man in shallow water. i remember a poor boy who was going to his canoe, where the water was not up to his knees, when suddenly, just as he was going to get in, he was seized by his leg and dragged into the water by one of these terrible sharks, which had probably been for some time swimming along the beach watching for prey. in that country it is dangerous to bathe in the sea, and i did not attempt to do so. so much for the sharks. every day, on the muddy banks near the mouth of the fetich river, we hauled in with our nets a great quantity of mullets and other fish. these were split open, cleaned, salted, dried, and smoked, and then packed away in baskets. sometimes, early in the morning, we went out to turn turtles. to do this we had to start before daylight. they came on the beach to lay their eggs in the sand, which the sea does not reach. there the heat of the sun hatches them out. i have sometimes spied these turtles early in the morning coming out of the water and ascending the beach in a clumsy way, until they reached the dry spot where they wish to lay their eggs. after laying them, they manage to cover them with sand. i should have liked very much to have seen the young ones come out of the eggs. how funny the little wee turtles must look! but i have never been so fortunate. one day we caught a turtle which had only three legs; the fourth had been bitten off, no doubt by a hungry shark. the wound had got well, and must have been made long before we caught the turtle. would you like to know how we captured turtles? as soon as they see people coming towards them they generally make for the water. then we rush with all speed upon the unwieldy turtle, and with one jerk roll it over on its back, where it lies, vainly struggling to recover its legs. then we kill it. hundreds of eggs are sometimes found in one turtle. i was very fond of them when found in the body, otherwise i did not like them. they made splendid omelettes. the turtles look very curious when they lie fast asleep on the water. at such times i am told that, with great care, they may be approached and captured. besides fishing, we had hunting also. south of the cape was a dense forest, in which might be found most of the animals that live in african woods. several times we saw elephants on the beach, but we shot none. i killed a great number of sea fowls, which fly about there in such flocks as almost to darken the air. they collect in this way in order to feed on the fish which are so plentiful. one evening, as aboko, niamkala, and i were returning from a fruitless hunt in the woods, we fell in with larger game. passing along the edge of the forest we were suddenly startled by a deep growl. looking quickly about, we perceived an immense male leopard just crouching for a spring upon our party. fortunately our guns were loaded with ball. no doubt we had come upon the animal unawares. in a flash we all three fired into the beast, for there was no time to be lost. he was already upon the spring, and our shot met him as he rose. he fell dead and quivering almost within a foot of aboko, who may be said to have had a very narrow escape, for the leopard had singled him out as his prey. he was an immense animal, and his skin, which i preserved as a trophy, is most beautifully shaded and spotted; in fact there is scarcely a more beautiful animal than the african leopard. at the mouth of the nazareth the savage saw-fish is found. it is no doubt one of the most formidable, and the most terrible of the animals that live in the water. i was quietly paddling in a little canoe, when my attention was drawn to a great splashing of water a little way off. i saw at once it was a deadly combat between two animals. all round the water was white with foam. the cause of this could not be two hippopotami fighting, for in that case i should have seen them. i approached cautiously, having first made my two rifles ready in case of an emergency. at last i came near enough to see an enormous saw-fish attacking a large shark. it was a fearful combat; both fought with desperation. but what could the shark do against the powerful saw of his antagonist? at last they came too near my canoe. i moved off lest they might attack my canoe, for they would have made short work of my small, frail boat; and a single blow of the saw-fish would have disabled me. each tooth of the saw must have been two inches long, and there were, i should say, forty on each side; the saw was about five feet long. in the end, the saw-fish, more active than the shark, gave him a terrible blow, making his teeth go right through the flesh of the shark. several such blows were quickly delivered, and all became still, the foam ceased, and the water resumed its accustomed stillness. i paddled towards the scene, when suddenly i saw, at the bottom of the river, what i recognised to be a great shark; it was dead, and lay on its back, showing its belly. the body was frightfully lacerated. the saw-fish had killed its antagonist, and left the field of battle, and only the blood of the shark stained the water. in the bay of cape lopez, in the month of july, i could see whales playing about in every direction, and sending water high into the air. they come at that time of the year with their young; and the water of the bay being very quiet, they enjoy there the sea, and the young whales get strong before they go into the broad ocean. very pretty it looks to see them swimming by the side of the big mothers. year after year the whales came, always in july; but one year the whalers found them out, and made war upon them; and now, when july comes, they are no more to be seen, for the whale is very intelligent, and knows well the places where he is not safe; so they look out for some other unfrequented bay wherein to play and train their young. besides the whale, all the year round can be seen what the sailor commonly calls the _bottle-nose_, an enormous fish, not so big as a whale, but nevertheless of great size. it is of the whale family. [illustration] [illustration: our schooner caught in a tornado.] chapter xxi. bound for the interior--a sea voyage--a tornado--we reach the fernand-vaz--sangala wishes to detain me--a night alarm--prospect of a war--arrayed for battle--a compromise--my commi friends. i have been a great wanderer. on the th of february, , i was on board of a little schooner, of forty-five tons burden, bound for the mouth of a river called fernand-vaz. from there i expected to penetrate into the interior. i was on my way to a wild and unexplored region. the name of the schooner was the caroline. she was full of provisions and goods for the long journey i had to undertake; for i intended to make a very long exploration before my return to america. the captain was a portuguese negro, cornillo by name. the crew, seven in number, were mpongwes, mbingos, and croomen, not more than two of whom could understand each other, and not a soul could properly understand the captain. a fine prospect for the voyage! i got aboard at daylight, and should have been glad to go immediately ashore again; but, by dint of steady shouting, and a great deal of standing idle, with a little work now and then, we got the anchor up just at dusk. the captain did not like to leave port on friday. i told him i would take the responsibility. he asked what good that would do him if he went to the bottom. it appears that the portuguese have the same absurd superstitions as many of the sailors of other nations. no sooner had we got into the swell than our two black women, and every man on board (except the captain), got sea-sick. the cook was unable to get the breakfast next morning; and the men were lying about, looking like dying fish. we set sail from the gaboon river, and hoped to get down to the commi country in five days. but for four days after starting we had light wind and a contrary current; and, on the fifth day, we were caught in such a storm at sea as i hope never to experience again. the steering went on so badly when captain cornillo was below, that i was forced to stand watch myself. i had been steering for four hours, and had been perhaps one hour in my berth, when i was awakened from a sound sleep by the captain's voice, giving orders to take down the mainsail. i sprang on deck immediately, knowing there must be at least a heavy squall coming. but no sooner did i cast my eyes to the leeward than i saw how imminent the danger was. a tornado was coming down upon us. the black clouds which had gathered about the horizon were becoming lurid white with startling quickness. it seemed almost as if they were lit up by lightning. the tornado was sweeping along and in a moment would be upon us. as yet all was still--still as death. there was not a breath of wind. i turned to see if the mainsail was down, but found nothing had been done. the captain was shouting from the wheel; the men were also shouting and running about, half scared to death; and, in the pitchy darkness (for i could not see my hands when held close before my eyes), no one could find the halliards. in the midst of our trouble the wind came roaring down upon us. i seized a knife, determined to cut everything away; but just then somebody let go the halliards, and, in the nick of time, the mainsail came half-way down. the tornado was upon us. the jibs flew away in rags in a moment. the vessel was thrown upon her beam ends. the water rushed over her deck, and the men sang out that we were drowning; as, in fact, we should have been in a very few minutes. happily the wind shifted a little; and, by the light of some very vivid lightning, we seized on the mainsail, like men that felt it was their last hope, and pulled it down, holding it so that the wind should not catch it again. the vessel righted, and in less than twenty minutes the squall died away, and was succeeded by a driving rain, which poured down in such torrents that in a very short time i was drenched to the skin. the lightning and thunder were something terrific. i was afraid of the lightning, striking us as the caroline had no lightning-rod, and we had powder enough on board to blow us all to atoms. the deck was so leaky that even below i could not get protection from the rain. the next morning we had no jibs, and our other sails were severely damaged. to add to our difficulties, no one on board, not even our captain, knew where we were. at that time i knew not how to make astronomical observations. the captain was in the habit of bringing up, every day, an old quadrant; but about the use of it he knew as much as a cow does about a musket. at last we made the land. a canoe came on board, and we asked where we were. we found that we must be somewhere near cape st. catherine, and therefore a good many miles south of the mouth of the fernand-vaz, the place where i was bound. so we turned about to retrace our path. sailing close in shore, when i passed the village of aniambia, or big camma, the natives came with a message from their king, offering me two slaves if i would stay with him. i was immovable, for i had set my heart on going to the fernand-vaz river, of which i heard a good deal, from my friend aboko, while in the cape lopez regions. as we approached that river, the vast column of water, pushing seaward, forced its separate way through the ocean for at least four or five miles; and the water there was almost fresh, and seemed a separate current in the sea. at last we came to the mouth of the fernand-vaz, and our fame had gone before us. some of the commi people, the inhabitants of the fernand-vaz, had seen me before at cape lopez. the news had spread that i wanted to settle at the village of a chief called ranpano; so, as we passed his seashore village, a canoe came off to ask me to land; but as the breakers were rather formidable, i begged to be excused. ranpano's men wanted much to hug me; and were so extravagant in their joy, that i had to order them to keep their hands off, their shining and oily bodies having quite soiled my clothes. they went back to the king to tell him the good news. i kept one of these men on board for a pilot, being now anxious to get across the intricate bar, and fairly into the river, before dark. as we sailed along up the river, canoes belonging to different villages shot out to meet us; and presently i had a crowd alongside anxious to come on board, and sufficient almost to sink us. they took me for a slaver at first, and their joy was unbounded; for there is nothing the african loves so much as to sell his fellowmen. they immediately called out their names in portuguese: one was don miguel, another don pedro, another don francisco. they began to jabber away in portuguese. where they had learned this language i could not tell, unless it were in sangatanga. i could not understand them; so i sent my captain to talk with them. he had some difficulty to persuade them that i came no such errand as slave-trading. they insisted that i had, and that the vessel looked exactly like a slaver. they said we must buy some of their slaves; they had plenty of them. they insisted that i should not go to ranpano. i should put up a factory in their place. they belonged to elindé, a town just at the mouth of the fernand-vaz, whose king is named sangala. they praised the power and greatness of sangala, and decried poor ranpano, until i had to order all hands ashore for the night, being anxious to get a good quiet sleep to prepare for the morrow. during the night, the men on watch said they heard the paddling of a canoe coming towards us. what could it be? let us be ready. these men might be coming to board us and make war. at length the canoe came within hailing distance; we shouted to them. (i may say that the commi speak the same language as the oroungou people--the inhabitants of cape lopez.) they came, they said, with a message from king sangala. i recognised the voice of the head man in the canoe to be that of nchouga. he was brother of king bango of cape lopez. bango had accused nchouga of bewitching him, whereupon the latter, to save his life, fled from the country; and having married one of the daughters of sangala, he came to his father-in-law for protection. nchouga was a very cunning fellow; fortunately i knew him well, and he could not fool me so easily as he thought. he came to tell me that sangala was the master of all the river; that he was a very great king; that he would not let me go to ranpano, who was only a vassal of the great sangala; therefore, he advised me as a friend--an old friend--to go ashore at elindé. i could read the cunning rogue. he had been one of the greatest rascals of cape lopez, and his slave dealings had not improved him. so i sent nchouga off; i wanted to go to sleep. he had come out to test me; they thought i was a green hand at slave-trading. early next morning sangala sent off a boat for me. on my arrival at elindé, which village was about two miles from the river's mouth, i was conducted to the best house. hither presently came king sangala, who, in order to nerve himself for the occasion, had got drunk, and came attended by a great crowd of eager subjects. he grew very angry when i stated my intention of passing up the river, and going to ranpano, and also into the interior. he declared that i should not go; he was the big king there and everywhere all over the world, and i must settle in his town. i declared that i should go on. sometimes i wonder that they did not at once make me a prisoner. we had some sharp words, and i explained to his majesty that i was an old african traveller, and saw through all his lies; that he was not the big king of the country, as he said. then he said i might go wherever i liked, provided i would have a factory built in his village. i said that i had no factory to build in his village; but i offered to "dash" him (give him some presents). he refused this offer; and now ranpano, having just come, assured me that i should be backed up. i told sangala i should force my way up. sangala and all his people shouted with all their might that there should be war; sangala, as he got up to say so, reared and tumbled down, he was so drunk. so i left sangala. by that time it rained so hard that no one followed us. it is wonderful how a crowd is dispersed by a shower of rain. a great palaver was looming up; the excitement had spread over the country. in the meantime i had succeeded in going to ranpano's village, situated up the river, five or six miles above elindé. ranpano gave me as much land as i wanted. my goods must come to his village; but it seemed that they could not be brought there without great trouble. our canoes would be attacked by sangala's people. men would be killed; and we might be routed, unless we had a powerful force. one morning the war drums beat. all ranpano's friends had gathered to help fight sangala. canoe after canoe came in loaded with armed men, with drums beating, and all hands shouting, and waving their swords, guns, and spears. all were prepared to assist ranpano's white man; all were anxious to burn and plunder elindé, ready even to die in the undertaking. there was king ritimbo, with two canoes and fifty men; king mombon, from sanguibiuri, also had two canoes; altogether we had no less than twenty big canoes, and could muster about three hundred men, most of whom were drunk on _mimbo_ (palm-wine), and as noisy and as ready for fight as drunkenness will make an african. the drums were beaten, war songs were sung, and guns fired, as we paddled down the river. all hands had their faces painted white, which is a sign of war; and were covered with fetiches and other amulets. the white chalk or ochre was a sovereign protection against danger, and their war fetiches would prevent them from being killed. i could not recognise old ranpano, his body was so daubed with paint. one would have supposed these terrible fellows were bent upon the most bloody of raids. i wondered if all this uproar would end in smoke; i thought it would; nor was i disappointed. as these terrible warriors approached the village of elindé they became less demonstrative. when they came in sight of sangala's town, they pushed over to the other shore, out of the way, and took care to keep the caroline between the enemy and themselves. the sight of sangala's warriors had wrought a wonderful change in their warlike feelings. they really began to think that there might be some fighting. we found that sangala had also gathered his friends, and had about one hundred and fifty men ready for the fight, who probably felt about as courageous as my men did. these fellows were painted more outrageously than mine, having red as well as white applied in broad stripes. they looked like so many devils shouting and firing guns, each side knowing their mutual lack of courage, and thinking it prudent to scare the other in advance. my men fired guns, sung, and danced war dances. i went on board my schooner. one small canoe on sangala's side, with two men, who were unarmed, started from the shore towards us. this of course meant a palaver; they came on board of the caroline, where i was. i sent word to sangala, pointing to two little guns we had on deck, that if he stopped me i would blow his canoes out of the water with grape-shot, and would then go and bring a man-of-war to finish him up. i loaded my guns and pistols before them. i made my men put good charges into their pieces, and showed sangala's men the bag of bullets i loaded them with, and then sent them back, and awaited the event. i spied them with a glass. as soon as they landed the people surrounded them; there was a grand palaver. presently, from sangala, came a small canoe to ask me ashore. sangala sent his konde (chief wife) to be hostage for my safety. i determined to go ashore, and, to show these negroes that i had no fear of them, i took the woman along with me, to her great joy. ranpano and his brother kings protested against my rashness as they thought it. "why not keep sangala's woman on board?" said they. but i told them it was not the fashion of white people to fear anything. they looked at me as if to say, "if you are not afraid we are." all this had its effect upon them, and ranpano and his brother kings were evidently impressed, and so also was old sangala when he saw me come with his wife by my side. we met on neutral ground outside his town. his army was drawn up in battle array, and made a fine savage display, many of the men wearing beautiful leopard skins about their waists. they came up to us at full trot, when we were seated, and made as though they would spear us all; and, if sangala had not been close to me, i should have thought it was to be the end of us all. ranpano kept whispering in my ears, "why did you not keep sangala's wife on board?" but this advance upon us was only a kind of military salute. sangala, this time, had become more gentle; he was not drunk, and, thinking that perhaps there might really be a fight, he had become very quiet. he did not wish to push matters to extremity. presently, sangala said he would let me pass if i would give him a barrel of rum, a big one. i refused. i said i had none. he insisted that they must rejoice and get drunk. he wanted to get drunk for several days, and drink rum to his heart's content. at last, the palaver was settled, and i gave him many presents; and thereafter king sangala became one of my best friends. ranpano was delighted; he hugged sangala; he swore eternal friendship, and said that he loved him with all his heart. sangala returned these compliments. we made a sign, agreed upon to our men, that everything was settled. immediately they fired guns, embarked in their canoes, and came over to sangala's village. they made a fine display, as all their canoes came in a line, and they were singing their war songs. they were met by sangala's warriors; and they made a rush towards each other as if they were to have a real fight, and then all was over and they laughed over the palaver, and swore that they would not hurt each other for the world. i need not say how glad i was that everything had ended so well. captain cornillo, when everything looked black, swore that he never would come again to this wild country; and the crew said i wanted them all to be murdered. i found these commi very good people. i took ashore canoe after canoe, loaded with goods which might well tempt these poor negroes sorely. many of the things were brought loose to ranpano's; and yet not a single thing was stolen, not even the value of a penny. they were proud that i had come to settle among them. i was the first white man who had done so. i love these commi people dearly; and i am sure they all love me also. they took such great care of me. ranpano was a very good king, and he always tried to please me, and so did his people. now and then they did wrong; but these poor people knew no better, and they were sorry afterwards. not one would have tried to do me an injury, and i could sleep with my doors wide open. [illustration] [illustration: african ball. king olenga-yombi dancing. chap. xii.] [illustration] chapter xxii. i build a village, and call it washington--i start for the interior--my speech on leaving--the people applaud me vociferously, and promise to be honest--we reach aniambia--the "big king," olenga-yombi--a royal ball in my honour--the superstitions of the natives--a man tossed by a buffalo. i immediately began building a substantial settlement, not an _olako_. i collected from a kind of palm tree a great many leaves, with which to cover the roofs of the buildings i had to construct. i gathered also a great quantity of branches from the same palm trees, and sticks, and poles, and all that was necessary to make a house; and finally i succeeded in building quite a village, which i called washington. my own house had five rooms; it was forty-five feet long by twenty-five wide, and cost me about fifty dollars. my kitchen, which stood by itself, cost four dollars. i had a fowl-house, containing a hundred chickens (and such nice little tiny chickens they are in that country) and a dozen ducks. my goat-house contained eighteen goats, and funny goats they were. you had to milk a dozen of them to get a pint of milk. i built a powder-house separate, for i do not like to sleep every day in a place where there is powder. i had a dozen huts for my men. this was washington in africa, a very different place from washington in america. at the back of my village was a wide extent of prairie. in front was the river npoulounai winding along; and i could see miles out on the way which i was soon to explore. the river banks were lined with the mangrove trees; and, looking up stream, i could at almost any time see schools of hippopotami tossing and tumbling on the flats or mud banks. i was now ready to explore the country, and go to aniambia, where the big king of the country lived. i bought a splendid canoe, made of large trees, which i hoped would be serviceable to me in my up-river explorations. i was now anxious to be off. before starting i called ranpano and all his people together, and said that i had perfect confidence in them; that i was their white man, and had come to them through much difficulty and many dangers. (cheers.) that sangala's people wanted me, but i was determined to live with the honest folks of biagano (ranpano's village). (tremendous applause.) that i was going away for a few days, and hoped to find my goods all safe when i came back. at this, there were great shoutings of "you can go! do not fear! we love you! you are our white man! we will take care of you!" and so on; amid which my sixteen men seized their paddles, and shoved off. at nine in the evening, the moon rose; and we pulled along through what seemed a charming scene. the placid stream was shaded by the immense trees which overhung its banks; and the silence was broken, now and then, by the screech of some night-prowling blast, or, more frequently, by the sudden plunge of a playful herd of hippopotami, some of which came very dangerously near us, and might have upset our canoe. towards midnight, my men became very tired, and we went ashore, at a little village which was nearly deserted. we could find only three old women, who were fast asleep and were not particularly anxious to make us welcome. i was too sleepy to stand upon ceremonies, and stowed myself away under a rough shed without walls. i had scarcely lain down, when there came up, suddenly, one of those fierce tornadoes which pass over these countries in the rainy season. fortunately, it was a dry tornado. in my half-sleepy state i did not care to move. as the tornado had unroofed every other shed as well as mine, nothing would have been gained by moving, even if it had rained. the next morning we paid for our lodging, not in hard cash, but with some leaves of tobacco, and up the river we paddled until we reached a village called igala mandé, which is situated on the banks of the river. in a two hours' walk through grass fields we found numerous birds. one, in particular, was new to me, the _mycteria senegalensis_. it had such long legs that it fairly outwalked me. i tried to catch it; but, though it would not take to its wings, it kept so far ahead that i did not even get a fair shot at it. this _mycteria senegalensis_ is a beautiful bird, and wanders here through the grass of the prairie. there were also great flocks of a beautiful bird, whose dark golden body-plumage and long snow-white downy necks make a very fine and marked contrast with the green grass. next to these, in point of number, was the snow-white _egretta_, which is found in vast flocks all along this coast. at last we came to aniambia. olenga-yombi, the king, came in from his plantation when he heard the joyful news that a white man had arrived. i paid him a state visit. he was a drunken old wretch, surrounded by a crowd of the chief men of the town. his majesty had on a thick overcoat, but no trousers; and, early as it was, he had already taken a goodly quantity of palm-wine, and was quite drunk. i was invited to sit at his right hand. king olenga-yombi was one of the ugliest fellows i ever met with. he always carried with him a long stick; and when drunk he struck at his people right and left, and shouted, "i am a big king!" happily, they managed to keep out of his way. at nightfall i got a guide, and went out to see if i could get a shot at something larger than a bird. we had gone but a little way, when my guide pointed out to me a couple of bright glowing spots, visible through a piece of thick brush. the fellow trembled, as he whispered "leopard!" but i saw at once that it was only the light of a couple of fireflies which had got in proper position to make a tolerable resemblance to the glowing eyes of the dreaded leopard. i did not think much of the bravery of my guide. what a difference between him and aboko, niamkala, or fasiko! i wished that i had them with me. at two o'clock in the morning we at last heard a grunting, which announced the approach of a herd of wild hogs. i lay in wait for them, and i was fortunate enough to kill the big boar of the pack. the rest of the herd made off without showing a desire for fight. the next day, king olenga-yombi held a grand dance in my honour. all the king's wives, to the number of forty, and all the women in the town and neighbourhood were present. fortunately, the dance was held out in the street, and not in a room, as at cape lopez. the women were ranged on one side, the men opposite. at the end of the line sat the drummers, beating their huge tom-toms, which make an infernal din, enough to make one deaf; and, as if for this occasion the tom-toms were not entirely adequate, there was a series of old brass kettles, which also were furiously beaten. in addition, as if the noise was not yet enough, a number of boys sat near the drummers, and beat on hollow pieces of wood. what beauty they found in such music i cannot tell. there was of course singing and shouting; and the more loudly and energetically the horrid drums were beaten, and the worse the noise on the brass kettles, the wilder were the jumps of the male africans, and the more disgusting the contortions of the women. as may be imagined, to beat the tom-tom is not a labour of love; the stoutest negro is worn out in an hour; and for such a night's entertainment as this, a series of drummers was required. the people enjoyed it vastly; their only regret was that they had not a barrel of rum in the midst of the street, with which to refresh themselves in the pauses of the dance; but they managed to get just as drunk on palm-wine, of which a great quantity was served out. the excitement became greatest when the king danced. his majesty was pretty drunk, and his jumps were very highly applauded. his wives bowed down to his feet while he capered about, and showed towards him the deepest veneration. the drums and kettles were belaboured more furiously than ever, and the singing, or rather the shouting, became stentorian. of course i did not think his majesty's party pleasant enough to detain me all night. i retired, but could not sleep. now i think i have given you a sufficient account of a ball at aniambia, and of how his majesty olenga-yombi danced. there are two very curious fetich-houses in aniambia, which enjoy the protection of two spirits of great power--abambou and mbiuri. the former is an evil spirit, a kind of devil; the latter, as far as i have been able to ascertain, is beneficent. the little houses where these spirits sometimes condescend to come and sleep for the night were about six feet square. in the house of abambou i saw a fire, which i was told was never permitted to go out. i saw no idol, but only a large chest, on the top of which were some white and red chalk and some red parrot-feathers. the chalk was used to mark the bodies of the devout. abambou is the devil of the commi people. he is a wicked and mischievous fellow, who often lives near graves and burial-grounds, and is most comfortably lodged among the skeletons of the dead. he takes occasional walks through the country, and, if he gets angry at anyone, he has the power to cause sickness and death. the commi people cook food for him, which is deposited in lonely places in the woods, and there they address him in a flattering manner, and ask him to be good to them, and, in consideration of their gifts, and of the great care they take of him, to let them alone. i was present once at a meeting where abambou was being addressed in public. they cried continually: "now we are well! now we are satisfied! now be our friend, abambou, and do not hurt us!" the offerings of plantain, bananas, sugar-cane, ground-nuts, etc., etc., are wrapped in leaves by the free men, but the slaves lay them on the bare ground. sometimes abambou is entreated to kill the enemies of him who is making the offering. a bed is made in abambou's house, and there he is believed to rest himself sometimes, when he is tired going up and down the coast in the forest. mbiuri, whose house i next visited, is lodged and kept much in the same way as his rival. he is a good spirit, but his powers are like those of abambou, as far as i could make out. not being wicked, he is less zealously worshipped. these commi people are full of superstition. they believe in a third and much-dreaded spirit, called ovengua. this is a terrible catcher and _eater_ of men. he is not worshipped, and has no power over disease; but he wanders unceasingly through the forests, and catches and destroys luckless travellers who cross his path. by day he lives in dark caverns, but at night he roams freely, and even sometimes gets into the body of a man, and beats and kills all who come out in the dark. sometimes, they relate, such a spirit is met and resisted by a body of men, who wound him with spears, and even kill him. in this case the body must be burned, and not even the smallest bone left, lest a new ovengua should arise from it. there are many places where no object in the world would induce a commi negro to go by night, for fear of this dreadful monster. they have a singular belief that when a person dies who has been bewitched, the bones of his body leave the grave one by one, and form in a single line united to each other, which line of bones gradually becomes an ovengua. it is not an easy matter to get at the religious notions of these people. they themselves have no well-defined ideas of them, and on many points they are not very communicative. i suppose they think that sometimes the ovengua is in a man; hence they kill him and burn his body. of course the commi people, like all other negroes, are firm believers in witchcraft. not very far from aniambia, there is a place in the forest which is supposed to be haunted by the spirit of a crazy woman, who, some hundreds of years ago, left her home. they believe that she cultivates her plantation in some hidden recess in the forest, and that she often lies in wait for travellers, whom she beats and kills out of pure malice. while at aniambia i had a great adventure with a _bos brachicheros_, which might have ended in a terrible way. i started out early one day to try and get a shot at some buffaloes which were said to be in the prairie at the back of the town. i had been an hour on the plains with ifouta, a hunter, when we came upon a bull feeding in the midst of a little prairie surrounded by woods, which made an approach easy. i remember well how beautiful the animal looked. ifouta walked round through the jungle opposite to where i lay in wait; for, if the animal should take fright at him, it might fly towards me. when he reached the right position, ifouta began to crawl, in the hunter's fashion, through the grass towards his prey. all went well till he came near enough for a shot. just then, unluckily, the bull saw him. ifouta immediately fired. it was a long shot, and he only wounded the beast, which, quite infuriated, immediately rushed upon him. it was now that poor ifouta lost his presence of mind. in such cases, which are continually happening to those who hunt the _bos brachicheros_, the proper course for the hunter is to remain perfectly quiet till the beast is within a jump of him, then to step nimbly to one side, and let him rush past. but ifouta got up and ran. the bull ran faster than he, and in a moment had him on his horns. he tossed him high into the air, once, twice, thrice, before i could come up; for, as soon as i saw what had happened, i ran as fast as i could to the rescue, and my shouts drew the bull's fury upon myself. he left ifouta and came rushing at me, thinking that he would serve me as he had just served ifouta. master bull was sadly mistaken. i took a good aim, and down came the bull, to rise no more. ifouta proved to be considerably bruised; but, on the whole, he was more scared than hurt. it was fortunate for him that the horns of these buffaloes slant backwards a good deal, and are curved. [illustration] [illustration: capturing a young gorilla.] chapter xxiii. capture of a young gorilla--i call him "fighting joe"--his strength and bad temper--he proves untameable--joe escapes--re-captured--escapes again--unpleasant to handle--death of "fighting joe." i remember well the day when i first possessed a live gorilla. yes, a gorilla that could roar; a young gorilla alive! he was captured not far from cape st. catherine, and dragged into washington. my hunters were five in number, and were walking very silently through the forest, when suddenly the silence was broken by the cry of a young gorilla for its mother. everything was still. it was about noon, and they immediately determined to follow the cry. soon they heard the cry again. gun in hand, the brave fellows crept noiselessly towards a clump of wood where the baby gorilla evidently was. they knew the mother would be near; and there was a likelihood that they might encounter the male also, which they dread more than they do the mother. but they determined to risk everything, and, if possible, to take the young one alive, knowing how pleased i should be, for i had been long trying to capture a young gorilla. presently they perceived the bush moving; and crawling a little farther on, in dead silence, scarcely breathing with excitement, they beheld what had seldom been seen even by negroes. a young gorilla was seated on the ground, as the picture shows you, eating some berries, which grew close to the earth. a few feet farther on sat the mother, also eating of the same fruit. instantly they made ready to fire; and none too soon, for the old female saw them as they raised their guns, and they had to pull triggers without delay. happily, they wounded her mortally. she fell on her face, the blood gushing from the wounds. the young one, hearing the noise of the guns, ran to his mother and clung to her, hiding his face and embracing her body. the hunters immediately rushed towards the two, hallooing with joy. how much i wished that i had been with them, and been so fortunate as to assist in the capture of a live gorilla! their shouts roused the little one, who, by this time, was covered with blood coming from his mother's wounds. he instantly let go of his mother and ran to a small tree, which he climbed with great agility. there he sat and roared at them savagely. they were now perplexed how to get at him. what was to be done? no one cared to run the chance of being bitten by this savage little beast. they did not want to shoot him, for they knew i should never forgive them for doing so. he would not come down the tree, and they did not care to climb it after him. at last they cut down the tree, and, as it fell, they dexterously threw a cloth over the head of the young monster, and thus gained time to secure it while it was blinded. with all these precautions, one of the men received a severe bite on the hand, and another had a piece taken out of his leg. the little brute, though very diminutive, and the merest baby in age, was astonishingly strong, and by no means good-tempered. they found they could not lead him. he constantly rushed at them, showing fight, and manifesting a strong desire to take a piece, or several pieces, out of every one of their legs, which were his special objects of attack. so they were obliged to get a forked stick, in which his neck was inserted in such a way that he could not escape, and yet could be kept at a safe distance. it must have been very uncomfortable for him; but it was the only way of securing themselves against his nails and teeth, and thus he was brought to washington. the excitement in the village was intense, as the animal was lifted out of the canoe in which he had come down the river. he roared and bellowed; and looked around wildly with his wicked little eyes, giving fair warning that if he could get at any of us he would take his revenge. of course, no one came in his way. i saw that the stick hurt his neck, and immediately set about having a cage made for him. in two hours we had built a strong bamboo house with the slats securely tied at such a distance apart that we could see the gorilla, and it could see out. we made it as strong as we could, and i was very careful to provide against every chance of his escaping. in this cage he was immediately deposited; and now, for the first time, i had a fair chance to look at my prize. as i approached the cage he darted at me; but i could afford to have a good laugh over him, for i knew he could not get near enough to bite me. he looked at me with very savage eyes. i named the gorilla joe--"fighting joe." he was evidently not three years old, but fully able to walk alone, and possessed, for his age, of very extraordinary strength. his height was about three feet and six inches. his hands and face were very black, his eyes were sunken. the hair on his head was of a reddish-brown colour. it began just at the eyebrows and came down the sides of the face to the lower jaw, just as our beards grow. the whiskers, if we may call them so, were of a blackish colour. the face was smooth, and intensely black. the upper lip was covered with short, coarse hair; i wondered if it was the beginning of a moustache. i found afterwards that gorillas had no moustaches. the lower lip had longer hair; and i wondered also if in time an imperial would grow there. there were eyelashes too, though these were slight and thin. the eyebrows were straight. excepting the face, and the palms of his hands and feet, his whole body was covered with hair. on the back, the hair was of an iron grey, becoming quite dark near the arms. on the arms, the hair was longer than anywhere else on the body, as you may see by the picture. after i had looked carefully at the little fellow, and knew well that he was safely locked in his cage, i ventured to approach him to say a few encouraging words. he stood in the farthest corner; but as i approached, he bellowed and made a precipitate rush at me. though i retreated as quickly as i could, he succeeded in catching my trousers' legs with the toes of one of his feet, and then retreated immediately to the farthest corner. this taught me caution; i must not approach too near. shall i be able to tame him? i thought i should; but i was disappointed. he sat in his corner, looking wickedly out of his grey eyes; and i never saw a more morose or ill-tempered face than this little beast had. i do not believe that gorillas ever smile. of course i had to attend to the wants of my captive. my first business in the morning was to attend on joe. i sent for some of the forest berries which these animals are known to prefer, and placed these and a cup of water within his reach. he was exceedingly shy, and would neither eat nor drink till i had removed to a considerable distance. the second day i found joe fiercer than on the first. he rushed savagely at anyone who stood even for a moment near his cage and seemed ready to tear us to pieces. a fine specimen of man-monkey, thought i; a tiger under the disguise of a gorilla. i wondered what kind of a cage a full-grown gorilla would require. i should certainly not care to be his keeper. i threw joe pieces of pine-apple leaves; and i noticed that he ate only the white part. there seemed to be no difficulty about his food, as long as it was gathered from his native woods; but he refused all other kinds of food. he was very fond of bananas and ripe plantains. the third day joe was still more morose and savage, bellowing when any persons approached, or retiring to a distant corner to make a rush upon them. on the fourth day, while no one was near, the little rascal succeeded in forcing apart two of the bamboo sticks which composed his cage and made his escape. i came up just as his flight was discovered, and immediately got all the negroes together for pursuit. where had he gone? i was determined to surround the wood and recapture him. running into my house to get one of my guns, i was startled by an angry growl issuing from under my low bedstead. it was master joe; there was no mistake about it; i knew his growl but too well. master joe lay there hid, but anxiously watching my movements. i cleared out faster than i came in. i instantly shut the windows, and called to my people to guard the door. when joe saw the crowd of black faces he became furious; and with his eyes glaring, and every sign of rage in his little face and body, he got out from beneath the bed. he was about to make a rush at all of us. he was not afraid. a stampede of my men took place. i shut the door quickly, and left joe master of the premises. i preferred devising some plans for his easy capture, to exposing myself and men to his terrible teeth; for the little rascal could bite very hard, and i did not care to have a piece taken out of one of my legs. how to take him was now a puzzling question. he had shown such strength and such rage already that i did not care, and none of my men seemed to care, to run the chance of getting badly beaten in a hand-to-hand struggle, in which we were pretty sure to come off the worse. meantime, peeping through the keyhole, i saw master joe standing still in the middle of the room looking about for his enemies, and examining, with some surprise, the furniture. he seemed to think that he had never seen such things before. i watched with fear, lest the ticking of my clock should attract his attention, and perhaps lead him to an assault upon that precious article. indeed, i should have left joe in possession, but for a fear that he would destroy the many little articles of value or curiosity i had hung about the walls, and which reminded me so much of america. finally, seeing joe to be quiet, i despatched some fellows for a net; and, opening the door quickly, i threw this over his head. fortunately we succeeded at the first throw in effectually entangling the young monster, who roared frightfully, and struck and kicked in every direction under the net. so fearfully was he excited that i thought he would die in a fit of rage. i took hold of the back of his neck; two men seized his arms, and another the legs; and, thus held by four men, we could hardly manage joe. we carried him as quickly as we could to the cage, which had been repaired, and then once more locked him in. i never saw such a furious beast in my life as he was. he darted at everyone. he bit the bamboos of his cage. he glared at us with venomous and sullen eyes, and in every motion showed a temper thoroughly wicked and malicious. after this joe got worse than ever; and as good treatment only made him more morose and savage, i tried what starvation would do towards breaking his spirit. besides, it began to be troublesome to procure his food from the woods, and i wanted him to become accustomed to civilized food, which was placed before him. but he would touch nothing of the kind. how was i to bring him to america? i could not put an african forest on board. as for his temper, after starving him for twenty-four hours, all i gained was, that he came slowly up and took some berries from the forest out of my hand and then immediately retreated to his corner to eat them. daily attentions from me, for a fortnight more, did not bring me any further confidence from him than this. he always snarled at me; and only when very hungry would he take even his choicest food from my hand. at the end of this fortnight i came one day to feed him, and found that he had gnawed a bamboo to pieces slily, and again made his escape. luckily he had but just gone, for as i looked around i caught a sight of him making off on all fours, and with great speed, across the prairie for a clump of trees. i at once gave the alarm. i called the men up, and we gave chase, taking with us all the fishing nets. he saw us, and, before we could head him off, made for another clump, which was thicker and larger. this we surrounded. he did not ascend a tree, but stood defiantly at the border of the wood. about one hundred and fifty of us surrounded him. as we moved up he began to yell, and made a sudden dash upon a poor fellow who was in advance. the fellow ran, and tumbled down in affright. by his fall he escaped the tender mercies of joe's teeth; but he also detained the little rascal long enough for the nets to be thrown over him. four of us bore him again, struggling, into the village. this time i would not trust him to the cage, but fastened a small chain round his neck. this operation he resisted with all his might, and it took us quite an hour to securely chain the little fellow, whose strength was something marvellous. ten days after he was thus chained he died quite suddenly. he had been in good health, and ate plentifully of his natural food, which was brought every day from the forest for him. he did not seem to sicken until two days before his death. he died in some pain. to the last he continued utterly untameable, and after his chain was put on he added treachery to his other vices. he would come sometimes quite readily to eat out of my hand, but while i stood by him would suddenly--looking me all the time in the face to keep my attention--put out his foot and grasp at my leg. several times he tore my pantaloons in this manner. a quick retreat on my part saved my legs from further injury, but i had to be very careful in my approaches. the negroes could not come near him at all without setting him in a rage. he seemed always to remember that they captured him, and to think he had experienced rather too hard treatment at their hands; but he evidently always cherished towards me also a feeling of revenge. after he was chained i filled a half barrel with hay, and set it near him for his bed. he recognised its use at once, and it was pretty to see him shake up the hay and creep into this nest when he was tired. at night he always shook it up, and then took some hay in his hands, with which he would cover himself when he was snug in his barrel. he often moaned, for his mother perhaps, at night. after joe died i stuffed his body, and brought his skin and skeleton to new york, where many saw it. around his neck, where the chain had been, the hair was worn off. poor joe! i wish he had lived and become tame, so that i could have brought him home with me to show the children. now poor joe can be seen stuffed in the british museum. [illustration: hippopotami at home.] chapter xxiv. the hippopotamus--a duel--shooting on the river--nearly upset--a night-hunt on land--my companion fires and runs--appearance and habits of the hippopotamus. what have we yonder in the water? a flock of hippopotami! their bodies look for all the world like so many old weather-beaten logs stranded on a mud-bank or a sand-bar. every thing was still. the sun was very hot, and all nature seemed to repose. i was concealed on the banks of the river, under a very shady tree, watching them. suddenly, not far from me, two huge beasts rose as by enchantment to the surface of the water and rushed towards each other. their vast and hideous mouths were opened to their utmost capacity, showing their huge crooked tusks, which gave their mouths a savage appearance. their eyes were flaming with rage, and each of them put forth all his power to annihilate the other. they seized each other with their jaws; they stabbed and punched with their strong tusks, lacerating each other in a frightful manner; they advanced and retreated; now they were at the top of the water, and now they sank down to the bottom. their blood discoloured the river, and their groans or grunts of rage were hideous to listen to. they showed little power of strategy, but rather a piggish obstinacy in maintaining their ground, and a frightful savageness of demeanour. the combat lasted an hour. it was a grand sight. the water around them was sometimes white with foam. at last one turned about and made off, leaving the other victorious and master of the field. a few days after, i killed a hippopotamus, and its thick hide was lacerated terribly. doubtless it was one of the beasts i had seen fighting. the hippopotamus is found in most of the rivers of africa which empty themselves into the atlantic or indian ocean, but in none but the nile of those which empty themselves into the mediterranean; and in the nile it is only met far up the river. many as there were of them on the fernand-vaz, they were more numerous on the ogobai. how much sport i have had with them! how often have i studied their habits! and now i must give you some account of my encounters with them. about five miles above my little settlement at washington there was a place in the river shallow enough for them to stand and play around, and there they remained all day playing in the deep water, sometimes diving, but for the most part standing on the shallows, with only their ugly noses or heads lifted out of the water. one fine morning i went towards them. we approached slowly and with caution to within thirty yards of them without seeming to attract the slightest attention from the sluggish animals. one might have asked himself, "are they hippopotami or not?" stopping there i fired five shots, and, so far as i could see, i killed three hippopotami. the ear is one of the most vulnerable spots, and this was my mark every time. the first shot was received with very little attention by the herd; but the struggles of the dying animal i had hit, which turned over several times and finally sank to the bottom, seemed to rouse the others, who began to plunge about and dive down into deep water. the blood of my victims discoloured the water all around, and we could not see whether those who escaped were not swimming for us. presently the canoe received a violent jar, and, looking overboard, we perceived that we were in the midst of the herd. "the hippopotami are coming upon us!" shouted the men; "they are going to attack us!" we pulled out of the way as fast as we could, none of us being anxious to be capsized. it would have been a comical sight to see us swimming in the midst of a flock of hippopotami, and some of us, perhaps, raised up on the back of one as he came to the surface, or lifted, maybe, with his two crooked tusks in our body. we were soon out of the way, and looking back to see where were the animals i had killed, i saw nothing. they had sunk to the bottom, and of the three, only one was recovered. it was found two days afterwards on a little island near the river's mouth. seeing this, i resolved never to shoot hippopotami while they are in the water, for i did not want to kill these animals for nothing; i wanted their skins and their skeletons to enrich our museums. some time after joe had died, i determined to go on a night hunt after hippopotami. these animals come ashore by night to feed. the fernand-vaz runs for many miles parallel with the seashore, separated from the sea by a strip of sandy prairie. on this prairie the hippopotamus feeds. he is sometimes called the sea-horse, for when his head is out of the water it looks from a distance exactly like the head of a horse. the "walk" of a herd is easily discernible. it looks very much like a regular beaten road, only their immense footprints showing who are its makers. in their track no grass grows. they always return by the same path they go out on. this gives the hunter a great advantage. i chose moonlight night, and paddled up to the vicinity of one of these "walks." there igala, my hunter, and i set out by ourselves. i had painted my face with a mixture of oil and soot, which is a prudent measure for a white hunter in africa. the beasts there seem to have a singularly quick eye for anything white. i made myself look exactly like igala. we both had black faces and black hands. i was dressed in the usual dark suit of clothes for the night; people there must not go hunting in light-coloured garments. we chose the windward side of the track, for the hippopotamus has a very keen scent, and is easily alarmed at night, feeling, probably, that on land his sluggish movements, huge bulk, and short legs have their disadvantages. we lay down under shelter of a bush and watched. as yet none of the animals had come out of the water. we could hear them in the distance splashing about in the water, their subdued snort-like roars breaking in upon the stillness of the night in a very odd way. it was the only noise we heard--no, i cannot say the only noise, for the mosquitoes were busily buzzing around, and feeding upon us, taking advantage, apparently, of our anxiety to keep perfectly quiet. the moon was nearly down, and the watch was getting tedious, when i was startled by a sudden groan. peering into the distance, i saw dimly a huge animal looking doubly monstrous in the uncertain light. it was quietly eating grass, which it seemed to nibble off quite close to the ground. there was another bush between us and our prey, and we crawled up to this in dead silence. arrived there, we were but eight yards from the great beast. how terrible he looked! the negroes who hunt the hippopotami are sometimes killed; i thought that one of us might be killed also. the animal, if only wounded, turns savagely upon his assailants, and experience has taught the negro hunters that the only safe way to approach him is from behind. he cannot turn quickly, and thus the hunter has a chance to make good his escape. this time we could not get into a very favourable position; but i determined to have my shot nevertheless, eight yards being a safe killing distance, even with so poor a light as we had by this time. we watched the hippopotamus intently, looking at each other as if to say, "are you ready?" we then raised our guns slowly. igala and i both took aim. he fired and, without waiting to see the result, ran as swiftly as a good pair of legs could carry him. i was not quite ready, but fired the moment after him, and before i could get ready for running (in which i had not igala's practice) i saw there was no need for it. the beast tottered for a moment, and fell over with a booming sound, dead. this closed our night's sport, as none of the herd would come this way while their companion lay there. so we returned home. poor igala remonstrated with me for not running as he did. it appears that running was considered one of the chief accomplishments of the hippopotamus hunter. our good luck created great joy in the village, where meat was scarce. the men went out at daylight and brought the flesh home. basket after basket came in, and as each one arrived all shouted except those who did not eat the hippopotamus. it is _roonda_ for them. some of their ancestry had a long time ago given birth to a hippopotamus, and if they were to eat any, more births of hippopotami would come to them, or they would die. these shouted, "i wish he had killed a bullock instead of a hippopotamus." the meat does not taste unlike beef, but was not so red. it was rather coarse-grained, and in the case of this animal it was not fat. it makes a welcome and wholesome dish. i tried to have some steaks; i must say they were rather tough, and did not go down easily. the broth was better, and i enjoyed it very much. there was something novel in having hippopotamus soup. i have killed a good many hippopotami. it is a very clumsily-built, unwieldy animal, remarkable chiefly for its enormous head, whose upper jaw seemed to be movable, like the crocodile's, and for its disproportionately short legs. the male is much larger than the female; indeed, a full-grown male sometimes attains the bulk, though not the height, of the elephant. in the larger specimens the belly almost sweeps the ground as they walk. the feet are curiously constructed to facilitate walking among the reeds and mud of the river bottom, and swimming with ease. the hoof is divided into four short, apparently clumsy and unconnected toes; and they are able, by this breadth of foot, to walk rapidly even through the mud. i have seen them make quick progress, when alarmed, in water so deep that their backs were just at the surface. the colour of the skin is a clayey yellow, assuming a roseate hue under the belly. in the grown animal the colour is a little darker. the skin of an adult hippopotamus is from one and a half to two inches thick on the middle of the back. it is devoid of hair, with the exception of a few short bristly hairs in the tail, and a few scattered tufts, of four or five hairs each, near the muzzle. all along the fernand-vaz there were scattered herds of hippopotami; and i used to watch them from my house. i could see them at any time during the day. after they have chosen a spot, they like to remain there day after day, and month after month, unless they are disturbed, or their food becomes scarce. these animals consort together in herds of from two to thirty. they choose shallows in the rivers, where the depth of the water allows them to have their whole body submerged when standing. there they remain all day, swimming off into the deep place, diving for their grassy food, or gambolling in the waves. from time to time they throw up a stream of water two or three feet high. this is done with a noise like blowing, and it is doubtless an effort to get breath. it is pleasant to watch a herd peacefully enjoying themselves, particularly when they have two or three young ones among them. some of the little fellows look very small, and are comically awkward. they chase each other about the shoals or play about their dams; and i have often seen them seated on the back of their mother in the water. how careful their mothers seemed to be when they were swimming about, and carrying their young in the way i have described. it is a sight worth seeing; sometimes the whole herd of hippopotami will disappear for a long time under the water. they prefer parts of the rivers where the current is not very swift, and are therefore to be found in all the lakes of the interior. they prefer to be near grass fields. they are very fond of a particular kind of coarse grass which grows on these prairies, and will travel considerable distances to find it. they always return, however, before daylight. their path overland is very direct. neither rocks nor swamps nor bushes can prove formidable obstacles to a water beast of such bulk. i have seen their path lie through the thickest woods. unless much pursued and harassed, they are not much afraid of man. if troubled by hunters they move their encampment, or go into countries where they can be more quiet. some of their favourite grass was growing on a little plain at the back of my house; and several times i found hippopotami tracks not more than fifty yards from the house. they had not feared to come as near as this; though probably, if the wind had been blowing towards them, they would have avoided the place. they always choose a convenient landing-place, where the bank has a long and easy incline. this landing-place they use till they have eaten up all the provender which can be found in that vicinity. before going ashore, they watch for an hour, and sometimes for two hours, near the landing, remaining very quiet themselves, and listening for danger. the slightest token of the hunter's presence, or any other suspicious appearances on such occasions, will send them away for that night. if no danger appears they begin to wander ashore in twos or threes. i never saw more than three of a herd grazing together; and, during their stay ashore, they place more dependence on their ears than on their eyes. i have watched them closely in many hunts; and i am sure that the beast walks along with his eyes nearly shut. when playing in the water, this animal makes a noise very much resembling the grunt of a pig. this grunt it utters also when alarmed by the approach of man. when enraged, or suddenly disturbed, it utters a kind of groan--a hoarse sound--which can be heard at a considerable distance. they are quite combative among themselves, as you have seen in the case of the fight i have described. [illustration] [illustration: marabouts, storks, and pelicans. chap. xxv.] [illustration] chapter xxv. visit of king quengueza--i promise to visit him--the kindness of the commi--the dry season on the fernand-vaz--plenty of birds and fishes--the marabouts--the eagles--a bad wound. one fine day i was quietly seated in my bamboo house, and reading over, for the fiftieth time, the letters of the dear friends who had not forgotten me, and were so kind as to remember me in my wandering life in africa. my attention was suddenly drawn away by the singing of numerous voices coming down the river. soon afterwards there stood before me, accompanied by ranpano, a tall venerable-looking and slender negro of noble but savage bearing; he was evidently, i thought, a chief; there was something commanding about his countenance. he was not very dark. the people who came with him showed him great respect. this tall negro was quengueza, the great king of the rembo, and the sovereign of the whole up-river country of the rembo and ovenga, the head waters of the fernand-vaz. he came down in considerable state in three canoes, with three of his favourite wives, and about one hundred and thirty men. my little black boy, macondai, brought him a chair; and after he had seated himself i saluted him, according to the usual custom, by saying "mbolo." after a few seconds he said "ai." then he paused a little while, and said "mbolo," to which i replied "ai." this is the usual mode of salutation in the commi country, the host beginning first. he looked at me and seemed very much astonished. he said he expected to see a tall and stout man. he had heard of me as a great hunter. he was now convinced, he said, that i must have a brave heart to hunt as i did. fortunately, quengueza and i could talk together, the commi being his native language. he told me there were plenty of gorillas and _nshiegos_ in his country; and that, if i would come, i should have liberty and protection to hunt and to do what i pleased. no one would hurt my people, or ranpano's people, or myself, or anybody, added he, with emphasis, that should come with me. i liked the old king at first sight; but i little guessed then that he would afterwards become so fond of me, and that i should love him so much. yes, i shall remember my good friend quengueza as long as i live. though he is a poor heathen, his heart was full of love for me, and he possessed many manly and noble qualities. i was so much pleased with king quengueza's visit that i sent the kind-hearted old fellow off with his canoes full of presents of iron bars, brass rods, chests, etc.; and i gave him goods on trust with which to buy me ebony. he promised me great sport, and an introduction to some tribes of whom these commi men of the seashore knew nothing. to do him greater honour my people fired a salute as he started off, with which he was highly delighted, as an african is sure to be with noise. he did not go before making me promise to come and see him as soon as the rainy season arrived. the dry season was now setting in. it was the first i had spent in the commi country; and i devoted the whole month of july to exploring the country along the seashore, between the fernand-vaz and the sea. there was quite a change. the birds, which were so abundant during the rainy season, had taken their leave; and other birds, in immense numbers, flocked in to feed on the fish, which now leave the seashore and the bars of the river's mouth and ascend the river to spawn. fish, particularly mullet, were so abundant in the river that two or three times, when i took my evening airing on the water in a flat upper-river canoe, enough mullet would leap into the boat to furnish me a breakfast the next day. the quantity of fish in the shallow water was prodigious. the breakers on the shore, never very light, were now frightful to see. the coast was rendered inaccessible by them even to the natives, and the surf increased to such a degree, even at the mouth of the river, that it was difficult, and often impossible, to enter with a canoe. strong winds from the south prevailed, and, though the sky was constantly overcast, not a drop of rain fell. the thermometer fell sometimes early in the morning to ° of fahrenheit, and i suffered from cold, as did also the poor natives. the grass on the prairie was dried up or burnt over; the ponds were dried up; only the woods kept their resplendent green. i was often left alone in that great prairie with my cook and my little boy macondai, and a dear little boy he was. i felt perfectly safe among the good commi. i always had tried to do right with them, and i had reaped my reward. they loved me, and anyone who should have tried to injure me would have no doubt been put to death or exiled from the country. i shall always remember my little village of washington and the good commi people. when perchance i got a chill the whole village was in distress. no one was allowed to talk loud, and everyone would call during the day and sit by me with a sad face for hours without saying a word, and, when they went away, they all expressed their sorrow to see me ill. the kind women would bring me wild fruits, or cold water from the spring, in which to bathe my burning and aching head; and sometimes tears would drop from their eyes and run down their kind black faces. at this season the negroes leave their villages and work on their plantations. the women gathered the crop of ground-nuts which had been planted the preceding rainy season, while the men cut down the trees for the plantations of the coming year, or built canoes, or idled about or went fishing. some of their farms are necessarily at some distance off. the sandy prairie is not fit to cultivate, being, in fact, only a deposit of the sea, which must have taken an incalculable period of time to form. the birds flocked in immense numbers on the prairies, whither they come to hatch their young; especially later in the season, when the ugly marabouts, from whose tails our ladies get the splendid feathers for their bonnets, were there in thousands; and i can assure you they were not very easy to approach. i believe the marabout is the ugliest bird i ever saw, and one would never dream that their beautiful feathers are found only under the tail, and can hardly be seen when the bird is alive. pelicans waded on the river banks all day in prodigious swarms, and gulped down the luckless fish which came in their way. i loved to see them swimming about in grave silence, and every now and then grabbing up a poor fish with their enormous, long, and powerful bills. if not hungry, they left the fish in their huge pouches, till sometimes three or four pounds of reserved food awaited the coming of their appetite. this pouch, you see, performed the office of a pocket, where boys, when not hungry, keep their apples in reserve. on the sandy islands were seen now and then flocks of the _ibis religiosa_, the sacred ibis of the egyptians. they looked exactly like those that are found mummified, and which have been preserved several thousand years. they are very curious-looking birds; the head and neck have no feathers. i have tried to find their nests, but never succeeded. ducks of various kinds built their nests in every creek and on every new islet that appeared with the receding waters. some of them were of beautiful plumage. cranes, too, and numerous other water-fowls, flocked in, and every day brought with it new birds. they came by some strange instinct, from far-distant lands, to feed upon the vast shoals of fish which literally filled the river. i wondered if many of these birds had come from the nile, the niger, the zambesi--from the interior of africa, where no one had ever penetrated, and from the vast plains of south africa. what great travellers some of these birds must be! i envied them, and often wished i could fly away, supported by their wings. what countries i should have seen!--what curious people i should have looked at!--and how many novel things i should have found to recount to you! along the trees bordering the river, sometimes perched on their highest branches, sometimes hidden in the midst of them, i could see that most beautiful eagle, the _gypohierax angolensis_, called _coungou_ by the natives. this eagle is of a white and black colour. he often watches over the water. how quickly his keen eyes can see through it! and with what rapidity he darts at his prey! then, seizing it in his powerful talons, which sink deep into it, he rises into the air and goes where he can devour it undisturbed. these eagles attack large fish. they generally make them blind, and then gradually succeed in getting them ashore, though it is hard work for them. they have a luxurious time on the fernand-vaz river during the dry season, and are very numerous. they build their nests on the tops of the highest trees, and come back to them every year. these nests are exactly like those you have seen, only larger. they keep very busy when their young begin to eat. the male and female are then continually fishing. strange to say, they are very fond of the palm-oil nuts. in the season, when these are ripe, they are continually seen among the palm trees. no wonder these eagles grab fish so easily, they have such claws! one day, as one passed over my head, i shot him, and, thinking that he was quite dead, i took him up, when suddenly, in the last struggle for life, his talons got into my hands. i could have dropped down from pain. nothing could have taken the claws away; one of them went clear through my hand, and i shall probably keep the mark of it all my life. on the seashore i sometimes caught a bird called the _sula capensis_, which had been driven ashore by the treacherous waves to which it had trusted itself, and could not, for some mysterious reason, get away again. finally, every sand-bar was covered with gulls, whose shrill screams were heard from morning till night, as they flew about greedily after their finny prey. it was a splendid opportunity for sportsmen, and i thought of some of my friends. as for myself, i took more delight in studying the habits of the birds than in killing them, and i assure you i had a very delightful time. i love dearly the dry season in africa. i am sure you would have enjoyed it quite as much as i did, if you had been there with me. [illustration] [illustration: the king receives me.] chapter xxvi. another expedition to lake anengue--difficult passage up the river--the crocodiles--king damagondai and his troubles--i buy an mbuiti, or idol. one fine morning there was a great bustle on the banks of the river at washington, where two canoes were loading. i was about to start on another expedition. i called king ranpano and his people together and gave them charge of my property; i declared that if anything was stolen during my absence i should surely punish the thief. they all protested that i need not even lock the doors of my house; and i believed them. the biagano people loved me, and did not steal from me. then i counted my ten goats in their presence, and said that i wanted no leopard stories told me when i came back. at this they shouted and laughed. they declared that neither they nor the leopards should touch my goats. i counted the fowls, and told them i wanted no snake stories about them. another hearty laugh, and they all shouted that no snakes should gobble up my fowls. these matters having been satisfactorily arranged, i started with my canoes and a well-armed crew. i was bound again for lake anengue, where i had been a few months before. it was now the dry season. we had armed ourselves well, for fear we might be interrupted, as some people came up this way to make plantations during the dry season and might dispute our advance; i determined to let no man bar the road to me. the dry season was at its height, and i found the npoulounay shallower than before. there was about fifteen feet less depth of water in the ogobai during the dry season than there was in the rainy season. at this time the river was covered with muddy or sandy islands, many of which were left dry. the muddy islands were covered with reeds, among which sported the flamingo, a bird not seen here in the rainy season. we pulled hard all day, and we slept the first night on a sandy island of the ogobai river, under our mosquito-nets, of which i had laid in a store. these nets, which the natives also use, are made of grass cloth, which comes from the far interior, and does very well out doors, where it keeps out the dew as well as the mosquitoes, and protects the sleeper against the cold winds which prevail. the next morning, when i awoke, i saw, for the first time, a fog in this part of africa; it was very thick, but the sun drove it off. i sent out my fishing-net, and in a few minutes the men caught fish enough for supper and breakfast. after our breakfast of fish and plantain, we paddled on up the stream. though we had seen a few villages, we had not met a single canoe on the water, and nothing human, except a corpse that came down the river and ran against our canoe. it was probably the body of some poor wretch who had been drowned on account of witchcraft. the hands and feet were tied, so that when they threw him into the water he could not swim. finally we entered the anengue; but this river we found was entirely changed since may. then it was a deep, swift stream. now its surface was dotted with numberless black mud islands, on which swarmed incredible numbers of crocodiles. we actually saw many hundreds of these disgusting monsters, sunning themselves on the black mud, and slipping off into the water to feed. i never saw such a horrible sight. many were at least twenty feet long; and when they opened their frightful mouths they seemed capable of swallowing our little canoes without trouble. i wondered what would become of us all if, perchance, our canoe should capsize. i determined to have a shot at these crocodiles, which seemed no wise frightened at our approach. making my men paddle the boat quite near to them, i singled out the biggest and lodged a ball in his body, aiming at the joints of his fore legs, where the thick armour is defective. he tumbled over, and, after struggling in the water for a moment, sank into the mud. his companions turned their hideous snaky eyes down at him, in momentary surprise, but did not know what to make of it, and dropped back to their sluggish comfort. i shot another, but he sank also, and as my men did not like to venture into the black mud after them, we got neither. as we ascended the stream, it branched off in several places, and became gradually narrower. crocodiles were seen everywhere. at length we found ourselves pushing laboriously along through a deep crooked ditch, not more than two yards wide, and overhung with tall reeds, on which a great number of birds balanced themselves, as though enjoying our dilemma. we found this time, to my surprise, a tremendous current running. in may, the water of the lake had overflowed its shores, and its regular outlets had therefore no great pressure upon them. now, this outlet was choked with water, which rushed through at such a rate that at some of the turns in the crooked channel we were actually swept back several times before we could make our way ahead. at one point, where the true outlets joined, we could not pass till i made the men smoke their _condouquai_, a long reed pipe, which seems to give them new vigour; i also gave them a sup of my brandy. this done, they gave a great shout and pushed through, and in an hour after we emerged into the lake, but not without tremendous exertions. we now lay on our paddles and gazed about us. on one side the lake is bounded by hills which come close down to the shore; on the other side the hills recede, and between them and the water lies a dreary extent of low marsh, covered with reeds. several towns were in sight, all located on the summits of hills. the lake, alas! had changed with the season too. it was still a beautiful sheet of water; but all over its placid face the dry season had brought out an eruption of those black mud islands which we had noticed before, and on these reposed, i fear to say what number of crocodiles. wherever the eye was turned these disgusting creatures, with their dull leering eyes and huge savage jaws, appeared in prodigious numbers. the water was alive with fish, on which i suppose the crocodiles had fat living; but pelicans and herons, ducks and other water-birds, also abounded, drawn hither by the abundance of their prey. paddling carefully past great numbers of crocodiles, into whose ready jaws i was by no means anxious to fall, and past several villages, whose people looked at us with mute amazement, we reached at last the town of damagondai. a great crowd was assembled to receive us, headed by the king himself, who stood on the shore. quarters were provided for me by his majesty, who, a short time after my arrival, presented me with a goat. he was dressed in the usual middle-cloth of the natives, and a tarnished scarlet soldier's coat, but was innocent of trousers. his welcome, however, was not the less hearty because the pantaloons were absent. his town, which contains about fifty huts, lies on some high ground, at a little distance from the water. i distributed presents among the grey-beards, and beads among the women, and thus put them all in good humour. damagondai, the king, then insisted that i must get married to at least two or three women. he was amazed when i declined this flattering proposal, and insisted upon it that my bachelor life must be very lonely and disagreeable. the king was a tall, rather slim negro, over six feet high, and well-shaped. in war, or in the chase, he had the usual amount of courage, but at home he was exceedingly superstitious. as night came on he seemed to get a dread of death; and at last began to groan that some of the people wanted to bewitch him, in order to get his property and his authority. finally he would get excited, and begin to curse all witches and sorcerers. he would say that no one should have his wives and slaves; and that the people who wanted to kill him had better beware; the _mboundou_ was ready. certainly poor damagondai must have slept on the wrong side, as i told him afterwards, for the old fellow began to lecture his wives, telling them to love him and feed him well, for he had given a great deal of goods and slaves to their parents for them, and they were a constant expense to him. to all this the poor women listened with respect. damagondai and i were very good friends. i really don't know why, but, wherever i went, these negroes seem to take a liking to me. in the village of damagondai there was an _mbuiti_, "an idol," representing a female figure, with copper eyes, and a tongue made of a sharp sword-shaped piece of iron. this explained her chief attribute; she cuts to pieces those with whom she is displeased. she was dressed in the shekiani cloth, covering her from the neck down. she is said to speak, to walk, to foretell events, and to take vengeance on her enemies. her house is the most prominent one in the whole village. she comes to people by night and tells them in their sleep what is going to happen. in this way, they asserted, my coming had been foretold. they worship her by dancing around her and singing her praises, and their requests. sometimes a single woman or man comes alone to prefer a request; and one evening i saw the whole village engaged in this rite, all dancing and singing around her. they offer her sugar-cane and other food, which they believe she eats. i tried to buy this goddess, but, ugly as she was, damagondai said that no amount of money would purchase her. he insinuated, however, in a very slight way, that for a proper price i might obtain the mbuiti of the slaves. then a great council took place with the grey-beards of the village. the slaves were on the plantations. they agreed to tell them on their return that they had seen their mbuiti walk off in the woods, and that she had not returned. i could hear them laugh over what they thought to be their clever plot. i paid them a good price for it. i packed the mbuiti up, and took her off with me, and her portrait, an exact likeness, taken in new york from the idol itself, is found in my book called "equatorial africa." i have often thought since how much i should have enjoyed seeing the return of the slaves to the village. i should like to know if they really believed that their mbuiti had left them; if so, there must have been great wailing and mourning for fear that the wrath of the mbuiti would come upon them. [illustration] [illustration: a crocodile hunt.] chapter xxvii. a visit to king shimbouvenegani--his royal costume--hunting crocodiles--how they seize their prey--the nkago--the ogata. i resolved to embark again on the waters of the anengue lake and make a little journey of exploration. damagondai went in the canoe with me. he was to take me to another king, a friend of his. we reached the residence of king shimbouvenegani, a king with a long name and a small village. we had to paddle through very shallow water before reaching this place. when we arrived, the king with the long name was not at his village. we were told he was at his _olako_--a place temporarily erected in the woods when villagers go out to hunt, or fish, or pursue agriculture. they had chosen a charming spot in the woods, just upon the shores of the lake, which here had abrupt banks. their mosquito-nets were hung up under the trees; every family had a fire built, and from the pots came a fragrant smell of plantain and fish cooking. the savour was very pleasant to me, for i was hungry. presently, shimbouvenegani came up. he was rejoiced to see me, and thanked his friend damagondai for bringing his white man to visit him. the appearance of shimbouvenegani was comical. he was between sixty and seventy years of age, and was quite lean. his only garment was a very dirty swallow-tailed coat, which certainly must have belonged to the time of my grandfather. the buttons were all gone. on his head he wore a broad beaver hat, which dated nearly as far back as the coat itself. the fur was entirely worn off, and the hat had a very seedy appearance. but the king seemed very proud when he made his appearance. he thought his costume was just the thing, and he looked loftily around, as if to say, "am i not a fine-looking fellow?" and truly, though his dress did not amount to much according to our notions, i doubt not it had cost him several slaves. he asked me how i liked his costume, at the same time taking one of the smaller tails in his hand and shaking it. presently, some large pots of palm-wine were brought, with which all hands proceeded to celebrate my arrival. damagondai and shimbouvenegani soon got drunk, and swore to each other eternal friendship, and shimbouvenegani promised to give one of his daughters in marriage to damagondai. meantime, damagondai had presented me to his eldest son, okabi, who resided in the village of shimbouvenegani. okabi arranged a nice little place for me, with branches of trees, and made a kind of bed for me. he then gave me his two wives to take care of me, and to cook for me. i had a very agreeable time in hunting while i was with shimbouvenegani. it was during my stay there that i discovered the _nshiego mbouvé_, of which i will speak by-and-by. we also had a great crocodile hunt, which pleased the people very much, as they are extravagantly fond of the meat. now and then during my travels, for lack of something better, i have been obliged to eat crocodiles. i have tried it in all sorts of ways--steaks, stews, boiled, and broth; but i must say i was never fond of it. they killed more or fewer crocodiles every day at this village; but the negroes were so lazy that they were glad to have me go and save them the trouble. moreover, the crocodile has not much meat on him; so that, though some were killed every day, the village was never sufficiently supplied. we went in canoes. these canoes on the anengue are of very singular construction. they are quite flat-bottomed, and of very light draught; many of them are about fifty feet long, with a breadth of not more than two feet, and a depth of ten to twelve inches. they are made of a single tree. they are ticklish craft. the oarsmen stand up and use paddles seven feet long, with which they can propel one of these canoes at a very good rate. they are, of course, easily capsized, the gunwale being but a very few inches above the water; but they do not often tip over. what surprised me most was the way in which the negro paddlers stood up at their work all day without tiring. the negroes on the anengue hunt the crocodile both with guns and with a kind of harpoon. the vulnerable part of the animal is near the joints of his forelegs; and there they endeavour to wound it. though so many are killed they do not decrease in numbers, nor, strange to say, do they seem to grow more wary. they were to be seen everywhere during the dry season; when the rainy season comes they disappear. as we started out, we saw them swimming in all directions, and lying on the mud banks sunning themselves. they took no notice of our canoe at all. as we were to shoot them we were obliged to look for our prizes on the shore, for if killed in the water they sink and are lost. presently we saw one immense fellow extended on the bank among some reeds. we approached cautiously. i took good aim and knocked him over. he struggled hard to get to the water, but his strength gave out ere he could reach it, and to our great joy he expired. we could not think of taking his body into our canoe, for he was nearly twenty feet long. we killed another which measured eighteen feet. i never saw more savage-looking jaws; they were armed with most formidable rows of teeth and looked as though a man would scarcely be a mouthful for them. we had brought another canoe along, and capsizing this upon the shore, we rolled the dead monsters into it and paddled off for the village. then we returned to the olako. during the heat of the day these animals retire to the reeds, where they lie sheltered. in the morning, and late in the afternoon, they come forth to seek their prey. they swim very silently, and scarcely make even a ripple on the water, though they move along quite rapidly. the motion of their paws in swimming is like those of a dog, over and over. they can remain quite still on the top of the water, where they may be seen watching for prey with their dull wicked-looking eyes. when they are swimming the head is the only part of the body visible; and when they are still, it looks exactly like an old piece of wood which has remained long in the water, and is tossing to and fro. they sleep among the reeds. their eggs they lay in the sand on the island, and cover them over with a layer of sand. it is the great abundance of fish in the lake which makes them multiply so fast as they do. the negroes seemed rather indifferent to their presence. on my journey back to damagondai's i saw an example of the manner in which the crocodile seizes upon his prey. as we were paddling along i perceived in the distance ahead a beautiful gazelle, looking meditatively into the waters of the lagoon, of which from time to time it took a drink. i stood up to get a shot, and we approached with the utmost silence; but just as i raised my gun to fire a crocodile leaped out of the water, and, like a flash, dived back again, with the struggling animal in its powerful jaws. so quickly did the beast take its prey that, though i fired at him, i was too late. i did not think my bullet hit him. after hunting on the water, i thought i would have a few rambles in the forest near the olako. i killed a beautiful monkey, which the natives call nkago, whose head is crowned with a cap of bright red, or rather brown, hair. the nkagos are very numerous in these woods. while walking in the forest i found, near the water, the hole or burrow of an ogata. this is a species of cayman, which lives near the pools, and makes a long hole in the ground, with two entrances. in this hole it sleeps and watches for its prey. the ogata is very unlike the crocodile in its habits. it is a night-roving animal, and solitary in its ways. it scrapes out its hole with its paws with considerable labour. it lives near a pool, for the double reason, i imagine, that it may bathe, and because thither come gazelles and other animals, for whom it lies in wait. the negroes told me that they rush out with great speed upon any wandering animal, and drag it into the hole to eat it. when the negroes discover one of these holes they come with their guns, which are generally loaded with iron spikes, and watch at one end, while a fire is built at the other entrance. when it becomes too hot the ogata rushes out, and is shot. i killed one which proved to be seven feet in length. it had great strength in its jaws, and its teeth were very formidable. like the crocodile, its upper jaw is articulated, and is raised when the mouth is opened. sometimes fire is put at both ends of the hole, and the animal is smoked to death. at other times a trap is made at the end where there is no fire, and when the ogata rushes out it is ensnared. [illustration] [illustration: the nshiego mbouvÉ.] chapter xxviii. the nshiego mbouvÉ--bald-headed apes--their houses in the trees--lying in wait for them--we kill a male--the shrieks of his mate--description of the animal--farewell to shimbouvenegani. as i was trudging along one day in the woods, rather tired of the sport, and on the point of going back to the camp, i happened to look up at a high tree which we were passing and saw a most singular shelter or home built in its branches. i immediately stopped and asked okabi why the hunters slept in that way in the woods. okabi laughed, after looking at me quizzically, and then he told me that no man had ever built that shelter. he said that it was made by a kind of man of the woods, called nshiego mbouvé, an animal which had no hair on the top of its head. i really thought okabi was joking. an animal--a man-monkey--with no hair on the top of his head? a bald-headed ape? it was now my turn to laugh, for i did not believe okabi's story about the bald-headed animal, though i believed what he said about the shelter in the tree. i saw at once that i was on the trail of an animal which no civilized man had ever seen before. i no longer felt tired, but pushed on through the woods with renewed ardour, and with increased caution, so as not to alarm our prey. the shelter we had seen was an old one, which had been abandoned, but we had a hope of finding another which should be still occupied. we were not disappointed. we soon found two more shelters. they were about twenty feet from the ground, and were on two trees, which stood a little apart from the others, and which had no limbs below the one on which the nests were placed. this location for its house is probably chosen by the animals to secure them at night from beasts and serpents, and from the falling limbs of surrounding trees. they build only in the loneliest part of the forest. they are very shy, and are seldom seen, even by the negroes. okabi, who was an old and intelligent hunter, told me that the male and female together select the material for their nest or shelter. it is constructed in part of the branches of the tree itself, which they twist in with the boughs of other trees collected by them for the purpose. the shelters i saw had the shape of an umbrella. we concealed ourselves by lying flat on the ground amidst the bushes near by, and keeping perfectly still. my patience was sorely tried. mosquitoes and flies were continually biting me. ants now and then were creeping upon me, and some of them managed to get under my clothes. besides, i had some fear of the bashikonay, or of the white ants, coming to disturb me, or of snakes creeping upon me. so, as you may imagine, i was not comfortable, neither had i pleasant thoughts. at length, just at dusk, we heard the loud peculiar "hew, hew, hew," which is the call of the male to his mate. i was glad to know i had not waited in vain; and looking up i saw a nshiego mbouvé sitting under his nest. his feet rested on the lower branch; his head reached quite into the little dome of a roof; and his arm was clasped firmly about the tree trunk. this, i suppose, is the position in which they sleep. soon after his mate came and ascended the tree. after gazing till i was tired, i saw that one of the animals showed signs of being alarmed. had they smelt us? had we made a noise that excited their suspicions? anyhow, we raised our guns and fired through the gloom at the one that seemed asleep. i almost felt sorry for the unfortunate beast, which fell with a tremendous crash, and died without a struggle. the other uttered an awful shriek and came down the tree with the utmost rapidity. i fired but missed the animal, and in less time than i take to write it the poor creature had disappeared in the woods. i was very hungry, for i had eaten nothing since breakfast. we built a fire at once, and made our camp. then we built several more fires, to prevent an attack of the bashikonay ants, in case they should come that way. the poor ape was hung up to a limb out of reach. during the night, i could hear now and then, in the distance, the piercing shriek of its mate, which no doubt was calling for the absent one. at last i fell asleep on my bed of leaves and grass, as pleased a man perhaps as any in the world. the next morning i examined the nshiego mbouvé. okabi, pointing to the head triumphantly, exclaimed, "see, chaillie, is not the animal bald-headed? did i not tell you the truth?" so it was. the nshiego mbouvé was quite bald; not a hair could be seen on the top of his head. he was a full-grown specimen, and measured three feet and eleven inches in height. his colour was intensely black, and the body was covered with short, rather blackish hair. on the legs the hair was of a dirty grey, mixed with black. on the shoulders and back the hair grew two or three inches long. this animal was old, and his hair was a little mixed with grey. the arms also, down to the wrists, were covered with long black hair. the hair is much thinner than on the gorilla, and is blacker, longer, and glossier. the nose, also, is not so prominent. though only three feet and eleven inches in height, the animal had an extremely broad chest, though not so powerful as that of the gorilla. the fingers, also, were much longer, and not large; and the hand was longer than the foot; while the gorilla, like man, has the foot longer than the hand. some of the teeth were decayed. so the poor fellow must have had the toothache badly; and i suppose there were no dentists among the nshiego mbouvés. i have killed several of these animals. one of them was a very old one; he had silvery hair; nearly all his teeth were decayed, and some were missing which had dropped out with age. he was getting so infirm that he had not strength enough to pick berries or break nuts; and, when killed, he had only leaves in his stomach. after enjoying myself thoroughly at the olako of shimbouvenegani, we returned to the village of damagondai. shimbouvenegani dressed himself again in state, that is to say, he put on his swallow-tailed coat and his beaver hat. in this regal costume he accompanied us to our canoes, and there bid us good-bye. [illustration] [illustration: expiration of mourning.] chapter xxix. war threatened--oshoria arms his men--we bluff them off, and fall sick with fever--the mbola ivoga, or end of mourning time--a death and burial--finding out the sorcerer--the village deserted--i become viceroy at washington. news came that oshoria, the chief of guabuirri, a village situated at the junction of the ogobai and anengue rivers, intended to stop me on my way back to washington. it was reported that he had assembled all his fighting men, and was bent upon war. poor damagondai was much troubled. he wanted no war. he sent his brother down with a plate, a mug, and a brass pan, to propitiate oshoria. these were great presents. a plate, a mug, and a pan are thought to be very valuable in the regions of the anengue. i was very angry. i had done no harm to the people of guabuirri; i had passed their village in peace. oshoria wanted to exact tribute for my passage; but he was not the king of the country, and i determined to put down mr. oshoria. we cleaned our guns, and i prepared my revolvers, and the next morning we set out, without waiting for the return of the king's brother, greatly to the dismay of damagondai and of his peaceful people. but nothing must stop us. we must return to washington. my men swore that they would fight to the death. when we came in sight of guabuirri, i saw that some of my fellows, who, a short time before, were going to be so brave, began to show the white feather. i therefore pointed to my revolver, and told them that i would blow out the brains of the first man who failed to fight to the last. they had a great respect for this wonderful revolver, and they immediately answered, "we are men." so we pulled down the stream and soon came almost opposite oshoria's people. i gave orders to make for the town. on the shore stood about one hundred and fifty fellows armed with spears and axes, and led by ten men who had guns. all of them were making a great noise. my men were all well armed, and, if i remember well, there were only sixteen of us. i had my revolver in one hand and a double-barrelled gun in the other. the men all had guns, which were placed beside them in such a way that the natives on the shore could see them. at this piece of bravado, oshoria's men became very civil. they retreated as we approached the landing; and instead of continuing their war-shouts and firing at us, they received us peaceably, and shouted to us not to fire. damagondai's brother hurried down to meet me, and announced that there was no palaver: i must not kill anybody. i was then led to where the quarrelsome oshoria stood. looking at him with a stern look, i reproached him for his conduct, telling him that if anybody had been killed, the palaver would have been on his own head. he said he had been vexed that i did not stop to see him on my way up; and, after making further excuses, added, "aouè olomé," "thou art a man;" an expression used in several ways, either to designate a smart man or a rascal, or, in the best sense, a very brave man. i was content to accept it as an intended compliment. i was presented with fruits and fowls, and we were presently the best of friends. to show them what i could do in the way of shooting, i brought down a little bird which sat on a very high tree. they all declared that i must have a very big shooting fetich; and they reverenced me greatly. the next morning, i left oshoria, and once more i glided down the placid waters of the ogobai. i reached washington in safety. it was in the month of august, and the malaria of the anengue marshes began to tell on me. i fell sick with dysentery and symptoms of malignant fever. in three days i took one hundred and eighty grains of quinine, and thus happily succeeded in breaking the force of the fever, which was the most dangerous of the two diseases. i was ill from the th to the st of august; and i did not regain my strength till the th of september. the commi waited patiently for my recovery before they would go through some of then ceremonies. there was to be a _mbola ivoga_ at biagano, that is, an end of the mourning time, to be celebrated with ceremonies and a terrible noise. when anyone of importance dies, the clan, or town, or the relatives, cease to wear their best clothes, and make it a point to go unusually dirty. no ornaments whatever, such as earrings or bracelets or beads, are worn. this is the way they "mourn." mourning lasts generally from one year to two years. the ceremonies at the breaking-up of this mourning are what i am now about to describe. the man who had died left seven wives, a house, a plantation, several slaves, and other property. all this the elder brother inherited; and on him, as the heir, it devolved to give the grand feast. for this feast every canoe that came brought jars of mimbo, or palm-wine. sholomba and jombouai, the heir, with his people, had been out for two weeks, fishing, and now returned with several canoe-loads of dry fish. from his plantation a large supply of palm-wine was brought in. the women and slaves had prepared a great quantity of food. everything needful was provided in great abundance. in the village the people all got ready their best clothes and furbished up their ornaments. drums and kettles were collected for music; powder was brought out for the salutes; and at last all was ready for the mbola ivoga. the seven wives of the deceased seemed quite jolly, for to-morrow they were to lay aside their widows' robes, and to join in the jollification as brides. the heir could have married them all; but he had generously given up two to a younger brother, and one to a cousin. he had already sixteen wives, and might well be content with only four more. twenty wives is a pretty good number. no wonder the widows were glad to see the time of mourning over. for two whole years they had been almost imprisoned in their husband's house, hardly ever going out. at seven o'clock three guns were fired off, to announce that the widows had done eating a certain mess, mixed of various ingredients, supposed to have magical virtues, and by which they are released from their widowhood. this was the first part of the ceremony. they then put on bracelets and anklets, and the finest calico they had. some of the commi women wear brass anklets on each leg almost as high as the knee, as you see represented in the picture. the weight must be between twenty and thirty pounds on each leg. besides these anklets, they wear a few bracelets of the same material. on their necks they wear beads. from early morning the guests had been coming, all bringing provisions and mimbo (palm-wine) with them, and dressed in their best clothes. there were several hundreds in all. the guests that lived far away had come the day before. about nine o'clock all the guests sat down on mats, spread about outside of the house of the deceased, and along the main street. they were divided into little groups; and before each was set an immense jar of mimbo, and food was spread before them. all began to talk pleasantly, till, suddenly, the biagano people fired off a volley of about one hundred guns. this was the signal for the drinking and eating to begin. men, women, and children set to, and ate as much as they could; and from this time till the next morning the orgies were continued without interruption. they drank, they sang, they shouted, they fired guns, and loaded them so heavily when they got tipsy that i wonder the old trade-guns did not burst. they drummed on everything that could possibly give out a noise. the women danced--such dances as are not seen elsewhere! you may imagine what they were, when every woman was so furiously tipsy. this mbola ivoga would have lasted probably for several days, but the victuals and palm-wine finally gave out. next day, about sunrise, jombouai came and asked me to assist at the concluding ceremony; for i had told him that i wanted to see every scene of the mbola ivoga. his brother's house, according to the custom, was to be torn down and burned--yes, burned to the ground, so that not a vestige of it would remain to remind the people that once there stood a house whose possessor was dead. the people came around the house and fired guns; then, in a moment, as if they were an infuriated mob, they hacked the old house to pieces with axes and cutlasses; then they set fire to it. when the ruins were burnt, the feast was done. this is the way they go out of mourning among the commi. the widows were all married again, and, until another death should occur, everything would go smoothly again. hardly were the rejoicings over, when ishungui, the man who had faithfully taken care of my house in my absence, lay at death's door. he had gone out on jombouai's fishing excursion, in order to catch fish for the mbola ivoga which i have just described. he caught cold, and had now a lung fever. the people called for me. i knew as soon as i saw him that he must die, and i tried to prepare his mind for the change. but his friends and relatives by no means gave him up. they sent for a distinguished fetich doctor, and under his auspices they began the infernal din with which they seek to cure a dying man. i am afraid the cure is worse than the disease. one of the commi people's theories of disease is, that obambou (the devil) has got into the sick man, and as long as the devil remains in the body there is no hope of curing the man. now this devil is only to be driven out by noise, and accordingly a great crowd surround the sick man and beat drums and kettles close to his head, fire off guns close to his ears, and in every part of the house they sing, shout, dance, and make all the noise they can. this lasts till the poor fellow either dies or is better; but i must say that he generally dies, unless the operators get tired out first. ishungui died. he left no property, and his brother buried him in the sand, without a coffin, in a grave so shallow (as is the custom) that, when i came upon it some days after, i saw that the wild beasts had been there and eaten the corpse. the mourning was short in this case; it lasted only six days. there were no wives or property; there was no feast. the relatives of the deceased slept one night in his house, as a mark of respect. among the commi it is the custom, when a man has died, to keep the _nchougou_. the nchougou is a feast that takes place generally, if not always, after the man has been dead six days. there is drinking, eating, and dancing; but the rejoicing is not so uproarious as the ceremony of the mbola ivoga. then the mourning begins. i think you will agree with me that the nchougou is a most extraordinary custom. after ishungui had died, it became necessary to discover the persons who had bewitched the dead man; for the commi said, "how is it that a young man, generally healthy, should die so suddenly?" this they did not believe to be natural; hence they attributed his death to sorcerers, and were afraid that the sorcerers would kill other people. a canoe had been despatched up to lake anengue to bring down a great doctor. they brought down one of damagondai's sons, a great rascal. he had been foremost in selling me the idol, or _mbuiti_, of the slaves of which i spoke to you, and he was an evident cheat. when all was ready for the trial, i went down to look at the doctor, who looked really diabolical. i never saw a more ugly-looking object. he had on a high head-dress of black feathers. his eyelids were painted red, and a red stripe, from the nose upward, divided his forehead into two parts; another stripe passed around his head. the face was painted white, and on each side of the mouth were two round red spots. about his neck hung a necklace of grass, and also a cord, which held a box against his breast. this little box is sacred, and contains spirits. a number of strips of leopard's skin, and of skin of other animals, crossed his breast, and were exposed about his person; and all these were charmed and had charms attached to them. from each shoulder down to his hands was a white stripe, and one hand was painted quite white. to complete this horrible array, he wore around his body a string of little bells. he sat on a box. before him stood another box containing charms. on this stood a looking-glass, before which lay a buffalo-horn. in this horn there was some black powder, and it was said to be the refuge of many spirits. the doctor had also a little basket of snake-bones, which he shook frequently during his incantations, and several skins, to which little bells were attached. near by stood a fellow beating a board with two sticks. all the people of the village gathered about this couple. the doctor had, no doubt, impressed the people with his great power. his incantations were continued for a long time, and at last came to the climax. jombouai was told to call over the names of persons in the village, in order that the doctor might ascertain if any of those named were sorcerers. as each name was called, the old cheat looked in the looking-glass to see the result. during the whole operation i stood near him, which seemed to trouble him greatly. at last, after all the names were called, the doctor declared that he could not find any "witch-man," but that an evil spirit dwelt in the village, and many of the people would die if it continued there. i have a suspicion that this final judgment with which the incantations broke up was a piece of revenge upon me. i had no idea until the next day how seriously the word of one of these _ougangas_ (doctors) is taken. the next morning all was excitement. the people were scared. they said their mbuiti was not willing to have them live longer here; that he would kill them, etc. then began the removal of all kinds of property, and the tearing down of houses, and by nightfall i was actually left alone in my house with a mpongwe boy and my little ogobai boy, macondai, both of whom were anxious to be off. old ranpano came to beg me not to be offended; he said that he dared not stay; that the mbuiti was now in town. he advised me as a friend to move also; but nobody wished me ill, only he must go, and would build his house not far off. i did not like to abandon my house and settlement at washington, which it had cost me a good deal of trouble to build. i called a meeting of the people, and it was with the greatest difficulty that i could get some of my own canoe boys and a few men to come and stay at my place. these began immediately to build themselves houses, and a little village was built, of which i was now, to my great surprise, offered the sovereignty. i remembered how the new king was made in the gaboon, and i did not know but that the commi had the same custom. the thought of the ceremony which precedes the assumption of royalty deterred me. finally, the men determined to have me as their chief, next to ranpano; and with this my ambition was satisfied. [illustration] [illustration: wolf hunting.] chapter xxx. hunting in the woods--the mboyo wolf--we catch another young gorilla--he starves to death. everything went on smoothly among the good commi. when i absented myself they took great care of my property. they seemed proud of their honesty; and though it was a wild country, and they were a wild people, i felt very safe among them. now and then i left washington to go and live entirely in the woods, and hunt, sometimes for gorillas, at other times for wild boars or buffaloes, or something else. i was also very fond of hunting the _mboyo_, a very shy animal of the wolf kind, with long yellowish hair and straight ears. they are very cunning; and now and then you can see them in the grass engaged in hunting for themselves. i have often watched these animals surrounding and chasing game. they run very well together in a drove; and as their policy is to run round and round, they soon bewilder, tire out, and capture any animal of moderate endurance. as they run round, gradually their circle grows smaller and smaller; and of course the smaller it becomes the more bewildered becomes their prey. often i have seen them prying about alone in search of prey. how roguish they look! and i could only shoot them at very long distances. i never was able to get near one of them. at times i went into the country where gorillas were plentiful, and had a good deal of fun and plenty of excitement. this country was not far from the village of a chief called makaga oune-jiou. this chief was affected with leprosy. he had already lost all the fingers of his left hand and two fingers of his right hand, besides the big toe of his left foot. but makaga was very kind to me, and was much beloved by his people. his village was small, but was a very dear little village to him. it was surrounded by fields of sugar-cane, plantain trees, and little fields of ground-nuts; and now and then the gorillas came and helped themselves to the good things these people had planted. this made them very wroth, and they were always glad to have me come and spend a few days among them. early in the morning i could sometimes hear the gorillas, who then came quite near the village. here i found that i need not make long journeys in order to reach the hunting ground. but they are difficult of approach; the slightest noise alarms them and sends them off. it is only once in a while that you can surprise an old male, and then he will fight you. while staying with makaga oune-jiou i captured a second young gorilla; and we had an exciting time, i assure you, before we got him. we were walking along in silence, when i heard a cry, and presently i saw not far from me, in the midst of a dense foliage, a female gorilla, with a tiny baby gorilla hanging to her breast. the mother was stroking the little one, and looking fondly down at it; and the scene was so pretty and touching that i withheld my fire and considered (like a soft-hearted fellow) whether i had not better leave them in peace. before i could make up my mind, however, my hunter fired and killed the mother, who fell dead without a struggle. the mother fell, but the baby clung to her, and, with piteous cries, endeavoured to attract her attention. i came up, and when it saw me it hid its poor little head in its mother's breast. it could neither walk nor bite, it was such a tiny little baby gorilla. we could easily manage it; and i carried it, while the men bore the mother on a pole. when we got to the village another scene ensued. the men put the body down, and i set the little fellow near. as soon as he saw his mother he crawled to her and threw himself on her breast. he did not find his accustomed nourishment, and perceived that something was the matter with his mother. he crawled over her body, smelt at it, and gave utterance from time to time to a plaintive cry, "hoo, hoo, hoo," which touched my heart. i could get no milk for this poor little fellow. he could not eat, and consequently he died on the third day after he was caught. [illustration: an incantation scene.] chapter xxxi. going to unknown regions--quengueza sends his son as a hostage--i take him along with me--reception by the king--our speeches--quengueza afraid of a witch--an incantation scene. time passed on. it was several years since i left the united states, but nevertheless i determined to set out for the head waters of the fernand-vaz, and for countries undiscovered as yet by white men. quengueza had sent to me his eldest son, named kombé (the sun), with a present of ebony wood, and his youngest son, a boy of ten, called akounga; and he said i must come and leave akounga in ranpano's hands as a hostage for my safety. "you see," he sent word, "that i am not afraid of you. you may trust me." i had to take my big boat, because no canoe would hold all the goods, powder and shot, guns, provisions, and medicines, i took along. it was to be a very, very long journey. i was the first white man to venture up in this direction, and i was anxious to get as far as possible. we were fifteen in all in my boat. another canoe, with fifteen more men, followed us. quengueza's little boy was with us too. i would never have thought of such a thing as keeping the poor little fellow away from his mother and father. i took also the brave little macondai, whom i had at first determined to leave behind, as being too small to stand the fatigues of such a journey. the little fellow entreated so much to be taken that i at last consented. he behaved like a man. macondai grew fast as years went by, and i wish you could have seen him fighting by my side in ashango land. at last, after much fatigue and hard pulling, we reached the village of goumbi, the residence of king quengueza. here i was received in the most triumphant manner. i could not make myself heard for the shouts and firing of guns. the whole population of goumbi crowded down to the shore to see me, and i was led up in procession to an immense covered space, capable of holding at least a thousand people, and surrounded by seats. i found there strangers from various parts of the interior, who gazed at me, and especially at my hair, with the greatest wonder. a large high seat was appointed for me, and another close to it was for quengueza, who presently arrived with a face beaming with joy. he shook hands with me and then seated himself. there was a dead silence in the vast crowd before us. quengueza was an old, white-woolled negro, very tall, spare, and of a severe countenance, betokening great energy and courage, qualities for which he was celebrated all over their country. when younger he was the dread of all, but now that he had become the chief of his clan, and was getting old, he had grown milder, and become peaceful, to the great joy of the surrounding villages. he was a very remarkable man for his opportunities. he made haste to tell me that he was in mourning for his eldest brother, who had died two years before, and left him chief of their clan, the abouya. quengueza had on a finely-knit black cap, and a grass body-cloth, which was black also; both the cap and cloth were of ashira make, and were really beautiful. he had no shirt; that article is not allowed to mourners; but he wore an american coat which was too small for him. after the king had done welcoming me, i called his little son, akounga. when he had come forward, i said to the king in a loud voice, that the people might hear: "you sent your son to me to keep, so that i might feel safe to come to you. i am not afraid. i like you, and can trust you. therefore i have brought your little son back to you. i do not want him as a hostage for my safety. let him remain by the side of his mother." at this there was a tremendous shouting, and the people seemed overjoyed. the king rose to reply. there was immediately a dead silence; for quengueza was greatly reverenced by his people. the king said: "this is my _ntangani_ (white man), he has come from a far country to see me. i went down to beg him to come up to me. now he has come. let no one do harm to his people; for him i need not speak. give food to his people. treat them well. do not steal anything. if you do not do as i say, a big palaver will come upon you!" this last sentence he uttered in a tremendous voice. then he addressed himself to the ashira and bakalai who were present, saying,: "beware! do not steal my white man, for if you should make the attempt, i will sell you all." then loads of plantains and sugar-canes, together with a hundred fowls, and several goats, were presented to me by the king, and this closed the ceremony. the longer i stayed with quengueza, the more i loved him; i was only sorry that he was so curiously superstitious. for a year he had not passed down the street which led most directly to the water, but had gone always by a roundabout way, because, when he came to the throne, this street was pronounced bewitched by a secret enemy of his; and he was persuaded that if he passed by it, he would surely die. this superstitious notion had originated in a dream of the king's which had been interpreted in that way. several times efforts had been made by distinguished doctors to drive away the _aniemba_ (witch), which there lay in wait; but the king, though he believed in sorcery, did not have much faith in the exorcisers or doctors. he thought that, perhaps, the aniemba had not gone, and that it was better to be on the safe side, which was not to go on the road at all. but his subjects felt very much troubled about this matter; for they wanted their king to pass through their street sometimes. once more a last attempt was made to drive off the aniemba, or witch. a famous doctor from the far-off bakalai country had been brought down to perform this act. his name was aquailai. in the evening the people gathered in great numbers under the immense _hangar_, or covered space in which i had been received, and there lit fires, around which they sat. the space thus covered was one hundred and fifty feet long by forty wide, and was roofed with palm branches and leaves. about ten o'clock, when it was pitch dark, the doctor commenced operations by singing some boastful songs, recounting his power over witches. immediately all the people gathered into their houses, and with such great haste, that two women failing to get home, and afraid to go farther through the streets, took refuge in my house. then all the fires in the houses were carefully extinguished, those under the hangar having been already put out; and, in about an hour more, there was not a light of any kind in the whole town except mine. they had only asked of me that i should shut my door. the most pitchy darkness and the most complete silence reigned everywhere. no voice could be heard, even in a whisper, among the several thousands of people gathered in the gloom. at last the silence was broken by the doctor, who, standing in the centre of the town, began some loud babbling, of which i could not make out the meaning. from time to time the people answered him in chorus. this went on for an hour, and was really one of the strangest scenes i ever took part in. i could see nothing but the faces of the two women in my house, who were badly frightened, poor things, as, in fact, all the people were. the hollow voice of the witch-doctor resounded curiously through the silence; and when the answer of many mingled voices came through the darkness, the ceremony really assumed the air of a poet's incantation scene. at last, just at midnight by my watch, i heard the doctor approach. he had bells girded about him, which he jingled as he walked. he went to every family in the town, successively, and asked if to them belonged the aniemba (witch) that obstructed the king's highway. of course, all answered no. then he began to run up and down the bewitched street, calling out loudly for the witch to go off. presently he came back and announced that he could no longer see the aniemba, which had doubtless gone, never to come back. at this, all the people rushed out of their houses, and shouted, "go away! go away! and never come back to hurt our king!" then fires were lit, and all sat down to eat. this done, all the fires were once more extinguished; and the people sung wild songs until four o'clock. then the fires were lit again. at sunrise the whole population gathered to accompany their king down the dreaded street to the water. quengueza, i know, was brave as a hunter and as a warrior. he was also very intelligent about many things regarding which his people were very stupid; but the poor old king was now horribly afraid. he was assured that the aniemba was gone; but he evidently thought that he was walking to almost certain death. he hesitated; but at last he determined to face his fate, and walked manfully down to the river and back, amidst the plaudits of his loyal subjects. so ended the ceremony; but quengueza never went again on that road; his dread of it still remained. [illustration] chapter xxxii. gorilla hunting--my companions, mombon, etia, and gambo--etia kills a large gorilla--we make up a large party--camp stories about gorillas--we capture a young gorilla--her untimely death. quengueza had a slave named mombon, whom he loved greatly. mombon was his overseer, chamberlain, steward, man of business, and general factotum, the man whose place it was to take care of the king's private affairs, set his slaves to work, oversee his plantations, and who had the care of the keys of the royal houses. mombon was to see that i was made comfortable in town. quengueza had also another slave named etia. etia was his favourite hunter, and he gave him to me for a guide in the bush. this etia was a fine-looking old man, belonging to a tribe far in the interior, who had never heard that there was such a thing as a white man in the world. he was living on a little plantation outside the town, where he had a neat house and a nice old wife, who always treated me in a kind, motherly way; she always had something to give me to eat. etia's business was to supply the royal larder with "bush meat," and he went out hunting almost every week for that purpose. etia and i became great friends, and loved each other much. i gave to etia and to his wife many little presents, with which they always seemed very much pleased. around the house of etia were arranged skulls of elephants, hippopotami, leopards, and gorillas, as trophies of his prowess. among the numerous guests of quengueza was an ashira chief, who had come on a visit to the king. he had a son called gambo, a noted hunter. gambo was a very ill-looking fellow, but he had a fiery eye, great courage, and a kind heart. i became very fond of gambo, and gambo became very fond of me. sometimes quengueza could not help saying to his people, "see how hunters love each other, no matter if they come from different countries. see how my white man loves the black hunters." in fact, we were always together. i had never seen the ashira tribe to which gambo belonged. one day we had been going through the woods about three hours when at last we came upon fresh gorilla tracks. etia now set out alone, while gambo and i walked silently in another direction. the gorilla is so difficult to approach that we had literally to creep through the thick woods when in their vicinity. the hunter cannot expect to see his enemy till he is close upon him. the forest is so thick and gloomy that even when quite near the animal is but dimly visible. all this makes hunting for the gorilla very trying to the nerves; for it is in the hunter's mind that if he misses--if his bullet does not go to the most fatal point--the wounded and infuriated brute will make short work of his opponent. as we crept silently along, suddenly the woods resounded with the report of a gun. we sped at once towards the quarter whence the report came, and there we found old etia sitting complacently upon the dead body of the largest female gorilla i ever saw. the total height of the animal was four feet seven inches. this was a huge gorilla for a female, for they are always much smaller than the males. another time we made up a large party. we were to go a considerable distance to a spot where etia gave me hopes that we should catch a young gorilla alive. i would have gone through any hardship and peril to get one large enough to be kept alive, and to be sent to europe. etia, gambo, myself, and ten men composed our party. each was armed, and laden with provisions for a couple of days. the men were covered with fetiches. they had painted their faces red, and had cut their hands in more than fifty different places. this bleeding of the hands was done for luck. the fellows were nearly naked; but this is their usual habit. as for me, i had also made extra preparations. i had blackened my face and hands with powdered charcoal and oil; and my blue drilling shirt and trousers and black shoes made me as dark as any of them. my revolvers hung at my side, with my ammunition bag and brandy flask; my rifle lay upon my shoulder. all this excited the admiration of the crowd which assembled to see us go out. quengueza was greatly delighted, and exclaimed, "what kind of ntangani (white man) is this? he fears nothing; he cares for neither sun nor water; he loves nothing but the hunt." the old king charged the people to take great care of his white man, and to defend him with their lives if need be. we travelled all day, and about sunset we came to a little river. here we began at once to make a fire and build leafy shelters for the night. scarcely was the firewood gathered, and we were safely bestowed under our shelter, when a storm came up which lasted half an hour. then all was clear once more. we cooked plantains and smoked some dried fishes. in the evening the men told stories about gorillas. "i remember," said one, "my father told me he once went out to the forest, when just in his path he met a great gorilla. my father had his spear in his hand. when the gorilla saw the spear he began to roar; then my father was terrified, and dropped the spear. when the gorilla saw that my father had dropped the spear he was pleased. he looked at him, and then left him and went into the thick forest. then my father was glad, and went on his way." here all shouted together, "yes! so we must do when we meet the gorilla. drop the spear; that appeases him." next gambo spoke. "several dry seasons ago a man suddenly disappeared from my village after an angry quarrel. some time after an ashira of that village was out in the forest. he met a very large gorilla. that gorilla was the man who had disappeared; he had turned into a gorilla. he jumped on the poor ashira and bit a piece out of his arm. then he let him go. then the man came back with his bleeding arm. he told me this. i hope we shall not meet such gorillas." chorus--"no; we shall not meet such wicked gorillas." i myself afterwards met that man in the ashira country. i saw his maimed arm, and he repeated the same story. then one of the men spoke up: "if we kill a gorilla to-morrow i should like to have a part of the brain for a fetich. nothing makes a man so brave as to have a fetich of gorilla's brain. that gives a man a strong heart." chorus of those who remained awake--"yes; that gives a man a strong heart." then we all gradually dropped to sleep. next morning we cleaned and reloaded our guns, and started off for the hunting ground. there is a particular little berry of which the gorilla is very fond, and where this is found in abundance you are sure to meet the animal. we had divided. etia, gambo, two other men, and i kept together, and we had hardly gone more than an hour when we heard the cry of a young gorilla after his mother. etia heard it first, and at once pointed out the direction in which it was. immediately we began to walk with greater caution than before. presently etia and gambo crept ahead, as they were expert with the net, and were also the best woodsmen. i unwillingly remained behind, but dared not go with them, lest my clumsier movements should betray our presence. in a short time we heard two guns fired. running up, we found the mother gorilla shot, but her little one had escaped; they had not been able to catch it. the poor mother lay there in her gore, but the little fellow was off in the woods. so we concealed ourselves hard by to wait, for its return. presently it came up, jumped on its mother, and began sucking at her breasts and fondling her. then etia, gambo, and i rushed upon it. though evidently less than two years old, it proved very strong, and escaped from us. but we gave chase, and in a few minutes had it fast, not, however, before one of the men had his arm severely bitten by the savage little beast. it proved to be a young female. unhappily, she lived but ten days after capture. she persistently refused to eat any cooked food, or anything else except the nuts and berries which they eat in the forest. she was not so ferocious as "fighting joe," but was quite as treacherous and quite as untameable. she permitted no one to approach her without trying to bite. her eyes seemed somewhat milder than joe's, but had the same gloomy and treacherous look, and she had the same way as joe of looking you straight in the eyes when she was meditating an attack. i remarked in her also the same manoeuvre practised by the other when she wished to seize something, my leg, for instance, which, by reason of the chain around her neck, she could not reach with her arm. she would look me straight in the face, then quick as a flash would throw her body on one leg and one arm and reach out with the other leg. several times i had narrow escapes from the grip of her strong big toe. i thought sometimes that when she looked at me she appeared cross-eyed, but of this i could not make certain. all her motions were remarkably quick, and her strength was very great, though she was so small. [illustration] [illustration: a trial by ordeal.] chapter xxxiii. voyage up the river--we build a village near obindji--quengueza's plan for keeping the sabbath--kindness of the natives--a trial by ordeal. king quengueza accompanied me on my voyage up the rembo and ovenga rivers. we were followed by a great many canoes, and by chiefs of the ashira and bakalai tribes. we were going to the bakalai country. the weather was intensely hot; even the negroes suffered; and, though i had a thick umbrella over my head, and sat quite still, i had frequently to bathe my head and keep wet handkerchiefs in my banana hat; for i feared a sunstroke. the river was narrow and deep, flowing generally between high lands and hills, and now and then in the midst of flats. everybody complained except macondai. he was the most spirited little negro i ever saw, a real little hero. i tell you that many, very many, of these african boys have a good deal of pluck, although they are black. two days after we started, we arrived, a little before sunset, at the village of obindji, a bakalai chief, who was a great friend of quengueza. wherever we passed a bakalai village the people rushed down to the banks to see me. as we approached the village of obindji, our men fired guns and sang songs. obindji came down in great state, dressed in his silk hat, a shirt, and a nice cloth. he was ringing his _kendo_--a bell, which is the insignia of kingship there--a sort of royal sceptre. the high-crowned silk hat, also, as i said before, is worn only by the chiefs. i said to obindji, "why do you ring your kendo?" he replied, "obindji's heart is glad, and he thanks his mboundji (a spirit) that he has to-day come up higher than he ever stood before--a _ntanga_ (white man) has come to see obindji." when we had landed, and the two kings and i were seated on the stools used in that country, the grand reception began. quengueza gave to his friend obindji, and to all the bakalai who surrounded us, an account of his entire intercourse with me, from the time he came down to see me at the seashore to the present hour. then obindji replied, giving, in like manner (in short sentences), a statement of his feelings when he heard that quengueza was to bring a ntanga to see him. this closed the conference. the village of obindji was small, and was beautifully situated at the foot of a high hill, just on the banks of the ovenga. the ovenga river belonged to quengueza, and, except at its head waters, it had been inhabited by the bakalai only since the time of quengueza's eldest brother, whom he had succeeded. these bakalai are very warlike; they are much dreaded by the other tribes. the region of the ovenga is a grand and wild country. it consists of hills and mountains, covered with impenetrable forests, which teem with all kinds of insects. many animals, curious birds, and a great number of snakes are found there, together with those extraordinary ants--the bashikonay. there also are the chimpanzees and gorillas. as i intended to remain some time, i set about building another village. the men all went into the forest to collect bark, palm leaves, and posts. when sunday came, i requested quengueza to make the men rest on this day, explaining to him that white men do not work on the sabbath. the old man was puzzled for a moment, and then said, "we are much hurried now. suppose you put off the sunday for three or four weeks. then we can have as many sundays as you want. we will keep four or five days following each other as sundays. it will be just the same." he seemed quite proud of his discovery and was quite disappointed when i told him it would not do. i worked very hard in building my house. the labour was the more trying because the heat was so intense; there was not a breath of wind in this bakalai country. besides, the fever had got hold of me again; but i did not give way to it. obindji became very friendly to me. i may say that all these negroes seemed to take a liking for me. i made quite a number of friends among the bakalai. two of them, indeed, were very dear friends of mine; they were called malaouen and querlaouen. i really do not know which of the two i liked the best. they were ready to do anything i wished them to do. if i proposed a hunt, they immediately offered to accompany me; if they killed game, they presented me with the best piece. their wives were sure to bring me, almost every day, sugar-cane, plantain, or something else. as for obindji, he did all in his power to please me. moreover, quengueza was always close to me. he said that wherever i went he would follow me, and build his shed by the side of mine. i was now quengueza's white man and obindji's white man. they all seemed to take pride in me. i am sure i also tried my best to be kind to them. above all things, i wanted them to believe my word implicitly. hence, whatever i promised, i kept my word. they noticed this; and therefore no one doubted me. these poor people, though they have no word to describe "an honest man," know the difference between lying and truth-telling; and they appreciate truthfulness. one day i saw a trial by ordeal performed. a little boy, a son of aquailai, the doctor who had driven the aniemba, or witch, from the main street at goumbi, reported that one of quengueza's men had damaged a bakalai's canoe. the owner demanded compensation for the injury. the goumbi men denied that he had injured the canoe, and asked for trial. an ashira doctor who was in the village was called. he said that the only way to make the truth appear was by the trial of the ring boiled in oil. thereupon, the bakalai and the goumbi men gathered together, and the trial was at once made. the ashira doctor stuck three little billets of wood into the ground, with their top ends together, then he piled some smaller pieces between, till all were laid as high as the three pieces. a native earthenware pot, half full of palm oil, was set upon the wood, which had been set on fire; and the oil was set on fire also. when it had burned up brightly, a brass bracelet or ring from the doctor's hand was cast into the pot. the doctor stood by with a little vase full of grass soaked in water, of which he threw in, now and then, some bits. this made the oil blaze up fresh. at last, all was burned out, and now came the trial. the accuser, the little boy, was required at once to take the ring out of the pot. he hesitated, but was pushed on by his father. the people cried out, "let us see whether he lied or told the truth." finally he put his hand in and seized the almost red-hot ring, but quickly dropped it, having severely burned his fingers. at this there was a shout, "he lied! he lied!" and the goumbi man was declared innocent. i ventured to suggest that he also would burn his fingers if he touched the ring, but nobody seemed to consider this view of the subject. [illustration] [illustration: the gorilla marches upon us.] chapter xxxiv. the kooloo-kamba--the gouamba, or meat-hunger--exploring the forest--gorilla-hunting--within eight yards of a large gorilla--he roars with rage and marches upon us. we established ourselves in a deserted bakalai village, a few miles from the banks of the ovenga, and about ten miles above obindji. i was glad that i had no olako to build. there were with me several bakalai; among whom, of course, were my good friends querlaouen and malaouen. gambo was also one of our party. after our camp was arranged we went out to look for gorilla tracks. it was too late to hunt; besides, we were too tired. in the evening malaouen came in after dark, and said he had heard the cry of the kooloo, and knew where to find it in the morning. of course i asked what this kooloo was; for i had not the slightest idea of what he meant. i had never heard the name before. i received, in answer, a description of the animal, which threw me into the greatest excitement; for i saw this was most certainly a new species of ape, or man-like monkey; a new man of the woods, of which i had not even heard as yet. it was called kooloo-kamba by the goumbi people from its cry or call, "kooloo," and the commi word _kamba_, which means "speak." the bakalai call it simply _koola_. i scarce slept all night, with fidgeting over the morrow's prospects. the bakalai said the kooloo-kamba was very rare here, and there was only a chance that we should find the one whose call had been heard. at last the tedious night was gone. at the earliest streak of dawn i had my men up. we had fixed our guns the night before. all was ready, and we set out in two parties. my party had been walking through the forest about an hour, by a path which led, i knew not where, when suddenly i stepped into a file of bashikonay ants, whose fierce bites nearly made me scream. the little rascals were infuriated at my disturbance of their progress; and they held on to my legs, and to my trousers, till i picked them off. of course i jumped nimbly out of the way of the great army of which they formed part, but i did not get off without some severe bites. we had hardly got clear of the bashikonays, when my ears were saluted by the singular cry of the ape i was after. "koola-kooloo, koola-kooloo," it said several times. only gambo and malaouen were with me. gambo and i raised our eyes, and saw, high up on a tree-branch, a large ape. it looked almost like a black hairy man. we both fired at once; and the next moment the poor beast fell with a heavy crash to the ground. i rushed up, anxious to see if indeed i had a new animal. i saw in a moment that it was neither a nshiego mbouvé, nor a common chimpanzee, nor a gorilla. again i had a happy day. this kooloo-kamba was undoubtedly a new variety of chimpanzee. we at once disembowelled the animal, which was a full-grown male. we found in his stomach nothing but berries, nuts, and fruits. he had no doubt just begun to take his breakfast. this kooloo-kamba was four feet three inches high. he was powerfully built, with strong and square shoulders. he had a very round head, with whiskers running quite round the face and below the chin. the face was round; the cheek-bones prominent; the cheeks sunken. the roundness of the head and the prominence of the cheek-bones were so great as to remind me of some of the heads of indians or chinamen. the hair was black and long on the arms, which, however, were partly bare. his ears were large, and shaped like those of a human being. of its habits the people could tell me nothing, except that it was found more frequently in the far interior. i brought the skin of this kooloo-kamba to new york, and some years ago many people saw it. on our return to obindji we were overtaken by my good friend querlaouen, who had shot a wild pig, of which the good fellow gave me half. the negroes feasted on the kooloo meat, which i could not touch. so the pig was welcome to me, as indeed it was to quengueza, whom we found almost crying with an affection which is common in this part of africa, and is called _gouamba_, but for which we happily have no name. gouamba is the inordinate longing and craving of exhausted nature for meat. for days, and sometimes for weeks, a man does not get any meat at all, and whenever other food is brought before him, you will hear him say, looking at the food with disgust, "gouamba," which means literally, "i am sick of food; i have a craving for meat; i care for nothing else." i had some glorious gorilla-hunting while in the bakalai country, in the upper regions of the ovenga river. malaouen, querlaouen, gambo, and i, often started out together, and remained for days in the thickest part of the forest. now and then we would return to obindji to get a supply of plantain, and then would go off again. we roamed over the forest in all directions; we explored some new regions; and sometimes we got lost in the midst of impenetrable mountains, where often for days we killed nothing. in these excursions we suffered sometimes a good deal; for we had to endure many hardships. we often had very poor fare, and fever sometimes prostrated me. one day, i remember well, we were out for gorillas; which we knew were to be found thereabouts, by the presence of a pulpy pear-shaped fruit, the _tondo_, of which the animal is very fond. i also am very fond of the subdued and grateful acid of this fruit, which is eaten by the negroes as well as by the gorilla. we found everywhere gorilla marks, and so recent that we began to think the animals must be avoiding us. this was really the case, i believe, though i am not sure. at any rate, we beat the bush for two hours, before, at last, we found the game. suddenly, an immense gorilla advanced out of the wood, straight towards us, and gave vent, as he came up, to a terrible howl of rage, as much as to say, "i am tired of being pursued, and will face you." it was a lone male, the kind which are always most ferocious. this fellow made the woods resound with his roar, which is really an awful sound, resembling very much a rolling and muttering of distant thunder. he was about twenty yards off when we first saw him. we at once gathered together; and i was about to take aim and bring him down where he stood, when malaouen stopped me, saying in a whisper, "not time yet." we stood, therefore, in silence, gun in hand. the gorilla looked at us for a minute or so out of his evil grey eyes, then beat his breast with his gigantic arms--and what arms he had!--then he gave another howl of defiance and advanced upon us. how horrible he looked! i shall never forget it. again he stopped not more than fifteen yards away. still malaouen said, "not yet." good gracious! what is to become of us, if our guns miss fire, or if we only wound the huge beast? again the gorilla made an advance upon us. now he was not twelve yards off. i could see plainly his ferocious face. it was distorted with rage; his huge teeth were ground against each other, so that we could hear the sound; the skin of the forehead was drawn forward and back rapidly, which made his hair move up and down, and gave a truly devilish expression to the hideous face. once more he gave out a roar, which seemed to shake the woods like thunder; i could really feel the earth trembling under my feet. the gorilla, looking us in the eyes, and beating his breast, advanced again. "don't fire too soon," said malaouen; "if you do not kill him, he will kill you." this time he came within eight yards of us before he stopped. i was breathing fast with excitement as i watched the huge beast. malaouen said only, "steady," as the gorilla came up. when he stopped, malaouen said, "now!" and before he could utter the roar for which he was opening his mouth, three musket-balls were in his body. he fell dead, almost without a struggle. he was a monstrous beast indeed, though not amongst the tallest. his height was five feet six inches. his arms had a spread of seven feet two inches. his broad brawny chest measured fifty inches round. the big toe of his foot measured five inches and three quarters in circumference. his arms seemed like immense bunches of muscle only; and his legs and claw-like feet were so well fitted for grabbing and holding that i could see how easy it was for the negroes to believe that these animals, when they conceal themselves in trees and watch for prey, can seize and pull up with their feet any living thing, leopard, ox, or man, that passes beneath. the face of this gorilla was intensely black. the vast chest, which proved his great power, was bare, and covered with a parchment-like skin. his body was covered with grey hair. while the animal approached us in its fierce way, walking on its hind legs and facing us as few animals dare face man, it really seemed to me to be a horrid likeness of man. [illustration: meeting the mbuiti.] chapter xxxv. we go up the river to n'calai boumba--a severe attack of fever--the tender care of the natives for me--anguilai accuses his people of bewitching me--i go out and quiet him--a boy cut to pieces for witchcraft--a useful idol--the ebony trees. with quengueza i resumed the ascent of the river ovenga. we were bound to the town of a chief named anguilai. the place was called n'calai boumba. we left obindji early in the morning. on the way we passed several bakalai villages, the largest of which, npopo, i afterwards visited. the river banks, all the way up, were densely wooded, but very sparsely inhabited by beasts. we saw no animals the whole day, except one monkey and a few birds. anguilai, who was one of the vassals of quengueza, and a powerful bakalai chief, and whom i had met at obindji's, received us well. anguilai's town is the hottest place i ever saw in africa. n'calai boumba was set in a hollow, and the houses were so small and close as to be quite unendurable to me. the village was only a little more than a year old. the people had come lately from the interior. plantations of plantain trees were very abundant. towards the end of april i was brought down to my bed with fever. this was the severest attack i had yet experienced in africa. it entirely prostrated me. i looked like a corpse. not a single particle of colour could be seen on my face. i had no strength. i could not eat. i could not walk. for three days i had violent returns of the fever. the blood rushed to my head, and my mind wandered at times; so the natives told me. of course i cannot remember what i said. i only know that my head burned like fire, and that i was almost mad with pain. between the attacks of fever i really thought i should die and i commended my soul to god. while i lay sick, people came and entreated me not to hunt so much and so constantly. they said, "look at us; we hunt one day; we rest two. when we hunt three days, we rest for many days after it. but you go out every day." i thought to myself, they are right, and i shall follow their rule hereafter. but it was hard to do so; for i felt that no one else was in the field; that in such an unhealthy climate no one can live very long, and i wanted to do as much work as i could. i wanted to bring all the wonders of that part of the world to light; and i felt that i was getting older and older, and there was yet very much work to be done. so i prayed god to give me strength for the work that was entrusted to my hands. i shall never forget the kindness of those native women to me while i was sick. poor souls! they are sadly abused by their task-masters. they are the merest slaves. they have to do all the drudgery. they receive blows and ill-usage. and yet, at the sight of suffering, their hearts soften, just as women's hearts soften in our own more civilized lands. no sooner did sickness attack me than these kind souls came to nurse and take care of me. they sat by me to fan me; they brought more mats for my bed; they bathed my burning head with cold water; they got me refreshing fruit from the woods. at night, when i woke up from a feverish dream, i used to hear their voices, as they sat around in the darkness, pitying me and contriving ways to cure me. when i think of these things i cannot help thanking god for them; that, wherever i have gone, he has made human hearts tender and kind to me; that, even under the black skin of the benighted and savage african, he has implanted something of his own compassionate love. anguilai and quengueza were sadly alarmed at my illness. anguilai accused his people of wickedly bewitching me. one still night he walked up and down the village, threatening, in a loud voice, to kill the sorcerers if he could only find them. i had to get up and tell anguilai that i was sure his people and the bakalai loved me too much to wish me to be sick. whereupon they all shouted at once, "it is so; it is so." after a few days i was able to walk again a little; and i went and lived in the forest, where i suffered less from the heat than in our little houses. how sorry i often felt that these kind-hearted negroes were given to superstitions which led them to commit the most horrid cruelties. a little boy, about ten years old, had been accused of sorcery. on being examined, he confessed that he had made a witch. thereupon the whole town seemed to be seized with the ferocity of devils. they took spears and knives, and actually cut the poor little fellow to pieces. i had been walking out, and returned just as the dreadful scene was over. i could not even make the wretched people feel shame at their bloody act. they were still frantic with rage at the thought that this little fellow had made a witch to kill some of them; and they were not quiet for some hours after. i felt so badly that i went into the woods and took the path that led to the village of npopo, which was not far distant from n'calai boumba. i wanted to see if the men had returned; i wanted to see aguailai, the chief. he was the doctor who had come to goumbi to drive off the aniemba. when i went down to npopo the first time i found the people all gone into the bush. everything was open and exposed to thieves; chickens and goats were walking about; and i wondered to see such carelessness in the village. but in the centre, looking down on everything, stood the _mbuiti_, or god of npopo, a copper-eyed divinity, who, i was informed, safely guarded everything. it seemed absurd; but i was assured that no one dared steal, and no one did steal, with the eyes of this mbuiti upon him. this uncommonly useful idol was a rudely-shaped piece of ebony, about two feet high, with a man's face, the nose and eyes of copper, and the body covered with grass. at last we started for the ebony woods. our new location was about nine miles from the river, on the side of a long hill, and close by where a cool sparkling rivulet leaped from rock to rock down into the plain, making the pleasantest of music for me as i lay, weak and sick, in the camp. five huge ebony trees lifted their crowned heads together in a little knot just above us. all around were pleasant and shady woods. it was a very pleasant camp, but proved to have one drawback--we nearly starved to death. i sent out the hunters immediately on our arrival. they were gone two days, but brought back nothing. game was very scarce there; and, without an _ashinga_, or net, such as many bakalai villages have, not much was to be got. [illustration] [illustration] chapter xxxvi. hunting for food--we kill a female nshiego mbouvÉ--a young nshiego with a white face--he becomes my pet tommy--his affection for me--his stealing pranks--tommy gets drunk--his behaviour at meals--his sudden death--conclusion. at last i got better. i could not stand hunger and gouamba any longer, and determined to make up a regular hunting party and stay out till we got something to eat. malaouen told me that if we went off about twenty miles we should come to a better game country. so we started in the direction he pointed out, and where he thought we should find the gorilla, or perhaps the nshiego mbouvé. the men were covered with greegrees, or fetiches, and had cut their hands for luck. anguilai told me that his _ogana_ (idol) had told him that to-morrow the heart of the _otanga_ (the white man) would be made glad, for we should kill game. for some hours after we started we saw nothing but old tracks of different wild beasts, and i began to think that anguilai's ogana had been too sanguine. finally towards twelve o'clock, when we were crossing a kind of high table-land, we heard the cry of a young animal, which we recognised to be a nshiego mbouvé. at once all my troubles left me. i no longer felt either sick or hungry. we crawled through the bush as silently as possible, still hearing the baby-like cry. at last, coming out into a little place where there was very little under-growth, we saw something running along the ground towards where we stood concealed. we hardly dared to breathe, for fear of awakening the animal's suspicions. when it came nearer, we saw it was a female nshiego mbouvé, running on all-fours, with a young one clinging to her breast. she was eagerly eating some berries, while with one arm she supported her little one. querlaouen, who had the fairest chance, fired, and brought her down. she dropped without a struggle. the poor little one cried, "hew! hew! hew!" and clung to the dead body, sucking her breasts, and burying his head there, in alarm at the report of the gun. we hurried up in great glee to secure our capture. i cannot tell my surprise when i saw that the nshiego baby's face was as white as that of a white child. i looked at the mother, but found her black as soot in the face. what did it mean?--the mother black, the child white! the little one was about a foot in height. one of the men threw a cloth over its head and secured it, till we could make it fast with a rope; for, though it was quite young, it could walk. the old one was of the bald-headed kind of which i had secured the first known specimen some months before. [illustration: a young nshiego mbouvÉ with a white face. chap. xxxvi.] i immediately ordered a return to the camp, which we reached towards evening. the little nshiego had been all this time separated from its dead mother, and now, when it was put near her body, a most touching scene ensued. the little fellow ran instantly to her. touching her on the face and breast, he saw evidently that some great change had happened. for a few minutes he caressed her, as though trying to coax her back to life. then he seemed to lose all hope. his little eyes became very sad, and he broke out in a long, plaintive wail, "ooee! ooee! ooee!" which made my heart ache for him. he looked quite forlorn, and as though he really felt his forsaken lot. all in the camp were touched at his sorrows, and the women especially were much moved. all this time i stood wonderingly staring at the white face of the creature. it was really marvellous, and quite incomprehensible. a more strange and weird-looking animal i never saw. while i stood here, up came two of my hunters, and began to laugh at me. "look, chaillie," said they, calling me by the name i am known by among them--"look at your friend. every time we kill gorilla, you tell us look at your black friend, your first cousin. now, you see, look at your white friend." then came a roar of laughter at what they thought a tremendous joke. "look! he got straight hair, all same as you! see white face of your cousin from the bush! he is nearer to you than the gorilla is to us!" then they roared again. "gorilla no got woolly hair like me. this one straight hair like you." "yes," said i; "but when he gets old his face is black; and do you not see his nose, how flat it is, like yours?" whereat there was a louder roar than before. the mother was old, to judge by her teeth, which were much worn; but she was quite black in the face; in fact, her skin was black. like all the nshiego mbouvé, she was bald-headed. now i must give you an account of the little fellow who excited all this surprise and merriment. he lived five months, and became perfectly tame and docile. i called him "tommy," to which name he soon began to answer. three days after his capture, he was quite tame. he then ate crackers out of my hands, devoured boiled rice and roasted plantain, and drank the milk of a goat. two weeks after his capture, he was perfectly tamed, and no longer required to be tied up. he ran about the camp, and, when we went back to obindji's town, he found his way about the village and into the huts just as though he had been raised there. he had a great affection for me, and used to follow me about. when i sat down, he was not content till he had climbed upon me and hid his head in my breast. he was extremely fond of being petted and fondled, and would sit by the hour while anyone stroked his head and back. he soon began to be a very great thief. when the people left their huts he would steal in and make off with their plantains or fish (for he could then eat anything). he watched very carefully till all had left a house, and it was difficult to catch him in the act. i flogged him several times, and indeed brought him to the conviction that it was _wrong_ to steal; but he could never resist the temptation. from me he stole constantly. he soon found out that my hut was the best supplied with ripe bananas and other fruit. he also discovered that the best time to steal from me was when i was asleep in the morning. at that time he used to crawl slowly and carefully on tip-toe towards my bed and look at my closed eyes. if he saw no movement, with an air of great relief he would go and pick up several ripe plantains. if i stirred in the least, he was off like a flash, and would presently re-enter for another inspection. if my eyes were open when he came in on such a predatory trip, he would come directly to me, with an honest face, and would climb upon me and caress me; but i could easily detect an occasional wishful glance towards the bunch of plantains. my hut had no door, but was closed with a mat. it was very funny to see tommy gently raising one corner of this mat and popping his head in to see if i was asleep. sometimes i feigned sleep, and then stirred, just as he was in the act of taking off his prize. then he would drop everything and make off in the utmost consternation. he kept the run of meal times, and was present at as many meals as possible; that is, he would go from my breakfast to half a dozen others, and beg sometimes at each. but he never missed my own breakfast and dinner, knowing by experience that he fared best there. i had a kind of rude table made, on which my meals were served, in the open part of my house. this was too high for tommy to see the dishes; so he used to come in before i sat down, when all was ready, and climb up on the pole that supported the roof. from here he would attentively survey every dish on the table, and having determined what to have, he would descend and sit down at my side. if i did not immediately pay attention to him he would begin to howl, "hew! hew! hew!" louder and louder, till, for peace sake, his wants were satisfied. of course i could not tell what he had chosen for dinner of my different dishes, and would offer him first one, then another, till the right one came. if he received what he did not want he would throw it down on the ground with a little shriek of anger and a stamp of his foot, and begin to howl, and this was repeated till he was served to his liking. in short, he behaved very much like a spoiled child. if i pleased him quickly, he thanked me by a kind of gentle murmur, like "hoohoo," and would hold out his hand to shake mine. he knew perfectly how to shake hands. he was very fond of boiled messes, particularly boiled fish, and was constantly picking the bones he found lying about the village. he wanted always to taste of my coffee, and when macondai brought it would beg some of me in the most serious manner. i made him a little pillow to sleep on, and he became very fond of it. after he was accustomed to it, he would never part with it, but dragged it after him wherever he went. if by any chance it was lost the whole camp knew it by his howls. now and then, on some forest excursion, he would mislay it, and then i had to send people for it in order to stop his noise. at other times the people would hide it, just to tease him. he slept on it, coiled up in a little heap, and only relinquished it when i gave him permission to accompany me into the woods. as he became more and more used to our ways, he grew more impatient of contradiction, and more fond of being caressed; and whenever he was thwarted, he would howl in his disagreeable way. now and then i gave him a flogging to teach him better manners. as the dry season came on it became colder, and tommy began to wish for company when he slept, to keep him warm. the negroes would not have him for a companion, for he seemed too much like one of themselves. i did not like to have him in bed with me. so poor tommy was reduced to misery, as he seemed to think nobody would have him. but soon i found that he waited till everybody was fast asleep at night, and then crawled in softly next some of his black friends, and slept there till the earliest dawn. then he would get up and get away undiscovered. at other times he felt too warm and comfortable to get up, and was caught and beaten, but he always tried it again. he showed an extraordinary fondness for strong drink. whenever a negro had palm-wine tommy was sure to know it. he had a decided taste for scotch ale, of which i had a few bottles, and he even begged for brandy. indeed, his last exploit was with a brandy bottle. one day, before going out to the hunt, i had carelessly left the bottle on my chest. the little rascal stole in and seized it; and being unable to get out the cork, in some way he broke the bottle. when i returned, after some hours' absence, i found my precious bottle broken in pieces! it was the last; and to an african traveller brandy is as indispensable as quinine. master tommy was coiled up on the floor amid the fragments, in a state of maudlin drunkenness. when he saw me he got up and tried to stagger up to me; but his legs tottered, and he fell down several times. his eyes had the glare of human drunkenness; his arms were extended in vain attempts to reach me; his voice came thick; in fact, he looked disgustingly and yet comically human. it was the maudlin and sentimental stage of human drunkenness very well represented. i had seen men looking exactly as tommy did, and i wished these drunkards could have seen him; they might then, perhaps, have become so disgusted with themselves that they would have given up their horrid vice. i gave him a severe thrashing, which seemed to sober the little toper somewhat; but nothing could cure him of his love for liquor. he was also very fond of tea and coffee, but wanted both to be well sweetened. he could drink out of a cup. sometimes, to tease him, i would not put in any sugar; then he would throw down the cup and begin to howl; and he would make the whole place resound with his noise. he had a great deal of intelligence; and, if i had had leisure, i think i might have trained him to some kind of good behaviour, though i despaired of his thieving disposition. the older he grew, the greater thief he became. he lived so long, and was growing so accustomed to civilized life, that i began to have great hopes of carrying him alive to america. sometimes he would come round the fire where my men were and warm himself with them. how comical he then looked! at other times, when they took their meals, and ate out of a common dish, master tommy would join the party; and when they would all put their hands into the dish, he would put his in also, and take a little handful of cooked and smoked fish. in fact, he kept time with them. but alas! poor tommy! one morning he refused his food, seemed downcast, and was very anxious to be petted and held in our arms. i got all kinds of forest berries for him, but he refused all. he did not seem to suffer, but he ate nothing; and next day, without a struggle, he died. poor fellow! he seemed sorry to leave us. i was grieved; and even the negroes, though he had given them great trouble, were mournful at his death. he had hardly expired when the news spread through the village that little tommy was no more. they all came to see him; he looked as if he were asleep. it seemed as if we had lost a friend. we missed his mischief and noise; and for many days we all mourned for tommy, and wished him back among us. tommy turned darker as he grew older. at the time of his death he was yellow rather than white. if he had lived to be old he would, no doubt, have become black, like his mother. * * * * * and now, young friends, for the present i have done. i have told you many things about africa, about its strange animals, its terrible gorillas, its savage cannibals. and all that i have told you is true; for it is what i have seen with my own eyes. but i have not told you all that i saw and heard in that far-distant country. i have many more singular sights to describe and queer adventures to recount to you. so i will not bid you farewell: i will say to you "_au revoir!_" that means "good-bye till i come again." the end. gilbert and rivington, ld., st. john's house, clerkenwell road, london. uniform with this volume. _with numerous illustrations, s. d.; gilt edges, s. d. each._ =dick cheveley.= by w. h. g. kingston. =heir of kilfinnan.= by w. h. g. kingston. =off to the wilds.= by g. manville fenn. =the two supercargoes.= by w. h. g. kingston. =the silver cañon.= by g. manville fenn. =under the meteor flag.= by harry collingwood. =jack archer=: a tale of the crimea. by g. a. henty. =the mutiny on board the ship "leander."= by b. heldmann. =with axe and rifle=; or, the western pioneers. by w. h. g. kingston. =red cloud, the solitary sioux=: a tale of the great prairie. by colonel sir william butler, k.c.b. =the voyage of the aurora.=, by harry collingwood. =charmouth grange=: a tale of the th century. by j. percy groves. =snowshoes and canoes.= by w. h. g. kingston. =the son of the constable of france.= by louis rousselet. =captain mugford=; or, our salt and fresh water tutors. edited by w. h. g. kingston. =the cornet of horse=; a tale of marlborough's wars. by g. a. henty. =the adventures of captain mago.= by leon cahun. =noble words and noble deeds.= =the king of the tigers.= by rousselet. =hans brinker=; or, the silver skates. by mrs. dodge. =the drummer-boy=; a story of the time of washington. by rousselet. =adventures in new guinea=: the narrative of louis trégance. =the crusoes of guiana.= by boussenard. =the gold-seekers.= a sequel to the above. by boussenard. =winning his spurs=: a tale of the crusade. by g. a. henty. =the blue banner.= by leon cahun. =ben burton=; or, born and bred at sea. by w. h. g. kingston. =adventures on the great hunting grounds of the world.= by v. meunier. =the three deserters=; or, ran away from the dutch. by m. t. h. perelaer. =my kalulu, prince, king, and slave.= by h. m. stanley. =adventures of a young naturalist.= by lucien biart. edited and adapted by parker gillmore (ubique). =the startling exploits of the doctor.= by céliere. =the brothers rantzau=: a story of the vosges. by erckmann-chatrian. =the serpent charmer.= by louis rousselet. =stories of the gorilla country.= by paul du chaillu. =the conquest of the moon.= by a. laurie. =the maid of the ship "golden age."= by h. e. maclean. =the frozen pirate.= by w. clark russell. =the marvellous country.= by s. w. cozzens. =the mountain kingdom.= by d. lawson johnstone. =a thousand miles in the "rob roy" canoe.= by john macgregor ("rob roy"). =blacks and bushrangers=; or, adventures in queensland. by e. b. kennedy. =sir ludar=: a tale of love, war, and adventure in the days of the great queen bess. by talbot baines reed. =wild life under the equator.= by paul du chaillu. =my rambles in the new world.= by lucien biart. =new york to brest in seven hours.= by a. laurie. =rob roy on the baltic.= by john macgregor, m.a. =bevis.= by richard jefferies. edited by g. a. henty. =the cobbler of cornikeranium.= by rev. a. n. malan. =strange stories of adventure.= by captain mayne reid. =the aztec treasure-house.= by t. a. janvier. =how martin drake found his father.= by g. norway. =roger ingleton, minor.= by t. b. reed. =axel ebersen, the graduate of upsala.= by a. laurie. =sandy carmichael.= by c. j. hyne. =the priceless orchid.= by percy ainslie. =an inca queen.= by j. evelyn. =voyage alone in the yawl "rob roy."= by j. macgregor. =adrift in the pacific.= by jules verne. =the purchase of the north pole.= by jules verne. london: sampson low, marston & company, ltd., st. dunstan's house, fetter lane, fleet street, e.c.